Global Research

For months now, our country has endured the tacit denigration of American ingenuity. Countless statements — from elected officials, activist groups, journalists and many others — have ignored our nation’s superb blend of dazzling high-tech capacities and statecraft mendacities. 

Fortunately, this week the news about release of illuminating CIA documents by WikiLeaks has begun to give adequate credit where due. And not a moment too soon. For way too long, Russia has been credited with prodigious hacking and undermining of democracy in the United States.

Many Americans have overlooked the U.S. government’s fantastic hacking achievements. This is most unfair and disrespectful to the dedicated men and women of intelligence services like the CIA and NSA. Far from the limelight, they’ve been working diligently to undermine democracy not just overseas but also here at home.

Today, the massive new trove of CIA documents can help to put things in perspective. Maybe now people will grasp that our nation’s undermining of democracy is home-grown and self-actualized. It’s an insult to the ingenious capacities of the United States of America to think that we can’t do it ourselves.

Contrary to all the public relations work that U.S. intelligence agencies have generously done for them, the Russians don’t even rank as peripheral to the obstacles and prospects for American democracy. Rest assured, throughout the long history of the United States, we haven’t needed foreigners to get the job done.

In our current era, can Vladimir Putin take any credit for purging huge numbers of African Americans, Latinos and other minority citizens from the voter rolls? Of course not.

Did Putin create and maintain the barriers that prevented many low-income people from voting on November 8? Only in his dreams.

Can the Kremlin hold a candle to the corporate-owned cable TV channels that gave Donald Trump umpteen free hours of uninterrupted air time for speeches at his campaign rallies? Absolutely not.

Could any Russian operation claim more than a tiny sliver of impact compared to the handiwork of FBI Director James Comey as he boosted Donald Trump’s prospects with a pair of gratuitous announcements about a gratuitously re-opened probe of Hillary Clinton’s emails during the last days of the 2016 campaign? No way.

Is Putin anything but a miniscule lightweight in any efforts to manipulate the U.S. electorate compared to “dark money” American billionaires like the Koch brothers? Give us a break.

And how about the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution? The Kremlin can only marvel at the way that the CIA, the NSA and the bipartisan leadership in Washington have shredded the Fourth Amendment while claiming to uphold it.

To sum up: The CIA’s efforts to tout Russia add up to jaw-dropping false modesty! The humility of “deep state” leaders in Langley is truly awesome.

Let’s get a grip. Overwhelmingly, the achievements of thwarting democracy in America have been do-it-yourself operations. It’s about time that we give adequate credit to the forces perpetuating this country’s self-inflicted wounds to American democracy.

To loosely paraphrase the beloved comic-strip character Pogo, when the subject is grievous damage to democracy at home, “We have met the ingenuity and it is U.S.” But we’re having a terrible time recognizing ourselves.

Norman Solomon is the coordinator of the online activist group RootsAction.org and the executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. He is the author of a dozen books including “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.”

This article is licenced under Creative Commons

Attribution of cyber-intrusions and attacks is nearly impossible. A well executed attack can not be traced back to its culprit. If there are some trails that seem attributable one should be very cautions following them. They are likely faked.

Hundreds if not thousands of reports show that this lesson has not been learned. Any attack is attributed to one of a handful of declared “enemies” without any evidence that would prove their actual involvement. Examples:

• Russian Hackers Blackmail US Liberal Groups After Stealing Emails And Documents, Report Says
• US officially accuses Russia of hacking DNC and interfering with election 
• Iran hacked an American casino, U.S. says
• Iran suspected for the attack on the Saudi Aramco 
• North Korea ‘hacks South’s military cyber command’
• Official: North Korea behind Sony hack

In June 2016 we warned The Next “Russian Government Cyber Attack” May Be A Gulf of Tonkin Fake:

All one might see in a [cyber-]breach, if anything, is some pattern of action that may seem typical for one adversary. But anyone else can imitate such a pattern as soon as it is known. That is why there is NEVER a clear attribution in such cases. Anyone claiming otherwise is lying or has no idea what s/he is speaking of.

There is now public proof that this lecture in basic IT forensic is correct.

Wikileaks acquired and published a large stash of documents from the CIA’s internal hacking organization. Part of the CIA hacking organization is a subgroup named UMBRAGE:

The CIA’s Remote Devices Branch‘s UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques ‘stolen’ from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation.

With UMBRAGE and related projects the CIA cannot only increase its total number of attack types but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the “fingerprints” of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from.

UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers, password collection, webcam capture, data destruction, persistence, privilege escalation, stealth, anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques.

Hacking methods are seldom newly developed. They are taken from public examples and malware, from attacks some other organization once committed, they get bought and sold by commercial entities. Many attacks use a recombined mix of tools from older hacks. Once the NSA’s STUXNET attack on Iran became public the tools used in it were copied and modified by other such services as well as by commercial hackers. Any new breach that may look like STUXNET could be done by anyone with the appropriate knowledge. To assert that the NSA must have done the new attack just because the NSA did STUXNET would be stupid.

The CIA, as well as other services, have whole databases of such ‘stolen’ tools. They may combine them in a way that looks attributable to China, compile the source code at local office time in Beijing or “forget to remove” the name of some famous Chinese emperor in the code. The CIA could use this to fake a “Chinese hacking attack” on South Korea to raise fear of China and to, in the end, sell more U.S. weapons.

Russia did not hack and leak the DNC emails, Iran did not hack American casinos and North Korea did not hack Sony.

As we wrote: “there is NEVER a clear attribution”. Don’t fall for it when someone tries to sell one.

(PS: There is a lot more in the new Wikileaks CIA stash. It seems indeed bigger than the few items published from the Snowden NSA leak.)

An action for damage against the state was brought by former members of the Unified Progressive Party(UPP) that was forcibly dissolved.

A thousand of former members of the UPP bring an action for damages against the state. According to the article, it was said that “at the time the UPP was dissolved, the party members’ political freedom of association were not only infringed due to illegal forced dissolution but also suffered from extreme mental harm, thus we file a lawsuit against the state.”

They pointed the Republic of Korea, former chief staff of the Blue House(Chung Wa-dae) Kim Ki-chun, and Chief Justice Park Han-cheol as defendants. They also criticized that Chief Justice Park was the one who violated the constitutional spirit of neutral judgement leading the dissolution of the UPP, legal political party in South Korea.

According to the article, it was also revealed that Park Han-cheol directly contacted with Kim Ki-choon through Kim Young-han’s memorandum. Attention will be given to the future by the lawsuit.

A million candle lights lit again !

On March 4, the first weekend of March, nearly one million candles gathered at Gwanghwamun Square in Sejong-ro, Seoul. The Constitutional Court is expected to announce the impeachment trial on March 10.

The National Action Against Park Geun-Hye’s resignation held the 19th national assembly on the theme of “Spring can come to us in this March only without Park Geunhye! Impeach her! Imprison her! Resign Hwang Kyo-an(the acting President)!” A total of one million people gathered at the 19th candlelight rally on the day.

As a result, participants in candlelight rallies exceeded 15 million people.

“I believe that the impeachment will be quoted, but I came out to add strength,” said Lee, who participated in the rally, saying, “The judges will make a right decision without shame.”

[Interview] “The dissolution of the Unified Progressive Party(UPP) was a decision that really changed the world.”

Kim Geun-rae, a former Vice Chairman of the Gyeong-gi Provincial Party, who was released after three years’ imprisonment.

“There is freedom of conscience in the Constitution of the Republic of korea, and also freedom of expression and and thought. Is it a normal democracy to judge someone’s thoughts by the law and sanction them with national violence? ”

In August 2013, the government announced that the Unified Progressive Party(UPP), including former lawmaker Lee Seok-Ki, had cooperated with the North Korea and embarked on a civil war. In the midst of the suspicion that the National Intelligence Service (NIS) intervened in the presidential election for the election of Park Geun-hye, the socalled ‘Insurrection Conspiracy case’ began. There was no evidence other than the recording file of the NIS coordinator Lee, and the actual remarks of Lee Seok-ki were later revealed to be hundreds different from the transcripts provided by the NIS. Eventually, there was no conspiracy of civil war, but the incitement of the civil war remained as a case of guilt.

Kim said, “The UPP was the only party that won the 13 seats in the National Assembly among the most successful parties advocating progress. Later, it became a political influence that could act as a casting boat for the National Assembly. It became a threat to the heart of power.”

Park Han-chul, the former head of the Constitutional Court, said, “I go down in history of democracy and set a democratic value for South Korea by putting social conflicts under control. It is the decision that can change the world.”

Kim said, “It really changed the world, making our country the world of darkness that destroys democracy and human rights. So people wind up taking up candles. It has reduced the flow of progress, reform, democracy and human rights throughout society. As far as the party is dissolved, ordinary individuals and groups with much weaker strengths are more likely to be intimidated. It is not just the problems of the progressive party, but the society itself has become isolated.

He does a signing campaign to urge the release of prisoners at the candlelight rallies every week in the activities of the Korean Committee to the Save the Victims of ‘Lawmaker Lee Seok-ki Insurrection Conspiracy Case’. Even three years passed, in the memories of the citizens, the dissolution of the Unified Progressive Party has been slowly forgotten and is still an uncomfortable theme.

Kim said, “the citizens who participated in the signing campaign say, ‘I do not support the unified progressive party, but I am wrong with the dissolution. Or some people say, ‘Are you a red man? Is it a pro-North? They are afraid of being seen as a Pro-North person, socalled ‘Jong-buk’. They themselves engage in self-censorship. It is real Boyg.”

“I live in a bigger prison”

He usually says, “Even though we are victims, we should live like sinners. Three years later, I am still afraid of the surrounding gaze. The world outside the prison is a bigger prison for me. A red stigmatization of the “red family” was stamped on my innocent family. When my son was in his first year of high school, he was told in class by his social studies teacher that people who engaged in the insurrection conspiracy should be sent to North Korea.” There was nothing he could do in the prison. In the end, the problem to be solved is the pain that family and acquaintances must bear.

At the end of the interview, he said, ”Men in power always use pro-north frame when they are in crisis. But now, the time of cleaning up deep-rooted evils, we, the citizens, should collect our strength of the people. I believe that today’s candlelight will change tomorrow’s politics and change the nation.”

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The following instances are carefully documented by the author indicating sources and references. Some of the instances presented are subject to debate and interpretation (GR Editor)

Presidents, Prime Ministers, Congressmen, Generals, Soldiers and Police ADMIT to False Flag Terror

An examination of a White Helmets video, conducted by Swedish medical doctors, specialists in various fields, including paediatrics, have revealed that the life-saving procedures seen in the film are incorrect – in fact life-threatening – or simply fake, including simulated emergency resuscitation techniques being used on already lifeless children.

The Alleged Sarmin Attack

There has been a recent, intense, publicity campaign that has capitalised on the Oscar for best documentary being awarded to the NATO and Gulf state funded organization, the White Helmets and their Netflix documentary producers [1] The White Helmets had previously been winners of the “Alternative Nobel Prize”, given to them in Sweden in 2016. [2] These various awards have ensured that the White Helmet fictitious “saving-childrens-lives” videos have been re-circulating across corporate and social media, a major PR coup for the sponsors of this questionable organization.

Central to this PR campaign and just prior to the Oscar award ceremony, Human Rights Watch published a “retrospective” report on February 13th 2017, focusing on spurious accounts of chemical attacks on the recently liberated city of Aleppo. This familiar HRW propaganda piece recycled a previous report from April 2015 detailing an alleged chlorine gas attack in Sarmin, Idlib [4].

Footage of the aftermath of this attack was provided, at the time, by none other than the White Helmets, which brings us to the macabre video, uploaded by this alleged first responder NGO to YouTube on March 15th 2015 [5]

Kenneth Roth’s obsessed ‘denouncing’ of unverified chlorine gas attacks, allegedly, carried out by the Syrian state against its own people

Ken Roth has waged a longstanding campaign for military intervention in Syria and the No Fly Zone, effectively a declaration of war

The “Sarmin attack” report published by HRW in April 2015 is, in itself, a remarkable feat of evidence engineering. HRW refers to two witnesses – anonymous “Sarmin residents” – stating they have “heard” helicopters “shortly before the attack”. They heard them but did not see them. Both witnesses also reported hearing “no explosions” [4] In the entire HRW report there is not one reported sighting of a helicopter, the existence of which should be an essential element of the White Helmet claims, uncritically reproduced by HRW and never questioned by the UN.

One of the key witnesses cited in the HRW, April 2015, report is a White Helmet operative by the name of Leith Fares [6]

“Leith Fares, a rescue worker with Syrian Civil Defence, told Human Rights Watch. “A helicopter always drops two barrels.” “You know, we were at first actually happy,” Fares said. “It is usually good news when there is no explosion.” [4]

A notably peculiar factor of the White Helmet footage of this alleged attack is that they do not film any external shots of the attack itself, despite their declared anticipation of being targeted, having “heard” helicopters.

Instead, the only footage is of an enclosed indoor space with no contextual filming to evidence where they are in Syria or that an attack has just taken place. The indoor environment certainly resembles a makeshift hospital emergency room. White Helmet “rescuers” parade in and out, manhandling and maneuvering the limp, lifeless bodies of three children. The naked bodies of these children have no external, visible injuries and do not respond when the various “medics” perform all manner of ostensibly “life-saving” procedures, in a haphazard effort to resuscitate these children.

“A Macabre Scene”

In order to obtain qualified clinical opinions, I sent the video to eminent Swedish medical specialists. I stressed that, particular attention, must be paid to the Syringe needle procedure (seemingly, intracardiac injection) carried out on one of the children, as seen in the screen shot from the video, below [Click on the image for the video]:

Dr Leif Elinder, a known Swedish medical doctor profile, author and specialist in paediatrics, summarised the following in his reply: [7]

“After examination of the video material, I found that the measures inflicted upon those children, some of them lifeless, are bizarre, non-medical, non-lifesaving, and even counterproductive in terms of life-saving purposes of children”.

Further, I received a detailed clinical statement from Dr Lena Oske, a Swedish medical doctor and general practitioner. In her statement, Dr Oske referred to the presumed, adrenaline injection, performed in the White Helmet video (excerpt in the photo above). Her specialist opinion dismisses the procedure conducted in the White Helmet video, as unqualified and incorrect. Furthermore, she describes the earlier assessment of the procedure by a colleague who had exclaimed:

“If not already dead, this injection would have killed the child!”

Excerpts from Dr Lena Oske’s statement to SWEDHR: [8]

“Intracutaneous injection with adrenalin may be used if any other resuscitation measure does not succeed. Especially under precarious circumstances – such as in field emergency settings– where safer ways for the administration of medication (i.e. endotracheal, intravenous, or intraosseus) might be difficult or unavailable. But not in the way shown in the video”.

“In order to perform the injection, CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) has to be interrupted, and then the CPR resumed immediately after. Which is not done in the procedures shown in the video.”

And referring to a correct medical procedure, the Swedish specialist MD adds:

“The technique is simple. Long needle, syringe with 1 mg adrenaline, find the 4th or 5th intercostal space and insert the needle just adjacent to the sternum, left side, deposit the medication after checking you are in the right position (aspiration of blood and no resistance), take out the needle and immediately resume CPR! So, the doctor who wrote the comment, ‘If not already dead, this injection would have killed the child’ was right! What a macabre scene; and how sad.” [8]

[Both colleagues, doctors Leif Elinder and Lena Oske, are senior members of SWEDHR, and on behalf of the SWEDHR board I fully endorse each other’s statements.]

‘White Helmets’ Associations with Nusra-Front, Al-Qaeda in Syria

It is also important to highlight that the so called White Helmets who have bestowed upon themselves, the title of Syria Civil Defence, are actually fraudulently mimicking the REAL Syria Civil Defence, established in Syria (not in Turkey) in 1953 and the only Syria Civil Defence officially recognised as such, by the (UN affiliated) International Civil Defence Organisation, based in Geneva.

This UK/US shadow state building project, in Syria, has been extensively investigated in the prominent work of independent journalist, Vanessa Beeley. [9] The authentic Syria Civil Defence serves an estimated 80 percent of the Syrian population inside Syria that lives under the protection of the Syrian state in Syrian government held territory.

Conversely, the White Helmets operate exclusively in Nusra Front and ISIS terrorist-controlled areas and therefore would service less than 20 percent of the remaining Syrian civilian population, when one takes into account the sheer numbers of foreign mercenaries and militants who also occupy those areas. Added to which, these “moderate” extremist held areas are continuously dwindling as the Syrian armed forces and their allies inexorably reconquer the national territory of Syria and release it from the grip of externally funded terrorism. As the terrorist factions are pushed out of liberated areas, such as East Aleppo, we clearly see the White Helmets depart in tandem.

Evidence of the White Helmet affiliation to the various terrorist factions is extensively documented. There are evidenced reports on one of the more prominent White Helmet leaders, Mustafa al Haj Yussef, in Khan Sheikhoun, Idlib where many of the East Aleppo terrorists and their civil defence have fled.[11] These reports detail his declarations of allegiance to various extremist factions such as Ahrar Al Sham, responsible for many of the ethnic cleansing pogroms across Syria. Yussef has openly called for the shelling of civilians in Damascus during the 2014 elections. He has advocated robbery, looting and sectarian punishments and murder under certain circumstances. Imagine a Red Cross official calling for such reprisals, and you can understand how extraordinary this behaviour is for an Oscar winning, “neutral, apolitical, impartial” allegedly, humanitarian NGO.

Yusef’s affiliations and behaviour are not the exception, the majority of White Helmet operatives have demonstrated the same ideological allegiances to extremist, armed groups in Syria.

The UN Theatre of the Macabre

The final scene of this “drama” is the closed-door session at the UN Security Council, where the White Helmet video we have referred to, took centre stage at a performance by former US Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power.

Predictably, the shocking scenes of children’s lifeless bodies being crudely manipulated and “arranged” combined with the theatrical and entirely ineffectual “life-saving” interventions – as depicted by the White Helmet movie – emotionally impacted upon the UN decision makers. In Samantha Power’s words:

“I saw no one in the room without tears. If there was a dry eye in the room, I didn’t see it” [12]

Unfortunately, UN officials were so distracted by the macabre performance they had just witnessed, that they did not think to ask for a translation of the various instructions being issued by the “medics” in the film. A rudimentary element of any investigation process must be to clarify context, particularly when the results have potential to precipitate a terrifying conflict escalation between the US and Russia on Syrian soil.

SWEDHR took the time to get the dialogue in the White Helmet movie translated. At 1:16 the doctor in full light green and a gray & black jumper says:

”Include in the picture (meaning in the film or the frame -translators note) the mother should be underneath and the children on top of her, hey! Make sure the mother is underneath.”

Perhaps, if the video had been subtitled, the UN officials might have queried this overt staging of an event that one must assume, was chaotic, harrowing and stressful. Perhaps, they would have found it strange, that in the midst of a “chemical weapon” attack, one of the medics, attempting to save the lives of three Syrian children, would be concerned with the positioning of their bodies for the camera.

Objective: No Fly Zone

The UNSC showing of the White Helmet footage, coincided with a universal call for a No-Fly Zone from NATO and Gulf state funded “moderate rebel” and terrorist groups, who depend upon the White Helmets for their civil defence. This international No-Fly-Zone campaign gathered momentum on the back of the UNSC tears over the White Helmet video of the alleged Sarmin chlorine gas attack, and was even supported in the Swedish media. [13]

In a later Channel 4 report on the alleged Sarmin chlorine gas attacks, during which they aired a brief, sanitized segment of the White Helmet video, Samantha Power declared:

“This document that we record now will be used at some point in a court of law, and the perpetrators of this crime need to have that in mind” [14]

In addition to calls for a No-Fly Zone and the analogous term ‘Safe Zones’, it should not be overlooked that all of the dubious and misrepresented media reporting emanating from the White Helmets is also being used to justify a continuous program of crippling US-led sanctions against Syria. According to a 2016 leaked UN internal report [15], US and EU economic sanctions on Syria are causing ‘huge suffering among ordinary Syrians’ and prohibiting the delivery of essential, humanitarian aid.

Conclusion

UN representatives were moved to tears by the spectacle presented to them by the White Helmets. An appropriate response, to the black art performance of the White Helmets, whose acting talents have propelled them onto Hollywood’s red carpet. In any sane world, however, the misuse, the propaganda abuse, of the children being exploited as props in a war that will inevitably kill more children, should also qualify the White Helmets for due process in a court of law and condemn their sponsors to prosecution in the European Court of Human Rights.

As for war-hawk, Samantha Power’s threats, echoed by her puppet human rights organisations, controlled by western corporate elites, I would like to mention that the war in Syria started when the US and NATO states, in unholy alliance with Gulf State tyrannies, funded, trained and armed the “moderate” extremist forces which have since invaded and terrorized the Syrian state and its people, who have steadfastly stood with their elected government against the tide of regime change propaganda and proxy military intervention.

In the final judgement, when the international court for war crimes puts the immoral warmongers on trial, they will be condemned and found guilty of abhorrent crimes against Humanity by all the decent people of this world.

Notes.

[1] The nomination done by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences took place January 27, 2017. The award decision was taken February 26. The Human Rights Watch (HRW) report sustaining the not-proved allegations by the White Helmets against the government of Syria was published Feb 13, 2017, right in the middle of the period between the nomination and the decision of the Oscar award to the film White Helmets.

[2] M Ferrada de Noli, “Why Is Sweden Giving the “Alternative Nobel Prize” to Syria’s ‘White Helmets’?” The Indicter Magazine, 25 November 2016.

[3] “Syria: Coordinated Chemical Attacks on Aleppo“. HRW, 13 February 2017.

[4] “Syria: Chemicals Used in Idlib Attacks”. HRW, 13 April 2015.

[5] “ الدفاع المدني ادلب_سرمين:محاولة لأنقاذ الأطفال بعد اصابتهم بالغاز الكيماوي 26_3_2015”. Uploaded by الدفاع المدني السوري في محافظة ادلب [“Syrian Civil Defence, Idlib”]. YouTube video published 16 March 2015.

[6] Leith (or Laith) Fares is repeatedly found in both Arab and Western news giving statements –from a variety of locations in Syria– to visiting Western journalists. For instance, while in the Human Rights Watch report Fares gives the notion of being present at the alleged event in Sarmin, in Arab News is given that Leith Fares is “a rescue worker in Ariha”, and that “(Fares) told AFP his team had pulled at least 20 wounded people out of the rubble.”

‘Laith Fares’ keeps also an uploading account in You Tube with anti-Syria propaganda videos, and on behalf of White Helmets political positions. [5]

Laith Fares’ YouTube account reaches 204 upload videos.

[7] Dr Leif Elinder’s email communication to the author, 4 March 2017.

[8] Dr Lena Oske’s email communication to the author, 4 March 2017.

[9] Vanessa Beeley, “The REAL Syria Civil Defence Exposes Fake ‘White Helmets’ as Terrorist-Linked Imposters“. 21st Century Wire, 23 September 2016.

[10] Vanessa Beeley, ” Syria White Helmets Hand In Hand With Al Qaeda”. YouTube, published 22 January 2017.

[11] Vanessa Beeley, ” ‘President’ Raed Saleh’s Terrorist Connections within White Helmet Leadership“. 21st Century Wire, 10 December 2016.

[12] Nick Logan, “UN officials in tears watching video from alleged chlorine attack in Syria”. Global News, 17 April 2017.

[13] See video “Sweden’s elites endorse H. Clinton No Fly Zone War with Russia & Syria”. The Indicter Channel, YouTube, published 22 November 2016.

[14] Quoted from ”UN tears over Syria chlorine attack video”. Channel 4 News. YouTube video published 17 April 2015.

[15] Patrick Cockburn, US and EU sanctions are ruining ordinary Syrians’ lives, yet Bashar al-Assad hangs on to power, The Independent (UK), October 2016.

Acknowledgements

The author wish to thank independent journalist Vanessa Beeley for invaluable feedback.

Professor Dr med Marcello Ferrada de Noli, formerly at the Karoilinska Institute and ex Research Fellow Harvard Medical School, is the founder and chairman of Swedish Professors and Doctors for Human Rights and editor-in-chief of The Indicter. 

The political settlement of the Syrian crisis in the wake of the meetings in Astana in mid-February. The agenda included such issues as counter-terrorism, the transitional period, the preparation to the general election and the draft constitution of 2017.

The latest round of failed negotiations in Geneva wrapped up on March 5.  Several “real” opposition groups involved in Astana were not present. The Saudi backed “opposition” namely the High Negotiations Committee (HNC) group demanded  “that [Syrian] President Bashar Assad should resign before the beginning of the talks”.

The Russian envoy pointed that the opposition hasn’t yet fully distanced itself from terror groups like Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) and Jabhat al-Nusra who were not part of talks.

“We expect this [separation] to happen soon,” the member of the Russian delegation said, who was present throughout the entire ten-day talks in Geneva as an observer.

Moscow also regrets that the Kurds, the so-called Astana platform, and other moderate groups weren’t present in Geneva, which prevented full opposition representation in Geneva. (RT, March 5, 2017)

*       *       *

The Syrian Constitution

The Syrian draft constitution proposed by the Russian side does not cease to be an object of popular interest on the internet.

From the front pages of the Western and Arab newspapers this question has dived into a heated discussion on the social media, forums and blogs. A month after the draft’s publication Inside Syria Media Center analyzes how the project was received by the Syrian experts and a wider audience.

Conservatives have had a very hard time getting over President Trump’s much-repeated response to Fox News anchor Bill O’Reilly’s calling Russian president Vladimir Putin “a killer”. Replied Trump: “There are a lot of killers. We have a lot of killers. You think our country is so innocent?”

One could almost feel a bit sorry for O’Reilly as he struggled to regain his composure in the face of such blasphemy. Had any American establishment media star ever heard such a thought coming from the mouth of an American president? From someone on the radical left, yes, but from the president?

Senator John McCain on the floor of Congress, referring to Putin, tore into attempts to draw “moral equivalency between that butcher and thug and KGB colonel and the United States of America.”

Ah yes, the infamous KGB. Can anything good be said about a person associated with such an organization? We wouldn’t like it if a US president had a background with anything like that. Oh, wait, a president of the United States was not merely a CIA “colonel”, but was the Director of the CIA! I of course speak of George Herbert Walker Bush. And as far as butchery and thuggery … How many Americans remember the December 1989 bombing and invasion of the people of Panama carried out by the same Mr. Bush? Many thousands killed or wounded; thousands more left homeless.

Try and match that, Vladimir!

And in case you’re wondering for what good reason all this was perpetrated? Officially, to arrest dictator Manuel Noriega on drug charges. How is that for a rationalization for widespread devastation and slaughter? It should surprise no one that only shortly before the invasion Noriega had been on the CIA payroll.

It’s the “moral equivalency” that’s so tough to swallow for proud Americans like O’Reilly and McCain. Republican Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell also chipped in with: “And no, I don’t think there’s any equivalency between the way the Russians conduct themselves and the way the United States does.”   Other Senators echoed the same theme, all inspired by good ol’ “American exceptionalism”, drilled into the mind of every decent American from childhood on … Who would dare to compare the morals of (ugh!) Russia with those of God’s chosen land, even in Moscow’s current non-communist form?

The communist form began of course with the October 1917 Russian Revolution. By the summer of 1918 some 13,000 American troops could be found in the newly-born state, the future Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Two years and thousands of casualties later, the American troops left, having failed in their mission to “strangle at its birth” the Bolshevik state, as Winston Churchill so charmingly put it.

US foreign policy has not been much more noble-minded since then. I think, dear students, it’s time for me to once again present my concise historical summary:

Since the end of World War 2, the United States has:

• Attempted to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments, most of which were democratically-elected.
• Dropped bombs on the people of more than 30 countries.
• Attempted to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders.
• Attempted to suppress a populist or nationalist movement in 20 countries.
• Grossly interfered in democratic elections in at least 30 countries.
• Though not as easy to quantify, has also led the world in torture; not only the torture performed directly by Americans upon foreigners, but providing torture equipment, torture manuals, lists of people to be tortured, and in-person guidance by American instructors.

Where does the United States get the nerve to moralize about Russia? Same place they get the nerve to label Putin a “killer” … a “butcher” … a “thug”.

It would be difficult to name a world-renowned killer, butcher, or thug – not to mention dictator, mass murderer, or torturer – of the past 75 years who was not a close ally of Washington.

So why then does the American power elite hate Putin so? It can be dated back to the period of Boris Yeltsin.

During the Western financial looting of the dying Soviet Union the US could be found meddling in favor of Yeltsin in the election held in 1996. Under Yeltsin’s reign, poverty exploded and life expectancy for men actually decreased by five years, all in the name of “shock therapy.”

The US/Western-backed destabilization of the Soviet Union allowed global capitalism to spread its misery unfettered by any inconvenient socialism. Russia came under the control of oligarchs concerned only for their own enrichment and that of their billionaire partners in the West. The transition of power to Vladimir Putin in the 21st century led to a number of reforms that curbed the disastrous looting of the nation by the oligarchic bandits. Putin and his allies vowed to build an independent, capitalist Russia that was capable of determining its own affairs free from US and Western domination. Such an orientation placed Putin in direct confrontation with US imperialism’s plans for unipolar global hegemony.

Washington’s disdain for Putin increased when he derided US war propaganda leading up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Then, the Russian leader played a crucial role in getting Iran to curtail its nuclear program and arranging for Syria to surrender its stockpiles of chemical weapons. Washington’s powerful neo-conservatives had been lusting for direct US military strikes against those two countries, leading to regime change, not diplomatic agreements that left the governments in place.

Lastly, after the United States overthrew the Ukrainian government in 2014, Putin was obliged to intervene on behalf of threatened ethnic Russians in Crimea and eastern Ukraine. That, in turn, was transformed by the Western media into a “Russian invasion”.

The same Western media has routinely charged Putin with murdering journalists but doesn’t remind its audience of the American record in this regard. The American military, in the course of its wars in recent decades, has been responsible for the deliberate deaths of many journalists. In Iraq, for example, there’s the Wikileaks 2007 video, exposed by Chelsea Manning, of the cold-blooded murder of two Reuters journalists; the 2003 US air-to-surface missile attack on the offices of Al Jazeera in Baghdad that left three journalists dead and four wounded; and the American firing on Baghdad’s Hotel Palestine, a known journalist residence, the same year that killed two foreign news cameramen.

The Trump honeymoon is over for me. It was never actually love; hardly more than an intriguing curiosity; mainly that he wasn’t Hillary Clinton; that he was unlikely to start a war with Russia or close down the Russia Today (RT) TV station in the US, which I and many others depend on daily; and that he was not politically correct when it came to fighting the Islamic State. Trump’s “moral equivalency” remark above gave me some hope. But this all vanished with his appointment to high office of one war-loving, bemedalled general after another, intermingled with one billionaire Goldman-Sachs official after another; his apparent confirmation of his Mexican Wall; and, worst of all, his increasing the military budget by $54 billion (sic, sick) … this will certainly be at the expense of human life and health and the environment. What manner of man is this who walks amongst us?

The word is “narcissism”.  New York Times columnist Frank Bruni (February 28, 2017) captures this well: “Why do I get the sense that fighter jets are Donald Trump’s biceps, warships are his pectorals and what he’s doing with his proposed $54 billion increase for the Pentagon is flexing?”

Will there ever be an end to the never-ending American wars?

How should we react to terrorism?

I hadn’t planned on returning to this subject so soon, if ever, because of the distasteful experience of last summer when at least 50 of my subscribers canceled because I said that terrorism carried out by Islamics was to some extent motivated by their religion, an hypothesis rejected by what I see as the “politically correct” who took it to be an unjust attack upon an ancient and noble religion. The fact that I, a leftist, a comrade, would say such a thing was especially hard for them to take.

Since then I have regularly received emails pointing out that neither I nor the media have the right to categorically condemn brutal terrorist actions because the terrorists are reacting to decades of Western, particularly American, violence against the Muslims of the Middle East and elsewhere; and that if only the West would stop their bombing they would stop creating new terrorists. Liberal columnists often echo these sentiments, but at the same time cannot accept the role played by radical Islamic beliefs in instigating the Islamic terror.

Not every American soldier in World War II was a knowledgable and convinced anti-fascist; nor were all of those fighting in Vietnam knowledgable and convinced anti-communists; but they deeply believed in American exceptionalism. I proceed from the assumption that Islamic terrorists deeply believe in the leading tenets of Islam though many of them may have been drawn to ISIS for a variety of reasons and may have only a passing knowledge of the Koran and may only rarely enter a mosque.

Why is it that terrorists routinely shout “Allah Akhbar” (“God is great”) while carrying out a bloody attack?

Why is it that so much of Islam teaches that non-Muslims are the enemy, that “disbelievers” are to be executed?

Why do they speak of their duty to perform “jihad”, which is usually defined as a struggle against the enemies of Islam or against the “infidels”?

Why do they speak of “martyrs”, which is often used as an honorific for Muslims who have died fulfilling a religious commandment, especially those who die waging jihad, or historically in the military expansion of Islam?

Why do they speak of martyrs going to paradise after dying and receiving heavenly rewards? Even being resurrected on earth, to once again die as a martyr, going again to paradise.

Yes, yes, I know about the terrible crimes of the IRA Catholics and the Israeli Jews, but on the scale of human moral evolution they don’t compare to the routine cutting off of heads; the whippings; demolishing 2000-year-old monuments; sternly banning alcohol, music, gays and sex; covering up women’s faces; forcibly imposing religious law; and on and on, including the worst of all: the never-ending horrific suicide bombings. ISIS has done the impossible: It has made American foreign policy look almost halfway decent.

Occasionally I reply to critics with something to this effect: Even if I completely accepted your premises, I’d still feel that it was too late. We can’t undo the harm that US foreign policy and the West have caused. The barn door is wide open and all the horses have escaped. There is an entire generation, or two generations, in the Muslim world totally committed to gaining bloody revenge against the West. It appears to be that it’s either us or them.

Explaining the cause of terrorism is not the same as excusing it

It might be different if the terrorists focused on killing only those in the West responsible for the horror carried out against their people, but their acts of violence are largely indiscriminate; they attack Westerners at random, often with Muslim victims included; often with only Muslim victims.

As I’ve pointed out in the past, we should consider this: From the 1950s to the 1980s the United States carried out all kinds of very harmful policies against Latin America, including numerous bombings, without the natives ever resorting to the uncivilized, barbaric kind of retaliation as employed by ISIS. Latin American leftists generally took their revenge out upon concrete representatives of the American empire: diplomatic, military and corporate targets – not markets, theatres, nightclubs, hospitals, schools, restaurants or churches.

France, the site of numerous terrorist attacks, has experimented with deradicalization centers in an attempt to combat homegrown extremism. The centers subjected those they housed to intense courses in French history and philosophy. But after five months the experiment has been abandoned as a complete failure.   My guess is that one reason for the failure is that French officials, like their American counterparts, were too politically correct when it came to questions of religion. If I were a teacher at one of these centers I would ask the students how they know – I mean really know – that “martyrs” go to paradise. They are, after all, considering sacrificing their lives for this belief. Seriously confronting this question for perhaps the first time ever, the students’ minds may well become somewhat confused, leaving them open for other challenging questions and thoughts.

For the record: I don’t support the US fighting ISIS in Syria. I don’t trust the Pentagon’s motivation, or their choice of bombing targets. They’re probably still into regime change. I’d leave the job to Russia and its allies.

Notes

1. Washington Post, February 9, 2017 
2. See William Blum, Killing Hope, chapter 50 for the details of the Panama intervention. 
3. Associated Press, February 6, 2017 
4. Winston Churchill, The Second World War, Vol. IV(1951), page 428. 
5. William Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower, chapter 18 
6. Ibid, chapter 5 (ends in 2005; much more is now known) 
7. See Bob Parry, “The Politics Behind ‘Russia-gate”, Consortiumnews.com, March 4, 2017 
8. Washington Post, February 25, 2017 

The few weeks of Trump’s presidency suffice to make clear that there will be no change this time either.  Normal relations with Russia are on the back burner, if not off the stove.  The material needs of the military/security complex for an enemy in order to justify its budget and police state powers, and the ideological needs of the neoconservatives for US world hegemony, are deemed to be more important than trust between thermo-nuclear powers. As for the liberal/progressive/left, they regard working to preserve life on earth as merely a pretext for being soft on Russians and those who commit treason by favoring friendly relations with Russia. 

The American working class has discovered that it has among Trump’s government no larger a constituency than have the Russians. Having been told by corporations, which are spending billions of dollars buying back their own stock, that they are too poor to pay US wages, Trump has found that the path to economic security for the work force lies in corporate tax reduction. Identity politics marches for open borders for Muslims and Hispanics and for transgendered toilet facilities, not for bread and peace, and wants Trump impeached because he is not yet at war with Russia.

Trump’s Russophobic appointments, such as McMaster, Mattis, and Fiona Hill are actually worst than Obama’s Victoria Nuland, Smantha Power and Susan Rice. Just as Hillary and Nuland brought regime change to Ukraine, Tillerson at the State Department has signaled regime change of the democratically elected government in Venezuela. Ecuador and Bolivia won’t be far behind.

Washington has never supported governments that put the interests of their peoples ahead of the interests of those who rule the US.  From Africa to South America to Indonesia to Cuba to Vietnam to Iran to Egypt, Washington has always misrepresented the forces for change as communist. Washington overthrew the first democratically elected government in Iran  , and a large numbers of others.  Read Stephen Kinzer’s The Brothers.  Read General Smedley Butler who said that he and the US Marines made South America safe for the United Fruit Company and investments of the New York Banks. Read John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. 

Washington opposes democratic change with an iron fist.  Now Marine Le Pen (right), the favored candidate for the presidency of France in the upcoming election, is in the process of being destroyed by Washington.

Marine is not on Washington’s approved list.  The reasons are:

(1) she speaks to French interests, not to Washington’s or the EU’s,

(2) she opposes the Trans-Atlantic Partnership, which gives US global corporations immunity to French laws against GMOs, and French labor, safety, and environmental standards,

(3) she supports French opinion that the French are French and not “European” and wants out of the European Union, and

(4) she wants France out of NATO, which uses France as a tool for American aggression.

Washington first attacked Marine via its surrogates in the French press and government, who managed to nullify her parliamentary immunity.  With this achieved, she is now accused of “misuse of EU funds.”

The charge, of course, is a hoax, a frame-up.  The charge, if it proves effective, will rely on the French presstitute media’s portrayal of Marine as a “fascist” for representing French nationalism.  Today, if a European person is loyal to his or her own country and not to the EU, the person is considered to be a “nationalist,” a term that has been merged with “fascist.”  The consequence is that anyone in France who wants to represent the French is a “fascist.”

Marine Le Pen lost her parliamentary immunity because she posted photos of ISIS victims on Twitter.  The photos she posted were accurate and correct, simply the truth.  But the charge is that to tell the truth about ISIS means that you are anti-Muslim, which today is like being anti-Jew, anti-black, anti-homosexual and anti-transgendered.  The protection of Identity Politics now extends not only to the Muslim refugees from America’s wars who are overrunning the Western world but also to ISIS.  The accurate and truthful photos violated Identity Politics.

The consensus of those few in Europe who reside outside the Matrix created for them by Washington and the American presstitutes is that the CIA will not permit Le Pen to become President of France.

She is a threat to Washington’s empire. If she cannot be destroyed with scandal and false charges, like Dominique Strauss-Kahn, she will be assassinated.

Democracy cannot function without an honest media.  Nowhere in the Western world does an honest media exist. There are a relatively few sites on the Internet media that are independent of ruling elites and speak the truth to the extent that they can find it.  But the very shadowy PropOrNot website, likely a product of the CIA or George Soros, has declared those who understand that good relations between thermo-nuclear powers are essential to be “Russian agents.”

One dozen Russian Satan 2 ICBMs are sufficient to destroy the United States.  One is sufficient to destroy France, the UK, or Texas.

Why is Washington and Washington’s European, Canadian, and Australian puppets inviting such an outcome with

continuous  false accusations against Russia (and China). No person with any intelligence can possibly regard the thrice elected president of Russia as “the new Hitler,” “a Mafia Don,” “ a thug.”

By orchestrating Russophobia in the West, Washington has put all of humanity at risk. The Russians have watched Washington’s false accusations against Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Libya, Yeman, Pakistan, Iran and against Russia herself—“invasion of Ukraine.”  False accusations have in the 21st century always been Washington’s set-up of the target country for invasion or bombing.

These provacations issued daily by the idiot Western press, the idiot Western governments, and the idiot commentators have prepared the groundwork for a misunderstanding that can result in thermo-nuclear war and the end of life on earth.

When you read the New York Times, the Washington Post, or listen to CNN, NPR, or MSNBC or the British, Canadian, German, French, and Australian media, you are being indoctrinated with war with Russia (and China) and, thus, you are being prepared for your funeral.

Accustomed to looking for hope from within their own country, Americans become depressed when faced with these facts.  Whereas the American Oligarchy is too strong for change, the situation in Europe is more hopeful.

The EU is a collection of countries that have little in common. The British have concluded that submerging their identity into something called “Europe” is not in their interest.  Other countries—Hungary, the Czech Republic, Greece and Portugal—are realizing that capitalists are more rapacious than commissars and might seek salvation in reclaiming their sovereignty.  The exit from the European Union, a CIA-sponsored organization, could gain momentum.

NATO also could come unglued as European populations realize that it is not Russia that is the threat.  The threat is that Washington is forcing Europe into conflict with Russia, a conflict in which Europe has nothing to gain.  For Europe, conflict with Russia means the death of Europe.  A few Europeans have gained sufficient awareness to begin asking: “Why die for Washington’s hegemony?”

This is Marine Le Pen’s question, and it is now being asked by a few in Germany.  As Europeans gain awareness of Washington’s insanity, the question will grow. The millions of Muslim refugees from Washington’s wars who are flooding Europe with problems are bringing home to insouciant Europeans the price of accepting Washington’s overlordship.

The privatizations, which have wrecked the prospects for Latvia, Ukraine, and Greece, and that have raised costs and lowered living standards in Britain and France while concentrating income and wealth at the top of the income distribution, are a European lesson that the partial socializations of social democracy are more livable than the system of plunder that now rules.

Washington’s mask of benevolence is falling away, revealing the face of greed and evil that is its true face.  This face is far more terrifying than the orchestrated “Russian threat.”  If more Europeans can gain awareness, the threat of thermo-nuclear war will crumble with Washington’s empire.

His new executive order, issued Monday, reworked his earlier one – rejected at the federal district and appeals court levels.

How this one fares remains to be seen. It’ll likely be challenged. Like the earlier one, it’s all about politics, unrelated to border control and keeping the nation safe from foreign terrorists – ISIS and others Washington created and supports.

It calls for improved “screening and vetting protocols associated with the visa-issuance process and the” US Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP).

It suspends for 90 days entry of certain (undefined) aliens from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. More on the special case of Iraq below.

It cites authorization under Article II of the Constitution, section 212(f) of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, and Title 8 of the US Code, stating:

“Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.”

Jimmy Carter used it in 1979 after the Iranian Revolution to stop its citizens from entering America, along with deporting thousands of its nationals.

Trump authorized the Secretary of State and DHS secretary to grant waivers in cases serving the national interest.

He suspended USRAP for 120 days, pending a review of screening and vetting procedures for refugees.

While claiming his new order avoids discriminating on the basis of religion, he solely targeted predominantly Muslim countries – mostly ones America lawlessly attacked, in the case of Iran, against a nation it’s been hostile toward for 38 years without justification.

Washington falsely designates Iran a state sponsor of terrorism, despite no credible evidence.

It calls Libya “an active combat zone,” ignoring Washington’s full responsibility, raping the country in 2011, endless chaos and human misery following.

It says parts of Somalia are “terrorist safe havens.” America has been ravaging the country for decades.

It calls (north) Sudan a state sponsor of terrorism because of its sovereign independence, on Washington’s target list for regime change.

Syria is designated a state sponsor of terrorism. After six years of US aggression (and sponsorship of Al Qaeda affiliated “Moderate Terrorists”), its one of its many victimized countries, struggling to end the scourge of US-NATO aggression.

It says “Yemen is the site of an ongoing conflict between the incumbent government and the Houthi-led opposition,” adding ISIS and al-Qaeda exploit the conflict.

It failed to explain ongoing conflict since March 2015 was orchestrated in Washington, using Riyadh as a proxy force, supporting the illegitimate US-backed regime, Houthi rebels rejecting its rule.

It calls Iraq “a special case,” ISIS controlling parts of the country, armed and otherwise supported by Washington.

“Decisions about issuance of visas or granting admission to Iraqi nationals should be subjected to additional scrutiny to determine if applicants have connections with ISIS or other terrorist organizations, or otherwise pose a risk to either national security or public safety.”

Unlike the other designated countries above, Iraqi nationals will be allowed into America, providing vetting indicates they pose no risk.

Saying “(s)ince 2001, hundreds of persons born abroad have been convicted of terrorism-related crimes in the United States,” failed to explain they were unjustly framed, wrongfully imprisoned for terrorist-related offenses they didn’t commit, Muslims singled out as America’s designated enemy of choice.

I’ve written about scores of innocent victims, mostly Muslims, languishing unjustly in US gulag hell – at home and abroad, including Guantanamo, most of its detainees randomly arrested, handed over to America for bounty, imprisoned despite having committed no crimes, most now freed after enduring a living hell, tortured to unjustly confess guilt so unbearable pain would stop, some murdered by guards.

According to Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway, “(i)f you have travel docs, if you actually have a visa, if you are a legal permanent resident, you are not covered under this particular executive action.”

It’s effective on March 16. In 90 days, DHS will issue new guidelines for travel to America, including restrictions for countries not in compliance.

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.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

“Palestinian women have always stood side by side with their fathers, brothers, husbands, comrades to resist the Zionist occupation, to fight for freedom and legitimate rights.

They are the first to go to the streets to protest the brutality of the Israeli military occupation, the first to organize sit-ins and marches demanding the release of their children, brothers and fathers from Israeli prisons. They are the protectors, the supporters, but most of all they are the comrades in the fight for a free Palestine.” Reham Al Helsi

The Pietas of Palestine bear the painful weight of the vicious Israeli occupation made crueller for its illegality and impunity that is shielded by Western betrayal of international law and morality.

While the world looked the other way during the 70 years since the Nakba, the Catastrophe of zionist terrorism that established parasitic Israel, no Palestinian woman has been spared grief, terror and trauma because every family has been torn apart by tragedies of a beloved murdered, or incarcerated, or denied desperate medical attention, or a family home demolished, or livelihoods destroyed as unemployment emasculates their men or when life-giving olive trees and orchards are laid waste by bulldozers and the Annexation Wall. Or all of the above.

You, who casually turn your taps and light switches on and off, consider the everyday stress of barely sufficient water for the family that trickles from the Israeli Mekorot company and the systematic electricity blackouts in summer and winter extremes metered out through Israel’s covert system of slow-motion genocide.

Ask yourself, how does a Gazan mother ensure her children’s health when the Israelis deliberately, as means of illegal collective punishment, calculate “the minimum caloric intake necessary for Palestinians to avoid malnutrition so Israel could limit the amount of foodstuffs allowed into Gaza without causing outright starvation.”

“In Palestine mothers are sacred. Every one of us has several mothers: the mother that gave birth to us, the olive tree, the land and the mother of all: Palestine. And a Palestinian mother isn’t just a mother to the children she gives birth to, she is mother to all Palestinians.” Reham Alhelsi

Every Palestinian mother knows when her children leave the house there is no guarantee of a safe return. A child throwing a stone against the soldiers, jeeps and tanks of the world’s 4th largest nuclear military may be buried that afternoon with a bullet in his/her back, or left to bleed to death on the street as the occupation forces prevent the ambulance from attending. Or that brave stone may effect 15 years in prison for her teenage child while Israel’s military killers, like Elor Azaria who point blank murdered a wounded Palestinian youth lying unarmed on the road gets 18 months for ‘manslaughter’! If that. The only assurance for the Palestinian mother is the killer’s promotion will be forthcoming.

Three comrades in the fight for freedom, Hanin Zoabi, Ahed Tamimi, Samah Sabawi hailing from the fractured body of Palestine – 1948 occupied Palestine, the 1967 occupied Palestine- West Bank and Gaza/diaspora respectively – represent the sumoud (steadfast resilience), the courage, the integrity defining the spirit of Palestinian women.

Hanin Zoabi

Hanin Zoabi was born in Nazareth and in 2009 became the first Palestinian woman to become, via the Arab Balad party, a member of the Knesset; the Israeli government.

As Israel has severe anaphylaxic reactions to Truth, Hanin’s blunt truthfulness, calling an Uzi an Uzi, challenges the media monopoly on Israel propaganda hence drawing hellfire from the zionists.

She has compared Zionist Occupation Forces to ISIS–  a fair comparison given both aim to set up exclusive political entities through violence: a Jewish State from the river to the sea, and a wide sweeping Islamic Caliphate. She was slammed and urged to apologise for calling Israeli commandoes ‘murderers’ for killing 9 unarmed Turkish humanitarian workers on the Gaza flotilla vessel, Mavi Marmara, on which she was a passenger.

Au contraire, she demanded in parliament, “Those who murdered need to apologize, you need to apologize.”. Shrugging off the Holocaust taboo, she stated “During Kristallnacht thousands of Jewish businesses and synagogues were burned, while the Germans remained silent. Today, as the homes of Palestinians are burned, as churches and people are burned alive- the majority in Israel remains silent.”

For her feisty principled outspokenness on Israel’s violent transgressions against Palestinians and democratic delinquency….

“Rather than seeing democracy as equality and human rights, now the only meaning of democracy in Israel is the rule of the – Jewish – majority.”

…. Hanin has been bullied and reviled by Israeli parliamentarians, denigrated  as ‘terrorist’, ‘neofascist,’ “Haneen Zoabi is not a circus, she isn’t even worthy of being used as lion food.” (Avi Dichter) and repeatedly threatened with the revocation of her citizenship, suspension and expulsion from the Knesset.

Undaunted, the formidable Hanin unswervingly demands a one state with equality for all its citizens and in the meantime she  fights for equal rights for Palestinian citizens of Israel, challenges Zionism and its recent law that legalised theft of Palestinian land through settlement expansion, and serves the rights of women.

Ahed Tamimi

Ahed, 15, was born with the Tamimi DNA of resistance and was suckled on Israeli tear gas and Palestinian sumoud in the weekly protests of her village, Nabi Saleh.

Nabi Saleh has 500 residents whose daily view across the valley is an army base alongside  the Jewish settlement, Halamish, built on their stolen land. They began weekly protests in 2009 organised by Ahed’s parents Bassem and Nariman, when the settler militia took over their village spring. Bassem, a grassroots nonviolent advocate has been described by the EU as a human rights defender. He has been arrested, tortured and incarcerated at least 4 times, once for 3 years. More than 13% of Nabi Saleh protestors have been in Israeli detention.

The first time I saw Ahed was on You-tube. Then all of 11, she was doggedly confronting with her little fist Israeli soldiers armed to the hilt, demanding the release of her brother. Like Justin King, her courage had a profound impact on me,

“It wasn’t just the defiance in her eyes. It was the fact that it wasn’t new to her. She had obviously seen more carnage and violence than most. She was a veteran. The world is becoming more and more accustomed to female warriors, so why did this veteran’s battle have the impact it did? She was 13 years old. I say “woman” because she isn’t a “child” and she isn’t a “girl”. Not anymore. She’s a hardened veteran. We bought her childhood at the price tag of $10 million dollars per day in military aid to Israel.” Justin King

The next time I saw this teenage warrior, she was fiercely locked, along with her  mother, aunt and cousin, onto an armed army thug that was attempting to arrest her 12 year old brother. The soldier was no match for these Tamimi lionesses and Mohamed was released. The big bad Israelis are so afraid of young Ahed, that pressure erupted to deny the 15 year old a visa to enter the USA  for a speaking tour. While David and Goliath are myths, Ahed versus the Goliath zionist army is reality.

One day, Ahed may succeed Hanin Zoabi as President of Palestine: both have more integrity and courage in one eyelash than all the traitors in the Palestinian Authority.

Samah Sabawi

Samah Sabawi is a Palestinian-Australian-Canadian poet, playwright, editor, PhD student, powerful orator, political commentator and spokesperson for Palestinian freedom. She was born in Gaza to  Suhailah and Abdul Kareem Sabawi, a distinguished poet, author and non-violence revolutionary. The Sabawi family’s forced wrench from Gaza is characteristic of Palestinian exiles in the diaspora and Samah’s passion for justice and love for her homeland is the gravitational pull of her activism and art,

I stand dispossessed of everything but my words

They are words of truth

Of fire and steel

I use them deliberately

Not to incite hatred

Not to frighten

But to lighten up this darkness

That tore me into 11 million pieces

And scattered me across the earth

Words tell my story

Nakba

Naksa

Forced exile

Ethnic cleansing

Apartheid

Words

Carefully chosen

Purposely uttered

These are the words that lay the foundation

Of the language of my liberation

Samah is a sought after spokesperson whose sharp intellect lit with poetic flair and reconciliatory grace makes her a powerful ambassador for Palestine in the diaspora. Yet, like Hanin, Samah too has been a target of controversy; the tentacles of the zionist lobby have no boundaries in the west. In 2014, Samah was dropped  from a panel debating the two-state solution at the Wheeler Centre Melbourne because of her support for BDS. When she was reinstated, Jewish panellists Geoff Bloch, Dvir Abramovich and the Head of the General Delegation of Palestine to Australia, Izzat Salah Abdulhadi withdrew from the event. In 2016, Abramovich reared his zionist head to strike with the faux accusatory venom of anti-semitism at Samah’s play, Tales of a City by the Sea, a love story set in Gaza,which was included in the  Victorian school curriculum and has since gone on to win literary awards.

On this 2017 International Women’s Day, I close with Samah’s poem, published in I remember my name,

Imra’a

For my sisters in the Arab World and beyond

Feb 17, 2013

I

am

woman

Imra’a

Whole

Not a fragment of your shadow

Not a rib torn out of your torso

Not a mail order

Not a house slave

Not a fairy-tale princess

Not a damsel in distress

Not a genie in a bottle

Not a devil

Nor a saint

Not scattered

Not arranged

Not lacking in brain or piety

Not a fountain of propriety

I am eternity

Lived in an instant

I am constant randomness

I am chaos in stability

In songs you ache for me

I am your refuge and your refugee

Your barren desert and your fertile field

Your homeland…your ‘watan’

My womb yields the fruit of life

I am your Mother

Daughter

Sister

Wife

A prince of poetry wrote of me

“Alommo madrasaton…”

A mother is a school if well prepared

You prepare a well-mannered nation

For a thousand and one Arabian nights

I am inspiration

In the Holy Scriptures

I am temptation

I am your Eve in the Garden of Eden

My qualities revealed in the holy Quran

‘inna kaydahonna azeem’

I am your dream

Your ‘hoor alayn’

Your seduction

Your redemption

Your struggle

Your salvation

I am strength and weakness

Rolled into one

I am your lived reality

And all that you refuse to see

I am what you cannot define

Cannot confine

To a fantasy

I am human

Of flesh and blood

My faults monumental

My virtues unquantifiable

I am neither a reflection of you nor on you

Your ticket to paradise does not begin with my virtue

Your peace of mind does not begin with my conformity

Your redemption does not begin with my submission

Your honor is not defined by my chastity

Your fantasies are your own

Your vice is yours alone

For I carry my own

Burden alone

I am woman

Imra’a

Whole

Dr. Vacy Vlazna is Coordinator of Justice for Palestine Matters and editor of a volume of Palestinian poetry, I remember my name. She was Human Rights Advisor to the GAM team in the second round of the Acheh peace talks, Helsinki, February 2005 then withdrew on principle. Vacy was convenor of  Australia East Timor Association and coordinator of the East Timor Justice Lobby as well as serving in East Timor with UNAMET and UNTAET from 1999-2001.

March 6 represents the 60th anniversary of the independence of the former British colony of the Gold Coast. The country was renamed Ghana at independence in order to reclaim the glorious accomplishments of the ancient kingdom in West Africa which lasted from the 6th to the 13th centuries CE.

Dr. Kwame Nkrumah was the co-founder of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) and stated during the independence celebrations that the independence of Ghana was meaningless unless it was linked up with the total liberation of the African continent. Consequently, the foreign policy of Ghana was largely based upon the realization of a United States of Africa.

The struggle in the Gold Coast was won through mass action such as general strikes, demonstrations, boycotts, urban rebellions and the organization of a revolutionary political party, the CPP. The movement inspired other states throughout Africa to accelerate their efforts aimed at achieving the same goals of statehood.

Not only did the liberation movement in the Gold Coast have an impact on other colonies throughout the continent, it influenced the consciousness and determination of the African American people in the United States which during the late 1950s was still enmeshed in legalized segregation in the South where the majority of the descendants of the enslaved Black people resided. Even outside of the South, segregation was enforced either through existing statutes or as a result of customs and practices.

In 1957, several African Americans traveled to Ghana to attend the inauguration ceremonies held in Accra. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Coretta Scott King were in attendance just several months after the conclusion of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, a turning point in what became known as the Civil Rights Movement.

Claude Barnett, the founder of the Associated Negro Press (ANP) in 1919, was also at the 1957 events and held meetings with the-then Prime Minister Nkrumah. The African American newspapers which the ANP supplied with dispatches saw the independence of Ghana as a beacon of hope for all African people throughout the world.

Julian Mayfield: The Emergence of a Radical Artist

During the late 1940s in the aftermath of the conclusion of World War II, the advent of the Cold War began partly in response to the expansion of the influence of the Soviet Union, enhanced by the Socialist revolutions in China, Vietnam and Democratic Korea. Although the U.S. declared its support for self-determination of colonial peoples as the War drew to an end, Washington had no intentions of abandoning the European-controlled territories to the influence of the Socialist camp. Consequently, the Cold War hysteria surrounding the rise of the Socialist camp was closely linked to the aim on the part of the imperialist states to maintain the dominance of Western Europe and the U.S. internationally.

Julian Hudson Mayfield was born on June 6, 1928 in Greer, South Carolina. At the age of five he moved with his family to Washington, D.C. which despite it being the capital of the U.S. was governed by segregationist laws. As a student at Paul Laurence Dunbar High School in Washington, he decided upon a career as a writer. Later in 1946 after WWII he joined the U.S. Army from which he was honorably discharged after a one-and-a-half year stint.

After studying at Lincoln University for a brief period he moved to New York City in 1948 to begin his participation in the theatre. Mayfield performed in the Kurt Weil musical Lost in the Stars in 1949-50 and the following year, 1951, produced his own work entitled Fire. He would direct Ossie Davis’ Alice in Wonder in 1952 and later publish three successful novels The Hit (1957), The Long Night (1958) and the Grand Parade (1961).

It was during the 1950s, that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) began to keep extensive files on Mayfield. He along with numerous other writers and artists such as Shirley Graham Du Bois, Ruby Dee, Ossie Davis, Alice Childress, Rosa Guy, John O. Killens, Loften Mitchell and others were monitored by the FBI due to their connections with the Communist Party and other left-wing groups and coalitions.

Of interests to the U.S. government also was Mayfield’s connections with the Puerto Rican Independence Movement. The writer had more than a political relationship with the Puerto Rican people due to his 1954 marriage to a physician from the colonized U.S. territory named Dr. Ana Livia Cordero, who was a well-known professional and political figure in her own right. Later during the same year, the couple moved to San Juan to live. It was there that he worked as a contributor to the Puerto Rican World Journal, an English language publication, along with a radio station.

FBI files reveal the agency’s attempt to link Mayfield with the Communist Party of Puerto Rico (PCP) and the Movimiento Pro Indepdencia de Puerto Rico. Mayfield’s wife accompanied him to Ghana in November 1961 where they remained until 1966. Dr. Livia Cordero operated a health clinic for women in Ghana and served as the personal physician of Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois up until his death on August 28, 1963.

After Mayfield became heavily involved in the support work surrounding the events in Monroe, North Carolina in the early 1960s, he was forced to go into exile from the U.S. for the following six years. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) leader in Monroe, North Carolina, Robert Williams had become an advocate of armed self-defense against racist organizations such as the Ku Klux Klan and the police.

Files kept by the FBI suggested that the work done by Mayfield in relationship to the situation in Monroe was supported by other activists in the New York area. A Bureau source indicated that on July 10, 1961 there had been a meeting held by an organization previously unknown to the agency called the Afro-American Alliance for Action. The declassified government documents speculate that the name of the group was utilized for the specific purpose of concealing its real identity in connection with another organization known as the On Guard Committee for Freedom (OGCFF).

In Mayfield’s FBI files under a section entitled “On Guard Committee for Freedom,” it noted that the OGCFF was founded on February 15, 1961 in Harlem. Purportedly the purpose of the organization was to respond to the recent assassination of Patrice Lumumba of the Congo.

A New York Times article from March 1, 1961 commented that Calvin L. Hicks, a journalist, was associated with the OGCFF. A publication issued in May 1961 by OGCFF entitled “On Guard” said that the objective of the group was: “to act as an educational and action organization. To inspire our people to united mass action on issues affecting their rights and opportunities. To expose those agents and agencies representative of government who violate those principles and documents upon which this country was founded. In order to implement the above-mentioned principles, OGCFF shall advocate and make use of the picket line, the boycott, the petition forums and mass circulation of ‘On Guard’, our monthly newspaper.” (p. 2)

While Mayfield and activist Mae Mallory were in Monroe during August 1961, a delegation of Civil Rights workers came into the city to engage in demonstrations against legalized segregation. Mobs of white racists gathered and began to attack the protesters. The African American community was outraged in the face of this brutality along with threats by law-enforcement against the life of Robert F. Williams.

A white couple had driven into the African American community and was surrounded by people threatening to do them bodily harm since they were suspected of being members of a racist organization. Williams took the couple into his home until they could be guaranteed safe passage out of the neighborhood. In response to rumors that Williams would be arrested and possibly killed, Mayfield and Mallory drove Williams out of North Carolina.

Williams and his family fled to Canada and later Cuba, where they were given political asylum after the FBI sought to arrest him on kidnapping charges. Williams continued his activism and advocacy of armed self-defense from Cuba for several years. By 1966, the Williams’ had relocated to the People’s Republic of China where they remained until late 1969 before returning to the U.S. where they successfully fought extradition to North Carolina from the state of Michigan.

Mayfield Takes Refuge in Ghana

After being sought by the FBI for questioning in the bogus kidnapping investigation surrounding events in Monroe, Mayfield arrived in Ghana during November 1961. He became a well-known writer and supporter of the Nkrumah government during 1962-66.

His articles appeared in the Evening News, founded by Kwame Nkrumah in 1948, as well as the Spark, a CPP journal. Mayfield was employed by the Ministry of Information and worked as a recorder for the Ghana Parliament. He would later establish the African Review, a journal which carried writings by leading intellectuals and artists including Neville Dawes, Preston King and Bessie Head. He was identified also in FBI documents as a part-time employee of the Publicity Secretariat of the Office of President Kwame Nkrumah.

In a telegram from the United States Information Agency (USIA) and the American embassy in Ghana a confidential classification inquiry was sent to the USIA headquarters in Washington seeking background information on Mayfield in response to a series of articles the writer published in the Evening News March 29 and 30 1962. According to the cable: “US Negro writer Julian Mayfield [wrote] on [the] trial [of] Mrs. Mae Mallory, purportedly followed Monroe North Carolina race disturbances last August. In questionable, inflammatory article Mayfield says, ‘Mrs. Mallory fighting for life in Cleveland after Governor Ohio yielded to pressures [by] white supremacists [in] North Carolina and ordered Mallory extradited to that state to stand trial on fallacious charges of kidnapping that grew out of Monroe race riots last August.’”

This telegram from the USIA and embassy in Ghana continued saying: “In view of further upcoming articles on this subject and anticipated unfavorable reaction, we require soonest full background information on author Mayfield who purportedly was ‘only reporter present at Monroe race riots last August,’ and full background information on trial of Mrs. Mae Mallory, including her present status.”

In response to the request for information on Mayfield, the New York Special Agent in Charge (SAC) for the FBI sent information to the Director of the agency which included an article by George Breitman, a writer for the Militant newspaper associated with the U.S.-based Socialist Workers Party (SWP). Breitman praised an article published by Mayfield in Commentary magazine in April 1961, entitled “Challenge of Robert Williams.”

Breitman stated in the report with the headline, “Nomination for Julian Mayfield”, that: “Without any disrespect for The Militant, which printed many fine articles too, Mayfield’s was in my opinion unrivaled among those I read last year for excellence of style and serious handling of an important theme. In it, Mayfield, author of three novels, told the story of Robert F. Williams and the movement he led in Monroe, N.C. That alone would make it worth reading, because it is a dramatic story. But Mayfield also related Williams and Monroe to their national background, showing that they represented the emergence of a new young leadership offering a serious challenge to the middle-class legalistic and pacifist spokesmen in the struggle for Negro equality.” (The Militant, May 4, 1962, p. 2)

Other information included in the dossier on Mayfield was a report indicating that he was a supporter of the Cuban Revolution. The author in his writing expressed sympathy for Cuba in its battle with the U.S. This information was also shared with the Miami FBI field office as well.

Mayfield’s association with support work for the Cuban Revolution was reflected in the FBI files which made reference to the placing of a full-page advertisement in the New York Times on April 6, 1960. Entitled “What Is Really Happening in Cuba”, the ad was signed by the Fair Play for Cuba Committee (FPCC).

Later in August 1961, Mayfield was a speaker at the first anniversary banquet of FPCC. Earlier that year the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee held hearings on the FPCC in January.

Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro visited New York City in October 1960 to participate in the United Nations General Assembly. He would meet with Malcolm X of the Nation of Islam and other important community leaders.

This visit took during the period leading up to the national presidential elections of November which were won by Democratic Party candidate Senator John F. Kennedy. Soon after taking office Kennedy gave authorization to the already planned invasion at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961. The attempt to overthrow the two-year old socialist-oriented Cuban revolutionary government relied on anti-Castro rebels who were totally unprepared to fight the committed and disciplined military and volunteer forces defending the Revolution.

Leading up to the Bay of Pigs invasion, the FPCC had warned of a possible intervention. At the time of the U.S.-backed military assault on the sovereign Caribbean state, thousands of people demonstrated against the attacks in various cities across the country. The largest actions were mobilized in New York and the Bay Area of California.

With the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) trained rebels being defeated in less than 48 hours of fighting, the internal security apparatus of the U.S. stepped-up its efforts to counter the solidarity work of FPCC. Corporate media outlets were compelled to draw a link between the successes of the Castro government in defeating the invasion with subversive activities among Communists in the U.S.

These events in 1960-61 generated further interests by American intelligence agencies in the role of Julian Mayfield. Robert F. Williams had traveled to Cuba in 1960 on a solidarity tour which included numerous other left-wing and African American leaders. When the false allegations of interstate flight to avoid prosecution for kidnapping were leveled against Williams after the Monroe incident of August 1961, Mayfield and Mallory were also targets for prosecution by the federal government.

A follow up report on Mayfield issued by the New York FBI office dated December 14, 1962, noted that: “Subject resided as of April 1962, at Bungalow #5, Signals Road, Achimota School, Accra, Ghana, and subject was a ‘Government Officer’ in the National Research Council, Department of National Institute of Health and Medical Research, University of Ghana, Legon, Acrra, Ghana. In September, 1962, source made available information reflecting that subject was fully in sympathy with the Cuban Revolutionary Government. In April, 1962, a source advised that subject was appointed as a contributor of news articles from Ghana for ‘Freedomways’ a quarterly review of the Negro freedom movement.”

Freedomways was a journal which began publishing in early 1961 and included leading African American editorial staff members from the Communist Party (CP) such as James Jackson and Shirley Graham Du Bois. The magazine was designed to provide a left analysis of the developing Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. and its international implications. The editorial board consisted of both Party members and non-members such as John Hendrik Clarke, a self-taught historian and writer who at the time was closed associated with the CP in New York City.

The FBI reports on a letter from Clarke to Mayfield in 1962 requesting the Ghanaian-based exile assist in recruiting writers for a special issue Freedomways was planning by the close of the year on the African situation. Clarke states in the letter that he wanted Mayfield to act as a representative of the journal in Ghana. Clarke also says that 50 copies of the upcoming issue on Africa would be forward to him in Accra from New York.

Another FBI report on Mayfield’s activities included a copy of a reprinted article from The Militant dated September 30, 1963, which had been initially published by the author in the Ghanaian Times. The article took the form of an open letter to Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes, appealing to him not to extradite Mae Mallory back to North Carolina to stand trial in the kidnapping case involving Robert F. Williams in August 1961.

Mayfield sought to dispel the very notion that a kidnapping had even taken place. He admits that he was there when the incident occurred in Monroe and that the white couple in question, the Stegalls, later said that Williams had saved their lives. Mayfield refuted the statement by Governor Rhodes that Mallory could receive a fair trial in the state. The case of Mae Mallory and the Williams’ had been widely publicized in West Africa in an effort to pressurize the Ohio governor from sending the-then Cleveland-based activist back to North Carolina to stand trial.

Continuing its monitoring of Mayfield’s work in Ghana, the FBI copied an article from the Muhammad Speaks newspaper dated March 19, 1965. A longer version of the article had originally appeared in the Ghanaian Times from November 25, 1964 entitled “Congo is a Lesson for the Apologists”.

The report deals with the duplicitous role of U.S. diplomatic personnel in Africa. Mayfield portrays the American embassy leaders as sophisticated in their language designed to win over African governmental officials to a sympathetic view of the Washington.

Discussing the so-called “Congo Crisis” of late 1964 that garnered the intervention of British and U.S. military forces to “evacuate white hostages” from the former Belgian Congo, Mayfield stresses: “The world has just witnessed a dramatic demonstration of the determination of world imperialism to keep the vast majority of mankind oppressed under its grinding heel. Belgium troops were quartered by Africa’s ‘friends’, Mr. Wilson’s Labor Party, on the British-controlled island of Ascension. United States aircraft transported these troops to Stanleyville, ostensibly to liberate white hostages, but clearly, the objective was to crush the nationalist opposition to the U.S. running-dog regime.”

In describing those Africans who are unwilling to see the U.S. imperialists for what they are in relationship to the struggle for genuine independence on the continent, the author observes:

“There is a type of African, usually educated in England or North America, who finds it uncomfortable and embarrassing to regard the United States as the capital of world imperialism…. This type of African is more dangerous to the African Revolution than any C.I.A. agent, black or white. The American who rants about the ‘free world’, ‘the rights of man’, and ‘the liberty of the individual’, knows in his teeth that he is lying. But this particular African, who is usually secure because of his education and his job, believes implicitly in that lie. During his brief tour of the U.S. he wined and dined in some fine white homes, and he will fight to the death anyone who purports to tell him that his recent hosts are the world’s greatest carriers of the neo-colonialist mentality.”

Mayfield then goes on to examine the “rehabilitation” of the secessionist leader of Katanga in the Congo, Moise Tshombe, who was appointed as the prime minister of the country in 1964 in an effort to shore up American influence and dominance. Tshombe was utilized by the Belgians and the U.S. during 1960 to destabilize the newly-independent former colony led by the first Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of the Congolese National Movement (MNC-Lumumba).

Lumumba was overthrown in a coup led by Joseph Mobutu, later known as Mobutu Sese Seko, which was backed by the Belgians and the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who authorized a plot to assassinate the Congolese leader. Placed under house arrest by the United Nations forces that were invited by Lumumba to assist in the stabilization of the country after the break down of order due to the mutiny by the para-military Force Publique, just days after the declaration of independence from Brussels on June 30, 1960, Lumumba eventually escapes in an effort to join his supporters in the east of the country where a genuinely independent Congolese state was under construction.

Nonetheless, Lumumba was captured by the imperialist-backed reactionary forces and taken to Elizabethville in Katanga Province where he was tortured and brutally murdered along with two of his closest comrades in January 1961. The assassination was overseen by Mobutu and the Belgian military with the assistance of Washington and London.

This outrageous attack on the independence and sovereignty of the emergent African states prompted widespread demonstrations across the continent and internationally. African Americans disrupted a United Nations hearing on the situation in New York shouting down U.S. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson blaming Eisenhower and the incoming administration of President John F. Kennedy for the murder of Lumumba and the other Congolese ministers accompanying him.

In this report written nearly four years after the coup and assassination of Lumumba, Mayfield then asks: “But what shall they say now, these people who have bought the beautiful American image, lock, stock and barrel? Only yesteryear Moise Tshombe was the symbol of all that is hateful and detestable in human society. Even in America he was regarded as liar, thief, traitor, imperialist lackey and co-murderer of the greatest statesman-patriot the Congo had produced. Who, reading these words, thought he would live long enough to see this same Tshombe crowned Prime Minister of the Congo? Who dreamed that the United States would so nakedly expose itself as to send thousands of military ‘advisers’, Cuban counter-revolutionary mercenaries, and devastating weapons of modern warfare to his aid, all supposedly in defense of U.S. interests?”

Who imagined that the ‘free’ press of ‘free’ England and the U.S. themselves so contemptuous of Uncle Tom Moise, would so suddenly and unashamedly begin to tout the Katangese puppet as the only popular figure in the Congo, ‘the only one who can bring peace to that troubled country.’’

These arguments were also echoed by Malcolm X (El Hajj Malik Shabazz) during the same time period. The leader of the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU) had just returned from an extended tour of several African, Middle Eastern and Western European states.

Malcolm X had visited Ghana earlier that year for the second time. His first visit was in 1959 as an emissary for the Nation of Islam (NOI) headed by the Hon. Elijah Muhammad, who had taken a tour of several African and Middle Eastern states including Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Sudan and Egypt. When Malcolm arrived in May 1964, Julian Mayfield was considered the de facto leader of the African American community in Ghana.

The African American community in Ghana at the time consisted of luminaries such as Shirley Graham Du Bois, Maya Angelou, Alice Windom, Vicki Garvin, Leslie Alexander Lacy, among others. Malcolm would address audiences at the University of Ghana at Legon, the Ghana Parliament and the Kwame Nkrumah Ideological Institute at Winneba. The OAAU leader met as well with Dr. Nkrumah who provided counsel in regard to the struggle for Pan-Africanism and Socialism.

Nonetheless, the address by Malcolm at Legon was severely criticized by H.M. Basner in a column published by the Ghanaian Times. Basner, a white South African and former member of the Communist Party of South Africa, claimed that Malcolm’s viewpoint was devoid of taking class into consideration and that this could not be justified based upon the history of the anti-slavery and the-then current Civil Rights Movement in the U.S.

Coming to Malcolm’s defense was Mayfield who responded in a column in the Ghanaian Times stressing that: “I sat several rows behind Mr. Basner and I heard nothing Mr. X said to contradict this. Mr. Basner’s audio reception is as good as mine and he must have heard Malcolm say that he did not believe that the black man would ever experience full freedom under the American system . . . Is not socialism the only alternative to the system? And did not Malcolm go on to outline a campaign by which the black man in the U.S. would do all he could to destroy the present system . . . ?”

Mayfield continued his defense emphasizing: “What we who support Malcolm X have recognized is that there can be no black-white unity until the black man himself is so organized that he cannot become the victim either of his enemies or of those whites who call themselves his friends. By making a passionate appeal to Afro-Americans to unite on the basis of racial self-interest and identify more closely with their African brother, Malcolm X is not being racialist, anti-Marxist nor showing disrespect to the memory of John Brown. He is merely using common sense. . . . Black fighters of America have neither the time nor the patience to go around with a magnifying glass searching for genuine white revolutionists . . . the vast majority of the oppressed people of the world are non-white and damn near all of the oppressors are white, and that if the vast majority could be properly channeled, a major and perhaps decisive blow could be struck against the bastion of world imperialism.”

Shirley Graham Du Bois, at the time Director of Ghana National Television, entered the debate as well viewing Basner’s comments as an indirect attack on the legacy of her husband, the-then late Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois who passed away less than one year prior to the visit of Malcolm X. Dr. Du Bois was selected by Nkrumah to direct the Encyclopedia Africana Project, a monumental work which was designed to reconstruct the history of the continent from the perspective of African people.

Graham Du Bois wrote that: “I must take issue with Columnist Basner in his criticism of Malcolm X. Mr. Basner seems to ignore the fact that Malcolm X’s vigorous protests and denunciations are against the White Government and the White Ruling Class ‘of the United States. The leader of the Black Moslems was presented at Legon by the Marxist Forum which would indicate that he does not share the prevailing fear and aversion which dominates America for all things Marxist. I have never heard or read of Malcolm X attacking Marx, Engels, Lenin or Mao-tse-Tung. I know that he has always admired, I might even say revered, the works of W. E. B. DuBois . . . The truths which Malcolm X enunciates are bitter. Many people find them hard to swallow.”

Basner would have the last word in the debate in an attempt to rehabilitate himself politically by quoting from a speech delivered by Malcolm X in Chicago upon his return to the U.S. which emphasized the economic and class dimensions of the African American struggle. Basner said in the final article: “In the next few years the effects of automation under capitalism will swell the ranks of those millions already unemployed . . . there is the natural army, with the Afro-American in the vanguard, which can carry on the real fight for civil rights . . . . I will be told that this army cannot be assembled. I answer it must be because there is no other army.” (May 29, 1964)

Mayfield and the Anti-Nkrumah Coup

Julian Mayfield was not in Ghana when the coup against Nkrumah was carried out on February 24, 1966. He had traveled to Spain in January and as a result of the police and military seizure of power engineered by the U.S. CIA and other western imperialist powers, remained unable to return to the country.

Although it was suspected at the time of the First Republic in Ghana that Washington was pursuing the removal of the CPP government, evidence in this regard has been subsequently revealed through the U.S. State Department declassified documents. Many of the progressive African Americans residing in Ghana during 1966 soon left the country including Shirley Graham Du Bois and Dr. William Alpheus Hunton, who was appointed as Director of the Encyclopedia Africana Project in the aftermath of the passing of Dr. Du Bois.

Mayfield lived in Spain for a year and eventually returned to the U.S. in 1967. The FBI remained interested in his work well into the 1970s. He would later travel to Guyana in 1971 to work for the government of the-then President Forbes Burnham.

Mayfield wrote and acted in the film Uptight which was created in the wake of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968. Three months following the King assassination and the subsequent urban rebellions in approximately 125 cities across the country, Cleveland would erupt on July 23, 1968. The Glenville Rebellion resulted in the ambushing and deaths of police officers. Fred Ahmed Evans, a Black Nationalist leader in Cleveland, was prosecuted and convicted for the murder of four people and given the death penalty. Evans was never placed in the electric chair however he reportedly died of cancer in 1978 while serving a life sentence in Lucasville Correctional Facility in Ohio.

Julian Mayfield after living in Guyana for four years won a Fulbright Fellowship to teach in West Germany and Turkey during 1976. He later worked as a lecturer at the University of Maryland at College Park and finally as a writer-in-residence at Howard University in Washington, D.C.

Mayfield died of a heart attack in Takoma Park, Maryland on October 20, 1984 at the age of 56.

On Monday, the Jaish al-Islam militant group, known to be supported by Saudi Arabia, launched missiles against government forces positions in the Damascus countryside. Jaish al-Islam allegedly captured some missiles in the Qalamoun area in 2013. The usage of these missiles is a clear indication that Jaish al-Islam, which keeps positions in the Eastern Ghouta region near the Syrian capital, is not going to follow a ceasefire agreement promoted by Damascus, Tehran, Ankara, and Moscow in the so-called “Astana format”.

Meanwhile, Turkish-backed militants captured some five Syrian army soldiers in the countryside of al-Bab. The incident took place as result of tensions between government troops and pro-Turksih forces in Tadef and west of Manbij.

The Syrian army’s Tiger Forces, backed up by the Russian Aerospace Forces, have continued operations in the Aleppo province, focusing on the water plant and the airport. The same move is aimed to isolate Deir Hafer.

In the western Aleppo countryside, fighting between the army and militants has been on-going in the area of Rashidin.

The Syrian army and the National Defense Forces have reportedly retaken the Jazal Oil Field from the ISIS terrorist group in the province of Homs. If confirmed, government troops will be in control of two important oilfields along the Homs-Palmyra highway.

WikiLeaks has published what it claims is the largest ever release of confidential documents on the CIA. It includes more than 8,000 documents as part of ‘Vault 7’, a series of leaks on the agency, which have allegedly emerged from the CIA’s Center For Cyber Intelligence in Langley, and which can be seen on the org chart below, which Wikileaks also released:

A total of 8,761 documents have been published as part of ‘Year Zero’, the first in a series of leaks the whistleblower organization has dubbed ‘Vault 7.’ WikiLeaks said that ‘Year Zero’ revealed details of the CIA’s “global covert hacking program,” including “weaponized exploits” used against company products including “Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android and Microsoft’s Windows and even Samsung TVs, which are turned into covert microphones.”

WikiLeaks tweeted the leak, which it claims came from a network inside the CIA’s Center for Cyber Intelligence in Langley, Virginia.

Among the more notable disclosures which, if confirmed, “would rock the technology world“, the CIA had managed to bypass encryption on popular phone and messaging services such as Signal, WhatsApp and Telegram. According to the statement from WikiLeaks, government hackers can penetrate Android phones and collect “audio and message traffic before encryption is applied.”

Another profound revelation is that the CIA can engage in “false flag” cyberattacks which portray Russia as the assailant. Discussing the CIA’s Remote Devices Branch’s UMBRAGE group, Wikileaks’ source notes that it “collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques ‘stolen’ from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation.

“With UMBRAGE and related projects the CIA cannot only increase its total number of attack types but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the “fingerprints” of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from. UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers, password collection, webcam capture, data destruction, persistence, privilege escalation, stealth, anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques.”

As Kim Dotcom summarizes this finding, “CIA uses techniques to make cyber attacks look like they originated from enemy state. It turns DNC/Russia hack allegation by CIA into a JOKE”

But perhaps what is most notable is the purported emergence of another Snowden-type whistleblower: the source of the information told WikiLeaks in a statement that they wish to initiate a public debate about the “security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.”  Policy questions that should be debated in public include “whether the CIA’s hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency,” WikiLeaks claims the source said.

The FAQ section of the release, shown below, provides further details on the extent of the leak, which was “obtained recently and covers through 2016”. The time period covered in the latest leak is between the years 2013 and 2016, according to the CIA timestamps on the documents themselves. Secondly, WikiLeaks has asserted that it has not mined the entire leak and has only verified it, asking that journalists and activists do the leg work.

Among the various techniques profiled by WikiLeaks is “Weeping Angel”, developed by the CIA’s Embedded Devices Branch (EDB), which infests smart TVs, transforming them into covert microphones. After infestation, Weeping Angel places the target TV in a ‘Fake-Off’ mode, so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it is on. In ‘Fake-Off’ mode the TV operates as a bug, recording conversations in the room and sending them over the Internet to a covert CIA server.

As Kim Dotcom chimed in on Twitter, “CIA turns Smart TVs, iPhones, gaming consoles and many other consumer gadgets into open microphones” and added ” CIA turned every Microsoft Windows PC in the world into spyware. Can activate backdoors on demand, including via Windows update”

Dotcom also added that “Obama accused Russia of cyberattacks while his CIA turned all internet enabled consumer electronics in Russia into listening devices. Wow!”

Julian Assange, WikiLeaks editor stated that “There is an extreme proliferation risk in the development of cyber ‘weapons’. Comparisons can be drawn between the uncontrolled proliferation of such ‘weapons’, which results from the inability to contain them combined with their high market value, and the global arms trade. But the significance of “Year Zero” goes well beyond the choice between cyberwar and cyberpeace. The disclosure is also exceptional from a political, legal and forensic perspective.”

Key Highlights from the Vault 7 release so far:

• “Year Zero” introduces the scope and direction of the CIA’s global covert hacking program, its malware arsenal and dozens of “zero day” weaponized exploits against a wide range of U.S. and European company products, include Apple’s iPhone, Google’s Android and Microsoft’s Windows and even Samsung TVs, which are turned into covert microphones.
• Wikileaks claims that the CIA lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal including malware, viruses, trojans, weaponized “zero day” exploits, malware remote control systems and associated documentation. This extraordinary collection, which amounts to more than several hundred million lines of code, gives its possessor the entire hacking capacity of the CIA. The archive appears to have been circulated among former U.S. government hackers and contractors in an unauthorized manner, one of whom has provided WikiLeaks with portions of the archive.
• By the end of 2016, the CIA’s hacking division, which formally falls under the agency’s Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI), had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans, viruses, and other “weaponized” malware. Such is the scale of the CIA’s undertaking that by 2016, its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook.
• The CIA had created, in effect, its “own NSA” with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capacities of a rival agency could be justified.
• Once a single cyber ‘weapon’ is ‘loose’ it can spread around the world in seconds, to be used by rival states, cyber mafia and teenage hackers alike.

Snowden 2.0?

• In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA’s hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency. The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.

CIA targets iPhones, Androids, smart TVs:

• CIA malware and hacking tools are built by EDG (Engineering Development Group), a software development group within CCI (Center for Cyber Intelligence), a department belonging to the CIA’s DDI (Directorate for Digital Innovation). The DDI is one of the five major directorates of the CIA (see this organizational chart of the CIA for more details).
• The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell’s 1984, but “Weeping Angel”, developed by the CIA’s Embedded Devices Branch (EDB), which infests smart TVs, transforming them into covert microphones, is surely its most emblematic realization.

Also cars, suggesting that the CIA may have a role in the death of Michael Hastings:

• As of October 2014 the CIA was also looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks.
• The purpose of such control is not specified, but it would permit the CIA to engage in nearly undetectable assassinations.

And computers:

• The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware. This includes multiple local and remote weaponized “zero days”, air gap jumping viruses such as “Hammer Drill” which infects software distributed on CD/DVDs, infectors for removable media such as USBs, systems to hide data in images or in covert disk areas ( “Brutal Kangaroo”) and to keep its malware infestations going.

Hoarding of Zero Day exploits:

• In the wake of Edward Snowden’s leaks about the NSA, the U.S. technology industry secured a commitment from the Obama administration that the executive would disclose on an ongoing basis — rather than hoard — serious vulnerabilities, exploits, bugs or “zero days” to Apple, Google, Microsoft, and other US-based manufacturers.
• Serious vulnerabilities not disclosed to the manufacturers places huge swathes of the population and critical infrastructure at risk to foreign intelligence or cyber criminals who independently discover or hear rumors of the vulnerability. If the CIA can discover such vulnerabilities so can others.

Proliferation of leaked/hacked Cyberwar programs:

• While nuclear proliferation has been restrained by the enormous costs and visible infrastructure involved in assembling enough fissile material to produce a critical nuclear mass, cyber ‘weapons’, once developed, are very hard to retain. Cyber ‘weapons’ are in fact just computer programs which can be pirated like any other. Since they are entirely comprised of information they can be copied quickly with no marginal cost.
• Over the last three years the United States intelligence sector, which consists of government agencies such as the CIA and NSA and their contractors, such as Booze Allan Hamilton, has been subject to unprecedented series of data exfiltrations by its own workers.
• Once a single cyber ‘weapon’ is ‘loose’ it can spread around the world in seconds, to be used by peer states, cyber mafia and teenage hackers alike.

The U.S. Consulate in Frankfurt is a covert CIA hacker base

• In addition to its operations in Langley, Virginia the CIA also uses the U.S. consulate in Frankfurt as a covert base for its hackers covering Europe, the Middle East and Africa. CIA hackers operating out of the Frankfurt consulate ( “Center for Cyber Intelligence Europe” or CCIE) are given diplomatic (“black”) passports and State Department cover.
• The instructions for incoming CIA hackers make Germany’s counter-intelligence efforts appear inconsequential: “Breeze through German Customs because you have your cover-for-action story down pat, and all they did was stamp your passport”

Examples of CIA projects

• The CIA’s Engineering Development Group (EDG) management system contains around 500 different projects (only some of which are documented by “Year Zero”) each with their own sub-projects, malware and hacker tools. The majority of these projects relate to tools that are used for penetration, infestation (“implanting”), control, and exfiltration.
• Umbrage: The CIA’s Remote Devices Branch’s UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques ‘stolen’ from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation. With UMBRAGE and related projects the CIA cannot only increase its total number of attack types but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the “fingerprints” of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from.
• Fine Dining:  Fine Dining comes with a standardized questionnaire i.e menu that CIA case officers fill out. The questionnaire is used by the agency’s OSB (Operational Support Branch) to transform the requests of case officers into technical requirements for hacking attacks (typically “exfiltrating” information from computer systems) for specific operations.  Among the list of possible targets of the collection are ‘Asset’, ‘Liason Asset’, ‘System Administrator’, ‘Foreign Information Operations’, ‘Foreign Intelligence Agencies’ and ‘Foreign Government Entities’. Notably absent is any reference to extremists or transnational criminals.
• ‘Improvise’; a toolset for configuration, post-processing, payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender), MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor).
• HIVE: HIVE is a multi-platform CIA malware suite and its associated control software. The project provides customizable implants for Windows, Solaris, MikroTik (used in internet routers) and Linux platforms and a Listening Post (LP)/Command and Control (C2) infrastructure to communicate with these implants. The implants are configured to communicate via HTTPS with the webserver of a cover domain; each operation utilizing these implants has a separate cover domain and the infrastructure can handle any number of cover domains.

And some key sections from the FAQ:

• What time period is covered? The years 2013 to 2016. The sort order of the pages within each level is determined by date (oldest first). WikiLeaks has obtained the CIA’s creation/last modification date for each page but these do not yet appear for technical reasons. Usually the date can be discerned or approximated from the content and the page order. If it is critical to know the exact time/date contact WikiLeaks.
• What is “Vault 7” “Vault 7” is a substantial collection of material about CIA activities obtained by WikiLeaks.
• What is the total size of “Vault 7”? The series is the largest intelligence publication in history.
• When was each part of “Vault 7” obtained?: Part one was obtained recently and covers through 2016. Details on the other parts will be available at the time of publication.
• Is each part of “Vault 7” from a different source? Details on the other parts will be available at the time of publication.
• How did WikiLeaks obtain each part of “Vault 7”? Sources trust WikiLeaks to not reveal information that might help identify them.
• Isn’t WikiLeaks worried that the CIA will act against its staff to stop the series? No. That would be certainly counter-productive.

* * *

PREVIOUSLY

As a reminder, last night Wikileaks announced that it has released an encrypted torrent file which reportedly contains information on the mysterious “Vault 7”, and which we now know is the biggest “collection of material about CIA activities obtained by WikiLeaks.publication in history.” It can be downloaded now at the following URL, and accessed using the password “SplinterItIntoAThousandPiecesAndScatterItIntoTheWinds”

Wikileaks had previously announced that it would hold an 8am Eastern press conference, as part of the unveiling.

However, there appeared to have been some complications, with Wikileaks tweeting that “the press conference is under attack: Facebook+Periscope video used by WikiLeaks’ editor Julian Assange have been attacked. Activating contingency plans”

Wikileaks then announced that “As Mr. Assange’s Perscipe+Facebook video stream links are under attack his video press conference will be rescheduled.”

In a separate tweet, Wikileaks has just released the passphrase to decrypt the torrent file: RELEASE: CIA Vault 7 Year Zero decryption passphrase:

SplinterItIntoAThousandPiecesAndScatterItIntoTheWinds

As a result, since Assange appears to have been unable to launch his previously scheduled press conference, he has gone ahead and issued the press release on Vault 7 Part 1 “Year Zero, which is titled: Inside the CIA’s global hacking force:

Press Release

Vault 7: CIA Hacking Tools Revealed

Today, Tuesday 7 March 2017, WikiLeaks begins its new series of leaks on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Code-named “Vault 7” by WikiLeaks, it is the largest ever publication of confidential documents on the agency.

The first full part of the series, “Year Zero”, comprises 8,761 documents and files from an isolated, high-security network situated inside the CIA’s Center for Cyber Intelligence in Langley, Virgina. It follows an introductory disclosure last month of CIA targeting French political parties and candidates in the lead up to the 2012 presidential election.

Recently, the CIA lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal including malware, viruses, trojans, weaponized “zero day” exploits, malware remote control systems and associated documentation. This extraordinary collection, which amounts to more than several hundred million lines of code, gives its possessor the entire hacking capacity of the CIA. The archive appears to have been circulated among former U.S. government hackers and contractors in an unauthorized manner, one of whom has provided WikiLeaks with portions of the archive.

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

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

By the end of 2016, the CIA’s hacking division, which formally falls under the agency’s Center for Cyber Intelligence(CCI), had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans, viruses, and other “weaponized” malware. Such is the scale of the CIA’s undertaking that by 2016, its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook. The CIA had created, in effect, its “own NSA” with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capacities of a rival agency could be justified.

In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA’s hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency. The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.

Once a single cyber ‘weapon’ is ‘loose’ it can spread around the world in seconds, to be used by rival states, cyber mafia and teenage hackers alike.

Julian Assange, WikiLeaks editor stated that “There is an extreme proliferation risk in the development of cyber ‘weapons’. Comparisons can be drawn between the uncontrolled proliferation of such ‘weapons’, which results from the inability to contain them combined with their high market value, and the global arms trade. But the significance of “Year Zero” goes well beyond the choice between cyberwar and cyberpeace. The disclosure is also exceptional from a political, legal and forensic perspective.”

Wikileaks has carefully reviewed the “Year Zero” disclosure and published substantive CIA documentation while avoiding the distribution of ‘armed’ cyberweapons until a consensus emerges on the technical and political nature of the CIA’s program and how such ‘weapons’ should analyzed, disarmed and published.

Wikileaks has also decided to redact and anonymise some identifying information in “Year Zero” for in depth analysis. These redactions include ten of thousands of CIA targets and attack machines throughout Latin America, Europe and the United States. While we are aware of the imperfect results of any approach chosen, we remain committed to our publishing model and note that the quantity of published pages in “Vault 7” part one (“Year Zero”) already eclipses the total number of pages published over the first three years of the Edward Snowden NSA leaks.

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Analysis

CIA malware targets iPhone, Android, smart TVs

CIA malware and hacking tools are built by EDG (Engineering Development Group), a software development group within CCI (Center for Cyber Intelligence), a department belonging to the CIA’s DDI (Directorate for Digital Innovation). The DDI is one of the five major directorates of the CIA (see this organizational chart of the CIA for more details).

The EDG is responsible for the development, testing and operational support of all backdoors, exploits, malicious payloads, trojans, viruses and any other kind of malware used by the CIA in its covert operations world-wide.

The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell’s 1984, but “Weeping Angel”, developed by the CIA’s Embedded Devices Branch (EDB), which infests smart TVs, transforming them into covert microphones, is surely its most emblematic realization.

The attack against Samsung smart TVs was developed in cooperation with the United Kingdom’s MI5/BTSS. After infestation, Weeping Angel places the target TV in a ‘Fake-Off’ mode, so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it is on. In ‘Fake-Off’ mode the TV operates as a bug, recording conversations in the room and sending them over the Internet to a covert CIA server.

As of October 2014 the CIA was also looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks. The purpose of such control is not specified, but it would permit the CIA to engage in nearly undetectable assassinations.

The CIA’s Mobile Devices Branch (MDB) developed numerous attacks to remotely hack and control popular smart phones. Infected phones can be instructed to send the CIA the user’s geolocation, audio and text communications as well as covertly activate the phone’s camera and microphone.

Despite iPhone’s minority share (14.5%) of the global smart phone market in 2016, a specialized unit in the CIA’s Mobile Development Branch produces malware to infest, control and exfiltrate data from iPhones and other Apple products running iOS, such as iPads. CIA’s arsenal includes numerous local and remote “zero days” developed by CIA or obtained from GCHQ, NSA, FBI or purchased from cyber arms contractors such as Baitshop. The disproportionate focus on iOS may be explained by the popularity of the iPhone among social, political, diplomatic and business elites.

A similar unit targets Google’s Android which is used to run the majority of the world’s smart phones (~85%) including Samsung, HTC and Sony. 1.15 billion Android powered phones were sold last year. “Year Zero” shows that as of 2016 the CIA had 24 “weaponized” Android “zero days” which it has developed itself and obtained from GCHQ, NSA and cyber arms contractors.

These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, Wiebo, Confide and Cloackman by hacking the “smart” phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied.

CIA malware targets Windows, OSx, Linux, routers

The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware. This includes multiple local and remote weaponized “zero days”, air gap jumping viruses such as “Hammer Drill” which infects software distributed on CD/DVDs, infectors for removable media such as USBs, systems to hide data in images or in covert disk areas ( “Brutal Kangaroo”) and to keep its malware infestations going.

Many of these infection efforts are pulled together by the CIA’s Automated Implant Branch (AIB), which has developed several attack systems for automated infestation and control of CIA malware, such as “Assassin” and “Medusa”.

Attacks against Internet infrastructure and webservers are developed by the CIA’s Network Devices Branch (NDB).

The CIA has developed automated multi-platform malware attack and control systems covering Windows, Mac OS X, Solaris, Linux and more, such as EDB’s “HIVE” and the related “Cutthroat” and “Swindle” tools, which are described in the examples section below.

CIA ‘hoarded’ vulnerabilities (“zero days”)

In the wake of Edward Snowden’s leaks about the NSA, the U.S. technology industry secured a commitment from the Obama administration that the executive would disclose on an ongoing basis — rather than hoard — serious vulnerabilities, exploits, bugs or “zero days” to Apple, Google, Microsoft, and other US-based manufacturers.

Serious vulnerabilities not disclosed to the manufacturers places huge swathes of the population and critical infrastructure at risk to foreign intelligence or cyber criminals who independently discover or hear rumors of the vulnerability. If the CIA can discover such vulnerabilities so can others.

The U.S. government’s commitment to the Vulnerabilities Equities Process came after significant lobbying by US technology companies, who risk losing their share of the global market over real and perceived hidden vulnerabilities. The government stated that it would disclose all pervasive vulnerabilities discovered after 2010 on an ongoing basis.

“Year Zero” documents show that the CIA breached the Obama administration’s commitments. Many of the vulnerabilities used in the CIA’s cyber arsenal are pervasive and some may already have been found by rival intelligence agencies or cyber criminals.

As an example, specific CIA malware revealed in “Year Zero” is able to penetrate, infest and control both the Android phone and iPhone software that runs or has run presidential Twitter accounts. The CIA attacks this software by using undisclosed security vulnerabilities (“zero days”) possessed by the CIA but if the CIA can hack these phones then so can everyone else who has obtained or discovered the vulnerability. As long as the CIA keeps these vulnerabilities concealed from Apple and Google (who make the phones) they will not be fixed, and the phones will remain hackable.

The same vulnerabilities exist for the population at large, including the U.S. Cabinet, Congress, top CEOs, system administrators, security officers and engineers. By hiding these security flaws from manufacturers like Apple and Google the CIA ensures that it can hack everyone &mdsh; at the expense of leaving everyone hackable.

‘Cyberwar’ programs are a serious proliferation risk

Cyber ‘weapons’ are not possible to keep under effective control.

While nuclear proliferation has been restrained by the enormous costs and visible infrastructure involved in assembling enough fissile material to produce a critical nuclear mass, cyber ‘weapons’, once developed, are very hard to retain.

Cyber ‘weapons’ are in fact just computer programs which can be pirated like any other. Since they are entirely comprised of information they can be copied quickly with no marginal cost.

Securing such ‘weapons’ is particularly difficult since the same people who develop and use them have the skills to exfiltrate copies without leaving traces — sometimes by using the very same ‘weapons’ against the organizations that contain them. There are substantial price incentives for government hackers and consultants to obtain copies since there is a global “vulnerability market” that will pay hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars for copies of such ‘weapons’. Similarly, contractors and companies who obtain such ‘weapons’ sometimes use them for their own purposes, obtaining advantage over their competitors in selling ‘hacking’ services.

Over the last three years the United States intelligence sector, which consists of government agencies such as the CIA and NSA and their contractors, such as Booze Allan Hamilton, has been subject to unprecedented series of data exfiltrations by its own workers.

A number of intelligence community members not yet publicly named have been arrested or subject to federal criminal investigations in separate incidents.

Most visibly, on February 8, 2017 a U.S. federal grand jury indicted Harold T. Martin III with 20 counts of mishandling classified information. The Department of Justice alleged that it seized some 50,000 gigabytes of information from Harold T. Martin III that he had obtained from classified programs at NSA and CIA, including the source code for numerous hacking tools.

Once a single cyber ‘weapon’ is ‘loose’ it can spread around the world in seconds, to be used by peer states, cyber mafia and teenage hackers alike.

U.S. Consulate in Frankfurt is a covert CIA hacker base

In addition to its operations in Langley, Virginia the CIA also uses the U.S. consulate in Frankfurt as a covert base for its hackers covering Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

CIA hackers operating out of the Frankfurt consulate ( “Center for Cyber Intelligence Europe” or CCIE) are given diplomatic (“black”) passports and State Department cover. The instructions for incoming CIA hackers make Germany’s counter-intelligence efforts appear inconsequential: “Breeze through German Customs because you have your cover-for-action story down pat, and all they did was stamp your passport”

Your Cover Story (for this trip)

Q: Why are you here?
A: Supporting technical consultations at the Consulate.

Two earlier WikiLeaks publications give further detail on CIA approaches to customs and secondary screening procedures.

Once in Frankfurt CIA hackers can travel without further border checks to the 25 European countries that are part of the Shengen open border area — including France, Italy and Switzerland.

A number of the CIA’s electronic attack methods are designed for physical proximity. These attack methods are able to penetrate high security networks that are disconnected from the internet, such as police record database. In these cases, a CIA officer, agent or allied intelligence officer acting under instructions, physically infiltrates the targeted workplace. The attacker is provided with a USB containing malware developed for the CIA for this purpose, which is inserted into the targeted computer. The attacker then infects and exfiltrates data to removable media. For example, the CIA attack system Fine Dining, provides 24 decoy applications for CIA spies to use. To witnesses, the spy appears to be running a program showing videos (e.g VLC), presenting slides (Prezi), playing a computer game (Breakout2, 2048) or even running a fake virus scanner (Kaspersky, McAfee, Sophos). But while the decoy application is on the screen, the underlaying system is automatically infected and ransacked.

How the CIA dramatically increased proliferation risks

In what is surely one of the most astounding intelligence own goals in living memory, the CIA structured its classification regime such that for the most market valuable part of “Vault 7” — the CIA’s weaponized malware (implants + zero days), Listening Posts (LP), and Command and Control (C2) systems — the agency has little legal recourse.

The CIA made these systems unclassified.

Why the CIA chose to make its cyberarsenal unclassified reveals how concepts developed for military use do not easily crossover to the ‘battlefield’ of cyber ‘war’.

To attack its targets, the CIA usually requires that its implants communicate with their control programs over the internet. If CIA implants, Command & Control and Listening Post software were classified, then CIA officers could be prosecuted or dismissed for violating rules that prohibit placing classified information onto the Internet. Consequently the CIA has secretly made most of its cyber spying/war code unclassified. The U.S. government is not able to assert copyright either, due to restrictions in the U.S. Constitution. This means that cyber ‘arms’ manufactures and computer hackers can freely “pirate” these ‘weapons’ if they are obtained. The CIA has primarily had to rely on obfuscation to protect its malware secrets.

Conventional weapons such as missiles may be fired at the enemy (i.e into an unsecured area). Proximity to or impact with the target detonates the ordnance including its classified parts. Hence military personnel do not violate classification rules by firing ordnance with classified parts. Ordnance will likely explode. If it does not, that is not the operator’s intent.

Over the last decade U.S. hacking operations have been increasingly dressed up in military jargon to tap into Department of Defense funding streams. For instance, attempted “malware injections” (commercial jargon) or “implant drops” (NSA jargon) are being called “fires” as if a weapon was being fired. However the analogy is questionable.

Unlike bullets, bombs or missiles, most CIA malware is designed to live for days or even years after it has reached its ‘target’. CIA malware does not “explode on impact” but rather permanently infests its target. In order to infect target’s device, copies of the malware must be placed on the target’s devices, giving physical possession of the malware to the target. To exfiltrate data back to the CIA or to await further instructions the malware must communicate with CIA Command & Control (C2) systems placed on internet connected servers. But such servers are typically not approved to hold classified information, so CIA command and control systems are also made unclassified.

A successful ‘attack’ on a target’s computer system is more like a series of complex stock maneuvers in a hostile take-over bid or the careful planting of rumors in order to gain control over an organization’s leadership rather than the firing of a weapons system. If there is a military analogy to be made, the infestation of a target is perhaps akin to the execution of a whole series of military maneuvers against the target’s territory including observation, infiltration, occupation and exploitation.

Evading forensics and anti-virus

A series of standards lay out CIA malware infestation patterns which are likely to assist forensic crime scene investigators as well as Apple, Microsoft, Google, Samsung, Nokia, Blackberry, Siemens and anti-virus companies attribute and defend against attacks.

“Tradecraft DO’s and DON’Ts” contains CIA rules on how its malware should be written to avoid fingerprints implicating the “CIA, US government, or its witting partner companies” in “forensic review”. Similar secret standards cover the use of encryption to hide CIA hacker and malware communication (pdf), describing targets & exfiltrated data (pdf) as well as executing payloads (pdf) and persisting (pdf) in the target’s machines over time.

CIA hackers developed successful attacks against most well known anti-virus programs. These are documented in AV defeats, Personal Security Products, Detecting and defeating PSPs and PSP/Debugger/RE Avoidance. For example, Comodo was defeated by CIA malware placing itself in the Window’s “Recycle Bin”. While Comodo 6.x has a “Gaping Hole of DOOM”.

CIA hackers discussed what the NSA’s “Equation Group” hackers did wrong and how the CIA’s malware makers could avoid similar exposure.

Examples

The CIA’s Engineering Development Group (EDG) management system contains around 500 different projects (only some of which are documented by “Year Zero”) each with their own sub-projects, malware and hacker tools.

The majority of these projects relate to tools that are used for penetration, infestation (“implanting”), control, and exfiltration.

Another branch of development focuses on the development and operation of Listening Posts (LP) and Command and Control (C2) systems used to communicate with and control CIA implants; special projects are used to target specific hardware from routers to smart TVs.

Some example projects are described below, but see the table of contents for the full list of projects described by WikiLeaks’ “Year Zero”.

UMBRAGE

The CIA’s hand crafted hacking techniques pose a problem for the agency. Each technique it has created forms a “fingerprint” that can be used by forensic investigators to attribute multiple different attacks to the same entity.

This is analogous to finding the same distinctive knife wound on multiple separate murder victims. The unique wounding style creates suspicion that a single murderer is responsible. As soon one murder in the set is solved then the other murders also find likely attribution.

The CIA’s Remote Devices Branch‘s UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques ‘stolen’ from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation.

With UMBRAGE and related projects the CIA cannot only increase its total number of attack types but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the “fingerprints” of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from.

UMBRAGE components cover keyloggers, password collection, webcam capture, data destruction, persistence, privilege escalation, stealth, anti-virus (PSP) avoidance and survey techniques.

Fine Dining

Fine Dining comes with a standardized questionnaire i.e menu that CIA case officers fill out. The questionnaire is used by the agency’s OSB (Operational Support Branch) to transform the requests of case officers into technical requirements for hacking attacks (typically “exfiltrating” information from computer systems) for specific operations. The questionnaire allows the OSB to identify how to adapt existing tools for the operation, and communicate this to CIA malware configuration staff. The OSB functions as the interface between CIA operational staff and the relevant technical support staff.

Among the list of possible targets of the collection are ‘Asset’, ‘Liason Asset’, ‘System Administrator’, ‘Foreign Information Operations’, ‘Foreign Intelligence Agencies’ and ‘Foreign Government Entities’. Notably absent is any reference to extremists or transnational criminals. The ‘Case Officer’ is also asked to specify the environment of the target like the type of computer, operating system used, Internet connectivity and installed anti-virus utilities (PSPs) as well as a list of file types to be exfiltrated like Office documents, audio, video, images or custom file types. The ‘menu’ also asks for information if recurring access to the target is possible and how long unobserved access to the computer can be maintained. This information is used by the CIA’s ‘JQJIMPROVISE’ software (see below) to configure a set of CIA malware suited to the specific needs of an operation.

Improvise (JQJIMPROVISE)

‘Improvise’ is a toolset for configuration, post-processing, payload setup and execution vector selection for survey/exfiltration tools supporting all major operating systems like Windows (Bartender), MacOS (JukeBox) and Linux (DanceFloor). Its configuration utilities like Margarita allows the NOC (Network Operation Center) to customize tools based on requirements from ‘Fine Dining’ questionairies.

HIVE

HIVE is a multi-platform CIA malware suite and its associated control software. The project provides customizable implants for Windows, Solaris, MikroTik (used in internet routers) and Linux platforms and a Listening Post (LP)/Command and Control (C2) infrastructure to communicate with these implants.

The implants are configured to communicate via HTTPS with the webserver of a cover domain; each operation utilizing these implants has a separate cover domain and the infrastructure can handle any number of cover domains.

Each cover domain resolves to an IP address that is located at a commercial VPS (Virtual Private Server) provider. The public-facing server forwards all incoming traffic via a VPN to a ‘Blot’ server that handles actual connection requests from clients. It is setup for optional SSL client authentication: if a client sends a valid client certificate (only implants can do that), the connection is forwarded to the ‘Honeycomb’ toolserver that communicates with the implant; if a valid certificate is missing (which is the case if someone tries to open the cover domain website by accident), the traffic is forwarded to a cover server that delivers an unsuspicious looking website.

The Honeycomb toolserver receives exfiltrated information from the implant; an operator can also task the implant to execute jobs on the target computer, so the toolserver acts as a C2 (command and control) server for the implant.

Similar functionality (though limited to Windows) is provided by the RickBobby project.

See the classified user and developer guides for HIVE.

* * *

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Why now?

WikiLeaks published as soon as its verification and analysis were ready.

In Febuary the Trump administration has issued an Executive Order calling for a “Cyberwar” review to be prepared within 30 days.

While the review increases the timeliness and relevance of the publication it did not play a role in setting the publication date.

Redactions

Names, email addresses and external IP addresses have been redacted in the released pages (70,875 redactions in total) until further analysis is complete.

1. Over-redaction: Some items may have been redacted that are not employees, contractors, targets or otherwise related to the agency, but are, for example, authors of documentation for otherwise public projects that are used by the agency.
2. Identity vs. person: the redacted names are replaced by user IDs (numbers) to allow readers to assign multiple pages to a single author. Given the redaction process used a single person may be represented by more than one assigned identifier but no identifier refers to more than one real person.
3. Archive attachments (zip, tar.gz, …) are replaced with a PDF listing all the file names in the archive. As the archive content is assessed it may be made available; until then the archive is redacted.
4. Attachments with other binary content are replaced by a hex dump of the content to prevent accidental invocation of binaries that may have been infected with weaponized CIA malware. As the content is assessed it may be made available; until then the content is redacted.
5. The tens of thousands of routable IP addresses references (including more than 22 thousand within the United States) that correspond to possible targets, CIA covert listening post servers, intermediary and test systems, are redacted for further exclusive investigation.
6. Binary files of non-public origin are only available as dumps to prevent accidental invocation of CIA malware infected binaries.

Organizational Chart

The organizational chart corresponds to the material published by WikiLeaks so far.

Since the organizational structure of the CIA below the level of Directorates is not public, the placement of the EDG and its branches within the org chart of the agency is reconstructed from information contained in the documents released so far. It is intended to be used as a rough outline of the internal organization; please be aware that the reconstructed org chart is incomplete and that internal reorganizations occur frequently.

Wiki pages

“Year Zero” contains 7818 web pages with 943 attachments from the internal development groupware. The software used for this purpose is called Confluence, a proprietary software from Atlassian. Webpages in this system (like in Wikipedia) have a version history that can provide interesting insights on how a document evolved over time; the 7818 documents include these page histories for 1136 latest versions.

The order of named pages within each level is determined by date (oldest first). Page content is not present if it was originally dynamically created by the Confluence software (as indicated on the re-constructed page).

What time period is covered?

The years 2013 to 2016. The sort order of the pages within each level is determined by date (oldest first).

WikiLeaks has obtained the CIA’s creation/last modification date for each page but these do not yet appear for technical reasons. Usually the date can be discerned or approximated from the content and the page order. If it is critical to know the exact time/date contact WikiLeaks.

What is “Vault 7”

“Vault 7” is a substantial collection of material about CIA activities obtained by WikiLeaks.

When was each part of “Vault 7” obtained?

Part one was obtained recently and covers through 2016. Details on the other parts will be available at the time of publication.

Is each part of “Vault 7” from a different source?

Details on the other parts will be available at the time of publication.

What is the total size of “Vault 7”?

The series is the largest intelligence publication in history.

How did WikiLeaks obtain each part of “Vault 7”?

Sources trust WikiLeaks to not reveal information that might help identify them.

Isn’t WikiLeaks worried that the CIA will act against its staff to stop the series?

No. That would be certainly counter-productive.

Has WikiLeaks already ‘mined’ all the best stories?

No. WikiLeaks has intentionally not written up hundreds of impactful stories to encourage others to find them and so create expertise in the area for subsequent parts in the series. They’re there. Look. Those who demonstrate journalistic excellence may be considered for early access to future parts.

Won’t other journalists find all the best stories before me?

Unlikely. There are very considerably more stories than there are journalists or academics who are in a position to write them.

The fact that the White House is seriously weighing the option of using military force against North Korea is an obvious deviation from what President Donald Trump said during the election campaign. He promised that the US would keep away from local conflicts. According to him, Iran was the main geopolitical foe. Now, this concept appears to be reviewed.

According to a The Wall Street Journal’s report, the US administration contemplates a military first strike against North Korea should that country come close to testing an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of delivering a nuclear warhead against the continental United States. US officials have underscored the possible military dimensions of their emerging strategy in recent discussions with allies, suggesting that the planning is at an advanced stage.

The Conservative Daily Post reported that, according to a source close to the White House, during a summit in February between President Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, discussions included statements that all options for dealing with North Korea were currently under consideration. In mid-February, Kathleen Troia McFarland, Deputy National Security Adviser, asked national security officials for proposals on the US’s North Korea policy.

During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing in December, Sen. Lindsey Graham revealed that said he intended to introduce an authorization for the use of military force to provide the president with the statutory approval to preemptively stop Pyongyang from finishing the development of its ICBM.

During a speech at the beginning of this year, Kim Jong Un claimed his country was prepared to begin testing intercontinental ballistic missiles that had the potential to reach the United States. Then-President-elect Trump took to Twitter to state the tests would not be happening. He did not elaborate but a military solution is what comes to mind.

North Korea has been testing ballistic missiles for the past few years, stepping up the frequency recently. In 2016, North Korea performed two nuclear tests and several missile launches to spark international outrage. Many arms control specialists believe that, by 2020, North Korea could have the capacity to launch a miniaturized nuclear device on an ICBM, with the range to strike at least the West Coast. It might even have that capacity sooner.

 

Last February, North Korea launched a satellite into space, which was widely seen as a test of long-range ballistic missile technology. The test suggested that North Korea was on the verge of developing a missile that could carry a 1,300-pound warhead some 7,000 miles. Pyongyang is believed to be capable of mounting a nuclear warhead on a ballistic missile but the capability to miniaturize a nuclear device has been questioned. Nor has it yet tested the missile’s re-entry capability needed to reach a specific target while withstanding extremes of temperature and vibration.

Tensions on the Korean peninsula have heightened recently, especially after Pyongyang performed a ballistic missile test on February 12 – the first one since US President Donald Trump took office. It was strongly condemned by the UN Security Council. Even China said that it would be suspending coal imports from North Korea for the rest of the year in response to the test. The country is highly dependent on China, which supplies it with most of its food and energy and accounts for more than 70 percent of North Korea’s total trade volume.

Amid heightened tensions over missile tests, the US and South Korean armed forces have launched a set of annual drills with several hundred thousand soldiers involved. The US would also employ aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, F-35 and the bombers B-1B and B-52 during the drills. US Defense Secretary James Mattis told his South Korean counterpart Han Min-koo the US «remains steadfast in its commitment» to South Korea’s defense. He warned that any North Korean attack on the US or its allies would be defeated and any use of nuclear weapons would be met with an «effective and overwhelming» response.

The exercise Foal Eagle will last for two months till April-end. The training event comes after Seoul claimed that Pyongyang plotted the alleged murder of Kim Jong-nam in Malaysia. North Korea has repeatedly condemned the drills as preparations for an attack.

On March 28, the South Korean government formalized the purchase of land for the installation of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system to be deployed this year. Last year, the US and South Korea agreed to build a missile defense system together. Both Russia and China have spoken out against THAAD, stating they will seek to intensify their opposition to the defense system. The Pentagon has more than 75,000 troops based in Japan and South Korea. South Korea hosts 28,000 of them.

No doubt, the US has the unexpected first strike capability can knock out the nuclear infrastructure using stealth aircraft and sea-based standoff cruise missiles. The aircraft could drop GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrators to reach the targets located deep underground. Two Ohio-class cruise missile submarines with more than 300 BGM-109 missiles could be secretly deployed off the coast. The number of missiles would grow at least twice when surface ships approach North Korea. After nuclear sites are destroyed, key defense installations, including transporter erector launchers (TEL), and delivery vehicles will be hit.

The US could limit the use of force to the nuclear program only in hope to prevent de-escalation or it could conduct a large-scale operation to destroy the military potential and change the regime. In the latter case, the US forces in South Korea would become targets for a retaliatory strike in a full-scale war.

Large-scale deployment cannot be clandestine to make inevitable North Korean pre-emptive strikes, taking cover and dispersion of forces in preparation for a conflict of long duration.

There is one more scenario. The special unit known as the Korea Massive Punishment and Retaliation (KMPR) is to be mission-ready this year. It is created to decapitate North Korea by physically eliminating its leader Kim Jong Un. South Korea has already developed a plan to annihilate the North Korean capital of Pyongyang through intensive bombing in case the North shows any signs of a nuclear attack. Any campaign would employ surface-to-surface Hyunmoo 2A, 2B and Hyunmoo 3 ballistic missiles, which have ranges of 300 km (185 miles), 500 km (310 miles) and 1,000 km (620 miles), respectively, to pummel the North’s capital city.

A military plan should take into account North Korea’s capability to use chemical and biological weapons. Seoul, the capital of South Korea, is within easy artillery range. North and South Korea are still technically at war as they signed an armistice but not a treaty following the end of the Korean War in 1953.

If intermediate-range Musudan missiles are not knocked out at first strike, they can be used to hit targets as far as Japan and Guam. A conventional strike on North Korea would almost certainly escalate to war. Pyongyang has a 1.1 million-man army, including a mechanized infantry corps, an artillery corps, an armored corps, and several infantry corps. 13,000 artillery pieces deployed along the demilitarized zone, 30 miles from Seoul. It boasts around 1,100 tactical short-range and medium-range ballistic missiles, in addition to 100–200 intermediate range weapons (the Musudan).

Perhaps, a rapid, victorious military action is the best way to unite the US against the background as the ongoing internal struggle between pro-Trump and anti-Trump forces and a wave of scandals hitting media headlines. China is a hard nut to crack and an operation against Iran will entail grave implications. Among the nations unfriendly toward the US North Korea is best suited for the role.

There is another option – to revive the Six-Party talks to prevent Pyongyang from developing a nuclear-capable ICBM in exchange for a peace agreement. The US, Russia, China, Japan and South Korea, as well as other international heavyweights and pertinent actors, could join forces to give a new impulse to the negotiation process.

The US and China are critical players but the bilateral relationship has deteriorated, especially after Donald Trump took office. The two rivals appear to be on a collision course. Russia is in position to mediate and bring them together. The same applies to the tense situation in the South China Sea. The three powers could set the differences aside to speak with one voice on this specific issue as no one is interested in Pyongyang going nuclear. North Korea is another security problem that needs to be urgently addressed internationally before it is too late. It should also become part of Russia-US security agenda.

The liberal elites, who bear significant responsibility for the death of our democracy, now hold themselves up as the saviors of the republic. They have embarked, despite their own corruption and their complicity in neoliberalism and the crimes of empire, on a self-righteous moral crusade to topple Donald Trump. It is quite a show. They attack Trump’s “lies,” denounce executive orders such as his travel ban as un-American and blame Trump’s election on Russia or FBI Director James Comey rather than the failed neoliberal policies they themselves advanced.

Where was this moral outrage when our privacy was taken from us by the security and surveillance state, the criminals on Wall Street were bailed out, we were stripped of our civil liberties and 2.3 million men and women were packed into our prisons, most of them poor people of color? Why did they not thunder with indignation as money replaced the vote and elected officials and corporate lobbyists instituted our system of legalized bribery? Where were the impassioned critiques of the absurd idea of allowing a nation to be governed by the dictates of corporations, banks and hedge fund managers? Why did they cater to the foibles and utterings of fellow elites, all the while blacklisting critics of the corporate state and ignoring the misery of the poor and the working class? Where was their moral righteousness when the United States committed war crimes in the Middle East and our militarized police carried out murderous rampages? What the liberal elites do now is not moral. It is self-exaltation disguised as piety. It is part of the carnival act.

The liberal class, ranging from Hollywood and the Democratic leadership to The New York Times and CNN, refuses to acknowledge that it sold the Democratic Party to corporate bidders; collaborated in the evisceration of our civil liberties; helped destroy programs such as welfare, orchestrate the job-killing North American Free Trade Agreement and Trans-Pacific Partnership deal, wage endless war, debase our public institutions including the press and build the world’s largest prison system.

“The truth is hard to find. The truth is hard to know. The truth is more important than ever,” reads a television ad for The New York Times. What the paper fails to add is that the hardest place to find the truth about the forces affecting the life of the average American and the truth about empire is in The New York Times itself. News organizations, from the Times to the tawdry forms of entertainment masquerading as news on television, have rendered most people and their concerns invisible. Liberal institutions, especially the press, function, as the journalist and author Matt Taibbi says, as “the guardians” of the neoliberal and imperial orthodoxy.

It is the job of the guardians of orthodoxy to plaster over the brutal reality and cruelty of neoliberalism and empire with a patina of civility or entertainment. They pay homage to a nonexistent democracy and nonexistent American virtues. The elites, who live in enclaves of privilege in cities such as New York, Washington and San Francisco, scold an enraged population. They tell those they dismiss as inferiors to calm down, be reasonable and patient and trust in the goodness of the old ruling class and the American system. African-Americans have heard this kind of cant preached by the white ruling class for a couple of centuries.

Because the system works for the elites, and because the elites interact only with other elites, they are mystified about the revolt rising up from the decayed cities they fly over in the middle of the country. They think they can stuff this inexplicable rage back in the box. They continue to offer up absurd solutions to deindustrialization and despair, such as Thomas Friedman’s endorsement of “a culture of entrepreneurship” and “an ethic of pluralism.” These kinds of bromides are advertising jingles. They bear no more connection to reality than Trump promising to make America great again.

I walked into the Harvard Club in New York City after midnight on election night. The well-heeled New York elites stood, their mouths agape, looking up at the television screens in the oak-paneled bar while wearing their Clinton campaign straw hats. They could not speak. They were in shock. The system they funded to prevent anyone from outside their circle, Republican or Democrat, from achieving the presidency had inexplicably collapsed.

Taibbi, when I interviewed him in New York, said political power in our corporate state is controlled by “a tripartite system.” “You have to have the assent of the press, the donor class, and one of the two [major] political parties to get in,” said Taibbi, author of “Insane Clown President: Dispatches From the 2016 Circus.”

“It’s an exclusive club. It’s like a membership system. They all have to agree and confer their blessing on the candidate. Trump somehow managed to get past all three of those obstacles. And he did it essentially by putting all of them on trial. He put the press on trial and villainized them with the public. I think it was a brilliant masterstroke that nobody saw coming. But it wouldn’t have been possible if their unpopularity hadn’t been building for years and years and years.”

“It’s a kind of Stockholm syndrome,” he said of the press.

“The reporters, candidates, and candidates’ aides are all thrown together. They’re stuck in the same environment with each other day after day, month after month. After a while, they start to unconsciously adopt each other’s values. Then they start to live in the same neighborhoods. They go to the same parties. Then it becomes a year-after-year kind of thing. Then after that, they’re the same people. It’s a total perversion of what’s supposed to happen. We’re [the press] supposed to be on the outside, not identifying with these people. But now, it’s a club. Journalists enjoy the experience of being close to power.”

At first the press, especially the television press, could not get enough of Trump. He received 23 times the coverage of Sen. Bernie Sanders, who spoke about things that do not make for great television—inequality and corporate corruption. Trump brought in the advertising dollars. 2016 was CNN’s most profitable year. Then, alarmed at Trump’s ascendancy, the press set out to destroy him. The press applied its Darth Vader Force choke. It did not work. They tried it again and again. The Force had deserted them.

“When a candidate makes a mistake and steps in it—[2004 presidential hopeful] Howard Dean is the classic example, the scream—then they [TV news shows] replay it every hour, 100 times a day,” Taibbi said.

“The critical part is that Dean was already in violation leading up to that moment. He was not the right person because he was anti-war. He got his donations from the wrong people. He makes the mistake. The press pig-piles on the person just instinctively. All this negative attention. The candidate freaks out and apologizes. He disappears for a while. He tries to soldier on. The next thing you know, there’s a Page 16 story: Candidate exits the race. It’s a script. But it didn’t work with Trump.”

The press, like the Democratic Party, is an appendage of the consumer society. These institutions are not about politics or news. They are about imparting an experience. They create political personalities, marketed as celebrities, to make us feel good about candidates. These manufactured emotions, the product of the dark arts of the public relations industry, determine how we vote. Issues and policies are irrelevant. It is marketing and entertainment. Trump is a skillful marketer of his fictitious self.

“When you work in that environment long enough you unconsciously become an agent for whatever that commercial strategy is,” Taibbi said of the press in our corporate-run political theater.

“What we call right-wing and liberal media in this country are really just two different strategies of the same kind of nihilistic lizard-brain sensationalism,” Taibbi wrote in “Insane Clown President.” “The ideal CNN story is a baby down a well, while the ideal Fox story is probably a baby thrown down a well by a Muslim terrorist or an ACORN activist. Both companies offer the same service, it’s just that the Fox version is a little kinkier.”

The pseudo-events on television displace reality. This is how a reality star becomes president. Sixty million people think Trump’s manufactured persona—the predominate tycoon—on “The Apprentice” is real. Our perception of the truth is determined by what appears on the screen. If an event is never broadcast, it somehow never happened. The electronic image is the word of God. The corporate state controls most of what is seen and heard on television, what ideas and events can be discussed in the mainstream media and what orthodoxies, including neoliberalism and the war industry, must never be questioned. We suffer an intellectual tyranny as pervasive as that imposed by fascism and communism. Trump, who is as gullible as the most habitual television viewer, exemplifies our cultural and political death. He is no more “authentic” than Hillary Clinton. But he appears on our screens as more authentic because he is more deeply embedded in the medium that controls our thoughts. He is what is vomited up from the perverted zeitgeist of a nation entranced and dominated by electronic hallucinations.

“People have this idea that Trump has no connection with the ‘common man,’ but he does,” Taibbi said. “He has exactly the same media habits that ordinary people have. He believes the stuff that he reads on the internet and watches on television implicitly and unquestioningly. That is what gives him that connection with people. He thinks like they do. He has the same habits they have. A classic example is the thing with the so-called 3 million illegal … voters. He reads that, probably in an Infowars story, it’s policy like two minutes later. He doesn’t go through the process of asking himself if it’s untrue. He’s a perfect consumer in that respect. That’s what makes him so dangerous.”

“[George W.] Bush was child’s play compared to what we’re dealing with now,” Taibbi said. “Bush was a puppet. He was a vehicle for a very familiar form of right-wing capitalist politics. This Trump thing is totally different. Trump really is the actual engine behind this phenomenon during the entire campaign. There were no people behind the man, I don’t think. The presidential campaign has no relation to the issue of whether or not you can govern effectively. The campaign is a television show. The values that decide whether a person becomes a candidate or can’t become a candidate are more or less arbitrary. It has a lot to do with the commercial value of the candidate. You can’t have an unentertaining candidate because the press needs to make money. They will unconsciously gravitate towards someone who does what Trump does, which is get [website] hits and eyeballs and ratings.”

Trump’s popularity increased the more the establishment condemned him. This would have sent a profound and disturbing message to anyone not as clueless as our liberal elites. They did not get it. They thought they could trot out Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Hollywood celebrities and get the rubes to fall for their routine one more time. They thought the country would again obey.

The liberal class, by embracing neoliberalism and refusing to challenge the imperial wars, empowered the economic and political structures that destroyed our democracy and gave rise to Trump. Multiculturalism, when it means, to use the words of Cornel West, nothing more than having a president who is a “black mascot for Wall Street,” betrays the disenfranchised and endows the ruling elites with a false progressivism, a false humanism and a false inclusiveness.

Hillary and Bill Clinton, Joe Biden and the current Democratic Party leadership designed and built the massive system of imprisonment, essentially ended welfare, expanded our wars and pushed through NAFTA. They destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of poor and working-class families and are responsible for the mounds of corpses in the Middle East. Yet these liberal elites speak as if they are champions of racial and economic justice. They appear in choreographed pseudo-events to demonstrate a faux compassion. Now they have been exposed as fakes.

A genuine populism, one defined and often articulated by Bernie Sanders, could sweep the Democratic Party back into power. Regulating Wall Street, publicly financing campaigns, forgiving student debt, demanding universal health care, bailing out homeowners victimized by the banks, ending the wars in the Middle East, instituting a jobs program to repair our decaying infrastructure, dismantling the prison system, restoring the rule of law on the streets of our cities, making college education free and protecting programs such as Social Security would see election victory after election victory.

But this will never happen within the Democratic Party. It refuses to prohibit corporate money. The party elites know that if corporate money disappears, so do they. The party’s hierarchy, pressured by Obama and the Clintons, elevated Tom Perez over Keith Ellison—whom a major donor to the party, Haim Saban, condemns as an “anti-Semite” because of Ellison’s criticism of the Israeli government—to head the Democratic National Committee. They will press forward repeating the same silly slogans and trying to use the now ineffective Force choke on their political enemies. They may have lost control of the Congress and the White House and hold only 16 governorships and majorities in only 31 of the states’ 99 legislative chambers, but they are incapable of offering any meaningful alternative to neoliberalism and empire. They are devoid of a vision. They can only moralize. They will continue to atrophy and enable the consolidation of an American fascism.

Fyodor Dostoevsky excoriated Russia’s bankrupt liberal class at the end of the 19th century. Russian liberals mouthed values they did not defend. Their stated ideals bore no relationship to their actions. They were filled with a suffocating narcissism.

In “Notes From Underground,” Dostoevsky lampooned the defeated dreamers of the liberal class, those who preached goodness but lived in moral squalor. These defeated dreamers denounced the social and cultural depravity they had largely created. They had an open disdain for the uneducated, the poor, the working class, the lesser breeds beneath them. And in the end they ushered in a moral nihilism to empower a dangerous class of demagogues, killers and fools.

“I never even managed to become anything: neither wicked nor good, neither a scoundrel nor an honest man, neither a hero nor an insect,” the Underground Man wrote.

“And now I am living out my life in my corner, taunting myself with the spiteful and utterly futile consolation that it is even impossible for an intelligent man seriously to become anything, and only fools become something. Yes, sir, an intelligent man of the nineteenth century must be and is morally obliged to be primarily a characterless being; and a man of character, an active figure—primarily a limited being.”

Trump claims that the Obama administration bugged Trump Tower before the election.

Sound nutty?

Perhaps … but former Attorney General Michael Mukasey said that Trump is probably right that Trump Tower was bugged (by the Justice Department, not Obama personally).

And chief Fox News Washington correspondent James Rosen – who Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder ordered be bugged … like many other reporters for well over a decade – said he thought Trump might be right:

Binney is the NSA executive who created the agency’s mass surveillance program for digital information, who served as the senior technical director within the agency, who managed six thousand NSA employees.

He was a 36-year NSA veteran widely regarded as a “legend” within the agency and the NSA’s best-everanalyst and code-breaker.

Binney also mapped out the Soviet command-and-control structure before anyone else knew how, and so predicted Soviet invasions before they happened (“in the 1970s, he decrypted the Soviet Union’s command system, which provided the US and its allies with real-time surveillance of all Soviet troop movements and Russian atomic weapons”).

Binney told Washington’s Blog:

NSA has all the data through the Upstream programs (Fairview/Stormbrew/Blarney)  [background] and backed up by second and some third party country collection.

Plus the FBI and CIA plus others, as of the last month of the Obama administration, have direct access to all the NSA collection (metadata and content on phones,email and banking/credit cards etc.) with no attempt at oversight by anybody [background]. This is all done under Executive Order 12333 [the order which allows unlimited spying no matter what intelligence officials claim] ….

FBI would only ask for a warrant if they wanted to be able to take it into court at some point given they have something meaningful as evidence. This is clearly true given the fact the President Trump’s phone conversations with other country leaders were leaked to the mainstream media.

In other words, Binney is saying that Trumps phones were bugged by the NSA without a warrant – remember, top NSA whistleblowers have previously explained that the NSA is spying on virtually all of the digital communications of Americans. – and the NSA shared the raw data with the CIA, FBI and other agencies.

If the FBI obtained a warrant to tap Trump’s phone, it was a “parallel construction” to “launder” improperly-gained evidence through acceptable channels.

As we’ve previously explained:

The government is “laundering” information gained through mass surveillance through other agencies, with an agreement that the agencies will “recreate” the evidence in a “parallel construction” … so they don’t have to admit that the evidence came from unconstitutional spying. This data laundering is getting worse and worse.

So does it mean that the NSA spying on Trump Tower actually turned up some dirt?

Maybe …

But history shows that mass surveillance has long been used to blackmail opponents … including high-level officials.  And see this.

And the former NSA director admitted that the mass surveillance is a power grab.

So we won’t know until the intelligence agencies actually show their cards … and reveal what evidence they’ve gathered.

In the West, even among people who consider themselves not susceptible to government-corporate media propaganda, any wild story about North Korea can be taken as credible. We should ask ourselves why that is the case, given what we know about the history of government and media fabrications, often related to gaining our acquiescence to a new war.

The corporate media reports North Korean agents murdered Kim Jong Nam with a banned chemical weapon VX. They fail to add that the US government is not a signatory to the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention. They rarely note the Malaysian police investigating the case have not actually said North Korea is connected to his death.

The story of his death or murder raises a number of serious questions. North Korea says Kim Jong Nam was not murdered, but suffered from heart problems, high blood pressure and diabetes, required constant medication, and this caused his death. The North Korean diplomat in Malaysia Ri Tong-il “cited the postmortem examination conducted by Malaysian health authorities, claiming that the postmortem showed Jong-nam died of a heart attack.”

Malaysian authorities conducted two autopsies, the second after the first said to be inconclusive in identifying a cause of death, before announcing well over a week later that VX was involved.

What was going on here? And why weren’t the autopsies made open to others besides Malaysian officials?

Why was the South Korean government the first country to come out quickly after Kim’s February 13 death to blame North Korea for murdering him with the VX nerve weapon – before Malaysia had determined anything? The Malaysian autopsy was not complete until February 23, ten days later.

Why did these two women charged with murder travel several times to South Korea before this attack occurred?

Why was the only North Korean arrested in the case released for lack of evidence?

The two women did not wear gloves, but had the liquid directly on their hands.  “The police said the four North Korean suspects who left the country the day of the killing put the VX liquid on the women’s hands.”They later washed it off.  Why did none of them die or even get sickened by it? No reports say they went to the hospital.

“Malaysian Inspector-General of Police Khalid Abu  Khalid said the women knew they were handling poisonous materials during the attack…. leading forensic toxicologists who study murder by poison… question how the two women could walk away unscathed after deploying an agent potent enough to kill Kim Jong Nam before he could even make it to the hospital.”

“Tens of thousands of passengers have passed through the airport since the apparent assassination was carried out. No areas were cordoned off and protective measures were not taken.”

Why, if a highly deadly VX used to kill Kim, did the terminal remain open to thousands of travelers, and not shut down and checked for VX until February 26, 13 days later?

Health Minister Subramaniam Sathasivam said “VX only requires 10 milligrams to be absorbed into the system to be lethal,” yet he added that there have been no reports of anyone else being sickened by the toxin.

DPRK’s Ri Tong-il said in his statement, “How is it possible” the two ladies survived? “How is it possible” no single person in the airport got contaminated? “How is it possible” no nurse, no doctor, no police escorting Kim after the attack were affected?

Why does Malaysia, which acknowledges Kim Jong Nam is Kim Jong Un’s half-brother, make the outrageous demand that Kim’s body won’t be released to North Korea until a close family member provides a sample of their own DNA?

From what we are told, the story does not add up.

Ri Tong-il asked in his same statement “Why is South Korea trying so hard [to blame the DPRK] in this instance? They have a great political crisis inside South Korea [which is quite true] and they need to divert people’s attention,” noting also that the two women involved traveled to South Korea and that South Korea blamed the North for murder by VX the very day it happened.

Stephen Lendman also gives a plausible explanation:

“Here’s what we know. North Korean senior representatives were preparing to come to New York to meet with former US officials, a chance for both sides to discuss differences diplomatically, hopefully leading to direct talks with Trump officials.

The State Department hadn’t yet approved visas, a positive development if arranged.

Reports indicate North Korea very much wanted the meeting to take place. Makes sense. It would indicate a modest thaw in hostile relations, a good thing if anything came of it.

So why would Pyongyang want to kill Kim Jong-nam at this potentially sensitive time, knowing it would be blamed for the incident, talks likely cancelled?

Sure enough, they’re off, Pyongyang accused of killing Kim, even though it seems implausible they planned and carried out the incident, using agents in Malaysia to act as proxies.”

Is possible that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un decided to murder his apolitical brother, chosing to do so by using a banned highly toxic agent in public, under video cameras in a crowded airport of a friendly country? Instead of say, doing it by easier means in the North Korean Embassy’s guesthouse in Kuala Lumpur, where the New York Times said his brother sometimes stayed?

We are not supposed to doubt what we are spoon fed, that Kim Jong Un is some irrational war-mongering madman who has instituted a reign of terror. A safer bet is this is a new attempt to beat the drums of war against North Korea and its allies.

The author’s previous articles on North Korea are at

https://chicagoalbasolidarity.wordpress.com/category/north-korea/

Syrian government troops deployed to the areas controlled by Kurdish forces in the countryside of Manbij on March 3, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. According to the report, Syrian troops have been deployed in the area south and southwest of Manbij. Russia’s center for the reconciliation of the warring parties in Syria also sent a food and medical supplies convoy to Manbij.

In response, Pentagon spokesman Navy Captain Jeff Davis said that US Defense Department is not aware of any agreement between the so-called “Syrian Democratic Forces” (the US and the mainstream media use this brand to describe Kurdish forces operating in northern Syria) and the Syrian government. However, Davis confirmed that the humanitarian convoy arrived in the area of Manbij.

Pro-government forces, backed by the Russian and Syrian air forces, have been rapidly advancing towards the Euphrates River. Since March 4, the Syrian army and the National Defense Forces have liberated a high number of villages, including Abu Jarin, Atwiyat, Qasr Hadla, Tal Mai, Rasm Kbar, Um Miyal and Abu Hanaya.

Thus, government troops deployed in a striking distance from the the ISIS-held Jarah Airbase. Another target of the Syrian military is the Water Treatment plant which had been damaged by ISIS. If government forces liberated the plant, they will be able to improve the water security in the city of Aleppo. Then, pro-government forces will likely focus on the ISIS stronghold of Deir Hafer.

The US-backed SDF, led by the People’s Protection Units (YPG), has renewed their push against the ISIS terrorist group in the eastern countryside of Raqqah. On March 5, SDF units resized the villages of Julayb Khalil, Abd al Matnī and Muhammad al-Ayyash from ISIS east of Raqqah. The Kurdish-led operation in the area had ben halt for some time because of tensions between Kurdish units and pro-Turkish forces in the province of Aleppo.

Head of the Directorate of Combat Training of the Western Military District’s Staff, Major General Petr Milyukhin, was critically injured in the battle for Palmyra in Syria, according to reports in Russian media. It was the first Russian general, who was wounded in Syria. According to the Russian Kommersant newspaper, the incident allegedly took place on February 16 when an armored vehicle with Russian military personnel was blown up on a radio-controlled IED en route from the Tiyas Airbase to the city of Homs and then came under fire. Milyukhin lost both his legs and an eye. 4 more Russian troops died in the incident. The death of four Russian military servicemen en route to Homs was reported by the Russian Defense Ministry in February.

The Russian Aerospace Forces performed 991 sorties, destroying 2,306 ISIS targets during a month, Chief of the Main Operations Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, Colonel General Sergei Rudskoy, said. ISIS command points, depots of arms and ammunition and heavy military equipment were main targets of the airstrikes.

The Russian air power and the special operations forces made a major contribution to the ISIS defeat in Palmyra where the terrorist group lost over 1000 fighters, 19 battle tanks, 37 armored vehicles, 98 pickup trucks with heavy weapons and over 100 vehicles.

A HQ of Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (formerly Al-Nusra) was also destroyed by the Russian air power near Rasm al-Eis in the southwestern countryside of Aleppo on February 28. 67 terrorists, including 19 filed commanders, were killed, and 104 others injured according to Rudskoy.

If Obama ordered Trump Tower wiretapped as Donald Trump claims, evidence may or may not be easily obtained.

If FISA court authorization occurred, a congressional inquiry could prove it. If conducted warrantless by the NSA, CIA or FBI, verifying Trump’s claim will be much harder.

Cooperation by agency heads would be needed. NSA director Admiral Michael Rogers is an Obama administration holdover. So is FBI head James Comey. CIA director Mike Pompeo is a Trump appointee.

If Obama got FISA court authorization to wiretap Trump Tower, or a server the building uses for electronic communications located anywhere, court records would verify it.

Still, it’s unproved so far if spying on Trump occurred, and if so, whether it stemmed from FISA court authorization or by other means.

The NSA, CIA and FBI notoriously conduct warrantless surveillance. Post-9/11, the NSA was authorized by a GW Bush executive order to warrantlessly spy on phone and other electronic communications in the name of national security.

Monitoring internally and abroad followed, a clear Fourth Amendment violation, prohibiting searches and seizures without judicial authorization – based on probable cause.

In 2012, Congress extended warrantless spying, constitutional law ignored. The FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act passed both houses overwhelmingly.

Obama signed it into law. Warrantless spying was extended for another five years. GW Bush and Obama authorized the NSA to eavesdrop on Americans lawlessly.

The CIA and FBI operate the same way extrajudicially. Constitutional protections no longer apply. Rogue governance does what it pleases – the way all police states operate.

It’s bad enough to spy on ordinary Americans, quite another on a major party presidential candidate if hard evidence proves it.

According to a NYT report, FBI director Comey “asked the Justice Department this weekend to publicly reject President Trump’s assertion that President Barack Obama ordered the tapping of Mr. Trump’s phones” – citing the usual unnamed “senior American officials.”

Comey, an Obama holdover, said Trump’s charge is false, according to The Times. The FBI and Justice Department declined to comment.

If a FISA warrant was issued, it would have likely come through the DOJ or FBI it administers. A statement by AG Jeff Sessions, another senior department official, or Comey would confirm or deny if one or the other agencies was involved. So far, no public comment by either.

Over the weekend, Trump reportedly said “(t)his will be investigated. It will all come out. I will be proven right.”

For starters, he should publicly reveal what he knows, any evidence he’s aware of, putting meat on the bones of his serious accusation.

One thing’s clear. This story has a long way to go. How it’ll end remains uncertain.

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. 

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

The Trump Administration’s draconian immigration policies, from the Muslim ban to the deportation by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers of hard-working parents who have no criminal record and young adults who know no other home, have drawn widespread criticism and protest.

In addition to these heart-wrenching, horrifying stories, more and more reports are emerging of travelers—including U.S. citizens returning home—being subjected to aggressive interrogations at the border that leave them humiliated, angry, and bewildered. Several prominent writers have spoken out in recent weeks about such experiences, which have altered their views of the United States and what it stands for.

The bestselling children’s book author Mem Fox, an Australian citizen, was detained in late February at the Los Angeles International Airport while en route to a conference in Milwaukee. She was detained for nearly two hours by Customs and Border Patrol officials who reportedly believed she was traveling on the wrong visa, although Fox says she has traveled to the U.S. over 100 times before without any incident. Her interrogation was so aggressive that she said she “felt like I had been physically assaulted.”

Fox, whose most recent book I’m Australian, Too is a celebration of immigration and Australia’s multicultural heritage, eventually received an apology from the U.S. embassy in Australia. But in reflecting on her ordeal, she emphasized its broader ramifications, noting, “They made me feel like such a crushed, mashed, hopeless old lady and I am a feisty, strong, articulated English speaker. I kept thinking that if this were happening to me, a person who is white, articulate, educated, and fluent in English, what on earth is happening to people who don’t have my power?”

Also in late February, Henry Rousso, a celebrated French historian of the Holocaust who was born and raised in Egypt, was detained for 10 hours at the George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston. Rousso, author of The Vichy Syndrome, about France’s struggle to reckon with its World War II history, was traveling to a symposium at Texas A&M University. Border officials questioned him about his visa and accused him of attempting to work illegally in the U.S. Rousso was first told that he would be deported, but was eventually released after Texas A&M learned of the situation and intervened. Like Mem Fox, Rousso’s experience has altered his view of the United States, as he wrote:

This incident has caused me some discomfort, but I cannot stop thinking of all those who suffer these humiliations and legal violence without the protections I was able to benefit from. …How can one explain this zeal if not by the concern to fulfill quotas and justify increased controls? That is the situation today in this country. We must now face arbitrariness and incompetence at all levels. I heard recently that “Paris isn’t Paris anymore.” The United States seems no longer quite the United States.

Aaron Gach, an American media artist and founder of the Center for Tactical Magic, contacted PEN after he was detained on February 23 on his return home to San Francisco from an art show in Brussels. Gach was subjected to detailed questioning regarding an art exhibition in which he had participated in Belgium, including questions about why he was invited, who invited him, and how often he takes part in such exhibits. Gach’s pieces included in the exhibition focused on issues related to incarceration in the United States; he is unsure whether he was detained in connection with his work. Gach was repeatedly asked to allow CPB agents access to his personal phone by turning it over and providing his password; when he finally agreed, the phone was removed from his sight for several minutes before being returned to him.

In the wake of reports like these and the expectation that a new travel ban will be issued at any moment, PEN America is hearing from artists, writers, poets, and other cultural and intellectual figures who are newly worried about making trips to the U.S., afraid of being turned away at the border, made to submit to invasive searches of their smartphones, interrogated about their political opinions and religious beliefs, or being subjected to arbitrary tests of their abilities. In a few short weeks, a pervasive fog of fear has encircled our borders, and it will deter countless people from even attempting to visit the country.

This, too, is a cost of President Trump’s immigration policies, and it will take a severe, long-lasting toll on America’s cultural and intellectual life. As we wrote in a letter to President Trump signed by sixty prominent writers urging him not to issue a new travel ban:

Arts and culture have the power to enable people to see beyond their differences. Creativity is an antidote to isolationism, paranoia, misunderstanding, and violent intolerance. In the countries most affected by the immigration ban, it is writers, artists, musicians, and filmmakers who are often at the vanguard in the fights against oppression and terror. Should it interrupt the ability of artists to travel, perform, and collaborate, such an Executive Order will aid those who would silence essential voices and exacerbate the hatreds that fuel global conflict.

America’s status as a world-class cultural hub, as a proponent of free thought and lively debate, as a country that celebrates our diversity and welcomes new voices and new ideas from all corners of the world, is crumbling. The image of a shining city on a hill is erased, and in its place rises a forbidding, angry, hostile country that talks of building walls and banning outsiders. We will all be poorer for it.

Edu Montesanti speaks to Daoud Kuttab about the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

Daoud Kuttab is an award-winning Palestinian journalist. In this conversation, journalist and author Edu Montesanti speaks to Kuttab about the future of U.S.-Israel relations under U.S. President Donald Trump, mainstream international media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and challenges to a peace agreement.

Edu Montesanti: How do you see the meeting between President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Feb. 15, especially the following observations by the U.S. president: “I’m looking at two-state and one-state” formulations, Mr. Trump said during a White House news conference with Mr. Netanyahu. “I like the one that both parties like. I’m very happy with the one that both parties like. I can live with either one”?

Protesters shout “Free Palestine” during a march in midtown Manhattan, New York, July 9, 2014. | Photo: Reuters

Daoud Kuttab: I think that meeting and that statement reflect the usual American-Israeli attempts to solve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict simply by pushing both sides to work things out, a solution that favors the powerful. It fits the saying “might is right not right is might.” The idea of a US president agreeing to a one-state solution less than 20 years after President Clinton insisted on the PLO to amend their charter to remove the idea of a one-state solution shows how the Americans are not serious about genuine peace.

Why cannot Israel and the Palestinians decide alone the question? Why do Palestinians need a third party to get an agreement?

It would work if there was agreement on the reference point but when you have the powerful side, Israel controling the areas this means that an agreement will be dictated by the powerful. As the saying goes posession is two-thirds of the law. Also the third party here, the U.S., is part of the problem since they fund Israel to the tune of US$3-4 billion a year plus give Israel protection in the U.N. If the U.S. was not so involved in defending the Israelis it might be a different issue.

The passage of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 voted on Dec. 23 last year — condemning the Israeli settlements as a flagrant violation of international law and a major impediment to the achievement of a two-state solution — changes nothing on the ground between Israel and the Palestinians. U.N. member states “agree to accept and carry out the decisions of the Security Council,” according to the U.N. Charter. Human rights and the international community also condemns the Israeli settlements and military attacks against Palestinians.

As you observed in (my article) “U.S. and Israel join forces to bury Palestinian statehood,” “ever since the 1967 occupation, the United Nations Security Council has repeatedly expressed the illegality of the occupation, as in the preamble of Resolution 242 ’emphasising inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war.'” Why nothing changes year by year, massacre after massacre?

Because of this one-sided U.S. policy that refuses to support international law and refuses to allow Israel to be sanctioned the same way Russia was sanctioned for its occupation of Crimea.

You know the Western media distorts the facts involving this massacre against Palestinians, Daoud. Please number the crimes or at least some of them commited by Israel.

The biggest crime is the occupation itself, then comes the illegal settlement and then the restriction on movement and the collective punishment in form of house demolitions.

How do you evaluate the Western media coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian confict?

Western coverage is mixed. While the major issues are covered, the public rarely sees the human side of Palestinians while exagerating the human suffering of Isrealis.

Professor Avi Shlaim observed days ago: “Sadly, the Palestinians are handicapped by weak leadership and by the internal rivalry between Fatah and Hamas.” Your view on the internal politics among Palestinians, please, Daoud.

I agree about the problem of leadership but this is not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is that the world, especially the western world, treats this conflict differently. The Iraqis were routed out of Kuwait by force when they occupied it, Russia is sanctioned for its occupation and here the problem is not the Isrealis but Palestinian incitement or weak leadership. This is not the main problem, the main problem is the occupation.

What could we expect from Arab leaders from now on?

Not much.

What is the solution to the conflict, Daoud?

The solution is for the world to treat Israel like any other agressor and not give them special treatment.

What are the principal obstacles to a fair agreement and solutions?

Absence of an agreed to reference point. The solution has to be either sharing the land (two state solution) or sharing the power (genuine one state solution with equal rights to all and not the Israeli version of apartheid annexation).

North Korea yesterday launched at least four ballistic missiles from its west coast, not far from the border with China, at around 7.30 a.m. local time. The missiles flew about 1,000 kilometres and, according to Japanese officials, three splashed down within Japan’s exclusive economic zone of 200 nautical miles or about 370 kilometres.

The missile launch took place amid heightened tensions on the Korean Peninsula as the US and South Korean militaries started their annual Foal Eagle war games. The joint exercises over the next two months reportedly involve at least 320,000 South Korean and American military personnel backed by a US aircraft carrier and its strike group, and advanced US fighters and bombers.

Pyongyang last week branded the drills as preparations for nuclear war and warned that “new types of strategic weapons will soar” if the Foal Eagle drills proceeded. David Wright from the Union of Concerned Scientists suggested to the Washington Post that the missiles were either of the extended-range Scuds or medium-range Nodong type, which have been tested before, indicating other missile tests could be pending.

North Korea’s militarist response to the threats posed by US imperialism and its allies is utterly reactionary and plays directly into Washington’s hands by providing a pretext for the expansion of US forces in Asia—directed against Pyongyang and Beijing. Far from defending the North Korean people, the regime’s bellicose and nationalistic posturing sows divisions between workers in North Korea and South Korea, Japan, the US and internationally.

The US nuclear arsenal is capable of obliterating North Korea’s military machine and industrial infrastructure many times over. Last week the US defence secretary repeated the threat of an “effective and overwhelming” response if Pyongyang ever attempted to use its nuclear weapons.

The US and its allies immediately condemned yesterday’s missile tests by North Korea. Acting South Korean president Hwang Kyo-ahn branded the launch as “a direct challenge and grave provocation.” Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe declared that the tests demonstrated that Pyongyang had developed “a new threat” and said Tokyo would “strongly protest to North Korea.”

The US and Japan have called for an emergency session of the UN Security Council to discuss the latest missile tests. A similar session was convened following North Korea’s launch of a new medium-range missile last month, but no punitive measures were taken. Washington will undoubtedly exploit the gathering to intensify the pressure on Beijing to impose crippling economic measures on its North Korean ally.

The North Korean missile launches take place as the Trump administration is engaged in a review of US strategy towards North Korea, which, since the end of the Korean War in 1953, has been one of unremitting hostility. The Obama administration has been heavily criticised in US foreign policy and military circles for not taking more aggressive action to halt the North Korean nuclear and missile programs.

In January, Trump, as president-elect, reacted to an announcement by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un that his country was preparing to test an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) by tweeting that it “won’t happen.” Details of the White House review leaked to the Wall Street Journal last week indicated that regime-change and pre-emptive military strikes against North Korea were under active consideration.

In a detailed article last weekend, the New York Times revealed that the US military under the Obama administration had engaged in an aggressive cyberwarfare campaign against North Korea’s missile systems following its nuclear test in 2013. The newspaper admitted that it had withheld details at the request of the military and security establishment. It was publishing the story now as it was becoming evident that North Korea had become aware of the cyber-attacks that appeared to be causing a high rate of missile launch failures.

The American cyber and electronic strikes against North Korea are a reckless act of war, which threaten to plunge the region into conflict. They recall the methods used by the US and Israel against Iran to undermine its uranium enrichment capabilities using the Stuxnet worm to cause gas centrifuges to malfunction. The cyber-attack was part of a broader Israeli campaign of assassination and sabotage against Iran’s nuclear programs.

The New York Times explained that Obama was prepared to go to any length in his efforts to halt North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. “With only a few months left in office,” it wrote, “he pushed aides for new approaches. At one meeting, he declared that he would have targeted the North Korean leadership and weapons sites if he thought that would work.” The administration concluded, however, that the difficulties of military strikes were too great, and “the risks of missing were tremendous, including renewed war on the Korean Peninsula.”

The Trump administration is now considering all options in its bid to prevent North Korea from building a nuclear-tipped ICBM capable of reaching the US mainland. Its measures will not be aimed just at Pyongyang but also Beijing, which Trump has repeatedly threatened with trade war measures and military action in the South China Sea. He is accelerating the military build-up in Asia in preparation for war with China in a bid to ensure US supremacy in the region and the world.

A senior Trump official confirmed to the New York Times that the White House was looking at “pre-emptive military strike options,” in spite of the tactical difficulties involved. “Putting American tactical nuclear weapons back in South Korea—they were withdrawn a quarter-century ago—is also under consideration even if that step could accelerate an arms race with the North,” the newspaper stated.

The reinstallation of US tactical nuclear weapons on the Korean Peninsula would threaten to dramatically raise tensions not only with North Korea, but also with China, which would quickly conclude that it was the real target. It could trigger a nuclear arms race involving South Korea, where some lawmakers have already called for building nuclear weapons, and Japan.

While Trump has also reportedly considered renewed negotiations with the Pyongyang regime, the White House is under growing pressure to act against North Korea. The danger that it will opt for militarist measures, including an attack on North Korea, is heightened by the political warfare in American ruling circles over foreign policy in relation to Russia in particular. As it attempts to extricate itself from a worsening crisis, the Trump administration is quite capable of initiating a reckless provocation against North Korea as a diversion.

US President Donald Trump issued a revised executive order banning travel from six majority-Muslim countries and halting all refugee entry into the United States for the next 120 days. The order revokes and replaces Executive Order 13769, signed by Trump January 27, which was struck down as unconstitutional by several federal courts.

The revised order targets six of the countries named in the previous order—Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen—but exempts the seventh country, Iraq. This was after objections from the Pentagon, which feared widespread popular anger in the country where 6,000 US troops are deployed alongside tens of thousands of Iraqi army and militia forces in the ongoing conflict with Islamic State guerrillas.

The order omits several of the most flagrantly illegal and unconstitutional provisions of the earlier order, including a specific preference for “minority religious groups,” which in the context of Muslim-majority countries meant overt discrimination against Muslims.

Unlike the first order, the travel ban is prospective only: it freezes new applications for visas for the next 90 days, but has no effect on current visas, or on US legal residents (green card holders) coming back from visits to one of the six targeted countries. There will be no mass cancellation of visas, as was the case under the initial draft of the order.

That said, the reactionary and anti-democratic character of the order remains, with the main immediate effect felt by refugees, who will make up the vast majority of those denied entry to the United States, rather than travelers.

Trump cuts the number of refugees to be admitted from 117,000 for the current fiscal year to only 50,000. Given that there is a 120-day freeze on all refugee admissions, which begins when the new order takes effect March 16 and lasts until July 14, it is highly unlikely that even 50,000 refugees will be able to enter the US during the remainder of the period ending September 30.

The impact on travelers could be much larger going forward, since the executive order commissions the secretary of homeland security, in consultation with the secretary of state and the attorney general, to make recommendation on extending the travel ban, and to draw up additional lists of countries whose citizens should be excluded, based on an assessment of whether these countries have provided information on their own citizens demanded by the US government. In other words, the “temporary” ban on the six countries could well become open-ended, and Washington will bully foreign governments into collaborating with its “anti-terrorism” policies, on penalty of being added to the travel ban.

The language of the new executive order bristles with Trump’s hatred for the judicial review process that resulted in the effective overturning of the earlier order, and his contempt for the issues of democratic rights and constitutional norms that were raised in the numerous legal challenges. It reiterates the claim of near-absolute presidential power to bar the entry of broad classes of foreigners at the discretion of the White House.

Immigrants’ rights groups and the American Civil Liberties Union denounced the new travel ban as just as anti-democratic and unconstitutional as the first order, even though scaled back to apply to somewhat fewer people. Lawsuits will be filed even before the new order takes effect on March 16.

The supposed “anti-terrorist” rationale for the travel ban is belied even by the agencies responsible for enforcing it. The Department of Homeland Security itself admitted, in a report made public last month, that country of origin was not a meaningful variable in assessing the likelihood of any individual mounting a terrorist attack.

According to an analysis by Charles Kurzman of the University of North Carolina, cited in Monday’s New York Times, of the 36 Muslim extremists who have engaged in terrorist attacks inside the United States since 2001, 18 were born in the US and 14 migrated here as children, and so would have passed any vetting procedure. None came from the six countries targeted by the travel ban.

The Times concluded: “Muslim extremists have accounted for 16 out of 240,000 murders in the United States since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.” The newspaper could have added—but chose not to—that during that period far more Americans have been killed by former soldiers traumatized and brutalized by the wars conducted by US imperialism in the Middle East than by any terrorists, Muslim or otherwise.

These facts did not stop Trump from claiming, in his address to Congress last Tuesday, “The vast majority of individuals convicted of terrorism and terrorism-related offenses since 9/11 came here from outside of our country.” That lie was followed by a brazen appeal to fear: “We cannot allow a beachhead of terrorism to form inside America.” This was in reference to refugees from Syria, mainly women and children, victims of a brutal civil war instigated by the United States and the oil-based monarchies of the Persian Gulf.

Congressional Democrats for the most part postured as critics of the revised travel ban, but they have focused all their attention on denouncing Trump as insufficiently aggressive towards Russia, effectively downplaying any objections to his attacks on democratic rights.

The issuance of the new order came in the midst of a mounting political crisis of the Trump administration over charges and counter-charges relating to alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and alleged contacts between Trump aides and Russian intelligence agencies. No actual evidence of such interference or such contacts has ever been made public—only an endless series of anonymous leaks from officials in the military-intelligence apparatus opposed to Trump’s apparently softer foreign policy towards Russia.

On Saturday, Trump retaliated with a series of tweets claiming President Obama had ordered wiretapping of his Trump Tower offices during the election campaign, claiming that this represented a scandal as serious as Nixon and Watergate. Like his critics in the anti-Russian campaign, Trump did not offer a shred of evidence to back up his extraordinary claims.

Reaction to these charges in the media and official political circles was overwhelmingly hostile, with congressional Republicans distancing themselves from the White House, agreeing only that the question of wiretapping should be looked into by the intelligence committees that are investigating the charges of Russian interference.

White House officials avoided all interaction with the media during the issuance of the executive order establishing the revised travel ban, apparently to avoid further questions on the wiretapping issue. Trump signed the order behind closed doors, rather than welcoming television cameras to the Oval Office as he did when he signed the first order.

The formal issuance of the order came at a joint White House appearance of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, at which each official read a short statement. All three then left without taking any questions. A scheduled televised press briefing by Press Secretary Sean Spicer was held off camera and behind closed doors.

A ministra (da defesa) Pinotti tem um sonho: um Pentágono italiano, a saber, uma única estrutura para as cúpulas de todas as forças armadas, uma cópia em miniatura da estadunidense. O sonho está a ponto de se tornar realidade.

A nova estrutura, anuncia a ministra numa entrevista ao “Repubblica”, já está na fase conceitual e uma primeira locação está prevista no orçamento  da Lei de estabilidade. Surgirá na zona aeroportuária de Centocelle, em Roma, onde existe espaço para construir outros edifícios e infraetruturas. Em Centocelle, para onde também foi transferida a Direção geral dos armamentos com seu staff de 1.500 pessoas, já se encontra o Comando operativo da cúpula inter-forças, através do qual o chefe do Estado Maior da Defesa comanda todas as operações das forças armadas. Antes de tudo, aquelas que estão no exterior: a Itália está engajada em 30 missões militares em 20 países, do Kossovo ao Iraque e Afeganistão, da Líbia à Somália e ao Mali. Considerando que em cada uma dessas missões participam componentes de todas as forças armadas, explica a ministra, é necessário um comando único inter-forças com sede em Centocelle.

Assim, está registrado oficialmente, antes mesmo que seja discutido no parlamento, o projeto de lei  sobre a implementação do “Livro Branco para a  segurança internacional e a defesa”, apresentado em 10 de fevereiro pelo Conselho de Ministros. Portanto, já está em curso o golpe branco que, no silêncio geral, subverteu as bases constitucionais da República italiana, reconfigurando-a como potência que intervém militarmente em áreas próximas ao Mar Mediterrâneo – no Norte da África, Oriente Médio e nos Bálcãs – em apoio aos seus próprios “interesses vitais” econômicos e estratégicos; e por toda a parte no mundo onde estão em jogo os interesses do Ocidente representados pela Otan sob comando estadunidense.

Com esse efeito, são necessários novos armamentos. Por exemplo, os dois primeiros aviões Gulfstream 550 modificados, que a Itália acaba de receber de Israel ao preço de cerca de um bilhão de dólares: verdadeiros comandos voadores, dotados da eletrônica mais avançada, para missões de ataque de longo alcance.

Ao mesmo tempo, são necessários profissionais da guerra, capazes de utilizar as novas tecnologias e de combater em países distantes nas condições ambientais as mais variadas. “Nós temos necessidade de soldados jovens – explica a ministra Pinotti – a chave está no recrutamento de pessoas de 19 a 20 anos, para lhes oferecer um importante pacote de formação durante sete anos de suas vidas, incluindo o ensino de línguas e uma profissão. Se eles estiverem no mercado aos 26 ou 27 anos, não será difícil encontrar outro emprego inclusive porque nós nos comprometemos a construir novas oportunidades de trabalho por vias legislativas”.

Numa situação de desemprego e precarização, oferece-se aos jovens um meio de ganhar a vida e ter um emprego seguro: a guerra. E aos profissionais da guerra, sob as ordens do Pentágono italiano, também está confiado no projeto de lei a “salvaguarda das instituições livres” com “deveres específicos em caso de necessidade extraordinária e de urgência”, fórmula vaga que se presta a medidas autoritárias e a estratégias subversivas.

Tudo isso tem um custo. A Itália, anuncia Pinotti, mesmo se não estiver em condições de suportar a despesa para a “defesa” de 2% do PIB como lhe exige a Otan, está aumentando-a: ‘Este ano estamos com 1,18% do PIB, o que equivale a cerca de 23 bilhões de euros”. A ministra nos informa assim  que a Itália gasta para a “defesa” em média 63 milhões de euros por dia, aos quais se acrescentam as despesas com as missões militares e os principais armamentos, inscritos nos orçamentos de outros ministérios.

Em Roma, enquanto se faz um furioso debate político sobre o impacto ambiental do novo estádio, ninguém se preocupa com o impacto social do novo Pentágono tricolor.

Manlio Dinucci

Artigo em italiano :

Il Pentagono della Pinotti

Fonte : il manifesto

Tradução de José Reinaldo Carvalho, para Resistência

Manlio Dinucci é jornalista e geógrafo

En 2016, el jefe del Ejecutivo federal vetó una ley del paquete correspondiente al Sistema Nacional Anticorrupción, que sus propios compañeros de partido habían votado afirmativamente y la devolvió al Poder Legislativo para sus enmiendas.

Los mismos legisladores que habían aprobado esa ley, repusieron el proceso y el ordenamiento corregido se promulgó y se publicó.

En términos generales, segmentos de la sociedad civil reconocieron ese acto de rectificación.

Hay ocasiones en que los poderes Ejecutivo y Legislativo pretenden investirse en México con el don de la infalibilidad. Incluso, en el Congreso de la Unión, determinadas iniciativas de ley pasan por procedimientos arbitrarios en que se niega el uso de la tribuna a los opositores para que expongan sus reservas o impugnaciones.

En algunos de esos casos, la Suprema Corte de Justicia de la Nación, procesa y sentencia recursos de controversia constitucional o de acción de inconstitucionalidad, enmendando la plana a los hacedores de leyes.

Frente a esas referencias, parece fuera de orden que la ministra de la Corte, Margarita Luna Ramos ofrezca esta perla retórica: “De veras no entiendo cómo (legisladores) pueden aprobar una ley y después la misma mayoría venir a decir que es inconstitucional. De verdad eso deja muy mal parada la función legislativa”.

Si a los miembros de un poder constitucional se les cuestiona por su voluntad rectificadora, ¿qué pueden esperar los ciudadanos del llano que objetan una ley por la que se sienten afectados?

Antes de entrar en materia retomemos un caso: El Congreso de la Unión  incorporó a los mandatos de la Constitución el derecho a la consulta popular “sobre temas de trascendencia nacional”.

El propio Congreso de la Unión aprobó la Reforma Energética. En las elecciones intermedias de 2015, partidos cuyos legisladores aprobaron esa reforma, solicitaron la consulta popular en esa materia y otros dos temas.

Al llegar a la Corte el asunto, los ministros denegaron ese derecho, sobreponiendo el interés del Estado al de los ciudadanos, sin alegar que “la función legislativa quedó mal parada”, como ahora argumenta su falta de entendimiento la ministra Luna Ramos.

Los Derechos Humanos, cuestión fundamental

El tema en cuestión no es de poca monta: Se trata de la Ley de Seguridad Pública promovida por el gobernador del Estado de México, Eruviel Ávila Villegas. En efecto, la legislatura estatal aprobó dicha iniciativa.

La reacción pública, que etiquetó como Ley Atenco esa legislación obligó a los diputados mexiquenses a recurrir a la acción de inconstitucionalidad para revertirla. Ley Atenco, se le tipificó, recordando la brutal represión contra la población en esa comunidad mexiquense en el sexenio del gobernador Enrique Peña Nieto.

Lo que está de por medio en ese debate, de acuerdo con sus objetores, son los Derechos Humanos, potencialmente amenazados por dicho instrumento jurídico.

Tan es grave el asunto que, de once ministros, cuatro votaron por la admisión del recurso mientras que otros cuatro emitieron su voto en contra. Tres votos quedaron pendientes para continuar el análisis el próximo lunes.

El quid de la cuestión son los Derechos Humanos. Es el caso que, precisamente la Corte, en esa materia ha fijado una posición de avanzada al conciliar sus fallos con base en la Constitución mexicana y la convencionalidad a la que el Estado mexicano se ha suscrito.

El suspenso eventualmente se resolverá el lunes al continuar el pleno la sesión de ayer jueves. No son reacciones glandulares las que pueden imponer el Estado de derecho en circunstancias como las que actualmente atraviesa el país.

Mouris Salloum George

Mouris Salloum George: Director del Club de Periodistas de México A.C.

La ministra Pinotti ha un sogno: un Pentagono italiano, ossia un’unica struttura per i vertici di tutte le forze armate, una copia in miniatura di quello statunitense. Il sogno sta per diventare realtà.

La nuova struttura, annuncia la ministra in un’intervista a Repubblica, è già in fase progettuale ed è previsto un primo stanziamento nel budget della Legge di stabilità. Sorgerà nella zona aeroportuale di Centocelle a Roma, dove c’è spazio per costruire altri edifici e infrastrutture. A Centocelle, dove è stata trasferita anche la Direzione generale degli armamenti con il suo staff di 1500 persone, c’è già il Comando operativo di vertice interforze, attraverso cui il Capo di stato maggiore della Difesa comanda tutte le operazioni delle forze armate. Anzitutto quelle all’estero: l’Italia è impegnata in 30 missioni militari in 20 paesi, dal Kosovo all’Iraq e all’Afghanistan, dalla Libia alla Somalia e al Malì. Dato che in ciascuna partecipano componenti di tutte le forze armate, spiega la ministra, occorre un comando unico interforze con sede a Centocelle.

Viene così attuato, ancor prima che venga discusso in parlamento, il disegno di legge sulla implementazione del «Libro Bianco per la sicurezza internazionale e la difesa», presentato il 10 febbraio dal Consiglio dei ministri. È quindi già in atto il golpe bianco che, nel silenzio generale, sovverte le basi costituzionali della Repubblica italiana, riconfigurandola quale potenza che interviene militarmente  nelle aree prospicienti il Mediterraneo – Nordafrica, Medioriente, Balcani – a sostegno dei propri «interessi vitali» economici e strategici, e ovunque nel mondo siano in gioco gli interessi dell’Occidente rappresentati dalla Nato sotto comando Usa.

Occorrono a tal fine nuovi armamenti. Ad esempio i primi due aerei Gulfstream 550 modificati, che l’Italia ha appena ricevuto da Israele al prezzo di circa un miliardo di dollari: veri e propri comandi volanti, dotati dell’elettronica  più avanzata, per missioni di attacco a lungo raggio.

Occorrono allo stesso tempo professionisti della guerra, capaci di usare le nuove tecnologie e di combattere in lontani paesi nelle più diverse condizioni ambientali. «Abbiamo bisogno di soldati giovani, – spiega la ministra Pinotti – la chiave sta nell’arruolare persone a 19-20 anni, offrirgli un pacchetto formativo importante per sette anni della loro vita, insegnando lingue e professionalità. Se si ritroveranno sul mercato a 26-27 anni non sarà difficile trovare un’altra occupazione anche perché ci impegniamo a costruire nuove opportunità di lavoro con percorsi legislativi».

In una situazione di disoccupazione e precariato, si offre cosi ai giovani il modo per guadagnare e avere un posto sicuro: la guerra. E ai professionisti della guerra, agli ordini del Pentagono italiano, viene affidata nel disegno di legge anche la «salvaguardia delle libere istituzioni» con «compiti specifici in casi di straordinaria necessità ed urgenza», formula vaga che si presta a misure autoritarie e a strategie eversive.

Tutto questo costa. L’Italia, annuncia la Pinotti, anche se non è ancora in grado di portare la spesa  per la «difesa» al 2% del Pil come richiede la Nato, la sta incrementando: «Quest’anno siamo all’1,18% del Pil pari a circa 23 miliardi». La ministra ci informa quindi che l’Italia spende per la «difesa» in media 63 milioni di euro al giorno, cui si aggiungono le spese per le missioni militari e i principali armamenti, iscritte nei budget di altri ministeri.

A Roma, mentre divampa il dibattito politico sull’impatto ambientale del nuovo stadio, nessuno si preoccupa dell’impatto sociale del nuovo Pentagono tricolore.

Manlio Dinucci

Dustin Pfundheller, 30, an American dentist living in Singapore, was set to become the youngest person to visit every country in the world while in a full-time job. His globetrotting has taken him to 192 of the 193 recognised states, bringing his medical skills to the world’s remotest places. But in January he was barred for the second time from Israel, the only country left on his list, having previously been refused entry last year.

Despite an invitation to a dental conference in Tel Aviv, and Israelis who vouched for him, border officials banned Pfundheller for 10 years. No reason was given, but lawyers suspect visits to Iran and the Arab states sealed his fate. There could hardly be starker evidence that Israel stubbornly refuses to become a normal country.

Paradoxically, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Singapore last month to promote Israel as a tolerant country, one “committed to a better world, a world of diversity.”

The reality could not be more different. Arabs and Muslims have always struggled to gain entry to Israel. Palestinians are routinely abused at the borders, and thousands, especially from Jerusalem, have been stripped of the right to return home after living abroad.

But new figures show Israel is excluding other groups too. Entry denials have increased nine-fold in the past five years, topping 16,000 people last year. Among those increasingly turned away are political activists. Israel controls all access to the occupied Palestinian territories, and has been regularly denying entry to solidarity activists and those who support the boycott movement.

Legislation passed by the Israeli parliament on Monday night will only intensify the exclusionary trend. The new law forbids entry to anyone who supports a boycott, even if it is only of the settlements. As one legislator pointed out, that means Israel may quickly find itself bound to refuse entry to all officials from the United Nations and Europe.

In a sign of the new direction, Israel denied a tourist visa last week to Human Rights Watch’s new director for Israel and Palestine, having earlier refused him a work permit. One of the most prominent human rights organisations in the world was dismissed as an outlet for “Palestinian propaganda”.

Weeks earlier, Israel subjected Jennifer Gorovitz, an American Jewish vice-president of the New Israel Fund, to a humiliating interrogation at airport arrivals. NIF is one of the largest funders of Israeli organisations supporting human rights and social justice. That includes assistance to groups that monitor military abuses in the occupied territories.

This presumably explains why Gorovitz’s interrogators suggested she posed a “security threat”. She finally gained admittance only after Talia Sasson, the Israeli head of NIF and an adviser to former prime ministers, pulled strings.

Gorovitz wrote of her experience: “My privilege as a Jew means I never imagined that Israel could or would deny me entrance.”

Such an assumption was justified. Israel’s Law of Return is supposed to guarantee Jews around the world the right to almost instant citizenship in Israel.

For that reason, the law is grossly unjust. It privileges Jewish access to Israel at the expense of the native Palestinian population, most of whom were expelled in 1948.

Nonetheless, it is noteworthy that Israel, a state that invested itself with the historical mission of offering sanctuary to Jews worldwide, is increasingly applying a political test to those who arrive at its borders.

Israel is denying entry not only to Arabs and would-be record breakers. And it is deporting not just those such as migrant workers and African asylum seekers who might pollute the Jewish state with non-Jewish genes. Now it is openly targeting Jews whose politics do not align with the far-right government of Netanyahu.

It should be noted that many of the solidarity and boycott activists turned away are Jewish. Famous Jewish critics of Israel such as Noam Chomsky and Norman Finkelstein have been barred too.

On Monday, Rebecca Vilkomerson, the US executive director of Jewish Voice for Peace, observed that, despite her husband and children being Israeli citizens, and her grandparents bured there, under the new anti-boycott legislation she was now denied the right to visit.

In Israel’s eyes, it seems some Jews are more equal than others.

The pulling up of the drawbridge comes as Israel’s leadership has remained largely silent in the face of a rising tide of anti-semitism in the US, fuelled by Donald Trump’s election as president. Dozens of Jewish centres have received bomb threats, and Jewish cemeteries have been vandalised.

There are growing rumblings among American Jews that their interests are being overlooked by the Netanyahu government to avoid damaging relations with the new US administration. But another reason for the lack of response should be considered.

The principle of the “ingathering of the exiles”, according to Israel’s official ideology, Zionism, assumes that Israel is the rightful home of Jews everywhere. And the largest Jewish population outside Israel resides in the US.

In November, Yaron London, a popular TV host, welcomed Trump’s election, pointing out that “a worldview which supports white supremacy matches our [Israeli] government’s interests.”

Last week opposition leader Isaac Herzog urged Israel to prepare for an influx of US Jews fleeing persecution.

But will Israel’s arms really be open to all Jews equally, or only to those willing to contribute enthusiastically to the tribal project?

And can Jews of conscience ignore the true cost of their migration? They can leave behind anti-Jewish bigotry in the US, but only if they bolster the Jewish bigots of Israel who lord it over the native Palestinian population.

A version of this article first appeared in the National, Abu Dhabi.

Jonathan Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel’s Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jonathan-cook.net.

Trump Abandons Cooperation with Russia

By Stephen Lendman, March 06 2017

After firing Michael Flynn, Trump said “(i)t would be unpopular for a politician to make a deal. It would be much easier for me to be so tough – the tougher I am on Russia,” the better. After only a few weeks in office, he was co-opted to stay hardline on Russia, China, Iran and other sovereign independent countries – indicating no change in imperial recklessness on his watch.

Empire Uses Kurds as Pawns in its Imperial Pursuits in Syria

By Sarah Abed and Mark Taliano, March 05 2017

Although they have in fact been successful in driving out terrorists in some areas there is information that needs to be discussed that explains the other half of the story that is purposely hidden in the Kurdish and mainstream media news outlets.  We have only been hearing from the Kurdish side now it’s time for the Syrians in Kurdish held areas to have their chance to tell us about the hardships they have been put under by the Kurds. 

No Such Thing as Humanitarian Terrorists, Analyst Says of the White Helmets

By Prof. Tim Anderson, March 06 2017

Muslim Press has conducted an interview with Tim Anderson, the author of The Dirty War on Syria, to discuss the White Helmets and the war propaganda against the Syrian government. The White Helmets “take selfies of themselves ‘saving’ children, only to fool gullible people. But there is no such thing as a humanitarian terrorist,” Tim Anderson says.

Sweat Shops, GMOs and Neoliberal Fundamentalism: The Agroecological Alternative to Global Capitalism

By Colin Todhunter, March 06 2017

The geopolitics of food and agriculture has played a significant role in creating food-deficit regions. For instance, African agriculture has been reshaped on behalf of the interests described in the above extract. The Gates Foundation is currently spearheading the ambitions of corporate America and the scramble for Africa by global agribusiness. And in India, there has been an ongoing attempt to do the same: a project that is now reaching a critical phase as the motives of the state acting on behalf of private (foreign) capital are laid bare and the devastating effects on health, environment and social conditions are clear for all to see.

Global Environmental Pollutants: Is Anthropogenic Activity Despoiling the Planet?

By Dr. Gary G. Kohls, March 04 2017

Every polluting, fossil fuel-burning multinational corporation could be indictedin any unbiased court of law for crimes against humanity and for crimes against the planet – if any courageous lawyer could be found to prosecute the case. Plenty of solid scientific data exists to convict polluting corporations for their crimes against the planet – if a fair-minded judge could be found that is not beholden to corporate interests.

“Peeping Pigs” and Propaganda by Omission

By Edward Curtin, March 05 2017

While there is much talk these days about “fake news,” omitting important news is perhaps as widespread and egregiously harmful to an informed public.  The following report tries to remedy the way the mainstream media have for years ignored one of the oddest but more important news stories of the last sixty years.  Its implications are momentous, especially in the light of the exponential growth of spying and the loss of privacy. There are eyes everywhere these days. That we are being watched is beyond dispute; but by whom and why?  This is the real story that the mainstream media have failed to address.  Their failure to do so is truly laughable.

Sin pruebas, el establishment, es decir, el gobierno oculto de Estados Unidos, acusa al nuevo presidente, Donald Trump, de haberse beneficiado del hackeo ruso al Partido Demócrata y de estar al servicio del Kremlin.
La campaña contra Trump, cuyo equipo la compara con una “cacería de brujas”, le costó el puesto al consejero de Seguridad Nacional, el general Michael Flynn, y acotó el poder del Fiscal General de la Unión Americana, Jeff Sessions, toda vez que le margina de las investigaciones de este caso.

El ataque político, diplomático y sobre, todo, mediático contra Trump se explica de manera muy sencilla: el sucesor de Barack Obama -empleado del establishment- y vencedor de Hillary Clinton -la candidata de ese gobierno oculto- significa pérdidas billonarias para ese Estado Profundo, que lucra con la guerra, con la especulación financiera, con la educación, con la salud, con la alimentación y aun, con las almas de miles de millones de seres humanos.

Trump “echó las cartas”, como se dice coloquialmente, el jueves 22 de julio de 2016, al pronunciar su discurso de aceptación a la candidatura presidencial republicana. En esa ocasión dijo, entre otras, las siguientes:
⦁ “Si quieren escuchar el discurso manido de las empresas, mentiras cuidadosamente elaboradas y los mitos de los medios, la convención de los Demócratas es la semana que viene.”
⦁ “Las grandes empresas, los medios de comunicación de elite y los mayores donantes se han alineado detrás de la campañaa de mi oponente porque saben que ella mantendrá ese sistema amañado.”
⦁ “Le dan dinero porque tienen control absoluto sobre todo lo que hace. Ella es su marioneta y tiran de los hilos. Por eso, el mensaje de Hillary Clinton es que las cosas nunca van a cambiar. ¡Nunca jamás!”
⦁ “Cuando la misma secretaria de Estado amasa millones y millones de dólares intercambiando favores por intereses especiales y poderes extranjeros sé que ha llegado el momento de actuar.”
⦁ “He bajado a la arena política para que los poderosos ya no puedan golpear a la gente que no puede defenderse por sí misma.”
⦁ “Nadie conoce el sistema mejor que yo, por eso soy el único que puede arreglarlo.”

Luego, el 20 de enero pasado, cuando tomó posesión como Presidente de los Estados Unidos, Trump apuntó:
⦁ “La ceremonia de hoy tiene un carácter especial porque no sólo hacemos una transferencia de poder, sino que estamos transfiriendo el poder de Washington hacia ustedes, el pueblo.Por demasiado tiempo, un grupo pequeño en la capital, se ha beneficiado del Gobierno, mientras el pueblo cargaba en sus espaldas los costes.”

Está claro que se trata de un pequeño grupo, si se le compara con el resto del pueblo de los Estados Unidos; sin embargo, es la gente que controla al complejo financiero, militar y mediático radicado, de manera parasitaria, en territorio norteamericano. Uno de los soportes del Estado Profundo es el Consejo de Relaciones Exteriores, cuya sede está en Nueva York, y al que componen menos de siete mil individuos. Otro, es la Comisión Trilateral. Uno más, el Club Bilderberg, que ha sido desenmascarado por el escritor y periodista Daniel Estulin. Otro, excesivamente poderoso, es el que controla a la Reserva Federal de los Estados Unidos.

Motivos concretos de odio contra Trump

1. Su propósito de evitar rencillas y enfrentamientos con las otras dos potencias mundiales: Rusia y China. Desactivar una nueva y artificiosa “guerra fría” significaría dejar de recibir ganancias fabulosas por venta de armas.
2. Su deseo de aniquilar al terrorismo islámico que, según el papa Francisco, no existe. Acabar con él, también afectaría las exportaciones de armas y de sistemas de seguridad en aeropuertos, oficinas públicas, etcétera.
3. Terminar con el “libre comercio” permitiría limitar las inmorales “libertades” de los grandes consorcios trasnacionales que enriquecen a sus pocos dueños, a cambio de empobrecer a la mayoría de la humanidad.
4. Sacar a los narcotraficantes de Estados Unidos redundaría, también, en una cuantiosísima merma a las sucias ganancias de los dueños del sistema neoliberal. Permitiría, luego, iniciar una campaña de prevención y atención de adicciones. Una juventud sin drogas tiene más probabilidades de contribuir a la grandeza nacional que aquella sujeta a la pipeta del narco-estado protector de los “derechos humanos”.

Conclusión

En síntesis: Trump ha osado enfrentarse al oscuro poder de Rockefeller, Soros, Sachs y compañía.

Lo que tiene qué hacer, ahora, el nuevo mandatario norteamericano es demostrar que en ningún momento vulneró la seguridad nacional de los Estados Unidos y, por el contrario,  exhibir a Barack Obama y Hillary Clinton -con pruebas irrefutables- acerca de cómo utilizan la industria de la guerra para enriquecer a sus amos, a costa de la invasión injusta a otras naciones y del sufrimiento humano.

Convencer, también, a los escépticos propio y extraños, que detrás de esa ilegal campaña de filtraciones está la mano de ese grupo de especuladores y belicistas conocido vulgarmente como el de los “Halcones”.

Concluiremos este artículo citando a uno de los medios del establishment, pero radicado en Europa. Hablamos del periódico español El País, que en su edición digital del sábado 4 de marzo de 2017, publicó uno de tantos materiales contra Trump, cargado de adjetivos y insultos. Sin embargo, El País tuvo que reconocer lo siguiente:

Aunque no se ha demostrado que el equipo de Trump tuviera participación en los cibertaques, las indagaciones abiertas por el FBI, los servicios inteligencia, el Senado y la Cámara de Representantes se han erigido en la más seria amenaza contra el presidente.

Jorge Santa Cruz

Jorge Santa Cruz: Periodista mexicano.

Los intentos del presidente ucraniano, Petro Poroshenko, de mantener hoy la campaña bélica en Donbass y de lidiar con radicales y sus bloqueos de regiones sublevadas solo sumaron caos en la república exsoviética.

En los últimos días, la situación cambió vertiginosamente en las autoproclamadas repúblicas de Donetsk y Lugansk. Los radicales ucranianos bloqueaban desde mediados de enero pasado el paso de vagones con antracita extraída en esas regiones.

Las autoridades ucranianas tuvieron la oportunidad desde un principio de suspender el boicot con métodos policiales, y establecer un control sobre las zonas de tránsito entre la región de Donbass (Donetsk y Lugansk) y el resto de Ucrania.

Sin embargo, en el fondo parecían compartir los lemas proferidos por los ultranacionalistas organizadores de los cercos y barricadas montados en las líneas de ferrocarril y en carreteras desde y hacia el Donbass.

La situación cambió, no solo por el hecho de que la falta del carbón y el coque proveniente del territorio rebelde creó una situación difícil a la economía ucraniana, sino porque los gobiernos de las citadas regiones impusieron sus condiciones.

Desde la jefatura de las repúblicas sublevadas se escuchó un ultimátum de que tomarían bajo su control las empresas y minas de carbón en sus territorios, si continuaba el bloqueo. Esa advertencia se materializó el 1 de marzo.

El gobierno ucraniano debió dedicarse a cómo salvar la economía nacional de un colapso energético y a aplicar medidas para evitar el cierre de complejos metalúrgicos.

Pero en Kiev, más bien lo que se produjo fue una fuerte polémica sobre quién podría estar detrás del bloqueo. Los más culpan en primer lugar a Moscú, pues consideran que el Kremlin lo planificó todo para volver a Ucrania dependiente del carbón ruso.

Otros estiman que los propios bloqueadores podrían buscar un beneficio para algunos sectores oligárquicos.

Pero lo que sí parece quedar claro es que con la admisión del bloqueo de los radicales, que causa daños económicos considerables a Ucrania, Poroshenko muestra la fragilidad del poder para canalizar problemas internos con la ultraderecha.

Como afirma el politólogo Mijail Pagrebinki, el Ejecutivo ya dejó pasar la oportunidad de resolver el asunto del bloqueo con el uso de la fuerza policial. Hasta de Occidente le recomiendan negociar con los bloqueadores del Donbas.

Además, las autoridades de Donetsk y Lugansk aseguraron que ahora serían ellos quienes impondrían un bloqueo a Ucrania por al menos 60 días. En ese lapso, las repúblicas buscarán nuevos mercados para sus productos.

Cabe destacar que Ucrania pierde, además del combustible para sus termoeléctricas, las cuales producen una tercera parte de la energía eléctrica, otros nueve mil millones de exportaciones de productos elaborados con el coque obtenido en el Donbass.

Para el filósofo y politólogo Serguei Datsiuk, en esta ocasión no estamos frente a un conflicto del Gobierno con los radicales por el tema de los bloqueos, sino entre el poder y la sociedad.

Las acciones y decisiones de los ultraderechistas cada vez se tornan más peligrosas para el poder en Kiev, que también está imposibilitado de retomar el control de 400 kilómetros de fronteras de Donetsk y Lugansk con Rusia.

Antonio Rondón García

Avanzar en las reformas para lograr un crecimiento económico de alrededor del 6,5 por ciento este año, es una meta que defiende hoy China pese a los retos presentes y los que están por llegar.

Al presentar el Informe sobre la Labor del Gobierno este domingo, el primer ministro chino, Li Keqiang, dejó claro que esta nación tiene previsto alcanzar este año un crecimiento económico de alrededor del 6,5 por ciento, o más si es posible en la práctica.

El reporte, exteriorizado por Li en la reunión inaugural de la V sesión anual de la XII Asamblea Popular Nacional (APN), deja claro que el objetivo, que se corresponde con las leyes de la economía y la realidad objetiva, es el más bajo en más de 20 años para el gigante asiático, no obstante, el país sigue siendo una de las economías de más rápido crecimiento en todo el mundo.

Aclara el texto que ese designio ayudará tanto a la orientación como a la estabilización de las expectativas y también al reajuste estructural.

A la par, apoyará las acciones para conseguir el propósito de construir una sociedad modestamente acomodada en todos los aspectos para 2020, según el primer ministro.

Durante su alocución de apertura de la sesión, la primera desde que Xi Jinping fue apoyado como núcleo del Comité Central del Partido Comunista de China (PCCh), en octubre pasado, Li pidió trabajar para cumplir las metas de desarrollo.

Ante unos tres mil diputados de la APN, subrayó que el 2017 es un año de crucial importancia para el país, cuando el PCCh celebrará su XIX Congreso Nacional en el segundo semestre para elegir un nuevo liderazgo para los próximos cinco años, periodo en el que se concretará la visión de Xi de una sociedad modestamente acomodada.

De acuerdo con el texto, China mantendrá el alza del IPC (Índice de Precios y Cotizaciones) en torno al tres por ciento, y creará más de 11 millones de puestos de trabajo en las zonas urbanas, con lo que tendrá una tasa de desempleo urbano de máximo 4,5 por ciento.

Por otra parte el país reducirá el consumo de energía por unidad del PIB (Producto Interno Bruto) en al menos un 3,4 por ciento.

El año pasado, el PIB del país alcanzó los 74,4 billones de yuanes (10,8 billones de dólares), para un aumento de un 6,7 por ciento, y contribuyendo con más del 30 por ciento al crecimiento de la economía global.

Igualmente el gobierno creó 13,14 millones de puestos laborales en las zonas urbanas, y además incrementó los ingresos disponibles per cápita en un 6,3 por ciento al tiempo que logró sacar de la pobreza a cerca de 12,4 millones de personas.

Entre los desafíos que encarará esta nación, Li mencionó el disminuido crecimiento económico del mundo y la tendencia al alza del proteccionismo.

Sin embargo enfatizó que tales dificultades serán vencidas, dado que el país cuenta con una sólida base material, abundantes recursos humanos, un mercado enorme y un completo sistema de industrias.

En lo referente a la reforma estructural por el lado de la oferta, prioridad en el desarrollo de China, Li manifestó que los esfuerzos se concentrarán en una variedad de áreas, como racionalizar la administración, reducir impuestos, ampliar el acceso al mercado y disminuir la oferta ineficaz, ampliando, al mismo tiempo, la eficaz.

Asimismo, Beijing continuará profundizando las reformas en la defensa nacional y las fuerzas armadas y se espera que antes que finalice la sesión del máximo legislativo el 15 de marzo, la administración revele el presupuesto para el área militar este año.

Prensa Latina

Los países del Triángulo Norte de Centroamérica están llamados a convertirse en el parachoques del flujo migratorio hacia Estados Unidos y en particular Guatemala, acorde con la política represiva impulsada por el presidente Donald Trump.

Durante su visita el 21 y 22 de febrero, el secretario de Seguridad Nacional, John Kelly, aseguró que no habría deportaciones masivas de personas oriundas de esta región, más catalogó a la migración de cáncer terrible y negoció tras bambalinas reforzar militarmente la frontera guatemalteca con México.

Incluso, el exjefe del Comando Sur recorrió el Centro de Recepción de Migrantes en la Fuerza Aérea de Guatemala, lo que a juicio de analistas confirmó la presunta intención de su llegada: comprobar la capacidad del país para recibir grandes cantidades de migrantes retornados de manera eventual.

Dos semanas después, trascendió que los ministros de Gobernación de Guatemala, Francisco Rivas; de Justicia y Seguridad Pública de El Salvador, Mauricio Ramírez; y de la Secretaría de Seguridad de Honduras, Julián Pacheco Tinoco, fueron convocados por Kelly a una reunión en Washington.

Rivas confirmó que el encuentro se dará en el mes de junio por iniciativa de Kelly y adelantó que los presidentes y cancilleres del área podrían participar en este, para diseñar acciones integrales con tal de obtener resultados mejores en la lucha contra la violencia y el trasiego de drogas, lo cual permitiría disminuir la migración ilegal.

Pero mientras llega el momento, los gobiernos vértices del Triángulo Norte de Centroamérica articulan planes para atacar ciertas causas que alientan el éxodo de seres humanos y sobre todo de menores de edad.

El 8 de marzo autoridades de Seguridad de Honduras acudirán a un diálogo con Rivas para evaluar posibles operaciones a ejecutar y los aspectos a priorizar en la lucha por desarticular los grupos criminales que actúan en ambas naciones, así como para disminuir el contrabando de mercadería, entre otros temas.

Sin embargo, antes que los vecinos llegará el secretario de Estado adjunto para Narcóticos y Asuntos de Seguridad en Estados Unidos, William Brownfield, quien se reunirá el lunes con el presidente Jimmy Morales.

El retorno de Brownfield, apenas un año después de un intercambio similar con el gobernante en el Palacio Nacional de la Cultura, es asociado a lo dicho en el Informe Anual del Departamento de Estado sobre Control de narcóticos: Informe de Estrategia, Volumen I, Control de Drogas y Químicos.

El documento señala a los tres países de la zona entre los más afectados por el lavado de dinero y aunque reconoce logros a la gestión de Morales, subraya su imposibilidad para construir mecanismos sostenibles de lucha contra el narcotráfico en Guatemala.

Destaca que ello sólo será posible cuando ‘implemente plenamente sus leyes, las reformas a las instituciones policiales y judiciales’, lo cual supone un claro mensaje a las autoridades electas tras la ola de protestas anticorrupción que sacaron de la silla presidencial al exmandatario Otto Pérez Molina (2012-2015).

Previo a esto, Estados Unidos anunció una eventual solicitud de extradición de la exvicepresidenta Roxana Baldetti y del exministro de Gobernación, Mauricio López Bonilla, acusados de narcotráfico por una corte norteamericana pero en prisión preventiva y sujetos a juicio por otros delitos en Guatemala.

Según el canciller guatemalteco, Carlos Raúl Morales, en la región se trabaja por mejorar las condiciones de vida de la población, la seguridad ciudadana y fronteriza, las perspectivas comerciales y el control migratorio.

Mas consultores políticos sugieren repensar la aplicación de un modelo que convirtió al área en una de las más desiguales, violentas y vulnerables ante el cambio climático en el mundo, sobre todo a Guatemala y Honduras.

Para el coordinador del Centro de Estudios de Guatemala, Sandino Asturias, ‘los procesos migratorios masivos hacia Estados Unidos tienen una causa fundamental: el fracaso del modelo económico impuesto hace más de dos décadas’, que redundó en la pobreza, la desigualdad, y la falta de oportunidades, especialmente para las mujeres, juventudes e infantes.

Isabel Soto Mayedo

Los objetivos de la lucha por Palmira entre el Estado Islámico, Daesh por su acrónimo en árabe, y el Ejército sirio y sus aliados van más allá de una confrontación militar porque significa la sostenibilidad nacional ante una guerra impuesta.

Palmira, cuya ciudadela antigua es Patrimonio de la Humanidad desde 1980, se ubica en medio del vasto desierto sirio fronterizo con Iraq, y a su alrededor geográfico se concentra casi el 45 por ciento de las reservas de gas de esta nación del Levante.

Más de 40 yacimientos están situados en el área noreste de la región, perteneciente a la provincia de Homs y cuya producción en condiciones normales llegaría a nueve millones de metros cúbicos diariamente.

La zona es también punto de tránsito por donde pasan los gaseoductos que transportan gas desde importantes yacimientos en las vecinas provincias de Hasaka y Deir Ezzor, al noreste y el este de Siria.

Los datos señalan que es además, el centro de la extracción o transferencia de casi toda la producción del país, donde se encuentran las más importantes plantas de procesamiento y de energía suministradoras de electricidad y gas para uso doméstico e industrial a las áreas donde vive la mayor parte de la población.

Maher, Shaer y Hayyan están entre los principales puntos geográficos en ese sentido, con pozos y plantas fundamentales con ese fin y fueron los principales objetivos en los ataques del Daesh desde los primeros instantes de la guerra terrorista.

Abu Bakr Al Bagdadi, el escurridizo y máximo cabecilla de ese grupo, lo expresó públicamente y en nombre de Alá pidió ‘consolidar’ el dominio sobre ese vasto territorio para sustentar- como lo lograron hasta no hace mucho- una fuente de financiamiento que les llegó a proporcionar miles de millones de dólares.

La realidad demuestra con creces que la base confesional, la denominada división entre extremistas religiosos y otras creencias más tolerantes, queda en un segundo plano y a pesar de todo el esfuerzo mediático sin precedentes que lanzó el mundo occidental en ese sentido contra Siria.

En medio de una brutal agresión externa que alentó hasta límites incalculables las disensiones internas, el Estado sirio comprendió y racionalizó prioridades y mantuvo la disputa en los terrenos de combate y aplicó estrictas medidas en los controles de combustibles y sus derivados y la generación de electricidad.

Desde el 2012, todo esa desértica región fue y sigue siendo escenario de duros combates y el dominio alterno de las fuerzas leales a Damasco y los extremistas armados y que obligó a la aplicación de nuevas tácticas y estrategias.

A partir de septiembre del 2015, todo empezó a cambiar tras la solicitud legal e institucional del gobierno de Bashar al Assad de apoyo aéreo de Rusia, dirigido esencialmente y sin cortapisas, contra el Daesh y su prepotencia política más que confesional.

Con rapidez y eficiencia, en medio de una realidad geográfica bien difícil desde el punto de vista militar, el apoyo aéreo ruso significó la garantía para el avance de las tropas terrestres del Ejército sirio y el sensible corte a las líneas de suministros del Daesh.

La primera liberación de Palmira en marzo del 2016 por el Ejército sirio y la posterior contraofensiva del Daesh que volvió a ocuparla a fines de ese año, permitió una evaluación de errores de apreciación tácticas y estratégicas, asimilarlos con rapidez y revertir la situación.

Entre diciembre de 2016 y el actual mes de marzo, la coordinación operativa junto a la asesoría rusa e iraní permitió a las fuerzas sirias reconquistar Palmira, con apoyo básicamente y como tropa de choque y avanzada por la Quinta Legión, los combatientes de Hezbolá y los afganos fatimís.

La actual situación permite equilibrar los flancos de defensa en el desierto y la región oriental de la provincia de Homs, mejorar la protección y retoma de los campos de petróleo y gas,tal como se logró en el de Hayyan.

Por primera vez en la vastas extensión desérticas hacia Palmira se emplearon equipos militares de avanzada como los TOS 1 A, Buratino y los helicópteros de ataques MI 28 y Ka 52, además de fuerzas especiales artilleras y de pequeñas unidades del Ejército sirio.

Los resultados de tales acciones están demostrados en la destrucción de 19 tanques, 37 blindados de combate, 98 camionetas con armas pesadas y más de 100 vehículos de otro tipo del Daesh y el establecimiento de una zona segura de operaciones a más de 20 kilómetros al este y sur de Palmira.

Todo ello en aproximadamente dos meses de operaciones, a lo que se suma la aniquilación de más de dos mil puntos de concentración de los terroristas y la recuperación de cerca de mil 700 kilómetros cuadrados de territorio.

Palmira, junto a sus milenarios valores históricos y arqueológicos, es hoy el símbolo de la resistencia y firmeza de un país del Medio Oriente como nunca antes, en defensa de la sobrevivencia de su soberanía e independencia.

Pedro García Hernández

Muslim Press has conducted an interview with Tim Anderson, the author of The Dirty War on Syria, to discuss the White Helmets and the war propaganda against the Syrian government.

Much of the argument in favour of GM agriculture involves little more than misrepresentations and un scrupulous attacks on those who express concerns about the technology and its impacts. These attacks are in part designed to whip up populist sentiment and denigrate critics so that corporate interests can secure further control over agriculture. They also serve to divert attention from the underlying issues pertaining to hunger and poverty and genuine solutions, as well as the self-interest of the pro-GMO lobby itself.

The very foundation of the GMO agritech sector is based on a fraud. The sector and the wider transnational agribusiness cartel to which it belongs have also successfully captured for their own interests many international and national bodies and policies, including the WTO, various trade deals, governments institutions and regulators. From fraud to duplicity, little wonder then the sector is ridden with fear and paranoia.

“They are scared to death,” says Marion Nestle, professor of nutrition, food studies, and public health at New York University and author of several books on food policy. She adds: “They have an industry to defend and are attacking in the hope that they’ll neutralize critics … It’s a paranoid industry and has been from the beginning.”

War against reason

Global corporations like Monsanto are waging an ideological war against not only critics but the public too. For instance, consider that the majority of the British public and the Canadian public have valid concerns about GM food and do not want them. However, the British government was found to have been secretly colluding with the industry and the Canadian government is attempting to soften up the public to try to get people to change their opinions.

Instead of respecting public opinion and serving the public interest by holding powerful corporations to account, officials seem more inclined to serve the interests of the sector, regardless of genuine concerns about GM that, despite what the industry would like to have believe, are grounded in facts and involve rational discourse.

Whether via the roll-out of GMOs or an associated chemical-intensive industrialised monocrop system of agriculture, the agritech/agribusiness sector wants to further expand its influence throughout the globe. Beneath the superficial façade of working in the interest of humanity, however, the sector is driven by a neoliberal fundamentalism which demands the entrenchment of capitalist agriculture via deregulation and the corporate control of seeds, land, fertilisers, water, pesticides and food processing.

If anything matters to the corporate agribusiness/agritech industry, contrary to the public image it tries to convey, it clearly has little to do with ‘choice’, ‘democracy’ or objective science. It has more to do with undermining and debasing these concepts and displacing existing systems of production: economies are “opened up through the concurrent displacement of a pre-existing productive system. Small and medium-sized enterprises are pushed into bankruptcy or obliged to produce for a global distributor, state enterprises are privatised or closed down, independent agricultural producers are impoverished” (Michel Chossudovsky in The Globalization of Poverty, p16).

Critics are highlighting not only how the industry has subverted and debased science and has infiltrated key public institutions and regulatory bodies, but they are also showing how trade and aid is used to subjugate regions and the most productive components of global agriculture – the small/peasant farmer – to the needs of powerful commercial entities.

Critics stab at the heart of neoliberalism

By doing this, critics stab hard at the heart such corporate interests and their neoliberal agenda.

According to Eric Holt-Giménez:

“The World Bank, the World Trade Organization, the World Food Program, the Millennium Challenge, The Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and industrial giants like Yara Fertilizer, Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland, Syngenta, DuPont, and Monsanto, carefully avoid addressing the root causes of the food crisis. The ‘solutions’ they prescribe are rooted in the same policies and technologies that created the problem in the first place: increased food aid, de-regulated global trade in agricultural commodities, and more technological and genetic fixes. These measures only strengthen the corporate status quo controlling the world’s food… The future of our food-and fuel-systems are being decided de facto by unregulated global markets, financial speculators, and global monopolies.”

The geopolitics of food and agriculture has played a significant role in creating food-deficit regions. For instance, African agriculture has been reshaped on behalf of the interests described in the above extract. The Gates Foundation is currently spearheading the ambitions of corporate America and the scramble for Africa by global agribusiness. And in India, there has been an ongoing attempt to do the same: a project that is now reaching a critical phase as the motives of the state acting on behalf of private (foreign) capital are laid bare and the devastating effects on health, environment and social conditions are clear for all to see.

Any serious commitment to feeding the world sustainably and equitably must work to challenge a globalised system of capitalism that has produced structural inequality and poverty; a system which fuels the marginalisation of small-scale farms and their vitally important cropping systems and is responsible for the devastating impacts of food commodity speculation, land takeovers, rigged trade and an industrial system of agriculture.

And embedded within the system is a certain mentality. Whether it is the likes of Monsanto’s High Grant, Robb Fraley or Bill Gates, highly paid (multi-millionaire) white men with an ideological commitment to corporate power are trying to force a profitable but bogus model of food production on the world.

They do so while conveniently ignoring the effects of a system of capitalism that they so clearly promote and have financially profited from.

It is a capitalism and a system of agriculture propped up by the blood money of militarism (Ukraine and Iraq), ‘structural adjustment’ and strings-attached loans (Africa) or slanted trade deals (India) whereby transnational agribusiness drives a global agenda to suit its interests and eradicate impediments to profit. And it doesn’t matter how much devastation ensues or how unsustainable their model is, ‘crisis management’ and ‘innovation’ fuel the corporate-controlled treadmill they seek to impose.

Genuine solutions: agroecology, decentralisation and localism

However, what really irks the corporate interests which fuel the current GMO/chemical-intensive industrialised model of agriculture is that critics are offering genuine alternatives and solutions. They advocate a shift towards more organic-based systems of agriculture, which includes providing support to small farms and an agroecology movement that is empowering to people politically, socially and economically.

This represents a challenge to all good neoliberal evangelists (and outright hypocrites) with a stake in corporate agriculture who rely on smears to attack those who advocate for such things.

To understand what agroecology involves, let us turn to Raj Patel:

“To understand what agro-ecology is, it helps first to understand why today’s agriculture is called “industrial.” Modern farming turns fields into factories. Inorganic fertilizer adds nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorous to the soil; pesticides kill anything that crawls; herbicides nuke anything green and unwanted—all to create an assembly line that spits out a single crop… Agro-ecology uses nature’s far more complex systems to do the same thing more efficiently and without the chemistry set. Nitrogen-fixing beans are grown instead of inorganic fertilizer; flowers are used to attract beneficial insects to manage pests; weeds are crowded out with more intensive planting. The result is a sophisticated polyculture—that is, it produces many crops simultaneously, instead of just one.”

And it works. Look no further than what Cuba has achieved and the successes outlined in this article. Indeed, much has been written about agroecology and its potential for radical social change, its successes and the challenges it faces (see this, this and this). And now there a major new book from Food First and Groundswell International: Fertile Ground: Scaling agroecology from the ground up.

Executive Director of Food First Eric Holtz-Gimenez argues that agroecology offers concrete, practical solutions to many of the world’s problems that move beyond (but which are linked to) agriculture. In doing so, it challenges – and offers alternatives to – the prevailing moribund doctrinaire economics of a neoliberalism that drives a failing system (also see this and this) of GM/chemical-intensive industrial agriculture.

He adds that the scaling up of agroecology can tackle hunger, malnutrition, environmental degradation and climate change. By creating securely paid labour-intensive agricultural work, it can also address the interrelated links between labour offshoring by rich countries and the removal of rural populations elsewhere who end up in sweat shops to carry out the outsourced jobs: the two-pronged process of neoliberal globalisation that has devastated the economies of the US and UK and which is displacing existing indigenous food production systems and undermining the rural infrastructure in places like India to produce a reserve army of cheap labour.

When you fail to understand capitalism and the central importance of agriculture, you fail to grasp many of the issues currently affecting humanity. At the same time, when you are part of the problem and fuel and benefit from it, you will do your best to attack and denigrate anything or anyone that challenges your interests.

“The triumph of the S.S. demands that the tortured victim allow himself to be led to the noose without protesting, that he renounce and abandon himself to the point of ceasing to affirm his identity. And it is not for nothing. It is not gratuitously, out of sheer sadism, that the S.S. men desire his defeat. They know that the system which succeeds in destroying its victim before he mounts the scaffold . . . is incomparably the best for keeping a whole people in slavery.”—Hannah Arendt reporting on the trial of Adolf Eichmann

You can’t have it both ways. You can’t live in a constitutional republic if you allow the government to act like a police state. You can’t claim to value freedom if you allow the government to operate like a dictatorship.

You can’t expect to have your rights respected if you allow the government to treat whomever it pleases with disrespect and an utter disregard for the rule of law.

If you’re inclined to advance this double standard because you believe you have done nothing wrong and have nothing to hide, beware: there’s always a boomerang effect.

Whatever dangerous practices you allow the government to carry out now—whether it’s in the name of national security or protecting America’s borders or making America great again—rest assured, these same practices can and will be used against you when the government decides to set its sights on you.

Nothing is ever as simple as the government claims it is.

The war on drugs turned out to be a war on the American people, waged with SWAT teams and militarised police.

The war on terror turned out to be a war on the American people, waged with warrantless surveillance and indefinite detention.

The war on immigration will be yet another war on the American people, waged with roving government agents demanding “papers, please.”

So you see, when you talk about empowering government agents to demand identification from anyone they suspect might be an illegal immigrant—the current scheme being entertained by the Trump administration to ferret out and cleanse the country of illegal immigrants—what you’re really talking about is creating a society in which you are required to identify yourself to any government worker who demands it.

Just recently, in fact, passengers arriving in New York’s JFK Airport on a domestic flight from San Francisco were ordered to show their “documents” to border patrol agents in order to get off the plane.

This is how you pave the way for a national identification system.

Americans have always resisted adopting a national ID card for good reason: it gives the government and its agents the ultimate power to target, track and terrorise the populace according to the government’s own nefarious purposes.

National ID card systems have been used before by oppressive governments—in Nazi Germany against the Jews, in South Africa against black citizens, in Rwanda against the Tutsis—in the name of national security, invariably with horrifying results.

In the United States, post-9/11, more than 750 Muslim men were rounded up on the basis of their religion and ethnicity and detained for up to eight months. Their experiences echo those of 120,000 Japanese-Americans who were similarly detained 75 years ago following the attack on Pearl Harbor, a practice the U.S. Supreme Court has yet to declare illegal.

Fast forward to the Trump administration’s war on illegal immigration, and you have the perfect storm necessary for the adoption of a national ID card, the ultimate human tracking device, which would make the police state’s task of monitoring, tracking and singling out individual suspects—citizen and noncitizen alike—far simpler.

A federalised, computerised, cross-referenced, databased system of identification policed by government agents would be the final nail in the coffin for privacy.

Granted, in the absence of a national ID system, “we the people” are already tracked in a myriad of ways. This informational glut—used to great advantage by both the government and corporate sectors—is converging into a mandate for “an internal passport,” a.k.a., a national ID card that would store information as basic as a person’s name, birth date and place of birth, as well as private information, including a Social Security number, fingerprint, retina scan and personal, criminal and financial records.

The Real ID Act, which imposes federal standards on identity documents such as state drivers’ licenses, is the prelude to this national identification system.

At some point, however, it will not matter whether your skin is black or yellow or brown or white. It will not matter whether you’re an immigrant or a citizen. It will not matter whether you’re rich or poor. It won’t even matter whether you’re driving, flying or walking.

Eventually, all that will matter is whether some government agent—poorly trained, utterly ignorant of the Constitution, way too hyped up on the power of their badges, and authorised to detain, search, interrogate, threaten and generally harass anyone they see fit—chooses to single you out for special treatment.

You see, the police state does not discriminate.

It’s a short hop, skip and a jump from allowing government agents to stop and demand identification from someone suspected of being an illegal immigrant to empowering government agents to subject anyone—citizen and noncitizen alike—to increasingly intrusive demands that they prove not only that they are legally in the country, but that they are also lawful, in compliance with every statute and regulation on the books, and not suspected of having committed some crime or other.

It’s no longer a matter of if, but when.

In the case of a national identification system, it might start off as a means of curtailing illegal immigration, but it will end up as a means of controlling the American people.

We have been down this road before.

Reporting on the trial of Nazi bureaucrat Adolf Eichmann for the New Yorker in 1963, Hannah Arendt describes the “submissive meekness with which Jews went to their death”:

…arriving on time at the transportation points, walking under their own power to the places of execution, digging their own graves, undressing and making neat piles of their clothing, and lying down side by side to be shot—seemed a telling point, and the prosecutor, asking witness after witness, “Why did you not protest?,” “Why did you board the train?,” “Fifteen thousand people were standing there and hundreds of guards facing you—why didn’t you revolt and charge and attack these guards?,” harped on it for all it was worth. But the sad truth of the matter is that the point was ill taken, for no non-Jewish group or non-Jewish people had behaved differently.

The lessons of history are clear: chained, shackled and imprisoned in a detention camp, there is little chance of resistance.

The time to act is now, before it¹s too late. Indeed, there is power in numbers, but if those numbers will not unite and rise up against their oppressors, there can be no resistance.

As Arendt concludes, “under conditions of terror most people will comply but some people will not, just as the lesson of the countries to which the Final Solution was proposed is that ‘it could happen’ in most places but it did not happen everywhere.”

It does not have to happen here.

As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, we do not have to condemn ourselves to life under an oppressive, authoritarian regime.

We do not have to become our own jailers.

We do not have to dig our own graves.

We do not have to submit.

Has Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte declared an end to the long-standing U.S.-Philippines alliance by seeking closer relations with China and Russia? 

It seems that “America’s Pacific Century” intended to maintain its influence throughout the Asia-Pacific region and isolate China has hit a major roadblock.

The relationship between the Philippines and the United States has been quite interesting with Duterte making headlines across the world in 2016 criticizing the foreign policy of the Obama administration.

According to a Reuter’s report on October 20th ‘Duterte aligns Philippines with China, says U.S. has lost’ on Duterte’s trip to China last October with a business delegation of over 200 people. Duterte spoke at a forum in the Great Hall of the People, and said “in this venue, your honors, in this venue, I announce my separation from the United States.” Duterte continued “Both in military, not maybe social, but economics also. America has lost “according to the report. What Duterte said next made Washington nervous:

I’ve realigned myself in your ideological flow and maybe I will also go to Russia to talk to (President Vladimir) Putin and tell him that there are three of us against the world – China, Philippines and Russia. It’s the only way

Here is Washington’s response to Duterte’s statement about the U.S.-Philippine relationship:

In Washington, the U.S. State Department said it was “baffled” by Duterte’s comments and would seek an explanation when Daniel Russel, the top U.S. diplomat for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, visits Manila this weekend.

We are going to be seeking an explanation of exactly what the president meant when he talked about separation from the U.S.,” said State Department spokesman John Kirby. “It’s not clear to us exactly what that means in all its ramifications

Duterte’s visit to China was not the only latest development that made headlines; he also called Obama a “son of a bitch” making it clear that he was not interested in diplomatic relations with the Unites States. The U.S.-Philippine relationship is a “colonial relationship” at best and Duterte wants to change that arrangement. The Philippines has been a “colony” of Washington since The Spanish-American War, not a sovereign nation that has its own political and economic interests at hand.

Duterte’s Controversial ‘War on Drugs’ Policy

Duterte’s domestic policy against drug dealers received criticism from the United Nations, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the Obama administration. In a nationally televised speech, Duterte said that “If (a criminal) fights, and he fights to the death, you can kill him.” He went on to say, “Please feel free to call us, the police, or do it yourself if you have the gun … you have my support.” The Associated Press reported on September 5th what Obama had said at a news conference in Hangzhou, China if he does meet with Duterte concerning the extrajudicial killings:

“I always want to make sure that if I’m having a meeting that it’s actually productive, and that we’re getting something done,” Obama said.

We recognize the significant burden that the drug trade plays not just in the Philippines but around the world, and fighting narco-trafficking is tough. But we will always assert the need to have due process and to engage in that fight against drugs in a way that’s consistent with basic international norms. And so, undoubtedly, if and when we have a meeting this is something that is going to be brought up,” said Obama, who has been attending a meeting of the Group of 20 nations

Duterte was not pleased on what Obama had said when he responded in a speech in a local convention in Manila the following month “Instead of helping us, the first to criticise is this State Department, so you can go to hell, Mr Obama, you can go to hell.” Although extra-judicial killings of suspected drug dealers are a policy that crosses the line when it comes to human rights violations, it’s a problem that the Filipinos themselves must solve. Saudi Arabia has committed numerous human rights violations against its citizens since its founding and Washington does not criticize the Saudi monarchy for it. Illegal drugs are a serious problem in the Philippines so many Filipino’s actually support Duterte’s decision to allow extra-judicial killings. The Daily Mail reported in 2016 that “In a separate poll the following day, 84 percent of Filipinos said they supported the drug crackdown although most felt it important to arrest suspects alive.” Whether you agree or disagree with Duterte’s drug war policies, it is a Filipino problem, a problem that needs no interference from Washington. Only the Filipino’s should decide how to deal with the drug epidemic that is a result from the “War on Drugs.”

Colonialism, Oppression, and Imperial Conquest

To Duterte, it is not just about Washington’s criticism of his war on drugs policy, it is about the history between the U.S. and the Philippines during and after the Spanish-American War. The Philippines became a colony of the U.S. after the Spanish-American War until 1946 and since its independence; it has remained a vassal state.

One of the main chapters in the Philippine-American War Duterte had mentioned was the Moro Rebellion (1899-1913), a conflict between the U.S. forces and the Moro people (ethnic Muslims) that took place in the southern part of the Philippines in the islands of Mindanao, Jolo and the Sulu Archipelago. The Moros are a tribe, committed to establishing a ‘Moro Nation.’ It was a “national liberation movement” of the Bangsamoro (an autonomous political entity within the Philippines for the ethnic Moro). The Moros have resisted foreign invaders for more than 400 years that included the Japanese, Spanish and the Americans.

In 1968, a conflict also erupted between the Moros and the Philippine government under the U.S-backed dictatorship of President Ferdinand Marcos. It was known as the Jabidah massacre that resulted in the killings of more than 60 Filipino Muslim commandos on a planned operation by the Marcos government to reclaim the north-eastern part of the Malaysian state of Sabah. Sabah was under the rule of the Sultanate of Sulu, a Muslim state which was part of the Malaysian Federation since 1963 under the Malaysia Agreement. However, the Philippine government claimed that the eastern part of Sabah was never part of any foreign entity and that Sabah was only leased and still remained part of the Philippines.

There were numerous battles between U.S. and the Filipino forces. One of the conflicts took place on May 2, 1902 called ‘The Battle of Bayan’ where U.S. troops clashed with the Moros near Bayan on the island of Mindanao which claimed the deaths of more than 350 Moros and a dozen U.S. soldiers.

The online news website www.sunstar.com.ph based in the Philippines published Duterte’s comments on America’s history in the Philippines during the early 20th Century. Duterte was asked by a reporter from Reuters about Obama’s response on the extra-judicial killings and he went on to mention the history of The Battle of Bud Dajo on March 6th, 1906 on the island of Jolo:

“Who is he? When as a matter of fact at the turn of the century, before the Americans left, the Philippines, in the pacification campaign of the Moro in this island, there were around 6 million ang population ng Moro, how many died? Six hundred. If you can answer this question and give an apology, I will answer him,” Duterte said

It was a massacre by the U.S. forces that attacked the Moros with advanced weapons such as mountain guns since an agreement between both sides that failed to establish a peaceful resolution. The Moros wanted Bud Dajo as a shelter, far away from the war. The Sunstar article published the details of what had happened at Bud Dajo:

On July 4, 1902, President Theodore Roosevelt declared the war over after successfully subjugating the insurrectionist Filipino forces, and in his own proclamation said, “except in the country inhabited by the Moro tribes, to which this proclamation does not apply.”

The Moro Province was created in 1903, comprising the southern Mindanao and the Sulu islands. Unlike the other provinces, the Moro Province was to be staffed by US Army officers, simply because US believed the Moro Province was backward and need to be civilized and educated on democracy

It was the continuation of Manifest Destiny when the U.S. expanded its economic, political and social influences throughout North America particularly affecting indigenous tribal nations. That same program was obviously implemented on the Philippines:

On March 5, 1906, Woods ordered his officers to gather 800 of his men from the 6th and 19th Infantry, the 4th Cavalry, the 28th Artillery Battery, the Sulu Constabulary, and sailors from the gunboat Pampanga, led by Colobnel Duncan, to Jolo. They were armed with mountain guns, rifles, bayonets, fast-firing pistols and grenades. When negotiations for the Moro people who sought refuge in Bud Dajo failed, they attacked.

The Moro warriors were armed with kris, barongs, and spears. The attack ended on March 7, 1906, with not one Moro standing; women and children among them. The Americans lost two dozen men and some 70 wounded. It was a complete massacre. The “victory” that was earlier celebrated in the US was immediately tainted with shame after the US Congress realized there were women and children among the dead

Duterte reminded Washington that the Philippines are neither a colony nor a vassal state:

“The PH is not a vassal state, we have long ceased to be a colony of the US. Alam mo, marami diyang mga columnista they look upon Obama and the US as we are the lapdogs of this country. I do not respond to anybody but to the people of the Republic of the Philippines. Wala akong pakialam sa kanya. Who is he to confront me, as a matter of fact, America has one too many to answer for the misdeeds in this country,” Duterte said

The Philippine-American War was about U.S. Imperialism and maintaining a foothold within the Asia-Pacific region.

On December 10th 1898, Spain ceded Cuba, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines to the U.S. under the Treaty of Paris. The Philippines was technically sold for $20 million. It was a justification for the U.S. to permanently occupy the Philippines. The Spanish Empire’s downfall led to the rise of the ever expanding American Empire. The U.S. government installed a military dictatorship on the Philippines on December 21, 1898 (as they did in other newly acquired territories including Puerto Rico). U.S. President William McKinley issued the Benevolent Assimilation Proclamation which said that the U.S. has “come, not as invaders or conquerors, but as friends, to protect the natives in their homes, in their employment, and in their personal and religious rights.”

The U.S. military experienced a resistance in the Philippines which led to The Philippine–American War. The leader of the resistance was Emilio Aguinaldo y Famy, a politician, a revolutionary and a military leader who led the defeat against Spanish forces and became the first President of the Philippines from 1899–1901. On January 5th, 1899 Aguinaldo declared the independence of the Philippines and established a “rebel” government in Malolos on January 23rd, 1899. Aguinaldo was named the President of the newly established government who led Philippine forces against Spain and then went on to fight the U.S. government with guerilla warfare tactics. Conflict began almost immediately between the Aguinaldo led rebel government forces and the U.S. in Manila on February 4th, 1899. U.S. forces went on to take control of a volcanic island called Jolo located in the province of Sulu on May 18th, 1899. Numerous conflicts soon followed as the rebel government suffered heavy losses due to a well-armed U.S. military. Aguinaldo was forced to continuously move his base of military operations during the war. The U.S. government wanted Aguinaldo dead or alive.

Since Aguinaldo declared independence for the Philippines, President McKinley had appointed the ‘First Philippine Commission’ or ‘The Schurman Commission’ on January 20, 1899. Dr. Jacob Gould Schurman was chosen as the chairman with other prominent members to investigate the living conditions throughout the Philippines and make recommendations to solve problems in an attempt to gain influence over the Filipino population. However, conflicts continued between U.S. forces and the Filipino rebels the following month as Aguinaldo’s ‘Revolutionary Congress’ which was known as the ‘Malolos Congress’ voted to stop fighting and give the peaceful resolution set forth by the McKinley administration a chance.

The revolutionary congress was then led by Apolinario Mabini, but was replaced by a ‘peace cabinet’ but suffered from internal conflicts. Aguinaldo appointed a delegation to meet with the commission that was advised by moderate members of the commission. Several arrests were made against the original members’ of the peace cabinet including Pedro Paterno and Felipe Buencamin by General Antonio Luna, a field commander for the rebels. Aguinaldo immediately withdrew his support of the peace cabinet and reinstated Mabini and his revolutionary cabinet.

Mr. Schurman advised McKinley to create a new plan as a way for the Filipino’s to participate politically and economically within the Philippine government since his original plan had failed to gain popularity with the Revolutionary government. President Mckinley ordered his Secretary of State John Hay to tell Schurman that the U.S. government would prefer peace but McKinley received advise from the commission members that the “prosecution of the war until the insurgents submit” would be more beneficial for U.S. interests.

On March 16th, 1900, the ‘Second Philippine Commission’ under the future President of the United States William Howard Taft called the Taft Commission appointed by McKinley was given legislative and executive powers replacing the Spanish system of law. From the start of the Taft Commission, close to 500 laws were passed including a U.S. inspired judicial system, a supreme court, municipality and tax collections. Elections were also held for new municipal board members. All of the new U.S. imposed systems were under the supervision of the U.S. government.

Emilio Aguinaldo was captured on March 23, 1901 by U.S. forces led by General Frederick Funston along with Filipino troops loyal to the U.S. government. Aguinaldo was replaced by General Miguel Malvar as the new rebel leader and continued the resistance against occupying U.S. forces. Aguinaldo was persuaded to take an “oath of allegiance” to the U.S. government on April 19, 1901. A few weeks later, Aguinaldo made a public statement which called on the rebels to lay down their weapons and surrender. H.W. Brands author of ‘Bound to Empire: The United States and the Philippines’ published what Aguinaldo had told the rebels:

“Let the stream of blood cease to flow; let there be an end to tears and desolation,” Aguinaldo said. “The lesson which the war holds out and the significance of which I realized only recently, leads me to the firm conviction that the complete termination of hostilities and a lasting peace are not only desirable but also absolutely essential for the well-being of the Philippines”

Aguinaldo’s full cooperation with the U.S. government was a major setback for the Filipino’s cause for independence. Washington replaced Aguinaldo with first, a U.S. Military Dictatorship under Lieutenant General Adna Chaffee, a veteran of the American Civil War and the “Indian Wars” then with a civilian government known as the ‘Insular Government’ of the Philippine’s led by William Howard Taft who served as its first civilian Governor-General taking the place of the military Governor, Lieutenant General Arthur MacArthur Jr.

However, General Miguel Malvar’s new leadership did give the Filipino’s hope by continuing what Aguinaldo had started, a revolution against the U.S. occupation. General Malvar launched an offensive against U.S. forces that were occupying the Batangas region while other Filipino generals continued the war in other areas throughout the Philippines. U.S. forces retaliated by targeting Filipino citizens, they forced interrogations upon the Filipino population and tortured suspected rebels. General Malvar along with his wife, children and close to 3,000 rebels had surrendered on April 16th, 1902 as the Scorched Earth Policy began to take a toll on the population. That same month, the U.S. Military went on to establish concentration camps known as “reconcentrados.” Close to 300,000 Filipinos were forced into concentration camps in the province of Batangas resulting in the deaths of more than 8,000 Filipinos. Torture methods such as ‘water boarding’ or what was known then as “the water cure” were also used against prisoners to gain intelligence on the rebels. The New Yorker magazine published a story in 2008 titled ‘The Water Cure’ by Paul Kramer who published a letter written by an American infantry man who was involved in the war explained how the water cure was used against the Filipinos:

A letter by A. F. Miller, of the 32nd Volunteer Infantry Regiment, published in the Omaha World-Herald in May, 1900, told of how Miller’s unit uncovered hidden weapons by subjecting a prisoner to what he and others called the “water cure.” “Now, this is the way we give them the water cure,” he explained. “Lay them on their backs, a man standing on each hand and each foot, then put a round stick in the mouth and pour a pail of water in the mouth and nose, and if they don’t give up pour in another pail. They swell up like toads. I’ll tell you it is a terrible torture”

The U.S. war in the Philippines resulted in numerous deaths in what could be considered, genocide. Various estimates suggest that at least 400,000 rebels or “insurrectos” and 4,000 U.S. soldiers died in combat. More than 1 million Filipino civilians had died through hardships caused by the “Scorched Earth Policies.” Deaths were caused by mass starvation and by U.S. forces targeting towns and villages killing men, women and even children.

The Philippine-American War Ends, but War against the Moros and the Pulahanes Continues

The Philippine-American war ended on July 2, 1902 with the United States as the victor despite the fact that other ethnic groups including the Moros and the Pulahanes continued the war. The Moros Rebellion was defeated almost 11 years later on June 15, 1913 during The Battle of Bud Bagsak (as mentioned earlier) where the Moro resistance battled U.S. forces on top of Mount Bagsak on the island of Jolo, Sulu.

The U.S. invasion of the Philippines was an imperial war against the Filipino people. The Filipino’s knew that the American invaders where there to exploit their country and establish a permanent base of military operations to subjugate the population and expand their imperial ambitions to neighboring countries within the Asia-Pacific region. The Filipino’s initial reaction was to join the revolution against the U.S. occupation, first led by Emilio Aguinaldo and then followed by others including General Miguel Malvar. The revolution was lost. More than 120,000 well armed American soldiers came to fight the Filipinos who formed a resistance against a foreign invader. In the course of the conflict, the Roman Catholic Church was dissolved as a legitimate institution (under Spain the Catholic Church was legitimized) and the U.S. government gained control of the lands the Church originally owned. The introduction of the English language was legitimized as the official language of the Philippines. The new Philippine government was given “limited self-government” under the “Philippine Organic Act” of 1902 which was quickly approved by the U.S. Congress. The U.S. government made a promise to the Filipinos that it would be granted independence 14 years later. However, the U.S. government passed the 1916 Philippine Autonomy Act (or “Jones Act”) with U.S. Congressional approval under President Woodrow Wilson. The 1916 Philippine Autonomy Act was established as a mechanism for U.S. control as it supposedly protected the “sovereign rights and interests” of the Philippines. Independence was granted only if it was “stable” or in other words, a Philippine government that was subservient to Washington.

By 1934, the Philippine Independence Act led to the Commonwealth of the Philippines the following year indirectly ending the case for independence of the Philippines. Elections were held in 1935 with Manuel L. Quezon as the winner effectively becoming the second President of the Philippines ending the insular government which led to the Commonwealth of the Philippines. The Commonwealth government was the final step into the transition into an independent Philippine government. Then World War II began where the Philippines experienced another occupation by a foreign entity, this time by the Imperial Japanese forces (1942-1945). After the end of World War II, the U.S. government granted the Philippines full independence on July 4th, 1946 through the Treaty of Manila.

The Process of Americanization of the Philippines

The Americanization process effected Filipino culture on various levels. An American form of education was imposed on the Filipino population. American culture, the English language and religion was taught through the education process. During the McKinley administration, English and some Philippine languages replaced the Spanish language. Eventually, U.S. administrators in charge of the education process phased out most Filipino ethnic languages and settled for a “monolingual” system in English.

The Americanization process began during the war in 1901 when more than five hundred teachers arrived from the U.S. on a Navy ship called the USS Thomas. The teachers were called the Thomasites. The teachers built numerous educational institutions (the Philippine Normal School and the Philippine School of Arts and Trades or PSAT) that taught Filipinos certain professions and trades under American supervision. The reason why the U.S. government decided to bring teachers and build educational institutions was to make the Philippines a permanent colony. Dr. John Henrik Clark, historian, professor and founder of the Africana studies in various education institutions in the U.S. spoke about the true nature of colonialism:

To control a people you must first control what they think about themselves and how they regard their history and culture. And when your conqueror makes you ashamed of your culture and your history, he needs no prison walls and no chains to hold you

Can Duterte End America’s Domination of the Philippines?

Duterte’s pivot to the east is about the Philippines becoming a sovereign nation with an independent foreign policy. Duterte said that he prefers China over the U.S. “because it has the character of an Oriental. It does not go around insulting people”.

Washington is not comfortable with Duterte’s pivot to China and Russia. In fact, when any nation who seeks to be a ‘sovereign nation’ Washington becomes a threat. Duterte is clearly not following the rules of Washington’s globalized World Order. The Asia-Pacific region is an important part of Washington’s geopolitical interests. According to a recent Press TV interview with a former US Senate foreign policy analyst James Jatras mentioned that Washington may plan to destabilize the Philippine government. Jatras said “that Washington does not “do very well in accepting foreign leaders that we believe are becoming too independent.” The U.S. is losing its sphere of influence in the Asia-Pacific when it comes to China’s growing political and economic power. Washington’s continued aggressive stance (including the Trump administration) toward China has increased over the past several years with the South China Sea dispute, its support of the Syrian government and its close relationship with nations who are non-compliant to Washington including Russia. The Philippines relationship with China concerns Washington. Jatras continued:

“I’m sure that there will be some people here in Washington that will be thinking in terms of how we destabilize Mr. Duterte and maybe replace him, I am not sure how strong that force will be, but no doubt there some people thinking around those lines,” he said.

However, he said, “From the information I’ve seen, most people of the Philippines seem to support the approach he is taking, now that includes also applauding an independent foreign policy, one that is not going to simply serve as a tool of American policy in the western Pacific, that is specifically on confronting China, which is not in the Philippines’ interest”

The mainstream-media already started demonizing Duterte as they do with every other leader who decides not to follow orders from Washington. It is important to note that Durterte is very popular among Filipino’s (his popularity rate is at over 80%) for his stance against the U.S. and his drug war policies. It is also true that 92% of Filipinos view the U.S. in favorable terms according to a 2014 Pew Research survey but it is also interesting to note that a 2015 Pew Research survey showed that 54% of Filipinos also view China in favorable terms. Trade and investments between China and the Philippines will grow stronger as Duterte seeks closer relations with Beijing. It can be a beneficial arrangement for both countries in economic and geopolitical terms. Anti-Americanism has always existed among the Filipinos as many do know the history of the U.S. invasion and the genocide that followed during the Philippine–American War. U.S. colonial rule prevailed until 1946 then becoming a de-facto vassal state until Duterte was elected.

Yesterday, it was the Congo’s Patrice Lumumba, Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez,  and Guatemala’s Jacobo Arbenz Guzman among many others who were not favorable to Washington’s geopolitical interests.

They were either overthrown or assassinated. Today it is Russia’s Vladimir Putin, China’s Communist Party, Rouhani of Iran, Bashar al-Assad of Syria and now Rodrigo Duterte. With Washington’s history of supporting dictatorships, the former Philippines President and dictator Ferdinand Marcos, a convicted murderer who killed Julio Nalundasan, his father’s political opponent and winner of the first national elections would be ideal. Marcos was elected President of the Philippines in 1965. The U.S. backed the Marcos government throughout his presidency (1965-1986).

The Marcos dictatorship impoverished the Philippines with more than $30 billion in debt; U.S. corporations profited while exploiting cheap labor and the environment. Martial law was imposed in 1972 due to horrible economic and social conditions caused by the Marcos government. The Philippines became a police state. By the 1977, more than 60,000 Filipino’s were arrested as political prisoners. Many were tortured and sometimes even murdered. Marcos was eventually overthrown in 1986 by supporters of the first female President of the Philippines, Corazon Aquino, a prominent member of the People Power Revolution and the wife of Benigno Aquino Jr. a political opponent of Marcos who was also assassinated in 1983. Washington would prefer a Ferdinand Marcos-style government. Historically, Washington has always supported dictatorships friendly to U.S. corporate interests.

U.S. interventions throughout the world before and after World War II were disastrous for many nations. Duterte wants to end that cycle of the U.S. domination, especially in the Philippines once and for all, but can he succeed? The Duterte government must continue to strengthen its alliances with its neighbors in the Asia-Pacific rim as a united front against the American Juggernaut. What will Washington’s next move be? Duterte congratulated Trump after the U.S. elections and said “I would like to congratulate Mr. Donald Trump. Long live.” Duterte said he can work with the Trump administration as he builds stronger ties with Russia and China. What can Duterte expect from a Trump administration that’s aggressive towards China? Tensions are sure to rise.

What is ahead for the U.S.-Philippines relationship? During Trump’s campaign for U.S. president, he said “our current strategy of nation-building and regime change is a proven failure” so according to Trump, regime change is not in the interests of his administration. However, before Rex Tillerson was confirmed as Secretary of State he told Latin America Goes Global that he would seek a transition to democracy in Venezuela:

If confirmed, I would urge close cooperation with our friends in the hemisphere, particularly Venezuela’s neighbors Brazil and Colombia, as well as multilateral bodies such as the OAS, to seek a negotiated transition to democratic rule in Venezuela

Tillerson’s comments seem to imply that the Trump administration will attempt to impose regime change in Venezuela. Will they attempt regime change in the Philippines? One important fact to consider is that the U.S. wants to maintain its influence throughout the Asia-Pacific region and isolate China. So what does it mean for the Duterte government? It all remains to be seen.

Friday was the last day of work for 1,300 General Motors hourly employees at the GM Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant. Less than a year after being hired and promised full-time positions by GM and union officials, the workers are out of a job. Medical insurance is running out at the end of the month, and there are few prospects for decent jobs in a city where 117,000 workers are unemployed.

The job cuts in Detroit provide a far more realistic picture of the US economy than soaring stock markets or the Fed officials’ fantasies about “full employment.” Yet the layoff of 1,300 workers was not even deemed newsworthy by the local media. It also did not rate a mention by President Trump, who has appointed GM’s CEO to his corporate advisory board.

The Detroit job cuts follow more than 2,000 GM layoffs in Lansing, Michigan, and Lordstown, Ohio in January. They anticipate a far greater onslaught as US corporations restructure in response to the global economic slowdown and increasing international competition.

In the US, automakers are cutting production due to a growing glut of unsold cars. Commercial aircraft manufacturer Boeing, which cut eight percent of its workforce last year, announced Friday that 1,880 workers had accepted voluntary retirements. The company said more job cuts are expected in 2017 amid falling orders and tight competition with European-based Airbus, which announced 1,200 job cuts a few months ago. A new layoff announcement is made virtually every day in the retail, banking and technology sectors.

These are part of an international process. On Wednesday, China’s labor minister, Yin Weimin, said the country will cut another 500,000 steel and coal jobs this year. Last year, 726,000 workers lost their jobs in the coal and steel industries, or 40 percent of the 1.8 million jobs the government said would be eliminated in those industries as part of a massive restructuring of state enterprises.

In addition to the job cuts, corporations are seeking to transform their workforces into largely casual, temporary laborers, hired and fired at will, like the Detroit-Hamtramck GM workers.

According to the Government Accountability Office, contingent workers now comprise 40.4 percent of all employees. Under Obama, 95 percent of all new jobs created in the US since the so-called economic recovery began have been part-time and temporary. In the European Union, more than half of all new jobs since 2010 have been through temporary contracts.

The corporations are also accelerating their plans to dump their pensions and retiree health care obligations and continue to shift the cost of medical coverage on to workers. This month, 22,600 retired coal miners or their widows were notified that they will be losing health care benefits on April 30, when funding for their insurance plans expire. More than one million working or retired Americans are currently covered by pension plans that are in imminent danger of insolvency, according to the Pension Rights Center.

The Trump administration, packed with billionaires, is planning to slash corporate taxes and eliminate workplace safety, environmental and labor regulations. In his address to the joint session of Congress on Tuesday, Trump declared that his government has “undertaken a historic effort to massively reduce job crushing regulations.” The increase in military spending outlined in his new budget will be paid for by slashing food stamps and other essential programs, while the ultra-reactionaries appointed to key agencies set their sights on the privatization of public education and the elimination of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

As Wall Street is celebrating the Trump administration’s plans for a massive handout to the corporations and banks, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka has pledged that his corporatist and anti-working class organization is “absolutely” committed to partnering with Trump.

Trump’s fascistic rants against immigrant workers and endless claims that foreign countries and foreign workers are destroying jobs and lowering wages is a calculated effort, aided and abetted by the unions, to divide the working class and block a unified response to the escalation of the class war policies at home and ever greater imperialist militarism abroad.

Responding to the speech, Trumka, the president of the AFL-CIO labor federation, told Fox News that the unions were prepared for Trump to “rewrite the rules of the economy,” particularly on trade and immigration policy.

Trump’s speech was the president’s “finest moment,” the union head said, signaling that “he’s about to start doing business rather than playing for the camera—that was a good sign.” Far from condemning the president’s xenophobic and racist slanders against immigrants, the AFL-CIO head signaled his support for an even more brutal immigration policy, including against legal residents.

“I was actually pleasantly surprised,” Trumka said, “to hear him say the system is broken and its legal immigration, as well as undocumented people—he talked about them a lot—but this was the first time he spoke about legal immigration being used to drive down wages. We’ve been saying that for a long time.”

Trumka said that workers voted for the president because “they wanted him to rewrite the rules of the economy—not for the rich, not for the wealthy, not for corporate America, not for Wall Street but for them—and so he’s been a mixed bag on that.” The unions would tout the good things he did and criticize the bad, Trumka said, echoing the lie that trade wars and mass deportation were good for American workers.

“Will we partner with him? Absolutely,” Trumka said. “Will we partner with him to try to rewrite the immigration rules of the country? Absolutely… Using the bully pulpit to say this is your country, this is where you owe your allegiance, this is where you should be investing and building, that is a good thing.”

The trade unions have been a chief conduit for spreading nationalist poison among workers for a very long time. In the early 1980s, as American capitalism fell into decline and its corporations confronted international competitors, the unions promoted economic nationalism to justify their integration into the structure of corporate management and collusion in the destruction of the jobs and living standards of the workers they claimed to represent.

While the unions have worked closely with the Democrats in overseeing the attack on jobs and wages for decades, they now see income opportunities in Trump’s efforts to entice corporations to “Buy American, Hire American.” This has nothing to do with the interests of workers. Rather, the union executives want to restore their lost income through the influx of new dues-paying members, regardless of whether they are earning poverty wages.

The unions are not “workers’ organizations,” but labor-management syndicates that are hostile to the interests of the working class. New organizations of struggle, including rank-and-file factory and workplace committees, democratically controlled by workers and committed to the methods of the class struggle, must be built to resist the coming attacks on jobs, living standards, essential social services and all the basic social rights of the working class.

Above all, workers must reject economic nationalism. Workers in every country face the same struggles and confront the same enemy: the global capitalist system, which enriches a handful of billionaires at the expense of the broad masses of working people whose collective labor creates society’s riches.

To unite the working class—black, white, native-born and immigrant, in the US and around the world—workers must build a political movement, independent of both capitalist parties, the Democrats and Republicans, to fight for international socialism and against the danger of world war.

Trump’s campaign rhetoric about cooperating with Russia in combating terrorism was bluster without follow-through, according to AP News, saying:

“[He’s] …telling advisers and allies that he may shelve, at least temporarily, his plan to pursue a deal with Moscow on the Islamic State group and other national security matters, according to administration officials and Western diplomats.”

It doesn’t surprise given longstanding US hostility toward Russia, especially during the Cold War and Putin’s tenure.

Trump stacked his administration with defense, national and homeland security hardliners. Reportedly he intends appointing Russophobe Fiona Hill as White House Director for Europe and Russia. She called Putin a “Mafia Don,” said “(b)lackmail and intimidation are part of his stock and trade.”

In response to candidate Trump urging better relations with Russia, opposition [“Deep State”] forces launched a campaign to delegitimize him. According to AP, Defense Secretary Mattis and National Security Advisor McMaster want tough anti-Moscow policies continued.

“During his first meeting with National Security Council staff, McMaster described Russia – as well as China – as a country that wants to upend the current world order, according to an administration official who attended the meeting,” said AP.

Key European allies urge no softening in US/Russia relations. Trump administration hardliners falsely claimed Moscow violated the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. The Big Lie about nonexistent “Russian aggression” in Ukraine persists.

“The president and his advisers have yet to settle on a formal approach to Russia, and discussions about how to proceed are still in early phases,” said AP.

After firing Michael Flynn, Trump said “(i)t would be unpopular for a politician to make a deal. It would be much easier for me to be so tough – the tougher I am on Russia,” the better.

After only a few weeks in office, he was co-opted to stay hardline on Russia, China, Iran and other sovereign independent countries – indicating no change in imperial recklessness on his watch.

It’s evident from harsh rhetoric by administration officials, continued US aggression in multiple theaters, including Pentagon terror-bombing of Yemen on the phony pretext of combating al-Qaeda Washington supports.

It’s clear from provocatively maintaining thousands of US-led NATO forces on Russia’s borders, challenging China in its own waters, harsh rhetoric on Iran, and Secretary of State Tillerson saying he’ll seek “transition to democratic rule in Venezuela” – code language for plotting regime change.

Hoped for responsible change under Trump was always wishful thinking. Stepping back from the brink didn’t happen.

Endless wars continue, maybe new ones planned. The threat of direct confrontation with Russia and China remain. Trump’s campaign pledge to combat terrorism was meaningless bluster.

On Saturday, Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia will continue combating terrorism on its own – the scourge Washington created and supports.

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. 

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

Pre-and-post election, pro-Hillary forces, supported by media, invented reasons to vilify Trump, wanting him delegitimized.

Failing to prevent his electoral triumph, relentless attacks continue. Targeting key administration officials Michael Flynn, Jeff Sessions, Kellyanne Conway and likely others to come is part of a sinister plot to weaken him – ahead of likely aiming to oust him from office for the wrong reasons.

There’s plenty about his agenda to criticize. Instead the Big Lie about nonexistent Russian US election hacking persists.

So do phony allegations of Trump’s links to Russian officials and banks, able to influence his decision-making.

The fake news dossier about his sexual escapades in Moscow sounds like a grade B Hollywood film plot. Endless accusations persist.

Obama denying he ordered Trump Tower wiretapped through his spokesman rang hollow – a statement saying “(n)either President Obama nor any White House official ever ordered surveillance on any US citizen.”

Edward Snowden revealed extensive NSA electronic surveillance. So did former Office of Naval Intelligence/Defense Intelligence Agency/NSA analyst Russell Tice.

In December 2005, he accused the NSA and DIA of unconstitutionally wiretapping US citizens. He got national attention, saying:

Everyone at NSA knew what they were doing was illegal, because it’s drilled into our heads over and over that it’s against NSA policy, that you do not do that. The choice is to speak out and get fired.

Bush administration officials sanctioned it. So did Obama’s. Lawless spying is pervasive with or without court authorized warrants – including on foreign leaders, political enemies, ordinary Americans, journalists, and Donald Trump if he’s got evidence proving it.

Obama’s deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes lied, tweeting “no president can order a wiretap.”

They do it legally through FISA court warrants obtained for reasons of national security and illegally, likely more of the latter than the former unaccountably.

Senator Ben Sasse (R. NE) issued a statement, saying “(t)he president today made some very serious allegations, and the informed citizens that a republic requires deserve more information.”

If there were wiretaps of then-candidate Trump’s organization or campaign, then it was either with FISA Court authorization or without such authorization.

If without, the president should explain what sort of wiretap it was and how he knows this. It is possible that he was illegally tapped.

If his allegation is true, evidence in FISA court records will show it. Congress should demand an investigation to prove or disprove his claim.

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. 

Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.

Tectonic shifts are continuing to occur in the political landscape of the Ukraine. Last week, following the imposition of a total blockade against Novorussia by the “Ukronazis” [Kiev regime], Russia declared that she will from now on recognize the official documents emitted by the DNR and LNR authorities. This week, the Novorussian authorities have nationalized all the key factories of the Donbass. Furthermore, the Novorussians have now declared that since the Ukrainian authorities are not willing to purchase their coal and anthracite they will from now on export them to Russia. And just to make sure that they cover all their bases, the Novorussians have also declared that from now on only the Russian Ruble will be circulating in the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics.

Not to be undone, the Kiev Regime has also taken a highly significant step: the Ukrainian Prime Minister has declared that he thinks that the irregular forces currently enforcing the blockade should be considered official border guards (as for these soon to be “border guards”, they have explained that for their main border post shall be called “nightingale” in honor of the Nachtigall battalion of the Nazi Abwehr).

Let’s sum all this up:

1. The “Urkonazis” [Kiev regime] completely close down the unofficial border with Novorussia
2. Russia recognizes Novorussian documents
3. The DNR and LNR nationalize all the Ukrainian industry in the Donbass
4. The “Ukronazis” declare that the line of contact is now to be considered a border
5. The Novorussians declare that the Russian Ruble is the only legal currency in Novorussia
6. The Novorussians will now export their entire production of coal/anthracite to Russia
7. All the factories in Novorussia will no longer pay taxes to Kiev

I don’t know about you – but to me this sure looks like the DNR and LNR are cutting off their last ties to the Ukraine and the the junta in Kiev appears to go along with this plan.

In reality, this is all much more complicated. There is a covert war going on between the Ukrainian oligarchs Rinat Akhmetov, Igor Kolomoiskii and President Poroshensko and there is also a not so covert war taking place between the Ukronazi opposition and Poroshenko. There are also many unanswered questions left, including how and if the Novorussians will sell their production of coal and anthracite either to Russia (which Russia really doesn’t need) or through Russia (possibly concealing its real origin). This situation also begs the question of what the Russian banks will be able and willing to do to help the Novorussians. The sums of money involved are huge and there are many, often mutually exclusive, interests competing against each other. But I won’t dwell on that level right now – what is most important to me is the big picture and that big picture says “good-bye Ukraine”.

One can judge the seriousness of these developments by the truly Herculean efforts made by the western corporate media not to notice them. Even the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Boris Johnson, who was in Kiev yesterday, was focusing exclusively on the upcoming Eurovision competition, and not on the dramatic developments taking place in the southeast.

In the Ukrainian context, the expression “never say never” is probably even more important than usual, but I will say that if what I think is happening is really happening, that is, if the Donbass is now de-facto cutting its last ties with the Ukraine and integrating with Russia politically and economically, and if the junta in Kiev appears to have been unable to prevent the Nazi volunteers from triggering this crisis with their blockade, then this potentially means to very important things:

1. The Kiev Regime has  given up on the concept of reconquering Novorussia.
2. The breakup of the rump-Ukraine has begun.

The blockade of the Donbass was decided by a rather small group of nationalist leaders who never asked for nor received any authorization for their actions from the junta in Kiev. Furthermore, the junta in Kiev never officially endorsed or even supported that move. But most amazingly, the junta never sent any kind of official police/military/security force to regain control of the situation. There was a group of men who, armed with sticks and baseball bats, tried to remove the Ukronazi crazies from the tracks, but they were quickly beaten back. Keep in mind that there are tens of thousands of soldiers and policemen deployed in the immediate vicinity of these volunteer units, but nobody, absolutely nobody has made a move to restore law and order.

Of course, the very notion of “law and order” is largely meaningless in a country occupied by a regime which itself is totally illegal. Furthermore, “law and order” are also meaningless in a country where might – usually in the form of a gang of thugs with Kalashnikovs – makes right. Forget “central Europe” – think “Somalia” and you will be much closer to the truth.

The Ukraine is a failed state, politically and economically. And, as a failed state, the Ukraine has plenty of armed gangs and even official armed forces, but nothing like the kind of modern and civilized military you need to take on the Novorussians who, far from being a failed state, are a young state which has just completed the modernization of its armed forces. The difference between the Ukrainian and the Novorussian armed forces is not just the result of Russian help, although they clearly played a major role, but the fact of the Novorussians having a capable fighting force has been a matter for survival from day 1, whereas for the junta this has never been a priority simply because there never was a military threat to the junta’s power. Bean-counters will tell me that the Ukrainian forces are about 2x to 3x larger, which is quite true. It is also irrelevant. What matters is whether they can mount modern, combined arms operations and that is something that the Ukrainian military does not seem to be capable of.

What we are seeing today is not just a Ukrainian military which seems to have given up on the notion of reconquering Novorussia, it is also one which appears to be giving up on the notion of holding the country together. Right now, this is only affecting the Donbass, but pretty soon other regions are likely to follow suit, especially the south (Odessa, Nikolaev, Mariupol) which, by itself, could be wealthy and prosperous and which has no need whatsoever for Neo-Nazi rulers. There are even some separatist movements in the western Ukraine who want to get rid of all the pseudo-Ukrainian “ballast” and build a “pure” Ukrainian state in the only place where such a state has real historical roots: on the border with Poland.

This all begs the question of the future of Poroshenko and here your guess is as good as mine. The only thing that has kept him in power so long is the support from the US and EU, but with the crises (plural) surrounding the Trump administration and the political uncertainty in Europe, there is only so long that Poroshenko can use his western mentors as the base for his power. Sooner or later, somebody somewhere in the Ukraine (my guess is in Odessa) will figure out that the local power configuration is far more important to him/her than what the western politicians have to say. Again, Somalia is the example to keep in mind: for a while the western powers also had a great deal of influence there, but only until that power was successfully challenged and then everybody declared victory and fled.

Needless to say, the Minsk Agreements are as far from being implemented as ever. For Washington and its allies that is enough of a justification to continue to blame Russia for it all. That will continue until the Ukraine finally implodes at which point the real negotiation will be “who will pays for the mess?” and Russia will probably declare that she is primarily responsible for the Donbass leaving the rest of the mess for the Europeans who, unlike the Americans, will have no choice but to pay. But that is still far in the future. Right now the question is how long can the agony of the Nazi Ukrainian regime last?

Alexander Zakharchenko predicted yesterday that the Ukrainian state would collapse within 60 days. Maybe. My personal gut feeling is that this might take quite a bit longer, especially considering the inertia of such a large country. We should also never discount a possible large-scale Ukronazi attack on Novorussia for no other reason than an expression of blind and dumb hatred. Should that happen the goal of the Novorussians will be to free the parts of the Lugansk and Donetsk regions which are still under Nazi occupation. This might be difficult – the Ukrainians have been fortifying their defenses for many months now – but I expect them to eventually succeed. At which point the West will blame Russia again (what else is new?).

Irrespective of how long this agony will last, there is no doubt in my mind that it has begun and that it is irreversible. It is actually quite remarkable that it took so long to bring about this last phase. For many months already we had many minor indicators and signs that thing were not going well, but with the de-facto separation of the Donbass and its gradual integration into the Russian economy we are witnessing a qualitatively new phase in the disintegration process of the Ukraine.

The hysteria over “Russia-gate” continues to grow – as President Trump’s enemies circle – but at its core there may be no there there while it risks pushing the world toward nuclear annihilation, writes Robert Parry.

There may be a turn-about-is-fair-play element to Democrats parsing the words of Attorney General Jeff Sessions and other Trump administration officials to hang them on possible “perjury” charges. After all, the Republicans made “lock her up” a popular chant citing Hillary Clinton’s arguably illegal use of a private email server as Secretary of State and her allegedly false claim under oath that her lawyers had hand-checked each of her 30,000 or so emails that were deleted as personal.

President Donald Trump being sworn in on Jan. 20, 2017. (Screen shot from Whitehouse.gov)

But there is a grave danger in playing partisan “gotcha” over U.S. relations with the world’s other major nuclear superpower. If, for instance, President Trump finds himself having to demonstrate how tough he can be on Russia — to save his political skin — he could easily make a miscalculation that could push the two countries into a war that could truly be the war to end all wars – along with ending human civilization. But Democrats, liberals and the mainstream news media seem to hate Trump so much they will take that risk.

Official Washington’s Russia hysteria has reached such proportions that New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman has even compared the alleged Russian hacking of Democratic emails to Pearl Harbor and 9/11, two incidents that led the United States into violent warfare. On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” show, Friedman demanded that the hacking allegations be taken with the utmost seriousness: “That was a 9/11 scale event. They attacked the core of our democracy. That was a Pearl Harbor scale event. … This goes to the very core of our democracy.”

But what really goes to “the very core of our democracy” is the failure to deal with this issue – or pretty much any recent issue – with the sobriety and the seriousness that should accompany a question of war or peace. Just as Friedman and other “star” journalists failed to ask the necessary questions about Iraq’s WMD or to show professional skepticism in the face of U.S. propaganda campaigns around the conflicts in Libya, Syria or Ukraine, they have not demanded any actual evidence from the Obama administration for its lurid claims about Russian “hacking.”

Before this madness goes any further, doesn’t anyone think that the U.S. intelligence community should lay its cards on the table regarding exactly what the evidence is that Russian intelligence purloined Democratic emails and then slipped them to WikiLeaks for publication? President Obama’s intelligence officials apparently went to great lengths to spread these allegations around – even passing the secrets around overseas – but they never told the American people what the evidence is. The two official reports dealing with the issue were laughably short on anything approaching evidence. They amounted to “trust us.”

Further, WikiLeaks representatives have indicated that the two batches of emails – one from the Democratic National Committee and the other from Clinton’s campaign chairman John Podesta – did not come from the Russians but rather from two different American insiders. That could be wrong – it is possible that Russian intelligence laundered the material through some American cutouts or used some other method to conceal Moscow’s hand – but Obama’s intelligence officials apparently don’t know how WikiLeaks obtained the emails. So, the entire “scandal” may rest upon a foundation of sand.

No ‘Fake News’

It’s also important to note that nothing that WikiLeaks published was false. There was no “fake news.” Indeed, a key reason why the emails were newsworthy at all was that they exposed misconduct and deception on the part of the Democrats and the Clinton campaign. The main point that the DNC emails revealed was that the leadership had violated its duty to approach the primary campaign even-handedly when instead they tilted the playing field against Sen. Bernie Sanders. Later, the Podesta emails revealed the contents of Clinton’s speeches to Wall Street bankers, which she was trying to hide from the voters, and the emails exposed some of the pay-to-play tactics of the Clinton Foundation.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaking with supporters at a campaign rally in Phoenix, Arizona, March 21, 2016. (Photo by Gage Skidmore)

In other words, even if the Russians did reveal this information to the American people, how does knowing relevant facts regarding a presidential campaign translate into an attack on “the core of our democracy”? Usually, journalists believe that getting the truth out, even if it embarrasses some politician or some political party, is healthy for a democracy. As an American journalist, I prefer getting information from people who have America’s best interests at heart, but I’m not naïve enough to think that people who “leak” don’t often do so for self-interested reasons. What’s most important is that the information is genuine and newsworthy.

Frankly, I found the WikiLeaks material far more appropriate for an American political debate than the scurrilous rumors that the Clinton campaign was circulating about Trump supposedly getting urinated on by Russian prostitutes in a five-star Moscow hotel, claims for which no evidence has been presented.

Also, remember that no one thought that the DNC/Podesta emails were significant in deciding the 2016 election. Clinton herself blamed FBI Director James Comey for briefly reopening the FBI investigation into her private email server near the end of the campaign as the reason her poll numbers cratered. It’s relevant, too, that Clinton ran a horrific campaign, which included breathtaking gaffes like referring to many Trump supporters as “deplorables,” relying way too heavily on negative ads, failing to articulate a compelling vision for the future, and ignoring signs that her leads in Rust Belt states were disappearing. In other words, the current effort to portray the disclosure of Democratic emails as somehow decisive in the campaign is revisionist history.

Yet, here we are with The Washington Post, The New York Times, CNN and almost the entire mainstream media (along with leading liberals and Democrats) panting every time they discover that someone from Trump’s circle met with a Russian. We are supposed to forget that the Russian government for many years was collaborating closely with the U.S. government – and particularly with U.S. national security agencies – on vital issues. Russia assisted in supplying the U.S. military in Afghanistan; President Putin played a crucial role in getting Iran to curtail its nuclear program; and he also arranged for the Syrian government to surrender its stockpiles of chemical weapons. The last two accomplishments were among President Obama’s most important foreign policy successes.

But those last two areas of cooperation – Iran and Syria – contributed to making Putin a target for Washington’s powerful neoconservatives who were lusting for direct U.S. military strikes against those two countries. The neocons, along with the Israeli and Saudi governments, wanted “regime change” in Tehran and Damascus, not diplomatic agreements that left the governments in place.

Neocons inside the U.S. government – including Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, Sen. John McCain and National Endowment for Democracy president Carl Gershman – then took aim at “regime change” in Ukraine, realizing its sensitivity to Russia. Gershman, whose NED is funded by the U.S. government, called Ukraine “the biggest prize” and a key step toward ousting Putin inside Russia; McCain cheered on Ukraine’s ultranationalists who were firebombing police in Kiev’s Maidan square; and Nuland was conspiring with U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt on how to “glue” or “midwife” a change in government.

This neocon strategy worked by overthrowing Ukraine’s elected President Viktor Yanukovych and causing Putin to intervene on behalf of threatened ethnic Russians in Crimea and eastern Ukraine. That, in turn, was transformed by the Western media into a “Russian invasion.”

Partisan Interests

Instead of standing up to this neocon troublemaking, Obama fell in line. Later, the Democrats saw political advantage in becoming the super-hawks standing up to Russia, essentially maneuvering to the right of the Republicans, especially when Donald Trump unexpectedly won the nomination, in part, by calling for better relations with Russia.

Russia’s Ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak. (Photo from Russian Embassy)

As the 2016 presidential campaign sank into infamy as one of the ugliest in U.S. history, Clinton hammered Trump over Russia, calling him a Putin “puppet.” But the Russia-bashing didn’t seem to help Clinton very much. Although it was calculated to pull in some “moderate” Republicans, it also alienated many peace-oriented Democrats.

Still, despite the shaky foundation and the haphazard construction, Official Washington is now adding more and more floors to this Russia “scandal.” Obama holdovers slapped together a shoddy pretext for going after Trump’s National Security Adviser Michael Flynn – citing the never-prosecuted Logan Act of 1799 and then trapping Flynn because he didn’t have total recall of a phone conversation with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak on Dec. 29 while Flynn was vacationing in the Dominican Republic.

Similarly, the mainstream media and Democrats are framing in a “perjury” case against Attorney General Sessions because of a sloppily worded response during his confirmation hearing about contacts with Russians. He had met twice with Kislyak (as many others in Washington have done). The heavy-breathing suspicion is that perhaps Sessions and Kislyak were plotting how the Kremlin could help the Trump campaign, but there is zero evidence to support that conspiracy theory.

What’s actually happening here should be obvious. The Obama administration, the Democrats and the mainstream media were horrified at Trump’s election. They understandably were offended by Trump’s personal behavior and his obvious unfitness for the presidency. Many Clinton supporters, especially women, were bitterly disappointed at the failure of the first female major-party presidential nominee who lost to a lout who boasted about how he could exploit his fame and power by grabbing the genitals of vulnerable women whom he assumed couldn’t do anything to stop him.

There was also alarm about Trump’s policies on the environment, immigration, education and the courts. Among the neocons and their liberal-interventionist sidekicks, there was concern, too, that Trump would not continue their “regime change” strategies in the Middle East and their hostility toward Russia.

So, these anti-Trump forces grabbed at the most potent weapon available, the suspicions that Trump had somehow colluded with Russia. It didn’t matter that the evidence was weak to non-existent. It would be enough to spread the allegations around under the cloak of U.S. intelligence “assessments.”

Nobody important would demand to review the evidence and, surely, with the availability of National Security Agency intercepts, people’s memories could be tested against the transcripts of conversations and be found wanting. Verbal missteps could become perjury traps. There could be a witch hunt against anyone who talked to a Russian. Any pushing back from the Trump people could be construed as a “cover-up.”

Having worked in Washington for nearly four decades, I have seen political investigations before, both in steering away from real crimes of state (such as Nicaraguan Contra cocaine trafficking and Republican collaboration with foreign governments to undercut Democrats in 1968 and 1980) and in fabricating scandals that weren’t there (such as the fictional offenses of Whitewater, Travelgate, Filegate, Chinagate, etc. under Bill Clinton who was finally cornered for the heinous crime of lying about sex). So far at least, “Russia-gate” fits much more with the latter group than the former.

What I also have learned over these years is that in Official Washington, power – much more than truth – determines which scandals are taken seriously and which ones are not. “Russia-gate” is revealing that the established power centers of Washington arrayed against Trump – the major news media, the neoconservatives and the Democratic Party – have more power than the disorganized Trump administration.

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).

Just a matter of days after John McCain’s “unusual” trip to Syria and Turkey, the Turkish government has cut off water supplies from the Euphrates River into northern Syria, violating international conventions on water rights.

While some measure of stability has returned to pockets of northern Syria following the Syrian Army’s recent liberation of al-Qaeda from Aleppo and elsewhere, external forces seem determined to keep the region volatile, regardless of the cost. In the latest example of aggressive foreign intervention in Syria, Turkey, which has long played an antagonistic role in Syria’s nearly six-year-long conflict, has now cut off the flow of the Euphrates River into Syria, depriving the nation of one of its primary sources of water.

According to the Kurdish Hawar News Agency, Turkey cut water supplies to Syria around Feb. 23, which subsequently forced a hydroelectric plant at the Tishrin Dam to shut down while also significantly reducing water levels on its associated reservoir. The dam supplies both water and power to key parts of northern Syria, such as the city of Manbij and other parts of the predominantly Kurdish Kobani Canton.

Kurdish Fighters take positions at the top of Mount Annan overlooking the Tishrin dam, after they captured from ISIS militants, south of Kobani, Syria December 27, 2015. (Photo: Rodi Said)

The dam is one of several major dams along the Euphrates River. Just downstream from Tishrin lies the Tabqa Dam and its reservoir Lake Assad, which supplies Aleppo with most of its power and drinking water, as well as irrigation water for over 640,000 hectares (2,500 square miles) of farmland. A city official in Manbij told Hawar that the city would provide generator fuel to civilians to help cope with the blackout that has resulted from the river being cut off. The same official added that Turkey had “violated the international conventions of water and rivers energy by cutting off Euphrates water.”

This is not the first time Turkey has deprived Syrians of water as a means to advance their political goals in the region. Turkey previously cut the river off in May of 2014, causing water levels on Lake Assad to drop by over 20 feet and creating the potential for genocide by means of dehydration. By blocking the river, Turkey threatens Iraqi civilians as well. Major urban centers like Mosul, whose water supplies largely depend on reservoirs fed by the Euphrates, could be gravely impacted if the river continues to be blocked.

The act of cutting off the river is not unprecedented, but its timing is peculiar. Just days prior to Turkey’s act, U.S. Senator John McCain “secretly” visited the Kobani Canton, the very region that now finds itself without water, before heading to Turkey, where he met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.  According to the senator’s office, “Senator McCain’s visit was a valuable opportunity to assess dynamic conditions on the ground in Syria and Iraq.” It adds that McCain looks forward to working with the Trump administration and military leaders “to optimize our approach” on fighting the Islamic State.

While the U.S. has backed the Kurds in their fight to keep their territories along the Syrian-Turkish border free of terrorist influence, it has come at the cost of greatly complicating diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Turkey.  For example, in early 2016, Erdogan dramatically demanded that the U.S. choose between an alliance with Turkey or with the Syrian Kurds. The diplomatic stand-off has since reached new heights of tension, with Turkey threatening to invade Kurdish-held Manbij less than two weeks ago. Manbij is suffering the most from Turkey’s blockage of the Euphrates, suggesting that the move could be intended to destabilize the Kurds before something more drastic takes place.

It also warrants mentioning that despite Erdogan’s and McCain’s claims that they are eager to “defeat” the Islamic State and other terrorist factions, both have close ties to those very same groups. This, of course, suggests that McCain’s visit, as well as recent moves by Turkey, have ulterior motives that have yet to be publicly expressed.

For example, McCain has been so intent on removing Assad from power that he has fostered relationships with the Syria’s “moderate rebels” and its more notorious opposition factions such as the Islamic State. Photographic evidence has confirmed this, with one infamous photo showing McCain posing with Khalid al-Hamad – a “moderate” rebel.  McCain has also admitted meeting with ISIS on national television, going so far as to acknowledge that he is still in contact with the infamous terrorist group.

Senator John McCain in Syria with members of the U.S.-backed rebel group Northern Storm.

Erdogan, for his part, was revealed to be a major player in the smuggling of Islamic State oil out of Syria for sale on the global market. It was these oil sales that enabled the Islamic State to grow into what it is today and to become one of the world’s most well-funded terror groups.

With such connections now well-documented, it seems unlikely that McCain and Erdogan discussed how to defeat the Islamic State. Based on the evidence, it seems much more likely that both remain eager to destabilize the region due to their shared goal of deposing Assad. With Turkey already working to destabilize Northern Syria by cutting off key resources, we will soon see what other measures may have been discussed during this “secret” meeting.

Whitney Webb is a MintPress contributor who has written for several news organizations in both English and Spanish; her stories have been featured on True Activist, Activist Post, We Are Change and Waking Times among others – she currently resides in Southern Chile.

Saudi Arabia’s king, Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, has recently undertaken a sweeping tour of Southeast Asia in what the media and analysts are claiming is a bid to firm up economic and political ties with Muslim-majority nations in the region.

However, both the media and analysts are sidestepping or entirely omitting the role Saudi Arabia has played in fueling global terrorism, extraterritorial geopolitical meddling, and even divisive and terroristic activities the notorious state sponsor of terrorism has been implicated in across the planet including within Southeast Asia itself.

German broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) in an article titled, “Saudi King Salman’s Southeast Asia trip affirms Muslim friendship,” would report:

The Saudi monarch’s rare month-long trip takes him to strategically important nations in the economically fast-growing region, with which Riyadh wants to deepen commercial engagement and socio-political ties.

DW would also report that:

Salman’s visit to the Southeast Asian countries also underscores cooperative and mutually reinforcing ties between Muslim-majority countries and affirms the Islamic credentials as well as image of the governments of Malaysia and Indonesia…

However, Saudi Arabia indisputably represents perhaps the greatest danger to Islam on Earth. The brand of politicized religion propagated by Saudi Arabia both within its borders and well beyond them known as Wahhabism was initially created and is still used today to establish, maintain, and expand Saudi political influence behind a tenuous veil of religion.

Saudi Arabia Exports More Than Just Oil and for More Than Just Petrodollars

Saudi Arabia as a protectorate of the United States, the United Kingdom, and other special interests across Europe, grants these nations a vector for power and influence through the use of Wahhabism in any nation it is allowed to take root and flourish.

In Southeast Asia specifically, Saudi-funded Wahhabi madrases dot Malaysia, Indonesia, and to a lesser extent elsewhere fueling extremism that often manifests itself politically against parties and political leaders the West seeks to coerce or replace.

In Myanmar, Saudi-funded terrorists are attempting to infiltrate the nation’s Rohingya minority, turning the group’s persecution into a regional security crisis and a pretext for greater US involvement, including US political and military expansion.

In reality, the United States and its Saudi proxies have no interest in the Rohingya beyond leveraging the crisis – nor does the US genuinely believe extremist infiltrators constitute a genuine security risk, The US does however seek to place a further wedge between Myanmar and China, and placing US military advisers in Myanmar to deal with a manufactured security risk Saudi Arabia is engineering serves that objective well.

In the Philippines, Saudi-funded and indoctrinated terrorist organizations help maintain constant pressure on the Philippine government and serves as a perpetual pretext for America’s continued military presence in the Philippines.

The United States has repeatedly attempted to transform separatist violence in Thailand’s southern most provinces into a religious-themed conflict to likewise put additional pressure on Bangkok and serve as a potential vector for introducing US military influence.

Just as US-Saudi meddling serves to disrupt Myanmar-Chinese relations, US-Saudi attempts to fuel terrorism in the Philippines and Thailand are also intended to prevent the two nations from strengthening ties with China at the expense of America’s longstanding regional hegemony.

US-Saudi Terror Serve Policy Aimed At China  

And in China itself, US-backed terrorism in the nation’s western province of Xinjiang serves as one of several pressure points America maintains in an attempt to divide and overturn Beijing’s influence both in the region and even within China’s own borders.

While the majority of the population in Xinjiang – regardless of their religion or ethnicity – prefer stability and socioeconomic progress, the US has created, funds, and directs opposition groups to create political upheaval and serve as cover for organized terrorism carried out against both the people and government of Xinjiang province.

Xinjiang’s extremist minority has also served as a recruiting ground for joint US-Saudi terror abroad, including in Syria where Uyghur terrorists were trafficked out of China, through Southeast Asia, and into Turkey where they would be armed and deployed into Syria itself.

Thailand’s detainment and extradition of several suspects believed to be part of this terror pipeline became a source of serious political contention between Bangkok and Washington, culminating in a deadly bombing carried out in the center of Bangkok killing 20 and injuring many more – with all evidence suggesting it was carried out as reprisal for Bangkok’s defiance.

In addition to Thailand’s very public defiance of Washington’s demands, the Southeast nation has been incrementally divesting from its Cold War ties to the US and building more diversified ties with China, Russia, and other significant centers of power across Eurasia. Finding additional points of leverage against Bangkok is essential for Washington, and using Saudi Arabia’s talent for creating sectarian firestorms is a likely option.

Stronger Saudi Presence Means Stronger US Influence 

The United States throughout decades of foreign policy have used Saudi Arabia as a means of laundering political support, weapons, and cash through when attempting to co-opt and use groups within Muslim-majority nations.

A stronger Saudi presence in Southeast Asia means greater opportunities for the US itself to tap into Muslim communities, cultivate extremism, and recruit human resources to use in destructive proxy wars across the planet, as well as across Southeast Asia itself.

Attempts to create religious divisions within the culturally diverse and tolerant populations of Southeast Asia have been ongoing for years but with little success. While it is uncertain whether a greater Saudi presence in the region can significantly improve the odds in Washington’s favor, it is certain that tensions, chaos, and division will follow.

While some may argue Saudi Arabia is simply attempting to diversify its ties abroad with Salman’s visit, the overt sectarian nature of his itinerary suggests otherwise. Without a concerted effort both regionally and within Southeast Asia’s respective nations to expose and disarm this dangerous geopolitical weapon the US and Saudi Arabia are attempting to deploy, the unprecedented trip of Salman may be looked back upon as the calm before an “Arab Spring” style wave of chaos swept the region.

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

Introduction by Sarah Abed:  

The situation in the North East of Syria regarding the Kurds seems to be a topic of confusion for most. Understandably so as they have been made to appear by US politicians and news outlets as the most effective fighters against terrorism in Syria. Although they have in fact been successful in driving out terrorists in some areas there is information that needs to be discussed that explains the other half of the story that is purposely hidden in the Kurdish and mainstream media news outlets.  We have only been hearing from the Kurdish side now it’s time for the Syrians in Kurdish held areas to have their chance to tell us about the hardships they have been put under by the Kurds.  

I have been actively collecting information and conducting interviews with Syrians who live in Kurdish held areas since 2015. Some reached out to me in hopes that their message will reach the West. They have read what the Kurdish and Western mainstream media news says about the situation in their area and are disheartened that the truth is not being told.

As a Syrian America who was born in Al Qamishly and having experienced living there before the war I felt it was my moral obligation to make sure their voices were being heard. In this article the second in a series that focuses on the situation in the lesser known and often misreported North East of Syria we will discuss in more detail how life has changed for Syrians due to the Kurds taking on an illegal leadership role in the area.

Treatment of non-Kurds by the minority Kurd population in Al Hasaka (also referred to as Hasaka) governorate is unethical and criminal. 

The minority Kurd population in Qamishly treats the majority non-Kurd population poorly. They are trying to impose their will on everyone by force. They pretty much have the Hasaka governorate under their control and those that oppose them are usually driven out of their homes. They are monopolizing everything for themselves trying to maintain self-Governance. They are placing unqualified people in positions of power, there is no law whatsoever to control the area. They are willing to take anyone who agrees to fight with them, even if they are criminals they get them out of jail immediately so that they can grow their army.  PKK fighters were brought into Syria from the Qandil Mountains in Turkey and made managers and heads of institutions in the Hasaka governorate. They are very authoritative and Syrians fear them. Kurds differentiate and provide better treatment to the Yazidi and Kurds that are displaced in Syrian than the Syrian Arabs. All passages from Turkey and North Iraq are under Kurdish control.

The Syrian government condemns separatist Kurdish ambitions and vows to keep Syria united as one country.

Lately, Kurds have been more vocal about their desire to create a federation. The areas they want to claim are Al-Malkiya to Efrin, the entire border line with Turkey including Al-Malkiya, Qamishli, Hassaka, Ein Arab, Al-bab, Efrin, in addition to the rural villages.  They have also mentioned that if they are able to liberate Al Raqqah they will add that to their federation.  As can be seen in their SDF insignia. The USA’s support to the SDF as was mentioned in more detail in the first article which can be read (here- please insert a link to the first article) has had a negative impact on Syrians and infringed on their sovereignty. USA is preparing to build a second military base in Syria at Tel-Baidar.

SDF soldiers (source: Wikipedia)

SDF insignia (source: Wikipedia)

The NATO-aligned Kurdish minority corrupts the Syrian educational system.

Education which was once an area of pride for the Hasaka region has now become one of the worst catastrophe’s as a result of the Kurds.  They have imposed a new school curriculum unaccredited by the Syrian State. Almost all government schools are now under Kurdish control. Kurds are teaching Kurdi in all of the nongovernment elementary schools, next year they will implement this in all middle schools under their control and the following year their plan is to implement this in high schools as well. Syrians in Kurdish areas are not able to study in Kurdi and have either pulled their children out of the Kurdi schools or send their children to Syriac schools which have limited space, at the moment they have 1,800 students. The only other option is to send their children to schools that are government held but farther away from their homes. Even Kurdish teachers are struggling with teaching the Kurdi curriculum. There is one private University Qurtuba in the Hasaka region.

 Illegal Western sanctions are benefitting the un-elected Kurdish minority that is imposing its undemocratic will on the community.

All daily activities are monitored by the Kurds. Social life in general has seen a drastic decline. Before the war the streets were bustling with movement and music. Restaurants were opened on every corner. Now people are afraid of assembling for fear of being targeted by terrorists. An example of this took place in Al Qamishly when a restaurant was targeted by a suicide bomber in December 2015 and at least 16 people were killed. Kurds demanding federalism make up 30% of population. Churches and mosques are practicing their religious rituals quite normally. I wrote about a specific Syriac church that one of the individuals I interviewed goes to every Sunday and also included pictures in this article

Living in isolation

The general consensus of Syrians in the Hasaka area is that they feel isolated from the rest of the country. They feel that Syrians in other parts of the country do not know much about their living conditions. The only way to travel outside of the Hasaka region is via plane.  The airport in Al Qamishly is operating, but until about a year ago it was simply too expensive for the average citizen to travel via air. An airplane ticket from Al Qamishly to Damascus reached 80,000 Syrian Pounds (3 times the average salary in the country) which would equate to about $160 USD. About a year ago, two new airlines started operating in Syria, so the price decreased and it became more affordable but is still out of many people’s budget.

Efforts to balkanize Syria are increasing the displacement of Syrians and causing Christians to flee Syria

Migration has become a major issue. Just this past month, more than 80 Christian families have left Qamishli, Al-Malikiya and Al-Qahtaniya. Most of those families took asylum in Belgium, Australia and Sweden, and most likely they will not return as long as the situation in the country unstable, said Samir one of my contacts in Al Qamishly . Al-Malkiya is almost empty of Christians now. It is estimated that 50% of Hasaka Christians have left; the majority of those who have left to Turkey were Christians (different ethnicities). Also a fair number of Kurds also left to Turkey.

Humanitarian aid is being provided by the UN, WFP, UNHCR, Armenian and Syriac churchs.  

UN is participating is helping people; teaching governmental curriculum for free to anyone who wants it, distributing food to families in need, and coordinating with different UN organizations operating in Al Hasaka. WFP (World food program) is also providing nutritional support. Also they are implementing development programs, like supporting bread bakeries and maintaining general hygiene. Armenian and Syriac church’s have also been helping citizens but their resources are very limited.

Concluding remarks:

Imperialists are instrumentalizing the Kurdish minority to balkanize Syria, to destroy its nation-state self-determination, to destroy its sovereignty, and to destroy its territorial integrity.  These violations derogate international law, and undermine world peace, prosperity, and democracy.

Whereas the Syrian government and its allies are aligned with the forces of international and national law and order, the West and its allies — including all of the terrorists in Syria, and a minority of the Kurdish population – continue to be perpetrators of the highest crimes according to Nuremburg principles.

If the West succeeds in carving out a part of Syria, ostensibly to serve Kurdish interests, more Western military installations will be built on Syrian soil, and the Kurds will soon discover that their new polity, in whatever form it may take, will become a corrupt stooge “government” at the service of Empire.

Sarah Abed is a Syrian American independent investigative political commentator who focuses on exposing the lies and propaganda in mainstream media news and social media. She is a truth advocate who uses her social media accounts and website The Rabbit Hole www.sarahabed.com to counter the fictitious stories and allegations that are part of a well-funded, highly intellectual, emotionally driven media campaign against Syria. Her goal is to help end the war in Syria by educating the masses. She has spoken on radio shows and contributed to news publications.

The Rabbit Hole

Denying the truth, doesn’t change the facts.

sarahabed.com

As Russia and China vetoed it, the UN Security Council failed to adopt a draft resolution on Syria sanctions on 28^th February. But what impressed is the seven-minute-long explanation given by a Chinese diplomat on the reasons behind the decision, in which he unmasked the “extremely hypocritical” faces of some powers.

The defeated resolution, drafted by Britain, France and the US, aimed to impose sanctions over alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria. If adopted, the draft resolution would have imposed asset freezes and travel bans on individuals and entities associated with the Syrian government.

The British, US and Japanese representatives pointed blame at China and Russia after their veto against the draft. UK’s permanent representative to the UN Matthew Rycroft told the council that he was astonished by Russia’s abuse of veto power, and was “surprised and disappointed” that China had also cast a veto.

Chinese permanent representative to the UN Liu Jieyi fought back those denouncements with a rare seven and a half minutes’ long speech.

“We oppose the use of chemical weapons by any state, any organization and any individual under any circumstance, and support the punishments against all instances of chemical weapons use,”said Liu.

“As a victim of chemical weapons back in those days, China has more right than any other country to condemn its use,” the diplomat added.

He also called on relevant countries to reflect on history to prevent from repeated catastrophes, citing the Middle East region as an example.

“We still remember the huge disasters brought by some countries after they waged wars against the region by alleging the latter of possessing large amount of weapons of mass destruction, and the Middle East still has not shaken itself from its after-effects,” Liu underlined.

He stressed that “it is too early to reach a final conclusion” since investigations on the use of chemical weapons are still ongoing, adding that a forcible vote amid serious disagreements of members did not help solve the chemical weapons issue in Syria, let alone the political settlement of the Syrian crisis.

In his last seconds of off-script remarks, Liu asked relevant stakeholders to reflect on how Syria and the Middle East were allowed to degenerate to their current situations, and what parts they played in this process.

“Which actions are good and which ones are ulterior? It is extremely hypocritical to take the interests of the public only in words,” the ambassador emphasized.

Zheng Qirong, a UN studies expert at China Foreign Affairs University, said that Liu’s relatively long statement is the latest case of Chinese representatives sending detailed, timely and clear-cut messages refuting slams or misunderstandings from the outside world.

But he pointed out that as the US and Russia are now wrestling their influence in Middle East affairs, the outside world will focus more on China’s positions.

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which. – George Orwell   Animal Farm

While there is much talk these days about “fake news,” omitting important news is perhaps as widespread and egregiously harmful to an informed public.  The following report tries to remedy the way the mainstream media have for years ignored one of the oddest but more important news stories of the last sixty years.  Its implications are momentous, especially in the light of the exponential growth of spying and the loss of privacy. There are eyes everywhere these days. That we are being watched is beyond dispute; but by whom and why?  This is the real story that the mainstream media have failed to address.  Their failure to do so is truly laughable.

Extensive scientific research over fifty years has concluded that pigs that stink and grow larger as they age have small eyes and tend to stare at people. I have previously reported on these startling studies, but they have been met with a blind eye. Researchers across the world continue to replicate and confirm the findings of the original research done in 1953 in Kansas by Dr. Wilfred Jeffred Eftie. Yet the mainstream media, as is their wont, keep failing to report these extraordinary studies or slight them as worse than fake news.  Averting one’s gaze from their import won’t make them disappear.  Surveilling pigs may not be obvious, but the fact that they’re not makes them triply dangerous.

While seemingly insignificant on the face of it, these replicated studies in abnormal autology have led to new insights into our osmological understanding of the place of egoism in political life. The epistemology of egoism has long perplexed scientists, but Eftie’s brilliant counterintuitive insights have led to some major breakthroughs. However, the story of Eftie’s original discovery, ignored for years, deserves renewed attention.  But I will get to that in due course. It is best to proceed backwards.  Looking back will allow us to see if we have learned anything from the past and if something is gaining on us.

So let’s first take a look at a few of the significant follow-up studies that have added so much to our understanding of human animal behavior. It’s surely an understatement to say that in the world of science we stand on the shoulders of giants such as Eftie. It allows us to see so far.  One study that was replicated 789 times found that small eyes in humans tended to result in marked elevations of dopamine and diminished activity in the frontal cortex, the same results that were found in pigs. When translated into the political arena, researchers found that politicians with small eyes tend to stare at people as a power tactic, and such body language is correlated with a tendency for them to grow larger as they age – i.e. get fat.  Their small-eyed stares seem to intensify the power differential between them and those stared at, but this was not conclusively proven. Not yet, at least.

Unlike the pig studies from which this research emanated, no correlation was found to body odor.  However, one eminent New York City based researcher, Dr. Wilbur Shoat, made the startling discovery that smell is very subjective, and therefore in the human samples an intervening variable, such as the number and consistency of nose hairs, may be a factor. Shoat did find a possible link that demands further study: In the politicians and celebrities that comprised his sample – seemingly different from the original pigs – there was a significant probability that the sulfuric whiff they gave off came from their mouths when they talked, unlike the small-eyed fat pigs that stank all over; that, at least, was what some researchers felt they smelled when working with pigs.  Ironically, pigs have an acute sense of smell far superior to that of humans, which may explain why non-scientists might think otherwise. Then again, it may not.

But Dr. Shoat, coming from a long line of swine scientists, had presciently hypothesized that finding, though common sense would have us expect the exact opposite. But then again, common sense often over-exaggerates its ability to grasp the nuances of science and understand its processes.  Perhaps this is because so much science reporting is written in jargon-filled prose and not clear, non-redundant language understandable to the average normal person.  Unlike today, reporters and doctors once wrote clearly, as the following quote from Dr. Eftie exemplifies.

In one of his follow-up studies, Dr. Eftie put it this way:

“Without resorting to value judgemnets, it is the intent of this research project to substantiate an empirical relationship between the small size of the medium swine eye (as intensified through the pig smell/eyelid blink factor) on the one hand, and resulting intrafamily behavioral oddness on the other…. Animals in the control group progressed, without exception, from small to large size as they matured, thus creating the impression that they could both see more and take increasingly decisive action in response to visual stimuli.”

An ingenious researcher, Dr. Edward Edwards, an amphigorologist known for his determinist determining twin studies, took the small-eyed pig studies and applied their methodology to self-promotion among well-known people – i.e. celebrities. He reviewed thirty-five books they had written, including autobiographies and political memoirs, and concluded that those with the smallest eyes (based on optical scans of book jacket photos) tended to have the largest egos.  While his sample size was admittedly small, so were their eyes, and he thought intensity of gaze was more important than size.  He reported that in a eureka moment he realized that they all seemed to be looking intensely at him. What his subjects had in common – aside from money and having been mentioned in the gossip columns – was that they considered themselves to be “somebodies” (his term, based on their notorious egocentricity).  As a good researcher does, he operationalized the term “somebody” to mean “not nobody,” making sure to be precise.  What else, if anything, a “somebody” is he left hanging until his follow-up study when he plans to interview the thirty-five and ask them.  He expects they will gladly answer, and that those answers will buttress his empirical findings.

Sadly, the first pigs observed by Dr. Eftie are long deceased.  They stare no more.  Absurd as it may sound, we owe them a great debt.  Since a pig’s life is a brief prologue to bacon in a country devoted to devouring the evidence of its crimes, most researchers have had to study the children and grandchildren of Eftie’s pigs.  But their offspring have flourished – thank God for that. Pigs seem to reproduce rapidly and in great numbers, and researchers today have a wide assortment to choose from – across species.

One of the most intriguing aspects of all this ground-breaking research is how it sheds light on the need to replicate studies and repeat inconvenient truths that people wish to avoid. Repetition, repetition, repetition – that’s the key – a sine qua non of the scientific method and the best news fit to print, as Edward Bernays, Sigmund Freud’s nephew and mentor to a certain German leader, instructed our finest opinion leaders.

Of course the news of Dr. Eftie’s important work can’t be repeated by the mainstream media since they have never reported it. Their focus on fake news reporting has diverted our attention from this censorship by omission. One might reasonably conclude they have no interest in autology or pig gazing, and that is a god-damned shame.  You can see I’m getting emotional, but the findings about pigs reported here need wide and ceaseless publicity, and we depend on our mainstream media to do that. Keep hammering the same point; that way truth will emerge. People need to hear things repeated before they sink in.

Not just the research into political pigs with small eyes and big egos, but what they say, and what we say about what they say, and what the media repeats about what they think about what they say.

We need the straight truth, and I think that if we compulsively repeat ourselves, we will be marching toward the light.  I am sure of that.  But it takes perseverance.  If we stick to our guns, remain humble, and keep repeating ourselves, this writer believes we will perhaps discover that even pigs with large eyes stare at people. That may be shocking, but it should wake people up.

After all, Dr. Eftie’s dazzling insights had humble beginnings, but he kept after it.  The roots of his genius lie in his childhood, as his first observational study makes clear.  He was a brilliant and precocious child.  When he was seven years old and just starting the second grade, his teacher, Mrs. Schmidt, had the original idea of having her students write about what they did on their summer vacation.  Wilfred’s scholarly career began with that essay.  Here it is:

Wilfred E       2A     My Sumer Vacation

I spent too to weeks all sumer at my Granpa Efties on a farm in Conzu Canz Canzus. i saw many pigs their. Sum of the pigs saw me too two. With there tiny eeis eyes. The Big pigs were very big.

While this childish writing is humorous, it became the inspiration for Dr. Eftie’s scientific breakthrough years later.  In 1973, the writer Tom Koch wrote a fascinating article describing his step-by-step maturation on his way to his Ph.D.* It reads like a case study of Piaget’s four stages of cognitive development or Dr. Kubler-Ross’s five stages of grief – Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance (DABDA); I forget which.  Scholars from across the disciplines should study it since they tend to like stages.

But little news since has been devoted to the advances made by Doctors Shoat and Edwards in their follow-up studies.  After all, studies replicated 789 times demand attention, especially considering their findings.  It is hoped that this update will convince the skeptical that there is more truth in a pig’s eye than seems to be the case.  News like this is often overlooked by the mainstream media that prefers what they call “real news.”  It behooves us to stand with Dr. Eftie and the importance of his insights into pigs, especially those with small eyes, since they are looking at us. The surveillance state has arrived.

Dr. Eftie’s lifetime work, including “My Sumer Vacation,” is comprehensively presented by Tom Koch in the April 1973 issue of Mad magazine, perhaps this country’s finest research journal.

Edward Curtin is a writer whose work has appeared widely.  He teaches sociology at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. His website is http://edwardcurtin.com/

Although combat aircraft such as the J-31 stealth fighter and J-15 aircraft carrier strike aircraft have made most of the headlines, China has made significant accomplishments in the realm of military transport, long range maritime patrol and carrier borne AEW&C aircraft over the past year.

First operational in 2016, the Y-20 military transport is now the largest such aircraft in production in the world. Roughly the size of the Boeing C-17 Globemaster, the Y-20 is a crucial component in China’s growing ability to expand its strategic power projection capabilities. After initially expressing a need for 400 of these aircraft, the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) later stated that this number was revised to 1000.

AVIC began production of the AG600 seaplane in July of 2016. The AG600 is a large flying boat, capable of landing and taking off on water, or on land-based airstrips, as it has a conventional, retractable tricycle landing gear. It is similar in size to a Boeing 737 or Airbus 320 airliner, and the largest seaplane currently in production anywhere in the world. The stated role of the aircraft is search and rescue, firefighting and humanitarian relief; however, it may also be slated to supplement the Harbin SH-5 in long range anti-submarine warfare (ASW) patrols and aerial reconnaissance.

This video is based on our previous military analysis entitled “China Makes Strides In Strategic Aviation“

When the Liaoning CV-16 was commissioned into service with the PLA Navy (PLAN) in 2012, its reliance on Z-18J airborne Early Warning and Control (AEW&C) helicopters was immediately identified as a weakness. The ski-jump STOBAR operation of the Liaoning and second aircraft carrier currently under construction, cannot support the operation of a large, fixed wing AEW&C aircraft. CATOBAR operations, utilizing a steam or electromagnetic catapult are required to aid such large and heavy aircraft in taking off from aircraft carriers. Further evidence that China plans on building a third aircraft carrier that allows for CATOBAR operations are the discovery of what appears to be a fixed wing AEW&C aircraft, similar in appearance to the U.S. Navy’s Northrop Grumman E-2 Hawkeye, at the Wuhan testing facility. Whether this aircraft is a prototype or a mock-up is not yet known.

The large scale production of the Y-20 is a significant achievement of China’s state owned aviation industry, and forecasts China’s growing desire for a robust strategic airlift capability. Not only can the Y-20 transport a large amount of cargo or troops over a great distance, but it can even transport main battle tanks and other armored vehicles. With a maximum payload weight of 73 short tons, the Y-20 can transport the PLA’s most modern Type 99A or Type 96 MBTs, and any IFVs and APCs now in service. The aircraft has a maximum range exceeding 10,000 km (6,200 miles), and can carry a reduced payload of 40 short tons a range of 7,800 km. (4,850 miles). Range with the maximum payload of 73 short tons is approximately 4,500 km. (2,800 miles).

Very similar in design, dimensions and appearance to the Boeing C-17 Globemaster and Ilyushin IL-76, the Y-20 was built to fill the roles of strategic airlift, paratroop transport, and heavy airdrop missions. It is slightly larger than the IL-76, yet smaller that a C-17. With the C-17 no longer being produced by Boeing, having halted production in 2015, the Y-20 is now the largest military transport aircraft currently in production.

As China makes a concerted effort to secure its strategic interests both close to home, and as far away as the Horn of Africa, a viable strategic airlift capability is seen as essential. With a reported short takeoff ability of 700 meters, the Y-20 can supply troops and supplies to any of China’s island outposts in the South China Sea that have an airstrip, such as Woody Island, Fiery Cross Reef, Mischief Reef or Subi Reef. Any military operations in response to territorial incursions on the part of other claimants to disputed territories in the region that required invading and occupying land would greatly depend on sufficient strategic airlift support. With tensions between China and the Philippines significantly lessened with the new Duterte administration, and cordial relations with Malaysia and Brunei, the likelihood of such a scenario has greatly reduced since last summer.

The aircraft can also greatly aid the PLA in maintaining the new military base at Doraleh, Djibouti. The new military base is located just eight miles from Camp Lemonnier, the largest U.S. military facility on the continent of Africa, and will serve as a logistics base capable of supporting Chinese maritime interests in the Indian Ocean, The Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf. The Japanese Self Defense Forces also operate a small logistics support center adjacent to Camp Lemonnier, and will apparently be expanding this facility in response the Chinese project.

The question of Taiwan, and any future attempt to retake it by force of arms, would require a massive amphibious and airlift commitment. China lacks both at present, but as Southfront has diligently documented recently, the PLA and PLAN have greatly expanded and modernized their amphibious warfare capabilities. Any invasion of Taiwan would require not only a sizeable amphibious armada, but a substantial strategic airlift effort. The acquisition of up to a thousand Y-20s goes a long way towards building the nucleus of such a force.The development of the AG600 maritime aircraft is a case study that clearly confirms the growth of China’s aviation industry. Developed by AVIC as an amphibian aircraft meant to serve a host of civilian and military duties, although AVIC is downplaying any military role for the plane, it was designed and built in roughly two years. The Harbin SH-5, which the AG600 will replace, took a fledgling Chinese aviation industry nearly 15 years to design and produce, and only a since production run yielding 6 aircraft was the result. AVIC has received orders for 17 aircraft so far, all for the domestic market. Although the aircraft can accommodate 50 passengers, no commercial airlines have expressed interest in the design so far. It is more likely that the AG600 will be utilized by the PLAN as a long range maritime patrol aircraft.

With much in common with the ShinMaywa US-2 seaplane utilized by the Japanese Maritime Self Defense forces (JMSDF), the AG600 will fill a similar role in the PLAN. The US-2 currently operates as an air-sea rescue (SAR) and maritime patrol/surveillance aircraft. It is also quite likely that the AG600 will be further developed into an anti-submarine (ASW) patrol aircraft like its predecessor the Harbin SH-5. As China strengthens its position in the South China Sea and continues to develop the defense infrastructure on a number of man-made islands, a long range SAR aircraft will be a great asset is support of PLAN and PLAAF air patrols operated from these islands. The AG-600 is equipped with retractable landing gear, and can operate from an airfield as well as from water. The reported maximum range of the AG600 is approximately 4,500 km. (2,800 miles).

After decades of investing in its indigenous aviation industry, one with humble beginnings, and learning as much as possible from both Russian and U.S. aircraft design, the nation has achieved the ability to develop a real strategic airlift capability. Although still reliant on Russian aircraft  engine production to a large degree in its most modern aircraft, Chinese analogs of many other Russian designs have definitely afforded the Chinese aviation industry greater independence. The maturity of this industry in just the last decade has impressed its peers in both Russia and various Western nations.

The resources and funding allocated to acquiring strategic airlift on the level expressed in official government press briefings and reported by state run media in China all communicate an obvious desire to expand the ability to both project power and respond strategically to challenges to Chinese national interests on a global scale. China is rapidly breaking free from its regional power status, and will continue to gain greater influence in global economic, political, and military spheres.

China may communicate its peaceful intentions through diplomatic channels; however, it is sending a quite different message in real terms as it continues to develop and fortify its position in the South China Sea and the Horn of Africa. China is wisely seeking to protect the vital trade lanes that are its very life blood. The economic benefit from this trade has enriched the nation and helped to bring it out of an era of stagnation and subjugation to outside interests. China is once again rising to a level of global influence and importance that it has enjoyed for the overwhelming majority of its more than 5,000 years of history. It is crucial to note that over the vast majority of that same history, China has largely adopted a strategically defensive military posture, very rarely engaging in military campaigns of expansion against its neighbors. By further solidifying its position in the South China Sea, China is wisely occupying the “central position” as part of a larger defensive strategy to protect the vital trade lanes and resources that will ensure its continued prosperity.

One thing is clear, China is developing the military means to defend its position as a world power and is sending a clear message to its peers that it will no longer subordinate its own national interests to those of others, regardless of their global power status. A viable aircraft carrier force and a large strategic air lift capability send a clear message to the United States and Japan, that China is determined and quite capable of securing and defending its national interests on a global scale. This increasingly assertive posture need not lead to military conflict; however, an even more assertive United States has already bristled at the possibility of relinquishing any amount of control over what it sees as its sole, global sphere of influence.

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Though the final final campaign-donation numbers are still not yet fully tabulated by anyone, we’re close enough now (99+% of the way toward 100% accuracy), so that reliably close approximations can at last be presented:   

In the 2016 U.S. Presidential contest, Hillary Clinton’s campaign received $300,084,866 from individuals who donated at least $200; Donald Trump’s campaign received only $45,725,669 — 15% as much as she did from such donors. For every $1 Trump got there, Clinton got $6.67.

In total, however, Clinton’s money-advantage over Trump wasn’t nearly so large, because Trump received millions of small donations, which enabled his campaign to remain competitive (though still considerably smaller than hers).

Whereas Hillary got 53.27% of her total appx. $775M as direct individual donations of $200+, Trump got only 13.94% of his appx. $425M that way.

In addition to individual donations, each campaign also received donations from various types of PACS or Political Action Committees, which are supposedly not controlled by, nor coordinated with, the candidate’s own campaign. That’s called “outside money.” The figures from some of these PACS haven’t yet been fully tabulated, but almost. (The individual donation-figures that were just cited are exact — all in, and fully tabulated — however.) Here are the outside-money numbers, as of now:

CLINTON OUTSIDE MONEY: $206,055,296 according to this [but mainly Clinton Priorities USA Action SuperPAC $192,065,768, out of an actual total of around $212M]

TRUMP OUTSIDE MONEY: $75,253,193 according to this [but mainly actually $90M 4 PACS: Great America, Rebuilding America, Make America #1, Our Principles, of an actual total of around $114M]

Here are the web-pages from which these figures are copied (or, in other instances, estimated):

https://www.opensecrets.org/pres16

https://www.opensecrets.org/pres16/candidate?id=N00000019

https://www.opensecrets.org/pres16/candidate?id=N00023864

https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/include/contribs_pop.php

https://www.opensecrets.org/pres16/outside-groups

As regards what the electoral result of this was:

Trump won 304 Electoral College votes; Clinton won 227.

In the Electoral College, there’s a winner-take-all system, so that to win a state by 1 vote gets all of its Electoral College votes, no different than if the state has been won by millions of votes.

Clinton campaigned in California, which wasn’t even in contention between her and Trump, and she achieved there an enormous victory-margin over Trump, of 4,269,978 votes; she won that state by 61.73%, compared to Trump’s 31.62%. She won that state by 4,269,977 votes more than were needed for her to win the state.

In all other states than California, Clinton lost nationwide by a total of 1,401,459 votes. However, because of her massive 4,269,978-vote win of California, she won the popular vote nationwide by 2,868,519 votes. If the election were to have been decided by popular votes instead of Electoral College votes, we’d have the President whom Californians overwhelmingly preferred, not the President whom the residents of the other 49 states strongly preferred; we’d have a President who was chosen by Californians, ruling over all of the 50 states.

These figures are taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_2016 as of 3 PM 2 March 2017.

So:

Clinton spent $775 million and won 65,853,625 votes, which cost $11.77 per vote won; Trump spent $425 million and won 62,985,106 votes, which cost $6.75 per vote won.

In the far more important — indeed all-important — Electoral College cost-per-vote-won, Clinton spent $3,414,097 per Electoral College vote; and Trump spent $1,398,026 per Electoral College vote.

More discussion of the Presidential contest’s voting results (as of 22 December 2016) can be found here.

So: that’s the final report on the 2016 U.S. Presidential contest, both the dollars and the votes.

My comments on the election’s outcome are here.

On March 2nd, Ms. Clinton spoke in a closed-to-the-public event at her alma mater Wellesley College, and according to the Boston Globe’s report based upon twitters, was asked “What would you change about your campaign?” and Clinton replied, “I’d win.” Many of the reader-comments there were published only as “This comment has been blocked.” However, that same report was also republished at Political Wire, and the reader-comments there were unedited and were overwhelmingly attacking Donald Trump as having stolen the election, and Vladimir Putin as having been behind it. The most popular reader-response (to her saying “I’d win”) was “If you look at it the right way, she DID.” Her 2,868,519 popular-vote margin was considered the ‘right way’ to evaluate her electoral performance. Almost none criticized Ms. Clinton, either substantively or even just tactically, such as by wondering why she had been campaigning in California and other states that weren’t even at all in contention. The commonest assumption (other than that nationwide popular votes should have decided the victor and California’s voters should have determined the next President even if she lost the rest of the national electorate) appeared to be that somehow Putin did something that had swayed the 77,744 voters in the closest three Trump-won states (Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania) who became Trump’s crucial victory-margin in the closest vote-count states for his side that would need to have been reversed in order for Clinton to have been able to win the Electoral College and thus the election.

On March 1st, UK’s Daily Mail headlined and opened:

EXCLUSIVE: Barack Obama’s close confidante Valerie Jarrett has moved into his new DC home, which is now the nerve center for their plan to mastermind the insurgency against President Trump

• Obama’s goal is to oust Trump from the presidency either by forcing his resignation or through his impeachment, a family friend tells DailyMail.com

• Jarrett has moved into the 8,200-square-foot, $5.3-million Kaloroma mansion to work closely with the former president and Michelle Obama

• Jarrett lived in the White House, dined with the Obamas, and helped shape his domestic and foreign policies

• Obama cannot use his West End office, a post-presidency perk, for political purposes

• ‘He’s coming. And he’s ready to roll.’ former Attorney General Eric Holder said yesterday about the former president’s reentry into the political scene

So, Obama’s goal now is for Mike Pence to replace Donald Trump.

President Trump on Saturday morning alleged that his predecessor Barack Obama had “wire-tapped” the Trump Tower in October, before the election: “Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my ‘wires tapped’ in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!” he wrote.

“Is it legal for a sitting President to be “wire tapping” a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!” he added in subsequent tweets. “I’d bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!”

Trump compared Obama’s alleged activity to Nixon’s bugging of the Watergate hotel. “How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!”

It was not immediately clear what evidence or report Trump was referencing. On Friday night, Breitbart News reported on radio host Mark Levin’s claim that Obama executed a “silent coup” of Trump via “police state” tactics.

Since Trump has a tendency to tweet about things he has just seen on TV or read in the press, and since there has been no definitive report on that topic, Trump may be referencing an internal report. And since the allegations in his tweets are material, and will surely provoke a response by Barack Obama (at least his twitter account), this may escalate significantly.

Also on Saturday, prior to the wiretapping tweet, Trump had also linked Obama to Attorney General Jeff Sessions’s meetings last year with Russia’s U.S. ambassador.

“The first meeting Jeff Sessions had with the Russian Amb was set up by the Obama Administration under education program for 100 Ambs,” he tweeted.

Trump on Saturday also blasted Obama for meeting with Kislyak 22 times while president, as the Daily Caller reported first on Friday, tweeting: “Just out: The same Russian Ambassador that met Jeff Sessions visited the Obama White House 22 times, and 4 times last year alone.”

The Trump administration has sought to push back on accusations of being cozy with Moscow, by pointing out instances of Democrats meeting with Kislyak. Critics have responded that the issue isn’t that Sessions met with the ambassador, but that he falsely told Congress he hadn’t while under oath. So far, according to some media outlets, Trump has failed to “fend off” the Russia questions, which continue to reemerge virtually every night in some new front page story on the WaPo, NYT, in a recurring pattern as described in the following blog post.

* * *

To be sure, Trump didn’t dwell much on the alleged wiretapping and by 8:19 a.m., the president had turned his sights to Arnold Schwarzenegger who succeeded Trump as host of “The Apprentice,” and who has sparred with Mr. Trump over the president’s policies on immigration.

“Arnold Schwarzenegger isn’t voluntarily leaving the Apprentice, he was fired by his bad (pathetic) ratings, not by me. Sad end to great show” Trump tweeted. “Sad end to great show,” he concluded.

Dr. Hassan Diab is a Canadian citizen and sociology professor who lived in Ottawa, Canada. He was extradited to France in 2014 in a case widely viewed as a wrongful conviction in the making. Dr. Diab has been detained since then in France for questioning, based on secret, anonymous “intelligence” allegations possibly gleaned from torture.

Dr. Diab was extradited based solely on a widely discredited handwriting report that the Canadian extradition judge described as “illogical”, “very problematic”, “convoluted”, and “suspect”. The judge noted that the low threshold for evidence under Canada’s extradition law compelled him to order Dr. Diab’s extradition.

In 2016, a French investigative judge found “consistent evidence” supporting Dr. Diab’s innocence, concluding that Hassan could not have been in Paris at the time of the 1980 bombing for which he is under investigation. In May and again in October 2016, the French investigative judge ordered Dr. Diab’s release on bail, finding no grounds for his further detention.

The prosecutor appealed and the French Court of Appeal unfortunately overturned the release orders, and Dr. Diab remains imprisoned in a special segregated unit with only two hours per day out of his cell.

The prospects of a fair trial in the current political climate in France are very slim. There is a real risk that Hassan may be wrongfully convicted due to the heavy reliance of France’s anti-terrorism courts on secret, anonymous intelligence.

Dr. Diab’s fingerprints, palm prints, and physical description do not match those of the suspect. He is not an anti-Semite, and he strongly condemns all forms of bigotry and violence. Hassan must not face life in prison for a crime that he did not commit and that runs contrary to everything he has ever stood for.

We call upon the Government of Canada to work towards the immediate granting of bail to Dr. Hassab Diab and securing his urgent return to his family and home in Canada.

Recent Articles on Dr. Hassan Diab’s Case

• “No evidence? No problem. – What Hassan Diab’s extradition and imprisonment in France tells us about Canada’s casual relationship with the rule of law”, by Matthew Behrens, March/April 2017 issue of The CCPA Monitor.

• “Hassan Diab supporters fear changing political climate could hurt chances of fair trial”, by Aedan Helmer, Ottawa Citizen, February 18, 2017.

How You Can Help

JOIN the Bring Hassan Home Campaign and sign a statement of support for Dr. Hassan Diab. To sign, complete the form at http://www.justiceforhassan diab.org/bring-hassan-home

WRITE to Canadian Minister of Foreign Affairs (Ms. Chrystia Freeland), Minister of Justice (Ms. Jody Wilson-Raybould), and Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs (Mr. Omar Alghabra) about Hassan’s plight. Urge them to bring Hassan back to his home and family in Canada. For a sample letter, visit http://www.justiceforhas sandiab.org/help

DONATE to Hassan’s legal defence in France. Your donation – of any amount – will help provide an innocent man with the means to defend himself. For information about how to donate, visit http://www.justiceforhas sandiab.org/donate

Join us for Two Events in Kingston on March 8, 2017

Join us on Wednesday March 8, 2017, in Kingston, Ontario, for TWO events about the case of Dr. Hassan Diab.

FIRST Event:

• Where: Mackintosh-Corry Hall, Room B201, Queen’s University, Kingston
  
• When: Wednesday March 8, at 12:00 noon
  
• What: Donald Bayne (Hassan’s lawyer, renowned criminal law advocate, and former Queen’s U. Gaels quarterback) will tell us about the case of Dr. Hassan Diab. See poster.
  

SECOND Event:

• Where: Unitarian Place, 206 Concession St., Kingston
• When: Wednesday March 8, at 7:00 pm (doors open at 6:40 pm)
• What: We will be showing the short documentary “Rubber Stamped: The Hassan Diab Story”, followed by an info session led by Donald Bayne. Complimentary light refreshments will be served.

Both events are FREE and open to the public.

Hassan Diab Support Committee
[email protected]
http://www.justiceforhassandia b.org

US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis presented a preliminary version of the new plan to defeat ISIS in Syria and Iraq, a Pentagon spokesman, Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, said on February 28th. The plan is aimed at making a “devastating impact” on the terrorist group. While the plan is reportedly transregional and aimed at defeating ISIS and al-Qaeda around the globe, the United States has little space to maneuver. In any case, the Syrian cities of Raqqah and Deir Ezzor, and the Iraqi city of Mosul will be the main targets of the US-led military efforts against ISIS.

There is no doubt that Iraqi security forces, actively backed by the US Air Force and the US Special Forces, will retake western Mosul from ISIS. This is just a matter of time. This move will not finish the war on ISIS in Iraq but will mark a transformation of the ISIS strategy. The group will focus on guerrilla warfare in the areas formally controlled by Iraqi security forces and its western allies.

The situations in Raqqah and Deir Ezzor are more complex and involve a wide range of regional and global powers. In this case, the problem is that, if the US involves Turkey in the Raqqah operation, such a decision will dramatically worsen US relations with Syrian Kurds who are the core and the only real fighting force in the so-called “Syrian Democratic Forces”. Thus, the US would lose its only loyal, or at least semi-loyal, force on the ground and would be pushed to rely upon the Turkish Armed Forces, Qatari, and Saudi Arabian special forces which are likely already involved.

At the same time, this would allow Damascus and Moscow to argue that Qatar and Saudi Arabia are now officially parties to the conflict. Presently, Doha and Riyadh deny their de-facto involvement in the war -despite their constant support of terrorist groups in Syria. In turn, the mainstream media and think tanks, which receive funding from the Gulf Monarchies, blame Tehran for involvement in the conflict.

If the US decides to decline the Turkish request to participate in the Raqqah offensive, it will lead to a Turkish-Kurdish escalation in Syria and will push the Pentagon to use its troops actively in operations on the ground. Clashes between Ankara-led forces and the US-backed SDF erupted west of Manbij in March. The formal presence of US Special Forces did not help Kurdish allies. The tense situation also pushed the SDF to intensify its contacts with the legitimate Syrian government.

The plan submitted by Mattis also includes a proposal to increase the size of the US military contingent to ISIS in Syria, a move repeatedly forecasted by SouthFront. Without significant US presence on the ground, the SDF will hardly be able to retake Raqqah from ISIS without incurring unacceptable losses.

The third option, widely denied by mainstream US politicians, is to cooperate with Moscow and Damascus. Such cooperation will lead to the rapid defeat of ISIS in Syria and liberation of Raqqah and Deir Ezzor. Furthermore, the successful attacks of the Syrian army and its allies against ISIS in eastern Aleppo and Palmyra clearly show that Tehran, Damascus, and Moscow have enough resources to contribute to the war on ISIS. Yet, hardcore Russophobia of the US deep state remains. This is why US-Russian cooperation will likely be constrained or even roughly sabotaged.

As to Deir Ezzor, the US can try to use militants trained in Jordan to launch an attack on Deir Ezzor from the southern direction. However, the total failure of this US-backed group in 2016 leaves little chance that it’s able to combat ISIS successfully in 2017. So, the US and its allies will be pushed to deploy special forces units or even ground troops to support the advance there.

The Polish Special Forces have already deployed to Jordan where they will operate alongside their French and British counterparts.

According to reports, the US-led block created a joint command center to coordinate efforts of all sides, which will support the advance against ISIS in the area.

Thus, the fate of ISIS as a semi-state entity in Syria and Iraq is predestined. Stiff pressure in central Syria from the Iranian-Syrian-Russian alliance and the intensification of the US-led operations in eastern Syria and in western Iraq are rapidly leading to a collapse of the self-proclaimed caliphate.

The question now is: How will the spheres of influence be divided following the defeat of ISIS?

“[America’s treatment of me] is a crime that history will never forgive.” Omar Abdel Rahman

Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the “blind sheik”, died on the morning of February 18, 2017, near the 24th anniversary of the 1993 WTC bombing.  He was an innocent victim of the US agenda to create a new enemy by engineering events that would make terrorism virtually synonymous with “Islamic fundamentalism”.

Sheik Rahman attained national fame in Egypt while he was on trial for inciting the 1981 assassination of former Egyptian President Anwar Sadat.  With a passionate moral integrity, he courageously attacked the government during his two days on the stand; the intensive trial media gave him a national platform that made him famous throughout the Muslim world.  His sermons were taped and traded throughout Egypt.

While he was vindicated of the charges against him, President Mubarak’s government ominously refused to give the necessary certification of the verdict and eventually drove Sheik Rahman out of Egypt.  The Sheik went to Afghanistan, where he helped the CIA recruit Arab fighters to serve with the US-backed mujahadeen (he would lose at least one of his own sons there), and the Sheik was reportedly on the CIA payroll.

Sheik Rahman came to the US in 1990, hoping to remain until he could safely return to Egypt.  According to Benjamin Begin in a 1993 Israel Today newsletter, Rahman’s mosques were infiltrated by FBI and Mossad operatives and would be the source of recruitment for their operations.

The World Trade Center explosion occurred on Friday, February 26th, 1993.  The Sheik was soon declared deportable when some of those charged were identified as members of his mosques.   The sheik was in the FBI’s crosshairs; the FBI offered Egyptian intelligence agent Emad Salem over one million dollars to entrap him.

The cagey Salem, who had become a trusted member of the Sheik’s inner circle, was aware of the obligation that the Sheik had as spiritual leader to respond to congregants’ needs.  Salem blindsided the sheik by going to his home after midnight on a Sunday, pretending to be in a spiritual crisis.  He claimed that he felt guilty for his years in the Egyptian military and needed to atone for his actions by attacking a target in the US — such as the United Nations.  The sheik tried to fob him off and talked him out of that terrorist target; he suggested that a US military target would be more appropriate, but he told Salem to “slow down” — to cool off.  Salem went home happy.

The Joint Anti-Terror Task Force and the Justice Department were allegedly dubious about whether they had evidence that would convict Rahman. The Sheik had repeatedly and publicly denounced the bombing of the WTC and claimed that he had nothing to do with it.  Those who heard Emad Salem’s recorded attempt to incriminate the Sheik didn’t think it was persuasive enough to stand up in court.  The FBI had tapped the Sheik’s telephones from two weeks before the WTC explosion until June, 1993; there was no evidence of any wrongdoing.  The INS said he was complying with the requirements of his deportation appeal.  Authorities noted that incarcerating the Sheik would be expensive because of his diabetes.  A detention until appeals were completed could have lasted for months — if not for years.

Attorney General Janet Reno, who had publicly been reluctant to charge the Sheik, finally succumbed to the political pressure: pressure that also came from the Egyptian government, which still felt threatened by the Sheik’s popularity.  Egyptian officials, afraid that Rahman would be deported to Egypt, wanted him safely incarcerated in the US.   On July 1st, 1993, the Justice Department, while avoiding making any criminal charge, decided to take the Sheik into custody — “indefinite administrative detention” — on immigration charges.

The Egyptian conundrum

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was afraid of Rahman’s popularity and influence; he appeared to be worried about suffering the same fate as the Shah of Iran, deposed by a popular religious leader.  Mubarak banned tapes of Sheik Rahman’s sermons; those found with copies were subject to up to five years in jail. Three thousand copies of a newspaper Al-Hayat that featured a March interview with Rahman were confiscated, and Rahman’s mosque in Fayoum was empty, guarded by a police agent.

While the Egyptian government had initially asked the Clinton administration to hold the Sheik to make sure he was not deported to Egypt, they changed their minds when they were informed that under the immigration charges, the sheik could accept his deportation voluntarily and go to any country that would take him, which could make him even more of a threat to the Mubarak government.  After intense discussions, the US agreed to accept Egypt’s official extradition request, which it claimed would take precedence over the deportation charge.  The only hitch was that appeals might take as long as eight years.

Mubarak was livid.  He reminded the U.S. that he had hosted an Arab summit before the 1991 US-led invasion of Iraq which brought most of the Arab world onside, providing important “optics” for the engineered invasion. 

Egyptian authorities were also outraged that two employees of the US Embassy had met earlier that year with prominent members of the Islamic Group, which regarded Sheik Rahman as their spiritual leader.  The US seemed to be hedging its bets on Egyptian leadership so that it would not be caught out in Egypt as it had been in Iran, when Khomeini was swept into power. To add insult to injury, there was even a Congressional effort to cut back on US aid to Egypt.

President Mubarak then demonstrated to the Clinton administration who was in charge of Egypt.  On  July 8th, the Egyptian government hanged seven followers of Sheik Rahman for attacks against foreign tourists and for conspiring to overthrow the Mubarak government.  It was the largest number of executions for a political crime in more than four decades, and it would be the start of a brutal campaign against dissidents that would last until the 2011 Arab Spring.

After witnessing Mubarak’s treatment of the Muslim Brotherhood, it was evident that Rahman’s supporters were powerless; Rahman was expendable.

US rejects political asylum for Rahman but can’t extradite him to Egypt

Meanwhile there were unforeseen complications with U.S. efforts to extradite Rahman to Egypt.  While the Board of Immigration Appeals rejected Rahman’s appeal for political asylum, it appeared that his appeals would eventually reach the Supreme Court.  Also, State Department officials realized that the 100-year old extradition treaty between the US and Egypt did not permit extradition based on “any crime or offense of political character.”  While one official claimed that US courts were not limited by treaties, another noted that the treaty strengthened Rahman’s case for political asylum.

The Egyptian plan to ensure that Sheik Rahman would be placed under their control hit another challenge at the end of July when Afghanistan’s Prime Minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar offered his country as a refuge for the Sheik.  The Sheik’s lawyers realized that deportation might be the only way for the sheik to regain his freedom, so they contacted the office of U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White to request his deportation. 

White’s office sat on the sheik’s deportation request while trying to accommodate Egypt’s demand for permanent control of the sheik. The problem was that those who were deported were free to go to any country that would accept them, but Egypt did not want the sheik in Afghanistan, where he would be free to communicate with his followers.

The “seditious conspiracy” solution

The sheik’s lawyers were still waiting for a response when, a week later, on August 25th, 1993, Attorney General Janet Reno issued an indictment for Sheik Rahman along with 14 others for “seditious conspiracy”, an obscure charge employed against political dissidents.

The 20-count, 27-page indictment claimed that one terrorist organization [which started in 1989, the year before the sheik arrived in the U.S.] was behind all of the plots and that Sheik Rahman, while not directly involved with the acts, was the “mastermind” who explicitly gave the orders.  The listed plots included: plans to attack American military installations; plans to murder F.B.I. agents; plans to seize hostages to help release jailed conspirators; the 1990 killing of Rabbi Meir Kahane; the 1991 killing of Alkifah Center President Mustafa Shalabi; the 1993 WTC bombing [ambiguously included, since there was currently a separate trial for that]; the June “landmarks bombing plot”; and the plot to assassinate President Hosni Mubarak. The New York Times featured a map of the presumed terrorist targets; it appeared that New York City was under a Muslim siege.

The “seditious conspiracy” charge, which had been created to target Confederates at the end of the Civil War, was defined as when two or more people “conspire to overthrow, put down, or destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them.”   Experts noted that the broad nature of the conspiracy indictment, which did not require connecting a defendant to any specific act of violence and allowed prosecutors to bring in evidence not related to terrorist acts, made it possible to convict people with little proof (let alone evidence) of guilt.  Criminal defense experts claimed that the Government was framing the case as much on the defendants’ beliefs as on any acts they may have committed.

Defense lawyers were also disturbed by the Government’s piling up of charges on a socially-isolated and demonized group, especially reviving the Kahane case just two years after El Sayid Nosair had been acquitted.  Claiming that the indictment was an attempt to “create an atmosphere of fear and intimidation“, defense lawyer Ronald Kuby noted that, “What they have done is take every allegation, every rumor, every loose end and created a vast mythical Islamic conspiracy. They have created a case that is so big and complicated that it is impossible to defend, impossible to understand, and impossible for any of these defendants to get a fair trial.”

Emad Salem’s tapes

Defense lawyers claimed that Emad Salem entrapped their clients by hiring them for his plots, then taped them making incriminating statements.  Salem’s tapes, on which most of this trial would be based, would also include two FBI admissions of overseeing the provision of the WTC explosives.  Ron Kuby requested that all of Salem’s tapes collected as evidence (which also showed the FBI’s unsavory ways of doing business) be released in their entirety to the public to expose the case as a conspiracy to frame the defendants.  Judge Michael B. Mukasey, (who would be named Attorney General in 2007), refused to allow the tapes to be made public.

The seditious conspiracy trial would be delayed until January, 1995, and corresponded in time to the televised O.J. Simpson trial, which contributed to its lack of media coverage, despite being touted as the terror trial of the century.  The year and a half between the defendants’ arrests and their trial gave the Government and courts time to strip the sheik and other defendants of Constitutional rights, including the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, the Fourth Amendment right against unwarranted search and seizure, and other basic freedoms.  The homes of two of Rahman’s paralegals would be raided for information against him, and dissident reading material found in defendants’ homes that was deemed “anti-American” or showed “hatred of Jews” could be used as evidence against them.

The seditious conspiracy trial

As with the first World Trade bombing trial, there would be no change of venue, the jury would be unsequestered and — supposedly to protect them from Muslim terror threats — would be identified only by number; their names would never be made public.  None of the jury was Muslim.

The media during the entirety of this trial would be filled with various terror stories.  The seditious conspiracy trial had barely started when the “mastermind” of the WTC bombing, Ramzi Yousef, arrived in  New York with huge media fanfare.  Mukasey asked the jury on the day after Yousef’s arrival if their opinions were changed by this media coverage.  He immediately determined that they weren’t, but ignored the subsequent barrage of prejudicial media exposure that lasted throughout this trial.  Some of Yousef’s publicity should have helped the defendants because Yousef, who didn’t know sheik Rahman, made statements that should have exonerated Rahman and others.  Unfortunately Yousef refused to testify at this trial and Judge Mukasey would not permit the defense counsel access to Yousef’s documents that the FBI had taken.

The Oklahoma City bombing, which occurred six weeks later in mid-April, was initially claimed to be similar to the WTC bomb, and due to Muslim terrorism.  Mukasey “assumed” that the jury would not be affected by the anti-Muslim media, although the defendants received heightened physical protection in their detention center.

That June, the actual driver of the bomb-laden Ryder van came to media attention and in August, there was media fanfare with his extradition to the U.S.

Sheik Rahman’s (nonexistent) Constitutional rights

Prosecution attention turned to the Sheik’s sermons to show his attitude towards the U.S. as well as his leadership in the Muslim community.   Many of the Sheik’s sermons, which encouraged the devout to fight enemies of Islam and God, were read out in an effort to criminalize what should have been his freedoms of speech and belief. 

Mukasey barred witnesses that would have shown the role of politics behind the arrest of Sheik Rahman, that would have testified that Rahman was not the radical that the media had described, and that would have provided a clearer understanding of Muslim terms (such as jihad and fatwa) that were being used against the defendants.  Mukasey’s rulings were devastating to the Sheik’s defense.

The defense lawyers tried to introduce sealed material from the previous WTC trial that would show the lengths to which the FBI had gone to implicate as well as convict the previous defendants in the World Trade Center trial.  Although that material was not produced, FBI scientist Fredrick Whitehurst’s subsequent testimony about the FBI’s incompetence, perjury and obstruction of justice that facilitated the convictions of the four charged in the WTC bombing did tell part of that story.

The Government’s desperation to find damaging information on Sheik Rahman was evident in the arrest of his paralegal at the end of April.  The authorities’ claim that Nasser Ahmed’s overstay on a student visa “just came to our attention”, was contradicted by an FBI agent’s message to Ahmed that if he did not cooperate with the FBI, he would be deported to Egypt.  After being charged with “secret evidence” and spending three years in solitary confinement, Ahmed would not be released until 1999.

The verdicts

Since this trial showed that there was little evidence that any of the defendants were guilty of any untried crime that had taken place, the prosecution tried to criminalize Islam; it described the defendants as a frightening “jihad army”: foreigners of a mysterious, militant culture.  Judge Mukasey assured the jurors they could find that there was a single conspiracy despite the differing defendants and plots, “so long as you find that some of the conspirators continued for the entire duration of the conspiracy to act for the purposes charged in the indictment.”

After deliberating for seven days, the jury returned on October 1, 1995 with guilty verdicts for 48 out of the 50 charges.  Sheik Rahman’s lawyer Lynne Stewart broke down and cried.

The defense cries “foul” and calls for a mistrial

The defense counsel immediately called for a mistrial because they believed that the problems with the trial were so egregious.  It was clear that the FBI made use of Egypt’s intelligence agent as an agent provocateur to carry out its own agenda. Some defendants claimed that exculpatory conversations were missing from the tapes; the FBI admitted that they had “briefly” returned the tapes to Salem after they had been entered as evidence.

Judge Mukasey told the defense lawyers that he would consider their request to hold a post-trial hearing on the issue of whether he should overturn the convictions.  But on January 10, 1996, he rejected the defense motion to throw out the convictions of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman and nine others, claiming that there was no proof that the evidence that Salem had destroyed would have helped exonerate the defendants.  Mukasey ignored Salem’s obvious motive for destroying evidence and the FBI’s interest in wanting him to do it.

Mukasey was determined to make an example of these “terror” defendants.  While the sentence for seditious conspiracy was 20 years, Mukasey used that as a starting point, and added the other charges on top of that.  He used his discretionary powers to make each part of the sentences sequential rather than concurrent; the sentences ranged from 30 years to life.

Sheik Rahman was sentenced to life.  Worse, the government silenced Rahman even further by new “Special Administration Measures” which allowed them to essentially isolate him totally. To facilitate that agenda, it taped what were supposed to be his private conversations with his lawyer Lynne Stewart, and would imprison her for trying to circumvent the restrictions.

The obscure conspiracy law came into its own

The prosecution congratulated itself on its use of the seditious conspiracy charge.  The verdict showed that the conspiracy law provided them with an easy venue to obtain verdicts with little evidence and for which no crimes had occurred.  The conspiracy charge would become the mechanism to convict Muslims in future terror trials because of the low standards required of any individual’s involvement.

The price

This trial demonstrated how the efforts of the government, the courts and the media — particularly The New York Times — ensured that the Muslim defendants could not obtain a fair trial.  The New York Times enabled convictions in all of these related trials by maligning the defendants with anonymous government leaks, generally using biased and inflammatory language to describe them, and invariably assuming their guilt.

The injustice of these convictions and the fruitless appeals have been clear to those following the cases.  While few Americans seem to be aware of the injustice, it has not been lost on the worldwide Muslim community.  There were various actions designed to free Sheik Rahman, including the 2005 kidnapping of the four Christian Peacemaker Team members in Iraq: Tom Fox (who died), James Loney, Norman Kember and Harmeet Singh Sooden.

The world lost a passionate voice for moral integrity with the silencing of Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, and his death before attaining justice was tragic.  His passing should provide Americans the opportunity to understand how FBI-monitored acts were used to eliminate Constitutional rights to freedom of speech, freedom of belief, the right against unreasonable search and seizure, the right to counsel, and protection from cruel and unusual punishment.  By ignoring the elimination of Muslim rights, Americans are laying the groundwork for the elimination of their own.

Karin Brothers is a freelance writer.

The Syrian army, backed up by the Russian Aerospace Forces, liberated the ancient city of Palmyra, including the Palmyra Airport from ISIS on March 2. Syrian army servicemen have been examining the historic part of Palmyra with the aim of demining the city.

The US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) primarily consisting of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) will hand over wide areas west of the northern Syrian town of Manbij to the Syrian army, according to a statement released by the so-called Manbij Miltiary Council. The SDF wants to use Syrian army troops as a buffer against Turkish-backed militant groups in northern Syria and refers that this decision is made after talks with “Russia”, aiming to use the Russian and Syrian military and diplomatic capabilities to defend itself from Turkey.

Just in August 2016, Talal Silo, a spokesman for the SDF, argued that the US is the only SDF partner and the group was not going coordinate anti-ISIS efforts or even negotiate with any other side without a signal from the Americans. It seems the SDF/YPG dramatically changed its attitude in March 2017 after it had became clear that photos of few US Special Forces troops were not enough to prevent Turkey from aiming to seize Manbij and Tell Rifat.

Turkey sees the YPG as just a branch of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), with which Turkey has been at war almost continuously since 1984. In turn, the PKK seeks to establish an independent Kurdish state in southern Turkey. There are still no official reports which areas the Syrian army will control in the Manbij countryside. However, there are two options:

1. The Syrian army enters villages west of Manbij. In this case, Turkey-led forces will be able to attack Manbij only from the direction of Jarabulus if they want to avoid confrontation with the Russian-Syrian-Iranian alliance.
2. Or the Syrian army enters villages west and north of Manbi, preventing possible Turkish military operations in both directions.

In any case, one problem will remain. Ankara-led forces will still be able to attack the YPG/SDF in Tell Rifat. Last months, there were some Russian-mediated negotiations between the government and the YPG in the area, but YPG sources were fast to deny that any agreement had been reached.

Meanwhile, the Syrian army’s Tiger Forces have liberated Alisah, Um Al-Amad, Barlin, Abu Tawil, Rahmaniya, Qaziqli and some nearby points from ISIS in the province.

If you’re able, and if you like our content and approach, please support the project. Our work wouldn’t be possible without your help: PayPal: [email protected] or via: http://southfront.org/donate/ or via: https://www.patreon.com/southfront

When a bank is found guilty of doing business in countries where they’re not supposed to be, and when the same bank is found guilty of helping drug cartels launder money, shouldn’t the public have a right to know about the banks’ efforts at correcting such actions? That’s the question being raised with respect to HSBC’s 1.92 billion dollar settlement with the U.S. and oral arguments are taking place in federal court this week on whether or not the compliance report should stay sealed.

The bank lost in court in 2012 when it was discovered they had business dealings in, “Cuba, Iran, Libya, Sudan and Burma, racking up violations of the Bank Secrecy Act, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the Trading With the Enemy Act,” according to CNS. The bank’s executives, who knew full well what the bank was doing, were given deferred prosecution agreements, so long as the bank, going forward, would reform its business practices and comply with the law.

“HSBC admitted to violating U.S. sanctions laws and failing to stop Mexican and Colombian cartels from laundering hundreds of millions of dollars in drug proceeds through the bank,” but now is fighting to keep the contents of the compliance report a secret. And the bank is getting help from what should be considered the most unlikely of sources, the Department of Justice. Yes. That’s right. The same justice department which prosecuted HSBC and won, is now seeking to keep the progress, or lack thereof, in complying with the law, a secret.

One lone ranger, a mortgage holder with HSBC, is fighting to make the compliance report public. Hubert Dean Moore believes HSBC’s progress with complying with the law should be a matter of public record and is arguing his case this week in Manhattan, NY. The DOJ’s lawyer, Jenny Ellickson, argued for the government on Wednesday saying Gleeson shouldn’t’ be involved in the proceedings. She argued that releasing the report would make it harder for the federal government to enforce the deferred prosecution agreement adding that doing so would mean that HSBC would be less likely to cooperate going forward. “The importance of the monitor’s confidential sources is critical here,” she said according to the New York Post.

Yahoo News writes,

Circuit Judge Gerard Lynch, one of the judges on the panel, expressed skepticism of that argument, saying that sources were most likely to suffer retaliation from HSBC, which received the monitor’s reports anyway. Paul Clement, representing HSBC, said it would not be fair to the bank to have the report released, when the original agreement called for reports to be confidential. David Schulz, who represents Moore pro bono, said it was prosecutors, not Gleeson, who had overreached. When Lynch pressed him to explain what gave Gleeson the power to order the report’s release, Schulz cited his ‘inherent supervisory powers’ over the case.

For the moment the report will remain confidential, as judges continue to hear arguments both for and against releasing the compliance report’s findings. The federal government’s own lawyers are helping to keep it that way, and the bank is more than happy to keep their movements in complying or not complying with the settlement, a continued secret.

Discovering HSBC engaged in illegal business dealings is almost as shocking as the slap on the wrist settlement it was given. According to one estimate, the 1.92 billion dollar figure amounts to five days worth of business earnings by the bank. Even more surprising may be the fact that not one person has spent any time in jail or prison over dealing directly with drug cartels and rogue governments leading many to question what would happen to an individual caught doing the same things. Are banks who are “too big to fail” also too big to prosecute?

Moore’s attorney, David Schulz said, “The appellants in this case try to argue that this is judicial overreach into a realm that’s exclusively left to prosecutors, and the fact is, just the opposite is true…What is going on here is not judicial overreach. It’s prosecutorial, executive branch overreach.”

Schulz wrote in his legal brief to the court, “Disclosing the report serves the important interest of informing the public about any substantive reforms actually being made by HSBC, and is needed for meaningful analysis of the propriety of the government’s decision to enter into the DPA (Deferred Prosecution Agreement),” with HSBC.

In a nutshell, HSBC was found guilty of some pretty nasty business dealings. The good old boy Wall Street network and its cozy relationship with the federal government likely resulted in a drop in the bucket type of settlement with the government, and deferred prosecution (some might say immunity) was given to its executives. And now, precisely how HSBC has shaped up its dealings is being kept from the American people, by our own Justice Department. And we call this ‘justice’ in the land of the free.

In its last months the Obama administration ordered the intelligence agencies to collect and distribute information of contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia. This to prevent any change by the Trump administration of the hostile policy towards Russia that the Obama administration instituted. The intent was also gives the intelligence services blackmail material to prevent any changes in their undue, freewheeling independence.

The above is reported in a rather short New York Times piece published yesterday. The reporting angle captured in the headline is biased to set the Obama efforts into a positive light. But the Obama Administration Rushed to Preserve Intelligence of Russian Election Hacking.

But make no mistake. Not single shred of evidence has been provided that “Russia hacked the election” or had anything to do with various leaks of Clinton related emails. A lot of fluff and chaff was thrown around but not even one tiny bit of evidence.

The effort was clearly to sabotage the announced policy of the incoming administration of seeking better relations with Russia. Obama intended to undermine the will of the voters by abusing instruments of the state.

Excerpts from the piece:

In the Obama administration’s last days, some White House officials scrambled to spread information about Russian efforts to undermine the presidential election — and about possible contacts between associates of President-elect Donald J. Trump and Russians — across the government. Former American officials say they had two aims: to ensure that such meddling isn’t duplicated in future American or European elections, and to leave a clear trail of intelligence for government investigators.

It is completely normal for any campaign, and especially an incoming administration, to have contacts with foreign government officials.

Such contacts are needed to prepare policies and to get the facts right to plan and run a consistent foreign policy. I am very sure that there were hundreds of talks between Trump campaign and incoming administration officials with Israeli, European and Arab officials. These are regular contacts and they do not violate any law. There was and is no reasons at all to pick out talks with Russian officials as something sinister or even illegal. Again – no evidence has been provided that Russia somehow interfered in U.S. elections. None at all. There was no sound reason to give special treatment to campaign contacts with Russia.

American allies, including the British and the Dutch, had provided information describing meetings in European cities between Russian officials — and others close to Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin — and associates of President-elect Trump, according to three former American officials who requested anonymity in discussing classified intelligence.Separately, American intelligence agencies had intercepted communications of Russian officials, some of them within the Kremlin, discussing contacts with Trump associates.

Here the NYT is divulging “sources and methods” – usually the holy grail for the intelligence community. U.S. intelligence is intercepting communication “within the Kremlin”? That is surely of interest to Russian counter-intelligence. One also has to ask who ordered the European intelligence services to watch over U.S. contacts with Russia. Were similar orders given to the Dutch secret services to report on contacts of the Clinton campaign with Israeli officials? Undue influencing attempts of Israeli politicians on U.S. policies are legend. Were they watched? If not why not?

Mr. Trump has denied that his campaign had any contact with Russian officials, and at one point he openly suggested the American spy agencies had cooked up intelligence suggesting that the Russian government had tried to meddle in the presidential election. Mr. Trump has accused the Obama administration of hyping the Russia story line as a way to discredit his new administration.

Guess what – Trump is right. The “Russian hacking” story is not backed by any evidence at all. It IS cooked up. And to say Trump “accused” the Obama administration of attempts to “discredit his new administration” is quite weak. The article says exactly that. How else could one interpret the following section?

As Inauguration Day approached, Obama White House officials grew convinced that the intelligence was damning and that they needed to ensure that as many people as possible inside government could see it, even if people without security clearances could not. Some officials began asking specific questions at intelligence briefings, knowing the answers would be archived and could be easily unearthed by investigators — including the Senate Intelligence Committee, which in early January announced an inquiry into Russian efforts to influence the election.At intelligence agencies, there was a push to process as much raw intelligence as possible into analyses, and to keep the reports at a relatively low classification level to ensure as wide a readership as possible across the government — and, in some cases, among European allies. This allowed the upload of as much intelligence as possible to Intellipedia, a secret wiki used by American analysts to share information.

There was also an effort to pass reports and other sensitive materials to Congress. In one instance, the State Department sent a cache of documents marked “secret” to Senator Benjamin Cardin of Maryland days before the Jan. 20 inauguration.

The “intelligence community”, it is specifically the CIA here which campaigned on the Clinton side, manipulated the classification of secrets for the sole purpose of instigating witch-hunt investigations against the incoming Trump administration. Such secrets were then used to decapitate the Trump administration with the first casualty being his selected national security advisor Flynn. We currently see an attack on the administration’s attorney general Session for a routine talk with the Russian ambassador. This based on “Justice department officials”, i.e. FBI flunkies. Why would they know who Session legitimately met in his function as U.S. Senator?

Slandered intelligence analysis was classified in low categories with the aim of distributing it far and wide and to practically guarantee that it would “leak” to the media. The real facts though were hidden as much as possible to provide no material for the Trump administration’s defense.

The opposite happened with the most sensitive intelligence, including the names of sources and the identities of foreigners who were regularly monitored. Officials tightened the already small number of people who could access that information. They knew the information could not be kept from the new president or his top advisers, but wanted to narrow the number of people who might see the information, officials said.

Everyone was to receive the slander “analysis” the intelligence services provided but no one was supposed to know the sources and the real facts. This would make sure that the anti-Russia and anti-Trump “analysis” would leak but not the weak bits of facts it is based upon.

To repeat: The Obama administration and the intelligence services spared no effort to sabotage the policies of the incoming Trump administration and prepared the grounds for baseless investigation against it. A lot of dirt is now thrown based on that effort and the hope is that some may stick.

The whole effort by the Obama administration started only after Trump was elected:

In early December, Mr. Obama ordered the intelligence community to conduct a full assessment of the Russian campaign.In the weeks before the assessment was released in January, the intelligence community combed through databases for an array of communications and other information — some of which was months old by then — and began producing reports that showed there were contacts during the campaign between Trump associates and Russian officials.

Again – there is nothing illegal with such contacts. These are routine and happen all the time. U.S. ambassadors all over the world routinely talk with local politicians in foreign countries. The Russian ambassadors do nothing different. This is known as diplomacy. There was no reason for the incoming administration to avoid such contacts with German, South African, Japanese or Russian officials or semi-officials. They intelligence community knows that there is no evidence that Russia interfered in the election. If it had any it would have long provided it.  The ffort is specifically against the announced Russia policy.

Trump was election in part because he promised better relations with Russia. What the intelligence services do here is to undermine the will of the people.

As Joanne Leon opined:

Need to recognize this for what it is. The incumbent president used SkyNet to try to rig election and as blackmail tool on his successor

Building on the illegal moves of the Cheney administration Obama installed and empowered the intelligence instruments and the precedence for such manipulations. Not since the worst days of J. Edgar Hoover has the U.S. seen such an interior assault on politicians and policies.

Trump now hired some partisan Russia expert from the Clinton aligned Brookings to run Russia policy in the NSC. She will institute anti-Russian bias in his policies. This would not have happened under a national security advisor Flynn. For now the Obama assault on Trump’s announced policy has succeeded. Those who voted for Trump for a change in Russia policies have been disenfranchised.

I do not prefer Trump policies. Flynn was a maniac and Session is a crazy fossil. But that does not justify this anti-democratic abuse of the foreign policy instruments of the state against the political opponents within the country.

Obama created these tools and now left them for the Trump administration to use. They will come back to haunt the Democrats. What will they say and do when the Trump administration will use these against them?

Over the weekend, the New York Times reported on the fact that China is building its first ever overseas military base.

“A low-rise encampment built adjacent to a new Chinese-owned commercial port,” the Times wrote, “the 90-acre base is designed to house up to several thousand troops and will include storage structures for weapons, repair facilities for ships and helicopters, and five berths for commercial ships and one for military vessels.”

But the fact that China is building a military base overseas isn’t the real story. The real issue is where the base is being constructed — just a few miles down the road from a U.S. installation in Djibouti, a tiny country in the Horn of Africa.

“It’s like having a rival football team using an adjacent practice field,” Gabriel Collins, a Chinese military expert, told the Times. “They can scope out some of your plays.”

Camp Lemonnier, a U.S. base established after 9/11, is home to 4,000 military personnel and is often employed for covert operations, including targeted drone strikes in the Middle East.

As highlighted by The Diplomat, “The thrust of the Times’ look at China’s upcoming facility in Djibouti is the broader effect it could have on the United States’ presence in the country.”

What’s meant, of course, is the U.S. military presence in the country. And the “broader effect” the Times wants its readers to consider is, quite clearly, all-out war with China. This, for instance, is how the piece opened:

The two countries keep dozens of intercontinental nuclear missiles pointed at each other’s cities. Their frigates and fighter jets occasionally face off in the contested waters of the South China Sea.

With no shared border, China and the United States mostly circle each other from afar, relying on satellites and cybersnooping to peek inside the workings of each other’s war machines.

Another analyst took a more level-headed approach to analyzing the development, however, and in doing so pointed out that news like this — and the manner in which the Times reported on it — plays directly into the hands of warmongers.

That analyst was Dr. Ron Paul.

On the Ron Paul Liberty Report on Tuesday, the former congressman and presidential candidate, along with his former advisor and now-executive director of the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity, Daniel McAdams, took a closer look at what might really be going on in Djibouti.

“The people who want to really paint it in a bad light,” Dr. Paul said Tuesday, will claim China is about to “put nuclear missiles” at the under-construction base. “I don’t think that’s their purpose.”

Without question, Djibouti is a strategically important region for China. Half of the country’s oil imports pass through the Mandeb Strait, a waterway chokepoint right off the coast of Djibouti. That straight connects the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea.

China claims, as it continually has, that the new naval base will be mostly used for combating piracy and providing security for its traveling citizens.

“The support facility will be mainly used to provide rest and rehabilitation for the Chinese troops taking part in escort missions in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia, U.N. peacekeeping and humanitarian rescue,” China’s Defense Ministry told the New York Times in a written response to questions.

The current strategic importance of Djibouti for the U.S. is — for those who have been paying attention — quite obvious. Noting the tiny nation’s coastline, Dr. Paul pointed out that “The distance between that and Yemen is a total of 18 miles. And that’s why we’re there.”

Since 2015, the U.S. has been supporting ally Saudi Arabia in its war in Yemen as the Saudis attempt to wipe out allegedly Iranian-backed Houthi rebels. The humanitarian crisis now taking place in the North African country has many analysts comparing it to the situation in war-torn Syria.

While doubting the Chinese motivation for building a naval base in such close proximity to a U.S. installation is rooted in an attempt to militarily provoke the United States, Dr. Paul conceded there may be a little bit of muscle flexing going on.

“I would think the Chinese government, because they get bashed a bit from our policies — you know, China is rigging their currencies and they’re bad people and their building islands — they’re on the receiving end,” Dr. Paul said. “Maybe they just feel like [they] ought to just express themselves, and this is convenient for them and they can use it. So it’s to show they’re not a bunch of pussycats.”

Bringing the conversation back to the notion of crafting news items to fit political agendas, Daniel McAdams stated:

And, of course, the neocon interventionists love stories like this because it feeds into their desire, their need, to have an enemy figure overseas.

Continuing, he cited the Times article directly:

And this is how the New York Times put it. I think this captures the interventionist perspective. The Chinese base’s construction ‘is a milestone marking Beijing’s expanding global ambitions.’

Dr. Paul chuckled at this, to which McAdams replied, “One base overseas is the only one they have. And how many do we have? 800.”

Noting that President Trump just recently outlined his plan for one of the “greatest military buildups in American history,” McAdams also pointed out how such news items work for the war machine itself.

“This is also a big windfall for the military-industrial complex,” he said, “because it’ll be used as an excuse.”

Agreeing, Dr. Paul lamented that a growing coalition of pro-war factions from both sides of the aisle are making continuous warfare under Trump all the more likely, and that those against this potentiality should unite.

“We have to get together, who are anti-imperialistic,” said Dr. Paul. “Because the coalition against us, they don’t agree on all the economic issues. Matter fact, they just come together for one thing — to be pro-war. We need to build a coalition against this senseless war that continues to go on. So, right now, I am not all that optimistic that the troops will be coming home soon.”