Global Research

La globalización es un fenómeno geopolítico-histórico  caracterizada  esencial y fácticamente por  la transferencia de poder individual y comunitario de las naciones hacia la Súper Elite que busca una creciente homogeneización global para lograr la hegemonía total.

Los propietarios de la Elite Global, tras la consecución de sus objetivos y a través de ideologías (calentamiento global, de género, desindustrialización, desarme poblacional, multiculturalismo, entre otras)  y esquemas empíricos, plasman un nuevo giro antropológico, buscando uniformizar  el pensamiento y el  modus vivendi  de la humanidad. Asimismo, preconizan una economía global, centrada en la usura, para que el hombre sea deudor permanente, un mero consumidor de la manufactura y/o servicios (de electrónica, robótica y comunicativa)  de las empresas multinacionales adheridas a las redes del formato globalizador  y, finalmente, reconstituirlo en mano de obra barata.

Proceso que  ineluctable y gradualmente pauperiza y esclaviza a las naciones, erosionando la soberanía política y la independencia económica de los estados. A éstos los reconvierte en gerencias funcionales para  dinamizar mejor el proyecto globalista y eficientizar el método recaudador.

Por lo tanto, geolocalizar exclusivamente al Poder Global del Dinero en territorio e institucionalidad estadounidenses constituye un error ya que precisamente la puesta en funcionamiento de la propia  globalización perjudicó a la mayoría de su población.

Y fue dicho menoscabo en general lo que posibilitó la gran adherencia poblacional que tiene Donald Trump. Su apoyatura en la base social se debe específicamente a que su discurso y programa de gobierno se basan en  la defensa de un nacionalismo económico, en el respeto y la observancia del orden natural; en el abandono del perfil de “Estado policial del mundo” que los Estados Unidos desempeña desde hace un siglo y en una nueva pujanza del estado-nación.

Efectos económicos negativos de la globalización en los EE. UU. 

La economía de la  nación de los Estados Unidos en relación a deudas presenta los siguientes indicadores:

• Deuda de consumidores, 12 billones de dólares.
• Deuda Corporativa, 16 billones de dólares.
• Deuda Pública, 20 billones de dólares.

La Reserva Federal y Wall Street, actores bancarios y financieros históricos íntimamente relacionados, son señalados como los grandes beneficiarios de la globalización.

La Reserva Federal fue creada por los grandes bancos de Wall Street y en beneficio de los grandes bancos de Wall Street.

Históricamente la  Reserva Federal ha jugado un papel importante en la creación del auge y de la recesión económica y dicha institución desde su creación en el año 1913 colaboró en la existencia de 18 recesiones o depresiones, disminuyendo el valor del dólar estadounidense (aproximadamente en un 98%),  siendo la tasa media anual de la  inflación un 3,5%.

De acuerdo con un informe de la Oficina de Rendición de Cuentas del Gobierno de los Estados Unidos (GAO) la Reserva Federal  salió al rescate de  los grandes bancos, entre 2007 y 2010, inyectándole 16.1 billones de dólares. (En ese momento, la deuda nacional pública de los EE.UU. era un poco más de 15 billones de dólares)

Con la globalización también las grandes empresas pudieron desplazar  fábricas a países como  México, China e India, a Bangladesh; producir allí con menor salario e impuestos para luego enviar los productos fabricados de vuelta a los EE.UU.

Esa libertad de trasladar la producción fuera de los EE.UU. empeoró la economía nacional.

En los últimos 25 años,  el registro de desempleo en el sector manufacturero creció exponencialmente en millones de personas, habiendo cerrado miles de fábricas por la imposibilidad de competir sana y vigorosamente contra lo producido en el extranjero a bajo coste laboral.

El salario real no crece significativamente desde hace 25 años.  La calidad de los empleos en Estados Unidos  estuvo mermando  constantemente desde que las diferentes administraciones federales aceptaron el formato de la globalización. –Uno de cada cuatro empleados en el sector privado   estadounidenses tiene remuneración  mínima de  10 dólares la hora e inclusive menos.

• La brecha entre el 1%  que más tiene y el resto del país es ahora la más grande desde 1920.
• 50 millones de personas viven en la pobreza.
• Oficialmente, se considera que existen 7.4 millones de desocupados en los Estados Unidos. A ese registro hay que agregarle  95.06 millones enmarcados en “not in the labor forcé”, sumando más de 102 millones de personas.
• Aproximadamente 17 millones de niños en los Estados Unidos se enfrentan a la inseguridad alimentaria.
• Alrededor del 20 %  de todos los adultos jóvenes están actualmente viviendo con sus padres.
• 7 de cada 10 estadounidenses tienen  menos de  1.000 dólares en ahorros.
• La balanza comercial de los EE.UU con China, México, Canadá y  Japón, entre otros países, le da  como resultante saldo negativo.

Medidas a implementar

Ante ese cuadro situacional complicado, Trump desde la Casa Blanca maniobrará con realismo político coordinando las distintas tendencias que coexistirán en su gobierno.

Él y ciertos asesores suyos coinciden en que es más positivo tener como patrón al Oro que al dólar.

Planea  evitar que la Reserva Federal manipule las tasas de interés y la masa monetaria y  poner freno a las ganancias exorbitantes del capital especulativo de Wall  Street. Donald Trump sabe que el inversor de clase media global busca confianza y seguridad de rentabilidad y le brindará ello. Bajo su gestión intentará impedir  que salga la menor cantidad de dinero de su país. Redirigirá ciertos capitales de los fondos de inversión a la economía real para desarrollar la infraestructura  pública e implementar la reindustrialización.

Promocionará el ahorro y la inversión.

Revisará los términos de comercio internacional que deterioren la economía estadounidense y cumplirá gradualmente con la repatriación de las fábricas geolocalizadas  en países con mano de obra barata y  gran exención fiscal. Aumentará el nivel salarial de los trabajadores y habrá crédito empresarial y crédito social necesario. El mercado interno se revitalizará.

Expulsará a los inmigrantes  delictivos e ilegales y a los inmigrantes que quieran sumarse a la economía formal observando  las leyes de los gobiernos federal y estatal no les pondrá obstáculos.

En suma, rechazará el transnacionalismo y la globalización.

A Trump no le resultará fácil continuar desde la Casa Blanca su batalla contra la globalización pero con tan sólo materializar el 40% de sus promesas económicas electorales podrá darle otra estocada a la globalización.

Los Estados Unidos bajo el formato Trump también  precisará de países cuyas poblaciones  tengan un considerable nivel salarial para que puedan comprarle lo manufacturado. Naciones hispanoamericanas  con elevado índice inflacionario, relevante decrecimiento salarial y anarquía social no pueden resultarle necesarias por su posible beneficio al proceso reindustrializador de Trump.

Pero esas naciones deberán sumarse con racionalidad y realismo al emergente antiglobalizador que se está produciendo en otras partes de Occidente.

Porque, como asertivamente lo señala el insigne comentarista político Pat Buchanan “Un cambio radical en el pensamiento está llevandose a cabo en Occidente.”

Diego Pappalardo

Introduction: 

The malady, common among political leaders who commit heartless crimes while craving popular adulation as heroes and misunderstood saints, is ‘Political Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy’ (PMSP).

PMSP best explains the pathologic drive of politicians and policy makers who inflict relentless, systematic mass destruction and then intervene in a most theatrical manner to save a few victims – thus drawing gratitude from the victim and public support for their ‘humanitarian intervention’ – ignorant of their fundamental role in creating the mayhem in the first place.

The actions of the outgoing President Barack Obama in the last three days of his administration present an example of PMSP on the domestic front.

Throughout his eight years as President of the United States , Obama exhibited many symptoms of PMSP – both abroad and in the US .  For his cynical crimes, he was awarded the ‘Nobel Peace Prize’ among other honors.

http://www.webmd.com/mental-health/munchausen-syndrome#1

PMSP – The Abuser as Savior

Each of Obama’s relentless military interventions, including Libya , Somalia , Yemen , Iraq , Afghanistan and especially Syria , were characterized by the deliberate and total destruction of the means of normal civilized social existence for defenseless civilians – the bombing of homes, factories, markets, weddings, funerals, schools, hospitals – leading to the deaths of many thousands and the uprooting of millions into desperate flight.  In each case, Obama would proclaim that he was saving the victims from imminent genocide by an abusive ruler or ethnic group.  He would rush in to provide a few baskets of relief and a few blankets to some bedraggled survivors of his own bombing campaigns and bask in the glowing praise of mass media propagandists and fellow imperialists.  Choreographed applause and adulation would seem to follow America ’s First Black Presidenteverywhere.

Obama’s bombs, arms and mercenaries drove hundreds of thousands of families into the streets, into the mountains and most horrifically onto rickety, overloaded boats on the seas.  In each series of destruction and chaos, he would calculate the point at which his ‘humanitarian intervention’ would most effectively reflect on his heroism.

He destroyed the entire nation of Libya, shredded its institutions and infrastructure, bombed its cities and villages, even deliberately sending a deadly missile into the home sheltering a half dozen of President Muammar Gadaffi’s small grandchildren and finally ended up with the public death by torture of the wounded Libyan president sodomized by stakes documented in a imperial-pornographic snuff film that should have revolted the entire world.  That the main victims of Obama’s ‘liberation of Libya ’ were hundreds of thousands of black Libyan citizens and sub-Saharan African workers did little to detract from his public persona as the first ‘African American’ world hero.  The capsized boatloads of fleeing black Libyans and the bloated bodies washing ashore on the beaches of Spain and Italy were never linked to the criminal policies of our Nobel Prize recipient!  He even urged Europe to accept the miserable refugees fleeing his war – in a gesture of supreme PMSP.  He could do no wrong.  This serial political killer had an unquenchable thirst for sympathy and admiration – and a wholly corrupt propaganda machine to polish his halo.

Obama’s PMSP and Chelsea Manning

In his last few days in power, Obama turned his ‘heroic and humanitarian’ attention to individual American victims of grotesque injustice in our bloated and racist prison system – just to prove that the great man could ‘set up’ and then save individuals as well as nations.

The cold, calculus of the Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy President finally focused on the fragile form of the imprisoned and tortured Chelsea Manning – hero to millions and condemned traitor to the empire’s ruling elite.  For eight years, Barack Obama pursued the arrest, torture, kangaroo court-martial, virtual life sentencing and prison mistreatment of the US soldier who had dared to expose large-scale war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and release thousands of damning documents of systematic political war crime hidden from her compatriots.  She released videos of US pilots playing ‘execution games’ against a crowd of defenseless Iraqi civilians, including children, as well as equally egregious war crimes elsewhere.

Obama and his fellow war criminals were furious at Manning’s revelations – and approved of her sentence of 35 years, some of which had been served before her conviction in solitary confinement, often stripped naked – in a condition described by the United Nations as torture and inhumane treatment.  After her conviction, she was harassed and driven to multiple attempts to take her life.

After seven years of brutal and degrading treatment, spanning almost the entire Obama Administration, the condition of the frail transgender soldier-hero, almost a martyr to truth and justice, her supporters and the world community were desperate with concern for her safety, survival and sanity.  At this point, and in the last three days of her administration on January 17, 2017, Obama ‘commuted Manning’s sentence’ but left it to the incoming Trump Administration to free her five months later in May.

Instead of celebrating the liberation and vindication of the hero Chelsea Manning in May, the media drowned out the plight of the frail tortured whistleblower with its loud tributes to the mercy and heroism of the serial abuser – Barack Obama.

Conclusion

In his last days, Obama played the ‘Merciful Pasha’ commuting Manning’s virtual life sentence – which he still justified.  Obama did so in a way that literally begged the incoming rabidly reactionary regime of Donald Trump to rescind the commutation or at least impose such levels of torture and pressure on Manning that her very survival and sanity in prison up to her scheduled release in May will be in grave jeopardy.

The most virulent militarists in the US Congress, including the war criminal John McCain, are howling for Manning’s head.  While they will torture Manning during the next 5 months behind thick prison walls, the press will compare the vindictive Trump with the benevolent Obama. This is a cynical ‘set-up’ for our hero, Chelsea Manning to be driven to suicide by Trump while her ultimate persecutor, the ‘saintly’ Barack Obama will ‘shine’ for having issue the belated commutation.  Obama could easily have released Manning earlier and spared her this mortal danger – but he chose to tie the poor prisoner to a stake – under the blood-lusting noses of our most sadistic militarists – and invite their public display of savagery.

In one very self-glorifying pronouncement, three days before leaving office, Obama has sanctified himself at Manning’s expense and insured Chelsea ’s destruction.  This is virtuosic Political Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy by a true master!

Di fronte all’accusa del neoeletto presidente Trump all’amministrazione Obama, perché avrebbe ottenuto poco o niente dagli alleati in cambio della «difesa» che gli Stati uniti assicurano loro, è sceso in campo il New York Times.  Ha pubblicato il 16 gennaio una documentazione, basata su dati ufficiali, per dimostrare quanto abbia fatto l’amministrazione Obama per «difendere gli interessi Usa all’estero».

Sono stati stipulati con oltre 30 paesi trattati che «contribuiscono a portare stabilità nelle regioni economicamente e politicamente più importanti per gli Stati uniti». A tal fine gli Usa hanno permanentemente dislocati oltremare più di 210 mila militari, soprattutto in zone di «conflitto attivo».

In Europa mantengono circa 80 mila militari, più la Sesta Flotta di stanza in Italia, per «difendere gli alleati Nato» e quale «deterrente contro la Russia». In cambio hanno ottenuto l’impegno degli alleati Nato di «difendere gli Stati uniti» e la possibilità di mantenere proprie basi militari vicine a Russia, Medioriente e Africa, il cui costo è coperto per il 34% dagli alleati. Ciò permette agli Usa di avere la Ue quale maggiore partner commerciale.

In Medioriente, gli Stati uniti mantengono 28 mila militari nelle monarchie del Golfo, più la Quinta Flotta di stanza nel Bahrain, per «difendere il libero flusso di petrolio e gas e, allo stesso tempo, gli alleati contro l’Iran». In cambio hanno ottenuto l’accesso al 34% delle esportazioni mondiali di petrolio e al 16% di quelle di gas naturale, e la possibilità di mantenere proprie basi militari contro l’Iran, il cui costo è coperto per il 60% dalle monarchie del Golfo.

In Asia orientale, gli Stati uniti mantengono oltre 28 mila militari nella Corea del Sud e 45 mila in Giappone, più la Settima Flotta di stanza a Yokosuka, per «contrastare l’influenza della Cina e sostenere gli alleati contro la Corea del Nord» In cambio hanno ottenuto la possibilità di mantenere proprie «basi militari vicino alla Cina e alla Corea del Nord», il cui costo è coperto dagli alleati nella misura del 40% in Corea del Sud e del 75% in Giappone. Ciò permette agli Usa di avere il Giappone e la Corea del Sud  quali importanti partner commerciali.

In Asia sud-orientale, gli Stati uniti mantengono un numero variabile di militari, nell’ordine di diverse migliaia, per sostenere Thailandia e Filippine unitamente all’Australia nel Pacifico. In tale quadro rientrano «le esercitazioni militari per la libertà di navigazione nel Mar Cinese Meridionale», da cui passa il 30% del commercio marittimo mondiale. In cambio gli Stati uniti hanno ottenuto la possibilità di «proteggere» un commercio marittimo del valore di oltre 5 mila miliardi di dollari annui. Allo stesso tempo hanno ottenuto «una regione più amica degli Stati uniti e più in grado di unirsi contro la Cina». Viene dimenticato in questo elenco il fatto che il Pentagono, durante l’amministrazione Obama, ha cominciato a schierare contro la Cina, a bordo di navi da guerra, il sistema Aegis analogo a quello già schierato in Europa contro la Russia, in grado di lanciare non solo missili anti-missile, ma anche missili da crociera armabili con testate nucleari.

È dunque infondata la critica di Trump a Obama, il quale ha dimostrato con i fatti ciò che afferma nel suo ultimo messaggio sullo Stato dell’Unione: «L’America è la più forte nazione sulla Terra. Spendiamo per il militare più di quanto spendono le successive otto nazioni combinate. Le nostre truppe costituiscono la migliore forza combattente nella storia del mondo». Questa è l’eredità lasciata dal presidente «buono».

Che cosa farà ora quello «cattivo»?

 Manlio Dinucci

AFRICOM and “Vanguard Africa” usher in a renewed phase of neo-colonial dominance

Ousted Gambian President Yahya Jammeh was flown out of his country on Friday January 20 after the military intervention of troops from neighboring Senegal and air support from the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Reports surfaced that Jammeh will be taken to Equatorial Guinea far away from his home in Gambia. The regional Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) had pressured Jammeh to relinquish power in the aftermath of an election in December when he was said to have been defeated by a coalition of opposition parties headed by rival candidate Adama Barrow.

Jammeh had initially accepted the results of the elections until the following week when he went on national television to challenge the authenticity of the poll claiming there were gross irregularities. The president had requested a revote and the parliament inside the country granted him a 90-day extension of office.

However, ECOWAS and their western imperialist supporters were determined to act immediately in order to remove Jammeh not only from his post but from the country. In a matter of days Senegalese troops were poised to invade with the full military support of other regional states including Nigeria and Ghana.

The events in Gambia were hailed by members of the corporate media and the government-controlled press of the western countries who framed the conflict inside the small West African state as a case of political intransigence and the suppression of democratic control. Barrow, who has been labelled as a successful “real estate developer” was installed at the Gambian embassy in Dakar, the capital of Senegal. Nonetheless, days after the removal of Jammeh, Barrow has still not entered Gambia saying he will only return when the situation is “stable.”

The Role of AFRICOM in West Africa

The entire military, political and public relations operations utilized to remove Jammeh from the country and to inaugurate President Adama Barrow were engineered by the United States military and State Department along with leading news agencies in alliance with the British Foreign Office. Senegal, which renewed a comprehensive defense cooperation agreement with the U.S. in July 2016, has close ties with the U.S. AFRICOM was founded in February 2008 under the administration of former President George W. Bush, Jr.

During the successive Democratic Party government of former President Barack Obama, AFRICOM has been strengthened and enhanced. Joint maneuvers with African military forces, the training of troops and officers, the supply of weapons, intelligence and defense technology, has become standard practice across the continent with specific reference in the case of Gambia in the ECOWAS region.

In the Horn of Africa, Camp Lemonier has been expanded in Djibouti while drone stations and training operations conducted by the Pentagon, the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) are proliferating in the eastern region of the continent. Obama pledged over two years ago that Washington would deploy at least 3,500 U.S. Special Forces and trainers in over 35 African states as part of what was described as “counter-terrorism” exercises designed to improve the security capacity of African states.

Operation Flintlock in West Africa is an annual training exercise which set the stage for the current intervention in Gambia. The early 2016 operation was led by the Pentagon and included agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) utilizing Senegal as its base for the joint military field training in cooperation with 30 other states.

In an article published by Deutsche Welle, it says: “The operations in this year’s (2016) Flintlock exercises took a global dimension but also put much emphasis on the African regions where terrorist activities are rife. The FBI trainers grouped police officers and gendarmerie custom officers from Mauritania and Senegal in a team and gave them tactical and operational trainings.” (Feb. 29)

The U.S. Army Africa (USARAF) website reported that:

“The Flintlock exercise started in 2005 across the Sahel region of Africa. Participating nations are members in the Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Partnership (TSCTP) and are planned by African partner nation Special Operations Forces and Special Operations Command-Africa to develop the capacity and collaboration among African security forces to protect civilian populations.”

Another report published by the New York Times emphasized the participation of military forces from The Netherlands, which houses the International Criminal Court (ICC), along with other NATO members. This institution, the ICC, has been pre-occupied with indicting, arresting, prosecuting and imprisoning African governmental and rebel leaders. At present former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo is facing trial after he was overthrown at the aegis of French paratroopers in 2011.

African Union (AU) member-states have expressed their trepidation related the apparent racist and pro-imperialist character of the ICC. Nonetheless, the mass exodus from the institution has yet to be forthcoming.

Three states have withdrawn from the ICC being Burundi, South Africa and interestingly enough, Gambia, which is the focus of the current ECOWAS intervention.  Jammeh had rejected the interference into Gambian national affairs by ECOWAS, a regional structure which remains within the orbit of former colonial powers and the U.S.

Eric Schmitt, the author of the NYT article, stressed in relationship to Operation Flintlock that:

“The exercise pairs Western trainers with African partners in different outposts scattered around Senegal and Mauritania. In Senegal, for instance, Estonian alpine experts are training Senegalese Special Forces; Italian commandos are working with troops from Chad; and Austrian Special Forces are also with Senegalese soldiers. Dutch marines, who have been training with Senegalese naval forces since 2007, were a natural fit for the new riverine mission. The recent beach landing was the first phase in training that over the next two weeks will build up to a two-day simulated mission with a night landing — as the commandos would do in a real operation to preserve the element of surprise and allow more time to surveil the target.” (Feb. 15, 2016)

Allegations of corruption by the ousted Jammeh administration are now making the case for the deportation of the former leader to the Netherlands. Reuters press agency quoted a Gambian citizen

“Trader Aji Jagne, 32, who had screamed ‘we are free’ until her voice was hoarse on Sunday (Jan. 22) but by the end of the day, less than 24 hours after Jammeh flew out of the country and into exile, her toothy grin had disappeared. ‘Why should he escape…? If he ever sets foot in Gambia again, we shall take him to the ICC,’ she said, referring to the International Criminal Court, from which Jammeh had planned to withdraw before his December 1 electoral defeat.” (Jan. 23)

Regime Change Agents and the Removal of Jammeh

A key aspect of overthrow of the Gambian government was a well-funded public relations campaign led by so-called non-profit organizations in cooperation with corporate media outlets and government-controlled press agencies. One such institution is Vanguard Africa which is based in the U.S.

The Atlanta-based Cable News Network (CNN) reported on January 23 that:

“Jeffrey Smith is the executive director of Vanguard Africa, a nonprofit organization that provides support to pro-reform political candidates and backed Barrow’s campaign. Smith told CNN: ‘The priority right now is getting the country back on track. Gambians just want to get on with building the country back up again.’”

Smith has worked with similar operations including Robert F. Kennedy Center, Freedom House, the National Endowment for Democracy, Institute for Democratic Alternatives in South Africa (IDASA), and UNESCO. Others associated with the Vanguard Africa group includes Joe Trippi as Senior Advisor, who as explained by the organization’s website: “In 2008 helped Morgan Tsvangirai and the Movement for Democratic Change receive the most votes, and helped garner international media attention to Robert Mugabe’s democratic subversion and violence which led to a ‘unity’ government and Tsvangarai becoming Prime Minister of Zimbabwe.”

The Zimbabwe government has been a target of the imperialist states led by Britain and the U.S. since 1998 when the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF) declared that it would redistribute land taken during the colonial onslaught of the late 19^th century. Since 2000, when the Third Chimurenga was launched, the economy of the mineral and agricultural rich state has been strangled through a draconian sanctions regime coupled with a massive anti-President Robert Mugabe propaganda campaign seeking the leader’s overthrow and expulsion from the country.

Similar Patterns Throughout Africa

The developments in Gambia are by no means an isolated incident prompted by the purported excesses of the Jammeh government. Just days prior to the Senegalese intervention, thousands of Europeans and other guests were residing unmolested inside the country which relies on the tourist industry for 40 percent of its national revenue. In fact it was the British Foreign Office which declared a travel advisory coupled with alarmist reports from corporate media and imperialist press agencies which led to the mass evacuation of the small state.

In Libya during 2011, it was the U.S. State Department and the western media that spread falsehoods about an imminent massacre of opposition forces in the oil-rich North African nation. The Obama administration accompanied by Britain and France set the stage for the blanket-bombing of Libya, the overthrow of the Jamahiriya system, the brutal execution of leader Col. Muammar Gaddafi and the subsequent destruction of the Libyan state. Today Libya is a source of regional instability and economic destabilization spreading throughout North and West Africa.

Ivory Coast leaders President Laurent and Simone Gbagbo are at present in the prisons of the Netherlands, in the case of the former leader, while the previous First Lady, has been railroaded through a biased court under the administration of the installed incumbent President Alassane Ouattara, and sentenced to twenty years in detention. The same fate is awaiting any other African leaders who dare to defy the dictates of western imperialism and its allies in the region.

These events will continue until the post-colonial African states break their political and economic dependency on imperialism. African unity must be based upon the sanctity of territorial sovereignty and genuine independence. Regional African military operations cannot be guided and coordinated by the Pentagon and NATO without forfeiting the inherent right to self-determination. They should be based upon the imperatives of African unity and the reconstruction of the continent on socialist development processes.

 

Two extreme, very polarized paradigms have emerged as President Donald Trump takes command of the White House. After the shattered hopes and fraud perpetrated by America’s first African-American president, Trump supporters naively believe they’ve elected their “great white hope” of a president who will “make America great again,” taking at face value his “America comes first” rhetoric.

Many see Trump as a modern day George Washington figure, leading Americans in their second revolution, fighting to take back their country from the globalists. But Trump’s legions of supporters fail to realize that the entrenched power machine that appears to reluctantly and covertly be behind Trump’s ascendance at the same time opposing him at every turn is in fact the very same power elite that’s been backing his opponent all along – the Hillary-Obama-Bush DC establishment cabal.

Indeed the trumped up “establishment outsider” image that’s won Trump the presidency belies the fact that in actuality he is an establishment insider who until now just hasn’t held political office. In stark contrast to the new president’s loyal constituency, the anti-Trump, “liberal-minded,” pro-Clinton-CIA minions’ world-view steadfastly insist that Donald Trump along with “partner-in-crime“ Vladimir Putin are the devil-incarnate themselves. To do an actual reset with Russia (unlike Obama’s fake one 8 years ago) and cease the neocons’ insane push for WWIII, within weeks President Trump will be meeting with Putin in Iceland’s capital (report to be confirmed). Of course Trump haters will see this as “proof” the two were in cahoots all along to “steal” the election.

Meanwhile, America has never been this divided a nation since the War Between the States more than a century and a half ago. With present battle lines so bitterly and fiercely drawn, the planetary rulers are once again laughing in their mansions over having so effectively divided and conquered Americans as their reliable go-to formula for strengthening their power and control over the masses, regardless of who occupies the White House, setting the stage for America’ssecond civil war and Europe’s counterpart.

Speculation amongst those following the money behind these two polarized political camps posit a Hatfield versus McCoy inner power struggle within the global elite currently taking place between the Clinton-Bush-Obama crowd backed by the Rothschild cartel and a Trump-Netanyahu/Sheldon Adelson-Kissinger-soft countercoup merger supported by the Rockefeller cabal, and that the real powerline story here might be the Rothschild versus the Rockefeller feud competing and vying for increased power and control at the expense of the other.

Yet this too is far more apt to just be more sleight of hand chicanery to project an illusion of difference between the Trump and Clinton camps. Bottom line – deep pocket money from both the Rothschild and Rockefeller dynasties have been funding both Hillary and Trump. Even the West versus East showdown leading humanity towards World War III could secretly be the pre-plotted machinations between the Western oligarchs and the Eastern oligarchs. How much of this economic and geopolitical division is real or unreal is extremely difficult to determine and prove or disprove. With elitist shills controlling both the mainstream media as well as much of the alternative media, deciphering actual truth becomes nearly impossible. Perhaps one helpful method of seeking the truth can be conveniently found on the mainstream media’s “fake news” list that blacklists 200 actual alt news sites that ironically most closely approximate and consistently deliver the truth.

That said, the truth that we can sure of is that for well over a century the ruling elite has backed and promoted both sides to every major war it manufactures, just as it has selected, backed and promoted every two-party candidate who ends up its president, keyword being “its” president as no president over the last half century has clearly acted in the best interests of American citizens. We’ve been living inan oligarchy where a handful of powerbrokers control the masses because they own and control virtually all the elected representatives who function on their explicit behalf rather than their constituent voters’ behalf. And sadly, it’s been operating this way in America for a very long time.

On January 20^th Donald Trump opened his presidency with a fiery 16-minute inaugural address that in a nutshell encapsulated his 18-month campaign, spouting his populist rabblerousing message. Having said that he himself would be writing his inauguration speech, in his first presidential oratorical display, in essence the brand new Commander-in-Chief just declared war against the ruling elite:

For too long, a small group in our nation’s capital has reaped the rewards of government while the people have bore the cost. Washington flourished, but the people did not share in its wealth.

Donald Trump goes on to describe “mothers and children trapped in poverty in our inner cities, rusted out factories” across our nation, an education system depriving students “of all knowledge,” and “the crime and gangs and drugs” robbing “our country of so much unrealized potential. This American carnage stops right here and stops right now.” Trump follows with:

We are one nation, and their pain is our pain. Their dreams are our dreams, and their success will be our success. We share one heart, one home and one glorious destiny. The oath of office I take today is an oath of allegiance to all Americans.

Unlike his critics claiming that Trump failed to offer words that unifythe divided nation, the president’s accurate observations of a nation in decline were followed immediately by statements reaching out to and inclusive of the millions of forgotten and downtrodden Americans who’ve been left behind by an ever-widening inequality gap that only benefits the wealthy class. Yet the consensus review by mainstream media that vehemently opposes Trump responded predictably, calling it “combative,” “divisive,” “polarizing” and “gloomy.”

Answering millions of his liberal haters insisting from day one of his candidacy that Trump is nothing but a racist wannabe dictator who’ll rival Hitler’s coldblooded tyranny, the newly sworn-in president predicts:

A new national pride will stir ourselves, lift our sights and heal our divisions. It’s time to remember that old wisdom our soldiers will never forget – that whether we are black or brown or white, we all bleed the same red blood of patriots.

Rather than echoing the usual sentiments that past inaugural addresses customarily deliver, espousing the Politically Correct clichéd pretenses calling for mending the differences while repeatedly resorting to flowery references to America’s glorious past, Trump once again defied tradition, angrily fighting against status quo elitism. But his contentious tone was clearly not directed at the American people, but limited to the Washington insiders, many of whom sat in the audience appearing uncomfortable hearing Trump directly attack them for nearly destroying America to make themselves and the rich richer and the rest of us poorer. In contrast, Trump stated:

That a nation exists to serve its citizens… We will no longer accept politicians who are all talk and no action, constantly complaining but never doing anything about it.

True to their heavily biased repulsion towards Trump, the mainstream presstitutes didn’t hesitate to trash Trump’s first presidential speech. A day later on Saturday the new White House press secretary Sean Spicer held an impromptu first press conference to push back against the faulty inauguration day coverage, citing a false tweet claiming Trump removed a Martin Luther King bust from the Oval Office and the New York Times disputing the inauguration crowd size based on a White House tweeted photo. Spicer said Trump is trying to unify the country but it requires fair reporting by the press that on his very first day was grossly lacking. With the press and Trump sworn enemies prior to inauguration, the war will only become more volatile. And with Trump haters the dominant majority in the media and a thin-skinned reactionary for president, the fireworks have only just begun.

The mega media outlets all made certain to repeatedly emphasize that Trump suffers the lowest approval rating at 40% for any incoming president in history. Ironically the three previous presidents who will go down in that same US history for nearly destroying America – Bill Clinton, Bush junior and Obama – all had approval ratings at their outset 20% or higher than Trump. Obama, perhaps the worst president in history, entered the White House with a 79% approval. And if this survey is anything like all those pre-election polls, it too isrigged as Trump is quick to point out. MSM also focused on how near 70 Democratic Party politicians in symbolic protest refused to even attend the inaugural ceremony and how the attendance was roughly half of Obama’s 2009 inauguration.

The fake-stream press of course works in tandem with the fake Hollywood entertainment industry. So the media went out of its way to feature each and every celebrity who publicly refused to perform at Trump’s big day commencement events. On inauguration eve all the A-list celebs joined thousands of New Yorkers, Michael Moore and their mayor protesting outside Manhattan’s Trump Tower.

Receiving the most airtime were Trump’s opposition forces gathering in the Big Apple and the Washington Mall. The star-studded kickoff on Thursday night in New York had the likes of Madonna, Cher, Robert De Niro and their ringleader Michael Moore leading the counteroffensive charge with his “first 100 days of resistance,” designed to rain their propaganda woes on Trump’s parade. Moore lathered up the crowd warning that America has entered “a very dangerous” time after electing a “sociopath.” Interesting to note that it’s the certifiable sociopath Obama whose agenda has been toplunge America into WWIII with Russia that all these anti-Trumpsters worship while the new president’s aim is to avert war against Putin as a potential life-extinction event. But then these people conveniently overlook those small details.

Rather than ponder that reality, MSM “fake news” prefers to concentrate all eyes on the so called resistance movement, endowed with $10 million of globalist regime money. Never mind that the hired anti-Trump leftist brigade turns violent, that’s what they’re paid to do. In Washington they again clashed and injured a half dozen police officers in riot gear that countered with pepper spray and concussion grenades. When the Elite  mercenaries weren’t blocking Air Force veterans from the inaugural ceremony, they were busy rioting as brick-throwing vandals shattering a number of storefront windows, setting fire to a limousine and causing extensive property damage that resulted in 217 arrests.

Those swept up in the turmoil and detained in Washington are apparently being held on felony riot charges punishable up to ten years in prison. Local police were joined by a deployment of National Guard units and Homeland Security. It appears that police state under Obama remains police state under Trump. Additionally, 15 arrests were made in New Orleans after a couple of patrol car windows were smashed and two police officers were injured. Armed with bottles, rocks and bats the anti-Trump protesters showed their real colors. This same violence was observed elsewhere, resulting in five arrests in Portland, Oregon and three in Oakland in addition to a man shot at a Seattle demonstration.

And while on Saturday the women’s multiple-city marches were being hyped up in the national press, Madonna was at it again, firing up the DC crowd with little Molotov cocktail gems like “I thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House” but luckily for the Donald she knows that “this won’t change anything.” Being a celebrity, she must have figured she could get away with threatening to kill the president of the United States. The Secret Service has taken her violent threat seriously and Madonna now finds herself under investigation. Officials claim a half million strong marched where Trump was sworn into office the day before. The so called anti-Trump movement was touted as a worldwide event with “sister marches” taking place in 600 locations across America as well as in Myanmar, Sydney, Copenhagen, Berlin and Prague.

 

Meanwhile, receiving little MSM attention was the fact that women from a pro-life group that were originally a co-sponsor of Saturday’s“unity” march were banned from participation. Thus, those not sharing the same political dogma as the march organizers were expressly forbidden, leaving on full display the hypocritical inconsistency of practicing the very same exclusionary behavior attributed to Trump that supposedly was the very purpose of conducting the protest.

Obviously the inclusionary message within Trump’s speech was totally ignored by these same anti-Trump protesters and the mass media. Its amazing how the “progressive-minded, so inclusive” left, always preaching unity while professing to be such staunch anti-globalists, anti-TPP, peace-loving anti-interventionists, yet they can turn dangerously violent, starting riots, and making threats to blow up the White House. Then they worship politicians like Obama and the Clintons who have pushed the globalist agenda more than any other American leaders in history. And now that we finally have a president committed to anti-globalism and non-interventionism, other than eliminating the terrorists that Obama and Hillary created, the progressive left is determined to take him down.

The last US president who exercised any real conscience and resolve to shake up the power establishment by acting in the best interests of the American people never made it past his first term in office. And the same criminal operation that took down JFK – key players within the CIA, the CFR and Kennedy administration including his own VP LBJ, those same shadow government rogue elements still remain alive and fully in power today. Case in point, that same CIA has bogusly charged Trump with colluding with Putin to overturn the election outcome, which has proven to be false. Yet sore-losing Democrats are still falsely claiming the lie in desperation to delegitimize and undermine the Trump presidency. And finally, the same CIA guilty of plotting and murdering JFK is still scheming and plotting the demise of President Donald J. Trump.

The very real prospect of Trump getting assassinated during his presidency has been repeatedly kept on the table, mostly couched in hypothetical terms behind barely contained wishful thinking by hordes of fake stream pundits and commentators representing the same crime cabal still in power. Not so veiled threats to Trump’s life have been brashly hyped repeatedly by all six oligarch owned and controlled mega media giants as well as Washington’s elite. Clearly many both in and out of the seats of power do want Trump dead.

Last February a New York Times columnist “joked” about ultimately halting Trump’s presidential campaign by assassination. Several weeks later conservative talk show host Glenn Beck threatened on the air to repeatedly “stab Trump.” Then in June just three months later a 20-year old British citizen actually did attempt to assassinate Trump, trying to pull a gun out a police officer’s holster at a Las Vegas rally. Ever since late 2015 when the inflammatory Trump emerged as the Republican frontrunner for good, aside from ongoing death threats from the left on social media, a rapper and a couple of GOPestablishment strategists also joined the fray openly calling for Trump’s assassination apparently with complete impunity. But now that Trump’s president, all that has changed. Ask Madonna. Recently more assassination concerns have been voiced by conspiracy theorists surrounding Trump’s upcoming inauguration. As perhaps the most blatant anti-Trump mainstream fake news network, CNN has notoriously carried the assassination torch right up to inauguration day. It’s as if CNN and others like Madonna are subliminally planting the seed to incite other lame brains into MK Ultra violent reaction to take down the 45^th US president. And with so many mentally unstable individuals out there, and mind control techniques utilizing black ops electromagnetic weaponry, undoubtedly more attempts on Trump’s life are bound to be in store.

Another aging remnant linked to the Kennedy assassination is the still alive George H.W. Bush who, as a young Skull & Bones CIA operative, was photographed in front of the book depository building in Dallas the same day Kennedy was assassinated. And H.W.’s still alive war criminal son was observed still smirking, laughing and joking with his fellow cabalist war criminal cronies the Clintons and Obama at the inauguration, just prior to the one man who successfully thwarted the Bush-Clinton-Obama dynasty after near four decades, began outing them as traitors. Suddenly the smirk disappeared.

After opening his inaugural address lavishing compliments on Barack Obama for being so graciously helpful during the presidential transition, the just sworn in President Trump then proceeded to expose both Congress and all the attending former presidents for turning their backs on the American people, stopping just short of calling them America’s traitors from within, which of course they clearly are.

Trump’s speech was his first shot across the bow as the brand new sheriff in town, directly blaming those in Washington for selling America out to foreign interests, selling off American workersto offshore foreign factories and globalist “free” trade deals, selling off America’s crumbling infrastructure to costly hegemonic warsoverseas, selling off America’s national security AND citizens’ legal rights for Obama’s illegal permanent war that’s made us far less safewith an open border policy inviting terrorist cells to flourish on US soil, selling off and abandoning America’s poor and middle classes for military industrial security complex profit and greed, and selling America out to a globalized fake mass media.

In his inauguration speech Trump laid out a plan to stop the bleeding and reverse the damage, reiterating all his campaign priorities as a nationalist, clearly opposing globalism as his enemy. To millions of long forgotten Americans viciously victimized by elitist rulers, his words came as music to their ears, reinforcing their belief that finally a president has arrived who’s once again looking out for them. Caution bears not getting your hopes up too high but simply holding Trump to his word.

Of course eight years ago after surviving eight painful years under Bush and Cheney’s reign of terror, Obama promised to end unwinnable foreign wars and deliver the most open and transparent presidency in US history that so captured and resonated with America’s hopes, was also welcomed as music to our ears. Soon enough though, we learned Obama’s domestic and foreign policies were pretty much the same as his predecessors and that voting a Democrat or a Republican into the White House really didn’t matter at all when the puppet in charge is never actually in charge. Like clockwork every eight years, America’s short term memory forces us to relive the disillusioning nightmare of déjà vu all over again… that the new boss turns out to be same as the old boss simply because he’s never been the boss to begin with. The figurehead occupying the White House has always taken his marching orders directly from the ruling elite. Perhaps the globalist design to dumb down Americans has been so successful that we may never learn this critical history lesson, however harsh the consequences.

If Trump really does mean business and attempts to make good on his campaign promise to “drain the swamp,” finishing the job that JFK started by abolishing the CIA, Trump most definitely has his work cut out for him. Once he completes that task, he must move on to destroying destructive, enslaving monsters like the Federal Reserve,Homeland Security and the DEA, drastically reducing the self-serving cancerous bureaucracy and cronyism of ever-sprawling big government. In addition to gutting the feds’ fat, President Trump’s priorities must also include eliminating the parasitic glut of thousands of private contractors, bilking billions more from taxpayers. Trump must also normalize relations with Russia (as well with China and Iran), and in partnership as mentioned in his inaugural, eradicate the cabal’s proxy ally the terrorists “off the face of the earth.” Trump needs to revoke all the unconstitutional Obama executive orders as well as dismantle and repeal a number of Obama passed laws, including reinstating the Smith-Mundt Act to once again hold all the fake MSM accountable for propagating unlawful lies and false propaganda.

Perhaps more important than anything else, President Trump needs to restore the US Constitution as America’s rule of law and our government back to a democratic republic. Trump’s website promises he will honor and uphold our Constitution as taking his oath of office demands. That means he needs to immediately begin rolling back the totalitarian police state tyranny and invasive violation of our constitutional freedoms already demolished under the Bush-Obama regime. Finally, Trump built his entire campaign on the promise to jump start the lifeless national economy by creating massive employment opportunity for millions of under- and unemployed Americans, vowing to create 25 million jobs within the decade. He also says that he’ll entice many companies back to the US as well as resurrect our lost manufacturing base and shrinking middle class. A tall if not impossible order that again we need to hold him to the task.

Shortly after President Kennedy warned of the shadow government and made it known he was committed to a course of peace instead of war (calling for withdrawal of all US military advisors from Vietnam), eliminating the CIA (prior to it eliminating him) and signing ExecutiveOrder 11110 that threatened to cut the authority of the Federal Reserve banksters by returning responsibility of America’s money supply over to the US Treasury, President Kennedy was suddenly shot dead. On a parallel course, Trump insists that he will not go to war with Russia or interfere in other nations’ internal affairs, and last week he called NATO “obsolete,” a radical departure from the hyper-aggressive unipolar US foreign policy. He’s also made overtures to end the Federal Reserve and the CIA, all reminiscent of our last assassinated president. For Trump to avoid this same tragic fate and be victorious in thoroughly “draining the swamp,” he will need to move gradually, steadily and stealthily, exercising extreme prudence and caution while navigating the formidable economic and geopolitical minefield that his powerful enemies have laid before him.

The Federal Reserve will soon be raising interest rates that will tighten the wallets of already strapped Americans, 76% of whom are living one paycheck away from homelessness. Interest rates across the boards on housing mortgages as well as credit cards and bank loans will be going up significantly in 2017. The elite’s policy in recent years has been to kick the can down the road temporarily averting the impending financial crash, that is until after Trump becomes president. Last week’s Davos meeting agenda no doubt placed the final touches on the globalist timetable to implode the house of cards economy this year. Be prepared for the 3 plus cents worth on our dollar since the Federal Reserve took over in 1913 to shrink even further into oblivion as the financial crisis deepens, and the US dollar/petrodollar as international reserve currency slips into its death throes. Hyperinflation will kick in and soon enough the United States will likely be following the same gloomy path as countries like current Venezuela and Zimbabwe 15 years ago. By globalist design the currency demonetization occurring in Venezuela and India will be arriving soon in the US. After all, absolute NWO surveillance and control can best be attained only when living in a cashless society.

With the national debt soaring to near $20 trillion, when the SHTF, like in Cyprus and Austria, expect the likelihood of bail-ins where you wake up one day to find your personal life savings stolen out of your private bank account. Gas, energy and food prices will be rising and in a crisis, grocery shelves will quickly empty. Americans are pretty jumpy and jittery these days. When earlier this month a minor winter storm moved across the south and southeastern US, it caused public panic. If an actual major crisis suddenly hits, you can imagine the outcome. On hungry stomachs, civil unrest quickly turns to uncivilized violence that could sweep across the nation, especially in large urban areas. And of course now that we have a brand new president already on tenuous ground as the elite’s designated fall guy, President Trump will be blamed. Buckle up folks, 2017’s shaping up to be one hell of a bumpy ride. Stay alert and informed, be prepared for the worst, and hope for the best.

Joachim Hagopian is a West Point graduate and former US Army officer. He has written a manuscript based on his unique military experience entitled “Don’t Let The Bastards Getcha Down.” It examines and focuses on US international relations, leadership and national security issues. After the military, Joachim earned a master’s degree in Clinical Psychology and worked as a licensed therapist in the mental health field with abused youth and adolescents for more than a quarter century. In recent years he has focused on his writing, becoming an alternative media journalist.

His blog site is at http://empireexposed.blogspot.co.id/.

 

The Obama administration went all out for its approval – a hugely secretive anti-consumer, anti-freedom, anti-environment, jobs-killing corporate giveaway race to the bottom.

It’s all about greater than ever corporate empowerment under its rules, overriding domestic laws for maximum profit-making.

Obama lied, claiming it aims to “promote economic growth; support the creation and retention of jobs; enhance innovation, productivity and competitiveness; raise living standards; reduce poverty in the signatories’ countries; and promote transparency, good governance, and enhanced labor and environmental protections.”

It’s polar opposite on all counts. Secret negotiations went on for years, owing to TPP’s controversial provisions. Congress never ratified it.

Trump’s opposition to the deal greatly aided his electoral triumph. Global Trade Watch director Lori Wallach explained Obama’s support “signaled to those whose lives have been turned upside down by the trade policies of the past 25 years that (Democrats don’t) care about them.”

Candidate Obama in 2008 campaigned against unfair trade deals. President Obama betrayed US workers by supporting them. Trump’s memorandum killed TPP on his watch.

He didn’t end talks on TTIP – TPP’s transatlantic equivalent or the secretive Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) – though his January 23 memorandum said his administration will “deal directly with individual countries on a one-on-one (or bilateral) basis in negotiating future trade deals.”

Wallach explained TISA “roll(s) back the improvements made after the global financial crisis to safeguard consumers and financial stability and cement us into the extreme deregulatory model of the 1990s that led to the crisis in the first place and the billions in losses to consumers and governments.”

She said “NAFTA is so packed with incentives for job offshoring and protections for…corporate interests” that Trump’s only responsible action is abandoning it altogether, not tweaking or renegotiating a measure too flawed to fix.

Is TPP dead or will a new administration and Congress revive it or something similar under a different name to disguise its hellishness?

Commenting on Trump’s executive order, the Electronic Freedom Foundation said his reasons for killing TPP aren’t in line with its opposition.

In his inaugural address, he said for too long, US trade policies “enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry.” He said nothing about TPP’s secrecy “and its impacts on digital rights.”

His “withdrawal from the TPP may not have achieved a long-lasting victory on those underlying issues.” Future trade deals under his stewardship “may be just as secretive, and equally harmful to Internet users’ rights,” EFF explained.

It urged a whole new approach to future negotiations, featuring “public transparency and openness.” Trump said “every decision on trade…will be made to benefit American workers and American families.”

Abandoning all one-sidedly pro-business, anti-consumer, anti-worker, anti-environment free trade deals for fair ones is the only way to keep his public pledge.

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.

As 2016 closes, we find ourselves a deeply unsettled nation. We’re unable to draw the lines of our national interest. Is it jobs and economy, is it national security, or is it now in our interest to ensure global security — in other words, act as the world’s policemen?

As the “failing” (to quote Trump) New York Times degenerates into a Washington Post organization with its stagnant Cold War vision of a 1950s world where the Russians are to blame for most everything — Hillary’s loss, most of the aggression and disorder in the world, the desire to destabilize Europe, etc. — the Times has added the issue of ‘fake news’ to reassert its problematic role as the dominant voice for the Washington establishment. Certainly this is true in the case of Russia’s ‘hacking’ the 2016 election and putting into office its Manchurian Candidate in Donald Trump. Apparently the CIA (via various unnamed intelligence officials), and the FBI, NSA, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper (who notoriously lied to Congress in the Snowden affair), President Obama, the DNC, Hillary Clinton, and Congress agree that Russia, and Mr. Putin predominantly, is responsible.

Certainly the psychotic, war-loving Senator John McCain is right up there alongside these patriots, calling President Putin a “thug, bully and a murderer and anybody else who describes him as anything else is lying.” He actually said this — the man whose sound judgment chose Sarah Palin as his VP nominee in ’08. And the Times followed by printing the story in its full glory on page one, clearly agreeing with McCain’s point of view. I don’t remember Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon, or Reagan, in the darkest days of the 1950s/80s, ever singling out a Russian President like this. The invective was aimed at the Soviet regime, but never were Khrushchev or Brezhnev the target of this bile. I guess this is a new form of American diplomacy. If a black youth in our inner cities were killed or a Pakistani wedding party were murdered by our drones, would President Obama be singled out as a murderer, bully, thug? Such personalization is a sign of sickness in our thinking and way beneath what should be our standards.

Note the enclosed link (“US Intel Vets Dispute Russia Hacking Claims”) from the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (which includes the ex-NSA reformer Bill Binney, a mathematical genius who inspired the Nic Cage character in “Snowden”). He talks here about what hacking really means, as opposed to a ‘leak’. The Times and other mainstream media have surprisingly evaded any contrary evidence, such as that presented by Craig Murray, ex-ambassador and Wikileaks spokesman who says he was given the information in a Washington park by a Democratic ‘insider’ who was disgusted by the behavior of the DNC; Murray then gave it to Wikileaks. This was a ‘leak,’ not a ‘hack,’ and always seemed to me the likely source for this scandal (as I think the Sony leak was as well, falsely blamed on North Korea, but that’s another matter). And if this were to be properly investigated, it might very well lead to the discovery that this was Hillary Clinton’s ‘Nixon moment.’ Clearly the DNC offices were up to no good. Ironically, Clinton first made her name as one of the investigators into Watergate. See Mark Ames’s article, “Site Behind McCarthyite Blacklist,” tracking this foul play to Washington Post journalist Craig Timberg.

I remember well in the 1950s when the Russians were supposed to be in our schools, Congress, State Department — and according to many Eisenhower/Nixon supporters — about to take over our country without serious opposition (and they call me paranoid!). It was this same media who insisted on our need to go to Vietnam to defend our freedoms against the communists 6,000 miles away. And after the Red Scare finally went away for good in 1991, let us remind ourselves that It never ended. It became Hussein of Iraq with his weapons of mass destruction, and talk of the ‘mushroom cloud.’ It became the Demon, as real as any Salem Witch Trial. It was Gaddafi of Libya, and then it was Assad of Syria. In other words, as in an Orwellian prophesy, it never ended, and I can guarantee you it never will — unless we the people who still think for ourselves in this existential matter, can say “Enough” to this demon act. “Enough,’ “go away” — laugh in their faces.

Of course, the NYT/WaPo nexus rarely publishes any of our serious dissents and therefore we take refuge in alternate media, such as ‘The Nation,’ ‘Consortiumnews,’ ‘The Intercept,’ ‘Naked Capitalism,’ ‘Counterpunch,’ ‘Zero Hedge,’ ‘Antiwar.com,’ ‘Truthdig,’ ‘Common Dreams,’ etc. I think then we were all quite shocked (but not surprised) when recently we saw 200 WEBSITES listed as tools of the Kremlin (WaPo’s November 24, “Russian propaganda effort helped spread ‘fake news’ during election”).

My God, the ghost of Izzy Stone is back from the 1950s! For that matter, so is Tom Clancy from the ’80s. False thrillers will now be written about the Russians hacking the American elections. Money and TV serials will be made. I’ve never read such hysterical junk in the New York Times (call it what it is — “fake news”), in which the editorials have become outrageous diatribes of alleged crimes by Russia, many of them presumably written by Serge Schmemann, one of those ideologues who still looks for Russians under his bed at night; they were called ‘White Russians’ in the old days and, like right-wing Cubans in Miami, are unable to live down past grievances. Schmemann is obviously riding high at the NYT edit board. This type of thinking has clearly influenced the Pentagon and many of our Generals’ statements, and has pervaded MSM reporting. When one group-think controls our national conversation, it becomes truly dangerous. In this spirit, I’m linking several crucial essays of new vintage, pointing out the disgrace the MSM has become.

As much as I may disagree with Donald Trump (and I do) he’s right now target number one of the MSM propaganda — until, that is, he jumps to the anti-Kremlin track because of some kind of false intelligence or misunderstanding cooked up by CIA. Then I fear, in his hot-headed way, he starts fighting with the Russians, and it wouldn’t be long then until a state of war against Russia is declared. I have no doubt then that our over-financed military ($10 to every 1 Russian dollar) will mean NOTHING against a country that right now believes the US, with the largest buildup of NATO on its borders since Hitler’s World War II, is crazed enough to prepare for a preemptive strike. In his analysis, “The Need to Hold Saudi Arabia Accountable,” Robert Parry points out that this conflict ironically started in the 1980s with the Neoconservatives defining Iran as the number one terrorist sponsor in the world. How this leads to our present mess is a brilliant analysis that is unknown to the American public.

I urge you to read the following articles and stay calm in your thinking. But bring it to bear in some way. As a believer in what the Dalai Lama says, every single one of us, even through our prayers, can add to the betterment of this world. I never thought I’d find myself praying for the level-headedness of a Donald Trump. Remember “The Iliad”? As Homer would have it, the gods would hover over each day’s battles and decide on the outcome. Who would die and who would live. Are the gods still listening?

Robert Parry, “Making Russia ‘The Enemy”

Joe Lauria, “Russia-Hack Story Another Media Failure”

Justin Raimondo, “Stop the CIA Coup”

Robert Parry, “The Need to Hold Saudi Arabia Accountable”

Ray McGovern, “US Intel Vets Dispute Russia Hacking Claims”

Mark Ames, “Site behind Washington Post’s McCarthyite Blacklist”

Robert Parry, “A Sour Holiday Season for Neocons”

Oliver Stone: Award-winning director, producer and screenwriter. Films include Untold History, Scarface, Platoon, Wall Street, JFK and Natural Born Killers.

Factionalism and fury are basic ingredients of the US Republic. Designed as a classic response to the lynch mob fantasy of direct democracy, and the weakness of unaccountable monarchy, those behind the US constitution contrived a select form of paternal snobbery: letting groups fight it out in the amphitheatre of politics. Such a battle would always adhere to certain demarcations of power along the separation of powers.

This was all well and good, bar one fundamental problem. The State blossomed and ballooned. Bureaucracy became both purpose and fetish, despite being opposed in a rhetorical way by various presidential administrations and politicians. WhileUS politicians – at least a good number of them – feared the growth of the unelected classes within the US government system, the empire’s appetite proved voracious.

Supply met demand.  Functionaries were hired; modern foot soldiers were sought for the task of building empire in freedom’s glades.  The National Security Agency, child of a new, post-World War empire, grew up alongside the Central Intelligence Agency.  A vast intelligence community mushroomed in the dark rhetoric of Cold War doom and nuclear fears.

What, then, of that elusive quantity known as the people?  Where would they fit in the administrative schemes of such behemoths? History shows them as subjects to be spied upon and suspected.  The security rationale became the necessary shibboleth.  Despite various imposed restrictions, warrantless surveillance took place in leaps and bounds, notably after September 11, 2001. The CIA became executor, under President George W. Bush’s watch, of extraordinary rendition and torture.

Now, the intelligence community is again creating its form of mischief.  A few days before the inauguration of Donald J. Trump we bore witness to unveiled threats and promises of an internal conflict, the anger of the Washington professionals against the out-of-town entertainers.

It continued the sentiment expressed by former CIA chief Michael J. Morell during the campaign, arguing that the USpeople were effectively going for a dangerous, destabilising defective.[1]  The language is important here, for democracies which do not yield the favoured candidate need, as Henry Kissinger famously noted, direction.  The wishes of the voter, in other words, require correction from time to time.

Trump’s critics within the intelligence community see the problem as Trump.  But in such criticism lies the most perverse tilt favouring the CIA’s stance.  This traditional bug bear of the Left, a body with various nasty character references, suddenly finds common ground with anti-Trump critics on both sides of the spectrum.  Unholy and unruly sympathies seem to be springing up in the untrimmed jungle of US politics.  The entire mood there is against Trump, against his legitimacy and, it follows, the nature of the US political system.  Who, then, is the emperor without clothes?

Last week’s antics gave us a few clues.  The outgoing Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, John Brennan, yielded a cranky example.  Brennan, in the last few years, has seen himself as the reformer, the moderniser.  Recently, he also fumed as school teacher and patriarch against the incoming president.

He was already facing enemies within his own organisation.  Attempts to bring the operational side of the organisation closer to the analytical side were efforts that trampled on sacred ground.  His stomping proposals sought to integrate four main directorates within the agency: those of operations, analysis, science and technology.[2]  It was the analyst desperate to move push up the value of analysis to professional parity with the operations officer.

Trump’s sallies against Brennan and the intelligence community set up the scene for the next round of institutional brawling.  The intelligence community has been subjected to the trash talk of historical comparisons – and notorious ones at that.  “Intelligence agencies,” tweeted Trump, “should never have allowed this fake news to ‘leak’ into the public.  One last shot at me.  Are we living in Nazi Germany?”[3]

In a series of other tweets, Trump also suggested in responding to Brennan’s view of a perceived Russian threat that he could hardly do “much worse – just look at Syria (red line), Crimea, Ukraine and the build-up of Russian nukes.  Not good!  Was this the leaker of Fake News?”[4]

Brennan then spoke about drawing lines and maintaining perspective.  “It’s when there are allegations about leaking or about dishonesty or a lack of integrity, that’s where I think the line is crossed.”[5]Former CIA deputy chief of staff Nick Shapiro also explained that Brennan was “deeply saddened and angered at Donald Trump’s despicable display of self-aggrandizement in front of CIA’s Memorial Wall of Agency heroes.”[6]

Trump did make some effort to pour oil on the waters on Saturday, though there are suggestions this did little. “There is nobody that feels stronger about the intelligence community and the CIA than Donald Trump,” claimed the President in his usual third person address.[7]

The new president certainly wants that organisation on side, even if it is only to use it as a rapid attack dog for the USrepublic.  Waterboarding, for instance, is said to make  a return. Counter-terrorist efforts are to be beefed up.  But the greatest question there is how that organisation reconciles itself with Trump’s approach to the Kremlin.

The battle of the lobbies is looming in Trumpland.  If there is one awful reality to play itself out here, lobbies, with their stifling tentacles, will be it.  The idea of an intelligence lobby that has stepped out of the shadows to actively barrack for their own candidate should be a worrying sign of the times, the rank smell of a potential coup d’état in the wings.

Now in office, Trump is coming at this from behind, having to face a multiple number of factions who are keen to frustrate, if not demolish him. Street marchers call for him to repealed; political pundits predict impeachment within months.  The choice of the US electoral system, not being the choice of a good number within the intelligence community, makes the initial period of the Forty Fifth Presidency precarious indeed.

Notes

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/05/opinion/campaign-stops/i-ran-the-cia-now-im-endorsing-hillary-clinton.html?_r=0

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/will-john-brennans-controversial-cia-modernization-survive-trump/2017/01/17/54e6cc1c-dcd5-11e6-ad42-f3375f271c9c_story.html?utm_term=.ca45f2e3358c

[3] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/819164172781060096?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

[4] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/820789938887294977?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

[5] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/01/17/the-director-of-the-cia-just-went-off-on-donald-trump-it-was-a-long-time-coming/?utm_term=.6b00079daa81

[6] http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/intelligence/315503-former-cia-director-trump-should-be-ashamed-of-himself

[7] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2017/01/21/trump-to-visit-cia-headquarters-after-sharply-criticizing-the-intelligence-community/?utm_term=.5179b306d979

Like Odysseus, Douglas Valentine is a wily warrior who managed to enter the enemy’s stronghold disguised as a gift. Not Troy, and not within a wooden horse, but in the guise of a nice young “Nobody,” he was able, thirty or so years ago, to breach the walls of the CIA through William Colby, a former director of the Central Intelligence Agency. The guileful thing he brought was his proposal to demystify the Phoenix program, “the controversial CIA assassination program that resulted in the deaths of thousands of civilians during the Vietnam War,” with which Colby was notably associated.

Colby naively assumed “demystify” meant justify, so he welcomed Valentine into his inner sanctum. As in days of yore, Colby, and the CIA officers he referred Valentine to, were so disarmed by the bright young trickster that they divulged their secrets without being asked, defeating themselves in the boastful ways of men drunk on their own youthful exploits. Wanting to be heroes in their own myths, they became unwitting accomplices in their own besmirchment. So much for intelligence.

When the Trojan Horse that became Valentine’s 1990 book, The Phoenix Program: America’s Use of Terror in Vietnam, was opened, and many truths rushed out to slay them, they reacted with shocked outrage that they had been double-crossed by an amateur counterspy.

Legends fall, of course, battles are lost, but when the self-anointed heroic warriors of the CIA fell, they summoned their acolytes and media scribes to silence the counterspy who did not love them. It was not the Valentine that these spurned lovers were expecting.

In this case, their defender was the media celebrity reporter, Morley Safer, who had reported from Vietnam and was friendly with William Colby. Safer owed Colby a favor. When he was in Vietnam, Safer had accepted Colby’s Mephistophelian offer to take a tour of the infamous Phoenix program’s interrogation centers and meet the counterterrorism teams, but with one stipulation. In Safer’s words, delivered to a conference in 2010: “I showed up and [Colby] said, ‘Okay, here are the rules. . . . You can’t take notes and you can’t report anything you hear. . . . to this day, I still feel constrained in terms of talking about’” (what he saw and heard).

Valentine: “And like Don Corleone dispensing favors in The Godfather, Colby knew that one day Safer would be obligated to return it. That is how the CIA, as the organized crime branch of the US government, functions like the Mafia through its old boy network of complicit media hacks.”

So The New York Times, which Valentine had criticized in his book for not reporting the truth about the CIA’s Phoenix program, had Safer write a book review of The Phoenix Program: America’s Use of Terror in Vietnam. He wrote a scathing review in which he said the book was “as turgid and dense and often incomprehensible book as I have ever had the misfortune to open.” Thus Valentine’s work was disappeared like the Vietnamese victims of the Phoenix program. (Safer’s “misfortune,” however, became our fortune when in 2014 Open Roads publishers announced a “Forbidden Bookshelves” series and resurrected Valentine’s exposé in a new edition.)

In his latest book, The CIA as Organized Crime: How Illegal Operations Corrupt America And The World, Valentine explains it thus:

“But the left’s leadership is part of the CIA’s old boy network and like all American intellectuals, they look to the Times for direction and validation. So the word went out to ignore the book, not just because it revealed CIA secrets, but because it identified the media, and the Times in particular, as the reason why the public can’t see the CIA clearly for what it is: a criminal conspiracy on behalf of wealthy capitalists.”

But Valentine had been “neutralized,” and over the next quarter century the CIA, through its placement of its people throughout the media, including Hollywood and television, resurrected its mythic image—phoenix-like—from the fleeting and rarely examined ashes Valentine had reduced it to. Using what the CIA officer Frank Wisner called the agency’s “Mighty Wurlitzer”—its deep penetration of the news and cultural apparatus—it played the American people to a tune of CIA heroes defending the “homeland” from mad Muslim terrorists and evil drug dealers besieging the U.S. citadel through deception and direct attack. Movies, television shows, cognitive infiltration of the mainstream media across platforms repeated the message over and over again: We are the good guys in this mythic battle of good against evil. We are defenders of the “Homeland.”

But over these years Valentine had not disappeared, despite the CIA’s wish that he had. It took him fifteen years to recover from his “neutralization,” and then he wrote two books—The Strength of the Wolf and The Strength of the Pack—that examine the nexus between the CIA, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, and the Drug Enforcement Administration in which he explains in documented detail how the CIA hijacked drug enforcement as it became a prime player in international drug trafficking. Joining hands with organized crime and corrupting law enforcement, the drug running and murder that was crucial to the CIA’s Phoenix program went international.

Most importantly, the Phoenix program’s organizational structure became the template for these world-wide bloody operations: among them, the Salvadoran Option, undertakings throughout South and Central America, the Middle-East, and later the war on terror, “the greatest covert op ever.” And the Phoenix became the conceptual model for The Department of Homeland Security, as “both are based on the principle that governments can manage societies through implicit and explicit terror.”

Valentine shows how the federal drug agencies protect the CIA’s drug running assets and operations, and spread addiction throughout the “homeland.” This is accomplished by CIA agents posing as federal narcotics agents. “The DEA has a public affairs branch staffed by creative writers who filter out anything bad and tell you only what the bosses want you to know. The media echoes what the DEA and the CIA PR people say. But it’s a big lie and it’s pervasive.”

But those important books had little effect on a drug addled population. They appeared in the midst of the dramatic rise in the use of “legal” pharmaceutical drugs (see Deadly Medicines and Organized Crime: How Big Pharma Has Corrupted Healthcare by Dr. Peter C. Gotzsche) and the epidemic of heroin (Greek, heros, hero + German chemical suffix, ine, coined in 1898 by the Bayer Company as a morphine substitute) that has reduced so many people to walking zombies, while minorities have long had their neighborhoods devastated by CIA facilitated crack cocaine. The zombie myth itself has become a staple of American culture—pure entertainment for a brain devouring and brain dead population—entertainment for dummies.

It is no wonder. Because from 1990 when Valentine’s The Phoenix Program was trashed by the Times until today, the U.S. government and the scientific/media establishment have worked to convince Americans that all our lives revolve around our brains and that the answers to our problems lie with more brain research, drugs, genetic testing, etc. It’s been a quarter century deluge of propaganda of scientific materialism and biological determinism that we are not free but victims of our genes, neurotransmitters, brains/computers, and chemicals. Having lost our minds and fixated on our brains as instructed, we have chosen to be determined to be determined, not free. It is not coincidental that the U.S. government, beginning with ex-CIA Director and then President George H.W. Bush, declared the 1990s the decade of brain research, followed up with 2000–2010 as the decade of the behavior project, and our present decade being devoted to mapping the brain and artificial intelligence, organized by the Office of Science and Technology Project and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Brains and drugs, Big Pharma and the CIA, drug running and drug dealing, deaths at home and deaths abroad—a neat circle that has corrupted the country at the deepest levels.

This corruption is dependent on the creation of fictions that penetrate public consciousness to the level of myth. “The government,” Valentine writes, “is creating conditions across the board that are conducive to taking drugs. The pharmaceutical industry is part of the problem, along with its co-conspirators in the advertising industry; every time you turn on the TV there’s a commercial telling you to take a pill. The next commercial says don’t take that pill, take this pill. This is the free market at work, sucking the life out of people.”

But myths rise and fall, and recently the CIA’s invincibility has come under increased scrutiny. As the Greeks warned us long ago, hubris leads to humiliation. Today, more and more Americans are learning, through independent Internet sources and a growing list of books, how to deconstruct the ways the CIA “uses language and mythology to control political and social movements.” The fight is on.

Valentine, a warrior of astute knowledge from his wanderings in the CIA’s labyrinth, has reemerged with his new guidebook to the Minotaur’s deadly ways. The CIA As Organized Crime is a tour de force, a counterpuncher’s no-holds-barred passionate battle to reverse “the terrible truth . . . that a Cult of Death rules America and is hell-bent on world domination.” Unlike many writers, he holds back nothing. He names names. He is adamantine in his accusations against those he considers accomplices—in particular, “the compatible left”—“liberals and pseudo-intellectual status seekers who are easily influenced”—in the CIA/media/elite’s efforts at domination and mind-control. He claims that media celebrities of the left serve the function of pacifying the liberal bourgeoisie in these enterprises.

But knowing how leads on to way and one can easily get lost in a labyrinth, let me not tell the story of the man, Valentine, skilled in all ways of contending with such a formidable foe as the CIA. Better to give you a sampling of his words that explain what he has learned in his long wanderings in these strange and sick worlds.

“I have a very broad approach. . . . psychological, political, anthropological, sociological, historical, philosophical. When I look at a subject I look at it comprehensively from all those different points of view. Literary criticism teaches the power of symbolic transformation, or processing experience into ideas, into meaning. . . . one must, above all, understand the archetypal power of the myth of the hero. That way you can transform, through words, Joe the Plumber or even a mass murderer, into a national hero. When I decided to research and write about the CIA’s Phoenix program, that was how I went at it.”

“They [CIA] create the myths we believe. If we were allowed to understand the CIA, we’d realize it’s a criminal organization that is corrupting governments and societies around the world. It’s murdering civilians who haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Nowadays, the only way you can discern what’s going on is by studying and understanding the historical arc of these bureaucracies. Where did the CIA come from? Where is it going? If you look at it historically, you can see beyond the spin and it becomes demystified. And that is not a happy story. As power gets more concentrated in the security services, the media is no longer simply compliant, it’s functioning as their public relations arm. It simply ignores anything that contradicts the official line.”

“The most important fiction of all is the need for secrecy to preserve our national security.”

“If you want to understand the CIA, you have to understand how it’s organized. . . . The media organizes itself the way the CIA does.”

“Journalism in the US is a traditional cover for CIA officers. And when the owners of the media aren’t covering for the CIA, they’re selling commercial time slots to the multi-national corporations that in turn are selling you commodities made in sweatshops in foreign nations that have been subverted by the CIA. You could almost say there is no such thing as factual reporting. . . . The CIA and the media are part of the same criminal conspiracy. You’re never going to learn anything substantive by reading what mainstream reporters dish out about the CIA. You can’t take a journalism course in CIA Criminal Conspiracies 101.”

“I’m sure the anthrax scare after 9/11 was a CIA provocation designed to justify a mail intercept program codenamed HTLINGUAL.”

“The CIA and the military hire the smartest anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists to figure out how to do this stuff [social engineering]. . . . That’s why you need a broad historical view. If you focus on just what’s happening now, you’re shocked every day by what you see.”

“When the United States took over drug law enforcement in Afghanistan, opium production increased dramatically. All of a sudden Afghan heroin is flooding the US and Europe. It still is. You can say it’s a coincidence, except all the opium warlords are on the CIA payroll. The DEA sends six hundred agents to Afghanistan to make sure nobody knows about it.”

“Phoenix is the conceptual model for the DHS [Department of Homeland Security]. Both are based on the principle that governments can manage societies through implicit and explicit terror. The strategic goal is to widen the gap between the elites and the mass of the citizenry, while expunging anyone who cannot be ideologically assimilated.”

“Through their control of the media, political and bureaucratic systems, America’s secret rulers engage in terrorism abroad and at home for economic purposes. . . . The objective is to maximize profits and concentrate wealth and political power in fewer and fewer hands. The global War on Terror and its domestic homeland security counterpart are flip sides of the same coin. They are the capitalist ideology applied to foreign and domestic security policy. And like the capitalist system it serves, an unstated national security policy is consolidated in fewer and fewer ideologically correct hands as the empire expands and its contradictions become more apparent.”

This sampling of Valentine’s insights should be enough to show the depth and breadth of his demythologization of this “religious” cult of death that is the CIA. Yet myths die hard. And even when they do, they often rise again, especially when one controls the levers of a society’s storytelling powers, as does the CIA to a great extent through its incestuous coupling with the mainstream corporate media. That is why it is so important for people to take the time to read Valentine’s work.

While The CIA As Organized Crime is filled with detailed information labyrinthine in its complexity, his primary goal is to help us grasp the big picture, to see how the myth and the mythmaking work and how we might break through these fictions. He repeatedly reminds us that we are truly caught in the belly of the whale, in the underworld that will overwhelm us if we do not make the sustained effort to get beyond the blur of daily events and understand how the illusionists who are deluding us create and structure their evil propaganda.

Perhaps the only way to heaven is through hell, as Dante told us. Virgil was his guide. The valiant Valentine can be ours, if we are willing to accompany him on the journey.

Edward Curtin is a writer whose work has appeared widely. He teaches sociology at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts. His website is edwardcurtin.com.

Obama backed the horrendous Trans Pacific Partnership.

Trump has just killed it.

The Teamsters and other union leaders – traditionally a solid part of the  Democratic base, who endorsed Hillary Clinton – praised Trump for driving a stake in the heart of the corporatist power grab (which would have destroyed privacy and the ability of signatory nations’ to follow their peoples’ wishes) … and had an “excellent” meeting with Trump today on labor issues.

Bernie Sanders praised Trump for stopping TPP, and said he’d work with Trump on trade.

Other Democrats in Congress are praising Trump’s move, as well.

Note: One of the main campaigners against the TPP (Public Citizen’s Lori Wallach) noted shortly after Trump won the election:

The relationship you have with your doctor is founded on trust, but your doctor or hospital might have a stronger obligation to “big pharma” than to your health.

The below infographic created by The Law Firm highlights the impact of big pharma on Americans.

Big pharma refers to the most influential pharmaceutical companies in the U.S., and this influence goes beyond profits. On average, Americans are spending $1,112 per capita on prescription drugs, four times more than Mexico. Also, the average child has four prescriptions filled per year, while adults fill 12 each year and seniors fill a whopping 27 separate prescriptions each year.

Between August 2013 and December 2014, these pharmaceutical companies spent $3.49 billion in disclosed payments. If you’ve been prescribed drugs from Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer or AstraZeneca, you might benefit from knowing these companies are spending a significant amount more on marketing than on research and development. Johnson & Johnson spent more than double on marketing in 2013, a total of $17.5 billion – and these companies aren’t alone. In fact, 90% of pharmaceutical companies engage in this practice.

If you’re a parent, you’ll be surprised to see that the two doctors earning the highest pharma profits are in family medicine and pediatric critical care. Even more, the top spending pharmaceutical company, Genentech Inc., spent a total of $388 million in payments to doctors. This company is behind the drugs Valium, Klonopin and Xenical.

These aren’t the only statistics presented in this infographic – and with a thorough read, you’ll be able to fully understand how you or your loved one’s health could be impacted in the pursuit of profits.

Take a look at the below infographic to learn more about the power and influence of pharmaceutical companies in the U.S., and how they can be stopped.

 

The Rohingyas are a people struck by tragedy. Persecuted in their home country, Myanmar, over 65,000 of them have fled to Bangladesh between October 9, 2016, and January 5, 2017, according to a report from the United Nations Office of Coordination for Humanitarian Affairs. Every day, as reported by The Daily Star, scores of Rohingya people, mostly women and children, are seen dotting a 15 kilometre stretch of road from Ukhia to Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar.

Having barely escaped with their lives leaving all their belongings, if any, behind, they are seen begging on and around the roads there. Hoping for someone to stop for a moment, sympathise with their sufferings and lend them some assistance, however trivial it may be.

The persecution of Rohingyas in Myanmar is, of course, nothing new. It has been going on for quite a while now. But ever since the attacks on Myanmar’s border guard posts on October 9, 2016, it has again escalated. This is obvious from the fact that, on average, over 1,000 Rohingyas have been entering Bangladesh every day since late last year, while the previous rate of Rohingya influx was 50 a day.

From the looks of various reports concerning the latest round of crackdown on the Rohingya people, it seems that some sections of the Myanmarese authority have not been shy in handing out collective punishment to all Rohingyas, regardless of their innocence or guilt.

Although some had expected things to improve for the Rohingyas under the stewardship of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, no such signs are currently visible. In fact, many have gone so far as to criticise her for her nonchalant attitude towards the sufferings of the Rohingyas, particularly her reluctance to condemn the attacks on occasions and for playing them down at times.

And this has been the official stance of the Myanmarese government for years now – to deny that the Rohingyas are being persecuted as severely as reports suggest. And in all honesty, with the rest of the world being busy dealing with other problems, it has served them well in avoiding taking any responsibility for the atrocities that have been committed against the Rohingyas.

But for how long can the government of Myanmar insist that the Rohingyas are not being persecuted mercilessly? For how long will people avoid asking: “Why then are Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar, risking their lives to resort to begging on the streets of Bangladesh or elsewhere”? Surely begging is not a profession many would take up willingly.

Even the UN, which some believe, has played a less than impressive role in helping to find a solution to the Rohingya crisis, seems to have lost its patience with the Myanmar government. The UN Human Rights envoy to Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, for example, said at a news briefing in Yangon that the Myanmar government would “appear less and less credible” if it continues being defensive in response to  the allegations of persistent human rights violations against Rohingyas (UN rights envoy: Myanmar losing credibility, Bangkok Post, January 21).

Furthermore, shifting from the UN’s routine position, she said: “I must remind again that these attacks took place in the context of decades of systematic and institutionalised discrimination against the Rohingya population.” Some strong words indeed, which, members of international observant groups have, unfortunately, failed to use with regards to the persecution of Rohingyas in the past.

With such strong words coming out even from within the ranks of the UN, is it a sign of hope for the Rohingyas? Will the international community finally take the matter as seriously as it should have all along? It will, of course, be unfair to include all nations under that umbrella. The Malaysian Prime Minister, for example, has already condemned the handling of Rohingyas by the Myanmarese government quite severely.

He has even gone so far as to push “the Organisation of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the world’s largest Muslim intergovernmental organisation, to apply pressure on Myanmar to end the persecution and killing of ethnic Muslim Rohingyas in the country” (Myanmar urged to end persecution of Rohingya, Bangkok Post, January 19). Encouragingly, he said: “I believe I speak for all neighbouring countries when I say that we want to avoid a repeat of the 2015 ‘boat people’ crisis”, referring to the thousands of Rohingyas who fled Myanmar in boats for Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand in 2015.

Finally, he urged on the whole of South Asia to unite in an attempt to resolve the crisis, warning that it may otherwise explode into something much bigger — such as increasing petty crimes, human trafficking and various forms of militancy — which will obviously harm the region as a whole. But for various geostrategic reasons, many leaders in South Asia have so far refused to condemn the government of Myanmar, despite the possible long term dangers its policies may pose to their respective countries.

But with the passing of time, it is becoming clearer by the day that things cannot be allowed to continue as usual. It is time for the other leaders of the region to realise that and heed the warning of the Malaysian Prime Minister and condemn the atrocities being committed against the Rohingyas.

Although one could take the comments made by the UN Human Rights envoy to Myanmar as an encouraging sign, what is needed is for the leaders of South Asia to solve the problem through dialogue before it gets much bigger and leads to many more atrocities than what has already been witnessed. It is a challenge which must be faced head on, rather than be criminally avoided, as it has been, despite the tragic consequences.

The Rohingyas are a people struck by tragedy. Persecuted in their home country, Myanmar, over 65,000 of them have fled to Bangladesh between October 9, 2016, and January 5, 2017, according to a report from the United Nations Office of Coordination for Humanitarian Affairs. Every day, as reported by The Daily Star, scores of Rohingya people, mostly women and children, are seen dotting a 15 kilometre stretch of road from Ukhia to Teknaf in Cox’s Bazar.

Having barely escaped with their lives leaving all their belongings, if any, behind, they are seen begging on and around the roads there. Hoping for someone to stop for a moment, sympathise with their sufferings and lend them some assistance, however trivial it may be.

The persecution of Rohingyas in Myanmar is, of course, nothing new. It has been going on for quite a while now. But ever since the attacks on Myanmar’s border guard posts on October 9, 2016, it has again escalated. This is obvious from the fact that, on average, over 1,000 Rohingyas have been entering Bangladesh every day since late last year, while the previous rate of Rohingya influx was 50 a day.

From the looks of various reports concerning the latest round of crackdown on the Rohingya people, it seems that some sections of the Myanmarese authority have not been shy in handing out collective punishment to all Rohingyas, regardless of their innocence or guilt.

Although some had expected things to improve for the Rohingyas under the stewardship of Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, no such signs are currently visible. In fact, many have gone so far as to criticise her for her nonchalant attitude towards the sufferings of the Rohingyas, particularly her reluctance to condemn the attacks on occasions and for playing them down at times.

And this has been the official stance of the Myanmarese government for years now – to deny that the Rohingyas are being persecuted as severely as reports suggest. And in all honesty, with the rest of the world being busy dealing with other problems, it has served them well in avoiding taking any responsibility for the atrocities that have been committed against the Rohingyas.

But for how long can the government of Myanmar insist that the Rohingyas are not being persecuted mercilessly? For how long will people avoid asking: “Why then are Rohingyas fleeing Myanmar, risking their lives to resort to begging on the streets of Bangladesh or elsewhere”? Surely begging is not a profession many would take up willingly.

Even the UN, which some believe, has played a less than impressive role in helping to find a solution to the Rohingya crisis, seems to have lost its patience with the Myanmar government. The UN Human Rights envoy to Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, for example, said at a news briefing in Yangon that the Myanmar government would “appear less and less credible” if it continues being defensive in response to  the allegations of persistent human rights violations against Rohingyas (UN rights envoy: Myanmar losing credibility, Bangkok Post, January 21).

Furthermore, shifting from the UN’s routine position, she said: “I must remind again that these attacks took place in the context of decades of systematic and institutionalised discrimination against the Rohingya population.” Some strong words indeed, which, members of international observant groups have, unfortunately, failed to use with regards to the persecution of Rohingyas in the past.

With such strong words coming out even from within the ranks of the UN, is it a sign of hope for the Rohingyas? Will the international community finally take the matter as seriously as it should have all along? It will, of course, be unfair to include all nations under that umbrella. The Malaysian Prime Minister, for example, has already condemned the handling of Rohingyas by the Myanmarese government quite severely.

He has even gone so far as to push “the Organisation of the Islamic Cooperation (OIC), the world’s largest Muslim intergovernmental organisation, to apply pressure on Myanmar to end the persecution and killing of ethnic Muslim Rohingyas in the country” (Myanmar urged to end persecution of Rohingya, Bangkok Post, January 19). Encouragingly, he said: “I believe I speak for all neighbouring countries when I say that we want to avoid a repeat of the 2015 ‘boat people’ crisis”, referring to the thousands of Rohingyas who fled Myanmar in boats for Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand in 2015.

Finally, he urged on the whole of South Asia to unite in an attempt to resolve the crisis, warning that it may otherwise explode into something much bigger — such as increasing petty crimes, human trafficking and various forms of militancy — which will obviously harm the region as a whole. But for various geostrategic reasons, many leaders in South Asia have so far refused to condemn the government of Myanmar, despite the possible long term dangers its policies may pose to their respective countries.

But with the passing of time, it is becoming clearer by the day that things cannot be allowed to continue as usual. It is time for the other leaders of the region to realise that and heed the warning of the Malaysian Prime Minister and condemn the atrocities being committed against the Rohingyas.

Although one could take the comments made by the UN Human Rights envoy to Myanmar as an encouraging sign, what is needed is for the leaders of South Asia to solve the problem through dialogue before it gets much bigger and leads to many more atrocities than what has already been witnessed. It is a challenge which must be faced head on, rather than be criminally avoided, as it has been, despite the tragic consequences.

A Republican-proposed House Resolution has quietly slipped past the public radar – proposing that the United States withdraw its membership from the United Nations, just as another bill was being concocted to cut US funding to the body.

Sunday, January 15, the government of Bahrain executed three young Shiite Muslim in charge of killing three policemen. Many social media are unable to verify whether or not such a crime has been committed by the executed people. Thousands of people poured to the streets demonstrating against the government of Bahrain.

Although more than 70% of the population of Bahrain are Shia Muslims, their fundamental human rights is disregarded by Bahraini administration. The law of Bahrain deprives Bahraini Shias of living in more than 40% of Bahrain’s territory; for example, the city of Riffa is a forbidden area for them. Whilst the Shias remain generally in the low level of Bahraini social classes, the most important jobs have been allocated to Sunni Muslims. The Shias have no right to be employed in police or army; their children are educated at different low level schools; and they have limited rights, in contrast to their Sunni counterparts, with regard to their bank accounts. The king of Bahrain, all his family and Bahraini elites belong to the minority of Sunni Muslims.

There exist a lot of impediments to the Shia party of Al Wefaq, the most important political force of Bahrain, in this country. Since the beginning of parliamentary elections in Bahrain, the Shia majority gain eccentrically the minority of parliament seats.

Bahraini Shias sought recurrently to modify this discriminatory situation, but the government as well as the King of Bahrain did not take their requests into consideration. Instead of paying attention to the demands of political activists, the government of Bahrain has incarcerated many of them; a large number of them have been tortured and tens of them have been killed.

In 1999, when Hamed bin Isa Al Khalifa became Emir of Bahrain, The Shias, being optimistic, welcomed his reign. From 1999 to 2002, Hamad brought several political reforms to Bahrain. But his attitude has been changed since 2002, when discrimination in housing and jobs, recruiting foreigners to military service, and bringing Sunni tribes from other countries to change the demographic composition of Bahrain have been resumed.

In 2010, although the opposition got 60% of votes, it could gain just 18 out of 40 seats at the parliament. In the same year, 23 political activists have been arrested under the charge of terrorism. In the recent twenty years, tens of thousands of the nationals of Syria, Jordan, Pakistan, and Yemen, who are Sunni Muslims, acquired Bahraini nationality. The government of Bahrain employs the newcomers in police or special organisations completely loyal to Royal family, and many analysists believe that this action is done in order to change the demographic composition of Bahrain and the reduction of the density of Shia population in this country. In addition to gaining Bahraini nationality, newcomers acquire many privileges in comparison to indigenous Shia or even Sunni people. For example, new citizens can use the privilege of public housing swiftly; but as far as the native people are concerned they have to wait even up to twenty years, or even more, to use such a facility. Whilst most of the indigenous Bahraini people are unemployed, the new citizens are employed as soon as they settle in Bahrain.

In addition to the above-mentioned discriminations, violence also can be seen amongst the actions of the government of Bahrain against the Shia majority. The government has spurred “Sunni vigilantes” to attack Shia areas. In April 2012, hundreds of armed vigilantes attacked some Shia villages in response to their opposition to Formula One races. Bahraini security forces did not impede the vigilantes. Although formal governmental proclamations have not referred to the number of victims, eyewitnesses testified that some people were killed and many were injured during the attack.

The US has a good relationship with the court of Bahrain. The US Fifth Fleet shares headquarters with US Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain. On the other hand, Russia whose deputy of Ministry of State met with the general secretary of Al Wefaq party in 2012, has delivered hope, since then, that all political parties can have a constitutive dialogue with each other. But this request has always met with a negative response on behalf of the government of Bahrain.

It seems that the only way of coming Bahrain out of the crisis is the negotiation between the great world and regional powers, as well as all efficient Bahraini parties. International community has to pay attention to Bahrain.

Amir A Amirshekari, PhD in International Law (University of Tehran, Iran), Advocate (Iran Bar Association)

[email protected]

For years now I have been pointing out that Obama’s lasting legacy would be his ill-advised decision back in 2009 to normalize assassination, which his administration successfully rebranded as “targeted killing”. This was supposed to be the latest and greatest form of “smart war”: the use of unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs), or lethal drones, to go after and eliminate evil terrorists without risking US soldiers’ lives.

It all sounds so slick and, well, Obama cool. The problem is that any sober consideration of Obama’s foreign policy over the course of his eight years as president reveals that the reality is altogether different. Judging by the murder and mayhem being perpetrated all across the Middle East, “smart war” was not so smart after all.

It’s not easy to tease out how much of the mess in the Middle East is specifically due to Obama’s accelerated use of lethal drones in “signature strikes” to kill thousands of military-age men in seven different lands. For he also implemented other, equally dubious initiatives. Planks of Obama’s bloody “smart power” approach included deposing Libya’s dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, and massively arming (from 2012 to 2013) a group of little-understood “appropriately vetted moderate rebels” in Syria.

Adding fuel to the fire, Obama oversaw the largest exportation of homicidal weapons to the Middle East ever undertaken by a single US president. Saudi Arabia wasted no time in using its US (and also UK) military provisions to lay Yemen to waste. Conjoined with Obama’s use of drones in that land, the result has been a horrific civil war in which many civilians have been killed and many civilian structures destroyed.

As if all of this were not bad enough, Obama also managed to drop more than 26K bombs in 2016, after having dropped more than 23K in 2015. Given all of this very warlike behavior in undeclared wars, no one can truly say precisely how much drones are to blame for the ongoing carnage throughout the Middle East. What is beyond dispute is that together these measures culminated in a huge expansion and spread of ISIS and other radical jihadist groups.

At the same time, given the tonnage of bombs dropped by Obama in seven different countries, the use of drones does seem to have led directly to a willingness of the president to use also manned combat aerial vehicles, notably in countries with which the United States was not at war when Obama assumed his office. While his predecessor, George W. Bush, can be properly credited with the destruction of Afghanistan and Iraq, Obama managed to contribute heartily to the destruction of Libya, Yemen, and Syria, while attacking the people of Somalia as well.

Enter Donald J. Trump, who became the new US president on January 21, 2017. On that same day, two drone strikes in Yemen killed a slew of people, three of whom were said to be “suspected Al Qaeda leaders”. The US government has not confirmed that it launched the strikes. It is the policy of the CIA, put in charge by Obama of the drone program “outside areas of active hostilities” (in countries such as Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, et al.), not to share the details of its covert operations. This would seem to imply that the drone strikes on January 21, 2017, were not the doings of the Pentagon, now under the direction of General James “Mad Dog” Mattis, who was sworn in on the same day as the new president.

Trump’s choice for CIA director, Mike Pompeo, has not yet been sworn in, as his confirmation process is still underway. In other words, the drone strikes carried out under the auspices of the CIA this past weekend were done so without a director in place. Obama therefore succeeded not only in normalizing assassination as “targeted killing” when the implements of homicide used are missiles, and they are launched by the CIA, but he also left the killing machine on autopilot. Note that the former CIA director, John Brennan, who first served as Obama’s drone killing czar, before being promoted to director, has spent his time in recent days bashing the new president, not serving as Trump’s interim adviser.

The incineration of military-age men using missiles launched from drones has become so frequent and commonplace that US citizens, including legislators, did not blink an eye at the fact that the killing machine set in motion by President Obama is now effectively on autopilot. It’s worth remembering that, once upon a time, acts of war were to be approved by the congress. Now even acephalic agencies such as the directorless CIA are permitted to use weapons of war to kill anyone whom they deem to be worthy of death. All of this came about because Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Barack “no boots on the ground” Obama wanted to be able to prosecute wars without appearing to prosecute wars. Fait accompli.

Laurie Calhoun, a philosopher and cultural critic, is the author of We Kill Because We Can: From Soldiering to Assassination in the Drone Age(Zed Books, September 2015; paperback forthcoming in 2016) and War and Delusion: A Critical Examination(Palgrave Macmillan 2013; paperback forthcoming in 2016). Visit her website.

Negotiating with terrorists is risky under any circumstances, especially with Turkey one of the key players involved.

Throughout six years of conflict, it supported ISIS, al-Nusra and likeminded groups it now says it opposes. Has Erdogan turned a page or is he engaged in a grand deception for his own self-interest?

He’s long sought annexation of northern Syrian territory. He profited hugely from sale of stolen Syrian oil. He proved many times he can’t be trusted.

Saying he now seeks peaceful conflict resolution can’t be accepted at face value without lots of proving on his part – much more needed than agreements reached with Russia and Iran.

Day one in Astana resolved nothing. Day two concluded with a joint statement, saying Russia, Iran and Turkey will establish a trilateral mechanism for monitoring ceasefire.

They agreed to continue combating ISIS and al-Nusra, as well as other groups breaching the ceasefire, stressing conflict resolution is only possible diplomatically.

Opposition delegation spokesman Yahya al-Aridi said “(t)here will be no signing. The guarantor countries (Russia, Iran and Turkey) will just release a document.”

An unnamed Syrian delegation source said his delegation won’t sign the document. It’s “being drawn up by the guarantor countries in order to present it to other talks participants.”

Astana set the stage for further discussions in Geneva next month. Three previous efforts there failed because of Obama obstructionism.

With Trump rhetorically opposed to US interventionism, hopefully a better outcome is possible this time – by no means certain given Western and regional opposition to Syrian sovereignty, Obama’s war waged for regime change, wanting puppet governance replacing Assad.

If Trump follows through responsibly on what he’s said, he’ll focus solely on combating terrorism. Doing it requires ending US support and cooperating jointly with Russia for a common objective.

From Astana, Putin’s special envoy to Syria Aleksandr Lavrentiev predicted a “good outcome” despite no direct talks between Syrian delegates and their Saudi cobbled together High Negotiations Committee counterparts, representing anti-Assad terrorist groups (excluding ISIS and al-Nusra).

Lavrentiev called day one “fruitful” – diplomatic code language for nothing achieved toward conflict resolution. Monday talks excluded discussions on “such relevant topics as the ceasefire regime, the distinction of opposition forces from Daesh and Al-Nusra Front, and the joint fight against terrorism,” he explained.

On Turkey’s insistence, Kurdish YPG representatives weren’t invited to Astana. On Monday, a statement said they’re “not bound” by decisions reached, if any.

It’s too early to call Astana a major breakthrough. Key is what Trump decides, unknown so far. Tuesday is only his fifth day in office.

Senate members haven’t yet confirmed his secretary of state designee Rex Tillerson. On Monday, he got Senate Foreign Relations Committee approval, assuring his confirmation in short order with Republicans holding a Senate majority.

In a Monday Astana meeting opening statement, Syrian delegation head Bashar al-Jaafari explained hordes of anti-government terrorist fighters were recruited, trained, funded, armed, and deployed cross-border from neighboring countries (mainly Turkey) to wage war on Syrian sovereignty and its people.

“Astana hosting the intra-Syrian meeting represents the mediation policy and the openness of Kazakhstan, and is the fruit of the joint efforts exerted by several parties, particularly Russia and Iran, with the aim of fixing the decision of cessation of hostilities all over Syria except for the areas where terrorist organizations such as ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra and others which rejected to join the agreement are active,” he said.

He blasted the Obama administration and its rogue allies for using terrorist foot soldiers as weapons to destroy Syrian independence.

He hopes talks in Astana and Geneva next month will advance the cause of conflict resolution and peace.

“Syria which we love is the homeland of diversity in all its forms, a homeland where the Syrians believe in the basis and principles of their independent democratic secular state based upon political pluralism, the rule of law, independence of the judiciary system, equality among citizens in rights and duties, guaranteeing cultural and social variety among all spectrum of the Syrian people, as well as maintaining the continuation of the work of the state institutions,” he said.

He called on all parties to work responsibly for ending six years of devastating carnage – while criticizing opposition representatives for inappropriate, undiplomatic, inflammatory remarks at the start of Monday’s session.

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.

Filmmaker Regis Tremblay states what few others dare to say. Humanity is on the brink of extinction! Nuclear power is not safe. 48 of America’s nuclear power plants are leaking and there is no way to get rid of nuclear waste. America’s reckless provocations of both Russia and China, two nuclear-armed countries, risk a nuclear holocaust from which no one survives. Climate change and global warming, if not mitigated immediately, will end the human experiment on earth sooner rather than later.

A shocking documentary that traces the origins of U.S. genocides, military interventions and wars from the 15th century when the white, colonial explorers first came to the Americas to  the very present. American Exceptionalism, Manifest Destiny, and the right to claim the earth  and its resources as their own are the beliefs that are the foundation of American foreign  policy in the 21st Century that has humanity on the brink of extinction.

Dr. Helen Caldicot, Ray McGovern, Chris Hedges, Ann Wright, Peter Kusnick, Bill McKibben, David Vine and other activists, scholars, and authors explain and clarify the crisis and  threats to life on the planet.

The only real hope lies in the result of the epic battle for humanity’s survival between two contrasting world views. On one side is the unipolar, capitalist world-domination by the U.S. enforced by the most lethal military the world has ever seen.

On the other side is a view held by Russia, China and the BRICS nations built on a multi- polar world based on respect, the sovereignty of all nations, international law, the equal value of all people, and cooperation.

So here we are. Humanity’s epic battle for survival. An old  paradigm based on white, colonial domination and empire versus the shared vision of others who are working for a  peaceful world based on justice, international law and the prosperity of all people.

The only question is, will the crazed neocons in Washington, realizing they have lost, take the whole world down with them.

The single fact which make the latest offensive by ISIS eastern Syria so frightening and serious is that the way for it was paved by the US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition.

Before discussing this, let me repeat a point I made for The Duran previously, the truth of which as a Syrian in Syria who is an actual witness of this war I can personally vouch for

In Syria fighters call themselves the “Free Syrian Army” or “Islamic state fighters” or Daesh or by any other name that suits them.  There is nothing “magical” about this.  It is just a  kaleidoscope of names intended to cause confusion.  In reality it is always the same people calling themselves by these different names.

The US and its allies of course know this.  They keep up this game of names so that they can go on pretending that there are “moderates” in Syria who they can support in place of the terrorists they actually support, and that these so-called “moderates” are fit to form a transitional government in place of the legitimate Syrian government and can also be persuaded to fight Daesh.  In Syria nobody is fooled by any of this.

The truth is that the Syrian people are being slaughtered by cold-blooded mercenaries.   They may call themselves the “Free Syrian Army,” “Ahrar Al Sham”,  “Ahlo Al Sonna”, “Jaish Al Esalm” or any of a myriad of other names all of which however simply designate factions affiliated with Al-Qaeda’s local franchise the Al Nusra front.  They are however always the same cold-blooded mercenaries pouring into Syria from Turkey paid for the Gulf Arab states to commit aggression upon Syria’s people

The organisation that is now most commonly called “ISIS”, but which has at various times in its history called itself by different names, is obviously a part of this.

As I have said previously, its phoney “Islamic State” was intentionally created to draw like a magnet Takfiri fighters to Syria in order to get them to wage war on the Syrian people and to break the Axis of Resistance which brings together the people and states of the Middle East (Syria, Hezbollah, Iran and now increasingly Iraq) who resist US-Israeli-Saudi power

The “Islamic State” has been designed to attract  Takfiri fighters from all over the world to join the war against Syria.  That way the war to destroy Syria and break the Axis of Resistance is fought with no shortage of fanatical recruits. The war is sponsored and funded by Saudi Arabia, the true factory of Wahhabism, as well as by countries like Qatar and Turkey.

That this is the case is shown by the fact that whenever the Syrian Arab Army shows pictures of dead ISIS terrorists they turn out to be mostly from Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Tunisia and other places, not from Syria.

That there is a continuity between the fighters who are now called ISIS and the Takfiri fighters who established themselves in the area since the start of the war is easily shown by looking at what has happened in Deir El-Zour.

This area has been under attack from Takfiri fighters since the very start of the war.   At that time they did not call themselves “ISIS” or whatever they call themselves now.  They called themselves the “Free Syrian Army”, and later “Jabhat Al-Nusra” (ie. Al-Qaeda).  Today they call themselves the “Islamic State” (ie. ISIS) but they are and always have been the same cold-blooded terrorists, united under the same slogan – “tell these pro-government people, we are their slaughterers!” – that they have always been.

Once these terrorists established themselves in this area it took them no time to act on their boasts.  They began their reign of terror by murdering two teachers who had come to teach in Deir El-Zour from the coastal regions of Syria’s west (Syrian law required teachers from the more developed regions of western Syria to spend time teaching children in places like Deir El-Zour).

This is how these criminals behave wherever in Syria they establish themselves, regardless of what name they call themselves by.  It is exactly how they behave in ISIS’s phoney capital Al-Raqqa, and in many other places.

The US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition for the first time actively assisted ISIS in this area on 7th December 2015 when it bombed a Syrian military camp in Deir El-Zour, killing (according to the Syrian Foreign Ministry) three Syrian soldiers, and destroying weapons, stores, and equipment.

In September 2016 Israeli and US air strikes took place against Syrian army positions, by the Israelis in the Golan Heights, by the US on 17th September 2016 in Deir El-Zour.  Whilst it is the US air strike which has attracted the most attention, the fact the two strikes happened so close together suggests more than coincidence.

The US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition airstrike of  17th September 2016 struck a key Syrian military position in the Thardeh mountains, which protected the Syrian forces’ key air base in the area.  It killed 83 Syrian soldiers and destroyed vehicles, weapons stores, radar stations, tanks, and other armoured vehicles.

The air strike was immediately followed by an ISIS attack which overran the position, enabling ISIS to break through to the road leading through the Al- Therdah Mountain which the terrorists had been trying – until then unsuccessful – to reach since 2014.

Moreover the US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition has also targeted bridges and power stations in Deir El-Zour in what seems to be an attempt to paralyse the Syrian forces there, hampering the Syrian air force’s ability to carry out air strikes on ISIS positions during the night (by making it impossible for Syrian forces on the ground to distinguish themselves from the Takfiri fighters) and making it more difficult for them to communicate with other Syrian forces elsewhere.

Furthermore  on  8th January, 2017 the US-led “anti- ISIS” coalition carried out a ground operation in eastern Syria, with US Special Forces landing there by helicopter, supposedly aimed at capturing ISIS commanders.   Colonel John Dorrian, the spokesman for the US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition, has confirmed that the raid took place, but has declined to provide details or say whether any ISIS commanders were in fact captured.

Some days after this raid ISIS terrorists attacked Deir El-Zour province on a far bigger scale than they had ever done before.  Not only were they more numerous but they appeared better organised and better armed than they had been at any other time.  Moreover they seemed to have a detailed knowledge of the defence positions of the Syrian army.

Inevitably that makes one wonder what the real purpose of the raid actually was.

The US-led “anti-ISIS” coalition has released no pictures of ISIS captives or of ISIS dead caused by this raid.  All one can say for sure is that after the raid ISIS seemed stronger and better organised, and in possession of more intelligence, than ever before.

During the US election Hillary Clinton spoke about US policy towards ISIS in this way

We’re hoping that within the year we’ll be able to push ISIS out of Iraq and then, you know, really squeeze them in Syria.

It is the results of this policy which we are now seeing in Deir El-Zour.

This escalation is going to cost the Syrians and the Syrian Arab Army many more martyrs.  All this whilst the world looks away, its gaze transfixed by the peace conference in Astana.

In reality the true masters of these armed factions continue to dream of reversing the Syrian, Iranian and Russian victory in Syria, regardless of whatever the negotiators in Astana say to each other.  They are planning to do this by capturing Deir El-Zour, thereby bringing the border between Syria and Iraq under the terrorists’ control, cutting this region off from the rest of Syria.

Deir El-Zour is a vital strategic point in this war.  It is a key link binding together the geography of the Axis of Resistance, which extends all the way from southern Lebanon on the Mediterranean coast, through Damascus further inland, and then through to Baghdad, and on to Tehran.

That is why the USA, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are so anxious for the terrorists to take it.

The Syrian Arab Army, supported by the Russian air force, will however make sure that the task is not easy for them.

Negotiations between the Syrian government and the so-called “opposition groups” kicked off in the Kazakh capital of Astana on January 23. Jaish al-Islam is the biggest militant group which participates in the talks. Another powerbroker, Ahrar al-Sham, which had been set to participate in the negotiations, rejected the idea last week.

In total 15 armed groups arrived to participate in the event. While the involved groups don’t have a united command, they all have one main foreign backer – Turkey. So, de-facto, the success of the Ankara talks will depend on ability of Ankara, Damasucs, Moscow and Tehran to reach some appropriate compromise.

Meanwhile, Anakra has announced that it does not see a reason to push “Assad must go” mantra and prefers to focus on keeping its influence in northern Syria between Jarabulus and Azaz.

The most practical goal of the talks is to agree terms and conditions of the ceasefire in order to improve the humanitarian conditions in the areas where it’s implemented. However, even in this case, many will depend on ability of Ankara to control its proxies on the ground.

The powerful pro-Israel Zionist lobby in Britain, which wields money and influence within parliament, is threatening to bring down the entire Conservative-led government over an escalating row which has been simmering for weeks, long before last week’s Israeli Embassy scandal erupted. Zionist support for Israel has often led to accusations of political manipulation inside the British government and the accusations were apparently vindicated when an embassy official was caught on camera plotting to “take down” MPs who are vocal in their support of Palestine.

However, it has now emerged that while the diplomatic spat between the Israeli Embassy and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has been played out in banner headlines across the front pages, a far more sinister row has been brewing behind the scenes over the British government’s support for UN Security Council Resolution 2334, which condemned Israel’s illegal settlements. In a copy of a redacted email and other material seen by MEMO, a direct threat was made to the chair of Conservative Friends of Israel, Sir Eric Pickles MP, from one of the most senior figures in the Zionist lobby. The email delivers a blunt message: Prime Minister Theresa May and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson should be “made to understand that Jewish support for the Conservative Party at the next General Election is at risk.”

The explosive threat was sent to Pickles and copied in to Lord (Stuart) Polak, a long-term Conservative Friends of Israel director who was given a peerage in 2015. He stood down from his CFI role ahead of his appointment to the House of Lords.

With the bold header of “UNSC Resolution 2334”, the email’s author — whose identity is not known by MEMO — wanted to record his “utter dismay” at the British government’s decision to support the resolution, which was passed just before Christmas. The author, whose name is redacted from the email shown to MEMO, lays the blame entirely at the feet of May and Johnson. “This Resolution does much more than merely restate previous policy positions of the UK government in relation to Israel and the Palestinian Arabs. It labels Jewish holy places – including the Temple Mount and the Western Wall — as existing on ‘occupied Palestinian territory.’ In demanding that Israel return to the 1949 armistice lines the resolution imperils the right of Jewish worship in these places, from which – as you know — Jews were barred between 1948 and 1967.”

The writer expresses regret to have to say that British support for 2334 must call into question the sincerity of the recent statement by Mrs May’s government on 12 December 2016 apparently evincing support for the Jewish state. The writer understands that CFI is writing to the prime minister and seeking an urgent meeting with Johnson. “These steps,” the email continues, “are necessary but insufficient. Mrs May and Mr Johnson must be persuaded to apologise to the Jewish people for their failure to veto 2334. If they do not do so, they must be made to understand that Jewish support for the Conservative Party at the next General Election is at risk.”

Details of this email and other correspondence from within the British Board of Deputies of British Jews, the UK Zionist Federation and the Jewish Leadership Council, clearly threaten to destroy the Tory vote at the next General Election in areas where Jewish voting influence has a major impact, such as Glasgow, Manchester and parts of North West London.

The move prompted an urgent meeting with Tobias Ellwood, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Foreign Office, on Wednesday. While the MP attempted to appease Jonathan Arkush, President of the Board of Deputies, demands were made for face-to-face meetings with May and Johnson.

After the meeting, Ellwood issued what many saw as a placatory statement which read: “While I reiterated the government’s continued belief that settlement building is illegal, I was clear that it is far from the only obstacle to peace and the international community must not forget this. The government is unwavering in its commitment to Israel’s security and we will continue to call out the scourge of Palestinian incitement and terrorism that blights the lives of ordinary Israelis.” Naturally, he made no mention of the brutality of Israel’s military occupation and how that “blights” the lives of all Palestinians.

Following his meeting with Ellwood, Arkush also issued a statement condemning British support for 2334. Around the same time, similar statements were issued by the United Synagogue and the Federation of Synagogues. United Synagogue President Stephen Pack urged his congregation to write to their local MPs.

Days earlier a rally of around 300 pro-Israel supporters was held by leading Zionist groups outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster to add to the pressure on the government.

According to Jewish historian and political analyst Professor Geoffrey Alderman, “In obsessing over an Al-Jazeera scam involving a minor figure reportedly employed by the Israeli Foreign Ministry the press has been following the wrong story. The real action has involved the quite legitimate activities of UK-based Jewish lobbies and Jewish voters. Once UNSC Resolution 2334 had been passed, Conservative Friends of Israel swung into action, using its influence to demand a meeting with Tory foreign minister Boris Johnson.”

He pointed out that the Jewish community in Britain is small – less than 350,000 — but is concentrated in London, South Hertfordshire and Manchester. “Ever since the days of Maggie Thatcher the Jewish vote has been predominantly Conservative. Any mass abstention by Jewish voters would place several Tory-held seats in jeopardy.”

You would have to go back to the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War in October 1973 to find a similar level of anger amongst Jewish voters, he explained. At that time the anger was directed at the Tory embargo on arms shipments to Israel. “We can assume that Ellwood’s 11 January statement condemning Palestinian terrorism was a late attempt to placate this lobby.”

Alderman, a Professor of Politics and Contemporary History at the University of Buckingham, has authored several books, including The Jewish Community in British Politics and British Jewry Since Emancipation. He says that he is neither a member nor supporter of the Conservative Party or Conservative Friends of Israel.

The high profile involvement of the Board of Deputies was criticised severely by Mick Napier, a co-founder of Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign. “The current Zionist leadership of the Board of Deputies of British Jews is more committed to promoting the interests of the Israeli State against the Palestinian people than in furthering any legitimate collective concerns of a group of British citizens. Given that Israel’s settlement building project is a war crime, efforts to align British Jews with such criminality is a reckless and dangerous campaign.”

In the meantime, it has emerged that Israeli diplomats in London issued a warning several months ago that attempts to “operate” British Jewish organisations from Jerusalem could be unlawful. This was long before the Al-Jazeera exposé of the embassy official talking about “taking down” MPs and setting up pro-Israel political groups in British.

“The strategic affairs ministry must understand that ‘operating’ organisations directly from Jerusalem by email and telephone isn’t good for their health,” warned a cable from the embassy in London. “It’s not clear that the strategic affairs ministry understand the local law with regards to the activities of charities.”

The Al-Jazeera documentary, some contents of which were leaked in advance, was actually broadcast on Wednesday. Shai Masot, the official at the centre of the Israeli embassy storm in London, was caught in an undercover sting boasting about plans to “take down” MPs who he regarded as hostile to Israel. One of his targets was Foreign Office Minister Sir Alan Duncan. Israel’s ambassador to the UK, Australian-born Mark Regev, has already issued a grovelling apology to Duncan and said that the embassy considered the remarks “completely unacceptable”.

Described as a “senior political officer” on his business cards, the embassy denied that Masot was a diplomat; it is understood that he will return to Israel before the end of the month. As well as establishing what he has described as “several political support groups in the UK”, Masot claimed credit for persuading the British government to adopt procurement guidelines preventing local authorities and the NHS from boycotting Israeli goods.

The Labour Party and the SNP, along with a number of Conservative MPs, have called for a public inquiry to be launched into what some have described as an issue of “national security”. Others are said to be mystified by Theresa May’s apparent reluctance to take the matter further. This could be explained, however, with the emergence of this latest correspondence which fuels speculation that the prime minister is under pressure not to further anger the powerful Zionist lobby or alienate the Jewish vote.

All of this prompts further questions about how much influence the state of Israel has had on successive British governments and their policies. Anyone who cares anything for democracy in Westminster must have serious concerns about this.

For two days the media have been busy counting people gathering in Washington DC. 90.3% of the voters in Washington DC had chosen Clinton.

A recent DC gathering of a Republican aligned crowd on a rainy work-day attracted many people. A following gathering of a Democratic aligned crowd on a work-free day without rain attracted more people.

The media watched, counted and was “astonished”. Thousands of lines of “political analyses” were written to explain the difference of the crowd size without mentioning the significance of where it happened, what day of the week it happened and the environmental circumstances. The result of such analysis was a lot of bullshit.

The new Trump administration was quite happy about this diversion of attention. It additionally lampooned the media when its new spokesperson condemned the press for not being able to count at all. More lines of bullshit analysis were written about that insult.

Just like during the election campaign the media fell for the cheap stunt and thereby missed the serious processes and the decisions that were taking place behind the curtains.

Today the Trump administration announced the end of the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement:

The president’s withdrawal from the Asian-Pacific trade pact amounted to a drastic reversal of decades of economic policy in which presidents of both parties have lowered trade barriers and expanded ties around the world. Although candidates have often criticized trade deals on the campaign trail, those who made it to the White House, including President Barack Obama, ended up extending their reach.

The NYT seems astonished that, unlike Obama, Trump stood by his words. The media had expected different and was distracted. It failed to report the issue until the decision was taken.

The TPP would have imposed “free trade” on more countries and products. The “free” in those trades would have meant that private companies would have been “free” to overrule national governments and their jurisdiction. They could have sued for “compensation” if a country, for public health or environmental reasons, rejected or hindered one of their businesses. Everyone should be happy that this monster died.

In another policy surprise a new coordination between Russian and U.S. intelligence circles in Syria is bearing fruits:

Russia has received coordinates of Daesh targets in Al-Bab, Aleppo Province, from the US via the ‘direct line,’ the Russian Defense Ministry said Monday.The United States has provided coordinates of the terrorists’ targets in the city of Al-Bab in Aleppo province for Russian airstrikes. After the reconnaissance check, Russia and two coalition jets have conducted joint airstrikes on the Daesh targets in the region.

The U.S. military seems to deny:

Any involvement or participation of American assets on the ground in country, in support of a series of Russian airstrikes against the northern Syrian town of al-Bab was “100 percent false,” said Pentagon spokesman Maj. Adrian Rankine-Galloway.

The U.S. coalition spokesperson also said it is:

“not coordinating airstrikes with the Russian military in Syria”

Before jumping up and down and claiming that the Russians are lying the media should take a fine comb and reread the statements.

The DoD only denied it coordinated airstrikes or helped with “assets on the ground”. It does not deny the transfer of coordinates. The Russians do not claim U.S. airplanes took part in the mission – only “coalition jets”. Turkey is part of the U.S. coalition and coordinates airstrikes with the Russian forces in Syria:

Earlier, Russian and Turkish combat planes have carried out a new series of joint airstrikes against Daesh targets in war-torn Syria, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Monday.”The Russian and Turkish planes carried out joint airstrikes against Islamic State terrorists in the outskirts of the town of al-Bab in Aleppo province on January 21,” the ministry said in a statement.

The Russian statement is likely as correct as the DoD statement.

The political significance here is the transfer of ISIS targeting coordinates from some U.S. agency directly to the Russian forces in Syria. That is something Russia has asked for for over a year and it now suddenly seems to happen.

This is next to the TTP decision a second significant change under Trump the media missed to report on as it developed.

While the blustering against Trump in U.S. media as well as in some countries abroad goes on and on, serious decisions are taken and implemented by the new administration. The media fail in some systematic way. Minor diversions from “political correctness” are blown up into big headlines while big policy decisions pass unnoticed. It is simple: The task with reporting on the Trump administration is the same as with any politician. Do not listen to what they say, watch what they do. It is high time for the media to get back to that basic rule.

Digression:

As a German I am embarrassed on how much my government failed to anticipate Trump and, since he is elected, fails to prepare for the coming onslaught on its export orientated economic model. Wages in Germany were held down by all means (including by importing additional workforce from Syria and elsewhere) and a huge export surplus was created that benefited only a few moneyed pockets. The scheme created a huge imbalance in Europe and the credit crisis in Spain, Greece and elsewhere. Trump’s policies will finally blow this model apart.

But neither of the ruling parties in Germany has yet developed an alternative or prepared a way towards one. Germany needs to re-orientate its industry from export to local consumption. That requires higher buying power for the general public via higher wages and lower taxes. A lower degressive VAT compensated by higher progressive taxes on non-work income would be a way to go. If such steps are delayed the economic damage will be serious and further open the way for a demagogic right.

On his first Monday in office, Trump hit the ground running, convening an advisory panel on manufacturing led by Dow Chemical CEO Andrew Liveris.

Other business leaders from Dell, Whirlpool, Ford, Johnson and Johnson, Lockheed Martin, Arconic, US Steel, Telsa Motors, Under Armour Inc, International Paper and Corning were present.

Trump promised regulatory reductions of 75% or more, significant corporate tax cuts, and a “very major” border tax on products imported by US companies made abroad, saying:

If you go to another country and you decide that you are going to close (a US factory) and get rid of 2,000 people or 5,000 people, we are going to be imposing a very major border tax on the product when it comes in, which I think is fair.

“Buy American and hire American” is what his America first policy is all about.

He told business leaders if they plan new domestic plant construction or expansions, they’ll get “approvals really fast.”

He signed executive orders withdrawing from job-killing, anti-consumer TPP and on renegotiating NAFTA with Canada and Mexico, ahead of planned afternoon meetings with labor leaders and workers.

His Friday inaugural address highlighted “rusted-out factories scattered like tombstones across the landscape of our nation. (America) “made other countries rich while the wealth, strength and confidence of our country has disappeared over the horizon,” he said, vowing to turn things around.

In earlier campaign addresses to the Detroit and New York Economic Clubs, he outlined the following regulatory steps he’d take if elected:

• ask all department heads to submit lists of regulations impeding jobs creation for elimination, providing public safety isn’t compromised.

• revamp the entire regulatory code to keep jobs and wealth at home.

• end regulations destroying jobs in US communities and inner cities. “We will stop punishing Americans for working and doing business in the United States,” he said.

• temporarily halt new agency regulations not urged by Congress or needed for public safety – to incentivize US companies to invest domestically and create jobs. “We will no longer regulate our companies and our jobs out of existence,” he said.

• immediately cancel all “illegal and overreaching executive orders.”

• eliminate “our most intrusive regulations…”

• reduce “the size of our already bloated government after a thorough agency review.”

His immediate priority is getting Senate confirmation for his agency heads and other officials. Democrats slowed the process instead of letting it move ahead smoothly.

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.

 

Los secretarios de Hacienda  y de Economía del gobierno de México, Luis Videgaray e Ildefonso Guajardo, respectivamente, serán la avanzada del presidente Enrique Peña Nieto en su excursión a Washington  el próximo 31 de enero.

Conviene puntualizar que, en el equipaje de esos enviados mexicanos, el texto principal del alegato con sus pares norteamericanos lleva una etiqueta: Resistencia a la restauración del proteccionismo.

Por supuesto, en las mesas de alto nivel se conocerá el discurso de los emisarios mexicanos al respecto. Pero, por lo escuchado en México al menos desde el otoño de 2015, ese planteamiento, que pareció irreversible, será el leitmotiv de las conversaciones.

La posición del gobierno mexicano se fijó a punto de formalizarse la inserción del país en el Acuerdo Transpacífico de Asociación Comercial (ATP), cuyo bastión eran en aquellos meses los Estados Unidos, gobernados por Barack Obama.

Hoy mismo se divulga la declaración de la Casa Blanca en el sentido de que Estados Unidos se retira del ATP. De esa brocha, México se ha quedado colgado pero, por lo anunciado hace unas horas por el presidente Peña Nieto, su gobierno se aferrará a la tabla de supervivencia del Tratado de Libre Comercio de América del Norte (TLCAN).

A ese efecto, el presidente mexicano agregó dos nuevas zanahorias: El inclusión en el clausulado del TLCAN de los sectores Energía y Telecomunicaciones.

El mexiquense anuncia que asistirá al encuentro con Donald Trump con la convicción de que es una cita entre dos países soberanos, en cuyo caso México dialogará “con seguridad, dignidad, firmeza, confianza y la fortaleza” de México. Soberanía de por medio, pues.

La significación del encuentro con Theresa May

En la agenda del nuevo ocupante de la Casa Blanca, desde la semana pasada se anunció como prioridad recibir a la primera ministra del Gran Bretaña, Theresa May.

No es ese un dato menor: Tomar en cuenta que la señora May es sucesora de Margaret Thatcher, quien, con el republicano  Ronald Reagan en la Casa Blanca, proclamaron hace más de tres décadas la Revolución conservadora, punto de partida de la globalización neoliberal.

Para efectos prácticos, Theresa May es la antípoda de Margaret Thatcher. Arribó a su encargo como consecuencia del triunfo del Brexit por el que el Reino Unido abandona la Unión Europea.

La significación de ese retiro de Reino Unidos de la UE, radica en que el referéndum fue ganado en 2016 por los más radicales sectores nacionalistas.

Ese es el punto: Sin una declaración explícita de la señora May, los especialistas en Relaciones Internacionales la inscriben en la nómina de gobiernos que, encabezados por Rusia e India, algunos regímenes del Medio Oriente, al menos cuatro latinoamericanos, cada uno con sus peculiaridades, profesan como doctrina política el nacionalismo. ¿Es casual que a Trump se le conceptúe como “amigo” de Vladimir Putin?

En el marco de la reunión del Foro Económico Mundial, reunido en Davos, Suiza, aquella fue una de las preocupaciones más recurrentes.

Si, de acuerdo con los expertos, la globalización va de retirada desplazada por los nuevos nacionalismos, ¿México seguirá embarcado en una embarcación que navega a contracorriente? Es pregunta.

 Mouris Salloum George

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

Para realizar el análisis de cuáles podrían ser los impactos del gobierno de Trump sobre el Mercosur debe tenerse en cuenta, en primer lugar, que la economía mundial se encuentra en un punto de inflexión: la globalización está retrayéndose y es cuestionada en los países periféricos y en los países centrales. En efecto, genera desocupación estructural, precarización del trabajo y el descenso en el nivel de vida de amplios sectores en los países centrales y, como contracara, provoca la sobre explotación de la mano de obra en los países periféricos.

El programa económico de Trump está dirigido, en parte, a los desplazados de la globalización a los que les prometió reindustrializar los Estados Unidos para que haya fuentes de trabajo para los norteamericanos.

Con ese fin realizaría una política de sustitución de importaciones, cuyos principales instrumentos serían: aumento de los aranceles a la entrada de productos “maquilados”;  redefinir y acotar los tratados de libre comercio, como el NAFTA;  rechazar los tratados plurilaterales como el Transpacífico; bajar los impuestos y subsidiar a las corporaciones que vuelvan a producir dentro de los Estados Unidos.

Para aumentar el nivel de actividad realizaría un shock de demanda tipo keynesiano a través de grandes inversiones en infraestructura financiada en parte por el Estado y en parte por el sector privado, la asociaciones público privadas. La expulsión de los trabajadores inmigrantes “ilegales” -que tienen menores salarios y prestaciones- es otra de las medidas para favorecer  a la mano de obra local. Todo esto enmarcado en un discurso xenófobo,  básicamente contra mexicanos y  musulmanes.

Otro punto de su plataforma de indudable importancia es su rechazo a los acuerdos contra el calentamiento global y su decisión de utilizar al máximo las energías tradicionales, incluido el fracking.

El Mercosur en la periferia

Con la profundización de la crisis han caído sustancialmente los precios de los productos primarios que exportan los países periféricos y se procesa un debilitamiento económico de los mismos y un empobrecimiento creciente de las clases subordinadas.

Complementariamente se está revalorizando el valor del dólar y su papel como principal moneda internacional mientras pierden peso las monedas que se plantearon como alternativas, caso del Euro,  y se deprecian las monedas de los países periféricos.

En ese marco el Mercosur fue severamente afectado con el cambio de ciclo de los precios de sus exportaciones lo cual produjo procesos recesivos en las principales economías del bloque: Argentina y Brasil.

Las políticas de conciliación de clases impulsadas por los gobiernos progresistas decayeron fuertemente por la falta de recursos para atender simultáneamente los requerimientos de los trabajadores, los capitalistas y amplios sectores de la población desocupada o con trabajos precarios que dependen básicamente de las políticas sociales. Por supuesto, a todo lo anterior debe sumársele la corrupción y el burocratismo.

La derecha retomó el gobierno en Argentina, Brasil y Paraguay con posiciones claramente favorables a la firma de acuerdos de libre comercio con los Estados Unidos y, consecuentemente, a la expulsión de Venezuela del Mercosur, habilitado por la abstención de Uruguay que podría haber vetado esta decisión.

 La relación económica

En primer lugar hay que señalar que ni el Mercosur como bloque, ni ninguno de sus países miembros, tiene acuerdos de libre comercio con Estados Unidos y sólo dos países, Argentina (1991) y Uruguay (2005) tienen tratados bilaterales de inversión con dicho país.

La Inversión Extranjera Directa (IED) de los Estados Unidos en los países miembros del Mercosur es relativamente baja, según lo reporta la CEPAL en su informe sobre la IED de 2016. A título de ejemplo, la mayor economía del bloque, Brasil recibe de Estados Unidos 14% del total de la IED, 22% de los Países Bajos y 50% de otros países europeos. En los casos de Argentina y Paraguay, la participación de la IED estadounidense, en 2014, es cercana al 40%; en Uruguay solo llega al 5%. Debe tenerse en cuenta que, aproximadamente, las tres cuartas partes de la IED que llega de Estados Unidos al Mercosur va a Brasil, otra cuarta parte a Argentina y solo un uno por ciento a Paraguay.

Las exportaciones del Mercosur a Estados Unidos llegaron en 2015 a 13,2%, lo que representa solo 2% del total de importaciones de los Estados Unidos. Así lo registró la CEPAL en el “Panorama de la inserción internacional de América Latina y el Caribe – 2016”. Cabe destacar que los productos exportados son en su mayor parte bienes primarios que no desplazan mano de obra estadounidense y no serían afectados por las medidas proteccionistas.

A partir de estos datos, se podría conjeturar que las medidas que se apresta a implementar Trump no tendrían un impacto económico directo y significativo sobre el Mercosur, aunque es muy probable que los impactos que estas políticas tendrán en México y Centroamérica lo afecten en forma indirecta.

Aspectos geopolíticos

Desde el punto de vista geopolítico, para la administración Trump el verdadero enemigo es China, tanto por lo que denomina “competencia desleal”, como por la amenaza que significa la enorme masa de dólares en poder del gobierno chino.

Barak Obama también actuó frente a China como un “enemigo económico” a desplazar para lo cual impulso un conjunto de acuerdos plurilaterales que excluían a China, en particular el Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) y el Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) que  restringirían la expansión comercial y la presencia de la IED China en el mundo.

La estrategia de Trump es mucho más confrontativa planteando un profundo distanciamiento comercial con China y una política de alianzas con Rusia y sus aliados para lograr la estabilidad en Oriente Medio garantizando el acceso al petróleo y reduciendo el flujo de refugiados. Busca, también, el acercamiento con todas aquellas fuerzas políticas europeas de derecha que tienen como bases sociales a los desplazados por la globalización, tales como los líderes del Brexit en Gran Bretaña y Marie Le Pen en Francia.

Con esa misma lógica sus aliados naturales en el Mercosur serán los países gobernados por la derecha –Argentina, Brasil y Paraguay– quienes han acordado la suspensión, paso previo a la expulsión, de Venezuela.

El enemigo, por supuesto, será el gobierno de Venezuela y, obviamente, todos aquellos que fomenten el avance Chino en el continente.

La derecha política y los grandes grupos económicos que operan en el Mercosur –al igual que en los Estados Unidos– hubieran preferido que continuara la estrategia norteamericana basada en los  tratados de “nueva generación”  como el TPP que, según fue anunciado, sería rechazado por Trump. Con dichos tratados buscaban la profundización, hasta sus últimas consecuencias, del modelo de acumulación vigente, lo que implicaba la expansión del capital a los ámbitos que aún están en manos del Estado y la consolidación de una nueva estructura institucional favorable al capital transnacional.

A modo de conclusión

La era Trump augura un proceso de agudización de las contradicciones entre los sectores  ligados al capital transnacional – principales impulsores y beneficiarios de la globalización – y sectores ligados a la producción para el  gigantesco mercado interno norteamericano. El resultado de esa disputa incidirá, sin duda, en las políticas económicas que se apliquen en el Mercosur, pero no afectará la alianza estratégica de las clases dominantes, ni las políticas de sobre explotación del trabajo y de los bienes comunes.

Cualquiera sea la fracción ganadora y los instrumentos que utilice la clase trabajadora debera enfrentar un acrecentamiento de la ofensiva del capital.

Antonio Elías

Antonio Elías: Máster en Economía,  docente de la Universidad de la Republica, Vicepresidente de la Sepla, miembro de Redem y Director del Instituto de  Estudios Sindicales (INESUR). 

A Associação Revolucionária das Mulheres do Afeganistão (RAWA, na sigla em inglês), organização clandestina e independente de mulheres afegãs que atuam no anonimato em favor dos direitos humanos, especialmente feministas, luta contra quatro inimigos em solo afegão: os senhores da guerra da Aliança do Norte colocada no poder pelos Estados Unidos em 2001, a ocupação norte-americana, o Taliban, e o Estado Islamita recém-surgido.

A representante da RAWA, que se identifica como Friba, concedeu esta entrevista sobre a situação de seu país há 15 anos de ocupação dos Estados Unidos sob promessa de promover liberdade, igualdade e justiça. A voz de Friba, que representa a dos mais de 30 mil afegãos inocentes assassinados e mais de 100 mil feridos por atos de terror e crimes de guerra desde outubro de 2001, enfrenta sérios riscos em um país historicamente estratégico para as grandes potências, e dos mais efervescentes do planeta hoje.

A militante afegã traz à luz fatos ocultados pela mídia predominante que explicam a atual conjuntura global, especialmente as causas do terrorismo e as reais intenções do Império agonizante em promover guerras, e perpetuar ocupações militares. “Os Estados Unidos não se interessam pela prosperidade do Afeganistão. Instabilidade, insegurança, pobreza, analfabetismo e outros problemas sociais e econômicos profundamente enraizados, ajudam os Estados Unidos e seu governo fantoche a permanecer no poder”, afirma a entrevistada, direto de Cabul.

“Os Estados Unidos cometeram crimes hediondos no Afeganistão na década passada, matando milhares de pessoas inocentes em ataques aéreos e incursões noturnas, e torturando afegãos inocentes em seus locais negros dentro de suas bases”, afirma a pacifista ao comentar a “Guerra ao Terror” que, apenas nos primeiros meses, matou muito mais inocentes que nos ataques em solo norte-americano há 15 anos, que apenas tem gerado mais radicalismo e violência no Oriente Médio, e em todo o mundo.

A seguir, a situação afegã vivida por dentro segundo a combativa líder da RAWA, uma das tantas heroínas anônimas de um dos países mais pobres e oprimidos pela propalada Operação Liberdade Duradoura dos Estados Unidos e da OTAN, formulada nos porões do poder global para levar caos e servir como pretexto para uma guerra sem fim.

Edu Montesanti: Por favor, fale sobre a RAWA e as dificuldades que seu país enfrenta hoje.

Friba: A Associação Revolucionária das Mulheres do Afeganistão é a mais antiga organização das mulheres no Afeganistão, a qual luta por liberdade, democracia, justiça social e secularismo.

A fundadora da RAWA foi Meena, quem formou este grupo ainda jovem, em 1977, com a ajuda de algumas outras estudantes universitárias em Cabul. Meena foi assassinada em Quetta, Paquistão em 1987 por agentes do KHAD (sucursal afegã da KGB), com a ajuda do grupo fundamentalista sanguinário de Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. Ela tinha apenas 30 anos de idade.

O que distingue a RAWA de outras associações é o fato de que somos uma organização política. Quando a RAWA foi fundada, o Afeganistão estava sob a opressão do governo fantoche da União Soviética e, posteriormente, da invasão russa, e Meena percebeu que a luta por independência, liberdade e justiça era inseparável da luta pelos direitos das mulheres.

Depois do martírio de Meena, a RAWA deu seguimento à luta contra os fundamentalistas islamitas afegãos e seus apoiadores internacionais, o que faz até hoje. A RAWA ainda atua na clandestinidade na maior parte do Afeganistão, e enfrenta enormes dificuldades.

Os líderes jihadistas, senhores da guerra com passados sangrentos de crimes horríveis, estão no controle do atual governo e do parlamento, e tem seus domínios separados em diferentes partes do Afeganistão. Abdullah Abdullah, o chefe de Estado do Afeganistão, é um desses líderes jihadistas que pertence ao grupo criminoso de Shorae Nizar.

Isso cria uma situação perigosa para nós já que esses bandidos, nossos maiores inimigos, não param de dificultar nosso trabalho e nos prejudicar. Em outras partes do Afeganistão, onde os fundamentalistas talibans estão no controle, a RAWA enfrenta a mesma opressão. Todas as nossas ativistas usam pseudônimos por precaução, e nunca podemos aparecer em público com nosso trabalho.

Apesar destes obstáculos, ainda é possível continuarmos as atividades políticas na maior parte do país devido ao nosso contato com os habitantes locais, e ao fato de que o ódio destes contra aqueles criminosos traduz-se em apoio a nós.

Nossas atividades políticas incluem a publicação de revistas e artigos, a mobilização de mulheres para que adquiram esta consciência e, assim, juntem-se à nossa luta. Coletamos e documentamos assassinatos, estupros, roubos, extorsões e outros crimes desses senhores da guerra, nas partes mais remotas do Afeganistão.

Nossas atividades sociais são proporcionar educação às mulheres – e não apenas as aulas de alfabetização, mas também a consciência social e política quanto aos seus direitos e como alcançá-los -, ajuda emergencial, criação de orfanatos e atividades relacionadas à saúde.

Edu Montesanti: Como está o Afeganistão hoje, 15 anos após a invasão norte-americana?

Friba: Os Estados Unidos cometeram crimes hediondos no Afeganistão na década passada, matando milhares de pessoas inocentes em ataques aéreos e incursões noturnas, e torturando os afegãos inocentes em suas prisões secretas dentro de suas bases militares.

O massacre de Bala Baluk na província de Farah em 2009, que matou 147 afegãos inocentes, o massacre de Panjwai na província de Kandahar em 2012, que matou 16 afegãos inocentes, a matança de doze crianças inocentes na província de Kunar em 2013, e o ataque ao hospital de Médicos sem Fronteiras em 2015, na província de Kunduz, que matou 42 e feriu mais de 30 pessoas, são apenas alguns casos envolvendo derramamento de sangue causados por forças dos Estados Unidos e da OTAN no Afeganistão.

Apesar disso, a maior traição dos Estados Unidos ao Afeganistão é a reedição de criminosos fundamentalistas islamitas no poder. Como a história tem mostrado sempre e o presente prova, nenhuma intervenção ou ocupação estrangeira é inteiramente bem-sucedida sem a cooperação de um grupo de traiçoeiros internos, mercenários do país ocupante.

Hoje, o Afeganistão é governado por senhores da guerra fundamentalistas sanguinários e criminosos que compactuam com a ideologia do Taliban, e que cometeram crimes piores do que os do Taliban no passado. A Aliança do Norte, composta pelos elementos mais traiçoeiros e misóginos dos senhores da guerra e comandantes militares, foi imposta ao nosso povo através de três eleições historicamente fraudulentas.

Esses criminosos provocaram a guerra civil de 1992 a 1996 que matou mais de 65 mil civis em Cabul, e saquearam a cidade. Suas milícias cometeram assassinatos sistemáticos, estupros, estupros coletivos, extorsões, roubos, detenções arbitrárias, cortaram os seios das mulheres, cravaram pregos em crânios, realizaram rituais de matança horrível e centenas de outros crimes. Em vez de enfrentar a acusação nos tribunais internacionais por tais crimes, esses assassinos desfrutam da mais absoluta impunidade e engordam suas contas bancárias, com o apoio do Ocidente.

Inúmeros relatórios de organismos internacionais como a Human Rights Watch e a Anistia Internacional documentaram os crimes cometidos pelos poderosos senhores da guerra em todo o Afeganistão, tanto no passado quanto no presente. Apesar disso, sabemos que este apoio é inabalável e continuará por décadas.

O novo governo do Afeganistão, denominado “Governo de Unidade Nacional”, é dirigido pelos mercenários de longa-data dos Estados Unidos, Ashraf Ghani e Abdullah Abdullah, ambos da Aliança do Norte que estavam unidos em um acordo quebrado por John Kerry, após os dois não terem concordado com os resultados das fraudulentas e repugnantes eleições presidenciais, repleta de sujeira; o resultado daquelas eleições foi oficialmente lançado um ano depois!

O vice de Ashraf Ghani é Rashid Dostum e outro foi Sarwar Danish, famosos criminosos enquanto os companheiros de chapa de Abdullah foram Mohammad Khan e Mohammad Mohaqiq, outros dois criminosos bem conhecidos. A primeira medida do novo governo foi assinar o Acordo de Segurança Bilateral, que legitima a presença a longo prazo dos Estados Unidos em nossa pátria, e foi o documento que oficialmente vendeu nossa independência aos Estados Unidos.

Não há nenhuma cara nova no governo. A única diferença é que, desta vez, os famosos criminosos das facções Khalq e Parcham, que eram marionetes da União Soviética, também têm recebido uma parte do poder apesar de terem sido incriminados em uma Lista da Morte que revelou os nomes de cinco mil ativistas políticos e intelectuais, mortos pelo regime nas décadas de 1970 e de 1980.

É desnecessário dizer que tal regime fantoche não pode trazer paz, liberdade, democracia, justiça e os direitos das mulheres, mesmo que se submeta a eleições cem vezes.

Segundo a ONU, o alcance do Taliban hoje é o mais amplo desde 2001. Os ataques suicidas do Taliban e a guerra constante entre o governo afegão e Taliban, fizeram um inferno na vida do nosso povo. A taxa de mortalidade civil em 2015 foi a maior já registrada, sendo que grande parte das vítimas era composta de mulheres e crianças.

Enquanto as feridas que o Taliban causou ao nosso povo ainda estão sangrando, as negociações de paz estão em andamento para incluir o Taliban no governo. Em vez de colocá-los em julgamento pelos crimes hediondos, estão sendo convidados para o governo com o objetivo de completar o círculo de fundamentalistas criminosos e mercenários no Afeganistão. Como pode uma força tão criminosa trazer paz ao tomar o poder?

Hoje, a economia do Afeganistão está em frangalhos. Mais de 60 bilhões de dólares foram doados ao Afeganistão para o propalado esforço de reconstrução, mas nem sequer alguns centavos chegaram ao nosso povo enquanto encheram os bolsos da máfia, dentro e fora do governo. Nos últimos treze anos nenhum projeto contribuiu para a reconstrução da base do país. Nenhuma infra-estrutura básica foi construída no país, e o desemprego atinge novos picos a cada dia.

A pobreza e a fome no Afeganistão estão entre as mais altas do mundo, apenas comparável às nações africanas. O Afeganistão tem a maior taxa de mortalidade infantil do mundo, milhões de pessoas sofrem de fome e desnutrição. 25% das crianças no Afeganistão trabalham para alimentar suas famílias, o que as impede de frequentar a escola e de ter acesso a outros direitos básicos.

O Afeganistão foi considerado o país mais corrupto do mundo nos últimos anos. Graças à invasão norte-americana, o Afeganistão é hoje um narco-Estado. Não é apenas o maior produtor de drogas fornecendo 90% do ópio mundial, mas também tem o maior índice [proporcional, grifo nosso] de usuários de drogas, com cerca de três milhões de viciados. Na recente entrevista coletiva de Londres, Ashraf Ghani afirmou que do lucro de 500 bilhões de dólares de drogas no Afeganistão, 480 bilhões fluíram para a Europa.

Isto não apenas revela o fracasso do Ocidente em sua chamada guerra contra as drogas no Afeganistão, como também suscita dúvidas em relação ao seu envolvimento neste negócio.

Edu Montesanti: Anos atrás, a escritora, ativista pelos direitos humanos e ex-parlamentar expulsa injustamente do cargo, Malalaï Joya, denunciou que a CIA segue coordenando o tráfico de drogas a partir do Afeganistão. Em uma entrevista por correio eletrônico (censurada) ao jornal brasileiro O Tempo, mais tarde enviada para mim na íntegra também por correio eletrônico, ela afirmou que “a economia de narcóticos do Afeganistão é um projeto traçado pela CIA, apoiada pela política externa dos Estados Unidos. Há relatos no Afeganistão de que até mesmo o Exército norte-americano está envolvido no tráfico de drogas. A máfia da droga faz parte dos porões do poder, apoiada pelo Ocidente”. O que você pode dizer sobre isso?

Friba: Nós apoiamos fortemente esta declaração de Malalaï Joya, baseada em fatos.

A CIA tem uma longa história de envolvimento no comércio global de drogas em todas as partes do mundo, sob controle dos Estados Unidos ou onde Washington exerce considerável influência. Alguns poucos casos foram investigados e expostos por jornalistas, mas a questão permanece encoberta.

A história da CIA começou na década de 1980. As drogas foram vistas como a maneira mais rápida e mais fácil de se obter dinheiro para financiar representantes da CIA e as forças paramilitares que os serviam, em diferentes países. Gary Webb, o corajoso jornalista que expôs o escândalo do tráfico de drogas dos Contra da Nicarágua, e que acabou sendo levado ao suicídio por uma extensa campanha de difamação pela grande mídia, descreveu o processo desta maneira:

“Nós [CIA] precisamos de dinheiro para uma operação secreta, e a maneira mais rápida para aumentá-lo é vendendo cocaína; vocês a venderão em algum lugar, não queremos saber nada sobre isso.”

Essa tática funcionou com muito sucesso no Afeganistão durante a Guerra Fria, quando as forças mujahideen que servem os EUA foram financiadas através das drogas.

Antes da invasão dos Estados Unidos em 2001, os campos de plantação de papoula foram erradicadas pelos talibans. Logo após a invasão dos Estados Unidos, a produção de drogas começou a aumentar drasticamente, e hoje o Afeganistão produz 90% do ópio do mundo, à beira de se tornar um narco-Estado. Há relatos de que as forças norte-americanas admitem que as drogas são transportadas a partir do Afeganistão em aviões norte-americanos.

Ahmed Wali Karzai, irmão do fantoche dos EUA, Hamid Karzai, ex-governador hoje morto na província de Kandahar, foi ao mesmo tempo o maior traficante não apenas do Afeganistão, mas da região. O tempo todo, ele esteva na folha de pagamento da CIA.

Houve, até mesmo, alegações por parte de oficiais norte-americanos diretamente envolvidos nas operações de drogas no Afeganistão sobre o envolvimento da CIA. Um agente da DEA [Drug Enforcement Administration, agência de fachada dos Estados Unidos, teoricamente anti-narcóticos que funciona como órgão da agência de inteligência norte-americana em todo o mundo], Edwrad Follis, afirmou que a CIA “fechou os olhos” para o tráfico de drogas no Afeganistão. Mais recentemente, John Abbotsford, ex-analista da CIA e veterano de guerra que lutou no Afeganistão, confessou que a CIA desempenhava seu papel em operações de contrabando de drogas.

Mesmo se excluirmos estas reivindicações e relatórios, é difícil acreditar que uma superpotência que possui a mais moderna tecnologia em vigilância e coleta de informações, não consegue encontrar campos de ópio e nem rastrear rotas de fornecimento dentro de um país que ocupa. O fato de que 8 bilhões de dólares foram gastos em esforços de erradicação da droga durante a última década, mas a produção de ópio tem apenas subido, é por si só uma indicação de que o negócio da droga serve a algum interesse dos Estados Unidos no Afeganistão, ou que teria sido concluído há muito tempo.

Outras protagonistas desses tão chamados esforços “antinarcóticos” são empresas privadas norte-americanas que ganham milhões de dólares por meio de contratos antinarcóticos. Uma das maiores beneficiárias é a notória empresa militar Blackwater, agora conhecida como Academi que, de acordo com a [rede de notícias] Russia Today, ganhou 569 milhões de dólares através desses contratos. Empreiteiras privadas têm uma enorme parcela sobre os lucros da guerra no Afeganistão, e essa fracassada guerra às drogas proporciona enormes lucros a elas.

Na verdade, uma das razões para a invasão do Afeganistão pelos Estados Unidos é que os norte-americanos devem manter o controle sobre o negócio de narcóticos, terceiro mais importante produto de comércio em termos de rendimento, depois do negócio das armas e do petróleo.

Edu Montesanti: Qual a situação das mulheres no Afeganistão hoje, as quais os Estados Unidos prometeram libertar da forte misoginia local em 2001?

Friba: A terrível situação das mulheres afegãs sob o regime de mentalidade medieval do Taliban foi explorada pelos Estados Unidos como uma das principais razões para invadir o Afeganistão em 2001. Vejamos como esta “libertação” foi cumprida.

Como todas as pessoas do Afeganistão, as mulheres estão esmagados entre diversas forças em uma guerra contínua, e a insegurança que assola nosso país por mais de uma década: os Estados Unidos e seus aliados, os jihadistas e fundamentalistas do Taliban, e o recém-surgido ISIS [Estado Islamita].

O Parlamento tentou legalizar o apedrejamento até a morte por adultério, a surra na esposa e assassinato em nome da honra [do homem]. A maioria das mulheres em prisões afegãs hoje foram condenadas pelo Judiciário misógino por “crimes morais”, tais como fugir de casa de maridos e de sogros crueis, fugir com amante, etc.

Inúmeros casos de amarração pública e execuções foram realizados pelos tribunais simulados de talibans, senhores da guerra locais e mulás em todas as partes do Afeganistão.

A situação das mulheres hoje é catastrófica. A violência contra as mulheres subiu a níveis sem precedentes hoje. As mulheres sofrem de violência doméstica, estupro, estupro coletivo, abuso sexual, homicídio, imolação, o assassinato honroso, casamentos forçados a menores de idade com homens muito mais velhos que elas, troca de meninas no casamento por mercadorias, e dezenas de outras desgraças semelhantes. As meninas têm sido torturadas nos porões, têm tido narizes, lábios e orelhas decepados, têm sido privadas de comida e espancadas até a morte, pelas famílias ou pelos sogros. O que ficamos sabendo através da mídia é apenas a ponta do iceberg.

Em 2001, os Estados Unidos e seus aliados usaram a situação das mulheres afegãs como pretexto para ocupar o Afeganistão; eles usaram especialmente a imagem de uma mulher afegã chamada Zarmina, assassinada publicamente pelo Taliban no estádio esportivo de Cabul. Contudo, apenas algumas semanas atrás uma mulher afegã foi executada publicamente de maneira semelhante, e os meios de comunicação ocidentais fecharam os olhos diante disso, e ainda não relataram o fato.

As taxas de auto-imolação atingiram novos picos. Muitas mulheres queimam-se vivas ao não enxergar outra solução aos seus problemas. Os legisladores, magistrados e policiais em todo o Afeganistão são fundamentalistas misóginos que impõem suas mentalidades anti-feministas em forma de leis, e oferecem impunidade total aos autores desses horrendos crimes. É natural que, em tal situação, a violência contra as mulheres apenas vai continuar subindo.

No ano passado, o Afeganistão testemunhou o crime mais horrível já cometido contra uma mulher afegã em plena luz do dia, no centro de Cabul, debaixo o nariz dos policiais locais e do governo. Farkhunda, estudante de 26 anos de idade, foi linchada por uma multidão de bandidos que, falsamente, acusaram-na de ter queimado o Alcorão. Ela levou chutes, socos, foi atropelada por um carro, apedrejada e, em seguida, queimada e jogada no seco rio de Cabul. A maioria dos assassinos de Farkhunda foram liberados dias após a detenção. Dos quatro detidos, um foi condenado a apenas dez anos de prisão, e os outros três a 20 anos. Suas penas de morte foram revogadas em sessões de julgamento ridiculamente curtas.

Mais tarde, ainda no ano passado, Rukhshana de 19 anos foi apedrejada até a morte por um tribunal desonesto do Taliban em uma província ocidental do Afeganistão dominada por mulás, por ter fugido. Seus gritos ecoaram por todo o país enquanto ela era lentamente assassinada por uma multidão enfurecida de talibans. Uma delegação foi enviada por Ashraf Ghani, presidente afegão, para investigar e punir os autores dos crimes. A delegação foi chefiada por um mulá, que apoiou o Taliban e defendeu abertamente o apedrejamento da jovem como sendo islamita e juridicamente legal, alguns dias após o incidente. A investigação foi, sem surpresa, inútil.

Talvez o reflexo mais claro da mentalidade da atual legislatura partiu de Nazir Ahmad Hanafi, proeminente legislador afegão cuja acalorada entrevista com Isobel Yeung culminou com uma evidente ameaça: “Talvez eu devesse entregar-lhe a um afegão para que decepasse seu nariz”, em referência à mutilação de uma jovem de 20 anos, Reza Gul, que teve o nariz mutilado pelo esposo pelo “crime moral” de ter fugido de casa.

O Afeganistão ainda tem uma das mais altas taxas de mortalidade materna do mundo, com milhares de mulheres morrendo durante o parto a cada ano. A taxa de alfabetização oficial está em 18%, ainda que considerando a realidade do território nacional a taxa seja muito menor que essa. O Afeganistão é, com razão, chamado de um dos piores lugares para ser mulher.

Os Estados Unidos têm feito uma piada em nome da democracia e com os direitos das mulheres em nosso país, apoiando os criminosos mais misóginos do governo, e descaradamente usando a presença simbólica de funcionárias governamentais, do sexo feminino, para enganar o mundo sobre a situação real. A maioria dessas mulheres estão vinculadas aos mesmos partidos fundamentalistas e criminosos, e são tão antidemocráticas e misóginas quanto seus homólogos masculinos. Os outros estão, simplesmente, usando esta oportunidade para engordar suas contas bancárias com a corrida do ouro da ajuda externa.

As outras realizações das mulheres, tais como reabertura de escolas e de postos de trabalho para mulheres, são limitadas a algumas cidades urbanas do Afeganistão com a maioria das mulheres ainda sofrendo com o atual fogo do Inferno.

Neste momento, o governo fantoche afegão está negociando com Gulbuddin; quer tirar seu nome da lista negra da ONU, dar-lhe proteção jurídica e impunidade. Mas este é o mais notório senhor da guerra afegão, e maior inimigo dos direitos das mulheres que costumava jogar ácido no rosto de mulheres, publicamente.

Os Estados Unidos usam esses “ganhos” superficiais como pretexto para darem seguimento à ocupação militar no Afeganistão, ameaçando que eles serão perdidos após sua chamada retirada. É uma verdade fundamental que os ganhos hard-lutou feitas pela verdadeira luta das mulheres nunca são perdidas, e os EUA usa essas mudanças cosméticas como uma cortina de fumaça para justificar a sua invasão ao povo do mundo.

Edu Montesanti: Como o povo afegão, em geral, vê a longa ocupação dos Estados Unidos?

Friba: Os afegãos estão fartos, sabem que o Ocidente os traiu, que vieram com longas alegações de “direitos humanos”, “direitos das mulheres” e “democracia”, mas na verdade eles empurraram o Afeganistão no sentido de desastres e de um Estado mafioso, e tudo o que fizeram foram apenas mudanças cosméticas.

Eles estão fartos dos crimes e brutalidade das forças dos Estados Unidos no Afeganistão ao longo dos últimos 15 anos, porque dezenas de milhares de afegãos foram mortos por suas bombas e tiroteios, e na verdade o terrorismo foi ainda mais alimentado que antes.

Eles estão fartos com o fato de que o Ocidente está contando com as bandas mais brutais e desumanas, e em nome da “Guerra ao Terror”, na verdade, apoia terroristas e usa o terrorismo como uma arma para derrotar seus rivais como Rússia e China.

Edu Montesanti: Quanto os Estados Unidos são sinceros em libertar o Afeganistão? Você acha que os Estados Unidos desejam um Afeganistão instável?

Friba: O clamor dos Estados Unidos e da OTAN de “libertar” o Afeganistão é apenas slogan barato, e na verdade eles são invasores e destruidores da “libertação”. Os Estados Unidos não têm interesse na prosperidade do Afeganistão. Na verdade, a instabilidade, a insegurança, a pobreza, o analfabetismo e outros problemas sociais e econômicos profundamente arraigados ajudam os Estados Unidos e seu governo fantoche a permanecer no poder, sem nenhuma oposição do povo.

Na verdade, o governo dos Estados Unidos tem as mãos sujas de sangue diante dos acontecimentos das últimas quatro décadas no Afeganistão. Eles apoiaram elementos armados, sedentos de sangue em nosso país, e levaram o Afeganistão a essa atual condição desastrosa. Se os Estados Unidos quisessem estabilidade e prosperidade, teriam dado os bilhões de dólares de ajuda para investimentos em infra-estrutura básica e não para encher os bolsos dos senhores da guerra e ONGs corruptas, que prosperaram sob a ocupação norte-americana. Esta corrida do ouro levou o Afeganistão a se tornar o país mais corrupto do mundo.

Os Estados Unidos e a OTAN tentam transformar não só o Afeganistão, mas toda a Ásia em uma região instável. Enquanto a economia mundial se volta para a Ásia com grandes potências, como Rússia, China, Índia, etc, os Estados Unidos contam com o terrorismo como arma para bloquear o progresso especialmente de Rússia e China, e causam problemas para estes países.

O Afeganistão tornou-se centro deste jogo de poder entre as grandes potências, mais uma vez. Igualmente, temos relatos de que a Rússia também arma o Taliban e os senhores da guerra no Afeganistão, para combater o plano dos Estados Unidos de exportar o terrorismo para repúblicas da Ásia Central e à própria Rússia. Neste jogo, em que ambos os lados usam o terrorismo como arma, os afegãos estão enfrentando um banho de sangue e as coisas estão progredindo rapidamente em direção a novas guerras, e mais derramamento de sangue.

Edu Montesanti: E por que, exatamente, os Estados Unidos estão tão interessados no Afeganistão, a seu ver?

Friba: Neste ponto, depois de mais de uma década de agressão dos Estados Unidos em vários países da região, achamos que não resta nenhuma dúvida na mente de ninguém de que os Estados Unidos estão presentes em nosso país, e em outros países, por seus próprios interesses.

A posição geopolítica do Afeganistão oferece aos Estados Unidos vantagem única na região: acesso aos seus maiores rivais em todo o mundo, Rússia, China, Índia e Irã. Os Estados Unidos construíram [no Afeganistão] bases militares gigantescas e sua segunda maior Embaixada no mundo, e tem milhares de militares e empreiteiros privados estacionados em diferentes partes do Afeganistão.

Essas bases militares oferecem pontos à tentativa dos Estados Unidos de manter seus adversários sob seus domínios, e de continuar perseguindo seus principais objetivos na região. Além disso, e talvez mais importante, o governo traiçoeiro e fundamentalista do Afeganistão, junto de uma população desgastada com a guerra que tem sido executada por quatro décadas, muito cansada de lutar novamente, proporciona as condições ideais para as operações dos Estados Unidos aqui.

Os traidores do Estado afegão não apenas venderam o Afeganistão, mas têm mantido silêncio sobre os crimes brutais das forças dos Estados Unidos, e defendido todos os seus atos de agressão no país.

Os afegãos sabem agora que os Estados Unidos, simplesmente, usam o Afeganistão como frente na Ásia para avançar sua agenda regional, que é promover terrorismo para transformar a Ásia em ponto efervescente na terra com o intuito de deter o avanço das emergentes potências militares e econômicas no continente.

Se você acompanhar cada mudança significativa na situação do Afeganistão – como a transferência do Taliban e da guerra, a insegurança, o terror e a agitação que automaticamente vem em seguida – para as regiões do norte, tudo isso eles serve a um certo interesse de os Estados Unidos. Neste caso, estaria gerando instabilidade nas proximidades da Rússia, e até mesmo a instigando.

É importante salientar aqui que, ao contrário do geralmente propagado sobre os talibans como lacaios do Paquistão e, em menor medida, do Irã, a verdade é que em última análise são os Estados Unidos quem estão segurando a coleira desses indivíduos violentos.

Os talibans são a força de reserva dos Estados Unidos, que irão utilizá-los sempre que virem necessidade para isso. Não é segredo que o regime sanguinário taliban foi criado e alimentado pelos Estados Unidos, e será usado sempre que for necessário.

O Taliban serve a um duplo propósito para os Estados Unidos hoje: eles justificam a continuação da “Guerra ao terror”, e serve como seus procuradores em partes do Afeganistão que não estão sob o controle do propalado governo [nacional].

Hoje, nada no Afeganistão pode ocorrer ou ser alterado sem autorização do Estados Unidos, e seria muito ingênuo pensar de outra forma. Esta situação também expõe a mentira que o governo dos Estados Unidos disse ao mundo em 2014 sobre o término de sua guerra no Afeganistão, retirando as tropas e acabando com a guerra no Afeganistão. Os Estados Unidos continuam tendo uma forte presença no Afeganistão para fins geoestratégicos.

Edu Montesanti: Se eu bem compreendi, Friba, você quer dizer que o Afeganistão está pior agora que antes da invasão liderada pelos Estados Unidos.

Friba: Sim, absolutamente. Para além do que mencionei anteriormente, se considerarmos apenas a deterioração da situação de segurança, vital às pessoas mais que comida e água, podemos entender o quanto a situação está pior do que antes em todo o Afeganistão.

O ópio é outro vírus mortal que infecta nossa nova geração, e é ainda mais perigoso do Taliban e da Al-Qaeda. O número de civis mortos em ataques suicidas por talibans, os ataques noturnos e os ataques aéreos das forças dos Estados Unidos, e os crimes das milícias dos senhores da guerra locais em diferentes partes do Afeganistão aumentam a cada ano.

A economia do país está em ruínas, controlada pela máfia que traça o apoio de poderosos funcionários do governo afegão. Os Estados Unidos e a OTAN invadiram o Afeganistão com importantes alegações de “reconstrução do Afeganistão”, mas não vemos nenhum crescimento em nenhum setor fundamental do Afeganistão.

Apenas a máfia e as ONGs têm crescido em número e tamanho. Os afegãos são o segundo maior grupo de migrantes do mundo, enquanto os jovens se engajam em viagens perigosas a fim de escapar da miséria em suas casas. Muitos jovens hoje são viciados em drogas.

Nas áreas mais isoladas, a pobreza e o desemprego têm levado os jovens a se juntar ao Taliban e ao ISIS [Estado Islamita] já que estes fornecem necessidades básicas, e às vezes até pagam salários. As mulheres afegãs são tão reprimidas e estão sob constante ataque quanto estavam sob a regra medieval do Taliban.

Governos vizinhos como Irã e Paquistão nunca tiveram mãos tão manchadas de sangue diante dos assuntos do Afeganistão, como atualmente.

Este é apenas um breve resumo da situação desastrosa do país, mas é o suficiente para mostrar a devastação que os EUA trouxe sobre o nosso país e as pessoas.

Edu Montesanti: Como você disse, a história e os acontecimentos atuais mostram que ocupação nunca é bem-sucedida. Que alternativas a RAWA defende a fim de mudar definitivamente a catastrófica realidade do Afeganistão? Você vê ajuda externa como produtiva para efetivamente libertar o povo afegão dos personagens e dos grupos altamente violentos, mencionados por você? Se assim for, quem e como poderia ser prestada uma ajuda eficaz ao Afeganistão?

Friba: Sempre dissemos que a independência de um país é a primeira condição para democracia, liberdade e justiça. Há poucos, ou nenhum exemplo na história em que a intervenção estrangeira libertou ou ajudou uma nação, e nos últimos 14 anos da ocupação norte-americana do Afeganistão é uma prova disso.

Os Estados Unidos não apenas não libertaram o Afeganistão, mas impuseram ao nosso povo os maiores inimigos, os criminosos fundamentalistas. Os Estados Unidos são o criador e educador desses violentos grupos. É uma política consciente do governo dos Estados Unidos formar parceria com fundamentalistas islamitas onde quer que ele entra em cena. Vimos isso na Líbia e na Síria também. Os Estados Unidos afirmam estar combatendo o terror, mas os maiores terroristas, os criminosos da Aliança do Norte foram levados ao poder pelos próprios Estados Unidos. Contudo, isso não causou nenhuma surpresa. Logo no início da invasão norte-americana ao Afeganistão, a RAWA declarou que o propósito desta agressão era servir aos objetivos imperialistas dos Estados Unidos, e que naquela tragédia faria parceria com os piores inimigos do nosso país. O que menos importa aos Estados Unidos é o bem-estar do Afeganistão e do seu povo. A situação atual do nosso país, é prova disso.

A chave para a liberdade e para a democracia está em uma luta unida, organizada do nosso povo. Uma luta árdua que seja, mas não há outra maneira de sair deste atoleiro. Apenas as pessoas de um país podem decidir seu destino, e construir um sistema que lhes serve.

A solidariedade das pessoas libertárias e amantes da paz em todo o mundo é muito importante no fortalecimento da luta do nosso povo, também. Este será um processo longo e difícil, mas os afegãos não têm outra alternativa senão unir-se e lutar por liberdade, democracia, justiça e libertação.

Edu Montesanti: A RAWA defende um Afeganistão laico ou islamita, fundamentado na sharia?

Friba: Secularismo tem sido o slogan da RAWA desde sua fundação. Acreditamos que a democracia não tem sentido sem o secularismo. A religião tem sido historicamente utilizada como meio para manter o poder daqueles que governam, e em uma sociedade onde as pessoas são profundamente religiosas, a combinação entre Estado e religião é particularmente perigosa.

Hoje no Afeganistão, a maior ferramenta de fundamentalistas atuais na utilização da força para defender seus atos e se proteger, é o Islã. Todos os criminosos fundamentalistas no poder encobrem seus crimes usando o Islã. Este tem sido utilizado para anular a indignação das pessoas, e o desejo delas de se levantar e de lutar por seus direitos.

O Taliban tem sido capaz de transformar jovens inocentes em mortais atacantes suicidas, através da lavagem cerebral baseada em ideias religiosas. Infelizmente, esse mau uso da religião tem servido muito bem.

Por essa razão, o secularismo é vital ao nosso país hoje, para extirpar o fundamentalismo e construir uma sociedade livre desse vírus mortal. Só assim o Afeganistão pode dar um passo em direção ao progresso e à prosperidade.

Edu Montesanti: A misoginia é senso-comum no Afeganistão, ou reduzida aos senhores da guerra e ao Taliban?

Friba: Não há dúvida de que o Afeganistão é atormentado pelo atraso, cultural e economicamente. Durante séculos, os monarcas reacionários injetaram e utilizaram ideias reacionárias para manter-se no poder. No entanto, nas últimas três décadas, quando os fundamentalistas islamitas dominaram o Afeganistão, o atraso do país tornou-se mais comum e extremo que nunca.

Um dos aspectos do Islã amplamente propagado por radicais islâmicos, é a degradação e a opressão das mulheres, vistas mais como animais que como seres humanos. As mulheres vivem apenas para serem vistas como servas que trabalham em casa, dar à luz a filhos e satisfazer as necessidades sexuais dos homens.

A violência familiar é um dos mais desgastantes e dolorosos problemas das mulheres no Afeganistão, assim como na maioria dos outros países muçulmanos, e é principalmente apoiada pelos governos de linha dura. Este problema, em parte alimentado com os ensinamentos islamitas que são dados aos homens… e mulheres desde a infância.

Há versos do Alcorão a este respeito, que dizem que:

“Suas mulheres são uma lavoura para você (cultivar); assim, vá à sua lavoura como quiser” (2: 223)

“Os homens estão a cargo das mulheres… Quanto àquelas a quem vocês temem rebelião, as admoestem e as isolem em camas separadas” (04:34)

Há um monte de versos deste tipo no Alcorão. Homens justifica sua superioridade e o tratamento desumano e relação às mulheres com base e, tais versos. E, é claro, em uma série de declarações do profeta Maomé ou de outras fontes religiosas, e sobre uma grande quantidade de poemas e histórias; aliás, poetas populares reforçam estes versos e, todos juntos, afetam homens de maneira tão maléfica que se eles tratam as mulheres com ligeira humanidade e bondade, sentem-se como se estivessem cometendo o maior pecado de suas vidas! Nos livros e fontes mencionadas, existem algumas palavras de compaixão e bondade para com as mulheres, mas fracassaram em proteger as mulheres do sofrimento contra elas.

Nos países muçulmanos onde os princípios seculares têm encontrado algum espaço dentro da sociedade, a profundidade desta violência não é tão ruim quanto naqueles infestados pelo fundamentalismo.

Edu Montesanti: As ativistas da RAWA acreditam no Alcorão? Qual a religião das mulheres da RAWA?

Friba: Acreditamos que a religião é um assunto completamente pessoal, e que não importa para nós se alguém na RAWA é religiosa ou não. O que é importante para nós é que elas sejam livres do aspecto reacionário da religião que impede qualquer luta, especialmente a luta revolucionária.

Os versos mencionados são amplamente utilizados por clérigos fundamentalistas para justificar seu tratamento desumano contra as mulheres, e para encorajar este tratamento entre as pessoas. Enquanto nossa luta não tem como objetivo a própria religião, em vez daqueles elementos que abusam de religião, esses versos têm de ser mencionados como eles são os mais comumente usados.

Nós acreditamos em secularismo, o qual simplesmente separa Estado e religião e que tem o maior respeito por quaisquer crenças pessoais, de qualquer um. Toda a nação do Afeganistão, salvo uma minoria muito pequena, é muçulmana, mas ela seguem apenas as boas ações estabelecidas pelo Islã e nunca o usa para justificar maus tratos contra mulheres, contra os não-muçulmanos, etc. Esta versão do Islã é respeitada por nós, mesmo que não seja aceita como parte de nossas crenças.

Sua página sobre cultura afegã parece ótima [Cultura & Arte Afegã, em www.edumontesanti.skyrock.com]. No entanto, existem algumas práticas culturais importantes do Afeganistão que são completamente ignoradas. O evento que você descreveu, o Eid, é uma celebração religiosa. Os fundamentalistas afegãos acabaram propagando o Eid como a celebração mais popular do Afeganistão devido ao seu aspecto islamita.

No entanto, isso não é verdade. Os afegãos seguem o calendário solar e comemorar seu ano novo em 20 ou 21 de março de cada ano. Isso é chamado de ‘Nowroz’ – Novo Dia. As pessoas usam roupas novas, vão a piqueniques com suas famílias e comemoram com música e dança. Eles fazem um prato de doce de sete frutas secas embebidas em calda doce, e cozinham o prato tradicional de arroz branco com espinafre. Esta tradição vem de antepassados afegãos não-islamitas, os Zardosht – ou aqueles que adoravam o fogo. É o acontecimento mais amplamente comemorado no Afeganistão.

Mesmo décadas de guerra e de dominação fundamentalista não foram capazes de apagar essa tradição. Por favor, dê uma olhada nisto: Why Afghanistan’s Nowruz has been interrupted. Este acontecimento é particularmente importante, uma vez que remete aos nossos primeiros ancestrais quando o Islã não era nem nascido ainda. Mais importante, apesar da propaganda generalizada e dos esforços por parte do clérigo, tanto do Taliban quanto do governo, as pessoas comemoraram amplamente o evento deste ano, e continuarão a fazê-lo.

Edu Montesanti: Como vivem as ativistas da RAWA, especialmente com seus cônjuges em uma sociedade altamente misógina como esta? Como seus maridos aceitam e o quanto apoiam seus pontos de vista revolucionários?

Friba: As ativistas da RAWA são mulheres de excepcional sorte em uma sociedade devastada. Nossos maridos e outros familiares do sexo masculino são muito favoráveis, apesar de não desempenharem nenhum papel na organização, propriamente. Na verdade, temos um grupo muito grande de apoiantes do sexo masculino.

Há outros grupos revolucionários e de esquerda no Afeganistão que são predominantemente comandados por homens – ao contrário de nossa organização, somente feminina – que nos apoiam também. Nosso próprio líder, o marido de Meena, Faiz Ahmad, o líder da Organização de Libertação Afeganistão, organização de esquerda radical que existe até hoje e única organização de esquerda que sobreviveu à opressão de quatro décadas de guerra.

Faiz Ahmad foi assassinado alguns meses antes de Meena, pelo mesmo criminoso Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, quem também matou Meena. As atividades de Meena e de Faiz tinham se tornado um espinho nos olhos dos fundamentalistas islâmicos no Paquistão e da inteligência secreta do Afeganistão, por isso foram mortos.

Edu Montesanti: Como você avalia a cobertura do Afeganistão por parte da mídia predominante? Como a RAWA avalia as organizações internacionais de “direitos humanos”, e a posição da chamada comunidade internacional relativos à Questão Afegã?

Friba: Não é mais segredo que a grande mídia é utilizada como uma arma nas guerras modernas. A grande mídia mundial, em especial a dos Estados Unidos, tem servido aos propósitos imperialistas dentro de seus países melhor que qualquer outra ferramenta.

Os povos desses países não têm a verdadeira imagem das guerras dos Estados Unidos para tomar decisões adequadas e bem-informadas sobre elas. O Afeganistão raramente faz parte de alguma cobertura e quando vira notícia, é sistematicamente noticiado de acordo com a política geral dos Estados Unidos.

Os crimes das forças dos Estados Unidos tais como assassinatos, torturas e ataques noturnos nunca serão mostrados, assim como a insegurança e a instabilidade do nosso país, e da situação devastadora das mulheres e das pessoas não recebe nenhuma atenção. São mostrados os horrores dos crimes do Taliban para justificar a guerra dos Estados Unidos, ou isoladas “histórias de sucesso” para pintar um quadro cor-de-rosa da situação do Afeganistão.

Com que frequência as pessoas são incentivadas a discutir o envolvimento dos Estados Unidos em guerras pelo mundo, fornecendo-lhes fatos verdadeiros? O mesmo vale para outros países onde os crimes de ditadores como Saddam Hussein, Muammar Gaddafi e Bashar Assad são enviados continuamente, mas a completa devastação do Iraque e da Líbia pelas forças dos Estados Unidos e de seus governos fantoches, e o apoio incondicional dos Estados Unidos aos elementos do Estado Islamita (renomeado de Al-Nusra e Al-Qaeda, por exemplo) na Síria nunca são mostrados. Na verdade, eles encontram formas cobrir com cal tais ações dos Estados Unidos.

Enquanto algumas organizações internacionais de direitos humanos têm desempenhado importante papel no Afeganistão em quatro décadas de guerra documentando crimes, publicando relatórios e chamando a atenção do mundo para estas questões, o mesmo não pode se dizer em relação a toda a comunidade internacional. A comunidade internacional e seus parceiros no Afeganistão têm sido envolvidas apenas em questões superficiais que não têm nenhuma relevância ao povo afegão, tais como projetos de curto prazo e a instituição de ONGs inúteis. Eles não têm lançado luz sobre o conjunto de questões fundamentais do Afeganistão como a ocupação norte-americana, a presença de fundamentalistas no poder e seus crimes. De fato, eles dão uma mão amiga aos principais meios de comunicação do mundo para retratar a situação no Afeganistão como “melhor” do que era há 15 anos.

Mas é claro que a mídia alternativa como Democracy Now!, etc, reflete a realidade, mas suas reportagens são enterradas sob as peças de propaganda veiculadas pelos grandes meios de comunicação, tais como CNN, BBC, AP, Fox News, etc, que têm grande cobertura e recursos para fazer as pessoas de bobas.

Edu Montesanti: Quem são os maiores inimigos dos afegãos?

Friba: Os afegãos são esmagados entre quatro inimigos atualmente: as forças dos EUA e da OTAN, os criminosos e senhores da guerra da Aliança do Norte no governo, o Taliban e um Estado Islamita emergente.

Os Estados Unidos têm gerado todos esses elementos fundamentalistas criminosos, e ainda têm licença para cumprir seus propósitos na região. Isso significa que os criminosos da Aliança do Norte apreciam a maior parte do apoio ocidental, tanto financeira quanto politicamente, o que os torna mais perigoso que outros bandos. A crueldade do Taliban e do Estados Islamita é bem conhecida do mundo, e recebem apoio militar e financeiro dos Estados Unidos, do Paquistão e até mesmo do Irã.

Todos esses inimigos são poderosos e controlam diferentes partes do país. Nas batalhas entre essas forças, nos terríveis ataques aéreos, suicidas e de foguetes levados a cabo por eles, apenas nosso povo sofre.

Edu Montesanti: Quais as perspectivas da RAWA para o Afeganistão diante do atual cenário? O que você gostaria de dizer ao mundo e, em especial, para o Ocidente, para os norte-americanos e ao governo deles?

Friba: Se a situação política do Afeganistão permanece inalterada, a situação atual apenas vai se tornar mais sombria. O povo do Afeganistão continuará sofrendo com insegurança, pobreza, corrupção, desemprego e outros problemas devastadores. Nosso povo vai continuar sendo vítima dos crimes das forças dos Estados Unidos, dos senhores da guerra, do Taliban e dos jihadistas. Há apenas um caminho para a atual situação poder mudar: através das próprias pessoas que lutam por seus direitos e por um país melhor, contra seus principais inimigos, os senhores da guerra dos EUA, o Taliban, jihadistas).

Não temos nada a dizer aos governos ocidentais que têm o sangue de nossos pessoas inocentes manchados em suas mãos. Nossa mensagem às pessoas amantes da paz destes países é que eles têm que enxergar a realidade do Afeganistão, e de todos os outros países que os Estados Unidos invadiram. O que eles veem como raras notícias da situação catastrófica nesses países, é a realidade cotidiana do povo.

Eles precisam pressionar seus governos para que mudem esta política de invasões e de ocupação, e serem solidários às pessoas que são vítimas dessas guerras. Esta solidariedade internacional fortalecerá a luta pela liberdade e pela democracia nesses países.

Eles devem saber que o imposto que pagam é usado por seus governos para tornar o Afeganistão e outros países em guerra em um Inferno, que irá impactar diretamente suas vidas e tornar os países ocidentais inseguro, como o que testemunhamos hoje nas cidades europeias.

 

Artigo original em inglês :

US War Crimes against Women: The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA): Interview, 17 de Maio de 2016

A era de Trump começa agora – com uma série de episódios plenos de suspense, ligados à geopolítica e à geoeconomia, iminentes e imprevisíveis.

Eu defendi que a estratégia de oposição do guru de Trump para a política externa, Henry Kissinger, ao poderoso trio de integração da Eurásia – Rússia, China e Irão – é uma mistura de dividir para reinar; seduzir a Rússia, afastando-a da sua parceria estratégica com a China, e acossar o elo mais fraco, o Irão.

Na verdade, é isso que está a acontecer – como se vê pelas ofensivas dos membros escolhidos para o gabinete de Trump durante suas audiências no Senado dos EUA. As fações dos EUA próximas do Think Tankland, defensores da política de Nixon para a China projetada por Kissinger, estão animadas com as possibilidades de contenção em relação a pelo menos um desses poderes “potencialmente virado contra a América.” Kissinger e o Dr. Zbig “Grande Xadrez” Brzezinski são as duas principais autonomeadas sumidades ocidentais – mestres fantoches – que se disputam na área da geopolítica. Em oposição a Kissinger, o mentor da política externa de Obama, Brzezinski, fiel à sua russofobia, propôs uma lógica de dividir para reinar, apostada na sedução da China.

No entanto, um influente homem de negócios de Nova Iorque, muito próximo dos reais e discretos Mestres do Universo, que previu corretamente a vitória de Trump semanas antes do fato, depois de examinar o meu argumento ofereceu-me não só uma avaliação mordaz dessas queridas sumidades; ele dispôs-se a detalhar-me como a nova normalidade será estabelecida, tendo sido negociada pelos Mestres diretamente com Trump. Vamos designá-lo por “X”.

A China em observação ininterrupta

“X” começa por dizer algo que aqueles que regularmente mantém ligações ao Deep State e que reverenciam os seus ídolos, nunca ousam dizer, pelo menos em público: “É importante não atribuir muita importância a Kissinger ou Brzezinski, pois eles são apenas fachadas para aqueles que tomam as decisões e o seu trabalho é recobrir e justificar as decisões com um refinamento de intelectualidade. O seu contributo não vale nada. Eu uso os nomes deles de vez em quando pois não posso usar os nomes daqueles que realmente tomam as decisões “. Está então aberto o caminho para” X ” detalhar a nova normalidade:

“Trump foi eleito com o apoio dos Mestres para se inclinar para a Rússia. Os Mestres têm os seus instrumentos nos media e no Congresso mantendo uma campanha de difamação contra a Rússia, e têm o seu boneco Brzezinski também a pregar contra a Rússia, afirmando que ‘a influência global da América depende da cooperação com a China’. O objetivo é pressionar a Rússia para ela cooperar, colocando essas fichas negociais na mesa de Trump. Em termos de uma abordagem tradicional de polícia-bom, polícia-mau, Donald é retratado como o polícia bom querendo boas relações com a Rússia, sendo o Congresso, os media e Brzezinski os policias maus. Trata-se de ajudar Trump nas negociações com a Rússia supondo que Putin, à medida que for vendo o seu amigo numa posição mais ´precária´, estará disposto a fazer maiores concessões.”

E isso leva a explicar como é que Taiwan – e o Japão – entram em cena:

“Donald mostrou a sua inclinação para a Rússia conversando com os taiwaneses, de forma a demonstrar que a mudança é a sério. Mas foi decidido fazer entrar o Japão na peça como sendo um predador contra a indústria dos EUA, através de um ataque à Toyota, bem merecido. Isso moderou a nossa posição já que os Mestres recearam que a perceção de que estávamos a apoiar o Japão contra a China seria considerada uma provocação excessiva “.

Por isso, espera-se que a China – que “não tem demasiada importância”, como afirmou Kissinger – seja mantida sob controlo ininterrupto:

“Os Mestres decidiram reindustrializar os Estados Unidos e querem trazer de volta os postos de trabalho da China. Isso é aconselhável do ponto de vista chinês; por que razões devem eles vender seu trabalho aos EUA por um dólar que não tem valor intrínseco, não recebendo realmente nada pelo seu trabalho. Cada trabalhador chinês deve ter um carro na sua garagem e a China deve tornar-se num produtor de carros maior do que a UE, EUA e Japão combinados, mantendo a sua riqueza no seu próprio país “.

E porquê a China e não a Rússia?

“A Rússia, no que toca a este tema, é um país com muitos recursos naturais, com um gigantesco complexo industrial militar (sendo este o único motivo pelo qual é secretamente respeitada), mas está fora destas difíceis negociações, pois quase não exporta nada além de recursos naturais e equipamentos militares. Os Mestres querem os empregos de volta do México e da Ásia, incluindo do Japão, de Taiwan, etc., e isso é já visível no ataque de Trump também ao Japão. A principal razão subjacente a esta estratégia é que os EUA perderam o controlo dos mares e não podem defender os seus destacamentos militares durante uma grande guerra. Esta é a realidade que interessa ter em conta no momento presente e esta é a verdadeira história que se desenrola nos bastidores. ”

Em poucas palavras, “X” resume o conteúdo da reversão de um ciclo econômico:

“Os Mestres ganharam dinheiro com a transferência da indústria para a Ásia (A Bain Capital especializou-se nisso) e Wall Street ganhou dinheiro com taxas de juro mais baixas sobre os dólares reciclados dos défices comerciais. Mas agora, a questão é estratégica; eles ganharão dinheiro de novo com o regresso das indústrias que reduzirão os seus investimentos na Ásia devolvendo-os aos Estados Unidos, à medida que reconstruímos a produção aqui “.

” X ” continua a ser um grande admirador da estratégia de negócios de Henry Ford, e esse é o ponto que ele vai usar para trazer à baila um tema crucial: a defesa nacional. De acordo com “X”:

“Ford dobrou os salários que pagou e ganhou mais dinheiro do que qualquer outro fabricante. A razão é que um salário mínimo mais elevado que permitiu à mulher ter muitos filhos, dependendo só do salário do marido, foi psicologicamente bom para o aumento da produtividade nas suas fábricas de automóveis, além de que permitiu aos próprios trabalhadores comprar-lhe os seus carros. Desse modo ele reconheceu que numa sociedade deve haver uma mais justa distribuição da riqueza, coisa que o seu admirador, Steve Jobs, não pode fazer.

A produção em série e a produtividade de Henry foi a maravilha que fez os Estados Unidos ganharem a Segunda Guerra Mundial. A Amazon não contribui em nada para a defesa nacional, sendo apenas um serviço de marketing na Internet baseado em programas de computador, nem o Google que simplesmente organiza e fornece melhor os dados. Nada disso constrói um míssil ou um submarino melhor, exceto de modo marginal. ”

É o Pentágono, estúpido

Pois sim; tudo isto tem a ver com a reorganização do poder militar dos EUA. “X” fez questão de se referir a um relatório do CNAS (Centro para uma Nova Segurança Americana), que citei na minha coluna inicial:

“É muito importante o que se depreende do relatório. E é por isso que estamos em grande dificuldade por estarmos tecnologicamente atrás da Rússia em várias gerações de armamento, o que vem na sequência da afirmação de Brzezinski, que diz que já não somos uma potência global”.

Esta é uma análise completa e abrangente de como a Rússia conseguiu organizar as melhores forças armadas do mundo. E o relatório nem sequer leva ainda em conta o sistema de defesa de mísseis S-500, que agora está sendo ultimado e que, sem dúvida, vai fechar por completo a totalidade do espaço aéreo russo. E a próxima geração – S-600? – Será ainda mais poderosa. “X” aventura-se mesmo no território tabu do Deep State, referindo a forma como a Rússia, ao longo da última década, conseguiu posicionar-se muito à frente dos EUA, “eclipsando-o como o poder militar mais forte”. Mas a vantagem deles no jogo deve estar perto do fim – seja isso desejo auto- realizável ou seja lá o que for:

“Esperamos que o Secretário de Defesa James Mattis entenda isso e que o Secretário Adjunto de Defesa tenha as competências técnicas, a capacidade organizacional e de previsão para entender que as armas da III Guerra Mundial são mísseis ofensivos e defensivos, e submarinos, e não poder aéreo, tanques e porta-aviões. ”

Um realista, “X” admite que o status quo neoconservador / neoliberal – representado pela maioria das fações do Deep State dos EUA – nunca abandonará a postura padrão de hostilidade incessante em relação à Rússia. Mas ele prefere concentrar-se na mudança:

“Deixe Tillerson reorganizar o Departamento de Estado de acordo com a eficiência da Exxon. Ele pode ser válido nessa tarefa. Ele e Mattis podem parecer falhos de coragem mas se você disser a verdade ao Senado você nunca vai poder ser confirmado. Por isso, o que eles lá dizem não significa nada. Mas veja o que se passou no caso da Líbia. A CIA tinha um objetivo de empurrar a China para fora da África e por isso criou o AFRICOM (Comando dos EUA para a África). Esse foi um dos segredos da nossa intervenção na Líbia.”

Não que tal tenha tido sucesso; A NATO / AFRICOM transformou a Líbia num terreno baldio dirigido por milícias, e a China ainda não foi afastada do resto da África.

“X” também admite: “A Síria e o Irão são linhas vermelhas para a Rússia. Assim como o é o leste da Ucrânia a partir do Dnieper. ”

Está também plenamente consciente de que Moscovo não permitirá qualquer ameaça de mudança de regime em Teerão. E está também ciente de que “os investimentos da China no petróleo e no gás iraniano implicam que a China também não permitirá o derrube por Washington do governo iraniano”.

As coisas vão tornar-se complicadas no que toca à NATO; “X” está convencido de que a Rússia: “invadirá a Roménia e a Polónia se os mísseis não forem retirados da Roménia e se o compromisso de aceitação de mísseis pela Polónia não for rescindido. A questão não são os mísseis defensivos não perigosos dos Estados Unidos, mas a possibilidade de os substituir por mísseis nucleares ofensivos nesses silos. A Rússia não tolerará esse risco. Esses mísseis não estarão sujeitos qualquer negociação. ”

Em contraste com a “perpétua ameaça”, contínua propaganda do Partido da Guerra dos Estados Unidos, Moscovo dá é atenção aos factos reais que ocorrem no terreno desde a década de 1990; a rutura do histórico aliado eslavo, a Sérvia; a anexação pela NATO das nações do Pacto de Varsóvia e até mesmo de ex-repúblicas da URSS, para não mencionar as tentativas de incluir também a Geórgia e a Ucrânia; o apoio e a organização, pelos EUA, de revoluções coloridas; o fiasco “Assad deve ir”, na tentativa de mudança forçada do regime da Síria, incluindo inclusive o armamento de Salafi-jihadis; as sanções económicas, a guerra de preços do petróleo e os ataques ao rublo; o continuado assédio da NATO. “X”, plenamente consciente destes factos, acrescenta:

“A Rússia sempre quis a paz. Mas eles não vão jogar um jogo com os Mestres do Universo que apresentam Trump como o tipo bom e o Congresso, CIA, etc., como o tipo mau, usando tal cenário como um estratagema de negociação. É assim que eles veem a situação. Eles não acham que este circo seja real. ”

O circo pode ser apenas uma ilusão. Ou uma wayang – uma espécie de teatro de fantoches indonésio – como eu já sugeri. “X” avança uma interpretação nítida deste jogo de sombras do ponto de vista de Moscovo, admitindo que “vão ser necessários vários meses para ver se Putin pode aceitar negociar um desanuviamento com Trump que essencialmente passará por uma Ucrânia oriental autónoma, um tratado de paz na Síria com Assad no lugar, e uma retirada das forças da NATO, regressando esta à linha de defesa que existia no tempo de Ronald Reagan. ”

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

We bring to the attention of our readers excerpts of an important article by Asra Q  Nomani published by Women in the World in association with the New York Times under the title: “Billionaire George Soros Has Ties to More than 50 ‘Partners’ of the Women’s March on Washington”.  January 20, 2017 

…The Guardian has touted the “Women’s March on Washington” as a “spontaneous” action for women’s rights. Another liberal media outlet, Vox, talks about the “huge, spontaneous groundswell” behind the march. On its website, organizers of the march are promoting their work as “a grassroots effort” with “independent” organizers. Even my local yoga studio, Beloved Yoga, is renting a bus and offering seats for $35. The march’s manifesto says magnificently, “The Rise of the Woman = The Rise of the Nation.”

To understand the march better, I stayed up through the nights this week, studying the funding, politics and talking points of the some 403 groups that are “partners” of the march. Is this a non-partisan “Women’s March”?

…

Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association, a march “partner,” told me his organization was “nonpartisan” but has “many concerns about the incoming Trump administration that include what we see as a misogynist approach to women.” Nick Fish, national program director of the American Atheists, another march partner, told me, “This is not a ‘partisan’ event.” Dennis Wiley, pastor of Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ, another march “partner,” returned my call and said, “This is not a partisan march.”

Really? UniteWomen.org, another partner, features videos with the hashtags #ImWithHer, #DemsInPhily and #ThanksObama. Following the money, I pored through documents of billionaire George Soros and his Open Society philanthropy, because I wondered: What is the link between one of Hillary Clinton’s largest donors and the “Women’s March”?

…

By my draft research, which I’m opening up for crowd-sourcing on GoogleDocs, Soros has funded, or has close relationships with, at least 56 of the march’s “partners,” including “key partners” Planned Parenthood, which opposes Trump’s anti-abortion policy, and the National Resource Defense Council, which opposes Trump’s environmental policies. The other Soros ties with “Women’s March” organizations include the partisan MoveOn.org (which was fiercely pro-Clinton), the National Action Network (which has a former executive director lauded by Obama senior advisor Valerie Jarrett as “a leader of tomorrow” as a march co-chair and another official as “the head of logistics”). Other Soros grantees who are “partners” in the march are the American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Constitutional Rights, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. March organizers and the organizations identified here haven’t yet returned queries for comment.

To read the complete article in the NYT click here

Asra Q. Nomani is a former Wall Street Journal reporter. She can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter.

The new U.S. administration of Donald Trump has made it public that it will seek a regime change policy in Venezuela disguised in “transition to democracy” rhetoric, the country’s potential new Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in an interview this week.

“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,” the former executive in ExxonMobil told Latin America Goes Global.

He further claimed that the economic crisis in the oil-rich South American country was “largely a product of its incompetent and dysfunctional government, first under Hugo Chavez, and now under his designated successor, Nicolas Maduro.”

The government of President Maduro has, however, blamed the recent crisis on an economic war by right-wing politicians as well as corporations who are hoarding products and halting production to put pressure on the socialist administration.

Meanwhile, Tillerson struck a less aggressive tone when pressed about how he would deal with the standoff between the government and the opposition-led national assembly in Venezuela.

 

“The U.S. should continue to support legitimate dialogue to resolve the political crisis between the Maduro government and the opposition that now controls the National Assembly.”

But then he called for sanctions against what he called “human rights violators” when asked about political prisoners while also slamming Maduro’s government for “undemocratic practices.”

The right-wing website also asked the nominee for U.S. top diplomat post “about the controversial and misguided decision to normalize relations with Cuba” to which he did not suggest a full rollback from Barack Obama’s steps on Cuba.

“I will engage with Cuba but continue to press for reform of its oppressive regime. I will support human rights defenders and democracy activists in Cuba, empower civil society, defend freedom of expression, and promote improved internet access and I will ask our allies to do the same,” he said.

He added that he would engage in bilateral and multilateral talks with Havana in order to “press Cuba to meet its pledge to become more democratic and consider placing conditions on trade or travel policies to motivate the release of political prisoners.”

However, when the interviewer pressed further Tillerson said he would stand by statements made by Vice President Mike Pence stating that the Trump administration would reverse Obama’s Cuba rapprochement policy.

“Yes. There will be a comprehensive review of current policies and executive orders regarding Cuba to determine how best to pressure Cuba to respect human rights and promote democratic changes.”

Tillerson and Venezuela, in fact, have a bitter history and some say he might pursue personal revenge against the socialist government as he takes the international diplomatic stage in Washington.

In 2007, late President Hugo Chavez ordered the nationalization of 22 major multinational corporations operating in the country including ExxonMobil, then headed by Tillerson.

He rejected the compensation deal offered by the government of US$1 billion and took Venezuela to the international arbitration court demanding instead US$10 billion. But the rarely defeated CEO lost and his company settled for US$1.6 billion.

“(Tillerson) took it very personal with Chavez,” said Ghassan Dagher, a Venezuelan oil industry consultant to the New York Times in December.

 

 

 

Last weekend, Syrian government forces, led by the Syrian Army’s Tiger Forces and backed up by the Russian Aerospace Forces, continued to make gains in the eastern countryside of Aleppo city, moving closer to the ISIS stronghold of al-Bab.

Government troops liberated Suran, Sarjah Kabirah, Sarjah Saghirah, Maran, and reached the villages of Madyunah and Sarbas. If government forces keep up with such rapid advances along the Aleppo-al-Bab road, they will reach Turkish forces storming the ISIS stronghold of al-Bab in northern Syria within few days.

Meanwhile, reports are circulating that Moscow, Damascus, and Ankara have made a deal to unite efforts in combating terrorists in al-Bab and to involve the army in cutting off ISIS units deployed there from the southern direction.

The situation will likely become more clear after the start of the Astana talks.

Trump is barely two days in office, and already a lawsuit is set to be filed against the newly inaugurated president. According to press reports, a group of lawyers, including former White House ethics attorneys will file a lawsuit on Monday accusing the President of allowing his businesses to accept payments from foreign governments in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) announced Sunday night it is bringing a suit “to stop President Trump from violating the Constitution by illegally receiving payments from foreign governments.” The group said the suit will be filed in the Southern District of New York at 9 a.m. on Monday.

Piggybacking on popular displeasure with the Clinton Foundation likewise accepting hundreds of millions in foreign payments, Deepak Gupta, a Supreme Court litigator working on the case, said the lawsuit will allege that the Constitution’s emoluments clause forbids payments to Trump’s businesses and will seek a court order forbidding Trump from accepting such payments. The case is part of a wave of litigation expected to be filed against Trump by liberal advocacy groups. It will be filed in a Manhattan federal court, Gupta said, and plaintiffs will include Richard Painter, a former ethics lawyer in Republican President George W. Bush’s White House.

“We did not want to get to this point. It was our hope that President Trump would take the necessary steps to avoid violating the Constitution before he took office,” CREW Executive Director Noah Bookbinder said. “He did not. His constitutional violations are immediate and serious, so we were forced to take legal action.”

“President Trump has made his slogan ‘America First,’” Bookbinder added. “So you would think he would want to strictly follow the Constitution’s foreign emoluments clause, since it was written to ensure our government officials are thinking of Americans first, and not foreign governments.”

The litigation will focus on Trump’s refusal to divest from his business or place his assets into a blind trust, which would separate him entirely from his business empire. He has said his adult sons will run his business while he is in office, that they will not conduct any foreign deals and will subject any domestic deals to an ethics review.

The group says that because Trump has not divested from his businesses, he is “now getting cash and favors from foreign governments, through guests and events at his hotels, leases in his buildings, and valuable real estate deals abroad.”

Meanwhile, Trump lawyer Sheri Dillon recently said that under the business plan, Trump will not be in violation of the Constitution’s “Emoluments Clause.” “Paying for a hotel room is not a gift or a present, and has nothing to do with an office,” she said. “It is not an emolument. The Constitution does not require President-elect Trump to do anything here.”

But, as The Hill notes, CREW charges that because Trump does business with such countries as China, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines, “now that he is President, his company’s acceptance of any benefits from the governments of those countries violates the Constitution.” It also warns that, “When Trump the president sits down to negotiate trade deals with these countries, the American people will have no way of knowing whether he will also be thinking about the profits of Trump the businessman.”

The lawyers behind action include constitutional law professors Laurence Tribe and Erwin Chemerinsky, as well as former White House ethics lawyers and CREW board members Norm Eisen and Richard Painter, as well as Bookbinder, Zephyr Teachout and Deepak Gupta.

Trump’s son Eric responded, telling the Times on Sunday that the company had taken more steps than required by law to avoid any possible legal exposure, such as agreeing to donate any profits collected at Trump-owned hotels that come from foreign government guests to the U.S. Treasury. “This is purely harassment for political gain,” Trump told the newspaper.

It may be, but it will also be yet another major distraction for Trump as he prepares to unveil his various stimulus packages. Furthermore, should a adversarial judge be appointedon the case, it is possible that the case will drag out extensively, leading to even more damage for the administration, and even more confusion and chaos for markets, which may be why

No hay más cera, que la que arde. A contrapelo de la atmósfera de sicosis desencadenada especialmente en México, una vez rendida su protesta constitucional, Donald Trump empieza a recibir el aval de las cúpulas financieras y políticas que ejercen el poder universal real.

Desde Davos, Suiza, donde se congregan los socios del Foro Económico Mundial, la directora gerente del Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI), Christine Lagarde ha saludado con beneplácito al Presidente número 45 de los Estados Unidos.

Ha anunciado la economista francesa que, quien se ha abanderado con el spot Volver a ser grandes, tendrá en 2017 uno de sus mejores años de recuperación. Se consolidará este año el crecimiento económico.

Si en Dios confiamos, como reza la leyenda impresa en el dólar, a Trump le favorecen los astros. Pero el asunto no es acreditable a la providencia. Es resultado de la gestión económica de Barack Obama, quien rescató la economía del profundo bache en la que la hundió la crisis financiera 2007-2009.

Los rapaces usufructuarios del 1 por ciento de la riqueza estadunidense, no se andan con remilgos por las calidades morales o políticas del nuevo Presidente norteamericano. Si se han logrado apoderarse de la colosal renta nacional, lo han hecho con independencia de quién despache en el Salón Oval de la Casa Blanca.

La lectura del anuncio del FMI, tiene una implicación mayor. Si 2017 es de bonanza para los Estados Unidos, Trump tiene una preocupación menos en el año inaugural de su mandato.

Atrincherado en esa fortaleza, su prioridad entonces es otra y su primera víctima será la propia sociedad estadunidense.

Nos explicamos. Aun durante los dos periodos presidenciales del demócrata Obama, calificados intelectuales estadunidenses, algunos de ellos, dicho sea de paso, de nuestras ediciones de Voces del Periodista, han denunciado la tendencia hacia la institucionalización el Estado policiaco en la Unión Americana.

Esos pensadores norteamericanos, no pasan por alto que un Estado policiaco en el interior del territorio estadunidense, tendrá su inevitable y nefasta repercusión en las democracias latinoamericanas.

La ostensible orientación del discurso de Trump, ha dejado de lado todo signo liberal del que blasonaba el poder político desde  Washington. Ese discurso tiene todos los tufos a fascismo.

En la nueva era que hoy se abre desde la Casa Blanca, México se encuentra entre la sartén y el fuego. Desde hace al menos dos décadas, México fue puesto de espaldas a América Latina, de la que antes fue considerado líder.

Por el lado septentrional, Canadá ha pintado su raya en la perspectiva de renegociación o suspensión del Tratado de Libre Comercio de América del Norte.

Es hora de dejarse de ver el ombligo

Frente a esa galopante realidad, el gobierno mexicano se ha plegado a una reacción casuística. En términos deportivos parece dispuesto a jugar con el score.

Hace unas horas, el presidente Enrique Peña Nieto declaró que  estará atento a fijar sus posiciones conforme actúe Donald Trump. Esto es, reaccionará a la defensiva. No puede exponerse a México al juego del gato y el ratón.

Se requiere, primordialmente, tomar la iniciativa, fundada en una diplomacia activa y soberana, cuyo soporte no puede ser otro que el del apoyo de todos los sectores internos actuantes, sin exclusiones ni arreglos unilaterales o cupulares concebidos para favorecer a los privilegiados de siempre.

Es cierto, que el Presidente parece haber perdido el capital político que acumuló en los primeros tres años. No obstante, no resulta ilusorio imaginar una nueva generación del Pacto por México, a condición de que se inserte en un esquema democráticamente incluyente, que remonte el exclusivismo que marcó su primera edición, que ha exacerbado la polarización socioeconómica.

En estos momentos de destino, cabe la disyuntiva de los hombres del campo: O cabresteas, o te ahorcas. Hacerlo, antes de que se suelten los demonios de la sucesión de 2018.

El tiempo se agota. Hay que dejar de verse el ombligo.

Mouris Salloum George

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

It’s kinda sneaking up on us like an East Texas copperhead pit viper. It began to get some wide attention in 2016, with prominent economists and financial media suddenly talking about the wonderful benefits of a “cashless society.” Then the government of Narenda Modi completely surprised his citizens by suddenly announcing withdrawal of larger denomination currency notes from circulation, forcing Indians to put their cash into banks or lose it. Now, everywhere we turn, it seems, someone is arguing the Nirvana benefits of a cashless, “digital” money world. It reminds me in an eerie way of a statement attributed to then US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger in the 1970’s. He reportedly stated, “If you control oil, you control entire nations; if you control food, you control the people; if you control money, you control the entire world.” Consider the following in this regard.

Modi and a USAID ‘Catalyst’

On November 8, 2016 in a surprise televised address, Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi announced that, within a deadline of days, all Indian currency notes of 500 and 1,000 Rupees must be put in a bank account and exchanged for smaller denomination notes. At today’s exchange rate 1,000 Rs is roughly equal to $15. This would perhaps be equivalent to the US Treasury outlawing all cash notes larger than a $10 bill.

Overnight, Modi’s government de facto outlawed an estimated 86 percent of all cash in circulation by value. People had 50 days to hand in the notes or they become worthless. Yet the government, despite stating it would issue new, more secure 500Rs and 1000Rs bills, had nowhere near the equivalent value of new notes ready for replacement. They say it may take up to a year to print enough, which means confiscation, de facto. Faked opinion polls with slanted questions done only via smart phone apps of which only 17% of the population has access, claimed that “90% of Indians approve” the demonetization.

Yet it’s far worse. India is an underdeveloped country, the largest in the world in population terms with more than 1.3 billion people. By demanding Indians turn in all 500Rs and 1,000Rs bills to banks, Modi is forcing major change in how Indians control their money in a country high on the corruption scale where few trust government let alone private banks, and prefer to deal strictly in cash or hoard gold for value. Nearly half the population, some 600 million Indians, do not hold a bank account and half of those, some 300 million Indians, lack a government identification, necessary to open an account.

When he presented his shock announcement, Modi pitched it in terms of going after India’s black economy. Soon he shifted gears and was praising the benefits of a “cash-less society” to enable Indians to enter the digital age, appealing to younger Indians, savvy in smart phones and digital networks, to convince the older of the benefits of online banking and consuming. The drastic demonetization declaration was planned by Modi and five other inner-circle ministers in complete secrecy. Not even the banks were told before. The question is what is behind, or rather who is behind this drastic form of monetary shock therapy?

Beyond Cash

The answer is as sinister as it is suggestive of a larger global agenda by what I call in one of my books the Wall Street “Gods of Money.” The Modi cash-less India operation is a project of the US National Security Council, US State Department and Office of the President administered through its US Agency for International Development (USAID). Little surprise, then, that the US State Department spokesman, Mark Toner in a December 1, 2016 press briefing praised the Modi demonetization move stating, “…this was, we believe, an important and necessary step to crack down on illegal actions…a necessary one to address the corruption.”

Keep in mind that USAID today has little to do with aiding poorer countries. By law it must follow the foreign policy agenda of the President’s National Security Council and State Department. It’s widely known as a conduit for CIA money to execute their dirty agendas abroad in places such as Georgia. Notably, the present head of the USAID, Gayle Smith, came to head USAID from her post as Senior Director at the US National Security Council.

German economist and blogger, Norbert Haering, in an extensive, well-documented investigation into the background of the bizarre Modi move to a cash-less India, found not only USAID as the key financial source of the project. He also uncovered a snake-pit of organizational vipers being funded by USAID to design and implement the India shock therapy.

USAID negotiated a co-operation with the Modi Indian Ministry of Finance. In October, 2016 in a press release USAID announced it had created and funded something it named Project Catalyst. The title of their report was, “Catalyst: Inclusive Cashless Payment Partnership.” Its stated goal it said was to bring about a “quantum leap” in cashless payment in India.

They certainly did that. Maybe two quantum leaps and some.

If we dig a bit deeper we find that in January, 2016, USAID presented the Indian Finance Ministry a report titled, Beyond Cash: Why India loves cash and why that matters for financial inclusion. Financial “inclusion” for them means getting all Indians into the digital banking system where their every payment can be electronically tracked and given to the tax authorities or to whomever the government sees fit.

Astonishingly, the report, prepared for USAID by something called the Global Innovation Exchange, admitted that “97% of retail transactions in India are conducted in cash or check; Few consumers use digital payments. Only 11% used debit cards for payments last year. Only 6% of Indian merchants accept digital payments…Only 29 percent of bank accounts in India have been used in the last three months.” The US and Indian governments knew very well what shock they were detonating in India.

The Global Innovation Exchange includes such dubious member organizations as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a major donor to the Modi war on cash initiative of USAID. It also includes USAID itself, several UN agencies including UNICEF, UNDP, UNHCR. And it includes the US Department of Commerce and a spooky Maclean, Virginia military contractor called MITRE Corporation whose chairman is former CIA Director, James Rodney Schlesinger, a close associate of Henry Kissinger.

The USAID Project Catalyst in partnership with the Indian Finance Ministry was done, according to the USAID press statement, with a sinister-sounding organization called CashlessCatalyst.org. Among the 35 members of CashlessCatalyst.org are USAID, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, VISA, MasterCard, Omidyar Network of eBay billionaire founder Pierre Omidyar, the World Economic Forum-center of the globalization annual Alpine meetings.

War on Cash

However, a most interesting member of the USAID Project Catalyst together with the Indian Ministry of Finance is something called Better Than Cash Alliance. In point of fact the US-government-finance Project Catalyst grew out of a longer cooperation between USAID, the Washington-based Better Than Cash Alliance and the Indian Ministry of Finance. It appers to be the core public driver pushing the agenda of the global “war on cash.”

India and the reckless (or corrupt) Modi government implementing the USAID-Better Than Cash Alliance agenda is clearly serving as a guinea pig in a mass social experiment about how to push the cash war in other countries. The Better Than Cash Alliance is described by the UNCDF, which is its Secretariat, as “a US $38 million global alliance of governments, private sector and development organizations committed to accelerating the shift from cash to electronic payments.”

The Better Than Cash Alliance website announces that the alliance, created in 2012, is a “partnership of governments, companies, and international organizations that accelerates the transition from cash to digital payments in order to reduce poverty and drive inclusive growth.” It’s housed at the UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) in New York whose major donors, in turn, surprise, surprise, are the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and MasterCard Foundation. Among the Better Than Cash Alliance’s 50 members are, in addition to the Gates Foundation, Citi Foundation (Citigroup), Ford Foundation, MasterCard, Omidyar Network, United States Agency for International Development, and Visa Inc.

Recently the European Central Bank, which has held negative interest rates for more than a year, allegedly to stimulate growth in the Eurozone amid the long-duration banking and economic crisis of almost nine years, announced that it will stop printing the €500 note. They claim it’s connected with money laundering and terror financing, though it ominously echoes the Modi India war on cash. Former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, whose shady role in the 1990’s rape of Russia through his Harvard cronies has been documented elsewhere, is calling for eliminating the US $100 bill. These are first steps to future bolder moves to the desired Cash-less society of Gates, Citigroup, Visa et al.

US Dual Standard: Follow the money…

The move to a purely digital money system would be Big Brother on steroids. It would allow the relevant governments to monitor our every money move with a digital trail, to confiscate deposits in what now are legal bank “bail-ins” as was done in Cyprus in 2013. If central banks move interest rates into negative, something the Bank of Japan and ECB in Frankfurt are already doing, citizens have no choice than to spend the bank money or lose. It is hailed as a way to end tax avoidance but it is far, far more sinister.

As Norbert Haering notes, “the status of the dollar as the world’s currency of reference and the dominance of US companies in international finance provide the US government with tremendous power over all participants in the formal non-cash financial system. It can make everybody conform to American law rather than to their local or international rules.” He adds, referring to the recent US Government demand that Germany’s largest bank, Deutsche Bank pay an astonishing and unprecedented $14 billion fine, “Every internationally active bank can be blackmailed by the US government into following their orders, since revoking their license to do business in the US or in dollar basically amounts to shutting them down.”

We should add to this “benevolent concern” of the US Government to stimulate a War on Cash in India and elsewhere the fact that while Washington has been the most aggressive demanding that banks in other countries enact measures for full disclosure of details of Swiss or Panama or other “offshore” secret account holders or US nationals holding money in foreign banks, the USA itself has scrupulously avoided demanding the same of its domestic banks. The result, as Bloomberg noted following the suspiciously-timed Panama Papers offshore “leaks” of May, 2016, is that the United States is rapidly becoming the world’s leading tax and secrecy haven for rich foreigners.

Perversely enough, in 2010 the US passed a law, the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, or FACTA, that requires financial firms to disclose foreign accounts held by US citizens and report them to the US IRS tax office or the foreign banks face steep penalties. The EU signed on to the intrusive FACTA despite strong resistance. Then, using FACTA as the model, the Paris-based OECD drafted an even tougher version of FACTA in 2014 to allegedly go after tax avoiders. To date 97 countries have agreed to the tough OECD bank disclosure rules. Very few have refused. The refusers include Bahrain, Nauru, Vanuatu—and…the United States.

World’s Biggest Tax Haven

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist, a financial wizard or a Meyer Lansky to see a pattern. Washington forces disclosure of secret bank accounts of its citizens or companies abroad, while at the same time lifting control or disclosure inside the United States of private banking accounts. No surprise that such experienced private bankers as London’s Rothschild & Co. have opened offices in Reno Nevada a stone’s throw from Harrah’s and other casinos, and according to Bloomberg, is doing a booming business moving the fortunes of wealthy foreign clients out of offshore havens such as Bermuda, or Switzerland which are subject to the new OECD international disclosure requirements, into Rothschild-run trusts in Nevada, which are exempt from those disclosure rules.

Rothschild & Co. Director, Andrew Penney noted that as a result, the United States today, “is effectively the biggest tax haven in the world.” Today Nevada, Meyer Lansky’s money laundering project of the 1930’s with established legalized gambling, is becoming the “new Switzerland.” Wyoming and South Dakota are close on the heels.

One area where America’s institutions are still world class is in devising complex instruments of financial control, asset theft and cyber warfare. The US War on Cash, combined with the US Treasury and IRS war on offshore banking is their latest model. As Washington’s War on Terror had a sinister, hidden agenda, so too does Washington’s War on Cash. It’s something to be avoided at all costs if we human beings are to retain any vestige of sovereignty or autonomy. It will be interesting to see how vigorously Casino mogul Trump moves to close the US tax haven status. What do you bet he doesn’t?

F. William Engdahl is strategic risk consultant and lecturer, he holds a degree in politics from Princeton University and is a best-selling author on oil and geopolitics, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

El presidente Evo Morales demostró hoy con cifras irrefutables el avance de Bolivia en 11 años del proceso de cambio que dirige, y que supera en todos los órdenes lo hecho en 180 años de anteriores gobiernos republicanos.

El informe anual de Morales -que duró cuatro horas y 20 minutos- mostró un Estado Plurinacional sólido, soberano, y cuyos beneficios sociales y económicos fundamentan la demanda de organizaciones sociales para continuar el mandato del primer presidente indígena del país hasta el 2025.

Tal vez uno de los indicadores que mejor refleja la obra de esta Revolución Democrática y Cultural es la pobreza extrema en Bolivia, que se redujo a menos de la mitad entre 2005 y 2015 del 38,2 al 16,8 por ciento de la población.

En su informe, Morales precisó que en 2005 la extrema pobreza en el área urbana era de 24,3 y en la rural de 62,9 por ciento, pero en 2015 esas cifras bajaron a 9,3 y 33,3 por ciento, respectivamente, en tanto la pobreza moderada descendió del 60,6 por ciento en 2005 al 38,6 por ciento en 2016

Al mismo tiempo, el incremento de ingresos del sector poblacional que lo ubican como clase media aumentó del 13 al 32 por ciento, mientras la desigualdad de ingresos entre el 10 por ciento más rico frente al 10 por ciento más pobre, se redujo en los últimos 11 años de 128 a 37 veces.

Esto se explica, en palabras del propio Morales, por la recuperación y defensa de la soberanía política y económica, y muy en especial la nacionalización de los recursos naturales y de las empresas estratégicas, cuya política ha impulsado el desarrollo económico del país.

Tan cierta es esa afirmación que, según estimaciones preliminares de organismos internacionales, Bolivia liderará el mayor crecimiento económico de Suramérica en 2016 con 4,3 por ciento del Producto Interno Bruto (PIB), conjuntamente con Paraguay, y ocupará el cuarto lugar en América Latina.

Este liderazgo regional en los últimos años ha sido posible gracias a nuestro modelo, la nacionalización y recuperación de recursos naturales y empresas estratégicas, la diversificación de los productos bolivianos y su exportación a 97 países, afirmó Morales.

De acuerdo con el informe del mandatario, el PIB de esta nación andina creció en promedio 2,8 por ciento en casi 55 años de era republicana (1951-2005), frente al cinco por ciento logrado como promedio durante su gestión entre 2006 y 2016.

Ante el pleno de la Asamblea Legislativa, en este Día del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia, Morales subrayó que más del 50 por ciento de sus 166 legisladores titulares son mujeres, 41 curules están ocupados por representantes de los pueblos indígenas y 29 por jóvenes.

Ratificó a la salud y educación como derechos ciudadanos y pilares de la Revolución boliviana, agradeció el apoyo de Cuba en la Operación Milagro que ha devuelto la vista a más de 676 mil bolivianos en 10 años y destacó la labor integral de unos 700 integrantes de la Brigada Médica Cubana en todo el país.

La reducción de las tasas de mortalidad infantil y desnutrición crónica son importantes logros en esta nueva Bolivia, dijo, donde se construyen 47 nuevos hospitales y más de tres mil puestos de salud, se vacuna contra 19 enfermedades y entregan medicamentos sin costo a los de escasos recursos.

Recordó Morales que en 2001 el índice de analfabetismo en el país rebasaba el 13 por ciento de la población, mientras en la actualidad es solo de 2,8 por ciento, y su gobierno ha invertido más de tres mil millones de dólares para la calidad de la enseñanza en todos los niveles.

Después de Cuba, Bolivia es el país que más invierte para mejorar la educación, aseguró, y destacó la creación de 128 nuevos institutos tecnológicos durante los 11 años de su gobierno, hasta en los lugares más aislados del país y acondicionados con moderna tecnología.

En este sentido, expuso datos que corroboran el avance en áreas como salud, educación, deporte, economía y finanzas, infraestructura, hidrocarburos y energía, empoderamiento social, autonomía y reducción de la pobreza, entre otros indicadores.

A su juicio, Bolivia se ha convertido en un país modelo en la lucha de los movimientos sociales y el aumento de la consciencia social y política del pueblo, encabezado por el Movimiento al Socialismo y el Instrumento Político por la Soberanía de los Pueblos. En más de 100 tablas demostró los avances logrados en 11 años tras ganar las elecciones el 2006 con casi un 54 por ciento de los votos, en todos los sectores de la economía, en especial hidrocarburos y generación de energía, en lo cual proyectan convertirse en líderes regionales.

La integración vial, en un país de más de un millón de kilómetros cuadrados, fue otro de los grandes sueños realizados, tanto en la construcción de carreteras y puentes como en aeropuertos nacionales e internacionales que hay proyectado el incremento del turismo.

Podemos equivocarnos, tener dificultades, somos seres humanos, no es sencillo administrar un país. Es derecho de todos observarnos, criticarnos, corregirnos, pero lo más importante es que todos pensemos en Bolivia y en cómo acabar con la pobreza, recalcó finalmente Morales ante su pueblo.

Venezuela tendió su mano de paz a Estados Unidos en momentos en que una nueva administración guiará los destinos de la nación norteña en medio de serios desafíos en el orden interno y externo.

El presidente Nicolás Maduro, fue claro cuando dijo el 18 de enero: ‘Yo quiero unas relaciones de respeto, de altura, de cooperación con el gobierno de Estados Unidos. Ojalá lo podamos lograr, ojalá’.

Miraflores espera que la Casa Blanca le de un giro al timón y se imponga una política pragmática de buena vecindad, respeto e intercambio entre dos economías que en cierta medida se complementan, una por ser productor de muchas manufacturas, por ejemplo, y la otra por tener las mayores reservas mundiales del llamado ‘oro negro’.

En referencia a Donald Trump, el mandatario venezolano dijo: ‘Pido a Dios que cambie su política hacia Venezuela y América Latina y mientras tanto nosotros estaremos aquí, firmes, libres, independientes y soberanos’.

En su breve discurso cuando asumió el mando, el 45 presidente estadounidense dejó la duda sobre cuál será su proyección hacia afuera, sus palabras estuvieron dirigidas más a los oídos de los millones de sus compatriotas inconformes con el llamado establishment que le dieron su voto para una nunca imaginada victoria.

En días recientes un diputado afín al gobierno nos preguntaba que pensábamos de Trump con respecto a Venezuela.

Brevemente le recordábamos palabras del ex presidente demócrata Jimmy Carter quien lo calificaba como una persona ‘pragmática’, ‘moldeable’, un empresario que verá las relaciones, presumiblemente desde esa óptica.

En ese tono las declaraciones del gobierno de Maduro se mantienen en un ambiente de respeto cauteloso, sin ceder posiciones y dispuesto a una mejora en las relaciones que alcanzaron un punto crítico cuando la administración del presidente Barack Obama vio a Venezuela como un peligro para Estados Unidos.

Muchos factores flotan en este ambiente, entre ellos el aparente acercamiento entre Moscú y Washington, para iniciar una nueva época de convivencia, lo que sin dudas tiene un peso en Venezuela.

Si bien es prematuro hablar de lo que hará Trump en el caso de América Latina, llama la atención que ratificó a varios altos funcionarios del Departamento de Estado, entre ellos a Thomas Shannon, el facilitador para Venezuela, quien ya estuvo por aquí en octubre cuando se inició el dialogo del gobierno con sectores opositores.

Según el académico y escritor Atilio Boron, ‘de ningún presidente estadounidense podemos esperar nada bueno. No porque sean malvados sino porque su condición de jefes del imperio les impone ciertas decisiones que en la soledad de su escritorio probablemente no tomarían’.

Ahora, hay que ver, y por supuesto, esperar, si el gobierno en la sombra, que Boron describe como el entramado de agencias federales, comisiones del Congreso, lobbies multimillonarios que por años y años han financiado a políticos, jueces y periodistas, el complejo militar-industrial-financiero, las dieciséis agencias que conforman la ‘comunidad de inteligencia’, entre otros, lo dejan hacer las cosas a su forma.

En términos generales, el equilibrio geopolítico mundial es mucho menos favorable para Washington, por lo que no se espera un avance de posiciones de fuerza cuando a lo interno la situación pudiera ser caótica.

Además, a lo externo, muchos países como el Grupo de los 77 más China llaman al nuevo gobierno de Estados Unidos a evaluar e implementar alternativas para entablar el dialogo con la Venezuela Bolivariana, en consonancia con el principio de respeto a la soberanía y autodeterminación de los pueblos.

Muchos analistas no descartan que se imponga la cordura, y al menos, en estos inicios Washington y Miraflores tomen el ramo de olivo de la paz.

Luis Beaton

El pasado 23 de Diciembre el presidente Juan Manuel Santos anunció que la OTAN aceptó la solicitud del Estado Colombiano para establecer un Acuerdo de Cooperación Estratégica y Militar. Este anuncio tiene como antecedente el Acuerdo de Intercambio  y Seguridad de Información firmado en Bélgica el 6 de Junio de 2013, ratificado por el Congreso de la República en 2014 y declaro inexequible por la Corte Constitucional al año siguiente. Al decir del Ministro de Defensa de la época a través de este acuerdo se buscaba, 

“tener acceso a conocimiento, experiencia, buenas prácticas en materia de misiones de paz, misiones humanitarias, derechos humanos, justicia militar, procesos de transformación y mejoramiento del sector de defensa y seguridad, además de ayudar en la lucha contra el narcotráfico”.

Así las cosas, se trataría desde la perspectiva gubernamental, de una cualificación de las FFMM colombianas en asuntos de operaciones humanitarias y de paz.

El acuerdo Colombia-OTAN de 2013 tenía como uno de sus objetivos estratégicos que el país sudamericano se constituyera en un aliado para combatir “la delincuencia trasnacional y otras amenazas” a la seguridad hemisférica.

Esto es, un territorio para el control geo-estratégico de un continente que durante la última década había puesto en cuestión la capacidad hegemónica de los EEUU.  De ahí, el amplio rechazo que generó el acuerdo en los gobiernos boliviano, venezolano, ecuatoriano y brasileño.

En su momento, estos gobiernos señalaron que este acuerdo ponía en cuestión la integración regional y los acuerdos establecidos en el marco de la CELAC y UNASUR  a través de los cuales se reconoció a América Latina y el Caribe como zona de paz. Así, la condición de “aliado extra-OTAN” fue catalogada como una amenaza a los equilibrios geopolíticos alcanzados en la región,  para Atilio Boron esta iniciativa tenía unas graves implicaciones en tanto conducía a,

tensar la cuerda de las relaciones colombo-venezolanas; amenazar a sus vecinos y precipitar el aumento del gasto militar en la región; debilitar a la UNASUR y la  CELAC; alinearse con Gran Bretaña en el diferendo con la Argentina por Las Malvinas, dado que esa es la postura oficial de la OTAN. Y quien menciona esta organización no puede sino recordar que, como concuerdan todos los especialistas, el nervio y músculo de la OTAN los aporta Estados Unidos y no los otros estados miembros, reducidos al triste papel de simples peones del mandamás imperial. En suma: una nueva vuelta de tuerca de la contraofensiva imperialista en Nuestra América.

Este nuevo anuncio del presidente Santos revive algunos de los temores señalados tres años atrás, aunque en un contexto regional menos favorable para frenar los embates imperialistas de esta fuerza político-militar.

Esto a razón del giro a la derecha en Argentina y Brasil y  su firme propósito de debilitar los procesos de integración regional, el caso de Venezuela ante el MERCOSUR es ilustrativo de esta cuestión.  También, debe leerse este acuerdo como un intento por frenar los espacios ganados en los últimos años por Rusia en la región.

Por eso, es importante el comunicado del gobierno venezolano manifestando su rechazo a dicho anuncio,

El Gobierno venezolano se opone firmemente ante el intento de introducir factores externos con capacidad nuclear en nuestra Región, cuyas actuaciones pasadas y recientes reivindican la política de la guerra (…) Este anuncio desvirtúa los principios de Bandung que dieron origen al Movimiento de Países No Alineados (Mnoal), que prohíbe expresamente a sus Estados Miembros formar parte de alianzas militares.

Ahora bien, es importante señalar que aunque este anuncio va en contravía de los anhelos de paz del pueblo colombiano y de Nuestra América y de los importantes espacios que abren los acuerdos de paz con las insurgencias, no implica, en si mismo, un freno a lo allí acordado.

Los Acuerdos alcanzados con las FARC-EP son de una gran envergadura política ya que generan condiciones de posibilidad para que se desate la lucha popular en unas condiciones más favorables.

Por esa razón, es fundamental que el movimiento popular y la sociedad civil en general exijan la implementación de todo lo acordado. De igual modo, el gobierno de Juan Manuel Santos debe asumir con férreo compromiso la defensa de la vida de nuestros líderes y lideresas sociales que están siendo sistemáticamente asesinados y amenazados por grupos paramilitares y un sector de la clase dominante enemiga de la paz. Son muchos retos y desafíos a los que nos enfrentamos, por eso saludamos el esfuerzo que hacen los ciudadanos y ciudadanas del Movimiento Político “Voces de Paz y Reconciliación” en procura de la construcción de una paz estable y duradera.

 Carolina Jiménez

Carolina Jiménez: Politóloga de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia, doctora en Estudios latinoamericanos de la Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM).

Parece que hemos entrado en el Imperio del Caos, entendido como lo que resulta de la negativa a aceptar el propio declive hegemónico. Parece que Obama lidió con la decadencia de Estados Unidos, como Gorbachov en la ex URSS. Con la paliza que recibieron los Demócratas en EE.UU., los perdedores principales son los globalistas, con los banqueros de Wall Street (City Bank, los Rothschild, etc.) y sus empresas transnacionales que operan en los países emergentes así como los principales medios masivos bajo su control (CNN, etc.). Con la pretensión de California, Hawai y Puerto Rico de separarse de la Unión de Estados parece anunciarse incluso la Perestroika en Occidente.

Las tendencias nacionalistas amenazan también la desintegración de la Unión Europea y se vislumbra un retorno al proteccionismo y nacionalismo. Al no prosperar los tratados de libre comercio empujados por Obama (ATP, el TTIP y TISA) un proceso de des-globalización se pone en marcha a menos que se lo impongan a la fuerza.

Es preciso saber que en Estados Unidos existe un Estado profundo o gobierno de sombra. Así como Clinton sufrió un ataque del Estado Profundo en la recta final de las elecciones cuando el FBI presentó nuevos correos electrónicos relacionados con el mal manejo de información clasificada, también Trump puede ser comido por el omnipotente ´Deep State´.

Todo sucede en un paisaje económico con alto riesgo de otra crisis financiera mundial. Al asumir Trump la presidencia las tasas de interés subirán porque necesita dinero rápido para su proyecto de invertir un millón de millones de dólares en infraestructura. Es un proyecto que constituye un genuino neo-keynesianismo anti-neoliberal que conllevaría a la des-globalización.

Con aumento en las tasas de interés, en el entorno de una inmensa pirámide invertido de crédito y deudas, otra gran crisis financiera global se pondrá en marcha. La nueva política económica no podrá evitarla, pero los globalistas sí podrían hacerle responsable a la administración Trump por el caos que resulte de ello.

En semejante coyuntura el capital financiero globalista (el verdadero responsable de la especulación financiera) se presentará como los salvadores del caos global. Ante la tesis que los nacionalismos solo generan caos, racismo, xenofobia y hasta fascismo, trabajan para poner nuevo orden en el mundo, con un proyecto del Estado Global que estaría por encima de las naciones e incluso por encima de los EE.UU. Para lograr su cometida no se puede descartar en este contexto un golpe, la ley marcial para no mencionar la eliminación física del nuevo presidente.

Lo prioritario en este contexto es lograr que se conserve la paz. No se olvide que ahora, si algo se rompe, estamos en pie de guerra, todos contra todos. No está nada claro que exista una red de seguridad internacional. Y ni Trump ni nadie puede estar seguro de que no la necesitará. La salida más sensata en el momento parece ser ir por un nuevo orden multipolar con diferentes regiones en el mundo sin guerra. La paz mundial tiene también su precio cuando China y Rusia, deberían ser solidarios y ayudar incluso a Estados Unidos a salir de su marasmo civilizatorio y económico.

En un mundo multipolar más proteccionista se erosiona el comercio internacional. La suma de las cuentas nacionales daría negativa, o sea, habrá decrecimiento económico a escala mundial y sin mayor perspectiva que lo habrá en el futuro. Tal vez se anuncia una nueva era  de decrecimiento estructural sin otra salida que la lucha social por otra civilización donde la re-producción de la vida colectiva está en el centro de nuestros valores y para lograrlo hemos de dar vida colectiva a las cosas que producimos. Solo así también podamos devolver la vida a la naturaleza y saber ser parte de ella.

Wim Dierckxsens

Wim Dierckxsens: Doctor en Ciencias Sociales de la Universidad de Nimega, Holanda. Tiene postgrado en demografía por la Sorbonne. Fue funcionario de las Naciones Unidas; Investigador del Instituto de Estudios para el Desarrollo, Universidad Tilburg, Holanda. Fue director del Postgrado en Economía de la UNAH en Honduras y fundador de la Maestría en Política Económica, UNA, Costa Rica.

El norte de Mali, Kidal, Tombuctú y Gao, tiende a convertirse en una de las regiones más inestables del planeta, extraordinariamente rica en uranio padece el accionar de los diferentes grupos con intereses propios y obviamente contrapuestos.

Fundamentalistas vinculados a al-Qaeda para el Magreb Islámico (AQMI); El Movimiento Nacional para la Liberación del Azawad (MNLA), de origen imazaghen que reclama la independencia del ancestral territorio tuareg, divididas en Alto Consejo para la Unidad del Azawad (HCUA) y el Movimiento Árabe del Azawad (MAA), el ejército del presidente malí Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta, y la organización pro Bamako Gatia, (Grupos de Auto-Defensa tuareg  imghad y aliados) liderada por Fahad Ag Almahmoud que se opone a la independencia de Azawad; militares franceses de las operaciones Serval y Barkhane, que desde 2013, se encuentran en la región con una dotación de 14 mil hombres a los que hay que sumar un pequeño contingente de 700 hombres del ejército alemán; numerosas bandas que trafican: armas, tabaco, combustible, drogas y personas y la agrupación Ansar al-Din, (Defensores de la Fe) liderada por Iyad Ag Ghaly, que bajo la cobertura de organización salafista, opera para los intereses de Argelia.

Este extraordinario mosaico de intereses, a la que habría que sumarles la fuerte rivalidad tribal tuareg entre imghad e imazaghen, convierte a esta región, más extensa que Francia, el tercer país más pobre de África, en una bomba de tiempo, que al parecer ha comenzado su cuenta regresiva.

Cuando todavía no se había disipado la estela del dulce y pegajoso perfume del presidente François “Flanby” Hollande, en el aeropuerto de Bamako, capital de Mali, tras su corta visita para participar en la cumbre XXVII África-Francia, última para Flanby, entre los días 13 y 14 de enero, a la que asistieron 35 mandatarios del continente, para discutir con la antigua metrópoli, temas de seguridad y económica; en la ciudad de Gao, a 1130 kilómetros, al noroeste de la capital el miércoles 18, en el interior de una base militar conjunta Francia-ONU para la Estabilización de Malí (Minusma), Abdul Hadi al-Fulani, un miliciano de la organización al-Mourabitoun, (los que firman con sangre), subsidiaria de AQMI, hizo estallar el camión que conducía, matando cerca de ochenta soldados e hiriendo a otros 120, del ejército malí y brigadistas de las auto-defensa de imghad.

Según los testimonios la explosión, produjo una nube de polvo que alcanzó a cubrir  gran parte de la  ciudad Gao, de cerca 90 mil habitantes, provocando la lógica conmoción. De inmediato comercios y escuelas, fueron cerrados y toda la actividad en la ciudad se detuvo.

Gao, capital del estado de mismo nombre, ubicada a orillas del río Níger, vive desde abril de 2012, tras la última sublevación tuareg, en permanente estado de alerta. La ciudad tras lo que fue la tercera sublevación tuareg desde la independencia de Mali en 1960, estuvo bajo control de AQMI, durante diez tremendos meses en que la sharia, se aplicó con todo rigor.

Como consecuencia del ataque del miércoles último, el sábado 21, se produjo un choque entre bandos antagónicos que operan junto al ejército malí. Un puesto en la localidad de Tinassako, en la región de Kidal, fue cercado por un grupo de  tuareg  independentistas de la Coordinadora de Movimientos del Azawad (CMA), produciendo catorce bajas a los  milicianos pro-Bamako de las auto defensas imghad.

El reinicio de las hostilidades entre estos grupos tuaregs, tras los acuerdos de paz de 2015, no del todo vigente, pone literalmente al norte de Mali, en estado de guerra civil. De la que sin duda intentará sacar ventaja al-Mourabitoun, esta organización creada en agosto de 2013 con la fusión al-Moulathamoun, el Movimiento por la Unicidad y la Yihad de África Occidental  (MUJAO) y el ya mencionado Ansar al-Din, está liderado por el mítico Mokhtar Belmokhtar, veterano de la guerra afgana contra los soviéticos, quien a lo largo de casi cuarenta años en el extremismo musulmán ha tenido sus idas y vueltas con AQMI.

La organización al-Mourabitoun, ha sido protagonista de los ataques  al hotel Radisson Blu en  Bamako, en noviembre de 2015 y al Hotel Splendid en Ouagadougou capital de Burkina Faso, en enero de 2016 y al mes siguiente en el balneario Grand Bassam, en Costa de Marfil,  que dejaron un total de 63 muertos, aunque en el caso de Costa de Marfil, pudo haber sido un ajuste de cuentas entre al-Mourabitoun y los nigerianos de Boko Haram y algún cartel narcotraficante que mantiene negocios con ambas organizaciones.

Un país demasiado central

Son varios los países de la región, que se verían muy afectados por la profundización y extensión de la crisis en Mali. Senegal, Costa de Marfil, Burkina Faso y hasta el sur de Níger podían quedar gravemente implicados de seguir en aumento la actividad salafista.

Habría que tener en cuenta dos factores determinantes para que esto suceda, la presencia de Boko Haram quien está recibiendo fuertes golpes en su país de origen Nigeria y podría buscar una alianza regional con al-Mourabitoun-AQMI y el posible retorno de veteranos de la guerra en Siria, a quienes tampoco les está yendo mejor en su teatro de operaciones.

De producirse una ecuación similar a la expuesta, el caos en el oeste africano podría adquirir, todavía formas más virulentas, lo que para contenerla se verían obligados a participar fuerza extracontinental, involucrándose en extenuante intervención. Entiéndase solo la OTAN, podría hacer frente a una situación semejante, claro si es que Donald Trump, estuviera dispuesto a intervenir.

La centralidad de Mali, en el noroeste africano, la hace clave al momento de los desplazamientos regionales, cercana al conflictivo golfo de Guinea, ubicada parte en el Sahara y el Sahel, sumado a la crónica porosidad de las fronteras, cualquier tipo de organización delincuencial o terrorista convierte a Mali, en un excepcional corredor por el que se pueden desplazarse a su antojo.

Según el informe de la Federación Internacional de Derechos Humanos, durante 2016, en el norte y centro del país, se registraron al menos 385 ataques terroristas, en el que se produjeron 332 muertes de ella 207 civiles. Lo que demuestra claramente que a pesar de la intervención militar francesa la región sigue siendo convulsa.

En julio del 2016, un ataque  contra una base militar en la ciudad Nampala en la región central de Segú, cerca de la frontera con Mauritania, dejó una veintena de soldados muertos y otros treinta heridos, sin que las fuerza malienses pudieran repelerlo, hasta que los atacantes se retiraron.

En el sur negro, que practica de manera mayoritaria el animismo, con algún sincretismo musulmán, y que ha dado como resultado un sufismo sui-generis, acumulado una gran cantidad de adeptos, al rigorismo wahabita practicado por al-Qaeda, no le procura ninguna simpatía, por lo que se podría esperar allí, grandes matanzas takfiristas, de asentarse al-Mourabitoun-AQMI.

Dos cuestiones más restan por analizar de afianzarse el salafismo en el norte de Mali, el peligro más concreto es la permeable, larga, y descontrolada frontera con Mauritania, de poco menos de 2300 kilómetros, un país con más del 99% musulmán de mayoría sunita en su versión sufí, absolutamente inerme para enfrentar una invasión fundamentalista.

Y la última y fundamental tiene que ver con los ricos yacimientos de uranio que explota la empresa estatal francesa Areva, en las minas de Arlit y Akouta, en la región tuareg de Agadez, en la frontera entre Malí y Níger, aunque sería prácticamente imposible que los hombres de AQMI, pudieran hacer algo con ese uranio, de acceder a él. Aunque  tecnológicamente, les sería mucho más factible utilizar las toneladas de desechos nucleares como uranio, cadmio, plomo y mercurio que Francia sin ningún control, ni cuidado abandona desde hace décadas en el desierto de Mali y zonas aledañas.

Quizás  Francia, que han hecho del expolió y  el latrocino de los territorios conquistados a sangre, engaño y fuego, su más genuino modo de vida, alguna vez, pueda comprender que cuándo sus ciudadanos son ametrallados, destrozados por una bomba o aplastados por un camión, existen razones que se esconden en lo más recóndito de los desiertos y las selvas, sumergidas en mares de la sangre de otros pueblos.

Guadi Calvo

Guadi Calvo: Escritor y periodista argentino, analista Internacional especializado en África, Medio Oriente y Asia Central. 

Los acontecimientos posteriores a la toma de posesión de Donald Trump, lejos de restar importancia a la V Cumbre de la Celac y al encuentro de movimientos sociales y fuerzas políticas “Por la Paz, la Unidad y la Integración de Nuestra América”, contribuyen a poner en evidencia la necesidad de dar seguimiento a ambos eventos y, más importante aún, dejan claro que es urgente fortalecer la Celac como mecanismo de integración regional.

En el discurso y en la práctica

En el discurso de toma de posesión, Donald Trump no mencionó a América Latina, pero la carga contra los inmigrantes y el énfasis en el objetivo de recuperar el orgullo yanqui y validar la visión panestadounidense en la política, anuncian que la nueva administración dará continuidad a la lucha contra el avance político en la región y rediseñará, con el propósito de lograr mayor efectividad, la conspiración contra los gobiernos progresistas.

En cuando a las relaciones con Cuba, es preciso recordar que Mike Pence y Donald Trump, en sus respectivas cuentas de Twitter celebraron la muerte de Fidel Castro. Trump dijo en ese momento que desde el gobierno haría “todo lo posible para asegurar que el pueblo cubano pueda iniciar finalmente su camino hacia la prosperidad y libertad”.

En el plano comercial, las relaciones con Cuba son del interés de varios grupos empresariales estadounidenses, pero el mantenimiento de las embajadas no implica el cese de la conspiración ni evita su recrudecimiento.

Sobre Venezuela, Trump ha sido explícito al demandar el excarcelamiento de los opositores que han ido a prisión por acciones deleznables, como es el caso de Leopoldo López. Rodeado de enemigos de Venezuela (el general John Kelly, por ejemplo, es el nuevo secretario de Seguridad Nacional), es obvio que Trump tiene en carpeta fortalecer la agresión.

La existencia del proyecto queda confirmada con la reciente declaración del embajador de Colombia en Estados Unidos, Juan Carlos Pinzón, quien asegura que Trump ve a Colombia como la puerta de entrada hacia América Latina. ¿Se puede poner en duda después del avance de las negociaciones entre el gobierno dirigido por el ultraderechista Juan Manuel Santos y la Organización del Tratado del Atlántico Norte, OTAN? ¿No es evidente la amenaza para todo proyecto de avance político en América Latina?

La Celac

La Celac es el mecanismo de integración idóneo para dar respuesta a la nueva situación.

Los jefes de Estado que asistieron a la Cumbre de la Unidad (Méxixo 2010), se manifestaron “Decididos a construir un espacio común con el propósito de profundizar la integración política, económica, social y cultural de nuestra región y establecer compromisos efectivos de acción conjunta para la promoción del desarrollo sostenible de América Latina y el Caribe en un marco de unidad, democracia, respeto irrestricto a los derechos humanos, solidaridad, cooperación, complementariedad y concertación política; y convencidos de que la región de América Latina y el Caribe debe seguir reafirmando su presencia en los foros de los que forma parte y pronunciarse sobre los grandes temas y acontecimientos de la agenda global”

En diciembre del año 2011, en la Cumbre Fundacional de ese espacio común, que es la Celac, Hugo Chávez expresó: “¿Hasta cuándo vamos a ser nosotros la periferia atrasada, explotada y mancillada? Estamos poniendo aquí la piedra fundamental de la unidad, la independencia y el desarrollo Sudamericano. Vacilar sería perdernos”.

Estas palabras conservan vigencia. El 20 de enero del año 2017 será recordado como el día en que esa periferia fue vilipendiada por un presidente yanqui que proclama que los capitales de su país han enriquecido a otros países y los militares de su país los han protegido.

Donald Trump, igual que sus antecesores, llama ayuda al saqueo capitalista y protección a la grosera injerencia militar yanqui. Su proclama es ofensiva para el resto del mundo y en particular para América Latina.

Como candidato, dijo que levantaría un nuevo muro en la frontera como México y habló de deportaciones. Como presidente, ¿qué se puede esperar de él?

La Organización de Estados Americanos, OEA, históricamente ha coincidido con Estados Unidos en los aspectos políticos esenciales.

En la Celac no participan Estados Unidos y Canadá, y esto la define como organismo regional latinoamericano.

Desde el 2013, las cumbres anuales se han realizado en el país con la presidencia pro tempore: Chile, Cuba, Costa Rica y Ecuador.

El 25 de noviembre, iniciará la V Cumbre, en Punta Cana, República Dominicana. Ese día, los mandatarios recibirán el documento emanado de la reunión de movimientos sociales y fuerzas políticas “Por la Paz, la Unidad y la Integración de Nuestra América”, una manifestación organizada de apoyo a la Celac y un llamado de atención sobre la necesidad de fortalecerla.

El bloqueo contra Cuba, las políticas anticubanas que Estados Unidos realiza desde sus agencias gubernamentales, así como la conspiración contra Venezuela, deberán constituir temas de primer orden.

Toda América Latina debe exigir que cese la conspiración desde el Norte.

La ultraderecha en acción

El tiempo de Trump es la continuidad del tiempo de la ultraderecha.

El saliente gobierno de Estados Unidos legalizó golpes de Estado y fomentó la política de golpe blando en América Latina, y ahora la ultraderecha se propone utilizar la figura del rancio magnate (misógino, homófobo, xenófobo y racista) para aplicar los métodos que considere más efectivos sin compromiso con la continuidad y sin necesidad de guardar las formas.

La efectiva preparación para dar respuesta a la situación creada a partir de esa decisión, incluye el fortalecimiento de la Celac y la creciente capacidad de la región para actuar como bloque.

Por eso, la V Cumbre merece la atención de todos los hombres y mujeres conscientes en la región y el reconocimiento de que los temas a discutir son de interés para América Latina y para el resto del mundo.

Los estrategas imperialistas han apadrinado a la derecha en la región para favorecer la actuación particular de cada país. Barack Obama dio un espaldarazo a Mauricio Macri en Argentina y lo mismo han hecho los miembros del equipo de Trump. Sobre Colombia, nada hay que decir.

Entre los asesores de Donald Trump sobre América Latina está Freddy Balsera, de origen cubano y nacido en Miami, quien asesoró durante más de cuatro años a Obama, y Julio Ligorría, ex embajador de Guatemala en Washington y ligado a varios casos de corrupción.

No hay duda de que, en materia de agresión, se ligan la continuidad y el recrudecimiento de la conspiración.

La unidad es necesaria en el presente, y lo es también de cara al futuro. No se equivocó en esto Hugo Chávez y tampoco Fidel Castro, quien siempre reconoció como urgente dar pasos hacia la integración continental.

En 1998, en la Cumbre Iberoamericana realizada en Portugal, Fidel dijo: “Les confieso sinceramente que es difícil resignarse a la idea de la integración circunscrita solo al MERCOSUR. Y digo aquí lo que pienso sinceramente y creo, y a muchos visitantes europeos y a muchos amigos y dirigentes políticos que visitan a Cuba, muchas veces calladamente, siempre les planteo el principio de que hay que ayudar a América Latina a unirse, que hay que ayudar a Suramérica a unirse. No me canso de predicar esa idea. Para tener más fuerza, hay que unir fuerzas”.

Ciertamente, de unir fuerzas se trata. En este momento, para unir fuerzas, es preciso dar impulso a la Celac.

Lilliam Oviedo

La elección de Donald Trump es una más de una serie de insubordinaciones políticas espectaculares que, en conjunto, apuntan a un colapso de la hegemonía neoliberal. Entre esas insubordinaciones, podemos mencionar entre otras, el voto del Brexit en el Reino Unido, el rechazo de las reformas de Renzi en Italia, la campaña de Bernie Sanders para la nominación Demócrata en los EEUU y el apoyo creciente cosechado por el Frente Nacional en Francia.

Aun cuando difieren en ideología y objetivos, esos motines electorales comparten un blanco común: rechazan la globalización de las grandes corporaciones, el neoliberalismo y el establishment político que los respalda. En todos los casos, los votantes dicen “¡No!” a la combinación letal de austeridad, libre comercio, deuda predatoria y trabajo precario y mal pagado que caracteriza al actual capitalismo financiarizado. Sus votos son una respuesta a la crisis estructural de esta forma de capitalismo, crisis que quedó expuesta por primera vez con el casi colapso del orden financiero global en 2008.

Sin embargo, hasta hace poco, la repuesta más común a esta crisis era la protesta social: espectacular y vívida, desde luego, pero de carácter harto efímero. Los sistemas políticos, en cambio, parecían relativamente inmunes, todavía controlados por funcionarios de partido y elites del establishment, al menos en los estados capitalistas poderosos como los EEUU, el Reino Unido y Alemania. Pero ahora las ondas de choque de las elecciones reverberan por todo el planeta, incluidas las ciudadelas de las finanzas globales.

Quienes votaron por Trump, como quienes votaron por el Brexit o contra las reformas italianas, se han levantado contra sus amos políticos. Burlándose de las direcciones de los partidos, han repudiado el sistema que ha erosionado sus condiciones de vida en los últimos treinta años. Los sorprendente no es que lo hayan hecho, sino que hayan tardado tanto.

No obstante, la victoria de Trump no es solamente una revuelta contra las finanzas globales. Lo que sus votantes rechazaron no fue el neoliberalismo sin más, sino el neoliberalismo progresista. Esto puede sonar como un oxímoron, pero se trata de un alineamiento, aunque perverso, muy real: es la clave para entender los resultados electorales en los EEUU y acaso también para comprender la evolución de los acontecimientos en otras partes.

En la forma que ha cobrado en los EEUU, el neoliberalismo progresista es una alianza de las corrientes dominantes de los nuevos movimientos sociales (feminismo, antirracismo, multiculturalismo y derechos LGBTQ) por un lado y, por el otro, el más alto nivel de sectores de negocios “simbólicos” y de servicios (Wall Street, Silicon Valley y Hollywood). En esta alianza, las fuerzas progresistas se han unido efectivamente con las fuerzas del capitalismo cognitivo, especialmente la financiarización. Aun sin quererlo, lo cierto es que las primeras le han aportado su carisma a las últimas. Ideales como la diversidad y el “empoderamiento”, que en principio podrían servir a diferentes propósitos, ahora dan lustre a políticas que han resultado devastadoras para la industria manufacturera y y para lo que antes era la clase media.

El neoliberalismo progresista se desarrolló en los EEUU durante estas tres últimas décadas y fue ratificado por el triunfo electoral de Bill Clinton en 1992. Clinton fue el principal organizador y abanderado de los “Nuevos Demócratas”, el equivalente estadounidense del “Nuevo Laborismo” de Tony Blair.

En vez de la coalición del New Deal entre obreros industriales sindicalizados, afroamericanos y clases medias urbanas, Clinton forjó una nueva alianza de empresarios, residentes de los suburbios*, nuevos movimientos sociales y juventud: todos proclamando orgullosos la honestidad de sus intenciones modernas y progresistas, a favor de la diversidad, el multiculturalismo y los derechos de las mujeres.

Aun cuando el gobierno de Clinton respaldó esas ideas progresistas, también cortejó a Wall Street. Pasando el mando de la economía a Goldman Sachs, desreguló el sistema bancario y negoció tratados de libre comercio que aceleraron la desindustrialización. Lo que se perdió por el camino fue el Rust Belt (Cinturón del Óxido), otrora bastión de la democracia social del New Deal y ahora la región que ha entregado el Colegio Electoral a Donald Trump. Esa región, junto con nuevos centros industriales en el Sur, recibió un duro revés con el despliegue de la financiarización más desenfrenada durante las últimas dos décadas. Las políticas de Clinton -que fueron continuadas por sus sucesores, incluido Barak Obama- degradaron las condiciones de vida de todo el pueblo trabajador, pero especialmente de los trabajadores industriales.

Para decirlo sumariamente: Clinton tiene una pesada responsabilidad en el debilitamiento de las uniones sindicales, en el declive de los salarios reales, en el aumento de la precariedad laboral y en el auge de las familias con dos ingresos que vino a substituir al difunto salario familiar.

Como sugiere esto último, cubrieron el asalto a la seguridad social con un barniz de carisma emancipatorio, tomado prestado de los nuevos movimientos sociales. Durante todos estos años en los que se devastaba la industria manufacturera, el país estaba animado y entretenido por una faramalla de “diversidad”, “empoderamiento” y “no-discriminación”. Al identificar “progreso” con meritocracia -en lugar de igualdad-, se equiparaba la “emancipación” con el ascenso de una pequeña elite de mujeres, minorías y gays “con talento” en la jerarquía empresarial basada en la noción de “quien-gana-se-queda-con-todo” (validando la jerarquía en lugar de abolirla).

Esa noción liberal e individualista del “progreso” fue reemplazando gradualmente a la noción emancipadora, anticapitalista, abarcadora, antijerárquica, igualitaria y sensible al concepto de clase social que había florecido en los años 60 y 70. Con la decadencia de la Nueva Izquierda, su crítica estructural de la sociedad capitalista se debilitó, y el esquema mental liberal-individualista tradicional del país se reafirmó a sí mismo al tiempo que se contraían las aspiraciones de los “progresistas” y de los autodenominados “izquierdistas”. Pero lo que selló el acuerdo fue la coincidencia de esta evolución con el auge del neoliberalismo. Un partido inclinado a liberalizar la economía capitalista encontró a su compañero perfecto en un feminismo empresarial centrado en la “voluntad de dirigir” del “leaning in”** o en “romper el techo de cristal”.

El resultado fue un “neoliberalismo progresista”, amalgama de truncados ideales de emancipación y formas letales de financiarización. Esa amalgama fue desechada en su totalidad por los votantes de Trump. Entre los marginados por este bravo mundo cosmopolita tienen un lugar prominente los obreros industriales, sin duda, pero también hay ejecutivos, pequeños empresarios y todos quienes dependían de la industria en el Rust Belt (Cinturón Oxidado) y en el Sur, así como las poblaciones rurales devastadas por el desempleo y la droga. Para esas poblaciones, al daño de la desindustrialización se añadió el insulto del moralismo progresista, que estaba acostumbrado a considerarlos culturalmente atrasados. Los votantes de Trump no solo rechazaron la globalización sino también el liberalismo cosmopolita identificado con ella. Algunos –no, desde luego, todos, ni mucho menos— quedaron a un paso muy corto de culpar del empeoramiento de sus condiciones de vida a la corrección política, a las gentes de color, a los inmigrantes y los musulmanes. Ante sus ojos, las feministas y Wall Street eran aves de un mismo plumaje, perfectamente unidas en la persona de Hillary Clinton.

Esa combinación de ideas fue posible debido a la ausencia de una izquierda genuina. A pesar de estallidos como Occupy Wall Street, que fue efímero, no ha habido una presencia sostenida de la izquierda en los EEUU desde hace varias décadas. Ni se ha dado aquí una narrativa abarcadora de izquierda que pudiera vincular los legítimos agravios de los votantes de Trump con una crítica efectiva de la financiarización, por un lado, y con una visión emancipadora antirracista, antisexista y antijerárquica, por el otro. Igualmente devastador resultó que se dejaran languidecer los potenciales vínculos entre el mundo del trabajo y los nuevos movimientos sociales. Separados el uno del otro, estos polos indispensables para cualquier izquierda viable se alejaron indefinidamente hasta llegar a parecer antitéticos.

Al menos hasta la notable campaña de Bernie Sanders en las primarias, que bregó por unirlos después de recibir algunas críticas del movimiento Black Lives Matter (Las vidas negras importan). Haciendo estallar el sentido común neoliberal reinante, la revuelta de Sanders fue, en el lado Demócrata, el paralelo de Trump. Así como Trump logró dar el vuelco al establishment Republicano, Sanders estuvo a un pelo de derrotar a la sucesora ungida por Obama, cuyos apparatchiks controlaban todos y cada uno de los resortes del poder en el Partido Demócrata. Entre ambos, Sanders y Trump, galvanizaron una enorme mayoría del voto norteamericano.

Pero sólo el populismo reaccionario de Trump sobrevivió. Mientras que él consiguió deshacerse fácilmente de sus rivales Republicanos, incluidos los predilectos de los grandes donantes de campaña y de los jefes del Partido, la insurrección de Sanders fue frenada eficazmente por un Partido Demócrata, mucho menos democrático. En el momento de la elección general, la alternativa de izquierda ya había sido suprimida. Lo único que quedaba era la elección de Hobson (“tómalo o déjalo”): elegir entre el populismo reaccionario y el neoliberalismo progresista. Cuando la autodenominada izquierda cerró filas con Hillary, la suerte quedó echada.

Sin embargo, y de ahora en más, este es un dilema que la izquierda debería rechazar. En vez de aceptar los términos en que las clases políticas nos presentan el dilema que opone emancipación a protección social, lo que deberíamos hacer es trabajar para redefinir esos términos partiendo del vasto y creciente fondo de rechazo social contra el presente orden. En vez de ponernos del lado de la financiarización-cum-emancipación contra la protección social, lo que deberíamos hacer es construir una nueva alianza de emancipación y protección social contra la finaciarización. En ese proyecto, que se desarrollaría sobre el terreno preparado por Sanders, emancipación no significa diversificar la jerarquía empresarial, sino abolirla. Y prosperidad no significa incrementar el valor de las acciones o los beneficios empresariales, sino mejorar los requisitos materiales de una buena vida para todos. Esa combinación sigue siendo la única respuesta victoriosa y de principios para la presente coyuntura.

A nivel personal, no derramé ninguna lágrima por la derrota del neoliberalismo progresista. Es verdad: hay mucho que temer de una administración Trump racista, antiinmigrante y antiecológica. Pero no deberíamos lamentar ni la implosión de la hegemonía neoliberal ni la demolición del clintonismo y su tenaza de hierro sobre el Partido Demócrata. La victoria de Trump significa una derrota de la alianza entre emancipación y financiarización. Pero esta presidencia no ofrece solución alguna a la presente crisis, no trae consigo la promesa de un nuevo régimen ni de una hegemonía segura. A lo que nos enfrentamos más bien es a un interregno, a una situación abierta e inestable en la que los corazones y las mentes están en juego. En esta situación, no sólo hay peligros, también hay oportunidades: la posibilidad de construir una nueva Nueva Izquierda.

De que ello suceda dependerá en parte de que los progresistas que apoyaron la campaña de Hillary sean capaces de hacer un serio examen de conciencia. Necesitarán librarse del mito, confortable pero falso, de que perdieron contra una “banda de deplorables” (racistas, misóginos, islamófobos y homófobos) ayudados por Vladimir Putin y el FBI. Necesitarán reconocer su propia parte de culpa al sacrificar la protección social, el bienestar material y la dignidad de la clase obrera a una falsa interpretación de la emancipación entendida en términos de meritocracia, diversidad y empoderamiento. Necesitarán pensar a fondo en cómo podemos transformar la economía política del capitalismo financiarizado reviviendo el lema de campaña de Sanders –“socialismo democrático”— e imaginando qué podría  significar ese lema en el siglo XXI. Necesitarán, sobre todo, llegar a la masa de votantes de Trump que no son racistas ni próximos a la ultraderecha, sino víctimas de un “sistema fraudulento” que pueden y deben ser reclutadas para el proyecto antineoliberal de una izquierda rejuvenecida.

Eso no quiere decir olvidarse de preocupaciones acuciantes sobre el racismo y el sexismo. Quiere decir demostrar de qué modo esas antiguas opresiones históricas hallan nuevas expresiones y nuevos fundamentos en el capitalismo financiarizado de nuestros días. Se debe rechazar la idea falsa, de suma cero, que dominó la campaña electoral, y vincular los daños sufridos por las mujeres y las gentes de color con los experimentados por los muchos que votaron a Trump. Por esa senda, una izquierda revitalizada podría sentar los fundamentos de una nueva y potente coalición comprometida a luchar por todos.

Artículo original en inglés:

The End of Progressive Neoliberalism, publicado el 2 de enero de 2017

Traducido por María Julia Bertomeu

Nancy Fraser

Nancy Fraser: Profesora de filosofía y política en la New School for Social Research de Nueva York. Su último libro se titula Fortunes of Feminism: From State-Managed Capitalism to Neoliberal Crisis (Londres, Verso, 2013).

Notas de la editora de Socialismo21:

* En el original “suburbanite”; se refiere a los habitantes de los suburbios de Estados Unidos, que son áreas residenciales en las que vive mayoritariamente gente blanca, con niveles de ingreso medios o altos.

** La frase “leaning in” procede del léxico empresarial y significa literalmente “inclinarse”; se refiere al gesto de enfatizar lo que se dice inclinando el cuerpo hacia adelante, al dirigirse a las personas sentadas alrededor de una mesa en una reunión de negocios. Surgió en 2013 y proviene del título de un libro de consejos para mujeres de negocios: Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, escrito por Sheryl Sandberg, Jefa de Operaciones de Facebook, en colaboración con Nell Scovell.

The Trump transition team is developing a federal budget based on a blueprint drawn up by the right-wing Heritage Foundation that will slash $10.5 trillion from government spending over the next decade, according to a report Thursday in the Hill.

The main budget priorities of the Trump administration are to be published within 45 days of the inauguration and the full budget proposal is expected sometime in April.

According to the Hill, the Trump administration’s budget proposal is being drawn up by Russ Vought and John Gray, former Heritage Foundation employees and one-time aides to Vice President Mike Pence. Vought was also the executive direction of the Republican Study Group, which has proposed similar cuts in recent years, while Gray served as an aide to Republican Speaker of the House Paul Ryan when he led the House Budget Committee.

The implementation of the reported budget cuts would mark a massive escalation in the social counterrevolution and attack on the living standards of the working class carried out by the Democrats and the Obama administration over the last eight years.

Among the “dramatic” reductions that are being prepared are significant cuts to funding for the Commerce Department and the Department of Energy, with programs currently under their jurisdiction either eliminated entirely or transferred to other departments.

Other federal departments that will reportedly be significantly impacted by cuts and program elimination include the Department of Transportation, Justice Department and State Department.

Under the Heritage Foundation plan, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which oversees the operations of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and National Public Radio (NPR), would be entirely privatized. While the CPB still relies on the federal government for a portion of its funding, it has increasingly relied on donations from large corporate sponsors and from the wealthy.

The Heritage Foundation’s budget blueprint is a litany of attacks on benefits and social programs which benefit the poor, as well as an assault on scientific research.

Under the guise of “reducing fraud,” the foundation calls for new restrictions on the Earned Income Tax Credit, which benefits millions of single mothers and low-wage workers. Other reactionary measures under consideration are new work requirements for adult Food Stamp recipients and eliminating Social Security payments for disabled children.

Federal funding for the arts and humanities research would be totally phased out with the elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Scientific research carried out across multiple departments, including in the Department of Energy, will be completely or partially defunded.

The savagery of the reported budget proposals is yet another expression of the fundamental class character of the incoming Trump administration, in which billionaire oligarchs are taking direct control of the federal government, rather than pulling the strings from behind the scenes.

Reports of the incoming administration’s budget plans came as the Senate held cabinet hearings Thursday for multimillionaire corporate raider and former Goldman Sachs executive Steven Mnuchin, nominated to serve as the Treasury Secretary, and former Texas governor Rick Perry for head of the Department of Energy, an agency which Perry called to eliminate in 2012.

Mnuchin, if confirmed, would join a cabinet comprised of billionaires, multimillionaires and former generals. While Mnuchin has an estimated net worth of $400 million, that puts him well behind Trump’s picks for Education Secretary, Betsy DeVos ($5.1 billion), Commerce Secretary, Wilbur Ross ($2.5 billion), and the Small Business Administration, Linda McMahon ($1.35 billion).

During his testimony Thursday, Mnuchin defended his time as the head of California-based IndyMac Bank, renamed OneWest, where he made massive profits aggressively pursuing foreclosures against homeowners during the height of the foreclosure crisis.

Mnuchin sought in his remarks to present himself as a savior moved by the plight of homeowners who was hindered in his efforts to help by too many government regulations. “If we had not bought IndyMac,” he said, “the bank would likely have been broken up and sold in pieces to private investors, where the outcome for consumers could have been much bleaker.” (And Mnuchin just happened to make millions in the process!)

He promised that if confirmed as Treasury Secretary, he would work to eliminate financial regulations that had kept him from becoming even wealthier. Mnuchin will also be taking the lead in formulating Trump’s tax plan, which is to include cutting the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to only 15 percent.

Demonstrating the practically nonexistent character of the vetting process for Trump’s ultra-wealthy nominees, the Washington Post reported Thursday that Mnuchin had failed to report his corporate interests in the Cayman Islands as well as more than $100 million in real estate and art holdings in an initial submission to the Senate panel reviewing his nomination. Though this lapse drew some flak from committee Democrats, it did little to hurt the former Goldman Sachs executive’s chances of confirmation by the Republican-controlled Senate.

While some of Trump’s nominees may take their time to get through the confirmation process, Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Thursday that a deal had been reached to approve retired Marine Corps Gen. James “Mad Dog” Mattis as Pentagon chief and retired Marine Corps Gen. John F. Kelly as head of the Department of Homeland Security shortly after Trump’s inauguration today.

“I looked at their records…and I think they’d be very good,” Schumer noted approvingly. He also indicated that Republican Representative Mike Pompeo would be confirmed as CIA director either today or on Monday.

One day after US President Donald Trump delivered an ultranationalist speech at his inaguration, and even as millions in the US and hundreds of thousands more around the world were protesting his inauguration, Trump went to the Langley, Virginia headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency to pledge his “love” and “1,000 percent” support.

The bulk of his rambling remarks, however, consisted of an attack on the media. Trump first accused the press of fabricating a feud between his transition team and the intelligence agencies and then charged it with deliberately underreporting the turnout for his inauguration the previous day. The new administration’s open feud with the corporate-controlled media underscores the degree of conflict and tension within the state as Trump takes office.

“And the reason you’re my first stop,” Trump told the audience of some 400 CIA employees, “is that, as you know, I have a running war with the media. They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth… they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community.”

Just ten days before, Trump had used his first postelection press conference to accuse the CIA of leaking a report claiming that the Kremlin had a dossier of compromising information on him. He compared the CIA’s alleged leak to the tactics of Nazi Germany.

This was a high point in a months-long public conflict between Trump and the bulk of the intelligence establishment over official claims of Russian government intervention in the 2016 election, allegedly aimed at undermining Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and tipping the vote to Trump.

Spearheaded politically by the Democratic Party and the Clinton campaign, and promoted by most of the corporate media, the McCarthyite-style campaign portrayed Trump as a stooge of Russian President Vladimir Putin because he talked of seeking improved relations with the Kremlin. This warmongering agitation, carried out without any factual substantiation of Russian meddling in the election, was initially aimed at attacking Trump from the right and creating the conditions for a Clinton administration to sharply escalate US military preparations against Russia. After Trump’s unexpected election victory, the campaign was revived in an attempt to block any rapprochement by the incoming government with Moscow.

Despite the complicity of the media in this reactionary campaign, Trump’s attempt to portray his feud with the CIA as a media invention is a patent lie. In Langley, he followed up this charge with a harangue against the press for allegedly underestimating the turnout for the inauguration in order to discredit his administration.

He estimated the attendance at “a million, a million and a half people,” an absurdly inflated figure refuted by aerial photographs showing a far smaller crowd than for Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration and by Washington Metro statistics pointing to a crowd of about 250,000.

Saying “we caught them in a beauty” of a lie, he declared ominously, “And I think they’re going to pay a big price.”

He then made much of an inaccurate report published Friday by Timemagazine, and quickly retracted, that Trump had moved a bust of Martin Luther King, Jr. out of the Oval Office.

Several hours later, the new White House held an, if anything, even more bizarre event. Trump press secretary Sean Spicer called a news conference in the White House briefing room at which he angrily attacked the press corps for lying about the inauguration turnout and all but accused it of sedition. After lashing out for some ten minutes, spouting a series of falsehoods about the attendance at the previous day’s event, he turned on his heels and walked out, refusing to take questions from the stunned reporters.

At neither appearance was any acknowledgment made of the unprecedented character and massive scale of the anti-Trump demonstration taking place a few blocks away and the hundreds of others taking place across the country and internationally.

Declaring Friday’s turnout to be “the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period, both in person and around the globe,”—a complete fabrication—Spicer added, “These attempts to lessen the enthusiasm of the inauguration are shameful and wrong.”

He then accused the media of “sowing division” with “deliberately false reporting” in an effort to undermine the new president, whose address was about “unifying the country.”

“There’s been a lot of talk in the media about the responsibility to hold Donald Trump accountable,” he warned, “and I’m here to tell you that it goes two ways. We are going to hold the press accountable as well.”

This was followed up by further threats against the press by Trump spokespeople who appeared on the Sunday morning news interview programs.

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus told “Fox News Sunday” that “The media, from day one, has been talking about delegitimizing the election, talking about the Russians, talking about everything you can imagine, except the fact that we need to move this country forward.”

He continued: “I’m saying there’s an obsession by the media to delegitimize this president, and we are not going to sit around and let it happen. We’re going to fight back tooth and nail every day, and twice on Sunday.”

Top Trump aide Kellyanne Conway reinforced the attack in an appearance on NBC News’ “Meet the Press.” Speaking of Trump, she declared, “He has just absorbed an unprecedented…deluge of negative criticism and coverage that’s frankly unfair and a little bit dangerous to our democracy.”

In relation to press accounts of Spicer’s performance, she said, “It is completely irresponsible, if not worse, for members of the media to be calling our press secretary a liar or worse…” She called Spicer’s lies “alternative facts” and followed with a direct threat: “If we are going to keep referring to our press secretary in those type of terms, I think we are going to have to rethink our relationship here.”

Trump’s anger is directed in the first instance against an utterly corrupt and subservient corporate-controlled press, which is rightly held in contempt by broad sections of the population because of its role as a purveyor of government lies and propaganda.

The new government, a direct instrument of the financial oligarchy, is nevertheless out to further muzzle the media in order to carry through a violent attack on the democratic rights and social conditions of the working class and prepare bigger and bloodier wars internationally.

Cowardly to its core and thoroughly bribed by the corporate elite, the establishment press is incapable of offering a principled defense of freedom of the press and speech.

Nor will the Democrats oppose Trump’s assault on democratic rights. This has already been demonstrated by the attempts of leading Democrats to attack Trump’s appearance at CIA headquarters from the right.

The New York Times, which functions as the unofficial house organ of the Democratic Party, managed to incorporate an attack on WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in its coverage of Trump’s appearance, writing: “He did not mention his apparent willingness to believe Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, who is widely detested at the CIA, over his own intelligence agencies.”

Adam Schiff of California, the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, and Charles Schumer, the Democratic Senate minority leader, both attacked Trump for showing insufficient deference to the CIA. Neither of them even raised the threat to press freedom and democratic rights posed by the administration’s broadsides.

Schiff said: “While standing in front of the stairs representing CIA personnel who lost their lives in the service of their country—hallowed ground—Trump gave little more than a perfunctory acknowledgment of their service and sacrifice.”

Schumer, appearing on ABC News’ “This Week” program, denounced Trump for raising the possibility of reducing sanctions against Russia. He touted legislation he is cosponsoring with Republican war hawks John McCain and Lindsey Graham to block the executive branch from easing the sanctions.

En 1985, miembros del temible escuadrón del Ejército discutieron cómo implementar la “próxima campaña antisubversiva”. Los datos surgen de la desclasificación de Obama.

A fines de marzo de 1985, un año y medio después de la asunción presidencial de Raúl Alfonsín, miembros del Batallón 601 de Inteligencia del Ejército se reunieron para discutir cómo mantener activa la “lucha contra la subversión” en plena democracia. El que tomó la voz cantante fue el coronel Luis Faustino Adolfo Suárez, identificado como jefe de Contrainteligencia del Batallón, quien afirmó que era indispensable establecer canales informales y discretos de comunicación con agentes de la Policía Federal Argentina para involucrar a dicha fuerza en la “próxima campaña antisubversiva”.

El dato surge de uno de los archivos secretos de los Estados Unidos que fueron desclasificados esta semana por el gobierno de Barack Obama, según lo que el mandatario le había prometido a Mauricio Macri durante su visita en marzo a la Argentina. El documento es  otra prueba de que, durante los primeros años del regreso a la democracia, las estructuras represivas de la dictadura militar se mantuvieron activas. De hecho, el Batallón 601 fue disuelto recién en 1985.

El despacho de inteligencia remitido desde Buenos Aires al Consejo de Seguridad Nacional de la Casa Blanca, entonces encabezado por el presidente Ronald Reagan, señalaba que en la reunión se había conversado sobre supuestos “preparativos militares de gran escala por parte del PRT-ERP y de un amplio tráfico clandestino de armas en la Argentina” que podían ser tomados como “indicios de que actividades subversivas podrían volver a tener lugar en la Argentina”. Suárez también le dijo al puñado de agentes presentes del Batallón –entre los que también estaba el mayor Rodolfo Dellatorre, vicejefe de Contrainteligencia– que él veía críticamente el modo en que la represión política había sido llevada a cabo durante los años setenta debido a una extendida “falta de experiencia, coordinación entre fuerzas y conducción clara y decidida”.

Suárez señaló que la “próxima campaña antisubversiva” debía realizarse en base a un programa “bien supervisado y centralizado”, que tuviera como elemento clave la coordinación con la Policía. Manifestó que “el Batallón debía proceder cuidadosamente en el establecimiento de contactos con la PFA y asegurarse de que los policías elegidos para cooperar fueran discretos y confiables”. Y dijo contar con una lista de altos jerarcas policiales a los que podrían consultarles qué oficiales eran recomendables para lo que buscaba el Batallón 601.

Al igual que muchos otros documentos incluidos en esta segunda tanda de desclasificaciones –la primera se difundió en agosto–, el archivo en cuestión tiene tachaduras que posiblemente buscan preservar la identidad de las fuentes.

Jugosos. Carlos Osorio, director del Proyecto Cono Sur del Archivo de Seguridad Nacional (NSA), una institución no gubernamental con sede en la Universidad George Washington que se dedica a sacar a la luz papeles confidenciales acumulados durante décadas por los distintos gobiernos estadounidenses, se ocupó de relevar y difundir esta nueva desclasificación. “Esta segunda tanda de archivos tiene la mitad de tamaño que la anterior, pero es mucho más jugosa –dijo Osorio a PERFIL–. Han sido muy abiertos con esta desclasificación, hay archivos marco que incluso podrían citarse en causas judiciales”.

Los documentos también aportan información sobre la Operación Cóndor y, en particular, sobre los tempranos planes que tenían las dictaduras de Argentina, Uruguay y Chile para exportar la coordinación represiva y la persecusión a disidentes hacia Europa. “Sabíamos que eso había existido, pero no conocíamos que con ese nivel de osadía y descaro –agregó Osorio–. Incluso hay pruebas de que planearon asesinar a miembros de Amnesty International”. El conocimiento histórico sobre la Operación  Cóndor ha sido siempre fragmentario, producto del trabajo de rompecabezas de investigadores. En esta desclasificación aparecen informes detallados de la CIA donde el cuadro de la represión extraterritorial empieza a verse más completo.

Facundo F. Barrio

It seemed an unnecessarily grand gesture, but the English Premier league discovered last week that Manchester United had appointed its own counterterrorism manager.  The person is said to be a former inspector from Greater Manchester Police’s specialist research unit.  As with everything else in matters of security, such a move will stir and spark discussion: if they have one, why not us? Club boards are bound to be meeting over the subject.

This has happened despite the Football Association’s keen confidence that the standards of security at English football venues are second to none.  “Irrespective of league position, stadium size or attendance; the way in which the grounds of our football clubs are operated ensures that crowd safety, accessibility and enjoyment are world class as standard.”[1]

The UK Government has its own Guide to Safety at Sports Grounds, which was commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. In its fifth edition, it has come to be known as The Green Guide, the salient benchmark.

The Green Guide acknowledges the need for counter-terrorist approaches, including the necessity of searching “spectators more thoroughly prior to entry.  This may require extra temporary arrangements and the deployment of additional resources on the approaches to the turnstiles or entry points, which in turn may reduce the rate at which spectators can enter.”[2]

The authors of the report also note the Counter Terrorism Protective Security Advice for Stadia and Arenas produced by the National Counter Terrorism Security Office.  With such an array of advising documents, the spectator can be either assured or irritated that appropriate measures are going to be in place against attack.

Despite supposedly exemplary state of stadium security, breaches do take place.  Manchester United’s appointment came in the wake of two incidents designated by The Guardian as blunders. May’s Premier League match with Bournemouthwas a disruptive affair: a questionable package had been discovered in a toilet.  A moment of panic ensued, then evacuation.

As things transpired, the suspected item proved harmless enough. The package had been, of all things, actually placed there by a security firm, a costly oversight that meant the match had to be rescheduled.

The lavatories were again the site of another breach, this time featuring two United fans who wished to capitalise on their tour of Old Trafford by icing the cake.  Their method proved childishly simple: conceal themselves in the good old water closet long enough to sneak in to see the match against Arsenal. The ploy failed, and the police duly tidied up.

As with much in the world of counter-terrorism speak, inconsistencies reign.  A counter-terrorism system can be lauded, yet breached in the twinkling of an eye.  This can happen despite the fact that Old Trafford remains heavily policed.  Turning up at a match entails searches of cars of owners wishing to avail themselves of the car park; spectators are searched at the turnstiles.  A perfect detection system, should it ever exist, would be intolerably intrusive.

Sporting officials have every reason to fear vulnerability of their sports venues, though football’s, at times pugilistic history, suggests that some of the greatest threats have been the fans themselves.  As is the fashion these days, fearing the next Islamic State attack or inspired attack, governs discussion and deliberation.

However an attacker is inspired (the lone-wolf term remains all too convenient and problematic), the danger in any such attack remains inherent and genuine.  As with everything else in the business of inflicting terror, theatrics and horror are ingredients to the pudding of mayhem.  The problem, as ever, remains detection, an imperfect science at best.

Manchester United’s appointment shines a light on the securitisation of the very pleasure of attending sporting venues, a process that has, in truth, been going on for some years.  Baroness Ruth Henig has even insisted on law changes to make entertainment venues through the UK undergo counter-terror training.[3]

The clubs, it would seem, have decided to buy into the rhetoric of counter-terrorism paradoxically making football seem lesssafe.  Counter-terrorist czars are being sought.  Clubs, as always, wish to be seen to be doing something. But nothing will ever eliminate the element of chance.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at SelwynCollege, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne.  Email: [email protected]

Notes

[1] http://www.thefa.com/football-rules-governance/more/stadium-safety

[2] http://www.safetyatsportsgrounds.org.uk/sites/default/files/publications/green-guide.pdf

[3] http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/38661302

 

The push to commercialise the growing of genetically modified (GM) mustard in India is currently held up in court due to a lawsuit by Aruna Rodrigues. The next hearing is due in February. Rodrigues has indicated at length that, to date, procedures and tests have been corrupted by fraudulent practices, conflicts of interests and gross regulatory delinquency.

Dr Deepak Pental, lead researcher into the crop at Delhi University, has now conceded that the GM mustard in question has not even been tested against varieties of non-GM mustard for better yields. That seems very strange given that the main argument for introducing GM mustard is to increase productivity in order to reduce edible oils imports (a wholly bogus argument in the first place).

All of this should in itself provide sufficient cause for concern and have alarm bells ringing. It raises the question: what then is the point of GM mustard?

Consider too that the drive to get India’s first GM food crop into the field and on the market also goes against the recommendations of four high-level reports that have advised against the adoption of these crops in India: The ‘Jairam Ramesh Report’ of February 2010, imposing an indefinite moratorium on Bt Brinjal; The ‘Sopory Committee Report’ (August 2012); The ‘Parliamentary Standing Committee’ (PSC) Report on GM crops (August 2012); and The ‘Technical Expert Committee (TEC) Final Report’ (June-July 2013).

These reports conclude that GM crops are unsuitable for India and that existing proper biosafety and regulatory procedures are inadequate. Appointed by the Supreme Court, the TEC was scathing about the regulatory system prevailing in India, highlighting its inadequacies and inherent serious conflicts of interest. The TEC recommended a 10-year moratorium on commercial release of GM crops. The PSC also arrived at similar conclusions.

It might seem perplexing that the current Modi-led administration seems to be accelerating the drive for GM given that the BJP manifesto stated: “GM foods will not be allowed without full scientific evaluation on the long-term effects on soil, production and biological impact on consumers.” Yet none of this has occurred.

According to eminent lawyer Prashant Bhushan, these official reports attest to just how negligent and unconcerned India’s regulators are with regard to the risks of GMO contamination. They also attest to a serious lack of expertise on GM issues within official circles.It now clear that placing GM crops on the commercial market in the first place (in the US) was based on the subversion or bypassing of science and that their introduction poses a risk to food security, human health and animal, plants and soil as well as the environment in general.

In India, the only commercialised GM crop (bt cotton) is a failing technology that has severely impacted farmers’ livelihoods.

As bad as all of this might seem, the real significance of GM mustard lies in the fact it could be India’s first GM food crop. In this sense, it should be regarded as a pioneering crop that would open the doors to a range of other GM food crops that are currently in the pipeline for testing.

GM provides a handful of companies with an ideal tool for securing intellectual property rights over seeds (and chemical inputs) and thus gaining corporate control over farming and agriculture. Despite the GMO industry saying that GM should be but one method within a mix, evidence indicates that this is impractical due to cross-contamination and that corporations and their mouthpieces are seeking to denigrate/replace existing food production practices in order to secure greater control over global agriculture. In effect, the only reason for imposing GM crops on India seems to be to facilitate corporate imperialism.

The issue of GM mustard is not only about a crop but is central to a development paradigm that wants to see a fully urbanised India with a small fraction of people left in agriculture and living in the countryside.US companies and Washington, via the Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture, are driving the agenda. Does India want to mirror what is effectively a disastrous US model of agriculture? If this is the case, it is highly disturbing, given that it is an unsustainable taxpayer-subsidised sector that has produced a range of social, environmental and health costs outlined in that last link.

We must therefore ask: does India want denutrified food, increasingly monolithic diets, the massive use of agrochemicals, food contaminated by hormones, steroids, antibiotics and a wide range of chemical additives, spiralling rates of ill health, degraded soil, contaminated and depleted water supplies and a cartel of seed, chemicals and food processing companies that seek to secure control over the global food production and supply chain to provide people with low-grade but highly profitable food products?

Things do not look good. A recent UN report said that by 2030, Delhi’s population will be 37 million. In 1991, it was just over 9.4 million. Such rapid, ongoing urbanisation will eat up highly productive farmland on the edges of cities and will place smallholder farmers under even more duress. Quoted in The Guardian, the report’s principal authors, Felix Creutzig, says:

The emerging mega-cities will rely increasingly on industrial-scale agricultural and supermarket chains, crowding out local food chains.

In India, the push to drive at least 400 million from the land and into cities is already underway at the behest of the World Bank: a World Bank that is, under the guise of ‘enabling the business of agriculture’, committed to opening up economies to corporate seeds and agrochemicals and securing global supply chains for transnational agribusiness from field to plate.

The drive is to entrench industrial farming, commercialise the countryside and to replace small-scale farming: small-scale farming that is the backbone of food production in India (and globally) and which is more productive than industrialised agriculture, more sustainable and capable of producing more diverse, nutrient- dense diets. Contrast this with what Green Revolution technologies and ideology has already done to India, including the degradation of its water, its soils and its people’s health (see this and this).

Contrast it with an industrial farming that would bring with it all the problems outlined above. And an industrial farming that would destroy hundreds of millions of livelihoods with little guarantee of work for those whose productive system is to be displaced by that which is to be imposed by the likes of Cargill, Monsanto/Bayer and other corporate entities that fuel industrial agriculture.

The issue of GM mustard is part of a drive that seeks to restructure India to benefit foreign capital; a process that regards as being India ripe for a 30-trillion-dollar corporate hijack.

Food and trade policy analyst Devinder Sharma describes the situation:

India is on fast track to bring agriculture under corporate control… Amending the existing laws on land acquisition, water resources, seed, fertilizer, pesticides and food processing, the government is in overdrive to usher in contract farming and encourage organized retail. This is exactly as per the advice of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund as well as the international financial institutes.

Dr Pental’s GM mustard has roots that trace its origins back to Bayer. Mr Modi, Arvind Subramanian (Chief Economic Advisor to the Indian government) and former governor of the Reserve Bank of India Raghuram Rajan also have roots that can be traced back to Washington, the IMF and the World Bank.

There is an agenda for India. An agenda that regards the peasantry, small farms and India’s rural-based traditions, cultures and village-level systems of food production/processing as backward, as an impediment to ‘progress’. An agenda that regards alternative approaches to agriculture that have been advocated by numerous high-level reports as a hindrance: approaches that would in effect build on and develop the current rural infrastructure and not eradicate it.

There is a push to displace the current productive system with a corporate-controlled model geared towards the maximisation of profit and the erosion of existing deeply-embedded and culturally relevant social relations. For all the fraud and corruption surrounding GM mustard, this alone should convince any bystanders to question the ongoing drive – against all the recommendations – to introduce GM food crops to India.

Finally, none of this is about being ‘anti-GMO’. It is about understanding and challenging the politics of GM and development. Wealthy corporations are flexing their financial and political muscle and are effectively hijacking public institutions for their own ends by slanting, science, politics, policies and regulation (these claims are discussed here, here and here) . It should not be about whether we are pro-GMO or anti-GMO. It is more the case of whether we are anti-corruption and pro-democratic.

The push to commercialise the growing of genetically modified (GM) mustard in India is currently held up in court due to a lawsuit by Aruna Rodrigues. The next hearing is due in February. Rodrigues has indicated at length that, to date, procedures and tests have been corrupted by fraudulent practices, conflicts of interests and gross regulatory delinquency.

Dr Deepak Pental, lead researcher into the crop at Delhi University, has now conceded that the GM mustard in question has not even been tested against varieties of non-GM mustard for better yields. That seems very strange given that the main argument for introducing GM mustard is to increase productivity in order to reduce edible oils imports (a wholly bogus argument in the first place).

All of this should in itself provide sufficient cause for concern and have alarm bells ringing. It raises the question: what then is the point of GM mustard?

Consider too that the drive to get India’s first GM food crop into the field and on the market also goes against the recommendations of four high-level reports that have advised against the adoption of these crops in India: The ‘Jairam Ramesh Report’ of February 2010, imposing an indefinite moratorium on Bt Brinjal; The ‘Sopory Committee Report’ (August 2012); The ‘Parliamentary Standing Committee’ (PSC) Report on GM crops (August 2012); and The ‘Technical Expert Committee (TEC) Final Report’ (June-July 2013).

These reports conclude that GM crops are unsuitable for India and that existing proper biosafety and regulatory procedures are inadequate. Appointed by the Supreme Court, the TEC was scathing about the regulatory system prevailing in India, highlighting its inadequacies and inherent serious conflicts of interest. The TEC recommended a 10-year moratorium on commercial release of GM crops. The PSC also arrived at similar conclusions.

It might seem perplexing that the current Modi-led administration seems to be accelerating the drive for GM given that the BJP manifesto stated: “GM foods will not be allowed without full scientific evaluation on the long-term effects on soil, production and biological impact on consumers.” Yet none of this has occurred.

According to eminent lawyer Prashant Bhushan, these official reports attest to just how negligent and unconcerned India’s regulators are with regard to the risks of GMO contamination. They also attest to a serious lack of expertise on GM issues within official circles.It now clear that placing GM crops on the commercial market in the first place (in the US) was based on the subversion or bypassing of science and that their introduction poses a risk to food security, human health and animal, plants and soil as well as the environment in general.

In India, the only commercialised GM crop (bt cotton) is a failing technology that has severely impacted farmers’ livelihoods.

As bad as all of this might seem, the real significance of GM mustard lies in the fact it could be India’s first GM food crop. In this sense, it should be regarded as a pioneering crop that would open the doors to a range of other GM food crops that are currently in the pipeline for testing.

GM provides a handful of companies with an ideal tool for securing intellectual property rights over seeds (and chemical inputs) and thus gaining corporate control over farming and agriculture. Despite the GMO industry saying that GM should be but one method within a mix, evidence indicates that this is impractical due to cross-contamination and that corporations and their mouthpieces are seeking to denigrate/replace existing food production practices in order to secure greater control over global agriculture. In effect, the only reason for imposing GM crops on India seems to be to facilitate corporate imperialism.

The issue of GM mustard is not only about a crop but is central to a development paradigm that wants to see a fully urbanised India with a small fraction of people left in agriculture and living in the countryside.US companies and Washington, via the Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture, are driving the agenda. Does India want to mirror what is effectively a disastrous US model of agriculture? If this is the case, it is highly disturbing, given that it is an unsustainable taxpayer-subsidised sector that has produced a range of social, environmental and health costs outlined in that last link.

We must therefore ask: does India want denutrified food, increasingly monolithic diets, the massive use of agrochemicals, food contaminated by hormones, steroids, antibiotics and a wide range of chemical additives, spiralling rates of ill health, degraded soil, contaminated and depleted water supplies and a cartel of seed, chemicals and food processing companies that seek to secure control over the global food production and supply chain to provide people with low-grade but highly profitable food products?

Things do not look good. A recent UN report said that by 2030, Delhi’s population will be 37 million. In 1991, it was just over 9.4 million. Such rapid, ongoing urbanisation will eat up highly productive farmland on the edges of cities and will place smallholder farmers under even more duress. Quoted in The Guardian, the report’s principal authors, Felix Creutzig, says:

The emerging mega-cities will rely increasingly on industrial-scale agricultural and supermarket chains, crowding out local food chains.

In India, the push to drive at least 400 million from the land and into cities is already underway at the behest of the World Bank: a World Bank that is, under the guise of ‘enabling the business of agriculture’, committed to opening up economies to corporate seeds and agrochemicals and securing global supply chains for transnational agribusiness from field to plate.

The drive is to entrench industrial farming, commercialise the countryside and to replace small-scale farming: small-scale farming that is the backbone of food production in India (and globally) and which is more productive than industrialised agriculture, more sustainable and capable of producing more diverse, nutrient- dense diets. Contrast this with what Green Revolution technologies and ideology has already done to India, including the degradation of its water, its soils and its people’s health (see this and this).

Contrast it with an industrial farming that would bring with it all the problems outlined above. And an industrial farming that would destroy hundreds of millions of livelihoods with little guarantee of work for those whose productive system is to be displaced by that which is to be imposed by the likes of Cargill, Monsanto/Bayer and other corporate entities that fuel industrial agriculture.

The issue of GM mustard is part of a drive that seeks to restructure India to benefit foreign capital; a process that regards as being India ripe for a 30-trillion-dollar corporate hijack.

Food and trade policy analyst Devinder Sharma describes the situation:

India is on fast track to bring agriculture under corporate control… Amending the existing laws on land acquisition, water resources, seed, fertilizer, pesticides and food processing, the government is in overdrive to usher in contract farming and encourage organized retail. This is exactly as per the advice of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund as well as the international financial institutes.

Dr Pental’s GM mustard has roots that trace its origins back to Bayer. Mr Modi, Arvind Subramanian (Chief Economic Advisor to the Indian government) and former governor of the Reserve Bank of India Raghuram Rajan also have roots that can be traced back to Washington, the IMF and the World Bank.

There is an agenda for India. An agenda that regards the peasantry, small farms and India’s rural-based traditions, cultures and village-level systems of food production/processing as backward, as an impediment to ‘progress’. An agenda that regards alternative approaches to agriculture that have been advocated by numerous high-level reports as a hindrance: approaches that would in effect build on and develop the current rural infrastructure and not eradicate it.

There is a push to displace the current productive system with a corporate-controlled model geared towards the maximisation of profit and the erosion of existing deeply-embedded and culturally relevant social relations. For all the fraud and corruption surrounding GM mustard, this alone should convince any bystanders to question the ongoing drive – against all the recommendations – to introduce GM food crops to India.

Finally, none of this is about being ‘anti-GMO’. It is about understanding and challenging the politics of GM and development. Wealthy corporations are flexing their financial and political muscle and are effectively hijacking public institutions for their own ends by slanting, science, politics, policies and regulation (these claims are discussed here, here and here) . It should not be about whether we are pro-GMO or anti-GMO. It is more the case of whether we are anti-corruption and pro-democratic.

What he should and will do may be world’s apart. His top priorities should be world peace, stability, mutual cooperation with all nations, making America a model state, unlike its current pariah status, along with equity and justice for everyone.

No president in US history reached that standard. Jack Kennedy came closest. Franklin Roosevelt gave Americans vital New Deal policies during the nation’s Great Depression. In large measure, he also bore responsibility for WW II.

Lyndon Johnson waged war on poverty while waging far greater war abroad, dividing the nation in the process, his unpopularity forcing him out of the 1968 race despite his Great Society achievements.

Ignore what politicians say. Follow only what they do. Trump delivered a promising inaugural address, striking a far different tone than most of his predecessors, refreshingly omitting phony rosy scenario hyperbole.

He pledged to serve all Americans straightaway. Saying he’ll “fight for you with every breath in (his) body, and (he’ll) never, ever let you down” is hollow rhetoric without meaningful policy initiatives backing it.

Replacing corporate enriching Obamacare with something worse is no way to fulfill his pledge. Nor is waging war on social justice if that’s what he has in mind.

The pro-Hillary, anti-Trump New York Times outrageously called his ascension to power “a hostile takeover” of the nation’s capital. The self-styled newspaper of record is unrelenting in its maliciousness – furious over an outsider defeating its favorite, wanting revenge, disgracing itself more than already.

Trump:

“We will no longer accept politicians who are all talk and no action, constantly complaining but never doing anything about it.”

The time for empty talk is over. Now arrives the hour of action. Do not allow anyone to tell you that it cannot be done.”

Strong stuff! Nothing Obama, Bush/Cheney, the Clintons and most other US presidents matched it in words or deeds.

Trump no longer is a private citizen. He’s America’s 45th president and armed forces commander-in-chief, an enormous responsibility for anyone.

He’s got bully pulpit power, along with the power and influence of his incumbency. Will he back his lofty rhetoric with positive actions?

Will he serve all Americans responsibly as promised or just its privileged few – the way it’s largely worked before?

Will he be a warrior or peace president? Is his pledge to combat terrorism real or just another ploy to continue US imperial madness?

Will he get along with Russia, China and all other sovereign independent nations or maintain adversarial relations?

Will he do the right things or be just another dirty politician? Will the Trump era be looked back on as transformational or disturbing continuity?

According to Sputnik News, “(t)he Trump Administration will consider the invitation to (Syrian conflict resolution) negotiations in Astana after its official receipt, and will not participate in any negotiations until the formation of a clear US vision of a resolution to the Syrian crisis.”

Earlier Trump complained about wasting trillions of dollars on foreign wars, accomplishing nothing but disaster. Will he curb imperial madness or continue it? Pretexts are easy to create to do what he wishes.

He took dead aim at destructive trade deals sending US jobs abroad. He wants NATO used to combat terrorism, not wage war on other countries, so he said earlier.

He rhetorically challenged longstanding US tradition. Will he initiate the most sweeping changes in American policy since FDR’s New Deal, LBJ’s Great Society, and the Reagan era?

Will his agenda improve things at home and abroad or worsen them? As a newly inaugurated president, it’ll take time to tell.

He deserves a chance to prove his mettle. He’s the first US president letting ordinary Americans communicate with his administration directly – via Twitter.

I’ve done it numerous times, urging him to do the right things in brief comments and links to some of my articles. He’ll get this one.

Incoming tweets are read by staff, checking for possible threats, along with likely gauging public sentiment, other than what polls reveal.

Trump used his inaugural address to communicate directly with ordinary Americans, hoping for improved public approval.

The only way to get it is through responsible governance – legislatively and by executive actions as necessary.

On January 20, a new era in America began – the fullness of time to tell if for good or ill.

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 US secret intelligence community bet everything on de-legitimizing Donald Trump by claiming that secret sources and methods demonstrated that the Russians hacked the US election. The evidence has not been forthcoming, and there has been such a powerful collection of voices to the contrary that it is the secret world that has de-legitimized itself, at least in the USA.

The US mainstream and progressive media bet everything on the assumption that Hillary Clinton was the inevitable candidate, and in the process demonstrated such a bias against the winning candidate and such a blindness to the will of the public that the US media is now called “fake news” – the public rejects the assertion that skeptical citizens are purveying “fake news.”

The US political duopoly – the Republican and Democratic parties that some say are two wings of the same bird – fought against Donald Trump to the very end. Julian Assange has promised an exciting 2017 – some expect him to do to the Republicans what he did to the Democrats. Political parties are now impotent.

For those in Europe who worry about what an “unshackled” Donald Trump might do to America – and to America’s relations with Europe – it may be helpful to reflect on the fact that Trump has spoken clearly about being against war and waste; against trade deals with secret clauses that disadvantage the public; and against political corruption – “play to pay.” He is, in short, against conventional wisdom and against the “Establishment” that has spent centuries fencing the commons and marginalizing the individual citizen.

For all of his flaws, Donald Trump, according to some observers represents a restoration of the voice of the people. As Europe deals with the millions of illegal immigrants displaced by America’s elective wars in the Middle East, North Africa, and Central Asia, it might do well to consider the possibility that Donald Trump represents the end of the central banking and central politics era – and the end of centralized secret intelligence without accountability – and the beginning instead of a new era where US foreign policy will be about legitimate commerce and peace for all instead of forced globalization and war as a profit center for the few.

It is too early to tell if Donald Trump will be a populist president. While he has chosen business and military elites to replace the political elites in the service of Wall Street – Donald Trump is a “Main Street” president – it remains to be seen if he will follow his instincts and pursue intelligence reform, media reform, and electoral reform.

What might a new world order look like if Donald Trump were to rebuild the US Government?

An end to waste and over-charging. Iran and Donald Trump have one big thing in common: they both believe that Boeing and Airbus and everyone else are double-charging, and we should be paying half the list price for everything. Under Donald Trump the various complexes, from the military-industrial to the pharmaceutical to the agricultural complex are headed for a sharp decline in earnings and excess profits.

The beginning of the open source era. While there is no evidence that Donald Trump intends to create the Open Source Agency (OSA) that his National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was briefed on in 2014, it is clear that a new era of evidence-based governance relying on ethical legal open sources to produce Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), has begun. The spies can no longer repress what they have long called “open sores.” It will take time, but it is possible that a Trump Administration could see that the open source era should include two new elements no one is talking about yet:

Creating the World Brain. Education, intelligence, and research are all broken. They do not do holistic analytics and true cost economics. Bearing in mind the centrality of the five billion poor as the engine of future prosperity, a Trump Administration may reject the neo-conservative attempts to double-down on investments in propaganda – lies – and instead seek to create a means for providing everyone in the world with free access to truthful information “one cell call at a time.” The education of the individual on a just enough, just in time basis, not government regulation and micro-management, is how we heal ourselves.

Open Source Everything Engineering (OSEE). Beyond OSINT lies OSEE – OSEE can achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in a fraction of the time as a fraction of the cost of the current dysfunctional industrial-donor paradigm. As a businessman, Donald Trump understands that the cheapest way to keep all those pesky illegal immigrants home is to stop supporting dictators while simultaneously enabling free solar energy, unlimited free desalinated water, free Internet, and free open source housing and other infrastructure advances. The industrial era that concentrated wealth is over – the information era of distributed 3D-printing and a re-birth of local sustainability has begun.

An end to elective wars, regime change operations, and drone assassinations. The foreign policy coup of the neo-conservatives that led to multiple foreign wars is over; the year-long soft coup against Donald Trump by the Establishment has been defeated. Europe should expect America to stop supporting both the United Nations (UN) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); to stop placing our military in overseas bases where they serve other countries instead of our own; and to re-focus the US intelligence community on producing decision-support relevant to peace and prosperity instead of engaging in crimes against humanity around the world.

New possibilities for Internet-enabled democracy. Although the Internet is very broken – and Facebook and Google have shown themselves to be above the law and ready to censor any opinion not approved by Eric Schmidt or George Soros – Parag Khanna among others has illuminated possibilities is his two books Connectography and Technocracy. If Donald Trump created the Trump Channel that places before the public a balanced budget with line item detail; if he demands that all legislation be posted in advance of being voted on; and most importantly, if he created a 24/7 interactive polling infrastructure that empowers all citizens including the 47% that did not vote at all in 2016, to be engaged informed citizens, not only would he bury the two-party tyranny, he would create new national conversation Of, By, and For all US citizens – a new global standard.

An end to Empire, an end to Central Banking. The Holy Grail of democracy is to be found in the death of Central Banking. Central banking – the creation of false wealth out of nothing and the imposition of both interest and exchange rates too easily manipulated with income taxation that exempts banks and fraudulent non-profits from taxation, have been the death of democracy. While the soft coup has been defeated, there is still a war going on in America, between those who wish to continue sacrificing the American public at the altar of globalization and concentrated wealth; and those who wish to end the Empire rooted in central banking and secret agencies managing global criminal networks, in favor of a restored America the Beautiful.

Emergence is not pretty. In my view, Donald Trump is the ugly duckling. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. This may surprise many in Europe, but from where I sit as a former infantry officer, former spy, and champion of open source everything, Donald Trump is the change agent we have all been praying for. He absolutely merits every possible courtesy.

Robert David Steele

During six years of Obama’s war, three rounds of Geneva talks failed – because of US obstructionism.

Neocons infesting Obama’s administration wanted endless war for regime change, not peace; mass slaughter and destruction, not conflict resolution; chaos, not calm.

Will Trump go a different way? It’ll take a while to find out. Much depends on what he decides. Sunday is his third day in office.

Though active pre-inauguration, Friday and Saturday, he won’t hit the ground running until Monday – even though working days are every day for presidents.

Russia extended an invitation to his administration to participate in Astana, Kazakhstan Syria peace talks – specifically National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. Delegations from Syria, Russia, Iran, Turkey, an umbrella group representing opposition terrorists (excluding ISIS and al-Nusra), and pro-Western UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura are attending.

According to acting State Department spokesman Mark Toner, “(g)iven our presidential inauguration and the immediate demands of the transition, a delegation from Washington” won’t be participating.

Trump’s secretary of state designee Rex Tillerson hasn’t yet been confirmed. On Monday, Senate Foreign Relations Committee members will vote on his nomination.

Republicans hold a one seat majority. Neocon senators Marco Rubio (FL) and John McCain (AZ) haven’t said if they’ll support or oppose him.

With or without majority Foreign Relations Committee approval, he’s likely to get the needed 50 or more full Senate votes to become Trump’s chief foreign policy official.

Until then, the office of secretary of state is being run by lower-level bureaucrats, including Obama holdover Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas Shannon, Jr.

US ambassador to Kazakhstan George Krol will attend Syria peace talks as an observer. On February 8, follow-up discussions will be held in Geneva, hopefully with full US participation, committed for conflict resolution – not rage for endless war like Obama.

Astana talks will focus on confirming ceasefire terms agreed to by Russia, Iran and Turkey, based on the provisions of Security Council Resolution 2254 – effective midnight December 29, ISIS and al-Nusra excluded.

According to an unnamed source close to the talks, no new initiatives are planned. “The key task is to confirm” ceasefire agreement terms.

From the opposition’s side at the talks will be exclusively representatives of armed groups, who can undertake straight obligations to observe truce.

For the first time, Syrian officials and opposition group representatives will hold face-to-face talks. Whether success is possible this time, unlike earlier, remains to be seen.

Astana was chosen as a neutral venue. Talks are scheduled for January 23 and 24, maybe longer if necessary – to be followed by a news conference when completed.

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.

 

Just hours ago Donald Trump was finally sworn in as the President of the United States. Considering all the threats hanging over this event, this is good news because at least for the time being, the Neocons have lost their control over the Executive Branch and Trump is now finally in a position to take action. The other good news is Trump’s inauguration speechwhich included this historical promise “We do not seek to impose our way of life on anyone, but rather to let it shine as an example for everyone to follow”. Could that really mean that the USA has given up its role of World Hegemon? The mere fact of asking the question is already an immensely positive development as nobody would have asked it had Hillary Clinton been elected.

The other interesting feature of Trump’s speech is that it centered heavily on people power and on social justice. Again, the contrast with the ideological garbage from Clinton could not be greater. Still, this begs a much more puzzling question: how much can a multi-millionaire capitalist be trusted when he speaks of people power and social justice – not exactly what capitalists are known for, at least not amongst educated people. Furthermore, a Marxist reader would also remind us that “imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism” and that it makes no sense to expect a capitalist to suddenly renounce imperialism.

But what was generally true in 1916 is not necessarily true in 2017.

For one thing, let’s begin by stressing that the Trump Presidency was only made possible by the immense financial, economic, political, military and social crisis facing the USA today. Eight years of Clinton, followed by eight years of Bush Jr and eight years of Obama have seen a massive and full-spectrum decline in the strength of the United States which were sacrificed for the sake of the Anglo-American Empire. This crisis is as much internal as it is external and the election of Trump is a direct consequence of this crisis. In fact, Trump is the first one to admit that it is the terrible situation in which the USA find themselves today which brought him to power with a mandate of the regular American people (Hillary’s “deplorables”) to “drain the DC swamp” and “make America”, as opposed to the American plutocracy, “great again”. This might be somethhing crucial: I cannot imagine Trump trying to simply do “more of the same” like his predecessors did or trying to blindly double-down like the Neocons always try to.

I am willing to bet that Trump really and sincerely believes that the USA is in a deep crisis and that a new, different, sets of policies must be urgently implemented. If that assumption of mine proves to be correct, then this is by definition very good news for the entire planet because whatever Trump ends up doing (or not doing), he will at least not push his country into a nuclear confrontation with Russia. And yes, I think that it is possible that Trump has come to the conclusion that imperialism has stopped working for the USA, that far from being the solution to the contradictions of capitalism, imperialism might well have become its most self-defeating feature.

Is it possible for an ideological system to dump one of its core component after learning from past mistakes? I think it is, and a good example of that is 21st Century Socialism, which has completely dumped the kind of militant atheism which was so central to the 20th century Socialist movement. In fact, modern 21st Century Socialism is very pro-Christian. Could 21st century capitalism dump imperialism? Maybe.

Furthermore, Trump inaugurational speech did, according to RT commentators, sound in many aspects like the kind of speech Bernie Sanders could have made. And I think that they are right. Trump did sound like a paleo-liberal, something which we did not hear from him during the campaign. You could also say that Trump sounded very much like Putin. The question is will he now also act like Putin too?

There will be a great deal of expectations in Russia about how Trump will go about fulfilling his campaign promises to deal with other countries. Today, when Trump pronounced the followings words “We will seek friendship and goodwill with the nations of the world – but we do so with the understanding that it is the right of all nations to put their own interests first” he told the Russians exactly what they wanted to hear: Trump does not pretend to be a “friend” of Russia and Trump openly and unapologetically promises to care about his own people first, and that is exactly what Putin has been saying and doing since he came to power in Russia: caring for the Russian people first. After all, caring for your own first hardly implies being hostile or even indifferent to others. All it means is that your loyalty and your service is first and foremost to those who elected you to office. This refreshing patriotic honesty, combined with the prospect of friendship and goodwill will sound like music to the Russian ears.

Then there are Trump’s words about “forming new alliances” and uniting “the civilized world against Radical Islamic Terrorism, which we will eradicate completely from the face of the Earth”. They will also be received with a great deal of hope by the Russian people. If the USA is finally serious about fighting terrorism and if they really wants to eradicate the likes of Daesh, then Russia will offer her full support to this effort, including her military, intelligence, police and diplomatic resources. After all, Russia has been advocating for “completely eradicating Radical Islamic Terrorism from the face of the Earth” for decades.

There is no doubt in my mind at all that an alliance between Russia and the USA, even if limited only to specific areas of converging or mutual interests, would be immensely beneficial for the entire planet, and not for just these two countries: right now all the worst international crises are a direct result from the “tepid war” the USA and Russia have been waging against each other. And just like any other war, this war has been a fantastic waste of resources. Of course, this war was started by the USA and it was maintained and fed by the Neocon’s messianic ideology. Now that a realist like Trump has come to power, we can finally hope for this dangerous and wasteful dynamic to be stopped.

The good news is that neither Trump nor Putin can afford to fail. Trump, because he has made an alliance with Russia the cornerstone of his foreign policy during his campaign, and Putin because he realizes that it is in the objective interests of Russia for Trump to succeed, lest the Neocon crazies crawl back out from their basement. So both sides will enter into negotiations with a strong desire to get things done and a willingness to make compromises as long as they do not affect crucial national security objectives. I think that the number of issues on which the USA and Russia can agree upon is much, much longer than the number of issues where irreconcilable differences remain.

So yes, today I am hopeful. More than anything else, I want to hope that Trump is “for real”, and that he will have the wisdom and courage to take strong action against his internal enemies. Because from now on, this is one other thing which Putin and Trump will have in common: their internal enemies are far more dangerous than any external foe. When I see David Horowitz declaring himself a supporter of Donald Trump, I get very, very concerned and I ask myself “what does Horowitz know which I am missing?”. What is certain is that in the near future one of us will soon become very disappointed. I just hope that this shall not be me.

In my previous article, titled “The End of Ideology in Cuba?,” I created a fair amount of controversy in stating, “I have always maintained that the most dangerous opposition to the Cuban Revolution comes from the so-called left, and not from the openly right Plattists, or annexationists.”

The majority of readers praised the article; many others participated in the serious debate; and only a couple very strongly objected to it, mainly singling out that particular sentence.

Thus, let us deconstruct the perception. It mentions the “openly right Plattists, or annexationists.” This means that there exists in Cuba both the openly pro-U.S. opposition and the hidden annexationists. The latter comprises these so-called “leftists.” Their narratives are carefully constructed to include some (mild) criticism of the American economic, social and political systems. They do not openly accept capitalism as an alternative, as opposed to the annexationists, who quite frankly do hold the U.S. up as their model. An American who has been living in Cuba as the adopted country for a number of years wrote some thoughtful positive comments on the article and the issue of socialism versus capitalism:

“Up North, in its simplest form, you could reduce it to acceptance of the ‘lesser evil.’ Both systems are flawed, but conveniently, socialism is more flawed, so let’s simply not go there. Any changes to capitalism are purely cosmetic with the objective of avoiding socialism. Here [in Cuba], since we have already arrived at socialism, the argument presented is: capitalism has some good features, let us just add (‘sumar’) those to socialism. Since the approach is to add to (‘sumar’), rather than subtract from (‘restar’), capitalism – that is what makes the objective here reverse to the one up North. Instead of improving socialism with the goal of avoiding capitalism, their idea is to adopt capitalism’s best features, as though both systems were compatible, with interchangeable parts, which of course they are not.”

This is a very good point indeed. One Cuban whom I consulted likened it to “using the spare parts of a Timex watch to fix a Rolex.” In this analogy, of course, the Rolex is socialism, while the Timex is capitalism. Nevertheless, the pieces making up both brands are just not compatible. It may be argued by some of the so-called “left” that Cuba is introducing certain market economy measures that amount to capitalism. However, the market economy existed long before capitalism, even in the most “primitive” systems. It is not an exclusive feature of any one system: capitalism did not invent it. In contrast, Cuba’s changes amount to improving the Rolex but with Rolex brand parts, and not some old pieces from a totally different and incompatible brand.

Thus, the “left” opposition objectively contributes to the American Dream of restoring capitalism in Cuba, even though they of course vehemently deny this. To portray their anti-capitalist image, some of them even define themselves as “democratic-socialists” as opposed to the Cuban socialist system, which is supposedly an authoritarian-type of socialism. The U.S.-centric view of systems specializes in adding hyphenated tickets to concepts, such asdemocratic-socialists. “Democracy” is perhaps the most manipulated concept in politics, an analysis that goes beyond the scope of this short article. Suffice it to mention for the moment that, based on the U.S.-centric view, the term democracy serves as a code word to contradict socialism. In Cuba, when this “democracy” tag is appended by sleight-of-hand, those in the North interested in subverting the Cuban Revolution know that the individuals espousing hyphenated socialism are in their ideological camp.

These and other similar trends within the “leftist” opposition, although seemingly in contradiction with each other, have at least one feature in common. Coming from different angles, they all converge into one common mindset: the Cuban system and government are “authoritarian,” the Communist Party of Cuba and the Army are omnipresent, and the system is centralized whereby the state plays too much of a leading role (even though Cuba has been decentralizing since 2008, but on its own terms within socialism). This opposition outlook ostensibly favours socialism, but their “socialism” is so very democratic. In order to foster this image, every incident in the Cuban system is pounced upon in order to paint Cuba as authoritarian. By relying mainly on some intellectuals, the “leftists” have set their sights on atomizing and dividing Cuban society, with the goal of destroying the unity it has been building since 1959.

In contrast, other Cuban commentators supporting the openly right annexationist trend criticize the Cuban government for not going far enough or fast enough in adopting what they also call “capitalist measures.” The annexationists openly advocate capitalism for Cuba under the tutelage of the U.S. This tendency also blames the “authoritarian” government for holding back what they envisage as Cuba’s inevitable slide into capitalism. Thus, “democracy” is manipulated by both the so-called “leftists” and the openly pro-U.S. and capitalist right.

There is another common denominator linking these two seemingly opposite extremes. There is no doubt that in Cuba today people engage in lively discussion and debate about improving Cuba’s socialism and political system. The attitude toward the U.S. in the new and complicated post-December 17, 2014 context is, of course, tied to these controversies. These deliberations are taking place at many levels and in various circumstances in the Cuban social and political systems. Carrying on a long-standing tradition, these debates constitute a feature of Cuban political culture. If, at this time, one takes the Cuban media as an example, a range of opinion articles is increasingly being published in the official press, such as Granma and Juventud Rebelde. Some of the pieces are written by what one could call “alternative” journalists and writers, such as Iroel Sánchez, Elier Ramírez, Enrique Ubieta, Luis Toledo Sande and Esteban Morales, just to name a few. These intellectuals and many others have their own active blogs and they participate daily through social media to resist the U.S.-led cultural war.

However, when the “left” or right opposition describes Cuba for the benefit of both foreign and some domestics consumption (and make no mistake about it, their views can be found in the foreign press hostile to Cuba), they invariably applaud and highlight what they call “opposition” or “alternative” journalists. The “leftist” opposition forces, supposedly the epitome of pluralism, cite only themselves and like-minded opponents, a very monolithic approach. This is also how the U.S. establishment media deals with debate. They cite only their own kind: a perverse consanguinity. In contrast, the real Cuban alternative intellectuals (only some of whom are mentioned above), those who work within the system for improvements, are blacklisted (or even vilified) by the “leftists.” They bestow these credentials on what they consider bona fide “alternatives,” invariably stirring up a backwash of invitations for both the “left” and right to travel to the U.S. or appear on foreign media in Cuba in exchange for delivering the goods: “Cuba is authoritarian or a dictatorship. Amen.” This quid pro quo is quite flagrant, to the extent that for a Cuban to receive these credentials from them could be considered the kiss of death.

Thus, both the “leftist” opposition and the openly right-wing annexationists are two wings of the same American eagle. One cannot underestimate their influence on some intellectual sectors in Cuban society – it would be naive to do so. However, it would also be wrong for the two wings to overestimate their appeal to Cuban society, because Cuban socialism is characterized by an exceptionally high level of political consciousness broadly accumulated over many decades. This allows Cuban revolutionaries and patriots to see through their manipulation and thus in the process further enrich the Cuban Revolution’s ideological heritage.

Source Prensa Latina

http://www.plenglish.com/index.php?o=rn&id=8265&SEO=cuban-left-opposition-and-annexationists-two-wings-of-same-eagle

Arnold August, a Canadian journalist and lecturer, is the author of Democracy in Cuba and the 1997–98 Elections and, more recently, Cuba and Its Neighbours: Democracy in Motion. Cuba’s neighbours under consideration are, on the one hand the U.S. and on the other hand, Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador. Arnold can be followed on Twitter @Arnold_August and FaceBook

 

“You have to go back to Nixon to find a president with as strong negative views about the agency. But the agency did not get this kind of public disparagement from Nixon.” –

Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA official, in an interview with AlterNet. [1]

 

 

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Donald Trump has finally taken his oath of office and assumed the role of President of theUnited States of America.

His inauguration on Friday, January 20^th coincided with numerous protests both in Washington and in cities across the US and around the world.

Trump’s rise to power and his cabinet picks have provoked numerous questions. Will he indeed build a wall between Mexico and the US? Will he register Muslims? What will become of the Free trade agreements like NAFTA which he has vowed to scrap or renegotiate? If he is mending relations withRussia, what will that mean for current hot-spots Syria and Ukraine, and for foreign policy generally?

On this week’s Global Research News Hour we take a look behind the scenes to determine how political events such as the recent election, are being manipulated to achieve elite ends, and the consequences for US democracy, and perhaps the future of Humanity.

Dr. Jack Rasmus is a progressive journalist, radio host, former union organizer and local president, and author. Hs upcoming book, ‘Central Bankers on the Ropes: Monetary Policy and the Next Depression’ will be released in April.

Professor Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal, and Editor of Global Research.

Mark Robinowitz is a writer, political activist, ecological campaigner and permaculture practitioner and publisher of oilempire dot us, a political map to connect the dots. campaigner and permaculture practitioner for over three decades.

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The Global Research News Hour airs every Friday at 1pm CT on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg. The programme is also podcast at globalresearch.ca . The show can be heard on the Progressive Radio Network at prn.fm. Listen in every Thursday at 6pm ET.

Community Radio Stations carrying the Global Research News Hour:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Notes:

1) http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/trump-cia-war

According to German broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW), German security and intelligence agencies were particularly familiar with the Berlin attacker, Anis Amri, long before he plowed a large truck into a Christmas market, killing 12 and injuring many more.

In an article titled, “All the cracks that Berlin suspect Amri slipped through,” a now familiar litany of excuses are peddled before audiences in a bid to explain why the suspect wasn’t stopped, weeks, months, even years before he carried out his attack, as soon as it became apparent he was both violent and a danger to society.

DW’s article admits:

The suspect first caught authorities’ attention in November 2015, when he unwittingly told an informant for the investigative police unit (BKA) in the state of North-Rhine Westphalia that he wanted to “do something in Germany,” according to a document obtained by the daily Süddeutsche Zeitung. He also claimed that he could get an AK-47 for an attack.

The article claims that from that point onward, Amri was “watched” by German agencies. DW also admits:

Further, he was apparently aggressively seeking an opportunity to undertake an attack in Germany. Information pointing to his dangerous potential became so overwhelming that authorities designated him a threat last February. 

DW then reports:

All information was then handed over to the Berlin public prosecutor’s office. The suspect was observed from March on. He raised no suspicion in the months that followed, and authorities stopped surveilling him in September.

In December, Amri would carry out his deadly attack, just as attackers in France and Belgium did after being surveilled – in some cases  for years – before being allowed to drop off security and intelligence agencies’ radars just ahead of their respective, deadly attacks.

Germany’s weak excuses for not apprehending a man who openly admitted he sought to acquire weapons and take human lives echo similarly convenient excuses provided by the French government following a string of fatal attacks across its territory.

Paris has claimed a lack of resources to process the large number of potential terrorists returning from battlefields France itself has helped send arms, fighters, and other forms of material support to on behalf of terrorist organizations and their allies.

Germany’s excuses might seem plausible if not for the fact that virtually every terror attack that has unfolded  not only in Germany, but across all of Europe follows a similar pattern where suspects are surveilled, questioned, entrapped, even arrested and released multiple times, before ultimately carrying out spectacular, politically convenient attacks across Europe.

Another “Gladio” 

Such purposeful negligence matches another chapter in Europe’s more recent history – that during the Cold War in which NATO security and intelligence agencies maintained a myriad of pan-European terrorist organizations of every imaginable variety, used to assassinate political opponents, carry out deadly and spectacular terror attacks, and otherwise use violence, fear, and intimidation to manipulate both public perception and political outcomes during elections in respective states.

Called “Operation Gladio,” it would be described by the New York Times in a 1990 article titled, “EVOLUTION IN EUROPE; Italy Discloses Its Web Of Cold War Guerrillas,” as:

In Europe’s new order, they are the spies who never quite came in from the cold, foot soldiers in an underground guerrilla network with one stated mission: To fight an enemy that most Europeans believe no longer exists. Theirs is a tale of secret arms caches and exotic code names, of military stratagems and political intrigues. At best, their tale is no more than a curious footnote to the cold war. The question is if, at worst, it could be the key to unsolved terrorism dating back two decades.

The New York Times would also reveal:

The focus of the inquiry is a clandestine operation code-named Gladio, created decades ago to arm and train resistance fighters in case the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies invaded. All this week, there have been disclosures of similar organizations in virtually all Western European countries, including those that do not belong to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. 

The New York Times would also describe how Gladio was used to manipulate public perception, use the specter of fear regarding communism after staged terror attacks to coerce populations to vote in governments of Washington’s liking, and essentially frame opposition groups for violence the US and NATO were carrying out with their own terror cells.

The real question is – are there similar networks being created and perpetuated by Western intelligence agencies today, to fill both the ranks of foreign mercenary armies everywhere from Libya and Yemen, to Syria and the borders of Iran – as well as manipulate and impose fear upon the populations of Western states at home?

Spectacular terrorist attacks like those in Paris, Brussels, and Berlin have certainly proven themselves potent events for swaying public opinion regarding political support of particular parties and candidates, as well as fomenting support for wars abroad against “Muslim” nations. There is also the inescapable fact that the very terrorists the West poses as fighting at home are armed, funded, and backed either directly by the West abroad, or through the West’s closest allies in the Middle East – namely Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

While it is tempting for people to fall into the false debate crafted in this newly forming “Cold War,” the lessons of history should teach us that not all is what it appears to be. And when absolutely every terror attack is carried out by suspects deeply intimate with Western security and intelligence agencies, both at home and in Western-sponsored wars abroad, tempting “clashes of civilization” narratives should be replaced with the prospect of Gladio’s inglorious return to Western political calculus.

Additionally, the next time agencies are told to “stop watching” a suspect, perhaps it would be in their best interest to watch them twice as closely, as well as those telling them to “stop watching.”

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

Following rhetoric regarding Europe’s refugee crisis, one might assume the refugees, through no fault of Europe’s governments, suddenly began appearing by the thousands at Europe’s borders. However, this simply is not true.

Before the 2011 wave of US-European engineered uprisings across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) transformed into Western military interventions, geopolitical analysts warned that overthrowing the governments in nations like Libya and Syria, and Western interventions in nations like Mali and the Ivory Coast, would lead to predicable regional chaos that would manifest itself in both expanding terrorism across the European and MENA region, as well as a flood of refugees from destabilized, war-racked nations.

Libya in particular, was singled out as a nation, if destabilized, that would transform into a springboard for refugees not only fleeing chaos in Libya itself, but fleeing a variety of socioeconomic and military threats across the continent. Libya has served for decades as a safe haven for African refugees due to its relative stability and economic prosperity as well as the Libyan government’s policy of accepting and integrating African refugees within the Libyan population.

Because of NATO’s 2011 military intervention and the disintegration of Libya as a functioning nation state, refugees who would have otherwise settled in Libya are now left with no choice but to continue onward to Europe.

For France in particular, its politics have gravitated around what is essentially a false debate between those welcoming refugees and those opposed to their presence.

Absent from this false debate is any talk of French culpability for its military operations abroad which, along with the actions of the US and other NATO members, directly resulted in the current European refugee crisis.

France claims that its presence across Africa aims at fighting Al Qaeda. According to RAND Corporation commentary titled, “Mali’s Persistent Jihadist Problem,” it’s reported that:

Four years ago, French forces intervened in Mali, successfully averting an al Qaeda-backed thrust toward the capital of Bamako. The French operation went a long way toward reducing the threat that multiple jihadist groups posed to this West Africa nation. The situation in Mali today remains tenuous, however, and the last 18 months have seen a gradual erosion of France’s impressive, initial gains.

And of course, a French military presence in Mali will do nothing to stem Al Qaeda’s activities if the source of Al Qaeda’s weapons and financial support is not addressed. In order to do this, France and its American and European allies would need to isolate and impose serious sanctions on Saudi Arabia and Qatar, two nations who exists as the premier state sponsors of not only Al Qaeda, but a myriad of terrorist organizations sowing chaos worldwide.

Paradoxically, instead of seeking such sanctions, the French government instead sells the Saudi and Qatari governments billions of dollars worth of weaponry, proudly filling in any temporary gaps in the flow of weapons from the West as each nation attempts to posture as “concerned” about Saudi and Qatari human rights abuses and war crimes (and perhaps even state sponsorship of terrorism) only to gradually return to pre-sanction levels after public attention wanes.

The National Interest in an article titled, “France: Saudi Arabia’s New Arms Dealer,” would note:

France has waged a robust diplomatic engagement with Saudi Arabia for years. In June, Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited France to sign deals worth $12 billion, which included $500 million for 23 Airbus H145 helicopters. Saudi and French officials also agreed to pursue feasibility studies to build two nuclear reactors in the kingdom. The remaining money will involve direct investment negotiated between Saudi and French officials.

The article would also note that Saudi Arabia’s junior partner in the state sponsorship of global terror, Qatar, would also benefit from French weapon deals:

Hollande’s address was delivered one day after he was in Doha, where he signed a $7 billion deal that included the sale of 24 French Rafale fighter jets to Qatar, along with the training of Qatari intelligence officers.

In order to truly fight terrorism, a nation must deal with it at its very source. Since France is not only ignoring the source of Al Qaeda’s military, financial and political strength, but is regularly bolstering it with billions in weapons deals, it is safe to say that whatever reason France is involved across MENA, it is not to “defeat” Al Qaeda.

The refugee crisis that has resulted from the chaos that both Western forces and terrorists funded and armed by the West’s closest regional allies, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, is a crisis that is entirely self-inflicted. The rhetoric surrounding the crisis, on both sides, ignoring this fundamental reality, exposes the manufactured and manipulative nature of French government and opposition agendas.

The chaos across MENA is so significant, and terrorism so deeply rooted in both Western and their Arab allies’ geopolitical equations that even a complete reversal of this destructive policy will leave years if not decades of social unrest in the wake of the current refugee crisis.

But for anyone genuinely committed to solving this ongoing crisis, they must start with the US, European, and Gulf monarchies’ culpability, and resist blaming the refugees or those manipulated into reacting negatively to them. While abuses carried out by refugees or locals are equally intolerable, those responsible for the conflicts and for manipulating both sides of this crisis are equally to blame.

Until that blame is properly and proportionately placed, and the root of the crisis addressed, it will only linger and cause further damage to regional and global security.

Ulson Gunnar, a New York-based geopolitical analyst and writer especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

 

Mesut Torun rejects allegations of links between IS and Baath Party and says battle of Mosul is ‘war of liberation’ against Iran, US

Mesut Torun is the grandson of the former Iraqi ruler Saddam Hussein. Born and raised in Turkey, the 33-year-old still flies the flag for the now-banned Baath Party and its struggle for what he calls the “liberation” of Iraq from Iran and the US.

Iraqi government forces fighting to capture Mosul from Islamic State militants are committing “genocide” against the population, and are facing resistance from Baathists and other Sunni forces in the city, according to Torun.

Mesut Torun says of the Mosul battle against the Iraqi government: ‘This is a war of liberation, a struggle for independence. We are fighting against Iran, the United States and more than 60 countries’ (MEE)

Baath militants are fighting the Islamic State group, as well as Iran, the US and Shia militias operating in Iraq, claims the late ruler’s grandson, who says that only Turkey should enter the city to protect its Sunni population.

‘This is a war of liberation, a struggle for independence. We are fighting against Iran, the United States and more than 60 countries’

“This is a war of liberation, a struggle for independence. We are fighting against Iran, the United States and more than 60 countries. If only the Iranian militia would withdraw from our territory, we will be able to regain Baghdad within 48 hours,” Torun told Middle East Eye.

Torun, based in Turkey, says the Baath party and its leader Izzet Ibrahim al-Duri has expressed support for the Turkish government and his own relatives came out on the streets in Istanbul during the 15 July coup attempt against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Torun denies that the Baath cooperate with IS, which is reported to have recruited many former Baath party supporters. Senior Baath intelligence and military officers became instrumental in the militant group’s seizure of swathes of Iraqi territory in 2014, according to several reports.

Torun claimed that the US and Iran control IS, and that the power of the group has been greatly exaggerated by international forces. Stating that there were more than 70 groups in Iraq fighting against government forces, Torun said that the main strength is not IS, but Baath militants. “Kerame Units, Liberation and Peace Brigade and Naqshbandi Army are fighting in Mosul with the Jihad and the High Command of Salvation. All of these groups answer to our leader Izzet Ibrahim al-Duri. Sunni tribes were also involved in this war in 2012. These tribes also belong to our leader.

Of course, there are also small Sunni groups not affiliated to the Baath. The Baath Party and Sunni tribes in Mosul are fighting [the government and foreign forces] not ISIS. This is a struggle for independence against more than 60 countries.

Torun claims IS are in a “state of panic” in Mosul and that the Baath, under the banner of the Naqshbandi Army, have launched attacks against the group in recent days inside Mosul. The Baath Party is part of a coalition of Sunni resistance forces seeking to remove IS and end the Iranian “occupation” of Iraq, he said.

Since the 2003 invasion, we have given 160,000 martyrs. Most of them are senior officers, teachers, engineers. Ba’ath is not just a structure that fights for power in Iraq. Our leader al-Duri does not have a goal to be the prime minister. This is a war of liberation, a struggle for independence.

Torun sums up the demands of the Baath Party for the solution to the crisis in Iraq: “Initially, the end of the Iranian occupation in the country, a new transition government, the beginning of constitutional work and stopping the exclusion of the Sunnis.”

Son of Uday Hussein

Torun’s mother Sevim, who died in 2010, was Turkish. She visited Iraq during the Saddam era and married his eldest son Uday, who met her after she entered a Baghdad beauty contest in 1982. However, the relationship with the Iraqi ruler’s notoriously violent son quickly deteriorated and Sevim, discovering she was pregnant, moved back to Turkey without the knowledge of Uday. Torun was then born.

Torun is one of the few survivors of Saddam Hussein’s family after many, including his father Uday, were killed following the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. He is in contact with the Baath Party, which is still known to be active in Iraq, and shares its view of the situation in the country.

IS power ‘exaggerated’

According to Torun, who argues that IS is a common project of the US and Iran, the power of the organisation is deliberately exaggerated as part of a strategy to destroy the legitimacy of the “Iraqi resistance”.

ISIS is a terrorist organisation, there is no dependence on them. In the past days, the Naqshbandi Army organised major operations against ISIS in Mosul. As a result, we know that there is great panic in the organisation. So we are fighting inside Mosul against ISIS, and outside we are fighting against Iran, the US and Shia militias. I know it’s hard to believe but Baath does not want to put itself in the foreground. It is a part of our strategy. We [the Baath Party] do not ignore IS’ existence in the country, but they [IS] are not the main strength in the conflict.

Torun, who believes that it is not possible for IS to maintain its existence in Iraq, said: “The people of the region, the local forces and the tribes, are permanent here. They are the true owners of the country” and not IS.

‘Genocide’

Describing the conditions and US-backed offensive to capture Mosul as “genocide”, Torun criticises the international community for being silent on the situation.

Civilians are being targeted by a very heavy bombardment. It is very sad that the international community has not reacted to this situation. This is genocide. People are surrounded and struggling in hunger and without medical support. Despite all this, our troops are exhibiting extraordinary resistance.

Torun argues that Mosul is the fortress of the Sunni insurgency. “If Mosul is overtaken by government forces, the security of Turkey will be in danger. We know that Iranian Shia militias have threatened Turkey before. However, we know that the same militias also want to go to Syria to support the Assad regime. If Mosul is lost, all the Sunnis will lose,” he said.

Only Turkey can enter Mosul

Saddam’s grandson said that Turkey would be forced from its Bashiqa base in northern Iraq by pressure from Iran, which wants Turkey pushed out of Iraq.

However the “resistance” forces in Mosul wanted Turkey alone to send its forces to take the city, said Torun. “Iran wants Turkey to be pushed out of the game in Iraq. As the Iraqi resistance, we say that only Turkey can enter Mosul. No other force can enter Mosul. We have also called on Turkey before to solve the problems in the region. Our leader, al-Duri, had previously congratulated the Turkish government after the [2015] election. He ended the statement by saying “your brother Ibrahim” to President Erdogan. We are with the present government for the interests of the region and Turkey.”

Torun also said: “Only the Turkish flag is the unbeaten flag of Islam. It is the flag of the Ottoman Empire, so it is the flag of all of us. That’s what the Baath Party thinks.”

Saddam’s heir?

Torun denied any aspiration to take over the leadership of the Baath party as the heir of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. He said those in the party who believed this “should not talk dreamy. I have no personal passions. I depend on our leader al-Duri.

I do not want to put myself in the foreground. We have a party and an army. Our party has directors. There are people who are martyred in this struggle and who pay a big price. My job as the grandson of Saddam Hussein is to support our party. My only goal is to be a servant and a soldier of Sheikh Izzet Ibrahim al-Duri, our leader. The claims I deserve from my grandfather’s heritage are not true. If I have a right, be merciful to the people of Iraq.

Torun, who is also known as Mesut Uday Saddam Hussein, stated that he wanted to carry his grandfather’s last name, and that this was of spiritual importance to him.

He defended his grandfather’s record, saying that he was a bulwark against the expansion of Iran in the region for many years. “We believe that the US wants to link Iraq to Iran and open up the Shia expansion in the Middle East. My grandfather Saddam Hussein was the safety valve of the Gulf states and Arab society, which prevented the formation of the present Shia sickle. After this safety valve was removed, everyone found himself neighbouring Iranian and sectarian militias.”

Noting that the Trump administration’s Iraq policy was unclear, Torun said the new administration “should develop realistic solutions.”

Links to Turkish militants

Despite keeping a low profile, Torun has been working with radical Islamist associations known in Turkey for their closeness to the Iraqi Baath Party and has made several press statements in front of the Iranian and US consulates. He said that he occasionally received death threats from Kurdish nationalists and Shia militias.

In March 2015, a bomb attack targeted the Istanbul office of Adimlar magazine, where Torun has a senior editorial role. The magazine is known for its ties to the Great Eastern Islamic Raiders’ Front or İBDA-C, a militant Salafist group that opposes secular rule in Turkey and has claimed responsibility for small-scale attacks in the country in the past.

The magazine has expressed support for IS, the Iraqi Baath Party and the Sunni population in Iraq. The suspects in the attack that killed one person and injured three others have not been found.

The last few years were marked by the debate on the characteristics of world politics after the end of the cold war. The majority of major analysts of the Anglo-American political-academic realm left no doubt that we were moving towards the formation of a unipolar world dominated by the United States. The evidence of the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, during the government of George W. Bush, founded on a document under the name of Project for a New American Century, left no margin for debate. This was heightened by the political crisis of the Western political system and the Anglo-Saxonization of International Relations, repeating the “scientific” discourses of the gurus, for example Kaplan, Kagan, Nye, Fukuyama, etc.

In the year 2008, among various experts we published the Diccionario Latinoamericano de Seguridad y Geopolítica (Latin American Dictionary of Security and Geopolitics), where we were among the few voices to note that we were moving towards a multipolar world, contrary to the opinions of the gurus; moreover, while there existed great expectations for the new President of the United States, we said that nothing indicated a change of foreign policy with respect to Bush junior.

Today, coinciding with the end of the presidency of Obama (the Nobel Peace Laureate who bombarded 7 countries in less than six years), we should note, in passing, that the Nobel Prize implies no guarantee. Alfred Nobel was the inventor of dynamite. President Wilson applied dollar diplomacy to the Caribbean, Theodore Roosevelt applied the policy of the bludgeon and Kissinger the so-called “Condor Plan”, and all were Nobel Prize winners. So Obama is one more confirmation that one must take a careful look when a US president gets a Nobel Prize.

In spite of the fact that he began with promises to withdraw his country from international conflict after the Bush junior mandate, Obama leaves office after having maintained the US nation in conflict for a longer period than any other president of the United States.

He expanded the air wars and the use of special forces throughout the world. The number of countries where US special forces are present has grown from 60 in 2009 to 138 in 2016 (in 70% of the countries of the world), according to data of the US Special Operations Command.

To analyse the legacy of President Obama, the US Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), that specializes in US foreign policy and international affairs, presented data on aerial attacks launched against foreign countries. In 2016 alone, the Obama government dropped at least 26,171 bombs.

While the majority of the bombardments took place in Syria and Iraq, US bombs also reached Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan, seven of the biggest Muslim countries.

During the eight years of the Obama mandate, his government not only ordered numerous air attacks, but also reached a record in the sale of arms since the Second World War, attaining 265,471 million dollars.

All this allows us to understand a most important but little known occurrence, that took place on 9th of January 2017, and that we believe to be central. The National Intelligence Council (NIC) of the United States, in their intelligence report for the new President of the US, Mr. Trump, implicitly recognizes the failure of Obama’s war diplomacy, and our now aged Dictionary (surely taken as a “political and ideological essay” by the majority of the Argentinian “neutral scientific” community) is in tune with the report of January 9th. If there were a trial for bad practice in social sciences, many of the sacred monsters would be shaking. This is not a vulgar irony, but a profound reflection that we must all undertake, from the social sciences and the university realm, on the evolution and events of the world system.

For almost two decades, the Global Trends Report of the National Intelligence Council has given rise to strategic conversations inside and outside of the US Government. Since the First Global Trends Report was launched in 1997, a new report is published every four years after the US elections.

Global Trends constitutes an important and strategic report on the evaluation of intelligence services of the forces—and elections—that will shape the world during the coming two decades.

The latest edition of the report “Global Trends: Paradox of Progress” of the National Intelligence Council, presented on January 9th 2017, explores trends and scenarios for the next twenty years.

Critical to its insight and policy-relevance have been meetings worldwide with a wide range of interlocutors—including government officials, scholars, business people, civil society representatives, and others—in workshops and exchanges. There they have examined the perspectives of the economy, demographics, ecology, energy, health and governability, identity and geopolitics and it is vital to understand their consequences for the peace and security of the world.

The NIC crystallizes ideas gleaned from these meetings as well as extensive research in each Global Trends Report published every four years, between the US Presidential Election Day and Inauguration Day.

In general lines, the report of January 9th alerts us about a “close, obscure and difficult” future, due to the increase of hostilities among Nations at levels that have not been seen since the Cold War; as global growth decelerates, the post Second World War “order” is being eroded, and as nationalisms in the framework of globalization are accentuated.

The uncertainty about the United States, together with a “West that looks inwards” and the weakening of international human rights and standards of conflict prevention, have induced Russia and China to put US influence to the test”, says the report.

And it adds “…these challenges will be under the shadow of a hot war, but will generate profound risks of errors in calculation”.

Russia and China already appear as actors able to dispute US influence, recognizing the loss of hegemony, as well as regional conflicts, terrorism and an increase in inequality.

The entity, in their 226-page report published January 9th, alerts “that the new world panorama is bringing the US domination, that followed the cold war, to an end” and hence the next five years “will put the resilience of the United States to the test”. On the other hand, the NIC foresees a growth of populism in the political field at a world level that will “represent a threat to liberalism”. Here we should add that the report does not distinguish the xenophobic parties that have appeared in Europe and regional nationalisms for the preservation of sovereignty, such as occur in Iran or could take on new strength in South America.

More than ever, in the Patria Grande, we must seek to build an Ethical, Political and Strategic Power and we face the tension: Patria Grande taken seriously or nothing. Here is our future, as Manuel Ugarte said.

On Saturday, Trump entered the lion’s den, visiting and speaking at CIA headquarters.

The agency under departed director John Brennan wanted his scalp – delegitimized and undermined, based on phony claims of Russian US election hacking, helping him defeat Hillary.

He’s now America’s 45th president. His incoming CIA director Mike Pompeo has yet to be confirmed. Senate Democrats Ron Wyden (OR), Patrick Leahy (VT) and Richard Blumenthal (CT) delayed his confirmation, solely for political reasons.

It was scheduled for Friday, Trump’s inaugural day. A joint statement said “in these dangerous times, (his) nomination (must) be thoroughly vetted, questioned and debated.”

With or without Pompeo in charge, the CIA constitutes a major threat to Trump, all other prominent figures challenging dirty business as usual – and most important world peace.

The late Chalmers Johnson called the agency incompatible with democratic freedoms. Its “unchecked power” threatens everyone everywhere. Its existence “shorten(s) the life of the American republic.”

At Langley, Trump spoke to around 400 CIA personnel, coming in on their day off to hear him. With Pompeo accompanying him, he criticized Senate Democrats for delaying his confirmation, saying they’re “playing little political games.”

Trump wants him heading the agency posing his greatest threat, saying he was the only one he interviewed for the job. “I didn’t want to meet anybody else. I said cancel them, cancel them.”

He told House Speaker Paul Ryan “I don’t want to lose this guy.” Does he believe Pompeo as his man heading the CIA can protect him from potential agency anti-Trump long knives?

Does he believe a peace offering by showing up as his “first (post-inaugural) stop,” and saying he’s “behind you 1000%…(N)obody…feels stronger about the intelligence community and CIA than Donald Trump” can save him if agency dark forces want him eliminated?

Last week, he blasted now departed CIA head John Brennan for being “the leaker of (anti-Trump) fake news”- referring the fabricated dodgy dossier, claiming Russia has compromising information about him, alleging it could be used for manipulative purposes.

No one is afforded a honeymoon with America’s leading rogue agency without playing by its rules, established by America’s deep state.

If Trump goes his own way, contrary to longstanding US practices, especially geopolitically, he’ll be vulnerable to impeachment or assassination.

Peacemaking at Langley, with his man in charge once confirmed, won’t help if he’s targeted for removal.

His vulnerability, or lack of it, will be better known once his policies become clear. Unprecedented vilification throughout the political season and post-election aftermath isn’t an encouraging sign.

The best advice he should heed is watch your back. Even that won’t help if America’s deep state wants him removed and replaced. Rough and tumble times ahead seem likely.

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.

 

President Donald Trump on Saturday flippantly suggested to CIA staff that the US might have another chance to invade Iraq and steal the country’s oil wealth.

In unscripted remarks at the CIA headquarters on Saturday, and while introducing Mike Pompeo, his nominee to head the spy agency, Trump said the Islamic State group would have never existed if the US had seized Iraq’s oilfields.

Trump has repeatedly made the erroneous claim, which is contrary to the opinion of most foreign policy experts, on the campaign trail.

Trump said the US should have kept Iraqi oil [Getty]

“Now I said it for economic reasons, but if you think about it, Mike, if we kept the oil, you probably wouldn’t have ISIS because that’s where they made their money in the first place, so we should have kept the oil. But, OK, maybe we’ll have another chance,” Trump said.

Trump’s visit to the CIA headquarters came as part of efforts to mend his relationship with intelligence agencies, which he likened to Nazis only ten days earlier.

The remarks demonstrate a complete disregard to international laws that prohibit stealing another country’s resources.

They also signify a complete insensitivity to the tragic consequences of the invasion of Iraq that was based on cooked up intelligence by the same agency at which Trump was speaking.

However, the remarks should not come as a surprise given the following exchange the new US president had with CNN in 2015.

If we would have taken the oil, you wouldn’t have IS, because IS formed with the power and wealth of that oil. They have among the largest oil reserves in the world. We go in, we spend $3 trillion, we lose thousands and thousands of lives, and then, we get nothing. It used to be to the victor belong the spoils. I always said: Take the oil.

Q: “You said you want to bomb the oil fields in Iraq to take on IS?”

A: “The only way you’re going to beat them is that. You know why they’re rich? Because they have the oil.”

Q: “But I don’t think the government of Iraq would want us to bomb their oil fields.”

A: “There is no government in Iraq. The so-called government in Iraq went to Iran to meet with Iran. Iran is going to take over Iraq. That’s as simple as that. I don’t care about the government of Iraq. They’re totally corrupt. Who cares?”

On January 21^st, 2017, the Bank of China has officially opened its regional branch headquarters in Serbian capital Belgrade, to provide banking services for cooperation in investments, trade, tourism and other fields, for countries in the region – Serbia, Rumania, Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and others. The ceremony was held in the Government`s Palace and attended by President of the Republic Tomislav Nikolic and members of the Government.

This important development follows last June`s state visit of the President of the Republic of China Xi Jinping to Serbia and also, his talks last week with Serbian Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic at Davos Economic Summit in Switzerland.

Establishment of the Bank of China`s regional headquarters in Belgrade, is today the main news in all major medias in Serbia and beyond. This morning I commented this event at the private regional network “TV Pink”. Among other, I noted that cooperation under OBOR, as the global initiative, is not important only for development of CEE countries, but for the whole of Europe. Through win win OBOR cooperation Europe and China are getting closer, what is equally positive form economic, cultural and political point of view, particularly now when EU is passing through serious difficulties.

Serbia`s role in the implementation of the China – CEE cooperation under OBOR is growing. Two countries are strategic partners cooperating in various fields.  In the past five years only, partners from the two countries have been constructing or modernizing roads, highways, railways, ports, bridges, tunnels, thermo-electric plant, steelwork factory, strengthening people to people exchange.  As of 1^st January this year, no-visa system for citizens of the two countries came into force. A number of infrastructure projects, already implemented, or under implementation in Serbia, are highly important for modernization of connectivity in the CEE region, or in Europe.

Cooperation under CEE-OBOR has proved to be very important for Serbia`s overall economic development, modernization of industry and infrastructure and improvement of international standing.