Seddique Mateen, the father of the Orlando, Florida nightclub shooter Omar Mateen and self-styled leader of a pro-Taliban Afghan government-in-exile in Florida, is emblematic of the American policy that permits extremist propaganda operatives to be nurtured on US soil. Since the Cold War era, the US Central Intelligence Agency has exceled in finding the most extreme Cubans, Eastern Europeans, Afghanis, Uighurs, and others to concoct and broadcast incendiary propaganda on airwaves funded by the US government.

As the late ABC News and Christian Science Monitor journalist and pre-eminent Middle East expert John Cooley so correctly observed in his book, «Payback: America’s Long War in the Middle East», when the United States replaced Britain and France as the major Western power player in the Middle East, it was repeatedly paid back for «poor judgement and often disastrous policy errors». One of the most disastrous policy errors was the decision by the Jimmy Carter administration to provide weapons and other support to some of the most radical Islamist «holy warriors» in Afghanistan. Soon, these Afghan radicals were supplemented by «Arab Legion» jihadists cobbled together from terrorist cells in Egypt, Yemen, Libya, and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

The Carter and Ronald Reagan administrations set the groundwork for radicalized veterans of the jihadist military campaign against the Soviet Union and the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan to establish a foothold in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the Middle East. For an entire decade, the Central Intelligence Agency’s Operation Cyclone saw to it that extreme jihadists, whose only commonality with the United States was fervent anti-Communism, were ferried to staging areas in northwestern Pakistan and safe zones inside Afghanistan to take on the Soviet and Afghan forces. Funds from the CIA, Saudi Arabia, and other Muslim countries were funneled to Osama Bin Laden’s and Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri’s Maktab Khadamat al-Mujahidin al-‘Arab (Arab Afghan Services Bureau) or MAK to recruit their jihadist Arab Legion from the Middle East and North Africa.

The radical Taliban established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in 1996. The Taliban welcomed their old ally in the war against the Soviets, Bin Laden, to move his al-Qaeda organization to Afghanistan. The Taliban, al-Qaeda, and various radical jihadist factions in Afghanistan had all benefited from the short-sighted policy of Washington to arm these groups to the teeth without having to worry about the «blowback» that experts like Cooley, but very few others, found so problematic.

Seddique Mateen arrived in the United States during a time when Ronald Reagan considered the Afghan mujahidin to be «freedom fighters» who were fighting «oppression» in the same spirit that George Washington fought British colonizers. Reagan’s complete ignorance permitted individuals like Mateen to find political sanctuary and support in the United States, a country from which he and his fellow travelers could promulgate their radical and antiquated views.

The jihadist attacks on the Boston Marathon; Fort Hood, Texas; a military recruiting station in Tennessee; a Christmas party in San Bernardino, California; and the Pulse nightclub in Orlando can all be laid at the feet of America’s insane dalliances with jihadists in wars beginning with the Afghan campaign and extending to the American invasion and occupation of Iraq, the destabilization of Libya and Syria, and aiding and abetting jihadist forces fighting Russia in the Caucasus region, including Chechnya. It is «blowback» in the truest sense of the word.

The uncle of Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Ruslan Tsarni (aka Tsarnaev), is linked to the CIA. Tsarni was married to the daughter of Graham Fuller, one of the chief CIA architects of the radicalization of Muslims to act as radical foot soldiers for the United States, whether in Afghanistan against the Soviets or in the Caucasus against Russia. Mir Seddique, aka Mir Seddique Mateen, is a self-styled leader of a government-in-exile of Afghanistan that is based in Port St. Lucie, Florida. He has called for the overthrow of Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and trials for him and his predecessor, Hamid Karzai.

America’s commitment to the «propaganda war» has also enabled jihadists to spread their radical message, often via US government-subsidized airwaves and satellite feeds. Seddique Mateen operated a Florida not-for-profit company called «The Durand Jirga, Inc». For years, the CIA subsidized Cuban radio and television stations in Florida, for example, Radio and TV Marti, which have done nothing but ratchet up ill will toward the government and people of Cuba. These efforts sometimes resulted in acts of terror committed by expatriate right-wing Cubans in the United States against Cuban and other targets. The template for Afghan and other Muslim expatriates in the United States who are involved in CIA and VOA propaganda is no different from that involving the Cubans, and, in the more distant past, Eastern European refugees and defectors. Radical messages are «de rigueur» for such elements of society.

US propaganda institutions have been rife with fraud, waste, and abuse. As pointed out by columnist Fulton Lewis, Jr. in 1958, Radio Free Europe had well in excess of 2000 employees, who, when not belching forth unverified news copy directed at Eastern Europe, were lolling around their offices waiting for their next paychecks. Lewis wrote, Radio Free Europe «is a ridiculous, wasteful, juvenile exhibition of futility to provide jobs for what is mainly a horde of free-loaders». The free-loaders of the Cold War have today morphed into the likes of Seddique Mateen and his band of radicals busy blathering their incoherent messages in Dari, Urdu, Pashto, Farsi, Uighur, Chechen, Arabic, and Kurdish, all at the American taxpayers’ expense.

The elder Mateen also hosted a television program called the «Durand Jirga Show». The show is broadcast on the Afghan satellite network «Payam-e-Afghan», which is headquartered in Los Angeles and broadcasts in Pashto and Persian. Los Angeles is the home to a number of CIA- and VOA-subsidized satellite broadcasts in Arabic to the Middle East and in Farsi to Iran.

Seddique Mateen’s own operations are clearly part of a pro-Taliban network of Afghan and Pakistani propagandists who have used television and radio networks funded by the CIA-influenced Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to spread their messages to audiences throughout the world.

Mateen claimed he runs his own intelligence network. However, this network appears to consist of his colleagues who are involved in South Asia’s propaganda war using satellite programs broadcast in Pashto – major languages of Afghanistan and Pakistan – Mateen’s own broadcast language-of-choice Dari, and Urdu. The BBG’s attempts at winning over the hearts and minds of the people of Pakistan and Afghanistan are considered major failures and a waste of taxpayers’ funds.

Even after the 9/11 terrorist attack on the United States, the VOA’s Pashto service gave a propaganda platform to the Afghan Taliban.

After the September 11 attack, Spozhmai Maiwandi, the director of the Voice of America’s Pashtun service, jokingly nicknamed «Kandahar Rose» by her colleagues, aired favorable reports on the Taliban, including a controversial interview with Taliban leader Mullah Omar. It should not be surprising, therefore, that Seddique Mir Mateen’s own views side with those of the Taliban. The presence of a number of pro-Taliban Afghan-Americans in the United States was facilitated by the CIA’s support for the mujahidin cause in the Afghan jihadist war with the Soviet Union in the 1980s. Even Afghan-American diplomat Zalmay Khalilzad, the former US ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Nations, served as a key interlocutor between the Taliban government of Afghanistan and the UNOCAL oil company in Houston in the late 1990s. Today, those links serve Khalilzad and the CIA well at the CIA-linked Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, where Khalilzad serves as a counselor.

Some 60 percent of the comments on the VOA’s Pashto language service’s Ashna TV website praised Omar Mateen and his actions in Orlando. And the American taxpayers fund this activity through their financial support for the VOA and the BBG. And, as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton championed the expansion of these broadcast services. In 2011, Clinton testified before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that her department needed additional funds for the propaganda war. She said,

 «During the Cold War we did a great job in getting America’s message out. After the Berlin Wall fell we said, ‘Okay, fine, enough of that, we are done,’ and unfortunately we are paying a big price for it… Our private media cannot fill that gap».

The radical messages broadcast by Payame Afghan and Ashna TV are the results of Mrs Clinton’s efforts to expand US propaganda broadcasting. For the CIA, keeping expatriates like Seddique Mir Mateen and his pro-Taliban colleagues at the VOA on the government dole is to ensure a ready supply of interlocutors and agents-of-influence are maintained inside radical circles.

Late Thursday evening, the Wall Street Journal reported, 51 State Department officials signed a statement condemning U.S. policy in Syria in which they repeatedly call for “targeted military strikes against the Damascus government and urging regime change as the only way to defeat the Islamic State.”

“In other words,” as Zero Hedge summarized,

“over 50 top ‘diplomats’ are urging to eliminate [Syrian Pres. Bashar al] Assad in order to ‘defeat ISIS’, the same ISIS which top US ‘diplomats’ had unleashed previously in order to … eliminate Assad.”

This gordian knot created by United States foreign policy — and intensified by that same policy — means not only could war with Syria be on the horizon, but if that happens, the U.S. could be facing a far more serious threat.

While discontented officials used what’s known as the “Dissent Channel” — “an official forum that allows employees to express opposing views,” State Department spokesman John Kirby explained in the WSJ — Saudi government officials employed more direct means to press their interests with the U.S. in Syria.

In a meeting with President Obama on Friday, Saudi foreign minister Adel al Jubair asserted, “Saudi Arabia supports a more aggressive military approach in Syria to get Assad to agree to a political solution,” as CBS’ Mark Knoller tweeted.

Of course, this meeting and the push for increased military force couldn’t be more timely to drum up public support, as a heated national debate has ensued following the deadly attack on an Orlando nightclub purportedly carried out by Omar Mateen — who pledged loyalty to ISIS as he killed 49 people and wounded over 50 others.

Despite the CIA’s report acknowledging it found no tangible connectionsbetween Mateen and the so-called Islamic state — also released on Friday — the narrative concerning his ISIS ties saturated mainstream headlinesfor days, almost certainly cementing the link in the public’s mind.

Disgruntled politicians eager to overthrow Assad — thus also carrying out Saudi goals — can now facilely flip the script to assert deposing the Syrian government is necessary in the fight against everyone’s enemy, the Islamic State.

“Failure to stem Assad’s flagrant abuses will only bolster the ideological appeal of groups such as Daesh [ISIS, etc.], even as they endure tactical setbacks on the battlefield,” the WSJ reported the dissenting cable stated.

But concerns about bloating ISIS’ following borders on comical, except for the potential waterfall of repercussions from carrying out targeted strikes on the Syrian government, considering the U.S. government, itself, once expressed the desire for the rise of an Islamic State to aid in the overthrow of — you guessed it — Assad.

According to declassified documents obtained by Judicial Watch last year:

If the situation unravels there is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist Principality in eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor), and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran).

Former Director of National Intelligence and retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, however, spoke to Al Jazeera about this ill-fated, notorious strategical blunder.

“You’re on record as saying that the handling of Syria by this administration has been a mistake. Many people would argue that the U.S. actually saw the rise of ISIL coming and turned a blind eye, or even encouraged as a counterpoint to Assad,” journalist Mehdi Hasan prefaced his query, adding,“The U.S. saw the ISIL caliphate coming and did nothing.”

Flynn responded, “Yeah, I think that we — where we missed the point. I mean, where we totally blew it, I think, was in the very beginning.”

Besides backing and blessings from the Saudi government for aggression on the Syrian front, dissent among U.S. officials couldn’t be more imperative in their eyes, because, as the WSJ reported:

The internal cable may be an attempt to shape the foreign policy outlook for the next administration, the official familiar with the document said. President Barack Obama has balked at taking military action against Mr. Assad, while the Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton has promised a more hawkish stance against the Syrian leader. Republican candidate Donald Trump has said he would hit Islamic State hard but has also said he would be prepared to work with Russia and Syria.

In fact, as Zero Hedge also noted, an albeit contested report from earlier this week claimed Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman made comments including “a claim that Riyadh has provided 20 percent of the total funding to” Clinton’s campaign.

Politicians and officials, in other words, are fast aligning a narrative touting the need to wage war with Syria in order to have it carried out by the candidate they assume will next take the White House.

And despite being a risky move in its own right — not to mention a potentially superficial, if not muddying, solution to an almost solely U.S.-created problem — ramping up military airstrikes in Syria could quite literally spark war with Russia.

“The Russian Air Force bombed U.S.-trained rebels in southern Syria not once, but twice Thursday, and the second wave of attacks came after the U.S. military called Russia on an emergency hotline to demand that it stop,” an unnamed defense official with knowledge of the situation told Fox News.

Russia has repeatedly warned against U.S. moves to oust Assad, which President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, reiterated following the tense situation Thursday and the report calling for increased military targeting of the Syrian government saying, it “wouldn’t help a successful fight against terrorism and could plunge the region into total chaos.”

As recently as February, Saudi Arabia proposed sending its own troops to join the fight against ISIS — which Russia wholly condemned. As head of the State Duma committee, Pavel Krasheninnikov, warned, “Syria has to give official consent, to invite, otherwise it will be a war.”

Now, it appears, that war might be closer than ever.

Syria doesn’t constitute the only arena of contention between the U.S. and Russia. As Anti-Media reported this week, continued buildup of NATO forces along the old Cold War foe’s borders in the Balkans and Poland — and particularly also in the Black Sea — has provoked Russia sufficiently enough for officials to caution the move might amount to aggression.

“This is not NATO’s maritime space and it has no relation to the alliance,”Russia’s director of European affairs told Interfax.

Nonetheless, the U.S. and E.U. have proffered a policy whereby defense of its installations on foreign soil is being carried out under the cloak of the NATO alliance — possibly with the intent of posturing dominance in the region to create a buffer zone for operations in Syria.

Pipelines through Syria would specifically allow oil and natural gas to flow to the European Union, which currently sources that fuel primarily from Russia. In other words, if Russia wants to defend its profitable relationship with the E.U., it must defend against the U.S.-led, Saudi-supported overthrow of its Syrian ally, Assad.

Meanwhile, civilians in Syria have been treated like cannon fodder and are fleeing for their lives — but the intensifying geopolitical maneuvers appear more likely than ever to have brought us all to the brink of a third world war.

Against the backdrop of the numerous discussions of the political agenda, appearance, and vocabulary of the candidates running in the American presidential election, there is practically no demand for one topic: what is the class nature and mass social base of each politician?

This approach seems quite natural for the right-wing and liberal media, but why is this topic completely alien to the left? The reason seems to be that the answers we would get if we consider this issue seriously will not be palatable for everyone on the left. For many American intellectuals, the provocative and politically incorrect statements by Donald Trump have become another ideological excuse allowing these intellectuals to express a “critical support” for the existing order, embodied in Hillary Clinton.

The fact that Hillary is the candidate of financial capital and that she intends to carry out an extremely aggressive foreign policy is not a secret to anyone. But all this is much less important than political correctness. After all, Hillary never allows herself to make statements insulting any minority, or rather, not in the past two decades, when political correctness became a norm of conduct in Washington.

Against this backdrop, the accusations of Donald Trump of “fascism” have become a constant refrain of the Clinton campaign. Paradoxically, these accusations are not directed against Trump himself, but rather against Bernie Sanders and his supporters. Since Trump is the “absolute evil”, everyone should unite around the “lesser evil” represented by Hillary, while the senator from Vermont, who stands in the way of this consolidation, has to leave the scene.

It is telling that such sentiment is expressed not only by the well-known economist Paul Krugman, who suddenly forgot all of his harsh statements condemning the neo-liberal policies, put in place by Democrats, but also by Noam Chomsky, who is undoubtedly a moral authority for the left. The difference between Krugman and Chomsky is, of course, enormous. The first is clearly hoping for a post in the new administration. His aggressive attack on Sanders’ campaign and its supporters have already caused a scandal and undermined the reputation of the economist. Chomsky, on the contrary, constantly expresses his respect and sympathy for Sanders, but reiterates that in the name of the fight against Trump will have to support Clinton, no matter how disgusting her policies are, and no matter how horrible would be the consequences of such choice.

In fact, the discussion is about how to maintain and increase current dominant evil for the sake of preventing certain, hypothetical evil, about which we do not know anything other than we ourselves have declared it to be something obviously worse.

The point is not only the moral side of the issue. Critically-minded intellectuals have largely turned into hostages of the existing system, and not just institutionally, since they are part of the system one way or another, but what is far worse, intellectually. While proclaiming the utopias and “alternatives”, they are not able to think in terms of practical politics, and realize that breaking with the established order of things involves risk, drama and challenges that require a significant courage. The intellectual and moral comfort is guaranteed by practical conservatism that people hide from themselves, repeating meaningless “progressive” mantras.

Source Al Jazeera 

At the time when the intellectual elite left is confused and divided, the sectarian groups on the left just try to ignore what is happening, proclaiming there is no difference between the two candidates running in the Democratic primary. However, it is not by chance that the Democratic Party leadership is doing everything possible to block the Bernie Sanders’ campaign despite the fact that according to the polls he looks much more attractive as a candidate in the fight against Trump. And the Republican machine also actively fought against Trump, though with less success: they were unable or unwilling to apply the methods of “foul play”  to which their colleagues and rivals from the Democratic Party resorted.

It is impossible to explain what is happening solely by the machinations conducted by Hillary who is doing whatever it takes to become a US president. The story with the “mysterious” transcripts of remarks made by Mrs. Clinton to the leadership of Goldman Sachs gives us some clues which help to understand what is going on. Despite the fact that the refusal to publish the text of the speech inflicts a serious blow to her reputation, and is constantly used by her opponents, she steadfastly refused to do so. Obviously, the content of the transcripts is so compromising, that it is better to lose votes because of the refusal to disclose the document, than to lose any chance of victory in the event of publication.

However, information about the contents of the transcript gradually seeps into the press. Employees of Goldman Sachs, who were present at the presentation, say that the former first lady actually discussed with the bankers, how they will divide the national budget together. Although Goldman Sachs has long been engaged in this directly or indirectly by receiving considerable public funds (regardless of who is in power – Democrats or Republicans), public recognition of such collusion, especially held in advance, can not only ruin the reputation of candidate, but also harm the bank. It seems Clinton is worried about it, no less than about her own political future.

Transcripts of remarks to Goldman Sachs represent the real political program of, not only Clinton, but also all the current Washington establishment regardless of the party differences. However, both Clinton opponents are not related to the financial capital, and, in case of victory, undoubtedly will try to limit, if not stop the “distribution” of national funds due to which major banks flourish amid the economic crisis. Sanders became famous a few years ago when he organized an audit of the Federal Reserve System, to find out how almost 13 trillion dollars of unaccounted money went through the “gray” schemes to the interested American banks.

Trump, who expresses the interests of the construction business and industrial capital, is interested to force the bankers to lend to the domestic production at a low interest rate, and for this it is necessary to put an end to the current policy when the money given to the banks by the state end up in the speculative markets. The class meaning of the struggle is clear. If Sanders could, perhaps for the first time in US history, form a Socialist-Democratic Bloc of employees, uniting the working class with the angry young middle class, Trump headed a rebellion of the industrial bourgeoisie against the financial capital, also with the support of a large section of the workers. The only difference is that in the case of Sanders, we see movement based on class (horizontal) solidarity, while Trump offers corporate solidarity (vertical).

This situation is quite natural for the working class, which not only has common social interests, but is embedded in the system of vocational and industrial relations, which makes it, in certain situations, support certain groups of the bourgeoisie, related to the working class by virtue of corporate production and market logic. From the standpoint of the left ideology, the first option of solidarity is progressive, while the second reactionary. But both of these uprisings are still dangerous in the eyes of the financial capital. We are talking about blocking of cash flow of billions of dollars, which allows banks and their bribed politicians to exist parasitically at the expense of the real economy.

Clinton’s policy is a classic example of splitting society into numerous interest groups, preventing the horizontal integration. It is not a coincidence that the crisis of the labor movement and class politics which is currently happening in the Western world is going along celebration of multiculturalism and political correctness. And the spread of political correctness, in turn, historically coincide with the “financialization” of the economy, in other words a massive redistribution of resources in favor of the banking sector. On the one hand, the capital triumphed over the labor, robbed it of a significant part of the social gains of the twentieth century.  But on the other hand, the capitalist class had its own redistribution of wealth, and the financial elite have appropriated nearly all the fruits of this victory.

It is not surprising that in this situation we see a rise of not only the working class, but also a part of the bourgeoisie. And Trump attacks against political correctness are by no means a manifestation of his personal feelings, his unrestraint and rudeness; it’s a conscious strategy to consolidate those social groups that have suffered under the dictatorship of political correctness. They were hit practically and financially; they lost their income, jobs and revenues. Trump’s propaganda is quite rational, and it is effective not because it, as the intellectuals think, resonates with the feelings and prejudices of the people, but because it reflects their real interests, even if expressed in a distorted form. The billionaire only bullies the groups which will not vote for him anyway. But it consolidates the voices of millions of white (and actually not just white) working class people, who are mortally tired of political correctness.

And even those Trump statements, which seem to many quite ridiculous and anecdotal, such as the promise to build a wall to fence off Mexico, in fact, are not. After all, if building the wall will really start, it will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, not only in the US but also on the opposite side of the border. In fact, this is another Keynesian project, albeit fairly absurd from the standpoint of ordinary logic. And therefore Trump statement that Mexico will finance the wall is not unfounded. For the economy of its northern states such a project will not be just profitable, but saving. It will not stop the illegal migration from the other side of the border, of course, but it will create incentives for the development of production in the region, whose livelihood is currently dependent mainly on drug trafficking and illegal migration.

The story is more complicated with the offensive remarks regarding women. On the one hand, it really causes indignation among educated white Americans, who are used to a completely different attitude. But on the other hand, the question arises: would these women vote for him, even if Donald showed more tact? At the same time, despite these statements (or even possibly because of them), bully Trump is gaining a reputation of a “real man”,  rough, but sincere, the one you can rely on and the one you can be attracted to, among the women belonging to the less educated part of society. Of course, there is nothing progressive in Trump’s ideology. But this is not about ideology, which today serves not so much as a factor of social mobilization, but as a tool for manipulation. The defeat of financial capital, no matter who brings it about, opens a new era in the development of the Western society, and would inevitably create conditions for strengthening the position of the working class and the revival of its organizations. In other words, it is Hillary who embodies the most reactionary project in the framework of modern capitalist development. And the unwillingness of Bernie supporters to vote for it, if the Socialist candidate quits, is not just emotional, but is entirely rational – politically, socially and morally. In the context of the current political situation the attempt to turn Trump into “an absolute evil” is nothing more than an attempt to mobilize people to protect the status quo for the sake of preventing any change.

But change is underway, not only because of the political and social logic, but also due to the fact that the possibility of maintaining the current neoliberal model of capitalism is objectively exhausted.

And if the left does not want and cannot fight it, it will be the right-wing populists like Donald Trump in the USA or Marine Le Pen in France who will strike the fatal blow to this order. In this case, it will be possible, of course, to get outraged at the “prejudice” and ” irresponsibility” of the working class , but the real moral responsibility still lies on the leftist intellectuals themselves, who, in times of crisis, have demonstrated their class position, by acting, in fact, as advocates of ideas and defenders the interests of the financial capital.

Brazil’s current Minister of Education is the latest public official in the Michel Temer administration to be implicated in the country’s political corruption scandal. 

Brazil’s coup imposed Education Minister Mendonca Filho is being investigated for allegedly receiving an illegal bribe of US$29,000 for the purpose of financing his 2014 re-election campaign, Brazil’s General Prosecutor Rodrigo Janot announced Friday, making him the latest official in Temer’s administration who could be forced to stand down.

During a Supreme Court hearing Friday, General Prosecutor Janot argued that “evidence of possible bribes for his [Mendonca Filho’s] political campaign” would result in the court having jurisdiction to investigate potential criminal practices.

Brazil’s interim President Michel Temer and other newly-appointed officials pose for photographers during a meeting at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia. | Photo: Reuters

The allegations stem from records and documents obtained by Brazilian authorities belonging to the former financial director of UTC, Walmir Pinheiro, who last year agreed to a plea bargain testimony.

The owner of UTC, Ricardo Pessoa, was also arrested last November after previously admitting to acts of corruption.

The new evidence made public Friday to the Supreme Court reveals that Education Minister Filho was the recipient of a US$29,000 donation from the UTC financial group in 2014, according to UTC company bank account records.

Thus far, Filho has denied the allegations, telling authorities that when approached by UTC representatives he refused the money and suggested that the funds be allocated to his political party, the Democrats (DEM).

According to the court documents, the DEM party received two donations of US$29,000 from UTC in August and September of 2014.

The prosecutors’ statement Friday also announced that an investigation may been opened up into the potential involvement of other construction companies such as Odebrecht and Queiroz Galvão, which is alleged to have deposited two “suspicious” sums of US$29,000 into the bank account of Mendonca Filho’s political campaign.

If convicted the Minister of Education would probably be pressured to resign from his current post, making him the fourth public official to resign or quit since the Temer administration came to power earlier this year.

Minister of Education and Culture Mendonca Filho is also implicated in Operation Car Wash, which lies at the core of the country’s corruption probes and involves accusations of money laundering and fraud involving the state oil company Petrobras. The newly-merged ministry sees the culture and education ministries joining together for the first time since the officers were separated in 1985 after the fall of the dictatorship.

With every day, the true face of Europe mirrors ever so clearer the abject inhumane colonial power that raped and usurped Asia, Africa and South America for hundreds of years, as so well depicted in numerous articles and essays by my friend, philosopher, historian and war journalist, Andre Vltchek. Every day this neo-colonial continent spits out new atrocities. And it’s getting worse. Jean Paul Sartre was right, when he said the US is but a Super-European-Monstrosity. The colonial Europeans, mostly Anglo-French Europeans, are at the helm of this monster-octopus, self-declared empire. They are behind the mysterious and Machiavellian eye on top of the pyramid on the US-dollar bill, the symbol of the Freemasons, the forefathers of today’s United States of America – and the driving force towards the New and One World Order.

They pull the strings via such semi-secret organizations like the Bilderbergers, Trilaterals, CFRs (Council on Foreign Relations), Chatham Houses, WEFs (World Economic Forum) – you name it.  Spineless individuals, like Bush, Obama, Clinton, Merkel, Hollande, Cameron – are mere vassals commandeering vassals; a construct that has grown so sophisticated and so evil – I’m sadly afraid, only eradication by war can stop it.

And that is exactly what the Monster is preparing, by provoking Russia and China, encircling Russia with NATO planes, bombs and tanks, and encroaching on Chinese territories with war ships in the South China Sea – and with slander propaganda day-in-day-out against any sovereign nation that refuses to bend to the US super power. Then again, there is Hope, the life blood of our lives – that this evil tower of greed will collapse in itself by the weight of its sheer maliciousness, thereby reducing violence to a minimum. But collapse it must this criminal beast. It’s as clear as the pristine water that still flows from distant, uncontaminated springs, the hope for human survival. – It may take more than our lifetime to happen, but happen it will. It has happened many times before.

Exit or No Exit From the European Union 

May it suffice to watch the gradual decay of Europe by observing the current spectacle over Brexit – the Brits in the limelight for exit or no exit from the European Union. With all the fake theories and invented projections, the UK and European elite spreads around the globe, nobody really knows what they are talking about. The people of an ancient-new empire is daring to take a step, a step towards freedom and self-determination, a step which the Lucifer eye on top of the pyramid won’t let it take. It’s a mere show, but people believe in it, hence the hype about the UK exit – or not – from a diabolical construct, its possible consequences of suffering, its possible losses or gains… versus an almost forgotten and down-trodden Greece, destroyed by the same vile Machiavellian forces that sit behind the clandestine eye. Greece, also a European country, but not at par with the Great, Great Britain, the very lauded, praised and literally prayed-to by the cream of the crop of the rest of the western world — Greece, today is almost totally destroyed and what’s left is in the process and programmed to be devastated and looted by the same admirers of the ancient-new Anglo colonialists – murderers, exploiters, looters, rapists – which Greece never was.

There is no term properly describing this still ongoing, perfected and legalized crime against Greece – and potentially against any other ‘misbehaving’ EU country. The people of the west are blinded by the massive killer propaganda funded by limitless billions of dollars made of thin air by the western liberated and too-big-to-fail predatory banking system.

The top-notch politicians of France, Belgium, Spain and Portugal are no better. Against public will, they follow the orders of Washington and Brussels to the letter, enslaving and impoverishing tens of thousands of people by imposing austerity, producing poverty, disease and death. Spain, according to official statistics, is recording 11 suicides per day, of which at least half are directly related to the economic crisis, unemployment, desperation. Cancer rates have drastically increased since 2008.

A study published in the British Lancet concludes that between 2008 and 2010 an additional 260,000 cancer deaths in OECD countries can be attributed to the effects of unemployment; 160,000 of them in the EU. Depression, loss of self-esteem and hopelessness are known to lead not only to suicide, but frequently affecting the immune system, thereby provoking cancer. This figure does not account for all the premature deaths due to malnutrition and lack of medical care and adequate shelter.

New generations of peoples of neo-colonialist nations are being brainwashed into believing they are floating on the crest of the world, they are part of the elite, and, thus, are to perpetuate this killer system. These same elitists and their new generation ‘students’ lambast Greece for being corrupt and lazy, deserving what she is getting, when indeed corruption originates in colonialism. A country weakened and injured by financial guns, tanks and bombs, is being stomped into the ground. It’s the victim’s fault anyway. These are the values we have grown up with in our western world, the values we are passing on to future generations.

Slamming Greece into oblivion is unimportant. But a possible Brexit – the Great British Empire leaving the corrupt EU – that would be a calamity. This fabricated event fills all the mainstream media – and takes Europe’s breath away. What a distorted and derailed world we are living in.

What Greece has done for civilization, not just for the west but for the world – the invaluable intellectual wealth she gave us, is forgotten. Nobody thinks about it anymore. Democracy, grown out of the Oracle of Delphi, the epitome of a think tank for peace, if there ever was one – democracy, the voice of the people for justice and equality, is today meaningless. The term is used to cheat and deceive the people – the ‘We, The People’ – into believing they have a saying in what their governments are doing.

In reality, we have a new world philosophy: Globalized neoliberalism, where peoples’ opinions don’t count. People are used as peons and cheap labor. Naked fascism in new shiny clothes. And like the sexual taboos of our monotheistic Christian culture, we are not allowed to see and recognize and talk about this new fascism’s nakedness.

Solidarity is Gone

Solidarity is gone – long gone. Though, we are born with it. That’s for sure. But as soon as we push out of the sheltering womb, the evil fist of a greed-struck and greed-driven society grabs us and makes sure we never look back – back to the realm that we are all coming from – the realm of solidarity and love.

The debate over Brexit by an elite that still adores the British Empire’s supremacy, while the same elite despises their southern neighbor, Greece, kicked and beaten into poverty, into horrendous suffering, but never, never into submission.

Greece is vulnerable, Greece can be smashed. Its unimportant. It consists of un-people. Germany and the troika are doing the right thing – putting Greece and the Greek into oblivion. That seems to be the going opinion of many European leaders (sic). Many of these spineless politicians perceive sub-consciously that what they are doing may be back-firing one day. So, why are they not standing up, screaming ‘stop it!’ to the monsters of Brussels and Washington?

Instead, the cowards who know about the wrong that is being done in their little remaining shred of consciousness, they allow the continuing looting and devastating of Greece. It is good ‘politics’. It is what’s called ‘political correctness’; and to belong to the elite, you have to behave as politically correct.

What the Greek have worked for in millenniums of their history – a significant part of the life-capital of the world – is being pillaged and annihilated by self-proclaimed emperors of the universe – the corporate leaders of the New World Order, headquartered in Washington, Tel Aviv and London, with asuccursale overseeing the vassals in Brussels.

This is how Greece and the UK compare on the eve of the ‘crucial’ show-referendum, only a few days from now: Remain or Exit. The elite abides by the elite; debates the fate of the elite, as they want to be part of the elite – by association of intellect (sic-sic). Greece is not on their radar screen. – Who cares whether the UK Remains or Leaves? – well, leaving could be the straw that brings the EU down. And that would be a good thing.

But does anyone really believe that Britain, the US mole in the European Union, is allowed to leave the EU? – To put it into context: The creators of the EU, who were not the Europeans, but America, the self-proclaimed winner of WWII – they will allow a Brexit only if they deem that now the artificial construct of usurpation, the constitution-less European Union and its artificial currency, the Euro – has lived its time and may now pass into the next phase, a feudal group of high-tech nations with low cost labor – with always the right number of unemployed – to be sustained by refugees of nearby wars and conflicts; the new serfs of the Washington-Tel Aviv based empire.

When the Greek leaders on 5 July 2015 put the question of accepting or not the ‘troika’s’ financial sledgehammer, the Greek people decided overwhelmingly against the suffocating austerity. Then, somebody at Lucifer’s bidding put the gun to the head of the leaders and they, gutless as they are, disobeyed the decision of the people, the very people who democratically elected them six months earlier. Saying no to the austerity strangulation, would have meant exit from the Euro and possibly exit from the EU. It would have meant the salvation of Greece.

But the masters of the universe – Washington, Berlin, Paris and London – couldn’t allow the southern, beautiful and proud Greece, the forefathers of our civilization, to become independent, autonomous and sovereign again. Greece, a strategic NATO position – no way can she get away.

Few people seem to recognize the insulting threats against Greece of expulsion from the Euro and the EU by Germany’s Lord of Finance as the bluff they are. Greece is not allowed to leave the Eurozone, not as long as there are still public assets to be stolen; and less so to leave the EU. The Greek territory and strategic position is needed by NATO, the vassal-EU’s military command center for the protection of the global corporate empire.

Brexit vs. Grexit; the elite vs. the un-people. One just wonders who is who? 

Hey – we are in the 21^st Century Roman Empire of Bread and Blood – and are enjoying it too.

Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a former World Bank staff and worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources. He writes regularly for Global Research, ICH, RT, Sputnik, PressTV, Chinese 4^th Media, TeleSUR, The Vineyard of The Saker Blog, and other internet sites. He is the author ofImplosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe. He is also a co-author of The World Order and Revolution! – Essays from the Resistance. 

The UN’s annual List of Shame is supposed to blacklist countries and groups “engage(d) in the recruitment and use of children, sexual violence against children, the killing and maiming of children, attacks on schools and/or hospitals and attacks or threats of attacks against protected personnel, and the abduction of children.”

It consistently fails the test of fairness. Syria’s freedom-fighting military was disgracefully blacklisted – courageously combating US-supported terrorists, imported from scores of foreign countries.

No nations more demand blacklisting than America, Israel, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, along with their rogue allies.

Endless US direct and proxy wars continue slaughtering children indiscriminately, devastating the lives of countless millions in numerous countries. Yet it isn’t included on the UN List of Shame.

Israel wages wars of aggression at its discretion. It collectively punishes millions of Palestinians daily, treating young children as viciously as adults, brutalizing, wrongfully imprisoning or murdering them in cold blood. Yet it’s not blacklisted.

Turkey is waging genocidal war on its Kurdish population, as well as against Syrian and Iraqi Kurds, slaughtering children indiscriminately, committing some of the region’s most serious human rights abuses overall. Its high crimes didn’t warrant blacklisting by UN standards.

Yemen is Obama’s war, partnered with Saudi Arabia, other Gulf States and Israel, orchestrating terror-bombing, choosing targets to strike, committing slow-motion genocide against millions of desperate Yemenis – an entire population at risk.

On June 2, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon included the so-called Saudi-led coalition on the UN’s blacklist – citing “(g)rave violations against children,” including “killing and maiming” them, along with “attacks on schools and hospitals.”

Days later, he reversed policy, absolving Saudi killers – claiming he was pressured, saying it was “one of the most painful and difficult decisions I have had to make.”

Again he proved his loyal imperial tool credentials, blaming victims, absolving predators waging naked aggression. Throughout his tenure as secretary-general, he failed to hold Washington and its rogue partners responsible for the highest of high crimes against peace.

NYT editors support his actions, complicit criminality, absurdly calling his position “thankless,” saying “to accuse Mr. Ban of caving in to Saudi intimidation…is not fair…(He) had no real choice.”

False! Claiming loss of Saudi financing, if withheld, would cause millions of children to “suffer grievously” ignores unspeakable horrors they face in all war theaters (largely US instigated ones).

Ban is responsible for his actions. Money won’t solve the problem of high crimes committed against children.

Stopping US wars of aggression complicit with NATO, Israel, Saudi Arabia and other rogue partners, along with holding culpable parties accountable, is the only way to end their suffering.

Countless millions of noncombatant men and women in harm’s way are affected the same way.

America and its rogue partners should head every annual UN List of Shame – its secretary-general demanding they be held accountable.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected].

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: 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 U.S. is moving towards war against Eritrea, a fiercely independent African nation of only six million people. Washington has deployed its UN “human rights” proxies to justify another “humanitarian” military intervention, remarkably like the UN-sanctioned aggression against Libya, in 2011. The UN panel charges Eritrea with “enslaving” and murdering its own people – a pack of imperial lies. Obama is set to add another war to his bloody legacy.

“Eritrea’s fierce independence has put it in imperialism’s crosshairs.”

The United States is methodically setting the stage for a so-called “humanitarian” military intervention against the small northeast African nation of Eritrea, under legal pretexts much like those used to justify NATO’s war of regime change against Libya, in 2011. As in Libya, the U.S. has hijacked the United Nations human rights apparatus to claim a “responsibility to protect” (R2P) Eritrea’s citizens from alleged abuses by their own government. War and regime change are the intended result.

Washington engineered UN sanctions against Eritrea, beginning in 2009, on the patently bogus charge that Eritrea’s determinedly secular government provided “political, financial and logistical support” to Islamist Shabaab fighters in Somalia. Islamic jihadism is anathema to Eritrea, whose population of six million on the shores of the Red Sea is about evenly divided between Muslims and Christians. But few people in the United States knew Eritrea existed, much less its secular revolutionary history and politics. The lies stuck, as did the sanctions, even after the UN Human Rights Council conceded there was no further evidence of Eritrean aid to the Shabaab.

A three-person UN panel now alleges that Eritrea is a lawless state that has committed “crimes against humanity,” enslaving up to 400,000 people and engaging in murder, forced disappearances, rape and torture. Mark Smith, the Australian chairman of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea, demands that Eritrea be put on trial before the International Criminal Court, a body that has indicted only Africans – and only those that were on the wrong side of U.S. foreign policy – since its creation in 2002. Smith laid the legal groundwork for the overthrow of the Eritrean government:

There is no genuine prospect of the Eritrean judicial system holding perpetrators to account in a fair and transparent manner. The perpetrators of these crimes must face justice and the victims’ voices must be heard. The international community should now take steps, including using the International Criminal Court [ICC], national courts and other available mechanisms, to ensure there is accountability for the atrocities being committed in Eritrea.

The UN commission demands that Eritrea be put on trial before the International Criminal Court, a body that has indicted only Africans.

In February of 2011, the United Nations Security Council, led by the U.S., Britain and France, referred the case against Libya to the ICC, to provide a criminal justice rationale for the military assault that was already underway against Muammar Gaddafi’s government. This time, Washington has instructed its UN proxies to give “humanitarian” legal cover in advance for an attack on Eritrea. The demonization campaign is built around two Big Lies: one, that Eritrea’s system of national service – a form of draft, which is the right of all nations – amounts to “slavery”; and two, that domestic oppression in Eritrea is a prime source of African refugees to Europe, with the tiny nation allegedly accounting for more cross-continental emigration than every other country except war-ravaged Syria.

National service in Eritrea, as in many other countries, includes not only military duty on the front lines with Ethiopia – which still occupies parts of Eritrea in clear violation of an international arbitration agreement – but also labor in public works projects as well as service in health and education infrastructures. (Most teachers in Eritrea, for example, are national service workers.) Lots of folks would call that socialism or nation-building – which is how the Eritreans see it.

The Eritreans defend extended national service on grounds of necessity, citing an existential threat from the Ethiopian military, backed to the hilt by Washington. Economic sanctions have also necessitated that Eritrea mobilize the population to develop its own national resources. However, self-reliance is also a cornerstone of Eritrean domestic development policy, and seen as central to maintaining true national sovereignty and independence. Eritrea rejects foreign “aid” and entanglements with structures of international capital, and is one of only two nations in Africa that has no relationship with AFRICOM, the U.S. military command on the continent (Zimbabwe is the other).

It is insane to believe that little Eritrea, with only six million people, has set more people to flight than neighboring Ethiopia, one of the poorest countries in the world, with a population 15 times greater.

Eritrea’s fierce independence has put it in imperialism’s crosshairs. Eritrea is “Africa’s Cuba” – and the United States treats it as such in a striking variety of ways. Indeed, the other Big Lie against Eritrea – that it is the second largest contributor to the waves of refugees risking life and limb to reach Europe – is directly related to European immigration policies, urged on them by the U.S., that put Eritrea in much the same bind as U.S. policy towards Cuba.

It is insane to believe that little Eritrea, with only six million people, has set more people to flight than neighboring Ethiopia, one of the poorest countries in the world, now in the throes of a devastating drought, with a population 15 times greater; or neighboring Sudan, also desperately poor and afflicted by multiple wars, with 40 million people; or nearby Somalia, a nation without a state, inhabited by 10 million people. Indeed, economic, political and war refugees from all across Africa claim to be Eritrean because, unlike citizens of any other African country, Eritrean refugees are afforded special status on arrival in Europe as presumptive political refugees who might face torture if returned home. As with U.S. Cuba policy, the Eritrean exception was designed to weaken and destabilize the country through a brain and human resource drain. Inevitably, however, the policy has made Eritrean identification papers the hottest selling documents on the streets of Khartoum and other refugee gathering points. Europe is awash, as is Israel, with fake Eritreans fleeing various military, political and economic catastrophes – most of them rooted in Euro-American foreign destabilization policies and the global capitalist Race to the Bottom.

If Latin Americans could pass for Cubans, the populations of U.S. “Little Havanas” would number in the tens of millions, full of Hondurans, Guatemalans, Salvadorans and Mexicans.

“Economic, political and war refugees from all across Africa claim to be Eritrean.”

Ethiopians pass most easily as Eritreans, since millions of them share the same ethnic background. About half of Eritreans are Tigrayan, the ethnic group that is the fourth largest in Ethiopia and dominates the ruling party in Addis Ababa. The Austrian Ambassador to Ethiopia, Andreas Melan, last year estimated that “among the thousands of Eritrean migrants in Europe, 30 to 40 percent are Ethiopians.” That may be an underestimate. And many more “Eritreans” actually hail from as far away as West Africa.

The Eritrean ambassador to Israel believes that Ethiopians account for half of the purported Eritreans seeking refugee status in that country. “They know the Eritreans automatically receive a six-month visa, so they pretend to be Eritrean,” said the ambassador.

The Eritrean refugee scam is an open secret all across Europe, and is well known to the American and European governments. The Big Lie is maintained to serve imperial purposes, and will now be deployed to justify an armed assault on Eritrea as an alleged mass enslaver and rogue nation. The UN Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea will submit its manufactured findings to the Human Rights Council on June 21, setting the imperial lynch mob in motion.

“They know the Eritreans automatically receive a six-month visa, so they pretend to be Eritrean.”

Eritrea cannot expect a fair hearing from a UN apparatus that is puppeteered from Washington. As the Eritrean government stated in its preliminary response to the UN commission’s charges:

The purposes of national service in Eritrea are clearly stated in a legal proclamation of 1994 and are three-fold: national defense, economic and social development and national integration.  The service is not indefinite although for a time and in certain cases it has been prolonged due the already explained existential threat of war.

The commission based its findings on the testimony of about 800 (alleged) Eritreans interviewed in various foreign cities, while ignoring the 42,000 Eritrean expatriates that have petitioned the world body to lift sanctions against their home country.

The UN panel is ignoring what is “effectively a continuing state of war with Ethiopia, the illegal occupation of Eritrean territory which constitutes a flagrant violation of human rights, repeated armed aggression, sanctions and mistaken policies that consider almost all Eritreans asylum-seekers,” said Eritrean government spokesperson Yemane Gebreab. That’s a diplomatic way of putting it. By referring the case to the International Criminal Court, and implicitly threatening military action against Eritrea, the commission has become a warmonger.

On Monday, the New York Times reported that thousands of Ethiopian and Eritrean troops were rushing towards the disputed border, the site of heavy artillery duels. The Times quoted an Eritrean dissident living in Sweden as their expert of the moment. “If there is a war, or the rumor of a war, it could be a way for the Eritrean government to get support and divert attention,” said the dissident. The newspaper also relayed a Twitter message from an Eritrean American in his homeland’s capital. “Here in Asmara, it’s peaceful despite #EthiopianAttacks against #Eritrea on the Tsorona front. And you wonder why there’s national service?”

President Obama seems intent on adding War #8 to his imperial legacy.

The U.S. is unwilling to stop the war on Syria and to settle the case at the negotiation table. It wants a 100% of its demands fulfilled, the dissolution of the Syrian government and state and the inauguration of a U.S. proxy administration in Syria.

After the ceasefire in Syria started in late February Obama broke his pledge to separate the U.S. supported “moderate rebels” from al-Qaeda. In April U.S. supported rebels, the Taliban like Ahrar al Sham and al-Qaeda joined to attack the Syrian government in south Aleppo. The U.S.proxies broke the ceasefire.

Two UN resolutions demand that al-Qaeda in Syria be fought no matter what. But the U.S. has at least twice asked Russia not to bomb al-Qaeda. It insists, falsely, that it can not separate its “moderates” from al-Qaeda and that al-Qaeda can not be attacked because that would also hit its “moderate” friends.

The Russian foreign minster Lavrov has talked wit Kerry many times about the issue. But the only response he received were requests to further withhold bombing. Meanwhile al-Qaeda and the “moderates” continued to break the ceasefire and to attack the Syrian government forces.

After nearly four month Kerry still insists that the U.S. needs even more time for the requested separation of its proxy forces from al-Qaeda. Foreign Minister Lavrov recently expressed the Russian consternation:

The Americans are now saying that they are unable to remove the ‘good’ opposition members from the positions held by al-Nusra Front, and that they will need another two-three months. I am under the impression that there is a game here and they may want to keep al-Nusra Front in some form and later use it to overthrow the [Assad] regime,” Lavrov said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

The bucket was full and Kerry’s latest request for another three month pause of attacking al-Qaeda was the drop that let it overflow. Russia now responded by hitting the U.S. where it did not expect to be hit:

Russian warplanes hit Pentagon-backed Syrian fighters with a barrage of airstrikes earlier this week, disregarding several warnings from U.S. commanders in what American military officials called the most provocative act since Moscow’s air campaign in Syria began last year.The strikes hit a base near the Jordanian border, far from areas where the Russians were previously active, and targeted U.S.-backed forces battling the Islamic State militants.
…
These latest strikes occurred on the other side of the country from the usual Russian operations, around Tanf, a town near where the borders of Jordan, Iraq, and Syria meet.
…
The Russian strike hit a small rebel base for staging forces and equipment in a desolate, unpopulated area near the border. About 180 rebels were there as part of the Pentagon’s program to train and equip fighters against Islamic State.

When the first strikes hit, the rebels called a U.S. command center in Qatar, where the Pentagon orchestrates the daily air war against Islamic State.

U.S. jets came and the Russian jets went away. The U.S. jets left to refuel, the Russian jets came back and hit again. Allegedly two U.S. proxy fighters were killed and 18 were wounded.

Earlier today another such attack hit the same target.

This was no accident but a well planned operation and the Russian spokesperson’s response makes the intend clear:

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov appeared to confirm the attack Friday, telling reporters it was difficult to distinguish different rebel groups from the air.

Translation: “If you can not separate your forces from al-Qaeda and differentiate and designate exclusively “moderate” zones we can not do so either.”

The forces near Tanf are supported by U.S. artillery from Jordan and air power via Iraq. British and Jordan special operations forces are part of the ground component (and probably the majority of the “Syrian” fighters.) There is no al-Qaeda there. The Russians know that well. But they wanted to make the point that it is either separation everywhere or separation nowhere. From now on until the U.S. clearly separates them from AQ all U.S. supported forces will be hit indiscriminately anywhere and anytime. (The Syrian Kurds fighting the Islamic State with U.S. support are for now a different story.)

The Pentagon does not want any further engagement against the Syrian government or against Russia. It wants to fight the Islamic State and its hates the CIA for its cooperation with al-Qaeda and other Jihadi elements. But John Brennan, the Saudi operative and head of the CIA, still seems to have Obama’s ear. But what can Obama do now? Shoot down a Russian jet and thereby endanger any U.S. pilot flying in Syria or near the Russian border? Risk a war with Russia? Really?

The Russian hit near Tanf was clearly a surprise. The Russians again caught Washington on the wrong foot. The message to the Obama administration is clear. “No more delays and obfuscations. You will separate your moderates NOW or all your assets in Syria will be juicy targets for the Russian air force.”

The Russian hits at Tanf and the U.S. proxies there has an additional benefit. The U.S. had planned to let those forces move north towards Deir Ezzor and to defeat the Islamic State in that city. Eventually a “Sunni entity” would be established in south east Syria and west Iraq under U.S. control. Syria would be split apart.

The Syrian government and its allies will not allow that. There is a large operation planned to free Deir Ezzor from the Islamic State occupation. Several hundred Syrian government forces have held an isolated airport in Deir Ezzor against many unsuccessful Islamic State attacks. These troops get currently reinforced by additional Syrian army contingents and Hizbullah commandos.A big battle is coming. Deir Ezzor may be freed within the next few month. Any U.S. plans for some eastern Syrian entity are completely unrealistic if the Syrian government can take and hold its largest eastern city.

The Obama administration’s delaying tactic will now have to end. Russia will no longer stand back and watch while the U.S. sabotages the ceasefire and supports al-Qaeda.

What then is the next move the U.S. will make?

The council of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) on Friday retained its earlier suspension of the Russian Federation’s track and field body on the basis of charges that Russian government and sports authorities oversaw the doping of athletes with performance enhancing drugs at the 2012 London Olympics and other international competitions.

The decision means that the Russian track and field team is banned from the Summer Olympics to be held in August in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The action, barring an entire national team from competing in the games on grounds of cheating, is unprecedented.

At a press conference in Vienna following a meeting of the 27-member council, IAAF President Sebastian Coe, a British lord, said, “Although good progress has been made, the IAAF council was unanimous that RUSAF (Russian Athletic Federation) had not met the reinstatement conditions.”

The IAAF suspended the Russian track and field federation from international competition last November following the release of a report by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) alleging that Russia had carried out systematic doping of its athletes at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. Russian sports authorities at that time agreed to enforce enhanced anti-doping standards and submit to outside testing of its athletes by British officials.

The IAAF set up a task force to determine whether Russian sports authorities had reformed their system and set July 17 as the date for the council to review the report of the task force and decide whether to lift the suspension. On Friday, Rune Andersen, the chairman of the task force, told the press that “the deep-seated culture of tolerance, or worse, for doping that got Russian athletics suspended appears not to have changed.” He added that no track and field athlete would “compete in Rio under a Russian flag.”

Russian officials, who had lobbied intensively for the IAAF to lift the suspension, denounced the decision and said they would appeal it to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the highest body overseeing the games, which meets Tuesday in Lausanne, Switzerland. Russian officials also indicated they might lodge an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking Friday in St. Petersburg, denied that the Russian government had condoned or facilitated doping by Russian athletes.

The Russian sports ministry issued a statement declaring, “We have done everything possible since the ban was first imposed to regain the trust of the international community. We now appeal to the members of the International Olympic Committee to not only consider the impact that our athletes’ exclusion will have on their dreams and the people of Russia, but also that the Olympics themselves will be diminished by their absence.”

WADA largely based its November 2015 report on alleged Russian doping on a series of documentaries broadcast last year by the German public television channel ARD. Those documentaries relied heavily on allegations by Russian sprinter Yulia Stepanova and her husband, Vitaly Stepanov, a one-time Russian anti-doping official.

The statement released by the IAAF on Friday indicated that it would be prepared to allow Stepanova and other Russian athletes who provided evidence against Russian authorities or who had trained outside of Russia and been subject to drug testing by Western authorities to seek exemption from the ban, on the condition that they compete, if accepted, for a “neutral” team.

It is entirely possible that Russian government and sports officials were involved in the doping of athletes and the cover-up of their use of steroids and other banned substances. There is a long history of such practices in Russia dating back to the Soviet period. The Putin government, the political instrument of right-wing and semi-criminal capitalist oligarchs, largely bases its rule on the promotion of Russian nationalism and has a strong interest in using Russian sporting achievements toward that end.

That being said, there is no doubt that the virtually exclusive focus of international sporting authorities on Russian violations and the decision to ban the Russian track and field team—and threats that other Russian Olympic teams could also be banned—are driven by political interests. There is a large degree of coordination between major imperialist media outlets and Olympic and anti-doping agencies in the campaign to exclude Russia from the Rio games.

Just last week, on the eve of the IAAF council meeting, ARD broadcast a further documentary on alleged Russian doping charging that Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko covered up a positive drug test by a football player from Russia’s top league. ARD also claims to have videos of banned coaches training Russian athletes.

Mutko denied the accusations and denounced the airing of the documentary as an “information attack.” He charged, “The aim of this and other publications is clear to me. It is to influence the athletics committee on the eve of the meeting.”

The ARD film was followed by the release of a new WADA report on Wednesday alleging a pattern of interference and resistance by Russian Olympic athletes and officials to British efforts to oversee testing for doping.

On Thursday, the day before the IAAF council meeting, the New York Times, which has spearheaded the media campaign in the US for a ban on Russian athletes at the summer games, ran a story that began as the page-one lead and filled two entire inside pages criticizing WADA for being insufficiently aggressive in going after Russia. The story cited the ARD films, the whistle-blowing claims of the Stepanovs, and interviews given to the Times by Grigory Rodchenkov, a former head of Russia’s anti-doping lab.

Rodchenkov was fired from his position by the Russian government after the publication of WADA’s exposé of doping violations last November. He fled to the US and is collaborating with an American writer in Los Angeles who is preparing a book on Russian sports doping. Last May, the Times ran another extensive front-page article laying out Rodchenkov’s claims to have supervised the systematic doping of Russian athletes and falsification of their drug tests during the 2014 Winter Olympic games at the Russian Black Sea report of Sochi.

The article was accompanied by a separate piece by one of its authors, “Sports of the Times” columnist Juliet Macur, calling for Russian to be banned from the Rio games and the 2018 Winter games as well. Macur was also a co-author of the article published on Thursday.

That Times article from last May prompted a WADA investigation of Russian practices at the Sochi games, the findings of which are slated to be released next month.

The political agenda here is clear. The campaign to bar Russia from the Olympics is part and parcel of the economic, diplomatic and military offensive being led by the United States and involving its NATO allies to isolate and encircle Russia and prepare for a military attack. The aim is to remove Russia as an obstacle to Washington’s drive to establish hegemonic control over the Eurasian continent, reduce Russia to neo-colonial status and dismember it.

This campaign was massively escalated beginning in February 2014 with the US- and German-orchestrated right-wing coup that overthrew a pro-Russian government in Ukraine and installed an ultra-nationalist, anti-Russian regime in Kiev. The ensuing revolt by Russian-speaking regions in eastern Ukraine and the secession of Crimea, which subsequently voted to join the Russian Federation, became the occasion for a massive NATO militarization of Eastern and Central Europe, which continues to escalate and threaten a war between nuclear powers.

In the pursuit of this bellicose policy, the US is seeking to criminalize Russia and cast it as a rogue state.

More generally, the pretense that Russia is some kind of outlier and affront to the “Olympic spirit” is an absurd and cynical fraud. The Olympics have long been an exemplar of the money-grubbing corruption and national chauvinist politics of the professional sports racket. Doping is rampant and practiced by virtually every country.

Since 1986, when the International Olympic Committee changed the rules to allow professional athletes to compete in every phase of Olympics competition, any lingering connection to the principle of amateur sports has been repudiated. The Olympics have become a crass spectacle of corporate commercialism and flag-waving patriotism. In the process, the pressure on athletes to win at any cost—and the pecuniary reward for winning a gold medal—have immensely intensified.

Bribery scandals have become routine. One of the worst was the payoff by US officials and boosters to members of the International Olympic Committee for voting to locate the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. An ensuing investigation found the IOC members accepted bribes as well during the bidding for the 1998 Winter Olympics and 2000 Summer games.

The Americans are past masters in using the Olympics for political purposes, going back to the US-led boycott of the 1980 Moscow games over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan—an invasion that was deliberately provoked by the Carter administration’s funding and arming of Islamist opponents of the pro-Soviet government in Kabul.

As for doping, there is nothing that compares to the decade-long fraud carried out by Lance Armstrong, who rode for the team of the US Postal Service, a government-sponsored corporation. In October 2012, the US Anti-Doping Agency released a report declaring that the US Postal Service cycling team had run “the most sophisticated, professional and successful doping program the sport has ever seen.”

A new report claims a U.S.-led coalition is bombing civilians to death and covering it up.

The United States-led coalition that is bombing Iraq and Syria may be underreporting the civilian toll of that war by as much as 95 percent, according to a new report released Friday by the monitoring group Airwars.

The U.S.-led coalition, which includes nations such as Britain, France and the Netherlands, has been bombing Islamic State group targets in Iraq and Syria since 2014, carrying out more than 13,121 airstrikes, or just over 19 a day. The vast majority of the strikes are carried out by the U.S., according to Airwars—68 percent in Iraq and and 82.5 percent in Syria—with an estimated civilian death toll of at least 1,312 people.

Over the past six months it’s gotten worse, according to Airwars. “Between December and May, in both Iraq and Syria, there was a marked increase in the number of alleged casualty incidents and civilian death attributed to coalition actions,” it says. In Iraq, the group reports that between 297 and 518 civilians were killed by coalition airstrikes in this time. In Syria, between 197 and 274 civilians were killed, “a 38 percent increase in likely civilian deaths above the previous six months.”

 The U.S. has admitted to killing just 20 civilians. Its allies have admitted to none. “If correct, Airwars data suggests the coalition may be underreporting civilian deaths by more than 95 percent,” the report says.

The worst incident for civilians occurred on March 19 in the Islamic State-occupied city of Mosul, when at least 25 innocents were killed when coalition airstrikes hit Mosul University in the middle of the day. As teleSUR reported at the time, such a strike on a civilian institution—confirmed by the U.S. Department of Defense—may constitute a breach of international law.

The U.S. and its coalition allies are not the only foreign governments reportedly killing civilians in the region. Of 630 alleged incidents where civilians died in Syria as a result of international airpower, 91 percent have been attributed to Russia, according to Airwars, killing between 2,792 and 3,451 civilians between December 2015 and May 2016, largely as the result of airstrikes targeting non-Islamic State forces and civilian areas, “particularly in and around Aleppo.”

The Russian government says its airstrikes have not killed any civilians since they began in Sept. 2015.

When the democratically elected President of Ukraine was violently overthrown in February 2014 and replaced by a rabidly anti-Russian regime, not only the residents in the areas of Ukraine that had voted heavily for him (Crimea having voted 75% for him, and Donbass having voted 90% for him) were terrified by what they viewed to be a bloodthirsty new regime, but Russians were, too, because the dictators who were installed made clear their hatred of Russians and even of speakers of the Russian language – one of their first legislative initiatives was to outlaw the Russian language, but the blatant hatred there made the proposal die in Ukraine’s parliament because this new regime needed outside support, and outlawing a language spoken by around half of the nation’s population would have sparked international condemnation.

Shortly after Crimeans voted overwhelmingly on 16 March 2014 to separate from Ukraine and to rejoin Russia, of which Crimea had been a part until the Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev arbitrarily transferred Crimea to Ukraine in 1954, the top military commander at NATO, US General Philip Breedlove, said that because Russia had protected Crimeans from invasion by the newly installed Ukrainian regime, which was threatening Crimeans if they were to hold a referendum to separate from Ukraine, «now it is very clear that Russia is acting much more like an adversary than a partner», and he speculated sarcastically about the «next place where Russian-speaking people may need to be incorporated» into Russia – as if the people of Crimea didn’t have a good reason to fear the new regime, and as if speakers of the Russian language in all countries were in the same situation and needed the same protection; and as if NATO itself had any right to comment about this matter at all, since Ukraine isn’t even a member-nation of NATO anyway. Ukraine is a nation that shares a long border with Russia, but does this give NATO a right to ‘defend’ Ukraine from ‘Russian aggression’? Is NATO trying to provoke a Russian invasion in order for NATO to have a pretext to launch a full-scale nuclear war?

Why was the top military commander of NATO commenting on this at all? He was representing the US President, not the people of Ukraine, and certainly not the people of Crimea. The people of Crimea had good reason to be terrified by the new regime, but Obama’s general who was running NATO’s military operations, didn’t care about that at all.

And the threat that the United States and its allies were posing to Russian-speaking populations in other countries that border Russia was also being ignored by the US and its allies.

Alexander Lukin wrote about this matter in Foreign Affairs on 17 June 2014:

Today, the West’s continued advance is tearing apart the countries on Russia’s borders. It has already led to territorial splits in Moldova and Georgia, and Ukraine is now splintering before our very eyes. Divisive cultural boundaries cut through the hearts of these countries, such that their leaders can maintain unity only by accommodating the interests of both those citizens attracted to Europe and those wanting to maintain their traditional ties to Russia. The West’s lopsided support for pro-Western nationalists in the former Soviet republics has encouraged these states to oppress their Russian-speaking populations – a problem to which Russia could not remain indifferent. Even now, more than two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, more than six percent of the population in Estonia and more than 12 percent of the population in Latvia, most of them ethnic Russians, do not have the full rights and privileges of citizenship. They cannot vote in national elections, enroll in Russian schools, or, for the most part, access Russian media. The EU, despite its emphasis on human rights outside its borders, has turned a blind eye to this clear violation of basic rights within them.

Why does the US government not care about the rights of ethnic Russians in countries which border on Russia, and which treat like dirt people whose families had moved there from Russia? Is the US government trying to goad Russia into protecting those people, too?

Why was General Breedlove (who hardly breeds love for oppressed people of Russian descent) mocking Russian President Vladimir Putin about the «next place where Russian-speaking people may need to be incorporated»?

Is Obama trying to force Putin to either lose face at home, or else to ‘provoke’ a NATO invasion, in order to provide NATO an ‘excuse’ to attack?

On 4 May 2016, Breedlove’s successor, US General Curtis M. Scaparrotti, took over from Breedlove, and he condemned «an aggressive Russia… a resurgent Russia trying to project itself as a world power». If the US government has a right to «project itself as a world power», then why doesn’t the Russian government possess the same right – especially in order to defend itself? The headline of that news report from the US Department of ‘Defense’ was «‘Resurgent Russia’ Poses Threat to NATO, New Commander Says», but precisely what ‘threat’ Russia poses to NATO wasn’t even suggested there, other than the vague charge of a «resurgent Russia striving to project itself as a world power».

Is General Scaparrotti trying to goad Putin to either lose face at home, or else to ‘provoke’ a NATO invasion?

But now NATO is staging Operation Atlantic Resolve, their biggest-ever military maneuvers on Russia’s borders. This includes nuclear weapons.

When the Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev tried to plant Soviet missiles 90 miles from the US in 1962, the American President, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was ready to go to a nuclear attack against the Soviet dictatorship; this was the Cuban Missile Crisis. Will Russian President Vladimir Putin soon be ready to go to a nuclear attack against the new American dictatorship, which is moving much farther against Russia’s democracy now, than the Soviet dictatorship ever did against America’s democracy then?

Does Obama think he’s playing some kind of game here? Khrushchev didn’t think it was any game; nor did Kennedy. Khrushchev backed down, in a deal in which the previous US President’s, Dwight Eisenhower’s, initiation of installation of US missiles in Turkey against the Soviet Union were also removed. Kennedy negotiated an elimination of both Eisenhower’s and Khrushchev’s provocative and dangerous acts, in a nuclear-armed world. Putin has been careful not to do anything that threatens the US, except to protect Russia from what by now is clearly US aggression. But the fact that a democratic Russia has not violated a now dictatorial US, constitutes no excuse for US Presidents continuing the aggression that US President George Herbert Walker Bush started against democratic Russia.

Meanwhile, we have blatant NATO propaganda spread on German public television, asking «Is NATO expansion to blame for Crimean crisis?» and answering: not only no, but «just change NATO’s name» and we all should ignore Russia’s worries about the hostile US military alliance that has spread right up to Russia’s borders and that’s intent upon posting nuclear missiles minutes from Moscow.

Do Western leaders really think that Western publics are stupid and callous enough to believe that? Is the leaders’ presumption, about this, correct? Is this the reason why nuclear war is getting perilously close while Western publics are worried about it little if at all?

This article was first published on May 19th, 2016. In recent developments Russia has been excluded from the Olympics in a dirty tricks operation.

This morning the New York Times sported these headlines “Justice Department Opens Investigation into Russian Doping Scandal” – proudly describing how US Justice (sic-sic) is going to investigate Russian doping. Any opportunity is good for denigrating Russia, foremost Vladimir Putin. It’s his fault, since Sochi is ‘his’ town anyway – Sochi, where the alleged doping took place, of course, among many other sports events, where Russians participate.

It borders on the ridiculous – no, it is abjectly stupid, what the western presstitute media, led by the US is capable of doing.

Does it ever occur to anyone with a half-brain left that US athletes have been caught en masse doping in sports events; that the US is the ‘pivot’ of all dope, as it is the trading place of drugs, where official government agencies, like the CIA and DEA are making some ‘extra cash’ – hundreds of millions a year – by smuggling and clandestinely dealing with heroin and cocaine under the guise of, for example the Plan Colombia.

Unmarked CIA planes have been observed coming from Afghanistan to Qatar or Saudi Arabia, unloading their poppy-bootie for on-shipment to the drug centers of Europe, Asia and, of course, the biggest market place of all – the Unites States of America.

I couldn’t help writing an open letter to the NYT Editor – which, of course, he will not publish. But, it is my hunch that it should be read, just for the record. Here it is.
—–

Dear NYT Editor,

You Americans! [Government and Media]- who think you are on top of the world – on top of the world of murderers and human rights abusers alright – to take every opportunity to attack Russia; now it’s for doping.

Who has ever investigated US doping – the US, the kings of drug trading throughout the world?

Would anybody dare to investigate US sportspeople? For fear of ‘sanctions’?

Give the world a break and step back!

If and when your empire falls, there will be days-and-days of Fiesta throughout the world – streets will be filled with people, hugging and kissing in solidarity – getting rid of the terror of fear Washington is planting throughout the world, the forced ‘regime changes’ – and now doping, attacking Russia, since everything is good for denigrating someone who shows resistance to the self-declared US hegemon.

Americans – think about it – wake up!

Will you print this, dear NYT Editor?

Peter Koenig

—
Peter Koenig is an economist and geopolitical analyst. He is also a former World Bank staff and worked extensively around the world in the fields of environment and water resources. He writes regularly for Global Research, ICH, RT, Sputnik, PressTV, Chinese 4^th Media, TeleSUR, The Vineyard of The Saker Blog, and other internet sites. He is the author of Implosion – An Economic Thriller about War, Environmental Destruction and Corporate Greed – fiction based on facts and on 30 years of World Bank experience around the globe. He is also a co-author of The World Order and Revolution! – Essays from the Resistance.

First published by Global Research in November 2015. Of significance in relation to the IAAF’s recent decision to ban Russia from the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro

When the International Olympic Committee gets judgmental about a country, we know the moral ride ahead is going to be an odd one.  Strange sight, indeed, to have such remarks that Russia deserves special sanction in allegations of mass doping violations in their athletics.  Why the conspicuous absentees?

The anti-doping agency got cracking after the beavering efforts of a German documentary alleging mass instances of doping in Russian sport.  The point of Hajo Seppelt’s work, however, was not to saddle exclusive blame on any one country, even if the Russian case study proved ominous.  It showed, among other things, that the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) had failed to chase up suspicious tests.  Target the doping phenomenon, Seppelt seemed to be saying.  Excluding the athletics of a particular state?  Distinctly not.

Instead, the IAAF’s president, Sebastian Coe, responded with volcanic fury when the documentary aired in 2014, suggesting that the allegations were nothing short of a declaration of war on his sport.  After 11 months, the tune had changed.

The 325-page report by former Wada (World Anti-Doping Agency) president Dick Pound did anything but admit to a universal problem, limiting itself to Russian athletics which supposedly “sabotaged” the London 2012 Olympics.  Two years later, at the Sochi Winter Olympics, there were suggestions of FSB involvement working undercover with lab technicians. In Pound’s own words, it was “hard to imagine what the Russian state interest in athlete’s urine would be.”

Published on Monday, the report “identified systemic failures within the IAAF and Russia” in fulfilling effective anti-doping programs.  Specific athletes were also pointed out as being violators, including the 800m Olympic champion Mariya Savinova.  Life-bans were also suggested for four other athletes.  It further recommended a ban on all Russian athletes taking part in IAAF-backed events, including the European and World championships, and the Olympics themselves.

Pound did admit at the press conference to there being a broader problem, while heaping praise upon Seppelt’s efforts and those of Russian whistleblowers behind the unearthing of extortion, bribery and cover-ups.For all of that, a good deal of hand washing was also taking place.  For one, it betrayed deep structural problems in the administration of world athletics.  Pointing hefty fingers at Russia did not get away from the fact that Wada itself has proven to be a miserable policing agent in this regard. National governments and the IOC must also be drawn in.

Coe certainly does not come out well in this. He had been Lamine Diack’s deputy, a person he expressed “great admiration” for.  Could Coe have been truly ignorant about various payments to Diack for purportedly coving up doping violations?  The scandals right at the heart of the IAAF establishment certainly suggest a cover-up of enormous proportions.

The Russian case is certainly not pretty.  The celebrated Wada-accredited Moscow laboratory supposedly behind combating doping measures seemed to have done its best to frustrate them.  The head of the lab, Grigory Rodchenko, admitted to destroying 1,417 samples in December last year prior to the visit of Wada officials.  This destruction was accompanied by cash payments for concealment.

The Russian Sports Ministry late on November 9 did issue a statement in response to the report, admitting to a lack of surprise at “most of the points”.  “We are fully aware of the problems in the All-Russia Athletic Federation (ARAF) and we have undertaken measures to remedy the situation: there is a new president in ARAF, a new head coach, and they are currently rejuvenating the coaching staff.”

The white as snow indignation has been nothing short of righteous, and the specifics of naming Russia over any other country smacks of a particularly pungent political flavour.  One need only go through a slew of statements to that effect.  Ever at the forefront are Australian sporting bodies, which still see the betrayals of the Cold War of the Eastern bloc countries in limiting their medal tallies.

The theme of being robbed of medals is certainly exemplified by such figures as Australian Olympic walker Jared Tallent.  “It has been hard to go to training every day knowing that you have been robbed of an Olympic medal.”

Athletics Australia chief executive, Phil Jones, is fairly typical of this sentiment.  “I think given the time between now and the Rio Olympics, it’s very difficult to see that their house is going to be demonstrably in order by the middle of next year” (ABC, Nov 10).  To Jones’ credit, however, he did concede that, “It would be very surprising if Russia was an island in this regard [of doping incidents].”

Getting stroppy over one state in this regard is not only missing the point but invalidating the premise of control altogether. The athletics sporting establishment has been crudely revealed to be sponsor, colluder and bumbler on the subject of corruption and drugs in the sport.  The lure of victory and prestige in the sporting arena remains so powerful it is bound to degrade the very premise of clean competition.  Success, at all costs.

Wada’s own statistics from 2013 show extensive doping cases in Turkey (188), France (108), India (95) and Belgium (94).  They are certainly not set for the chop.  Much of this remains a dirty rotten business, but settling old scores with what Pound sees as a residual “Soviet” mentality hardly deals with the issue of global mass doping, the greatest symptom of professional sports.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: [email protected]

Combat on June 16, 2016 in Syria opened with a dawn raid comprised of Iraqi and Iranian troops against Jabhat al-Nusra positions in Maarata, southern Aleppo. The attack failed, with dozens of casualties reported, with one Iranian and three Iraqi service members being held as prisoner. A Jaysh al-Fatah offensive has succeeded in seizing over 90% of the territory around Khalasah in southern Aleppo.

In Huways, in the Hama province, rebels filmed the destruction of a government tractor with a BGM-71 TOW missile.

Further to the north, Syrian Arab Army (SAA) forces report gains in the Jabl al-Turkman mountain region, which borders Turkey. The SAA report taking the town of Kellaz near Latakia as well .

ISIS captured the “Panorama” barrier in Deiz ez-Zor , while an attempted car bomb detonation by the same group on the Dudiyan front, in northern Aleppo, was foiled by militants from Faylaq al-Sham.

Towards the evening, an IED placed near the home of journalist Hadi Abdallah and his cameraman Khalid Alissa detonated, reportedly injuring both men . Meanwhile, an aid convoy reached al-Waer delivering international aid to the stricken area outside of Homs.

In the early hours of June 17, 2016 the Russian Air Force attacked a key Jabhat al-Nusra ammunition depot in norther Aleppo, destroying it completely. The depot was adjacent to a command-and-control center in the village of Babis.

Pro-government forces, supported by Russian warplanes, retook more ground at the Syrian-Turkish border in the northern part of Latakia province. By June 17, the loyalists have liberated the villages of al-Shahrourah, Ain Issa and Hasam, the Tal al-Hayat hill, 3 high points (502, 559 and 469). Clashes are ongoing in the al-Rowaisi mountains.

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 A proposed law in Brazil would replace the word “pesticide” on food labels with “plant health protection.”

Around 70 percent of food consumed by Brazilians is contaminated by agrochemicals, researcher Karen Friederich of the Brazilian Association of Collective Health said Thursday.

Friederich delivered the findings of her research during a lecture at the Health Movement Forum, revealing that Brazilians consume nearly 7.5 liters of agropesticides per year—the highest per capita consumption rate in the world.

She went on to point out that at least one-third of agrochemicals used in the Brazil have been banned in the European Union and the United States due to their impacts on human health and the environment.

A worker sprays chemicals at a farm in Brazil’s Ceara state. The WHO released a report recently which found that Monsanto chemicals “probably cause cancer.” | Photo: Reuters

“The cases of contamination are not well documented, but they affect a large portion of the population, generating reproductive changes, birth defects and effects on the immune system,” Friederich stated.

Her comments come after the World Health Organization, WHO, released a report last year finding that glyphosate, a key ingredient used in many herbicides and pesticides, “probably causes cancer.”

Since 2007, when Brazil’s Health Ministry began keeping records, the number of reported cases of human intoxication by pesticides has more than doubled, from 2,178 that year to 4,537 in 2013.

Meanwhile, the annual number of deaths linked to pesticide poisoning climbed from 132 to 206. Public health specialists say the actual figures are higher because tracking is incomplete.

While speaking at the conference on Thursday, professor and scientist Leonardo Melgarejo argued that efforts to curb the use of agro-chemicals have been undermined by Brazilian lawmakers who support the interests of powerful agriculture lobby groups.

The Brazilian Congress is currently reviewing a bill that would replace the word “pesticide” with “plant health protection” on package labels, which Melgarejo argued “would increase the risks regarding the use of these substances.”

In 2014, Brazilian health agency ANVISA, which is in charge of evaluating pesticide residues in food, found that of 1,665 samples collected, ranging from rice to apples to peppers, 29 percent showed residues that either exceeded allowed levels or contained unapproved chemicals.

A newly-released Hilary Clinton email confirmed that the Obama administration has deliberately provoked the civil war in Syria as the “best way to help Israel.”

Clinton also wrote that it was the “right thing” to personally threaten Bashar Assad’s family with death.

In the email, released by Wikileaks, then Secretary of State Clinton says that the “best way to help Israel” is to “use force” in Syria to overthrow the government.

The document was one of many unclassified by the US Department of State under case number F-2014-20439, Doc No. C05794498, following the uproar over Clinton’s private email server kept at her house while she served as Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013.

Although the Wikileaks transcript dates the email as December 31, 2000, this is an error on their part, as the contents of the email (in particular the reference to May 2012 talks between Iran and the west over its nuclear program in Istanbul) show that the email was in fact sent on December 31, 2012.

The email makes it clear that it has been US policy from the very beginning to violently overthrow the Syrian government—and specifically to do this because it is in Israel’s interests.

“The best way to help Israel deal with Iran’s growing nuclear capability is to help the people of Syria overthrow the regime of Bashar Assad,” Clinton forthrightly starts off by saying.

Even though all US intelligence reports had long dismissed Iran’s “atom bomb” program as a hoax (a conclusion supported by the International Atomic Energy Agency), Clinton continues to use these lies to “justify” destroying Syria in the name of Israel.

She specifically links Iran’s mythical atom bomb program to Syria because, she says, Iran’s “atom bomb” program threatens Israel’s “monopoly” on nuclear weapons in the Middle East.

If Iran were to acquire a nuclear weapon, Clinton asserts, this would allow Syria (and other “adversaries of Israel” such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt) to “go nuclear as well,” all of which would threaten Israel’s interests.

Therefore, Clinton, says, Syria has to be destroyed.

It is, Clinton continues, the “strategic relationship between Iran and the regime of Bashar Assad in Syria” that makes it possible for Iran to undermine Israel’s security.

This would not come about through a “direct attack,” Clinton admits, because “in the thirty years of hostility between Iran and Israel” this has never occurred, but through its alleged “proxies.”

Clinton goes on to asset that directly threatening Bashar Assad “and his family” with violence is the “right thing” to do:

The email proves—as if any more proof was needed—that the US government has been the main sponsor of the growth of terrorism in the Middle East, and all in order to “protect” Israel.

It is also a sobering thought to consider that the “refugee” crisis which currently threatens to destroy Europe, was directly sparked off by this US government action as well, insofar as there are any genuine refugees fleeing the civil war in Syria.

In addition, over 250,000 people have been killed in the Syrian conflict, which has spread to Iraq—all thanks to Clinton and the Obama administration backing the “rebels” and stoking the fires of war in Syria.

The real and disturbing possibility that a psychopath like Clinton—whose policy has inflicted death and misery upon millions of people—could become the next president of America is the most deeply shocking thought of all.

Clinton’s public assertion that, if elected president, she would “take the relationship with Israel to the next level,” would definitively mark her, and Israel, as the enemy of not just some Arab states in the Middle East, but of all peace-loving people on earth.

Decoding the Orlando Shooting, Cui Bono? Who Benefits?

By Mark Taliano, June 17 2016

The shooting in Orlando, Florida, is not about homosexuals, or Muslims, or assault rifles. It is about waging aggressive warfare overseas, empowering the domestic police state, and electing a warmongering President. Dr. Graeme McQueen, founding member of the Centre for…

Orlando Killer Omar Mateen Harbored by G4S, the World’s Largest Private Security Company

By Peter Phillips, June 15 2016

The Orlando mass murderer, Omar Mateen, worked for G4S, one of the largest private security employers in the world. G4S has some 625,000 employees spanning five continents in more than 120 countries.

Global Warfare: Is US-NATO Going to Attack Russia?

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky and Bonnie Faulkner, June 16 2016

image: Prof. Michel Chossudovsky The world is at a dangerous crossroads.  “The United States and its allies have launched a military adventure which threatens the future of humanity. Major military and covert intelligence operations are being undertaken simultaneously in the…

UK – The European Union Referendum and the Parliamentary Dirty Tricks Brigade

By Felicity Arbuthnot, June 15 2016

The referendum on whether the Britain leaves or stays in the European Union is just 8 days away. A glossy leaflet dropped through my letterbox headed: “Vote Leave – The European Union and Your Family: The Facts.”

Is Trump a New Kind of Fascist?

By Sam Ben-Meir, June 17 2016

Donald Trump’s obscene demagoguery; his contemptuous regard for the first amendment, his desire to expand the authorities of the presidency (the awesome power of which has never been equal to what it is now), his belligerent and threatening attitude towards…

Clinton’s National Security Strategy: Military Escalation with Hillary

By Stephen Lendman, June 16 2016

Her record speaks for itself, publicly supporting all US wars of choice, aggression against nonbelligerent states, responsible for mass slaughter, destruction and appalling human misery.  Don’t let her deceptive rhetoric fool you. Urging escalated war on ISIS ignores its US…

Author’s Note

The US has already special forces inside Syria. Their “official” mandate under the “Global War on Terrorism” is to confront the ISIS which happens to be supported by Turkey, Saudi Arabia in laison with Washington.

The deployment of US ground forces inside Syria is now contemplated against Syrian government forces following an initiative of US State Department officials.

Some 51 State Department “diplomats” signed a memo distributed through the official “dissent channel,” seeking military strikes against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad whose forces have been leading the pushback against Islamist extremists who are seeking control of this important Mideast nation. (Robert Parry, Consortium News, June 17, 2016) 

The agenda is no longer to confront the ISIS under a bogus counterterrorism mandate. Quite the opposite. It consists in coming to the rescue of al Qaeda affiliated opposition forces (Moderate Terrorists) who are being decimated by Syrian government forces with the support of Russia, Iran and Hezbollah.

Were US-NATO troops to be deployed in an outright invasion, the West’s coalition forces would not only be fighting Syrian government forces, they would also be  clashing with Iranian and Russian forces, which in turn could lead the World into a broader war scenario.

The following article was first published by Global Research in early May, 2016.

Michel Chossudovsky, June 18, 2016

*       *       *

US-NATO is not prepared to let go in Syria.

While the US sponsored Al Qaeda and ISIS rebels have largely been defeated, with the support of Russia, Iran and Hezbollah, the Obama administration is now intent upon replenishing so to speak its “moderate opposition” brigades inside Syria with a new influx of jihadist fighters. 

Following the decimation of Daesh-al Nusrah positions throughout the country,  thousands of Islamic militants have fled amidst the outflow of refugees. 

The Western military alliance has responded to this defeat of “moderate” rebel positions by replenishing its proxy army, –ie. recruiting and training a new horde of mercenaries and jihadists with the support of  Turkey, Israel and Saudi Arabia.

In this regard, the ongoing Battle for Aleppo is absolutely crucial. “Thousands of terrorists” were reported to have crossed the Turkey-Syria border in early May. No doubt, they will be deployed against government forces in Aleppo:

” Syrian Prime Minister Wael Nader al-Halqi also warned that more than 5,000 fresh militants crossed the border into the Northwestern provinces of Aleppo and Idlib from Turkey, stressing that the ceasefire agreement was being violated by certain parties.”

In October 2015, the Obama administration confirmed that the deployment of US Special Forces would “involve fewer than 50 Special Operations advisers, who will work with resistance forces battling the Islamic State in northern Syria but will not engage in direct combat” (WP, October 30, 2015)

In recent developments, however, Washington confirmed that another 250 special forces were to be deployed. This took place in April alongside the influx of thousands of new rebel recruits.

250 US Special Forces? These official numbers are meaningless. They do not include those sent in by Britain and France. Moreover, among the new 5000 jihadists who have entered Syria, a large number are in fact highly trained mercenaries (recruited by private companies on contract to US-NATO) operating within rebel ranks. It is worth recalling that last August  Britain’s Sunday Express confirmed that British “SAS dress as ISIS fighters in undercover war on jihadis,” 

“More than 120 members belonging to the elite regiment are currently in the war-torn country” covertly “dressed in black and flying ISIS flags,”

The influx of jihadists coupled with the deployment of US and allied special forces was carefully coordinated. The US special forces will integrate the ranks of  the newly deployed Al Qaeda brigades in Northern Syria which will replace those which were defeated by SAA forces and their allies.

Of strategic significance, the influx of special forces and new jihadist troops is changing the composition and identity of  “Syrian opposition” combat forces, most of which are now made up of foreign fighters, including a significantly larger contingent of US-NATO military personnel.

When does a “civil war” become an “invasion”?  The fiction of a civil war and “opposition forces” can no longer be sustained when a large number of those forces are US and allied troops operating within Syria.

Sofar, officially it’s a “counterterrorism operation” but there are no terrorists to fight because they have been defeated by SAA forces. Hence the new influx of terrorists.

A Proxy War against Russia? 

The strategy now appears to be evolving towards US-NATO boots on the ground: a war theater with the deployment of special forces and eventually regular ground troops in larger numbers, with the danger that Western forces could enter into  direct confrontation with Russian as well as Iranian forces and military advisers.

In October, US officials accused Russia of aggression directed against US forces inside Syria:

‘Putin is deliberately targeting our forces. Our guys are fighting for their lives.’

Moscow is “deliberately targeting” U.S.-backed forces in Syria as part of a military campaign that has killed up to 150 CIA-trained rebels, a U.S. official told Fox News

The claims state that Russia’s apparent mission to destroy ISIS is really a facade, and that their real mission is to kill American assets. (Fox New  14, 2015).

The “Our Guys” category (“fighting for their lives”) not only includes bona fide “moderate terrorists” trained by the Western military alliance, it also includes an increasingly large number of  Western military advisers, intelligence agents and mercenaries deployed inside Syria.

The increased influx of foreign forces into Syria leads towards a scenario of escalation and confrontation with Russia.

The Syrian Arab Army (SAA), supported by the Russian Aerospace Forces, has been repelling advances of the Al Nusra Front terrorist group and its allies in southern Aleppo. Jeish al-Fatah, Al-Nusra and some Turkoman units launched an offensive in the direction of the villages of Zaytoun and al-Khalasa and clashes with SAA troops near al-Zarbeh. The joint militant forces have not been able to breach the SAA’s defense lines, yet. Accoring to pro-government sources, up to 70 militants, including an Al-Nusra commander, Ammar al-Khaled, have been killed in the clashes since yesterday.

Russian warplanes conducted air strikes against ISIS militants near the besieged city of Deir Ezzor and the nearby areas: al-Baghaliyah, the Thurdah mountai, the Al-Rashdiyah district and the Al-Ummal neighbourhood. In a separate development, Russian aircraft has dropped 18 tons of UN humanitarian cargos – food products and grains – on Deir Ezzor.

SAA units, supported by Russian warplanes, have been clashing with ISIS militants on the way to Tabaqa military airport in western Raqqa. 37 SAA soldiers and more than 100 ISIS militants have been killed in action since the SAA launched the advance in the direction of Raqqa.

The US-led coalition said in a press statement on Wednesday that on June 13, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), mostly Kurdish YPG units, completed the first phase of the operation to free Manbij, dividing ISIS forces in the provinces of Raqqa and Aleppo. The coalition air power has reportedly conducted some 190 airstrikes near Manbij since the start of the operation. Now, the second phase to liberate the city will start. The Pentagon believes that the Arab part of the SDF, doubbed “Syrian Arab Coalition”, will play a crucial role in the operation.

Sniper fire by ISIS militants has killed a senior Iraqi commander near the city of Mosul in the province of Nineveh, Iraq’s Defense Ministry said late Tuesday. Brig. Ahmed Badr al-Luhaibi was the commander of Brigade 71st of Division 15 of the Iraqi Army. Recently, Iraqi forces have liberated the villages of Hajj Ali and Khirbat Shammām in the area. US Apache helicopter gunships have supported the recent advane of the Iraqi military.

More than 50 U.S. State Department “diplomats” sent a “dissent” memo urging President Obama to launch military strikes against the Syrian army, another sign that Foggy Bottom has collectively gone nuts, writes Robert Parry.

Over the past several decades, the U.S. State Department has deteriorated from a reasonably professional home for diplomacy and realism into a den of armchair warriors possessed of imperial delusions, a dangerous phenomenon underscored by the recent mass“dissent” in favor of blowing up more people in Syria.

Some 51 State Department “diplomats” signed a memo distributed through the official “dissent channel,” seeking military strikes against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad whose forces have been leading the pushback against Islamist extremists who are seeking control of this important Mideast nation.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testifies before Congress on Jan. 23, 2013, about the fatal attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11. 2012. (Photo from C-SPAN coverage)

The fact that such a large contingent of State Department officials would openly advocate for an expanded aggressive war in line with the neoconservative agenda, which put Syria on a hit list some two decades ago, reveals how crazy the State Department has become.

The State Department now seems to be a combination of true-believing neocons along with their liberal-interventionist followers and some careerists who realize that the smart play is to behave toward the world as global proconsuls dictating solutions or seeking “regime change” rather than as diplomats engaging foreigners respectfully and seeking genuine compromise.

Even some State Department officials, whom I personally know and who are not neocons/liberal-hawks per se, act as if they have fully swallowed the Kool-Aid. They talk tough and behave arrogantly toward inhabitants of countries under their supervision. Foreigners are treated as mindless objects to be coerced or bribed.

So, it’s not entirely surprising that several dozen U.S. “diplomats” would attack President Barack Obama’s more temperate position on Syria while positioning themselves favorably in anticipation of a Hillary Clinton administration, which is expected to authorize an illegal invasion of Syria — under the guise of establishing “no-fly zones” and “safe zones” — which will mean the slaughter of young Syrian soldiers. The “diplomats” urge the use of “stand-off and air weapons.”

These hawks are so eager for more war that they don’t mind risking a direct conflict with Russia, breezily dismissing the possibility of a clash with the nuclear power by saying they are not “advocating for a slippery slope that ends in a military confrontation with Russia.” That’s reassuring to hear.

Risking a Jihadist Victory

There’s also the danger that a direct U.S. military intervention could collapse the Syrian army and clear the way for victory by Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front or the Islamic State. The memo did not make clear how the delicate calibration of doing just enough damage to Syria’s military while avoiding an outright jihadist victory and averting a clash with Russia would be accomplished.

Video of the Russian SU-24 exploding in flames inside Syrian territory after it was shot down by Turkish air-to-air missiles on Nov. 24, 2015.

Presumably, whatever messes are created, the U.S. military would be left to clean up, assuming that shooting down some Russian warplanes and killing Russian military personnel wouldn’t escalate into a full-scale thermonuclear conflagration.

In short, it appears that the State Department has become a collective insane asylum where the inmates are in control. But this madness isn’t some short-term aberration that can be easily reversed. It has been a long time coming and would require a root-to-branch ripping out of today’s “diplomatic” corps to restore the State Department to its traditional role of avoiding wars rather than demanding them.

Though there have always been crazies in the State Department – usually found in the senior political ranks – the phenomenon of an institutional insanity has only evolved over the past several decades. And I have seen the change.

I have covered U.S. foreign policy since the late 1970s when there was appreciably more sanity in the diplomatic corps. There were people like Robert White and Patricia Derian (both now deceased) who stood up for justice and human rights, representing the best of America.

But the descent of the U.S. State Department into little more than well-dressed, well-spoken but thuggish enforcers of U.S. hegemony began with the Reagan administration. President Ronald Reagan and his team possessed a pathological hatred of Central American social movements seeking freedom from oppressive oligarchies and their brutal security forces.

During the 1980s, American diplomats with integrity were systematically marginalized, hounded or removed. (Human rights coordinator Derian left at the end of the Carter administration and was replaced by neocon Elliott Abrams; White was fired as U.S. ambassador to El Salvador, explaining: “I refused a demand by the secretary of state, Alexander M. Haig Jr., that I use official channels to cover up the Salvadoran military’s responsibility for the murders of four American churchwomen.”)

The Neocons Rise

As the old-guard professionals left, a new breed of aggressive neoconservatives was brought in, the likes of Paul Wolfowitz, Robert McFarlane, Robert Kagan and Abrams. After eight years of Reagan and four years of George H.W. Bush, the State Department was reshaped into a home for neocons, but some pockets of professionalism survived the onslaughts.

Former Assistant Secretary of State Elliott Abrams, a leading neocon.

While one might have expected the Democrats of the Clinton administration to reverse those trends, they didn’t. Instead, Bill Clinton’s “triangulation” applied to U.S. foreign policy as much as to domestic programs. He was always searching for that politically safe “middle.”

As the 1990s wore on, the decimation of foreign policy experts in the mold of White and Derian left few on the Democratic side who had the courage or skills to challenge the deeply entrenched neocons. Many Clinton-era Democrats accommodated to the neocon dominance by reinventing themselves as “liberal interventionists,” sharing the neocons’ love for military force but justifying the killing on “humanitarian” grounds.

This approach was a way for “liberals” to protect themselves against right-wing charges that they were “weak,” a charge that had scarred Democrats deeply during the Reagan/Bush-41 years, but this Democratic “tough-guy/gal-ism” further sidelined serious diplomats favoring traditional give-and-take with foreign leaders and their people.

So, you had Democrats like then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations (and later Secretary of State) Madeleine Albright justifying Bill Clinton’s brutal sanctions policies toward Iraq, which the U.N. blamed for killing 500,000 Iraqi children, as “a very hard choice, but the price – we think the price is worth it.”

Bill Clinton’s eight years of “triangulation,” which included the brutal air war against Serbia, was followed by eight years of George W. Bush, which further ensconced the neocons as the U.S. foreign policy establishment.

By then, what was left of the old Republican “realists,” the likes of Henry Kissinger and Brent Scowcroft, was aging out or had been so thoroughly compromised that the neocons faced no significant opposition within Republican circles. And, Official Washington’s foreign-policy Democrats had become almost indistinguishable from the neocons, except for their use of “humanitarian” arguments to justify aggressive wars.

Media Capitulation

Before George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq, much of the “liberal” media establishment – from The New York Times to The New Yorker – fell in line behind the war, asking few tough questions and presenting almost no obstacles. Favoring war had become the “safe” career play.

At the start of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, President George W. Bush ordered the U.S. military to conduct a devastating aerial assault on Baghdad, known as “shock and awe.”

At the start of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, President George W. Bush ordered the U.S. military to conduct a devastating aerial assault on Baghdad, known as “shock and awe.”

But a nascent anti-war movement among rank-and-file Democrats did emerge, propelling Barack Obama, an anti-Iraq War Democrat, to the 2008 presidential nomination over Iraq War supporter Hillary Clinton. But those peaceful sentiments among the Democratic “base” did not reach very deeply into the ranks of Democratic foreign policy mavens.

So, when Obama entered the White House, he faced a difficult challenge. The State Department needed a thorough purging of the neocons and the liberal hawks, but there were few Democratic foreign policy experts who hadn’t sold out to the neocons. An entire generation of Democratic policy-makers had been raised in the world of neocon-dominated conferences, meetings, op-eds and think tanks, where tough talk made you sound good while talk of traditional diplomacy made you sound soft.

By contrast, more of the U.S. military and even the CIA favored less belligerent approaches to the world, in part, because they had actually fought Bush’s hopeless “global war on terror.” But Bush’s hand-picked, neocon-oriented high command – the likes of General David Petraeus – remained in place and favored expanded wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

Obama then made one of the most fateful decisions of his presidency. Instead of cleaning house at State and at the Pentagon, he listened to some advisers who came up with the clever P.R. theme “Team of Rivals” – a reference to Abraham Lincoln’s first Civil War cabinet – and Obama kept in place Bush’s military leadership, including Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense, and reached out to hawkish Sen. Hillary Clinton to be his Secretary of State.

In other words, Obama not only didn’t take control of the foreign-policy apparatus, he strengthened the power of the neocons and liberal hawks. He then let this powerful bloc of Clinton-Gates-Petraeus steer him into a foolhardy counterinsurgency “surge” in Afghanistan that did little more than get 1,000 more U.S. soldiers killed along with many more Afghans.

Obama also let Clinton sabotage his attempted outreach to Iran in 2010 seeking constraints on its nuclear program and he succumbed to her pressure in 2011 to invade Libya under the false pretense of establishing a “no-fly zone” to protect civilians, what became a “regime change” disaster that Obama has ranked as his biggest foreign policy mistake.

The Syrian Conflict

Obama did resist Secretary Clinton’s calls for another military intervention in Syria although he authorized some limited military support to the allegedly “moderate” rebels and allowed Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to do much more in supporting jihadists connected to Al Qaeda and even the Islamic State.

Syrian women and children refugees at Budapest railway station. (Photo from Wikipedia)

Under Secretary Clinton, the neocon/liberal-hawk bloc consolidated its control of the State Department diplomatic corps. Under neocon domination, the State Department moved from one “group think” to the next. Having learned nothing from the Iraq War, the conformity continued to apply toward Libya, Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Russia, China, Venezuela, etc.

Everywhere the goal was same: to impose U.S. hegemony, to force the locals to bow to American dictates, to steer them into neo-liberal “free market” solutions which were often equated with “democracy” even if most of the people of the affected countries disagreed.

Double-talk and double-think replaced reality-driven policies. “Strategic communications,” i.e., the aggressive use of propaganda to advance U.S. interests, was one watchword. “Smart power,” i.e., the application of financial sanctions, threats of arrests, limited military strikes and other forms of intimidation, was another.

Every propaganda opportunity, such as the Syrian sarin attack in 2013 or the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 shoot-down over eastern Ukraine, was exploited to the hilt to throw adversaries on the defensive even if U.S. intelligence analysts doubted that evidence supported the accusations.

Lying at the highest levels of the U.S. government – but especially among the State Department’s senior officials – became epidemic. Perhaps even worse, U.S. “diplomats” seemed to believe their own propaganda.

Meanwhile, the mainstream U.S. news media experienced a similar drift into the gravity pull of neocon dominance and professional careerism, eliminating major news outlets as any kind of check on official falsehoods.

The Up-and-Comers

The new State Department star – expected to receive a high-level appointment from President Clinton-45 – is neocon Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland, who orchestrated the 2014 putsch in Ukraine, toppling an elected, Russia-friendly president and replacing him with a hard-line Ukrainian nationalist regime that then launched violent military attacks against ethnic Russians in the east who resisted the coup leadership.

Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland, who pushed for the Ukraine coup and helped pick the post-coup leaders.

When Russia came to the assistance of these embattled Ukrainian citizens, including agreeing to Crimea’s request to rejoin Russia, the State Department and U.S. mass media spoke as one in decrying a “Russian invasion” and supporting NATO military maneuvers on Russia’s borders to deter “Russian aggression.”

Anyone who dares question this latest “group think” – as it plunges the world into a dangerous new Cold War – is dismissed as a “Kremlin apologist” or “Moscow stooge” just as skeptics about the Iraq War were derided as “Saddam apologists.” Virtually everyone important in Official Washington marches in lock step toward war and more war. (Victoria Nuland is married to Robert Kagan, making them one of Washington’s supreme power couples.)

So, that is the context of the latest State Department rebellion against Obama’s more tempered policies on Syria. Looking forward to a likely Hillary Clinton administration, these 51 “diplomats” have signed their name to a “dissent” that advocates bombing the Syrian military to protect Syria’s “moderate” rebels who – to the degree they even exist – fight mostly under the umbrella of Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front and its close ally, Ahrar al Sham.

The muddled thinking in this “dissent” is that by bombing the Syrian military, the U.S. government can enhance the power of the rebels and supposedly force Assad to negotiate his own removal. But there is no reason to think that this plan would work.

In early 2014, when the rebels held a relatively strong position, U.S.-arranged peace talks amounted to a rebel-dominated conference that made Assad’s departure a pre-condition and excluded Syria’s Iranian allies from attending. Not surprisingly, Assad’s representative went home and the talks collapsed.

Now, with Assad holding a relatively strong hand, backed by Russian air power and Iranian ground forces, the “dissenting” U.S. diplomats say peace is impossible because the rebels are in no position to compel Assad’s departure. Thus, the “dissenters” recommend that the U.S. expand its role in the war to again lift the rebels, but that would only mean more maximalist demands from the rebels.

Serious Risks

This proposed wider war, however, would carry some very serious risks, including the possibility that the Syrian army could collapse, opening the gates of Damascus to Al Qaeda’s Nusra Front (and its allies) or the Islamic State – a scenario that, as The New York Times noted, the “memo doesn’t address.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin greets Secretary of State John Kerry before meetings at the Kremlin on Dec. 15, 2015. (State Department photo)

Currently, the Islamic State and – to a lesser degree – the Nusra Front are in retreat, chased by the Syrian army with Russian air support and by some Kurdish forces with U.S. backing. But those gains could easily be reversed. There is also the risk of sparking a wider war with Iran and/or Russia.

But such cavalier waving aside of grave dangers is nothing new for the neocons and liberal hawks. They have consistently dreamt up schemes that may sound good at a think-tank conference or read well in an op-ed article, but fail in the face of ground truth where usually U.S. soldiers are expected to fix the mess.

We have seen this wishful thinking go awry in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Ukraine and even Syria, where Obama’s acquiescence to provide arms and training for the so-called “unicorns” – the hard-to-detect “moderate” rebels – saw those combatants and their weapons absorbed into Al Qaeda’s or Islamic State’s ranks.

Yet, the neocons and liberal hawks who control the State Department – and are eagerly looking forward to a Hillary Clinton presidency – will never stop coming up with these crazy notions until a concerted effort is made to assess accountability for all the failures that that they have inflicted on U.S. foreign policy.

As long as there is no accountability – as long as the U.S. president won’t rein in these warmongers – the madness will continue and only grow more dangerous.

[For more on this topic, see Consortiumnews.com’s “Democrats Are Now the Aggressive War Party” and “Would a Clinton Win Mean More Wars?’]

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon andbarnesandnoble.com).

The following statement was presented by Arabian Rights Watch Association to the UNHRC [UN Human Rights Commission] during their 32nd session.  In this statement US-Yemeni lawyer, Mohammed Al Wazir outlines the ongoing human rights violations being carried out by the US and UK armed Saudi coalition whose collective punishment of 27 million Yemeni people is being cynically endorsed by the UN via their resolution 2216 that is being imposed under the false pretext of the legitimacy of the fugitive, twice resigned ex President Mansour Hadi. 

The UN complicity with the Saudi Coalition genocidal war of aggression is explored in this 21st Century Wire article: UN Whitewashing Saudi Coalition War Crimes and International Human Rights Violations.  (Vanessa Beeley, 21st Century Wire)

Saudi Coalition Airstrikes & Blockade Against the People of Yemen Cause a Humanitarian Disaster

IDO, together with Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain, and Arabian Rights Watch Association, express our utmost concern over the Saudi Arabian led Coalition’s (the “Coalition”) a) ongoing serious and systematic rights violations in Yemen, including political, economic, human, and humanitarian rights. These ongoing and systematic violations come in the form of: i) a comprehensive indiscriminate land, air, and sea blockade under the pretense of UN Security Council Resolutions 2140 and 2216 and ii) airstrikes on civilian targets that include the use of internationally banned cluster munitions. We also express our deep concern with the Saudi-led Coalition’s iii) forced expulsion of Yemenis from Aden to Taiz and other northern provinces as well as the iv) lack of neutrality, authority, or political will of Hadi’s National Commission to investigate crimes committed in Yemen.

a) Ongoing Violations of the Laws of War, Human Rights Law & Humanitarian Law

i) Imposition of a comprehensive land, air and sea blockade by the Saudi-led Coalition

The Saudi-led Coalition’s implementation of Resolutions 2140 and 2216 has contributed to food insecurity for an estimated 14.4 million Yemenis, 7.4 million of whom are severely food insecure. Moreover, hundreds of hospitals and clinics have shut down due to the Saudi-led Coalition’s airstrikes and blockade. The blocking of critical fuel and medical supplies effectively denies an estimated 15 million Yemeni people access to basic healthcare needs.

Allowing the free flow of commercial imports and facilitating their distribution to all locations are essential in stemming further increases in humanitarian needs. According to the 2016 Humanitarian Needs Overview, since the crisis began, the Coalition’s blockade – as well as damage to port infrastructure due to air strikes – have added to the humanitarian burden by preventing or discouraging commercial imports into the country:

Over 90 per cent of staple food (such as cereals) in Yemen was imported prior to the crisis, and the country was using an estimated 544,000 metric tons of fuel per month before the crisis. Fuel is essential to distribute food, pump water and run hospital generators, among other critical activities. In September, OCHA estimated that commercial fuel imports fell to just 1 per cent of monthly requirements, and food imports hit their second-lowest level since the crisis began. These restrictions constitute a major driver of shortages and rising prices of basic commodities, which have in turn contributed to crippling the economy. Health facilities continue to close at alarming rates due to shortages of fuel and other basic supplies. Without critical commodities, needs across sectors are rising, and response efforts are being hampered.

According to Ahmed Alshami, the Executive Director at Arabian Rights Watch Association, the mechanism used during the past 14 months to search ships for weapons has been abused to block commercial goods and humanitarian aid. Ships are stopped by the Saudi Coalition, delayed from entry for days, weeks or months at a time under the pretext of ongoing weapons searches before being allowed to continue. Some sources report extortion is also used to restrict shipping into Yemen. Some ships are simply denied entry altogether.

We further call attention to the text of the UNSC Resolutions which involve an arms embargo, asset freeze and travel ban on 5 named individuals. These UNSC resolutions do not sanction war, nor do they enact a comprehensive land, air, and sea blockade to police and sanction regular trade, both import and export, in commercial goods, including food, medical and fuel supplies, and humanitarian aid.

We appreciate the efforts announced by the UN Secretary-General to institute a United Nations Verification and Inspection Mechanism (UNVIM) for the facilitation of commercial imports to 3 out of the 5 main ports in Yemen however express concern at the level of awareness regarding the new program. Given the website and forms are still only offered in English, we recommend translating the website and hosted documents into Arabic and launching a corresponding awareness campaign to increase registration participation and compliance.

ii) Airstrikes on civilian targets that include the use of internationally banned cluster munitions

According to the Legal Center for Rights and Development, in the first 12 months of the war, a total of 9136 civilians were documented to have been killed by Saudi-led Coalition airstrikes. 5,271 were men (58%), 1,654 were women (18%), and 2,211 were children (24%). The total number of civilians wounded due to the indiscriminate airstrikes exceeds 16,000. 622 bridges and roads were destroyed along with 135 power plants, 188 water stations, 195 telecom stations, 14 airports, 11 sea ports and harbors, 325,000 residential homes, 250 hospitals and clinics, 43 colleges and universities, 630 schools and causing 3,750 others to close down.

In addition to the indiscriminate use of air power to attack civilian populations, the Saudi-led coalition has also been documented to have used internationally banned cluster munitions on civilian populations in violation of the principles of distinction, proportionality, and military necessity. According to many local and international NGOs, young children have been killed and maimed by unexploded toy-like sub-munitions that can detonate upon touch. A 10 day research trip to Saada, Hajjah and Sanaa by Amnesty International revealed that US, UK, and Brazilian cluster munitions were used by the Saudi Coalition resulting in the death or injury of 16 civilians including nine children, two of whom were killed. According to the report, these casualties took place days, weeks, and sometimes months after the bombs were dropped by coalition forces in Yemen.

iii) Forced Expulsion of Yemenis from Aden by Saudi led Coalition and Hadi government-in-exile

We further raise our continued concern with the Coalition and the Hadi government-in-exile’s ongoing rights violations in Yemen. Particularly, the measure by the government-appointed security forces to expel from Aden over 800 Yemenis with links to the Taiz governorate. This policy is worrisome as it employs discrimination and provincial bigotry threatening the right to life, employment and mobility for thousands of Yemenis. The expulsion which was ordered at the behest of security officers appointed by the Hadi government-in-exile without his express order indicates his lack of control in Aden and raises further questions about his government’s legitimacy. Despite the Hadi government-in-exile’s subsequent disapproval of the expulsion of Yemenis from Aden, it has not managed to end the policy nor remedy those affected. Instead we remain concerned that hundreds more Yemenis are threatened by expulsion to northern governorates.

iv) Inability of Hadi’s national commission to investigate the crimes being committed in Yemen

In the 31st Session of the Human Rights Council, Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Kate Gilmore, reported that over 55% of the casualties in Yemen were due to Coalition airstrikes and demanded the beginning of investigations. In response, the Hadi government-in-exile appointed Minister of Human Rights, Izz Aldin Alasbahi, requested a review of the statements made by OHCHR regarding the casualties that occurred in Yemen, disputing the impartiality and accuracy of the Deputy High Commissioner’s assessment. This posture will not lend itself to an impartial investigation into the crimes committed in Yemen.

Taken together, the airstrikes and blockade are measures deliberately inflicted on the whole of the Yemeni people that create conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction, the extent of which appear to constitute crimes against humanity and war crimes. As a belligerent in this multifaceted conflict, neither the National Commission, nor the Saudi Coalition may be reasonably expected to impartially investigate its own role in such crimes. Only through the establishment of an independent, international commission with a mandate to document abuses on all sides, and make impartial recommendations to the UN Security Council for referral to the International Criminal Court, can true accountability be accomplished.

Recommendation

At the 32nd Session of the Human Rights Council, IDO together with Americans for Democracy & Human Rights in Bahrain, and Arabian Rights Watch Association, urge UN Member States to renew their calls to:

• Call for an end to the war in Yemen, including the ongoing airstrikes and blockade, and the full withdrawal of all foreign forces from the territory of Yemen;
• Establish an independent international commission of inquiry into the crimes being committed by all parties to the war in Yemen, with a mandate to make recommendations to the UN Security Council to transfer cases to International Criminal Court.
• Extend the arms embargo to include members of the Saudi-led Coalition for their role in perpetuating violations of humanitarian law and the laws of war in Yemen;
• Facilitate humanitarian access to all areas in need of assistance;
• Provide support to Yemen in its struggle to combat violent extremism; and
• Facilitate Yemeni to Yemeni dialogue without the intervention of regional powers.

A previous article discussed dozens of unnamed State Department staffers urging “targeted military strikes” on Assad’s government – signing an internal memo posted on the agency’s dissent channel.

Obama already is at war to transform Syria into another US vassal state, using ISIS and other imported terrorist groups as imperial foot soldiers – supplemented by air strikes on infrastructure and government targets, along with US, UK, French and now German special forces on the ground, aiding the scourge their political leaders claim to oppose.

The State Department acknowledged the internal memo without comment. It’s more evidence of neocons infesting Washington, in this case the agency most responsible for US foreign policy.

It’s unclear if notorious hawk Victoria Nuland was one of the memo’s signatories. She’s militantly anti-Assad – earlier turning truth on its head, calling him “evil…inhumane,” unfit to rule, adding:

He certainly should leave power. He is beyond brutal. It is inhumane what he has done to his own people.

I don’t think anybody who has is guilty of the kinds of crimes against your own people…can be considered rational by any human sense of the word.

When Washington wants a sovereign leader toppled, politicized demonization precedes more forceful action.

Assad is overwhelmingly popular, reelected in June 2014, a process independent observers called open, free and fair. Syrians want no one else leading them. They alone have the right to choose, free from foreign meddling.

International law is clear. No nation may interfere in the internal affairs of others except in self-defense. Russia is legally aiding Syria combat US-supported terrorists at the behest of its government.

US military action flagrantly breaches international laws, norms and standards. Neocon State Department staffers want things escalated, Assad forcefully ousted, pro-Western puppet rule replacing him.

On Wednesday, John Kerry hinted at possible more robust US action, saying “Russia needs to understand that our patience is not infinite. (It’s) very limited now with respect to whether or not Assad is going to be held accountable.”

The United States is not going to sit there and be used as an instrument that permits a so-called ceasefire to be in place while one principal party is trying to take advantage of it to the detriment of the entire process. We’re not going to allow that to continue.

Fact: Assad is responsibly defending his nation and people against US-supported terrorist invaders.

Fact: They’re virtually entirely responsible for ceasefire violations.

With half a year left before stepping down, Obama is unlikely to undertake a major policy shift on Syria. At the same time, US war on its sovereignty won’t end with a new administration. As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton orchestrated it. She’ll likely escalate it if elected in November.

Trump showed he’s hawkish, earlier saying “I’m gonna build a military that’s gonna be much stronger than it is right now. It’s gonna be so strong, nobody’s gonna mess with us” – implying heavy-handed saber rattling, likely freely using it.

Dozens of State Department staffers wanting US military strikes on Assad’s government is more evidence of America’s rage for war, neocons infesting Washington exerting influence on policy, disregard for rule of law principles, and likelihood of extremist/lawless governance continuing no matter who succeeds Obama.

Escalating war on Syria heightens the danger of direct confrontation with Russia, risking the possibility of extinguishing life on earth.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected].

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: 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.

I was crossing the airstrip to a small aircraft that would take me to Nepal’s interior. We had left the disarray of the departure hall in Kathmandu airport with its melee of early morning hopefuls anxious to escape the polluted city and fly to a trailhead in search of fresh mountain streams and clean air. Planes are in short supply here and cancellations of domestic flights are common. Although those waiting foreigners seemed remarkably patient with the delays, perhaps attributing the disorder to high altitude. Politics wouldn’t figure into any charming anecdote sent from their holidays in the Himalayas. Neither was I thinking about Nepal’s political troubles at that moment. Not until my colleague directed my attention to a medium sized plane parked on the edge of the tarmac.

“That Turbo Prop M16 is Chinese-made; it was bought by Nepal. Another of the same model, a gift, is expected: two-for-the-price-of-one, you can say.” Nepal could use more aircraft, with not infrequent crashes and regular over-bookings on domestic flights. As for the undelivered Chinese turbo prop, “It’s being held up”, my companion replied. He exhibited the lighthearted cynicism that Nepalese now apply to all public announcements, especially when officials are involved.

I recalled seeing a recent front page article where a minister announced that irregularities in the registration of a Chinese aircraft would delay its arrival. “Too much aid from China is not welcome.” Was this another case of India blocking Nepal’s economic exchanges with China?

Maybe. Or maybe Boeing, American. Or Airbus. Europeans and Americans may be unhappy with China’s overtures in Nepal. India too; Delhi influences everything that happens here.

India and Nepal are bound together in a myriad of ways with India being the overwhelmingly dominant partner. Nepalese were painfully reminded of this when India supported a severe and sustained economic blockade on its land-locked northern neighbor. With Nepal’s dependence on India for heating fuel and petrol for transport— two of many essential commodities ranging from paper and wood to rice and fruit, also manufactured items and packaged/processed food and beverages—life across much of Nepal came to a halt. It was the heating gas and transport fuel embargo that caused unprecedented hardships in population centers, especially the capital. It left people embittered and reassessing their relation with India.

The boycott was launched by the Mahdesi people, unhappy at what they considered marginalization, when last July after years of delays, Nepal’s new constitution was signed. Mahdesi-Nepalese, inhabiting a wide belt of land along their shared border, maintain close ties with India. They decided to utilize this strategic position to express their discontent with the constitution and press for better representation; thus the blockade of goods (from India) entering Nepal through their region.

That internal Nepal crisis took on greater significance when the Indian government was seen as reinforcing Mahdesi demands. Indeed India instructed Nepal to amend its constitution in line with Mahdesi requests. Nepal’s leaders were neither able to secure India’s co-operation nor to negotiate a solution with the steadfast Mahdesi.

As the blockade wore on (lasting for seven months, including winter, although it began to ease somewhat earlier) Nepalese began to seek an alternative. Not easy, since its northern border cuts through the almost impenetrable Himalayan mountain range. Tibet to the north is vast and undeveloped but is nevertheless Nepal’s best access to China. It would be years before a viable route through there could bring essentials like fuel on the scale needed. Although during the blockade China began sending limited supplies to its stricken neighbor.

Even with end of the blockade, anti-Indian sentiment in Nepal remains high. Over my many decades observing Nepal at close hand, I’d not seen Nepalese so angry and disappointed with their neighbor, a place where many of them have studied and where they seek medical treatment, with a culture close to their own, the source of their evening television entertainment. Those millions of children who experienced hardships created by the blockade may well remember that injury for years to come.

Enter China: ties between it and Nepal have moved far beyond a few specialized items produced in Tibet. Today Chinese travelers are a common sight in the capital and on trekking trails. Chinese retailers operate shops in the tourist quarter of Thamel, selling curios and garments and managing hotels and restaurants. Chinese-made household items, electrical goods (in competition with Indian manufactured goods) are for sale across Nepal. China also provides significant development aid to Nepal. An indication of envisioned future growth is the offering of classes in Mandarin at least one major Kathmandu language institute (www.ulci.com.np).

When the earthquake struck Nepal last year, China was seen through a new and favorable prism as it competed with India to provide disaster relief. Both neighbors rushed to Nepal’s assistance and they’ve matched each other in terms of pledges for reconstruction. On the ground at that critical time, I myself witnessed the efficiency with which Chinese aid workers operated; one heard frequent complimentary remarks by recipients of that assistance. Urgent supplies arrived from China by air while Chinese bulldozers opened the blocked roads along the quake-damaged Tibet-Nepal route. Contrasting with praise of Chinese relief efforts were complaints about India. (Rumors circulated that India’s military charged into Nepal when the quake struck without Nepal’s approval, also that Indian media exaggerated India’s relief contributions. Although it is acknowledged that huge quantities of needed supplies arrived from India, and India facilitated overland shipments sent from other parts of Asia.)

The Madhesi embargo was started before earthquake relief ended and long before collapsed homes and schools could be rebuilt, also just as winter was approaching. In Nepal’s desperate search for fuel at that time, China became to the fore. It would not be a simple solution since the quantities needed could only be provided by road through Tibet and across Himalayan passes. Supplies might be insufficient but the concept of expanding routes from the north was pursued. (By October, at the height of the blockade Nepal and China signed two treaties, one on trade and a second on fuel supplies). A viable rail link or a pipeline into Nepal from the north seems implausible; in the recent crisis the China option was of limited benefit.

Yet China’s reputation in infrastructure engineering is legend; having achieved a rail route across China into Tibet, an extension through the Himalayas, however fantastic, is possible. Indeed a month ago, China dispatched what appears to be a symbolic train delivery to Nepal . The international shipment departed from Lanzhou westward covering 2,431 kilometers of rail from to Shigatse (Tibet), then 564 kilometers by road from Shigatse to Kyirong (on Nepal’s border) and the final 160 kilometers by road to Kathmandu. Accompanying this news there’s talk of a tunnel through the Himalayan range from China into Nepal. Given what Chinese engineers have accomplished elsewhere, such a route is not unattainable.

What eventually happens depends more on Nepali politics, and China and India’s determination not to jeopardize their own growing co-operation. Internally Nepal’s leadership is weak and unstable, subject to factionalism and corruption. Leaders from across the political spectrum lack negotiating power, political support, and any vision to follow through with a substantive long-term Chinese policy. On its side, it’s doubtful if China would jeopardize a stable relationship with India to change the status quo in Nepal. Meanwhile India and Nepal are reportedly finalizing plans for an oil pipeline from the south.

In its Monetary Policy Report 2015-2016, the Bank of Greece highlights what many Greeks already know, EU austerity demands is pushing the country towards a healthcare disaster.

Economic insecurity, high unemployment, decreasing income and constant stress are the personal struggles that many Greeks now live with. Personal income belt tightening is causing many patients to cut out necessary health care treatments, while shortages in government funds is resulting in general healthcare system shortages across the country.

Keep Talking Greece summarises the BoG report and its startling findings…

– Suicides increased. “The risk of suicidal behavior increases when there are so-called primary risk factors (psychiatric-medical conditions), while the secondary factors (economic situation) and tertiary factors (age, gender) affects the risk of suicide, but only if primary risk factors pre-exist.

– Infant mortality increased by nearly 50%, mainly due to increase of deaths of infants younger than one year, and the decline of births by 22,1%. Infant mortality increase: 2.65% in 2008 and 3.75% in 2014

– Increase of parts of population with mental illness, especially with depression. Increase:  3.,3% in 2008 to 6.8% in 2009, to 8.2% in 2011 and to 12.3% in 2013. In 2014, a 4.7% of the population above 15 years old declared it suffered form depression – that was 2.6% in 2009.

– Increase of chronic diseases increased by approximately 24%.

The BoG notes that “the large cuts in public expenditure have not been accompanied by changes and improvement of the health system in order to limit the consequences for the weakest citizens and vulnerable groups of the society.”

The report of the Governor of the Bank of Greece reckons surveys conducted by Greek Statistic Authorities (ELSTAT) and according to which:

– a significant increase of 24.2% of people aged 15+ suffering from chronic health problem or chronic disease.
– increase of more than 15% of people who limited their activities due to health problems in 2014.
– percentage of low-weight (below 2.5 kg) births increased by 19% in 2008-2010, and that this is associated with long-term negative effects on the health and the development of children.

Citing OECD data of 2013, the BoG underlines that 79% of the population in Greece was not covered with insurance and therefore without medical and medicine due to long-term unemployment, while self-employed could not afford to pay their social contributions.

A survey conducted in 2014 by ELSTAT showed that part of population above 15 years old was in need of medical help but did not receive it due to lack of financial means:

13% of population did not receive medical care or treatment

15.4% of population did not receive dental care of treatment

4.3% of population did not receive mental health care services

11.2% did not take the prescription medicine prescribed by doctors.

The same survey shows a decrease in private hospital admissions and increase in public hospital with the effect that public hospitals are not able to cope with the increase demands due to austerity budget and personnel cuts. Public hospital admission in 2009 were 1.6 million, and 2.5 million in 2014.

According to the survey, percentage of population that needed to receive medical-nursing care and received it in delay or not at all was:

13.1% due to long waiting list

6.1% due to long distance or transportation problems

9.4% due to lack of specialized doctors and health personnel.

The BoG report warns that the economic crisis and the devaluation of the health sector threaten to shrink the life-expectancy.

Via:

www.keeptalkinggreece.com/2016/06/16/austerity-kills-bank-of-greece-reports-greeks-health-deteriorating-life-expectancy-shrinks/

A Freedom of Information request by Drone Wars UK has revealed that only 5% of British air strikes in Iraq and Syria are pre-planned.

According to the FoI reponse from the Ministry of Defence out of 414 UK air strikes in Iraq and Syria during 2015, 395 were launched under dynamic targeting procedures while just 19 were pre-planned.  Dynamic targeting procedures are used when aircraft are already in the air and either ‘targets of opportunity’ are spotted or strikes are launched in defence of troops on the ground during direct combat.

As dynamically targeted strikes are launched in a short-time frame and without pre-planning it is generally recognised that such strikes are more likely to injure civilians than those that are pre-planned.  Pre-planning of strikes gives time to assess possible dangers to civilians and enable strikes to be launched in a way that can minimise such danger.  According to US doctrine documents “dynamic targeting occurs in a much compressed timeline… [which] may require that targeting be completed in minutes.”

The Ministry of Defence continues to insist that there is no evidence that any of the UK’s 845 air strikeslaunched since September 2014 in Iraq and Syria have killed or injured civilians. Casualty reporting organisations however report that hundreds of civilians have been killed in Coalition air strikes. Airwars, which tracks strikes in Iraq and Syria reported this week that more than 1,300 civilians have been killed in Coalition air strikes.

While there are likely to be a large number of dynamic strikes during a conventional ‘hot battlefield’ situation such as that taking place in Iraq and Syria, that fact that only 5% of UK strikes are pre-planned is extremely surprising. As if to pre-empt questions, in its response letter the MoD argues that

prioritisation of providing close air support to partner forces on the ground can result in a high proportion of strikes being dynamic. The UK has some of the most capable air assets, which can result in the allocation of dynamic targets to UK assets, freeing up other nations’ aircraft to prosecute pre-planned deliberate targets.

However our analysis of  UK strikes in Iraq and Syria (from the MoD’s regular updates) show that many of the strikes cannot be classified as close air support strikes.

Deaths from dynamic strike

An important investigation published in last week’s Washington Post illustrates clearly how dynamic strikes can kill civilians without those undertaking such strikes being aware of the impact on the ground. On 13 March 2015 US aircraft were sent to strike an Islamic checkpoint near Mosul, a  dynamic targeting mission, according to a subsequent Centcom report.

According to the Washington Post, the pilots were about to strike the checkpoint when two vehicles stopped and those inside begin talking to the guards.  The article goes on:

Running low on fuel and time, the pilots concluded that the people in the cars were allied with the militants and asked for permission to strike. After a brief discussion with their headquarters in Qatar, they got their reply: “You’re cleared to execute.”

The pilots later report that the guard shack was flattened, two vehicles destroyed and four enemy fighters killed.

Two weeks later however an email arrived at the US embassy from Raja’a Zidan al-Ekabee, an Iraqi woman who owned one of the cars, reporting civilian casualties and requesting compensation for her destroyed car. She had fled Mosul earlier and was paying a driver to undertake the dangerous job of bringing the car out of the area.  Apparently the driver brought fleeing civilians along in the car which was travelling with a second car also filled with escaping civilians.

The US military investigated the report and, according to the Washington Post identified a “communications error” during the hurried conversations between the pilots and their headquarters.  After reviewing the video, the US changed the final casualty count of the strike to “four enemy fighters and four civilians.”

However the four civilian casualties accepted by the US under counts the actual number of civilian deaths.  According to the Washington Post, which interviewed surviving family members (including a lieutenant colonel with the Iraqi police) and local officials, eleven civilians actually died in the strike, including five children, four women and two male civilian drivers.  It should be noted that no compensation was paid to Ekabee.  An email from the US military stated that she was not entitled to compensation as the car was destroyed in “combat activity.” Separately, family members of the civilian victims did not as yet claim compensation.

Here in the UK, the bullish tone around the precision of UK air strikes and the lack of civilian casualties from UK strikes appears to be being modified.  In his latest quarterly statement to parliament on the campaign, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon argued that while the UK takes “very good care” to minimise civilian casualties, “in the messiness of war it is not impossible that there may be civilian casualties at some point”.  Later in response to questions, he accepted that “it will be more and more difficult to ensure that we avoid civilian casualties” in areas of intense fighting, a reference no doubt to the coming heavy strikes on Mosul and Raqqa.

While some will accept such casualties as the price ‘we’ (sic) have to pay to tackle ISIS, a brief read through the hundreds of individual human stories of those killed in Coalition airstrikes compiled by Airwars should give all serious pause for thought.

The facile and indiscriminate use of the term fascism has led to a widespread misunderstanding and misuse of its meaning. Asked to define fascism, most people would respond in terms such as dictatorship, anti-Semitism, mass hysteria, efficient propaganda machine, mesmerizing oratory of a psychopathic leader, and the like.

Such a pervasive misconception of the meaning of the term fascism is not altogether fortuitous. It is largely because of a longstanding utilitarian misrepresentation of the term. Fascism is deliberately obfuscated in order to sanitize capitalism. Ideologues, theorists and opinion-makers of capitalism have systematically shifted the systemic sins of fascism from market/capitalist failures to individual or personal failures.

Thus, the origins, the rise and the ravages of the classic European fascism are blamed largely on Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, not the socio-economic circumstances that gave rise to those instrumentally “useful” characters. An obvious flaw of this interpretation of fascism is that it cannot explain recent manifestations of fascism: since the archetype European fascism is attributed to Hitler and Mussolini, their demise ought to have logically meant the end of fascism. Yet, manifestations of fascism has been a recurring phenomenon characteristic of periods of capitalist crisis, as evinced by today’s expressions of fascistic tendencies in most of the core capitalist countries.

These ominous developments are testament to the fact that the germs of fascism are intrinsic to capitalism, as periodic economic crises are intrinsic to capitalism. As such, it is bound to periodically resurface as long as capitalism continues to be the dominant mode of socio-economic production.

Just as the original European fascism was blamed on Hitler and Mussolini, so is today’s display of fascistic propensities blamed on characters such as Donald Trump (in the U.S.), Marine Le Pen (in France), Norbert Hofer (in Austria), Alexander Gauland (in Germany), and so on. The real culprit, however, has been market failure and economic insecurity, both now and then.

In addition to the intended absolution of capitalism from the sins of fascism, its utilitarian misrepresentation has the political advantage of conveniently demonizing any “unfriendly” politician or “rogue” state leader as fascist. As Jean Bricmont recently put it on this site: “New Hitlers spring up in the Western imagination like mushrooms in an autumn woods”: Gaddafi, Saddam Hussein, Assad, Milosevic, LePen, Putin, and Ahmadinejad have all been subjected to such characterizations. Indeed, a number of “unfavorable” nationalist leaders such as Saddam Hussein and Gaddafi were first branded as fascist before they were overthrown and murdered.

Misrepresentation of fascism is intended to absolve capitalism from its responsibility in two major ways. First, it blames the executive agent of fascism (for example, Hitler) for the rise and the crimes of fascism. Second, the executive agent, in turn, shifts the blame from the system, or the socio-economic structure, to scapegoats such as migrants, ethnic, racial, or religious minorities.

Fascism cannot be defined capriciously. It cannot be reduced to the crimes of individual leaders of Nazi Germany, or the pathological problems of Hitler’s mind, or the “unfriendly” nationalist leaders who disobey the imperialist agenda of war and militarism. While obfuscationist judgments of this sort may succeed in dressing in the uniform of Adolf Hitler the horrific acts that the capitalist system can occasionally perform, such reductionist judgments would not be very useful for the purposes of averting social conditions that may lead to the recurrence of fascism.

Fascism is a specific historical category that evolves out of particular socio-economic circumstances. It grows out of conditions of severe economic distress and deep social discontent. As such circumstances tend to give rise to protest demonstrations and radical demands from labor and other grassroots on the Left, they also prompt counterbalancing social forces on the Right. In other words, fascism is essentially a counter-revolutionary strategy to preempt revolutionary developments.

This means that, at its core, fascism is a social-political strategy or tool that is employed by big business, or the ruling capitalist class, to simultaneously pacify the discontented public and fend off radical, socialistic developments. It also means that, while antithetical, both fascism and socialism are incidents that are latent in a relatively advanced capitalist structures—a case of the unity of opposites.

During cycles of economic expansion and relatively low levels of unemployment and poverty, such potential occurrences remain dormant. By contrast, during periods of deep and protracted cycles of economic contraction signs and symbols of both begin to re-emerge. In general, fascistic signs and symbols remain dormant as long as socialistic manifestations remain dormant, as former manifestations often emerge in reaction to the latter ones.

The development and brutality of fascism is proportionate with the degree of the severity of economic crisis, or the level of the gravity of class struggle. For example, the intensity of the 1930s socio-economic crisis in Europe and the strength of socialist movements and organizations, especially in Germany, played a critical role in catapulting the Nazi forces to power and precipitating the vicious rule of fascism there.

By contrast, as the bureaucratic labor leaders in the current (2016) US presidential elections chose to support the candidate of the status quo, Hillary Clinton, and Bernie Sanders’ campaign agenda stopped way short of a meaningful socialist program, fascistic manifestations of Donald Trump’s campaign remained largely sporadic and relatively mild. Had the class collaborationist big union leaders (the “labor lieutenants of capitalism,” as the late Leon Trotsky put it) charted an independent labor-grassroots campaign and demanded a substantive socio-economic revolution, instead of Sanders’ hollow “political revolution,” fascistic tendencies or displays of the Trump campaign would have escalated to dangerous levels.

It must be pointed out in passing that the capitalist ruling class (especially the “far-sighted,” non-partisan, big business establishment) would employ fascistic methods of control only as a means of last resort. As long as there is no serious grassroots threat to the status quo, it prefers to mitigate economic distress and social tensions by means of minimal reforms and usual “democratic” measures. Only when such measures fail to pacify the restless and rebellious masses of workers and other grassroots, that is, only when the ruling class finds itself unable to rule with the help of “democratic” machinery, would it employ fascistic means of control.

It must also be pointed out that a direct link can be detected between the recent rise of fascistic tendencies in most of the core capitalist countries, on the one hand, and the rise or reign of parasitic finance capital in these countries, on the other. As the unproductive, scrounging financial sector has systematically emaciated the productive, real sector of the economies of these countries, chronic stagnation has become a perennial feature of their markets.

Accordingly, high levels of unemployment, poverty and inequality have also become prevailing features of these societies. As these ominous developments have given rise to public discontent and workers militancy in these countries, they have also given rise to expressions of fascism. And as economic crises tend to recur more frequently in the age of the dominance of parasitic finance capital, the specter of war and militarism abroad along with threats of repression and police state at home also tend to become more menacing.

It follows from this brief discussion that crisis situations present both opportunities and dangers, both revolutionary/socialistic occasions and counter-revolutionary/fascistic prospects. Such socio-economic periods of contradictory developments prompted the late German revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg to declare: socialism or barbarism. Whether socialism or barbarism would prevail depends crucially on the balance of political power, or the outcome of class struggle.

Many radicals have dropped class politics at exactly the moment it is needed most. Rosa Luxemburg’s view that socialism is the only humane alternative to capitalist barbarism is as relevant today as when she expressed it (during the carnage of World War I). Barbarism stares us in the eye in many disguised forms. Yet, much of the left these days shy away from using words such as class struggle, organization, or the crucial role of labor for social and economic change.

While participation of all the layers of the grassroots is crucial to the success of the fight for a superior civilization to what is prevalent under capitalism, the role of labor in the attendant coalition of the masses would be most critical. Only labor—labor in the broadest sense of the term that would include both the so-called blue-collar and white-collar workers—can bring an end to the rule of capital, thereby to the constantly lurking threats of economic crises, of fascism, of poverty, and of police state at home, and of war and militarism abroad.

Transforming the world economy in the interests of the majority of the people is, of course, not easy. It certainly cannot be brought about in one jump or an overnight uprising. It can come about only as the cumulative outcome of many steps along the path of a long and difficult journey of continuous social and economic change. Nobody can tell a priori how long or what form such transitional steps or stages may take. It is clear, however, that to change the world economy in the interests of the majority of its inhabitants, labor would need new politics and new organizations to articulate the struggle for change.

This requires a new labor movement with independent politics and organization(s). Whatever the new labor organization is called, it has to be different not only from the U.S. business union model but also from the Social Democratic model of Europe, trade unions + party. This means that the new labor movement and/or organization has to represent the interests of the entire working class, not just organized industrial labor, nor only its singular economic interests. In addition, it must aim at defending the interests of all those who challenge the logic of the profit-driven market mechanism. The working class can influence, shape, and ultimately lead the world economy if it takes on the challenge (a) on an international level, and (b) in the context of broader coalitions and alliances with other social strata that also struggle for equity, environmental protection, and human rights.

Ismael Hossein-zadeh is Professor Emeritus of Economics (Drake University). He is the author of Beyond Mainstream Explanations of the Financial Crisis (Routledge 2014), The Political Economy of U.S. Militarism (Palgrave–Macmillan 2007), and the Soviet Non-capitalist Development: The Case of Nasser’s Egypt (Praeger Publishers 1989). He is also a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion.

China is the only Great Power with the economic wherewithal to challenge the US all across the world, and as such, these qualities neatly complement Russia’s military capabilities in assisting both civilizational poles as they jointly forge a multipolar world order. The manifestation of their shared global vision and the framework through which they cooperate in achieving it is the Russian-Chinese Strategic Partnership, and because of Beijing’s intimate closeness with Moscow, it too has been targeted for full-scale proxy destabilization by the US. Washington’s strategy isn’t limited to solely obstructing multipolar transnational connective projects (as ambitious of a goal as that is already), but also in physically containing China in its own home region, similar in many respects to what it’s been attempting to do to Russia ever since the end of the Cold War.

These two strategies intersect to a large degree and have a major commonality between them in that they can both be furthered by American-driven Hybrid Wars. This part of the book explores the applicability of this method to ASEAN, the strategic ‘backyard’ and ‘soft underbelly’ of China. In many ways, ASEAN is to China just what Central Asia is to Russia, although it can be strongly argued that ASEAN is of much more critical economic importance to China than Central Asia ever will be for Russia (though both regions have equal strategic value as relative to each respective Great Power). The first part of the book mapped out the three ASEAN states most vulnerable to Hybrid Wars (Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand), but their geopolitical significance and the attractiveness that the US has in targeting these specific states can’t be fully understood if explained in isolation from the larger ASEAN region.

For that reason, it’s integral for the first parts of this geopolitical study to focus on ASEAN as a whole in explaining its strategic saliency in general and then in describing how the US plans to weaponize the bloc for macro-regional proxy rivalry against China. Along the same lines, it’s also relevant to detail China’s grand strategic plans in responding to this aggressive encirclement and the unipolar militarization of the international waterways through which so much of its economic growth depends. This naturally brings the research along to a thorough discussion about why China selected Myanmar, Laos, and Thailand as the host countries for its multipolar transnational connective projects and how these are envisioned as suitable countermeasures in evading the trap that the US is setting in the South China Sea. The socio-political vulnerabilities of all ASEAN countries will then be touched upon before the research goes fully in-depth investigating the Myanmar and Thai case studies, after which these two scenarios will be compared with one another in highlighting the difference between their respective likelihoods and overall strategic impact.

The Global Economic Crossroads

ASEAN’s solid growth in the past few decades has made it an enviable partner for many, and the economic bloc has entered into several high-profile free trade agreements (FTAs) in the past couple of years. As of the end of 2015, it has bilateral FTAs with Australia and New Zealand, China, India,Japan, and South Korea, essentially making it the formal economic crossroads between these leading world economies. Furthermore, it’s currently engaged in free trade negotiations with the EU and theEurasian Union, which if ultimately sealed, would give ASEAN free trade rights with almost the entirety of the supercontinent with the exception of the Mideast and a small handful of other countries. With the convergence of so many economic interests over ASEAN, it’s only a matter of time before this smattering of bilateral agreements is expanded into a multilateral framework that progressively includes each of the given parties.

Such an arrangement would represent a major victory for Eurasia and the multipolar world because it would tie each of the Great Powers together and make them collectively more interdependent on one another than either of them individually would be with the US. This is obviously a long-term vision and isn’t something that can be actualized in the scope of just a few years, but the path is already being paved the closer that ASEAN comes to inking free trade deals with the EU and theEurasian Union. The increasingly intertwined FTAs that these respective economic partners reach with one another will inevitably bring them all closer together with time, despite existing political and structural differences between some of them such as the current American-dictated chill in the EU’s relations with the Eurasian Union.

TTIP Tramples Everything

If given the chance to behave freely, the EU would likely intensify bilateral ties with the Eurasian Union as evidenced by Junker’s late-November 2015 outreach to the bloc, but US grand strategy has always been based on keeping the two divided, hence the manufactured Ukrainian Crisis and subsequently planned New Cold War. Should a breakthrough in bilateral relations occur, perhaps due to the structural changes that Balkan Stream and the Balkan Silk Road would generate inside the EU if either of them is successfully completed, then it’s probable that their overlapping economic interests in ASEAN (independently negotiated up until that point) could represent the perfect catalyst for banding together and formalizing a larger and more inclusive economic framework between all actors. The reasoning behind this is because the current American-attributed deterioration of EU-Eurasian Union relations is the only ‘non-natural’ structural impediment preventing all of the supercontinent’s trade blocs from cooperating on the all-inclusive scale suggested above.

From the American strategic standpoint, however, this would represent the ultimate failure of its divide-and-rule policy in Eurasia, and it’s for this institutional reason why the US is so adamant about pursuing the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) with the EU. In the event that this neo-imperialist proposal ever enters into force, then the US would have the dominant say in deciding whether its junior EU ‘partner’ is allowed to continue its existing free trade negotiations with Japanand India. More likely than not, it would indefinitely freeze these already-stalled processes in order to consolidate its economic control over the bloc, and only after it exercises indisputable control over it will Washington allow the talks to proceed. By that point, the goal would be to link TTIP and the TPP (which will be expanded upon shortly, but whose Asian component will be led by Japan) together to make the US the institutionally essential actor between them, and then complete the unipolar-dominated economic envelopment of Eurasia by bringing India into the mix to some capacity.

This strategy is contingent on the US using the New Cold War hype that it’s created to scare its partners into agreeing to the TTIP and TPP out of the manufactured perception that they need to contain Russia and China, respectively. In the scenario being describe above, if the US doesn’t succeed in pushing through TTIP and the EU independently aligns itself with either of those major Asian economies (let alone that it begins free trade negotiations with China), then the US could rapidly lose its present preeminence over the EU economy. In a short time, Brussels might finally come to the conclusion that everyone else in the world has already arrived at and realize that the future of the global economy rests in the East, not the West, and enter into wider and freer trading relations with the rest of its prospective partners. This would of course naturally include Russia and the Eurasian Union, and with the two economies already converging on their own as it would be (remembering that it’s only because of American-attributed political impediments that they aren’t doing so already), it’s foreseeable that they could coordinate their respective FTAs with ASEAN as a final stepping stone before engaging in a similar one amongst themselves.

Multilateral Backup Plans

As positive of a picture as the above section paints, it probably won’t happen for at least the coming decade, if at all, seeing how serious the US is in ‘playing for keeps’ within the New Cold War rivalry. Whether through the institutional workings of the TTIP or outside of it via more unscrupulous measures if the said agreement isn’t passed by that time, the US will do everything in its power to prevent the EU from expanding its independent economic relations with the Eurasian Union, China, and ASEAN. It might potentially be allowed to deepen its ties with Japan and India (per the unipolar grand strategy described previously), but even that is debatable unless the US feels assured enough that it can maintain control over the bloc after those prospective agreements are clinched. It probably wouldn’t have the confidence to do so unless it formally controlled the EU through TTIP, thus making these potential free trade areas unlikely, at least in the short- to medium-term timeframes, barring of course any unexpected geopolitical shifts. For the most part, then, the EU can be safely discounted from any serious discussions about intra-Eurasian free trade zones, but that doesn’t mean that such dreams should be discouraged simply because the bloc realistically can’t take part in them for a while (if at all).

RCEP And FTAAP:

To compensate for the expected non-participation of the EU inside the envisioned multipolar economic frameworks, a few modified proposals have been suggested. Two of the most talked about are theRegional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific(FTAAP), both of which are actively supported by China. The RCEP is the formalization of a multilateral FTA between ASEAN and each of its already-existing free trade partners (Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea), while the FTAAP takes things a lot further and proposes a grandiose free trade zone among all the countries that constitute the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, thereby including Russia, the US, and a few other Western Hemispheric countries but at the expense of a full free trade deal with ASEAN as a whole (Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia are not APEC members).

Nevertheless, it’s still significant that most of the countries within the bloc would be participants in that framework, highlighting just how important ASEAN economies are for transregional free trade deals nowadays. At the same time, however, the inclusion of the US would greatly erode the multipolar flexibility of the intended grouping and turn it into more of an apolitical economic organization that can’t be used in a relative way to weaken the US’ unipolar standing. It’s probable that Russia and China only support this idea so as to score political points of their own in contrasting it with the US’ exclusionary TPP plans that threaten to undermine both Great Powers’ existing trade connections and future opportunities with the involved states.

Source: Vietnam Briefing

Russia’s Vision For GEFTA:

The latest proposal to be brought up for creating a multilateral transregional trading bloc came from Russia and was pronounced during President Putin’s Address to the Federal Assembly on 4 December, 2015. The Russian leader announced his country’s intention to form an economic partnership between the Eurasian Union, ASEAN, and SCO states (including the two ascending members of India and Pakistan), arguing that the new organization would “make up nearly a third of the global economy in terms of purchasing power parity.” This is the most realistic of the three suggestions and the most likely to be implemented in practice. China already has a FTA with Pakistan(the ‘zipper’ of Eurasian integration), and the Eurasian Union is exploring the possibility of sealing similar deals with India and official SCO-prospect Iran. Of note, Russia and China are also engaged in a trilateral partnership with Mongolia that could predictably become a free trade area sometime in the future as well.

Assuming that Moscow will be successful in reaching these (and there’s no reason to doubt that at the moment), then joining the Eurasian Union and the SCO together in an economic partnership would be a natural fit, with ASEAN offering a perfect complementary touch that would economically excite all of the members. Furthermore, India and Pakistan’s inclusion into the discussed framework would likely lead to the rest of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC, and which has its own internal free trade area) joining in as well, which would then push the proposed organization’s ranks to also include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, the Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Taken together, Russia’s vision amounts to a Grand Eurasian Free Trade Area (GEFTA) that’s supposed to encompass the vast majority of Asia and one day merge with the EU, with the notable exclusions for now obviously being the European economies (both EU and non-EU-member states), the Mideast (except for perhaps Syria and Israel [an odd combination to be sure, but pursued for entirely separatereasons]), the Koreas, and Japan.

The Indian Impediment Opens Up An ASEAN Opportunity

Even assuming a minimum of external (American) interference in trying to offset Russia’s vision, it’s foreseeable that India will present a major challenge for GEFTA’s implementation. India and China are engaged in a very intense security dilemma at the moment that neither side publicly wants to acknowledge, and under such conditions, it’s not likely that either of them is serious about pursuing a FTA with the other. From New Delhi’s perspective, India has no motivation whatsoever to sacrifice what it feels to be its national economic interests by entering into a FTA with China, no matter if it’s in RCEP or GEFTA. Relating to RCEP, India already has FTAs with Japan and South Korea, and it doesn’t believe that including Australia and New Zealand into the proposed multilateral framework would compensate for the economic unbalancing that it thinks it would experience through the tariff-free trade with China that it would have to agree to as part of the deal. With respect to GEFTA, the concerns are very similar. India is currently in a free trade relationship with ASEAN and might eventually enter into one with Iran after the latter proposed such an idea in spring 2015. With progress looking quite positive in reaching a free trade deal with the Eurasian Union one day soon, India doesn’t see any need to jump into GEFTA when it’s already all but assured to receive every benefit that it would be seeking out of the arrangement minus the foreseen complications that would happen if it has to do so with China as well (and to which its leadership presently sees no benefit).

India’s expected absence from GEFTA doesn’t translate into the vision’s failure, but it does raise its dependency on ASEAN’s inclusion in order to be geopolitically broad-based enough to become a defining point in the global economy. By itself, the Eurasian Union and its bilateral free trade arrangements are positive developments in and of themselves, especially if they lead to a prospective Eurasian Union-China FTA that multilaterally incorporates the other deals reached prior to that point (such as with Iran), but multipolarity would be infinitely more enhanced through the addition of ASEAN to this accord. Vietnam is already party to such a deal with the Eurasian Union, and even though it’s a robust component of the bloc’s partnership portfolio, its mutual potential pales in comparison to if both economic groupings had their own inclusive bloc-to-bloc pact. One of the steps in advancing this possibility would be for Russia to make efficient use out of ASEAN’s SEZs in Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia in order to reach individual FTAs with the rest of the organization’s mainland members (including Thailand, whom Medvedev offered the possibility to in spring 2015) so that they can collectively lobby their insular counterparts in this direction.

The TPP Strikes Back

The greatest threat to the multipolar world’s economic relations with ASEAN comes directly from the TPP. The US is pushing this exclusionary trade arrangement in order to obstruct the existing trade partnerships that non-allied countries (Russia and China) plan on enhancing with each of the bloc’s members. In a sense, it can be thought of as a preemptive declaration of economic war because the US is taking proactive steps in carving out a restricted market that will fall under its primary control. Washington is keenly aware of Moscow’s envisioned Pivot to Asia and understands that it must be diversified past China in order to achieve its full economic potential, and regarding Beijing, the US recognizes how obstructive a disturbance in bilateral Chinese-ASEAN economic relations could be for the New Silk Road plans that it hopes to complete in the coming years. The US would like to use the economic hegemony that it would acquire over each of the TPP’s ASEAN members in order to bully them away from these multipolar centers and firmly entrench them in the unipolar camp, and there are concrete reasons that this strategic threat should be taken seriously.

The AEC:

ASEAN reached an historic milestone during its 27^th summit at the end of November 2015 in Kuala Lumpur, agreeing to form the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) in order to coordinate the bloc’s economic relations with the outside world and strengthen social, cultural, and security cooperation among its members. It’s expected that the AEC will seek to enact bloc-wide trade agreements from this point on, striving to eventually expand the TPP to include the rest of the organization with time. The reasoning for this is quite simple, and it’s that ASEAN would like to standardize the trade deals that its members have with outside countries and blocs so as not to create an internal structural imbalance between its economies. If Malaysia is in the TPP but Vietnam has a FTA with the Eurasian Union, the thinking goes, then that creates a disadvantage for the Philippines which doesn’t have institutionalized ties with either, for example, and the mishmash of various external actors interacting with ASEAN on a member-to-member basis instead of dealing with the entire group creates an unnecessarily complex intra-bloc situation that makes it all the more difficult for the AEC’s diverse members to economically integrate with one another.

Although it’s not the most accurate comparison in general, in this case it’s somewhat fitting to pair the AEC with the EU since both blocs want to control their members’ institutionalized economic relations with other states and organizations. Even though this objective hasn’t been formally proclaimed by the AEC as of yet, it’s functionally inevitable that it will move in this direction sooner or later once its members get more serious about their shared integration goal. This means that the AEC will one day have to make the decision over which non-bloc-including bilateral agreements it wants to expand to cover the entire organization and which ones its respective members must be forced to abandon. It’s significant to note at this point that most of the AEC seems to be moving in the direction of the TPP, judging at least by the statements coming out of the group’s top two economies, Indonesia and Thailand. President Joko Widodo told Obama during a White House meeting in late October that “Indonesia intends to join the TPP”, while one of Thailand’s deputy prime ministers proclaimed at the end of November that his country “is highly interested in joining TPP…chances are high that Thailand will seek to join TPP.”

Thailand And Indonesia:

Thailand might be trying to publicly defer to the US for as long as possible in order to deflect some of the hostility that many in Washington harbor towards it ever since the multipolar coup ousted the pro-American leadership and the country largely reoriented towards China. It’s probable that Bangkok doesn’t sincerely intend to join the TPP, or at least at this point, because it would endanger the strategic partnership that it’s rapidly developed with Beijing over the past year and a half (and which will be addressed more in the research later), but the situation with Indonesia is a lot more straightforward. Unbeknownst to most observers, the West has been engaging in a mini-containment of sorts against the country in order to further pressure its leadership into making pro-unipolar decisions when the appropriate time comes. Widodo is already recognized as being Western-friendly as it is, but he’s still the steward of one of the largest economies in the world and has a tricky role to play in strategically hedging against China (as the Indonesian leadership sees it) while simultaneously preventing itself from falling under the US’ full supremacy as its latest proxy state.

Rewriting The Rules

Regretfully, however, it looks as though Indonesia is about to use its economic leadership role over the AEC to misguide the rest of the organization into moving along the path of unipolar servitude. If Jakarta commits to the TPP, then it’s foreseeable that this will be the deciding factor in whether the rest of the AEC accepts the US’ disadvantageous trade offer at the expense of upgrading its ties with the Eurasian Union. In fact, the implementation of the TPP might even result in the eventual nullification of ASEAN’s FTA with China, thereby dealing a double-whammy to the multipolar world’s institutional influence in Southeast Asia.

While scarcely any details are known about the TPP (the leaked text is around two million words in length and nearly impossible for a single individual to read through and totally comprehend on their own), it’s already been well-established that the “preferential” legal adjustments that it mandates each party abide by are nothing more than a smokescreen for major corporations to acquire decisive political rights. One of the controversies herein is that companies could sue national governments if the respective state enacts or enforces any “environmental, health or other regulatory objectives” that inhibit the said organization’s legally enshrined trade advantages or endanger its profits (it doesn’t even have to result in any actual decline, just the possible threat thereof).

Recalling that Vietnam is already in a FTA with the Eurasian Union and all of ASEAN has a similar arrangement with China, it’s definitely possible that the US would find a pretext within each of these existing agreements to argue that they violate the TPP and must be rewritten or outright abandoned. If they fail to rectify the problem within the given period of time, then the US’ supportive companies will take each of the ‘violating’ states to court on Washington’s behalf to squeeze a punitive settlement out of them and/or force them to make the dictated changes. US-ally Japan may also direct some of its major companies to do the same as part of a coordinated push to maximize the ‘legal’-economic pain being inflicted on the targeted state.

How It Could Be Stopped

As extreme as such a scenario may sound at the moment, if perfectly correlates to the US’ strategic objectives of pushing multipolar Great Power influences out of Southeast Asia and hoarding the region’s economic potential all to itself. Doing so also has very specific geostrategic underpinnings that will be described in the next chapter, thus adding another layer of motivation for the US to move forward in this direction. As much as Washington wants to carry out this strategy, however, it doesn’t mean that it’s guaranteed to be successful, and there’s still the very real possibility that its plan could be stopped in its tracks before it ever has the chance to come to full fruition.

The greatest obstacle to the US’ TPP-dominating dream for Southeast Asia is China’s ASEAN Silk Road, the high-speed rail line that’s expected to run from Kunming to Singapore and traverse through Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. The first two transit states have the most to gain from this proposal and are thus anticipated to remain the most ‘loyal’ in safeguarding China’s FTA with ASEAN in the event that the AEC ever tries to revise it (perhaps under a TPP-influenced Indonesian initiative). There’s also the China-Myanmar Pipeline Corridor that was launched in early 2015 to transfer Mideast oil and gas to Yunnan Province via a more thought-to-be geostrategically secure route than the Strait of Malacca (which is questionable and will be explained later in the work), with the envisioned potential of evolving into a full-scale trade corridor with time. This theoretically gives Naypyidaw a stake in preserving the institutional FTA status quo with China, although this could (and probably will) change with Suu Kyi’s increased role over the state. Cambodia is also a close Chinese ally nowadays, but it’s not institutionally tied to any  major infrastructure projects, thereby meaning that it’s capable of being ‘bought off’ by the ‘highest bidder’ and isn’t fundamentally dependable. Therefore, the most reliable partners that China has to defend its economic interests in the AEC are Laos and Thailand.

It’s predicted that these two states have already made the conscientious choice among their top leaderships to economically tie themselves closer with China through their participation in the ASEAN Silk Road project. For this reason, they have vested interests in making sure that their TPP-adhering AEC counterparts don’t enforce their unipolar trade terms on the rest of the bloc and/or compel the others to restrict their established economic ties with China (at the behest of the US, of course). An intra-organizational split could easily occur under these conditions, with the TPP-affiliated states facing off against the non-TPP ones as the AEC struggles to streamline its institutional economic engagements in its quest for greater coordination and integration among its members. The anticipated friction that this will produce would lead to a likely deadlock in implementing any institutionally revisionist (or expansionist, as per the TPP) policies within the AEC and prevent the US from achieving its full unipolar objectives in the theater. Consequently, due to Laos, Thailand, and to an extent, Myanmar’s highly strategic economic relations with China (the first two being party to the ASEAN Silk Road and the latter being host to the China-Myanmar Pipeline Corridor) that are standing in the way of the US’ full-spectrum unipolar dominance over ASEAN, all three of these states are ‘valid’ targets for a Hybrid War sometime in the future.

The Global Perspective

The economic proxy war going on between the unipolar and multipolar camps over ASEAN is of immense significance in terms of its global impact, but in order to truly appreciate how it relates to the rest of the world, it’s essential for the reader to be reminded of certain elements of contemporary American grand strategy.

The US capitalized off of the end of the Cold War by exporting its neo-liberal economic practices all across the world, with the ultimate intent being to entrap Russia, China, and to an extent that’s ever more relevant nowadays, Iran, in an institutional net of Washington-dominated control from which there’d be no escape. It’s taken some time to advance, but right now the US is steadily moving forward with great speed in tying the four corners of Eurasia into its matrix of control, de-facto encircling these three Great Powers and making them disproportionately dependent on a shared center of economic-strategic gravity.

The TTIP, should it enter into force, would place the EU’s external economic relations under the control the US, thereby meaning that Brussels would be powerless to enter into any FTA or similarly privileged trading accord with other countries without the US’ explicit blessing. Moving along in a counterclockwise direction, the US and the GCC are working on intensifying their economic relationsto the point of an eventual FTA. This isn’t too important right now because of the lopsided dependence that the Gulf economies have on energy sales, but eventually they’ll have to transition to a more ‘normal’ economy based on material trade, and at that point, their hefty financial reserves that they’ve been saving will go towards purchasing products from the US and any other country that it’s likely to be in a FTA with by that time. The next object of American focus is ASEAN, which has just been comprehensively described, and the final part of the supercontinental strategy is South Korea and Japan. The US already has a FTA with the former, and it’s planning to use TPP to enter into the same arrangement with the latter.

Altogether, one can clearly see that most of the cardinal directions in Eurasia are covered by America’s FTA plans. To reexamine the US’ plans from this perspective, the EU represents West Eurasia, the GCC is Southwest Eurasia, ASEAN is Southeast Eurasia, and South Korea and Japan are Northeast Eurasia. The only missing link is South Eurasia, mostly India, which is being wooed by the US anyhow as it is, although it’s still a far time away from entering into a FTA with the US. Nonetheless, if TTIP and TPP are allowed to enter into practice, then it’s only a matter of time before an irresistible offer is made to New Delhi in coaxing India into this unipolar economic web. Even without India’s formal incorporation into the US’ global neo-liberal scheme, it’s already been argued that it’ll most likely remain outside of GEFTA because of concerns for its strategic sovereignty vis-à-vis neighboring rival China. In that case, Russia, China, and Iran would then share the same economic-strategic space in Central Asia, one of the last parts of the supercontinent to remain outside of the US’ formal institutionalized control. This would make Central Asia the unquestionable center of multipolar gravity between these three Great Powers, but conversely, it would also make them disproportionately vulnerable to American-engineered Hybrid Wars there.

In order to avoid a three-for-one ultra-dependency on Central Asia, it’s urgently imperative for the multipolar world to maintain and defend its inroads in the AEC, ergo the importance that goes into China’s counter-TPP efforts via the ASEAN Silk Road and the China-Myanmar Pipeline Corridor. A retreat from these fronts and the cession of Southeast Asia to America’s unipolar clutches will create a strategically dangerous situation for China, and by extension, the rest of the multipolar Great Powers, and resultantly push up the US’ timetable for corralling their shared economic interests into Central Asia. China also has very clearly defined geostrategic interests in sustaining its influence in ASEAN (or at least in part of its mainland component) in order to halt the advancement of the US’ ‘Chinese Containment Coalition’ (CCC) and maintain non-American-controlled outlets to the Indian Ocean that allow it to safely access the burgeoning African markets on which its future growth depends.

To be continued…

Andrew Korybko is the American political commentator currently working for the Sputnik agency. He is the post-graduate of the MGIMO University and author of the monograph “Hybrid Wars: The Indirect Adaptive Approach To Regime Change” (2015). This text will be included into his forthcoming book on the theory of Hybrid Warfare.

PREVIOUS CHAPTERS:

Hybrid Wars 1. The Law Of Hybrid Warfare

Hybrid Wars 2. Testing the Theory – Syria & Ukraine

Hybrid Wars 3. Predicting Next Hybrid Wars

Hybrid Wars 4. In the Greater Heartland

Hybrid Wars 5. Breaking the Balkans

London: Much of Britain is recoiling in the wake of the death of Labour MP Jo Cox, who was shot and stabbed on Thursday in broad daylight outside the public library in Birstall to the shouts of “Britain first!” It was the first killing of a serving MP since Ian Gow, whose life was taken by Irish Republicans in 1990.

The suspect, Thomas Mair, was said to have carried what was an “old-fashioned” possibly homemade gun, and also brandished a knife in the attack. At around 1 pm, the shots and blows rained down upon Cox, who was declared dead less than an hour later.

Her husband, Brendan Cox, reiterated a theme that has been articulated all too often of late. There was hatred, and such hate had no “creed, race of religion – it is poisonous.”

The wells and soil of Britain, and indeed many a state, have been poisoned by the flipside of such hate, which is fear itself. The country has been embroiled in a debate about whether to leave the European Union, and the sensible ones guided by sobriety are nowhere in sight. Apocalyptic scenarios are being generated on an hourly basis by the campaigns of those who wish to remain and those who wish to exit. There have been suggestions of economic collapse, impoverishment and even war.

In this climate, the immediate rumours that were set alight by the killing of the MP for Batley and Spen was whether it was another ISIS inspired, as opposed to directed, move.

As the torrid air began to clear, it surfaced that Mair had been a former psychiatric patient with suggested links to ultra-patriotic right wing groups, a habitual “loner” with a subscription to the S. A. Patriot, a South African publication coming out of the offices of the pro-apartheid group, the White Rhino Club. It may be relevant in so far as Cox had spoken out against Britain First, a vociferously proud anti-Islamic group of the right.

Across the Atlantic, in Orlando, Florida, the death of Cox seemed miniature in comparison to the killing and injuring of over a hundred people on June 12. As with everything else, the United States does things to vast scale, supersizing everything from food to death.

In the case of the attack on the Pulse club in Orlando by Omar Mateen, there were the usual personality issues, be there a history of abuse, innate aggression and paranoia. The same characteristics as those with Mair were manifest here, though the medical arguments were fast obscured by a tissue of incoherent political explanations.

It was clear that the Orlando shooter had little sense about an ideological anchor, deeply troubled about the roots of his inspiration. As long as the alternative was sufficiently contrarian, violent and contrary to the status quo, it featured in his mental universe. It explained why he would express support for the dirty work of the al-Nusra front prior to his exultant embrace of Islamic State in his 911 calls. Shia and Sunni differences were of little consequence to him, or is reading.

To the addling wonder that was Mateen’s mind came a not so closeted homosexuality. While that side of the pudding has yet to be proven in detail, friends and locals suggested that he had been a user of gay dating apps and a regular of gay bars. Along with ideological confusion came a good deal of self-woe.

The Mateen blueprint – confusion and indifference to the dimensions of faith and a creative streak of fabrication – were very much present in yet another “lone wolf”, that grand fabulist and showman, Man Haron Monis.

In seizing the Lindt Café in Sydney on December 15, 2014, a standoff resulting in three deaths including Monis, the hostage taker was simply adding another confused chapter to a series of preposterous acts he had engaged in since arriving in Australia as an Iranian refugee.

As local security services realised, he giddily switched sides with a breezy disdain. He advocated support for both Shia and Sunni causes. He created the impression he was knee-deep in the Iranian security establishment, and a threat as result. He also attempted to join the Rebel motorcycle gang. Similarly to Mateen, he was a profoundly dedicated narcissist.

The nature of such outfits as the Islamic State is that any event that smells of murderous promise, done with sufficient dedication, is bound to get the seal of approval. News agencies were awash in the aftermath of the slaughter in Orlando with messages that Mateen had been “one of the soldiers of the caliphate in America.” Like Mateen, Islamic State issued a similar note of credit for Monis’s actions.

Never mind the actual profile of the killer, be he unstable, mentally fraught and desperate. It signals, if nothing else, a bone lazy disposition to putting in the hard yards, and hoping that ideas have wings that will find useful idiots. Mateen and Monis were convenient executors of that legacy. Britain First has, however denied having any influence over Mair’s actions, issuing a statement of disassociation.

In time, it may simply transpire that yet another individual of ill-health, bumbling along the crooked road of life, decided to ingest a poor morsel of politics, and kill. The coherence of the idea was irrelevant; such matters are often indigestible. As Mair’s brother Scott explained, “My brother was not violent and is not all that political. I don’t even know who he votes for.”

Sydney, Orlando, Birstall all reveal the difficulties of finding clarity of explanation in the world of the inscrutable. For the three assailants in question, the world must have seemed just as puzzling. They became useful fools in broader agendas. Other groups, be they the National Rifle Association on the one hand, or Islamic State on the other, will always be there to reap the bloody bounty.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne and is currently in London. Email: [email protected]

While the Press celebrates the Democratic Party victory of the first female billionaire in history, a somber legal battle is going on in the shadows.

The State Department report on Hillary Clinton’s emails, and the different legal proceedings which followed, establish that she is guilty of :

• Obstruction of Justice by Mrs. Clinton and her advisors (Section 1410) ;
• Obstruction of Criminal Enquiries (Section 1511) ;
• Obstruction of the application of local and Federal laws (Section 1411) ;
• Federal crime of negligence with classified information and documents (Section 1924) ;
• Detention in her computer, at home and on a non-secure server, of 1,200 secret documents (Section 1924)
• Felony – Mrs. Clinton declared under oath to a Federal judge that she had given all her emails to the State Department. However, the Inspector General of the State Department declared this week that this was a lie (Section 798) ;
• Moreover, she declared under oath that the State Department had authorised her to use her personal computer to work at home. The Inspector General of the State Department declared this week that this was a lie (Section 798) ;
• Mrs. Clinton did not alert the authorities, nor even her own Department, that her personal computer had been hacked several times. Yet she had asked her system administrator to try to protect her computer.
• Misappropriation and Concealment. The Clinton Foundation and Mrs. Clinton were corrupted so that the State Department would close their eyes to various practices (Rico Law and Section 1503).

In principle, and since the facts and their gravity have been established by the FBI, the State Departement, and a Federal judge, Hillary Clinton should have been arrested this week.

Bernie Sanders, the other candidate for the Democratic nomination, was counting on Mrs. Clinton’s arrest before their party’s convention. He therefore decided to stay in the running, although he does not have enough delegates. But he was summoned to the White House, and informed that President Barack Obama would prevent his administration from applying the law. Obama then followed through by publicly announcing his support for the candidacy of Mrs. Clinton.

Why is it that Vote Leave, trying to persuade the UK to vote to leave the European Union,  can get away with so many lies?  And why won’t the mainstream media really pick up on this?  For instance:

Vote Leave claims that if the UK leaves the EU we will:

Stop sending £350 million every week to Brussels.

Except that we don’t; the majority of the money doesn’t leave the country, and no matter how many times economists keep pointing out this is nonsense, they keep repeating it.  This is the only claim that has really made the news for being wrong.

Be free to trade with the whole world

Have they not been to their local supermarkets and seen how much wine and fruit we import from California?  Or South Africa?  Want out-of-season asparagus (and more wine)?  It comes from Chile.  Green beans and flowers?  Try Kenya.

We trade with all the Commonwealth countries.  Part of the deal when we joined the Common Market in the 1970s was that we had to be able to continue trading with the Commonwealth.  We trade with China (the sixth biggest importer of UK goods and services), India (which invests more in the UK than all the other EU countries combined), and in April this year we exported goods worth £1 billion more to the US than we imported.  We trade.

Former London mayor Boris Johnson, promised that “If we vote Leave we will be able to forge bold new trade deals with growing economies around the world.”  He wants us to ‘go global’.  Has he not noticed we already are?

We will take back control over our laws

They claim the EU controls our laws.  It doesn’t.  Many ‘EU’ laws are actually part of UK law.  Only 13 percent of our laws have anything to do with the EU, and that figure includes all UK laws where the text simply mentions the EU.  The truth is The House of Commons Library researched this issue and Richard Corbett MEP quoted their answer in 2008 – only 9% of our laws come from the EU.

They claim the European Court of Justice has control over UK laws.  No; it is ‘the highest court in the European Union in matters of European Union law.’  EU laws, not ours.

And the Court can and does rule in our favour – it has just ruledthat the UK does not have to pay welfare benefits to unemployed EU migrants who have been here for less than 5 years.

We will build a fairer immigration system.

They say the European Courts will be in charge of who we let in, and who we can remove.  No.  We control legal migrants coming to this country.  Nor will leaving the EU stop the illegal migrants from Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere seeking asylum and what they believe will be a better life.  And international law says that we can legitimately return any illegal migrants to the last ‘safe’ country they passed through in order to reach the UK.

What they really want to get rid of is the free movement of Europeans coming here to work, while forgetting all the traffic going the other way.  Free movement across Europe is a boon to our young people.  Nor can we, as they claim, make a trade deal with Europe post-Exit without including free movement.  Norway and Switzerland have had to accept free movement as part of their trade deals.  And Norway pays per capita as much into the EU as the UK.

They say that recipients of EU funding would get the same money if the UK votes to leave.

They promise that EU funding projects for areas including farming, science, and culture would be continued until 2020.  But Brexit negotiations with the EU could go on beyond 2020.  Can we be sure the EU would still be willing to fund us during what could be acrimonious negotiations?  Nor does Vote leave mention that any trade deals with the EU post-Brexit would take many years more.  According to them, such deals would be set up in the twinkling of Boris Johnson’s eye.

And in their wild fantastical promises of what we could have if only we didn’t have to pay so much to the EU, they have theoretically spent several times over what they claim would be money going spare if we left the EU.  It brings up an image of children happily smashing a piggy bank and running off to the sweet shop, dropping half the money on the way.  And being sick afterwards when they realise that sweets aren’t food, don’t keep you warm or give you shelter.

But their dishonesty does not stop there.

They are now in trouble for using in their campaign material, the logos of international companies they imply support Brexit.  But those companies don’t support Vote Leave, and are quite rightly considering legal action.  As did the National Health Service back in March.

Vote Leave had a pop-up ad on websites and Facebook using a 23-year-old quote from Jeremy Corbyn when he was speaking against the Maastricht Treaty.  It asked people to ‘stand with Corbyn’: “if you agree with Jeremy, then Vote Leave”.  That has now disappeared, but it is still on their website.  They are also pulling the same trick with an old quote from Lord Peter Mandelson, once Tony Blair’s right-hand man.

The only campaign that even remotely equals this dishonest, crooked rubbish is that of Remain, headed by Prime Minister David Cameron.  And the sad and terrifying thing is that far too many people are willing to believe what they are told.  One side promises them an impossible economic nirvana if they vote to leave, while the other side terrifies them with an economic apocalypse – if they vote to leave.

The terrorist attack in Magnanville by alleged Da’esh (Islamic State) operative, Larossi Aballa, on two police officers in Paris, serves one purpose: to remind the public that the war on terror is real and that the police and army are here to protect the population, not oppress it. As protests and strikes continue against the ruling class assault on worker’s security (rights won through a century of indefatigable struggle), phantom enemies are the oligarchic state’s best friends. Phantom enemies allow the oligarchic state to force hostile citizens to seek their protection from the ‘greater evil’.

In the Middle East where they were created by the United States and Israel, the so-called ‘Islamic State’ (Da’esh) have attempted to do what former Western trained terrorists could not: to destroy Syria and Iraq through a large-scale military occupation of those countries. The French media portray the Islamic State as being a symptom of the nihilism and despair of our era; that is only partly the truth.

What is overlooked is the deep complicity of the French state in terrorism – the obscenely Machiavellian determination to use the most brutal barbarians seen in the modern era to implement Western imperial policy in the Middle East and throughout the world. The Islamic State is a mercenary force of the Deep State, the imperial financial order, the hidden hand of military and financial corporations and lobbyists who steer the policies of Western governments behind the scenes. They do not oppose ‘Western civilisation’, they serve it, massacring people such as those of Syria who, imbued with patriotism, heroism and piety, refuse to kneel and worship at the alter of Mammon.

We are told by Le Monde that the terrorist/patsy in the police attack, Larossi Aballa, used the Facebook Live application during the attack to propagandise his crimes. He is also reported to have threatened journalists.

Two points here –

1. Anyone with enough curiosity and intelligence to visit a good bookshop knows that the role of journalists in the capitalist world order is to be stenographers to power. A daily perusal of the corporate press proves the proposition unfailingly. It helps restore public confidence in the credibility of corporate journalists if they are ‘threatened’ every now and then; especially by the terrorists whose crimes they ignore when they are committed on behalf of Western geopolitical interests in foreign lands such as Syria.

2. The dissemination of truth through social media and the emergence of citizen journalists all over the world exposing the lies of the corporate press are undermining the public’s confidence in authority. Hence, the use of pseudonyms and the freedom to diffuse information must be curtailed. Fear not! The government will protect you by limiting your ability to research and share information.

The murder of the two police officers comes just days after police were caught on camera vandalising shops in an effort to discredit legitimate and peaceful protests against undemocratic labour reforms. It sends a powerful message: police are there to protect us from terrorists not oppress us on behalf of the ruling class!

Protests are turning violent on the streets of Paris with several cars being set alight by ‘Black Box’ anarchist protesters. These Black Box hooligans sabotage worker’s struggles every time they threaten the established order. Their actions are criminalising legitimate protests. The recent attacks on the Necker Hospital in Paris are acts of sabotage which are providing the pretext for the government to interdict further protests. It is clear the protest movement is hurting the ruling class.

The murder of the two police officers in Paris is an outrage which should be condemned by all. But it must be borne in mind that thousands of working-class policemen and soldiers unwittingly defend an execrable class of people who would not hesitate in murdering if political expediency required it.

As the class struggle intensifies on our streets, the police will be increasingly mobilised against the public. The ‘terrorist threat’ is more important than ever to sustain the illusion of government legitimacy and bludgeon the masses into submission to the police state. But history shows that the weakness of tyranny is that it always relies on servile classes whose loyalty is based more on cynicism and personal advancement than moral conviction. Thus, the possibility always exists for police revolt against the oligarchs. Understanding the precariousness of policing in tyranny is vital in activism. We must not hurl rocks and stones at the police but seek to win them over to the cause of popular democracy and freedom.

Gearóid Ó Colmáin is an Irish journalist and political analyst based in Paris. His work focuses on globalisation, geopolitics and class struggle.

Cambodia has been through a period of untold upheaval, which has resulted in the restructuring of its economy. Neoliberalism, or free market economics, has been introduced into Cambodia since the end of the Cold War, and more aggressively since the UNTAC began to administer the country in 1992. Subsequently, there have been dramatic consequences in the way Cambodia is administered, particularly in regard to government expenditure. As a result of neoliberal reforms, Cambodia’s government spending has remained extremely low, which has translated to insufficient investments in the education sector. Furthermore, neoliberal ideology promotes market based activities, meaning teachers in Cambodia, as a result of low spending in the education sector, receive an unsustainable wage and are forced into offering private tuition to their students. Inequalities in the quality of education that students can expect to receive, including levels of attainment, based on whether their households can afford private tutoring or not, have emerged as a result. This situation translates deeper into Cambodian society, where those who attain well in school are more likely to be able to demand better wages when in work. Significantly, income inequality has increased in Cambodia since the introduction of neoliberalism. 

1         Chapter One: Introduction

This dissertation seeks to understand the social consequences of neoliberal reforms in Cambodia. Given that the subject of neoliberalism is vast in any context, a literature review was completed in order to find an area which required further investigation within the framework of neoliberalism in Cambodia. Following the analysis of literature surrounding the social consequences of neoliberal reforms in Cambodia since the 1990s, a gap within the literature was identified. Subsequent to the review of the relevant literature, it is clear that there is a lack of research surrounding the neoliberalisation of Cambodia’s education system and whether this has impacted on inequalities within the country. This dissertation will answer the following question in order to gain a deeper understanding of the void found within the literature; How have neoliberal structural reforms affected the education system in Cambodia, and how has this impacted on inequalities within the country since the 1990s?

1.1       Aims of Research

This thesis aims to analyse how neoliberal reforms have impacted on Cambodia’s population, specifically to understand how inequalities in outcomes of children’s education has been affected. The project aims to understand how neoliberal structural reforms within the Cambodian economy have affected how children have been impacted in ways relating to their educational attainment. Moreover, the paper will seek to understand how impacts on children’s educational attainment effects their socio-economic status later in life based on data relating to income inequalities within Cambodia. Consequently, the project aims to understand how the neoliberalisation of the Cambodian economy has affected the country’s education system and whether this, as a result of the policies associated with such neoliberal reforms, has any bearing on the equity outcomes of those who depend on the state for their education.

In 1991, after many years of violent conflict within Cambodia and the surrounding region, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) established a transitional authority under the auspice of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC), which effectively governed the country for two years beginning in 1992 (Gottesman, 2003, p.342-345). The UNTAC was mandated to control and administer many components of the Cambodian state and to deal with many of the issues associated with a country that had suffered from years of violent conflict, including; the Military, Police, Elections, Economy, Civil Administration, Rehabilitation, Human Rights and Repatriation (UNRISD, 1993, p.8). One of the main components of the UNTAC was to ‘ensure a neutral political environment conducive to free and fair general elections’ (Peace Accords Matrix, Article 6, 2015). Given that the United Nations (UN) has, since the beginning of the 1980s, subscribed to the ideology of neoliberalism (Free market economics, achieved through privatisation, deregulation and liberalisation) it is unsurprising that the Cambodian People’s Party (CCP), after winning the election organised by the UN were committed to following the same ideology (Gottesman, 2003, p. 345). In fact, Article 56 of the Cambodian Constitution (Cambodia, 2010) states that the country is committed to enabling a free market economy.

1.2       Theoretical Underpinnings

1.2.1       Neoliberalism

This paper will use different theoretical underpinnings in order to explain and understand the issues relating to matters of equity within the Cambodian education sector, providing an enhanced comprehension of how this translates in Cambodia’s society. The theory of neoliberalism will provide the focal point in this paper in order to understand how Cambodia’s education sector has been impacted since the early 1990s, and how this has played out in issues of equity within the country’s population. Neoliberalism is a theory which began to emerge in the 1970s as an alternative to variants of the Keynesian approach of development economics, according to Willis (2011, p.52). The Keynesian theory of economics advocated state intervention at a national level, rather than allowing market forces to determine outcomes, in order to more efficiently utilise resources, better providing for societies. Neoliberalism, on the other hand, came about as a result of a number of economists challenging Keynesian theory, suggesting that state intervention was creating inefficiencies, leading to slower economic growth. The key components of neoliberalism include reductions in government expenditure, privatisation of state owned assets, reduction of government regulation, increased significance of the free market and an emphasis on individualism, or individual responsibility, according to Payne and Phillips (2011, p,87). Harvey (2005, p.88) claims that Thatcher and Regan adopted the tenets of neoliberalism in the 1980s after both the UK and US experienced difficult economic times, but the policies adopted by both governments resulted in high unemployment mixed with, as a result of the cuts in social welfare, a reduction in the quality of life for many and increasing income inequality.

John Williamson coined the term ‘Washington Consensus’ is his writings concerned with economics at the end of the 1980s, according to Marangos (2009, p.350). The Washington Consensus refers to the situation when the world’s dominant international financial institutions (IFIs), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, which are located in Washington, USA, agreed upon a set of economic reforms, aimed at increasing economic growth, for Latin American countries which were experiencing economic strain in the 1980s. The Washington Consensus assumed that the Keynesian approach of development, which had influenced many South American country’s leaders, who had implemented protectionist policies such as Import Substitution Industrialisation (ISI), had come to an end (Willis, 2011, p. 77). The phrase has evolved over time, but is contemporarily understood to refer to the IMF and World Bank and their methodology (Serra, Spiegel & Stiglitz, 2004, p.3), who have adopted a neoliberal development approach aimed at privatising state owned assets, liberalising economies (opening up to foreign investment), emphasising the free market, and reducing the role of the state. Not only were the World Bank and IMF associated with the Washington consensus because of the geographical locations of their head offices, but because many argued that their aims are a reflection of the interests of the United States, according to Woods (2011, p.251). The IMF and World Bank were formed at the Bretton Woods conference in 1944 with the aim of providing a framework for a stable post-war economy (Gore, 2000, p. 789). Since their formation the World Bank and IMF have adopted different economic development models but, since the beginning of the 1980s, have embraced the neoliberal development model.

1.2.2       Structural Adjustment Programmes

In order for the World Bank and IMF to implement neoliberal policies throughout the world they have used, since the end of the 1970s, Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPS). SAPs are often agreed upon by national governments in order to receive financial support or loans from the Bretton Woods Institutions, according to Willis (2011, p.57). SAPs reflect the neoliberal free market ideology of both the Ragan and Thatcher (Craig and Potter, 2006, p.55) governments of the 1980s, and their implementation have demonstrated how the Global North has been able to influence the economies of the Global South. SAPs arose as a result of many governments in the Global South becoming unable to keep up with interest rate payments on debt borrowed from commercial banks in the 1970s. In response to this situation the IMF and the World Bank offered loans to countries suffering from balance of payments problems. In order to secure loans from the IMF and World Bank recipient countries were required to ‘structurally adjust’ or accept ‘conditions’ set out by the two institutions, which were deeply rooted in neoliberal ideology, according to O’Brian and Williams (2010, p.193).

Governments that adopt SAPs are required to introduce a number of different policies in order to reduce the role of the state in the running of the economy. SAPs comprise of two main policy groups, as Stiglitz (2002, p.14) highlights; i) stabilization measures, and ii) adjustment measures. Stabilisation measures included freezing government spending on public-sector wages, reducing governments spending (including on health and education) and currency devaluation. These measures were supposed to stabilize recipient economies, which would then lead onto a number of structural measures being introduced. Structural measures include the opening up of the national economy to foreign direct investment (FDI), tax system reform, which often lead to reduced taxes for the wealthy and large multi-national corporations (MNCs) and privatization of state-owned assets, such as electricity production, postal services or transport networks. According to Stiglitz (2002, p.14) the Bretton Woods institutions took a simplistic view when implementing SAPs, assuming that all countries, regardless of their differing economic problems, all needed the same structural reforms. Thomas (2008, p.424) claims that the IMF and World Bank’s blanket treatment of different countries with different problems was inappropriate and resulted in an inability to deliver economic growth, while having detrimental environmental and social consequences.

SAPS are now known to have had very negative outcomes in a great number of places where they have been implemented (Willis, 2011, p.58). Neoliberal policies introduced as part of SAPs, such as reducing the size of the state, removing barriers to foreign investment and currency devaluations, in many cases, have had serious consequences. Although, in some cases, SAPs may have had the desired economic stabilization outcomes, there have been severe consequences in terms of human welfare where they have been implemented. Thomas (2008, p.431) argues that IMF and World Bank SAPs implemented throughout the 1980s and 1990s reduced the availability of health care and education services as public expenditure was reduced. The privatization of public utilities meant that as well as reduced health care and education, user fees were introduced for necessities such as water. Bonal (2002, p. 7) states that SAPs have had very specific negative outcomes in countries where adjustments have taken place, explaining that reductions in per capita expenditure on education has had damaging consequences. Increases on student absenteeism, failing schools and reduced access to primary and secondary education are all symptomatic of reductions in education expenditure as a result of SAPs. The reductions in salaries or continuing low salaries for teachers are a particularly pertinent negative consequence of SAPs. Teachers who receive low salaries are often forced into supplementing their income by other means, for example, charging students for parts of their education which is essential if they are to pass their examinations (Bray and Bunly, 2005, p. 75).

Willis (2011, p.58) states that there was a growing awareness of the negative consequences associated with IMF and World Bank SAPs towards the end of the 1990s. In response to the this negative publicity the Bretton Woods institutions decided to remould the SAPs, which involved giving them new names and paying more attention to the needs of the poorest people where the policies were implemented. The new ‘Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers’ (PRSPs) are, however, often thought to include the same damaging elements of SAPs and have resulted in limited improvements, according to Shah (2013).

1.2.3       Inequalities

This paper, which focusses on the social consequences of neoliberal reforms, will investigate how such reforms have impacted on inequalities within Cambodia’s education sector. Inequality within countries is often understood as the differing share of wealth or income that people living within a country experience, according to Greg, Hulme and Turner (2007, p.11). Inequality is not only relating to the share of wealth, but includes, among other things, the unequal level of access to education and health care services members of a society can expect to receive. Wilkinson and Pickett (2009), in their book The Spirit Level, argue that large inequalities within countries not only damage the ‘poor’ but have negative outcomes for everybody within a given society. However, on an individual level, rather than on a societal level, it is clearly the poorest people within a society who are burdened more severely by the effects of large inequalities rather than the most wealthy, as Platt (2011, p.132) explains.

Income Inequality has severe impacts on life expectancy, educational attainment, infant mortality, social mobility, violence within societies, levels of trust between different  socio-economic groups, obesity and imprisonment rates, according to Wilkinson and Pickett (2009, p 19). Therefore, poor people within societies which suffer from higher levels of inequality can expect to live shorter lives, receive a lower standard of education, be more likely to engage in illegal activities and be at risk of being subjected to, or involved in violent behaviour than more wealthy members of society.

Income inequality affects the ability of members of a society to access and take advantage of the services which lead to a more prosperous life. Education plays a significant role in a person’s ability to earn money. Those who are able to achieve the highest educational attainment are more likely to be able to demand a better standard of living and those who cannot are not. In their study, Wilson and Pickett (2009, p.161) conclude that levels of public expenditure on education impacts on inequalities within countries. Where public expenditure on education is high, compared with levels of private expenditure, there is a higher degree of social mobility. Consequently, there is a correlation between levels of public expenditure on education and levels of inequality within countries. This is particularly pertinent given that neoliberal policies favour the reduction in size of the state, which includes cutbacks in spending on social services, health care and, significantly, education. The Gini Coefficient measure of income inequality will be used in this paper to determine the effects of neoliberal reforms on income equity within Cambodia since 1993. Todaro (1997, p.145) explains that the Gini coefficients are cumulative measures of inequality which vary on a scale of 0 (absolute equality) to 100 (absolute inequality).

1.2.4       Millennium Development Goals

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) consist of eight goals set out at the United Nations Millennium Summit in September 2000. The second goal, to achieve universal primary education, is particularly pertinent in the context of this dissertation. This paper will analyse the effects of the goal to achieve universal primary education and how this has impacted on Cambodia’s society. Given that the United Nation’s (2014, p.16) target was to achieve this particular goal by the end of 2015; a perfect opportunity has arisen to assess the implications of this particular MDG in the context of the neoliberal agenda.

The United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) stance regarding government intervention within economies contradicts that of the IFIs, such as the World Bank and IMF. The UNDP recognises that neoliberal policies, such as privatisation of public services and reductions in government expenditure, can be detrimental to members of society who depend on social services. In the Human Development Report (UNDP, 2003, p. 114) the UNDP acknowledges that user fees for education discourage poor families from sending their children to school. Consequently, this is not conducive to realizing universal primary education and is a factor which is likely to result in the failure of this particular MGD. The UNDP (2014, p.85) argue that universal basic education diminishes the disparity in the quality of education children from wealthy and poor backgrounds receive. On the subject of user fees, such as children having to buy their education, the UNDP claims that access to universal basic education should be free to all and that the quality and quantity of education should not be linked to a person’s ability to pay. Therefore, governments have a responsibility to provide universal basic education to all without users being charged in the process, if universal basic education is to be achieved.

The United Nations Millennium Project (2005, p. 28) claims that for governments to rely solely on the market, avoiding public expenditure, will not lead to wealth ‘trickling down’ from top to bottom, as is often cited as an intended consequence of neoliberal development. Therefore, the United Nations Millennium Project encourages both marketand government in order for a society to achieve the MDGs. Furthermore, it states that it is misrepresentative to give emphasis to the importance of economic growth in the context of achieving the MDGs. Greig, Hulme and Turner (2007, p. 155) point to the experiences of many poorer countries who have had their economies structurally adjusted by the IFIs, as a condition of securing loans, as an example of policies which have relied on the market while overlooking the needs of populations. In such circumstances governments are required to redress deficits in their budgets, but rather than increase taxes on the wealthy, reductions in expenditure on health care and education are often seen as a priority. It is policies such as this, which reflect neoliberal ideology, that disproportionately impact on poor communities and hinder the chance of achieving the MDGs.

Regarding the MDGs, Unterhalter (2013, p.5) claims that although the MDGs have increased enrolment rates in many developing countries, which has contributed to the move towards universal primary education, there are a number of caveats which counter the claim that the MDGs are proving successful. Unterhalter claims that the focus on universal primary education has come at the expense of the quality of education. For example, although more children might be in school, they are often likely to be in classes which have dramatically increased numbers of students with the same amount of teaching staff, leading to a reduction in the quality of education. Furthermore, while many developing countries have been focused on providing universal primary education, attention has moved away from other educational sectors, at the expense of secondary, higher and adult education. Heyneman (2009) claims that the World Bank bears some responsibility for this due to moving donor focus towards primary education, while fostering an unwilling attitude towards assistance in other departments of education. Given that the IFIs neoliberal policies, implemented through SAPs, are often responsible for the reductions in education budgets in many developing countries who have adopted such restructuring measures, it is clear there has been a conflict between different UN agencies (Untehalter, 2013, p.16). Therefore, it is likely that a lack of consensus between the IFIs and other UN agencies, regarding the importance of providing quality education and increasing education budgets, has been a factor in the inability to meet the MDG so far.

2          Chapter Two: Reflective Discussion, Methodology and Dissertation Structure

2.1       Reflective Discussion

The author of this dissertation has selected the topic of study for a number of reasons. Firstly, the author has spent several years living in South-East Asia and has first-hand experience of the issues which this dissertation is seeking to understand; those being the impacts of neoliberal reforms and their resulting outcomes with regard to inequality. The effects of neoliberalism have been of particular interest throughout the author’s degree, prompting a desire to further investigate the impacts of such policies, in relation to inequality, within Cambodia.

This dissertation draws on a large amount of literature in order to make conclusions regarding the equity implications of neoliberal reforms in Cambodia. A number of key readings from different themes (neoliberalism, inequality, MDGs and Education in Cambodia), chosen due to their relevance to the selected topic, provide the backbone for this dissertation from which the final conclusions have be drawn. Springer (2010) provided a detailed understanding into the history of Cambodia’s neoliberalisation, describing how the country started to undertake neoliberal structural reforms, simultaneously with the end of the cold war and the subsequent involvement of the UNTAC. Wilkinson and Pickett (2009) and Greig, Hulme and Turner (2007) in their respective books provided the author with an insight into contemporary issues surrounding global and domestic inequalities related to market led neoliberal development. Furthermore, Greig, Hulme and Turner (2007) elaborate on the implications of the MDGs and the challenges faced by the countries adopting such goals. The MDGs are particularly pertinent in Cambodia’s case with regard to the education system, as they affect the quality of education provided by the state, as mentioned previously. Brehm and Silova (2014), Lall and Sakellariou (2010) and Bray and Bunly (2005) have provided invaluable information relating directly to Cambodia’s education sector. All of their writings use a combination of qualitative and quantitative, primary and secondary research relating to household financing of primary education, the evolution of private fees for tutoring after the UNTAC and equity implications of private tutoring in Cambodia. All of the above literature has shed light on the issues that they aim to highlight, although none are directly focussing on the neoliberalisation of Cambodia’s education system and the related equity implications. The author has used the mentioned literature, and multiple other relevant sources, in order to formulate an answer to the question posed above.

2.2       Methodology (Research Methods)

This paper has been compiled using a mixed methods approach, including both Qualitative and Quantitative data in order to draw conclusions. The data and information used has been drawn only from secondary sources relating to the research topic. The materials gathered for this research have come from a number of different sources. Literature relating to the subject has been utilised, all of which have provided relevant qualitative information in order to draw conclusions relating to the research. Reports from a number of international institutions have contributed to the research, providing both qualitative and quantitative data, helping to focus on the outcomes of neoliberal reforms within Cambodia. However, it must be noted that many international institutions, including the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) subscribe to the theory of neoliberalism. Governmental reports have made up a proportion of the quantitative data used in this research paper, drawing statistical data concerning the subject matter. Peer-reviewed journal articles have provided a significant amount of information included in this study, all of which have been accessed through the university library system, including platforms such as EBSCO Academic Search Complete, JSTOR and Taylor & Francis Journals Complete. The specific range of sources has been selected as a result of their relevance to this particular dissertation, and has enabled the author to present the following thesis.

2.3       Dissertation Structure

This paper will take the following structure. Chapter three will focus on giving a historical background of Cambodia and neoliberal structural reforms within the country. Firstly, an introduction to the historical background of Cambodia will be provided, endowing the reader with the necessary knowledge and understanding of the pertinent issues in the country’s history relating to the dissertation. Secondly, Cambodia’s neoliberal structural reforms will be examined, giving the reader an understanding of when and why such reforms have been implemented, and how this has impacted those living in the country. Moving on, chapter three will assess more closely how Cambodia has implemented neoliberal reforms. Firstly, the section will focus on the international financial institution’s (IFIs) involvement in restructuring the Cambodian economy. Secondly, IFI implemented Structural Adjustment lending and the associated conditionality will be examined, seeking to determine what bearing they have had on the Cambodian economy and how this has reflected on the education system.  Finally in chapter three, an analysis of Cambodia’s self-imposed adjustment will be conducted, with an emphasis on the extent to which the country was ready to open its economy regardless of involvement from the IFIs.

Chapter four will consist of the analysis of the implications of neoliberal reforms in Cambodia and how this has impacted on inequalities in the country. Firstly, an analysis of the effects that neoliberal policies have had on government expenditure will be undertaken, seeking to find how this has impacted on the population. Secondly, a closer look at reductions in government expenditure will focus on the repercussions for the education sector, where the impacts of Cambodia’s commitments to the MDGs, simultaneous with the impacts of neoliberal policies, will be examined. Next, the effects of neoliberal policies on education will be scrutinised, exploring whether informal fees and larger class sizes are impacting on inequalities in levels of attainment outcomes for students depending on socio-economic status. Moving on, Gini coefficient data will be used in order to gain a deeper understanding of the levels of income inequality within Cambodia since the introduction of neoliberal economic reforms in the early 1990s, and how this is related to the level of education members of Cambodian society have received.  Chapter four will finish by assessing the overall equity implications of neoliberal reforms on the Cambodian education sector. Finally, Chapter five will offer conclusions based on the findings of this dissertation.

3  Chapter Three: Historical Background of Cambodia and Neoliberal Reforms

This chapter will give an outline of Cambodia’s history since receiving independence from France in 1953 and will investigate how neoliberal structural reforms have been implemented. The first part of this chapter is dedicated to exploring Cambodia’s history and the first phase of the country’s economic reforms. The second part of this chapter is devoted to further understanding how Cambodia’s economy has been exposed to neoliberal reforms. The UNTAC’s impacts on the country will be analysed, giving an understanding of how the country undertook its second economic reform, which further imbedded neoliberal ideology within Cambodia.

3.1       Cambodia Before Adjustment

Since Cambodia received its independence from France in 1953 the country experienced untold upheaval. Cambodia has been involved in the Vietnam War, leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths at the hands of United States (US) forces, according to Springer (2010, p. 1). Following this, between 1970 and 1975, Cambodia was ruled by a US-backed military Junta (Fergusson and Masson, 1997, p.91), which was played out in the backdrop of the Cold War, while the United States were trying to gain influence in the region. Cambodia’s people then suffered hugely at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, who introduced communism to the country, ruling between 1975 and 1979 where every aspect of the Cambodian people’s lives were controlled by the state . Guo (2006, p.49) claims that Pol Pot had set out to implement an ambitious economic experiment which attempted to achieve a self-reliant communist state dependent on agricultural production, which failed to provide enough food for the country’s population.  By the time the Khmer Rouge were overthrown in 1979 the regime had been responsible for the deaths of nearly two million people in what has been named the ‘killing fields’, according to Vannath (2002, p.303). Furthermore, the fall of the Khmer Rouge was brought about by the invasion of Vietnamese forces, which were responsible for the implementation of a Vietnam-backed government, bringing about more upheaval for Cambodia’s people. Fighting within the country continued between the new government forces and the Khmer Rouge.

In 1981 parliamentary elections resulted in the pro-Vietnamese Kampuchean People’s Revolutionary Party gaining power, which the international community refused to recognise, because of its commitment to communism.  Hen Sen became Prime Minister in in 1985, while intense fighting continued within the country, as a result of the bipolar tensions created by the Cold War, which Cambodia had become involved with. In 1989 Vietnamese troops left Cambodia and Hen Sen, in response to the collapsing communist world (East Germany), began taking small steps towards introducing market reforms (Kilmister, 2004, p.310), which resulted in the reversal of state controls. This issue was compounded with the loss of support from the Soviet Union who were themselves implementing market reforms (perestroika), according to Buszynski (2013, p.88) and were more interested in rebuilding their relationship with China than dealing with time and resource consuming issues in Southeast Asia (Gottesman, 2003, p.277). Following the breakdown of the Soviet Union and the loss of support that was received by from them, Cambodia began to experience severe financial difficulties by the end of 1989, as Gottesman (2003, p.316) explains, which promoted the rate at which the Cambodian government implemented economic reforms in the country, opening up the country to neoliberal ideology and a liberalised economy.

Cambodian authorities began to implement economic reforms throughout the 1980s under the guidance of Hen Sen, which had been prompted by structural changes taking place elsewhere in the socialist world, according to Gottesman (2003, p.276). This period, Hughes (2003, p.2) explains represented the first phase of Cambodia’s transition away from the communist experiment and towards a free market economy. The Soviet Union had begun a process of economic reforms under Mikhail Gorbachev, where state enterprises were beginning to be exposed to market forces after having been granted a limited level of autonomy, which highlights the transition of the Soviet economy away from communism and towards the free market, as Willis (2011, p. 90) explained. Given that the Soviet Union was withdrawing their support for many socialist countries, Cambodia was in effect being sent the message to stand on its own feet and Gorbachev encouraged the Cambodian government to improve relations with their capitalist neighbours in the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) region, according to Hughes (2003, p.2) . This stance was echoed by Thailand’s Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhaven who encouraged Cambodia to ‘turn battlefields into market places’, as Szalontai (2011, p.155) highlights. Hughes (2003, p.40) identified that as a consequence of the departure of Soviet aid towards the end of the 1980s, Cambodia experienced a huge financial deficit, which contributed to leaders having to accept that a structural transition was inevitable. Furthermore, resources which the Cambodian government had relied on, such as oil, vehicles, building materials and medicines had ceased to be supplied from the Soviet Union. Of particular concern was Cambodia’s lack of fuel, which was needed in order to continue the ongoing military campaign. Subsequently, as Gottesman (2003, p.316) states, Hen Sen was forced to look at other areas for fuels and had little alternative but to turn to private Thai companies to supply fuels to the country, which further highlights Cambodia’s economic transition.

Many Cambodian students living in Moscow were being introduced to ideas of Perestroika (Restructuring) and were bringing these ideas back with them to Cambodia, which increased the rate at which the country adjusted towards a market based economy, Guo (2006, p.50) argues. Additionally, from the end of the 1970s, state cadres had been unofficially permitted to partake in market based wealth generating activities in order to supplement their incomes. As a consequence of this, state doctors and teachers, for example, began to provide private consultations and lessons in order to generate income. This situation increased calls for economic reforms within the country, as those who were enjoying supplemented incomes had an incentive to move towards a free market economy, according to Gottesman (2003, p.281). Significantly, these wealth generating activities conducted by state employees have had profound implications with regard to Cambodia’s education sector as the practice of teachers charging fees has continued until now (Bray and Bundy, 2005, p.40). However, currently teachers wages are so low within Cambodia that they are unable to sustain themselves or their families and are subsequently put in a position where they are required to charge fees to students in order to feed their families, as Bray and Bunly (2005, p.81) explain.

3.2       Historical Background of Neoliberal Reforms in Cambodia

On 23rd October 1991, in an attempt to bring peace and stability to Cambodia, the Paris Peace Agreements (PPA) were signed by 19 governments and the opposing factions within Cambodia, which represented the second phase of Cambodia’s transition towards a free market economy, suggests Hughes (2003, p.2). Upon signing the agreement it was decided that the United Nations would send a mission to the country which would oversee the proposed ceasefire, supervise the drafting of a new constitution and prepare Cambodia for democratic elections (OHCHR, 2011).

The stated aim of the UNTAC was to disarm the remnants of the conflict that had been ongoing for over two decades and to bring about a ceasefire with the intention of creating a neutral environment in order for political parties to contest “free and fair” elections. Once elected, the new government, as a condition of the PPA, was tasked with drafting a new constitution which enshrined human rights and basic freedoms, according to Hendrickson (1998, p. 44). Along with these specific aims of the UNTAC, it has also been noted by Springer (2010, p.5) that the mission furthered the free market neoliberal reforms which the government prior to the UN’s involvement had been adopting. Springer (2010) describes how these reforms have intensified social problems that had already existed within the country, such as low levels of education, poor health care and inequality. Given that the United Nations and its affiliated financial institutions, the World Bank and IMF, have adopted neoliberal reforms as the best means of achieving development aims, which have been achieved through the implementation of SAPs, it is unsurprising that such a situation has arisen. As Scholte (2005, p.11) suggested in a report for the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, ‘Marketization through privatization, liberalization and deregulation has not fulfilled—and shows little sign of fulfilling—a panglossian dream of maximal well-being for all humankind.’

Prior to the arrival of the UNTAC in 1992 a separate mission was sent to Cambodia under the auspice of the United Nations Advanced Mission in Cambodia (UNAMIC) in 1991, which was put in place in order to preserve the ceasefire and prepare the country for the arrival of the UNTAC (Curtis, 1993, p. 7). On 15 March 1992 the UNTAC arrived in Cambodia and began its work while taking over the duties of the UNAMIC. The UNTAC, at its peak, consisted of more than 20,000 staff from around the globe, the vast majority of whom were military personnel, while a large numbers were also operating in the country in order to oversee the election process (UN, 2014). While the UNTAC was governing the country there was a distinct lack of investments or loans made available for the country’s rehabilitation, with many aid donors, including the World Bank and IMF, choosing to wait for the outcome of the election process before committing large sums into Cambodia (UNRISD, 1993, p.11). However, of the investments that were made in the country during the UNTAC mission many were committed to longer term infrastructure projects, while leaving the social sector, including education, severely underfunded. This pattern has consistently led to worsening social conditions in many of the countries where neoliberal reforms have been implemented (Scholte, 2005, p.11). The UNTAC’s mission culminated in an election being held in May 1993 (Duffy, 1994, p.2). Considering that Cambodia’s people had been subjected to such violence, and were still being intimidated by government and opposition forces, the turn out in the election was high. As Duffy (1994, p.2)  explains, of those registered to vote more than 90 percent made it to the ballot boxes and cast their vote.

3.3       International Financial Institutions involvement in Cambodian Reforms

Upon the completion of elections within Cambodia in 1993, when a coalition government was formed between the Front Uni National pour un Cambodge Indépendent, Neutre, Pacifique et Coopératif (FUNCINPEC) and the Cambodian People’s Party (CPP), international aid and loans became the responsibility of the newly elected government (Hughes, 2003, p.2). Although, in the election which took place a majority government was not formed and a formal power-sharing agreement was agreed, with two co-Prime Ministers running the country. Hen-Sen, who was one of those co-prime ministers, has, in effect, been Prime Minister of Cambodia since 1985 until today. Subsequent to elections being held in Cambodia in 1993 the government committed to implement neoliberal structural reforms, according to Springer (2010, p.5), which is consistent with the self-imposed structural reforms Hen-Sen had already started to implement as a response to the collapse of the Soviet Union and the communist world. Consequently, Cambodia’s new government included in Article 56 (Cambodia, 2010) of its constitution that the country would commit to fostering a free market economy, essentially signing the country’s reforms into law.  Ojendal (2006, p.194) claims that although the stated aim of the UNTAC was to bring about elections and to create a peaceful society, but rather the key objective of the mission was to establish Cambodia as a liberal economic state, fully incorporated into the international economy. The IMF and World Bank appear to have convinced the country’s new government that, with the offer of conditional loans or Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), neoliberal policies would be the correct path for the country to take.

3.4       Structural Adjustment and Conditionality Implications in Cambodia

Given that the bipolar system the world experienced during the Cold War had come to a close, those countries which had relied on Soviet development assistance had little alternative but to accept assistance from the West’s now dominant IFIs, the World Bank and IMF, and the conditionality which came with it, according to Springer (2010, p.30). Effectively, Cambodia had no alternative but to accept World Bank and IMF SAPs, which were designed in order to liberalise economies. Such liberalisation, as mentioned above, involve reducing the state’s involvement in the working of the economy, reductions in government spending (including health and education), privatization of state owned assets, wage freezes, deregulation of industry and the removal of subsidies from, for example, public utilities and transport. Almost as soon as the UNTAC mission left Cambodia in 1993 the newly formed government adopted SAPs as a condition of loans secured from the World Bank and IMF in accordance with the country’s new constitution, explains Springer (2010, p.76). Soon after the adoption of SAPs, Cambodia was receiving so much foreign assistance from outside donors that it had been drawn into a pattern of dependency, which resulted in the country being less able to negotiate the conditions attached to loans (Hendrickson, 2011). The IMF and World Bank have continued to promote SAPs in Cambodia, sometimes under different names (Enhanced Structural Adjustment Facility, Structural Adjustment Credits), since the 1990s. Cambodia has experienced problems as a consequence of SAPs, which has stemmed from the associated conditions imposed in return for loans. Hughes (2003, p. 45) has highlighted the extent to which SAPs have negatively impacted on Cambodia through the marketization of the economy and deregulation of industry. Hughes explains how SAPs encouraged the exploitation of Cambodia’s natural resources by private companies who, operating under an unregulated system, were able to exploit vast areas of Cambodia’s rainforests, generating large amounts of income which has not benefitted Cambodian society.

The structural changes which have taken place since the end of the 1980s have resulted in a change in relationship between the Cambodian government and society, which has consolidated the position of the state elites and lead to increased inequality between the rich and poor, according to Hughes (2003, p.38). Bray and Bunly (2005, p.81) highlight that economic development has taken on a more significant position amongst the countries leaders when compared to government spending on welfare and, significantly, education. This situation, like in many developing countries around the world, is a result of the implementation of SAPs which require governments to prioritise economic growth over social matters. Although substantial public investments were made within Cambodia in the aftermath of the UNTAC organised elections, it has been discovered that these investments have been focussed on improving the country’s infrastructure, while ignoring other areas, according to Hughes (2003, p.38). Developments have occurred with enhancements to the electricity, transport and communications networks, but investments failed to reach both the education and healthcare sectors between 1996 and 2001. Springer (2010, p. 29) suggests that the introduction of the neoliberal style free market reforms within Cambodia, and elsewhere, are related to social and economic inequalities. Springer concludes that those members of society with greater access to economic resources are more able to influence government decision making. Therefore, the wealthy are able to demand policies which are disproportionately beneficial to them when compared with those who are less economically endowed. Such influence over the state leads to policies which have resulted in uneven access to education, with poor and vulnerable members of society being less able to access quality education.

3.5       Education Sector Reforms

Since the beginning of Hen Sen’s economic restructuring of the Cambodian economy in the 1980s, and simultaneous with the adoption of neoliberal reforms, Cambodia’s public education sector has taken on characteristics which are usually associated with the private sector; the requirement of students to pay fees for their education (Brehm and Silova, 2014). Although fees are informal and the Cambodian government have attempted to forbid the practice, many students are required to pay such fees to teachers in order to receive the education they need to progress from grade to grade. Teachers will often miss out important parts of the curriculum in normal lessons, while charging students to attend before and after school classes for the critical information they need to be able to pass exams and, consequently, progress to the next stage of their education, as Bray and Lykins (2012, p.43) describes. Teachers have found themselves in a position where their wages are not adequate to sustain their needs, especially those with families and children and have been forced into charging fees to students to supplement their incomes (Bray and Bunly, 2005, p.75). Informal fees have effectively become a necessary component of Cambodia’s underfunded education system. Given that the government has committed to neoliberal policies, the occurrence of Cambodia’s informal or unregulated education system reflects the overall mantra of neoliberalism; deregulation, privatization, reductions in government spending and the exposure of formerly public services to market mechanisms.

During the first decade of the 21st century Cambodia managed to increase its education enrolment rates significantly, in line with the MDG of providing universal primary education, however, dropout rates in primary schools are prevalent (Lall and Sakellariou, 2010, p.333). Significantly, Cambodia continues to perform among the worst countries in the world in terms of educational attainment and holds the unenviable position of having the worst literacy rates in the ASIAN region except for Laos. The most significant factor influencing whether a child can attend school is whether his/her family can afford it or not, which is resulting in the situation where the poorest families are more severely affected by the indirect costs of sending children to school, as Bray (2007, p.27). For example, a child who has been sent to school will not be earning money for the family. Therefore, a child attending school costs a family the upfront costs associated with schooling (uniform, transport), foregoes potential earnings while at school and may have to pay informal fees to their teachers. Bray and Bundy (2005) claim that both the direct and indirect costs act as an obstacle to the poorest members of society in Cambodia. Thus, the neoliberal policies implemented in Cambodia, which have resulted in the introduction of informal tutoring fees, are contributing to socio-economic inequalities within the country (Lall and Sakellariou, 2010 p.334).

BANGKOK — For years, it was a poorly kept secret. Thailand’s fishing industry — a key supplier to the US — is entangled in barbaric slavery.

Today, slave labor on Thai trawlers is no longer a secret. It’s a worldwide scandal.

Wave after wave of damning investigations — previously by GlobalPost, most recently by The Guardian — have helped reveal an underground trade in which men are press-ganged into toiling on the seas for zero pay.

Smuggled from poor villages in Myanmar or Cambodia, with promises of jobs on land, men and teen boys are instead forced onto Thai-owned boats plying distant waters. Quitting is forbidden. Disobedience is punished with beatings, dismemberment and worse.

Many of these migrants — and the Thai boatmen who lord over them — have told GlobalPost that murder on Thai trawlers is practically routine. As one Thai crewman explained: “I saw an entire foreign crew shot dead… The boss didn’t want to pay up so he lined them up on the side of the boat and shot them one by one.”

This practice’s horrors have become so well known that — after years of giving Thailand a pass — the US may announce sanctions against the Southeast Asian nation this week.

The implications could be huge for Thailand’s $7 billion global seafood industry. Thailand is America’s second-largest seafood supplier thanks in large part to Western appetites for cheap shrimp and fish sticks.

But there is one commodity churned out by this industry that’s notoriously reliant on forced labor. It’s called “trash fish” — and it’s as unpleasant as it sounds.

Trash fish doesn’t refer to a single species. It’s a catch-all term for two types of wild-caught seafood: species that are unpalatable (to human tongues, at least) and species that would grow into big, tasty fish if nets had not snared them so young.

Trash fish are only valuable once they’re ground to a mush used to produce livestock feed, pet chow, fish oil and cheap processed food

The link between trash fish and forced labor is clear. The accounts of escaped slaves indicate that victims invariably work on Thai-owned trawlers, small vessels that travel vast distances to dredge trash fish in giant nets.

Southeast Asia’s seas are so overfished that high-value species are increasingly rare. The scarcity of quality fish forces trawler captains to scour for loads and loads of trash fish — a grueling, labor-intensive chore.

“There is great pressure to drive down costs,” said Steve Trent, executive director of the London-based Environmental Justice Foundation, which has conducted extensive investigations into forced labor on Thai trawlers. “In some people’s minds, that’s practically legitimized the use of slave labor.”

“The fisheries are out of control,” Trent said. “There is no effective management. In a relatively short time, since the industrial trawlers were introduced to the region, you’ve had a more than 90 percent decline in catch. They’re crumbling beneath the weight of this mismanagement.”

Much of the supply chain from trawler net to supermarket is simply not monitored or properly policed. By the time slavery-tainted fish reaches the shore, the origins have been obscured by a series of fishmongers and middlemen. The system is so murky that seafood companies can’t honestly assert that their trash fish purchases are slavery free.

“They claimed they don’t know. Or they’re preferred to look the other way,” Trent said. “But now you have clear evidence of abuse in the production of trash fish … and you cannot be sure you don’t have something on your shelves that does not have slavery or forced labor in its production.”

Here are three items reliant on trash fish that you may find in your pantry or freezer:

Shrimp: Thailand is the world’s largest shrimp exporter and and America’s largest foreign shrimp supplier.

The shrimp aren’t directly farmed using forced labor. But shrimp are often fed the mushed-up sea life collected on slave boats. “That has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt,” Trent said. The Guardian has directly implicated the planet’s largest shrimp exporter — a massive Thailand-based conglomerate called CP Foods — in feeding slave-caught trash fish to shrimp.

CP Foods has long sold shrimp to Wal-Mart and Costco as well as Tesco, a UK-headquartered superstore chain, and France’s Carrefour. So far, only Carrefour has stopped buying shrimp from CP Foods following Guardian’s expose.

Dog and cat food: Ground-up trash fish are a common ingredient in pet food. No investigation has linked a particular pet chow factory to forced labor but “it’s wholly reasonable to expect that trash fish may be entering supply chains producing cat food and dog food,” Trent said.

Last year, $171 million worth of dog and cat food entered the US from Thailand, according to the United States Department of Agriculture. When it comes to dog and cat food in “sealed in airtight containers” — which typically means wet pet food — Thailand is America’s top foreign supplier.

Fish sauce: Trash fish is a key ingredient in fish sauce — a savory, amber-colored liquid. In many Asian kitchens, it’s an ingredient no less crucial than salt in Western kitchens.

In the US, Thai fish sauce rules 85 percent of the market. Last year, according the US government statistics, Americans consumed more than 35 million pounds of Thai-produced fish sauce. That’s enough to feed two ounces of fish sauce to every American man, woman and child.

Fish oil pills: A popular source of Omega 3 fatty acids, fish oil pills are sometimes produced with trash fish. Mackerel and sardines are common species used to make the pills. They’re also common species caught by slaves on Thai trawlers.

The Environmental Justice Foundation has looked into links between slave-caught fish and factories and will “examine them further,” Trent said. “I don’t think people in the major consumer markets want to be eating a health product produced by slaves.”

In a large, windowless hall smelling of antiseptic and the sea, hundreds of white-clad men and women in masks line rows of metal tables.

To the tune of Thai pop songs blasting in the background, they make deft work of trays of cooked skipjack tuna, stripping skin and bones in a matter of minutes.

The resulting hunks of brown flesh are stuffed into 6kg bags, ready to be shipped more than 6,000km away to Israel.

This is the factory of Thai Union Group, the world’s largest canned tuna producer, which of late has been acquiring so many big-name seafood firms that it became embroiled in an anti-trust probe in the United States.

Thai Union owns brands such as Chicken of the Sea, John West, King Oscar and Petit Navire. It also supplies processed seafood to other companies.

Its products can be found in major pet food brands as well as supermarket chains such as Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Woolworths and Safeway.

On Dec 4, it scrapped its plan to acquire US-based Bumble Bee Seafoods after the authorities there deemed the deal harmful to local competition.

With an eye on hitting its US$8 billion (S$11 billion) revenue target by 2020, it announced, just two weeks later, plans to buy a majority stake in Rugen Fisch, a leading German canned seafood firm.

With operations so big, the company has been the target of investigations over the use of coerced labour long alleged in the complex supply chains that make up Thailand’s seafood industry.

The kingdom is the world’s third largest exporter of seafood, selling about US$3.17 billion worth of fish products last year, according to statistics from the Thai Frozen Foods Association.

The trail of fish from sea to plate often involves low-wage boat hands from Cambodia and Myanmar and vulnerable migrant workers who process the seafood for suppliers of big exporters.

On Dec 10, just days before the release of an Associated Press report that exposed slave-like conditions on the premises of one of its suppliers of peeled shrimp, Thai Union announced that it would, from Jan 1, directly employ shrimp peelers so as to guarantee their welfare.

Nestle, one of its clients, admitted last month that seafood made with forced labour had found its way into its products.

In a recent interview with The Straits Times, Thai Union president and chief executive Thiraphong Chansiri said he welcomed the scrutiny. “Frankly, I don’t mind,” he said. “We accept the challenge. We accept that it’s our responsibility and we want to do the right thing.”

But he also said the firm became aware of the problem of coerced labour in seafood supply chains only recently.

“Frankly, before 2013, how could we know? First of all, we don’t buy much from the boats in Thailand.

“And then we buy fish delivered to the factory,” he said. “People talked about traceability not long ago.”

Just 4 per cent – or 14,000 tonnes – of the company’s seafood is sourced from Thailand.

But that may mean little in the face of growing calls for consumer boycotts of Thai seafood in Western countries.

The kingdom’s entire seafood export industry has been under threat since the EU issued a “yellow flag” in April for Thailand’s lax controls over illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.

Since then, the military government has been scrambling to register fishing vessels, legislate the use of ecologically sensitive fishing equipment and weed out the use of forced labour on boats to avert the import ban should the EU follow up with a “red card”.

Thailand exported about US$700 million worth of seafood exports to the European Union last year.

“Certainly we are all concerned,” said Mr Thiraphong.

Technically, a ban would apply only to products sourced from Thailand, but “you don’t know” how each EU country might interpret the ruling, he said.

Thai Union has cut ties with some 2,000 boats over the past two years to ensure ethical labour practices.

Meanwhile, the Thai government last Monday refuted the AP report on rogue shrimp peeling sheds, arguing that it was unrepresentative of the entire industry.

“Don’t just base your judgment on one news article; that is not fair,” Vice-Admiral Chumpol Lumpiganon, a spokesman for the Command Centre for Combating Illegal Fishing, told The Straits Times.

“Anyone who finds a rogue factory can come to us and we will deal with it instantly.”

About 8,000 fishing vessels have lost their licences since the government began cleaning up the industry, leaving about 40,000 now subjected to tighter monitoring.

In a related move, new measures gazetted last month have put seafood factories that violate labour laws at risk of closure.

But migrant worker advocates fear that the application of the rules may remain lax in the domestic seafood market, where consumer pressure for traceable supply chains is not so strong.

“Conditions in the domestic seafood market are always worse than those for the export market,” said Mr Andy Hall, an international affairs adviser to Thailand’s Migrant Workers Rights Network.

Mr Thiraphong said Thai Union, as a market leader, has been “working closely with the Thai government” to support industry-wide reform.

Despite its global ambitions – and the flurry of recent reports about labour abuses in the Thai seafood industry – the company does not intend to loosen its association with its home country.

In September, the company, formerly known as Thai Union Frozen Products, chose to retain reference to the kingdom in a rebranding exercise.  “We are very proud to be Thai,” said Mr Thiraphong.

“We chose the name with ‘Thai’ (in it) so that we can represent Thailand in the global landscape.”

BANGKOK — Seafaring slave ships didn’t vanish in the 19th century. They still persist.

And there’s a good chance they’re catching your dinner.

Just a few years ago, the dark underworld of forced labor in Thailand’s fishing sector was little known. The dirty secrets of this $7.3 billion powerhouse industry have since been explored by the media and international watchdog groups.

But this international outcry has changed little on the lawless seas, where men still slave away on Thai-captained trawlers under savage conditions. Implications for the US are disturbing: Thailand is America’s second-largest seafood supplier behind China.

The men who haul these fish from the sea were typically suckered into working for zero pay. Almost all of the victims are smuggled from destitute villages in Myanmar or Cambodia under false promises of gigs in factories, farms or construction yards.

GlobalPost’s award winning 2012 investigation “Seafood Slavery” tells the grim saga of escaped slaves lorded over and tortured by Thai captains. Those who resist are often murdered.

“I once saw a captain grab a metal spike used to mend nets and stab a fisherman in the chest,” said Moeun Pich, a Cambodian ex-slave, recounting a fairly typical story shared by former victims.  “The crew pulled a sleeping bag over his corpse and rolled it overboard.” These conditions are confirmed by Thai boatmen, one of whom said that captives can toil “for 10 years just getting sold over and over.”

Following reports from Human Rights Watch, the International Labour Organization and others, the latest exposé into Thailand’s seafood industry comes from the London-based Environmental Justice Foundation. The investigation builds upon a mounting pile of evidence that this global trade is propped up by vicious practices.

But so far, there is little indication that this netherworld of slavery will disappear — despite its well-documented role in delivering fish to Western supermarkets. Here are five reasons Thailand’s seafood slavery problem will likely persist.

Dodgy Fishing Trawlers Operate in a Legal Abyss

Just as drug money is laundered of its illicit origins, so is slave-caught seafood. The captive workers toil on unregistered “ghost ships.” Their catch is transferred to colossal motherships far out at sea, where it is mixed with fish from other vessels before being offloaded to fishmongers at the docks.

These steps are practically impossible to trace. In fact, ghost ships need not dock for years on end. They’ll remain murky and inscrutable until either Thailand’s government or the seafood industry forces all fishing vessels to prove where and how they caught their fish.

More than 25,000 fishing vessels are legally registered by Thailand. Each one should be outfitted with a GPS-powered monitoring system, argued Steve Trent, the Environmental Justice Foundation’s director. “For just a couple of thousand dollars a year, an authority can monitor the exact locations of boats, which has benefits for both fisheries management and ensuring the safety of crews,” he said. “There is absolutely no excuse for a country as developed as Thailand … not to employ this very basic technology.”

The US Keeps Looking the Other Way and Giving Thailand a Pass

Thailand is America’s oldest Asian ally. The two nations have been buddies since the Vietnam War, when the US launched jets from Thailand to carpet-bomb suspected communist rebels. And with China now ascendant, America appears reluctant to take action that would threaten the friendship.

This helps explain why America takes pains to avoid sanctioning Thailand — even though the nation is clearly one of Asia’s major human trafficking hubs.

When it comes to human trafficking, the White House talks a good game. The State Department puts out an annual Trafficking In Persons report and vows to sanction nations ranked in its lowest tier. But Thailand has managed to hover just above the worst ranking for four years straight. Why? Because the Secretary of State repeatedly issues waivers to spare the government from a humiliating slide into the bottom ranks.

Thai Police Barely Pursue the Criminals Behind the Slavery

Thailand’s forced labor victims are believed to number in the thousands.

Guess how many traffickers were prosecuted in 2012? 27.

Thai police aren’t just apathetic when it comes to chasing down perpetrators of forced labor. They’re sometimes in cahoots. The State Department cites “credible reports that corrupt officials protected brothels … seafood and sweatshop facilities from raids and inspections” and even used “victim testimony to weaken cases.”

Thai police don’t aggressively pursue forced labor cases on land. They’re even less likely to hunt down Thai-captained ghost ships — which are compelled by overfishing to trawl deeper into international waters each year. One ship captain told GlobalPost his fleet had once ventured as far as Somalia, nearly 4,000 miles away.

Forced Labor Victims that Seek Justice are Isolated by the Authorities

Say you’re a sea slave who has defied the odds. You’ve managed to swim to Thailand’s shores, eluding capture. You wash ashore, filthy and fatigued and unable to speak the native language. And you somehow find an official willing to submit your case into the justice system.

Your nightmare is far from over.

Forced labor victims are typically quarantined in shelters as they pursue justice. They’re often forbidden from leaving or even communicating with family members. The rationale is well meaning; intel on their whereabouts is easily leaked to trafficking syndicates who can threaten relatives or otherwise sabotage the case.

But many victims prefer to drop cases so they can return home or get back to work. This is especially true of migrants who have ventured from their far-flung villages to shore up cash for their ailing families. They simply can’t afford to wait in confinement while the justice system drags on for years.

Seafood Consumers are Ignorant or Do Not Care

Unease over the origins of blood diamonds, non-fair trade coffee and even iPads has seeped into the American consciousness. The fact that seafood shipped to America is tangled in a slavery-tainted supply chain hasn’t.

Traffickers, cops and seafood moguls in Thailand are not on the verge of a collective moral epiphany that will rid the nation of forced labor. Impoverished Myanmar and Cambodia will be full of men desperate enough to fall prey to smugglers’ lies for years to come.

And Western buyers are, for now, too uninformed or unconcerned about the tragic lives of men trapped on distant trawlers to alter their shopping habits. As long as no one along the supply chain objects, trawler captains who help supply American supermarkets will continue to buy men like livestock, at $650 per head, and dispose of them at will.

While Brexit versus the continuation of the European Union is a hot news topic, few know the secret who and why of the EU’s creation.

The lead financial writer at the Telegraph, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, wrote in 2000:

Declassified American government documents show that the US intelligence community ran a campaign in the Fifties and Sixties to build momentum for a united Europe.

***

The head of the Ford Foundation, ex-OSS officer Paul Hoffman, doubled as head of ACUE [below, we’ll explain who these players are] in the late Fifties. The State Department also played a role. A memo from the European section, dated June 11, 1965, advises the vice-president of the European Economic Community, Robert Marjolin, to pursue monetary union by stealth.

It recommends suppressing debate until the point at which “adoption of such proposals would become virtually inescapable”.

In other words, the U.S. State Department recommended ramming through the creation of the EU before Europeans knew what was happening.

Professor of International Security at the University of Warwick Richard J. Aldrich reviewed available historical documents, and also concluded that the European Union was largely an American project:

US officials trying to rebuild and stabilize postwar Europe worked from the assumption that it required rapid unification, perhaps leading to a United States of Europe. The encouragement of European unification, one of the most consistent components of Harry S. Truman’s foreign policy, was even more strongly emphasized under his successor General Dwight D. Eisenhower. Moreover, under both Truman and Eisenhower, US policymakers conceived of European unification not only as an important end in itself, but also as a way to solve the German problem.’

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One of the most interesting US covert operations in postwar Europe was the funding of the European Movement. The European Movement was an umbrella organization which led a prestigious, if disparate, group of organizations urging rapid unification in Europe, focusing their efforts upon the Council of Europe, and counting Winston Churchill, Paul-Henri Spaak, Konrad Adenauer, Leon Blum and Alcide de Gasperi as its five Presidents of Honour.

***

The discreet injection of over three million dollars between 1949 and 1960, mostly from US government sources, was central to efforts to drum up mass support for the Schuman Plan, the European Defence Community and a European Assembly with sovereign powers. This covert contribution never formed less than half the European Movement’s budget and, after 1952, probably two-thirds.

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The conduit for American assistance was the American Committee on United Europe (ACUE), directed by senior figures from the American intelligence community. This body was organized in the early Summer of 1948 by Allen Welsh Dulles, then heading a committee reviewing the organization of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) on behalf of the National Security Council (NSC), and also by William J. Donovan, former head of the wartime Office of Strategic Services (OSS) [predecessor to the CIA].

***

The International Organizations Division [a newly-established branch of the CIA] was also involved in the fourth type of US covert operation — provoking dissonance in the satellite states. This effort was channelled through the National Committee for a Free Europe, later known as the Free Europe Committee, which controlled Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty. Much of the work, done with the help of irascible exile groups under the Assembly of Captive European Nations (ACEN), was coordinated by the CIA’s burgeoning Munich station, which also gave aid to resistance groups within eastern Europe.

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The ACUE and its short-lived predecessor were only two of many `American’ and ‘Free’ committees established during 1948 and 1949. Well-documented examples include the National Committee for a Free Europe (later the Free Europe Committee) and the Free Asia Committee (later the Asia Foundation). The Free Europe Committee, formed in 1948 by the retired diplomat Joseph E. Grew at Kennan’s request, worked closely with the CIA to maintain contact between exile groups in the West and the Eastern bloc. Their campaign ‘to keep alive the hope of liberation in Eastern Europe’, was launched publicly in 1949 by the recently retired American military governor in Germany, General Lucius D. Clay.” The initial membership included many senior government figures such as the former Assistant Secretary of State, Adolphe Berle, Allen Dulles and ex-OSS personnel such as Frederic R. Dolbeare. The Free Europe Committee purported to draw its resources from private subscriptions and various foundations, but in reality the majority of its funds came from the US government through channels managed by the CIA.

***

The United States persuaded Britain and France to give the exile groups associate membership of the Council of Europe. A year later the White House endorsed State Department plans to accelerate these efforts. Outlining their proposals in a special guidance paper entitled ‘The Concept of Europe’, they admitted their concern that the main propaganda effort in the East lacked the `positive qualities which are necessary to arouse nations’. Several studies had been made in an attempt to find a positive concept and the themes of ‘European Unity’ and ‘Return to Europe’ might rectify this problem. Its ‘solely European’ nature ensured that it could not be `dismissed as another manoeuvre of “American imperialism”‘.

***

Unification was officially a central component of US policy — Congress had stipulated it as a condition of further Marshall Plan aid

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The ACUE’s work in continental Europe during the early 1950s also focused increasingly upon propaganda and mass action

***

In 1951, the majority of ACUE funds for Europe were employed on a new venture — a unity campaign amongst European youth. Between 1951 and 1956 the European Movement organized over 2,000 rallies and festivals on the continent, particularly in Germany where they received the help of the US army. One of the additional advantages of deploying American funds on the large youth programmes was that it helped to disguise the extent to which the European Movement was dependent upon American funds. In May 1952 Spaak decided that funds from American sources that had previously been used in the ordinary budget of the European Movement would now be diverted for use in the ‘Special Budgets’ used to support their growing range of new programmes. This disguised their source and avoided any accusations of American dependency. Again, in November 1953, Baron Boel, the treasurer of the European Movement, explained that it was essential to avoid a situation where opponents of European unity could accuse them of being an American creation. For this reason ‘American money, quite acceptable for the European Youth Campaign and certain restricted activities, could not be used for the normal running of the Movement’. Through the use of `Special Budgets’, the large sums from American sources did not show up in the ordinary budget of the European Movement.”

***

As early as 1949, at the behest of Allen Dulles, the Ford Foundation was cooperating with the CIA on a number of European programmes.” By 1950, the ACUE and the Ford Foundation were coordinating their efforts to support federalism.” Moreover, by the mid-1950s, the senior figures who directed both overt and covert American support were increasingly synonymous. By 1953 both John J. McCloy and Shepard Stone, who had been instrumental in arranging for substantial covert government funds for the European Youth Campaign, were both on the board of trustees of the Ford Foundation. McCloy was also a director of the Rockefeller Foundation. By 1955, McCloy had become chairman of the Ford Foundation, while serving as chairman of the Council on Foreign Relations. Simultaneously, the same circle, including Retinger, McCloy, Allen Dulles, Harriman, David Rockefeller, Jackson and Bedell Smith were busy creating the Bilderberg Group, yet another organization that bridged the narrowing gaps between government, private and public organizations and between overt and covert on both sides of the Atlantic.”

***

Most ACUE funds originated with the CIA.

***

Mutual Security Agency [an American agency created by Congress] funds were also used to support the European Movement, indeed the Mutual Security Act of 1951 explicitly stated that its resources were to be used ‘to further encourage the economic and political federation of Europe’.’

A North American Created the Euro

This guy – Robert Mundell – is the father of the Euro:

Born in Canada, Mundell taught at the University of Chicago for 7 years, and has since taught at Columbia University in New York for more 42 years.*

But didn’t Mundell create the Euro to help Europe?

Not according to Guardian, Independent and BBC investigative journalist Greg Palast, who explained in his book Vulture’s Picnic:

Who spawned this cruel little bastard coin?

I called its parent, Professor Robert Mundell. Mundell is known as the Father of the Euro. The Euro is often spoken of as a means to unite post-war Europeans together emotionally and politically and to give this united Europe the economic power to compete with the U.S. economy.

That’s horseshit.

The Euro was invented in New York, New York, at Columbia University. Professor Mundell invented both the Euro and the guiding light of Thatcher-Reagan government: “Supply Side Economics” or, as George Bush Sr. accurately called it, “Voodoo Economics.” Reagan-Thatcher voodoo and the Euro are two sides of the same coin. (Ouch! Some puns hurt.)

Like the Iron Lady and President Gaga. the Euro is inflexible. That is, once you join the Euro, your nation cannot fight recession by using fiscal or monetary policy. That leaves “wage reduction, fiscal constraints (cutting government jobs and benefits) as the only recourse in crisis,” The Wall Street Journal explains with joy—and sell-offs of government property (privatizations).

Why the Euro, Professor? Dr. Mundell told me he was upset at zoning rules in Italy that did not allow him to put his commode where he wanted to in his villa there. “They’ve got rules that tell me I can’t have a toilet in this room. Can you imagine?”

I couldn’t really. I don’t have an Italian villa, so I cannot really imagine the burden of commode placement restriction.

The Euro will eventually allow you to put your toilet any damn place you want.

He meant that the only way the government can create jobs is to fire people, cut benefits, and, crucially, cut the rules and regulations that restrict business.

He told me: “Without fiscal policy, the only way nations can keep jobs is by the competitive reduction of rules on business.” Besides bowl location, he was talking about the labor laws, which raise the price of plumbers, environmental regulations, and, of course, taxes.

No, I am not making this up. And I am not saying the Euro was imposed on the Old Country just so the professor could place his toilet at a place of maximum pleasure. The Euro is fashioned as an anti-regulation straitjacket that would eliminate gallons-per-flush laws, flush away restrictive banking regulation, and all other government controls.

Now does the destruction of Greece’s sovereignty make a little more sense?

As Palast pointed out in the Guardian:

The idea that the euro has “failed” is dangerously naive. The euro is doing exactly what its progenitor – and the wealthy 1%-ers who adopted it – predicted and planned for it to do.

***

For him, the euro wasn’t about turning Europe into a powerful, unified economic unit. It was about Reagan and Thatcher.

***

And when crises arise, economically disarmed nations have little to do but wipe away government regulations wholesale, privatize state industries en masse, slash taxes and send the European welfare state down the drain.

***

Far from failing, the euro, which was Mundell’s baby, has succeeded probably beyond its progenitor’s wildest dreams.

In other words, the Euro was intended to impose a Shock Doctrine straightjacket on Europe, where the big banks are stripping Greece and other countries of their public assets, pillaging, plundering and lootingthem of their natural resources and wealth.

Donald Trump’s obscene demagoguery; his contemptuous regard for the first amendment, his desire to expand the authorities of the presidency (the awesome power of which has never been equal to what it is now), his belligerent and threatening attitude towards the judiciary, his shameless blurring of private and public agendas, his cynical exploitation of the fears of millions of Americans concerning Muslims in the wake of the nation’s deadliest mass shooting in Orlando, his nationalist, anti-immigrant, racist politics, and finally, his endorsement of violent outbursts against dissenters, have all served to raise the specter of a new fascism on the political landscape.

But to what extent is fascism an appropriate name for what Trump represents?

By fascism, I simply mean a militaristic regime that is characteristically authoritarian, anti-immigrant, and extremely nationalistic. We must use the term carefully, as it is all too often a sign of intellectual laziness and a lack of conceptual clarity. To complicate matters, we are witnessing Trump’s political rise while at the same time extreme right-wing parties are making startling gains in many countries, including Austria, which had not seen such a development since the end of World War II. This is important because it indicates that Trump is not an isolated phenomenon. He should be thought of primarily as a symptom – a symptom of the decay of the democratic form of global capitalism.

Trump and his European counterparts are symptomatic of the fact that capitalism’s need for democratic institutions and processes has been steadily diminishing. The most efficient administrators of capitalism are arguably turning out to be non-democratic, authoritarian regimes, including nominally communist regimes such as China and Vietnam. When Trump says there is no democracy, that the whole system is rigged, what is most frightening is not that it may be true or that so many believe it to be true – in fact, his very ascendance demonstrates that there is still an irreducible element of contingency in politics.

We are witnessing all over the world the dissolution of the marriage between democracy and capitalism. It can be seen in the corrupt pseudo-communism of China, or the authoritarianism of Putin’s Russia and Erdogan’s Turkey, and it may take the form that we are seeing here: where the rule of law, integrity of our governing bodies, and voices of dissent are treated with contempt and mockery by the leader of a major political party.

Trump’s fascism is especially on display in his endless assurances that he intends for Mexico to finance a massive wall along the US-Mexican border. This promise – a fixture of each Trump rally – should not be answered by giving reasons as to why it is a bad idea, impractical, etc. Once you begin to provide arguments, you’ve already lost – this is because the proposal is not meant to be rational at all, but instead it is precisely meant to mock the use of reason in politics. Trump is treating his followers not as rational agents; rather, they are bundles of repressed, violent energy which Trump has expertly manipulated to his advantage.

Countless Americans are now more or less ready to deny the basic rights of millions of immigrants under the threat of forcible deportation, and to refuse hundreds of thousands of refugees seeking shelter and asylum. The way to address this xenophobic hysteria is certainly not through the liberal discourse of tolerance and respect for the other. On the contrary, the language of tolerance is totally misplaced here and counterproductive. More appropriate, rather, is a fidelity to human rights and an emphatic refusal to allow any group of people to be denied the fundamental conditions in which to live and thrive. Refugees don’t need sympathy and tolerance from us, and they don’t need us to open our hearts: they need us to open our borders and provide food, shelter, and work.

What Trump has effectively demonstrated is that political correctness, and the liberal insistence on rules of correctness, has served only to regulate hatred and racism while reproducing the subjective conditions that can give rise to violent racial outbursts. The miserable failure of political correctness lies in its attempt to impose what should be spontaneous; in mocking its inherent fakeness, Trump has managed to create the perception that he is somehow honest and authentic. The problem is that in place of political correctness, he’s given us a more or less open mixture of racism, misogyny, and nationalism.

Trump’s campaign has been a sustained attempt to obliterate the distinction between politics and mass entertainment; to stupefy the masses of uneducated lower-income whites who are transfixed by his apparent wealth and celebrity, his unabashed greed and contempt for anything that cannot be marketed and sold. So should we regard Trump as a kind of new fascist, using a mixture of kitsch, obscenity, and bombast to keep his followers rapt? Liberating the repressed, unconscious wishes of his supporters who are implicitly encouraged to enact symbolic and even physical violence against the perceived other?

The new fascism we are witnessing today should not be confused with the fascism of yesteryear. But perhaps it is no less dangerous in the long run, and conventional political wisdom is no more able to halt its progress. The antidote to the rise of populist politics based on distrust is in how we describe the disease itself. To view Trump simply as an aberration, a metaphysical monstrosity – which undoubtedly he is in some sense – is profoundly inadequate. We must see him as the symptom of a general disease; a disease which is global in nature, and which bears witness to the contradictions and antagonisms of the democratic capitalistic order.

Dr. Sam Ben-Meir, professor of philosophy at Eastern International College. His current research focuses on environmental and business ethics.

Caracas.— Cuba’s Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla called on the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (Alba-TCP) to strengthen strategies to confront imperialist intervention and coup plots on the continent.

In his comments, during the Alba-TCP Political Council meeting to discuss common strategies to defend the region, Rodríguez likewise called on social movements to defend progressive governments facing attacks orchestrated by foreign powers, as is the case in Venezuela, which was subjected to an attempt by the Organization of American States (OAS) to justify intervention via the application of the bloc’s Inter-American Charter, as well as Brazil, where a parliamentary coup and media campaign are currently underway against the country’s legitimate President, Dilma Rousseff.

In his remarks, broadcast by teleSUR, the Cuban Foreign Minister emphasized the timeliness of Alba’s mobilization given the escalating right wing offensive taking place across the region.

He stressed that in these circumstances, it is the Alba-TCP Political Council’s responsibility to mobilize popular and political movements, revolutionary and progressive forces, trade unions, campesinos, and intellectuals to confront imperialist intervention, coups, and neo-liberalism.

The Cuban diplomat explained that to do so, regional unity and the gains achieved by the continent in international organizations such as the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) must be consolidated. He stressed:

Latin America and the Caribbean have changed, we are no longer, nor will we be, the backyard of the United States, we will not allow for the return of the carrot and the stick and I repeat that no one can beguile Cuba, which is still under blockade and whose territory in Guantánamo is still occupied, while attempts are made to isolate Venezuela.

In this regard, he added that the region is at present threatened by the U.S. government and national oligarchies, who, for lack of popular support, “Again resort to coups to reverse sovereignty over our natural resources, our policies of independence and social development.”

During his speech to the Council, Rodríguez noted that the continent’s history will be defined in the current battle of Venezuela against constant threats, and reaffirmed Cuba’s solidarity and the deep bonds between the two nations. He said:

The history of Latin America and the Caribbean is being decided in this battle, here in Venezuela, we will all defend, whatever the price, the legacy of (Hugo) Chávez and Venezuela will continue to have in Cuba a sister nation ready to share the same fate.

Saint Kitts and Nevis Senior Foreign Service Officer, Samuel Berridge, also stated his country’s support for the Bolivarian Republic and highlighted the progress made during the past 17 years, thanks to agreements such as Petrocaribe, and the services provided to the peoples through different social missions.

“We are encouraged by the model of social cohesion in Venezuela,” Berridge stated, while expressing support for dialogue initiatives promoted by the national government, accompanied by the support of UNASUR.

“Saint Kitts and Nevis is supportive of the government and people of Venezuela and is committed to ensuring the onset of a new era of economic growth and development in Venezuela. Venezuela is an important member in our hemisphere, the country is of no interest to us weakened and will be of no benefit to Alba or the rest of the hemisphere,” he emphasized.

Meanwhile the Foreign Minister of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez, condemned the media campaigns against leftist governments in the region, which seek to set the stage for imperialist aggression. She pointed out:

The peoples do not want to go back to the dark decade of neoliberalism, they do not want to be politically, economically, financially suppressed and subjugated and handed over to the International Monetary Fund.

According to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the main topic of discussion at the meeting was the need to create a common strategy for the defense and freedom of our revolutionary processes.

Meanwhile, Ecuador’s Foreign Minister, Guillaume Long, highlighted that the union of the ALBA-TCP countries is necessary to address and counter the effects of the global right in their attacks against the region.

The Minister of the Presidency of Bolivia, Juan Ramón Quintana, also condemned any attack against Venezuelan democracy on behalf of his country.

The majority of US airstrikes in Afghanistan in 2016 have been in support of ground troops including Afghan forces fighting the Taliban, rather than targeting suspected terrorists.

An investigation by the Bureau reveals that more than 200 strikes, the majority by drones, have been conducted to defend ground forces battling a rising insurgency, despite the fact that combat missions came to an end in 2014. These strikes represent more than 60% of all US airstrikes in the country.

Since the US ended combat operations against the Taliban at the end of 2014, leaving that to Kabul’s security forces, the American military presence in Afghanistan has been largely confined to a support role.

They are there to “train, advise and assist” Afghan soldiers and police as part of Nato’s US-led, non-combat mission. US rules of engagement do allow force to be used against the Taliban, but only in self-defence.

US Air Force technicians loading guided bombs onto an F-16 jet at Bagram Airbase in Kabul (Snr Airman Justyn Freeman/US Air Force)

US combat operations have continued in Afghanistan but only as part of a separate, smaller counter-terror mission targeting al Qaeda and Islamic State.

But the extent of US air attacks conducted outside the counter-terror remit, revealed by the Bureau today, suggests the US has been drawn quietly yet significantly into fighting the Taliban-led insurgency.

Last week Washington appeared to make its airwar against the Taliban official by relaxing its rules in Afghanistan. The military now has explicit permission to proactively support the stretched Afghan security forces on the battlefield.

Under the new policy, the US commander in Afghanistan, General John Nicholson, who took control in March, will be able to assign troops to accompany regular Afghan soldiers at key moments in their offensive campaign. Until now only Afghan special forces have had such close cooperation. US commanders will have greater discretion to carry out airstrikes against the Taliban as well.

There are currently around 15,700 international troops in Afghanistan with nearly 12,800 working on Resolute Support, Nato’s “train, advise, assist” mission. These soldiers are drawn from Nato members and non-Nato “partner countries”, such as Georgia and Ukraine.

The extra 2,900 are US soldiers in the country on offensive combat operations as part of a parallel counter-terror mission.

The US Air Force (USAF) carries out strikes for both Resolute Support and the counter-terrorism operations.

In January 2016 the rules governing the counter-terror operations were changed to allow the USAF to hunt out Islamic State fighters as well as al Qaeda fighters.

The US has been “aggressively pursuing these targets” from the air, according to Brigadier Charles Cleveland, Resolute Support’s deputy chief of staff for communication.

But of the 347 air strikes in the first five months of the year, 213, equivalent to 61%, were described as defensive, force protection strikes, according to the US press office in Kabul.

US officials generally describe these strikes as being used “to counter a threat to the force”. They do not elaborate on what threat or what force.

Data also shows that there has been a dramatic increase in the number of hits by the US Air Force. Between January and May 2016 451 weapons were released in these airstrikes compared to just 189 in the same period in 2015.

Working closely with Afghan partners puts Coalition troops into harm’s way and in such a situation the US can carry out airstrikes to protect ground forces under attack. The ground troops do not have to be “engaged in combat situations” for the US to strike, Cleveland added.

These defensive strikes can be conducted against the Taliban “if we identify that a threat to the force is developing,” he told the Bureau.

Kate Clark of the Afghan Analyst Network, a highly respected think tank said the rise in the proportion of airstrikes against the insurgency was a pragmatic response to a deteriorating situation. The contradiction between the reality and the political position in Washington that combat operations are over was “the result of having a conflict between military needs and political imperatives, having to say one thing and do another,” she added.

“From their mandate you would assume foreign forces would not be putting themselves in harm’s way as part of normal daily routine,” Clark told the Bureau. “But clearly last year as the conflict got worse and the Taliban got stronger and the weakness of government forces became apparent, there was an obvious need for American support.”

That support comes from intelligence, surveillance and help with logistics, as well as close mentoring by US forces, important for boosting moral of the Afghans they work with. However “airstrikes have been crucial,” Clark explained. “As soon as you have that threat from the sky, the Taliban’s fighting ability is reduced.”

Last month a US military drone killed the Taliban’s leader, Akhtar Mansour, for example. The strike was particularly controversial as US military operations crossed over the border into Pakistan where Mansour was based. All strikes in Pakistan before this point had been conducted as part of the US covert war on terror operated by the CIA.

The May 21 strike, which caused much outcry in Pakistan, was justified by the US as a defensive action. Obama commented on Mansour’s threat to American lives.

In September and October last year a team of Green Berets also took part in an operation to retake Kunduz, the first provincial centre to fall to the Taliban since 2001. The attack was widely reported after a US airstrike flattened a hospital operated by the international medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres.

Troops were operating with both mandates during the effort to retake Kunduz. US forces conducted 22 strikes in the city as the Green Berets and Afghan partners battled to liberate the city. Nine were conducted using counter-terrorism rules, 13 under a self-defence remit.

US troops in Afghanistan are due to be cut to just 5,500 by the start of next year. A White House press officer said the policy shift last week to widen the remit of US troops in Afghanistan was not a reflection of a change to this plan.

At a press conference last Friday the White House spokesman said: “The US combat role in Afghanistan ended at the end of 2014, and the President is not considering restarting it.

“But the question is, is it possible for us to be more proactive in supporting conventional Afghan security forces? And we anticipate that by offering them more support in the form of advice and assistance, and occasionally accompanying them on their operations, that they are likely to be more effective on the battlefield.”

The case for or against a British exit from the EU – #Brexit – is headline news. For the moment the earlier quarrel about a possible Greek exit from the Eurozone – #Grexit – seems to have taken the back seat – with one or two exceptions such as Christian Lindner, leader of Germany’s liberal FDP. Most EU proponents are deeply concerned about these prospects and the repercussions either might have on European unity.

Yet, while highly important, neither of them should distract Europe from zooming in on the real issue: the dominant and altogether destructive role of Germany in European affairs today. There can be no doubt that the German “stability-oriented” approach to European unity has failed dismally. It is high time for Europe to contemplate the option of a German exit from the Eurozone – #Gexit – since this might be the least damaging scenario for Europe to emerge from its euro trap and start afresh.

Germany’s membership of the Eurozone and its adamant refusal to play by the rules of currency union is indeed at the heart of the matter. Of course, it was never meant to be this way. And it was not inevitable for Europe to end up in today’s state of never-ending crisis that impoverishes and disunites its peoples. I have always supported the idea of a common European currency as I believed that it could potentially provide a monetary order that is far superior to the status quo ante of deutschmark hegemony: the Bundesbank – in pursuit of its German price stability mandate – pulling the monetary strings across the continent. While I have also always held that the euro – the peculiar regime of Economic and Monetary Union agreed at Maastricht – was deeply flawed, I kept up my hopes that the political authorities would reform that regime along the way to make the euro viable.

In this spirit I proposed my “Euro Treasury” plan that would, among other things, fix the Maastricht regime’s most serious flaw: the divorce between the monetary and fiscal authorities that is leaving all key players vulnerable and short of the powers required to steer a large economy like the Eurozone through anything but fair weather conditions, at best. Watching developments over in Europe from afar my hopes are dwindling by the day that the failed euro experiment will usher in reforms that could save it. Instead, the likelihood of some form of eventual euro breakup seems to be rising constantly. It is undeniable that the euro has turned out to be an instrument of widespread impoverishment rather than shared prosperity. It seems increasingly unclear for how much longer pro-European politics will be able to somehow cover up the blunder and hold things together – particularly as politics is turning more and more nationalistic and confrontational everywhere.

The quest for monetary stability in Europe was always about two things: price stability and the absence of “beggar-thy-neighbor” distortions in competitiveness and trade. Monetary stability was seen as a pre-condition for peace and shared prosperity. Today, the Eurozone is on the verge of deflation, domestic demand is still below the level reached eight years ago, and unemployment remains extremely high, especially in over-indebted euro crisis countries. How did we get here? And how could #Gexit help?

Germany Offside

The troubling truth is that Germany largely determined the Maastricht rules of the game but failed to abide by them. Perhaps not Germany alone. But Greece is too small to matter in any well-designed monetary union while Germany is too big not to matter hugely in any monetary union, especially a poorly designed one. Germany dictated that central bank independence, the primacy of price stability, and the prohibition of excessive fiscal deficits must be the overarching policy principles of EMU. These principles had secured both price stability and prosperity in post-war West Germany.

Pegged nominal exchange rates were key to this outcome though as German competitiveness improved whenever German inflation stayed below trends elsewhere. In this way Germany could always rely on exports as its growth engine and largely abstain from active domestic demand management. At Maastricht the German authorities overlooked the obvious fact that the German model would no longer work once Germany’s trade partners behaved just like Germany – which is precisely what the euro asked of them. Germany’s fatal mistake was to then interpret the consequent stagnation of the mid1990s as a call to boost its national competitiveness by wage repression instead. This move paved the way for ruin across the Eurozone.

For diverging competitiveness positions are not permissible inside a monetary union that is not also a fiscal and transfer union. (I dubbed this “Germany’s euro trilemma”) The effect: a buildup of imbalances, bubbles, and their inevitable bursting under the euro. Germany accumulated huge claims against its euro partners that were running up ever higher external debts. The so-called “bailouts” then allowed it (and other creditors) to pull out while taking limited losses. The ECB’s liquidity support of crisis country banks was highly instrumental in this context. Essentially the migration of risks from private to public balance sheets was facilitated so as to contain and cover up the damages in creditor countries. Germany had bailed out its banks for losses suffered on their US subprime adventures. Apparently the German authorities judged that it was an easier sell to bail out its euro partners than organizing another round of bailouts for German financial institutions for losses suffered on their Eurozone adventures.

But bailouts of euro partners had to come along with punishment. Germany prescribed harsh austerity for its partners but refused to share in the rebalancing process by fiscal expansion and higher wage inflation at home. As a result, the rebalancing has been one-sided and deflationary, with unnecessary pain inflicted across the Eurozone. Germany itself got lucky once more: recovery in the US, UK, China and other emerging markets offset the repercussions of suffocating its Eurozone export market.

Wir Sind Wieder Was

And here we are today with a highly divided euro experience. Outside of Germany the euro means impoverishment and hardship. In Germany itself the vast majority of the population has not made much headway either, but compared to the mess seen in euro partner countries Germans probably feel thankful for having a job and whatever little income gains they may have experienced over the past 20 years; mainly over the past two years actually. There is systematic indoctrination to feel pride in Germany’s übercompetitiveness. That makes it easier to blame any troubles existing elsewhere on others’ inferiority and laziness. Yet political discontent is surging everywhere. Outside of Germany because people increasingly question any sense and fairness in their impoverishment. Inside Germany because there is a prevailing sense that the country is somehow asked to bail out everyone else – the old “EU paymaster” cliché in overdrive.

The latest incarnation of this cliché features German savers as being “expropriated” by the ECB’s monetary policies. There is no appreciation of the fact that today’s interest rates are a consequence of German misconduct under the euro regime, a regime “made in Germany” that has brought nothing but ruin to Europe. Instead Germans live by the myth that Germany’s stronger position today proves that it has done everything right. Wage repression under the euro facilitated a massive shift in income and wealth distribution in Germany too. But the average German is unaware that the only real winner of the euro is Germany’s top one percent. Fleeced by his/her own elite the average German lives in fear of being blood-sucked by his or her fellow Europeans.

One thing is clear: Germany’s euro partners will not accept impoverishment as their lot forever – the euro cannot survive unless Germany changes its ways drastically. But how do you convince Germany to change given that Germans were misled to believe that they have done everything right? That is the challenge Europe must meet.

The New German Question

Europe should focus its attention and conversation on how to convince Germany to either change its ways or exit from the euro. It is no use to pretend that euro breakup is not an option. Without drastic change in policies and institutions it will happen one way or the other anyway. One option is complete breakup with all partners returning to their national currencies. In this case it would be no use pegging to the new deutschmark as that would just repeat the old problem. Another option is that only a certain (group of) member(s) leave(s). The (fear of) #Grexit experience last year (and earlier escalating euro crises) provided a foretaste of the pains that any exiting weak debtor country would go through. Creditors would suffer some unpleasant consequences of debtor country exit and default too though.

#Gexit, the departure of the strong, would be less disruptive for the Eurozone as a whole. Germany could declare next Sunday that it re-introduces the deutschmark converting all domestic euro contracts and prices at a 1:1 rate. (Perhaps the Dutch and Austrians might consider going along with it, but I leave that possibility aside here.) On Monday morning the Bundesbank would stand by and cheer the new deutschmark surge on the exchanges. It would follow the advice of Deutsche Bank and raise German interest rates to make sure savers get their well-deserved rewards.

The German government would proudly announce to its citizens that they will no longer have to bail out any lazy Europeans but will from now on enjoy the real fruits of their hard-won übercompetitiveness. And so all Germans would live happily ever after. Tranquilized by their stability-oriented ideology they would ignore any discomfort coming along with the chosen deflationary adjustment; just as they have ignored the agonies experienced elsewhere in the Eurozone since 2009. And they would be troubled even less by any surges in indebtedness (and resulting bankruptcies), private and public, coming along with such a deflationary adjustment; just as they saw no reason to concern themselves with these kind of side effects elsewhere in the Eurozone since 2009 either.

Essentially, the current Eurozone has Germany’s euro partners serving as the economic wasteland that is keeping the euro low so that German exports have it easier globally. By contrast, the new Eurozone (ex Germany) would see its external competitiveness restored instantly, especially vis-à-vis Germany itself; while, internally, any remaining competitiveness imbalances would be minor compared to a status quo that includes Germany. Unshackled from German idiosyncrasies in all matters of macroeconomics, the Eurozone would follow through with my Euro Treasury plan and henceforth smartly invest in their joint future – a future of prosperity rather than impoverishment. Unhindered by German pressures and supported by constructive rather than destructive fiscal policy the ECB would continue its current course and re-establish price stability in a couple of years. If they preferred to return to their national currencies, that would be the other avenue to climb out of their euro trap. I personally think that, if the Euro Treasury were established, the members of the Eurozone (ex Germany) would be better off with the euro. But that is their choice to make.

Meanwhile, Europe is far too important to be left to the Germans.

“It is an absolute outrage that financial institutions are investing billions into … weapons which are banned under international law.”

NATO is a threat to world peace. Its incessant war games and its addiction to antagonising the Russian bear are putting the future of the world in jeopardy. After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, NATO should have been disbanded; not expanded to include former Warsaw Pact states in a blatant policy of encircling Russia. Instead of advocating the abolition of NATO however, one of the most influential think tanks in the US is pushing for the further integration and consolidation of this Cold War relic.

At the start of June, Elisabeth Braw wrote an article for Foreign Affairs – the publication of the Council on Foreign Relations – titled: A Schengen Zone for NATO.  In the article, Braw argues for the creation of a “military Schengen” in order to move troops between NATO countries without any delays, unsurprisingly justifying this further integration as a necessary move to counter “Russian aggression:”

 “NATO’s member states are willing to defend one another, and they have the troops and the equipment to do so… But one thing frustrates commanders even more: the arduous process of getting permission to move troops across borders… At their upcoming summit in Warsaw, NATO members will discuss joint responses to Russian aggression, and they are likely to agree to station four battalions—totaling about 4,000 troops—in the Baltic states and Poland. But with Russia forming two new divisions in its western military region, which borders the Baltic states, 4,000 forward-stationed troops may not be enough to deter a potential attack.”

Braw continues:

“Moving troops across Europe requires permission at each border… But military commanders, hoping for more progress—and more uniform progress across Europe—are arguing for an EU-inspired military Schengen. The Schengen Agreement, in place since 1996, allows passport-free passage between the 28 European countries that are part of the arrangement… With a military Schengen in place, NATO troops and equipment would be able to cross NATO borders to their destination the same way EU citizens do: without having to show permits… Should a war break out, SACEUR [NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe] Curtis Scaparrotti and his fellow NATO commanders would, of course, be free to move their troops across NATO borders without diplomatic clearance… But many commanders and analysts, including Brezinski, argue that peacetime red tape is affecting planning and preparations for such contingencies, which in turn affects deterrence.”

The idea of a military Schengen for NATO member states has increasingly being advocated in recent months by defense ministers and military commanders. As Sputnik reported in an article last month titled, NATO’s ‘Tank Schengen’: Baltic States Call for Free Movement… of Troops:

“The defense ministers of the three Baltic States have called for an easing of travel restrictions on the movement of NATO troops and equipment in Europe, and are suggesting the creation of a visa-free space, similar to that of the Schengen area, to accelerate the deployment of allied forces and armament in the Baltic States.”

Under the guise of deterring Russian aggression, the US is pushing for a deepening of the alliance, and further undermining the sovereignty of each member state. NATO is also attempting to expand once again, trying to formally secure Montenegro as a member state in the near future, in addition to pulling Georgia closer to the imperial alliance. The abolition of NATO is what is needed to move the world closer to peace, not the further integration of this nefarious arm of Western imperialism.

Steven MacMillan is an independent writer, researcher, geopolitical analyst and editor of  The Analyst Report, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

These days, lamenting the apparently aimless character of Washington’s military operations in the Greater Middle East has become conventional wisdom among administration critics of every sort. Senator John McCain thunders that “this president has no strategy to successfully reverse the tide of slaughter and mayhem” in that region. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies bemoans the “lack of a viable and public strategy.” Andrew Bacevich suggests that “there is no strategy. None. Zilch.”

After 15 years of grinding war with no obvious end in sight, U.S. military operations certainly deserve such obloquy. But the pundit outrage may be misplaced. Focusing on Washington rather than on distant war zones, it becomes clear that the military establishment does indeed have a strategy, a highly successful one, which is to protect and enhance its own prosperity.

Given this focus, creating and maintaining an effective fighting force becomes a secondary consideration, reflecting a relative disinterest — remarkable to outsiders — in the actual business of war, as opposed to the business of raking in dollars for the Pentagon and its industrial and political partners. A key element of the strategy involves seeding the military budget with “development” projects that require little initial outlay but which, down the line, grow irreversibly into massive, immensely profitable production contracts for our weapons-making cartels.

If this seems like a startling proposition, consider, for instance, the Air Force’s determined and unyielding efforts to jettison the A-10 Thunderbolt, widely viewed as the most effective means for supporting troops on the ground, while ardently championing the sluggish, vastly overpriced F-35Joint Strike Fighter that, among myriad other deficiencies, cannot fly within 25 miles of a thunderstorm. No less telling is the Navy’s ongoing affection for budget-busting programs such as aircraft carriers, while maintaining its traditional disdain for the unglamorous and money-poor mission of minesweeping, though the mere threat of enemy mines in the 1991 Gulf War(as in the Korean War decades earlier) stymied plans for major amphibious operations. Examples abound across all the services.  

Meanwhile, ongoing and dramatic programs to invest vast sums in meaningless, useless, or superfluous weapons systems are the norm. There is no more striking example of this than current plans to rebuild the entire American arsenal of nuclear weapons in the coming decades, Obama’s staggering bequest to the budgets of his successors.

Taking Nuclear Weapons to the Bank 

These nuclear initiatives have received far less attention than they deserve, perhaps because observers are generally loath to acknowledge that the Cold War and its attendant nuclear terrors, supposedly consigned to the ashcan of history a quarter-century ago, are being revived on a significant scale. The U.S. is currently in the process of planning for the construction of a new fleet of nuclear submarines loaded with new intercontinental nuclear missiles, while simultaneously creating a new land-based intercontinental missile, a new strategic nuclear bomber, a new land-and-sea-based tactical nuclear fighter plane, a new long-range nuclear cruise missile (which, as recently as 2010, the Obama administration explicitly promised not to develop), at least three nuclear warheads that are essentially new designs, and new fuses for existing warheads. In addition, new nuclear command-and-control systems are under development for a fleet of satellites (costing up to $1 billion each) designed to make the business of fighting a nuclear war more practical and manageable.

This massive nuclear buildup, routinely promoted under the comforting rubric of “modernization,” stands in contrast to the president’s lofty public ruminations on the topic of nuclear weapons. The most recent of these was delivered during his visit — the first by an American president — to Hiroshima last month. There, he urged “nations like my own that hold nuclear stockpiles” to “have the courage to escape the logic of fear, and pursue a world without them.”

In reality, that “logic of fear” suggests that there is no way to “fight” a nuclear war, given the unforeseeable but horrific effects of these immensely destructive weapons.  They serve no useful purpose beyond deterring putative opponents from using them, for which an extremely limited number would suffice. During the Berlin crisis of 1961, for example, when the Soviets possessed precisely four intercontinental nuclear missiles, White House planners seriously contemplated launching an overwhelming nuclear strike on the USSR.  It was, they claimed, guaranteed to achieve “victory.” As Fred Kaplan recounts in his book Wizards of Armageddon, the plan’s advocates conceded that the Soviets might, in fact, be capable of managing a limited form of retaliation with their few missiles and bombers in which as many as three million Americans could be killed, whereupon the plan was summarily rejected.

In other words, in the Cold War as today, the idea of “nuclear war-fighting” could not survive scrutiny in a real-world context. Despite this self-evident truth, the U.S. military has long been the pioneer in devising rationales for fighting such a war via ever more “modernized” weapons systems. Thus, when first introduced in the early 1960s, the Navy’s invulnerable Polaris-submarine-launched intercontinental missiles — entirely sufficient in themselves as a deterrent force against any potential nuclear enemy — were seen within the military as an attack on Air Force operations and budgets. The Air Force responded by conceiving and successfully selling the need for a full-scale, land-based missile force as well, one that could more precisely target enemy missiles in what was termed a “counterforce” strategy.

The drive to develop and build such systems on the irrational pretense that nuclear war fighting is a practical proposition persists today.  One component of the current “modernization” plan is the proposed development of a new“dial-a-yield” version of the venerable B-61 nuclear bomb. Supposedly capable of delivering explosions of varying strength according to demand, this device will, at least theoretically, be guidable to its target with high degrees of accuracy and will also be able to burrow deep into the earth to destroy buried bunkers. The estimated bill — $11 billion — is a welcome boost for the fortunes of the Sandia and Los Alamos weapons laboratories that are developing it.

The ultimate cost of this new nuclear arsenal in its entirety is essentially un-knowable. The only official estimate we have so far came from the Congressional Budget Office, which last year projected a total of $350 billion. That figure, however, takes the “modernization” program only to 2024 — before, that is, most of the new systems move from development to actual production and the real bills for all of this start thudding onto taxpayers’ doormats. This year, for instance, the Navy is spending a billion and a half dollars in research and development funds on its new missile submarine, known only as the SSBN(X). Between 2025 and 2035, however, annual costs for that program are projected to run at $10 billion a year. Similar escalations are in store for the other items on the military’s impressive nuclear shopping list.

Assiduously tabulating these projections, experts at the Monterey Center for Nonproliferation Studies peg the price of the total program at a trillion dollars. In reality, though, the true bill that will come due over the next few decades will almost certainly be multiples of that. For example, the Air Force has claimed that its new B-21 strategic bombers will each cost more than$564 million (in 2010 dollars), yet resolutely refuses to release its secret internal estimates for the ultimate cost of the program.

To offer a point of comparison, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, the tactical nuclear bomber previously mentioned, was originally touted as costing no more than $35 million per plane. In fact, it will actually enter service with a sticker price well in excess of $200 million.

Nor does that trillion-dollar figure take into account the inevitable growth of America’s nuclear “shield.” Nowadays, the excitement and debate once generated by President Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” scheme to build a defense system of anti-missile missiles and other devices against a nuclear attack is long gone. (The idea for such a defense, in fact, dates back to the 1950s, but Reagan boosted it to prominence.) Nevertheless, missile defense still routinely soaks up some $10 billion of our money annually, even though it is known to have no utility whatsoever.

“We have nothing to show for it,” Tom Christie, the former director of the Pentagon’s testing office, told me recently. “None of the interceptors we currently have in silos waiting to shoot down enemy missiles have ever worked in tests.” Even so, the U.S. is busy constructing more anti-missile bases across Eastern Europe. As our offensive nuclear programs are built up in the years to come, almost certainly eliciting a response from Russia and China, the pressure for a costly expansion of our nuclear “defenses” will surely follow.

The Bow-Wave Strategy 

It’s easy enough to find hypocrisy in President Obama’s mellifluous orations on abolishing nuclear weapons given the trillion-dollar-plus nuclear legacy he will leave in his wake. The record suggests, however, that faced with the undeviating strategic thinking of the military establishment and its power to turn desires into policy, he has simply proven as incapable of altering the Washington system as his predecessors in the Oval Office were or as his successors are likely to be.

Inside the Pentagon, budget planners and weapons-buyers talk of the “bow wave,” referring to the process by which current research and development initiatives, initially relatively modest in cost, invariably lock in commitments to massive spending down the road. Traditionally, such waves start to form at times when the military is threatened with possible spending cutbacks due to the end of a war or some other budgetary crisis.

Former Pentagon analyst Franklin “Chuck” Spinney, who spent years observing and chronicling the phenomenon from the inside, recalls an early 1970s bow wave at a time when withdrawal from Vietnam appeared to promise a future of reduced defense spending. The military duly put in place an ambitious “modernization” program for new planes, ships, tanks, satellites, and missiles. Inevitably, when it came time to actually buy all those fancy new systems, there was insufficient money in the defense budget.

Accordingly, the high command cut back on spending for “readiness”; that is, for maintaining existing weapons in working order, training troops, and similar mundane activities. This had the desired effect — at least from the point of view of Pentagon — of generating a raft of media and congressional horror stories about the shocking lack of preparedness of our fighting forces and the urgent need to boost its budget. In this way, the hapless Jimmy Carter, elected to the presidency on a promise to rein in defense spending, found himself, in Spinney’s phrase, “mousetrapped,” and eventually unable to resist calls for bigger military budgets.

This pattern would recur at the beginning of the 1990s when the Soviet Union imploded and the Cold War superpower military confrontation seemed at an end.  The result was the germination of ultimately budget-busting weapons systems like the Air Force’s F-35 and F-22 fighters. It happened again when pullbacks from Iraq and Afghanistan in Obama’s first term led to mild military spending cuts. As Spinney points out, each successive bow wave crests at a higher level, while military budget cuts due to wars ending and the like become progressively more modest.

The latest nuclear buildup is only the most glaring and egregious example of the present bow wave that is guaranteed to grow to monumental proportions long after Obama has retired to full-time speechmaking. The cost of the first of the Navy’s new Ford Class aircraft carriers, for example, has alreadygrownby 20% to $13 billion with more undoubtedly to come. The “Third Offset Strategy,” a fantasy-laden shopping list of robot drones and “centaur” (half-man, half-machine) weapons systems, assiduously touted by Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work, is similarly guaranteed to expand stunningly beyond the $3.6 billion allotted to its development next year.

Faced with such boundlessly ambitious raids on the public purse, no one should claim a “lack of strategy” as a failing among our real policymakers, even if all that planning has little or nothing to do with distant war zones where Washington’s conflicts smolder relentlessly on.

Andrew Cockburn is the Washington editor of Harper’s Magazine. An Irishman, he has covered national security topics in this country for many years. In addition to numerous books, he co-produced the 1997 feature filmThe Peacemaker and the 2009 documentary on the financial crisis, American Casino. His latest book is Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins(just out in paperback). 

Coping with NATO’s recent aggressive behavior has been unquestionably the most important issue on the Russian foreign policy agenda, an issue around which all other issues revolve. Considering that NATO is a military alliance, Russia’s responses have necessarily been military in nature so as to find a way out of the current crisis in a way consistent with Russia’s national interests.

From Moscow’s perspective, the relationship with NATO can take one of five forms, in reverse order of desirability:

1. Hot, “shooting” war.
2. Post-“color revolution” Russia as a raw materials colony of the West, deprived of its sovereignty, industry, and great power status.
3. Another “cold war” accompanied by hybrid conflicts, covert warfare, proxy struggles, arms races, and military forward deployments.
4. Armed neutrality, in which Russia and NATO delineate and respect their corresponding spheres of influence and have no further interaction, for better or worse.
5. Partnership in resolving global problems.

Needless to say, at the moment the Russia-NATO relationship is close to the “cold war” stage as a result of the Kiev coup d’etat and “color revolutions” being promoted not just against Russia’s allies and neighbors but also against Russia itself. Since the idea of a Russia-NATO partnership seems inconceivable at the moment, and will remain so for as long as the Obama/Cameron/Merkel/Erdogan/Hollande crew is calling the shots in NATO (though that situation could radically change in the next several years, due to term limits, electoral challenges, and all-round unpopularity), the goal of Russia’s policy has been to ratchet the tension down to the level of “armed neutrality” while at the same time preparing for the worst–a “hot war”.

Already the ancient Romans knew that “si vis pacem, para bellum”–if you wish peace, prepare for war. Which means that Russia’s military responses have centered at establishing a credible deterrence posture while at the same time signalling the readiness to ratchet down the level of military confrontation. It is not an easy task–one of the lessons of the late 1940s is that responses to crises at hand which are intended to be temporary can quickly become permanent and lock succeeding leaders and administrations into the confrontation which is then passed on, as it were, from generation to generation.

Russian actions also indicate that NATO is not viewed as a unitary actor, which indeed it is not. There is the US, there is also Germany and France, there is Poland and the Baltics, and of course there is Turkey. Each of those sets of countries represents a faction within NATO with its all interests and the ability to pursue them independently of the rest of NATO. It would be a mistake to believe that Warsaw, Ankara, Berlin, Paris, etc.,  all take their orders from Washington. Nevertheless, they do have a certain commonality of interests, for otherwise NATO would have long fallen apart. In regards to Washington, the structure of preferences looks something like this, again, in reverse order of preferability:

1. Hot, “shooting” war.
2. Another “cold war” accompanied by hybrid conflicts, covert warfare, proxy struggles, arms races, and military forward deployments.
3. Partnership in resolving global problems.
4. Armed neutrality, in which Russia and NATO delineate and respect their corresponding spheres of influence and have no further interaction, for better or worse.
5. Post “color revolution” Russia as a raw materials colony of the West, deprived of its sovereignty, industry, and great power status.

The current predatory model of capitalism that the West is pursuing means the West’s priorities at the moment are quite incompatible with that of Russia. . Western regime change policies are driven by economic imperialism, pure and simple, though nicely disguised as “globalization”. It is simply colonialism through indirect, local rule, whose aim is to yield economic benefits to the Western powers at the expense of the “neo-colonies”. It means that, fortunately, Western powers are leery of another prolonged “cold war” because of the sheer expense that would be associated with it.

Therefore if Russia is to persuade the West that “armed neutrality” is actually desirable, it has to show the ability to engage in a prolonged “cold war” and even a “shooting war” if need be, while at the same time demonstrating its resilience against “color revolutions”. It is admittedly debatable whether armed neutrality is preferable to partnership, from NATO’s perspective. It would appear the West is opposed to cooperation with Russia on matters like international terrorism simply because the West doesn’t view terrorism as the problem. If anything, Russia’s participation in resolving the problem would mean Western “spoils of war” would be greatly reduced. We have seen the West’s twisted priorities in action in Syria, after all.

Given the problem at hand, the various and disparate military measures undertaken by the Russian Federation in the last couple of years that have been chronicled in various issues of the Russia Defense Report should be viewed as pieces of a larger puzzle.

Thus the creation of the Russian Guard is intended to show the West that “color revolution” strategies are bound to fail when used against Russia. Re-establishing Ground Forces’ divisions and even Tank Armies, in addition to the Airborne Forces’ expansion, sends a message to the Baltic States and Poland plus any NATO countries contemplating establishing military presence in these countries  that there is no way NATO can attain conventional superiority over Russia in that part of the world. Potential deployments of Iskander and Kalibr missiles to Kaliningrad and Crimea sends a message to NATO countries further afield, including Germany, France, and Turkey, that they can’t count on staying above the fray–the long arm of Russia’s conventional deterrence can reach them too.  Finally, the US is being put on notice that any effort to undermine Russia’s nuclear deterrent will face a multifaceted response of targeting anti-ballistic missile sites and deploying new ICBMs and SLBMs that can overcome and/or bypass US missile defenses.

Is this approach, now at least two years in the offing, working? It is too early to say, though the upcoming Warsaw NATO summit will no doubt shed some light on NATO preferences. For now, the apparent unwillingness to commit to permanent troop basing in Eastern Europe and favoring troop rotations instead (which will no doubt prove very onerous for the thinly stretched, demoralized, and underfunded NATO land forces that have not recovered from the Afghanistan and Iraq debacles) suggests that the “armed neutrality” is at least being considered in NATO high councils. On the other hand, should the West’s apparently terminal economic crisis take a turn to the worse, there is no telling what NATO might do in desperation. For that reason, one should not expect anything better than Russia-NATO “armed neutrality” for many years to come, until the West adopts a more sustainable economic model that is not dependent on constant aggression.

The shooting in Orlando, Florida, is not about homosexuals, or Muslims, or assault rifles.

It is about waging aggressive warfare overseas, empowering the domestic police state, and electing a warmongering President.

Dr. Graeme McQueen, founding member of the Centre for Peace Studies at McMaster University, Canada and author of The 2001 Anthrax Deception, argues that the prime suspects in any such case should be intelligence agencies.

We don’t have to go far to see the hand of intelligence agencies in this catastrophe. The shooter himself was an employee of G4S, described by journalist Alex Emmons as “a giant, often controversial global contracting corporation that provides mercenary forces, prison guards and security services.”

Additionally, the shooter’s father is said to be a CIA asset.

Given that Intelligence agencies are well-positioned to engineer synthetic terror threats, author Naomi Wolf argues that it is “crazy” not to question new events, since “spectacles” drive “outcomes”.  Further, she observes that propagandizing the public includes films (i.e. “Zero Dark Thirty”) – arguing that the Pentagon must have “signed off” on it —which indirectly seek to “normalize” intelligence operations such as torture and mass surveillance.

Intelligence operatives know that synthetic terror events shock and anesthetize the public; that they make people susceptible to manipulation; and that they lay the groundwork for the terror event to be easily politicized.

Naomi Klein describes the same dynamic in The Shock Doctrine.  When people are shocked by a real or man-made event, they can be easily manipulated to support wars, or neoliberal market schemes, or any number of toxic agendas.

A simple formula underpins these operations:  problem, reaction, solution.

The problem from the perspective of criminal warmongers is that the public doesn’t want war or a police state.  The intended reaction of the operation is that the synthetic terror event will induce people to seek protection from the state, coupled with aggressive war to bomb the threat out of existence. The solution, or intended result, is already occurring.  Engineered fear and racism have set the stage for the public to be manipulated to accept a covert agenda that it would otherwise reject.

Cui Bono?  Who benefits? The police state apparatus, War Inc., and a warmongering Presidential agenda all benefit.

The manipulation of the public is further enabled by an amendment to the National Defence Authorization Act (NDAA) which negates the Smith-Mundt Act (SMA) of 1984 which prohibits government agencies from propagandizing domestic populations.

Susan Posel explains in “How the NDAA Allows US Gov to Use Propaganda Against Americans”:

“SMA  defines the prohibition of domestic access to influence information through a variety of means, from broadcast to publishing of books, media, and online sources by restricting the State Department.”

The Broadcasting Board of Governors was created from SMA. This agency claims to “inform, engage, and connect people around the world in support of ‘freedom and democracy’. They omit that their specialty is making sure propaganda is added to the informational flow we all depend on.”

Instead of succumbing to the shock of terror events, instead of allowing our “reptilian minds” to overrule rational decision-making processes, we need to decode the Orlando shooting, and other terror events, within the “problem, reaction, solution” framework, and be conscious of how they are being manipulated and politicized to suit covert agendas that do not serve the public interest. The “therapy” for the shock will allow us to subordinate our “reptilian” mindsets, and to act rationally.  A rational mindset will reject the racism, hatred, and warmongering which are intended off-shoots of these terror events.

On June 14, NATO’s defense ministers formally approved the deployment plan of four multinational battalions to Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. Each country will be reinforced by a battalion. The battalions will be under the orders of NATO commanders, and formally deployed on a rotational basis rather than being based permanently in the host countries, but coverage will be continuous and the presence will be maintained permanently.

Great Britain, Germany and the United States advanced plans on June 14 to spearhead a new NATO force on Russia’s border from next year. The three NATO’s biggest military powers said they would each command a combat battalion across the eastern flank. The new force is expected to total about 4,000 soldiers, with contributions from other allies. Germany is likely to deploy to Lithuania, the United States to Poland and Britain to Estonia, on a six-to-nine month rotating basis. Canada is expected to command a fourth battalion in Latvia. Other NATO nations will eventually take command responsibilities. France is also sending a company of about 250 troops. The battalions are part of a wider NATO deployment to be approved at the Warsaw summit on July 8-9, which will involve troops on rotation, warehoused equipment and a highly mobile force backed by NATO’s 40,000-strong rapid response force.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said at the June 14 meeting that the alliance is considering a Romanian offer to command a multinational brigade which could coordinate alliance training and possibly play a deterrent role. Romania has offered to provide the headquarters for the brigade and is expected to lead the formation.

In addition, the United States will increase its military presence in Eastern Europe by deploying an armored brigade. According to the fiscal year 2017 European Reassurance Initiative budget proposal, the US military spending in Europe will be more than $3.4 billion – far more than the $786 million in the current budget. The Army will repair and upgrade its already pre-positioned arms and place them at sites in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany. Those stocks will be sufficient for another armored brigade to fall in on. The rotating brigade will bring its own equipment. The move will add hundreds of the Army’s most advanced weapons systems to beef up the US European Command’s combat capability. It will also free up an entire brigade’s worth of weapons currently being used by US forces training on the continent to enable more American troops to be rushed in on short notice. The rotation period will be limited to nine months. An armored brigade combat team comprises about 4,200 troops and includes approximately 250 tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles and Paladin self-propelled howitzers, plus 1,750 wheeled vehicles. The proposed budget increase includes a $1.8bn outlay on 45,000 GPS-guided smart bombs and laser-guided rockets to boost the forces precision strike capability.

All these plans are in violation of the Russia-NATO Founding Act (1997), which states that «in the current and foreseeable security environment», it would not seek «additional permanent stationing of substantial ground combat forces» in the nations closer to Russia.

The arguments of NATO officials saying the forces will deploy on temporary basis do not hold water. The violation is obvious. Actually, stationing forces abroad under the pretext of holding exercises cannot be done on a non-rotational basis anyway, because each unit has an operational cycle that envisions going through exercises. The announced plans are nothing else but a permanent military presence of substantial forces. With the Founding Act invalid, the Russia-NATO military relationship will be left without a legal basis to go upon. The document has played a very important role in the relationship for 19 years.

It’s not about ground forces only. Poland and the Baltic States are attempting to build a regional anti-aircraft missile shield. «We are in discussions now with the Estonians, the Latvians, and the Poles over how we can create some kind of regional air defense system», Lithuanian Defense Minister Juozas Olekas told the Financial Times on June 10.

American Patriot missiles are being considered as the four countries evaluate procurement possibilities.

In addition to a proposed anti-aircraft missile shield, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania are also lobbying NATO for an air mission requiring the deployment of dozens of warplanes, said Lithuania’s defense chief, Lieutenant General Vytautas Zukas.

Meanwhile, Romania has announced its desire to station a permanent alliance fleet –including ships from Ukraine and Georgia – in the Black Sea to counter Russia.

Moscow has accused NATO of moving more and more military forces close to its borders, and vowed to do what it takes to protect Russia’s national security and interests. It will have to deploy additional military aircraft and Iskander missile systems closer to the border. In response to NATO’s plans, Moscow has announced the decision to deploy two new divisions in the west and one in the south to counterbalance NATO’s increased military presence near Russian borders.

Many Europeans oppose these NATO’s plans. For instance, some 56 percent of Germans surveyed recently do not consider Russia as a threat to their country, with 49 percent of respondents opposing the idea of permanent deployment of NATO forces in Poland or the Baltic states.

The US decision to increase military presence in Europe comes along with the rise of Donald Trump, who has disparaged the NATO alliance as a drain on US resources.

His stance has a lot of supporters in the US.

The negative development of events is seen as a provocation by Moscow to reduce any chances of a dialogue within the framework of Russia-NATO Council. NATO’s plans to send four armed battalions to the Baltic States and Poland will greatly reduce European security and provoke an arms race with unpredictable results. An accident or provocation could lead to a dangerous escalation in hostilities. The stand-off will trigger an arms race.

It’s not an accident that the very same day the NATO defense ministers meeting took place, President Vladimir Putin ordered a snap inspection of the Russian armed forces to assess combat and mobilization readiness. The inspection (June 14-22) is carried out at a number of weapons and hardware storage facilities, as well as individual military control agencies. Despite the fact that the 2011 OSCE Vienna Document’s provisions did not apply to such inspections, Russia voluntarily notified all the signatories about the move. This is the first reaction to NATO’s hostile activities.

After a torrent of multifaceted politically-motivated assumptions about the Orlando shooting which claimed the lives of 50 and left scores more injured, the extent to which the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) interacted with the suspect, Omar Mateen, before the attacks was partially revealed.

In a press conference, FBI Director James Comey would admit (emphasis added):

…the FBI’s Miami office opened a preliminary investigation, and over the next 10 months we attempted to determine whether he was possibly a terrorist. Something we do in hundreds and hundreds of cases all across the country. 

Our investigation involved introducing confidential sources to him, recording conversations with him, following him, reviewing transactional records from his communications, and searching all government holdings for any possible connections, any possible derogatory information. We then interviewed him twice. He admitted making the statements that his co-workers reported, but explained that he did it in anger because he thought his co-workers were discriminating against him and teasing him because he was Muslim.

FBI Director Comey never elaborated on just how those informants interacted with Mateen. However, examining publicly available FBI affidavits from other investigations that resulted in arrests and prosecutions, it is almost certain the informants posed as terrorists with ties to Al Qaeda or the self-proclaimed “Islamic State” (ISIS).

In two cases that unfolded just last years, FBI informants would be revealed to have helped plan attacks with suspects, suggest to suspects that they credit ISIS for the attacks (as reported by the Intercept), and even helped them in procuring weapons and explosives before finally arresting them.

The results of such investigations are often high-profile counterterrorism news stories portraying the investigations as having stopped real attacks. Headlines like the Washington Post’s “Mass. man accused of plotting to hit Pentagon and Capitol with drone aircraft,” or the FBI’s own press release, “Oregon Resident Convicted in Plot to Bomb Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony,” betray the fact the virtually every aspect of these supposed plots from A-Z were scripted by the FBI’s informants themselves with the suspects often being mentally unstable and technically/financially incapable of carrying out the attacks on their own – as evident in the FBI’s own affidavits.

Protecting America, or Exploiting the Mentally Ill to Fill Quotas and Make Headlines?  

The FBI often opens these cases when suspects with questionable mental health make statements online or to friends, family, or co-workers indicating possible support for terrorist groups or terroristic aspirations. Comments could range from claims of belonging to a terrorist group or expressing a dislike of or a desire to cause harm to certain groups.

Instead of recognizing a potentially dangerous, mentally unstable individual and getting them the help they need, the FBI instead proceeds with a process of entrapping them. They work often for months posing as terrorists, gaining the trust of the suspect, and leading them through elaborate, scripted terror plots.

So elaborate are these undercover investigations, that in at least two cases, FBI informants would actually train suspects how to use real explosives and even practice detonating live explosives in remote areas in the lead up to the final “attack.”

Image: What looks like a terrifying bomb filling the back of a van was actually constructed by the FBI and handed over to suspect Mohamed Osman Mohamud in Portland, Oregon. They also handed him a detonator he attempted to trigger twice before finally being arrested. The FBI – prior to the final staged bombing/arrest – would travel with the suspect to Lincoln County Park where he and FBI informants detonated real explosives.

In one such case in 2010, the FBI investigated naturalized US citizen and Oregon resident Mohamed Osman Mohamud. In their own official statement titled, “Oregon Resident Arrested in Plot to Bomb Christmas Tree Lighting Ceremony in Portland,” released by the U.S. Attorney’s Office on November 26, 2010 it was reported (emphasis added):

According to the affidavit, on November 4, 2010, Mohamud and the undercover FBI operatives traveled to a remote location in Lincoln County, Ore., where they detonated a bomb concealed in a backpack as a trial run for the upcoming attack.

In 2012, amid another FBI undercover investigation, USA Today would report in their article, “FBI foils alleged suicide bomb attack on U.S. Capitol,” that (emphasis added):

According to a counterterrorism official, El Khalifi “expressed interest in killing at least 30 people and considered targeting a building in Alexandria and a restaurant, synagogue and a place where military personnel gather in Washington before he settled on the Capitol after canvassing that area a couple of times,” the Associated Press writes. During the year-long investigation, El Khalifi detonated explosives at a quarry in the capital region with undercover operatives. He is not believed to be affiliated with al-Qaeda, officials said.

One can only speculate what – over the course of 10 months – undercover FBI informants said and did with Orlando shooting suspect Omar Mateen and how that may have contributed to his final act of violence years later.

The Public Must Demand Answers From the FBI 

The FBI’s practice of entrapping terror suspects has long been called into question. Until now, the damage caused by the FBI’s methods has been confined to locking away for years suspects who were otherwise incapable of carrying out actual terror attacks and instead required the attention of mental health professionals.

With revelations that the FBI investigated Omar Mateen twice, including two interviews and the use of undercover informants over the course of at least 10 months, it appears that the FBI’s methods may have backfired – and it would be for the first time.

Image: Another FBI undercover investigation backfired in 1993 when suspects the FBI was helping build a truck bomb for ended up detonating the device in New York City’s World Trade Center, killing 6 and wounding hundreds more. The FBI’s role in the bombing was only revealed when an undercover informant who recorded conversations between himself and FBI agents, provided tapes to the New York Times.

It is possible that contact with undercover informants posing as extremists may have radicalized or at the very least, planted the seeds for the violence Mateen would eventually carry out years later. The public, press, and America’s elected representatives must demand answers from the FBI regarding the nature of their investigation including who the FBI’s informants posed as, and what ideas they attempted to lure Mateen into their practiced methods of entrapment with.

Did they suggest or help plan attacks on bars as they did with Alexander Ciccolo whom the FBI entrapped and arrested in 2015 according to the Intercept’s article, “Another “Terror” Arrest; Another Mentally Ill Man, Armed by the FBI?” Did they encourage or compound a possible internal conflict Mateen was struggling with regarding his apparent homosexuality?

So far, the FBI refuses to make the details of their previous investigations public. They must as it constitutes a potentially essential key in ascertaining Mateen’s motives – and the FBI investigating a crime they themselves may have played a criminally negligent role in motivating constitutes a dangerous conflict of interests unacceptable if an impartial and honest investigation is to move forward.

Instead of attempting to hitch our own various personal political causes to this tragedy, make it a priority instead to pursue and demand the truth. The villains we think we fear may pale in comparison to what may have truly sparked this tragedy – and exposing it may be the key to preventing the next tragedy.

If the FBI played a role in radicalizing and provoking Mateen’s violence, and if the FBI is conducting hundreds of such entrapment cases all across America, how many other pending tragedies await the American public?

The United States is methodically setting the stage for a so-called “humanitarian” military intervention against the small northeast African nation of Eritrea, under legal pretexts much like those used to justify NATO’s war of regime change against Libya, in 2011. As in Libya, the U.S. has hijacked the United Nations human rights apparatus to claim a “responsibility to protect” (R2P) Eritrea’s citizens from alleged abuses by their own government. War and regime change are the intended result.

Washington engineered UN sanctions against Eritrea, beginning in 2009, on the patently bogus charge that Eritrea’s determinedly secular government provided “political, financial and logistical support” to Islamist Shabaab fighters in Somalia. Islamic jihadism is anathema to Eritrea, whose population of six million on the shores of the Red Sea is about evenly divided between Muslims and Christians. But few people in the United States knew Eritrea existed, much less its secular revolutionary history and politics. The lies stuck, as did the sanctions, even after the UN Human Rights Council conceded there was no further evidence of Eritrean aid to the Shabaab.

A three-person UN panel now alleges that Eritrea is a lawless state that has committed “crimes against humanity,” enslaving up to 400,000 people and engaging in murder, forced disappearances, rape and torture. Mark Smith, the Australian chairman of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea, demands that Eritrea be put on trial before the International Criminal Court, a body that has indicted only Africans – and only those that were on the wrong side of U.S. foreign policy – since its creation in 2002. Smith laid the legal groundwork for the overthrow of the Eritrean government:

“There is no genuine prospect of the Eritrean judicial system holding perpetrators to account in a fair and transparent manner. The perpetrators of these crimes must face justice and the victims’ voices must be heard. The international community should now take steps, including using the International Criminal Court [ICC], national courts and other available mechanisms, to ensure there is accountability for the atrocities being committed in Eritrea.”

In February of 2011, the United Nations Security Council, led by the U.S., Britain and France, referred the case against Libya to the ICC, to provide a criminal justice rationale for the military assault that was already underway against Muammar Gaddafi’s government. This time, Washington has instructed its UN proxies to give “humanitarian” legal cover in advance for an attack on Eritrea. The demonization campaign is built around two Big Lies: one, that Eritrea’s system of national service – a form of draft, which is the right of all nations – amounts to “slavery”; and two, that domestic oppression in Eritrea is a prime source of African refugees to Europe, with the tiny nation allegedly accounting for more cross-continental emigration than every other country except war-ravaged Syria.

National service in Eritrea, as in many other countries, includes not only military duty on the front lines with Ethiopia – which still occupies parts of Eritrea in clear violation of an international arbitration agreement – but also labor in public works projects as well as service in health and education infrastructures. (Most teachers in Eritrea, for example, are national service workers.) Lots of folks would call that socialism or nation-building – which is how the Eritreans see it.

The Eritreans defend extended national service on grounds of necessity, citing an existential threat from the Ethiopian military, backed to the hilt by Washington. Economic sanctions have also necessitated that Eritrea mobilize the population to develop its own national resources. However, self-reliance is also a cornerstone of Eritrean domestic development policy, and seen as central to maintaining true national sovereignty and independence. Eritrea rejects foreign “aid” and entanglements with structures of international capital, and is one of only two nations in Africa that has no relationship with AFRICOM, the U.S. military command on the continent (Zimbabwe is the other).

Eritrea’s fierce independence has put it in imperialism’s crosshairs. Eritrea is “Africa’s Cuba” – and the United States treats it as such in a striking variety of ways. Indeed, the other Big Lie against Eritrea – that it is the second largest contributor to the waves of refugees risking life and limb to reach Europe – is directly related to European immigration policies, urged on them by the U.S., that put Eritrea in much the same bind as U.S. policy towards Cuba.

It is insane to believe that little Eritrea, with only six million people, has set more people to flight than neighboring Ethiopia, one of the poorest countries in the world, now in the throes of a devastating drought, with a population 15 times greater; or neighboring Sudan, also desperately poor and afflicted by multiple wars, with 40 million people; or nearby Somalia, a nation without a state, inhabited by 10 million people. Indeed, economic, political and war refugees from all across Africa claim to be Eritrean because, unlike citizens of any other African country, Eritrean refugees are afforded special status on arrival in Europe as presumptive political refugees who might face torture if returned home. As with U.S. Cuba policy, the Eritrean exception was designed to weaken and destabilize the country through a brain and human resource drain. Inevitably, however, the policy has made Eritrean identification papers the hottest selling documents on the streets of Khartoum and other refugee gathering points. Europe is awash, as is Israel, with fake Eritreans fleeing various military, political and economic catastrophes – most of them rooted in Euro-American foreign destabilization policies and the global capitalist Race to the Bottom.

If Latin Americans could pass for Cubans, the populations of U.S. “Little Havanas” would number in the tens of millions, full of Hondurans, Guatemalans, Salvadorans and Mexicans.

Ethiopians pass most easily as Eritreans, since millions of them share the same ethnic background. About half of Eritreans are Tigrayan, the ethnic group that is the fourth largest in Ethiopia and dominates the ruling party in Addis Ababa. The Austrian Ambassador to Ethiopia, Andreas Melan, last year estimated that “among the thousands of Eritrean migrants in Europe, 30 to 40 percent are Ethiopians.” That may be an underestimate. And many more “Eritreans” actually hail from as far away as West Africa.

The Eritrean ambassador to Israel believes that Ethiopians account for half of the purported Eritreans seeking refugee status in that country. “They know the Eritreans automatically receive a six-month visa, so they pretend to be Eritrean,” said the ambassador.

The Eritrean refugee scam is an open secret all across Europe, and is well known to the American and European governments. The Big Lie is maintained to serve imperial purposes, and will now be deployed to justify an armed assault on Eritrea as an alleged mass enslaver and rogue nation. The UN Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea will submit its manufactured findings to the Human Rights Council on June 21, setting the imperial lynch mob in motion.

Eritrea cannot expect a fair hearing from a UN apparatus that is puppeteered from Washington. As the Eritrean government stated in its preliminary response to the UN commission’s charges:

“The purposes of national service in Eritrea are clearly stated in a legal proclamation of 1994 and are three-fold: national defense, economic and social development and national integration.  The service is not indefinite although for a time and in certain cases it has been prolonged due the already explained existential threat of war.”

The commission based its findings on the testimony of about 800 (alleged) Eritreans interviewed in various foreign cities, while ignoring the 42,000 Eritrean expatriates that have petitioned the world body to lift sanctions against their home country.

The UN panel is ignoring what is “effectively a continuing state of war with Ethiopia, the illegal occupation of Eritrean territory which constitutes a flagrant violation of human rights, repeated armed aggression, sanctions and mistaken policies that consider almost all Eritreans asylum-seekers,” said Eritrean government spokesperson Yemane Gebreab. That’s a diplomatic way of putting it. By referring the case to the International Criminal Court, and implicitly threatening military action against Eritrea, the commission has become a warmonger.

On Monday, the New York Times reported that thousands of Ethiopian and Eritrean troops were rushing towards the disputed border, the site of heavy artillery duels. The Times quoted an Eritrean dissident living in Sweden as their expert of the moment. “If there is a war, or the rumor of a war, it could be a way for the Eritrean government to get support and divert attention,” said the dissident. The newspaper also relayed a Twitter message from an Eritrean American in his homeland’s capital. “Here in Asmara, it’s peaceful despite #EthiopianAttacks against #Eritrea on the Tsorona front. And you wonder why there’s national service?”

President Obama seems intent on adding War #8 to his imperial legacy.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at [email protected]

So how is your war on “terrorism” going? I’m not doing too well at it since I have no idea who the enemy is. Like the American black comedian, Dick Gregory, who, on hearing that President Johnson had declared a war on poverty, ran out onto the street with a hand grenade to throw it at some poor people, I have no idea who the real enemy is, who to throw a grenade at. That makes me think.

We are told, the world over, by every government, that we are in a “war against terrorism.” But terrorism is an action, a tactic, a strategy. It’s a method not person, a group, a country. How can there be a war against a method of war. But they want us to fight a method and never ask the why or the who. That doesn’t seem to matter anymore. They tell us not to be concerned with why something happens, only how it happens.

Let’s face it, the Americans, with all the creative skills of Madison Avenue, have got us all to use a phrase that George Bush first used in 2001after the strange event in New York that has all the indicia of a state attack on its own people to justify the invasions of Afghanistan and then Iraq. It has become a euphemism and a justification for all the wars they have waged since. The people don’t need to know why “terrorists” exist, or who they are and what motivates them, or even whether they really exist, for they are just “terrorists.”

Sometimes the war is against a “regime” that is “terrorising” its own people according to the “responsibility to protect” mafia that act as the chorus to the principal players in this theatre, as was done to Yugoslavia and Libya; or a regime that “terrorises the world”, as we saw with Iraq. Sometimes the war is a phony war against ‘terrorists” who are really mercenary forces fighting for the USA and its allies. We see this in Syria. We have seen it used against Russia. The result is the same.

When the Americans say they are fighting “terrorists” in Iraq, they really mean they are fighting the resistance to their invasion and occupation. When they same the same thing in Afghanistan, the same holds true, they are fighting a national resistance. The Russians, when they say they are fighting “terrorism” in Syria, know that in fact they are fighting the United States and its allies and proxy forces.

The bombings and shootings in Europe, Asia, the US, and Russia are all connected to the real war that is being conducted by the United States against the world it wants to control, and, in fact, can better be described as a war of terror being waged against the rest of us by the United States and its vassal states.

The War On Terror is in fact The American War Against The World. For isn’t that what we are dealing with from the United States itself to Latin America, to Africa, Europe to Asia, non-stop wars since World War II ended? You can even say that World War II never did really end. It just went through different stages, from the defeat of the German and Japanese empires in 1945 to the war by the American corporate state against all socialist and worker oriented governments worldwide afterwards and against any country, even of a capitalist orientation, that demanded or demands a fair price for its resources or that won’t obey orders from Washington.

The acts of terrorism by US proxy elements and forces in Syria and Ukraine for example are a type of hybrid warfare, used both against the targeted country, for instance Syria, Libya and Russia, and a type of hybrid warfare against its own people and the peoples of its allies to create the necessary propaganda to obtain their support for the very wars in which they are the first victims. In other words, they get the people to cut their own throats.

For the result is the same, new oppressive security laws and surveillance, more calls for war on the middle east, and the use of emergency laws, as we see in France, being used to terrorise working people with the threat of harsher working conditions for less pay in order to give industrialists more profit. Is that not a form of terrorism, class terrorism?

With each set of ‘terrorist” bombings from London to Madrid, to Paris to Boston and the shootings in which the claimed attackers always end up dead instead of arrested, and in which all the alleged attackers apparently have some connection to the intelligence services of the countries involved, and which attacks often occur at the same time that the police are conducting “anti-terrorist” drills, cause many to question whether some of the events are staged by the state itself and those that are clearly not, whether they are also the work of the state intelligence services as the famous Bologna bombing in Italy turned out to be; the work of state secret services to discredit the left using the Operation Gladio network to conduct the attack.

The NATO build-up of forces in Eastern Europe threatening Russia, is that not an attempt to terrorise the Russian people? The American build up of forces around China, is that not an attempt to terrorise the Chinese people with the threat of war unless they kowtow to the American president?

The American renewal of its nuclear arsenal, the British promise to do the same, the constant threats of world war coming from the foul mouths of the decaying leadership campaigning for the American presidency, the lies and distortion propagated by the western mass media against their own peoples to make them fear even their own shadows, are these not acts of terrorism against the people of the entire world?

The use of the word “terrorism” says nothing. It contains no useful information that can lead to an understanding of events and circumstances. It is a word used to dope the mind, paralyse thought, to sap the will. Language is an important tool of control of the people. To accept the terms of propaganda used by the powers that want to control us is to surrender to them completely because once we do that we lose the ability think rationally, to analyse, to question, to think for ourselves.

Finally, terror is an act that is used by those that can’t get what they want legitimately. Individual acts of terror, carried out by the lone terrorist or small group are carried out because they have no other political power than to try to frighten the populace. But acts of terror carried out by those factions of society that hold state power proves that they know their objectives and methods are criminal. That is why they have to resort to the terrorism of their own peoples in order to maintain control and dominance. And this is the state of affairs to which the world has been reduced after a century of war beginning with The Great War, World War I, through the Second, and the Third, euphemistically called the Cold, War, and now the Fourth, and final war that is now on-going and has been since the NATO terrorist bombing of Yugoslavia.

If we want to eliminate terrorism in this world then we have to eliminate the conditions that bring to power those willing to use terrorism to rule. In the United States, a democratic revolution would have to take place, but the disorganised mob that is now the American people is more easily swayed by the demagogues of fascism, like Donald Trump or Hilary Clinton, than by ideas of social and economic justice.

The situation is bleak and getting darker by the day as the violence increases, as the drones assassinate at a distance, as international law is ripped to shreds, as the climate continues to warm and change without any real attempt to stop it, as every day life becomes more precarious each passing day.

Maybe someone out there has the answer to all this. I don’t. But we are not going to find it, even look for it, unless we know when to call a spade a spade, and not “terrorism,” unless we define our own terms and talk to each other with real meaning, instead of being trapped in the matrix of lies and deceit that define the modern world.

Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto, he is a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada and he is known for a number of high-profile cases involving human rights and war crimes, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

After spending more than 14 months in Yemen as part of the “Saudi-led coalition” to re-impose the rule of corrupt Western-friendly Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and destroy the Houthi revolution, the United Arab Emirates are announcing their plans to withdraw from the country.

While the Saudis and their coalition laughably claim that their campaign is based upon human rights, the reality is that it is based upon the desire to prevent further Iranian influence in the region and the expansion of Shi’ite power.

Nevertheless, after over a year of military presence in Yemen and repeatedly crushing defeats, the UAE is stating that its campaign is “practically over.”

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed’s official Twitter account quoted the Minister of State For Foreign Affairs as saying “Our position today is clear: the war is practically over for our troops.”

“We are looking at political arrangements and our political role now is to empower the Yemenis in the liberated areas,” he said.

The statement was left somewhat open-ended thus suggesting the possibility that the UAE troops could remain in Yemen under the guise of providing protection for sensitive locations or “counterterrorism” operations.”

Emirati media is now attempting to cover up for the massive failure of UAE operations claiming that the military phase has ended and that it is now merely time for a political phase.

It is unclear whether or not the UAE pullout of Yemen has resulted in any disagreement between the Emiratis and the Saudis.

However, the Saudis have recently argued for yet another major push toward Houthi territory so it is clear that, if the UAE does indeed end its military participation in the campaign, the Saudis and the UAE are on very different pages.

Brandon Turbeville – article archive here – is the author of seven books, Codex Alimentarius — The End of Health Freedom, 7 Real Conspiracies, Five Sense Solutions and Dispatches From a Dissident, volume 1and volume 2, The Road to Damascus: The Anglo-American Assault on Syria, and The Difference it Makes: 36 Reasons Why Hillary Clinton Should Never Be President. Turbeville has published over 650 articles on a wide variety of subjects including health, economics, government corruption, and civil liberties. Brandon Turbeville’s radio show Truth on The Tracks can be found every Monday night 9 pm EST at UCYTV. His website is BrandonTurbeville.com He is available for radio and TV interviews. Please contact activistpost (at) gmail.com.

The campaign launched by Senate Democrats to ban gun purchases by anyone on the massive FBI terrorism “watch list” is the opening move in a broader attack on democratic rights.

Both the Obama administration and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton have endorsed the effort led by Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who staged a 15-hour filibuster Tuesday and Wednesday, with the backing of most Senate Democrats, to force Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell to agree to a vote on two gun-related amendments to an appropriations bill currently before the Senate.

It is not clear whether the amendments will pass when they come to a vote, now scheduled for Monday, but there will be heavy pressure mounted through the media and by Obama and Clinton, perhaps joined in this effort by the presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

One amendment would ban gun purchases by anyone on the FBI’s terrorism watch list. The other would expand the current requirement that gun stores perform background checks on buyers to include gun shows, Internet sellers and other private sellers.

Using the FBI’s terrorism watch list as the basis for banning an otherwise legal activity—in this case, purchasing a gun—is clearly only a test run for using the watch list for other, even more anti-democratic purposes.

The same slogan endorsed enthusiastically by Hillary Clinton—“no fly, no buy”—will have many other applications. If people on the watch list, now denied the right to board an airplane, are then denied the right to buy a gun, what comes next? Should they be denied the right to vote? What about the right to use the Internet, or drive a car?

The logic is inexorable, and in the event of new tragedies on the scale of Orlando, such demands will inevitably arise, and will be taken up by various factions in the reactionary political establishment in the United States.

The FBI watch list is a huge database, estimated at 800,000 names, and including, among the many well-publicized errors, a Republican congressman and a four-year-old boy, both from northern California. There is no judicial review of the FBI operation, and no legal procedure for having one’s name removed from the list.

An ACLU-backed lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security’s “no-fly” list, a subset of the FBI database, has been dragging on in the federal courts for the past six years. Another such lawsuit, sponsored by Islamic-American groups, is in federal court in Virginia.

The vast majority of the names on the watch list are people “suspected” of links to terrorism, in most cases without meeting any justiciable standard, such as “probable cause,” let alone proof “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Many, if not most, are Muslim Americans who were “nominated” for the list because they come from Syria, Iraq, Somalia or other countries ravaged by US-sponsored wars, or attend the same mosque as an Islamic extremist, or had bigoted neighbors who called the FBI over people wearing traditional Islamic dress.

As the New York Times admitted in an analysis Wednesday, “Tens of thousands of counterterrorism tips flow to the FBI each year. Some are legitimate. Others come from vengeful ex-spouses or people casting suspicion on Arab-Americans.”

The 800,000 names compares to what FBI Director James Comey described as about 1,000 active investigations into alleged ISIS sympathizers in the United States, and the tiny handful of actual terrorist attacks by people claiming to be ISIS supporters—even if one includes an attack like that in Orlando, where the only apparent connection to ISIS was gunman Omar Mateen’s 911 call after the bloodbath had already begun.

The statements by leading Democrats in support of the ban on gun purchases have been remarkably blunt in their anti-democratic thrust. Senator Dianne Feinstein, top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the ban would apply to “known or suspected terrorists.”

It is doubtful that any “known terrorists” are visiting US gun shops, passing the required background checks and having themselves recorded by store cameras. In any case, no new laws would be required to arrest them. As for “suspected terrorists,” that category is infinitely flexible, depending on whose mind is responsible for forming the “suspicion” and what grounds are adduced for doing so.

In his remarks Thursday, after visiting Orlando for private meetings with families of the victims of the massacre at the Pulse gay night club, President Obama sounded the same theme, condemning the fact that “weapons of war” were freely available on America’s streets.

There are more than a few ironies in this statement. Obama is, of course, the commander-in-chief of the US military-intelligence apparatus, which is responsible for the death, not of dozens, but of hundreds of thousands during Obama’s tenure in the White House.

The AR-15 semi-automatic, which he condemned, is the civilian version of the same weapon that US soldiers use to mow down villagers in Afghanistan and Iraq. It is supplemented by weapons with far more firepower, such as the Apache helicopter gunships now unleashed on the Iraqi city of Fallujah by the Pentagon, at Obama’s orders.

As for terrorists having access to weapons, it is the United States and its allies who have funneled arms into Islamic fundamentalist organizations in Libya and Syria, first as part of the war against the government of Muammar Gaddafi, and then as part of the proxy war against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad.

And finally, no one in the official “debate,” Democrat or Republican, comments on what the proliferation of mass shootings says about the health of American society as a whole. The nearly 10,000 gun homicides a year represent a death toll greater than in many civil wars.

Introducción

El pasado 7 de junio del 2016, medios de prensa reportaron que Costa Rica oficialmente anunció que notificó a Nicaragua el monto indemnizatorio que reclama al Estado vecino por los daños ocurridos en Isla Portillos (ver  nota  de prensa).

El comunicado de prensa del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Costa Rica (ver texto completo reproducido al final de esta nota) precisa que:

“La formalización de la pretensión costarricense fue realizada por el Embajador de Costa Rica en el Reino de los Países Bajos, Sergio Ugalde, al Embajador nicaragüense, Carlos Arguello, en La Haya, mediante la presentación de documentos que detallan los diferentes rubros que Costa Rica considera que Nicaragua le debe indemnizar.

El monto total de lo reclamado supera los seis millones de dólares, en donde se contempla la valoración monetaria del daño ambiental ocasionado por Nicaragua, así como una serie de gastos adicionales en los que Estado costarricense debió incurrir en relación con las acciones de Nicaragua, incluyendo su presencia militar en Isla Portillos, así como los daños por la excavación de caños y la tala de bosque en un humedal internacionalmente protegido bajo la Convención de Ramsar sobre Humedales”.

Como se puede observar, son diversos rubros, de los que se puede distinguir un rubro principal correspondiente al daño ambiental causado por Nicaragua en Isla Portillos, de otros rubros, correspondientes a “gastos adicionales”, según la expresión usada por la cancillería de Costa Rica.

Nótese que el Día Mundial del Ambiente y los días subsiguientes parecieran ser fechas muy esperadas por Costa Rica y Nicaragua en años recientes para proceder a realizar anuncios sobre temas de cierta relevancia. El 5 de junio del 2008 fue la fecha en la que Costa Rica rechazó formalmente una solicitud de Nicaragua (hecha en mayo del mismo año) al considerarla “improcedente”: se trataba de la solicitud de Nicaragua para obtener copia del Estudio de Impacto Ambiental (EIA) en el caso del proyecto minero ubicado en Las Crucitas (ver  texto  del comunicado de Costa Rica).  En el año 2013, el 5 de junio fue la fecha en la que Nicaragua anunció la adjudicación a la empresa HKND Group de la concesión del canal interoceánico (ver texto), seguida el 14 de junio por la aprobación (expresa) de la denominada “Ley del Canal” o ley 840.

Figura 1 del Caño “Google” o “Caño Pastora” (trazo azul), un caño artificial realizado por Nicaragua en Isla Portillos en octubre del 2010, a partir de un mapa erróneo de Google Map (figura realizada por el Dr. Allan Astorga Gättgens, Escuela de Geología, UCR) y toma aérea del mismo caño.

El fallo de la CIJ del 15 de diciembre del 2015

Como se recordará  (Nota 1), en su fallo del 15 de diciembre del 2015, la Corte Internacional de Justicia (CIJ) invitaba a ambos Estados en un plazo de 12 meses a llevar a cabo negociaciones con el fin de acordar de forma conjunta el monto indemnizatorio correspondiente a los daños causados por Nicaragua en Isla Portillos. En su decisión (ver texto en  inglés ), el párrafo 142 se lee de la siguiente manera:

“Costa Rica is entitled to receive compensation for the material damage caused by those breaches of obligations by Nicaragua that have been ascertained by the Court. The relevant material damage and the amount of compensation may be assessed by the Court only in separate proceedings. The Court is of the opinion that the Parties should engage in negotiation in order to reach an agreement on these issues. However, if they fail to reach such an agreement within 12 months of the date of the present Judgment, the Court will, at the request of either Party, determine the amount of compensation on the basis of further written pleadings limited to this issue“.

El texto en francés, (ver  texto completo ) se lee como sigue: “142. Le Costa Rica est fondé à recevoir indemnisation pour les dommages matériels découlant des violations dont la Cour a constaté la commission par le Nicaragua. La Cour ne pourrait procéder à l’évaluation de ces dommages et du montant de l’indemnité que dans le cadre d’une procédure distincte. La Cour estime que les Parties devraient mener des négociations afin de s’entendre sur ces questions. Toutefois, si elles ne parviennent pas à un accord dans un délai de 12 mois à partir de la date du présent arrêt, la Cour déterminera, à la demande de l’une d’entre elles, le montant de l’indemnité sur la base de pièces écrites additionnelles limitées à cet objet“.

Recordemos que en el párrafo 144 de su fallo de diciembre del 2015, el juez internacional consideró que  “sería inapropiada” aceptar una petición de Costa Rica para que Nicaragua cubriera los gastos incurridos por Costa Rica relativos a la etapa que inició con la detección de dos nuevos caños en septiembre del 2013 (y culminó con la adopción en noviembre del 2013 de una ordenanza de la CIJ). El párrafo 144 del fallo de la CIJ de diciembre del 2015 se lee de la siguiente manera en sus dos únicas versiones oficiales:“While the breach by Nicaragua of its obligations under the 2011 Order necessitated Costa Rica engaging in new proceedings on provisional measures, the Court finds that, taking into account the overall circumstances of the case, an award of costs to Costa Rica, as the latter requested, would not be appropriate”  /  “Bien que, en ne respectant pas les prescriptions de l’ordonnance de 2011, le Nicaragua ait conduit le Costa Rica à engager une nouvelle procédure en indication de mesures conservatoires, la Cour considère que, compte tenu de l’ensemble des circonstances de l’espèce, la condamnation du Nicaragua à supporter certains frais de procédure du Costa Rica, comme celui-ci l’a demandé, ne serait pas appropriée » . Sobre este preciso punto, tres jueces titulares así como el juez ad hoc de Costa  Rica, el jurista sudafricano John Dugard, consideraron que la CIJ debió ordenarle este pago a Nicaragua (véase  texto  de  su declaración conjunta).

A pocos días de emitida la sentencia de la CIJ en diciembre del 2015, las autoridades de Nicaragua y de Costa Rica habían externado su disposición a dialogar, en respuesta a un llamado hecho desde la Santa Sede a ambos ribereños del río San Juan (ver  nota  de prensa del 21/12/2015). Como bien se sabe, la negociación diplomática, el intercambio de puntos de vistas previos a ella, el envío de emisarios de un Estado a otro, así como la obligación de negociar de buena fe y la de no entorpecer o agravar con su conducta una controversia son ámbitos que el juez internacional ha tenido la oportunidad de precisar en varias sentencias de la misma CIJ.

Una verdadera “sociología del contencioso”

En el caso de Costa Rica y Nicaragua, pareciera que los canales diplomáticos no logran establecer un clima de acercamiento en aras de restablecer paulatinamente el diálogo, y que la línea de la confrontación heredada de la administración (2010-2014) es la que, por alguna razón, sigue prevaleciendo.

En una emisión de radio en France Culture del pasado 2 de mayo del 2016, se habló incluso de una verdadera “sociologie du contentieux” por parte de un experimentado jurista como lo es el Profesor Serge Sur (Profesor emérito de la Universidad de Paris II y ex juez Ad Hoc en la CIJ): escuchar audio en el minuto 48:21 de dicha emisión radial francesa disponible  aquí.

Según este experto, hay sectores que de ambos lados del río San Juan, encuentran beneficios y ventajas en mantener tensa la relación, con la consiguiente judicialización de las controversias. Recordemos, para el lector poco familiarizado, que en el período 2010-2014, Costa Rica y Nicaragua presentaron tres demandas ante la CIJ en tres años y medio, una cifra que no tiene precedente alguno en los anales de la justicia internacional:

a)   en noviembre del 2010, una demanda de Costa Rica contra Nicaragua por el dragado y la ocupación ilegal de Isla Portillos;

b)   en diciembre del 2011, una demanda de Nicaragua contra Costa Rica por la denominada “trocha fronteriza” o Ruta 1856;

c)   en febrero del 2014, una demanda de Costa Rica contra Nicaragua por la delimitación marítima en ambos océanos, no exenta de riesgos para Costa Rica, que analizamos en su momento (ver breve nota de febrero del 2014): en efecto, Nicaragua no cuenta con ninguna isla en el Pacífico, mientras que en Caribe, la actual línea paralela que pareciera reconocerle Nicaragua a Costa Rica podría inclinarse de manera desventajosa para Costa Rica.

Figura 2: Mapa de la “trocha fronteriza” y de las rutas de acceso al río San Juan habilitadas por Costa Rica en respuesta a la ocupación ilegal de Isla Portillos por parte de Nicaragua calificada como “agresión” e “invasión” por las autoridades de Costa Rica. Documento oficial presentado en Casa Presidencial en Costa Rica. Al extremo derecho, Isla Portillos (circulo en rojo realizado por el autor ya que no se distingue mayormente en razón de la escala usada)

La ausencia de acercamiento entre ambos ribereños del río San Juan

Salvo error de nuestra parte, desde el 15 de diciembre del 2015, y pese al llamado al diálogo del juez internacional, de la Santa Sede y de otros Estados terceros, no se ha oído de consultas preliminares o de algún tipo de acercamiento entre ambos Estados, ni del inicio de rondas de negociaciones entre Costa Rica y Nicaragua sobre el monto a acordar por los daños causados en Isla Portillos y los gastos en los que ha incurrido Costa Rica.

Tampoco ha trascendido ninguna iniciativa tendiente a una reunión al más alto nivel como la que celebraron, por ejemplo, los Presidentes de Perú y de Chile a pocos días de oírse el fallo de al CIJ entre ambos en enero del 2014; o la reunión sostenida entre los Presidente de Argentina y del Uruguay en abril del 2010, pocas semanas después de dictaminarse la decisión del juez internacional sobre el caso de las denominadas “Papeleras”.  La ausencia de cumbre entre Presidentes después de leerse un fallo del juez de La Haya entre Costa Rica y Nicaragua también se verificó después del fallo del 13 de julio del 2009 sobre derechos de navegación y derechos conexos.

Es probable que en las próximas semanas, este monto indemnizatorio hecho público de manera unilateral por Costa Rica sea rechazado por Nicaragua. En caso de persistir el desacuerdo (y vencerse el plazo otorgado de 12 meses por la CIJ), será la CIJ la llevada a fijar el monto indemnizatorio. Ello, después de varios años (que se pueden estimar a dos, como mínimo) de un procedimiento específico, al que, por ejemplo, en años recientes se sometieron Guinea y República Democrática del Congo (Nota 2).

Los costos de un procedimiento contencioso en La Haya

En el caso de una demanda en el marco de un procedimiento contencioso clásico ante la CIJ, se calcula un monto que oscila entre 6 a 9 millones de US$ en gastos para cada uno de los Estados. Este monto, sobre el que los Estados se muestran extremadamente discretos, debería incluir los  honorarios de abogados, los salarios de funcionarios nacionales, los estudios, viajes y perdiem en La Haya, peritajes, elaboración de mapas, fotografías satelitales, gastos secretariales, traducciones, certificaciones y demás rubros, durante los cuatro años que (como mínimo) dura un procedimiento de este tipo en La Haya. El mínimo anteriormente indicado corresponde a procedimientos en los que no se presentan incidentes procesales. En el caso de la demanda de Nicaragua contra Colombia en materia de delimitación marítima presentada en el 2001, el fallo de la CIJ se leyó tan solo en noviembre del 2012, después de una serie de incidentes procesales (excepciones preliminares presentadas por Colombia en el 2003 y solicitudes de intervención de Costa Rica y de Honduras del 2010, ambas rechazadas).

No obstante el rango de entre 6 a 9 millones de US$ en un procedimiento normal, en el caso de la demanda de Perú contra Chile ante la CIJ, el Poder Ejecutivo chileno reconoció, después de un intento inicial para evadir la consulta (ver decisión  de la Corte de Apelaciones del 13/11/2013) haber incurrido en un gasto superior a los 20 millones de US$ (ver  nota  de prensa). Nótese que una decisión de la Corte Suprema chilena de enero del 2014 (ver  texto ) dejó sin efecto la decisión judicial anterior, evidenciando la dificultad de Chile de transparentar del todo estos rubros.

Por su parte, Colombia optó, al obtener el retiro de la demanda planteada por Ecuador ante la CIJ con relaciones a aspersiones químicas aéreas interpuesta en el 2008, por depositar a Ecuador la suma de 15 millones de US$ (que incluye, entre otros, los gastos de Ecuador en el procedimiento ante la CIJ – ver punto 9 del  texto  del acuerdo suscrito Colombia y Ecuador el 9/09/2013). Con relación a los únicos honorarios de abogados internacionales, un medio colombiano logró tener acceso a los honorarios devengados por los asesores contratados por Colombia para enfrentar la precitada demanda de Nicaragua presentada en el 2001 (ver  nota  de Semana con detalle exacto del monto pagado a cada uno de los asesores internacionales).

En el caso de Costa Rica, el 10 de diciembre del 2010, el canciller René Castro precisó en una nota publicada en La Nación “País presupuesta $2 millones por año para juicio en La Haya” la previsión presupuestaria hecha para el único caso de Isla Portillos de aquel momento, la cual se ubica en el rango precitado (6 a 9 millones de US$). Recientemente, se leyó en la prensa que: “A lo largo del primer juicio, estos especialistas en materia limítrofe cobraron al país $1 por sus servicios profesionales” (ver  nota de CRHoy): un dato verdaderamente curioso que nos ha parecido oportuno mencionar (y que habría que dar a conocer de forma urgente a los que velan por la buena salud de la hacienda pública … chilena).

La ausencia de una metodología acordada

La jurisprudencia internacional ofrece pocos casos en materia de daño ambiental causado por un Estado a otro Estado (Nota 3). El único precedente en el que la CIJ haya fijado  un monto compensatorio por daños de importancia, fue el caso del estrecho de Corfú en 1949: Reino Unido, cuya marina perdió varios barcos en razón de la explosión de minas submarinas colocadas por Albania, presentó una estimación del monto, que no refutó Albania (al haber optado por no comparecer ante el juez).

Es de recordar que, en una materia como la ambiental, la cuantificación del daño depende básicamente de la metodología escogida. En Centroamérica, no existe una metodología regional aceptada en materia de cuantificación del daño ambiental, por lo que es posible que ambos Estados cuenten con herramientas técnicas distintas.

Tampoco existe una metodología oficial en Costa Rica (como bien lo ilustran los diversos montos millonarios avanzados por peritajes sucesivos con relación a la tala acaecida en Las Crucitas en octubre del 2008 durante un fin de semana, luego de la publicación de un  cuestionado Decreto de “conveniencia nacional” (Nota 4): el verdadero “contubernio” Estado – empresa denunciado en el 2009 (ver nota sobre audiencias ante la Sala Constitucional) demostró hasta donde se puede llegar para favorecer a una empresa minera y puede explicar – al menos en parte – la reticencia del Estado a cuantificar el daño producido.

El vacío existente en materia de valoración del daño ambiental en Costa Rica es también confirmado por la ausencia de acciones civiles y del mismo Tribunal Ambiental Administrativo (TAA) contra productores de piña en todos estos años – ver declaraciones de la jueza Ligia Umaña en  reportaje  del Semanario Universidad).  En esta  entrevista  al entonces Presidente del TAA titulada “José Lino Chaves: ‘Vergüenza debe darle todo esto al Estado’ “que fue publicada el 17/09/2014 en La Nación (Costa Rica) se lee lo siguiente: “¿El país no tiene a nadie que se encargue de la valoración económica por contaminación hídrica? Pues sí, así de sencillo. Eso lo hacía Digeca (Dirección de Gestión de Calidad Ambiental) hace unos años, pero ahora lo quitó de su reglamento”. Dejamos a nuestros lectores el buscar cuál pudo haber sido el motivo para retirarle esta competencia a DIGECA, sin trasladarla a otro ente público costarricense, y de dónde pudo haber provenido semejante regresión.

Como referencia esporádica de  un caso en el que sí se llegó a determinar un monto por contaminación a un cuerpo de agua en Costa Rica, podemos indicar que en el 2008, la cooperativa costarricense Dos Pinos fue condenada a pagar 410.000 US$ por la contaminación del río Siquiares (ver  nota  de prensa).

Con relación al daño causado en Isla Portillos por Nicaragua, se leyó en un artículo de opinión de un autor costarricense, que, aplicando parámetros internacionales, “la estimación del valor del daño ambiental para la situación local a 10 años sería de $12.000.000” ( artículo  de Allan Astorga, La Nación).

En el comunicado oficial del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Costa Rica, el mismo Estado costarricense admite que la valoración económica del daño ambiental no fue realizada por una entidad pública. En efecto, el texto precisa que “… la determinación del valor monetario del daño ambiental ocasionado por Nicaragua estuvo a cargo de la Fundación Neotrópica, la cual donó su trabajo al Estado costarricense como una contribución a este proceso de interés nacional”.

Conclusión

Más allá de los preocupantes vacíos persistentes que colocan en situación de total desprotección los recursos naturales de Costa Rica en caso de daños ocasionados contra el ambiente, el anuncio unilateral hecho por Costa Rica el pasado 7 de junio  presagia una  probable nueva controversia entre ambos Estados. Esta vez, con un plazo de 12 meses que inició el pasado 15 de diciembre del 2015, sin lograr ningún tipo de acercamiento: una vez finalizado (y de mantenerse el descuerdo sobre el monto), ambos Estados ineludiblemente se remitirán a los estrados de la justicia en La Haya.  Serán entonces nuevamente los jueces de la CIJ los llamados a analizar los alegatos de ambos Estados, revisar sus peritajes técnicos y confrontarlos a parámetros internacionales aplicables a la materia, con el fin de fijar el monto exacto con relación al daño provocado por Nicaragua en Isla Portillos.

Nicolás Boeglin

Nota 1: Véase nuestro breve análisis de este fallo de la CIJ: BOEGLIN N., “El fallo de la Corte internacional de justicia entre Costa Rica y Nicaragua: breves apuntes”,  publicado en este  enlace  del OPALC,  Sciences-Po, Paris.

Nota 2: En el caso de la demanda de Guinea contra República Democrática del Congo, la CIJ sentenció en su fallo del 30 de setiembre del 2010 que ambas partes debían acordar un monto para indemnizar al ciudadano Ahmadou Sadio Diallo. En su sentencia del 19 de junio del 2012 (ver  texto ), el juez internacional fijó el monto en 95.000 US$. Es de notar que Guinea exigía el pago de más de 12 millones de US$ (para ser exactos, 11.590.148 US$ a los que había que sumar 500.000 US$ por gastos incurridos ante la CIJ, según se lee en el punto 10 de la sentencia), mientras que la República Democrática del Congo ofertaba una compensación por un monto de 30.000 US$.

Nota 3: Entre muchos artículos sobre el tema, véase por ejemplo, MALAPI HERNANDEZ D., “La responsabilidad internacional de los Estados por daños ambientales transfronterizos en la jurisprudencia de los tribunales internacionales”, Sección 4.  Artículo disponible  aquí.  Con relación al marco conceptual del daño ambiental transfronterizo en derecho internacional público, a partir de la práctica internacional, los trabajos de la Comisión de Derecho Internacional (CDI)  de Naciones Unidas, y la larga reflexión realizada por autores muy diversos, véase un esfuerzo de sistematización de la actual jueza de nacionalidad china en la Corte Internacional de Justicia, Xue Hanqin: HANQIN X., Transboundary damage in international law, Cambridge University Press, 2003. Texto completo de la obra disponible  aquí.

Nota 4: El monto fijado en Costa Rica en noviembre del 2015 por la jueza a cargo de la ejecución de la sentencia del Tribunal Contencioso Administrativo del año 2010 fue de 6,4 millones de US$ (ver  nota  de  CRHoy del 2015).  Esta sentencia fue apelada por lo que, al momento de redactar estas breves líneas, no se tiene certeza que este monto se mantenga.  Un peritaje fijó este monto en unos  4,6 millones de US$ (ver  nota  de Radio Monumental del 2014), mientras que otro equipo de peritos, que realizó una visita in situ (a diferencia del anterior, basado en imágenes satelitales) fijó el monto por el daño ambiental en 10,6 millones de US$ (ver   nota   de La Nación del 2012).

Documento oficial

Comunicado de prensa, Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto de Costa Rica, 7 de junio del 2016 

Costa Rica formaliza ante Nicaragua su pretensión de indemnización

Este 7 de junio, Costa Rica dio a conocer a Nicaragua su pretensión de indemnización por los daños resultantes de sus actividades ilícitas en Isla Portillos, de conformidad con la sentencia de la Corte Internacional de Justicia del 16 de diciembre de 2015.

La formalización de la pretensión costarricense fue realizada por el Embajador de Costa Rica en el Reino de los Países Bajos, Sergio Ugalde, al Embajador nicaragüense, Carlos Arguello, en La Haya, mediante la presentación de documentos que detallan los diferentes rubros que Costa Rica considera que Nicaragua le debe indemnizar.

El monto total de lo reclamado supera los seis millones de dólares, en donde se contempla la valoración monetaria del daño ambiental ocasionado por Nicaragua, así como una serie de gastos adicionales en los que Estado costarricense debió incurrir en relación con las acciones de Nicaragua, incluyendo su presencia militar en Isla Portillos, así como los daños por la excavación de caños y la tala de bosque en un humedal internacionalmente protegido bajo la Convención de Ramsar sobre Humedales.

“Expreso mi deseo de que Nicaragua responda positivamente al trabajo serio y fundamentado hecho por Costa Rica, para que en forma definitiva se pueda cerrar este capítulo y ambos países puedan, eventualmente, retomar la senda de buena vecindad y hermandad, sin necesidad de recurrir nuevamente ante la Corte Internacional de Justicia”, aseguró el Canciller Manuel A. González.

Antecedentes

La Corte Internacional de Justicia estableció, el 16 de diciembre del 2015, que “Costa Rica tiene derecho a recibir compensación por los daños materiales provocados por los incumplimientos de obligaciones de Nicaragua”, en concreto, “la excavación de tres caños y el establecimiento de presencia militar en partes de ese territorio”.

La Corte consideró que “las partes deben entablar negociaciones para lograr un acuerdo sobre estos temas” pero, si dentro de los 12 meses siguientes a la fecha de la dicha Sentencia las partes no logran alcanzar un acuerdo, la Corte, a solicitud de cualquiera de las Partes, determinará el monto de la compensación, sobre la base de argumentos escritos adicionales.

Preparación del reclamo

La Cancillería costarricense lideró la preparación del reclamo que se realizó en el periodo de seis meses, posterior al fallo de la CIJ.

Además, contó con valiosa colaboración para la recopilación de los gastos en los que incurrió el Estado costarricense, por lo que agradece al Ministerio de Ambiente y Energía, al Sistema Nacional de Áreas de Conservación, al Área de Conservación de Tortuguero, al Ministerio de Seguridad Pública y a la Comisión Nacional de Emergencias por la ayuda brindada.

Por otro lado, la determinación del valor monetario del daño ambiental ocasionado por Nicaragua estuvo a cargo de la Fundación Neotrópica, la cual donó su trabajo al Estado costarricense como una contribución a este proceso de interés nacional.

El Canciller Manuel González reconoce y agradece a los numerosos funcionarios de las entidades nacionales que participaron en este proceso de recopilación de información y documentos de respaldo, a la vez que reitera su agradecimiento a la Fundación Neotrópica por un extraordinario estudio, que al aplicar técnicas y principios internacionalmente aceptados, traduce en un valor económico la afectación

The following is a photographic essay that is based on articles published for South Korean news outlet MinPlus by two men conducting a roof-top sit-in protest against KIA Motors to bring attention to the condition of temporary employees and KIA’s employment practices.

In South Korea, temporary employees usually work full-time with lower wages and very little compensation for hard jobs. After two years of employment, these temporary employees are either supposed to be promoted to positions with permanent employment or to be permanently contracted in their current position after two years of temporary employment. Corporate employers in South Korea, however, typically violate this obligation. Instead of providing better wages and employment security to these workers, South Korean corporations simply prolong the temporary contracts of the temporary employees or simply dismiss them from their jobs when the two-year period arrives.

This conduct is the reason behind an extraordinary roof-top sit-in protest by two temporary employees of KIA Motors named Choi Jung Myung and Han Gyu Hyup. Their roof-top sit-in has lasted about one year. Both men were fired by KIA Motors as soon as they started their roof-top sit-in to bring attention to the conditions of temporary employees in South Korea.

Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Asia-Pacific Research Editor, 17 June 2016.

To read the series of articles published on the sit-ins please visit Mini-Plus:

Diary on the Roof – part 1

Diary on the Roof -part 2

Dairy on the Roof – part 3

Photographs of Choi Jung Myung and Han Gyu Hyup on the roof-top protesting KIA’s employment practices.

Choi Jung Myung and Han Gyu Hyup forced to pull back their placard on a windy day.

Photograph taken from the roof-top of the supports of the KIA Motors temporary employees gathering on the ground on day 324 of the protest.

Photograph taken from the roof-top of the supports of the KIA Motors temporary employees gathering on the ground on World Labour Day.

 Choi Jung Myung and Han Gyu Hyup holding the MinPlus logo up to support alternative grassroots media in South Korea.

Meals being pulled up by the protesting KIA Motors temporary employees.

Because of the wind and rain, on some days this can be a dangerous task.

The two sit-in protesters have to pull up their supplies.

Pictures of meals prepared and setup to the sit-in for Children’s Day.

  Flowers sent by one of the sons of the two KIA Motors temporary employees.

 Musician supporters on the ground playing music in solidarity with the roof-top sit-in.

Musician supporters on the ground playing music in solidarity with the roof-top sit-in.

Supporters performing for the two roof-top protesters.

 Supporters of the roof-top sit-in on the ground. 

Plants being grown on the roof by the two sit-in protesters.

Plants being grown on the roof by the two sit-in protesters.

Supporters of the KIA Motors temporary employees demanding equal treatment and fair work conditions. 

Pastor Whang Nam Deok and the New National Church’s congregation members perform a prayer service for KIA Motors temporary employees.

Shows of public support for the roof-top sit-in.

Shows of public support for the roof-top sit-in.