Global Research

“I think there’s instances at this university where some faculty should no longer be working at this university [sic].” – FAU Provost Gary Perry

“If you can take tenure away, and this document says that you can, essentially this faculty does not have tenure anymore. There is not another university that has anything close to [this].” – FAU professor

Source: Rachel Liu, Crossmap

A policy promoted by Florida Atlantic University administrators is proving controversial among faculty at the South Florida college. The proposed set of rules, “Post-Tenure/Sustained-Performance Evaluation,” was recently authored by a subcommittee of senior professors, administrators and former administrators under the auspices of the University’s Faculty Senate.

Shortly thereafter, however, the document went through a process of heavy revision overseen by FAU Provost Gary Perry and college deans who want to grant themselves the ability to potentially terminate any tenured faculty member.

Read the rest of this entry »

Greece sold its soul to the Troika  abandoning what its people want most – an end to punishing austerity, government representing them, not Western bankers, a chance for a better future.

No matter what ruling coalition emerges from Sunday’s snap election, anti-populist business as usual will triumph, serving monied interests exclusively, imposing greater austerity than already.

The race is too close to call. Most polls show Alexis Tsipras’ SYRIZA party and Evangelos Meimarakis’ right-wing New Democracy in a virtual dead-heat – at around 32% support, a statistically insignificant 1% differential between them.

Seven other parties are competing: right-wing PASOK, Potami, and Independent Greeks, neo-Nazi Golden Dawn, the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), Union of Centrists, and Popular Unity headed by former SRYIZA energy minister/vocal Tsipras critic Panagiotis Lafanzanis.

None have more than single-digit support – once powerful Pasok a meager 5%, Popular Unity lower at 3%. Either SYRIZA or New Democracy will form a new government with coalition partners – maybe each other.

Not a dime’s worth of difference separates them ideologically, each solely beholden to Western banker interests and their own.

SYRIZA’s stated program going forward is polar opposite its policies – duplicitously claiming it intends to “implement with different terms” than ones agreed on, “disengage from neoliberalism and austerity, to achieve a radical, democratic transformation of the state, while at the same time seeking solutions to limit the repercussions of the agreement.”

After forming a coalition government in January on an anti-austerity platform, Tsipras surrendered unconditionally to Troika demands – imposing harsher austerity than right-wing governance preceding him.

Expect nothing different ahead under coalition governance led by SYRIZA or New Democracy. Greece is a banker occupied colony. Social genocide is official policy. Democracy died in its birthplace.

Protracted Depression conditions persist. Nothing in prospect looks hopeful. Early Sunday, Reuters reported “weary voters” headed to the polls for the third time this year.

Early turnout was low. The New York Times said polls show many voters undecided or “might abstain altogether.” The Washington Post suggested Tsipras’ snap election strategy “may bounce him from office.”

The Wall Street Journal said “(w)hoever wins will find their policies heavily constrained by Greece’s latest bailout plan, which (SYRIZA and New Democracy) promise to uphold.” The Financial Times highlighted “fragile coalition governance” emerging from Sunday’selection.

After voting early, Tsipras lied to supporters, saying he’s “very optimistic that tomorrow a new day will begin and soon the hardship will be over. The difficulties will be overcome with firm steps.”

Everything is possible…We are fighting for a great victory of the left in Greece and to maintain hope across Europe.

Former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis told RT International SYRIZA “surrendered to an illogical logic. They surrendered to going along with and extending the crisis – something I have fought against for five years.”

He blasted Tsipras, saying he admitted agreeing to “a terrible package,” claiming he’d “implement it a little better than the others…” It’s “not the path I am prepared to walk,” he explained.

If God and his angels came down to produce a reform package for Greece, the Troika would have turned it down it down, because they were interested in humiliating us and demonstrating to the people of Spain and Ireland that if they vote in the way that the Troika doesn’t like, they will be crushed.

The only uncertainty about Greece’s future is how much worse things will get than already.

It’s hard imagining anything in prospect able to end its long nightmare.

The only solution would be a popular grassroots revolution.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PMCentral time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

The NYC Free Mumia Coalition just hosted a critical but disturbing update on the latest with the world’s most famous political prisoner.

At issue is how Pennsylvania Corrections will just not give this man the medical treatment he needs and how they now appear to be preparing to subject him to punitive transfer for taking this into court.

People’s attorney Bob Boyle, who played key roles in securing the release of  Dhoruba Bin Wahad and most recently Marshall Eddie Conway, reviewed in detail how Mumia’s medical saga actually goes back to 2012 when Mumia was first diagnosed as having the trait for the Hepatitis C that is now ravaging his body.

Instead of monitoring his health for what it obviously implies, the state began a pattern of ignoring and band-aiding the emergence of all of the symptoms that indicate the onset of the disease and that ultimately put him at death’s door when he suffered Diabetic Shock on March 30th.

So now, not only does Mumia have a dangerously active case of Hepatitis C, he also has several just as dangerous related conditions consistent with the disease. He has Diabetes and that almost killed him when those symptoms were ignored. Over 70% of his body is now violently disfigured by the scarring of his skin also associated with the disease. In fact, Dr. Joseph Harris, a Bronx based African American doctor, believes that the dangerous skin scarring that Mumia is suffering may be a side effect of the disease that is particular to people of African descent.

Esperanza Martell, working in overdrive for the release of Puerto Rican political prisoner Oscar Lopez Rivera and a longtime Mumia supporter, laid out in horrific detail how Mumia’s treatment is a throwback to what was done to the immortal Don Pedro Albizu Campos. Between 1951 and 1956, Campos, the legendary ‘Father of Modern Puerto Rican independence,’ was subjected to radiation torture in the guise of medical treatment that also brutally disfigured his skin and ravaged his health! She laid out ultimately it was the applying of pressure in the international arena that proved key in securing his release. Tragically, Campos died shortly after his release as a consequence of the medical abuse.

Johanna Fernandez, who just visited Mumia several days ago, revealed an ugly, painful detail not previously known to the public.

“Mumia has suffered encephalitis as a consequence of the disease,” she uttered hurtfully.

Encephalitis is imflamation of the brain!

What he used to do to process in an hour with his work, outlining an essay and then putting it to paper, now takes him days.

“But it is his incredible engagement with books and words that has helped keep him going,” she explained.

She then linked his ordeal to another key issue of these times…mass incarceration. She asserted that they are not just trying to kill Mumia “body and soul” for beating death row, they are using this mistreatment to NOT establish a treatment precedent. There are 10,000 other prisoners in the state of Pennsylvania who are also suffering from Hepatitis C and are also being denied treatment.

10,000!

If Mumia gets the legal mandate for the treatment he needs, it should lead to all of those other prisoners also getting that treatment. This is also a key piston in the engine driving the state’s denial of Mumia’s diagnosis and necessary treatment.

Zayid Muhammad, who has been a diehard Mumia supporter for 25 years, shook his head and angrily said that “this is not just about the torture and sickening of Mumia and the violation of his human rights.”

“This is where mass incarceration is linked to genocide.”

Particularly maddening in all of this is that Mumia’s illness is curable. Denial of treatment, however, has deadly implications.

“Failure to treat Mr. Abu-Jamal’s Hepatitis C will result in serious harm to his health. He faces an increasingly serious risk of suffering from fibrosis and cirrhosis, liver cancer, complications of his diabetes, and eventual death,” read a statement of health experts Boyle produced at that forum.

Attorney Jill Elijah, who has also worked on a number of political prisoner cases, may have provided the evening with the only bright spot when she explained that NY state has just developed a medical treatment protocol for Hepatitis C that it will now use in the NY state prison system, and that may prove to be an embarrassing factor to compel the state of Pennsylvania to ultimately do the same,…whether they want to or not…

Sound the drum! Make the calls now! Demand Treatment to Cure Mumia’s Hepatitis C and ‘NO’ to any Retaliatory Transfer:

John Wetzel, Secretary of Corrections 717 728 2573

John Kerestes, Superintendent, SCI Mahanoy Prison 570 773 2158…

The last thing the GOP field of candidates would have wanted was Donald Trump continuing to make headlines and confronting them with such bread and butter issues of prejudice as what to do with Islam in the United States. Then there was that issue that had shadowed Trump like a storm of doubt: Is Obama really “American”? Has a follower of the Prophet been occupying the White House all this time?

Having smeared and praised Washington’s southern neighbours as  marauders yet inspired by an ambitious leadership, Trump decided to go a few rounds with the issue of Islam. But he was in no mood to be ecumenical. This was familiar, reactionary terrain.

A town hall rally in New Hampshire was not perhaps the ideal venue for the trigger, but it did give Trump a chance to respond to a questioner who was sporting a good number of fears.

“We have a problem in this country. It’s called Muslims. We know our current president is one. You know he’s not even an American. Birth certificate, man.”

Trump added a boost to the questioner, saying that “we need this question. This is the first question.” This provided enough encouragement. “But anyway, we have training camps growing where they want to kill us. That’s my question: When can we get rid of them.”

Pure conspiracy theory; and purely, the politics of reaction. In such thinking, the enemy is not so much without, where wickedness is simply presumed, but within, when it supposedly lulls you, like the Devil, into a false sense of security. There can be nothing more lulling than the notion of presidential propriety when the man in the Oval Office is supposedly an agent of the enemy.

The questioner had evidently received encouragement by the recent circumstances surrounding Ahmed Mohamed’s now fabled clock. The conservative press lines were keen to find some plausibility behind the notion that the 14-year old school boy was a jihadi in a different dress in bringing a clock to school.School officials, writes Kyle Smith for the New York Post (Sep 19), thought “as 95 percent of Americans would, that it kinda looked like a bomb”. Ahmed was subsequently handcuffed and, once the dust settled, suspended.This is a rationale that creates its own evidence, which, when shown not to exist, is justified on the basis that it might have existed. The clock “beeped”; it was “strange-looking” and “homemade” – suggesting an earthy, terrorist domesticity. Such circumstances of invention duly presented themselves in the New Hampshire townhall.

Wanting to play along that line, Trump’s response was not so much feeble as conciliatory to the questioner’s position. “We’re going to be looking at a lot of different things and, you know, a lot of people are saying that, and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there.”

The Christian-Muslim card is going to be hard sell in the US electorate. There is an assured space for bigotry and political perversions, but some of these have to be tempered as the campaign wears on. The longer Trump spends on his failed pet project of outing Obama’s “birth certificate”, the more time he expends on a non-issue. This will fly in some small circles, but it is idiocy misspent.

The Trump team response showed all the signs of falling into this limbo, one of embracing the politics of reaction while claiming it was one of plausible substance. “Mr Trump was referring to the need to protect Christians’ religious liberties as his previous statement says and nothing more.” As far as the issue of training camps was concerned, Team Trump were happy to file it in the homework folder: “we will look into it.”

Such a response also showed a measure of confusion. Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, decided to iron out the evident wrinkling by suggesting deafness. “All [Trump] heard was a question about training camps, which he said we will have a look into.” Some juice – most of it – had to removed from the steak.

Naturally, such behaviour allows the Democrats room to strike, even if this risks fanning flames that really need no oxygen. “GOP frontrunner Donald Trump’s racism,” claimed Democratic National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman, “knows no bounds.” But this is not quite the case, given that Trump shows, at least at times, a certain calculating approach to how he plays the race card.

Fellow GOP contenders find themselves in the unenviable situation where they must take a stance: What is your feeling about Mr T on the subject? Mike Huckabee has decided to show support, going so far at the debates to suggest that, “The candidates we have on stage are the A team. We even have our own Mr. T, who doesn’t mind saying about others: you’re a fool!”

Rick Santorum and Ted Cruz decided to go on the offensive against those who reported the incident, rather than the incident itself. Lindsey Graham, Chris Christie and Jeb Bush took the line that Trump had erred in not standing up to the question, and not believing that Obama was born in the US.

Bad things are, indeed, happening “out there”, but the badlands of GOP thinking continue to cause despair and amusement. Trump is revelling in it, because he never had to adapt. His fellow “A” Team members, however, are still finding the pitch that will embrace a political centre without keeling over in the process.

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

This month marks 10 years since Israel withdrew its last troops and settlers from the Gaza Strip. It has spawned a narrative as deceitful and destructive as that of Israel’s “generous” offer at Camp David in 2000.

The so-called disengagement from Gaza was billed as a momentous opportunity for its people. However, the subsequent blockade of the territory and full-scale onslaughts by Israel’s military have culminated in a warning from the UN this month that Gaza could become “uninhabitable” by 2020. Its residents were not offered freedom, simply a modified prison cell.

To understand how it has come to this, it is necessary to pick apart the entrenched fallacies surrounding Israel’s narrative of its withdrawal. First and foremost, it was not a goodwill gesture – Israel was withdrawing from Palestinian land, not its own, and some settlers were relocated to the West Bank to continue living illegally on occupied territory.

Besides that, there were two underlying motives behind the withdrawal, one of them being demography. Gaza constitutes less than 6 per cent of the land mass of the occupied territories, but is home to more than 40 per cent of the Palestinian population.

The foreign minister at the time, Silvan Shalom, claimed that his country was “prepared to take risks for peace”, but withdrawing from Gaza was not a risk. From the point of view of maintaining Jewish numerical supremacy – a prime objective repeatedly stated by Israeli officials – it was a no-brainer.

Though demography is often overlooked by Israel’s allies and lobbyists when considering its motives, its government at the time was unambiguous. “We are disengaging from Gaza because of demography,” then-deputy prime minister Shimon Peres told the BBC.

Then-prime minister Ariel Sharon, whose Kadima party platform states that “in order to maintain a Jewish majority, part of the land of Israel must be given up”, said at the time: “Over one million Palestinians live [in Gaza], and they double their numbers with every generation.”

The other underlying motive was consolidating Israeli control over the rest of the occupied Palestinian territories – the West Bank, including East Jerusalem – by banking the international goodwill generated by the misperception that the Gaza withdrawal was a major concession for peace.

The ensuing siege of the territory – a violation of international law because it constitutes collective punishment of a civilian population – is part of this second motive. Israel has deliberately created and exacerbated a humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza, thereby eliciting intermittent rocket fire from there. This is the only time the international community pays attention.

Israel then frames its military attacks and invasions as self-defence, and cites rocket fire as evidence that further territorial withdrawals would jeopardise Israel’s national security because Arabs are inherently opposed to peace and incapable – even unworthy – of governing themselves.

In other words, put people in a cage, constantly provoke them, wonder why they are not grateful and blame them when they lash out. It is an absurd narrative that has nonetheless taken hold. Relieved of the burden of policing Gaza – which was notorious for being particularly unruly – Israel has zealously entrenched its occupation and colonisation of the West Bank.

It has facilitated this by seeking, ever since its withdrawal from Gaza, to separate the territory from the West Bank – not just physically, but also politically and diplomatically – as part of a classic divide-and-rule strategy. This is despite the Oslo Accords, to which Israel is a signatory, recognising Gaza and the West Bank as a single territorial unit.

Gaza is now all too often spoken of as a distinct, separate entity, rather than as part of the wider Palestinian nation and people. Even supporters of the Palestinian cause inadvertently foster this impression when they call for “freedom for Gaza” rather than “freedom for Palestine”, and when the lifting of the blockade is viewed as the solution, rather than a step toward realising Palestinian rights.

As if simply lifting the blockade would fulfil Gaza’s aspirations and rights, and as if Gazans would be happy to leave their compatriots in the West Bank and in refugee camps to their own fate. Israel may be hoping that given enough time, the international community – and even the Palestinians – will come to accept this separation as a fait accompli.

Israel’s apologists peddle the notion that the situation in Gaza is fundamentally different because it is no longer occupied. That is another falsehood that has become accepted wisdom. Under international law, occupation exists if a state has “effective control” over a territory, not necessarily a direct military presence.

Explaining why Israel maintains “effective control” of Gaza and is thus still the occupying power, Amnesty International wrote in August last year: “Israel maintains sole control of Gaza’s air space and territorial waters [including offshore gas reserves] and continues to prohibit any movement of people or goods via air or sea.

It directly controls all but one of Gaza’s land border crossings, and continues to close three out of the four crossings for commercial goods, restrict the volume of key imports and ban most exports, all of which have a serious impact on humanitarian and socioeconomic conditions in Gaza.

Amnesty added: “Israel continues to control the Palestinian population registry … so all identity documents (including passports) require Israeli approval. And the Gaza Strip continues to depend on Israel for the majority of its electricity supply. Since 2005, Israel has continued its land incursions into Gaza … Several large Israeli operations in recent years have had a devastating effect and Israeli forces regularly use live fire against Palestinian civilians.”

As such, despite what Israeli officials have been claiming since the withdrawal, their country is still legally responsible for Gazans’ welfare – not that it had previously been shouldering that responsibility.

The situation in Gaza has continued to deteriorate to such an extent that ISIL is beginning to establish a foothold there. This, in addition to Israel’s siege, military attacks and constant provocations, leaves little hope on the horizon for a beleaguered people.

The UN’s warning that the territory could become “uninhabitable” in less than five years will probably turn out to be prophetic. To many Gazans, that stage has already been reached. The international community, either in its shameful inaction or its blind kowtowing to Israel, shares the blame for this tragedy.

Sharif Nashashibi is a journalist and analyst on Arab affairs

The state of Pennsylvania is slowly murdering longstanding political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal by willful neglect. He’s seriously ill with hepatitus C.

Untreated, it can cause chronic potentially fatal liver disease. Attorneys Bret Grote and Robert J. Boyle representing Mumia say it’s “the underlying cause of his health crisis,” including skin lesions, painful rashes, open wounds and severe swelling.

On August 2, they filed a lawsuit “seek(ing) injunctive relief for prison medical staff’s failure to treat” his active disease.

Despite clear evidence he needs proper treatment as soon as possible, he’s denied it. Medications are extremely expensive. A 12-week Harvoni regimen costs over $95,000. Sovaldi treatment costs $84,000 or a $1,000 per pill.

Prisoners in America receive deplorable medical treatment, denied access to proper medications able to help them.

New remedies for hepatitus C are extremely effective. Prison authorities claiming cost as the reason for denial is red herring cover for wanting Mumia dead – execution by neglect. The longer he’s denied, the more likely he’ll perish behind prison walls.

On September 18, Prison Radio’s Noelle Hanrahanreported bad news, saying “United States Magistrate Judge for the Middle District of Pennsylvania Karoline Mehalchick issued a proposed order denying Mumia Abu-Jamal’s motion for preliminary injunction and his 1st Amended complaint seeking immediate treatment for active Hepatitis C.”

According to Mehalchick, after “(r)eviewing Abu-Jamal’s motion, it is clear that he has not shown that he is entitled to injunctive relief.”

Inmates who fail to fully exhaust administrative remedies may not subsequently litigate those claims in federal court, and this prohibition extends to requests for injunctive relief.

“(T)he Court recommends (his) motion for injunctive relief be dismissed without prejudice” – meaning litigant is free to pursue further legal action.

For a man denied judicial fairness for over 30 years, chance for fair treatment now is slim to none. His courage throughout his ordeal shows he’s no quitter.

In June, City Light Books published his eighth book – all written from prison cells, mostly on death row, his newest titled “A Review of Writing on the Wall: Selected Prison Writings of Mumia Abu-Jamal.”

It includes commentaries he’s written from 1982 – 2014. Its title is taken from the gospel song “Handwriting on the Wall,” based on a biblical story in the Book of David. In one chapter, he addressed earlier Jim Crow lynchings, honoring famed civil rights advocate Ida B. Wells, saying:

…(W)hite terrorism, perpetrated through lynching, was the peculiar American custom that wasn’t spoken of in polite society. So, quietly (except for Ida B. Wells), Black bodies hung and burned by the thousands across America, the courts and law deeming it mere local custom, beyond their control.

The current custom is locking thousands of US political prisoners behind bars longterm, notably heroic Black activists like Mumia – disgracefully framed for a murder he didn’t commit, systematically denied justice by a vicious, racist society, wanting his powerful voice for justice silenced.

Noelle Hanrahan said his lawyers intend appealing Mehalchick’s ruling straightaway on procedural and substantive grounds in the Third Circuit US District Court – his case to be heard by Judge Robert Mariani, urging him to grant Mumia the vital treatment he needs to ease his suffering and help him survive.

Otherwise, Mehalchick’s decision is a likely slow-motion death sentence. She falsely said Mumia “fail(ed) to fully exhaust administrative remedies.” His attorneys fully complied with their procedural obligations.

Her claim that denying Mumia the care he needs won’t “irreputabl(y) harm” him shows contempt for his health, welfare and fight for survival, as well as indifference to his pain, suffering and medical neglect.

In March, he nearly died from acute renal failure. Diagnostic tests show “organ failure (skin) and organ damage (liver), open wounds, hemoglobin deficiency, extensive fevers, and continued weakness,” Hanrahan explained.

He noted his attorneys expressed confidence to be able get Mumia the vital treatment he needs and deserves.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PMCentral time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Washington continues using Islamic State and other takfiri terrorists as US proxy foot soldiers, waging naked aggression on Syria, largely affecting millions of civilians, creating a human flood of internally and externally displaced people along with mass slaughter and destruction.

Obama, John Kerry and other US officials firmly oppose Russia legitimately aiding its Syrian ally in need – providing political support as well as military weapons, munitions, equipment and technology.

The grand deception about Russian forces and warplanes operating in Syria persists. It’s one of many Big Lies circulating to vilify Putin. Moscow has been forthrightly candid all along – explaining its obligation to supply Syria with contractually agreed on weapons, the only nation providing humanitarian aid along with UN efforts.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said over 12 million Syrians need help, larger numbers daily, desperate people enduring deplorable conditions and treatment, Obama’s proxy war using IS and other takfiri terrorist foot soldiers fully responsible.

Spurious reports claiming Russian military involvement lack credibility. Alleged evidence is fabricated. On September 14, Foreign Policy (FP) cited satellite images it said showed its “military presence in Syria” – based on construction seen at Latakia, Syria’s Bassel al Assad International Airport, no different from similar activities worldwide.

Russian air flights delivering military and humanitarian aid arrive daily. Moscow openly confirms it. It’s forthright about its relationship with Assad’s government – unlike Washington’s duplicitous agenda to topple it, no matter the cost in human life and misery.

FP claiming images “confirm the presence of Russian combat forces fighting in Syrian” is propaganda rubbish, typical of what passes for journalism in America, substituting misinformation and bald faced lies for verifiable hard truths.

Alleged “Russian aggression” in Ukraine was long ago totally discredited, even though it’s still repeated. Now it’s Syria. Expect continued irresponsible bashing ahead.

On September 18, the Wall Street Journal headlined “Russia Moves Its First Tactical Fighter Jets to Base in Syria,” – citing unnamed US defense officials as their source, the Journal saying:

(T)he surprising Russian escalation…to send in jets…is the clearest indication Moscow is preparing to use military might to help Mr. Assad as he clings to power.

The direct involvement of Russian forces in the Syrian civil war on behalf of Mr. Assad would mark a new twist that could put American pilots, who regularly fly surveillance flights and airstrike missions, in substantially greater danger.

Fact: No evidence shows Russian warplanes in Syria. Regular cargo flights arrive daily delivering vital supplies.

Fact: Pentagon reports are notoriously fabricated – all propaganda all the time.

Fact: Russia forthrightly respects the sovereignty of all nations. Syrians alone have the right to decide who’ll lead them, not foreign powers. They overwhelmingly support Assad.

He clearly said earlier he’ll retain his leadership position only as long as Syrians want him. Otherwise, he’d step down.

His daily burden is far more than ordinary people could handle. He continues going all out to defend Syria for Syrians. He deserve praise, not rebuke, for his efforts.

Fact: Russian aid is to help him defeat ISIS and other takfiri terrorists, a scourge wherever they’re deployed.

Fact: US surveillance and combat flights aid these elements, destroy Syrian infrastructure, provide intelligence to death squads murdering civilians, using drones to target Syrian military forces.

Propaganda wars precede and accompany hot ones. Joseph Goebbels once called truth “the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

Disinformation repeated often enough getting most people to believe it is its greatest ally – the bigger the lie, the more likely.

Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier and as recently as Friday, no Russian military forces operate in Syria – nor are combat missions being flown.

At the same time, if Damascus requests Russia’s military involvement, “it would be discussed and considered. So far it’s hard to hypothesize,” he explained.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem said Damascus “would ask Russia to dispatch its troops to fight on the Syrian army’s side, if it becomes necessary.”

If the need arises, Syria would not hesitate to request this of Russia. At the moment, there are no Russian troops in Syria.

Most of all, Moallem and Assad welcome efforts made to resolve things diplomatically. Russia’s best previous attempts failed because Washington undermined them.

Moscow and Syria want peace and stability. Obama wants war. Nothing indicates a change of policy – replacing Assad with a pro-Western stooge, no matter how much more mass slaughter, destruction and greater human floods it takes.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PMCentral time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden’s revelations rocked the world.  According to his detailed reports, the US had launched massive spying programs and was scrutinizing the communications of American citizens in a manner which could only be described as extreme and intense.

The US’s reaction was swift and to the point. “”Nobody is listening to your telephone calls,” President Obama said when asked about the NSA. As quoted in The Guardian,  Obama went on to say that surveillance programs were “fully overseen not just by Congress but by the Fisa court, a court specially put together to evaluate classified programs to make sure that the executive branch, or government generally, is not abusing them”.

However, it appears that Snowden may have missed a pivotal part of the US surveillance program. And in stating that the “nobody” is not listening to our calls, President Obama may have been fudging quite a bit.

In fact, Great Britain maintains a “listening post” at NSA HQ. The laws restricting live wiretaps do not apply to foreign countries  and thus this listening post  is not subject to  US law.  In other words, the restrictions upon wiretaps, etc. do not apply to the British listening post.  So when Great Britain hands over the recordings to the NSA, technically speaking, a law is not being broken and technically speaking, the US is not eavesdropping on our each and every call.

It is Great Britain which is doing the eavesdropping and turning over these records to US intelligence.

According to John Loftus, formerly an attorney with  the Department of Justice and author of a number of books concerning US intelligence activities, back in the late seventies  the USDOJ issued a memorandum proposing an amendment to FISA. Loftus, who recalls seeing  the memo, stated in conversation this week that the DOJ proposed inserting the words “by the NSA” into the FISA law  so the scope of the law would only restrict surveillance by the NSA, not by the British.  Any subsequent sharing of the data culled through the listening posts was strictly outside the arena of FISA.

Obama was less than forthcoming when he insisted that “What I can say unequivocally is that if you are a US person, the NSA cannot listen to your telephone calls, and the NSA cannot target your emails … and have not.”

According to Loftus, the NSA is indeed listening as Great Britain is turning over the surveillance records en masse to that agency. Loftus states that the arrangement is reciprocal, with the US maintaining a parallel listening post in Great Britain.

In an interview this past week, Loftus told this reporter that  he believes that Snowden simply did not know about the arrangement between Britain and the US. As a contractor, said Loftus, Snowden would not have had access to this information and thus his detailed reports on the extent of US spying, including such programs as XKeyscore, which analyzes internet data based on global demographics, and PRISM, under which the telecommunications companies, such as Google, Facebook, et al, are mandated to collect our communications, missed the critical issue of the FISA loophole.

Under PRISM, said Snowden, the US has “deputized” corporate telecoms to do its dirty work for them.  PRISM, declared Snowden was indeed about content, rather than metadata.

However, other reports indicated that PRISM was not collecting telephone conversations and was  only collecting targeted internet communications. The most detailed description of the PRISM program was released in a report from the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) on July 2, 2014. The report disclosed that “ these internet communications are not collected in bulk, but in a targeted way: only communications that are to or from specific selectors, like e-mail addresses, can be gathered. Under PRISM, there’s no collection based upon keywords or names.”( (Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, Report on the Surveillance Program Operated Pursuant to Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, July 2, 2014).

U.S. government officials have defended the program by asserting it cannot be used on domestic targets without a warrant. But once again, the FISA courts and their super-secret warrants  do not apply to foreign government surveillance of US citizens. So all this sturm and drang about whether or not the US is eavesdropping on our communications is, in fact, irrelevant and diversionary.

Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, which authorized extensive surveillance capabilities, expired in June of 2015. Within one day,  it was  replaced by the misnamed USA Freedom Act.  In a widely disseminated tweet, President Obama stated “Glad the Senate finally passed the USA Freedom Act. It protects civil liberties and our national security.”

In fact, the USA Freedom Act reinstituted a number of the surveillance protocols of Section 215, including  authorization for  roving wiretaps  and tracking “lone wolf terrorists.”  While mainstream media heralded the passage of the bill as restoring privacy rights which were shredded under 215, privacy advocates have maintained that the bill will do little, if anything, to reverse the  surveillance situation in the US. The NSA went on the record as supporting the Freedom Act, stating it would end bulk collection of telephone metadata.

However, in light of the reciprocal agreement between the US and Great Britain, the entire hoopla over NSA surveillance, Section 215, FISA courts and the USA Freedom Act could be seen as a giant smokescreen. If Great Britain is collecting our real time phone conversations and turning them over to the NSA, outside the realm or reach of the above stated laws, then all this posturing over the privacy rights of US citizens and surveillance laws expiring and being resurrected doesn’t amount to a hill of CDs.

The NSA was contacted with a query about the GB listening post, as was British intelligence. A GCHQ  spokesperson  stated:“Our response is that we do not comment on intelligence matters.” The NSA also declined to comment.

Janet C. Phelan, investigative journalist and human rights defender that has traveled pretty extensively over the Asian region, an author of a tell-all book EXILE, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

According to some estimates, the group could be making US$1 billion per year from drug trafficking.

Russia’s United Nations Envoy Vitaly Churkin warned Thursday that Moscow received information on the Islamic State group confirming the group now controls an important narcotics supply route from Afghanistan.

“There is information that a group of militants from ISIS (Islamic State group) already control a part of the routes of illegal drug supply from the Badakhshan Province (in northeastern Afghanistan),” said Churkin during a United Nations Security Council session.

The official also called upon the U.N. body to closely monitor the situation of drugs in Afghanistan, given that it is one of the main routes of drug trafficking into Europe.

The Badakhshan Province is especially strategic since it extends into Afghanistan’s neighbors Pakistan, Tajikistan and the Xinjiang Province in China, which could also become a militant corridor for Islamic State group.

Iraqi security forces display vehicles and weapons seized from the Islamic State group | Photo: Reuters

Analysts have pointed out that the terrorist organization also runs drug trafficking operations in Libya, where the lawlessness generated by the civil war has provided a safe haven for militants.

The pink area on the map shows the Badakhshan Province | Photo: Google Maps

The humanitarian situation in the country has driven huge profits for the Islamist group since it is also involved in human trafficking. The group already controls territory in the coastal region of Sirte, which is considered a gateway to the Mediterranean Sea.

A report published in March by the Russian Federal Drug Control Service (FSKN) estimated that the Islamic State group makes up to US$1 billion per year in sales on Afghan heroin trafficked through its territory.

The Iraqi government has also documented evidence of Islamic State group involvement in organ trafficking.

Experts have pointed out that the group is trying to expand its funding sources to depend less on oil revenues, which could lead to wider involvement in other criminal activities, in particular the lucrative drug trafficking business.

According to some estimates, the group could be making US$1 billion per year from drug trafficking.
Russian United Nations Envoy Vitaly Churking warned Thursday that Moscow received information on the Islamic State group confirming the group now controls an important narcotics supply route from Afghanistan. 

“There is information that a group of militants from ISIS (Islamic State group) already control a part of the routes of illegal drug supply from the Badakhshan Province (in northeastern Afghanistan),” said Churkin during a United Nations Security Council session.

The official also called upon the U.N. body to closely monitor the situation of drugs in Afghanistan, given that it is one of the main routes of drug trafficking into Europe.

The Badakhshan Province is especially strategic since it extends into Afghanistan's neighbors Pakistan, Tajikistan and the Xinjiang Province in China, which could also become a militant corridor for Islamic State group.

Analysts have pointed out that the terrorist organization also runs drug trafficking operations in Libya, where the lawlessness generated by the civil war has provided a safe haven for militants.

The pink area on the map shows the Badakhshan Province | Photo: Google Maps

The humanitarian situation in the country has driven huge profits for the Islamist group since it is also involved in human trafficking. The group already controls territory in the coastal region of Sirte, which is considered a gateway to the Mediterranean Sea.

A report published in March by the Russian Federal Drug Control Service (FSKN) estimated that the Islamic State group makes up to US$1 billion per year in sales on Afghan heroin trafficked through its territory. 

The Iraqi government has also documented evidence of Islamic State group involvement in organ trafficking.

Experts have pointed out that the group is trying to expand its funding sources to depend less on oil revenues, which could lead to wider involvement in other criminal activities, in particular the lucrative drug trafficking business.

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In the current historical moment in the United States, the emptying out of language is nourished by the assault on the civic imagination. One example of this can be found in the rise of Donald Trump on the political scene. Donald Trump’s popular appeal speaks to not just the boldness of what he says and the shock it provokes, but the inability to respond to shock with informed judgement rather than titillation. Marie Luise Knott is right in noting that “We live our lives with the help of the concepts we form of the world. They enable an author to make the transition from shock to observation to finally creating space for action—for writing and speaking. Just as laws guarantee a public space for political action, conceptual thought ensures the existence of the four walls within which judgment operates.”[1] The concepts that now guide our understanding of American society are dominated by a corporate induced linguistic and authoritarian model that brings ruin to language, politics and democracy itself.

Missing from the commentaries by most of the mainstream media regarding the current rise of Trumpism is any historical context that would offer a critical account of the ideological and political disorder plaguing American society—personified by Trump’s popularity. A resurrection of historical memory in this moment could provide important lessons regarding the present crisis, particularly the long tradition of racism, white supremacy, exceptionalism, war mongering, and the extended wars on youth, women, and immigrants. Calling Trump a fascist is not enough. What is necessary are analyses in which the seeds of totalitarianism are made visible in Trump’s discourse and policy measures. One example can be found in Steve Weissman’s commentary on Trump in which he draws a relationship between Trump’s casual racism and the rapidly growing neo-fascist movements across Europe that “are growing strong by hating others for their skin color, religious origin, or immigrant status.”[2] Few journalists have acknowledged the presence of white militia and white supremacists groups at his rallies and almost none have acknowledged the chanting of “white power” at some of his political gatherings, which would surely signal not only Trump’s connections to a racist past but also to the formative Nazi culture that gave rise to the endgame of genocide.[3] Another example can be found in Glenn Greenwald’s analysis of the mainstream media’s treatment of Trump’s attack on Jorge Ramos, an influential anchor of Univision.[4] When Ramos stood up to question Trump’s views on immigration, Trump refused not only to call on him, but insulted him by telling him to go back to Univision. Instead of focusing on this particular lack of civility, Greenwald takes up the way many journalists scolded Ramos because he had a point of view and was committed to a political narrative. Greenwald saw this not just as a disingenuous act on the part of establishment journalists but as a weakness that furthers the march of an authoritarian regime that does not have to be accountable to the press. Trump may be bold in his willingness to flaunt his racism and make clear that money drives politics, but this is not new and should surprise no one who is historically and civically literate.

What is clear in this case is that a widespread avoidance of the past has become not only a sign of the appalling lack of historical consciousness in contemporary American culture, but a deliberate political weapon used by the powerful to keep people passive and blind to the truth, if not reduced to a discourse drawn from the empty realm of celebrity culture. This is a discourse in which totalitarian images of the hero, fearless leader, and bold politicians get lost in the affective and ideological registers of what Hannah Arendt once called “the ruin of our categories of thought and standards of judgment.”[5]Of course, there are many factors currently contributing to this production of ignorance and the lobotomizing of individual and collective agency. The forces promoting a deep seated culture of authoritarianism run deep in American society.

Such factors extend from the idiocy of celebrity and popular culture and the dumbing down of American schools to the transformation of the mainstream media into a deadly mix of propaganda and entertainment. The latter is particularly crucial as the collapse of journalistic standards that could inform the onslaught of information finds its counterpart in a government wedded to state secrecy and the aggressive prosecution of whistleblowers,[6] the expanding use of state secrecy, the corruption of political language,[7] the disregard for truth, all of which have contributed to growing culture of political and civic illiteracy.[8] The knowledge and value deficits that produce such detrimental forms of ignorance not only crush the critical and ethical imagination, critical modes of social interaction, and political dissent, but also destroy those public spheres and spaces that promote thoughtfulness, thinking, critical dialogue, and serve as “guardians of truths as facts,” as Arendt once put it.[9]

Under the reign of neoliberalism, space, time, and even language have been subject to the forces of privatization and commodification. Public space has been replaced by malls and a host of commercial institutions. Commodified and privatized, public space is now regulated through exchange values rather than public values just as communal values are replaced by atomizing and survival-of-the fittest market values. Time is no longer connected to long term
investments, the development of social capital, and goals that benefit young people and the public good. On the contrary, time is now connected to short-term investments and quick financial gains. More broadly, time is now defined by “the non-stop operation of global exchange and circulation”[10] and the frenetic reproduction and perpetuation of an impoverished celebrity and consumer culture that both depoliticizes people and narrows their potential for critical thought, agency, and social relations to an investment in shopping, and other market-related activities. Under neoliberalism, time presents itself as a form tyranny, an unquestioned necessity, and in speeding up the flows of work, leisure, knowledge, and everyday life it spawns a new kind of violence in which the flow of capital replaces the flow of thoughtfulness, atomization replaces a notion of shared solidarity, the spectacle undermines historical memory, privatization seeks to erase all notions of the public good, and manufactured precarity replaces any sense of security and long-term planning.

In the age of casino capitalism, time itself has become a burden more than a condition for contemplation, self-reflection, and the cultivation of thoughtful and compassionate social relations. The extended arc of temporal relations in which one could imagine long-term investments in the common good has given way to a notion of time in which the horizon of time is contained within the fluctuating short-term investments of the financial elite and their militant drive for profits at any price. What is lost in this merging of time and the dictates of neoliberal capital are the most basic elements of being human along with the formative culture and institutions necessary to develop a real, substantive democracy. As Christian Marazzi observes:

Taking time means giving each other the means of inventing one’s future, freeing it from the anxiety of immediate profit. It means caring for oneself and the environment in which one lives, it means growing up in a socially responsible way. [Taking time means] questioning the meaning of consumption, production, and investment [so as to not] reproduce the preconditions of financial capitalism, the violence of its ups and downs, the philosophy according to which ‘time is everything, man is nothing.’ For man (sic) to be everything, we need to reclaim the time of his existence.[11]

Civic death and disposability are the new signposts or a society in which historical memory is diminished and ethical evaluations become derided as figments of liberal past. Dispossession and depoliticization are central to the discourse of neoliberalism in which language is central to moulding identities, desires, values, and social relationships. As Doreen Massey observes, under neoliberalism the public is urged to become consumers, customers, and highly competitive while taught that the only interest that matters are individual interests, almost always measured by monetary considerations.[12] Under such circumstances, social and communal bonds have been shredded, important modes of solidarity attacked, and a war has been waged against any institution that embraces the values, practices, and social relations endemic to a democracy.

This retreat into private silos has resulted in the inability of individuals to connect their personal suffering with larger public issues. Thus detached from any concept of the common good or viable vestige of the public realm, they are left to face alone a world of increasing precarity and uncertainty in which it becomes difficult to imagine anything other than how to survive. Under such circumstances, there is little room for thinking critically and acting collectively in ways that are imaginative and courageous.

Surely, the celebration and widespread prevalence of ignorance in American culture does more than merely testify “to human backwardness or stupidity”; it also “indicates human weakness and the fear that it is unbearably difficult to live beset by continuous doubts.”[13] Yet, what is often missed in analysis of political and civic illiteracy as the new normal is the degree to which these new forms of illiteracy not only result in an unconscious flight from politics, but also produce a moral coma that supports modern systems of terror and authoritarianism. Civic illiteracy is about more than the glorification and manufacture of ignorance on an individual scale: it is producing a nation-wide crisis of agency, memory, and thinking itself.

How else to explain, for instance, the mainstream media’s willingness to provide a platform for Donald Trump whose views express an unchecked hatred of immigrants, women, the welfare state, and any viable notion of the public good. As Richard Hofstadter, Noam Chomsky, and Susan Jacoby have made clear ignorance is not simply about the absence of knowledge, it is a kind of ideological sandstorm in which reason gives way to emotion, and a willful stupidity spreads through the culture as part of a political project that both infantilizes and depoliticizes the general public.[14] Trump is simply the most visible embodiment of a society that is not merely suspicious of critical thought but disdains it. Trump is the quintessential symbol of the merging of a war-like arrogance, a militant certainty, and as self-absorbed unworldliness in which he is removed from problems of the real world. The clueless Trump is far from a kind of clownish fiction some writers have described him to be. And while liberals such as Michal Tomasky have pointed to his appeal to racial resentment, a gladiatorial style, and his ability to combine a war like discourse and elements of conservative fundamentalism with a flair for entertainment,[15] this type of analysis regrettably shies away from talking about Trump’s presence on the political landscape as an indication and warning of the specter of totalitarianism confronting Americans in new forms.[16]

Trump is the embodiment of a political party and casino driven social order in which informed judgments, moral responsibility, and collective action disappear from the world of politics. Trump’s often insulting, humiliating, misogynist, and racist remarks signify more than the rantings of an antediluvian, privileged white man who is both savvy in the world of public relations and delusional in the world of politics. Trump represents the new face of what Hannah Arendt once called the “banality of evil.”[17]   Unapologetic about the racist nature of his remarks, unreflective about an savage economic system that is destroying the planet and the lives of most of its inhabitants, and unaware of his own “criminal” participation in furthering a culture of fear and cruelty, he is typical of an expanding mass of pundits, anti-public intellectuals, and right-wing fundamentalists who live in a historical void and for whom emotion overtakes reason.

Clearly, the attack on reason, evidence, science, and critical thought has reached perilous proportions in the United States. A number of political, economic, social, and technological forces now work to distort reality and keep people passive, unthinking, and unable to act in a critically engaged manner. Politicians, right-wing pundits, and large swaths of the American public embrace positions that support Creationism, capital punishment, torture, and the denial of human-engineered climate change, any one of which not only defies human reason but stands in stark opposition to evidence-based scientific arguments. Reason now collapses into opinion, as thinking itself appears to be both dangerous and antithetical to understanding ourselves, our relations to others, and the larger state of world affairs. Under such circumstances, literacy disappears not just as the practice of learning skills, but also as the foundation for taking informed action. Divorced from any sense of critical understanding and agency, the meaning of literacy is narrowed to completing basic reading, writing, and numeracy tasks assigned in schools. Literacy education is similarly reduced to strictly methodological considerations and standardized assessment, rooted in test taking and deadening forms of memorization, and becomes far removed from forms of literacy that would impart an ability to raise questions about historical and social contexts.

For Arendt the inability to think, to be thoughtful, and assume responsibility for one’s actions spoke not just to a regrettable type of civic and political illiteracy, but was crucial for creating the formative cultures that produced totalitarian regimes. Absent any residue of moral responsibility, political indignation, and collective resistance, crimes committed in a systemic way now emerge, in part, from a society in which thinking had become dangerous and non-thinking normalized. Of course, thinking critically is largely produced in public spheres that instill convictions rather than destroy them, encourage critical capacities rather than shut them down, invest in public spheres rather than eliminate them by turning them over to private interests. What Donald Trump represents is rarely talked about in the media. He is the most current egregious highly visible symbol of a terrifying stage in American society haunted by the protean elements of a new totalitarianism. Totalitarian forms are still with us but they no longer find expression in the rounding up and killing of Jews, gays, and intellectuals or in the spectacles of militarism with the heightened show of armies of thugs dressed in military uniforms and black boots. The new totalitarianism is echoed in the resurgence of religious bigotry that runs through the current society like an electric current and personified in the media celebration of bigots such as Kentucky clerk Kim Davis who believes that her religion gives her the right to both deny marriage license to gays and the disavow the separation of church and state. Unfortunately, Davis is more than an embarrassment politically and ethically, she reflects a sizable number of religious fundamentalists who have the backing of Republican Party and presidential candidates such as Ted Cruz and Mike Huckabee.

Totalitarianism throws together authoritarian and anti-democratic forms that represent a new historical moment in American history. Economic fundamentalism now governs all of society rather than just the market and in doing so drives politics and sets polices that promote massive inequalities in wealth and power, produce huge amounts of suffering, and appear to delight in a culture of cruelty. Military fundamentalism points to a society that now militarizes everything from knowledge to schools. In this scenario, an increasing number of behaviors are criminalized, militarism feeds the punishing and incarceration state, and a kind of hyper masculinity now parades as the new model for legitimating aggression and violence in multiple spheres and against an increasing range of populations extending from women and black youth to Mexican immigrants. One of the most deadly fundamentalisms is education. We now live in a world in which illiteracy has replaced literacy and civic values have gone the way of the typewriter. As the orbits of privatization increase furthering what has been called by Mark Fisher the “empire of the self,” knowledge is transformed into the flow of non-stop information just as education collapses into training. Students are now defined as test-takers and celebrity culture has overtaken any viable notion of a critical, questioning, and informed culture. Trump’s rise in the polls is tantamount to the collapse of civic literacy and the public spheres that support it.

Totalitarianism’s curse finds public and political support for a mode of non-thinking in which rails against any attempt to ask what it might mean to use knowledge and theory as a resource to address social problems and events in ways that are meaningful and expand democratic relations. This this is a form of illiteracy marked by the inability to see outside of the realm of the privatized self, an illiteracy in which the act of translation withers, reduced to a relic of another age. The United States has become a country in which a chron­ic and deadly form of civic illiteracy finds its most visible expression into a disimagination machine that celebrates the Donald Trumps of the world. The world of politics is far from clownish and in fact points to a poisonous future at a time in which the educational force of the culture is being used to promote a poisonous form of civic illiteracy. Donald Trump is not the singular clown who has injected the color and idiocy into American politics, he is the canary in the mineshaft warning us that totalitarianism relies on mass support and feeds on hate, moral panics, and “the frenzied lawlessness or ideological certitude.”[18]

As American society moves from a culture of questioning to a culture of shouting, it has restaged politics and power in ways that are truly unproductive, frightening, and anti-democratic. Jerome Kohn writing about Arendt’s notion of totalitarianism provides a commentary that contains a message for the present age, one that points the possibility of hope triumphing over despair—a lesson that needs to be embraced at the present moment. He writes that for Arendt “what matters is not to give oneself over to the despair of the past or the utopian hope of the future, but ‘to remain wholly in the present.’ Totalitarianism is the crisis of our times insofar as its demise becomes a turning point for the present world, presenting us with an entirely new opportunity to realize a common world, a world that Arendt called a ‘human artifice,’ a place fit for habitation by all human beings.”[19] And if Trump represents a symbol of a threatening totalitarianism, the legacy of individual and collective struggle now on the horizon in the struggles emerging among the Black Lives Matter Movement, fast food workers, environmentalists, and a range of other groups point to a different future in which the ideological stupidity and the unbridled braggadocio of the loud mouth authoritarians will be challenged and overcome by the urgency of hope in the face of despair. Rather than view Trump as an eccentric clown maybe it is time to portray him symbolic of the legacy of a totalitarian post whose story needs to be told again. And in making such connections, there is not only the power of resistance but a call to civic action to prevent such horrible narrative from appearing once again.

I want to conclude by arguing that inherent in Arendt’s notion of the banality is view of education as central to politics. That is, for her the educative nature of politics is dialectical in that it is central to both creating the formative cultures of thoughtlessness and Nazi pedagogy and in creating those modes of politics in which matters of critique, desire, and agency are central to constructing critical and socially responsible citizens alive to the demands of economic, racial, and political justice. For those of us who believe that education is more than an extension of the business world, it is crucial to address a number of issues that stress the educative nature of politics as part of a broader effort to create a critical culture, democratic public spheres, and a collective movement that supports the connection between critique and action and redefines agency in the service of the practice of freedom and justice. Let me mention just a few.

First, educators, artists and others can address and make clear the relationship between the attack on the social state and the transformation of a range of democratic public spheres into adjuncts of corporate power. The neoliberal attacks on the welfare state, social provisions, public servants, and the public good must be understood and addressed as not simply an agenda to solidify class power but as an attack on democracy itself. . Nor can it be understood outside of the production of the atomized neoliberal subject who is taught to believe in a form of possessive individualism that disdains matters of compassion, solidarity, and the type of sociality crucial to a democratic society. In a society in which the “social self’ has been transformed into the “disembedded individual,” any viable notion of the public good is now repudiated by the privatizing and atomistic values at the heart of a hyper-market driven society. [20]

As I have mentioned earlier in this essay, militarism has a deadly grip on American society as both an ideology with its celebration of the ideals of war, violence, and military heroism and as a policy that fuels the arms race, invests billions in military weapons, and spends more on the tools of surveillance, war, and state violence than on schools, health care, and the welfare state. Brown University’s Watson Institute for International Studies has done extensive research on military spending and the costs of war and states that as a result of the Iraqi War alone “American taxpayers will ultimately spend roughly $2.2 trillion on the war, but because the U.S. government borrowed to finance the conflict, interest payments through the year 2053 means that the total bill could reach nearly $4 trillion.”[21] At the very least, any viable form of resistance against the onslaught of totalitarianism will have to develop as Rabbi Michael Lerner of Tikkun has pointed out a Marshall Plan in which funding is sufficient to make all levels of education free, while also providing enough social support to eliminate poverty, hunger, inadequate health care, and the destruction of the environment.[22] There is nothing utopian about the demand to redirect money away from the military, powerful corporations, and the upper 1 percent.

Second, progressives need to develop a new radical democratic imaginary that challenges the notion that a market economy is synonymous with democracy. Capitalism and democracy are antithetical and the ways in which democracy is undermined by casino capitalism needs to be endlessly addressed as part of the pedagogical and political task of rupturing what might be called neoliberal commonsense, especially regarding the assumption that the market should govern all of social life. The greatest threat posed by authoritarian politics is that it makes power invisible and hence defines itself in universal and commonsense terms, as if it is beyond critique and dissent. Moreover, disposability has become the new measure of a savage form of casino capitalism in which the only value that matters is exchange value. Coupled with making the machinery of neoliberal power visible is the need to overcome the fragmentation of the left while not denying the various modes of oppression at work in the United States. Put differently, there is a need young people, workers, educators, artists, and others to become part of a broader social movement aimed at dismantling the repressive institutions that are moving the United States into a new authoritarian age. This is especially true with regards to addressing the mass incarceration state, which drains billions of dollars in funds to put people in jail when such resources could be used to fund health care, free higher education, much needed infrastructure, a social wage, free day care, and so it goes. .

What I am suggesting is that progressives need to develop a more comprehensive view of society and a keener recognition of the mutually informing registers of politics, oppression, and political struggle. There is a noble and informing example of this type of analysis in the work of theorists such as Michael Lerner, Stanley Aronowitz, Angela Davis, and the late Martin Luther King, Jr., who drew connections between militarism, racism and capitalism as part of is call not for reform but for a radical restructuring of American society.

Third, against the new thoughtlessness that drapes the American public in the abyss of ignorance, infantilism, consumerism, militarism, and environmental stupidity, there is a need to create those pedagogical spaces in which shared faith in justice replaces the shared fears of precarity, hatred of the other, and a fear of the demands of justice. Against the savage brutalism of the new totalitarianism, there is a need to develop new discourses, vocabularies, values, desires, and a sense of spirituality that brings people together around a need for critique, passion for justice, and a desire for new modes of collective resistance and struggle. We may be in the midst of “dark times” but the light of hope is never far off and while it offers no guarantees, it posits the possibility of a future that will not mimic the horrors of the past and present.

Notes.

[1] Marie Luise Knott, Unlearning With Hannah Arendt, trans. by David Dollenmayer, (Other Press: New York, NY. 2011, 2013), p. 47.

[2] Steve Weissman, “Bashing Blacks, Latinos, Jews, and Muslims: Never Again!,” Reader Supported News, (September 2011). Online at:http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/32150-focus-bashing-blacks-latinos-jews-and-muslims-never-again

[3] See, for example, Randy Blazak, “Donald Trump is the New Face of White Supremacy,” Counter Punch, (August 28, 2015). Online at:http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/08/28/donald-trump-is-the-new-face-of-white-supremacy/

[4] Glenn Greenwald, “Jorge Ramos Commits Journalism, Gets Immediately Attacked by Journalists,” The Intercept, (August 27, 2015).

Online at: https://theintercept.com/2015/08/26/jorge-ramos-commits-journalism-gets-immediately-attacked-journalists/

[5] Hannah Arendt, Hannah Arendt: The Last Interview and Other Conversations, (Brooklyn, NY. : Melville House Publishing, 2013)

[6] Glenn Greenwald, No Place to Hide (New York: Metropolitan, 2014).

[7] Charles Lewis, 935 Lies: The Future of Truth and the Decline of America’s Moral Integrity (New York: Public Affairs, 2014).

[8] Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason (New York: Pantheon, 2008); Robert N. Proctor and Londa Schiebinger, eds.Agnotology: the Making and Unmaking of Ignorance (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008). The classic text here is Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in America Life (New York: Knopf, 1963).

[9] Hannah Arendt, Hannah Arendt: The Last Interview and Other Conversations (Brooklyn, NY: Melville House Publishing, 2013), p. 31.

[10] Jonathan Crary, 24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep, (Verso, 2013) (Brooklyn, NY: Verso Press, 2013), p. 5.

[11] Christian Marazzi, The Violence of Financial Capitalism (New York: Semiotext(e) 2011), p. 96.

[12] Doreen Massey, “Vocabularies of the economy,” Soundings, (2013)

http://lwbooks.co.uk/journals/soundings/pdfs/Vocabularies%20of%20the%20economy.pdf

[13] Zygmunt Bauman and Leonidas Donskis, Moral Blindness: The Loss of Sensitivity in Liquid Modernity (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2013), p. 7.

[14] Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (New York: Pantheon, 2002); Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason (New York: Pantheon, 2008) and Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in America Life (New York: Knopf, 1963).

[15] Michael Tomasky, “Trump,” New York Review of Books(September 24, 2015). Online:http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/sep/24/trump/

[16] See, for instance, Cornelius Castoriadis, “The Destinies of Totalitarianism,” Salmagundi, No. 60, (Spring -Summer, 1983),http://www.jstor.org/stable/40547754

[17] Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (New York: Penguin, 2006).

[18] Bill Dixon, “Totalitarianism and the Sand Storm,” Hannah Arendt Center (February 3, 2014). Online:http://www.hannaharendtcenter.org/?p=12466

[19] Jerome Kohn, “Totalitarianism: The Inversion of Politics,” The Hannah Arendt Papers at the Library of Congress Essays and lectures—“On the Nature of Totalitarianism: An Essay in Understanding” (Series: Speeches and Writings File, 1923-1975, n.d.) Online at: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/arendthtml/essayb1.html

[20] These two terms are taken from Stefan Collini, “Response to Book Review Symposium: Stefan Collini, What are Universities For,” Sociology 1-2 (February 5, 2014), Online:http://soc.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/02/14/0038038513518852

[21] Ben Armbruster,”Study: Iraq War Cost U.S. $2.2 Trillion, Claimed Nearly 200,000 Lives,” ThinkProgress (March 14, 2013). Online: http://thinkprogress.org/security/2013/03/14/1721961/study-iraq-war-cost-2-triillion/ The publication by the Watson Institute of the March 14, 2013 ‘Costs of War’ Project, “Iraq War: 190,000 lives, $2.2 trillion,” can be found online athttp://news.brown.edu/articles/2013/03/warcosts

[22] For Tikkun’s Marshall Plan, seehttp://spiritualprogressives.org/newsite/?page_id=114

Compiled by Cem Ertür

As French President Francois Hollande calls for the “neutralization of Bashar Assad”, British Defence Minister Michael Fallon announces preparations for “Striking ISIL in Syria […] [to] keep our streets safe here at home” and Turkish media proclaims “Aleppo to become the 82nd province of Turkey” ;

it is worth remembering the September 2011 visits by the arch-war criminals French President Nicolas Sarkozy, British Prime Minister David Cameron and Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to the NATO-occupied Libya.

.

.

Flashback to September 15th, 2011:

Le Figaro, 16 September 2011

Libyans welcome Sarkozy and Cameron as liberators

caption:  [French] head of state [Nicolas Sarkozy] and British Prime Minister [David Cameron] in a street of Benghazi yesterday.

“This does go beyond Libya; this is a moment when the Arab spring could become an Arab summer and we see democracy advance in other countries too. I believe you have the opportunity to give an example to others about what taking back your country can mean.”

[British Prime Minister David Cameron, joint press conference with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Corinthia Hotel, Tripoli, 15 September 2011]

(source:  Cameron and Sarkozy meet Libya’s new leaders in Tripoli, The Guardian, 15 September 2011)

“Do you know what I was thinking, walking round the streets of Tripoli and the hospital corridors? I was dreaming that one day young Syrians will have the same opportunity young Libyans are enjoying today, and that one day they too can say: “democracy and peaceful revolution are for us”. So perhaps the best thing I can do is dedicate our visit to Tripoli to all those people hoping Syria, too, can one day be a free country.”[French President Nicolas Sarkozy, joint press conference with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Corinthia Hotel, Tripoli, 15 September 2011]

(source:  Statements by Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the Republic, at his joint press conference with David Cameron, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and Moustafa Abdul Jalil, Chairman of the Libyan National Transitional Council (excerpts), France in the United Kingdom (official website of the embassy of France in London), 15 September 2011)

British Prime Minister David Cameron poses with NATO’s mercenary-terrorists, Benghazi Airport, 15 September 2011

The Independent, 16 September 2011

British Prime Minister David Cameron, Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and French author Bernard-Henri Levy (behind) are accompanied by NATO’s mercenary-terrorists, Tripoli, 15 September 2011

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron shake hands with a wounded NATO mercenary-terrorist, Tripoli Medical Centre, 15 September 2011

British Prime Minister David Cameron shakes hands with a wounded NATO mercenary-terrorist as French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil stand aside, Tripoli Medical Centre, 15 September 2011

Flashback to September 16th, 2011:

Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Tripoli Airport, 16 September 2011
NATO’s top mercenary-terrorist commander Mahdi al-Harati stands in the background.

Mahdi al-Harati has played a key role in NATO’s invasion of Libya and then in NATO’s covert war on Syria.  (see also the “Flashback to 2010” section below)

Mr Erdogan’s visit took place the day after French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister David Cameron’s visit to Tripoli and Benghazi.

Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag, Energy Minister Taner Yildiz, Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan attend Friday prayers, Green Square, Tripoli, 16 September 2011. Turkey’s Defense Minister Ismet Yilmaz and Minister of Transport Binali Yildirim [not seen in this photo] are also present.

Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivers his speech as Turkey’s FM Ahmet Davutoglu, Libya’s “President” Mustafa Abdul Jalil, “Prime Minister” Mahmoud Jibril and NATO’s top mercenary-terrorist commander Abdel Hakem Belhaj stand aside, Green Square, Tripoli, 16 September 2011

Abdel Hakem Belhaj has played a key role in NATO’s invasion of Libya and then in NATO’s covert war on Syria.

Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan delivers a speech to a crowd waving flags of Turkey and Libya’s ‘National Transitional Council’ “government”, Green Square, Tripoli, 16 September 2011

“I was in Tunisia yesterday; I greeted people who carried out the Jasmine Revolution. Two days before that, I was in Egypt and I greeted people who have initiated the Arab Spring. Today, I am with you. […]

Those who repress their own people in Syria will not survive. The time of autocracies is over. Totalitarian regimes are disappearing. The rule of the people is coming.”[Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, speech at the Green Square, Tripoli, 16 September 2011]

source:  Syria’s oppressors will not survive, Erdoğan says in Libya, Today’s Zaman, 16 September 2011

Flashback to April 2011:
Star, 16 April 2011. Help our country

[Turkey’s] Prime Minister Erdogan paid a morale-boosting visit to the wounded [NATO’s mercenary-terrorists] who were brought from Libya [to Ataturk Hospital in Ankara]. One of the wounded thanked Erdogan and asked for support: “Libyans are proud of you and give your name to their newborn babies. Please help our country.”

Flashback to 2010:




During Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to the wounded passengers of the Gaza-bound Mavi Marmara aid flotilla, Libyan-Irish “activist” Mahdi al-Harati kisses him on the forehead, Ataturk Hospital, Ankara, 3 June 2010 Turkey’s Deputy Prime Minister and Turkey’s Minister of Health Recep Akdag are standing aside. Qatar’s Foreign Minister Ahmed bin Abdullah al-Mahmoud [not seen in this photo] is also present.

Libyan-Irish “activist” Mahdi al-Harati (*) was supposedly injured during Israeli army’s assault on the Gaza-bound Mavi Marmara aid flotilla on May 31, 2010 and then brought to Turkey for treatment. In reality, this assault, which resulted in the massacre of 10 passengers (**), was a joint false-flag operation by Israel, Turkey, Britain and U.S. launched nine months before NATO’s overt invasion of Libya and covert war on Syria.

(*)  see the “Flashback to September 16th, 2011” section above

(**)  passenger Süleyman Ugur Söylemez succumbed to his injuries in May 2014

Haberturk, 4 June 2010

caption:  Yesterday, [Turkey’s Prime Minister] Erdogan visited the wounded. Libyan [Mahdi] Harati kissed Erdogan.

Flashback to 2014:



Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shakes hands with a wounded mercenary-terrorist, Israeli military field hospital in the occupied Golan near Israel’s border with Syria, 18 February 2014

Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon stands aside.


Jerusalem Post, 19 February 2014

“On the day that the world powers are opening talks in Vienna with Iran, it is important for the world to see pictures from this place. This place separates the good in the world from the evil in the world. The good is Israel, which saves lives from the daily slaughter taking place in Syria. This is the true face of Israel. The evil, is Iran, which is arming those carrying out the slaughter. All the children wounded, to say nothing of those killed, were harmed as a result of Iran arming, financing and training the Assad regime in the mass slaughter it is perpetrating. From here, I want to say to the world, as the talks between the major powers and Iran are being resumed, that Iran has not changed its aggressive policies. Iran has not changed its brutal character; Iran continues to support the Assad regime, which is slaughtering its citizens. This is the true face of Iran, and the world must not forget that.”

Related:

“End of a tyrant”: The Independent and The Guardian jubilant over the assassination of Libya’s deposed President Gaddafi

compiled by Cem Ertür, Indybay, 21 October 2011

Turkey’s top officials: A new regime should be established in Libya

compiled by Cem Ertür, Indybay, 25 May 2011  

UK Prime Minister: There is no question of an invasion or occupation of Libya

compiled by Cem Ertür, Indybay, 21 April 2011

“Show me bodies floating in water, play violins and show me skinny people looking sad. I still don’t care.” – Popular conservative Sun (a British daily newspaper) commenting on the homeless war refugees from war-torn Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, etc. who are fleeing their militarily de-stabilized and devastated countries after their homes and homelands had been reduced to bloody rubble by soldiers obeying orders from their commanders (including NATO and American “interventionism” in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, etc, etc).

Hopkins appears to be in good company. But she was probably just paraphrasing what she had been hearing from a multitude of ultra-nationalist xenophobic racists around the world have been saying. Many of them are revealing their true colors these days. There certainly seems to be an abundance of them among the 16 remaining Republican presidential candidates here in the US. It is instructive to note that the candidacy of Donald Trump has elicited the endorsement of fascist groups like Storm Front, the neo-Nazi group that appreciates his vehement, albeit delusional, anti-immigration agenda.

Fascism Keeps Rearing its Ugly Head (both in England, America and Around the World)

The spirit of the infamous British fascist leader, Oswald Mosely, seems to periodically raise its ugly head in England. Mosely, back in the 1920s, had been the youngest member of Britain’s Conservative Party to be elected to Parliament. An admirer of Adolph Hitler, he started the British Union of Fascists (BUF) in the 1930s. That group gloried in their Black Shirt uniforms until the BUF was abolished when Great Britain declared war on Germany. However, celebrities like Hopkins, even though they will deny that they are fascists, are decidedly right-wing extremists that meet many of the characteristics of fascism. The latest incarnation of the BUF is the New British Union Party, and they are proud of it. Here is one of their recent posters:

Many nations around the world have had and are continuing to have within their borders fascist movements. Remember Vidkun Quisling who led the Nazi puppet government in Norway? And then recall Quisling’s modern day incarnation, the mass murderer of innocent progressive-minded kids, Anders Behring Breivik and his fascist manifesto?

Look at the list of the hundreds of defunct, hibernating and/or active fascist movements around the world by googling “list of fascist movements by country”. For much more on the 14 characteristics of fascism, which should be tested against the beliefs and actions of every political and economic leader, google “George W. Bush and the 14 characteristics of fascism”.

American Fascism Through the Years

Of course, America has had its share of active and hibernating fascist movements, but our high school history textbooks have typically ignored that unpleasant part of our history. According to Wikipedia, there have been at least 31 very public fascist political parties in the US since 1920. The Southern Poverty Law Center has investigated hundreds and hundreds of fascist and racist sects that are currently active.

One of the largest was the Silver Legion of America, commonly known as the Silver Shirts (Brown and Black Shirt uniforms had been spoken for in Germany.). The Silver Shirts’ political party was called the Christian Party, and founder William Dudley Pelley, son of a protestant minister, ran for president in 1936 against Roosevelt. Pelley, an avowed racist, anti-Semite and. ultranationalist hated FDR, as have most conservative groups ever since the 1930s. They hated him because of the New Deal, which saved middle and lower class Americans at the expense of the wealthy elite 1 %. The New Deal set back corrupt crony capitalism’s agendas a couple of generations or so, and their spiritual progeny in the Republican Party are still fuming about it.

Pelley’s Silver Shirts had initially been a secret group of right-wing extremists, but its existence was finally made public on April 30, 1933, the very day that German President Paul von Hindenberg finally yielded to the right-wing German political parties and Germany’s ruling elites and appointed Adolf Hitler Chancellor of Germany.

Interestingly, the headquarters of the Silver Shirts was located in Asheville, North Carolina, which has evolved into a very politically progressive community. Pelley later moved his organization to Indiana, a historical hotbed of American right-wing extremism, including the Ku Klux Klan.

A few days after the Silver Shirts came up from the underground (early in May 1933), Nazi Deputy Führer Rudolf Hess gave German Nazi Party member (and legal immigrant) Heinz Spanknöbel authority to form a Nazi Party organization in America. Its national headquarters was in New York City, with a large contingent of Bund members active in Chicago. It was called the German American Bund, aka Friends of New Germany (FONG).

Interestingly – for those of us who live in the so-called progressive heartland of America – one of the Bund’s American Nazi training camps was located in Grafton, Wisconsin. Grafton had previously been called Hamburg, reflecting the German heritage of many eastern Wisconsin communities such as Milwaukee, the beer capital of America. The infamous 1950s-era Republican Senator Joe McCarthy’s hometown was nearby Appleton, Wisconsin, which still is, not surprisingly, the headquarters of the John Birch Society. JBS members dearly loved Tail-gunner Joe and his poisonous neo-fascist McCarthyism.

What Does PNAC Have to do With the Drowned Syrian Toddler?

There has been a massive amount of confusing and self-contradicting propaganda concerning the Middle East crises ever since the Cheney/Bush administration chose to invade the oil-rich, opium-rich and lithium-rich region shortly after 9/11/01. One of the important points that needs emphasis is that there is a tight connection (albeit not a straight line connection) between what guilty perps made happen on 9/11/01 and what happened to the drowned Syrian toddler pictured above.

9/11/01 is now well understood by scholars (and real investigative journalists) to have been a false flag operation, orchestrated by nefarious, as-yet unindicted persons and right-wing think tanks, groups that have been funded by billionaires and American-based trans-national corporations. Those entities have long-term business plans for domination of extractable resources, finances and territory anywhere on the globe.

Those plans had been clearly out-lined by arguably the right-wing’s most important think tank, the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). PNAC’s manifesto had already been proposed to (and rejected by) the Clinton administration in the 1990s, but it was accepted by the Cheney and Bush after many of its members (17 to be precise) officially joined the Cheney/Bush administration. America’s military de-stabilization of the Middle East closely followed the propaganda-inspired false assumption that Middle Eastern foreigners, and not US government insiders, expertly planted the explosive charges in WTC Towers 1, 2 & 7 over weeks and months prior to their explosive pulverization into fine dust.

It is now established that the two jet planes caused only brief, self-extinguishing, low-temperature fires in towers 1 & 2, temperatures that were incapable of melting, much less suddenly transecting, all of the core steel columns in sequence. The only rational explanation for what happened that day is that computer-controlled demolitions dropped all three skyscrapers into their footprints on 9/11/01.

PNAC, the Real Conspiratorial Group that Needs to be Subpoenaed to Testify, Under Oath, About 9/11/01

PNAC was an outgrowth of the nefarious NeoConservative think tank, the American Enterprise Institute, which continues to promote the economic agendas of any number of anti-democratic, obscenely wealthy, multinational corporations that continue to pay the generous salaries of its high profile stable of “fellows”.

Among other things, the purpose of PNAC was and still is to increase military spending, subvert the United Nations, ensure planetary domination by US corporate (and military) interests and spread (anti-democratic) capitalism around the world (through the barrel of a gun if necessary), thus enriching PNAC’s corporate sponsors. Hidden from the public view was the precise identity of PNAC’s paymasters, which surely must include this list of One Percenters: the multi-millionaire politicians, multimillionaire corporate lobbyists, multi-billionaire war-profiteers, multi-billionaire Wall Street executives, oath-taking militarists and the corporate-controlled media.

The original members of PNAC (a few of whom are pictured below) admitted that their goals of American military and economic domination would be difficult to implement “without a catastrophic catalyzing event such as ‘a new Pearl Harbor’”. Viola! After Bush was elected, PNAC member and Vice President Dick Cheney acquired immense power in the White House, as did Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz at the Pentagon. Within a year the desired “New Pearl Harbor” was successfully orchestrated.

The False Flag 9/11 Reichstag Fire – What Really Happened

The false flag events of 9/11/01 were the perfect Pearl Harbor, the perfect Reichstag Fire (google “The 9/11 Reichstag Fire – What Really Happened”), the perfect Krystallnacht. the perfect Operation Northwoods, the perfect Gulf of Tonkin Incident, etc, etc.

Operation Northwoods False Flag

Each of those “catalyzing events” have been proven to be false flag operations (or events that were allowed to happen). (NOTE: A false flag operation is a governmental conspiracy to “stage” a secret operation that pretends that their nation is being attacked by a targeted enemy in order to elicit public outrage and then claim that that enemy drew first blood and therefore deserves to be attacked “in retaliation”. Considerable propaganda (especially in the “fog of war”) needs to accompany the event for the Big Lie Bamboozle to work on naïve, ignorant, partisan or uber-patriotic citizens. )

A scary list of some of the nefarious, hard right-wing ruling class elites who signed on to the PNAC’s statement of principles can be found by googling “Old American Century – PNAC”. Following is a sobering photo of ten of them (including GOP presidential candidate Jeb Bush). Those pictured were protected from testifying under oath by the 911 Commission, despite the fact that it was on their watch that America was led, by Big Lie propaganda, into the disastrous, perpetual “Wars on Terrorism”.

Those wars of aggression and the subsequent – and inevitable – atrocities met the definition of international war crimes and crimes against humanity, but no prosecution has yet come to pass, even though the US lost both the Gulf Wars. And, of course the perpetual wars led directly or indirectly to the current war refugee crises in Europe and the Middle East, including the drowning of the innocent Syrian toddler, Aylan Kurdi and most of his family The PNAC perps need to take some responsibility for the loss of innocent lives.

Even this partial list of PNAC members should make American anti-fascists, anti-imperialists, and Occupy member’s skin crawl. (Google “PNAC Archives – 911 Truth” for more about PNAC). Those lists include Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, Jeb Bush, Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, Gary Bauer, John Bolton, Richard Perle, William Kristol (founder and chairman), James Wolsey, Elliot Abrams, Eliot Cohen, Dan Quayle, Donald Kagan, William J. Bennett, Scooter Libby, Vin Weber, Norman Podhoretz, Steve Forbes and others after the fraudulent election of 2000.

Despite their roles in leading America into the illegal and unconstitutional wars for oil (which have resulted in millions of innocent Muslim men, women and children dead, wounded, starving and homeless), none but Scooter Libby has spent any time in jail. Go figure.

The politicians, billionaire war-profiteers, Wall Street financiers, oath-taking militarists and the corporate-controlled media (that also must take some responsibility for the war refugee crisis) are composed of groups of conscienceless operatives from the infamous, chronically conspiratorial military/industrial/congressional/media complex, subgroups of which were certainly among the planners and/or orchestrators of the controlled demolitions of the three World Trade Center buildings.

There are a lot of traitorous elites who have been knowingly and secretly usurping American democracy by, post-911, helping to prevent truly independent investigations from happening. Those cunning manipulations have kept Americans from hearing the testimony about the multiple bomb explosions from eye-witnesses who were ready to reveal the obvious truth: that the official White House conspiracy theories about 9/11 were fraudulent. If real investigations would have been allowed to occur right away, the horrific slaughter of the innocents in the Middle East would have been averted – and the drowned Syrian toddler would be alive today.

The 9/11 Truth Movement’s Assertions are not ”Theories” Anymore

All the existing evidence that has been accrued over the past 14 years proves that there were any number of guilty people and groups, and most of them are hiding in plain sight, hopefully shaking in their boots for fear that a powerful grassroots movement will arise and effectively demand justice for their treasonous crimes. All the evidence of their treason has been accumulated, and it is court-of-law-worthy.

The prime suspects that need to be brought to justice as co-conspirators are surely some or all of the folks in the PNAC. So far, they have been protected from being subpoenaed to giving public testimony under oath. They have a lot to lose and therefore have been working hard to avoid indictment, trying to remain in positions of economic or (un-elected) political power. Many of many of them are still deeply involved in US foreign policy and domestic politics.

Conclusion

For any truthful, open-minded person with an IQ above 90 (and who also isn’t an obedient, political hack with ulterior motivations to lie for their political party), understanding why 9/11 was a false flag operation is a no-brainer: All one has to do is study a couple of the powerful, unassailably truthful documentaries on YouTube (see below).

If real investigative journalists – who already knew something was fishy on 9/11/01 – had been allowed to do their jobs and question the unbelievable official theories, justice would have been done before the dogs of war were relesed. Even our co-opted and conflicted politicians might have been able to comprehend that the three WTC Towers 1, 2 & 7 could only have been brought down by pre-planted demolition charges.

And if a real search for the real culprits had been done – as promised by President.Bush – that investigation would have revealed that it is impossible for jet planes to bring down modern, non-flammable steel-reinforced skyscrapers. So, in conclusion, it was the demolitions – and not the “attacks” – that were responsible for the deaths of most of the 3000 civilians that would otherwise have been rescued shortly after the office fires self-extinguished. Planes hitting skyscrapers that were designed to withstand direct hits from Boeing 707s would not incite a nation to go to war – because the buildings would have been left standing. It was therefore necessary to destroy the incriminating evidence: perhaps of a drone plane or two, or the still missing black boxes, or the lack of passengers, etc. That all had to be rubbed out by the demolitions and the total destruction from 3 months-long red-hot smoldering fires from the heat producing incendiaries that were capable of melting steel, like thermite, thermate, military-grade nano-thermite or other high explosives.

So if justice had been done immediately after 9/11, neither Afghanistan nor Iraq would have been illegally invaded and immorally de-stabilized, and all those targeted Middle Eastern nations in the region, including Syria, would not have experienced the chaos of experiencing millions of Iraqi war refugees crossing over the border in the mass movements of internally and externally displaced civilian war refugees like the Syrian toddler.

Important Research Opportunities

Among the many fine documentaries on the subject that are capable of totally disproving the White House Big Lie, the one that has the best historical context is “Loose Change 9/11: An American Coup”. In my opinion, the documentary with the best science behind it is “9/11: Explosive Evidence – Experts Speak Out” from Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth.

Real patriots, if they want to be on the right side of history, need to watch them both and then adjust their politics.

To do so will place in proper perspective the sufferings and deaths of the millions of war refugees like Alyan Kurdi, his sibling and his mother, all of whom drowned on the same day.

Dr Kohls is a retired physician who writes a weekly column for the Reader Weekly, an alternative newsweekly published in Duluth, Minnesota, USA. Many of his columns are archived at http://duluthreader.com/articles/categories/200_Duty_to_Warn.

Step by step, Washington is inexorably setting up a major provocation against China.  Until now, the Obama regime tightened a military encirclement of China, expanding its armed forces agreements with Japan, the Philippines and Australia.  In addition, it has promoted the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), a regional trade agreement which openly excludes China.  Obama has ordered a major naval build-up in the South China Sea and embarked on extensive cyber-espionage of Chinese industries and the government via major US high-tech companies, as revealed by Edward Snowden in his release of confidential NSA documents.

President Xi Jinping

As President Xi Jinping prepares for his first US visit as China’s leader on September 25, with the aim of extending economic ties between Chinese and US business (especially with the high tech corporations in Seattle and Silicon Valley), the Obama regime has threatened to impose a series of punitive sanctions against Chinese companies and individuals for ‘cyber-espionage’, essentially undermining the purpose of his trip.

Characterizing the Chinese as ‘cyber-thieves’ and imposing sanctions on Chinese businesses on the eve of Xi’s visit will be justifiably seen as a deliberate humiliation and a provocation, designed to treat China as a mere vassal state of Washington.

This will force the Chinese government to retaliate on behalf of Chinese businesses – and President Xi is fully capable of imposing retaliatory sanctions against multi-billion dollar high tech US corporations, which had been flourishing – up to now – in China.

Obama’s decision to provoke China on multiple fronts reflects the overwhelming influence of the militarist power configurations in Washington: the Pentagon, the NSA and the Zionist –militarist ideologues.

In contrast to Washington’s aggressive policy, the major US high tech corporations are almost unanimous in their opposition to Obama’s ‘military pivot’ and are appalled by the threat of cyber sanctions, rightly calling them a “needless provocation”.

For its part, Wall Street has taken an intermediary position – hoping Washington will coerce China into ‘opening’ its protected financial markets to the big US banks.  It doesn’t necessarily support aggressive sanctions, which could provoke a response from China closing off lucrative opportunities in the world’s biggest financial market.

Background to a Momentous Confrontation

China’s growth and overseas economic expansion has increasingly challenged US market supremacy in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

China’s relationship with the US, EU and Japanese multi-national corporations has changed due to its recent technological advances in its manufacturing and service sectors moving its production up the value chain.  Increasingly, the Chinese have been demanding technology transfers from their multinational partners and an increasing use of locally manufactured parts in their assembly plants.

China’s economic expansion and industrial maturation has evoked divergent responses from the elites in Washington, Silicon Valley and Wall Street.

US Elites Diverge

The Pentagon and the White House developed the ‘military pivot’ to deal with China’s ascendency as an economic world power.  This is essentially a policy of strategic confrontations, including military encirclement through regional base agreements, deliberate economic exclusion through regional trade agreements and political provocation through threatened sanctions. US military bases have expanded and a huge naval armada patrols China’s maritime frontier.  There are US fighter planes flying over Beijing’s reclaimed island installations while the US State Department goads China’s neighbors to stake their own territorial claims in the South China Sea.

The White House and its highly militarized State Department have launched a full-scale propaganda campaign through the US mass media, criminalizing China with unsubstantiated charges of espionage. The range, intensity and frequency of these accusations indicate that this campaign is not  some clever diplomatic ploy intended to squeeze out concessions in an otherwise peaceful relation.  Rather Washington’s criminalization of China is meant to provoke a full rupture in diplomatic, political and economic relations and prepare for harsh military confrontations.

Washington’s campaign to criminalize China includes the hysterical claims that China has engaged in the long-term, large scale theft of US intellectual property rights.  By falsely attributing China’s technological advances to ‘theft’ Washington denigrates China’s endogenous scientific and technological achievements as well as criminalizing the Beijing and Chinese companies.

In the last few years, the US arrested several Chinese scientists and issued warrants for others, publicly accusing them of spying on US companies.  The charges against several of the scientists were later quietly dropped by the FBI for lack of evidence but not before the scientists had seen their careers destroyed.  The negative propaganda impact on the US public was successful – Chinese scholars and scientists were depicted as spies.  Whistleblower Edward Snowden’s revelations of National Security Agency’s documents clearly show that it was the US which was engaged in large-scale spying on Beijing, using major US IT corporations operating in China as a principal vehicle for data theft.

The US has accused China of violating international norms regarding the governance of the internet – claiming that Chinese authorities exercise censorship and control over US IT companies as well as its own citizens.  In other words, Washington denies Chinese sovereignty by claiming extra-territorial jurisdiction over the internet!  Along the same lines, Washington asserts that China has blocked US market access by insisting that public agencies rely on Chinese suppliers and that US firms store their data in China.  China’s new policies developed after they discovered that US multi-national corporations were working hand-in-glove with the NSA and other US intelligence agencies.  Is it any wonder that China sought to protect its industrial and trade secrets, as well as national security, by limiting access for US IT corporations?

The “Financial Press”: Wars over Markets

Washington’s provocative campaign to criminalize China and Chinese industries has been amplified in the financial pages of the respectable US and British press.  The degree to which the leading Anglo-American financial newspapers, the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times, have become rabid advocates of Obama’s militarist confrontational policy instead of serving the business community’s market interests, evaluating the impact of sanctions on US high tech multi-nationals and presenting the much more moderate position of the major high-tech multi-nationals is striking.

The financial press’s shrill campaign is designed to paint China as a corporate criminal and ignores major US corporate opposition to any rash military actions.   This propaganda campaign is warning the US IT elite of an imminent barrage of economic sanctions against China’s burgeoning cyber industries.  These Sanctions could be announced prior to or even during President Xi Jinping’s visit to the US– if the militarists have their way.

White House Sanctions:  The Divergences in US Policy

Despite White House rhetoric and anti-China hysteria, most US IT corporations have reaped huge profits from their sales and business arrangements with the Chinese state and Chinese businesses.  According to one executive, “Apple is the standout success story, with sales of the iPhone rising 75 percent in China over the past year (2014)’. (FT 9/12 – 9/13/15).

Senior IT executives have expressed their willingness to accommodate China’s demands a change in the way they do business, including technology transfers, because they see “huge opportunities (for profit) in the near term”.  The last thing Silicon Valley wants is for Washington to provoke hostile retaliation from China if Obama imposes sanctions:  That would entail the loss of hundreds of billions of dollars!

In the highly militarized-‘Zionized’ Obama administration, immersed in the politics of provocation and war, the multi-nationals do not have the final say.

China’s Maturing Capitalism:  Indigenous Innovations

China’s maturing capitalism has been accompanied by significant changes.  And in 2006, the Chinese leadership announced a new policy promoting ‘indigenous innovation’.  The purpose of the policy was two-fold: to become less dependent on foreign technology and to combat the growing threat of Washington’s espionage via US high tech corporations operating in China.

In line with these strategic goals, in 2009 China ruled that only companies with locally developed technology would be allowed to bid for public procurement contracts.

In 2010, Google’s operations in China were shutdown when it was revealed that the company had acted as a ‘transmission belt’ transferring sensitive Chinese data to the NSA.  Washington immediately denounced China for what it termed “censorship” of Google.

As the endogenous innovation policy gained momentum, the US MNC monopoly of China’s high tech market was undermined.  The MNC’s called for Washington to intervene and force China to “open” its markets to US dominance.

In strategic terms, the tie-in between the US IT MNCs and Washington boomeranged:  While spying for NSA may have gained short-term favors for the high tech sector, it undermined strategic relations with China and its lucrative market.  The IT moguls re-thought the strategy and sought greater autonomy from the NSA to regain China’s trust and re-enter its market.

High Tech Diplomacy

The high tech multinational corporations are eager to welcome China’s President Xi on his visit, viewing it as an opportunity to mend and expand relations.  The Silicon Valley-Seattle corporate elite oppose sanctions against while the White House claim to be acting on their behalf.

The US high tech elite are aware that American IT companies must accommodate China’s demands to transfer and share technology. They have adopted a realistic perspective that if they do not share markets, technology and sales – they can lose out entirely.

Apple, IBM, CISCO, Qualcomm have declared that they would rather cooperate with China’s indigenous innovations policy than face big losses or total exclusion from the Chinese market.

Even Google, which served as the NSA’s willing accomplice and was expelled for espionage against China, is now seeking approval for a limited re-entry.

Wall Street Diplomacy:  Pressure not Provocation

The big Wall Street bankers, on the other hand, want the White House to pressure China to de- regulate its financial markets.  They want China to allow American hedge funds and speculators to sell short and artificially drive down the value of Chinese stocks, increasing volatility and discouraging investors.
It is questionable whether Wall Street’s idea of US “pressure” extends to applying punitive economic sanctions.  After all, limited financial access under present circumstances is still far more lucrative than total exclusion which could result from Chinese retaliation in response to White House sanctions.

Conclusion

The divergent interests and approaches among US imperial elites, between high powered IT corporate CEO’s and Pentagon and White House militarists is evident in two parallel meetings taking place during President Xi’s visit.

During his visit to the US, Xi will stop over in Seattle to confer with top IT executives, coinciding with the US-China Internet Industry Forum. The timing and location (Seattle) of the Forum is not coincidental.  Its timing was planned by the Chinese and reflects their influence and capacity to play-off powerful US economic elites against Washington’s war mongers and Pentagon militarists.

The White House has been pushing for a fight with China ever since Obama announced his so-called ‘pivot to Asia’.  The saber rattling has escalated over the past two years, aided and abetted by an all-out propaganda campaign denigrating China’s scientific and economic performance and exaggerating fears of its defense modernization programs.  When one reads the Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times, one would think the Chinese economy is on the verge of collapse.  They describe the drop in China’s projected annual growth from 7.3% to 7% as ‘catastrophic’!  If the EU and US grew at half that rate, the financial scribes would claim an ‘economic miracle’!

Denigration of the Chinese economy; screeds and characterizations of the Chinese as industrial thieves engaged in spying and criminal behavior and the wild paranoid warnings about the growing ‘Chinese military threat’ are part of a systematic build-up to counter lucrative economic relations between China and IT corporations and other leading US economic sectors.

Washington’s projected sanctions on China will be many times more costly to US MNC than its current sanctions on Russia.  White House sanctions on Moscow mainly damaged European-based industries and businesses. However sanctions against China will have a massive impact on the US economy.

The White House’s version of the “yellow peril” has no redeeming features for any sector of the US economy.  It is the purest expression of militarism run amok.  It over-rides any rational economic interest in pursuit of unadulterated geo-political military supremacy.  Even on its own terms military supremacy is unattainable as Washington will soon discover, as China deepens its military ties with Russia!

If and when Washington raises the specter of sanctions against China, (with the accompanying gratuitous insults and unsubstantiated accusations of state sponsored “cyber theft”) the Chinese government will respond.

President Xi will take reprisals as he has done before, faced with lesser threats.  And he will have the support of the vast majority of Chinese from all regions and classes.

US IT corporations are aware of this potential debacle and have openly and forcefully conveyed their views to Washington.  For them, the so-called ‘cyber theft’ is a minor issue compared to the lucrative long term strategic opportunities in working with China.

So far the militarists in the Obama White House have commanded US-China policy.  Up to now they have disregarded corporate American interests; whether it is US oil interests in Iraq and Libya, or IT corporations in China.

If Zionist officials in the Executive influence the militarists on Middle East policy, the hard core militarists influence the Zionists in the Far East.
If the US military-driven Middle East policy has been a failure, a similar policy toward China will be catastrophic.

US sanctions and humiliation against China and the consequent falling out of relations will play out in slow motion.  Beginning with the precipitous decline of joint ventures and exports, it will lead to lifeless cranes in empty Pacific coast ports and rusting container ships; profit losses and vacant country clubs in Silicon Valley and lost sales for US auto companies.  The list is endless but the consequences are clear.

Step by step, Washington is inexorably setting up a major provocation against China.  Until now, the Obama regime tightened a military encirclement of China, expanding its armed forces agreements with Japan, the Philippines and Australia.  In addition, it has promoted the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), a regional trade agreement which openly excludes China.  Obama has ordered a major naval build-up in the South China Sea and embarked on extensive cyber-espionage of Chinese industries and the government via major US high-tech companies, as revealed by Edward Snowden in his release of confidential NSA documents.

President Xi Jinping

As President Xi Jinping prepares for his first US visit as China’s leader on September 25, with the aim of extending economic ties between Chinese and US business (especially with the high tech corporations in Seattle and Silicon Valley), the Obama regime has threatened to impose a series of punitive sanctions against Chinese companies and individuals for ‘cyber-espionage’, essentially undermining the purpose of his trip.

Characterizing the Chinese as ‘cyber-thieves’ and imposing sanctions on Chinese businesses on the eve of Xi’s visit will be justifiably seen as a deliberate humiliation and a provocation, designed to treat China as a mere vassal state of Washington.

This will force the Chinese government to retaliate on behalf of Chinese businesses – and President Xi is fully capable of imposing retaliatory sanctions against multi-billion dollar high tech US corporations, which had been flourishing – up to now – in China.

Obama’s decision to provoke China on multiple fronts reflects the overwhelming influence of the militarist power configurations in Washington: the Pentagon, the NSA and the Zionist –militarist ideologues.

In contrast to Washington’s aggressive policy, the major US high tech corporations are almost unanimous in their opposition to Obama’s ‘military pivot’ and are appalled by the threat of cyber sanctions, rightly calling them a “needless provocation”.

For its part, Wall Street has taken an intermediary position – hoping Washington will coerce China into ‘opening’ its protected financial markets to the big US banks.  It doesn’t necessarily support aggressive sanctions, which could provoke a response from China closing off lucrative opportunities in the world’s biggest financial market.

Background to a Momentous Confrontation

China’s growth and overseas economic expansion has increasingly challenged US market supremacy in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

China’s relationship with the US, EU and Japanese multi-national corporations has changed due to its recent technological advances in its manufacturing and service sectors moving its production up the value chain.  Increasingly, the Chinese have been demanding technology transfers from their multinational partners and an increasing use of locally manufactured parts in their assembly plants.

China’s economic expansion and industrial maturation has evoked divergent responses from the elites in Washington, Silicon Valley and Wall Street.

US Elites Diverge

The Pentagon and the White House developed the ‘military pivot’ to deal with China’s ascendency as an economic world power.  This is essentially a policy of strategic confrontations, including military encirclement through regional base agreements, deliberate economic exclusion through regional trade agreements and political provocation through threatened sanctions. US military bases have expanded and a huge naval armada patrols China’s maritime frontier.  There are US fighter planes flying over Beijing’s reclaimed island installations while the US State Department goads China’s neighbors to stake their own territorial claims in the South China Sea.

The White House and its highly militarized State Department have launched a full-scale propaganda campaign through the US mass media, criminalizing China with unsubstantiated charges of espionage. The range, intensity and frequency of these accusations indicate that this campaign is not  some clever diplomatic ploy intended to squeeze out concessions in an otherwise peaceful relation.  Rather Washington’s criminalization of China is meant to provoke a full rupture in diplomatic, political and economic relations and prepare for harsh military confrontations.

Washington’s campaign to criminalize China includes the hysterical claims that China has engaged in the long-term, large scale theft of US intellectual property rights.  By falsely attributing China’s technological advances to ‘theft’ Washington denigrates China’s endogenous scientific and technological achievements as well as criminalizing the Beijing and Chinese companies.

In the last few years, the US arrested several Chinese scientists and issued warrants for others, publicly accusing them of spying on US companies.  The charges against several of the scientists were later quietly dropped by the FBI for lack of evidence but not before the scientists had seen their careers destroyed.  The negative propaganda impact on the US public was successful – Chinese scholars and scientists were depicted as spies.  Whistleblower Edward Snowden’s revelations of National Security Agency’s documents clearly show that it was the US which was engaged in large-scale spying on Beijing, using major US IT corporations operating in China as a principal vehicle for data theft.

The US has accused China of violating international norms regarding the governance of the internet – claiming that Chinese authorities exercise censorship and control over US IT companies as well as its own citizens.  In other words, Washington denies Chinese sovereignty by claiming extra-territorial jurisdiction over the internet!  Along the same lines, Washington asserts that China has blocked US market access by insisting that public agencies rely on Chinese suppliers and that US firms store their data in China.  China’s new policies developed after they discovered that US multi-national corporations were working hand-in-glove with the NSA and other US intelligence agencies.  Is it any wonder that China sought to protect its industrial and trade secrets, as well as national security, by limiting access for US IT corporations?

The “Financial Press”: Wars over Markets

Washington’s provocative campaign to criminalize China and Chinese industries has been amplified in the financial pages of the respectable US and British press.  The degree to which the leading Anglo-American financial newspapers, the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times, have become rabid advocates of Obama’s militarist confrontational policy instead of serving the business community’s market interests, evaluating the impact of sanctions on US high tech multi-nationals and presenting the much more moderate position of the major high-tech multi-nationals is striking.

The financial press’s shrill campaign is designed to paint China as a corporate criminal and ignores major US corporate opposition to any rash military actions.   This propaganda campaign is warning the US IT elite of an imminent barrage of economic sanctions against China’s burgeoning cyber industries.  These Sanctions could be announced prior to or even during President Xi Jinping’s visit to the US– if the militarists have their way.

White House Sanctions:  The Divergences in US Policy

Despite White House rhetoric and anti-China hysteria, most US IT corporations have reaped huge profits from their sales and business arrangements with the Chinese state and Chinese businesses.  According to one executive, “Apple is the standout success story, with sales of the iPhone rising 75 percent in China over the past year (2014)’. (FT 9/12 – 9/13/15).

Senior IT executives have expressed their willingness to accommodate China’s demands a change in the way they do business, including technology transfers, because they see “huge opportunities (for profit) in the near term”.  The last thing Silicon Valley wants is for Washington to provoke hostile retaliation from China if Obama imposes sanctions:  That would entail the loss of hundreds of billions of dollars!

In the highly militarized-‘Zionized’ Obama administration, immersed in the politics of provocation and war, the multi-nationals do not have the final say.

China’s Maturing Capitalism:  Indigenous Innovations

China’s maturing capitalism has been accompanied by significant changes.  And in 2006, the Chinese leadership announced a new policy promoting ‘indigenous innovation’.  The purpose of the policy was two-fold: to become less dependent on foreign technology and to combat the growing threat of Washington’s espionage via US high tech corporations operating in China.

In line with these strategic goals, in 2009 China ruled that only companies with locally developed technology would be allowed to bid for public procurement contracts.

In 2010, Google’s operations in China were shutdown when it was revealed that the company had acted as a ‘transmission belt’ transferring sensitive Chinese data to the NSA.  Washington immediately denounced China for what it termed “censorship” of Google.

As the endogenous innovation policy gained momentum, the US MNC monopoly of China’s high tech market was undermined.  The MNC’s called for Washington to intervene and force China to “open” its markets to US dominance.

In strategic terms, the tie-in between the US IT MNCs and Washington boomeranged:  While spying for NSA may have gained short-term favors for the high tech sector, it undermined strategic relations with China and its lucrative market.  The IT moguls re-thought the strategy and sought greater autonomy from the NSA to regain China’s trust and re-enter its market.

High Tech Diplomacy

The high tech multinational corporations are eager to welcome China’s President Xi on his visit, viewing it as an opportunity to mend and expand relations.  The Silicon Valley-Seattle corporate elite oppose sanctions against while the White House claim to be acting on their behalf.

The US high tech elite are aware that American IT companies must accommodate China’s demands to transfer and share technology. They have adopted a realistic perspective that if they do not share markets, technology and sales – they can lose out entirely.

Apple, IBM, CISCO, Qualcomm have declared that they would rather cooperate with China’s indigenous innovations policy than face big losses or total exclusion from the Chinese market.

Even Google, which served as the NSA’s willing accomplice and was expelled for espionage against China, is now seeking approval for a limited re-entry.

Wall Street Diplomacy:  Pressure not Provocation

The big Wall Street bankers, on the other hand, want the White House to pressure China to de- regulate its financial markets.  They want China to allow American hedge funds and speculators to sell short and artificially drive down the value of Chinese stocks, increasing volatility and discouraging investors.
It is questionable whether Wall Street’s idea of US “pressure” extends to applying punitive economic sanctions.  After all, limited financial access under present circumstances is still far more lucrative than total exclusion which could result from Chinese retaliation in response to White House sanctions.

Conclusion

The divergent interests and approaches among US imperial elites, between high powered IT corporate CEO’s and Pentagon and White House militarists is evident in two parallel meetings taking place during President Xi’s visit.

During his visit to the US, Xi will stop over in Seattle to confer with top IT executives, coinciding with the US-China Internet Industry Forum. The timing and location (Seattle) of the Forum is not coincidental.  Its timing was planned by the Chinese and reflects their influence and capacity to play-off powerful US economic elites against Washington’s war mongers and Pentagon militarists.

The White House has been pushing for a fight with China ever since Obama announced his so-called ‘pivot to Asia’.  The saber rattling has escalated over the past two years, aided and abetted by an all-out propaganda campaign denigrating China’s scientific and economic performance and exaggerating fears of its defense modernization programs.  When one reads the Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times, one would think the Chinese economy is on the verge of collapse.  They describe the drop in China’s projected annual growth from 7.3% to 7% as ‘catastrophic’!  If the EU and US grew at half that rate, the financial scribes would claim an ‘economic miracle’!

Denigration of the Chinese economy; screeds and characterizations of the Chinese as industrial thieves engaged in spying and criminal behavior and the wild paranoid warnings about the growing ‘Chinese military threat’ are part of a systematic build-up to counter lucrative economic relations between China and IT corporations and other leading US economic sectors.

Washington’s projected sanctions on China will be many times more costly to US MNC than its current sanctions on Russia.  White House sanctions on Moscow mainly damaged European-based industries and businesses. However sanctions against China will have a massive impact on the US economy.

The White House’s version of the “yellow peril” has no redeeming features for any sector of the US economy.  It is the purest expression of militarism run amok.  It over-rides any rational economic interest in pursuit of unadulterated geo-political military supremacy.  Even on its own terms military supremacy is unattainable as Washington will soon discover, as China deepens its military ties with Russia!

If and when Washington raises the specter of sanctions against China, (with the accompanying gratuitous insults and unsubstantiated accusations of state sponsored “cyber theft”) the Chinese government will respond.

President Xi will take reprisals as he has done before, faced with lesser threats.  And he will have the support of the vast majority of Chinese from all regions and classes.

US IT corporations are aware of this potential debacle and have openly and forcefully conveyed their views to Washington.  For them, the so-called ‘cyber theft’ is a minor issue compared to the lucrative long term strategic opportunities in working with China.

So far the militarists in the Obama White House have commanded US-China policy.  Up to now they have disregarded corporate American interests; whether it is US oil interests in Iraq and Libya, or IT corporations in China.

If Zionist officials in the Executive influence the militarists on Middle East policy, the hard core militarists influence the Zionists in the Far East.
If the US military-driven Middle East policy has been a failure, a similar policy toward China will be catastrophic.

US sanctions and humiliation against China and the consequent falling out of relations will play out in slow motion.  Beginning with the precipitous decline of joint ventures and exports, it will lead to lifeless cranes in empty Pacific coast ports and rusting container ships; profit losses and vacant country clubs in Silicon Valley and lost sales for US auto companies.  The list is endless but the consequences are clear.

“A transformation strategy that solely pursued capabilities for projecting force from the United States, for example, and sacrificed forward basing and presence, would be at odds with larger American policy goals and would trouble American allies...Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor.” –Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century – A Report of The Project for the New American Century, September 2000 (emphasis added) [1]

“September 11, 2001 provided a justification for waging a war without borders. Washington’s agenda consists in extending the frontiers of the American Empire to facilitate complete U.S. corporate control, while installing within America the institutions of the Homeland Security State…The September 11, 2001 attacks also played a crucial role in the formulation of U.S. military doctrine, namely in sustaining the legend that Al-Qaeda is an enemy of the Western world when in fact it is a construct of U.S. Intelligence, which is used not only as a pretext to wage war on humanitarian grounds but also as an instrument of non-conventional warfare.’  – Professor Michel Chossudovsky, The Globalization of War: America’s “Long War” against Humanity [2]

LISTEN TO THE SHOW

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On the occasion of the 14th anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks, the Global Research News Hour examines some of the problems with the official story, as well as how 9/11 opened the door to more robust, and dangerous military advances in key regions of the world.

Has the power of the 9/11 lie run its course, or could exposing that lie somehow undermine the long War?

Has infiltration and other sophisticated mechanisms succeeded in derailing 9/11 Truth?

Does the US/NATO War machine even need 9/11 anymore with the arrival of ISIS/ISIL?

These are some of the questions we will be exploring with our guests.

Sibel Edmonds is the editor of the Boiling Frogs Post and Founder-Director of the US-based National Security Whistleblowers Coalition. She is the recipient of the 2006 PEN/Newman’s Own First Amendment Award, and the author of two books including her memoir Classified Woman: The Sibel Edmonds Story: A Memoir and a work of fiction: The Lone Gladio.

Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG). He has authored 11 books including ‘America’s “War on Terrorism” ‘ (2005), ‘Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War‘ (2011), and ‘The Globalization of War, America’s Long War against Humanity’ (2015).

A complete digest of 9/11 related articles is available on the Global Research site.

THE 9/11 READER. The September 11, 2001 Terror Attacks

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The Global Research News Hour airs every Friday at 1pm CT on CKUW 95.9FM in Winnipeg. The programme is also podcast at globalresearch.ca .

The  show can be heard on the Progressive Radio Network at prn.fm. Listen in every Monday at 3pm ET.

Community Radio Stations carrying the Global Research News Hour:

CFUV 101. 9 FM in Victoria. Airing Sundays from 7-8am PT.

CHLY 101.7 FM in Nanaimo, B.C – Thursdays at 1pm PT

Boston College Radio WZBC 90.3FM NEWTONS  during the Truth and Justice Radio Programming slot -Sundays at 7am ET.

Port Perry Radio in Port Perry, Ontario – Thursdays at 1pm ET

Burnaby Radio Station CJSF out of Simon Fraser University. 90.1FM to most of Greater Vancouver, from Langley to Point Grey and from the  North Shore to the US Border. It is also available on 93.9 FM cable in the communities of SFU, Burnaby, New Westminister, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Surrey and Delta, in British Columbia Canada. – Tune in every Saturday at 6am.

Notes:

1) Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century – A Report of The Project for the New American Century, September 2000 ;  http://cryptome.org/rad.htm; Originally published at  http://www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf

2) Michel Chossudovsky (2015) p.32; The Globalization of War: America’s “Long War” against Humanity; Global Research. 2014 

Podcast interview: (32 mins)

Prior to yesterday’s Fed anti-deflation policy stance Lars Schall talked with Swiss financial analyst Michael Bernegger in an exclusive interview for Matterhorn Asset Management, about his paper “The Greek Tragedy and its solution“ that offers a counter-consensus analysis of Greece’s economic crisis.

Another topic in their discussion is the growing economic challenges for China.

Michael Bernegger’s papers and columns are very regularly published in the German business press. He previously worked for the Swiss National Bank and Credit Suisse

To introduce this string of BBC lies, one thing that’s worth noting is that overwhelmingly the people of Syria view that nation’s current President, Bashar al-Assad, favorably. He won his election on 27 May 2007 by acclamation in a referendum when the Associated Press at the time reported that, “the country’s tiny opposition boycotted the voting.” (Note that it indeed was “a tiny opposition.”)

The AP reported: “Still, the president is assured of another seven-year term in a referendum that gave voters just one choice: a green circle to approve Assad or a gray one to oppose his second term. In his first referendum, he received 97.29 percent approval.” The West supports not only that “tiny opposition,” but the much bigger opposition that comes from the Saudi and Qatari royal families, and which has recruited Sunni jihadists from around the world to fight in Syria against the secular Shiite Assad. Furthermore, repeated polling even by Western polling firms, shows that the Syrian people overwhelmingly reject Islamic jihadists and blame the U.S. for ISIS. They hate America because America backs the jihadists. (And see here U.S. Senator John McCain congratulating the ISIS “heart-eater” who was helping to lead in the fight to remove Assad. And here is the back-story regarding that “heart-eater.” And here is confirmation from McCain that he “accidentally” met with him.) Furthermore, the U.S. has not been inactive in the Syrian war; long before America’s active bombing campaign inside Syria, the U.S. was feeding sarin gas into al-Qaeda’s affiliate there al-Nusra, and fabricated blame for the sarin gas attack which even British intelligence could not endorse but instead found to be a ludicrous fraud, but kept secret (in order not to embarrass their ally).

With that, then, as the firmly documented historical background:

BBC Newshour, on the morning of Friday September 18th, interviewed Oxford Professor Eugene Rogan and also the Century Foundation’s Thanassis Cambanis, on the question, “Is it time for the west to bury the hatchet with President Assad and ally with him against IS?”

Cambanis said,

“To expect Bashar al-Assad to be a reliable partner … ignores the last decade during which he single-handedly has driven Syria to the brink of destruction, and, by the way, has been the key culprit in the rise of al-Qaeda in Iraq first, and later in the rise of ISIS.”

Rogan did not challenge that assertion.

Cambanis then referred to

“Bashar al-Assad’s strategy, which was to set up a false choice, apres moi, le deluge, if you don’t support me, you’re going to get ISIS, and we got to that point because he really systematically focused all his firepower on killing moderate, reasonable people and leaving those as the two choices.”

Rogan did not challenge that assertion, either.

Cambanis then said,

“The U.S. position has been to just stay out of this complex mess, and there is some merit and some moral reason for this. Now we see not intervening has also led to a disaster. So logically what follows is either the U.S. remains remains on the sidelines and just lets it play out as it may, or, …,”

and Rogan did not challenge those allegations either.

Rogan then said,

“What Russia has done by prepositioning the facilities for Russian troop presence is to escalate its position in Syria, and by providing the Syrians with air defense systems, they are actually creating the kind of protections that will make any talk of a no-fly zone a nonstarter, so I think the Russians are trying to clearly set what the limits of the terms of discussion will be, and it’s very clear that preserving Bashar al-Assad in power is the Russian condition.”

The interviewer then said,

“But if the West were to come onside with President Assad, I mean that would represent the most appalling concession, would it not, given the number of Syrians who died as a result of actions by President Assad and his military?”

Rogan answered: “I agree with that.” But he advised negotiations instead of “the West” sending in more military assets for “continuing a struggle that no side is capable of winning.”

Cambanis interjected,

“What we’re seeing right now is the result of America and the West not intervening. It’s not really American weapons, or American anything that has fueled this conflict. It’s important to remember also that Assad has been a huge strategic threat to the West long before ISIS even existed.”

To that, Rogan replied, “I could not agree with you more, that the injustice that Assad has inflicted on his people has been an injustice of the first magnitude.”

So: the BBC simply assumes that Assad is hated instead of passionately supported by the Syrian people, and that the U.S. and “the West” have been “not intervening” but have been well-intentioned there. And the BBC’s producers invited on Western ‘experts’ to ‘debate’ the matter, but all within this lying framework.

Clearly, then, the BBC’s answer to its headline question, “Is it time for the west to bury the hatchet with President Assad and ally with him against IS?” is: No!

Here, again, is my article about the recent WIN/Gallup polling results of the Syrian people regarding their attitudes towards ISIS, the U.S., and Assad.

What remains of honest news-media in the West? They’re few, and small.

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

The British Parliament has come under increasing fire over its decision to skip a debate on a petition calling for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“It’s quite disappointing that the Parliament has refused to play by its own rules. The fact is that it’s a particular issue which receives over 100,000 signatures that ultimately allows to be debated on the floor of the House. The fact that it has been declined, gives rise to many questions,” said Anas al-Tikriti, chief executive of the Cordoba Foundation.

“It seems to me that the Parliament has failed in its duty. It seems to me that this is the continuation of the pro-Israel lobby in its attempt to sweep under the carpet the crimes committed by Israel,” he told Press TV’s UK Desk on Friday.

‘Important petition’

Al-Tikriti described the petition as an important bid, which shows the British people want an end to their government’s support for the Israeli regime.

“I think that 112,000 signatures means that there is a quite tremendous disgust in British government’s continuous relationship with Israel… It demonstrates that there is a huge gap between what the British public feels and wants and how the British government and its politicians behave,…”

he underscored.

Earlier this week, the British parliament announced that it will not debate the petition calling for the arrest of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over war crimes.

The petition has already received over 112,000 signatures, well above 100,000 signatures necessary to qualify the motion for a debate in parliament.

It was uploaded on the UK Parliament’s official website on August 7.

Those signing the petition wanted Netanyahu to be brought to justice for the crimes committed against Palestinian people during Israel’s deadly war on the Gaza Strip last year.

However, the House of Commons’ Petitions Committee announced Wednesday that it is not possible, neither under the international law, nor the UK law, to take action against the Israeli prime minister over Tel Aviv’s war crimes against the people of Gaza.

‘Staunch support for Israel’

The British government, which is seen as one of the staunch supporters of the Israeli regime, had already rejected the bid.

“Under UK and international law, visiting heads of foreign governments, such as Prime Minister Netanyahu, have immunity from legal process, and cannot be arrested or detained,” the government said on the petition website.

Earlier this month, British Prime Minister David Cameron announced that his country “remains staunch” in its “defense of Israel”.

Cameron made the pledge while meeting with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at 10 Downing Street in London on September 10.

Anti-Israel sentiments

Netanyahu’s two-day visit to London provoked anger among many Britons with a number of them gathering outside Downing Street on to demand his arrest for war crimes in the Gaza Strip.

Last year, Tel Aviv launched a 50-day war on the besieged coastal territory, killing nearly 22-hundred people, most of them civilians. Thousands more were injured and some 100-thousand houses were damaged during the indiscriminate attacks.

The war drew global condemnation and prompted many people across the world to join campaigns against the Israeli regime, including BDS Movement (boycotts, divestment and sanctions against Israel).

Europe faces a significant threat which is increasing. If IS takes Syria and creates, in their view, the Caliph, it will go up to a 10 out of 10 on the danger scale.  I think we will continue to see these types of lone wolf attacks against European targets, which could be mass casualty. Pravda.Ru interviews international biowarfare expert Jill Bellamy*.

1. Do you think we are being told the whole truth about the fight against Islamic State?

I don’t think it’s about the ‘truth’ or not  being told the ‘truth’ I think it has to do with acknowledging the reality of the situation on the ground and some parties are reluctant to do so because this would mean defining an end-game strategy and there isn’t one, as the situation exists today. If you recall, there was great hope placed in the so called ‘Arab Spring.’ This has become a disaster and humanitarian tragedy of epic proportions, not only for the Middle East but the West. We are watching the creation of a terrorist state. This is unlike say Somalia which dissolved into a terrorist state. Syria was a stable secular state (an important factor in the Middle East today) and President Assad is a rational state actor. IS has an end-game strategy and that is being successfully implemented. While al Zawahiri, the leader of Al Qaeda may disagree with me on this one, IS for all intents and purposes is a state. It’s a state that’s in the process of swiftly consolidating its power, it has extensive resources, a core leadership, incredibly savvy recruitment program and the time to really make an impact to reverse IS has passed us by about four years ago; when Russia offered to negotiate a peace settlement which would most likely have averted IS taking over strategic points in Syria and Iraq. The focus on removing Bashar al Assad, so over shadowed the real threat to stability and peace (IS) that it obscured strategic planning.

I have spent years assessing Syria’s unconventional weapon capabilities, long before Syria was on the radar or at war. I was one of President Assad’s ardent critics when it came to his WMD programs. I worked on areas related to UN Treaty Verification under the BTWC.  I think the fear now is a political one for those who insisted President Assad be forced out of office. The meteoric rise of IS due in part to oil revenue, their exceptional command structure and operational capabilities caught the West, I would say completely by surprise. They were used to dealing with Al Qaeda who moved at a more predictable pace and whose leadership was well known and could be targeted. As long as the West continues to underestimate IS they will be unable to contribute to any kind of regional stability and will be fighting IS on the streets of Brussels if they don’t change track soon.

AP Photo

At this moment we need to acknowledge beyond perceived political correctness which often dictates a policy of antagonism, that Russia is the only stabilizing force on the ground in Syria today. Western States who are running sorties to try to impact IS are simply wasting time and resources that could better be used to coordinate with Russia, who have more knowledge and more experience in the country. If we lose Assad we hand IS a mandate to rule over millions of people. There is too much at risk to simply try to ‘look good.’ Regardless of tensions between the West and Russia, I’m reminded of the Palmerston quote “We have no eternal friends, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and these interests it is our duty to follow.”

If we are going to win against IS, we need Russia and we need them more than they need us. Such admissions may be hard to come by, but as a realist, I believe we need to work with Russia to develop a strategy to keep Syria together, for the peace of that nation, for stability within the Middle East and for international security. It’s too late to avert a humanitarian crisis, which has been on-going for the past three years.  Western Europe is only now interested as it’s beginning to affect them but this has been ongoing for a long time and it will only get worse if we fail to coordinate efforts. We need President Assad to maintain command and control over his military, his weapon classes and territory. While it will be very unpopular to suggest this we need to work closely with Russia in order to ensure Damascus doesn’t fall to IS like Raqqa and Mosul.

2. What is the real situation in your opinion?

The situation on the ground today is one where terrorist groups are carving up Syria and if we don’t join forces to stop this it will not end at Syria’s door but our own. For both Russia and the West it may mean having to eat humble pie, but if we don’t coordinate now we will see IS setting up camp in Turkey and then in parts of Western Europe. In 2014 when IS took over Dabiq, I believe we conceded Syria to IS. Obviously I’m hoping that Russia can support the Assad government to take it back, but Dabiq has incredible religious and historical relevance, it is the location noted in the hadith that Muslims will fight Christians which will bring the apocalypse. It’s extremely important and we simply ignored Dabiq falling to IS. Our leadership’s lack of intervention at that point gave IS the green light.  Bombing IS and trying to do so in ways which still allow it to function and to walk a fine line, so it is somewhat hindered but not really impacted in order to not help or be perceived as helping Pres. Assad is like bleeding out a bull. It will take forever and the results will be human misery and a humanitarian crisis which we are just at the beginning of witnessing here in Europe. If European states don’t want to take in the tens of thousands of refugees now, it’s not going to get better a year from now when IS is running Syria or taking parts of Turkey. Should President Assad lose command and control over his military programs in Damascus, IS will use biological weapons against Syrian civilians like they have used chemical agents. Biological warfare agents don’t discriminate against national boundaries. When IS does this it will again catch the West off guard as they cling to this antiquated idea that terrorists won’t use BW.

For Russia, they have fought terrorist factions for years and years in the Caucuses and have experience with routing out terrorist organizations, a capability largely lacking in the West, who’ve not experienced terrorists taking over their actual territory and holding it.  They also have vast experience in the region and could well be an accepted mediator, but not as long as IS is in Syria. We need to now go into damage control mode and coordinate with Russia on removing IS from Syria.

3. Why does the West not provide more help to President Assad who is fighting ISIS?

I think there remains an ingrained sense of fear due to the first and second Gulf wars. Beyond this, I think Assad was positioned to be ‘the enemy’ and it’s hard to pull back once you’ve named the enemy, built political positions and careers on this and supported in some instances other terror organizations to try to remove him. I think the international community was caught off guard at the meteoric rise of IS. If we could turn back time to the very beginning of the Arab Spring, I expect very different decisions would have been made. We are now too far down the line and too politically entrenched to pull back from the position that Assad is the enemy. This is a position which focuses purely on the short term without any long term planning for Syria. The West may have been planning for Syria “after Assad” with a few terrorist groups to deal with but nothing like IS was on the agenda then. IS creating a State within Syria and Iraq was not considered a viable outcome. Unless we coordinate our efforts, Syria will fall to IS. Other regional powers, even declared enemies of the Syrian State do not want Syria to fall to IS.

4. How credible are the claims that ISIS now has chemical weapons?

What appears to be concerning is not just that they have chemical weapons but that they have some capability to manufacture crude CW. It’s highly unlikely they acquired CW from either the Iraq or Syria. CW left in Iraq would no longer be viable as depending on the compound, you must generally replace it on 18 month cycles. The supposed CW stocks they captured in Iraq would no longer be viable. Syrian CW was destroyed and any remaining stocks that were perhaps overlooked would hopefully still be under the command and control of President Assad. This question begs exactly the problem with not supporting President Assad. I’ve worked on the other side with Treaty Verification and the BTWC and what is most concerning is to see a state lose control of this weapon class. It’s not the ‘lesser of two evils’ here for the West. Should Pres. Assad lose control of his defensive biological weapon programs, it will make IS use of CW look like a children’s lab experiment. This keeps me awake at night. Should IS gain control of the SSRC in Damascus we will see the use of biological warfare agents and it would be likely IS will be able to protect themselves. In the event that the obsolete notion that ISIS wouldn’t use BW because they would expose themselves accidently or deliberately is floated, as some kind of inhibitor, it’s not. Blow back is no longer an inhibitor as forces using BW can fully protect themselves and can deploy it in such a way that it will not severely impact their own populations. While ISIS is Sunni, they share an apocalyptic belief similar to the Twelver’s belief that an apocalypse will usher back the Mahdi to the Well at Qum (for Shiite). ISIS believes bringing on the apocalypse will bring the arrival of the Mahdi (not yet born) perhaps to Dabiq.

Biological warfare agents, pathogens and toxins do not respect international boundaries. While kill ratios with CW can be fairly accurately calculated, BW is an entirely different weapon class. The use of BW on civilians would mean global pandemics, particularly with modern day air travel, but more specifically with the outpouring of refugees into and through Europe. In most instances the 6 or so Category A agents are transmissible, highly infectious and have lengthy incubation periods, which means from the time of infection one can be A symptomatic, enter a short prodromal phase and then spread disease. It’s possible to genetically amplify virulence (its difficult but it is possible) to increase transmission, so that one case infects many more than you would have in a natural outbreak.

You can imagine that a refugee crisis of this proportion would accelerate transmission. We worry about just general disease burden in refugee populations as they are at risk from a number of highly transmissible and infectious diseases, but with a deliberate disease, intentionally meant to infect high numbers, the possibility that an epidemic would go global, increases.

In addition to creating epidemics and pandemics, at the tactical level, a military lay down of anthrax could deny territory and advantage IS specifically over other terrorist organizations operating inside Syria. From a BW perspective we need to maintain Assad in power so he can maintain command and control over this research. We may currently be cooperating with Russia in some areas, but we need to expand that cooperation in order to counter the threat IS poses to humanity and this is a much greater, immediate and more serious threat than Assad represents to the West.

5. How near is ISIS to developing biological weapons?

I’m very worried about their acquiring a BW capability. We have seen them develop CW almost in a vacuum. If this is anything to go by then BW will not be that far behind. In terms of their CW, if we assume they had no precursors and have not diverted CW stocks, then they are working on this like Al Qaeda did back in the 90’s. It appears they are farther along than was expected with regard to their crude CW manufacturing efforts. I’m sure they are working to refine this and I believe we will see them using other chemical agents against civilians. Military forces can protect themselves generally from CW, so it is the civilians I worry about most. We have seen IS  move at light speed when it comes to acquiring and further developing weapons-most of the defence community would have been previously skeptical that IS could develop, manufacture and deploy chemical weapons as a non-state actor. Which says two things: one, they are a state actor, and two, they are interested in and will use WMD.

Biological weapons are easier to acquire, produce and deploy than chemical warfare agents. I would be worried that should they acquire something like bacillus anthracis they could use it for territory denial. They could conduct human experiments and film it as a form of intimidation and terror. It would be difficult to imagine after watching numerous videos of beheadings and the horrific death of the Jordanian pilot whom IS set on fire in a cage, that we should not take every action we can to prevent them from acquiring biological warfare agents. Scenarios that involve European transportation are worrying. IS has condemned the exodus of civilians from Syria and if they acquire biological agents, some of which would not need to be weaponized to be used effectively, they could spread disease among refugees either in the camps on the Syrian border or expose captives and release them into the general population.

6. On a level of one to ten, how serious is the threat of an impending massive terrorist strike against the West by ISIS?

Europe faces a significant threat which is increasing. Right now I would put it at about a 7. If IS takes Syria and creates, in their view, the Caliph, it will go up to a 10.  I think we will continue to see these types of lone wolf attacks against European targets, which could be mass casualty. I do think ISIS at the moment is very focused on consolidating the Caliph and this takes up quite a bit of their operational planning. This is in some contrast too Al Qaeda who was far more focused on international terrorism and less so on creating the Caliph. I think we should discuss IS networks in Europe and understand that as their strength in the Middle East increases, the likelihood we will experience major multi state terrorist attacks increases. While the refugee crisis unfolding in Europe may provide IS with infiltration routes, I believe they already have an established network with a few key operatives here who are in positions to oversee more major attacks after the planning stages develop into more finalized forms. This network has been in place for some time.  Like AQ, I believe they’ve designated a number of targets in Europe and I do think our services struggle to keep up with the sheer volume of potential plots. The chance that IS will succeed in planning and carrying out a major attack is fairly good particularly in European states which do not really think terrorism will affect them or deny that IS is really an issue for Europe.

Those states are more vulnerable. IS pays attention. They know which states are the most vulnerable and where those vulnerabilities lay.  When we suffer lone wolf attacks they watch how the counter operations work. Lack of coordination among some EU states is also an issue which needs urgent review. One of the problems is that smaller European states simply don’t have the resources to deal with IS, so they are dependent upon larger services. This co-dependence has inherent risks which larger states are unlikely to take. We simply do not have the resources to prevent every single attack or threat. The key is stability in the Middle East and reducing their territory and capabilities (be this financial, in terms of their training camps, their weapon classes, recruitment etc.) This will require a coordinated effort.

*Dr. S.J. Bellamy is a recognized international expert on biological warfare. She has previously developed and run NATO sponsored policy programs on biological terrorism and has published extensively in related fields. Her papers have appeared in the National Review, The Washington Post, The Washington Times, Le Monde, Le Temps and the Jerusalem Post. Over the past twenty five years she has worked in non-proliferation and contributed to UN Expert Meetings for the Biological and Toxin Weapon Convention.  She has developed and run nuclear and biological war games and scenarios supported by European Ministries of Defence.  Currently she advises governments on national strategic stockpiling and force protection.

Interview conducted by Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey, Pravda.Ru

Over recent months the situation in the Mediterranean has served as a dramatic reminder of what the leaders of Europe have tried hard to forget. The Syrian crisis has reached Europe.

Although a lot of talk has been made over numbers and percentages of refugees that every country may or may not accept, let’s not forget that behind those numbers and the showy emotionalism of the politicians hides the ugly side of world politics.

The plans to overthrow the “annoying” regimes in the Middle East began at the time when the war hawks of Washington and their European allies prepared the first Iraqi war.

In a 2007 speech, US General Wesley Clark recounted a conversation he had back in 1991 with the then Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz.

During that talk, the Secretary told the General that the Pentagon had already drawn plans in order to achieve the change of regimes in Iraq, Syria and Iran. “…We’ve got about 5 or 10 years to clean up those old Soviet regimes – Syria, Iran, Iraq – before the next great superpower comes on to challenge us.”

General Clark went on to reveal that six weeks after the attack on the twin towers in 2001, an official from the Department of Defense told him that the Pentagon had issued a classified document describing the strategy of the USA in order to overthrow the regimes of seven countries in the next five years.

The beginning would be made with Iraq, followed by Syria and Lebanon, then Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finally, Iran.

Those claims were confirmed by the former French Minister of Foreign affairs, Roland Dumas when he told aFrench television station that Great Britain used to train and suport Syrian rebels at least two years prior to the revolt aiming to overthrow Assad from power.

The money that fuels the war

Between 2006 to 2010, the US spent 12 million dollars in order to support and instigate demonstrations and propaganda against the Syrian government. WikiLeaks released over 7000 secret diplomatic cables that document that funding.

The cables revealed that up to 6,3 million dollars was funneled to the Movement for Justice and Development, a Syrian dissident organization based in London. The Movement operated the Barada satellite channel that broadcasted anti-government propaganda in Syria and that played an important part in the 2010-11 anti-Assad protests.

The remaining 6 million were spent by the US in order to support rebels and activists and educate journalists in ways of manipulating the news about the Syrian crisis in a manner that would benefit the rebels.

In Aprιl 2011, the spokesman for the State Department, Mark Toner, admitted that the WikiLeaks documents were authentic and he claimed that the US supported several “civil movements in Syria” with “the goal of strengthening freedom of expression”.

In 2012, the French Minister of Foreign affairs, Laurent Fabius, alongside the UK, pushed for a relaxation of the EU arms embargo to Syria to enable “defensive arms to reach opposition fighters”.

France was the first European power to recognize the Syrian National Coalition for Opposition and Revolutionary Forces, a coalition of several rebel groups formed in Doha that according to the French president François Hollande, was the “only representative of the Syrian people”.

The coalition was also recognized by neighboring Turkey and the Arab League as “the legitimate representative of the Syrian people’s aspirations.”

In December 2012, at a meeting held in Marrakesh, the United States backed the National Coalition as the transitional government of Syria.

By that time more than 100 countries, including the European Union, had recognized the Syrian opposition, despite fears that it might be linked to Al Qaeda-related groups.

According to the French foreign minister Laurent Fabius, “important” financial contributions were announced at the meeting: Saudi Arabia offered $100 million, the US pledged a further $14m in medical aid and Germany offered $29m.

Two years later, in 2014, French president Hollande, cynically told French media that France was arming and training Syrian rebels, for an unspecified period of time, because “they are the only ones to take part in the democratic process”.

In an interview with French daily Le Monde he admitted that France cannot “go it alone” and that there was “a good understanding with Europe and the Americans.”

Indeed there was.

The Libyan connection

Back in September 2012, the US consulate in Benghazi and a CIA base located a mile from the consulate were attacked by local militias. The attacks resulted to the death of four people, including the American ambassador to Libya, Christopher Stevens.

President Obama and Hillary Clinton were heavily criticized over the lack of security at the consulate and the delayed response.

But the official narrative failed to address some key issues: why the CIA base was attacked and what was the exact role of the consulate in an area partially controlled by local militia?

Officially the consulate’s role was to establish a cultural center and a library in Benghazi. But media reports indicate that the consulate had a much more obscure role.

Soon after the war to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi in Libya began, in February 2011, the CIA set up a base for its spying operations in Benghazi. The CIA base was known as the Annex and according to the Wall Street Journal the sole aim of the consulate was to “provide diplomatic cover to the Annex”.

The Sunday Times of London reported that the United States had been secretly purchasing the stockpiled weapons of Gaddafi — including anti-aircraft SA-7 missiles, anti-tank rounds, rocket-propelled grenades and mortar shells.

Via a connection with Middle Eastern countries that were already supporting various opposition groups in Syria some of these weapons were channeled to the rebels.

Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter Seymour Hersh has also revealed that President Obama and the Turkish PM, Erdogan had reached a secret deal in the beginning of 2012.

The deal was that the CIA and the British M16 would undertake to move Gaddafi heavy weapons out of Libya and use them to supply the Free Syrian Army; Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar were to provide the funds for this operation that was covered under the auspices of an Australian entity.

It is very likely that most of those weapons ended up in the hands of the Al-Nusra front – an extremist group that is linked to Al Qaeda in Syria. When the US and its European and Middle Eastern allies were channeling heavy weaponry to the rebels in Syria, up to 9 per cent of the Free Syrian Army’s total fighters belonged to the Al Nusra Front.

In 2012 Washington Post reported that the jihadist group is growing fast “in part because it has been the most aggressive and successful arm of the rebel force”

Indeed, by 2013, virtually all rebel areas controlled in Syria would be led by jihadists.

The Ghouta massacre

In August 2013, yellow smoke rose over the rebel -controlled suburb of Ghouta near Damascus. A few hours later and the lifeless bodies of 1000 people, including 300 children would be lying in the streets. It was one of the worst sarin attacks in the history of the Syrian civil war.

President Obama accused the Syrian regime for allegedly crossing the ‘red line’ he had set in 2012 on the use of chemical weapons and announced US military intervention in Syria.

However, two days before the planned strike, Obama said that he would seek congressional approval of the intervention.

So what has made the US President to change his mind?

Seymour Hersh presents an alternative narrative to the events: The US intelligence feared that Turkey was supplying sarin gas to rebels’ months before the attack took place. This information was never made public.

Hersh writes that “the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency issued a highly classified five-page “talking points” briefing on June 19th which stated the Syrian rebel group al-Nusra maintained a sarin production cell”.

According to the paper “Turkey and Saudi-based chemical facilitators, ‘were attempting to obtain sarin precursors in bulk, tens of kilograms, likely for the anticipated large scale production effort in Syria”.

According to Hersh’s exposé, in 2012 the US intelligence services believed that the rebels would lose the war.

This prompted the Turkish national intelligence agency and Gendarmerie, the nation’s paramilitary law enforcement arm, to work with al-Nusra Front in Syria in order to help them built their chemical development.

Erdogan allegedly hoped that the use of chemical weapons on Syrian civilians would led to a military response from the United States against Asad.

Hersh’ report has sparked controversy and the New Yorker and Washington Post declined to publish it.

It would take years until the political and military games surrounding the Syrian conflict come to light.

Meanwhile, 4 million Syrians are forced to escape the conflict and over 250.000 people have tried to reach Europe in August 2015. Western countries are willing to grant asylum, but are not willing to stop the actions that fuel the war.

It seems that the bodies of the drowned Syrian children shocked a lot of consciences, but changed no policies.

 Fragkiska Megaloudi is an independent journalist covering humanitarian stories and news from my home country of Greece.

Testifying to the Senate Armed Services Committee today, Gen. Lloyd Austin, the head of Centcom, admitted that the pro-US Syrian rebel faction, dubbed the New Syrian Force (NSF) in most official contexts, is virtually gone now, with virtually everybody either killed or having fled.

What was initially envisioned as a force of tens of thousands of anti-ISIS fighters amounted to only 54 to start with, and Gen. Austin told Congress today that they are down to “four or five” fighters still active in the field. Needless to say, it’s not going well.

Austin went on to say that the next two classes of NSF fighters are still being trained, though that training too is falling behind schedule. The indications are that these classes aren’t much bigger, 100-120 fighters all told. The pared-back goal of 5,000 fighters is likely still years off.

The general went on to say that they are “reviewing” the program, though since the Pentagon has repeatedly talked up the NSF as the end-all, be-all plan for victory in Syria, and has harshly resisted efforts to change the process, which they’ve invested tens of millions of dollars into for tens of fighters.

Candidates on the stump show why America’s political system is too corrupted to fix – a money controlled duopoly masquerading as democratic. Democrats and Republicans represent one party with two wings.

They’re interchangeable on issues mattering most, representing wealth and power exclusively at the expense of beneficial social change, lying when claiming otherwise, other times making disgraceful comments, revealing their dark side.

Muslims are America’s geopolitical enemy of choice – vilified for their faith and ethnicity, a convenient pretext for Washington’s phony war on terror.

They’re maligned as belligerent, hostile and inferior – fair game for disparaging, a convenient target, used to justify endless US imperial wars, portrayed to a gullible public as a good v. evil struggle, supported by irresponsible major media propaganda.

Islamic tenets are ignored – teaching love, not hate; peace, not violence; charity, not selfishness; and tolerance, not terrorism.

Its five pillars include profession of faith, prayer five times daily, fasting during Ramadan, charity, and performing the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in a lifetime if able to afford it.

None of this is publicly explained. Fear-mongering substitutes. Muslims are stereotypically portrayed as dangerous gun-toting terrorists – an abhorrent mischaracterization.

Political candidates exploit it – on the one hand, justifying attacking Muslim nations; on the other, denigrating Islam overtly, by implication or failing to denounce hate-mongering.

Donald Trump is a caricature of a presidential candidate, a demagogic billionaire con man, a self-styled celebrity, outspoken to a fault, hostile to Latino immigrants, at least tacitly anti-Muslim from comments in response to an overt Muslim hater.

The exchange went as follows at the start of a September 18 Rochester, New Hampshire town hall rally:

A racist supporter said “(w)e have a problem in this country. It’s called Muslims. We know our current president is one. You know he’s not even an American. Birth certificate, man.”

Trump responded, saying “(w)e need this question. This is the first question.” The supporter continued, saying:

“But, anyway, we have training camps growing where they want to kill us. That’s my question: When can we get rid of them?” Trump’s response drew justifiable outrage, saying:

We’re going to be looking at a lot of different things and, you know, a lot of people are saying that, and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there. We’re going to be looking at that and plenty of other things.

Staff damage control claimed his comment meant

“Christians need support in this country. Their religious liberty is at stake.”

Mr Trump was referring to the need to protect Christians’ religious liberties as his previous statement says and nothing more. To be clear, Mr Trump’s response to the question regarding training camps in this country was ‘we will look into it.’

America is a racist, white supremacist Judeo-Christian society – needing no support to protect their religious liberties.

Democrats disingenuously jumped on the chance to bash Trump. Notorious racist Hillary Clinton supports US imperial wars on Muslim countries. She lied calling Iran an “existential threat to Israel.”

During her 2008 presidential campaign, she boasted of stronger white support than Obama. She vowed to “attack Iran” if it threatened Israel, saying she’d “totally obliterate them.”

She was the driving force for war on Libya, overtly reveling after Gaddafi’s sodomized murder saying: “We came. We saw. He died.”

Her Trump criticism rang hollow, twittering: “Donald Trump not denouncing false statements about POTUS & hateful rhetoric about Muslims is disturbing, & just plain wrong. Cut it out. -H

Democrat National Committee chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz was just as disingenuous, saying:

“GOP frontrunner Donald Trump’s racism knows no bounds. This is certainly horrendous, but unfortunately unsurprising given what we have seen already.”

Trump’s comments came days after 14-year-old Muslim Irving, TX high school freshman student/MIT aspirant Ahmed Mohamed was outrageously suspended, handcuffed, arrested and detained by police for bringing a homemade alarm clock to class. Racist school officials accused him of making a fake bomb.

Surprising national outrage followed. His father said “(t)hat is not America. That is not us. That is not like us.”

War on Islam is official US policy – Obama its lead proponent. His supportive twitter comment to Ahmed and White House invitation was political grandstanding – a thinly veiled stunt to one-up Republicans.

Bernie Sanders revealed his phony populism by shamelessly bashing the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez – murdered by Obama, either poisoned or infected with incurable cancer causing substances.

Four surgeries in 18 months couldn’t save him. At the time, then acting (now current) President Nicholas Maduro said he “was poisoned by dark forces in order to hit at the Venezuelan people and Latin America.”

Chavez remains a world hero, a true democrat and social justice champion. James Petras said he “was loved not only by Venezuelans but throughout Latin America” and elsewhere. He was special. No Western nation ever had a leader like him.

Jimmy Carter praised him, saying

“he’ll be remembered for his bold assertion of autonomy and independence for Latin American governments and for his formidable communication skills and personal connection with supporters in his country and abroad to whom he gave hope and empowerment.”

Fidel Castro called him the “Olympic champion of new socialist ideas.” He’s sorely missed. In March 2006, I wrote him an open letter posted on my blog site, urging him to protect himself against dark forces wanting him eliminated.

I praised his spirit and glorious Bolivarian revolution. I wished America had a leader of his character, stature and commitment to peace and social justice. I vowed to continue writing and speaking out supportively for vital issues important to us both.

Sanders is no Hugo Chavez – or new UK Labour party leader Jeremy Corbyn. He disgracefully denigrated Chavismo, calling the late Venezuelan leader a “dead communist dictator.”

He deserves universal condemnation for the remark, revealing his dark side. He’s no populist champion – never throughout his entire political career, undeserving of support from anyone.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PMCentral time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Corruption is conditioning. In the world’s most notable mafia sporting organisation, it should barely register a shock that FIFA’s Secretary General has been fiddling with tickets.  To be precise, Jérôme Valcke is said to have been involved in email traffic with former Israeli footballer Benny Alon which speak of the sale of 8,750 tickets for 24 top notch matches at the Brazil World Cup.  Such a procedure would have been in breach of FIFA’s own ticketing rules.

Alon, who has buttered his bread as a ticketing and hospitality agent since 1990, was forthcoming to the Daily Mail.  Presumably the prosecution bonanza regarding FIFA executives had triggered his interest.  “I told him that we’d like tickets to three Germany matches, and all the matches Brazilian might play.” From these games, so called “the crème de la crème” assortment, “we could make a good amount of money from selling these tickets”. Both, Alon alleges, would then split the profit.  The tickets would initially go to Alon’s JB Sports Marketing (JBSM).

Having taken a good dump on Valcke, Alon then reiterated that the deal did not eventuate, as Valcke requested that, “as a favour” it might be cancelled as FIFA already had a ticketing arrangement with Match, a different company.  In fact, Valcke shows an awareness that such arrangements would be rather smelly.  Avoid, he cautions to Alon, asking too many people’s advice on it.  “It is very serious,” writes Valcke.  “Just do it, if I may say using a slogan from one company involved.  All is clear and has to be finalised now.”

As the Independent points out, an eight month period seems to have elapsed between the point Valcke shows knowledge about the arrangement of the tickets being sold at such inflated prices, and the withdrawal of the deal.  This by no means is the end of it, and the email exchanges point to failed meetings over money transactions that did not eventuate.

Valcke found himself in the rather dense woods of FIFA corruption when his name was found at the end of an email licensing a $10m payment to the Caribbean Football Union for a so-called “African Diaspora Legacy Programme”.  The money would come from FIFA’s coffers, and was linked to the South Africa World Cup.  So far, he has been spared the grief given many of his colleagues.

FIFA’s own brief statement on the subject of the Alon-Valcke affair was brief.  Valcke had “been put on leave and released from his duties effective immediately until further notice.  FIFA has been made aware of a series of allegations involving the secretary-general and has requested a formal investigation by the FIFA Ethics Committee.”

The FIFA corruption dossier is getting thicker as the assortment of US and Swiss authorities get deeper to the labyrinthine structure of deals and “understandings” that characterise the organisation.  Even those touted as being potential brooms for the task of cleaning up the organisation in a post-Blatter sweep have been arrested.  Jeffrey Webb of the Cayman Islands, a FIFA vice president, was one such character.  In FIFA, even the brooms tend to be very used.

The wheels of prosecution are also turning in the extradition stakes. This week, the Swiss Federal Office of Justice approved the extradition request of another former FIFA vice-president Eugenio Figueredo to the United States to face corruption charges relating to the sale of marketing rights covering the Copa América tournaments in 2015, 2016, 2019 and 2023.[1] He had formerly been president of the South American confederation Conmebol.

On Monday, US Attorney-General Loretta Lynch, who has shown a terrier-like disposition in the effort to bring the organisation to book, promised that the number of arrests would balloon, depending on the trail of evidence. These would add to the number from May 27 when FIFA executives were dramatically marched out their hotel in Zurich in a dawn raid. But the emperor in question, that biggest of fish Sepp Blatter, is not necessarily on that list.

Any prosecution would be incomplete without bringing the leader of the entire organisation into the fold.  Scouring 11 terabytes of information is a tall order – and that’s just the amount of material seized by the Swiss authorities.  Blatter has every reason to fear going to the North Americas.  Lynch has so far resisted dropping his name into the prosecutor’s mix.  “I’m not going to comment on individuals and I am not able to give you information about Mr Blatter’s travel plans.”

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

Notes

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/sep/17/fifa-corruption-suspect-eugenio-figueredo-extradition

A group of Russian scientists discovered an ancient strain of bacteria deep in the Siberian permafrost that could lead to the development of organisms capable of destroying petroleum molecules, turning them into water, and rejuvenating the overall health of living beings, similar to “the elixir of life.”

If properly developed, the discovery could lead to a breakthrough in environmental protection, as with the help of the ancient bacteria scientists will clean up oil spills and dangerous chemical leaks by simply turning them into water, Viktor Cherniavskiy, a renowned Russian doctor and epidemiologist, told Sputnik.

There are three different strains of bacteria that were found in the permafrost. The first one is loosely called “the petroleum destroyer,” for its ability to break apart petroleum molecules, turning them into water. The second strain is capable of eliminating cellulose molecules. This could help scientists get rid of a great deal of urban and industrial garbage. And the third strain has shown to significantly boost the overall health of living beings.

The bacteria dates back to over 18,000 years, and was found in the permafrost along with the remains of a woolly mammoth in Russia’s Republic of Yakutia. When the ancient strains of bacteria were discovered, after a thorough scientific research group of about 10 scientists from several Siberian cities found out that the ancient microorganisms had the potential to change the world, Cherniavsky said.

Russian scientists set up new laboratory to clone woolly mammoths http://t.co/2ABGSEOdd2 pic.twitter.com/8vHDTryJl4

— Sir Arnold Robinson (@uk_expat) September 2, 2015

“Nobody has ever discovered the bacteria that we have discovered, because they were kept frozen under the ground for thousands of years,” Cherniavskiy told Sputnik.

The doctor also warned that before further work could be done, scientists need to find out if the bacteria might carry strains, hidden under the permafrost, which could be dangerous to people. Fortunately, so far, scientists have found no ill-effects.

Another difficulty when developing the strains is the fact that they quickly lose their “magical” abilities when exposed to warm temperatures. Cherniavskiy explained that the ideal temperature range is between 4C and 8C. This is something that scientists need to further work on, developing methods that could sustain the transforming and regenerating abilities of the bacteria strains.

The Elixir of Life

A few days ago, Russian media reported on the ancient microorganisms that could lead to the development of an “elixir of life,” a substance that allegedly could give people endless youth. According to reports, scientists from Novosibirsk, Ekaterinburg and Yakutsk tested a probiotic substance, derived from the ancient bacteria, on old mice in laboratory settings.

The results were astonishing.  The old mice under the experiment showed the signs of rejuvenation — their overall health improved and they recovered breeding abilities, lost due to old age. Now if the same substance were to be given to people, it could cause a significant improvement in their health as well, leading to the discovery of an “elixir of life,” Dr. Cherniavskiy speculated.

Unfortunately, it’s too soon to say when this could happen due to laws that prohibit testing on humans. However, the Russian epidemiologist said that for centuries the local populations in North-Eastern Siberia were known to have very good health until very old age, despite very harsh environmental conditions. It could have been because they consumed local food that contained specks of the ancient bacteria, Cherniavskiy hypothesized.

Why should I care whether Iran has nukes? It most likely doesn’t, but even if it does… it never attacked anyone, never overthrew any government, and never performed experiments on human beings. It had not committed a single genocide, and never dreamed about conquering the world.

So why should I even bother to think much about Iran’s nuclear program, big or small, “peaceful” or defensive?

If Iran is capable of defending itself – then excellent; I am only happy! At least it will not be wiped out from the face of the Earth, as happened to its unfortunate neighbors Iraq and Afghanistan or to a bit more distant but not more fortunate countries like Libya.

Do I want this great, ancient Iranian culture to become defenseless and to eventually disappear, to be destroyed, or to get replaced by aggressive Western consumerism, arrogance and pathological lack of compassion? Or more concretely: Do I want Iran to turn into yet another Western colony? I don’t! I want it to survive and to thrive. As I want great Chinese and great Arab cultures to survive and flourish. As I want all cultures on earth to survive and flourish.

But it seems that, as the Empire is on its final bellicose and ideological crusade, unless a truly independent nation begins to roar, unless it shows both its teeth and its missiles, it has almost no chance to survive.

Iran is roaring and it is also logically explaining where it stands. It has both guts and big heart!

After suffering, after bleeding incessantly, it appears that Iran had finally enough. It is no longer willing to play this neo-colonialist game. It is now going public with its grievances.Iran is told to comply, “or else”. Its tormentors insist on “transparency”, while themselves staying in total murkiness. They are above the law; in fact they are the law. In the world they created, they themselves don’t have to prove absolutely anything, while their victims are routinely challenged, scrutinized, cornered, bullied and humiliated.

*

At the opening of the “2^nd International Congress on 17.000 Iranian Martyrs”, (held in Teheran on August 31 – September 1^st, 2015) I was allowed to speak right after the President of Iran, Mr. Hassan Rouhani.

“You are being targeted because you are taking care of your people”, I said after him, in my discourse, as I was designated a keynote speaker of the Conference. “Iran suffers similar attacks as Latin America. The Western imperialism tries to destroy virtually every revolutionary, socialist country. But the world is changing and you are not alone. As Latin America is not alone.”

17.000 Iranian victims; 17.000 human lives lost. And almost no one in the West seems to know! How convenient. How cowardly. How servile!

The West supports the Saudis, Qataris and other Wahhabi extremists. It had been arming ISIL (Dash). It already destroyed almost every socially oriented, moderate and secular nation in the Muslim world, from Yemen to Syria, from Egypt to Indonesia. Little surprise that independent-minded and proud Iran is now at the very top of the Empire’s hit list.

The entire situation would be grotesque, truly laughable, if those thousands of innocent people would not be dying.When I spoke in Teheran, my voice was shaking. I addressed the Iranian government and the academia: “We are all brothers”, I said, old images of Chavez and Ahmadinejad embracing, appearing in my mind. Then I recalled the US-sponsored coups in Venezuela, and few moments later, those thousands of innocent, slaughtered Iranian civilians.

I spoke about resistance to imperialism, about new powerful media outlets in Latin America, Russia, and China as well as in Iran itself.

I told them about my 1.000-page book “Exposing Lies of the Empire”, depicting virtually all corners of the globe that have already been ravished by the West. I spoke about those fascist, fundamentalist doctrines behind such attacks. I told them what I saw, how devastated I have been, but also how determined to resist! And I concluded:

Why is Iran one of the main targets of the terrorists who are supported by the West? It is obviously because Iran is doing many of the right things, for its own people and for the world!

*

Iran, one of the most criticized and scrutinized nations, is in reality one of the most peaceful and long-suffering countries on earth.

The West has been tormenting the Iranian people sadistically, continuously and relentlessly.

Since the ancient Greek Empire, Iran (Persia) was continuously invaded and partitioned, although never fully colonized.

In 1953 the US and Britain overthrew the democratically elected government of Mohammad Mosaddegh, a socialist leader dedicated to social changes. During his government, the Iranian people were enjoying subsidized housing, good education and medical care. He also launched a comprehensive land reform. In order to improve life of Iranian people, he nationalized Iran’s oil industry. The Brits and the North Americans, of course, considered such behavior as unacceptable. Mosaddegh was ousted, and a tyrant monarch, Shah, put on the throne. Cheap oil began to flow to the West, while thousands of Iranian people were savagely tortured and killed. The Empire later committed the same crimes in Indonesia (1965) and in Chile (1973), to name just two places.

After the Shah was forced to leave, the West armed and encouraged Iraq to invade its neighbor, Iran. In 1980, a terrible war erupted. As a result, around one million people died.

When Iran decided to develop its peaceful nuclear program, brutal sanctions were imposed, destroying lives of millions, including women and children.

Then the extremist terrorist groups were “put to work” by both the West and Israel. Their goal was to spread fear and devastation, and to murder Iran’s
prominent scientists.

Attempts to destabilize Iran are constant but had proven to be futile.

Shaken, injured but determined, Iran is facing vicious attacks calmly and with dignity. The more self-respect it radiates, the more vicious propaganda and loud barking are coming from the West, and the more chilling are the threats.

The position of Washington, Paris and London is obvious (and it has been for centuries): non-Western countries have no right to defend themselves. They only exist in order to supply North America and Europe with cheap raw materials and labor. They cannot decide their fate.

And there is no compromise on the table. Either a country fully submits to the Western dictate, or it is destroyed.

Monument to murdered Iranian nuclear scientists

But Iran refused to accept such “arrangement” of the world. Too mighty to be out rightly attacked, it rose against Western global dictatorship. Of course Russia did, too. And so did China. Most of Latin American countries did as well. And now several African and Asian countries are also determined to join those who are refusing to kneel.

The West trembles: its dogmas are being challenged! And it does what it has been doing for many terrible centuries: it is trying to murder, to deceive and to trick. It is desperately fighting for being able to maintain its iron grip on the World.

*

At the Conference, ideas were exchanged, and concepts erected. Several speakers described how the West has been supporting extreme, ultra-conservative Islamic teaching -Wahabbism – and used it against the socialist Islam, against countries like Turkey, against several Arab states, against the Soviet Union, China and now against Iran. Ahmadinejad called Wahhabism “a cancer that made the entire Middle East sick.” I also argued that it is also making sick entire Indonesia.

One of the speakers, Professor Azizi, declared from the stage of Shahid Beheshti University Conference Center:

Americans intend to establish their own religion, their own version of Islam… They created DAESH (ISIL) in order to support such version, such “new religion”… They do it this way, covertly, because they would not dare to fight Islam openly, fearing a great backlash.

I heard terms like “social terrorism”.

Finian Cunningham, renowned columnist from Northern Ireland, compared the operations of British death squads in his country to other acts of terror that the Empire has been spreading all over the world, including places like Yemen and Iran: “Illegal war of aggression against sovereign nations.”

I was told by several Iranian participants, repeatedly, that one hidden “secret” which the Western media has been keeping away from the public, is that both Ahmadinejad and Chavez were actually building two respective socialist countries, two states with different history and cultures, but with very similar, socialist principles.

Western propaganda is depicting Iran as some brutal religious dogmatic state, not as an enormous 80-million inhabitants country that is re-inventing itself on the values of the socialist Islam.

High above the city, at the viewing platform of the magnificent Milad Tower, I listened to a passionate discourse of my new friend, Soraya Sebahpour-Ulrich, a great Iranian thinker, and a stepdaughter of a former cabinet minister who also happened to be the Shah’s ghostwriter:

“
The world sees Iran not as it is, but as it is projected by Western media. It pains me. I see the kindness and beauty, and then I am told that it is being ugly. And this destructed image is stabbing me in the heart. I just want to say: ‘I am Iran and Iran is me… I want people to see me as I am, and I want them to see real Iran.”

Soraya also believes that Iran is a socialist country, and she wants it to stay this way: “This is Iran that I love and appreciate much more than that Iran, where I had a very privileged life.”

*

I report that I saw great socialist city – Teheran – standing tall, proud and determined.

Teheran with its old bazaars and mosques, palaces and mountains, but above all with thousands of projects designed to provide welfare for its people.

In Teheran, like in Caracas, I witnessed a breathtaking struggle for a better world. Sanctions or not, Teheran is impressive, with its modern public transportation system, huge public parks, wide sidewalks, vast cultural institutions, free medical facilities and schools.

I did not see slums. I did not see people begging. I did not witness frustration or rage. Instead, I felt kindness at each and every corner, and I also felt great confidence of the nation with tremendous culture and 5 thousand years of recorded history.

At one point, I was driven to the studios of Press TV and asked to comment on the diplomatic conflict between the USA and Russia. There was absolute trust. Few minutes later, IRINN TV interviewed me on the West–Iran relationship. Radio stations, including IRIB, were lining up, microphones ready. Some interviews were live. No one was asking those ‘BBC screening question’: “What are you going to say, Mr. Vltchek?”

It was like interacting with other progressive channels – like TeleSUR or RT.

Iran was not scared of me, as I was not scared of Iran.

What I said in Teheran, I have been saying again and again in Caracas, Quito, Beijing and Pretoria: “If we are united, we will never be defeated! Venezuela may appear far away on the world map, but in reality it is standing right here, shoulder to shoulder with you.”

The powerful specter of a united, internationalist, and anti-imperialist block horrifies the West. That is why Iran is now under attack. That is why fascist gangsters are hitting Venezuela. That is why the imperialists are encircling Russia and China. That is why Western propaganda is demonizing all proud and noble countries around the world.

17.000 Iranian victims of terrorism sponsored by the West. More than one million victims since the West overthrew the progressive government in 1953. What a tremendous toll! But true freedom is priceless.

I report that Iran is standing! And it will not succumb to vicious and senseless attacks. It will never kneel, because it knows – surrendering would lead directly to slavery.

*

One is of course tempted to ask: how much is too much? How many people have to die, before the patience of the oppressed of the world runs out?

I interacted with many Iranian people. Their peaceful nuclear program does not scare me. And it does not scare people of Western and Central Asia. Iranian culture is thousands of years old and it is deep and tolerant. It gained the trust of the world; of people who are not blinded by toxic propaganda.

But I have to admit that the Western Empire increasingly disgusts me, as it terrifies billions of people all over the world. It already lost all breaks, all sense of decency. It already ruined and finished billons of lives, by spreading and forcing its fundamentalist dogmas, its greed and incomparable brutality. I don’t want more lives to be destroyed. I don’t want more countries, more nations, to be shattered.

That is why I feel that as long as Iran and countries like Iran are standing, so are we!

Andre Vltchek is a philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. His latest books are: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire” and “Fighting Against Western Imperialism”. Discussion with Noam Chomsky: On Western Terrorism. Point of No Return is his critically acclaimed political novel. Oceania – a book on Western imperialism in the South Pacific. His provocative book about Indonesia: “Indonesia – The Archipelago of Fear”. Andre is making films for teleSUR and Press TV. After living for many years in Latin America and Oceania, Vltchek presently resides and works in East Asia and the Middle East. He can be reached through his website or his Twitter.

This article originally appeared at DWN, translated by Frank Jakob exclusively for SouthFront 

In a surprise move Germany left the anti-Putin-alliance formed by the USA: Germany is now officially welcoming Moscow’s readiness to act in Syria and is starting an initiative together with the Russians and the French to bring an end to the war. This is to stop the constant stream of refugees. Germany has ordered thousands of soldiers into readiness. 

Germany surprisingly left the alliance formed together with the United States which intended to block Russia’s entry into the Syrian conflict.

Minister of Defence Ursula von der Leyen told Der Spiegel that she welcomed president Putin’s intentions of joining the fight against the extremist organization “Islamic State”. It would be a matter of mutual interests, she said.

© Deutsche Presse‑Agentur
Frank-Walter Steinmeier and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov have been working hard in the background on a plan for Syria . The picture shows the two foreign ministers during the visit of Stalingrad memorial in Volgograd in May this year .

A speaker of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs added, Germany would welcome additional efforts of Russia in the fight against IS. Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier even announced the starting of a joint venture between him, Russian foreign minister Lavrov and their French colleague Laurent Fabius with the aim of bringing the Syrian civil war to an end. Lavrov and Fabius are expected to arrive in Berlin this Saturday.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called upon the US-Ministry of Defence to coordinate their efforts with the Russian military.Because both sides are actively invested in Syria it would be paramount for the US to reinstate the previously ceased operational cooperation with Russia, said Lavrov on Friday in Moscow. This was intended to avoid “unintentional incidents”. Russia’s military drills in the Mediterranean would be in accordance to international law. Larvrov explained furthermore, that Russia would keep delivering weapons to the troops of Syrian president Bashar al-Assad to support their struggle against the extremist organization of Islamic State (IS).

Russia already began a diplomatic offensive weeks ago. The Americans did not precisely indicate whether they would support the Russian initiative. Under no circumstances would the US give Russia credit for solving the deadlocked situation, should Russia in fact be successful. Therefore the US-government warned precautionary of a worsening in the refugee crisis should Russia intervene.

Especially the neocons are issuing warnings of any cooperation with Russia in whatever matter. US-President Obama did not clearly state whether the Russian initiative was done in coordination with the White House. Foreign Minister John Kerry went on a surprise visit to Russia in spring which, however, remained without results regarding the Syrian matter. It is likely that the US-government changed their mind in the face of the worsening of the refugee crisis so that they are now willing to cooperate with Russia in the middle east.

German Frank-Walther Steinmeier has long been trying to conciliate behind the curtains and is therefore constantly in touch with his Russian colleague Lavrov. It looks like he is the only one in the German government who realizes that the refugee crisis will get completely out of control if the war in the Middle East continues. Austria and Spain signaled days ago that a Russian participation in the battle against IS was crucial. Russia began expanding its military activities in Syria.

German Minister of Defence Ursula von der Leyen wants to expand the deployment of the Bundeswehr in Iraq. Bundeswehr would be ready to continue its successful work in Kurdish regions in cooperation with the Iraqi government, she told Der Spiegel on Saturday. First steps would already be undertaken. Germany delivered medical supplies, helmets and hazard-protections masks. Up to 100 Bundeswehr soldiers are training Kurdish Peshmerga fighters in northern Iraq. Weapons were also delivered.

Von-der Leyen also ordered thousands of German soldiers into readiness in the wake of the refugee crisis. If this was done because of the refugees or hints of terror threats is still unknown. The order was given to the troops a day before, said a speaker of the ministry on Friday in response to a report by Der Spiegel. Up to 4000 soldiers are under constant readiness to be deployed. Hundreds of soldiers were deployed to help accommodate newly-arrived refugees last weekend. The solders are financially compensated for their services under this deployment order.

Translators comment:

It has been reported that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov called into question the effectiveness of the US-led coalition against Islamic State (IS). According to PNP magazine he stated, that concerned colleagues from within the US-led coalition turned to him. They informed him that the US-military did not give clearances to their fighter pilots even though they clearly located and identified Islamic State positions.

There is an obvious course that President Barack Obama could follow if he wants to lessen the crises stemming from the Syrian war and other U.S. “regime change” strategies of the past several decades, but it would require him to admit that recent interventions (including his own) have represented a strategic disaster.

Obama also would have to alter some longstanding alliances – including those with Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Israel – and correct some of the false narratives that have been established during his administration, such as storylines accusing the Syrian government of using sarin gas on Aug. 21, 2013, and blaming the Russians for everything that’s gone wrong in Ukraine.

In retracting false allegations and releasing current U.S. intelligence assessments on those issues, the President would have to repudiate the trendy concept of “strategic communications,” an approach that mixes psychological operations, propaganda and P.R. into a “soft power” concoction to use against countries identified as U.S. foes.

“Stratcom” also serves to manage the perceptions of the American people, an assault on the fundamental democratic precept of an informed electorate. Instead of honestly informing the citizenry, the government systematically manipulates us. Obama would have to learn to trust the people with the truth.

Whether Obama recognizes how imperative it is that he make these course corrections, whether he has the political courage to take on entrenched foreign-policy lobbies (especially after the bruising battle over the Iran nuclear agreement), and whether he can overcome his own elitism toward the public are the big questions – and there are plenty of reasons to doubt that Obama will do what’s necessary. But his failure to act decisively could have devastating consequences for the United States and the world.

In a way, this late-in-his-presidency course correction should be obvious (or at least it would be if there weren’t so many layers of “strategic communications” to peel away). It would include embracing Russia’s willingness to help stabilize the political-military situation in Syria, rather than the Obama administration fuming about it and trying to obstruct it.

For instance, Obama could join with Russia in stabilizing Syria by making it clear to putative U.S. “allies” in the Mideast that they will face American wrath if they don’t do all that’s possible to cut off the terrorists of the Islamic State and Al Qaeda from money, weapons and recruits. That would mean facing down Turkey over its covert support for the Sunni extremists as well as confronting Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Persian Gulf sheikdoms over secret funding and arming of these jihadists.

If Obama made it clear that the United States would take stern action – such as inflicting severe financial punishments – against any country caught helping these terrorist groups, he could begin shutting down the jihadists’ support pipelines. He could also coordinate with the Russians and Iranians in cracking down on the Islamic State and Al Qaeda strongholds inside Syria.

On the political front, Obama could inform Syria’s Sunni “moderates” who have been living off American largesse that they must sit down with President Bashar al-Assad’s representatives and work out a power-sharing arrangement and make plans for democratic elections after a reasonable level of stability has been restored. Obama would have to ditch his mantra: “Assad must go!”

Given the severity of the crisis – as the refugee chaos now spreads into Europe – Obama doesn’t have the luxury anymore of pandering to the neocons and liberal interventionists. Instead of talking tough, he needs to act realistically.

Putin’s Clarity

In a sense, Russian President Vladimir Putin has clarified the situation for President Obama. With Russia stepping up its military support for Assad’s regime with the goal of defeating the Islamic State’s head-choppers and Al Qaeda’s terrorism plotters, Obama’s options have narrowed. He can either cooperate with the Russians in a joint campaign against the terrorists or he can risk World War III by taking direct action against Russian forces in pursuit of “regime change” in Damascus.

Though some of Official Washington’s neocons and liberal war hawks are eager for the latter – insisting that Putin must be taught a lesson about Russia’s subservience to American power – Obama’s sense of caution would be inclined toward the former.

The underlying problem, however, is that Official Washington’s foreign policy “elite” has lost any sense of reality. Almost across the board, these “important people” lined up behind President George W. Bush’s invasion and occupation of Iraq, arguably the worst blunder in the history of U.S. foreign policy.

But virtually no one was held accountable. Indeed, the neocons and their liberal interventionist sidekicks strengthened their grip on the major think tanks, the op-ed pages and the political parties. Instead of dialing back on the “regime change” model, they dialed up more “regime change” schemes.

Although historically the U.S. government – like many other imperial powers – has engaged in coups and other meddling to oust troublesome foreign leaders, the current chapter on “regime change” strategies can be dated back to the late 1970s and early 1980s with what most American pundits rate a success: the destruction of a secular regime in Afghanistan that was allied with the Soviet Union.

Starting modestly with President Jimmy Carter’s administration and expanding rapidly under President Ronald Reagan, the CIA mounted its most ambitious “covert” operation ever – funding, recruiting and arming Islamic extremists to wage a brutal, even barbaric, war in Afghanistan.

Ultimately, the operation “succeeded” by forcing a humiliating withdrawal of Soviet troops and driving the Moscow-backed leader Najibullah from power, but the cost turned out to be extraordinary, creating conditions that gave rise to both the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

In 1996, the Taliban took Kabul, captured Najibullah (whose tortured and castrated body was hung from a light pole), and imposed a fundamentalist form of Islam that denied basic rights to women. The Taliban also gave refuge to Saudi extremist Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda band enabling them to plot terror attacks against the West, including the 9/11 assaults on New York and Washington.

In response, President George W. Bush ordered an invasion and occupation of Afghanistan in late 2001 followed by another invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003 (though Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11). Those “regime changes” began a cascade of chaos that reached into the Obama administration and to the present.

As Iraq came under the control of its Shiite majority allied with Shiite-ruled Iran, disenfranchised Sunnis organized into increasingly vicious rebel movements, such as “Al Qaeda in Iraq.” To avert a U.S. military defeat, Bush undertook a scheme of buying off Sunni leaders with vast sums of cash to get them to stop killing U.S. soldiers – called the “Sunni Awakening” – while Bush negotiated a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops.

The payoffs succeeded in buying Bush a “decent interval” for a U.S. pullout that would not look like an outright American defeat, but the huge payments also created a war chest for some of these Sunni leaders to reorganize militarily after the Shiite-led regime of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki refused to make significant economic and political concessions.

Obama’s Misjudgment

Obama had opposed the Iraq War, but he made the fateful choice after winning the 2008 election to retain many of Bush’s national security advisers, such as Defense Secretary Robert Gates and General David Petraeus, and to hire hawkish Democrats, such as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and National Security Council aide Samantha Power.

Obama’s pro-war advisers guided him into a pointless “surge” in Afghanistan in 2009 and a “regime change” war in Libya in 2011 as well as a propaganda campaign to justify another “regime change” in Syria, where U.S. Sunni-led regional “allies” – Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Persian Gulf sheikdoms – took the lead in a war to oust President Assad, an Alawite, an offshoot of Shiite Islam. Syria was allied with Iran and Russia.

At the same time, the Sunni rebel group, “Al Qaeda in Iraq,” expanded its operations into Syria and rebranded itself the Islamic State before splitting off from Al Qaeda’s central command. Al Qaeda turned to a mix of foreign and Syrian jihadists called Nusra Front, which along with the Islamic State became the most powerful terrorist organization fighting to oust Assad.

When Assad’s military struck back against the rebels, the West – especially its mainstream media and “humanitarian war” advocates – took the side of the rebels who were deemed “moderates” although Islamic extremists dominated almost from the start.

Though Obama joined in the chorus “Assad must go,” the President recognized that the notion of recruiting, training and arming a “moderate” rebel force was what he called a “fantasy,” but he played along with the demands from the hawks, including Secretary of State Clinton, to “do something.”

That clamor rose to a fever pitch in late August 2013 after a mysterious sarin gas attack killed hundreds of Syrian civilians in a Damascus suburb. The State Department, then led by Secretary of State John Kerry, rushed to a judgment blaming the atrocity on Assad’s forces and threatening U.S. military retaliation for crossing Obama’s “red line” against using chemical weapons.

But the U.S. intelligence community had doubts about the actual perpetrators with significant evidence pointing to a “false flag” provocation carried out by Islamic extremists. At the last minute, President Obama called off the planned airstrikes and worked out a deal with President Putin to get Assad to surrender Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal even as Assad continued to deny a role in the sarin attack.

Still, the U.S. conventional wisdom held fast that Assad had crossed Obama’s “red line” and – amid more bellicose talk in Washington – Obama authorized more schemes for training “moderate” rebels. These sporadic efforts by the CIA to create a “moderate” rebel force failed miserably, with some of the early trainees sharing their weapons and skills with Nusra and the Islamic State, which in 2014 carried its fight back into Iraq, seizing major cities, such as Mosul and Ramadi, and threatening Baghdad.

As the Islamic State racked up stunning victories in Iraq and Syria – along with releasing shocking videos showing the decapitation of civilian hostages – the neocons and liberal war hawks put on another push for a U.S. military intervention to achieve “regime change” in Syria. But Obama agreed to only attack Islamic State terrorists and to spend $500 million to train another force of “moderate” Syrian rebels.

Like previous efforts, the new training mission proved an embarrassing failure, producing only about 50 fighters who then were quickly killed or captured by Al Qaeda’s Nusra and other jihadist groups, leaving only “four or five” trainees from the program, according to Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, head of the U.S. Central Command which has responsibility for the Middle East.

The Current Crisis

The failure of the training program – combined with the destabilizing flow of Mideast refugees into Europe from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and other countries affected by the regional chaos due to “regime changes” – has brought new calls across Official Washington for, you guessed it, a U.S.-imposed “regime change” in Syria. The argument goes that “Assad must go” before a solution can be found.

But the greater likelihood is that if the U.S. and its NATO allies join in destroying Assad’s military, the result would be Sunni jihadist forces filling the vacuum with the black flag of terrorism fluttering over the ancient city of Damascus.

That could mean the Islamic State chopping off the heads of Christians, Alawites, Shiites and other “heretics” while Al Qaeda has a new headquarters for plotting terror strikes on the West. Millions of Syrians, now protected by Assad’s government, would join the exodus to Europe.

Then, the option for Obama or his successor would be to mount a major invasion and occupation of Syria, a costly and bloody enterprise that would mean the final transformation of the American Republic into an imperial state of permanent war.

Instead, Obama now has the option to cooperate with Putin to stabilize the Syrian regime and pressure erstwhile U.S. “allies” to cut off Al Qaeda and the Islamic State from money, guns and recruits. Though that might seem like clearly the best of the bad remaining options, it faces extraordinary obstacles from Official Washington.

Already there are howls of protests from the neocons and liberal interventionists who won’t give up their agenda of more “regime change” and their belief that American military power can dictate the outcome of every foreign conflict.

So, whether Obama can muster the courage to face down these bellicose voices and start leveling with the American people about the nuanced realities of the world is the big question ahead.

Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com). You also can order Robert Parry’s trilogy on the Bush Family and its connections to various right-wing operatives for only $34. The trilogy includes America’s Stolen Narrative. For details on this offer, click here.

British monied interests hate Corbyn. Bank of England Governor Mark Carney disingenuously denigrated his policies, saying they’ll “hurt” poor and elderly Brits and harm the economy.

Carney represents entrenched interests, enriching the few at the expense of most others, an agenda systematically thirdworldizing Britain like similar harmful US policies. Corbyn supports lifting all boats equitably – few like him in Western societies, virtually none in Washington, for sure none able to make a difference.

Question Time (Prime Minister’s Questions – PMQs) is a longstanding British tradition – held each Wednesday atnoon when the House of Commons is in session, giving MPs a chance to get answers to questions they pose.

Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn participated in his first PMQ session as party leader. Media response was surprisingly positive.

The Telegraph called his performance “brilliant.” He’s here to stay. The BBC said Labour MPs cheered him.

The Mirror recapped Wednesday’s session, saying he “promised a People’s Question Time – and delivered.”

London’s Independent headlined “Corbyn triumphed at PMQs – while Cameron’s responses showed him up as out-of-touch.”

Ahead of the session, Corbyn twittered “(m)y first #pmqs as @uklabour leader. I will be asking Qs on behalf of the people across the country as together we must hold this Gov to account.”

He asked questions submitted by voters – no simple task given 40,000 responses after requesting ideas by email. London’s Guardian called Wednesday’s Q&A “the first (ever) crowdsourced session of prime minister’s questions,” adding he “stabilised his position” as opposition leader.

He reduced the volume received to his allotted six questions for Cameron. “(H)e triumphed with a set of razor-sharp (ones) focused on day-to-day lives of ordinary people,” said the Independent – issues most MPs treat dismissively.

“Cameron’s lack of compassion and stark inhumanity was obvious from the outset,” said Independent reporter Liam Young.

“His detachment from the reality of food banks and employment insecurity across modern Britain was more apparent than ever. (His) responses were scripted and rehearsed, while Corbyn’s questions were plainly sincere.”

He focused on Britain’s lack of affordable housing – reading a question asking “(w)hat does the government intend to do about the chronic lack of affordable housing and the extortionate rents charged by some private sector landlords in this country?”

Far too little despite Cameron claiming otherwise. Rental or owned housing in Britain is notoriously expensive, notably in London. An unaddressed affordable housing crisis exists, parliament doing shamefully little to address it.

Last January, thousands rallied in London against skyrocketing rents, unscrupulous landlords and lack of remedial government action.

In April, a group called Just Fair issued a report, saying Britain’s affordable housing crisis dates from the 1980s. “Without decent housing, you can’t experience an adequate life in society, but now housing is seen just as an asset,” it said.

Another question criticized Britain’s “shameful” cut in tax credits – one questioner asking: “Why is the government taking tax credits away from families?”

“We need this money to survive so our children don’t suffer. Paying rent and council tax on a low income doesn’t leave you much. Tax credits play a vital role and more is needed to prevent us having to become reliant on food banks to survive.”

Mental health was another issue – a questioner asking: “Do you think it is acceptable that the mental services in this country are on their knees at the present time?”

Cameron delivered dismissive stock answers to each question asked – The Independent saying they “may as well have been cut and pasted from (an anti-populist) Tory manual,” in contrast to Corbyn’s “straightforward and honest politics.”

His questions focused on major public concerns and sentiment – posed by ordinary people, reflecting what they’re forced to endure under anti-populist British governance since the 1970s, and inhumane force-fed austerity since 2008.

Corbyn notably bested Cameron in their first-head-to-head PMQ session – a clear distinction between a caring opposition leader and a dismissive of human need prime minister.

The Independent said he began his first direct encounter with Cameron “battered and bruised by recent headlines, but…left (with) the upper hand, spurred by (being) genuinely in touch with the real difficulties and aspirations of the people of Britain” – his greatest strength against a business as usual Tory leader.

He made “a ground-breaking start” in his pledge to change British politics, the first time in decades a party leader being a voice for ordinary people, putting their issues on the table for debate in hopes of enlisting a groundswell of support for real change.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PMCentral time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

 More than 1,991 Palestinian children have been killed by Israeli forces and extremists since 2000, according to figures released by an international rights group Thursday. 

Ongoing settlement building in occupied East Jerusalem and the West Bank are wedging Palestinian children and their families against “expanding and often violent Israeli settler communities,” Defense for Children International- Palestine (DCIP) research reported.

Such expansion is increasingly placing Palestinian children in a “hyper-militarized environment,” where they are facing higher frequencies of disproportionate violence from Israeli forces protecting settlers in the area, as well as from the settlers themselves.

In the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, 12 Palestinian children were killed by Israeli forces during 2014, the majority from live ammunition, DCIP reported.

In each case, DCIP’s research found “no evidence that any of the children killed in the West Bank posed a direct threat to Israeli troops or settlers,” adding that one out of the 12 cases resulted in both an investigation and indictment.

DCIP also revealed that 553 of those killed since 2000 died as a direct result of Israeli attacks during the 2014 offensive in the Gaza Strip, around 68 percent of whom were under 12 years of age.

Significant deterioration

DCIP said that the security of Palestinian children — which make up 42.6 percent of over 4.5 million Palestinians living in occupied Palestinian territory — “significantly deteriorated” in 2014, citing military force as well as the Israeli military court system’s denial of basic rights.

Thursday’s report also documented violations of children’s rights under Palestinian jurisdiction — particularly abuse during arrest and interrogation — criticizing the lack of a unified juvenile law used by Palestinian authorities.

The West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA) enforces a Jordanian law dating back to 1954, while the Hamas-run government in the Gaza Strip uses a law enacted in 1937 during the British Mandate.

“These legislations predate modern international standards for safeguarding children’s rights,” the report said, noting that the PA had made moves towards safeguarding the legal rights of children.

Furthermore, over 50 percent of Palestinian children face some form of domestic abuse, and rising poverty in the occupied territory has forced around 73,000 Palestinian children to join the labor force, DCIP reported.

The rights group documented Palestinian children — some as young as 11-years-old — working 12-hour days on Israeli agricultural settlements.

“Employers pay them in cash,” the report said, “which leaves no trace of them working in settlements and denies them official status, health insurance, or rights as employees.”

The Palestinian government lacks jurisdiction over Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, but DCIP pushed the necessity of reforming domestic labor laws.

The rights group also pointed out that the lives of Palestinian children will not improve until the ongoing Israeli military occupation ends.

I think that a week after Ynet broke the story about a Russian military intervention in Syria we can confidently say that this was a typical AngloZionist PSYOP aimed at inhibiting the Russian involvement in the Empire’s war against Syria and that it had no basis in reality.

Or did it?

It turns out that there was a small kernel of truth to these stories. No, Russia was not sending “MiG-31s to bomb Daesh”, nor is Russian going to send an SSNB (submarine armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles) to the Syrian coast. All these rumors are utter nonsense. But there are increasing signs that Russia is doing two thing:

1) increasing its diplomatic involvement in the Syrian conflict

2) delivering some unspecified but important military gear to Syria

The second item is the one which is most interesting. Needless to say, as is typical in these cases, the actual contents of the cargo Russia is sending by air and sea is not made public, but we can speculate. First, we know that Syria needs a lot of spare parts and equipment repairs. This war has been going on for 4 years now and the Syrians have made intensive use of their equipment. Second, the Syrians lack some battlefield systems which could greatly help them. Examples of that include counter-battery radars (radars which spot where the enemy’s artillery is shooting from) and electronic warfare systems. Furthermore, Russian sources are saying that Syria needs more armored personnnel carriers.

We know that Russia and Syria have long standing military contracts and we know that Russia is now delivering her heavy equipment by sea and the lighter systems by air. Does all that indicate some kind of game changer?

No. At least not at this point in time.

So why the AngloZionist panic?

My feeling is that one thing which makes them so nervous is that the Russian apparently have chosen the city of Latakia as their “delivery point”. Unlike Damascus, Latakia is an ideal location: it is safe but not too far away from the frontlines, and it is relatively near the Russian base in Tartus. The airport and naval port are also reportedly easy to protect and isolate. There are already reports that the Russians have lengthened the runways and improved the infrastructure at the Latakia airport and that heavy AN-124s have been observed landing there. As for the Russian Navy – it has been sending ships to the Latakia airport.

In other words, instead of limiting themselves to Tartus or going into the very exposed Damascus, the Russians appear to have created a new bridgehead in the north of the country which could be used to deliver equipment, and even forces, to the combat area in the north of the country.

This, by the way, would also explain the panicked rumors about the Russians sending in their Naval Infantry units from Crimea to Syria: Naval Infantry forces are ideal to protect such a base and considering that the front lines are not that far, it would make perfect sense for the Russians to secure their bridgehead with these units.

Furthermore, while heavy equipment is typically sent by the sea, the Russians can deliver their air defense systems by air: The AN-124 is more than capable of transporing S-300s. That fact alone would explain the AngloZionist panic.

What appears to be happening is this: the Russians are, apparently, sending some limited but important gear to provide immediate assistance to the Syrian forces. In doing so, they have also created the conditions to keep their options open. So while there is not massive Russian intervention taking place, something has definitely shifted in the Syrian conflict.

I would like to add here that while the government forces have recently lost the Idlib air base in the north of the country (and not too far from Latakia), all my sources confirm to me that the Syrian forces are in a much better position than Daesh and that the war is going very badly for the Takfiris. The Syrians have recently freed the city of Zabadan and they are on the offensive in most locations and while it is true that Daesh still controls a lot of land, most of that is desert.

To summarize the above I would say this: the AngloZionists are freaking out because their war against Syria has failed; while Daesh has created havoc and terror in several countries, there are many signs that the local countries are gradually becoming determined to do something. The US has also failed to get rid of Assad, the massive refugee crisis has triggered a major political crisis in Europe, and now the Europeans are looking at Assad in a dramatically different light than before. Russia has clearly decide to get politically involved with all the regional powers, effectively displacing the USA, and there are pretty good indications that the Russians are keeping their options open. And while there are absolutely no reasons to suspect that Russia is planning a major military intervention in the conflict in terms of quantity, there are signs that the Russian support has risen to a new qualitative level.

Two things need to be stressed here:

First, on a political level, it is still exceedingly unlikely that Russia would take any major unilateral action in this war. While Syria is a sovereign country and while a Syrian-Russian agreement is enough to legally justify any military move agreed to by both parties, Russia will try hard not to act alone. This explains why Foreign Ministery Lavrov is trying so hard to create some kind of coalition.

Second, on a military level, the country to look at is not Russia but Iran. The Iranians have a safe and secure land-line to Syria (via northern Iraq) and they have the kind of combat forces which could be successfully engage against Daesh. The same goes for Hezbollah which has, and will in the future, send its elite forces to support the Syrians in strategically vital areas. Should there be a need for a major ground operation in support of the Syrian forces, these are the forces we should expect to intervene, not the Russians.

In conclusion I would say that what we see taking place it “typical Putin”: while western leaders typically prefer high visibility actions which bring immediate (but short term) results, Putin prefers to let his opponent inflict the maximal amount of damage upon himself before intervening in gradual, slow steps. The unleashing of Daesh by the AngloZionists was a kind of a “political shock and awe” which did almost overthrow the Syrian government. When that initial “fast-acting” but short term strategy failed, Assad was still there, but Daesh had turned into a Golem monster which threatened everybody and which nobody could control. As for Assad, he was gradually downgraded from being a “new Hitler” gassing his own people into somebody who will clearly be a part of the solution (whatever “solution” will eventually emerge).

The lesson for all those who resist the Empire is obvious: the hardest thing is to remain standing after the first “blow” delivered by the imperial forces. If you can survive it (as the Donbass and Syria have done), then time is on your side and the position of the Empire will begin to weaken slowly but surely because of its own internal contradictions. When that process being, you must not fall into the trap of over-committment, but gradually occupy each position (political or other) given up by the Empire in the process of the disintegration while securing your own each step of the way.

It is way too early for any triumphalism – Daesh is still here, and so are the Ukronazis in Kiev, and the Empire has not given up on them quite yet. The good news is that the tide has now visibly turned and while there is still a long struggle ahead, the eventual defeat of the Takfiris and Nazis appears to be inevitable.

I’m really torn writing this, for on the one hand, Jeremy Corbyn’s (JC) sudden materialisation in the midst of a rampant, Victorian-style imperialist England, like Doctor Who in the Tardis, it’s difficult not to join in the euphoria currently sweeping through what’s left of the left in England (the current Media Lens has an excellent description) and bow down before JC, an almost Christ-like apparition in the midst of the gangster capitalists in Armani suits who rule us.

However, whilst not wanting to rain on the party,

“I cannot conclude without an earnest appeal to those Socialists, of whatever section, who may be drawn towards the vortex of Parliamentarism, to think better of it while there is yet time. If we ally ourselves to any of the presen[t] parties they will only use us as a cat’s-paw; and on the other hand, if by any chance a Socialist slips through into Parliament, he will do so at the expense of leaving his principles behind him; he will certainly not be returned as a Socialist, but as something else; what else is hard to say… Whatever concessions may be necessary to the progress of the Revolution can be wrung out of them at least as easily by extra-Parliamentary pressure, which can be exercised without losing one particle of those principles which are the treasure and hope of Revolutionary Socialists.” — William Morris, The Commonweal, Volume 1, Number 10, November 1885, p. 93.[1]

And on the other, as William Morris avers, the road to Parliament is also paved with good intentions and JC has been plodding along that road for thirty or so years with no more impact on the ‘democratic process’ than the rest of us have had (though a cynic would suggest that the perks and the pension plan might have something to do with it).

Thus whilst it’s admirable, heart-warming even, to see JC echo at least some of the left’s hopes and aspirations and for them to surface in the sea of misery that is, once more, reactionary and backward-looking Tory England, what is actually possible without an active, organised extra-Parliamentary opposition? In fact, things have gone into reverse during JC’s 30-year stint in the House of Commons. His has been a lone voice in the wilderness of parliamentary procedureness.

This is JC’s dilemma, his ‘Syriza’ moment if you like; Reformism versus Revolution and JC long ago chose Reform as did the Labour Movement over one hundred years ago when the Labour Party was born at the instigation of the trade union movement, to represent their interests in a capitalist Parliament (women still didn’t have the vote then), the hope being that capitalism could be reformed gradually through the democratic process and finally arrive at socialism (though that bit, the most important bit, hadn’t been worked out).

This is JC’s reality; he has to work within the ‘system’, a system created by capitalism, for capitalism. Okay, it (the capitalist state) has been forced to make some accommodation for the rest of us, well at least it used to during those thirty years, from 1945 to 1975, and this is the point: Does Jeremy Corbyn have the Parliamentary Labour Party behind him and what is it possible for him as an individual, to do about what is now a transnational ruling class as events in Greece so tragically demonstrate?

Corbyn’s dilemma is revealed first and foremost in the choices he has made for his Shadow Cabinet. Its composition reflects the compromises of all kinds Corbyn must make in order to accommodate a Parliamentary Party pretty much opposed to his views on just about everything.

According to Labour List, an ‘inside the Labour Party’ source, JC commands only 7% support within the Parliamentary Labour Party, that’s the one the Labour MPs belong to. Don’t forget, there are two Labour Parties, the Constituency Labour Party that in theory anyway, anybody can join, and the Parliamentary Labour Party, though obviously the two are connected at the hip (as the song and dance about ‘infiltrators’ during the election process, shows). It’s worth noting that the Labour Party has long practiced what my folks called a policy of ‘Bans and Proscriptions’, whereby not only were lefties left of the Labour Party banned from joining said Labour Party, but there was to be no connection at all to anything left of the Labour Party, like we had a communicable disease. I well remember what seemed to be a yearly event; the Labour Party disbanding the Labour Party Young Socialists because it got too socialist! It had been infected with the disease of socialism, well at least Trotskyism.

The Labour Party is, in every sense a creature born of the Establishment. In that sense, the Labour Party is as imperialist as the Tory Party with its history of promoting imperialism-colonialism abroad (to the marginal benefit of its organised working class support, ie the trade unions) attests. This is an embarrassing history for the left of today, and the left of the past, my past. To my mind, this issue is central to the paradox that is the Western left generally, but those of the imperialist states in particular. But it does go some way to explaining the following bizarre behaviour by someone who calls himself a socialist:

Tariq Ali, doyen of the intellectual left here, at the very beginning of the (current) imperialist assault on Assad’s Syria in 2011, called for “Assad to go”, he revealed exactly how the Western left is trapped in an imperialist worldview. We, along with everyone else here are forever telling the rest of the world what to do and how to it – or else, including Tariq Ali.

Yet JC has clearly touched a nerve, especially it would seem, amongst the young who have better sense than to have anything to do with our corrupt and moribund political class and its equally moribund so-called democratic system. But this is not even the first step on the long road to socialism. Whilst the existing left is quick to exploit every opportunity that comes its way, it either never knows what to do with it or, it behaves opportunistically. But this is not to say that if JC reached out to the formerly voiceless that something significant couldn’t be built and in quite a short time.

But not if it develops within the Labour Party. Again, I aver to William Morris on this score. If Jeremy Corbyn is to have any chance at all in mobilising the voiceless, who after all, are almost 30% of the population, and build an alliance with progressive sections of the “middle class” who are already active through such issues as climate change, consumerism, tax evasion or whatever, as well as the few remaining progressive trade unions, gathers these “issues” together and links them all to their common cause – capitalism.

Can Jeremy Corbyn do this? Is this what he wants to do (or something like it)? But on the one hand he bypasses the established institutions in favour of ‘alternative’ media, social networks and so forth. He reaches out to his constituency and speaks their language but on the other he heads a party whose institutions he has to work with. Can he change the party he now heads that much?

But assuming JC makes all the right calls, could it, a reborn Labour Party lead to a new call for an end to the madness of capitalism and exactly 130 years after Morris made his plea?

Amidst the emergence of politically-right-wing forces in Kiev, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko claims to be shocked and outraged by recent violence. Speaking in reference to an explosion which killed three members of the national guard outside parliament and left another officer in a coma, Poroshenko called the attack “an anti-Ukrainian action” and demanded that “all organizers, all representatives of political forces… must carry full responsibility.” More than a whopping 140 were also wounded in the attack, which was apparently caused by a grenade. All three guardsmen were young, in their twenties.

The incident occurred in the midst of a demonstration against a plan to provide more autonomy to separatist enclaves in the Ukrainian east where Russian-backed rebels hold sway. Authorities have blamed the explosion on a fighter in the so-called Sich volunteer battalion, which is linked in turn to far right-wing Svoboda or Freedom Party [in Ukraine, “Sich” refers to historic Cossack homelands. Though Cossack is a loaded term and carries unpleasant historic meaning for some, nationalists recently revived the word by referring to a protest area in Kiev which launched the 2013-14 EuroMaidan revolution as a “Cossack Sich.” Svoboda meanwhile loves “Cossack rock” music]. Rather questionably, the government itself has ties to the Sich battalion which falls under the official control of the Ministry of the Interior.

Svoboda’s Role

Svoboda was highly represented at the demonstration outside of parliament, and most protesters participating in subsequent violence and clashes with the police were Svoboda members. Later, the Minister of the Interior claimed that that party was “directly” responsible for clashes and the government has charged senior Svoboda members with rioting. Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk has declared that right wing-nationalists were “worse” than Russian-backed separatists in the east, because they were “trying to open another front” in Ukraine “under the guise of patriotism.”

Ismail Akin Bostanci via Getty Images

Svoboda on the other hand denies any responsibility and claims the authorities are out on a witch hunt to deface the party. Whatever the case, it’s a little odd that the authorities have only now woken up to the ominous threat of right wing groups. Indeed, the attack in front of the parliament building follows close on the heels of another incident in south-west Ukraine, in which members of Right Sektor battalion got into a shootout with local police. Perhaps, high-ups at the Ministry of Interior and elsewhere are finally paying the price for coddling the nationalist right and its backward political and social agenda.

Waking Up to Far Right

It’s only now, when extremists pose a threat to the government itself, that the international media has woken up to the rise of the political right. For years now, however, the nationalist right has posed a risk to independent leftists on the ground.Denis Pilash, one such activist who I interviewed in Kiev, is no stranger to Svoboda. Even before the EuroMaidan revolution which toppled Viktor Yanukovych from power, Pilash observed Svoboda trying to stir up “anti-migrant hysteria” by holding hostile rallies. Eventually, however, Svoboda and the right may have realized that anti-immigrant messaging wasn’t resonating so well, so they turned to opposing anarchists, feminists, and the LGBT community.

As if such developments weren’t concerning enough, Svoboda also has a peculiar habit of resuscitating dubious World War II icons. Svoboda leaders, in fact, admire “proto-Nazis” such as Ernst Jünger, and are “understanding” of Goebbels. They moreover talk about “purity of blood” and refer to Ukraine as “one race, one nation, one fatherland.” Svoboda meanwhile idolizes the Ukrainian Insurgent Army or UPA, an outfit which fought against the Soviets in World War II but also collaborated with the Nazis at one point. During unrest at Maidan square, Svoboda brandished the traditional UPA flag. In addition, Svoboda has defended extremists’ right to brandish this flag at local soccer matches.

Problematic Police

Pilash adds that rightists dress up in military-style outfits with red and black insignia and some paramilitaries are “linked to the most notorious figures in Svoboda.” Pilash is particularly disturbed by one case last year in which Vasyl Cherepanyn, a lecturer at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and editor of leftist Political Critique magazine, was brazenly attacked in broad daylight in crowded Kontraktova Square. Cherepanyn was assaulted by a group of men dressed in camouflage paramilitary uniforms. As they proceeded to pummel their victim, the thugs shouted “communist” and “separatist.” Unfortunately, police arrived late to the scene and failed to catch the assailants. Pilash says the attackers had no clear insignia on their uniforms, but he suspects they may have belonged to local battalions which assist the police.

There are other disturbing indications that the police may have been penetrated by right wing zealots. Azov Battalion is a military outfit fighting Russian separatists in the east which advocates right-wing nationalism and anti-Semitism. One infamous Azov commander is Andriy Biletsky, who has been promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the police. The military figure has openly admitted that some men in his unit “are interested in their historical roots,” though this may be difficult to understand for more modern, “uprooted” nations such as the United States.

Looking the Other Way?

As if it wasn’t disturbing enough that bad apples are caught up in the police, high up politicians have also gotten into the habit of appeasing the far right. To be sure, Petro Poroshenko is a far cry from such violent street toughs. Unfortunately, however, the authorities have either turned the other way or sought to incorporate far right messaging, thus perpetuating a chilling climate in which fringe ideas are allowed to thrive.

Take, for example, Poroshenko’s comment that the “timing is good” to define the status of the UPA. The politician then signed a decree establishing a “Day of Ukrainian Defenders” on October 14. The date is significant as it marks the anniversary of the UPA’s formation. Taking to Twitter, Poroshenko added “UPA soldiers – an example of heroism and patriotism to Ukraine.”

Then, for good measure, Poroshenko provided a Ukrainian passport to a Belarusian neo-Nazi. The man, Serhiy Korotkykh, served as a fighter in the eastern conflict zone and helped to defend Donetsk airport from Russian separatists. During a ceremony, Poroshenko awarded a medal to Korotkykh and praised the Belarusian as “courageous and selfless.” Experts however claim that Korotkykh was a founder of a neo-Nazi group in Russia and point out the Belarusian had been charged for involvement in a Moscow bombing and was also detained in Minsk for allegedly stabbing an anti-fascist organizer. Needless to say, top Ukrainian authorities reject such claims as defamatory. Like Biletsky, Korotkykh is a member of the Azov Battalion.

As if all of this wasn’t enough already, Poroshenko has also praised Andrey Sheptytsky, a priest who worked in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. Though Sheptytsky harbored some Jews during World War II, he initially supported the Nazis during their invasion of Ukraine, favored the UPA and endorsed the creation of a Ukrainian division with the Nazi SS. Rather questionably, Poroshenko recently unveiled a monument to Sheptytsky in the western city of Lviv where Svoboda and the political right enjoy a degree of popularity. During a ceremony attended by 10,000 people, Poroshenko praised the priest.

The Ricochet Effect

Terrified at the prospect of being overrun by separatists or even that the nation itself might implode or collapse, Poroshenko and the political establishment have engaged in a kind of Faustian bargain with the far right. This mindset is at least partially due to Poroshenko’s nervousness about upcoming local elections in the fall and the prospect of being overwhelmed by radical populists. Such firebrand politics could shock the establishment, which has failed to revive the economy or even break the power of the oligarchs for that matter. Reportedly, Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk’s party has plummeted in popularity to such a degree that he is now joining forces with Poroshenko so as to avoid an electoral rout.

Tying one’s sails to the far right, however, has constituted a serious mistake. While extreme nationalists still might not command an electoral majority, the Ukrainian political class has historically displayed an alarmingly high level of tolerance and acquiescence towards right wing antics. Though certainly horrific, recent riots in Kiev will hopefully serve to highlight the real danger of the far right and the need to take a firm stand against such elements.

Nikolas Kozloff is a New York-based writer who conducted a research trip to Ukraine last year.

Banks Rig Treasury Market

Bloomberg reports today:

The same analytical technique that uncovered cheating in currency markets and the Libor rates benchmark [details below] — resulting in about $20 billion of fines — suggests the dealers who control the U.S. Treasury market rigged bond auctions for years, according to a lawsuit.

***

The plaintiffs built their case against the 22 primary dealers who serve as the backbone of Treasury trading — including Goldman Sachs Group Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley — using data from Rosa Abrantes-Metz, an adjunct associate professor at New York University who has provided expert testimony in rigging cases.

Her conclusion: More than two-thirds of a certain type of Treasury auction appear to have been rigged. She found issues with other auctions, too.

***

Treasury traders at some banks learn of customer demand hours before auctions, and were communicating with their counterparts at other firms via chat rooms as recently as last year, Bloomberg News reported earlier this year.

***

Among the lawyers representing the investors is Daniel Brockett, a Quinn Emmanuel attorney who recently won a $1.87 billion settlement against Wall Street’s largest banks in a case alleging they conspired to limit competition in the market for credit-default swaps.

***

Another group of investors, including Boston’s public employee retirement system, has filed a similar suit against Wall Street primary dealers. Experts interviewed by Labaton Sucharow LLP, the law firm that filed that suit, analyzed auctions and the market for when-issued securities, which are essentially agreements to buy or sell Treasury bonds, notes or bills once they’re issued.

They claim that banks colluded to push prices artificially low at auctions, and to drive prices for when-issued securities to artificially high levels, until December 2012, when news broke of investigations into how Libor was set.

“These scenarios all turn on a very simple conflict of interest,” attorney Michael Stocker said in a telephone interview. “You had banks who were auction participants who also had the power to move the prices that those markets depended on.”

High-frequency trading has also long been used to manipulate the treasury market.

Banks Rig Currency Markets

It has long been known that currency markets are massively rigged. And see this, this, and this. Indeed, not only do the banks share confidential information with each other … they also shared it with a giantoil company.

A number of giant banks pleaded guilty to manipulating currency markets, and agreed to pay a $7.5 billion dollar fine. New York’s state financial regulator called it “a brazen ‘heads I win, tails you lose’ scheme to rip off their clients.”

The formal admissions by the banks include a trader saying, “We trying to manipulate it a bit more in ny now . . . a coupld buddies of mine and I.” And a vice president of a big bank said:

• “If you aint cheating, you aint trying.”

Derivatives Are Manipulated

Runaway derivatives – especially credit default swaps (CDS) – were one of the main causes of the 2008 financial crisis. Congress never fixed the problem, and actually made it worse.

The big banks have long manipulated derivatives … a $1,200 Trillion Dollar market.

Indeed, many trillions of dollars of derivatives are being manipulated in the exact same same way that interest rates are fixed (see below) … through gamed self-reporting.

Reuters noted last year:

A Manhattan federal judge said on Thursday that investors may pursue a lawsuit accusing 12 major banks of violating antitrust law by fixing prices and restraining competition in the roughly $21 trillion market for credit default swaps.

***

“The complaint provides a chronology of behavior that would probably not result from chance, coincidence, independent responses to common stimuli, or mere interdependence,” [Judge] Cote said.

The defendants include Bank of America Corp, Barclays Plc, BNP Paribas SA, Citigroup Inc , Credit Suisse Group AG, Deutsche Bank AG , Goldman Sachs Group Inc, HSBC Holdings Plc , JPMorgan Chase & Co, Morgan Stanley, Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and UBS AG.

Other defendants are the International Swaps and Derivatives Association and Markit Ltd, which provides credit derivative pricing services.

***

U.S. and European regulators have probed potential anticompetitive activity in CDS. In July 2013, the European Commission accused many of the defendants of colluding to block new CDS exchanges from entering the market.

***

“The financial crisis hardly explains the alleged secret meetings and coordinated actions,” the judge wrote. “Nor does it explain why ISDA and Markit simultaneously reversed course.”

In other words, the big banks are continuing to fix prices for CDS in secret meetings … and have torpedoed the more open and transparent CDS exchanges that Congress mandated.

The managing director at Graham Fisher & Co. (Joshua Rosner) recently said that the big banks arefrontrunning CDS trades … and manipulating decisions on whether a the party “insured” by CDS has defaulted on its obligations, thus triggering an “event” requiring payment on the CDS.

By way of analogy, whether or not an insurance company pays to rebuild a house which has burned to the ground may turn on whether it finds the fire was arson or accidental.

This is a big deal … while hundreds of thousands of dollars might be at stake in the home fire example, many tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars ride on whether or not a country like Greece is determined to have suffered a CDS-triggering event.

Rosner notes:

The potential use of CDS to artificially manipulate corporate solvency, the imbalances in the amounts of CDS outstanding relative to referenced debt and ongoing allegations that ISDA’s Determinations Committee is deeply conflicted and “operates as a quasi-Star Chamber or cartel”, are finally being scrutinized.

As one source recently suggested, “It would be a surprise if determinations of default, made by a committee of interested parties, don’t lead to findings of manipulation similar to those found in LIBOR and FOREX”.

***

The fact that Pimco’s Chief Investment Officer criticized the determination that Greece had not triggered its CDS, even though Pimco was part of the unanimous vote making that determination, is profoundly troubling to say the least.

***

The fact that the [ISDA’s Determinations Committees] has no obligation to “research, investigate, supplement or verify the accuracy of information on which a determination is based” and members “may have an inherent conflict of interest in the outcome of any determinations” only adds credence to suggestions that the “CDS market is being manipulated and gerrymandered by the all-powerful investment banks”.

Energy Prices Manipulated

Energy markets are manipulated as well …

For example, oil prices have been manipulated for many years.

And the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission says that JP Morgan has massively manipulated energy markets in California and the Midwest, obtaining tens of millions of dollars in overpayments from grid operators between September 2010 and June 2011.

And Pulitzer prize-winning reporter David Cay Johnston noted last year that Wall Street is trying to launch Enron 2.0.

And the Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee On Investigations found that Enron itself (which massively manipulated energy markets) was enabled by the fraud of big banks such as Citigroup and Chase.

Commodities Are Manipulated

The big banks and government agencies have been conspiring to manipulate commodities prices for decades.

The big banks are taking over important aspects of the physical economy – including uranium mining, petroleum products, aluminum, ownership and operation of airports, toll roads, ports, and electricity – to manipulate market prices.

And they are using these physical assets to massively manipulate commodities prices … scalping consumers of many billions of dollars each year. (More from Matt Taibbi, FDL and Elizabeth Warren.)

Gold and Silver Are Manipulated

Last November, Switzerland’s financial regulator (FINMA) found “serious misconduct” and a “clear attempt to manipulate precious metals benchmarks” by UBS employees in precious metals trading, particularly with silver.

Reuters reports:

Swiss regulator FINMA said on Wednesday that it found a “clear attempt” to manipulate precious metals benchmarks during its investigation into precious metals and foreign exchange trading at UBS …

Gold and silver prices have been “fixed” in daily conference calls by the powers-that-be.

Bloomberg reported in 2013:

It is the participating banks themselves that administer the gold and silver benchmarks.

So are prices being manipulated? Let’s take a look at the evidence. In his book “The Gold Cartel,” commodity analyst Dimitri Speck combines minute-by-minute data from most of 1993 through 2012 to show how gold prices move on an average day (see attached charts). He finds that the spot price of gold tends to drop sharply around the Londonevening fixing (10 a.m. New York time). A similar, if less pronounced, drop in price occurs around the London morning fixing. The same daily declines can be seen in silver prices from 1998 through 2012.

For both commodities there were, on average, no comparable price changes at any other time of the day. These patterns are consistent with manipulation in both markets.

Interest Rates Are Manipulated

Bloomberg reported last year:

Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc was ordered to pay $50 million by a federal judge in Connecticut over claims that it rigged the London interbank offered rate.

RBS Securities Japan Ltd. in April pleaded guilty to wire frauda s part of a settlement of more than $600 million with U.S and U.K. regulators over Libor manipulation, according to court filings. U.S. District Judge Michael P. Shea in New Haventoday sentenced the Tokyo-based unit of RBS, Britain’s biggest publicly owned lender, to pay the agreed-upon fine, according to a Justice Department statement.

Global investigations into banks’ attempts to manipulate the benchmarks for profit have led to fines and settlements for lenders including RBS, Barclays Plc, UBS AG and Rabobank Groep.

RBS was among six companies fined a record 1.7 billion euros ($2.3 billion) by the European Union last month for rigging interest rates linked to Libor. The combined fines for manipulating yen Libor and Euribor, the benchmark money-market rate for the euro, are the largest-ever EU cartel penalties.

Global fines for rate-rigging have reached $6 billion since June 2012 as authorities around the world probe whether traders worked together to fix Libor, meant to reflect the interest rate at which banks lend to each other, to benefit their own trading positions.

To put the Libor interest rate scandal in perspective:

• The big banks have conspired for years to rig interest rates … upon which $800 trillion in assets are pegged

• This was the largest insider trading scandal ever … and the largest financial scam in world history

• Local governments got ripped off bigtime by the Libor manipulation

• Even though RBS and a handful of other banks have been fined for interest rate manipulation, Libor is still being manipulated. No wonder … the fines are pocket change – the cost of doing business – for the big banks

Everything Can Be Manipulated through High-Frequency Trading

Traders with high-tech computers can manipulate stocks, bonds, options, currencies and commodities. And see this.

Manipulating Numerous Markets In Myriad Ways

The big banks and other giants manipulate numerous markets in myriad ways, for example:

• Engaging in mafia-style big-rigging fraud against local governments. See this, this and this

• Shaving money off of virtually every pension transaction they handled over the course of decades, stealing collectively billions of dollars from pensions worldwide. Details here, here, here, here, here,here, here, here, here, here, here and here

• Charging “storage fees” to store gold bullion … without even buying or storing any gold . And raiding allocated gold accounts

• Committing massive and pervasive fraud both when they initiated mortgage loans and when they foreclosed on them (and see this)

• Pledging the same mortgage multiple times to different buyers. See this, this, this, this and this. This would be like selling your car, and collecting money from 10 different buyers for the same car

• Cheating homeowners by gaming laws meant to protect people from unfair foreclosure

• Pushing investments which they knew were terrible, and then betting against the same investments to make money for themselves. See this, this, this, this and this

• Engaging in unlawful “frontrunning” to manipulate markets. See this, this, this, this, this and this

• Engaging in unlawful “Wash Trades” to manipulate asset prices. See this, this and this

• Otherwise manipulating markets. And see this

• Participating in various Ponzi schemes

• Charging veterans unlawful mortgage fees

• Cooking their books (and see this)

• Bribing and bullying ratings agencies to inflate ratings on their risky investments

The Big Picture

The experts say that big banks will keep manipulating markets unless and until their executives are thrown in jail for fraud.

Why? Because the system is rigged to allow the big banks to commit continuous and massive fraud, and then to pay small fines as the “cost of doing business”. As Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitznoted years ago:

The system is set so that even if you’re caught, the penalty is just a small number relative to what you walk home with.

The fine is just a cost of doing business. It’s like a parking fine. Sometimes you make a decision to park knowing that you might get a fine because going around the corner to the parking lot takes you too much time.

Indeed, Reuters points out:

Switzerland’s regulator FINMA ordered UBS, the country’s biggest bank, to pay 134 million francs ($139 million) after it found serious misconduct in both foreign exchange and precious metals trading. It also capped bonuses for dealers in both units at twice their basic salary for two years.

Capping bonuses at twice base salary? That’s not a punishment … it’s an incentive.

Experts say that we have to prosecute fraud or else the economy won’t ever really stabilize.

But the government is doing the exact opposite. Indeed, the Justice Department has announced it will go easy on big banks, and always settles prosecutions for pennies on the dollar (a form of stealth bailout. It is also arguably one of the main causes of the double dip in housing.)

Indeed, the government doesn’t even force the banks to admit any guilt as part of their settlements. In fact:

“The banks have been allowed to investigate themselves,” one source familiar with the investigation told Reuters. “The investigated decide what they want to investigate, what they admit to, and how much they will pay.

Wall Street has manipulated virtually every other market as well – both in the financial sector and thereal economy – and broken virtually every law on the books.

And they will keep on doing so until the Department of Justice grows a pair.

The criminality and blatant manipulation will grow and spread and metastasize – taking over and killing off more and more of the economy – until Wall Street executives are finally thrown in jail.

It’s that simple …

Pavlos Klavdianos (PK): Will the elections bring about changes in the balance of power and on the political system?

Michalis Spourdalakis (MS): The historical victory of the Left in January marked a change in the system of political representation which outlines a new dynamic for the political forces. However, the way in which this victory was achieved and the difficulties that the first government of the left faced, led after the referendum of the 5 of July, to a big fallback, a big defeat. This defeat needs to be understood as a turning point in a long and large war for the victory of the left in the struggle for the control of state power. The government did not handle this well, it must be said, through the collective processes of the party, which resulted in totally justified emotional responses, mainly disappointment, and which in turn has created a general climate of disappointment and therefore centrifugal tendencies. It was a withdrawal and/or a defeat which however was not the result of a betrayal of a selfish or sneaky leadership. In my opinion, it was a manoeuvre in front of incredibly more powerful forces, in order to save strength and the ability to continue the war in the future. It is very important to see it in this way and not like an accomplishment the government is content with or even in terms of the simplistic logic that it now accepts the notion that there is no alternative.

Syriza and Society

BS: There is stern criticism being voiced against Syriza for calling this election.

MS: Syriza won the elections by promising a very specific program (the Salonica program), was forced to back down and so they are turning to the people for a decision, with a new political strategic proposal. There is of course the parliamentary dimension (loss of the majority), but this was not the defining factor. Syriza is guided by a different logic. It was founded and was developed on the basis of the promise that it would “bring society to the stage.” It also promised to do this with its action at the social level… it would go to the social movements, learn from them, and would form a government that would take into account not just the technocratic hierarchies but also the experience gained from the social movements. Moreover, for Syriza the prerequisite for this strategy was based on the call for the unity of the Left. This was its strategy when it said that it is not interested whether someone was coming from one or the other ideological or party background or movement and spoke of the “whole of the Left” in pluralistic way.

So, Syriza with its action on a social level and with its program which is based on this action attempted to engage the institutions [aka the Troika: European Commission, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank]. It stands therefore with one leg in the society and the social movements and the other in a serious, systemic presence in the institutions: in the parliament, in the peripheral and municipal level and also in the unions, the co-ops, the various citizens’ movements etc. With these prerequisites, it gained the “right” to govern, to manage the state power, in a different logic from which had been imposed in the post-Junta years.

BS: It is difficult to be convinced that it honors the logic you presented. Isn’t this suggested by its fall in the polls?

MS: This weakness stems from the fact that Syriza reached 27 per cent in 2012, through the logic I described, but I fear that even the top cadre of the party, who had helped shape and were operating under this logic, had not fully understood the significance of this strategy. No theoretical or education work to ensure the consolidation of “the Syriza way” was conducted.

Thus, after 2012, Syriza gradually slid into somewhat “governmental” practices and hurried to ascend to power, “at all costs.” It gave much emphasis to the parliamentary game and the action in the social field seemed a routine. It ceased to take initiatives in the society, be inventive as it was in 2010 or 2011. This became apparent in the 2012 convention and even more clear in the 2013 founding conference where the issues discussed were mainly procedural in nature,  apparently isolated from the social field, concerned with only “party organizational matters.” Without any inspiration and creativity, the organization was unable to maintain and support this strategy of Syriza, which up until the 2012 election was more pure and fresh.

Absolute Naivety

BS: But there was popular pressure for Syriza to govern.

MS: The critical assessment we make, cannot simply be attributed to the deficit of the choices of leadership but is a response to real pressures and necessities, arising from the social dynamics and political necessity. It was a “mobilization” of Syriza from the popular classes, which required it to govern. So, the organizational problems of Syriza were not addressed, the necessary adjustments to the new situation were not made, which would require a better consolidation of the party’s strategy.

At the same time, there have been a series of naiveties, having to do with the action of Syriza within the country and the perception of the international environment. There is a perception that if we went to Europe and voiced our view in a well-documented and clear way, this will be heard and the “institutions” would subside. “Institutions” which, however, are filled by neoliberal logic and express very hard and inflexible interests. This was a huge naivety, which decisively influenced the negotiation. In respect to Greece itself, the major naivety had to do with the party. Since the electoral influence was expanding, the leadership implicitly seems to think that a vibrant, democratic, participatory party was not all that necessary. The theoretical work was ignored and the notion was if you take the government that will be enough to allow you to gradually change the domestic balance of power. The naivety of that view, was based on an instrumental conception of power and the state, led the government to tolerate key figures in public administration serving other goals or even appoint technocrats, who clearly had a different make-up and skill-set than the ones required to serve the social alliances with Syriza.

The social alliance that made Syriza comprises not only of the lower social classes (workers, precarious workers, the unemployed, etc.) but also the so-called petty bourgeoisie traditional class (shopkeepers, small traders, etc.), crushed under the austerity policies, as well as the new petty bourgeoisie (self-employed, the urban educated strata and so on). This is the alliance Syriza should have in mind and to strengthen, however slowly, with structural reforms to change the balance of power, despite the adverse conditions, and so to open roads for a broader social transformation.

BS: The idea that when we take the government everything will be done, it was a blatantly instrumental view.

MS: Exactly! Despite the theoretical achievements of the radical, “regenerative” left, standing against instrumental logic, the Syriza government did not follow this. It showed an absolute naivety. Thus the government ran into a wall. The left government proved more inefficient than what you expect, so the criticism is, I think correctly, stating that beyond the limitations of the memorandum, in other areas where it does not touch, the government was not as effective as it had to be.

BS: Do you think that the current difficulty of Syriza to rally, in the elections, its influence on January 25, and its new earned influence even despite the onerous agreement, has its roots in the post-2012 period?

MS: From 2012 onward, I think Syriza became more “governmental,” even before getting the government. It forgot, somehow, what had brought it to the fore, the protagonist of the developments in the country and in Europe, the alter-globalization democratic movement. However, after the retreat this July, the following risk presented itself: the management of that defeat would have heavier political effects than just those resulting from the continuing economic repression it required. First, it did not happen through the collective proceedings of the party, although many excuses given for this were to some extent understandable. It is, however, wrong to claim that the party had become a pro-memorandum, a pro-austerity one. Syriza is not that. We had a government, “with Syriza being its backbone” which in the face of “the EU coup” – we have to say this – was forced to retreat. This party was constructed and strengthened in a completely different orientation, as I explained earlier, drawing strength from distress and resistance struggles against austerity over the last five years.

BS: On what basis, then, can a political recovery be achieved?

MS: First of all, Syriza should reaffirm its pluralism, in terms of radical, regenerative Left. The party’s and the subsequent government’s character, has to take some lessons from the seven months’ tenure. Secondly, the people selected will have to mark this achievement. Thirdly, we need to appreciate the importance that the government has in managing the state. One cannot say “oh, it’s too difficult, I will leave the management of the state.” That is because the state resources are key for the left to strengthen the subordinate classes and change institutions and relations, from state centered to societal centered. Instead, it must manage them in an innovative way, especially under the restrictions put in place by the new agreement.

Something else that must be done, and I think Syriza does it to an extent, is put higher in its agenda the importance of renegotiation of the debt and to be connected with an investment program in the social sector. This will not only alleviate the difficulties imposed by this agreement in the social field, but will also at least give a vision, a positive look to the immediate future of subordinate classes. To promote its contribution to the new strategy, a new vision that we should give to Greek society is key in order to revive the hope that Syriza represented. We also need to overcome the not very democratic functioning of Syriza. The party should quickly proceed to a conference designed to mend the bridges with those who were disappointed, tired, totally justifiably, given how much Syriza had inspired so many.

BS: Syriza is a socially oriented political force; this is clear and those who believe that this was lost because of the forced agreement are wrong. However, there are two elements in its theoretical equipment that suffer, had not been assimilated and, unfortunately, we are going to need them now very much. The first one is that Syriza is not only an anti-memorandum party, but also a left one, which results in its having a great range of action, especially in the Greek society. The second one is the purpose – especially the ability to materialize it – of the transformation of the Greek society and economy. What has been revealed about Syriza’s deficiencies in terms of these characteristics is what this discussion is trying to underline.

MS: And this is the reason why I insisted on the need to renew, to retrieve, to recapture, to realize and systematize Syriza’s strategy. For a long time now, it has become clear that we needed to cast the anti-memorandum character off and insist that we are against austerity entirely and the internal devaluation that goes with it, and this requires that we must become actually anti-neoliberal today and, finally, somehow anti-capitalist. This has not been done and it must get done now; to be creative not only in fields that are not affected by the memorandum, but also in fields that are affected by the memorandum.

This tactic gives us another power, another perspective, knowing – and saying – that this is not the maximum that we want to manage, but that along with the debt reduction, recommit ourselves to the democratic goals we need to realize in terms of transparency, fighting corruption, upgrading local government, democratizing public administration, stopping tax evasion etc., all of which would substantially undermine the reproductive core of Greek capitalism. After all, corruption, or what is called here “interlocking,” is actually key for the reproduction of Greek capitalism, so it is not just a moral or merely a legal issue. The new strategic discussion required for this will need to be a long one, because such a transformation plan needs to involve all the forces of the party, and it should be recalled that Alexis Tsipras, even at the Central Committee meeting after “the coup” himself said that we want to start the procedures for the general social transformation. But for this to happen, all these strategic elements need to be discussed, and in a way that is always moving toward their verification.

BS: The problem we are discussing relates to one of the root causes of the split, in the sense of the non-consolidation of this strategy or maybe also of its non-acceptance by those comrades who formed Popular Unity (LA.E.)

MS: I would like to remind people that the majority of Syriza’s former members who are now connected with Popular Unity have also had an instrumentalist perception of the state, which the majority of Syriza itself does not espouse. Moreover, what Syriza used to say in its formal texts about social control was not absolutely understood by that tendency which is now Popular Unity, and which always gave great emphasis on state control. The understanding of socialism in terms of social control not state control is one of the key achievements of today’s radical and regenerative left which, as it seems, this tendency did not share. A third element is that this tendency could not fully understand the importance of solidarity networks and social movements and actually concluded in a refusal to participate. There was confusion, because it was thought that solidarity is charity.

What this reflects is that words in the party program had different meaning for different tendencies in the party, which led to many misunderstandings, but there were no procedures for real theoretical and political debate and discussion. The “federal” nature of the tendencies in the party did not help; they functioned more or less as small or larger networks and even as movements or parties within the party, so that almost no common understanding was allowed. It was thought that through decisions from above, minorities and majorities in the founding Congress, things could be addressed. This is a tedious job, which requires a functional, living party, the organization of which will support the strategy of Syriza and that organizationally will be what is really the “new” about the “Syriza way.” The lack of this must be attributed, to some extent, to the split in the party that has now occurred and which costs so much energy, efficiency and votes.

Let me add one more thing. No one takes initiatives, which either force some people to the exit, or undermine the management of the state from the left, unless you have an instrumental conception of power. That is to say a perception that if I am in the government, I will make it. Or counter to that, that I cannot stay in government since I can readily implement the whole of my political project and so I retire. So, these two aspects have met at the same place. Can you criticize from either side of the management of the state and power, if you haven’t grounded what you want to do in the real social and political balance of power not only in our country but also in Europe?

We know from the history of the Left that no social transformation could happen in a single country, let alone today with the processes of global capitalist integration, and which also institutionally now due to the EU relates to the hard core of capitalist dynamics. You do not give up, however, the government for that reason. We shall retake the thread and through a “Syriza’s way” build the party, as we built it gradually since 2006, even without full knowledge of what we were up to. Anything else will be a tacit acceptance of post-democratic currents, that does not want collectivities, but sees management policy, more or less along the lines in which businesses operate. Instead, I believe that there are still resources in Syriza which if properly exploited will not only lead it to recover but will guarantee a real take off. Laying the ground for this positive outlook might be the best outcome of the election. •

Michalis Spourdalakis, a founding member of Syriza, is one of Greece’s foremost political scientists and currently Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Politics, University of Athens.

This interview was originally published in the Greek left weekly, Epochi, and was translated in Toronto by Aris Spourdalakis and Dionysia Pitsili-Chatzi.

The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), a charity that began in 1961, is on the verge of destroying everything it stands for. For decades, the charitable organization played an integral role in conserving important regions while working on behalf of animal welfare around the world. In the new millennia, however, the WWF has strayed from its roots. It has been watered down and infiltrated by the nature-destroying ideas of the biotech industry.

The WWF is not what they once were. In the recently published book, PandaLeaks: The Dark Side of the WWF, German author Wilfried Huismann exposes everything, from the charity’s outrageously high salaries to its recent partnership with agrochemical giant Monsanto.

Suppressed book exposes dangerous relationship between WWF and Monsanto

When the book came out in 2012, the WWF legal team tried to censor it. They succeeded for several months, afraid of being exposed for promoting Monsanto’s genetically modified crops. In the fall of 2014, the book was re-released, shedding light on the funds the WWF took from Monsanto. The book endured several lawsuits and revealed the dark side of the WWF’s relationship with the multinational agrochemical seed engineer. The book reveals that the WWF collaborated with Monsanto to create a “Round Table on Responsible Soy.” This means WWF leaders discussed ways to unleash GMO soy around the world while convincing entire countries that GMOs and agrochemicals are the most environmentally-conscious method of farming.

Monsanto is infamous for “green washing” their products, making people think they are for the environment. The corporation calls their GMO soy a “responsible” choice for protecting the environment. This deceit ultimately infected the WWF, which went along with plans to unleash GMO soy in the Amazon. Now Brazil and Argentina are being turned into GMO plantations as the Amazon is cut down to make way for Monsanto’s GMO “save the planet” brainwashing.

The clever operatives at Monsanto have found a way to convince environmentally conscious charities such as the WWF to go along with their plans for agricultural control and world dominance. Every donation that is made to the WWF is now supporting the very ideas that destroy the natural environment. Monsanto’s agrochemicals have been linked to mass die-offs of honey bee and monarch butterfly populations. Without these key pollinators, many vegetables and herbs can’t reproduce. Monsanto’s agrochemicals pose a threat to ecosystems, all the way down to wiping out the good bacteria in the soil and the human gut. When the quality of the soil is ignored, the nutrition of the crop reduces over time, ultimately affecting people’s health.

Amazon rain forest being cut to pieces to make room for GMO plantations

The Amazon GMO soy boom is causing millions of acres of rain forest to be cleared. Between 2007 and 2008, nearly 3 million acres were destroyed in the Brazilian Amazonrain forest as logging, soy plantations and cattle ranching took over the region. The WWF has no interest in protecting these regions any more because they are infiltrated by the ideas of Monsanto, which is all for clearing out the rain forest and taking over the area’s agriculture.

Monsanto is not feeding the world. They are raping the natural diversity on this planet and controlling what farmers can grow to stay in business. Brazilian soy is now over 90 percent genetically modified. Much of the GM soy is used to sell animal feed back to farmers as their free range, biodiversity-rich farming practices are taken from them and replaced by fields of GMO soy.

Virtually everyone is familiar with Pinocchio’s story – a wooden puppet carved by Gepetto brought to life by a fairy that instructed him to be “brave, truthful, and unselfish” in order to remain a real boy. What I remember the most about Pinocchio was his failure to heed the fairy, his nose growing longer with every lie. This seems to be the case with Tehran Bureau’s unnamed ‘correspondent’ who failed to heed the ‘canons of journalism’ by making up tall stories about Iran in her article “How the hijab has made sexual harassment worse in Iran” — in effect turning herself into

Correspondent Pinocchio (CP).

CP writes a damning account of being sexually harassed in Iran, of being subjected to ‘ogling’, “whistling, hissing, smacking, licking, puffing” and ‘unhindered expressions of lust’ and ‘profanity’.  She backs her personal account with remarks from a friend who told her that she felt “naked, and worthless.” Not only is CP claiming that hijab has made the situation worse for women, but she also quotes someone as saying: “Basically, a woman shouldn’t walk in the street without male protection,”.  What nonsense.

Now as a scholar of US foreign policy I pay close attention to propaganda. Misinformation is nothing new to me and I don’t like to spend my time and energy responding to all the lies. But this particular article by CP hit me hard because I happen to be in Iran at the moment and in the same exact location/neighborhood she mentions in her tall tale. And t had it not been for the fact that the evening prior to reading her story I had been talking to my husband in California telling him that never had I felt more safe and comfortable walking alone and eating alone in a restaurant than I did here, I would have dismissed CP’s propaganda.  But CP’s lies had a personal effect on me and I could not let it rest — especially in light of Tehran Bureau’s malicious history.

Tehran Bureau (TB) was established shorty prior to the 2009 elections in Iran. It would seem the sole purpose at the time was to start false allegations about the 2009 elections in Iran (Foreign Policy Journal Editor Jeremy Hammond has a brilliant piece on this HERE).  TB’s ability to promote lies and with it, unrest, must have caught the attention of PBS. Tehran Bureau is now affiliated with PBS. PBS receives funding from the Federal Government.  Hosting Tehran Bureau by The Guardian” may have well given the paper a boost for its very continuity was questionable as admitted to in 2013 when its CEO warned that his paper may not survive.

So given this colorful background of Tehran Bureau and PC’s blatant lies, I was prompted to set the record straight and share my experiences and observations which were the exact opposite of what PC wrote in her piece. What I saw and personally experienced was profound respect. No glaring stares, no harassment. Simply the kind of courtesy that is offered to a woman and that is demanded by society. It seems to be me as if in Iran the hijab serves as a reminder of how men are expected to behave toward women. (See article on hijab and status of women in Iran HERE). So what is CP on about?

Of course there is the possibility that CP is a budding beauty and Iranian men simply can’t handle her splendor (what an insult to Iranian men). Were I to give her this benefit of the doubt and imagine her to be a radiant beauty, her (possible) beauty would be completely eclipsed in Iran.  As Mara wrote of the Iranian women in her 2012 article titled For the women of Iran, with Love “They are the most beautiful women I have ever seen”.  I concur – as do many others.  And Iranian men are accustomed to beauty.  So I tend to dismiss her claims of “harassment” based on her glamor.

On the other hand, it may be that she was completely ignored.  After all, in many countries around the world men do indeed harass women and make sexual overtures.  Some women are flattered while others are offended.  But being invisible is not easy to handle.  Being invisible may be likened to a blank piece of paper on which one can write anything and all things imaginary – depending on one’s inclination. What is an undisputed fact is that contrary to CP’s report, many Iranian women go all out to become visible.

I spent hours in a coffee shop in a beautiful park (Ab o Atash – literal translation water and fire) near where CP claims to have walked, and watched young women. Faces made up, dressed fashionably in their colorful ‘hijab’ they parading around like peacocks that opens their glorious tails in order to attract attention.  Sadly for them, I was doing the glaring while they were left mostly unnoticed.  And in their midst there were also women who did not venture out to make an impression with their hairdo and clothing. They were beautiful in their simplicity and modesty.  I made a mental note of them too, of their ease and confidence in themselves.

Now it would be a lie to claim that all women are ignored and all men here are well behaved.  With all the demonizing of Iranians, it may be hard to believe that Iranians are normal!  As with every other country in the world, there are men who harass women and who make unsolicited approaches.  This is more a personal upbringing than a norm. In the pre-revolution years, when I visited Iran as a very young teenager, harassment and catcalling was prevalent. As a shy girl, I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me up so that I would be spared the stares, the pestering.  But things have changed. What was once common is truly rare these days.  Men would not dare disrespect women – and they don’t.

I would very much like to suggest that PC take her notebook or laptop, sit in the aforementioned park (or anywhere else in Tehran and elsewhere) and speak the truth. Perhaps only then, as with Pinocchio, her courage and unselfishness to write truthfully will turn her into a real bona fide correspondent.

Soraya Sepahpour-Ulrich is an independent researcher and writer with a focus on US foreign policy.

The whole world needs to follow Iceland’s lead. Its capital City of Reykjavik no longer will buy products made in Israel.

Its city council voted for boycott as long as it continues occupying Palestinian territory – a bold act deserving high praise, perhaps inspiring greater numbers of cities worldwide to follow suit, then maybe countries if enough effective popular resistance against its viciousness materializes.

Petitions in Britain and America to arrest Netanyahu attracted growing thousands of ordinary people – expressing justifiable anger against an apartheid state brutalizing Palestinians for not being Jewish.

Reykjavik Social Democratic Alliance councilwoman Bjork Vilhelmsdottir introduced the motion to boycott – her last action before retiring from politics, expressing support for long-suffering Palestinians, recognizing their self-determination right, free from Israeli oppression.

Left Green Alliance governing coalition member Soley Tomasdottir expressed hope Reykjavik’s action will be a step toward ending Israel’s illegal occupation. Boycotting other countries guilty of human rights abuses may follow, she said.

By acting, “we as a city council, even though we are a small city in the far north, are doing what we can to put pressure on the government of Israel to stop the occupation of Palestinian territory,” she told Icelandic public broadcaster RUV.

Israel reacted as expected. “A volcano of hatred is erupting in the Reykjavik city council,” blustered foreign ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon.

“There is no reason or justification for this move, besides hate itself, which is being heard in the form of calls for a boycott against Israel, the Jewish state,” he added.

“We hope that someone in Iceland will wake up and stop this blindness and one sidedness which is aimed against the only democracy in the Middle East, Israel.”

The move is largely symbolic, yet another BDS success. Its web site highlighted “a decade of effective solidarity with Palestinians,” citing the following:

A UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) report shows year-over-year direct foreign investment in Israel declined 46% in 2014.

UNCTAD’s Ronny Manos said “(w)e believe that what led to the drop in investment in Israel are Operation Protective Edge and the boycotts Israel is facing.”

French transnational company Veolia failed to win major contracts across Europe and in other countries because of its involvement in Israeli human rights abuses.

The University of Johannesburg cut ties to Israel’s Ben-Gurion University in response to boycott calls from 400 South African academics. Three-fourths of London’s SOAS University academics and students voted to back BDS.

Growing numbers of entertainers refuse to perform in Israel. Many academics decline to lecture there or participate in Israeli conferences. Thousands of professionals and activists support culturally boycotting Israel.

Over 30 US student associations and 11 in Canada voted to support BDS. Israel’s largest defense company Elbit Systems lost a major Brazilian contract. SodaStream closed its settlement factory.

The American Studies Association is the nation’s oldest and largest organization involved in the interdisciplinary study of US culture and history. It voted to boycott Israeli academic institutions.

Kuwait boycotted 50 companies profiting from Israel’s occupation. The African National Congress declared support for BDS. Sao Paulo Festival organizers ended a sponsorship arrangement with Israel.

Major European banks divested from Israeli companies. Community actions blocked Israeli ships from docking at world ports.

Israeli exporters are experiencing sales declines in Europe. Chile suspended a trade agreement with Israel following its summer 2014 Gaza aggression.

US churches are divesting from companies involved in Israel’s occupation. Its state owned Mekorot water company lost contracts in Argentina, Portugal and the Netherlands.

Over 500 European academics called for EU nations to boycott Israeli settlement products. Growing numbers of European city councils support BDS.

Citing Israeli “state terrorism,” Venezuela and Bolivia cut diplomatic ties. Norway refuses to sell it weapons.

These and numerous other examples of BDS effectiveness show growing world outrage against daily Israeli crimes too horrific to ignore, including against young Palestinian children.

They’re terrorized, brutalized, or murdered in cold blood. Defense for Children International-Palestine (DCIP) reported around 2,000 Palestinian children killed by Israeli forces in the past 15 years.

It blamed Israel’s “hyper-militarized environment” – calling its summer 2014 Operation Protective Edge a war on Gazan children. Over 550 died – 68% under age 12.

It blasted Israel’s judicial system for denying Palestinian children basic rights. It said conditions won’t improve until occupation ends.

Global BDS activism is the single most effective campaign against Israeli lawlessness. It hits hard where it hurts most – economically, as well as exposing its phony image as a democratic state. It highlights its apartheid viciousness.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Obama, John Kerry and other US officials rhetorically urge settling conflicts diplomatically in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Donbass, Palestine and elsewhere – while waging endless direct or proxy wars in multiple theaters with new ones in mind.

Syria is in the eye of the storm. In an interview with six Russian media outlets, Bashar al-Assad said defeating ISIS and other takfiri terrorism is the only way to end ongoing conflict and the human flood it creates.

As long as Washington, other Western countries and regional ones support terrorists, endless wars will continue. Syrians want resolution “through dialogue and political action,” he explained. They want peace, stability and national sovereignty respected. They deplore intervention by foreign powers.

Washington bears full responsibility for creating ISIS. Russian UN envoy Vitaly Churkin traced its origin from Bush’s Iraq war, saying it “became active when (it) began storming Baghdad…So, the Islamic State ripened in Iraq during the US occupation. (America) should be blamed for” its rise and proliferation.

It’s time to “creat(e) an international coalition to fight ISIS, which is what President Putin is proposing.”

“Russia…has proposed (forming) a wide coalition to fight extremists without any delay. It should unite everyone” against a common enemy, Putin stressed.

Churkin called Washington’s so-called coalition “flawed” – lacking Security Council authorization, a strategy for endless war, not peace and stability.

“All Russia’s actions in Syria are coordinated with the Syrian government and stay within the norms of international law,” Churkin stressed.

John Kerry claiming Russian involvement in Syria “exacerbate(s) and extend(s) the conflict, and undermine(s)…fighting extremism” is polar opposite truth. It’s vital to help contain and defeat US-sponsored terrorism in Syria and elsewhere – regionally and beyond.

State Department spokesman Admiral John Kirby ludicrously blaming Assad for ISIS in Syria ignores Washington’s full responsibility. Blaming victims is longstanding US policy.

Russia’s upper house Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko forthrightly explained “the real culprits behind the drama that people of the Middle East and North Africa are living through today.”

“All of this stems from the devastating policies the US and a handful of other nations are conducting in the region.” she said. Putin has a “detailed, clear and realistic (conflict resolution) plan.”

Federation Council members “will do their best to inform the world community on the essence of the plan through the channels for inter-parliamentary communications.”

“Responsibility for regional and global security, for the implementation of people’s right to peaceful life” requires resolving ongoing conflicts diplomatically. “Russia has made an important step in that direction, and now it’s time for other countries to act.”

Not as long as Washington and rogue allies wage endless wars on humanity. Peace and stability defeat their agenda.

Mass slaughter and destruction serve it, targeting one country after another, heading inevitably toward direct US confrontation with Russia and China, risking nuclear war to make both countries US-controlled vassal states.

No nation in world history ever threatened humanity’s survival more than America. In his new book titled “Secretary of Peace,” former Nobel Peace Prize Committee secretary Geir Lundestad called honoring Obama with the coveted award a mistake.

The committee “thought it would strengthen (him) and it didn’t have this effect,” he said. “Even many of (his) supporters believed that the prize was a mistake.”

Nobel Committee members notoriously honor war criminals, shunning peace activists. The award should be called the Nobel War Prize, Obama perhaps its most notorious recipient, given his record of endless aggression in multiple theaters, risking global conflict for the first time since WW II.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Middle East residents increasingly skeptical of US role in Syria

More than 81 percent of Syrians believe the United States and its allies are behind the creation of the Islamic State terrorist group, a recent survey found.

Conducted by research firm ORB International, the survey questioned 1,365 Syrians throughout the country on matters regarding the Islamic State and the nation’s ongoing turmoil.

“81% [of Syrians polled]… believe that ISIL is a foreign/American made group,” the survey states.

The poll’s conclusions are unsurprising given both comments and the general sentiment from residents in the Middle East in light of the Islamic State’s continued advance across the region.

Just last June, a Wall Street Journal reporter speaking with Iraqi refugees in Baghdad found agrowing number of residents believed the United States was directly supporting ISIS terrorists after multiple US weapons airdrops reportedly fell into the hands of jihadists in 2014.

“We don’t have any trust in Americans anymore,” said prominent lawmaker Alia Nusseif. “We now think ISIS is being used as a tool by America to divide and weaken Iraq.”

Regardless of whether Western powers created ISIS as some claim, Pentagon documents recently uncovered by political watchdog Judicial Watch revealed that the US deliberately used al-Qaeda and other radical groups to destabilize Syria – leading to the rise of the Islamic State.

“According to the newly declassified US document, the Pentagon foresaw the likely rise of the ‘Islamic State’ as a direct consequence of this strategy, and warned that it could destabilize Iraq,” Insurge Intelligence writer Nafeez Ahmed wrote. “Despite anticipating that Western, Gulf state and Turkish support for the ‘Syrian opposition’ — which included al-Qaeda in Iraq — could lead to the emergence of an ‘Islamic State’ in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the document provides no indication of any decision to reverse the policy of support to the Syrian rebels.”

During an interview with Al Jazeera’s Mehdi Hasan, retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), openly admitted that the policy of supporting terrorist groups was a “willful decision” of the Obama administration.

“I think it was a decision. I think it was a willful decision,” Flynn said.

Despite clearly having a role in Iraq and Syria’s destabilization, Western governments continue to justify further intervention overseas in the name of fighting ISIS terrorists.

In early 2015, Yousaf al Salafi, a man believed to be the Pakistani commander of the Islamic State, confessed during investigations that he has been receiving money through the United States.

A few months after al Salafi revealed the funding he was receiving was routed through the United States, Michael Flynn, former director of Obama’s Defence Intelligence Agency, said he warned the Obama administration three years ago that the groups they were funding in Syria were actually Islamic jihadists. Now, a group of 50 intelligence analysts working out of the U.S. military’s Central Command have complained that their reports on Islamic State and the Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda were being incorrectly changed by senior officials.

On January 22, law enforcing agencies in Pakistan claimed they arrested not only al Salafi, but also two other people during a raid in the city of Lahore. A source familiar with the investigation told Daily Express that during the investigation al Salafi admitted he received funding to run the organisation in Pakistan and “recruit young people to fight in Syria.” The Pakistani-Syrian entered Pakistan via Turkey last year, but it was previously reported that he crossed into Turkey from Syria, was caught there but managed to escape and went to Pakistan to establish ISIS in the region.

Daily Express cited sources as saying that John Kerry, the U.S. Secretary of State was familiar with al Salafi’s revelations and so was CENTCOM chief General Lloyd Austin. Al Salafi confessed he was recruiting people with a Pakistani accomplice to send them to Syria and was receiving around US$600 per person.

A recently declassified 2012 document shows that “Salafist, the Muslim Brotherhood and AQI [Al-Qaeda in Iraq]” were listed as the “major forces driving the insurgency in Syria.” The document also revealed that “the West, Gulf countries and Turkey support the opposition while Russia, China and Iran support the regime.” According to the declassified document, the Obama administration was warned in 2012 that these Islamic jihadists wanted to create a “Salafist principality in eastern Syria” and that ISI [Islamic State of Iraq] could declare an Islamic State through its union with other terrorist organizations in Iraq and Syria, which will create grave danger in regards to unifying Iraq and the protection of its territory.”

Now, over 50 intelligence analysts have formally claimed their reports on Islamic State and al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria were altered by senior officials, The Daily Beast reported. An investigation into the alleged manipulation of intelligence has been opened.

A couple of months ago, two senior analysts at CENTCOM claimed in a written complaint to the Defence Department inspector general that the reports described the terror groups as weaker than they believe they are. The reports, some of which were briefed to the U.S. president, were altered by CENTCOM senior officials to make sure it adheres to the presidential administration’s public line that the United States is winning the fight against Islamic State and an al-Qaeda branch in Syria named al-Nusra, the analysts told the publication. The written complaint was supported by 50 other intelligence analysts.

In recent months, members of the Obama administration have tried to convince the population that the fight against ISIS may soon be over. “ISIS is losing,” John Allen, retired Marine general charged with coordinating the Islamic State campaign said in July.

The UK government has committed itself to a 2 per cent of GDP military spending target (MacLellan, 2015) for the next five years on the basis of demands for more foreign military interventions.

In each of the last 100 years Britain has been involved in military conflict somewhere on Earth (Cobain et al., 2014). It is a habitual invader of other countries. Intense Anglo-American imperialist violence has played a key role in creating the current vicious and expanding cycle of conflict in the Middle East, North Africa and other parts of the Third World.

The wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and elsewhere have been a colossal waste of resources and of lives. A million people (as well as millions of animals) have been killed in the Second Iraq War (Physicians for Social Responsibility et al., 2015) and, according to a recent study, as many as 2 million people (ibid.)may have died as a result of the global terroristic “war on terror”.

Apart from continuing to cause extreme and mass suffering, these conflicts create immense bitterness against the West, Britain and the US in particular. More than a decade of savage war has shown that violence only breeds more violence and that hatred and bombing cannot bring peace. More interventions will only add fuel to this inferno of hatred and inhumanity.

War constitutes the sunset of civilisation. It should be obvious that money should instead be used to generously invest in re-building these wretched, war-stricken countries, to invest in peacebuilding, education and human development, to build bridges instead of creating more enemies for the West.

Britain’s military spending is already much higher than that of other European countries (SIPRI, 2015a). Furthermore, the political elite is planning to squander a £100 billion of public money on the new generation of Trident nuclear weapons (Norton-Taylor, 2015). Military spending increased by 19 per cent in real terms between 1998 and 2008 (Chalmers, 2011). More than 37 billion pounds are spent each year (SIPRI, 2015b) on the military and on foreign wars (the full figure is much higher and includes the increasing budget given to the security services, the cost of healthcare for veterans, etc.).

A recent report stated that the global cost of war last year alone was US$14 trillion (Telesur, 2015). By comparison, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN claims that $30 billion a yearwould be sufficient to eradicate world hunger, which affects close to a billion people (FAO, 2008). Professor Jean Ziegler (the UN’s former Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food) stated that around 36 million people are dying as a result of hunger and malnutrition every year. According to these figures, around half of the UK annual military budget would be sufficient to save the lives of tens of millions of starving people each year.The resources squandered on the UK military budget could therefore save the lives of hundreds of millions of people in the space of a single decade. We are living under an evil, grotesquely anti-human system.

Increased military spending is particularly wrong at a time when the Conservative government is implementing severe cuts in the budgets for healthcare, education and welfare. These are core public services which are essential for creating and sustaining civilised public life.

Instead of enriching private military corporations and the rest of the military establishment, resources should be channelled towards improving the education system, building a greener economy, housing the homeless, feeding the poor, and providing the best possible medical care for Britain’s population. Hundreds of thousands of people are facing homelessness in Britain (Sparkes, 2015), each year tens of thousands of people die ofhypothermia because they cannot afford heating (BBC, 1999), thousands of people are facing long delays for cancer treatment(Campbell, 2015) and thousands of poor children are left to suffer and die each year due to a lack of funds for potentially life-saving cancer treatment (Reuters, 2004). Real existential threats which affect a large segment of the British population are being callously disregarded while the causes and the extent of the terrorist threat are being intentionally misrepresented. One report found that more US citizens die each year due to being crushed by their own furniture than have died as a result of Islamist terrorism since 9/11 (Greenwald, 2015). Besides, it is the brutal and cynical Anglo-American policy of permanent war and imperialist control which is fomenting extremism and violence. True human security is being sacrificed at the altar of the militarist Moloch. What are we actually defending when we’re shutting down hospitals and fire stations?

The peace movement needs to continually reveal the links between the British establishment’s commitment to perpetual war abroad and permanent structural violence at home. As Tony Benn (2005, n.p.) wrote: “The Stop the War movement might even be regarded as a Start the Peace movement dedicated to challenging the capitalist concept of globalisation involving exploitation and bloodshed by offering a perspective of internationalism, cooperation and solidarity”.

Militarism and neoliberal austerity are inextricably linked, which is why the anti-war and anti-austerity movements have to work closely together. It is not possible to truly challenge either without challenging both at the same time. Stop the War Coalition is committed to maintaining its vital role in this united struggle for peace and social justice.

Daniel Jakopovich is a writer, researcher, a member of the Council of the International Peace Bureau and a national organiser of the Stop the War Coalition. He is the editor of the Novi Plamen journal for peace studies, politics and culture. He was a guest lecturer at the University of Cambridge and at several other universities. His forthcoming book is entitled Essays in Defence of Human Dignity.

Notes:

BBC, Hypothermia, BBC, 10 February 1999,http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/medical_notes/276284.stm

Benn, T., Foreword, in Murray, A. and German, L., Stop the War: The Story of Britain’s Biggest Mass Movement, Bookmarks, London, 2005

Campbell, D., More NHS Hospitals Beach Waiting Times for Cancer Treatment, The Guardian, 20 May 2015,http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/may/20/more-nhs-hospitals-breach-waiting-times-for-cancer-treatment

Chalmers, M., The Lean Years: Defence Consequences of the Fiscal Crisis, in Codner, M. and Clarke, M., A Question of Strategy: The British Defence Review in an Age of Austerity, I.B. Tauris & Co., London and New York, 2011

Cobain, I, MacAskill, E. and Stoddard, K., Britain’s Hundred Years of Conflict, The Guardian, 11 February 2014,http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/ng-interactive/2014/feb/11/britain-100-years-of-conflict

FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization), The World Only Needs 30 Billion Dollars a Year to Eradicate the Scourge of Hunger, Food and Agriculture Organization, 2008,http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2008/1000853/index.html

Greenwald, G., The Greatest Obstacle to Anti-Muslim Fearmongering and Bigotry: Reality, The Intercept, 24 June 2015, https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/06/24/greatest-obstacle-anti-muslim-fear-mongering-bigotry-reality/

MacLellan, K., Britain Commits to NATO 2 Percent Defense Spending Target for Next Five Years, Reuters, 8 July 2015,http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/08/us-britain-economy-budget-defence-idUSKCN0PI1IL20150708

Norton-Taylor, R., Trident: Parliament Debates £100bn Project – At Last, The Guardian, 20 January 2015,http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/defence-and-security-blog/2015/jan/20/trident-uk-s-nuclear-arsenal-commons-debate

Physicians for Social Responsibility, Physicians for Global Survival and International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, Body Count: Casualty Figures after Ten Years of the “War on Terror”, 2015, http://www.ippnw.de/commonFiles/pdfs/Frieden/Body_Count_first_international_edition_2015_final.pdf

Reuters, Poor Children With Cancer ‘Left to Die’, The Guardian, 16 February 2004, http://www.theguardian.com/society/2004/feb/16/medicineandhealth.lifeandhealth1

SIPRI (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute),Trends in World Military Expenditure 2014, SIPRI, Stockholm, 2015a, http://books.sipri.org/product_info?c_product_id=496

SIPRI (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute), SIPRI Military Expenditure Database, SIPRI, Stockholm, 2015b,http://www.sipri.org/research/armaments/milex/milex_database/milex_database

Sparkes, J., Homelessness Is Much Worse Than it Appears and Politicians Must Act, The Guardian, 4 February 2015,http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/feb/04/numbers-of-homeless-much-greater-than-official-figures-political-parties-must-take-action

TELESUR, Global Cost of War Was $14 Trillion Last Year, TELESUR, 19 June 2015, http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Global-Cost-of-War-Was-14-Trillion-Last-Year–20150619-0038.html

Ziegler, J., Independent Expert on Effects of Structural Adjustment, Special Rapporteur on Right to Food Present Reports, United Nations, 2004, http://www.un.org/press/en/2004/hrcn1064.doc.htm

Some 61,000 people have signed a petition against perceived BBC bias towards Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. As the broadcaster routinely refers to Corbyn as ‘left-wing,’ signatories say David Cameron should likewise be tagged Britain’s ‘right-wing’ prime minister.

The petition, started by Amanda Drury, says “every time Jeremy Corbyn is mentioned in a news report on the BBC he is referred to as ‘the left wing Labour Party leader.’”

In the interest of fairness and un-biased reporting, David Cameron should also be referred to in terms of his place on the political spectrum – ‘the right-wing prime minister.’

In a statement, a BBC spokesman said: “Our journalists use descriptions of different political leanings to help the audience’s understanding or where there is a specific editorial justification.

Mr Corbyn was to the left of the other candidates and now he has been elected it is fair and accurate to say the Labour leadership is more to the left, or more ‘left wing’ than before.

“We do not use such labels in every instance, but we have taken a similar approach with the different political shades of other parties,” the spokesman added.

The BBC has been wracked with accusations of bias in recent months, mostly over its coverage of foreign policy issues.

Jeremy Corbyn © Peter Nicholls / Reuters

In June, the BBC acknowledged its presenter Sarah Montague did not adequately challenge controversial comments made by Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon about Palestine on the broadcaster’s flagship Radio 4 Today program.

Mr Ya’alon was allowed to make several controversial statements on those matters without any meaningful challenge and the program makers have accepted that the interviewer ought to have interrupted him and questioned him on his assertions.

In a statement, a BBC spokesman said: “The BBC has reached a provisional finding that the complaints should be upheld and will be taking comments from the complainants into account before finalizing the outcome.”

The interview, which took place on March 19, saw the minister make a number of contestable claims, which political groups say went unchallenged.

These include Ya’alon’s claim that Palestinians “enjoy already political independence. They have their own political system, government, parliament, municipalities and so forth. And we are happy with it. We don’t want to govern them whatsoever.”

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Despite public hesitation on the issue of Montenegro’s membership in NATO, yesterday  the country’s parliament adopted a symbolic resolution in favor of a future accession to the alliance.  Hereby we publish a briefing by our permanent contributor with an analysis of geopolitical context and possible implications of the chamber decision. (Oriental Review)

The tiny Balkan state of Montenegro is having a Ukrainian-esque “either-or” choice forced upon its population, which in this case is whether or not the country should join NATO by the end of the year. By all indications, the US will support an initiative to extend membership to Montenegro during the upcoming NATO meeting in December, and the almost more than two-decade-long-straight Djukanovic government appears more than eager to accept. The trouble, however, is that just as many people are against joining the military bloc as those who support doing so, and the Democratic Front party has called for the entire opposition to gather in the capital on 27 September to protest against the government’s unilateral action. They say that it would beundemocratic for such a significant decision to be made without a referendum, let alone in such a near-even polarized political climate, and the forthcoming manifestations next weekend in Podgorica might turn into a social referendum on the government itself. With Montenegro heading towards what might turn out to be a mountain of trouble, it’s important for observers to bring themselves up to speed on the situation and place it into the larger geopolitical context.

Operation: Serbia

It’s impossible to separate NATO’s actions in Montenegro from its larger strategic goals in Serbia. The two populations enjoy exceptionally fraternal relations, and one could argue that if it wasn’t for the1999 War on Yugoslavia, they’d still be united under one state. History doesn’t have any hypotheticals, however, so one must deal with the present as it currently is, and the contemporary situation is that one of the two very similar states, Montenegro, is on the cusp of joining the exact same organization that bombed it and its then-fellow Serbian countrymen 16 years ago. Aside from the national humiliation that this entails, it must also be looked at as a maneuver to further split the two brotherly states along military lines, with a NATO-dedicated Montenegro almost completing the full encirclement of Serbia and enacting heightened psychological pressure on Belgrade for that very fact.

Other than the military reasons associated with this development, there are also more subtle political-economic ones as well. History demonstrates that many future EU members first ‘paid their dues’ in NATO before being allowed to join the EU, and it looks to be no different in the case of Montenegro. The reason Djukanovic is so gung-ho about joining the EU is so that he can attain ‘institutional legitimacy’ for his vast family-controlled business empire, which includes everything from cigarette smuggling to beachfront property. His enthusiasm for the carrot of potential membership is so great that he even ordered his government to enact sanctions against Russia as a signal of solidarity with Brussels. This decision was made despite the fact a third of all registered companies are linked to Russia. Moscow has of course retaliated with agricultural counter-sanctions and earlier threats to revoke the visa-free travel agreement that brings so many Russian holidaymakers and their checkbooks to the country each year. The reason Djukanovic would risk such self-inflicted economic damage to his country is evident, and that’s to clean out all the other businesses he and his family have yet to own in order to acquire them for bare-bottom prices shortly thereafter.

Popular Pushback

The people of Montenegro aren’t taking their undemocratic whipping and forthcoming fleecing quietly, however, as the Movement for Neutrality plans to become the core of popular resistance to both NATO and Djukanovic. As mentioned in the beginning of the briefing, the goal is for them and the Democratic Front to gather the disaffected masses on 27 September to stage a patriotic and peaceful resistance to the country’s current direction. Think of it as a reverse of the historic pro-government rally in nearby Macedonia back in May, just this time with crowds of well-behaved anti-government protesters whose numbers also greatly overwhelm their political rivals. The purpose of this manifestation is to show the world that democracy and the peoples’ will must be respected in their country, which once again follows in the footsteps that the Macedonians so bravely set a couple months before them.

Other motivators that could attract more people to protest are the deep bonds still felt by many Montenegrins towards their Serbian cultural brethren. The people of Montenegro understand the aggressive and unnecessary message that their ascension to NATO would send to their neighbors across the mountains, and in the interests of preserving friendly relations with them, they may decide to make a public statement through their protest action. More tangible to most Montenegrin families, however, is the premeditated economic calamity that Djukanovic is plotting for the population. As mentioned in the previous section, he purposely wants to destroy Russian-affiliated businesses (over a third of the country’s total) so that his family empire can swallow them up for enormous profit, but given the scope of how many people would be affected by this aggressive ‘corporate takeover’, it’s foreseeable that they might want to make one last hurrah in reversing the impending economic failure that their Prime Minister has planned for them. All of these factors thus combine to prove that any protest actions that take place on 27 September won’t be directed solely against NATO, but will also be an expression of popular outrage against Djukanovic.

Concluding Thoughts

The government is keenly aware of the main reason why so many people might turn out against it next weekend, which is why the potential for state-sponsored violence (either directly or through proxy mob) is so high. In a country with only a little bit more than 600,000 people, it’s easy for one political provocation or false flag attack to literally engulf the entire population in chaos. This means that Montenegro might enter into an acute crisis if enough citizens demonstrate on behalf of the opposition and Djukanovic gives the panicked order to use force against them if he feels his rule is threatened. His gangster mentality dictates that he would automatically resort to such ‘reflexes’, and the geopolitical situation is such that his NATO and EU affiliations would predictably shield him from any Western criticism for attacking what would likely by that time have already been slandered as “Putin’s proxies”. Nevertheless, this doesn’t mean that Montenegrins won’t take a page out of the Macedonians’ playbook and staunchly resist the foreign-supported force that’s attempting to take over their country, and it might just be that in hindsight one realizes that it was both peoples’ democratic resistance that finally put the brakes on NATO’s “Drang nach Suden” (Drive to the South).

Andrew Korybko is the American political commentaror currently working for the Sputnik agency.

Last week, US officials once again marked the anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington with solemn speeches vowing a never-ending war on terrorism. President Barack Obama spoke to US troops at Fort Meade, Maryland about “significant threats coming from terrorist organizations and a terrorist ideology,” while US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter vowed at a Pentagon ceremony that “terrorists will not escape the long arm and the hard fist of American justice.”

Alongside this official 9/11 rhetoric, which grows more hollow with every passing year, a different discussion is taking place within the ruling political establishment and the military and intelligence apparatus. It centers on a proposal that Washington recruit factions of Al Qaeda—the group blamed for the attacks that killed nearly 3,000 14 years ago—as its proxy troops in a simultaneous war against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad.

The point man for this scheme is David Petraeus, the retired four-star Army general who served as the director of the Central Intelligence Agency after postings as the US military commander in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

The attention given to Petraeus’ proposal is indicative of the continuing influence that he wields within US ruling circles, despite his sacking as CIA director over illegally passing binders filled with highly classified information to his biographer and mistress, Paula Broadwell. He received only a misdemeanor conviction and a sentence of a $100,000 fine and two years probation for essentially the same offense for which Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 35 years in a military prison. Manning leaked information documenting war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq in which Petraeus himself was among those most directly responsible.

In recent weeks, Petraeus has confirmed the thrust of a story that first appeared on the DailyBeast web site, which quoted unnamed sources in Washington to the effect that the retired general “has been quietly urging U.S. officials to consider using so-called moderate members of al Qaeda’s Al Nusra Front to fight ISIS in Syria.”

Petraeus told CNN: “… it might be possible at some point to peel off so-called ‘reconcilables’ who would be willing to renounce Nusra and align with the moderate opposition (supported by the US and the coalition) to fight against Nusra, ISIL, and Assad.”

In promoting his plan, Petraeus boasts about the supposed “success” of his “surge” policy in Iraq, which included the “peeling off” of Sunni elements that had fought against the US occupation, intimidating and bribing them into forming the “Sons of Iraq” militias to combat Al Qaeda in Iraq. In reality, the “Sons of Iraq” quickly disappeared after the US withdrew the bulk of its troops and with the relentless growth of sectarian tensions first fostered by the US occupation’s divide-and-conquer strategy. Today, many of those who comprised the “Sons of Iraq” are part of ISIS.

Some media liberals have feigned shock at Petraeus’ proposal to harness Al Qaeda to the US war wagon in Syria. In reality, the plan is fully in line with policies pursued both before and after 9/11 of using armed Islamist factions to advance US imperialist interests in the Middle East.

Al Qaeda itself was the product of the CIA-orchestrated war waged by the so-called mujahideen against the Soviet-backed government of Afghanistan that plunged that country into decades of war, costing millions of lives. Osama bin Laden worked closely with the CIA and its Pakistani and Saudi intelligence counterparts.

Well before that, US policy in the region was pursued through the support of Islamist elements as a counterweight to radical nationalist and socialist movements in the Arab world. Washington covertly funded and mobilized right-wing Islamists as a crucial component of the CIA-backed 1953 coup that toppled the Mossadegh government, which had nationalized Western oil interests in Iran, ushering in the Shah’s 25-year dictatorship. In Egypt, it secretly supported the Muslim Brotherhood against the government of Col. Abdel Nasser, during the period when it nationalized the Suez Canal.

More recently, the Obama administration relied upon Islamist militias, including elements who had previously been targeted by Washington for their affiliation to Al Qaeda, as proxy ground troops in the 2011 US-NATO air war to topple the secular government of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya.

Fresh from its “success” in murdering Gaddafi, destroying Libya’s government and plunging the country into bloody chaos that continues to this day, the White House and the CIA embarked on a similar venture in Syria, relying on similar elements.

Under the guiding hand of the CIA, Washington’s key regional allies—Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar—funneled billions of dollars worth of arms and aid into the Al-Nusra Front, ISIS and other Islamist militias, which have, from the beginning, served as the main fighting force in the Western-backed war for regime change in Syria.

With the rise of ISIS and its offensive last year that routed the US-trained and armed security forces in Iraq, the policy of aggression and subversion pursued by the Obama administration in the region produced a debacle. Billions of dollars more worth of US weaponry fell into the hands of ISIS from the fleeing Iraqi troops.

The proposed turn to the Al-Nusra Front is a tacit admission that the so-called “moderate opposition,” touted for years by US officials, does not exist on the ground in Syria. The Pentagon’s abortive attempt to arm and train “vetted” rebels has proven an unmitigated fiasco, with the handful sent back into Syria being routed and captured by Al-Nusra, to which they swore fealty. The only indigenous force that has effectively resisted ISIS, the Kurdish militias, have themselves become the principal target of Washington’s main ally in the so-called war against ISIS, Turkey, which is concentrating its firepower on destroying them.

Petraeus is not alone in advocating a turn to Al Qaeda-linked elements to do Washington’s dirty work in Syria. Robert S. Ford, the US ambassador to Syria from 2011 to 2014, drafted an article for Middle East Institute this summer calling for Washington to make an approach to Ahrar al-Sham (Free Men of the Levant) another Islamist militia with its roots in Al Qaeda.

Ford acknowledges that Ahrar al-Sham advocates “an Islamic state in Syria” and a “Sunni theocracy,” but claims that it has “ideological and political differences” with Al-Nusra and Al Qaeda. He admits that its record is “problematic,” with its fighters massacring Alawi civilians and desecrating Christian sites, but points in their defense to a propaganda video showing “its fighters visiting priests.”

Ahrar al-Sham’s founders include Abu Khalid al Suri, who was designated as Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri’s representative in the Levant, and Abu Hafs al Masri, an Egyptian, who was a military commander and trainer for Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. Both have been killed in the last year fighting with the militia.

The call by key men of the state like Petraeus and Ford for a more explicit turn to Al Qaeda-linked forces in Syria only underscores the complete fraud of the “war on terrorism.” It likewise points to the real aims of US imperialism in its current war in Iraq and Syria. Washington is fighting neither against terrorism nor for “democracy” and “human rights.” It is prosecuting another predatory war of aggression aimed at securing a US stranglehold over the Middle East and its vast energy reserves and thereby preparing for even more catastrophic conflicts with Iran, Russia and China.

There can be no dispute that speculative trade in put options – where a party bets that a stock will drop abruptly in value – spiked in the days around September 11, 2001 – even if the US Securities and Exchange Commission and the 9/11 Commission will not say so. More than a few people must have had advance warning of the terror attacks, and they cashed in to the tune of millions of dollars.

Is there any truth in the allegations that informed circles made substantial profits in the financial markets in connection to the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, on the United States?

Arguably, the best place to start is by examining put options, which occurred around Tuesday, September 11, 2001, to an abnormal extent, and at the beginning via software that played a key role: the Prosecutor’s Management Information System, abbreviated as PROMIS. [i]

PROMIS is a software program that seems to be fitted with almost „magical“ abilities. Furthermore, it is the subject of a decades-long dispute between its inventor, Bill Hamilton, and various people/institutions associated with intelligence agencies, military and security consultancy firms. [1]

One of the „magical“ capabilities of PROMIS, one has to assume, is that it is equipped with artificial intelligence and was apparently from the outset “able to simultaneously read and integrate any number of different computer programs or databases, regardless of the language in which the original programs had been written or the operating systems and platforms on which that database was then currently installed.“ [2]

And then it becomes really interesting:

What would you do if you possessed software that could think, understand every major language in the world, that provided peep-holes into everyone else’s computer „dressing rooms“, that could insert data into computers without people’s knowledge, that could fill in blanks beyond human reasoning, and also predict what people do – before they did it? You would probably use it, wouldn’t you? [3]

Granted, these capabilities sound hardly believable. In fact, the whole story of PROMIS, which Mike Ruppert develops in the course of his book Crossing the Rubicon in all its bizarre facets and turns, seems as if someone had developed a novel in the style of Philip K Dick and William Gibson. However, what Ruppert has collected about PROMIS is based on reputable sources as well as on results of personal investigations, which await a jury to take a first critical look at.

This seems all the more urgent if you add to the PROMIS capabilities „that it was a given that PROMIS was used for a wide variety of purposes by intelligence agencies, including the real-time monitoring of stock transactions on all the world´s major financial markets“. [4]

We are therefore dealing with a software that

a) Infiltrates computer and communication systems without being noticed.
b) Can manipulate data.
c) Is capable to track the global stock market trade in real time.

Point c is relevant to all that happened in connection with the never completely cleared up transactions that occurred just before September 11, [5] and of which the former chairman of the Deutsche Bundesbank Ernst Weltke said „could not have been planned and carried out without a certain knowledge“. [6]

I specifically asked financial journalist Max Keiser, who for years had worked on Wall Street as a stock and options trader, about the put option trades. Keiser pointed out in this context that he „had spoken with many brokers in the towers of the World Trade Center around that time. “I heard firsthand about the airline put trade from brokers at Cantor Fitzgerald days before.“ He then talked with me about an explosive issue, on which Ruppert elaborated in detail in Crossing the Rubicon.

Max Keiser: There are many aspects concerning these option purchases that have not been disclosed yet. I also worked at Alex Brown & Sons (ABS). Deutsche Bank bought Alex Brown & Sons in 1999. When the attacks occurred, ABS was owned by Deutsche Bank. An important person at ABS was Buzzy Krongard. I have met him several times at the offices in Baltimore. Krongard had transferred to become executive director at the CIA. The option purchases, in which ABS was involved, occurred in the offices of ABS in Baltimore. The noise which occurred between Baltimore, New York City and Langley was interesting, as you can imagine, to say the least.

Under consideration here is the fact that Alex Brown, a subsidiary of Deutsche Bank (where many of the alleged 9/11 hijackers handled their banking transactions – for example Mohammed Atta) traded massive put options purchases on United Airlines Company UAL through the Chicago Board Option Exchange (CBOE) – „to the embarrassment of investigators“, as British newspaper The Independent reported. [7]

Michael Ruppert

On September 12, the chairman of the board of Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, Mayo A Shattuck III, suddenly and quietly renounced his post, although he still had a three-year contract with an annual salary of several million US dollars. One could perceive that as somehow strange.

A few weeks later, the press spokesperson of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) at that time, Tom Crispell, declined all comments, when he was contacted for a report for Ruppert´s website From the Wilderness, and had being asked „whether the Treasury Department or FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation] had questioned CIA executive director and former Deutsche Bank-Alex Brown CEO [chief executive officer], A B ‚Buzzy‘ Krongard, about CIA monitoring of financial markets using PROMIS and his former position as overseer of Brown’s ‚private client‘ relations.“ [8]

Just before he was recruited personally by former CIA chief George Tenet for the CIA, Krongard supervised mainly private client banking at Alex Brown. [9]

In any case, after 9/11 on the first trading day, when the US stock markets were open again, the stock price of UAL declined by 43%. (The four aircraft hijacked on September 11 were American Airlines Flight 11, American Airlines Flight 77 and UAL flights 175 and 93.)

With his background as a former options trader, Keiser explained an important issue to me in that regard.

Max Keiser: Put options are, if they are employed in a speculative trade, basically bets that stock prices will drop abruptly. The purchaser, who enters a time-specific contract with a seller, does not have to own the stock at the time when the contract is purchased.

Related to the issue of insider trading via (put or call) options there is also a noteworthy definition by the Swiss economists Remo Crameri, Marc Chesney and Loriano Mancini, notably that an option trade may be „identified as informed“ – but is not yet (legally) proven – „when it is characterized by an unusual large increment in open interest and volume, induces large gains, and is not hedged in the stock market“. [10]

Open interest describes contracts which have not been settled (been exercised) by the end of the trading session, but are still open. Not hedged in the stock market means that the buyer of a (put or call) option holds no shares of the underlying asset, by which he might be able to mitigate or compensate losses if his trade doesn’t work out, or phrased differently: one does not hedge, because it is unnecessary, since one knows that the bet is one, pardon, „dead sure thing.“ (In this respect it is thus not really a bet, because the result is not uncertain, but a foregone conclusion.)

In this case, the vehicle of the calculation was „ridiculously cheap put options which give the holder the ‘right‘ for a period of time to sell certain shares at a price which is far below the current market price – which is a highly risky bet, because you lose money if at maturity the market price is still higher than the price agreed in the option. However, when these shares fell much deeper after the terrorist attacks, these options multiplied their value several hundred times because by now the selling price specified in the option was much higher than the market price. These risky games with short options are a sure indication for investors who knew that within a few days something would happen that would drastically reduce the market price of those shares.“ [11]

Software such as PROMIS in turn is used with the precise intent to monitor the stock markets in real time to track price movements that appear suspicious. Therefore, the US intelligence services must have received clear warnings from the singular, never before sighted transactions prior to 9/11.

Of great importance with regard to the track, which should lead to the perpetrators if you were seriously contemplating to go after them, is this:

Max Keiser: The Options Clearing Corporation has a duty to handle the transactions, and does so rather anonymously – whereas the bank that executes the transaction as a broker can determine the identity of both parties.

But that may have hardly ever been the intention of the regulatory authorities when the track led to, amongst others, Alvin Bernard „Buzzy“ Krongard, Alex Brown & Sons and the CIA. Ruppert, however, describes this case in Crossing the Rubicon in full length as far as possible. [12]

In addition, there are also ways and means for insiders to veil their tracks. In order to be less obvious,

„the insiders could trade small numbers of contracts. These could be traded under multiple accounts to avoid drawing attention to large trading volumes going through one single large account. They could also trade small volumes in each contract but trade more contracts to avoid drawing attention. As open interest increases, non-insiders may detect a perceived signal and increase their trading activity. Insiders can then come back to enter into more transactions based on a seemingly significant trade signal from the market. In this regard, it would be difficult for the CBOE to ferret out the insiders from the non-insiders, because both are trading heavily.“ [13]

The matter which needs clarification here is generally judged by Keiser as follows:

Max Keiser: My thought is that many (not all) of those who died on 9/11 were financial mercenaries – and we should feel the same about them as we feel about all mercenaries who get killed. The tragedy is that these companies mixed civilians with mercenaries, and that they were also killed. So have companies on Wall Street used civilians as human shields maybe?

According to a report by Bloomberg published in early October 2001, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) began a probe into certain stock market transactions around 9/11 that included 38 companies, among them: American Airlines, United Airlines, Continental Airlines, Northwest Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Boeing, Lockheed Martin Corp., American Express Corp., American International Group, AXA SA, Bank of America Corp., Bank of New York Corp., Bear Stearns, Citigroup, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., Morgan Stanley, General Motors and Raytheon. [14]

So far, so good. In the same month, however, the San Francisco Chronicle newspaper reported that the SEC took the unprecedented step to deputize hundreds, if not even thousands of key stakeholders in the private sector for their investigation. In a statement that was sent to almost all listed companies in the US, the SEC asked the addressed companies to assign senior staff for the investigation, who would be aware of „the sensitive nature“ of the case and could be relied on to „exercise appropriate discretion“. [15]

In essence, it was about controlling information, not about provision and disclosure of facts. Such a course of action involves compromising consequences. Ruppert:

What happens when you deputize someone in a national security or criminal investigation is that you make it illegal for them to disclose publicly what they know. Smart move. In effect, they become government agents and are controlled by government regulations rather than their own conscience. In fact, they can be thrown into jail without a hearing if they talk publicly. I have seen this implied threat time after time with federal investigators, intelligence agents, and even members of United States Congress who are bound so tightly by secrecy oaths and agreements that they are not even able to disclose criminal activities inside the government for fear of incarceration. [16]

Among the reports about suspected insider trading which are mentioned in Crossing the Rubicon/From the Wilderness is a list that was published under the heading „Black Tuesday: The World’s Largest Insider Trading Scam?“ by the Israeli Herzliyya International Policy Institute for Counterterrorism on September 21, 2001:

• Between September 6 and 7, the CBOE saw purchases of 4,744 put options on United Airlines, but only 396 call options. Assuming that 4,000 of the options were bought by people with advance knowledge of the imminent attacks, these „insiders“ would have profited by almost $5 million.
• On September 10, 4,516 put options on American Airlines were bought on the Chicago exchange, compared to only 748 calls. Again, there was no news at that point to justify this imbalance; again, assuming that 4,000 of these options trades represent „insiders“, they would represent a gain of about $4 million.
• [The levels of put options purchased above were more than six times higher than normal.]
• No similar trading in other airlines occurred on the Chicago exchange in the days immediately preceding Black Tuesday.
• Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co, which occupied 22 floors of the World Trade Center, saw 2,157 of its October $45 put options bought in the three trading days before Black Tuesday; this compares to an average of 27 contracts per day before September 6. Morgan Stanley’s share price fell from $48.90 to $42.50 in the aftermath of the attacks. Assuming that 2,000 of these options contracts were bought based upon knowledge of the approaching attacks, their purchasers could have profited by at least $1.2 million.
• Merrill Lynch & Co, with headquarters near the Twin Towers, saw 12,215 October $45 put options bought in the four trading days before the attacks; the previous average volume in those shares had been 252 contracts per day (a 1200% increase). When trading resumed, Merrill’s shares fell from $46.88 to $41.50; assuming that 11,000 option contracts were bought by „insiders“, their profit would have been about $5.5 million.
• European regulators are examining trades in Germany’s Munich Re, Switzerland’s Swiss Re, and AXA of France, all major reinsurers with exposure to the Black Tuesday disaster. (Note: AXA also owns more than 25% of American Airlines stock, making the attacks a „double whammy“ for them.) [17]

• Concerning the statements of the former chairman of the Deutsche Bundesbank Ernst Welteke, their tenor in various press reports put together is as follows:

German central bank president Ernst Welteke later reports that a study by his bank indicates, „There are ever clearer signs that there were activities on international financial markets that must have been carried out with the necessary expert knowledge,“ not only in shares of heavily affected industries such as airlines and insurance companies, but also in gold and oil. [Daily Telegraph, 9/23/2001] His researchers have found „almost irrefutable proof of insider trading“. [Miami Herald, 9/24/2001] „If you look at movements in markets before and after the attack, it makes your brow furrow. But it is extremely difficult to really verify it.“ Nevertheless, he believes that „in one or the other case it will be possible to pinpoint the source“. [Fox News, 9/22/2001] Welteke reports „a fundamentally inexplicable rise“ in oil prices before the attacks [Miami Herald, 9/24/2001] and then a further rise of 13 percent the day after the attacks. Gold rises nonstop for days after the attacks. [Daily Telegraph, 9/23/2001] [18]

Related to those observations, I sent a request via e-mail to the press office of the Deutsche Bundesbank on August 1, 2011, from which I was hoping to learn:

How did the Bundesbank deal with this information?

Did US federal agencies ask to see the study?

With whom did the Bundesbank share this information? And additionally:

1. Can you confirm that there is such a study of the Bundesbank concerning 9/11 insider trading, which was carried out in September 2001?
2. If Yes: what is the title?
3. If Yes: who were the authors?
4. If Yes: has the study ever been made available to the public?

On August 2, I was then informed: „Your mail has been received by us and is being processed under the number 2011 / 011551.“ Ultimately, however, the press office of the Deutsche Bundesbank was only available for an oral explanation on the phone. With this explanation, I then turned to the press office of the federal financial regulator in Germany, the Bundesanstalt fur Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht, BaFin, with the following e-mail – and that because of obvious reasons:

Yesterday, I sent a request (see end of this e-mail) to the press office of the Deutsche Bundesbank relating to insider trading connected to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, and respectively relating to an alleged study carried by the Deutsche Bundesbank. The request carries the reference number 2011 / 011551.

The press office or respectively Mr Peter Trautmann was only available for an oral explanation. I repeat this now, because it is related to your entity. This will be followed by my further questions.

According to an oral explanation from the press office of the Deutsche Bundesbank, there has never been a detailed and official study on insider trading from the Bundesbank. Rather, there has been probably ad-hoc analysis with corresponding charts of price movements as briefings for the Bundesbank board. In addition, it would have been the duty of the Bundesfinanzaufsicht to investigate this matter. The press office of the Bundesbank was also not willing to give out any written information, not even after my hint that this alleged study by the Bundesbank has been floating around the Internet for years without any contradiction. That was the oral information from the Bundesbank press office, or respectively from Mr Peter Trautmann.

Now my questions for you:

1. Has the BaFin ever investigated the 9/11 insider trading?
2. With what result? Have the results been made public?
3. Have there not been any grounds for suspicion that would have justified an investigation, for example as damaged enterprise: Munich Re, and as buyers of put options of UAL’s United Airlines Company: Deutsche Bank/Alex Brown?
4. Has the Deutsche Bundesbank ever enquired with BaFin what information they have regarding the 9/11 insider trading – for example for the creation of ad-hoc analysis for the Bundesbank?
5. Have the US federal agencies ever inquired if the BaFin could cooperate with them in an investigation?

Could you reply to me in writing, unlike the Deutsche Bundesbank, please? I would be very grateful for that!

The next day I did indeed receive an e-mail concerning this topic from Anja Engelland, the press officer of the BaFin in which she answered my questions as follows:

1. Yes, the former Bundesaufsichtsamt fur Wertpapierhandel, BAWe (federal supervisory for securities trading), has carried out a comprehensive analysis of the operations.
2. As a result, no evidence of insider trading has been found. Their approach and results have been published by the BAWe or BaFin in the annual reports for the years 2001 (cf S 26/27) and 2002 (cf p 156 above first paragraph). Here are the links. [See here and here.]
3. See annual reports 2001 and 2002. Put options on United Airlines were not traded on German stock exchanges (the first EUREX options on US equities were introduced only after the attacks on 9/11/2001); there were warrants on UAL and other US stocks, but those traded only in low volumes.
4. I personally do not know about such a request. Furthermore, the Bundesbank itself would have to comment on this.
5. BaFin is fundamentally entitled to the exchange of information with foreign supervisory authorities, like SEC, on the basis of written agreements, so-called memoranda of understanding (MoU). Regarding potential inquiries from foreign supervisory authorities, the BaFin can unfortunately not comment, this would be a matter of respective authority. For this I ask for understanding.

Then I wrote another brief note to BaFin, „in order to prevent any misunderstanding: your answers refers, as far as I understand, solely to the financial markets in Germany and Frankfurt, or not?“ The reply from BaFin:

The answers refer to the German financial market as a whole and not only on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. In terms of the assessment of foreign financial markets, the relevant authorities are the competent points of contact.

In my inquiries, I mentioned, among other things, a scientific study by US economist Allen M Poteshman from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which had been carried out in 2006 regarding the put option trading around 9/11 related to the two airlines involved, United Airlines and American Airlines. Poteshman came to this conclusion:

„Examination of the option trading leading up to September 11 reveals that there was an unusually high level of put buying. This finding is consistent with informed investors having traded options in advance of the attacks.“ [19]

Another scientific study was conducted by the economists Wong Wing-Keung (Hong Kong Baptist University, HKBU), Howard E Thompson (University of Wisconsin) and Kweehong Teh (National University of Singapore, NUS), whose findings were published in April 2010 under the title „Was there Abnormal Trading in the S&P 500 Index Options Prior to the September 11 Attacks?“

Motivated by the fact that there had been many media reports about possible insider trading prior to 9/11 in the option markets, the authors looked in this study at the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index (SPX Index Options), in particular with a focus on strategies emanating from a bear market, namely those under the labels „Put Purchase,“ „Put Bear Spread“ and „Naked ITM Call Write“, as each of these are in accordance with the assumption that one would be betting on a general bear market if one wanted to profit in anticipation of the 9/11 event. [20]

Along these lines, the authors refer to an article which Erin E Arvedlund published on October 8, 2001, in Barron’s, the heading of which suggested precisely that thesis:

„Follow the money: Terror plotters could have benefited more from the fall of the entire market than from individual stocks.“ [21]

Basically, Wong, Thompson and Teh came to the conclusion „that our findings show that there was a significant abnormal increase in the trading volume in the option market just before the 9-11 attacks in contrast with the absence of abnormal trading volume far before the attacks“.

More specifically, they stated, „Our findings from the out-of-the-money (OTM), at-the-money (ATM) and in-the-money (ITM) SPX index put options and ITM SPX index call options lead us to reject the null hypotheses that there was no abnormal trading in these contracts before September 11th.“

Instead, they found evidence for „abnormal trading volume in OTM, ATM and ITM SPX index put options“ for September 2001, and also in „ITM-SPX index call options“ for the same month. „In addition, we find that there was evidence of abnormal trading in the September 2001 OTM, ATM and ITM SPX index put options immediately after the 9-11 attacks and before the expiration date. This suggests that owning a put was a valuable investment and those who owned them could sell them for a considerable profit before the expiration date.“

From all of this, they took the position that whilst they couldn’t definitively prove that insiders were active in the market, „our results provide credible circumstantial evidence to support the insider trading claim“. [22]

Disambiguation: „in the money“ means that the circumstances arise on which the owner of a put option is betting – the market price of the underlying asset, for example a stock (or in this case an index of shares), is lower at that moment compared to the price at the time when the transaction took place. „At the money“ means that the price of the underlying asset has remained equal or nearly equal. And „out-of-the-money“ means that the price of the underlying asset has gone up, so the opposite of what the owner of the put option was betting on took place. „In the money“: win. „Out of the money“: loss.

There are also ITM, ATM and OTM options both for trading strategies with put and call options, depending on which kind of risk one would like to take. For example, according to Wong, Thomson and Teh, the „Put-Purchase Strategy“ in the case of a downward movement of the underlying asset „is a cheaper alternative to short-selling of the underlying asset and it is the simplest way to profit when the price of the underlying asset is expected to decline“.

The use of the OTM put option compared to the ITM put option, however, offers „both higher reward and higher risk potentials (…) if the underlying asset falls substantially in price. However, should the underlying asset decline only moderately in price, the ITM put often proves to be the better choice (…) because of the relative price differential.“

That is why speculators would fare best, if they bought ITM put options, „unless the speculators would expect a very substantial decline in the price of the underlying asset.“ [23]

After they calculated such strategies in the light of the available trading data in the CBOE relating to 9/11, the three economists ultimately do not accept a possible counter-argument that their results could be attributed to the fact that the stock markets were generally falling and that there had already been a negative market outlook. Finally they pointed out: „More conclusive evidence is needed to prove definitively that insiders were indeed active in the market. Although we have discredited the possibility of abnormal volume due to the declining market, such investigative work would still be a very involved exercise in view of the multitude of other confounding factors,“ such as confusing trading strategies, „intentionally employed by the insiders“ in order to attract less attention. [24]

That would be – and if only to invalidate these scientific results once and for all – primarily a task for the SEC, the FBI and other governmental authorities of the United States. However, we will have to wait for this in vain.

I think that not less worthy of a mention is an article that the French financial magazine Les Echos published in September 2007 about a study conducted by two independent economics professors from the University of Zurich, Marc Chesney and Loriano Mancini. Journalist Marina Alcaraz summarized the content of the findings in Les Echos with these words and with these explanations by Professor Chesney, which I for the first time translated into German (and do now translate from French into English):

The atypical volumes, which are very rare for specific stocks lead to the suspicion of insider trading.“ Six years after the attacks on the World Trade Center this is the disturbing results of a recent study by Marc Chesney and Loriano Mancini, professors at the University of Zurich. The authors, one of them a specialist in derivative products, the other a specialist in econometrics, worked on the sales options that were used to speculate on the decline in the prices of 20 large American companies, particularly in the aerospace and financial sector.

Their analysis refers to the execution of transactions between the 6th and 10th of September 2001 compared to the average volumes, which were collected over a long period (10 years for most of the companies). In addition, the two specialists calculated the probability that different options within the same sector in significant volumes would be traded within a few days. „We have tried to see if the movements of specific stocks shortly before the attacks were normal.“ We show that the movements for certain companies such as American Airlines, United Airlines, Merrill Lynch, Bank of America, Citigroup, Marsh & McLehnan are rare from a statistical point of view, especially when compared to the quantities that have been observed for other assets like Coca-Cola or HP,“ explains Marc Chesney, a former Professor at the HEC and co-author of Blanchiment et financement du terrorisme (Money laundering and financing of terrorism), published by Editions Ellipses. „For example 1,535 put option contracts on American Airlines with a strike of $30 and expiry in October 2001 were traded on September 10th, in contrast to a daily average of around 24 contracts over the previous three weeks. The fact that the market was currently in a bear market is not sufficient to explain these surprising volumes.

The authors also examined the profitability of the put options and trades for an investor who acquired such a product between the 6th and 10th September. „For specific titles, the profits were enormous.“ „For example, the investors who acquired put options on Citigroup with an expiry in October 2001 could have made more than $15 million profit,“ he said. On the basis of the connection of data between volumes and profitability, the two authors conclude that „the probability that crimes by Insiders (Insider trading) occurred , is very strong in the cases of American Airlines, United Airlines, Merrill Lynch, Bank of America, Citigroup and JP Morgan. „There is no legal evidence, but these are the results of statistical methods, confirming the signs of irregularities.“ [25]

As Alcaraz continued to state for Les Echos, the study by Chesney/Mancini about possible insider trading related to the 9/11 attacks was not the first of its kind; but it was in sharp contrast to the findings of the US Securities and Exchange Commission SEC and the 9/11 Commission, since they classified the insider trading as negligible – the trades in question had no connection to 9/11 and had „consistently proved innocuous“.

Different in the assessment is also the scientific work that Chesney and Mancini had published together with Remo Crameri in April 2010 at the University of Zurich, „Detecting Informed Trading Activities in the option markets.“ In the segment that is dedicated to the terror attacks of 9/11, the three authors come to the conclusion, that there had been notable insider trading shortly before the terrorist attacks on September 11 that was based on prior knowledge.

Without elaborating on the detailed explanation of the mathematical and statistical method, which the scientific trio applied during the examination of the put option transactions on the CBOE for the period between 1996 and 2006, I summarize some of their significant conclusions.

Companies like American Airlines, United Airlines, Boeing” – the latter company is a contractor of the two airlines as aircraft manufacturer – „and to a lesser extent, Delta Air Lines and KLM seem to have been targets for informed trading activities in the period leading up to the attacks. The number of new put options issued during that period is statistically high and the total gains realized by exercising these options amount to more than $16 million. These findings support the results by Poteshman (2006) who also reports unusual activities in the option market before the terrorist attacks.[26]

In the banking sector, Chesney, Crameri and Mancini found five informed trading activities in connection to 9/11. „For example the number of new put options with underlying stock in Bank of America, Citigroup, JP Morgan and Merrill Lynch issued in the days before the terrorist attacks was at an unusually high level. The realized gains from such trading strategies are around $11 million. [27]

For both areas, the aviation and the banking sector, the authors state that „in nearly all cases the hypothesis“, that the put options were not hedged, cannot be rejected. [28]

Regarding the options traded on EUREX, one of the world’s largest trading places for derivatives, which in 1998 resulted from the merger between the German and Swiss futures exchanges DTB and SOFFEX, Chesney, Mancini and Crameri focused on two reinsurance companies, which incurred costs in terms of billions of dollars in connection with the World Trade Center catastrophe: Munich Re and Swiss Re.

On the basis of EUREX trading data provided by Deutsche Bank, the three scientists detected one informed option trade related to Munich Re, which occurred on August 30, 2001. The authors write:

The detected put option with underlying Munich Re matured at the end of September 2001 and had a strike of € 320 (the underlying asset was traded at € 300, 86 on August 30th). That option shows a large increment in open interest of 996 contracts (at 92.2% quintile of its two-year empirical distribution) on August 30th.

Its price on that day was € 10, 22. … On the day of the terrorist attacks, the underlying stock lost more than 15% (the closing price on September 10th was € 261, 88 and on September 11th € 220, 53) and the option price jumped to € 89, 56, corresponding to a return of 776% in eight trading days. … The gains … related to the exercise of the 996 new put options issued on August 30th correspond to more than 3.4 million.“ Similar is true, according to the authors, for one informed option trade on Swiss Re on August 20, 2001 with „a return of 4,050% in three trading weeks“, or „more than € 8 million. [29]

In a new version of their study that was published on September 7, 2011, the authors stuck to their findings from April 2010. They added the emphasis that in no way the profits gained with the put options to which they point could have been achieved due to sheer fortunate coincidence, but that in fact they were based on prior knowledge which had been exploited. [30]

With those results in terms of what went on at the EUREX according to Chesney, Crameri and Mancini, I again addressed the BaFin, which had written to me that for the financial centers in Germany insider trading around 9/11 could be excluded, and asked:

How does this go with your information that the federal supervisory for securities trading (BAWe) could in its comprehensive analysis not find evidence for insider trading? Do the authors, so to speak, see ghosts with no good reason?

In addition, I stated:

If it is true what Chesney, Crameri and Mancini write, or if you at the BaFin cannot (ad hoc) refute it, would this then cause the BaFin to thoroughly investigate the matter again? If the findings of Chesney, Crameri, and Mancini were true, this would constitute illegal transactions relating to a capital crime, which has no status of limitations, or not?

In case that a need for clarification had arisen at the BaFin, I added Professor Chesney to my e-mail-inquiry in the „carbon copy“ – address field, as because these were the results of his scientific work.

The response that I received from BaFin employee Dominika Kula was as follows:

As I already told you in my e-mail, the former federal supervisory for securities trading (BAWe) carried out a comprehensive analysis of the operations in 2001. As a result, no evidence of insider trading has been found. For clarification purposes, I wish to point out that violations of statutory provisions of securities or criminal law can never be excluded with absolute certainty. In order to pursue and prosecute such matters concrete evidence of an unlawful act is required … Such evidence does not exist here.

With regard to the sources you mentioned, I ask for understanding that I can neither comment on scientific analyses, nor on reviews by third parties.

Regarding the statutes of limitations for offences relating to the violation insider trading regulations trading I can give you the following information: A violation of the law to prohibit insider trading is punishable with imprisonment up to 5 years or with fines. The statutes of limitations applied for crimes carrying this kind of penalty (section 78 paragraph 3 No. 4 Penal Code) are five years. These limitations are described in the statutes of limitations (§§ 78 et seq.) (Criminal Code).

In addition, I turned to the EUREX with three questions:

1. How do you as EUREX comment on the findings of Messrs Chesney, Mancini and Crameri?
2. Did you at EUREX perceive the particular trading in Munich Re and Swiss Re it in any way as strange?
3. Have domestic (eg BAWe and BaFin) or foreign (such as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission) authorities ever inquired if there may have been evidence of insider trading via the EUREX in connection with the 9/11 attacks?

I subsequently received the following response from Heiner Seidel, the deputy head of the press office of the Deutsche Borse in Frankfurt.

We do not give you a public written response on behalf of the Deutsche Börse or Eurex regarding the topics of your inquiry. This is for the following reason: the trade monitoring agency (HüSt) is part of the Exchange, but it is independent and autonomous. Their investigations are confidential and are carried out in close coordination with the BaFin. They are never public, a request which HüSt is therefore not meaningful.

I leave it to the reader to draw his/her conclusions from these two replies from the press offices of BaFin and Deutsche Borse. Regarding the topic of option trades related to 9/11, I once more talked with Swiss historian Dr Daniele Ganser („Operation Gladio“), by asking him this time about the importance of those put options, which were traded shortly before the attacks of September 11, 2001.

Daniele Ganser: This is an important point. This is about demonstrating that there was insider trading on the international stock exchanges before 11 September. Specifically put options, ie speculation on falling stock prices were traded. Among the affected stocks were United Airlines and American Airlines, the two airlines involved in the attacks.

A colleague of mine, Marc Chesney, professor at the Institute of banking at the University of Zurich, has examined these put options. You first of all have to check if there may have been international speculation that the aviation industry would be experiencing a weak period and whether accordingly also put options on Singapore Airlines, Lufthansa and Swiss were bought. This was not the case.

Very significant put option trades were only transacted for these two airlines involved in the attacks. Secondly, you must examine the ratio of put options to call options and look if they had also been purchased to a similarly significant extent that would constitute speculations on rising stock prices. And that is also not the case. There were only significant put options and only significant transactions for United Airlines and American Airlines.

Now you need to look further in order to see who actually bought the put options, because that would be the insider who made millions on September 11. Most people are unaware that money was also earned with the attacks on September 11. The Security and Exchange Commission, SEC, the Securities and Exchange Commission of the United States, however, does not publish the information on who bought the put options, because you can do this anonymously. It is disturbing that this data is not made public.

What you have is the 9/11 Commission report, and here it is pointed out , that there has been insider trading, but that this insider trading cannot be traced to [al-Qaeda leader] Osama bin Laden, which means that it is highly unlikely that it had been Bin Laden.

Question: If this is not pursued any further, what does it mean?

Daniele Ganser: This means that the investigation of the terrorist attacks was incomplete, and always at the point where there are contradictions to the SURPRISE story, no further investigations are made. It looks very much as if one wants to examine only one story, the investigation is therefore one-sided. But this does not only apply to the put options. [31]

Interestingly enough, when Dr Ganser points out in his reply that this important data is not published, it is actually only half of the truth. Why? The answer is very simple and odd at the same time: David Callahan, the editor of the US magazine SmartCEO, filed a request to the SEC about the put options which occurred prior to September 11 within the framework of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The SEC informed Callahan in its reply of December 23, 2009 under the number „09 07659-FOIA“ as follows:

This letter is in response to your request seeking access to and copies of the documentary evidence referred to in footnote 130 of Chapter 5 of the September 11 (9/11) Commission Report… We have been advised that the potentially responsive records have been destroyed. [32]

Therefore, we will unfortunately never know exactly how the SEC and the 9/11 Commission came to their conclusions regarding the 9/11 put options trading for their final report, because relevant documents were not only held back, but also destroyed – and that in spite of an agreement between the SEC and the National Archive of the United States, in which the SEC has agreed to keep all records for at least 25 years. [33]

The 9/11 Commission report wrote this in footnote 130 of Chapter 5, which briefly focuses on the alleged insider trading:

Highly publicized allegations of insider trading in advance of 9 / 11 generally rest on reports of unusual pre-9/11 trading activity in companies whose stock plummeted after the attacks. Some unusual trading did in fact occur, but each such trade proved to have an innocuous explanation. For example, the volume of put options – investments that pay off only when a stock drops in price – surged in the parent companies of United Airlines on September 6 and American Airlines on September 10 – highly suspicious trading on its face.

Yet, further investigation has revealed that the trading had no connection with 9/11. A single US-based institutional investor with no conceivable ties to al-Qaeda purchased 95 percent of the UAL puts on September 6 as part of a trading strategy that also included buying 115,000 shares of American on September 10. Similarly, much of the seemingly suspicious trading in American on September 10 was traced to a specific US-based options trading newsletter, faxed to its subscribers on Sunday, September 9, which recommended these trades.

These examples typify the evidence examined by the investigation. The SEC and the FBI, aided by other agencies and the securities industry, devoted enormous resources to investigating this issue, including securing the cooperation of many foreign governments. These investigators have found that the apparently suspicious consistently proved innocuous. (Joseph Cella interview (Sept 16, 2003; May 7, 2004; May 10-11, 2004); FBI briefing (Aug 15, 2003); SEC memo, Division of Enforcement to SEC Chair and Commissioners, „Pre-September 11, 2001 Trading Review,“ May 15, 2002; Ken Breen interview (Apr. 23, 2004); Ed G. interview (Feb. 3, 2004).

The author Mark H Gaffney commented on this finding of “innocuousness”:

Notice … the commission makes no mention in its footnote of the 36 other companies identified by the SEC in its insider trading probe. What about the pre-9/11 surge in call options for Raytheon, for instance, or the spike in put options for the behemoth Morgan Stanley, which had offices in WTC 2? The 9/11 Commission Report offers not one word of explanation about any of this. The truth, we must conclude, is to be found between the lines in the report’s conspicuous avoidance of the lion’s share of the insider trading issue.

Indeed, if the trading was truly „innocuous“, as the report states, then why did the SEC muzzle potential whistleblowers by deputizing everyone involved with its investigation? The likely answer is that so many players on Wall Street were involved that the SEC could not risk an open process, for fear of exposing the unthinkable. This would explain why the SEC limited the flow of information to those with a „need to know“, which, of course, means that very few participants in the SEC investigation had the full picture.

It would also explain why the SEC ultimately named no names. All of which hints at the true and frightening extent of criminal activity on Wall Street in the days and hours before 9/11. The SEC was like a surgeon who opens a patient on the operating room table to remove a tumor, only to sew him back up again after finding that the cancer has metastasized through the system.

At an early stage of its investigation, perhaps before SEC officials were fully aware of the implications, the SEC did recommend that the FBI investigate two suspicious transactions. We know about this thanks to a 9/11 Commission memorandum declassified in May 2009 which summarizes an August 2003 meeting at which FBI agents briefed the commission on the insider trading issue. The document indicates that the SEC passed the information about the suspicious trading to the FBI on September 21, 2001, just ten days after the 9/11 attacks.

Although the names in both cases are censored from the declassified document, thanks to some nice detective work by Kevin Ryan we know whom (in one case) the SEC was referring to. The identity of the suspicious trader is a stunner that should have become prime-time news on every network, world-wide. Kevin Ryan was able to fill in the blanks because, fortunately, the censor left enough details in the document to identify the suspicious party who, as it turns out, was none other than Wirt Walker III, a distant cousin to then-president G W Bush.

Several days before 9/11, Walker and his wife Sally purchased 56,000 shares of stock in Stratesec, one of the companies that provided security at the World Trade Center up until the day of the attacks. Notably, Stratesec also provided security at Dulles International Airport, where AA 77 took off on 9/11, and also security for United Airlines, which owned two of the other three allegedly hijacked aircraft. At the time, Walker was a director of Stratesec. Amazingly, Bush’s brother Marvin was also on the board.

Walker’s investment paid off handsomely, gaining $50,000 in value in a matter of a few days. Given the links to the World Trade Center and the Bush family, the SEC lead should have sparked an intensive FBI investigation. Yet, incredibly, in a mind-boggling example of criminal malfeasance, the FBI concluded that because Walker and his wife had „no ties to terrorism … there was no reason to pursue the investigation.“ The FBI did not conduct a single interview. [34]

For this translation, I asked Kevin Ryan via e-mail if he could send me a link for his „nice detective work“. Ryan, who’s in my humble opinion one of roughly 10 people around the world who have to be taken seriously regarding 9/11, replied:

You are referring to my paper „Evidence for Informed Trading on the Attacks of September 11.“ [See here.] The following two references from the paper are relevant to what you are describing. [2] 9/11 Commission memorandum entitled „FBI Briefing on Trading“, prepared by Doug Greenburg, 18 August 2003, [22].

The 9/11 Commission memorandum that summarized the FBI investigations refers to the traders involved in the Stratesec purchase. From the references in the document, we can make out that the two people had the same last name and were related. This fits the description of Wirt and Sally Walker, who were known to be stock holders in Stratesec. Additionally, one (Wirt) was a director at the company, a director at a publicly traded company in Oklahoma (Aviation General), and chairman of an investment firm in Washington, DC (Kuwam Corp). Here are two other recent articles on Stratesec and its operators. [See here and here.]

The stock of Stratesec, I should add by myself, increased in value from $0.75 per share on September 11 to $1.49 per share when the market re-opened on September 17. As a firm that provides technology-based security for large commercial and government facilities, Stratesec benefited from the soaring demand of security companies right after 9/11.

It is also remarkable what Ryan wrote to me regarding a company on which he did some research, too: Viisage Corp, another high-tech security firm.

Kevin Ryan: In late 2005, George Tenet became a director for Viisage, which had been flagged by the SEC for 9/11 trading but never investigated. Viisage was led by Roger LaPenta, formerly of Lockheed.

Seven months later, in 2006, FBI director Louis Freeh also joined the Viisage board. One might think that when both the CIA director (on 9/11) and the FBI director (from 1993 to June 2001) joined a company suspected of 9/11 insider trading, we might want to go back and actually investigate the SEC’s flagging of that company. But, of course, that was not the case. In 2009, „Bandar Bush“ hired Freeh as his personal attorney.

Freeh is nowadays the bankruptcy trustee of the alleged market manipulator MF Global. And about his client, the former Saudi ambassador Prince Bandar, I should add that we know for sure that he bankrolled indirectly via his wife two of the alleged would-be 9/11 hijackers, Khalid Al-Mihdhar and Nawaf Al-Hazmi. [35]

But let’s get back to the subject of destruction. On September 11, not only human life, aircraft and buildings were destroyed in New York City, but also data on computers and in archives. For example, several federal agencies occupied space in Building 7 of the World Trade Center, including the Securities and Exchange Commission on floors 11 to 13.

Those and other data could have given information about the alleged 9/11 insider trading (though it seems to be very unlikely that no backup existed elsewhere independent of the local computer systems). In fact, some technology companies were commissioned to recover damaged hard disks, which had been recovered from the debris and dust of Ground Zero.

One of these companies was the English company group Convar, more precisely: their data rescue center in the German city Pirmasens. Erik Kirschbaum from the news agency Reuters reported in December 2001 that Convar had at that time successfully restored information from 32 computers, supporting „suspicions that some of the 911 transactions were illegal“.

“The suspicion is that inside information about the attack was used to send financial transaction commands and authorizations in the belief that amid all the chaos the criminals would have, at the very least, a good head start,‘ says Convar director Peter Henschel.”[36] Convar received the costly orders – according to Kirschbaum´s report the companies had to pay between $20,000 and $30,000 per rescued computer – in particular from credit card companies, because: “There was a sharp rise in credit card transactions moving through some computer systems at the WTC shortly before the planes hit the twin towers. This could be a criminal enterprise – in which case, did they get advance warning? Or was it only a coincidence that more than $100 million was rushed through the computers as the disaster unfolded?”[37]

The companies for which Convar was active cooperated with the FBI. If the data were reconstructed they should have been passed on to the FBI, and the FBI, according to its statutory mandate, should have initiated further investigation based on the data to find out who carried out these transactions. Henschel was optimistic at the time that the sources for the transactions would come to light.

Richard Wagner, a Convar employee, told Kirschbaum that „illegal transfers of more than $100 million might have been made immediately before and during the disaster. ‚There is a suspicion that some people had advance knowledge of the approximate time of the plane crashes in order to move out amounts exceeding $100 million,‘ he says. ‚They thought that the records of their transactions could not be traced after the main frames were destroyed‘.“ [38]

Wagner’s observation that there had been „illegal financial transactions shortly before and during the WTC disaster“ matches an observation which Ruppert describes in Crossing the Rubicon. Ruppert was contacted by an employee of Deutsche Bank, who survived the WTC disaster by leaving the scene when the second aircraft had hit its target.

According to the employee, about five minutes before the attack the entire Deutsche Bank computer system had been taken over by something external that no one in the office recognized and every file was downloaded at lightning speed to an unknown location. The employee, afraid for his life, lost many of his friends on September 11, and he was well aware of the role which the Deutsche Bank subsidiary Alex Brown had played in insider trading. [39]

I was curious and wanted more information from Convar regarding their work on the WTC-computer hard drives, but also about the statements made by Peter Henschel and Richard Wagner. Thus, I contacted the agency which represents Convar for press matters, with a written request. But their agency „ars publicandi“ informed me swiftly:

Due to time constraints, we can currently offer you neither information nor anyone on the part of our client to talk to regarding this requested topic.

I also approached KrollOntrack, a very interesting competitor of Convar in writing. Ontrack Data Recovery, which also has subsidiaries in Germany, was purchased in 2002 by Kroll Inc – „one of the nation’s most powerful private investigative and security firms, which has long-standing involvement with executive protection US government officials including the president. This would require close liaison with the Secret Service.“ [40]

At the time of the 9/11 attacks, a certain Jerome Hauer was one of the managing directors at Kroll Inc. He had previously established the crisis center for the mayor of New York City as director of the Office of Emergency Management (OEM), which occupied office space on the 23rd floor of the WTC Building 7. Hauer helped former FBI agent John O’Neill to get the post of the head of Security Affairs at the WTC, and spent the night of September 11 with O’Neill in New York before the latter lost his life on September 11 in the WTC. Hauer was most likely involved in the planning of „Tripod II“, the war game exercise at the port of New York City. [41]

Therefore, I found it appealing to uncover some more details of this aspect, or, more accurately to find out if Ontrack or KrollOntrack had received an order in 2001 or after to rescue computer hard drives from the WTC. The answer I received from KrollOntrack said:

Kroll Ontrack was not at the site of the data recovery – the devices at the Twin Towers have been completely destroyed or vaporized. The firm Kroll was, however, at that time active in the field of computer-forensic investigations, securing devices in the surrounding buildings.

In essence, these two inquiries did not help me at all. If anything, a further question arose: why did KrollOntrack send me a response, where it was really obvious that the content did not match the facts? After all, I had written in my inquiry that Convar had received orders to restore damaged computer hard drives from the World Trade Center.

I sent a new inquiry, attaching a link for Erik Kirschbaum’s Reuters article and additional cinematic reports on Convar’s which showed that some of the WTC disks had not been „completely destroyed or vaporized“. I stated to KrollOntrack: „Your answer does not seem to match the facts, when it comes to ‚completely destroyed or vaporized‘. Will you still stick to your answer?“

KrollOntrack then replied that their previously given assessment constituted „not a statement, but an opinion“.

I do not find this assessment worthless, because it is in line with the knowledge of the general public and can easily be refuted in argumentum in contrario by Convar´s activities.

One film report to which I referred to in my second inquiry to KrollOntrack originated from the German television journal Heute-Journal broadcast on March 11, 2002, on ZDF, and the other from the Dutch TV documentary Zembla, broadcast on September 10, 2006.

The ZDF report showed that Convar received the WTC disks from the US Department of Defense and that Convar had managed until March 2002 to recover more than 400 hard drives. It also reported that the private companies that employed Convar had paid between $25,000 and $50,000 per hard drive. In the TV documentary Zembla, Convar essentially maintained its position as it had been reported by Erik Kirschbaum in 2001.

Obviously, in connection with 9/11 there has not only been insider trading via put options, but there is additional evidence that there have been illegal financial transactions via credit cards through which more than 100 million US dollars were removed from the WTC computer systems.

Those occurred shortly before and during the WTC disaster. It remains unclear what the FBI did later on with the data recovered by Convar. On the other hand, it may have been not very much, as can be seen from a memorandum from the 9/11 Commission, which was released in May 2009.

The 9/11 Commission asked the FBI about the use of credit cards for insider dealing. On the basis of the information provided by the FBI, the commission came to the conclusion that no such activity occurred because „the assembled agents expressed no knowledge of the reported hard-drive recovery effort or the alleged scheme“ – but above all „everything at the WTC was pulverized to near powder, making it extremely unlikely that any hard-drives survived“. [42]

The activities of Convar, however, prove the exact opposite.

But it gets even better. According to Zembla, the FBI was directly involved with the data rescue efforts of Convar. And on top of it, the broadcast of Heute-Journal reported that Convar worked in that „highly sensitive“ matter with several federal agencies of the United States government.

So there have been ample indications for insider trading based on foreknowledge of the attacks, but there are very few hard facts as Catherine Austin Fitts, a former managing director and member of the board of the Wall Street investment bank Dillon, Read & Co, Inc (now part of UBS), pointed out when I talked with her about this topic.

Ms Fitts, what are your general thoughts related to the alleged 9/11-insider trading?

Catherine Austin Fitts: Well, I’ve never been able to see concrete evidence that the insider trading has been proved. There’s a lot of anecdotal information from investment bankers and people in the investment community that indicate that there was significant insider trading, particularly in the currency and bond markets, but again it hasn’t been documented.

I think around situations like 9/11 we’ve seen things that can only be explained as insider trading. Therefore, it wouldn’t surprise me if it turns out the allegations are true, because my suspicion is that 9/11 was an extremely profitable covert operation and a lot of the profits came from the trading. It wouldn’t even surprise me if it turns out that the Exchange Stabilization Fund traded it and that some of the funding for the compensation fund for the victims came from the ESF.

Insider trading happens around these kinds of events, but if you really want to produce evidence of insider trading, you need the subpoena powers of the SEC, and of course we know that they haven’t exercised them. If anything, right after 9/11, the government settled a significant amount of cases I presume because a lot of the documents were destroyed by the destruction of WTC building number 7, where the SEC offices and other governmental investigation offices were. [43]

Fitts, who had written a longer essay in 2004 related to this, replied to my question about who had benefited from 9/11:

Catherine Austin Fitts: 9/11 was extraordinarily profitable for Wall Street, they of course got a kind of „Get Out of Jail Free card“ as I’ve just described. In addition, the largest broker of government bonds, Cantor Fitzgerald, was destroyed, and there was a great deal of money missing from the federal government in the prior four or five years. If you look at the amount of funds involved, it is hard to come to a conclusion other than massive securities fraud was involved, so I find it very interesting that this happened. [44]

A short explanation: Cantor Fitzgerald’s headquarters were located in the North Tower of the WTC (floors 101-105). On 9/11, the company lost nearly two-thirds of its entire workforce, more than any other tenant in the WTC. (Also two other government bonds brokers, Garbon Inter Capital and Eurobrokers, occupied office space in the WTC towers that were destroyed.) Back to Fitts and the question: „Cui bono 9/11?“

Catherine Austin Fitts: In addition, the federal government took the position that they couldn’t produce audited financial statements after 9/11, because they said the office at the Pentagon that produced financial statements was destroyed. Now given what I know of the federal set up of financial statements, I am skeptical of that statement.

But needless to say, if you take the government on its word, you had another „Get Out of Jail Free card“ for four trillion dollars and more missing from the federal government. So if you’re just looking at the financial fraud angle, there were a lot of parties that benefited from 9/11. But then of course what 9/11 did, it staged the passage of the Patriot Act and a whole series of laws and regulations that I collectively refer to as „The Control on Concentration of Cash Flow Act.“ It gave incredible powers to centralize.

In addition, if you look at monetary policies right after 9/11 – I remember I was over in the City of London driving around with a money manager and his phone rang and he answered it on his speaker phone. It was somebody on Wall Street who he hadn’t talked to since before 9/11, and he said to him:

“Oh Harry, I am so sorry about what has happened, it must have been very traumatic.” And the guy said: “Don’t be ridiculous! We were able to borrow cheap short and invest long, we’re running a huge arbitrage, we’re making a fortune, this is the most profitable thing that ever happened to us!” – So you could tell the monetary policies and sort of insider games were just pumping profits into the bank at that time, so that was very profitable.

But of course the big money was used for a significant movement of the military abroad and into Afghanistan and then into Iraq … You could see that the country was being prepared to go to war. And sure enough, 9/11 was used as a justification to go to war in Afghanistan, to go to war in Iraq, and commit a huge number of actions, and now much of the challenges about the budget are the result of extraordinary expenditures on war including in Afghanistan and Iraq and the costs of moving the army abroad and engaging in this kind of empire building with ground military force.

So I think if you ask Cui Bono on 9/11, one of the big categories was all the people who made money on engineering the popular fear they needed to engineer these wars. I believe whether it was financial fraud, engineering new laws or engineering wars, it was a fantastically profitable covert operation. [45]

In that category of people who benefit from 9/11 are also the arms manufacturer Raytheon, whose share price gained directly from the 9/11 attacks. Trading of the shares of Raytheon, the producer of Tomahawk and Patriot missiles (and parent company of E-systems, whose clients include the National Security Agency and CIA), experienced an abrupt six-time increase of call option purchases on the day immediately before September 11. [46]

The outright purchase of call options implies the expectation that a stock price will rise. In the first week after 9/11, when the New York Stock Exchange opened again, the value of Raytheon actually shot up considerably. Looking at the development of the stock price, the impression is a very weak performance before the attacks – and then, after resumption of trade, a „gap“ (at substantial volume) upwards. In other words: just under $25 on September 10, the low in the period between August 20 to September 28, at $31, 50 on September 17 and up to $34,80 on September 27, 2001.

With regards to government bonds, buyers of US Treasury securities with a maturity of five years were also winners. These securities were traded in an unusually large volume shortly before the attacks. The Wall Street Journal reported at least in early October 2001 that the Secret Service had started an investigation into a suspiciously high volume of US government bond purchases before the attacks. The Wall Street Journal explained:

Five-year Treasury bills are the best investments in the event of a global crisis, in particular one like this which has hit the United States. The papers are treasured because of their safety, and because they are covered by the US government, and usually their prices rise if investors shun riskier investments, such as shares. [47]

Adding to this phenomenon, the government issues these bonds that serve as a basis of money creation for funding a war such as the immediately declared „war on terror“, engaging the Tomahawks from Raytheon. And here it may again be useful to have a quick look at the „cui bono“ relationship:

The US Federal Reserve creates money to fund the war and lends it to the American government. The American government in turn must pay interest on the money they borrow from the Central Bank to fund the war. The greater the war appropriations, the greater the profits are for bankers. [48]

A multi-layered combination, one could say.

I also talked about the topic of 9/11 insider trading with one of the world’s leading practitioners at the interface between the international capital markets, the national security policy of the US as well as geopolitics, James G Rickards. He gave me some answers in a personal discussion, which I am allowed to repeat here with his expressed approval.

Question: Did suspicious trading activities of uncovered put options on futures markets occur shortly before 9/11?

James G Rickards: Well, the trading documents certainly look suspicious. It is simply a fact that an unusually high volume of purchases of put-options for the two airlines occurred over the three trading days before the attacks. This is a mere fact, no speculation, no guessing around. This is clearly obvious from the documents of the trading sessions on the derivatives exchanges.

Question: Do you think that the intelligence agencies could have got a warning signal based on this information?

James G Rickards: Theoretically that is possible, if are you are looking and watching out for this. But there was far more significant information, which was ignored.

Question: Do you also think that some people with foreknowledge operated speculatively in the option markets?

James G Rickards: Based on the documentation of the trading session it seems that this has been the case, yes.

Let’s sum up a bit at the end. We have, among other things:

• The „nice detective work“ by Kevin Ryan related to Stratesec/Wirt Walker III.
• Some highly inconsistent information vis-a-vis Convar/illegal credit card transactions.
• Scientific papers supporting the allegations that there were indeed unusual trading activities in the option market before the terrorist attacks of 9/11, although the 9/11 Commission (based on the investigation of the SEC and the FBI) ruled that possibility out.

As it became clear that I would publish this article here at Asia Times Online, I contacted the US Federal Bureau of Investigation via its press spokesman Paul Bresson in order „to give the FBI the opportunity to give a public statement with regards to three specific issues“. Those three specific issues were the ones I have just highlighted. Related to each of them I’ve asked Mr Bresson/the FBI: „Could you comment on this for the public, please?“ Up to this moment, Mr Bresson/the FBI did not respond to my inquiry in any way whatsoever. Does this come as a surprise?

I’ve also got back in touch with „ars publicandi“, the firm that does public relations for Convar in Germany. The response said: „Unfortunately I have to inform you that the status has not changed, and that Convar considers the issue of 9/11 as dead in general.“

As you have read, the status in August of last year was slightly different.

At the end of this article, I should perhaps mention that this research ultimately led to negative consequences for me. After I contacted the FBI, I was informed by the publisher of a German financial website, for which I conducted interviews for a professional fee (and had already prepared more work), that no further cooperation was possible. Now that I will come in one way or another into the focus of the FBI, any association with me would be undesirable.

Well, you know the rules.

As far as the abnormal option trades around 9/11 are concerned, I want to give Max Keiser the last word in order to point out the significance of the story.

Max Keiser: Regardless of who did it, we can know that more than a few had advance warning – the trading in the option market makes that clear.

References:

[1] Compare Michael C. Ruppert: “Crossing the Rubicon: The Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age Of Oil“, New Society Publishers, Gabriola Island, 2004, page 152.

[2] Ibid., page 153.

[3] Ibid., page 154 – 155.

[4] Ibid., page 170.

[5] Ibid., page 238 – 253: “9/11 Insider Trading, or ‘You Didn’t Really See That, Even Though We Saw It.’“

[6] Ibid., page 239.

[7] Compare Chris Blackhurst: “Mystery of terror ‘insider dealers’”, published at The Independent on October 4, 2001 under:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/mystery-of-terror-insider-dealers-631325.html

[8] Compare “Profits of Death“, published at From the Wilderness on December 6, 2001 under:

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/12_06_01_death_profits_pt1.html

[9] For the fact, that it was George Tenet who recruited Krongard, compare George Tenet: “At the Center of the Storm”, Harper Collins, New York, 2007, page 19.

[10] Compare Marc Chesney, Remo Crameri and Loriano Mancini: “Detecting Informed Trading Activities in the Option Markets”, University of Zurich, April 2010, online at:

http://www.bf.uzh.ch/publikationen/pdf/publ_2098.pdf

[11] Nafeez M. Ahmed: „Geheimsache 09/11. Hintergründe über den 11. September und die Logik amerikanischer Machtpolitik“, Goldmann Verlag, Munich, 2004, page 182. (Translated back into English from German.)

[12] Compare Michael C. Ruppert: “Crossing the Rubicon“, page 244 – 247.

[13] Wing-Keung Wong, Howard E. Thompson und Kweehong Teh: “Was there Abnormal Trading in the S&P 500 Index Options Prior to the September 11 Attacks?”, published at Social Sciences Research Network, April 2010, under:

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1588523

[14] Compare “Bank of America among 38 stocks in SEC’s attack probe”, published at Bloomberg News on October 3, 2001, archived under:

http://911research.wtc7.net/cache/sept11/bloombberg_BAamong38.html

[15] Michael C. Ruppert: “Crossing the Rubicon“, page 243.

[16] Ibid.

[17] “Suppressed Details of Criminal Insider Trading Lead Directly into the CIA’s Highest Ranks”, published at From the Wilderness on October 9, 2001 under:

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/10_09_01_krongard.html

[18] Compare “Early September 2001: Almost Irrefutable Proof of Insider Trading in Germany”, published at History Commons under:

http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=ernst_welteke

[19] Allen M. Poteshman: “Unusual Option Market Activity and the Terrorist Attacks of September 11, 2001”, published in The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, 2006, Vol. 79, Edition 4, page 1703-1726.

[20] Wing-Keung Wong, Howard E. Thompson und Kweehong Teh: “Was there Abnormal Trading in the S&P 500 Index Options Prior to the September 11 Attacks?”, see endnote 13.

[21] Ibid. The authors refer to Erin E. Arvedlund: “Follow the money: terrorist conspirators could have profited more from fall of entire market than single stocks“, published in Barron’s on October 8, 2001.

[22] Wong, Thompson, Teh: “Was there Abnormal Trading in the S&P 500 Index Options Prior to the September 11 Attacks?”

[23] Ibid.

[24] Ibid.

[25] Marina Alcaraz: “11 septembre 2001: des volumes inhabituels sur les options peu avant l’attentat”, published in Les Echos, page 34, September 10, 2001, online at:

http://archives.lesechos.fr/archives/2007/LesEchos/20001-166-ECH.htm

[26] Marc Chesney, Remo Crameri and Loriano Mancini: “Detecting Informed Trading Activities in the Option Markets”, see endnote 10.

[27] Ibid.

[28] ibid.

[29] Ibid.

[30] Compare Marc Chesney, Remo Crameri and Loriano Mancini: “Detecting Informed Trading Activities in the Option Markets”, published at the University of Zurich on September 7, 2011 under:http://www.bf.uzh.ch/publikationen/pdf/2098.pdf

[31] Vgl. Lars Schall: “Sapere Aude!“, German Interview with Dr. Daniele Ganser, published at LarsSchall.com on August 18, 2011 under:

http://www.larsschall.com/2011/08/18/%E2%80%9Csapere-aude%E2%80%9C/

[32] Compare a copy of the letter by the SEC on MaxKeiser.com under:

http://maxkeiser.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/FOIAresponseGIF1.gif

[33] Compare related to this agreement Matt Taibbi: “Is the SEC Covering Up Wall Street Crimes?”, published at Rolling Stone on August 17, 2011 under:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/is-the-sec-covering-up-wall-streetcrimes-20110817

[34] Mark H. Gaffney: “Black 9/11: A Walk on the Dark Side”, published at Foreign Policy Journal on March 2, 2011 under:

http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2011/03/02/black-911-a-walk-on-the-dark-side-2/2/

[35] Compare Peter Dale Scott: “Launching the U.S. Terror War: the CIA, 9/11, Afghanistan, and Central Asia”, The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol 10, Issue 12, No 3, March 19, 2012, online at:http://japanfocus.org/-Peter_Dale-Scott/3723

[35] Erik Kirschbaum: “German Firm Probes Last-Minute World Trade Center Transactions“, published at Reuters on December 19, 2001, online at:

http://www.naderlibrary.com/911.germanfirmprobeslastminutewtctrans.htm

[36] Ibid.

[37] Ibid.

[38] Michael C. Ruppert: “Crossing the Rubicon“, page 244.

[39] Ibid., page 423.

[40] Ibid., page 423 – 426.

[41] Commission Memorandum: “FBI Briefing on Trading“, dated August 18, 2003, page 12, online at: http://media.nara.gov/9-11/MFR/t-0148-911MFR-00269.pdf

[42] Lars Schall: “9/11 Was A Fantastically Profitable Covert Operation”, Interview with Catherine Austin Fitts, published at LarsSchall.com on September 3, 2011 under:

http://www.larsschall.com/2011/09/03/911-was-a-fantastically-profitable-covert-operation/

[43] Ibid. Compare further related to the “cui bono“ topic Catherine Austin Fitts: “9-11 Profiteering: A Framework for Building the ‘Cui Bono?’“, published at GlobalResearch on March 22, 2004 under:http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/FIT403A.html

[44] Lars Schall: “9/11 Was A Fantastically Profitable Covert Operation”, see endnote 42.

[45] Compare “Bank of America among 38 stocks in SEC’s attack probe”, see endnote 14.  “A Raytheon option that makes money if shares are more than $25 each had 232 options contracts traded on the day before the attacks, almost six times the total number of trades that had occurred before that day. A contract represents options on 100 shares. Raytheon shares soared almost 37 percent to $34.04 during the first week of post-attack U.S. trading.”

[46] Compare Barry Grey: “Suspicious trading points to advance knowledge by big investors of September 11 attacks”, published at World Socialist Web Site on October 5, 2001 under:

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/oct2001/bond-o05.shtml

[47] J. S. Kim: “Inside the Illusory Empire of the Banking Commodity Con Game”, published at The Underground Investor on October 19, 2010 under:

http://www.theundergroundinvestor.com/2010/10/inside-the-illusory-empire-of-the-banking-commodity-con-game/

The ongoing refugee crisis has its roots in Western military interventions carried out under the guise of humanitarian efforts to protect civilians. The following article, posted in 2011, deals with the consequences of NATO-backed interventions in the Middle East and North Africa: namely, making it increasingly difficult for “countries of origin” to put in place “effective policies for the reinsertion of returning migrant workers into their labour markets by creating decent work where people live”. Read more below:

CAIRO, May 20, 2011 – As the world rallies in support of the popular uprisings sweeping across the Arab world, which were provoked by long social and economic injustice, the plight of migrant workers from Africa and Asia find themselves jobless, penniless and subjected to threats and beatings.

Many of the estimated twenty million migrant workers in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) are from poor countries whose leaders have long failed to put in place mechanisms to protect their nationals from abuse, inhumane working conditions, trafficking and a means for repatriation during times of crisis.

Migrant rights advocates – and workers themselves – say their remittances have contributed to increasing foreign currency reserves, reducing devaluation of labour sending country’s monies, investments in infrastructure and the repayment of foreign debts like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank. But despite growing complaints of mistreatment, governments are unwilling to listen.

“For those in Bahrain, their were human rights violations previously but in the current crisis there is no where to go and most of the embassies are not equipped enough to take care of their nationals,” says Mohammad Harun Al Rashid, regional coordinator of CARAM (Coordination of Action Research on AIDS and Mobility) Asia. “These countries need to provide better representation in labour receiving countries. However, most labour sending countries are only looking at the remittances and not the working and living conditions of their citizens. The governments are not listening to their nationals and to rectify this problem they need to establish relationships with community leaders.”

Jan De Wilde, coordinator at the International Organization of Migration (IOM) office in Tunisia, says that although evacuation mechanisms are usually the responsibility of the employers or labour sending countries in situations like this the international community needs to step in and assist in evacuating third party nationals before matters get worse. According to De Wilde, there are massive amounts of migrants – mainly from Bangladesh, the Philippines, Egypt, West and sub-Saharan Africa – streaming out of Libya since mid-February at a rate of 1,000-3,000 per day.

“Many have not been paid and are having a lot of difficulty getting food, medical care and many of the Black Africans have been severely discriminated against,” says De Wilde. “People are becoming very restless, impatient and fighting amongst themselves because one group thinks that another group is being favoured and they’re becoming very difficult to manage. The situation is going to become worse once the summer arrives as the temperatures are already over twenty during the day and they’ll be going up to fifty.”

Tales of mistreatment long before uprisings

South Asians in Bahrain, mainly migrant workers from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, India and Pakistan, constitute nearly fifty percent of the country’s population of 1.2 million.

Demographics like Bahrain are commonplace throughout the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states, where the International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates migrant workers comprise nearly forty percent of the workforce – and in some cases outnumber the population.

Usman is 43 years old and comes from the coastal city of Pasni in Pakistan. In his city, he was a bicycle repairman. He liked his job but with three mouths to feed, it was time to make more money. In early 2007, Usman decided to travel to Dubai where he was hired as a mason assistant.

Eight months into a two-year contract Usman suffered a severe injury to his left calf. It occurred when a crane, on a multi-story construction site, was hoisting a large crate full of electrical equipment. The crate had a nail sticking out of it, and it literally ripped his calf to shreds as it passed by him.

“I was dealing with the mortar mixture on the site, mixing it up in order to put it down on the brick, and then the crate passed by. I felt this horrible sting in my leg, and I was lifted a little off the ground…the next thing I know, I was bleeding and I went into shock. I could not feel my leg and could not see it because of all the blood,” says Usman.

The construction company took Usman to the emergency room where they patched him up. Later he was given a plane ticket back to Pakistan and told that he would receive no further assistance in Dubai. Before the injury Usman earned 700 Dirhams per month. The construction company allowed him to return for 520 Dirhams as a cleaner for the labour camp.

“If I didn’t come back, then I would make no money, and my family would suffer,” adds Usman. “I had to come back. But I can’t work the same things that I used to work.”

Since the Bahraini government ordered the crackdown on street protests, nearly eight migrants have been killed and forty-nine wounded with the majority of the attacks targeting the Pakistani community.

Faraz Sanei, a researcher for New York-based Human Rights Watch in Bahrain says that although Indians represent the largest community in Bahrain with 350,000 migrants, Pakistanis are overwhelmingly visible in the riot police and are usually implicated in the deaths of protestors.

In addition, opposition groups calling for political and social reforms have long argued that the influx of Sunni nationals from outside in the last fifteen years is the government’s attempt to change the sectarian demographics of Bahrain.

“Before the violence a lot Bahrainis when dealing with riot police complained that they couldn’t speak to them because they don’t share the same language or have limited Arabic. Whenever there are investigations in villages there is this us versus them mentality because of this language barrier,” adds Sanei.

“The migrant worker issue is not the same as the Pakistani issue in that there are many Egyptians, Yemenis, Jordanians, Syrians and Pakistanis in the security and intelligence forces as well as the military that are naturalized so they are technically Bahraini citizens.”

‘We’re like slaves here’

The winds of change, for more democracy, rights and decent work taking place in Yemen – as anti-regime protestors demand the immediate end of the thirty-two year authoritarian rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh – bypasses the approximately forty to sixty thousand Ethiopian domestic workers who are forced to work all day under mental torment and abuse.

In Yemen, which has an unemployment rate of thirty-five percent and is one of the poorest countries in the Arab world; Somali, Sudanese and Ethiopian female refugees or migrants work as housemaids for a monthly salary of merely seventy to one hundred and fifty dollars.

Despite incidents of violence targeting female migrant workers during street protests in Yemen have failed to make the press, ongoing maid abuse has definitely put countries in the Middle East in harsh spotlight.

Angelique, a 26-year-old domestic worker from Congo, escaped the conflict in her country and travelled to Lebanon on a six-year contract to work as a housemaid. Woken daily at 5:30am, she works 18 hours confined to the apartment, without any time off.

“I have only six months left and then I will go back to the Congo. You see Madame has cut off all of my hair. Every day I clean and cook. I sleep on the floor in the kitchen and I can’t take any more of this life,” says Angelique, who did not want to give her real name for fear of retribution, speaking from across the balcony.

“Even the dogs are allowed to go out but we’re stuck. We’re like slaves here.”

Angelique earns just US$100 a month, three times below the minimum wage, and sends all of it home to Congo.

Being stranded is not new for migrants

Western military intervention into Libya under the guise of humanitarian efforts to protect civilians broke new ground when NATO warships shelled a Red Crescent Society centre in Misurata, which has been catering to the wounds of those injured in the ongoing unrest. However, the dire need to protect civilians from the refugee and migrant community seems to be a desire not high on NATO’s agenda.

But migrant workers being left stranded by their employers or their governments are not a new phenomenon in the Arab world. During the US-led invasion of Iraq and the 2006 summer war in Lebanon thousands of migrant workers were left to fend for themselves.

According to the UNHCR, nearly 140,000 foreign nationals have fled Libya via land borders. Including an estimated 69,000 Egyptians, who have crossed to the Egyptian border and another 75,000 Asians and Africans that have crossed into Tunisia while another 50,000 – including over 10,000 Egyptian workers – remain stranded in Tunisia.

Libya has been a major destination for migrant workers following the 1969 revolution as a massive influx of construction workers from Tunisia, teachers from Egypt and Palestine and health care workers from Yugoslavia and Bulgaria poured in to assist in rebuilding.

Twenty years later a second wave of migrants, mainly from Asia, sub-Saharan and West Africa arrived to take advantage of the relatively high salaries of almost $300 per month, for unskilled labour.

Globally, remittances sent home by migrants and refugees have become a key feature in the socio-economic fabric of developing countries in Africa and Asia.

On the macro level, Dr. Ibrahim Awad, Director of the Center for Migration and Refugees Studies at the American University in Cairo, says that remittances assist in reducing chronic trade deficits and contribute in balancing the economy in countries like Egypt due to their reliance and countercyclical nature, which help sustain consumption and investment during economic downturns.

However on the micro level, labour sending economies could be at risk from the exodus of migrants fleeing violence in Libya as people supplying the labour take a hit, an increase in the demand of jobs as unemployed workers return and reliance on remittances to spur economic activity as a means of reducing poverty is halted.

“The crisis highlights the reliance of some migrant sending countries on remittances. In some countries remittances constitute over thirty percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) like in Egypt, which has a relatively high proportion of the GDP at sixty percent. Reliance on this money influx suggests that any reduction will mainly impact the household level as well as create external financing gaps, which are hard to fill,” said Dr. Awad in an interview with IPS.

With no end in sight, concerns are growing amongst some developing nations that turmoil in the region could spread to oil rich Gulf states where foreign labour accounts for more than eleven million of the workforce.

But instead of waiting for the rebellions to die down in order to send migrants to Libya again or redirect efforts in locating new markets, labour sending countries should adopt appropriate policy measures to end reliance on manpower export and create incentives that encourage their nationals to say home.

“Migrant sending countries should not rely solely on migration as a means of solving unemployment. The issue of lack of jobs should be solved internally. Countries of origin should therefore put in place effective policies for the reinsertion of returning migrant workers into their labour markets by creating decent work where people live,” adds Dr. Awad.

“Obama administration officials, who have been negotiating with Turkey for months, said Thursday that they had reached an agreement for manned and unmanned American warplanes to carry out aerial attacks on Islamic State positions from air bases at Incirlik and Diyarbakir. The agreement was described by one senior administration official as a “game changer.” New York Times, July 23, 2015

The Syrian war can be divided into two parts: The pre-Incirlik period and the post-Incirlik period. The pre-Incirlik period is roughly the four year stretch during which US-backed Islamic militias and al Qaida-linked groups fought the Syrian army with the intention of removing President Bashar al Assad from power. This first phase of the war ended in a draw.

The post-Incirlik period looks like it could produce an entirely different outcome due to the fact that the US will be able to deploy its drones and warplanes from a Turkish airbase (Incirlik) that’s just 15 minutes flying-time from Syria. That will boost the number of sorties the USAF can able to carry out while increasing the effectiveness of its jihadi forces on the ground which will conduct their operations under the protection of US air cover. This will greatly improve their chances for success.

The New York Times calls the Incirlik deal a “game-changer” which is an understatement. By allowing US F-16s to patrol the skies over Syria, Washington will impose a de facto no-fly zone over the country severely limiting Assad’s ability to battle the US-backed militias that have seized large swaths of the countryside and are now descending on Damascus. And while the war cannot be won by airpower alone, this new tactical reality tilts the playing field in favor the jihadis. In other words, the Incirlik agreement changes everything.

The Obama administration now believes that regime change is within its reach. Yes, they know it will require some back-up from US Special Forces and Turkish combat troops, but it’s all doable.  This is why Obama has shrugged off Russia’s plan for forming a coalition to defeat ISIS.  The US doesn’t have to compromise on these matters because, after all, it has a strategically-located airbase from which it can protect its proxy-army, bomb cross-border targets, and control the skies over Syria. All Obama needs to do is intensify the war effort, put a little more pressure on Assad, and wait for the regime to collapse. This is why we should expect a dramatic escalation as we begin Phase 2 of the conflict.

Russian President Vladimir Putin knows this, which is why he’s sending more weapons, supplies and advisors to Syria. He’s signaling to Washington that he knows what they’re up to and that he’ll respond if they carry things too far. In an interview with Russia’s state Channel 1, Putin said, “We have our ideas about what we will do and how we will do it in case the situation develops toward the use of force or otherwise. We have our plans.”

The administration is very nervous about Putin’s plans which is why they keep probing to see if they can figure out what he has up his sleeve. Just days ago,  Secretary of State John Kerry phoned his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov to express his concerns about “an imminent enhanced Russian military buildup” in Syria. The call was a clumsy attempt to trick Lavrov into volunteering information that might shed light on what Moscow intends to do if Washington goes ahead with its regime change strategy.  But Russia’s foreign minister didn’t take the bait. He stuck to his script and didn’t tell Kerry anything he didn’t already know.

But the fact is, Putin is not going to allow Assad to be removed by force. It’s that simple. Obama and his advisors suspect this, but they are not 100 percent certain so they keep looking for confirmation one way or the other. But Putin is not going to provide a clear answer because he doesn’t want to tip his hand or appear confrontational. But that doesn’t mean he’s not resolute. He is, and Washington knows it. In effect, Putin has drawn a line in the sand and told the US that if they cross that line, there’s going to trouble.

So it’s up to Obama really. He can either seek a peaceful solution along the lines that Moscow has recommended or push for regime change and risk a confrontation with Russia. Those are the two choices.

Unfortunately, Washington doesn’t have an “off” switch anymore, so changing policy is really not in the cards. Instead, the US war machine will continue to lumber ahead erratically until it hits an impasse and sputters to a halt. Once again, the immovable object will prevail over the unstoppable force (as it did in Ukraine), albeit at great cost to the battered people of Syria, their nation and the entire region.

Keep in mind, that the imperial plan for Syria is subtler than many people realize. As the Brookings Institute’s Michael E. O’Hanlon states in his piece titled “Deconstructing Syria: A new strategy for America’s most hopeless war”:

“The plan… would not explicitly seek to overthrow him (Assad), so much as deny him control of territory that he might still aspire to govern again. The autonomous zones would be liberated with the clear understanding that there was no going back to rule by Assad or a successor. In any case, Assad would not be a military target under this concept, but areas he currently controls… would be. And if Assad delayed too long in accepting a deal for exile, he could inevitably face direct dangers to his rule and even his person.” (“Deconstructing Syria: A new strategy for America’s most hopeless war”, Michael E. O’Hanlon, Brookings Institute)

This is the basic plan: To seize major cities and large parts of the countryside,  disrupt supply-lines and destroy vital civilian infrastructure, and to progressively undermine Assad’s ability to govern the country. The ultimate goal is to break the state into a million disconnected enclaves ruled by armed mercenaries, al Qaida-linked affiliates, and local warlords. This is Washington’s diabolical plan for Syria. It is strikingly similar to the Zionist plan to “effect the division of the whole area into small states by the dissolution of all existing Arab states.” (“The Zionist Plan for the Middle East”, Israel Shahak) In fact, it is virtually identical.

It’s clear that Obama is emboldened by the Incirlik deal and believes that, with Turkey’s help, he can achieve US imperial ambitions in Syria. But it’s not going to happen.  Russia, Iran and Hezbollah are prepared to defend their ally Assad and stop Washington dead-in-its-tracks.  Obama will have succeeded in destroying another sovereign nation and scattering its people across the Middle East and Europe. But the US mission will fall short of its original objectives. There will be no regime change in Syria. Putin, Nasrallah and Khamenei will make sure of it.

‘US Seek to Control the EU Elites via Refugee Crisis’

By Andrew Korybko, September 17, 2015

Interview given by Andrew Korybko to the Iranian FARS News agency on the origins of the Syrian war, refugee crisis in the EU and the US interest in making radicals infiltrate Europe.

A social justice organization has accused the European Commission of “putting lipstick on a pig” with its plan for a new court system for a pending EU-US trade deal the group says still affords “corporations frightening new powers at the expense of our national democracies.”

The proposed system, the Investment Court System, would replace the controversial investor-to-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanism, which allows corporations to bypass domestic courts to sue governments over policies that could affect their profits.

Talks on the trade deal, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), “have been dogged by disagreements, particularly over Washington’s insistence that as part of the pact, private companies be allowed to sue governments before special tribunals,”Agence France-Presse reports. Reuters adds:

Fears that U.S. multinationals could use private arbitration rules in the proposed trade pact to challenge European food and environmental laws have overshadowed a transatlantic project meant to ease business and compete with China’s economic might.

Trade Commissioner Cecilia Malmström made the announcement Wednesday, saying in astatement: “Today, we’re delivering on our promise—to propose a new, modernised system of investment courts, subject to democratic principles and public scrutiny.”

“We want to establish a new system built around the elements that make citizens trust domestic or international courts,” her statement continues.

“I’m making this proposal public at the same time that I send it to the European Parliament and the Member States. It’s very important to have an open and transparent exchange of views on this widely debated issue.”

UK-based Global Justice Now, however, says the proposal offers mere cosmetic changes to the ISDS mechanism, to which the European public has voiced overwhelming opposition.

Nick Dearden, director of the organization, called the proposal

“essentially a PR exercise to get around the enormous controversy and opposition that has been generated by ISDS. The Commission can try to put lipstick on a pig, but this new proposal doesn’t change the fundamental problem of giving corporations frightening new powers at the expense of our national democracies.”

“The real issue at hand here is that of corporate power,” Dearden added.

“Commissioner Malmström says she wants to ‘establish a new system built around the elements that make citizens trust domestic or international courts’—but she hasn’t explained why those courts are not good enough for multinational corporations to use.”

Friends of the Earth Europe joined Global Justice Now in rejecting the proposal, echoing the concern that the plan ignores the vast public opposition

“The European Commission’s proposal for an ‘International Court System’ is tarred with the same old corporate friendly brush,” stated Natacha Cingotti, trade campaigner at Friends of the Earth Europe.

“Despite a new name and some reforms on the functioning of the system, it reaffirms the granting of VIP rights for corporate investors without giving them any obligations that would protect citizens and the environment.”

“As long as companies can sue governments if they act in the public interest, the ability of governments to regulate is undermined,” Cingotti stated. “It should be resisted at all costs.”

Canada’s current federal election campaign is now at the half-way point in the lead-up to October 19. The three major parties are polling almost equally, with the ruling Conservative vote dropping steadily while the opposition New Democrats (NDP) and Liberals are virtually tied overall at just over 30 per cent. This means the NDP has not significantly increased its support from the previous election in 2011, while the Liberals under Justin Trudeau have staged a remarkable recovery from their 19 per cent in 2011. In Quebec, the NDP polls far ahead of the other parties and even beyond its 43 per cent support in 2011, but it is lagging behind the Liberals in most of the rest of Canada (ROC).

It is a depressing campaign, with little discussion of major issues in the corporate media. No party is offering a real alternative on such key issues as climate change, increasing neoliberal austerity, Canada’s increasing militarization, etc.

As the Official Opposition in the last Parliament, the NDP was well poised for further advances this year. But its campaign, built entirely around the image of party leader Thomas Mulcair, is pathetically devoid of proposals that could inspire enthusiastic support in an electorate that by all accounts is overwhelmingly eager for “change.”

[Mike Constable]

What Can the Left Do?

What can the left do? Nowhere is this a more acute question than in Quebec where the largely pro-sovereignty left recognizes the need to engage with federal politics but is divided between the Bloc Québécois (BQ), which campaigns for independence as a Quebec-only federal party, and the federalist NDP, which currently holds most of the province’s seats and is once again polling far ahead of the other parties including the BQ.

As a member of a collective (the Collectif d’analyse politique, or CAP) associated with the semi-annual journal Nouveaux Cahiers du Socialisme, I was asked, along with a few others, to summarize my perspectives on the election in no more than 500 words for the September issue of our members-only bulletin, Les nouvelles des NCS. The five contributions published therein offer a glimpse of some of the ways in which these issues are being addressed in the Quebec left. The CAP will be discussing the election at its next meeting. Here is a summary of four contributions followed by an English version of mine.

Aurélie Lanctôt is a law student at McGill University, a graduate in journalism from the Université du Québec, and a blogger at Ricochet and Voir, among other sites.

She focuses on the incoherencies in the NDP campaign, noting how Mulcair’s previous right-wing positions conflict with the party’s proposals ($15 minimum wage, child care program, etc.), and emphasizes in particular his promise of a balanced budget beginning with his government’s first term in office. “Thomas Mulcair seems more determined to fight the Right’s mockery than he is about the legitimate concerns coming from his left, the NDP membership and potential sympathizers of the party…. By clinging to the goal of a balanced budget, despite everything, isn’t Mulcair revealing that he has not completely abandoned his past political beliefs?”

Michel Roche is a professor of political science at the University of Quebec Chicoutimi campus and author of (inter alia) a stimulating essay, La gauche et l’Indépendance du Québec.

He argues that more harm than good may result if Quebec progressives support the NDP in order to defeat Harper. He advocates a vote for the BQ, notwithstanding its “pro-free trade discourse.” By supporting Quebec independence, the BQ alone signifies a “rupture” with the existing constitutional status quo, upheld by the NDP as well as the other parties. The Quebec independence movement, which he thinks is experiencing a revival under the new Parti Québécois leader Pierre-Karl Péladeau, scares the ruling class much more than the prospect of “an NDP government unable to renounce tar sands operations and their transmission to the East.” Furthermore, another defeat of the BQ would “discourage the living forces of the independentist movement and fuel the federalist offensive of Quebec’s Liberal government….”

Francine Pelletier, a bilingual journalist in print, TV and digital media, was a co-founder of the feminist magazine La Vie en rose. She blogs at L’actualité en petites bouchées.

Pelletier acknowledges that the Bloc Québécois has never been so loudly independentist, but also, she notes, never more inclined to forget its left-wing roots. A vote for the Bloc “is to subject all the issues in this election campaign – and they are many, from the environment to democracy itself – to the sole hypothesis, still far off, of Quebec’s independence.” The most discouraging feature of the current debate, she says, is the tendency of many Québécois to blame Harper on “Canadians” and leave it to them to defeat his government. She calls for a vote for “the candidate most likely to defeat the Conservatives,” which in Quebec excludes the Bloc.

André Frappier is a former president of the Montréal local of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), a leader of Québec solidaire, and a writer in Canadian Dimension, Presse-toi à gauche, and other publications.

BQ leader Gilles Duceppe, says Frappier, “puts Liberals and New Democrats on the same footing” and calls on them to settle the fate of the Harper Tories in the rest of Canada “while he will take care of Quebec’s interests.” The BQ thereby “erects a wall between the social forces in Quebec and in Canada, preventing the establishment of the relations of mutual support and understanding that we need.”

As for the NDP, it is a social-democratic party originating in the Canadian trade-union movement, with all the deformations that represents, but it is at this point the only [political] tool not belonging to sectors of big business…. The left should use it to go further and work to build a real progressive, pan-Canadian political alternative that will uphold Quebec sovereignty.

And here is an English version of my contribution to this debate focused on what I consider the main considerations. I follow it with reference to some of my past articles on the evolution of the NDP historically and in recent years. •

At stake in this election is the fate of the Harper government, the most reactionary government since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Only two opposition parties can realistically hope to replace the Conservatives: the New Democratic Party and the Liberals. Both are neoliberal, with no substantial programmatic differences.

The Liberals, with a long record of serving Canadian capitalism as the country’s traditional governing party, but sensing the public mood for “change,” are attempting to outflank the NDP on its left – proposing major public infrastructure projects and acknowledging the need for deficit budgets to confront the impending global recession.

NDP leader Thomas Mulcair is attempting to prove his party’s reliability to a ruling class still distrustful of the NDP’s historic origins in and surviving links to a section of organized labour, mainly in English Canada. He is stressing his commitment to a balanced budget from the outset, an implicit acknowledgement that an NDP government would not implement major social reforms other than (possibly) its promise of a “national” childcare program.

There are differences between the Liberals and NDP in some other areas. For example, the NDP to its credit has opposed anti-democratic legislation like Bill C-51, which the Liberals supported.

However, beholden to the needs of finance capital, neither party can be trusted to implement any real program of progressive reform, still less challenge the hydrocarbon-based economic model underlying capitalist development in recent decades.

Ecosocialist Options?

What, then, are the options for ecosocialists in Canada and Quebec?

The Harper government must be defeated. Although neither the NDP nor the Liberals offer a break with neoliberalism, there is a political rationale for calling for an NDP vote, both in Quebec and the ROC.

A Liberal government would simply replace one traditional capitalist party with another. The election of an NDP government, on the other hand, while not a paradigm shift, would disrupt the established order, politically destabilizing it at the level of government holding decisive powers in the Canadian state.

It could open space for popular movements to mobilize and open an improved perspective for exploring and possibly creating a new pan-Canadian left force.

The Bloc Québécois offers a false choice between Quebec independence and the defeat of Harper. The BQ cannot defeat Harper, and independence will be won in Quebec, not Ottawa. The success of the Quebec sovereigntist movement is a precondition to implementing a progressive anticapitalist agenda in Quebec and would pose the possibility of reconfiguring the Canadian state, either without Quebec or in a new, democratic and plurinational federation including not only Quebec but the First Nations.

The power of the Quebec independence movement has already forced the NDP to acknowledge formally Quebec’s right of self-determination, through its Sherbrooke Declaration and its draft bill in the last Parliament that would recognize as legitimate a 50 per cent plus one vote for independence. That alone demarks it from the Liberals on a key fault line in the politics and structure of the Canadian capitalist state. If the NDP is elected to government, the left must hold it to that position.

Richard Fidler is an Ottawa member of the Socialist Project. This article first appeared on his blog Life on the Left.

Eric Draitser appears on WBAI 99.5 FM (NYC) for part 2 of his interview on imperialism in the world today.

He describes in detail what the US and its neocolonial NATO allies are doing in Africa, with close attention to the grand strategy of militarily checking the economic influence of China. Draitser examines some of the volatile conflicts on the continent, attempting to trace how they relate to the US-NATO regional and global hegemonic agenda.

From there, he provides his analysis of Syria and the US role in the rise of ISIS/ISIL, as well as Washington’s militarization of Latin America in order to stifle its independence and growing alliances with the non-western world. Finally, Draitser touches on the current situation in Haiti and the grand strategy of containing China through the Asia Pivot and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. All this and much much more in this wide-ranging interview.

Two leading German manufacturers have turned their back on contracts worth hundreds of thousands of euros to help build up Hungary’s border with Serbia. Despite the gesture, more and more countries are fencing themselves off from the flow of asylum seekers into Europe.

According to German media, Hungary, a major transit route for migrants attempting to reach Germany from Greece, put out a tender for 9,000 or 10,000 rolls of barbed wire in August. Each roll would have contained up to 10 feet of wire, and cost between €15 ($17) and €30 ($34) for an order of this size.

Syrian migrants cross under a fence as they enter Hungary at the border with Serbia, near Roszke.
Bernadett Szabo / Reuters

An improved modification of barbed wire, razor wire is lighter, and features small blades instead of barbs, meaning it cuts more easily, and is harder to break with a pair of clippers.

Mutanox, a Berlin-based manufacturer said it refused to put forward a bid on principle.

“Razor wire is designed to prevent criminal acts, like a burglary. Fleeing children and adults are not criminals,” a spokesman told Die Welt newspaper.

© Mutanox GmbH / Google Maps

A second company, which wished to remain unnamed, said it initially submitted a bid, only to regret the decision.
“The whole process was very fast and opaque. In the end, we were glad not to have won. Children trapped in razor wire are a disgrace,” said the CEO.

Die Welt reported that in the end a Chinese firm stepped in to fulfill the order.

Hungary’s nationalist government has been unapologetic about the construction of the fence, after 170,000 people entered the country illegally since the start of this year. It has recently approved a law that introduces sentences of up to three years for illegal crossers.

When the fence opened on Tuesday, the number of those attempting to cross into the country fell to 316, from a record 9,380 the day before. According to the Guardian, those attempting to enter were subjected to on-the-spot asylum assessments, with the vast majority being told to return to Serbia. On Wednesday, a group of migrants attempted to forcefully cross the fence, only to be met with water cannon and tear gas.

Chaos at Hungarian border as police and refugees clash (VIDEO) https://t.co/9SL67ek5Su pic.twitter.com/zK6cY3bESP

— RT (@RT_com) September 16, 2015

 

For all the criticism prime minister Viktor Orban has brooked from his political opponents at home and in the EU, and human rights groups – from being called unempathetic to accusations of crypto-fascism – Hungary appears to have been a forerunner of a trend that is now being taken on board by the rest of Europe.

The main migrant routes into Europe, recently introduced border controls and border fences pic.twitter.com/DFVXbfUrRm

— Agence France-Presse (@AFP) September 15, 2015

 

Last week, Germany instituted border checks with Austria, and suspended several train services that resulted in Munich being overrun with asylum seekers arriving from the country. In a domino effect, Austria has closed off its border with Hungary, also halting several communication lines, to prevent a build-up of refugees inside its territory. Slovakia and the Czech Republic are two other Schengen Agreement members, who have instituted controls on their southern checkpoints, with Croatia expected to become the next easy route towards Germany, which has accepted more refugees than all the rest of Europe put together.

Meanwhile, Hungary has now said it plans to extend its fence to the border it shares with Romania.

After the two World Wars of the 20th Century, the humanitarian and economic situation in the Middle East and North Africa, the former colonies of the West, became far worse than that that of the entire northern Eurasia, especially Europe.

And after 1991, in other words, after USSR’s defeat in the Cold War, the ranks of economically depressed countries were joined by the entire Eastern European  region. 

TRANSCRIPT

Such processes always cause people mass migration from their traditional habitats. Not surprising and not unexpected …But due to some reasons of common knowledge the problem has resumed with renewed vigor today and we name it, – the immigration crisis. Indeed, current situation is in the zone between the acute state of crisis and, simply, the war.The most of illegal immigrants are in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Greece. Nonetheless, the number of illegal immigrants has gone sky-high in the all of North Europe over the last years.

Only in the first half of 2015 over 135,000 refugees and migrants arrived in Europe, according to the UNHCR report. This number increased for more than 80 per cent over the same period in 2014.

The report said many more people had tried to make the crossing from Africa but did not make it.

In May, more than 800 people died when a crowded migrant boat capsized off Libya. Between January and March, 479 refugees and migrants drowned or went missing, the report said, as opposed to 15 in the same three months of 2014. In April, the deadliest month, an “unprecedented” 1,308 migrants and refugees died or went missing, compared to 42 in the previous year. European countries don’t have an economic capacity and a political will to accept all migrants. On August 11, Greek police used pepper spray, fire extinguishers and batons in order to stem the chaos which has broken out at a football stadium on the island of of Kos where more than 1,000 migrants had been locked in without shelter, food or toilets – while they were waiting to be registered.

Meanwhile, European Union foreign and defense ministers have agreed on plans to form a naval force to tackle people-traffickers who send boats filled with desperate migrants from Libya to mainland Europe. EU plans to “identify, capture and destroy” potential people-trafficking boats before they can be loaded with people fleeing from conflict in Africa. The naval operation will involve gathering intelligence on smugglers; locating and inspecting boats; and destroying the vessels.In fact, people are getting the impression that EU authority is preparing for a new global war, – the war on immigrants.

While by no means a new phenomenon, the number of sub-Saharan African and Middle Eastern migrants traveling across the Mediterranean Sea to reach Europe – along with the associated death toll-is unprecedented in scale. The ongoing wave of immigration followed the so-called ‘revolutionary struggles’ of the media-named Arab Spring, when Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey with support of the US attempted to redraw a map of the Middle East conducting a bloody chaos and arise of terrorism in the region. Since this moment, Europe has become filled out with refugees from the war-torn territories. While various maritime migration routes are used, most of Migrants arrived to France from the Northern Africa and Algeria by the way of Libya and Tunisia.

This is the Central Mediterranean route and it is the most heavily trafficked and the deadliest maritime migration route in the world. Record numbers of migrants are not only traveling the Central Mediterranean route, but are also arriving to Germany, Austria and countries of the Central and Northern Europe using the Eastern Mediterranean route that passes through the Aegean Sea from Turkey. Other substantial ways of migration are: an air track from Asia and Arabian Countries to the United Kingdom and Northern Europe , the flow from NATO-humbled Balkans to the European Union and the way from former USSR to the European Union. The complexity of these migration flows is challenging current frameworks, and Europe is struggling to develop a comprehensive architecture that balances efforts to assist persons in need with efforts to secure its borders. Furthermore, this situation highly cuts the proportion of labor migrants and rises the number of refugees and anti-social elements.

It has been conducting a growth and strengthening of the ethnical criminality. One must consider the various motivating factors behind immigration: the earlier ones, before the outbreak of the bloody conflicts to the South and East of the EU, and now, when people are forced to save their lives by running where there is still peace. 10-20 years ago the migrants to Europe were predominantly looking for work in order to earn money for their families or were driven by their personal ambitions which could be realized in Europe. However, in the last two-three years the new arrivals in the EU are angry individuals who have lost everything or almost everything due to the horror of war. Many of them have lost their families. And what do you think? Whom do they consider responsible for that?

Entry-point states bear unilateral responsibility for migrants under the Dublin Regulation. Revised in 2013, this EU law continues to stipulate that asylum seekers must remain in the first European country they enter. Migrants who travel to other EU states face deportation back to the EU country they originally entered. To facilitate burden sharing across the EU, entry-point states along the Southern periphery have called for the suspension of the Dublin Regulation. However, northern states like Germany are quick to point out that almost a third of 2014’s 626,000 asylum applications were made within its borders.

Migrant detention centers along Europe’s southern periphery-in Greece, Italy, Malta, and Spain-have all invited charges of abuse and neglect over the years. Many rights groups contend that a number of these centers violate Article III of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits inhuman or degrading treatment. In Italy, migrants face fines and deportation under the controversial Bossi-Fini immigration law, which stipulates that they must secure work contracts before entering the country. This 2002 law makes illegal migration-and aiding illicit migrants- punishable by fine or jail. Despite its severity, many say the law has done little to curb the flow of migrants in recent years. The situation is especially acute in Greece, which has been hit hard by a five-year debt crisis and successive rounds of austerity measures. Overcrowded facilities lacking proper ventilation, clean water, and sanitation have been blamed for compromising migrants’ health, and police mistreatment and harassment continue to elicit censure from rights groups. The country’s soaring unemployment rates and drastic cuts in public spending mean there is scant economic opportunity and welfare support for migrants and refugees.

As with the sovereign-debt crisis, national interests have consistently trumped European ones in the areas of migration and asylum. This was illustrated in 2011, when France briefly reintroduced border controls in the free-movement Schengen area in response to the influx of thousands of Tunisian and Libyan refugees in neighboring Italy. The adoption of fortress policies by several EU member states has come at a high cost, some rights groups contend. However, the part of northern countries have continued to offer more inclusive migration and asylum policies. In September 2013, Sweden announced that it would offer permanent residency to all Syrian refugees. Germany also committed to offering ten thousand Syrian refugees temporary residency in 2013. But some experts say these policies conduct anti-immigrant sentiment that is gaining hold across much of Europe.

Many of immigrants come from Muslim countries, and the relationships between these immigrants and the majority populations are tense. In turn, governments just cannot integrate effectively all these immigrants into local society. It establishes a ground for activity of ultra nationalist parties, groups and lone wolfs as Anders Behring Breivik.We can say with certainty that the policy of multiculturalism has completely failed. Interestingly, Angela Merkel stated this as far back as in 2010, and Nicolas Sarkozy in 2011. EU Leaders understood the depth of the problem along at least of 5 years, but it was too late to take effective measures to resolve the problem. At that time it already was clear that the planned actions of US leaded Western hawks in North Africa and the Middle East would cause unprecedented new wave of immigrants with whom it would be impossible to act similarly, even fortress policy would be under defended.The recent economic crisis has also spurred a demographic shift across the continent, with citizens of crisis-hit states migrating to the north in record numbers in search of work. And while the issue of intra-EU migration has sparked anxiety over social welfare benefits in recent months, those who are coming from the Middle East and North Africa tend to provoke more problems in local societies. Experts say that any movement on immigration reform will be difficult with nationalist parties across the continent continuing to make significant gains and the threat of European jihadists returning home from the Middle East and North Africa continues to hold sway in public.

Now, the European migration crisis is especial acute. Since 2013, a cruel competition has been going among migrants, European governments and local societies. Immigrants concentrated in the entry point states move to the countries of the Central Europe (Germany, France) and the North Europe (United Kingdom, Sweden, Norway), spread over the whole union. The European governments impacted by critical look of the public opinion and the economic crisis have been trying to stop this process using the more and more gray approaches based on the wide notion of nation security concepts and the disregarding of human rights. However, the para-military operations in the Mediterranean sea and the usage of unadapted capms only conducts an additional exacerbation of migrants often pushed from their homes by the circumstances of insuperable force.

In turn, inability of governments to solve the ongoing crisis conducts the anger of European citizens and contributes to the growth of radical parties and movements. Neo Nazis and other destructive marginals feel comfortable in skin of the social tension in Europe. The crisis has been gaining momentum because of a constant military activity of the US and its allies supported by transnational corporations and western moneyed interest over the Middle East, Africa and East Europe. Supporting of so-called ‘moderate rebels’ in the Middle East, illegal coups in the different parts of the world, all these are the ground of the forthcoming migration war in the Europe. Thus, the war-forced migration is a complex issue conditioned by circumstances out of the ordinary and it cannot be solved by any local fortress actions. Mind boggling, US and their allies’ actions lead to the European Unions inward destruction via the inevitable social upheaval, burdened by ethnic and religious issues. Are the US analysts really run so incompetent that they arent able to forecast the simple effects? Or they are….

A note from South Front 

Dear friends!

This film came to being thanks to your support. With your support, having overcome the crisis in the beginning of August, we decided to set ambitious targets to show what we can do together. As you know, much has been done…, but, in an effort to justify your trust and respect, we have tried to bite more than we could chew, which almost led to a halt of the project.

A few days ago, we issued an appeal ; it was heard and supported by you.

Today we present another analytical film – “Migration War” and we are grateful to say you made it happen – all you who are supporting and sharing our goals and activities. Unfortunately, we are still experiencing shortage in the budget for the project: in September it was less than 50 % of what is needed (about $ 1,200). We ask all our friends to support the project if you can.

In any case, we are proud of your attention and moral support.

Sincerely, SouthFront

To Donate to South Front click

http://southfront.org/donate/ 

http://southfront.org

Israel treats Arabs the way Nazis treated Jews – a racist, fascist, white Jewish supremacist (the chosen people nonsense), Arab-hating society systematically ghettoizing and terrorizing people for praying to the wrong God.

Palestinians are treated like subhumans, enduring virtually every type indignity and mistreatment under brutalizing militarized rule, civil justice denied.

Institutionalized racism worse than South African apartheid denies them fundamental human and civil rights. De-Arabization is official Israeli policy. Occupation harshness facilitates slow-motion genocide.

Millions suffer horrifically. Anyone resisting tyranny is eliminated – brutalized, imprisoned or murdered.

Muhammad Allan is a Palestinian political prisoner – rearrested at Barzilai hospital before his release to be transferred to a West Bank hospital to continue his recovery process after a 66-day hunger strike for justice, leaving him close to death and brain damaged. More on this below.

In 2006, he was arrested for the first time and sentenced to three years imprisonment. He committed no crimes. In 2011, he was detained and brutally interrogated for 50 days.

On November 6, 2014, he was again arrested and held indefinitely under draconian administrative detention – uncharged and untried. After months in prison, he began his heroic, debilitating hunger strike.

“Administrative detention returns us to slavery, and therefore I refuse to be a slave to anyone,” he said. “The truth is that I currently prefer hunger as long as freedom is the goal in the absence of law in Israeli courts. So, I found myself forced to fight this battle.”

With no explanation or proof provided, Israel calls him a threat to society – a catchall pretext to target any Palestinian illegally, detain them, and hold them indefinitely in brutalizing confinement.

The Addameer prisoner support group calls administrative detention “a tool of punishment in the absence of clear evidence regarding committing a specific action.”

It constitutes a grave violation of international humanitarian law. It’s longstanding Israeli practice. On September 16, Israeli forces rearrested Allan at Barzilai hospital – shortly after his release forms were signed in early morning.

Police said he’ll remain incarcerated until hisNovember 4 administration detention period ends – after which it can be automatically renewed indefinitely, six-month periods at a time.

According to his lawyer, Jamil al-Khatib, he immediately resumed hunger striking for justice – to death if that’s what it takes. Addameer said rearresting him “despite his unstable critical health condition and after suspending his administrative detention order for weeks only confirms the arbitrariness and reprisal nature of the arrest.”

It further demonstrates the complicity of the hospital’s administration with the occupation’s intelligence forces and judicial system who aim to hold Palestinians in detention for as long as possible even if without charges or trial.

Administrative or other forms of detention without charges or trial violates Fourth Geneva’s Article 78 – limiting it for protected persons in cases of alleged security threats to short-term periods.

Detainees have the right of appeal – to “be decided with the least possible delay.” Article 75 of Geneva’s Additional Protocol I affirms the right to a fair trial before an independent, impartial judiciary. Israeli military courts deny it. Guilt by accusation is virtually automatic.

Israel is a serial international law violator, masquerading as democratic. What’s next for Allan remains to be seen. His long ordeal for justice continues.

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.

It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

President Bashar al-Assad gave an interview to Russian media outlets, following is the full text of the interview, which was conducted in English and Arabic.

Below is the RT video recording of the interview.

It is important for Americans and Europeans to listen carefully to president Assad’s responses, his understanding of the causes and consequences of terrorism, of the process of State sponsorship of terrorism by the US and its allies. 

Question 1: Mr. President, thank you for giving us all, from the Russian media, from RT, from Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Channel 1, Russia 24, RIA Novosti, and NTV channel. Thank you for giving us all the opportunity to talk to you during this very critical phase of the crisis in Syria, where there are many questions that need to be addressed on where exactly the political process to achieve peace in Syria is heading, what’s the latest developments on the fight against ISIL, and the status of the Russian and Syrian partnership, and of course the enormous exodus of Syrian refugees that has been dominating headlines in Europe.

Now, the crisis in Syria is entering its fifth year. You have defied all predictions by Western leaders that you would be ousted imminently, and continue to serve today as the President of the Syrian Arab Republic. Now, there has been a lot of speculation recently caused by reports that officials from your government met with officials from your adversary Saudi Arabia that caused speculation that the political process in Syria has entered a new phase, but then statements from Saudi Arabia that continue to insist on your departure suggest that in fact very little has changed despite the grave threat that groups like ISIL pose far beyond Syria’s borders.

So, what is your position on the political process? How do you feel about power sharing and working with those groups in the opposition that continue to say publically that there can be no political solution in Syria unless that includes your immediate departure? Have they sent you any signal that they are willing to team up with you and your government? In addition to that, since the beginning of the crisis in Syria, many of those groups were calling to you to carry out reforms and political change. But is such change even possible now under the current circumstances with the war and the ongoing spread of terror in Syria?

President Assad: Let me first divide this question. It’s a multi question in one question. The first part regarding the political process, since the beginning of the crisis we adopted the dialogue approach, and there were many rounds of dialogue between Syrians in Syria, in Moscow, and in Geneva. Actually, the only step that has been made or achieved was in Moscow 2, not in Geneva, not in Moscow 1, and actually it’s a partial step, it’s not a full step, and that’s natural because it’s a big crisis. You cannot achieve solutions in a few hours or a few days. It’s a step forward, and we are waiting for Moscow 3. I think we need to continue the dialogue between the Syrian entities, political entities or political currents, in parallel with fighting terrorism in order to achieve or reach a consensus about the future of Syria. So, that’s what we have to continue.

If you are worried about the refugees, stop supporting terrorists.

If I jump to the last part, because it’s related to this one, is it possible to achieve anything taking into consideration the prevalence of terrorism in Syria and in Iraq and in the region in general? We have to continue dialogue in order to reach the consensus as I said, but if you want to implement anything real, it’s impossible to do anything while you have people being killed, bloodletting hasn’t stopped, people feel insecure. Let’s say we sit together as Syrian political parties or powers and achieve a consensus regarding something in politics, in economy, in education, in health, in everything. How can we implement it if the priority of every single Syrian citizen is to be secure? So, we can achieve consensus, but we cannot implement unless we defeat the terrorism in Syria. We have to defeat terrorism, not only ISIS. I’m talking about terrorism, because you have many organizations, mainly ISIS and al-Nusra that were announced as terrorist groups by the Security Council. So, this is regarding the political process. Sharing power, of course we already shared it with some part of the opposition that accepted to share it with us. A few years ago they joined the government. Although sharing power is related to the constitution, to the elections, mainly parliamentary elections, and of course representation of the Syrian people by those powers.

But in spite of that, because of the crisis, we said let’s share it now, let’s do something, a step forward, no matter how effective. Regarding the refugee crisis, I will say now that Western dealing in the Western propaganda recently, mainly during the last week, regardless of the accusation that those refugees are fleeing the Syrian government, but they call it regime, of course. Actually, it’s like the West now is crying for the refugees with one eye and aiming at them with a machinegun with the second one, because actually those refugees left Syria because of the terrorism, mainly because of the terrorists and because of the killing, and second because of the results of terrorism. When you have terrorism, and you have the destruction of the infrastructure, you won’t have the basic needs of living, so many people leave because of the terrorism and because they want to earn their living somewhere in this world. So, the West is crying for them, and the West is supporting terrorists since the beginning of the crisis when it said that this was a peaceful uprising, when they said later it’s moderate opposition, and now they say there is terrorism like al-Nusra and ISIS, but because of the Syrian state or the Syrian regime or the Syrian president. So, as long as they follow this propaganda, they will have more refugees. So, it’s not about that Europe didn’t accept them or embrace them as refugees, it’s about not dealing with the cause. If you are worried about them, stop supporting terrorists. That’s what we think regarding the crisis. This is the core of the whole issue of refugees.

Question 2: Mr. President, you touched on the subject of the internal Syrian opposition in your first answer; nevertheless, I would like to go back once again because it’s very important for Russia. What should the internal opposition do in order to cooperate and coordinate with Syrian authorities to support them in battle? This is what they are saying and what they intend to do. How do you see the prospects of Moscow 3 and Geneva 3? Will that be useful for Syria in the current situation?

President Assad: As you know, we are at war with terrorism, and this terrorism is supported by foreign powers. This means that we are in a state of complete war. I believe that any society and any patriotic individuals, and any parties which truly belong to the people should unite when there is a war against an enemy, whether the enemy was in the form of domestic terrorism or foreign terrorism. If we ask any Syrian today about what they want, the first thing they would say we want security and safety for every person and every family. So, we as political forces, whether inside or outside the government, should unite around what the Syrian people want. This means that we should first unite against terrorism. This is logical and self-evident. That’s why I say that we have to unite now as political forces or government or as armed groups which fought against the government in order to fight terrorism. This has actually happened. There are forces fighting terrorism now with the Syrian state, which had previously fought against the Syrian state. We have made progress in this regard, but I would like to take this opportunity to call on all forces to unite against terrorism, because it is the way to achieve the political objectives which we as Syrians want through dialogue and political action.

VIDEO: COMPLETE INTERVIEW

Intervention: Concerning Moscow 3 and Geneva 3, in your opinion, are there prospects for this endeavor?

President Assad: The importance of Moscow 3 lies in the fact that it paves the way to Geneva 3, because the international sponsorship in Geneva was not neutral, while the Russian sponsorship is. It is not biased, and is based on international law and Security Council resolutions. Second, there are substantial differences around the “transitional body” item in Geneva. Moscow 3 is required to solve these problems between the different Syrian parties; and when we reach Geneva 3, it is ensured that there is a Syrian consensus which would enable it to succeed. We believe that it is difficult for Geneva 3 to succeed unless Moscow 3 does. That’s why we support holding this round of negotiations in Moscow after the preparations for the success of this round have been completed, particularly by the Russian officials.

Question 3: I would like to carry on with the issue of international cooperation in order to solve the Syrian crisis. In this regard, it is clear, after solving the Iranian nuclear file issue, that Iran will play a more active role in the region’s affairs. In this context, how do you evaluate the recent Iranian initiatives concerning reaching a settlement for the situation in Syria? And in general, what is the importance of Tehran’s support for you, is there military support? And in case there is, what form does it take?

The relationship between Syria and Iran is an old one.. There is an alliance based on a great degree of trust

President Assad: At present, there is no Iranian initiative. There are ideas or principles for an Iranian initiative based primarily on Syria’s sovereignty, the decisions of the Syrian people, and on fighting terrorism. The relationship between Syria and Iran is an old one. It is over three and a half decades old. There is an alliance based on a great degree of trust. That’s why we believe that the Iranian role is important. Iran supports Syria and the Syrian people. It stands with the Syrian state politically, economically, and militarily. When we say militarily, it doesn’t mean as claimed by some in the Western media that Iran has sent an army or armed forces to Syria. This is not true. It sends us military equipment, and of course there is an exchange of military experts between Syria and Iran. This has always been there, and it is natural for this cooperation to grow between the two countries in a state of war. Yes, Iranian support was essential to support Syria in its steadfastness in this difficult and ferocious war.

Question 4: Concerning the regional factors and actors, you recently talked about security coordination with Cairo in fighting terrorism, and that you are in the same battle line in this regard. How is your relationship with Cairo today given that it hosts some opposition groups? Do you have a direct relationship or perhaps through the Russian mediator, particularly in light of the strategic relations between Russia and Egypt. President el-Sisi has become a welcome guest in Moscow today.

President Assad: Relations between Syria and Egypt have not ceased to exist even in the past few years, and even when the president of Egypt was Mohammed Morsi who is a member of the terrorist Muslim Brotherhood organization. Egyptian institutions insisted on maintaining a certain part of this relationship, first because the Egyptian people are fully aware of what is happening in Syria, and second because the battle we are fighting is practically against the same enemy. This has now become clearer to everyone. Terrorism has spread in Libya, Egypt, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and in some other Arab countries, and in some Muslim countries too like Afghanistan, Pakistan, and others. That’s why I can say that there is joint vision between us and the Egyptians, but our relationship exists now on the security level. There are no political relations, i.e. there are no contacts between the Syrian Foreign Ministry and the Egyptian Foreign Ministry, for instance. Contacts are done on the security level only. We understand the pressures that might be applied on Egypt or on both Syria and Egypt so that they don’t have a strong relationship. This relationship does not go, of course, through Moscow. As I said, this relationship has never ceased to exist, but we feel comfortable for the improvement in relations between Russia and Egypt. At the same time, there is a good, strong, and historical relation between Moscow and Damascus, so it is natural for Russia to feel comfortable for any positive development in relations between Syria and Egypt.

Question 5: Mr. President, allow me to go back to the question on fighting terrorism. How do you look at the idea of creating a region free of ISIS terrorists in the north of the country on the borders with Turkey? In this context, what is your comment on the indirect cooperation between the West and terrorist organizations like al-Nusra Front and other extremist groups? And with whom are you willing to cooperate and fight against ISIS terrorists?

Terrorism should be eradicated everywhere

President Assad: To say that the borders with Turkey should be free of terrorism means that terrorism is allowed in other regions. This is unacceptable. Terrorism should be eradicated everywhere; and we have been calling for three decades for an international coalition to fight terrorism. But as for Western cooperation with al-Nusra Front, this is a reality, because we know that Turkey supports al-Nusra and ISIS by providing them with arms, money, and terrorist volunteers. And it is well known that Turkey has close relations with the West. Erdogan and Davutoglu cannot make a single move without coordinating first with the United States and other Western countries. Al-Nusra and ISIS operate with such a force in the region under Western cover, because Western states have always believed that terrorism is a card they can put in their pocket and use from time to time. Now, they want to use al-Nusra just against ISIS, maybe because ISIS has gone out of control one way or another. But this doesn’t mean that they want to eradicate ISIS. Had they wanted to do so, they would have been able to do it. For us, ISIS, al-Nusra, and all similar organizations which carry weapons and kill civilians are extremist organizations.

But with whom do we conduct dialogue, is a very important question. From the beginning, we said that we engage in dialogue with any party if that dialogue leads to degrading terrorism and consequently achieve stability. This naturally includes the political powers, but there are also armed groups with whom we conducted a dialogue and reached agreements in troubled areas which have become quiet now. In other areas, these armed groups joined the Syrian Army and are fighting by its side, and some of their members fell martyrs. So, we talk to everyone except the organizations I mentioned like ISIS, al-Nusra, and similar ones for a simple reason which is that these organizations base their doctrine on terrorism. They are ideological organizations and are not simply opposed to the state as is the case with a number of armed groups. Their doctrine is based on terrorism, and consequently dialogue with such organizations cannot lead to any real result. We should fight and eradicate them completely and talking to them is absolutely futile.

Intervention: When talking about regional partners, with whom are you prepared to cooperate in fighting terrorism?

You cannot be with and against terrorism at the same time

President Assad: Certainly with friendly countries, particularly Russia and Iran. Also we are cooperating with Iraq because it is facing the same type of terrorism. As for other countries, we have no veto on any country provided that it has the will to fight terrorism and not as they are doing in what is called “the international coalition” led by the United States. In fact, since this coalition started to operate, ISIS has been expanding. In other words, the coalition has failed and it has no real impact on the ground. At the same time, countries like Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Western countries which provide cover for terrorism like France, the United States, or others, cannot fight terrorism. You cannot be with and against terrorism at the same time. But if these countries decided to change their policies and realize that terrorism is like a scorpion, if you put it in your pocket, it will sting you. If that happens, we have no objection to cooperating with all these countries, provided that it is a real and not a fake coalition to fight terrorism.

Question 6: What is the current condition of the Syrian Army? The Syrian Armed Forces have been fighting for over four years. Have they been exhausted by the war, or have they become stronger as a result of engagement in military operations? And are the reserve forces to support their activities? And I have another important question: you said that a large number of your former adversaries and adversaries of the Syrian Army have moved to your side and are fighting within the ranks of the government forces. What is their number? And what is the extent of the help they are extending in the fight against extremist groups?

We are more determined than before to fight and defend our country against terrorists

President Assad: Of course, war is bad. And any war is destructive, any war weakens any society and any army no matter how strong or rich a country is. But things cannot be assessed in this manner. War is supposed to unite society against the enemy. The army becomes the most important symbol for any society when there is an aggression against this country. Society embraces the army, and provides it with all the necessary support, including human resources, volunteers, conscripts, in order to defend the homeland. At the same time, war provides a great deal of expertise to any armed forces practically and militarily.  So, there are always positive and negative aspects. We cannot say that the army becomes weaker or stronger. But in return, this social embrace and support for the army provides it with volunteers.

So, in answer to your question. “Are there reserves?” Yes, certainly, for without such reserves, the army wouldn’t have been able to stand for four and a half years in a very tough war, particularly that the enemy we are fighting today has unlimited human supply. We have terrorist fighters from over 80 or 90 countries today. You talk about a popular incubator in the millions in different countries sending individuals to fight in Syria with the terrorists. As far as we are concerned, our reserve force is Syria in the first instance. So, we have reserve forces, and this is what enables us to carry on. There is also determination. We have reserves not only in terms of human power, but in will as well. We are more determined than before to fight and defend our country against terrorists. This is what led some fighters who used to fight the state in the beginning for different reasons, and then discovered that they are wrong, so they decided to join the state. Now they are fighting battles with the army, and some have actually joined the army as regular soldiers. Some of them have kept their weapons, but they are fighting in groups with the armed forces in different parts of Syria.

Question 7: Mr. President, Russia has been fighting terrorism for 20 years, and we have seen its different manifestations. And now it seems that you are fighting it head on. In general, the world is witnessing now a new form of terrorism. In all the regions occupied by ISIS, they are setting up courts and administrations, and there are reports saying that it intends to mint its own currency. This way, they are constructing what looks like a state. This in itself might attract new supporters from different countries. Can you explain to us whom are you fighting? Is it a large group of terrorists or is it a new state which intends to radically redraw the borders of the region and the whole world? What is ISIS today?

President Assad: Of course, the terrorist ISIS groups tried to give the semblance of a state, as you said, in order to attract more volunteers who live on the dreams of the past: that there was an Islamic state acting for the sake or religion. This ideal appearance is unreal. It is deceptive. But no state can suddenly bring a new form to any society. The state should be the product of its society. It should be a natural evolution of that society, to express it. In the end, a state should be a projection of its society. You cannot bring a state which has a different form and implant it in a society. Here we ask the question: does ISIS, or what they call the Islamic State, have any semblance to Syrian society? Certainly not.

Of course we have terrorist groups, but they are not an expression of society. In Russia, you have terrorist groups today, but they do not project the Russian society, nor do they have any semblance to the open and diverse Russian society. That’s why if they tried to mint a currency or have stamps or passports, or have all these forms which indicate the existence of a state, it doesn’t mean that they exist as a state, first because they are different from the people, and second because people in those regions flee towards the real state, the Syrian state, the national state. Sometimes they fight them too. A very small minority believes these lies. They are certainly not a state, they are a terrorist group. But if we want to ask about who they are, let’s speak frankly. They are the third phase of the political or ideological poisons produced by the West, aimed at achieving political objectives. The first phase was the Muslim Brotherhood at the beginning of the last century. The second phase was Al Qaeda in Afghanistan in order to fight the Soviet Union. And the third phase is ISIS and al-Nusra Front and these groups. Who are ISIS? And who are these groups? They are simply extremist products of the West.

Question 8: Mr. President, at the beginning of the Syrian crisis, the Kurdish issue started to be discussed more often. Previously, Damascus was severely criticized because of its position towards the Kurdish minority. But now, practically, in some areas, Kurdish formations are your allies in the fight against ISIS. Do you have a specific position towards who the Kurds are for you and who you are for them?

The Kurds are part of the Syrian fabric

President Assad: First, you cannot say that there was a certain state policy concerning the Kurds. A state cannot discriminate between members of its population; otherwise, this will create division in the country. If we had been discriminating between the different components of society, the majority of these components wouldn’t have supported the state now, and the country would have disintegrated directly from the very beginning. For us, the Kurds are part of the Syrian fabric. They are not foreigners, they live in this region like the Arabs, the Circassians, the Armenians, and many other ethnicities and sects existing in Syria and living in it for many centuries. It’s not known when some of them came to this region. Without these groups, there wouldn’t have been a homogenous Syria. So, are they our allies today? No, they are patriotic people. But on the other hand, you cannot put all the Kurds in one category. Like any other Syrian component, there are different currents among them. They belong to different parties. There are those on the left and those on the right. There are tribes, and there are different groups. So, it is not objective to talk about the Kurds as one mass.

There are certain Kurdish demands expressed by some parties, but there are no Kurdish demands for the Kurds. There are Kurds who are integrated fully into society; and I would like to stress that they are not allies at this stage, as some people would like to show. There are Kurdish soldiers in the army who have fallen martyrs, which means that they are fully integrated into society. But there are parties which had certain demands, and we addressed some of those demands at the beginning of the crisis. There are other demands which have nothing to do with the state, and which the state cannot address. There are things related to the whole people, to the constitution, and the people should endorse these demands before a decision can be taken by the state. In any case, anything proposed should be in the national framework. That’s why I say that we are with the Kurds, and with other components, all of us in alliance to fight terrorism. This is what I have talked about a while ago, that we should unite in order to fight ISIS. After we defeat ISIS, al-Nusra, and the terrorists, the Kurdish demands expressed by certain Kurdish parties can be discussed nationally. There is no problem with that, we do not have a veto on any demand as long as it is within the framework of Syria’s unity and the unity of the Syrian people and territory, fighting terrorism, Syrian diversity, and the freedom of this diversity in its ethnic, national, sectarian, and religious sense.

Question 9: Mr. President, you partially answered this question, but I would like to have a more precise answer, because some of the Kurdish forces in Syria call for amending the constitution. For instance, setting up local administration and then moving on to an autonomy in the northern regions. These statements are becoming more frequent now that the Kurds are fighting ISIS with a certain degree of success. Do you agree to such statements? Can the Kurds bet on some kind of gratitude? Can this be discussed?

President Assad: When we defend our country, we do not ask people to thank us. It is our natural duty to defend our country. If they deserve thanks, then every Syrian citizen defending his country deserves as much. But I believe that defending one’s country is a duty, and when you carry out your duty, you don’t need thanks. But what you have said is related to the Syrian constitution. Today, if you want to change the existing structure in your country, in Russia for instance, let’s say to redraw the borders of the republics, or give one republic authorities different from those given to other republics; this has nothing to do with the president or the government. This has to do with the constitution. The president does not own the constitution and the government does not own the constitution. Only the people own the constitution, and consequently changing the constitution means national dialogue. For us, we don’t have a problem with any demand. As a state, we do not have any objection to these issues as long as they do not infringe upon Syria’s unity and diversity and the freedom of its citizens. But if there are certain groups or sections in Syria which have certain demands, these demands should be in the national framework, and in dialogue with the Syrian political forces. When the Syrian people agree on taking steps of this kind, which have to do with federalism, autonomy, decentralization, or changing the whole political system, this needs to be agreed upon by the Syrian people, and consequently amending the constitution. This is why these groups need to convince the Syrian people of their proposals. In this case, they are not in dialogue with the state, but rather with the people. When the Syrian people decide to move in a certain direction, and to approve a certain step, we will naturally approve it.

Question 10: Now, the U.S.-led coalition has been carrying out airstrikes on Syrian territory for about one year on the same areas that the Syrian Air Force is also striking ISIL targets, yet there hasn’t been a single incident of the U.S.-led coalition and the Syrian Air Force activity clashing with one another. Is there any direct or indirect coordination between your government and the U.S. coalition in the fight against ISIL?

There’s not a single coordination or contact between the Syrian government and the United States government

President Assad: You’d be surprised if I say no. I can tell you that my answer will be not realistic, to say now, while we are fighting the same, let’s say enemy, while we’re attacking the same target in the same area without any coordination and at the same time without any conflict. And actually this is strange, but this is reality. There’s not a single coordination or contact between the Syrian government and the United States government or between the Syrian army and the U.S. army. This is because they cannot confess, they cannot accept the reality that we are the only power fighting ISIS on the ground. For them, maybe, if they deal or cooperate with the Syrian Army, this is like a recognition of our effectiveness in fighting ISIS. This is part of the willful blindness of the U.S. administration, unfortunately.

Question 11: So not event indirectly though, for example the Kurds? Because we know the U.S. is working with the Kurds, and the Kurds have some contacts with the Syrian government. So, not even any indirect coordination?

President Assad: Not even any third party, including the Iraqis, because before they started the attacks, they let us know through the Iraqis. Since then, not a single message or contact through any other party.

Question 12: Ok, so just a little bit further than that. You’ve lived in the West, and you, at one time, moved in some of those circles with some Western leaders that since the beginning of the crisis have been backing armed groups who are fighting to see you overthrown. How do you feel about one day working again with those very same Western leaders, perhaps shaking hands with them? Would you ever be able to trust them again?

President Assad: First, it’s not a personal relation; it’s a relation between states, and when you talk about relation between states, you don’t talk about trust; you talk about mechanism. So, trust is a very personal thing you cannot depend on in political relations between, let’s say, people. I mean, you are responsible for, for example in Syria, for 23 million, and let’s say in another country for tens of millions. You cannot put the fate of those tens of millions or maybe hundreds of millions on the trust of a single person, or two persons in two countries. So, there must be a mechanism. When you have a mechanism, you can talk about trust in a different way, not a personal way. This is first. Second, the main mission of any politician, or any government, president, prime minister, it doesn’t matter, is to work for the interest of his people and the interest of his country. If any meeting or any handshaking with anyone in the world will bring benefit to the Syrian people, I have to do it, whether I like it or not. So, it’s not about me, I accept it or I like it or whatever; it’s about what the added value of this step that you’re going to take. So yes, we are ready whenever there’s the interest of the Syrians. I will do it, whatever it is.

Question 13: Talking about alliances in the fight against terrorism and ISIS, Russian President Vladimir Putin called for a regional alliance to fight what is called the Islamic State, and the recent visits of Arab officials to Moscow come in this context, but Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem said that this means a miracle. We are talking here about security coordination, as described by Damascus, in case it happened, with the governments of Jordan, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia. How do you see this alliance? In your opinion, will it achieve any results? You just said that any relation is based on interests, so are you willing to coordinate with these countries, and what is the truth behind the meetings held between Syrian and maybe Saudi officials as reported by the media?

We are not facing terrorist groups, we are facing terrorist armies

President Assad: As to fighting terrorism, this is a big and comprehensive issue which includes cultural and economic aspects. It obviously has security and military aspects as well. In terms of prevention, all the other aspects are more important than the security and military ones, but today, and in the reality we live now in terms of fighting terrorism, we are not facing terrorist groups, we are facing terrorist armies equipped with light, medium, and heavy weaponry. They have billions of dollars to recruit volunteers. The military and security aspects should be given priority at this stage. So, we think that this alliance should act in different areas, but to fight on the ground first. Naturally, this alliance should consist of states which believe in fighting terrorism and believe that their natural position should be against terrorism. In the current state of affairs, the person supporting terrorism cannot be the same person fighting terrorism. This is what these states are doing now. Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Jordan, which pretend to be part of a coalition against terrorism in northern Syria actually support terrorism in the south, the north, and the northwest, virtually in the same regions in which they are supposed to be fighting terrorism. Once again I say that within the framework of public interest, if these states decided to go back to the right position, to go back to their sense and fight terrorism, naturally we will accept and cooperate with them and with others. We do not have a veto and we do not stick to anything in the past. Politics change all the time. It might change from bad to good, and the ally might become an adversary, and the adversary an ally. This is normal. When they fight against terrorism, we will cooperate with them.

Question 14: Mr. President, now there is a huge wave of refugees, largely from Syria, going to Europe. Some say that these people are practically lost to Syria. They are very unhappy with the Syrian authorities because they haven’t been able to protect them and they had to leave their homes. How do you look at those people? Do you see them as part of the Syrian electorate in the future? Do you expect them to return? And the second question has to do with the European sense of guilt about the displacement happening now. Do you think that Europe is guilty in this regard?

We are sad for every innocent victim .. Europe is responsible because it supported terrorism

President Assad: Any person who leaves Syria constitutes a loss to the homeland, to be sure, regardless of the position or capabilities of that person. This of course does not include the terrorists. It includes all citizens in general with the exception of terrorists. So, yes, there is a great loss as a result of immigration. You raised a question related to the elections.  Last year, we had presidential elections in Syria, and there were many refugees in different countries, particularly in Lebanon. According to Western propaganda, all those had fled the state, the oppression of the state, and the killing of the state, and they are supposed to be the enemies of the state. But the surprise for Westerners was that most of those voted for the president who is supposed to be killing them. That was a great blow to Western propaganda. Of course, voting has certain conditions. There should be an embassy, and to have the custodianship of the Syrian state of the voting process. This depends on relations between the states. Many countries have severed relations with Syria and closed Syrian embassies, and consequently Syrian citizens cannot vote in these countries. They should go to other countries where ballot boxes are installed. But this did happen last year.

As to Europe, of course it’s guilty. Today, Europe is trying to say that Europe is guilty because they haven’t given money or they haven’t allowed these people to immigrate legally to Europe, and that’s why they came through the sea and were drowned. We are sad for every innocent victim, but is the victim who drowns in the sea dearer to us than the victim killed in Syria? Are they dearer than innocent people whose heads are cut by the terrorists? Can you feel sad for a child’s death in the sea and not for thousands of children who have been killed by the terrorists in Syria? And also for men, women, and the elderly? These European double standards are no longer acceptable. They have been flagrantly exposed. It doesn’t make sense to feel sad for the death of certain people and not for the death of others. The principles are the same. So, Europe is responsible because it supported terrorism, as I said a short while ago, and is still supporting terrorism and providing cover for them. It still calls them “moderate” and categorizes them into groups, while all these groups in Syria are extremists.

Question 15: If you don’t mind, I would like to go back to the question about the political future of Syria. Mr. President, your opponents, whether those fighting against the authorities with weapons or your political opponents, still insist that one of the most important conditions for peace in the country is your departure from political life and from the position of the president of the republic. What do you think of this, not only in your capacity as president of the state, but as a Syrian citizen as well? Theoretically, are you prepared if you feel it is necessary?

President Assad: In addition to what you are saying, Western propaganda was from the very beginning about the idea that the cause of the problem is the president. Why? Because they want to portray that the whole problem of Syria lies in one individual, and consequently the natural reaction for many people is that if the problem lies in one individual, that individual should not be more important than the whole homeland. So, let that individual go, and things will be all right. This is how they oversimplify things in the West. What’s happening in Syria, in this regard, is similar to what happened in your case. Notice what happened in the Western media since the coup d’état started in the Ukraine. What happened? President Putin was transformed from a friend of the West to a foe, and once again he was characterized as a tsar. He is portrayed as a dictator suppressing opposition in Russia, and that he came to power through undemocratic means, despite the fact that he was elected in democratic elections, and the West itself acknowledged that the elections were democratic. Now, it is no longer democratic. This is Western propaganda.

They say that if the president went, things will become better. What does that mean practically? For the West, it means that as long as you are there, we will continue to support terrorism, because the Western principle followed now in Syria and Russia and other countries is changing presidents, changing states, or what they call bringing regimes down. Why? Because they do not accept partners, and they do not accept independent states. What is their problem with Russia? What is their problem with Syria?  What is their problem with Iran? They are all independent countries. They want a certain individual to go and be replaced by someone who acts in their interests and not in the interest of his country. For us, the president comes through the people and through elections, and if he goes, he goes through the people. He doesn’t go as a result of an American decision, a Security Council decision, the Geneva conference or the Geneva communiqué. If the people want him to stay, he should stay; and if the people reject him, he should leave immediately. This is the principle according to which I look at this issue.

Question 16: Military operations have been going on for over four years. You are likely to analyze things and look back often. In your opinion, was there a crucial juncture when you realized that war is unavoidable? And who initiated that war machinery? Is it the influence of Washington, or were they your Middle Eastern neighbors in the region? Or were there mistakes on your part? Are there things you regret? And if you had the opportunity to go back, would you change them?

President Assad: In every state, there are mistakes, and mistakes might be made every day, but these mistakes do not constitute a crucial juncture because they are always there, so what is it that makes these mistakes suddenly lead to the situation we are living in Syria today? This doesn’t make sense. You might be surprised if I tell that the crucial juncture in what happened in Syria is something that many people wouldn’t even think about. It was the Iraq war in 2003, when the United States invaded Iraq. We were strongly opposed to that invasion, because we knew that things were moving in the direction of dividing societies and creating unrest. And we are Iraq’s neighbors. At that time, we saw that the war will turn Iraq into a sectarian country, into a society divided against itself. To the West of Syria there is another sectarian country, Lebanon.

We are in the middle. We knew well that we will be affected. Consequently, the beginning of the Syrian crisis, or what happened in the beginning, was the natural result of that war and the sectarian situation in Iraq, part of which moved to Syria, and it was easy for them to incite some Syrian groups on sectarian grounds. The second point which might be less crucial is that when the West adopted terrorism officially in Afghanistan in the early 1980s and called terrorists at that time “freedom fighters,” and then in 2006 when the Islamic State appeared in Iraq under American sponsorship and they didn’t fight it.

All these things together created the conditions for the unrest with the Western support and Gulf money, particularly form Qatar and Saudi Arabia, and with Turkish logistic support, particularly that Erdogan belongs intellectually to the Muslim Brotherhood. Consequently, he believes that if the situation changed in Syria, Egypt, and Iraq, it means the creation of a new sultanate, this time not an Ottoman sultanate, but a sultanate for the Brotherhood extending from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean and ruled by Erdogan. All these factors together brought things to what we have today. Once again, I say that there were mistakes, and mistakes always create gaps and weak points, but they are not sufficient and they do not justify what happened. And if these gaps and weak points are the cause, why didn’t they lead to revolutions in the Gulf States, particularly in Saudi Arabia which doesn’t know anything about democracy? The answer is self-evident, I believe.

Mr. President, thank you for giving us the time and for your detailed answers to our questions. We know that in September you have your golden jubilee, your 50th birthday. Probably the best wishes in the current circumstances would be the return of peace and safety to your country as soon as possible.

Thank you

Tensions between Washington and Moscow have continued to escalate over US allegations that Russia is establishing a “forward-operating air base” outside the northwestern port city of Latakia in preparation for a more direct intervention in support of the government of President Bashar al-Assad against Islamist militias armed and supported by the US and its regional allies.

The US State Department reported that Secretary of State John Kerry telephoned his Russian counterpart, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Tuesday for the third time in barely 10 days to warn against continued Russian backing for the Assad regime.

According to a State Department readout of the conversation, Kerry said that Russian backing for the Syrian government “risks exacerbating and extending the conflict, and undermining our shared goal of fighting extremism.”

Kerry apparently reiterated earlier statements that the only legitimate Russian role in Syria would be in subordination to the so-called “coalition” cobbled together by Washington and led by the US and its regional allies, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the other reactionary Sunni oil monarchies of the Persian Gulf region.

In an earlier conversation, Kerry issued an even more blunt threat that any expanded Russian presence in Syria risked “confrontation” with the US military, which is conducting air strikes inside the country.

This US-led air war is threatening to heat up, with Australia announcing that its warplanes launched their first air strikes inside Syria on Monday, claiming they were directed against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) targets.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, meanwhile, told France Inter Radio Wednesday that French warplanes would launch their own air strike in coming weeks in an attempt to stop ISIS advances, particularly near the city of Aleppo, Syria’s largely destroyed former industrial and commercial capital. So-called “rebels,” Islamist forces that Le Drian insisted on still calling the “Free Syrian Army,” carried out a murderous mortar shelling of the western pro-government section of the city on Tuesday, killing 38 civilians, 14 of them children.

Increasing the danger of a military clash with Russian forces, Washington has broken off military-to-military relations with Russia as part of its campaign to isolate Moscow over its annexation of Crimea following last year’s US-orchestrated, fascist-spearheaded coup in Ukraine.

Secretary of State Kerry acknowledged Wednesday that Russia had proposed the resumption of such talks in order to “deconflict” any encounters between the two countries’ military forces in Syria. He indicated that the request would be discussed but made no commitment to such contacts.

Russian officials have denied that Moscow is carrying out any direct intervention or qualitative buildup on Syrian soil, while insisting that its aid to the Syrian government forces is crucial to defeating ISIS and other Islamist forces seeking its overthrow.

Speaking Tuesday at the Collective Security Treaty Organization in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, Russian President Vladimir Putin defended Russian military aid to Syria. “We are supporting the government of Syria in the fight against a terrorist aggression, and we are offering and will continue to offer it necessary military and technical assistance, and we call on other countries to join us,” Putin said.

The Russian president called upon the Western powers to

“sideline geopolitical ambitions, refrain from so-called double standards, from the policy of direct or indirect use of separate terrorist groups to achieve opportunistic goals, including the change of governments and regimes that may be disagreeable to whomever.”

Putin also stated that Syria’s President Assad was prepared for a political compromise with “the healthy part of the opposition.”

Washington and its regional allies have insisted that no compromise is possible outside of Assad’s ouster. Some European officials, however, have called this policy into question, fearing that a precipitous collapse of the Assad regime would only result in either ISIS or the Al Qaeda-affiliated Al-Nusra Front overrunning Damascus.

British Foreign Minister Philip Hammond, suggested last week that Assad could remain in office during a six-month “transitional period,” a scheme that was rejected by the Syrian government, which questioned the right of London to impose the length and outcome of such a process.

During a state visit to Iran last week, Austria’s Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz told reporters that “a pragmatic common approach” was needed, “including the involvement of Assad in the fight against Islamic State terror.” Kurz added, “In my opinion the priority is the fight against terror. This will not be possible without powers such as Russia and Iran.”

Officials in Moscow have insisted that Russian planes flying into Syria have carried both military and humanitarian supplies. While Washington had pressured the governments of Bulgaria and Greece to deny Russia permission to make these flights through their airspace, they have since shifted to a route over Iran and Iraq. US officials have declined to comment on whether they sought to similarly pressure the regime in Baghdad, their supposed ally in the war against ISIS.

“An average of two giant Condor transport aircraft have been landing every day for the past 10 days at the [Latakia airport], while cargo ships have been docking at a Russian base in the port city of Tartous,” the McClatchy news agency quoted a US official as saying. It reported that deliveries thus far have included “pre-fabricated housing for 1,500 people, six advanced T-90 tanks, 36 advanced armored personnel carriers and 15 artillery pieces,” together with the deployment of some 200 Russian Marine commandoes.

If this inventory is accurate, it is a drop in the bucket compared to the military hardware and personnel that Washington has poured into the region. Far greater stockpiles of US weapons are now in the hands of ISIS after it routed Iraqi forces in Mosul and elsewhere, capturing their arms and equipment. Over 3,000 US troops, meanwhile, have been deployed to Iraq, while US warplanes are conducting round-the-clock sorties over Iraq and Syria.

Despite this deployment, however, Washington has little to show for a year of bombing ISIS. The Islamist militia, according to intelligence reports, has just as many fighters and continues to control at least as much territory as it did a year ago.

This was the thrust of a pointed comment from the Russian Foreign Ministry Wednesday. “A legitimate question arises—what results have we got from sending into the region military forces of those countries, which are so fond of counting foreign aircraft overflights,” the ministry said in a statement. “Unfortunately, the achievements of the coalition in the fight against (the Islamic state) look very modest.”

This assessment received stark confirmation Wednesday in testimony by Gen. Lloyd Austin, the chief of the US Central Command, before the Senate Armed Services Committee. Asked by Senators how many US-trained Syrian “rebels” were fighting inside Syria, General Austin replied that “it’s a small number…We’re talking four or five.” Pentagon officials added that barely more than 100 such fighters are currently undergoing training. Senators responded by calling the $500 million training program a “failure” and a “debacle.”

What is clear is that Washington’s principal objective in Syria is not the defeat of ISIS, but rather regime change. Its aim is to deprive Russia of its one ally in the Middle East—and its sole foreign naval base—as part of a broader strategy of militarily imposing US hegemony over the energy-rich region, and more broadly over the Eurasian landmass.

To that end, US imperialism is escalating its military threats against Russia. Pentagon Comptroller Michael McCord, in an interview with Bloomberg news, indicated that the US 2017 military budget is being reshaped largely in preparation for a confrontation with Moscow.

“The thing that we have the most thinking to do about in this budget compared to any other previous budgets is Russia,” McCord said, adding that this is “in terms of are we doing the right things in investments and posture?”

This follows earlier testimony by President Barack Obama’s nominee for chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Dunford, that Russia “could pose an existential threat to the United States” and that its actions were “nothing short of alarming.” Significantly, Dunford ranked Russia as a far greater threat than terrorism.

… it is Western propaganda that is capable of mobilizing the masses for whatever ends or goals anywhere in the world. For whatever reasons, it can trigger coups, conflicts, terrible violence, and ‘strive for change.’ It can call the most peaceful large country on earth the most violent; it can describe it as the real threat to world peace; and it can call a bunch of Western nations that have been, for centuries, terrorizing the world, the true upholders of peace and democracy, and almost everybody believes it. Almost all people in the West believe it. – Noam Chomsky and Andre Vltchek, On Western Terrorism: From Hiroshima to Drone Warfare

“… trenches of ideas are more powerful than weapons.” – José Martí

After months of horrific scenes of migrant deaths in the Mediterranean where literally thousands of human beings were dying at sea, European public opinion was finally mobilized to respond to this movement of people. However, the anguished expressions of concern from the general public and government leaders in Europe was a far cry from the response that met the first wave of migrants that was largely African.

In response to that migration, European authorities openly talked of launching military attacks on the boats in Libya to stop the “flood” of these “illegal” immigrants into Europe, even after experts cautioned them that military attacks would result in even more deaths at sea.

What changed? The racial composition of the majority of the migrants shifting away from Sub-Saharan Africans to refugees from the various conflict zones of Iraq and Syria, captured in the image of the globally disseminated image of Aylan Kurdi, the Kurdish child from the devastated city of Kabani. But even more importantly, European and U.S. propaganda could exploit this flow of humanity from Syria politically.

This example is pertinent to the discussion here because it raises two issues related to Yemen: first, the ease in which public opinion is influenced by Western propagandists (I include both the official state entities responsible for psy-ops directed at the public and the corporate media that largely collaborates with these efforts because of shared ideological positions and worldviews), and secondly, how humanitarian concerns are selectively manipulated to prepare and justify military attacks from the U.S./EU/NATO axis of domination.

In Yemen, six months of relentless and seemingly indiscriminate bombing by the repressive Wahhabaist dictatorship of Saudi Arabia has cost the lives of over four thousands human beings, who according to the United Nations and major human rights organizations have been primarily civilians.

Along with this wanton murder, the Saudi government and its allies from the contemptuous gang of corrupt Arab monarchies known as the Gulf Cooperation Council benefit from the diplomatic cover and military support from the equally contemptuous U.S. state. Together, they have created a humanitarian catastrophe in one of the poorest nations on the planet.

Yet, for the majority of the people in the U.S., the carnage in Yemen simply does not exist because it has not been in the interests of the rulers to draw the attention of the American people to it.

Therefore, the U.S. public is unaware that the U.S. is participating in the naval blockade of a country that imports 80% of its food by sea. They don’t know that the bombing, blockade, and massive displacement has resulted in widespread famine with more than 78% of the population now in need of humanitarian assistance. They never read the report from Peter Maurer, the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), who said that “Yemen after five months looks like Syria after five years.”

And while U.S. propagandists are preparing the people for an even more direct intervention into Syria, using the absurd pretext that somehow the imposition of a “no fly zone” is an appropriate response to the humanitarian concerns of refugee flows from Syria to Europe, the humanitarian emergency created by the war in Yemen is largely uncovered and outside the bounds of polite conversation in the U.S.

This conspiracy of silence has translated into impunity for war crimes and crimes against humanity. It has meant that the central role played by the U.S. in this criminal assault occurred without any opposition from mainstream politicians or most radicals and leftists in the U.S.

Do Non-European Lives really Matter to White Leftists?

The political reaction to the killing spree in Yemen that now eclipses the murderous assault on Gaza by Israel, has not only been met with indifference but many leftists and radicals in the U.S. have given their support to Bernie Sanders who said very clearly that under his administration the Saudi’s would be given even more latitude to carry out military operations in the Middle-East. The Sanders’ position is that the Saudi’s needed to get their “hands a little dirty.” For Bernie and his supporters, the mischief that the Saudi government and private individuals have been engaged in across the region financing groups like ISIS wasn’t dirty enough.

After years of drone attacks from the U.S., the end of the agony of the people of Yemen is nowhere in sight. These attacks targeted weddings, funerals, first responders to an initial drone attack and so-called signature strikes where an anonymous person is murdered because he fits the behavior profile of a “terrorist.” After pounding the country into rubble with six months of terror from the sky, the Saudi’s are now involved in ground operations in Yemen that will only increase the death toll and the humanitarian disaster.

This is the world that a President Sanders promises—continued war crimes from the sky with drone strikes and Saudi led terror in support of the Western imperial project.

This is not to suggest that everyone who might find a way to support Sanders is a closet racist and supporter of imperialism. I know plenty of folks of all backgrounds who “feel the Bern.” There is, however, an objective logic to their uncritical support that they cannot escape and which I believe represents the ongoing crisis of radicalism in the U.S. and Europe.

The Sanders’ campaign, like the Obama phenomenon before it, does not offer a program or strategic direction for addressing the current crisis and contradictions of Western capitalist societies. Instead, it is an expression of the moral and political crisis of Western radicalism. This crisis – which is reflective of the loss of direction needed to inform vision, and fashion a creative program for radical change – is even more acute in the U.S. than Western Europe. Yet, what unites both radical experiences is a tacit commitment to Eurocentrism and the assumptions of normalized white supremacy.

In their desperate attempt to defend Sanders and paint his critics as dogmatists and purists, the Sanders supporters have not only fallen into the ideological trap of a form of narrow “left” nativism, but also the white supremacist ethical contradiction that reinforces racist cynicism in which some lives are disposable for the greater good of the West.

And as much as the ‘Sandernistas ’ attempt to disarticulate Sanders “progressive” domestic policies from his documented support for empire (even the Obamaite aphorism “The perfect is the enemy of the good” is unashamedly deployed), it should be obvious that his campaign is an ideological prop – albeit from a center/left position – of the logic and interests of the capitalist-imperialist settler state.

The silence of the left on Yemen is not a trivial matter. The fact that so many white leftist supporters of Sanders can politically and psychologically disconnect his domestic program from his foreign policy positions that objectively support U.S. and Western neoliberal hegemony means that not only have they found a way to be comfortable collaborating with imperialism, but that they have also decided that they can support the implicit hierarchy that determines from an imperial perspective that lives in the White West matter more than others.

What this means for those of us who are internationalists and believe in the equal value of all life is that we have to question the sincerity of individuals who claim that black lives matter while supporting someone who clearly believes that Israeli lives matter more than Palestinian and Yemeni lives. And that the pro-democracy fighters in Bahrain should be subjected to the policing and murderous assault by the gangster regime in Saudi Arabia.

It means that if today leftists in the U.S. can find a way to reconcile the suffering of the people of Yemen and Gaza and all of occupied Palestine for the greater good of electing Sanders, tomorrow my life and the movement that I am a part of that is committed to fighting this corrupt, degenerate, white supremacist monstrosity called the United States, can be labeled as enemies of the state and subjected to brutal repression with the same level of silence from these leftists.

And since tomorrow has already happened in the past with the repression of the Black Liberation Movement, when it happens again we will not be surprised – but this time we will be ready.