Did Obama Defense Deputy Lie To Protect Her Fraudulent Russiagate Sources?
By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | May 9, 2020
Newly declassified congressional transcripts from the Russia investigation include testimony from former Obama administration defense official, Evelyn Farkas, who testified under oath that she lied in an MSNBC interview when she claimed to have evidence of “the Trump staff dealing with Russians,” and said that the Obama administration was “trying to also get information to the hill” because the incoming Trump administration would try to hide the (nonexistent) evidence.
Former Obama DoD Deputy Evelyn Farkas reveals White House gathered intel on Trump campaign staff and then leaked it! https://t.co/W6FG4IFe5Q pic.twitter.com/VwaF2CnZzn
— ZeroPointNow (@ZeroPointNow) March 29, 2017
During closed-door testimony on June 26, 2017, however, Farkas – who was the Clinton campaign’s senior foreign policy adviser – admitted she had nothing.
In an exchange with former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC), Farkas is pressed on why she said ‘we’ when she said ‘if they found out how we knew what we knew about their staff dealing with Russians.’
Farkas’ response: I didn’t know anything.
In fact, Farkas – who is currently running for a Housee seat in the 17th congressional district of New York – shouldn’t have known anything, because she resigned from the Obama administration in September 2015.
… how did this non-resident fellow at the Atlantic Council, member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and former deputy assistant secretary of defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia, gain knowledge of intelligence regarding members of Trump’s team and their relations with Russia, when she was the senior foreign policy advisor for Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton?
Farkas was the prime driver behind the anti-Russia phobia inside the Pentagon during the Obama years — shilling hard for the Ukraine — requesting that the President send them anti-tank missiles — which, essentially, would mean outright war with Russia. – iBankCoin
Given all we now know, Occam’s razor suggests that Farkas, while working for the Clinton campaign, was fully aware of the work of Christopher Steele – the former UK spy paid by the Clinton campaign (through their lawyers and Fusion GPS) to fabricate the infamous dossier used by US intelligence to paint Donald Trump as an agent of Russia.
That said, who exactly did she mean by “we” during that interview? And who was scrambling to leak evidence to the hill?
Based on the MSNBC interview, Farkas obviously knew something. But instead of going down that particular rabbit hole during congressional testimony, she thought the best option was to simply say she lied.
Venezuela’s Guaido says US mercenary contract is fake, even after own allies give full doc to US media
RT | May 9, 2020
Opposition leader Juan Guaido continues to deny any link to a failed armed incursion into Venezuela, despite his own allies handing over a lengthy contract to American media naming him as the commander of the operation.
The opposition figurehead and self-declared “interim president” of Venezuela denied again on Friday that he had anything to do with the ill-fated mission, which by most accounts was set up by a Florida-based security company, Silvercorp USA, and its American CEO, Jordan Goudreau.
“We reiterate once again that the interim government has no link, commitment or responsibility to Silvercorp or its actions, as well as deny that President Guaido has signed an assumption contract with [the company],” Guaido’s office said in a statement.
Earlier this week, however, the Washington Post published a 41-page document it alleged to be the full multi-million-dollar contract between Silvercorp and Guaido, even noting the document was “provided by Venezuelan opposition officials on the condition that one of the attachments be redacted.” Among its many revelations, the leaked contract clearly lists Guaido as the operation’s “commander in chief,” directly at odds with his repeated claims to the contrary.
While the complete contract does not contain Guaido’s signature, top adviser Juan Rendon has admitted to Reuters that he negotiated the deal, and his name does appear on the contract alongside other senior opposition members. Guaido did apparently sign a shorter “general services agreement,” though that document does not specify what the deal was for.
The failed mission, launched on May 3, saw several dozen armed mercenaries attempt to storm the Venezuelan coast from Colombia in speedboats. The operation fell apart before it could get off the ground, with security forces intercepting the boats and killing eight of the fighters before arresting some 13 more – two of them US citizens and employees of Silvercorp. One of those Americans, Luke Denman, has since stated the mission sought to capture Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and bring him back to the US, where he is wanted on “narco-terrorism” charges.
Guaido has offered a very different version of events, however, insisting Maduro fabricated the entire story while calling the leaked contract a fake, meant to generate a “false positive” justification to “kidnap and arrest” members of the opposition. The alternative account, if true, would mean the Washington Post is either working hand-in-glove with Maduro, or was fooled by his operatives posing as opposition figures. Goudreau and Rendon – Guaido’s own adviser – would also have to be in on the conspiracy, as both have corroborated that there was, in fact, a deal with Silvercorp.
US President Donald Trump has rejected claims of American involvement in the incursion plot, stating he would have sent in the military had he wanted to carry out such a mission, though Maduro has repeatedly accused Washington of ordering the operation. Other critics have also voiced suspicions about the timing of the attempted mercenary raid, which came only weeks after the US indicted Maduro on drug trafficking and launched a militarized anti-narcotics mission in the Caribbean Sea – on Venezuela’s doorstep.
Now that Michael Flynn is free, Trump may be tempted to punish the Russiagate conspirators
By Robert Bridge | RT | May 8, 2020
As the Justice Department drops all charges against the former White House adviser, many are hoping the final chapter on Russiagate is closed. However, as the probe against Trump rivals wraps up, the saga is just beginning.
May 7 may go down in the American history books as the day when Donald Trump began to turn the tide against his Democrat opponents and their relentless efforts to have him removed from office. That was the day when the Justice Department declared there was no “legitimate investigative basis” for FBI agents to interview Gen. Michael Flynn over his contacts with Russian diplomats, coming as they did at a time when the lame-duck Obama administration was sabotaging US-Russia relations on its way out the door.
Incidentally, Thursday was notable for another bit of news as well. The House Intelligence Committee released its Russiagate interviews, in which the former director of national intelligence, James Clapper, admitted he “never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign… was plotting/conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election.”
No wonder Intel chief Adam Schiff demanded absolute secrecy during his closed-door inquisition.
Among Trump’s circle of colleagues brought down in the Democrats’ big-game hunting expedition, such as former campaign adviser Roger Stone and businessman Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn was by far the most prized trophy. In hindsight, Trump may have believed that, by firing Flynn just days into his job, the Russia-collusion story would just magically disappear as the Democrats gave up the hunt. If that was the plan, it backfired in spectacular fashion: the Democrats sensed blood and doubled down on their impeachment efforts.
What came next was a three-year political witch hunt against Trump that was never seriously challenged by the predominantly left-leaning mainstream media – even after the US$30 million Mueller probe finally put the conspiracy theory to bed. Today, although the media headlines conceal it, the narrative is slowly beginning to swing in Trump’s favor, as Flynn’s release strongly suggests.
As I discussed in a recent column, many Americans are blissfully ignorant of the fact that, back in May 2019, Trump launched an investigation into the origins of Russiagate. Tracking the scandal leads one into a labyrinthine rabbit hole of intrigue, where it is believed that the Obama-led FBI misled the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court to spy on the Trump campaign. The potential list of individuals who may eventually be forced to testify for their actions extends to the highest echelons of the Democratic Party. And that would include even ‘untouchables,’ such as former president Barack Obama and his secretary of state, Hillary Clinton. In fact, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that has-been politicians like Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton are still being considered as presidential material simply to escape prosecution.
Anyone who doubts the severity of the possible charges would do well to consider recent comments by Attorney General William Barr. In an interview last month with Fox News, Barr said the FBI counterintelligence against Trump served to “sabotage the presidency… without any basis.” That is about as close to the legal definition of sedition as one can get, and I am sure there are many powerful people who have arrived at the same conclusion.
It should be remembered that Donald Trump was voted into office largely because of his pledge to “drain the swamp.” In other words, the Manhattan real-estate developer turned rabble-rousing populist had a very negative attitude about the career politicians who make up Washington, DC long before he entered the Oval Office. Now, after being hounded and harassed for the entirety of his first term, while watching colleagues such as Michael Flynn, Roger Stone and Paul Manafort have their lives and careers senselessly upended, Trump may be expected to take full advantage of Flynn’s exoneration to make those responsible pay a hefty legal penalty. If ever there were a time for such a move, now would certainly be it.
Exactly what the charges against the architects of Russiagate will be, if there are any, will probably be revealed in the next days and weeks, when William Barr and his assistant, John Durham, are expected to make the findings of their year-long investigation public.
I am guessing we have not heard the end of the Russiagate drama yet with the freeing of Michael Flynn, but, instead, are heading into Part II. Fasten your seatbelts – things could get interesting.
Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist. He is the author of the book, ‘Midnight in the American Empire,’ How Corporations and Their Political Servants are Destroying the American Dream. @Robert_Bridge
The Justice Department Drops Flynn Case
By Jonathon Turley | May 7, 2020
Over a week ago, I wrote a column calling for the Justice Department to drop its case against former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. I have long been a critic of the case but the new evidence undermined not just the legitimacy of the prosecution but of the Justice Department itself. The Justice Department just moved to dismiss the case, a belated but commendable decision. The Flynn case represents one of the most ignoble chapters of the Special Counsel investigation. Notably, the motion itself could lay the foundation for suing on the basis of malicious prosecution.
While Judge Emmet Sullivan could dismiss the charges on the papers (an unopposed motion), I would expect a hearing to be called. There is a great irony here. Sullivan’s last hearing on sentencing led to controversial statements from the bench and a delay in sentencing that resulted in an easier path to dismissal.
James Comey tweeted that “DOJ has lost its way.” Given what this motion and the new evidence says about Comey’s own conduct, I would hope so if Comey is referring to his way of running the DOJ. Comey is implicated in this ignoble effort to bag a Trump official at any cost.
In the motion below, the Justice Department stresses that “the citizen’s safety lies in the prosecutor who … seeks truth and not victims, who serves the law and not factional purposes, and who approaches [the] task with humility.” It also establishes that there was never a satisfaction of the materiality element to the criminal allegation:
“In the case of Mr. Flynn, the evidence shows his statements were not “material” to any viable counterintelligence investigation—or any investigation for that matter—initiated by the FBI. Indeed, the FBI itself had recognized that it lacked sufficient basis to sustain its initial counterintelligence investigation by seeking to close that very investigation without even an interview of Mr. Flynn. See Ex. 1 at 4. Having repeatedly found “no derogatory information” on Mr. Flynn, id. at 2, the FBI’s draft “Closing Communication” made clear that the FBI had found no basis to “predicate further investigative efforts” into whether Mr. Flynn was being directed and controlled by a foreign power (Russia) in a manner that threatened U.S. national security or violated FARA or its related statutes, id. at 3.”
It further notes that key figures like Andrew McCabe “cut off” objections to the overly aggressive pursuit of Flynn. It describes an effort of former Director James Comey, McCabe, and others to skip common protocols to bag Flynn at any cost on any grounds.
While malicious prosecution cases are notoriously difficult to prove (particularly in a case with a voluntary plea), the motion reinforces the view of many of us that the Justice Department was engaged in a campaign to incriminate Flynn — a campaign that now appears entirely detached from both the evidence and legal standards supporting a criminal charge. Such a lawsuit could allow Flynn to pursue discovery into the motivations and actions of figures like McCabe.
The motion relieves President Donald Trump of the necessity of a pardon for Flynn. However, it hardly ends the matter. Congress has expressed an interest in investigating new and troubling evidence. It has every reason to do so. The new evidence obviously does not comport with the standard narrative of the media from the outset of the Russian investigation. Many will defend this case and its underlying abuses as “standard” practices. I have certainly seen abuses in my career as a criminal defense attorney, but I have never seen a record as troubling as this one in prosecutors seeking the creation rather than the investigation of criminal conduct. Even if such abuse is deemed standard by apologists for Mueller, it is neither an excuse nor a license for such misconduct.
End of Russiagate? DOJ drops case against Trump adviser Flynn that started ‘witch hunt’
RT | May 7, 2020
Charges against US President Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, General Michael Flynn, have been dropped due to new evidence showing they were baseless. Flynn was the first to be targeted in the ‘Russiagate’ probe.
The FBI’s interview of Flynn in January 2017 was “untethered to, and unjustified by, the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation” into the former head of military intelligence, and conducted “without any legitimate investigative basis,” the US Department of Justice said in a court filing on Thursday.
Attorney Jeffrey Jensen, who was charged by Attorney General William Barr to review the case, recommended this course of action in a document last week, the AP reported – presumably after Flynn’s attorneys made public FBI documents that unequivocally showed that the general had been targeted for entrapment by a group of Bureau officials who had privately discussed an “insurance policy” in case of a Trump victory.
Asked about the news on Thursday afternoon, Trump called Flynn “an innocent man.”
He also called the Obama administration holdovers in the FBI and the Justice Department who orchestrated Flynn’s prosecution, “human scum” and their conduct “treason.”
“What they’ve done is a disgrace, and I hope a big price is going to be paid,” the president added.
It was disgraced agent Peter Strzok who intervened to keep Flynn’s case open, and who later interviewed Flynn and apparently heavily edited the notes from that interview, with the help of Bureau lawyer – and his extramarital partner – Lisa Page. The interview was ordered by then-FBI Director Jim Comey, by his own admission.
The news of the charges being dropped comes just hours after the DOJ notified US District Judge Emmet Sullivan that prosecutor Brandon Van Grack was withdrawing from the Flynn case – as well as others linked to the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into allegations that Trump’s campaign had “colluded” with Russia in the 2016 election.
More documents showed that Van Grack, Mueller’s handpicked prosecutor, apparently coerced Flynn into pleading guilty by threatening to indict his son, then allegedly conspired with Flynn’s attorneys to keep that secret. Flynn ultimately pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about the content of his conversations with Russian ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, during the transition period between the election and Trump’s inauguration.
The former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency was the first feather in the cap of the ‘resistance’ to the Trump administration. Flynn was forced to resign less than a month into the job, after the Washington Post accused him of lying about his conversations with Kislyak, apparently based on FBI leaks. His prosecution has long been held up as proof there was something rotten within the Trump campaign, and the fact he pleaded guilty has been repeatedly used in political and media attacks on the administration, and even the impeachment hearings.
Government by billionaires? Cuomo names former Google CEO to join Gates & Bloomberg in drafting post-pandemic ‘reforms’
RT | May 6, 2020
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has appointed ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt to lead a panel on post-pandemic “reform” of health and education systems, despite criticism for taking other billionaires with conflicts of interest on board.
Schmidt will head a ‘Blue Ribbon Commission’ tasked with “reimagining” New York’s existing systems of healthcare and education, Cuomo announced on Wednesday during his daily coronavirus briefing. The decision to place such power in the hands of another unelected billionaire has riled critics already uneasy about the governor’s post-Covid-19 plans.
The panel’s initial priorities will be “tele-health, remote learning and broadband,” Schmidt announced, dropping into Cuomo’s broadcast. The former Google exec still receives a paycheck from parent company Alphabet in an advisory capacity, raising questions of conflict of interest given Google’s leading role in developing a digital contact-tracing platform for Covid-19. While Cuomo confirmed in the same presser that the state is partnering with former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg – another billionaire – in building a human contact-tracing network, any digital component will likely involve the participation of Google. At the same time, the tech giant’s insatiable hunger for health data, as evinced by initiatives like Project Nightingale and Google’s acquisition of Fitbit, is unlikely to sit well with New Yorkers concerned about the company’s privacy record.
Cuomo was previously deluged by criticism after announcing on Tuesday that he would place the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in charge of developing a “blueprint to reimagine education in the new normal,” praising former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates as a “visionary” and calling for state schools to be “revolutionized.” Public schooling groups slammed the billionaire, accusing him of promoting “one failed educational initiative after another, causing huge disaffection in districts throughout the state.”
The Gates Foundation poured nearly half a billion dollars of its own money into the notorious Common Core program, which while pitched as a way to improve floundering educational performance in mathematics has actually caused the US to drop even lower in international rankings since its nationwide implementation in 2013. After steering over $4 trillion of taxpayer dollars into the government-funded program, the Foundation tacitly admitted failure in 2016, acknowledging in a letter to donors that it had “underestimated the level of resources and support required for our public education systems to be well-equipped to implement [Common Core].”
Cuomo himself has landed in hot water in the past for his efforts to unilaterally refashion New York’s admittedly dilapidated public school system. In 2015, he was accused of “unconstitutional interference in education policy” by New York State Allies for Public Education, which highlighted his “cozy relationships” with charter school advocates and education technology businesses. One of those education technology businesses was Google. In 2014, Schmidt, then the company’s executive chairman, was appointed to a three-person commission to advise on a ‘Smart Schools’ bond issue, setting off alarm bells among consumer advocates who pointed out that Google would directly benefit from system-wide adoption of Google Apps and Chromebook laptops.
The New York governor’s history with his state’s healthcare system is equally checkered, marked by a long string of budget cuts, hospital consolidations, and layoffs, and his pledge to “revolutionize” the chronically strapped system has already gotten off on a bad foot. On Wednesday, Cuomo announced that out-of-state nurses who had come to New York to help out with the coronavirus epidemic would be required to pay state income tax on whatever compensation they had received, even if they were being paid by companies located in their home state.
Cuomo’s decision to appoint private equity bigwigs, including Bill Mulrow of Blackstone Group and Steven Cohen of MacAndrews & Forbes, to the economic advisory team charged with reopening New York has also come in for criticism, given that private equity firms often benefit from the same bankruptcies the state’s businesses are hoping to avoid.
New Bombshell Documents Raise the Question Why Obama Feared Michael Flynn So Much
By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 07.05.2020
As a result of AG William Barr’s decision to review Michael Flynn’s case new bombshell documents were unearthed and unsealed on 29 April shedding light on a potential FBI plot against the general. The exposure has triggered new questions about the anti-Trump “spygate” effort by FBI and DOJ officials, says Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel.
The newly unveiled written notes openly ask whether the bureau’s goal was “to get” General Michael Flynn “to lie”, so that the FBI could “prosecute him or get him fired”. The files also indicate that the FBI’s operation Crossfire Razor targeting Flynn had found nothing implicating the general in the “collusion” with Russia and would have been closed if then-FBI Deputy Assistant Director Peter Strzok not intervened to keep the case open.
On 24 January 2017, Strzok and FBI Special Agent Joe Pietka conducted an interview with Flynn, who at that time was Trump’s national security adviser, about his December phone talks with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. The interview played out ugly as in February 2017 Flynn resigned while several months later he pleaded guilty to making “false statements” to FBI agents over his conversation with the ambassador.
Seeking Truth & Connecting the Dots
Having taken the job of Flynn’s defence lawyer in 2019, Sidney Powell, a former federal prosecutor, pushed for the revision of the case despite DOJ prosecutors considering the general’s sentencing a done deal. The lawyer argued more dots needed to be connected and requested all the material that could potentially vindicate her client.
Powell argued that the prosecutors intentionally hid the exculpatory information stressing that the purported egregious misconduct by the government would justify the dismissal of Flynn’s case by the court. For their part, Justice Department attorneys have repeatedly rebutted Powell’s requests as “irrelevant” and even dubbed the defence’s supposition that Flynn was targeted by the FBI as part of a broader plot against Trump a “conspiracy theory”.
Nevertheless, Flynn’s legal team managed to expose a set of inconsistencies in the bureau’s handling of the case including edits in the general’s FD-302s – forms used by FBI personnel to report or summarise the interviews that they conduct. The newly discovered documents apparently indicate that the bureau intentionally set a perjury trap for Flynn.
Following the disclosure the general’s defence ramped up calls to throw the case out.
”More concerning than the perjury trap is that the FBI launched an investigation into a person – Michael Flynn – rather than a crime, under President Obama’s watch, and that this evidently unlawful investigation continues to this day”, opines Wall Street analyst and investigative journalist Charles Ortel.
He recollects that former President Barack Obama warned Trump against hiring Mike Flynn as his national security adviser.
“Why does Barack Obama fear Michael Flynn so much? Why do so many people still in the Trump administration obstruct the process of terminating the Flynn prosecution? Let us hope US Attorney John Durham asks and answers these questions”, the analyst notes referring to the special investigator appointed by AG William Barr to look into the origins of the FBI’s Crossfire Hurricane targeting Donald Trump’s aides over their alleged ties with Russian officials.
A year ago Barr clearly articulated his concern that the US intelligence community spied on the Trump campaign during the previous election cycle adding that “spying on a political campaign is a big deal”. The newly released documents appear to back Barr’s concerns, according to the analyst.
“I suspect Barr’s focus has much to do with these and looming revelations”, Ortel presumes. “But I question why Barr and the president have not yet replaced FBI Director Christopher Wray and all who had anything to do with the Flynn prosecution and Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe. The FBI has a stunning array of resources that should be trained on investigating crimes, rather than instigating potential crimes to exact political retribution”.
Trump ‘Should Consider Full Pardon’ of All Deep State Victims
One might hope that FBI agents involved in the alleged framing of General Flynn as well as their backers will be held responsible, according to Ortel.
“Across the political spectrum, most thoughtful people must demand full disclosure of the extent to which FBI and other ‘public servants’ crossed a key line to become political hit men and women”, he highlights. “The FBI is supposed to investigate objectively and apolitically, while the Department of Justice is supposed to uphold the law, neutrally”.
According to him, “under Robert Mueller, James Comey, and Christopher Wray at the FBI, and under Eric Holder, Loretta Lynch and Jeff Sessions at the Justice Department, corrupt political motives seem to have overwhelmed obligations to support and defend the US Constitution”.
In the aftermath of the recent disclosure Donald Trump suggested that the newly unveiled documents “essentially exonerated” Michael Flynn.
“They tormented him – dirty cops tormented Gen. Flynn”, Trump told reporters on 30 April. “If you look at those notes from yesterday, that was total exoneration”.
The president earlier signalled that he was “strongly considering pardoning” former national security adviser Michael Flynn. One might wonder whether it’s time for the president to pick up this option. According to Ortel, Trump “should consider full pardons for all targets of any Mueller instigated prosecutions as these seem to have started in the absence of solid predicates of criminal activity”.
As for Flynn, the analyst hopes that Barr “would direct prosecuting attorneys to cease their efforts, while referring any evidence of criminal behaviour by prosecutors in the Flynn case to new teams of prosecutors who then should seek indictments”. He believes that such a path might be deemed a form of exoneration.
“General Flynn and many others have suffered too much for too long”, Ortel says. “President Trump and Attorney General Barr must unequivocally prove that government employees will suffer grievous punishment when they subvert the rule of law to serve corrupt political masters”.
OPCW head FALSELY described Syria whistleblower inspectors to discredit them, new documents show
RT | May 6, 2020
New documents leaked from the global chemical watchdog show that two inspectors blowing the whistle about the 2018 Douma incident in Syria were right, and the director seeking to discredit them was wrong.
Two inspectors with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have challenged the organization’s final report on the April 2018 incident, which they say was altered to dismiss their findings and validate after the fact the US, UK and French missile strikes against the government in Damascus.
OPCW Director General Fernando Arias responded earlier this year by describing them as “rogue” inspectors who weren’t even members of the mission. Documents obtained by investigative journalist Aaron Mate at Greyzone, however, show that Arias’ statements were false or misleading.
Arias claimed that South African inspector Ian Henderson was “not a member” of the fact-finding mission (FFM) dispatched to Douma, and that he had played a “minor supporting role.” However, the documents from April 2018 obtained by the Grayzone show that OPCW directors were “happy” to have Henderson lead the visits to the most important locations in Douma: the hospital and the sites of alleged chlorine cylinder impact, for instance.
Another document, described as a sensitive security-planning memorandum known as CONOPS, lists Henderson as part of the FFM under the section “Mission Personnel.”
Last, but not least, the “F038” memorandum to the Syrian government lists Henderson as “part of the team conducting the technical secretariat visits,” notifying Damascus of his role. Henderson has previously explained publicly that he was on a mission in Nepal, and was assigned to Douma immediately upon his return.
Moreover, another OPCW document shows that Henderson took over the OPCW Damascus command post on May 3, 2018 – two days after returning from Douma. This goes directly against Arias’ version of events, according to which Henderson was already in Damascus, happened to play a minor role in the Douma mission, and then went “rogue” to sabotage the organization for reasons unknown.
Henderson and another whistleblower inspector – who remains anonymous – have said for months that they had not gone rogue, but were sidelined by OPCW because they produced evidence suggesting the Douma incident had been staged by the Army of Islam militants who controlled the area at the time. The final OPCW report, they contend, was doctored to retroactively justify the US, UK and French missile strikes and enable them to blame Damascus.
The OPCW responded to their revelations by painting them as disgruntled employees who breached confidentiality and lacked expertise and access to all the evidence. Their own documents now clearly show those statements to be false.
Russia Probe Testimonies Reveal There Was No Collusion Between Moscow & Trump Campaign, Report Says
By Lilia Dergacheva – Sputnik – May 7, 2020
As part of an earlier declared bipartisan effort to approve the public release of files pertaining to the Russia probe, Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell announced that 53 of them had been cleared to this end.
The due-to-be-released transcripts of House Intelligence Committee interviews feature top law enforcement and intelligence officials asserting they had no evidence of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and Russia , senior administration and intelligence community officials told Fox News.
The findings are reportedly entirely in line with the results of former Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, which found no evidence of illegal or criminal coordination between President Trump, his presidential campaign, and Russia in 2016. However, the interviews, which are eligible for release, cast a heavy doubt on committee Chairman Adam Schiff’s previous statements about “direct evidence” of close coordination.
“Schiff is in panic mode”, a senior administration official recounted to Fox News.
The 53 transcripts reportedly include interviews with Donald Trump Jr., Trump’s ex-campaign manager Steve Bannon, adviser Jared Kushner, Trump aide Hope Hicks, former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, and others.
“The transcripts show a total lack of evidence, despite Schiff personally going out saying he had more than circumstantial evidence that there was collusion”, one source involved in House Russia investigations told Fox News.
Only one of the 53 is said to have implied there is some evidence of alleged coordination.
Earlier this week, House Republicans combed through over 6,000 pages of transcripts pertaining to interviews conducted by the committee in 2017 and 2018, after the the partisan vote in September 2018 approved their public release.
Newly sworn-in Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell notified Schiff that the redaction and declassification process was complete, and that the records were ready for release, thereby implying that Schiff is welcome to act next. Grenell directed a letter to Schiff on 4 May reporting that the review of 43 of the 53 transcripts “was completed in June 2019″, and that the “interagency review of the remaining ten transcripts has been completed”. “Pursuant to your guidance, these transcripts have not been shared with the White House”, Grenell further pointed out.
Grenell went on to inform Schiff that he was “willing” to release the transcripts directly from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence [ODNI] “as to ensure we comply with the unanimous and bipartisan vote to release the transcripts”. However, he didn’t specify when he would release the transcripts.
Intelligence officials told Fox News that Schiff had had his subcommittee staff director reaching out to intelligence community agencies asking how Grenell was involved and what role Grenell, who is known to be a Trump ally, could have played in the declassification and review he had reported on.
Fox News was told, however, that the review was completed before Grenell took the helm as acting director a little over two months ago, in February.
The process, according to an intelligence source, took place under both former directors Dan Coates and Joseph Maguire, and was conducted by career intelligence officials. The official also told Fox News that the relevant heads of appropriate agencies were consulted on the declassifications and redactions of all 53 transcripts.
Adam Schiff made headlines when he dramatically read into the congressional record some of the most explosive claims from Christopher Steele’s controversial dossier. His claims, in common with ones by the “former British intelligence officer who is reportedly held in high regard by US intelligence”, as Schiff put it, have since been directly contradicted by intelligence evidence in recently declassified and released FBI and Justice Department memos and reports.
Mueller, similarly, rounding off of his nearly two-year-long investigation, found insufficient evidence and produced no charges of criminal conspiracy or coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia. At the same time, the Special Counsel’s team did not reach a conclusion on obstruction of justice, which current Attorney General Bill Barr ultimately decided not to pursue.
Israel’s War Crimes Have Killed Americans
If the president loves to honor the military, start with the U.S.S. Liberty
By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • May 5, 2020
Imagine if you will a ship from a nation not at war with anyone sailing in international waters on a quiet June day being suddenly attacked by unidentified warplanes and torpedo boats, their markings covered up to conceal their country of origin. The vessel under attack had little with which to defend itself, but its crew heroically made sure that a large national flag was hoisted to demonstrate that it was not a belligerent in anyone’s conflict. The attackers noted the nationality of the vessel, but persisted in their aggression in a clear attempt to sink the ship and kill all its crew. The officers on the ship radioed that they were under attack and asked for help, but even though friendly fighter aircraft were within striking distance and were automatically dispatched, they were then mysteriously recalled. The attacks lasted for two hours, longer than the Pearl Harbor attack that brought about American entry into World War 2, killing and wounding more than two hundred of the crew. Life rafts lowered into the water as the vessel seemed to be sinking were machine gunned by the attacking aircraft and torpedo boats to make escape or evacuation of the wounded impossible but the captain and survivors worked heroically, and successfully, to keep the ship afloat. When the vessel finally made it back to port, the officers and crew were sworn to silence by their own government and a cover-up was initiated that has persisted to this day. Many of the ship’s survivors have died since that day 53 years ago, and the attempts of the remainder to see justice before they are also gone have been ignored.
I am, of course, referring to the Israeli attack on the U.S.S. Liberty, which took place on June 8, 1967, nearly 53 years ago. The anniversary of the attack is coming up in a month and the remaining officers and crew will hold a ceremony at the Navy memorial in Washington D.C. to honor the memory of their thirty-four shipmates killed and the 172 who were wounded. Seventy per cent of the crew were casualties, the highest percentage of casualties on any ship that remained afloat in the history of the U.S. Navy. The lightly armed intelligence gathering vessel Liberty and its heroic crew emerged from the near destruction as the most decorated ship for valor in a single action in the United States Navy.
Israeli willingness to attack and kill Americans unnecessarily, apparently to send a message, has been noted before. There is the case of Rachel Corrie run over by an Israeli bulldozer and of Furkan Dogan, a Turkish-American who was, like the crew of the Liberty, killed in international waters when he sailed on the Gaza relief vessel Mavi Marmara. But in spite of that, the deliberate attempt to destroy the Liberty, which, according to former U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk, was clearly approved at the highest level of the Jewish state’s government, still has shock value.
Israel’s apologists, a virtual fixture at all levels in the U.S. government as well as in academia and the media, have long been making the argument that the attack on the Liberty was some kind of “friendly fire” accident. But the relatively recent discovery that a Navy spy plane intercepted and recorded Israeli both helicopter and fighter pilots mentioning the American flag displayed by the ship during the attack suggests otherwise. Other recordings made of the Israeli communications revealed that some of the pilots did not want to attack. One pilot said, “This is an American ship. I can see the flag. Do you still want us to attack?” Israeli ground control responded, “Yes, follow orders. Hit it!” before admonishing the pilots to “finish the job.”
But while one expects the Israelis to behave abominably, based on any assessment of the years of war crimes committed in places like Lebanon and what remains of Palestine, the greatest crime against the Liberty crew was committed by the United States government itself. President Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ) and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara reportedly were informed of the attack shortly after it began and it was Johnson who twice personally ordered the recall of the U.S. fighter planes going to rescue the Liberty. Admiral Lawrence Geis, commander of the carrier group in the Mediterranean that the planes had launched from, objected and McNamara responded testily that “President Johnson is not going to go to war or embarrass an American ally over a few sailors.” It was McNamara, again acting on LBJ’s orders, who had the crew sequestered after the ship made it to Malta, issuing a “gag-order” over the incident with the understanding that anyone who spoke up would be secretly court martialed and imprisoned.
To maintain the cover-up, Captain William McGonagle, who was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his role in saving the ship, had his medal awarded without any publicity in a private ceremony at the Washington Naval Yard rather than at the White House as was otherwise normal. The President of the United States did not make the award, yet another dismissal of the valor of the Liberty crew.
Normally an attack on a U.S. Navy vessel would have mandated an official Court of Inquiry, but in the case of the Liberty an improvised team consisting of Admiral Isaac Kidd and Chief Counsel Ward Boston was pulled together in the Mediterranean under orders from Admiral John S. McCain, father of Senator John McCain, who was based in London. The Navy’s official ‘Court of Inquiry’ therefore consisted in reality of just Kidd and Boston making a quick visit to the Liberty at sea and then rushing back to Washington via London, where McCain endorsed the 700 page draft document without reading it. The hastily prepared report bypassed all ordinary fact-finding and legal review procedures and no one knows what channels the ‘Findings of the Court of Inquiry’ followed in Washington.
Acting under orders from the White House, the inquiry had been given only a week to prepare its report, a procedure that normally requires six months. The result was also predetermined by McNamara acting for LBJ, who ordered that the conclusion would be that the attack on the Liberty had been a “case of mistaken identity.”
No crewmen from the Liberty were even allowed to provide formal testimony during the inquiry proceedings. Nevertheless, the inquiry’s chief counsel Ward Boston subsequently confirmed in a sworn affidavit that he and Kidd had strongly disagreed with the coerced findings, believing instead that Israel had staged an unprovoked attack intending to sink the ship and kill all the crew. Admiral Kidd referred to the Israelis as “murderous bastards.” Boston also observed that the transcript of the court of inquiry that was subsequently released had been altered, presumably by someone acting on behalf of the White House, to delete and change testimony damaging to Israel.
As is often the case, there is a back story to what happened to the Liberty. In the years prior to the attack on the Liberty, President John F. Kennedy was concerned over powerful and wealthy American Jews attempting to hijack U.S. foreign policy to favor Israel. He also took steps to prevent Israeli development of nuclear weapons. After he was assassinated, his successor as president Lyndon B. Johnson, who has been described as having a political career “interwoven with Jews,” saw things quite differently. He turned a blind eye over the Israeli nuclear program and surrounded himself with Jewish friends and advisors who were actively engaged in promoting the Zionist agenda, some of them plausibly as actual agents of Mossad.
Most prominent among that group were the Krims, Arthur and Mathilde, he a leading media lawyer and studio head who was a Democratic Party fundraiser and she a geneticist, a Swiss born convert to Judaism who had lived in British Mandate Palestine with her first husband, an Irgun terrorist. Jewish terror was a cause which she actively supported. The Krims were regular companions of LBJ throughout his presidency, with a reserved room in the White House and a house near his ranch in Stonewall Texas when he was on vacation there. Johnson also stayed at their mansion in New York.
At the time of the Six Day War when the Liberty was attacked, the Krims were constantly at the side of LBJ and it is generally accepted that they were both working on behalf of the Israeli government to cultivate a decisive presidential tilt towards Israel. Johnson, in fact, was informed of the Israeli intention to go to war against its neighbors in advance and gave the green light, even agreeing to come to the aid of the Jewish state if things went wrong. To seal the deal, Mathilde was even having an affair with LBJ, a situation well known to White House staff and to the Secret Service.
Since 1967, there have been a number of documentaries, books and unofficial inquiries regarding the attack on the Liberty, but resistance from the usual suspects has meant that the story has not become better known. Meanwhile Congress, the Pentagon and the White House have refused to authorize fair and impartial formal hearings that would recognize the deficiencies in the 1967 inquiry and which would include testimony from the remaining Liberty survivors. Senator John McCain was notorious for his offhand treatment of entreaties from the survivors as was then congressman and now governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, a former Navy Seal. DeSantis now calls himself the most pro-Israel governor in the United States.
The most serious unofficial inquiries have involved former military officers. In 2003, Admiral Thomas Moorer, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, formed an independent commission of inquiry to look into the attack. It produced Loss of Liberty, a documentary that included actual interviews with survivors. The commission, which included Rear Admiral Merlin Staring, Marine General Ray Davis, and Ambassador James Akins, reviewed all documentary evidence in the case and interviewed both survivors and other naval officers who were involved indirectly. They learned that the Liberty had been surveilled by the Israelis for at least eight hours prior to the attack and that the ship was both clearly marked as American and was unmistakable as a uniquely configured and immediately recognizable intelligence collection vessel, not even close to the profile of an Egyptian horse transporter as Israel subsequently claimed. During the carefully planned attack, Israeli used radio jamming in an attempt to prevent the Liberty from radioing its predicament.
Moorer’s commission concluded that Israel had deliberately attacked the Liberty and sought to sink it and kill its entire crew. The crewmen who were killed were “murdered” by Israel while the U.S. should have regarded the attack as an act of war and responded appropriately. The cover-up of what had taken place was ordered by the White House and the fact that the truth about the incident continues to be hidden is a “national disgrace.” In an op-ed Moorer wrote in 2004, he concluded by asking “Did our government put Israel’s interest ahead of our own? If so, why?”
In October 2003 the Moorer commission presented its report on Capitol Hill, though its audience was often limited to congressional staffers rather than the understandably fearful members. One year later Representative John Conyers of Michigan overcame considerable resistance to have the report and some accompanying information entered into the Congressional Record. Moorer and Admiral Staring, a former Judge Advocate General of the Navy, who had been the legal officer in the McCain office in London who had not been allowed to carefully review the Court of Inquiry report, continued to advocate for an honest investigation of the attack on the Liberty until they died in 2004 and 2013 respectively.
Which leads us to the present and the question of justice for the U.S.S. Liberty survivors who will be gathering next month. The tale of the Liberty demonstrates that even fifty-three years ago the United States government was betraying its own people out of deference to Jewish power and to the state of Israel. If anything, as horrific as the killing of 34 personnel on board of the Liberty was, the situation has gotten even worse as Washington sends billions of dollars to the Jewish state annually while also giving its kleptocratic government a green light to commit war crimes and other aggressions that will ultimately draw in the United States, and could plausibly bring about our ruination. It is unpleasant to say the least to watch an unrestrained and unprincipled client state do terrible damage to a much larger patron enabled by the machinations of a dual-loyalty fifth column, but that is what we are seeing.
And the actual rot really began with the attack on the U.S.S. Liberty, when patriotic Americans died at the whim of a feckless president who loved a foreign country more than his own. One hopes he is rotting in hell. Today few Americans even know about the Liberty even though they are now facing an election in which two presidential candidates will seek to outdo each other in expressing their love for Israel. Trump and Biden should instead take pause and first demand as a sine qua non justice for the survivors of the U.S.S. Liberty.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.
Coronavirus Gives a Dangerous Boost to DARPA’s Darkest Agenda
By Whitney Webb | The Last American Vagabond | May 4, 2020
In January, well before the coronavirus (Covid-19) crisis would result in lockdowns, quarantines and economic devastation in the United States and beyond, the U.S. intelligence community and the Pentagon were working with the National Security Council to create still-classified plans to respond to an imminent pandemic. It has since been alleged that the intelligence and military intelligence communities knew about a likely pandemic in the United States as early as last November, and potentially even before then.
Given this foreknowledge and the numerous simulations conducted in the United States last year regarding global viral pandemic outbreaks, at least six of varying scope and size, it has often been asked – Why did the government not act or prepare if an imminent global pandemic and the shortcomings of any response to such an event were known? Though the answer to this question has frequently been written off as mere “incompetence” in mainstream media circles, it is worth entertaining the possibility that a crisis was allowed to unfold.
Why would the intelligence community or another faction of the U.S. government knowingly allow a crisis such as this to occur? The answer is clear if one looks at history, as times of crisis have often been used by the U.S. government to implement policies that would normally be rejected by the American public, ranging from censorship of the press to mass surveillance networks. Though the government response to the September 11 attacks, like the Patriot Act, may be the most accessible example to many Americans, U.S. government efforts to limit the flow of “dangerous” journalism and surveil the population go back to as early as the First World War. Many of these policies, whether the Patriot Act after 9/11 or WWI-era civilian “spy” networks, did little if anything to protect the homeland, but instead led to increased surveillance and control that persisted long after the crisis that spurred them had ended.
Using this history as a lens, it is possible to look at the current coronavirus crisis to see how the long-standing agendas of ever-expanding mass surveillance and media censorship are again getting a dramatic boost thanks to the chaos unleashed by the coronavirus pandemic. Yet, this crisis is unique because it also has given a boost to a newer yet complimentary agenda that — if fulfilled – would render most, if not all, other government efforts at controlling and subduing their populations obsolete.
DARPA Dystopia
For years, the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has remained largely out of sight and out of mind for most Americans, as their research projects are rarely covered by the mainstream media and, when they are, their projects are often praised as “bringing science fiction movies to life.” However, there have been recent events that have marred DARPA’s often positive portrayal by media outlets, which paint the agency as a beacon of scientific “progress” that has “changed the world” for the better.
For instance, in 2018, a group of European scientists accused the DARPA’s “Insect Allies” program of actually being a dystopian bioweapons program that would see insects introduce genetically modified viruses into plants to attack and devastate a targeted nation’s food supply. DARPA, of course, maintained that its intent to use these insects to genetically modify plants was instead about “protecting” the food supply. Regardless of DARPA’s assertions that it is merely a “defensive” program, it should be clear to readers that such a technology could easily be used either way, depending on the wielder.
Though DARPA’s futuristic weapons of war often get the most attention from media, the agency has long standing interests in tinkering with, not just the biology of plants, but of humans. DARPA, which is funded to the tune of approximately $3 billion a year, has various avenues through which it pursues these ambitions, with many of those now under the purview of the agency’s “Biological Technologies Office” (BTO), created in 2014. As of late, some of DARPA’s human biology and biotech projects at its BTO have been getting a massive PR boost thanks to the current coronavirus crisis, with recent reports even claiming that the agency “might have created the best hopes for stopping Covid-19.”
Most of these technologies garnering positive media coverage thanks to Covid-19 were developed several years ago. They include the DARPA-funded platforms used to produce DNA and RNA vaccines, classes of vaccine that have never been approved for human use in the U.S. and involve injecting foreign genetic material into the human body. Notably, it is this very class of vaccine, now being produced by DARPA-partnered companies, that billionaire and global health “philanthropist” Bill Gates recently asserted has him “most excited” relative to other Covid-19 vaccine candidates. Yet, key aspects regarding these vaccines and other DARPA “healthcare” initiatives have been left out of these recent positive reports, likely because they provide a window into what is arguably the agency’s darkest agenda.
“In Vivo Nanoplatforms”
In 2006, DARPA announced its Predicting Health and Disease (PHD) program, which sought to determine “whether an individual will develop an infectious disease prior to the onset of symptoms.” The PHD program planned to accomplish this by “identifying changes in the baseline state of human health through frequent surveillance” with a specific focus on “viral, upper respiratory pathogens.”
Three years later, in 2010, DARPA-funded researchers at Duke University created the foundation for this tool, which would use the genetic analysis of blood samples to determine if someone is infected with a virus before they show symptoms. Reports at the time claimed that these “preemptive diagnoses” would be transmitted to “a national, web-based influenza map” available via smartphone.
Following the creation of DARPA’s BTO in 2014, this particular program gave rise to the “In Vivo Nanoplatforms (IVN)” program. The diagnostics branch of that program, abbreviated as IVN:Dx, “investigates technologies that incorporate implantable nanoplatforms composed of bio-compatible, nontoxic materials; in vivo sensing of small and large molecules of biological interest; multiplexed detection of analytes at clinically relevant concentrations; and external interrogation of the nanoplatforms without using implanted electronics for communication.” Past reports on the program describe it as developing “classes of nanoparticles to sense and treat illness, disease, and infection on the inside. The tech involves implantable nanoparticles which sense specific molecules of biological interest.”
DARPA’s IVN program has since helped to finance and produce “soft, flexible hydrogels that are injected just beneath the skin to perform [health] monitoring and that sync to a smartphone app to give the use immediate health insights,” a product currently marketed and created by the DARPA-funded and National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded company Profusa. Profusa, which has received millions upon millions from DARPA in recent years, asserts that the information generated by their injectable biosensor would be “securely shared” and accessible to “individuals, physicians and public health practitioners.” However, the current push for a national “contact tracing” system based on citizens’ private health data is likely to expand that data sharing, conveniently fitting with DARPA’s years-old goal of creating a national, web-based database of preemptive diagnoses.
Profusa is also backed by Google, which is intimately involved in these new mass surveillance “contact tracing” initiatives, and counts former Senate majority leader William Frist among its board members. They are also partnered with the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The company also has considerable overlap with the diagnostic company Cepheid, which recently won FDA approval for its rapid coronavirus test and was previously awarded lucrative government contracts to detect anthrax in the U.S. postal system. As of this past March, Profusa again won DARPA funding to determine if their injectable biosensors can predict future pandemics, including the now widely predicted “second wave” of Covid-19, and detect those infected up to three weeks before they would otherwise show symptoms. The company expects to have its biosensors FDA licensed for this purpose by early next year, about the same time a coronavirus vaccine is expected to be available to the general public.
“Living Foundries”
Another long-standing DARPA program, now overseen by BTO, is known as “Living Foundries.” According to DARPA’s website, Living Foundries “aims to enable adaptable, scalable, and on-demand production of [synthetic] molecules by programming the fundamental metabolic processes of biological systems to generate a vast number of complex molecules that are not otherwise accessible. Through Living Foundries, DARPA is transforming synthetic biomanufacturing into a predictable engineering practice supportive of a broad range of national security objectives.”
The types of research this “Living Foundries” program supports involves the creation of “artificial life” including the creation of artificial genetic material, including artificial chromosomes, the creation of “entirely new organisms,” and using artificial genetic material to “add new capacities” to human beings (i.e. genetically modifying humans through the insertion of synthetically-created genetic material).
The latter is of particular concern (though all are honestly concerning), as DARPA also has a project called “Advanced Tools for Mammalian Genome Engineering,” which – despite having “mammalian” in the name – is focused specifically on improving “the utility of Human Artificial Chromosomes (HACs),” which DARPA describes as a “fundamental tool in the development of advanced therapeutics, vaccines, and cellular diagnostics.” Though research papers often focus on HACs as a revolutionary medical advancement, they are also frequently promoted as a means of “enhancing” humans by imbuing them with non-natural characteristics, including halting aging or improving cognition.
DARPA is known to be involved in research where these methods are used to create “super soldiers” that no longer require sleep or regular meals, among other augmented “features,” and has another program about creating “metabolically dominant” fighters. Reports on these programs also discuss the other, very disconcerting use of these same technologies, “genetic weapons” that would “subvert DNA” and “undermine people’s minds and bodies.”
Another potential application being actively investigated by DARPA is its BioDesign program, which is examining the creation of synthetic organisms that are created to be immortal and programmed with a “kill switch” allowing a synthetic, yet organic organism to be “turned off” at any time. This has led some to speculate such research could open the doors to the creation of “human replicants” used for fighting wars and other tasks, such as those that appear in the science fiction film Bladerunner.
However, these genetic “kill switches” could also be inserted into actual humans through artificial chromosomes, which – just as they have the potential to extend life – also have the potential to cut it short. Notably, it was revealed in 2017 that DARPA had invested $100 million in “gene drive” research, which is involves the use of genetic modification to wipe out entire populations, explaining why it it often referred to as a “genetic extinction” technology.
In addition, other DARPA experiments involve the use of genetically modified viruses that insert genetic material into human cells, specifically neurons in the brain, in order to “tweak” human brain chemistry. In one example, DARPA-funded research has altered human brain cells to produce two new proteins, the first allowing neural activity to be easily detected by external devices and the second allowing “magnetic nanoparticles” to “induce an image or sound in the patient’s mind.”
“Next-Generation Nonsurgical Neurotechnology”
Changing human brain chemistry and functionality at the cellular level is only one of numerous DARPA initiatives aimed at changing how human beings think and perceive reality. Since 2002, DARPA has acknowledged its efforts to create a “Brain-Machine Interface (BMI).” Though first aimed at creating “a wireless brain modem for a freely moving rat,” which would allow the animal’s movements to be remotely controlled, DARPA wasn’t shy about the eventual goal of applying such brain “enhancement” to humans in order to enable soldiers to “communicate by thought alone” or remotely control human beings (on the enemy side only, so they say) for the purposes of war.
The project, which has advanced greatly in recent years, has long raised major concerns among prominent defense scientists, some of whom warned in a 2008 report that “remote guidance or control of a human being” could quickly backfire were an adversary to gain access to the implanted technology (opening up the possibility of “hacking” a person’s brain), and they also raised concerns about the general ethical perils of such technologies. Work began in 2011 on developing “brain implants” for use in human soldiers, officially with the goal of treating neurological damage in veterans, and such implants have been tested on human volunteers in DARPA-funded experiments since at least 2015.
Concerns, like those raised by those defense scientists in 2008, have been regularly dismissed by DARPA, which has consistently claimed that its controversial research projects are tempered by their in-house “ethical experts.” However, it worth noting how DARPA’s leadership views these ethical conundrums, since they ultimately have the last word. For example, in 2015, Michael Goldblatt, then-director of DARPA’s Defense Sciences Office (DSO), which oversees most aspects of the agency’s “super soldier” program, told journalist Annie Jacobsen that he saw no difference between “having a chip in your brain that could help control your thoughts” and “a cochlear implant that helps the deaf hear.” When pressed about the unintended consequences of such technology, Goldblatt stated that “there are unintended consequences for everything.”
Thus, it is worth pointing out that, while DARPA-developed technologies – from human genetic engineering to the brain-machine interfaces – are often first promoted as something that will revolutionize and improve human health, DARPA sees the use of these technologies for such ends as being on the same footing as other dystopian and frankly nightmarish applications, like thought control. BMIs are no exception, having first been promoted as a way to “boost bodily functions of veterans with neural damage or post-traumatic stress disorder” and to allow amputees to control advanced prosthetics. While these do indeed represent major medical advances, DARPA’s leadership has made it clear that they see no distinction between the medical use of BMIs and using them to exert near total control over a human being by “guiding” their thoughts and even their movements.
Such stark admission from DARPA’s leadership makes it worth exploring the state of these current “brain-machine” interface programs as well as their explicit goals. For instance, one of the goals of DARPA’s Next-Generation Nonsurgical Neurotechnology (N3) program involves using “noninvasive or minimally invasive brain-computer interfaces” to “read and write” directly onto the brain.
According to one recent report on DARPA’s N3 program, one example of “minimally invasive” technologies would involve:
“an injection of a virus carrying light-sensitive sensors, or other chemical, biotech, or self-assembled nanobots that can reach individual neurons and control their activity independently without damaging sensitive tissue. The proposed use for these technologies isn’t yet well-specified, but as animal experiments have shown, controlling the activity of single neurons at multiple points is sufficient to program artificial memories of fear, desire, and experiences directly into the brain.”
Though the purported goal of N3 is related to creating “thought-controlled” weapons that react and fire based on a soldier’s thoughts, the fact that the technology is also bidirectional, opens up the disturbing possibility that efforts will be made to control and program a soldier’s thoughts and perceptions as opposed to the other way around. This may be more of the plan than DARPA has publicly let on, since official military documents have openly stated that the Pentagon’s ultimate goal is to essentially replace human fighters with “self-aware” interconnected robots “who” will both design and conduct operations against targets chosen by artificial-intelligence systems. This weapons system of the not-so-distant future seems to have little room for human beings, even those capable of “controlling” weapons with their minds, suggesting that futurist military planners see soldiers with BMIs as a “weapon” that would also become connected to this same AI-driven system. It is also worth pointing out that DARPA has been attempting to create an “artificial human brain” since 2013.
In addition, reports on DARPA’s BMI efforts have suggested that this bidirectional technology will be used to “cloud the perception of soldiers” by “distancing them from the emotional guilt of warfare,” a move that would set a dangerous precedent and one that would surely result in a marked jump in war crimes.
Of course, these are just the admitted, potential “military” applications of such technology. Once this technology moves from the military to the civilian sphere, as several DARPA inventions have in the past, their use for “remote guidance”, “thought control” and/or the programming of thoughts and experiences is more than likely to be misused by governments, corporations and other power-brokers in the U.S. and beyond for the purposes of control.
The entrance of BMIs into the civilian sphere isn’t very far away, as DARPA executives and researchers who have worked on the N3 and other DARPA-backed BMI programs have since been “scooped up” by Verily (a Google-GlaxoSmithKline partnership), Elon Musk’s Neuralink and Facebook’s Building 8 – all of which have been working to bring “neuro-modulation” devices and BMIs to market.
“Human Bio-reactors”, “Nanotherapeutics” and DARPA-funded gene vaccines
As detailed above, DARPA often frames the controversial technologies it develops as being developed to mainly advance medicine and healthcare. Aside from the technologies already discussed, it is important to note that DARPA has been very interested in healthcare, specifically vaccines, for sometime.
For instance, in 2010, DARPA began developing a class of vaccine that could “inoculate against unknown pathogens,” a component of its Accelerated Manufacture of Pharmaceuticals program. The vaccine would inject thousands of synthetic antibodies, such as those developed through DARPA’s “Living Foundries” program, into the human body. These synthetic antibodies or “synbodies” would then “create an immunity toolkit that can be combined in myriad ways to tackle virtually any pathogen.”
That same year, DARPA began funding efforts to create “multiagent synthetic DNA vaccines” that would be delivered into the human body via “noninvasive electroporation” and was quickly promoted in media reports as a way to quickly produce vaccines compared to traditional vaccine production methods. This category of vaccine would involve the same type of synthetic DNA that DARPA was also simultaneously researching for the purposes of both “enhancing” and “subverting” human beings at the genetic level. It was also this year, 2010, that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also began heavily funding DNA and RNA vaccines.
DNA vaccines, which were first created in 2005, have never been approved for human use in the United States and past studies have warned that they “possess significant unpredictability and a number of inherent harmful potential hazards” and that “there is inadequate knowledge to define either the probability of unintended events or the consequences of genetic modifications.” Another long-standing issue with such vaccines is mitigating “unwanted immune reactions” that result from natural immune response to the foreign genetic material they contain.
In 2011, DARPA announced its “Rapidly Adaptable Nanotherapeutics” program, which seeks to create a “platform capable of rapidly synthesizing therapeutic nanoparticles” aimed at combatting “evolving and even genetically engineered bioweapons.” DARPA’s plan for these nanoparticles, which media reports described merely as “tiny, autonomous drug delivery systems,” was to combine them with “small interfering RNA (siRNA),” which are snippets of RNA that can target and shut down specific genes. As Wired wrote at the time: “siRNA could be reprogrammed ‘on-the-fly’ and applied to different pathogens,” allowing nanoparticles to “be loaded up with the right siRNA molecules and sent directly to cells responsible for the infection.”
The creation of this program was shortly followed by DARPA’s decision in 2013 to fund Moderna Therapeutics to the tune of $25 million to develop their synthetic RNA vaccine production platform. DARPA funded the project to “develop platform technologies that can be deployed safely and rapidly to provide the U.S. population with near-immediate protection against emerging infectious diseases and engineered biological weapons.”
Then, in 2015, DARPA’s research into vaccines involving synthetic antibodies and synthetic genetic material expanded, with them giving $45 million to the DNA vaccine company, Inovio Pharmaceuticals. This same year, DARPA-funded RNA and DNA vaccines began to be framed differently by both DARPA researchers and the media – who described the technology as transforming the human body into a “bio-reactor.”
In the years since, DARPA-backed DNA and RNA vaccine companies, including Moderna, Inovio as well as Germany’s CureVac, have been unable to get their products licensed for human use, largely due to the fact that their vaccines have failed to provide sufficient immunity in human trials. Examples of these ineffective vaccines include CureVac’s attempt at a rabies vaccine and Moderna’s efforts to create a vaccine for the Zika virus (which was funded by the U.S. government).
Several workarounds for this issue have been proposed, including vaccines where the genetic material (RNA or DNA) “self-amplifies.” However, the workaround of choice to this lack of immune response and other obstacles for DNA/RNA vaccines is the incorporation of nanotechnology into these vaccines. As a result, the use of nanoparticles as the carriers for the genetic material in these vaccines has been widely promoted and studied, as well as touted as the best way to improve their stability, increase their targeted delivery ability and enhance the immune response they provoke.
The combination of DNA or RNA vaccines with nanotechnology has already become reality thanks to the companies leading that field. For instance, the DARPA-backed DNA vaccine company Inovio Pharmaceuticals utilizes what reports refer to as “DNA nanotechnology” in their line of synthetic vaccines branded as “SynCon” by the company, which uses an undisclosed computer algorithm to design its vaccines. It is an interesting coincidence, then, that the Inovio “SynCon” vaccine for Covid-19 now appears to be ahead of the rest of the pack, with backing from Bill Gates, DARPA, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) and other government agencies.
DARPA – Saving us from Covid-19?
In January, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) announced it would begin funding vaccine candidates for the coronavirus outbreak, long before it became a major global issue. CEPI describes itself as “a partnership of public, private, philanthropic and civil organizations that will finance and co-ordinate the development of vaccines against high priority public health threats” and was founded in 2017 by the governments of Norway and India along with the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. That month, CEPI only chose two pharmaceutical companies to receive funding for their efforts to develop a vaccine for Covid-19 – Moderna and Inovio Pharmaceuticals.
As previously mentioned, these two companies are DARPA-backed firms that frequently tout their “strategic alliance” with DARPA in press releases and on their websites. DARPA has also provided these companies with significant amounts of funding. For instance, the top funders behind Inovio Pharmaceuticals include both DARPA and the Pentagon’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) and the company has received millions in dollars in grants from DARPA, including a $45 million grant to develop a vaccine for Ebola. They were also recently awarded over $8 million from the U.S. military to develop a small, portable intradermal device for delivering DNA vaccines, which was jointly developed by Inovio and the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), which also manages the “biodefense” lab at Fort Detrick.
In addition, the German company CureVac, which is also developing a CEPI-backed RNA vaccine for Covid-19, is another long-time recipient of DARPA funding. They were one of DARPA’s earliest investments in the technology, winning a $33.1 million DARPA contract to develop their “RNActive” vaccine platform in 2011.
In Moderna’s case, DARPA financed the production and development of their RNA vaccine production platform and their RNA therapy candidate for Chikungunya virus (their first for an infectious disease) was developed in direct collaboration with the agency. Since 2016, Moderna’s RNA vaccine program has received $100 million in funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Gates Foundation has since poured millions directly into both Moderna’s and Inovio’s Covid-19 vaccine efforts.
Gates’ backing of DNA and RNA vaccines is significant, given that Gates – a billionaire with unparalleled influence and control over global healthcare policy – recently asserted that the best options for a Covid-19 vaccine are these same vaccines, despite the fact that they have never before been approved for use in humans. Yet, thanks to the emergency authorizations activated due to the current crisis, both Moderna’s and Inovio’s testing for these vaccines has skipped animal trials and gone straight to human testing. They are also set to be fast-tracked for widespread use in a matter of months. Moderna’s clinical trial in humans began in mid-March, followed by Inovio’s in the beginning of April. Thus, they are not only Gates’ favorites to be the new vaccine, but are also slated to be the first to complete clinical trials and garner emergency U.S. government approval, especially Moderna’s vaccine which is being jointly developed with the government’s NIH.
The rapid rise to prominence of Moderna’s and Inovio’s Covid-19 vaccines has resulted in several media articles praising DARPA as having provided our “best hope” for thwarting the coronavirus crisis. In addition to its backing of Moderna’s and Inovio’s own efforts, DARPA itself, specifically DARPA’s BTO, is set to have a “temporary” vaccine for Covid-19 available in a matter of weeks that will involve the production of synthetic antibodies that would ostensibly provide immunity for a few months until a longer-lasting vaccine (such as those produced by Moderna and Inovio) is available.
DARPA’s antibody treatment for Covid-19 is pursuing two routes, including the “human body as bio-reactor” approach that would involve synthetic DNA or RNA being injected in order to prompt the body to produce the necessary antibodies. Defense One notes that DARPA’s Covid-19 treatment would utilize techniques that had resulted from the agency’s investments in microfluidics (the manipulation of liquids at the sub-millimeter range), nanotechnology fabrication and “new approaches to gene sequencing.”
Persistent Concerns
While most media reports have painted these DARPA-led efforts as entirely positive, it is worth noting that concerns have been raised, though these concerns have hardly gotten the coverage they warrant. For instance, Nature recently noted some key points regarding safety issues related to the race for a Covid-19 vaccine, including the fact that all “previous coronavirus vaccines have not all proven appropriate or even safe,” with some past attempts at coronavirus vaccines having resulted in antibody dependent enhancement (ADE). ADE results in cells more rapidly taking up the virus and speeding up the virus’ replication, increasing its infectiousness and virulence.
Nature also noted that the two coronavirus vaccines for SARS that managed to pass phase 1 trials ended up, in subsequent studies, causing immune hypersensitivity in mice “resulting in severe immunopathology,” i.e. permanent defects or malfunctions in the immune system. In addition, Nature also pointed out that it is unknown how strong an immune response is needed to confer immunity for Covid-19 and coronaviruses in general, making it incredibly difficult to gauge if a vaccine is even effective.
Another issue worth noting involves concerns raised about Inovio Pharmaceuticals by investment research firm Citron Research, which compared Inovio to Theranos, the disgraced medical technology company that had initially promised to offer diagnoses for numerous diseases via a simple blood test, but was later revealed to be a sham. Citron asserted that “It’s been over 40 years since Inovio was founded, yet the company has NEVER [sic] brought a product to market, and all the while insiders have enriched themselves with hefty salaries and large stock sales.”
Citron Research went on to say that the company’s claim to have designed their Covid-19 vaccine in only 3 hours based on a computer algorithm was hard to believe, stating that “Inovio has a ‘computer algorithm’ that no one else in the world has and is arguably one of the greatest breakthroughs in vaccine discovery in the past 100 years, and yet this ‘computer algorithm’ is not mentioned once in any of its 10-K’s or 10-Q’s? Sounds like Theranos to us.” It also noted that Inovio’s partnerships with pharmaceutical companies Roche and AstraZeneca ended up failing with those two companies canceling the partnership despite claims from Inovio’s CEO that whey would “continue to thrive.”
A Not-So-Hidden Agenda
Of course, these are just concerns focused on corporate behavior and obstacles towards making a Covid-19 vaccine in general. As this report has already shown in detail, DARPA’s other experiments with the same technologies (particularly genetic engineering, synthetic chromosomes, and nanotechnology) that are being used to produce RNA and DNA vaccines for Covid-19 are arguably more concerning. This is especially true given that DARPA-backed companies that describe themselves as “strategic partners” of the agency are those manufacturing these vaccines. In addition, thanks to backing from the U.S. government and Bill Gate, among others, they are are also slated to be among the first vaccines (if not the first) approved for widespread use.
It is certainly troubling that media coverage of DARPA’s efforts and the efforts of Moderna and Inovio have thus far not included critical reporting regarding the different branches of DARPA’s research that has produced the technology involved in creating these vaccines, leaving little room for public scrutiny of their safety, efficacy and their potential for unintended effects on human genetics.
This is particularly alarming given that, over the past several weeks, efforts have been taking shape in many countries to enforce mandatory vaccinations once a Covid-19 vaccine becomes available. In some countries, it appears likely that the Covid-19 vaccine will not be made mandatory per say, but will be required for those who wish to return to any semblance of “normalcy” in terms of public gatherings, working certain jobs, leaving one’s home for longer periods of time and so on.
Would those involved in creating such a mandatory vaccine, e.g. DARPA, pass up the opportunity to utilize the same technologies involved in producing the vaccine for some of their other admitted goals? This question, of course, has no obvious answer, but the fact that the arc of DARPA’s research is aimed at the weaponization of human biology and genetics in a way that is ripe for misuse, suggests very worrying possibilities that warrant scrutiny. Indeed, if one merely looks at how the crisis has been a boon for the Orwellian plans of the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (NSCAI) and the federal government’s current efforts to dramatically increase its powers amid the current crisis, it becomes increasingly difficult to give government agencies like DARPA and their corporate partners like Moderna and Inovio the benefit of the doubt.
This is especially true given that – without a major crisis such as that currently dominating world events – people would likely be unreceptive to the widespread introduction of many of the technologies DARPA has been developing, whether their push to create cyborg “super soldiers” or injectable BMIs with the capability to control one’s thoughts. Yet, amid the current crisis, many of these same technologies are being sold to the public as “healthcare,” a tactic DARPA often uses. As the panic and fear regarding the virus continues to build and as people become increasingly desperate to return to any semblance of normalcy, millions will willingly take a vaccine, regardless of any government-mandated vaccination program. Those who are fearful and desperate will not care that the vaccine may include nanotechnology or have the potential to genetically modify and re-program their very being, as they will only want the current crisis that has upended the world to stop.
In this context, the current coronavirus crisis appears to be the perfect storm that will allow DARPA’s dystopian vision to take hold and burst forth from the darkest recesses of the Pentagon into full public view. However, DARPA’s transhumanist vision for the military and for humanity presents an unprecedented threat, not just to human freedom, but an existential threat to human existence and the building blocks of biology itself.
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Sanctions, War and the Policy of Dual Containment
By SASAN FAYAZMANESH | March 17, 2008
It is now nearly three decades since the Unites States adopted the policy of dual containment of Iran and Iraq. While much has been written about the containment of Iraq, there has been very little in-depth analysis of this policy when it comes to Iran. In a book that is going to be released on March 31, 2008, entitled The United States and Iran: Sanctions, Wars and the Policy of Dual Containment (Routledge), I attempt to address this shortcoming by investigating when and why the US policy of containment of Iran came about, how it evolved, and where it stands today.[1] To the extent that Israel has been involved in US policy making, the study will also include the role that Israel has played in the containment of Iran. Also, since the fate of Iran has been inextricably linked to that of Iraq, occasionally the investigation will overlap with the containment of Iraq.
The policy of dual containment of Iran and Iraq originated during the Carter Administration, but it was not until the Clinton Administration that the expression “dual containment” became popular. … continue
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