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Democracies Don’t Start Wars. But Democrats Do

By Philip Giraldi | Strategic Culture Foundation | December 24, 2020

It may have been President Bill Clinton who once justified his wrecking of the Balkans by observing that liberal interventionism to bring about regime change is a good thing because “Democracies don’t start wars with other democracies.” Or it might have been George W. Bush talking about Iraq or even Barack Obama justifying his destruction of Libya or his interventions relating to Syria and Ukraine. The principle is the same when the world’s only superpower decides to throw its weight around.

The idea that pluralistic democracies are somehow less inclined to go to war has in fact been around for a couple of hundred years and was first elaborated by Immanuel Kant in an essay entitled “Perpetual Peace” that was published in 1795. Kant may have been engaging in some tongue in cheek as the French relatively liberal republic, the “Directory,” was at that time preparing to invade Italy to spread the revolution. The presumption that “democracies” are somehow more pacific than other forms of government is based on the principle that it is in theory more difficult to convince an entire nation of the desirability of initiating armed conflict compared to what happens in a monarchy where only one man or woman has to be persuaded.

The American Revolution, which preceded Kant, was clearly not fought on the principle that kings are prone to start wars while republics are not, and, indeed, the “republican” United States has nearly always been engaged in what most observers would consider to be wars throughout its history. And a review of the history of the European wars of the past two hundred years suggests that it is also overly simple to suggest that democracies eschew fighting each other. There are, after all, many different kinds of governments, most with constitutions, many of which are quite politically liberal even if they are headed by a monarch or oligarchy. They have found themselves on different sides in the conflicts that have troubled Europe since the time of Napoleon.

And wars are often popular, witness the lines of enthusiastic young men lining up to enlist when the Triple Entente took on the Germans and Austrians to begin the First World War. So, war might be less likely among established democracies, but it should be conceded that the same national interests that drive a dictatorship can equally impact on a more pluralistic form of government, particularly if the media “the territory of lies” is in on the game. One recalls how the Hearst newspaper chain created the false narrative that resulted in the U.S.’s first great overseas imperial venture, the Spanish-American War. More recently, the mainstream media in the United States has supported the disastrous invasion of Iraq, the destabilization of Syria, and the regime change in Ukraine, Afghanistan and Libya.

So now we Americans have the ultimate liberal democratic regime about to resume power, possibly with a majority in both houses of Congress to back up the presidency. But something is missing in that the campaigning Democrats never talked about a peace dividend, and now that they are returning the airwaves are notable for Senators like Mark Warner asking if the alleged Russian hacking of U.S. computers is an “act of war?” Senator Dick Durbin has no doubts on the issue, having declared it “virtually a declaration of war.” And Joe Biden appears to be on board, considering punishment for Moscow. Are we about to experience Russiagate all over? In fact, belligerency is not unique to Donald Trump and Mike Pompeo. War is in the air, and large majority of the Democratic Party recently voted for the pork-bloated National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), endorsing a policy of U.S. global military dominance for the foreseeable future. If you are an American who would like to see national health insurance, a large majority among Democrats, forget about it!

But more to the point, the Democrats have a worse track record than do the Republicans when it comes to starting unnecessary wars. Donald Trump made the point of denouncing “stupid wars” when he was running for office and has returned to that theme also in the past several weeks, though he did little enough to practice what he preached until it was too late and too little. Clinton notoriously intervened in the Balkans and bombed a pharmaceuticals factory in Sudan and a cluster of tents in Afghanistan to draw attention away from his affair with Monica Lewinsky. His secretary of State Madeleine Albright thought the death of 500,000 Iraqi children due to U.S. sanctions was “worth it.” Barack Obama tried to destroy Syria, interfered in Ukraine and succeeded in turning Libya into an ungovernable mess while compiling a “kill list” and assassinating U.S. citizens overseas using drones.

If you want to go back farther, Woodrow Wilson involved the U.S. in World War One while Franklin D. Roosevelt connived at America’s entry into the Second World War. FDR’s successor Harry Truman dropped two atomic bombs on civilian targets in Japan, killing as many as 200,000. Japan was preparing to surrender, which was known to the White House and Pentagon, making the first use of nuclear weapons completely unnecessary and one might call it a “war crime.” Truman also got involved in Korea and John F. Kennedy started the intervention in Vietnam, though there are indications that he was planning to withdraw from it when he was killed. The only Democratic president who failed to start one or more wars was the much-denigrated Jimmy Carter.

So, it is Joe Biden’s turn at the wheel. One has to question the philosophy of government that he brings with him as he has never found a war that he didn’t support and several of his cabinet choices are undeniably hardliners on what they refer to as national security. The lobbies are also putting pressure on Biden to do the “right thing,” which for them is to continue an interventionist foreign policy. The Israeli connected Foundation for the Defense Democracies (FDD) has not surprisingly issued a collection of essays that carries the title “Defending Forward: Securing America by Projecting Military Power Abroad.” If one had to bet at this point “defending forward” will be what the Biden Administration is all about. And oh, by the way, as democracies don’t go to war with democracies, it will only be the designated bad guys who will be on the receiving end of America’s military might. Or at least that is how the tale will be told.

Philip Giraldi, Ph.D. is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest.

December 24, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | , | Leave a comment

US provides $500m to Israel under national covid relief bill

MEMO | December 22, 2020

The United States has passed a $900 billion COVID-19 relief bill to support industries and workers affected by the ongoing pandemic, of which hundreds of millions of dollars have been granted to Israel and its defence.

In the bill passed by US Congress yesterday – part of an overall $2.3 trillion package – the act under the heading of “Procurement, Defense-Wide” detailed a total of $500 million for the “Israeli Cooperative Programs”.

Of that amount, “$73,000,000 shall be for the Secretary of Defense to provide to the Government of Israel for the procurement of the Iron Dome defense system to counter short-range rocket threats.”

In addition to that, a further “$177,000,000 shall be for the Short Range Ballistic Missile Defense (SRBMD) program, including cruise missile defense research and development under the SRBMD program, of which $50,000,000 shall be for co-production activities of SRBMD systems in the United States and in Israel to meet Israel’s defense requirements consistent with each nation’s laws, regulations, and procedures.”

Meanwhile, the rest of the relief package deals with matters such as tax breaks, the selection of the next Dalai Lama, and providing businesses and the unemployed with benefits to ease their ordeal during the coronavirus pandemic.

In the announcement of the agreement, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell stated that the bill is “another major rescue package for the American people,” referring to the first relief package made in March this year. He promised that the 5,593-page-long bill “is packed with targeted policies to help struggling Americans who have already waited too long.”

Even those policies which help the citizens and unemployed are severely limited, however, with the agreed $300 per week bonus jobless benefit reportedly being half of the federal unemployment benefit given in the previous package. That payment runs for 11 weeks in comparison to the 16 in the last package. To add to that, the direct stimulus payment of $600 to many people is also half of that given in March.

The disparity in relief payments leads to questions relating to the prioritisation of the US defence industry, its affiliated companies, and the Pentagon – which reportedly received $696 billion in the package – as well as the defence industry of a foreign nation such as Israel.

Congress’ justification for the limit in spending on the unemployed and businesses is that billions were allegedly also needed for other essential resources and unfinished business such as water provision and flood control in the country. The defence companies and military sectors which are provided money in the bill were also said to be heavily hit by the pandemic.

December 22, 2020 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

What’s actually IN the US “Covid Stimulus Bill”?

The answer to that is nothing like as simple as you’d expect, given the name.

OffGuardian | December 22, 2020

The US congress just passed their Covid stimulus bill, or the “Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021” to give its official title. So what’s actually inside it? What has just been passed into law?

The answers to that is “nobody really knows”, least of all the members of congress, who passed the law without reading it, as they so often do. It’s the longest bill in US history, at over 5500 pages and it sailed through the voting mostly sight unseen.

We’ve downloaded a copy of the full document and will embed it for those of you patient or masochistic enough to tackle the whole thing. We’ve read some already, and will point out the highlights:

  • “Foreign aid” is a big winner. Egypt is getting $1.3 billion, Sudan, Israel and Ukraine get over 500 million each, and many other countries around the world sizeable contributions, much of which will be spent on “defense”. Which is to say sent straight back to America via massive arms purchases.
  • Not all the money being sent overseas is for buying weapons, some is for backing coups. Venezuela and Belarus get special mention here, each getting their own section of the bill detailing how terrible their “illegal regimes” are. There’s also a large section on “combating Chinese influence”.
  • For some reason there’s another section on copyright law, which makes illegal streaming copyrighted content a federal crime, punishable by up to three years in prison.
  • Nearly 300 million is put aside to develop influenza vaccines and prevent a future influenza pandemic.
  • 4 BILLION dollars for the Gates-funded GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance.
  • Vaccine “misinformation” is also a concern, and the bill provides for a pro-vaccine propaganda campaign – or rather a “PUBLIC AWARENESS CAMPAIGN ON THE IMPORTANCE OF VACCINATIONS”

So – huge amounts of foreign aid, support for various coups, totally irrelevant copyright laws, provisions for pro-vaccine propaganda campaigns… it’s not your typical “stimulus bill” so far, is it?

December 22, 2020 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

U.S. plans to build a nuclear plant on the Moon are a major challenge to other Great Powers

By Paul Antonopoulos | December 21, 2020

The U.S., via its Space Policy Directive-6 (SPD-6), announced plans to set up a nuclear power plant on the Moon by 2027. The SPD-6 states that the Moon will be installed with a fission power system that will have a power range of 40 kilowatt-electric (kWe) and higher so that the celestial body can support a sustained lunar presence and allow Mars to be more easily explored.

China’s Global Times reported that the U.S.’ ambitions will lead to future lunar military projects as it seeks space supremacy. According to Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert, the moon is rich in helium-3, which can be used to produce energy by nuclear fusion. Song warned that by setting up a nuclear power plant, the Americans can theoretically turn the Moon “into a production site of nuclear weapons”.

U.S. President Donald Trump, as Eurasian Times reported, issued the SPD-6, which lays out a national strategy for the responsible and effective use of space nuclear power and propulsion (SNPP) systems.

Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign Affairs University highlighted that the use of SNPP is in the attempt to establish “American unilateralism” over space. As per the Moon Treaty, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1979, celestial bodies and the Moon are “not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means”. Washington has generally adhered to the Moon Treaty, but never formally signed or ratified it.

Earlier this year, Trump attempted to challenge this Treaty by proposing new rules, dubbed the “Artemis Accord”, which would change the status quo. The Artemis Accord would allow for the exploitation of lunar resources for commercial gain and focus on establishing so-called safety zones around landing sites. This could be interpreted as de facto ownership of areas of the moon, forbidden by the Outer Space Treaty that provides a basic framework for international space law.

In addition, on April 6, Trump passed a decree that allows the U.S. to extract mineral resources from outer space. The document, states: “Americans should have the right to engage in commercial exploration, recovery, and use of resources in outer space, consistent with applicable law. Outer space is a legally and physically unique domain of human activity, and the United States does not view it as a global commons”.

It adds: “the United States does not consider the Moon Agreement to be an effective or necessary instrument to guide nation states regarding the promotion of commercial participation in the long-term exploration, scientific discovery, and use of the Moon, Mars, or other celestial bodies”. Finally, the document emphasizes that the U.S. will challenge any attempt by another state or international organization that wants to treat the Moon Agreement as customary international law.

With the U.S. planning to violate international treaties to unilaterally exploit the resources of space and construct a nuclear plant on the Moon, it is understood why Trump established the United States Space Force (USSF), the space service branch of the U.S. Armed Forces. Russia, India and China all have interests on the Moon too, and the USSF was established to ensure U.S. dominance over space rivals.

India in 2019 launched the Chandrayaan 2 mission with the aim to land on the south pole of the Moon to search for water and minerals. No other landing craft has reached this part of the moon before. Unfortunately for India, the landing failed because of a software glitch. This has not deterred Indian ambitions though and Chandrayaan-3 is scheduled to land on the Moon in the second quarter of 2021.

Meanwhile, China launched the Chang’e 5 robotic Moon mission on November 23 from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site and landed on the Moon on December 1. By December 16 it returned to Earth with lunar soil and rock samples. It was China’s first sample-return mission, making it the third country after the U.S. and the Soviet Union to successfully obtain samples returned from the Moon.

Russia will be returning to the Moon after 45 years of inactivity. Vladimir Kolmykov, head of the Lavochkin Scientific and Production Association at the Russian space agency Roscosmos, told Russian President President Vladimir Putin on April 10 that: “The Luna-25 spacecraft is currently in the assembly and first trial stages. Yes, there are some cooperation problems but we are working on them. I hope that the 2021 goal of launching Luna-25 will be achieved.”

With the world’s Great Powers (the U.S., Russia and China), and emerging Great Power, India, all having vested interests in space and the Moon, the construction of a nuclear plant on the celestial body is a major challenge as it will propel a race for its resources and weaponization. All countries will try and claim parts of the moon for mining, resembling something akin to Western Europe’s Scramble for Africa or the race to claim large swathes of Antarctica. The U.S. is trying to dominate space policies from a very narrow U.S.-centric view when space should be viewed as a Common Heritage to Mankind. Russia, China and India could also claim large swathes of the moon in reaction to U.S. unilateral activities, thus kicking off another, more fundamental “Scramble for the Moon.”

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst.  

December 21, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism | | Leave a comment

Iran calls for end to development, testing of nuclear weapons: Envoy

Press TV | December 16, 2020

Iran’s permanent representative to Vienna-based international organizations has called for an end to the development and testing of nuclear weapons, saying such a move is the first step toward total nuclear disarmament.

Kazem Gharibabadi made the plea at the 55th Session of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) in the Austrian capital on Tuesday and underlined Iran’s long-standing position on the need for the complete elimination of all nuclear weapons.

“Iran supports the objectives stipulated in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) with the ultimate goal of disarmament, as well as general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control,” he said.

“We also strongly believe that stopping all explosive tests of nuclear weapons and other nuclear explosions, as well as ending the quantitative development and qualitative improvement of these weapons, is the first necessary step towards nuclear disarmament,” Gharibabadi added.

The Iranian envoy censured Washington’s approach on the non-proliferation regime and expressed concern over the possibility of the US conducting nuclear test explosions, saying the move undermines international peace and security.

Gharibabadi stressed that a possible resumption of the tests would breach a treaty on the moratorium on such practices, and also violates the nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation efforts.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Iran’s permanent representative to Vienna-based international organizations touched on Saudi Arabia’s nuclear program and called on the kingdom to join the NPT.

Saudi Arabia’s nuclear ambitions have prompted worries in the global community over the past few years, especially after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman hinted in 2018 that the kingdom may go for nukes.

Widespread reports of Saudi Arabia’s undeclared nuclear activities were confirmed in August, when satellite images revealed a large compound in a suspicious location in the heart of the desert.

The Wall Street Journal, citing Western officials, reported that Saudi Arabia had built a facility, with foreign aid, for extraction of yellow cake from uranium ore near the remote town of al-Ula.

December 16, 2020 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

The Colonization of Haiti in 1915

Tales of the American Empire | December 10, 2020

Haiti is near the United States with fertile land and cheap labor that American business tycoons find attractive. In November 1914, the US Navy Department drew up a proposal called: “Plan for Landing and Occupying the City of Port-au-Prince” that outlined measures to take control of the capital of Haiti; and also set forth an official public rationale to invade: “solely for the establishment of law and order.” That rationale sufficed for immediate intervention, which American President Woodrow Wilson soon ordered without consulting Congress. With European powers busy with World War I, the American empire dispatched US Marines to invade Haiti and seize control. The American colonization of Haiti succeeded, but at the cost of thousands of Haitian lives while military records list 146 US Marines killed during their 19-year occupation.

_____________________________________

“Admiral Capteron in Haiti”; 1915 Essay; US Navy History and Heritage Command; https://www.history.navy.mil/research…

December 15, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Video, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

What Joe Biden’s Electoral College “Victory” Really Means

By Kit Knightly | OffGuardian | December 15, 2020

So, the electoral college cast their votes, and they handed Joe Biden the Presidency. The decision was never in any serious doubt.

We’ve been over the evidence the election was rigged, we’ve discussed at length the potential corruption of postal ballots (historically the least safe way to vote, and most liable to fraud). There’s no need to go over it again.

Given all that, it was inevitable the Electoral College would vote Biden in, and the lawsuits would be turned out of court unheard. You don’t go to the trouble of fixing a nationwide election and without knowing you have the judges and bureaucrats on-side first. When you’re staging a coup, the vast majority of the work is behind the scenes – securing the loyalty of soldiers and officials and media mouthpieces. You don’t actually act until the last minute, one frenzied moment of violent change, then a steady period securing of your position.

Donald Trump’s cause has been largely hopeless since well before polling day. He will be forced aside, one way or another. Likely peacefully, thanks to some backroom deal. What his many millions of supporters do after that is anyone’s guess…there is definitely a potential for chaos.

At this point the question isn’t “was the election fixed?”, the question is “why was the election fixed?”

The issue here isn’t whether or not America’s democracy is corrupt, anyone paying attention can see that it is (and has been for decades). The issue is why are they making it so obvious, and what is so important about Biden being President?

Is it about the Iran nuclear deal, Wearing masks? Funding the WHO, or staying put in Somalia? Unlikely. These are policy changes you can bring about through passive resistance, bureaucratic red-tape, or simply straight up saying you did them when you didn’t. You don’t need to stage a coup to keep 700 soldiers in Somalia.

So what would be worth all the trouble?

Perhaps for a possible answer to this question we should look back at the last US election so openly and obviously subject to creative vote distribution: Bush vs Gore in 2000.

The 2000 election was almost certainly fixed. It was clearly very important that George W. Bush became President, and with him came his coterie of neocon warmongers and puppetmasters.

Less than a year into his Presidency, 9/11 happened. Less than two months after that, the US invaded Afghanistan. The war on Terror had begun, and Iraq, Syria, and Libya would all be caught up in the blaze.

It wasn’t just about starting a few wars, either.

It was about a “single catastrophic and catalyzing event” triggering monumental changes in the way the world works. It was about Gitmo and Drone Strikes and Enhanced Interrogation Techniques. It was about normalising execution without trial, constant surveillance and keeping people scared.

It was about the Patriot Act “temporarily” halting people’s fundamental freedoms… forever. A huge policy shift that cemented Imperial power abroad, enforced draconian discipline at home and totally changed the political landscape of the entire planet.

I would expect something similar for Joe Biden’s contrived presidency. But what form will it take? Will it be due to the Covid19 “pandemic”, or can we expect another “catalysing event”? It could be the Great Reset, or the Green New Deal. Or both.

While Biden will likely endorse, and even reinforce, US troops all over Africa and the Middle East, his flagship policy is likely to be domestic rather international, and political rather than military. Some brutal authoritarian consolidation of control in a flimsy “progressive” disguise.

Whatever it turns out to be, it will be a sea-change in the way the world works. The Deep State don’t stick their necks out this far for anything less.

December 15, 2020 Posted by | Deception, Militarism | | Leave a comment

An Expert Military Analysis of War with China

Actually, None is Necessary

By Fred Reed • Unz Review • December 13, 2020

The Correlation of Armed Forces: U.S. goods and services trade with China totaled an estimated $634.8 billion in 2019. Exports were $163.0 billion; imports were $471.8 billion. The U.S. goods and services trade deficit with China was $308.8 billion in 2019. Trade in services with China (exports and imports) totaled an estimated $76.7 billion in 2019. Services exports were $56.5 billion; services imports were $20.1 billion. The U.S. services trade surplus with China was $36.4 billion in 2019.

There is talk within the Washingtoniat of a possible war with China. Steve Bannon, who apparently was dropped on his head as a child, actually favors such a war. We hear the usual shoo-the-boobs alarm about how the Chinese are doing something terrible and we must gird our loins and American values and show them what for, bow wow, woof. The danger is that the current game of who-blinks-first in Asian waters might actually provoke a shooting war. You know the kind of thing: One warship refuses to get out of the way of another, a collision ensues, some retard lieutenant who signed up on waivers opens fire, and we’re off and running. It is not a good idea to let children play with matches.

The said war is discussed either in emotional terms by idiots or in purely naval terms by those familiar with such things, so we hear of the First Island Chain and the Second Island Chain and whose missiles against the other’s missiles and so on. This would be appropriate if we were fighting World War Two again. Which we aren’t. Let’s take a quick-and-dirty look at how such a war might go.

To begin the war, America would overestimate itself and underestimate China. This is doctrine in the Pentagon. There is probably a manual on it. Inside the DC Bubble, fern-bar Napoleons would assure us that it would be a short war, a cakewalk, a matter of days, not weeks. You know, like Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria. When it turned out that the Chinese had other ideas, among which surrendering was not, and the months dragged on, various fascinating things would happen.

Rand, a thinktank wholly owned by the Pentagon, at least mentally, has wargamed both the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea, concluding that the war could be both very long and a loss for America. We no longer live in 1960.

OK, the war: On day one, all the multitudinous American factories in China shut down. Example: Apple loses its factories, products from those factories, and the Chinese market of 1.4 billion consumers. Its stores close. Tim Cook’s gratitude will know no bounds. American auto manufacturers sell googolplexes of cars in China (or at least lots), mostly made in China. Overnight they will lose factories, cars, and Chinese customers. Overall, China buys many more cars than does the US. This analysis, if anything so obvious may be called analysis, can be repeated for industry after industry after industry. Goodbye, business vote.

Within weeks, Walmart’s shelves go bare. Walk down the aisles and read the “Made in” labels. We are not talking only plastic buckets and mops but chain saws, pharmaceuticals, motorcycles, and blood-pressure cuffs. So much for the blue-collar vote. The US buys 472 billion in goods annually from China, high-tech, low-tech, consumer goods, manufacturing components. No more.

China buys over $163 billion annually in American goods: petroleum, semiconductors, airline engines, soybeans, airliners, on and on. No more. It is hard to underestimate the joy this will cause in influential boardrooms. And of course the American workers who would have produced these things for China will be laid off. As electoral politics, this will prove suboptimal.

China produces a great majority of the rare earth elements crucial to the manufacture of electronics, such as semiconductors. No quick substitute is in sight. Just about everything in America uses these, to include the computers that run the electrical systems of cars. Though I haven’t checked, it is quite possible that the computers themselves are made in China. If you want a new and deeper understanding of the word “hostile,” check the influential CEOs of businesses on their second chipless day.

In a real war, it is likely that China, having thought of the foregoing, would (intelligently) destroy Taiwan’s semiconductor fabs, notably those of TSMC, as well as other factories of electronics. This would hardly be difficult since the Taiwan Strait is only a hundred or so miles wide. Losing these industries would be exceedingly painful for the US since its high-end chips come from Taiwan. It would take America years to replace this capacity domestically. Some of the necessary equipment, extreme ultraviolet lithography machines, is not made in America and in any event cannot be stamped out like beer cans.

In America it would quickly be discovered that the country is rather more dependent on China than some might think. If I may make up an example: The automotive industry finds that its sparkplugs come from China. While America could certainly make spark plugs, it turns out that a decade back the industry found that China could make them for forty percent less. In the cooperative commercial world pre-Trump, this was no problem. Not now. So much for sales of cars. And for the jobs of the workers who make them.

I will bet you all my diamond mines in South Africa and cattle lands in Argentina, that if you went through a parts list for, say, Boeing’s airliners, you would find lots of them made in China. Sure, the US could manufacture most of them, eventually. But companies need parts now, not eventually.

The effects on other countries of a large war against China would be catastrophic if not worse. Other countries also get many things, from China or Taiwan, such as semiconductors. Google on “country x largest trading partner.” A strong pattern quickly becomes clear: China is huge in trading with practically everybody. “Everybody” includes Germany, Japan, Australia, Russia, and South America as a whole. The world economy in its entirety would collapse.

How smart would this be? The United States is already in serious trouble, what with a currency rapidly being debased, a sinking middle class, businesses dying of Covid, jobs disappearing abroad, people living paycheck to paycheck, and social unhappiness resulting in continent-wide riots. Do you suppose the public will gladly support an unfathomably stupid war causing an instant, profound, and murderous economic depression? If so, you probably already have a collection of bridges.

This can be inflicted on the entire earth by a half-dozen loons in or circling around the White House unhindered by a worthless Congress. Six loons. Yes, I know, Trump is unlikely deliberately to start a Third world War, even as a publicity stunt. No, the generals in the Pentagon are not nearly stupid enough. (They might even refuse, pointing out that starting a war requires a declaration by Congress.) The problem is that for years America has been, if not actually looking for a fight, at least daring other countries to start one. For example, murdering Iranian officials, pulling out of arms-control treaties, pushing NATO ever closer to Russia, sanctioning countries far beyond anything that can be called a trade war, and playing chicken with China in the South China Sea. Under these circumstances you can get a fight without quite looking for one.

Write Fred at jet.possum@gmail.com. Put the letters pdq anywhere in the subject line to avoid heartless autodeletion.

December 13, 2020 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | 1 Comment

America’s Life of the Lie

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | December 10, 2020

Over the Thanksgiving holidays, I visited Luray, Virginia, a beautiful little town nestled in the Shenandoah Valley. Walking by the county courthouse, I noticed a plaque out in front, whose inscription exemplifies a root cause of the dysfunctional nature of American society. The plaque reads:

Page County Veterans Memorial

Those who have long enjoyed such freedoms as we enjoy forget in time that man has died to win them.

Dedicated to those who served their country in times of war and peace especially dedicated to those who paid the ultimate sacrifice in order that all mankind may live free.

We all gave some and some gave all.

The plaque lists the names of American military personnel from Page County, Virginia, who died in four of America’s foreign wars: World War I, World War II, Korean War, and Vietnam War.

Of course, this type of plaque is not unique to Luray. Variations of it can be found in front of government buildings all across America.

If you want to understand one of the big reasons why the United States is riddled with massive drug addiction and alcoholism, irrational acts of violence, and ever-rising suicide rates, especially among young people and veterans, just read that plaque in front of the Page County, Virginia, courthouse.

Talk to any psychologist or psychiatrist or just read a few self-help books about living a life that denies reality. They will all tell you that when a person lives that type of life, it will inevitably lead to severe psychosis, especially if the person doesn’t realize that anything is wrong with him and instead believes that everything is fine with him.

It’s only when a person achieves a “breakthrough” as to his condition that he is able to start the long road to recovery. The first step toward recovery and health, as Alcoholics Anonymous points out, is for a person to acknowledge that he has a problem.

That’s the problem with America, or, to be more precise, with a large segment of the American populace. They are living what can be called the life of the lie and have been for their entire lives. It is a lie that holds that American soldiers have died for freedom in America’s foreign wars.

Nothing could be further from the truth. But all too many Americans simply cannot bring themselves to acknowledge the lie they are living. It’s just too comfortable living the life of the lie, which, over time, manifests itself in a massively dysfunctional society, one in which the dysfunctionality becomes increasingly worse the longer the lie persists.

World War I. No American soldier, including those from Page County, Virginia, died in World War I defending the freedom of the American people or, for that matter, anyone’s else’s freedom. The freedom of the American people was never at stake or at risk. President Wilson’s war aims were (1) to “make the world safe for democracy,” which, of course, is not the same thing as freedom and (2) to make this the war that would end war forever.

Wilson’s war aims were a crock. It didn’t take Americans long to realize that Wilson had sacrificed the lives of American soldiers for nothing. No, not for freedom, but rather for nothing. Even worse, he had destroyed freedom by conscripting — i.e. forcing — men to go thousands of miles away to be sacrificed for nothing. Moreover, there was the destruction of liberty here at home, including the jailing of American citizens who dared to criticize Wilson’s deadly folly.

World War II. Germany never attacked the United States or even threatened to do so. Hitler’s aim was always to establish dominance on the European continent and to move eastward against the Soviet Union and communism. After the fiasco of World War I, Americans wanted no part of another European war. But President Roosevelt, unwilling to let the American people have the final say, provoked the Japanese into attacking Pearl Harbor and the Philippines, especially through a very effective oil embargo, in order to give him a “back door” to getting the U.S. into the war against Germany. At no time did Japan threaten the freedom of the American people. Its war aim was limited to trying to knock out the U.S. fleet so that Japan would have a free hand in invading the Dutch East Indies to secure the oil to fund its war machine in China.

Moreover, at the end of the war, half of Germany and all of Eastern Europe were under communist control, which wasn’t any better than Nazi control. Communism, like Nazism, is the opposite of freedom. The aftermath of the war also led to the conversion of the U.S. government to a national-security state with omnipotent, dark-side powers that are antithetical to the principles of a free society. It also led to the Cold War, which brought massive infringement on the liberties and privacy of the American people.

Korean War and Vietnam War. These were nothing more than civil wars that were no business of the U.S. government. At no time did North Korea or North Vietnam threaten the freedom of the American people. The U.S. interventions into these civil wars actually destroyed freedom at home through conscription and destruction of civil liberties.

Maybe nobody from Page County has been killed in Iraq or Afghanistan, given that those two forever wars aren’t listed on the plaque. But the same principle applies there as well: Soldiers who have died in those two foreign escapades did not die for freedom, given that the freedom of the American people was never being threatened by either the Afghan regime or the Iraqi regime. American soldiers in Afghanistan or Iraq have died for the same thing that American soldiers died for in other foreign escapades: they have died for nothing.

But Americans cannot bring themselves to face these discomforting and painful truths. They insist on continuing the life of the life — the life that defers to and, even worse, glorifies the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA, the three principal components of the national-security establishment that itself has destroyed the freedom and well-being of the American people. Americans simply cannot bring themselves to acknowledge reality — that American soldiers who died in these foreign escapades died not for freedom but for nothing and that many of them were forced to do so through conscription.

Until Americans come to grips with reality, the suicides will continue, especially among young people and veterans, as so will the massive drug addiction, alcoholism, and other self-destructive behavior, not to mention the many irrational acts of violence. That’s the type of dysfunctional society that the life of the lie — a life that denies reality — produces.

December 10, 2020 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes, Wars for Israel | | Leave a comment

NATO says it is “United for a New Era” but is trying to resurrect 20th century policies

By Paul Antonopoulos | December 10, 2020

On December 3, Carnegie Europe hosted the public launch of the NATO 2030 Expert Group’s Report: “United for a New Era”. The report comes as U.S. President Donald Trump has many issues with NATO members for not committing to their military budget, Turkey continues its near daily military threats against fellow NATO member Greece, and French President Emmanuel Macron famously highlighted that NATO suffers from a “brain death.” NATO is struggling to find a reason for its existence since the collapse of European communism in 1991, but the report’s authors are confident that their suggestions can adapt NATO “for a New Era”.

What becomes evident from the report is that this “New Era” is not based on multipolarity. Rather it is an attempt to resurrect the U.S.-led unipolar world, suggesting that NATO actually has no strategy for the “New Era” of multipolarity.

But for NATO to justify its existence in the 21st century, they require a political consolidation of members who are divided. It appears that the authors hope that anti-Russian and anti-Chinese positions can unite NATO again towards a common goal.

“NATO must adapt to meet the needs of a more demanding strategic environment marked by the return of systemic rivalry, [and a] persistently aggressive Russia”, the authors said in their “Main Findings: Moving Toward NATO 2030”.

However, the old Russian enemy is also no longer a strong enough reason to justify the existence of NATO, which is why there is also a particular emphasis on China in the report.

“NATO must devote much more time, political resources, and action to the security challenges posed by China,” the report said, adding that NATO must “develop a political strategy for approaching a world in which China will be of growing importance through to 2030. The Alliance should infuse the China challenge throughout existing structures and consider establishing a consultative body to discuss all aspects of Allies’ security interests vis-à-vis China.”

The 67-page report however is mostly just theory, analytical considerations and suggestions. In practice, NATO is dominated by absolute indecision. Some so-called experts are not content with only Russia being the main focus of NATO in the 21st century and consider China a major enemy of the alliance. This is problematic as many NATO members, including countries like Greece that are traditionally subservient to the Alliance, are unwilling to jeopardize trade relations with China and are beginning to improve their ties with Moscow again.

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg noted that important decisions will be taken in February during a meeting of defense ministers. This meeting will occur just weeks after we discover whether it will be Donald Trump or Joe Biden sitting in the White House on January 20.

A NATO emphasis against China or Russia will depend on whether it will be a Trump or Biden administration next year. For Trump, China is Washington’s main adversary. Biden certainly emphasizes China’s supposed threat, but in reality, the trade war will likely cool down as there are influential interest groups in both countries wanting to engage in business rather than a geopolitical struggle. However, a Biden presidency will certainly push NATO to become tougher against Moscow and encourage destabilization on Russia’s frontiers.

In support of destabilizing Russia’s borders and undermining its interests, the report urges NATO to “expand and strengthen partnerships with Ukraine and Georgia, seek to heighten engagement with Bosnia and Herzegovina”.

As the report states, NATO should “counter destabilization across the Western Balkans”. This is despite the fact that it was the Alliance that violently dissolved Yugoslavia in the 1990’s by supporting separatist forces in Kosovo, as well as jihadists from the Arab World and Chechnya to help break Bosnia off from Yugoslavia.

The fact that Russia is the main threat to Biden is very suitable for some NATO members and their allies like Ukraine, Georgia, Poland and Lithuania. If necessary, these countries could also turn against China if demanded so by NATO or Biden. These states will be more than satisfied as anti-Russian policies in today’s NATO is fanatically supported by Anglosphere and former Warsaw Pact countries.

Reading the new NATO report, which attempts to set a decade-long strategy for the Alliance, actually reveals the desperation to find relevance in the 21st century. Biden may say “America is back”, but that does not mean it will be able to return. Washington’s peak power occurred when the world became unipolar after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However, this short period has already passed and NATO is more obsolete than ever.

NATO, but especially the likes of the Anglosphere and former Warsaw pact states, tries to cling onto an inefficient past. It is for this reason that other NATO members are beginning to look outside of the Alliance to ensure their security without the cost of opposing Russia and China. An example of this is the emerging alliance between France, Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates.

The 21st Century is incomparable to the previous century as new regional and global security threats have emerged under different geopolitical contexts. Insisting that Russia and China are the main adversaries to Anglo-American dominance, prevents NATO states from facing the reality that the 21st century is an era of multipolarity, thus limiting their own global influence as states are choosing to engage in new relations and alliances disconnected from demands made by third parties. NATO believes it can unite all member states “for a New Era” by opposing Moscow and Beijing, but this will only end in major disappointment and failure for the alliance as member states are becoming unwilling to adopt anti-Russian and anti-Chinese policies.

Paul Antonopoulos is an independent geopolitical analyst. 

December 10, 2020 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Pearl Harbor and the Bay of Pigs

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | December 8, 2020

U.S. officials have long criticized Japan for its supposedly unprovoked military attack on Pearl Harbor, which enabled President Roosevelt to fulfill his desire to intervene into World War II. As I showed in my blog post yesterday, the Japanese attack was hardly unprovoked, given Roosevelt’s actions that were designed to provoke Japan into “firing the first shot,” which would enable Roosevelt to exclaim: We’ve been attacked! We are shocked! This is a day that will live in infamy! Now give me my declaration of war so that I can enter World War II.

Given the outrage over what the court historians and the U.S. mainstream press have long maintained was an unprovoked attack by Japan on the United States, why have these same court historians and mainstream media outlets given a pass to the U.S. government for initiating an unprovoked attack on Cuba in 1961?

Oh sure, there have been countless books and articles written about how the attack turned out to be a debacle for the U.S. government, specifically the CIA, one of the three main elements of the national-security branch of the federal government. But they never go after the CIA and the rest of the U.S. government for doing what Japan supposedly did — initiate an unprovoked attack on an independent country.

The U.S. national-security establishment has long maintained that it had the “right” to initiate its attack on Cuba because Cuba had established a communist government and a socialist system.

But since when does a disagreement with a country’s political and economic systems justify an unprovoked attack on that country? If Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor because of America’s New Deal system, which was characterized by both socialism and economic fascism, would that have made the attack justifiable? Does the U.S. government today have the “right” to attack Vietnam, China, North Korea, and, yes, Cuba because they have communist and socialist systems? Indeed, do communist regimes have the “right” to attack the United States because the U.S. has a “capitalist” system, or does the principle work only one way?

The CIA and its acolytes in the mainstream press have always maintained that Castro’s Cuba posed a grave threat to U.S. “national security” and, therefore, that their unprovoked attack was justified.

Really? How exactly was “national security” threatened by a communist regime and a socialist system in Cuba, no matter what definition is given to that nebulous and meaningless term? Was a communist regime and a socialist system in Cuba going to somehow cause the East Coast to fall into the ocean? Was the Cuban army somehow going to invade Florida, without a navy, and work its way up the East Coast and conquer Washington, D.C., and take control over the United States? Or was the danger that socialist ideas would seep into the minds of U.S. officials, the American people, and the mainstream press, inciting them to expand existing socialist programs, such as Social Security, public schooling, a central bank, progressive income taxation, and welfare, or adopt new socialist programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid?

And while we are on the subject of unprovoked attacks, it’s worth asking how the U.S. government justified its repeated attempts to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Even Lyndon Johnson referred to the CIA’s assassination program as “Murder, Inc.,” which is precisely what it was, especially given the CIA’s assassination partnership with the Mafia, the world’s premier criminal organization specializing in drug dealing, racketeering, and murder.

Why can’t the court historians and the mainstream press just accept the truth: The U.S. government initiated an unprovoked attack on Cuba in 1961 that was no different in principle from Japan’s supposed unprovoked attack on the United States in 1941? The real reason for the unprovoked attack on Cuba was that U.S. national-security state officials were furious that the Cuban revolution had succeeded in ousting from power the pro-U.S. Cuban leader Fulgencio Batista, who was one of the most brutal, crooked, and corrupt dictators in the world. U.S. officials were even more furious that Castro, unlike Batista, wished to establish a truly independent nation, one whose government refused to take orders from U.S. officials, especially those in the Pentagon and the CIA. It was that desire for Cuban independence that motivated the U.S. national-security state to do the same thing that Japan had supposedly done some 20 years earlier — initiate an unprovoked attack on another nation.

Jacob G. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. He was born and raised in Laredo, Texas, and received his B.A. in economics from Virginia Military Institute and his law degree from the University of Texas. He was a trial attorney for twelve years in Texas. He also was an adjunct professor at the University of Dallas, where he taught law and economics. In 1987, Mr. Hornberger left the practice of law to become director of programs at the Foundation for Economic Education.

December 8, 2020 Posted by | Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Biden’s Prospective New Defense Secretary Further Erodes a Key U.S. Norm: Civilian Control

Gen. Lloyd Austin, on the Raytheon Board, is yet another high-level Biden nominee enmeshed in D.C.’s corporatist “revolving door” of legalized influence-peddling.

By Glenn Greenwald | December 8, 2020

Joe Biden’s pick to be the next Secretary of Defense, according to reports on Monday night, is recently retired Gen. Lloyd J. Austin, III. The choice of Gen. Austin further erodes the once-sacred American norm that military officials will be barred from exercising control over the Pentagon until substantial time has passed after leaving active-duty military service.

Before Gen. Austin can be confirmed, Biden will need a special waiver from Congress under the National Security Act of 1947. That law, a cornerstone of the post-World War II national security state, provides that “a person who has within ten years been on active duty as a commissioned officer in a Regular component of the armed services shall not be eligible for appointment as Secretary of Defense.” Enactment of the law after the war, explained the Congressional Research Service, was imperative to “preserve the principle of civilian control of the military at a time when the United States was departing from its century-and-a-half long tradition of a small standing military.” A 2008 law reduced that waiting period to seven years, but Gen. Austin, who retired from the U.S. Army only four years ago, in 2016, still falls well within its prohibition.

Biden’s choice of Gen. Austin was somewhat surprising in light of the widespread expectation that he would instead tap long-time Pentagon operative Michèle Flournoy, who would have made history as the first woman to run the Defense Department after serving as Obama’s Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, the Pentagon’s highest-ranking woman in history.

But Flournoy’s nomination encountered problems after The New York Times last week said her appointment would present a “test of transparency and ethics” in light of her heavy involvement during the Trump years in a consulting firm, WestExec Advisors, and an investment fund, Pine Island Capital Partners. Those are classic D.C. “revolving door” corporate entities which exploit the access and influence inside the Pentagon and other government agencies of their principals, former top-ranking national security officials, to use their influence within the agencies they once ran to secure lucrative weapons purchases and similar government contracts for their undisclosed corporate clients. These are not just ethical problems of the past; as the Times noted, officials who have done this “bring with them questions about whether they might favor or give special access to the companies they had worked with in the private sector.”

It is hard to believe, though, that Biden’s choice of Gen. Austin was motivated by these kinds of ethical concerns over Flournoy. After all, the sleazy, legalized influence-peddling of Flournoy’s firm has long been known, at least since the investigative journalist Lee Fang revealed many of the details back in 2018 (last week’s Times article added new disturbing facts). Moreover, many of Biden’s key national security appointees were WestExec founders right along with Flournoy, including his pick for Secretary of State, Antony J. Blinken, and his Director of National Intelligence, Avril Hines.

Why would Flournoy’s work with these firms be disqualifying when other Biden picks — Blinken, Hines, White House Press Secretary Jennifer Psaki — was not? Moreover, Biden’s picks for top administration positions in general are people who have spent years deeply entrenched in the corporate and lobbyist world that controls the U.S. Government.

And Gen. Austin, apart from the serious civilian-military problem of the National Security Act, is himself a fully entrenched player in this swamp. Since retiring from the Army, the four-star General became, as New York Times reporter Ken Vogel noted, “a member of a private equity fund” — Pine Island Acquisition Corp. — that “invests in defense contractors, and boasts that its members’ ‘access, network and expertise’ are an advantage in government contracting.”

Biden’s choice to lead the Pentagon is also currently a member of the Board of Directors of Raytheon Technologies, the world’s third-largest defense contractor. That means that upon Austin’s confirmation, Raytheon will have a very good friend in charge of the bloated $750 billion annual U.S. defense budget.

If ethical considerations were not determinative, that leaves the question of why Biden risked a confirmation battle over military control of the Pentagon by rejecting Flournoy in favor of Gen. Austin. According to Politico, race was a major factor: “Biden had been under growing pressure to nominate a Black person to be his defense secretary in recent weeks.” The site had previously reported that “members of the Congressional Black Caucus are urging [Biden] to pick a Black Defense secretary, somewhat dimming hopes that Biden will pick Flournoy, who would be the first female Pentagon chief, for the job.”

Given that 30% of active-duty enlisted men in the U.S. military are African-American, along with 17% active-duty women, it is a reasonable goal to choose the first black American in history to lead the Pentagon. But given how much talk we heard over the last four years of the sanctity of “norms,” this deep erosion of the principle of civilian control over the government and military makes this choice a highly disturbing one.

One of the reasons Trump was repeatedly accused of violating “norms” was his reliance on military officers to run civilian parts of the government, including the Pentagon. So prominent was the criticism that Trump was militarizing the government that the Democrats’ 2020 platform addressed it, vowing — under the title “Renewing American Leadership” — to restore “healthy civil-military relations”:

Civil-Military Relations

Democrats believe that healthy civil-military relations are essential to our democracy and to the strength and effectiveness of our military. We will end the Trump Administration’s politicization of the armed forces and distortion of civilian and military roles in decision-making.

Yet even prior to the choice of a recently retired General to run the Pentagon, “Biden’s transition team ha[d] appointed at least four retired generals or admirals and a former top enlisted Marine,” Politico noted. Moreover, during the 2020 election, the Biden/Harris campaign aggressively touted the large numbers of retired military commanders who united to endorse the Democratic ticket; civil-military relations scholar Peter Feaver of Duke denounced this practice to Politico on the ground that they “are trading on the nonpolitical status of the military institution to make that endorsement” — in other words, the same “politicization of the armed forces” which the Democrats’ platform also vowed to end.

While Democrats and liberal pundits complained that Trump was violating this norm of civilian control, they also celebrated his choice of retired Generals for key positions because they believed that those military officials — Secretary of Defense Gen. James Mattis, White House Chief of Staff Gen. John Kelly, National Security Adviser Gen. H.R. McMaster — had better judgment than Trump and, as “the adults in the room,” would serve as a backstop against Trump’s worst impulses.

Worse, many in the media and D.C. professional class cheered outright subversion by military brass and the intelligence community of the policies of the elected President — including when they withheld classified information from Trump, “slow walked” his orders, and deceived him about troop positions to prevent him from leaving Syria. In other words, while the liberal establishment feigned concern over “norms,” including the one that demands civilian control, they applauded military and intelligence sabotage of the president’s policies. (Subversion by the military of democratically elected leaders who, in their judgment, pursue unwise policies is a defining element of a Deep State, something supporters of this subversion simultaneously insisted did not exist in the U.S. and that only conspiratorial crazies could believe it did).

But even with this establishment support for assertion of clandestine and improper intelligence and military power, Trump’s 2017 choice of Gen. Mattis to lead the Pentagon after only a few years in retirement provoked serious concerns, as it was the first time since 1950 that a National Security Act waiver would be necessary. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) said that as much as she respected Mattis, the dangers of a waiver were too great.

But Congress ultimately granted the waiver and confirmed Mattis. in large part because influential Democratic Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, himself a former Army Captain, urged its issuance. But when doing so, Sen. Reed vowed:

[W]aiving the law should happen no more than once in a generation. Therefore I will not support a waiver for future nominees. Nor will I support any effort to water down or repeal the statute in the future.”

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who also voted to confirm Mattis, similarly warned: “I want to be sure it’s a one-time waiver and not for-all-time.” And similar warnings were issued when Trump installed Gen. Kelly as his White House Chief of Staff. “By putting General John Kelly in charge, President Trump is militarizing the White House,” Congresswoman Barbara Lee of California argued.

Can one envision Democratic members of Congress following through on their righteous vow made during the Mattis hearings by not only rejecting one of Biden’s most important Cabinet positions, but also refusing to confirm the first-ever African-American to become Defense Secretary? That is difficult to imagine.

But all of this underscores why the values and methods embraced by Democrats and their allies in the name of opposing Trump were often at least as dangerous, if not more so, than the worst excesses of the Trump presidency itself. Those who warned of the anti-democratic dangers of empowering the CIA and the military to act as a bulwark against Trump in the name of #Resistance, and of restoring the mythology of intelligence agencies as a noble instrument to protect democratic values rather than what they are in reality (one of the greatest menaces to democratic values), were often accused of being pro-Trump partisans.

That was always a deceitful and propagandistic accusation, designed to ostracize #Resistance critics as Trump supporters and, more importantly, to conceal the fact that those sanctimoniously touting the need to preserve “norms” were often the most aggressive violators of those same norms. While it was Trump who chose numerous Generals for key administration position, it was his opponents who applauded and enabled their empowerment and, worse, cheered the anti-democratic subversive acts of the intelligence community to secretly undermine the elected president.

Over the last four years, Democrats and establishment liberals militarized themsleves and became far more jingoistic in their rhetoric and far more reverential of the military and intelligence establishments, to the point where they even filled their newsrooms with former Pentagon, FBI and CIA operatives.

For that reason, it is unsurprising to see Biden relying at least as heavily on Generals and intelligence officials as Trump did, including doing exactly that which Democrats vowed in 2017 would not happen again: choosing a recently retired General — one on the Board of Raytheon, no less — to run the Pentagon. But that lack of surprise should not obscure the dangerous and anti-democratic threats posed by these ongoing trends.

December 8, 2020 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | | Leave a comment

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