States that stood up for INF Treaty have now ‘de facto blessed’ US for scrapping it – Moscow
RT | December 22, 2018
The very same nations that blasted the White House for deciding to pull out of the landmark 1987 INF Treaty have now helped to defeat the UN resolution calling for its support, the Russian Foreign Ministry pointed out.
Russia expressed “disappointment” as a resolution in support of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty was voted down by a narrow margin in the UN General Assembly on Friday.
Forty-three states, including China and South American countries, voted for the document drafted by Russia.
Forty-six voted against the resolution, with 78 abstaining. The US’ allies in NATO and the EU voted ‘No’ despite previously speaking in favor of keeping the arms agreement intact, the Russian Foreign Ministry noted.
These countries, especially the NATO members – contrary to their own statements about the importance of the INF Treaty – acted as its opponents.
Friday’s vote shows how the US’ allies “de facto blessed” Washington for violating the INF deal, the foreign ministry stressed.
Moscow’s envoy to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya told Rossiya 1 TV channel that prior to the vote his American counterpart, Nikki Haley, sent out a letter urging everyone to vote down the Russian draft.
As the US announced its willingness to ditch the landmark INF Treaty back in October, many European politicians defended the need to keep the existing agreement and hailed its role in nuclear disarmament. German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas called Washington’s decision “regrettable” as the treaty is “hugely important” to the European continent.
EU foreign affairs chief, Federica Mogherini referred to the embattled treaty as the “key” and “a fundamental pillar” to European security architecture and urged for it to be “preserved and fully implemented.”
The INF Treaty bans Moscow and Washington from developing and deploying ground-based missiles with ranges from 500 to 5,500 kilometers. Both sides accuse each other of violating its terms, and likewise deny any wrongdoing.
Two weeks ago, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo threatened to pull the US from the deal in 60 days “unless Russia returns to compliance.”
Russia, in turn, warned that the US withdrawal from the INF Treaty will trigger an arms race across the globe.
Trump Syria Withdrawal Decision Requires Congressional Hearings – Senator Graham
Sputnik – December 21, 2018
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s plan to pull all American forces out of Syria needs to be examined by Congress to determine the impact on US national security, Senator Lindsey Graham said on Friday.
“It is imperative Congress hold hearings on withdrawal decision in Syria — and potentially Afghanistan — to understand implications to our national security,” Graham said on Twitter.
Any hearings, as suggested by Graham, would likely be held when the new Congress convenes in January.
Trump announced plans this week to pull 2,000 US troops out of northern Syria, where they have been backing Kurdish rebels in the US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The president has also ordered the withdrawal of about half of the 14,000 US forces in Afghanistan, according to media reports.
The planned withdrawals – which are opposed by many Republicans and Democrats in Congress — prompted the resignation of Defense Secretary James Mattis on Thursday.
More: ‘Trump Plunging Country Into Chaos’: GOP, Dems Slam Trump for Mattis Resignation
Ex-Diplomat: US Elites Alarmed That Trump May Accomplish Promised Foreign Policy
Sputnik – 21.12.2018
WASHINGTON – The US troop withdrawal from Syria and the resignation of Defense Secretary James Mattis has the establishment fearful that President Donald Trump might finally implement the foreign policy he campaigned on, former diplomat Jim Jatras told Sputnik.
“Terror has again gripped the establishment that the Trump who was elected president in 2016 might actually start implementing what he promised,” Jatras, who was also once a US Senate foreign policy adviser, said on Thursday.
Trump needed to also overhaul the rest of his top-tier defense and national security advisers and chiefs, Jatras said.
“This will be a critical time for the Trump presidency. If he can get the machinery of the Executive Branch to implement his decision to withdraw from Syria, and if he can pick a replacement to General Mattis who actually agrees with [his own] views,” Jatras said. “It is imperative that he pick someone for the Pentagon — and frankly, clear out the rest of his national security team — and appoint people he can trust and whose views comport with his own.”
Trump in a tweet earlier in the day commenting on his decision to withdraw US troops from Syria, said it was “time to come home and rebuild.”
On Thursday, Mattis stepped down citing the fact his views no longer aligned with Trump’s a day after the White House announced that US troops were leaving Syria.
Earlier on Thursday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump has ordered the US military to withdraw some 7,000 troops from Afghanistan in the coming weeks.
The president made promises during his campaign to stop expending money and lives on foreign wars to rebuild the United States.
Syria Insanity Must Continue, Sez Washington Establishment & Media
By James Bovard | December 20, 2018
The Washington Post front page today is in full panic mode over Trump’s decision on Syria. Reading the Post, one would think that US intervention had achieved something aside from getting vast numbers of Syrians pointlessly killed. Washington’s laptop bombardiers are hysterically opposed to Trump’s withdrawal of US troops from Syria. But the “Combat Veterans for Continued Carnage” lobby is almost nonexistent. I slammed Trump’s Syria policy last year in USA Today as his “worst foreign policy folly” but his decision to exit Syria is one of his best decisions yet.
Here’s a link to a USA Today oped I did five years ago on why Americans couldn’t trust Obama on Syria. In a 2014 blog on “Obama’s Great Syrian Bombing Scam,” I groused: “Obama loves to preen as if he is spreading peace, freedom, and democracy with his bombs. But there is no reason to presume that bombing Syria is not as idiotic as it appears. Thus far, the Establishment media is largely playing a lapdog role.” The media’s response to Trump’s withdrawal announcement vivifies how the pro-war bias continues.
When Trump denounced “trigger-happy Hillary” on the campaign trail in 2016, crowds roared. Hopefully exiting Syria is the start of a sea change in U.S. intervention abroad.
Cartoonist Tom Toles beautifully captured the idiocy of U.S. policy in this 2014 cartoon. Two years later, CIA-backed Syrian rebels were fighting Pentagon-backed Syrian rebels. What could possible go wrong?
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Ukraine plans another incursion into Kerch Strait, hopes NATO ships will join in – top official
RT | December 20, 2018
Kiev is considering sending its Navy ships through the Kerch Strait again, a high-ranked official said weeks after a tense standoff between Russian and Ukrainian vessels in the area.
Another passage by Ukrainian Navy ships through the Kerch Strait which connects Black and Azov Seas might take place very soon, according to Alexander Turchinov, head of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council. “I think that this issue cannot be delayed,” he told BBC News Ukraine on Wednesday.
Turchinov, who briefly served as interim president after the Western-backed 2014 Euromaidan coup in Kiev, didn’t mince his words while explaining the rationale between the action. To him, Russia is after “seizing the Azov Sea,” install new maritime borders and “legitimize the occupation of Crimea.”
The only antidote to the plan is “to show to the entire world that Ukraine has not lost its position in the Azov Sea.” Turchinov was speaking several weeks after three Ukrainian ships attempted to break through the strait which Russia had closed on safety reasons.
On November 25, three Ukrainian Navy vessels, including two combat-ready gunboats, entered the Kerch Strait without getting proper clearance first, according to Moscow. After ignoring multiple warnings and demands to stop, they were fired upon and seized by the Russian coast guard, while the sailors were taken to custody.
This time, the official said he hopes Ukraine will not be left alone in the next endeavor. “It would be very logical if NATO ships which we invited [to visit] the Azov Sea ports make sure that Russia complies with international law,” he said, lamenting the military bloc provided no response yet.
Nevertheless, Turchinov hopes that “during the next passage of Ukrainian warships through the Kerch Strait they will at least send their observers to us.” Kiev had also invited officials from OSCE and other international bodies to be on board Ukrainian ships to prove “that Ukraine and its sailors do not violate any laws and international rules.”
The latter phrase sounds odd given that Moscow had accused Ukrainian sailors of deliberately violating Russia’s maritime borders in the Kerch Strait and breaking specific rules of passing through the narrow, complex water area. Top Russian officials maintained that this was a premeditated and provocative act plotted by the Ukrainian government.
Turchinov’s BBC interview was predictably met with little praise in Moscow. “This was just an announcement of another provocation,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Wednesday, calling it “utterly irresponsible.” She noted the inflammatory remark came at the time when “many Ukraine’s partners try to defuse tensions in this situation and seek ways of de-escalation.”
It also comes several days after the UN General Assembly passed a Ukrainian resolution, condemning the presence of the Russian military in the Crimean Peninsula and the surrounding waters of the Black Sea and the Azov Sea. 66 countries supported the non-binding resolution but 72 abstained from voting altogether.
Do you believe it’s OUR goal? Putin says he knows ‘very well’ who seeks to rule the world
RT | December 20, 2018
Russia does not aim to rule the world, and such assumptions are part of an “imposed mentality” used to distract people, Vladimir Putin told a WSJ reporter when asked about Russia’s supposed ambitions for world domination.
Faced with a rather provocative question from the WSJ Moscow Bureau Chief, Ann Maria Simmons, Putin said that “when it comes to ruling the world we know very well where the headquarters [of those], who are trying to do exactly that,” is located. “And it’s not in Moscow,” the president added, speaking at an annual Q&A session in Moscow.
Although the Russian leader has never openly accused Washington of having some global ambitions, he still said that the ongoing contest of influence in the international arena is linked to “the US leading role in the world economy” and its enormous defense spending amounting to “more than $700 billion,” which Washington apparently seeks to translate into some political power.
Russia’s defense spending amounts to just $46 billion, the president said, noting that the total population of the NATO countries accounts for some 600 million people while Russia has just about 140 million.
“Do you really believe that it is our goal to rule the world?” Putin asked rhetorically.
All the speculation about Russia’s supposed aspirations for the world dominance are nothing but a “mentality imposed by some to achieve internal goals,” the president said.
US preparing for complete military withdrawal from Syria – reports
RT | December 19, 2018
Washington is planning to “rapidly” pull out all its troops from Syria, various media outlets have reported, citing US officials
The decision was allegedly taken by President Donald Trump himself, who had repeatedly expressed his intent to get out of the Arab Republic earlier. However, the Pentagon apparently opposes the move. The potential withdrawal would upend assumptions about the long-term US presence in the war-ravaged country, which was particularly backed by the Defense Secretary James Mattis.
The schedule, as well as the details of the alleged withdrawal, are yet unknown. While the Pentagon and the White House did not issue any official statements on the issue, Trump said in a Twitter post that Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), which he called “the only reason for [the US troops] being there [in Syria],” has been defeted, apparently signaling that there was no reason for the US to stay on the ground in Syria any longer.
According to some reports, the withdrawal might primarily affect the US troops on the ground working together with an alliance of Arab and Kurdish militias, known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The US has a total of 2,000 servicemen there, who are particularly involved in training the local militias. The news come as the SDF are reportedly on the verge of retaking one of the terrorist group’s last major strongholds – the town of Hajin, located east of the Euphrates.
UK psyops bigwig pushed plan to ‘mine Sevastopol Bay’ during 2014 Crimea crisis – leaked documents
RT | December 17, 2018
In the midst of the Crimean crisis, a special adviser to the UK House of Commons Defence Committee had a suggestion for Kiev – to lay mines in Sevastopol Bay, leaked documents have revealed.
“I am trying to get this message across” to Kiev, reads a leaked document purporting to show the strategy that Christopher Donnelly, who was a Special Adviser to the UK House of Commons Defence Committee, recommends.
The documents, leaked by a group which claims to be associated with the Anonymous hackers, purport to indicate that Donnelly had drafted “military measures” that he would implement if he, personally was “in charge.” The documents are allegedly dated March 01, 2014, when the Crimean crisis was in full swing.
A print screen of the leaked document with alleged “military measures” which Christopher Donnelly wanted to communicate to Kiev. © cyberguerrilla.org
Donnelly noted that “at the moment the new ‘Government’ in Kyiv is unable to think in terms of military reality,” since it was not sure if its “orders will be obeyed or not.”
“They are like a rabbit in the car’s headlights,” he said, according to the documents.
The measures which the official would supposedly implement, include “mining of Sevastopol harbor,” setting up a “cordon sanitaire” across the Crimean Isthmus with “troops and mines,” and trying to “inspire” their own troops, endeavoring to explain to them what exactly they had to fight for.
Donnelly allegedly writes that he would have used “some seriously important weapons” Ukraine “used to have,” namely some sort of “big microwave anti-satellite weapon.”
Apart from that, the text says all the air forces in the region should have been scrambled and anti-aircraft defenses activated. If the aviation in Crimea proved to be not airworthy, it should have been destroyed “as a gesture that they are serious.”
While all the “measures” appear to be designed to incite an open armed conflict, the last one was also about making profit by the West: “They should ask the west now to start supplying oil and gas. There is plenty available due to the mild winter.”
Donnelly has a rich background that ties him to top military officials. Between 1989 and 2003, as special adviser to four NATO Secretaries General, he was closely involved with NATO. From 2003 to 2010 he ran the UK Defence Academy’s Advanced Research and Assessment Group. He has been a specialist adviser to three UK Defence Secretaries (both Labour and Conservative) and was a member of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s Soviet advisory team. Since 2010 he has been the Co-director of The Institute for Statecraft – a shady think tank that provides “decision takers & policy makers with reliable, alternative solutions.”
This is the third of a number of leaks, which began on November 5. The leaks claim that the UK government-funded group “Integrity Initiative” (II), which was founded by the Institute of Statecraft, has a network of journalists, analysts and former politicians who make up a Europe-wide chain of “clusters” that help London meddle in other state’s affairs.
Commenting on the previous leak, the II neither confirmed nor denied that the documents were genuine, saying that it didn’t have time to validate them.
However, II did confirm that the organization has, indeed, been receiving funding from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) for the past two years, but insisted that private donors were its primary source of money. Meanwhile, in response to a question by Labour MP Chris Williamson last week, Minister for Defence, People and Veterans Tobias Ellwood admitted that the Institute for Statecraft had also received funding from the British Army and the Ministry of Defence. The FCO money came from the department’s ‘Conflict Fund’ which investigative journalist Mark Curtis exposed last year as a “secretive slush fund” which had backed “some of the world’s worst security forces.”
RT has reached out to Mr. Donnelly for comment over the contents of the “military measures” list, as well as over allegations that his organization targeted Jeremy Corbyn in an anti-smear campaign which are now being investigated by the Foreign Office. He declined to comment.
“Thank you very much for your enquiry but as RT is a state-sponsored propaganda organization and not a legitimate news channel, we have no comment to make,” Donnelly said in a mailed statement.
Underwater VIDEO Reveals HUGE Damage to ‘Torn Apart’ Norwegian Frigate
Sputnik – December 17, 2018
The inexplicable collision involving the frigate KNM Helge Ingstad returning from NATO naval drills has set the Norwegian Navy back billions of kronor, while the Maltese-flagged and Greek-owned oil tanker is expected to return to service by the end of December.
Norway’s Defence Ministry has released underwater footage showing, for the first time, the extent of the damage to its frigate KNM Helge Ingstad, which sank after colliding with an oil tanker erroneously taken for an immobile object.
The footage, uploaded to Dropbox due to temporary website failures, was taken by a marine diving unit (MDK) normally used for planting and disarming underwater mines, ammunition and bombs. Its members have been diving around the mostly sunken wreckage of the frigate for weeks, removing ammunition, weapons and other hazardous material.
Previously, the damage to the hull of the frigate was believed to be a long gash in the starboard side. The footage taken from the depth of the Hjelte Fjord, where the vessel lies half-submerged, indicated that the damage is much worse than thought. The gash was estimated at around 45 metres long and eight metres high. By contrast, the tanker only suffered minor damage and is expected to become operative again by the end of December.
The video shows cabins and rooms smashed, flooring torn up and ventilation fans hanging from what’s left of ceilings. The footage also shows what used to be the vessel’s accommodation area, sleeping quarters, machine rooms and a generator room.
“It’s really something to see one of our frigates lying under water”, Commander Bengt Berdal, the leader of MDK, told Norwegian broadcaster NRK. “When we see the hull torn apart in this way, you can only imagine what it was like for those on board”.
Berdal called it “sheer luck” that all 137 people on board the frigate survived the collision, with only a few sustaining minor injuries before successfully being evacuated in the early hours of 8 November.
Meanwhile, Rolf Ole Eriksen, former accident preparedness official for oil company Norske Shell and now a maritime security consultant, has penned a searing commentary in the newspaper Aftenposten. In Eriksen’s own words, “only a miracle averted a gigantic catastrophe that had potential for large loss of life, fire, explosions and extensive pollution”. The frigate was returning to its home port at Haakonsvern in Bergen after participating in NATO’s huge drill Trident Juncture around Trondheim and was carrying weapons, ammunition, missiles and helicopter oil in addition to its fuel.
Eriksen was highly critical of the preliminary report released by Norway’s accident investigation commission, venturing that the investigators were downplaying the severity of the collision between a fixture of the Norwegian Navy and fully loaded oil tanker, and clouding the responsibility. According to Eriksen, the responsibility lies with the crew on the bridge of the KNM Helge Ingstad, which the report was “under-communicating”, he claimed. The frigate was sailing at a high speed of 17-18 knots, with its crew oblivious of their own whereabouts or the appearance of the tanker, which was sailing out of the Sture terminal in Øygarden northwest of Bergen.
“With its top modern radar and navigational equipment on board, the frigate was capable of following every movement of all vessels in the area”, Eriksen wrote.
A more detailed and conclusive report may take months to be released. Meanwhile, the frigate lies mostly underwater. Around 350 people are now working every day in connection with the salvage of the frigate.
Commander Berdal calls the divers’ work “challenging” and dependent on good weather. So far, the salvaging mission has been delayed several times by storms. The vessel won’t be raised until 25 December at the earliest. The collision has cost the Norwegian Navy billions of kronor and resulted in the nation’s maritime defence being greatly reduced.
READ MORE:
Ex-Norwegian Official Slams Sunken Frigate Probe as ‘Smokescreen’ Hiding Facts
South Korea, US Fail to Agree on Sharing Costs for USFK’s Stationing – Reports
Sputnik – 14.12.2018
Seoul and Washington failed to agree on the amount of South Korea’s financial contributions for the stationing of the US Forces Korea (USFK) in South Korea, the Yonhap news agency reported, citing a government official.
“Again, nothing is agreed until everything is agreed … There’s still a big difference over the total amount [of Seoul’s financial contributions]. The two sides will continue consultations through diplomatic channels. If necessary, we can have [formal] negotiations next month,” the official said, as quoted by the Yonhap news agency.
The official noted that there would be no more formal talks in December.
The 10th round of negotiations on dividing the cost of the USFK’s stationing between representatives from South Korea and the United States began on Tuesday and lasted for three days.
Washington’s push for an increase in Seoul’s contribution is regarded as an obstacle to reaching the deal. In 2018, South Korea has paid some $859 million to maintain the US forces, which serve as a deterrent against possible aggression of North Korea, the news outlet reported.
Seoul has been sharing the cost for the stationing of about 28,500 US servicemen within the framework of the Special Measures Agreement (SMA) on cost sharing, due to expire at the end of this year, since 1991.
Turkey threatens to pull the plug on US
By M.K. Bhadrakumar | NewsClick | December 14, 2018
An impression has been gaining ground lately that the Trump administration is making overtures to Ankara to revive the original US-Turkish project on regime change in Damascus. The recent visit to Ankara by James Jeffrey, the US special representative to Syria, was seen in that light.
Prior to his trip to Ankara, Jeffrey openly suggested at a briefing at the US state department on December 3 that the Astana process on Syria (involving Russia, Turkey and Iran) should be wound up since it failed to advance the political process. As he put it, “US view … is let’s pull the plug on Astana.” In essence, Jeffrey ’s game plan was to somehow break up the Russian-Turkish-Iranian axis in Syria so that the US can tackle each of these three protagonists from a position of advantage.
However, the contradiction here is the US’ alliance with the Kurds, which is anathema to Turkey. Jeffrey tried to fudge this contradiction by saying, “Our policy is to work with the people of the northeast first of all to defeat ISIS… We have no political agenda either with the Kurdish groups, with the Arab groups, or with any other groups inside Syria. Our position is (a) the territorial integrity of Syria under its present borders; (b) we will work with all political forces that are willing to recognize and accept the UN political process and the basic criteria of all of these UN initiatives since 2012 on Syria, which is no threat to the neighbors, no threat to the population, no use of chemical weapons, no support for terrorism, no mass slaughter of one’s own civilians, and accountability for war crimes. That’s our position with everybody and anybody.”
But Turks refuse to be taken for a ride. If anything, the Turkish suspicions regarding the American intentions in northern Syria have only deepened. Two recent developments contributed to this:
One, the US move to establish observation posts next to Turkey’s border. Washington claims that these OPs will prevent possible terrorist threats against Turkey. But Turks are not duffers and they understand perfectly well that the real reason behind this Pentagon decision (announced innocuously almost as an aside by Defence Secretary James Mattis two weeks ago) is to prevent any Turkish operation against the Kurdish forces in northern Syria.
Two, the US disclosure (by the outgoing chairman of joint chiefs of staff Gen. Joseph Dunford) that “35,000-40,000 local forces need to be trained to provide stability” in the territories occupied by the US in northeast Syria. Without doubt, the alarm bells must have rung in Ankara that the US is moving in the direction of creating security underpinnings for an autonomous Kurdistan in Syria similar to what it achieved in Iraq following the Gulf War in 1990-91.
Taken together, Turkish leadership realizes that unless Turkey forcefully acted to thwart the US strategy before it is too late, Ankara may face the stark choice of an independent Kurdish entity appearing along its border with Syria, which of course would imperil Turkey’s own security, territorial integrity and even threaten its unity. Thus, President Recep Erdogan had no option but to announce on Wednesday that Turkey proposes to launch a military operation against the Syrian Kurdish groups in a “few days”.
Erdogan said, “It is time to realize our decision to wipe out terror groups east of the Euphrates. We will start the operation in east of the Euphrates in a few days to save it from the separatist terrorist organization. Turkey’s target is never the US soldiers, but rather the members of the terror group.”
Erdogan rejected outright the US move on setting up OPs along Turkish border, saying, “It is clear that the purpose of US observation points in Syria is not to protect our country from terrorists but protect (Kurdish) terrorists from Turkey.” Meanwhile, other Turkish officials have cast aspersions on the US plan to train 40000-strong local militia and Jeffrey’s diatribe against the Astana process.
Conceivably, Turkish officials conveyed to Jeffrey Ankara’s plans to launch military operations against Syrian Kurds. At any rate, no sooner than Erdogan spoke on Wednesday, Washington reacted sharply, expressing “grave concern” and warning that any such Turkish military operations in Syria will be “unacceptable.”
However, all indications are that preparations are complete on the Turkish side of the border for the military strike. A Turkish daily close to the ruling circles reported that the operation will be carried out with “point shots” – namely, precisely targeting concentrations of the Syrian Kurdish militia. Some 200 such targets have been reportedly identified. Indeed, the Turkish armed forces have the capability to shoot at these targets from the air and ground without entering Syrian airspace and territory. One possibility is that Turkish jets can strike the Kurdish targets from a 30-kilometer depth in the air, while the howitzers can strike up to a depth of 40 kilometers on the ground.
Other reports have claimed that over the past fortnight, there have been significant military deployments to the Syrian border with armored vehicles, tanks and personnel deployed from Şanlıurfa to Akçakale. The plan seems to be that strategic targets of the Kurdish forces will be hit initially with a view to rapidly clear a swathe of Syrian territories so that fighters of the so-called Free Syrian Army (Syrian opposition groups aligned with Turkey) can move into the area.
Indeed, if Erdogan carries out his pledge, it will put the US in an unenviable position of having to watch passively when its allies get pulverized by the jets and artillery. It will be a huge loss of face for the US and, importantly, it will render the best-laid American plans for an open-ended occupation of Syria nonviable and senseless.
Without doubt, Moscow and Tehran will be pleased with Erdogan’s resolve to frustrate the US game plan to divide Syria. Around 30 percent of Syrian territory is presently under American occupation. Some US analysts have openly estimated that if only Turks could be brought on board, that would increase the area to around 40 percent of Syrian territory and eventually help provide an outlet for that land-locked enclave (which also contains Syria’s oil fields) to the Eastern Mediterranean coast and access to the world market.
The heart of the matter is that other than rhetorically, Russia shies away from challenging the US occupation of Syria lest it led to military confrontation, which Moscow has been scrupulously avoiding, no matter the provocations from the American side (eg., drone attacks on the Russian bases in Syria.) As for Iran, it is fighting an existential battle to counter the US sanctions and a confrontation with the US in Syria is not the priority today. Damascus cannot hope to confront the US by itself, either.
Thus, unsurprisingly, a note of triumphalism had lately crept into the US stance – all but implying that the Americans are salvaging victory out of the jaws of military defeat in the Syrian conflict and that it is a matter of time before Russia finds itself in a quagmire, keeping afloat the regime in Damascus out of its own meager resources and increasingly feeling the financial crunch, with Washington effectively plugging any help for Syria’s reconstruction coming from the western allies by making all such aid conditional on the removal of President Bashar al-Assad from power.
No doubt, the simmering US-Turkish tensions in northern Syria over the Pentagon’s alliance with Syrian Kurdish groups have surged. It will be hard landing for the Pentagon if the long-awaited Turkish crackdown begins against the US’ Kurdish allies in Syria.
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From the Archives
Who Runs Our World?
Netanyahu addresses US Congress
By Richard Hugus | January 4, 2019
Our world is run by oligarchs, the holders of vast wealth from monopolies in banking, resource extraction, manufacturing, and technology. Oligarchs have such power that most of the world doesn’t even know of their influence over our lives. Their overall agenda is global power — a world government, run by them — to be achieved through planned steps of social engineering. The oligarchs remain in the background and have heads of state and entire governments acting in their service. Presidents and prime ministers are their puppets. Bureaucrats and politicians are their factotums.
Who are politicians? Politicians are people who work for the powerful while pretending to represent the people who voted for them. This double-dealing involves a lot of lying, so successful politicians must be good at it. It’s not an easy job to make the insane agenda of the powerful seem reasonable. Politicians can’t reveal this agenda because it almost always goes against the interests of their constituents, so they become adept at sophistry, mystification, and the appearance of authority. For example, wars for Israel have been part of the agenda of the powerful for years. Since 2001, wars for Israel have been sold as “the war on terror” and lots of lies had to be made up as to why the war on terror was a real thing. The visible faces promoting the war on terror were neoconservatives in the US, almost all of whom were advocates for Israel, or Zionists. Zionists are not the only members of the oligarchy, but they seem to be its lead actors. ... continue
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