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Western Anti-Russia Paranoia Reaches Fever-Pitch

Strategic Culture Foundation | February 1, 2019

Western corporate news media have got to be one of the most irresponsible and toxic entities. In particular, their contribution to distorting international relations with Russia and stoking tensions is bordering on incitement.

It is astounding and atrocious that such paranoid thinking is displayed on a massive scale. Western establishment news media, without a hint of irony, proclaim to be independent, critical, free-thinking and defenders of democracy. How delusional. They are increasingly serving up war propaganda like ministries of disinformation in a truly Orwellian scenario. And yet Western media have the arrogant hypocrisy to vilify Russia for malign intent.

German media recently accused Russian news channels of “propaganda” and demanded their shutdown. British media, including supposedly “quality” brands, run sensational reports about Russian warships “menacing” Britain and Europe because those vessels sailed through proximate international waters. Alleged Russian cyberattacks are aiming to destroy civil society and infrastructure. And so on.

But this week, it was American news media that once again excelled in irresponsible anti-Russia paranoia. The CNN news channel “informed” its viewers of how Russia and North Korea were “teaming up” as “two of America’s most dangerous adversaries”. The brief report is worth studying for its sinister use of images and innuendo to convey alleged nefarious intentions imputed to both Russia and North Korea towards US national security.

A day before that report, the Washington Post published an equally hollow article claiming that Moscow had offered Pyongyang a deal to build a nuclear power plant in exchange for North Korea dismantling its ballistic weapons. The alleged deal, according to the Post, “marked an attempt by Moscow to intervene in high-stakes nuclear talks as it asserts itself in a string of geopolitical flash points from the Middle East to South Asia to Latin America.”

That non-entity report was then “cited” by CNN subsequently to make its breathless case that Russia and North Korea were “teaming up” against the US.

This non-stop fingering by Western news media of Russia as a malign nation is not “news information” to the public. It is simply disinformation, distortion and demonization. It is war propaganda. The caricature of Russia as being an evil enemy is not based on facts or evidence. It is based on repetition of lies and innuendo.

Western news media are a disgrace to any claims of being independent “public information”. They are the antithesis of critical journalism.

This incendiary role comes at a time when international relations are acutely strained. Russia’s deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov warned this week that the world has never been in greater danger in recent decades as it is now of an all-out military confrontation. He was speaking at a conference held in Beijing on nuclear arms controls attended by the US, Russia, Britain and France.

Ryabkov was referring to the threat by the US to abandon the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty. If the treaty collapses then international security is gravely weakened.

Russia and the US accuse each other of breaching the INF. Moscow points to the actual installation of short-range US ballistic missile systems in Romania and Poland. For its part, the American side has not provided evidence to back up its claims against Russia.

The point is, however, that the claims and counter-claims should be resolved through negotiations and dialogue. The unilateral abandonment of the INF by the US is reprehensible and reckless.

But such high-handed conduct by Washington is based to a large extent on the sinister imaging of Russia as a “dangerous enemy”.

This is why the Western news media deserve reproach. The Russophobia that they churn out on a weekly, daily basis has directly fomented a prejudice detrimental to international relations.

Western state policies of antagonism towards Russia are being fashioned based on false perceptions. Those policies are partly enabled by public passivity inculcated by Western media constantly portraying Russia as a “bad actor”.

The so-called “Russiagate” scandal has been running for almost two years in the Western corporate media. Yet, there is still no proof to substantiate the sensational claims that Russia interfered in the 2016 US presidential elections with the aim of getting Donald Trump elected.

Nonetheless, the Western media continue to propagate that threadbare narrative. This week, the top US intelligence official, Dan Coats, claimed that Russia was going to interfere in the 2020 election on a much greater scale that it had allegedly done in 2016. The news media reported without any skepticism or investigation.

Fortunately though, the establishment Western media has come to be seen by many people in Western states and around the world as a farce. The repetition of lies and fiction regarding Russia – by supposedly august titles like the New York Times, London Times, BBC, Der Spiegel and many more – has totally discredited Western so-called news media.

Public trust in what is supposed to be an institution upholding “democracy” appears to be at an all-time low. The baneful condition is correlated with Western media and government anti-Russia paranoia being at an all-time high.

This growing public distrust and contempt is good and a mercy. For if the deranged Western media and governments had their Russophobia fulfilled, the world would be plunged into war.

One thing that emerges clearly is the past Cold War hostility towards the Soviet Union is recycled into animosity towards Russia. In the Cold War, the Western states could at least claim they were fighting against an unwanted ideology. There is no basis for such a claim post-Cold War, yet the aggression continues. That means the hostility emanates from the West. Why? That is a question Western populations should be asking about their media and governments and their foreign policies. What is the immanent need for such hostility?

The Western media’s function is to keep the mass of people drugged from asking searching questions about their condition and the imposition of irrational war-like mentality.

February 1, 2019 Posted by | Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Senate Approves Bill Opposing ‘Precipitous’ US Pullout From Afghanistan, Syria

Sputnik – 01.02.2019

WASHINGTON – The Senate has voted to advance legislation opposing any “precipitous withdrawal” of US forces from Syria and Afghanistan, following President Donald Trump’s announcement that he would be pulling all US troops out of the country.

The Senate voted 68-23 to limit debate on an amendment introduced by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell that calls on the United States to remain in Syria and Afghanistan until all terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda and the Daesh are defeated there.

McConnell’s move was backed by almost all Republicans in the Senate, with only three of them — John Kennedy, Mike Lee and Ted Cruz — voting against the motion to advance the amendment.

Trump is reportedly considering plans to withdraw around 7,000 of the 14,000 US troops deployed to Afghanistan after ordering the Defense Department to pull out all 2,000 US soldiers stationed in Syria.

However, Senator Bernie Sanders criticized Trump’s move and supported congressional intervention to help create a more gradual troop withdrawal plan in a statement on Thursday.

“Congress must play a role, consistent with its Constitutional authority over war, in developing a troop withdrawal plan that is coordinated with our allies, that continues to provide humanitarian aid and that supports political settlements in these countries”, Sanders said.

The amendment will be introduced to a wide-ranging Senate bill on the Middle East, the “Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act”. The sweeping legislation must still go up for a vote in the Senate, along with the US House.

If passed, the legislation would impose new sanctions against Syria, boost defense spending in the region and punish activists who call for economic boycotts of Israel to protest its policies in Palestine, among other measures.

The move marks a rare break between Senate majority Republicans and President Donald Trump who has said he plans to pull US troops out of both countries. The 68 votes in favor of the motion mean it could be re-passed with two-thirds of the 100 senators overriding any presidential veto by Trump.

On December 19, President Trump announced that the US would be withdrawing its troops from Syria over a period of several months. According to Trump, the US coalition’s mission, the defeat of Daesh (ISIS), had been secured.

The US and NATO initially launched military operations in Afghanistan in 2001 after the 9/11 terror attack. While most of the US troops had left the country by the end of 2014, NATO launched a new mission in 2015, called Resolute Support, to provide training and assistance to Afghan security forces.

January 31, 2019 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Less fallout, more danger: US ‘low-yield’ warhead pushes Doomsday Clock closer to midnight

RT | January 30, 2019

A new “low-yield” US warhead is less powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima but more capable of igniting a nuclear conflict than bigger nuclear weapons, analysts believe.

Dubbed W76-2, the weapon is now being produced by the Pantex plant in Texas, according to Donald Trump’s nuclear posture review which he signed last year. The Trump administration – whose boss has already shown a fixation on building up nukes – claims the new “low-yield” warhead would give the US a more “flexible” deterrent.

The new “mini-nuke” has less velocity than the Hiroshima bomb as it was designed by taking away one stage from the original two-stage W76 thermonuclear device usually mounted on Trident ballistic missile. The new warhead’s explosive power was reduced from 100 kilotons of TNT, to around five.

Now, an enemy (Russia, for example) could no longer count on Washington being afraid of using its huge nuclear arsenal due to the unimaginable civilian casualties, the US administration says.

However, less damage doesn’t mean no damage at all as the ‘Little Boy’ bomb, which the US dropped on Hiroshima, killed up to 80,000 people in 1945.

Some US mainstream media noticeably voiced concerns about the new weapon and the impact it will have on international peace. Defense News, for instance, cited some non-proliferation advocates who argue “all nuclear weapons are strategic, not tactical.”

Some Democrats in Congress worry that installing a low-yield and high-yield warhead on the same missile creates a dangerous situation where an adversary cannot know which system is being used, the paper wrote. Therefore, it would react as if the larger and deadlier warhead has been launched.

That aside, the W76-2 could give birth to other low-yield projectiles, reducing the threshold for using nuclear weapons, Mikhail Khodarenok, a Russian military expert said. Such nuclear munitions could easily be launched from the B-21 Raider, a US heavy bomber currently under development by Northrop Grumman, or the F-35 jet, he believes.

Other pundits are already sounding the alarm about the danger of the US building low-yield nuclear weapons. “I think it is time for a new meeting of major countries that have nuclear weapons to develop a new treaty or a new agreement that restricts what can be developed and what cannot be developed,” General Paul Vallely, formerly second-in-command of the US Pacific Command told RT.

“The belief that there might be tactical advantage using nuclear weapons – which I haven’t heard that being openly discussed in the United States or in Russia for a good many years – is happening now in those countries which I think is extremely distressing,” former US defense secretary and an arms control advocate William Perry was quoted as saying by the Guardian. “That’s a very dangerous belief.”

January 30, 2019 Posted by | Environmentalism, Militarism | | Leave a comment

US revisits Vietnam Syndrome in Afghanistan after 17 years of war and destruction

By Finian Cunningham | RT | January 30, 2019

It is America’s longest war, costing huge amounts of “blood and treasure” as US leaders claim. Yet, the signs are that Washington is finally accepting an historic defeat in Afghanistan comparable to the ignominious Vietnam War.

Intensive negotiations between American officials and Taliban insurgents have produced the “biggest tangible step” towards ending the nearly 18-year war in Afghanistan, according to the New York Times.

More talks are scheduled in the coming weeks to firm up details, but already it is reported that the US is to withdraw its remaining 14,000 troops from the Central Asian country over the next year without any guarantees of reciprocation by the enemy.

That unilateral pullout is not yet officially admitted by Washington, but analysts believe the US has tacitly accepted the long-held demand by the Taliban for foreign troops to get out.

At the height of the war, US forces numbered up to 100,000 personnel. The remnant American military therefore have no way of countering the growing insurgency. Even with an additional 8,000 NATO troops and thousands of private contractors also present in Afghanistan supporting the US-backed government in Kabul, the sordid game is up.

Zalmay Khalilzad, US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation, during the latest round of talks held in Doha, Qatar, sought to portray an “agreed framework for a peace deal” being contingent on the Taliban delivering on three items: a ceasefire; entering into negotiations with the government in Kabul; and a vow to never allow Afghanistan to become a haven for terror groups.

But media reports cite Taliban officials as giving no firm commitment to those US demands, while it appears Washington has accepted its troops are to be repatriated regardless. In other words, the American side is looking for a face-saving, apparent bilateral “deal” when the reality is Washington knows its war is over.

Ryan Crocker, a former US ambassador to Afghanistan, puts it acerbically. Washington is only polishing the optics, while finessing “the terms of surrender.”

He compares the American withdrawal from Afghanistan to the disorderly retreat and defeat that US forces incurred at the end of the Vietnam War in the mid-1970s. “Then, as now, it was clear that by going to the table we were surrendering; we are just negotiating the terms of our surrender,” opined Crocker in the Washington Post.

The defeat of US military might in Indochina gave rise to the Vietnam Syndrome which entailed a grave loss in national confidence and international standing. The war in Afghanistan has already exceeded the duration of the Vietnam debacle by nearly eight years. While the death toll among American forces is a lot less, the financial cost of Afghanistan is potentially ruinous. Up to $2 trillion of taxpayer money is estimated to have been poured into waging war in that country, yet the strategic achievements are arguably zero.

Not only that, but the launching of “Operation Enduring Freedom” in October 2001 by the GW Bush administration was the catalyst for a global so-called “war on terror” which engulfed several countries. The total financial cost for those wars is reckoned to be around $5 trillion – or nearly a quarter of America’s spiraling national debt.

In cost of human lives, the Afghan war and its derivative “anti-terror” operations elsewhere have resulted in millions of deaths and casualties, millions of refugees and the decimation of whole nations, which have further spawned conflict and the spread of terrorism. Suicide rates and pathological self-destruction among US veterans who served in Afghanistan (and Iraq) are off the charts and will have long-term detriment on American society for generations to come.

The Afghan Syndrome is going to haunt the US for decades in the same way the Vietnam forerunner did.

What’s more despicable is the utter waste and futility. When Bush ordered the troops into Afghanistan at the end of 2001, it was supposed to be in revenge for the terror attacks on the US on September 11. Never mind that the evidence linking those attacks to Afghanistan was tenuous at best.

The Taliban regime, which had been in power from 1996, was toppled by the US. But three presidents later, the Taliban now are reckoned to control over half the territory in Afghanistan, and can carry out deadly attacks on US-backed local forces seemingly at will on a daily basis, including in the capital Kabul.

Now it seems only a matter of time until the Taliban will be back in power with the US and allied NATO forces gone.

Richard Haass, a former senior US State Department planner, commented: “The Taliban have concluded that it is only a matter of time before the United States grows weary of stationing troops in a far-off country and spending $45 billion a year on a war that cannot be won… they have little need to compromise.”

The irony is that the Taliban grew out of the tribal militants that the US cultivated and armed to the teeth at the end of the 1970s when Afghanistan was governed by a Soviet-backed administration.

The American policy was gleefully calculated in Washington to give the “Soviets their Vietnam.” The proxy war was indeed a heavy loss for the Soviet Union, but in the longer-term it looks like Uncle Sam ended up getting another Vietnam in terms of creating the longest war ever for Washington, the unfolding ignominious defeat and the global blowback from Islamist terrorism it engendered.

Washington may be pretending it has reached a “framework deal for peace” in Afghanistan. But the brutal truth is Washington has lost another epic war.

The Taliban have always maintained they are not going to negotiate with the US-backed administration in Kabul, headed by President Ashraf Ghani. Like his predecessor, Hamid Karzai, the Taliban view Ghani and his government as a corrupt, venal puppet of the Americans.

The fact that the US sidelined the Kabul regime by talking directly with the Taliban is a crucial concession by Washington. By doing so, the US is effectively admitting that the insurgents are in the driving seat. All the talk out of Washington about supporting “intra-Afghani dialogue” and finding a “comprehensive peace settlement” is window-dressing rhetoric.

US President Donald Trump last month ordered about half of the American troops in Afghanistan – some 7,000 – to withdraw. Trump is said to be growing impatient with the huge financial drain of the never-ending war. His order to pull out forces before the latest round of negotiations in Qatar will have been taken by the Taliban as further proof the Americans know they are beaten.

Astoundingly, prominent voices in Washington are arguing that, in spite of the human calamity and cost of Afghanistan, US troops should remain there indefinitely. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell wants to pass legislation forbidding a withdrawal. The Washington Post’s editorial board – which reflects the foreign policy establishment view – admonished: “The Trump administration’s tentative deal with the Taliban could return Afghanistan to chaos.”

“Return to chaos”?

Afghanistan – known as the Graveyard of Empires – from centuries of defeating great powers is showing that the Americans are up their necks in chaos.

January 30, 2019 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

US warns Israel against keeping up strikes on Syria

Press TV – January 30, 2019

The top US intelligence official has warned Israel of the consequences of keeping up its military strikes on Syrian soil, saying the attacks could eventually trigger a response from Iran, which has its military advisors based in the Arab state.

Speaking at a hearing of the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in Washington on Tuesday, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said that Israel’s continued aerial assaults against Syria would increase the risk of Iran’s retaliation.

“We assess that Iran seeks to avoid a major armed conflict with Israel,” Coats said. “However, Israeli strikes that result in Iranian casualties increase the likelihood of Iranian conventional retaliation against Israel.”

Coats also raised concerns about “the long-term trajectory of Iranian influence in the region and the risk that conflict will escalate.”

He further claimed that Iran pursues “permanent military bases” in Syria and probably wants to maintain a network of “fighters” there despite the Israeli aerial assaults.

The American official was presenting the views of the US Intelligence Community to the congressional committee as part of the annual Worldwide Threat Assessment.

Tehran has been offering military advisory assistance to the Syrian army at the request of the Damascus government. Iran says it is not operating any military bases there.

The Israeli military has on multiple occasions launched air raids against targets inside Syria, some of which it claims belonged to Iranian forces.

Israel – which has been backing the terror groups operating against Damascus — views Iranian advisors in Syria as a threat and has openly pledged to target them until they leave the Arab country.

Earlier this month, the chief commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) responded to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s “ridiculous” threat of strikes against Iranian advisors.

Major General Ali Jafari vowed that the Islamic Republic will protect its military advisory mission against the regime’s acts of aggression.

Just days ago, Iran’s chief military commander raised the possibility of Iran adopting offensive military tactics to protect its interests.

The chief military commander says Iran is prepared to adopt offensive military tactics in order to protect its interests while generally adhering to its broad defense doctrine.

In April 2018, an Israeli airstrike against the T-4 airbase in Syria’s Homs Province killed more than a dozen people, reportedly including seven Iranian military advisors.

In May of the same year, Israel conducted its most intensive airstrikes on Syria in decades. According to Russia’s Defense Ministry, Israel had used 28 warplanes in its Syria strikes and fired 70 missiles. Both Damascus and Moscow said that the Syrian army had managed to shoot down over half of the missiles.

The Tel Aviv regime, at the time, claimed that its assault was in response to a barrage of 20 rockets that had been fired from Syria at Israeli military outposts in the occupied Golan Heights, and it blamed the rocket attack on Iran.

January 30, 2019 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

McConnell Mulls Introducing Amendment to Stop US Pullout from Syria, Afghanistan

Sputnik – 30.01.2019

WASHINGTON – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Tuesday he plans to introduce legislation to prevent what he called a “precipitous” withdrawal of US forces from Syria and Afghanistan before terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda and the Daesh are defeated there.

“My amendment would acknowledge the plain fact that al Qaeda, ISIS[Daesh], and their affiliates in Syria and Afghanistan continue to pose a serious threat to our nation”, McConnell said in remarks on the Senate floor.

McConnell said his amendment, which he plans to introduce to a wide-ranging Senate bill on the Middle East, would “recognize the danger of a precipitous withdrawal from either conflict, and highlight the need for diplomatic engagement and political solutions to the underlying conflicts in Syria and Afghanistan”.

He stressed that his amendment would ensure the continued commitment of US forces until “vile terrorists” suffer an enduring defeat in both countries.

Moreover, McConnell emphasized that if the US exit the two countries before defeating the terrorists, the two conflicts would “reverberate in the United States”.

The comments mark a rare break between the Republican Senate majority leader and President Donald Trump, who has signaled that he intends to pull US troops out of both countries.

McConnell said he would introduce the amendment to the “Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act”, a sweeping package of measures that would impose new sanctions against Syria, boost defense spending in the region and punish activists who call for economic boycotts of Israel to protest its policies in Palestine, among other measures.

The bill cleared a first Senate hurdle on Monday in a 74-19 vote, and the chamber is expected to decide on the final version of the legislation in the coming days.

In December, the US-based media reported that Washington planned to withdraw around 7,000 troops deployed in Afghanistan. The reports came in the wake of Trump’s announcement regarding his intention to pull the US troops out of Syria since, according to him, the Daesh had been defeated.

The White House, however, has dismissed the claims about Afghanistan, saying that Donald Trump had no such plans.

January 30, 2019 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Canada strips group of charity status for funding Israel army

MEMO | January 29, 2019

A Canadian Jewish organisation has been stripped of its charity status for supporting the Israeli army. The discovery – which has come as a shock to many well-meaning donors – was made following a government audit of the Toronto based group whose revenue is in the region of tens of millions.

Federal regulators found that some of the activities of Beth Oloth Charitable Organisation were not charitable under Canadian law, such as “increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of the Israeli armed forces,” Canadian news agency Global News reported.

The pro-Israeli charity group, established in 1962, describes itself as “having reached out to thousands of newly-arrived immigrants and under-privileged Israeli girls – young victims of terror, sickness, turmoil, poverty and family strife.”

The group promotes its work saying: “the devoted staff at Beth Oloth receives these girls at the tender age of nine. The next ten years are marked with one continuous chain of love, warmth and nurturing, alongside a quality education.”

Beth Oloth’s charity work has now come under scrutiny after Canada’s Revenue Agency (CRA) discovered that it has been supporting “foreign armed forces”. Almost all the money raised by the pro-Israeli charity group went abroad. Beth Oloth was not only found to be aiding the Israeli military, it was also undermining Canada’s own foreign policy in the Israeli-Palestine conflict by funding projects in the occupied territories.

Investigation by the Canadian government discovered that the pro-Israeli charity group lacked “direction and control” over the use of its funds, and had funded non-charitable activity. Global News said that this included educational programs called “mechinot” that prepared high school students for Israeli military service.

The program is said to have provided weapons, physical and martial arts training, mentoring by Israel Defence Forces officers and visits to army bases and sites of historical battles.

The revocation was announced in the 12 January edition of the government’s Canada Gazette. Some 94 pages of evidence were released to expose the pro-Israeli group’s non charitable work. Beth Oloth has received vast donations in recent years – $61 million in 2017, $45 million in 2016 and $42 million in 2015 – but it’s not clear how much of that was spent on charity and how much went towards funding the Israeli army; programs for preparing kids for military training or towards projects in illegal settlements in occupied West Bank.

Beth Oloth responded to the allegations by insisting that its work involved providing “stipends to the poor for the observance of religious life” and that it had funded teachers to provide religious training at mechinot schools.” CRA refuted their claim saying: “Providing assistance to Israeli settlements in the occupied territories serves to encourage and enhance the permanency of the infrastructure and settlements and therefore is contrary to Canada’s public policy and international law on this issue.”

According to Canada’s tax agency, Beth Oloth’s revenue was relatively small; raising a mere $21,000 in 2008, a year before the Israeli military carried out one of the deadliest assault on the Palestinians in Gaza during “Operation Cast Lead”, killing 1,400 people. The pro-Israeli group enjoyed a rapid growth after that period but it’s not clear why its revenue went from mere thousands to over $60 million in such a short period of time.

Beth Oloth’s non-charitable activities have come as a shock. Jewish leaders accused the pro-Israeli group of abusing their generosity. “Well-meaning donors to Jewish community foundations may be surprised to learn that they have been funding illegal Israeli settlement activity,” said Rabbi David Mivasair of Hamilton, Ontario. “The CRA doing its job and removing Beth Oloth’s illegitimate charitable status strengthens our confidence that our generosity is not being abused.”

Beth Oloth isn’t the only pro-Israeli charity group whose work has raised the suspicion of the Canadian government. Audits carried out during the same week by the CRA found that the Jewish National Fund of Canada (JNF), one of the country’s long-established charities, funded infrastructure projects for the Israeli army, air and naval bases.

Complaints are said to have been raised against JNF for years. The pro-Israeli charity claims to run reforestation efforts in areas hit by wildfires, but an 85 page document has been submitted listing the many ways in which it has been violating Canadian tax law for over 50 years.

READ:

Hollywood stars raise record $60m for Israel army

UK pro-Israel charity investigated for anti-Corbyn campaign

January 29, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

End All Interventionism, Not Just in Venezuela

By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | January 28, 2019

It truly is phenomenal. The massive death and destruction from U.S. interventionism in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and the rest of the Middle East isn’t even over with, and yet interventionist dead-enders are now shifting their sights to Venezuela. One almost gets the impression that the dead-enders are saying to America, “Please, give us one more chance. We promise we’ll get it right this time.”

Obviously, the dead-enders are hoping that Americans forget the unmitigated disasters that interventionism has produced on this side of the world, such as in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Cuba, Chile, and others.

The time has come for the American people to raise their sights to a higher level, one that involves not only rejecting more interventionism in Venezuela but one that rejects interventionism entirely. It is the only solution to the foreign policy-woes in which interventionist dead-enders have mired our nation.

That necessarily means the following:

  • Bring home all U.S. troops from everywhere and discharge them into the private sector, since they will no longer be needed.
  • Abandon all U.S. military bases in foreign countries, including the Pentagon’s and CIA’s torture and prison center in Cuba.
  • End all foreign aid, including to pro-U.S. dictatorial regimes.
  • Restore a limited-government republic to our land, which necessarily means the dismantling of the national-security state branch of the federal government (i.e., the Pentagon, military-industrial complex, CIA, and NSA).

If Americans were to do those four things, the United States would be well on its way toward achieving a peaceful, prosperous, harmonious, and free society, which, needless to say, would be completely different from the type of society in which we live today, thanks to those interventionist dead-enders.

Think Switzerland. Unlike the U.S. government, the Swiss government is based on the concept of non-interventionism, which, by the way, was the founding foreign policy of the United States. Unlike the U.S. government, the Swiss government hasn’t been imposing sanctions on the Venezuelan people in the hopes of starting a violent revolution that has the potential of killing and injuring untold numbers of people, like in Syria. The Swiss government also hasn’t recognized an alternative president in Venezuela, like the U.S. government has, again in the hopes of inciting a violent revolution.

Instead, the Swiss government takes the position that Venezuela is none of Switzerland’s business. Venezuela is the business of the Venezuelan people. If they wish to start a revolution knowing that there will likely be a high toll in terms of death and destruction, that’s their decision, not that of the Swiss government.

Thus, Switzerland butts out of Venezuela’s turmoil. The Swiss government limits itself to defending Switzerland. And no one, not even the U.S. government, jacks with the Swiss.

That’s the model for the United States. Stop being the world’s buttinski, invader, occupier, assassin, torturer, sanctioner, embargoer, kidnapper, dictator-aider, and regime-changer. Just butt out of everyone else’s wars, problems, conflicts, and hostilities. Instead, restore America’s founding principle of non-interventionism and lead the world to peace, prosperity, harmony, and liberty.

January 28, 2019 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Will France pay for its nuclear testing in the Pacific Ocean?

By Sofia Pale – New Eastern Outlook – 28.01.2019

French Polynesia comprises a multitude of islands in the center of the Pacific Ocean, which are a part of France. The biggest and the most famous of these is the island of Tahiti. As in other “overseas” territories that remain under France’s dominion since colonial times, there is a powerful movement for independence in French Polynesia. Islanders take special issue with their parent country when it comes to numerous nuclear tests, which France conducted in the region in the second half of the 20th century.

Based on available data, during the period from 1966 to 1998, the French military performed 193 tests of nuclear weaponry in the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa, which comprise the Tuamotu Archipelago. It is public knowledge that 46 tests, conducted from 1966 to 1974, were atmospheric in nature, i.e. nuclear warheads were positioned in special towers on the Earth’s surface, on barges in lagoons, on aerostats in the air, and were also dropped from planes and detonated in the air. It is noteworthy that in 1963, the USSR, the USA and Great Britain signed the Treaty of Moscow, which banned nuclear weapon tests in the atmosphere, under water and in outer space, but France chose not to participate in this agreement.

The other 147 tests were performed underground from 1975 to 1998, with detonations taking place in 500 to 1,100-meter-deep closed vertical shafts.

It is worth mentioning that both atmospheric and underground nuclear tests were conducted on the two atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa.

It is difficult to say which approach is more harmful to the environment and population’s health. A nuclear detonation in the atmosphere causes a rapid dispersion of radioactive substances over a large area, which soon have an effect on well-being of residents living in this area. After an underground test, a lot of harmful compounds could remain in a shaft, where the detonation took place, for quite a number of years. However with time, these substances, via various routes, such as underground waters, could pollute the surrounding area, and their effect may be more long-lasting and permanent than after-effects following a detonation in the atmosphere, which gradually subside with the help of winds and rains.

Either way, for a long time the French leadership asserted that the tests conducted in the Tuamotu Archipelago had no effect on either the environment or the residents of French Polynesia. However, even in the 1960s, many did not believe this to be true. For decades, the media have published increasingly frightening data about the state of the atoll environment and the fate of people who were in surrounding areas during nuclear testing. It was reported that French politicians and high-ranking military personnel often ignored warnings made by scientists about consequences of nuclear detonations. As a result, residents of near by areas were not evacuated, while French servicemen, who carried out these tests, did not have access to protective gear. In the 1980s the French military leadership attempted to convince the public that it possessed technology of a “clean bomb”, but few believed such statements. Even a stage-managed swim, taken by the French Defence Minister, Paul Quilès, in the lagoon of the Moruroa atoll 5 hours after yet another scheduled test in 1985 did not help matters (interestingly, he is alive and well at present).

In the end, the French Polynesian government managed to receive financial compensation from France, which makes annual payments for damage caused by nuclear testing. This money is a significant contribution to French Polynesia’s budget.

In addition, in 2001 two organizations were established in France. Their aims are to prove that the French government caused harm to a large number of people with its testing and to secure compensation for these people. These organizations are Association des vétérans des essais nucléaires (AVEN, Nuclear Test Veterans Association), which comprises French service personnel who took part in the testing, and Moruroa e tatou (Moruroa and us), which united workers from Moruroa testing sites together. For a number of years these bodies waged an information war against the French government, who continued to assert that the explosions in French Polynesia did not have any serious consequences.

In the end, France was forced to officially admit that thousands of people, including military personnel involved in nuclear testing as well as local residents, contracted serious diseases, including oncological, due to exposure to radiation.

In March 2009, France’s Minister of Defence, Hervé Morin, stated that overall, 150,000 residents of French Polynesia and France were affected by the French nuclear tests. In addition, he informed the public that the French Parliament was in the process of reviewing legislation on making annual targeted compensation payments to people who suffered from radiation exposure. France allocated 10 million euros for these disbursements per year. And individuals who happened to be near a nuclear testing site during detonations were no longer obliged to prove that their health problems stemmed from effects of radiation. The law was approved in 2010, however, according to data as of the end of 2018, only few people have been able to receive this compensation due to red tape. Based on some sources, in French Polynesia the number of such individuals is equivalent to dozens. Hence, the previously mentioned organizations with active support from the Assembly of French Polynesia (AFP, the local parliament) continued waging their battle.

As for the AFP, many of its members are supporters of independence of French Polynesia from France, and the damage sustained by the islands as a result of nuclear testing, is yet another trump card for them. The AFP organized numerous protests and information campaigns which demanded an admission that French Polynesia suffered from the actions taken by French military personnel. One of the key figures in this struggle became Oscar Temaru, a former President of French Polynesia, who held this post on five occasions and was the founder and leader of the party, the Front for the Liberation of Polynesia (FLP), currently known as Tavini Huiraatira (People’s Servant).

In 2013, France’s Ministry of Defence was forced to declassify a number of documents, which were immediately publicized by the media. These reports provide detailed descriptions of the effects of nuclear testing on the environment of the entire French Polynesia. For instance, the documents mention that after a series of nuclear tests, increased radiation levels exceeding safety limits were reported in Tahiti, an island in the center of French Polynesia, which is located more than 1,000 km from Moruroa and happens to be a popular international resort. Other islands of French Polynesia were reported to be in a similar situation. Furthermore, witnesses recall that there were instances when French authorities refused to evacuate residents from some French Polynesian islands that were within the fallout zone.

In November 2014, the AFP announced that it was determined to demand compensation from France for damage caused to the environment of French Polynesia, which it estimated to amount to more than 1 billion US dollars.

In October 2018, at the session of the UN Committee on Decolonization in New York, the previously mentioned politician, Oscar Temaru, affirmed that he and his allies had begun legal proceedings against France at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. France has been accused of crimes against humanity.

The same month, a court ruled to suspend Oscar Temaru from his duties within the AFP for a year as unexpectedly, fraudulent financial irregularities were uncovered during his election campaign. In November 2018, Oscar Temaru was detained for 12 hours in the course of an investigation on fund embezzlement from a local company that sponsored an opposition-friendly radio station. Now, the famous politician is awaiting trial, which will begin in June 2019. Members of the Front for the Liberation of Polynesia assert that evidence against Oscar Temaru was fabricated by the French authorities in order to ruin his reputation as a politician.

Regardless of whether these accusations are true or not, any focus on issues connected to nuclear testing in French Polynesia hurts France. As new facts about the events that transpired emerge, France’s actions in French Polynesia begin to look more and more unsightly. Environment-related crimes are among the most condemned in modern liberal European society. And the fact that France chose its “overseas” territory in the Pacific Ocean for its nuclear testing and failed to take necessary safety measures to protect local residents may be tied to even more deplorable acts, such as colonialism and racism.

Hence, France, long considered to be a bastion of European values, such as tolerance and multiculturalism, will most likely do everything in its power to reduce tensions surrounding Moruroa, Fangataufa and its nuclear program by, among other means, sidelining politicians such as Oscar Temaru.

In addition, it is important for France to dampen the separatist mood in French Polynesia so as not to lose dominion over the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa. After all, in order to accurately assess the environmental consequences of French nuclear testing in French Polynesia, and the potential threat to future generations of Polynesians, scientists need to conduct research in the cursed atolls. They need to determine quantities of harmful substances which remain underground, and to find possible routes that these compounds could use to spread from these two atolls to the rest of the region. Some also think that underground detonations could have resulted in appearance of cracks, which could connect the shafts where the tests were conducted with the ocean. However, scientists have not been able to access Moruroa and Fangataufa since France ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1998. Nuclear test sites have thus been sealed and are protected by armed security personnel who do not allow scientists and employees of environmental organizations to reach these areas.

Various experts have, on numerous occasions, expressed an opinion that France’s unwillingness to allow researchers to access these closed off testing sites is one of the reasons why France is trying to keep French Polynesia in its dominion.

It is well known that keeping these islands under France’s control is a significant expense for the French budget. The region is incapable of supporting itself even through tourism, which accounts for 25% of French Polynesia’s GDP and is a key economic sector for the nation. Paris is compelled to spend billions of euros on French Polynesia, which is why calls for its independence are even periodically echoed in France itself.

In addition, independence supporters who live in French Polynesia think that France is responsible for the region’s economic woes, as it prevents development of local businesses and sets high tariffs on imported and exported goods. Members of forces, opposing French rule, believe that the parent nation uses such means to artificially slow down economic development of French Polynesia for fear that, on gaining financial independence, the region will immediately attain political freedom. Then France will lose control over Moruroa and Fangataufa, and whatever secrets are hidden in these atolls will be revealed by the world media.

Now that the case has been taken to the International Court of Justice, France will need to do its best to maintain control of French Polynesia. If the AFP estimates damages, caused by nuclear testing, at 1 billion US dollars, then, most likely, France will pay this sum out. From now onwards, France will probably start making compensation payments due to veterans, affected by nuclear testing, and to common residents of French Polynesia, in accordance with the 2010 law, with much more effort. However, it is uncertain whether these measures will help France’s case, as this issue has already gained notoriety world-wide. For far too long, France ignored demands from people who suffered from consequences of nuclear tests. Perhaps if it had started making generous compensation payments to these individuals several years earlier, there would not be a court case against France at The Hague. As things stand now, the global community will have to make a legal and environmental assessment of the actions taken by France from 1966 to 1998. And it can not be ruled out that soon France will not only lose control over French Polynesia but its reputation as well.

Sofia Pale, PhD, Research Fellow of the Center for South-East Asia, Australia and Oceania of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

January 28, 2019 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

US to spend $500bn on nuclear weapons upgrade over next 10 years

Press TV – January 27, 2019

A new US government estimate has found that Washington’s plans for modernizing and maintaining the country’s nuclear arsenal will cost nearly $500 billion over the next decade.

The exact nuclear weapons upgrade cost assessment stands at $494 billion, which is part of a biannual estimate produced by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), and reflects a 23-percent increase over the previous estimate of $400 billion released in 2017, which was 15 percent more than the 2015 figure, US-based military journal Defense News reported Friday.

The report points out, however, that the whopping figure for the US nuclear arms upgrade only represents nearly six percent of the country’s overall projected military spending during the time period.

According to the report, three notable changes featured in Washington’s so-called Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) were the development of a low-yield submarine-launched ballistic missile, development of a new sea-launched cruise missile and increased plutonium pit production, further adding that they resulted in an estimated $17 billion cost increase over the time period.

It also emphasized that the figure could further increase should the Trump administration follow through on plans in the NPR to keep the B83 nuclear bomb in service longer than intended, or if it develops a land-based nuclear cruise missile following an expected US withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) with Russia.

Overall, the report adds, the US Defense Department and the Department of Energy (DOE) intend to spend the funds in the following way:

  • $234 billion on strategic nuclear delivery systems and weapons — including submarines, intercontinental ballistic missiles and long-range bombers – as well as the nuclear warheads for use from those systems, and DOE’s funding of nuclear reactors for the submarine fleet.
  • $15 billion on tactical nuclear delivery systems and weapons, including tactical aircraft for delivering weapons, management of the warheads for those tactical aircraft; and funding for the new submarine-launched cruise missile.
  • $106 billion for DOE’s nuclear weapons laboratories and production facilities, where the US stockpile of nuclear warheads are maintained and developed.
  • $77 billion on nuclear command, control, commutations and early warning systems, used to coordinate any nuclear-related issues. This is while Pentagon officials have warned over the past two years that its nuclear command and control is at risk of being outdated without major investments.

The report also points out that the remaining $62 billion in projected costs come from “CBO’s estimate of additional costs that would be incurred over the 2019–2028 period if the costs of nuclear programs exceeded planned amounts at roughly the same rates at which costs for similar programs have grown in the past.”

January 27, 2019 Posted by | Militarism | | Leave a comment

McCain May Be Dead, but ‘Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran’ Still Resounds

By Brian CLOUGHLEY | Strategic Culture Foundation | 26.01.2019

In 2007, when making a speech during his bid for the presidency of the United States, the late Senator John McCain spoke about Iran’s supposed nuclear weapons’ programme and when questioned as to whether there might be US reaction to such allegations responded by singing “That old Beach Boys song, Bomb Iran… bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb.”

This jovial retort about killing people by bombing them was not surprising to those who remembered that during the US war on Vietnam McCain was shot down on a mission to bomb a power generation plant in Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam, in the course of the entrancingly-named Operation Rolling Thunder.  If he hadn’t been shot down before he released his bombs there would almost certainly have been civilian casualties and deaths. Power stations in cities are not manned by soldiers, after all, and around the Hanoi plant there were houses that would doubtless be struck by errant bombs.

But who cares about civilians who are killed or maimed in bombing or rocket attacks?

In Syria, for example, in October 2018 “the US-led coalition was responsible for 46% of civilian casualties from all explosive weapon use in Syria.”  And in November Reuters reported that “At least 30 Afghan civilians were killed in US air strikes in the Afghan province of Helmand, officials and residents of the area said on Wednesday, the latest casualties from a surge in air operations aimed at driving the Taliban into talks.”

Forbes records that “the US has never dropped as many bombs on Afghanistan as it did this year. According to U.S. Air Forces Central Command data, manned and unmanned aircraft released 5,213 weapons between January and the end of September 2018. The UN announced that the number of civilian casualties in the first nine months of 2018 is higher than in any year since it started documenting them in 2009.”  On January 25 Defense Post reported that “Afghanistan is investigating reports that at least 16 civilians including women and children were killed in an airstrike in southern Helmand province, the defense ministry said in a statement.” On and on its goes — Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Afghanistan.

There’s nothing new in this, so far as US Secretary of State Pompeo is concerned. As a member of Congress in 2014 he made it clear that he was one of the bombing club. As The Nation reported, “Representative Mike Pompeo (R-KS), participating in the same [Foreign Affairs Committee] roundtable, urged the United States and its allies to strongly consider a pre-emptive bombing campaign of Iran’s nuclear sites. He said ‘In an unclassified setting, it is under 2,000 sorties to destroy the Iranian nuclear capacity. This is not an insurmountable task for the coalition forces’.”

The fact that when Pompeo was asked at a US Senate hearing in April 2018 if he was supportive of a preemptive strike on Iran he declared “I’m not. I’m absolutely not” is indicative only of the fact that he is given to duplicity.

Which brings us to Trump’s National Security Advisor, John Bolton, who has been an advocate of bombing for many years. He is the man who declared in November 2002 that “We are confident that Saddam Hussein has hidden weapons of mass destruction and production facilities in Iraq” and four weeks before the US invaded Iraq, according to Israel’s Haaretz newspaper in February 2003, “US Undersecretary of State John Bolton said in meetings with Israeli officials on Monday that he has no doubt America will attack Iraq, and that it will be necessary to deal with threats from Syria, Iran and North Korea afterwards.”

Iraq was duly bombed and rocketed and reduced to chaos, and Bolton was totally unrepentant. In an article in the UK’s Daily Telegraph in 2016 he pronounced that “Iraq today suffers not from the 2003 invasion, but from the 2011 withdrawal of all US combat forces. What strengthened Iran’s hand in Iraq was not the absence of Saddam [Hussein], but the absence of coalition troops with a writ to crush efforts by the ayatollahs to support and arm Shi’ite militias. When US forces left, the last possibility of Iraq succeeding as a multi-ethnic, multi-confessional state left with them. Don’t blame Tony Blair and George W Bush for that failure. Blame their successors.”

In November 2016 Bolton was aptly described by MSNBC host Joe Scarborough as “a massive neocon on steroids” but the Financial Times argues that he is not a neocon, because “Neocons believe US values should be universal. Mr Bolton believes in aggressive promotion of the US national interest, which is quite different.” Be that as it may, there are some things that are certain, such as that Bolton is a rabid warmonger who avoided serving in Vietnam just like Donald Trump and George W Bush and Bill Clinton and Dick Cheney and many others. (And here it has to be said that my feelings are strong about this, having served in Vietnam in the Australian Army in 1970-71.)

As noted by the Daily News of his Alma Mater, Yale, “though Bolton supported the Vietnam War, he declined to enter combat duty, instead enlisting in the National Guard and attending law school after his 1970 graduation. ‘I confess I had no desire to die in a Southeast Asian rice paddy,’ Bolton wrote of his decision in the 25th reunion book. ‘I considered the war in Vietnam already lost’.” But now that it is obvious that Washington lost its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Bolton is ready for another one.

In July 2018, while tension between the US and Iran was heightening, the Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, warned Washington about pursuing a hostile policy against his country, saying “Mr Trump, don’t play with the lion’s tail, this would only lead to regret… America should know that peace with Iran is the mother of all peace, and war with Iran is the mother of all wars.” That was a red rag to a bull, and Trump responded in his normal way by tweeting “To Iranian President Rouhani: NEVER, EVER THREATEN THE UNITED STATES AGAIN OR YOU WILL SUFFER CONSEQUENCES THE LIKES OF WHICH FEW THROUGHOUT HISTORY HAVE EVER SUFFERED BEFORE. WE ARE NO LONGER A COUNTRY THAT WILL STAND FOR YOUR DEMENTED WORDS OF VIOLENCE & DEATH. BE CAUTIOUS!  — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)”

That is frightening. Any world leader who tweets such things as “North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen” is verging on the psychotic. And, in his own words, the demented.

Trump’s former foreign policy officials were not altogether in favour of having Iran and North Korea suffer unspecified but obviously terrifying consequences for having expressed its views on Trump policy, but now, as the BBC notes, “Mr Trump has built a foreign policy team that is largely on the same page — his page.”

That’s the Fire and Fury Page, and it’s being proof-read and expanded by Pompeo and Bolton. Stand by for Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran.

January 26, 2019 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

US plans for space wars are real – Russian Foreign Ministry

RT | January 25, 2019

US plans to pursue development of space-based interceptors signals that Washington would use space for military operations, the Russian Foreign Ministry has warned.

Washington’s concept of a space-based interceptor capable of destroying missiles in the boost phase was presented in the US Missile Defense Review (MDR) last week.

In the speech announcing the publication of the MDR, US President Donald Trump warned that the new strategy will “ensure that enemy missiles find no sanctuary on Earth or in the skies above.”

He also declared that “space is a new war-fighting domain with the Space Force leading the way.”

The US “implementation of its military space plans will hit the current system of space activities’ safety,” stated Moscow, referring to Washington’s previous attempts to achieve dominance in the military sphere resulted in “growing tensions and a spiralling arms race.”

The Foreign Ministry has also expressed regret that the US abandoned “constructive dialogue” and returned to the 1980s ‘Star Wars’ missile defense program of President Ronald Reagan, when the spaced-based interceptors were first envisioned.

Though the MDR only recommends studying the issue at this point, Moscow is convinced that the Trump administration puts a “strong emphasis” on it and will be inclined to go ahead with the development of the spaced-based weapons.

Besides development of space-based capabilities, the MDR describes plans to deploy 20 additional interceptor missiles in Alaska as soon as 2023. Other plans include arming missile facilities in Romania and Poland – part of the European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) – with new Aegis SM-3 missiles.

January 25, 2019 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

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