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FT Says “Anti-Vax Sentiment” in the West Being Fueled by Russia & China

Advocates governments using “psychological operations” against their own people

By Paul Joseph Watson | Summit News | January 13, 2022

In a report that advocates governments using “psychological operations” against their own population, the Financial Times asserts, with no proof, that Russia and China are responsible for pushing “anti-vax sentiment” and criticism of lockdown measures in the west.

The article quotes Mikael Tofvesson, head of the Swedish Navy’s new Psyops division, who says “foreign aggressors” are trying to “sow division by targeting areas of public concern such as crime, Covid vaccinations, the government’s response to the pandemic, and immigration.”

“The most important task in psychological defence is to inoculate the population against believing false information,” states the article, which is written by Elisabeth Braw of the American Enterprise Institute, a neo-con think tank.

Such measures were deployed in the United Kingdom during the first lockdown, when scientists in the UK working as advisors for the government admitted using what they now admit to be “unethical” and “totalitarian” methods of instilling fear in the population in order to control behavior during the pandemic.

One scientist with the SPI-B admitted that, “In March [2020] the Government was very worried about compliance and they thought people wouldn’t want to be locked down. There were discussions about fear being needed to encourage compliance, and decisions were made about how to ramp up the fear.”

Of course, contrary to the claims in the article, the primary goal of psychological operations, whether directed against an enemy or a domestic population, is to instill fear and change behavior – telling the truth is hardly a priority.

Far from dispelling “false information,” psychological operations routinely rely on using false information to influence and manipulate “the enemy.”

“Psychological operations have long been a part of military operations, and are typically defined as the use of propaganda and other methods to influence the attitudes and behavior of foreign adversaries,” writes Allum Bokhari.

“What the FT is advocating — and what many have long suspected — is the use of these techniques by western military, security, and intelligence forces against their own citizens.”

“Hostile states including Russia, China and Iran have increased their use of disinformation and online propaganda to amplify anti-vax sentiment and foment political tensions in Europe and the US,” Braw claims.

However, the report contains no evidence whatsoever that Russia and China are responsible for any coordinated attempt to sow doubts about COVID-19 vaccines or lockdown measures.

Indeed, the mere fact that the newspaper complains about “disinformation” in the context of COVID-19 conspiracy theories is pretty rich given that the constantly invoked ‘Russian collusion’ charge is itself a baseless conspiracy theory.

In reality, concerns about vaccine side-effects, giving vaccines to children and mandating vaccines and COVID passports as part of the growing bio-security police state are perfectly valid concerns shared by millions of people across the west.

The FT is a staunchly globalist newspaper of record for the international elite and is routinely represented at the annual Bilderberg conference.

It can hardly be trusted to represent the interests of the common man.

January 13, 2022 Posted by | Deception, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Sweden to tackle “misinformation” by “psychological” means but insists it’s not the “Ministry of Truth”

By Christina Maas | Reclaim The Net | January 7, 2022

Sweden is taking a new approach to fight “misinformation.” The government launched the “Psychological Defence Agency” which they say will fight misinformation, propaganda, and psychological warfare.

The mission of the new agency will be identifying misinformation and “educating” the community to be resilient against harmful misinformation campaigns. The agency is headed by Henrik Landerholm, a diplomat, The Record reported.

Landerhom was interviewed by a Swedish radio station after the announcement of the agency, where he said nations like China, Iran, and Russia are sources of misinformation campaigns in Sweden. He singled out Russia for its attempt to interfere in US elections.

Swedish leaders have previously warned about the ever-growing “threat” of misinformation. In the nation’s recent elections, Russia was accused of attempting to interfere, which led to a coordinated effort to fight misinformation campaigns.

The efforts included training thousands of public officials on how to respond to false information and working with social media companies and journalists to curb its spread. These efforts inspired the creation of the new agency.

During the interview, Landerholm insisted that work of the new agency is not a form of government propaganda.

“This is not the Ministry of Truth or a State Information Board like we had during the Cold War,” Landerholm said. “We want to protect freedom of opinion in our country.”

January 7, 2022 Posted by | Russophobia | | Leave a comment

THE WORSE THE BETTER – HOW TWITTER VIEWS KAZAKHSTAN

By Paul Robinson | IRRUSSIANALITY | January 7, 2022

Various commentators have suggested that I write something about recent events in Kazakhstan. I’ve been loath to do so since my knowledge of the country is very limited, but there are some interesting things to say about what others have been writing on the topic, particularly concerning how it all relates to Russia. Notably, a certain part of the online commentariat has been keen to express indignation that Russia has “invaded” Kazakhstan to suppress a “democratic revolution”.

The rapid spread of violence in Kazakhstan generated hopes in some circles that the mob would topple the “regime” and install a new government that would somehow or other distance the country from Russia. Alternatively, the hope was that “democracy” would arrive in Kazakhstan. With this, another brick in the wall of authoritarianism would collapse, bringing closer the day when it would collapse in Russia too.

All this was somewhat unspoken, but once the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which includes Russia, announced that it would send troops to help restore order in Kazakhstan, and once Kazakh forces took the offensive and began clearing away anti-government protestors, all these hopes were dashed. The Kazakh government isn’t out of the woods yet. Protests continue in several cities, and things could still go horribly wrong. But at the moment it’s looking like the regime will survive. The internet’s keyboard warriors and online regime changers are seriously annoyed and looking for someone to blame. The guilty party is obvious – Russia.

However, despite the headlines in today’s newspapers about Russia sending troops to “quell” the uprising, the Kazakh state’s survial has little to do with the Russians or the CSTO. It seems as if the CSTO contingent in Kazakhstan will amount to no more than about 2,500 troops, which for a country that size is a tiny quantity. The role of the CSTO is largely symbolic – it sends a message to protestors and Kazakh security forces alike that the government isn’t backing down and has powerful external support. That should deter some of the former while putting a bit of steel in the spines of the latter. Perceptions of strength matter in situations like this, and thus the CSTO’s support perhaps makes a slight difference. But the hard work of restoring order belongs largely to the Kazakhs themselves. Whatever the press tells you, “Russia” isn’t “putting down” the uprising.

Nor can it be said that Russia has “invaded” Kazakhstan, as so many have liked to claim this past week on Twitter. Take for instance all these Tweets from the likes of one-time US Ambassador to Moscow Michael McFaul and former Estonian president Toomas Hendrik Ilves:

Various themes repeat themselves in all these: invasion, occupation, the “crushing” of democracy, and comparisons of Russia with Nazi Germany. It is, to be frank, more than a little over the top. You can’t invade, let alone occupy, a country the size of Kazakhstan with only 2,500 troops. Furthermore, the troops are there at the invitation of the internationally recognized government – recognized by us in the West as well as by everybody else. That’s hardly an invasion.

Maybe it’s because I’m a total reactionary, but I’m not too fond of the mob, and I’ve never understood why street protest (accompanied by looting and burning) is associated with democracy. The thing is that all those complaining about the efforts to restore order in Kazakhstan aren’t too fond of the mob either, at least when it starts attacking things that they like. A year ago, McFaul and others were complaining loudly about the crowd that assaulted the Capitol building in Washington DC. And none of those whose Tweets I copied above were to be seen complaining when the Ukrainian military responded to protests in Donbass by firing rockets from aircraft and shells from multiple launch rocket systems.

Somehow, though, people are rather inclined to like the mob when it attacks somebody or something they don’t like. If it’s anti-American, that’s bad. But if rioting and looting damages Russian interests – they’re all for it.

But here’s what really gets me. Do the McFauls and Ilveses truly believe that it would be better for Kazakhstan if the Russians and CSTO didn’t help restore order and the state collapsed? There’s a very real danger of at best anarchy and at worst civil war. How would that help anybody? We’ve seen this scenario before. In Ukraine, revolution led to counter-revolution and bloody violence. In Syria, likewise. And so on. It tends not to turn out well.

But it seems like people don’t care. The attitude appears to be “The worse the better”, as long as the chaos is not at home but on Russia’s borders. Let Kazakhstan descend into anarchy – that’s to be preferred to an order backed by the Russians. Suffice it to say, I don’t agree.

January 7, 2022 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Russophobia | | Leave a comment

The sinister legacy of January 6

By Frank Furedi | RT | January 5, 2022

Almost one year on from the riot at the US Capitol Building, it continues to be used by those in positions of power to develop a culture of fear – yet another example of a threat being amplified and raising public insecurity.

There is no need for a pandemic for the hysterical ruling class to constantly turn on the engine of fear. Without blinking an eye, the American political establishment has casually catastrophised the Capitol protest in Washington on 6 January last year.

Almost immediately a political riot by angry protestors was reframed as an “insurrection” and an act of domestic terror. Leading Democratic Party figures even sought to link the so-called coup attempt to Russia, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi declared that the rioters were “Putin’s puppets”.

Despite the relentless quest to uncover a malevolent conspiracy to overthrow the elected government of the United States, there is nothing to suggest that what occurred on January 6 was anything more than an instance of angry, violent rioters invading the Capitol Building. Despite their best efforts, the FBI and other agencies could find no proof of any conspiracy. Last August, Reuters reported that “the FBI has found scant evidence that the January 6 attack on the US Capitol was the result of an organized plot to overturn the presidential election result”.

This absence of evidence notwithstanding, America’s cultural elite, along with the leadership of the Democratic Party, continues to remain in hysteria mode. Indeed, its obsession with the threat of an insurrection or a coup has hardened during the past year to the point that it genuinely finds it difficult to distinguish between fantasy and reality.

The New York Times, once a serious news outlet, has become a slave of its paranoia about an impending civil war. Anyone reading its commentary would draw the conclusion that what happened on January 6 was akin to the violent rioting that accompanies a bloody coup d’etat.

On the first day of 2022, its Editorial Board published a piece titled “Every Day Is Jan. 6 Now”. In case anyone failed to get the point of the title, it added, “Jan. 6 is not in the past; it is every day”. The statement evokes a world where the American “Republic faces an existential threat” and insists that “we should stop underestimating the threat facing the country”. The threat it refers to constitutes the millions of voters who continue to support Donald Trump and deny the New York Times’ version of reality. In its typical alarmist tone, it states, “no self-governing society can survive such a threat by denying it exists”.

This feverish irrationality isn’t restricted to America. Across the Atlantic, The Guardian adopts a similar tone in its treatment of the legacy of January 6. “US could be under rightwing dictator by 2030, Canadian warns” runs one of its headlines. In this article, the scaremongering prediction of an academic in The Globe and Mail is presented as a sensible assessment of future possibilities. Political science professor Thomas Homer-Dixon from Royal Roads University in British Columbia urges Canada to protect itself against the “collapse of American democracy”. And he warns, “We mustn’t dismiss these possibilities just because they seem ludicrous or too horrible to imagine.”

Projecting a scene akin to one in a dystopian horror film, Homer-Dixon asserts, “By 2025, American democracy could collapse, causing extreme domestic political instability, including widespread civil violence. By 2030, if not sooner, the country could be governed by a right-wing dictatorship.”

The editorial team at The Guardian appears to have become addicted to the political pornography peddled by the likes of Homer-Dixon. It also features a piece by Jason Stanley, who imaginatively recasts the contemporary era as akin to the one that led to the rise of fascism in Weimar Germany. In a commentary titled “America is now in fascism’s legal phase”, Stanley paints a picture that looks depressingly similar to the months leading up to the rise of Adolf Hitler. For Stanley, there is a clear parallel between the behaviour of Trump and Hitler. He contends that “as in all fascist movements, these forces have found a popular leader unconstrained by the rules of democracy, this time in the figure of Donald Trump”.

At first sight, it is tempting to draw the conclusion that the catastrophising of January 6 or the constant evocation of the spirit of Nazi Germany haunting America is pure scaremongering propaganda. No doubt there is an element of media manipulation and conscious twisting of reality at play. But on closer inspection, it seems as if the ruling classes in Western societies have genuinely internalised the culture of fear. January 6 is simply one catastrophe amongst the many that preoccupy them.

A striking illustration of how the self-catastrophising masochistic ruling elite thinks was offered by Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo in a speech he gave to the United Nations General Assembly last September. Pointing to climate, vaccines, and terrorism’, he stated that “nobody is safe until everybody is safe”. By linking together three different and disparate elements, De Croo painted a picture of a world where threats to human existence are endemic. Add this scenario to the threat of American fascism and we end up with a 21st-century version of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

This distorted representation of reality promoted by insecure elites is having a cumulative impact on public life. Put simply, it is raising public insecurity – and at the same time diminishing the capacity of people to confront some of the very real problems they face.

Frank Furedi is an author and social commentator. He is an emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Kent in Canterbury. Author of How Fear Works: The Culture of Fear in the 21st Century.

January 5, 2022 Posted by | Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Russia not deliberately choking gas supplies to West – Bloomberg

RT | December 24, 2021

Russian energy giant Gazprom has already fulfilled its contractual obligations and is not manipulating European prices, Bloomberg has claimed.

Recent slumps in Russian gas deliveries to Europe are not because of price manipulation for political gain, the New York based finance bible reported on Wednesday.

Earlier this week, the Yamal-Europe pipeline, which brings gas from Russia to Germany through Poland and Belarus, halted shipments. As European energy prices soared, some officials in the West accused Moscow of playing politics with the gas supply, in order to push Germany towards approval of the new Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which has been completed for months but has yet to be officially approved.

However, Bloomberg reported that anonymous sources familiar with the matter had confided that the real cause of the halt in gas transit was that Western buyers under long-term deals had already hit their contractual limits for 2021.

Typically, Gazprom and its customers agree to an arrangement whereby the company will supply a certain volume of gas at a pre-set rate, which this year was less than market price. Beyond that volume, energy buyers would need to pay the market rate, and when several of them reached their volume cap this week, they elected not to purchase more gas.

The Russian state-owned energy giant and its clients, including Uniper SE and RWE AG, confirmed that the company had fulfilled its agreements this year, with the Russian firm stating that it delivers gas to Europe “fully in compliance with the current contract obligations.”

Gas prices in Europe rose about 20% this week, sparking fears of a winter energy crisis, and leading to heated rhetoric surrounding energy security and the role of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, which will bring Russian gas to Germany through the Baltic Sea, bypassing transit countries such as Ukraine and Poland.

The controversial project, which was fully constructed in September, has met with staunch opposition from Kiev, Warsaw, and Washington, and Ukrainian officials have taken credit for working to delay its certification. However, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has insisted that it should not be used as political leverage against Moscow, saying, “The German authorities will decide this completely independent of politics. The process is moving along.”

At a press conference on Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Western leaders of lying to make Moscow out to be responsible for the rising gas prices. “Gazprom is delivering the volume requested by its partners in full, in accordance with existing contracts,” he said.

December 24, 2021 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Postcard From Romania – Part II

Christmas tree made of empty vaccine bottles to encourage Romanian children to get vaccinated
By Niculina Florea | The Daily Sceptic | December 24, 2021

Mihai Fagadaru is dead.

Of course, nobody knows who Mihai Fagadaru was.

Fagadaru was a medical doctor, father of two, fervent Christian and leader of protests against Covid measures in my home country of Romania. On October 30th he led a protest in our capital of Bucharest. The following week, after treating two patients sick with Covid, he himself fell ill. He went to hospital on November 18th, where his condition suddenly deteriorated. In his final hours he recorded himself saying that doctors were putting him under pressure to accept intubation. He was afraid the procedure would kill him. He asked that his lawyer record his refusal to give consent and that his friends care for his children should his fears be realised.

Dr. Fagadaru had arrived at that hospital on his own two feet. The next day he was declared dead with Covid at the age of 43.

The national press hastened to declare, in large type, the death of an infamous anti-vaxxer from the very disease he had denied and would not be vaccinated against. Perhaps, during his last moments on earth, he expressed regret at not taking the vaccine? But with the Fagadaru’s own video contradicting a deathbed conversion, the media mob moved onto the next of the day’s hundred or so Covid fatalities (most of them, according to official statistics, unvaccinated): the search for dying lips, to which some click-baiting last words might be attributed, must go on.

This is what passes for news in Romania these days; a country on the brink of civil strife and wracked with governmental instability; which is already onto its third Prime Minister this year and enjoyed a turnout of 30% in January’s general elections; and where there have been protests against Covid measures every week since spring. Meanwhile, despite a rapidly receding fifth wave, a gentile debate continues in a parliament of questionable legitimacy about whether to legislate for a covid vaccination certificate.

When this wave was at its peak the eyes of Europe, or at least its mainstream media bloodhounds, were upon us. They were looking for a horrific situation in “one of the most unvaccinated countries in Europe”. Curiously, now that wave has receded, so too have the hacks, and any commentary on our collective vaccination status or lack thereof has dried up.

It remains, however, a convenient angle for the national Government, dovetailing as it does with the trusty blame-it-on-Russia approach to problem-solving. Thus, these days, all evil is born of a combination of the unvaccinated and ‘Russian disinformation’. That Russia, much like the West, has introduced draconian restrictions and is preparing for compulsory vaccination is neither here nor there. Of equal irrelevance is that the Russian vaccine cannot be sold in the EU as it does not have EMA approval. So, when hearing complaints that it is Russia who is trying to destabilise western democracies, am I alone in perceiving a possible nonsense?

Romanians live in many shadows. Russia is one, our recent experience of dictatorship another. Echos of that past can be heard with increasing clarity. Do you know, for instance, that PCR in Romanian stands for ‘Partidul Comunist Roman’? The CC-PCR, or Central Committee of the Romanian Communist Party, was the tool of control in Romanian society for decades. Today it is the RT-PCR. Can it be no more than coincidence that the health authorities have made this the only accepted test for administrative purposes? Certainly, that Romanians are viscerally repelled by the abbreviation is of little concern.

Here is another striking reminder of the old days: the resurgence of dichotomies. ‘Whoever is not with us is against us’ was once a popular Communist saying. How odd to hear that old tyranny on the lips of today’s democratic leaders! For, as we all know, he who is not pro-vaxx is an anti-vaxxer. And, by the same easy-to-follow logic, he who is not in favour of restrictions is an anarchist; while he who does not espouse hard-left ideas is a right-wing extremist; and he who questions government measures is a terrorist.

Despite these regresses, Romanian life goes on unabated for the most part. A long history of occupation and barbarian invasion, combined with the ruling class’ regular betrayal of the less privileged, caused the evolutionary gears to shift long ago. Opportunism and tactical cunning have been bred into the population. Romanians do not stand up, they bend; and they bend backwards not forwards, securely rooted so that they may face the prevailing wind without being torn asunder.

They are not opposed to vaccination; they just don’t get vaccinated. Your employer has demanded a covid certificate (though not yet a legal requirement)? Here is a fake one for your pleasure, sir! The authorities order positive cases to report for quarantine if symptomatic? Why doctor, I haven’t got so much as a cough! (just remember to clear your throat when the health authorities pay a visit.)

Meanwhile, the market for ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine and a strong antiviral, arbidol, is flourishing. You’ll find these banned products in your local pharmacy, if you know how to ask. The regime beams daily TV reminders to the population of what fools they were – the dead – for treating themselves with outlawed medicines. The dead are, almost without exception, those who ignored the advice (i.e., diktats) of the state.

“Don’t follow the example of young, healthy upstarts like Fagadaru,” the state-sponsored news channels chide, “or you too will be languishing on your deathbed, whispering your regret at not being vaccinated.” Well, if they think we’re going to just take them at their word, they must think we peasants have short memories! Our blood-soaked revolution took place a little over 30 years ago. That’s not even a lifetime. Certainly I remember, as anyone my age can, never mind a member of my parents’ generation, what life is like under tyranny.

I remember the rationing of basic foods, not for the population’s oppression or to maintain a primal state of destitution and fear, you understand! But to ensure “nutrition according to science” and that the earth would not be deprived of her riches.

I remember two hours of energy cuts a day at peak hours, radiators left cold in the middle of winter to conserve fossil fuels, my fingers frozen crooked as I did homework by candlelight, kneeling on the floor and covering myself with three blankets in an attempt to keep the cold away.

I remember conversations conducted sotto voce so that the neighbours, encouraged by state propaganda, would not eavesdrop and turn you in.

I remember the long, pointless meetings, the ritual self-abasement at those meetings as a demonstration of humility, and the unconditional applause for Communist Party leaders.

I remember the lack of free speech, the lack of free thinking, the pervasive censorship – of books, of philosophical ideas, of the press – more applause…

I remember the personality cult, the same face on TV and banners and buildings, the same face everywhere, in a country where advertising (a decadent bourgeois habit) was forbidden; flamboyant speeches on the creation of “the New Man”, on the dawning of the “Golden Era” – applause!; of the “multilaterally developed society” – applause!; being told the “One Truth” policy, and “don’t listen to capitalist propaganda, don’t switch on to Free Europe radio, don’t be an enemy of the people, the neighbours are listening” – applause!; hearing that “people are starving in the West, it’s full of drug addicts and marred by unemployment, don’t go there, don’t ever believe what you hear, it’s propaganda…” – applause, applause, applause!

How could anyone forget? Yet here we are again: Stay home. Don’t be selfish. Save the health service. Save Granny. Applause. What if Granny does not want to be saved? Irrelevant. The state says she must be saved. So she must be jabbed. Now she’s jabbed. Applause. Jab her again. Protect the state. Follow the Science. Don’t listen to disinformation. Cancel anti-vaxxers. Applause. Report infractions. It’s the dawning of the New Normal. Applause. Wash your hands. Wear a mask. Keep your distance. Get tested. You’re dirty. Don’t kill Granny. Applause. Listen to this speech. Don’t leave. Don’t go there. It’s dangerous. It’s on the red list. Applause. Quarantine outsiders. Imprison anti-vaxxers. Follow the One Science. It’s the software of life.

And the same faces. The same masked faces everywhere saying: Be afraid. Be afraid and get jabbed. And get jabbed again. Get jabbed again and again and again. But the jabs don’t seem to work…

This popular fraud comes as no surprise. In my society we have been playing this game of cat and mouse for centuries. They seek to enslave us, we seek to cheat them on that. They know the wickedness of the common people, the authorities; they know of their deceit and mischief. So why wait for Parliament to act? Why not arrange for local businesses and public bodies to enforce covid certification while sluggish parliamentarians make their law? That is why people in my hometown cannot access municipal services, or even pay their taxes without presenting an unlawful certificate. And where is the humanity of our superiors, I wonder? Reserved, perhaps, for “overworked” medics, who cry of exhaustion on TV shows and foam with rage against the unjabbed preventing them from taking their holidays.

My views can be inconvenient. “Stop reading obscure sites!” says my best friend from Bucharest, with whom I have shared the best, worst, most intimate, and most secret moments of my life. For the past two years she has incessantly posted photos of dogs, cats, birds, wildlife and attractive colleagues on Facebook; projecting an image of a perfect world. Now I’m a conspiracy theorist, un-jabbed and unapologetic, she doesn’t want to talk to me. “Where is your compassion, my old friend?” she asked.

Perhaps I have none left. I have expended it on passage for ones dear to me, to bring them out of the darkness and back to the light. What a price I pay! Communism was easy. It was so fearlessly disingenuous and so horrifically vulgar as to be obvious. It never touched the spirit. People obeyed out of fear, not belief. In body we may have been dirty and destitute, but in soul we were pristine. This time it’s different. It’s insidious. ‘It’ has crept into the hearts and minds of people. ‘It’ has separated friends and families. ‘It’ has torn through the fabric of society. And when torn, the insides come bursting out.

Recently, some monks came down from monasteries nestled in the mountains to the north. They made their way to Bucharest and addressed a large crowd. Doughty Father Ariton made it, but Father John, over 90 winters, could not manage the journey. He sits in his hermitage, receiving pilgrims in their dozens every day, stubbornly refusing to contract and die from ‘the disease’. The authorities would love that, surely! They could parade his body from town to town, exhibiting their war trophy: there, you idiots, we told you so!

Can anything stop the slide into tyranny? Three weeks ago Parliament failed at the first attempt to pass the Covid Certificate Act. Two weeks ago, the December 1st kick-off for the programme to vaccinate five year-olds (an early present from Santa) was delayed awaiting deliveries of the product. But these are mere obstacles, effortlessly overcome by the spreading darkness.

As I watch its approach, I feel angry with our cowardly leaders. I think of brave citizens like Dr Fagadaru and weep. They are simple people who would hold back the darkness, and whose reputations are sullied posthumously for no more than disagreeing with the revival of a terrible status quo. I am too angry to forgive the political class, the medics, the media. But neither do I wish to see the light die with men like Fagadaru. Perhaps I can draw inspiration from my fellow Romanians. As ever, they hold their ground. Bent, not upright. That’s how you fight an ill wind.

December 24, 2021 Posted by | Russophobia, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | | Leave a comment

A misunderstanding between NATO & Russia could cause a catastrophe

By Paul Robinson | RT | Decvember 15, 2021

If you can read only one article about international relations theory, it should be Columbia Professor Robert Jervis’ “Hypotheses on Misperception.” Jervis died last week, but his work explains recent Russia and NATO tensions.

In the past month, an alleged “build-up” of Russian military forces close to Ukraine has led to numerous claims that Moscow is planning to invade its neighbor. To head off this supposed danger, Western states have this past week threatened President Vladimir Putin’s government with “massive consequences” if it orders an offensive.

The Kremlin has consistently denied it is preparing an attack, and instead has demanded NATO pledge that it will not expand any further to the east. Ukraine’s long-held ambitions to join the bloc, it says, would cross a “red line” and would provoke a stern response.

In the West, Russian complaints about NATO expansion evoke little sympathy. The bloc is a purely defensive organization, goes the argument. Besides which, it is said, the alliance’s only borders with Russia consist of two short strips of land, along the Estonian/Latvian and Norwegian frontiers. Given Russia’s size, this hardly poses a severe threat, it is claimed.

Against this, others note that NATO’s aircraft are just a few minutes from the country’s second city, St. Petersburg. When the Soviet Union placed rockets in Cuba in the early 1960s, it was enough to make the US threaten war. One can hardly expect the Russians to react with complete equanimity.

In his celebrated “Hypotheses on Misperception,” Jervis noted that we all need to “develop an image of others and of their intentions,” but that this image is often faulty. Jervis drew up 13 hypotheses to explain why. A number of them are very relevant to the current crisis of Russian-Western relations.

The first problem, says Jervis, is that “decision makers tend to fit incoming information into their existing theories and images.” Furthermore, “there is an overall tendency for decision-makers to see other states as more hostile than they are.” Put these together and you have a toxic cocktail: if your existing theory is that another state is hostile, you will interpret any information you receive about that state in such a way as to confirm its hostility.

It’s easy to see how this fits the current state of Russian-Western relations. Each side has a negative image of the other, and each therefore interprets the other’s behavior in the worst possible way. For Russia, NATO expansion is a threat; the Maidan revolution in Ukraine was a plot engineered by the West; and so on. For NATO, the “annexation” of Crimea was the first step in a Russian plan of aggression against Europe, and Russian military exercises are not really exercises but a preliminary to a massive invasion of Ukraine.

Of course, there are other perfectly innocent explanations for all these things, but as Jervis comments, “actors tend to overlook the fact that evidence consistent with their theories may also be consistent with other views.” The Russian “build-up” of troops near Ukraine is much more likely to be a warning to Ukraine not to launch an assault on rebel Donbass than to be a preparation for an invasion. But the fact that it is consistent with Western perceptions of Russia as aggressive is enough to mean that this more realistic theory is never even considered.

This in turn reveals another problem. A lot of international politics is about signaling, but as Jervis points out, “when messages are sent from a different background of concerns and information than is possessed by the receiver, misunderstanding is likely.”

Take, for instance, NATO’s plans for missile defense systems in Europe. These are notionally a response to the threat of Iranian ballistic missiles. Russia, though, is worried that these systems might weaken its own deterrent capability, making it less able to retaliate in the event of a strike and tipping the scales of mutually assured destruction. To Russia, NATO’s concerns about Iran are ridiculous. But to NATO, Russia’s concerns are equally silly. The two sides thus end up talking past each other.

Or take another example. By deploying its forces near Ukraine, Moscow is signaling Kiev not to assault Donbass. But the message the West is getting is a different one: Russia is poised to attack. Likewise, the West thinks that by sending troops to the Baltic States, and threatening Russia with “massive consequences,” it is deterring Russian “aggression.” But the message that Moscow is getting is that the West is hell-bent on a confrontation. The signals sent are not the signals received.

What makes matters worse is that, as Jervis says, “when people spend a great deal of time drawing up a plan or making a decision, they tend to think that the message about it they wish to convey will be clear to the receiver.” Similarly, “when actors have intentions that they do not try to conceal from others, they tend to assume that others accurately perceive those intentions.”

In line with this, NATO and Russia assume that because they think that their message is clear, the other must understand it. If the other is acting otherwise, the only logical conclusion is that it is pretending not to understand, in order to justify its own hostile actions.

Since NATO thinks that it should be clear to everyone that it is a defensive organization, if Moscow insists on viewing it otherwise, that is further proof of Russia’s aggressive intentions. And likewise, since Russia thinks it is obvious that it has no intention of invading Ukraine, if NATO is saying the opposite, it must be because it is looking for an excuse to take action against Moscow.

To counter this, Jervis suggests that decision-makers should be aware of their own biases, avoid tying their policies to specific theories, and be more willing to examine situations from a variety of angles. None of this is exactly rocket science, but it does point us towards what’s wrong. Rather than being open to different views, we have become locked in a theory of ourselves as innately good and those with whom we disagree as innately evil.

As a result, we exaggerate threats, misinterpret signals, and fail to recognize that the signals we send are likely to be misunderstood. When others respond differently to how we desire, it reinforces our vision of them as hostile, causing more exaggeration, more misinterpretation, and so on ad infinitum. Jervis showed us how we got on this vicious cycle. It’s now up to us to find a way off.

Paul Robinson is a professor at the University of Ottawa. He writes about Russian and Soviet history, military history and military ethics, and is author of the Irrussianality blog.

December 15, 2021 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , , , | Leave a comment

How Domestic Surveillance of Journalists & Citizens Became Standard US Government Practice

By Ekaterina Blinova | Sputnik | December 14, 2021

Under the Trump administration, the Counter Network Division, a special unit within Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agency, used government databases intended for terrorist tracking to investigate 20 US-based journalists, Yahoo News revealed on Saturday.

CBP is the largest federal law enforcement agency in the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The bombshell revelation prompted ire among US news organisations, with AP’s executive editor, Julie Pace, urging DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to explain why the agency ran the name of an AP reporter through its databases. In its statement, the CBP claimed that the agency “does not investigate individuals without a legitimate and legal basis to do so.” However, according to AP, “this appears to be an example of journalists being targeted for simply doing their jobs, which is a violation of the First Amendment.”

Are US Federal Probes Turning Into Paranoia?

“The Department of Homeland Security has pretty much summed up America’s authoritarian drift since its creation in the wake of 9/11,” says Daniel Lazare, an independent journalist, author, and writer.

Lazare mocks the newly revealed operation, carried out by the Counter Network Division’s Jeffrey Rambo in 2017 and dubbed “Operation Whistle Pig,” adding that “the particulars of the case are less interesting than the general trend, which is toward greater and greater paranoia.” To illustrate his point the independent journalist refers to the FBI’s Operation Crossfire Hurricane into alleged Trump-Russia collusion which turned out to be what CNN described as a “big nothing burger”.

He also cites the US intelligence community and mainstream media attempts to depict New York Post’s allegations about Hunter Biden as “Russia disinformation.” Lazare also posits what he refers to as vain efforts by the Democrat-run US House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack as a means of steering public attention away from a question of “whether FBI or CIA informants helped egg on the insurrection.”

“So while the DHS has promised to call off its bloodhounds with regard to the AP, my sense is that paranoia will merely take on new forms as it continues to metastasize,” the writer says. “The problem can only get worse.”

Why US Federal Agencies are Tracking Independent Journalists

“Operation Whistle Pig” is just one of numerous surveillance efforts carried out by US federal agencies against journalists, notes former Department of Defence veteran analyst Karen Kwiatkowski.

“Utilising national technical means to track journalists, access their metadata to determine and identify their anonymous or protected sources, and using domestic law enforcement capabilities to monitor, pressure and prosecute journalists into revealing their sources has been done for more than just the previous administration,” Kwiatkowski says, referring to similar ops under the Obama administration.

In particular, the veteran DoD analyst refers to Pulitzer-Prize winning reporter James Risen, who was persecuted under the Obama administration over his refusal to reveal confidential sources. In February 2015, Risen called the Obama administration “the greatest enemy of press freedom.” Additionally, the Obama cabinet and also subsequent US administrations have targeted WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, seeking his extradition to the US.

Earlier this year, a scandal erupted over allegations of spying on Fox News host Tucker Carlson. In June the journalist claimed, citing an unnamed whistleblower within the US government, that the National Security Agency (NSA) was monitoring his electronic communications and had planned to leak them to the press to take his show off of the air for “political reasons.”

“This is increasingly standard practice for US administrations,” Kwiatkowski suggests. “However, in the case of US citizens, without FISA Court authorization, this kind of surveillance and targeting remains illegal and unconstitutional.”

While the US government usually justifies its conduct as matters of “national security,” in reality, according to the Pentagon veteran, it is protecting “government security” by chasing those who are leaking factual information that the US leadership finds “embarrassing”.

She refers to ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s revelation with regard to National Security Agency’s global spying programmes; Chelsea Manning’s exposure of Pentagon war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and WikiLeaks bombshells, including Vault 7, which detailed CIA hacking techniques and cyber-tools.

“Avoiding political embarrassment, and controlling a certain political narrative is, for most people in Washington DC, more important and more compelling than national security,” she stresses.

While mainstream journalism in the US “is well moderated and normally serves to promote the government narrative of whatever subject, be it health, national security or science and technology,” there are alternative media sources that occasionally manage to gain audience and traction, she offered.

Ironically, according to Kwiatkowski, US government agencies are keeping an eye on dissenting news sources and independent journalists akin to Washington’s Cold War-era rivals, whom the US leadership used to scold for their own lack of press freedom.

How US Government Agencies are Surveilling Americans

It’s not only journalists who are being surveilled by US government agencies, however, as a FISA compliance review written in November 2020 and declassified on 26 April 2021 revealed that the FBI used the NSA’s massive electronic troves for warrantless searches of US citizens’ information, despite having been previously censured by a court for such activities.

In May 2021, Democratic Senator Ron Wyden raised an alarm over what he described as the Pentagon’s warrantless spying on US citizens. The DoD reportedly used various software tools that used location data harvested from common apps installed on peoples’ phones. Wyden’s investigation also “confirmed the warrantless purchase of Americans’ location data by the Internal Revenue Service, Customs and Border Protection, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Defence Intelligence Agency,” according to the senator’s letter, addressed to Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III.

That same month, CNN reported that the Biden administration was considering using private firms to surveil “suspected domestic terrorists” online under the pretext that the DHS and the FBI, are limited in how they can monitor citizens online without a warrant. An unnamed source said to be familiar with the matter told the broadcaster that outside entities hired by federal authorities would be able to “legally” infiltrate private groups to gather vast amounts of information.

December 15, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Why the Russiagate Scandal Outranks the Rest

By J. Peder Zane | Real Clear Politics | December 8, 2021

Russiagate is the biggest scandal in American history.

Nothing comes close in size, scope or harm to the republic than the years-long effort to cripple Donald Trump’s presidency by claiming he conspired with an enemy state to steal the 2016 election and then do its bidding as commander-in-chief.

Its notorious predecessors – L’Affaire Lewinsky, Iran-Contra, Watergate, Teapot Dome, Crédit Mobilier, the XYZ Affair – involved relatively small numbers of malefactors engaged in specific acts of illegality and corruption (we still don’t know who, if anyone, planned the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol)

Russiagate, by contrast, is a vast conspiracy involving innumerable powerful forces, including the Democratic Party, NeverTrump Republicans, the Obama administration, the FBI, Department of Justice and the nation’s most prestigious news outlets.

Where previous scandals often ended with public accountability for the perpetrators – Watergate saw the imprisonment of top White House aides and President Nixon’s resignation – and public reforms, Russiagate has produced no such reckoning.

Russiagate began with a kernel of truth: Someone – probably Russians, though we still don’t know for sure – hacked the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s private server. Fearful of what might be released, the Clinton campaign tried to discredit any damaging material by raising dark questions about its source. (Joe Biden executed this same strategy to great effect when he falsely described the evidence of corruption found on his son Hunter’s laptop as “Russian disinformation.”)

In response, the Clinton campaign financed an absurd collection of conspiracy theories involving peeing prostitutes and billion-dollar bribes, the so-called Steele dossier. Its importance cannot be overstated – it was the dossier that linked the Trump campaign to the hacking. No dossier, no collusion theory.

During the summer and fall of 2016, Hillary’s henchmen fed this preposterous concoction to Obama administration officials in the DOJ, FBI, CIA and State Department. Everyone knew it was a political operation: Declassified notes showed that then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama in July 2016 that Clinton planned to tie Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.”

Clinton staffers – including Jake Sullivan, who now serves as Biden’s national security adviser – tried to interest the mainstream press in its scurrilous accusations, but got little traction because they could not be verified. Instead of laughing it all off as transparent campaign mud-slinging, however, the FBI joined the conspiracy. The bureau took the extreme step of opening a counter-intelligence probe into an ongoing presidential campaign – and its agents perjured themselves to obtain wire-tapping warrants.

Days after the November election, Hillary’s campaign focused on “Russian interference” as a chief reason for her defeat. On Jan. 5, 2017, President Obama, Vice President Biden and other key leaders met with FBI Director James Comey in the Oval Office to discuss Russia-related matters. We do not know what was discussed in that meeting, but the next day, Comey briefed President-elect Trump on some allegations in the Steele dossier. Four days later, on Jan. 10, CNN used that briefing as a news hook to report the collusion conspiracy theories as high-drama news.

Over the next few months and years, current and former officials illegally fed misleading classified material and partisan anonymous quotes to the New York Times, Washington Post, NBC News and other sympathetic press outlets to advance the narrative. Brennan and former National Director of Intelligence James Clapper became a constant presence on cable news, using the top-secret authority of their previous positions to assure the public that collusion was real – although in sworn testimony, Clapper admitted he had not seen such evidence.

Congressional Democrats, including Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Adam Schiff – who falsely claimed to have seen “more than circumstantial evidence” of Trump/Russia collusion – amplified the smears.

The appointment of Special Counsel Robert Mueller to investigate the fantasy in May 2017 fueled the fire. His effort became part of the scheme: He only looked for evidence that might implicate Trump, ignoring questions about who cooked up the conspiracy theory, how they disseminated it throughout the government and media, and the laws they might have broken in the process.

Despite his best effort, Mueller said he’d found no evidence of collusion when he released his report in April 2019. That should have killed the conspiracy theory and – following the script of previous major scandals – sparked a period of reflection by the government, the media and the American people that asked: How did we get this so wrong?

Such a broad reckoning has not yet happened. DoJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s 2020 report detailing grave abuses in the FBI’s handling of the matter prompted little outcry and no sweeping reform. The recent indictments of Clinton-connected actors filed by Special Counsel John Durham – who is finally doing the work Mueller should have, exposing the malfeasance that actually transpired during the 2016 campaign – have, bizarrely, led partisans to minimize his findings and actually double-down on the debunked collusion narrative. Recent pieces in The Atlantic and New York Times, for example, suggest, without evidence, that “Mueller never definitively got to the bottom of what happened.”

As Aaron Maté recently reported for RealClearInvestigations, many news organizations have refused to correct documented errors in Trump/Russia coverage, including deeply flawed articles thatwere awarded a Pulitzer Prize.

Leading peddlers of the hoax – including Brennan, Clapper, Pelosi, Schiff and Sullivan – have paid no price for their actions. To date, no one has conducted probing interviews with Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama about their roles in the scandal.

Engineered by broad swaths of the government and media, the effort to paint a sitting president as a foreign agent alone makes Russiagate the worst scandal in American history. But it is this second, still ongoing  phase – this willful effort to deny  what happened, this refusal to hold the  perpetrators accountable – that presents the most serious danger to our nation.

If truth and justice don’t matter, what does?

December 14, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , | Leave a comment

Is everyone a Russian agent now?

RT | November 28, 2021

In recent years, governments have created armies of online warriors designed to fact-check alleged Russian ‘disinformation.’ Worryingly, these guardians of the truth are often more dangerous than the threat they claim to combat.

Most analysts grounded in reality accept that Russia is not about to invade Ukraine. Still, the breathless speculation to the contrary in much of the Western media this month has had the virtue of concentrating a few minds. Suddenly alert to the seriousness of the situation, a few of the more sensible commentators have come to the conclusion that the West ought perhaps to reconsider its policy towards Ukraine. The result has been an outpouring of bile that brings to light the difficulty of having an intelligent conversation on anything involving Russia.

A case in point is the reaction to an article last week by the RAND Corporation’s Samuel Charap. Writing for Politico, Charap suggested that the United States should help end the war in eastern Ukraine by using its leverage to persuade the Ukrainian government to fulfil its obligations under the 2015 Minsk II agreement, according to which Ukraine is meant to grant “special status” – i.e. political autonomy – to the rebel region of Donbass.

This is hardly a novel proposal. Others have been saying the same thing for several years. But the RAND Corporation, for which Charap works, has long been considered the intellectual heart of the American military industrial complex. This gave his article a certain oomph, being seen in some circles as a betrayal of Ukraine from within the core of the American system.

While some people welcomed Charap’s piece, others were furious. Comparisons with Hitler were soon spreading over the internet. Stephen Blank of the Center for European Policy Analysis – a think tank funded by the likes of Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and the US Department of Defense – penned an article in which he claimed that “Appeasement of Russia would deliver exactly the same outcome as the betrayal of Czechoslovakia at Munich – dishonor and disaster.” “The consequences of following Charap’s advice,” says Blank, would be no less than “the dismantling of the post-Cold War settlement. … The international rules-based order would end.”

Others were not content with mere hyperbole, and sought instead to name and shame the appeasers who had had the temerity to promote Charap’s article. An example was the Ukrainian information warfare outfit Stop Fake which produced a hit piece entitled ‘Are we ready to die for Kyiv? How Twitter is helping to push the West towards surrendering Ukraine.’ In this, Stop Fake denounced journalists who had tweeted links to Charap’s essay, saying that “Kremlin-friendly actors turned it into a mainstream theme.”

Among the “Kremlin-friendly actors,” Stop Fake singled out RT’s Bryan MacDonald, The Independent’s Mary Dejevsky, Meduza’s Kevin Rothrock, Latvian-based Russian journalist Leonid Ragozin, bne Intellinews’s Ben Aris, and the Atlantic Council’s Emma Ashford. One can see why Ukrainian info-warriors might have a beef with someone from RT, and it’s probably fair to say that Dejevsky is relatively fair to Russia as British journalists go. But Stop Fake’s attempts to portray its targets as propagators of “Kremlin metanarratives” is absurd.

Rothrock’s Meduza, for instance, is decidedly hostile to the Russian government. So too is Ragozin, who has often used Twitter to boost the cause of imprisoned activist Alexey Navalny. This, however, didn’t prevent Stop Fake from denouncing him as “just another Kremlin mouthpiece.” And as far as NATO lobby group the Atlantic Council is concerned, to call it “Kremlin-friendly” is like praising cats as “mouse-friendly.” Ridiculous doesn’t begin to describe Stop Fake’s position.

Unfortunately, though, it’s pretty much par for the course for the organization, as for so many others who make up what one might call the “disinformation industry” – that is to say the large and well-funded network of institutions that has sprung up in the past five or six years to supposedly protect democratic societies from the insidious danger of foreign “influence operations.”

Although these institutions purport to be doing valuable work exposing “fake news,” analysis of their output reveals that much of what they produced is decidedly biased. Their own opinions are taken for absolute truth, and anything that disagrees with their interpretation of reality is denounced as “disinformation.” In the process, these organizations spread disinformation of their own.

A report by British academics, for instance, determined that, “The EU’s main task force for fighting Russian disinformation is in danger of becoming a source for disinformation itself, and so of skewing policy decisions in the EU and the UK, as well as distorting public discourse throughout Europe.” The EU’s disinformation outfit, EUvsDisinfo, was guilty of “blatant distortion,” said the report, adding that “the EU is not alone” in this regard.

Indeed, one can find many examples beyond Stop Fake and EUvsDisinfo. The problem is that the disinformation industry does not for the most part consist of independent researchers objectively determining the accuracy of what appears in the media and on the internet. Rather, many of its members are political activists pursuing an extreme agenda and using their power and influence to attempt to silence those who do not agree one hundred percent with them. In this sense, the disinformation industry is quite dangerous. By supporting it, states are elevating entirely unsuitable persons to the position of semi-official guardians of the truth, in the process severely constraining the parameters of public debate.

Take, for instance, the issue of Russia and Ukraine. As the reaction to Charap’s article shows, even people who are far from being “Kremlin-friendly” find themselves being denounced as such if they deviate even slightly from the preferred narrative. This serves to silence voices urging restraint and to block any proposals which offer a peaceful solution to the war in Donbass, on the dubious grounds that any move towards peace is a dissemination of “Kremlin metanarratives.”

Since Donald Trump’s election as US president in 2016, much of the Western world has been in the grip of exaggerated fear of foreign “influence” and “disinformation.” To combat this, governments have empowered zealots who do their utmost to maintain a constant state of international tension. Sadly, as the Ukrainian example shows, the cure is proving to be even worse than the disease.

November 28, 2021 Posted by | Russophobia | | Leave a comment

The Spy Business

Just follow the money

BY PHILIP GIRALDI • UNZ REVIEW • NOVEMBER 23, 2021

I have been following the story regarding the arrest of the sub-source who reportedly provided much of the apparently fabricated “intelligence” that went into the Christopher Steele dossier that was commissioned by Hillary Clinton and the DNC to get the dirt on GOP candidate Donald Trump. The real story is, of course, that the Democrats used their incumbency in the presidency to illegally involve various national security agencies in the process of defaming Trump, but for the time being we have to be content with the detention of Russian born Virginia resident Igor Danchenko for the crime of lying to the FBI.

My problem is that apart from the lying, which might be categorized in a file labeled “Everyone Lies to the Police,” I can’t quite figure out what the poor sod did that was criminal. I have reconstructed the sequence of events as follows: A business intelligence research firm Fusion GPS originally began researching Trump’s possible ties with Russia during the primary elections on behalf of a conservative who wanted to damage Trump’s campaign. After Trump became the Republican nominee, the original funder discontinued the search, but Fusion GPS was hired to keep going by the Perkins Coie law firm, which was working for the Hillary Clinton campaign. Christopher Steele, former MI-6 officer with a good reputation and reported access to information coming from Russia among other places, was sub-contracted by Fusion to assist in the effort by compiling a dossier containing defamatory material on Trump. As he had limited access to the kind of sleaze that was being sought, Steele contacted a known intelligence researcher who appeared to have such access. That was Danchenko, an analyst who specialized in Russia, whom Steele subsequently described as his “primary sub-source.” Danchenko had worked for the Washington DC based and Democratic Party linked Brookings Institution from 2005 until 2010 and was considered reliable.

Steele tasked Danchenko with finding out details about Trump and the Russians, to include possible contacts with the Kremlin’s intelligence services during a trip to Moscow in 2013 where the Trump Organization was hosting the Miss Universe contest. Danchenko did just that to Steele’s satisfaction, which also pleased Steele’s clients. The information collected subsequently was incorporated into what became the notorious Steele Dossier and was used by the FBI among others to make a case against Donald Trump and his associates. Among other initiatives, the Bureau used the file, which it knew to be largely innuendo, as justification to obtain a secret surveillance court order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court (FISA) which authorized a wiretap targeting former Trump adviser Carter Page.

The only problem was that some of the information was fabricated, apparently by Danchenko, though that is by no means clear. The fake material included the notorious anecdote about Trump urinating on a prostitute in the bed that Barak Obama had slept in when he had visited the Russian capital. The assumption was that Trump would have been photographed in flagrante and the Kremlin would have been able to use the material to blackmail him. Other parts of the final dossier were also discovered to be false.

Making something up in a criminal investigation might be wrong, even criminal, but both Steele and Danchenko were private citizens with no legal status at the time. It was up to Steele to validate the information he was receiving. As for Danchenko, he was one of numerous former officials of various governments that have set themselves up profitably as intelligence peddlers. Some of them make a very nice living from it and many of them are quite willing to bend the facts to make a client happy. In my own experience in CIA I have run into many intelligence peddlers in Europe and the Middle East and they all use the same MO, namely mixing confirmable factual information with fabricated information so the former validates the latter. Since leaving government, I have also worked for three private security firms in the US and I would suggest that at least two of them would have been quite willing to slant what they were discovering to fit what the client was seeking to find. Such behavior is not at all unusual in the business since ex-intelligence officers and policemen tend to have a history of operating with little oversight and minimum accountability.

In this case, the charges cited in the indictment derived from statements made by Danchenko describing the sources he claimed to have used in providing sensitive information to Steele’s United Kingdom investigative firm with which he had contracted to prepare what are identified in the indictment as “Company Reports.” The implication would of course be that he had no actual sources and instead used his creative writing skills to come up with some suitable narratives relating to Trump’s behavior. Danchenko, for his part, reportedly claimed to investigators that it was Steele who overstated the information that had been provided from confidential Russian sources which was in the nature of “raw intelligence,” not a finished product. Be that as it may, the final dossier was a concoction of verifiable facts mixed with gossip, rumors and sheer speculation. Danchenko also denied knowing who was paying for the investigation even though it appears that he had had contact with several Clinton associates, most notably one Charles H. Dolan, who may have actually suggested to the investigators what type of “information” was being sought.

The arrest came as part of the special counsel John Durham investigation into Russiagate and related matters, most specifically the claim that Russian intelligence agencies had interfered in the 2016 election. This latest activity comes after Durham’s recent charging of Hillary Clinton’s former campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann in an indictment that alleges that he lied to federal investigators in September 2016, when he gave them information that he falsely claimed showed a connection between the Trump Organization and Alfa Bank in Russia.

So the takeaway from all of this is that there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians to subvert the 2016 election. On the contrary, it was Hillary Clinton’s campaign that sought the dirt on Trump and used a largely fraudulent dossier to make its case. And, oh yes, President Barack Obama knew exactly what was going on, which led to the completely illegal involvement of the intelligence and law enforcement federal agencies. And you can bet that if Obama knew, so did his Vice President Joe Biden. And the former head of CIA John Brennan and FBI head James Comey, who corruptly engaged their agencies in the conspiracy, are still walking free instead of in jail where they should be. And as for Hillary… I will leave that up to the reader.

Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation (Federal ID Number #52-1739023) that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is councilforthenationalinterest.org, address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its email is inform@cnionline.org.

November 23, 2021 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Russophobia, Timeless or most popular | , , , | Leave a comment

Theater of Absurd… Pentagon Demands Russia Explain Troops on Russian Soil

Strategic Culture Foundation | November 19, 2021

The United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin this week performed impressive, albeit pathetic, mental gymnastics. In a press conference, the Pentagon chief called on Russia to be more transparent about troop movements “on the border with Ukraine”. In others words, on Russian soil.

Meanwhile, the absurd hypocrisy sees U.S. and NATO forces brazenly escalating their offensive presence on Russia’s borders, especially in the Black Sea region.

Here’s an Associated Press clip on the Pentagon press conference: “American officials are unsure why Russian President Vladimir Putin is building up military forces near the border with eastern Ukraine but view it as another example of troubling military moves that demand Moscow’s explanation, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Wednesday.”

The report quotes Austin as saying: “We’ll continue to call on Russia to act responsibly and be more transparent on the buildup of the forces around on the border of Ukraine… We’re not sure exactly what Mr Putin is up to.”

This dubious talent for mind-bending mental gymnastics and double-think is shared with other members of the Biden administration. Last week, America’s top diplomat Antony Blinken claimed that Russia was about to invade Ukraine yet at the same time the U.S. Secretary of State confessed similar ignorance about what “Putin is up to”.

How is it possible to engage in meaningful dialogue with such vacuous people who are supposed to be government leaders – and leaders too of the self-declared world’s most powerful, most brilliant nation? No undue offense intended, but it would probably be more productive to engage in a dialogue with the bewildering characters from Samuel Beckett’s absurdist play Waiting for Godot.

Russia has repeatedly dismissed all claims about it threatening Ukraine or any other country with invasion. Moscow also disputes “unreliable” information touted by the Biden administration and Western media of troop buildup near Ukraine on its western flank. Western media reports have relied on dodgy commercial satellite data purporting to show Russian military maneuvers. It is contemptible that senior U.S. government figures are basing grave allegations against Russia on such ropy sources. That in itself speaks volumes about the deterioration in Washington’s diplomatic professionalism and political intelligence.

Secondly, the salient fact being missed in all the hullabaloo is this: Russian troops and equipment are on Russia’s sovereign territory. It is the height of absurdity for U.S. officials to demand that Russia “explain” and be “more transparent” about its own national defenses. That speaks of a hyper-arrogance among American politicians that are deforming their ability to think reasonably.

There is an analogy here with the outcry this week over Russia’s successful missile test against a Soviet-era satellite in orbit. The Biden administration condemned Russia for creating “space junk” and weaponizing space while ignoring the fact that the U.S. previously carried out the same kind of missile strike and, arguably has been trying to weaponize space since the Reagan administration’s “star wars” program during the 1980s.

In any case, the U.S. charges of Russia’s military buildup on its own territory are made all the more ridiculous when we consider the actual increase in NATO forces in Ukraine and the Black Sea region – right on Russia’s western doorstep.

In a major speech this week delivered at the Russian foreign ministry, President Putin noted again how Western powers have continually failed to register Moscow’s national security concerns over the expansion of NATO forces along Russia’s borders. He described this inability for cognition of what should be an obvious grievance as “very peculiar”.

The Kremlin has suggested that the increasing NATO offensive presence near Russia’s borders is not due to stupidity, but rather is aimed at provoking a conflict. Russia is strenuously resisting the danger of an armed confrontation, and yet the provocations continue.

Nearly two weeks ago, William Burns, the head of the CIA made a high-profile visit to Moscow during which he held discussions with senior Kremlin figures, including President Putin. We can safely assume that Burns was told in no uncertain terms that the buildup of U.S. and NATO forces near Russia’s territory is a red line that will presage a response from Russia.

But these red lines continue to be skirted by Washington and its NATO allies.

More perplexing, too, are the moves by the U.S.-backed Kiev regime to escalate the conflict in Ukraine against the ethnic Russian population in the separatist Donbas region. The ultranationalist regime has been waging a low-intensity war against the Donbas since the U.S.-backed coup in Kiev in 2014. The Americans and other NATO powers are increasing weapon supplies and military trainers to the regime, emboldening it to repudiate any peaceful settlement of the eight-year conflict.

Only last month, Pentagon chief Austin was in Kiev where he recklessly endorsed the joining of the NATO bloc by Ukraine. That is in spite of numerous warnings from Moscow that such a move would be an unacceptable destabilization.

The stepped-up war drills by NATO in the Black Sea region are inevitably leading the Kiev regime to resile from legally binding commitments to the Minsk Peace accord of 2015 – brokered by Russia, Germany and France. The release this week of diplomatic communications by the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov clearly demonstrates that Germany and France are complicit in turning a blind eye to the Kiev regime’s systematic violation of the Minsk deal.

In this context, Russia is justifiably deeply wary of a confrontation exploding out of the tinderbox conditions in Ukraine and the Black Sea. Given the Russian nation’s tragic history of suffering from past military invasions, it is entirely understandable and indeed vitally prudent that the country’s formidable defenses are on high alert.

It is not for Russia to explain its troops. It is for the United States and its NATO partners to account for their wanton aggression and to desist.

There is something of the theater of absurd in American and European posturing. But it’s far from funny. It’s menacingly deranged.

November 21, 2021 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia | , , , , | Leave a comment

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