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Trump’s Syrian Pullout is a Game Changer

By M.K. Bhadrakumar | News Click | December 2018

US President Donald Trump’s announcement on Wednesday regarding the withdrawal of American military forces from Syria has predictably run into strong headwinds in the Washington Beltway. A formidable coalition appeared overnight – comprising the Deep State, US defence and security establishment, leading members of the Congress, major media organs –branding Trump as a maverick. However, the fact of the matter is that Trump made a considered decision.

Basically, it is a political call on his part to advance his consistent stance that the US should not intervene in the Syrian conflict – a stance, we may recall, which Michael Flynn had begun fleshing out even before the Trump presidency began in January last year. Why is Trump asserting his political will?

Clearly, Turkey’s threat to launch an operation “any moment” to crush the US’ Kurdish allies and the deployment of Turkish troops on the Syrian border profoundly influenced Trump’s decision-making. (See my blog There’s no quick fix to US-Turkish tensions.)

Trump made a phone call to Turkish President Recep Erdogan last Friday to urge restraint and signaling a change of course in the US’ Syrian policy. Erdogan later nodded satisfaction over the phone conversation. The point is, the Turkish threat to attack Kurdish groups inside Syria makes the ground situation completely untenable for the US military. The options for the Pentagon will be either to intervene on behalf of its Kurdish proxies and confront the Turkish military (which is senseless), or to watch passively the complete demolition of the zone encompassing one-third of Syria that the US carved out for itself through the past year or more.

More to the point, there is every likelihood of US forces, numbering 2,000 soldiers and spread thinly on the ground, getting caught in the crossfire between the Turkish military and its affiliated Syrian opposition groups on one side and Kurdish fighters on the other. If the Turks vanquish and scatter the Kurdish groups, the US will be left with no local allies. And it will be a only matter of time before the isolated US “bases” in Syria numbering over a dozen will face harassment and predatory attacks by the battle-hardened Shi’ite militia trained and equipped by Iran. It can turn out to be a situation like the attack on the Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983.

The spectre that haunts Trump is of body bags of American soldiers killed in Syria coming home, which of course, will be spelling doom for his re-election bid in the 2020 election. Trump understands that there is a Russian-Turkish-Iranian convergence to evict the US forces from Syria and the only way to counter it can be by committing boots on the ground in much larger numbers, which is of course unrealistic.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon has been pursuing an invidious agenda of creating a quagmire for the Russians in Syria and acting, therefore, as a “spoiler” in any whichever way it can to frustrate the Russian-Turkish-Iranian efforts to stabilize Syria. Time and again, it became apparent that the US forces in Syria maintain covert links with extremist groups, provide cover for them, and disrupt the operations by the Syrian government forces fighting terrorism. The US role in Al-Tanf on the Syrian-Iraqi border is dubious, shameful and cowardly, to say the least.

Quite obviously, the Mission Creep pursed by the Pentagon commanders have come to a point where real danger exists today of direct clashes erupting at any moment involving US forces arrayed against the Russian / Turkish / Iranian / Syrian forces. An extremely risky venture of brinkmanship by the Pentagon commanders has been afoot. There is no way Turkey can compromise with the US-Kurdish axis in Syria. Nor are Russian and Iran going to throw away their hard-earned victory in the Syrian conflict to strengthen the government led by President Bashar Al-Assad. In a major speech in Moscow on Tuesday while addressing Russian Defence Board, President Vladimir Putin touched on the Syrian situation, underscoring, “We will give Syrians all the support they need.” (See my blog Putin warns US against misadventures.)

Equally, Trump cannot be unaware that there is growing uncertainty about the Saudis bankrolling the US operations in Syria, what with the growing tensions in the US-Saudi relations over the Jamal Khashoggi affair. Qatar and Jordan have already pulled out of the “regime change” project in Syria. Suffice to say, Israel is the only American ally in the region, which is today keen on an open-ended US military intervention in Syria.

Trump has been paying a lot of attention lately to mend the fractured Turkish-American ties and to revive the alliance, if possible. Step by step, he has been clearing the debris that had accumulated during the Obama presidency. The extradition of Islamist preacher Fetullah Gulen is a major obstacle, but even here Trump appears to have set the ball rolling. On December 18, Pentagon announced the clearance for a possible sale of the Patriot air and missile defence system to Turkey, notwithstanding Turkey’s purchase of S-400 ABM system from Russia. Trump is also addressing the detention in the US of a top executive of Halk Bank, which has serious political overtones for Erdogan personally. Unsurprisingly, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu acknowledged publicly on December 18 that the climate of bilateral relations is “much, much better” of late. Cavusoglu disclosed that a visit by Trump to Turkey is on the cards.

Having said that, the US’ continued alliance with the Kurdish militia is a red line for Turkey and the relations between Ankara and Washington can never be normal so long as this “unholy alliance” (as Turks perceive it) continues. Ankara will suspect the US intentions toward Turkey so long as Pentagon treats the Kurds as strategic allies, no matter the tactical reasons proffered by the Pentagon commanders.

Trump understands this. And it largely explains his decision to cut the Gordian knot. Significantly, Cavusoglu discussed the US withdrawal plans in Syria with US Secretary of State Mike Pence within hours of the news of Trump’s decision.

The heart of the matter is that the US’ regional strategies can never be optimal without Turkey, which has been a “swing” state. Turkey has a vital role to play not only in the Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean but also in the Black Sea and the Balkans. Above all, Turkey is a NATO power and the alliance loses traction in the southern tier if Ankara does not take active interest, which has been the case in the most recent period. Therefore, on balance, US’ regional strategies have much, much more to gain out of Trump’s decision to disengage from direct military intervention in Syria and to resuscitate the relations with Turkey and re-energize the old partnership.

Of course, interest groups and war profiteers (“military-industrial complex”) in the US will castigate Trump for his decision to order the halt of the gravy train. But their main argument that residual terrorism still remains in Syria is a phony one bordering on rank hypocrisy. For, it is a matter of time before Russia and Iran and the Syrian government forces with their affiliated militia will make mincemeat out of the terrorist groups that have taken shelter in the US- controlled zone in eastern Syria as well as destroy the US-backed extremist groups ensconced in Idlib. Plainly put, the fight against terrorism will be taken to its logical conclusion as soon as the US forces get out of the way and the Pentagon is prevented from playing the spoiler’s role.

Therefore, paradoxically, the decision to pull out from Syria and the rebooting of the Turkish-American alliance can only improve the US’ capacity to influence the Syrian peace process, and regional politics in general. Interestingly, Trump’s announcement came just as agreement was reached in Geneva on the composition of the committee to write a new constitution for Syria, which is a defining moment in the UN-brokered peace process.

December 20, 2018 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Turkey and Russia Push Towards a Resolution in Syria

By Tom LUONGO | Strategic Culture Foundation | 19.12.2018

Turkish-US relations are terrible and deteriorating by the day despite bromides to the contrary. Actions speak louder than words. And that has been all President Trump seems capable of anymore, words not actions.

Since the beginning of l’affair Khashoggi Turkey has been extracting concession after concession from the US as the Trump administration tries to salvage its soon-to-be-unveiled Middle East peace plan.

The latest concession may be the biggest. There’s a report out now that the Trump administration is readying the extradition of cleric Fethulah Gulen, who President Erdogan believes was behind the coup attempt against him in July of 2016.

The US has protected Gulen well beyond any reasonable measure for someone not in their pay so Erdogan’s claims ring true enough. I’ve always thought he was a US intelligence asset and that the US were the ones truly behind the coup attempt.

And since the Trump administration has been desperate to get the Turks to stop leaking details of the Khashoggi murder, Erdogan has pretty much had a free hand to conduct business as he’s seen fit for the past two-plus months.

Whether the US ever returns Gulen to Ankara or not is actually irrelevant; keeping it a sore spot open is its biggest value while Turkey prepares an assault against US-backed YPG forces in Manbij, Syria.

It helps raise Turkey’s position with the other countries involved in the Astana peace process for Syria while keeping Trump, his foreign policy mental midgets and Saudi Arabia on their collective back foot.

Turkey has grown increasingly restless about the US’s lack of movement in turning Manbij over to them. And have now unleashed attacks on Kurdish forces in Northern Iraq to hamper them further.

All of this is making the US presence in eastern Syria more untenable over time while the Saudis struggle with falling oil prices and no longer want to pay the bill for the US’s proxy war.

Don’t kid yourself, the US is struggling to keep its financial pressure up on Iran.

If these things weren’t enough Turkish Prime Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said recently that Ankara was now willing to work with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad if he survives “democratic and credible” elections. This is rich coming from Turkey, but whatever.

The importance of this statement, however, cannot be overstated. Turkey was one of the major partners in the mission to destroy Syria. And now they have joined with Russia, Iran and China in negotiating the peace process.

They have gone from “Assad must go!” to “Assad can stay.” It is an admission that the US plan for balkanization of Syria will eventually fail and that their best bet is putting maximum pressure on the US to give up its regional plans.

Russia, of course, stands behind Turkey in this and they themselves are now upping the costs on the US and the Israelis. Because, it is now Russian policy to assist Syrian Arab Army forces in proportional retaliation against Israeli aggression in Syrian territory, according to Elijah Magnier.

No longer will the Russians stand aside and allow Israel a free hand over bombing what it says are Hezbollah and Iranian targets within Syria. The SAA will now strike back with a proportional response.

An airport for an airport, as it were.

What started as a State Department operation to install a puppet government and sow chaos in Syria under Hillary Clinton then became one to drain Russian and Iranian resources by wasting their time under John Kerry.

Today, that US/Israeli/Saudi strategy has been turned on its head.

It is now the US and the Saudis that are feeling the pinch of yet another quagmire without end. Moreover, the Israeli security situation is now worse than it was before all of this started in the first place. This necessitates an even more unhinged response from Washington which it cannot defend to the American people as to why we need to stay in Syria forever.

None of this is what President Trump campaigned on. None of this is what candidate and citizen Trump argued for.

The real war of attrition was never about physical resources and money. It was always about time. The Iranians and Russians have played for time. Time brought out the truth about the Syrian invasion. It exposed the real causes of the conflict.

The hope now for the US is that financial pressure will get Iran to knuckle under. But, look at what is happening. Oil prices are in freefall as the global economy slows down thanks to debt saturation, a rising dollar and increasing opposition in the West to neoliberalism and globalism.

Trump whines about this because it upsets his mercantilist plans to corner the energy markets while weaponizing the use of the dollar.

EU technocrats who fancy themselves the inheritors of a waning US empire, bristle under Trump’s plans. They will build an alternative payment vehicle to buy goods and services from sanctioned entities. This is about much more than Iranian oil.

So, while Trump, Bolton, Mnuchin and Pompeo, the Four Horsemen of the Foreign Policy Apocalypse, think they are winning this war on commerce, all they are doing is falling into the very trap Putin, Xi and Rouhani have set for them.

Again, they playing for time. The dollar is the US’s strength and also its Achilles’ heel. And if you are playing for time it is to build alternative channels for trade, oil, gas and whatever else the US deems against its interests without need for dollars.

Trump’s energy dominance plan is as transparent as his narcissism. More likely the sanctions exemptions for buying Iranian oil will be extended in May because he can’t have a global crisis be his fault as he prepares for re-election in 2020.

But, that’s exactly what he’s setting up.

So, now back to Syria.

Those who were set up to be scapegoats – namely Qatar and Turkey – washed their hands of the operation quickly, made deals with Russian President Vladimir Putin and charted their own independent paths. By the time the truth about US involvement in Syria was exposed they were long gone and only the real perpetrators left holding onto poor positions and worse arguments.

All Trump can do now is openly admit that we’re there on behalf of Israel and Saudi Arabia to get Iran. That’s it. He can sell that to part of his base. But, not enough of them to win re-election.

His peace plan is DOA. It died along with the 15 Russian airmen on that IL-20 back in August. I’ll be surprised if it is ever actually announced. That one event set us on this path. It permanently poisoned Russian/Israeli relations as Netanyahu overplayed his hand assisting NATO in a needless provocation which nearly sparked a wider war.

Reports are that Putin doesn’t return his phone calls and now dictates to Bibi what happens next. This also tells me Putin now has control over his Israeli fifth columnists within the Kremlin otherwise this order would never have been issued and made public.

Now Netanyahu is hemmed in on all sides and the Saudis are political pawns between the warring factions of the US government – Trump who wants an Arab NATO and the Deep State that wants him on a platter. Their benefactor, Trump, is in an increasingly untenable position who will soon be forced to choose between hot war and impeachment.

Meanwhile, Iran, Turkey and Russia will continue to bleed out the US forces in Syria while sanctions prove to be increasingly less effective. Simultaneously, the Astana process moves forward with all groups trying to reach out to each other around the sclerotic reach of the US and put an end to this shameful period of US foreign policy insanity.

December 19, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Europeans refusing fuel to Iranian aircraft: Official

Press TV – December 18, 2018

Iran’s airspace remains open to all international flights, including US airliners, but most European countries refuse fuel to Iranian planes, an official says.

“Iran’s sky is open to all countries, except Israel,” head of the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization (CAO) Ali Abedzadeh said.

Currently, American airplanes are also passing through the Iranian sky and Iran has not imposed restrictions on any country, the official said. Likewise, no country has put any restrictions on the passage of Iranian planes.

However, “unfortunately, most European countries are refusing to supply fuel to Iranian aircraft and this creates problems for us, for which we have plans to overcome,” Abedzadeh said.

Fuel service providers in Europe and some other countries are citing new US sanctions in refusing to refuel Iranian aircraft.

“US goal is to cut off foreign flights of Iranian airlines,” Abedzadeh said.

Iran is already angry with the EU over its failure to stop European companies from leaving the Islamic Republic.

For months, the Europeans have been working on a virtual clearing house to process Iran-related transactions independent of the US.

The three main countries behind the initiative – Germany, France and the UK – say they have set up a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to facilitate non-dollar trade with Iran.

However, they appear to be passing the buck on who should take the responsibility for the system and house it.

Last month, Iran’s nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi said he had warned the Europeans that Iranian patience was wearing thin.

Salehi said while the European Union’s efforts were encouraging, “we have not yet seen any tangible results.”

Iran is disappointed with a mass exodus of major European companies which began even before the sanctions kicked in after President Donald Trump announced pulling the US out of the nuclear deal in May.

On Monday, national flag carrier Iran Air Chief Executive Farzaneh Sharafbafi called on the European Union to press US authorities to allow delivery of Airbus passenger aircraft purchased by Tehran.

European commercial aircraft manufacturer Airbus signed a contract to sell 100 passenger aircraft to Iran Air after a 2015 nuclear deal was reached with the Islamic Republic.

The US revoked licenses for Airbus as well as Boeing which had signed the delivery of 80 planes to Iran Air after Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal.

“We hope that the EU can get the OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) licenses for delivery of purchased Airbus planes,” Sharafbafi said.

The official urged the EU to press US authorities, “as OFAC licenses were issued for ATR planes” built by the Franco-Italian turboprop maker which had signed to deliver 20 planes to Iran Air.

ATR delivered 13 aircraft, some of which came after OFAC had withdrawn the licenses, with the rest remaining on order.

Airbus delivered only three aircraft before the licenses were withdrawn. The Europeans say they have to get American permits for their deliveries because 10 percent of the components of the aircraft are US-made.

On Wednesday, a top official said Iran needs some 500 planes and would likely back buying the Sukhoi Superjet 100 if Russia is willing to sell them to its airlines.

Russian officials have been reported as saying Sukhoi is working on reducing the number of US parts in the hopes of winning an Iranian order for up to 100 aircraft.

“If the Iranian airlines want to use this aircraft (Superjet 100 ) and the seller is willing to sell it to Iran, the Civil Aviation Organization is ready to issue its final comment on this aircraft,” Abedzadeh said.

December 18, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

US Sanctions Against Iran

By Linh Dinh • Unz Review • December 18, 2018

Last month, I was interviewed by Jamejam Daily, an Iranian newspaper. Below is the English version:

There are calls inside and outside the country that Iranian officials would do well to get real about the US demands and drink the coup of poison sooner rather than later. They say the US “maximum pressure campaign” has already inflicted acute strains on Iran’s economy. What’s your view? What should Iran do? Will Iran prove capable of enduring the sanctions?

The US is withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal because of pressure from Israel, that’s all. As long as Israel exists, Iran will be targeted. Israel was behind the American war against Iraq and Libya, and it’s seeking to destroy Syria and Iran also. Israel was founded on terror, and is maintained by terror, so peace won’t come to the Middle East until Israel disappears.

The renewal of American sanctions against Iran is causing problems to the entire world, not just Iran, and that’s why it will end up hurting America the most. There are all these countries that need to trade with Iran, and many will continue to do so, in defiance of the USA. Already, America is forced to allow China, India, Italy, Greece, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Turkey to buy Iranian oil, at least for six more months. This, after it has threatened to reduce Iranian oil export to zero!

European countries are talking about setting up an alternative to the SWIFT payment system, and it will happen, for the world needs to bypass American control and interference, not just in this instance, but for the future.

US officials have openly talked about the need for regime change in Iran. It seems they currently hope that the Iranian people will distance from the government and pressure for change from within the country will yield results. Are such hopes realistic? Will the US see the end of the Islamic Republic without shooting even a single bullet?

By waging economic war against Iran, the US and its Israeli master are hoping to sow discord and division with Iran, but no Iranian should believe the American rhetoric about human rights and democracy. The US has been demonizing not just Iran, but all Muslims, for decades, so it’s not aiming to help Iranians, but destroy them. Look at what’s happening to Syria. When the US attacked Iraq, Syria accepted hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees, but now, Syrians themselves are fleeing their homeland. I saw many of these refugees, including children, begging on the streets of Istanbul.

Preaching freedom and democracy, America brings death and destruction. Look at what’s happening in Ukraine. When I visited Kiev, I saw people, including old women, kneeling on the sidewalks, begging, in the middle of the winter, as snow was falling. America brings war and economic collapse, and it would love nothing more than to see Iran destroyed.

Some believe Iran and its allies will be able to shape the new world order in case they manage to resist the US pressure and pass the current stage. What’s your take on that?

As led by China and Russia, the Eurasian landmass is becoming economically integrated, and Iran is a key player in this, thanks to its oil, natural gas, size and geographical location. Although hampered for decades by American-led sanctions, Iran still has one of the strongest economies in the Middle East.

Iran will certainly survive these sanctions, which are already cracking. By standing up to the US and Israel, Iran is setting an admirable example to the rest of the world, and its stature will only increase as the American empire declines further.

Linh Dinh’s latest book is Postcards from the End of America. He maintains a regularly updated photo blog.

December 18, 2018 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Why the United States Has Not Won a Real War Since 1945

By Philip Giraldi | American Herald Tribune | December 16, 2018

If anyone is still wondering why the United States has not won a real war since 1945, I offer up the example of retired U.S. Army Colonel Wes Martin, who writes for Town Hall and reportedly also has appeared as an expert commentator on Fox. Town Hall is a purveyor of a certain type of “American conservatism.” It was founded by the Heritage Foundation on the principle that the United States is ordained by God as uber alles. Though it features many good writers and even genuine conservatives it occasionally goes off the rails. Its latest incarnation features an article entitled “Obama-loving country music star Tim McGraw partners with terror-sponsoring communists.”

Colonel Martin’s bio includes his service as the Senior Antiterrorism Officer for all Coalition Forces in Iraq and Commander of Camp Ashraf, which is where the military arm of the Mojahedin e Khalq (MEK) terrorist group was camped while Saddam Hussein was still in power. MEK, consisting of Iranian dissidents, was being used by Saddam to carry out low-intensity warfare against Iran. It was placed under American military protection after the fall of Baghdad in 2003.

Martin’s latest foray in Mullah-bashing is a December 10th article entitled “Iran’s Continuing Misinformation Campaign.” It is a defense of MEK, which he describes as a victim of Iranian propaganda. Martin frames his argument around a critique of a November 9th report entitled “Terrorists, cultists – or champions of Iranian democracy? The wild, wild story of the MEK” that appeared in The Guardian, but, in reality, most of his piece is about himself. The Guardian article, written by Arron Merat, provides an in-depth analysis of MEK, how it developed, and what it is doing today. It does, to be sure, come down on the side of MEK being both a cult and a terror organization, which is what Martin disputes.

Martin’s article, like all of his pieces appearing on Town Hall, is nearly unreadable. It includes gems like “The Iranian dissidents have a primary target of the ayatollahs misinformation campaign” and also “This was the first time in U.S. history, and perhaps world history, where one country was invaded and with it came the entrapment of a large military force dedicated to the removal of a third of the country’s leadership.” I’m sure Colonel Martin actually meant something in those two sentences but I am at a loss to figure out what it might be.

Martin reports that MEK first came on to his “radar” in 2003 after the invasion of Iraq by U.S. forces, which is part of his problem, which might be described as seeing what one wants to see. He conducted “an assessment on the MEK and determined they were not a threat.” But other evidence, which Martin should have considered, suggests that MEK was not just a group of Iranian dissidents. A study prepared by the Rand Corporation for the U.S. government conducted interviews at Camp Ashraf and concluded that there were present “many of the typical characteristics of a cult, such as authoritarian control, confiscation of assets, sexual control (including mandatory divorce and celibacy), emotional isolation, forced labor, sleep deprivation, physical abuse and limited exit options.”

MEK made the transition from terrorist group to “champions of Iranian democracy” by virtue of intensive lobbying of Iran haters. The Guardian article also describes how “A stupendously long list of American politicians from both parties were paid hefty fees to speak at events in favor of the MEK, including Giuliani, John McCain, Newt Gingrich and former Democratic party chairs Edward Rendell and Howard Dean – along with multiple former heads of the FBI and CIA. John Bolton, who has made multiple appearances at events supporting the MEK, is estimated to have received upwards of $180,000. According to financial disclosure forms, Bolton was paid $40,000 for a single appearance at the Free Iran rally in Paris in 2017.”

It apparently never occurred to Martin that the group had a whole lot of history before he appeared on the scene and it began buying American politicians. It may not have been an active threat in 2003, when confronted by overwhelming U.S. military force, but it sure was anti-American back in the 1970s, to include the assassination of at least six U.S. Air Force officers and civilian defense contractors. The ambush in which two air force officers were murdered by MEK was reenacted for each incoming class at the Central Intelligence Agency training center in the late 1970s to illustrate just how a terrorist attack on a moving vehicle might take place.

Colonel Martin is inevitably a harsh critic of President Barack Obama, mentioning in passing that “Unfortunately, the State Department policy under the Obama administration was intent on appeasing the Iran regime.” It is an assertion for which there is scant evidence apart from Obama’s clearly expressed reasonable desire to negotiate an end to any possible Iranian nuclear weapons program. In fact, Obama’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton removed the group from the State Department terror list in 2012, and then arranged for its relocation to a safe site in Albania, where it still resides.

In another article on “evil” Iran, obviously an obsession with Martin, he states that “The fundamentalists in Tehran were almost overthrown during the vast national uprisings of 2009 (predating the Arab Spring). While former President Obama and former Secretary Clinton stayed silent, in favor of their nuclear deal with the regime…” Martin is dead wrong that the regime was almost overthrown. It was never threatened. And, of course, it would have been difficult for Obama to have remained silent in 2009 over the “nuclear deal” which was not signed until 2015.

Martin also has problems with the Guardian article’s assertion that MEK derives from an “Islamist-Marxist” ideology. He observes “In other words, the MEK is composed of God-fearing atheists. He needs to pick one or the other, because Islam and Marxism do not mix.” Actually Marxism, as a primarily social and economic framework, is not necessarily anti-religious, particularly when religion inspires the workers as part of the class struggle. Political Marxism and religious zealotry can coexist. The communist Tudeh Party of pre-revolutionary Iran was reportedly full of Islamists. And MEK does indeed have both Marxist and Islamic roots. It helped to overthrow the Shah in 1979 through cooperation with the religious parties but then turned against the clerics after they had succeeded in assuming control of the revolution.

Martin also completely ignores MEK’s anti-American, anti-capitalist and anti-colonialist roots. It began as a radicalized student group in Iran in the 1970s that attacked U.S. businesses and was viscerally opposed to the United States presence. The Guardian article describes how one of its songs went “Death to America by blood and bonfire on the lips of every Muslim is the cry of the Iranian people. May America be annihilated.”

Colonel Martin saves his best for last as he fulminates “Iran, the number one nation-state exporter of terrorism, is also the number one exporter of propaganda. Iran’s MOIS [Ministry of Intelligence and Security] will fight the truth with lies, deceit, and manipulation of facts. MOIS expends great effort to neutralize the MEK as the primarily threat to the Iranian regime.”

That Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism is often asserted by folks like Colonel Martin and John Bolton but rarely elaborated on, particularly given the fact that the United States operates worldwide with intelligence officers, special ops and drones that kill lots of people on a regular basis without any declarations of war. Who has Iran killed lately? And when it comes to propaganda, no one does it better or more aggressively that the U.S. and Israel, even if no one believes any of it anymore.

What it comes down to is that people like Colonel Wes Martin, unfortunately proliferating in the U.S. government, hate Iran for a whole lot of reasons that have nothing to do with national security. Israel and its lobby are certainly an element as is the need for enemies to feed the paranoia that drives and funds the military industrial complex. Martin reveals his ignorance when he objects to what he believes to be Iranian government efforts to “neutralize the MEK as the primarily (sic) threat to the Iranian regime.” That claim is complete nonsense. MEK worked with Saddam Hussein to kill Iranians, just as it earlier killed Americans. It is hated in Iran and has little support inside the country. It is a terrorist group, currently being used by the CIA and Israel’s Mossad to assassinate and otherwise kill still more Iranians. This is why luminaries like Mike Pompeo and John Bolton and Colonel Martin love it, not because it is poised to bring democracy to Iran.

December 16, 2018 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Canada to Pay Heavy Price for Trudeau’s Groupie Role in US Banditry Against China

By Finian CUNNINGHAM | Strategic Culture Foundation | 16.12.2018

You do have to wonder about the political savvy of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his government. The furious fallout from China over the arrest of a senior telecoms executive is going to do severe damage to Canadian national interests.

Trudeau’s fawning over American demands is already rebounding very badly for Canada’s economy and its international image.

The Canadian arrest – on behalf of Washington – of Meng Wanzhou, chief financial officer of Chinese telecom giant Huawei, seems a blatant case of the Americans acting politically and vindictively. If the Americans are seen to be acting like bandits, then the Canadians are their flunkies.

Wanzhou was detained on December 1 by Canadian federal police as she was boarding a commercial airliner in Vancouver. She was reportedly handcuffed and led away in a humiliating manner which has shocked the Chinese government, media and public.

The business executive has since been released on a $7.4 million bail bond, pending further legal proceedings. She is effectively being kept under house arrest in Canada with electronic ankle tagging.

To add insult to injury, it is not even clear what Wanzhou is being prosecuted for. The US authorities have claimed that she is guilty of breaching American sanctions against Iran by conducting telecoms business with Tehran. It is presumed that the Canadians arrested Wanzhou at the request of the Americans. But so far a US extradition warrant has not been filed. That could take months. In the meantime, the Chinese businesswoman will be living under curfew, her freedom denied.

Canadian legal expert Christopher Black says there is no juridical case for Wanzhou’s detention. The issue of US sanctions on Iran is irrelevant and has no grounds in international law. It is simply the Americans applying their questionable national laws on a third party. Black contends that Canada has therefore no obligation whatsoever to impose those US laws regarding Iran in its territory, especially given that Ottawa and Beijing have their own separate bilateral diplomatic relations.

In any case, what the real issue is about is the Americans using legal mechanisms to intimidate and beat up commercial rivals. For months now, Washington has made it clear that it is targeting Chinese telecoms rivals as commercial competitors in a strategic sector. US claims about China using telecoms for “spying” and “infiltrating” American national security are bogus propaganda ruses to undermine these commercial rivals through foul means.

It also seems clear from US President Donald Trump’s unsubtle comments this week to Reuters, saying he would “personally intervene” in the Meng case “if it helped trade talks with China”, that the Huawei executive is being dangled like a bargaining chip. It was a tacit admission by Trump that the Americans really don’t have a legal case against her.

Canada’s foreign minister Chrystia Freeland bounced into damage limitation mode following Trump’s thuggish comments. She said that the case should not be “politicized” and that the legal proceedings should not be tampered with. How ironic is that?

The whole affair has been politicized from the very beginning. Meng’s arrest, or as Christopher Black calls it “hostage-taking”, is driven by Washington’s agenda of harassment against China for commercial reasons, under a legal pretext purportedly about Iranian sanctions.

When Trump revealed the cynical expediency of him “helping to free Wanzhou”, then the Canadians realized they were also being exposed for the flunkies that they are for American banditry. That’s why Freeland was obliged to quickly adopt the fastidious pretense of legal probity.

Canadian premier Justin Trudeau has claimed that he wasn’t aware of the American request for Wanzhou’s detention. Trudeau is being pseudo. For such a high-profile infringement against a senior Chinese business leader, Ottawa must have been fully briefed by the Americans. Christopher Black, the legal expert, believes that Trudeau had to have known about the impending plot to snatch Wanzhou and moreover that he personally signed off on it.

What Trudeau and his government intended to get out of performing this sordid role for American thuggery is far from clear. Maybe after being verbally mauled by Trump as “weak and dishonest” at the G7 summit earlier this year, in June, Trudeau decided it was best to roll over and be a good little puppy for the Americans in their dirty deed against China.

But already it has since emerged that Canada is going to pay a very heavy price indeed for such dubious service to Washington. Beijing has warned that it will take retaliation against both Washington and Ottawa. And it is Ottawa that is more vulnerable to severe repercussions.

This week saw two Canadian citizens, one a former diplomat, detained in China on spying charges.

Canadian business analysts are also warning that Beijing can inflict harsh economic penalties on Ottawa. An incensed Chinese public have begun boycotting Canadian exports and sensitive Canadian investments in China are now at risk from being blocked by Beijing. A proposed free trade deal that was being negotiated between Ottawa and Beijing now looks dead in the water.

And if Trudeau’s government caves in to the excruciating economic pressure brought to bear by Beijing and then abides by China’s demand to immediately release Meng Wanzhou, Ottawa will look like a pathetic, gutless lackey to Washington. Canada’s reputation of being a liberal, independent state will be shredded. Even then the Chinese are unlikely to forget Trudeau’s treachery.

With comic irony, there’s a cringemaking personal dimension to this unseemly saga.

During the 1970s when Trudeau’s mother Margaret was a thirty-something socialite heading for divorce from his father, then Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, she was often in the gossip media for indiscretions at nightclubs. Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards claims in his autobiography that Margaret Trudeau was a groupie for the band, having flings with Mick Jagger and Ronnie Wood. Her racy escapades and louche lifestyle brought shame to many Canadians.

Poor Margaret Trudeau later wound up divorced, disgraced, financially broke and scraping a living from scribbling tell-all books.

Justin, her eldest son, is finding out that being a groupie for Washington’s banditry is also bringing disrepute for him and his country.

December 16, 2018 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

Averting World Conflict with China

The PRC Should Retaliate by Targeting Sheldon Adelson’s Chinese Casinos

By Ron Unz • Unz Review • December 13, 2018

As most readers know, I’m not a casual political blogger and I prefer producing lengthy research articles rather than chasing the headlines of current events. But there are exceptions to every rule, and the looming danger of a direct worldwide clash with China is one of them.

Consider the arrest last week of Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, the world’s largest telecom equipment manufacturer. While flying from Hong Kong to Mexico, Ms. Meng was changing planes in the Vancouver International Airport airport when she was suddenly detained by the Canadian government on an August US warrant. Although now released on $10 million bail, she still faces extradition to a New York City courtroom, where she could receive up to thirty years in federal prison for allegedly having conspired in 2010 to violate America’s unilateral economic trade sanctions against Iran.

Although our mainstream media outlets have certainly covered this important story, including front page articles in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, I doubt most American readers fully recognize the extraordinary gravity of this international incident and its potential for altering the course of world history. As one scholar noted, no event since America’s deliberate 1999 bombing of China’s embassy in Belgrade, which killed several Chinese diplomats, has so outraged both the Chinese government and its population. Columbia’s Jeffrey Sachs correctly described it as “almost a US declaration of war on China’s business community.”

Such a reaction is hardly surprising. With annual revenue of $100 billion, Huawei ranks as the world’s largest and most advanced telecommunications equipment manufacturer as well as China’s most internationally successful and prestigious company. Ms. Meng is not only a longtime top executive there, but also the daughter of the company’s founder, Ren Zhengfei, whose enormous entrepreneurial success has established him as a Chinese national hero.

Her seizure on obscure American sanction violation charges while changing planes in a Canadian airport almost amounts to a kidnapping. One journalist asked how Americans would react if China had seized Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook for violating Chinese law…especially if Sandberg were also the daughter of Steve Jobs.

Indeed, the closest analogy that comes to my mind is when Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia kidnapped the Prime Minister of Lebanon earlier this year and held him hostage. Later he more successfully did the same with hundreds of his wealthiest Saudi subjects, extorting something like $100 billion in ransom from their families before finally releasing them. Then he may have finally over-reached himself when Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, was killed and dismembered by a bone-saw at the Saudi embassy in Turkey.

We should actually be a bit grateful to Prince Mohammed since without him America would clearly have the most insane government anywhere in the world. As it stands, we’re merely tied for first.

Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme World Hegemon. As a result, local American courts have begun enforcing gigantic financial penalties against foreign countries and their leading corporations, and I suspect that the rest of the world is tiring of this misbehavior. Perhaps such actions can still be taken against the subservient vassal states of Europe, but by most objective measures, the size of China’s real economy surpassed that of the US several years ago and is now substantially larger, while also still having a far higher rate of growth. Our totally dishonest mainstream media regularly obscures this reality, but it remains true nonetheless.

Provoking a disastrous worldwide confrontation with mighty China by seizing and imprisoning one of its leading technology executives reminds me of a comment I made several years ago about America’s behavior under the rule of its current political elites:

Or to apply a far harsher biological metaphor, consider a poor canine infected with the rabies virus. The virus may have no brain and its body-weight is probably less than one-millionth that of the host, but once it has seized control of the central nervous system, the animal, big brain and all, becomes a helpless puppet.

Once friendly Fido runs around foaming at the mouth, barking at the sky, and trying to bite all the other animals it can reach. Its friends and relatives are saddened by its plight but stay well clear, hoping to avoid infection before the inevitable happens, and poor Fido finally collapses dead in a heap.

Normal countries like China naturally assume that other countries like the US will also behave in normal ways, and their dumbfounded shock at Ms. Meng’s seizure has surely delayed their effective response. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow and famously engaged in a heated “kitchen debate” with Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the relative merits of Communism and Capitalism. What would have been the American reaction if Nixon had been immediately arrested and given a ten year Gulag sentence for “anti-Soviet agitation”?

Since a natural reaction to international hostage-taking is retaliatory international hostage-taking, the newspapers have reported that top American executives have decided to forego visits to China until the crisis is resolved. These days, General Motors sells more cars in China than in the US, and China is also the manufacturing source of nearly all our iPhones, but Tim Cook, Mary Barra, and their higher-ranking subordinates are unlikely to visit that country in the immediate future, nor would the top executives of Google, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, and the leading Hollywood studios be willing to risk indefinite imprisonment.

Canada had arrested Ms. Meng on American orders, and this morning’s newspapers reported that a former Canadian diplomat had suddenly been detained in China, presumably as a small bargaining-chip to encourage Ms. Meng’s release. But I very much doubt such measures will have much effect. Once we forgo traditional international practices and adopt the Law of the Jungle, it becomes very important to recognize the true lines of power and control, and Canada is merely acting as an American political puppet in this matter. Would threatening the puppet rather than the puppet-master be likely to have much effect?

Similarly, nearly all of America’s leading technology executives are already quite hostile to the Trump Administration, and even if it were possible, seizing one of them would hardly be likely to sway our political leadership. To a lesser extent, the same thing is true about the overwhelming majority of America’s top corporate leaders. They are not the individuals who call the shots in the current White House.

Indeed, is President Trump himself anything more than a higher-level puppet in this very dangerous affair? World peace and American national security interests are being sacrificed in order to harshly enforce the Israel Lobby’s international sanctions campaign against Iran, and we should hardly be surprised that the National Security Adviser John Bolton, one of America’s most extreme pro-Israel zealots, had personally given the green light to the arrest. Meanwhile, there are credible reports that Trump himself remained entirely unaware of these plans, and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump’s face.

But Bolton’s apparent involvement underscores the central role of his longtime patron, multi-billionaire casino-magnate Sheldon Adelson, whose enormous financial influence within Republican political circles has been overwhelmingly focused on pro-Israel policy and hostility towards Iran, Israel’s regional rival.

Although it is far from clear whether the very elderly Adelson played any direct personal role in Ms. Meng’s arrest, he surely must be viewed as the central figure in fostering the political climate that produced the current situation. Perhaps he should not be described as the ultimate puppet-master behind our current clash with China, but any such political puppet-masters who do exist are certainly operating at his immediate beck and call. In very literal terms, I suspect that if Adelson placed a single phone call to the White House, the Trump Administration would order Canada to release Ms. Meng that same day.

Adelson’s fortune of $33 billion ranks him as the 15th wealthiest man in America, and the bulk of his fortune is based on his ownership of extremely lucrative gambling casinos in Macau, China. In effect, the Chinese government currently has its hands around the financial windpipe of the man ultimately responsible for Ms. Meng’s arrest and whose pro-Israel minions largely control American foreign policy. I very much doubt that they are fully aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage.

Over the years, Adelson’s Chinese Macau casinos have been involved in all sorts of political bribery scandals, and I suspect it would be very easy for the Chinese government to find reasonable grounds for immediately shutting them down, at least on a temporary basis, with such an action having almost no negative repercussions to Chinese society or the bulk of the Chinese population. How could the international community possibly complain about the Chinese government shutting down some of their own local gambling casinos with a long public record of official bribery and other criminal activity? At worst, other gambling casino magnates would become reluctant to invest future sums in establishing additional Chinese casinos, hardly a desperate threat to President Xi’s anti-corruption government.

I don’t have a background in finance and I haven’t bothered trying to guess the precise impact of a temporary shutdown of Adelson’s Chinese casinos, but it wouldn’t surprise me if the resulting drop in the stock price of Las Vegas Sands Corp would reduce Adelson’s personal net worth were by $5-10 billion within 24 hours, surely enough to get his immediate personal attention. Meanwhile, threats of a permanent shutdown, perhaps extending to Chinese-influenced Singapore, might lead to the near-total destruction of Adelson’s personal fortune, and similar measures could also be applied as well to the casinos of all the other fanatically pro-Israel American billionaires, who dominate the remainder of gambling in Chinese Macau.

The chain of political puppets responsible for Ms. Meng’s sudden detention is certainly a complex and murky one. But the Chinese government already possesses the absolute power of financial life-or-death over Sheldon Adelson, the man located at the very top of that chain. If the Chinese leadership recognizes that power and takes effective steps, Ms. Meng will immediately be put on a plane back home, carrying the deepest sort of international political apology. And future attacks against Huawei, ZTE, and other Chinese technology companies would not be repeated.

China actually holds a Royal Flush in this international political poker game. The only question is whether they will recognize the value of their hand. I hope they do for the sake of America and the entire world.

December 13, 2018 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

George H.W. Bush’s Bitter Legacy in the Middle East

By As`ad AbuKhalil | Consortium News | December 12, 2018

Any sober assessment of late President George H.W. Bush’s political legacy was drowned last week by the avalanche of hagiography by the mainstream media. This served, in part, the role of catharsis. The more loudly the members of the media praised Bush, whose family has testy relations with President Donald Trump, the more it helped them vent their animosity towards the current president.

Lost in this anti-historical, fact-free binge was any possible discussion of Bush’s most important legacies, one of which is certainly his great fake-out of Arab interests in the Middle East. Almost every U.S. president since Harry S. Truman has been more pro-Israel than his predecessor. The sole exception to this was George H.W. Bush. But via the war against Iraq, his administration wound up embracing Israeli interests and regional hegemony to such a degree that it left lasting damage to peace and stability in the region.

H.W. Bush was adept at changing ideologies to suit the venue. The man who emerged from the “moderate” wing of the East Coast Republican Party became the political heir of President Ronald Reagan, who wooed the Religious Right and made abortion a litmus test for all Supreme Court nominees.

While Bush did not leave a presidential memoir, (he is the first since Franklin D. Roosevelt not to do so), he did coauthor a book with Brent Scowcroft, his national security advisor, “A World Transformed.” This offers evidence of Bush’s close ties with Arab Gulf despots and the deposed Egyptian strongman Husni Mubarak, who served as his chief advisor on the region.

Bush was obviously impressed by the fabulous wealth and hospitality of Arab potentates.  At one point in the book, during a stay in one of King Fahd’s marble guest palaces, he marvels at the chandeliers, the air conditioning and goes on at length about a lavish state dinner. “I had never seen so much—and of nearly every conceivable type of food.”

Wealthy Arab Friends 

Bush’s ties with wealthy Arabs served him well. Lebanese businessman Najad Isam Faris and Syrian businessman Jamale Daniel helped the business career of Bush’s son, Neil. With his network of Gulf associates, Bush served as a prized advisor to the Carlyle Group, the global, private equity firm based in Washington, D.C., with a specialty of investing in companies that depend on government contracts.

Bush’s footprints in the region begin with his oil-business years in Texas. At that point, in the 1950s, oil companies often served as a chief lobbying force for Gulf regimes against the Israeli lobby. This was not due to any humanitarian concern for the plight of the Palestinian people. It was due to the usual financial motivation. The Israel lobby opposed closer ties between the U.S. and all Arab countries, which compelled oil businesses to defend their Gulf suppliers. Since the Israeli lobby opposed U.S. arms sales to Middle East regimes, it had other big-business opponents as well.

Later in his life, Bush also dealt with the Middle East as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and as director of the CIA. (The deputy chief of Saudi intelligence during Bush’s time at the CIA, Prince Turki Al-Faisal, was one of the few foreign dignitaries invited to attend the funeral).

When the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, paid tribute last week to Bush he concealed a long history of Israeli detestation for the man.

As Ronald Reagan’s vice president, Bush—along with James Baker, the White House chief of staff, and Caspar Weinberger, the secretary of defense—had the coolest attitudes towards Israel of any in the administration, which was otherwise loaded with ardent Zionists. Bush was vilified for his 1991 remark that he was a “one lonely guy” battling “a thousand lobbyists on the Hill.”

Nonetheless Bush toed the pro-Israeli line and championed the cause of Soviet Jewish dissidents and the sponsorship of the emigration of Jews from Ethiopia, Syria and the former Soviet Union to Israel. He also recruited ardent Zionists (Jack Kemp, Condoleezza Rice and Dennis Ross) for his administration.

As president, Bush was branded an anti-Semite in 1991 for “deferring” for 120 days $10 billion in loan guarantees to Israel. He did this to prevent Israel from putting the money toward settlements in the occupied lands of 1967. Bush was also trying to persuade Israel to join the U.S.-sponsored peace process.

Serious About Settlements

This was the only time the U.S. government treated the settlements and the Israeli role in the peace process as a serious matter. The Obama administration did voice mild protestations about the settlements, which violate international law. But after Bush, the settlements never again caused any serious irritation to U.S.-Israeli relations.

The Bush administration also, at one point, banned Ariel Sharon, the Israeli militarist and politician, from entering U.S. government buildings due to his statements against the U.S. role in the peace process. (When Jack Kemp, housing secretary at the time, wanted to meet with Sharon, James Baker instructed him to meet outside government offices).

But in Iraq, the Bush administration began the process of removing a regime that the Israel government had been complaining about for years. This was before Israel discovered the Iranian danger. It was also many years after Israel rid itself of the Egyptian danger thanks to the Camp David Accords between the despotic Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and the Israeli government under the auspices of the American human rights president, Jimmy Carter. Going forward, the U.S. bombed everything on Israel’s bombing wish list in Iraq.

Bush was intent on going to war against Iraq in 1990. He sent Dick Cheney, then secretary of defense, and Colin Powell, then chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, to Riyadh to persuade the king that U.S. troops were needed on the ground in Saudi Arabia to protect the kingdom from an Iraqi invasion (U.S. ships had moved before Cheney stepped foot on Saudi soil).

Rallying Against Iraq 

The H.W.Bush administration rallied Arab despots against Iraq and established a regional tyrannical order. Even the Syrian regime rose above its previous conflicts with the U.S. and got on board. Together, they denied Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s president, the one condition that he sought for withdrawal. As Bush admits in the book he coauthored, that sole condition was access to the Persian Gulf.

From 1991 on, most members of the U.S. armed forces—especially the Air Force—began to train over (or on) Arab lands. Today that means bases and military activities in Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Oman, UAE, Syria (illegally), not to mention other places where the U.S. maintains secret military and intelligence bases (it was leaked to the press a few years ago that Dubai hosts one of the largest CIA bases in the world).

Bush exploited the Gulf War to impose a security regime where the U.S.—and not the local despotic clients—called the shots. Furthermore, Bush introduced the misuse of the U.N. as “an added cloak of political cover for U.S. wars and actions,” as is described on page 416 of the book he coauthored.

In targeting Iraq, Bush began to eliminate the biggest (albeit exaggerated) Arab military power. He also pushed Arab governments to sit face-to-face with Israel in Madrid without securing any concessions from Israel at all.

The “peace process” under Bush was just as it had been under his predecessors and successors. It amounted to empty promises of U.S. rewards for Arab participation in the war on Iraq. It was a repeat of the “British betrayal” of World War I, when, in exchange for help fighting against the Ottoman Empire, Arabs thought they would earn  independence.

As’ad AbuKhalil is a Lebanese-American professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. He is the author of the “Historical Dictionary of Lebanon” (1998), “Bin Laden, Islam and America’s New War on Terrorism (2002), and “The Battle for Saudi Arabia” (2004). He tweets as @asadabukhalil

December 12, 2018 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

As Israel crimes on Gaza border hit zenith, US backs bill targeting Palestinian anti-occupation leaders

Palestine Information Center – December 12, 2018

RAMALLAH – The US House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a bill that would target for sanctions Hamas resistance movement and Hezbollah over allegations of using civilians as human shields, guaranteeing that it will become law, JTA reported.

The bill describes Hamas and Hezbollah groups as “repeated” practitioners of an action that violates international law, claiming that Hamas routinely launches missiles at Israel from densely populated areas.

The US Senate unanimously passed the bipartisan bill in October.

The bill was authored by Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Joe Donnelly (D-IN) and was co-sponsored by 50 other senators. It was first introduced this past summer.

“This critical and timely legislation mandates new sanctions against Hamas, Hezbollah and foreign state agencies that use civilians as human shields or provide support to those doing so,” the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) said in a statement Tuesday after the House passed the bill, which now goes to President Donald Trump for his signature.

Last February, the House of Representatives unanimously passed the Hamas Human Shields Prevention Act which condemns Hamas for the alleged use of civilians, including children, as human shields, sanctioning those who use them.

The act, however, emphasizes the efforts made by the Israeli occupation military to avoid civilian casualties, a claim that analysts said amounts to an attempt to whitewash Israeli crimes and terrorism against Palestinian civilians and unarmed protesters, including on the Gaza border.

December 12, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

US Deploys Carrier Strike Group to Middle East Amid Iran, Syria Tensions

Sputnik – December 8, 2018

A carrier strike group led by the Nimitz-class supercarrier USS John C. Stennis has arrived in the Middle East, ending an eight month period during which a US carrier wasn’t based in the region, the US Navy has reported.

Earlier, the Pentagon announced that the US and its allies in eastern Syria would train an additional 35,000 to 40,000 local militia to “provide stability” in the region following the defeat of Daesh (ISIS) terrorists.

The carrier group will be based with the 5th Fleet, which is responsible for US naval activity in the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf, and will be stationed in the region for at least two months.

According to the US government-funded news service Voice of America, the carrier strike group is being deployed to “help in the fight against the Islamic State terror group in Iraq and Syria and the war in Afghanistan.”

Furthermore, a US Defense Department official confirmed earlier reports that the US was beefing up its presence in the region as a “message” to Tehran, telling VOA that “just being there is a show of force to Iran.”

The carrier group’s presence is expected to have a similar effect to the US base in at-Tanf, southern Syria, the official added.

The US established an illegal garrison at at-Tanf in 2016, justifying the deployment as part of its war against Daesh. Damascus and its allies have repeatedly accused the US of using the base to retrain and reequip former Islamist militia to continue the war against the Syrian government. On Thursday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Joseph Dunford said that the US would have to train 35,000 to 40,000 more “local forces” to “provide stability” in eastern Syria, where US-backed Syrian Kurdish forces took control following Daesh’s expulsion from the region.

Washington, which originally justified its presence in Syria by citing the war against terrorism, has altered its reasoning for remaining in the country following Daesh’s decline. In September, Trump national security adviser John Bolton said that the US military would stay in Syria until alleged Iranian-backed militias had also left the country.

Tensions between Washington and Tehran escalated in May, after the US unilaterally withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action nuclear deal and slapped Iran with a series of strict sanctions.

December 8, 2018 Posted by | Illegal Occupation, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

Huawei CFO Detained in Canada to Face Fraud Charges in US

Sputnik – December 7, 2018

Canadian prosecutors said Friday that the US is seeking the extradition of Huawei Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Meng Wanzhou on suspicion of engaging in conspiracies to defraud multiple financial institutions and contravene US sanctions on Iran.

It isn’t clear how many charges she faces, but each one carries a maximum sentence of 30 years behind bars.

Meng, the Chinese telecommunication giant’s CFO and deputy board chair, was arrested in Vancouver on Saturday but the US Department of Justice did not announce the arrest until Wednesday. Canada’s Globe and Mail broke the story, based on law enforcement sources, that she had been arrested for violating US sanctions against Iran.

A gag order, or as it is called in Canada, a publication ban, was imposed on Meng’s case. Several media outlets have challenged the gag in court. That ban was eventually lifted by a judge in Vancouver, BBC reports.

The court is still considering whether it will grant Meng bail. The Canadian government prosecutor has told the judge Meng has substantial resources in China and is a flight risk.

The prosecutor alleged that Meng deceived American lawyers regarding the connection between the company SkyCom and Huawei. Using SkyCom as a secret proxy, Huawei sold products to Iran in breach of US sanctions between 2009 and 2014.

Huawei is the second-largest telecommunications equipment manufacturer in the world, Sputnik News reported.

The US has introduced a number of measures to curb the flow of technology from Huawei and another telecom manufacturer, ZTE Corp, believing that the Chinese government have could used the tech for surveillance in the past year. Huawei products have also been banned by the Pentagon from being sold on US military bases.

December 7, 2018 Posted by | Economics, Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

‘Arrogant jingoist policy’: Lavrov blasts Washington’s request to arrest Huawei CFO

RT | December 7, 2018

Washington’s “revolting” policy of stretching its own criminal laws to other countries’ territories has to end, Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said as Huawei’s top executive faces extradition to the US.

Lavrov slammed America’s habit of applying its laws “extraterritorially” and dubbed it “revolting to the vast majority of normal states and normal people.”

The minister’s outrage follows the recent arrest of Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver, Canada.The businesswoman, who is also the daughter of the company’s founder, was apprehended on Sunday at the request of the US, and is now facing extradition. The charges levied against Meng remain unknown, but it is believed they relate to possible violations of US sanctions placed on Iran.

Talking to reporters at an OSCE event in Milan, Lavrov said that Washington’s approach has no support in the world and alienates the US’ own partners.

Chinese diplomats protested Meng’s arrest, saying that she didn’t violate any US or Canadian laws.

The Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson, Geng Shuang, demanded that Washington and Ottawa clarify the reasons behind the executive’s detention and “immediately” release her. Chinese officials also said that the arrest itself “seriously harmed the human rights of the victim.”

December 7, 2018 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , | Leave a comment

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