A fictional “scenario” of multiple bomb attacks on London’s underground took place at exactly the same time as the bomb attack on July 7, 2005.
Peter Power, Managing Director of Visor Consultants, a private firm on contract to the London Metropolitan Police, described in a BBC interview how he had organized and conducted the anti-terror drill, on behalf of an unnamed business client.
The fictional scenario was based on simultaneous bombs going off at exactly the same time at the underground stations where the real attacks were occurring:
POWER: At half past nine this morning we were actually running an exercise for a company of over a thousand people in London based on simultaneous bombs going off precisely at the railway stations where it happened this morning, so I still have the hairs on the back of my neck standing up right now.
HOST: To get this quite straight, you were running an exercise to see how you would cope with this and it happened while you were running the exercise?
POWER: Precisely, and it was about half past nine this morning, we planned this for a company and for obvious reasons I don’t want to reveal their name but they’re listening and they’ll know it. And we had a room full of crisis managers for the first time they’d met and so within five minutes we made a pretty rapid decision that this is the real one and so we went through the correct drills of activating crisis management procedures to jump from slow time to quick time thinking and so on.
(BBC Radio Interview, 7 July 2005)
In response to the flood of incoming email messages, Peter Power –who is a former senior Scotland Yard official specializing in counterterrorism– responded in the form of the following “automatic reply”:
“Thank you for your message. Given the volume of emails about events on 7 July and a commonly expressed misguided belief that our exercise revealed prescient behaviour, or was somehow a conspiracy (noting that several websites interpreted our work that day in an inaccurate / naive / ignorant / hostile manner) it has been decided to issue a single email response as follows:
It is confirmed that a short number of ‘walk through’ scenarios planed [sic] well in advance had commenced that morning for a private company in London (as part of a wider project that remains confidential) and that two scenarios related directly to terrorist bombs at the same time as the ones that actually detonated with such tragic results. One scenario in particular, was very similar to real time events.
However, anyone with knowledge about such ongoing threats to our capital city will be aware that (a) the emergency services have already practiced several of their own exercises based on bombs in the underground system (also reported by the main news channels) and (b) a few months ago the BBC broadcast a similar documentary on the same theme, although with much worse consequences [??]. It is hardly surprising therefore, that we chose a feasible scenario – but the timing and script was nonetheless, a little disconcerting.
In short, our exercise (which involved just a few people as crisis managers actually responding to a simulated series of activities involving, on paper, 1000 staff) quickly became the real thing and the players that morning responded very well indeed to the sudden reality of events.
Beyond this no further comment will be made and based on the extraordinary number of messages from ill informed people, no replies will henceforth be given to anyone unable to demonstrate a bona fide reason for asking (e.g. accredited journalist / academic).
There was nothing “routine” in the so-called “walk through” scenarios. Visor’s mock terror drills (held on the very same day as the real attack) was by no means an isolated “coincidence”. Power’s email response suggests that mock drills are undertaken very frequently, as a matter of routine, and that there was nothing particularly out of the ordinary in the exercise conducted on July 7th, which just so happened to coincide with the real terror attacks.
There have indeed been several documented high profile cases of mock terror drills in the US and the UK, held prioror on exactly the same day and at the same time as the actual terror event. In the three previous cases reviewed below, the mock drills bear a canny resemblance to the real time terror attacks.
1. CIA Sponsored Exercise on the Morning of 9/11
On the morning of September 11 2001, within minutes of the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the CIA had been running “a pre-planned simulation to explore the emergency response issues that would be created if a plane were to strike a building”. The simulation was held at the CIA Chantilly Virginia Reconnaissance Office.
The Bush administration described the event as “a bizarre coincidence”. The matter was not mentioned by the media.(AP, 22 August 2002)
The CIA sponsored simulation consisted in a “scheduled exercise” held on the morning of September 11, 2001, where “a small corporate jet crashed into one of the four towers at the agency’s headquarters building after experiencing a mechanical failure.” (Quoted in Associated Press, 22 August 2002.)
The news concerning the 9/11 Chantilly aircraft crashing simulation was hushed up. It was not made public at the time. It was revealed almost a year later, in the form of an innocuous announcement of a Homeland Security Conference. The latter entitled “Homeland Security: America’s Leadership Challenge” was held in Chicago on September 6, 2002, barely a few days before the commemoration of the tragic events of 9/11.
The promotional literature for the conference under the auspices of the National Law Enforcement and Security Institute (NLESI) stated what nobody in America knew about. On the morning of 9/11, the CIA was conducting a pre-planned simulation of a plane striking a building. One of the key speakers at the National Law Enforcement and Security Institute conference was CIA’s John Fulton, Chief of the Strategic War Gaming Division of the National Reconnaissance Office a specialist in risk and threat response analysis, scenario gaming, and strategic planning.
On the morning of September 11th 2001, Mr. Fulton and his team at the CIA were running a pre-planned simulation to explore the emergency response issues that would be created if a plane were to strike a building. Little did they know that the scenario would come true in a dramatic way that day. Information is the most powerful tool available in the homeland security effort. At the core of every initiative currently underway to protect our country and its citizens is the challenge of getting the right information to the right people at the right time. How can so much information from around the world be captured and processed in meaningful and timely ways? Mr. Fulton shares his insights into the intelligence community, and shares a vision of how today’s information systems will be developed into even better counter-terrorism tools of tomorrow. (Ibid)
2. October 2000 Mock Terror Attack on the Pentagon
In late October 2000 (more than ten months prior to 9/11), a military exercise was conducted which consisted in establishing the scenario of a simulated passenger plane crashing into the Pentagon. The Defense Protective Services Police and the Pentagon’s Command Emergency Response Team coordinated the exercise. According to a detailed report by Dennis Ryan of Fort Myer Military Community’s Pentagram, “the Pentagon Mass Casualty Exercise, as the crash was called, was just one of several scenarios that emergency response teams were exposed to on Oct. 24-26 [2000]“:
The fire and smoke from the downed passenger aircraft billows from the Pentagon courtyard. Defense Protective Services Police seal the crash sight. Army medics, nurses and doctors scramble to organize aid. (…) Don Abbott, of Command Emergency Response Training, walks over to the Pentagon and extinguishes the flames. The Pentagon was a model and the “plane crash” was a simulated one.
On Oct. 24, there was a mock terrorist incident at the Pentagon Metro stop and a construction accident to name just some of the scenarios that were practiced to better prepare local agencies for real incidents.
(Dennis Ryan, “Contingency planning, Pentagon MASCAL exercise simulates scenarios in preparing for emergencies”, MDW NEWS 3 Nov 2000.)
3. Britain’s Atlantic Blue, April 2005
In Britain, there were several documented exercises of terror attacks on London’s underground system.
In addition to the 7/7 exercise conducted by Visor Consultants, a similar mock terror drill on London’s transportation system entitled “Atlantic Blue” was held in April 2005, barely three months prior to the real attacks. In 2003, a mock terror drill labelled OSIRIS 2 was conducted. It consisted, according to Peter Power in testing the “equipment and people deep in the Underground of London”. It involved the participation of several hundred people. (Interview with Peter Power, CTV, 11 July 2005).
“Atlantic Blue” was part of a much larger US sponsored emergency preparedness exercise labelled TOPOFF 3, which included the participation of Britain and Canada. It had been ordered by the UK Secretary of State for the Home Department, Mr. Charles Clarke, in close coordination with his US counterpart Michael Chertoff.
The assumptions of the Visor Consultants mock drill conducted on the morning of July 7th were similar to those conducted under “Atlantic Blue”. This should come as no surprise since Visor Consultants was involved, on contract to the British government, in the organisation and conduct of Atlantic Blue and in coordination with the US Department of Homeland Security.
As in the case of the 9/11 simulation organized by the CIA, the July 7, 2005 Visor mock terror drill, was casually dismissed by the media, without further investigation, as a mere “coincidence”, with no relationship to the real event.
Foreknowledge of the 7/7 Attack?
According to a report of the Associated Press correspondent in Jerusalem, the Israeli embassy in London had been advised in advance by Scotland Yard of an impending bomb attack:
Just before the blasts, Scotland Yard called the security officer at the Israeli Embassy to say they had received warnings of possible attacks, the official said. He did not say whether British police made any link to the economic conference.(AP, 7 July 2005)
Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was warned by his embassy not to attend an attend an economic conference organized by the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange (TASE) in collaboration with the Israeli embassy and Deutsche Bank.
Netanyahu was staying at the Aldridge Hotel in Mayfair. The conference venue was a few miles away at the Great Eastern Hotel close to the Liverpool subway station, where one of the bomb blasts occurred.
Rudolph Giuliani’s London Visit
Rudolph Giuliani, who was mayor of New York City at the time of the 9/11 attacks, was staying at the Great Eastern hotel on the 7th of July, where TASE was hosting its economic conference, with Israel’s Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as keynote speaker.
Giuliani was having a business breakfast meeting in his room at the Great Eastern Hotel, close to Liverpool Street station when the bombs went off:
“I didn’t hear the Liverpool Street bomb go off,” he explains. “One of my security people came into the room and informed me that there had been an explosion. We went outside and they pointed in the direction of where they thought the incident had happened. There was no panic. I went back in to my breakfast. At that stage, the information coming in to us was very ambiguous.” (quoted in the Evening Standard, 11 July 2005.)
Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Rudolph Giuliani knew each other. Giuliani had officially welcomed Netanyahu when he visited New York City as Prime Minister of Israel in 1996. There was no indication, however, from news reports that the two men met in London at the Great Eastern. On the day prior to the London attacks, July 6th, Giuliani was in North Yorkshire at a meeting.
After completing his term as mayor of New York City, Rudi Giuliani established a security outfit: Giuliani Security and Safety. The latter is a subsidary of Giuliani Partners LLC. headed by former New York head of the FBI, Pasquale D’Amuro.
After 9/11, D’Amuro was appointed Inspector in Charge of the FBI’s investigation of 9/11. He later served as Assistant Director of the Counterterrorism Division at FBI Headquarters and, Executive Assistant Director for Counterterrorism and Counterintelligence. D’Amuro had close links to the Neocons in the Bush adminstration.
It is worth noting that Visor Consultants and Giuliani Security and Safety LLC specialize in similar “mock terror drills” and “emergency preparedness” procedures. Both Giuliani and Power were in London at the same time within a short distance of one of the bombing sites. While there is no evidence that Giuliani and Power met in London, the two companies have had prior business contacts in the area of emergency preparedness. Peter Power served on the Advisory Board to the Canadian Centre for Emergency Preparedness (CCEP), together with Richard Sheirer, Senior Vice President of Giuliani and Partners. who was previously Commissioner at the NYC Office of Emergency Management, and Director of New York City Homeland Security. (See CCEP)
Concluding Remarks
One should not at this stage of the investigation draw hasty conclusions regarding the mock terror drill of a terror attack on the London underground, held on the same day and at the same time as the real time attacks.
The issue cannot, however, be dismissed. One would expect that it be addressed in a serious and professional fashion by the police investigation and that the matter be the object of a formal clarification by the British authorities.
The issue of foreknowledge raised in the Associated Press report also requires investigation.
More generally, an independent public inquiry into the London bomb attacks is required.
… Since the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January, from which 16 people died, Paris-area ambulance crews and emergency personnel have taken part in regular exercises designed to test their readiness for possible attacks. One such exercise was held on Friday morning, the day of the latest terror attacks. In a twist of fate, the simulated emergency was a mass shooting, according to Dr. Mathieu Raux, emergency room chief at the Pitié-Salpetrière hospital in Paris. … Full article
How predictable is the globalist imperial agenda? We are now witnessing the final stages of a long-term plan to induce another economic recession and erect a new high-tech police state throughout Europe and beyond. All they needed was a pretext.
While the mainstream media performed its normal routine of emotive reporting, stoking general fear and spreading mass hysteria, some smaller independent media outlets were busy plotting the establishment’s latest crisis agenda.
When the Paris Attack news broke last week, 21WIRE’s Patrick Henningsen went on television late Friday evening to comment on the unfolding drama, and also to analyze what was was likely to happen in the coming days and weeks in the wake of this event.
As it turns out, his quick predictions were incredibly accurate…
1. Declaration of a State of Emergency
France declared its first nationwide state of emergency since 1961 (when it attempted a coup d’état during the Algerian colonial war). Initially, this week’s snap passage of the emergency powers law only provides for a 12 day period, but on Monday French ministers confirmed this would be extended to 3 months because they believed that French citizens “had a right to a safe Christmas.” It gets even worse. After closing French borders, President François Hollande then proceeded to accelerate new police state measures after declaring publicly that, “We are a nation at war”, and then called for suspending normal due process by canceling search warrants, imposing curfews, traffic bans, and even authorizing local governments to impose a ban on public demonstrations. It seems the President has traded in his nation’s liberty for security theatre. In addition, over 100,000 police and soldiers have been deployed throughout the country. France is now under Martial Law.
2. Airstrikes by Monday
In predictable knee-jerk fashion, the French government seized upon this opportunity in order to insert more of its military assets into the Syria conflict by launching airstrikes on Sunday night in the area surrounding Raqqa, Syria, allegedly striking a multitude of “ISIS targets”, including command centers, weapons depots, and ISIS ‘Oil Assets’ – all thanks to supposed intelligence provided by the US. However, reports suggest that the impressive display of French air power didn’t actually net any real ISIS casualties. One can only wonder how so many ‘high value targets’, especially ISIS oil assets (we’re told this is so crucial to ISIS funding), could suddenly be made available to the French by a US military that claims to have been conducting round-the-clock airstrikes over this same region… for the last 14 months. This only reinforces many people’s suspicions that the US-led Coalition “Anti-ISIS(ISIL) Campaign” has been nothing more window dressing for a covert agenda, where the US and its allies have actually been working in concert with both ISIS and al Qaeda in Syria in order to achieve a long-held policy of toppling Syria’s government, ala regime change in Damascus.
3. Invoking the Article 5 ‘Mutual Defense’ Clause
To date, Washington’s multi-lateral proxy, NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), has not been able to legally wiggle its way into Syria to help the thousands of foreign fighters and terrorists (like NATO did in Libya in 2010-2011) who have been allowed to flood into that country since 2011. Currently, the US and its allies are engaged in an illegal, undeclared war in Syria, and the US are desperate to find some legitimate avenue to pursue their military ambitions after having failed to cheat their way into Syria via a staged false flag ‘chemical weapons’ event in Aug 2013. According to NATO article 5, an attack on one member state is deemed an ‘attack on all’, and thus automatically triggers a joint military action (war) by the NATO collective against their declared enemy. Already, a number of political figures have cried out for ‘Article 5’ war powers, including former NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen who claimed that, “I do believe that the attacks on Paris qualify for an invocation of Article 5.” He added, “It was an attack on an ally and we know who the attacker is.” (certainly, they know the attacker much more than they are letting on). Eager to see a wider military deployment from Washington, US Senator Marco Rubio has called for ‘an Article 5’ too. Absent of any official NATO route, however, France has simply gone ahead and invoked an obscure ‘Mutual Defense’ pact hidden within the EU charter. The clause is called Article 42.7of the Treaty on European Union which states that, “If a member state is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other member states shall have toward it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power.” Job done. Bombs away.
4. Calls for No Fly Zone
As 21WIRE first reported last year, the ‘No Fly Zone’ meme has been coming out of every available orifice in Washington since 2013, and this popular US tool for military intervention still draws the affectionate gaze of Democratic Party war hawks like Hillary Clinton, as well as the endless column of Republican war hawks who are in the pocket of the military industrial lobby. Whether its Jeb Bush, John McCain, or Lindsey Graham, they never get tired of the No Fly Zone.
5. US Republicans pushing for ‘boots on the ground’
Just like the No Fly Zone, ‘Conservative’ Republican war hawks have been desperate to implement another old chestnut – by throwing thousands of young US men and women at a problem which the US has actually created. War hawks in Washington DC have predictably seized on the Paris Attacks as an opportunity to reignite calls for “boots on the ground” in Syria. Amazingly, they are now claiming that massive deployment of troops “worked really well” in Iraq and Afghanistan.
6. Call for closing freedom of movement across European borders
Early Saturday morning, Hollande’s first move was to ‘seal’ France’s borders, supposedly to catch the terrorists. This ’emergency’ move also comes at the height of Europe’s co-called ‘Migrant Crisis’ (a crisis that’s actually been engineered by the US and Europe). Rather conveniently, one of Friday the 13th’s said ‘suicide bombers’ was allegedlycarrying a fake Syrian passport, which somehow led the French government and the western media to conclude that the Paris Attacks were a result of the ‘Migrant Crisis’, claiming the terrorists has sneaked into the country as refugees. To date, this only an official conspiracy theory, but that hasn’t stopped politicians and ‘security experts’ from using this crack-pot theory as justification for a European lock-down, prompting some European leaders to call for an end to freedom of movement across Europe.
7. Debate on Govt Spying and Privacy Rights, now off the table
As expected, politicians looking to appear ‘tough on terror’ and the growing gaggle of security lobbyists, and other assorted corporate fascists, have called for something akin to a ‘European Patriot Act’ – an end to the ‘Post-Snowden’ debate over bulk data collection and privacy – covering issues like NSA and GCHQ blanket spying on all citizens, and imposing more regulations and government monitoring of mandatory manufacturer ‘back doors’ for computers, mobile phones, gaming consoles, and also calls to make encryption illegal (except for government of course).
8. Calls for mandatory ID’s, biometric IDs
This hasn’t hit the headlines yet, but you can be sure that the usual gang of security contractors are putting the final touches on their proposals from a new regime of biometric ‘real IDs’. Expect announcements before the week’s end.
The last one is wasn’t very difficult to predict, but it has now been proven accurate nonetheless…
9. Cameron using Paris to Push for Syria War Vote
Back in August 2013, British MPs rejected Cameron’s call for bombing Syrian government forces in a close vote. It turns out that MP’s made the right choice as that war would have been waged on false pretenses. As predicted on Friday last week, David Cameron has now promised a new “comprehensive strategy” to win MP’s Parliamentary votes for an open-ended UK bombing campaign ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Cameron claims he wants to, “do the right thing for our country” (fancy that), and hit the “head of the snake” of ISIS in Raqqa, Syria. What military impact the UK would make in a multi-nation war in the region is debatable, with an air force of about a dozen Typhoon fighters and a handful of operational naval vehicles. Make no mistake about it – the British defense industry would like nothing more than to see this happen tomorrow – along with increased defense spending and procurement. Job done. Bombs away.
We’d rather none of these had come true, especially this quickly, but it only goes to show just how transparent the new world order agenda really has become.
Watch 21WIRE’s Patrick Henningsen and his original analysis from Friday evening, Nov. 13, 2015 on RT International…
On the first market day after Friday’s deadly attacks in the French capital, stock shares for major defense contractors shot sky-high. Coincidence?
While military experts worldwide are predicting an escalation of the war against the self-proclaimed Islamic State terror group, wheeler-dealers on Wall Street seem to be expecting big-time gains from intensified military campaigns.
Northrop Grumman, recently awarded the contract for the US’ next-generation long-range strike bomber, was up more than 4.4% at the close of the NYSE Monday.
Raytheon, known for its guided missiles among other things, was up at least 4.20%.
Lockheed Martin, another leader in the industry with its F-35, F-22, F-16, F-117, and C-130s saw shares grow more than 3.53%.
Oshkosh Corporation, the leading truck producer for the US Marines and Army, was up over 2.86%.
Boeing, manufacturer of the Tomahawk cruise missile, F-18 fighters, and CH-47 Chinook helicopters, gained some 1.28%.
The French-based multinational Thales Group, famous for its electronics, shows 3.3% growth, even though the general France’s index has been down the whole day.
The Italian helicopter and weapons systems’ producer Finmechanica has gained 2.7%.
The British BAE Systems, which builds destroyers, assembles and contributes to design of multiple fighters at home and oversees, shows almost 2.2% growth.
Along with arms producers, other companies, in particular those considered surveillance state profiteers, showed fast growth. Shares in Booz Allen Hamilton, for instance, gained over 3.4% on Monday.
• Just a week ago the EU couldn’t possibly figure out anything to do to stop the influx of “refugees” from all those countries the US and NATO had bombed into oblivion. But now, because “Paris changed everything,” EU’s borders are being locked down and refugees are being turned back.
• Just a week ago it seemed that the EU was going to be swamped by resurgent nationalism, with incumbent political parties poised to get voted out of power. But now, thanks to the Paris massacre, they have obtained a new lease on life, because they can now safely embrace the same policies that a week ago they branded as “fascist.”
• Just a week ago the EU and the US couldn’t possibly bring themselves to admit that they are utterly incompetent when it comes to combating their own creation—ISIS, that is—and need Russian help. But now, at the après-Paris G-20 summit, everybody is ready to line up and let Putin take charge of the war against terrorism. Look—the Americans finally found those convoys of tanker trucks stretching beyond the horizon that ISIS has been using to smuggle out stolen Syrian crude oil—after Putin showed them the satellite photos!
Am I being crass and insensitive? Not at all—I deplore all the deaths from terrorist attacks in Iraq, in Syria, in Lebanon, and in all the other countries whose populations did absolutely nothing to deserve such treatment. I only feel half as bad about the French, who stood by quietly as their military helped destroy Libya (which did nothing to deserve it).
Note that after the Russian jet crashed in the Sinai there weren’t all that many Facebook avatars with the Russian flag pasted over them, and hardly any candlelight vigils or piles of wreaths and flowers in various Western capitals. I even detected a whiff of smug satisfaction that the Russians got their comeuppance for stepping out of line in Syria.
Why the difference in reaction? Simple: you were told to grieve for the French, so you did. You were not told to grieve for the Russians, and so you didn’t. Don’t feel bad; you are just following orders. The reasoning behind these orders is transparent: the French, along with the rest of the EU, are Washington’s willing puppets; therefore, they are innocent, and when they get killed, it’s a tragedy. But the Russians are not Washington’s willing puppet, and are not innocent, and so when they get killed by terrorists, it’s punishment. And when Iraqis, or Syrians, or Nigerians get killed by terrorists, that’s not a tragedy either, for a different reason: they are too poor to matter. In order to qualify as a victim of a tragedy, you have to be each of these three things: 1. a US-puppet, 2. rich and 3. dead.
Also, you probably believe that the terrorist attacks in Paris were the genuine article—nobody knew it would happen, and it couldn’t have been stopped, because these terrorists are just too clever for the ubiquitous state surveillance to detect. Don’t feel bad about that either; you are just believing what you are told to believe. You probably also believe that jet fuel can melt steel girders and that skyscrapers collapse into their own footprints (whether they’ve been hit by airplanes or not). You can certainly believe whatever you like, but here are a couple of easy-to-understand tips on telling what’s real from what’s fake:
1. If it’s fake, the perpetrators are known immediately (and sometimes beforehand). If it’s real, then the truth is uncovered as a result of a thorough investigation. So, for instance, on 9/11 the guilty party were a bunch of Saudis armed with box cutters (some of whom are, paradoxically, still alive). And in Paris we knew right away that this was done by ISIS—even before we knew who the perpetrators were. And when that Malaysian jet got shot down over Ukraine, we knew right away that it was the Russians’ fault (never mind that on that day the Ukrainians deployed an air defense system, and also scrambled a couple of jets armed with air-to-air missiles— against an enemy that doesn’t have an air force). Note, however, how we still don’t know what happened with the Russian jet over Sinai. That case is still under investigation—as it should be. If it’s real, officials stall for time and urge caution while scrambling to find out what happened. When it’s fake, the officials are ready to go with the Big Lie, and then do everything they can to make it stick, suppressing what shreds of evidence can be independently gathered.
2. If it’s fake, then you should also expect cute little touches: designer logos for publicity campaigns ready to launch at a moment’s notice, be it “Je suis Charlie” or that cute little Eiffel Tower inscribed in a peace symbol. There weren’t any props to go with the Russian jet disaster—unless you count that tasteful Charlie Hebdo cartoon of a jihadi rocket having anal sex with an airliner. There might also be a few traditional tidbits designed to feed a media frenzy, such as a fake passport found lying next to one of the perpetrators—because when terrorists go on suicide missions they always take their fake passports with them. The people who are charged with designing these events lack imagination and usually just go with whatever worked before.
We should certainly expect there to be more fake massacres of this sort—whenever the political situation becomes sufficiently fraught to call for one—because at this point ready-to-go jihadi terrorist cells are something of a sunk cost and can be deployed very cheaply and effectively. Of course we should grieve for the victims, but there is something far more important at stake than mere human lives, which are, deplorably, becoming cheaper with each passing year. We should grieve for the truth.
As it plans its response to a series of six terrorist attacks Friday night that killed 129 and injured 352, the government of France will likely step up its efforts to keep tabs on the movements and communications of people within its borders.
As it happens, the attacks have occurred only a few months after legislators in that country passed a sweeping new surveillance law that gives the government broad powers to closely monitor the mobile phone and Internet communications of French citizens.
Passed by the French Parliament in May in response to the attacks on the Paris-based magazine Charlie Hebdo, the law allows the government to monitor phone calls and emails of people suspected of connections to terrorism without the authorization of a judge.
But it goes further than that. The law requires Internet service providers to install “black boxes” that are designed to vacuum up and analyze metadata on the Web-browsing and general Internet use habits of millions of people using the Web and to make that data available to intelligence agencies.
In exceptional cases, the law allows the government to deploy what are called “ISMI catchers” to track all mobile phone communications in a given area. These catchers are basically designed to impersonate cell towers, but they intercept and record communications data from phones within its range, and can also track the movements of people carrying the phones.
Finally, the law allows government agents to break into homes of suspected terrorists for the purpose of planting microphone bugs and surveillance cameras and installing keyloggers on their computers, devices that capture data on every keystroke and mouse click.
Critics of the law complain that there’s not much oversight and that the conditions under which the law’s powers can be triggered are vague. As The Vergenoted in July, the government can authorize the surveillance for “major foreign policy interests” or to counter “organized delinquency.”
Surveillance operations are overseen by a nine-person committee led by Prime Minister Manuel Valls. But that committee has only an advisory role, and cannot overrule decisions by the prime minister.
“France has emerged as the most prominent backer of Syria’s armed opposition and is now directly funding rebel groups around Aleppo as part of a new push to oust the embattled Assad regime.
Large sums of cash have been delivered by French government proxies across the Turkish border to rebel commanders in the past month, diplomatic sources have confirmed. The money has been used to buy weapons inside Syria and to fund armed operations against loyalist forces.
The French moves have stopped short of direct supply of weapons – a bridge that no western state has yet been willing to cross in Syria. But, according to western and Turkish officials as well as rebel leaders, the influx of money has made a difference in recent weeks as momentum on the battlefields of the north steadily shifts towards the opposition.
Some of the French cash has reached Islamist groups who were desperately short of ammunition and who had increasingly turned for help towards al-Qaida aligned jihadist groups in and around Aleppo.”
Let that sink in for a moment.
Now to summarise, France sent ‘large sums of cash’ to fund an ‘armed opposition’ that was trying to overthrow the internationally recognised government of a sovereign country.
Moreover, those funds meant for a shift in momentum ‘towards the opposition’, ‘on the battlefields of the north’; northern battlefields that ISIS now calls home to their ‘caliphate’.
Finally, ‘some of the French cash’ reached ‘Islamists’ that were openly working with ‘al-Qaida aligned jihadist groups’.
Instead of standing behind French President Francois Hollande, perhaps the French people should demand his immediate impeachment and arrest? Anyone with the slightest modicum of common sense can clearly see that Western support for these ‘rebels’ allowed for the growth of ISIS.
The growth of ISIS has, in turn, facilitated the growth of international terrorism. Did any of the terrorists responsible for the devastating attack in France ever get their hands on this French cash? Was it used to buy the explosives and weapons?
Those questions are, unfortunately, far from ridiculous, they are incredibly plausible.
How do we think France might react if Syria decided to start funding rebel groups to overthrow what it might call ‘the Hollande regime’?
For more in-depth analysis on the Paris Attacks, listen to this special 5 hr omnibus episode of the Sunday Wire here:
We’ve heard this one before, but this time they are doubling down on this all-too familiar set piece.
Watch a video of this report here:
Details are emerging after last night’s horrific events in Paris, and one particular item of investigation is all too familiar.
AFP, RT, Reuters, ITV, Sky News, AP, Fox News and Sputnik, are all reporting that a Syrian passport was found either on, or near, the body of one of the suicide bombers in Paris.
For those of you unaware, this story is a mirror image of another that surfaced on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.
Apparently, according to CBS, “a passerby found the passport of one of the hijackers” on the street just hours after the 9/11 attacks.
Interestingly, in the same breath, a FOX News reporter speaking about the story says that the building it supposedly came from was completely engulfed in fire.
How would a passport survive the ordeal of being crashed into a building while inside a plane loaded with jet fuel?
This story was eventually buried and given very little coverage at all by media outlets.
Instead of blindly accepting this story from French authorities, mainstream media would do themselves far better by asking the following questions:
Was the passport found on, or nearby, the suicide bomber? If it was not physically on their person, it is possible that it did not belong to them.
Speaking of not belonging to them, just because someone is in possession of an object does not necessarily make them the owner of it.
Who exactly found this passport? Is the passport real? If it is real, is it valid?
When was the passport last used to make entry into France?
What condition is the passport in?
Is it possible that the passport was planted by a third party?
Could the passport have ever survived in the conditions under which it was supposedly exposed to?
These are all questions that any real investigator should, and hopefully will, be asking. The consequences of this alleged Syrian passport being used as evidence can only be dire.
The only aircraft carrier in the French Navy’s fleet, the Charles de Gaulle, will leave for the Persian Gulf on November 18, to join the fight against Islamic State in the region, Paris has confirmed.
“The naval group will leave Toulon (a major French naval base) in a few days, on November 18, to arrive in the Persian Gulf in mid-December,” government spokesman Stephane Le Foll said, as cited by Le Figaro.
France announced the deployment of its only aircraft carrier against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) on November 5.
“The deployment of the battle group alongside the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier has been undertaken in order to participate in operations against Daesch [ISIS] and its affiliate groups” the French president’s office said in an issued statement.
“The aircraft carrier will enable us to be more efficient in coordination with our allies” President Francois Hollande said, adding that it will “bolster Paris’ firepower in the region amid international efforts to launch Syrian peace talks.”
France started its airstrikes in Syria in September, a year after it launched similar operations in Iraq. It is now using six Rafale multirole fighter aircraft stationed in the United Arab Emirates and six Mirage 2000 fighters deployed in Jordan.
France carried out about 1,300 aerial missions in Iraq with 271 airstrikes destroying more than 450 terrorist targets. Only a few airstrikes have been carried out in Syria.
The Charles de Gaulle is the biggest European aircraft carrier. It is also the only nuclear-powered vessel of this nature outside the US. The vessel can deploy up to 40 fixed wing jets and helicopters including 12 Rafales. The Charles de Gaulle has already been used against the IS militants in Iraq – in February and in April, 2015.
The US and France may blame the Syrian government for the Paris attack and start bombing Syria indiscriminately, Edward Corrigan told Press TV on Saturday.
The attacks in Paris, France, could possibly be a “false flag” operation so that the US and its allies can intensify the bombing campaign against Syria, says a political commentator.
A witness told The Associated Press that the shooters shouted “Allahu Akbar” (God is the Greatest) in Arabic as they massacred scores of diners and concert-goers in the French capital.
“Just because somebody goes and says Allahu Akbar doesn’t mean they’re Muslim, it may mean it’s a false flag,” Edward Corrigan told Press TV on Saturday.
The United States and France may blame the Syrian government for the attack and start bombing Syria indiscriminately, Corrigan said.
“You’re going to see a lot of destruction of infrastructure; you’re going get a lot of civilians killed, you’re going to see a massive overreaction like we saw with 9/11, which of course gave the Americans the impetus to invade and attack Iraq, kill over a million Iraqis,” he added.
“Of course Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11 but that of course got lost in the smoke and haze.”
Over 150 people were killed in multiple coordinated attacks on Friday in one of the deadliest assaults to hit the French capital since the World War II.
US President Barack Obama condemned the “outrageous” terrorist attacks in Paris, and promised the United States stands ready to provide whatever assistance is necessary to the French government and people.
Obama also called French President François Hollande Friday night. “The two leaders pledged to work together, and with nations around the world, to defeat the scourge of terrorism,” the White House said in a statement.
The terror attacks came just hours after an interview aired in which Obama boasted about recent successes against the Daesh (ISIL) terrorist group. “I don’t think they’re gaining strength,” Obama told ABC News’ “Good Morning America.” “We have contained them.”
Police in major US cities have stepped up security in the wake of the Paris attacks. Officials in New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia said there was no intelligence indicating any threats, but were taking security precautions.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has condemned the string of coordinated terrorist attacks that killed at least 127 people in and around the French capital of Paris.
“What France suffered from – savage terror – is what the Syrian people have been enduring for over five years,” he said on Saturday, hours after the attacks in France.
The attacks in France were carried out late on Friday, when assailants struck at least six different venues in and around the French capital.
Since March 2011, Syria has been beset by foreign-backed militancy, which has so far claimed the lives of over 250,000 people and displaced millions of others.
French President Francois Hollande has said the attacks were an “act of war” carried out by the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.
The group has overrun about a third of Syria, where it is tyrannizing the civilian population.
France is among the Western countries that have been supporting the militants fighting against the Syrian government. As part of a US-led coalition, the country has also been conducting air raids against what it alleges to be Daesh positions in the violence-scarred Arab country.
Assad complained back in May that the so-called coalition against Daesh does not aim to “do away” with the terror group, adding, “They want to use this terrorist structure for threatening and blackmailing other countries.”
Also on Saturday, Daesh released an undated video, threatening to attack France as long as the aerial campaign continued.
“As long as you keep bombing you will not live in peace. You will even fear traveling to the market,” said a Daesh member in the footage.
Trudeau “unveils most diverse Cabinet in Canada’s history”, was how one media outlet described the new Liberal cabinet. It includes a Muslim woman, four Sikhs, an indigenous woman, two differently abled individuals and an equal number of women and men. Half even refused any reference to God at Wednesday’s swearing in ceremony.
But in one respect there was no diversity at all. Every single person wore a Remembrance Day poppy. Even Justin Trudeau’s young children were made to publicly commemorate Canadians (and allies) who died at war.
As we approach the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month expect politicians of every stripe to praise Canadian military valour. At last year’s Remembrance Day commemoration Stephen Harper suggested that Canada was “forged in the fires of First World War”. The former Prime Minister described “the values for which they fought … Justice and freedom; democracy and the rule of law; human rights and human dignity.”
On Remembrance Day what is it we are supposed to remember? The valour, sacrifice and glory of soldiers — and no more?
What about the victims of Canadian troops? Should we abandon the search for truth and learning from our past on this day that is supposedly devoted to remembering?
Why not a diversity of recollection? An honest accounting of what really happened and why — isn’t that the best way to remember?
For example, World War I had no clear and compelling purpose other than rivalry between up-and-coming Germany and the lead imperial powers of the day, Britain and France. In fact, support for the British Empire was Ottawa’s primary motive in joining the war. As Canada’s Prime Minister Robert Borden saw it, the fight was “to put forth every effort and to make every sacrifice necessary to ensure the integrity and maintain the honour of our empire.”
To honour Canada’s diversity, how about this year we remember some of the victims of that empire?
For Africans World War I represented the final chapter in the violent European scramble for their territory. Since the 1880s the European powers had competed to carve up the continent.
Canada was modestly involved in two African theatres of World War I. A handful of Canadian airmen fought in East Africa, including naval air serviceman H. J. Arnold who helped destroy a major German naval vessel, the Königsberg, during the British/Belgian/South African conquest of German East Africa. Commandant of Canada’s Royal Military College from 1909 to 1913, Colonel J.H.V. Crowe commanded an artillery division for famed South African General Jan Christiaan Smuts and later published General Smuts’ Campaign in East Africa.
About one million people died as a direct result of the war in East Africa. Fighting raged for four years with many dying from direct violence and others from the widespread disease and misery it caused. Hundreds of thousands of Africans were conscripted by the colonial authorities to fight both in Africa and Europe.
J.H.V. Crowe was English born, but an individual with deeper roots in Canada, commanded the force that extended Britain’s control over the other side of the continent.
The son of a Québec City MP and grandson of a senator, Sir Charles MacPherson Dobell, commanded an 18,000 man Anglo-French force that captured the Cameroons and Togoland. Gazetted as Inspector General of the West African Frontier Force in 1913, the Royal Military College grad’s force defeated the Germans in fighting that destroyed many villages and left thousands of West Africans dead. Early in the two-year campaign Dobell’s force captured the main centres of Lomé and Douala and he became de factogovernor over large parts of today’s Togo and Cameroon. A telegram from London said “General Dobell should assume Government with full powers in all matters military and civil.”
British officials justified seizing the German colony as a response to the war in Europe, but to a large extent World War I was the outgrowth of intra-imperial competition in Africa and elsewhere. In The Anglo-French “Condominium” in Cameroon, 1914-1916 Lovett Elango points to “the imperialist motives of the campaign”, which saw the two allies clash over their territorial ambition. Elango concludes, “the war merely provided Britain and France a pretext for further colonial conquest and annexation.” After the German defeat the colony was partitioned between the two European colonial powers.
Canada’s massive contribution to World War I propped up British (as well as French, Belgian and South African) rule in Africa. It also added to it. Similar to the Berlin Conference of 1885, which effectively divided Africa among the European powers, after World War I European leaders gathered to redraw Africa’s borders. But this time the Canadian prime minister attended.
World War I reshaped colonial borders in Africa. Germany lost what is now Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi and part of Mozambique (German East Africa) as well as Namibia (German West Africa), Cameroon and Togoland. South Africa gained Namibia, Britain gained Tanzania and part of Cameroon, France gained Togo and part of Cameroon while Belgium took Burundi and Rwanda.
The other British Dominions (Australia, New Zealand and South Africa) that fought alongside London were compensated with German properties. With no German colonies nearby Ottawa asked the Imperial War Cabinet if it could take possession of the British West Indies as compensation for Canada’s defence of the Empire. London balked.
Ottawa was unsuccessful in securing the British Caribbean partly because the request did not find unanimous domestic support. Prime Minister Borden was of two minds on the issue. From London he dispatched a cable noting, “the responsibilities of governing subject races would probably exercise a broadening influence upon our people as the dominion thus constituted would closely resemble in its problems and its duties the empire as a whole.” But, on the other hand, Borden feared that the Caribbean’s black population might want to vote. He remarked upon “the difficulty of dealing with the coloured population, who would probably be more restless under Canadian law than under British control and would desire and perhaps insist upon representation in Parliament.”
Our racist and colonial past, as well as Canada’s role in exploiting people of colour all over the world, must also be included in our remembrance if we are to build a nation of respect for all people — the essence of real diversity.
In honour of Michael Parenti (1933–2026), who passed away on 24 January 2026 at the age of 92. He spent his life naming what power prefers to leave unnamed.
In 1837, Abraham Lincoln remarked: “These capitalists generally act harmoniously, and in concert, to fleece the people.”
Today, he would be dismissed as a conspiracy theorist.
That dismissal—reflexive, automatic, requiring no engagement with evidence—is not a mark of sophistication. It is a tell. The question worth asking is not whether conspiracies exist (they are a matter of public record and a recognised concept in law) but why acknowledging their existence provokes such reliable hostility. What work does the label “conspiracy theorist” actually do?
The late political scientist Michael Parenti spent decades answering that question. His conclusion was blunt: “’Conspiracy’ refers to something more than just illegal acts. It serves as a dismissive label applied to any acknowledgment of ruling-class power, both its legal and illegal operations.” The term functions not as a descriptor but as a weapon—a thought-terminating cliché that protects the powerful from scrutiny by pathologising those who scrutinise them.
Conspiracy denial, in Parenti’s analysis, is not skepticism. It is the opposite of skepticism. It is credulity toward power dressed up as critical thinking. As he wrote in Dirty Truths: “Just because some people have fantasies of conspiracies does not mean all conspiracies are imaginary.” … continue
This site is provided as a research and reference tool. Although we make every reasonable effort to ensure that the information and data provided at this site are useful, accurate, and current, we cannot guarantee that the information and data provided here will be error-free. By using this site, you assume all responsibility for and risk arising from your use of and reliance upon the contents of this site.
This site and the information available through it do not, and are not intended to constitute legal advice. Should you require legal advice, you should consult your own attorney.
Nothing within this site or linked to by this site constitutes investment advice or medical advice.
Materials accessible from or added to this site by third parties, such as comments posted, are strictly the responsibility of the third party who added such materials or made them accessible and we neither endorse nor undertake to control, monitor, edit or assume responsibility for any such third-party material.
The posting of stories, commentaries, reports, documents and links (embedded or otherwise) on this site does not in any way, shape or form, implied or otherwise, necessarily express or suggest endorsement or support of any of such posted material or parts therein.
The word “alleged” is deemed to occur before the word “fraud.” Since the rule of law still applies. To peasants, at least.
Fair Use
This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more info go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
DMCA Contact
This is information for anyone that wishes to challenge our “fair use” of copyrighted material.
If you are a legal copyright holder or a designated agent for such and you believe that content residing on or accessible through our website infringes a copyright and falls outside the boundaries of “Fair Use”, please send a notice of infringement by contacting atheonews@gmail.com.
We will respond and take necessary action immediately.
If notice is given of an alleged copyright violation we will act expeditiously to remove or disable access to the material(s) in question.
All 3rd party material posted on this website is copyright the respective owners / authors. Aletho News makes no claim of copyright on such material.
Israeli Finance Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Rudolph Giuliani knew each other. Giuliani had officially welcomed Netanyahu when he visited New York City as Prime Minister of Israel in 1996. There was no indication, however, from news reports that the two men met in London at the Great Eastern. On the day prior to the London attacks, July 6th, Giuliani was in North Yorkshire at a meeting.
Aletho News 
