John Kerry, the US Secretary of State, recently visited Moscow to discuss the Syrian crisis with his colleague Sergei Lavrov and President Vladimir Putin. Journalists observed handshakes, smiles, even hearty laughter, between Kerry and his Russian counterparts. Syrian President Bashar al Assad does not have to resign immediately, Kerry declared, and the United States is not trying to isolate Russia. What good news, and what a surprise for the Russians. The Moscow show seemed a great success. Kerry strolled along Stariy Arbat Street, met smiling Russian pedestrians and bought souvenirs to take home. A few days later the UN Security Council passed a resolution, calling for a ceasefire and negotiations. Russian and western journalists alike now say there is some hope to avoid the worst in Syria. And as you may already know, if the United States wants a ceasefire, it’s because their «moderate» Jihadist allies are getting beaten up now by the Syrian Arab Army backed by Russian air support.
Is cautious optimism warranted about a Syrian peace? It is hard to see how. Kerry may say whatever he wants in Moscow, but when he gets back to Washington, he sings a different song, or his colleagues do. His boss, President Obama, said «Assad has to go» only a few days after Kerry returned home. And then there is the new phantasmagorical story published by Seymour B Hersh, the muckraking US journalist, who has revealed that not everyone inside the US government is brain dead. It’s a remarkable discovery when you think about US foreign policy. Some military officials, and no less than the former Chief of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, were actually indirectly, and very secretly, passing military intelligence to the Syrian government to help it fight Daesh, Al-Qaeda and allied Jihadist forces operating in Syria. At the same time, the CIA, with Obama’s support, was sending arms hither and thither in Syria to help the Jihadists overthrow the Assad government.
General Dempsey left office in September 2015 and was replaced by General Joseph Dunford, a true blue Russophobe, who says Russia is an «existential threat» to the United States. It is a classic Washington response: the US aggressor accuses its intended victim of aggression. Just the other day (22 December), the United States slapped on gratuitous new sanctions against Russia. It’s the same old pretext: Russian «aggression» in the Ukraine.
Yet another US provocation, you might think, as Russia searches for a peaceful settlement of the Syrian war. The Russian government is taking a sensible position, but in the present circumstances, is a negotiated peace a real possibility? If the war in Syria were simply a civil war, as is often repeated in the media, you could encourage the belligerents to put on suits and ties and sit down at a table to negotiate a settlement. Unfortunately, the war in Syria is not a civil war: it is rather a proxy war of aggression led by the United States, Britain, and France (until the Paris massacre in November), and pursued vigorously in the region by Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, and Apartheid Israel.
Turkey is playing a dirty, evil role. It provides arms and supplies across its borders for Daesh in Syria. Oil taken from Syrian wells by Daesh travels in the opposite direction, sold at cut rate prices, to provide revenue to the Jihadists for their war against Assad. It is estimated that Daesh was obtaining $40 millions a month from exported oil (before Russian intervention), but this is a bagatelle in terms of the money necessary for the Jihadists to wage war against Syria. Hundreds of millions are required. Saudi Arabia and Qatar are important suppliers and financiers of the Salafi Jihadist movement. Jordan permits training of Jihadists on its territory and allows passage across its frontiers into Syria. Israel also provides support from the occupied Golan territory, even providing medical care to wounded Jihadists. A coalition of states, four of which are NATO members, is waging a war of aggression against Syria. Against this array of deadly enemies, the Syrian government and the Syrian Arab Army, in a remarkable feat of arms, has been able to hold out for more than four years. President Assad has proven his courage and tenacity as a leader by refusing US summons to resign and by staying in Damascus to share the personal danger which all Syrians must endure simply to live in their country. No wonder Obama wants to get rid of Assad before talk about Syrian elections for he would almost certainly win them.
Sputnik in Moscow has estimated that there are as many as 70,000 foreign Jihadists fighting in Syria.
These forces appear for the most part are well motivated, supplied largely with US weapons and deeply entrenched in various parts of Syria. Since the Russian intervention on the side of the Syrian government, progress has been made in rooting out Jihadist forces, but as long as supply routes remain open across Turkey, Iraq, Jordan, Israel, even Lebanon, the war in Syria is not going to end.
Turkey’s role is particularly dangerous. It is a NATO member and it uses this privileged position to commit acts of aggression against Iraq and Syria. It shot down a Russian warplane in a well-planned ambush, likely with US connivance, and then ran to hide in NATO’s skirts. Apparently, the Turkish government hoped to sabotage budding European cooperation with Russia against Daesh, or to provoke a NATO-Russian war, as insane as that might seem. Other NATO members, the United States, France, and Britain, have also been deeply involved in the proxy war against Syria. Indeed, after the destruction of Libya, it has been reported that NATO planes were secretly used to transport Jihadists and Libyan arms to other Middle Eastern fronts. NATO members are effectively allied with Daesh and its Al-Qaeda derivatives against the Syrian government.
To be sure, the United States and its European vassals have attempted to cover up their links to the Jihadist war in Syria by launching make-believe air attacks on Daesh targets, occasionally bombing a caterpillar tractor here or there and blowing up a lot of sand in people’s eyes. Russian intervention exposed the double game of the United States and changed the balance of military forces in Syria.
Even now however, the US air force sends warning messages to Jihadist truck drivers to get away from their vehicles before it attacks them. Or it refuses altogether to attack trucks carrying Daesh oil, claiming it’s private civilian property. How preposterous! Since World War II, when has the United States hesitated to attack civilian targets? It is understandable that Obama and the CIA, having been caught red-handed in Syria, are furious with Putin for exposing them. Nevertheless, the Russian government has offered the United States, a porte de sortie, pushing for an anti-Jihadist alliance and peace talks to settle the war.
Peace is a marvelous idea and the US escape route, a practical gesture, but how is Foreign Minister Lavrov going to get Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, Jordan, and Israel, not to mention the United States and Britain, to stop supporting the Jihadist movement in Syria and Iraq? Talk about an impossible alliance: it’s like taking a writhing nest of asps to your breast and hoping they won’t bite you. Are such hopes realistic? «Maybe not but that’s diplomacy,» Lavrov might respond: «we have to try nevertheless». These days it takes infinite patience and great theatrical skills to be a Russian diplomat. Russia is trying to finesse the United States into dropping its support of «moderate» Jihadists. In fact, such moderates do not exist.
Neither does the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA). The Jihadists decapitate a few hapless victims, and FSA volunteers run away in horror leaving their arms for Daesh. Or, they laugh at the infidels’ stupidity and go over, arms in hand, to the Jihadist side.
Even if Russia could get real commitments from the United States, which is as yet quite uncertain, what is to be done about Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states? And what is to be done with all the foreign Jihadists in Syria? Are these terrorists and war criminals going to be encouraged to return to the 40+ different countries whence they came to stir up violence there? And what is to be done about the Syrian Jihadists, though there is no open source information about their numbers? Will they be allowed to remain at large, or worse, will they be recognised as a legitimate Syrian opposition?
Even an anti-Jihadist coalition of willing members will have hard work rooting out Daesh and its allies. But the coalition of asps which Russia is trying to organise is composed of Daesh supporters. How is that going to work? One fears not at all well since the would-be alliance members, with the possible exception of France, have not abandoned their backing of Daesh, whatever one hears to the contrary notwithstanding. The United States remains the chief culprit continuing to pursue its two-faced, dangerous policies.
«The four core elements of Obama’s Syria policy remain intact today», Seymour Hersh says: «an insistence that Assad must go; that no anti-IS (Islamic State) coalition with Russia is possible; that Turkey is a steadfast ally in the war against terrorism; and that there really are significant moderate opposition forces for the US to support».
Policy based on false premises invariably leads to failure. Obama’s policy is no exception. Assad is a courageous leader of Syrian resistance against the Jihadist invasion. The only possible successful coalition against Daesh, Al-Qaeda and their affiliates is with Assad and with Russia. Turkey is a dangerous provocateur, playing with matches amongst open kegs of gunpowder, trying to drag NATO into a deeper de facto alliance with Daesh or even war with Russia. Finally, there are no «moderate» Jihadist forces in Syria. The Free Syrian Army barely exists at all, and the so-called moderates are no less murderous than their Daesh allies.
One cannot fault the Russians for trying to organise an anti-Jihadist alliance in Syria, but their potential allies, apart perhaps from the apparently repentant French, are all snakes in the grass. And Obama, the Nobel Peace Prize winner, is the biggest snake of all. «Do you realise what you have done?» Putin asked at the UN in September. Not yet apparently, reports to the contrary notwithstanding. But then, as we know, there are none so blind as those who will not see.
December 26, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Aletho News | Da’esh, France, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Middle East, NATO, Obama, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkiye, UK |
Leave a comment
A high-ranking Iraqi military commander has accused Turkey of providing members of the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group, who are wreaking havoc in neighboring Iraq, with shelter.
Spokesman for Badr Organization Karim al-Nouri said on Thursday, “Turks are clearly helping Daesh,” adding that the process is “obvious” and “does not require additional evidence.”
“The problem of Daesh has not appeared out of nothing. It did not arise from the ground or fell from the sky. Someone lets them (Daesh militants) travel through different countries. They use the airports, hospitals. Where are the leaders of Daesh treated? They are treated in the hospitals of Turkey,” Nouri said.
He added that Deash extremists from Uzbekistan, Chechnya and other regions sneak into Iraq and Syria via Turkey.
“Turkey recruits and sends them to Iraq and Syria. It is clear as daylight and needs no proof. It is always hard to explain the obvious things.
“We have a lot of documents that prove that the greatest logistical support and supply routes are provided by Turks. The militants even return to their countries through Turkey,” Nouri said.
The senior Iraqi military figure said Daesh militants, who murdered between 560 and 770 captured Iraqi soldiers at Camp Speicher near the oil-rich northern city of Tikrit back in June, went to Turkey after the massacre.
“I have documents proving the connection of one person to the events in the Speicher. He was arrested because he participated in events in the Speicher. After the Speicher carnage, he went to Turkey and then came back again. This problem is obvious. It is known to everyone and does not require additional evidence,” Nouri said.
This is not the first time Ankara is being implicated in support for Daesh, whose militants have been committing vicious crimes against all ethnic and religious communities, including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians and others, in Iraq and Syria.
Apart from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar also stand accused of contributing to the violence that has gripped the neighboring Arab states for the past two years.
December 25, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Aletho News | Da’esh, Iraq, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkiye |
Leave a comment
Despite the announcement of a “partial withdrawal” of Turkish forces from a training camp near the ISIS-controlled northern Iraqi city of Mosul, Ankara has done nothing to follow up on its empty statements, the Iraqi defense ministry says.
“In fact there is no Turkish troop withdrawal. There are just statements from Anakara,” said Iraqi defense ministry spokesman Nasir Nouri Mohammed, TASS reported. According to the spokesman, Ankara’s forces “only slightly relocated near the same positions.”
This cannot even be called a “partial withdrawal,” Nouri Mohammed said, let alone a full withdrawal of the Turkish contingent.
Tensions between the two countries have increased dramatically since Turkey reinforced its military deployment in Iraq with about 150 soldiers backed by artillery and around 25 tanks in a base near the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL)-controlled northern Iraqi city of Mosul on December 4.
The Iraqi government considered this action as an hostile act in violation of its sovereignty and demanded the immediate withdrawal of Turkish troops.
Nouri Mohammed expressed hope that Turkey would follow up on its promises and will proceed to the “actual withdrawal” of its contingent. Yet, the spokesman reiterated, “no concrete steps” have been taken by Ankara so far.
On Sunday, the president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, announced the withdrawal of military troops from Iraq to reduce tensions following international criticism. The decision to pull out troops also came after Iraq brought the issue to the United Nations Security Council.
Yet despite the announcement made by Erdogan on December 20, Turkish Prime Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu said Tuesday that the troops will remain in Iraq to fight IS militants. According to the PM, Turkish training and equipment mission for Iraq will continue until IS-held Mosul is liberated.
“Within this framework and in line with Iraqi authorities’ demands, we have been providing training and equipment to both the Peshmerga and the local Mosul volunteers. Our support will continue until Mosul is liberated,” Davutoglu said, Hurriyet Daily News reported.
Addressing national assembly members on Tuesday, Turkish defense minister Ismet Yilmaz said that IS is a direct security threat for Turkey.
“Ensuring Iraq’s stability passes from neutralizing Daesh [the Arabic name for IS]. This can only be possible through the recapture of Mosul, which has, in the first place, strategic importance,” he said.
IS captured Iraq’s second-largest city in 2014. The United States and its allies have been carrying out air strikes against Islamist militants in Iraq since August 2014, but are yet to produce any tangible results.
December 23, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Illegal Occupation | Iraq, Turkiye |
Leave a comment
An Algerian diplomat has revealed that his government has suggested that Saudi Arabia and Iran should hold direct talks to solve regional conflicts and regain stability in the Arab world, Anadolu reported on Sunday.
“Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika offered an initiative to Eshaq Jahangiri, the first deputy of the Iranian president,” explained the anonymous official. Jahangiri visited Algeria last Wednesday and Thursday. The same suggestion was made to Saud Bin Mohamed Al-Saud, an aide of the Saudi monarch, who was also in Algiers last week.
The initiative apparently includes an invitation to both countries to sit for direct talks in order to solve the armed conflicts in the Arab region. Neither government has responded as yet.
Bouteflika met with Jahangiri on Thursday at the end of his two-day visit to Algeria, during which he attended a meeting of the High Cooperation Committee which discusses matters of direct relevance to Algiers and Tehran. According to Jahangiri, the situation in Syria and Iraq was on the agenda for the talks with the Algerian president.
December 21, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Solidarity and Activism | Algeria, Iran, Iraq, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen |
Leave a comment
Turkey’s invasion into northern Iraq could well be part of a plan to split Iraq into three separate states, undertaken with the approval of the US, while the recent Daesh attack on the Turkish troops plays right into the hands of Ankara, according to Russian political analyst and Middle East expert Semyon Bagdasarov.
The rocket attack at a base in northern Iraq where Turkish troops are currently stationed was solely to the benefit of the Turkish leadership, Semyon Bagdasarov, who is also the Director of the Center for the Middle East and Central Asian Studies, told Radio Sputnik.
On Wednesday, Daesh militants fired rockets at a base in northern Iraq, as they launched a wave of attacks against Kurdish forces.The Turkish Armed Forces said its soldiers returned fire, with four of them sustaining minor injuries.
The expert says that it could well have been a planned act by Ankara.
“In fact, it is all about [the city of] Mosul — who takes Mosul and kicks Daesh out. The Turks want control over it. Well, in the worst case, jointly with Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga forces. To be more exact, with the Iraqi Kurdistan Democratic Party, led and controlled by Masoud Barzani, with whom the Turks, altogether, have a good relationship.”
“So, incredible as it may seem, this strike plays into the hands of the Turkish leaders, who will now justify the country’s presence there and the increase of its military contingent,” said Bagdasarov.
His words have already been supported by the statement of the Turkish foreign ministry that Wednesday’s fighting demonstrated it had been right to send additional forces to protect its personnel.”This attack showed how legitimate our concerns were about the security of Bashiqa camp,” it said.
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu also said that Wednesday attack on its Iraq base by Daesh militants “justified the recent military deployment”.
Bagdasarov therefore said that it was, in fact, “an occupation of a territory of a different state” which Iraq is unable to withstand.
“In this case there could be only one appropriate countermeasure — military. However the fact is that there is almost no Iraqi army present in this region, it is mostly the Turks and Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga. And the reality is that Iraq is unable to resist the Turkish aggression. The Iraqi army is very weak on the ground. But the conflict is ripening and it is only the matter of time when there will be a clash between the Iraqis and the Turks.”
It is impossible that the Turkish military invasion of Iraq could have occurred without US approval.
“I think that the decision to bring the Turkish military into the Iraqi territory has been agreed upon with the US. And America’s current inaction speaks volumes. Then, right after that, information emerged that US, Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan decided to meet first in Ankara and then in Erbil to discuss the future of Iraq. Without Baghdad, without the central government. And it is easy to figure out what future for Iraq they foresee.”
“And several months ago one of America’s generals announced in a soldierly way that a unified Iraq ceased to exist. So we should regard three separate states: Iraqi Kurdistan, Shia state in Baghdad and Sunni Mosul.”
“So I think it is all about the implementation of this very project with the help of Turkey, moreover that it is now a member of the Saudi-led coalition on the fight against terrorism. All the above is going to be implemented on the Iraqi territory and, I am afraid, on the Syrian as well.”
Three goals of the Saudi-led coalition
The expert explained that the coalition proclaims its aim as the fight against Daesh. It is forming a special forces out of the servicemen of its member states. The second aim is the so-called protection of civilians.
“Such a wording often conceals the desire to topple President Assad, accusing him of alleged fight against peaceful civilians,” he said.
The third aim is the ideological counter-strategy against Daesh.
“The Turks will carry it out from the Iraqi territory they will seize under their control. And I think, most likely from part of the Syrian territory.”
“There, many understand that the new borders are being shaped out. And it is very important who will own what. Thus we are witnessing some stepping-up with everyone claiming that they are fighting against Daesh.”
December 19, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, False Flag Terrorism, Illegal Occupation, Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Da’esh, Iraq, Middle East, Syria, Turkiye, United States, Zionism |
Leave a comment
“The ISIL simply would not be able to support itself without American airpower,” US politician Art Olivier told Press TV on Saturday.
The United States is supporting the Daesh (ISIL) terrorist group because it does not want to end war in the Middle East, an American politician and political analyst says.
“The United States is ultimately behind ISIS,” Art Olivier said on Saturday, using an alternative acronym for the Takfiri group.
Olivier, former mayor of Bellflower, California, and former US vice presidential [Libertarian] candidate, told Press TV that the United States creates these terrorist groups “to keep fighting in the Middle East.”
“The ISIS simply would not be able to support itself without American airpower — in Iraq — and without American spies,” he noted.
On Friday, a US “friendly fire” reportedly killed at least 20 Iraqi soldiers and injured 30 others in Fallujah in Anbar province.
Olivier said US airstrikes also “attack the Syrian army when the Syrian army is fighting against ISIS. The only thing they drop on ISIS is ammunition and food.”
“Recently, some Iraqi soldiers caught some ISIS [militants] and they had fresh rations of US military food with them, and the whole idea that the US is fighting ISIS is silly,” the analyst stated.
The US and some of its allies have been conducting airstrikes against purported Daesh positions in Iraq and Syria and since last year.
The US-led coalition has done little to stop the ISIL’s advances in parts of Syria and in western Iraq.
Commenting on the recent shooting in San Bernardino, California, Olivier said, “Every witness said that they saw three tall white men with athletic skills that were the terrorists, and what they [police] ended up doing was killing a Pakistani man and his petite little 90-pound wife.”
“You know the story about ISIS is getting more ridiculous all the time,” he added.
On November 2, at least 14 people were killed in San Bernardino in the deadliest mass shooting in the US in three years on November 2.
Hours later, the suspects, Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 29, reportedly died in an exchange of fire with police. The Daesh group has claimed responsibility for the deadly attack.
December 19, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Deception, False Flag Terrorism | Da’esh, Iraq, ISIL, ISIS, United States |
Leave a comment
A senior Iraqi officer says the US is deliberately hindering his country’s military advances after an American airstrike kills at least 20 soldiers in the Anbar province.
Hakim al-Zamili, the head of Iraqi parliament’s Security and Defense Committee, blamed the US for the inability of Iraqi troops to enter Ramadi and Fallujah in the western province.
The MP accused the Americans of launching airstrikes or dropping aerial packages that provide weapons and equipment to Daesh.
His strong words came after a US strike hit the Iraqi army’s 3rd Division 55th Brigade west of the Iraqi capital on Friday.
According to Iraq’s joint operations command, the strike came as Iraqi forces were advancing on terrorist positions near Amriyat al-Fallujah.
Zamili put the death toll at 20, saying the number may increase since “many were seriously injured and have not yet been taken to hospitals.”
The lawmaker asked Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi to conduct an investigation into the airstrike against the 55th Brigade “which had previously had huge success in the fight against Daesh terrorists.”
“We will go to court over this crime, there will be a hearing,” an apparently outraged Zamili said.
Another MP rejected US military assistance, saying it would harm the national security and cause chaos in the country.
The US has proposed to provide ground forces including Apache helicopters to help Iraq recover Ramadi. On Wednesday, US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter went to Iraq to discuss the details about sending troops and helicopter gunships, which was not approved by the Iraqi government.
Abd al-Hussain al-Zergawy, member of the Iraqi Parliament, said the US move may harm Iraq’s national security and impinge on its sovereignty.
“The actions of the special forces on the ground are not controlled by us due to the nature of the tasks, which is harmful to our national security. Because we cannot tell what they should or should not do, which may lead to new problems and infringe on Iraq’s sovereignty,” he said.
“It is not simply about Apache helicopters, but about the trust between us,” al-Zergawy added.
Iraqi army and allied paramilitary fighters maintain a heavy presence in Anbar, where they have been engaged in a massive operation against Daesh.
The Iraqi forces have managed to recapture most parts of the desert province, including several districts of its capital Ramadi, which fell into the hands of Daesh in May.
Iraq has on several occasions complained about the ineffectiveness of the airstrikes launched by the US and its allies in June 2014 allegedly targeting Daesh Takfiri terrorists in north and west of Iraq.
Iraqis say many attacks have been carried out without coordination with Baghdad, increasing the likelihood of coalition fighter jets hitting civilians and Iraqi forces.
Zerqawi said Iraq should not allow the US troops to enter as it cannot control them and they may also cause chaos.
“If they send out ground troops and you cannot control them, it will be considered a new invasion into Iraq. So we will refuse that directly. The US invasion is a painful experience to us. They just left after causing chaos in our country.
“So we cannot open our door again when we are able to make progress in fighting extremist groups,” the lawmaker said.
December 19, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Deception, Illegal Occupation, War Crimes | Da’esh, Hakim al-Zamili, Iraq, United States |
Leave a comment
The establishment so wants everyone else to unfriend Trump supporters on Facebook. There’s even an app to block them. That’ll teach them!
Yes, Trump plays a bully boy and is appealing to populist (good), nativist, xenophobic, racist sentiments (bad). Those things need to be meaningfully addressed and engaged rather than dismissed by self-styled sophisticates, noses raised.
Focusing on the negative aspects of his campaign has blinded people to the good — and I don’t mean good like, oh, the Democrat can beat this guy. I mean good like it’s good that some of these issues are getting aired.
Trump is appealing to nativist sentiments, but those same sentiments are skeptical of the militarized role of the U.S. in the world — as was the case of Pat Buchanan’s 1992 campaign.
The New York Times recently purported to grade the veracity of presidential candidates. Of course by their accounting, Trump was off the scales lying. But he recently said the Obama administration and Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State “killed hundreds of thousands of people with her stupidity…. The Middle East is a total disaster under her.” Now, I think that’s pretty accurate, though U.S. policy in my view may be more Machiavellian than stupid, but the remark is a breath of fresh air on the national stage.
But I’ve not seen anyone fact check that, because that’s not an argument much of establishment media wants to have. Of course, a few sentences later Trump talks about the attack on the CIA station in Benghazi, causing Salon to dismiss him as embracing “conspiracies,” which is likely all many people hear.
Shouldn’t someone who at times articulates truly inconvenient truths be noted as breaking politically correct taboos? Trump says such truths — like at the Las Vegas debate about U.S. wars:
We’ve spent $4 trillion trying to topple various people that frankly, if they were there and if we could’ve spent that $4 trillion in the United States to fix our roads, our bridges, and all of the other problems; our airports and all of the other problems we’ve had, we would’ve been a lot better off. I can tell you that right now.
Which I think is a stronger critique of military spending than we’ve heard from Bernie Sanders of late.
But Trump — or Rand Paul’s — remarks about U.S. policies of regime change and bombings are often unexamined. It’s more convenient to focus on our kindness in letting a few thousand refugees in than to examine how millions of displaced people from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somali might have gotten that way because of U.S. government policies.
People say Trump’s proposal to temporarily ban Muslim immigrants is unconstitutional. News flash: the sitting Democratic president has bombed seven countries without a declaration of war. We’ve effectively flushed our constitution down the toilet. Does that justify violating it more? No. But the pretend moral outrage on this score is hollow.
And there’s a logic to the nativist Muslim bashing. It’s obviously wrong, but it’s rational given the skewed information the public is given. Since virtually no one on the national stage is seriously and systematically criticizing U.S. policy — it’s invasions, alliances with Saudi Arabia and Israel — then it makes sense to say we’ve got to change something and that something is separating from Muslims.
Some sophisticates slam Trump for acting in the Las Vegas debate like he didn’t know what the nuclear triad is. Well, I have no idea if he knows what the nuclear triad is or if he was just acting that way. But I’m rather glad he didn’t adopt the administration position of saying it’s a good idea to spend a trillion dollars to “modernize” our nuclear weapons so we can efficiently threaten the planet for another generation. People may recall that for all the rhetoric from Obama on ending nuclear weapons, it was Reagan who apparently almost rose to the occasion when Gorbachev proposed getting rid of nuclear weapons. But Reagan is totally evil, so “progressives” have to hate him and so we’re not supposed to remember that.
So much of our political culture just lives off of hate. People hated Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden, so they backed anything GW Bush wanted. People hated GW Bush, so they backed Kerry or Obama or whoever without condition, no matter where it lead. People hated Assad, so they helped the rise of ISIS. People now hate ISIS — some apparently want to nuke ’em — that will almost certainly lead to worse. John Kasich — the great reasonable Republican moderate — says “it’s time that we punched the Russians in the nose” — who cares if that brings us closer to nuclear war. Many demonize Trump — at last, someone from the U.S. who some in the mainstream label a Hitler. Hate, hate, hate, hate. Can we just view people for who they are with clear eyes, assessing the good and bad in them?
Trump calls for a cutoff of immigration of Muslims “until we can figure out what the hell is going on” — which, given our political culture’s seeming propensity to never figure out much of anything, might be forever. Then again, he’s raising a real question. Says Trump: “There’s tremendous hatred. Where it comes from, I don’t know.” Now, a reasonable stance would be to say let’s stop bombing until “we can figure out what the hell is going on.” But Trump — unlike virtually anyone else with a megaphone — is actually raising the issue about why there’s resentment against the U.S. in the Mideast.
Virtually the only other person on the national stage stating such things is Rand Paul, though his articulations have also been uneven and have been a pale copy of what his father has said.
Of course, what should be said is: If we don’t know “what the hell is going on!” — then maybe we should stop bombing. But that doesn’t get processed because the general public lives under the illusion that Obama is a pacifistic patsy. The reality is that Obama has been bombing more countries than any president since World War II — Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Somalia.
At the Las Vegas debate, Trump said: “When you had the World Trade Center go, people were put into planes that were friends, family, girlfriends, and they were put into planes and they were sent back, for the most part, to Saudi Arabia.” Which is totally mangled, but raises the question of Saudi Arabia with relation to 9/11.
Half of what Trump says is boarderline deranged and false. But he also says true things — and critically, important things that no one else with any media or political access is saying.
Yes, Trump says he’ll bomb the hell out of Syria, as does virtually every other Republican candidate. But Obama’s already bombing the hell out of Syria and Iraq — but it’s quiet, so people think it’s not happening. So they reasonably think passivity is the problem.
What people are right in sensing is that Obama, Bush and the rest of the establishment is playing endless geopolitical games and they’re right to be sick of it. The stated goals — democracy in the Mideast, getting rid of WMDs, stability in the right and protecting the U.S. public are obviously not going to be achieved by the policies of the establishment. They in all likelihood are pretexts and the planers have other, unstated, objectives that they are pursuing.
Trump touts his alleged opposition to the Iraq war. Some of us launched major campaigns to try to stop the 2003 invasion. I don’t remember seeing Trump at any of the anti-war rallies in 2002, but he apparently made a few remarks in 2003 and 2004. Certainly nothing great or courageous. But it’s good that someone with the biggest megaphone is saying the Iraq war was bad. People who are getting behind him are thus reachable on the U.S. government’s proclivity toward endless war.
And perhaps think for a minute about what a Trump-Clinton race would be like, given that she voted for the invasion of Iraq.
Now, Trump may well be no different if he were to get into office. But he conveys the impression that he will act like a normal nationalist and not a conniving globalist. And much of the U.S. public seems to want that. And that’s a good thing. He’s indicating that there’s a solution to constant war and that he’s different from everyone else who has signed on to perpetual war. It’s good that that’s energizing people who had given up on politics.
Trump — apparently alone among Republican presidential candidates — is saying that he will talk to Russian President Putin. Having some sense that the job of a president is to attempt to have reasonable relations with the other major nuclear powered state is a serious plus in my book. He conveys the image of being a die-hard nationalist, but — unlike most of our recent leaders — not hell-bent on global domination. People who want a better world should use that.
No prominent Democrat has taken on the position that we should really seriously examine the root causes of anger at the U.S. government. The public is never presented with a world view that does that. The only one on the national stage in recent memory to have done so in recent history was Ron Paul — and he was demonized in ways similar to Trump by much of the liberal establishment in 2008.
Bernie Sanders has of course rightly touted his vote against the Iraq invasion in 2002 and has very correctly linked that invasion to the rise of ISIS. But Sanders had a historic opportunity to address these issues in a debate just after the Paris attack on Nov. 13, and actually didn’t seem to want to talk foreign policy. Now he’s complaining about a lack of media coverage. Yes, the media are unfair against progressive candidates, but you don’t do any good by refusing to engage in what is arguably the great, defining debate of our time.
Even more troubling has been that Sanders has adopted the refrain that we need to have the Saudis “get their hands dirty.” That’s exactly the wrong approach and one shared with most of the Republican field. Even at the liberal extreme, Barbara Lee has declined to take issue with the U.S. arming with Saudi Arabia as it kills away in Yemen.
In terms of economics, Trump is alone in the Republican field in defending in a progressive tax. Tom Ferguson has noted: “lower income voters seem to like him about twice as much as the upper income voters who like him in the Republican poll.” Trump has “even dumped on some issues that are virtually sacred to the Republicans, notably the carried interest tax deduction for the super rich.” Writes Lee Fang: “Donald Trump Says He Can Buy Politicians, None of His Rivals Disagree.”
Can progressives pause for a moment and note that it’s a good thing that someone who a lot of people who have checked out of the political process are backing someone saying these things?
It’s important to stress: I have no idea what Trump actually believes. Backing him as person is probably akin to picking a the box on The Price is Right. He could of course be even more authoritarian than what we’ve seen so far. The point I’m making is what he’s appealing to has serious elements that are a welcome break from the establishment as well as some that are reactionary.
I have no personal love lost for Trump. Truth is, I lived in one of his buildings when I was growing up in Queens. His flamboyance as my dad and I were scraping by in a one bedroom apartment rather sickened me. I remember seeing the recently completed Trump Tower in Manhattan for the first time as a teen with my father and my dad bemused himself with the notion that he’d own one square inch of the place for the monthly rent checks he wrote to Trump for years.
And Trump for all I know is a total tool of the establishment designed to implode, as some of critics of Bernie Sanders have accused him of Sheepdogging for Hillary Clinton, so too Trump might be doing for the Republican anti establishment base. Or he might pursue the same old establishment policies if he were ever to get into office — that’s largely what Obama has done, especially on foreign policy. Trump says “I was a member of the establishment seven months ago.”
The point is that the natives are restless. And they should be. It’s an important time to engage them so they stay restless and funnel that energy to constructive use, not demonize or tune them out.
Sam Husseini is communications director for the Institute for Public Accuracy and founder of votepact.org — which urges left-right cooperation. Follow him on twitter: @samhusseini.
December 16, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Militarism | Afghanistan, Barbara Lee, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, Iraq, John Kasich, Libya, Middle East, Obama, Pakistan, Somalia, Syria, United States, Yemen |
Leave a comment
Pakistani Foreign Secretary Aizaz Chaudhry says he was surprised that Saudi Arabia included Pakistan in a so-called anti-terror coalition whose formation Riyadh recently announced.
The foreign secretary said Wednesday that he had no knowledge of Saudi Arabia’s decision on the inclusion of Pakistan in the 34-country coalition, adding that Riyadh never gained Pakistan’s consent for the move.
Chaudhry said he was surprised to read the news a day earlier that Pakistan will be part of the Riyadh-led coalition with an alleged goal of combating terrorism in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Afghanistan.
The Pakistani foreign secretary has asked the ambassador to Riyadh to get a clarification from Saudis on the matter. In addition, a later report on the website of the Dawn daily quoted a Pakistani Foreign Office statement as saying that Pakistani officials are awaiting details from the regime in Riyadh to decide whether to participate in the coalition.
Pakistan’s army spokesman Lieutenant General Asim Bajwa said Islamabad’s policy is not to look for any involvement ‘outside our region.’
This is the second time in a year that Pakistan regrets Saudi Arabia’s uncoordinated naming of the country in a foreign military mission. In April, Islamabad announced that it will not join a group of Arab countries in the Saudi deadly campaign against Yemen.
Saudi Arabia announced on Tuesday the formation of the military coalition, saying countries such as Egypt, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Malaysia, Pakistan and several other African and Persian Gulf states form the coalition. Saudi state television said the headquarters of the alliance will be based in Riyadh.
This comes as Saudi Arabia is known as the main supporters of terror groups like Daesh in Syria and Iraq.
December 16, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Aletho News | Afghanistan, Da’esh, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria |
Leave a comment
What Makes Recep Run? The Making of a Modern Pasha
Erdogan began his ascent to power as a social reformer in opposition to the power elite; he was a rabble-rouser for popular Islam and social welfare. Once he takes political power he enriches his family and the business elite and purges adversaries and rivals.
With political power and economic connections, he amasses personal wealth through illicit business transactions.
With political power and personal wealth, he seeks prestige and status among the Western elites by serving imperial interests: He shoots down a Russian military jet over Syrian territory and thereby threatens hundreds of Turkish businesses and loses a major source of personal enrichment. When the Russians threaten to cut off energy exports to Turkey, Erdogan’s opponents suggest he heat his own palace and villas with cow dung this winter.
The Two Faces of Erdogan
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has a long and ignoble history of betraying political associates, trading partners and military allies; of pledging friendship and then bombing his ‘friends’ and murdering citizens; of negotiating ‘in good faith’ and then killing rivals; of playing democrat then behaving like an ordinary demagogic dictator.
Erdogan appeals to the plebian and austere values of the Anatolian provincial petty bourgeoisie, while building the largest luxurious presidential palace in the world – fit for a 21st century Pasha. He repeatedly pronounces his fealty to the ‘Turkish Nation’, while he robs the Turkish treasury by repeatedly accepting bribes and pay-offs from building contractors who then double charge for publically-funded projects.
More recently, Erdogan claims to oppose terrorism and fight ISIS, while the major Turkish and regional newspapers, journalists and most domestic observers document the massive flow of illegal arms across the Turkish-Syrian border to ISIS terrorists.
Erdogan’s ‘Carnal Relation’ with ISIS
Erdogan supports ISIS by bombing the Syrian Kurdish fighters who resist the jihadi mercenaries; by shooting down a Russian military jet defending the Damascus government against the terrorists; by smuggling and selling oil which ISIS had stolen from Iraq and Syria; by providing medical assistance to wounded ISIS fighters; and by training and arming ISIS terrorists in Turkish bases.
There is a reciprocal relationship: Erdogan uses ISIS operatives to terrorize his own domestic opposition, including terror bombing a gathering of Kurdish ‘socialist youth’ in the town of Suruç on July 20, 2015, which killed 33 and the massive bombing in Ankara on October 10 of a ‘peace and justice’ march, which killed over 100, targeting trade unionists, leaders of professional associations, community activists and members of a democratic Kurdish electoral party and wounded many hundreds.
During the legislative election of 2015 ISIS terrorists and thugs from Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) attacked the offices, meetings and candidates of the opposition parties, especially of the Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP), to ensure that Erdogan secured a super-majority.
In other words, Erdogan has three uses for ISIS serving his external and internal interests:
(1) To attack and destroy secular Kurdish forces resisting ISIS in Syria and Iraq, thus preventing the formation of an independent Kurdish state on the Turkish border.
(2) To attack and destroy Syria’s independent Baathist government under Bashar Al-Assad, dismantle the multicultural secular state apparatus and install a Sunni Islamist client in Damascus subordinate to Erdogan’s AKP.
(3) To attack and terrorize the Turkish domestic opposition, including the broad-based Kurdish HDP, and the leftist trade union confederation (DISK).
Erdogan has a decade-long strategic alliance with the militant Wahhabi terrorists who now make up ISIS. He intends to ‘remake’ the map of the Middle East to serve his own expansionist ambitions. In part this explains why Erdogan has provided large-scale arms and material to the terrorists, trained thousands of mercenaries and provided medical aid to wounded ISIS fighters. It also explains why Erdogan took the unprecedented and extremely provocative step of shooting down a Russian military jet over Syrian territory, which had been bombing Erdogan’s ISIS allies. Russian and Syrian Army successes against ISIS have threatened his ambitions.
Erdogan’s transformation from ‘Muslim democrat’ to bloody authoritarian Islamist ruler with pretensions of becoming the dominant Middle Eastern Pasha has to be seen in light of his rise to power over the past 40 years.
What Makes Recep Run?
Erdogan, early on, showed his affinity for extremist Islamist politics. In the 1970’s he was head of the youth branch of the Islamist Salvation Party (MSP), a virulent anti-communist, anti-secular party committed to converting Turkey, a huge multi-ethnic secular state, into a theocratic regime (along the lines of contemporary ISIS).
After the military coup of 1980 the MSP was dissolved and reappeared as the Welfare Party. Erdogan became a leader of the new (re-named) Islamist party.
Erdogan and the Welfare Party exploited Turkish mass discontent with the corrupt and authoritarian military. The Welfare Party embraced a populist social welfare program with Islamist religious undertones in order to build a formidable grassroots organization in the working class neighborhoods in Istanbul. Erdogan was elected mayor of Turkey’s largest city in 1994.
As Mayor, Erdogan over-reached his power by preaching militant Islamism and was convicted in 1998 of sedition against the secular state. He served 4 months of a 10-month sentence.
Henceforth he changed tactics: His Islamist fanaticism was disguised. He changed the party name from Welfare to the modern sounding Justice and Development Party (AKP). Erdogan then launched a series of political maneuvers, in which he cleverly manipulated adversaries to gain power and then… stabbed each of them in the back.
Erdogan: Embrace and Back-Stab
Despite his earlier conviction for sedition against the secular state, the ‘reformed’ Erdogan allied with the Kemalist, secular Republican Peoples Party (CHP) to overturn the military’s ban on his participation in politics in 2002. He was elected Prime Minister in 2003. After the AKP won the general election it cut its ties with the CHP. Erdogan was re-elected Prime Minister in 2007 and 2011.
Erdogan allied with the pro-US Islamist leader Fethullah Gülen’s Hizmet or Cemaat Movement, which was influential within the judicial system, police and army. Together they launched a purge against secular military and judicial officials, journalists and media critics.
The Erdogan – Gülenist state apparatus arrested and jailed 300 secular military officers, judges and journalists and replaced them with Erdogan and Gülen loyalists – all Islamists.
Dubbed “Operation Sledgehammer” the entire purge was based on fabricated charges of treason and conspiracy. Yet it was described by the Western media in terms that flattered Erdogan’s democratic credentials, calling it an ‘effort to consolidate democracy’ against the military.
It had nothing to do with democracy: The purge consolidated Erdogan’s personal power and allowed him to pursue policies that were more overtly neo-liberal and Islamist. The purge of the judiciary further allowed Erdogan to enrich crony capitalists and family members.
Erdogan: The Birth of a Neoliberal Pasha
Erdogan then embraced an IMF-designed ‘stabilization and recovery’ program, which reduced wages, salaries and pensions while privatizing public sector enterprises and activities. This attracted a large inflow of capital as foreign investors and cronies snapped up the goodies at bargain prices. Most emblematic of this ‘free-for-all cronies’ approach to the economy was the Soma coal mine disaster in May 2014 when over 300 miners were killed in a previously state-owned mine, which had suffered a breakdown of worker safety conditions after it had been privatized to an Erdogan-crony. Despite local and international outrage, Recep ignored the scandal and unleashed police on the demonstrating miners.
Erdogan’s combination of Islam with brutal neo-liberalism attracted support from Brussels, Wall Street and the City of London. Large inflows of speculative foreign capital temporarily inflated Turkey’s GNP and Erdogan’s wealth and ego!
In the beginning of his rule Erdogan’s concessions, tax incentives, government contracts to big capital were broadly distributed to most sectors, but especially to his crony capitalists within the construction and real estate sectors.
As the capitalist boom continued and his power increased, Erdogan became more obsessed with his role as the savior of Turkey. By 2010, a serious difference developed between Erdogan and his Gülenist partners over the division of power. Erdogan moved rapidly and brutally. He launched another massive purge of suspected ‘Gülenist officials’. He arrested, fired, jailed and relocated Gülen sympathizers among judges, police and civil servants despite the fact that these were officials who had served him well during the earlier purge of the secular military.
Erdogan is not willing to share power with any other party, movement or group. Pasha Recep wanted to monopolize power. He has attacked critical newspapers, businesses and conglomerates claiming these were ‘Gülen controlled’. Erdogan ensured that only capitalists completely loyal to him would receive regime patronage. In other words, he strengthened the size, strength and importance of crony capitalists: especially in the real estate and construction sector.
Pasha Recep’s Assault on Civil Society
Turkey, under Erdogan’s absolute power, has seen a geometric increase in corruption and mindless ‘development projects’, leading to the degradation and usurpation of public spaces. His arbitrary and destructive policies have provoked sustained civil society protests, especially in the center of Istanbul – during the Gezi Park demonstrations, which began in May 2013.
In response to civil society demonstrations, Erdogan shed all pretensions, ripping off his ‘modern democratic’ mask and brutally repressing the peaceful protestors in the heart of Istanbul– resulting in 22 deaths, hundreds wounded and more arrested and sentenced to long jail term. Erdogan subsequently targeted liberal critics and business leaders, who had criticized his brutal use of force.
2013, the year of the Gezi Park Movement, was a turning point – Erdogan and family members were implicated in a $100 million-dollar corruption scandal while liberal critics of the regime were purged.
Facing opposition from sectors of the elite as well as popular classes, Erdogan became more rabidly ‘Islamist’, chauvinistic and megalomaniacal – ‘Neo-Ottoman’.
In short order, he re-launched his attack on the Turkish Kurds and increased his support to the Islamist terrorists in Syria, including what would become ISIS. These policies were designed to complement his ongoing war against the secular Kurds in Iraq and Syria.
Erdogan: Backstabbing Secular Syria and “Best Friend” Russia
From the beginning of his rule, Erdogan cultivated the ‘best of relations’ with Syria’s Bashar Al-Assad and Russian President Vladimir Putin. He signed dozens of trade agreements with Damascus and Moscow. Putin was welcomed to Ankara and Erdogan to Moscow where they signed billion-dollar energy deals and mutual co-operative agreements.
Up to 3 million Russian tourists visited Turkish resorts each year, a bonanza for one of Turkey’s major industries.
Erdogan’s regime was ebullient, effusive, embracing Moscow and Damascus while systematically preparing the ground for more backstabbing!
By 2011, Erdogan had been deeply involved in preparing the ground for what would become the bloody Islamist uprising in Syria. Early on, hundreds of armed foreign Islamist terrorists crossed the Turkish border into Syria. Their presence overwhelmed local Syrian dissidents. Armed Islamists seized villages and towns brutally purging them of Christians, Kurds, Alawites and secular Syrians. They took over the oil fields. From one day to the next, Erdogan was transformed from loving friend to deadly foe of neighboring Syria demanding ‘regime change’ through terrorist sectarian violence.
Erdogan embraced the most extreme, sectarian Wahhabi Islamist groups because they were committed to undermining the nationalist aspirations of the Syrian Kurds as well as overthrowing the secular Al-Assad government. Erdogan’s covert alliance with ISIS and other Islamist terrorist groups was motivated by several strategic considerations, which are outlined below:
1) The alliance serves to prevent the establishment of an autonomous Kurdish enclave on the Syrian-Turkish border in the event of a Damascus defeat, which Erdogan fears would then link armed Syrian Kurds with the huge disaffected Kurdish population in southeastern Turkey and lead to the formation of an autonomous secular Kurdish state.
2) Erdogan’s alliance with jihadis in Syria has served Ankara’s ambition to impose a puppet Sunni-Islamist regime in Damascus.
3) The ISIS regime controlling the Syrian and Iraqi oil fields provides Turkey with a source of cheap fuel and lucrative profits for the regime. Recep’s son, Necmettin Bilal Erdogan owns and operates the BMZ Group which buys the contraband Syrian and Iraqi oil in Turkey and sells it overseas (especially to Israel) earning nearly a billion dollars a year for ‘the family’.
It is not a surprise that the Erdogan family directly financed ISIS, which uses the cash from contraband oil, pillaged antiquities and ‘tribute’ taxes, to purchase heavy and light arms, military and transport vehicles and communications equipment in Turkey and elsewhere to support its terror campaign in Syria and Iraq. Well-informed Turkish observers believe that Erdogan’s intelligence officials are directly involved in recruiting ISIS terrorists to operate within Turkey and attack Erdogan’s internal opposition, especially the Kurdish electoral party HDP and the broad-based Turkish left and trade union movements. Observers claim Turkish intelligence operations had a direct role in the ‘ISIS’ bomb attacks in Suruç and Ankara this year, which killed and maimed hundreds of Erdogan opponents and civil society activists.
Erdogan and ISIS developed a co-dependent relation, one of mutual manipulation. Each has publicly declared their tactical enmity to the other, while busily pursuing joint strategic aims.
Ankara uses the pretext of fighting ISIS in order to bomb the Kurds in Syria who are resisting the jihadis. ISIS uses the pretext of opposing the NATO member Turkey in order to cover its massive oil and weapons trade deals with Erdogan’s family and crony business enterprises.
The Pasha Stabs the Bear and the Bear Bites Back – One Stab Too Many
Russia’s highly effective aerial bombing campaign against the jihadi and ISIS terrorist networks in Syria was in response to a formal request for military intervention by the legitimate government of President Bashar Al-Assad. Russia has long-standing ties to the Baathist regime in Damascus. The intervention has threatened to undermine Erdogan’s regional power ambitions and illicit business operations in Syria. First and foremost, it ended Erdogan’s plan to annex a large swathe of Northern Syria and call it a ‘no fly zone’. The Turkish-controlled ‘no fly zone’ in Syria would expand Turkish military training bases for ISIS and other jihadi terrorists and secure the transport routes for ISIS oil shipments smuggled out of Iraq and Syria.
Unlike the US, which had rarely bombed the strategic Erdogan-ISIS oil smuggling operations, the Russians destroyed over a thousand oil trucks and numerous ISIS oil depots and logistical centers in the first month of its air campaign. By reducing the flow of smuggled oil, Russia cut off the main source of massive profit for Bilal Erdogan’s BMZ Company as well as for Turkish arms dealers.
Like gangsters, Erdogan, his family and cronies have been immersed in massive corrupt business activities at home and abroad; he can no longer operate within the context of the larger interests of the Turkish capitalist class with its $40 billion dollar annual trade and investment relations with Russia. Erdogan’s decision to shoot down a Russian jet in Syrian territory, on November 24, 2015, was largely motivated by his fury at Russia’s successful interruption of the ISIS oil convoys. By protecting his own family interests, Erdogan stabbed more allies in the back: The Russians, as well as large sections of the Turkish capitalist class!
Up until Erdogan’s act of war against Russia, he had publicly embraced Putin as an ally, friend and partner. The two leaders had cordial relations for over a decade. The Turkish military was fully informed about Russian military operations in Syria, including its flight paths. Then suddenly in November 2015 he risked a total rupture in relations and invited retaliation against Turkey from Russia by shooting down a Russian jet.
Russia immediately responded by upgrading its most advanced weapons systems to defend its operations and bases in Northern Syria and intensified its bombing of the ISIS – Turkish oil operations.
Russia retaliated by imposing visa restrictions and economic sanctions on Turkey, adversely affecting the multi-billion dollar tourist business. Strategic energy deals were terminated. Large-scale Turkish construction contracts were ended. Turkish agricultural exports to Russian markets virtually stopped.
The Pasha Bites His own Tail
Erdogan’s unilateral actions were clearly against the broad interests of Turkey’s large export sector. From Gezi to Gülen, from one purge to another, Erdogan, the former ‘poster boy’ of neo-liberal Turkish capital, has become a self-centered despot, acting on behalf of a narrowing circle of corrupt family and crony capitalists. Erdogan set himself up as a modern day pasha more in the image of the self-indulgent Ibrahim I (the Madman) than the far-seeing Suleyman I (the Wise).
Once Erdogan realized the damage that his fit of egomaniac fury against the Russians had provoked abroad and his growing isolation within Turkey, he rushed to NATO on bended knee to beg for support. True to his authoritarian personality, Recep Erdogan crawls on his knees before his ‘superiors’ (NATO-US) while grabbing the throats of his ‘inferiors’ (the Turkish people)!
Conclusion
Erdogan’s road to absolutist power is strewn with indiscriminate purges, terror and deceit; violence against environmental and liberal protesters in Gezi Park and moderate Gülen Islamists; jail sentences and firing of journalists and publishers, military officials and judges; repression of workers and capitalists; terror bombing against activists and democrats; and war against Kurds and Syrians.
Erdogan’s paranoid and greed-driven vision of politics precludes any trust and stable relations. He thinks he is very clever with his combination of charm and broken promises, but he fools nobody. He reignites the war against the Kurds in Turkey and Syria but they retaliate!
He attacks Russia and provokes a very costly retaliation so far limited to the Turkish economy.
He increases his personal power, but undermines the interests of the Turkish nation and its people. Erdogan believes he is the rising regional hegemon, indispensable to the West. He blackmails the EU for billions of Euros to control the flood of refugees fleeing violence in Syria and Iraq with his promises to warehouse desperate refugees in Turkish concentration camps. But Europeans must know that their money can never buy trust and loyalty from the Pasha.
His oil deals with ISIS are in tatters. Russian bombs ensure that Erdogan will have to find other sources of illicit profit. Worst of all, Erdogan’s furious actions have lost markets, allies and domestic support. He faces enemies from all sides – liberal professors, students, big business owners and organized workers in Istanbul; small business people in the tourist trade; construction and oil companies in Ankara; farmers in Anatolia, and, above all, the coal miners in Soma Manis.
Who knows under what circumstances Pasha Recep (the ‘Megalomaniac’) will be replaced?
December 16, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Civil Liberties, Corruption, Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular | Erdogan, Human rights, Iraq, ISIS, Middle East, Syria, Turkiye |
Leave a comment
Ankara and Washington contravened the UN resolution on financing terrorism by failing to inform the Security Council about Islamic State illegally trafficking stolen oil, Russia’s UN envoy has said.
“We’ve got serious complaints about the implementation of [UN] resolution (#2199, banning financing of the terrorist organization),” Vitaly Churkin told RIA Novosti news agency.
“Under Resolution 2199, adopted on our initiative in February, countries are obliged to provide information (about financing terrorists) to the Security Council – if they have such information. That means the Americans had to provide such information, and of course Turkey, which should have reported any illegal [oil] trade going on there. They didn’t do it,” Churkin said.
“We’ve just been to the Pentagon and two several star generals were telling us about (US-led) coalition actions. I asked them a very simple question: you’ve been flying there for a year, we’ve been there for two months and already provided many photos showing that oil is smuggled through the Turkish border. Didn’t you know about it? They must have known, and if they did, they should have reported it to the Security Council,” the Russian UN envoy told RIA Novosti in an interview.
Vitaly Churkin has revealed that a new UN resolution on illegal oil trade is currently being prepared. “Together with the Americans, we’re drafting a new resolution tightening regulations on that kind of reporting. Possibly we could oblige the Secretary General to deliver regular reports on the issue, or it would be some sort of counter-terrorist agencies. We hope to adopt this resolution on December 17,” Churkin said.
Last week, the Russian Defense Ministry presented evidence of oil being transported by Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) to Turkey. Washington said according to their intelligence, the quantity of oil being delivered to Turkey is insignificant, yet acknowledged that certain parts of the Turkish-Syrian border remain unsecured.
Vitaly Churkin also believes the US-led coalition airstrikes on the Syrian Army more than a week ago may not have been an accident and could be repeated. Last week, the Syrian Army confirmed the strike on government troop positions by a Western coalition aircraft in the Deir ez-Zor area killed four and wounded 12 servicemen.
“Naturally, there is the suspicion that it was not accidental, that despite all assurances given to the Syrian government that these strikes would not target the Syrian government’s forces, the strikes could target government troops from time to time,” Churkin told RIA Novosti.
READ MORE: ‘Turkey acts like ISIS ally, should not be EU member’– Czech president
December 14, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Corruption, Deception | Iraq, ISIL, ISIS, Syria, Turkiye |
Leave a comment
At the Brookings Institution in Washington last Friday, Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon gave an expose of his country’s perspectives on the conflict in Syria. Ya’alon is a former chief of staff of Israeli armed forces. His extensive remarks betrayed Israel’s acute dilemma on the policy front following the traumatic defeat its diplomacy suffered in attempting to forestall the Iran nuclear deal. Israel is finding it hard to turn a new leaf, while other protagonists in the region and indeed the Obama administration are moving on. Ya’alon made the following points:
- Russia is playing a “more significant role” than the US in the Syrian conflict at present. This is not to Israel’s liking, because Russia supports the ‘Shia axis’, which includes Iran, Syria (Assad regime), Hezbollah, Houthis in Yemen and other Shia elements in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, etc.
- Israel disfavors the Syrian peace process devolving upon the UN-sponsored International Syria Support Group and the Vienna talks because it recognizes Iran’s key role in reaching any settlement, which can only lead to the consolidation of Iran’s ‘hegemony’ in Syria.
- The geopolitics of the Middle East in general and in Syria are centred around three groupings: a) The “very solid” Shia axis which at present enjoys the support of Russia, is anathema to Israel; b) The Muslim Brotherhood axis which comprises Turkey, Qatar, and Gaza (Hamas), which is “not on the same page” as with the US or Israel; and, c) The Sunni Arab camp, “the most significant camp” in the region, which lacks leadership, but brings together Israel with Saudi Arabia and other GCC states, Egypt, Jordan, and Morocco.
- The US should “orchestrate” and lead the Sunni Arab camp; in Syria, this means defeating Daesh with the foot soldiers provided by Sunni Arabs and Kurds, whom, therefore, Washington should ‘empower, support, finance and arm’. The US should have done this from the very beginning, but it is not yet “a lost cause. There is still a chance to do it”.
- One of the dangerous implications of the Iran deal is that Tehran is increasingly perceived as “a part of the solution” in Middle East’s hot spots, whereas, a resurgent Iran is a more confident Iran which is all set on the path to become a big military power. The S-300 missiles supplied by Russia recently “are going to be operational within a couple of weeks.”
- The Russian military operations in Syria have been a failure insofar as Moscow had estimated that a 3-month offensive would gain more territory for the Syrian regime, whereas, this hasn’t happened, and, therefore, pressure has built on Moscow to explore a political settlement.
- A settlement is hard to reach in Syria and the country will remain unstable for a very long time to come.
Interestingly, Ya’alon conceded that the “apocalyptic, messianic” regime in Iran is firmly ensconced in power in Tehran and “with more money now, without political isolation, without external pressure”, it has more room to maneuver. Thus, no change can be expected in the Iranian policies. As he put it, “I don’t see the chance to have McDonald branches in Tehran as the new future”.
The remarks by Ya’alon underscore the stark isolation of Israel in the politics of the Middle East. Evidently, Israel’s preferred option is that the US resumes its containment strategy against Iran, and, as part of the policy, should lead its regional allies to militarily push for regime change in Syria. On the other hand, the Obama administration has had enough of confrontation with Iran, has no stomach for getting involved in a prolonged war in Syria or anywhere in the Middle East. Besides, Israel is overlooking that the West’s attitude toward the Assad regime has mellowed significantly and there is overall acceptance that Assad has a role in the transition.
On the other hand, the S-300 missiles supplied by Russia recently are becoming operational within the coming week or so and they will considerably strengthen Iran’s air defence system. In sum, an Israeli military option against Iran is inconceivable from now onward. Both Iran and Israel are acutely conscious that the power balance in the region has shifted. Put differently, the spectre that is haunting Israel is the inexorable rise of Iran as a regional ‘superpower’. At one point Ya’alon put it as follows:
- We believe in the end Daesh (Islamic State) is going to be defeated. Iran is very different. It’s actually an original superpower… That is why we worry about this regime, and if they are perceived as a key for the solution because they are ready to fight Daesh, then they are going to gain more hegemony in the region… to be more dangerous, to be situated on our border, as part of the political settlement in Syria. This is very dangerous.
The implications of a Syrian settlement, reached on the basis of a consensus involving Iran, are very serious indeed for Israel. Iran put its cards on the table recently by stressing that the fate of President Assad is a ‘red line’ for Tehran – non-negotiable. And Iran openly regards Assad as an anchor sheet of ‘resistance’. Significantly, one of the most influential figures in the Iranian establishment, Ali Akbar Velayati, the advisor on foreign affairs to the Supreme Leader and a distinguished former foreign minister himself, made a stunning statement last week that Tehran expects Russia to join the resistance soon — and China too in a conceivable future. Velayati’s statement cannot be without any basis.
Israel has adopted a tactful line so far by engaging Russia and avoiding any skirmishes with the Russian forces operating in Syria. But it thoroughly dislikes the Russian-Iranian-Hezbollah axis in Syria, which is only going from strength to strength. Israel watches with unease that the Russian-Iranian military ties are poised for a phenomenal makeover. (Iranian and Hezbollah forces apparently helped in the rescue of the Russian pilot recently on the Syrian-Turkish border.) The Russian operations go hand in hand with the ground attacks by the Syrian government forces, who are assisted by the Hezbollah and are operating under the guidance of Iranian military advisors.
The crunch time comes if and when the military operations intensify in the southern regions of Syria bordering the Golan Heights. The instability in Syria is useful for Israel to disrupt the supply lines for Hezbollah. But the new reality could be a strong Iranian-Hezbollah presence in southern Syria in the approaches to the Golan Heights enjoying Russian air cover. If that happens, Israel’s illegal annexation of the Golan Heights could become a theatre for the forces of the ‘resistance’. Read Ya’alon’s extensive remarks here.
December 13, 2015
Posted by aletho |
Timeless or most popular, Wars for Israel | Da’esh, Egypt, GCC, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Middle East, Morocco, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkiye, Yemen, Zionism |
Leave a comment
Zeolite is old. It is in Roman concrete that has held for two thousand years. It’s in the water filters of ancient cisterns. It’s in the stomachs of Pacific livestock whose keepers knew, somehow, that this grey crumbling rock made the animals healthier. It’s in Soviet clinical protocols from the 1960s. It’s in the standard emergency response to the Chernobyl explosion.
Aletho News
