The Nobel Peace Prize in Support of War
By Terje Maloy | OffGuardian | December 6, 2018
On December 10, the 2018 Nobel Peace Prize Award Ceremony will be held in Oslo, the capital of Norway. This analysis will try to look at how the prize fits in the bigger picture, but first, some general background is appropriate:
Norway is a member of NATO and has close ties to the United States and Great Britain. The political, economic and bureaucratic elites are firmly integrated in transatlantic networks, a nexus of economic connections, think tanks, international institutions, media and a thousand other ties that bind. They tend to identify with the liberal wing of the empire, (i.e. the Democrats, not the Republicans), but will work with any US administration. The members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee are selected by the Norwegian parliament, and the Committee is nominally independent.
Despite being considered – and where the population considers itself – a ‘peace nation’, there are few countries that have eagerly joined more wars than Norway, from the attack on Yugoslavia in 1999, Afghanistan 2001, the occupation of Iraq, Mali, Libya 2011 and the ongoing occupation of Syria. Norway spends large sums of money supporting the joint Western effort to control the rest of the world through comprador intermediaries in non-governmental organizations.
This analysis will discuss some (overlapping) points about the Nobel Peace Prize:
- The prize reinforces certain grand narratives, the most important one being We are the good, and thus have the right to decide the fate of the rest of the world.
- It creates symbols for regime change operations. It beatifies modern day ‘good natives’ complaining about cruel treatment and pleading for the West to do something to liberate them (but are often remarkably unable to see Western abuses).
- It reinforces general reasons to start wars, by making specific themes very important at the same time they are being used to justify military action.
- It reinforces the narrative that enemy fights with illegal and cruel weapons. The focus on chemical weapons, as opposed to napalm or sanctions, is one example.
- It sanctifies peace treaties that are more like unilateral surrenders, advantageous to Western imperialism and capitalist interests.
- For a bunch of peaceful people, the prize winners are remarkably eager for war and bloody interventions.
- Some other points + Conclusion.
1. WE ARE THE GOOD, AND THUS HAVE THE RIGHT TO DECIDE THE FATE OF THE REST OF THE WORLD
(Photo: / White House, Samantha Appleton /Public Domain)
The Nobel Peace Prize gets its prestige and press coverage because it reinforces several big narratives. If it should deviate too much from what the powerful want, it would be ignored. Of prime importance is the notion that we are the good, and we have a monopoly on interpreting reality and to decide what is important. (‘We’ in this context being people in the West, and by extension their governments and leaders). During the Cold War, the prize had a similar function. It would be interesting to take a closer look at it, but for practical purposes this analysis will mostly be limited the last 30 years. Once you start to notice certain basic themes, they are rather obvious. To put it pointedly, the Nobel Peace Prize tries to aid regime changes to achieve the Empire’s aims where it is possible to avoid direct war, but it will aid in confirming the narrative that our troops are good guys.
This explains why Western leaders so often get the prize. The point is creating an impression that there exists a more humane possibility within our current unjust world system. When they receive it, what they have actually done is not an issue. Hence the award to people like Jimmy Carter (winner 2002); as president he instigated several bloody covert interventions in Central-America, Africa and of course the Islamist fighters in Afghanistan, but has since then opposed direct US wars; or Al Gore (winner 2007), who when he was vice president didn’t shy away from using the military as a foreign policy tool (see part 7). The prize to Barack Obama (winner 2009) can be placed here.
But the main use of the prize is to create support in Western liberal opinion for interventions that would otherwise be naked imperialistic aggression.
2. A FOCUS FOR REGIME CHANGE OPERATIONS
Where a Nobel Peace Prize is awarded to a dissident of a non-western country, the CIA or the Pentagon (see point 3) often has a task force working on cracking the exact same country.
The winners have varying degrees of internal appeal in the targeted country, but the main purpose in choosing these people is not to boost their standing internally, but to justify attempts at regime change to Western liberal public opinion. Without the focus on these martyrs, these operations would look suspiciously like old style colonial domination.
Hence the beatification of Aung San Suu Kyi (winner 1991) coincided with a concerted campaign to get control over a recalcitrant, but very strategic country. Suu Kyi is in many ways typical of the people the Committee prefers. She is a known entity, having conspicuously strong personal connections to the former colonial power – Oxford educated, married to a British citizen, her children are British citizens, etc. Signaling in which direction her political compass was oriented, she asked the world to use the old colonial name Burma instead of Myanmar. She asked for harsh measures against her own country (for its own good) fitting hand in glove with the US strategy actually used. In fact, all means would be permissible to use against this regime imprisoning a modern day saint.
The Nobel Prize to Suu Kyi played an invaluable role in creating huge support, especially on the liberal left, for the draconian economic sanctions against an otherwise fairly obscure country. And maybe many of her Western supporters actually did believe that the US and UK could fund her with large sums of money and create entire NGO-networks for her with the expressed goal of subverting a sovereign nation’s government, and her intentions to still be pure and progressive.
Myanmar is immensely rich in natural resources and is positioned between China and the Indian Ocean, and China and India. Any significant land connection between these two 21st century great powers would have to go through Myanmar to avoid the Himalayas. It is also of great Chinese interest as a transit country to the Indian Ocean. Therefore, the country was targeted with a multi-approach regime change operation.
A massive press campaign was arranged over several decades, a plethora of NGOs financed, whilst “former” CIA-agents now turned missionaries were working with the ethnic guerilla forces to create military pressure. In the usual attempt to concentrate all opposition into a joint force, extreme right wing religious fanatics became the spearhead in this campaign. The sanctions imposed on Myanmar, precluded any economic development and doomed the population to a life of crushing poverty.
One could interpret the recent calls to take the prize back from Suu Kuy as disappointed buyers not getting what they paid for.
We can go forward to 2010, when a Chinese citizen, Liu Xiaobo, won the prize. There were no surprises for what future was envisaged for China:
It took Hong Kong 100 years to become what it is. Given the size of China, certainly it would need 300 years of colonisation for it to become like what Hong Kong is today. I even doubt whether 300 years would be enough.”
The lines between creating justification for a covert regime change operation and next step, a direct war, is blurry. But when required, the Prize Committee can step in to keep the focus of world opinion on the right narrative.
3. CREATING REASONS FOR WAR: WOMEN’S RIGHTS
Malala Yoysafzai receives the Sakharov prize © Claude Truong-Ngoc / Wikimedia Commons
In 2003, just after the blitzkrieg on Iraq and at the very height of the George Bush’s talk of continuing the offensive to a few more countries, the committee chose to give the prize to Shirin Ebadi. By beatifying an Iranian at that time, the committee very well knew that they increased the danger of war.
Ebadi is a champion of women’s rights, a recurrent theme in NATO’s efforts to justify their wars. We know that targeting women in the West with this type of messaging has been a major effort for the organization for a long time. By giving the prize to her, they in effect created support in Western (female) public opinion for a war/regime change that would kill an untold number of Iranian women and destroy the lives of the rest, a repeat on a larger scale of what happened in Iraq.
The 2018 prize went to the fight against sexual violence in war. This happens to coincide with the very image NATO wants to promote of itself – who can forget Angelina Jolie and NATO’s General Secretary Jens Stoltenberg writing a joint article in 2017 titled “Why NATO Must Defend Women’s Rights,” where they point out that “NATO has the responsibility and opportunity to be a leading protector of women’s rights” and “can become the global military leader in how to prevent and respond to sexual violence in conflict”. How convenient that the Nobel Committee shares the same view.
A more analytic approach would point out such facts that US/NATO-interventions have made the situation for women infinitely worse in places such as Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan. An intervention to topple the legal government in Syria would certainly have created the same result.
In addition, a bit broader view would point out how allegedly stopping sexual violence against women has justified many wars of aggression. The stereotypes of cruel foreigners have not advanced noticeably from depictions of swarthy Spaniards groping blonde women in the Spanish-American war, to the claim that Gaddafi was handing out Viagra to mercenaries to rape women, as Susan Rice, the US Permanent Representative at UN told the Security Council. Amnesty International, later reported it had “not found any evidence or a single victim of rape or a doctor who knew about somebody being raped.”
Other notorious examples of how this has been used in war propaganda include Serbian rape camps during the Yugoslav wars. Allegations of mass rape were a key element of NATO’s propaganda campaign during the 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia. Clare Short, Britain’s international development secretary, claimed that the rapes were “deliberately performed in front of children, fathers and brothers.” After the war was over, there were some retractions, including from the Washington Post, which reported that “Western accusations that there were Serb-run rape camps […] all proved to be false.”
Malala Yousafzai (winner 2014), the young Pakistani girl who became a symbol of the war against the Taliban, is another figure that fits this pattern. The indefinite occupation of Afghanistan is, among plenty of other vicarious reasons, justified by improving women’s rights. This overlooks the fact that no improvement can be made under a government installed with the help of foreign bayonets. The situation for Afghan women has not improved since the occupation, but then again, the claim was only meant to create support for the war in public opinion.
The importance of creating the perception of fighting for women’s rights has long been realized in military circles.
An internal CIA-document from 2010 (a few years before Malala received the prize from the Nobel Institute for her struggle against the Taliban), published by WikiLeaks, discusses how to best market the war in Afghanistan, To show how similar the Nobel Committee and the military/intelligence apparatus think, it is worth quoting the following passage:
Afghan women could serve as ideal messengers in humanizing the ISAF role in combating the Taliban because of women’s ability to speak personally and credibly about their experiences under the Taliban, their aspirations for the future, and their fears of a Taliban victory. Outreach initiatives that create media opportunities for Afghan women to share their stories with French, German, and other European women could help to overcome pervasive skepticism among women in Western Europe toward the ISAF mission.
4. THE ENEMY FIGHTS WITH ILLEGAL AND INHUMANE WEAPONS, AND IT IS IMPERATIVE TO STOP THEM
By highlighting certain themes, in this case ‘illegal weapons’, they reinforce the narrative in Western public opinion that certain things are very urgent and real problems, when in fact they are of relatively minor significance.
Poison gas is a clear example. The OPCW won the prize in 2013. Given the general situation in the Middle East, several million dead in Iraq after the US invasion and at least 400.000 dead in the covert invasion of Syria, gas is a minor factor, and even if we take the frequent claims of ‘gas massacres’ at face value (which of course we shouldn’t), is only responsible for an infinitesimal fraction of these dead.
But to reinforce a false narrative, this focus has been invaluable. The prize creates acceptance for the narrative that gas is a uniquely important and evil weapon, where it is fully justified to do anything necessary, including attacking countries, to stop the possible use of it. At the moment of writing this, Nov 24, 2018, the US just accused Iran of hiding a chemical weapons program.
Some weapons that are killing far more people in far more gruesome ways than poison gas, like napalm, would never be put on this list. And we could compare gas to sanctions, the West’s favorite and most effective weapon of mass destruction, killing the weakest, the sick, children and old people slowly, while destroying entire peoples’ right to a decent life. No other or weapon of mass destruction has killed as many people since WW2.
5. SANCTIFYING PEACE TREATIES THAT ARE NEGOTIATED SURRENDERS TO WESTERN INTERESTS
Yasser Arafat receives the prize in 1994, together with Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin CC BY-SA 3.0 File:Flickr – (GPO)
The most noticeable feature when the prize goes to creators of peace treaties, is that the treaties are more like a negotiated surrender than a just peace.
Colombia’s president Juan Manuel Santos (winner 2016) received the prize for victoriously having put the finishing touches to a long US-led counter-insurgency campaign against leftist guerilla forces. Now the reactionary oligarchy has a safe grip on the country, and can continue their neoliberal agenda, which isn’t that different from the old reactionary order. The death squads murdering leftist and human rights activist continue their activities with impunity.
The country had an extremely tarnished image in human rights issues and needed a quick touch-up to make it palatable. The most conspicuous thing the 2016-award is that the president got the prize just before Colombia became a global partner of NATO. The planning of the PR-requirements for this to happen smoothly must have been already well under way when the prize winner was decided. Remember the prize is directed at Western public opinion, and has little to do with an actual just peace in Colombia.
Yasser Arafat (co-winner 1993) got the prize so he would be tied to a peace plan with a chimerical two-state solution the Israeli side had no intention of honoring. The peace offer didn’t even include a stop in construction of Israeli settlements. No clearer signal of Israeli intentions could have been given. This is a continuation of the joint prize to Sadat and Begin in 1978, for the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, where Israel succeeded in making a separate peace with the biggest Arab country, and could thereafter concentrate on consolidating its grip on the West Bank.
While Nelson Mandela (co-winner 1994) undoubtedly was a worthy winner, the transition deal the ANC negotiated for South Africa only transferred formal political power, and left unjust economic power structures intact. The assets of multinational companies were guaranteed, and the neoliberal policies implied in the deal doomed the large majority of the population to continued poverty.
Michail Gorbachev (winner 1990) got the prize for a unilateral and wholesale surrender of every Soviet position, both economic and political; he didn’t even keep them as bargaining cards. Trusting Western oral promises, this naiveté is unprecedented in a leader of a great power. His bad decisions made a managed transition to a mixed system impossible and abandoned the former socialist states to Western looting and a social collapse they still haven’t recovered from. No wonder he still is so popular in the West that gave him the medal as a sign of appreciation.
Finnish Martti Ahtisaari got the prize in 2008, «for his efforts on several continents and over more than three decades, to resolve international conflicts». This is very true. Left out is what should be added to the sentence, to resolve international conflicts – as a total Western victory.
Ahtisaari is directly linked to the creation of the NATO-protectorate of Kosovo. By 1999, NATO had decided to splinter Yugoslavia one more time. A 78 day aerial bombing campaign had little effect, so they sent in the diplomats. It was suggested that an envoy from a ‘neutral’ country would be more efficient. Here is how Ahtisaari handled the situation, telling the Serbs what ‘we’ would do (my emphasis):
Ahtisaari opened the meeting by declaring, “We are not here to discuss or negotiate,” […]. Ahtisaari says that Milosevic asked about the possibility of modifying the plan, to which he replied, “No. This is the best that Viktor and I have managed to do. You have to agree to it in every part.” [..] As Milosevic listened to the reading of the text, he realized that the “Russians and the Europeans had put us in the hands of the British and the Americans.”
Milosevic took the papers and asked, “What will happen if I do not sign?” In answer, “Ahtisaari made a gesture on the table,” and then moved aside the flower centerpiece. Then Ahtisaari said, “Belgrade will be like this table. We will immediately begin carpet-bombing Belgrade.” Repeating the gesture of sweeping the table, Ahtisaari threatened, “This is what we will do to Belgrade.” A moment of silence passed, and then he added, “There will be half a million dead within a week.”
The Serbians signed the treaty.
6. NOT A PEACEFUL VERY BUNCH OF PEOPLE
US Marine Corps tank in Baghdad, 2003 (Photo: USMC/ Public Domain)
For recipients of a peace prize, a remarkable number of them support wars.
The invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a war of aggression under the trumped up pretext of disarming Iraq of Weapons of mass destruction. It was a blatant breach of both international law and the United Nations Charter. What did the Nobel Prize Winners think of it?
Here we have Elie Wiesel (winner 1986): “I now know I was wrong, but better that than to have stood idly by”.
Jose Ramos-Horta (winner 1996) claimed approvingly that the only truly effective means of pressure on the Iraqi dictator [is] the threat of the use of force.
Liu Xiaobo (winner 2010) was clear, the “decision by President Bush is right!”. But then again, Liu had the remarkable opinion that “the major wars that the US became involved in are all ethically defensible,” including the wars in Afghanistan and Vietnam.
Former vice president Al Gore (winner 2009) had argued aggressively in favor of war in Iraq in 1991 and 1998, Bosnia in 1995 and Kosovo in 1998, and believed the 2003 Iraq war was legal based on earlier UN resolutions.
The Cold War winner Lech Walesa (1983) was an opponent of the invasion, but at least he knew where to put the blame: “It’s not the United States that is to blame for the war, but rather the EU, and in particular Germany and France. They knew the war was coming and they failed to prevent it.”
The Dalai Lama (winner 1989) was wily enough to hedge his bets, but decidedly did not condemn the war: “it’s too early to say, right or wrong”, He also supported the US/NATO military intervention in Afghanistan and the attack on Yugoslavia.
There is a similar level of support among prize winners for a direct intervention in the ‘civil’ war in Syria, a US/NATO regime change plan on the drawing board for at least 10 years before it started. The push for a no-fly zone in Syria on a Libyan model, which could then be used as a fig leaf for a full-scale assault, was immense for several years. What did the Nobel Prize winners think of this possibility?
(Keep in mind that the ‘action’ they call for, can only be either an aerial bombing or ground troops.)
Kailash Satyarthi (winner 2014) did not say anything about the fact that it was the 3 Western powers on the Security Council which started this war by spending billions of dollars arming and financing armed Islamist gangs. Stopping this support would seem to be the obvious way to stop the war, but instead we get: “The UN Security Council (UNSC) has the military power to bring this unceasing genocide to a halt.”
His co-winner Malala Yousafzai who seems to have envisaged a similar future for Syria as for Afghanistan, a Western intervention: “When I look at Syria, I see the Rwandan genocide. When I read the desperate words of Bana Alabed in Aleppo, I see Anne Frank in Amsterdam… We must act. The international community must do everything they can to end to this inhumane war”
This was echoed by former UN-leader Kofi Annan (winner 2001). Defining Aleppo as only the small part of the city occupied by Islamist gangs, he called for ‘action’. How this ‘action’ would differ from what he describes, is not clear: “The assault on Aleppo is an assault on the whole world. When hospitals, schools and homes are bombed indiscriminately, killing and maiming hundreds of innocent children, these are acts that constitute an attack on our shared, fundamental human values. Our collective cry for action must be heard, and acted upon, by all those engaged in this dreadful war.”
This wish was supported by Medecins sans Frontiers, recipient of the 1999 Nobel Peace Prize. It was the first to report the alleged gas attack in Ghouta on 21. August 2013, which the Obama-administration wanted to use as a pretext for a military assault. As it admitted, the MSF’s decision to issue a press release on the incident—which had not taken place in an MSF hospital, but in its “silent partner” facilities in rebel-controlled areas—was highly political.
MSF was well aware that their announcement of chemical weapons use would be immediately seized upon by the US to claim that Syrian President Assad had crossed a red line, and to start a bombing campaign.
The organization was here true to its roots, as the civilian part in the French military/intelligence effort to support an independent state in the oil producing parts of Nigeria, in the Biafran war of independence in 1967-1970.
Amnesty International, (winner 1977) was not much better, with its call for unspecified ‘action’: “The international community’s catastrophic failure to take concrete action to protect the people of Syria has allowed parties to the conflict, most notably the Syrian government, to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity with complete impunity, often with assistance of outside powers, particularly Russia… the international community had said ‘never again’ after the government devastated Eastern Aleppo with similar unlawful tactics. But here we are again.”
Anyway, Amnesty has a soft spot for endless NATO-interventions. In 2012, after 11 years of dismal occupation, the organization paid for advertising posters in the US applauding NATO’s actions in Afghanistan — “Keep the progress going”, purportedly doing something for women’s rights.
Tawakkol Abdel-Salam Karman is a Yemeni journalist and human rights activist that won the prize in 2009 wanted ‘protection’, writing: “Instead of protecting residents in Aleppo from brutalities of Russia, Iran and Bashar Al Assad’s regime, the world tended to mediate to provide safe corridors for the displacement of civilians,” adding, “these also are partners in crime.”
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos (2016) voiced support for the missile attacks on Syria in March 2018.
Such bellicosity (or just as often, coy bellicosity) is nothing new in the type of people selected as winners. Henry Kissinger (winner 1973) was the most infamous war hawk to win the prize during the Cold War, but as long as it was the right side doing the fighting, plenty of others identified with this one sided world view. We can recognize all the themes mentioned above in Michael Parenti’s description of the 1975 Peace Prize winner:
Andrei Sakharov was a darling of the U.S. press, a Soviet dissident who regularly sang praises to corporate capitalism. Sakharov lambasted the U.S. peace movement for its opposition to the Vietnam War. He accused the Soviets of being the sole culprits behind the arms race and he supported every U.S. armed intervention abroad as a defense of democracy. Hailed in the west as a «human rights advocate,» Sakharov never had an unkind word for the horrific human rights violations perpetrated by the fascist regimes of faithful U.S. client states, including Pinochet’s Chile and Suharto’s Indonesia, and he aimed snide remarks at the «peaceniks» who did. He regularly attacked those in the West who opposed U.S. repressive military interventions abroad.
7. Some other points + Conclusion
You don’t have to be an prop for US/NATO power projection to win the prize, but it helps.
The prize was originally intended to be given to the person who has done most to foster peace between nations. In a subtle twist, in many cases it has changed to banning aspects of warfare, barely ever addressing war itself. Broaching such a subject honestly would be impossible without addressing the elephant in the room, US/Western imperialism. The award has had many winners who are variants of this year’s theme, sexual violence in war (which also touches on point 3, the NATO-narrative of defense of women). The focus here is on a more civilized form of war, not abolishing war as such as a means of settling disputes.
No one (apart from some military brass) is actually pro-landmines, but the Peace prize to the Campaign Against Land Mines in 1997 coincided with the increased Western interventions in places where these weapons would be a hindrance to the success of the occupation It was not in the interest of NATO forces to have their opponents using these ‘poor man’s weapons’, creating the casualties so feared by the military in modern wars, which again might increase opposition at home to war. The coalition suffered most of their casualties from IEDs, a sort of land mine, in Iraq, while having limited use of mines themselves.
There is a certain unpredictability as to who the prize will be awarded to, making it not as obviously beholden to the immediate needs of the powerful, even though the long term trend is clear. For example, there has been no Russian winner for quite a while now, and the White Helmets have not yet got the award, maybe as they are too obviously only a PR-front.
When Jean-Paul Sartre declined the Nobel Prize in Literature, he said that the prize ‘is for Western writers or Eastern rebels’. On a similar note, we might say that the Nobel Peace Prize is for Western elites or Eastern rebels.
That the selection of winners conforms to US views does not mean that there is a direct influence, although some recommendations to the Committee probably weigh heavier than others. Rather this pattern is a sign of how well socialized the Norwegian Nobel Committee members are in the transatlantic world view, where ‘our’ requirements override any genuine wish for peace.
Military defeats push Kabul into talks with Taliban as US seeks way out from Afghan stalemate
RT | December 5, 2018
Direct talks with the Taliban are crucial for the Kabul government to survive amid crushing defeats by the militants, Afghanistan experts told RT amid expectations that end of the 17-year war is looming.
Afghanistan returned to headlines this week, with a government-affiliated official making an unconventional peace gesture towards the Taliban. Ehsan Taheri, spokesman for the High Peace Council – a body that mediates peace between the government and the militants – said Kabul is ready to talk directly to the Taliban. He promised there will be no prerequisites to discuss any issue “crucial for the future of Afghanistan.”
“There’s no doubt the Afghan government relies on speeding up talks with Taliban” as the situation on the ground deteriorated over the past two years, Nikita Mendkovich, an expert with Russian International Affairs Council, told RT.
The Taliban have managed to gain upper hand in various parts of the country, and the Western-backed Afghan National Army risks being defeated in the coming years, he explained. And while Kabul’s offer of peace sounds promising at a glance, analysts say it has more to do with the survival of the current government than anything else.
The militants are able “to take matters into their own hands” without providing any security guarantee to the Afghan government, the expert noted.
That aside, Afghanistan is preparing to hold presidential elections, putting the sitting President Ashraf Ghani in a precarious position. Because he is unpopular with sizeable part of the population and regional elites, he must demonstrate “some results.”
“A peace deal or at least a long-term truce with Taliban would be a bargaining chip for Ghani to remain in power,” according to Mendkovich. However, the main reason for Kabul to accelerate the peace process is still rooted in “military defeats” sustained by the Afghan army and NATO forces.
Meanwhile, Omar Nessar, a researcher with Russia’s Institute for Oriental Studies, said he doesn’t see how a peace deal might become reality.The Taliban are demanding that NATO troops leave the country, which in turn is “unacceptable” for Western sponsors of Kabul.
The Taliban “doesn’t need peace talks right now as they continue to gain foothold in Afghanistan,” Nessar stressed. The Afghan leadership is a too week actor to talk with, but the Americans may try to ask Kabul to negotiate on their behalf in order to “save the image of the government.”
Afghan stalemate: Winning peace to lose war?
On the military front, the reality looks as murky as it was over the past years. On Tuesday, Marine Lt. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie who is set to take the lead of US Central Command (CENTCOM), gave oxygen to a claim there was no easy way out from the 17-year Afghan war.
“I do know that today it would be very difficult for [the Afghan security forces] to survive without our and our coalition partners’ assistance,” McKenzie said, noting that if the US forces are to leave “precipitously right now,” the Kabul government might fall.
McKenzie said that in light of a steep rise in casualties, the US must step up its efforts to help Afghan forces to recruit and train much-needed reinforcements, describing the current rate of losses as unsustainable. “They’re fighting hard, but their losses are not going to be sustainable unless we correct this problem.”
Asked to provide his take on this, Nessar said that while the US “is tired of the war” it cannot leave Afghanistan in full. A complete troop withdrawal would mean acknowledging a military defeat in the war on Taliban, he stated.
“The US cannot win war, it tries to win peace,” Mendkovich commented. Asked if the US could employ a peace deal with Taliban to get out of the war, he suggested a complete troop pullout is unlikely. US air bases and military compounds are “strategic assets” instrumental to “create threats” against neighboring China, Russia and Iran, and the Americans don’t want to lose them.
Russia in Full Compliance With INF Treaty, US Side Knows Well About It – Moscow
Sputnik – 04.12.2018
Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova responded to earlier statements by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg regarding the INF treaty by stating that Moscow strictly adheres to the provisions of the arms accord.
“Russia is following the provisions of the treaty and the American side knows this well,” she said.
Earlier, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg stated at a press conference in Brussels on December 4 that Russia should not miss its “last chance” to preserve the key arms control agreement between Moscow and Washington. Speaking at the same conference, Pompeo said that the US would suspend its adherence to the INF Treaty in 60 days unless Russia returns to full compliance with the agreement.
The US secretary of state also announced that the US would suspend its obligations under the arms treaty for 60 days until Russia “returns to full and verifiable compliance”. He also said that the US would not produce, deploy, or test any missile that violates the treaty during this period.
Earlier, US President Donald Trump accused Russia of violating the INF treaty by building prohibited missiles and vowed to abandon it in the near future. Moscow denied Washington’s accusations, saying it abides by the accord’s provisions. Russia has called the US plans to withdraw from the INF dangerous, saying that it could draw “entire regions of the world into an arms race”.
Previously, Russia has also accused the US of violating the INF treaty by deploying launchers capable of firing prohibited missiles in Europe, which is also prohibited by the INF.
What Foreign Threats?
The biggest threats to America come from its “friends”
By Philip Giraldi • Unz Review • December 4, 2018
One of the local Washington television stations was doing a typical early morning honoring our soldiers schtick just before Thanksgiving. In it soldiers stationed far from home were treated to videolinks so they could talk to their families and everyone could nod happily and wish themselves a wonderful holiday. Not really listening, I became interested when I half heard that the soldier being interviewed was spending his Thanksgiving in Ukraine.
It occurred to me that the soldier just might have committed a security faux pas by revealing where he was, but I also recalled that there have been joint military maneuvers as well as some kind of training mission going on in the country, teaching the Ukrainian Army how to use the shiny new sophisticated weapons that the United States was providing it with to defend against “Russian aggression.”
Ukraine is only one part of the world where the Trump Administration has expanded the mission of democracy promotion, only in Kiev the reality is more like faux democracy promotion since Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko is clearly exploiting a situation that he himself provoked. He envisions setting himself up as a victim of Moscow to aid in his attempts to establish his own power through a security relationship with Washington. That in turn will help his bid for reelection in March 2019 elections, in which his poll numbers are currently running embarrassingly low largely due to the widescale corruption in his government. Poroshenko has already done much to silence the press in his county while the developing crisis with Russia has enabled him to declare martial law in the eastern parts of the country where he is most poorly regarded. If it all works out, he hopes to win the election and subsequently, it is widely believed, he will move to expand his own executive authority.
There also has to be some consideration the encounter with the Russians on the Kerch Strait was contrived by Poroshenko with the assistance of a gaggle of American neoconservative and Israeli advisers who have been actively engaged with the Ukrainian government for the past several years. The timing was good for Poroshenko for his own domestic political reasons but it was also an opportunity for the neocon warmongers that surround Trump and proliferate inside the Beltway to scuttle any possible meeting between a vulnerable Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin at the G20 gathering in Argentina.
The defection of Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen, together with the assumption that a lot of anti-Trump dirt will be spilled soon, means that the American president had to be even more cautious than ever in any dealings with Moscow and all he needed was a nod of approval from National Security Adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to cancel the encounter. A heads-of-state meeting might not have solved anything but it certainly would be better than the current drift towards a new cold war. If the United States has only one vitally important relationship anywhere it is with Russia as the two countries are ready, able and apparently willing to destroy the world under the aegis of self-defense.
Given the anti-Russian hysteria prevailing in the U.S. and the ability of the neocons to switch on the media, it should come as no surprise that the Russian-Ukrainian incident immediately generated calls from the press and politicians for the White House to get tough with the Kremlin. It is important to note that the United States has no actual national interest in getting involved in a war between Russia and Ukraine if that should come about. The two Eastern European countries are neighbors and have a long history of both friendship and hostility but the only thing clear about the conflict is that it is up to them to sort things out and no amount of sanctions and jawing by concerned congressmen will change that fact.
Other Eastern European nations that similarly have problems with Russia should also be considered provocateurs as they seek to create tension to bind the United States more closely to them through the NATO alliance. The reality is that today’s Russian Federation is not the Soviet Union and it neither aspires to nor can afford hegemony over its former allies. What it has made very clear that it does want is a modus vivendi where Russia itself is not being threatened by the West.
Recent military maneuvers in Poland and Lithuania and the stationing of new missiles in Eastern Europe do indeed pose a genuine threat to Moscow as it places NATO forces on top of Russia’s border. When Russia reacts to incursions by NATO warships and planes right along its borders, it is accused of acting aggressively. One wonders how the U.S. government would respond if a Russian aircraft carrier were to take up position off the eastern seaboard and were to begin staging reconnaissance flights. Or if the Russian army were to begin military exercises with the Cubans? Does anyone today remember the Bay of Pigs?
When it comes to international conflicts context is everything. Seeing the incident between Russia and Ukraine in Manichean terms as an example of Moscow’s aggressive instincts is satisfying in some circles, but it does not in any way reflect the reality on the ground. Internal politics of the two countries combined with deliberate fabrications that are expected to generate a certain response operate together to create a largely false narrative for both international and domestic consumption. Unfortunately, narratives have consequences: in this case, the sacrifice of the possibly beneficial meeting between Trump and Putin.
The same dynamic works vis-à-vis Washington’s other enemy du jour Iran. In the case of Russia, useless “friend” Ukraine is pulling the strings while regarding Iran it is conniving Israel and Saudi Arabia. Iran has been accused of being the world’s leading sponsor of terror, of destabilizing the Middle East, and of having a secret nuclear weapon program that will be used to attack Israel and Europe. None of those assertions are true. The terrorism tag comes from the country’s relationship with Hezbollah, which is only a terrorist group insofar as it is hostile to Israel and pledged to resist any future Israeli invasion of Lebanon. Washington and Israel have pushed the terrorism label for Hezbollah, but most Europeans have begun to disregard the designation since the group has become a part of the Lebanese government.
And regarding destabilizing the Middle East, that has largely been the end result of actions undertaken by the United States, Israel and the Saudis, while the alleged Persian nuclear weapons program is a fantasy. If someone in the U.S. national security apparatus had any brains the United States would work to improve relations with Iran real soon as the Iranians would in the long run quite likely prove to be better friends than those rascals who are currently running around using that label.
And there are other friends in unlikely places. Beleaguered British Prime Minister Theresa May is wailing loudly against a Trump threat to reveal classified documents relating to Russiagate. The real problem is that the documents apparently don’t expose anything done by the Russians. Rather, they seem to appear to reveal a plot by the British intelligence and security services working in collusion with then CIA Director John Brennan to subvert the course of the 2016 election in favor of the Deep State and Establishment favorite Hillary Clinton. How did that one work out?
So how about it? Teenagers who get in trouble often have to ditch their bad friends to turn their lives around. There is still a chance for the United States if we keep our distance from the bad friends we have been nurturing all around the world, friends who have been convincing us to make poor choices. Get rid of the ties the bind to the Saudis, Israelis, Ukrainians, Poles, and yes, even the British. Deal fairly with all nations and treat everyone the same, but bear in mind that there are only two relationships that really matter – Russia and China. Make a serious effort to avoid a war by learning how to get along with those two nations and America might actually survive to celebrate a tricentennial in 2076.
Berlin should not be ‘drawn into war’ with Russia by Kiev over Kerch crisis – German ex-FM Gabriel
RT | December 2, 2018
Germany can’t afford being plunged into a war with Russia amid the Kerch Strait crisis, the country’s former Vice Chancellor alarmed, blasting Ukraine’s suggestion that Berlin deploy its warships to the troubled Azov Sea.
Former German Vice Chancellor and Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel has spoken out about the recent Kerch Strait incident, criticizing Kiev’s attempts to raise stakes in the political row with Moscow. At any rate, Germany “should not be drawn into a war against Russia,” Gabriel told Tagesspiegel newspaper.
He also denounced Ukraine’s call to shut international ports for Russian vessels based in Crimea, calling the suggestion “a new edition of gunboat diplomacy.”
In a separate interview with N-TV broadcaster, the retired politician also accused Ukraine of trying to ignite a direct confrontation between Russia and Germany. “I think that in no case should we let ourselves be drawn into a war through Ukraine,” Gabriel stressed, adding “this is what Ukraine has tried [to do].”
Gabriel’s remarks came after Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko suggested that Berlin provide military assistance to Kiev. “We need increased presence warships from Germany and allied nations in the Black Sea to send a message and deter Russia,” he told Funke media group.
Berlin, however, ruled out a possibility of its warships being sent to Crimean shores. “We do understand Ukrainian concerns,” Foreign Minister Heiko Maas responded last week, adding, “but what we do not want is militarization of this conflict.”
Earlier, Poroshenko had also called NATO to deploy military vessels to the Crimean coast “in order to back Ukraine and ensure security.”
Kiev’s pleas for help had also apparently fallen on deaf ears as NATO provided a tight-lipped response, with the spokeswoman Oana Lungescu saying the bloc already has a sizeable naval presence in the Black Sea.
As the story developed, Russian President Vladimir Putin predicted the Ukrainian conflict will go on as long as “a party of war” stays in power in Kiev. Ukraine’s government is craving war to rip profits from it and to blame their own domestic failures on some “aggressors.”
Tensions between Russia and Ukraine soared after the incident in the Kerch Strait last weekend. At the time, several Ukrainian Navy ships tried to sail through the strait without seeking the proper permission, Moscow said. Responding to the border violation, Russia’s border guard have seized the vessels and detained their crews.
While Kiev branded the incident an act of “aggression” on Moscow’s part, Russia believes the whole affair to be a deliberate “provocation” which allowed Kiev to declare a so-called “partial” martial law ahead of Ukraine’s presidential election.
The Nuclear Lies of NATO’s Jens Stoltenberg. Brand New “Precision Guidance” Nukes Deployed All Over Europe
By Manlio Dinucci | Global Research | November 30, 2018
“Russian missiles are a danger” – the alarm was sounded by the Secretary General of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, in an interview with Maurizio Caprara published in the Corriere della Sera*, three days before the “incident” in the Sea of Azov which added fuel to the already incandescent tension with Russia. “There are no new missiles in Europe. But there are Russian missiles, yes”, began Stoltenberg, ignoring two facts.
First: as from March 2020, the United States will begin to deploy in Italy, Germany, Belgium, and Holland (where B-61 nuclear bombs are already based), and probably also in other European countries, the first nuclear bomb with precision guidance in their arsenal, the B61-12. Its function is primarily anti-Russian. This new bomb is designed with penetrating capacity, enabling it to explode underground in order to destroy the central command bunkers with its first strike. How would the United States react if Russia deployed nuclear bombs in Mexico, right next to their territory? Since Italy and the other countries, violating the non-proliferation Treaty, are allowing the USA to use its bases, as well as its pilots and planes, for the deployment of nuclear weapons, Europe will be exposed to a greater risk as the first line of the growing confrontation with Russia.
Second: a new US missile system was installed in Romania in 2016, and another similar system is currently being built in Poland. The same missile system is installed on four warships which, based by the US Navy in the Spanish port of Rota, sail the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea close to Russian territory. The land-based installations, like the ships, are equipped with Lockheed Martin Mk41 vertical launchers, which – as specified by the manufacturer himself – are able to launch “missiles for all missions: either SM-3’s as defence against ballistic missiles, or long-range Tomahawks to attack land-based objective”. The latter can also be loaded with a nuclear warhead. Since it is unable to check which missiles are actually loaded into the launchers parked at the frontier with Russia, Moscow supposes that there are also nuclear attack missiles, in violation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which forbids the installation of intermediate- and short-range missiles on land bases.
On the contrary, Stoltenberg accuses Russia of violating the INF Treaty, and sends out a warning:
“We can not allow the Treaties to be violated without punishment”.
In 2014, the Obama administration accused Russia, without providing the slightest proof, of having tested a Cruise missile (SSC-8) from a category forbidden by the Treaty, announcing that “the United States are considering the deployment of land-based missiles in Europe”, in other words, the abandon of the INF Treaty. This plan, supported by the European allies of NATO, was confirmed by the Trump administration: in the fiscal year of 2018, Congress authorised the financing of a programme of research and development for a Cruise missile to be launched from a mobile platform.
Nuclear missiles of the Euromissile type, deployed by the USA in Europe during the 1980’s and eliminated by the INF Treaty, are capable of hitting Russia, while similar nuclear missiles deployed in Russia can hit Europe but not the USA. Stoltenberg himself, referring to the SSC-8’s that Russia had deployed on its own territory, declared that they are capable of reaching most of Europe, but not the United States. This is how the United States defends Europe.
And in this grotesque affirmation by Stoltenberg, who attributes to Russia “the highly perilous idea of limited nuclear conflict”, he warns:
“All atomic weapons are dangerous, but those which can lower the threshold for use are especially so”.
This is exactly the warning sounded by US military and scientific experts about the B61-12’s which are on the verge of being deployed in Europe:
“Low-powered, more accurate nuclear weapons increase the temptation of using them, even to using them first instead of as a retaliation”.
Why is the Corriere della Sera not going to interview them?
Source: PandoraTV
This article was originally published in Italian on Il Manifesto.
Translated by Pete Kimberley
Manlio Dinucci is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization.
Note
*The Corriere della Sera is a historical Italian daily newspaper, founded in Milan in 1876. Published by RCS MediaGroup, it is the most important Italian daily in terms of distribution and the number of readers.
US, Europe & NATO risk all-out war by backing unhinged Kiev regime
By Finian Cunningham | RT | November 28, 2018
With the US, EU and NATO all bolstering claims of “Russian aggression” – in face of contrary evidence – the real danger is that the Kiev regime will be emboldened to carry out more reckless provocations leading to all-out war.
It seems indisputable that the three Ukrainian Navy vessels were dispatched last Sunday in order to instigate a security response from Russian maritime border forces. In contrast to normal procedures for passage clearance through the Kerch Strait, the Ukrainian warships refused to communicate with Russian controls and acted menacingly inside Russia’s Black Sea territorial limits.
At a United Nations Security Council emergency meeting on Monday, the US, Britain and France pointedly refused to take on board Russia’s legal argument for why it felt obliged to detain the Ukrainian boats and 24 crew. The Western powers automatically sided with the version of events claimed by President Petro Poroshenko – that the Ukrainian Navy was attacked unlawfully by Russia.
The US, EU and NATO denounced Russia’s “aggression” and demanded that the Ukrainian vessels and crew be repatriated immediately, even though under Russian law there is a case for prosecution.
It is the West’s refusal to acknowledge facts that is part of the problem. Russia is continually accused of “annexing” Crimea in 2014 instead of the Western powers recognizing that the Black Sea peninsula voted in a constitutionally held referendum to secede from Ukraine and join the Russian Federation. Crimea was prompted to take that historic step because the US, EU and NATO had only the month before backed an illegal coup in Kiev against the elected Ukrainian government. That coup brought to power the present Kiev regime led by Poroshenko and a parliament dominated by neo-Nazi parties.
So, the problem here is a refusal by Western supporters of the dubious Kiev regime to accept the legal, historic reality that Crimea is part of Russia’s territory. Ships passing through the Kerch Strait between Russia’s mainland and Crimea are obliged to notify Russian maritime controls of passage. Russia has since reopened the strait to civilian cargo transport following the naval skirmish at the weekend.
When the Ukrainian Navy vessels violated legal procedures and entered Russian territorial limits, their action was aggressive, not Russia’s response.
Furthermore, there are already emerging signs that the Ukrainian naval transport was orchestrated for the purpose of inciting an incident.
Some of the detained crew members have admitted carrying out orders which they knew would be seen by Russia as provocative.
It has also been reported by US government-owned Radio Free Europe that the Ukrainian secret services (SBU) have confirmed that its officers were among the crew on the boats. The vessels were also armed. If the transfer was an innocent passage, why were secret services involved?
Recall that Ukrainian secret services have previously been caught staging sabotage operations in Crimea.
Another major background factor is the increasing NATO military buildup in eastern Ukraine and the Black Sea.
When Russian President Vladimir Putin officially opened the 19km bridge linking Russia’s mainland with Crimea in May earlier this year, there were calls in US and Ukrainian media for the structure to be sabotaged. Moscow has understandably stepped up security controls around the vital infrastructure, which cost $3.7 billion and is the longest bridge in Europe.
In recent months, the US and Britain have ordered increasing military deployment to the region under the guise of “training” and “assistance” to the Kiev regime forces.
Earlier this year, in July, the NATO alliance held naval drills, Sea Breeze, along with Ukrainian forces in the Black Sea. That’s in spite of the fact that Ukraine is not a member of NATO, although it is aspiring to join the 29-member US-led bloc at some time in the future.
It was the following month, in August, that Russia began stepping up its controls and searches of vessels through the Kerch Strait linking the Black Sea to the Sea of Azov. The latter leads to ports under the control of the Kiev regime such as Mariupol, which is adjacent to the breakaway Donetsk People’s Republic. The DPR and Luhansk People’s Republic broke away following the coup in Kiev in 2014 and have been under military attack for the past four years despite the so-called Minsk peace treaties. These are more facts that the Western backers of the Kiev regime refuse to deal with.
More NATO buildup continued in September with the supply of two gunboats by the US to the Ukrainian Navy for deployment in the Sea of Azov. Pentagon-linked publication Defense One described that supply as part of efforts by Washington and Kiev to develop a “mosquito navy” in order to skirmish with Russian forces.
Only four days before the latest naval clash, Britain’s Defense Minister Gavin Williamson announced the Royal Navy was to send HMS ‘Echo’ to patrol with Ukrainian special forces to “defend freedom and democracy.” Williamson said: “As long as Ukraine faces Russian hostilities, the United Kingdom will be a steadfast partner.”
This is background to the simmering tensions in the Black Sea between Ukraine and Russia. The situation has arisen because of Western interference in Ukraine – primarily the coup in Kiev in February 2014. Yet, in all discussions about events since then, the Western powers are in denial of facts and their culpability. The recent militarization of the Black Sea by the NATO alliance is a stark provocation to Russia’s national security, but again the Western powers bury their collective heads in the sand.
Given the reckless indulgence by the US, Europe and NATO of the Kiev regime amid its ongoing violations against the populace in eastern Ukraine, its refusal to abide by the Minsk agreements, and its continual inflammatory and unhinged rhetoric against Russia, it should not be surprising if this same regime feels emboldened to provoke an armed confrontation with Moscow.
Arguably, the Kiev regime and its adulation of World War II Nazi collaborators never had any legitimacy in the first place. It continues to demonstrate its lack of legitimacy from the immense social problems in Ukraine of poverty, corruption, human rights violations, neo-Nazi paramilitaries running amok, and now martial law being imposed.
It remains to be seen if the recent naval provocation was carried out with the tacit approval of Washington and other NATO powers as a pretext for further militarization against Russia. The initial misplaced condemnations of Russia have subsided to more measured calls from US President Donald Trump and French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian for “restraint” and “dialogue.”
That might suggest Kiev’s failing President Poroshenko and his security services acted alone to order the naval confrontation as a desperate throw of the dice to escalate NATO and EU support for his shaky regime against Russia.
Trump’s comments hoping that Kiev and Russia would “straighten things out” sound like Washington is not behind the provocation and has no desire for a wider conflict. Just as well, because such a development is a gateway to all-out war.
Nevertheless, such a catastrophe is always a serious risk when Western powers indulge this unhinged Kiev regime.
A European Army Obeying US Interests Will Only Incentivize More Imperialism and Military Corruption
By Federico PIERACCINI | Strategic Culture Foundation | 27.11.2018
The idea of creating a common army for the countries of the European Union has been repeatedly proposed by numerous advocates of the globalist elite for at least a decade. The latest example came from French President Macron, who took the opportunity during commemorations of the end of WWI in Paris to revive an idea that represents more a fantasy than a real possibility.
First the good news. Richard Shirreff, a retired senior British Army officer, stated: “I think we have got to be very careful about loose talk of a European army. An army is a legally constituted armed force operating under the authority of a sovereign Government. So, if you accept that definition, the notion of a European army is impossible until and unless there is a sovereign European Government, which is obviously not in existence. And I think it is some way off.”
The question then arises as to why Macron and Merkel are so interested in talking about something that seems unrealistic at the moment? The answer is simple and obvious. It is a strategy aimed at striking at Trump directly, as evidenced by the words of Merkel, who also voiced her support for the creation of a European army. The Chancellor has indeed stated that “[t]he times when we could rely on others are over”. By “others” she is clearly referring to the United States. Also, putting to one side the tense personal relationship between Macron and Trump, the Frenchman, like Merkel, is an exponent of globalism. The agreement between Berlin and Paris is intended to move Europe in a direction more agreeable to them, focussing on the need to attract more investment in European weapons, coupled with a desire to decrease dependence on US weapon systems. As Macron stated: “Europe must increase military spending, but the money should go to European, not American companies.”
The main issue, therefore, revolves around the economics of the import and export of arms in Europe and around the world, a business worth tens of billions of dollars a year. As SIPRI’s annual report reminds us, “The five largest West European suppliers – France, Germany, the UK, Spain and Italy – together accounted for 23 per cent of global arms transfers in 2013-17. The combined arms exports by European Union (EU) member states accounted for 27 per cent of the global total in 2013–17.”
Specifically, France and the UK increased their exports by 27% and 34% respectively, while Germany had a decline of 14% over the last 5 years. It should be remembered that the data is only up to 2017, and many agreements have since been concluded, especially between European countries, with France and Germany leading in exports. The SIPRI report presents us with a fairly clear picture of imports from countries like Greece and Italy,even as the US dominates market share, with 20 out of 40 importing countries having the US as their main supplier.
France, the fourth country to have increased exports from 2008-2017, has gone from 5.8% of world exports to 6.7%, increasing exports by 27%. The United Kingdom, the 18th largest importer in the world, imports about 80% from the US. Italy is the 22nd largest importer in the world, importing 55% from the US and about 28% from Germany. Italy is the European country that imports most arms from another European country (Germany), about 28%, about 55% from the US, and the remaining 8.4% from Israel. In terms of imports, Greece is the 28th in the world, importing 68% from Germany, 17% from the US, and 10% from France. Of the top 40 importers, the US is the leading supplier for 20 of the 40, followed by Russia with seven countries, China with three, and seven for the UK, France and Germany combined.
In addition to the creation of a conglomerate that would combine mainly French and Germany industries, Merkel emphasized that such a European army would not be for the purposes of ensuring greater sovereignty for the EU, but rather complement NATO, thereby strengthening the imperialist and ultra-neoliberal positions that have devastated the world in recent decades. As the German chancellor has emphasized, “This is not an army against NATO, it can be a good complement to NATO”, also pointing out the logistical difficulties Europe faces to integration, with more than 150 different weapons systems as opposed to the 50 to 60 of the US.
Such veiled wording indicates the desire of Merkel and Macron to further decrease the importation of arms from American companies, even if overall Germany and France import less than 100 million euros a year from the US. France and Germany will face a critical need to modernize their armed forces in the coming decade, given Europe’s relative backwardness when compared to recent strides made in Russia, China and even the United States. Macron stated that it is crucial to devote 2% of GDP to military spending within four to five years. The new French defense budget, Macron said, would allow for the acquisition of:
“1,700 armored vehicles for the Army as well as five frigates, four nuclear-powered attack submarines and nine offshore patrol vessels for the Navy… The Air Force would receive 12 in-flight refueling tankers, 28 Rafale fighter jets and 55 upgraded Mirage 2000 fighters … This year will see a €1.8 billion increase (US $2.1 billion) in the annual defense budget to €34.2 billion, of which €650 million is earmarked for overseas deployment of combat troops… The modernization strategy will not be just about numbers, as performance should be pursued and the equipment should meet the requirement for ‘balanced’ cooperation between the services and the Direction Générale de l’Armement procurement office.”
The idea of creating a European army also contributes towards budgetary planning, which will start mainly from 2022, as “a large part of the money would only be released in 2024 and 2025, after a budgetary review in 2021.”
This all represents the perfect excuse to increase defense budgets, aiming at a European army that will apparently establish some sort of independence from Donald Trump’s America while simultaneously warding off Vladimir Putin’s Russia. Both Trump and Putin are hated by the globalist elite, being seen as their absolute enemies, and are both used by Macron and Merkel as boogeymen threatening European security, as if Moscow were intent on invading the Baltic countries as NATO analysts constantly claim. Such analysts need to make such claims in order to justify the existence of NATO and their accompanying salaries, with the defense sector being among Europe’s main industries, accounting “for about half a million jobs directly (plus half that number indirectly), in more than 1,300 companies”. That pretty much sums up the reason behind an EU army.
The American and European military-industrial complexes are huge employers. This represents a pool of voters that Merkel and Macron need to keep onside, just as they need financial support from the CEOs of large arms manufacturers in exchange for billion-dollar contracts, something that would simply be called corruption if practiced in other parts of the world.
With the economic crisis of 2008, European spending on arms fell by 22%, But with the provocations in Ukraine in 2014, and then the aggression directed against the Donbass region, creating tensions between Russia and the EU, there was new justification for an increase in military spending, especially since 2017. For example, Poland, Romania and Sweden have each decided to acquire long-range air-defense systems from the US, and Lithuania ordered medium-range air-defense systems containing components coming from Norway and the US.
Thankfully the use of Trump and Putin as boogeymen to justify the creation of a European army is a bluff that will not lead to any concrete action. It all comes down to the money to be made in this multi-billion dollar market. Once again, SIPRI’s study reminds us that Washington is dominant in this field, especially in the private sector, with “[f]orty-four US-based companies accounted for over 60 percent of all arms sales listed by SIPRI. The 30 European companies on the list make up just under 30 percent. France and Germany lead the pack, followed by the United Kingdom.” This is while taking into account that EU member states “are not even legally obliged to declare what their companies sell. Their code has achieved neither transparency nor consistency.”
The question may arise as to how Europe is to be prevented from developing imperial ambitions. The simple if banal answer is that this is not possible so long as Europe remains dependent on the United States and her imperialist and ultra-capitalist ambitions. European countries would in the first instance need a sovereign central bank with their own currency, in addition to a national army that could defend European territory. European elites are in fact moving in the exact opposite direction, and this can be seen almost in the daily activities and statements by leaders like Merkel and Macron. The creation of a European army, instead of guaranteeing greater political freedom and distancing the EU from the US, would only actually serve to buttress the ideology of Washington as the only world superpower.
Contrary to what would in actual fact be needed – more military and economic sovereignty of EU member states – the EU leadership seems to be heading in the other direction. In a world that is becoming more multipolar, the abdication of any kind of political, economic and military sovereignty is a recipe for disaster. Macron and Merkel, instead of balancing Europe’s political weight with China, Russia and the US, are hoping and waiting for a new Obama after the 2020 presidential election, so as to subjugate the whole of Europe to Washington’s rule, with Paris and Berlin acting as local satraps, treating the remaining 25 states of the EU as provinces of the Franco-German sub-empire.
Rising Crimea tensions mar Trump-Putin meeting
By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | November 26, 2018
The ‘frozen conflict’ in Ukraine has suddenly become active on Sunday with an encounter involving the naval vessels of Ukraine and Russia at Kerch Strait in Crimea, the entry point of the Sea of Azov from the Black Sea. The Russians have detained three Ukrainian ships that tried to enter the Sea of Azov (where Ukraine has two ports). Russian boats fired on the vessels for allegedly disregarding warnings and violating Russian territory. Three Ukrainian personnel received injuries.
The Sea of Azov was steadily becoming the focal point of tensions between Ukraine and Russia with Kiev asserting its right of navigation (under a 2003 treaty with Russia) and Moscow insisting on its sovereign prerogative to control the narrow Kerch Strait.
Of course, the tensions basically have their origin in Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014. Ukraine calls the annexation illegal. Moscow estimates that western powers are egging on Ukraine to strengthen its naval presence in the Sea of Azov, which would of course have serious security implications for Crimea.
To compound matters, Russia has lately built a 19-km bridge connecting Crimea with the Russian hinterland. Russia suspects that there could be covert operations to damage the Kerch Bridge, which provides the vital communication link to Crimea.
From available details, Ukraine precipitated the incident on Sunday. Now, why would it have made such a move? One interpretation could be that it is all related to Ukrainian politics. Ukraine is heading for presidential and parliamentary elections in March next year. The incumbent pro-US president Petro Poroshenko is keen on securing another term. But he is terribly unpopular and his rating stands at 8% currently. He is unlikely to get a fresh mandate.
Interestingly, Poroshenko has seized Sunday’s incident in Kerch Strait to declare martial law. The martial law regulations give the government the power to curb public demonstrations, regulate the media and suspend the upcoming elections. The probability is high that Poroshenko is moving in the direction of canceling the 2019 presidential and parliamentary elections. And, arguably, the West would also like its s.o.b in power in Kiev at any cost.
But then, Ukraine situation is also at the very core of the tensions between Russia and the Western powers. It is all but certain that Poroshenko pushed the envelope only with some degree of quiet encouragement from certain Western power centres that may want to poke the Russian bear to see what its reaction could be.
What complicates matters is that the anti-Russian constituency in Europe and NATO on the one hand and the ‘Deep State’ in the US on the other (especially the Pentagon) are kindred souls in opposing President Trump’s agenda to improve relations with Russia. Significantly, the incident in Kerch Strait comes just before the planned meeting between Trump and Vladimir Putin in Argentina in the weekend.
The Kremlin has signaled that the forthcoming meeting in Argentina is on course. But the anti-Russian transatlantic caucus will try to undermine the meeting, if not get it derailed altogether. Their fear is that Trump is more assertive today (after the US midterm elections) than ever before in his presidency and might simply brush aside opposition to his agenda to improve relations with Russia.
To be sure, the Western camp which rejects Trump’s approach to Russia has lost no time to condemn Moscow for Sunday’s incident in Kerch Strait. The European Union, NATO and France have taken a strident position demanding that Russia should forthwith release the Ukrainian ships and the detained personnel. Moscow, in turn, has called for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council. Meanwhile, Sputnik reported that a Crete-based US spy plane entered the Black Sea area on Monday morning.
Of course, an open western military intervention can be ruled out. But the danger lies in the Ukrainian hardliners drawing encouragement from the Western support to stage more provocations against Russia that might lead to a conflict. A flare-up in Donbass between the Ukrainian army and the separatists (backed by Russia) also cannot be ruled out. Any such renewed tensions over Ukraine will help the Cold Warriors to demonize Russia as a revanchist power threatening European security. That, in turn, can provide the alibi for stepping up NATO’s backing for Ukraine and even to impose more sanctions against Russia.
In these circumstances, the upcoming meeting in Argentina between Trump and Putin is unlikely to be productive. Curiously, the transatlantic rift – over climate change, Iran, NATO budget, immigration, trade balance, etc. – has acquired a new dimension with Europe aligning with Trump’s adversaries in the US in a joint enterprise to thwart his best-laid plans to do business with Russia.
UK Commits Extra Military Forces to Ukraine: Irresponsible Policy, Dangerous Repercussions
By Arkady SAVITSKY | Strategic Culture Foundation | 24.11.2018
Ukraine’s Constitutional Court green-lighted a bill on amending the country’s main law by enshrining into it the final goal of obtaining NATO and EU membership. The decision was announced the next day after the UK and Ukraine’s defense ministries made a joint statement, stressing the need to expand military cooperation. The defense chiefs agreed that Operation Orbital, the Army training program started in 2015, was a success to be continued at least till 2020. Instructors from the British Army, most of who have significant experience in participating in combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, have trained over 9,500 Ukrainian servicemen. An unspecified number of UK soldiers would be sent to train Ukrainian special forces and marines, in addition to the 100 personnel deployed currently in the country.
A multi-role hydrographic survey ship will be deployed in the Black Sea next year to demonstrate Britain’s support for Ukraine and ensure “freedom of navigation”. HMS Echo is not a warship but it flies the naval ensign. In September, Great Britain made known it planned to increase the warships’ presence in the Black Sea next year with increasingly frequent port calls to Odessa.
NATO naval presence there is seen as provocative by Russia amid increasing tensions in the Azov Sea. A conflict appears to be imminent and the West has taken the side of Ukraine despite the fact that it was Kiev who has been provoking it. EU High Representative/Vice-President Federica Mogherini believes many vessels flying European Union flags were threatened to make Brussels consider “appropriate targeted measures” to be taken as a signal to Moscow.
The increase in UK military presence goes against the letter and spirit of Minsk accords, which state that the conflict in Ukraine should be managed through diplomatic and political means.
The US military already runs a maritime operations center located within Ukraine’s Ochakov naval facility designed to deliver flexible maritime support throughout the full range of military operations. Hundreds of US and Canadian military instructors are training Ukrainian personnel at the Yavoriv firing range. The US is to transfer two Oliver Hazard Perry-type frigates to Ukraine. The move will actually ensure constant NATO naval presence in the Black Sea going around the restrictions imposed by the Montreux Convention because the vessels will have America sailors onboard carrying out “training missions” and remain under US command, despite official sources saying otherwise. All in all, ten ships of that class are available for export. In September, the US Coast Guard transferred two Island-class cutters, armed with .50-caliber machine guns and 25mm deck guns. The transfers urge Kiev to challenge Moscow militarily.
Nobody in Washington or London asks why an industrialized nation and a large arms exporter, with abundant resources and fertile land should depend on foreign assistance unable to defend itself. Weapons are supplied and training is provided to the country, where corruption is rampant. Even the US State Department’s recent report says it is. Popular protests are commonplace. The conflict in Donbass is used to distract the people from domestic woes. The frustration with Kiev’s reluctance to introduce much-needed reforms and curtail the political influence of the oligarchs is rapidly growing. The common people of Ukraine need political and economic reforms, not increased foreign military presence on their soil.
The only reason for the West to keep the failed Ukraine afloat is its obsequiousness and readiness to be converted into a springboard to threaten Russia with an aggression. Despite Ukraine’s multiple problems, the country has recently been rewarded with an official status in NATO. The 2018 North Atlantic Alliance’s summit confirmed its support for Ukraine’s full-fledged membership to make a mockery of the so called “NATO standards.”
The UK government is going through hard times. It has just achieved as a draft agreement on post-Brexit relations with the EU. The deal has a little chance to make it through the Commons. Nobody knows exactly how it will end up if the MPs say no. There may be no Brexit at all finally. Chancellor Philip Hammond believes “If the deal is not approved by parliament, we will have a politically chaotic situation… In that chaos that would ensue, there may be no Brexit.” Or there may be endless negotiations, reconciliation conferences, delays and postponements. It’ll be a large order for the government to stay. There are supporters of no-confidence vote in parliament. You never know how it’s all going to pan out.
Nothing unites a divided nation better than an external threat, such as Russia. The Brexit deadline is March 29 to launch a 21-months transition period with Britain still a member. The events in Ukraine are needed to fuel the fire. Making people think that the UK is lending a helping hand to a poor nation under attack is a way to improve the government’s image and approval ratings. The cabinet members never tell their people that by rendering military assistance to Kiev their country becomes an accomplice to a conflict that has nothing to do with its national security or interests. The UK military aid eggs the Ukrainian government on to seek a military solution.
Russia is not watching idle. If the Minsk accords are washed out, it will have each and every reason to recognize the Lugansk and Donetsk self-proclaimed republics as independent states eligible for military cooperation agreements, including stationing Russian military bases on their soil, if their governments ask for it. No international law would be violated.
Ukraine’s government is ramping up tensions because President Petro Poroshenko is running for re-election in March 2019 on a national security platform. So he takes a tougher line on Azov. Those who rush to provide him with military assistance become accomplices in his adventurist actions that could have disastrous consequences. The UK will bear responsibility for goading Kiev into taking a confrontational approach and turning the Azov Sea into a flashpoint that can spark at any minute.
Countering Washington’s Confrontation
By Brian CLOUGHLEY | Strategic Culture Foundation | 23.11.2018
The United States continues to brandish its military power all round the globe and has recently been concentrating on confronting Russia and China. Its policy and deployments were explained by the US Air Force Secretary in September when she declared that Washington felt threatened because “Less than a week ago Russia began the largest exercise on Russian soil in four decades… with more than 300,000 troops and 1000 aircraft.
On the other side of the world, China’s first aircraft carrier was declared combat ready this year, and promptly sailed into the Pacific to conduct flight operations.”
The absurdity of that statement escaped fitting comment by the West’s mainstream media, which also considers it astonishing that Russia should carry out a military exercise in its own territory following the massive build-up by the US-NATO military alliance along its borders. As pointed out on November 15 by Russia’s Foreign Ministry, this expansion can be seen “along the entire stretch of land connecting the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea. Since October, vast operational resources have been concentrated in the Baltic Region and the north of Europe, due to a series of major international exercises. They are being deployed in addition to NATO regiments already present in the countries of the eastern flank. Those regions have never seen such a military presence since the end of the World War II”.
And it is growing.
Foreign Policy in Focus observes that “In all NATO countries in Eastern Europe, the US Air Force is investing multimillion-dollar sums in the expansion of its air bases, with more than $50 million pouring into a base in Hungary, more than $60 million allocated to the modernization of two air force bases in Romania, and two bases in Slovakia that will be upgraded with more than $100 million, besides various base upgrades in other countries in the region.”
In October President Putin said that “Russia doesn’t threaten anyone and has strictly adhered to its obligations in the sphere of international security and arms control,” but made it clear there would be decisive action if an attack takes place, and “the aggressor should know that retaliation is inevitable, and he will be destroyed.” Russia has “precision hypersonic weapons” exemplified by the Kinzhal missile and a new system, the Avangard, that will enter service in the next few months.
His outlook and approach are echoed by China’s leader, President Xi Jinping, who reminded those attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Papua New Guinea on November 17 that “History has shown that confrontation, whether in the form of a cold war, a hot war or a trade war, produces no winners.”
In early 2018 President Xi said plainly that China “will forge a powerful military that is ready to respond to the call, to fight and to win a war,” and in October, following Washington’s increasing military activity in and around the South China Sea, the President told his armed forces to “concentrate preparations for fighting a war”, which is as blunt a warning to Washington as might be expected in the circumstances, in which the US is deliberately provoking China by its widely-publicised support for Taiwan. This has gone so far as for the Defence Minister Wei Fenghe to announce that Beijing would never give up “one single piece” of its territory. He warned that “repeated challenges” to China’s stance on Taiwan would lead to military action.
What China and Russia are saying is plain, blunt and unambiguous : stay out of our territory; stop prodding our borders and cease your coat-trailing provocation.
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is an unpleasant person, but on November 17 he put things in perspective in his region. When questioned about US Navy operations in the South China Sea he asked in turn “Why do you have to create frictions that will prompt a response from China?”
One of the more ridiculous observations by the US Air Force Secretary concerned the commissioning of China’s first aircraft carrier. In tones of hushed horror she revealed that it “was declared combat ready this year, and promptly sailed into the Pacific to conduct flight operations.”
What upsets the US military is the fact that China now has an aircraft carrier that can defend the country from beyond its shores, unlike America’s eleven enormous aircraft carriers which sail round the world’s oceans in order to impose Washington’s will. At the moment there are two carrier groups in the Philippines Sea, ready to move into the South China Sea to conduct more provocative operations.
The Air Force Secretary added to absurdity by declaring that “now all of Southeast Asia is within reach of China’s long-range bombers” — presumably considering it irrelevant that in October, in the latest of a series of provocative operations, two nuclear-capable USAF B-52 bombers from Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, overflew the South China Sea. As reported in the Air Force Times “the flights were in support of US Indo-Pacific Command’s Continuous Bomber Presence, a mission focused on deterring regional challengers.”
Regional challengers? Just who is challenging whom with a “continuous bomber presence”?
Like Russia, China has had to develop advanced weapons to counter the menace patrolling and probing its borders, and these could be employed effectively in the event of US confrontation getting out of hand.
A CNN headline in October was “US Navy proposing major show of force to warn China” and it indicated that the “Pacific Fleet has drawn up a classified proposal to carry out a global show of force as a warning to China and to demonstrate the US is prepared to deter and counter their military actions . . . The plan suggests sailing ships and flying aircraft near China’s territorial waters in the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait in freedom of navigation operations to demonstrate the right of free passage in international waters. The proposal means US ships and aircraft would operate close to Chinese forces.”
If Washington is insane enough to go ahead with this deliberately confrontational fandango, there could be serious consequences. Chinese warships could manoeuvre to bar US Navy vessels from coming with 12 nautical miles of one of its islands in the South China Sea, and if there were attempts by the US to penetrate that barrier, there could well be a serious incident. Should this involve damage to a Chinese ship, Beijing would not stand idly by and would respond appropriately. Given its inventory of weapons, especially its advanced torpedoes, this could involve destruction of one of the US Navy’s carriers.
There are similar possibilities in the north. CNN noted that “Currently the aircraft carrier USS Harry S Truman is taking the unexpected step of operating in the North Sea — sending a signal to Russia that US military forces can extend their reach to that area.” But if US warships behave aggressively it can be expected that Russia will counter such behaviour most forcefully.
In October the Commander of US Naval Forces Europe, Admiral James Foggo, told the US Naval Institute that “it would be important to have a greater naval presence in Europe than the US has had in the last two or three decades, and that this year’s presence by the Harry S Truman Carrier Strike Group and the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group were part of the effort to boost presence to reassure allies and to keep an eye on Russian activity. With the Truman Strike Group now back in the region — spending time in Iceland and the North Sea ahead of Trident Juncture [the November 2018 anti-Russia US-NATO exercise based on Norway] — ‘that sends a very strong message that the United States will operate anywhere, either unilaterally or in collaboration with our NATO partners and allies. And like I said, nobody in the world can come close to a US nuclear-powered aircraft carrier in terms of firepower, dwell and endurance,’ he said.”
Foggo’s diatribe ended with the juvenile but still dangerous pronouncement that “And those guys and gals out on that carrier and the Marines are doing a fantastic job. So we’re keeping the adversaries back on their heels. They don’t know where we’re going next and that’s a good thing. And we’re working more with allies and partners because we have that additional capability. Right now I have — I think, at last count — 495,000 tons of grey-hulled shipping operating in the theatre. And that’s great. I love it.”
This type of trigger-happy immature belligerence is official warning of US policy as regards Russia and China, and it is not surprising that both nations are countering Washington’s confrontation.
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A low-fat, high-carb diet has been the largest public health experiment in history. It’s past time for a rethink.
By Malcolm Kendrick | RT | November 25, 2020
New research suggests that four billion people globally will be overweight in 2050. This trend can be traced back to the ‘low-fat, high-carb’ guidelines first issued in the 70s, and should prompt a major U-turn on dietary advice.
A recent report from the Potsdam Institute predicts that by 2050 there will be four billion overweight people in the world, with one-and-a-half billion of them obese. This is not entirely surprising. The world has been getting fatter for years, and things do not seem to be slowing down.
Why is this happening? … continue
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