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“Until Proven Otherwise, it is Likely Covid mRNA Vaccines Played a Significant Role in All Unexplained Heart Attacks Since 2021”

BY WILL JONES | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | OCTOBER 18, 2022

“Until proven otherwise, it is likely that Covid mRNA vaccines played a significant or primary role in all unexplained heart attacks, strokes, cardiac arrhythmias and heart failure since 2021.”

That’s according to Dr. Aseem Malhotra, a renowned British cardiologist who once endorsed the vaccines on TV but is now raising awareness of their dangers. In September his two–part, peer-reviewed analysis of vaccine efficacy and safety was published in the Journal of Insulin Resistance.

Dr. Malhotra made the comments in a new interview with James Freeman Wells, a former Head of U.K. Trade and Business Inflation Statistics at the Office for National Statistics, the U.K.’s Government statistics agency. James has tweeted a link to the full interview here.

Dr. Malhotra’s comments come ahead of a meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on COVID-19 Vaccine Damage, where he will speak to MPs and Peers about the evidence of the risks from the vaccines, putting it in the context of wider problems with the way medicine is regulated and marketed globally. The meeting was originally planned for September but was delayed due to the Queen’s death and will now take place this coming Thursday, October 20th in the House of Commons of the U.K Parliament.

Referring to the worrisome influence of large pharmaceutical companies in the regulation of drugs – whom he describes as “immoral” and “psychopathic” because he says they are constitutionally unable to put people before profits – he proclaims:

“It’s time to put patients before profits, to put truth before money, to put human needs ahead of the needs of an immoral, psychopathic entity. Let’s do this.”

James Wells has posted a link to a template letter to encourage your MP to attend here.

Let’s hope this delivers another hammer blow to the wall of silence that has thus far met the growing clamour for recognition of the extraordinary level of injuries associated with these experimental genetic vaccines.

October 18, 2022 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

US envoy for Iran: Reviving JCPOA ‘not even on agenda’

Press TV – October 18, 2022

The US special envoy for Iran, Robert Malley, has acknowledged that negotiations on a revival of the 2015 Iran deal are “not even on the agenda” for now, trying to shift the blame on Tehran for the stalled diplomatic process.

Malley, in an interview with CNN on Monday, accused the Islamic Republic of not being interested in restoring the deal and claimed that the administration of US President Joe Biden believed diplomacy was the best way to prevent Iran from what he called “acquiring a nuclear weapon.”

“President Biden made it clear from the first day he came into office that one of his priorities was to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. And he believes and we continue to believe that diplomacy is the best way to achieve that goal,” Malley told CNN.

He referred to the latest remarks by the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, that he did not expect any movement anytime soon in efforts to revitalize the Iran deal, officially called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), accusing Tehran of raising issues that were “inconsistent” with a return to the deal.

Iran has demanded that the United States provide assurances that it would not leave the JCPOA again before it could reenter the agreement. Washington has refused to give a legally enforceable guarantee, leaving Iranian negotiators suspicious of the Biden administration’s seriousness in the talks.

“The reason the talks are at a standstill and at an impasse and why they’re not so far moving at all and why they’re not the focus is because Iran has taken a position in those talks for the past two months which is simply inconsistent with a return to the deal; they’re making demands that have nothing to do with the JCPOA and as long as that’s the case, the talks will be stopped,” Malley claimed.

Asked about the fate of negotiations on the JCPOA’s revival, Malley said, “It’s not even on the agenda. It’s not the focus because there’s no movement… We will see whether this is a government that is interested in reaching that deal. But at this point, the focus is on what’s happening around because the talks are stalled.”

Meanwhile, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a press briefing on Monday that the JCPOA-related talks may be fatally stalled, saying, “We don’t see a deal coming together anytime soon.”

Last week, Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kan’ani reaffirmed the Islamic Republic’s commitment to keeping up the talks aimed at reaching an agreement on the revival of the 2015 nuclear deal.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran’s approach is to remain in the course of negotiations so as to reach a lasting and sustainable agreement that would simultaneously guarantee the fundamental interests of the government as well as those of the Iranian nation,” Kan’ani told reporters.

Kan’ani said the three EU parties to the deal – France, Britain and Germany – and the United States have linked the talks to the latest violent riots in Iran, asserting that Tehran will not allow other states to interfere in its domestic affairs.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman also made clear that Tehran is ready for bilateral interaction with all parties so that the negotiations would come to fruition.

The current crisis over Iran’s nuclear program was created in May 2018, when former US president Donald Trump pulled Washington out of the 2015 nuclear deal and imposed tough economic sanctions against the Islamic Republic under what he called the “maximum pressure” policy.

The talks to salvage the agreement kicked off in the Austrian capital of Vienna in April last year, months after Biden succeeded Trump, with the intention of examining Washington’s seriousness in rejoining the deal and removing anti-Iran sanctions.

Despite notable progress, the US indecisiveness and procrastination have caused multiple interruptions in the marathon talks.

October 18, 2022 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Those Demonising the Unvaccinated Need to Look in the Mirror

BY NICK RENDELL | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | OCTOBER 17, 2022

It’s been known since the outbreak of Covid that obesity leads to higher rates of hospitalisations and deaths. Despite this, very few resources were deployed to encourage healthier eating and lifestyles. This article argues that this was a disastrous decision for the long term health of the nation and the short to medium term capacity of the NHS.

Boris Johnson (BMI 34; healthy is under 25) in his New Year message broadcast on December 31st 2020 said: “Get a vaccine, it’s far easier than losing weight” (see video from two minutes in). Well, the people of the U.K. took him at his word: we’ve had 30 months to galvanise the population into losing weight and getting fitter, 30 months entirely squandered.

First, let’s just look at how effective spending £25bn injecting 150 million vaccines into the U.K. population has been. As the NHS continues to struggle to meet demand, perhaps Covid hospital admissions are the key metric. For the vaccine programme to have been a success we should expect the unvaccinated to be disproportionately admitted to hospital. They’re not. These figures come from the latest UKHSA Weekly Vaccine Surveillance Report; table 12a on page 49 gives us the figures for hospital admissions between March 21st and August 28th of this year. In each age cohort the unvaccinated are proportionately less likely to be hospitalised than the vaccinated. As an example, in the 50-64 year-olds, 129 of the 1,342 admissions were unvaccinated, that’s 9.6%. Yet, about 14% of that age group are unvaccinated. If the unvaccinated were more likely to be hospitalised we would expect the figures to be reversed, to see a higher proportion of the unvaccinated hospitalised than the total proportion of people unvaccinated.

Demonstrably, despite the Government’s claims that vaccines have reduced hospital admissions, this can’t be true. Something has reduced hospital admissions from the peaks in the first two waves, but if the rate of admission is much the same for the vaccinated and the unvaccinated I struggle to see how vaccines can explain it. Surely, far more likely are the twin benefits of immunity brought about by prior infection and a less virulent variant. Figure 2 shows the peaks and troughs of Covid hospital admissions since the start of the pandemic.

Also worth noting, the seven-day average number of hospital admissions for Covid is currently 132% higher than it was on October 7th 2020, before anyone anywhere had been vaccinated, and 86% higher than on October 7th 2021 when most people had been vaccinated – though it should be noted that over half of Covid hospital admissions since Omicron have been primarily being treated for something else.

Despite my deep scepticism of the efficacy of the mRNA vaccines and the real world evidence presented above, to avoid any accusations of dogmatism I’m going to indulge the vaccine zealots’ figures for vaccine effectiveness. Again, with the data taken from the Government’s week 40 vaccine surveillance report, figure 3 suggests that the UKHSA thinks that the best protection a fourth dose of vaccine can offer is about 50%, soon falling to 20%.

Now let’s compare that vaccine efficacy with the impact of obesity on severe Covid outcomes by turning to a fascinating study published in June in the Lancet that looked at how BMI affects Covid outcomes. What made this latest study particularly interesting was that it used real, though anonymised, data from about 20% of the U.K. population. The data, from QResearch had over 12 million patient records but about 3 million couldn’t be used, mainly because BMI data were missing, but that still left 9,171,524 patient records to be analysed. So, again, we’re looking at real-world evidence whereas the UKHSA vaccine efficacy rates are estimates.

The data related to the period from December 2020 to November 2021. This was the period covering the initial rollout through to booster doses in older people. Part of the summary table is reproduced in Figure 4. I’ve highlighted in red hospital admissions.

There were 3,509,213 people of a healthy weight in the study, of whom 8,315 were hospitalised with Covid, that’s 0.23%. Of the 3,062,925 overweight people, 10,653 or 0.35% were hospitalised. That means the overweight were 50% more likely to end up in hospital than those classed as healthy weight.

Of the 2,278,649 obese people 13,044 or 0.57% were hospitalised. This means they were 150% more likely require hospital treatment than the healthy weight group.

Let’s now compare the relative risk of being vaccinated with that of being obese. The obese get hospitalised at a rate 150% greater than those of a healthy weight while the best you can hope for from your fourth vaccine is a 50% reduction in the likelihood of being admitted to hospital, dropping to 20% after about four months. And that’s another key point, keep the weight off and that risk reduction remains in contrast to any benefit from vaccination that soon wanes to nothing (assuming it ever existed in the first place).

But of course, it’s not just Covid where the overweight and obese have worse outcomes. The Lancet study goes on to list some of the other health outcomes for other conditions. The obese are almost six times more likely to have type 2 diabetes, more than twice as likely to suffer cardiovascular disease and over three times more likely to suffer hypertension.

Lose weight and many of these rates of disease would fall. The burden on the NHS would be reduced, the people losing weight, in most cases, would feel better and no doubt their mental health would, in the round, be improved.

I was interested in a piece by Michael P. Senger in the Daily Sceptic on October 14th 2022 highlighting the demonisation of the unvaccinated. I really don’t recall anyone in the mainstream media or in Government objecting to this vilification at the time yet it was evident from the Week 35 2021 Vaccine Surveillance Report that in each of the age groups from 40 to 80 the double dosed were testing positive for the virus at a higher rate than the unvaccinated (see an article I wrote back in June that goes into some detail on this point), so it was evident that the unvaccinated represented less of a threat than the vaccinated. Likewise, it’s been known since the Covid outbreak on the Diamond Princess back in February 2020 that obesity was a risk factor. However, can you imagine the furore that would result if people were to suggest that the obese were denied hospital treatment?

It’s not the unvaccinated who are clogging up the NHS, it’s disproportionately the obese and overweight – some of whom have been particularly vocal in vilifying the unvaccinated or in failing to promote healthier lifestyles:

  • Andrew Neil (estimated BMI 32) argued for restrictions on the freedoms of the unvaccinated.
  • Piers Morgan (estimated BMI 29) argued for the unvaccinated to be denied NHS care if they caught Covid.
  • Boris Johnson (estimated BMI 34) attempted to bring in vaccine passports.
  • Michael Gove (estimated BMI 28) was a keen advocate of vaccine passports.
  • Therese Coffey (estimated BMI 30), the new Health Minister appears to be far keener on promoting vaccines rather than healthy lifestyles.

The Government spent about £12bn vaccinating the under 50s, largely a pointless exercise. As an advocate of lower taxes and a smaller state I don’t argue that this money should have been spent on schemes to subsidise healthier living. Such schemes invariably fail. What’s more, I would object just as fiercely to coercing people to lose weight as I do to coercing people to get vaccinated. However, I would like to see them campaign to raise people’s awareness of the risks associated with a high BMI. In rough terms, there appears to be about a 10% Covid hospitalisation risk reduction for each BMI point reduction and associated risk reductions for various cancers, diabetes, heart conditions, muscular/skeletal problems and mental health.

Body positivity is all well and good but being overweight is neither risk or cost free. If Andrew Neil, Piers Morgan, Boris Johnson et al. want target a group to be censorious of perhaps they should follow Jordan Peterson’s advice and go tidy their own room first.

October 17, 2022 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Time to start worrying again!

By Gilbert Doctorow | October 15, 2022

Some readers have commented in direct emails to me that they have taken comfort from my writings insofar as I have been a moderate voice, avoiding alarmism over the often troublesome daily news in and around the Russian war with Ukraine, or more properly speaking today, Russia’s proxy war with NATO in and about Ukraine.

For this very reason, I hesitated whether to share with readers the deep pessimism that overcame me a couple of days ago over our chances of avoiding nuclear Armageddon. This followed my watching the latest Solovyov political talk show on Russian state television. I have used this show regularly as a litmus test of the mood of Russian social and political elites: that mood has turned black.

Whereas in the past, going back six months or more, I had reported on the open contempt which leading and highly responsible Russian academics from university circles and think tanks were showing for the American political leadership in their statements on the political talk shows, this contempt has moved into an actionable phase, by which I mean that serious, God-fearing Russians are so furious with the rubbish propaganda coming out of Washington, repeated with bullhorns in Europe that if given the chance they would personally “press the button” and unleash nuclear attacks on the United States and Britain, in that order notwithstanding the possibility, even probability of a return strike, which, however enfeebled, would be devastating to their own country. That is to say, deterrence as a policy is fast losing its psychological impact on the Russian side of the argument.

Whatever the words of the Biden Administration about nuclear war being ‘off the table,’ America’s aggressive and threatening behavior, including the ongoing ‘training in nuclear weapons’ currently going on in Europe under U.S. direction, has made rational and very serious Russians ready to give it a try.

One of the most sober-minded international affairs experts to appear on the Solovyov show, Yevgeny Satanovsky, president of the Institute of the Near East think tank, contained his rage with some difficulty, saying only that while he had once held some sympathy for the United States, he would see its utter destruction now with little regret; he left no mention where his feet are pointed when he added that he could say no more on air for fear that he will be censored and his words removed from the video.

For these reasons, I have given to this essay addressed to the Collective West, and in particular to the fomenters of world disorder in Washington and London, a title that fits the current situation.

*****

As we have seen from even before the launch of the ‘special military operation,’ Russian talk programs identify by name individuals in the Biden team whose outstanding stupidity, obtuseness and rank ignorance they find unbearable, with the likes of Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and Lloyd Austin among those coming in for special mention. We are left with the impression that when Biden calls in his advisers to the Oval Office, he, senile dimwit that he is, is the bright light in the room. The Russians conclude from this that they have no one to negotiate with.

Now the naming of idiots in high places carries over to all discussion of European Union and British leaders. The denunciation of incompetence, rank stupidity and, yes, neo-colonialist or fascist mindsets among European leaders was well reflected in the latest Solovyov show. The most discussed whipping boy was the EU’s commissioner on external action, Josep Borrell, who seems to be speaking to the world daily and acknowledges no limits on what he may proclaim, as if it were official EU policy in defense as well as diplomacy.

The Solovyov show put up on screen a brief video recording of Borrell expounding smugly on Europe’s privileged position as ‘a garden of liberal democracy, good economic prospects and social solidarity’ which is surrounded by ‘the jungle.’  That jungle reference fits in well, Solovyov remarked, with the colonialist mindset of Rudyard Kipling and is deeply offensive to the Rest of the World, of which Russia is a part. More to the point, Borrell was also notorious in Russia this past week for his statement that any use by Russia of nuclear weapons in Ukraine would be met by a massive non-nuclear attack from Europe which would ‘annihilate’ the Russian army. However, Borrell was not alone in the stocks: other European leaders who were decried for their stupid policies this past week included German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emanuel Macron.

So you have no bomb shelter? Then, as the Russians said decades ago, it is high time to throw a bed sheet over your shoulders and slowly walk to the nearest cemetery.

*****

One of the two latest fake news stories being disseminated simultaneously and ubiquitously in Western major media this past week is that Russia is considering using against Ukraine ‘tactical nuclear weapons,’ meaning warheads with a destructive force equivalent to the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombs mounted on cruise or medium range ballistic missiles.  Our print and electronic media speculate on the numbers of warheads Russia currently possesses (2,000 or more), as if that would make any difference in an assault on Ukraine.

Rubbish say the Russians on Solovyov’s show: we have no need of nuclear arms to finish off the Ukrainians. The only nuclear forces we would deploy in the current situation are strategic arms, and they are directed against…. Washington with the help of the Sarmat and Poseidon delivery systems.

The other major fake news disseminated massively by Western media in recent days was the allegation that the Russians are seeking to freeze the Ukrainians to death by their strikes against power generation infrastructure. Images of Stalingrad were evoked by our broadcasters. A similar freeze is said to be inflicted on Western Europe by the cut-off of Russian energy supplies to the EU.

More rubbish say the panelists on the Solovyov program. The attack on the electricity grid in Ukraine is not directed against civilians per se; it is intended to halt rail deliveries of advanced weapons systems and munitions coming into Ukraine at the Polish border and being moved by train to the fronts in the east and south of the country.  Without these inputs, the Ukrainian army will be kaput and the war can come to an early conclusion with the capitulation of Kiev.  As regards the EU, whatever chill out may be coming this winter is due solely to the unprofessional and ignorant decisions of the Commission on imports of Russian hydrocarbons that have been blindly followed by the Member States without due consideration of consequences for their own populations.

*****

The Collective West speaks of ‘sham’ referendums in the four Ukrainian oblasts that have now been reintegrated into (or annexed by, depending on your politics) the Russian Federation. In this spirit, in the middle of the past week the United Nations General Assembly overwhelmingly approved a U.S. sponsored resolution refusing to recognize the legality of this annexation. Among those who voted against Russia were such prominent ‘friendly states’ as Serbia and Hungary. One hundred forty states voted with the United States; four states, including the pariah regimes in Venezuela and North Korea, joined Russia in voting ‘nyet,’ and thirty-five states abstained.

The United States trumpeted this victory at the UN over the mischievous and rules-breaking Russians. EU chief of diplomacy Borrell was also gloating, though he expressed regret that 20% of the member states had not voted for the resolution.

The Russians, for their part, insist that this vote was a sham, given the carrots and sticks that U.S. and European diplomats used to get the results desired. Blackmail of all kinds was applied, say the Russians. Morever, the number of states in each tally tells only part of the story: among the 35 abstaining countries were India and China, which between them alone account for 35% of humanity.

Meanwhile, over in Europe, on the next day the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe meeting in Strasbourg adopted a resolution condemning Russia for its alleged aggression against Ukraine with a bill of particulars several pages long and including a call for the 46 member states to declare Russia a ‘terrorist state’ as Zelensky had requested of them. The vote as published was said to be 99 for the resolution, 1 opposed.  No mention was made in the announcement of vote results that the actual number of deputies in PACE is 306. The point was not missed by the Solovyov panel, who here too cried ‘foul.’

Putting aside these two votes that garnered so much attention in the propagandistic Western media, there were other international developments bearing on the relative standing of Russia in the global community which Western media chose to ignore, but Russia media, featured prominently.

I think in particular of the three days of summitry in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. The first of these gatherings brought together 27 heads of state from across Asia, running from Israel and Palestine, Qatar and the Emirates in the west to Korea in the east. Let us remember that a goodly number of the participants were from countries that voted against Russia in the UN General Assembly. Their presence in Astana gave the lie to the notion that they were expelling Russia from polite society.

The key personality at the meeting of 27 was clearly Vladimir Putin. Film footage on Russian television showed him in animated conversation with these leaders in group and bilateral formats. Of these the most significant was likely the face-to-face with Turkish president Erdogan, during which the two discussed immediate steps to implement the Russian proposal that a new pipeline be added to Turk Stream so as to greatly increase possibilities for delivering gas to Europe by this southern route through the Balkans. In this concept, Turkey will become a major gas hub, which represents fulfillment of a long-held dream by the Turkish leader.

In its capacity as hub, Turkey would be able to mix Russian gas with flows from Azerbaijan and possibly later from Turkmenistan, so that the product sold as a Turkish export would be bullet proof against American or European sanctions. The additional line could probably be laid down within a year, that is to say, more quickly than the problematic repairs to the damaged Nord Stream 1 pipelines.

The next day in Astana, another summit was held between leaders of the Community of Independent States. This reduced circle of members was also of great importance insofar as it confirms Russia’s standing as facilitator of diplomatic solutions between member states experiencing armed conflict with one another, the Azeris and Armenians being first in line. And the final summit, among the leaders of Central Asian republics with Russia had yet another important agenda:  agreeing security measures to defend against spillover into their region of the developing civil war in Afghanistan, where the U.S. and Britain are aiding extremist groups seeking to overthrow Taliban rule. From the body language of leaders, it would seem that Putin’s ear was much in demand. Relations with Kazakhstan leader Tokaev appeared to be solid once again after a trying period of several months earlier in the year.

In considering the meaning of these gatherings, I think that a remark made several days ago on another Solovyov show and with regard to the decision of the Saudis and Gulf States to snub the insistent demands of Biden that oil production be raised: the decision to make common cause with Russia came not out of pity for the weak but out of Realism, namely the assessment that Russia will win the military contest with NATO/Ukraine.  These rulers in Opec, like the rulers who came to Astana this past week, back winners not prospective losers.

If I may draw any positive conclusions from the otherwise bleak analysis in the foregoing, they are that Russia is successfully resisting massive U.S. and E.U. pressures, and that the world is realigning before our eyes in a more multi-polar and democratic direction.  And yet, the fears of miscalculations on one side or another in this tense and unparalleled contest mean Armageddon constantly threatens in the background.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2022

October 16, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Suppress alternative views, say the climate mafia

By Paul Homewood | TCW Defending Freedom | October 14, 2022

Earlier this year four leading Italian scientists published a major review of  historical climate trends titled A critical assessment of extreme events trends in times of global warming, and concluded that declaring a ‘climate emergency’ is not supported by the data. 

The authors do not deny that the world is a little bit warmer than a century ago, nor that the climate has been changing. But after analysing the official data they found no evidence of a climate crisis.

The study looked at various indicators of extreme weather such as temperature extremes, heavy rainfall, hurricanes, floods and droughts. It also reviewed trends in food production and yields. It concluded: ‘None of these response indicators show a clear positive trend of extreme events. In conclusion on the basis of observational data, the climate crisis that according to many sources we are experiencing today is not evident yet.’

The scientists suggested that rather than burdening our children with anxiety about climate change, we should encourage them to think about issues like energy, food and health with a more ‘objective and constructive spirit’ and not waste limited resources on ‘costly and ineffective solutions’.

There really was little that was controversial in the study. A succession of reports from the IPCC, the UN climate panel, essentially have all come to similar conclusions once the political spin was taken away.

Any changes that have affected the climate have been slight and often undetectable. Moreover many of the changes have undoubtedly been beneficial; for instance drought is now much less common and severe in many parts of the world, such as India, Sahel and the US than it used to be in the past. It always was absurd to maintain that global warming makes everything worse.

No matter that the study was well written by highly respected scientists, factually based and peer-reviewed, its message did not fit the narrative. It therefore did not take long for the climate mafia to demand that the paper should be withdrawn by the European Physical Journal Plus which published it in January this year.

According to Phys.Org:  A fundamentally flawed study claiming that scientific evidence of a climate crisis is lacking should be withdrawn from the peer-reviewed journal in which it was published, top climate scientists have told AFP [the Paris-based news agency Agence France-Presse].

‘Appearing earlier this year in the European Physical Journal Plus, published by Springer Nature, the study purports to review data on possible changes in the frequency or intensity of rainfall, cyclones, tornadoes, droughts and other extreme weather events.

‘Four prominent climate scientists contacted by AFP all said the study – of which they had been unaware – grossly manipulates data, cherry-picking some facts and ignoring others that would contradict their discredited assertions.’

We are of course used to the climate establishment trying to censor heretical views. The Climategate emails a few years ago uncovered many such attempts, some even threatening journal editors. And it is worth noting the use of phrases such as ‘fundamentally flawed’, ‘manipulating data’ and ‘cherry–picking’ in an attempt to destroy the study’s credibility. Yet none of these critics are able to back up any of these claims with actual facts.

Doing science is all about facts. If you disagree with a particular scientific study, you challenge it on a factual basis and point out exactly where it is flawed. There is a well-established method of doing this, which is to ask the journal involved to print a response to the original article. Normally the paper’s authors would of course have a right of reply. That is the way facts are established. Simply to demand that the journal withdraws the paper is the worst sort of censorship.

Perhaps worst of all is the fact that the attack on this study was led by Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts Research at the UK Met Office. As an employee of a taxpayer–funded agency, Betts has more obligation than most to be unbiased and open-minded.

He and his supporters may disagree with the European Physical Journal Plus paper: that is their prerogative. But they need to present facts  instead of trying to force the journal into withdrawing the paper.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | | Leave a comment

Putin explains why there are no peace talks with Ukraine

Samizdat – October 14, 2022

Ukraine is refusing to engage in peace talks, Russian President Vladimir Putin told journalists on Friday, when asked about possible negotiations to end the conflict between the two countries.

The Kiev government “had been saying that they wanted talks and ostensibly asked for them, but now they issued a formal decision that prohibits them,” he said during a press conference in Astana, Kazakhstan.

Earlier this month, Zelensky signed a decree forbidding any negotiations with Putin, saying Ukraine will only talk to Russia when it has a different president. Speaking to journalists on Friday, Putin remarked that mediation by nations including Türkey between Moscow and Kiev may be required, if Ukraine’s position changes.

Putin recalled that Russia and Ukraine reached a preliminary agreement which could have the halted hostilities, during Turkey-mediated talks in late March.

“Those agreements were almost initialled. But as soon as the troops were pulled back from Kiev, the leadership in Kiev lost all desire to have talks,” he remarked.

The Russian Defense Ministry announced a withdrawal of troops from the Ukrainian capital after news broke that the negotiators in Istanbul had agreed on a draft treaty. Under its terms, Ukraine would have pledged to maintain a neutral status and not allow foreign troops and military installations on its soil, in exchange for security guarantees from foreign nations, including Russia.

Days later, President Vladimir Zelensky accused Russian troops of committing war crimes, claiming that evidence was discovered in Bucha, one of the towns near Kiev that the Russian army had left. He declared that the Ukrainian people would not allow him to negotiate with Russia after the discovery. Moscow claimed that the evidence was fabricated to justify breaking off the talks.

According to Russian diplomats, Moscow wrote up a formal peace agreement based on Ukrainian proposals and sent it to Kiev, but never heard anything back.

According to Ukrainian media reports in May, Zelensky was pressured into breaking off negotiations with Russia by Boris Johnson, then-prime minister of Britain. Johnson arrived in Kiev, “almost without warning” on April 9. He allegedly told the Ukrainian leader that Western nations would refuse to sign up to the security guarantees that Kiev wanted to receive under the proposed peace treaty.

President Zelensky has repeatedly stated that his only goal in the conflict is to defeat Russia on the battlefield and retake control of all territories that Kiev claims to be under its sovereignty.

October 14, 2022 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Europe’s descent into totalitarianism

By John Laughland | Forum for Democracy | October 11, 2022

On 7 October 2022, late in the evening, at around 11.30 pm, I was detained at Gatwick Airport in London by anti-terrorism police. I was not released until shortly before 1 am and my computer was taken from me. It has not yet been returned.

My passport and all my personal belongings – my wallet, my phone, my keys, everything – were removed. I was taken to a room where I was questioned for an hour by two anti-terrorism police officers, acting under powers given to the police (as I learned for the first time) by Schedule 3 of the 2019 Counter-terrorism and Border Security Act.

The Act is supposedly designed to allow the police to detain ‘hostile actors’ who are travelling to the country to ‘plan, prepare or carry out their hostile acts’ (according to the leaflet the officers gave me). But the Act itself says, ‘An examining officer may exercise the powers under this paragraph whether or not there are grounds for suspecting that a person is or has been engaged in hostile activity’ (my emphasis)[1].  So an Act ostensibly designed to allow hostile actors to be stopped in fact applies indiscriminately to everyone, according to its own explicit terms.

It is certainly surprising that the powers were wielded, in my case, against a British national. Nationals should not normally be questioned in this way about their reasons for entering the territory of their own country.

One of the officers opened the interrogation by saying that I was not being detained and that therefore I could not have access to a lawyer. But of course I was being detained, since it was impossible for me to leave the interrogation room and, even more so, the airport, without my passport and personal effects. (I was kept on the ‘air side’, i.e. before passing through passport control.) The word ‘detained’ has evidently been emptied of all meaning.

According to the leaflet, ‘Unlike most other Police powers, the power to stop, question, search and, if necessary, detain persons under Schedule 3 does not require authority or any suspicion.’ So the special powers enjoyed by the Police at UK ports are a ‘regime of exception’ in which the normal safeguards of the rule of law have been tossed aside.

It goes on, ’You can be searched, and anything you have with you … this includes electronic devices … where searches are conducted, there is no requirement for a written notice of search to be provided to you.  Under certain circumstances, the officer can seize any property they find.’

What are these ‘certain circumstances’? When I protested at the fact that my computer was being taken from me, which would prevent me from working until it is returned, and when I offered to bring it to a police station the following day, the officer replied that it was out of the question that it would not be taken.  In other words, there are no ‘certain circumstances.’ The seizure of such devices is, on the contrary, the rule.

In a state of law, the Police can search someone’s property only with a search warrant. This is a document signed by a judge which authorises private property to be searched and seized. If you look up ‘search warrant’ in Wikipedia, it says, ‘In certain authoritarian nations, police officers may be allowed to search individuals and property without having to obtain court permission or provide justification for their actions.’  According to this standard, the UK is now an ‘authoritarian nation.’ 

It is precisely what separates a legal state from a dictatorship that the work of the police is not abused for political purposes, yet this is what occurred to me.

The officers questioned me about my work at the Institute of Democracy and Cooperation in Paris from 2008 to 2018 and about my work at the European Parliament since then, and more recently for FVD. All the information they wanted is available publicly, for instance on Wikipedia. The questioning was polite but amateurish.

I was asked about my political views. The officer said, ‘It is a free country, not everyone is so lucky.’ I believe this is what is called ‘the British sense of humour’.

The officers told me that they had had two or three hours to prepare. This means that they were alerted in London to my imminent arrival at the moment when my boarding pass was scanned in Budapest. Everyone should know this.

They spent those hours looking things up on the Internet. The officer questioning me seemed unsure of what he was really trying to find out. The Internet, as everyone should know, is a veritable cesspit of false information and there are endless claims on it about me which are untrue. Many of these have been repeated recently in the Dutch press, as journalists go online, find what they are looking for and repeat lies told earlier by others.  In my case, they never tire of telling the same fairy tale. 

It is bad enough when journalists do this but it is frightening to think that anti-terrorism police officers regard Google as a reliable source of information. One dreads to think how many genuinely hostile actors pass through the net if this is the Police’s idea of investigation. Unfortunately that is the state of the world today.

It is particularly symbolic that this should happen to me.  Ever since I started to get interested in international criminal law over 20 years ago, I have criticised the way in which international tribunals toss aside the myriad rules and procedures which have accumulated over the centuries to ensure due process. The British are traditionally proud of these procedures which have protected citizens against abusive state power for centuries. I have repeatedly warned that these dictatorial practices would soon percolate down into national jurisdictions and destroy the precious inheritance known as the rule of law. This has now happened.

Ever since the EU announced its Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime in December 2020, moreover, I have also pointed out that the EU has given itself the power to punish individuals by executive order. This is a very dangerous development.  Individuals are punished under this regime without any legal procedure (no trial) and without any means of defending themselves. So much for human rights! I have warned for two years now that citizens of Western states would themselves be the target of these sanctions. This duly happened in July when a British blogger, Graham Philipps, was sanctioned by the United Kingdom which has the same system as the EU and the US.

In other words I, who have been warning that these procedures, introduced at international level, would soon corrupt the criminal law in domestic jurisdictions, have now been proved horribly right by an example of this abuse of which I have now personally been a victim. It was a profoundly disturbing experience.

Shortly before it happened, FVD International tweeted its disapproval of the EU sanctions imposed on the philosopher, Alexander Dugin. As we showed with a screen shot of the relevant EU document, the European Council (i.e. the executive) sanctioned Dugin purely for his views. Nowhere it is alleged that he has actually participated in the invasion of Ukraine nor even that he is guilty of incitement. Instead, he is sanctioned for thoughtcrime. 

Some people who do not like Dugin are pleased at this. But they should understand that these are seriously abusive powers which can easily, as in my case, be directed against totally innocent people. To such people I can find no better response than the famous remarks by Pastor Martin Niemöller:

First they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the Socialists and I did not speak out because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me.  And there was no one left to speak out for me.

Europe is sliding into dictatorship.  In fact, it is already there.

October 12, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties | , , | Leave a comment

Europe’s Eerie Silence – The Curious Case of the Dog That Did Not Bark

By Alastair Crooke | Strategic Culture Foundation | October 10, 2022

Western media is full of speculation whether, or not, we stand at the cusp of WW3. Actually, we are already there. The long war never stopped. In the wake of America’s 2008 Financial Crisis, the U.S. needed to reinforce its economy’s collateral resource base. For the Straussian current (the neocon hawks if you prefer), Russia’s then post-Cold War weakness was an ‘opportunity’ to open a new war front. The U.S. hawks wanted to kill two birds with one stone: to pillage Russia’s valuable resources to reinforce their own economy and to fracture Russia into a kaleidoscope of parts.

For the Straussians, the Cold War too never ended. The world remains binary – ‘us and them, good and evil’.

But the neoliberal pillage ultimately didn’t succeed – to the lasting chagrin of the Straussians. Since 2014 at least, (according to one senior Russian official), the Great Game has moved towards the attempt by the U.S. to control the flows and corridors of energy – and to set its price. And, on the other side, on Russia’s counter-measures to create fluid and dynamic transit networks through pipelines and Asian internal waterways – and to set the price of energy. (Now via OPEC+)

So, Putin holding the Ukraine referenda; mobilising Russian military forces; and reminding the world that he is open to talks, clearly ‘ups the ante’. Should the NATO-led Ukrainians push into these areas after next week, it will constitute a direct attack on Russian soil. This retaliation threat is backed up by the mobilisation of massive military deployments.

Then, the Nordstream pipelines were blown up. Put simply, this is a high-stakes game of chicken playing out centred around energy – and against the relative strengths and weaknesses of the western economy and the Russian economy. Biden releases 1 million per day from strategic reserves and OPEC+ seems set to cut by 1.5 million barrels per day.

On the one hand, the U.S. is a large resource-rich economy, but Europe isn’t and is much more dependent on imports of food and energy. And with the final bursting of the QE bubble, it is not clear that Central Bank intervention which created the $30+ trillion QE bubble will be able to provide a solution. Inflation changes the calculus. A return to QE becomes highly problematic in an inflationary environment.

One prescient financial commentator noted: “Bubbles bursting are not just about inflated prices falling, they’re about the recognition that an entire way of thinking was wrong”. Put simply, did the Straussians adequately think through their recent exaltation of the pipeline disruption? Blinken has just called the Nordstream sabotage and Europe’s consequent energy deficit a “tremendous opportunity” for the U.S.. Curiously, the sabotage coincided with reports suggesting that secret talks were afoot between Germany and Russia to resolve all Nordstream issues and to restart supply.

But what if the resultant crisis crashes the political structures in Europe? What if the U.S. turns out not to be immune to the type of financial leverage crisis facing the UK? Team Biden and the EU plainly didn’t think through the rush to sanctioning Russia. They also didn’t think through the consequences of their European ally losing Russia.

These ‘fin-war’ elements will likely become more a focus of attention than battlefield wins or reverses in Ukraine (where the rainy season has already begun), and it will not be until early November that the ground will freeze hard. The conflict is heading to a pause, just as the western attention span for the Ukraine war seems to be fading somewhat.

However, what is ‘curious’ for so many, is the eerie silence emanating out of Europe in the wake of their vital energy pipelines lying broken on the Baltic Sea floor at a time of financial crisis. This is the ‘dog’ that did not bark in the night – when you would expect it so to do. Hardly a word, or murmur, is to be heard about this matter in the European press – and nothing from Germany … It as if it never happened. Yet of course the Euro-élite know ‘who did it’.

To understand this paradox, we must look at the interplay of the three principal dynamics at work in Europe. Each thinks of theirs as ‘a winning hand’; the ‘be all, and end all’ of the future. But in reality, these two currents are but ‘useful tools’ in the eyes of those who ‘pull the levers’ and ‘sound the whistles’ – i.e. control the psyops from behind the curtain.

Furthermore, there is a sharp disparity of motives. For the Straussians, behind the curtain, they are at war – existential war to maintain their primacy. The second two currents are utopian projects which have shown themselves to be easily manipulated.

The ‘Straussians’ are the followers of Leo Strauss, the leading neo-con theorist. Many are former Trotskyists who morphed over, from Left to Right (call them Neocon ‘hawks’ if you prefer). Their message is a very simple doctrine about the maintenance of power: ‘Never let it slip’; block any rival from emerging; do whatever it takes.

Leading Straussian, Paul Wolfowitz, wrote this simple doctrine of ‘destroy any emergent rivals before they destroy you’ into the U.S. 1992 official Defence Planning Document – adding to it that Europe and Japan particularly were to be ‘discouraged’ from questioning U.S. global primacy. This skeleton doctrine, though re-packaged in subsequent Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, continued with its essence unchanged.

And, since the message – ‘block any rival’ – is so direct and compelling, the Straussians flit easily from U.S. political party to party. They also have their ‘useful’ auxiliaries deeply burrowed within the U.S.’ élite class, and institutions of state power. The oldest and most trusty of these auxiliary forces however, is the Anglo-American intelligence and security alliance.

The ‘Straussians’ prefer to scheme from ‘behind the curtain’ and in certain U.S. think-tanks. They move with the times, ‘camping on’, yet never assimilating into whatever prevalent cultural trends are ‘out there’. Their alliances always remain temporary, opportunistic. They use these contemporary impulses primarily to craft fresh justifications for American exceptionalism.

The first such important impulse in the current reframing is liberal-woke, activist-driven, social justice-oriented identity politics. Why wokeism? Why should woke be of interest to the CIA and MI6? Because it is revolutionary. Identity politics was evolved during the French Revolution to upend the status quo; to overthrow its pantheon of hero-models, and to displace the existing élite and rotate a ‘new class’ into power. This definitely excites the interest of Straussians.

Biden likes to tout the exceptionalism of ‘our democracy’. Of course, Biden refers here, not to generic democracy in the wider meaning, but to America’s liberal-woke re-justification for global hegemony (defined as “our democracy”). “We have an obligation, a duty, a responsibility to defend, preserve, and protect ‘our democracy’…It is under threat”, he has said.

The second key dynamic – the Green Transition – is one that co-habits under the Biden Administration umbrella, together with the very radical and distinct philosophy of Silicon Valley – an eugenist and trans-human view that aligns in some respects with that of the ‘Davos’ crowd, as well as with the straight-forward Climate Emergency activists.

Just to be clear, these two distinct, but companion piece dynamics to ‘our democracy’, crossed the Atlantic to burrow deeply into the Brussels leadership class. And, put simply, the Euro-Version of liberal-woke activism keeps intact the Straussian doctrine of U.S. and western exceptionalism – together with its’ insistence that ‘enemies’ be portrayed in the most extreme Manichaean terms.

The aim of Manicheanism (since Carl Schmitt first made the point) is to foreclose on any mediation with rivals by portraying them as sufficiently ‘evil’ that discourse with them become pointless and morally defective.

The transition of liberal-woke politics across the Atlantic should come as no surprise. The EU’s regulation ‘trussed’ internal market was precisely devised to displace political debate with tech managerialism. But the very sterility of econ-tech discourse birthed the so-called ‘democracy gap’. With the latter becoming evermore the Union’s unmissable lacuna.

The Euro-élites thus were in desperate need of a Values System to fill the gap. So, they leaped onto the liberal-woke ‘train’. Drawing on this, and the Club of Rome’s ‘messianism’ for de-industrialisation, gave to the Euro-élites their shiny new sect of absolute purity, a Green Future, and stainless ‘European Values’ filling the democracy-gap lacuna.

Effectively, these latter two currents – identity politics and the Green Agenda – were and are very much in the lead within the EU with the Straussians standing behind the curtain, pulling the Intelligence-Security axis lever.

The new zealots were deeply entrenched into Europe’s élite class by the 1990s, particularly in the wake of Tony Blair’s importation of the Clinton worldview and were ready to cast down the Pantheon of the old order, so to establish a new ‘de-industrialised’ Green world that would wash away the western sins of racism, patriarchy, and heteronormativity.

It culminated in the mounting of ‘a revolutionary vanguard’, whose proselytizing fury is directed both at ‘the Other’ (which serendipitously happens to be America’s rivals), as well as towards those at home (whether in the U.S. or Europe) who are defined as extremists threatening ‘our (liberal) democracy’; or, the imperative need for a ‘Green Revolution’.

Here is the point: At the tip of the European ‘spear’ reside the Green zealots — particularly the truly revolutionary German, Green Party. They hold the leadership in Germany and are at the helm at the EU Commission. It is Green zealotry fused to ‘ruining Russia’ – an intoxicating mix.

The German Greens see themselves as legionaries in this new Trans-Atlantic imperial ‘army’, pulling down literally the pillars of European industrial society, redeeming its smoking ruins, and its unpayable debts, through a digitised financial system and a ‘renewables’ economic future.

And then, with Russia weakened sufficiently, and with Putin effected, the vultures would prey at the Russian carcass for resources – precisely as occurred in the 1990s.

But they forgot … They forgot that Straussians don’t have permanent ‘friends’: U.S. primacy always trumps the interests of allies.

What can the European Green zealots say? They wanted anyway to throw down the pillars of industrialised society. Well, they got it. The Nordstream ‘escape route’ out from economic catastrophe has gone. There is nothing else, but to mumble unconvincingly: ‘Putin did it’. And to contemplate the ruin of Europa and what that may mean.

What next? The hawks likely will now play their next hand in the high stakes game of WW3 ‘chicken’. The soaring dollar is one vector. The question is who holds the stronger cards? The West believes it holds the Ukraine card. Russia believes it has ace economic cards of food, energy, and resource security – and has a stable economy. Ukraine represents an entirely different battlespace: the long term Straussian ambition to strip Russia of its historic ‘safety belt’ that began in the wake of the Cold War with the fragmentation of the Soviet Union.

Much will depend on the fall-out from the Bubble burst. As that one commentator put it: “The moment has come for central bankers to tighten and to unwind their various market distortions: The impact has already been catastrophic,” said Lindsay Politi, a Fund manager. “And central banks aren’t done yet. Inflation changes the calculus: Many central banks simply don’t have the option of returning to QE anymore”.

October 11, 2022 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia, Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

UK intelligence plotted Crimean Bridge bombing – Grayzone

Samizdat | October 11, 2022

Attacking the strategically vital Crimean Bridge was clearly not a new idea for Ukraine and its anti-Russia allies. In fact, UK intelligence officials reportedly commissioned a study in April examining ways to blow up the key transportation link across the Kerch Strait.

The secret plot was drawn up at the request of senior British Army intelligence operative Chris Donnelly, the Grayzone reported on Tuesday, citing internal documents and correspondence that the investigative journalism outlet obtained from an unidentified source. The stated goal was to destroy the bridge to cut off a key Russian supply route, isolate military forces in Crimea and temporarily block maritime access to the Sea of Azov.

The attack roadmap was titled, ‘Audacious: Support for Ukraine Maritime Raiding Operations’, and it was produced by UK military veteran Hugh Ward, according to the documents obtained by Grayzone. Donnelly, who’s also a veteran NATO advisor, called the plans “very impressive indeed.”

Ward laid out multiple options for blowing up the $4 billion bridge, including a cruise missile attack targeting concrete pillars on each side of the central steel arch. He also examined using divers or underwater drones to attach limpet mines to pillars at the “weakest part” of the structure.

Although last week’s attack on the bridge was carried out using a truck bomb, rather than the options discussed in the UK analysis, there are indications that British spies had shared their findings with Ukraine’s government “at the highest levels,” Grayzone said. The outlet obtained an email in which Donnelly forwarded the plans to Lithuanian Defense Minister Audrius Butkevicius.

Reached by phone, Ward didn’t deny that he prepared the attack plans for Donnelly, Grayzone said. “I’m going to have a chat with Chris and confirm with him what he’s prepared for me to release,” Ward told the outlet.

Although the Crimean Bridge is crossed by thousands of civilians daily, the UK study included no reference to avoiding non-combatant casualties. Saturday’s bombing, as it turned out, killed at least four civilians. Russian President Vladimir Putin called the blast a terrorist attack and indicated that Monday’s air strikes against infrastructure targets in Kiev and other Ukrainian cities were carried out in response to the bridge incident.

Ukrainian media outlets reported that the attack was perpetrated by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). Senior officials in Ukraine’s government celebrated the bombing and made jokes about it. The SBU posted a photo of the damaged bridge with a note saying, “The sun is rising, the bridge is burning beautifully.” Senior presidential aide Mikhail Podoliak posted a Twitter message calling the blast “just the beginning.”

October 11, 2022 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Open Letter to Therese Coffey Urging Her to Apologise to the Care Workers Forced Out by Vaccine Mandate

BY TOBY YOUNG | THE DAILY SCEPTIC | OCTOBER 10, 2022

Campaign group Together’s latest campaign, an Open Letter to Health Secretary Therese Coffey urging her to “Apologise, Reinstate, Compensate the 40,000 Care Workers Forced Out by Covid Jab Mandate” has attracted over 10,000 signatures within a few hours of going live. Here is an extract:

Forcing out approximately 40,000 social care workers for declining the Covid jab was not just unethical, but disastrous for the care sector and those it supports. The sector now has 165,000 vacancies, with 500,000 members of the public waiting for assessments, care or reviews. The situation is grave and urgent, not least as without a functioning care sector the NHS will collapse.

Failure to respect bodily autonomy was wrong in principle. ‘No jab, no job’ amounted to blackmail. But even on a practical level, the ‘mandate’ policy was always illogical and ill-advised.

For starters, natural immunity was totally ignored as a factor – for reasons that remain unclear. Throughout most of 2021 it was clear that Covid jabs did not prevent transmission and by October, the Guardian was explicitly reporting that ‘research reveals fully vaccinated people are just as likely to pass (the) virus on… whether an infected individual is themselves fully vaccinated or unvaccinated makes little or no difference to how infectious they are to their household contacts’. This alone should have been enough to kill off this divisive policy. Yet, seemingly oblivious to the actual scientific data, your predecessor Sajid Javid took to television the same month, belligerently ‘warning’ care workers ‘if you cannot be bothered to go and get vaccinated then get out… go and get another job.’

On November 9th 2021, the Department of Health and Social Care warned Javid that his ‘mandate’ policy would result in upwards of 40,000 care staff leaving the sector. He persisted with it anyway, and on 11 November workers who had not already been forced out were sacked in droves. Many lost not only their jobs, but also their pensions.

Already a range of well-known people including Prof Carl Heneghan, journalists Allison Pearson and Julia Hartley-Brewer, author and broadcaster Laura Dodsworth, Richard Tice of Reform UK and Laurence Fox of the Reclaim party, medics Dr Tony Hinton, Dr Renee Hoenderkamp, Dr Clare Craig and Dr Teck Khong, and sportsman Matt Le Tissier, have all signed.

You can read the Open Letter in full and sign it here.

October 10, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , , , | Leave a comment

Has AUKUS nuclear submarine deal stalled?

With a deal that threatens non-proliferation, Australia is now yet another focal point of US-China tensions.

By Uriel Araujo | October 10, 2022

According to recent reports, an amendment proposed by AUKUS (Australia, UK and the US) countries to legitimize their nuclear submarine cooperation is being curbed by Chinese diplomatic efforts. The $122.4 billion dollars deal reached in September 2021 had been announced as the core component of this new strategic partnership. 

AUKUS, the security pact between these three Anglo-Saxon countries to counter China, was announced in September 2021, and has been controversial from the very start. Together with the QUAD, it has certainly increased tensions in the Asia-Pacific region.

In this context, Australian authorities in Canberra plan to acquire at least eight nuclear submarines, thereby possibly making the Indo-Pacific state the first one in the Southern Hemisphere to possess such vessels, as well as the first country that is a party to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to do so other than the five recognized weapon states, namely the US, Russia, China, UK, and France. According to the International Atomic Energy (IAE) Rafael Grossi, these submarines will be fuelled by “highly enriched uranium”, so they could be weapons-grade or close to it. Beijing’s Permanent Mission, in a position paper sent to the IAE last month, emphasized the fact that the “AUKUS partnership involves the illegal transfer of nuclear weapon materials, making it essentially an act of nuclear proliferation.”

The AUKUS countries in turn argue that the NPT allows marine nuclear propulsion as long as the proper arrangements are made with the Agency. However, in this case, nuclear material will be transferred to rather than produced by Australia itself. China disagrees with the AUKUS’ stance, arguing that the IAE is in fact overstepping its mandate. Beijing has called for an “inter-governmental” process to examine the issue at hand.

This is a complicated matter: when nuclear submarines are at sea, their fuel is not within the reach of the IAE’s inspectors and there is no way to keep track of the nuclear material. The agency’s director himself, Rafael Grossi, has told the BBC the AUKUS submarine deal would be “very tricky” for nuclear inspectors.

China’s mission to the UN in Vienna has also bluntly described AUKUS’ plans as nuclear proliferation under a naval nuclear propulsion “cover”. Ambassador Wang Qun, Chinese Permanent Representative to the UN accused the AUKUS states of “double standard” in a September 19 interview. 

American-Chinese tensions are already too high over the issue of Taiwan and to add fuel to the fire, Beijing perceives the US-led AUKUS plans as the West pushing its sea frontiers against China by weaponizing its ally Australia with nuclear submarines. To make matters worse, under the current arrangements the fleet would be a US-controlled squadron. Given the ongoing American “dual containment” policy, Beijing’s concerns do make a lot of sense.

Chen Hong, president of the Chinese Association of Australian Studies and also a director of the Australian Studies Center at East China Normal University, has even warned that by playing a part in this, Canberra could be sacrificing its own national security for the sake of other countries’ national interests.

In July, two Chinese think-thanks (China Arms Control and Disarmament Association and China Institute of Nuclear Industry Strategy) had already warned that the AUKUS submarine project could set a “dangerous precedent” and thus threaten non-proliferation in a lengthy report called “A Dangerous Conspiracy: The Nuclear Proliferation Risk of the Nuclear-powered Submarines Collaboration in the Context of AUKUS.” 

According to the document, if the US and the UK have their way, nuclear states will for the very first time be transferring weapons-grade nuclear material to a non-nuclear state (Australia). Such a precedent, it warns, “ferments potential risks and hazards in multiple aspects such as nuclear security, arms race in nuclear submarines and missile technology proliferation, with a profound negative impact on global strategic balance and stability.” The report also controversially evokes the possibility that Canberra might actually be intent on acquiring nuclear weapons, given its historical pursuit of the technology since the 1950s.

Meanwhile, Rob Wittman and Donald Norcross, two members of the US House Armed Services Committee, in a Wilson Center discussion on southeast Asia and the Pacific, have  urged Australians to work closely with the US to master nuclear technology.

Anthony Moretti, a Department of Communication and Organizational Leadership Professor at the Robert Morris University argues that there is a loophole in the NPT which would allow Canberra to acknowledge to the IEA that it has acquired nuclear materials and then simply refuse to allow any inspections validating its procedures. This would be the only way for Australia to go ahead with the AUKUS deal under the current framework, but the problem is the dangerous precedent it would set, as mentioned above. It is quite hard to imagine how Beijing could possibly allow such development. 

In his recent book titled “Sub-Imperial Power: Australia in the International Arena”, retired Australian army intelligence officer, Clinton Fernandes makes the convincing point that Canberra’s defense strategy has been built around a “structural dependence” on the US, which leaves it unable to defend itself in any scenario other than “in the context of the US Alliance.”

Australia has been called the “coup capital” of the so-called democratic world and the American influence on the country over the years has a lot to do with this. Washington has also controlled Canberra’s foreign policy for decades, as exemplified by the infamous Anglo-American coup that “dismissed” Prime Minister Gough Whitlam. Right now, the island-country has become yet another focal point of tensions between great powers.

Uriel Araujo is a researcher with a focus on international and ethnic conflicts.

October 10, 2022 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

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