Skip to main content

Home/ Socialism and the End of the American Dream/ Group items tagged eastern-europe

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
Paul Merrell

Israel's Right, Cheering Donald Trump's Win, Renews Calls to Abandon 2-State Solution -... - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...p-palestinian-settlements.html

war & peace U.S.-foreign-policy Israel Palestine 2-state-solution

shared by Paul Merrell on 16 Nov 16 - No Cached
  • Emboldened by the Republican sweep of last week’s American elections, right-wing members of the Israeli government have called anew for the abandonment of a two-state solution to the conflict with the Palestinians.“The combination of changes in the United States, in Europe and in the region provide Israel with a unique opportunity to reset and rethink everything,” Naftali Bennett, Israel’s education minister and the leader of the pro-settlement Jewish Home party, told a gathering of the Foreign Press Association in Jerusalem on Monday.Mr. Bennett, who advocates annexing 60 percent of the occupied West Bank to Israel, exulted on the morning after Donald J. Trump’s victory: “The era of a Palestinian state is over.”That sentiment was only amplified when Jason Greenblatt, a lawyer and co-chairman of the Trump campaign’s Israel Advisory Committee, told Israel’s Army Radio that Mr. Trump did not consider West Bank settlements to be an obstacle to peace, in a stark reversal of longstanding American policy.
  • Members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud party and other rightist politicians jumped to make hay of the change. Advertisement Continue reading the main story Yoav Kish, a Likud member of Parliament, called for the expansion of Israeli sovereignty into the West Bank; Meir Turgeman, the chairman of Jerusalem’s municipal planning committee, said he would now bring long-frozen plans for thousands of Jewish homes in the fiercely contested eastern part of the city up for approval.
  • Israel’s Supreme Court on Monday rejected a government request for a seven-month delay of the demolition of an illegal West Bank outpost built on privately owned Palestinian land. The court-ordered demolition is slated for Dec. 25, and the government had argued for the delay in part to temper a potentially violent settler response.On Sunday, a ministerial committee of rightists within the Likud party and the governing coalition approved a contentious bill to retroactively legalize illegal settlement on privately owned Palestinian land. Prompted by the effort to salvage the Amona outpost, it may be a precursor of things to come.Although the pro-settler camp was promoting the bill long before Mr. Trump’s victory, the decision was taken, unusually, over Mr. Netanyahu’s vehement objections and despite his exhortations for it to be postponed.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Israeli analysts point out that the Trump campaign has spread contradictory messages. While many here assume that he will have more pressing priorities than the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Mr. Trump told The Wall Street Journal on Friday that he would like to seal an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement, calling it the “ultimate deal.”
  • Acknowledging that Mr. Trump’s positions are not entirely clear, Mr. Bennett, the leader of Jewish Home, said, “We have to say what we want first.”
  • But Mr. Gold suggested that a Trump administration was likely to roll back the demand that Israel withdraw to the 1967 lines and support borders that are more accommodating to Israel. “Trump’s policy paper spoke about Israel having defensible borders, which are clearly different from the 1967 lines,” he said.
Paul Merrell

Obama urges Trump not to cut deals with Russia - 0 views

www.usatoday.com/...94014484

U.S.-foreign-policy Russia Obama Trump

shared by Paul Merrell on 20 Nov 16 - No Cached
  • President Obama urged his successor to continue a tough-but-open policy on Russia, saying Thursday that President-elect Donald Trump should not fall into the trap of seeking short-term deals with the rival power for the sake of expediency.Obama said he hopes Trump would not "just cut some deals" or "do whatever is convenient at the time," saying that policy would lead to longer-term problems in Syria and Eastern Europe. Instead, Obama said, Trump should take a constructive approach, "finding areas where we can cooperate with Russia where our values and interests align." He said Trump should be "willing to stand up to Russia where they are deviating from our values and international norms."Even as Obama warned against what he called a "realpolitik approach," Trump met in New York with perhaps its most well known modern practitioner: former secretary of State Henry Kissinger. "I have tremendous respect for Dr. Kissinger and appreciate him sharing his thoughts with me,” Trump said in a statement.
  • Paul Merrell on 20 Nov 16
     
    Yes, no deals. {lease keep Cold War 2.0 going so we cam justify that trillion-dollar nuclear weapon expansion program.
Paul Merrell

Prensa Latina News Agency - Ecuadoran Parliament Begins Procedure to Resign from Rio Tr... - 0 views

www.plenglish.com/index.php

foreign policy Ecuador Rio Treaty Monroe Doctrine

shared by Paul Merrell on 12 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • Ecuador''s National Assembly has begun the procedure to make official the resignation of the Andean country from the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (Rio Treaty), signed with the United States in 1947. The approval of the resignation request is being handled by the Commission on Sovereignty and International Relations, which yesterday listened to arguments from several officials belonging to the foreign ministry, the legislative body reported in a press note. According to the text, the diplomat Mauricio Montalvo explained to some members of the commission that the Ecuadorian government supports the country's resignation from that agreement due to the current lack of political, material, and historical conditions that were once present after the end of the Cold War and which motivated the signature of the agreement. Montalvo referred to the Rio Treaty as an instrument promoted by the United States to deal with alleged attacks against the peace, security, and sovereignty of Latin American nations, as a result of the intervention of powers outside the region, specifically the communist bloc in Eastern Europe and Asia.
  • However, the diplomat stated that in recent years the document has been used to justify interventionism and the use of force against Latin American countries and governments with nationalist, socialist, or populist tendencies. In addition, he mentioned as an example the case of the British invasion of the Malvinas (Falkland) Islands, when the United States sided with the United Kingdom, against Argentina´s interests, despite this Southern country being one of the signatories of the agreement. Ecuador announced its resignation from Rio Treaty at the summit of the Organization of American States celebrated in June, 2012 in the Bolivian city of Cochabamba, through its foreign minister, Ricardo Patiño. On that occasion, the head of Ecuadorian diplomacy expressed that his country, like Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Venezuela had made the choice to withdraw from the agreement, considering that it had lost its legitimacy after the Malvinas war. "We have decided to bury what deserves to be buried, and to dispose what is of no longer useful," Patiño declared at the time.
  • Paul Merrell on 12 Jan 14
     
    Looks like the Monroe Doctrine is running out of steam. 
Paul Merrell

Syria war: new push against Assad being planned, reports suggest | World news | theguar... - 0 views

www.theguardian.com/...al-effort-southern-front-assad

war & peace Syria U.S. foreign policy

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • After months of battlefield stalemate in Syria, a flurry of reports from Washington, Jerusalem, Amman and the Gulf suggests a major new clandestine effort is under way to open up a "southern front" against the regime of Bashar al-Assad.Central to the mooted plan is a renewed push to provide Syria's badly divided and often ineffectual moderate, secular rebel groups with additional funding, upgraded weapons and intelligence support.What use they may make of such support, if indeed it fully materialises, remains to be seen.The initiative, as reported in the region, is set against a backdrop of secret talks in the US last month between Susan Rice, Barack Obama's national security adviser, and Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, the Saudi interior minister in charge of covert action programmes in Syria.According to the usually well informed Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, spy chiefs from Jordan, Turkey, Qatar and other regional countries also attended the discussions, focused on making a "stronger effort" to help the rebels.
  • After months of battlefield stalemate in Syria, a flurry of reports from Washington, Jerusalem, Amman and the Gulf suggests a major new clandestine effort is under way to open up a "southern front" against the regime of Bashar al-Assad.Central to the mooted plan is a renewed push to provide Syria's badly divided and often ineffectual moderate, secular rebel groups with additional funding, upgraded weapons and intelligence support.What use they may make of such support, if indeed it fully materialises, remains to be seen.The initiative, as reported in the region, is set against a backdrop of secret talks in the US last month between Susan Rice, Barack Obama's national security adviser, and Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, the Saudi interior minister in charge of covert action programmes in Syria.
  • According to the usually well informed Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, spy chiefs from Jordan, Turkey, Qatar and other regional countries also attended the discussions, focused on making a "stronger effort" to help the rebels.This meeting has been linked in turn to last month's launching by the Free Syrian Army (FSA) of what they termed a spring offensive in the south of Syria. The offensive began days after they received new US weapons funding that may eventually total $31.4m (£18.9m), rebel commanders said.After holding back for months owing to fears that new arms might fall into the hands of al-Qaida affiliates, unidentified American officials said Congress had given closed-door approval in January for renewed cash for light weapons intended for the moderate, secular opposition in the south.The new US funding supposedly augments a fresh push by Gulf states to finance rebel operations in the southern region of Syria, which are ultimately aimed at Damascus. More than $1bn has been disbursed since last summer, much of it for weapons purchases in eastern Europe, according to Gulf government sources quoted by regional media.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Detailed media reports claim the operational plans, supply routes and tactics for the new push are being overseen by a secret international operations command centre in Amman staffed by military officials from 14 countries, including the US, Britain, Israel and Arab states opposed to the Assad regime."Rebel fighters and opposition members say the command centre, based in an intelligence headquarters building in Amman, channels vehicles, sniper rifles, mortars, heavy machine guns, small arms and ammunition to Free Syrian Army units," the Abu Dhabi-based National newspaper reported.Jordan denies the existence of the centre and of reportedly CIA-run rebel training facilities in northern Jordan.
Paul Merrell

Russia transfers nine warplanes to Belarus to 'counter massing of forces on the border'... - 0 views

rt.com/...belarus-planes-nato-poland-594

war & peace Ukraine Russia U.S. foreign policy military-postitioning

shared by Paul Merrell on 14 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • Six Russian Sukhoi-27 fighter jets and three transport planes have been deployed at Bobruisk airfield in Belarus. Earlier this week Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko invited Russian forces to fend off potential NATO threat. “In case of continuing build-up of military forces in countries bordering Belarus, the country will take adequate response measures,” says a statement from the country’s Defense Ministry in Minsk. NATO is sending 12 F-16 craft in Poland, in the wake of the Crimea crisis, and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski has asked for an even greater US presence. Baltic states have also requested military assistance from NATO. Just like their NATO counterparts, the Russian aircraft in Belarus will participate in a joint training exercise. “The joint air defense system [between Russia and Belarus] is intended to guarantee collective security in Eastern Europe,” the Belarusian Defense Ministry said.
Paul Merrell

Another Anschluss In Crimea - 0 views

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article37962.htm

war & peace Ukraine Russia-NATO-treaty neocons

shared by Paul Merrell on 16 Mar 14 - No Cached
  • No western leaders should have been surprised by Crimea. Nations still have strategic sphere of influence. In 1991, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev refused to use force to keep the union together and allowed Germany to peacefully reunify. In exchange, US President George H.W. Bush agreed not to expand NATO’s borders east, and certainly not to Russia’s borders. But at the time, Washington regarded Russia as a broken-down, third world nation beneath contempt. Bush senior and his successor, Bill Clinton, reneged on the deal with Moscow and began pushing Western influence east –to the Baltic, Romania and Bulgaria, Kosovo and Albania, then Georgia, across Central Asia. NATO offered membership to Ukraine. Moscow saw encirclement. Having serially violated Russia’s traditional sphere of influence, it was inevitable Moscow would riposte. This writer, who extensively covered the Soviet Union, strongly advised NATO in the early 1990’s not to push east but to leave a strategic buffer zone in Eastern Europe to maintain peace with nuclear-armed Russia. The opposite occurred.
  • The western allies have committed the same error over Ukraine that they did over Czechoslovakia in the mid-1930’s: extending security guarantees they could not possibly fulfill. As of now, it looks like Putin’s gambit over Crimea will work and there is nothing the West can do about it but huff, puff and impose mutually negative economic sanctions.
  • Washington’s pot-calls-kettle black denunciations of the Crimea referendum ring hollow given the blatantly rigged votes coming up in US-dominated Egypt and Afghanistan. Moreover, too few in Washington are asking what earthly interests the US has in Ukraine? About as much as Russia has in Nebraska. Yet the bankrupt US is to lend $1 billion to the anti-Russian Kiev leadership and risk war in a foolish challenge to Russia in a region where it has nothing to be gained. Except, of course, for the US neocons who have played a key role in engineering the coup in Kiev and this crisis. They want to see Russia punished for supporting Syria and the Palestinians.
  • Paul Merrell on 16 Mar 14
     
    Yes, there was that agreement that NATO would not move into the former Soviet Republics, That hasn't been getting any time on U.S. mainstream media though. 
Paul Merrell

Britain Detains the Partner of a Reporter Tied to Leaks - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...of-reporter-tied-to-leaks.html

surveillance state Greenwald Miranda-detention border-search-&-seizure thumbdrive Snowden British-Terrorism-Act

shared by Paul Merrell on 19 Aug 13 - No Cached
  • The partner of Glenn Greenwald, the journalist for The Guardian who has been publishing information leaked by the former National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden, was detained for nine hours by the British authorities under a counterterrorism law while on a stop in London’s Heathrow Airport during a trip from Germany to Brazil, Mr. Greenwald said Sunday.
  • Mr. Greenwald’s partner, David Michael Miranda, 28, is a citizen of Brazil. He had spent the previous week in Berlin visiting Laura Poitras, a documentary filmmaker who has also been helping to disseminate Mr. Snowden’s leaks, to assist Mr. Greenwald. The Guardian had paid for the trip, Mr. Greenwald said, and Mr. Miranda was on his way home to Rio de Janeiro.
  • The Guardian published a report on Mr. Miranda’s detainment on Sunday afternoon. Mr. Greenwald said someone who identified himself as a security official from Heathrow Airport called him early on Sunday and informed him that Mr. Miranda had been detained, at that point for three hours. The British authorities, he said, told Mr. Miranda that they would obtain permission from a judge to arrest him for 48 hours, but he was released at the end of the nine hours, around 1 p.m. Eastern time. Mr. Miranda was in Berlin to deliver documents related to Mr. Greenwald’s investigation into government surveillance to Ms. Poitras, Mr. Greenwald said. Ms. Poitras, in turn, gave Mr. Miranda different documents to pass to Mr. Greenwald. Those documents, which were stored on encrypted thumb drives, were confiscated by airport security, Mr. Greenwald said. All of the documents came from the trove of materials provided to the two journalists by Mr. Snowden. The British authorities seized all of his electronic media — including video games, DVDs and data storage devices — and did not return them, Mr. Greenwald said.
  • Paul Merrell on 19 Aug 13
     
    My comments mighty be longer than Diigo allows from the client sidee so I will place them in in a comment following this post. However, do not miss the companion article in The Guardian, at  
  • Paul Merrell on 19 Aug 13
     
    Note that when detained, Mr. Miranda was acting in the role of a courier transporting documents on a thumb drive between two of the lead reporters working on the NSA scandal for The Guardian. The police kept the thumb drive and all other electronic devices Mr. Miranda carried, presumably to study their data stores.  Perhaps even more to the point, this was the seizure of leaked NSA documents and reporters' notes about them. I do not know about the UK law on the subject, but the shame of it is that it would be lawful accordng to the U.S. Supreme Court for U.S. Customs officials to do the same thing had Mr. Miranda arrived at an American international airport. Most Americans would be shocked to learn how many of their cherished Constitutional rights disappear at a port or entry or when crossing a border into the U.S. and when traveling within a 100-mile distance from a U.S. border on the U.S. side. But the particular detention of Mr. Miranda and seizure of the reporter's research and NSA document copies was sure from the outset to cause a major media stir. It has also provoked a strong diplomatic protest from Brazil This incident has already provoked not only a strong diplomatic protest from Brazil, but also in the UK, "Labour MP Tom Watson said he was shocked at the news and called for it to be made clear if any ministers were involved in authorising the detention." Also note in The Guardian article that the police were acting under authority of the draconian British Terrorism Act, which does not limit its application to those who are not suspected of being a terrorist. That UK government was willing to endure a public whipping by the media testifies loudly to the desperation of spy agencies - in the U.K., U.S., Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and Israel intelligence alliance - to learn what documents Snowden leaked to Glenn Greenwald and the Washington Post so they have a clue about: [i] what hammer blows will hit them in the future so they can get out i
  • Paul Merrell on 19 Aug 13
     
    I see that I forgot to paste the link to the companion article in The Guardian. Here 'tis. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/18/glenn-greenwald-guardian-partner-detained-heathrow
Paul Merrell

Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs - 2 views

www.atimes.com/...MID-03-090913.html

war & peace Syria Obama Pipelinestan U.S.-credibility

shared by Paul Merrell on 12 Sep 13 - No Cached
Gary Edwards liked it
  • There is nothing tragic about the Obama presidency, capable of drawing the analytical talents of a neo-Plutarch or a neo-Gibbon. This is more like a Pirandello farce, a sort of Character in Search of An Author. Candidates to Author are well documented - from the Israel lobby to the House of Saud, from a select elite of the industrial-military-security complex to, most of all, the rarified banking/financial elite, the real Masters of the Universe. Poor Barack is just a cipher, a <a href='http://asianmedia.com/GAAN/www/delivery/ck.php?n=a9473bc7&cb=%n' target='_blank'><img src='http://asianmedia.com/GAAN/www/delivery/avw.php?zoneid=36&cb=%n&n=a9473bc7&ct0=%c' border='0' alt='' ></a> functionary of empire, whose ''deciding'' repertoire barely extends to what trademark smile to flash at the requisite photo-ops. There's nothing ''tragic'' about the fact that during this week - marking the 12th anniversary of 9/11 - this presidency will be fighting for its bombing ''credibility'' trying to seduce Republican hawks in the US Congress while most of the warmongers du jour happen to be Democrats.
  • Republicans are torn between supporting the president they love to hate and delivering him a stinging rebuke - as much as they are aching to follow the orders of their masters, ranging from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee to military contractors. Once again, this is farce - caused by the fact that a man elected to finish off wars is eager to start yet another one. And once again without a United Nations vote. The White House ''strategy'' in this crucial negotiating week boils down to this; to convince the US Congress that the United States must start a war on Syria to punish an ''evil dictator'' - once again, as bad as Hitler - for gassing children. The evidence? It's ''indisputable''. Well, it's not ''irrefutable''. It's not even ''beyond-a-reasonable-doubt''. As Obama's Chief of Staff Denis McDonough admitted, with a straight face, it boils down to ''a quite strong common sense test, irrespective of the intelligence, that suggests that the regime carried this out''. So if this is really about ''common sense'', the president is obviously not being shown by his close coterie of sycophants this compendium of common sense, compiled by a group of top, extremely credible former US intelligence officials, which debunks all the ''evidence'' as flawed beyond belief. To evoke a farce from 12 years ago, this clearly seems to be a case of ''facts being fixed around the policy''.
  • The Arab street doesn't buy it because they clearly see through the hypocrisy; the desperate rush to ''punish'' the Bashar al-Assad government in Syria while justifying everything the apartheid state of Israel perpetrates in occupied Palestine. The Muslim world doesn't buy it because it clearly sees the demonization only applies to Muslims - from Arafat to bin Laden to Saddam to Gaddafi and now Assad. It would never apply to the military junta in Myanmar, which was clever enough to engineer an ''opening''; the next day Westerners were lining up to kiss the hem of Burmese longyis. It would never apply to the Islam Karimov dictatorship in Uzbekistan because ''we'' always need to seduce him as one of our bastards away from Russia and China. It eventually applies, on and off, to the Kim dynasty in North Korea, but with no consequences - because these are badass Asians who can actually respond to an US attack. Informed public opinion across the developing world does not buy it because they clearly see, examining the historical record, that Washington would never really be bothered with the sorry spectacle of Arabs killing Arabs, or Muslims killing Muslims, non-stop. The 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war is a prime piece of evidence.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • Then there's the ''credibility'' farce. The Obama administration has convoluted the whole world in its own self-spun net, insisting that the responsibility for the ''red line'' recklessly drawn by the president is in fact global. Yet the pesky ''world'' is not buying it.
  • At the Group of 20 summit last week, the BRICS group of emerging powers - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - as well as Indonesia and Argentina, clearly stressed that a war on Syria without UN Security Council approval would qualify Obama as a war criminal. Even among the European poodles ''support'' for the White House is extremely qualified. Germany's Angela Merkel and even France's attack dog Francois Hollande said the primacy is with the UN. The European Union as a whole wants a political solution. It's enlightening to remember that the EU in Brussels can issue arrest warrants for heads of EU governments guilty of war crimes. Someone in Paris must have warned attack dog Hollande that he would not welcome the prospect of slammer time. ''Evil'' as a political category is something worthy of the brain dead. The key question now revolves around the axis of warmongers - Washington, Israel and the House of Saud. Will the Israel lobby, the more discreet but no less powerful Saudi lobby, and the Return of the Living Dead neo-cons convince the US Congress to fight their war?
  • And then there's the curioser and curioser case of al-Qaeda - essentially the Arabic denomination for a CIA database of US-Pakistani-Saudi trained mujahideen during the 1980s: the oh so convenient transnational bogeyman that ''legitimized'' the Global War On Terror (GWOT) of the George W Bush years; the ''opening'' for al-Qaeda to move to Iraq; and now, no middle men; the CIA and the Obama administration fighting side-by-side with al-Qaeda in Syria. No wonder the denomination ''al-CIAeda'' has gone viral. With farce after farce after farce piling up in their own Tower of Babel, the much-vaunted ''US credibility'' is in itself the biggest farce of all. Politically, no one knows how the vacuum will be filled. It won't be via the UN. It won't be via the BRICS. It won't be via the G-20 - which is seriously divided; at least new multipolar players are carrying way more weight than US poodles. Much would be made to restore ''US credibility'' if the Obama administration had the balls to force both the House of Saud and Qatar (''300 people and a TV station'', in the epic definition of Saudi Arabia's Prince Bandar Sultan - aka Bandar Bush) to end once and for all their weaponizing of hardcore ''rebels'' and ultimately hardcore jihadis, and accept Iran in the negotiating table for a real Geneva II peace process in Syria. It won't happen because this bypasses farce. Once again; helpless Barack is just a paperboy. The plutocrats in charge are getting extremely nervous. The system is melting - and they need to act fast.
  • They need a Syria as docile as the Arab petro-monarchies. They want to hit Russia bad - and then discuss missile defense and Russian influence in Eastern Europe from a position of force. They want to hit Iran bad - and then continue to issue ultimatums from a position of force. They want to facilitate yet another Israeli attempt to capture southern Lebanon (it's the water, stupid). They want a monster gas pipeline from Qatar for European customers bypassing Iran and Syria as well as Gazprom. Most of all, this is all about control of natural resources and channels of distribution. These are real motives - and they have nothing to do with farce. Farce is only deployed to kill any possibility of real diplomacy and real political discussion. Farce is a theatrical mask - as in ''humanitarian'' imperialism - the ''acceptable'' version of the Dick Cheney-run years. It's as if Dick Cheney had never left the building; paperboy Barack is Dick Cheney with a ''human'' face. The only good outcome in this multi-sorrowful tale is that the real ''international community'', all around the world, has seen the naked Emperor in all its (farcical) glory.
  • Paul Merrell on 12 Sep 13
     
    What can I say? The iconoclastic Pepe Escobar strikes again. 
  • Gary Edwards on 12 Sep 13
     
    Outstanding article Paul. Wow! Watching the 911 link now. But here's one for you: Massimo Mazzucco's new 5-hour documentary "September 11- The New Pearl Harbor" summarizes 12 years of public debate on 9-11, looking at the events from all sides. Watch a trailer for the film here: http://goo.gl/M5c0dj Full five hours available here: http://www.luogocomune.net/site/modules/sections/index.php?op=viewarticle&artid=167 I listened to a two hour interview with Massimo last night. Awesome stuff.
  • Paul Merrell on 13 Sep 13
     
    A 5-hour documentary will have to wait for tomorrow. I'm about 7 hours away from a deadline for the current development cycle's Help file. :-) I do think Pepe is a off on a couple of details in this article. The Neocons were mostly silent on this one and Rumsfeld came out against the intervention, saying that Obama hadn't made a valid case for war. That's most likely because the Neocons are joined at the hip with Israeli government and that government is a house divided this time around, with only factions supporting the military strike. The current thinking in Tel Aviv/Jerusalem is, in line with the Israeli right's long term strategy, that it's just fine with them to have Muslims running around killing each other in Syria. That long-term strategy is to destabilize Israel's Arab neighbor states while Israel builds its economic empire and military hegemony in the region. Israeli government isn't exactly thrilled by the prospect of Obama delivering fulfillment of the Saudi goal of transforming Syria from a secular state into a non-secular Islamic state run by Wahabi extremists. Such a state, armed to the teeth by the U.S. and/or the Saudi-Qatari zillionaires could be very bad news for Israel. Notably, the very strongest case thus far that the August 21 chemical attack was conducted by the opposition forces with the U.S. and Syria in on it to create a false flag attack, has been delivered in installments by Yossef Bodansky, an Israeli-American uber-scholar of Islamic "terrorism" and Soviet/Russian weaponry who is incapable of criticising Israel's decades-long terrorism inflicted on the Palestinian people and Israel's continuing unlawful occupation of Palestine plus parts of Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon. Bodanysky sits at the center of an intelligence web of intelligence professionals from nations worried about Islamic "terrorism." In other words, he's extremely pro-Israeli and to boot, very close to Mossad and Israel's IDF intelligence forces. Israel's AIPAC lobby d
Paul Merrell

Ukraine Crisis: Geneva Talks Produce Agreement On Defusing Conflict - 0 views

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article38259.htm

war & peace Ukraine negotiations U.S. Russia EU

shared by Paul Merrell on 18 Apr 14 - No Cached
  • "The Guardian" -  The US, Russia, Ukraine and the European Union have agreed a plan aimed at defusing the gathering conflict in eastern Ukraine. At a meeting in Geneva which began with low expectations but led to seven hours of intense negotiations, foreign ministers agreed a series of "concrete steps" to be taken by all sides. "All sides must refrain from any violence, intimidation or provocative actions. The participants strongly condemned and rejected all expressions of extremism, racism and religious intolerance, including antisemitism," the joint statement said. "All illegal armed groups must be disarmed; all illegally seized buildings must be returned to legitimate owners; all illegally occupied streets, squares and other public places in Ukrainian cities and towns must be vacated." The constitution is also to be revised in a process that is "inclusive, transparent and accountable".
  • The substantive agreement also grants amnesty to protesters including those who had occupied government property and surrendered their weapons. The exception would be those "found guilty of capital crimes".
  • The success of the agreement will depend on its implementation. Kerry made it clear that the US would hold Moscow responsible for controlling the pro-Russian protesters, who the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has portrayed as independent minded Ukrainians.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe will be given a leading role in monitoring the agreement and helping to implement it. "The US, EU and Russia commit to support this mission, including by providing monitors," the statement said. On constitutional talks it said: "The announced constitutional process will be inclusive, transparent and accountable. It will include the immediate establishment of a broad national dialogue, with outreach to all of Ukraine's regions and political constituencies, and allow for the consideration of public comments and proposed amendments." Kiev: Military operation in Ukraine southeast to go on despite Geneva agreement: Despite calls for a peaceful dialogue in the document on Ukraine adopted in Geneva, the coup-imposed Ukrainian Foreign Minister said it will not affect the “anti-terrorist” operation in the East of the country and the troops will remain there.
  • Paul Merrell on 18 Apr 14
     
    Re: "Kerry made it clear that the US would hold Moscow responsible for controlling the pro-Russian protesters, who the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has portrayed as independent minded Ukrainians." I've seen no evidence thus far that Russia has any control over the protesters in southeast Ukraine. Many allegations that Russia has that control, but not a solitary specific fact illustrating that it is so. Given that the Kiev coup leaders rammed legislation through the moment they came to power ejecting Russian from the list of official languages and their other vehement anti-Russian acts, ethnic Russians in Ukraine have every reason to secede from Ukraine, in my opinion.    
Paul Merrell

Ukraine-Russia Near "Serious Conflict" Following Explosion In Largest European Gas Tran... - 0 views

www.zerohedge.com/...gas-transit-pipeline-explosion

war & peace Ukraine EU Russia pipelinestan

shared by Paul Merrell on 17 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • With 2 Russian TV journalists killed in recent days and on the heels of Russia's cutting off Ukraine's gas supply for non-payment, Interfax is reporting that: *EXPLOSION ON UKRAINE GAS TRANSIT PIPELINE REPORTED: IFX *INTERFAX CITES UKRAINE INTERIOR MINISTRY ON GAS PIPELINE BLAST Witnesses say flames are reaching 200 metres high. Gazprom shares are tumbling on the news (as should European stocks) and Russia's Foreign Affairs Committee Chief Aleksei Pushkov warned relations between Ukraine and Russia have entered a new stage and are "moving closer towards a serious conflict."
  • As RT reports, An explosion has struck a pipeline in the eastern Ukrainian Poltava region. Witnesses say flames from the blast are up to 200 meter high, RIA Novosti reports. The “Brotherhood” natural gas pipeline (Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhgorod) is about one kilometer away from the nearest settlement. No injuries have been reported from the blast. Fire fighting crews have been deployed to the scene. Operating since 1967, the “Brotherhood” is the largest consumer gas pipeline in Europe, clocking in at 4,451 km. It cuts through Ukraine and runs into Slovakia, where it diverges in two directions; with one part supplying gas to the Czech Republic, Germany, France and Switzerland, and the other to Austria, Italy, Hungary and several countries in the Balkans. Pipeline faucets are being tuned off as fire fighters still can’t put out the flame.
  • As Bloomberg reports, Relations between Russia and Ukraine have entered a new stage and are "moving closer towards a serious conflict", said State Duma Foreign Affairs Committee chief Aleksei Pushkov.   Russia did not recognise unilateral border demarcation by Ukraine which was "contrary to all norms of international law", Russia's ITAR-TASS news agency quoted Pushkov as saying Tuesday.   "An attack on the Russian embassy, an attempted attack on the consulate-general in Odessa, insults to the Russian president, regular arrests of Russian journalists -- I think this is a deliberate decision co-ordinated with the U.S -- all these are links of one chain," he said. We are sure the explosion/fire on the pipeline will further this sentiment.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • Update: *UKRAINE MINISTRY: FIRE BROKE OUT ON GAS PIPLINE, NO EXPLOSION *UKRAINE MINISTRY SAYS INVESTIGATING CAUSE OF GAS PIPELINE FIRE Coincidental "fire"? In the #Poltava region #Ukraine explosion on a gas pipeline Urengoy-Uzhgorod-Pomary pic.twitter.com/aURhFAU4dj — ??????? ?????? (@buritomexican0) June 17, 2014
Paul Merrell

The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity : What Does The US Government Want in U... - 0 views

ronpaulinstitute.org/...overnment-want-in-ukraine.aspx

war & peace Ukraine U.S.-foreign-policy ron paul

shared by Paul Merrell on 13 May 14 - No Cached
  • Written by Ron Paul
  • Why are people protesting in eastern Ukraine? Because they do not believe the government that came to power after the US-backed uprising in February is legitimate. They do not recognize the authority of an unelected president and prime minister. The US sees this as a Russian-sponsored destabilization effort, but is it so hard to understand that the people in Ukraine may be annoyed with the US and EU for their involvement in regime change in their country? Would we be so willing to accept an unelected government in Washington put in place with the backing of the Chinese and Iranians?
  • The real question is why the US government is involved in Ukraine in the first place. We are broke. We cannot even afford to fix our own economy. Yet we want to run Ukraine? Does it really matter who Ukrainians elect to represent them? Is it really a national security matter worth risking a nuclear war with Russia whether Ukraine votes for more regional autonomy and a weaker central government? Isn’t that how the United States was originally conceived?   Has the arrogance of the US administration, thinking they should run the world, driven us to the brink of another major war in Europe? Let us hope they will stop this dangerous game and come to their senses. I say let’s have no war for Ukraine!
Paul Merrell

Obama asks Congress to approve $500M for Syrian rebels | New York Post - 0 views

nypost.com/...approve-500m-for-syrian-rebels

war & peace Obama Syria U.S.-foreign-policy appropriations

shared by Paul Merrell on 28 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • President Barack Obama asked Congress Thursday for $500 million to train and arm vetted members of the Syrian opposition, as the U.S. struggles for a way to stem a civil war that has also fueled the al Qaeda-inspired insurgency in neighboring Iraq. The military training program would deepen the Obama administration’s involvement in the more than four-year conflict between rebels and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. If approved by Congress, the program would supplement a covert training-and-assistance program run by US intelligence agencies.
  • The Syria program is part of a broader $65.8 billion overseas operations request that the administration sent to Capitol Hill Thursday. The package includes $1 billion to help stabilize nations bordering Syria that are struggling with the effects of the civil war. It also formalizes a request for a previously announced $1 billion to strengthen the US military presence in Central and Eastern Europe amid Russia’s threatening moves in Ukraine. The requests come as Obama faces fresh criticism of his restrained policies in Syria, which some White House opponents contend allowed the Sunni insurgency pressing through Iraq to gain strength. US officials increasingly see the instability in Syria and Iraq as a single challenge, with the border between the two countries increasingly blurred.
Paul Merrell

Remarks by President Obama in Address to the United Nations General Assembly | The Whit... - 0 views

www.whitehouse.gov/...nited-nations-general-assembly

war & peace Obama-speech U.N. hypocrisy

shared by Paul Merrell on 24 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • Remarks by President Obama in Address to the United Nations General Assembly United Nations General Assembly Hall New York City, New York 10:13 A.M. EDT PRESIDENT OBAMA:  Mr. President, Mr. Secretary General, fellow delegates, ladies and gentlemen:  We come together at a crossroads between war and peace; between disorder and integration; between fear and hope. Around the globe, there are signposts of progress.  The shadow of World War that existed at the founding of this institution has been lifted, and the prospect of war between major powers reduced.  The ranks of member states has more than tripled, and more people live under governments they elected. Hundreds of millions of human beings have been freed from the prison of poverty, with the proportion of those living in extreme poverty cut in half.  And the world economy continues to strengthen after the worst financial crisis of our lives. 
  • And yet there is a pervasive unease in our world -- a sense that the very forces that have brought us together have created new dangers and made it difficult for any single nation to insulate itself from global forces.  As we gather here, an outbreak of Ebola overwhelms public health systems in West Africa and threatens to move rapidly across borders.  Russian aggression in Europe recalls the days when large nations trampled small ones in pursuit of territorial ambition.  The brutality of terrorists in Syria and Iraq forces us to look into the heart of darkness.
  • First, all of us -- big nations and small -- must meet our responsibility to observe and enforce international norms.  We are here because others realized that we gain more from cooperation than conquest. 
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • Recently, Russia’s actions in Ukraine challenge this post-war order.  Here are the facts.  After the people of Ukraine mobilized popular protests and calls for reform, their corrupt president fled.  Against the will of the government in Kyiv, Crimea was annexed.  Russia poured arms into eastern Ukraine, fueling violent separatists and a conflict that has killed thousands.  When a civilian airliner was shot down from areas that these proxies controlled, they refused to allow access to the crash for days.  When Ukraine started to reassert control over its territory, Russia gave up the pretense of merely supporting the separatists, and moved troops across the border. This is a vision of the world in which might makes right -- a world in which one nation’s borders can be redrawn by another, and civilized people are not allowed to recover the remains of their loved ones because of the truth that might be revealed. America stands for something different.  We believe that right makes might -- that bigger nations should not be able to bully smaller ones, and that people should be able to choose their own future.
  • nd these are simple truths, but they must be defended. America and our allies will support the people of Ukraine as they develop their democracy and economy.  We will reinforce our NATO Allies and uphold our commitment to collective self-defense.  We will impose a cost on Russia for aggression, and we will counter falsehoods with the truth.  And we call upon others to join us on the right side of history -- for while small gains can be won at the barrel of a gun, they will ultimately be turned back if enough voices support the freedom of nations and peoples to make their own decisions. Moreover, a different path is available -- the path of diplomacy and peace, and the ideals this institution is designed to uphold.  The recent cease-fire agreement in Ukraine offers an opening to achieve those objectives.  If Russia takes that path -- a path that for stretches of the post-Cold War period resulted in prosperity for the Russian people -- then we will lift our sanctions and welcome Russia’s role in addressing common challenges.  After all, that’s what the United States and Russia have been able to do in past years -- from reducing our nuclear stockpiles to meeting our obligations under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, to cooperating to remove and destroy Syria’s declared chemical weapons.  And that’s the kind of cooperation we are prepared to pursue again -- if Russia changes course. 
  • This speaks to a central question of our global age -- whether we will solve our problems together, in a spirit of mutual interest and mutual respect, or whether we descend into the destructive rivalries of the past.  When nations find common ground, not simply based on power, but on principle, then we can make enormous progress.  And I stand before you today committed to investing American strength to working with all nations to address the problems we face in the 21st century.
  • America is pursuing a diplomatic resolution to the Iranian nuclear issue, as part of our commitment to stop the spread of nuclear weapons and pursue the peace and security of a world without them.  And this can only take place if Iran seizes this historic opportunity.  My message to Iran’s leaders and people has been simple and consistent:  Do not let this opportunity pass.  We can reach a solution that meets your energy needs while assuring the world that your program is peaceful.  America is and will continue to be a Pacific power, promoting peace, stability, and the free flow of commerce among nations.  But we will insist that all nations abide by the rules of the road, and resolve their territorial disputes peacefully, consistent with international law. 
  • In other words, on issue after issue, we cannot rely on a rule book written for a different century.  If we lift our eyes beyond our borders -- if we think globally and if we act cooperatively -- we can shape the course of this century, as our predecessors shaped the post-World War II age.  But as we look to the future, one issue risks a cycle of conflict that could derail so much progress, and that is the cancer of violent extremism that has ravaged so many parts of the Muslim world. Of course, terrorism is not new.  Speaking before this Assembly, President Kennedy put it well:  “Terror is not a new weapon,” he said.  “Throughout history it has been used by those who could not prevail, either by persuasion or example.”  In the 20th century, terror was used by all manner of groups who failed to come to power through public support.  But in this century, we have faced a more lethal and ideological brand of terrorists who have perverted one of the world’s great religions.  With access to technology that allows small groups to do great harm, they have embraced a nightmarish vision that would divide the world into adherents and infidels -- killing as many innocent civilians as possible, employing the most brutal methods to intimidate people within their communities.
  • I have made it clear that America will not base our entire foreign policy on reacting to terrorism.  Instead, we’ve waged a focused campaign against al Qaeda and its associated forces -- taking out their leaders, denying them the safe havens they rely on.  At the same time, we have reaffirmed again and again that the United States is not and never will be at war with Islam.  Islam teaches peace.  Muslims the world over aspire to live with dignity and a sense of justice.  And when it comes to America and Islam, there is no us and them, there is only us -- because millions of Muslim Americans are part of the fabric of our country. So we reject any suggestion of a clash of civilizations. Belief in permanent religious war is the misguided refuge of extremists who cannot build or create anything, and therefore peddle only fanaticism and hate.  And it is no exaggeration to say that humanity’s future depends on us uniting against those who would divide us along the fault lines of tribe or sect, race or religion.
  • But this is not simply a matter of words.  Collectively, we must take concrete steps to address the danger posed by religiously motivated fanatics, and the trends that fuel their recruitment.  Moreover, this campaign against extremism goes beyond a narrow security challenge.  For while we’ve degraded methodically core al Qaeda and supported a transition to a sovereign Afghan government, extremist ideology has shifted to other places -- particularly in the Middle East and North Africa, where a quarter of young people have no job, where food and water could grow scarce, where corruption is rampant and sectarian conflicts have become increasingly hard to contain.   As an international community, we must meet this challenge with a focus on four areas.  First, the terrorist group known as ISIL must be degraded and ultimately destroyed.
  • The second:  It is time for the world -- especially Muslim communities -- to explicitly, forcefully, and consistently reject the ideology of organizations like al Qaeda and ISIL.
  • Later today, the Security Council will adopt a resolution that underscores the responsibility of states to counter violent extremism.  But resolutions must be followed by tangible commitments, so we’re accountable when we fall short.  Next year, we should all be prepared to announce the concrete steps that we have taken to counter extremist ideologies in our own countries -- by getting intolerance out of schools, stopping radicalization before it spreads, and promoting institutions and programs that build new bridges of understanding.
  • Third, we must address the cycle of conflict -- especially sectarian conflict -- that creates the conditions that terrorists prey upon.
  • The good news is we also see signs that this tide could be reversed.  We have a new, inclusive government in Baghdad; a new Iraqi Prime Minister welcomed by his neighbors; Lebanese factions rejecting those who try to provoke war.  And these steps must be followed by a broader truce.  Nowhere is this more necessary than Syria.  Together with our partners, America is training and equipping the Syrian opposition to be a counterweight to the terrorists of ISIL and the brutality of the Assad regime.  But the only lasting solution to Syria’s civil war is political -- an inclusive political transition that responds to the legitimate aspirations of all Syrian citizens, regardless of ethnicity, regardless of creed.
  • My fourth and final point is a simple one:  The countries of the Arab and Muslim world must focus on the extraordinary potential of their people -- especially the youth.
  • We recognize as well that leadership will be necessary to address the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis.  As bleak as the landscape appears, America will not give up on the pursuit of peace.  Understand, the situation in Iraq and Syria and Libya should cure anybody of the illusion that the Arab-Israeli conflict is the main source of problems in the region.  For far too long, that's been used as an excuse to distract people from problems at home.  The violence engulfing the region today has made too many Israelis ready to abandon the hard work of peace.  And that's something worthy of reflection within Israel.
  • Because let’s be clear:  The status quo in the West Bank and Gaza is not sustainable.  We cannot afford to turn away from this effort -- not when rockets are fired at innocent Israelis, or the lives of so many Palestinian children are taken from us in Gaza. So long as I am President, we will stand up for the principle that Israelis, Palestinians, the region and the world will be more just and more safe with two states living side by side, in peace and security. So this is what America is prepared to do:  Taking action against immediate threats, while pursuing a world in which the need for such action is diminished.  The United States will never shy away from defending our interests, but we will also not shy away from the promise of this institution and its Universal Declaration of Human Rights -- the notion that peace is not merely the absence of war, but the presence of a better life. 
  • Paul Merrell on 24 Sep 14
     
    Epic hypocrisy. He bows to international law while waging multiple wars in direct defiance of it. And that's just in the first few paragraphs. It gets worse the farther he gets in his speech.
Paul Merrell

REVEALED: GCHQ's BEYOND TOP SECRET Middle Eastern INTERNET SPY BASE * The Register - 0 views

www.theregister.co.uk/...e_middleeast_internet_spy_base

surveillance-state GCHQ Snowden El-Reg Seeb

shared by Paul Merrell on 06 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Exclusive Above-top-secret details of Britain’s covert surveillance programme - including the location of a clandestine British base tapping undersea cables in the Middle East - have so far remained secret, despite being leaked by fugitive NSA sysadmin Edward Snowden. Government pressure has meant that some media organisations, despite being in possession of these facts, have declined to reveal them. Today, however, the Register publishes them in full.The secret British spy base is part of a programme codenamed “CIRCUIT” and also referred to as Overseas Processing Centre 1 (OPC-1). It is located at Seeb, on the northern coast of Oman, where it taps in to various undersea cables passing through the Strait of Hormuz into the Persian/Arabian Gulf. Seeb is one of a three site GCHQ network in Oman, at locations codenamed “TIMPANI”, “GUITAR” and “CLARINET”. TIMPANI, near the Strait of Hormuz, can monitor Iraqi communications. CLARINET, in the south of Oman, is strategically close to Yemen. British national telco BT, referred to within GCHQ and the American NSA under the ultra-classified codename “REMEDY”, and Vodafone Cable (which owns the former Cable & Wireless company, aka “GERONTIC”) are the two top earners of secret GCHQ payments running into tens of millions of pounds annually.
  • The actual locations of such codenamed “access points” into the worldwide cable backbone are classified 3 levels above Top Secret and labelled “Strap 3”. The true identities of the companies hidden behind codenames such as “REMEDY”, “GERONTIC”, “STREETCAR” or “PINNAGE” are classified one level below this, at “Strap 2”.After these details were withheld, the government opted not to move against the Guardian newspaper last year for publishing above-top-secret information at the lower level designated “Strap 1”. This included details of the billion-pound interception storage system, Project TEMPORA, which were revealed in 2013 and which have triggered Parliamentary enquiries in Britain and Europe, and cases at the European Court of Human Rights. The Guardian was forced to destroy hard drives of leaked information to prevent political embarrassment over extensive commercial arrangements with these and other telecommunications companies who have secretly agreed to tap their own and their customers’ or partners’ overseas cables for the intelligence agency GCHQ. Intelligence chiefs also wished to conceal the identities of countries helping GCHQ and its US partner the NSA by sharing information or providing facilities
  • According to documents revealed by Edward Snowden to journalists including Glenn Greenwald among others, the intelligence agency annually pays selected companies tens of millions of pounds to run secret teams which install hidden connections which copy customers' data and messages to the spooks’ processing centres. The GCHQ-contracted companies also install optical fibre taps or “probes” into equipment belonging to other companies without their knowledge or consent. Within GCHQ, each company has a special section called a “Sensitive Relationship Team” or SRT.BT and Vodafone/C&W also operate extensive long distance optical fibre communications networks throughout the UK, installed and paid for by GCHQ, NSA, or by a third and little known UK intelligence support organization called the National Technical Assistance Centre (NTAC).
  • Paul Merrell on 06 Jun 14
     
    Report on GCHQ documents that The Guardian had agreed not to write about. Nice picture of the secret Seeb base.
Paul Merrell

Syria debate roils administration - Philip Ewing - POLITICO.com - 0 views

www.politico.com/...bama-adminstration-112362.html

war & peace Obama-administration house-divided

shared by Paul Merrell on 31 Oct 14 - No Cached
  • President Barack Obama’s top national security aides are at odds over the U.S. strategy for Syria, engaged in a debate behind the scenes as the administration endures a rash of withering skepticism on foreign and defense policy.Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel last week sent what’s been described as a sharply critical memo on Syria to National Security Adviser Susan Rice, faulting the administration’s outlook for failing to account for Syrian President Bashar Assad.
  • The U.S. must clarify what it’s going to do about Assad, Hagel wrote, especially given that it will face a decision about how to respond when the Syrian fighters it wants to train in Saudi Arabia come into conflict with Assad-backed forces. The memo was first described on Wednesday by The New York Times. A defense official confirmed details about it to POLITICO. And Hagel was asked about it Thursday, as well as whether he has doubts about the current Syria strategy.
  • “The baseline is this is a complicated issue,” Hagel told reporters at the Pentagon. “We are constantly assessing and reassessing and adapting to the realities of what is the best approach, how we can be most effective. That’s a responsibility of any leader, and because we [the Defense Department] are a significant element of this issue, we owe the president, and we owe the National Security Council, our best thinking on this. And it has to be honest and it has to be direct.” The Times’ report followed stories by POLITICO Magazine, Reuters and others questioning Obama’s management of national security as the U.S. grapples with crises in Syria and Iraq, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa and the ongoing standoff with Russia in Eastern Europe.
Paul Merrell

Can you smell what The Caliph is cooking? - RT Op-Edge - 0 views

rt.com/...184416-isis-us-obama-baghdadi

war & peace ISIL war on terror™ U.S.-foreign-policy Syria Iraq Saudis

shared by Paul Merrell on 05 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • Obama’s “coalition of the willing”, about to fight ISIS/IS/The Caliph, includes Britain, Australia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. No less than five out of these seven happen the be the ones who trained/weaponized/facilitated the “flowers of evil” of ISIS/IS blooming in Syria. So it’s no wonder the Arab Street is drowning in skepticism about who’s really running the ISIS/IS show. It can’t be Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, a.k.a Caliph Ibrahim, all by himself. How come The Caliph, out of the blue, crosses the desert with a skilled, full-fledged army crammed with advanced artillery to capture a territory larger than the UK?
  • Meanwhile, the powerful House of Saud’s PR lobby is absolutely monolithic; Wahhabism – which has been boosting/funding fanatics worldwide since the early days of the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan – is simply not to be blamed for what The Caliph has been up to. And yet it’s Saudi ideology which ultimately spawned the Frankenstein Caliph leading the freak sons of the Syrian “revolution”.
  • Being so flush, no wonder The Caliph’s armies are heading towards Aleppo; they are less than 50 km away, and could soon easily take over some eastern suburbs. The Obama administration, meanwhile, prefers to excel at sanctioning Russia. If they were really serious at targeting The Caliph, they’d be following the money, deploying local intel to track where the money actually is (certainly not in a bank). Instead, all the rhetoric in the Beltway is about more bombing of - another historical irony - made in USA hardware left behind by the Iraq army; more drones; and eventually, more “boots on the ground”.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • The “known known” – to quote Donald “Rummy” Rumsfeld – in the Beltway “debate” is that for the CIA and the Pentagon, fighting The Caliph is the absolutely perfect excuse to eventually impose regime change in both Iraq and Syria. Washington has already got regime change-lite in Baghdad. The CIA and the Pentagon are thinking in terms of We bomb The Caliph/Caliph fights Assad/Hezbollah gets involved/Divide and Rule and More Chaos/We bomb a little to the side/Assad falls. It won’t work, though. Washington thought – until the capture of Mosul – that The Caliph was under control. But he has a mind of his own - and a lot of cash still flowing from powerful Saudi and Kuwaiti backers, apart from the oil smuggling. The Caliph dreams of being intimately involved in the House of Saud’s succession, and even making a play for power himself.
  • Thus the myth was born that ISIS/IS is way more hardcore than Al-Qaeda – a sterling PR move by The Caliph to bolster his and his outfit’s charisma. For the multinational Google Jihad generation, if the grand mufti of Egypt, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) all dismiss ISIS/IS, that’s because it’s the real deal. And it’s wealthy, armed to the teeth and rules over a vast territory. It is reducing the Sykes-Picot agreement to dust. So yes, The Caliph is indeed implementing Osama’s trap – in his own way. Zarqawi tried to implement it. And Zarqawi is the predecessor of al-Baghdadi. But that’s only part of the story.
  • The real juice is how The Caliph has now legitimized the Global War on Terror (GWOT) for “decades”, in British Prime Minister David Cameron’s words. The indefatigable “senior US military officials” have gone on red alert, warning that ISIS/IS will soon “threaten” the US and Europe. The Caliph is the new Osama. And this only just a year after Obama – armed with his self-imposed red line – was about to bomb Syria because “Assad must go” had “gassed his own people.” And the ones who actually talked Obama out of this insanity were none other than Russian President Vladimir Putin and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov - now demonized with a vengeance by the Empire of Chaos. Hollywood couldn’t come up with a more far-fetched script. Deep in the bowels of a palatial abode in “Syraq”, one can distinctly hear the sound of The Caliph laughing.
  • Paul Merrell on 05 Sep 14
     
    Pepe Escobar, who proves over and over again that sarcasm is a much-underrated art form.
Paul Merrell

Obama is a Liar. Fake NATO Evidence. OSCE Confirms that No Russian Troops, No Tanks, ha... - 0 views

www.globalresearch.ca/...5399457

war & peace Ukraine Russian-invasion propaganda Obama lies

shared by Paul Merrell on 06 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • The following report is a slap in the face to president Obama and his NATO partners meeting today in Newport Wales.  Obama confirmed on September 3 that  “Russian combat forces with Russian weapons in Russian tanks”  had been deployed in Eastern Ukraine. That’s not only a Lie, it is Lie which could potentially precipitate humanity into a Third World War. Observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) “have registered no troops, ammunition or weapons crossing the Russian-Ukrainian border over the past two weeks” (Itar-Tass)
  • The OSCE report contradicts the statements made by the Kiev regime and its US-NATO sponsors. It confirms that NATO accusations pertaining to the influx of Russian tanks are an outright fabrication. NATO backed up Obama’s statements with “fake” satellite images (28 August 2014) that allegedly “show Russian combat forces engaged in military operations inside the sovereign territory of Ukraine”.  These statements are refuted by a detailed report of the OSCE monitoring mission stationed at the Russia-Ukraine border. The NATO reports including its satellite photos were based on fake evidence. It is worth noting that the OSCE carefully categorizes movements across the border, which largely consist of refugees:
Paul Merrell

IS confronts Turkey with policy challenge - Middle East - Al Jazeera English - 0 views

www.aljazeera.com/...-state-201491016343833184.html

war & peace ISIL Turkey Syria

shared by Paul Merrell on 11 Sep 14 - No Cached
  • Turkey’s foreign minister is preparing to attend key talks involving the US and Arab countries willing to participate in a coalition against the self-proclaimed jihadist Islamic State (IS) group. Thursday’s gathering in Saudi Arabia, an attempt to organise efforts to tackle the IS in Iraq and Syria, is to take place two days after a visit by Chuck Hagel, the US defence secretary, to the Turkish capital, where he discussed Ankara’s commitment to the planned US-led coalition.
  • It also comes a day after a prime-time address US President Barack Obama delivered on Wednesday night ordering expanded air strikes against the group that has declared a "caliphate" in eastern Syria and northern Iraq. Turkey has been criticised by Western governments for turning a blind eye to the flow of fighters into Syria, indiscriminately keeping its borders open to armed groups fighting the Damascus regime, once a close ally of Ankara. Hordes of foreign fighters from Turkey, the US and Europe have joined the IS, according to analysts, diplomats and a senior IS member. The IS member recently spoke to The Washington Post in a Turkish border town, explaining how fighters used Turkish territory for hospital treatment, accommodation and securing supplies.
  • Turkey has over the summer been ramping up efforts to control its 850km Syrian border with stricter controls, and called for Western countries to stop the flow of potential fighters to the country. Fehim Tastekin, a veteran Turkish journalist who has extensively reported from the region, believes that despite stricter Turkish controls, IS fighters and weapons continue to cross the border - but to a lesser extent. "The planned American operation against the IS will push Turkey to implement an even stricter border regime as an ally," Tastekin said, adding that the Turkish-Syrian border was not as crucial before the arrival of the IS.
Paul Merrell

NATO Finds Arab Backdoor to Arm Kiev | nsnbc international - 0 views

nsnbc.me/...inds-arab-backdoor-to-arm-kiev

war & peace U.S.-foreign-policy Ukraine UAE weapons-transfers

shared by Paul Merrell on 28 Feb 15 - No Cached
  • The announcement this week that the Kiev regime struck a major deal with the United Arab Emirates for military weapons raises strong suspicions that the US-led NATO alliance has found a new backdoor into Ukraine. We say «new» because it is believed that the US and its NATO allies, Poland and Lithuania, are already covertly supplying weapons to the Kiev regime. 
  • Kiev President Petro Poroshenko hailed the new strategic partnership with the Persian Gulf kingdom while attending the International Defence Exhibition (IDEX) in the UAE capital, Abu Dhabi. Poroshenko, who was royally received by UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al Nayhan, declared himself a «president of peace» but that Ukraine, or rather the rump state that his regime commands, needed strong defence because of its «Russian enemy». A giveaway to the real significance of the surprise development is that Poroshenko and his Arab hosts also reportedly held discreet meetings with Pentagon officials and US weapons manufacturing executives during the weapons exhibition. That indicates that Washington is coordinating the expected arms transfers.
  • Although the Kiev-UAE partnership lacked any public detail, one can safely assume that the Arab supply of weapons to Ukraine is simply a conduit for American and NATO military support to the Western-backed junta, which seized power in Ukraine last year in an illegal coup. Its war of aggression on the separatist eastern Ukraine has inflicted at least 6,000 deaths, mainly among the ethnic Russian civilian population. Earlier this month it soon became clear that Washington and its NATO allies would pay a heavy political price for an audacious move to openly increase their military involvement in the Ukraine conflict. When Washington announced that it intended to go ahead with Congressional provisions to send «lethal aid» to Kiev there was much international consternation over such a reckless move. Moscow warned Washington that any further military support to the reactionary, anti-Russian Kiev regime on its western border would constitute a «disastrous escalation». US President Barack Obama then appeared to back off from the proposal to supply lethal munitions. America’s normally servile European allies also baulked at the Washington arms move. Germany, France and even Britain indicated disproval by stating that they would not be following suite by sending arms to Ukraine. Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel was perhaps the most forthright in her reservations. While on an official visit to Washington she reiterated her «no weapons» position to US media while being received in the White House by Obama.
  • ...1 more annotation...
  • No doubt a disgruntled European public reeling from economic austerity, unemployment and seething contempt for unaccountable EU leaders had a concentrating effect on the various political capitals to not throw more fuel on an already raging Ukrainian fire. The idea of going along with incendiary American militarism in Ukraine and further antagonising Russia would provoke a political storm across Europe. Hence the usually trusty European «yes men» had to defy Washington’s recklessness. That incipient divergence between the US and EU appeared to unnerve Washington, with the latter fearing that its anti-Russian axis and sanctions tactics might be unravelling. President Obama and his Secretary of State John Kerry were at pains to emphasise American-European «unity» over Ukraine and alleged «Russian aggression» – in spite of the fact that European leaders were, publicly at least, repudiating Washington’s weapons policy. So, rather than risking an open split in the NATO ranks, Washington and its allies seem to have found an ingenious way around that problem – by getting the UAE to be the front end for weapons supplied to the Kiev regime.
Paul Merrell

Exit South Stream, enter Turk Stream - RT Op-Edge - 0 views

rt.com/...turkey-russia-east-pipeline-eu

war & peace Pipelinestan Russia Turkey EU energy

shared by Paul Merrell on 03 Dec 14 - No Cached
  • So the EU “defeated” Putin by forcing him to cancel the South Stream pipeline. Thus ruled Western corporate media. Nonsense. Facts on the ground spell otherwise. This “Pipelineistan” gambit will continue to send massive geopolitical shockwaves all across Eurasia for quite some time. In a nutshell, a few years ago Russia devised Nord Stream – fully operational – and South Stream – still a project – to bypass unreliable Ukraine as a gas transit nation. Now Russia devised a new deal with Turkey to bypass the “non-constructive” (Putin’s words) approach of the European Commission (EC). Background is essential to understand the current game. Five years ago I was following in detail Pipelineistan’s ultimate opera – the war between rival pipelines South Stream and Nabucco. Nabucco eventually became road kill. South Stream may eventually resurrect, but only if the EC comes to its senses (don’t bet on it.)
  • The 3,600 kilometer long South Stream should be in place by 2016, branching out to Austria and the Balkans/Italy. Gazprom owns 50 percent of it - along with Italy’s ENI (20 percent), French EDF (15 percent) and German Wintershall, a subsidiary of BASF (15 percent). As it stands these European energy majors are not exactly beaming – to say the least. For months Gazprom and the EC were haggling about a solution. But in the end Brussels predictably succumbed to its own. Russia still gets to build a pipeline under the Black Sea – but now redirected to Turkey and, crucially, pumping the same amount of gas South Stream would. Not to mention Russia gets to build a new LNG (liquefied natural gas) central hub in the Mediterranean. Thus Gazprom has not spent $5 billion in vain (finance, engineering costs). The redirection makes total business sense. Turkey is Gazprom’s second biggest customer after Germany. And much bigger than Bulgaria, Hungary, and Austria combined. Russia also advances a unified gas distribution network capable of delivering natural gas from anywhere in Russia to any hub alongside Russia’s borders.
  • And as if it was needed, Russia gets yet another graphic proof that its real growth market in the future is Asia, especially China – not a fearful, stagnated, austerity-devastated, politically paralyzed EU. The evolving Russia-China strategic partnership implies Russia as complementary to China, excelling in major infrastructure projects from building dams to laying out pipelines. This is business with a sharp geopolitical reach – not ideology-drenched politics.
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • Turkey also made a killing. It’s not only the deal with Gazprom; Moscow will build no less than Turkey’s entire nuclear industry, apart from increased soft power interaction (more trade and tourism). Most of all, Turkey is now increasingly on the verge of becoming a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO); Moscow is actively lobbying for it. This means Turkey acceding to a privileged position as a major hub simultaneously in the Eurasian Economic Belt and of course the Chinese New Silk Road(s). The EU blocks Turkey? Turkey looks east. That’s Eurasian integration on the move. Washington has tried very hard to create a New Berlin Wall from the Baltics to the Black Sea to “isolate” Russia. Now comes yet another Putin judo/chess/go counterpunch – which the opponent never saw coming. And exactly across the Black Sea. A key Turkish strategic imperative is to configure itself as the indispensable energy crossroads from East to West – transiting everything from Iraqi oil to Caspian Sea gas. Oil from Azerbaijan already transits Turkey via the Bill Clinton/Zbig Brzezinski-propelled BTC (Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan) pipeline. Turkey would also be the crossroads if a Trans-Caspian pipeline is ever built (slim chances as it stands), pumping natural gas from Turkmenistan to Azerbaijan, then transported to Turkey and finally Europe.
  • So what Putin’s judo/chess/go counterpunch accomplished with a single move is to have stupid EU sanctions once again hurt the EU. The German economy is already hurting badly because of lost Russia business. The EC brilliant “strategy” revolves around the EU’s so-called Third Energy Package, which requires that pipelines and the natural gas flowing inside them must be owned by separate companies. The target of this package has always been Gazprom – which owns pipelines in many Central and Eastern European nations. And the target within the target has always been South Stream.
  • Now it’s up to Bulgaria and Hungary – which, by the way, have always fought the EC “strategy” – to explain the fiasco to their own populations, and to keep pressing Brussels; after all they are bound to lose a fortune, not to mention get no gas, with South Stream out of the picture. So here’s the bottom line; Russia sells even more gas – to Turkey; and the EU, pressured by the US, is reduced to dancing like a bunch of headless chickens in dark Brussels corridors wondering what hit them. The Atlanticists are back to default mode – cooking up yet more sanctions while Russia is set to keep buying more and more gold.
  • This is not the endgame – far from it. In the near future, many variables will intersect. Ankara’s game may change – but that’s far from a given. President Erdogan – the Sultan of Constantinople – has certainly identified a rival Caliph, Ibrahim of ISIS/ISIL/Daesh fame, trying to steal his mojo. Thus the Sultan may flirt with mollifying his neo-Ottoman dreams and steer Turkey back to its previously ditched “zero problems with our neighbors” foreign policy doctrine. The House of Saud is like a camel in the Arctic. The House of Saud’s lethal game in Syria always boiled down to regime change so a Saudi-sponsored oil pipeline from Syria to Turkey might be built – dethroning the proposed, $10 billion Iran-Iraq-Syria “Islamic” pipeline. Now the Saudis see Russia about to supply all of Turkey’s energy needs – and then some. And “Assad must go” still won’t go.
  • US neo-cons are also sharpening their spears. As soon as early 2015 there may be a Ukrainian Freedom Act approved by the US Congress. Translation: Ukraine as a “major US non-NATO ally” which means, in practice, a NATO annexation. Next step; more turbo-charged neo-con provocation of Russia. A possible scenario is vassal/puppies such as Romania or Bulgaria – pressed by Washington – deciding to allow full access for NATO vessels into the Black Sea. Who cares this would violate the current Black Sea agreements that affect both Russia and Turkey? And then there’s a Rumsfeldian “known unknown”; how the weak Balkans will feel subordinated to the whims of Ankara. As much as Brussels keeps Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia in a strait jacket, in energy terms they will start depending on Turkey’s goodwill. For the moment, let’s appreciate the magnitude of the geopolitical shockwaves. There will be more, when we least expect them.
« First ‹ Previous 81 - 100 of 106 Next ›
Showing 20▼ items per page