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August 16, 2014
Open Thread 2014-18
Comments
Have safe journey, other than that the world is still F$$$$$ up.
Posted by: jo6pac | Aug 16 2014 19:03 utc | 1
Mapping the military gear to the states…..Note the rural deployment for grenade (tear gas, heh) launcers.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/08/15/us/surplus-military-equipment-map.html?_r=0
Posted by: Ben Franklin | Aug 16 2014 19:18 utc | 2
James Risen, Surveillance and Obama’s Threat to Journalism
Why James Risen Is At the Center Of the Most Important Case of US Press Freedom
Finally, we just terrorise [and kill] some folks, that’s all…
Police Union Commissar: If You Resist, You Should Expect to Die
What’s the saying? “We’re all Palestinians now” …
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Aug 16 2014 20:23 utc | 4
One more:
Veterans on Ferguson
It’s a growing aggregation of military veterans’ commentaries on the unjustified, over-extended, overkilled, accelerating militarization of the police, from the perspectives of people who have served. It paints a picture of corruption, injustice, fear, and blindness in domestic American localized precincts.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Aug 16 2014 20:27 utc | 5
A positive outcome of the police murder of another U.S. black teenager, Michael Brown, is, as Ben Franklin’s link shows, the renewed attention on the militarization of the police. Crime is not up. Crime is down. Yet MRAPs and APCs and assault rifles and body armor are being horded by police forces of all sizes. Why? Because war is going to come to the U.S. homeland. A popular insurrection of some sort. No doubt there is Rand Corporation brief sitting on the shelf that says as much.
The continued trend in the concentration of wealth guarantees it. Picketty hasn’t been refuted. Return on capital will continue to outpace GDP growth in the Western core. Workers are going to be marginalized ever more, absent a revolution.
Posted by: Mike Maloney | Aug 16 2014 20:30 utc | 6
Thanks, Ben, for posting that interactive info-map from The Grey Lady. Given that the domestic militarization has been underway for some time under Meese and the LEAA and the old Frank Giuffrida/Ronald Reagan focus on “militant negroes”, the idea that riot control is focused on protests not crime, that the police in the Ferguson case were trained by Israel and Academi (nee Blackwater), and further that the Fed’l gov’t does Sociocultural Behavior Analysis and Modeling [ http://info.publicintelligence.net/DoD-HSCB-Overview.pdf ], that “WorldView-3 will offer 30-centimeter resolution, unprecedented in the civilian world, enough to make out individual manholes…. WorldView-3 alone can scan a band from Washington, DC to New York City in 45 seconds”, and “if it’s true that DARPA and the military deploy smart phones with NGIA apps, “ a suite of software applications for integrating, visualizing and analyzing information”, the Map of the World project, intended to give the U.S. military [as well as DHS, the FBI, intelligence agency,private mercenaries, and covert operators] clearer on-the-ground intelligence pictures to enhance situational awareness and mission planning” “down to 10 cm resolution”, and that the US Army has given over its logistics operation to Amazon, and finally that DARPA’s SmartPhone apps were deployed in Boston during the Boston Marathon bombing events, then[b] all that military gear deployed throughout the US can be mapped, commandeered, logistically moved, and re-deployed with greater rapidity[/b]. Let’s see what Sun Tzu and others have to say about logistics: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/navy/log_quotes_navsup.pdf
Ed;
Your comment about St Ronaldus reminded me of the Mulford Act.
“As governor of California, Reagan signed the Mulford Act into law in 1967. Written by Republican Assemblyman Don Mulford, the legislation was the most sweeping state edict in all the country, prohibiting the more or less free carrying of firearms in public. It went along with the rest of his heavy-handed entire law-and-order agenda and inspired an avalanche of new gun laws nationwide.
The purpose of the law was to disarm the Black Panthers, a radical leftist group that openly carried firearms, kept an eye out on the police, and even took their rifles to the state Capitol to protest what they decried as racist legislation.
In the late 1960s, the racism of gun control was fresh on many Civil Rights thinkers’ minds. Upholding gun rights for freed slaves was a primary motive behind the Fourteenth Amendment. State-level gun control became instrumental in suppressing blacks.”
http://www.theroot.com/articles/politics/2013/01/black_panthers_and_gun_control_the_nras_flip_flop.html
Posted by: Ben Franklin | Aug 16 2014 22:14 utc | 8
The release of the convenience store surveillance video by the Ferguson police was a remarkable accomplishment in changing the narrative by appealing to racial stereotypes centred around the young black male “thug”. No matter what facts are yet to be determined, the cultural impact will be to further solidify already established divides and to ensure that attempts at dialogue are frustrated by competing and mutually exclusive world views.
The police presentation emphasized a rarely used technical term – strong-arm robbery – which predetermined how the video and select stills would be viewed. Therefore, while a dispute which clearly featured a shove occurred, the context or interpretation of this event relies on a police report written sometime after the fact (Brown is identified by name) and which cites only two witnesses, both store employees. The other witnesses seen in the video do not react in a manner which suggest a violent assault and robbery is occurring. The suspect Brown actually returns items to the store counter, as does his friend.
The items by which it is alleged he steals had fallen to the floor and Brown leans over to pick them up. It is, in other words, a strange sort of robbery. The assault is limited to a shove as the store employee tries to prevent him from the door. The police had over five days to talk to the other witnesses and establish a clearer picture of what happened. There is no indication they had done so.
I don’t know what happened in that store, but a review of the surveillance video suggests that the dispute which did occur may be something a little less than what is claimed. If so, then the now ingrained image of Brown as a “thug” may not be correct. The manner of the release of the tape has encouraged both a racially biased backlash and support for the notion that the police officer involved in the later shooting was first assaulted by Brown, an element to the incident claimed only by the police.
Posted by: jayc | Aug 16 2014 22:35 utc | 9
The ‘troubles’ in the ‘news’ could be represented as Wenn diagrams, or nested Russian dolls. To Israel the lives of Palestinians are worth less than zero. To the neo-Nazi Ukraine the lives of Russians are worth less than zero. To Corporate America the lives of Palestinians, Russians, and black (or white, but demonstrably black) Americans are worth less than zero. To the Trans National Corpse, the life of the biosphere, of the planet itself, is worth less than zero.
If we are going to fight for our lives we need to recognize that the fight will be indecisive at any of the interior borders. It is the inhuman, TNC Moloch that must be defeated.
Posted by: john francis lee | Aug 16 2014 22:48 utc | 10
@9
If all they implied with the video were true, being suspected of stealing cigars is not grounds for execution … unless you have a Nobel Peace Prize.
Any rational person has to assume that everything implied by the tape is more likely a lie.
Yes, white racist Americans will seize upon the video as a fig-leaf for their genocidal hatred. I’ve seen reports of the KKK passing the hat for the cop who murdered Mike Brown.
I’ve also read reports of the Israeli ambassador to the United States nominating the IDF for the Noble Peace Prize. Perhaps the Israelis were the force behind Barack the Assassin in Chief Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize way back when? They seem to have an ‘uncanny’ knack for the pre-emptive Big Lie. Outfits like Murdoch’s are always left playing catch-up.
Posted by: john francis lee | Aug 16 2014 23:03 utc | 11
Think about this for a minute: Poroshenko issues a statement saying Ukrainian troops destroyed a Russian convoy of armored vehicles on Thursday. If that’s true, then it is an act of war by Russia.
At the same time, he hasn’t used the convoy incident to deny Russian humanitarian convoy from entering the country. Why?
Yes, I know the Red Cross convoy is still at the border, but the fact is Poroshenko hasn’t pointed to the destruction of invading Russian armored vehicles to defend his decision. In fact, he hasn’t even brought it up. Why? If you were in his shoes, you’d cut off all relations with Moscow and close the borders AND DECLARE A STATE OF WAR. Wouldn’t you?
This just shows that the whole Russian convoy deal is a complete fabrication.
These fu**ers rattle off so many lies, they can’t even keep track of what they said a day earlier. It is truly pathetic.
As for Shaun Walker…Shouldn’t he forced to resign just as Judy Miller was forced out after the WMD fiasco…after all, his claims are an attempt to lead the country to war. Isn’t that a crime?
Posted by: plantman | Aug 16 2014 23:03 utc | 12
They forgot that they said they were WHITE Russian armored vehicles. But Rasmussen never mentioned vehicles, nor invasion. He just said “incursion.” It’s the Fogh of war.
In Iraq, ISIS captured the Mosul Dam from the Kurds, and now the US is supporting a Kurd counterattack with aerial support. The dam is interesting, as described in an abc article:
“Mosul Dam, the largest dam in Iraq, was constructed on a foundation of soluble soils that are continuously dissolving, resulting in the formation of cavities and voids underground that place the dam at risk for failure,” said an urgent letter sent from David Petraeus, then commanding general of the U.S. Army, and Ryan Crocker, then U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in 2007.
The dam requires “extraordinary engineering measures” — namely constant grouting operations — to fill in the holes and “maintain the structural integrity and operating capability of the dam,” according to a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) report from the same year.
For 30 years –- and through several periods of violent conflict — the Iraqi government has managed to keep the dam upright by continuously pumping in literally tons of grout like an industrial version of the little Dutch boy, as a geotechnical expert who worked on the dam put it.
But the U.S. says any failure of the dam could be “catastrophic.”
“[T]he most severe impact of a dam failure would be [for] the City of Mosul, located 50 kilometers [31 miles] downstream of the dam,” Petraeus’ and Crocker’s 2007 letter said. “Assuming a worse [sic] case scenario, an instantaneous failure of Mosul Dam filled to its maximum operating level could result in a flood wave over 20 meters [65 feet] deep at the city of Mosul, which would result in a significant loss of life and property.”
The US and Brit militaries have destroyed dams before, in other places, to augment their military campaigns by wiping out civilian populations. Now ISIS may have a shot.
@ #11, Ferguson
Reportedly there is no connection between Brown’s alleged theft and the shooting incident. Brown was accosted for walking in the middle of the street and blocking traffic. Then it escalated, the cop may have been injured, and next came the shot in or from the car and alleged further shots as Brown ran.
Novorossia TV
Rebel leader says 1,200 Russian fighters, weapons en route to eastern Ukraine (VIDEO) | Kyiv Post
Aug. 16, 2014, 6:09 p.m. | Ukraine — by Christopher J. Miller
Press statement made in a YouTube publication by НОВОРОССИЯ TV [novorossia tv]
On their website a message reads their hosting has been interrupted.
Same info is on twitter here
Domain registration info indicates expiration per 2014-08-14T12:34:01Z
NOTICE The expiration date displayed in this record is the date the
registrar’s sponsorship of the domain name registration in the registry is
currently set to expire. This date does not necessarily reflect the
expiration date of the domain name registrant’s agreement with the
sponsoring registrar.
Site was registered to an organization in Lugansk [now under control of Ukarinian forces?]
Name: Vladimir Konstantinov
Organisation: TOVARISTVO Z OBMEZHENOYU VDPOVDALNSTYU “NOVOROSSIA TV”
Hosting in: Moscow, RU
On this date, WayBackMachine archive has webpage saved – here.
Kyiv Post article has been disseminated to British papers The Guardian, Mail Online …
@#15
Brown and his friend may not have been blocking traffic at all. Videos from the scene show that the street itself is relatively narrow -i.e. no lane separation – running through a residential neighbourhood. The police car apparently was able to backtrack in reverse without difficulty – if anything it was the dead body lying in the street for hours which blocked traffic. The officer fired multiple shots at Brown when the victim was 30 feet away, which might be considered an unlikely event or a truly irresponsible act if there was traffic all around.
Posted by: jayc | Aug 17 2014 0:11 utc | 17
Brown was most likely shot for touching a cop — one way or another — which is such an outrageous, mind-blowing deviation from “proper conduct” as to be considered “assault”, and see also, being less than fully cooperative = resisting arrest — Welcome to the USA …
this is Rodney King redux, the difference being that King was crazy drunk and wouldn’t stop fighting …
the LAPD assumed King was hopped up on PCP, claimed he demonstrated super-human strength … Brown was a large young man … the convenience store video counters the claim, as I recall it, that he was Gentle Giant who would run from confrontation .. It doesn’t take much to scare the police …
Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Aug 17 2014 0:26 utc | 18
@16
I just read the bbc story. Why would the rebel leader mention about fighters being trained in russia? If a covert operation is supposedly going on between the rebels and russia why would he post a video stating such damning info? Doesn’t makes any sense from a strategic point of view for the rebel leader. This is another example of nato/US projection of something that they themselves are more than likely doing.
Posted here earlier:
http://www.businessinsider.com/r-west-faces-tough-choices-if-russia-ukraine-fight-2014-16
“…Up to now, officials say the U.S. has avoided sending additional military elements to Ukraine as a matter of policy. That will change next year if Congress approves a request to send units from the U.S. Army in Europe and/or the California National Guard to Ukraine’s peacekeeping training center in the far west of the country, far from the current conflict.
Increasing training for Ukraine’s military in locations outside Ukraine might be another option, although so far there have been no public suggestions of doing so.
Regardless of whether Putin crosses another line, the U.S officials said more sanctions on Russia are almost certain if he does not end support for the separatists. A key pivot point wil be the NATO summit in Wales in the first week of September…
Posted by: really | Aug 17 2014 0:44 utc | 19
Venezuela Calls for the Reconstruction of Gaza http://shar.es/1nlu6e via @grtvnews
Posted by: brian | Aug 17 2014 0:46 utc | 20
@Oui #16:
Who cares what Kiev junta lies newspapers in Air Strip 1 are disseminating? What matters is what American and German media are reporting.
The American media are preoccupied with Ferguson ATM. And everyone is suffering from Ukraine fatigue except the British, who have a much greater capacity for Russophobia than other Western peoples.
I really don’t see what the point is in paying attention to whatever the latest lie coming out of Kiev is. When I see Kyiv Post, “I stop reading.”
Speaking of rumors coming out of the former Ukraine, comments over at the Saker say that Yarosh has given the junta 48 hours to conduct purges of the government, and threatened to send Right Sector from the area of the ATO into Kiev if it doesn’t. Suffering massive losses in the civil war does not help the stability of the junta.
Really @19
“Regardless of whether Putin crosses another line, the U.S officials said more sanctions on Russia are almost certain if he does not end support for the separatists. ”
The sanctions will never end. They will only escalate. It doesn’t matter if Russia ends support for the separatists (assuming they are actually supporting the separatists, which is not clear at this point). It doesn’t matter if Russia returns the Crimea to Ukraine. It doesn’t matter if Putin crawls all the way to Washington on his belly and begs forgiveness. The cowards in Washington have found a new way to make war — sanctions — that doesn’t upset the American people or bother the military industrial complex (quite the contrary). Any attempts to appease America will fail. The only language America understands is defeat (though to be honest, America doesn’t understand defeat either — there are a lot of words Americans don’t understand — but defeat will at least make America change the subject and move on to something else).
Posted by: shargash | Aug 17 2014 1:56 utc | 22
Don@14
The Islamic State has no reason to destroy the Mosul Dam because it supplies their city of Mosul with power and water but they can and may reduce or stop the flow of water to Baghdad. The present siege of Baghdad is nothing compared with what would happen if the water is cut off.
Posted by: Wayoutwest | Aug 17 2014 2:16 utc | 23
The Pentagon has long had ties with Ukraine, and has conducted joint exercises there (though apparently not recently).
The Office of Defense Cooperation works with the Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense to provide military equipment and training to support the modernization of Ukraine’s military. They also do humanitarian work with orphanages. They include:
–Joint Contact Team Program-Ukraine (JCTP)
–International Military Education and Training (IMET)
–Foreign Military Sales/Foreign Military Financing
–California–Ukraine State Partnership Program
The last joint military exercise I can find is Sea Breeze 2008. –Sea Breeze 2008, a vast NATO military exercise begins on Monday in Ukraine`s Odessa region, the Crimea, and Black Sea coastal regions.
It wasn’t entirely popular with the locals, according to IHT.
KIEV, Ukraine: U.S.-Ukrainian military exercises began on the Black Sea on Monday amid anti-NATO protests that indicated the deep hostility among some in this former Soviet republic toward the Western military bloc.
I suspect that “trained in Russia” is deliberate taunting of U.S. policies in which we, for instance, train Syrian rebels, but keep our “boots” out of harm’s way and our hands clean, sort of. The United States trains all sorts of people all over the world — it seems to be one of our go-to fixes — we also had special ops boots-on-the-ground in Libya months before Nato was “summoned” and then there’s our famed international university of special ops and torture methods – School of the Americas, now called “Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation” (looks like there has been lobbying for “Middle East Institute for Security Cooperation” but it’s not in existence yet)
Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Aug 17 2014 3:25 utc | 25
I really don’t see what the point is in paying attention to whatever the latest lie coming out of Kiev is. When I see Kyiv Post, “I stop reading.”
Posted by: Demian | Aug 16, 2014 9:12:41 PM | 21
Yup, I do the same. If propaganda has credibility in the West it might be worth reading. Otherwise, stop reading.
Other comments:
You might be misogynist if you especially fear Hillary over all the other mainstream a##hole imperialist potential USA next presidents. I like in a sense that she’s clumsy and people hate her, and so she will have much more difficulty b.s.ing people than Obama does. (Of course, I thought the same about G Bush Jr, and his idiocy and cluelessness didn’t seem to slow down the full-on imperialist onslaughts in Afghanistan and Iraq.) If it mattered who you vote for it’d be illegal, but I agree with Demian that there are readily available protest votes, for the Greens, or whoever.
Don’t believe the Ferguson hype. Poor and especially poor black Americans are victimized by the police and their SWAT-style militarized ‘colonial police’ approach, most certainly, but the Dem-Party-tied race-bait (Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton) lobby always seems to pick the absolute worst examples. Almost like they want to alienate fair-minded people and keep Americans divided on the race issue.
AT LEAST — as we recommend all civilized people do, whether it’s Syria, Ukraine or on MH-17 — let’s wait for the evidence, especially the police car video, and see what it shows. There will be plenty of evidence, and of course evidence is always capable of being spun, but since we here are all fair-minded we won’t do that.
The EU foreign ministers are talking tough, with of course UK and France dancing on the US puppetmaster’s strings, but Putin holds the trump cards, and some other countries aren’t happy.
some headlines:
Hungary PM Orban condemns EU sanctions on Russia
EU unity on Russia sanctions fraying despite tough talk
EU’s Russia sanctions doing more harm than good says Hungary
EU sanctions like ‘shooting oneself in the foot’ – Hungary PM
Greek farmers hit hard by Russian sanctions against EU products
Eastern Europe braces for Russia sanctions pain
Ukraine Says Sanctions May Force EU to Buy Gas at Russian Border
Despite US and EU Sanctions, Russia’s Economy Is Still Growing
France calls on ECB to act as eurozone growth grinds to a halt
German Economy Contracts, France Stagnates, Italy in Recession; Time for a Rethink
France rebels against austerity as Europe’s recovery collapses
Euro zone recovery snuffed out
There’s no end in sight to Europe’s woes
Italy slips back into recession, Germany rejects France growth appeal
Interesting Guardian article on Where Isis Evolved from by a Syrian
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/16/isis-salafi-menace-jihadist-homeland-syria
Apparently in Syria:
In this context of rebel exhaustion, the latest comeback of Isis promises to endure. Before the group committed its latest massacres in Deir Ezzor, for example, it had imposed a state of calm welcomed by residents, who had been alienated by militia control over the region’s lucrative resources. When Isis came in, it subdued these militias and, according to sources, it intends to distribute oil revenues to provide services and start development projects, such as fixing bridges, providing clean water and establishing irrigation projects. One resident told me: “The area has never been safer in months and we no longer hear gunshots because rebel infighting stopped. Everyone swore allegiance to Isis or fled if they had made money from the oilfields.”
Also a discussion of Isis as the result of and cause of a re-evaluation and reinvigoration of Salafism (a pragmatic form of fundamentalism), apparently unrelated to (and considerably more palatable than) Wahabbism …
Posted by: Susan Sunflower | Aug 17 2014 3:42 utc | 29
. Before the group committed its latest massacres in Deir Ezzor, for example, it had imposed a state of calm welcomed by residents
cool
@fairleft #26:
You might be misogynist if you especially fear Hillary over all the other mainstream a##hole imperialist potential USA next presidents. I like in a sense that she’s clumsy and people hate her, and so she will have much more difficulty b.s.ing people than Obama does.
I have to admit that when it comes to Hillary, I’m a misogynist. 😉 Her lust for power is distinctly feminine, like that of Lady Macbeth; I suppose that such a sentiment on my part can be considered misogynistic.
Your argument that it might be good for Hillary to become the next president because “she’s clumsy and people hate her” is one I haven’t heard before. Obama appointing Hillary SecState was the first clear sign after the election (there were already signs before) that his presidency was going to be a disaster. I don’t want to see or hear anything from Hillary ever again. It is hard to think of a politician who is more annoying. There are plenty of women who become successful politicians in Europe, and none of them suffers from the Lady Macbeth syndrome, so far as I know.
Finally, as an American, to me there is the simple matter of national dignity. Are we really going to have wives succeed their husbands as president now? Up until now, this has only happened in Third World countries.
Since the black boxes and ATC recordings seem to be long time coming and collection of wreckage probably even further off, I wonder about what the “experts” may find in identifying the bodies. Specifically the pilot and co-pilot bodies (or parts) need to have more of a forensic examination than just the DNA check. Would there be shrapnel that is not of plane parts?
A better question may be, are the expert teams tasked with anything beyond identifying the persons? Would they be limited or forbidden to seek more than identity?
If the limitations are placed by the agreement of Oz Dutch governments, who would have and what reasons defined the parameters?
Since any hint of this stuff would be in the Netherlands, do any Dutch observers have any idea?
Posted by: YY | Aug 17 2014 4:32 utc | 32
I wouldn’t worry about Hillary. She’s not going to win.
Yes, she has her supporters , but she is also the most polarizing candidate in history.
The Jeb Bush campaign torpedoed Chris Christie who was the only other top GOP competitor, so it will probably be Hillary vs Bush,..only Bush will have an Hispanic on the ticket to put him over the top.
There’s going to be a split on the left, because Obama was such a bust. Bernie Sanders or some other fake leftist will run and siphon votes away from Hillary, and Bush will win.
When Bush wins, the neocon plan will go forward and the US will go off the cliff taking millions of people with it.
America is a goner. Another 6 to 8 years and it will all be over.
Posted by: plantman | Aug 17 2014 4:34 utc | 33
“The Pentagon has long had ties with Ukraine”
Certainly, but the CIA for much, much longer. I probably telling you what you already know, as its pretty common knowledge, but it bears repeating.
There are deep, deep connections between the US and this particular brand of Ukrainian Nazis, that go back to OSS/CIA work with the “Ghelen Organization” – that being the remainders of the Nazi intelligence apparatus on the Eastern Front. And, quite openly and with former SS and Gestapo officers – it was the organization out of which official West German intelligence was created. Which, frankly, begs the question as to wether the Nazis were defeated or, perhaps, co-opted. And wether de-Nazification was more of a fiction than anything.
Imagine the Soviets seeing these ex-Nazis and war criminals put back in charge in the top intelligence spots in Germany so soon after the war that caused the death of 24 million of your citizens.
And the connections are open and obvious – this from Wikipedia:
The predecessor of the BND was the German eastern military intelligence agency during World War II, the Abteilung Fremde Heere Ost or FHO Section in the General Staff, led by Wehrmacht Major General Reinhard Gehlen. Its main purpose was to collect information on the Red Army. After the war Gehlen worked with the U.S. occupation forces in West Germany. In 1946 he set up an intelligence agency informally known as the Gehlen Organization or simply “The Org” and recruited some of his former co-workers. Many had been operatives of Admiral Wilhelm Canaris’ wartime Abwehr (counter-intelligence) organization, but Gehlen also recruited people from the former Sicherheitsdienst, SS and Gestapo, after their release by the Allies. The latter recruits were later controversial because the SS and its associated groups were notoriously linked to many Nazi atrocities during the war.[3] The organization worked at first almost exclusively for the CIA, which contributed funding, equipment, cars, gasoline and other materials. On 1 April 1956 the Bundesnachrichtendienst was created from the Gehlen Organization, and transferred to the West German government, with the recruits of the former Sicherheitsdienst, SS and Gestapo. Reinhard Gehlen became President of the BND and remained its head until 1968.[4]
And Stepan Bandera himself, the ideological (and genocidal) forefather of these same fascists who are busy murdering civilians today much like they did 70 years ago, was killed by Soviet intelligence in Munich, Germany in 1959, still walking free, apparently, under the watchful eye of the CIA and BND.
…..
Allow me some freedom here, perhaps It goes a little too far (perhaps not), but: In some ways, I see a lot of parallels between the creation of ISIS and the German far-right during the 1930s. Both received much support from the the powerful to give them power, yet both have gotten “out of control”. Both are useful enemies for the United States to go into war posture, but both have as their primary enemy the major enemy of the United States. And both, I imagine, will be used to the extent that they can be, while at the same time being attacked and wiped out once they’ve done their job of attacking the enemies of the US.
Posted by: guest77 | Aug 17 2014 4:50 utc | 34
Russian Spring
Donetsk. 08/16/2014-23:48
Comment:
Evening summary from combatant Prokhorov.
Donetsk:
It was a hot day. The activities lessened tonight.
One direction was border passage “Uspenka” (?). Very intense carnage was there afternoon. If Ukrainians do not provide enforcement, Donetsk People Republic would possess second border crossing. In addition, Ukrainians were assaulted by mortars and “Grads” in area of settlement Blagodatnoyen (near Amvrosiyevka).
In afternoon, Ukrainians were chopped at their block-post near village Zelenoye (Green) – outskirts of city Ilovaysk.
Map:— #Yasinovataya
– Donetsk — Khartsizck #Shakhtersk – Torez —- Snezhnoye — Miusinsk
———— #Ilovaysk ———— Saur-Mogila Stepanovka- Dmitrovka
——————————— #Blagodatnoye
———————————————————
BorderLugansk:
Occupant’s block-post near village Zelenoye (area of settlement Metallist) was attacked.
Around Lugansk the city was bombed. A regional clinic was crashed. Just for duration of 5 minutes, an Ukrainian flag was raised over a police station in Vergunka.
Battalion “Aidar” and 51st brigade are being finished in area of settlement Khryschevatoye (?).
Russian”>http://rusvesna.su/news/1408215658/”>Russian Spring
Donetsk. 08/16/2014-23:00
Comment:
Ukrainian troops went on to storm strategically important city Yasinovataya. Both sides actively dueled with mortars.
Preliminary, the punitive troops occupied settlement Kashtanoboye, which is within city limits.
Intense shelling preceded the storm. Locals leave the city.
Russian”>http://rusvesna.su/news/1408182542/”>Russian Spring
Donetsk. 08/16/2014-13:45
Comment:
In addition to above …
Concerted efforts of the punitive troops were directed to block a highway between Donetsk and Shakhtersk. The efforts did not succeed.
A mortar squad was destroyed by a reconnaissance group of combatants in area of Saur-Mogila.
Novosvetlovka (Lugansk). A raid detachment attacked an enemy company base. Two carriers and eight autos were destroyed. The punitive troops’ loss amounted up to 20.
All together in last 24 hours, the punitive troops forfeited two tanks, two cannons, up to ten carriers, nineteen autos and up to hundred thirty of killed and wounded.
Posted by: Fete | Aug 17 2014 5:18 utc | 35
Posted by: Demian | Aug 17, 2014 12:22:09 AM | 31
You have sons succeed their fathers which places the US somewhere in the Middle East.
Posted by: somebody | Aug 17 2014 6:41 utc | 36
@somebody #36:
Haha, I didn’t think of that.
Yes, given that the only reason Bush II was considered as a presidential candidate was that he was Bush I’s son, I guess you have to be a misogynist to consider that a wife being taken seriously as a presidential candidate because she is married to a former president is significantly worse.
However, just because Republicans have political dynasties, doesn’t mean that Democrats should still have them, too. In that respect, Democrats would just be following Republicans into degeneracy, as they have on everything else except for gay rights.
A medium once said that after Bush was elected the end of the world would happen. So now I know, she meant Jeb, Not Dubya.
Too phuckin funny muchachos.
Like the H.W. said once, “the truth can’t wait”….
Posted by: Fernando | Aug 17 2014 7:24 utc | 38
Posted by: Demian | Aug 17, 2014 12:22:09 AM | 31
I understand your emotional reaction, but I have that feeling for pretty much all major American politicians of the last 40 or so years. The only good thing that happens is when one of them finally leaves the stage, hopefully in some sort of disgrace. So why focus on Hillary when there are so many major politicians we’re sick of seeing hog the national stage with their murderous goon, “pretend I give a sh!t”, or good ol’ boy personas? Just to name a few: John McCain, Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Rick Perry, Dick Durbin, Barbara Boxer, Dianne Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, Sarah Palin, Joe Biden, Bobby Jindal, Jesse Jackson, and on and on and on, we’re tired of your schtick! JUST go away!
@fairleft #39:
Yes, I guess I’m being emotional, but honestly, to address the list you gave, I think those people are just run of the mill Western politicians (AKA whores – no disrespect to working women intended), except for Sarah Palin, who is batshit crazy, as is your typical Christian fundie.
In Clinton however, I detect a real bloodlust. McCain is a doddering fool, so his constant warmongering doesn’t get on my nerves. But Hillary has a non-senile zeal for thousands, if not millions, of people to be obliterated, all for the glory of the Empire. All the other politicians talk up war because they know that that is what they must do for “serious people” to take them seriously. With Hillary in contrast, there seems to be an unquenchable genuine thirst for blood to be endlessly spilled to glorify the Empire. I don’t see how anyone can deny that there is anything that she resembles more than a witch, or someone with the sensibility of a vampire, to use a less sexist term.
This is something specific to Hillary. Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein are no different than any male politician in terms of how they betray the American people and the most basic morality.
I hope JSorrentine is just taking a break and we will hear from him soon.
Posted by: Demian | Aug 17, 2014 4:20:38 AM | 40
To see whether I agree with you, I would actually have to listen more to her and assess her tone of voice and such. Doesn’t sound like fun. I definitely get that bloodlust from Samantha Power, but hadn’t thought I heard it in Hillary’s words and tone of voice. Except for when she made that disgusting comment after Qhadafi’s murder.
4
The Brown Boy broke The Law. What is the Law!? The Law says The Chosen must have Peace and Quiet™, no Shoving. The Law says we must Schlep to whatever Wage-Slave Jobs we can, then pay The Landlord and The Bankster for the Privilege of Life. The Law says we are not Men. Do Not Loiter. And Do Not Stack. Cash Redemptions Limited to $250. Have a Nice Chosen Day.
The Philippines Embassy has applied to DHS for ‘Temporary Protection Status’ for 1,200,000 Filipino ‘refugees’ to be granted Do Not Deport status, so they can work in America, you know, to send money home to the ‘disaster victims’. Shouldn’t TPS go to Ukrainians instead? Oh, wait, They Are Not Men to The Chosen, not when there are so many Brown Housekeepers.
It’s all the rage now, bubelah! You must have a yard boy and a housekeeper!
“We won, you lost. It’s just business, get over it. Now GET OFF MY LAND.”
E pluribus what difference does it make?
Posted by: ChipNikh | Aug 17 2014 8:47 utc | 42
27
You realize that IMF/WB knew EXACTLY what repercussions of sanctions against Russia would be on those vassal states that it intends to impose ‘structural readjustments’ on, then go one step deeper, ala Argentina, and IMF/WB would also know EXACTLY what the repercussions of ‘structural readjustments’ would be on their EU slave states, and now you have a brew so vile and thick and bitter, you’d have to be an Afghan or an Iraqi to choke it down.
We’re on the event horizon of a Second Coming of Hapsburg’s servi camerae regis, and the only people who might stop them are foaming at the mouth re Muslims, Migras and Gnu Control.
It’s going to be Peace and Quiet™ for One Thousand Years this time.
Posted by: ChipNikh | Aug 17 2014 9:05 utc | 43
@demian and @really
My intended message wasn’t the content of the article, I was looking how and when it was sourced. This propaganda piece originates in Kyiv and is picked up by the western prime media distributors. Via search engines one can see how it is spread, indeed includes the Business Insider.
The main reason it is sold as “evidence” by the British media because it was “sourced” by pro-Russian rebel forces and its new leader Alexander Zakharchenko. The distribution of articles started on August 16 based on a YouTube video (not linked by British msm) source as НОВОРОССИЯ TV [novorossia tv]. Production date of the YouTobe video was August 15. The website of novorossia TV was discontinued as per August 14, 2014.
Here @MoA I can’t post more links, that is why I posted the second link to my post @BooMan with all the linked sources.
“On August 9, Prime Minister of the self-proclaimed Donetsk Republic Alexander Zakharchenko announced the republic was ready for a ceasefire not to allow spread of the humanitarian catastrophe in Donbass. His statement was published on the dnr.today website.”
The Kiev junta doesn’t want a cease-fire but a total military victory, that’s why that piece of trash was distributed, to up the war rhetoric.
Witness to Michael Brown shooting: “dude kept coming towards the police”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mAaJMBxKA4&list=PLfrlsC1yJ2dSwsuFlboCJ1YBmNJ5H4SyE
Posted by: Tom Murphy | Aug 17 2014 9:15 utc | 45
@fairleft #41:
Ah, Samantha Power. She does come across as zealous. I can’t figure her out, since she’s an academic from Ireland. Why should she have bloodlust? I don’t know that she has.
She certainly seems to have a hatred of Russia, but one can explain that in terms of her being Irish, hence Catholic I guess, and being an Atlanticist. But hating Russia because it is an obstacle to the AngloAmerican Empire does not mean that you have bloodlust.
To me, with Samantha Power, the hatred of Russia seems to be mostly intellectual, based on geopolitics and Anglophone feelings of being superior to Russians. In Hillary, I detect a native-bred, and hence deeper and more primal, feeling of American exceptionalism, with a quasi-religious fervor, reminding one of the remarkably righteous and zealous Battle Hymn of the Republic (written by a woman, as everyone knows):
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
His truth is marching on.
I detect exactly the same zealotry in Hillary. (Note: any country that can teach such a song which turns Christianity on its head to its children is doomed.)
Copied from Pravy Sektor’s site and run through Google translate (did *much* better than Yandex.) I have inserted some dashes, and a few words // xyx // otherwise the translation is untouched.
LETTER TO THE PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE military-political movement “Legal //=Right// sector»
August 16, 21:47
Today, along with the open aggression of intensified internal counterrevolution – Its vanguard is revanchist forces in the Interior Ministry, including at the highest posts – //that is// The head of the bandit-separatist militia group and collaborators Moscow protege General Evdokimov. He and his pryhvosni //are// doing everything possible to destroy the gains of our revolution and pave the way for separatist and terrorist groups in Kyiv.
An example of his violent anti-Ukrainian activities are constant attempts to destroy the Ukrainian volunteer movement based on a vanguard of the Revolution, and now the national liberation war – “Right Sector.” Since the destruction of our colleague Alexander Muzychka and recent developments in Striy, Dnipropetrovsk, Kyiv and other cities, //it// is a methodical game //which plays// into the hands of the invaders separatists and Moscow – on the part of the police. Returning the Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk, thousands of moving to the side of the enemy, at the same time receiving a salary from the state police rear rats fighting combatants throughout Ukraine. //last sentence??//
In recent weeks, police illegal detentions, arrests, beatings, searches, seizure //of// gained-in combat arms, touched dozens of volunteer fighters //of the//Ukrainian Corps “Right Sector.” Using the fact that the vast majority of fighters “Legal //=Right // sector” is an uncompromising struggle at the forefront of those who opposed us on Hrushevskoho and university felt their impunity and counterattacked. //last sentence??//
In this regard, we appeal to the President of Ukraine Poroshenko calling //him// immediately //to// bring order to the Interior Ministry, freeing //=kicking out// notorious representatives of anti-Ukrainian forces from positions in the Interior Ministry and //to start// an investigation of their criminal activities.
//We// Also demand the release of all detainees, //the// closing //of// all criminal proceedings against the soldiers of the Volunteer Corps //of the//Ukrainian “Right Sector” and other volunteer units and //=as well as// the return of all illegally seized weapons and transport //equipment// in the war zone.
In case of failure of our demands within 48 hours we will have to withdraw all our forces from the front lines, to declare a general mobilization of reserve battalions and start a campaign to Kyiv for the purpose of “rapid reform” in the Interior Ministry. Derived //??// column “Legal //=Right// Sector” will go into full gear.
We appeal to our brothers fighting with other volunteer departments and units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as well as to all the activists of the revolutionary Maidan to support our requirements //=demands// and finally bring order to the Interior Ministry.
Down aids terrorists in police uniforms with Ukrainian land!
Glory to the Nation! Death to the enemy!
08/16/2014 p.
Leader “Legal Sector” Dmitry Jarosz
The commander of the Volunteer Corps Ukrainian Andriy STEMPITSKYY
original
http://tinyurl.com/nbs3onq
Posted by: Noirette | Aug 17 2014 10:03 utc | 47
Commentary No. 383, Aug. 15, 2014 “The Caliphate vs. Everyone Else” by Immanuel Wallerstein
Posted by: c | Aug 17 2014 10:16 utc | 48
‘Finally, as an American, to me there is the simple matter of national dignity. Are we really going to have wives succeed their husbands as president now? Up until now, this has only happened in Third World countries.
Posted by: Demian | Aug 17, 2014 12:22:09 AM | 31
whoa! are you saying Argentina(where a wife succeeded a husband) is worse than the US where Obama succeeded Bush?! or UK etc?
good govt is not based on the voting for leaders principle..or EU and US and canada would be paragons of governing virtue.
good govt needs good people…argentina shows a family succession can provide that
Posted by: brian | Aug 17 2014 10:35 utc | 49
Excellent analysis (only in French, sorry, would be worth translating)
http://www.les-crises.fr/video-decryptage-de-lintervention-des-usa-en-irak-par-bassam-tahhan/
Posted by: Mina | Aug 17 2014 10:47 utc | 50
David Cameron “ISIL militants could grow strong enough to target people on the streets of Britain unless action is taken, British prime minister David Cameron has warned”. What a prat, he should have thought about that before Hague started arming them in Syria. http://www.almanar.com.lb/english/adetails.php?eid=166054&cid=22&fromval=1&frid=22&seccatid=48&s1=1
Posted by: harry law | Aug 17 2014 12:25 utc | 52
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/aug/16/church-of-england-attack-david-cameron-middle-east-policy
The same few voices speaking out as in Iraq 2003
Posted by: Mina | Aug 17 2014 12:57 utc | 53
@harry law
Exactly! A year ago Cameron, Hollande and Obama wanted devastating bombing of Assad’s military might … to open a corridor for the Islamists’ march on Damascus. The extremists of Al Nusra Front, ISIL and dozens of others would have profited. How much blood would have been shed? Erdogan’s Turkey has been forced to close the borders for Islamists, as if that was an option in the terrain! NATO still has the Patriots stationed with support from Germany, The Netherlands and the U.S. How a regime change can backfire for the people of Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. Yes, the trained IS fighters will be returning to the streets of London, Birmingham, The Hague, Antwerp, Paris, Hamburg, etc.
Yeah. Few see the connection between Sevastapol and Tartus. ISIS is being driven to the actual objective and instructions given; on to Aleppo. But ISIS is rather like the wild beasts used in Circus Maximus to kill in the arena. Sometimes, the control is tricky.
Posted by: Ben Franklin | Aug 17 2014 13:30 utc | 55
An interesting hard hitting blog, “Penny For Your Thoughts” website appears to have been hacked. Penny are you still here?
Posted by: Fast Freddy | Aug 17 2014 13:35 utc | 56
@56: At least for me, Penny seems up and running. Last entry on the 15th.
Posted by: ben | Aug 17 2014 15:15 utc | 58
Penny: ISIS Tentacles Reach toward China
And guess what — the US tentacles also reach out
NED
http://www.ned.org/
The Endowment continued to prioritize the rights of ethnic groups in China, including robust programs focusing on Xinjiang/East Turkistan and Tibet.
The Endowment supported Uyghur diaspora organizations that serve as essential voices against Chinese propaganda and as sources of information and analysis about the situation inside Xinjiang.
In Tibet, which saw an unprecedented wave of self-immolations in protest of repressive Chinese policies, NED continued to support programs focusing on human rights protection, the free flow of information, and civic and democratic education among the Tibetans. The Endowment also supported efforts by ethnic Mongolians to defend their rights under China’s legal framework for autonomy.
2011 Annual Report — NED
China (Xinjiang/East Turkistan)
$240,000 – $73,399 – $280,000 – $195,000 = $788,399
http://www.ned.org/publications/annual-reports/2011-annual-report/asia/china-xinjiang/east-turkistan
Are they turning against each other in the western Ukraine?
Right Sector Not Going to Attack Kiev, Some of Requirements Fulfilled – Leader | World | RIA Novosti
KIEV, August 17 (RIA Novosti) – Right Sector militants will continue to fight against the militia forces in the east of Ukraine and will not march on Kiev, because the authorities partially complied with the demands presented by the movement, the leader of the organization Dmitry Yarosh said.
On Saturday, the Right Sector ultranationalist movement addressed to the president of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko, demanding to carry out purges of staff in the Interior Ministry and to close all criminal cases against members of the organization. In case it does not happen within 48 hours, Right Sector promised to withdraw from the frontline and to move to the Ukrainian capital.
So far I haven’t seen this in Western media.
Posted by: Fran | Aug 17 2014 16:14 utc | 60
@ Fran
The western media, of course, is forbidden to suggest that Nazis exist and hold power in Ukraine. The recent “accidental” release of talking points from State to AP suggests how the US media get their stories, and the UK (and other western media) must be similar.
Thank you, Ben #2. I sent friends an email of that map along with the others on Ferguson to show how screwed up the situation is. Actions have consequences. It’s so hard to get politicians to understand this. Back to the surplus destination map, everybody got assault weapons (even though they demonize them for the rest of us) and the south western part of the US got most of the gear. Why?
Posted by: Curtis | Aug 17 2014 16:34 utc | 62
I wonder why we did not see any of that miltary grade gear here.
http://heavy.com/news/2014/04/cliven-bundy-ranch-standoff-police-videos/
Here is a map showing ISIS territorial control in Syria and Iraq. Apparently ISIS has focused only upon major communications routes and cities.
Imagine if the US had pursued a similar strategy in Iraq and (especially) Afghanistan, instead of sending large numbers of troops into remote areas. But they didn’t. As a result Afghanistan highways were (and are) dangerous and so far-off remote outposts had to be resupplied by night-time helicopter flights. Now the outposts have been abandoned because the Afghans have no such aerial capability. It was all for nought.
This is exciting, from SanDiego7
New Design39Campus Opens in North San Diego
After much anticipation, a new, state-of-the-art school is opening its doors in San Diego’s North County, welcoming hundreds of students to the unique campus.
Design39Campus (D39C), located at 17050 Del Sur Ridge, is the newest school to open in the Poway Unified School District. Class officially begins Wednesday but on Saturday, parents and students got a chance to check out the campus, meet teachers and explore the learning space.
[snip]
Wrisley said the school’s tech-savvy layout will complement a more hands-on curriculum and aid in the school’s mission to individually tend to every student.
“We’re personalizing learning for our students. We’re going to meet each child exactly where they need to be. If they’re ready to fly and move on in the curriculum we’ll help them do that. If they need to go a little bit slower in some areas, we’ll slow down and help them with that,” said Wrisley. “We’ll do exactly what each child needs.”
That will bump up against standardized testing, so we’ll see.
@34
The western secret service relations to Ukrainian fascist groups are well documented:
‘HITLER’S SHADOW. Nazi War Criminals, U.S. Intelligence, and the Cold War’ by Richard Breitman and Norman J.W. Goda, Published by the National Archives. Chapter Five: ‘Collaborators: Allied Intelligence and the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists’.
http://www.archives.gov/iwg/reports/hitlers-shadow.pdf
Posted by: Kassandra | Aug 17 2014 17:25 utc | 66
@65
San Diego is a Republican Stronghold. This raises some questions. Charter School Perhaps.
As you suggest, such education is antithetical to the relentless testing designed to fail schools – and ultimately break and destroy America’s Public Ed System.
We’re on a train bound for the good ol days of one percent unbridled robber barons and 99 percent peasants.
Posted by: Fast Freddy | Aug 17 2014 17:47 utc | 67
Mitchell Prothero:
“Syria is collapsing”.
Prothero is a Middle East correspondent for McClatchy Newspapers.
E.g.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/03/17/221510/lebanon-braces-for-more-violence.html
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/search_results?q=prothero
He’s regularly interviewed by Scott Horton. (http://scotthorton.org)
Posted by: Willy2 | Aug 17 2014 18:03 utc | 68
War criminal propagandist outlet VICE media – don’t worry about the Murdoch family’s involvement, bro! – is doing a 5 part series on ISIS so if that doesn’t tell you that any connection between reality and Zionist war criminal propaganda has been completely severed then you probably are still putting your teeth under your pillow.
VICE media war criminals?
If you have the stomach, go back and read their full-throated, disgusting, shameless and reprehensible endorsement of the “protestors” throughout the Syrian “uprising”.
Actually, to really get a feel for what VICE – and by extension – the other war criminal propagandist outlets attempt to accomplish by creating false narratives, one might do no better than visit their “Syria Issue” which states:
Today we are proud to present the first bits of The Syria Issue, an entire magazine dedicated to one of the oldest and most important cradles of civilization in the world. It is also a place that has been decimated by brutal internal strife for the past year and a half, following the widespread unrest of the Arab Spring. Just like in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Yemen, etc, the revolt in Syria was sparked by decades of authoritarian rule by a megalomaniac—namely President Bashar al-Assad.
Unlike other revolutions in the region, however, Syria has reached a boiling point that could result in the total collapse of the geopolitical stability of the region. The organized opposition known as the Free Syrian Army—an amalgam of defected Syrian Army soldiers, jihadists, and average citizens who are fed up with oppression—have clashed with Assad’s forces, resulting in an ongoing civil bloodbath inside the capital of Damascus, Aleppo, Homs, and other cities throughout the nation. Following a failed UN-organized peace effort that was deemed a complete failure and dissolved in late August, the situation has only gotten worse.
What’s happening in Syria right now is perhaps one of the most confusing and complex conflicts of our time. So we have created what amounts to a reference book on the subject that attempts to view the strife from a myriad perspectives, and we believe we have succeeded in this regard.
Gee, “confusing” and “complex”, huh? Why, that sounds EXACTLY like the drivel peddled by the other sophisticated “analysts” as they attempt to paint the ISIS phenomenon as anything BUT the continued waging of war by the Zionist West against the ME.
For a great read, you might want to compare the Syrian timeline b provided with the murderous nonsense VICE promulgates. In addition, you also might find enjoyable the VICE cartoon history – i.e. The Road to Ruin of the region/Syrian conflict as the West’s current reporting on ISIS borrows many of the same “historical” themes to make the narrative “back-stories” of both the Syrian “freedom-fighters” and ISIS seem more believable.
VICE.com appeals to the lowest retarded common denominators of current Western society – e.g., most of the Millenial generation – by mixing in their sex & drugs reporting with stories chock full of support for the very worst of Western backed/created mercenary groups and the murderous false flags etc that they are responsible for.
Posted by: JSorrentine | Aug 17 2014 18:05 utc | 69
Biggest rises and falls in the 2014 World Press Freedom Index The 2014 World Press Freedom Index
“…Countries that pride themselves on being democracies and respecting the rule of law have not set an example, far from it. Freedom of information is too often sacrificed to an overly broad and abusive interpretation of national security needs marking a disturbing retreat from democratic practices. Investigative journalism often suffers as a result.
This has been the case in the United States (46th), which fell 13 places, one of the most significant declines, amid increased efforts to track down whistleblowers and the sources of leaks….”
http://rsf.org/index2014/en-index2014.php#
Interesting read has some good links and explanations as to why rankings went up or down.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XU0SHO4hDgo
This is a lecture from Aleksander Dugin in Greece. This lecture in particular seems to lay out his theories in its “largest” sense.
His whole theory seems, to me and as far as I can tell, patched together from 19th Century Western rightists who saw geo-politics in almost mystical terms. And I don’t think it is particularly valid way to consider politics. He seems to hem Russia into some kind of unnatural position with unnatural allies based on nothing more than their global location. And in doing so, he uses arbitrary lines such as the location of rivers to determine who falls into “the heartland” and who outside of it. All well and good for someone who is trying to revive romantic theories of geo-politics, but it seems to me that this ignores the success of the Soviet Union in supporting national liberation movements all over the globe.
He, at one point, declares that he was never a Marxist, and thereby avoided learning about Marx’s theories. And I have to wonder – who would have been supporting anti-Marxist intellectuals at the time of the fall of the Soviet Union? Who would benefit by placing Russia in a political position where her natural allies are determined by simple geography and not by the human connections that have arisen out of the common experience of liberation struggle over the last century? Would Dugin throw away Russia’s alliances with, say, the ALBA states, simply because they are on the wrong side of the Oder river? What about with Vietnam? Who, really, benefits from such romantic throwback theories of geopolitics – mostly concocted in Victorian England? Certainly not Russia, in my estimation.
And now that we hear, from the Saker about the possibility of a “nationalist” anti-Putin rising by people who associate themselves with the theories of Dugin, I become even more suspicious.
Posted by: guest77 | Aug 17 2014 18:26 utc | 71
Patrick Cockburn wrote a new book: “The jihadis return”.
http://www.orbooks.com/catalog/jihadis-return/
He wrote the book because he forsaw the current developments in Iraq. He saw that the Maliki government was getting weaker and weaker in 2011 & 2012.
Mitchell Prothero:
– After Syria has fallen ISIS then Jordan next on the list.
– If ISIS & Jordan start to fight inside Jordan then Israel will invade Jordan.
– ISIS wants Aleppo much more than they want Baghdad.
– If Iraq falls apart then Iran could/will be tempted to invade Southern (Shia) Iraq and turn it into a protectorat.
Posted by: Willy2 | Aug 17 2014 18:27 utc | 72
Mitchell Prothero:
– ISIS has taken over most of the syrian oilfields (& gasfields ??). So, Assad is “Toast”.
Posted by: Willy2 | Aug 17 2014 18:29 utc | 73
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/poland-speeds-arms-deal-citing-ukraine-conflict
“Spokesman Jacek Sonta said Thursday the ministry has moved up the deadline for choosing the provider of 30 new helicopters, which wil replace the aging Russian-made Mi-24….”
I bet those aging russian helicopters are going to a boneyard……in ukraine.
@72
Lest we forget, the Sunni-Shia conflict was kicked off by the Samarra mosque bombing in February 2006. Patrick Cockburn wrote about it here and I imagine that it’s in his “jihadis return” book. In other words Cockburn “foresaw the current developments in Iraq” because he was familiar with Samarra.
The bomb attack has enraged the majority Shia population, who regard the shrine in the same way that Roman Catholics view St Peter’s in Rome.
In a number of respects civil war in Iraq has already begun. Many of the thousand bodies a month arriving in the morgues in Baghdad are of people killed for sectarian reasons. It is no longer safe for members of the three main communities the Sunni and Shia Arabs and the Kurds to visit each other’s parts of the country.
In February 2006 Samarra was under total US military control. The curfew in Samarra started at 8pm. On February 21st, at 8:30pm, according to a witness, joint forces of the Iraq National Guard and the American Army appeared, then left at 9, then reappeared at 11pm. At 6am on the morning of the 22nd the ING left the area, and at 6:30 the Americans left. The first explosion occurred at 6:40, the second at 6:45.am.
Construction Minister Jassem Mohammed Jaafar, who toured Sammara and inspected the damage incurred to the shrine, said the placing of explosives inside the dome was meticulous and must have taken at least 12 hours.”Holes were dug into the mausoleum’s four main pillars and packed with explosives,” he told the media, adding that work on each pillar must have taken at least four hours. The normal security detail of 35 men had been reduced to five, the five guards were taken hostage during the twelve hours, and nobody noticed anything.
The bombing of the Al-Askaria Mosque and its violent aftermath ratcheted the numbers of displaced persons up to a staggering 2.7 million. In a period of about a year, five percent of Iraq’s total population fled their homes and settled elsewhere in Iraq while an additional 2 million or so fled the country entirely. It is important to underscore that this displacement was not just a by-product of the conflict, but rather the result of deliberate policies of sectarian cleansing by armed militias.
The internally displaced were the most vulnerable — and perhaps the clearest sign of the success of sectarian cleansing as entire neighborhoods were transformed. Sunnis and Shiites alike moved from mixed communities to ones where their sect was the majority. And while the displacement of Sunnis and Shiites was massive, proportionately the displacement of religious minorities was even more sweeping in effect.
Divide-and-conquer is the US strategy. Samarra was also intended to prolong the US military occupation, and it did.
SEC. GATES: “Well, what I’m saying to you is, though, you had one strategy under way until attack on the Samarra mosque. After that and the development of the sectarian violence that was being stoked by extremists — this wasn’t spontaneous — there was a shift in strategy, and instead of sending troops home, the troops that were supposed to be sent home were kept — or the troop level was kept.”
Europeans take info from the US without any criticism.
http://www.unz.com/article/the-ukraine-corrupted-journalism-and-the-atlanticist-faith/
Posted by: Willy2 | Aug 17 2014 19:49 utc | 78
Comment from the saker site:
the pug
17 August, 2014 16:30
Here’s the compassion of a Ukie politician in his own words
Babay @Truth_Seeker_11 3 mins
#Ukraine parliamentary speaker #Turchinov urged soldiers on social media to “stop crying and die with dignity” pic.twitter.com/pdJsSAYtw6
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-08-17/obama-putting-vacation-hold-returning-washington-unspecified-meetings
Is Obama meeting in Washington wrt Ukraine and/or Syria?
Posted by: crone | Aug 17 2014 20:07 utc | 80
@ JSorrentine | Aug 17, 2014 2:05:21 PM | 69
Dutch lady Yasmina Haifi tweeted a very similar comment and got into hot water. She was instantly removed from her task working for the Security and Justice ministery on matters of terrorism and cyber security. Some extracurricular activities don’t mix well. LOL
NATO never sleeps, because there might be aliens about.
U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said although NATO had no plans to intervene in non-NATO member Ukraine, NATO countries in eastern Europe needed to start preparing for a possible threat from “little green men” – referring to soldiers in unmarked uniforms. If Russia tries to infiltrate troops into a NATO country, even out of official military uniform as it did before it annexed Ukraine’s Crimea, NATO will respond militarily, the alliance’s top commander said in an interview published on Sunday.
http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2014/08/brussels-demand-on-argentina-arrogance.html?m=1
Check this out…
@82 I thought they were “polite armed men in green?” US/NATO have a hard time dealing with the fact that Crimea was bloodless, hence the change to “little green men.”
Posted by: ess emm | Aug 17 2014 20:24 utc | 84
@84
It’s actually a remake, retitled “the little green men are coming, the little green men are coming.”
The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming is a 1966 American comedy film directed by Norman Jewison. It is based on the Nathaniel Benchley novel The Off-Islanders, and was adapted for the screen by William Rose. Without hostile intent, a Soviet sub runs aground off New England. Men are sent for a boat, but many villagers go into a tizzy, risking bloodshed.
Breedlove is the supreme tizzy commander.
Europe and Korea are the only parts of the world where foreign armies have a US supreme exalted commander. Other countries the US invaded are less fortunate. They must get by without an American warning them of green men.
“Is Obama meeting in Washington wrt Ukraine and/or Syria?”
A difference without a distinction?
World events seem complex, but the synchronicity is simple.
The Big Picture often is.
Posted by: Ben Franklin | Aug 17 2014 21:04 utc | 88
@really #74:
The Voice of Sevastopol (in Russian) reports that guerrillas destroyed a jeep with Polish mercenaries in it in Kharkov.
If true, this is good news, since it would mean the resistance is expanding its operations beyond the Donetsk and Lugansk regions.
#really #79:
#Ukraine parliamentary speaker #Turchinov urged soldiers on social media to “stop crying and die with dignity”
At least he’s honest about the junta not caring in the least about the men it sends into “battle”. A main theme of Novorossiyan propaganda directed at the people of the former Ukraine is that the junta is sending people to their death, as cannon fodder. Uke soldiers are poorly equipped and receive only two or three days of training between being drafted and sent to the front.
@87 Green men? Who you gonna call? Breedlove, Rasmussen and McCain: Security Consultants to the World.
Posted by: dh | Aug 17 2014 21:21 utc | 90
@82
Breedlove – Strangelove. Cowboy Mounts Projectile. Exits thru bombay doors. Yeehaw.
The brilliance of these leaders is blinding.
Posted by: Fast Freddy | Aug 17 2014 21:30 utc | 91
nato are so pathetic, the barking never ends, they lost and now they cant stop whining about it.
Posted by: Anonymous | Aug 17 2014 21:32 utc | 92
ah the free press!…
‘How handy. All three US networks and the increasingly shackled BBC were ordered to drop Gaza reporting and refocus their camera teams on the suffering Yazidis and, all of a sudden, Iraq’s fleeing Christians.
This was a brilliant media ploy. The world, which was furious at the US for enabling Israel’s savaging of Gaza and killing of almost 2,000 Palestinians, switched its attention to the hitherto unknown Yazidis, and to Iraqi Christians. No one in the US had ever heard of Yazidis but that was ok. Uncle Sam to the rescue
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39435.htm
how free are they or their readers?!
Posted by: brian | Aug 17 2014 21:54 utc | 93
Baghdadi ‘Mossad trained’
WASHINGTON: The former employee at US National Security Agency (NSA), Edward Snowden, has revealed that the British and American intelligence and the Mossad worked together to create the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).
Snowden said intelligence services of three countries created a terrorist organisation that is able to attract all extremists of the world to one place, using a strategy called “the hornet’s nest”.
NSA documents refer to recent implementation of the hornet’s nest to protect the Zionist entity by creating religious and Islamic slogans.
According to documents released by Snowden, “The only solution for the protection of the Jewish state “is to create an enemy near its borders”.
Leaks revealed that ISIS leader and cleric Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi took intensive military training for a whole year in the hands of Mossad, besides courses in theology and the art of speech.
http://www.gulf-daily-news.com/NewsDetails.aspx?storyid=381153
Posted by: Prey4 Justice | Aug 17 2014 21:56 utc | 94
@guest77, #71
I don’t think Dugin should be characterized as being against alliances between Russia and ALBA nations,as an example of some policy that is based on the Eurasian land mass. He was describing only the wellspring of Russia’s cultural and geopolitical identity, as he sees it.
Thanks for linking to the video. This is the first occasion I’ve had to see and hear Dugin.
He made the point that he sees what he calls “land powers” and “sea powers” as having very different geopolitical destinies; and the thing he emphasized was the importance of creating a multi-polar world as opposed to the hegemonic unipolar power in the world of the US Empire. But somewhat disturbingly he describes history, “as war”.
One questioner asked about China’s buildup of naval power. But Dugin’s reply was that (to paraphrase) it would not essentially change the society if it was defensive in nature; but that if the emphasis changed into a sea power for projecting power, then China would fundamentally change, and would not be the country we know today. As for Dugin’s sense of what a land power is, he equates that with a fundamental mindset, and a country’s basic orientation, in a geopolitical sense. In contrast, recall that 19th Century Britain was ever concerned about Russia having a warm water port, giving it a base from which to project naval power.
Dugin also was of the opinion that Germany is an instrument of US power and is without much sovereignty of its own. “An instrument can’t be blamed for being an instrument”. He thought Russia should possibly look for closer ties with France, or with Greece (the host for his talk).
He recommends that Europe break away from the hold the USA has on it, and become independent and control its own affairs. There is something perhaps old fashioned about Dugin; but at this point there is nothing to suggest that he is being somehow groomed as a more essentially nationalist challenger to Putin.
Dugin made it clear he didn’t want any questions posed to him about any personal reflection on Putin; but on the other hand, he was describing Putin’s place in Russia’s history in a favorable light, as far as I could tell.
@89
‘A main theme of Novorossiyan propaganda ‘
eh? propaganda?
Posted by: brian | Aug 17 2014 22:20 utc | 98
Posted by: Willy2 | Aug 17, 2014 3:49:40 PM | 78
the eurotrash is a combination of servant and true believer
Posted by: brian | Aug 17 2014 22:22 utc | 99
I haven’t listened to this fully yet, but it is one of my favorite authors – Douglas Valentine, author of The Phoenix Program, discussing the CIA actions in Ukraine with Ry Dawson (from May 1st). Goes into Omidyar’s involvement in Ukraine as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gK_jVDNyyQc
Thanks for your thoughts, Copeland.
Posted by: guest77 | Aug 17 2014 22:34 utc | 100