Weekly Review And Open Thread 2018-11

March 18, 2018

The last week at Moon of Alabama was heavy on 'Novichok'. But that story it is only one act in a much larger play.

This morning Afrin fell to the Turkish supported Takfiris. Over the last days civilians and YPG fighters fled the area. The Kurdish YPG made no serious attempt to defend the city. They left large stacks of ammunition behind. The Turkish government will now 'settle' its own people in Afrin and, in two to five years, will let them vote to be annexed by Turkey. This chanin of events was easy to see but the political stupidity of the Kurdish leadership is immeasurable.

The Syrian army continues to split Takfiri held areas of east-Ghouta into tiny pieces. Ten thousands of civilians have fled from the Takfiri to the government's side. Negotiations over the evacuation of the 'rebel' fanatics are ongoing. In a week or two the whole area will be liberated and under government control. A 'chemical factory', likely used to prepare chemical weapons, was found in the already librated area.

The Russian Defense Ministry loudly warns that U.S. paid provocateurs plan a "chemical incident" to then accuse the Syrian government. The U.S. has sortied ships, say the Russians, to 'respond' to such an incident with a swarm of cruise missiles on Syrian government targets. If that happens, Russia said, it will attack any detected missile launching platform.

Mar 12 – Theresa May's "45 Minutes" Moment

The British government again lies about chemical weapons.

Mar 13 – Trump Orders Rexit – Torture Woman To Head CIA – (Updated)

Who is the next to be fired by Trump? Mattis or McMaster?

Mar 14 – Are 'Novichok' Poisons Real? – May's Claims Fall Apart

The 'Novichok' story, as told by the British government, can not be true.

Mar 16 – The British Government's 'Novichok' Drama Was Written By Whom?

The piece was updated quite often with additional facts and supporting links. Early readers may want to reread it.

A big thank you to all commentators for the extensive and very disciplined discussion of our 'Novichok' posts. These could not be published without your support.

Mar 17 – Guardian Rips-Off Goebbels – Fascist Propaganda For Better Anti-Russian Smears

The post was somewhat updated with this comment.

Use as open thread …

Posted by b on March 18, 2018 at 14:44 UTC | Permalink

Comments

Don Bacon 98
Russia has not been bombing US controlled areas.
Why is the US holding al Tanf area?
It is very likely there is a build up in US controlled areas of Syria.
The propaganda coming from US and UK indicates there will be an attack on Syria
and the Russian forces there.
US may attempt to avoid Russia by taking a narrow strip along the Iraq/Syria, Jordan/Syria borders to give a land link from Israel through to US Kurdistan.
At the moment, US Kurdistan which is partly in Syria, partly in Iraq, is land locked in a hostile area.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Mar 20 2018 5:37 utc | 101

Posted by: psychohistorian | Mar 19, 2018 10:28:15 PM | 95
Yep I have no doubt that NSA or whoever is datamining for their own nefarious goals. Christopher Wyllie is pretty close mouthed about his gig pre-CA altho he says Nix had a spiel which emphasised previous tasks for the pentagon cia etc, so I took that to infer Wyllie was headhunted out of an alphabet agency.
The real issue with CA is that they don’t enable governments to realise what is often a narrow if murderous agenda, CA is offering its services, an ability to persuade every human who goes online to do whatever it is that any corporate ‘client’ wants them to do.
We spend considerable time at MoA analysing the scams which governments pull, but we do tend to lose sight of the forest as we zoom in on a particular tree. These governments exist solely to smooth the way for corporations to lie, rape, cheat, steal and murder with impunity. CA is corporation owned by a man even more sociopathic than the Koch Bros, Robert Mercer, who will use the power he has built up to do stuff that trump, obama, the bushes, the clintons, hell even dick cheney would likely resile from.
To add insult to injury humans are not just gonna be convinced to act against their best interests time and time again, they are going to be conned into splashing out kazillions of dollars for the ‘privilege’.
Thanks for responding psychohistorian cos I promised myself if this issue was ignored by everyone else whilst they raced down this week’s rabbit hole of shock horror inside Syria or the englander poisoning – important issues sure, but not ones any or all of us can effect any change upon. then I was gonna take another extended leave from MOA.
Something that I should probably do anyhow. The CA business is equally removed from us Jo/Joe posters, but it does remain open to pushback by individuals who are woke, which is not the case with these other important realities.
CA will have warrens of careerists devoted to protecting apartheid israel and demonizing Palestinians as well as just about every other issue we consider important around here. Increasingly web links will be less about providing support for a particular point of view and more about drowning non-mainstream views in a sea of specious nonsense.
Yep that already happens but CA have increased its occurence by orders of magnitude, yet requiring little more effort to implement than a single mouse-click.

Posted by: Debsisdead | Mar 20 2018 5:42 utc | 102

Thanks for your posts Debs. Been looking at the alongside of the media management of the Skripal affair.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Mar 20 2018 6:16 utc | 103

Magnier. This one pulls a lot of things together.
https://ejmagnier.com/2018/03/20/why-afrin-has-fallen-us-turkish-russian-kurdish-roles/

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Mar 20 2018 6:40 utc | 104

re 99 krollchem

If I am wrong please provide links supporting why the occupiers have given up on Syria and are ready to leave.

The US has lost. It just hasn’t realised it yet. Sooner or later, they’ll get bored, and other crises will draw off their attention. Or the Kurds will ask them to leave, when they figure out that having US garrisons in their midst is not conducive to a good future. That’ll probably happen in Iraq again – there’ve already been calls in Iraq for the US to withdraw.
There’s just nowhere for US policy to go, to achieve their aims. But still there will be a “surge”, which will achieve nothing.

Posted by: Laguerre | Mar 20 2018 13:46 utc | 105

@ Peter AU 1, 104
Yes, a few of the things I found interesting
“For the last two years, in every single Syrian brigade or division, there have been Russian Special Forces, coordinating on the ground the military operation and all air strikes. ”
–US has been amply warned about attacking Russian forces. Russia is serious about eliminating jihadi threats as well as aiding Syria in general–
and
“It was clear that, when al-Qaeda (aka al-Nusra, aka Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham) disobeyed Turkish plans, the Syrian proxy groups would attack and engage in fierce fighting to submit al-Qaeda to the will of Turkey. President Erdogan has contributed to the fall of Aleppo to Damascus and the control of a large part of rural Idlib. He is an essential player Moscow is in need of to stop the war in Syria, a war that the US is trying to keep on fire for as long as possible. Therefore, if the price would be to lose part of the Syrian territory for the time being, Russia won’t stand in Erdogan’s way”
–again pointing to the main goal of eliminating jihadis and the complicated interplay of Syria and Turkey–

Posted by: financial matters | Mar 20 2018 13:48 utc | 106

@ Debsisdead with the response to my comment
I am reading this after b has promoted your original comment to posting status….H/T and thanks for the response
I say thanks because I, like you, see humanity as being led around by the nose……way more than folks are willing to admit to themselves.
I would have less of a problem with that if the leadership was more benign but instead it favors competition over sharing and cooperation……and many have trouble discussing our existence at this level….as evidenced by the MoA commentariat……sigh

Posted by: psychohistorian | Mar 20 2018 17:02 utc | 107

Gravatomic, with President Assad’s drive to, and walking tour of Ghouta happening immediately after US threats of an imminent invasion and “decapitation” strikes intended to murder the democratically-elected President of that sovereign State, I expect you’re quite correct about the air cover he enjoyed.
But I also have to say that sure looked like a ballsy move on his part. No need to brag about “big buttons” or show cartoons of WMDs.
It serves as a brilliant de facto demonstration of what the AAZ Empire can expect should they take out the beloved President. Even most of the sincere Syrian dissenters from 2011 now stand with their President against the Evil Empire.

Posted by: Daniel | Mar 20 2018 17:19 utc | 108

Laguerre@105
I hope you are right.

Posted by: Krollchem | Mar 20 2018 17:32 utc | 109

Debsisdead and psychohistorian, et al. Yes, perception management/propaganda/Mind Control is the purpose of CA and other offshoots of TIA.
BBC covered their Sunday Morning website with articles “exposing” the shocking. . Shocking I tell ya… “news” that CA had manipulated people who believed they were “woke” to MSM propaganda.
Yes, we at MoA are no doubt often “examining the scams” while missing the forest. Or, as Karl Rove is said to have described us in the “Reality Based Community:”
“We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.”
And I have no doubt that these scripts are carefully constructed to manipulate/divert the target demographic of “woke” analysts as we “judiciously study” their “new realities.”

Posted by: Daniel | Mar 20 2018 17:45 utc | 110

@109 Interesting read by Meyssan@voltairenet.org. According to him we are coming out of the storm txs in part to the firing of Tillerson. I dont know how much is political SF though so take his essay with a grain of sand..
http://www.voltairenet.org/article200232.html

Posted by: Lozion | Mar 21 2018 5:08 utc | 111

Israel has now “confirmed” it bombed a “nuclear reactor” in Syria back in 2007. The “nuclear reactor” was most likely something to do with Syria’s missile program. If it had really been a reactor the US IC would have been all over it when the SDF captured it from ISIS, but they weren’t so it wasn’t a reactor.
What this most likely shows is that the Israelis are no longer willing to enter Syrian airspace for fear of losing aircraft and pilots, so they have gone back to boasting about previous raids into Syria to try and hide their growing weakness.

Posted by: Ghost Ship | Mar 21 2018 11:25 utc | 112

111
I think global powers have been working themselves up into another “cold war” which would mean – following the example of the last one – the definition of spheres of influence and the control of the populations within.
Trump seems to imply he wants to negotiate the end of the arms race – which means Russia has won the “missile defense” war, Putin’s declaration was not bluff and the US knows it.
It is possible that Tillerson is no longer needed as the sane friendly face of US foreign policy but time has come for talk between the generals.
If Europe minus Britain is lucky they can negotiate “neutral” status this time.

Posted by: somebody | Mar 21 2018 12:13 utc | 113

How many Ukrainian POWs and prisoners will Putin have to release to get Savchenko out of jail?

Ukraine arrests pilot hero Savchenko over ‘coup plot’ – BBC News, March 22, 2018
One of Ukraine’s most famous MPs, Nadiya Savchenko, has been arrested on suspicion of planning an assault on parliament and supporting a coup.
The ex-military helicopter pilot was detained in parliament after MPs viewed evidence against her and voted to remove her immunity from prosecution. She has not denied the charges.
She had been feted as a national hero after spending nearly two years in a Russian jail. She was captured fighting rebels in eastern Ukraine.
On Thursday MPs watched a video of her talking to two officers about plans to attack parliament. She smiled and laughed in response, and did not question the authenticity of the video. She said Ukraine’s “corrupt” government did need to be overthrown, but described the plot as a “provocation”.
She was granted Ukraine’s highest award – the Order of the Gold Star – after her release from jail in Russia in 2016 as part of a prisoner swap.

Posted by: Petri Krohn | Mar 22 2018 17:49 utc | 114

114
I remember the outcry in the comment sections of blogs when Putin pardoned her.
Worth remembering when watching Russia work with the likes of Turkey.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Mar 22 2018 18:26 utc | 115

Petri, I read the BBC article on “war hero” Savchenko’s arrest in Ukraine, and it somehow failed to mention that she had just revealed in a foreign TV news interview that the snipers at Maidan were brought in by the “pro-democracy peaceful protesters.”
She says she’s angry the the putsch regime is not living up to her neo-nazi standards by acting much like every other corrupt Ukrainian government, and is pushing for an even farther right wing coup II.

Posted by: Daniel | Mar 22 2018 20:37 utc | 116

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