Category Archives: Geopolitics

How This US Lie Will Likely Lead to War, by Dr. Joseph Mercola

Posted on March 2, 2023 | 1 comment

The Nordstream sabotage may lead the U.S. not only into war with Russia, but also into a war with Germany, an ally of the U.S. From Dr. Joseph Mercola at theburningplatform.com:

Story at-a-glance

  • September 26, 2022, Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 — Russian pipelines that deliver natural gas from Russia to Europe underneath the Baltic Sea — were blown up
  • Months before the sabotage, President Biden publicly announced that “if Russia invades Ukraine, there will be no Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.” Undersecretary Victoria Nuland also delivered a near-identical message, saying, “If Russia invades Ukraine, one way or another Nord Stream 2 will not move forward”
  • February 8, 2023, legendary investigative journalist Seymore Hersh published a shocking article based on whistleblower testimony claiming the sabotage was carried out by U.S. Navy divers during BALTOPS 22, a NATO exercise that took place in the Baltic Sea in June 2022. Three months later, the planted explosives were remotely detonated, destroying the two pipelines
  • According to the whistleblower, Norway was in on the plan, and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz OK’d the operation
  • According to Hersh, the “why” behind Biden’s decision to blow up the pipelines was threefold. First, it would massively impact Russia’s economy. Second, eliminating Germany’s and Western Europe’s ability to buy low-cost gas from Russia would force them to buy U.S. gas. And third, he feared Europe would be reluctant to supply Ukraine with money and weapons if they were reliant on Russian gas

September 26, 2022, massive leaks were detected in two Russian pipelines — Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 — that deliver natural gas from Russia to Europe underneath the Baltic Sea. Within a couple of days, several countries, including Russia, agreed the leaks were the result of intentional sabotage.

Continue reading

1 Comment

Posted in Crime, Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, Horseshit, Intelligence, Military, War

Tagged

US Ambassador To China: “We’re The Leader” Of The Indo-Pacific, by Caitlin Johnstone

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Leave a comment

There are probably a few Asians that don’t cotton to the U.S. ambassador’s claim. From Caitlin Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

A recent US Chamber of Commerce InSTEP program hosted three empire managers to talk about Washington’s top three enemies, with the US ambassador to China Nicholas Burns discussing the PRC, the odious Victoria Nuland discussing Russia, and the US ambassador to Israel Tom Nides talking about Iran.

Toward the end of the hour-long discussion, Burns made the very interesting comment that Beijing must accept that the United States is “the leader” in the region and isn’t going anywhere.

“From my perspective sitting here in China looking out at the Indo-Pacific, our American position is stronger than it was five or ten years ago,” Burns said, citing the strength of US alliances, its private sector and its research institutions and big tech companies.

“And I do think that the Chinese now understand that the United States is staying in this region — we’re the leader in this region in many ways,” Burns added emphatically.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, Imperialism, Military, Philosophy, War

Tagged , , ,

The Military-Industrial Complex and American Fascism, by William J. Astore

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Leave a comment

The MIC is the embodiment of fascism. From William J. Astore at antiwar.com:

Since Ike’s warning more than 60 years ago, the MIC has only grown stronger and more anti-democratic

President Dwight D. Eisenhower (Ike) had it right. The military-industrial complex (MIC) is fundamentally antidemocratic The national security state has become the fourth branch of government and arguably the most powerful one. It gets the most money, more than half of the federal discretionary budget, even as the military remains America’s most trusted institution, despite a woeful record in wars since 1945.

A colleague, Christian Sorensen, says that when we look closely at the MIC we see something akin to American fascism. As he put it to me: “Our fascism certainly doesn’t look like past European movements, but it is far more durable, has killed millions and millions (SE Asia, Indonesia, Central America, Middle East), and has manifold expressions: wars abroad, wars at home, surveillance state, digital border, militarized law enforcement, economic warfare in the form of sanctions, militarization of space.”

It’s hard not to agree with him, not in the sense of Hitler’s Germany or Mussolini’s Italy but in the sense of concentrated government/corporate power that draws sustenance from nationalism at home and imperialism abroad. It’s true that America doesn’t have goose-stepping soldiers in the street. There are no big military parades (though Donald Trump once wanted one). It still seems like we have contending political parties. But when we look deeper, a militant nationalism and aggressive imperialism powered by corporations and enforced by government, including notably the Supreme Court, is the salient feature of this American moment.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Civil Liberties, Collapse, Geopolitics, Governments, Intelligence, Military, Tyranny

Tagged ,

The UN Discusses Darkening The Skies to Combat Climate Change, by Igor Chudov

Posted on March 2, 2023 | 2 comments

Yes, an idea this dumb really is under consideration. From Igor Chudov at igorchudov.substack.com:

Will Bill Gates succeed with his new plan?

A new report from the UN was just published. It proposes and discusses ways to cool our planet by restricting sunlight and darkening our skies.

Source: UNEP Document

What is this about? Why block sunlight, of all things? Let me explain.

The UN is worried about climate change. As the efforts to reduce CO2 emissions are faltering, the UN is looking for more ways to cool the Earth. The UNEP’s report details ideas called “Solar Radiation Modification,” the gist of which is to reflect sunlight and prevent it from heating the surface of our planet.

Here are the main ideas that the UN will consider:

  • Injecting reflective nanoparticles/sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere (stratospheric aerosol injection)
  • Brightening of low clouds over the ocean by seeding ocean clouds with submicron salt particles
  • Using space mirrors, that is, many giant mirrors launched into outer space to reflect sunlight.

The UN explains that should the “global stakeholders” decide to proceed, the skies could be darkened within only a few years:

SRM is the only option that could cool the planet within years. To be effective at limiting global warming, SRM would need to be maintained for several decades to centuries, depending on the pace of emissions reductions and carbon removal.

Continue reading

2 Comments

Posted in Environment, Geopolitics, Governments, Horseshit, Robert Gore, Technology

Tagged ,

Washington Post Lets Hersh’s Dangerous Cat Out of the Bag, by Ray McGovern

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Leave a comment

Seymour Hersh’s story was just too big to ignore. From Ray McGovern at antiwar.com:

Bombshell No. 1: Seymour Hersh’s Feb. 8 report that President Joe Biden authorized the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines built to carry cheap Russian gas to Europe.

Bombshell No. 2: The Washington Post today ended the Establishment media embargo on Hersh’s damning report, mentioning its findings and even including a link to his article.

The Post’s article by Karen DeYoung, no rogue reporter, bore the headline, “Russia, blaming US sabotage, calls for UN probe of Nord Stream.” DeYoung reported on the UN Security Council meeting yesterday at which Russia called for a special United Nations commission to investigate the explosions that blew up the Nord Stream undersea pipelines. DeYoung also noted that Professor Jeffrey Sachs and I gave short briefings at the beginning of the Security Council session.

Here’s an edited summary account by the UN of our testimony at the Security Council session:

SACHS: As the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines on 26 September 2022 constitutes an act of international terrorism and represents a threat to peace, it is the Council’s responsibility to take up the question of who might have carried out the act, help bring the perpetrator to justice, pursue compensation for the damaged parties and prevent such actions from recurring in the future. Countries need full confidence that their infrastructure will not be destroyed by third parties.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Government, Imperialism, Intelligence, Media, Military, Politics, Propaganda, War

Tagged ,

SCOTT RITTER: Reimagining Arms Control After Ukraine

Posted on March 1, 2023 | 1 comment

It’s hard to imagine reinstating arms control with Russia, when the Russians justifiably believe the U.S. Government wouldn’t observe an agreement to save its life. From Scott Ritter at consortiumnews.com:

Having used arms control to gain unilateral advantage over Russia, the cost to the U.S. and NATO in getting Moscow back to the negotiating table will be high.

Checking out the rise and fall of nuclear warheads over the years of the nuclear arms race at the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site in South Dakota, 2017. (Wayne Hsieh, Flickr, CC BY-NC 2.0)

U.S.-Russian arms control is in a state of extreme distress.

The U.S. withdrawal from the foundational Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty in 2002 undid the functional and theoretical premise of mutually assured destruction (MAD) that provided logical equilibrium to the fundamentals of nuclear deterrence theory.

Similarly, the Trump administration’s precipitous termination of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty in 2019 attacked both elements of the “trust but verify” maxim that governed issues of compliance verification that made arms control viable in the first place.

The last remaining arms control agreement that places limits on the strategic nuclear arsenals of both the U.S. and Russia is the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START).

Signed in 2010, and extended for five years in 2021, the treaty will expire in 2026. It places restrictions on the number of deployed nuclear warheads each side is permitted to have (1,550), as well as vehicles (missiles, bombers, submarines) to deliver these warheads (700).

Equally important to the numerical caps is the compliance verification regime mandated by the treaty, which includes the right of each side to conduct up to 18 on-site inspections per year. Up to 10 of these inspections can be done at operational bases where nuclear delivery systems are based. Inspectors there can visually confirm the presence of nuclear warheads by randomly selecting missiles for inspection. 

Continue reading

1 Comment

Posted in Geopolitics, Governments, History, Politics, War

Tagged

Ukraine: The Tunnel at the End of the Light, by Robert Freeman

Posted on March 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

You almost have to post this one just for the title, but the article itself is excellent as well. From Robert Freeman at consortiumnews.com:

The U.S. abused its providential anointment as the exceptional nation, writes Robert Freeman. That abuse has been recognized, called out and is now being acted against by most of the other nations of the world.  

Jan. 16, 2017: U.S. Vice President Joe Biden traveling to Kiev. (U.S. Embassy Kyiv, Flickr)

“Light at the end of the tunnel” was an iconic phrase used by the warmongers who kept the U.S. in Vietnam long after the War had been lost.

The implication was that insiders could see through the fog of war and know that things were getting better. It was a lie.

In January 1966, long before the military height of the war, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara told President Lyndon Johnson that the U.S. had a one-out-of-three chance of winning on the battlefield.

But Johnson, like Eisenhower and Kennedy before him, and Nixon after him, didn’t want to be the first American president to lose a war. So, he ginned up a simplistic lie and “soldiered on.” 

The lie was blown by the Tet Offensive in January 1968. More than 100 U.S. military installations were attacked in a simultaneous nationwide assault that stunned the U.S.

The broadcaster, Walter Cronkite, then “the most trusted man in America,” bellowed on national television, “I thought we were supposed to be winning this damned thing.” It was the beginning of the end of the U.S.’ murderous and failed occupation. 

We’re now facing another light-and-tunnel event, this time in Ukraine. Only now, it’s not the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s the tunnel at the end of the light. What do we mean by that? 

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Business, Geopolitics, Government, Imperialism, Military, Politics, Propaganda, War

Tagged

The Phone Call, by William Gudal

Posted on March 1, 2023 | 1 comment

It would take about 30 seconds to make the world a lot better place than it is now. From SLL contributor William Gudal:

Somewhere in the Ukraine the phone rings:

“Hello, Volodymyr here”

“Hi Mr. President, Joe Biden speaking”

“So good to hear from you. It’s been days”

“It’s over”

“We have a poor connection”

“Volo, so you do not misunderstand, no more money, nor more armaments. We stand ready to help you with the transition to neutrality.”

“But . . . “

“It will all work out, Bye”

One phone call lasting less than one minute changes the world for the next 25 years. The carnage stops. The world economy abruptly changes. NATO goes home and resumes its customary barracks role, training for phantom aggression that will never come. Russia rightfully retains its warm water port on the Black Sea. The US is forced to deal with an economic competitor on a more level playing field. The danger of nuclear catastrophe lessens. Sino- Russian dialogue adjusts to a diminished likelihood of US invasion. Inexpensive energy returns to Europe. The madness of the US neocon/neo liberal dream of dismantling Russia is deferred to another day. The altar boys of Europe gain some self-respect. Money is reallocated to a frighteningly long list of US domestic needs. Germany avoids being suckered once again into a war not of its making.

Continue reading →

1 Comment

Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, War

Tagged

Public vs. Private: Managing Perceptions of the War in Ukraine, by Ted Snider

Posted on March 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

They say something different in private than they do in public. They must be politicians. From Ted Snider at libertarianinstitute.org:

“I want Russia to be defeated in Ukraine,” French President Emmanuel Macron publicly told the media. But it’s not what he privately told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He also said that now is not the right time for dialogue with Moscow and that France is ready to sustain “a longer conflict.” That’s not what he told Zelensky either.

“America…will stand with you as long as it takes,” President Biden publicly promised Ukraine in his State of the Union Address. But it’s not what his administration privately told Zelensky.

“The war I know about is not the war you are reading about,” investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said recently.

Managing public perception about the war to control the narrative and maintain support seems to have required a divorce between what NATO officials are telling Ukraine privately and what they are telling the public they are telling Ukraine.Biden’s public mantra has been “nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine” and “will stand with you as long as it takes.” Privately, neither seems to be true.

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, Horseshit, Media, Politics, War

Tagged

JFK’s Remarkable Peace Speech that Sealed His Fate, by Jacob G. Hornberger

Posted on March 1, 2023 | Leave a comment

The Deep State doesn’t take kindly to politicians who actually take peace seriously enough to strive for it. From Jacob G. Hornberger at fff.org:

The deep animosity against Russia and China that the U.S. national-security establishment has inculcated in the American people brings to mind the remarkable speech that President Kennedy delivered on June 10, 1963, at American University that sealed his fate.

Just imagine what would happen to any American who today dares to say good things about Russia and China. The Russia haters and the China haters will heap condemnation and calumny on them. The haters will accuse them of being “Putin lovers” who support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In the case of China, they will accuse them of being communist sympathizers who support China’s military expansionism. 

No, there is no room in America for positive sentiments toward Russia and China. Through the power of indoctrination, the Pentagon and the CIA have succeeded in inculcating a mindset of deep hostility all across America toward both Russia and China.

Of course, they did the same thing back in the Cold War era, perhaps even more so given that, during that time, both Russia and China were communist regimes. Throughout the Cold War decades, Americans were indoctrinated in the same way that Americans today are indoctrinated. They were taught to hate and fear the Russian Reds and the Chinese Reds and, for that matter, the North Korean Reds, the Cuban Reds, the Vietnamese Reds, the Chilean Reds, the Guatemalan Reds, and, well, all the Reds in the world, including those who were inside the United States. 

Continue reading

Leave a comment

Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, History, Intelligence, Politics, Propaganda, War

Tagged ,