Category Archives: Governments

Chris Hedges: Ukraine’s Death by Proxy

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

Ukraine is the new Afghanistan. From Chris Hedges at consortiumnews.com:

Proxy wars devour the countries they purport to defend. There will come a time when the Ukrainians will become expendable to the U.S. They will disappear, as many others before them, from U.S. national discourse and popular consciousness.

There are many ways for a state to project power and weaken adversaries, but proxy wars are one of the most cynical. Proxy wars devour the countries they purport to defend. They entice nations or insurgents to fight for geopolitical goals that are ultimately not in their interest.

The war in Ukraine has little to do with Ukrainian freedom and a lot to do with degrading the Russian military and weakening Russian President Vladimir Putin’s grip on power. And when Ukraine looks headed for defeat, or the war reaches a stalemate, Ukraine will be sacrificed like many other states, in what one of the founding members of the C.I.A., Miles Copeland Jr., referred to as the “Game of Nations” and “the amorality of power politics.”

I covered proxy wars in my two decades as a foreign correspondent, including in Central America where the U.S. armed the military regimes in El Salvador and Guatemala and Contra insurgents attempting to overthrow the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. I reported on the insurgency in the Punjab, a proxy war fomented by Pakistan.

I covered the Kurds in northern Iraq, backed and then betrayed more than once by Iran and Washington. During my time in the Middle East, Iraq provided weapons and support to the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) to destabilize Iran. Belgrade, when I was in the former Yugoslavia, thought by arming Bosnian and Croatian Serbs, it could absorb Bosnia and parts of Croatia into a greater Serbia. 

Proxy wars are notoriously hard to control, especially when the aspirations of those doing the fighting and those sending the weapons diverge. They also have a bad habit of luring sponsors of proxy wars, as happened to the U.S. in Vietnam and Israel in Lebanon, directly into the conflict.

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Posted in Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, History, Military, Politics, War

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“One Health”, ESG & “Sustainable Development”: Inside the WHO’s “Pandemic Treaty”, by Simon Elmer

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

An excellent survey of what the globalists are trying to do with world health. From Simon Elmer at off-guardian.org:

The World Health Organization is the One Ring to Rule them All, and its written goal, inscribed in fiery letters along both sides of its band, is the Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response Treaty. Fashioned by the Dark Lord of the Twenty-first Century, the United States of America, in its own iteration of Mount Doom, it only appears to yield US sovereignty to an external organisation.

In reality and practice, as this article will show, the Treaty will give Washington increased power over the G20 nations — the holders of the other ‘rings’ — and through them the rest of the Western World: not only its people but also its animals, its eco-systems, its resources. This, and not the health of the globe, is its dark purpose.

The Civil War

The World Health Organization, which since January 2020 has received $782 million in grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is a corporate-funded and lobbied agency of the United Nations without legal jurisdiction over the populations of its 194 member states — to which it acts, at least in principle, in an advisory role.

But that’s going to change soon.

On 3 March 2022, as lockdown regulations were revoked across Europe and NATO declared its proxy war on Russia, the European Council adopted a decision to authorise the opening of negotiations for an international Treaty on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response. Under the terms of this Treaty, the member-states of the World Health Organization will be legally bound to implement restrictions on human rights and freedoms — such as further lockdowns, mandatory face masking, compulsory gene therapy, a system of digital identity and programmes of surveillance and censorship — all on the judgement of the WHO.

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Posted in Civil Liberties, Governments, Medicine, Tyranny

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On War With China, Australia Is Caught Between A Rock And A Pentagon, by Caitlin Johnstone

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

Militarily, Australia and the U.S. are joined at the hip. Economically, Australia and China are joined at the hip. It makes for an interesting situation because China and the U.S. view each other as adversaries. From Caitlin Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

As part of Australian media’s relentless onslaught of war–with–China propaganda, the government-run Australian Broadcasting Corporation just aired a radio segment on RN Breakfast about the newly revealed details on the AUKUS nuclear-powered submarine deal, featuring two guests who are enthusiastic supporters of the deal, and hosted by another enthusiastic supporter of the deal.

One of the guests, Australia’s former treasurer and ambassador to the United States Joe Hockey, made some interesting remarks.

“This locks us in with the United States for decades to come; is there a risk, as the smaller partner in this deal, we’ll just have to do what the US tells us when it comes to future wartime engagements?” host Patricia Karvelas asked Hockey.

“Well we’re already fully integrated with the United States military, and arguably have been for more than one hundred years,” Hockey replied. “We’re the only country in the world that has fought side-by side with them in every major battle for the last one hundred years. And already today a lot of our navy has the Aegis Combat System, which is an American combat system; our current Collins-class submarines use American torpedoes… and in every major way, communications systems and integration, we already have American technology, and we’re integrated with American systems. So there’s nothing new here in that regard.”

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Posted in Economics, Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, Military, Trade

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Israel and Its US Lobby Dealt Major Blow by China-Saudi-Iran Peace Initiative, by Grant Smith

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

It looks like Israel and the U.S. are not going to have the run of the Middle East. From Grant Smith at automaticearth.com:

On Thursday the New York Times ran yet another report about Saudi Arabia’s entry into an “Abraham Accord,” but if only certain conditions could be met. It quoted longtime Israel lobby heavyweight Martin Indyk and reported on the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s think tank the Washington Institute for Near East Policy “expert” delegation’s visit to Riyadh to finalize a deal. Then on Friday explosive news broke that China had successfully concluded a secret peace agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia.

The plan aims to restore diplomatic relations by reopening embassies within two months. They also agree to restart their April 2001 Security Cooperation. Also back on the front burner is a 1998 General Agreement covering economic, trade, investment, technology, science, culture, sports and youth ties. It is well worth reading the entire statement.

As it often does, the New York Times quickly updated its March 9 story in an attempt not to look foolish having given too much credence to Israel lobby guidance.

Too late.

Israel and its lobby have for decades attempted to steer the United States into attacking Iran. The neocon policy coup of 2001 was not only a plan to get the U.S. to attack Israel’s arch enemy Iraq, it was also designed to steer the US into attacking seven countries in seven years, most prominently Iran.

When the US invasion of Iraq quickly turned into a quagmire, two American Israel Public Affairs Committee executives tried to place stolen classified Department of Defense information incriminating to Iran into circulation at the Washington Post. The operation failed, the Pentagon colonel leaking classified information was prosecuted, while the longtime AIPAC officials were dismissed.

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Biden’s Genius Detente Has Cost America the Old Ballgame, by Phil Butler

Posted on March 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

Biden has built up a formidable anti-U.S. alliance and turned itself into a banana republic. From Phil Butler at lewrockwell.com:

President Joe Biden’s benefactors have lost the world, whether Russia wins or loses in Ukraine. This was a poignant message delivered by Fox News’s Tucker Carlson the other day. Forcing the Russians to act, and pushing them into unbreakable alliances with China, India, and Iran, Biden and Co. have almost overnight turned the United States into one great big meaningless banana republic.

I know, these are strong words, a dramatic revelation. But I and Tucker Carlson are not the only people on Earth who recognize what’s happening. The New Yorker just featured a piece entitled. “Russia and China Unveil a Pact Against America and the West.” February 7th, Moscow and Beijing declare their opposition to the further enlargement of NATO and the formation of other regional security alliances.

It’s America’s worst nightmare. Biden’s blundering, blustery policy toward Putin and Russia is a disaster for the dinosaurs clinging to their Cold War ideologies, and for the average US citizen who will end up devastated when our country has nowhere left to grow or go. Carlson quotes former President Donald Trump saying that “We will never be Russia’s close ally, but if Russia and China ally, we America will be in deep trouble.” And, so we are. The Fox commentator went on to point out that preventing such an alliance against the west, was former President Richard Nixon’s reason for going to China in 1972.

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Betting All on Hegemony; Risking All, To Stave Off Ruin, by Alasdair Macleod

Posted on March 13, 2023 | 1 comment

Western governments are as distrusted at home as they are abroad, maybe more so. From Alasdair Macleod at strategic-culture.org:

The West is too dysfunctional and weak now to fight on all fronts. Yet there can be no retreat without some de-legitimising humiliation of the West.

Just occasionally, a window is opened onto the truth of how the ‘system’ works. Momentarily, it stands naked in its degeneracy. We avert our eyes, yet, it is a revelation (though it shouldn’t be). For, we see clearly how tawdry has been the attire which clothed it. ‘Liberalism’s’ seeming success – almost wholly an ephemeral PR production – serves only to make its underlying internal contradictions more obvious; more ‘in your face’ – much less credible.

This unravelling speaks to a failure to satisfactorily resolve liberal modernity’s inherent contradictions. Or, rather its unravelling derives from the choice to resolve a waning legitimacy, through an ever more totalistic and ideological reaching for hegemony.

One such window has been the sordid affair of the UK pandemic lockdowns – as revealed by a paper trail leak of 100,000 ministerial WhatsApp messages, managing the lockdown project.

What did they show (in the words here of pro-government leading political commentators)? An ugly picture of how a western Establishment interacts in adolescent sniping at each other, and in its utter disdain for the populace.

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Posted in Collapse, Geopolitics, Governments, Politics

Russia, China, Iran… and Saudi Arabia? By Ron Unz

Posted on March 13, 2023 | 1 comment

America is reaping what it has sown. From Ron Unz at unz.com:

On Friday geopolitical plates of tectonic scale may have visibly shifted as Iran and Saudi Arabia, two of the most important countries in the Middle East and erstwhile bitter adversaries, announced that they had reestablished diplomatic relations after a lengthy round of negotiations held with top Chinese officials in Beijing.

Back in 1945, President Franklin Roosevelt famously met on an American cruiser with Ibn Saud, and our important alliance with oil-rich Saudi Arabia came into being.

Though sometimes stressed during the 1973 Oil Embargo and in the aftermath of the 9/11 Attacks, the relationship remained our most important in the Arab World, being responsible for the rise of the Petrodollar and the maintenance of our own greenback as the world’s reserve currency. With America’s industrial base having been reduced to a mere shadow of its once global dominance and our country plagued by horrendous annual budget deficits and accumulated debt, much of our national prosperity and current standard of living probably today depends upon that maintaining that status.

Meanwhile, during the four decades since its 1979 Islamic Revolution, no country in the region has been a greater object of American hostility than Iran. As recently as January 2020, we assassinated Gen. Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s greatest military commander, who had been considered a likely presidential candidate in their 2021 elections.

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The Drums Of War With China Are Beating Much Louder Now, by Caitlin Johnstone

Posted on March 13, 2023 | Leave a comment

There are some in high places who think war with China is probable, and don’t seem bothered by the prospect. From Caitlin Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

Comments from both Washington and Beijing have suddenly become much more pointed and aggressive in recent days, with talk about hot war now being discussed as not just a real possibility but in many cases as a probability. Let’s have a look at some of the most significant recent developments.

Beijing comments on US encirclement

The Chinese government has finally broken from its usual restrained commentary on the way the empire has been aggressively encircling the PRC with war machinery in ways that Washington would never permit itself to be encircled and waging economic warfare that it itself would never tolerate.

“Western countries—led by the U.S.—have implemented all-round containment, encirclement and suppression against us, bringing unprecedentedly severe challenges to our country’s development,” President Xi Jinping said in a speech last week.

China’s new Foreign Minister Qin Gang followed up on Xi’s comments the next day with a warning of “conflict and confrontation” should US aggressions and encirclement continue.

“If the United States does not hit the brake, but continues to speed down the wrong path, no amount of guardrails can prevent derailing, and there surely will be conflict and confrontation,” he said, adding, “Who will bear the catastrophic consequences? Such competition is a reckless gamble with the stakes being the fundamental interests of the two peoples and even the future of humanity.”

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Death of a Myth, by George D. O’Neill, Jr.

Posted on March 13, 2023 | Leave a comment

The U.S. is no longer the unchallenged king of the hill. From George D. O’Neill, Jr., at theamericanconservative.com:

As we witness the collapse of various mainstream narratives, especially those surrounding the U.S./NATO war with Russia in Ukraine, Americans should begin to reassess their understanding of U.S. national leadership. Most American citizens have no notion of the great disparity between what their government does overseas and the stories they hear from its mouthpieces. As a result, Americans unwittingly support all sorts of foreign operations with little or no understanding of what is actually going on. For years, they have been misled by a non-stop propaganda campaign that is only now beginning to crumble.

We are experiencing the death throes of the United States’ unipolar hegemony over large parts of world. Until citizens begin to realize the magnitude of their government’s policy deceptions, it will become increasingly difficult to understand the United States’ changing global position and adjust to the effects of the growing negative perception of our country held by many people around the world.

Since World War II, and particularly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States was the dominant and unrivaled world power. Instead of being a peacekeeper and honest “world’s policeman,” the U.S. has increasingly been a destabilizing bully. Many leaders worldwide have been reluctant to speak up about the increasingly destructive nature of U.S. foreign policy for fear of being punished. But as U.S. stature and power declines, large parts of the world have been seeking arrangements to protect themselves from U.S. predation.

Most Americans do not understand why such realignments are occurring, thanks to a constant stream of propaganda about America being the “most generous,” the “exceptional nation,” a “nation that sets aside its interests for the benefit of the world,” an “important source of good” around the globe as the “protector of the rules based order,” always shouldering the heavy responsibility to protect the international system and weak nations from bad actors, ad nauseam. According to a number of sources, U.S.-caused wars have been directly responsible for the deaths of more than 10 million people since World War II. The neoconservatives will scoff at these facts and their sources, but most of the rest of the world believes this to be true.

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Posted in Geopolitics, Governments, History, Politics

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Who Did Blow Up the Nord Stream Pipeline? By Ted Snider

Posted on March 13, 2023 | 1 comment

Regardless of whether Seymour Hersh’s account or the far less believable New York Times’ account of the Nordstream pipeline sabotage is correct, the implications for Europe, Ukraine, and the U.S. are dire. From Ted Snider at antiwar.com:

In September 2022, the Nord Stream gas pipelines exploded in one of the most spectacular political and environmental acts of terrorism in history.

In the days immediately following the attack, which cut Germany and Europe off from its gas supply and released enormous amounts of methane gas into the atmosphere, the West immediately pronounced judgement against Russia. “No one on the European side of the ocean is thinking this is anything other than Russian sabotage,” said a senior European environmental official. US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm immediately said that it “seems” Russia is to blame.

But investigations by Sweden, Denmark and Germany, countries close to the explosion site, were slow to report and unable to arrive at conclusions. Then, on December 21, 2022, The Washington Post reported that, after months of investigation, there is nothing to suggest that Russia was responsible. The Post article interviewed “23 diplomatic and intelligence officials in nine countries” who said that “[t]here is no evidence at this point that Russia was behind the sabotage.” It reports that “even those with inside knowledge of the forensic details don’t conclusively tie Russia to the attack.” The Wall Street Journal reports that there is a “growing sense among investigators in the U.S. and Europe that neither Russian-government nor pro-Russian operatives were behind the sabotage.”

But if Russia didn’t do it, then one of us did.

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Posted in Crime, Energy, Geopolitics, Governments, Media, Politics

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