2017_06_25 14:45


TL:DR - Military intelligence and CIA determined that Assad did not use sarin gas in the April 4, 2017 attack on jihadist rebel leaders.  They clearly communicated this information to President Thump, but he had already made up his mind (from watching TV news reports) that Assad did it, and he had already decided to launch a military attack, regardless of the facts. Hijinks ensue. Veteran journalist Seymour Hersh (My Lai, Abu Gharaib) tells the tale, in detail.

The April incident in which Assad was accused of a Sarin gas attack, and the vilification of the Russian government for a media cover up was complete, absolute bullshit.  This was clear if you did not depend on our failed legacy media for your information about the world.  Thump's response to this bullshit story, launching 60 Tomahawk cruise missiles at an evacuated Syrian air base was another horrendous war crime (nine civillians, including women and children were reportedly killed, when these smart weapons missed their targets) was widely and wildly hailed as bold and presidential by the media whores, many whom had previously been virulently anti Thump.

Seymour Hersh, probably the best and most important investigative reporter since Ida Tarbell, has published chapter and verse on exactly what bullshit went on in the corridors of power around this sordid episode.  Of course, Hersh published this article overseas; the man who revealed the My Lai, Vietnam mass murder/war crime, who described the depth of the torture and murder at Abu Ghareb decades later, and plenty of important work in between can no longer be read in any American mainstream media outlet.

The main article is long (24 minutes reading time according to the editor) but well worth the effort.  Among other things, it illustrates very clearly Thump's decision making in this life and death instance.  And it ain't pretty, but it is perfectly consistent with what we very well know of the President, (when we aren't foaming at the mouth in reaction to his latest outrage.) Source is the Sunday edition of Die Welt, (Welt am Sonntag) a major German daily newspaper.

Trump‘s Red Line Von Seymour M. Hersh

sidebar story, a conversation between an American soldier and a CIA spook a Security Advisor on the ground in Syria on post somewhere in Central Command.

"We got a fuckin‘ problem“

and a commentary piece, on Hersh and the backstory on this story.

The Fog of War Von Dirk Laabs

 This report details the fact that the intelligence community quickly and definitively established that the Syrians did not use chemical weapons.

"Trump issued the order despite having been warned by the U.S. intelligence community that it had found no evidence that the Syrians had used a chemical weapon."

But Thump didn't care about the facts; he saw dead children on CNN, and he quickly decided to bomb Syria in retaliation.  In retaliation for the propaganda aired by cable news, (or, in the parlance of our times, 'Fake News'); a plethora of deadly images misattributed, misreported and outright manufactured to push a lie about chemical weapons.

The intelligence made clear that a Syrian Air Force SU-24 fighter bomber had used a conventional weapon to hit its target: There had been no chemical warhead. And yet it was impossible for the experts to persuade the president of this once he had made up his mind. “The president saw the photographs of poisoned little girls and said it was an Assad atrocity,” the senior adviser said. “It’s typical of human nature. You jump to the conclusion you want. Intelligence analysts do not argue with a president. They’re not going to tell the president, ‘if you interpret the data this way, I quit.’”

Kinda like in 2013, when 0bama almost bit at the propaganda (that time pushed by some in the intelligence and nat sec agencies).  But Thump just flat out ignores intelligence facts he doesn't like, as opposed to his two immediate predecessors, whose minions instruct the spooks to come up with the intelligence that supports their forgone conclusions and decisions.  So, progress?

Thump's 'thought' process (perhaps decision process is more accurate) is both frighteningly alarming and pretty much what we should expect.  He has a long public record of snap decisions and pronouncements in opposition to facts, supporting his own interests or his whims of the moment.  He now has a five month record as president, which has seen quick 180˚ turns by him or his administration officials.  The Qatar/Saudi Arabia feud.  The role of NATO in the 21st century.  Even this story:  just a few days before the cruise missile attack, Tillerson and Haley were saying publicly and unambiguously that regime change in Syria was no longer an objective.  But a few days later, missiles are flying and Haley is again demanding that Assad must go.  (Oh, and private citizen Thump insisted in 2013 that the president must have congressional approval before bombing Syria.)

I could quote plenty more from these articles, but I'll list my takeaways.

1. There is a big disconnect between Thump and his highest officials (Tillerson, Mathis, et al) regarding this story, which I will bet is true throughout the administration.

2. Unsurprisingly, Thump will do what he wants to do, at the moment, facts consequences or even death of others be damned.

3.  Again, out of 59 missiles (one failed at launch), this article admits 24 missed their targets (Syrian, Russian and other sources say as many as 36 missed).  This article quotes a soldier as saying the Russians have the capability to stop Tomahawk missiles, between their electronic jamming techniques and their anti-missile artillery/radar/rockets.  The surfeit of damage done to the airfield, as presented by the US DoD photographs is the strongest argument that few missiles hit their mark.  The why is fascinating to me.  Technical failure?  Particularly if this was a way to clear old, obsolete stock from the shelves, and pump more money into the MIC.  Russians tried to shoot down/disable all 59 and they had a high failure rate?  Russians intended to shoot down some but not all, either to protect their own people and assets while not caring as much about Syrian personnel? Or as a face saving measure, while demonstrating, 'yeah, we can shoot 'em down.   Time, and if we end up in a shooting war with Russia will answer these questions that bug me much more than they should.

4.  The anti-Russia propaganda did not begin with the Wikileaks email disclosures and the election last year.  The grossly dishonest propaganda during the Ukraine crisis, and the shoot down of the Malaysian passenger airliner opened a new era of Russophobia.  This story, ostensibly about Assad gassing his own people, quickly became another opportunity to Blame Russia.

By now, there are several good articles that compile, chapter and verse, the falsehoods behind the election and dnc 'hacks'.  If I am so inspired, I'll post a couple here.  But they are readily available on line.

All this Russia hacking stuff is complete bullshit.  Last week the WaPo dramatically repackaged the same pile of lies, irrelevant half-truths and unnamed sources to feed the masses the same meal of bullshit.  It is sad how completely the legacy media is party to this blatant propaganda, and how many otherwise thinking people believe it.

There are plenty of events that are distressing signs of how badly corrupted virtually every aspect of our society has become.  Most days I read to keep up but I don't have the desire to tweet about it, much less write about it.  I'm gonna keep repeating:  Thump is a disaster, but he is merely a symptom.  Our foreign and domestic policies are a disaster; our politics are a disaster;  the only alternative we were allowed to vote for (or against) in November is a well proven disaster.  Yeah, I get tired of repeating the same theme, even with new current evidence.  Seymour Hersh, however, is always worth the effort.

But lest we forget, there was one prominent democrat who publicly disagreed with Thump's cruise missile attack. This leading figure, coincidentally hours before the attack, stated that the proper response was to destroy all of Assad's air bases.  I am sure that is just what the speaker would do, were she not cheated her big moment in history.  Hillary Clinton: US should 'take out' Assad's air fields CNN Updated 5:28 AM ET, Fri April 7, 2017

Hey, you think I'd get through a post w/o mentioning Secretary Clinton?  Of course you didn't.  But, I'm not alone.  From the convo between the soldier and the security advisor:

Security Advisor: What are the Russians doing or saying  Am I correct that we did little real damage to Russia or Syria?                        

American Soldier: We didn't hit a damn thing, thankfully. They retrograded all their aircraft and personnel. We basically gave them a very expensive fireworks display.                       

AS: They knew where ships were and watched the entire strike from launch to end game.                       

AS: The Russians are furious. Claiming we have the real Intel and know the truth about the weapons depot strike.                       

AS: They are correct.                       

AS: I guess it really didn't matter whether we elected Clinton or Trump. Fuck.                       

2017.04.11
18:20

Within hours of this latest gassing of Syrian people, it was obviously very likely not the responsibility of Dr.  Assad.  Primarily because, the last time a gas attack was attributed to the Assad government forces, 2013, it was very quickly proved to be a false flag attempt by the rebel forces.  We nearly went to war over this.  Obama even said he backed off from launching an attack, because he was shown the proof. That long Atlantic magazine exit interview.

Shortly after the incident, as the fake corroboration (such as the transparently bogus White Helmets video rolled in, hey fellas, if you don't wear gloves and a real gas mask while taking care of sarin victims, you gonna die too) and the complete lack of evidence presented to support the bullshit claim, any thinking person (who doesn't watch cable news) knew this blaming Assad was 100% garbage.

And Thump attacked.

Syria: New U.S. Air Support On Request Scheme For Al-Qaeda

Is There A New U.S. Syria Policy? Is There One At All?

The Great Illusion 

Sentence First - Verdict Afterward

A multi-level analysis of the US cruise missile attack on Syria and it's consequences

2015_4_03
17:35

Glad it is springtime, and that baseball is back.  I've been away from the blog due to some personal setbacks and a difficult illness (nothing life-threatening, but sucks nonetheless.)  Plus, the disconnect between how I see the world, the way our nation is going, and the fictions that most people embrace, as offered by our media and our alleged leaders has worn me down.  I am tired of hearing/writing my own opinions and ideas, and don't feel much like bothering.

Reality will eventually reassert itself.  Part of me wants it to hurry, part of me fears that day.

But things are bad.  War, racism, economic manipulation and oppression, poisoned air, food, water and medications.  I still watch and read, particularly events in the Ukraine, but I have less and less to say.

So, sports.  On to Baseball season, and Giants Tickets.  In the post below.  

2014_09_15
17:35

Obama renews overt military attacks in Iraq, extending them to Syria, to counter the newest threat to our security, ISIL.  Bullshit.

This will be used to relaunch regime change in Damascus.  US bombs will fall on Assad's forces, and the US will now, finally, overtly try to destroy his rule.  I think this is Obama's idea of being clever--under the cover of the latest escalation against Terrorism, fool us all by actually waging war on Damascus.  What Russia does in response (if anything) will be quite interesting.  How this blows back, on Israel or otherwise, will also be interesting.

The  ceasefire in Ukraine has lasted longer than I expected, but it was never widespread or comprehensive.  While most of the fighting did stop, and the lack of killing over the past week is welcome, battles continued and shelling of civilian residential districts in Donesk killed dozens.  The ceasefire, to a significant degree, is bullshit.

During this respite, the Kiev forces are concentrating, reorganizing and rearming.  I expect they will launch significant attacks very soon, trying to secure some military victories before winter comes.  This is a guess--there are so many factors in play.  I also assume such a possibility is in the forefront of planning by the Novorussia military.  As well as in the plans of Putin and Russia, in their defense against the continued advances of NATO/EU/USA in Ukraine and the rest of Europe.

Amid all the propaganda and lies, attempting to discern the internal politics of Kiev and of Russia is particularly challenging.  The role of wealthy oligarchs in both capitals is particularly opaque.  While the Kiev regime was installed by the US and the EU, the degree to which the Western powers are pulling the strings day to day may have significantly decreased, given the military failure and the US 'pivot' to Syria.  Or not, and the next round of military violence visited upon the Donbass in the East may be specifically directed by Washington.

When the fighting renews, I anticipate Russia will respond in kind, as they did this spring and summer.  The latest round of mindless sanctions against Russia will again damage European economies much more than the target, both directly and with the inevitable Russian retaliatory sanctions.

There are big forces in the American power structure that promote these moves toward more and more war.  The fact that the economy is dead and not getting better cries out for major war to distract us from the harsh reality.  The dogma of so many of those in power (including in Jerusalem) that any chaos in the Arab world is a positive factor drives many of these policy 'failures'.  The factions in the Arab world allied with Washington (Saudi Arabia and Qatar in particular) who have interests not aligned with American security much less with peace.

Yeah, attempting to discern the internal politics of Washington, New York, London and Jerusalem ain't exactly simple either.  Not all bullshit is transparent.

2014_08_29
21:05

The madness of the West's (USA, EU, NATO, Germany) attempt to tiptoe into Ukrainia is turning out not so much as the Obama State Department (and affiliated secret services) planned.  Such big brains and wise knowledgeable souls, too.  Shame they didn't foresee that Putin and the actual 'folks' who live in Eastern Ukraine didn't just say 'OK' when a democratically elected government was brutally overthrown, admittedly with intense involvement of the US, led by Assistant Secretary of State Victoria 'fuck the EU' Nuland, and all the atrocities of the subsequent civil war, fueled and funded by US dollars, weaponry and policies.

This historic episode, unfolding since the start of this year, has been fantastic and surreal.  I am especially struck by three aspects--the increased level of raw lies and misinformation being relentlessly spewed by our government; secondly the astounding success of the Eastern Ukrainian people in winning this civil war (it ain't over yet, but the fat lady is warming up); finally, Putin's actions which have seriously reduced the risk of WW3, while at the same time securing the best interests of his nation using minimal military force and maximal diplomatic efforts.

I have not written much on this topic, but it is far more important than other current events.  ISIS in Syria/Iraq, Israel-Hamas, Ferguson, Mo are all repetition of well-established behaviors.  The clash of Russia and The West, this round at least, is novel, and has not been this hot and dangerous for decades.  One reason I have not written much is that the narrative of the USG and the media is so 180˚ from reality, and that false narrative is so widely accepted.  I can climb that steep hill in my own mind easily (a lifetime of practice) and in face to face discussions with friends, but not so much on a humble, little-read blog.

I tried to write a summary of events of the past eight months, but I just don't have the heart.  Instead, an extremely brief synopsis.

The US/NATO/EU actively overthrew the democratically elected, Russian leaning leader and government of the Ukraine in February. The US supported and financed, to the tune of ~$5 billion the junta that overthrew a democratically elected, Russian-leaning government.  This government was corrupt, but not particularly compared to prior Russian-leaning or West-leaning governments.  The rebellion followed the unacceptable rejection of a free-trade agreement with the EU.  (Funny, people don't generally turn out on the streets to demand regime change over trade agreements--not exactly the emotional hot button that fuels revolution.)  Without overt US prodding and support, there is no regime change--this is not a matter of opinion.

Nuland video:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2y0y-JUsPTU#t=447

They installed a hand-picked junta, which immediately passed laws restricting ethnic/cultural Russian Ukraine citizens in the eastern part of the country from basic rights of citizenship.  Not long afterward, people in two eastern provinces voted to secede, and Kiev launched a civil war to prevent their secession.

In response to the US coup d'etat in Kiev, Putin snatched the Crimean Peninsula, an essential piece of territory if you have a big navy.  It was far less of a snatch than portrayed by the US, as Russia had a long-term lease on naval bases there, the population is overwhelmingly Russian-speaking and otherwise ethnically/culturally, the new government in Kiev quickly passed laws outlawing the speaking of the Russian language and other stupid discriminatory laws, and the people of the Crimea overwhelmingly voted to secede, and to join the Russian Federation.

Obama and the West did not like this.  The leveled economic sanctions against Russia, and sent money and arms to Kiev to push the civil war.

The US loves elections, except when they don't.  Twice this spring in Ukrainia, the USG declared elections they did not like as invalid.  The second time, in Crimea, they couldn't do shit about it.  So they declared sanctions, the next best thing to doing nothing (but running their mouth.)

The civil war quickly became an exercise in ethnic cleansing, by the Kiev junta, with full matériel support and probable operational support of the USA, NATO and the EU.  But instead of a quick victory (as promised by Kiev,) the war bogged down.

The Kiev junta (and their west backers) have screamed and screeched repeatedly blatant large lies that Russia was 1) invading; 2) massing troops on the border getting ready to invade; 3) was directly responsible for the civil war (conveniently ignoring the direct responsibility of the USA for the civil war and the whole mess; 4) frequent outrageous specific lies regarding destroyed invading Russian armored columns, but providing zero evidence, just replacing the lie of the day with a new lie.

Then, someone shot down a civilian airplane, murdering 300 people.  Russia was immediately blamed, Putin anointed the next Hitler, and more sanctions leveled.

Funny thing, since that airliner was destroyed nearly two months ago.  There has been no large scale Russian invasion--only support on the same covert level as that of the West.  The actual culprit in the airline murder is likely the Kiev government.  Yet, no info from the black boxes, from satellite surveillance, from examination of the wreckage has been produced.  You can be sure were there proof of Russian or rebel blame, it would be all over the tv.  But, crickets.

Another funny thing.  The rag-tag rebels have been winning the civil war.  Despite weekly pronouncements (ie lies) that the rebels are being crushed, on the verge of defeat by the junta forces, the rebels are kicking ass and establishing their freedom from Kiev.  And while Putin is certainly providing some level of materiel support, just as is NATO and the USA, this is a rebel thing.  Putin's overt actions are sending food, water and generators into the war zone.  And advocating peace and negotiation.

I could go on and on.  I am distressed because the Kiev junta has murderously bombed the urban centers of the rebel territory relentlessly for weeks now.  As their defeat materializes, they increase the bombing.  Murdering their own citizens, with the full support of the US/NATO.  As they scream 'it's all Putin's fault--the Russians are coming'.

The lies and propaganda are distressing enough.  The mass bombing and murder of civilians, women and children, which dwarfs that happening simultaneously in Gaza, to the silence of the western media saddens me deeply.  Particularly because Obama and the west could stop the madness at any time.

But, there are fish to be fried.  The motives of the US were 1) NATO expansion, including military presence in Ukrainia, on Russia's doorstep, in violation of prior US promises across several administrations; 2) economic rape of the Ukrainian natural resources and assets, primarily fossil fuel, pipelines for fossil fuels, and vast agricultural lands; 3) retribution against Putin for his involvement in Syria, for Edward Snowden, and for his repeated making Obama look like the fool he is.

 As usual, oil/gas/pipelines underlie the whole murderous mess.  Mass civilian bombings, war fever, slav killing slav while the west prompts their proxies to kill some more.  And, ignominious defeat looms, with likely dismemberment of Ukrainia.

That is if we are lucky.  World wars start amid such instability and active stupidity/propaganda/casual mass murder/bullshit rhetoric from political leaders.  False accusations of invasion and shooting down airliners (passenger ships/the USS Maine) are lifted straight from our history books.

If only the USA would mind it's own fucking business, there would be a hell of a lot less killing and war.  But, not much profit nor political power in that.