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Syria regime change PR in high gear: More ‘newborn baby slaughter’ propaganda

February 13, 2012

Patrick Henningsen
21st Century Wire
February 12, 2012

LONDON – We can already see exact parallels with the current PR operation to bring down Syria with how Libya went down. In one story published today, it seems that one award-winning mainstream newspaper has been caught red-handed running faux news on Syria - and incredibly, it’s not the first time this exact story has been used.

Late last week, reporter Alastair Beach of The Independent newspaper based in London, cited “evidence” in his article entitled “Assad’s slaughter of the innocents“, claiming that Syrian President Assad’s security forces have indiscriminately killed scores of newborn babies in Homs this week, as his article claims:

“Bashar al-Assad’s bloody siege of Homs intensified yesterday as clear evidence emerged that his indiscriminate shelling of the restive town had started claiming innocent victims, including at least 18 premature babies and three entire families. The evidence came as civilians in the besieged city endured a fifth day of incessant shellfire – the worst yet, according to eyewitnesses – with dozens of other people being killed as the brutal assault continued.”

Writer Beach’s source for his claims seem to originate from only one organization, not in Syria – but in London. Surprisingly, the Independent’s chief source for the alleged horrors in question is a nearly invisible organization known as the ”Syrian Observatory for Human Rights”(SOHR) (and to make matters worse, there are two competing SOHR orgs in London- with the same name although the Independent does not provide a link to either org), who claim to have an office based in London, but apparently have no address or contact phone number listed - only and email address. Even murkier however, is that fact that there are no names associated with the SOHR on their website, and many of its articles have been written under the fictitious pen name known as “Rami Abdul Rahman“.

It’s likely that “Rami Abdul Rahman” could be one Rami Abdelrahman, depicted in other online press coverage as head of the SOHR, and is reported to have met with Britain’s Foreign Secretary,William Hague at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on November 21, 2011.

One can only conclude that with no names or contact information, the SOHR is – by definition - a very well-hidden, clandestine lobbying organization, and in this case, it appears to be lobbying for regime change in Syria, from inside Britain’s Foreign Office.

 Before regime change in Tripoli, the US, France and Britain relied on the likes of Soliman Bouchuiguir, the former Libyan League for Human Rights president with ties to NATO’s National Transitional Council (NTC), helped to generate numerous lies needed by the west to justify NATO’s now famously titled “humanitarian intervention” – allegedly to protect Libyans.  This human rights impostor – like his present day Syrian counterpart Rami Abdelrahman who may very well have ties to the Paris-based rebel coalition known as Syrian National Council (SNC), made then Colonel Moumar Gaddafi a targeted by spreading lies of alleged state crimes – but with with no evidence, as outlined in documents released last October by the publication Voltaire. Syria’s President Assad is currently undergoing the exact same treatment, and in the exact same manner.

Babies in incubators: a recycled media hoax

Amazingly, this exact same story was also making the rounds recently in August of 2011, when a similar claim was busy circulating online through various social networks including Twitter in Arabic - the exact same tale of premature babies who died in their incubators when Syrian forces cut off electricity to hospitals during their assault, not in Homs, but on the city of Hama.

Even though it admits that it could not independently verify the account, CNN still ran with the SOHR rumor back in August, broadcasting: ”Rights Group: 8 babies die after power cut to Syrian hospital“.

Electronic Infidada reported on the August 2011 baby hoax, stating back then, “Evidence suggests it is a cruel hoax, and the pictures of the “dead babies” widely circulated online are false.”  They went on to outline parallels between the August faux story and other past regime change PR campaigns:

“URGENT – Syria | The electricity was cut today from the city of Hama, and the outage included the hospitals. Following this, the Shabiha [state militia] deliberately destroyed the electricity generators in the hospitals which led to the deaths of all the premature babies (more than 40 in a single hospital).”

To me the story was immediately suspicious. First of all it sounded too much like the false reports of invading Iraqi troops throwing babies out of incubators in Kuwait in August 1990 — reports that were used to build public support and urgency for the 1991 Gulf War. These claims were part of an elaborate propaganda effort by the Washington PR consultancy Hill & Knowlton hired by the Kuwaiti government.

The fact that an award-winning newspaper like the UK’s Independent would use such a shadowy outfit to support one of its most shocking headlined stories on the crisis in Syria – is also surprising in itself. The biggest problem with both seperate claims of dying babies in incubators put forward by the SOHR, and circulated in the corporate media by the likes of  The Independent and CNN, is that at no point along the line, has the SOHR been held accountable for what are patently unsubstantiated claims.

Lobbying groups and their governments in-exile are traditionally the source of anti-regime “heart-string” reports which have in the past been passed on for broadcast by major media outlets, which naturally follows with favoring pre-emptive military strike, or as recently seen with Libya – a ‘humanitarian intervention’. 

We can see how the corporate media will knowingly run sensationalist, unverified accounts of human rights events in countries like Libya and Syria, but what about out elected leaders? Will they too run with these same wild claims in order to make their public case for war?

No doubt. Members of the NATO governments have also been assigned their roles in making intervention possible. Britain’s William Hague seems to be running point on the PR campaign for regime change in Syria. Following Russia and China’s veto of the UN’s recent revolution for action in Syria, Hague condemned the decision – and used wild, unverified statistics most likely gleaned from his friend at the SOHR, as reported by the Guardian:

“More than 2,000 people have died since Russia and China vetoed the last draft resolution in October 2011,” he said after the vote. “How many more need to die before Russia and China allow the UN security council to act?”

Journalist Tony Cartalucci reported back in December regarding the clandestine activities of SOHR, adding:

It is quite clear that the “Syrian Observatory for Human Rights” based in London and receiving the entirety of their reports via “phone” & YouTube videos from Syria, is working in coordination with both US-funded NGOs and the British Foreign Minister. Considering that Hague similarly coddled Libyan opposition leaders in London while playing a key role in promoting the NATO attack on Libya and the subsequent installation of a BP oilman as “prime minister,” Abdelrahman’s consorting signifies a verbatim repeat of the now openly fraudulent and genocidal NATO campaign in Libya.

Just as in Libya, where “human rights activists” have now admitted to fabricating the evidence used by the International Criminal Court and the United Nations to rubber stamp Wall Street and London’s designs for regime change, likewise the “evidence” from Syria has turned out to be a complete fraud, derived by opposition “witnesses” and compiled by a corporate D.C. think-tank director into a UN “human rights report.”

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights serves as the exclusive source of “reports” coming out of Syria despite the fact that it is actually, entirely based in London. While it is verified that the NGOs it works in tandem with are US-funded, the Observatory itself fails to publish where its money comes from or the backgrounds of those that constitute its membership. We then, are expected to simply believe on face value a mysterious organization whose head meets with the British government and their unverified “witness accounts” as evidence to initiate military intervention at the cost of potentially millions of lives.

The UN based the whole premise for its Security Council Resolution 1973 for Libya on reports from western-backed Libyan rebels and the NTC. Their wild claims included – unbelievably and highly reported by the western media - that Gaddafi led jet attacks on his own people, and killed more than 6,000 unarmed protester cum civilians in the run up to NATO intervention. This jet claim was needed as a key component in order to get a No Fly Zone included in resolution 1973.

During the run-up to their vote on the matter, no due diligence was carried out by any of the UN member states, which stands to reason, why the whole UN Libyan affair – from beginning to end, was planned and executed as a political operation - hardly of any humanitarian concern. 

Here we are again, at another crossroads, so soon after the last one. And like clockwork, the same patterns are emerging to sway western public opinion, this time against President Assad and his Syrian government. It seems that consumers of the press in the west are being force fed another endless diet of false claims designed to sway public opinion in favor of military action by NATO, or NATO-backed allies in Syria, and later in Iran.

This writer has already attempted to contact SOHR via their email address, in order to receive further clarification as to the source of their recent claims that Assad’s security forces are responsible for the death of 18 newborn babies, but have yet to receive any response from the London-based organization.

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Posted in 2012, 2012 Election, Afghanistan, International News, Iran, Syria, Uncategorized, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | Leave a Comment »

Obama’s Secret Letter to Tehran: Is the War against Iran On Hold?

January 25, 2012

Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
4th Media
January 23, 2012

“The Road to Tehran Goes through Damascus”

The New York Times announced that the Obama Administration had sent an important letter to the leadership of Iran on January 12, 2012. [1]

On January 15, 2012, the spokesperson of the Iranian Foreign Ministry acknowledged that the letter had been delivered to Tehran by way of three diplomatic channels:

(1) one copy of the letter was handed to the Iranian Ambassador to the United Nations, Mohammed Khazaee, by his U.S. counterpart, Susan Rice, in New York City;

(2) a second copy of the letter was delivered in Tehran by the Swiss Ambassador to Iran, Livia Leu Agosti; and

(3) a third copy went to Iran by way of Jalal Talabani of Iraq. [2]

In the letter, the White House spelled out the position of the United States, while Iranian officials said it was a sign of things as they really are: the U.S. cannot afford to wage a war against Iran.

Within the letter written by President Barak Hussein Obama was a U.S. request for the start of negotiations between Washington and Tehran to end Iranian-U.S. hostilities.

“In the letter, Obama announced readiness for negotiations and the resolution of mutual disagreements,” Ali Motahari, an Iranian parliamentarian, told the Mehr News Agency. [3] According to another Iranian parliamentarian, this time the Deputy Chairperson of the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, Hussein Ebrahimi (Ibrahimi), the letter went on to ask for Iranian-U.S. cooperation and negotiations based on the mutual interests of both Tehran and Washington. [4]

Obama’s letter also tried to assure Tehran that the United States would not engage in any hostile action against Iran. [5] In fact, in the same timeframe, the Pentagon cancelled or delayed major joint drills with Israel. [6]

To the Iranians, however, the gestures are meaningless, because the Obama Administration’s actions with Iran have always contradicted its words. Moreover, Iran believes that the U.S. has not attacked, because it knows that the costs of a war with an opponent like Iran are too high and its consequences far too risky.

This, however, does not mean that an Iranian-U.S. showdown has been avoided or will not eventually happen. The currents can go either way, so to speak. Nor does this mean that the Obama Administration is not currently waging a war against the Iranians and their allies. In fact, Washington’s bloc and Iran’s bloc have been fighting a shadow war from the digital arena and television airwaves to the valleys of Afghanistan and the bustling streets of Beirut and Baghdad.

The War Against Iran Started Years Ago

The war in Iran did not start in 2012 or even 2011. Newsweek Magazine even stated the following on a cover title in 2010: “Assassinations, cyberattacks, sabotage – has the war against Tehran already begun?” The actual war may have started in 2006.

Instead of attacking Iran directly, the U.S. has started a covert and proxy war. The covert dimensions of the war are being fought by intelligence assets, cyber attacks, computer viruses, secretive military units, spies, assassins, agent provocateurs, and saboteurs. The kidnapping and assassination of Iranian scientists and military commanders, which started several years ago is a part of this covert war. In this shadow war, Iranian diplomats in Iraq have been abducted and Iranians visiting Georgia, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey have been detained or kidnapped. Syrian officials, various Palestinian figures, and Hezbollah’s Imad Fayez Mughniyeh have also all been assassinated in this shadow war.

The proxy wars started in 2006 when Israel attacked Lebanon with the intention of expanding the war against Syria. The road to Damascus goes through Beirut, while Damascus is on the way to Tehran. After their failure in 2006, realizing that Syria was the lynchpin of the Resistance Bloc, which Iran dominated, the U.S. and its allies spent the next five to six years trying to de-link Syria from Iran.

The U.S. is also fighting Iran and its allies on the diplomatic and economic fronts through the manipulation of international bodies and proxy states. In the 2011 to 2012 context, the crisis in Syria on a geo-political level is a front in the war against Iran. Even the Israeli-U.S. drill Austere Challenge 2012 and the U.S. deployment of troops were primarily aimed at Syria as a means of combating Iran.

Syria in the Eye of the Storm

What Washington is doing is exerting psychological pressure on Iran as a means of distancing it from Syria, so that the United States and its cohorts can go for the kill. Up until the start of January 2012, the Israelis have continuously been preparing to launch an invasion of Syria in a rematch of 2006, while U.S. and E.U. officials have continously tried negotiating with Damascus for a deal to de-link from Iran and the Resistance Bloc. The Syrians, however, have always refused.

Foreign Policy, the magazine of the Council on Foreign Relations, published an article in August 2011 stating what was on the Saudi King’s mind about Syria in context of attacking Iran: “The King knows that other than the collapse of the Islamic Republic [of Iran] itself, nothing would weaken Iran more than losing Syria.” [7] Whether the above statement genuinely came from Abdul Aziz Al-Saud or not, this strategic outlook is representative of the reasons for the targeting of Syria. Obama’s own security advisor has also said the same thing, just a few months after the piece by Foreign Policy was released, in November 2011. National Security Advisor Donilon gave a speech saying that the “end of the Assad regime would constitute Iran’s greatest setback in the region – a strategic blow that will further shift the balance of power in the region against Iran.” [8]

The Kremlin has also made statements that corroborate that Washington wants to de-link Syria from its Iranian ally. One of Russia’s highest security officials has announced that Syria is being punished, because of its strategic alliance with Iran. The Secretary of the National Security Council of the Russian Federation, Nikolai (Nikolay) Platonovich Patrushev, has publicly stated that Syria is the subject of Washington’s pressure due to geo-political interests tied to cutting Syria’s ties with Iran and not due to any humanitarian concerns. [9]

Iran has also given signals that should the Syrians be attacked, it will not hesitate to intervene militarily to come to Syria’s aid. Washington does not want this. The Pentagon would much rather swallow Syria first, before turning its full and undivided attention to Iran. The Pentagon’s objectives are to fight its targets piecemeal. Despite the U.S. military doctrine of fighting simultaneous wars in multiple theatres and all the Pentagon literature about it, the U.S. is not ready yet to wage a conventional regional war against both Iran and Syria or risk an expanded war with Iran’s Russian and Chinese allies yet. The march to war, however, is far from over. For now the U.S. government will have to continue the shadow war against Iran and intensify the media, diplomatic, and economic war.

Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya is a Sociologist and award-winning author. He is a Research Associate at the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal. He Specializes on the Middle East and Central Asia. He Has been a contributor and guest discussing the Broader Middle East on numerous international programs and networks such as Al Jazeera, Press TV and Russia Today. His writings have been published in more than ten languages​​. He also writes for the Strategic Culture Foundation (SCF), Moscow.

NOTES

[1] Elisabeth Bumiller et al., “US sends top Iran leader warning on Hormuz threat,” The New York Times, January 12, 2012.
[2] Mehr News Agency, “Details of Obama’s letter to Iran released,” January 18, 2012.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Yakkov Katz, “Israel, US cancel missile defense drill,” Jerusalem Post, January 15, 2012.
[7] John Hannah, “Responding to Syria: The King’s statement, the President’s hesitation,” Foreign Policy, August 9, 2011.
[8] Natasha Mozgovaya, “Obama Aide: End of Assad regime will serve severe blow to Iran,” Haaretz, November 22, 2011.
[9] Ilya Arkhipov and Henry Meyer, “Russia Says NATO, Persian Gulf Nations Plan to Seek No-Fly Zone for Syria,” Bloomberg, January 12, 2012.

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Posted in 2012, 2012 Election, America, BREAKING NEWS, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Russia, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 4 Comments »

Israel Lobby launch new Super PAC effort to bring down Ron Paul

January 23, 2012

Patrick Henningsen
21st Century Wire
January 23, 2012

For decades, lobbies and special interests have ruled Capitol Hill, with PACs effectively steering the outcome of every major political campaign by injecting money and buying influence. Now we find out that Texas Congressman and GOP candidate Ron Paul has been targeted by a new breed of PAC – this time with foreign backing.

In recent years, activists and advocates have won back some ground in terms of placing limits and disclosure on campaign donations from individuals, businesses and have attempted to rein in some of the financial influence of political action committees (PACs). Just when one dragon was slayed, another, more menacing one was born. Enter the world of the Super PAC.

Following the tragic ruling of US Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, corporations won the same rights as humans, and thus are now about to pump as much money into political campaigns via the unregulated new ‘Super PACs’.

As 501c organizations, Super PACs take advantage of recent election funding rulings which allow corporations, unions and wealthy individuals to operate totally independently – and spend as much as they wish on election campaign media packages. Super PACs can also hold fundraisers to solicit money from donors – with no limits. The rise of the Super PAC has meant a complete runaround of any campaign ethics, or campaign finance regulation.

Where the game was often played according to how much special interests could buy a candidate, the game has now shifted into darker areas, namely, how special interests can take down, and eliminate a candidate during the early part of an election cycle. South Carolina residents are currently being slammed with a record number of Super PAC-funded TV adverts, some of which are negative in nature. More shocking is the fact that all these Super PAC ads are being paid for by just a handful of wealthy donors and establishment syndicates.

According to a recent article in the Washington Post this week, David Donnelly, National Campaigns Director for the Public Campaign Action Fund revealed, “There are probably fewer than 100 people who are fueling 90 percent of this outside money right now.” The report also adds:

In total, these new and unrestrained political action committees spent more than $15 million supporting GOP candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire and are now outspending the official campaigns in South Carolina by 2 to 1, according to advertising and expenditure data.

Out of this small handful of mega-rich donors, the Israeli lobby is represented heavily. The Washington Post adds here:

And casino magnate Sheldon Adelson recently dashed off a $5 million check to a group backing former House speaker Newt Gingrich (Ga.), marking what may be the largest single political contribution in U.S. history. Adelson is well known for supporting hard-line policies favoring Israel while also advocating measures that would benefit the gambling industry.

This level of allowable interference in US campaigns has seen Super PACs propping up certain alternate horses in the political race, in order to take votes away from the any serious rival to Establishment’s front-runner of choice. Based on election results and major polling, Mitt Romney’s only serious rival coming out of New Hampshire would be Ron Paul, yet, large sums of money are still flowing elsewhere in the field. Why?

In terms of the remaining GOP field, one could not find a more unappealing and unpopular candidate to commit millions in PAC funds for the duration of the primaries than Rick Santorum. Similarly, a complete non-runner and failure in all polling, John Huntsman, managed to bag a cool $2.5 million late in the game from the Super PAC, ‘Our Destiny’, which floated his campaign through Iowa and New Hampshire. Both men have secured some heavy backing, but skeptics should really be asking after these primaries have concluded, how a candidate with no real national support base could continue through the primaries – at such a great expense.

Likewise, the career of Newt Gingrich has long since peaked, with many mainstream political pundits even categorizing him as ‘unelectable’, but his recent record-breaking PAC donation from the Israeli lobby establishment figure Sheldon Adelson now begins to make sense. Note that Adelson is also an active financial supporter and media arm for Benjamin Netanyahu’spolitical career in Israel.

Ron Paul is the only GOP candidate who is not overtly ‘pro-Israel’ in the popular neoconservative sense. On January 13, in the run-up to the pivotal South Carolina GOP primary, the Emergency Committee for Israel, run by neoconservative thinker William Kristol, released an ad in which its Director Gary Bauer makes a plea to voters – not endorsing any candidate, rather, telling conservatives that they must reject Congressman Ron Paul as their GOP candidate, deriding his foreign policy views with respect to America’s ‘special relationship’ with Israel, and fighting the War on Terror – concluding that, “We can do better than Ron Paul”. See their advert here:

In reality, Ron Paul has broadcast a consistent message over the years, one which firmly places America first, and foreign entanglements last. He is the only GOP candidate who pledges to bring the troops home, cut off foreign military aid to countries overseas and lastly, he is not supporting any form of military showdown with Iran. For these reasons, his platform comes into direct conflict with the state of Israel – who is advocating the opposite, making him a target of this latest foreign interest Super PAC attack.

From this event, one can state as fact – not theory, that Israel and its supporters in the US are actively working to derail Ron Paul’s race towards the GOP nomination, and the Presidency. This fact alone, should be cause for alarm from even the most moderate of public corridors:

Israel’s lobby in America, AIPAC, is the only foreign agent in America that does not have to register under the Foreign Agent Registration Act. Almost every major American politician in the last decade has either met with AIPAC or flown to Israel to receive approval before running a campaign. Many of America’s congressman have admitted that they constantly ask how Israel feels about a bill before voting on it.

Should a foreign country, in this case Israel, be allowed to buy a significant influence through the media in American democratic elections? Should candidates be allowed to accept donations – even indirectly, from foreign interest PACs or agents thereof, thus creating a serious conflict of interest, and threat to national security?

Democracy for hire?

Once the GOP primaries are finished and the opposition nominee is selected, you will then see the pro-Democratic Super PACS sprung into action. President Obama’s hands will remain clean until that time, but the Democrats could very well fall on this same sword should public outrage in America reach significant levels.

With such an over-arching umbrella of influence determining its outcome, one can only conclude that the American democratic system of elections has been manipulated and twisted to such a degree by powerful special interests, that major elections in the US cannot be classed as either free or fair. Rather they have warped into cynical, stage-managed events, engineered by the few in order to achieve a particular outcome.

What does this say about the state of America in 2012? To this point, Donnelly sums it up: “When you think about the amazing impact that this small number of people have on deciding the election, on the information that people will have on who to vote for, it’s mind-boggling.”

Surely, the American people cannot be a winner in this current climate of campaign high finance and open corruption. Much worse however, in this current set-up the true winner of a genuine democratic race – can never be known.

Many will be understandably outraged to know how this game is being played behind the scenes. If there was ever a time for election reform, it is 2012.

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Posted in 2012, 2012 Election, Afghanistan, America, Arab Spring, BREAKING NEWS, Hollywood, International News, Israel, Middle East, NEWS, Obama, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 1 Comment »

RON PAUL 2012: “Beware of the War Propaganda”

January 13, 2012

Ron Paul is reminding Americans that the lies that led us to war in 2003 with Iraq are being recycled again to prime the pump for a war with Iran in 2012. Our advice: don’t be fooled again.

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Washington’s plan to isolate Iran is drifting towards a profitable stalemate

January 11, 2012

By Patrick Henningsen
21st Century Wire
January 11, 2012

On the surface, the latest spat between the West and Iran looks like a step closer to war, with tensions reaching a fever pitch on both sides of this potential conflict. Upon closer examination however, present conditions are not particularly ideal for a preemptive strike against Iran by the US and Israel. There is still much money to be made from the current crisis – on both sides, before the winds of war could be unleashed on the region.

Military posturing by the United States and Israel near the Strait of Hormuz reached a new level this week with announcement of Austere Challenge 12, a naval drill which looks designed to apply increased pressure on Iran to abandon their alleged nuclear weapons ambitions. At the same time, Iran has announced it will be shoring up its defensive positions by conducting its own war games in neighboring waters. From a military standpoint, exactly how far and how fast these tensions escalate is still uncertain. There have been a number of key indicators though in the last week that hint at a longer, drawn out affair.

Real military conflict not looking favourable

Unlike Iraq or Afghanistan – two countries which offered little or no real military resistance when attacked by the US, Iran actually has the means to fight back and sustain its defensive position, as well as retaliate regionally, over a long period of time. The first target would be any US naval vessels parked or patrolling regional waters. Such a scenario may lead to a multi-regional World War III condition, and without a doubt, will be hugely unpopular in the West, plunging a global economy into a worldwide depression.

In addition, the US and Israel have yet to secure Syria and eliminate the military might of loyal Iranian allies Hezbollah in Lebanon – which must be done in order for the US and Israel to gain the upper hand regionally. Both these points are key factors in achieving a green light for any preemptive strike against Tehran, and both those lights are currently red.

Most experts are also in agreement that any serious clash between the West and Iran could result in a disruption in the flow of oil to a petroleum-dependent global economy that surely needs it now – more than ever.

These stark realities could be pushing the current standoff closer towards a stalemate, than towards the hot conflict that many mainstream media analysts are expecting to take place between now and spring 2012.

Signals from traditional US military and ‘coalition’ ally Great Britain are also not looking great. Addressing a recent conference entitled, “NATO and the Case for Collective Defense in the 21st Century” at Atlantic Council in Washington, the UK’s Defense Secretary Philip Hammond clearly noted, “We would not be in favor of a preemptive strike on Iran.”

Sanctions will not isolate Iran for long

US-led calls for economic sanctions against Iran may partially isolate Iran politically in the short-term, but they do not have the teeth to sustain enough severe pressure over the long run.

Already this week, South Korea announced that it will still be buying Iranian crude oil in 2012. China is also defying the US call for sanctions, stating its plans to make Iran its second largest oil importer in 2012. In addition to these, another trading partner of Iran – Japan, is expecting to receive an exemption from US penalties on Japanese banks doing business with Iran. “We are not considering banning imports,” Japan Times quoted a Japanese Foreign Ministry late last week.

Major oil companies are also represented throughout America’s elite clique of foreign policy think tanks, and like their corporate siblings in the defense industry, they will also reap huge dividends from the appearance of instability and crisis around the Persian Gulf. Such a ‘strategy of tension’ normally sees winners in those industries which are best placed to benefit.

Unlike the steady dollar slide between 2007-2008 which help drive the oil price spike of over $140 per barrel during the summer of 2008, this week’s oil highs of over $100 per barrel are a direct result of the present war-hype and threats of escalation. This will result in an overnight bumper economy for many of the OPEC petrol nations, as well as the major US oil distribution and retail corporations.

A New Cold War is emerging

The West’s last real military standoff was against the former Soviet bloc which came to a political finale in 1991 following the disintegration of the Iron Curtain. It was the world largest-ever arms race, fueled by 20th Century power politics, played out in the form of a Cold War.

The real winners of this long Cold War between the West and the Soviet bloc were those military defense contractors who became incredibly wealthy and influential as a result of decades of 20th Century global power politics. Their influence remains to this day and already, a handful of companies have reaped incredible rewards from the current protracted diplomatic deadlock with Iran. It is little wonder that some of these same corporations actually dictate most US foreign policy to a large degree, through their own CEO’s and board members that also belong to the dominant US-UK foreign policy think tanks including the Council on Foreign Relations, Chatham House and the Atlantic Council who then dictate their international policy recommendations to Washington and London, whose governments finally adopt these as official foreign policy. Their names include Lockheed Martin, General Electric, Raytheon, Boeing and others.

As the threat of a regional confrontation with Iran continues to drag itself out, the trend of profitability looks likely to continue as most of the West’s regional partners continue to both re-arm and upgrade their own defense  systems – with US-made hardware.

The Arab GCC countries like Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Kuwait have already begun their process of re-arming. In December 2011, the United States announced a $3.48 billion arms deal with the UAE, which included state-of-the-art THAD missile defense systems, as part of a wider American effort to build up missile defenses among Gulf allies to counter Iran. On December 29, the White House announced that it was sending nearly $30 billion worth of F-15 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia, part of a $60 billion package – the largest arms deal in history.

In addition, the US and Saudi Arabia signed a $1.7 billion deal earlier in 2011 to boost their Patriot missile batteries, and Kuwait put in their order to purchase 209 GEM-T missiles – at a cost of $900 million. These regional missile defense strategies will also need land-based interceptors to knock out incoming missiles, backed up by a detection network… aboard a group of US Navy Aegis-class warships. By the time this current round of re-arming is complete, US defense contractors will have seen a rise in profits which also means a rise in their all-important share prices.

Still, despite all these significant acquisitions on the part of the GCC so far, by no means do they provide blanket protection from an Iranian retaliatory strike against the Arabian Western allies. They are simply the latest chapter in that time-honoured tradition of Washington stoking regional tension on one hand, and America’s arms industry bleeding the Arab states of hard cash for still more expensive military hardware on the other. The Arabs can naturally afford to pay for their new military hardware from a sustained surge in world oil prices…. caused by the continued hyping of a potential military confrontation which could block the oil industry’s most key transit waterway – the Strait of Hormuz. One can see the geopolitical relationship between these events happening right now.

Here we have the ideal set of conditions for a New Cold War to emerge in the early 21st Century – one where the Western Axis powers of the US, Europe, Israel and the Emirates sit on one side, and Iran, Syria, China, Russia sit on the other. This Cold War will be more about sub-regional dominance in terms of economics – natural gas, mineral and trade relationships, than it will about the political ideologies that seemed to dominate the infamous 20th Century face-off.

How long this current stalemate drags on is anyone’s guess right now, but one thing is for sure – while it continues to brew, there are still massive profits to be made by key players in both the global defense and petroleum industries.

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Posted in 2012, 2012 Election, Afghanistan, International News, Iran, NATO, NEWS, Oil, Uncategorized, United Nations, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 1 Comment »

Faking It: How the Media Manipulates the World into War

January 2, 2012

Global Research TV
January 2, 2011

As the US and Iranian governments escalate tensions in the already volatile Straits of Hormuz, and China and Russia begin openly questioning Washington’s interference in their internal politics, the world remains on a knife-edge of military tension.

Far from being a dispassionate observer of these developments, however, the media has in fact been central to increasing those tensions and preparing the public to expect a military confrontation. But as the online media rises to displace the traditional forms by which the public forms its understanding of the world, many are now beginning to see first hand how the media lies the public into war.

See also:

Former CIA Officials Admit To Faking Bin Laden Video

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Posted in 2012, America, BREAKING NEWS, Uncategorized, United Nations, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 1 Comment »

INFOWARS NIGHTLY NEWS: Host Alex Jones talks with Patrick Henningsen

December 30, 2011

21st Century Wire
December 29, 2011

As the New Year comes to a close and 2012 beckons, Alex Jones talks to Infowars writer and 21st Century Wire editor Patrick Henningsen about the current geopolitical scene, also discussing Monsanto’s GM plague, Syria, Iran and the digital revolution. Watch in two parts:

Below is a clip from Al Jazeera’s Empire, where Professor Dan Plesch and Patrick Henningsen discuss the cause and effect scenarios should the US and Israel go in unilaterally with an attack on Iran. Watch here:

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Posted in 2012, 2012 Election, America, Arab Spring, BREAKING NEWS, International News, Iran, Middle East, REVOLUTION, Ron Paul, Uncategorized, United Nations, US Politics, WAR ON TERROR, WORLD NEWS | Leave a Comment »

Interview with Immortal Technique

December 28, 2011

December 28, 2011

The following interview with American hip-hop artist and activist ‘Immortal Technique’ was film earlier this year by Infowars and serves as a great reference piece for anyone who is interested in getting involved in the fight for truth and freedom when the bell rings in for 2012.

A truly inspirational segment from one of the great communicators on the scene today:

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The Shocking Truth About the Crackdown on Occupy Movement

November 29, 2011

Naomi  Wolf
Guardian
November 28, 2011

The mainstream media was declaring continually “OWS has no message”. Frustrated, I simply asked them. I began soliciting online “What is it you want?” answers from Occupy. In the first 15 minutes, I received 100 answers. These were truly eye-opening.

The No 1 agenda item: get the money out of politics. Most often cited was legislation to blunt the effect of the Citizens United ruling, which lets boundless sums enter the campaign process. No 2: reform the banking system to prevent fraud and manipulation, with the most frequent item being to restore the Glass-Steagall Act – the Depression-era law, done away with by President Clinton, that separates investment banks from commercial banks. This law would correct the conditions for the recent crisis, as investment banks could not take risks for profit that create kale derivatives out of thin air, and wipe out the commercial and savings banks.

No 3 was the most clarifying: draft laws against the little-known loophole that currently allows members of Congress to pass legislation affecting Delaware-based corporations in which they themselves are investors.

When I saw this list – and especially the last agenda item – the scales fell from my eyes. Of course, these unarmed people would be having the shit kicked out of them.

For the terrible insight to take away from news that the Department of Homeland Security coordinated a violent crackdown is that the DHS does not freelance. The DHS cannot say, on its own initiative, “we are going after these scruffy hippies”. Rather, DHS is answerable up a chain of command: first, to New York Representative Peter King, head of the House homeland security subcommittee, who naturally is influenced by his fellow congressmen and women’s wishes and interests. And the DHS answers directly, above King, to the president (who was conveniently in Australia at the time).

In other words, for the DHS to be on a call with mayors, the logic of its chain of command and accountability implies that congressional overseers, with the blessing of the White House, told the DHS to authorise mayors to order their police forces – pumped up with millions of dollars of hardware and training from the DHS – to make war on peaceful citizens.

But wait: why on earth would Congress advise violent militarised reactions against its own peaceful constituents? The answer is straightforward: in recent years, members of Congress have started entering the system as members of the middle class (or upper middle class) – but they are leaving DC privy to vast personal wealth, as we see from the “scandal” of presidential contender Newt Gingrich’s having been paid $1.8m for a few hours’ “consulting” to special interests…

The inflated fees to lawmakers who turn lobbyists are common knowledge, but the notion that congressmen and women are legislating their own companies’ profits is less widely known – and if the books were to be opened, they would surely reveal corruption on a Wall Street spectrum. Indeed, we do already know that congresspeople are massively profiting from trading on non-public information they have on companies about which they are legislating – a form of insider trading that sent Martha Stewart to jail.

Read full article here

Posted in 2012, America, Occupy, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 1 Comment »

Paper Money Is Not Wealth

November 28, 2011

Bob Livingston
Personal Liberty
November 28, 2011

Have you ever seen “old people” hold and fondle their paper money? They count it, hide it under the mattress and bury it for safekeeping.

Remember my example of the power of inflation? I said that you could bury your paper money 40 miles deep in a sealed concrete vault, and it still could be inflated or devalued to nothing. There is no way to preserve your paper money. It is up to the money creators to not overprint.

Here’s how we are fooled: People equate fiat paper money like U.S. dollars with wealth. Only if paper money held its purchasing power could it be a store of value. Only then could you bury it and forget it.

Fiat paper notes will not survive an inflation crisis - they will be worthless

For now, the safest currencies are those tied to commodities, such as the Canadian dollar (CAD) or the Norwegian kroner (NOK).

In addition to being commodity currencies, these countries are not reckless with their currencies and national resources. Most people do not understand currency gains (or losses). Right now, with the U.S. dollar and the U.S. economy in big trouble, there is not much risk to be in a foreign currency. We prefer the Canadian dollar, right after the Swiss franc.

The U.S. dollar does rally from time to time, but the long-term trend is down. We must understand this in order to protect our savings and investments.

The only thing that the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve can do under any pretense is to debase the currency. They do this by printing money or massive devaluation. It is not a solution, only a delay.

It’s a cruel hoax! Debasing the currency cannot and will not bring prosperity. It will bring ruin. It always has. It can come only to final default.

Printing money plus big devaluation means default — maybe not suddenly, but default is guaranteed. Understand this today, all people who hold U.S. dollars.

Alan Greenspan is the man who printed more paper money than anyone in history. In a candid moment he said: “Inflation is taxation. Inflation is the hidden confiscation of wealth.”

It is the direct result of government, through the central banking system, expanding (printing money) the money supply. They create new money so they can spend it into circulation to pay for their ever-increasing spending programs. Deficit spending is simply a scheme for the hidden confiscation of wealth.

Your government and the Federal Reserve private bankers are counterfeiting. We need desperately to understand this and dwell upon it. In 1792, a law was passed in the United States that mandated the death penalty for counterfeiting.

How far we have fallen!

The drive of the elite is a constant attack on the middle class with fear-based propaganda. The thrust is to seduce the middle class into giving up power and wealth for “security.”

There is a consistent downgrade of the individual and personal liberty in favor of internationalism.

The politicians are swimming naked, and it is easy to see that they are unAmerican and working for their elite controllers.

What’s Next?

More of the same, just with greater intensity. Better add war clouds!

Here are probabilities:

  • Continued money printing, maybe under some disguise or many disguises. The American people should never discover that the money creators are carrying on modern warfare against them. No matter what name or pretense they use to print money, they are transferring wealth from the people to the money creators. All U.S. dollar assets are under attack. Did you hear your politicians warning the American people? The exceptions are Ron Paul and Texas Governor Rick Perry, though I’m not sure he understood what he was saying.
  • Massive devaluation of the U.S. dollar. As if consistently printing multitrillions of new dollars weren’t enough, we might as well prepare for the eventuality of an overnight or weekend huge devaluation preceded by denials “that it will never happen.” Desperate governments do desperate things, like attacking their own people. We may believe it or not. There is more than enough precedent in America and the world.
  • Exchange controls. Greater restriction of money leaving the United States. The excuse will be the same old, same old “money laundering.”
  • Money printing creates higher prices on everything. Few people are alert to the fact that higher prices are caused by money printing. It is the value of paper money going down that we call inflation or higher prices.
  • Stepped-up police state under a barrage of propaganda. Our politicians will cooperate with the police state. There will be more and more controls and restrictions of freedom.
  • New war(s) will be waged under the same old fear-based propaganda. Warfare is a vital part of a worldwide paper-money system. It is the alter ego of the Keynesian welfare state. I suppose we could say paper money plus blood is the foundation of the Keynesian welfare state.

“When money dies” and the failed State can no longer conceal the cause d’affaires, war is inevitable and certain. Evidence of the failed State is everywhere, even worldwide.

The classic option now is war as a fail-safe stimulus. This is the ace of the welfare-warfare State. The population will unite under war propaganda and inspire new life into disguised authoritarianism.

War is what’s left. Since people are waking up to the grand theft of the money creators and the widespread fraud of the system, “the ruling elite will inevitably turn to bloodshed as a source of economic stimulus.” From Slaughter as “Stimulus” by William Norman Grigg.

What could revive the crowd to rally behind the rot of the system and its stooge mouthpieces but the hysteria of war? So war is more than bloodshed stimulus. It is a political panacea. This is the basis of war crime that murders millions of military personnel and civilians.

It is perfectly astounding and amazing how people will give up their sons and daughters for ritual sacrifice under the pretense of patriotism.

The system is reduced to non-productivity and political vulgarism. The elite must shift gears to war by creating phantom threats, both external and internal.

The collapse of the U.S. economy into a modern depression is the perfect platform on which to create war clouds.

There is one shabby little secret here. The secret is that concocted war must arise on propaganda and deceit. The truth would shatter the whole thing. For one certain thing, the bloodthirsty politicians and their hidden masters would be revealed for the subhuman vampires that they are. Public executions might follow. Even as docile and manipulative as Americans have become, some percentage of them would be triggered to explode into anger and retribution.

We need to awaken from our childish love affair with democracy and realize that while the U.S. Constitution is still on display in the United States, we have descended into militarism and corporate socialism not unlike Nazi Germany. Didn’t Herr Hitler proclaim that Nazi Germany was a “great democracy?”

For many years now, the heartbeat of America has been imperialism. We have intimidated the world under the weak doctrine of antiterrorism.

Our sons and daughters have been the cannon fodder for foreign wars for several generations. And for what?

It is a monument to modern propaganda how the entire psyche of a country can be mobilized to surrender their children and wealth to the myth of war-fear created by the State for economic revival. No death and destruction are too much to make the fabricated cause real and to make a massive transfer of wealth to the elite.

Modern propaganda is especially adept at twisting our language into thoughts and phrases that serve the State. Bad things are manipulated and twisted to sound good and good things become bad, with our warped vocabulary.

Please read When Money Dies by Adam Fergusson, first copyrighted 1975 and since republished. It’s all about the nightmare of the Weimar German hyperinflation of 1923.

Posted in BREAKING NEWS, Business, money, NEWS, US Politics, WORLD NEWS | 5 Comments »

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