Tag Archives: Syria

No Tea for the Tillerson

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Former Exxon-Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson, Donald Trump’s nominee for Secretary of State, was on Capitol Hill yesterday for confirmation hearings before Congress. Given the general hysteria over Tillerson’s business ties with Russia, I thought at first he’d be a good pick. Nothing is more important than repairing America’s damaged relations with Russia. It’s a powerful country, rich in resources, with an educated population and a shared opposition to Islamic terrorism. Most importantly, it has nuclear weapons, so to attack it would be suicidal.

Unfortunately, the US government is lousy with “exceptionalists” who deny that Russia has the right to defend its own interests. They’re apoplectic that Moscow has opposed the illegal installation of hostile regimes in two of its former allies, Ukraine and Syria. The neo-conservative anti-Russian crusade is not about “human rights.” If we cared about that, we wouldn’t support countries like Saudi Arabia that murder gays and enslave women.

As for Tillerson, he’s more of a war-hawk than his detractors thought. He supports our pointless sanctions on Russia as if either Crimea or Aleppo was any of our business. Furthermore, the accusations of Putin “hacking” the Presidential election are just that, accusations, unsupported by credible evidence. Even if the Kremlin DID hack the Democratic Party’s server, the released information was true and relevant to the voters’ decision, so the leak was a public service.

Perhaps Rex is repeating this neo-conservative rubbish so the clowns in Congress will confirm him. I hope that’s the case, but I have my doubts after hearing his belligerent remarks about China. What gives us the right to tell a sovereign nation what it can and cannot do in its own coastal waters? Open navigation in the South China Sea is critical for Beijing’s survival. Despite that fact, Rex insists that China must stop building artificial island bases and threatens to send our Navy to kick them off.

Is this man insane? It’s acceptable to make war for our own national defense, but not to attack the vital interests of another country. China has every right to defend itself and having come late to the party, there are no leftover islands for it to occupy as bases. To Beijing’s credit, these built-up shoals were not inhabited. They’re not conquering and coercing native peoples as we did with Guam, Samoa, Hawaii and Puerto Rico. Even Diego Garcia, which the US rents from the UK, was stolen from its native population.

Why do so many powerful Americans continue to frame other nations’ defensive moves as aggression? It must be psychological projection because the US is second to none at portraying imperialism as defense. We needn’t accept this nonsense. Congress should reject Tillerson’s nomination, not because he’s (allegedly) soft on Russia, but because he’s unhinged, unfair, and unbalanced on China. We don’t need another conflict, especially one that could escalate into a nuclear war.

If you like political intrigue, you’ll enjoy my novel Centrifugal Force.

My Arcane and Esoteric Predictions for 2016

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Everyone likes to start the new year with a bunch of optimistic forecasts but this is not that year. I have three:

  1. Donald Trump will not be President. At the rate he’s going, he could legitimately be elected, but the powers that be won’t tolerate a loose cannon like him in the White House. Not that presidents have all that much authority, anyway, but the elites need to maintain at least the facade of democracy.
  2. There will be no economic recovery. Nothing has changed since 2007. The bad actors weren’t punished, and the big banks weren’t allowed to fail. The economy needs a reset; we need to repudiate government debt, ax laws and regulations, and close our expensive and unnecessary overseas military bases. Until that happens, things won’t get better.
  3. We can expect civil unrest to expand beyond the inner cities. The American “Deep State” is a big believer in “divide and conquer” which is why they’ve pursued chaos in Ukraine and Syria. Lately I’ve suspected they want to try it here. If they can get the majority to riot, they’ve got an excuse for repression, and maybe even for repudiating some of the aforementioned debt. Consider the offenses to Christians, conservatives and Southerners: gay marriage by judicial fiat, making transsexuals a protected class, denigrating the rebel flag and destroying Confederate monuments. I’m not saying I share their outrage but I’m baffled that we haven’t seen more push-back. The clincher would be (a) forcing us to accept massive numbers of Muslim refugees, and expecting us to accommodate their prejudices, as Germany and Sweden have done, or (b) gun confiscation. This is especially likely if Hillary is elected President. The elite can make her play the bad guy, then follow up with impeachment and prosecution for her criminal past. Of course, whatever outrages she imposes upon us will stand even after she is gone. Read Machiavelli, it’s in “The Prince.”

There you have it. I hope I’m wrong. If I’m right, you all owe me a beer – if our new Muslim overlords will allow it.

Barack Obama: Cat’s Paw of the CIA?

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A few days ago I encountered a fascinating article by the investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, a man whose writings I give a lot of credence. Entitled “Military to Military”,  the piece alleges that the Pentagon and the CIA have been at odds about the crisis in Syria. Hersh reports that the US Military, acting contrary to the policies of the Obama administration, shared information with the government of Bashar Assad in Syria, to help it fight the so-called Islamic State (ISIS.) The brass, alarmed about the growing influence of ISIS, decided that Assad’s regime was preferable to a Syria run by lunatic Islamic fundamentalists. General Michael Flynn openly objected to Obama’s strategy of arming terrorists and was fired; after that, General Martin Dempsey acted secretly to help Assad. According to Hersh, this secret rebellion ended with Dempsey’s retirement from the Joint Chiefs of Staff this September.

This story is a bombshell in itself, but it caused me to make a connection to numerous articles in the alternative media I’ve read about Obama’s mother, Ann Dunham, having worked for the CIA. This is cited as one of the reasons for Barack’s sudden rise from obscurity to President. The Wikipedia article about Dunham says nothing about this (if Wikipedia were objective, they would have at least noted the allegations,) but it notes a long sequence of non-profit and quasi-government jobs in Kenya, Indonesia, and Pakistan. This perfectly fits the pattern of CIA cover employment. So if the mother was a CIA asset, why not the son?

I see the Hersh article as another piece of evidence of the battle between different factions in the American Deep State. On one side is the Pentagon, on the other the intelligence services. My view is that as bureaucratic, inefficient and corrupt as our military is, it is still, at its heart, a pro-American institution. We can’t say the same for the CIA, whose predecessor the OSS was instrumental in bringing Nazi scientists to America, and was almost certainly involved in anti-democratic debacles such as the JFK assassination, the 9/11 attacks and the false-flag terrorism of “Operation Gladio” in post-war Europe.

I do occasionally agree with Obama’s foreign policy initiatives; his support of the nuclear deal with Iran and normalization of relations with Cuba are two of them. It seems to me, however, that both of these have the same motivation as the coup in Ukraine and Islamic terrorism in Syria – an attempt to marginalize and otherwise punish the un-cooperative leaders of the Russian Federation. To risk nuclear war by way of Machiavellian maneuverings is exactly the kind of treason the CIA is known for. As we near the end of the immensely unpopular Obama administration, it’s well worth thinking about.

Illustration from www.freeimages.com

Man Up, Mr. Obama

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Mr President, everybody is talking about your address to West Point graduates. Republicans and other neoconservatives are upset because you showed an insufficient degree of blood lust. Anti-interventionists like myself are upset because you persist in keeping America in its role of global policeman. I’m aware that you Democrats seem to have a psychological need to prove you’re as “tough” or more so than the Republicans. But why? Let me humbly offer a suggestion. You can be much tougher by doing a 180 degree turn and, in the manner of statesmen from George Washington to Robert Taft to Ron Paul, renounce foreign entanglements completely.

This is, after all, one of the main reasons the American people elected you in 2008, because we were already weary of George W Bush’s constant war-making and intrusions on our civil liberties. Not only that, but you promised us “one of the most transparent administrations ever.”

Here are my top 10 suggestions:

1. End all US military operations in the Islamic world, including support of rebels in Syria and the deployment of “advisers” in Afghanistan, thus removing a major motivation for terrorism.

2. Announce an end to the use of weaponized drones, with a pledge to never again to deploy them absent a Congressional declaration of war.

3. Issue sweeping restrictions on NSA spying, as required by the Bill of Rights.

4. Close Guantanamo – not just the prison, but the entire naval base, and hand it back to Cuba, as part of an unconditional normalization of relations with that country. Release all prisoners against whom the US has no evidence, which, according to terrorism experts, would be all but a handful.

5. Announce your intention to veto any extension of the USA PATRIOT Act or the NDAA.

6. Normalize relations with Iran, and end sanctions immediately in return for thorough and frequent inspections of nuclear facilities.

7. Issue executive pardons for Chelsea Manning, Edward Snowden, and James Risen. Terminate any ongoing prosecutions of government whistle blowers.

8. End all US aid to and special bilateral agreements with the apartheid regime in Israel. Prohibit all US arms sales until illegal settlers are removed from Palestinian land. Alternatively, all Arabs, including those in the occupied territories and refugees living abroad, should be granted full rights and equal status with Jewish citizens.

9. Abandon the “Pivot to Asia.” Support negotiations between China and its neighbors to fairly divide claims to the Senkaku Islands and mineral rights in the South China sea.

10. End all sanctions against Russia and invite them to talks between the Kiev government and rebels in Donetsk and other Russian speaking areas. Support the notion of Ukraine as a neutral, decentralized buffer state with good relations with both Russia and the EU. Recognize the annexation of Crimea as consistent with Russia’s historic claims to the region.

Contrary to the assertions of the corporate-owned media, all of these actions would have substantial public support, some of them overwhelming majorities. I assure you that if you take even one of these actions, everyone, including Republicans, will have to admit you have the cojones. Furthermore, the United States would no longer be seen as the bully of the world, but would once again be “the shining light on the hill.”