Hoe kan je als volksvertegenwoordiger de belangen behartigen voor een groot deel van het volk, terwijl je zelf een inkomen hebt van meer dan 1,5 ton per jaar??
Hoe kan je dan de financiële ellende begrijpen waarin de meer dan 4 miljoen mensen moeten leven, die tegen, op, of onder de armoedegrens moeten leven…??
Hoe kan je als volksvertegenwoordiger beoordelen dat huurders jaar in jaar uit meer kunnen betalen voor een niet geïsoleerd huis in een achterstandswijk..?? Ja zelfs zoveel huur dat een groot deel van de kopers maandelijks veel minder kwijt is voor wel een goed geïsoleerd huis, in een ‘gewone wijk….’ En hoe kan je beoordelen dat de grote onderlaag één derde van zijn/haar inkomen moet verwonen?? (een huur die vaak al hoger ligt dan één derde van het inkomen…)….
Zoals
eerder o.a. op deze plek betoogd, concludeert ook Noam Chomsky dat de Israëlische bemoeienis met de VS verkiezingen veel verder gaat dan
wat men Rusland in de schoenen probeert te schuiven en dat laatste zonder maar één flinter aan
bewijs…..
Met
veel ophef sprak de Palestijnenslachter Netanyahu in 2015 het Congres
toe, zelfs zonder eerst te overleggen met de president, destijds ‘vredesduif’ Obama…… Dan zijn er nog de reguliere (massa-) media in de
VS, die fungeren als lobbyisten voor de fascistische apartheidsstaat Israël en knippen na elke klapscheet van een Israëlische politicus……
Chomsky
wijst op het zogenaamde democratische proces in de VS en stelt
volkomen terecht dat er geen sprake is van een functionerende democratie in de VS
(overigens geldt dit ook meer en meer voor landen in de EU, zelfs voor Nederland…), volgens Chomsky moeten we in de VS spreken van een
‘billionaire
corporatocracy’, niet het volk maar de 1 procent (van welgestelden, waar veel zionisten tussen zitten) en grote bedrijven worden door
de politiek in de VS bediend…… (oh ja en niet te vergeten de belangenbehartiging voor Israël en wat andere
‘fijne fascistische landen’ als Saoedi-Arabië ‘natuurlijk’)
Zelfs
als zou Rusland hebben geprobeerd de verkiezingen te manipuleren,
hebben ze dat op een manier gedaan die totaal geen zoden aan de dijk
zet, althans als je alleen al het bedrag aan reclames door ‘Rusland’
geplaatst op sociale media in ogenschouw neemt, kunnen die niet eens
in de schaduw staan van de bedragen die worden misbruikt voor deze
presidentsverkiezingen……
Voorts
is daar de zogenaamde manipulatie door hacks en door het lekken van
documenten van de democraten naar WikiLeaks, alweer geen flinter aan
bewijs. Bovendien komt deze claim uit de smerige koker van Clinton en
haar aanhangers, om zo de aandacht af te leiden van het smerige spel
waarmee zij tot presidentskandidaat van de democraten werd verkozen, een smerig
spel tegen de enige kandidaat die er toe deed, Bernie Sanders…… Ofwel: je speelt een smerig spel, waarvan de bewijzen op straat komen
te liggen, maar je doet verder geen onderzoek naar dat smerige spel……. Sterker nog: je beschuldigt de klokkenluider en stelt plompverloren dat deze buiten het democratisch comité te vinden moet zijn, vervolgens ga je op zoek naar die klokkenluider* en schuift Rusland de schuld in de schoenen, de aanzet tot het nieuwe ‘McCartyisme’ in de VS en een verdere aanjager voor de herintroductie van de Koude Oorlog..!!! (‘natuurlijk’ worden daarmee ook nog eens de belangen van het militair-industrieel complex gediend……)
Ongelofelijk!!
Lees
het volgende artikel met de zienswijze van Chomsky en oordeel zelf:
Noam
Chomsky: “Israeli Intervention in US Elections Overwhelms Anything
Russia Has Done”
(ZHE) — Well,
this is going to make the weekend’s political conversations a
little more awkward around America.
As
the mainstream media (and even the leftist politicians) begin to back
quietly away from the “collusion” narrative, they remain
increasingly focused on Russia’s “evil” efforts at “meddling”
in the US election and “interfering with our democracy,” or some
such hysterical phrase.
And
that is what makes the comments by mainstay of world-renowned
political dissident and liberal-thinking hero Noam Chomsky’s
comments in the following interview with Democracy Now so ‘awkward’
for the Trump-hating members of society.
(Let wel: dit is niet de video van Democracy Now, met o.a. Chomsky en gepresenteerd door Amy Goodman uit het originele artikel, klik daarvoor op deze link)
…so,
take, say, the huge issue of interference in our pristine
elections. Did
the Russians interfere in our elections? An
issue of overwhelming concern in the media. I mean, in most of the
world, that’s almost
a joke.
First
of all, if you’re interested in foreign interference in our
elections, whatever
the Russians may have done barely counts or weighs in the balance as
compared with what another state does, openly, brazenly and with
enormous support.
Israeli
intervention in U.S. elections vastly overwhelms anything the
Russians may have done…
I
mean, even to the point where the
prime minister of Israel, Netanyahu, goes directly to Congress,
without even informing the president, and speaks to Congress, with
overwhelming applause, to try to undermine the president’s policies
– what happened with Obama and Netanyahu in 2015….
Did
Putin come to give an address to the joint sessions of Congress
trying to – calling on them to reverse U.S. policy, without even
informing the president? And
that’s just a tiny bit of this overwhelming influence.
So
if you happen to be interested in influence of – foreign influence
on elections, there are places to look. But even that is a joke.
I
mean, one
of the most elementary principles of a functioning democracy is that
elected representatives should be responsive to those who elected
them. There’s nothing more elementary than that. But we know very
well that that is simply not the case in the United States.
There’s
ample literature in mainstream academic political science simply
comparing voters’ attitudes with the policies pursued by their
representatives, and it shows that for a large majority of the
population, they’re basically disenfranchised. Their own
representatives pay no attention to their voices. They
listen to the voices of the famous 1 percent – the rich and the
powerful, the corporate sector.
The
elections—Tom Ferguson’s stellar work has demonstrated, very
conclusively, that for a long period, way back, U.S. elections have
been pretty much bought. You can predict the outcome of a
presidential or congressional election with remarkable precision by
simply looking at campaign spending. That’s only one part of it.
Lobbyists
practically write legislation in congressional offices.In
massive ways, the concentrated private capital, corporate sector,
super wealth, intervene in our elections, massively, overwhelmingly,
to the extent that the most elementary principles of democracy are
undermined. Now,
of course, all that is technically legal, but that tells you
something about the way the society functions.
So, if
you’re concerned with our elections and how they operate and how
they relate to what would happen in a democratic society, taking a
look at Russian hacking is absolutely the wrong place to look. Well,
you see occasionally some attention to these matters in the media,
but very minor as compared with the extremely
marginal question of Russian hacking.
And
I think we find this on issue after issue, also on issues on which
what Trump says, for whatever reason, is not unreasonable. So, he’s
perfectly right when he says we should have better relations with
Russia.
Being
dragged through the mud for that is outlandish, makes – Russia
shouldn’t refuse to deal with the United States because the
U.S. carried out the worst crime of the century in the invasion of
Iraq, much worse than anything Russia has done.
But
they shouldn’t refuse to deal with us for that reason, and we
shouldn’t refuse to deal with them for whatever infractions they
may have carried out, which certainly exist. This is just absurd. We
have to move towards better – right
at the Russian border, there are very extreme tensions, that could
blow up anytime and lead to what would in fact be a terminal nuclear
war, terminal for the species and life on Earth. We’re
very close to that.
Now,
we could ask why. First of all, we should do things to ameliorate it.
Secondly, we should ask why. Well, it’s because NATO expanded
after the collapse of the Soviet Union, in violation
of verbal promises to Mikhail Gorbachev, mostly under Clinton, partly
under first Bush, then Clinton expanded right to the Russian border,
expanded further under Obama.
The
U.S. has offered to bring Ukraine into NATO. That’s the kind
of a heartland of Russian geostrategic concerns.
So,
yes, there’s
tensions at the Russian border – and not, notice, at the Mexican
border. Well,
those are all issues that should be of primary concern.
The
fate of – the
fate of organized human society, even of the survival of the species,
depends on this. How
much attention is given to these things as compared with, you know,
whether Trump lied about something? I think those seem to me the
fundamental criticisms of the media.
So
to sum up – Trump’s
right about better relations with Russia – the fate of the world
depends on it, Russia did nothing of note, Russian hacking is
extremely marginal, Israel is the real meddler, US democracy no
longer exists, the billionaire corporatocracy runs America.
Is
Noam Chomsky a “puppet of Putin”? Did the veteran political
dissident just become a “useful
idiot”?
Well he must be an anti-semite, right? We look forward to Adam
Schiff’s response to this crushing blow to the left’s
‘russia-russia-russia’ narrative.
* Onder andere Seth Rich, een ontevreden DNC medewerker, lekte documenten naar WikiLeaks, daar hij pissig was over deze gang van zaken. Deze Rich werd, oh wonder, kort daarna vermoord op straat, volgens de politie een roofoverval, terwijl er niets van waarde werd gestolen en waardevolle spullen had Rich tijdens die ‘roofoverval’ voldoende ‘op zak…’
Professor
Stephen Cohen prikt in een interview dat Aaron Mate afnam, fijntjes door de
Putin – Trump hysterie heen, de hysterie die in de VS ontstond na het gesprek dat
Putin en Trump voerden in de Finse hoofdstad Helsinki. Men raakt er
in de VS weer niet over uitgesproken, al heeft dat alles met de reguliere, over het algemeen rechtse neoliberale pers in de VS te maken,
uiteraard aangevuld met de democratische en republikeinse politici
die openlijk lobbyen voor het militair-industrieel complex……….
Vanaf
het eind van de Sovjet-Unie tot de ontmoeting van Trump en Putin, zet
Cohen duidelijk uiteen hoe we zijn voorgelogen, bijvoorbeeld over ‘de
oorlog van Rusland tegen Georgië’, via Oekraïne, De Krim tot
Syrië…..
Voorts
moet ik Cohen gelijk geven als hij stelt dat we nu blij mogen zijn met
Trump als president, daar hij niet meegaat in de oorlogshitserij die
zoveel VS politici in hun greep houdt. Zoals op deze plek al eerder gesteld,
wat is erop tegen dat men met elkaar spreekt en probeert oorlog te
voorkomen??? Oké Trump is een beest, maar liever een beest dat niet aanvalt dan bijvoorbeeld Obama die 2 volledige termijnen in illegale oorlogsvoering was verwikkeld, zelfs 2 illegale oorlogen extra begon en veel meer bommen liet afwerpen dan Bush in 2 termijnen…….
Cohen stelt voorts terecht dat het onder eerdere
presidenten de normaalste zaak van de wereld was om te spreken met
de Russische collega’s, terwijl dat nu als verraad wordt
neergezet, alleen om Trump af te kunnen zetten en ongebreideld oorlog te kunnen voeren, zoals de VS gewend is te doen…….
Cohen gaat ook in op de beschuldiging dat Putin journalisten laat vermoorden, terwijl daar geen bewijs voor wordt geleverd, sterker nog: Cohen stelt dat deze moorden alles te maken hebben met de georganiseerde misdaad in Rusland……
Lezen mensen en geeft het door, de hoogste tijd dat we met z’n allen weer ons gezonde verstand gebruiken en ons niet langer laten voorliegen en gek laten maken door de reguliere media en het grootste deel van de politici in ons land!
Video:
Debunking the Putin Panic With Professor Stephen Cohen
(RN) — President
Trump’s warm words for Vladimir Putin and his failure to endorse
U.S. intelligence community claims about alleged Russian meddling
have been called “treasonous” and the cause of a “national
security crisis.” There
is a crisis, says Prof. Stephen F. Cohen, but one of our own making…
Part
1:
AARON
MATE: It’s
The Real News. I’m Aaron Mate.
The
White House is walking back another statement from President Trump
about Russia and U.S. intelligence. It began in Helsinki on Monday,
when at his press conference with Vladimir Putin, Trump did not
endorse the claim that Russia meddled in the 2016 election. After an
outcry that played out mostly on cable news, Trump appeared to
retract that view one day later. But then on Wednesday, Trump was
asked if he believes Russia is now targeting the U.S. ahead of the
midterms.
DONALD
TRUMP: [Thank]
you all very much. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you.
REPORTER: Is
Russia still targeting the U.S. [inaudible]. No, you don’t believe
that to be the case?
DONALD
TRUMP: Thank
you very much, everyone. We’re doing very well. We are doing very
well, and we’re doing very well, probably as well as anybody has
ever done with Russia. And there’s been no president ever as tough
as I have been on Russia. All you have to do is look at the numbers,
look at what we’ve done, look at sanctions, look at ambassadors.
Not there. Look, unfortunately, at what happened in Syria recently. I
think President Putin knows that better than anybody. Certainly a lot
better than the media.
AARON
MATE: The
White House later claimed that when Trump said ‘no,’ he meant no
to answering questions. But Trump’s contradiction of U.S.
intelligence claims has brought the Russiagate story, one that has
engulfed his presidency, to a fever pitch. Prominent U.S. figures
have called Trump’s comments in Helsinki treasonous, and compared
alleged Russian e-mail hacking and social media activity to 9/11 and
Pearl Harbor. Those who also question intelligence claims or
warmongering with Russia have been dubbed traitors, or Kremlin
agents.
Speaking
to MSNBC, the former U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul
declared that with Trump’s comments, the U.S. is in the midst of a
national security crisis.
MICHAEL
MCFAUL: Republicans
need to step up. They need to speak out, not just the familiar
voices, because this is a national security crisis, and the president
of the United States flew all the way to Finland, met with Vladimir
Putin, and basically capitulated. It felt like appeasement.
AARON
MATE: Well,
joining me to address this so-called national security crisis is
Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus at New York University and
Princeton University. His books include “Failed Crusade: America
and the Tragedy of Post-Soviet Russia,” and “Soviet Fates and
Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War.” Professor
Cohen, welcome. I imagine that you might agree with the view that we
are in the midst of a national security crisis when it comes to
Russia, but for far different reasons than those expounded on by
Ambassador McFaul.
STEPHEN
COHEN: There is a national security crisis, and there is a
Russian threat. And we, we ourselves here in the United States, have
created both of them. This has been true for years, and now it’s
reached crisis proportion. Notice what’s going on. A mainstream TV
reporter shouts to President Trump, “Are the Russians still
targeting our elections?” This is in the category “Are you still
beating your wife?” There is no proof that the Russians have
targeted or attacked our elections. But it’s become axiomatic. What
kind of media is that, are the Russians still, still attacking our
elections.
And
what Michael McFaul, whom I’ve known for years, formerly Ambassador
McFaul, purportedly a scholar and sometimes a scholar said, it is
simply the kind of thing, to be as kind as I can, that I heard from
the John Birch Society about President Eisenhower when he went to
meet Khrushchev when I was a kid growing up in Kentucky. This is
fringe discourse that never came anywhere near the mainstream before,
at least after Joseph McCarthy, that the president went, committed
treason, and betrayed the country. Trump
may have not done the right thing at the summit, because agreements
were reached. Nobody discusses the agreements. But to stage a
kangaroo trial of the president of the United States in the
mainstream media, and have plenty of once-dignified people come on
and deliver the indictment, is without precedent in this country.
And it has created a national crisis in our relations with Russia. So
yes, there’s a national crisis.
AARON
MATE: Let
me play for you a clip from Trump’s news conference with Putin that
also drew outrage back in the U.S. When he was asked about the state
of U.S.-Russia relations, he said both sides had responsibility.
DONALD
TRUMP: Yes,
I do. I hold both countries responsible. I think that the United
States has been foolish. I think we’ve all been foolish. We should
have had this dialogue a long time ago. A long time, frankly, before
I got to office. And I think we’re all to blame. I think that the
United States now has stepped forward, along with Russia, and we’re
getting together, and we have a chance to do some great things.
Whether it’s nuclear proliferation, in terms of stopping, because
we have to do it. Ultimately that’s probably the most important
thing that we can be working on.
AARON
MATE: That’s
President Trump in Helsinki. Professor Cohen, I imagine that this
comment probably was part of the reason why there was so much
outrage, not Just of what Trump said about the claims of Russian
meddling in the election. Can you talk about the significance of what
he said here, and how it contradicts the, the entire consensus of the
bipartisan foreign policy establishment?
STEPHEN
COHEN: I
did not vote for President Trump. But for that I salute him, what he
just said. So far as I can remember, no wiser words or more important
words have been spoken by the American president about Russia and the
Soviet Union since Ronald Reagan did his great detente with Mikhail
Gorbachev in the late 1980s. What
Trump just did, and I don’t- we never know, Aaron, how aware he is
of the ramifications of what he says. But in this case, whether he
fully understood it or not, he just broke with, and the first time
any major political figure in the United States has broken with the
orthodoxy, ever since at least 2000. And
even going back to the ’90s. That all the conflicts we’ve had
with post-Soviet Russia, after communism went away in Russia, all
those conflicts, which I call a new and more dangerous Cold War, are
solely, completely, the fault of Putin or Putin’s Russia.That
nothing in American policy since Bill Clinton in the 1990s did
anything to contribute seriously to the very dangerous conflict,
confrontation we have with Russia today. It was all Russia’s fault.
What
that has meant, and you know this, Aaron, because you live in this
world as well,it
has meant no media or public dialogue about the merits of American
policy toward post-Soviet Russia from Clinton, certainly through
Obama. It
may be changing now under President Trump. Not sure. It means if we
don’t have a debate, we’re not permitted to ask, did we do
something wrong, or so unwise that it led to this even more dangerous
Cold War? And
if the debate leads to a conclusion that we did do something unwise,
and that we’re still doing it, then arises the pressure and the
imperative for any new policy toward Russia. None of that has been
permitted, because the orthodoxy, the dogma, the axiom, is Putin
alone has solely been responsible.
So
you know, you know as well as I do what is excluded. It doesn’t
matter that we moved NATO to Russia’s borders, that’s not
significant. Or that we bombed Serbia, Russia’s traditional ally.
Or that George Bush left the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, which was
the bedrock of Russian nuclear security and, I would argue, our own.
Or that we did regime change by military might in Iraq and Libya, and
many other things. Or that we provoked the Ukrainian crisis in 2004,
and supported the coup that overthrew a legitimate, elected,
constitutional president there. None of that matters. Oh, it was kind
of footnotes to the real narrative. And the narrative is, is that a
Russian leader Vladimir Putin in power was a horrible aggressor.
Killed everybody, somehow, with secret poisons or thieves in the
night who opposed him. And began this new cold or even worse war with
the United States.
No
historian of any merit will ever write the story that way. It’s
factually, analytically, simply untrue. Now Trump has said something
radically different. We got here in these dire circumstances because
both sides acted unwisely, and we should have had this discussion a
long time ago.
So for that, two cheers for President Trump. But whether he can
inspire the discussion that he may wish to, considering the fact that
he’s now being indicted as a criminal for having met Putin, is a
big question.
AARON
MATE: So
a few questions. You mentioned that some agreements were made, but
details on that have been vague. So do you have any sense of what
concretely came out of this summit? There was talk about cooperation
on nuclear weapons, possibly renewing the New START Treaty. We know
that Putin offered that to Trump when he first came into office, but
Trump rejected it. There was talk about cooperating in Syria. And,
well, yeah, if I can put that question to you first, and then I have
a follow-up about what might be motivating Trump here. But first,
what do you think concretely came out of this?
STEPHEN
COHEN: Well,
look, I know a lot, both as a historian, and I’ve actually
participated in some about the history of American-Russian,
previously Soviet, summits. Which, by the way, this is the 75th
anniversary of the very first one, when Franklin Roosevelt traveled
to Tehran to meet Stalin. And
every president, and this is important to emphasize, every president
since
Roosevelt
has met with the Kremlin leader. Some many times, or several times.
So there’s a long tradition. And therefore there are customs. And
one custom, this goes to your question, is that never, except maybe
very rarely, but almost never do we learn the full extent and nature
of what agreements were made. That
usually comes in a week or two or three later, because there’s
still the teams of both are hammering out the details.
So
that’s exactly what happened at this summit. There was no
conspiracy. No, you know, appeasement behind closed doors. The two
leaders announced in general terms what they agreed upon. Now,
the most important, and this is traditional, too, by meeting they
intended to revive the diplomatic process between the United States
and Russia which has been badly tattered by events including the
exclusion of diplomats, and sanctions, and the rest. So to get
active, vigorous diplomacy about many issues going. They
may not achieve that goal, because the American media and the
political mainstream is trying to stop that. Remember that anything
approaching diplomatic negotiations with Russia still less detente,
is now being criminalized in the United States. Criminalized. What
was once an honorable tradition, the pursuit of detente, is now a
capital crime, if we believe these charges against Trump.
So
they tried to revive that process, and we’ll see if it’s going to
be possible. I think at least behind the scenes it will be. Obviously
what you mentioned, both sides now have new, more elusive, more
lethal, faster, more precise nuclear weapons. We’ve been developing
them for a long time in conjunction with missile defense. We’ve
essentially been saying to Russia, you may have equality in nuclear
weapons with us, but we have missile defense. Therefore, we could use
missile defense to take out your retaliatory capacity. That is, we
could stage the first strike on you and you would not be able to
retaliate.
Now,
everybody who’s lived through the nuclear era knows that’s an
invitation to disaster. Because like it or not, we’ve lived with a
doctrine called MAD, Mutual Assured Destruction, that one side dare
not attack the other with a nuclear weapon because it would be
destroyed as well. We were saying we now have this primacy. Putin,
then, on March 1 of this year, announced that they have developed
weapons that can elude missile defense. And it seems to be true. In
the air and at sea, their dodgy, darty, quick thing- but they could
avoid our missile defense. So where we are at now is on the cusp of a
new nuclear arms race involving more dangerous nuclear weapons. And
the current START, New START Treaty will expire, I think, in three or
four years. But its expiration date is less important that the
process of talking and negotiating and worrying officially about
these new weapons had ended.
So
essentially what Trump and Putin agreed is that process of concern
about new and more dangerous nuclear weapons must now resume
immediately. And if there’s anybody living in the United States who
think that that is a bad idea they need to reconsider their life,
because they may be looking into the darkness of death. So
that was excellent. Briefly.
What
I hope they did- they didn’t announce it, but I’m pretty sure
they did- that there had been very close calls between American and
Russian combat forces and their proxies in Syria. We’re doing a
proxy war, but there are plenty of native Russians and Americans in
Syria in a relatively small combat cell. And there have been
casualties. The Russians have said at the highest level the next time
a Russian is killed in Syria by an American-based weapon, we will
strike the American launcher. If Russia strikes our launching pads or
areas, whether on land or sea, which means Americans will be there
and are killed, call it war. Call it war.
So
we need to agree in Syria to do more than, what do they call it,
deconfliction, where we have all these warnings. It’s
still too much space for mishap. And what I hope it think Trump and
Putin did was to try to get a grip on this.
AARON
MATE: Stephen
F. Cohen, professor emeritus at at Princeton University and New York
University, thank you. And stay tuned for part two. I’m Aaron Mate
for The Real News.
*
* *
There
is much to criticize the Russian president for, says Professor
Stephen F. Cohen of Princeton and NYU, but
many US political and media claims about Putin are false – and
reckless…
Part
2:
AARON
MATE: It’s
The Real News. I’m Aaron Mate. This is part two with Stephen Cohen,
professor emeritus of Russian studies at New York University and
Princeton. In part one we talked about the uproar over the
Trump-Putin summit, and Trump’s comments about the U.S.
intelligence community and about cooperation with Russia. Now
in part two we’re going to get to some of the main talking points
that have been pervasive throughout corporate media, talking about
the stated reasons for why pundits and politicians say they are
opposed to Trump sitting down with Putin.
So
let me start with Jon Meacham. He is a historian. And speaking to
CNN, he worried that Trump, with his comments about NATO calling on
the alliance to pay more, and calling into question, he worried about
the possibility that Trump won’t come to the aid of Baltic states
in the event that Russia invades.
JON
MEACHAM: And
what worries me most is the known unknown, as Donald Rumsfeld might
put it, of what happens next. Let’s say Putin- just look at this
whole week of the last five, six days in total. What happens if Putin
launches military action against, say, the Baltics? What, what is it
that President Trump, what about his comments that NATO suggest thar
he would follow an invocation of Article 5 and actually project
American force in defense of the values that not only do we have an
intellectual and moral assent to, but a contractual one, a treaty
one. I think that’s the great question going forward.
AARON
MATE: OK.
So that’s Jon Meacham speaking to CNN. So, Professor Cohen, putting
aside what he said there about our intellectual values and strong
tradition, just on the issue of Trump, of Putin posing a potential
threat and possibly invading the Baltics, is that a realistic
possibility?
STEPHEN
COHEN: So,
I’m not sure what you’re asking me about. The folly of NATO
expansion? The fact that every president in my memory has asked the
Europeans to pay more? But can we be real? Can we be real? The only
country that’s attacked that region of Europe militarily since the
end of the Soviet Union was the United States of America. As I
recall, we bombed Serbia, a, I say this so people understand, a
traditional Christian country, under Bill Clinton, bombed Serbia for
about 80 days. There is no evidence that Russia has ever bombed a
European country.
You
tell me, Aaron. You must be a smart guy, because you got your own
television show. Why
would Putin want to launch a military attack and occupy the Baltics?
So he has to pay the pensions there? Which he’s having a hard time
already paying in Russia, and therefore has had to raise the pension
age, and thereby lost 10 percentage points of popularity in two
weeks? Why
in the world can we, can we simply become rational people. Why in the
world would Russia want to attack and occupy Latvia, Lithuania, and
Estonia? The only reason I can think of is that many, many of my
friends love to take their summer vacations there. And maybe some
crazy person thinks that if we occupy it, vacations will be cheaper.
It’s crazy. It’s beyond crazy. It’s a kind-.
AARON
MATE: Professor
Cohen, if you were on CNN right now I imagine that the anchor would
say to you, well, okay, but one could say the same thing about
Georgia in 2008. Why did Russia attack Georgia then?
STEPHEN
COHEN: I’m not aware that Russia attacked Georgia. The
European Commission, if you’re talking about the 2008 war, the
European Commission, investigating what happened, found that Georgia,
which was backed by the United States, fighting with an
American-built army under the control of the, shall we say, slightly
unpredictable Georgian president then, Saakashvili, that
he began the war by firing on Russian enclaves. And the Kremlin,
which by the way was not occupied by Putin, but by Michael McFaul and
Obama’s best friend and reset partner then-president Dmitry
Medvedev, did what any Kremlin leader, what any leader in any country
would have had to do: it reacted. It sent troops across the border
through the tunnel, and drove the Georgian forces out of what
essentially were kind of Russian protectorate areas of Georgia.
So
that- Russia didn’t begin that war. And
it didn’t begin the one in Ukraine, either. We did that by
[continents], the overthrow of the Ukrainian president in [20]14
after President Obama told Putin that he would not permit that to
happen. And I think it happened within 36 hours. The
Russians, like them or not, feel that they have been lied to and
betrayed. They use this word, predatl’stvo, betrayal, about
American policy toward Russia ever since 1991, when
it wasn’t just President George Bush, all the documents have been
published by the National Security Archive in Washington, all the
leaders of the main Western powers promised the Soviet Union that
under Gorbachev, if Gorbachev would allow a reunited Germany to be
NATO, NATO would not, in the famous expression, move two inches to
the east.
Now
NATO is sitting on Russia’s borders from the Baltic to Ukraine. So
Russians aren’t fools, and they’re good-hearted, but they become
resentful. They’re worried about being attacked by the United
States. In fact, you read and hear in the Russian media daily, we are
under attack by the United States. And
this is a lot more real and meaningful than this crap that is being
put out that Russia somehow attacked us in 2016. I must have been
sleeping. I didn’t see Pearl Harbor or 9/11 and 2016. This is
reckless, dangerous, warmongering talk. It needs to stop. Russia has
a better case for saying they’ve been attacked by us since 1991. We
put our military alliance on the front door. Maybe it’s not an
attack, but it looks like one, feels like one. Could be one.
AARON
MATE: OK.
And in a moment I want to speak to you more about Ukraine, because
we’ve heard Crimea invoked a lot in the criticism of Putin of late.
But first I want to actually to ask you about a domestic issue. This
one is it’s widely held that Putin is responsible for the killing
of journalists and opposition activists who oppose him. And on this
front I want to play for you a clip of Joe Cirincione. He is the head
of the Ploughshares Fund. And this is what he said this week in an
appearance on Democracy Now!.
JOE
CIRINCIONE: Both
of these men are dangerous. Both of these men oppress basic human
rights, basic freedoms. Both of them think the press are the enemy of
the people. Putin goes further. He kills journalists. He has them
assassinated on the streets of Moscow.
Donald
Trump does not go that far yet. But I think what Putin is doing is
using the president of the United States to project his rule, to
increase his power, to carry out his agenda in Syria, with Europe, et
cetera, and that Trump is acquiescing to that for reasons that are
not yet clear.
AARON
MATE: That’s
Joe Cirincione.
STEPHEN
COHEN: I
know him well. It’s worse than that. It’s worse than that.
AARON
MATE: Well
Yes. There’s two issues here, Professor Cohen. One is the state of
the crackdown on press freedoms in Russia, which I’m sure you would
say is very much alive, and is a strong part of the Russian system.
But let’s first address this widely-held view that Putin is
responsible for killing journalists who are critical of him.
STEPHEN
COHEN: I
know I’m supposed to follow your lead, but I think you’re
skipping over a major point. How
is it that Joe, who was once one of our most eminent and influential,
eloquent opponents of nuclear arms race, who was prepared to have the
president of the United States negotiate with every Soviet communist
leader, including those who had a lot of blood on their hands, now
decide that Putin kills everybody and he’s not a worthy partner?
What happened to Joe?
I’ll
tell you what happened to him. Trump. Trump has driven once-sensible
people completely crazy. Moreover, Joe knows absolutely nothing about
internal Russian politics, and
he ought to follow my rule. When I don’t know something about
something, I say I don’t know. But what he just said is ludicrous.
And the sad part is-.
AARON
MATE: But
it’s widely held. If it’s ludicrous-. But widely held, yeah.
STEPHEN
COHEN: Well,
the point is that once
distinguished and important spokespeople for rightful causes, like
ending a nuclear arms race, have been degraded, or degraded
themselves by saying things like he said to the point that they’re
of utility today only to the proponents of a new nuclear arms race.
And he’s not alone. Somebody called it Trump derangement
syndrome. I’m
not a psychiatrist, but it’s a widespread mania across our land.
And when good people succumb to it, we are all endangered.
AARON
MATE: But
many people would be surprised to hear that, because again, the
stories that we get, and there are human rights reports, and it’s
just sort of taken as a given fact that Putin is responsible for
killing journalists. So if that’s ludicrous, if you can explain why
you think that is.
STEPHEN
COHEN: Well, I
got this big problem which seems to afflict very few people in public
life anymore. I live by facts. I’m
like my doctor, who told me not long ago I had to have minor surgery
for a problem I didn’t even know I had. And I said, I’m not going
to do it. Show me the facts. And he did. I had the minor
surgery. Journalists
no longer seem to care about facts. They repeat tabloid rumors. Putin
kills everybody.
All
I can tell you is this. I
have never seen any evidence whatsoever, and I’ve been- I knew some
of the people who were killed. Anna
Politkovskaya, the famous journalist for Novaya Gazeta was the first,
I think, who was- Putin was accused of killing. I knew her well. She
was right here, in this apartment. Look behind me, right here. She
was here with my wife, Katrina vanden Huevel. I wouldn’t say we
were close friends, but we were associates in Moscow, and we were
social friends. And
I mourn her assassination today. But I will tell you this, that
neither her editors at that newspaper, nor her family, her surviving
sons, think Putin had anything to do with the killing. No
evidence has ever been presented. Only media kangaroo courts that
Putin was involved in these high-profile assassinations, two of the
most famous being this guy Litvinenko by polonium in London, about
the time Anna was killed, and more recently Boris Netsov, whom, it’s
always said, was walking within view of the Kremlin when he was shot.
Well, you could see the Kremlin from miles away. I don’t know what
within the view- unless they think Putin was, you know, watching it
through binoculars. There is no evidence that Putin ever ordered the
killing of anybody outside his capacity as commander in chief. No
evidence.
Now,
did he? But we live, Aaron, and I hope the folks who watch us
remember this. Every professional person, every decent person lives
or malpractices based on verified facts. You go down the wrong way on
a one-way street, you might get killed. You take some medication
that’s not prescribed for you, you might die. You pursue foreign
policies based on fiction, you’re likely to get in war. And
all these journalists, from the New York Times to the Washington
Post, from MSNBC to CNN who churn out daily these allegations that
Putin kills people are disgracing themselves. I
will give you one fact. Wait. One fact, and you could look it up, as
Casey Stengel used to say. He was a baseball manager, in case you
don’t know.
There’s
an organization called the Committee to Protect American Journalists.
It’s kind of iconic. It does good things, it says unwise things. Go
on its website and look at the number of Russian journalists killed
since 1991, since the end of the Soviet Union, under two leaders.
Boris Yeltsin, whom we dearly loved and still mourn, and Putin, whom
we hate.Last
time I looked, the numbers may have changed, more were killed under
Yeltsin than under Putin. Did Putin kill those in the 1990s?
So
you should ask me, why did they die, then? And
I can tell you the main reason. Corrupt business. Mafia-like business
in Russia. Just like happened in the United States during our
primitive accumulation days. Profit
seekers killed rivals. Killed them dead in the streets. Killed them
as demonstrations, as demonstrative acts. The only thing you could
say about Putin is that he might have created an atmosphere that
abets that sort of thing. To which I would say, maybe, but originally
it was created with the oligarchical class under Boris Yeltsin, who
remains for us the most beloved Russian leader in history. So that’s
the long and the short of it. Go look at the listing on the Committee
to Protect Journalists.
AARON
MATE: OK.
So, following up on that, to what extent- and this gets a bit into
history, which you’ve covered extensively in your writings. To what
extent are we here in the West responsible for the creation of that
Russian oligarchal class that you mentioned? But also, what is
Putin’s relationship to it now, today? Does he abet it? Is he
entrenched in it? We hear, often, talk of Putin possibly being the
richest person in the world as a result of his entanglement with the
very corruption of Russia you’re speaking about. So both our role
in creating that problem in Russia, but then also Putin’s role now
in terms of his relationship to it.
STEPHEN
COHEN: I’m
going to give you a quick, truncated, scholarly, historical
perspective on this. But this is what people should begin with when
they think about Vladimir Putin and his 18 years in power. Putin came
to power almost accidentally in 2000. He inherited a country whose
state had collapsed twice in the 20th century. You’ve got to think
about that. How
many states have collapsed that you know of once? But the Russian
state, Russian statehood, had collapsed once in 1917 during the
revolution, and again in 1991 when the Soviet Union ended. The
country was in ruination; 75 percent of the people were in poverty.
Putin
said- and this obsesses him. If you want to know what obsesses Putin,
it’s the word ‘sovereignty.’ Russia lost its sovereignty-
political, foreign policy, security, financial- in the 1990s. Putin
saw his mission, as I read him, and I try to read him as a
biographer. He says a lot, to regain Russia’s sovereignty, which
meant to make the country whole again at home, to rescue its people,
and to protect its defenses. That’s been his mission. Has it been
more than that? Maybe. But everything he’s done, as I see it, has
followed that concept of his role in history. And he’s done pretty
well.
Now,
I can give you all Putin’s minuses very easily. I would not care
for him to be my president. But let me tell you one other thing
that’s important. You evaluate nations within their own history,
not within ours. If
you asked me if Putin is a democrat, and I will answer you two ways.
He thinks he has. And compared to what? Compared to the leader of
Egypt? Yeah, he is a democrat. Compared to the rulers of our pals in
the Gulf states, he is a democrat. Compared to Bill Clinton? No, he’s
not a Democrat. I mean, Russia-. Countries are on their own
historical clock. And you have to judge Putin in terms of his
predecessors. So people think Putin is a horrible leader. Did you
prefer Brezhnev? Did you prefer Stalin? Did you prefer Andropov?
Compared to what? Please tell me, compared to what.
And
by the way, that’s how that’s how Russians-. You want to know why
he’s so popular in Russia? Because Russians judge him in the
context of their own what they call zhivaya istoriya, living history;
what we call autobiography. In
terms of their own lives, he looks pretty darn good. They complain
out him. We sit in the kitchen and they bitch about Putin all the
time. But they don’t want him to go away.
AARON
MATE: All
right. Well, on that front, we’re going to wrap this up there.
Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at New York
University and Princeton. His books include “Failed Crusade:
America and the Tragedy of Post-Soviet Russia,” and “Soviet Fates
and Lost Alternatives: From Stalinism to the New Cold War.”
Professor Cohen, thank you.
STEPHEN
COHEN: You
forgot one book.
AARON
MATE: I
did not say I was reading your, your complete bibliography.
STEPHEN
COHEN: It’s
called-. It’s called “Confessions of a Holy Fool.”
AARON
MATE: Is
that true? Or are you making a joke.
STEPHEN
COHEN: Somewhere
in between. [Thank you, Aaron.]
AARON
MATE: Professor
Cohen, thank you. And thank you for joining us on The Real News.
Trump die zwaar onder druk ligt in de VS vanwege zijn gesprek met Putin, had gisteren het gore lef te zeggen dat hij zich versproken had toen hij stelde dat ook een ander de VS verkiezingen kan hebben gemanipuleerd……
Trump liet weten dat hij het woord ‘would’ had gebruikt waar het had moeten zijn: ‘wouldn’t….’ Ofwel hij vroeg zich eerder af waarom het de Russen zouden zijn, die de verkiezingen hadden gemanipuleerd, ‘waar hij bedoelde’: waarom zouden het de Russen niet geweest zijn, die de verkiezingen hebben gemanipuleerd…… ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!
Tja als je de dodelijke belangen van de democraten, republikeinen (die beiden vooral goed zijn in liegen), de doodsindustrie aangeduid als wapenindustrie (die samen met het Pentagon worden aangeduid als militair-industrieel complex in de VS) voor de voeten loopt, zijn de rapen gaar……
Mensen, hoe is het mogelijk dat men in de westerse wereld moord en brand schreeuwt, daar Putin en Trump de spanningen tussen Rusland en de VS uit de lucht proberen te halen…??
Wil men zo graag oorlog, of een voortbestaan van de koude oorlog, zaken waar werkelijk niemand beter van wordt??
Op Radio1, BNR, VRT (radio) 1, WDR en BBC vanmorgen de ene na de andere oorlogshitser, die schande sprak van de ontmoeting tussen Putin en Trump……. Deze reguliere media die het woord complottheorie te onpas en te onpas gebruiken, hebben nu geen moeite de ene na de andere samenzweringstheorie te lanceren, zo zou Putin Trump in de hand hebben, zou Putin een geheim van Trump weten en hem daarmee chanteren, om er een paar te noemen….
Uiteraard haalt men alle fake news (nepnieuws) van stal: de Russen zouden voor de winst van Trump tijdens de VS presidentsverkiezingen hebben gezorgd, middels het hacken van computers en documenten te lekken….. Niet dat daar ook maar één bewijs voor is geleverd, ook voor de laatste beschuldigingen van Mueller aan het adres van de Russen, is niet een flinter van bewijs gegeven….. (en dat zal zo blijven) Een correspondent van WDR durfde zelfs te beweren dat hij een stapel aan bewijzen had gezien voor de beschuldigingen van Mueller aan het adres van 12 Russische inlichtingenofficieren, als zouden zij de computer van Podesto, de rechterhand van Clinton tijdens de verkiezingscampagne, hebben gehackt……. Dit terwijl ook deze ‘bewijzen’ niet openbaar kunnen worden gemaakt, daar ze anders ‘een gevaar voor de VS staatsveiligheid’ zouden vormen…… ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!
Scala is een programma op WDR 5 en in dat programma werd een goed uur geleden door een presentator gezegd dat Trump Putin gelooft met diens bewering dat Rusland geen hand had in de manipulatie van de VS presidentsverkiezingen, de presentator deed dit op een smalende manier, daar Putin dit gezegd zou hebben, terwijl voor deze zaak zoals gezegd geen flinter bewijs ligt…… Als deze presentator z’n werk had gedaan, had hij zelf deze conclusie kunnen trekken…. Ook de annexatie van De Krim werd door deze presentator gehekeld, terwijl het volk van De Krim, in een door internationale waarnemers als eerlijk en goed beoordeeld referendum besloot zich aan te sluiten bij Rusland en niet langer te willen leven onder de corrupte neonazi-junta van Porosjenko, een junta die één op één door de VS in het zadel werd geholpen……
De reguliere westerse media en het grootste deel van westerse politici hebben geen moeite met een illegale oorlog meer of minder aangegaan door de VS, sterker nog men verdedigt zelfs de leugens die de VS gebruikt om een land naar god te bombarderen…….
Vanmorgen na 9.30 u. op Radio1, hare kwaadaardigheid Salemon, naast alle leugens over Rusland stelde ze dat het economisch slecht gaat met Rusland, terwijl Rusland het ene contract na het andere afsluit met niet-westerse landen en het ondanks de westerse sancties economisch redelijk goed gaat met Rusland…. Dat laatste, het afsluiten van overeenkomsten en contracten met niet westerse landen en de grote bedrijven daar, is ook van toepassing op het volgende wat Salemon aan haar woorden toevoegde: Putin is geïsoleerd…… ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! Tja dat krijg je als je het westen als heel de wereld ziet! (jezus!) Ook zwetskop en grofgraaier Charles Groenhuijsen mocht heel dapper laten horen wat hij aan kronkels in de kop heeft als het om Rusland, Putin of Trump gaat…..
Op BNR was vanmorgen na 8.30 u. VS ‘deskundige’ Diederik Brink te horen, deze huis, tuin en keukenpsycholoog stelde dat Trump maar slapjes stond naast Putin en zo stelde Brink, het lijkt erop dat hij werkelijk gelooft op eigen kracht in het Witte Huis te zijn gekomen…… ha! ha! ha! ha! Zie het voorgaande, bovendien is de smerige campagne die Clinton voerde de oorzaak voor haar verlies, een smerige campagne die men in de schoenen van de Russen wil schuiven, nogmaals: zonder dat er ook maar een flinter aan bewijs werd geleverd……. Terwijl er een fiks aantal documenten liggen, die duidelijk maken dat er vanuit de DNC is gelekt naar de pers, daar er nog een paar medewerkers waren die het niet eens waren met het smerige spel van Clinton……
Voor het tegenovergestelde, dus dat de VS elders: -verkiezingen manipuleert (ook middels hacken, zie Vault 7 en 8 documenten op WikiLeaks), -opstanden organiseert, -staatsgrepen regisseert dan wel uitvoert, -verdachten en niet verdachten massaal vermoordt middels drones, -met geheime CIA/leger acties, een groot aantal mensen vermoordt en -illegale oorlogen begint, liggen er wel een enorm aantal bewijzen (veelal officiële documenten van de VS en alweer >> vaak te vinden op WikiLeaks…)….
Brink was één van de figuren die beweerde dat Rusland waarschijnlijk zaken van Trump weet waarmee het Trump onder druk zou hebben gezet……. Volgens Brink komen er in de VS dagelijks schandalen bij, waaronder hij ook de lariekoek van Mueller verstaat……
Overbodig te melden dat men vanmorgen tijdens deze anti-Russische propaganda keer op keer vlucht MH17 aanhaalde, terwijl het hele onderzoek naar het neerhalen van MH17 een farce is >> ondanks alle belachelijke beschuldigingen aan het adres van Rusland, liggen er meer dan voldoende bewijzen die in de richting van de VS en Oekraïne wijzen……
Om een paar zaken te noemen: waarom week vlucht MH17 op 17 juli 2014 van het normale ‘vliegpad’ af en vloog men over oorlogsgebied? Hoe is het mogelijk dat een land al haar radarposten op dezelfde dag uitschakelt, zoals Oekraïne op 17 juli 2014 heeft gedaan, vandaag precies 4 jaar geleden? Wie had er belang bij het neerhalen van MH17? (Niet Rusland noch de opstandelingen tegen de Oekraïense dictatuur) Waarom mocht Maleisië niet meewerken aan het onderzoek, omdat het ‘de Rusland is schuldig doctrine’ niet geloofde? Voor meer berichten over het neerhalen van vlucht MH17, klik op het label MH17, direct onder dit bericht (na een aantal berichten volgt het laatst gelezen bericht telkens weer terug, dan even onder het laatst gelezen bericht nog eens op ‘MH17’ klikken)
Nogmaals: mensen hoe is het mogelijk dat men de kans op ontspanning verfoeit in het westen, niet alleen door de reguliere media, maar ook door het grootste deel van de politici…? Wil men zo graag een echte oorlog met Rusland…?
Bij deze wil ik de nabestaanden van de slachtoffers die door de MH17 ramp te betreuren zijn, deze dag sterkte wensen.
Naar aanleiding van een eerder artikel van Caitlin Johnstone*, waarin ze op de nieuwe beschuldigingen aan het adres van Rusland ingaat en terecht wijst op het feit dat deze beschuldigingen wel heel toevallig net voor de top tussen Putin en Trump werden gepubliceerd, heeft ze het hieronder opgenomen artikel geschreven.
Men kan er maar geen genoeg van krijgen in de VS (en de rest van het westen): Rusland demoniseren op basis van… Ja, waarvan? ‘Simpel’: op basis van bewijzen die helaas voor iedereen geheim moeten blijven……** ha! ha! ha! ha! Nu zouden 12 Russische officieren de computers van Clinton (of eigenlijk van haar rechterhand Podesta) hebben gehackt en documenten hebben doorgespeeld aan Wikileaks……. Zoals de ‘overtuigende bewijsvoering’ bij de eerdere beschuldigingen aan het adres van Rusland, ook daar mochten we niet weten wat die ‘bewijzen’ zijn en waaruit de ‘overtuigende bewijsvoering’ is opgebouwd……
Caitlin Johnstone geeft in het hierna opgenomen artikel aan welke 5 feiten voor haar voldoende zouden zijn om op de ‘Russische-hysterie trein’ van de VS te springen…….
Feilloos geeft Johnstone aan waar de schoen wringt, al moet ik zeggen dat er nog wel meer redenen zijn waarom deze door de geheime diensten van de VS, met hulp van de democraten en de reguliere media gefabriceerde Rusland-hysterietotaal ongeloofwaardig is. (zelfs Nederland is aangestoken…. ha! ha! ha! ha! Als je gelooft dat Rusland zelfs maar moeite zou doen om de boel hier te beïnvloeden, ben je echt voor eeuwig de weg kwijt! Vanmorgen werd toevallig gemeld dat 900 retweets van een ‘Russische trollenfabriek’ [ha! ha! ha!] met racistisch commentaar hier de boel negatief zou hebben beïnvloed…… ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! Knettergek!!)
Terecht wijst Johnstone overigens op het feit dat uit overheidsdata blijkt dat de VS zelf van 1946 tot het jaar 2000 in 81 landen de verkiezingen heeft gemanipuleerd, zelfs in Rusland, een publiek feit….. Zo bezien kan de VS als wraak van die landen nog wel een 70 tal verkiezingsmanipulaties verzinnen………
Bovendien, als er nu één ding is waar de geheime diensten van de VS (en intussen ook de massamedia) goed in zijn, is het wel in glashard liegen, zo merkt Johnstone alweer volkomen terecht op.
Five Things That Would Make The CIA/CNN Russia Narrative More Believable
As we just discussed, some major news stories have recently dropped about what a horrible horrifying menace the Russian Federation is to the world, and as always I have nothing to offer the breathless pundits on CNN and MSNBC but my completely unsatisfied skepticism. My skepticism of the official Russia narrative remains so completely unsatisfied that if mainstream media were my husband I would already be cheating on it with my yoga instructor.
I do not believe the establishment Russia narrative. I do not believe that Donald Trump colluded with the Russian government to rig the 2016 election. I do not believe the Russian government did any election rigging for Trump to collude with. This is not because I believe Vladimir Putin is some kind of blueberry-picking girl scout, and it certainly isn’t because I think the Russian government is unwilling or incapable of meddling in the affairs of other nations to some extent when it suits them. It is simply because I am aware that the US intelligence community lies constantly as a matter of policy, and because I understand how the burden of proof works.
At this time, I see no reason to espouse any belief system which embraces as true the assertion that Russia meddled in the 2016 elections in any meaningful way, or that it presents a unique and urgent threat to the world which must be aggressively dealt with. But all the establishment mouthpieces tell me that I must necessarily embrace these assertions as known, irrefutable fact. Here are five things that would have to change in order for that to happen:
In most cases, it’s so basic that unproven allegations by a prosecutor in an indictment shouldn’t be accepted as true one need not even point it out. In this case, pointing it out will be seen as blasphemy. Everyone should want to see the evidence on which the claims are based:
The first step to getting a heretic like myself aboard the Russia hysteria train would be the existence of publicly available evidence of the claims made about election meddling in 2016, which rises to the level required in a post-Iraq invasion world. So far, that burden of proof for Russian hacking allegations has not come anywhere remotely close to being met.
How much proof would I need to lend my voice to the escalation of tensions between two nuclear superpowers? Mountains. I personally would settle for nothing less than hard proof which can be independently verified by trusted experts like the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
Is that a big ask? Yes. Yes it is. That’s what happens when government institutions completely discredit themselves as they did with the false narratives advanced in the manufacturing of support for the Iraq invasion. You don’t get to butcher a million Iraqis in a war based on lies, turn around a few years later and say “We need new cold war escalations with a nuclear superpower but we can’t prove it because the evidence is secret.” That’s not a thing. Copious amounts of hard, verifiable proof or GTFO***. So far we have no evidence besides the confident-sounding assertions of government insiders and their mass media mouthpieces, which is the same as no evidence.
2. Proof that election meddling actually influenced the election in a meaningful way.
Even if Russian hackers did exfiltrate Democratic party emails and give them to WikiLeaks, if it didn’t affect the election, who cares? That’s a single-day, second-page story at best, meriting nothing beyond a “Hmm, interesting, turns out Russia tried and failed to influence the US election,” followed by a shrug and moving on to something that actually matters.
After it has been thoroughly proven that Russia meddled in the elections in a meaningful way, it must then be established that that meddling had an actual impact on the election results.
3. Some reason to believe Russian election meddling was unwarranted and unacceptable.
The US government, by a very wide margin, interferes in the elections of other countries far, far more than any other government on earth does. The US government’s own data shows that it has deliberately meddled in the elections of 81 foreign governments between 1946 and 2000, including Russia in the nineties. This is public knowledge. A former CIA Director cracked jokes about it on Fox News earlier this year.
If I’m going to abandon my skepticism and accept the Gospel According to Maddow****, after meaningful, concrete election interference has been clearly established I’m going to need a very convincing reason to believe that it is somehow wrong or improper for a government to attempt to respond in kind to the undisputed single worst offender of this exact offense. It makes no sense for the United States to actively create an environment in which election interference is something that governments do to one another, and then cry like a spanked child when its election is interfered with by one of the very governments whose elections the US recently meddled in.
This is nonsense. America being far and away the worst election meddler on the planet makes it a fair target for election meddling by not just Russia, but every country in the world. It is very obviously moral and acceptable for any government on earth to interfere in America’s elections as long as it remains the world’s worst offender in that area. In order for Russia to be in the wrong if it interfered in America’s elections, some very convincing argument I’ve not yet heard will have to be made to support that case.
4. Proof that the election meddling went beyond simply giving Americans access to information about their government.
If all the Russians did was simply show Americans emails of Democratic Party officials talking to one another and circulate some MSM articles as claimed in the ridiculous Russian troll farm allegations, that’s nothing to get upset about. If anything, Americans should be upset that they had to hear about Democratic Party corruption through the grapevine instead of having light shed on it by the American officials whose job it is to do so. Complaints about election meddling is only valid if that election meddling isn’t comprised of truth and facts.
5. A valid reason to believe escalated tensions between two nuclear superpowers are worthwhile.
After it has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Russia did indeed meddle in the US elections in a meaningful way, and after it has then been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Russia actually influenced election results in a significant way, and after the case has been clearly made that it was bad and wrong for Russia to do this instead of fair and reasonable, and after it has been clearly proven that the election meddling went beyond simply telling Americans the truth about their government, the question then becomes what, if anything, should be done about it?
If you look at the actions that this administration has taken over the last year and a half, the answer to that question appears to be harsh sanctions, NATO expansionism, selling arms to Ukraine, throwing out diplomats, increasing military presence along Russia’s border, a Nuclear Posture Review which is much more aggressive toward Russia, repeatedly bombing Syria, and just generally creating more and more opportunities for something to go catastrophically wrong with one of the two nations’ aging, outdated nuclear arsenals, setting off a chain of events from which there is no turning back and no surviving.
And the pundits and politicians keep pushing for more and more escalations, at this very moment braying with one voice that Trump must aggressively confront Putin about Mueller’s indictments or withdraw from the peace talks. But is it worth it? Is it worth risking the life of every terrestrial organism to, what? What specifically would be gained that makes increasing the risk of nuclear catastrophe worthwhile? Making sure nobody interferes in America’s fake elections? I’d need to see a very clear and specific case made, with a ‘pros’ and ‘cons’ list and “THE POTENTIAL DEATH OF LITERALLY EVERYTHING” written in big red letters at the top of the ‘cons’ column.
Rallying the world to cut off Russia from the world stage and cripple its economy has been been a goal of the US power establishment since the collapse of the Soviet Union, so there’s no reason to believe that even the people who are making the claims against Russia actually believe them. The goal is crippling Russia to handicap China, and ultimately to shore up global hegemony for the US-centralized empire by preventing the rise of any rival superpowers. The sociopathic alliance of plutocrats and intelligence/defense agencies who control that empire are willing to threaten nuclear confrontation in order to ensure their continued dominance. All of their actions against Russia since 2016 have had everything to do with establishing long-term planetary dominance and nothing whatsoever to do with election meddling.
Those five things would need to happen before I’d be willing to jump aboard the “Russia! Russia!” train. Until then I’ll just keep pointing to the total lack of evidence and how very, very far the CIA/CNN Russia narrative is from credibility.
** Vanmorgen op Radio1 bij de ‘onafhankelijke’ zendgemachtigde NOS, VS correspondent Wouter Zwart. Deze enorme leugenaar durfde keihard te zeggen dat er bergen bewijs zijn voor de aanklachten tegen 12 Russische officieren, die de computers van de democraten zouden hebben gekraakt….. ‘Bergen bewijs‘ die niemand mag inzien…… Later zal ik hier nog een bericht over opstellen. Hier nog een artikel van Blik op NOS Journaal over deze Zwart met commentaar op de top tussen Putin en Trump: ‘Wouter Zwart (NOS) desinformeert over Putin-Trump Top‘ (klik ook op het label Wouter Zwart, direct onder dit bericht)
*** GTFO: Get The Fuck Out
**** Rachel Maddow, een radio en tv presentator MSNBC
Het is meer dan duidelijk dat Merkel het onderspit heeft gedolven in de strijd met de fascistische CSU minister Seehofer, die dreigde de Beierse grenzen te sluiten als Merkel niet overstag zou gaan……
Vluchtelingen zullen in Duitsland worden opgevangen in gesloten ‘transitcentra’ waar men zal controleren via welk land de vluchtelingen de EU zijn binnengekomen en hen daarna zal uitwijzen naar dat land……
Het woord ‘kampen’ mocht niet worden gebruikt, echter als je ziet wat er zal gebeuren als e.e.a. doorgaat (er is grote weerstand tegen dit plan in de SPD, de coalitiepartner van de CDU en CSU), de vluchtelingen ofwel mensen geconcentreerd zullen worden opgesloten in ‘centra’, waarvoor je zonder meer het woord ‘concentratiekampen’ kan gebruiken……..
Het is dan ook meer dan duidelijk dat het gedaan is met Merkel als premier, immers een paar jaar geleden nog, zou ze niet akkoord zijn gegaan met dit lamlendige, fascistoïde akkoord……..
Merkel durfde nieuwe verkiezingen niet aan en was te beroerd om in gesprek te gaan met de Groenen voor steun, als men de CSU uit de regering zou schoppen vanwege de houding in deze zaak……
De CSU, een partij die in Beieren alleen op de verkiezingsformulieren staat, daar de CDU zich daar volgens afspraak niet mag meten met haar ‘zusterpartij……’ Terwijl er veel CSU stemmers in Beieren zijn, die veel liever op de CDU zouden stemmen, dan op de benepen extreem rechtse CSU (onbegrijpelijk overigens dat deze mensen dan niet op een andere partij stemmen, ‘maar goed…’)
Als de CDU verstandig is, maakt het een eind aan de langdurige samenwerking met de Beierse CSU en stelt het zich ook in Beieren verkiesbaar.
Laten we hopen dat dit niet de opmaat is tot dit soort centra in de rest van de EU, ook al willen de Nederlandse politici als plork Rutte dolgraag vluchtelingen opvangen in concentratiekampen in de EU en daarna in Noord-Afrika…….. Een plan dat minstens zo fout is, als het Duitse compromis….
Concentratiekampen in Duitsland anno 2018, hoe is het in godsnaam mogelijk….??!!!
PS: in de maand juni zijn meer dan 600 gevluchte mensen verdronken in de Middellandse Zee…… ‘Gelukzoekers’ die verdronken, waaronder een fiks aantal kinderen….. Dan zijn er nog politici die durven te zeggen dat de reddingsacties op de Middellandse Zee, door particuliere hulporganisaties, per direct moeten worden verboden……… Overigens zijn deze politici van VVD, PVV en CDA ook tegen deze reddingsacties door EU organisaties……. ‘Echte mensen’ zal ik maar denken……
Altijd
leuk om weer een bevestiging tegen te komen over de leugen dat
Rusland de presidentsverkiezingen in de VS heeft beïnvloed t.g.v.
Donald Trump, de ‘lichtelijk’ imbeciele psychopaat.
Er
kunnen niet genoeg van deze berichten verschijnen, zeker als je dag
in dag uit westerse ‘journalisten’, politici en ‘deskundigen’ de leugen hoort
herhalen dat de Russen wel degelijk deze verkiezingen hebben
gemanipuleerd, iets waarvoor tot op heden geen flinter bewijs is
geleverd….. Zoals er ook geen nanometer bewijs is voor Russische bemoeienis met de Brexit, de roep om onafhankelijkheid in Catalonië of verkiezingen in de EU, terwijl ook dat bijna dagelijks de revue passeert……
Lees
het hieronder opgenomen artikel en verbaas je ook over het gemak
waarmee de wereld werd en nog steeds wordt voorgelogen met een zo
doorzichtig aantal leugens….. In deze geopenbaard door Jack
Matlock, een voormalig VS ambassadeur in Moskou. Hij stelt o.a. dat de aanname dat de VS inlichtingendiensten achter deze leugens staan, op zich al een leugen van formaat is en dat het zogenaamde inlichtingen rapport vooral politiek gemotiveerd is (o.a. om Hillary Clinton uit de wind te houden en de winst van Trump bij de presidentsverkiezingen ter discussie te stellen, Ap):
Former
US Ambassador: Intel Report on Russian Interference “Politically
Motivated”
Prominent
journalists and politicians seized upon a shabby, politically
motivated, “intelligence” report as proof of “Russian
interference” in the U.S. election without the pretense of due
diligence, argues Jack Matlock, a former U.S. ambassador in Moscow.
(CN Op-ed) — Did
the U.S. “intelligence community” judge that Russia interfered in
the 2016 presidential election?
Most
commentators seem to think so. Every news report I have read of the
planned meeting of Presidents Trump and Putin in July refers to
“Russian interference” as a fact and asks whether the matter will
be discussed. Reports that President Putin denied involvement in the
election are scoffed at, usually with a claim that the U.S.
“intelligence community” proved Russian interference. In fact,
the U.S. “intelligence community” has not done so. The
intelligence community as a whole has not been tasked to make a
judgment and some key members of that community did not participate
in the report that is routinely cited as “proof” of “Russian
interference.”
I
spent the 35 years of my government service with a “top secret”
clearance. When
I reached the rank of ambassador and also worked as Special Assistant
to the President for National Security, I also had clearances for
“codeword” material. At that time, intelligence reports to the
president relating to Soviet and European affairs were routed through
me for comment. I developed at that time a “feel” for the
strengths and weaknesses of the various American intelligence
agencies. It is with that background that I read the January 6,
2017 report of
three intelligence agencies: the CIA, FBI, and NSA.
This
report is labeled “Intelligence Community Assessment,” but in
fact it
is not that.
A report of the intelligence community in my day would include the
input of all the relevant intelligence agencies and would reveal
whether all agreed with the conclusions. Individual agencies did not
hesitate to “take a footnote” or explain their position if they
disagreed with a particular assessment. A report would not claim to
be that of the “intelligence community” if any relevant agency
was omitted.
The
report states that it represents the findings of three intelligence
agencies: CIA, FBI, and NSA, but even
that is misleading in
that it implies that there was a consensus of relevant analysts in
these three agencies. In fact, the report was prepared by a group of
analysts from the three agencies pre-selected by their directors,
with the selection process generally overseen by James Clapper, then
Director of National Intelligence (DNI). Clapper told the Senate in
testimony May 8, 2017, that it was prepared by “two dozen or so
analysts—hand-picked, seasoned experts from each of the
contributing agencies.” If you can hand-pick the analysts, you can
hand-pick the conclusions. The analysts selected would have
understood what Director Clapper wanted since he made no secret of
his views. Why would they endanger their careers by not delivering?
What
should have struck any congressperson or reporter was that the
procedure Clapper followed was the same as that used in 2003 to
produce the report falsely claiming that Saddam Hussein had retained
stocks of weapons of mass destruction. That should be worrisome
enough to inspire questions, but that is not the only anomaly.
The
DNI has under his aegis a National Intelligence Council (NIC) whose
officers can call any intelligence agency with relevant expertise to
draft community assessments. It was created by Congress after 9/11
specifically to correct some of the flaws in intelligence collection
revealed by 9/11. Director Clapper chose not to call on the NIC,
which is curious since its duty is “to act as a bridge between the
intelligence and policy communities.”
Unusual
FBI Participation
During
my time in government, a judgment regarding national security would
include reports from, as a minimum, the CIA, the Defense Intelligence
Agency (DIA), and the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) of
the State Department. The FBI was rarely, if ever, included unless
the principal question concerned law enforcement within the United
States. NSA might have provided some of the intelligence used by the
other agencies but normally did not express an opinion regarding the
substance of reports.
What
did I notice when I read the January report? There was no mention of
INR or DIA! The exclusion of DIA might be understandable since its
mandate deals primarily with military forces, except that the report
attributes some of the Russian activity to the GRU, Russian military
intelligence. DIA, the Defense Intelligence Agency, is the U.S.
intelligence organ most expert on the GRU. Did it concur with this
attribution? The report doesn’t say.
The
omission of INR is more glaring since a report on foreign political
activity could not have been that of the U.S. intelligence community
without its participation. After all, when it comes to assessments of
foreign intentions and foreign political activity, the State
Department’s intelligence service is by far the most knowledgeable
and competent. In my day, it reported accurately on Gorbachev’s
reforms when the CIA leaders were advising that Gorbachev had the
same aims as his predecessors.
This
is where due diligence comes in. The first question responsible
journalists and politicians should have asked is “Why is INR not
represented? Does it have a different opinion? If so, what is that
opinion? Most likely the official answer would have been that this is
“classified information.” But why should it be classified? If
some agency heads come to a conclusion and choose (or are directed)
to announce it publicly, doesn’t the public deserve to know that
one of the key agencies has a different opinion?
The
second question should have been directed at the CIA, NSA, and FBI:
did all their analysts agree with these conclusions or were they
divided in their conclusions? What was the reason behind hand-picking
analysts and departing from the customary practice of enlisting
analysts already in place and already responsible for following the
issues involved?
State
Department Intel Silenced
As
I was recently informed by a senior official, the
State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence Research did, in fact,
have a different opinion but was not allowed to express it.
So the January report was not one of the “intelligence community,”
but rather of three intelligence agencies, two of which have no
responsibility or necessarily any competence to judge foreign
intentions. The job of the FBI is to enforce federal law. The job of
NSA is to intercept the communications of others and to protect ours.
It is not staffed to assess the content of what is intercepted; that
task is assumed by others, particularly the CIA, the DIA (if it is
military) or the State Department’s INR (if it is political).
The
second thing to remember is that reports of the intelligence agencies
reflect the views of the heads of the agencies and are not
necessarily a consensus of their analysts’ views. The heads of both
the CIA and FBI are political appointments, while the NSA chief is a
military officer; his agency is a collector of intelligence rather
than an analyst of its import, except in the fields of cryptography
and communications security.
One
striking thing about the press coverage and Congressional discussion
of the January report, and of subsequent statements by CIA, FBI, and
NSA heads is that questions were never posed regarding the position
of the State Department’s INR, or whether the analysts in the
agencies cited were in total agreement with the conclusions.
Let’s
put these questions aside for the moment and look at the report
itself. On the first page of text, the following statement leapt to
my attention:
“We
did not make an assessment of the impact that Russian activities had
on the outcome of the 2016 election. The US Intelligence Community is
charged with monitoring and assessing the intentions, capabilities,
and actions of foreign actors; it does not analyze US political
processes or US public opinion.”
Now,
how can one judge whether activity “interfered” with an election
without assessing its impact? After all, if the activity had no
impact on the outcome of the election, it could not be properly
termed interference. This disclaimer, however, has not prevented
journalists and politicians from citing the report as proof that
“Russia interfered” in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
As
for particulars, the report is full of assertion, innuendo, and
description of “capabilities” but largely devoid of any evidence
to substantiate its assertions. This is “explained” by claiming
that much of the evidence is classified and cannot be disclosed
without revealing sources and methods. The assertions are made with
“high confidence” or occasionally, “moderate confidence.”
Having read many intelligence reports I can tell you that if there is
irrefutable evidence of something it will be stated as a fact. The
use of the term “high confidence” is what most normal people
would call “our best guess.” “Moderate confidence” means
“some of our analysts think this might be true.”
Guccifer
2.0: A Fabrication
Among
the assertions are that a persona calling itself “Guccifer 2.0”
is an instrument of the GRU, and that it hacked the emails on the
Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) computer and conveyed them to
Wikileaks. What the report does not explain is that it is easy for a
hacker or foreign intelligence service to leave a false trail. In
fact, a program developed by CIA with NSA assistance to do just that
has been leaked and published*.
Retired
senior NSA technical experts have examined the “Guccifer 2.0”
data on the web and have concluded that “Guccifer 2.0’s” data
did not involve a hack across the web but was locally downloaded.
Further, the data had been tampered with and manipulated, leading to
the conclusion that “Guccifer 2.0” is a total fabrication.
The
report’s assertions regarding the supply of the DNC emails to
Wikileaks are dubious, but its final statement in this regard is
important: “Disclosures
through WikiLeaks did not contain any evident forgeries.” In
other words, what was disclosed was the truth! So, Russians are
accused of “degrading our democracy” by revealing that the DNC
was trying to fix the nomination of a particular candidate rather
than allowing the primaries and state caucuses to run their course. I
had always thought that transparency is consistent with democratic
values. Apparently those who think that the truth can degrade
democracy have a rather bizarre—to put it mildly–concept of
democracy.
Most
people, hearing that it is a “fact” that “Russia” interfered
in our election must think that Russian government agents hacked into
vote counting machines and switched votes to favor a particular
candidate. This, indeed, would be scary, and would justify the most
painful sanctions. But this is the one thing that the “intelligence”
report of January 6, 2017, states did not happen. Here is what it
said: “DHS
[the Department of Homeland Security] assesses that the types of
systems Russian actors targeted or compromised were not involved in
vote tallying.”
This
is an important statement by an agency that is empowered to assess
the impact of foreign activity on the United States. Why was it not
consulted regarding other aspects of the study? Or—was it in fact
consulted and refused to endorse the findings? Another obvious
question any responsible journalist or competent politician should
have asked.
Prominent
American journalists and politicians seized upon this shabby,
politically motivated, report as proof of “Russian interference”
in the U.S. election without even the pretense of due diligence. They
have objectively acted as co-conspirators in an effort to block any
improvement in relations with Russia, even though cooperation with
Russia to deal with common dangers is vital to both countries.
This
is only part of the story of how, without good reason, U.S.-Russian
relations have become dangerously confrontational. God willin and the
crick don’t rise, I’ll be musing about other aspects soon.
‘Campagne Clinton, smeriger dan gedacht…………‘ (met daarin daarin opgenomen de volgende artikelen: ‘Donna Brazile Bombshell: ‘Proof’ Hillary ‘Rigged’ Primary Against Bernie‘ en ‘Democrats in Denial After Donna Brazile Says Primary Was Rigged for Hillary‘)
Zie ook het volgende artikel daterend van 26 oktober 2017: ‘‘Death Sentence for Local Media’: Warnings as FCC Pushes Change to Benefit Right-Wing Media Giant‘ Met o.a.:“At a time when broadcast conglomerates like Sinclair are gobbling up new stations and pulling media resources out of marginalized communities, we still need the main studio rule to help connect broadcasters to the local viewers and listeners they’re supposed to serve.” —Dana Floberg, Free Press. Vergeet niet dat bijvoorbeeld de lokale dagbladen in ons land intussen zo ongeveer allemaal zijn ondergebracht bij de grote dagbladen, allen in bezit van op winst beluste eigenaren, dan wel (beursgenoteerde) politiek rechtse organisaties, die een eigen belang hebben bij voor hen gunstig gekleurde berichtgeving in de bladen die zij onder het beheer hebben, waarbij deze eigenaren allen grote aanhangers zijn van het ijskoude, inhumane neoliberalisme en grote voorstanders zijn van de VS terreur, waar ter wereld die ook wordt uitgeoefend……..
GRU in Nederlands GROe, label veranderd op 5 oktober 2018.
Het Britse bedrijf Strategic
Communication Laboratories (SCL Group), waarvan de VS tak ofwel
dochtermaatschappij het vermaledijde Cambridge Analytica is, viel fiks
door de mand (met bewijzen >> gelekte officiële documenten) voor o.a. het manipuleren van
verkiezingen, terwijl voor ‘Russische manipulaties na godbetert 2 jaar nog steeds geen
flinter aan bewijs is geleverd……..’ Overigens ook in WikiLeaks zijn bewijzen te vinden van VS manipulaties van verkiezingen elders… Zo de waard is vertrouwt deze zijn/haar gasten, om nog eens een cliché aan te halen, al is de waard de VS …..
SCL gebruikte in 2009 m.n. Jemen als
proefgebied voor haar smerige spelletjes….. De in Jemen ontwikkelde
onderzoeks- en psychologische tactieken, werden later gebruikt tegen
bevolkingen de wereld rond, o.a. in landen als Libië, Syrië en
Iran……
SCL heeft een dubieuze reputatie van
stoken in conflictgebieden, zoals deze organisatie dit heeft gedaan in Nigeria, Oekraïne, Litouwen en
in meerdere westerse landen…… (zie de link onder het hieronder opgenomen artikel)
Randi Nord, schrijver van het hieronder opgenomen artikel, eerder gepubliceerd op Geopolitics Alert, neemt m.n. Project Titania onder de loep, dit is het project van SCL dat in 2009 van start ging in Jemen, een project waarvan men de uitkomsten heeft ingezet in een aantal andere landen…..
Heel smerig is het gebruik van informatie door SCL, informatie die door o.a. NGO’s werd verzameld…… SCL Group gebruikte (en gebruikt) deze informatie voor psychologische manipulaties en zelfs voor psychologische oorlogsvoering……. SCL Group lanceerde Project Titania t.b.v. een militaire onderaannemer genaamd Archimedes……..
Sinds Project Titania van start ging hebben de VS en de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten (VAE) 18 ‘black site prisons’ geopend in Jemen, ofwel geheime gevangenissen waar men martelt en de ergste vorm van marteling >> verkrachting toepast op gevangenen die niet eens zijn veroordeeld, gevangenen van wie niemand uit de achterban weet waar ze zijn, zoals je zal begrijpen uit het voorgaande…..
Cambridge
Analytica Parent Co. Used Yemen as Test Site for Global Manipulation
Tactics
London (GPA)
– Leaked documents show that Strategic Communication Laboratories
(SCL), the parent company of the notorious Cambridge Analytica,
carried out a surveillance operation embedded among local Yemeni
populations in 2009. The research and psychological tactics of
deception were likely later used against populations around the world
including Libya, Syria, and Iran where SCL Group carried out
various operations to influence social climates on behalf of their
clients.
SLC
Group has a dubious history of stirring up trouble with
“psychological warfare” in places like Nigeria, Ukraine, Latvia
and many Western countries.
The
leaked documents, obtained by the Grayzone
Project,
detail a program called “Project Titania” carried out in Yemen
which SCL Group appears to have used for honing their psychological
manipulation skills. Grayzone spoke
with a media professional who SCL attempted to recruit for an
operation in Iran in 2009.
According
to SCL Group, they launched Project Titania on behalf of an entity
called Archimedes — a U.S.-based military contractor. This
highlights the dangers of private companies like Facebook and Google
merging with the military-industrial complex.
Since
launching Project Titania, the United States and United Arab Emirates
have opened 18
black site prisons in
Yemen for arbitrarily detaining, torturing, and sexually abusing
Project
Titania
Strategic
Communication Laboratories (SLC) launched Project Titania in 2009
between June and July in very specific areas of Yemen’s Marib
province and al-Mukalla city in Hadramaut province. Working on behalf
of their client (a U.S.-based military contractor), SCL Group chose
these locations after careful consideration and research about
al-Qaeda’s (AQAP) growing presence.
Project
Titania included four main phases: motivation and segmentation,
research plan, field phase, analysis, and reporting. The experience
SCL Group gained and the tactics they used were later employed
throughout the rest of the world for other clients.
In
Yemen, SCL’s goal with Project Titania was to reduce what they
called “non-desired behaviors” or NDB by using something called
“communication campaigns.” In Project Titania’s case, “the
non-desired behavior” involved young men joining terrorist groups
like al-Qaeda. Research leading up to the communication campaign
included recorded interviews and questionnaires with local Yemenis
while deceiving respondents about the interview’s or
questionnaire’s purpose.
The
victims’ responses were later used to determine if NDBs (joining
terrorist groups)
could
be reduced through deceptive intervention techniques.
Open-source
Deskwork
A
large portion of Project Titania took place before the foreign agents
even began conducting interviews. Researchers at SCL Group used
open-source information from NGOs, local publications, census data,
“earlier studies,” and other entities deemed relevant or
accurate.This draws into question the role non-governmental
organizations play supporting the military-industrial complex.
The
public doesn’t hear about this scenario too often, but it’s
really not uncommon for U.S. military contractors or other
individuals with ulterior motives to seek employment at NGOs. In
2015, the Yemeni resistance group Ansarullah (aka. the Houthis)
apprehended a U.S.
military contractor working
undercover for the Red Cross in Yemen. The contractor, Scott Darden,
was tasked with setting up sleeper cells and safe houses for U.S.
commando units inside Ansarullah-held territory.
Going
Undercover
SCL
Group employed what they called “Researchers” to conduct recorded
interviews with local Yemenis to gather psychosocial information
about relevant issues, historic context, language, literacy, channel
exposure, channel credibility, noise, values, attitudes and beliefs,
current behavior, common enemies, binary opposition, decision paths,
power structures, message appeals, skills, intent, motivations, and
everything else that makes a person tick.
SCL
Group’s “Researchers” told the victims that the questionnaires
and interviews were for seemingly benign purposes like market
research. “Prior
to completing the interview or the questionnaire, all
participants will be given a rationale for the study (i.e., that the
study is part of a university research programme or a market research
programme),” the
document reads.
Each
questionnaire contained 35 questions and took about 30 minutes to
complete. SCL Group carried out 30 in-depth interviews and a
staggering 300 guided interviews during a mere month-long period in
the two target locations. The respondents were also asked to provide
their gender, education level, income level, religious affiliation,
and other demographic data in addition to the psychosocial questions.
Understanding
and Using the Data
Groups
of eight Researchers were lead by a team leader known as a Research
Leader. Their goals were to answer the following questions about
al-Qaeda in Marib and al-Mukalla but it’s easy to see how the same
strategy was later applied elsewhere among different populations with
different goals.
Accessibility: how
easy is it to gain access into the group or contact people in the
group?
Salience
of Impact: how
likely is the communication campaign to change NDB?
Problem
Relevance: how
relevant is a factor to the client’s goals and objectives?
Measurability: any
instance of applying numbers to the behavior
Influenceability: how
likely is the campaign to influence the target audience behavior?
The
research described here was part of a larger campaign to influence
behavior in Marib and al-Mukalla. The entire project included three
steps: identify campaign target groups (CTG), understand
campaign target groups to develop an influencing plan, and
understanding a target audience to create an influence path to the
CTG.
A
Few Things…
In
Project Titania’s case, the “campaign target group” included
young men at risk for joining al-Qaeda but, again, it’s very easy
to see how this same strategy could be applied in numerous situations
to produce a desirable social climate for any client.
It’s
possible that these tactics were used by one entity or another for
several purposes since 2009 including in now-current war zones like
Syria or Libya as well as elections in various countries throughout
the entire world.
The
detailed assessment and analysis SCL Group conducted of Marib and
al-Mukalla shows that similar or affiliated entities like Cambridge
Analytica run into no trouble gathering publicly available or
user-provided information from social media, NGOs, censuses, and
other sources before even lifting a finger to conduct their own
questionnaires or interviews.
However,
SCL Group’s detailed assessment of Yemen’s 2009 current and
future political situation were not at all accurate as they described
the overall political security as “country collapse currently
slim.” We all know how that’s worked out.
The
report mainly appeared concerned with AQAP and, to a lesser extent,
Yemen’s southern separatist movement al-Hirak. Unsurprisingly, SCL
Group highly underestimated Ansarullah’s potential for gaining
enough public support to control the capital city and most of the
northern provinces. Their report knocks the Houthis for “draining
precious military resources” (the then-president Ali Abdullah Saleh
was receiving military support from the United States to keep
al-Qaeda at bay).
The
report also counters Saudi
Arabia’s line that
Ansarullah (the Houthis) are a terrorist group. The document mentions
that hostilities might occur, but it mentions nothing about violent
terror attacks on civilians akin to al-Qaeda. If SCL Group (or the
U.S. military contractor they were conducting Project Titania on
behalf of) believed that the Houthi group was apt to launch similar
attacks or behave like al-Qaeda, SCL probably would have lumped them
into the project’s research.
It’s
also worth mentioning that since Project Titania, the United States
and United Arab Emirates have set up a series of 18 black site
detention centers throughout areas of Yemen under their control. The
victims are swept up under the guise of fighting al-Qaeda, but locals
say the men were arbitrarily detained and forced into confessions
with physical and sexual torture.
These
documents were released by the Grayzone
Project as
the first in a two-part series. Featured photo: a woman walks near
the Marib ruins by Will De Freitas on Flickr.
====================================
Zoals al vaker op deze plek verzucht: het is de allerhoogste tijd dat de VS, Groot-Brittannië en bedrijven als SCL voor het Internationaal Strafhof (ICC) worden gedaagd!
Zie ook:
‘Martin Vrijland ontmaskerde SCL groep al voordat The New York Times dat deed over verkiezingsbeïnvloeding‘ (SCL is o.a. mede verantwoordelijk voor de coup in Oekraïne, de coup tegen de democratisch gekozen president Janoekovytsj, dit deed SCL als onderaannemer van de VS regering en in dit geval in innige samenwerking met Hillary Clinton,destijds minister van BuZa Hillary Clinton, die hier maar liefst meer dan 4 miljard dollar voor uittrok….. SCL werkt voorts nauw samen met de uiterst agressieve oorlogshond van de VS, de NAVO….)
‘Christen’Unie (CU) voorzitter in de Tweede Kamer, Gert-Jan Segers heeft een interview gegeven aan de Telegraaf, waarin hij volkomen terecht stelt dat Nederland Turkije niet langer moet verdedigen ‘tegen agressie’ van Syrië.
Een verdediging die Nederland een paar jaar geleden nog deels voor haar rekening nam met de stationering van Patriot-raketten in Turkije…. Lullig genoeg was dezelfde CU destijds wel voor stationering van Patriot-raketten in Turkije, dit vanwege ‘dreigende’ Syrische agressie….. Voordewind, destijds de voorman van de CU, was zelfs blij met de stationering van Patriot-raketten in Turkije en wilde er meteen wat leveren aan Israël…… ha! ha! ha! ha! Terwijl Israël al bomvol stond met dat soort raketten, maar dat terzijde. Van agressie van Syrië tegen Turkije was toen geen sprake, zelfs niet van een dreiging daarmee……
Zoals gezegd, van die dreiging van Syrisch agressie tegen Turkije was geen enkel teken, maar toch stemde Nederland voor stationering van die raketten…… Des te vreemder, daar ook Turkije zich destijds als grote agressor gedroeg en zowel Irak als Syrië binnenviel als het haar zo uitkwam…… Deze feiten zetten ook achteraf nog grote vraagtekens bij het gezeur over artikel 5 van de NAVO: als een NAVO lidstaat wordt aangevallen, springen de andere lidstaten in de aanvalsmodus om dat land te verdedigen…….
Precies dat haalde ook Segers aan in zijn interview en hij stelde dat Turkije de grote agressor is in de regio, zo voert Turkije een smerige oorlog tegen de Koerden op Syrisch grondgebied…….. Vandaar dat Segers tegen verdere bijstand voor Turkije is.
Vreemd dat Segers zich nu hier over uitspreekt, blijkbaar is er weer sprake van een beroep op artikel 5 van de uiterst agressieve terreurorganisatie NAVO, terwijl zoals gezegd Turkije volkomen illegaal op Syrisch grondgebied een smerige oorlog uitvecht tegen de Koerden….. Dezelfde Koerden die NB met succes tegen IS hebben gevochten in Syrië, terwijl Turkije aangetoond olie heeft afgenomen van IS en deze terreurorganisatie van wapens en training heeft voorzien…….
Blijkbaar overweegt Nederland weer patriot-raketten in Turkije te stationeren, dat zou zonder meer op een schandelijke en ronduit valse voorstelling van zaken gebeuren, precies zoals Nederland dit een paar jaar geleden heeft gedaan (met ons belastinggeld en dan durven te zeuren dat we te weinig uitgeven aan defensie, terwijl volgens mij de eerdere stationering van raketten niet uit het defensie budget werd bekostigd, maar ik kan me vergissen, daar hier niets over te vinden is op het net…)…..
Segers sprak zich verder terecht uit tegen de verkeersborden in Nederland, die Turken de weg wezen naar de Turkse stembus in Nederland. Borden voor een verkiezing die niets meer met eerlijke democratische verkiezingen te maken hebben, daar de oppositie geen kans had om op radio, tv en andere media haar standpunten bekend te maken en de Turkse pers monddood is gemaakt door de zwaar corrupte regering Erdogan……
Volgens het meer dan waardeloze kabinet Rutte 3 is dat wat ‘we doen bij verkiezingen’, waar Segers (nogmaals) terecht stelde dat dit alleen het geval zou moeten zijn bij democratische verkiezingen, waar in dit geval geen sprake van was…… Ach ja, Nederland is de grootste EU handelspartner van de reli-fascistische Erdogan dictatuur…….
Het meest belachelijke wat Segers te berde bracht was wel dat hij niet wil dat Turkije uit de NAVO wordt gezet……. Dit terwijl hij, zoals hiervoor al gesteld, Turkije ziet als een dictatuur, die agressief (en illegaal) tekeer gaat in buurland Syrië…….. Ongelofelijk, al ziet Segers de NAVO ‘uiteraard’ niet als een agressieve organisatie, is de NAVO dat wel, alleen al door de deelname van Turkije aan dit bondgenootschap, om nog maar te zwijgen over de feitelijke baas van de NAVO, de grootste terreurentiteit op aarde, de VS (alleen deze eeuw begon de VS al 4 illegale oorlogen en intussen, heeft de VS, sinds het jaar 2000, al dik meer dan 2 miljoen mensen vermoord…)……
