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French Historian: World War III Has Already Begun

French Historian: World War III Has Already Begun

“We are now in an endless war.”

JOEL SAGET via Getty Images

A French historian who accurately predicted the fall of the Soviet Union over a decade in advance says that World War III has already begun as a result of the conflict in Ukraine.

The comments were made by Emmanuel Todd, one of France’s leading intellectuals, during an interview with the Le Figaro newspaper.

“It is evident that the conflict, initially a limited territorial war, has evolved into a global economic confrontation between the whole West on one side, and Russia, backed by China, on the other. It has become a world war,” Todd said.

Todd added that “the resistance of the Russian economy is pushing the U.S. imperial system toward the abyss” and that Biden must “hurry” to rescue a “fragile” America.

According to the historian, U.S. control of the world financial system is at risk because the Russian economy’s resistance to sanctions is pushing “the American imperial system” toward the precipice,” with Russia still able to rely on China for monetary backing.

Todd says America “cannot withdraw from the conflict, they cannot let go,” because it has no exit strategy and the stakes are too high.

“This is why we are now in an endless war, in a confrontation whose outcome must be the collapse of one or the other,” said the intellectual.

Todd is a widely respected figure, having accurately predicted the collapse of the Soviet Union 14 years before it happened.

As we highlighted last month, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church cautioned that any attempt to “destroy Russia” by “madmen” trying to impose their values will lead to “the end of the world.”

…click on the above link to read the rest…

Let’s Be Real: President Biden Would Probably Be More Hawkish Than Trump

Let’s Be Real: President Biden Would Probably Be More Hawkish Than Trump

People who dislike Trump are often reluctant to talk about this, but it looks likely that a Biden administration would be more warlike than its predecessor.

In a recent interview with US Department of Defense newspaper Stars and Stripes, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden said it’s important to keep troops in the Middle East to fight terrorism, and that it’s likely that America’s bloated military budget will not only remain at its current size but may actually increase under his presidency due to the need to focus on “near peer” threats like China and Russia.

This is not a deviation in messaging from Biden and his crack team of beltway string-pullers, but a continuation of already established patterns. His campaign has been consistently out-hawking Trump on foreign policy by attacking him for insufficient aggression toward VenezuelaChinaNorth KoreaSyriaCuba, and of course Russia, as well as criticizing Trump for not acting like a “wartime president“.

 

In a July interview with Biden foreign policy advisor Anthony Blinken, The Wall Street Journal‘s Walter Russell Mead was told of the campaign’s plan to “tame China, Russia and woke Democrats” using “Cold War-era Democratic policy”, including “a liberal multilateralism—supplemented when absolutely necessary by the American military and a willingness to use it.”

“A Biden administration won’t be looking for a reset, a grand bargain, or anything more than a businesslike relationship with Vladimir Putin,” Mead wrote after the interview. “Democrats haven’t been this hawkish on Russia since the Kennedy administration.”

“While China’s rise and Russia’s turn to the dark side complicate foreign policy, the ideas and institutions of the liberal internationalist order are failing not because the world is fundamentally changing but because the global liberal system has been starved of a critical ingredient in the Trump years: American support,” Mead writes.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Rubio’s Gloating Betrays US Sabotage in Venezuela Power Blitz 

Marco Rubio | Venezuela

Rubio’s Gloating Betrays US Sabotage in Venezuela Power Blitz 

American gangsterism towards Venezuela is being exposed for the naked aggression that it is.

US imperialists are so desperate in their regime-change predations over Venezuela, they seem to have a problem controlling their drooling mouths.

The latest orgy of American gloating was triggered by the massive power outages to have hit Venezuela. No sooner had the South American country been blacked out from its power grid collapsing, senior US officials were crowing with perverse relish.

Republican Senator Marco Rubio – who has become a point man for the Trump administration in its regime-change campaign in Venezuela – was a little too celebratory. Within minutes of the nationwide power outage last Thursday, Rubio was having verbal orgasms about the “long-term economic damage”… “in the blink of an eye”. But it was his disclosure concerning the precise damage in the power grid that has led the Venezuelan government to accuse the US of carrying out sabotage.

Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez noted how Rubio, in his tweeted comments “three minutes” after the power outage, mentioned the failure of “back-up generators” in Venezuela’s main hydroelectric plant, known as the Guri Dam, located in Bolivar State. The dam supplies some 80 percent of the Venezuelan population of 31 million with its electricity consumption.

Rodriguez mockingly ascribed “mystic skills” to Rubio because the Florida Republican senator appeared to know the precise nature of the power failure even before the Venezuelan authorities had determined it.

The Venezuelan government has since claimed that the failure in the electric grid was caused by a cyberattack on the computer system controlling the Guri Dam turbines. Caracas said it will present proof of its claims to the United Nations.

Apart from Rubio’s apparent insider information, there are several other indicators that Venezuela’s latest turmoil from power blackout was indeed caused by US sabotage, and specifically a cyberattack.

 …click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How the US Spent Billions to Change the Outcome of Elections Around the World: A Review

How the US Spent Billions to Change the Outcome of Elections Around the World: A Review

How the US Spent Billions to Change the Outcome of Elections Around the World: A Review
How the US Spent Billions to Change the Outcome of Elections Around the World: A Review

The U.S. military state overthrows democratically-elected governments that it deems to be a threat to corporate interests.

“There is plenty of evidence that the United States is the most depraved and dangerous “meddler” in the affairs of other nations that history has ever known.”

Dan Kovalik is a labor and human rights lawyer, but most of all he is an anti-imperialist and an author of three books. Kovalik’s first two books tackled the specific US war drives against Russia and Iran. His third installment, The Plot to Control the World: How the US Spent Billions to Change the Outcome of Elections Around the World, addresses the broad scope of US election meddling abroad. The book provides much needed political and ideological life support to an anti-war movement in the U.S that has been rendered nearly invisible to the naked eye.

The Plot to Control the World is as detailed in its critique of U.S. imperialism as it is concise. In just over 160 pages, Kovalik manages to analyze the various ways that the U.S. political and military apparatus interferes in the affairs of nations abroad to achieve global hegemony. He wastes no time in exposing the devastating lie that is American exceptionalism, beginning appropriately with the U.S. imperialist occupations of Haiti and the Philippines at the end of the 19thcentury and beginning of the 20th. The U.S. would murder millions of Filipinos and send both nations into a spiral of violence, instability, and poverty that continues to this day.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Untouchable US-Saudi Relation Is a Core Element of US Imperialism

The Untouchable US-Saudi Relation Is a Core Element of US Imperialism

The Untouchable US-Saudi Relation Is a Core Element of US Imperialism

In the last few weeks, numerous articles and analyses have been produced relating to the murder of Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. However, the relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States has not been questioned, and the reason for this has not yet been explained.

Nixon’s decision in 1971 to withdraw the United States from the gold standard greatly influenced the future direction of humanity. The US dollar rose in importance from the mid-1950s to become the world reserve currency as a result of the need for countries to use the dollar in trade. One of the most consumed commodities in the world is oil, and as is well known, the price is set by OPEC in US dollars, with this organization being strongly influenced by Saudi Arabia.

It is therefore towards Riyadh that we must look in order to understand the workings of the petrodollar. After the dollar was withdrawn from the gold standard, Washington made an arrangement with Riyadh to price oil solely in dollars. In return, the Saudis received protection and were granted a free hand in the region. This decision forced the rest of the world to hold a high amount of US dollars in their currency reserves, requiring the purchase of US treasuries. The relationship between the US dollar and oil breathed new life to this currency, placing it at the centre of the global financial and economic system. This privileged role enjoyed by the dollar allowed the United States to finance its economy through the simple process of printing its fiat currency, relying on its credibility and supported by the petrodollar that required other countries to store reserves of US treasuries in their basket of currencies.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Two Keywords for US Imperialism: ‘Justification’ and ‘Plausibility’

Two Keywords for US Imperialism: ‘Justification’ and ‘Plausibility’

Two Keywords for US Imperialism: ‘Justification’ and ‘Plausibility’

Observing the behavior of the United States over recent decades, it becomes clear that the American establishment has always relied on two fundamental factors to justify choices in foreign policy.

We have been accustomed in recent years to humanitarian interventions being justified on the assumption that the United States and the West were in some way intervening militarily in the interests of defending innocent civilians from brutal dictators. This justification for armed intervention has either been the key factor or the direct cause for the expansion of US imperialism. The use of the media as an instrument of war – with lies, artfully constructed stories, intentional omissions, and targeted disinformation – has helped US imperialism to justify armed interventions abroad.

There is always some sort of justification, rationale or pretext offered when Washington intervenes to bring about conflict. These excuses were showcased in Yugoslavia in 1999, in Afghanistan in 2002, in Iraq in 2003, and in Libya in 2011. With Yugoslavia and Libya, the lie of protecting human rights was the justification offered to the public. The September 11, 2001 attacks were used to justify attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq in 2002 and 2003, pointing the finger of blame at these countries. The war on terror in general offered a perfect justification for bringing about chaos in every corner of the world.

Naturally, these are excuses meant to be peddled in the international arena. There is no justification for bombing a nation, completely destroying its services and infrastructure, and killing tens of thousands of its innocent people. But US imperialism works like a steam-roller. The artful fabrication of a humanitarian cause gives the green light to rain down bombs to save the poor and downtrodden civilians. All this is possible thanks to the nauseating and false media rhetoric that creates the ideal conditions needed to justify the horrible war crime that is aggression against a sovereign nation.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Oil Underground in Neuquén, Argentina – and a New US Military Base There

Oil Underground in Neuquén, Argentina – and a New US Military Base There

Obsessive media focus on President Trump’s personal indecencies undoubtedly contributes to important news stories not seeing the light of day. In that regard it’s no wonder the U.S. public is generally unaware of U.S. military interventions in parts of the world, particularly in Latin America. That way U.S. imperial excess gets a pass.

Political ramifications would be more likely if stories like two recent good examples from Argentina were known about. One of them is a warm-up to the other, which is the main show here.

On July 12 a Hercules C-130 U.S. military transport plane landed at a military base near Buenos Aires with at least eight U.S. Special Forces troops on board, along with “arms, explosives, and head gear.”  They will be preparing 40 police officers from Argentina’s “Special Group for Federal Operations” to take charge of security for a two-day meeting of  the G-20groupof wealthy nations set for Buenos Aires beginning on November 30.Argentina and Brazil are the only Latin American members of the G-20 group.

The U.S. government will pay most of the  $1.5 millioncost of the training project. The U.S. soldiers belong to the “Special Operations Command” of the U.S. Southern Command. They’ll be in the country until August 3.

Argentina’sLaw 25.880requires that the government seek congressional approval for the entry of foreign troops. That did not happen with these U.S. soldiers.A government spokesperson emphasized that they will “be strengthening relations and tiesof friendship between both countries.”

As acolytes of the market economy and expropriators of natural resources, the two nations enjoy an affinity, which is oxygen for a U.S. project underway now in Neuquén. That southwestern city of 340,000 people is the largest in Argentina’s Patagonia region.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The War Against the Cowboys: The Oregon stand off and US imperialism

The War Against the Cowboys: The Oregon stand off and US imperialism

As our old republic fades into history, replaced by a voracious global Empire, the division between foreign policy and domestic policy is erased. A conquistador treats his helots on the home front with the same contempt he has for his subjects abroad. In both cases, conquest and subjugation is the goal – and rebellion is the inevitable result.

Just as the people of Iraq rose up and finally threw out the American occupiers, so the people in the American West are rising up against their federal overlords. This is the reason for the occupation of a federal facility in Burns, Oregon, where hundreds of protesters rallied against the jailing of ranchers Dwight Hammond and his son Steve.

The Hammond case has become a cause celebre West of the Mississippi, where federal control of huge swathes of real estate has become a life and death issue for ranchers and others who make their living off the land. As the feds encroach on their livelihood, they are pushing back, and nothing illustrates this better than the Hammond case.

In 2001, the Hammonds started a controlled burn on their own land to eliminate invasive junipers from ruining grazing for cattle: the fire spread to neighboring federal lands. As the Tri-State Livestock News reports:

“The first fire, in 2001, was a planned burn on Hammonds’ own property to reduce juniper trees that have become invasive in that part of the country. That fire burned outside the Hammonds’ private property line and took in 138 acres of unfenced BLM land before the Hammonds got it put out. No BLM firefighters were needed to help extinguish the fire and no fences were damaged.

“’They called and got permission to light the fire,’ Dwight’s wife, Susan, said, adding that was customary for ranchers conducting range management burns – a common practice in the area.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

ISIS is US: the Empire and the Evil Genie It Released

ISIS is US: the Empire and the Evil Genie It Released

isis

Picturing Papal Petrification

The reigning politics and media culture of the United States is not without moments of high comic relief. Three weeks ago, for example, CNN’s Chris Cuomo presented the buffoonish Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump with a bizarre hypothetical situation. What would Trump do, Cuomo asked, if he met the Pope and the pontiff expressed his opinion that capitalism can be “a real avenue to greed, it can be really toxic and corrupt.”

Trump didn’t miss a beat. “I’d say ISIS wants to get you,” Trump said. “You know that ISIS wants to go in and take over the Vatican? You have heard that. You know, that’s a dream of theirs, to go into Italy.”

“He talks to you about capitalism, you scare the pope?” Cuomo asked.

“I’m gonna have to scare the Pope because it’s the only thing,” Trump said. “The Pope, I hope, can only be scared by God. But the truth is — you know, if you look at what’s going on — they better hope that capitalism works, because it’s the only thing we have right now. And it’s a great thing when it works properly.”

Funny stuff. It doesn’t get much wackier than that. Forget for now the notion that that capitalism is a wonderful “thing” when it is functioning “properly,” whatever that means. And never mind whether or not ISIS chiefs dream of claiming St. Peter’s Square for Islamic jihad (maybe they do).

ISIS as Imperial Blowback

Let’s look instead at Trump’s suggestion that the Pope would do well to stop mouthing off about the profits system because he needs to get under the protective umbrella of the U.S. against the Islamic State. Trump’s balderdash aside, the notion that the U.S. is the leading and true enemy of ISIS is widely assumed across the U.S., thanks in part to the properly working propagandistic mechanisms of dominant U.S. corporate war, election, and entertainment media.

 

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Top German Politician Blasts Nuland & Carter: “F##k US Imperialism”

Top German Politician Blasts Nuland & Carter: “F##k US Imperialism”

With intra-Europe relations hitting a new all-time low; and, having already been busted spying on Merkel, Obama got caught with his hand in Hollande’s cookie jar this week, the following exultation from one of Germany’s top politicians will hardly help Washington-Brussells relations. As Russia Insider notes, Oskar Lafontaine is a major force in German politics so it caught people’s attention when he excoriated Ash Carter and Victoria Nuland on his Facebook page yesterday… “Nuland says ‘F*ck the EU’. We need need an EU foreign policy that stops warmongering US imperialism… F*ck US imperialism!”

Here is the Facebook post (in German):

 

Lafontaine  has been an outsized figure in German politics since the mid-70s. He was chairman of the SPD (one of Germany’s two main parties) for four years, the SPD’s candidate for chancellor in 1990, minister of finance for two years, and then chairman of the Left party in the 2000s. He is married to Sarah Wagenknecht, political heavyweight, who is currently co-chairman of Left party.

Lafontaine’s outburst came a day after his wife, Sarah Wagenknecht, blasted Merkel’s Russia policy in an interview on RT. 

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

 

 

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