What the Mueller report tells us about the post-truth era
2019/03/30
The 2016 US presidential elections were the most convulsive in American history: a battle without exclusion of blows characterized by hatred, violence and media sensationalism; but now it is sure that the Russophobic and anti-Trump campaign was all a lie.
by Emanuel Pietrobon
The Report of the Russian interference investigation during the 2016 presidential elections, commonly known as the Mueller Report, was finally published. To understand if Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin had acted in collusion, or if Russia had somehow interfered on its own initiative by conveying hoaxes and altering the quality of information on the Internet in favor of the Republican candidate, the investigation committee made use of a team made up of 19 lawyers and 40 agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, listening to 500 witnesses, requesting documentation from 13 governments, obtaining about 500 search warrants and sending over 2800 summonses, reaching a conclusion: a Russian influence it was, but Trump and his staff played no role in this conspiracy.
This is a result that is both important and disturbing. Important for Trump: the president most hated and criticized in recent US history has finally obtained justice and the results of the report will surely play in [his] favor in the upcoming elections, further eroding the credibility of the liberal and democratic galaxy with public opinion.
Disturbing for all the others: that is us, the public opinion, citizens, voters, unaware pawns of a constant and continuous information war that distorts factual reality and objective truth to the point of making the true from the false indistinguishable, the right from wrong. Trump, candidate to be the most powerful man on the planet, was the victim of an incredibly violent information war based on personal attacks, verbal violence, hoaxes, discredit works, serious accusations of conspiracy with foreign powers.
The propaganda machine set in motion against Trump has crossed national borders, making use of the collaboration of every major Western information channel and Italy has not been excluded from the battlefield. The main newspaper and virtual newspapers have in unison repurposed and repeated ad infinitum the truth of the Anglo-Saxon media aligned against Trump, depicting him as a puppet of Putin and a threat to all humanity, simultaneously avoiding to undermine the public image of Hillary Clinton, until the last moment in the lead in every survey.
In the jargon of psychological warfare operations, what happened during the US, French and Italian presidential elections is called environmental intoxication. It is a technique of manipulation that is as subtle as powerful, based on the continuous spreading of false information, such as hoaxes, or confusing information, like multiple versions of the same fact, with the aim of creating disorientation and insecurity in the target group.
The first known environmental poisoning operations were carried out in Chile, always on the occasion of presidential elections, respectively in 1964 and 1970, with the aim of preventing the victory of the socialist Salvador Allende. The terror campaigns were named that way because of the climate of tension that characterized them. The walls of Santiago de Chile were covered with posters depicting the invasion of the country by Soviet tanks, Cuban concentration camps; the information galaxy was mobilized entirely, broadcasting a daily average of 20 commercials, 24 news programs and 26 anti-communist debate spaces.
Over 5 million Chileans were reached by journalistic, radio and mural propaganda, a very important pool of potential votes, considering that at the time Chile was inhabited by 9.5 million people. These figures were provided by a US Senate inquiry committee set up to clarify the role of the CIA in the violent dismissal of Allende, the Church commission. Robert Mueller as Frank Church, statesmen engaged in the arduous task of discerning the true from the false, knowingly facing the risk of being trapped in a labyrinth made of half truths and total lies, because brave enough to investigate the depths of the deep State .
A rereading of the Church report would help to understand that the world entered the post-truth era long before the 2000s, the Mueller report confirms instead that the techniques of psychological manipulation have been diabolically perfected and that the media are the stone angular of all this. Public opinion has been accustomed to consuming the news instead of analyzing it and it was precisely this tragic event, combined with the progress of neurolinguistics, cognitive neuroscience and psycholinguistics, that enabled the definitive entry of the world into the era of post-truth.
One of the perverse effects of post-truth is the polarization of society into distinct and opposing groups, each unable or unwilling to listen to the arguments of the other, willing and inclined to practice violence to suppress the other's right of expression rather than listen to the reasons for it and constructively dialogue.
This is in fact what happened during the past US presidential elections: Trump supporters attacked at demonstrations, right-wing ideological bans in the universities, radicalization of both democratic exponents and their civilian supporters, repeating hoaxes, Russian-speaking hysteria and collective anti-fascist psychosis. The largest democracy in the world that fell victim to a war of internal information is the confirmation that every viper dies of its own poison, but it is also a sign of an unexpected degeneration that in the near future can only get worse.
Trump and Putin have never been friends, and the rigidity of the anti-Russian containment is proof of this, but no intellectual, politician and journalist, Italian, European or American, will apologize for having relied on the credulity of public opinion, fueling division through the diffusion of fake news and very serious accusations not corroborated by any evidence. Defending against post-truth misinformation is not simple, but neither is it impossible following certain rules: general mistrust of the news produced by mass information sources, diversification of reference channels, independent analysis of the topic in progress, verification of the opinion of the direct interested whenever possible.
The real problem is the natural human tendency to the loss of historical memory: no one remembers any more than the shocking report of the Church commission and the Mueller report will also fall into oblivion over several years. Trump was lucky, as were also Salvini and Di Maio. In both cases there was no lack of dangerous statements by intellectuals and activists who called for intervention by the armed forces to restore order and protect the allegedly threatened freedom.
Trump has had to face the distrust of a part of the armed forces, of the federal police and of the intelligence community, making of the positioning of men of trust in key places of such strategic environments his winning weapon. What could have happened in the worst case scenario, in light of the ferocious campaign unleashed against him? A coup d'état masked with an indictment, which in fact was requested several times by the Democrats in relation to Russiagate. But in an another country, the violent and distorting disinformation of the post-truth could give rise to real civil wars. It's already happened: in Chile.
The Church commission has indeed ascertained that the CIA propaganda campaign played a fundamental role in inducing the armed forces to violently depose Allende and to fuel the fascistisation of society. No one in the White House was aware of the fact that the September 11, 1973 coup would be led by Augusto Pinochet; Henry Kissinger had not even considered him as a potential ally in the antiallendist cause, considering him almost as loyal as René Schneider, as established by the Church commission.
Pinochet did not act because of the CIA's libation but because he was really worried about the situation in the country and paranoidly convinced by the environmental intoxication that Allende would have consumed a short-term self-coup with the support of Moscow and Havana, establishing a Soviet-style dictatorship. The post-truth is also this, so today more than ever it is important to study history, so as not to repeat it, and to understand that the media does not inform, but influence, and does not report reality, but distort it.
***************************
Original column by Emanuel Pietrobon:
https://www.lintellettualedissidente.it/esteri-3/rapporto-mueller-donald-trump-vladimir-putin/
English translation by Costantino Ceoldo - Pravda freelance
House With a Strange Window Make Everybody Laugh
2019/03/29
This questionable window found in Barnaul, Russia, was thought by many to be a ridiculous mistake of builders. Everybody believed it would be fixed. Crazy, but it never happened and they finished the work just like this, with a crooked window.
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Ta da!
Brexit: The wider discussion on democracy
2019/03/29
Brexit: The wider discussion on democracy
The lesson from Brexit is never to ask the peoples of the United Kingdom to vote in a referendum on anything with great national significance.
The second lesson from Brexit is to scrutinize carefully the reasons for the almost total lack of information and clear, hard facts to enable people to reach a decision and the third lesson is the political system itself.
How it is possible that people who had the individual responsibility to think carefully about the future of the country not only for themselves, but also for their children's and grandchildren's generation, were so misinformed that they could wholly and totally miss the main issues at stake is dumbfounding.
When the climate is macro you do not go micro
The main issues, as I have stated here numerous times, are that the global economy is governed by macro-economic trends and when the climate is macro, you do not go micro. When you have tied your economy inextricably into a mesh of 28 nations, when you do over half your trade with this block of 741 million people (the population of the UK is 66 million), then going it alone has serious consequences.
First, Brexit means that the UK will now have to pay to do business with the EU, whereas today it does its business for free. This will entail knock-on effects upstream and downstream, meaning that exports will have to be more expensive and therefore they will be reduced in number. Fewer exports is translated into companies going under, and this means job losses. This means more social payments in unemployment benefit from the State, and this means either higher taxes to cover the cost, or else worse public services. This means a National Health Service with less money, so longer waiting lists, shortages of staff, worse healthcare. It means schools with fewer teachers and worsening accommodation, coupled with less equipment. It means fewer police on the beat and this means rising crime rates.
Everyone is firing, nobody is hiring
It means the growth of a marginalized younger population with no prospect of work because the jobs are being cut, nobody is hiring, everyone is firing. Brexit means the closure of research facilities today employing thousands of people, it means controls on collaboration among security services and Universities. It means narrower opportunities for young people and students to travel and study and work and live abroad, acquiring skills which enrich British society if they choose to return at a later date.
These are not pie-in-the-sky fantasies such as the 50 million pounds a day for the NHS peddled by those who used and manipulated half the population of the UK, these are undeniable facts.
Sharks first, minnows last
So the only alternative the UK would have in this scenario would be to suddenly conjure up a mass of trading agreements with the rest of the world, or else go back to the 1930s and practise autarky, as Portugal and Spain did under Salazar and Franco. The problem with scenario one is that countries are going to speak and listen to the EU first (with a far greater population than the UK) and then the UK might get a few of the crumbs and scraps after the main business has been done with the Big League.
As regards autarky, the idea is that an economy is self-sufficient and produces what it needs as far as possible. In Portugal and Spain, at that point in time (1930s/40s), the autarky solution meant that there were jobs available and prices tended to be low, as were salaries. But look at what happened. Spain slid down into backwardness and Portugal's energies went into maintaining its overseas Provinces and possessions (Angola, Cape Verde, Daman, Diu, Goa, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe Isles and East Timor. Brazil had already ganied independence in the 19th century). Both countries lost the opportunities created through synergies and shared experiences and lost 50 years in terms of development. This is where Britain wants to go?
Today, a European project can fund a research initiative in, say, Lithuania using the resources of Romania's excellent scientific equipment, counting on the collaboration of scientists from France, Portugal, Italy, and today, the UK. Tomorrow, cut the UK out.
The Brexit version of democracy
So the democratic exercise of the Brexit vote has shown us what, exactly? It has shown us that people are not informed, they are disinformed and manipulated by those making a mint out of Brexit at their expense (those with offshore savings which this year they will have to declare in the EU if the country is a member state and those who made tens or hundreds of millions by "shorting the Pound"). Brexit may be an interesting exercise to discuss in an academic paper but the further you scratch at the surface, the worse the stench.
It is cloud cuckoo land, leading the United Kingdom into uncertainty and uncertainly is bad news for the economy, the value of the Pound and for jobs.
The bottom line is that if the politicians in Parliament deliver Brexit, they are delivering something which today most citizens of the UK do not want (the figure is at the lowest 55% Remain and 45% Leave, at the highest 72% Remain and 28% Leave, so probably somewhere in the region of 65% Remain and 35% Leave, the gap widening by the day as the uninformed inform themselves and the elderly pass on, and are replaced by younger voters, over 80 per cent of whom wish to Remain).
In this case, we can place in question the entire political system in the United Kingdom. It does not defend the interests of the people, it defends the vested interests of those in Parliament many of whom are connected to Lobbies and the second they are elected, they are controlled by those pulling their strings. The people who placed them there are an afterthought. They are hands to be shaken, votes to be bought with a smile then dropped and forgotten.
How many members of the electorate know what their Member of Parliament is voting for, or why? Did the people of the UK agree with the war in Iraq? Then why did it go ahead? Do the people of the UK want Brexit? No, not all want the government "to get on with it", most do not want them to deliver it at all, as a Second Referendum would show clearly, and democratically.
What use is the British Parliament if it has made a laughing stock of itself, the country and its peoples? Perhaps the UK should consider Proportional Representation coupled with a form of Direct Voting. For that the political class will have to learn how to debate and negotiate, which is called Responsibility and also learn how to inform the people, which is their duty.
Those who further their own interests over the desire to show responsibility and fulfil their duty have no place in public service.
By Francisco Goya - Unknown, Public Domain, https://ift.tt/2Ox60za
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
Twitter: @TimothyBHinchey
timothy.hinchey@gmail.com
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey works in the area of teaching, consultancy, coaching, translation, revision of texts, copy-writing and journalism. Director and Chief Editor of the Portuguese version of Pravda.Ru since 2002, and now Co-Editor of the English version, he contributes regularly to several other publications in Portuguese and English. He has worked in the printed and online media, in daily, weekly, monthly and yearly magazines and newspapers. A firm believer in multilateralism as a political approach and multiculturalism as a means to bring people and peoples together, he is Official Media Partner of UN Women, fighting for gender equality and Media Partner with Humane Society International, promoting animal rights. His hobbies include sports, in which he takes a keen interest, traveling, networking to protect the rights of LGBTQI communities and victims of gender violence, and cataloging disappearing languages, cultures and traditions around the world. A keen cook, he enjoys trying out different cuisines and regards cooking and sharing as a means to understand cultures and bring people together.
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Truth For Christchurch: Staged, false flag event?
2019/03/28
By Jim Jones
By now most of you will have had some information about a tragedy in Christchurch New Zealand. You will have been fed on a well oiled Main Stream Media [MSM] press service which swung into gear surprisingly quickly after the incident. Of course, if this event actually happened as portrayed in the MSM then it is to be thoroughly condemned as a callous and brutal attack on the citizens of the country - supposedly by an Australian Import and his three identified accomplices.
However, all may not be as it seems for many inconsistencies exist in the official story and there are too many similarities to False Flag operations that have been conducted around the world which are designed to sway public option.
Now hold up there, I know some of you are going to jump up and down in righteous indignation saying, "but we saw it on TV!". Remember, Richard Nixon infamously said "Americans won't believe it unless they see it on TV". Well, unfortunately that is so for people around the globe now, TV has become their source of news and their mind control medium. People "turn off," chill out and with a beer in one hand and pizza in the other, watch TV all night long without actually thinking once about what they are seeing. And with MSM blasting any particular subject matter, the sheeple are programmed to believe what they see. Wasn't it Gobles who said "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie". And this is exactly what MSM does; station after station repeats the party political line - usually from one source and each agency will quote the other for "confirmation". Fortunately, if you have come to Pravda.Ru, then you are less likely to be one of the programmed as you are seeking corroborating evidence and an alternative view point: but you are in a minority I am sorry to say.
The Geopolitical Background
I have grown up in New Zealand and it was a lovely little country until about twenty years ago when successive governments bowed to the wishes of the overseas owner of the Crown Corporation of New Zealand Incorporated - [yes, New Zealand like scores of "countries" around the world is actually a corporation listed on the New York Securities Exchange and the notion of democracy is nothing by a constructive fraud - arguably the greatest deception perpetrated on man worldwide] and liberalised the immigration policy of the country against the wishes of the people. In 1961, there were about 260 Muslims in New Zealand, now we have something like 60,000 and with their higher birth rate than the European community; they are set to grow exponentially in this country. Wholesale immigration has radically changed the cultural mix in New Zealand until now we have those of Chinese origin representing around 12% of the population and ousting the native Maori as the second largest demographic group. Churches are closing all over New Zealand and mosques are springing up. It is not unusual now to hear the call to prayer rather than the church bells calling to worship.
This is not a purely New Zealand problem; the George Soros immigration plan has destroyed Europe and now seriously threatens Australia and New Zealand. Soon Australia will have its own "No go" areas for the local Police as it will be "Policed" by Muslims practicing Sharia law - like in the UK now. In New Zealand there is a strong under swell of discontent against the Government policy on Immigration and the selling of land to overseas owners, but like in the lyrics of The Eve of The War -"The chances of anything coming from Mars are a million to one they say - but still they come."
So as in Australia, New Zealand also has a fertile ground of discontent that can be used and will strike a chord in the minds and emotions of the citizens across the country. This feeling is not really openly discussed in fear of being labelled a racist or heaven forbid - intolerant, the new catch phrase for the liberal agenda. New Zealand wants desperately to be perceived as a very tolerant country and the new female Labour Prime Minister goes to considerable lengths to promote this view.
New Zealanders are easily rallied around this concept of tolerance and being a very friendly country in which to live - indeed it was. So an anti Muslim theme was definitely one way to galvanise the country in behind the MSM narrative. And it has worked very well. There has been a huge outpouring of sympathy for the victims; large amounts of money have been gathered from the public and organisations around the country are competing with each other to demonstrate their tolerance of minorities and intolerance for this "terrorist act".
The Police Agenda
In New Zealand we have reasonably liberal Firearms Laws - certainly better than Australia and the UK. Here people can own what the Police define as Military Styled Semi Automatic [MSSA] weapons - ops, sorry, only the Army, Police and gangsters have weapons the general public own Firearms. So a MSSA firearm was possible to be held on a Restricted Firearms Licence provided one could offer suitable cause to use. [Three gun shooting, culling operations et..al]. A standard semi automatic firearm without a free standing pistol grip, a flash eliminator and a magazine capacity of 7 rounds or less is classified in legislation as a Category A firearm and is permitted on a standard Firearms License.
Now about 30 or 40 years ago [1983??] , I remember the occasion but do not recall the actual date, the Police decided that they only needed to Register the owner of a Firearm and not the actual firearm - unless it was a Restricted Firearm [MSSA or Pistol].
However, the issue for the Police was that they failed to anticipate how easy it was to circumvent this stupid legislation and soon firearms with all manner of devices such as thumbhole stocks, stay bars from the bottom of the pistol grip to the butt etc were flooding into the country. So Police invented "Policy" to try and block the legal import of these types of firearms and over the last 4 or 5 years several actions were taken in Court opposing the Police policy and the Police lost the cases. Police could not get a law change passed though Parliament as there was no public support for it and with a quarter of a million firearms holders in New Zealand -[7% of the voting public], it was not a safe political move to change the legislation.
Last year alone, there were some 53,000 Firearms imported legally into New Zealand. No one actually knows the total number of Semi Automatics that are in the Country and with the ready availability of magazines of more than 7 round capacity, the temptation to convert these into MSSA category firearms, that are NOT registered, is substantial. Over the last 4 years there has been a huge volume of AR platform firearms imported. What is more, as only the Firearm holder is registered and only has to show a valid Licence to uplift an AR platform semi automatic Category A firearm, so that any owner once he purchases a Semi automatic can on sell it without trace. Let us say, he develops and drug habit and goes to the local gang for his drugs. The gang can say to him, "go get a semi auto firearm and we will give you your dope". The gangs are arguably now better armed than the New Zealand Police.
New Zealand Police have also suffered an influx of senior Officers from the UK who it appears have brought their own agenda on Firearms Control based on the UK model.
The stage is set for a False Flag operation.
Police faced with a perceived problem and unable to get law change because of public opinion have another option open to them; stage an event to create an outburst of public sympathy and condemnation of the Semi Automatic legislation and under that hysteria, use the Firearms Regulations to exercise the Executive Order [Order in Council] whereby the Commissioner of Police sits down with the Governor-General and "Makes Law". This is de facto law and for now bypasses the Parliamentary system wherein it is debated. But it means that if they work fast enough before Parliament can sit and debate / pass the Bill they can confiscate the Semi Automatics and any issue of law is then too late. Besides, when it is debated the public will have been so riled up by the MSM that they will of course support the changes. Quite clever really.
The Event
Consider all the False Flag events around the world, they were al committed with an ulterior motive - to galvanise the public through some horrific event so that the public would willingly give up a right or privilege that they had without due process of law. Surely you are not so myopic that you cannot see that fact? 9/11 - to initiate a war of terrorism. Sandy Hook, Boston Marathon, LA shootings - all attempts to sway public opinion to support gun law change and remove the 2nd amendment. The London Bombing, Sergei Skipral, et..all. I am sure you can recount many similar events around the world which have been clearly shown to have been staged and all had some underlying motive to change and shape public opinion. It is as well oiled now as the US penchant for Coloured Revolution [Current one is Venezuela]. What is more alarming is that because of the apparent success of these events , they are increasing and becoming even more blasé in their operation - are we so stupid?
There are many issues about the Christchurch event that need to be questioned in open forum. Any attempt to create a government lead enquiry [In New Zealand a Royal Commission] will only operate as a Whitewash and cement the political narrative. That is what government enquiries are for - remember the Warren Commission - Oswald was a lone gunman!. What about the 9/11 commission, the buildings fell as a result of being hit by a plane - oh and the adjoining build just happened to fall in sympathy!. Only an open public enquiry will get to the truth and the government will resist that right up to the point of open insurrection as it will bring down the government if proven to be false.
Leading up to this event in Christchurch, I understand that a National Minister of Parliament predicted in an open public meeting the exact events that have happened and did so late last year. Was he a prophet or did he has insider knowledge? Myself, I don't think he has many credentials to be a prophet.
The week prior to the incident, the Police in Christchurch were issued anti terrorist firearms and equipment - this is not standard carry for NZ Police - and like so many other False Flag operations around the world, the Police just happened to be conducting an anti terrorist exercise the very moment this attack happened.
Do you notice the similarity to all other events around the world how the Police/Authorities just so happen to apprehend the suspects so quickly? I recall the in Christchurch it was reported he was captured in 26 minutes. Isn't that so convenient - police forces don't have to waste time, effort and money doing some long search for the offender and can come out with so much detailed information about the offenders almost immediately!
MSM were there almost before it happened and in good reporting style as they do all over the world - they produced an "eye witness". The eye witness they produced was a middle aged man who arguably had just witnessed the most horrific and traumatic event in his life! 50 people slaughtered by what I believe police initially said was a 12ga shotgun, more than that number of people wounded, many critically wounded; there would have been blood and gore all over the place, children screaming, mothers and woman wailing/crying and men screaming in agony. Truly, it must have been one horrific scene, yet this middle aged guy calmly speaks to the reporter who prompts him with questions and he provides the scripted answers! He said, "I was so scared I just kept my fingers crossed" Seriously, they could have got a better crisis actor than that.
All acting first responders were going about their business in a very calm and controlled manner - police didn't appear too worried, they seemed to know that had the bad guy. Ambulance responders calmly transported critically injured to the hospital - no need to rush. One critically injured victim passed by the camera at close quarters [so we can get a good look at him] and he apparently later died of his wounds - he showed no signs of shock - he looked very calm and relaxed for being mortally wounded. Have a look at some victims of shooting from Syria on Youtube and note the difference.
I watched the video that was realised - incidentally, the Police after it was realised and seemingly realising the errors in it quickly banned viewing of it under threat of a $10,000 fine for viewing objectionable material!
In the video, the shooter approaches this door and appears to shoot someone at point blank range [under 2 metres]. Now I have some 25 years military experience and was a senior Officer in the Infantry; someone shot at point blank [especially if it was a shotgun as initially reported] is in a mess. Most definitely he has a through and through and for him to fall dead immediately he has been hit in vitals /main trunk. This victim falls face down [very convenient] and I saw no blood, no exit hole, nothing that would indicate he had been shot. I did note he had no shoes on -remember that point, I'll come back to it later - but one can expect that in a mosque. The shooter proceeds up the corridor and glances to his right into a side room where there appeared to be dead bodies stacked in there. He moves further up the corridor and one of this magazines is lying on the floor beside the skirting board - it has his distinctive white writing on it. He passes that and then shoots at someone who flits across the corridor. He turns and returns down the corridor, picking up his magazine as he goes. As he passes the victim lying at the entry, the victim now has blue shoes on!
What else did I notice - well he was firing a semi automatic which seemed to be expelling cased as quick as a firearm in full auto. The cases ejected out and forward [as one might expect] but after travelling about one metre they mysteriously vanished; not hitting the wall and bouncing around on the floor etc. The cases did not look like those from a 12ga - they looked more like those from an AR15. While firing the firearm there was no perceived recoil/muzzle flip. The mosque was surprisingly quite - the noise of the shooting was evident but no screaming, crying, calling for help at a time when there must have been wholesale panic and total bedlam.
This just didn't ring true to me - Peter Jackson could have done a better job of the production.
Conclusion
It is my firm belief that this was a staged event - False Flag, for the reasons I covered above and I believe that the only way the truth can come out is for there to be a public demand for a full and open public enquiry into the whole event.
What are the chances of that?
Jim Jones
UK MPs Demote Prime Minister
2019/03/27
UK MPs Demote Prime Minister
On Wednesday, the London Guardian headlined: "MPs to vote on alternative (Brexit) plans as speculation mounts May could announce decision to quit," adding: She's "under intense pressure to set out a timetable for her departure from Downing Street..."
Theresa May resembles a "dead man walking," increasingly a prime minster in name only - her wings clipped, her power ebbing.
Her epitaph as PM alone remains to be written. It won't be kind about a more wrecking ball figure than leader, a humiliating example of ineptitude.
Straightaway after the June 2016 Brexit vote to leave the EU, she botched discussions with Brussels, dragging them out endlessly, agreeing to a no-Brexit/Brexit deal, displeasing Tories, opposition parties, most Brits and European officials - achieving nothing but overwhelming revulsion over how she handled things.
On Monday, MP took control of the Brexit process, adopting an amendment for them to hold so-called "indicative votes" this week. They, not May, will decide where Brexit goes from here.
Three more of her ministers resigned, voting for the amendment she opposed, powerless to stop its adoption.
Though non-binding, "indicative votes" will determine Brexit options going forward, abandoning it altogether, remaining in the EU, the most likely one.
After nearly three years of toing and froing, achieving nothing, ending up at square one, Brexit appears zombie-like, its corpse awaiting burial.
MPs defeated May's no-deal/deal twice. They oppose another vote to defeat it a third time. Chances of Britain crashing out of the EU with no deal are virtually nil.
Options are either May's no-deal/deal, another referendum likely to kill Brexit if held, or MPs conducting the burial themselves.
Brussels rejects Brexit other than on its terms - Britain leaving the bloc in name only, in reality remaining a member - indicative voting unlikely to change the impasse.
There's no new approach acceptable to all sides. No matter how many parliamentary votes are taken, a majority for one option agreeable to Brussels is highly unlikely.
For nearly three years, no breakthroughs were achieved, none likely coming. Other than a second referendum, the options are like being pregnant or not at all. There's no in between.
Monday was significant, a big step toward ending May's tenure as prime minister, MPs taking control of the Brexit process, her power slipping away.
Responding to Monday events in parliament, her Brexit spokesman said adoption of the amendment for indicative voting "upends the balance between our democratic institutions and sets a dangerous, unpredictable precedent for the future," adding:
"While it is now up to parliament to set out next steps in respect of this amendment, the government will continue to call for realism. Any options considered must be deliverable in negotiations with the EU."
"Parliament should take account of how long these negotiations would take, and if they'd require a longer extension, which would mean holding European parliamentary elections."
While May isn't bound to accept indicative voting results, her only acceptable option is stepping down - other than hanging on to be voted out of office, where things are heading, maybe in days.
As things now stand with Brussels, the March 29 deadline was pushed back to May 22 - provided UK parliamentarians accept the twice rejected deal by end of this week, or make significant movement toward acceptance.
If not, May was given an April 12 deadline to leave the bloc, what won't happen without a deal approved by UK MPs and Brussels.
Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn was right, saying May's approach to Brexit "has now become a national embarrassment. Every step of the way along this process the government has refused to reach out, refused to listen and refused to find a consensus that can represent the views of the whole of the country, not just her own party."
Brexit is dead, May's tenure as prime minister on life support. Admitting reality and leaving is her only option - voluntarily or being shoved.
VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home - Stephen Lendman). Contact at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
My newest book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."
Alaska: Lessons of geopolitics
2019/03/27
By Emanuel Pietrobon
What if Russia never sold Alaska to the United States? History would have been completely different, this is why the study of the Alaska purchase is a must-to-do for every want-to-be geopolitician and strategist
Between 1835 and 1840 the French sociologist Alexis de Tocqueville published "Democracy in America", a two-volume essay focused on the explanation of the reasons behind the firmly establishment of democratic culture in the United States.
Tocqueville went beyond the mere analysis of American society, because in the conclusions he made some personal predictions about future trends in the United States and in the international relations. According to him, the United States and Russia, although deeply different and geographically distant from each other, in the future would have rivaled for "the destinies of half the world" because of their territorial extension, their ambitions, and their historical path.
The book was a success but the prophecy was ignored and forgotten for a century. It was resumed and popularized only after World War II with the emergence of the Cold War and the global confrontation between the so-called free world, led by the United States, and the Communist empire, led by the Soviet Union.
The US-Russia geopolitical rivalry has gradually re-emerged twenty years after the end of the Cold War, consolidating the idea that Russia is destined to face a neverending containment by the West, as it is considered by Washington the main obstacle to hegemonization over what Sir Halford Mackinder, the founding father of geopolitics, renamed the "Heartland", ie the central part of Eurasia.
But relations between Russia and the United States have not always been characterized by distrust alternated with Russophobic hysteria, as demonstrated by the sale of Russian America, today's Alaska. What at the time was considered a farsighted agreement today is readable and judgeable by posterity as a severe mistake dictated by contingent interests which has deprived Russia not only of a natural resources-rich territory, but above all of a geostrategic outpost that it would be fundamental in the following years to put pressure on the United States and, maybe, change recent and contemporary history.
The study of Alaska allows drawing from a precious and evergreen source of teaching that, if properly exploited, could help strategists and geopoliticians not to act according to impulse and circumstance but to act thinking about long-term survival.
The history of Russkaja Aljaska is the following: the first settlement was established in 1784 and used as a bridgehead by the Russian-American Company (RAC) for the creation of commercial outposts in the Aleutian Islands, the Pacific, and the West Coast.
But only the Rac's explorers-settlers seemed aware of the potential of an expansion of the imperial borders in the Pacific and the Americas. In fact, Tsars Alexander I and Nicholas I were respectively protagonists of the withdrawal from Hawaii in 1817, aimed at not annoying the United States, and the sale of Fort Ross (California) in 1841.
It was precisely the submissive attitude of the imperial family that convinced the United States that it would be possible to expel permanently every Russian presence from the continent through dollar diplomacy. The discussions began unofficially in 1857 and were finally concluded on March 30, 1867, by the Russian ambassador Eduard de Stoeckl and the Secretary of State William Seward.
Alaska was sold for $7.2 million, the equivalent of present-day $121 million, a ridiculous amount: 2 cents per acre, about 4 dollars per square kilometer.
Yet, in Russia the event was celebrated as a diplomatic success full of benefits because American capital would improve the government budget, more resources (both human and economic) would be available for expansionistic campaigns in Europe, Central Asia, and Siberia, a possible future conflict against the United States or the British Empire would be avoided, and furthermore Americans would buy a sterile territory, without natural resources and therefore unprofitable.
In reality, the sale of Russian Alaska did not produce or nourish any of the allegedly flaunted benefits. In fact, the imperial budget and the general economic situation of the country worsened in the following years, fueling the insurrectionary and anti-tsarist protests that eventually resulted in the October revolution.
Moreover, taking into account that at the time of the negotiations the imperial budget was about 500 million rubles, with a debt of 1.5 billion, and that the paid amount was the equivalent of about 10 million rubles, it is possible to understand the irrelevance of the sum received.
In the following decade, US settlers would discover immense deposits of natural resources, such as oil, and precious metals, such as gold. The discovery refuted the false belief of having sold a sterile and resourceless land.
It was also false the claim according to which the control over Russian America involved an excess of human and economic resources otherwise usable, such as Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Siberia. In fact, at the time of the sale 40 thousand people lived in Alaska, most of them were Aleuts and, moreover, most of the expenses incurred were covered by the RAC.
Finally, it should be noted that even the leitmotif of the entire operation has been refuted by history because the withdrawal from the Americas has not led to any improvement in relations with the United States and the British Empire.
Even the withdrawal from Hawaii was a severe mistake dictated by comparable strategic myopia: World War II showed the importance of the archipelago for the purposes of military hegemony over the Pacific and the Far East.
If the Russian Empire had kept control over Hawaii and Alaska, the entire historical course would have followed a different line. The missile crisis would not have arisen in Cuba but in Alaska. The United States could not aspire to hold any hegemonic position in the Pacific. Even the quality of anti-Soviet containment in Eurasia would have suffered, because the USSR could have implemented an effective and suffocating counter-containment by means of Hawaii, Alaska, and Cuba, with the result to encircle the United States.
Alaska teaches that even territories apparently irrelevant from a strategic point of view in a given period could prove fundamental in reversing world power balances in an indefinite future. Although it is true that the future is unpredictable, it is equally true that some trends can be deciphered as demonstrated by Tocqueville's prophecy.
The survival of Russia depends on how the Scramble for Eurasia will be dealt with in the near future, because the country is already surrounded at West from Euro-American expansionism and in the rest of the continent from China, and military pressure and economic fragilities could push the country to repeat the mistake of giving away geostrategically important lands.
In fact, although the costs for maintaining a hegemonic sphere (not excessively large) can be high, the gains are always higher: Alaska proves it again.
The negative disparity between costs and benefits is typical of the short term and it tends to gradually vanish with the reverberation of profits in the medium and long term in the diplomatic, economic, geopolitical and military dimensions.
The United States recovered the price paid for Alaska in less than twenty years, obtaining a 100 times higher economic return by 1917 due to the full entrance of land and sea exploitation.
Moreover, it was precisely the complete ousting of the European powers from the continent that allowed the United States to concentrate every resource on the submission and the hegemonization of Latin America. The permanent presence of the Russians in Alaska would have hindered US hegemonic initiatives on the rest of the continent, due to the mandatory attention to be devoted to the northern front.
Alaska has also allowed the United States to have an outlet on the Arctic, and therefore to have a natural justification for hegemonic claims and ambitions on the region - which in recent years it has regained vital geopolitical importance due to global warming.
In the end, it is not so hazardous to claim that Alaska purchase helped the United States turn into the world's first power, because the change of ownership locked up Russia in Eurasia, with all the above-mentioned consequences, and simultaneously allowed Washington to finalize the building of its own sphere of influence.
Like Russia, every other hegemonic power in history faces, and has faced, the choice to sell, quit or defend a seemingly unimportant territory, but in the decision-making process it is always necessary to consider the "future uncertainty" variable, because if it is true Cicero's "Historia magistra vitae" (history is life's teacher), then it is legitimate to say that the study of Alaska should serve as a teacher of geopolitics.
Terror in the heart of the Netherlands escalates into outburst of nationalism
2019/03/26
In the quiet morning of the 18th of March, a terrorist attack took place in the city of Utrecht, The Netherlands, causing a new wave of distrust in the most tolerant kingdom of the world. Living in the very center of the country, a member of ethnic minority, Gokmen Tanis, killed with a pistol three Dutch people and heavily wounded five more in a tram, heading from the city´s central station.
Photo: Wikipedia/Hansmuller/CC BY-SA 4.0
The murderer is a 37-years-old, native of Turkey. He left the transport and ran into hiding, nevertheless, getting his face caught on a security camera of the tram. Committing the attack at 10 a.m. in the morning, the police searched for eight hours and subsequently arrested the murderer in one of the living houses, three kilometers from the crime scene.
The investigation group had resorted to exceptional measures by the standards of Dutch law. As the criminal´s personality became identified, the investigators disclosed his bank account and discovered that, after the attack, Gokmen transferred an unknown sum of money from a phone. By employing special devices, the group found a phone number, which was linked to the bank account, and tracked down the digital footprint of the shooter.
Labyrinth of motives
The motives of the crime contradicted to each other until the very end. No connections between the suspect and the victims were established. Initially, as it often happens, the police didn't disdain to call the case as a terroristic one. The same happened the last year, when a young refugee from Afghanistan almost slaughtered two American tourists on the central station of Amsterdam, thereby expressing his anger to a right wing "Party for Freedom" and its all-time leader Geert Wilders, the Dutch Trump, who planned to organize a competition for the most offending caricature of the prophet Muhammad.
This time, the society got completely blown away by the uncertainty of the motive as well as the reluctance of law enforcements to inform media due to the slow collection of evidences. From the start, the police expected the worst, presuming terroristic cause and potential attacks all around the city. The public transport, partially paralyzed by the strikes across the country, quickly disappeared from the streets, on which nobody was recommended to appear. A found note in Gokmen´s car with a word "Allah" only added to the suspicion of religious roots.
In spite of the notion that friends of Gokmen say that he was raised in a deeply religious Wahhabi family and his brother is a member of Turkish Islamic fundamentalist and anti-democratic club "Chalifa state", the personal mental state could also play a big role in the development of the incident. In 2011, Gokmen was already spotted on the camera of a Dutch right wing website GeenStijl where answering to the questions of an accidentally approached journalist, stated that he is a democrat, not a religious fanatic.
According to an ex-girlfriend of the shooter, Angelica, Gokmen is a psychopath, rather than a terrorist and she attempted numerous times to make the police aware of his probable mental relapse.
The couple together sniffed cocaine throughout the year of their relationships, which hard to call romantic. Angelica would be often beaten and even once violently raped in 2017. The offender faced a trial and was taken into custody in August of the same year, but eventually saw freedom in September under the pretense of the unsound mind and willingness to participate in a personality test. During the following fifteen months, the criminal would not appear in a prescribed for him psychological institution. Getting detained again, but this time until the 1st of March of 2019, Gokmen expanded own list of the previous convictions, among which we can find: shoplifting, drunk driving, drug dealing, possession of a firearm, spitting on a police officer and such a widespread misconduct in the Netherlands as bicycle theft. The reason behind the release is the same as the last time, namely, suspicion of a personality disorder and the promise of the criminal to participate in the personality test.
Chance for political alternative from the right
Just as the assault of the Afghan refugee, the recent terrorist attack is a handy occasion for Dutch nationalists to remind the frightened electorate about inconsistency of the currently prevailing social-liberal agenda. After the incident in Amsterdam, the attention of the public towards anti-immigrant sentiments has been considerably growing, people started to look up Geert Wilders name in the internet more often, while a new party "Forum for Democracy" several times appeared on top positions of polls for the 2019 elections, promoting, more relevant than ever, American idea of the three-strikes law. According to the party, the third heavy offense must be accompanied with a life sentence.
The tragedy unfolded two days before the provincial elections in Utrecht, where nationalists for many years lose to most of the parties, competing on par only against greens. The provincial elections indirectly form the upper chamber of the Dutch parliament or the senate, which task is to identify technical contradictions in new bills and the current legislation, and affirm new laws, proposed by the the lower chamber. On the next day after the incident, the lower chamber became a place of confrontation between right parties and the rest. The second biggest party of Geert Wilders together with the young, but rapidly burgeoning party "Forum for Democracy", attempted to start debates with the remaining eleven parties, majority of which has already formed opposition against the nationalists.
Geert Wilders spoke out against the minister of justice and security, calling upon his immediate resignation. Comparing the length of the Gokmen's list of convictions with the distance from The Hague to Tokio, the politician added that the police and its administration have committed an unprecedented hindsight, leaving the incorrigible criminal to freely wander on the streets. Wilders attempted to initiate debates, involving the prime-minister Mark Rutte in the dispute, who earlier asked the public to avoid hatred and xenophobia, although he repeatedly speculated on the topic of terroristic motive, thereby evoking discontent among the ethnic minorities.
The debates that had to attract attention of the public to the current left liberal stance in relation to criminals, were doomed to silence. The coalitional parties jointly voted to postpone the discussion, as if being afraid of a polemic just few days before the provincial elections kicked off. They justified the decision by addressing the lack of forensic evidences. Wilders understood that the actions of his opponents have a political rather than organizational character, noticing that the parliament is ready to discuss an agricultural problem of environmental unfriendliness of Dutch manure, not the slaughter. In the same way, social liberal parties accused "Forum for Democracy" in the reluctance of the party to stop their political campaign on the day of the attack, hoping for the minimal intensity of the society in such dramatic times.
Elections after the terror
The 20th of March, the election day, Utrecht stood out with the highest turnout among all Dutch cities. The recent terror apparently provoked the residents of the railroad center, which turnout reached a mark of 60%, leaving behind the political capital The Hague with its 49%.
The results of the elections eroded the superior position of the centrist government. If four years ago, the Netherlands chose conservative liberals of Rutte, christian democrats and progressivists, this time, victory was achieved by new right in the face of Thierry Baudet and his "Forum for Democracy". The brand new party literally broke into the upper chamber on the first try, taking more than 14% of the total seats and driving out the long-standing leader "Party for Freedom and Democracy" of Mark Rutte. The once dominant party lost ten seats, keeping now 13% of the total share.
The unprecedented success of the forum, which showed up just three years ago, makes us think about new social demand of the Dutch nation that experiences a palling taste of costly and occasionally dubious reforms of the ruling elites.
A proposed by Rutte abolishment of dividend tax on transnational corporations was recently repealed due to the fact that expenses on the reduction of international tax burden incurs two billion euro expenditures every year. By arguing that suchlike indulgence for the international capital is going to bring more jobs, the prime minister archly holds back that the real reason behind the initiative is a desire of the government to keep or move the headquarters of huge companies Shell and Unilever to the Netherlands. Being British-Dutch corporations, the European Union might prohibit these two to simultaneously remain dual-listed on European and non-European stock exchanges, at least in case if Brussels doesn't come up with any deal regarding Brexit. Rutte wants to see the skyscrapers of transnational corporations in the Hague and Rotterdam, but not in London, where the companies trade volume is much bigger than in his country.
Thierry Baudet, the leader of the election's winner party, condemned the initiative, stating that the loss of billions of euros in exchange with the relocation of two headquarters and their tiny staff is completely extraneous to the interests of people, whose high tax load, also in relation to dividends of the local business, doesn't bother the government, which prefers to make advances towards foreign capital.
One way or another, surprising, even for the winners, victory of new right forces, points out not only distrust of the society in political elites, but also indicates its dissatisfaction with populist radicalism of old right in the face of Wilders. "Party for Freedom" lost half of the seats, reserving five, the result is undoubtedly disappointing for one the most provocative politicians, however, in alliance with "Forum for Democracy", Wilders and his movement will only reinforce the presence of nationalists in political life of the Kingdom. The only question that comes up is "what kind of right movement is the most demanded in the country of fragrant tulips and old windmills"?
Regardless the fact that the parties are based on the common beliefs, they focus on totally different segments of the electorate, jointly opposing the European Union, refugees, high taxation and russophobia. Wilders is a devoted populist, his mission is to ignite a spark amongst the wide masses of working class. Often employing vulgar and banal anti-Islamic rhetoric, he demands to ban the Quran and close all the mosques together with muslim schools. Thierry Baudet, on the other hand, seeks support from more educated sectors of the population, dreaming to revive the golden age of the 19th century Netherlands. Calling himself as a man of Enlightenment, Thierry shifts the focus from anti-Islamic sentiments to classical Dutch culture, which is expressed in the photorealistic masterpieces of Rembrandt, geometrically adjusted philosophy of Spinoza and, of course, black Pete, a dark skinned assistant of Sinterklaas (the Dutch Santa Claus).
Since "Forum of Democracy" has become a part of the senate, the party is planning to oppose immigration loosenings and green taxation on CO2. At the very end of the election day, Thierry Baudet quoted Hegel, saying "The owl of Minerva spreads its wings in the dusk", insinuating that only now it became apparent what direction the nation heads to.
The rest of the parties, predominantly of the left liberal cohort, lost influence in the senate. Progressivists from D66 as well as social democrats PvdA gave up several seats, while a party of ethnic minorities DENK, which participated in the provincial elections just like "Forum for Democracy" for the first time, couldn't make it to get into the senate.
Sergei Filatov
Brexit: Making sense of the UK and the Bipolar Brassiere
2019/03/24
Brexit: Making sense of the UK and the Bipolar Brassiere
Take an S and the final E off the word Brassiere (an undergarment supporting the breasts) and you get Brasier, the maiden name of Theresa May, the British Prime Minister who spent two and a half years negotiating with the European Union without creating a consensus in her own Parliament.
In general, in my columns, I do not do political assassination pieces and try to find the other side of the person in focus. In Theresa May's case, I am certain that she would be an excellent host of a sophisticated dinner with a nice, tasty, crusty, aromatic English pie with the right amount of cheese sneakily added in the dough mix for the pastry, served with some fresh vegetables cooked to perfection, a silky, heavy gravy yet with a curious twist of something special, some excellently chosen fine wines before she wows the table with an exquisitely decadent French gateau oozing with raspberry jelly topped with molten 70 per cent cocoa chocolate. That, with an intelligent, lively and interesting rendition of the season's cricket.
However, what really gets my goat with Theresa May is her sheer and unadulterated arrogance and the utter stupidity of her strategy. Let us face it, when she was Home Secretary (Minister of Internal Affairs) she became famous for the repeated one-line policy justification when asked a question. Fair enough, because when you find yourself as a POS in these Positions of (Public) Service, you are given two lessons: first, to have your bag packed by the door because you might have to leave tomorrow morning and secondly, to respond to interviewers' questions by turning everything into up to three concise answers and bring all the questions back to these, the backbone of your message.
In Theresa May's case, it is disappointingly one single phrase, such as "a strong and stable Britain under a Conservative government", or "We are leaving the European Union on March 29th" or "It's my deal or no deal". It is getting shorter. Perhaps next week it will be the word "Cornflakes". So Mrs. May, what is the alternative to your deal on Brexit? "Cornflakes". Hmmm...Which brings me round to the analogy of the Bipolar Brassiere, one painted black, the other, white with no seven shades of... in between.
The point is not whether Theresa May has the negotiating skills to master her brief at this point in time - she has not and never has had. She is reasonable material for a junior ministerial level in which one has to toe the line and utter the right sounds at the right time, without having to think much, speak much or appear much in public. What happens when someone like that does, is the cringingly embarrassing dance routine.
The point is whether the British Government or indeed its entire political class has any idea of what Brexit is all about, and here it is, lock, stock and barrel:
The European Union is the fruit of a Germany endemically needing Lebensraum for its industries because the Germans are regimentally well organized and hard-working and disciplined and always have been, their technology is sound and their machines work. Ask any driver of a Mercedes taxi whose car has been running 24 hours a day for 20-plus years without the need for a revision. It is also the fruit of a France and Belgium scared sh*tless that the Germans will invade again. So much for the origins.
And today, the European Union is the fruit of a load of ninnies who in the 1990s went too far, too fast, creating something in a decade which should have taken centuries as thousand-year-old economies and societies with their socio-economic-societal vectors were hurriedly patched together to form what is after all clearly a neo-liberal project, Fortress Europa. That entity which went gallivanting across the globe drawing lines on maps, forcing people to leave their families and be carted off across the oceans in a sea of excrement to become slaves for the rest of their lives while their families starved to death back home. They destroyed entire nations, committed genocide, stole resources then declared that the inhabitants of the lands they destroyed were "illegal immigrants".
On the other hand, diatribe over and back to today, Europe and the European Project is part of the process of cultural globalization in which common standard operating practices are used for accounting (OK except for the Germans but they are...sort of...über Alles, so to speak), in which common rules apply to guarantee minimum levels of security and well-being, in which development projects are implemented with common funds and in which Universities pool their knowledge, people are free to work and travel across some invisible line called a "frontier".
It is far from perfect but when you form a block you have to take the rough with the smooth and you cannot have things all ways to your own selfish advantage all the time. If you don't like it, vote against it. This is 2019, not the nineteen-twenties when you just invade someone, shoot the natives in the whites of the eyes and civilize them with the Bible and the Bullet, elevating the secondary power group to a state of primacy so that it needs the invader to remain in power, and in so doing, totally destroy the status quo. It's called Divide and Rule, something the British have always excelled at. They're not so hot when the chickens come home to roost.
And now let us focus on Britain and Brexit. We finally see what the United Kingdom is: a collection of peoples, almost micro-states sewn together under a common reference, the Monarchy (which does its job very well). Open the can of worms and what happens? Something like Brexit.
The peoples of the United Kingdom have been fed decades of ridicule by a mass media bordering on the hysterically absurd, which presents evidence of the level "someone heard someone else who thinks she heard someone say at the hairdressers' " and being a good-natured but gullible bunch, half of them fell hook, line and sinker for the utter nonsense and sh*tfaced lies peddled as the truth by toffs and toffs' friends about how much more money the UK would have if it did not belong to the European Union.
The reality is quite simple, and let us use an analogy. A family thinks about selling its historic home, a mansion set deep in the leafy Surrey countryside. They call the family together (seventeen of them) and have a vote. Just over half, nine of them, are swayed by the discourse of the Prodigal Son, a trader of intelligent bathrooms called Justin Thyme, who claims that the family will make billions from the sale because the land can be developed into housing estates.
Little do they know that prospectors have discovered oil deep beneath the property and that other prospectors suspect that part of the estate is rich in shale gas. The whole area is about to be drilled to the core and have the living daylights fracked out of it.
The family starts to have second thoughts about whether it is such a good idea to sell the property, and the younger ones coming along, now eligible to vote, want to retain this pearl in the English countryside and open it to schools to use as an eco-park or Biosphere. Three of the elders have since passed away, so a family vote today would go the other way, eleven in favor of remaining in charge of the property and six against, with two of the six now over 85 and with three of the next generation aged 17.
Justin Thyme said "No, we said we will sell, so sell we shall". In fact he said it 376 times in just four days in a series of interviews.
Back to the real world. This is where the Peoples of the United Kingdom stand today, faced with the reality of what Brexit means. It means losing any voice within the EU, it means paying to do business with a block where today they do it for free, so it means continuing to accept EU norms, paying for it and with no voice in return to change anything. It means paying more for imports, which means rising prices. It means fewer exports, so it means growing unemployment. It means the positive employment figures peddled today by the Government (it also depends on how you cook the figures) reflect the UK inside the EU. Wait till the UK comes out and see what happens, however the figures are cooked.
It means fewer opportunities for the young, it means fewer University exchange programs, it means the closing of research centers in the UK employing, today, thousands of people, it means panic among insurers, among banks, it means a drain of business, cash and opportunities for generations to come, it means the UK falling apart at the seams as a bunch of elitists talk of cloud cuckoo land without having a clue what they are doing.
Now for those who really want to know what Brexit means, Google up millions made by shorting the Pound (about those who made tens of millions out of Brexit while the people were sold lies, using them like guinea pigs) and Google up 2019 EU tax law on offshore funds (under which those who have their cash offshore to avoid paying taxes will have to declare and pay tax on their stash, in their own countries).
To conclude, it is incredible that anyone, including and especially the Prime Minister, could even be considering that a No Deal Exit is on the cards less than a week before the UK might leave. It is equally incredible that the Prime Minister and Parliament can refuse a second referendum when it is clear that the first referendum was illegally managed, was flawed, was based on lies and when people had no idea what they were voting for.
Democracy would dictate that the people are given a second chance, because it is evident that Parliament is a failed medieval project, or at best one belonging to the Early Modern Historical period. Given that official polls place REMAIN at over 60% and LEAVE at under 40% (the gap widens by the day), perhaps the Prime Minister, her Government and Parliament should try following Democracy. They will not, because they know that a second referendum = no Brexit.
It is by now clear that Brexit was fixed, the people were duped and the Government does not want to practise any form of democracy. A flawed vote taken in 2016 does not reflect the reality today.
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey
Twitter: @TimothyBHinchey
timothy.hinchey@gmail.com
Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey works in the area of teaching, consultancy, coaching, translation, revision of texts, copy-writing and journalism. Director and Chief Editor of the Portuguese version of Pravda.Ru since 2002, and now Co-Editor of the English version, he contributes regularly to several other publications in Portuguese and English. He has worked in the printed and online media, in daily, weekly, monthly and yearly magazines and newspapers. A firm believer in multilateralism as a political approach and multiculturalism as a means to bring people and peoples together, he is Official Media Partner of UN Women, fighting for gender equality and Media Partner with Humane Society International, promoting animal rights. His hobbies include sports, in which he takes a keen interest, traveling, networking to protect the rights of LGBTQI communities and victims of gender violence, and cataloging disappearing languages, cultures and traditions around the world. A keen cook, he enjoys trying out different cuisines and regards cooking and sharing as a means to understand cultures and bring people together.
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The neverending containment of Russia
2019/03/22
by Emanuel Pietrobon
In 1946 in the famous "Long Telegram" George Kennan, a US diplomat based in Moscow, denounced that the next threat to the existence of the free world would come from the Soviet Union. According to Kennan the combination of ideological elements, namely the Marxist-Leninist thesis of the capitalist encirclement aimed at killing the proletarian revolution, and cultural attitudes, namely the expansionist and imperialistic ambitions inherently part of Russian history, should have pushed the United States to annihilate the Communist threat through a farsighted containment along the Soviet borders.
It is from this moment that, by understanding the importance of the hegemony over Eurasia, the United States decided to enter into the Great Game, since then fought by the British Empire, and to make the control over the Heartland one of its priorities.
Gathering the legacy of Sir Halford Mackinder, one of the founding fathers of geopolitics, the focus of Washington's foreign agenda shifted from the control over the "backyard", namely Latin America, to Eurasia. According to Mackinder, Eurasia was different from any other continent, because it was the land of great civilizations, the residence of a large part of the world population, strategically accessible and unattainable with an adequate network of infrastructures, and with an incomparable wealth in terms of natural resources.
Because of these reasons, according to him, the British should have invested more resources not in the maintenance of a thalassocracy but in avoiding the formation of a hegemonic power in Eurasia by means of sabotages, the creation of buffer states, secret diplomacy.
In particular, Mackinder was worried about the possibility of a Russian-German alliance because from the union of the Teutonic industrial potentials with the endless resources offered by the Russian soil it could emerge a lethal power for the British hegemony, which was not only decadent but also anachronistic because founded on the domination of the seas in the era that would have enshrined the rule of land transport.
More than a century after the publication of The Geographical Pivot of History by Mackinder and more than 20 years after the publication of The Big Chessboard by Zbigniew Brzezinski, one of the most powerful strategists of the recent US history (strongly influenced by the Mackinderian school), it is easily noticeable how the suggestions about the control over Eurasia have been scrupulously followed by the United States.
Mackinder's theory of Heartland (Source: CA&CC Press AB)
In particular, Brzezinski's recommendations for an "Eurasian strategy" have become a reality: expansion of NATO and the European Union in the Balkans and in the Eastern Europe, removal of Ukraine from the Russian sphere of influence, pressure on the main Asian geostrategic pivots like Caucasus, Turkestan, Turkey, Fertile Crescent and Persian Gulf, to make the continent ungovernable to any wanna-be hegemon.
Decades of successful post-Cold war neo-containment have resulted in a favourable situation for the United States, but the events could still change in favour of Russia because of the emerging of China.
In fact, on the one hand the United States show interest in the deepening of the neo-containment begun after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, on the other hand the emphasis given to the War on Terror and Russia has allowed China to emerge as an economic major power whose planetary ambitions are threatening the stability of the American empire.
And it is precisely in this complicated context that the Trump administration strategy has been developed with the aim of lowering the risks of the imperial overextension by means of strategic withdrawals in places of secondary or declining importance (Syria, Afghanistan), compromise agreements wherever is possible to avoid escalations that would steal precious resources (North Korea), and make tailored traps to get the best result at the lowest cost.
Apart from some appreciation of Vladimir Putin and signal of openness, the Trump administration is being working very hard to bring Russia to the implosion: new agreements for military supply and deployment of new military, sale of heavy weapons to Ukraine, new rounds of sanctions, withdrawal from the INF treaty, on the background of a general sabotage of the Russian agenda for the Middle East.
Ronald Reagan docet and Trump learnt the lesson: sanctions to make pressure on the Russian economy and the prospect of a new arms race to push Russia (and China) in. The context is also similar: it is no longer Afghanistan, but Syria and Ukraine. The strategy can work: indeed the Russian economy continues to be dependent on the export of weapons and energy resources, while there are no farsighted plans for real and efficient diversification, but the budget of the world's largest state can not continue to depend only on two revenues.
It is true that Trump has occasionally shown a willingness to improve relations with Russia, but always dictating his own rules. There are ongoing talks about a possible future recognition by the United States of Crimea as a territory under Russian sovereignty. Trump himself said he left the possibility open. But it is an event that will take place according to the rules set by Washington. And in the United States, strategists know very well what to ask in exchange: China, ie they will try to push Russia out from Chinese orbit in order to avoid the birth of an alliance extremely dangerous for the creaky American-centric unipolar order.
It won't be easy to make the strategy work but the White House already knows what to do: exploiting the creeping and existing fears in the Kremlin about a Chinese-run Eurasia which would doom Moscow to play a peripheral role. The strategy could work because it has already successfully tested in the past, namely when the divisions within the international Communist bloc were cleverly exploited by Henry Kissinger to bring China out of the Soviet orbit.
This time the game would take advantage of what Kennan called the "traditional Russian insecurity" in order to turn two collaborative partners into two competitive rivals. Thanks to the withdrawal from the INF treaty, the military threats along the national borders, the economic pressure and the need to compete against the United States and China, Russia would probably implode in the same way of the Soviet Union. At this point, Washington could finally focus its efforts against the true target of this century: Beijing.
But the US strategy for Eurasia will work only if Russia and China will respond to pressures and threats as planned and until now Putin and Xi Jinping seem to have understood the American intentions and are deepening the strategic bilateral partnership in every important sector. Also, Russia does not seem interested in taking part in a new arms race and the economic pressures could be relieved with a strengthening of the Eurasian Economic Union.
The last point is the German question. Both Mackinder and Brzezinski feared the emergence of a possible Moscow-Berlin axis. Until now, thanks also to the underground economic warfare waged by the United States against Germany, Chancellor Merkel has satisfied every US directive, even freezing profitable energetic projects such as the Nord Stream 2.
But if Macron and Merkel's plan for a new Europe more autonomous from Washington come true, there could take place also a reevaluation of their current positions about Russia.
In any case, Russia can not have trust in the European Union, because it acts on the basis of contingent interests and defends American agenda in every possible sector even when against its own interests. The only way to deal with the neverending containment is to read Mackinder and Brzezinski and understand the importance of having a counter-strategy for hegemony over the Heartland.
Emanuel Pietrobon
Graff Laundromat
2019/03/21
A British company could assist Russian financier Emil Gaynulin in hiding money from US authorities in its valuable diamonds.
In May 2015, the world-famous British jewellery house Graff Diamonds Ltd together with its Russian partners, entrepreneur Emil Gaynulin and philanthropist Rustem Magdeev, opened the doors of its first boutique in Cyprus, in the prestigious new Marina, located in the city of Limassol, which is sometimes called the new playground for "rich Russians."
Two years later, in May 2017, the shareholders of the Cypriot company Equix Group Ltd, which owned the Graff franchise rights, got involved in an internal conflict that led to the closure of the store, the disappearance of diamonds worth tens of millions of euros and the intervention of well-known Russian crime bosses.
London court proceedings, initiated as a result of a filing of a lawsuit by one of the shareholders of Equix Group Ltd against its former owner revealed that the moneys invested in Graff jewellery could belong to an influential Tatar politician and members of the Russian criminal community.
However, the greatest resonance was caused by the fact that a core investor and a shareholder in Equix Group Ltd, Emil Gaynulin, who spent in excess of $ 100 million buying Graff watches and diamonds, could actually be just a nominee, and the capital itself belonged to individuals under US sanctions - it's not by chance that a daughter of an influential financier and art collector Michael Openheim known for his association with some people on the US sanction list, became one of the preference shareholders in the art gallery owned by Equix Group Ltd, and he himself received Cypriot nationality with Emil Gaynulin' help. Last year Michael Openheim has appeared in money laundering scandal in Germany, linked to elite real estate valued $1 billion.
Photo: http://eclectic-magazine.ru/mixail-opengejm-galereya-artstory-intervyu/
It is quite possible that the management of Graff Diamonds Ltd was well aware of the origin of Emil Gaynulin funds - that is why, in June 2015, they insisted on some transactions to be carried out via Graff Diamonds Overseas SA, a company owned by the Graff family, which opened accounts in a Swiss bank UBS AG.
According to our sources, US FBI got interested in a number of transactions between Emil Gainulin and Graff Diamonds Ltd, as well as in the involvement of a Swiss Bank Julius Baer & Co. Ltd, where the funds came from. London could start proper investigation too - British authorities are very sensitive to the origin of Russian money.
Christchurch aftermath: Invaders complain of invaders
2019/03/20
Brenton Tarrant, the shooter from New Zealand's Christchurch, was not a lone wolf. The West has missed out an important point - the formation of organised Christian extremism. Tarrant killed about 50 people in two mosques. At first glance, this crime is reminiscent to the that committed by Anders Breivik, who killed 77 in Norway in 2011. Breivik was a "lonely wolf", though. Is Tarrant another lone terrorist, or is he a member of an extremist group?
In his 74-page manifesto titled "The Great Replacement," Tarrant said that he comes from a working, low-income family. He moved to New Zealand from Australia to plan an attack that would reveal the truth about the "attack on our civilization," "that nowhere in the world is safe." "We must crush immigration and deport those invaders already living on our soil," he wrote. "It is not just a matter of our prosperity, but the very survival of our people."
By "invaders" Tarrant means Muslims. The killer described his attack as an act of "revenge on the invaders for the hundreds of thousands of deaths caused by foreign invaders in Europeans lands throughout history.
Here is an excerpt from the manifesto:
"To take revenge on the invaders for the hundreds of thousands of deaths caused by foreign invaders in European lands throughout history.
"To take revenge for the enslavement of millions of Europeans taken from their lands by the Islamic slavers.
"To take revenge for the thousands of European lives lost to terror attacks throughout European lands.
"To directly reduce immigration rates to European lands by intimidating and physically removing the invaders themselves.
"To incite violence, retaliation and further divide between the European people and the invaders currently occupying European soil.
"To avenge those European men and women lost in the constant and never ending wars of European history who died for their lands, died for their people only to have their lands given away to any foreign scum that bother to show up."
New Zealand is a country where it is not easy to buy automatic or semi-automatic weapons, which Tarrant used in his attack. One requires a license, which a person can receive after a number of thorough police inspections. It does not seem to be likely that the killer could obtain the license himself. It seems much more likely that the weapons were provided to him from local members of a criminal group.
It just so happens that the West has missed the moment of the formation of the organised protest extremist movement of white people with Bibles in their hands. It goes without saying that they have nothing to do with Christians and Christianity, just like those who kill in the name of the Quran. Such terrible crimes come as a radical act of protest against the policy of the global melting pot, multiculturalism and omnipresent tolerance.
Security Specialist Paul Buchanan told Herald.nz that Tarrant was a member of ultra-right communities on social networks. Another member of those groups shot parishioners at a synagogue in Pittsburgh last year. Buchanan believes that Christchurch is home to a very active community of white supremacists who have repeatedly attacked refugees and people of color in the last 20 years.
"New Zealand had succumbed to "the homicidal politics of confrontation that we see in the US and Europe," Buchanan said.
Dmitry Mosyakov, chief of the Center for Southeast Asia at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Pravda.Ru that in Europe, tensions between migrants, most often from Muslim countries, and the local population are most often eased at courts. "In most cases, people would make some posters and hold a demonstration to say that they condemn violence. However, Australia and New Zealand is a patriarchal society, in which non-acceptance of migrants may lead to a terrible tragedy. When migrants tried to harass Australian women on the beach, all of Sydney was infuriated very quickly," Dmitry Mosyakov said.
In other words, the "Western periphery" has never become part of liberal policy of multiculturalism and tolerance. "Many believe that New Zealand is like heaven on Earth. It is really so, if you come to the country as a tourist. However, if you live there as a local resident, then you live in the environment that is exempt from global Western trends," the expert noted.
According to him, the Christchurch massacre will cause great and just riots in the Muslim world, because it is an absolutely unprovoked terrorist act: there is no Muslim extremism in New Zealand."
"At the same time, there were examples of such extremism in South-East Asia, for example, when Australians were killed in Bali explosions. This indicates deep contradictions inside the modern Western world. The liberal paradigm is not successful in regulating interethnic and inter-religious relations," concluded Dmitry Mosyakov.
We would like to add here that New Zealand, just like Australia and many other countries of the world, used to be a British colony. Anglo-Saxons had colonised those countries and did their best to exterminate indigenous populations. They colonise half of the world, use humans as slaves and then complain of immigrants and call them invaders.
The Decolonization of Western Sahara: A Saharawi vision of the solution
2019/03/20
The Decolonization of Western Sahara: A Saharawi vision of the solution
By: Amb. Malainin Lakhal*
The Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara remains the last case of decolonization in Africa. The Moroccan military invaded the territory on the 31st of October 1975 despite a clear ruling issued by the International Court of Justice a few days before, on the 16th of October of the same year. On the 6th of November 1975, Morocco organized what it called a "Green March" to officially invade the North of Western Sahara moving 350,000 Moroccan settlers to the territory, in complicity with Spain, the colonial power in the territory since 1884.
The United Nations Security Council immediately called on Morocco to withdraw from the territory, but the Moroccan King was strongly backed by France and other Western powers. It was obvious that Morocco was violating not only the UN Charter's principles, such as abstention from "the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state", but also the African Union Constitutive Act's sacred principle of "respect of borders existing on achievement of independence". This is why both organizations adopted the same position: the rejection of the Moroccan colonial fait accompli, and the insistence on the need to decolonize Western Sahara through a genuine process of self-determination under the auspices of the UN and AU.
Basic facts
Many analyses tend to call for a peaceful and mutually acceptable resolution of this conflict, but sometimes fall short in proposing solutions that would meet the necessary conditions for a just solution.
A "just" solution can never be achieved if the proposals put to the table are in violation of international law. Unfortunately this is what many voices seem to suggest, proposing "solutions" that violate the UN Charter, the AU Constitutive Act and worse, some of the main pillars of modern international law, mainly the right of the people to self-determination, and the sovereignty of the people over their land and resources.
Other proposals, such as the Moroccan "wide autonomy" is simply an attempt to normalize the illegal occupation. The UN never recognized Moroccan sovereignty of any sort over the territory of Western Sahara, and identified Morocco as an occupying force in 2 General Assembly's resolutions. According to international law an occupying power cannot exercise control over the occupied territory. In fact, the occupying power doesn't have the right to change the demographic, economic or political status of the occupied territory, and must respect the rules and principles of international law in its treatment of the people of the occupied land according to the Geneva Convention and to Chapter 11 of the UN Charter among other instruments. In fact, it should not hinder the people's right to self-determination and freedom.
The African Union (formerly known as the Organisation of African Unity [OAU]) went even further. The OAU formally recognized the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic in 1982 as the legitimate authority in Western Sahara after having paid huge efforts to convince the Moroccan King Hassan II to end this act of aggression against its neighbors. The African Union seeks to bring the two member States, Morocco and the Saharawi Republic, to negotiate under the auspices of the UN without preconditions so as to reach a solution that would end this conflict.
What norms for what solution?
The International Court of Justice's opinion of 1975 indicated that the native Sahrawi people of Western Sahara are the only sovereign power in Western Sahara. It also considered that it "has not found legal ties of such a nature as might affect the application of resolution 1514 (XV) in the decolonization of Western Sahara and, in particular, of the principle of self-determination through the free and genuine expression of the will of the peoples of the Territory." (para. 129, 162)
Therefore, any proposed solution to this clear-cut conflict of decolonization must be decided and approved by the people of Western Sahara and them alone. No other country, organization or entity is entitled to decide over the political future of the territory.
Further, the way of consulting the people of Western Sahara, as prescribed by UN General Assembly's resolutions 1514 and 1541 and confirmed in more than 100 UN resolutions, can only be attained through a genuine and free vote in a referendum on self-determination supervised by the UN and the AU, in which the people have various choices including independence, free association with another entity or integration into an existing entity. Therefore, any consultation that doesn't include independence will be in total contravention of international law.
A Just, lasting, realistic and mutually acceptable solution
A formula that was adopted by the UN Security Council's various resolutions consider that the mutually acceptable solution to the conflict must be just, realistic and lasting. Various interpretations can be given to these four terms but one reading that cannot be ignored should certainly be related to the realities on the ground and the political and legal facts.
A just solution must respect the law. So simple! The UN cannot allow Morocco to impose a colonial fait accompli in Western Sahara in violation of the UN principles. Morocco is an occupying force, and as such it must simply withdraw from the territory to allow its people to control their land and resources. Allowing Morocco to expand its territory through the use of force as it is trying to do will destroy the whole modern international system.
Likewise, a lasting solution can only be a legal one that is approved by the people of the colonized territory. Once they decide the fate of their territory in a legitimate process, the decision they take will allow peace to be restored.
On the other hand, depriving the Saharawi people from freely deciding over their future will likely push them to contest the results of any solution they interpret as imposed upon them. No one can predict the extent of the Saharawis' reaction in such circumstances, or the extent of the instability and conflict it will unleash on the region, the continent and the world.
The solution to the conflict must also be "realistic" according to various UN resolutions. But again, we should read the facts on the ground properly, and ask the right questions: Does Morocco really control the territory? Can it legalize its illegal occupation? Are the proposals of Morocco realistic? If so, why did it not succeed in convincing the Saharawis?
A "realistic" solution can only be a solution that guarantees a lasting peace in the territory. Any solution that is not accepted or satisfying to the Saharawi people will never help in resolving the problem. What is real on the ground is that Morocco is still an occupying power. It could not normalize its occupation and is still facing huge challenges in the daily administration of the territory. Morocco is deploying thousands of armed forces and police corps to control the territory committing all sort of human rights abuses and violating all norms of the International Humanitarian law. It is challenged by the Polisario Front with regards to the illegal exploitation of the natural resources of the territory. The two landmark rulings of the European Union Court of Justice of 2016 and 2018 are the latest example of the Polisario's successful challenges.
Fair and mutually acceptable solutions
The resolution of the conflict in Western Sahara will open a new era in international relations. Any solution that violates the legitimate rights of the people of Western Sahara to self-determination and independence will only lead to more conflicts and deprive the whole North African region and Africa from tremendous opportunities of development, integration and stability.
A fair solution would be to implement the principles of the UN Charter and AU Constitutive Act, asking Morocco to immediately withdraw from the territory, respect its internationally recognized borders and allow the Saharawi Republic, the founding member of the AU, to exercise full control over all its territory. The two States can thereafter negotiate a detailed peace agreement in which the concerns and interests of both are taken into consideration. In this case, the region of North Africa will finally be able to build its long awaited regional union, which will benefit not only the African Union but also Europe and the world.
Another alternative is of course to go back to the OAU-UN Settlement Plan of 1991, which was signed and agreed upon by the two parties. The settlement plan is a big concession from the Saharawi Republic, but it also ensures sovereignty of the people of Western Sahara over their land. It would give Morocco a chance to save face and escape the trap that has imprisoned its potential in the region for four decades.
Conclusion
Western Sahara is located in a region that is affected by terrorism, cross-border crime, drug dealing and migration. Failing to resolve the conflict peacefully and in respect of international law will likely plunge the North African region into turmoil. On the other hand, resolving the conflict peacefully and in a lasting and fair way will allow the North African and Sahel countries to intensify their efforts, and coordinate appropriately, to find solutions to the problems, including through intensive programs of economic and social investments in the border zones that lack development in addition to stronger coordination in terms of security.
The violation of the right to self-determination would also entail a dangerous precedent in international law. It would push the international community into an uncertain future where strong nations can violate the territorial integrity and freedom of weaker ones.
43 years on from its military invasion and occupation of Western Sahara, Morocco has failed to legalize its status internationally or regionally, and has not managed to convince the Saharawi people under occupation to accept this colonial fait accompli. Worse still, the Moroccan government has problems administrating its own internationally recognized territory, which is evidenced by all the political, economic and social problems suffered by the Moroccan people. Resolving the conflict in Western Sahara according to International Law will ease Morocco from this burden and perhaps give its people a chance to resolve their own internal problems adequately.
* Saharawi writer and diplomat
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