Turkish outlet, Daily Sabah reported on October 13th reported that the journalist’s smartwatch may play an important role into the investigation. The outlet, citing anonymous sources in a special intelligence department, said that authorities have discovered that Jamal’s watch recorded audio of his meeting inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, which was then sent to a phone he gave his fiancée ahead of his meeting.
Saudi Arabia still maintains that Khashoggi left the consulate alone and that they have played no part whatsoever in his disappearance.
On October 13th, the International Press Institute’s Daoud Kuttab said that US President Donald Trump’s “tirades against journalism” and claims of “fake news” encourage leaders in other parts of the world to limit press freedom.
“The rhetoric coming out of the White House, coming out of the president, attacks daily on news as being fake news gives the permission to autocratic leaders to take out their own opposition and independent journalists,” he was cited by Al Jazeera.
“Leaders around the world and especially autocratic leaders watch the White House and the president carefully. When the president of the US says that journalists are the enemies of the people, that’s music to their ears and the feel like they can get a green light or a yellow light from America to do what they want [to] their own journalists,” Kuttab further commented.
On the same day, the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres expressed his fear that “enforced disappearances” have become the “new normal.”
Speaking to the BBC at the International Monetary Fund meeting in Bali, Guterres said governments must respond appropriately once a “clear answer” on what happened to Khashoggi emerges.
“I must say I am feeling worried [at] this apparent new normal,” he said. “Because this kind of incident is multiplying and it’s absolutely essential to make sure that the international community says clearly that this is not something that can happen,” he was cited by the BBC.
“We need to know exactly what has happened and we need to know exactly who is responsible and, of course, when we see the multiplication of this kind of situation, I think we need to find ways in which accountability is also demanded,” he urged.
In the UK, Mark Menzies, chair of the all-party parliamentarian group on Saudi Arabia, together with several other members of British Parliament expressed concern regarding the disappearance. He and the other 12 MPs wrote a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Jeremy Hunt calling for a “thorough investigation.”
“Clearly this is a very concerning case, with serious implications for the future of Saudi Arabia and her relations with liberal democracies worldwide,” his comment said. “The UK must call for a full and thorough investigation into the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of Mr Khashoggi, and stand ready to support all authorities in their inquiries,” Menzies continued.
On October 12th, US President Donald Trump said he would be calling Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman “pretty soon.”
“I will be calling, at some point, King Salman, I’ll be speaking to him pretty soon,” Trump said. “We’re gonna find out what happened with respect to the terrible situation in Turkey having to do with Saudi Arabia and the reporter.”
He was, however, hesitant to strongly criticize one of his closest allies. “It is potentially a really, really terrible situation,” Trump said.
Nonetheless, leaving for a rally in Kentucky, Trump told media that the US would be “foolish” to cancel arms deals with Saudi Arabia in response to the incident with the Saudi journalist.
“We’re just hurting ourselves,” he said adding that this move may impact US workers more than Saudi Arabia.
Another argument used by Trump is that such a move would benefit to China and Russia, which are ready to use any US-Saudi rift to sell own arms to the kingdom.
France24 also cited French President Emmanuel Macron who said he was “extremely worried” about the disappearance. “I am waiting for the truth and complete clarity to be established. What’s being mentioned is serious, very serious […] France wants everything to be done so that we have all the truth on this case of which the first elements are extremely worrying.”
The French leader said he would undertake action once there are established facts.
On October 12th, a spokesperson for the Future Investment Initiative that is to be held on October 23rd in the Saudi Arabia said that the conference would still take place, despite numerous speakers and partners have pulled out of the event.
“While it is disappointing that some speakers and partners have pulled out, we are looking forward to welcoming thousands of speakers, moderators and guests from all over the world to Riyadh from Oct. 23-25,” the statement said.
So far, on October 12th, the Financial Times, Bloomberg, CNN and The New York Times, as well as reporters and editors from the Economist and CNBC said on Friday they were no longer participating.
Dara Khosrowshahi, CEO of ride-sharing company Uber, Bob Bakish, CEO of US mass media conglomerate Viacom and billionaire Steve Case, one of the founders of AOL also said they would not attend.
World Bank President Jim Yong Kim also said he would not attend, citing a scheduling conflict.
US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchins and top Wall Street banks said they would attend. So US support of questionable Saudi misconduct continues as usual.
journalists going missing? this is why i marched for tommy robinson. We did it to keep him alive, because as far as the UK conservative Regime was concerned, They put him in prison illegally and then put a reporting ban on it. They tried killing him in prison before. They tried doing it again.
‘In the UK, Mark Menzies, chair of the all-party parliamentarian group on Saudi Arabia, together with several other members of British Parliament expressed concern regarding the disappearance. He and the other 12 MPs wrote a letter to Foreign Affairs Minister Jeremy Hunt calling for a “thorough investigation.”’
MP’s in UK gave more attention to other countries journalists than they did their own citizens
https://www.globalresearch.ca/english-translation-of-udo-ulfkottes-bought-journalists-suppressed/5601857
English Translation of Udo Ulfkotte’s “Bought Journalists” Suppressed?
By James F. Tracy
Global Research, July 31, 2017
Region: Europe, USA
Theme: Intelligence, Media Disinformation
print 661 375 58 1448
The English translation of German journalist Udo Ulfkotte’s best-selling book, Gekaufte Journalisten (Bought Journalists) appears to have been suppressed throughout North America and Europe. On May 15, 2017 Next Revelation Press, an imprint of US-Canadian-based publisher Tayen Lane, released the English version of Bought Journalists, under the title, Journalists for Hire: How the CIA Buys the News.
Tayen Lane has since removed any reference to the title from its website. Correspondingly Amazon.com indicates the title is “currently unavailable,” with opportunities to purchase from independent sellers offering used copies for no less than $1309.09. The book’s subject matter and unexplained disappearance from the marketplace suggest how powerful forces are seeking to prevent its circulation.
Gekaufte Journalisten was almost completely ignored by mainstream German news media following its release in 2014. “No German mainstream journalist is allowed to report about [my] book,” Ulfkotte observed. “Otherwise he or she will be sacked. So we have a bestseller now that no German journalist is allowed to write or talk about.”{1]
Along these lines, publication of the English translation was repeatedly delayed. When this author contacted Ulfkotte in early December 2015 to inquire on the book’s pending translation, he responded, “Please find the link to the English edition here,”
http://www.tayenlane.com/bought-journalists
The above address once providing the book’s description and anticipated publication date now leads to an empty page.[2] Tayen Lane has not responded to emails or telephone calls requesting an explanation for the title’s disappearance.
When a book publisher determines that it has acquired a politically volatile or otherwise “troublesome” title it may embark on a process recognized in the industry as “privishing.” “Privishing is a portmanteau meaning to privately publish, as opposed to true publishing that is open to the public,” writes investigative journalist Gerald Colby.
It is usually employed in the following context: “We privished the book so that it sank without a trace.” The mechanism used is simple: cut off the book’s life-support system by reducing the initial print run so that the book “cannot price profitably according to any conceivable formula,” refuse to do reprints, drastically slash the book’s advertising budget, and all but cancel the promotional tour.”[3]
Privishing often takes place without the author knowing, simply because it involves breach of contract and potential liability. Tayen Lane will likely not face any legal challenge in this instance, however. Ulfkotte died of a heart attack on January 13, 2017, at age 56.[4]
Udo Ulfkotte was a prominent European journalist, social scientist, and immigration reform activist. Upon writing Gekaufte Journalisten and becoming one of the most significant media industry and deep state whistleblowers in recent history, Ulfkotte complained of repeated home searches by German state police and expressed fear for his own life. He also admitted previous health complications stemming from witnessing a 1988 poisoned gas attack in Iraqi Kurdistan.
Ulfkotte’s testimony of how intelligence agencies figure centrally in Western journalism is especially compelling because he for many years functioned in the higher echelons of mainstream newsworkers. The German journalist explains how he was recruited during the 1980s to work in espionage. This began through an invitation proffered by his graduate school advisor for an all-expense-paid trip to attend a two-week seminar on the Cold War conflict in Bonn.
Editor of Major German Newspaper Says He Planted Stories for the CIA
After Ulfkotte obtained his doctorate he was given a job as a reporter at “the leading conservative German newspaper, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, oddly appointed despite no journalistic training and hundreds of other applicants. Serving as a correspondent throughout the Middle East, Ulfkotte eventually became acquainted with agents from the CIA, German intelligence agency Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), Britain’s MI6, and Israel’s Mossad, all of whom valued his ability to travel freely in countries largely closed to the West. His editors readily collaborated in such intelligence gathering operations,”[5] for which journalist possess “non-official cover” by virtue of their profession.
“Non-official cover” occurs when a journalist is essentially working for the CIA, but it’s not in an official capacity,” Ulfkotte explains. “This allows both parties to reap the rewards of the partnership, while at the same time giving both sides plausible deniability. The CIA will find young journalists and mentor them. Suddenly doors will open up, rewards will be given, and before you know it, you owe your entire career to them. That’s essentially how it works.”[6] He likewise ruefully admits to “publishing articles under my own name written by agents of the CIA and other intelligence services, especially the German secret service.”[7]
Ulfkotte’s insider knowledge of the relationship between mainstream media and the intelligence community has special relevance in terms of informing the CIA’s antipathy toward Wikileaks, as well as the media campaign centering on the Trump administration’s alleged “ties to Russia,” while also lending credence to Trump’s frequent claims of the US media’s political biases and deep state ties. Indeed, Ulfkotte “Tweeted” about these very subjects just two days before he passed.
+++ Trump nennt CNN FakeNews…+++https://t.co/uLJhQbic7a
— Udo Ulfkotte (@UdoUlfkotte) January 11, 2017
Ulfkotte’s explosive revelations still have the potential to further intensify the much-deserved scrutiny corporate news media presently face. In a society that pays more than lip service to freedom of thought and expression Journalists for Hire would be required reading for college students—and particularly those studying in journalism programs intending to seek employment in the media industries.
In fact, journalism professors, some of whom have migrated to the academy following long careers at renowned news outlets, possess similar insider knowledge of the relationships Ulfkotte readily explains. As both journalists and educators they have a twofold burden of responsibility. This is the case more so than ever because the entire professional and intellectual enterprise they are engaged in (and one directly linked to the nation’s accelerating civic deterioration) has been made a farce. Journalists for Hire’s suppression suggests how Ulfkotte’s posthumous censors refuse for this important examination and cleansing to proceed.
Notes
[1] Ralph Lopez, “Editor of Major German Newspaper Says He Planted Stories for CIA,” Reader Supported News, February 1, 2015.
[2] Udo Ulfkotte to James Tracy, email correspondence, December 6, 2015. In author’s possession.
[3] Gerard Colby, “The Price of Liberty,” in Into the Buzzsaw: Leading Journalists Expose the Myth of a Free Press, Kristina Borjesson, ed., Amherst NY: Prometheus Books, 2002, 15-16.
[4] Former US military intelligence officer L. Fletcher Prouty relates a similar experience of how publication of his book, The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World, was greeted in 1972. “Then one day a business associate in Seattle called to tell me that the bookstore next to his office building had had a window full of books the day before, and none the day of his call. They claimed they had never had the book. I called other associates around the country. I got the same story from all over the country. The paperback had vanished. At the same time I learned that Mr. Ballantine had sold his company. I traveled to New York to visit the new ‘Ballantine Books’ president. He professed to know nothing about me, and my book … The campaign to to kill the book was nationwide and worldwide. It was removed from the Library of Congress and from College libraries as letters I received attested all too frequently.” Prouty, The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World, New York: SkyHorse Publishing, 2008, xii.
[5] Ronald L. Ray, “Reporter Admits Most Media Work for CIA, MI6, Mossad,” American Free Press, October 26, 2014. See also Tyler Durden, “German Journalist Blows Whistle on How CIA Controls the Media,” Zerohedge, October 9, 2014; Udo Ulfkotte, “German Politicians Are US Puppets,” Center for Research on Globalization, November 9., 2014.
[6] Durden, “German Journalist Blows Whistle on How CIA Controls the Media.”
[7] Lopez, “Editor of Major German Newspaper Says He Planted Stories for CIA.”
Saudi aren’t independent’s since Lawrence of Arabia times… King Faisal cares of his Kingdom, hew was immediately assassinate by a CIA brainwashed Princ
MBS is a NATO/Gladio/MOSSAD profiled hostage, if he want to go to the toilettes, he has to ask permission…
duhhhhhhhhh what a fucking surprise LOl….seriously, would anybody expect something different of people with no moral,dignity and honesty………this “ordered” US-Saudi friendly relationship is part of a bigger agenda…and NOTHING,absolutly NOTHING including the open genocide of the jemeni people will change that, and definetly not some journalist who got murdered…….people that rise up, be it politicians or journalists etc.. get murdered all the time around the globe including in the usa the great journalist and brave couragious man gary Webb who broke the story about the “crack/cocaine epidemic” in california, which was orchestrated by the CIA.He got murdered in 2004.
anybody whos interested should read gary webb´s book: Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion.
http://www.voltairenet.org/article183125.html
Captagon® is jihadists’ main weapon
VOLTAIRE NETWORK | 2 APRIL 2014
FRANÇAIS ESPAÑOL فارسى DEUTSCH PORTUGUÊS TÜRKÇE ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΆ ITALIANO
While the Western and Gulf media lead people to believe that jihadists get their nourishment primarily from the verses of the Koran, the seizures made in Syria show that in reality, they feed on Captagon.
In two days, the Syrian Arab Army took hold of a car full of Captagon tablets and a tank truck containing a ton.
Captagon (Fenetylline hydrochloride) is an amphetamine that causes euphoria and numbs the pain. Mixed with other drugs like hashish, it constitutes the basic feed ration for the jihadists. Combatants neither feel their own suffering nor the suffering they inflict on others. Therefore, they can commit all sorts of atrocities, laughing.
Contrary to popular belief, the jihadists are not driven by religious concerns, but by the quest of immediate pleasures. They are mainly recruited among hooligans and prisoners.
Manufactured in 2011 by NATO in a laboratory in Bulgaria, Captagon is now manufactures throughout the Middle East, including the Syrian territory.
http://www.voltairenet.org/mot2282.html?lang=en
THEMES
Mafias and narcopolitics
569 ARTICLES
FRANÇAIS 231 ITALIANO 28 ESPAÑOL 211 ENGLISH 31 PORTUGUÊS 14 DEUTSCH 19 РУССКИЙ 3 عربي 10 ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΆ 5 فارسى 5 TÜRKÇE 6 POLSKI 2 NEDERLANDS 1 ČEŠTINA 1 NORSK 1 SUOMI 1
Will the UCK terrorist be brought to trial [again]?
Will the UCK terrorist be brought to trial [again]? 17 JANUARY 2017
The former President of Kosovo, Ramush Haradinaj, was arrested by the French Judicial police, at the airport of Bâle-Mulhouse and then released on a bond of judicial supervision. Serbia is asking for his extradition to put him on trial for the crimes he committed as part of the Army for the Liberation of Kosovo (UCK) during the nineties.
Kosovo is a state created by Nato, but has not been recognized by the international community. Set up by Nato from the Albanian mafia, the UCK unleashed a (…)
«Godfather» Binali Yıldırım next Turkish Prime Minister
«Godfather» Binali Yıldırım next Turkish Prime Minister 24 MAY 2016
The AKP will probably elect Binali Yıldırım as its President during its meeting on the 22 May 2016. As we announced two weeks ago, he should then immediately assume his functions as Prime Minister.
Presented by the Western Press as a personality devoted to President Erdoğan, he is in fact a key figure in the current Mafia system.
Binali Yıldırım is a maritime expert, ex-representative for the International Maritime Organisation. He was introduced to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan when Erdoğan was elected (…)
NATO AND THE EUROPEAN UNION PARTICIPATE IN TERRORISM
How Bulgaria supplied drugs and weapons to Al-Qaïda and Daesh
by Thierry Meyssan
How Bulgaria supplied drugs and weapons to Al-Qaïda and Daesh DAMASCUS (SYRIA) | 4 JANUARY 2016
The best-kept secrets must be revealed in the end. The mafia cartel which governs Bulgaria has been caught supplying drugs and weapons to Al-Qaïda and Daesh, at the demand of the CIA, both in Libya and Syria. The affair is all the more serious since Bulgaria is a member of NATO and the European Union.
Karzai family hands over heroin trafficking to Islamic State
Karzai family hands over heroin trafficking to Islamic State 1 DECEMBER 2014
According to the UN, world heroin production stands at 430-450 tons, of which only 340 tons actually reach the market, the rest being seized or destroyed .
Top heroin producing countries are: Afghanistan (at least 380 tonnes), Myanmar and Laos (at least 50 tonnes).
According to John F. Sopko, the US government’s special inspector general for Afghanistan, the reconstruction efforts undertaken by Afghanistan have collapsed in the face of the continued expansion of drug cultivation drugs (…)
Afghan opium and heroin production explodes
Afghan opium and heroin production explodes 11 JUNE 2014
U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan, John F. Sopko, was heard on 10 June 2014 by the House Sub-Commission on the Middle East and North Africa regarding the “reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. ”
The official lamented the collapse of efforts in Afghanistan, especially for women and for the rule of law, under the pressure of drugs and criminal organizations.
According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, the budget for Afghan drug-related activities was $ 2 billion in 2012 (…)
Ukraine: Ihor Kolomoisky offers $ 1 million to murder Oleg Tsarev
Ukraine: Ihor Kolomoisky offers $ 1 million to murder Oleg Tsarev 17 MAY 2014
The Israeli-Ukrainian oligarch living in Switzerland, Ihor Kolomoisky, called South-East pro-federalist leader, Oleg Tsarev, to inform him that the Ukrainian Jewish community was prepared to pay a bounty of $ 1 million to whoever would assassinate him. He ordered him to immediately flee the country .
Mr. Kolomoisky holds Mr Tsarev responsible for the death of a Jewish Kiev-coup supporter on May 9 in Mariupol.
However, a leader of the Ukrainian Jewish community, Ian Epstein, denied Mr. (…)
Captagon® is jihadists’ main weapon
Captagon® is jihadists’ main weapon 2 APRIL 2014
While the Western and Gulf media lead people to believe that jihadists get their nourishment primarily from the verses of the Koran, the seizures made in Syria show that in reality, they feed on Captagon.
In two days, the Syrian Arab Army took hold of a car full of Captagon tablets and a tank truck containing a ton.
Captagon (Fenetylline hydrochloride) is an amphetamine that causes euphoria and numbs the pain. Mixed with other drugs like hashish, it constitutes the basic feed ration for (…)
Global opium and heroin production explodes
Global opium and heroin production explodes 16 FEBRUARY 2014
Poppy cultivation reached an unprecedented historical peak in 2013, surpassing the record of 2007-08, said Yuri Fedotov, director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
375 tons came from Afghanistan, while 50 tons originated from Myanmar and Laos.
The Afghan economy is reconverting to opium
The Afghan economy is reconverting to opium 21 NOVEMBER 2013
According to the UNODC (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime), the opium production in Afghanistan has increased by 49% in 2012, and should still go up by another 36% in 2013. By 2014, the country will account for 90% of world’s opium supply.
The Afghan economy is reverting almost exclusively to drugs, at a time when the international forces are getting ready to withdraw from the territory, and a new president is to be elected in (…)
Good link… thanks
US Warmongers are an tiring nuisance !
Trump is only showing China-Russia-Iran-Hezbollah-Turkey is the “Free World” hope
When do EC will noticed Europe is part of the Eurasian Cultures built by the Silk Road ?
dictatorships are ever hope. especially shtty islamic country.
For the moment Israel/US are the worst Racist, Fascist
and Fundamentalist Theocratic existing Countries,
a human Colonial shame Culture !
bullshit
Trump is a fat immoral pervert Zionist pimp and has no regard for human rights or basic decency. His agenda is simple, promote Zionist wars and sell inflated junk weaponry to the Saudis who funded his campaign. Kushner and Trump’s son gets millions of dollars from the Saudi headchoppers. The Republican party was given $100 million in donations from al-Waleed’s Citigroup and other Saudi sources.
If possible, Obama was worst, but more elegant !
It’s an appearance illusion lesson ! ======================================== https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/09/14/obamas-imperial-presidency/ .
Obama’s Imperial Presidency
by CARL BOGGS
Could Donald Trump already be the worst of all American presidents? In less than two years his record on the world scene has been frightening enough: U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Accords, scuttling of the Iran nuclear treaty, moving the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, unjustifiably punitive sanctions against Russia, Iran, and Venezuela, terror bombing of Mosul and other Iraq cities, bombastic threats against friends and enemies alike – not to mention a $54 billion gift to the Pentagon and stepped-up nuclear “modernization”. Hard to imagine much worse.
One article of faith among liberals and the corporate media is that Trump’s presidency stands alone as a house or horrors, unprecedented in its fascistic authoritarianism, crazy pronouncements, and ideological blend of xenophobia, racism, sexism, and sheer extremism. Those in the “resistance” know that pretty much any alternative (Bill Maher, LeBron James) would be far better, though specifics — beyond Trump’s mortal sin of partnering with Putin — are rarely mentioned. But precisely what alternatives? Bernie Sanders? Well, the Democratic National Committee never gave him much chance. Obvious comparisons are Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, and his competitor, Hillary Clinton. Obama was in charge of U.S. foreign policy for the preceding eight years, so his legacy (with plenty of help from Clinton) might be worth considering.
Obama, it turns out, was among the most militaristic White House occupants in American history, taking the imperial presidency to new heights. It has been said that Obama was the only president whose administration was enmeshed in multiple wars from beginning to end. His imperial ventures spanned many countries – Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Somalia along with proxy interventions in Yemen and Pakistan. He ordered nearly 100,000 bombs and missiles delivered against defenseless targets, a total greater than that of the more widely-recognized warmonger George W. Bush’s total of 70,000 against five countries. Iraq alone – where U.S. forces were supposed to have been withdrawn – was recipient of 41,000 bombs and missiles along with untold amounts of smaller ordnance. Meanwhile, throughout his presidency Obama conducted hundreds of drone attacks in the Middle East, more than doubling Bush’s total, all run jointly (and covertly) by the CIA and Air Force.
Obama engineered two of the most brazen regime-change operations of the postwar era, in Libya (2011) and Ukraine (2014), leaving both nations reduced to a state of ongoing civil war and economic ruin. For the past seven years Libya has been overrun by an assortment of militias, jihadic groups, and local strongmen – predictable result of the U.S./NATO bombing offensive to destroy the secular nationalist (and modernizing) Kadafi regime. This was purportedly Secretary of State Clinton’s biggest moment of glory, her imperialist gloating on full display following Kadafi’s assassination. As this is written conditions in Libya worsen by the day, reports surfacing of hundreds of people killed during violent clashes in the suburbs of Tripoli as rival militias fight for control of the capital. Militias now exercise control over ports, airfields, and much of the oil infrastructure. More tens of thousands of Libyans are being forced from their homes, a development greeted with silence at CNN and kindred media outlets.
United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric recently decried this violence, noting the indiscriminate shelling by armed groups killing civilians, including children. Not to be outdone, the U.S. (joined by a few European states) issued a statement condemning the violence in Libya, reading in part: “We urge armed groups to immediately cease all military actions and warn those who tamper with security in Tripoli or elsewhere in Libya that they will be held accountable for any such actions.” How thoughtful of those very military actors who, with U.N. blessing, brought nothing but endless death and destruction to the Libyan people.
In Ukraine, as Vladimir Putin was being demonized as the “new Hitler”, real fascists (or at least neo-fascists) were installed in power through the well-planned and generously-funded conspiracy of Obama’s neocon functionaries, led by Victoria Nuland and cheered on by such visiting notables as John McCain, Joe Biden, and John Brennan — all scheming to bring the Kiev regime into the NATO/European Union orbit. The puppet Poroshenko regime has since 2014 been given enough American economic and military largesse to finance its warfare against separatists in the Russian-speaking Donbass region, resulting in more than 10,000 deaths, with no end in sight. Following the gruesome pattern of Libya, Iraq, and Afghanistan, Ukrainian society descends into deepening chaos and violence with no end in sight.
It is easy to forget that it was the Obama administration that planned and carried out the first phases of the Mosul operation (begun in October 2016) which produced hundreds of thousands of casualties (with at least 40,000 dead), left a city of two million in Dresden-like state of rubble, and drove nearly a million civilians into exile. The same fate, on smaller scale, was brought to other Sunni-majority cities in Iraq, including Ramadi, Tikrit, and Fallujah (already destroyed by U.S. forces in 2004). Whatever the official goal, and however many secondary collaborators were involved, these were monstrous war crimes by any reckoning.
After calling for a nuclear-free world (and receiving a Nobel Peace Prize for that promise), Obama reversed course and embarked on the most ambitious U.S. nuclear upgrading since the early 1950s – the same project inherited by Trump. Speaking in Prague in 2009, the president called for total abolition of nukes, saying “the Cold War has disappeared but thousands of those [nuclear] weapons have not . . . Our efforts to contain these dangers [must be] centered on a global non-proliferation regime.” A laudable objective to be sure. But for a price tag of one trillion dollars (over two decades), Obama decided to create new missile delivery systems, expand the arsenal of tactical warheads, and fund a new cycle of bombers and submarines – all with little political or media notice. These initiatives violated the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty prohibiting such moves, while essentially blocking any genuine efforts toward nuclear reduction and nonproliferation.
In the months before Obama departed the White House he laid the groundwork for a new, more dangerous, Cold War with Russia. This agenda, negating earlier plans for a “reset” with the Putin government, would be multi-faceted – expanded NATO forces along Russian borders, renewed support for the oligarch Poroshenko in Ukraine, new and harsher economic sanctions, expulsion of diplomats, accelerated cyberwarfare, charges of Russian interference in the 2016 elections. Not only has this strategy, eagerly advanced by the Clintonites and their media allies, brought new levels of insanity to American politics, it has left the two nuclear powers menacingly closer to armed confrontation than even at the peak of the Cold War.
Obama’s contributions to a more robust imperial presidency went further. Collaborating with Israel and Saudi Arabia, he stoked the Syrian civil war by lending “rebel” fighters crucial material, logistical, and military aid for what Clinton – anticipating electoral victory – believed would bring yet another cheerful episode of regime change, this one leaving the U.S. face-to-face with the Russians. During his tenure in office, moreover, Obama would deploy more special-ops troops around the globe (to more than 70 countries) than any predecessor.
Many liberals and more than a few progressives – not to mention large sectors of the media intelligentsia — will find it difficult to reconcile the picture of an aggressively imperialist Obama with the more familiar image of a thoughtful, articulate politician who laced his talks with references to peace, arms control, and human rights. But this very dualism best corresponds to the historical reality. In his book The Obama Syndrome, Tariq Ali writes: “From Palestine through Iraq, Obama has acted as just another steward of the American empire, pursuing the same aims as his predecessors, with the same means but with more emollient rhetoric.” He adds: “Historically, the model for the current variant of imperial presidency is Woodrow Wilson, no less pious a Christian, whose every second word was peace, democracy, or self-determination, while his armies invaded Mexico, occupied Haiti, and attacked Russia [yes, Russia!], and his treaties handed one colony after another to his partners in war. Obama is a hand-me-down version of the same, without even Fourteen Points to betray.”
As the 2018 midterm elections approach, Obama has chosen to depart from historical norm and go on the attack against a Trump presidency viewed as signifying all that is evil. A Democratic victory would reject Trump’s “dark vision of the the nation and restore honesty, decency, and lawfulness to the American government”. In his first speech Obama said that orchestrated public fear has created conditions “ripe for exploitation by politicians who have no compunction and no shame about tapping into America’s dark history of racial and ethnic and religious division.” Does Obama need to be reminded that such “dark history” also includes militarism and imperialism?
Whatever one’s view of the Trump phenomenon in its totality, the amount of death and destruction he has brought to the world does not (yet) come close to Obama’s record of warfare, drone strikes, regime changes, military provocations, and global deployments. If neocon interests have come to shape U.S. foreign policy, those interests have so far been more fully embraced by Obama and the Clintonites than by Trump, despite the scary presence of Trump’s hawkish circle of lieutenants. Unfortunately, Obama’s eight years of imperial aggression elicited strikingly few liberal or progressive voices of dissent across the political and media terrain. He enjoyed nearly complete immunity from protest at a time when even the smallest vestiges of a once-vigorous American antiwar movement had disappeared from the scene.
For Trump, it is all about the green. But every president has bowed to the wicked Kingdown. The petrodollar agreement signed between Dick Nixon and King Faisal was intended to prop up the dollar permanently. Wall Street still believes this myth. And yet, Saudi has only half as much Treasuries as China or Japan and the lion’s share of Treasuries are purchased out of the Social Security fund. Mythology drives US foreign policy. Here is why the Saudis are allowed to write US foreign policy: http://www.newsilkstrategies.com/opinion/making-saudi-arabia-great-again-pt-1 http://www.newsilkstrategies.com/opinion/making-saudi-arabia-great-again-pt-2 http://www.newsilkstrategies.com/opinion/making-saudi-arabia-great-again-part-3
Yes, but because all(most) oil sales are in US dollars, they have to go through American banks, who charge fees. The fees are basically a tax the US collects on every dollar of trade, even when the US is not the buyer or seller. Global trade in 2016 was about $16 trillion. The US charges 0.1% in money changing fees, which is $16 billion. Because both parties to the trade need to change their money, the US gets double that amount, $32 billion. But there are other fees involved as well, so being the global reserve currency is a very lucrative private tax the US levies on the world.
Not any more, Sinbad. Iran sells all its oil in non-dollar currencies. China buys from Russia in local currencies (roubles or yuan). The euro will be a major currency in oil settlements in the near future.
Not true if they sold their oil to Europe in other currencies, the EU wouldn’t be creating an alternative payment system.
The EU is seriously weighing buying oil from Iran using euros. https://www.ibtimes.com/europe-pay-iran-euros-oil-abandoning-dollar-2681417 A Russian oil firm wants to accept euros as oil payment from eu: https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/russian-oil-firm-seeks-payments-in-euros-amid-us-sanction-threat/
No surprises there. Members of the Axis of Evil: they all protect each other and will protect each other till kingdom come, literally!
There is. As the controle is based on mental illusions and psy-ops, the solution is also psychological!
The solution is to know! If you know Finance controle every step toward totalitarian with usury, you know it!
If you know its International Finance who dont allow doctors and big pharma to cure, dont allow teachers and professors to teach knowledge, dont allow engineers and architects to provide solutions, dont allow local politicians to carry out visions, dont allow national soldiers and policemen to defend their country and societies, dont allow priests to teach Gods words, you now know it!
The psychological reaction is you stop blaming all the wrong guys because you now know! The next psychological step is you are free to choose how you will and can get around it, because you are no longer a stupid sheeple being pulled around!
As Jesus said: “seek the truth and it will set you free”.
What exactly does the US MIC have to sell the Saudis for 400 billion? The F35 is a lemon, they bought some THAAD, they don’t want any Patriots, they have aircraft galore…..maybe they can convince the Saudis to buy a carrier strike force and nuclear subs?
The Saudis have a lot of money in the US, money they are not allowed to take out of the US as cash, only as goods. They are also prisoners of America, just like everybody else.
I don’t think the Saudis are that inept, they are the foundation of the petro dollar, I think they have options.
Being the foundation of the pertrodollar is no longer what it used to be. It supposedly propped up the USD by investing in Treasuries. But China and Japan EACH have twice as much in Treasuries as the Saudis. The Saudi sun is setting.
Yes they have options, a bullet in the head, or crucifixion by the mob.
Not only that, the Saudis have not yet completely given up on their dream to acquire the S-400. https://www.rt.com/news/439061-saudi-us-s400-sanctions/
The Saudi Royals would buy a rotten fish for 400 billion USD if the US Protection Racketeers demanded it. The Saudi Royals lives literally depend on that :)
Trump was after his furious speech against Saudi regime summoned to Rothschilds lair and get grabbed by nuts and washed his head. Now we can spot 180 degree turn in Trump’s attitude. Well, that deescalated quicky. Who could expect this ? (sarcasm)
You can do it Trump! If you can dream it you can do it! Do it man!
Give Saudi, the MIC deal and the American working class a f.ckfinger……………………………………….LOL.
I mean, really, why would it not be foolish to stop for one man, given you know your sold weapons have killed and will kill thousands? It’s like a serial rapist finding remorse and release from further crimes when they see another engaging in a perverted glance. ‘highly unlikely’, in certain parlance!
Trump will probably use this incident, be it abduction or murder, as a cudgel to force the Saudis to buy an expensive and less efficient defense system from the US instead of the cheaper, better Russian system.
Some interesting things: Adnan Kashoggi (the Famous Weapons-Dealer: Iran-Contra Scandal among others) was the Uncle of Jamal Kashoggi…and a Friend of Trumpster…Mister Trumpster even bought his yacht, the Nabila in the Eighties…
https://www.google.nl/amp/s/www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2018-10-10/jamal-khashoggi-s-shift-from-insider-to-exiled-critic-quicktake
https://fitzinfo.wordpress.com/tag/adnan-khashoggi/
Are the Elites starting to Kill eachother? Because it is starting to look as if Mohammed Bin Salman will be Sacrificed soon…London stole the Saudi Gold… only have to get rid of the Jewish House of SAUD…a Western Organised Coup d’Etat perhaps?
“Obvious assassination”? Shouldn’t we wait for proof first?
but he also told, if the saudis did this act, then will come sanctions.
it;s almost like, if he talks while he is on the move, no one will care what he says ! like he has an excuse or something, to talk absoloute nonsense…. my money ?? my money says we will never find out what happened to ‘ol mate. the media will let it die.
Well, the usa already get what they want to turkey, the pastor that cause sanction on turkey
Well the journalists, for sure fear of disappearing and being torn to pieces one flies to Riadh. Or you say what the ripper prince likes or he sow you in two. Not good.