Puppet MastersS


Chess

The Rimland Imperative: How the Deep State plans to counter Russia, China and Iran

Christoph Germann
Newsbud
Fri, 29 Dec 2017 20:44 UTC
trump deep state
© WhoWhatWhy / Gage Skidmore / Flickr / US Government
Since his appointment as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, Aaron Wess Mitchell has mostly stayed out of the spotlight but his geopolitical views are already having a profound impact on U.S. foreign policy, as illustrated by the Trump administration's newly released National Security Strategy and the decision to provide lethal weapons to Ukraine.

One week before U.S. President Trump unveiled the 2017 National Security Strategy (NSS), his National Security Advisor Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster gave a preview of the strategy at an event hosted by the British think tank Policy Exchange in Washington.

McMaster disclosed that the Trump administration views Russia and China as "revisionist powers" which "are undermining the international order and stability" and "ignoring the sovereign rights of their neighbors and the rule of law."

"Geopolitics are back, and back with a vengeance, after this holiday from history we took in the so-called post-Cold War period," McMaster emphasized.[1]
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Rocket

The N. Korea nuclear missile crisis was created by Cheney and his cronies

Gareth Porter
Truthout
Thu, 28 Dec 2017 00:00 UTC
the dick
© Getty Images/KJNFormer VP Dick Cheney
The Trump administration has been telling people for months that the crisis with North Korea is the result of North Korea's relentless pursuit of a nuclear threat to the US homeland and past North Korean cheating on diplomatic agreements. However, North Korea reached agreements with both the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations that could have averted that threat, had they been completed.

Instead, a group of Bush administration officials led by then-Vice President Dick Cheney sabotaged both agreements, and Pyongyang went on to make rapid strides on both nuclear and missile development, leading ultimately to the successful late November 2017 North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test.

The record shows, moreover, that Cheney and his allies derailed diplomatic efforts to curb North Korean nuclear and missile development, not because they opposed "arms control" (after all, the agreements that were negotiated would have limited only North Korean arms), but because those agreements would have been a political obstacle to fielding the group's main interest: funding and fielding a national missile defense system as quickly as possible. The story of Cheney's maneuvering to kill two agreements shows how a real US national security interest was sacrificed to a massive military boondoggle that served only the interests of the powerful contractors behind it.
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Arrow Up

Creating the next empire

Jeff Thomas
International Man
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 17:41 UTC
Dragonbeareagle
© Kopiya
Throughout history, political, financial, and military leaders have sought to create empires. Westerners often think of ancient Rome as the first empire. Later, other empires formed for a time. Spain became an empire, courtesy of its Armada, its conquest of the New World, and the gold and silver extracted from the West. Great Britain owned the 19th century but lost its empire due largely to costly wars. The US took over in the 20th century and, like Rome, rose as a republic, with minimal central control, but is now crumbling under its own governmental weight.

Invariably, the last people to understand the collapse of an empire are those who live within it. As a British subject, I remember my younger years, when, even though the British Empire was well and truly over, many of my fellow Brits were still behaving in a pompous manner as though British "superiority" still existed. Not so, today. (You can only pretend for so long.)

But this does suggest that those who live within the present empire - the US - will be the last to truly understand that the game is all but over. Americans seem to be hopeful that the dramatic decline is a temporary setback from which they will rebound.

Not likely. Historically, once an empire has been shot from its perch, it's replaced by a rising power - one that's more productive and more forward thinking in every way. Yet the US is hanging on tenaciously, and like any dying empire, its leaders are becoming increasingly ruthless, both at home and abroad, hoping to keep up appearances.

Comment: Move with the times and join the party or be left sitting alone on the curb. Not many will care and even fewer will look back to notice.

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Propaganda

WikiLeaks proof of NYT colluding with Clinton State Dept to deceive Americans

Jay Syrmopoulos
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 04:17 UTC
Cablegate
© Wikileaks/KJN
WikiLeaks has released evidence which shows that New York Times "reporter" Scott Shane handed over Cablegate's secret country-by-country publication schedule to the U.S. government, giving the State Department (then headed by Hillary Clinton) up to a week in advance to spin the revelations or to create diversions.

The collusion between The New York Times - supposedly the United States' newspaper of repute - and the U.S. State Department, reveals a co-opting of corporate media that keeps the public ignorant to government malfeasance and impropriety.
The Times was one of five newspapers that obtained an advance copy of all leaked cables, which began being released on November 28, 2010. WikiLeaks made the specific cables, selected by the newspapers and redacted by their journalists, available on its website.

Comment: Without Wikileaks, the US public would be clueless and unwittingly supporting a paper democracy.

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Star of David

Netanyahu supports Iran regime change, denies Israel is involved in protests


RT
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 15:04 UTC
NetiRouhani
© ReutersNetanyahu • Rouhani
The Israeli PM has advocated regime change in Iran, saying that if the Tehran government collapses, Israelis and Iranians will be "great friends." He then ridiculed Iran's claim that foreign players were behind recent protests.

Benjamin Netanyahu was responding to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, who had earlier suggested that Israel was involved in the recent unrest. In the 90-second-long video Netanyahu praised the protesters who have rallied since Thursday, saying that they "seek freedom and justice."

He then dismissed the accusation that Israel was involved into stirring Iranian protests, calling this "false" and "laughable."


Comment: It would be extremely hard to believe Israel doesn't have its hands dirty, either covertly or instigating from the sidelines.

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Attention

The US' controversial foreign policy statements are sowing confusion worldwide says analyst


Sputnik
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 17:24 UTC
Tillersontrump
© Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Despite Donald Trump's stated desire to mend fences with Russia, relations between the two countries remain tense. In an interview with Radio Sputnik, Thomas Whalen, an associate professor of social science at Boston University, said that the current tensions between the two countries go "well beyond Trump's term in office."

In an op-ed for The New York Times, wrapping up the results of his diplomacy in 2017, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson offered a somewhat rosy picture of what the US has achieved and argued that there is every reason to "be encouraged by the progress" made. Looking at the hard facts, however, it is difficult to avoid the impression that things are not as good as America's top diplomat believes they are.

"I think that [under President Trump] the world has become a much more unstable place as we all fear a possible nuclear war over the Korean peninsula. There have been a series of missteps by several Republican and Democratic administrations going back several decades, but [there hasn't been] any real talk about going to war over it. Now it seems a fifty-fifty possibility," Dr. Whalen said.

Comment: Certainly changes are coming. It is how they are navigated that will determine to what degree the US remains relevant or slides headlong into its 'good night.' Unique times, unique players, new paradigms already set into motion and a need for a US political housecleaning...it's going to get interesting.

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Star of David

Israelis brace for 'Earth-shattering' indictments against Netanyahu

Tyler Durden
Zero Hedge
Wed, 27 Dec 2017 13:40 UTC
Netanya
© Amir Cohen/Reuters
As Israeli police conclude their corruption investigation of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, former advisor to the force, Lior Chorev, says the indictments to follow will be "earth-shattering" and will result in early elections - possibly as soon as May 2018, which would end the political career of the longest-serving Israeli leader since founding father David Ben-Gurion.

Chorev, who resigned last month under pressure from Netanyahu's allies, told The Jerusalem Post "When they [the recommendations] will be announced, they will have information such as the specific charges and a complete list of the people involved," he said, adding "Netanyahu is not running a campaign for his innocence but a campaign to keep the coalition intact. It is a political campaign, not a legal one, and so far he is succeeding. He is keeping his coalition in one piece despite very complicated investigations."

The indictment recommendations will bear "a lot of information that we didn't know - and it will cause an earthquake here."
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No Entry

Iranian protesters do not welcome 'Trump's support', misreads reasons for protests


RT
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 23:09 UTC
Tehran protest
© ReutersProtest in Tehran, Iran
With Iran engulfed by an ongoing wave of mass protests, US President Donald Trump has jumped at the opportunity to say that Iran needs "change." But the US leader is failing to grasp the true nature of protests, analysts told RT.

Just days before the New Year, Trump went on a Twitter spree, demonizing Iran and at the same time calling on the country to "respect the people's rights." He warned that "oppressive regimes" do not "endure forever," adding that the US "is watching very closely for human rights violations" in an apparent attempt to express his support for the protesters.

His comments, which came amid mass protests that have swept the Islamic Republic since December 28, provoked angry reaction in Tehran. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said the US has no moral right to act as if defending the rights of Iranians because Washington itself calls them terrorists.

Rouhani's sentiments are likely to be shared by most Iranians, analysts told RT. They added that everything Trump says now is irrelevant due to his previous statements, as well as Washington's general attitude towards the Islamic Republic.
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Stop

Palestinian politicians slam 'US-enabled' Israeli land grab in the West Bank


RT
Tue, 02 Jan 2018 19:47 UTC
Mahmoud Abbas
© Eduardo Munoz / ReutersPalestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Both rival Palestinian political groups have slammed a non-binding resolution passed by the ruling Israeli Likud party, which calls for the annexation of West Bank territory that the Palestinians see as their future state.

On Sunday, the Likud Central Committee unanimously approved a non-binding resolution to annex Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria in the West Bank. The document also recognized the decades-old Israeli stance on Jerusalem, which calls the city the "eternal capital" of the Jewish state. While it has no legal effect, the symbolic proclamation directly endorses the expansionist policies of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, which are in the spotlight following the US recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital in December.

The advisory resolution, which was widely condemned in Israeli political circles, was also slammed by Hamas and Fatah - the two main Palestinian political parties. Illegal Jewish settlements and the status of Jerusalem are regarded as the main obstacles to a two-state peace process.

Comment: Further reading: Gideon Levy: Trump - Visionary of the single-state solution for Israel-Palestine?

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Mr. Potato

Dumb as rocks: Clinton aide Huma Abedin forwarded state passwords to her Yahoo account - Trump tweets 'Jail!'

Luke Rosiak
The Daily Caller
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 19:07 UTC
Huma Abedin
© John Moore/Getty ImagesHuma Abedin
Huma Abedin forwarded sensitive State Department emails, including passwords to government systems, to her personal Yahoo email account before every single Yahoo account was hacked, a Daily Caller News Foundation analysis of emails released as part of a lawsuit brought by Judicial Watch shows.

Abedin, the top aide to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, used her insecure personal email provider to conduct sensitive work. This guarantees that an account with high-level correspondence in Clinton's State Department was impacted by one or more of a series of breaches - at least one of which was perpetrated by a "state-sponsored actor."

The U.S. later charged Russian intelligence agent Igor Sushchin with hacking 500 million Yahoo email accounts. The initial hack occurred in 2014 and allowed his associates to access accounts into 2015 and 2016 by using forged cookies. Sushchin also worked for the Russian investment bank Renaissance Capital, which paid former President Bill Clinton $500,000 for a June 2010 speech in Moscow.

A separate hack in 2013 compromised three billion accounts across multiple Yahoo properties, and the culprit is still unclear. "All Yahoo user accounts were affected by the August 2013 theft," the company said in a statement.

Abedin, Clinton's deputy chief of staff, regularly forwarded work emails to her personal humamabedin@yahoo.com address. "She would use these accounts if her (State) account was down or if she needed to print an email or document. Abedin further explained that it was difficult to print from the DoS system so she routinely forwarded emails to her non-DoS accounts so she could more easily print," an FBI report says.

Comment: Either Huma Abedin is one of the dumbest women on the planet, or she intended to make that information available to foreign spooks. Either way, there's a solution for this level of criminal negligence:



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