SOTT
SIGNS
OF THE
TIMES
OF THE
TIMES
Welcome to Sott.net
The World for People who Think
Puppet MastersS
The king of derangement, danger and chaos himself: John McCain
As it happened, the former was apparently another random eruption by of one of America's sicko lone wolves - a wretch in the same league as South Carolina church killer, Dylann Roof. Notwithstanding that the latter had littered the nether regions of the Internet with racist rantings while the former was apparently a prolific Never Trumper left-winger, neither represented a real threat to the nation's equanimity - even if they did bring a savage rain of violence to bear on those unfortunate dozens caught in their immediate line of fire.
Not so for the 325 million American citizens who were pounded upon during the balance of the day by the allegedly "sane" Imperial City officialdom which rules the roost in America.
Specifically, we have in mind Janet Yellen's hideous presser in which she declared "mission accomplished" and that the US economy is blessed with "solid fundamentals" that are getting ever stronger. And in the same vein of unreality, there soon came the Senate's 97-2 vote to smack the Donald in his ample jaws and impose even more sanctions on Russia, thereby bringing the nation another step closer to the brink of war and bankruptcy.
The Japanese Coast Guard identified the commercial ship as a Philippine container vessel, Sputnik news agency reported.
The crash occurred 56 nautical miles southwest of Yokosuka at 2:30am local time, June 17, according to the US Pacific Fleet.
The Japanese public TV channel NHK reported that the USS Fitzgerald,an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer, was rendered "unable to operate" and suffered flooding, Reuters reported.
The US Pacific Fleet said that "The extent of damage is being determined. The extent of personnel injuries is being determined. The incident will be investigated."
© Kyodo / Reuters
In total, seven US sailors were declared missing in the incident and three more were injured, including the commander of the ship, Bryce Benson.
The search for the seven missing sailors has ended, but the number of bodies found has not been confirmed as of yet, according to a US Navy commander cited by AP.
The strategy appears to be working. The Russian Embassy in Washington confirms that for the first time since the Russian Federation's founding the State Department did not send pro forma national day greetings. Perhaps the bureaucrats were afraid they would be tainted and themselves become targets of multiple investigations into "collusion" with the Kremlin. (Luckily, this intrepid Washington analyst has no qualms about such associations.)
© Samiullah Peiwand / Reuters Afghan security forces inspect the aftermath of a suicide bomb blast in Paktia Province, Afghanistan June 18, 2017.
A suicide attacker detonated a car packed with explosives at the entrance of the police compound in the city of Gardez, the capital of Paktia province, said Najib Danish, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, as cited by Reuters. The attacker opened the way for other insurgents to penetrate the headquarters' territory.
Two police officers were killed and five wounded during the attack, Reuters reports, citing Danish. The news agency cites local hospitals as saying that five policemen are dead and least 30 people injured, including 20 civilians.
© Romeo Ranoco / Reuters
"The fighting is going on, but it's winding up," Duterte told soldiers of the 4th Infantry Division Command Post in Butuan City on Saturday. According to official government figures 225 militants, 59 soldiers and 26 civilians have been killed in the siege so far.
"It's difficult to fight those who are willing to die. They have corrupted the name of God in the form of religion to kill many innocent people, for nothing."
But is this just for starters? If Trump stays in power for the duration of his term, is there a major war, or even multiple wars, on the horizon? Judging by the rhetoric and actions already taken by the Trump administration, it will be a miracle if the US does not start a major war in the near future. Coincidentally, the main countries in the sights of the Trump administration just happen to be the three countries that the neoconservatives pinpointed for regime change 17 years ago, but have not yet been dealt with.
1997 marked the birth of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), a neoconservative think tank of catastrophic proportions. It was founded by William Kristol, the longtime editor of the Weekly Standard, who also served as the chief of staff to Vice President Dan Quayle, and Robert Kagan, a former State Department official who is now a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institute. A long list of neocons belonged to the group, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz.
Comment: At worst, Trump has seemingly succumbed to the neocon-aligned military-industrial-complex agenda that seeks war, war, and more war. At best, Trump is secretly holding to his stated conviction that these US-inspired wars have to stop, and he's now scrambling to figure out a strategy to accomplish this without losing his head.
Russian President Putin received a report from Russian Defense Minister Shoigu yesterday during a meeting of Russia's Security Council concerning the claims that a Russian air strike might have killed the ISIS leader Ibrahim Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi.
The report of the meeting on the Kremlin's website is careful not to repeat this claim or even to mention Al-Baghdadi's name
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu updated the meeting participants on the strike delivered by the Russian Aerospace Forces near Raqqa in Syria, in which a large group of terrorists, possibly including some ISIS leaders, have been killed.
© Sputnik/ Aleksey Nikolskyi
Helmut Kohl, who served as the Federal Republic of Germany's chancellor between 1982 and 1998, passed away on Friday. He died in his house in western German city of Ludwigshafen.
"I have known him since the beginning of the 1990s. I was there when he was speaking with the then-mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak. He invited him to his residence — the German government was then in Bonn. We met several times and our first conversation made a very strong impression on me, a very strong one," Putin told journalists.
Comment: Update: Missing sailors found dead in damaged US destroyer following collision near Japan - Navy