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Trump's neocon cabal misses the boat on North Korea - not using complete intelligence resources

Wayne Madsen
Intrepid Report
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 19:04 UTC
Kim Jong-un North Korea
© Wong Maye-E/Associated Press Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, watched the military parade from a platform.
Donald Trump's neocon cabal of National Security Adviser General H. R. McMaster and his assistants Dina Powell and Fiona Hill, the latter in charge of the National Security Council's Russia desk, are poor choices to gauge subtle messages coming out of North Korea. McMaster, a student of professional Army pencil sharpener David Petraeus, fails to grasp that there are many more methods to ascertain the policies of a secretive country like North Korea. Beyond technical products, such as imagery and signals intelligence, and neocon drivel from such outfits as the Brookings Institution, Council on Foreign Relations, and the Heritage Foundation, there are ground reports from various defense attachés posted at embassies in Pyongyang and psychological analysis of the North Korean leader.

During the Cold War, the Central Intelligence Agency, State Department, and other federal elements employed "Kremlinologists," who carefully pored over photographs of the Soviet leadership standing atop Lenin's Mausoleum on Red Square. Emphasis was placed on the physical appearances of the Soviet leaders, where they stood on the reviewing stand in relation to the General Secretary of the Communist Party, and whether they were even present at the November 7 parade marking the anniversary of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and the annual May Day parade marking international Communist solidarity. From the photographic data, coupled with human intelligence from Western defense attachés in Moscow, who also attended the parades, intelligence analysts could figure out who was "in" and who was "out," or heading "out," within the Soviet leadership.

The same analysis was applied by the CIA to photographs and intelligence reports from similar military parades marking Communist "red letter dates" on other countries, including the October 1 founding of the People's Republic of China in Beijing, and other celebrations in Pyongyang, Ulan Bator, Mongolia; Hanoi, North Vietnam; Tirana, Albania; and other Communist capitals.
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Arrow Up

International Court of Justice refuses Ukraine's request for 'terrorism' ruling against Russia

Alexander Mercouris
The Duran
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 20:44 UTC
London High Court
London High Court
International Court of Justice refuses to make anti-terrorism ruling against Russia, clearing way for Russia to enforce $3 billion Judgment it obtained against Ukraine in London High Court.

Ukraine has suffered another blow in the web of legal cases in which it is now involved with Russia.

Following the decision of the High Court in London to grant Russia summary Judgment in the case Russia is bringing against Ukraine for repayment of the $3 billion loan Ukraine owes Russia, the International Court of Justice in The Hague has today declined to grant even on a provisional basis the main part of the relief Ukraine was seeking in the case it has brought against Russia.

As I have discussed previously, Ukraine's case in the International Court of Justice was almost certainly brought in order to try to offset the financial effect of the Judgment of the High Court in London. However the case Ukraine brought to the International Court of Justice did not make any claims against Russia based based what have been the most contentious issues between Ukraine and Russia in recent years. The International Court of Justice noted this fact (rather sourly) in the short Judgment it handed down today
The Court is fully aware of the context in which the present case has been brought before it, in particular the fighting taking place in large parts of eastern Ukraine and the destruction, on 17 July 2014, of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 while it was flying over Ukrainian territory en route between Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur, which have claimed a large number of lives. Nevertheless, the case before the Court is limited in scope. In respect of the events in the eastern part of its territory, Ukraine has brought proceedings only under the ICSFT. With regard to the events in Crimea, Ukraine's claim is based solely upon CERD, and the Court is not called upon, as Ukraine expressly recognized, to rule upon any issue other than allegations of racial discrimination made by the latter.
As I have explained previously, the reason Ukraine did not bring any claim to the International Court of Justice in relation to Crimea's secession and subsequent re-unification with Russia is because it knows it would almost certainly lose, as the International Court of Justice has said previously in its Advisory Opinion on Kosovo that such a unilateral act of secession is not contrary to international law.

Comment: See also: Here's why Ukraine is suing Russia in the International Court of Justice

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Light Saber

Really Stupid Vanity Fair suggests Russians are 'hopeless primitives' from a medieval country

Bryan MacDonald
RT
Tue, 18 Apr 2017 16:33 UTC
Young Russian women working
© Robedero/Getty ImagesYoung women are working outside the coffee shop, Moscow, Russia.
Vanity Fair apparently believes Russians are 'hopeless primitives' who rejected the attempts of smart people to 'civilize' them. Specifically folk like Bill Clinton, Boris Yeltsin, and Jeffrey Sachs.

Ignorance is bliss. Don't take my word for it. Just observe really stupid people. Or read Vanity Fair's Russia coverage. Which is much the same thing. So far this year the magazine has plumbed new depths of foolish, doltish and half-baked analysis.

It started in January when it offered us "The Secret Source of Putin's Evil," which was supposedly Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov. The drivel continued with fixations on the "Trump-Russia nightmare" and the "Trump-Russia mess". The focus then switched to "Why Russia Loves Trump" before the same writer came back a few weeks later with "Why Even Russia Is Turning on Trump" when the wind obviously hit his posterior from a different direction.

Now, he's back, and he's going all feudal on Russian rumps. Because Peter Savodnik wants you to know how democracy could have flowered from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok if only locals had heeded Clinton, Yeltsin, and Sachs. Who we are told had "noble intentions." However, the problem was "it was probably too much to ask a basically medieval country to become modern in a decade." So "instead, Russia reverted to its primal self, to Vladimir Putin."
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Bomb

Hold on America, Somalia first!

Michael Krieger
Liberty Blitzkrieg
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 18:39 UTC
The war is waged by each ruling group against its own subjects, and the object of the war is not to make or prevent conquests of territory, but to keep the structure of society intact. The very word 'war', therefore, has become misleading. It would probably be accurate to say that by becoming continuous war has ceased to exist.

- George Orwell, 1984
War is Peace
© George Orwell/1984
Although the U.S. already has special forces operating in Somalia (of course), Mr. "America First," Donald Trump, figured it'd be a swell idea to add some more.

The Independent reports:
U.S. regular troops are returning to Somalia for the first time since 1993 when 18 special forces died fighting militias in Mogadishu, a battle dramatised in the film Black Hawk Down

A US military spokeswoman yesterday(SAT) said several dozen soldiers from the 101st Airborne Division would train and equip Somalia's army to better fight al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda linked extremist group.

She offered no further details.

"For operational security issues, we will not discuss specifics of military efforts nor speculate on potential future activities or operations," she said.
Well of course, why should the American public be clued in regarding the expansion of yet another destructive, endless imperial war.
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Info

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev says US missile strike against Syria gives free rein to Daesh


Sputnik
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 20:18 UTC
US Navy
© AP Photo/ U.S. NavyIn this image provided by the U.S. Navy, the guided-missile destroyer USS Porter (DDG 78) launches a tomahawk missile in the Mediterranean Sea, Friday, April 7, 2017
The US missile strike against Syria gave a free rein to Daesh, Washington is fighting Damascus instead of terrorism, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said on Wednesday.

He noted that the attack was not authorized by the United Nations and was in violation of international law thus being "an act of military aggression".

"We do not know what may happen next. But I know for sure who benefited from this act of aggression — Daesh, because [the attack] gave them [terrorists] a free rein," Medvedev said.

"And what we see is that the new US administration's first step in the Syrian issue was a strike against government troops. This means that this is not a fight against terrorists but a fight against the Syrian leadership. Whether Americans like it or not, but that is a legal political power," he elaborated.

The prime minister said that further escalation of the Syrian conflict may lead to the destruction of the state and partial victory of terrorists.
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Bad Guys

Libya: More War And Reconciliation Among The Tribes

Richard Galustian
Moon of Alabama
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 19:10 UTC
Libyan military
© Goran Tomasevic / Reuters
The West retains it's out of touch Libyan policies when in Luca, Italy last week the G7 'warned and commanded' that the fractious warring Libyan parties 'must' work with the dying UN appointed and recognised Government of National Accord (GNA), situated only in a small naval base in Tripoli and its so called Presidency Council (PC). And further ordered Libyans to work together to fix the economic crisis by recognising that the Central Bank of Libya (CBL) need to only collaborate with the GNA/PC, so out of touch with the real issues on the ground in Libya are the G7 Countries. Their language almost expressed in colonial terms!

Other global interference in Libya continues. Most recently also the GNA and Presidency Council (PC) leader Fayez Serraj was seeing the head, at his HQ in Stuttgart, of the United Stated Africa Command (AFRICOM) General Thomas Waldhauser. I didn't know Stuttgart was in Africa?

Other pronouncements of one kind or another backing the phantom GNA appear almost weekly.

All a waste of time, as UN and EU efforts have proven these past years. As far as Serraj is concerned he is unelected by Libyans but chosen by the foreigners. That's never going to achieve forward progress for Libya's future.

The one year anniversary of the General National Accord (GNA) created by the UN and headed by Serraj was on the 30th March just two weeks ago. But the GNA doesn't function. To compound the GNA's inability to govern, an acute emergency has emerged in the last 7 days revolving around further direct sales by Cyrenaica (East Libya) of oil bypassing Tripoli and the West. If this issue remains unresolved the country may split into two or three pieces. There is now tremendous in-fighting between National Oil Company (NOC) and a variety of diverse interests. The West's reactions to these realities remain puzzling and totally unrealistic to say the least.

Comment: Western powers now compete to carve up Libya for themselves

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Info

Body language expert says Assad is telling truth about Syria chemical weapons while McMasters is lying

Alex Christoforou
The Duran
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:40 UTC
body language graphic
When the body talks, it rarely lies.

We may never really know what happened in Idlib, Syria on April 4th, ever since the United States decided to forgo an investigation and act as judge, jury and executioner with flimsy, if not outright false evidence.

The Duran has done an extensive amount of reporting, thoroughly debunking the entire chemical weapons incident in the Syrian province, most recently summed up in this excellent post.

Today we thought we would provide a different angle to the Assad-ISIS-chemical weapons debate, with video analysis from a body language expert.
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Network

Twitter will move Russian users' personal data to servers in Russia


RT
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:36 UTC
Twitter birds
© Lluis Gene / AFP
The messaging service Twitter has notified the Russian communications regulator it is ready to transfer personal data of Russian users to servers based in the country by summer 2018.

"Twitter has formally confirmed in a letter that it will relocate bases with personal data of Russians to Russia's servers," said the head of Roskomnadzor, Aleksander Zharov.

According to the regulator, the US company is currently identifying what Russian user data must be moved to servers in the country.
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MIB

US intelligence agencies fear rogue insiders more than spies these days

Tim Johnson
McClatchy DC Bureau
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:09 UTC
CIA Director Mike Pompeo
© Pablo Martinez Monsivais / APCIA Director Mike Pompeo
Forget about spies. It's rogue insiders that cause heartburn at U.S. intelligence agencies these days.

Few spy cases have broken in the past decade and a half. In contrast, a proliferation of U.S. intelligence and military insiders have gone rogue and spilled secrets to journalists or WikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy group.

The leaks are as damaging as any major spy case, perhaps more so. And they have underscored the ease of stealing secrets in the modern age, sometimes with a single stroke of a keyboard.
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Star of David

Shameless Israel celebrates 50 years of Palestine occupation and oppression

Jonathan Cook
Jonathan Cook Blog
Wed, 19 Apr 2017 17:16 UTC
israel 50th anniversary
© Carlos Latuff
Israel is to hold lavish celebrations over the coming weeks to mark the 50th anniversary of what it calls the "liberation of Judea, Samaria and the Golan Heights" - or what the rest of us describe as the birth of the occupation.

The centrepiece event will take place in Gush Etzion, south of Jerusalem. The West Bank settlement "bloc" enjoys wide support in Israel, not least because it was established long ago by the supposedly left-wing Labour party, now heading the opposition.

The jubilee is a potent reminder that for Israelis, most of whom have never known a time before the occupation, Israel's rule over the Palestinians seems as irreversible as the laws of nature. But the extravagance of the festivities also underscores the growth over five decades of Israel's self-assurance as an occupier.
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