Puppet MastersS


Take 2

Killary's constant Putin-blaming, an absurd American national catastrophe

Putin popcorn
© twitter"It's a bit like watching a really bad movie, lots of popcorn seems to help!"
Did you think that the American election campaign had already reached the bottom? Nope! There are chances that more surprises lie ahead of us, but some instances that took place over the past few days will go down in history no matter what.

It's not every day that senators blame the director of the FBI for working for Putin, right? After FBI Director James Comey informed Congress that the FBI had resumed its investigation concerning Hillary Clinton's storage of secret documents on a private server, he was immediately blamed for being a "Russian agent." This is an unprecedented charge, but that's not all.

Hillary Clinton called on the FBI director to immediately make publicly available the FBI's evidence of ties between Russia and Donald Trump. By saying so, she meant that the FBI leadership has this evidence, but doesn't want to present it to the American electorate.


Comment: One of those suggestive ploys to lead folks to faulty conclusions without any facts. There are none.


For a moment, let's believe Hillary Clinton and the Democratic senators who are hinting that Putin has a whole network of agents in the American business community and security agencies. Look what a lovely agent Russian intelligence has won over in the FBI director!

James Comey is a Republican, the former deputy attorney general of the United States, and the vice president of Lockheed Martin, a corporation that deals in developing top-secret weapons for the Pentagon. Comey is also a member of the board of directors of NSBC Bank and the director of the FBI personally appointed by Barack Obama. If Russian intelligence really managed to recruit such an American official, then the US has much more serious problems than interference in election campaigns.

Comment: Attention! Curtain call for all Americans: You can be 'an extra' in the unending and stomach-turning saga: "The Empire Strikes Out" Coming November 8th to a polling place near you. All felons, convicts, dead people, and deplorables welcome.


Bad Guys

Alleged US airstrikes to support ground op in Afghanistan kill scores of Kunduz villagers (GRAPHIC)

Kunduz airstrike US
© Bashir Khan Safi / Agence France PresseAn Afghan man carries the dead body of a child following a NATO coalition airstrike on the outskirts of Kunduz on November 3, 2016.
Scores of civilians, including children, have reportedly been killed in US airstrikes supporting a ground operation in Kunduz, Afghanistan, officials and media report. NATO forces in Afghanistan said the airstrikes were "to defend friendly forces under fire."

Earlier on Thursday, United States Forces Afghanistan released a statement, saying that two US servicemen had died "as a result of wounds sustained during operations" in Kunduz.

"The service members came under fire during a train, advise and assist mission with our Afghan partners to clear a Taliban position and disrupt the group's operations in Kunduz district," the statement said.

Resolute Support, a NATO-led training mission in Afghanistan, tweeted that the airstrikes in Kunduz had been carried out to defend "friendly forces under fire."

Brigadier General Charles Cleveland, a spokesman for the United States military in Afghanistan, said that he couldn't say whether the civilian deaths near Kunduz and the attack on US soldiers were related, but noted that the deceased American servicemen had been as advisers to an Afghan military operation.

"We have no evidence at this point of any civilian casualties, but we take all allegations very seriously," he said, as cited by the New York Times. "Although this was an Afghan operation advised by US forces, US aircraft were used to defend all of the friendly forces."

Comment: Regarding the two US soldiers:

RT
Two US soldiers have been killed and two were wounded in action during a raid on Taliban positions in the northern Afghan province of Kunduz, the commander of the American task force in Afghanistan said in a statement.

The US troops came under fire while conducting a joint operation with Afghan forces to clear a Taliban position and disrupt the group's operations in the Kunduz district, General John W. Nicholson, commander of US Forces in Afghanistan (USFOR-A), said on Thursday.

No other details regarding the operation were immediately available. The Pentagon has withheld the names of the soldiers due to "pending next-of-kin notification," but said additional information would be released later.
[...]

The fall of Kunduz in 2015 has been one of the most serious defeats to the Western-backed Kabul government since the withdrawal of most NATO troops in 2014.

In August, Stratfor, a US-based private intelligence agency, said in a report that Taliban fighters are now operating in more Afghan territories than prior to the 2001 US invasion. They have made those territorial gains despite the efforts of the Western-trained Afghan army and US troops to push forward in other provinces.



Bomb

Saudi ambassador on Yemen cluster bomb question: 'It's like asking,"Will you stop beating your wife?"'

Al-Saud
© www.mofa.gov.saAmbassador to the US, Prince Abdullah Al-Saud
The Saudi ambassador to the US has dodged a journalist's question on the use of cluster bombs in Yemen, saying it's like asking, "Will you stop beating your wife?" He also said the Saudi-led coalition will continue bombing Yemen, "no matter what." Prince Abdullah Al-Saud, Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States, was confronted by a reporter from the Intercept, the publication said on Tuesday.

"Will you continue to use cluster weapons in Yemen?" the reporter asked the diplomat. Al-Saud laughed before answering: "This is like the question, 'Will you stop beating your wife?'" After the reporter repeated the question, the ambassador again dismissed it, saying "You are political operators. I'm not a politician."

Speaking at the Annual Arab-US Policymakers Conference last week, al-Saud insisted that the Saudi-led coalition will continue its bombing campaign in Yemen, the Intercept reported. "If anyone attacks human lives and disturbs the border, in whatever region, we're going to continue hitting them, no matter what," said al-Saud.


Comment: The perfect solution. By this standard, are they going to bomb themselves as well?



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Footprints

King of Paranoia: Netanyahu claims a US-led conspiracy to boot him from office

Netanyahu
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu allegedly told a reporter via phone on the day of parliamentary elections that there was a US-led conspiracy to remove him from power by means of "super-software" to locate voters, Haaretz reported. According to the paper, Netanyahu spoke with "a senior Israeli journalist" on Election Day, March 17, 2015.

"I want to tell you that what's happening today is election stealing," the PM reportedly told the journalist on the phone. "Nothing like this has ever happened in any democracy anywhere. Because you're in the press, you didn't report on this scandal here. I'm about to lose the election," he added.

The reporter allegedly tried to assure Netanyahu that he was going to remain prime minister after the election, but Netanyahu replied: "I'm not. The V15 movement [opposition group], backed by the American administration, brought software programs here... You know what I'm talking about. I don't want to elaborate over the phone, OK? Super-software that locates voters," he said, according to Haaretz. "I want you to know that this is what happened," the PM added.

Before hanging up, Netanyahu blasted the journalist and the whole Israeli media for turning its back on him. "You won't touch it. You aren't handling [the story.] That's why I'm going to lose the election," the PM reportedly claimed. Haaretz noted that the reporter sensed "paranoia" in the Israeli leader's words about a Washington-led conspiracy against him.

Comment: He's a dangerous and vindictive spoiled brat.


Bomb

RT news crew under fire as Aleppo militants launch new assault

RT under fire
© Show AllRT crew evacuates archway as bomb goes off close by.
RT's Murad Gazdiev and his crew came under fire in Aleppo as militant groups holding the eastern part of the city launched a new assault on government-held western areas, trying to break the blockade, after rejecting an offer to leave the city with their arms. The neighborhood "has been relatively quiet for the past two days and we wanted to see what was happening there," RT's Gazdiev reported from Aleppo. "There are still dozens of civilians there, not everyone managed to leave."

The rebels apparently launched a major new offensive against the government-held part of the city, radio communications intercepted by the Syrian military indicate.

"There were apparently two or three suicide car bombs blown up very close to us. We hid. We saw many shells landing meters away from us," Gazdiev said. The Syrian Army helped the RT crew along with civilians being evacuated from the area.


Comment: See also:


Red Flag

Guantanamo Bay study reveals US' gross miscarriages of justice to warrant detentions

Guantanamo prisoner
© Khaama Press (KP)Afghan prisoner, Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp
A study by Afghan-based research group came to troubling conclusions regarding the US government's handling of Guantanamo Bay, finding it used bad intelligence and rigged its own legal system to justify detentions, thus prolonging the Afghan war.

The author of the study by the Afghan Analysts Network says systemic ignorance of reality by both intelligence and military, as well as attempts to justify the War on Terror by any means necessary, have created a mechanism that only prolonged the conflict - America's longest in history - and strengthened the Taliban insurgency.

Author Kate Clark delves deep into the case of eight remaining Afghans at Guantanamo. Their varying stories are used as case studies for how badly things can go wrong if bad intelligence is being upheld by a rigged justice system. The eight are the longest-serving inmates, all of whom are either still at Guantanamo, or have been transferred to UAE facilities. Of the eight, six were captured in the early days of groundless arbitrary detentions. The report, based on a wealth of documents and testimony, found that the "in none of the eight cases" has the US military "been able to substantiate its accusations." Moreover, the special boards set up to ensure only enemy combatants were detained, failed in the basic task of clearing out "obvious, multiple mistakes" from detainee files - something that all but ensured wrongful detention.

And finally, it was found that the faltering justice mechanism was unwilling to stand up to the executive: "they have failed to question what the government has asserted or protect individuals from the arbitrary power of the state," Clark writes. "Reading through the United States military and court documents outlining the allegations and evidence against these eight men, one enters a Kafkaesque world of strange, vague accusations, rife with hearsay, secret evidence, bad translations, gross errors of fact and testimony obtained under duress and torture," she recounts.

Comment: Independent validation of the Guantanamo Bay travesty, the frightening state of US illegal power to ignore, abuse and fabricate its justifications, has managed to continue without proper examination, rectification or prosecution for those who should be held responsible. Shame on the US and shame on its justice system. The ends do not justify the means.


Jet5

Squeeze play: US aircraft to block ISIL militants' escape from Mosul

Fleeing Mosul
© CNN.com
The U.S.-led coalition has developed plans to target Islamic State militants from the air if they attempt to escape the Iraqi city of Mosul and head west toward Syria, as Iraqi ground forces close in on the city from several sides, a top U.S. general said Monday. "This is all about getting after (the Islamic State) and setting up an opportunity where, should they try to escape, we have a built-in mechanism to kill them as they are departing," said Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Harrigian, commander of U.S. air forces in the Middle East.

Blocking militants from escaping has been a key challenge as U.S.-backed Iraqi and Syrian ground forces have retaken towns and cities from the Islamic State. Hundreds of militants have managed to slip away.

The Pentagon has acknowledged there is no simple solution to prevent militants from grabbing civilian hostages or simply escaping in small numbers. But the coalition is beefing up surveillance, and Iraq's government is encouraging civilians to stay put and avoid trying to flee, lessening the likelihood they will be grabbed as human shields.

Islamic State fighters have typically attempted to inflict heavy casualties on Iraqi and Syrian opposition forces before abandoning their positions and escaping.

In the Mosul campaign, Harrigian said military planners are focused on the western approaches of the city, which are not as well defended as the other sides. He spoke to USA TODAY in a telephone interview from his headquarters in Qatar. "We're very much focused there," Harrigian said of the western routes. "Should they come out that direction, we're prepared to get after them."

The western approaches are not completely open. Shiite militias are moving into positions there and have said they will drive the Islamic State from Tal Afar, a town west of Mosul on the road to Raqqa, Syria, the de facto capital for the militant group. The militias could act as a screening force to capture the Islamic State fighters if they attempt to head toward Raqqa.


Jet5

Russian MoD: Russia, US defense officials discuss flight safety measures in Syria

A Russian Su-30 fighter aircraft takes off from the Hmeimim airbase in Syria
© Maksim Blinov / SputnikA Russian Su-30 fighter aircraft takes off from the Hmeimim airbase in Syria
US and Russian defense officials have discussed additional flight safety measures in Syria during a video conference, the Russian Defense Ministry's press service told Russian media.

A video conference between top US and Russian defense officials was held at "the US's initiative" and was focused on the "implementation of the October 2015 ... flight safety memorandum," a statement by the Russian Defense Ministry's press service says, as cited by TASS.

Heart - Black

Israeli bill proposes stripping EU diplomats of immunity for helping Palestinians build homes in West Bank

west bank settlement
© Ammar Awad / ReutersA view of the West Bank Jewish settlement of Maale Adumim is seen near Jerusalem
European Union diplomats should be stripped of immunity for supporting the construction of houses for Palestinians in the disputed West Bank, according to new legislation proposed by a member of the Israeli Parliament.

The bill was presented on Wednesday by Oded Forer, a member of the Knesset (Israeli Parliament) for Yisrael Beiteinu, a right-wing nationalist party.

The proposed legislation says EU diplomats should be stripped of immunity if they help Palestinians build homes illegally in Area C of the West Bank. It is not yet clear what the measure would actually mean for EU diplomats, however.

Area C is an administrative division in the West Bank that comprises about 60 percent of its territory. According to information from the Israeli media, it was home to some 150,000-300,000 Palestinians and 380,000 Israelis in 2015. It is this area where the Jewish settlements, which are illegal under international law, are located.

The European Union doesn't recognize the legality of Israel's settlements in the West Bank and helps build shelters for Palestinians there. Such houses are easily recognized, as they are all labeled with the EU flag.

Powertool

Russia just received the tools to neutralize NATO reconnaissance planes in Syria

Boeing E-3 Sentry AWACS
© Flickr/ Archangel12Boeing E-3 Sentry AWACS
Last week, NATO announced that it had begun tracking the movement of Russian military aircraft operating in Syria using AWACS reconnaissance planes operating from Turkish bases. But as luck would have it, Russia has just received all the tools it needs to neutralize the alliance's snooping.

In late September, NATO announced that a fleet of 16 Airborne Early Warning and Control Systems (AWACS) aircraft would be sent to Turkey, ostensibly to help the alliance's ongoing efforts against the Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) terrorists. A month later, the alliance confirmed that the aircraft had been deployed, and that they started their surveillance of Syrian airspace beginning October 20.