Puppet MastersS


Take 2

Journalist investigates the CIA's involvement in shaping popular culture via the entertainment industry


Sputnik
Sat, 09 Apr 2016 16:08 UTC
argo scene
© imdb.com
The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has a finger in every pie including... the entertainment business: it turns out that the CIA has played a role in producing at least 22 entertainment projects; investigative journalist Adam Johnson argues that by doing this the US intelligence agency puts American media workers at risk.

It seems that the US Central Intelligence Agency follows the theory that says that there are no little or insignificant things. The intelligence agency has long been keeping an eye on the Western entertainment industry and has even had a role in producing popular fiction movies and documentaries.

In his article for Fair.org media watchdog investigative journalist Adam Johnson argues that this type of collaboration may cast a shadow over the image of US media workers and even put them at risk.

"For years, artists from across the entertainment industry — actors, authors, directors, producers, screenwriters, and others — have been in touch with the CIA to gain a better understanding of our intelligence mission," the CIA public website reads.
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Light Sabers

Strained US-Turkey relations may lead to Ankara closing Incirlik airbase


Sputnik
Sun, 10 Apr 2016 16:01 UTC
Incirlik base
© Flickr/ U.S. Department of Defense
Washington's unwillingness to take actions toward the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), designated as a terrorist group by Turkey, may result in Ankara closing the Incirlik airbase to the US, an adviser to the Turkish president said.

The news came amid deepening tensions between Washington and Ankara over US support for Kurdish forces fighting in Syria.

In late-March, US President Obama rejected Recep Tayyip Erdogan's request to participate in a joint event during a nuclear summit in Washington. The move to close the Icirlik base would have a number of consequences for the Turkish government, an article in the Turkish newspaper Yeni Cag read.

Turkey has long emphasized the fact that the PYD is a Syrian branch of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). The PKK is designated as a terrorist group by a number of international organizations and countries, including the US.

However, that does not prevent Washington from supporting Kurdish PYD fighters in their fight against Daesh in Syria.
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Chess

Trains to counter terrorism: Why China is investing in Afghanistan

Caleb Maupin
New Eastern Outlook
Mon, 11 Apr 2016 00:00 UTC
afghanistan
Recent developments around the world concerning the seemingly unrelated topics of railways, heroin production, and international terrorism point toward emerging realities about the global economy.

On April 4, 2016, the 48th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., an Amtrak Train derailed in western Pennsylvania. Two Amtrak workers were killed. Accidents on Amtrak and other systems of United States public transportation are becoming much more common. Just a few weeks before, the DC Metro, the second-largest subway system in the country, closed down for an entire day for urgent safety repairs. In January, someone died when a DC metro station filled up with smoke.

Every day, Amtrak train passengers in the United States are transported over a 106-year-old bridge in Hackensack, New Jersey. It's widely acknowledged that the decaying railway bridge needs to be repaired, but the funds simply cannot be put together. The plan to replace the bridge was abandoned in 2014 when the funds raised for the project came up $900 million short.

As the US public transportation system decays, it is still highly useful to individuals who support themselves with a certain illicit profession — narcotics trafficking. According to City Lab, train and bus stops are the ideal spot for those transporting cocaine, crystal meth, or the drug which is causing an epidemic throughout the United States: heroin.

Comment:

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Snakes in Suits

CIA director says he would refuse to waterboard detainees even if ordered by the president


RT
Mon, 11 Apr 2016 15:23 UTC
John Brennan
© Kevin Lamarque / ReutersCIA Director John Brennan
Director of the CIA John Brennan, in a candid interview, has pledged never to bring back waterboarding - the practice classified in 2009 as torture - even if the future US president ordered it.

The practice has received condemnation ever since the release of the long-awaited CIA memo on torture, which revealed waterboarding to be in widespread use in the US War on Terror during the Bush Jr. administration. Presidential candidates have all been weighing in with their stances on it to appeal to their constituency (with the Republicans predictably being in favor).

But in an upcoming interview to be broadcast on NBC Monday night in the US, Brennan appears resolute.

"I will not agree to carry out some of these tactics and techniques I've heard bandied about because this institution needs to endure," he says.

Comment: Luckily for Mr. Brennan, the CIA has a multitude of torture techniques at their disposal so as to allow him to keep his word on waterboarding.

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Bad Guys

Daesh made $200mln from selling ancient Palmyra relics


Sputnik
Tue, 12 Apr 2016 15:17 UTC
ancient Palmyra
© Sputnik/ Mikhail Voskresensky
Militants from the Daesh terrorist group have made around $200 million from selling unique Palmyra relics.

Daesh (Islamic State/ISIL) extremists didn't just demolish the World Heritage site, the city of Palmyra that they seized last year, they had been successfully trading the city's unique relics while in control of the territory.

The terrorist group has garnered around $200 million, Fox News reported citing Russian investigators.

The archeological wonder with 2,000-year-old ruins, located amid the Syrian desert, was eviscerated by Daesh terrorists last year.
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MIB

Now it's getting juicy: CIA used Mossack Fonseca to hide its activities


RT
Tue, 12 Apr 2016 15:08 UTC
mossack fonseca
© Rodrigo Arangua / AFP
Intelligence agencies from several countries, including CIA intermediaries, have abundantly used the services of Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca to "conceal" their activities, German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) says, citing leaked documents.

Both "secret agents and their informants have used the company's services," wrote the newspaper, which earlier this month published online materials based on 11.5 million documents from the Panamanian law firm. It has been called the largest leak on corruption in journalistic history.

"Agents have set up shell companies to conceal their activities," the Munich-based newspaper reported, adding that there are CIA mediators among them.

Comment: Don't miss our discussions on the Panama Papers:

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Megaphone

Swedish media and government lying about Russian threat to force public to accept bid for NATO membership


Sputnik
Sun, 10 Apr 2016 14:54 UTC
NATO HQ
© REUTERS/ Francois Lenoir
Both the mainstream Swedish media and politicians have spread lies about Russian aggression in order to force the Swedish public to accept their bid for NATO membership, journalist Olle Ljunbeck wrote for the Swedish newspaper Gefle Dagblad.

Anti-Russian rhetoric in Sweden has become more aggressive and less believable.

"Members of the Swedish government, parliamentarians and representatives of national security and defense agencies allow themselves any lies about Russia and Putin" to scare the Swedish public and force them to accept the country's NATO membership, the newspaper said.

These accusations against Russia are outright lies and those who spread them are deceiving the public, Ljunbeck said.

For example, two years ago the government in Stockholm accused Russia of sending its submarine to the Swedish waters to spy on them. Sweden mobilized all of its intelligence services trying to find the Russian submarine, but all of their attempts were in vain, as of course there were no submarine nor any traces of it being anywhere near Stockholm.
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Cross

2 Russian helicopter pilots crash and die in Homs, Syria


RT
Tue, 12 Apr 2016 14:32 UTC
mi-28n helicopter
© Ivan Rudnev / Sputnik

Comment: This brings the number of Russian soldiers who have died in Syria since October of last year to eight. Better news: Russian engineers have cleared over 180 hectares of land in and around Palmyra - defusing just under 3000 explosives. The number of towns who have signed on to the truce has reached 61 (armed groups remains 47).

Meanwhile, some 9,500 militants are present around Aleppo to prevent its liberation by the Syrian Army. More arrive daily. And in Latakia, Turkish Armed Forces shelled Syrian troops in Latakia province. Turkey itself suffered another car bomb; this one at a military residence in Hani, Diyarbakir. One serviceman was killed, 47 people injured. Turkey placed the blame on the PKK.


A Mil Mi-28N Night Hunter attack helicopter has crashed in Syria while performing a flight near the city of Homs, the Defense Ministry's press-service reports. The ministry says the helicopter was not shot down.

"On April 12 at 01:29 msk a helicopter of Russian Air Force helicopter was involved in an accident, and two crewmen have died," the ministry said.

Reports from the crash site indicate the helicopter didn't come under fire, the press service added.

A rescue operation recovered the pilots' bodies and took them to the Khmemim airbase.
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Clipboard

Brutal, ugly and illegal: Essential facts about Israel's occupation of Palestine

David Palumbo-LIiu
Salon
Mon, 11 Apr 2016 08:00 UTC
Israeli flags

The Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement is gaining new ground by the day. Here's why

As this story goes to press, the American Anthropological Association is voting on an academic boycott resolution in solidarity with the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. If it passes the resolution, it will become the largest academic association in the world to do so, joining dozens of professional academic organizations, unions, and student unions in the United States and Europe. The AAA boycott resolution has now also just received an endorsement from twenty-two Israeli anthropologists, whose letter reads in part:
"We agree that we have reached a crisis point, where under certain international conditions, another mass expulsion of Palestinians could occur—or worse... We believe it is possible to take a positive stand against this reality. The Palestinian call for BDS is at its core an anti-colonial, non-violent form of international protest against an enormously violent occupation."
The Occupation is at the forefront of the U.S. political scene as well, even when politicians dance around the issue. Recently, four candidates for president, including Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, made it a point to voice their ardent support for Israel at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) convention. The title of an article in Haaretz says it all: "The Candidates at AIPAC: Pandering by Numbers: Clinton or Trump? What does it matter? The AIPAC conference was Benjamin Netanyahu's victory lap." The article summarizes the sorry spectacle thusly:
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Георгиевская ленточка

Iran receives first delivery of Russian S-300 air defense system


RT
Tue, 12 Apr 2016 14:22 UTC
s-300 missile system
© Valeriy Melnikov / Sputnik
The first delivery of the Russian S-300 surface-to-air missile system has arrived in Iran, the country's Foreign Ministry has announced.

"We had already announced that despite several changes in the time of delivery, the deal is on its path of implementation and today I should announce that the first part of this equipment has arrived in Iran and delivery of other parts will continue," Foreign Ministry spokesman Jaberi Ansari told journalists, Mehr news agency reported.

He said the delivery came through the Caspian Sea, which both Iran and Russia border.

Russia's sale of S-300 missiles to Iran has a bumpy history. The deal was first signed in 2007, but was suspended by Russia under pressure from the US and Israel. Moscow said the delivery would destabilize regional security at a time when Tehran was accused of having a clandestine nuclear weapons program.

The contract was revived last year after Iran and six leading world powers signed a nuclear deal, which addressed concerns over a potential nuclear breakout by Tehran.

The S-300 system now being delivered by Russia is the result of a new deal signed with Iran in November, and is an upgraded version of the one that Tehran initially purchased. The delivery is expected to be complete by mid-2016.
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