Puppet MastersS


Fire

'Socialism' threatens the West - Argentine leader Milei to Davos crowd


RT
Thu, 18 Jan 2024 02:06 UTC
javier milei davos
© AP / Markus SchreiberPresident of Argentina Javier Milei at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, January 17, 2024.
President Javier Milei has issued a warning at Davos, saying "collectivist experiments" will lead to poverty.

One month on from taking office as Argentina's new president, self-described "anarcho-capitalist" Javier Milei has urged Western leaders to steer clear of the socialist path he claims led his country into an economic crisis and surging poverty.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum on Wednesday in Davos, Switzerland, Milei warned that "the Western world is in danger" because it's tilting toward collectivism. "It is endangered because those who are supposed to defend the values of the West are co-opted by a vision of the world that inexorably leads to socialism, and thereby to poverty," he said.

Comment: That was, undoubtedly, not a popular speech with the Davos crowd. Considering everything the WEF stands for is about hindering free markets and driving towards collectivism, there's no way a renegade capitalist issuing warnings about socialism is going to go over well. And the guys speaks from experience. That's gotta hurt!

See also:

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Russian Flag

Holocaust doesn't give Israel impunity - Lavrov


RT
Thu, 18 Jan 2024 08:31 UTC
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
© Sputnik/Ramil SitdikovRussian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
The Soviet people were also subject to Nazi genocide, but Russia doesn't have carte blanche in the global arena, he says.

Israel should not think that the suffering of Jews during World War II gives it free rein in foreign policy, particularly when it comes to the hostilities in Gaza, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.

Speaking at a press conference on the results of Moscow's diplomacy in 2023 on Thursday, Lavrov reiterated his support for the creation of a Palestinian state. The decades-long failure to do this is one of the key reasons for the current instability in the Middle East and tensions between Palestinians and Israelis, he added.

The foreign minister noted that Russia had immediately condemned the attack on Israel by Hamas on October 7. However, after the hostilities began, some Israeli officials went so far as to call the residents of Gaza "animals" without facing any backlash from the West, he added.
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Megaphone

To end the war in Ukraine, expose its core lie

Ted Snider and Nicolai N. Petro
The Libertarian Institute
Thu, 18 Jan 2024 07:27 UTC
vladimir putin
The essential argument used to avoid negotiation and continue support for the war in Ukraine is based on a falsehood. That falsehood, repeated by President Joe Biden, is that when Vladimir Putin decided to invade, he intended to conquer all of Ukraine and "annihilate" it.

Its falsity has been exposed multiple times by military experts, who have pointed out, both before and after the invasion, that Russia could not have intended to conquer all of Ukraine because it did not invade with sufficient forces to do so. Indeed, this was a key reason why senior Ukrainian officials, and even President Volodymyr Zelensky himself, argued just days before the invasion that it would not occur.

The mistake that most analysts at the time made (these authors included), was to assume that since the troops mobilized by Russia did not suffice for a full scale occupation of Ukraine, no military operation, not even a limited one, was in the offing. It was only later that Western political leaders turned this mistake to their propaganda advantage by insisting that Russia had always intended to first take Kiev, then all of Ukraine, and ultimately even attack NATO.

But if basic military logic is taken into account, the fact that Putin committed only 120,000-190,000 men to his campaign and did not mobilize more resources until months later, after Kiev rejected the Istanbul peace deal, indicates that his objectives in Ukraine were limited and revolved around guaranteeing the security of the populations of Donbass and Crimea from Ukrainian assaults and Russia from NATO expansion. Given that Ukraine had cut off Crimea's water and electricity years before, this required a land bridge to the region; hence, the illegal annexations of the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions.
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Bad Guys

IDF chief says war in Lebanon becoming much more likely

Emanuel Fabian
The Times of Israel
Thu, 18 Jan 2024 21:35 UTC
Herzi Halevi IDF
© Israel Defense ForcesIDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi (center) meets troops during a drill in northern Israel, January 17, 2024. Visiting north, Halevi says lessons from fighting in Gaza will be applied to fight against Hezbollah and its allies, as Hamas rocket barrage from Lebanon targets Rosh Hanikra.
The likelihood that Israel will be drawn into a war in Lebanon is growing, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said Wednesday, hours after Hamas terrorists fired a barrage of rockets at a northern Israel town.

With visiting troops drilling for a simulated offensive inside Lebanon, as the army winds down its most intense stages of fighting in Gaza, Halevi said Israel was "increasing readiness for fighting in Lebanon," as it seeks to stabilize its northern border and allow tens of thousands of Israelis evacuated from the region to return home.


Comment: Indeed, prompting some analysts to speculate that they may have excelled themselves with regards to crimes against humanity, but they made little headway against Hamas: Israel withdraws troop division from Gaza for 'R&R, training', US prepares to send 1,500 troops to Syria, Iraq


The IDF has "a very clear goal in Lebanon — to return the residents to the north, all the communities in the north," Halevi said.

Comment: It's not clear how Israel - even with backup - could take on Hezbollah. Moreover, the West seems to be preparing to split its efforts between the failed proxy war in Ukraine and its new destabilization efforts in the Middle East. All the while the world is increasingly uniting against it.

That said, Israel has proven beyond a doubt that it will commit whatever abominable criminality is necessary to further its nefarious goals:

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Vader

Germany to supply Israel with tanks shells, will 'intervene' in support of genocide at ICJ trial


The Cradle
Wed, 17 Jan 2024 12:00 UTC
germany israel
© JOHN MACDOUGALL/ AFP via GettyBerlin has also announced its intention to 'intervene' on behalf of Israel in the genocide case at the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
German government officials have "fundamentally agreed behind the scenes" to supply Israel with thousands of rounds of 120-millimeter precision ammunition to fuel the war in Gaza, according to a report by Der Spiegel.

Since receiving an Israeli request for the tank shells in November, the Chancellery, the Defense Department, the Foreign Office, and the Ministry of Economic Affairs have been holding talks to fulfill the request.

"German defense companies were not in a position to deliver the requested ammunition in a short period of time, and the ministries have started on a plan to provide this ammunition from the German army's own stocks," the German daily reported on 16 January.

Comment: Germany also intends to play a key role here: NATO set to mobilize 90,000 soldiers for biggest drill since Cold War, rehearsing rapid US deployment near Russia's borders

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Eye 1

EU state's expulsion of elderly Russians a 'security threat' - Putin


RT
Wed, 17 Jan 2024 00:48 UTC
latvia monument
Deportations of ethnic Russians, in many cases elderly retirees, from Latvia and other Baltic states is a serious matter threatening the security of Russia, President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday.

Speaking at a meeting with municipal leaders in Moscow, Putin linked the actions of Baltic states with how the Ukrainian government treated Russian speakers after the US-backed coup in 2014, which triggered the Donbass conflict.

"In 2014 there was also a coup d'etat and the declaration of Russians in Ukraine as a non-titular nation. This was followed by a whole series of other decisions that nullified and actually led to what is now happening in Latvia and in other Baltic republics, when Russian people are simply dumped across the border," Putin said.
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Bad Guys

Best of the Web: NATO set to mobilize 90,000 soldiers for biggest drill since Cold War, rehearsing rapid US deployment near Russia's borders


Reuters
Thu, 18 Jan 2024 17:07 UTC
NATO drill
© REUTERS/Kacper Pempel/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsPolish military vehicles are transported during TUMAK-22 NATO exercises in an area known as the Suwalki Gap, of crucial significance to the security of the alliance's eastern flank, at a polygon in Klusy, Poland November 25, 2022.
NATO is launching its largest exercise since the Cold War, rehearsing how U.S. troops could reinforce European allies in countries bordering Russia and on the alliance's eastern flank if a conflict were to flare up with a "near-peer" adversary.

Some 90,000 troops are due to join the Steadfast Defender 2024 drills that will run through May, the alliance's top commander Chris Cavoli said on Thursday.


Comment: There seems to be a number of converging events in the early part of this year: Google warns advertisers of 'sensitive events' in February


More than 50 ships from aircraft carriers to destroyers will take part, as well as more than 80 fighter jets, helicopters and drones and at least 1,100 combat vehicles including 133 tanks and 533 infantry fighting vehicles, NATO said.

Comment: Coincidentally: And yet the West wants us to believe that it's Russia that's the threat?


Danny Haiphong: Russia is going to march right through Poland and Romania, right to retake Germany. It's going to conquer Europe, and maybe it won't even stop in England.

American economist and professor Michael Hudson: Well, that's just nonsense. The reality is that Russia and China don't need Europe anymore. They don't need the United States.

Danny Haiphong: Just in the last few days, you've had numerous American military magazines and especially European spokesmen saying, if we lose in Ukraine, Russia is going to march right through Poland and Romania, right to retake Germany. It's going to conquer Europe, and maybe it won't even stop in England.

Michael Hudson: Well, that's just nonsense. The reality is that Russia and China don't need Europe anymore. They don't need the United States. Whereas under the Clinton administration, Madeleine Albright says, America is the unique country, it's the necessary country.

The fact is that the rest of the world not only finds America unnecessary, but America and its NATO allies to be the major threat to their own prosperity. So they're essentially splitting into their own world. And the BRICS group is expanding its trade relations, its investment relations, and especially its financial clearing and monetary operations to be independent of the dollar, de dollarizing and certainly independent of the euro, which seems to have no visible means of support right now and going their own way.

Now, that is exactly what has led the United States to push Israel to take, essentially to follow Netanyahu's belligerence. Because the United States says, we realize we're losing power. We know that it's really not a stalemate. We know that we've lost the chance for world dominance. We may be reelected by telling people it doesn't really matter, but we know that it does matter. The last chance we have to assert american power is military, and the main military prize is the Near east.

Now, just as it was after 911 when Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld pressed for an invasion of the Iraq to begin grabing its oil and to essentially create America's foreign legion in the form of the ISIS and al Qaeda Iraq. So now America has two armies that it's using to fight in the Near east. The ISIS, al Qaeda, foreign legion. Arabic speaking foreign legion, and the Israelis. The plan is, and America is willing to fight to the last Israeli, just as it's trying to fight to the last Ukrainian in order to make this final grab of the near east in fighting Iran. This is a crazy idea, but it seems that that's exactly what is being planned.

General Petraeus, who lost the war in Afghanistan, has said, we've got to conquer Iran. That's going to, we can regain all the power that we've lost by attacking Iran. And so now it looks like President Biden is hoping to make a political comeback by saying, well, we may not have blocked Russia and Ukraine, but at least we've conquered the Near East.

'He did not rule out the presence of French intelligence services on Ukrainian territory. Earlier it became known that after the strike by the Russian Armed Forces, many foreigners who spoke French were admitted to Kharkov hospitals.'


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Rocket

Iran demonstrates missile capabilities with regional strikes

Jiyar Gol
BBC Persian
Wed, 17 Jan 2024 09:28 UTC
flags
© NurPhoto/Getty ImagesIRGC's Kheibar Shekan (Castle Buster) ballistic missile to target "terrorist groups" in Syria
With its strikes on Iraqi, Syrian and Pakistani territory, Iran's Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) is showing it has become a major regional military power. The IRGC openly states that US bases in the Middle East, as well as Israeli bases in Tel Aviv and Haifa, are within range of its ballistic missiles. In the space of only 24 hours, it gave a stark demonstration of its capabilities, launching missiles and drones at targets in three different countries.

On Tuesday evening the IRGC attacked two targets inside neighbouring Pakistan, with media close to the force reporting that the strikes destroyed two bases of the militant group Jaish al-Adl in retaliation for the killing of Iranian border guards in recent weeks.

Jaish al-Adl, a Sunni group that says it is fighting for the rights of ethnic Baloch people in south-eastern Iran, said two houses where the families of its members were living were hit. Pakistan called the strikes "completely unacceptable", saying they resulted in the death of two children, and warned of "serious consequences".

There was similar condemnation from Iraq, Iran's western neighbour, after the IRGC launched 11 ballistic missiles at Irbil, the capital of the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region. At least four civilians were killed, according to the regional government, whose Prime Minister Masrour Barzani called the attack a "crime against the Kurdish people".

Comment: Iraq recalls its envoy to Iran after Revolutionary Guard fires projectiles at Israeli 'spy headquarters':
Mounir al-Mustafa, deputy director of the civil defense in northwest Syria, also known as the White Helmets, said one of the strikes in Idlib targeted a medical clinic that was no longer operating in the village of Talteta in northwest Idlib province. Two civilians suffered minor injuries, he said.

Sami al-Qassim, who lives near the targeted site, said the clinic was empty and there were no militant activities in the area. Masrour Barzani, prime minister of the Kurdish region, called for an Iraqi response.
3 guys
© Omar Albam/APAbandoned medical facility presumed hit by Iranian missile • Talteta, Syria • Jan. 16, 2024
"There is no reason for these attacks and there is no excuse," Barzani said during a news conference in Davos, where he was attending the World Economic Forum on Tuesday. "These attacks should not remain without a response."
smoke
© Rudaw TV/APSmoke rises from building hit by a strike in Erbil, Iraq • January 16, 2024
The United States condemned what State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller described as "Iran's reckless missile strikes."

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said in a statement that the strikes in Iraq and Syria were "in line with the resolute defense of the country's sovereignty and security, countering terrorism, and part of the Islamic Republic's punishment against those who threaten the country's security."

He said that Iran in "a precise and targeted operation, identified the headquarters of the criminals and targeted them with accurate and precision-guided projectiles."

A few hundred demonstrators gathered in Erbil on Tuesday to protest the attacks.
White Helmets? Remember they were the outfit that faked human atrocities in Syria with a white powdery substance.

See here:

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Eye 1

Poland deeply involved in Nord Stream terrorist attack

Lucas Leiroz
Strategic Culture Foundation
Sat, 13 Jan 2024 00:00 UTC
Sikorski/gasleak
© Swedish Coast Guard Handout/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images/Źródło/PAP/Wiktor Dąbkowski/KJNRadoslaw Sikorski • A screen grab from Danish Defense shows the gas leak from the exploded Nord Stream pipelines September 30, 2022
Polish participation in the Nord Stream attack may be related to an American geopolitical project for Europe.

It increasingly seems clear that there was Western participation in the terrorist attack that destroyed the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines. As leaked by journalists and anonymous sources, the explosions were certainly caused by a secret American military operation involving Ukrainian proxy agents. Now, it is revealed that Polish authorities acted to prevent an investigation into the crime, which further substantiates the hypothesis of a NATO act - and also clarifies the real reasons for such attack.

The news was reported by the Wall Street Journal. According to the newspaper, Polish agents hid evidence and obstructed the investigation into the explosions. Journalists claim that the Warsaw authorities vetoed cooperation with the investigative team made up of Germany, Sweden and Denmark, and even prevented those suspected of involvement from being detained and interrogated on Polish soil.

Comment: See also:

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HAL9000

Digital kill switches: How tyrannical governments stifle political dissent

John and Nisha Whitehead
The Rutherford Institute
Wed, 17 Jan 2024 00:00 UTC
on/off
© cybernews.com
"No president from either party should have the sole power to shut down or take control of the internet or any other of our communication channels during an emergency."
— Senator Rand Paul
What's to stop the U.S. government from throwing the kill switch and shutting down phone and internet communications in a time of so-called crisis?

After all, it's happening all over the world.

Communications kill switches have become tyrannical tools of domination and oppression to stifle political dissent, shut down resistance, forestall election losses, reinforce military coups, and keep the populace isolated, disconnected and in the dark, literally and figuratively.

As the Guardian reports:
"From Ukraine to Myanmar, government-run internet outages are picking up pace around the world. In 2021, there were 182 shutdowns in 34 countries... Countries across Africa and Asia have turned to shutdowns in a bid to control behaviour, while India, largely in the conflict-ridden region of Jammu and Kashmir, plunged into digital darkness more times than any other last year... Civil unrest in Ethiopia and Kazakhstan has triggered internet shutdowns as governments try to prevent political mobilisation and stop news about military suppression from emerging."
In an internet-connected age, killing the internet is tantamount to bringing everything — communications, commerce, travel, the power grid — to a standstill.

Comment: One day we may experience the button-pressed equivalent of The Presidential Finger...a couple of flickers and the lights go out. T'would be wise to have a candle or two.

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