Puppet MastersS


Arrow Down

Bye bye diplomacy: Ukrainian FM chants 'Putin - f**ker' at vandalized Russian embassy in Kiev

Ukrainian FM Andrey Deshchitsa
© Youtube
In an incident that may be a first in diplomatic history, Kiev's top diplomat publicly 'effed' the head of another state. Foreign Minister Andrey Deshchitsa chanted "Putin's a f**ker" with a cheering crowd that earlier vandalized the Russian embassy.

Deshchitsa arrived at the scene of the heated protest - which involved overturning cars belonging to embassy staff, the desecration of a Russian flag and pelting the building with firecrackers and paint - in an apparent attempt to defuse the crowd.

He confronted some of the protesters - or rather sided with them. Footage of the encounter shows the minister saying he is all for the protest and its goals.

"I would stand up here with you can say, Russia, get out of Ukraine," he said. "Putin's a f**ker, right!"


Pirates

Russian embassy in Kiev attacked: Protesters throw stones, firecrackers, Molotov cocktails - West blocks UN condemnation

Russian embassy in Kiev attacked
© Reuters / Valentyn OgirenkoPro-Ukrainian people overturn a car during a rally in front of the Russian embassy in Kiev June 14, 2014
A few hundred Ukrainian protesters rallying at the Russian embassy in Kiev have overturned several diplomatic cars and piled up tires to block entry into the building. They have also and thrown stones, smoke grenades, eggs, and paint at the premises.

Police stood idly by as the anti-Moscow crowd blockaded the site, expressing its anger over the Russian government's alleged involvement in the Ukrainian crisis.

The protesters have thrown a Molotov cocktail at the embassy, causing a minor fire which has been extinguished. As of midnight local time, the situation had calmed down. However, protesters still remain at the site.


Green Light

Propaganda? U.S. claims Russia sent tanks to separatists in Ukraine

russia satellite photo
© NATOA satellite photograph taken on Wednesday that NATO officials said shows 10 Russian tanks in a staging area on the Russian side of the border with Ukraine. At bottom left, the officials said, are three tanks loaded onto heavy equipment transporters, the primary method of moving tanks over road networks.
The State Department said Friday that Russia had sent tanks and other heavy weapons to separatists in Ukraine, supporting accusations Thursday by the Ukrainian government.

A convoy of three T-64 tanks, several BM-21 multiple rocket launchers and other military vehicles crossed the border near the Ukrainian town of Snizhne, State Department officials said. The Ukrainian Army reported Friday that it had destroyed two of the tanks and several other vehicles in the convoy.

"This is unacceptable," said Marie Harf, the deputy State Department spokeswoman. "A failure by Russia to de-escalate this situation will lead to additional costs."

Comment: The Western media is still parroting the threadbare propaganda line that Russia is at fault for east Ukraine's unwillingness to support a fascist, racist, prostitute government in Kiev. Russia is not engaging in provocation; the West is. Russia is not responsible for the civil war and unrest; the West is. Russia is doing all it can to deal with Western provocation, but her options are running out. Even if Russia IS supplying the independents in SE Ukraine, it's the least they can do. They need all the help they can get to protect themselves from the terrorist government in Kiev. But so far, all we have are "he said, she said" claims and conjecture, along with a provocative but totally inconclusive satellite image. Show us the PROOF.


Dollars

No deal reached in Russia-Ukraine-EU gas talks in Kiev

russian gas
© AFP Photo/Alexander Zobin
Three-party gas talks will continue in Kiev on Sunday morning, after Gazprom and Naftogaz failed to reach a deal on Saturday, Ukrainian Energy Minister Yury Prodan said.

Both sides made their proposals today, but no compromise was found, Prodan told reporters, adding that European Commissioner for Energy Gunter Oettinger advised for talks to resume on Sunday morning.

Before the talks, Gazprom spokesman Sergey Kuprianov told ITAR-TASS: "We are prepared to seek compromise, but pressuring us is useless. Our stance on the accumulated load of problems has been voiced many times."

The meeting in the Ukrainian capital was attended by representatives from the European Commission, which is trying to mediate the gas negotiations.

The previous round of talks over the price of Russian gas for Ukraine failed to reach a solution to the standing Ukrainian $1.95 billion gas debt. Ukraine have not been paying for most of the gas supplied by Russia this year and demands that the contract on the deliveries be amended.

Comment: We won't know until Monday, but at present it's looking like Ukraine is either being willfully stubborn, to their own detriment, or simply following orders. Russia is making reasonable demands, and even willing to compromise, but Kiev is shooting itself in the collective foot.


War Whore

Washington's Iraq "Victory"

isis3feb
A Tree Is Known by Its Fruit: USA's legacy in Iraq
The citizens of the United States still do not know why their government destroyed Iraq. "National Security" will prevent them from ever knowing. "National Security" is the cloak behind which hides the crimes of the US government.

George Herbert Walker Bush, a former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency who became President courtesy of being picked as Ronald Reagan's Vice President, was the last restrained US President. When Bush the First attacked Iraq it was a limited operation, the goal of which was to evict Saddam Hussein from his annexation of Kuwait.

Kuwait was once a part of Iraq, but a Western colonial power created new political boundaries, as the Soviet Communist Party did in Ukraine. Kuwait emerged from Iraq as a small, independent oil kingdom.

Radar

Deja vu? US warship, 50 fighter jets ready in Persian Gulf as Iraq crisis escalating

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© Press TV

The Pentagon says the US aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush and more than 50 attack aircraft are in the Persian Gulf, ready to launch attacks against Takfiri militants in Iraq.


The warship along with a battle group of ships are "in the region and ready for tasking," Pentagon spokesperson Rear Adm John Kirby said on Friday.

Iraqi armed forces have had fierce clashes with the militants over the past few days. The terrorists have threatened to do terrorist acts in other Iraqi cities too, including the capital Baghdad.

Takfiri groups, including the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), are reportedly coming to Iraq from neighboring Syria and Saudi Arabia to undermine security in the country.

Kirby also pointed to the presence of over 30,000 military personnel in the Middle East in order to defend against any possible aggression and terrorist acts.

Comment: See also:

Covert re-invasion of Iraq on the cards? U.S. feigns surprise at ISIS attacks

Iraq crisis: Executions and rape reported as Islamist ISIS militants close in on Baghdad


Apple Red

Pentagon prepares for mass civil unrest, spends millions

three students w end war in Vietnam sign
© dailyperversion.blogspot.com
The Pentagon is pumping millions of dollars annually into programs that set out to explore the factors responsible for creating civil unrest around the world, The Guardian reported this week.

An article by journalist Nafeez Ahmed published by the paper on Thursday this week acknowledges that the little-known United States Department of Defense program - the Minerva Research Initiative - has since 2008 partnered with universities "to improve DoD's basic understanding of the social, cultural, behavioral and political forces that shape regions of the world of strategic importance to the US."

According to the program's website, it has recently awarded millions of dollars to be divvied up among 12 proposals from colleges that have launched projects relevant to the Pentagon's interest, including a Cornell University study called "Tracking Critical-Mass Outbreaks in Social Contagions" as well as others involving state stability, social disequilibrium and, in one instance, "Understanding American Muslims Converts in the Contexts of Security and Society." The funding all comes entirely from the Dept. of Defense.

"Understanding the Origin, Characteristics and Implications of Mass Political Movements," a study out of the University of Washington, was among those selected as well. In Lowell, Massachusetts, researchers there will use $2 million from the Pentagon to study terrorist behavior.

Comment: Criticisms have been raised by the Network of Concerned Anthropologists regarding universities which take in a large portion of research funding from military sources. Academic focus becomes overly distorted to war-making, shrinking other fields such as environmental research, while research goals in physics, computer science, and engineering now operate on the assumptions that knowledge about force is paramount. It is also their worry that dependence on this source of funding reduces intellectual autonomy so that the university becomes an instrument, rather than a critic.


Chess

A prophecy of pain: Prescient Solzhenitsyn foretold the future for Ukraine

The writer and Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn predicted the current situation in Ukraine almost half a century ago

Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Dead write: many of Solzhenitsyn's predictions for the future of Ukraine have come to a painful fruition
In The Gulag Archipelago, the Nobel laureate wrote: "With Ukraine, things will get extremely painful."

Even during Soviet times, Alexander Solzhenitsyn prophetically did not rule out the idea that Ukraine may break away, although "a referendum may be required for each region", given the Bolshevik way of lumping together lands that had never historically belonged to Ukraine.

The Gulag Archipelago, Part 5, Chapter 2

... It pains me to write this as Ukraine and Russia are merged in my blood, in my heart, and in my thoughts. But extensive experience of friendly contacts with Ukrainians in the camps has shown me how much of a painful grudge they hold. Our generation will not escape from paying for the mistakes of our fathers.

To stamp one's foot and shout: "This is mine!" is the easiest option. It is far more difficult to say: "Those who want to live, live!" Surprising as it may be, the Marxist teaching prediction that nationalism is fading has not come true. On the contrary, in an age of nuclear research and cybernetics, it has for some reason flourished. And time is coming for us, whether we like it or not, to repay all the promissory notes of self-determination and independence; do it ourselves rather than wait to be burnt at the stake, drowned in a river or beheaded. We must prove whether we are a great nation not with the vastness of our territory or the number of peoples in our care but with the greatness of our deeds. And with the depth of ploughing what we shall have left after those lands that will not want to stay with us secede.

With Ukraine, things will get extremely painful. But one has to understand the degree of tension they feel. As it has been impossible for centuries to resolve it, it is now down to us to show good sense. We must hand over the decision-making to them: federalists or separatists, whichever of them wins. Not to give in would be mad and cruel. The more lenient, patient, coherent we now are, the more hope there will be to restore unity in future.

Let them live it, let them test it. They will soon understand that not all problems are resolved through separation. (Since in different regions of Ukraine there is a different proportion of those who consider themselves Ukrainians, those who consider themselves Russians and those who consider themselves neither, there will be many difficulties there. Maybe it will be necessary to have a referendum in each region and then ensure preferential and delicate treatment of those who would want to leave. Not the whole of Ukraine in its current formal Soviet borders is indeed Ukraine. Some regions on the left bank [of the River Dnieper] clearly lean more towards Russia. As for Crimea, Khrushchev's decision to hand it over to Ukraine was totally arbitrary. And what about Carpathian (Red) Ruthenia? That will serve as a test, too: while demanding justice for themselves, how just will the Ukrainians be to Carpathian Russians?)

Written in 1968; published in 1974.

Comment: It would seem that in terms of deeds, Putin is the only one championing the rights of the local populations.

By demanding Russia interfere in Crimea, Obama regime's hypocrisy sets new world record
Putin orders Russian troops home from surprise war games
Birth of Novorossiya? Self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk republics form 'Novorossiya' union with 6 other regions


Light Saber

Vindication: City of Albuquerque ordered to pay $6m over man's wrongful killing by police

albuquerque killer cops christopher torres
Christopher Torres
The city of Albuquerque must pay more than $6m in connection with the wrongful death of a man with schizophrenia killed by Albuquerque police, a New Mexico judge ruled Tuesday.

In her detailed findings of fact, district court judge Shannon Bacon said officers were not acting in self-defense when they punched and shot Christopher Torres, 27, in his backyard in 2011.

Bacon also wrote the use of deadly force violated Torres' constitutional rights.

According to authorities, detectives CJ Brown and Richard Hilger shot Torres in the back at close range while serving an arrest warrant on a felony charge of aggravated auto burglary for trying to carjack a woman at a traffic light. During the confrontation with police, Torres tried to punch Hilger and grabbed Hilger's gun as they scuffled in the suspect's backyard, police said.

But Bacon said the officers did not present the arrest warrant when they confronted him in his yard. The judge said Hilger and Brown also did not contact Torres' assigned Crisis Intervention Team officer or family before confronting him - something the family had asked in order to ease tensions.

Instead, the officers jumped the fence and walked toward him, the ruling said.

"The unnecessary escalation of events by Detectives Brown and Hilger and their own aggressive acts at the Torres home created the unnecessarily dangerous situation in which Christopher Torres was shot to death," Bacon wrote.

Steve Torres, Christopher's father, said he hadn't seen the ruling but he thinks it vindicates the family's story that their son was unnecessarily killed by police.

"For us, it was never about the money," Torres said. "It was about setting the record straight."

An attorney for the city of Albuquerque did not immediately respond to an email from the Associated Press.

The ruling comes as the city of Albuquerque is in talks with the US Justice Department over pending police reforms following a scathing report faulting Albuquerque police over its use of force and the way officers handle suspects battling mental illness.

The Justice Department is expected to release a draft of its decree later this week.

Via Associated Press

USA

U.S. wars, a record of unparalleled failure

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© amidnightsuns.blogspot.com
The United States has been at war -- major boots-on-the-ground conflicts and minor interventions, firefights, air strikes, drone assassination campaigns, occupations, special ops raids, proxy conflicts, and covert actions -- nearly nonstop since the Vietnam War began. That's more than half a century of experience with war, American-style, and yet few in our world bother to draw the obvious conclusions.

Given the historical record, those conclusions should be staring us in the face. They are, however, the words that can't be said in a country committed to a military-first approach to the world, a continual build-up of its forces, an emphasis on pioneering work in the development and deployment of the latest destructive technology, and a repetitious cycling through styles of war from full-scale invasions and occupations to counterinsurgency, proxy wars, and back again.

So here are five straightforward lessons -- none acceptable in what passes for discussion and debate in this country -- that could be drawn from that last half century of every kind of American warfare: