The Killing of History

Source: The Killing of History

With permission from

http://www.counterpunch.org

by John Pilger

September 22, 2017

Photo by FDR Presidential Library & Museum | CC BY 2.0

One of the most hyped “events” of American television, The Vietnam War, has started on the PBS network. The directors are Ken Burns and Lynn Novick.  Acclaimed for his documentaries on the Civil War, the Great Depression and the history of jazz, Burns says of his Vietnam films, “They will inspire our country to begin to talk and think about the Vietnam war in an entirely new way”.

In a society often bereft of historical memory and in thrall to the propaganda of its “exceptionalism”, Burns’ “entirely new” Vietnam war is presented as “epic, historic work”. Its lavish advertising campaign promotes its biggest backer, Bank of America, which in 1971 was burned down by students in Santa Barbara, California, as a symbol of the hated war in Vietnam.

Burns says he is grateful to “the entire Bank of America family” which “has long supported our country’s veterans”.  Bank of America was a corporate prop to an invasion that killed perhaps as many as four million Vietnamese and ravaged and poisoned a once bountiful land. More than 58,000 American soldiers were killed, and around the same number are estimated to have taken their own lives.

I watched the first episode in New York. It leaves you in no doubt of its intentions right from the start. The narrator says the war “was begun in good faith by decent people out of fateful misunderstandings, American overconfidence and Cold War misunderstandings”.

The dishonesty of this statement is not surprising. The cynical fabrication of “false flags” that led to the invasion of Vietnam is a matter of record – the Gulf of Tonkin “incident” in 1964, which Burns promotes as true, was just one. The lies litter a multitude of official documents, notably the Pentagon Papers, which the great whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg released in 1971.

There was no good faith. The faith was rotten and cancerous. For me – as it must be for many Americans — it is difficult to watch the film’s jumble of “red peril” maps, unexplained interviewees, ineptly cut archive and maudlin American battlefield sequences.

In the series’ press release in Britain — the BBC will show it — there is no mention of Vietnamese dead, only Americans. “We are all searching for some meaning in this terrible tragedy,” Novick is quoted as saying.  How very post-modern.

All this will be familiar to those who have observed how the American media and popular culture behemoth has revised and served up the great crime of the second half of the twentieth century: from The Green Berets and The Deer Hunter to Rambo and, in so doing, has legitimised subsequent wars of aggression.  The revisionism never stops and the blood never dries. The invader is pitied and purged of guilt, while “searching for some meaning in this terrible tragedy”. Cue Bob Dylan: “Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son?”

I thought about the “decency” and “good faith” when recalling my own first experiences as a young reporter in Vietnam: watching hypnotically as the skin fell off Napalmed peasant children like old parchment, and the ladders of bombs that left trees petrified and festooned with human flesh. General William Westmoreland, the American commander, referred to people as “termites”.

In the early 1970s, I went to Quang Ngai province, where in the village of My Lai, between 347 and 500 men, women and infants were murdered by American troops (Burns prefers “killings”). At the time, this was presented as an aberration: an “American tragedy” (Newsweek ).  In this one province, it was estimated that 50,000 people had been slaughtered during the era of American “free fire zones”. Mass homicide. This was not news.

To the north, in Quang Tri province, more bombs were dropped than in all of Germany during the Second World War. Since 1975, unexploded ordnance has caused more than 40,000 deaths in mostly “South Vietnam”, the country America claimed to “save” and, with France, conceived as a singularly imperial ruse.

The “meaning” of the Vietnam war is no different from the meaning of the genocidal campaign against the Native Americans, the colonial massacres in the Philippines, the atomic bombings of Japan, the levelling of every city in North Korea. The aim was described by Colonel Edward Lansdale, the famous CIA man on whom Graham Greene based his central character in The Quiet American. 

Quoting Robert Taber’s The War of the Flea, Lansdale said, “There is only one means of defeating an insurgent people who will not surrender, and that is extermination. There is only one way to control a territory that harbours resistance, and that is to turn it into a desert.”

Nothing has changed. When Donald Trump addressed the United Nations on 19 September – a body established to spare humanity the “scourge of war” – he declared he was “ready, willing and able” to “totally destroy” North Korea and its 25 million people. His audience gasped, but Trump’s language was not unusual.

His rival for the presidency, Hillary Clinton, had boasted she was prepared to “totally obliterate” Iran, a nation of more than 80 million people. This is the American Way; only the euphemisms are missing now.

Returning to the US, I am struck by the silence and the absence of an opposition – on the streets, in journalism and the arts, as if dissent once tolerated in the “mainstream” has regressed to a dissidence: a metaphoric underground.

There is plenty of sound and fury at Trump the odious one, the “fascist”, but almost none at Trump the symptom and caricature of an enduring system of conquest and extremism.

Where are the ghosts of the great anti-war demonstrations that took over Washington in the 1970s? Where is the equivalent of the Freeze Movement that filled the streets of Manhattan in the 1980s, demanding that President Reagan withdraw battlefield nuclear weapons from Europe?

The sheer energy and moral persistence of these great movements largely succeeded; by 1987 Reagan had negotiated with Mikhail Gorbachev an Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) that effectively ended the Cold War.

Today, according to secret Nato documents obtained by the German newspaper, Suddeutsche Zetung, this vital treaty is likely to be abandoned as “nuclear targeting planning is increased”. The German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel has warned against “repeating the worst mistakes of the Cold War … All the good treaties on disarmament and arms control from Gorbachev and Reagan are in acute peril. Europe is threatened again with becoming a military training ground for nuclear weapons. We must raise our voice against this.”

But not in America. The thousands who turned out for Senator Bernie Sanders’ “revolution” in last year’s presidential campaign are collectively mute on these dangers. That most of America’s violence across the world has been perpetrated not by Republicans, or mutants like Trump, but by liberal Democrats, remains a taboo.

Barack Obama provided the apotheosis, with seven simultaneous wars, a presidential record, including the destruction of Libya as a modern state. Obama’s overthrow of Ukraine’s elected government has had the desired effect: the massing of American-led Nato forces on Russia’s western borderland through which the Nazis invaded in 1941.

Obama’s “pivot to Asia” in 2011 signaled the transfer of the majority of America’s naval and air forces to Asia and the Pacific for no purpose other than to confront and provoke China. The Nobel Peace Laureate’s worldwide campaign of assassinations is arguably the most extensive campaign of terrorism since 9/11.

What is known in the US as “the left” has effectively allied with the darkest recesses of institutional power, notably the Pentagon and the CIA, to see off a peace deal between Trump and Vladimir Putin and to reinstate Russia as an enemy, on the basis of no evidence of its alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The true scandal is the insidious assumption of power by sinister war-making vested interests for which no American voted.  The rapid ascendancy of the Pentagon and the surveillance agencies under Obama represented an historic shift of power in Washington. Daniel Ellsberg rightly called it a coup. The three generals running Trump are its witness.

All of this fails to penetrate those “liberal brains pickled in the formaldehyde of identity politics”, as Luciana Bohne noted memorably. Commodified and market-tested, “diversity” is the new liberal brand, not the class people serve regardless of their gender and skin colour: not the responsibility of all to stop a barbaric war to end all wars.

“How did it fucking come to this?” says Michael Moore in his Broadway show, Terms of My Surrender, a vaudeville for the disaffected set against a backdrop of Trump as Big Brother.

I admired Moore’s film, Roger & Me, about the economic and social devastation of his hometown of Flint, Michigan, and Sicko, his investigation into the corruption of healthcare in America.

The night I saw his show, his happy-clappy audience cheered his reassurance that “we are the majority!” and calls to “impeach Trump, a liar and a fascist!” His message seemed to be that had you held your nose and voted for Hillary Clinton, life would be predictable again.

He may be right. Instead of merely abusing the world, as Trump does, the Great Obliterator might have attacked Iran and lobbed missiles at Putin, whom she likened to Hitler: a particular profanity given the 27 million Russians who died in Hitler’s invasion.

“Listen up,” said Moore, “putting aside what our governments do, Americans are really loved by the world!”

There was a silence.

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More articles by:John Pilger

John Pilger can be reached through his website: www.johnpilger.com

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Further Evidence As To Why America’s Word Cannot be Trusted

Source: Further Evidence As To Why America’s Word Cannot be Trusted | New Eastern Outlook

journal-neo.org

Author: James ONeill

09.09.2017 

Recent events confirm the long held view of many that adherence to international law is, for the Americans, at best an optional extra rather than being an essential component of conduct between States.

The first example relates to the current standoff between the US and North Korea. Article 2 (3) of the UN Charter, a document the US was instrumental in formulating, requires that:

“All members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means….”

Article 2 (4) further provides that:

“All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity …..of any State…..”

Scarcely a day has passed in recent weeks without those obligations being violated in respect of North Korea. President Trump himself has threatened “fire and fury like you have never seen”. He, along with his Defence Secretary Mattis and the US ambassador to the Un Nikki Haley have variously referred to “all options are on the table” or “North Korea will be obliterated” and similar phrases, all of which are unsubtle overt threats.

It is not just words. Massive military exercises have been conducted close to North Korea’s borders, both land and maritime. We are told that one of the objectives of the exercise is to practice the “decapitation” of the North Korean leadership. Nuclear-armed bombers patrol Korean air space, and missile systems have been installed. The latter are purportedly for “defensive” purposes but in reality they are part of an offensive missile system aimed at Russia and China.

The second example was the unprecedented incursions by US federal officers into the Russian consulate in San Francisco and the homes of Russian consular staff. This is a breach of one of the most important international conventions, the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and Optional Protocols (“the Vienna Convention.”)

Article 22 of the Vienna Convention states:

1. The premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State may not enter them, except with the consent of the head of the mission.
2. The receiving State is under a special obligation to take appropriate steps to protect the premises of the mission……
3. The premises of the mission, their furnishings and other property therein and the means of transport of the mission shall be immune from search, requisition, attachment or execution.

There is no scope for ambiguity here. Inviolable means exactly what it says. What is less clear are the American’s motives for such a blatant and unacceptable breach of international norms. Christopher Black quotes the Russian Foreign Ministry as saying that the only reason for such a search to be conducted, aside from bullying and intimidation, is to use it as an opportunity for the Americans to plant items to be used in their propaganda war against Russia.

That is certainly possible, and it is a reasonable inference to draw from the fact that the Americans demanded that the premises be vacated while the search was undertaken. It is also consistent with a long record of such duplicity by the United States, and its persistent false claims used to justify aggression.

The allegations against the Libyan government’s ‘killing of its own people’; the alleged sarin gas attacks by the Syrian government against its own people; Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction; and Iran’s alleged nuclear weapons program are only four of the most recent and egregious examples.

The consequences of those falsehoods have been devastating for three of the four countries concerned. Notwithstanding convincing evidence to the contrary, successive US governments have persisted in these falsehoods, with the willing complicity of the mainstream media.

Black also correctly points out that it acts as a precedent that can rebound against the United States, as the US cannot now logically argue that its own diplomatic missions remain immune.

The third possibility is that the actions were simply a result of terminal hubris and stupidity. The US has long regarded itself as the “exceptional nation” with that perception now irrefutably extended to being exempt from the provisions of international law.

This would not be a novel conclusion as their actions for many decades have long demonstrated both stupidity and a disregard for international law. The invasion and searching of diplomatic premises in violation of the Vienna Convention is therefore simply an extension of a well-established pattern of behaviour.

The third illustration of why the word of the United States cannot be trusted is the one with potentially the most dangerous consequences. The US and its allies have long claimed that Iran had a nuclear weapons program. Israel has claimed for 20 years that Iran was “only months away” from possessing a nuclear weapon, including a bizarre presentation by Benjamin Netanyahu to the UN General Assembly.

The complete absence of any supporting evidence, and indeed the existence of two unanimous US Intelligence Reports to the contrary, was never sufficient to stop the relentless propaganda barrage against Iran, nor prevent the imposition of sanctions.

The net effect was to dangerously ratchet up tensions to the point where a single act of stupidity, such as Israel carrying out one of its multiple threats to attack Iran, could easily have led to a wider war.

Thanks largely to the initiatives of the Russian and Chinese governments, and a rare moment of sanity by the then US administration, an agreement between the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the European Union’s Foreign Affairs High Representative, Germany and Iran was negotiated. Known as the Joint comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) it was agreed to by all parties in July 2015.

The UN Security Council subsequently endorsed the agreement unanimously on 20 July 2015 (UNSC Resolution 2231). Three key provisions from the Preamble are worth briefly noting:

(iii) Iran reaffirms that under no circumstances will Iran ever seek, develop or acquire nuclear weapons.

(v) The JCPOA will produce the comprehensive lifting of all UNSC sanctions as well as multilateral and national sanctions related to Iran’s nuclear program.

(viii) The E3/EU+3 and Iran commit to implement this JCPOA in good faith and to refrain from any action inconsistent with the letter, spirit and intent of this JCPOA that would undermine its successful implementation.

The UNSC Resolution effectively turned the JCPOA into an instrument of international law. The US Congress also passed the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act under which the President is required to provide a “compliance certification” to Congress every 90 days to verify Iran’s adherence to the terms of the JCPOA.

Under the terms of the JCPOA the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is also entitled to carry out inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities (civilian use is permitted) and issue its own compliance certificates. It has repeatedly done so.

Trump has twice thus far met his obligations to report compliance to Congress, but he told the Wall Street Journal that if it was up to him he would have found Iran non-compliant 180 days ago (i.e. when he was inaugurated).

Trump’s ignorance is bad enough, but it is now known that he has instructed his intelligence agencies to provide proof of Iran’s non-compliance. This is extraordinary and dangerous. Trump clearly has an a priori conclusion that Iran is non-compliant and wants the intelligence agencies to produce what can only be described as ‘fake facts’ to justify his pre-held conclusion.

This is reminiscent of the point noted by the head of British Intelligence in the lead up to the Iraq war when he noted that “the facts were being made to fit the policy.”

The US has also not only failed to life the sanctions in accordance with the JCPOA but has imposed new sanctions on the pretext that Iran has carried out ballistic missile tests (not banned under the JCPOA) and is a “sponsor of terrorism.” Again, facts are not allowed to intrude upon the policy. It is simply impossible to reconcile these and other actions with the obligation of “good faith” in the JCPOA.

The three illustrations noted here confirm the truth of President Putin’s observation that America was HeAOROBOPOCNOCO6Hb1, which I understand, translates as “non-agreement capable.”

The only remaining mystery is why anyone would accept America’s commitment to anything when compliance is completely at the whim of the administration of the day.

James O’Neill, an Australian-based Barrister at Law, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

If Assad Is “Killing His Own People” Why Are They Rushing Back To Him?

Source: If Assad Is “Killing His Own People” Why Are They Rushing Back To Him?

http://www.activistpost.com

Brandon Turbeville

August 21, 2017

As the mainstream corporate press attempts to guilt Westerners over making Syrian refugees return home, Western outlets are, in fact, deconstructing their own propaganda narrative for all to see.

For instance, according to the International Organization for Migration, more than 600,000 Syrians have returned home to Syria since the beginning of 2017, more than the number of returning refugees in the entire year of 2016.

IOM reports that the majority of those Syrians going home were internally displaced people. After that, Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, and Iraq followed respectively.

The typically pro-imperialist NPR attempted to suggest that the return of the internally displaced to their homes are being forced to relocate back home by the Syrian government. That claim, while largely nonsensical, is also contradicted by reports from other mainstream agencies.

IOM is worried that the “appropriate measures” to ensure safety to those Syrians returning home are not yet in place. 

Of course, the real question that needs to be asked here is simple: “If Assad is killing his own people, why are Syrians running back to him in droves?” After all, when African refugees were being labeled Syrian two years ago, we were told that these people were fleeing the “brutal Assad,” the dictator “killing his own people.” So why would people who were being slaughtered by their own government rush back to it at the earliest possible opportunity?

Perhaps because they actually prefer to live in Syria than some other country. Perhaps their government isn’t killing them like Americans are being told they are.

It is also important to point out that the rate of return for Syrian refugees has increased directly with the amount of territory liberated by the Syrian government. In other words, as the Syrian government liberates more territory, more Syrians return to their homes in government-controlled territory. Obviously, if Syrian refugees were fleeing Assad, we would be seeing an increase in refugees.

Regardless, it is clear to all who are not being paid to see otherwise that Syrians are returning home because America’s terrorists are losing territory and, thus, they now have the ability to return to their homes under government control.

While alternative media researchers have been pointing this out since the beginning of the conflict, mainstream media now has no choice but to admit that Syrians are willingly returning to the country run by the man these same outlets have attempted to demonize and destroy for six years.

Slowly but surely, the mainstream media’s narrative surrounding Syria is unraveling in front of everyone’s eyes.

Brandon Turbeville – article archive here – is the author of seven books, Codex Alimentarius — The End of Health Freedom, 7 Real Conspiracies, Five Sense Solutions and Dispatches From a Dissident, volume 1 and volume 2, The Road to Damascus: The Anglo-American Assault on Syria, The Difference it Makes: 36 Reasons Why Hillary Clinton Should Never Be President, and Resisting The Empire: The Plan To Destroy Syria And How The Future Of The World Depends On The Outcome. Turbeville has published over 1000 articles on a wide variety of subjects including health, economics, government corruption, and civil liberties. Brandon Turbeville’s radio show Truth on The Tracks can be found every Monday night 9 pm EST at UCYTV. His website is BrandonTurbeville.com He is available for radio and TV interviews. Please contact activistpost (at) gmail.com.

Watch Abby Martin Expose the Absurdity of Capitalism with Peter Joseph

Abby Martin’s new interview with Peter Joseph will blow your mind.

Source: Watch Abby Martin Expose the Absurdity of Capitalism with Peter Joseph

theantimedia.org

Written by Emma Fiala 

August 21, 2017

(MR) — Abby Martin sits down with Peter Joseph, the founder of the Zeitgeist Movement, to discuss his most recent book, ‘The New Human Rights Movement’ and his urgent call for global activists to replace the violent oppression that defines our economic order.

 

Founded in 2008, the Zeitgeist Movement is “a global sustainability activist movement presenting the case for the needed transition out of our current unsustainable economic model and into a new sustainable socioeconomic paradigm based on using the best that science and technology have to offer to maximize human, animal and environmental well being in accordance with the natural world.” The movement utilizes a network of regional chapters, teams, events, charity work and media to conduct community based activism and increase awareness.

Having a background in advertising and equity trading has lent to an informed and unique perspective on capitalism in the United States. According to Peter, without advertising, a necessary piece to our consumption based economy, “you wouldn’t have people aspiring to things that are highly irrational.” Our susceptibility to advertising is written into our biology, it is a matter of social inclusion. We identify by how others see us and therefore desire things that others have and desire, causing this need for material things to spread like a virus. Advertising thus manipulates this primal biological human desire to belong, in order to make a profit.

A false sense of progress has emerged from our hypercapitalistic society— an abundance of production and ownership is perceived as a sign of progress despite it being at the detriment of human psychology and the environment. The term “cultural violence” applies directly to this manipulation of human psychology for the benefit of the economy. Cultural violence helps justify structural violence so that it feels “right” and acceptable. 

Capitalism supports the destruction of the environment and promotes significant structural violence, creating an ingroup-outgroup of those that can afford desired goods and those that cannot. We see this magnified in today’s culture with a sitting U.S. President immersed in a lavish lifestyle that has been paraded through and praised by the media for years, a President that profits off the primal desire of humans to need and want material goods in order to belong. Advertising and the flaunting of material goods can barely be ignored in U.S. culture today.

This ingroup-outgroup phenomenon of material desire has been magnified to the extent of normalizing control of the economy by the wealthy and elite when, in reality, the economy should function to benefit and provide for all Americans. However, a system controlled by the rich lacks the sympathy to function in this way as profits remain the sole focus without a critical eye questioning why the have nots are unable to have.

Abby and Peter go on to discuss the purpose and current state of the stock market, a system that creates profit for the rich and absolutely no material goods or other benefits to society at large, the concept of debt throughout the world, Wall Street’s covert control over U.S. politics, the ability for automation to free humans from labor, what he advocates to save the planet from catastrophe and more. 

By Emma Fiala / Republished with permission / Media Roots / 

Israel Claims Iran Is Building A Missile Factory In Syria, Builds Excuses For Strike Against Assad

Give it up Israel, the world knows how you lie and stretch the truth. Relocate to Florida ye pathetic war criminals!

This causes some to worry that the Israeli officials may influence or otherwise wreck the Russian/U.S. cooperation as Israel has managed to do in the past.

Source: Israel Claims Iran Is Building A Missile Factory In Syria, Builds Excuses For Strike Against Assad

http://www.activistpost.com

Brandon Turbeville

August 18, 2017

The Israeli government is at it again. The Zionist settler state is currently laying the groundwork for a justification of military aggression against Syria over flimsy claims that Iran is building a scud missile factory in Lattakia.

Israel claims that satellite photos allegedly taken by its EROS-B satellite show the construction of the Scud missile factory. The location is allegedly near Lattakia near the coastline.

Israel claims the photo of the facility shows that the structure resembles a missile plant in Tehran.

The Independent cites Channel 2’s experts who claim that the facility could not have been constructed without the help of Iran and Iranian experts allegedly operating in Syria. They say work began on the facility last year and that is has both production and underground storage capacity for long-range missiles. These missiles would thus be capable of striking Israel.

These “experts” claim the facility will be completed by the end of 2017. 

Of course, the word “alleged” appears so often in this report because the Israeli claims are missing a very important element which is needed to make decisions regarding what to do in any given important situation such as this – proof. The photos, assuming they are real and not doctored by Mossad or the Israeli military, simply show the construction of a facility that “resembles” a missile facility in Iran. From such a simple statement, we then have experts discussing how the missiles will threaten Israel and how Iranian experts must be in Syria and how the Syrians must have Iranian experts working with them to build the Scud facility. All this because a building looks like another building that manufactures missiles located in a different country.

And so what if it is a missile facility? Israel has missiles that can reach every country in the Arab world. Syria has a right to defend itself, produce Scud missiles and, yes, aim them at the country that has illegally occupied Syrian territory since 1967 and which has repeatedly attacked Syria over the last six years. It also has the right to work with the Iranians and invite Iranian experts into the country. Syria is, after all, sovereign.

Israel actually is concerned about both Syria and Iran’s influence in the region. Ironically, the latter’s influence is growing rapidly as a result of the Western-backed terrorist campaign in Syria. Israel is fearful of a stronger Iran and, by default, a stronger Hezbollah.

“Our policy is clear: We vehemently oppose the military buildup by Iran and its proxies, primarily Hezbollah, in Syria and we will do whatever it takes to protect Israel’s security,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a speech just last week, adding his fears that, as ISIS is destroyed, Iran will move in to take its place. This is hyperbole and hysteria which can be accurately translated “As Syria, Russia, Hezbollah, and Iran defeat Western and Israeli-backed terrorists in Syria, the Israeli position is weakened by the lack of ISIS in Syria. Thus, Israel may have to engage in direct military action to ensure victory where the terrorists it has supported have currently failed.”

What is much more concerning that Israel’s lack of evidence and perpetual whining over the possibility that someone may be able to stand up to its racist imperial aims is the fact that it is relatively clear Israel is simply laying the foundation of propaganda for an attack on Syria in the near future. It is creating a paper trail in the Western media that journals its “concerns” and “fears” over Syria and Iran’s “aggression” and, when it is time to strike, it can then claim that it has been bringing its concerns up to the international community for some time only to have their worries ignored. For that reason, they will argue, they had to take action for the safety and security of Israel.

It is notable that the prospective date for completion on the facility is by the end of 2017 raising the possibility that, if Israel does intend to strike Syria using this facility as a justification, it may be before the end of the year.

On the other hand, Israel’s unproven claims may be seated in the desire to break up the recent U.S.-Russian cooperation over southern Syria and “de-escalation zones.” Israel has repeatedly tried to scupper these negotiations and prevent peace in Syria, claiming it gives Iran too much power.

While U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has stated that the negotiations with Russia will continue, provided that the Iranian forces are eventually removed from Syria, Israeli intelligence officials are scheduled to meet with the U.S. officials later this week to discuss the situation further. This causes some to worry that the Israeli officials may influence or otherwise wreck the Russian/U.S. cooperation as Israel has managed to do in the past.

Brandon Turbeville – article archive here – is the author of seven books, Codex Alimentarius — The End of Health Freedom, 7 Real Conspiracies, Five Sense Solutions and Dispatches From a Dissident, volume 1 and volume 2, The Road to Damascus: The Anglo-American Assault on Syria, The Difference it Makes: 36 Reasons Why Hillary Clinton Should Never Be President, and Resisting The Empire: The Plan To Destroy Syria And How The Future Of The World Depends On The Outcome. Turbeville has published over 1000 articles on a wide variety of subjects including health, economics, government corruption, and civil liberties. Brandon Turbeville’s radio show Truth on The Tracks can be found every Monday night 9 pm EST at UCYTV. His website is BrandonTurbeville.com He is available for radio and TV interviews. Please contact activistpost (at) gmail.com.

NATO ‘s War Crimes: The Crime of Propaganda

“For NATO is first and foremost the armed fist not only of the United States and its allies as nations, but is the armed fist of the capitalists of those nations who are prepared to strike against any nation, capitalist or socialist, that stands in their way of obtaining profit.”

 On Propaganda: “It turns us into salivating monsters calling for death of the other and cheering when the bombs explode; turns us all into the Hilary Clinton lunatic who cackled like some satanic demon as she watched a great man cut to pieces before her eyes.”

Source: NATO ‘s War Crimes: The Crime of Propaganda | New Eastern Outlook

journal-neo.org

Author: Christopher Black

Aug 14, 2017 

The NATO military alliance is a world encompassing threat. It is now conducting various forms of hybrid warfare against Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and most of Africa. They have destroyed directly or are largely responsible for the destruction of the socialist nations of the USSR, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and too many to name in Latin America, Africa and Asia. Destruction is the fate that each nation on earth can expect unless it pays homage and obeisance to these neo-feudal overlords who promise protection in return for national servitude, in return for the complete surrender of their people and natural resources to increase the rate of profit for the capital that controls the NATO military machine. For NATO is first and foremost the armed fist not only of the United States and its allies as nations, but is the armed fist of the capitalists of those nations who are prepared to strike against any nation, capitalist or socialist, that stands in their way of obtaining profit.

The primary concern they have, in order to preserve their control, is for the preservation of the new feudal mythology that they have created; that the world is a dangerous place, that they are the protectors, that the danger is omnipresent, eternal, and omnidirectional, comes from without, and comes from within. The mythology is constructed and presented through all media; journals, films, television, radio, music, advertising, books, the internet in all its variety; all the information systems available are used to create and maintain scenarios and dramas to convince the people that they, the protectors, are the good and all others are the bad. We are bombarded with this message incessantly. They have succeeded into luring us to all their communication platforms, so that no one is able to ignore the constant flow of information into their consciousness and their subconscious. They have us locked to our screens. The have our attention. They have us hypnotised and under this state of hypnosis we are fed so many images we cannot take any of them in and so we drown in the river of information washing over us, barely able to breathe, unable to think, blind from looking.

The use of propaganda, and by propaganda I mean here the use of lies, inventions, fabrications, distortions and misrepresentations of reality in order to evoke an emotional response in the receiver of the desired type and desired action to follow, is a primary pillar of the mythology they create. The immediate means of delivery is through the news media. To turn on the television these days to watch the political, national and world “news” is a surreal experience. You have a dissociative experience as the presenters present not “news” but carefully crafted scripts inventing scenarios out of whole cloth that have nothing to do with what is really happening in any given situation. Even the weather “news” is moulded to keep mention of abrupt climate change to a minimum and sports “news” seems like a rehearsal for war news to come as our team smashes their team with our catastrophic weapons, erases them from the earth, never to play again.

But whatever form the propaganda takes it is a crime against the people, a crime against the republic, a crime against democracy, and since it is a part of the hybrid warfare campaign being conducted and because it is used to provoke a large aggressive general war, it is a war crime.

It is a crime against the people because the people are in essence the state, the nation. The leaders of our nations are merely our representatives placed in positions of power through various, more or less “democratic” mechanisms to act for our benefit, on our behalf. But when these leaders instead represent secret cabals of financiers and industrialists who want to use the government machinery for their private benefit against the interests of their people then they have betrayed the people, have sold them out to the highest bidder. Their lies flow from this betrayal for if their wars were just they would not need to use propaganda. But their wars are not just, they are the actions of gangsters writ large and so to get the people to go along, to fool them, they, by necessity, have to lie to the people.

It is a crime against democracy for the same reason, for democracy means that representatives of the people put in positions of power have a duty to inform the people honestly on all issues, to present all the facts and arguments, and most importantly, fulfill their duty to preserve the peace and to seek peaceful resolutions of differences between nations. But again, their wars for the profit of a few are always against the interests of the people and so the lies become part of the system of control, and with each lie the grave of democracy is dug deeper and deeper.

It is a crime against the republic because the republic is the people ruling themselves, in the name of the people, not the people ruled by a monarch or emperor, who rule in their own name. So when the leaders of a republic lie to the people of the republic they repudiate the republic and act against its interests and for the private interests of those who control them. They subvert the republic and destroy it.

It is a war crime because propaganda is used to provoke war, to sustain war, to turn other people, declared to be the enemy, into beings that need to be killed. It robs them of their humanity, of their kinship with us, their desires and dreams, and makes them into vermin to be destroyed with ease and even joy in the killing. It turns us into salivating monsters calling for death of the other and cheering when the bombs explode; turns us all into the Hilary Clinton lunatic who cackled like some satanic demon as she watched a great man cut to pieces before her eyes.

I could give dozens, hundreds, thousands of examples of how the propaganda is being used. The New York Times, BBC, CNN, CBC and the rest of the western media are full of it every day and every day worse than the day before, against Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Syria Venezuela, all the known targets. We all sense that the intensity if it is increasing, the vitriol becoming more hysterical and absurd with every headline.

The journalists who write these propaganda pieces and the presenters who read them on television are among the worst of criminals as they sit there looking attractive, with their fake smiles and fake concern, while taking lots of money to lie to our faces every day. It takes a very low person to sit there and lie to their fellow citizens so easily. It takes someone who has no sense of morality whatsoever. One could say they are sociopaths. But criminals they are and they deserve to be in the dock with the leaders that hand them the scripts they read so willingly.

For propaganda is a threat to peace itself. It is not only necessary to eliminate nuclear weapons and armies, it is also necessary to eliminate the psychological weapons that are used to justify, provoke and prolong war. Lenin once said that “disarmament is an ideal of socialism” and it was, we must not forget, the USSR that developed ideals of international peace and responsibility for wars of aggression. The successor state of Russia still relies on these principles.

On the second day of the creation of Soviet power the Decree on Peace was issued that made it a matter of state policy that aggressive war is a crime. Up until then it was assumed that nation states had an inherent right to go to war for their own interests. War propaganda is a way of preparing for aggressive war and consequently is a war crime. This was confirmed at the Nuremberg Tribunal in 1946.

This was echoed in the Resolution of the General Assembly of the United Nations of November 3, 1947 that denounced war propaganda;

“The General Assembly condemns all forms of propaganda, in whatsoever country conducted, which is either designed or likely to provoke or encourage any threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression.”

A Soviet draft definition of aggression presented to the General Assembly in 1957 defined war propaganda as ideological aggression. Their draft stated that a state has committed ideological aggression when it “encourages war propaganda, encourages propaganda for the use of atomic or other weapons of mass extermination and stimulates Nazi-fascist views, racial or national superiority, or hatred and disdain for other peoples.”

But before that the Supreme Soviet on March 12, 1950 passed a law on the defense of peace that stated:

“The Supreme Soviet of the USSR is guided by the high principles of the Soviet peace policy, which seeks to strengthen peace and friendly relations between the peoples, recognizes that human conscience and the concept of right of the peoples, who, during one generation suffered the calamities of two wars, cannot accept that the conduct of war propaganda remain unpunished, and approves the proclamation of the Second World Congress of the Partisans of Peace, who expressed the will of the entire progressive mankind concerning the prohibition and condemnation of criminal war propaganda.

“The Supreme Soviet decrees,

1. To recognize that war propaganda under whatever form it is made, undermines the cause of peace, creates the threat of new war and is the graves crime against humanity.

2. To bring to court person guilty of war propaganda and to try them as having committed a most grave criminal offense.”

The western powers blocked a Russian UN resolution at that time to denounce war propaganda even though it was in accord with the principles of the United Nations Charter which makes it a duty of all member states to preserve the peace. The west relied on arguments of “free speech” arguments that do not hold water since war propaganda is not designed to enlighten people but to twist their minds into thoughts of hatred and war.

The Rome Statute today contains a clause that arguably encompasses these principles in Article 5, dealing with aggression, though this clause is not yet in effect. It is one of the grave problems with the International Criminal Court, that aside from being controlled effectively by the US and European Union for their purposes, its statute does not include a specific section on war propaganda. But then the United States and its allies prevented the inclusion of such a clause just as they prevented the adoption of the resolution at the UN in the 1950’s so that they could continue using war propaganda as part of their arsenal of world control.

So, the criminal dossier against NATO grows with the crimes committed. One day we can hope that those responsible for the war propaganda used against us will face the peoples’ justice but in the meantime we have to be aware that when we are confronted with it, when we open a newspaper, turn on the television, or radio, click that link on the internet, we are the victims of a war crime, the use of war propaganda as part of the crime of aggression, each and every one of us. And if that does not make you angry then what hope is there for peace in this world?

Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto. He is known for a number of high-profile war crimes cases and recently published his novel “Beneath the Clouds. He writes essays on international law, politics and world events, especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

Trump Family Launches Hilarious State-Run Propaganda News Network “Trump TV”

President Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, will head the “news organization” being deemed “Trump TV” funded by Trump’s reelection campaign

Source: Trump Family Launches Hilarious State-Run Propaganda News Network “Trump TV”

http://www.activistpost.com

Aaron Kesel

August 16, 2017

In a world of fake news and alternative facts it can be hard to get the “truth,” so U.S. President Donald Trump has quietly launched his own ‘propaganda’ news network in a move straight out of George Orwell’s dystopian society 1984, a Ministry of Truth.

In Orwell’s novel, the Ministry of Truth’s purpose was to dictate and protect the government’s version of reality.

Last week, it went silently unnoticed as the Trump campaign launched a state propaganda news network.

 President Donald Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, will head the “news organization” being deemed “Trump TV” funded by Trump’s reelection campaign according to The Daily Beast.

Trump’s plight about MSM news and their lack of positive news about his administration will finally be heard using Facebook to broadcast “Trump TV.” Topics include job growth, the stock market, the economy and any other positive news about Trump’s achievements for the week.

“More great economic news on Friday,” former pro-Trump CNN commentator Kayleigh McEnany says, seated in front of a blue Trump-Pence themed wall to give “the real news.”

McEnany has also just been announced to be the Republican National Committee’s national spokesperson, Politico reported. It’s unclear if this new job will affect McEnany’s ability to also be the propaganda spokeswoman for Trump TV as well. It’s also unclear whether she is being paid by the Trump campaign or the White House.

1984‘s sales raised the book back to the bestseller’s list on Amazon after Trump’s inauguration, NYPost reported.

In another video, Lara Trump talks about the president’s successes.

“I bet you haven’t heard about all the accomplishments the president had this week because there’s so much fake news out there,” she said at the beginning of the video, The Hill reported. “We wanted to give you a glimpse into his week,” Lara Trump added.

However, it’s the way she signs off the network that is worrying.

“Thanks for joining us everybody. I’m Lara Trump, and that is the real news,” Laura Trump said concluding the video.Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul tweeted that the video felt like “state-owned channels” in other countries.

The director of Campaign Legal Center, Brendan Fischer, told The Daily Beast that the president “is now using campaign funds to create what looks like a quasi-state TV project.”

“A disclaimer stating that this is paid for by the Trump campaign appears particularly important here,” Fischer continued.

That disclosure “is legally required for any other ad broadcast by the Trump campaign,” he further expressed, but “there is some ambiguity about when a disclaimer is required for ads posted exclusively on social media, and the Trump campaign may be trying to assert a loophole.”

The Late Show host, Stephen Colbert, spoofed President Trump’s new “Real News” videos in a segment last week “that looks like state-sponsored propaganda,” Colbert said.

The comedian then cuts to a quick skit of his program “Real News” in which the anchors mock Lara Trump.

While Trump TV may highlight his accomplishments it certainly won’t highlight his scandals and it’s important to get a balanced diet of propaganda.

Previously MSNBC’s Co-host of Morning Joe, Mika Brzezinski, has stated that it was the media’s job to “control exactly what people think.” Here at Activist Post we think it’s your job to think for yourself.

Whoever controls the media, controls the mind. – Jim Morrison.

Aaron Kesel writes for Activist Post and is Director of Content for Coinivore. Follow Aaron at Twitter and Steemit.