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“Swarming adolescents”, technology, branding, NGOs – US/NATO regime change operations

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By Brandon Turbeville
Activist Post
April 9, 2015

As NATO-backed protests were beginning to take off in Ukraine after then-president Viktor Yanukovich agreed to accept a financial deal with Russia as opposed to the greater integration/austerity package proposed by the European Union, evidence of US involvement in the Euromaidan color revolution began to surface in the Ukrainian Rada.

Indeed, early on, there were individuals in the Ukrainian government who recognized that there was an international and NATO-centered plot at work in their country designed to overthrow the President and other elected officials using “swarming adolescents” and other more violent elements of protest and destabilization.

While color revolutions are often manifested through a variety of channels — the National Endowment for Democracy, USAID, IRI, NDI, are just a few examples, — there were a number of relatively new participants in the game of national destabilization at play in Ukraine this time around.

For instance, even something as a seemingly innocuous “TechCamp” acted as a front for the color revolution apparatus in Ukraine. While the “TechCamp” concept is one that is presented as bringing influential and important members of the public together with members of the technology community for the purposes of greater training and understanding, the truth is that these “TechCamps” are actually operations used to disseminate methodologies for the implementation of color revolutions throughout the target country.

This was recognized early on by Oleg Tsarev, former Deputy of Ukraine and now a member of the separatist parliament in Eastern Ukraine. In November, 2013, before he was ousted from his position in the Ukrainian government, Tsarev attempted to warn the Rada of the involvement of the West with the protests taking off in Ukraine and the use of the “TechCamp” as a tool of destabilization.

[Transcript — http://vineyardsaker.blogspot.com/2015/01/must-watch-ukrainian-deputy-us-to-stage.html%5D

Tsarev took his chance to speak to the Rada amongst howls of protest and managed to produce a speech that ultimately went unheeded to say the least. He stated,

In my role as a representative of the Ukrainian people…activists of the public organisation “Volya” turned to me…providing clear evidence…that within our territory…with support and direct participation…of the US Embassy in Kiev…the “TechCamp” project is realised…under which preparations are being made for a civil war in Ukraine.

The “TechCamp” project prepares specialists for information warfare…and the discrediting of state institutions using modern media…potential revolutionaries……for organising protests…and the toppling of the State Order.

The project is currently overseen and under the responsibility…of the US ambassador to Ukraine…Geoffrey R. Pyatt.

After the conversation with the organisation “Volya“… I have learned…that they succeeded to access Facilities in the project “TechCamp“…disguising as a team of IT specialists.

To their surprise, briefings on peculiarities of modern media were held.

American instructors explained how social networks and Internet technologies…can be used for targeted manipulation of public opinion…as well as to activate protest potential…to provoke violent unrest on the territory of Ukraine…Radicalisation of the population and triggering of infighting.

American instructors show examples of successful use of social networks…used to organise protests…in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya.

“TechCamp” representatives currently hold conferences throughout Ukraine. A total of five events have been held so far.

About 300 people were trained as operatives, which are now active throughout Ukraine.

The last conference “TechCamp” took place on 14 and 15 November 2013…in the Heart of Kiev on the territory of the US Embassy!

You tell me which country in the world would allow…a NGO to operate out of the US Embassy?

This is disrespectful to the Ukrainian government, and against the Ukrainian People!

I appeal to the Constitutional Authorities of Ukraine with the following question:

Is it conceivable that representatives of the US Embassy…which organise the “TechCamp” Conferences…misuse their diplomatic mission?

At this point, Tsarev was interrupted to the point that the officer chairing the session was forced to intervene in order to restore order and allow him to continue.

He picked back up where he left off and finished his statement. Tsarev said,
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The US and EU owe Iran over $100 billion in seized assets – the real reason behind stalled negotiations?

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By Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya
Global Research, July 02, 2015

Another deadline in the nuclear negotiation between Iran and the Permanent 5 +1 (or EU3 + 3) over the restrictions on the Iranian nuclear energy program was not reached on June 30, 2015. To some it may look like the United States and its allies have had a change of heart while others may think that Washington and its allies are trying to secure more concessions from the Iranians. The US and its European Union allies, however, are clearly trying to maintain the sanctions and trying to avoid returning Iranian financial assets and funds that they have withheld due to the sanctions regime against Iran. Could this be because Iran’s frozen financial assets and funds have been illegally channeled elsewhere by the US and the EU?

The Stonewalling of a Nuclear Agreement

Since the Lausanne Agreement was reached in Switzerland, the US team negotiating with Iran has, so to speak, changed the goal posts for the nuclear negotiations. In other words, Washington has ignored the framework of the Lausanne Agreement that it made with Iran on April 2, 2015. Instead US Secretary of State John Kerry and the Obama Administration have asked for new concessions from the Iranians on things that an understanding was already reached about. These demands appear to be excuses or pretexts.

During the negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran a good and bad cop strategy has clearly been used by the US and France where either Washington has or Paris has stonewalled the negotiations. Even the split between the US Congress and the Obama Administration could be part of this two-track approach. Is the Republican Party faction in the US genuinely acting as a spoiler or does some level of establishment cooperation exist between it and the Obama Administration?

Are parallel foreign policies at work or not in the US? While the Obama Administration is engaged in a dialogue with Iran to get as much concessions from it as possible on its nuclear energy program, pressure is being exerted by the US Congress and the Republican Party, which are threatening to disrupt the nuclear negotiations and keep the sanctions regime against Iran. Regardless of what their strategy is or strategies are, the saber rattling definitely helps give an edge to the US negotiating team.

Obama Threatens to Walk Out While Sending Secret Messages

On the eve of the June 30 deadline, when the US Department of State confirmed that the negotiations with Tehran were being extended for another week, US President Barack Obama made the threat of “walking away” from the negotiating table with Iran on June 29. “I will walk away from the negotiations if in fact it’s a bad deal,” Obama told reporters during a press conference with his visiting Brazilian counterpart, Dilma Rousseff.

As a response to the fog of war that has deliberate been created around the nuclear negotiations, on the same day that Obama threatened to “walk away” from the negotiations, the Iranian parliamentarian Mehrdad Bazrpash told Fars News Agency that the US leader had sent Iran another secret letter. The letter is believed to have been delivered to the Iranian side by Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi sometime during his visit to Tehran either on June 17 or 18, 2015. MP Bazrpash took the opportunity to point out that the contents of Obama’s letter where very different from the public position of Washington. The point is that Washington’s private messages to Iran are very different from what the Obama Administration is saying in public and that Washington’s public threats are meant to create the impression that it is negotiating from a position of strength.

In reality, it is the US that needs a nuclear deal with Iran. In the first place, the US only began negotiations with Iran when it saw that it had no means left to pressure Tehran. A war with Iran is too dangerous and unpredictable for the US. Moreover, it was becoming increasingly clear that the sanctions were going to crumble as the Chinese, Russians, and others began to show signs that they would normalize trade with Iran even if a nuclear agreement was not reached.

Washington needs a deal with Iran to deactivate tensions with Tehran. Deactivating or freezing tensions with Iran are important for Washington, because it will be able to focus more on Russia and China. An accommodation with Iran will allow the US and the EU to tighten sanctions on Russia. It will additionally help the European Union eventually substitute energy imports from Russia with energy imports from Iran. In this regard, one of Washington’s major objectives is to co-opt the Iranians against the Russians.

In Vienna the US Team Acted As If the US Never Signed the Lausanne Agreement

Although the nuclear negotiations for a final deal or what is called the “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” were extended until July 7, 2015 under what the negotiating teams have dubbed the “Joint Plan of Action” (JPA), a major stumbling block has been the release of the immense holdings of Iranian financial assets and funds that have been frozen or seized under the justification of sanctions. Months before the June 30 deadline, US Secretary of State John Kerry told the US Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs that the Iranians had well over one hundred billion US dollars that were seized and frozen. In addition, he testified that since 2012 that the US has denied the Iranians access to two hundred billion US dollars in lost exports and funds held in restricted accounts.

The Lausanne Agreement was reached by Iran and the P5+1 on the basis of an understanding between Iran, the US, and the EU that there would be simultaneous gives-and-takes of equal substance. That means that sanctions would be dropped at the same time that Iran made nuclear concessions. Tehran has been very adamant about this point, refusing to make any concessions without having sanctions reciprocally dropped and having access to its appropriate financial assets.

During the negotiations at the Palais Coburg or Palais Saxe-Coburg Hotel in the Austrian capital of Vienna, the US government took backward steps and reversed its track. In Vienna, the US no longer recognized the terms of the Lausanne Agreement and the understanding that the US side had reached with the Iranians and committed itself to respecting. There was a return by the US team to arguing over the number of Iranian centrifuges that could be in operation, demands for restrictions on nuclear research and scientific development, demands for inspections of Iran’s military bases, and a refusal not to prolong the economic sanctions against the Iranians.

Siphoning Iran’s Money: Have Frozen Funds Been Funneled Elsewhere?

The US and the EU are no strangers to looting from others. When financial sanctions were imposed on Libya by the US and the EU, Libyan funds and the interest they accumulated were appropriated and even illegally used by these actors. In this regard there are important questions about why the US is trying to keep the sanctions on Iran or to end them in gradual phases.

Are Iranian financial assets and funds really frozen or are they also being utilized as loans or collateral? In other words, have Iran’s frozen funds been channeled elsewhere by the US and the EU to make up for their own economic problems and the economic war against Russia? Do the financial liabilities of those holding Iranian funds exceed their financial assets? More simply asked: can the countries that froze Iran’s money pay Tehran its money back or are they stalling, because they cannot return all the money that was frozen under sanctions?

The position of the US and France are excuses to avoid lifting the sanctions on Iran and to avoid returning Iranian funds. Their goal is to neutralize the Iranian nuclear energy program while keeping the sanctions and appropriating Iranian funds. This is why the frame of time for Washington’s promises to remove the sanctions have no guarantees. What the US is doing is trying to impose legal obligations on Iran without giving any guarantees on the removal of sanctions. Washington’s promises to remove the sanctions also gradually became longer, changing from six months to a year to over a year, and have had additionally conditions placed on them.

Aside from the strategic considerations and dimensions of the nuclear negotiations, it should come as no surprise if Washington is stonewalling a final agreement to help the US and the EU continue siphoning Iran’s earnings. After all the US is in the midst of an economic war and fighting to keep the US dollar’s position as the top currency of the world while the EU is experiencing economic decline. The EU, however, is in a predicament; even if it wanted to keep Iranian funds and continue the sanctions, it still needs to start large-scale trade with Iran to mitigate its economic decline and negative effects from the EU sanctions against Russia.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/is-a-nuclear-deal-with-iran-being-stalled-because-the-west-cant-pay-tehrans-money-back/5459994

Belgium exits from anti-ISIL coalition’s bombing campaign in Syria and Iraq

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By Sputnik
Global Research, July 04, 2015
Sputnik 3 July 2015
Signs of Disillusionment

On Friday, Belgian media announced that their country’s contribution to the anti-ISIL coalition mission has been suspended. Commenting on the announcement, a senior Syrian official told Sputnik that that Brussels’ move comes as no surprise, given the growing divide between the coalition’s stated military aims and its actual activities.

Friday’s announcement came after Belgium’s six F-16 fighter bombers had already returned from their base in Jordan, where they had spent the last nine months participating in the US-led bombing campaign against ISIL in Iraq. Brussels has declared that it could no longer afford to continue funding the air operation.

Asked for comment by Sputnik, Syrian Information Minister assistant Ali al-Ahmed stated that Brussels’ announcement comes as no surprise, given repeated reports of Europeans’ growing doubts “about the effectiveness of the coalition and its operations.” Noting that the Belgian government has been plagued by high rates of disapproval of “this enormous and ineffective spending,” al-Ahmed told Sputnik that “Belgium has now come to personify European countries’ dissatisfaction over the coalition’s actions.”

The Syrian civil servant lamented that “from the very beginning, this coalition has not been serious in its approach to fighting the terrorists. We have noticed that the coalition only strikes at those ISIL and al-Nusra objects which threaten Western interests. The coalition’s military aviation is fighting terrorism not out of the need to fight evil, but based on the narrow self-interest of the parties involved.” According to al-Ahmed, “this explains why air strikes regularly miss ISIL targets and facilities,” or strike “military targets of the forces of the people’s militia leading the real fight against ISIL.” The advisor notes that “even civilians who assist the army and the militia have repeatedly been subjected to coalition airstrikes.”

Al-Ahmed criticized Western nations’ use of limited financial resources for expensive airstrikes, noting that these funds could have been much more effectively spent by providing assistance to the countries directly involved in the fight against ISIL terror, including Iraq and Syria.

Ultimately, Al-Ahmed, whose country has been involved in a battle against radical Islamic groups for over four years now, pessimistically noted that “the main goal of this coalition is to preserve the balance of forces on the ground, so that no one can win, with the shedding of blood continuing for a long time, until the US is able to implement its interests in the region.”

http://www.globalresearch.ca/belgiums-exit-from-anti-isil-coalitions-bombing-campaign-in-syria-and-iraq/5460409

Russia’s Gazprom deal with Germany for mutual benefit cuts through US-NATO propaganda

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As Russia looks at long-term relationships and partnerships, not subjugation, certainly not aggression, Washington resolutely refuses to “get it” because it wants to be the center of the universe.

U.S. and many NATO alliance leaders seem to have the maturity of spoiled two-year-old brats. The dangerous thing is they have weapons of mass destruction at their fingertips and little scruples, morals, common sense, emotional balance, humility, or again, maturity to deal with anything other than their immediate desires. Alcoholics Anonymous calls this syndrome King Baby.

The world is at a very perilous crossroads. The United States sees itself as indispensable and exceptional, is prepared to take no prisoners, can justify any action, and has a history of savagery. The American public is willing to be hoodwinked repeatedly, unwilling to strip the massive budgets from the Pentagon and NSA, and though they may feel one way privately, is generally unwilling to put shoe leather to pavement to demonstrate publicly or take risks. Because of this, one must step very carefully.

By Mike Whitney
Global Research, July 03, 2015
CounterPunch 29 June 2015

Here’s the scoop: Two days before the swaggering Sec-Def touched down in Germany, Gazprom announced that it was putting the finishing touches on a massive deal that would double the amount of Russian gas flowing to Germany via a second Nord Stream pipeline. The shocking announcement made it look like the clueless Carter had no idea what was going on and that his efforts to isolate Russia were a complete flop. And, make no mistake; the deal is huge, big enough to change the geopolitical calculus of the entire region. Robert Morley explains what’s going on in a recent article at The Trumpet:

“Once this pipeline is finished, almost all of Eastern Europe can be completely cut out of the gas picture. There will be no need for any gas to transit through Ukraine, Poland, Romania, Belarus, Hungary or Slovakia.” (Gazprom’s Dangerous New Nord Stream Gas Pipeline to Germany, The Trumpet)

Yep, Ukraine is out and Germany’s in, which means that Washington’s plan to extend US hegemony by driving a wedge between Russia and Europe is down the plughole.

Judo expert Putin has done it again; he waited until the eleventh hour to pull the rug out from under the blustery Carter, and now he’s sitting back enjoying the show. Is it any wonder why Carter’s been running around Europe with his hair on fire? Here’s more from the same article:

“Think of the huge leverage this will give Russia…..Germany may not have much in the way of natural resources of its own, but with Russia’s help, it is becoming an energy hub of Europe! Increasing quantities of Russian gas are flowing through Germany before being distributed to countries like the Netherlands, Belgium, France and Britain. In this way Germany leverages the power of Russia. Western Europe also is becoming dependent on Germany for gas supplies too…

Don’t let the current conflict in Ukraine cloud what is happening. Germany and Russia have a history of secret cooperation—even when headline conflict appears to indicate otherwise. That Germany and Russia would push through such a deal when the West is supposedly sanctioning Russia for its actions in Ukraine speaks volumes.” (“Gazprom’s Dangerous New Nord Stream Gas Pipeline to Germany”, The Trumpet)

Talk about sour grapes! The author would like you believe that US motives in Europe are pure as the driven snow, but are they? Is Washington really afraid of Russian aggression or are they trying desperately to keep the unipolar model intact by separating Germany and Russia? Isn’t that what the sanctions are all about? STRATFOR CEO George Friedman summed up it up perfectly in a recent speech he gave at The Chicago Council on Foreign Affairs. He said:

“The primordial interest of the United States, over which for centuries we have fought wars–the First, the Second and Cold Wars–has been the relationship between Germany and Russia, because united there, they’re the only force that could threaten us. And to make sure that that doesn’t happen.”

Bingo. This is Washington’s strategy in a nutshell, preventing German industry from linking up with Russia’s vast natural resources. That’s the lethal combo that will lead to an integrated Eurasian free trade zone that will dwarf US GDP and put an end to the empire. So don’t believe the baloney about “Russian aggression”. What Washington really cares about is an economic rival that could leave it in the dust. And that’s exactly what’s going to happen when Germany becomes Moscow’s biggest gas station.

Naturally, the Gazprom news left Carter in a bit of a crabby mood, which may explain why he’s been dragging himself from one Capital to the next issuing terse warnings to Putin while promising NATO more weapons, more troops, more joint-maneuvers, and more missiles. And for what? To stop the Cossacks from sweeping across the Steppe and into Baltics? Be serious. Putin’s not going to invade Europe. He wants their business, that’s all. Like we’ve been saying from the beginning; Putin just wants to makes some dough. He wants to pull his economy out of recession, and, yes, beef up Gazprom’s profits. Is there a problem with that?

Nope. In fact, that’s the way the US used to do things, y’know, before they decided it was easier to just blow up stuff and steal whatever they could.

But all this whining about Putin is ridiculous, don’t you think? So he sells gas to Europe. So what? Get over it. No one likes a whiner.

The US did everything in its power to sabotage South Stream, and they succeeded too. Score one for Team USA. But did they really think it would end there? Did they really think that that Putin would just fold his tent and go home for a good cry? Did they really think he was going to walk away from his biggest trading partner and move on to China?

Of course not. Any fool could have seen this coming, so why was the Pentagon caught flatfooted? Don’t they have anyone on the payroll who can figure out stuff like this or are they too busy with their damn wargames? And why is Carter talking about tanks and missiles systems when US trade reps should be looking for ways to cut a deal? Isn’t that the way capitalism is supposed to work or has the US degenerated to the point where it has to incinerate anyone it can’t compete with? It’s pathetic! Here’s a clip from Carter in Europe:

“One of [Putin’s] stated views is a longing for the past and that’s where we have a different perspective on the world and even on Russia’s future, Carter said. “We’d like to see us all moving forward, Europe moving forward, and that does not seem to be his stated perspective.”

C’mon, Carter. Can’t you just man-up and admit the US can’t compete anymore so you’ve decided to start a war instead. Is that so hard to say?

Of course Carter has made every effort to sweep the Gazprom story under the rug and pretend that nothing has happened, but anyone who follows these things can figure it out. The fact is, he got his clock-cleaned by Putin, and not just once either. There was another bombshell on Wednesday that just added a little icing to the cake. Check this out from Oil Price.com:

“Russia’s state-run gas company Gazprom says it has taken a step toward building the Turkish Stream pipeline by securing permission from Ankara to begin surveying waters of the Black Sea for the offshore leg of the project…..Alexander Novak, Russia’s energy minister, says he expects Ankara and Moscow will sign an agreement to build Turkish Stream by the end of June.” (Controversial Gazprom Pipeline Clears Hurdle, Oil Price)

That’s what you call the double whammy! Now Putin’s going to be pumping gas into Europe from both directions leaving Uncle Sam out in the cold. Can you feel those Russian pincers starting to tighten around Europe? Now you can understand why Carter’s been running around Europe with his knickers in a twist; it’s because his glorious divide and conquer strategy just exploded in his face. His only option now is to scrap Plan A altogether and go back to drawing board. What a freaking disaster.

There’s another story that broke during Carter’s euro-junket that’s also worth mentioning. This is from Bloomberg:

“Ukraine will miss a bond coupon payment in July, setting off a default on about $19 billion of debt, as a standoff with creditors shows no sign of abating, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc…

Ukraine is giving creditors a few weeks to accept a proposal that includes a 40 percent writedown to principal before it imposes a debt moratorium, a person familiar with the talks said on June 19.

“Ukraine will not make the July 24 coupon payment and, as a result, will enter into default at that point,” Matheny said of his base-case scenario in the report. “We do not expect the ad hoc committee to accept Ukraine’s latest restructuring proposal.” (Goldman Sees Ukraine Default in July as Debt Standoff Holds, Bloomberg)

Ukraine is busted, are you kidding me? The country that was so critical to US plans for luring Putin into a Vietnam-type quagmire, is headed for bankruptcy? So all that work was for nothing–toppling the government, arming the Nazis, fomenting a civil war, incinerating buildings full of civilians in Odessa, shooting down commercial airliners, and plunging the state into Somalia-like chaotic abyss? It was all just a big miscalculation, a boo-boo; is that it?

Can you see why the United States can’t be trusted as “the guarantor of global security”? Washington destroys everything it touches with its wrecking ball foreign policy; Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria. Now it’s destroyed Ukraine. Who’ll be next?

Putin has done us all a favor by throwing a wrench in Washington’s plans and helping to bring the era of imperial overreach to a swift and merciful end. We all owe him a debt of gratitude.

Way to go, Vladimir.

Mike Whitney lives in Washington state. He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion (AK Press). Hopeless is also available in a Kindle edition. He can be reached at fergiewhitney@msn.com .

http://www.globalresearch.ca/putin-gobsmacks-uncle-sam-again/5460115

More wildfires in Chernobyl exclusion zone

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Posted on Optimal Prediction.com July 2, 2015

The latest wildfire to break out near Chernobyl has consumed 130 hectares. It started on June 29, and it is unclear whether it is still burning or not.

Experts have recorded 0.0025 becquerels of Cesium-137 per cubic meter of air. The inspection found that it is beyond the measures usually observed.

According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Emergency Situations, the fire in the Chernobyl exclusion zone continues, firefighters are unable to resolve the situation. (link)

Air near the desolated settlement of Polesskoye in the Chernobyl zone is contaminated with the radioactive element cesium-137. Its content in the air has reached a level called “sequence above the norm” (approximately ten times the norm), the State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine (SNRI) reported on Wednesday.

Cesium-137 is one of the most dangerous nuclear elements, as it accumulates in the body and can lead to leukemia. (link)

The radiation risk involves the fire spreading to areas closer to the plant. But there is no danger of a new explosion.

Fire near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine poses a danger to the surrounding regions, expert of the Polish branch of Greenpeace Jan Haverkamp told TASS on Thursday.

“We are monitoring the situation. Fortunately, the fire has not yet reached the NPP reactor zone. It’s very dangerous that everything is happening in the nuclear power plant area. If the fire spreads there, a huge amount of radiation will get into the atmosphere,” he said. “It’s a risk, but the risk primarily to Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, as they are located in close vicinity,” Haverkamp said.

According to him, there will be no explosion, similar to the 1986 accident, and Eastern European countries, including Poland, have now nothing to worry about.

“We welcome the efforts of Ukrainian authorities that are doing their utmost to prevent the fire from spreading,” the expert said. (link)

http://optimalprediction.com/wp/another-fire-in-chernobyl-exclusion-zone-increasing-i-131-and-emissions-at-fukushima/

http://sputniknews.com/europe/20150702/1024111335.html

 

Banned German satire “Die Anstalt”. Media double standards on Russia and Ukraine (Eng Subs)

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Published on Jan 3, 2015

The scandal episode of the German political satire program ‘Die Anstalt’ about the media leaders’ ties to lobby organisations and their use of enemy images in the Ukrainian conflict.

Josef Joffe and Jochen Bittner – a publisher-editor and political editor of the major German newspaper ‘Zeit’ got an injunction against ZDF to prevent this episode of ‘Die Anstalt’ from being publicly available as it questions the impartiality of the two Zeit journalists. As a result, this episode was temporarily banned from German TV and the ZDF mediathek.

After several months the court ruled in favor of ZDF and the injunction was lifted.

The full episode without subtitles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOzd8…

The lonely American

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By Chris Hedges
June 29, 2015
“Information Clearing House” –
“Truthdig“-

Michael P. Printup, president of Watkins Glen International, one of the country’s largest racetracks, stood with a group of about a dozen race fans at 8:30 a.m. Saturday. Next to him were boxes of free doughnuts and coffee. A line of men with towels, who had spent the night in nearby RV campers, pop-up campers and tents, stood patiently outside the door to a shower room. A light drizzle, one that would turn into a torrential downpour and lead to the races being canceled in the afternoon, coated the group, all middle-aged or older white men. They were discussing, amid the high-pitched whine of cars practicing on the 3.4-mile, 11-turn circuit racetrack, the aging demographic of race fans and the inability to lure a new generation to the sport.

“Maybe if you installed chargers for phones around the track they would come,” suggested one gray-haired man.

But it is not just sporting events. Public lectures, church services, labor unions, Veterans of Foreign Wars halls, Masonic halls, Rotary clubs, the Knights of Columbus, the Lions Club, Grange Hall meetings, the League of Women Voters, Daughters of the American Revolution, local historical societies, town halls, bowling leagues, bridge clubs, movie theater attendance (at a 20-year low), advocacy groups such as the NAACP and professional and amateur theatrical and musical performances cater to a dwindling and graying population. No one is coming through the door to take the place of the old members. A generation has fallen down the rabbit hole of electronic hallucinations—with images often dominated by violence and pornography. They have become, in the words of the philosopher Hannah Arendt, “atomized,” sucked alone into systems of information and entertainment that cater to America’s prurient fascination with the tawdry, the cruel and the deadening cult of the self.

The entrapment in a world of nonstop electronic sounds and images, begun with the phonograph and radio, advanced by cinema and television and perfected by video games, the Internet and hand-held devices, is making it impossible to build relationships and structures that are vital for civic engagement and resistance to corporate power. We have been transformed into commodities. The steady decline of the white male heaven that is NASCAR—which has stopped publishing the falling attendance at its tracks and at some speedways has begun to tear down bleachers—is ominous. It is the symbol of a captive society.

“We don’t see the youth coming in,” Printup said. “The millennial, the younger adults 18 to 35, is our target. We spend millions of dollars a year to target that group. But it’s hard. Look around. Who’s the youngest person here? That’s our problem. Every sport from the NFL to NHL is struggling with the 18 to 35 demographic. They call them weird. They call them difficult. They only want to look at their computers.”

Printup’s parent company, the International Speedway Corp. (ISC), has invested significant sums to reach this demographic with little to show for it.

“We have a digital firm that represents nearly all our tracks in the ISC,” he went on, noting that Watkins Glen, which drew about 16,000 fans this past weekend, is one of the few exceptions to the decline in numbers. “The digital platform is about the only way you can get to them. We target them. We buy lists. We hire an agency that tracks their Web and Internet interactions. If they bring up racing, we want to be there. When a kid Googles ‘Ferrari—racing—sports car’ we are one of the top 10 lists. We pay for that. It is not cheap. That’s how you have got to get these kids. But it’s not working the way it should.”

Robert D. Putnam pointed out the decline of independent civic engagement, or what he called our “social capital,” in his book “Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community.” He noted that our severance from local communal and civic groups brought with it not only loneliness and alienation, but also a dangerous and passive reliance on the state.

Totalitarian societies, including our own, inundate the public with a steady stream of propaganda accompanied by mindless entertainment. They seek to destroy independent organizations. In Nazi Germany the state provided millions of cheap, state-subsidized radios and then dominated the airwaves with its propaganda. Radio receivers were mounted in public locations in Stalin’s Soviet Union; and citizens, especially illiterate peasants, were required to gather to listen to the state-controlled news and the dictator’s speeches. These totalitarian states also banned civic organizations that were not under the iron control of the party.

The corporate state is no different, although unlike past totalitarian systems it permits dissent in the form of print and does not ban fading civic and community groups. It has won the battle against literacy. The seductiveness of the image lures most Americans away from the print-based world of ideas. The fascination with the image swallows the time and energy required to attend and maintain communal organizations. If no one reads, why censor books? Let Noam Chomsky publish as much as he wants. Just keep his voice off the airwaves. If no one attends community meetings, group events or organizations, why prohibit them? Let them be held in near-empty rooms and left uncovered by the press until they are shuttered.

The object of a totalitarian state is to keep its citizens locked within the parameters of official propaganda and permanently isolated. Propaganda and isolation make it difficult for an individual to express or carry out dissent. Official opinions, little more than digestible slogans and clichés, are crafted and disseminated by public relations specialists on behalf of the power elite. They are repeated endlessly over the airwaves until the public unconsciously ingests them. And the isolated public in a totalitarian society is unable to connect its personal experience of despair, anxiety, fear, frustration and economic insecurity to the structures that create these conditions. The isolated citizen is left feeling that his or her personal misfortune is an exception. The portrayal of society by systems of state propaganda—content, respectful of authority, just, economically secure and free—is mistaken for reality.

Totalitarian propaganda, accompanied by isolation, or what Arendt called “atomization,” makes it possible for a population not to “believe in anything visible, in the reality of their own experience; they do not trust their eyes and ears but only their imaginations, which may be caught by anything that is at once universal and consistent in itself.” This propaganda, Arendt went on, “gave the masses of atomized, undefinable, unstable and futile individuals a means of self-definition and identification.”

Corporate propaganda saturates the public, especially a generation wedded to new technology, with these lies. Its power, however, comes from the meticulous study of the moods, prejudices, whims and desires of the public, to manipulate the masses in their own language and emotions. Konrad Heiden made this point when he examined fascist propaganda in Nazi Germany, noting that propaganda must detect the murmur of the public “and translate it into intelligible utterance and convincing action.”

“The true aim of political propaganda is not to influence, but to study, the masses,” Heiden wrote. “The speaker is in constant communication with the masses; he hears an echo, and senses the inner vibration.” Heiden, forced to flee Nazi Germany, went on: “When a resonance issues from the depths of the substance, the masses have given him the pitch; he knows in what terms he must finally address them. Rather than a means of directing the mass mind, propaganda is a technique for riding with the masses. It is not a machine to make wind but a sail to catch the wind.”

Dissent will only be possible when we break the dark spell of corporate propaganda and the isolation that accompanies it. We must free ourselves from corporate tyranny, which means refusing to invest our emotional and intellectual energy in electronic images. We must build what the Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin  called “voluntary associations for study and teaching, for industry, commerce, science, art, literature, exploitation, resistance to exploitation, amusement, serious work, gratification and self-denial.”

“We know well the means by which this association of the lord, priest, merchant, judge, soldier, and king founded its domination,” Kropotkin wrote. “It was by the annihilation of all free unions: of village communities, guilds, trades unions, fraternities, and medieval cities. It was by confiscating the land of the communes and the riches of the guilds; it was by the absolute and ferocious prohibition of all kinds of free agreement between men; it was by massacre, the wheel, the gibbet, the sword, and the fire that Church and State established their domination, and that they succeeded henceforth to reign over an incoherent agglomeration of subjects, who had no direct union more among themselves.”

Corporate propaganda has become so potent that many Americans are addicted. We must leave our isolated rooms. We must shut out these images. We must connect with those around us. It is only the communal that will save us. It is only the communal that will allow us to build a movement to resist. And it is only the communal that will sustain us through mutual aid as climate change and economic collapse increasingly dominate our future.

Chris Hedges spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years.

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http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42268.htm

Armenia: Electric Yerevan and lessons on the Color-Spring tactic

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by Joaquin Flores
June 27, 2015
A Fort Russ and Greanville Post Feature

The Electric Yerevan protest provides us with an excellent opportunity to review some of the basic underlying mechanics and psychology of the Color-Spring tactic.  It is important to share these publicly, for it is indeed probable that the Color-Spring tactic will be increasingly applied in the world as a “hybrid soft-power/hard-power tactic”.
A moral principle held by Gene Sharp, who was one of the tactic’s main developers, was that violence is not necessary for revolution. What is strange, contradictory, even dishonest here is that violence is reduced taxonomically to the physical violence of the state’s gendarmes against the civilians.  But we know that violence comes in many forms.
We live in a time of great violence; physical, psychological, legal, economic, spiritual violence.  Not only has the Color Revolution tactic engendered the latter four, but its mutation into the Arab Spring tactic also employs heinous physical violence.  We can see today, tens of thousands dead in Libya, hundreds of thousands in Syria, and a mounting figure in Ukraine which threatens to surpass the precedents.
“Non-violent” change in Syria
Novices to political science and political activism may be lured by the spectre and spectacle of the Color Revolution method that has characterized ostensible movements for radical social change in the last generation.  The symbols have become iconic and clichéd: the tent city, the die-in, the girl placing flowers in the gendarme’s gun barrels, water cannons and tear-gas, the fist flag.
What is missing of course from this view is an understanding of the real social forces in a society, class and economic forces.  For forty years, genuine activism, labor union militancy, has been marginalized.  In place of direct action against the ruling class at the very places that make their wealth, is a strange simulation of late 1960’s student activism; shown to us on a never-ending film reel loop.
Others have caught on to the fact that the US has been funding these protest movements, and that these ‘grass-roots’ movements are in fact astroturf movements.  Still, it is misunderstood how the US viewed these governments before they tried to destabilize them.
One thing which is often popularly misunderstood about the Color-Spring tactic, by those who know that the US is behind them, is that governments being targeted for regime change by the US are not just those which have apparently bad relations with the US, but may in fact be generally US-friendly governments.  By and large, in fact, the latter is the case.  We will be exploring this aspect as it relates to Armenia.
Also we will look at some of the methods used in the application of this tactic in Armenia, and at the general psychological and technical framework of the organizing methods.
Gene Sharp – a man of ‘Non-Violence’
Why the US Targets ‘Regimes’ for ‘Change’
In the Color-Spring tactic, the US may target countries for ‘regime change’ that it has had generally constructive relations with, but whose other ties are increasingly problematic.  It may be also generally friendly countries who refuse to commit resources to reshaping regional power balances, such as with Mubarak in Egypt, who was reluctant to interfere with Syria.  Another reason may be that the targeted country has a natural relationship with other countries in its region which, regardless of the official position of the government, promotes certain economic and meta-political relationships and developments which are contrary to US interests.  In the latter case, it may be desirable to employ a scorched earth policy, known as the ‘failed state’, in order to destroy the material foundations of economic and political coherency.
Given the failure of the Orange Revolution to frustrate relations with Russia, the situation in Ukraine may be an example of this scorched earth/failed state strategy.   Conclusively, the Color-Spring tactic is compatible with any number of strategies, and can be a part of producing any number of desired outcomes, and as such is a very useful weapon to possess.
How the US Sets up a ‘Regime’ for ‘Change’

Interview with Michel Chossudovsky: US/NATO playing war games on Russia’s doorstep, threatening Russia with a first-strike nuclear attack

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By Prof Michel Chossudovsky
Global Research, June 28, 2015
Press TV

Press TV has conducted an interview with Michel Chossudovsky, of the Centre for Research on Globalization in Montreal, concerning NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg calling on Moscow to stop “supporting” pro-Russia forces in eastern Ukraine.
Press TV: Do you think it is in the role of NATO Secretary General to warn Russia against the situation in eastern Ukraine?

Chossudovsky: I think NATO has the ability of turning the realities upside down, because recent reports confirm that it is not Russia which is supporting the rebels but NATO and the United States which are supporting Ukraine not only with so-called nonlethal weapons but also with military advisers, training and so on. Moreover, they are now providing core support not only to the armed forces but also to the neo-Nazi National Guard. And the US Congress has debated this issue and they said yes, we will support the National Guard but we will not support the Neo-Nazi Azov battalion.

Other countries such as Canada are supporting the Azov battalion, but I should say that while the Azov battalion has been recognized as a neo-Nazi entity, the Right Sector Nazi party has an oversight and control over the entire National Guard.

In recent developments, Ukraine’s military has been bombing civilian areas including schools. There is ample evidence to that effect, and ironically NATO is accusing the separatist forces of Donbass of killing their own people, so to speak, when in fact those strikes were perpetrated by the Ukrainian armed forces.

Press TV: Basically you are saying that the US and NATO have set the grounds to ensure this grace period that there is of relative calm in eastern Ukraine is used to basically once again increase hostilities and ensure that there is no separatist movement left within eastern Ukraine. However, my question to you is what does NATO get out of it?

Chossudovsky: I think we have to look at the broader military agenda, because NATO – and when we say NATO we are saying the United States – the United States and NATO are involved in war games on Russia’s doorstep.

They have several initiatives, they are moving military hardware to Eastern Europe, and this serves as an act of provocation directed against the Russian Federation; and they accuse Russia without evidence of supporting the rebels when in fact they have their own troops right on Russia’s doorstep supporting the Ukrainian government, which is an illegitimate government.

And I think there is another element which has not been understood or even reported in the media, is that the president of Ukraine, President Poroshenko, has made the statement and it is with Ukraine Constitutional Court that the coup directed against his predecessor Yanukovych was an illegal act rather than a “transition towards democracy” n.

So within Ukraine there is there is division within the leadership. The country is in crisis situation following the imposition of the IMF’s deadly microeconomic reforms and the impoverishment of large sectors of the population. And within the armed forces there are also divisions and there is also a movement at the grassroots to refuse to fight, in other words not to join the armed forces, not to be involved in a civil war in eastern Ukraine.

Press TV: So if Russia is the big enemy here, what do you make of that? Is Russia a threat to the West – militarily or strategically speaking?

Chossudovsky: I think that Russia is not a threat and neither is China. The United States is engaged on a very dangerous path, because they have adopted the doctrine of preemptive war and they are in fact also saying that they can use nuclear weapons against Russia on a preemptive first strike basis.

Now that type of discourse is extremely dangerous, because it could ignite a World War III scenario.

First of all, they say that the new generation of nuclear weapons, namely the tactical nuclear weapons, are harmless to civilians and can be used against non-nuclear states; this is an outright lie.

And now they that they are threatening Russia with nuclear weapons, and this is very clear, the nuclear option has been debated in the US Congress.

We are at a very dangerous crossroads in our history – the unthinkable: a possible World War III scenario.

And this is no longer at the abstract level, it has been envisaged by decision makers in the Pentagon and it could unleash World War III.

Order Michel Chossudovsky’s Book directly from GR,  

Towards a World War III Scenario, TheDangers of Nuclear War,

Global Research, Montreal, 2011, also available in pdf.

WWIII Scenario

Nuclear war has become a multibillion dollar undertaking, which fills the pockets of US defense contractors. What is at stake is the outright “privatization of nuclear war”.

The Pentagon’s global military design is one of world conquest. The military deployment of US-NATO forces is occurring in several regions of the world simultaneously.

Central to an understanding of war, is the media campaign which grants it legitimacy in the eyes of public opinion. A good versus evil dichotomy prevails. The perpetrators of war are presented as the victims. Public opinion is misled.

Breaking the “big lie”, which upholds war as a humanitarian undertaking, means breaking a criminal project of global destruction, in which the quest for profit is the overriding force. This profit-driven military agenda destroys human values and transforms people into unconscious zombies.

The object of this book is to forcefully reverse the tide of war, challenge the war criminals in high office and the powerful corporate lobby groups which support them.

Reviews

“This book is a ‘must’ resource – a richly documented and systematic diagnosis of the supremely pathological geo-strategic planning of US wars since ‘9-11’ against non-nuclear countries to seize their oil fields and resources under cover of ‘freedom and democracy’.”
–John McMurtry, Professor of Philosophy, Guelph University

“In a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably “humanitarian” wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call.”
-Denis Halliday, Former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations

Michel Chossudovsky exposes the insanity of our privatized war machine. Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defense industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered. If we must have a military, it belongs entirely in the public sector. No one should profit from mass death and destruction.
–Ellen Brown, author of ‘Web of Debt’ and president of the Public Banking Institute

http://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2015/06/26/417607/Russia-Ukraine-NATO-US-Europe

http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-nato-playing-war-games-on-russias-doorstep-threaten-russia-with-a-first-strike-nuclear-attack-michel-chossudovsky/5458752

Historic interview with Tariq Aziz: “It’s not ‘regime change’ America wants, but ‘region change’…The Embargo also extends to dialogue.”

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“Madam Felicity, when I was ten years old, I was handing out leaflets in the streets of Baghdad, putting them through people’s doors, to stop the British stealing our oil. I am not about to give up on Iraq now.”
Former Iraq Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz died of a heart attack in prison June 5, 2015.
By Felicity Arbuthnot
Global Research, June 27, 2015

First published by Middle East International, 21st May 1999.

Author’s note: In context, this interview took place during the most draconian US-UK led UN sanctions ever imposed on a country, denying all essential to modern life, which had been in place for nine years and nine months.

Tariq Aziz doesn’t hide his anger and frustration when speaking of his country’s plight:

“This is a region of conflicts, upheavals, revolutions, but this is the first time such rigid and comprehensive sanctions have been imposed anywhere.

“Prior to the embargo we had a high standard of free education from primary school to university and free health care. But one cannot live alone in the world. Nations need to trade, to buy and sell. There has been a sharp deterioration in health, social services, electricity, clean water.”

Seated in his Baghdad office, Iraq’s Deputy Prime Minister lists countless further examples of the misery inflicted by sanctions, from how the collapse of the Dinar has slashed the income of once well paid professionals to the equivalent of $3 a month, to the way the world’s former number one date producer is prohibited from selling its crop.

Aziz stresses that increasing the amount of oil that Iraq is allowed to sell under the oil-for-food arrangement to $5.2 billion every six months does nothing to alleviate the situation: “Our oil industry cannot do it”, he says.

“They need new equipment, parts, extensive refurbishment. Even before recent further damage by bombing, we could pump less than $2billion worth each six months. Forty percent of that goes to the UN. We are still paying for UNSCOM* which destroyed hundreds of factories and equipment, a number of whose Members are now exposed as spies. We also paying reparations to Kuwait and so on. We have nearly twenty three million inhabitants. We need  $16-18 billion a year plus export of commodities. Yet we are not allowed agricultural equipment to produce our own food, so we have to import.”

Ironically it was the UN Food and Agricultural Organization which advised Iraq that importing the bulk of its food needs made better economic sense than trying to become self-reliant. In 1993, just  three years in to the embargo, the (UN) World Food Programme warned that: “All the pre-famine indicators are now in place” in Iraq.

He recalls how James Baker ** told him during their famous pre-war meeting in Geneva that if Iraq did not comply with US demands: “We will reduce you to the pre-industrial age.” “That remains the objective today”, he asserts.

“In March ’91, we were left with no telephones or electricity, no clean water, with the refineries either crippled or damaged, almost all the bridges bombed, thus the country virtually divided. But we rebuilt and restored to a certain degree. The government remained. But now there are almost daily bombardments with the same objective.

“In the December (1998) aggression, the US ignored the (UN) Security Council. Fifteen Members were formally meeting (to discuss Iraq) and the bombs were already falling.”

Aziz contrasts Washingtons’s refusal to talk to Baghdad with the increasingly receptive ears grievance against sanctions have been falling on in other world capitals. “When we go to the US we are not allowed to leave New York. Congressmen, old friends, must come to New York to see us. Even a minor official at the UN is not allowed a cup of tea in the lobby with an Iraqi official. The Embargo also extends to dialogue. Dialogue is the golden rule to finding solutions. Yet the US accuses us of being ‘undemocratic’ “, he says.

“Recently, President Chirac was denied permission to discuss Iraq with (President) Clinton, yet Paris is deeply involved and I can talk at any level with them, the Russians, the Chinese. Big delegations visit here and I recently travelled to Spain, Italy, Belgium and France. But sanctions are genocide. If the US wants to impose military sanctions on Iraq, let them do it, but don’t deprive our children of milk, health, medicine.”

He has no doubt why the US attitude:

“ Iraq has the second largest oil reserves – actually the first. You can find oil wherever you drill in Iraq. The US wishes to dominate oil, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. They want to keep us dormant, to bring in a pro-US government and present that as bringing about ‘democracy’ and ‘human rights.’ We are a ‘threat to peace and stability’ and a ‘threat to the region.’ ”

“Yet Saudi Arabia, run by just one man, is the darling of Washington. The irony is that the countries of the region are paying dearly, Saudi and Kuwait are paying – while we are the perceived ‘threat’ – for Americans to be on their soil.”

But doesn’t Iraq indeed pose a threat to its neighbours? What about human rights? Halabja? The Kurds? He replies that Iraq too feels threatened by US bases in the region, that the Kurds have a better deal than their Turkish counterparts, enjoying autonomy, official recognition and cultural rights. The truth about such matters, he intimates, is in the eye of the beholder.

“I have read stories in The Times that President Saddam shoots people in Cabinet meetings. How could he survive? Iraqis are quick to revolt as they did in 1921, 1931, 1947, 1957 and 1968.”

So how is this impasse to be resolved?

“Why don’t a cross-party group of US Congressmen come here, address our parliament, engage in dialogue, meet people? Misunderstandings arise from lack of dialogue. Even our Bishop” – Aziz is a Chaldean Christian – “cannot get in to the US to travel with a delegation. He has had to apply for a Vatican passport

“Last year, when I received an invitation from the Oxford Union, my visa was turned down by the UK. But shortly I am going to Ireland at the invitation of University College Dublin and they are connecting with the Oxford Union by TV, so we will belatedly have our debate – three ways.

As I rose to leave he said: “It is not ‘regime change’ America wants, but ‘region change.’ “

Then: “Madam Felicity, when I was ten years old, I was handing out leaflets in the streets of Baghdad, putting them through people’s doors, to stop the British stealing our oil. I am not about to give up on Iraq now.”

First published by Middle East International, 21st May 1999.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/its-not-regime-change-america-wants-but-region-change-historic-interview-with-tariq-aziz/5458748