The spheres and perils of U.S. hegemony

Posted by admin

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China

US Hegemony and Its Perils

February 2023

Contents

Introduction

I. Political Hegemony—Throwing Its Weight Around

II. Military Hegemony—Wanton Use of Force

III. Economic Hegemony—Looting and Exploitation

IV. Technological Hegemony—Monopoly and Suppression

V. Cultural Hegemony—Spreading False Narratives

Conclusion

Introduction

Since becoming the world’s most powerful country after the two world wars and the Cold War, the United States has acted more boldly to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, pursue, maintain and abuse hegemony, advance subversion and infiltration, and willfully wage wars, bringing harm to the international community.

The United States has developed a hegemonic playbook to stage “color revolutions,” instigate regional disputes, and even directly launch wars under the guise of promoting democracy, freedom and human rights. Clinging to the Cold War mentality, the United States has ramped up bloc politics and stoked conflict and confrontation. It has overstretched the concept of national security, abused export controls and forced unilateral sanctions upon others. It has taken a selective approach to international law and rules, utilizing or discarding them as it sees fit, and has sought to impose rules that serve its own interests in the name of upholding a “rules-based international order.”

This report, by presenting the relevant facts, seeks to expose the U.S. abuse of hegemony in the political, military, economic, financial, technological and cultural fields, and to draw greater international attention to the perils of the U.S. practices to world peace and stability and the well-being of all peoples.

I. Political Hegemony — Throwing Its Weight Around

The United States has long been attempting to mold other countries and the world order with its own values and political system in the name of promoting democracy and human rights.

◆ Instances of U.S. interference in other countries’ internal affairs abound. In the name of “promoting democracy,” the United States practiced a “Neo-Monroe Doctrine” in Latin America, instigated “color revolutions” in Eurasia, and orchestrated the “Arab Spring” in West Asia and North Africa, bringing chaos and disaster to many countries.

In 1823, the United States announced the Monroe Doctrine. While touting an “America for the Americans,” what it truly wanted was an “America for the United States.”

Since then, the policies of successive U.S. governments toward Latin America and the Caribbean Region have been riddled with political interference, military intervention and regime subversion. From its 61-year hostility toward and blockade of Cuba to its overthrow of the Allende government of Chile, U.S. policy on this region has been built on one maxim-those who submit will prosper; those who resist shall perish.

The year 2003 marked the beginning of a succession of “color revolutions” — the “Rose Revolution” in Georgia, the “Orange Revolution” in Ukraine and the “Tulip Revolution” in Kyrgyzstan. The U.S. Department of State openly admitted playing a “central role” in these “regime changes.” The United States also interfered in the internal affairs of the Philippines, ousting President Ferdinand Marcos Sr. in 1986 and President Joseph Estrada in 2001 through the so-called “People Power Revolutions.”

In January 2023, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo released his new book Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love. He revealed in it that the United States had plotted to intervene in Venezuela. The plan was to force the Maduro government to reach an agreement with the opposition, deprive Venezuela of its ability to sell oil and gold for foreign exchange, exert high pressure on its economy, and influence the 2018 presidential election.

◆ The U.S. exercises double standards on international rules. Placing its self-interest first, the United States has walked away from international treaties and organizations, and put its domestic law above international law. In April 2017, the Trump administration announced that it would cut off all U.S. funding to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) with the excuse that the organization “supports, or participates in the management of a programme of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.” The United States quit UNESCO twice in 1984 and 2017. In 2017, it announced leaving the Paris Agreement on climate change. In 2018, it announced its exit from the UN Human Rights Council, citing the organization’s “bias” against Israel and failure to protect human rights effectively. In 2019, the United States announced its withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty to seek unfettered development of advanced weapons. In 2020, it announced pulling out of the Treaty on Open Skies.

The United States has also been a stumbling block to biological arms control by opposing negotiations on a verification protocol for the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) and impeding international verification of countries’ activities relating to biological weapons. As the only country in possession of a chemical weapons stockpile, the United States has repeatedly delayed the destruction of chemical weapons and remained reluctant in fulfilling its obligations. It has become the biggest obstacle to realizing “a world free of chemical weapons.”

◆ The United States is piecing together small blocs through its alliance system. It has been forcing an “Indo-Pacific Strategy” onto the Asia-Pacific region, assembling exclusive clubs like the Five Eyes, the Quad and AUKUS, and forcing regional countries to take sides. Such practices are essentially meant to create division in the region, stoke confrontation and undermine peace.

◆ The U.S. arbitrarily passes judgment on democracy in other countries, and fabricates a false narrative of “democracy versus authoritarianism” to incite estrangement, division, rivalry and confrontation. In December 2021, the United States hosted the first “Summit for Democracy,” which drew criticism and opposition from many countries for making a mockery of the spirit of democracy and dividing the world. In March 2023, the United States will host another “Summit for Democracy,” which remains unwelcome and will again find no support.

II. Military Hegemony — Wanton Use of Force

The history of the United States is characterized by violence and expansion. Since it gained independence in 1776, the United States has constantly sought expansion by force: it slaughtered Indians, invaded Canada, waged a war against Mexico, instigated the American-Spanish War, and annexed Hawaii. After World War II, the wars either provoked or launched by the United States included the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Kosovo War, the War in Afghanistan, the Iraq War, the Libyan War and the Syrian War, abusing its military hegemony to pave the way for expansionist objectives. In recent years, the U.S. average annual military budget has exceeded 700 billion U.S. dollars, accounting for 40 percent of the world’s total, more than the 15 countries behind it combined. The United States has about 800 overseas military bases, with 173,000 troops deployed in 159 countries.

According to the book America Invades: How We’ve Invaded or been Militarily Involved with almost Every Country on Earth, the United States has fought or been militarily involved with almost all the 190-odd countries recognized by the United Nations with only three exceptions. The three countries were “spared” because the United States did not find them on the map.

◆ As former U.S. President Jimmy Carter put it, the United States is undoubtedly the most warlike nation in the history of the world. According to a Tufts University report, “Introducing the Military Intervention Project: A new Dataset on U.S. Military Interventions, 1776-2019,” the United States undertook nearly 400 military interventions globally between those years, 34 percent of which were in Latin America and the Caribbean, 23 percent in East Asia and the Pacific, 14 percent in the Middle East and North Africa, and 13 percent in Europe. Currently, its military intervention in the Middle East and North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa is on the rise.

Alex Lo, a South China Morning Post columnist, pointed out that the United States has rarely distinguished between diplomacy and war since its founding. It overthrew democratically elected governments in many developing countries in the 20th century and immediately replaced them with pro-American puppet regimes. Today, in Ukraine, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, Pakistan and Yemen, the United States is repeating its old tactics of waging proxy, low-intensity, and drone wars.

◆ U.S. military hegemony has caused humanitarian tragedies. Since 2001, the wars and military operations launched by the United States in the name of fighting terrorism have claimed over 900,000 lives with some 335,000 of them civilians, injured millions and displaced tens of millions. The 2003 Iraq War resulted in some 200,000 to 250,000 civilian deaths, including over 16,000 directly killed by the U.S. military, and left more than a million homeless.

The United States has created 37 million refugees around the world. Since 2012, the number of Syrian refugees alone has increased tenfold. Between 2016 and 2019, 33,584 civilian deaths were documented in the Syrian fightings, including 3,833 killed by U.S.-led coalition bombings, half of them women and children. The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) reported on 9 November 2018 that the air strikes launched by U.S. forces on Raqqa alone killed 1,600 Syrian civilians.

The two-decades-long war in Afghanistan devastated the country. A total of 47,000 Afghan civilians and 66,000 to 69,000 Afghan soldiers and police officers unrelated to the September 11 attacks were killed in U.S. military operations, and more than 10 million people were displaced. The war in Afghanistan destroyed the foundation of economic development there and plunged the Afghan people into destitution. After the “Kabul debacle” in 2021, the United States announced that it would freeze some 9.5 billion dollars in assets belonging to the Afghan central bank, a move considered as “pure looting.”

In September 2022, Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu commented at a rally that the United States has waged a proxy war in Syria, turned Afghanistan into an opium field and heroin factory, thrown Pakistan into turmoil, and left Libya in incessant civil unrest. The United States does whatever it takes to rob and enslave the people of any country with underground resources.

The United States has also adopted appalling methods in war. During the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, the Kosovo War, the War in Afghanistan and the Iraq War, the United States used massive quantities of chemical and biological weapons as well as cluster bombs, fuel-air bombs, graphite bombs and depleted uranium bombs, causing enormous damage on civilian facilities, countless civilian casualties and lasting environmental pollution.

III. Economic Hegemony — Looting and Exploitation

After World War II, the United States led efforts to set up the Bretton Woods System, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, which, together with the Marshall Plan, formed the international monetary system centered around the U.S. dollar. In addition, the United States has also established institutional hegemony in the international economic and financial sector by manipulating the weighted voting systems, rules and arrangements of international organizations including “approval by 85 percent majority,” and its domestic trade laws and regulations. By taking advantage of the dollar’s status as the major international reserve currency, the United States is basically collecting “seigniorage” from around the world; and using its control over international organizations, it coerces other countries into serving America’s political and economic strategy.

◆ The United States exploits the world’s wealth with the help of “seigniorage.” It costs only about 17 cents to produce a 100 dollar bill, but other countries had to pony up 100 dollar of actual goods in order to obtain one. It was pointed out more than half a century ago, that the United States enjoyed exorbitant privilege and deficit without tears created by its dollar, and used the worthless paper note to plunder the resources and factories of other nations.

◆ The hegemony of U.S. dollar is the main source of instability and uncertainty in the world economy. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States abused its global financial hegemony and injected trillions of dollars into the global market, leaving other countries, especially emerging economies, to pay the price. In 2022, the Fed ended its ultra-easy monetary policy and turned to aggressive interest rate hike, causing turmoil in the international financial market and substantial depreciation of other currencies such as the Euro, many of which dropped to a 20-year low. As a result, a large number of developing countries were challenged by high inflation, currency depreciation and capital outflows. This was exactly what Nixon’s secretary of the treasury John Connally once remarked, with self-satisfaction yet sharp precision, that “the dollar is our currency, but it is your problem.”

◆ With its control over international economic and financial organizations, the United States imposes additional conditions to their assistance to other countries. In order to reduce obstacles to U.S. capital inflow and speculation, the recipient countries are required to advance financial liberalization and open up financial markets so that their economic policies would fall in line with America’s strategy. According to the Review of International Political Economy, along with the 1,550 debt relief programs extended by the IMF to its 131 member countries from 1985 to 2014, as many as 55,465 additional political conditions had been attached.

◆ The United States willfully suppresses its opponents with economic coercion. In the 1980s, to eliminate the economic threat posed by Japan, and to control and use the latter in service of America’s strategic goal of confronting the Soviet Union and dominating the world, the United States leveraged its hegemonic financial power against Japan, and concluded the Plaza Accord. As a result, Yen was pushed up, and Japan was pressed to open up its financial market and reform its financial system. The Plaza Accord dealt a heavy blow to the growth momentum of the Japanese economy, leaving Japan to what was later called “three lost decades.”

◆ America’s economic and financial hegemony has become a geopolitical weapon. Doubling down on unilateral sanctions and “long-arm jurisdiction,” the United States has enacted such domestic laws as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act, and the Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, and introduced a series of executive orders to sanction specific countries, organizations or individuals. Statistics show that U.S. sanctions against foreign entities increased by 933 percent from 2000 to 2021. The Trump administration alone has imposed more than 3,900 sanctions, which means three sanctions per day. So far, the United States had or has imposed economic sanctions on nearly 40 countries across the world, including Cuba, China, Russia, the DPRK, Iran and Venezuela, affecting nearly half of the world’s population. “The United States of America” has turned itself into “the United States of Sanctions.” And “long-arm jurisdiction” has been reduced to nothing but a tool for the United States to use its means of state power to suppress economic competitors and interfere in normal international business. This is a serious departure from the principles of liberal market economy that the United States has long boasted.

IV. Technological Hegemony — Monopoly and Suppression

The United States seeks to deter other countries’ scientific, technological and economic development by wielding monopoly power, suppression measures and technology restrictions in high-tech fields.

◆ The United States monopolizes intellectual property in the name of protection. Taking advantage of the weak position of other countries, especially developing ones, on intellectual property rights and the institutional vacancy in relevant fields, the United States reaps excessive profits through monopoly. In 1994, the United States pushed forward the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), forcing the Americanized process and standards in intellectual property protection in an attempt to solidify its monopoly on technology.

In the 1980s, to contain the development of Japan’s semiconductor industry, the United States launched the “301” investigation, built bargaining power in bilateral negotiations through multilateral agreements, threatened to label Japan as conducting unfair trade, and imposed retaliatory tariffs, forcing Japan to sign the U.S.-Japan Semiconductor Agreement. As a result, Japanese semiconductor enterprises were almost completely driven out of global competition, and their market share dropped from 50 percent to 10 percent. Meanwhile, with the support of the U.S. government, a large number of U.S. semiconductor enterprises took the opportunity and grabbed larger market share.

◆ The United States politicizes, weaponizes technological issues and uses them as ideological tools. Overstretching the concept of national security, the United States mobilized state power to suppress and sanction Chinese company Huawei, restricted the entry of Huawei products into the U.S. market, cut off its supply of chips and operating systems, and coerced other countries to ban Huawei from undertaking local 5G network construction. It even talked Canada into unwarrantedly detaining Huawei’s CFO Meng Wanzhou for nearly three years.

The United States has fabricated a slew of excuses to clamp down on China’s high-tech enterprises with global competitiveness, and has put more than 1,000 Chinese enterprises on sanction lists. In addition, the United States has also imposed controls on biotechnology, artificial intelligence and other high-end technologies, reinforced export restrictions, tightened investment screening, suppressed Chinese social media apps such as TikTok and WeChat, and lobbied the Netherlands and Japan to restrict exports of chips and related equipment or technology to China.

The United States has also practiced double standards in its policy on China-related technological professionals. To sideline and suppress Chinese researchers, since June 2018, visa validity has been shortened for Chinese students majoring in certain high-tech-related disciplines, repeated cases have occurred where Chinese scholars and students going to the United States for exchange programs and study were unjustifiably denied and harassed, and large-scale investigation on Chinese scholars working in the United States was carried out.

◆ The United States solidifies its technological monopoly in the name of protecting democracy. By building small blocs on technology such as the “chips alliance” and “clean network,” the United States has put “democracy” and “human rights” labels on high-technology, and turned technological issues into political and ideological issues, so as to fabricate excuses for its technological blockade against other countries. In May 2019, the United States enlisted 32 countries to the Prague 5G Security Conference in the Czech Republic and issued the Prague Proposal in an attempt to exclude China’s 5G products. In April 2020, then U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the “5G clean path,” a plan designed to build technological alliance in the 5G field with partners bonded by their shared ideology on democracy and the need to protect “cyber security.” The measures, in essence, are the U.S. attempts to maintain its technological hegemony through technological alliances.

◆ The United States abuses its technological hegemony by carrying out cyber attacks and eavesdropping. The United States has long been notorious as an “empire of hackers,” blamed for its rampant acts of cyber theft around the world. It has all kinds of means to enforce pervasive cyber attacks and surveillance, including using analog base station signals to access mobile phones for data theft, manipulating mobile apps, infiltrating cloud servers, and stealing through undersea cables. The list goes on.

U.S. surveillance is indiscriminate. All can be targets of its surveillance, be they rivals or allies, even leaders of allied countries such as former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and several French Presidents. Cyber surveillance and attacks launched by the United States such as “Prism,” “Dirtbox,” “Irritant Horn” and “Telescreen Operation” are all proof that the United States is closely monitoring its allies and partners. Such eavesdropping on allies and partners has already caused worldwide outrage. Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, a website that has exposed U.S. surveillance programs, said that “do not expect a global surveillance superpower to act with honor or respect. There is only one rule: there are no rules.“

V. Cultural Hegemony — Spreading False Narratives

The global expansion of American culture is an important part of its external strategy. The United States has often used cultural tools to strengthen and maintain its hegemony in the world.

◆ The United States embeds American values in its products such as movies. American values and lifestyle are a tied product to its movies and TV shows, publications, media content, and programs by the government-funded non-profit cultural institutions. It thus shapes a cultural and public opinion space in which American culture reigns and maintains cultural hegemony. In his article The Americanization of the World, John Yemma, an American scholar, exposed the real weapons in U.S. cultural expansion: the Hollywood, the image design factories on Madison Avenue and the production lines of Mattel Company and Coca-Cola.

There are various vehicles the United States uses to keep its cultural hegemony. American movies are the most used; they now occupy more than 70 percent of the world’s market share. The United States skilfully exploits its cultural diversity to appeal to various ethnicities. When Hollywood movies descend on the world, they scream the American values tied to them.

◆ American cultural hegemony not only shows itself in “direct intervention,” but also in “media infiltration” and as “a trumpet for the world.” U.S.-dominated Western media has a particularly important role in shaping global public opinion in favor of U.S. meddling in the internal affairs of other countries.

The U.S. government strictly censors all social media companies and demands their obedience. Twitter CEO Elon Musk admitted on 27 December 2022 that all social media platforms work with the U.S. government to censor content, reported Fox Business Network. Public opinion in the United States is subject to government intervention to restrict all unfavorable remarks. Google often makes pages disappear.

U.S. Department of Defense manipulates social media. In December 2022, The Intercept, an independent U.S. investigative website, revealed that in July 2017, U.S. Central Command official Nathaniel Kahler instructed Twitter’s public policy team to augment the presence of 52 Arabic-language accounts on a list he sent, six of which were to be given priority. One of the six was dedicated to justifying U.S. drone attacks in Yemen, such as by claiming that the attacks were precise and killed only terrorists, not civilians. Following Kahler’s directive, Twitter put those Arabic-language accounts on a “white list” to amplify certain messages.

◆The United States practices double standards on the freedom of the press. It brutally suppresses and silences media of other countries by various means. The United States and Europe bar mainstream Russian media such as Russia Today and the Sputnik from their countries. Platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube openly restrict official accounts of Russia. Netflix, Apple and Google have removed Russian channels and applications from their services and app stores. Unprecedented draconian censorship is imposed on Russia-related contents.

◆The United States abuses its cultural hegemony to instigate “peaceful evolution” in socialist countries. It sets up news media and cultural outfits targeting socialist countries. It pours staggering amounts of public funds into radio and TV networks to support their ideological infiltration, and these mouthpieces bombard socialist countries in dozens of languages with inflammatory propaganda day and night.

The United States uses misinformation as a spear to attack other countries, and has built an industrial chain around it: there are groups and individuals making up stories, and peddling them worldwide to mislead public opinion with the support of nearly limitless financial resources.

Conclusion

While a just cause wins its champion wide support, an unjust one condemns its pursuer to be an outcast. The hegemonic, domineering, and bullying practices of using strength to intimidate the weak, taking from others by force and subterfuge, and playing zero-sum games are exerting grave harm. The historical trends of peace, development, cooperation, and mutual benefit are unstoppable. The United States has been overriding truth with its power and trampling justice to serve self-interest. These unilateral, egoistic and regressive hegemonic practices have drawn growing, intense criticism and opposition from the international community.

Countries need to respect each other and treat each other as equals. Big countries should behave in a manner befitting their status and take the lead in pursuing a new model of state-to-state relations featuring dialogue and partnership, not confrontation or alliance. China opposes all forms of hegemonism and power politics, and rejects interference in other countries’ internal affairs. The United States must conduct serious soul-searching. It must critically examine what it has done, let go of its arrogance and prejudice, and quit its hegemonic, domineering and bullying practices.

https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/wjbxw/202302/t20230220_11027664.html

Okinawa faces a crisis. Citizens appeal for your support 26 February.

Posted by admin

Posted on Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space

February 11, 2023

To: All you folks who think peace is the better option
From: No More Battle of Okinawa: Nuchi du Takara (Life is a Treasure) People’s Association
Co-representatives: Hiroji Yamashiro; C. Douglas Lummis (and others).
Contact address: Ideaspeddler(at)gmail.com

As you may know, The US and Japanese governments have announced that, in the event of a “Taiwan contingency”, the “Southwest Islands” will become a war zone. “Contingency” is a softer way of saying “war”, and “Southwest Islands” means the Ryukyu Archipelago: Okinawa.

The two governments are not simply predicting that will happen. They are arranging so that it will happen. That is, all along the outer islands of the Ryukyu Archipelago they are building new missile launching sites, targeting China – this in addition to the formidable attack bases already on Okinawa main island. Should any of these missiles actually be fired on the Chinese mainland or against Chinese naval vessels, the Chinese military will have the right, under the international law of war, to return the fire. The Mayor of Naha [Okinawa] has already begun carrying out civil defense drills.

This is not an issue only for in-principle pacifists, who believe all war should be abolished. To fight a war in a neutral country is a violation of the law of war itself. Okinawa is not merely neutral, it is not a party to this war in any way, shape or form. Okinawa has no quarrel with China. Many see this as a replay of the Battle of Okinawa, and are asking, Are we to be the sacrificial pawns (sute-ishi in Japanese) – again?

There is a new movement forming now in Okinawa to point out the grotesque absurdity of fighting this war in Okinawa and to call for a negotiated peace. Please understand: This is a movement that can include people who accept the necessity of some wars, but not this one. (Even dedicated soldiers can, with perfect consistency, call for a negotiated peace.)

A large gathering to voice opposition to Okinawa becoming again a war zone and to demand negotiations is being planned for 26 February, Okinawa time. It would be very encouraging if you could support this action, either as an organization or as individuals – and this either by taking some simple action on the same day, or by sending messages of support.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-1.png

Statement from Global Network:

The Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space shares the deep concerns of the people of Okinawa about the possibility of US-NATO war against China that would directly impact your island home.

Recent belligerent words by Pentagon officials signal that Washington is indeed planning such a horrific war.

Already the US-NATO has launched a war against Russia using Ukraine as a proxy.

The US intends to do the same to China using Taiwan as the instrument to justify this war.

It is more than insane for Washington to think it can fight against two nuclear powers at virtually the same time. This is a clear sign of US desperation to remain as ‘king of the hill’.

We declare our solidarity with the people throughout the Ryukyu Archipelago and beyond.

Close US bases on Okinawa!
No war with China!

Bruce K. Gagnon
Coordinator
Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space

http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2023/02/okinawa-faces-crisis-this-is-appeal-for.html

New information on US biological weapons work in Ukraine

Posted by admin

From Strategic Stability

Report # 96. More details on the US military-biological activity in Ukraine

July 8, 2022

On July 7^th the Russian MoD arranged a briefing on the results of analysing documents related to the military-biological activity of the USA in Ukraine. The speaker was Lt-Gen Igor Kirillov, the head of radiological, chemical and biological defense. Russian Armed Forces.

“The Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation continues analysing the military-biological activity of the USA and its allies in Ukraine and other regions of the world in view of new information received at the liberated territories and at the branch offices of the Defence Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) that form a unified information network.

We have previously stated that the Ukrainian project of the Pentagon do not meet the pertinent healthcare problems of Ukraine, while their implementation has not led to any improvement of the sanitary-epidemiological situation.

The special military operation has led to forming the final report on DTRA activity dated from 2005 to 2016. The document contains the data on evaluation of healthcare, veterinary and biosecurity system efficiency prepared by a group of U.S. experts in 2016.

This report is a concept document designed for further planification of military-biological activity of the Pentagon in Ukraine that contains conclusions on implementation of the programme guidelines.

Despite the more than 10-year-long period of cooperation in the alleged ‘…reduction of biological threats…’, the experts have stated:

‘…There is no legislation on the control of highly dangerous pathogens in the country, there are significant deficiencies in biosafety… The current state of resources makes it impossible for laboratories to respond effectively to public health emergencies…’

The document emphasises that ‘…over the past five years, Ukraine has shown no progress in implementing international health regulations of the World Health Organisation’.

The report pays particular attention to non-compliance with biosafety requirements when working and storing microbial collections.

It has been stated ‘…that most facilities are characterised by numerous gross violations, such as unlocked fencing systems, unlatching windows, broken or inactive pathogen restriction systems, lack of alarm systems…’ The results of the review conclude that there is no system for protecting dangerous pathogens in Ukraine.

At the same time, the activities of the Defence Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) have been assessed positively: the organisation has managed to bring the national collection of microorganisms to the United States, to organise biological assessment work and to implement projects to study particularly dangerous and economically significant infections that could cause a worsening (changing) epidemic situation.

The report makes the case for continuing this work on behalf of the Pentagon that has cost more than $250 million since 2005.

The document is annexed with ambiguous comments about the sponsors and implementers of the Biological Threat Reduction Programme in Ukraine that have nothing to do with biosecurity issues. In particular, the Soros Foundation is mentioned with the notation ‘…contributed to the development of an open and democratic society…’

It confirms again that the official activities of the Pentagon in Ukraine are just a front for illegal military and biological research.

We have repeatedly mentioned the role of U.S. Democratic Party representatives in funding bioweapons activities in Ukraine and the intermediary organisations that have been used for this purpose.

I would like to refer to one of the key Pentagon contractors receiving money from Hunter Biden’s investment fund, Metabiota.

The available data suggests that the company is merely a front for internationally dubious purposes and is used by the U.S. political elite to carry out opaque financial activities in various parts of the world.

There is a specific example: Metabiota was involved in the response to the Ebola epidemic in West Africa. The activities of the company’s employees have raised questions from the World Health Organisation (WHO) in terms of their compliance with biosafety requirements.

This is the report of the international panel of experts from the Haemorrhagic Fever Consortium who were involved in the fight against Ebola virus disease in Sierra Leone in 2015. According to the document, Metabiota staff had failed to comply with handling procedures and concealed the involvement of Pentagon staff who were using the company as a front. The main purpose of these activities was to isolate highly virulent variants of the virus from sick and dead people, as well as to export its strains to the USA.

In view of the apparent failure of Metabiota’s activities to meet the goals of controlling the spread of the disease, the World Health Organisation’s Ebola coordinator, Philippe Barbosa, recommended to recall the staff of the company saying he was extremely concerned about the potential risks of such collaboration to WHO’s reputation.

The U.S. military contractor’s heightened interest in the Ebola virus is not a coincidence: the disease is one of the most pathogenic to humans. During the outbreak that began in 2014, 28,000 people were contaminated, over 11,000 of them died, the mortality rate was around 40%.

The special military operation has led to receiving documents that reveals the plans of Metabiota and the Ukrainian Scientific-Technological Centre to study the Ebola virus in Ukraine. This is the request for U.S. funding to diagnose highly dangerous pathogens in Ukraine, including Ebola virus. This kind of requests are part of U.S. strategy to redeploy high-risk work with dangerous pathogens to third countries.

The research was to be carried out at the Mechnikov Anti-Plague Institute in Odessa. As the disease is not endemic and has never been recorded in Ukraine indeed, there is a legitimate question about the need for such research and its true purpose.

We have already noted that Ukraine and other post-Soviet states have become a testing ground for biological weapons not only for the USA, but also for its NATO allies; on the first place, Germany. Various projects have been carried out on behalf of the Joint Medical Service of the German Armed Forces.

Bundeswehr professionals paid particular attention to the Congo-Crimean fever pathogen. A large-scale screening of the susceptibility of the local population to this infection was carried out and included summarising demographic, epidemiological and clinical data. This kind of approaches allows to identify new regional virus genotypes and to select strains that cause latent clinical forms.

The study of natural foci of Crimean-Congo fever was carried out under the pretext of improving the Ukrainian epidemiological surveillance system, with the participation of the Institute of Veterinary Medicine in Kiev and the Mechnikov Anti-Plague Institute in Odessa.

Bundeswehr’s interest in Crimean-Congo fever stems from the fact that mortality can be as high as 30% and its outbreaks create a need for lengthy and costly treatment, preventive and special handling measures.

This is a quote from Bundeswehr’s instructions:

‘…pay particular attention to fatal cases of infection with Crimean-Congo fever as it allows the virus strains with maximum pathogenicity and virulence for humans to be extracted from the dead individuals…’

Apart from Germany, microbiologists from the USA have shown a keen interest in tick-borne infections; research in this area has been funded by DTRA through the UP-1 and UP-8 projects.

A separate project on ixodid ticks that are vectors of a number of highly dangerous infections (tularemia, West Nile fever, Congo-Crimean fever) has been implemented by the University of Texas.

Ticks used to be collected in the south-eastern regions of Ukraine, where natural foci of infections characteristic of the territory of the Russian Federation are located. At the same time, the period of implementing this work coincided with a rapid increase in the incidence of tick-borne borreliosis among the Ukrainian population, as well as the increase in the number of ticks in various regions of Russia bordering Ukraine.

This issue is being studied by competent Russian professionals in coordination with professionals from the Ministry of Defence of Russia.

We have previously pointed out the significance of the results of the military-biological projects codenamed UP for the Pentagon.

Note the report prepared for the U.S. Defence Department by Black & Veatch and Metabiota. According to the document, Veterinary Projects codenamed ‘TAP’ were implemented simultaneously with the UP projects in Ukraine.

Their main guideline lies in economically significant quarantine infections capable of damaging the agriculture of several countries and entire regions, such as glanders, African swine fever (ASF), classical swine fever, highly pathogenic avian influenza and Newcastle disease.

African swine fever with two projects dedicated to this pathogen represented particular interest to U.S. military biologists.

The TAP-3 project was aimed to study the spread of ASF pathogen through wild animals. The migration routes of wild boar through Ukraine had been examining within its framework. The TAP-6 project scaled this process up to Eastern European countries.

The study of vector populations of dangerous zoonotic infections was carried out by staff of the Institute of New Pathogens of the University of Florida (Gainesville) in Volyn, Rovno, Zhitomir and Chernigov regions of Ukraine, as well as in the areas bordering Belarus and Russia.

Note the worsening situation of African swine fever in Eastern European countries: According to the International Office of Epizootics, since 2014, outbreaks have been recorded in Latvia (4,021 cases), Estonia (3,814) and Lithuania (4,201). In Poland, more than 13,000 cases of ASF have been detected, and agricultural losses from the disease have exceeded 2.4 billion euro.

We have already emphasised the use of biological weapons in Cuba in the 1970s and 1980s. Today, I would like to focus on U.S. military-biological activities during the Korean War.

In March 2022, the U.S. Army Strategic Studies Institute published a report on the U.S. chemical and biological weapons programme during the Korean War. This report was aimed to create a possible line of defence against allegations of illegal activities carried out by U.S. biolaboratories in Ukraine.

The document attempts to refute the testimony of 38 U.S. military pilots who have admitted using biological weapons in China and Korea.

According to the document, while preparing for the Korean campaign, ‘…the U.S. Air Force secured additional funds to purchase large quantities of chemical and biological munitions, obtained a testing range for them in Canada and carried out an extensive conceptual work on their use…’

At that time, the Americans considered brucellosis pathogens and economically important infections, including wheat stem rust, as priority biological agents. 2,500 munitions of this type the U.S. Air Force Strategic Air Command planned to use, including ‘…to attack Soviet grain crops…‘

Analysis of the data mentioned in the report shows that the U.S. command uses the results of the research received from the Japanese military-biological programme and a certain ‘continuity’ of the works previously carried out by the Detachment 731 led by Shiro Ishii.

This is the record of the closed session of CIA, State Department and the Pentagon representatives dated July 7, 1953. The document clearly shows that the Americans are focusing on techniques to manipulate public opinion and launch an aggressive counter-attack within their strategies aimed to defend from allegations. The report states that the officials are reluctant to actual investigations of chemical and biological incidents due to fears of revealing the activities carried out by the U.S. Eighth Army.

Thus, the comparative analysis of U.S. activities during the Korean War and currently in Ukraine demonstrates the persistence of the U.S. policy of building up its own military and biological capabilities in circumvention of international agreements.

In conclusion, I would like to present real data on the health condition of the voluntarily surrendered Ukrainian servicemen. This diapositive presents the data on presence of antibodies to contagious disease agents without mentioning personal data of these servicemen.

The results are as follows: 33% of the examined servicemen had had hepatitis A, over 4% had renal syndrome fever and 20% had West Nile fever. The figures are significantly higher than the statistical average. In view of active research of these diseases held by the Pentagon within the Ukrainian projects, there is reason to believe that servicemen of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) were involved as volunteers in experiments to assess the tolerance of dangerous infectious diseases.

The lack of therapeutic effect of antibacterial medication has been reported during in-patient treatment of AFU servicemen in medical facilities. High concentrations of antibiotics, including sulphonyl amides and fluoroquinolones, have been detected in their blood. This fact may indicate preventive use of antibiotics and preparation of personnel for operating in conditions of biological contamination, such as cholera agent, that indirectly proves the information of the Russian Defence Ministry that Ukrainian special units were planning to use biological agents.

Annex: Six PPT slides to this Report in English are attached separately.

Pentagon upgrades to target China – JADC2 and Space Force – At what price? Part 1

Posted by admin

From Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
June 28, 2021
by Koohan Paik-Mander

The Pentagon is upgrading its full-spectrum dominance, with China as the primary target.

In early June 2021, in a classified directive to Pentagon officials, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin slammed the former Trump administration for talking big but never taking action to counter “the China threat.”

Austin made it clear that things would be different under President Biden. His “tough guy” rhetoric strikes just the right tone for a massive, costly, military-infrastructure overhaul that would render the conventional warfare of the twentieth century unrecognizable: more nukes, fewer troops, and an omnipotent 5G network.

The goal of this overhaul is to give the United States and its allies the ability to summon, at once, unmanned military forces to rain terror down on any spot in the world—a swarm of drones, hypersonic missiles, submarine torpedoes, and bombers—all with the ease of calling an Uber.

This game-changing metamorphosis of how wars are fought is already underway. It’s called the JADC2 (Joint All-Domain Command & Control), a globally networked, cloud-based command center, overseen by the recently anointed U.S. Space Force.

It was for this that the Space Force was created—not as a jokey Trump trifle.

However, targeting China with this new paradigm for mass destruction will not bring about global security. Even if it were to somehow not culminate in a nuclear conflict, the ecological and climate costs of commanding war from outer space would be devastating. And yet, ever-more-mammoth military preparations are being staged in ever-more-numerous locations on Earth.

President Biden is in lockstep with Austin’s anti-China mission. Much of Biden’s $715 billion Pentagon budget request for 2022 is for investment in hypersonic weapons, artificial intelligence, micro-electronics, 5G technology, space-based systems, shipbuilding and nuclear “modernization” (read: expansion). The request seeks $28 billion to “modernize” the nuclear triad (the ability to launch nukes from land, sea, and air). The budget also includes the largest research-and-development request—$112 billion—in the history of the Pentagon.

Imagine that kind of support for healthcare.

Each line item is a deadly weapon, which, discretely, already carries terrifying implications. But, taken together, as part of the JADC2—an integrated, multi-dimensional system with machines responsible for pulling the trigger—the whole is far more chilling than the sum of the parts.

Among the types of missiles on Biden’s wish-list are some whose range exceeds the limits in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty of 1987. But the INF Treaty is no longer in effect, after President Trump withdrew the United States from the agreement in August 2019, just four months before the creation of the Space Force. That means that Biden and Austin are now free to spend taxpayer money on these perilous weapons.

Policy analyst Michael Klare has observed that this year’s budget subordinates all perceived threats to a single bogeyman-du-jour: China. War with China, specifically, means more nukes, long-range missiles, and unmanned weapons. These weapons are not just to be used by the United States, but are also for export to allies as well—much to the financial gain of weapons industrialists like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon.

For example, a declassified U.S. Department of Defense report from 2018 provides a directive to sell more arms to India, to “enhance India’s status as a Major Defense Partner,” and to “support India’s membership in the Nuclear Supplier’s Group.” The essence of the Pentagon’s massive global vision is to construct, from the ground up, a hard and soft infrastructure upon which the newly created Space Force can operate.

Just as the continent-spanning interstate highway system was laid during the 1950s to ensure a profitable future for the automobile industry, this new infrastructure—comprised of 5G, artificial intelligence, rocket launchpads, missile tracking stations, satellites, nukes, and internet-connected fleets of unmanned ships, jets, subs, hypersonic, and other craft—will ensure a reliably profitable assembly-line output of arms for the weapons industry.

In tandem with the military infrastructure will come a continued expansion of associated security infrastructure, such as increased surveillance and data collection of every individual on the planet. As a former board member at Raytheon, Lloyd Austin is perfectly positioned to pull this off. In fact, during his first three months as defense secretary, he awarded over $2.36 billion in contracts to the missile manufacturer he once faithfully served.

http://space4peace.org/countering-the-china-threat-at-what-price/

Jimmy Carter: U.S. is “the most warlike nation in the history of the world”

Posted by admin

https://www.npr.org/2019/04/15/713495558/president-trump-called-former-president-jimmy-carter-to-talk-about-china

https://www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/Jimmy-Carter-Lectures-Trump-US-Is-Most-Warlike-Nation-in-History-of-the-World-20190418-0020.html

President Biden’s magic tricks: watch both of his hands

Posted by admin

From Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
February 5, 2021
Bruce Gagnon

During the Obama administration the Modus operandi (MO) was to play magic tricks. Obama would announce a good thing and then at the same time do a really bad thing. I started urging people to watch both of the magicians hands.

Following Obama’s slight of hand tricks, Biden is off to a similar start. Here are a few examples:

Just yesterday Biden made a foreign policy speech where he said, “America is back. Diplomacy is back at the center of our foreign policy”. But on February 2 Stars & Stripes newspaper [1] reported that his administration was “deploying bombers and airmen to a base in Norway for the first time, underscoring the growing importance of the Arctic region to U.S. defense strategy.” The Air Force has been stepping up its strategic bomber missions in the Arctic, but recent missions have either been staged from England, where bombers typically deploy while training in Europe, or have involved round-trip flights between the U.S. and the Nordic region. This is the first time bombers are deploying to Norway. (Which of course borders Russia in the north.)

In his speech Biden praised those who have been calling for an end to the Saudi-US war in Yemen. He said the US will end all support for Saudi Arabia’s ‘offensive operations’ in Yemen. But then in typical magician style the new prez stated that the US will “continue to help and support Saudi Arabia” by selling them ‘defensive’ weapons. Now let’s see here – how much difference is there between offensive and defense weapons? A bullet is a bullet. A bomb is a bomb….
On February 3 Biden announced an agreement to extend the New START Treaty with Russia, to preserve the only remaining nuclear arms agreement between them. OK that is good. But are you watching his other hand? On Biden’s first day in office he ordered more US troops into the oil fields of Syria. [2]
On January 28 Biden sent three warships into the Black Sea, stepping up its presence in the region after a drop in overall NATO maritime activity there last year. The destroyer USS Porter began its transit into the sea, joining the USS Donald Cook (built in Bath, Maine) and a third warship conducting operations in the strategic waterway, the Stars & Stripes reported.[3] Retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, who led the Army in Europe until 2018, said more allies should step up to help the U.S. in the region. “We clearly have to increase the priority of the Black Sea,” said Hodges, who is now the Pershing chair of strategic studies at the Center for European Policy Analysis. “US Navy has too many (requirements) and not enough resources. President Biden will expect Allies to do more.” Russia took note of the US’s Black Sea escalation and sent fighter jets zooming just above Washington’s provocative deployment of destroyers in Russia’s backyard. How would the US respond if Moscow sent warships into the Gulf of Mexico?

Let’s not leave China out. Again on January 28 Biden ordered a ‘task force’ of four B-52 bombers to fly to Andersen Air Force Base, Guam, part of an ongoing demonstration by the Air Force of its ability to move strategic assets around the globe. Stars & Stripes again reported [4] that the B-52s, from Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, were sent to “reinforce the rules-based international order in the Indo-Pacific region” through “strategic deterrence.” Guam, at the eastern edge of the Philippine Sea, is within easy range of the South China Sea, where the US is escalating pressure on China to surrender to Washington’s control.

Then on February 4, just to make sure that Beijing got Biden’s message that “American is back”, the US Navy destroyer USS John S. McCain (built in Bath, Maine) sailed through the Taiwan Strait [5] marking the first such transit since Biden took office. The Navy called it “routine”. China said it remains on “high alert” and “is ready to respond to all threats and provocations at any time.” My son lives in Taiwan so this one really hit close to home.
All of these ‘operations’ cost big $$$$ – especially at a time when the US Congress says that the government can’t afford to give our citizens $2,000 each to help them deal with loss of jobs, no healthcare, growing hunger and poverty, and general economic collapse. But despite all the nice talk about bringing the nation back to sanity and solvency – it is the same old ‘double cross’ – Three-card Monte scam. Watch both hands of the dealer. Look away at your own risk.

[1] stripes.com/news/europe/us-air-force-bombers-deploy-to-norway-for-first-time-1.660701?fbclid=IwAR39tIrNICWQATY60CzR2EvCfvJ7DPop0UFQscnDWkwh5F2BKPso8RD1ER4

[2] youtube.com/watch?v=n1QiulgahxU&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR1uzSdiSovqqWFZbBKsqMe3Gi64NhLgDBKJCG2Fm567EtdaRNaVDzNTD5k

[3] stripes.com/news/europe/navy-sends-three-ships-into-black-sea-as-russia-takes-notice-1.660114?fbclid=IwAR1exjiEkYPqJy13tE3r8diqgyxP8H1BmJhVYHP6CdpN1AzEs34HHJF5TDk

[4] stripes.com/news/europe/navy-sends-three-ships-into-black-sea-as-russia-takes-notice-1.660114?fbclid=IwAR1exjiEkYPqJy13tE3r8diqgyxP8H1BmJhVYHP6CdpN1AzEs34HHJF5TDk

[5] msn.com/en-us/news/world/a-us-navy-warship-sailed-through-the-taiwan-strait-for-the-first-time-since-biden-became-commander-in-chief/ar-BB1dopBg?ocid=msedgntp&fbclid=IwAR0Lr3d81iYDklWrGVvvDxtktk2t4CZUOPxRsc-XTgAmsoxB2ISgv6jT0hU

http://space4peace.blogspot.com/2021/02/bidens-magic-tricks-watch-both-of-his.html

China and Russia have long endured massive threats. War hawk JFK against China, Russia, and Cuba

Posted by admin

So many myths have been fed to the American people. Here’s more information about the real John F. Kennedy. [1]

–

From Global Research

–

By Shane Quinn

February 15, 2018

–

In April 1962, the Kennedy administration ordered nuclear missiles to be sent to Japan’s Okinawa Island. The weapons were directed at the People’s Republic of China, a nation the Americans had “lost” to Communism 13 years before.

President John F. Kennedy‘s decision to aim missiles at China occurred six months before the Cuban Missile Crisis, known as the October Crisis in Cuba. The missiles Kennedy directed at Mao Zedong’s China were “near identical” to those aimed at the US, after the Soviet Union sent nuclear-armed weapons to Cuba in October 1962.

The American missiles on occupied Okinawa – an island just over 500 miles from China’s coast – were “over 75 times the power of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima” in August 1945. The nuclear weapon that leveled Hiroshima killed about 80,000 people initially, mostly civilians. However, further tens of thousands later died after succumbing to severe radiation poisoning.

In the early 1960s, China possessed by far the world’s largest population, at almost 700 million. Any order obeyed to fire such destructive weapons at China would have killed unprecedented numbers. Yet the American missiles on Okinawa remained hidden from public knowledge, and has only come to light in recent times. The reason for Kennedy’s order for missiles to be readied on Okinawa, can be traced to intense friction between two of Asia’s largest countries.

A 1962 aerial photograph shows Okinawa’s first Mace missile site at Bolo Point, Yomitan. (Source: Larry Johnston via APJJF)

During 1962, antagonism soared between China and American-backed India – primarily over border disputes along the Himalayas. It culminated in the Sino-Indian conflict, starting on 20 October, with much of the fighting occurring at over 4,000 meters. This forgotten conflict also began in the middle of the Cuban Missile Crisis, as the Americans were entirely distracted with Cuba. After a month of bloody fighting, China emerged victorious having secured territorial gains.

History, up to the current day, suggests the US holds the right to erect weapons wherever it chooses, ignoring the potential consequences. For example, in 1961, president Kennedy positioned intermediate-range “Jupiter” nuclear missiles in Italy and Turkey – this time aimed at Russia. The Turkish border is little more than 300 miles from Russia, separated alone by diminutive Georgia.

None of this was lost on the Russians. In May the following year (1962), the Soviet president Nikita Khrushchev complained to a confidant that the Americans “have surrounded us”. Kennedy’s reckless deployment of missiles was also a crucial factor leading up to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Behind the thinking of his Cuban missile decision, Khrushchev explained following his retirement that the Americans

“would learn just what it feels like to have enemy missiles pointing at you; we’d be doing nothing more than giving them a little of their own medicine”.

The enormous threats against Russia also had a deeper psychological impact. Over the past century and more, Russia was repeatedly invaded and almost destroyed by invading armies. From Napoleon Bonaparte’s 1812 offensive, through to Operation Barbarossa overseen by Adolf Hitler in 1941.

The intimidation of Russia, a long-time nuclear power, has continued apace to the present day. One significant menace is the continued existence of NATO as an organization – and the presence of its troops and weapons along Russia’s frontiers. NATO receives much of its funding from America, so is in reality a tool of imperialism, posing a significant global security threat.

In more rational times Dwight D. Eisenhower, NATO’s first supreme commander, wrote in 1951 that NATO

“will have failed” if “in 10 years all American troops stationed in Europe… have not been returned to the United States”.

Eisenhower would become a re-elected US president (1953-61), so his was not a voice without weight. It would be interesting to gauge his reaction if he knew that, by 2018, American troops were still present on European soil. This reality may have disturbed George Kennan too, the farsighted former US ambassador to the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, himself no dove. In 1996 Kennan described NATO expansion eastwards, in continued violation of agreements, as “a strategic blunder of potentially epic proportions”.

Meanwhile, a further critical element in the placing of Soviet missiles in Cuba, was the Kennedy administration’s assaults on the island nation. There was the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961, which ended in a Cuban rout of US-backed forces. Stung by this embarrassment, in January 1962 Kennedy outlined that “the Cuban problem” is “the top priority in the United States government”.

The ensuing Operation Mongoose brought the “terrors of the earth” to Cuba – a quote attributed to Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Kennedy’s top Latin American advisor. In the months before the missile crisis, Cuba was subjected to widescale terrorist attacks directed from America. This included the bombing of Cuban hotels and petrochemical plants, poisoning of crops and livestock, attacks on fishing boats, the tainting of sugar exports, etc.

In March 1962, it was made clear that the assaults were to lead to “final success” which would “require decisive US intervention”. The renewed invasion of Cuba was dated for October 1962 – it is no coincidence that Khrushchev sent his missiles to Cuba during the same month.

As the missile crisis peaked, the world came perilously close to a nuclear war, largely due to Kennedy’s hegemonic policies. This was all concealed from the American public, who were repeatedly informed the blame lay squarely with the USSR and its Cuban ally.

Bosch and Posada (Source: Cuba Headlines)

Following the de-escalation in late October, the US immediately recommenced terrorist operations against Cuba. These murderous acts continued for decades in various forms. This included American support for the Cuban exiles, Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch, two of the worst international terrorists of the post-World War II period.

Posada Carriles and Bosch are most infamously remembered for masterminding the 1976 destruction of a Cuban airliner, killing all 73 people aboard. However, the duo were also responsible for countless other terrorist attacks on embassies, consuls, tourist industries, ambassadors, civilians, etc. – not just in Cuba – but across Latin America.

Furthermore, the US continues its blockade of Cuba, which has lasted for more than five decades – despite opposition from virtually the entire world. The embargo was first introduced by Kennedy himself in October 1962.

After visiting Cuba two years ago, then president Barack Obama said he and Raul Castro “continue to have serious differences, including on democracy and human rights”. One could forgive the Cuban leader for being somewhat perplexed by this statement. Not mentioned by Obama was America’s efforts to bring “democracy and human rights” to Cuba, in the form of vicious terrorist assaults and economic strangulation.

Nor did Obama highlight Cuba’s central role in liberating southern Africa from apartheid. South Africa’s racist regime was heavily supported by the US, yet it appears trivial facts such as these are not worthy of mention by Obama, or indeed, the mainstream press.

Since the 1950s, the American record in introducing “human rights” and “freedom” to the world makes something of a mockery of its projected image. Instead, it is Cuba that has long been vilified by Western elites for supposed human rights abuses.

Shane Quinn obtained an honors journalism degree. He is interested in writing primarily on foreign affairs, having been inspired by authors like Noam Chomsky.

The original source of this article is Global Research

https://www.globalresearch.ca/china-and-russia-have-long-endured-massive-threats/5629315

–

[1] Also, for those with the stomach, there is The Dark Side of Camelot by Seymour Hersh about the Kennedy presidency.

Andre Vltchek: Why I reject Western courts and justice

Posted by admin

From Global Research

By Andre Vltchek

June 23, 2017

There is a small courthouse from the ‘British era’, standing right in the center of Hong Kong. It is neat, well-built, remarkably organized and some would even say – elegant.

Earlier this year I visited there with an Afghan-British lawyer, who had been touring East Asia for several months. Hong Kong was her last destination; afterwards she was planning to return home to London. The Orient clearly confused and overwhelmed her, and no matter how ‘anti-imperialist’ she tried to look, most of her references were clearly going back to the adoptive homeland – the United Kingdom.

“It looks like England,” she exclaimed when standing in the middle of Hong Kong. There was clearly excitement and nostalgia in her voice.

To cheer her up even more, I took her to the courthouse. My good intentions backfired: as we were leaving, she uttered words that I expected but also feared for quite some time:

“You know, there are actually many good things that can be said about the British legal system.”

I thought about that short episode in Hong Kong now, as I drove all around her devastated country of childhood, Afghanistan. As always, I worked without protection, with no bulletproof vests, armored vehicles or military escorts, just with my Afghan driver who doubled as my interpreter and also as my friend. It was Ramadan and to let him rest, I periodically got behind the wheel. We were facing countless detentions, arrests and interrogations by police, military and who knows what security forces, but we were moving forward, always forward, despite all obstacles.

From that great distance, from the heights of the mountains of Afghanistan, the courthouse in Hong Kong kept falling into proportion and meaningful perspective.

It was surrounded by an enormous city, once usurped and sodomized by the British Crown. A city where ‘unruly locals’ were being killed, tortured, flogged and regularly imprisoned.

And it was not only Hong Kong that has suffered: the entire enormous country of China with one of the oldest and greatest cultures on Earth had been brutally ransacked, including its splendid capital – Beijing – that was invaded and almost totally destroyed by the French and British troops. For a long period, China was divided, humiliated, impoverished and tormented.

But the courthouse, a little neat temple of colonialist justice, now stood in the middle of the once occupied city, whispering about the days when it offered certainty and pride to all those who came to Hong Kong as colonizers, as well as to all those who served and licked the boots of their British masters.

The courthouse was providing confidence to people who were longing for one, just as they did during the grotesque and perverse days, as well as now.

Behind its walls ruled clearly defined and meticulously obeyed spirit of fairness: if one’s chicken got slaughtered, or if one’s tricycle god smashed by a hammer of a mad shopkeeper, the legendary British justice was administered promptly and properly.

Some people would argue, of course, that the entire colonialism was unjust, that the killing of tens of millions of people in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and elsewhere was much more noteworthy than settling fairly and justly some domestic or real estate dispute. Such voices, however, have been always quickly silenced, or bought (with money, diplomas, or other means).

Certainly, the British Crown has been busy subjugating entire countries and continents, murdering innocent people, freely plundering and enslaving men, women and children. Tens of millions died in the British-triggered famines alone, on the Sub-Continent and elsewhere. But that was done “outside” the legal framework, and it was never fit to be discussed publicly in a ‘polite society’, by both the English people as well as by the émigré elites.

Now the UK has been absorbed by the ‘great’ Western Empire, governed by its offspring. Global genocides continue to murder millions. For those, no one gets punished, while the fines for speeding or not wearing seat belts are getting transparently dispersed among the servile citizens of the British Isles.

You kick your dog in public, and you could get arrested, then fined, or perhaps even thrown into jail. You shout at your girlfriend, she runs to police, and they open a ‘criminal investigation’ against you.

You shoot a few missiles at some independent country, killing dozens of innocent people, and it is business as usual. You overthrow some ‘unruly’ African government, and no court of justice, local or international, would even bother to hear the case against you, properly and seriously.

Continue reading →

Responsible actions needed to ensure peace on the Korean Peninsula — a Chinese perspective

Posted by admin

By Zhong Sheng

Global Research, May 01, 2017

People’s Daily 30 April 2017

Given the continued escalation of tensions on the Korean Peninsula over the past months, all concerned parties should implement the resolutions adopted by the UN Security Council in a more strict manner and return to peaceful negotiations, the People’s Daily said in an editorial published on Sunday.

The commentary came after Friday’s ministerial meeting on the nuclear issue of the Korean Peninsula hosted by the UN Security Council at the UN headquarters in New York.

The latest developments on the peninsula highlighted an imperative need for all parties to intensify their efforts to bring stakeholders to dialogue table, added the commentary published under the pen name Zhong Sheng, which is often used to express the paper’s views on foreign policy.

It is reasonable for the DPRK to pursue its own security, but its nuclear and missile ambitions have put itself and the whole region into dire peril, stressed the article titled “Responsible actions are needed to ensure peace of Korean Peninsula”.

The country has been immersed itself into a strong sense of insecurity given historic reasons and reality, the paper added.

The DPRK must not be obsessed in a wrong path of repeated nuclear tests and missile launches that resulted in rounds of sanctions, the commentary said, calling on the country to respect and comply with the relevant Security Council resolutions.

The article pointed out that the Republic of Korea(ROK) and the US also added fuel to the escalated tensions since the two allies, who have been maintaining a high-handed pressure on the nuclear issue of the Korean Peninsula, revealed a strategic intention to crush the DPRK.

It is almost impossible to ease the crisis on the peninsula if the ROK and the US continue their fantasy to settle the problem with more military actions but turn a blind eye to reasonable appeals of the DPRK, the paper stressed.

China is not a directly-concerned party of the peninsula crisis, and it does not hold the key to solving the nuclear issue on the peninsula, the commentary admitted.

But it emphasized that no matter what happens, China will never waiver in its clear-cut position regarding the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula, which means it will stay committed to the goal of denuclearization as well as the path of dialogue and negotiation.

In the next step, the DPRK should refrain from further nuclear test or missile launches, the article urged, adding that the ROK and the US, for their part, also need to stop launching or expanding their military drills or deployment against the DPRK.

All stakeholders need to comprehensively understand and fully implement the DPRK-related resolutions adopted by the Security Council, the paper said. The international community needs to step up their anti-proliferation efforts against the DPRK action. Meanwhile,all parties also need to do more to persuade stakeholders back to peaceful dialogues, it added.

China will, with its utmost sincerity and efforts, safeguard the peace and stability of Northeast Asia and realize the goal to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula along with relevant parties, the paper vowed, stressing that though a peace lover, the country is fearless of any provocations or tests.

China has proposed the “dual-track approach” and “suspension for suspension” plan for peaceful settlement of the issue, in an attempt to help the parties breakout of the security dilemma and return to the negotiating table.

The objective, reasonable and feasible proposals, according to the editorial, not only conform to the requirements of the UN resolutions, but also meet the fundamental interest of all parties including the US and the DPRK.

Translated from Chinese, People’s Daily, April 2017.

The original source of this article is People’s Daily

http://www.globalresearch.ca/responsible-actions-needed-to-ensure-peace-on-the-korean-peninsula/5587878

Top Secret – Beijing has become one of the greatest cities on Earth!

Posted by admin

By Andre Vltchek

Global Research, February 28, 2017

Open your eyes and see for yourself. Unclog your ears and hear. Discard your preconceptions, of all those propaganda refrains that are accompanying the myriad of brainwashing tunes that are being spread by the Western indoctrination media.

For decades, smearing Beijing, while negating its greatness, has been one of the most effective weapons used by the US and Europe in their cultural anti-revolutionary war against all those great independent nations of the planet, especially China.

For those who want to taste the reality, the best advice would be: enter Beijing and let Beijing speak for itself, without an intermediary or ‘interpreter’. But could it be done? Aren’t biases already too deeply engrained in the psyche of most of the people worldwide, people that are bombarded by professional disinformation campaigns manufactured by the Empire and its mouthpieces?

“I used to cry almost every night, from hopelessness and pain,” I was once told by one of the greatest contemporary concert pianists, Yuan Sheng, who decided to return to his native Beijing many years ago. “When I lived in New York, when I read and heard all those lies about my country and my city, I felt so helpless. I couldn’t explain the truth, as nobody around me was willing to listen.”

Old rattles have been played day and night on the BBC, the CNN and many other official channels of the West: the tear-jerking stories depicting the plights of the migrant workers, or some gruesome portrayals of China’s human rights record (all based on extremely arrogant Western dogmas, thoroughly incompatible with Chinese and Asian culture), or the mainstream interpretation of the Tiananmen Square events, or the loud and hypocritical laments about the disappearance of some old neighborhoods, and not to speak of the loud salvoes fired against Beijing’s ‘disastrous’ air pollution and traffic jams.

When a tremendous effort by the government had been made to accommodate the migrant workers arriving from the poorer provinces to Beijing and to other major cities, and when, simultaneously, the standard of living began to rise dramatically all over the Chinese countryside, the topic got quietly shelved. Hardly any credit has been given to the country’s leadership.

When new evidence about the 1989 Tiananmen events began to surface, when it was proved, again and again, that the West actually infiltrated and supported the so called ‘student pro-democracy movement’; and when the facts about the extremely violent nature of many of those ‘students’ became simply undisputable, the Western media clenched its fists and never backpedaled, never bothered to present arguments ‘from the other side’. On the contrary, it turned up the volume of its monotonous propagandist cacophony. Until now, in the eyes of the general Western public, Tiananmen Square is synonymous with ‘oppression’ and not with the great revolutionary history and stunning monumental beauty.

Brian Becker wrote for LiberationNews.org :

The fictionalized version of the “massacre” was later corrected in some very small measure by Western reporters who had participated in the fabrications and who were keen to touch up the record so that they could say they made “corrections.” But by then it was too late and they knew that too. Public consciousness had been shaped. The false narrative became the dominant narrative. They had successfully massacred the facts to fit the political needs of the U.S. government.

“Most of the hundreds of foreign journalists that night, including me, were in other parts of the city… Those who tried to remain close filed dramatic accounts that, in some cases, buttressed the myth of a student massacre,” wrote Jay Mathews, the Washington Post’s first Bureau Chief in Beijing, in a 1998 article in the Columbia Journalism Review.

Mathews’ article, which includes his own admissions to using the terminology of the Tiananmen Square massacre, came nine years after the fact and he acknowledged that corrections later had little impact.

As for violations of human rights in China in general and Beijing in particular, only one (Western) view is commonly presented in the West. As Tom Zwart (professor of cross-cultural law and human rights at Utrecht University) wrote on January 21^st, 2017 for China Daily:

Generally, Western states seem to be strongly attached to promoting their own position and using it as a benchmark to judge others… While Western states are uncompromising about their own stance on human rights, China is keen on achieving harmony and therefore attaches less value to human rights dogma.

That is certainly a nobler approach, but the loud shouting, simplifications and vulgar insults coming from the Western media, politicians and academia, are effectively indoctrinating billions worldwide.

But let’s return to Beijing.

The Demolition of several old hutons in the capital was never presented (by Western media) for what it really was: as part of the great effort to improve living conditions and sanitation of the poor people. Instead it was portrayed as some atrocious crime against the city’s history and culture. Never mind that all truly architecturally valuable old neighborhoods were painstakingly preserved and restored, as were actually almost all important structures of the capital. Never mind that when asked, most huton dwellers are actually grateful for being awarded with comfortable and modern flats.

What about pollution? I encountered people in all corners of the world, who swore that they would never set foot in Beijing, as the pollution levels there are hazardous, almost murderous. Most of these same people said that they’d have no objections to travel to much more polluted cities which are located in the ‘client’ states of the West and therefore managed to escape the toughest criticism: Jakarta, Manila, Phnom Penh and Bangkok, to give just a few examples.

There is hardly any mention, at least in the West, that for years and decades Beijing has been engaged in an epic fight against pollution and in support of the environment: the massive improvement of ecological public transportation (already 17 mostly modern metro lines are in service, countless trolley bus lines, encouragement of electric vehicles, wide sidewalks and introduction of shared bicycles, plus several revolutionary new forms of public transportation soon to be introduced). There are tough emission controls in place, and a ban on scooters. There is also the huge expansion of green areas around and inside the city, as well as the recently imposed ban on smoking (one of the toughest in the world).

It was recently reported by local Chinese media outlets (including China Daily) that:

The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region saw improvements in air quality in 2016… the average concentration of PM2.5, a hazardous pollutant, has decreased by 33 percent compared to the level of 2013…

Many other indicators have improved as well, although mentioning this fact on regular basis in the mainstream Western media would be ‘unacceptably pro-Chinese’.

*

In the last two decades, Beijing has become one of the world’s most exciting cities.

Its cultural life is second to none.

One of the curators of the National Center for Performing Arts (also known as “The Egg”, the largest opera house and performing center in the world) once explained to me:

When I used to live in London, I was dreaming about all those great world-class musicians and performers. Now I’m having meetings and dinners with them, all the time. It is because almost all great artists want to come to Beijing; to perform here.

One of the greatest (and free for all) museums on Earth, the China National Museum, is presently hosting two parallel world-class exhibitions: on the archeological treasures of Saudi Arabia, and the other on the collection from the Louvre Museum. In that institution, some of the greatest masterpieces of Salvador Dali rub shoulders with Chinese revolutionary art and anti-imperialist manifestos.

But now there are actually dozens of world-class museums and concert halls all over Beijing. In the iconic “798” (an old and massive weapons factory located on the outskirts of the city, which used to cover several square kilometers), literally hundreds of avant-garde art galleries are exhibiting everything from Western mainstream art including Andy Warhol or fashion images of Conde Nast, to the most ‘outrageous’ and politically daring ‘radical’ art, critical of the West, of capitalism, in China, and even of the government itself, is on display. It is mind-blowing! There is nothing like this anywhere in the West. Beijing artists are without any doubt much more innovative, daring and free than those in Paris, London or New York.

And on the other side of the city, around the ancient lakes and canals, dozens of clubs are hosting great bands from Africa and other parts of the world.

A prolific writer based in China, Jeff Brown contributed to this essay:

Beijing is one of the world’s greatest repositories of ancient history and modern humanities, showing off hundreds of world class museums, galleries, parks, temples, squares, shrines, monuments, mountains, lakes and rivers – all within a one-hour drive of the city center. You don’t need a car anyway. Beijing has the world’s largest metro system, 1,000 public bus routes and 66,000 licensed taxis to get you to all these myriad sites.

Since 1949, metropolitan Beijing has planted over a half a billion trees, shrubs and flowering bushes, as well as millions of square kilometers of green belts along the fringes of the nearby Gobi Desert, to stop its southern advance and to reduce dust levels blowing in from the north. By 2050, Beijing will have planted 100 billion trees to its north, covering more than ten percent of the country’s landmass

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2874368/Will-China-s-Great-GREEN-Wall-save-country-dust-storms-100-billion-tree-project-halt-advancing-Gobi-Desert.html.

This greenification program continues with a passion and love for nature. Beijing has identified and coddles, like rock stars, 40,000 urban trees that are over 100 years old, some dating back more than 1,000 years

http://www.fao.org/docrep/u9300e/u9300e04.htm.

Contrary to ceaseless propaganda in the West, Beijing and all of China’s cities have shown nonstop improvement in air quality, and Beijing is spending billions to keep bettering its environment. This has been going on since the 1990s, something I can personally attest to

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2017-01/04/content_27853288.htm.

Tetovo, Cairo, Kathmandu, Accra, Manila, Delhi, Beirut, Ulaanbaatar, Baku, Dhaka and Sao Paulo, among others, all had higher 2016 pollution indexes than China’s capital, but only Beijing gets the mainstream media black eye

https://www.numbeo.com/pollution/rankings.jsp?title=2016.

Why? Because Beijing is the heart and soul of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and thus, is not a NATO doormat and puppet, an intolerable affront to Western capitalism.

Proud, forward-looking, full of hope and dreams, Beijing is marching forward.

The West which is clearly in permanent decay, is shooting its poisonous but powerless arrows tinted with nihilism and spite, towards the great capital of this enormous nation which, after a long and dark period of humiliation and suffering is finally reclaiming its rightful place in the world.*

Andre Vltchek is a philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He has covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. Three of his latest books are revolutionary novel “Aurora” and two bestselling works of political non-fiction: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire” and “Fighting Against Western Imperialism”. View his other books here. Andre is making films for teleSUR and Al-Mayadeen. Watch Rwanda Gambit, his groundbreaking documentary about Rwanda and DRCongo. After having lived in Latin America, Africa and Oceania, Vltchek presently resides in East Asia and the Middle East, and continues to work around the world. He can be reached through his website and his Twitter.

The original source of this article is Global Research
Copyright © Andre Vltchek, Global Research, 2017

http://www.globalresearch.ca/top-secret-beijing-has-become-one-of-the-greatest-cities-on-earth/5577157

Free Ukraine Now

Stopping US-NATO takeover of Ukraine and Russia

China

The spheres and perils of U.S. hegemony

Okinawa faces a crisis. Citizens appeal for your support 26 February.

New information on US biological weapons work in Ukraine

Pentagon upgrades to target China – JADC2 and Space Force – At what price? Part 1

Jimmy Carter: U.S. is “the most warlike nation in the history of the world”

President Biden’s magic tricks: watch both of his hands

China and Russia have long endured massive threats. War hawk JFK against China, Russia, and Cuba

Andre Vltchek: Why I reject Western courts and justice

Responsible actions needed to ensure peace on the Korean Peninsula — a Chinese perspective

Top Secret – Beijing has become one of the greatest cities on Earth!