TURKEY/SYRIA: Who is Right in Syria?

Who is Right in Syria? – An Analysis by Lawrence Davidson

Posted by Dr. Lawrence Davidson on November 29, 2015 in France, Middle East, News & Analysis, Russia, Syria, United States, World | | 2 Responses

US, Turkey, NATO Supporting ISIS and al-Qaeda – Supporting the Creation of Buffer Zones

In all of the bloodshed, population displacement and terror that has accompanied the Syrian civil war, the least-considered party has been the Syrian people and their future. Right now that vital ingredient can only be supplied by the reimposition of order by Damascus. The folks in Washington, Paris and Ankara might not like that, but they are not the ones facing a future of anarchy. And indeed, the more they stand in the way of Damascus, the more chaos they will help create.

by Dr. Lawrence Davidson

Here is the situation in Syria as I see it: Russia is taking a long-range view and wants stability in post-ISIS Syria. France and the United States are taking the short-range view and really have no achievable plans for Syria’s future stability. Turkey appears to have given little thought to Syria’s future. Ankara may be willing to see indefinite chaos in Syria if it hurts the Assad regime on the one hand and the Kurds on the other.

Part I – Russia

The Russians may be the only party interested in the long-term political stability of Syria. There is certainly no doubt that President Putin is more determined than Western leaders to act on the fact that the various so-called moderate parties standing against the Assad regime cannot work together, and that this fault cannot be corrected by enticements from the United States. For the Russians, this fact makes the Damascus government the only source of future stability.

This understanding, and not Soviet-era nostalgia, has led Russia to support the Assad regime, which possesses a working government, a standing army, and the loyalty of every religious minority group in the country.

Some might object that both Assad and Putin are dictators and thugs (by the way, thugs in suits in the U.S. government are all too common). However, this cannot serve as a serious objection. The only alternative to Damascus’s victory is perennial civil war fragmenting the country into warlord zones. With the possible exception of Israel, this scenario is in no one’s interest, although it seems that the leaders of in Washington and Paris are too politically circumscribed to act on this fact.

 Part II – U.S. and France

Thus, it would appear that neither the U.S. nor France really cares about Syria as a stable nation. Once the present military capacity of ISIS is eliminated, Washington and Paris may well clandestinely continue to support a low-level civil war against the Assad regime. In this effort they will have the help of Turkey, the Kurds and Israel. The result will be ongoing decimation of the Syrian population and fragmentation of its territory.

As if to justify U.S. strategy, President Obama, with French President Hollande by his side, recently  boasted that the United States stood at the head of a “65-country coalition” fighting terrorism in Syria. However, this is a hollow claim. Most of these countries are coalition members in name only, and some of them, like Saudi Arabia and the Gulf state governments, play a double game. And then Obama dismissed Russia and Iran as “outliers” and “a coalition of two.” Yet those two countries are the Syrian nation’s best hope for future stability.

The fact is that U.S. policy in Syria has been a losing proposition from the beginning just because of its hostility to the Assad government. Despite its air campaign against ISIS, Washington has no ground component nor any answer to the political vacuum in Syria. Both missing parts are to be found in an alliance with Damascus.

Refusal to make that alliance has also opened Washington to building neoconservative political pressure to increase U.S. military presence in the area. However, American “boots on the ground” in Syria is both a dangerous option as well as an unnecessary one. Syrian government boots can do the job if they are properly supported. The support has come from Russia, Iran and Hezbollah. It is the United States and its coalition who are the “outliers.”

Part III – Turkey

It is not easy to explain Turkey’s animosity toward Damascus. Prior to the civil war in Syria, the two countries had good relations. Then something changed. It may have been something as foolish as President Erdogan’s taking personal offense against President Assad because the latter chose to heed the advice of Iran rather than Turkey at the beginning of the war. Whatever happened, it sent Ankara off on an anti-Assad crusade.

That anti-Assad mindset is probably the backstory to the recent reckless Turkish decision to shoot down a Russian warplane operating in support of Syrian government troops close to the Turkish border.

The Turks say that the Russian jet strayed into Turkish airspace. The Russians deny this. The Turks claim that they tried to communicate with the Russian plane to warn it away. When it did not respond, they destroyed it. Of late the Turkish Prime Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, has said that Ankara “didn’t know the nationality of the plane that was brought down … until Moscow announced it was Russian.” This statement is frankly unbelievable given that Davutoglu followed it up with an admission that Turkey had complained to Russian about military flights in this exact border area. He also asserted that both Russian and Syrian operations in this region of northern Syria should stop because ISIS has no presence there. This assertion makes no sense, since Damascus’s aim is to reassert government authority by the defeat of armed rebels regardless of their organizational affiliation.

It is hard to say whether the Turks are telling the truth about an incursion into their airspace. Most of their evidence, such as recorded Turkish warnings to the Russian plane, is easily fabricated. However, in the end it does not really matter if the plane crossed the border. There was no need to shoot it down.

If the Russian jet strayed into Turkish airspace, there would have been a range of options. The Turks could be very sure that the Russian plane had no hostile intention toward their country, and they should have assumed, for the sake of minimizing any consequences, that no provocation was meant on the part of the Russia. In other words, they should have acted as if the alleged overflight was a mistake. The Turks could have then shadowed the Russian plane in a way that coaxed it back into Syrian airspace and followed the incident up with a formal protest to Moscow. Instead they made the worst possible choice and shot the plane down. Now both Ankara and Washington are shouting about Turkey’s right to defend its territory despite the fact that the Russian plane never posed any threat.

 Part IV – Conclusion

In all of the bloodshed, population displacement and terror that has accompanied the Syrian civil war, the least-considered party has been the Syrian people and their future. ISIS, or at least its present infrastructure, will ultimately be destroyed. However, while that destruction is necessary, it is an insufficient outcome because it fails to provide long-term stability. Right now that vital ingredient can only be supplied by the reimposition of order by Damascus. The folks in Washington, Paris and Ankara might not like that, but they are not the ones facing a future of anarchy. And indeed, the more they stand in the way of Damascus, the more chaos they will help create.

About the Author

Dr. Lawrence Davidson

Lawrence Davidson is a retired professor of history from West Chester University in West Chester PA. His academic research focused on the history of American foreign relations with the Middle East. He taught courses in Middle East history, the history of science and modern European intellectual history.

SYRIA: Syrian Destabilization Campaign Updates: June 1 2012

Syrian Destabilization Campaign Updates: June 1 2012

Posted on July 1, 2012 by willyloman

by Scott Creighton

New reports indicate the Turkish version of the Phantom shoot-down incident are completely fabricated. The Turkish plane was shot down inside Syrian airspace by artillery with a range of only 1.5 miles. According to this information, the plane had to be flying low to the ground, in Syrian airspace, and very slowly to be hit by this type of defense system. Now, why do you think Turkey would do that?

“U.S. intelligence indicates that a Turkish warplane shot down by Syrian forces was most likely hit by shore-based antiaircraft guns while it was inside Syrian airspace, American officials said, a finding in tune with Syria’s account and at odds with Turkey….”

“The use of antiaircraft fire would suggest the Turkish plane was flying low to the ground, and slowly, U.S. officials said—though Syria said the jet was traveling at 480 miles an hour.

If hit by antiaircraft fire, the jet likely came closer to the Syrian shoreline than Turkey says, U.S. officials said. ” DP News

The new meeting is over and done with and according to all sources, Hillary didn’t get the regime change mandate she was looking for. Apparently Russia and China held firm in the face of Hillary’s hysterical warmongering and there will be no preconceived arraignment that Assad must go in support of a new puppet regime in Syria.

“After the first session of the international work group meeting in Geneva on Saturday, Lavrov told a news conference there were no preconditions to Syria’s transition process and no attempt to exclude any group from a proposed national unity government.

 The key point was that the agreement did not attempt to impose a process on Syria, he said.”  DP News

Perhaps not so coincidentally, the Israeli’s have come out with a new line of propaganda… RUSSIA shot down the Turkish jet. Yes, that is the story….

“We would not be surprised if these Russian experts, if they didn’t push the button, at least were beside the Syrian officers who did it,” an Israeli air force source told the British paper.” Haaretz

“It definitely has Russian fingerprints on it,” a diplomat told the Sunday Times. He summarized the Russian message: “Syria is not Libya and any attempt to impose a ‘no fly zone’ over Syria will face one of the most formidable air defenses on Earth and will cost any attacker dearly.” YNet

So Russia stands between the NATO regime change efforts and Israel jumps in accusing Russia of downing the Turkish fighter. Interesting.

Also of note, the so-called “rebels” (aka “terrorist regime change actors”) are demanding the US send them arms in-spite of the fact that they have “Islamists” fighting with them. As you may recall, even Hillary Clinton had to eventually admit there are members of al Qaeda inside Syria trying to help her destabilize the country.

“Islamists are among the most effective fighters against the Syrian leadership, some opposition figures said, and Washington needs to know that while these rebels are conservative Muslims they are a far cry from Afghan-style jihadi militants.”  Reuters

Meanwhile, a massive car-bombing took place immediately after the announcement of the decision made by the international Syrian conflict group. Apparently some of those terrorists didn’t like the outcome of the meeting so they are stepping up their efforts. 85 people are reported dead.

The low intensity warfare operation rolls on while limited hangout specialists continue to demonize Assad.

 

SYRIA: Russia attacks 'meddling' on eve of Syrian crisis talks in Geneva

Russia attacks 'meddling' on eve of Syrian crisis talks in Geneva

 

Foreign minister warns Moscow will not support outside interference over the fate of president Bashar al-Assad

Hopes of a political solution to the Syrian crisis suffered a fresh blow on Thursday when Russia insisted it would not endorse an internationally backed plan for a political transition that would require President Bashar al-Assad to surrender power.

Syrian opposition groups warned that Assad would have to step down and leave the country before they would negotiate future political arrangements.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov issued his warning as preparations are being made for Syrian crisis talks in Geneva on Saturday. Photograph: Alexander Zemlianichenko/AP

Russia's foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said in Moscow: "We will not support and cannot support any meddling from outside or any imposition of recipes. This also concerns the fate of the president of the country, Bashar al-Assad."

Lavrov was due to meet Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, to discuss Saturday's Geneva conference, called in an attempt to agree broad support for a transitional national unity government in Damascus that could include anti-Assad forces.

But the Syrian National Council, the most coherent anti-Assad grouping, said it would reject any plan that did not include the unconditional departure of the president, his family and close allies. The SNC position was "firm and clear," insisted spokesman George Sabra. Elements of the Syria-based internal opposition who once advocated dialogue with the regime also now say it is too late.

Reports from Syria depicted another day of violence. Deir Ezzor, in the east, came under tank and artillery fire for the seventh consecutive day in an apparent attempt to take back the only city under almost complete rebel control. Gunfire and arrests were reported from several parts of Damascus.

Casualty levels this month have hit an average of 100 dead a day, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Kofi Annan, representing the UN and the Arab League, is formulating a plan for negotiations between government and opposition that can be presented as a "Syrian-led political process" – language that has been endorsed by Moscow.

The US and Britain say they discern mixed signals and ambiguity in Russia's position. Clinton, speaking in Latvia before travelling to St Petersburg, said: "It was very clear from the invitations that were extended … that people were coming [to Geneva] on the basis of the transition plan that [Annan] had presented."

Lavrov criticised Annan's failure to extend an invitation to Iran, Syria's closest regional ally. "Iran is undoubtedly a powerful player in the whole situation," he said. "Leaving it out of the loop of the Geneva meeting is a mistake."

Saudi Arabia, which is financing elements of the armed opposition, was also excluded from the Geneva event.

Lavrov attacked western governments for "unscrupulous diplomatic practices" in leaking ideas which he said Russia had not endorsed.

Diplomatic efforts should focus on urging Syrian opposition groups to drop their "uncompromising approaches and ... sit down for negotiations with the government," he said.

SNC leaders were meeting on Thursday to discuss whether to go to Geneva before holding an opposition-wide dialogue sponsored by the Arab League in Cairo next week.

The novelty of the Geneva conference is participation by Russia and China, which have vetoed punitive action against Assad at the UN and shunned the western-Arab Friends of Syria grouping on the grounds that it is working against Assad. The Friends of Syria was "not the right format for serious discussion but a tool for generating propaganda," Lavrov said.

France's foreign ministry said the Geneva meeting must "agree on the principles and steps for a democratic transition in Syria, as well as the priority attached to an end to repression and free access for humanitarian aid to civilians".

Underlining its long-standing support for Assad, Russia confirmed it would follow through with plans to deliver refurbished attack helicopters to Syria. "Syria is our friend, and we fulfil all our obligations to our friends," Alexander Fomin, head of the federal service for military-technical co-operation, told RIA-Novosti.

A Russian ship sailing under the Curaçao flag attempted to deliver three helicopters as well as air defence systems last month, but it turned back as it rounded the coast of Scotland after its British insurers withdrew their coverage amid international criticism. The ship returned to port in Russia and was re-outfitted with a Russian flag. It would sail with a non-military escort, the ship's owner said this week.

 

ISRAEL: NATO’s Little Helper: The Overlooked Player in the Syrian Destabilization Campaign

Israel, NATO’s Little Helper: The Overlooked Player in the Syrian Destabilization Campaign

 

Posted on June 23, 2012 by willyloman

by Scott Creighton

All too often we find ourselves talking about the United States and Britain’s destabilization campaign in Syria and we forget to mention the other partner in crime working to break the country up into little pieces: NATO’s Little Helper, Israel.

Israel’s involvement in the terrorist centered destabilization campaign is extensive to say the least and their motives to assist in the NATO efforts are just as obvious.

Israel has more than a few prime motivations to see that the current regime in Syria is overthrown and replaced by a puppet regime friendly to the west and Israel in particular. The first and foremost, is the survival of Israel itself and this has nothing to do with some existential threat posed by Syria.

Israel has been occupying the Golan Heights since the end of the Six Day War back in 1967. It’s managed under Israeli military rule and is still quite disputed by the vast majority of the civilized world. In 1973 Syria won back part of the Golan Heights and Assad has never given up on taking back all of it from the Israeli occupiers. Fewer than 10% of the people living in the Heights have accepted Israel’s offer of citizenship thus the vast majority of the Druze living in the Heights are still Syrian.

In 1981, Israel began building settlements in the Heights which drew immediate international condemnation in the form of  UN Security Council Resolution 497 which stated “the Israeli decision to impose its laws, jurisdiction and administration in the occupied Syrian Golan Heights is null and void and without international legal effect“  The resolution was passed by the Security Council by a vote of 15-0. The United States uncharacteristic did not veto the resolution to protect Israel’s interests.

According to the CIA World Factbook, as of 2010, “there are 41 Israeli settlements and civilian land use sites in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights“. Even the CIA admits the Heights are occupied Syrian territory.

What makes the Golan Heights so important to the state of Israel right now is the fact that Israel gets 1/3rd of it’s water from the Heights which makes it the main water source for all of Israel. With Golan, Israel would literally dry up and blow away.

A large percentage of the rest of their water comes from the occupied West Bank. So they literally bleed what they need from their neighbors. Nice, huh?

Now, you might think that would be reason enough for Israel to help push along a Libyan style imperialist overthrow of the Syrian government or a Balkanization of the country. In the aftermath of whatever shakes out of the turmoil being caused by the CIA, NATO, and the rest of the low-intensity warfare players, Israel stands to take and keep the Golan Heights for real this time making it part and parcel of Israel for good.

I would say that is pretty good motivation, wouldn’t you?

Well, it gets better.

For being”Gods chosen people”, the Israeli’s got stuck with the short end of the stick when it comes to oil and LNG in the region. Seems like Israel is the only country in the entire Middle East with no real reserves to speak of on their property. There are some reserves off the coast of Gaza which explains Israel’s efforts there and their “slant drilling” operation they don’t want people to see. But, for the most part, Israel doesn’t have jack squat when it comes to oil riches. They depend on importing 99% of their oil needs.

That may change after the Heights becomes Israel East so Israel is getting busy looking for their missing black gold.

“The (Israeli) government has secretly green-lighted exploratory drilling for oil and gas in the Golan Heights, almost 20 years after diplomatic initiatives put operations on hold.

National Infrastructure Minister Uzi Landau (Yisrael Beytenu) approved exploratory drilling in the Golan Heights for petroleum and natural gas a few weeks ago despite the risk of Syrian indignation.

“His view is that the State of Israel must utilize all options for oil exploration across the country in order to break free from dependence on Arab oil,” sources close to the minister told the daily Yedioth Ahronoth on Sunday.” The Times of Israel, May 13 2012

Israel’s exploration for natural resources in an occupied territory is clearly a violation of various international laws. They say themselves that they wouldn’t be able to do it without risking a national incident were it not for the fact that the United States and her brothers in crime over at NATO were in the process of tearing Syria into little pieces like they are doing down in Libya.

Of course, the MSM says nothing about this.

Israel for their part, has been aiding and abetting the international crimes against humanity taking place in Syria. They have been caught providing weapons to the Free Syrian Terrorists as the Syrian government has confiscated numerous Israeli made weapons of all sorts from the captured terrorists.

“The discovery of caches of Israeli weapons in Syria’s Latakia Province, used as a hideout by armed groups, reinforces the notion that Israel is one of the forces inciting violence in Syria.

The weapons, which included machineguns, bombs, automatic rifles and explosive devices, were displayed on Syrian TV on June 15. The incident came two days after Israeli authorities took an official stance against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and endorsed armed gangs operating in Syria.” Press TV

A week or so ago, Israel felt the need to step up the rhetoric swirling around the efforts to justify an outright invasion of Syria by claiming they had stockpiles of chemical weapons and they would use them against Israel.If that sounds a bit like the justification for the invasion of Iraq that is probably because Israel was behind that propaganda as well. At least they had a part in it.

“On Monday Israeli Maj. Gen. Yair Naveh, the country’s deputy military chief, warned that Syria could pose a threat to Israel with its chemical weapons.” Russia Today

One can only speculate as to why the general would fear some retaliation from Syria against Israel after all of this is done. Perhaps because he knows that Syria knows that Israel is playing a bigger role than most understand in this effort to destabilize their sovereign state. Who knows. But the WMDs story is bogus at best. Israel, not Syria, is the aggressor here and they have been in the region for quite sometime.

Israel is a pariah nation which exists not by developing mutually beneficial and amicable trade agreements with their neighbors, but rather by seeing something they need and brutally invading and occupying areas which they can leech what they want. They’re doing it in the West Bank and off the coast of Gaza and they’re doing it in the Golan Heights as well.

This is Israel’s motivation for helping with the destruction of the state of Syria. Pure, unadulterated greed. What mandates their having to resort to tactics like this is the fact that for decades their leaders have behaved in this bullish and illegal manner and gotten away with it solely because they are friends with the biggest kid on the block, the United States. After a developed history such as this, few nations are willing to forgive and forget and deal with Israel on a neutral basis and thus, they are left with only the thuggish route to securing the interests of their nation. That and the fact that getting the United States to spend our money bombing them a new water source and some oil reserves is a hell of a lot cheaper.

At any rate, I figured it was high time I spend a little effort exposing NATO’s Little Helper for what they are and the role they are playing killing civilians in Syria for water and profits.

NATO: How the West implemented Hitler’s goals

NATO’s Nazi Beginnings: How the West implemented Hitler’s goals

Posted on June 21, 2012 by willyloman

(Absolute MUST READ on the history of NATO and the fascist state the US and Britain intend to create across the entire globe. Deals with US and British elites and how they supported the rise of the NAZI fascist state until they attacked Britain and what they did in the decades since WWII ended in order to bring the world to the point we are at now. This article goes into many of the aspects of the Global Free Market Wars that I have written about including the Bank for International Settlements and the way various nations are attacking the state owned central bank systems across the world. It’s a good read and not too long.)

by Robert S. Rodvik, Voltaire Network

Many writers have documented how British and American elites bankrolled Hitler’s rise to power and not until he turned his forces westward did they begin to mount defensive actions against the Third Reich. In Britain, elite members of The Right Club, often with government collusion, secretly supported Hitler’s actions against the Jews and against communists and socialists. The Duke of Wellington was a noted anti-semite and a member of the Right Club. Edward the VIII, known as “the Traitor King” was close friends with Adolf Hitler and was forced to give up his throne, not because of Wallis Simpson, but because it was discovered that he was passing British war operations documents to the Nazis. The aristocracy, after all, have never submitted to sharing the wealth with the lesser classes and Adolf was equally amenable to those ends, the destruction of the untermenschen being foremost in Plan A of his conquest strategy for Europe and Russia.

Until 1977 the BIS headquartered in Basel, Switzerland, hid itself from the world. Bankers told visitors to go to Frey’s Chocolate Shop and enter the unmarked entrance of the former hotel next door.

The Bank for International Settlements was a joint creation in the 1930’s of the western world’s central banks, including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Montagu Norman, governor of the Bank of England was a wholehearted supporter of Hitler and, when the Nazis marched into Austria in 1938 most of the country’s gold was packed and loaded into vaults controlled by the Bank for International Settlements – the main central bank for the western world. One day later the Nazis marched into Prague, took the directors of the Czech National Bank as hostages and demanded they cede control of the country’s gold reserves representing some $48 million. Informed that the gold had already been transferred to London’s vaults, efforts were made to contact Montagu Norman – who immediately transferred the money to the Germans to outfit their war machine. Friends indeed.

The United States of America had not yet arrived at the position of world’s leading imperialist power, but many of its elites were aligned with British elite sentiments. One of the leading lights in furthering the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party was none other than Prescott Bush, father to George Herbert Walker Bush and grandfather to G.W. Bush, both future presidents and G.W. H. Bush as head of the CIA. These war criminals have maintained their popularity among right-wing Americans mostly due to a compliant media that has obscured their Nazi-loving history from the populace at large.

In their book George Bush:The Unauthorized Biography, Webster G. Tarpley & Anton Chaitkin write the following: In October 1942…Prescott Bush was managing partner of Brown Brothers Harriman. His 18-year-old son George, the future U.S. President, had just begun training to become a naval pilot. On Oct. 20, 1942, the U.S. government ordered the seizure of Nazi German banking operations in New York City which were being conducted by Prescott Bush. Under the Trading with the Enemy Act, the government took over the Union Banking Corporation, in which Bush was a director. The U.S. Alien Property Custodian seized Union Banking Corp.’s stock shares, all of which were owned by Prescott Bush, E. Roland “Bunny” Harriman, three Nazi executives, and two other associates of Bush. [1]

Tarpley and Chaitkin add the following: President Bush’s family had already played a central role in financing and arming Adolf Hitler for his takeover of Germany…By deciding that Prescott Bush and the other directors of the Union Banking Corp. were legally front men for the Nazis, the government avoided the more important historical issue: In what way were Hitler’s Nazis themselves hired, armed and instructed by the New York and London clique of which Prescott Bush was an executive manager? [2]

Among those supporting the rise to power of Adolf Hitler was industrialist Henry Ford, a noted Jew hater. Among his other crimes, Ford…”refused to build aircraft engines for England and instead built supplies of the 5-ton military trucks that were the backbone of German army transportation.” [3] The list of US industrialists linked to the Nazis is too long to recount here but can be accessed in Charles Higham’s excellent book, Trading With The Enemy: the Nazi-american plot 1933 – 1949. [4]

Clearly the west’s leading financiers were in Hitler’s camp, busy supplying funds for his military buildup and not till he betrayed them by attacking England did the Allies unite to defeat the Nazi forces. In this effort an unholy alliance was formed; that of the western powers and of the Soviet Union, the major force in defeating Hitler’s legions. Yet long before the war ended the Brits and Americans were plotting to redirect their energy against the Soviets, a déjà vu of the 1918 invasion that the west mounted against the Bolsheviks and certainly the most unknown major event of modern history. To this end the British and US rescued the most murderous Nazi war criminals being sought by investigators of the same governments and mingled them into British and US apparatus of terror.

As Michael McClintock writes: It was immediately after the creation of the United Nations that American leaders found it necessary—as a matter of interest—to break the new rules they publicly lauded. In doing so, they developed new systems by which to evade accountability for lawbreaking–including an enormous apparatus for covert intervention–and, by means of extraordinary effort, to present the United States’ actions, whatever their nature, as in accord with international law. [5]

At the same time as the west was planning its covert actions against its WWII ally, it also created the formation of the terror club known as NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Almost in its entirety it was a Nazi enterprise. Nazi General Reinhard Gehlen, for example, who had headed the Russia Desk in the Oberkommando der Wermacht (OKW – Hitler’s Supreme Headquarters) and a consultant on the Final Solution, was secretly brought to the United States where he would deliver his vast storehouse of previously hidden files on the Soviet Union and then set up the Russia Desk for the soon-to-be-formed CIA. [6]

Gehlen would then be returned to postwar Germany where he was put in position as head of Germany’s new Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), the German Secret Intelligence Service. In essence, two Russia desks (at least) now functioned instead of just one; both with the same ultimate aim: destroy the Soviet Union and communism.

Hundreds if not thousands of old Nazis found new life working for the US, Britain, and Canada as the Cold War was cranked up and now the mass murderers were brought into policy making for the same Lords of the Manor who had supported Hitler to begin with. And, with the same old Nazis back in charge, every foul means was employed against the Soviets to prevent any challenge of global capital’s right to dictate the terms of enslavement.

West Germany, now being run by ex-Nazis under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, joined NATO in 1954 and Gehlen liaised with his pro-Nazi mentor Allen Dulles who would become head of the CIA, with brother John Foster as Secretary of State. Soon NATO began appointing the old tried and true Nazis into high positions within the organization.

General Hans Speidel, for example, became commander-in-chief in 1957 of AFCENT (Allied Forces Central Europe). Nazi Admiral Friedrich Guggenberger joined the highly important NATO military committee in Washington and General Adolf Heusinger (Gehlen’s old chief at Hitler’s OKW), became its chairman. At Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers in Europe (SHAPE), Gehlen managed to install several Nazi collaborators into vital positions [7]. Amongst these was Col. Hennig Strumpell, who became deputy to British Maj. Gen. Charles Traver, the Assistant Chief of Staff (Intelligence) at SHAPE. Col. Heinz Koller-Kraus was made head of logistics at Speidel’s AFCENT. Many other Gehlen men would soon join NATO to define its policies. [8]

With the same Nazis well integrated into NATO and the CIA becoming an extension of Gehlen’s old Nazi intelligence agency, the Nieue World Ordnung was essentially relocated from the Reichstag in Berlin and dropped into the Pentagon and CIA Langley, Virginia.

Added to the anti-Soviet battle plans, US elites recognized the value of Goebbel’s Ministry of Truth and turned the lessons learned into the world’s most sophisticated propaganda network ever created. All western wars would now be given illusionary titles, such as: “wars for democracy”, “wars for peace”, “wars for justice”, “wars for humanitarianism” and on and on. The corporate funded elites that run the UK and Canada were quick to adopt the same essential elements.

Two of those components of the propaganda wars for the US/UK/Nazi Nieue World Ordnung was the creation of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty – both staffed with Gehlen’s old Nazis and funded by the CIA. [9]

These Nazi mass murderers set up an Hungarian Desk, provided arms and assistance to underground pro-Nazi elements in Hungary and together with the CIA, instigated the Hungarian uprising – which the Soviets brutally put down [10]. The prime use of this episode however, had little to do with the dead and dying, rather it was the propaganda value which portrayed an “Evil Empire” that had to be destroyed. [11]

Dr. Eberhardt Taubert joined the Nazi party in 1931 and was soon promoted to the rank of Sturmführer, following Goebbels to the Ministry of Propaganda. After the war Taubert slid down to South Africa where he found comfort among the neo-Nazis in power in Johannesburg busy designing the apartheid system. In 1950 he returned to Germany and joined his old Nazi pal Reinhard Gehlen, becoming a member of the BND. In his new BND/CIA post, Taubert became chairman of the CIA-backed “National Association for Peace and Freedom” becoming also an adviser to German Minister of Defense, ex-Nazi Franz Josef Strauss and was then assigned by Strauss to NATO as adviser to the “Psychological Warfare Department”. Goebbel’s Ministry of Truth being recirculated to feed the Christian fundamentalists some newly constructed, yet old and familiar Tales from the Dark, only having different packaging. [12]

“NATO’s Secret Armies: Operation GLADIO and Terrorism in Western Europe” by Daniele Ganser, Contemporary Security Studies, February 2005.

http://www.amazon.com/NATOs-Secret-…

NATO has also been closely linked to a series of terrorist bombings in Italy in the 1980s in order to create a “Strategy of Tension” designed to allow the fascist right wing into power and thereby bring “stability” to the country. This program made use of numerous far right terrorists like Stefano Delle Chiaie of Ordine Nuovo and other demented souls who planted bombs in public places that killed hundreds, aided in implementation by Gehlen’s NATO/Nazi terrorists. Though well covered in Europe, thanks to media complicity, the story barely made a blip here.

In essence these and their followers are the people that run NATO, presently killing its way around the world thanks to the likes of Barack Obama, Steve Harper, and the rest of the West’s puppet satraps; while posing as defenders of humanity. It’s all too much to embrace without losing one’s dinner over and over again.

USA/NATO: 3 Posts on Syria...

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton's accusation 

against Russia prompted a stern denial. 

Photograph: Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

        News

·     World news

·      Syria

  

US backtracks on claims Russia is arming Syrian regime State department acknowledges Damascus already owned attack helicopters, cited by Hillary Clinton as escalating violence

The US state department has acknowledged that Russian helicopters it claimed had been sent recently to the Syrian regime were, in fact, refurbished ones already owned by Damascus.

Secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, claimed on Tuesday that "the latest information we have that there are attack helicopters on the way from Russia to Syria".

The state department admitted details had been omitted from Clinton's speech in which she accused Russia of escalating the violent situation in Syria. But spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said: "Whether they are new or they are refurbished, the concern remains that they will be used for the exact same purpose that the current helicopters in Syria are being used, and that is to kill civilians.

"These are helicopters that have been out of the fight for some six months or longer. They are freshly refurbished. The question is simply what one expects them to be used for when one sees what the current fleet is doing. Every helicopter that is flying and working is attacking a new civilian location so the concern is when you add three more freshly refurbished helicopters to the fight, that is three more that can be used to kill civilians."

Clinton's accusation prompted a stern Russian denial and countercharges of hypocrisy against the US for selling military equipment, including jet engines and patrol boats, to Bahrain despite civil strife in the Arab state.

The US fears Syria is sliding into a violent sectarian conflict and is unhappy that Russia has shown little willingness to help in the US-led efforts against President Bashar al-Assad.

Presidents Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin meet next week for the first time since Putin's return to the presidency last month. The Russian leader is likely to use the session to set out complaints about US foreign policy in several areas.

Clinton's charge over the helicopters could become an afterthought as the US, Russia and other nations engage in tough diplomacy to bring peace to Syria after more than a year of brutal government crackdowns on peaceful protesters and the emergence of an increasingly fierce armed insurgency.

The US had hoped to broaden international efforts to include Russia and China, who have twice prevented the UN security council from adopting binding sanctions against Assad's government.

The Russians have refused to entertain any talk of a Libya-style military intervention in Syria, its closest ally in the Arab world and the host of its only naval base in the Mediterranean aea. It has also put a far greater emphasis on criticising armed Syrian rebels for their attacks, with language that has appeared to equate their violence to that of the Assad regime.

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U.S. provides communications aid for Syria opponents

 

By Agence France-Presse
Thursday, June 14, 2012 21:48 EDT

WASHINGTON — The United States on Thursday acknowledged providing communications equipment and other forms of assistance to members of the “peaceful opposition” in Syria.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the aid is part of “non-lethal” assistance to Syrians living under President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, and part of a global effort to support Internet freedom.

Nuland declined to elaborate on the aid, but a source familiar with the effort said it includes things such as anonymizing software, and satellite phones with GPS capabilities “to document the location of atrocities.”

Nuland said the Internet freedom initiatives are part of “programs that we do around the world that we’ve been doing with Syrians and many, many other countries for quite a long time.”

These are programs “that help citizens in countries where the Internet is restricted or unavailable to find ways to have access to the Internet so that they can know their fundamental freedom to expression and access to information is respected,” she told a press briefing.

The United States has spent $76 million since 2008 for these programs around the world and has another $25 million that will be allocated this year.

Nuland said that additional aid for Syria “is largely in the communications area” and is “designed to help those who are subjected to government intrusion, government interruption of their ability to communicate with each other, to do so to help support unity among the peaceful opposition.”

Time magazine reported this week that the State Department has been providing media-technology training and support to Syrian dissidents by way of small nonprofits.

Asked about the report, Nuland said it was “greatly over-revved.”

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BBC world news editor: Houla massacre coverage based on opposition propaganda

By Chris Marsden
15 June 2012

As quietly as possible, BBC world news editor Jon Williams has admitted that the coverage of last month’s Houla massacre in Syria by the world’s media and his own employers was a compendium of lies.

Datelined 16:23, June 7, Williams chose a personal blog to make a series of fairly frank statements explaining that there was no evidence whatsoever to identify either the Syrian Army or Alawite militias as the perpetrators of the May 25 massacre of 100 people.

By implication, Williams also suggests strongly that such allegations are the product of the propaganda department of the Sunni insurgents seeking to overthrow Bashar al-Assad.

After preparatory statements of self-justification noting the “complexity of the situation on the ground in Syria, and the need to try to separate fact from fiction,” and Syria’s long “history of rumours passing for fact,” Williams writes:

“In the aftermath of the massacre at Houla last month, initial reports said some of the 49 children and 34 women killed had their throats cut. In Damascus, Western officials told me the subsequent investigation revealed none of those found dead had been killed in such a brutal manner. Moreover, while Syrian forces had shelled the area shortly before the massacre, the details of exactly who carried out the attacks, how and why were still unclear.”

For this reason, he concludes somewhat belatedly, “In such circumstances, it’s more important than ever that we report what we don’t know, not merely what we do.”

“In Houla, and now in Qubair, the finger has been pointed at the Shabiha, pro-government militia. But tragic death toll aside, the facts are few: it’s not clear who ordered the killings—or why.”

No trace of such a restrained approach can be found at the time on the BBC, or most anywhere else.

Instead the BBC offered itself as a sounding board for the statements of feigned outrage emanating from London, Washington and the United Nations headquarters—all blaming the atrocity on either the Syrian Army or Shabiha militias acting under their protection.

Typical was the May 28 report, “Syria Houla massacre: Survivors recount horror”, in which unidentified “Survivors of the massacre ... have told the BBC of their shock and fear as regime forces entered their homes and killed their families.” Nowhere was the question even posed that in such a conflict these alleged witnesses could be politically aligned with the opposition and acting under its instruction.

Only now does Williams state: “Given the difficulties of reporting inside Syria, video filed by the opposition on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube may provide some insight into the story on the ground. But stories are never black and white—often shades of grey. Those opposed to President Assad have an agenda. One senior Western official went as far as to describe their YouTube communications strategy as ‘brilliant’. But he also likened it to so-called ‘psy-ops’, brainwashing techniques used by the US and other military to convince people of things that may not necessarily be true.”

Williams is in a position to know of what he speaks.

On May 27, the BBC ran a report on Houla under a photo purporting to show “the bodies of children in Houla awaiting burial.”

In reality this was an example of opposition propaganda that was anything but “brilliant”. The photograph of dozens of shrouded corpses was actually taken by Marco di Lauro in Iraq on March 27, 2003 and was of white body bags containing skeletons found in a desert south of Baghdad.

Di Lauro commented, “What I am really astonished by is that a news organization like the BBC doesn’t check the sources and it’s willing to publish any picture sent it by anyone: activist, citizen journalist or whatever… Someone is using someone else’s picture for propaganda on purpose.”

The BBC again acted as a vehicle for such propaganda, despite knowing that the photo had been supplied by an “activist” and that it could not be independently verified.

Williams concludes with the advice to his colleagues: “A healthy scepticism is one of the essential qualities of any journalist—never more so than in reporting conflict. The stakes are high—all may not always be as it seems.”

Given its track record, the appeal to exercise a healthy skepticism should more correctly be directed towards the BBC’s readers and viewers—and towards the entire official media apparatus.

It may well be the case that Williams’ mea culpa is motivated by a personal concern at the role he and his colleagues are being asked to play as mouthpieces for the campaign for regime change in Syria. But with his comments buried away on his blog, elsewhere on the BBC everything proceeds according to script.

The BBC’s coverage of the alleged June 6 massacre in the village of Qubair once again features uncritical coverage of allegations by the opposition that it was the work of Shabiha militias that were being protected by Syrian troops. BBC correspondent Paul Danahar, accompanying UN monitors, writes of buildings gutted and burnt and states that it is “unclear” what happened to the bodies of dozens of reported victims. He writes of a house “gutted by fire,” the “smell of burnt flesh,” blood and pieces of flesh. He writes that “butchering the people did not satisfy the blood lust of the attackers. They shot the livestock too.”

This is accompanied by a picture of a dead donkey, but aside from this there is absolutely nothing of substance to indicate what happened in the village.

And at one point, Danahar tweets: “A man called Ahmed has come up from the village who says he witnessed the killings. He has says dozens were killed… He has a badly bruised face but his story is conflicted & the UN say they are not sure he’s honest as they think he followed the convoy” (emphasis added).

This does not stop Danahar from concluding, from tracks supposedly made by military vehicles, that “attempts to cover up the details of the atrocity are calculated & clear.”

So much for healthy scepticism!

It must also be pointed out that the BBC has not written a word regarding the June 7 report by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that the Free Syrian Army carried out the Houla massacre, according to interviews with local residents by opposition forces opposed to the Western-backed militia.

 What 

the hell do they 

want?!