India: No Place For Dissent In World’s Biggest Democracy

Avik Roy

“You can’t muzzle dissent in a democracy”, said the Delhi High Court while delivering a verdict against the federal government’s attitude towards civil society.

But this is what green campaigners say India’s government led by prime minister Narendra Modi aims to do — stifle the voices that speak a language different from that of the state.

On April 9 the federal government blocked foreign funding to Greenpeace India with immediate effect by suspending its licence for six months and served a notice to it asking why its registration should not be cancelled.

The decision was taken by the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) after it was allegedly found that the NGO has “prejudicially affected public interests and economic interests of the country in violation” of the laws regulating international financial transactions — Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA).

Legal threat

The environmental organization claimed last week it was being hit by “unfounded allegations”, filing a 26-page response to the MHA’s show-cause notice asking it to explain its alleged violations of the FCRA.

“We are confident that this response establishes our legitimacy beyond any doubt,” said Samit Aich the executive director of Greenpeace India.
Along with the 180-day suspension, the home ministry froze all seven domestic bank accounts of the organization. The government is now planning to cancel the licence of Greenpeace to function in India.

“It is the government using strong arm tactics to clamp down on dissenting voices in civil society,” Greenpeace added in a press statement.

In June last year a report by the National Intelligence Bureau accused Greenpeace of acting against “national interests”.

This report was then used to block access to funds from Greenpeace International, a move that was overturned by the Delhi High Court in January this year.

This was followed by the government banning campaigner Priya Pillai from traveling to the UK in January to testify before a British parliamentary committee on the impact that a coal mining project by London-based Essar would have on the tribal population of Singrauli near the Mahan forest.

Funding drought

On January 20, the Delhi High Court had directed the Home Ministry to transfer the blocked foreign funds — to the tune of 19 million rupees (US$ 299,502) — from Greenpeace International and Climate Works Foundation to Greenpeace India’s accounts, declaring the ministry’s actions to be “arbitrary, illegal and unconstitutional”.

The court also observed that all NGOs were entitled to have their viewpoints and just because their views are not in agreement with that of the government’s, it did not mean they were acting against the national interest.

The home ministry claims that Greenpeace has used its domestic bank accounts to divert funds received from foreign donors.

Last week the minister of state for home, Kiren Rijiju, told the Rajya Sabha (upper house) that an inquiry conducted by the Home Ministry has found that Greenpeace India under-reported and repeatedly mentioned incorrect amount of foreign funds received.

He spoke of “violations of rules”, referring to the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) that governs how investments from overseas can be used in India.

These included using more than 50% of foreign funds on administration and paying salaries to foreign activists.

But it wasn’t just Greenpeace’s foreign accounts that were frozen but the domestic banking too, which Greenpeace India’s program director Divya Raghunandan said was “shocking”.

“The domestic accounts have nothing to do with the entire FCRA Act and that is why we think this is absolutely unacceptable.”

Silenced voice

Greenpeace now faces imminent shut down in India if the government doesn’t unblock its bank accounts.

“This has never happened in the history of Greenpeace,” said Priya Pillai. “It’s strange, it’s sad and it is alarming that this is happening in a country like India which is the world’s largest democracy.”

And that could mean many projects it was actively highlighting and blocking will now progress unopposed.

Activists have accused the government of watering down environmental rules allowing industries to operate closer to protected green zones.

The government has already or is in the process of weakening key environmental laws in India — the Forest Conservation Act and the Environment Protection Act, and is amending laws that guarantee the legal rights of land owners and forest dwellers.

Satinath Sarangi, who works on rights of the victims of the 1987 Bhopal gas tragedy, describes the government crackdown as “illegal and unconstitutional.”

“This government is bent upon destroying the environment of this country and muzzling those who are trying to protect the environmental heritage of our country,” he said.

Infrastructure drive

Modi, a right-wing Hindu nationalist elected by a landslide last May, wants to increase investment in infrastructure and make it easier for businesses to buy land to boost Asia’s third-largest economy.

India has a fast growing economy and population, but many are being left behind. The World Bank estimates a fifth still live below the poverty line. 300 million live without electricity access.
Since he assumed power, the prime minister has pushed through a series of long-awaited reforms and polices making it easier for companies to get approval for new projects.

But this aggressive development drive – which Modi argues is necessary for India to ensure millions have a good standard of living – has collided with civil society groups working to protect the environment.

Critics say his definition of development is pro-corporate and not necessarily pro-people, favoring huge corporations like Adani Industries and Reliance Energy.

Some of these companies are known to have deep links to some in the Modi government. According a report at the Deccan Herald, the Supreme Court had in March issued notice to the government on alleged bureaucrat-corporate nexus.

The apex court sought a probe on allegations that steel, energy and construction conglomerate Essar allegedly granted gifts and favors to ministers and bureaucrats for promoting its business.

Others have reported that the government was irked by Greenpeace targeting India’s public-sector Coal India and a project by Adani, whose promoter Gautam Adani is known to have a close relationship with Modi.

Activists say that the government wants untrammeled development thus seeking to dismiss any criticism of its actions.

Greenpeace campaigns on renewable energy, community rights to their forests and in favor of organic farming have earned the environmental watchdog powerful corporate enemies in the coal and pesticides sectors.

But they’re not the only ones feeling the heat. A similar ban on international funding was imposed on the Indian branches of 350.org, Avaaz and the Sierra Club among others.
The United States has expressed concern that India’s crackdown on the activities of Greenpeace and the Ford Foundation risks limiting the “necessary and critical debate” in the world’s largest democracy.

The US ambassador to India, Richard Verma, says a clampdown by Narendra Modi’s government could have a “chilling effect” on foreign-funded charities and activists and is a cause for concern.

“The regulatory actions that are being taken could have a chilling effect on speech and expressions,” Verma told a news briefing in New Delhi.

The move against NGOs has also sparked debate at Parliament, with the opposition Congress Party offering its support to green groups.

“If an NGO takes up a matter and protests against it in a peaceful way then it cannot be anti-national,” said Tariq Anwar, general secretary of Congress. “They have been accused of this and banning their funding on the basis of this is undemocratic. I consider it to be wrong and government should rethink over it.”

End of the road?

While the debate continues, the clock is ticking for Greenpeace.

Pillai, whose overseas travel ban was overturned by the Delhi High Court in March, said that the NGO has been left with funds for staff salaries and office maintenance costs that will last for just about a month.

“Greenpeace India is heading for a shutdown. The reason we are going to shutdown is that government has blocked not only our FCRA money but also our domestic accounts,” she said.

“This means we cannot access any money by 77,000 Indian supporters who donate money to Greenpeace. It also means that the 340 people of Greenpeace who have been working on various campaigns in this country will lose their livelihood in a month’s time.”

According to media reports, the government has written to the revenue department to revoke Greenpeace India’s society registration and tax exemption for donations.

Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, a journalist and film-maker well-known in India for documentaries like ‘Coal Curse’, said Greenpeace had found a way to hurt the Modi administration, and is being punished as a result.

“The government is targeting Greenpeace in an unfair manner because it is speaking out against certain environmental concerns, specifically what is happening in Singrauli,” he said.
“The government is also unhappy that Greenpeace is also opposing a major [coal mining] project in Australia which is set up by Adani group.”

At a press conference in New Delhi last week, civil society groups called on the prime minister to stop the crackdown on NGOs and begin a dialogue.

Modi missed their call. He was in China meeting Xi Jinping, discussing the two country’s new trade relationship and plans for this year’s UN climate summit in Paris.

In a statement the regional superpowers emphasized their desire to address global warming and invest in clean energy technologies.

“India is ready for business,” Modi said in a closing press conference in Beijing. Like China, that looks like a future without troublesome green groups slowing progress.

Note: Since this story was published, the Delhi High Court has issued notice to Home Ministry and several Indian banks (where the NGOs held accounts) calling on them to respond to a Writ petition filed by Greenpeace challenging the suspension of its license and freezing of its bank accounts without a court order.

© RTCC

Muslims And Terrorism—The Right Response

Maulana Wahiduddin Khan

Some days ago, a Muslim school student asked me, “How should I respond when my friends from other communities allege that all, or most, Muslims are terrorists, or that all, or most, terrorists are Muslims?”

I said to the boy, “I can tell you what my approach is. When people make such statements, I do not defend Muslims at all. Instead, I admit that Muslims are indeed engaged in terrorism. And after this I am able to say that one must distinguish between Islam, on the one hand, and Muslims on the other. I am able to say that we need to gauge Muslims in the light of Islamic teachings, and not vice versa. I admit that Muslims are engaged in terrorism, and then I say that these Muslims’ behaviour is not only not in accordance with Islam, but that it is totally opposed to it.”

I explained to the boy that if you try to defend Muslims from the charge of being engaged in terrorism, you do not have solid ground to stand on. You will get stuck. Why? Because it is an undeniable reality that Muslims are indeed engaged in terrorism.

Now, what is terrorism?

Terrorism can be defined as the use of arms by agencies other than the state. Muslim non-state groups that are engaged in violence in different parts of the world are, therefore, by definition, engaged in terrorism. This is a reality. By issuing wrong fatwas, ulema or Muslim clerics in different parts have wrongly sought to sanction this violence. They have wrongly sought to provide justification for Muslim terrorism.

In Islam, it is very clear that the use of arms is the prerogative solely of the state. Islam brought about major reform in this regard. In pre-Islamic Arabia, everyone kept arms, and inter-tribal rivalry was rife. Islam established a new rule—that the use of arms was to be the prerogative of the state. But today, in various parts of the world, ulema have issued fatwas that wrongly declare it permissible for Muslim non-state actors to engage in violence.

So, I do not at all defend Muslims. I say that it is a fact that Muslims, in different parts of the world, are indeed engaged in terrorism. But, then, I add that Muslims are one thing, and Islam is another. In public gatherings, I openly say, “I have not come here to advocate for Muslims. I am here only to tell you about Islam.” And when I do that, everyone accepts what I say.

It is not only those Muslims who are actively engaged in violence who are engaged in terrorism. Those Muslims who tacitly support Muslims who are engaged in terrorism, even only by sympathizing with them or keeping quiet on their crimes, are also engaged in terrorism—in this case, passive terrorism.

Many Muslims simply refuse to admit that Muslims are indeed engaged in terrorism. They insist that the terrorist violence engaged in by Muslims is actually the handiwork of some other people. When this argument fails to convince others, they seek to justify the violence of Muslims by claiming it is a reaction to the violence of others.

Such defences will not work. No one will be satisfied with these arguments. People know that the 9/11 terrorist attacks were done by Muslims, but many Muslims blame it on Jews. No one takes this argument seriously, though.

This approach will not work. It is not honest. You need to admit the truth. And the truth is that Muslims are indeed engaged in terrorism. And it is the ulema who are majorly responsible for this, because many of them, in different countries, have, through their wrong fatwas, sought to justify the possession and use of arms by Muslim non-state actors, something that is not permissible in Islam. The ultimate responsibility for this terrorist violence lies not with the young Muslim men who have taken to violence. It lies, instead, with these ulema who have wrongly declared this violence legitimate.

So, the only honest option for Muslims when asked by others about Muslim terrorism is to adopt the approach I have adopted. And that is, that they must disown the terrorists completely. No attempt to defend or justify their violence is acceptable. No excuse will work. Once you disown the terrorists completely, everything will be clear.

A week after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I participated in a conference on terrorism in Switzerland. When my turn came to speak about the attacks, my eyes were full of tears. The chairperson of the meeting came on stage and said, “In our midst there is one Muslim who sheds tears for 9/11.”

After I had spoken, a Muslim from America of Indian origin came on stage. He had lived in America for 25-30 years. He said, “It is not just one person who is shedding tears for the victims of 9/11. The whole Muslim world is weeping!”

Later, when we broke for tea, I said to this Muslim man, “I’ve come from Delhi, and I haven’t seen a single Muslim who has shed tears for 9/11, contrary to what you claim.”

And do you know what the man answered? He said, “America was acting just too bossy. And so, it had to be taught a lesson.”

On the stage, the man had said something, but in our private conversation he said just the opposite.

This is just one case of dishonesty on the issue of terrorism involving Muslims. People say one thing in public, and just the opposite in private. I can cite many other examples of this sort.

This sort of dishonesty is totally unacceptable.

And so I say to Muslims, “It is imperative that you disown the terrorists in your midst and not defend them in any way. If you are honest, there is absolutely no need to fear. God will protect you. We have to save Islam, not the terrorists.”

The Epoch Of Human Economy

Lionel Anet

Life starts when a process that used energy eventually managed to replicate itself. That process, which uses energy to produce a need, is an economy. No matter if it’s a plant or an animal like us. *

Life is an economic process. It uses the energy essentially from sunlight and the earth’s minerals to build structures and to self-maintain, then to acquire more of those items and propagate more of its self. That’s life; its economy will vary according to the niche it occupies. Economies have become so varied and sophisticated particularly ours, that its simple value is easily hidden. However we’re interested in human economy, so I’m dividing the epoch of humans into Eras and Periods, to better see how we’re arriving towards our self-destruction.

The commons

· The Era of hunter-gatherers

· Pre Homo sapiens felt they belong to an area and a group that lived on the common for a few million years. Up to 150,000 years before present

· Modern human hunter-gatherers lived on all continents except Antarctica. As before, people still belonged to an area as a part of nature, and in groups in associate with other groups around them. They managed the change from the ice age to its end because they were expert toolmakers, chemist and artist. That lifestyle was similar for people throughout the world.

· The Era of Agriculture. ~ 11,000 YBP

· Agriculture in a few localities that had the right physical condition for suitable plants and animals to be nurtured. People would have had to ease themselves from hunting and gathering but never giving it up.

· The Era of Private property. The beginning of work, wars, and sacrifices. ~ 9,000 YBP

· Agriculture became the dominant food produced preferably by slaves and robbed by warriors, who became key people in all civilisations.

· Local Civilisation led by warriors and or priest who used spiritual mythology to own the land and people.

· The Era of serfs, the end of slavery in Europe. ~ 600 AD

· Christian’s ideology against slavery led to serfs, who had the power to fulfil the needs of society the best way they could

· Particularly in England and Netherlands the serfs and artisans developed water and wind mill, horse collar, horse shoe and many other inventions. That’s labour saving devices, which increased the scope of the economy and set it on a new course.

· The Era of capitalism ~ 1600

· Banks create fiat money, Colonialism, race ideology of selecting people by colour of skin to violate the Christian principle of equality to enslave them and still be a Christian. The massacre of seal and whale for oil.

· Colonisation by the metropolitan European powers. Improved in ships design to cope with trade of primary produce, from slaved labour to be manufactured in Great Britain. The stock exchange and the formation of Corporation. While civilisation maintain wars of glory and conquest (thievery). -----

· The steam age fossil fuel energy 1800

The creation of the working class controlled with money - Competitive democracy dominated by deceit (“universal” suffrage) women as cheap labour.

· The mechanisation of wars for the needed natural resources maintaining the eternal conflicts. It’s now also profitable for the suppliers of military equipment. up to 1905

· The Era of the internal combustion engine. 1900

· Factories for mass production - broad acre farming, cars, aeroplanes, and universal education geared to maximise economic growth with competition, a system that must grow to appear to function.

· 1930 interruption to growth of markets failure. The solution was to save; it resulted with the depression, bankruptcies and unemployment- sacrifices.

· The new mobile wars are total, the young and old are targets. The devastation is near total in many parts of the world.

· Nations competing with one another for markets.

· The Era of Electronics and the world domination by the USA. 1945 on, until now.

· Nuclear for weapons and then for power. Space exploration and its use. The collapse of the soviet bloc. The plastic industry. Globalisation and shipping containers to aid competition for the cheapest workers. The gradual use of robots in manufacturing. Global economy and communication spurred by competition. It’s the ultimate exploitation of people and planet for mainly the 0.1% of the people.

· The military economy. Use of drones for military purposes. NATO verse BRIC powers.

· This led to depletion of resources and pollution on a world scale, which will change the climate to an unliveable state for most life including ourselves.

· Without realising, we are now in charge of heating the global climate.

The current civilised system will be the end of the 0.1% wealthy people, so it’s in their interest, and that means our interest as well, we must help them to survive so that we can change the direction we are heading; so we can all survive.

What we need to overcome, to survive.

Our education (indoctrination) we received to grow the economy and to justify the domination of people and nature, which isn’t seen as it became a part of us. With some effort that indoctrination can be removed, this is possible because we have no alternative and it’s necessary to survive.

The economy used by any living thing is its paramount identity, which directs the way that life lives. If for some reason the economy used by a particular species is incompatible with nature it will cease to live. The option we have should be strong enough for people to take the trouble to think and change the system.

Jeffrey Sterling vs. the CIA: the Untold Story

Norman Solomon

A dozen years before his recent sentencing to a 42-month prison term based on a jury’s conclusion that he gave classified information to a New York Times journalist, former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling was in the midst of a protracted and fruitless effort to find someone in Congress willing to look into his accusations about racial discrimination at the agency.

ExposeFacts.org has obtained letters from Sterling to prominent members of Congress, beseeching them in 2003 and 2006 to hear him out about racial bias at the CIA. Sterling, who is expected to enter prison soon, provided the letters last week. They indicate that he believed the CIA was retaliating against him for daring to become the first-ever black case officer to sue the agency for racial discrimination.

As early as 2000, Sterling was reaching out toward Capitol Hill about his concerns. He received a positive response from House member Julian Dixon (D-Calif.), a former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, who expressed interest in pursuing the matter of racial discrimination at the CIA and contacted the agency about his case, Sterling says. But the 20-year member of Congress died from a heart attack on Dec. 8, 2000.

Sterling recalls getting special firing treatment in early 2002 from John Brennan, then a high-ranking CIA executive, now the agency’s director and a close adviser to President Obama: “He personally came down to the administrative office to tell me that I was fired. Someone told me that, ‘Well, you pulled on Superman’s cape.’”

Soon after the CIA fired him, the New York Times, People magazine and CNN reported on Sterling’s lawsuit charging the CIA with racial discrimination. But Sterling found no support from civil rights organizations.

In a letter dated Jan. 9, 2003, to Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, Sterling recalled joining the CIA in 1993 “to serve my country” — “but the clubby and racially exclusive atmosphere in the Agency denied me such an opportunity.”

The letter went on: “The Agency taught me Farsi and I was trained as an expert against Iranians and terrorists. I proved my abilities as a case officer, however, when the time came for my use in the field or to move up in the ranks of officers, I was ‘too big and too black.’ That and other discriminatory treatment I received during my time at the Agency are the impetus behind my suit.”

In an interview for the new documentary “The Invisible Man: NSA Whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling” (which I produced on behalf of ExposeFacts), Sterling told the film’s director Judith Ehrlich that CIA leaders quickly focused on him when they learned about a leak of classified information to Times reporter James Risen in the early spring of 2003. (At the emphatic request of the Bush White House, the story was spiked by the Times leadership and did not reach the public until a book by Risen appeared in January 2006.)

“They already had the machine geared up against me,” Sterling says in the film. “The moment that they felt there was a leak, every finger pointed to Jeffrey Sterling.” He added: “If the word ‘retaliation’ is not thought of when anyone looks at the experience that I’ve had with the agency, then I just think you’re not looking.”

His letters to members of Congress, being reported here for the first time, show that Sterling was anticipating severe retribution as early as mid-2003 — more than seven years before he was indicted on numerous felony counts, including seven under the Espionage Act, for allegedly informing Risen about the CIA’s Operation Merlin. That operation had given flawed design material for a nuclear weapon component to the Iranian government in early 2000. According to Risen’s reporting, Merlin “may have been one of the most reckless operations in the modern history of the CIA.”

While the prosecution put on 23 witnesses from the CIA during Sterling’s trial in January this year, negative comments about his actual job performance at the CIA were rare during their testimony. An exception was David Cohen, who headed the CIA’s New York office when Sterling worked there. Cohen — a notably hostile witness who called Sterling’s job performance “extremely sub-par” — booted Sterling from the New York office in 2000.

Shortly after 9/11, Cohen left the CIA to head up a New York Police Department program that drew strong criticism and opposition from civil liberties groups. In 2002, as my colleague Marcy Wheeler wrote, Cohen “got a federal court to relax the Handschu guidelines, which had been set up in 1985 in response to NYPD’s targeting of people for their political speech. … After getting the rules relaxed, Cohen created teams of informants that infiltrated mosques and had officers catalog Muslim-owned restaurants, shops, and even schools.”

The CIA fired Sterling in January 2002 after many months of administrative limbo. His letters the following year reflected escalating disappointment and anger at an absence of interest from members of Congress as well as from civil rights organizations including the Rainbow Push Coalition and the NAACP. Sterling says that none answered his letters.

“It has … become apparent there is a general fear of taking on the CIA,” said a June 26, 2003 letter from Sterling to the then-chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, Elijah Cummings (D-Md.). “As a result, I have been engaged in a solitary and completely one-sided battle against the Agency that has left me ruined. There has been no one to stand with me either out of fear or ignorance. At every turn, the Agency has attempted to denigrate me and get rid of my case.” (Sterling’s lawsuit was to continue along a convoluted judicial path for over two more years, until a court finally dismissed it on grounds that a trial would reveal state secrets.)

Sterling says he never got a reply from Rep. Cummings.

“Congressman Cummings does not recall receiving such a letter,” his press secretary Trudy Perkins told me this week.

Sterling’s letter to Cummings came two months after the White House had succeeded at persuading the Times management not to publish Risen’s story on Operation Merlin. Meanwhile, the government was searching for someone to blame for the leak. “Now it seems I am part of a leak investigation being conducted by FBI,” Sterling’s letter said. “Apparently, information related to very sensitive operations I was instrumental in conducting was leaked to the press thereby causing the FBI to launch an investigation.”

The letter added: “As I have absolutely nothing to hide, I agreed to meet with the FBI to show my veracity and assist in their investigation. During that meeting, it was apparent that CIA has been instrumental in pointing the finger directly at me as a source of this leak. Though the FBI Agents conducting the session emphasized that I was not the target of their investigation, it was more than obvious to me that I will be the one to eventually take the fall.”

The indictment of Jeffrey Sterling came seven and a half years later, at the end of 2010.

Testimony at Sterling’s trial showed that the FBI did little or no investigation of other individuals who had extensive knowledge of Operation Merlin. For instance, the then-chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Pat Roberts (R-KS), shielded the committee’s chief of staff by successfully insisting that the FBI not interview him about the leak — even though, or perhaps because, investigators viewed the committee’s chief of staff as a key suspect. Trial testimony showed that the FBI had initially suspected that the leak came from the Senate committee staff.

On July 17, 2003 — four months after the U.S. invasion of Iraq — Sterling sent a letter to Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), who had recently been chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee and remained its ranking member. “Given the courage you have displayed along with a few other Senators in speaking out about the current intelligence controversy related to Iraqi WMD,” Sterling wrote, “I feel that you would be an appropriate Senator to reach out to. What I have to say is substantially related to the current debate about WMD intelligence.”

At Sterling’s trial four months ago, Judge Leonie Brinkema effectively barred defense efforts to present information related to Sterling’s concerns about such matters. But those concerns are evident in Sterling’s letter to Sen. Levin, which addressed issues of CIA activities related to weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East region.

Sterling’s letter to Levin stated that “since April 2000” — just two months after Operation Merlin gave flawed nuclear weapon design information to Iran — “I have been reaching out to numerous members of Congress including both intelligence committees to bring to their attention my concerns about the CIA’s efforts directed at terrorism (focus on pre 9/11) and dangers of certain operations, particularly involving WMD in the Middle East. My efforts all fell upon deaf ears.”

The letter continued: “Finally, after close to three years of trying, I gained an audience with the Senate Intelligence Committee — more specifically, Committee staffers this past March. I told them my concerns and provided necessary details and specifics. I pointed out though I had extensive experience in Iranian operations, the WMD information had significant impact on intelligence related to Iraq.”

(Sterling had gone through legal channels to meet with Senate Intelligence Committee staffers. A dozen years later, testimony at Sterling’s trial revealed that only negligible action had resulted. A high-ranking committee staff member told of asking the CIA if its Operation Merlin was problematic, and predictably the CIA replied that the operation was just fine.)

Shortly after he met with Senate committee staff, Sterling’s letter to Sen. Levin said, “in early April the information was evidently leaked to the press. I have no idea what the staffers did with the information, but it is difficult for me to assume that the leak did not somehow originate from the Senate Intelligence Committee. From the frantic way the CIA threatened my attorney with sanctions and threats to send their security folks to pay me a visit, it was clear that CIA automatically assumed I was the source of the leak without even confirming that I had talked with individuals cleared to hear the information. …

“I have been trying to do the right thing, and I found myself in the middle of a firestorm involving the [Bush] Administration and the highest levels of CIA and FBI. Given the current debate on intelligence and the credibility of the President, I can certainly understand the attempts to make me just ‘go away.’ Despite the great personal risk I am undertaking reaching out to you, I feel it my duty to bring to your attention information that is vital to the national security of this country. I feel this especially given the way the President and the administration has skewed the truth with regard to WMD intelligence.”

Sterling’s letter to Levin noted that “as a Senator, you should have the proper clearance for me to discuss intelligence matters with you,” and closed with a one-sentence paragraph: “I do hope to hear from you soon.”

Sterling told me that he never heard from Sen. Levin.

Likewise, Sterling says, he received no reply to the October 2, 2006 letter that he sent to Rep. Mel Watt (D-NC), who then chaired the Congressional Black Caucus. (Watt, like Levin, is no longer in Congress.) That year had begun with publication of Risen’s book “State of War,” followed by an FBI raid on the home near St. Louis that Sterling shared with his then-fiancee and current wife Holly. “Now there is a federal grand jury sitting attempting to come up with something to indict me on,” Sterling wrote. Recalling how his discrimination suit was tossed out of court on “national security” grounds, he added: “I think it is deplorable how I am denied the opportunity to utilize the courts to defend my civil rights, yet they can use the same system to most likely charge me with a supposed crime.”

Like his going through channels to file an internal complaint with the CIA and then a court lawsuit alleging racial discrimination at the agency, Sterling’s going through channels to express concerns to the Senate Intelligence Committee was to be repeatedly used against him during the January 2015 trial that resulted in a prison sentence of three and a half years. Inside the courtroom, in front of the jury, the prosecution often cited his lawsuit and his contact with Senate Intelligence Committee staffers as clear indications of bitterness, vengefulness and motive for taking the actions alleged in the indictment.

At the CIA and the Justice Department, authorities routinely depicted Jeffrey Sterling as a “disgruntled” employee. During interviews for “The Invisible Man,” he addressed how that depiction has played out for him: “I think the label ‘disgruntled’ came from the moment that I complained, in any aspect. I was not being part of the team. … People say that individuals play the race card. What about the other side of that? The race card was certainly being played with me. And you can say it was the white race card because I wasn’t white. They had all those cards. … And if there isn’t going to be a true, real, honest investigation with any veracity, the natural conclusion is going be ‘disgruntled.’ It’s a very easy label to place.”

ISIS on the Rampage

Deepak Tripathi

The capture of Ramadi in central Iraq on 18 May by the Sunni-dominated fundamentalist group Islamic State, and only three days later the fall of the ancient city of Palmyra in the heart of Syria, have shocked Arab and Western governments alike. Taking control of Ramadi and Palmyra, cities more than 400 miles apart, and in different countries, so quickly is no mean feat.

Subsequent reports indicated that the Syrian government’s last border crossing between Iraq and Syria had also fallen to Islamic State forces, giving them control of the entire border between the two countries. This frightening new reality means that the frontier is now open to Islamic State, who can move from one country to the other at will.

The radical Islamic militia continues its murderous campaign elsewhere, too. It claimed that one of its suicide bombers blew up a Shia mosque in Saudi Arabia’s eastern town of Qadeeh, killing and wounding scores of people.

Events like these belie claims of success in recent military operations by the United States and allies against the Islamic State’s command structure and fighters on the ground. America’s strategy, often repeated, has been to “degrade and destroy” Islamic State, just as Washington’s aim was to deal with al-Qaida. That strategy continues to be in a state of failure, because Washington is unable to prevent the phenomenon of one extremist organisation morphing into several splinter groups which are far more dangerous.

The causes of Islamic State’s growth are multifaceted. So is the significance of its dramatic advances in the battlefield. Ramadi in Anbar province, barely 70 miles from the capital Baghdad, was where the American-sponsored “Sons of Iraq” (Sahwa) militia started in order to counter al-Qaida nearly a decade ago. Born out of expediency, that alliance was forged between the US occupation forces and members of the overthrown Ba’athist regime of Saddam Hussain and Sunni tribes.

Now that Iraq is under Shia rule, the alienation among Sunnis is strong for two main reasons. The sense of loss of identity, depersonalisation and lack of opportunities, and the perception of abandonment by the United States, add fuel to the fires burning in the region. Both in Iraq and Syria, government authority is absent in vast areas, leaving a dangerous vacuum. The void is filled by fanatics who have sectarian zeal, appetite to settle matters by violence and weapons in abundance.

A strategy whose objectives are mixed up, and which is based on sheer opportunism, lacks consistency and is likely to fail. In Iraq, Saddam Hussain, leading a Sunni minority and secular dictatorship, was deposed. Saddam’s overthrow released soldiers of his Ba’athist army and alienated Iraq’s Sunni tribes. But then, many of the same were enticed by the United States with money and weapons to fight al-Qaida. With that phase over and a Shia-dominated regime in Baghdad, the Sunnis were out of favour again. They turned from allies to enemies.

The nature of war between government forces and Islamic State in Iraq is full of irony. The Iraqi military is heavily equipped with American weapons and is supposedly well trained, but clearly lacks the will to fight. IS forces, too, have plenty of weapons, originally supplied by Washington to the “Sons of Iraq” militia to fight al-Qaida, or captured from the Iraqi military.

The US strategy in Syria has been to overthrow the Assad regime and thus eliminate an old rejectionist challenge to American–Israeli supremacy in the Middle East. Again, expediency drove the United States and anti-Assad forces closer. Western arms supplied to anti-Assad groups that are described as “moderate” have often been seized by more fanatical and trigger-happy groups like Islamic State.

Events in recent years have demonstrated again and again that alliances with extremist groups to destabilise countries tend to produce a boomerang effect. From Libya to Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the effects have been devastating. The region is destabilised. Human misery is indescribable. External powers are eager to intervene when it is least helpful and display withdrawal symptoms when the going gets tough or it does not suit them.

Accounts of the fall of Palmyra, site of two-thousand-year-old Roman-era ruins and artefacts, speak of large-scale evacuation of nearby communities by Syrian troops as they withdrew. There was no intervention by US aircraft which have been deployed in recent months to target Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. Residents left behind face atrocities from IS militants.

North of Palmyra lie oil and gas fields under Syrian government control. Does the US goal to depose President Assad in Syria explain why American air power did not intervene in the battle for Palmyra, and may not do so in the battle for the oil fields nearby? After all, the loss of those oil fields would be a big setback against the Syrian regime whereas a US intervention against Islamic State in that battle would help the Assad regime.

So, in Iraq as well as Syria, contradictions in American policy abound. Islamic State poses a serious threat to the Iraqi government which Washington does not want to collapse. In Syria, on the other end, the American agenda is the exact opposite – to engineer the end of the Assad regime. Just as the United States helped raise a Sunni tribal militia called “Sons of Iraq” to counter the threat of al-Qaida some years ago, opportunism now requires Washington to sustain a Shia regime in Baghdad. To protect that regime, the US is now supporting a predominantly Shia militia, described as the “Popular Mobilisation Units”. In Iraq, America and Iran are in tacit alliance with each other. In Syria they support opposite sides.

With such contradictory motives in Iraq and Syria, America’s strategy against Islamic State cannot succeed.

Murder, Inc. Returns to the Middle East

Dan Glazebrook

The strategy was first revealed as far back as 2007 in Seymour Hersh’s article ‘The Redirection’, which revealed how Bush administration officials were working with the Saudis to channel billions of dollars to sectarian death squads whose role would be to “throw bombs… at Hezbollah, Motada al-Sadr, Iran and at the Syrians” in the memorable words of one US official.

But more evidence of precisely how this strategy unfolded has been coming out ever since. Most recently, last Monday saw the release of 100s of pages of formerly classified US Defence Intelligence Agency documents following a two year court battle in the US. These documents showed that, far from being an unpredictable ‘bolt from the blue’, as the mainstream media tends to imply, the rise of ISIS was in fact both predicted and desired by the US and its allies from as far back as 2012. The DIA report, which was widely circulated amongst the USA’s various military and security agencies at the time, noted that “There is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in Eastern Syria, and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran)” Elsewhere, the “supporting powers to the opposition” are defined as “Western countries, the Gulf states and Turkey”.

In other words, a Salafist – that is militantly anti-Shia – “principality” was “exactly” what the West wanted as part of their war against, not only Syria, but “Shia expansion” in Iraq as well. Indeed, it was specifically acknowledged that “ISI [the forerunner of ISIS] could also declare an Islamic state through its union with other terrorist organisations in Iraq and Syria”.

The precision of the declassified predictions is astounding. Not only was it predicted that the terrorist groups being supported by Washington and London in Syria would team up with those in Iraq to create an ‘Islamic State’, but the precise dimensions of this state were also spelt out: recognising that “the Salafist[s], the Muslim Brotherhood, and AQI are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria”, the report noted that the consequences of this for Iraq would be to “create the ideal atmosphere for AQI [al Qaeda Iraq] to return to its old pockets in Mosul and Ramadi.” Mosul, don’t forget, was taken by ISIS in June 2014, and Ramadi fell earlier this week.

In the three years since the document was drawn up, the policy has continued relentlessly. Recent months have seen the West and its regional allies massively stepping up their support for their anti-Shia death squads. In late March, Saudi Arabia began its bombardment of Yemen following military gains made by the Houthi (Shia) rebels in that country. The Houthis had been the only effective force fighting Al Qaeda in the country, had taken key territories from them last November, and were subsequently threatening them in their remaining strongholds. This was when the Saudis began their bombardment, with US and British support, natch, and, unsurprisingly, Al Qaeda have been the key beneficiary of this intervention, gaining ‘breathing space’ and regaining valuable lost territory, retaking the key port of Mukulla within a week of the commencement of the Saudi bombardment.

Al Qaeda have also been making gains in Syria, taking two major cities in Idlib province last month following a ramping up of military support from Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. And of course, Britain has been leading the way for a renewed military intervention in Libya in the guise of a “war against people smuggling” that, as I have argued elsewhere, will inevitably end up boosting the most vicious gangs involved in the trade, namely ISIS and Al Qaeda.

So what explains this sudden stepping up of Western and ‘allied’ support for al Qaeda and co right now?

The answer lies in the increasing disgust at the activities of the death squads across the region. No longer perceived as the valiant freedom fighters they were depicted as in 2011, their role as shock troops for the West’s ‘divide and ruin’ strategy, promising nothing but a future of ultra-violent trauma and ethnic cleansing, has become increasingly obvious. The period between mid-2013 and mid-2014 saw a significant turning of the tide against these groups. It began in July 2013 with the ouster of Egypt’s President Morsi following fears he was planning to send in the Egyptian army to aid the Syrian insurgency. New President Al-Sisi put an end not only to that possibility, but to the flow of fighters from Egypt to Syria altogether. The West hoped to step in the following month with airstrikes against the Syrian government, but their attempts to ensure Iranian and Russian acquiescence in such a move came to nought and they were forced into a humiliating climbdown.

Then came the fall of Homs in May 2014, as Syrian government forces retook a key insurgent stronghold. The momentum was clearly with the government side; that is until ‘ISIS’ sprang onto the scene – and with them, a convenient pretext for the US intervention that had been ruled out just a year before.

Meanwhile, in Libya, the pro-death squad parties decisively lost elections for the first elected ‘House of Representatives in June 2014. Their refusal to accept defeat led to a new chapter in the post-NATO Libyan disaster, as they set up a new rival government in Tripoli and waged war on the elected parliament. Yet following a massacre of Egyptians by ISIS in Libya last December, Egypt sent its airforce in on the side of the Tobruk (elected) parliament; it is now, apparently, considering sending in ground troops.

Losing ground in Yemen, in Libya, in Egypt and in Syria, the West’s whole strategy for using armed Salafists as tools of destabilisation had been starting to unravel. The direct interventions in Syria, Yemen and soon Libya, then, are nothing but a means of propping them up – and last Friday’s bombings show they are already paying dividends.

Kiev’s Repression of Anti-Fascism in Odessa

Eric Draitser

There is a common misconception in the West that there is only one war in Ukraine: a war between the anti-Kiev rebels of the East, and the US-backed government in Kiev. While this conflict, with all its attendant geopolitical and strategic implications has stolen the majority of the headlines, there is another war raging in the country – a war to crush all dissent and opposition to the fascist-oligarch consensus. For while in the West many so called analysts and leftists debate whether there is really fascism in Ukraine or whether it’s all just “Russian propaganda,” a brutal war of political repression is taking place.

The authorities and their fascist thug auxiliaries have carried out everything from physical intimidation, to politically motivated arrests, kidnappings, torture, and targeted assassinations. All of this has been done under the auspices of “national unity,” the convenient pretext that every oppressive regime from time immemorial has used to justify its actions. Were one to read the Western narrative on Ukraine, one could be forgiven for believing that the country’s discontent and outrage is restricted solely to the area collectively known as Donbass – the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics as they have declared themselves. Indeed, there is good reason for the media to portray such a distorted picture; it legitimizes the false claim that all Ukraine’s problems are due to Russian meddling and covert militarization.

Instead, the reality is that anger and opposition to the US-backed oligarch-fascist coalition government in Kiev is deeply rooted and permeates much of Ukraine. In politically, economically, and culturally important cities such as Kharkov, Dnepropetrovsk, and Kherson, ghastly forms of political persecution are ongoing. However, nowhere is this repression more apparent than in the Black Sea port city of Odessa. And this is no accident.

Odessa: Center of Culture, Center of Resistance

For more than two centuries, Odessa has been the epicenter of multiculturalism in what is today called Ukraine, but what alternately was the Soviet Union and the Russian Empire. With its vibrant history of immigration and trade, Odessa has been the heart of internationalism and cultural, religious, and ethnic coexistence in the Russian-speaking world. Its significant populations of Russians, Jews, Ukrainians, Poles, Germans, Greeks, Tatars, Moldovans, Bulgarians and other ethnic and national identities made Odessa a truly international city, a cosmopolitan Black Sea port with French architecture, Ottoman influence, and rich Jewish and Russian/Soviet cultural history.

In many ways, Odessa was the quintessential Soviet city, one which, to a large extent, actually embodied the Soviet ideal enumerated in the state anthem – a city “united forever in friendship and labor.” And it is this spirit of multiculturalism and shared history which rejects the racist, chauvinist, fascist politics which now passes for standard political currency in “Democratic Ukraine.”

When in February 2014, the corrupt, though democratically elected, government of former President Viktor Yanukovich was ousted in a US-backed coup, the people of Odessa, just as in many other cities, began to organize counter-demonstrations against what they perceived to be a Western-sponsored oligarch-fascist alliance seizing power over their country. In the ensuing weeks and months, tens of thousands turned out into the streets to air their discontent, including massive rallies held in February, March, and April.

This inchoate movement against the new dispensation in Kiev,handpicked by the US and its European allies, culminated in two critical events: the establishment of an anti-Maidan movement calling for federalization and greater autonomy for the Odessa region, and the massacre at the Trade Unions House carried out by fascist thugs which resulted in the deaths of more than fifty anti-fascist activists and demonstrators. As a protest organizer and eyewitness recounted to this author, “That was the moment when everything changed, when we knew what Ukraine had really become.”

The brutality of the pogrom – an appropriate word considering the long and violent history of this region – could hardly be believed even by hardened anti-fascist activists. Bodies with bullet wounds found inside the burned out building, survivors beaten on the streets after their desperate escape from the flames, and myriad other horrific accounts demonstrate unequivocally that what the Western media dishonestly and disgracefully referred to as “clashes with pro-Russian demonstrators,” was in fact a massacre; one that forever changed the nature of resistance in Odessa, and throughout much of Ukraine.

No longer were protesters simply airing their grievances against an illegitimate government sponsored by foreigners. No longer were there demonstrations simply in favor of federalization and greater autonomy. Instead, the nature of the resistance shifted to one of truly anti-fascist character seeking to get the truth about Ukraine out to the world at large. Where once Odessa had been the site of peaceful demands for fairness, instead it became the site of a brutal government crackdown aimed at destroying any semblance of political protest or resistance. Indeed, May 2, 2014 was a watershed. That was the day that politics became resistance.

The Reality of the Repression

The May 2, 2014 massacre in Odessa is one of the few examples of political repression that actually garnered some attention internationally. However, there have been numerous other examples of Kiev’s brutal and illegal crackdown on dissent in the critical coastal city and throughout the country, most of which remain almost entirely unreported.

In recent weeks and months, the local authorities have engaged in politically motivated arrests of key journalists and bloggers who have presented a critical perspective on the developments in Odessa. Most prominent among them are the editors of the website infocenter-odessa.com, a locally oriented news site that has been fiercely critical of the Kiev regime and its local authorities.

In late 2014, the editor of the site, Yevgeny Anukhin, was arrested without any warrant while he was attempting to register his human rights organization with the authorities. According to various sources, the primary reasons for his arrest were his possession of video evidence of illegal shelling by Ukrainian military of a checkpoint in Kotovka, and data on his computer which included a compilation of names of political prisoners held without trial in Odessa. With no evidence or warrant, and in breach of standard legal procedures, he was arrested and charged with recruitment of insurgents against the Ukrainian state.

In May 2015, the new editor of infocenter-odessa.com Vitaly Didenko, a leftist, anti-fascist activist and journalist was also arrested on trumped up charges of drug possession which, according to multiple sources in Odessa, are entirely fabricated by the SBU (Security Service of Ukraine) secret police in order to create a pretext upon which to detain him. In the course of his arrest, Didenko was seriously injured, incurring several broken ribs and a broken arm. He is currently sitting in an Odessa jail, his case entirely ignored by Western media, including those organizations ostensibly committed to the protection of journalists.

Additionally, just this past weekend (May 24, 2015) there was yet another sickening display of political repression on the very spot of the May 2, 2014 massacre. Activists and ordinary Odessa citizens had been taking part in a memorial service for the victims of the tragedy when the demonstration was violently dispersed by armed men in either military or national guard uniforms (see here for photos). According to eyewitnesses, the military men instigated violence at the gathering and broke it up, all while both local police and OSCE monitors stood aside and watched. Naturally, this is par for the course in “Democratic Ukraine.”

Aside from journalists, a large number of activists have been detained, kidnapped, and/or tortured by Ukrainian authorities and their fascist goons. Key members of the Borotba (Struggle) leftist organization have been repeatedly harassed, arrested, and beaten by the police. One particularly infamous example was the detainment of Vladislav Wojciechowski, a member of Borotba and survivor of the May 2^ndmassacre. According to Borotba’s website, “During the search of the apartment where he lived, explosives were planted. Nazi “self-defense” paramilitaries participated in his arrest. Vladislav was beaten, and it is possible that a confession was beaten out of him under torture.  Currently, he is in SBU custody.” He was ultimately charged with “terrorism” by the authorities after having been beaten and tortured by both Nazi goons and SBU agents.

Upon his release more than three months later in December 2014 in a “prisoner exchange” between Kiev and the eastern rebels, Wojciechowski defiantly stated, “I am very angry with the fascist government of Ukraine, which proved once again with its barbaric acts that it is willing to wade through corpses to defend its interests and those of the West. They failed to break me! And my will has become tempered steel. Now I’m even more convinced that it is impossible to save Ukraine without defeating fascism on its territory.”Wojciechowski was also the editor of the website 2May.org, a site dedicated to disseminating the truth about the Odessa massacre.

It should be noted though that Wojciechowski was arrested along with his comrades Pavel Shishman of the now outlawed Communist Party of Ukraine, and Nikolai Popov of the Communist Youth. These arrests should come as no surprise to observers of the political situation in Ukraine where all forms of leftist politics – the Communist party, Soviet symbols and names, etc. – have been outlawed and brutally repressed.

Kiev is not only engaged in an assault on political freedoms, but also a class war against the working class of Odessa and Ukraine generally. That the events leading up to the massacre took place at Kulikovo Field – a famous staging area for Soviet era demonstrations of working class politics – and the massacre itself took place in the adjacent Trade Unions House, there’s a symbolic resonance, the significance of which is not lost on the people of Odessa. It is the attempt to both erase the legacy of working class struggle and leftist politics, as well as the sacrifices of previous generations in a place where historical memory runs deep, and the scars of the past have yet to heel.

Aside from these shameful attacks on leftist formations, multicultural institutions too have been repressed under the pretext of “Russian separatism.” A multiethnic, multi-nationality organization known as the Popular Rada of Bessarabia (PRB) was founded in early April 2015 in order to push for regional autonomy and/or ethnic autonomy in response to the legal and extralegal attacks on minorities by the Kiev authorities. It was reported that within 24 hours of the founding congress, Ukraine’s SBU had detained the core leaders of the organization, including the Chair of the organization’s presidium Dmitry Zatuliveter whose whereabouts, according to this author’s latest information, remain unknown. Within two weeks 30 more PRB activists were arrested, including founding member Vera Shevchenko.

While the Western media and its armies of think tanks and propaganda mouthpieces steadfastly deny that an organization such as PRB can be anything other than “a project of Russian political consultants,” the reality is that such moves have been a reaction to repressive legislation and intimidation by the US-backed regime in Kiev which has done everything from outlawing the two most popular political parties of the Russian-speaking South and East (The Party of Regions and the Communist Party), to attempting to strip the Russian language of official status within Ukraine, a move interpreted by these groups as a direct threat against them and their regions where Russian, not Ukrainian, is the lingua franca.

As Senior Fellow at the Jamestown Foundation and former Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (read CIA front) contributor Vladimir Socor wrote last month in an article entitled Ukraine Defuses Pro-Russia Instigations in Odesa Province, “In the spirit of preventive action, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies have arrested some 20 members of a centrifugal organization in Odesa [sic] province..The timely intervention also stopped the publicity bandwagon that had just started rolling from Moscow in support of the Odesa [sic] group.” Interestingly, the author deceptively frames his apologia for so called “preventive detention” as merely a “timely intervention,” conveniently glossing over the blatant illegality of the action by Kiev, which has eschewed the rule of law in favor of brute force and repression.

And what is the PRB’s great crime in the eyes of Mr. Socor and the US interests for which he speaks? As he directly states in the article with typical condescension:

[BPR’s program and manifesto] include demands for: greater representation of ethnic groups in the administration of Ukraine’s Odesa [sic] province; promotion of the ethnic groups’ cultural identities and schools; conferral of a “national-cultural special status” to Bessarabia; a free economic zone, with specific reference to local control over Ukraine’s Black Sea and Danube ports; no integration of Ukraine with the European Union, the “enslavement practices of which would ruin the region and its agriculture”; and reinstatement of Ukraine’s [recently abandoned] international status of nonalignment, or else: “In the event of Ukraine moving close to NATO [the North Atlantic Treaty Organization], we reserve the right to implement the self-determination of Bessarabia.”

A careful reading of these demands reveals that these are precisely the demands that any right-minded anti-imperialist position should espouse, including rejection of NATO integration, rejection of EU integration, rejection of opening up Ukraine’s agricultural sector to the likes of Monsanto and other Western corporations, and protection of ethnic, religious, and cultural minorities, among other things. While Socor writes of these demands derisively, the reality is that they constitute precisely the sort of program that is essential for defending both Ukraine’s sovereignty, and the rights of the people of Odessa and the region. But of course, for Socor, this is all just a Russian plot. Instead, he kneels to kiss the chocolate ring of Poroshenko…and perhaps other parts of Victoria Nuland and John Kerry, while vigorously cheer-leading further political repression.

A Message for the Left

The question facing leftists internationally is no longer whether they believe there are fascists in Ukraine, or whether they are an important part of the political establishment in the country; this is now impossible to refute. Rather, the challenge before the international left is whether it can overcome its deep-seated mistrust of Russia, and consequent inability to separate fact from fiction, and unwaveringly defend its comrades in Ukraine with the conviction and aplomb of its historical antecedents.

There is a whole history that is under assault, a whole people being oppressed, a leftist tradition being ground to dust under the heel of an imperialist agenda and comprador oligarch bourgeoisie. Some on the left choose to snicker derisively at this struggle, aligning themselves once again with the Empire just as they so often have in Libya, Syria, and elsewhere. And then there those who, like this author, refuse to be cowed by the baseless slur of “Russian apologist” and “Putin puppet”; those of us who choose not to look away while our comrades in Ukraine are beaten, kidnapped, tortured, imprisoned, and disappeared.

For while they speak out in the face of reprisals, in the midst of brutal repression, under threat of prison and death, the least we can do is speak out from our comfortable chairs. Anything less is moral cowardice and utter betrayal.

Free Financial Markets are a Hoax

Paul Craig Roberts

There are no free financial markets in America, or for that matter anywhere in the Western word, and few, if any, free markets of any other kind.  The financial markets are rigged by the big banks, the Federal Reserve, and the Treasury in the interests of the profits of the few big banks and the dollar’s exchange value, which is the basis of US power.

There is a contradiction between a strong currency on one hand and on the other hand massive money creation in order to sustain zero and negative interest rates on the massive debt levels. This inconsistency is revealed by rising gold and silver prices.

When gold hit $1,900 an ounce in 2011 the Federal Reserve realized that the precious metal market was going to limit its ability to provide enough liquidity to keep the thoughtlessly deregulated financial system afloat. The rapid deterioration of the dollar in terms of gold and silver would sooner or later spill over into the exchange value of the dollar in currency markets.  Something had to be done to drive down and to cap the gold price.

The Fed’s solution was to take advantage of the fact that the prices of gold and silver are determined in the futures market where paper contracts representing gold and silver are traded, and not in markets where the physical metal is actually purchased by people who take possession of it.  The Fed realized that uncovered short sales provided enormous leverage over the prices of the metals and that it would be profitable for the bullion banks, such as JPMorgan, Scotia, and HSBC, to short the market heavily and then cover their shorts at lower prices produced by selling as a result of triggering stop-loss orders and margin calls.

Dave Kranzler and I have shown on numerous occasions that the bullion banks  and the Federal Reserve make profits and protect the dollar by suppressing the prices of gold and silver.  They do this by illegally selling huge numbers of uncovered shorts in the futures market.  This illegal operation is supported by the so-called “regulatory authorities”  who steadfastly refuse to intervene.

It has just happened again.  Dave Kranzler describes it in detail here.

If memory serves, Matt Taibbi explained a few years ago how Goldman Sachs got position limits removed from speculators, so that now speculators can dominate market forces.

Neoliberal economists in service to the financial sector have created a rationale for why interest rates can be negative in the face of massive debt and money creation and a slew of troubled financial instruments from corporate junk bonds to sovereign debt.  The rational is that there is too much saving:  The excess of savings over investment forces down interest rates.  The negative interest rates will discourage people from saving and encourage them to spend, because the price of consumption in terms of foregone future income from saving is zero.  It even pays to consume, because saving costs more than it earns.

Economists argue this even though the Federal Reserve reported that a majority of Americans are so low on savings that they cannot raise $400 without selling personal possessions.

That economists would concoct such an absurd explanation for negative interest rates, an explanation obviously contradicted by empirical evidence, shows that economists are now prostitutes just like the media.  The economists are lying in support of a Federal Reserve policy that benefits a handful of mega-banks at the expense of the rest of the world.

The absence of integrity in Western institutions and politicized professions is proof that Western civilization has declined into total decadence just as Jacques Barzun said.

It is amazing that there still are some Russians and some Chinese who want to be part of the sordid decadence that is the Western world.

It is just as amazing that Americans and Europeans are so trapped in The Matrix that they have no inkling that their future has been destroyed.

Nuclear Weapons Proliferation: Made in the USA

John LaForge

The United States is perhaps the principle nuclear weapons proliferator in the world today, openly flouting binding provisions of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Article I of the treaty forbids signers from transferring nuclear weapons to other states, and Article II prohibits signers from receiving nuclear weapons from other states.

As the UN Review Conference of the NPT was finishing its month-long deliberations in New York last week, the US delegation distracted attention from its own violations using its standard Red Herring warnings about Iran and North Korea — the former without a single nuclear weapon, and the latter with 8-to-10 (according to those reliable weapons spotters at the CIA) but with no means of delivering them.

The NPT’s prohibitions and obligations were re-affirmed and clarified by the world’s highest judicial body in its July 1996 Advisory Opinion on the legal status of the threat or use of nuclear weapons. The International Court of Justice said in this famous decision that the NPT’s binding promises not to transfer or receive nuclear weapons are unqualified, unequivocal, unambiguous and absolute. For these reasons, US violations are easy to illustrate.

Nuclear Missiles “Leased” to British Navy

The US “leases” submarine-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles (SLBMs) to Britain for use on its four giant Trident submarines. We’ve done this for two decades. The British subs travel across the Atlantic to pick up the US-made missiles at Kings Bay Naval base in Georgia.

Helping to ensure that US proliferation involves only of the most verifiably terrible nuclear weapons, a senior staff engineer at Lockheed Martin in California is currently responsible for planning, coordinating and carrying out development and production of the “UK Trident Mk4A [warhead] Reentry Systems as part of the UK Trident Weapons System ‘Life Extension program.’” This, according to John Ainslie of the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, which closely watchdogs the British Tridents — all of which are based in Scotland, much to the chagrin of the Scots.

Even the W76 warheads that arm the US-owned missiles leased to England have parts made in United States. The warheads use a Gas Transfer System (GTS) which stores tritium — the radioactive form of hydrogen that puts the “H” in H-bomb — and the GTS injects tritium it into the plutonium warhead or “pit.” All the GTS devices used in Britain’s Trident warheads are manufactured in the United States. They are then either sold to the Royals or given away in exchange for an undisclosed quid pro quo.

David Webb, the current Chair of the British Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament reported during the NPT Review Conference, and later confirmed in an email to Nukewatch, that the Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico announced, in March 2011, that it had conducted “the first W76 United Kingdom trials test” at its Weapons Evaluation and Test Laboratory (WETL) in New Mexico, and that this had “provided qualification data critical to the UK [United Kingdom] implementation of the W76-1.” The W76 is a 100 kiloton H-bomb designed for the so-called D-4 and D-5 Trident missiles. One of the centrifuges at Sandia’s WETL simulates the ballistic trajectory of the W76 “reentry-vehicle” or warhead. This deep and complex collusion between the US and the UK could be called Proliferation Plus.

The majority of the Royal Navy’s Trident warheads are manufactured at England’s Aldermaston nuclear weapons complex, allowing both the Washington and London to claim they are in compliance with the NPT.

US H-bombs Deployed in Five NATO Countries

An even clearer violation of NPT is the US deployment of between 184 and 200 thermonuclear gravity bombs, called B61, in five European countries — Belgium, The Netherlands, Italy, Turkey and Germany. “Nuclear sharing agreements” with these equal partners in the NPT — all of whom declare that they are “non-nuclear states” — openly defy both Article I and Article II of the treaty.

The US is the only country in the world that deploys nuclear weapons to other countries, and in the case of the five nuclear sharing partners, the US Air Force even trains Italian, German, Belgian, Turkish and Dutch pilots in the use of the B61s in their own warplanes — should the President ever order such a thing. Still, the US government regularly lectures other states about their international law violations, boundary pushing and destabilizing actions.

With so much a stake, it is intriguing that diplomats at the UN are too polite to confront US defiance of the NPT, even when the extension and enforcement of it is on the table. As Henry Thoreau said, “The broadest and most prevalent error requires the most disinterested virtue to sustain it.”