The Politics of Funding: Cash Crisis at the United Nations

Binoy Kampmark

It remains one of the more unusual arrangements in terms of funding. Like a club filled with members of erratic disposition, the United Nations can never count on all dues to come in on time.  Some members drag their feet.  The bill is often delayed.  In the United States, responsible for some 22 percent for the operating budget of the UN, payment only tends to come in after October, a matter put down to the nature of the fiscal year.

That, however, is only one aspect of the broader problem.  Withholding money is as much a political as it is a budgetary act, despite it being notionally a breach of Article 17 of the UN Charter.  The article is important for stipulating that the Organisation’s expenses “shall by borne by the Members as apportioned by the General Assembly.”

Historically, foreign policy and matters of organisation reform have been cited as key matters to reduce or withhold membership dues.  The reason is simple: such “assessed dues” go to funding the official regular budget, which defrays administrative costs, peacekeeping operations and various programs.

For the United States, this has been a critical matter, given that some 40 percent of running costs for the organisation were initially borne by Washington.  It was therefore unsurprising that some pressure would come to bear upon the organisation.  In the mid-1980s, for instance, it became US policy to threaten the reduction of Washington’s “annual assessed contribution… by 8.34 percent for each month which United States is suspended” if Israel was “illegally expelled, suspended, denied its credentials or in any manner denied its right to participate.”

The funding issue has been a burning one for a US Congress mindful of the money bags.  Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Jesse Helms, the immoveable furniture of that committee for years, could claim to be the one deciding voice on whether the US would pay its UN dues either in full or on time.  (It often did neither.)  Along with Senator Joe Biden, a deal was struck in 1997 to pressure the UN to observe various “benchmarks” in order to receive full payments.  These included the necessary reduction of UN staff, appropriate reporting procedures between the Inspector General and the Secretary General, and a ban on funds to other organisations.

In January 2000, Senator Helms was given a chance to advise, poke and condescend to the body he had held in such deep suspicion for decades, this so-called shadow government in waiting.  The UN was greeted to the unusual spectacle of a Congressman addressing the UN Security Council, an event engineered by then US ambassador to the UN, Richard Holbrooke.  Despite professing a degree of strained friendship for the organisation, his purpose was to rebuke those critics who had considered US contributions to the body those of a “deadbeat”.  As “the representative of the UN’s largest investors – the American people- we have not only a right, but a responsibility, to insist on specific reforms in exchange for their investment.”

President Donald Trump’s arrival was unlikely to start a new chapter of warm accommodation between US money and UN operating costs.  In September 2018, the Trump administration announced that it would cease US humanitarian aid contributions to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).  Despite threatening social services, healthcare and education, Jared Kushner was convinced by the wisdom of the move.  “This agency is corrupt, inefficient, and doesn’t help peace.”

The 2018 budget proposal also included slashing half of US funding to UN programs, with climate change being a particularly inviting target.  (Congress has relented on the issue of enforcing a cap on contributions to the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations.)  Such an example of hectoring, threatening UN agencies with a cessation of funding designed to induce changes of policy, remains a steadfast practice.

Of the current amount of some $1.3 billion owed to the UN by members, the US boasts the lion’s share of arrears at $1 billion.  This figure of imbalance has not prevented Trump, from venting about other members.  “So make all Member Countries pay, not just the United States!”

In June this year, Secretary-General António Guterres informed the budget overseers at the Fifth Committee that the UN faced catastrophe in terms of reputation and its ability to operate if payroll and supplies were not covered. “The solution lies not only in ensuring that all Member States pay in full and on time, but also in putting certain tools in place.”  By the end of May, the organisation was facing a deficit of $492 million.  Guterres could not help but sound apocalyptic.  “We are at a tipping point and what we do next will matter for years to come.”

The situation has duly worsened.  On Monday, Guterres suggested the possibility that the UN would run dry of cash reserves by the end of October.  In a letter to the 37,000 employees based at the UN secretariat, the secretary general explained that, “Member states have paid only 70 percent of the total amount needed for our regular budget operations in 2019. This translates into a cash shortage of $230 million at the end of September.  We run the risk of depleting our backup liquidity reserves by the end of the month.”

Belt tightening measure are being suggested.  Conferences and meetings are being postponed.  Non-essential travel is being stopped.  UN spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric is pressing member states, of whom 129 have paid their annual dues in full to date “to avoid a default that could risk disrupting operations globally.”  As the UN is only as relevant, and as effective, as its member states, failure to fill the coffers may well confirm Trump’s sentiment that the globalist is in retreat.  Behold the parochial patriot.

Towards Normalcy in Ukraine

Rene Wadlow

For the first time in several years, there are realistic possibilities for a negotiated settlement of the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine between the Ukrainian government and separatist forces backed by the Russian Federation in which an estimated 13,000 persons have been killed The Normandy Format gets its name when leaders from France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine met on 6 June 2014 on the margins of the 70th anniversary of the D-Day allied landings in Normandy.

The framework for the negotiations  has been called “the Steinmeier Formula.”  In the context of earlier negotiations held in Minsk, then Foreign Minister and now President of Germany, Frank-Walter Steinmeier proposed a compromise of returning control of the Ukraine frontier to the Ukrainian government, a withdrawal of troops and armament, elections under the supervision of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and a status of “self rule” in the  republics of Donbas and Luhansk.

Now, with a new President of Ukraine and a need to reduce Russian-Western European tensions, President Zelinsky has agreed in a general way to the Steinmeier Formula.  Serious negotiations are still needed.  It is hoped that the “Normandy Format” can be put into operation with a meeting in Paris within a month’s time.  President Macron and President Putin spoke briefly together in Paris on 30 September at the funeral for the former French President, Jacques Chirac.

Hard line nationalists and Right Wing political figures in Ukraine have attacked the agreement.  Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymeshenko said the agreement was a “direct threat to the national security, territorial integrity and sovereignty of our country.”  The Far Right National Corps leader Andrey Baletsky had even sharper terms.  However, the nationalist Right has never had realistic propositions for a governmental structure that would recognize the specific economic and cultural nature of eastern Ukraine without creating totally independent countries or integrating Donbas and Luhansk into the Russian Federation as Crimea has been integrated. Thus, the crucial question today is what is the nature of the proposed “self rule” which is to follow the elections.

The Association of World Citizens, which is concerned with the development of appropriate structures of government as an important element in the resolution of armed conflicts, had proposed the creation of a federal or con-federal Ukraine.  In a 14 April 2014 message to the Secretary General of the OSCE, the Association of World Citizens stressed that government structures should be as close as possible to the people so that their views can have a direct impact on government decisions.  Federalist and con-federalist forms of government can facilitate the balance between the need for larger governmental units for policy making and units close to the local communities so that those impacted are able to influence policy.

The Association stressed that federalism is not a first step to the disintegration of the Ukraine.  But it is not a “magic solution” either. Government structures are closely related to the aims which people wish to achieve.  The aims of the Ukrainians are multiple.  Dialogue and open discussion is needed so that these aims are seen more clearly, and then structures created to facilitate these aims.

In a follow up 3 May 2014 message, the Association stressed that there should be a link made between the proposed referendum in eastern Ukraine and the structure of the Ukrainian State.  The 11 May 2014 referendum was organized in only part of eastern Ukraine, in what was then newly proclaimed as the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic.  The question posed concerned “yes” or “no” on the Russian word samastoyatelnost” which can be translated as “self rule”.  Since there had been no real public discussion, the term could mean – and did mean – different things to different people.  People were discouraged from voting “no” and few did.

Today, there is a need for dialogue, trust-building, and reconciliation within the country.  The same issues as to what “self rule” means in practice is still the crucial issue.  Ultimately, all conflicts can end only when there is an agreement about the shape of government and the rules of law under which people agree to live.  While the discussions and compromises must be done among the Ukrainians themselves, persons in the other three States of the Normandy Format, Germany, France, Russia, familiar with con-federal structures may provide some guidelines. Negotiations are likely to be difficult, but an atmosphere for advancing conflict resolution can be created with active support of non-governmental organizations, who have not played a very active role on the issue in the near past.  There seem to be real possibilities for progress which must be acted upon.

The reality of lynchings

T Navin

The RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat in recent Vijay Dashami speech pointed out that ‘Lynching’ is a ‘Western concept’ and alien to India. It has its origins in Bible and that ‘lynching’ is being used to defame India. He was in a denial mode for the criticism being raised on incidents of ‘lynchings’ in India.

It does not really matter whether the word ‘lynching’ originated in India. Its applicability in India is not dependent on geographies of its origin, but applicability of its attributes in different contexts including India.

Lynching refers to premeditated extrajudicial killing by a group. It is used to characterize informal public executions by a mob to punish an alleged transgressor, convicted transgressor or to intimidate a group. It is a form of extreme form of informal group social control, and is often conducted with the display of a public spectacle for maximum intimidation. 

In United States, incidents of ‘lynchings’ have been recorded during the period of abolition of slavery and even thereafter. The incidents mostly involved African Americans. It is estimated that during the period 1868 to 1871 – 400 lynchings took place. Similarly during 1882 to 1968, 3,446 lynchings of blacks took place. Mob violence was seen as a way of establishing white supremacy. Incidents of lynchings have also been witnessed in Britain.

Attributes of ‘lynchings’ in the recent Indian context need to be delved into. They are triggered by attempts by RSS to establish ‘Hindu supremacy’ similar to other ‘western societies’ which intended at establishing ‘white supremacy’.

Firstly, these incidents are based on the primary ideological beliefs that India is a land of the Hindus. The existence of other religions is considered to be an aberration, where they have either been forcibly converted or lured to be converted. Hence the only way to exist in India is to undertake the process of ‘Ghar Whapsi’ by returning to their ‘original’ religion.

Secondly, ‘culture’is deterministic in its nature according to RSS and religion is the only basis through which it can be defined. Hence there are different cultures – Hindu culture, Muslim culture, Christian culture. India being the land of the Hindus, the other religions should either come back to ‘Hinduism’ or adopt their ‘culture’ what is defined as ‘Hindu culture’. The prevalence of diversity of ‘culture’ within a religion across regions and linguistic groups is ignored. The culture belonging to ‘Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan’ and upper caste is considered to be the mainstream cultures, to which others need to assimilate.

What is considered as ‘sacred’ and ‘profane’ by ‘Hindus’ are to be adhered to by other religions, even if it means giving up their own cultural practices. Hence if cow is a sacred symbol for the Hindus, the other religions should give up the practice and not consume ‘beef’.

Thirdly, the supremacy of ‘Hindus’ over other religions need to be taken as given in India. Other religions can only live as second grade citizens. Two citizens of different religions are not equal, but are determined by the religion they belong to.

The equal citizenship rights provided to people based on the constitution does not really matter. Citizens are not equal. Hindus come at the top of the hierarchy and Christians and Muslims at the bottom. Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism are only considered to be variants of Hinduism and hence the reason they just follow below Hinduism.

Within the Hindus the practices followed by the upper castes is considered superior to others. Hence beef eating which is not prevalent among upper castes is considered normal. Those practicing beef eating such as ‘Dalits’ and ‘Adivasis’ hence need to give it up.

Fourthly, RSS is seen as the ‘authority’ that would define what it means to be a ‘Nation’, ‘Culture’, ‘Hindu’. In this definition there is uniformity of practices. Uniformity, Inequality, Hierarchy and common cultural practices need to be taken as given. Diversity and Equality are seen as a weakness.

Fifthly, to create a Hindu Rashtra it is absolutely fine to impose this ‘uniformity, inequality, hierarchy and common cultural practices’. It is only then India would acquire a ‘Nationhood’. Cow being a symbol of ‘cultural practice’ for this uniformity of practice – it is absolutely fine to impose the same even through a mob violence. Minorities need to be made to prove their nationalism by uttering ‘Jai Shriram’ and ‘Vandemataram’. It is only through these slogans, their nationalism can be tested. This needs to be enforced if necessary. Mob violence are only triggers of the ideological propaganda.

It can be seen that the recent lynching incidents are a direct result of the ideological propaganda carried out by RSS and its other Hindutva soldiers over the last many decades and particularly the last five years. Social media such as ‘whatsapp’, ‘facebook’, ‘twitter’ has been extensively used to mobilize the mobs against ‘minorities’ and ‘dalits’ whom it considered as going against the ‘norms’ set by the RSS defined Hindu culture. The attributes of lynching such as intimidating a group, exercising control over others, establishing superiority and carrying out premeditated attacks and executions are very much part of the incidents which occurred in India. Hence irrespective of its origin and how differently it could be defined, Lynchings are a reality and become a part of growing violence against minorities in India.

A self-inflicted wound: Trump surrenders the West’s moral high ground

James M. Dorsey

For the better part of a century, the United States could claim the moral high ground despite allegations of hypocrisy because its policies continuously contradicted its proclaimed propagation of democracy and human rights. Under President Donald J. Trump, the US has lost that moral high ground.

This week’s US sanctioning of 28 Chinese government entities and companies for their involvement in China’s brutal clampdown on Turkic Muslims in its troubled north-western province of Xinjiang, the first such measure by any country since the crackdown began, is a case in point.

So is the imposition of visa restrictions on Chinese officials suspected of being involved in the detention and human rights abuses of millions of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims.

The irony is that the Trump administration has for the first time elevated human rights to a US foreign policy goal in export control policy despite its overall lack of concern for such rights.

The sanctions should put the Muslim world, always the first to ring the alarm bell when Muslims rights are trampled upon, on the spot.

It probably won’t even though Muslim nations are out on a limb, having remained conspicuously silent in a bid not to damage relations with China, and in some cases even having endorsed the Chinese campaign, the most frontal assault on Islam in recent history.

This week’s seeming endorsement by Mr. Trump of Turkey’s military offensive against Syrian Kurds, who backed by the United States, fought the Islamic State and were guarding its captured fighters and their families drove the final nail into the coffin of US moral claims.

The endorsement came on the back of Mr. Trump’s transactional approach towards foreign policy and relations with America’s allies, his hesitancy to respond robustly to last month’s missile and drone attacks on Saudi oil facilities, his refusal to ensure Saudi transparency on the killing a year ago of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and his perceived empathy for illiberals and authoritarians symbolized by his reference to Egyptian field marshal-turned-president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi as “my favourite dictator.”

Rejecting Saudi and Egyptian criticism of his intervention in Syria, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan gave the United States and Mr. Trump a blunt preview of what they can expect next time they come calling, whether it is for support of their holding China to account for its actions in Xinjiang, issues of religious freedom that are dear to the Trump administration’s heart, or specific infractions on human rights that the US opportunistically wishes to emphasize.

“Let me start with Saudi Arabia,” Mr. Erdogan said in blistering remarks to members of his Justice and Development Party (AKP). “Look in the mirror first. Who brought Yemen to this state? Did tens of thousands of people not die in Yemen?” he asked, referring to the kingdom’s disastrous military intervention in Yemen’s ruinous civil war.

Addressing Mr. Al-Sisi, Mr. Erdogan charged: “Egypt, you can’t talk at all. You are a country with a democracy killer.” The Turkish leader asserted that Mr. Al-Sisi had “held a meeting with some others and condemned the (Turkish) operation – so what if you do?”

The fact that the United States is likely to encounter similar responses, even if they are less belligerent in tone, as well as the fact that Mr. Trump’s sanctioning of Chinese entities is unlikely to shame the Muslim world into action, signals a far more fundamental paradigm shift:  the loss of the US and Western moral high ground that gave them an undisputed advantage in the battle of ideas, a key battleground in the struggle to shape a new world order.

China, Russia, Middle Eastern autocrats and other authoritarians and illiberals have no credible response to notions of personal and political freedom, human rights and the rule of law.

As a result, they countered the ideational appeal of greater freedoms by going through the motions. They often maintained or erected democratic facades and payed lip service to democratic concepts while cloaking their repression in terms employed by the West like the fight against terrorism.

By surrendering the West’s ideological edge, Mr. Trump reduced the shaping of the new world order to a competition in which the power with the deeper pockets had the upper hand.

Former US national security advisor John Bolton admitted as much when he identified in late 2018 Africa as a new battleground and unveiled a new strategy focused on commercial ties, counterterrorism, and better-targeted U.S. foreign aid.

Said international affairs scholar Keren Yarhi-Milo: “The United States has already paid a significant price for Trump’s behaviour: the president is no longer considered the ultimate voice on foreign policy. Foreign leaders are turning elsewhere to gauge American intentions… With Trump’s reputation compromised, the price tag on U.S. deterrence, coercion, and reassurance has risen, along with the probability of miscalculation and inadvertent escalation.”

We can’t keep on neglecting the future and survive

Lionel Anet

The eighteenth century was the start of the end of civilisation. That was due to burning fossil fuels to power society’s energy needs instead of using muscle, and renewable power. Now our end is near and we are speeding it up. Our hopes are fading as fast as we try to grow our economy. So we flutter about in the hope of finding that “Magic Pudding” that will give us everlasting energy and resources.

In the late 18th century the world population was less than 1 billion people. Coal doubled that, and oil has managed to increase it to 7.7 billion. That’s 8 times more people on a planet, which is now showing the strain due to depleting resources and degradation of the biosphere. We have achieved that by burning fossil fuels, which is now involved in all aspects of our life. Although coal produces 38% of world energy, it, like all other energy sources it relies on oil to maintain it’s output. Therefore without that fuel there would be very little coal or any other source of energy including solar and wind. Oil has become our primary and essential source of energy for 60 years and is the only thing that can support an increasing population.

We need to understand how we got into this fine mess. It wasn’t planned we just muddled along trying to get an advantage over other social groups and dominate nature. So we still tended to see forests as a resource if they can be used for timber, but if those trees are on a possible agriculture site or over a mineral deposit then that is seen as a waste of good land. Contrasted to that, when we lived as hunter-gatherers we saw ourselves as a part of nature; therefore there was no attempt to use it as our exclusive pantry.

Our pre-agriculture life styleHuman nature, at its best, will naturally occur when people live in small intimate bands. Studies by anthropologists reveal that our natural social life for nearly all human existence occurred when we lived in groups of no larger than our ability to know everyone’s character. In the last few hundred thousand years we humans showed that we have outstanding abilities that enabled our ancestors to live in all mammalian-liveable parts of the planet, and also we were able to cross short distances of sea as hunter-gathers. (Our hand has made us the most wonderful life that ever lived.)

Those studies also showed that hunter-gatherers had practically no personal belongings. Parents did not own their children as they are a part of their band and young children up to 5 years old would suckle from any lactating woman and may not know their mother or father until much older, which gave all individuals a secure life. Furthermore, in that band it’s unlikely that a child has siblings of near the same age but they all have older and younger ones so there’s no hierarchy or competition. This equalises everyone for their whole life, but that doesn’t mean they were evaluated as having or required to have the same ability, temperament, and interest.

Consequently hunter-gatherers weren’t competitive or demanding. Also sharing was their natural way of life not only within one’s band but between bands and other life. They saw themselves as a part of life, one of many living things spending most of their lives socializing. Hunting and gathering for their food was a relatively small part of their life, and it was also a social affair as it might still be today in a few workplaces. People in small communities who had very few tools or things to look after weren’t motivated by greed and therefore individuals who had little feeling for others had no opportunities to express greed or to dominate.

However, when bands grew well beyond a hundred individuals, it started to become unwieldy and chaotic therefore one would welcome a leader to maintain order. But large social groups have to increasingly rely on agriculture and that was the creation of work, which was an opportunity for private property within a social setting which is for the most social life a contradiction. Also leaders tend to lose their concerns for their fellows and with ambitions they will want a larger domain creating disputes within and between different social groups.

Due to population growth leaders were then seen as a different class able to control their community and to satisfy their egoism it results in conquest and oppression. Large populations opened up opportunities for “psychopaths” (those that have ability but little to no feelings for others) to use the crowd as a way to get whatever they wanted. The end result is civilisation with its violent ways to exploit whoever and whatever is vulnerable in conflicts that are overt and covert.

However, societies must maintain themselves, so we need food, shelter and all the services to sustain a healthy happy life with the least stress on individuals and our planet. To achieve that, we need a different life-style, not because it would be better for us at this stage, but for our offspring survival.

Past global temperature rises were due to planetary causes. But temperature rise now is due to burning fossil fuels and deforestation. Scientists in that discipline estimate we have a decade to become sustainable or our offspring will suffer a horrible demise.

We are losing the ice and snow cover from the arctic it is changing the albedo thus it accelerates the rate our planet warms making it vulnerable to uncontrollable forest fires. They now occur simultaneously on the northern and southern hemispheres, it never happened before nor has Alaska and Siberia had forest fires. So now we already have out-of-control bush fires as predicted 20 years ago. I remember in the 1990’s reading in the New Scientist that there will be uncontrollable fires within the first half of this century. That then was a problem for someone in the future, which is as yet ours to deal with today.

At present we are fulfilling the needs of an economy that demands continual growth that can only be temporally powered with fossil fuels that are polluting and insulating the biosphere raising temperatures to perilous levels. To survive we will need to live a peaceful cooperative life, centred on helping each other, which will also satisfy our psychological nature. However, due to the irresponsibility of civilised leaders our survival is at stake. Life will be difficult until we can stabilise living conditions back to pre-fossil fuels days. And with a bit of luck we can make it.

To have a better happier life we need to have fewer activities, reduce our population, and enjoy life instead of competing to have more and dominate whoever and whatever we can. We need to use the least amount of stuff, and live within the planet’s resources by being a part of its life. That means abandoning the civilised hierarchical control that evolved to a wealth dominated civilisation.

The beginning of the end for civilisation started when James Watt’s steam engine replaced water, wind and animal power as that new power could be used where, when and how much of it is needed. But it did a lot more besides; it introduced the new science of thermodynamics as that understanding is the main reason the planet can temporally support our 7.7 billion people. Oil is involved in all aspects of our life and is essential for our present way of living, but if we use it for much longer it will make our children’s life a nightmare to their bitter end.

The effect of using fossil fuels (particularly oil) had on our planet is still largely ignored by world leaders, for their moment is all important. Oil is involved in all aspects of our lives, it has shaped our cities, our economy is totally dependent on it, and it will destroy us and maybe life if we keep using it. Many of our present activities are dependent on oil as the only source of energy to be viable, such as air and sea travel and long distance roads and rail transport; it has become the linchpin for the primary industries.

The outlandish use of air transport is our most dishonest activity as flying at 10 km high the burned fuel is about 5 times more effective as a global warming gas than at sea level; plus planes use about 20 times more oil per km than trains do. That is grossly unfair. We cannot survive with such unfairness, plus our increasing population will boost that disparity and reduce our ability to cooperate for our survival. All competitive activities are antisocial and wasteful, they also open up opportunities for deceitful interactions in all fields the ultimate being warfare an integral aspect of civilisation. We must stop competing as soon as we can and encourage cooperative and compassionate interaction.

We are on an extinction course and our leaders can only take us to our demise in a faster or a slower way. That is due to the indoctrination we all received during our formative years; that is education, which is tuned to increase our activities in as many domains possible. That education, if maintained will end life. However, due to intense competition and specialisation we cannot be as well aware of other fields’ activities to be concerned and understand the significance of the whole as it appears just a distraction.

We are now close to the end of economic growth, as we see interest rates going down towards negative and the cost of living going up due to deteriorating climate and rising the cost of energy. Sadly there’s no other way of living that current leaders can contemplate.  Nevertheless, most of us are not so fixed mentally on an economy that must grow. Whiles our survival as individuals and for our offspring is paramount there is hope for life.

Our dependence on fossil fuels is terminal and without it our planet can’t sustain our present population for much longer even on a survival course. Therefore we have a multitask effort to drastically reduce our birth rate and stop working on non-essential matters, and with a bit of luck we might be able to save ourselves by also changing from a growth to a minimal economy.

Presently the physical effort we exert doing our work, is negligible as nearly all of it is done by machines using mainly fossil fuels. But to keep fit one pays to exercise at a gymnasium, fulfilling one need, then drive our car to work and back home. It is obvious by just walking to where we need to go; we can solve many problems with that action. Plus, when walking we can talk to people and observe one’s community in safety. Those attributes will be enhanced by living in a more compact way without parking space, wide roads, and traffic noise. This will make light rail the ideal way to get around in towns as they are the most energy efficient transport. Unfortunately most of outer city areas were built to satisfy the needs of cars but those cars have and are playing a devastating part against our survival.

Indoctrination, but we call it education, is really our biggest problem that fixes our mindset, which under extreme situations can be impossible to change. The prime purpose of education in any civilisation is to justify its way of life; therefore, truth is subjugated to the needs of the system in control at the time. Reality is distorted to fit the needs of those who are dominant during that period, such as the geocentric view of the universe by the church of that time. Honesty in civilisation is subjugated to the needs of the few who control and dominate.

Historian’s version of capitalism is centred on a growing political-economic system that has supposedly produced its amazing growth due to its system ignoring the role played by fossil fuels and the devastation it is leaving our planet in. As resources are used they diminish requiring more energy to extract and process the less easy ones to obtain, however, cheap world energy is declining effecting world economy.

Oil has replaced gold and fiat money as a regulator of activities and a gauge of prosperity. The energy used is hardly noticed by historians and economists; they see it as a side issue. However, there is no life without energy. That is nothing happen unless there is energy in the system, and oil is a very concentrated and near-universal in supplying capitalisms ravenous needs. There is no other. Politicians are good at expressing their lack of understanding without knowing it.

We need a new non-competitive holistic education that’s base on cooperativeness to enjoy life and know and understand it. The motivation is the pleasure in seeing everyone achieving a satisfying life within a pleasant and vibrant environment.

I’m always amazed how we can do so many things so easily yet even climate scientists using their reductionist way of investigation misunderstood the speed of the change. They estimate the present climate would have taken a further 30 to 40 years to be what we are experiencing now. The error is due to their reductionist investigative method which can give spectacular information but it sacrifices a little understanding.

Everything we do requires energy, whatever moves and changes does so because energy is used. Therefore energy must be present for any substances to be known to exist. So a state of no energy does not exist, it’s the end of matter, as it no longer matters.

To illustrate the difference between knowing and understanding as I see it for this piece is, knowing is like the information my computer can give me, which is vast, but understanding that data is up to me, to understand its significance for it to have much value. For most of us it is much easier to know than have an understanding and this is so for examiners to evaluate people’s ability. Exams are centred on knowing as gauging understanding is more involved. From what I have been told even PHD students may have little understanding of their subject yet remember well the information but in a superficial way. This is one of many outcomes of competition.

Knowing relevant information gives an advantage in a competitive situation, but understanding that information needs knowing other relevant associated information and need much more time, requiring considerably more effort, placing those who search for an understanding at a disadvantage in a competitive setting. So we know a great deal about the physical world but little about human societies and how best to live in harmony due to that competitiveness.

There’s no need to take away affluent people’s wealth, as all we need to do is take their power to use it as they feel. They can have whatever they have but wouldn’t have free use of it as we must have rationing as we had during WWII but more comprehensive to suit the dire situation. Billionaires can keep their wealth and accumulate and increase it as long as society determines where and how it will be spent. To maintain honesty in allocating resources we must ditch democracy, as that is a competitive activity and we need a collaborative life style to be honest. There are better ways a society of multi-interest can represent its self ((Wikipedia sortition (also known as selection by lot, allotment, or demarchy) is the selection of political officials as a random sample from a larger pool of candidates,[1] a system intended to ensure that all competent and interested parties have an equal chance of holding public office.)

But soon, it may be obvious to one and all, that we have one overwhelming interest of survival.

Nobel Prize in Physics awarded for research in cosmology and exoplanets

Bryan Dyne

The latter half of the 20th century and the first decades of the 21st have witnessed an immense growth in humanity’s understanding of cosmology and planetary astronomy, shifting them from fields that were based on either speculation or limited data to those that were decisively placed within a rigorously scientific framework. This year’s Nobel Prize in Physics honors James Peebles, Michael Mayor and Didier Queloz for their integral roles in understanding the Earth’s place in the cosmos.

James Peebles, who was born in Canada in 1935, began his career in cosmological studies while a graduate student, and then professor, at Princeton University. Since 1964, he has focused on what is known as physical cosmology, the study of the large-scale structures and evolutionary dynamics of the universe. His work has spanned the breadth of the field, including predicting the cosmic microwave background, leading the work to understand the structure of galactic clusters, making several contributions on the synthesis of elements just after the Big Bang and working to understand dark matter and dark energy.

A sketch of the evolution of the universe, with an unknown beginning on the left, the cosmic microwave background and the development of galaxies in the middle, leading to a darkening cosmos on the right (Credit: Nobel Prize Institute)

Modern cosmology is based on Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity, which unified space and time as a single dynamic entity, spacetime, which is warped by the local presence of mass and energy. Using those equations, Soviet mathematician Alexander Friedman developed a theory for an expanding universe in 1922, which was confirmed by US astronomer Edwin Hubble in 1929. This led to the realization that if the universe is expanding, it must have originated as a single immensely hot and incredibly dense point. We now call this moment the Big Bang.

These early studies led to further developments in the 1940s which attempted to uncover why protons, neutrons and electrons formed into mostly just hydrogen and helium in the early universe and why matter clumps together to form galaxies and galactic clusters. Astronomers realized that these were related, that the primordial energies from which the building blocks of atoms emerged were also the initial conditions for what eventually became the galaxies, though the exact model to describe this process would not be developed for several years.

Peebles came to prominence after the 1964 discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation, which confirmed predictions he and others made of the overall temperature of the universe. Peebles then realized that the detected temperature is directly related to the initial density of the universe and thus places constraints on how much and what types of matter were created by the Big Bang.

His major breakthrough occurred two decades later as scientists were working to determine how galaxies formed in the first place, because protons, neutrons, electrons and photons (particles of light) were not heavy enough to make matter coalesce in the early universe. Peebles suggested that it was dark matter, a type of invisible and still largely mysterious type of matter which was earlier theorized by Fritz Zwicky and Vera Rubin, and which makes up about a quarter of the universe. He played a critical role in the research that finally developed a model of sound waves in the early universe, known as baryonic acoustic oscillations, that caused the necessary clumping to eventually form galaxies. These theories have since been confirmed by the COBE, WMAP and Planck experiments.

It should be mentioned that cosmology is an immensely social and international field of study, which is not wholly captured by an award which can at most be granted to three individuals. Peebles himself has said, “It was not a single step, some critical discovery that suddenly made cosmology relevant but the field gradually emerged through a number of experimental observations. Clearly one of the most important during my career was the detection of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation that immediately attracted attention ... [from] both experimentalists interested in measuring the properties of this radiation and theorists, who joined in analyzing the implications.”

While the origins of the universe were relatively well understood by the mid-1990s, a critical question about the evolution of the universe still remained: Was the development of planets around the Sun a fluke or a common occurrence for most stars?

This was partially answered in 1992, when an exoplanet was first detected around a pulsar using the millisecond radio pulses emitted by the dead star. That technique, however, could not detect planets around Sun-like stars, and so astronomers turned to a method known as radial velocity.

This technique was developed by Otto Struve in 1952, and measures the wobble of a star as it travels through the galaxy caused by an orbiting planet. This is done by looking at slight shifts in the star’s color, which becomes red when the star moves away from Earth and blue as it oscillates back toward our planet. These changes, however, are so minute it took four decades until technology was available to make reliable scientific observations.

These developments, primarily the ELODIE spectrograph, allowed Michael Mayor and Didier Queloz to start an observing campaign of 142 stars, a record in the early 1990s. By the fall of 1994, they noted that the star 51 Pegasi had periodic color shifts every four days. More surprisingly, the size of the shifts suggested a Jupiter-sized planet orbiting very close to its star, which had thought to be impossible based on the one data point of planetary formation that then existed, our own Solar System.

That aside, the short orbital period of the planet, dubbed 51 Pegasi b, allowed for many other teams to quickly confirm the discovery, including Geoff Marcy, Paul Butler and numerous others.

A special word should be said about Geoff Marcy, who developed novel experimental techniques that greatly refined our ability to eke out the minute wobbles of star motion caused by their orbiting exoplanets. Marcy and his team confirmed the discovery of 51 Pegasi b along with 70 of the first 100 exoplanets discovered, winning him many awards along with Mayor and Queloz, including the Henry Draper Medal, the Beatrice M. Tinsley Prize and the Shaw Prize, as well as being a contender for the Nobel.

He has, however, largely been ostracized by the astronomical community since 2015, when he was forced to resign from his Berkeley professorship through a Title IX procedure which included several anonymous accusations of sexual harassment. To this day, none of the accusations have been proven, much less presented in a court of law.

The discovery of 51 Pegasi b, unofficially known as Bellerophon (the tamer of Pegasus in Greek mythology), opened up a torrent of further exoplanet candidates and confirmations. In the ensuing five years, astronomers used the radial velocity to find dozens more planets, mainly large gas giants close to their parent star, revitalizing the field of planetary formation.

The 2019 Nobel Prize in Medicine awarded for research in cellular responses to oxygen

Benjamin Mateus

In the course of a lifetime, the human heart will beat more than three billion times. We will have taken more than 670 million breaths before we reach the end of our lives. Yet, these critical events remain unconscious and imperceptible in everyday life, unless we exert ourselves, such as running up several flights of stairs. We quickly tire, stop to take deep breaths and become flushed.

With the deepening comprehension by medical science of how our bodies work, we have come to better understand the fundamental importance of oxygen to life. Every living organism relies on it in one form or another. However, how cells and tissues can monitor and respond to oxygen levels remained difficult to elucidate. It has only been late in the 20th century with advances in cellular biology and scientific instrumentation that these processes have finally been explained.

On Monday, the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded jointly to three individuals: William G. Kaelin, Jr., Sir Peter J. Ratcliffe, and Gregg L. Semenza. Specifically, their discoveries helped elucidate the mechanisms for life’s most basic physiologic processes.

The official announcement of the laureats. Credit: Nobel Prize Institute

They were able to discover how oxygen levels directly affect cellular metabolism, which ultimately controls physiological functions. More importantly, their findings have significant implications for the treatments of conditions as varied as chronic low blood counts, kidney disease, patients with heart attacks or stroke and cancers. One of the hallmarks of cancer is its ability to generate new blood vessels to help sustain its growth. It also uses these oxygen cellular mechanisms to survive in low oxygen environments.

Dr. William G. Kaelin Jr. is a professor of medicine at Harvard University and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. The main focus of his work is on studying how mutations in what are called tumor suppressor genes lead to cancer development. Tumor suppressor genes are special segments of the DNA whose function is to check the integrity of the DNA before allowing a copy of itself to be made and undergo cell division, which prevents cells from propagating errors. Cellular mechanisms are then recruited to fix these errors or drive the cell to destroy itself if the damage is too severe or irreparable.

His interest in a rare genetic disorder called Von Hippel-Lindau disease (VHL) led him to discover that cancer cells that lacked the VHL gene expressed abnormally high levels of hypoxia-regulated genes. The protein called the Hypoxia-Inducible Factor (HIF) complex was first discovered in 1995 by Gregg L. Semenza, a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize. This complex is nearly ubiquitous to all oxygen-breathing species.

The function of the HIF complex in a condition of low oxygen concentration is to keep cells from dividing and growing, placing them in a state of rest. However, it also signals the formation of blood vessels, which is important in wound healing as well as promoting the growth of blood vessels in developing embryos. In cancer cells, the HIF complex helps stimulate a process called angiogenesis, the formation of new blood vessels, which allows the cancer cells to access nutrition and process their metabolic waste, aiding in their growth. When the VHL gene is reintroduced back into the cancer cells, the activity of the hypoxia-regulated genes returns to normal.

Dr. Gregg L. Semenza is the founding director of the vascular program at the Johns Hopkins Institute for Cell Engineering. He completed his residency in pediatrics at Duke University Hospital and followed this with a postdoctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins. His research in biologic adaptations to low oxygen levels led him to study how the production of erythropoietin (EPO) was controlled by oxygen. EPO is a hormone secreted by our kidneys in response to anemia. The secretion of EPO signals our bone marrow to produce more red blood cells.

A diagram showing how cells make use of oxygen. Credit: Nobel Prize Institute

His cellular and mouse model studies identified a specific DNA segment located next to the EPO gene that seemed to mediate the production of EPO under conditions of low oxygen concentration. He called this DNA segment HIF.

Sir Peter J. Ratcliffe, a physician and scientist, trained as a nephrologist, was head of the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine at the University of Oxford until 2016, when he became Clinical Research Director at the Francis Crick Institute. Through his research on the cellular mechanisms of EPO and its interaction between the kidneys and red cell production, he found that these mechanisms for cellular detection of hypoxia, a state of low oxygen concentration, were also present in several other organs such as the spleen and brain. Virtually all tissues could sense oxygen in their micro-environment, and they could be modified to give them oxygen-sensing capabilities.

Dr. Kaelin’s findings had shown that the protein made by the VHL gene was somehow involved in controlling the response to low oxygen concentrations. Dr. Ratcliffe and his group made the connection through their discovery that the protein made by the VHL gene physically interacts with HIF complex, marking it for degradation at normal oxygen levels.

In 2001, both groups published similar findings that demonstrated cells under normal oxygen levels will attach a small molecular tag to the HIF complex that allows the VHL protein to recognize and bind HIF, marking it for degradation by enzymes. If the oxygen concentration is low, the HIF complex is protected from destruction. It begins to accumulate in the nucleus where it binds to a specific section of the DNA called hypoxia-regulating genes, which sets into motion the necessary mechanisms to respond to the low oxygen concentration.

The ability to sense oxygen plays a vital role in health and various disease states. Patients who suffer from chronic kidney failure also suffer from severe anemia because their ability to produce EPO is limited. This hormone is necessary for the stem cells in our bone marrow to produce red blood cells. Understanding how cancer cells utilize oxygen-sensing mechanisms has led to a variety of treatments that targets these pathways. The ability to elucidate these mechanisms offers insight into directions scientists and researchers can take to design or create novel treatments.

US and China reach limited trade deal

Nick Beams

The US and China have reached a partial and very limited agreement on trade following talks held in Washington on Thursday and Friday.

It provides for a pullback by the US of a tariff hike on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods that had been threatened for next week. In return China has increased purchases of US agricultural products and agreed on the need for stabilization of the Chinese currency.

The limited agreement was described by US President Trump as a “substantial phase one deal” following a meeting yesterday with Chinese vice-premier and chief trade negotiator Liu He at the White House. The full text will be finalised in discussions between US and Chinese officials over the next five weeks.

China has agreed to purchase $40 billion to $50 billion worth of additional US agricultural products and gave a commitment to further open its economy to the operation of international financial services. It has also agreed to tighten control of intellectual property in response to continuous US allegations of theft.

In addition, the two sides reported progress on other matters, without providing details, including intellectual property and currency movements. No agreement was finalised on a pact to deal with currency manipulation, but US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said discussions were “almost complete.”

The reaching of a deal is the result of a shift by the Trump administration. In the lead up to the talks, Trump made clear on numerous occasions that he was not inclined to make a limited agreement and preferred a big deal or not one at all.

But facing the possibility of a sharp fall on markets if negotiations had broken down and amid the ongoing pressure created by the Democrats impeachment investigation, Trump appears to have decided to claim a win.

The markets responded enthusiastically with the Dow up 500 points at one point during the day, before finishing up by more than 300 points.

For all the celebrations on Wall Street, however, the agreement is very limited, described by one financial analyst in a comment to the Financial Times as “cosmetic.” While China will make additional purchases of agricultural products, they may not even reach the level attained before the trade conflict broke out.

Overall, the Chinese concessions have been described as “relatively minor”—essentially a repackaging of measures it had agreed to in previous rounds of talks.

The US has made little movement. None of the existing tariffs will be removed or even reduced. The major component of deal is the US decision to suspend the threatened hike in tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods from 25 percent to 30 percent, which had been set to take effect next week.

At this point, the agreement does not appear to include the withdrawal of a 15 percent tariff on more than $150 billion worth of Chinese consumer products, scheduled to come into effect on December 15.

Five dead and almost 1,000 arrested as repression mounts in Ecuador

Andrea Lobo

Police state repression and casualties are mounting in Ecuador as mass protests continue against the IMF-dictated austerity package announced by the Lenín Moreno administration on October 1.

As the main component of the IMF deal involving a $4.2 billion loan, President Moreno eliminated fuel subsidies the following day, leading to a sharp increase in fuel prices and subsequent price hikes in other basic goods. This immediately triggered the protest movement, which has included intermittent national strikes called by the trade unions, widespread roadblocks and mass marches with tens of thousands of indigenous demonstrators, students and workers.

On Thursday evening, the Ombudsman Office of Ecuador confirmed that the repression has left five demonstrators killed, 554 injured, and 929 arrested. These numbers do not reveal the full brutality of the repression. Beyond tear gas and rubber bullets, police and military charges have included wild beatings and the running over of demonstrators with motorcycles.

Marcos Humberto Oto Rivera, a 26-year-old worker, and José Daniel Chaluisa Cusco, another young worker, both died on October 8 from their injuries after anti-riot police caused them to fall off a bridge in Quito where they had set up a roadblock. Oto’s brother told Wambra, “he was not a delinquent, he was a worker.”

On October 6, the demonstrator Raúl Chilpe died on October 6 in the Azuay province when a driver ran over a roadblock.

On October 9, Segundo Inocencio Tucumbi Vega, an 50-year-old indigenous leader from the Cotopaxi province, was reportedly surrounded by police cavalry and beaten to death on the head. According to the human rights group Inredh, he was killed by the “excessive repression carried out by the public forces” in Quito. During the same protests in the capital, another indigenous demonstrator from the same town of Pijulí, José Rodrigo Chaluisa, was also killed.

On Thursday, thousands of demonstrators, including students, workers and peasants, gathered in the Casa de la Cultura building in Ecuador to conduct a wake at the casket of Tucumbi Vega. At the event, the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities (CONAIE) announced that it had captured ten police officers that morning as prisoners. Four of the officials were forced to carry the casket to the stage of the building.

Jaime Vargas, the CONAIE president, then appealed to the leadership of the armed forces to “join the people” and “don’t obey the orders of that traitor, liar and thief,” referring to Lenín Moreno.

After the funeral, the police officials were escorted by hundreds of demonstrators to downtown Quito where they were handed over to officials of the UN and the Ecuadorian Ombudsman’s Office.

In Pijulí, about 60 miles south of Quito, neighbors captured three officials at the police station on Thursday, with the Interior minister confirming Friday morning that they remain prisoners of the indigenous community. A video from the same town captured Thursday and confirmed by radio station Lacatunga showed indigenous demonstrators intercepting an ambulance and a motorcycle carrying weapons, high-caliber munitions and tear gas cannisters.

According to El País, 47 soldiers who invaded the indigenous community of Cochapamba in the same Cotopaxi province were captured and remain detained inside of the church “until the repression stops” and the “brothers arrested” are freed.

This follows the capture of 50 soldiers and five police officials between Saturday and Monday in the southern Azuay province and the takeover of several power plants and oilfields in the northeast since the weekend, forcing the Ministry of Energy to shut down the country’s main pipeline on Tuesday.

David Cordero, a human rights lawyer of Inredh reported that dozens of detainees are being held in police barracks in Quito, presenting the danger of disappearances and torture. RT reported that the Ecuadorian police raided the headquarters of the Pichincha Universal radio station for “inciting divisions.”

These developments highlight the dangers facing Ecuadorian workers, youth and peasants. The Ecuadorian ruling class, with the full support of Washington, is preparing to employ the same methods of repression used by the US-backed military dictatorship during the 1970s.

Without presenting any evidence, Lenín Moreno has claimed that ex-president Rafael Correa and Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro are financing and orchestrating a “coup,” with the interior minister claiming Friday that 17 people—“mostly Venezuelans”—were arrested in Quito’s international airport “holding information about the movements of the President and Vice-President.”

US sends 3,000 more troops to defend Saudi monarchy

Bill Van Auken

The Pentagon confirmed Friday that 3,000 more US troops are being deployed to Saudi Arabia to defend the blood-soaked monarchy led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and prepare for war against Iran.

The deployment includes two fighter squadrons, one Air Expeditionary Wing (AEW), two more Patriot missile batteries, and one Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system (THAAD).

According to a Pentagon statement Friday, the US Secretary of Defense phoned Crown Prince bin Salman (who also holds the post of Saudi minister of defense) to inform him of the coming reinforcements, which he said were meant “to assure and enhance the defense of Saudi Arabia.”

The Pentagon also acknowledged that the latest escalation brings the number of additional troops sent into the Persian Gulf region since May to 14,000. They have been accompanied by an armada of US warships and a B-52-led bomber task force. The Pentagon has also announced that an aircraft carrier-led battle group will remain in the Persian Gulf.

US soldiers deployed in the Middle East (U.S. Army by 1st Lt. Jesse Glenn)

While initiated as a supposed response to unspecified threats from Iran, the US buildup in the Persian Gulf region has constituted from its outset a military provocation and preparation for a war of aggression. This military buildup has accompanied Washington’s so-called “maximum pressure” campaign of sweeping economic sanctions that are tantamount to a state of war. The aim, as the Trump administration has stated publicly, is to drive Iranian oil exports down to zero. By depriving Iran of its principal source of export income, Washington hopes to starve the Iranian people into submission and pave the way to regime change, bringing to power a US puppet regime in Tehran.

The latest military buildup was announced in the immediate aftermath of an attack on an Iranian tanker in the Red Sea, about 60 miles from the Saudi port of Jeddah.

The National Iranian Tanker Co. reported that its oil tanker, the Sabiti, was struck twice by explosives early Friday morning, leaving two holes in the vessel and causing a brief oil spill into the Red Sea.

While Iranian state news media blamed the damage on missile attacks, a spokesman for the company told the Wall Street Journal that the company was not sure of the cause.

Some security analysts have suggested that the fairly minor damage to the vessel could have been caused by limpet mines. Such mines were apparently used last June when two tankers—one Japanese and one Norwegian-owned—were hit by explosions in the Sea of Oman. At the time, Washington blamed the attacks on Iran, without providing any evidence. Tehran denied the charge, saying that it sent teams to rescue crew member of the damaged tankers.

The Iranian Students News Agency (ISNA) quoted an unnamed Iranian government official as stating that the Iranian tanker had been the victim of a “terrorist attack.”

“Examination of the details and perpetrators of this dangerous action continues and will be announced after reaching the result,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said.

The National Iranian Tanker Co. issued a statement saying that there was no evidence that Saudi Arabia was behind the attack.

The incident raised the specter of an escalating tanker war that could disrupt shipping through the strategic Strait of Hormuz, through which 20 percent of the world’s oil supply flows. News of the attack sent crude oil prices spiking by 2 percent.

In addition to the June attacks on the tankers in the Gulf of Oman, in July British commandos, acting on a request from Washington, stormed an Iranian super tanker, the Grace 1, in waters off the British overseas territory of Gibraltar. In apparent retaliation, Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized the British-flagged Stena Impero for what Tehran charged were violations of international maritime regulations as it passed through the Strait of Hormuz. Both tankers were subsequently released.

Earlier this week, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a statement charging that the Iranian super tanker, renamed the Adrian Darya 1, had offloaded its oil in Syria in violation of European Union sanctions and a pledge made by Tehran to the UK at the time of the vessel’s release. He demanded provocatively that “EU members should condemn this action, uphold the rule of law, and hold Iran accountable.”

Crisis mounts over Turkish offensive against Kurdish forces in Syria

Bill Van Auken

The Turkish military invasion of northern Syria, now in its third day, has unleashed a mounting political firestorm in Washington. Leading Republicans, along with Democrats and elements within the US military, have sharply condemned US President Donald Trump for green-lighting Ankara’s action and abandoning the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which served as Washington’s proxy force in the so-called war against ISIS.

Turkish forces, backed by the largely Sunni Arab and Turkmen militias of the so-called “Syrian National Army” have opened up their offensive with incursions close to the towns of Tal Abyad and Ras al Ain, both east of the Euphrates River.

Heavy fighting was reported between the Turkish military and units of the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, along with civilian casualties on both sides of the border. The Turkish advance has been supported by aerial bombardments and artillery fire. The Syrian state news agency Sana reported 16 civilian fatalities in three towns, including that of an 11-year-old boy.

Turkish armored vehicles patrol as they conduct a joint ground patrol with American forces in the so-called "safe zone" on the Syrian side of the border with Turkey, near the town of Tal Abyad, northeastern Syria, Friday, Oct.4, 2019.

The Kurdish forces responded with their own barrages of mortar bombs which claimed the lives of four Turkish civilians, including a baby, in the town of Akcakale, which is separated from Tal Abayad only by the Syrian-Turkish border.

In a speech to leaders of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) Thursday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan claimed that Turkish forces had killed 109 “militants” in the first two days of fighting.

The areas targeted by Turkey are controlled by the Kurdish-dominated SDF, but are populated predominantly by Syrian Sunni Arabs. When the area was previously overrun by the Al Qaeda-linked Al Nusra Front—which served as the leading ground force in the US-backed war for regime change in Syria—Kurdish civilians were expelled under threat of death.

Tens of thousands are once again fleeing the area to escape the fighting and in fear of another round of ethnic cleansing, this time at the hands of Turkey and its local allies.

Turkey’s stated war aims include driving the SDF and YPG—which Ankara regards as terrorist organizations and branches of the PKK, the Turkish Kurdish organization against which it has fought a protracted and bloody decades-long counterinsurgency campaign—away from the Turkish border.

In their place, the Turkish regime intends to create a so-called “safe zone” stretching 300 miles long and 30 miles deep inside Syria’s northern border. Its intention is to repopulate this zone with the 3.6 million Syrian refugees now living in Turkey. Such a massive operation would inevitably entail driving Syrian Kurds away from the Turkish border.

Ankara’s decision to launch the cross-border offensive came only after an October 6 telephone conversation between Erdoğan and Trump in which the US president announced his withdrawal of some 50 to 100 US troops that had been deployed in the border area alongside the SDF Kurdish fighters, serving as an impediment to any Turkish incursion.

Fox News, which generally spouts pro-Trump propaganda, carried a report by its Pentagon correspondent citing a “well-placed senior U.S. military source” as stating that the US president went “off script” in the course of his call with Erdoğan. According to the source, Trump had been given talking points that included a demand that Turkish troops remain north of the Syrian border.

Fox also quoted the source as saying that Trump had repeatedly expressed the position that Washington should “Just let the Turks do it” in terms of pursuing their aims in northern Syria.

Trump subsequently issued orders to the US military to stay out of the conflict, even as the SDF requested that the Pentagon provide air support.

In a tweet Thursday, Trump defended his decision to pull back the US troops, while claiming that he was prepared to respond with sanctions against any Turkish war crimes:

“Turkey has been planning to attack the Kurds for a long time. They have been fighting forever. We have no soldiers or Military anywhere near the attack area. I am trying to end the ENDLESS WARS. Talking to both sides. Some want us to send tens of thousands of soldiers to.......the area and start a new war all over again. Turkey is a member of NATO. Others say STAY OUT, let the Kurds fight their own battles (even with our financial help). I say hit Turkey very hard financially & with sanctions if they don’t play by the rules! I am watching closely.”

At a news conference on Wednesday, Trump justified his action by insisting that Washington had spent “tremendous amounts of money” in arming and funding the SDF. He went on to criticize the Kurds for not having fought alongside the US in World War II. “They didn’t help us with Normandy as an example.”

In a closed-door emergency session of the United Nations Security Council Thursday to consider the Turkish invasion of Syria, US Ambassador Kelly Craft did not join European representatives in criticizing Ankara’s intervention, but merely echoed Trump’s vague suggestion that Turkey should “play by the rules”.

For his part, Erdoğan responded to criticisms from Europe Thursday by threatening to “open the doors and send 3.6 million refugees to you.”