Putin's Had Enough:This Is Not Your Mother's Cold War

Three weeks ago at the Munich Security Conference, before the assembled heads of state of Western Europe and the US Secretary of Defense, Vladimir Putin let it all hang out. He's had more than enough and told the world in no uncertain terms that US aggression and military adventurism in the Caucaucus basin and the Middle East is provoking a new Cold War.

Sec'y Gates and other administration mouthpieces laughed off Putin's remarks, but it is simply extraordinary that this highly intelligent, ex-KGB head would give such a blunt warning in such a prominent setting. Putin knows something, and the US has pushed his hand.

So what's going on? What gave Putin the confidence to send such a major shot across the bow of the USS Cheney? Essentially, Russia's on the rise and the US is going down. Russia is now the world's number one producer of oil, and after nearly being dismantled with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the country under Putin has quietly rebuilt and consolidated its power.

At the same time the US is spiraling out of control. Staggering debt and staggering balance of payments deficits are sinking the American economy. The unenviable pillars of our supposed prosperity are debt, debt & more debt; a rapidly deflating housing bubble; and an inflated stock market that is about to collapse. And our sources of oil are not secure. The US wars in the Middle East are an act of desperation, an oil grab--the US is securing for itself Iraq's oil and Afghanistan to build pipelines that would allow the US to bring the oil from the Caucaucus basin to Pakistan and the Arabian Sea. The US is also trying to dislodge the former Soviet republics--the crescent of unpronouncible -stans ringing Russia's southeastern borders--from Russian influence, eager to base missiles there pointed at Russia and to lock in their oil reserves as well.

Putin is speaking up now because of Iran. He's drawing a line in the sand. And he's in a surprisingly solid position on the global chessboard.

And here's why: the SS-N-25 Super Sunburn, a missile so potent the US Navy tried to purchase its predecessor from the Russians. A few vital stats: it flies at Mach 2.5+ with a cruising altitude of 45 feet and a range of over 150 miles.

Okay, Putin's got a cool missile; what's the big deal? This missile flies so low and so fast that it is undetectable by radar, and has such an impact velocity that, even mounted with a conventional warhead, it could easily sink a Nimitz-class aircraft carrier. Putin has quietly offered them to Iran and Syria. Not only are the US carrier groups in Persian Gulf at grave risk from the Sunburn, but Israel's major population centers as well.

This is obviously known to the Pentagon, witness the current strife between the career military and the administration over Iran, with even Joint Chiefs Chairman General Pace undercutting White House disinformation about Iran's supposedly supplying advanced IEDs to Iraqi insurgents.

Simply put, the Pentagon knows it will pay a staggering and unacceptable price for unleashing an attack on Iran. Those huge carriers are now obsolete, at least against Russia and its allies.

Global chess. Watch out, the Russians are the Grandmasters.

Walter Reed: Karmic Payback

I hesitated to comment on the Walter Reed Veteran's Hospital scandal, as it is so obvious what this is all about.

The Cheney administration and Commander Codpiece couldn't give the time of day to the wounded and broken soldiers coming back from the Iraq/Afghanistan killing fields and are only interested in sending more to be killed and maimed in their insane global chess game.

Walter Reed Hospital, once a leading government facility, was privatized by the neocons and the contractors bled it for profit instead of carrying out even the most basic maintenance. The hospital is now, according to the WaPo, a "dank structure besieged by mold, leaks and rot."

There's a low-level war going on right now between the White House and the Pentagon, and I believe there's no coincidence that this story surfaced right now, in the run-up to the Iran war. This is sabotage, and I think the military was willing to take the hit on this one because they know the ultimate responsibility rests with the administration and they'd get tarred with the blame. Apparently there are still a lot of real patriots in our armed forces and they're making their stand now.

As for Cheney and his Cheerleader and the neocon court, they can fire all the Army Secretaries and scapegoat colonels they want, but that will not redeem their utter disregard for the most basic responsibility of government to care for sick and wounded soldiers--most barely beyond adolescence--that it has sent to fight and die for it.

The karmic payback: veterans groups are rightly outraged, weakening one of the few remaining pillars of popular support for the Bush regime.

Unconscionable.

9/11 Pentagram Mystery Solved, and It's Slick

Some clever guys have done some compelling footwork and I think they've finally figured out what really went down at the Pentagon on 9/11.

Their conclusion: AA Flight 77 came in nearly head-on to the Pentagon, pulled up, and flew on towards Arlington, while the actual jet or missile that struck the building came in simultaneously from another angle, clipping the light poles and striking the facade.

Very smart work.

Check out their site and the video; it's raw and has absolutely zero production values, but the eyewitnesses--among them two Pentagon cops, no less--are obviously telling the truth. The other eyewitnesses were all on the highway, at bad angles--these guys were stationary, with excellent reference points for what they saw.

Compelling. Give the traitors on the other side of the Pentagram credit, that is one slick operation.

Iran: They'd Rather Walk

From Sunday's Times of London, a report that an order to strike Iran could lead to the mass resignation of senior military commanders. The Times' reporters have identified at least four to five generals and admirals who would resign their commissions rather than carry out such orders.

The money quote:

A British defence source confirmed that there were deep misgivings inside the Pentagon about a military strike. “All the generals are perfectly clear that they don’t have the military capacity to take Iran on in any meaningful fashion. Nobody wants to do it and it would be a matter of conscience for them."

And the military's discontent goes all the way to the top:

General Peter Pace, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said recently there was “zero chance” of a war with Iran. He played down claims by US intelligence that the Iranian government was responsible for supplying insurgents in Iraq, forcing Bush on the defensive...

Hillary Mann, the National Security Council’s main Iran expert until 2004, said Pace’s repudiation of the administration’s claims was a sign of grave discontent at the top.

“He is a very serious and a very loyal soldier,” she said. “It is extraordinary for him to have made these comments publicly, and it suggests there are serious problems between the White House, the National Security Council and the Pentagon.

The Cheney administration is destroying and dividing the US military. The generals are not about to walk the plank with these madmen. Apparently Duty, Honor, Country is still alive in our armed forces, and for this we must all be deeply thankful.

To think it has come to this.

Chilling Prescience: Jim Garrison Speaks, 1967

Here I cede the floor to a remarkable man, whose words should not be lost.

Earling Carothers "Jim" Garrison was District Attorney for New Orleans, and placed local businessman Clay Bertrand on trial for conspiracy in the assassination of John F. Kennedy. He is the focus of Oliver Stone's film, JFK. From a Playboy interview in 1967:

PLAYBOY: Many of the professional critics of the Warren Commission appear to be prompted by political motives: Those on the left are anxious to prove Kennedy was murdered by a internal conspiracy within the establishment; and those on the right are eager to prove the assassination was an act of "the international Communist conspiracy." Where would you place yourself on the political spectrum--right, left or center?

JIM GARRISON: That's a question I've asked myself frequently, especially since this investigation started and I found myself in an incongruous and disillusioning battle with agencies of my own Government. I can't just sit down and add up my political beliefs like a mathematical sum, but I think, in balance, I'd turn up somewhere around the middle. Over the years, I guess I've developed a somewhat conservative attitude--in the traditional libertarian sense of conservatism, as opposed to the thumbscrew-and-rack conservatism of the paramilitary right--particularly in regard to the importance of the individual as opposed to the State and the individual's own responsibilities to humanity . . .

I was with the artillery supporting the division that took Dachau; I arrived there the day after it was taken, when bulldozers were making pyramids of human bodies outside the camp. What I saw there has haunted me ever since. Because the law is my profession, I've always wondered about the judges throughout Germany who sentenced men to jail for picking pockets at a time when their own government was jerking gold from the teeth of men murdered in gas chambers. I'm concerned about all of this because it isn't a German phenomenon; it's a human phenomenon. It can happen here, because there has been no change, there has been no progress and there has been no increase of understanding on the part of men for their fellow men.

What worries me deeply, and I have seen it exemplified in this case, is that we in America are in great danger of slowly eroding into a proto-fascist state. It will be a different kind of fascist state from the one the Germans evolved; theirs grew out of depression and promised bread and work, while ours, curiously enough, seems to be emerging from prosperity. But in the final analysis, it's based on power and on the inability to put human goals and human conscience above the dictates of the State. Its origins can be traced in the tremendous war machine we've built since 1945, the "military-industrial complex" that Eisenhower vainly warned us about, which now dominates every aspect of our life. The power of the states and the Congress has gradually been abandoned to the Executive Department, because of war conditions; and we've seen the creation of an arrogant, swollen bureaucratic complex totally unfettered by the checks and balances of the Constitution.

In a very real and terrifying sense, our Government is the CIA and the Pentagon, with Congress reduced to a debating society. Of course, you can't spot this trend to fascism by casually looking around. You can't look for such familiar signs as the swastika, because they won't be there. We won't build Dachaus and Auschwitzes; the clever manipulation of the mass media is creating a concentration camp of the mind that promises to be far more effective in keeping the populace in line. We're not going to wake up one morning and suddenly find ourselves in gray uniforms goose-stepping off to work.

About the photo: Paramilitary police attacking lawful demonstrators protesting against the Free Trade Area of the Americas pact (FTAA) in November of 2003 in Miami.

But this isn't the test. The test is: What happens to the individual who dissents? In Nazi Germany, he was physically destroyed; here the internal process is more subtle, but the end results are the same. I've learned enough about the machinations of the CIA in the past year to know that this is no longer the internal dreamworld America I once believed in. The imperatives of the population explosion, which almost inevitably will lessen our belief in the sanctity of the individual human life, combined with the awesome power of the CIA and the defense establishment, seem destined to seal the fate of the America I knew as a child and bring us into a new Orwellian world where the citizen exists for the State and where raw power justifies any and every immoral act.

I've always had a kind of knee-jerk trust in my Government's basic integrity, whatever political blunders it may make. But I've come to realize that in Washington, deceiving and manipulating the public are viewed by some as the natural prerogatives of office. Huey Long once said, "Fascism will come to America in the name of anti-fascism." I'm afraid, based on my own long experience, that fascism will come to America in the name of national security.

Dr. Evil: Rumsfeld, $2.3 Trillion and 9/11

Here's a staggering bit of recent history that should not be allowed to disappear down the memory hole: On September 10, 2001--yes, that is one day before 9/11--Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced that, "According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions."

I'll be brief here. A few obvious points:

What better way to hide such an outrageous revelation in plain sight than announcing it on the eve of 9/11? The result: Only one major news outlet, CBS News, reported the story. Yet more proof of the conspiracy, if any was needed.

All that money didn't just disappear, nor was it all siphoned off in corruption. This is the cost of our black-ops programs. That means, for the 10-year period of the accounting inquiry, that the Pentagon is spending half the amount in black programs that it does with those officially budgeted, currently some $450 billion per year. And this has been going on since Truman. Let your imagination run free with what they've developed with all that cash.

Also, all those F-22s and submarines and toilet seats don't cost the amounts the Pentagon attributes to them either. They're inflated by at least a quarter, if not by half, with that money also going into black-ops programs. This of course explains why those Humvees in Iraq aren't properly armored, among other things.

Finally, why isn't anyone paying attention? Why no outraged calls for oversight, no moves to reform this mess? Well I know why, just thought I'd play the naif to wrap it up.

Oh, and one last thing: now you know why that manifestly incompetent and sinister nutjob hung on so long.

The New Crowd Control: Shake & Bake

Via the BBC, the Pentagon unveils two new weapons: a mobile, heat-producing ray gun which can be mounted on a Humvee, and a super-slick, spray-on polymer that reduces traction and is nicknamed "Black Ice."

First, the slip-up:
The plastic-like substance, the brainchild of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), would be used to force slip-ups from enemies....officials point out that "to get from point A to point B, one must have sufficient traction with the ground".

Einstein himself couldn't have put it better.

Then, fry them:
The weapon - called the Active Denial System [and known in the Pentagon by the Orwellian appellation, "Silent Guardian"] - projects an invisible high energy beam that produces a sudden burning feeling, but is harmless.

Military officials believe the gun [which has a range of 550 yards] could be used as a non-lethal way of making enemies surrender their weapons.

And just who are these weapons developed against?
--The [heat-ray] weapon could potentially be used for dispersing hostile crowds in conflict zones such as Iraq or Afghanistan.

--The "polymer ice" would be designed for hot, arid environments, "as found in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Uh huh. Sure.

I'm particularly convinced that black ice will be especially effective in unpaved, desert terrain.

So, next time you plan to protest in Washington, remember to pack SPF 30 tanning lotion and football cleats.

The Good News: War is ObsoleteThe Bad News: "Conflict Without End"

In his new book, "The Utility of Force," General Rupert Smith, who served over forty years in the British Army, posits that conventional war--army vs. army and nation vs. nation--is a historical relic, and that since the end of WWII the asymmetrical, guerrilla war of occupier vs. insurgency has become the new paradigm of conflict.

Korea, Algeria, Vietnam, El Salvador, Afghanistan, Iraq: behold the war that is not war.

In the new paradigm, General Smith argues, war does not lead to victory and peace. Rather, confrontation leads to conflict, which subsides into confrontation. The weapons, instead of cruise missiles, are machetes, AK-47 assault rifles and suicide bombers. Only carefully defined and tightly intertwined political, diplomatic and military missions can hope to be effective, if only temporarily. That’s another feature of the new paradigm: No war, but no peace either, only conflict without end.

And at the Pentagon?

Even though today the Armed Forces can't recruit enough soldiers or adequately equip those already in uniform, the Pentagon is committing itself to massive corporate contracts for new high-tech weapons systems slated to come on-line years, even decades, from now, guaranteed only to enrich their makers.

A sampling of the cool new toys:

The same Army that can't provide the basics of modern war is now promising the Future Combat Systems network (FCS), a "family of systems" that will enable soldiers to "perceive, comprehend, shape, and dominate the future battlefield at unprecedented levels." The FCS network will consist of a "family" of 18 manned and unmanned ground vehicles, air vehicles, sensors, and munitions, including: eight new, super-armored, super-strong ground vehicles to replace current tanks, infantry carriers, and self-propelled howitzers; four different planes and drones that soldiers can fly by remote control; and several "unmanned" ground vehicles. And of course eventually robot armies.

The Air Force wants new generations of fighters and bombers that will fly into low earth orbit and change color and shape, all so that it can remain technologically ahead of itself in a surreal, multi-billion-dollar game of Chase Your Own Tail. And of course the Navy wants stealth ships and the top brass want space weapons most of all--what a surprise, that.

Apparently, WW III will look something like a cross between World of Warcraft and the battle scenes from "The Terminator." Wouldn't it be ironic if it were to be waged by President Schwarzenegger?

The Founding Fathers were indeed wise men. I used to think it was an anachronistic folly, but only the Second Amendment will keep us free.

Iraq: Frogs in a Pot

From Digby at Hullabaloo, the realization that US Special Forces may be fomenting violence in Iraq, just as was done in El Salvador (and in Egypt, Iran, Chile, Nicaragua, Panama, Venezuela...). Deja vu all over again.

I have only the greatest respect for Digby--he writes wonderfully and goes further than most mainstream bloggers in challenging the conventional wisdom--but even he holds an obdurate, rationalist naivete about just what makes this world go round.

Of course the US government is spreading chaos in Iraq, but even if they are not actively doing so, the entire way in which the war was conceived and executed to date is incontrovertible proof that there was never any real US interest in fostering stability in Iraq. Once they were ignited, the fires would fan and spread on their own. We should recognize that it's in the interest of those really in power to stay. Just look at those bases they've built. As long as Iraq is dysfunctional, we can't pull out. That's the point.

Digby came to his conclusion of suspicion after Googling the subject of special forces in Iraq. I would encourage everyone to also Google these phrases: "false-flag terrorism" and "ordo ab chao (order from chaos)."

We need to wake up. We're deep through the looking glass here, and Iran and Syria are next. We need only refer to the administration's handy atlas to the Middle East, "Rebuilding America's Defenses," what I call the PNAC agenda, for the roadmap. ( And no, it's not from Rand-MacNally.)

In a nutshell, here's the route we're on: you take a sharp right turn at the WTC, then keep going straight until you reach Armageddon.

Digby concludes his post by saying, "I wish I didn't believe this could be true..."

The first thing we've got to do is stop acting like jilted lovers when we ponder the US government.

We are all rational, sensible people. We go to work, we love our families, we respect the law and our fellow human beings, we pay our bills and taxes. We hope for a better, fairer world and a brighter future.

Well, pardon my French but those in real positions of power are the most corrupt and cynical of bastards and believe they are above the laws, and use our well-meaning, blinkered belief system to their advantage. Simply because we cannot conceive that they would do such things doesn't mean they don't actually do them.

Sorry to rant here, but it's this "normal" mindset that has allowed us to have been pushed this far. We are the proverbial frogs in the pot on the stove.

Again, we need to wake up. Google is a great alarm clock.

9/11 Clearinghouse

First, a word on the photo: note the now-infamous demolition squibs shooting out of the WTC, caused by major detonations of the central columns in roughly 20-story increments, as above secondary charges pulverize the tower, bringing it down at free-fall speed.

September 11th was an inside job, the third US coup d'etat after the Kennedy assassination and the first George W. Bush administration, and if possible it was even more destabilizing and insidious than JFK's murder.

Like many, after the initial shock of events, I hadn't given 9/11 much serious thought until I read of the results of a recent Zogby poll showing nearly half of Americans and well over 60% of New Yorkers believe the US government is somehow involved in the conspiracy. Those are shocking numbers.

So I began to Google and indeed the evidence is overwhelming and irrefutable. The government's cover-up relies upon media collusion and mass apathy, but 9/11 must not be allowed to stand, as it is the base of the present regime's "legitimacy," the staggering treason that underpins their fascist agenda.

Fletcher Prouty--CIA liaison and man of conscience--penned words concerning the JFK assassination that find new relevance today: "Almost everyone who has taken the time to do any reading and thinking about that crime knows this is a game for the biggest stake of all--absolute control of the government of the United States of America; and, with control of this government, control of the world. And yet the real crime underlying all of this has not even been identified, stated, and charged. The real criminals still walk the streets, run their corporations, control their banks, and pull strings throughout their political and financial machines."

Following are links to the best online websites and video presentations concerning the events of September 11, 2001.

Overview
The Complete 911 Timeline: Compilation of all journalistic media accounts of 9/11; a massive undertaking.

Loose Change, 2nd Edition: A 90-minute documentary that concisely marshals the basic facts about what really happened on 9/11. Clear and straightforward, highly recommended.

The American Scholars Symposium, Los Angeles, 8 July 2006. Organized by Alex Jones, a panel discussion about 9/11 and the false-flag terrorism it embodies.

The WTC Towers
South Tower Collapse. A short (-2 min.) slow-motion video of the beginning of the South Tower's collapse, showing jetting plumes and flashes as cutter charges are set off in the impact area. Also, note that the 20 uppermost floors--a massive structure in and of itself--initially intact and toppling at an angle, simply explodes in mid-air. What more proof does one need?

911 Mysteries: A 90-minute documentary examining the collapse of the three WTC towers. Clear, straightforward presentation, though the narrator has a banal delivery. Nonetheless highly recommended for its content.

9/11: Scientific and Ethical Questions, by Prof. Steven Jones. Jones, a physicist at BYU, is the leading scientific proponent of controlled demolition. Compelling for anyone who is not afraid to think.

Interview with Prof. Steven Jones. A straightforward digest of the physical evidence of controlled demolition of the WTC towers. Prof. Jones is in many ways the epitome of the mild-mannered professor--cautious, logical, and relying upon sound evidence for his deductions--and thus his concluding statements in this video are absolutely chilling.

WTC 7 Collapse
Alex Jones on the collapse of WTC Building 7. The collapse of WTC 7 on the afternoon of 9/11 is the most outrageous element of the 9/11 conspiracy. Here Jones has every right to express his indignation.

WTC7.net, a website documenting the controlled demolition of WTC Building 7, command and control center for the 9/11 attacks.

The Plotters
Facing 9/11 Truth, a lecture by Webster G. Tarpley, Seattle, April 2006. An expert on false-flag terrorism, Tarpley lays out the whys and the hows of rogue government involvement in 9/11. A brilliant exposition; should not be missed.

TerrorStorm by Alex Jones. Jones is a courageous, in-your-face provocateur to power and researcher into secret societies and conspiracies, and here explains 9/11 as a government-sponsored terrorist event: the foundational event in the Global War on Terror--by Western governments against their own populations.

Hijacking Catastrophe, A half-hour video explaining the geopolitical benefits--among them, permanent US bases in Iraq and Afganistan and dominance of the Caucusus Basin--that the self-inflicted wound of 9/11 permitted. Ask yourself, "Who benefits most?," and you will find the perpetrator.