Iraqi counter-terrorism forces arrested four foreign military advisors from the United States and Israel who were aiding the Islamic State, Iranian Tasnim News Agency reports. Three of the arrested military advisors are dual citizens of the United States and Israel, while the fourth advisor is from a Persian Gulf country, Iraq’s Sarma News Agency said. The foreign military advisors were captured in a headquarters, from where the Islamic State organized its military operations in Iraq’s Northern Province of Nineveh. The arrests were made during the Operation, codenamed “The Sting of a Scorpion”. A number of other Islamic State fighters have been killed during the assault. The detained foreign advisors have now been transferred to Baghdad.
Category: Head Stories
Scanning the headlines in the western mainstream press, and then peering behind the one-way mirror to compare that to the actual goings-on, one can’t but get the impression that America’s propagandists, and all those who follow in their wake, are struggling with all their might to concoct rationales for military action of one sort or another, be it supplying weapons to the largely defunct Ukrainian military, or staging parades of US military hardware and troops in the almost completely Russian town of Narva, in Estonia, a few hundred meters away from the Russian border, or putting US “advisers” in harm’s way in parts of Iraq mostly controlled by Islamic militants.
The CIA supported and equipped “moderate” rebels in Syria are losing out against al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra. The last “moderate” group active in north Syria, Harakat Hazzm, had to give up its headquarter -including a warehouse full of U.S. weapons- to Jabhat al Nusra and dissolved. Many of its members then joined Nusra. The U.S. military plans to recruit, pay and train new “moderate” rebels but the effort is starting veeerrry slow. Just 100 have been vetted so far to be “moderate” enough for the program. There are simply too few non-Jihadi rebels and warlords available who are willing to die for U.S. dollars.
What Are They Really Up To? Winston Churchill once said, “I feel lonely without a war.” He also badly missed the loss of empire. Churchill’s successor – the ‘Empire of Chaos’ – now faces the same quandary. Some wars – as in Ukraine, by proxy – are not going so well. And the loss of empire increasingly manifests itself in myriad moves by selected players aiming towards a multipolar world. So no wonder US ‘Think Tankland’ is going bonkers, releasing wacky CIA-tinted “forecasts” where Russia is bound to disintegrate, and China is turning into a communist dictatorship. So much (imperial) wishful thinking, so little time to prolong hegemony.
When it comes to the Ukraine proxy war, which started in earnest just about one year ago with the violent coup that overthrew then president Yanukovich and replaced him with a local pro-US oligarch, there has been no ambiguity who the key actors were: on the left, we had the west, personified by the US, the European Union, and NATO in general; while on the right we had Russia. In fact, if there was any confusion, it was about the role of that other “elephant in the room” – China. To be sure, a question few asked throughout the Ukraine civil war is just whose side is China leaning toward. After all the precarious balance of power between NATO and Russia had resulted in a stalemate in which neither side has an obvious advantage (even as the Ukraine economy died, and its currency hyperinflated, waiting for a clear winner), and the explicit or implicit support of China to either camp would make all the difference in the world, not to mention the world’s most formidable axis.
US armored vehicles flying American flags were paraded Tuesday through the Estonian city of Narva, just a few hundred yards from the Russian border. The provocative action, coming on the heels of the first anniversary of the US-orchestrated coup in Kiev, underscores the transformation of the entire region into a zone of military confrontation, with potentially catastrophic implications for the peoples of not only Eastern Europe, but the entire planet. Spearheaded by the fascistic Right Sector militia, the coup that toppled the government of President Viktor Yanukovych on February 22 of last year was carried out with the direct support and intimate involvement of the US government.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro announced a new mandatory visa requirement for all Americans visiting the country. The leader also called to review and downsize the number of US embassy staff in Caracas. “In order to protect our country…I have decided to implement a system of compulsory visas for all Americans entering Venezuela,” Maduro said in a speech on Saturday. This is a reciprocal measure and now all Americans will have to pay tourist visa fees equal to what “a Venezuelan pays to travel to the US.” When announcing the new regulations for US tourists, Maduro said that Venezuela apprehended American citizens who were involved in “espionage activities.”
Above all, they want Ukraine’s mighty neighbour, Russia. They want to Balkanise or dismember Russia and exploit the greatest source of natural gas on earth. As the Arctic ice melts, they want control of the Arctic Ocean and its energy riches, and Russia’s long Arctic land border. Their man in Moscow used to be Boris Yeltsin, a drunk, who handed his country’s economy to the West. His successor, Putin, has re-established Russia as a sovereign nation; that is his crime. The responsibility of the rest of us is clear. It is to identify and expose the reckless lies of warmongers and never to collude with them. It is to re-awaken the great popular movements that brought a fragile civilisation to modern imperial states. Most important, it is to prevent the conquest of ourselves: our minds, our humanity, our self respect. If we remain silent, victory over us is assured, and a holocaust beckons.
U.S. President Barack Obama apparently is going ahead with his plan for NATO missiles to be placed in Ukraine aimed against Moscow, but found a way to do it that won’t violate the warnings by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin against Washington’s directly supplying those arms to Ukraine (such as is demanded of Obama by congressional Republicans, and even by a few hawkish Democrats — all passionate supporters of Hillary Clinton). Obama’s subordinate (or dependent local leader), the President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, is now arranging to receive those weapons via a less direct channel; and this arrangement couldn’t happen if the U.S. White House were opposed to it. The idea might even have originated inside the White House.
Since 2010 the troika, consisting of the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Union’s commission, has forced different governments in Athens to implement six consecutive austerity programs which have severely lowered the living standards of working people, devastated Greece’s social systems and plunged millions into poverty. This is why on 25 January, the majority of the Greek population decided to vote for a party that raised their hopes for a better future by promising an end to austerity. Four weeks later this dream has been shattered. In last week’s negotiations the troika left no doubt that it will not deviate from its path of insisting on the unrestricted continuation of austerity politics. In other words: The working people of Greece will have to keep filling the gaps in the state budget generated by the bank bailout in the beginning stages of the Euro crisis.