Lincoln: “The Yankee Nero,” Comic News, London, 1864
Abraham Lincoln is a butcher who attacks his own people. He is responsible for the blood of countless Americans and has to go. He declared a brutal war on the democratic, peace-loving opposition in the South. There is no end in sight to the bloodshed until Lincoln steps down or is removed from power. We can’t just stand idly by and watch the carnage as the death toll grows by the day. We have to do something!
Mr. Lincoln has lost his legitimacy and is no longer fit to rule!
Yes, that’s right! Not Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but LINCOLN!
If you had lived in London or Paris during the time of the American Civil War, this is the Abraham Lincoln you would have known – not the great (or perhaps greatest) American President, liberator of slaves, preserver of the Union, proponent of the American system of economics, etc. The aristocracy of Great Britain (especially Lord Palmerston) and France were anti-Lincoln and pro-Confederacy, and there was a very strong sentiment among their ranks that Britain and France should intervene in order to stop the bloodshed and help the rebels gain their freedom from the tyrant Lincoln who was not only slaughtering his own people but was even cracking down on the once free press of the United States and exercising total government control over the media. As current US Ambassador to the UN Samantha Power would say, Britain and France had the “responsibility to protect”.
The moderate opposition
If all of this sounds very familiar – wait, there’s more!
You’ll never guess in a million years which nation actually intervened in order to stop this planned Anglo-French intervention. Go ahead and try anyway!
Did you say Canada? Sorry, guess again. That was the place where the British troops were waiting to swoop in and bring “peace and freedom”.
Mexico? No, not them either.
Japan? No, you’re thinking of something else.
Did you by any chance say Russia? Really? Russia? The evil Czarist Russian Empire? That’s insane!
What’s even more insane is that you would be correct! It was Russia – Lincoln’s only significant international friend was Czar Alexander II of Russia, and yes, they did intervene on behalf of the Union. If you didn’t hear about this in school, you might want to ask yourself why.
I highly recommend listening to Dr. Webster G. Tarpley’s excellent and scrupulously researched 2013 CSPAN Lecture on the Russian Fleets of 1863:
In 2013, the leader of Russia intervened to keep the peace yet again.
Much more serious was the situation that developed late in the summer of 1862. At that time, as far as any European could see, the Confederacy was beginning to look very much like a winner – a point which James Mason insistently pressed home with British officialdom. The Northern attempt to capture the Confederate capital had failed, Virginia’s soil had been cleared of invaders, and in the East and West alike the Confederates were on the offensive. Minister Adams warned Seward that the British government might very soon offer to mediate the difficulty between North and South, which would be a polite but effective way of intimating that in the opinion of Great Britain the quarrel had gone on long enough and ought to be ended-by giving the South what it wanted. Adams knew what he was talking about. Earl Russell had given Mason no encouragement whatever, but after news of the Second Battle of Bull Pun reached London, he and Lord Palmerston, the Prime Minister, agreed that along in late September or thereabouts there should be a cabinet meeting at which Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary would ask approval of the mediation proposal. (Implicit in all of this was the idea that if the Northern government should refuse to accept mediation, Britain would go ahead and recognize the Confederacy.) With a saving note of caution, Russell and Palmerston concluded not to bring the plan before the cabinet until they got further word about Lee’s invasion of the North. If the Federals were beaten, then the proposal would go through; if Lee failed, then it might be well to wait a little longer before taking any action.
Undeniable, glaringly obvious facts about the US, Russia & Syria that people need to get into their heads:http://tinyurl.com/qx5fbyf
Keep this little history lesson in mind the next time the media start another smear campaign against whatever evil dictator du jour finds his or her way onto the Pentagon hit list.
Terms like “the responsibility to protect”, “moderate rebels”, “humanitarian intervention”, and “evil dictator” are usually nothing more than doublespeak dreamed up by some PR agency. Ask the people of Libya what they think of the US / EU “humanitarian intervention” now that they live in the chaos and hell that followed the removal of their “evil dictator” from power.
If nothing else, consider all the taxpayer money wasted on these interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Serbia, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, just to name a few. You pay for all of this.
Ignore the consequences of endless foreign interventions at your own peril.
Rest in peace, little boy.
Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will recommend the general cause, by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself, beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force. The frontlet upon her brows would no longer beam with the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and power. She might become the dictatress of the world: she would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit.
1. The democratically-elected government of Syria invited Russia to help them fight ISIS and related terrorist groups. This is in accordance with international law (host-state consent, intervention by invitation). The United States was never invited by the Syrian government to intervene.
2. There are no moderate rebels fighting against the government of Syria. The moderate opposition is in the parliament. The armed opposition outside the parliament that’s attempting to overthrow the government are terrorists. These so-called “moderate” rebels are linked with well-known terrorist groups such as ISIS and al-Nusra, and are responsible for handing US weapons over to ISIS. It is simply a matter of playing with words to speak of moderate rebels or relatively moderate rebels or reconcilables as Former CIA Director and CENTCOM Commander General David Petraeus recently put it. The reconcilable, relatively moderate Syrian rebels are doing the same things and pose the same threat to civilization that ISIS, ISIL, or IS do.
Can we get over this “moderate Syrian rebels” myth, for crying out loud? There is no “moderate” opposition running around with machine guns and shooting at people, even if the people they’re shooting at are all military and police. What would you call, say, “moderate” Tea Party rebels (and this is totally hypothetical) trying to remove Obama from office through an armed uprising? Would you call that a “legitimate” and “pro-democracy” moderate opposition? And what would you call it if another country actively supported and funded it? Would it matter to you if you approved of President Obama’s activities or not?
Bashar al-Assad: Do you have military opposition in the United States? Would you accept it? You wouldn’t!
3. Bashar al-Assad (the democratically-elected leader of Syria) has never attacked and has never even threatened to attack the United States.
Assad has warned of blowback against the West if they attack Syria, but he has never threatened the United States or the NATO allies. Newspapers such as The Guardian try to spin his warnings into direct threats:
Syrian president Bashar al-Assad has hinted at terrorist reprisals against western interests in the event of a US strike against his country, saying he could not rule out that chemical weapons might be used.
If you read his actual statements, it becomes clear that Assad is simply warning of repercussions in the region (or blowback) as many western analysts have also said:
Assad: “If you strike somewhere, you have to expect repercussions somewhere else. It may take different forms, direct and indirect. Direct when governments want to retaliate, and indirect when you are going to have instability and the spread of terrorism over the region that will influence the west directly.”
Asked if chemical warfare could be one repercussion, Assad added: “That depends if the rebels or the terrorists in this region or any other group have it. It could happen. You are going to pay the price if you are not wise with dealing with terrorists.”
What he is saying is factual and based on historical precedent – if you attack Syria, you will unleash forces that neither I (Assad) nor you (the West) can predict or control. This is actually a friendly warning and nothing more.
US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has also made the same type of warning to Russia for being involved in Syria, but the Western media do not attempt to spin this into a direct threat.
4. The refugee crisis in Europe was caused by ISIS and their allies, the “moderate” Syrian rebels, not Assad.
5. The regime-change policies of the United States have ended in catastrophe in every case.
6. “Humanitarian intervention” means war. This is doublespeak.
“Police actions” are wars. The Vietnam “conflict” or “police action” was a war, and it doesn’t matter what words are used to designate it.
“Kinetic military actions with no boots on the ground” are wars. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor was a kinetic military action with no boots on the ground, and it was indeed an act of war.
This also applies to the following (real) examples: limited operations; time-limited, scope-limited military action; a very limited operation that is geared to save lives; an unbelievably small military action; a response to violations of a norm; surge; overseas contingency operation; humanitarian mission; nation-building mission; action limited in duration and scope; a signal; the authorized use of force; a very limited, very targeted, short-term effort; putting enablers on the ground.
7. The US and UK governments lied about Saddam Hussein having nuclear weapons. They invaded Iraq and overthrew his government. The US, UK, and France lied about Muammar Gaddafi killing peaceful protesters and overthew his government. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton then gloated over his brutal death. The US and UK lied about Assad using chemical weapons on his own supporters. They’ve been obsessed with overthrowing his government ever since.
8. If pro-American, anti-Russia propaganda is OK, then so is Russian propaganda. The difference is that the US media does it on a much larger scale with a lot more money and bigger audiences, and relies more on lies (eg. Saddam’s nuclear weapons), deception, doublespeak (eg. kinetic military actions), twisted logic, blatant hypocrisy (eg. accusing Russia of bombing “moderate” rebels in Syria at the same time the US bombed a hospital in Afghanistan), constantly claiming to be unbiased (eg. Fox News), and faked evidence (eg. the September Dossier).
A bias in reporting the news will always be present – it can’t be avoided. In telling any story, decisions have to be made about what to leave in and what to leave out. It is impossible to present every angle to a story and to do so in an entirely neutral way. Nor is this necessarily a bad thing. Who, for example, would care to see the History Channel give a “fair and balanced” or unbiased account of Nazi Germany, giving equal time and weight to both the pro- and anti-Nazi sides?
Nearly the entire US media tells the US side (or the Pentagon side) while bashing Putin at every opportunity. Why shouldn’t Russia be allowed to tell their side of the story? Why is it always propaganda when they do it, and “investigative journalism” when we do it?
9. Russian news outlets RT and Sputnik are state-funded.So is the BBC. In shaping public opinion against the Assad government and their supposed war crimes against the Syrian people, the BBC and other news outlets have relied heavily upon “evidence” gathered from “experts” such as Eliot Higgins (an unemployed office worker with no training in weapons) and his Brown Moses blog. There is also the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (according to Wikipedia: cited by virtually every western news outlet since the beginning of the uprising), which is run by Rami Abdulrahman (a shop owner in Coventry, England) from his home.
10. Russia (unprovoked) poses no threat to American national security – on the contrary, they are vital partners in the national security of the United States. Russia has neither attacked nor even threatened to attack the United States or Europe.
On September 11, 2001, Vladimir Putin was the first international leader to call President George Bush to express his sympathy and to offer the support of Russia in the war on terror. When the US was preparing to launch the invasion of Afghanistan, Putin said, “Russia will continue to provide intelligence information we have collected on the infrastructure, location and training of international terrorists.” He also allowed and coordinated for the US the use of former Soviet military bases in central Asia. Until 2015, Russia generously gave the US and NATO allies access to Afghanistan through a vital transit route for military and non-lethal supplies.
On two occasions, Russian authorities warned the US government about the Tsarnaev brothers who were accused of carrying out the Boston Marathon bombings.
When the US and UK governments were planning a lunatic invasion of Syria over the made-up story of Assad gassing his own people, it was not Obama (the Nobel Peace Prize winner) who prevented the US from leaping into yet another Iraq war disaster, it was Putin and Lavrov who gave Obama a way of getting out of his foolish “red line” promise. It was Putin and Lavrov who saved American and British kids from getting plunged into the chaos of the Syrian Civil War.
And now Russia is joining Assad in the fight against ISIS in Syria. This means that Russian soldiers are now putting their lives at risk instead of Americans. Isn’t this worth our gratitude?
11. Putin never said that he wants to bring back the Soviet Union. Here’s what he said:
“Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century. As for the Russian nation, it became a genuine drama. Tens of millions of our co-citizens and co-patriots found themselves outside Russian territory. Moreover, the epidemic of disintegration infected Russia itself.”
“Anyone who doesn’t regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. Anyone who wants it restored has no brains.”
12. Syria, Ukraine, and Crimea are all of vital national security interest to Russia. Russia has close ties to Assad and has a naval base in Syria, as well as in Crimea. The United States may have some security or economic interests in Syria, but is currently unwelcomed there. The United States has countless military bases all over the world. Ukraine and Crimea represent no national security interests for the United States.
13. The US strategy in Syria has been muddle-headed (at best) and doomed to failure from the beginning. This is due in large part to the unwillingness of the US government to work with Assad. Instead, the US has adopted the hopeless strategy of working with so-called moderate rebels to overthrow Assad while at the same time fighting terrorist groups who also seek to overthrow Assad. The worst-kept secret in the world is that these “moderate” rebels have been working with ISIS to overthrow Assad all along. As pointed out by Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Javad Zarif in an interview with Charlie Rose, the US government didn’t care about ISIS until they started attacking Iraq. Before that, the US was content to sit back and watch ISIS attack the Syrian government.
Now, after over a year of fighting ISIS, the US and NATO allies have achieved practically nothing.
In spite of this, we still have people like David Ignatius, one of the US State Dept. mouthpieces at The Washington Post, saying that the Pentagon needs to find a more secretive way to work with al Qaeda in Syria: “The Pentagon needs to assess immediately why this overt, U.S.-backed program failed so badly, and whether it can be rebuilt. A better bet may be the CIA’s covert training program, whose fighters can make tactical battlefield deals with Jabhat al-Nusra without publicly allying with it.”
By working with the government of Syria and refusing to work with any terrorist groups, Russia has a much better chance of eliminating the threat of ISIS and alleviating the refugee crisis in Europe. This should be cause for celebration everywhere.
14. Everyone, starting with the United States, should be happy that Russia is fighting terrorists in Syria, but instead they whine, criticize, and even threaten military retaliation against Russia!
Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov: “One would think the world should applaud, but then we have US and the West worrying about ISIL losses. Yesterday they said it was evil, yet as soon as Russian aviation started conducting airstrikes, they suddenly condemn bombings and call for taking measures against Russia. But there’s the nation behind our army, and nobody cares about the West’s whining.”
Among the lunatics in the US who have actually called for military action against Russia to protect our so-called “assets” in Syria, we have: Presidential candidates Carly Fiorina and Senator Marco Rubio, career Russophobe Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Senator John McCain. I submit to you that these people are traitors to the real national security interests of the United States. These fascist lunatics talk about “standing up to Russia” and protecting our “assets” in Syria, but nobody wants to call it what it really would be: World War III. We have no assets in Syria worth that! We need to get our ASSETS out of Syria now if they’re so important, and anyway, didn’t we already say NO several times to “intervention” in Syria?
15. Obama’s (now former) ISIS Czar General John Allen conducted the “fight” against ISIS by doing everything possible to undermine the main enemy of ISIS – Assad. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has employed the same strategy by working to overthrow Assad, bombing ISIS a little from time to time, bombing the Kurds (true enemies of ISIS and effective fighters as well) a lot, and refusing to seal the Syria-Turkey border, allowing ISIS terrorists in and out of Syria. Erdogan’s daughter even runs a covert hospital to treat wounded ISIS terrorists!
15. Globalization (including the Washington Consensus and global free trade policies with America as the world policeman) has been an unmitigated disaster for the entire world, including the United States.
The unipolar world led by the United States as the lone superpower (otherwise known as the world police) has not led to a golden age of universal democracy and freedom and the free market utopia promised in the post-USSR 90s. It has led instead to a world of brutal IMF-style austerity, out-of-control speculation and toxic derivatives markets, the absolute rule of finance capitalism in place of industrial capitalism, a Wall Street / military-industrial-complex oligarchy with an utterly subservient, toothless political class to do their bidding (lest the Too-Big-To-Fails fail and the apocalypse ensues, bringing, so they say, death, destruction, anarchy and martial law), seemingly endless wars (not of conquest of land, but of the vital assets and resources of nations), nation-building (doublespeak for attacking nations), CIA-backed color revolutions and uprisings (the disastrous Arab Spring, the Euromaidan in Kiev), speculation-driven financial warfare on nations such as Greece (followed of course by demands for ruthless, barbaric austerity), and low-wage, rip-off, monetarist economies in place of the high-wage, productive labor-oriented economies of the past, just to name a few glorious triumphs of the globalized / free trade world. The living standards of the lower and middle classes have declined throughout Europe and America, while the wealthiest of the wealthy, the one percent of the one percent, have acquired ungodly, incalculable wealth, expanding the gap between the rich and the poor to unprecedented levels. Borders open up everywhere, first world jobs are lost, third world sweat shops thrive, profits roll in, bankers rejoice, the jobless recovery is trumpeted from the mountaintops, and Ross Perot’s “giant sucking sound” gets louder and louder year after year.
The return to a multipolar world will not solve all of these problems, nor will socialism, or communism, or Bernie Sanders, or anything we can imagine. Jeremy Corbyn can’t save us and neither can Putin. But as Russia takes back their rightful place as a global power, along with China and the BRICS nations, what we can now hope for is the beginning of the end of Francis Fukuyama’s prophesied pseudo-Hegelian “End of History” American style – the ultimate and utter triumph of “Washington Consensus” liberal democracy, small (and feckless) government dominated by multi-national corporations and cocaine-addicted Wall Street speculators, and at the very least we can hope for an end to the nightmare of the lunatic “Wolfowitz Doctrine” neocon wars to spread democracy and topple governments around the world without any meaningful dissent. As Peter Lavelle put it, “Finally we are witnessing the first steps beyond the post-Cold War order – and praise God for this!” Since the neolibs and neocons couldn’t care less what the people think about all of this, we should all welcome Vladimir Putin’s insistent NYET, and we should all be asking our leaders the same question Putin put to them at the UN General Assembly:
Marco Rubio Would Risk War With Russia In Order To Enforce Safe Zone In Syria:http://tinyurl.com/qc55qkb
War Psychosis Grips Washington Elites as Russia Hits CIA’S Pet Syrian Terrorist Rebels with Ship-Launched Cruise Missiles from Caspian Sea:http://tinyurl.com/p434lzu
Soros-Sponsored NGO (The White Helmets) in Syria Aims at Ousting Assad, Not Saving Civilians:http://tinyurl.com/p9txfcb
Counting the Dead in Syria:
Consistent with earlier analyses, most people who have tragically lost their lives in Syria are not civilians, but rather active combatants. This is worth bearing in mind when U.S. senators repeat the inaccurate statement that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has “massacred” 200,000 of his own people.
It is an excellent rule to be observed in all disputes, that men should give soft words and hard arguments; that they should not so much strive to vex as to convince each other.
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Go to theindicter.com. The Professors' Blog, founded 2005, is Sweden's earliest blog by univerisity professors (In Swedish: "professorsblogg"). Founded by Prof. Marcello Ferrada de Noli
Palestinians are at the heart of the conflict in the M.E Palestinians uprooted by force of arms.. Yet faced immense difficulties have survived, kept alive their history and culture, passed keys of family homes in occupied Palestine from one generation to the next.
Lincoln: “The Yankee Nero,” Comic News, London, 1864
The moderate opposition
Rest in peace, little boy.
Bperet's Blog 