A KSA CT that is worth considering
The comments at Moon of Alabama are of uniformly high quality, seemingly written by people in the know. Often, they contain absolute gold. Here is one of them that just blew my socks off:
I posted a TL:DR rant on SouthFront comment, but I'll summarize here for comment:
1. Salman purge is, in reality, fake; meant to explain his (temporary) reign.
2. Purpose is to have Salman appear to initiate an aerial campaign against Lebanon/Hezbollah that is designed to eventually spill over into Syria. Nayef 'The Good Saudi Prince' kept on ice for now to appear 'innocent' of starting the war. Will replace Salman when job finished (and CIA whacks Salman).
3. Unexplained massive KSA/UAE arms buildup over last few years consisted of unusual number of air-dropped bombs of all types. No way they used that many in Yemen - that was an excuse to increase stockpiles even more.
4. KSA/UAE air forces incapable of mounting a massive Lebanese/Syria aerial campaign. Pilots will be Israeli (as seen in Yemen), US or some kind of R2(UAE's Blackwater) mercs. Yes, ex-F-15/F-16 pilots from many countries are mercs, too. An uncomfortable fact: the US would prefer the taxpayers didn't know how many US-trained military pilots do this.
5. The whole crazy-Salman thing is simply cover to disguise the US/Israeli-led campaign. No Israeli or US aircraft will be used - "It wasn't US!" Furthermore, Israel can't afford the aircraft losses - it would prefer to burn through KSA/UAE aircraft. KSA/UAE have no problem with that - they can afford more (or the US will just give them more).
6. US/Israeli/KSA/UAE goal is not to take over Lebanon or Syria. Aside from the expected Israeli land-grab, the goal is only to throw both countries into chaos again (after killing Aoun and Assad with airstrikes) and destroy as much of Hezbollah and their arms as possible.
This solves many problems at once and is conveniently timed after sufficient head-chopper weakening. Best of all, it accomplishes those goals with the throw-away bin Salman. After they whack him, the 'Good-guy Saudi' Nayef will lead a kinder, gentler Saudi Arabia into the future. See? The bad guy who started the aerial butchery is dead. The US and Israel are innocent, yet have managed to 'win' the long war against Lebanon and Syria.
ON EDIT: Here's the link:
Saudi Arabia - This "Liberal Reformer" Is An Impulsive Tyrant
Posted by: PavewayIV | Nov 10, 2017 12:36:38 PM | 10
Wow. Just wow. And I thought I was cynical. But the ME is so nutzo these days that this CT is not beyond possibility. Even if its wrong, it brings up the interesting fact of massive aircraft and bomb sales to KSA. Now, you could just say that KSA is stupid and being fleeced by the Merchants of Death; or that they are terrified and are buying anything they think will protect them (which does not square with their aggressive, messianic Wahabiism). But, the society is so closed, so conspiratorial, that it is fertile ground for the kind of intelligence agency games that the Mossad and the CIA play.
ON EDIT: still reading the comments. Really interesting, informed theorizing.
Comments
I will read the article,
and I thank you for posting it. Just as an initial response to you, though, I see the Saudi junta as just one of the psychopathic killer squadrons propped up by Chevron for the purpose of keeping the people of the world terrified and oppressed and the American taxpayer hemorrhaging money into the black hole of covert military spending. The weapons used by Saudi Arabia don't have to have a strategy other than to destroy democracy and whatever is left of the labor movement.
True, but when the killer squads start shooting each other...
then things get interesting.
I think it's been established that the "strategy" is chaos. The strategy is one big protection racket. "Nice little country you got there. It would be a shame if some terrorists showed up. Why don't you invite the corporatocracy in to 'protect' you, for a small fee - like ownership of your country."
KSA has been at the forefront of exporting terrorism since that Polish fanatic, Brezizinski, sic-ed OBL on Afghanistan in the late 1970s. KSA is the Arab wing of the empire of chaos; and the Arab wing is the marquee franchise of terror. Islam has been turned into the major brand of terrorism, now that TPTB don't have Communism to kick around anymore. (I always get a laugh about how TPTB have no problem with "communist" China.)
What I like about this CT is that it looks like KSA itself is no longer a "player", but rather is being played by Israel/US. Decades ago, someone described the Saudi royals as (paraphrase) "old men in wheelchairs being pushed down a street in a ghetto at 2 AM by their armed bodyguards." The implication being that, without the bodyguards, KSA would be dead immediately.
Well, today, it looks like the bodyguards have started shooting some of the guys in wheelchairs. Couldn't happen to a more bloodthirsty, medieval bunch of assholes - MbS included. If only the carnage could be contained inside KSA, the world would be better off. But it won't.
It's a mystery to me
what is going on in KSA.
I'm not sure that anyone knows.
Exactly. That's why I will entertain *intelligent* CT.
The term CT has been used, since it was invented by the CIA, as an epithet. It deliberately conflates crazy ideas with well-founded speculation, to the detriment of the latter.
The truth is that, in an absence of facts, it is human to theorize. Nothing intrinsically bad about theorizing - detectives do it all the time. Nothing unusual about conspiracies, either. New ones turn up in the news every month.
It is only when *someone's* facts arise and do not conform to *someone else's* theory that the insult of CT gets hurled.
----
In the case of KSA, there are very few true facts. We know some of people who have been arrested or killed. That's about it. Nevertheless, what happens in KSA (and the larger MENA theater) is very important. People will not wait for facts, which may not be forthcoming. They form theories and act on them.
I freely admit that the KSA CT I posted is unfounded. Furthermore, I acknowledge a confirmation bias. Namely, it confirms my view that the world is largely shaped behind the scenes, and that democracy in an age of $100B black budgets, is increasingly a joke. When the Russiagate lie still stands after a year of people demonstrating it is nothing more than a CT backed up by the confirmation bias of the Deep State/corporate media, it is laughable to call anyone out about CT.
This +++
In today's world more CT's are truth, rather then fiction.
BWTFDIK?
I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish
"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"
Heard from Margaret Kimberley
I don't see the point in bombing Lebanon
without some sort of follow up, merely reprising 2006 won't accomplish anything and will only strengthen the Hezbos. Destroying infrastructure is a temporary problem and one that LB has faced many times before, they are tough people, and can easily rebuild.
Regarding a ground invasion in the south, I say "good luck, Bibi, you'll need it".
The KSA foreign policy reminds me of an out of control drunk, between the bombing of Yemen, the blockade of Qatar, the threatening of Iran, the manipulation of Lebanon, the kidnapping of Hariri, the support for Daesh and Nusra... it's foreign policy is unsustainable, foolish and ineffective. The fact that they have Israel and the US as coaches only underscores the point, as both have been completely inept regarding ME policy in recent years.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
The point is provocation
They keep trying to get Russia or Iran to overreact so that the US and Israel can bomb the shit out of Iran. They tried the same game in Ukraine. They tried it on Syria with the false flag gas attacks.
They just keep going more indirect. This time its KSA attacks Hizbullah in order to destabilize Lebanon. They keep moving the "red lines". All of the sudden, the mere presence of Hizbullah is a causus belli against Iran.
If this scenario plays out, it will be interesting to watch (from a safe distance, in a bomb shelter) how Russia counters this latest aggression.
The optics of Lebanon being bombed without provocation
would negate any perceived benefit. If you want to make Russia or Iran look bad, attacking a third country for no legitimate reason isn't going to accomplish that goal. Photos of the carnage and horror will be immediately available, as well.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
The optics only have to work inside the US bubble
Outside the US/EU/Israel/UK 5 eyes bubble, the rest of the world finds the US to be the major threat to peace. The rest of the world is onto our "send in the terrorists" destabilization gambit. But the US population remains clueless, which allows our murderous foreign policy to continue.
In the case of a KSA-branded attack (which could be carried out with US, Israeli, or mercenary pilots), the corporate media would pull a Russiagate. Its all the fault of Hizbullah and Iran and Russia. As long as the bombing is "over there", Joe Sixpack doesn't give a shit. And, absent real world consequences for his pathetic lifestyle, he doesn't know or care what the rest of the world thinks of the US.
AFAICT, we don't depend on Mideast oil. Most of that goes to Europe and China. And fracking is ramping up as the oil price climbs. So, the economic fallout of any ME conflict will not hit the US - unless the Chinese-yuan for oil gambit takes hold and kills the US dollar.
Being inside our bubble is like being inside the Nazi propaganda bubble, its an alternate reality with black-and-white good guys/bad guys.
Bottom line: until the murderous sociopaths that run this country really hurt the country, no one will dare to criticize them. And by then, there will be some kind of war, and criticism will be declared to be treason.
We are just circling the drain as a country.
They don't want to make R/I look bad. They want to bomb them.
All the US has going for it is the military. Mostly, they can't use the military because of politics. So, they have been trying for years to provoke Russian and Iran into doing something they could use as an excuse to attack them. They don't care if the US "looks bad" as long as they get to destroy Iran (and, they think, any Russians who get in the way) for Bibi.
You and I know that such an attack would be suicidal in the case of Russia; and result in political ostracism in the case of attacking an Iran that is compliant with all treaties. But the gangsters in charge of our government have no other tools left, and they are losing. Such an attack would be a desperate escalation; but it is all they have left between them and defeat in the ME.
@arendt I think recent
I think recent military encounters with the Russians might have put a bit of a damper on that. Apparently they can often simply neutralize our attack capabilities before we do anything. They've shown us that--without destroying any of our vessels or doing anything particularly aggressive.
Again, it comes back to how much rationality of any kind plays a role in the decisions of the powerful.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I am aware of the Khibiny system...
and its involvement in the still murky USS Donald Cook incident.
So, I would agree with you that a rational US military would think twice about attacking places defended by Russian equipment, e.g., Iran.
What worries me is that the US/KSA/Israel keeps up the drumbeat that Iran is a menace and Iran must be attacked - not contained, not negotiated with, but ATTACKED.
The disconnect between known capabilities and political statements scares the crap out of me. Our leadership hasn't been rational in quite a while; and it only got worse with Trump. They are all lost in this "exceptional", invincible nation groupthink that can only end badly.
Best case, they try to attack Iran and Khibniy shuts it down without too much bloodshed.
@dervish
But will the US permit such evidence to be posted on the internet? Certainly not on FB or Twitter and algorithms can be set to bury anything anywhere on the net, not just on Youtube... and anything that gets through will be A Russian!!! (or other foreign!!!) Plot!
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@arendt dervish has a point
dervish has a point though. we could be wrong in attributing a rational motive to KSA--hell, we could be wrong in attributing a rational motive to the CIA!
That said, I think intelligent speculation is still worthwhile, so thanks for your article.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Not sure which of dervish's posts that is referencing
My response to that is that the follow up is to attack Iran.
And that is the worry I expressed in my recent response to you (about Khibiny).
So, with the standard level of military secrecy, the failed state of corporate media reporting, and the potential insanity of the leadership, us peasants don't know jack shit.
Attacking Iran is another issue.
I mean that if Lebanon is bombed, Hezbollah won't be eradicated. If they want to eliminate the Hezbos, they'll have to do it on the ground.
Or try anyway.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
Got it. Thanks. n/t
chicken and egg issue
With KSA, the question is: Which was chicken and which egg? The "coaches" are playing the very game that the Kingdom wants them to play.
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
The goals align, but KSA is being played
as usual. When it's all over, they'll wake up and notice that they are the ones who have spent all of their money and political capital, and have very little to show for it. They are like the guy who wakes up and notices that the hooker is gone, and so are his wallet and watch.
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
"the hooker is gone, and so are his wallet and watch." LOL! n/t
@dervish Are you sure they
Are you sure they aren't playing us?
I have had the uneasy feeling for some time that the tables have been turned.
Sure, we massively outgun them, but we also can't afford to lose them (petrodollar/stupid 20th-century fossil fuel economy)
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
So far they seem to be doing the dirty jobs
that we and the Israelis don't want to do ourselves, so I doubt we're being played in that regard. Going forward, I think they'll try to dump us... under the circumstances, who wouldn't?
"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."
My take:
The MbS roundup of Saudi Oligarchs is aimed at eliminating/neutering the Bush/Clinton backed elements in the Saudi hierarchy (see e.g., Bandar Bush) in order to give SA more independence from American influence/control.
Trump is more than happy to support the coup because it removes a key power/financial base of his domestic opposition and lets him profit from US-Saudi oil-arms deals instead. (See e.g., ARAMCO IPO)
MbS is willing to aid Israel's attack on Hezbollah/Iran as a way of shoring up Israeli support for his coup as well as reverse some of the losses from the Syrian misadventure (fat chance on the latter).
Jared Kushner is the middle man in all of this.
Rex Tillerson and a big part of the US defense establishment think an Israeli attack on Lebanon is a fool's errand that could boomerang bigly. (they're probably right)
Netanyahu needs a war to save himself from being removed from power over corruption charges. If that still doesn't save him, he's content to go down in a blaze of gory.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
Yes, everything you say is plausible
Please feel free to dispute the conjectures that follow. I am just spitballing here.
IMHO, Trump doesn't know anything about foreign policy. That would leave FP being run by Jared/Ivanka. (shoot me now) Jared, a rank amateur and hardcore Zionist, is being led by the nose by NuttyYahoo. So, the whole MbS scam is being run out of Tel Aviv. That is plausible.
Yeah, but are they just trading being controlled by America for being controlled by Israel? Is MbS stupid enough to think the Israelis and the neocons are not on the same team? Hmmm. Let me talk that through:
Obama gave Israel $50 B worth of military goodies on his way out the door. Hillary is a hardcore neocon. That says they are on the Zionist team. Does NuttyY have the chutzpah to pocket the US money and then kick them out of KSA? Possibly. Maybe he figures Hillary is toast, and the neocons can be managed by the Israelis.
Another possiblity is that NuttyY personally and/or Israel are facing crunch time. The Shia coalition, backed by Russia, is growing to the point where Israel can't win a war. The US, for all the Trump team's belligerence against Iran, is also going to think twice about getting involved in another MENA war - especially when the other side has massive numbers of modern anti-air and anti-ship missiles.
So, maybe NuttyY has made a deal with MbS. Together they will roll the dice, combining their air forces (ala the snip in the OP) to try to provoke Iran and then bomb Iran. Its insane; but when you're an asshole like Bibi and your back is to the wall, insanity is an option.
Israel would have to give some strong guarantees to KSA. That's because KSA feels it has been played by the neocons (lost money when they crashed the price of oil; feeling competition from government-backed (ZIRP) loans for fracking), so it wants a new partner (e.g., China). Unless Israel can either distance itself (unlikely) from the neocons or simply have them drop the masquerade and come out as directly anti-US, I don't see MbS buying in. But, since he did, maybe they did.
----
Having read what I just wrote, it is pretty lame CT. In my defence, I will say that the relationships among the neocons, the Bush-Clinton Crime family, Israel, the CIA, and the Mossad are as incestuous and convoluted as those in the Saudi royal family.
Any further insight you can offer would be well received.
This assessment is close
to where I am, but I am definitely not the least bit knowledgeable on foreign policy. That said, Moon of Alabama is probably one of the most consistent sources on foreign policy, particularly the Middle East.
I really do not know what to think at this point.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
(To arendt above) The neocons...
(and the rest of the Bush/Clinton/Obama power base) are the ones being neutered here, so to stay in Israeli good graces, MbS is giving Bibi his war.
I agree with most of this:
except that they wont attack Iran directly. Lebanon will be the whipping boy and Iran the pretext. For the Israelis, Hezbollah is the true threat.
Trump has made a career of people underestimating him. He may not know much, but he does have a lot of smart people on his team (Kushner is just the bag man, he's not the one formulating policy).
Trump's move in support of the MbS coup makes a lot of sense from his perspective: supplant the Bushies as ME power brokers, weaken domestic opposition, and make oodles of cash.
Trump may play dumb, but he's not an idiot. Don't fall for the schtick.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
This is so convoluted I need you to confirm I understood you
1. MbS is kicking out the US neocons and their hangers on (B/C/O).
I can buy that, because the neocons have been using KSA and costing KSA money without much return for KSA. And, people like Bandar Bush are targeted by MbS as well.
2. (here is where I get lost) Bibi is OK with this because MbS has promised Bibi he will attack Hizbullah and thereby open the way for Israel to lock down southern Lebanon, and maybe give Israel the excuse to bomb Iran (or have Israeli pilots fly KSA jets to bomb Iran).
Not that I don't believe it possible, but, you are saying that Bibi would shaft the neocons and the US elites just to be able to attack Hizbullah? The only way that works is if KSA/Israel have already done an under-the-table deal with China (and/or Russia) to be the protector for Israel going forward (cuz after such a double cross, if the US had half a brain, they would feed Israel to the Islamic wolves). Again, not impossible, just above my paygrade in absolutely Machiavellian politics.
What's so hard to understand?
The neocons are out of power. Why wouln't Bibi shaft them in favor of Trump?
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
It really is game of thrones, then.
I thought I was cynical; but I guess I'm just too nice a person.
Its not that its hard to understand; its that its nauseating to understand.
The chess game of Middle East politics...
makes Game of Thrones look like checkers.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
@Not Henry Kissinger
(Sorry that this collection is kinda a mess, (as am I, lol, very tired,) but I hope that this makes the point OK. The past several Administrations all have top representatives (or Hillary Clinton, in one case) who have left public office, yet are still poking their noses in.)
If the neocons are out of power, why is Dick Cheney advising the Trump Admin and mentoring Pence, quoted as stating that he wants to model his Vice on Cheney's?
https://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/dick-cheney-trump-surrogate-232746
http://www.businessinsider.com/mike-pence-dick-cheney-vice-president-201...
http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/dick-cheney-key-donald-trump-adviser/201...
And way back here (my searches suck and I'm having trouble finding articles I've seen before,) but this shows that the warmongers began moving in early, (while various intelligence officials formed a similar coalition to make a statement that Trump would be the most reckless President ever):
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3811850/More-50-Bush-administrat...
And I can only say that my gut dropped reading the rest of the following at source... also see his statement lower down, regarding indefinite detention of American citizens without charges.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/12/27/trump-na...
https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/04/17/trump-hiring-officials-from-...
https://www.cwla.org/trump-administration-brings-back-president-bush-app...
And this Bush Admin influence shows:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-admin-tags-isis-fighter-enemy...
I smell a precedent-setting indefinite detention of American citizens without charges case to test out Obama's spiffy law-change doing away with more inalienable, guaranteed Constitutional protections, now that the Supreme Court's up to majority-corrupt status again.
And I'm going to curl up in bed with a cat and book and try not to have nightmares about all this crap...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Cheney...
appears to be more an advisor to Pence than Trump, with Cheney advising Pence how to manage Trump the way Cheney managed W.
Early on in Trump's presidency Pence did seem to wield outsized influence (Flynn was fired because he lied to Pence, not because of his actual per-inauguration contacts to Russia), but that influence looks to have waned considerably from those early chaotic days, and especially since Rence Priebus (who Trump saw as a old guard mole) was fired and Kelly took over as Chief of Staff in what the NYT called a 'management coup'.
It's interesting to note that Pence's role in foreign policy has particularly waned since Kelly took over. Where Trump sent Pence to South Korea in April to 'stare down' Kim across the DMV, on Trump's current trip to Asia he left Pence at home to lobby for the tax bill. Quite the come down.
I strongly suspect that Pence knew nothing about the KSA coup. Kelly is known for keeping a very close circle of confidants and Pence doesn't appear to be one of them. The MbS round up caught the Bush-friendly Saudi oligarchs completely by surprise, so even if Pence did know about it in advance, he sure as hell didn't tell Cheney.
Viewed in this light, the Saudi coup is as much about consolidating Trump's power as it is MbS.
I'm guessing ol' deadeye Dick is going to have a tough time getting his calls to the VP answered from here on in.
The current working assumption appears to be that our Shroedinger's Cat system is still alive. But what if we all suspect it's not, and the real problem is we just can't bring ourselves to open the box?
@Not Henry Kissinger
Thanks! And it sounds as though anyone remotely sane doesn't want Pence/Cheney involved in anything, lol, which makes sense to me.
But, rightly or wrongly, it seems to me that previous Presidents/Vice Presidents and others, once out of public office, didn't hang around, potentially (I suspect, anyway,) to be certain that the same progressions of PNAC-type policy development were carried out? Not that I'd expect Obama, Cheney or the Clintons to trot around the world building Habitats For Humanity or anything...
Edit: used the wrong word...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Useful info. Thanks.
I don't have time to keep track of former menaces to society like Cheney, because I'm too busy keeping track of current menaces.
It speaks volumes about the US that war-criminal sociopath Cheney is still considered an acceptable source of policy advice, and that the neocon war machine is still sending out war messages that are taken seriously by some parts of offical Washington and the corporate media.
The people overwhelmingly want peace. Instead, they get false flags, warmongering, US troops in most nations on earth, and slashes to non-military government programs. And they get to be lectured to by a snarling scumbag like Cheney, even if (thank dog) Trump's triumvirate has shut him out.
@Ellen North Because Pence is
Because Pence is the CIA's man in the administration, which also makes him the representative of the Bush/Clinton political cartel, and the one they'd like to take over if/when Trump is impeached in a flurry of sentimental statements about anti-racism that don't actually mean shit.
Of course Cheney is mentoring him. Who else?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
Thanks!
Didn't know he was CIA; there seems to be a lot of it about... leprosy is contagious...
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@Ellen North OK, I should
OK, I should backtrack a bit:
*I believe* Pence is the CIA's man in the Trump Administration. I don't have proof. It's just what it looks like to me.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Ellen North And he's not an
And he's not an agent himself--that's not what I meant. I meant, he's the politician the CIA can rely on within the Trump administration.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
Lol, the only exercise I seem to get these days is jumping to conclusions! But that would make sense.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@arendt Would China or Russia
Would China or Russia be dumb enough to become Israel's protector?
China and Russia don't have a cultural reason/a constant chatter of pseudo-morality telling them they have to protect Israel because there's something holy or wonderful about it that makes it better than all the other sacred sites in the world or about Jews in particular over all the other human beings in the world. The U.S. does. In fact, even I have enough of that cultural belief system that I'm uncomfortable with what I just wrote. I don't like the idea of the holy site of Jerusalem being laid waste and the people of that country killed. On the other hand, seems to me the Likkud party has led them right down the path to that goal, so I'm not sure how protecting the current power structure in Israel is any better than abandoning them. Seems like long-term destruction versus short-term destruction to me (though they have nukes; more on that below). Regardless of my own moral qualms, would Russia or China share them? I don't think their cultures contain the right ideas to buy automatically into protecting Israel.
China and Russia equally don't have a long-established policy/historical relationship with Israel which I guess looked like a good idea to the U.S. and Britain in 1947/8, but has now obviously become a boondoggle.
If you lack those cultural/moral ideas and that history, then--please excuse my ignorance here--why is it a good idea to be Israel's protector? Other than the fact that they have nuclear weapons (not a minor point), why would anyone (other than us) want to protect them rather than throw them to the wolves and ally with the much larger percentage of people who do not like them, many of whom have reasonably effective militaries and also some oil and natural gas to bring to the table?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal
Speaking as One Who Knows Nothing, Israel is also being controlled by propagandistic, warmongering psychopathic lunatics committing war-crimes on captive inhabitants within their own territory, which they're stealing.
If the world is finally beginning to back away from the US propagandistic, warmongering psychopathic lunatics committing war-crimes all over the world, while stealing from the inhabitants of their own territory, why would they want to go into another such universally destructive relationship?
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@Ellen North The thing about a
The thing about a hot potato is you DON'T want to pick it up.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I think the alliance would be with KSA, not Israel
But, KSA wants Israel so that they will do incompetent-KSA's dirty work by attacking Iran. Both Israel and KSA hate Hizbullah, so that's a perfect fit. So, Israel would just be along for the ride, changing horses from US-KSA-ally to China-KSA-ally. (which is the scenario NotHenryKissinger was proposing.)
IMHO, its the Chinese who would support KSA, for economics reasons. Its not that China needs KSA's oil; China can get what it needs from Russia, without all the messy wars and jihadis getting in the way.
What China (and Russia) wants is to smash the petro-dollar. Its worth making a deal with KSA to do that. If KSA is in alliance with Israel on local (ME) politics, the Chinese don't care. The Russians, OTOH, are allied with Iran and the Shias (and, maybe, the non-insane, non-Wahabi Sunnis). The Russians are not going to support any attacks on Iran by anyone.
Just speculating.
@arendt I guess the Chinese
I guess the Chinese have no direct reason to care. But Israel is, as I've said elsewhere, a boondoggle. A hot potato. It's a rotten policy mistake made 70 years ago that's causing problems, and will continue to cause problems, for anybody protecting it. Understandable that they want to crush the petro-dollar, but if they're smart, they will not take on Israel as part of the price for doing so. If they want to work with Russia, which they seem to, they will be given other reasons for not being Israel's new best buddy.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
There are many overlapping interests
… that range from local to global, and many opportunists who use the chaos to their advantage. While money is the ubiquitous motivator — in this case it is money-for-power rather than money-for-wealth.
I prefer to watch the strategic plays at the top (global) because the game at the top is generally the invisible hand that pushes the invisibly-connected struggles below. At top is China, and the fact that it is Saudi Arabia's biggest customer — now and for the remainder of this Asian Century. When the US was the top customer, the Saudis (and OPEC) had to play by US rules with US Dollars. Decision time has run out for the Saudis. If they are going to become a strategic player in tomorrow's world, they must immediately begin selling oil in Yuan and partner with China for the economic diversification they desperately need as their petroleum supply plays out. The US gambit as global hegemon hangs in the balance.
That drama casts a shadow all the way down to the regional and local levels of the Middle East where various powers, authorities, entities, and loyalties are clashing and jockeying for advantage and position. Moon of Alabama speaks to that drama at the local level, where it has sparked a massive clash of politics, loyalty, and social order. It's akin to a change of Dynasty. There, in the wrong place at the wrong time, the US Neocons have co-joined Israel's aspirations to misplaced US national interests, playing Jay and Silent Bob to the Middle East while pretending imperious independence. They think they are fomenting wars that will pay off for them in the long run, but they are mere executioners in the ongoing genocide of the Shiites, and little more than Sunni sub-contractors.
Off to the side, Africa hangs in the balance. Unbeknownst to most Americans and their political representatives, the US has military operations in 53 of 54 nations there. China is in Africa, as well, but they are wearing business suits instead of military gear. The Saudi's impending decision will determine what happens next in that final frontier.
The overarching game that all humans are playing is rooted in the diminishing resources of a vastly overpopulated planet. It's a zero sum game.
Sad, but true
Since 1945, the demographic timebomb has been exploding, especially in the Third, Fourth, and Fifth world. We are devouring the planet.
Other choices could have been made along the way. Warnings could have been heeded. But TPTB said "no". We will continue to block birth control and pre-natal health care. We will continue to encourage throw away products and maximizing the rate at which raw materials are converted to landfill.
When your metric is maximum profitability right now, the planet is just something to be plundered. We have plundered it to the point you stated: its a zero sum game for insufficient and declining resources.
It didn't have to be this way.
Pluto, this!!!
I think you are very right on these two things.
The US is falling behind in terms of economic productivity in the world market. And while the dollar is still strong world wide, I believe that Pluto is correct in her assessment. Thus this...
IMHO, it has become all about Africa.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Africa is the prize?
I have no position on whether that is true. But I do have a position on what that says about the state of world politics: it sucks.
Really, a continent that has been looted for almost two centuries, a continent that is run by global corporations and local kleptocrats, a continent that lags far behind on all metrics of development - this "international basket case" (to use a Henry Kissinger term) is THE PRIZE?
How absolutely pathetic. It certainly gives the lie to all the rhetoric about our high-tech future. The continent is completely low-tech, a resource base and little else.
At least the Chinese are willing to invest in basic infrastructure, like roads; the West just wants to continue the looting while re-instating white-man's colonialism (i.e., the US military all over the continent, with the French continuing their thin-skinned control of the Francophone areas.)
Frankly, Africa is a secondary theater. The fact that the US is willing to waste military resources there instead of fixing our crumbling infrastructure at home says all I need to know about the total capture of the US government by the MIC and the resource-extracting global corps.
Yes
We're late in the endgame now. It's about food and water.
Chinese food security may be motivating investments in Africa
China, Africa and Food Security
I'll spare you the detailed projections of how food production is expected to be compromised by climate change, but it's worth reading. Then realize it will happen much more quickly than they predict.
Raw materials and food. Access and denial of access. That's the game in Africa.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Food and water
WATER: We are using up and poisoning the water table everywhere there is fracking.
FOOD: Monsanto is splicing in death genes to prevent seed saving. All the agri-businesses are pumping out neonicotonoid insecticides that are killing bees; and it was just reported that in protected wilderness areas in Germany, insect populations are down 75%.
And, a two-fer: OCEAN ACIDIFICATION: falling pH has already decimated shellfish beds, and forced shellfish farmers to add lime and other alkali agents in order to have a "crop" at all. It will soon start dissolving any corals that global warming hasn't bleached.
Bottom line: we are killing the planet as fast as possible. TPTB's solution is to find more land - that they will rapidly despoil with the techiques listed above.
This civilization has a death wish.
@arendt Not a
Not a civilization, because its strategy is minimizing survival potential. The purpose of civilization is to maximize survival potential (sometimes in extremely ugly ways). This is more like a weapon of mass destruction based on a misguided understanding of, and application of, Darwinism. (Combined oddly with Calvinism. How the hell did that happen.)
Sorry, just my own pet peeve and my personal definitions.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
It happened when profit replaced production
when Financial Capitalism replaced Industrial Capitalism.
The economic signals today are completely ruined. ZIRP destroys signaling about the true value of a company. Connected companies can roll over their debts forever. Stock market funding can be used to extract loot - watch Uber, subsidized with $50 B of stock market cap, destroy legitimate businesses with what amounts to "capital dumping". Stock buybacks are another form of looting that blocks the development of environmentally friendly methods. Buybacks are handed out in lieu of capital investment and R&D for the future health of companues.
If the signals were in place and the looting were against the law, the economy would measure and price in environmental destruction and the true value of companies.
As for Calvinism and Darwinism, it is a matter of degree. Those ideologies were around post-WW2, but then TPTB were more afraid of recession. So they moderated the Darwinian brutality. It is, once again, the financial capitalist looters that demand Darwinian behavior. They began this crap in the 1980s when they used "shareholder value" and leveraged buyouts from newly deregulated banks to loot and destroy profitable businesses for a quick one-time profit. I'm looking at you, Mitt Romney.
To me, its all about the dominance of paper/computer capitalism. Its all about making deals and profits instead of making things. Finance capitalism is parasitical and always demanding more profit when the financial capitalists produce nothing of value themselves. As FC becomes a larger part of the economy, the real economy and the environment are destroyed to serve FC.
Umair Haque has a better explanation of what I said
@arendt
Just like various industries, poisoning workers, breathers, soil, air, water, food, the life support system, plants and all, but never counting the cost, while underpaying workers and often draining the public purse, in 'incentives' as well as in offshored profits out of the entire economy and the rest... it's all a drain on everything and everyone else and it's murderously suicidal.
The more enlightened US Founders were right to fear corporations and to insist that they must be regulated and only short-term, for specific purposes benefiting the public good.
Yet people fear to topple the corrupted and deadly system because of the lesser disaster which would follow, but allow for life on the planet to continue, and give a chance of a real civilization perhaps growing in its wake.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
@arendt Excellent
Excellent analysis. I'm going to have to read that article.
Since I'm a humanities person with a little knowledge of some of the social sciences, my language for describing what's happened is incomplete--though, since people in the humanities are rarely listened to, it's also a language that's often left out, along with what it reveals.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
@WoodsDweller What with
What with desertification, how the hell is Africa going to be able to help much?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Desertification...
Short answer, it's the least bad option.
China is going to have a food problem in the best of cases. The world does not have a significant food surplus, so when the Chinese start to buy food on the open market (and they will have money to do so) there is no surplus to sell them. Also, being at the mercy of the market for your food supply is a bad idea.
So where can they go? The Tibetean plateau and Mongolia are the only nearby options, and they have negligible agricultural potential. India has 2/3 as many people and is growing faster and has food security issues of its own. Australia has been in drought for a decade or more and has no serious potential to increase its exports. Russia might be interested in selling to them, but China controlling their production is not an option. Europe? They will be very lucky to feed themselves. That leaves Africa, South America, and North America.
So Africa it is. A continent full of people who are already food insecure, with the world's largest desert and where deserts are increasing. The lush equatorial region has typically poor soil (the nutrients in a rain forest are in the foliage, not the soil) and is already hotter than optimal for agriculture, and will get hotter still.
They can boost production by irrigating with ground water as long as that lasts, and export food to China. For a little while.
What other choice do they have? They surrendered hope when they abandoned the one child policy.
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Albert Bartlett
"A species that is hurtling toward extinction has no business promoting slow incremental change." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Yeah, I have been surprised at how short-term China thinks
I had always thought they had the wisdom of millenia of civilization. But, I guess that particular civilization never thought much beyond getting enough food to eat tomorrow. Historically, Chinese civilization has been very conservative. Confucianism is conservative. They administer very well, but they do not innovate very much. Innovation is not conservative.
Since opening to the West, China has built a hugely poluting infrastructure. They adopted automobiles and highways en masse. Either they didn't understand the lessons learned by the West, or they were so focused on the short term that they didn't care about those lessons.
So, yes, your logic about Africa makes perfect sense. China, like the US, are completely short-term thinkers. Africa is the path of least resistance.
The planet is screwed.
You're not seeing the big picture in China,
Their vision is extraordinarily long. They got their industrial revolution over with in under twenty years and lifted a billion people out of poverty. They had to do it fast and knew it would be messy, but they are beyond that now. They've already started to evolve from a factory economy to a service economy. They lead the world in sustainable energy, electric cars, mass transportation, and infrastructure for the 21st century. They are leading the world in carrying out the Paris Accord, and they are the leading innovators in the technologies that will make it possible for all nations to reach their environmental goals. They will be the first — once again — to curb their population growth through legislation. A sacrifice for the benefit of the entire world. Their innovative thrust is toward transformational solutions. If vertical farms work better than horizontal farms, they can do that. They work at a different scale than we do.
China has been a continuous civilization for more than 5,000 years. They've seen some things. They know the cycles. They can pull us through the difficulties ahead.
I'd love to agree with you, but...
You are missing the downside.
Yes, because they are still largely a command economy, they can pivot to sustainable energy much faster than the US, with its entrenched fossil fuel monopolies and their solar-suppressing lobbyists. However, they really are not innovating; merely using tech that they got from the West. Same as their 20 year takeoff into a modern economy. Copycatting. That's the Asian way.
Here's the problem with that. When the West devours itself, the innovation will cease, and the Chinese miracle will slow down. They are building up right now in supercomputing and genetics. Supercomputing is completely copycat land; but genetics is a new frontier. Terra incognita. If China starts to take the lead in new genomics discoveries, patents, and products, then I will find your optimism to be justified.
Until then, everyone is screaming about the Chinese debt bubble, the "ghost cities", the massively polluted countryside. It is one thing to stop polluting, and a whole nother thing to clean up the mess you already made. For example, China has cornered the market on rare earth metals for strong magnets needed in electric motors and generators for clean energy; and they have used it to club Japan into economic submission. (Monopoly, how progressive.) How did they do it? By massively polluting the countryside, pouring the massive amounts toxic sludge that RE mining produces over tens of thousands of hectares. (To the West, RE was another toxic industry they were happy to send to the 3rd world.) How are they going to stay in the RE game AND clean up their environment.
Further, they continue to buy and build cheap, crappy nuke plants. Another environmental time bomb.
Finally, as to their "long view", I don't think it extends much beyond "China has survived and will continue to survive". I do like their basic civilizational stance of striving for harmony and shunning violence. However, their civilization tolerated massive poverty and oppressive landlordism until the 20th century. Their long view is a very conservative, hierarchical society with huge amounts of surplus labor to keep the masses under control. It may be a very productive and intelligent country, but it is not and never has been a Western style democracy with Enlightenment values.
Acrually, India is now up to around 95% of China’s population.
https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=population+of+india+and+population...
For the US
which functions as the guardian for the corporations, Africa represents vast resources for them to plunder.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
@Pluto's Republic Great comment.
Great comment.
Only caveat I'd add: most of us are not playing any game. We are, perhaps, pieces and counters being moved around on the game board, or maybe not even that. Maybe just sad bystanders who know that the final move of the game is blowing the game board up with a WMD that will lay waste to everything for miles around.
The players are actually a pretty small percentage of the human race. Too bad.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Good essay along these lines:
Saudi Arabia’s Desperate Gamble
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." - JFK | "The more I see of the moneyed peoples, the more I understand the guillotine." - G. B. Shaw Bernie/Tulsi 2020
Yes. Alistair Crooke is a reliable commentator. n/t
From the Crooke article:
Why? Because MbS sees the Saudi political and religious leadership of the Arab world slipping, like sand, through the king’s fingers, and he cannot bear the thought that Iran (and the despised Shi’a), could be the inheritor.
Then maybe he (and others) should have thought of that before backing the ridiculous wars on non-Wahabbist Sunnis and secularists. What the fucking fuck.
I'm getting to the point where the psychopathy of the powerful is almost less offensive than their short-sighted stupidity.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
And more:
If there be some notion that Russia might be induced to “rein in” Iran and its allies across the region to mollify Israeli concerns, this smacks of wishful thinking. Even if Russia could (and it probably cannot), why should it? How then will Iran be rolled-back? By military action? This, too, seems a stretch.
Yes, why should it?
Can someone explain to me why anyone who isn't a Sunni living in the Middle East would find Iran more terrifying than any of the other power players in the region? Or more terrifying than any of half a dozen terrifying non-state groups backed by the CIA over the past 10-20 years? As far as Israel is concerned, it's never seemed to me like most of the states or the non-state groups in that region have been particularly friendly to Israel. Somehow passionately Wahabbist KSA seems to be able to have a strong alliance with Israel, I guess via mutual connections to the U.S., that they simply don't talk about much when they're making speeches about the new Caliphate, or whatever (it's awful to be a Shia, but fine to be a Jew. I'll never understand religious extremists). But it's hardly a widespread view. Aside from KSA and Egypt, who is on Israel's side? And if the answer is "nobody, or hardly anybody" then what makes Iran worse than any of the others for Israel? I've never understood why Bibi et al are particularly freaked out about Iran. They live surrounded by enemies (which is largely their fault, Britain's fault, and the U.S.' fault); what is particularly horrible about Iran? Why should Israel care whether a Muslim nation is Sunni or Shia?
I'm sure I'm simply revealing my ignorance here, so please instruct me!
However, I don't think it's ignorant to say that, outside the ME, there's no rational reason to be more afraid of Iran than any of the other powerful players, state and non-state, in the region. What exactly has Iran done that is so terrifying?
This isn't some ridiculous holdover from the fact that they defied the U.S. in the 70s, is it?
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
The US hates Iran for the same reason they hate Russia
Only to the extent that the Iranian economy was disconnected from the world economy by the Revolution and hasn't reconnected yet. The US demands that they reconnect by surrendering their autonomy - not just economic autonomy, but political autonomy. Same as Russia.
The Iranians are villified, like the Russians and the Syrians (and the Libyans before the US and France murdered Khaddafi and raped the country for its gold reserves), because they refuse to kowtow to the US. KSA kowtows.
That is the reason. It has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with power.
@arendt So you're a demon if
So you're a demon if you won't bow to the forces of unbridled finance capitalism (thanks for your other comment btw!) and give them absolute power over your politics and resources. Unbridled finance capitalism has set up shop, and housed its arsenal, primarily in the English-speaking world, especially the United States and Britain, so that ends up meaning "bow to the U.S. (and our British friends/sidekicks)."
So it doesn't really have much to do with whether or not Iran is actually more dangerous than anybody else over there, in the way that ordinary mortals define "dangerous."
Basically just more Bush-speak.
Got it.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
You're welcome
I added a reply linking to a better explanation, courtesy of Umair Haque.