Whilst Big Bombs and Chemical Weapons Grab The Headlines

Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 1:32am

NATO deploys troops to Poland near Russian border

Poland on Thursday welcomed the first US troops in a multinational force being posted across the Baltic region to counter potential threats from Russia.

More than 1,100 soldiers - 900 US troops as well as 150 British and 120 Romanians - are to be deployed in Orzysz, about 57km south of Russia's Baltic Sea enclave of Kaliningrad, where Moscow has stationed nuclear-capable missiles and an S-400 air missile defense system.

Three other formations are due to become operational by June across the region..

Russia vowed to take retaliatory measures in May 2016 if NATO deployed more battalions in Poland and the Baltic states, adding it would reinforce its western and southern flanks with new divisions.

Moscow has reacted angrily to the alliance's military presence in countries that were once part of the Soviet Union and to exercises close to its borders.

Then I suppose if Russia adds more troops so will NATO, escalation it is called.

With the US and Russia actively operating in the same war zone [Syria] on different sides any movement of troops elsewhere can be perceived to be aggressive.

With the integration of former Warsaw Pact countries into NATO Moscow has got a whole lot closer to the "front". The rapid integration of these same countries into NATO was also perceived to be an act of aggression by Russia.

We have a President and a congress capable of saying anything at anytime, Russia!!! How fast did any rapprochement to Russia rhetoric become lost in the noise of aggressive accusations?

Accusations of cyberwar and election manipulation coupled with actual troop movements closer to land border of the accused seems to be a dangerous strategy. Disengagement would appear to be the sensible choice. What we need are demilitarised zones at this time.

This military build up in Europe has been going on quite some time also under Obama. What is changing is the rhetoric, becoming more belligerent with each passing day.

All it takes is one idiot in power to make a really bad decision. Sadly there seem to be plenty of those available these days.

There is still time to back-off and start talking, but that window is shrinking rapidly.

Tags: 
A Muse
Belligerence
Bellicose
wars
Share
up
0 users have voted.

Comments

Submitted by riverlover on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 2:58am
riverlover's picture

This troop movement has been going on too long. On the other side of Russia's borders, I mean. I do not understand why.

up
0 users have voted.
—

Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.

Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 4:27am

@riverlover With the US military in large numbers in Eastern Europe, S. Korea Iraq and Afghanistan and threatening military action in N. Korea. Russia is basically encircled.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by Ellen North on Sat, 04/15/2017 - 11:29am

@riverlover

This has a great explanation, with a portion of it below for anyone on a limited device. I believe that this has been posted on-site already, but darned if I can remember by whom... couldn't sleep at all last night again, going to be another interesting, wasted day...

http://rinf.com/alt-news/editorials/oil-gas-war-syria-maps/

The Oil-Gas War Over Syria, in Maps
By
Eric Zuesse -
Nov 6, 2016

Turkey’s Anadolu News Agency, though government-run, is providing remarkably clear and reliable diagrammatic descriptions of the current status of the U.S-and-fundamentalist-Sunni, versus Russia-and-Shia-and-NON-fundamentalist-Sunni, sides, in the current oil-and-gas war in the Middle East, for control over territory in Syria, for construction of oil-and-gas pipelines through Syria supplying fuel into the world’s largest energy-market: Europe. Russia is now the dominant supplier of both oil and gas, but its ally Iran is a Shiite gas-powerhouse that wants to share the market there, and Russia has no objection. Qatar is a Sunni gas-powerhouse and wants to become the main supplier of gas there, and Saudi Arabia is a Sunni oil-powerhouse, which wants to become the major supplier of oil, but Saudi oil and Qatari gas would be pipelined through secular-controlled (Assad’s) Syria, and this is why the U.S. and its fundamentalist-Sunni allies, the Sauds, and Qataris, are using Al Qaeda and other jihadists to conquer enough of a strip through Syria so that U.S. companies such as Halliburton will be able safely to place pipelines there, to be marketed in Europe by U.S. firms such as Exxon. Iran also wants to pipeline its gas through Syria, and this is one reason why Iran is defending Syria’s government, against the U.S.-Saudi-Qatari-jihadist invasion, which is trying to overthrow and replace Assad.

Here are the most-informative of Anadolu’s war-maps:

The first presents the effort by many countries to eliminate ISIS control over the large Iraqi city of Mosul. A remarkably frank remark made in this map is “An escape corridor into Syria will be left for Daesh [ISIS] so they can vacate Mosul” — an admission that the U.S.-Saudi-Qatari team want the ISIS jihadists who are in Mosul to relocate into Syria to assist the U.S.-Saudi-Qatari effort there to overthrow and replace the Assad government: ...

up
0 users have voted.
—

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.

Submitted by HenryAWallace on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 6:42am

We act as though killing 1-100 people is so unthinkable and horrifying, but wars that kill and maim or people home emotionally damaged by the thousands are honorable.

Nothing about war is sane. Nothing.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 7:26am

@HenryAWallace Since WWII

http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-has-killed-more-than-20-million-people-i...

This study reveals that U.S. military forces were directly responsible for about 10 to 15 million deaths during the Korean and Vietnam Wars and the two Iraq Wars. The Korean War also includes Chinese deaths while the Vietnam War also includes fatalities in Cambodia and Laos.

The American public probably is not aware of these numbers and knows even less about the proxy wars for which the United States is also responsible. In the latter wars there were between nine and 14 million deaths in Afghanistan, Angola, Democratic Republic of the Congo, East Timor, Guatemala, Indonesia, Pakistan and Sudan.

But the victims are not just from big nations or one part of the world. The remaining deaths were in smaller ones which constitute over half the total number of nations. Virtually all parts of the world have been the target of U.S. intervention.

The overall conclusion reached is that the United States most likely has been responsible since WWII for the deaths of between 20 and 30 million people in wars and conflicts scattered over the world.

This does not include the deaths from regime change and the massacres/genocides of dictors and regimes we helped create. Our wars have cost far more than that.

The nation of peace also has

Despite recently closing hundreds of bases in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States still maintains nearly 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and territories abroad—from giant “Little Americas” to small radar facilities. Britain, France and Russia, by contrast, have about 30 foreign bases combined.

We are the "good guys" in our own eyes. The Empire of Good intentions and bloody carnage.

Hell isn't merely paved with good intentions; it's walled and roofed with them. Yes, and furnished too.
~Aldous Huxley

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 7:34am

@LaFeminista
http://www.globalresearch.ca/america-has-been-at-war-93-of-the-time-222-...

Below, I have reproduced a year-by-year timeline of America’s wars, which reveals something quite interesting: since the United States was founded in 1776, she has been at war during 214 out of her 235 calendar years of existence. In other words, there were only 21 calendar years in which the U.S. did not wage any wars.

To put this in perspective:

* Pick any year since 1776 and there is about a 91% chance that America was involved in some war during that calendar year.

* No U.S. president truly qualifies as a peacetime president. Instead, all U.S. presidents can technically be considered “war presidents.”

* The U.S. has never gone a decade without war.

* The only time the U.S. went five years (1935-40) was during the isolationist period of the Great Depression.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by HenryAWallace on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 10:03am

@LaFeminista

The US is not the only one that has engaged in wars, either. In any discussion about war, someone will always point to World War II, as though the typical war is one in which someone gassing 12 million people is stopped. And as if no one could have found a way to arrest him and take him to the Hague (or wherever the proper place may have been).

And even as to Hitler, if we hadn't been such icks in World War I and the peace treaty, I wonder if that little monster could have got where he did.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 10:13am

@HenryAWallace They said it would prevent another war, it was more a revenge than a treaty [France and Britain headed the list].

The Unhappy Compromise it was called.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 10:13am

@HenryAWallace They said it would prevent another war, it was more a revenge than a treaty [France and Britain headed the list].

The Unhappy Compromise it was called.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by CB on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 11:07am
CB's picture

@HenryAWallace
Have you ever wondered how Germany managed to pull itself out of the ashes of WWI and become an economic and military powerhouse so quickly (its industry had became second in the world by 1929) despite the onerous terms of the Treaty of Versailles?

The Americans who funded Hitler, Nazis, German economic miracle, and World War II

Seventy years ago the greatest massacre in history began - with the financing from the Bank of England and the Federal Reserve System of the United States.
...
The key structures of the West's post-war strategy were the central financial institutions of the United States and Great Britain - the Bank of England and the Federal Reserve System - coupled with financial-industrial organizations, who set out to establish absolute control over the financial system in Germany to manage the politics of Central Europe. The implementation of this strategy included the following steps:

1st: 1919-1924 - Preparing the grounds for massive American financial investments in the German economy.
2nd: 1924-1929 - Establishing control over the financial system and funding the National-Socialist movement.
3rd: 1929-1933 - Inciting and unleashing a deep economic crisis ensuring the Nazis would rise to power.
4th: 1933-1939 - Financial cooperation with the Nazi government and support for its expansionist foreign policy, aimed at preparing and unleashing the new world war.
...
American cooperation with Germany's military-industrial complex became so intense and pervasive that, by 1933, American capital had reached key sectors of German industry and even major banks like Deutsche Bank, Dresdner Bank, Donat Bank, etc.

Comment: Germany presented an incredible investment opportunity. A well-educated, motivated population in a key geographic location available for pennies on the dollar. Perhaps some investors were not concerned about other agendas.

Simultaneously, a political force was being financed that would be called upon to play a crucial role in the Anglo-American plans - the Nazi party and Adolf Hitler himself.
...

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by The Voice In th... on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 11:12am

@CB

up
0 users have voted.
—

I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

Submitted by CB on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 2:28pm
CB's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness
nazicollablogos.jpg

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by Deja on Sat, 04/15/2017 - 7:11pm
Deja's picture

@The Voice In the Wilderness
Oh wait. Sorry, I just had a bit of a flashback. Wink

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by HenryAWallace on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 11:52am

@CB

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by eyo on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 7:34am

Once I admired Lech Walesa, a long time ago. These days are so Bush redux I am illin' quite bad, alienation achieved. Solidarity.

Peace & Love

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by detroitmechworks on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 9:33am
detroitmechworks's picture

But for almost half a century nobody wanted to play Global Thermonuclear War.

Then, suddenly we found somebody whose mind is still in the 80s.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecPeSmF_ikc]

up
0 users have voted.
—

I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 10:16am

@detroitmechworks been there for the last few months. They have yet to get to the 80's

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by coloradoblue on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 11:06am
coloradoblue's picture

and the Supreme Allied Commander during WWI got it right...

After the Treaty of Versailles Ferdinand Foch said "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years".

He was only off by one year.

up
0 users have voted.
—

Dear Dems: You lost the WH, Senate, House, dozens of governors, state level SOS and AG and about 1,000 state legislative seats. Maybe...you're doing something wrong.

Submitted by The Voice In th... on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 11:16am

country as they did so many times in the past and just did with Ukraine recently. Putin is NOT a nice guy! He's an expansionist dictator who engineered a constitutional change to their term limits and become the perpetual ruler of Russia.

Putin is smarter than Trump but no nicer. Think Paul Ryan.

up
0 users have voted.
—

I've seen lots of changes. What doesn't change is people. Same old hairless apes.

Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 12:37pm

@The Voice In the Wilderness @The Voice In the Wilderness Poland was often used as a convenient battleground between the Russians and Europeans in general {the Prussians during the 7 year war].

Europe was always at war with itself.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by LaFeminista on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 12:46pm

@LaFeminista Russians, whereas our lot is another matter.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by Ellen North on Sat, 04/15/2017 - 11:47am

@The Voice In the Wilderness

No, Putin's not a nice guy, but the citizens involved still have a right to return to Russia, after the coup imposed upon them.

https://consortiumnews.com/2016/07/16/the-new-cold-wars-frontline-in-cri...

The New Cold War’s Frontline in Crimea
July 16, 2016

... In 1954, the Soviet government assigned Crimea to Ukraine, one of the Soviet republics, and Crimea remained part of Ukraine when it became a separate country following the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1991. But the population was resistant to being politically absorbed into Ukraine. A 1991 referendum favored making Crimea an autonomous zone and a 1994 referendum sought greater autonomy from Ukraine.

Coup Plotting

Crimea regained the world’s attention in 2014 after a U.S.-backed coup against the elected government of Ukraine. In the weeks before the coup, U.S. involvement was exposed in an intercepted phone call between Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Geoffrey Pyatt, U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine. ...

... The coup on Feb. 22, 2014, brought to power a right-wing Ukrainian nationalist government hostile to the country’s ethnic Russian minority with the parliament voting to remove Russian as an official language. Amid the post-coup chaos and violence, the leaders of Crimea called for a referendum to decide whether Crimea should secede from Ukraine and reunite with Russia.

On March 16, 2014, more than 80 percent of the voters participated and some 96 percent favored rejoining Russia, a decision that the Russian government accepted. The Russian Federation formally annexed Crimea six days after the vote. Because Russia’s southern naval fleet is located in Crimea at Sevastopol, Russia gave as its rationale for annexing Crimea – beyond the overwhelming result of the referendum – the national security necessity of protecting the port and fleet from anti-Russian forces.

However, the United States and its Western allies denounced Crimea’s referendum, called the annexation a violation of international law, and imposed sanctions on Russia and Crimea. The E.U. sanctions prohibited investment in Crimea, infrastructure, assistance to Russian oil and gas exploration in the Black Sea, and certain tourist activities in Crimea. The U.S. sanctions prohibited new investments in Crimea; the import and export of goods, technology and services from or to Crimea; and the purchase of real estate in Crimea and blocked certain individuals from coming to the U.S. ...

... One local official expressed great concern about the negative reaction of the international community to the decision by Crimeans to reunite with Russia, compared with the lack of criticism for the overthrow of Ukraine’s elected government in 2014. She believed that without the coup there never would have been a referendum in Crimea and a subsequent annexation by Russia.

She asked, “Why isn’t the international community focusing on the overthrow?”

Crimeans noted that many of the sanctions were not aimed at Russia itself, but just Crimea – to teach the citizens of Crimea a lesson, they told us.

Ann Wright served 29 years in the U.S. Army/Army Reserves and retired as a Colonel. She was a U.S. diplomat for 16 years and served in U.S. Embassies in Nicaragua, Grenada, Somalia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Sierra Leone, Micronesia, Afghanistan and Mongolia. She resigned from the U.S. government in March 2003 in opposition to the war on Iraq. She is the co-author of Dissent: Voices of Conscience.

up
0 users have voted.
—

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.

Submitted by CB on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 12:20pm
CB's picture

I am so fucking sick and tired of raw American aggression couched as 'defense'. The MIC took control of this country at the end of WWII and has not let up since.

The only difference between Trump and Hillary is that Trump is in-your-face, macho man aggressive while Her is secretive, two-faced passive-aggressive. The final result remains the same.

U.S. Reviews Nuclear Strike Survival for Russia and China
January 29, 2017

U.S. intelligence agencies and the Pentagon’s Strategic Command are working on a new evaluation of whether the Russian and Chinese leadership could survive a nuclear strike and keep operating, even as President Donald Trump seeks to reshape relations with both nations.

The new study, ordered by Congress before Trump took office, drew bipartisan support from members who harbor deep concern about China’s increasing military boldness and distrust of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions.
...
The review is to include “the location and description of above and underground facilities important to the political and military” leadership and which facilities various senior leaders “are expected to operate out of during crisis and wartime.”
...
“The United States must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes,” Trump wrote in a Dec. 22 Twitter posting. Also in December, Mika Brzezinski, co-host of MSNBC’s ‘Morning Joe’ show, said Trump told her in a phone call: “Let it be an arms race. We will outmatch them at every pass and outlast them all.”
...

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by Big Al on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 1:06pm
Big Al's picture

@CB kind, we being those that want this to end. Has to be lots of people and organization that agree on what needs to be done.
Who does it and how I don't know, but I don't see any other way.
I've been saying for years, "they" are not going to stop.

up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by CB on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 12:39pm
CB's picture

The official YouTube channel of Alexander Zakharchenko, leader of the Donetsk Republic, has published momentous footage of the gathering of 30,000 men in the DNR forces reserve, which took place on 6th April 2017.

"For the third year in a row, there is war in our country. For the third year, the enemy is a attempting to eradicate us, our children and our parents. Everyday, Ukrainian media attempts to prove why they need to kill us. I am proud that I was born in the Donbass and I am proud of you. Together we will win - the enemy will be destroyed." - said Zakharchenko.
up
0 users have voted.
Submitted by dervish on Fri, 04/14/2017 - 1:32pm
dervish's picture

the American media is salivating over the the GBU-43 drop, and the prospects for unlimited war with North Korea. They want want war, desperately.

up
0 users have voted.
—

"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

Submitted by doh1304 on Sat, 04/15/2017 - 2:07am

we can only hope it's not The Guns of August.

up
0 users have voted.
—

On to Biden since 1973