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Showing posts with label false narratives. Show all posts
Showing posts with label false narratives. Show all posts
Principle 1: Beware False Prophets—Learn to Recognize False
Resistance
Principle 2: More Weight—Refuse to Validate the Lies
Principle 3: My Enemy’s Enemy—Your Ally Doesn’t Have to Be
Pure
Principle 4: Force the Fight, Even When You’re Losing
On to the remaining five!
Principle 5: Resistance Is a Lifetime, Not a Moment
You
might not want to hear this but single dramatic acts of defiance are
only the beginning of your fight. “Real resistance requires persistence
to keep pursuing your goal and resilience to withstand the inevitable
counterattacks without breaking.” (Stoermer, p. 332)
Resisters
must build their capacity for sustained resistance so they can overcome
numerous setbacks and adapt to new threats. In other words, a
revolution is a lifetime commitment. It’s not for the faint hearted.
The
oligarchs, our oppressors, know they can wait out our first hint of
confrontation—a protest, strike, or walkout. They know from past
experience that most can’t sustain defiance for very long. Resisters
will fold withing days or weeks, not years. Life happens. The oligarchs’
strategy is to outlast the resisters and make simply surviving so tough
that people will give up and go back to life as “normal.”
The oligarchs waiting us out works since most resisters don’t realize that persistence is necessary. We must keep our eyes on the goal, even when things seem impossible. Resilience
is another trait that helps us recover from the inevitable blows.
Resisters must adapt, recover, and build new support networks, to
continue on with the unglamorous, mundane, grinding fight.
Nobody
said it was going to be easy. You could lose it all—family, friends,
home, job, your life. Are you willing to make such a commitment to the
cause? “Your persistence—your refusal to quit no matter how long it
takes—is what they [the oligarchs] can’t plan for, can’t budget for,
can’t outlast.” (Stoermer, p. 335)
“This
is the hardest of all the principles because it demands the most. A
moment of courage you can summon when adrenaline runs high. A lifetime
of resistance requires something deeper—an unshakable core that sustains
you when no one is watching, when the world has moved on, when you’re
exhausted and alone.” (Stoermer, p. 334)
To learn more about the historical figures behind the principles of resistance (and how all nine were used and can be used today), please copy or click on the following link:
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Conscientious Objectors: Call the G.I. Rights Hotline at 1-877-447-4487 or the Center
for Conscience & War at 1-800-379-2679.
Or "Do Western Governments Really Care About 14,000 Babies Dying Within 48 Hours"
by C.A. Matthews
Have you ever known a person whose word you couldn’t take seriously? They’ll say they’ll mow your lawn, but they never seem to get around to it. They say they care about you, but they never return your calls. They promise to pay you back when you loan them money, but do they ever? You can’t trust a single word this person says because of what they do—or don’t do, more than likely.
That’s how I feel today about Western governments’ politicians and diplomats. They’re always trying to cover their asses when the shit hits the fan as a result of their actions. They’ll fake tears of concern, saying that they truly care about starving Palestinian babies, although hundreds of thousands of innocents in Gaza have been dying over the past 19+ months due to their direct material, financial, and “moral” support of the genocidal Israeli regime.
We can’t trust sociopathic politicos of the West to show empathy. All along they’ve been a proud part of this genocide of the Palestinian people. Whether they do what they do for money or for the power they seek in West Asia and/or the petroleum resources they’ve been promised makes no difference. They’re okay with 14,000 babies starving within 48 hours. Selfish, heartless bastards the lot of them.
I particularly distrust the genocidal state of Israel, even more than I distrust Western politicians. They’ve claimed all along that they want their hostages back, but their implementation of their Hannibal Directive on October 7, 2023, demonstrates that they’ve never really cared about their own people’s safety. Photographic evidence revealed how they shot from helicopters at their own soldiers and citizens in escaping cars in order to make it seem like a much larger incident than it was by a small, ragtag group of oppressed Palestinians.
Israelis simply want to steal the entirety of the Gaza Strip and keep it for themselves. They want the oil and natural gas reserves located just off shore. So, why would any thinking person believe the Israelis actually care about any of their victims, let alone the young and innocent...
To learn more about recent false flags (or psyops) possibly created by untrustworthy actors, please continue reading the rest of this
article on Substack. Just copy or click on this link:
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This
article is the 521th blog posting of The Revolution Continues. We began
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sharing, and subscribing to help TRC continue for another ten years.
Let’s start the new year off with a leisurely stroll along the beach and a bit of nonsense from a classic poem. Somehow, it just seems very appropriate.
This first of the year’s disturbing news in New Orleans and Las Vegas reminded me that I hadn’t written a “book report” on a fantastic book I finished reading recently. JFK and the Unspeakable by James W. Douglass is a book everyone should read thoroughly and keep on their bookshelf for quick reference whenever things in the world start to seem too nonsensical or too coincidental to be quite true. Often you’ll find that there are no such things as “coincidences” and that the truth is out there, and it has nothing to do with aliens or UFOs (UAPs).
Who or what is the Unspeakable?
To learn about the Unspeakable and to see how the coincidences seem to be part of a larger pattern, please continue reading this article by clicking on this Substack link: https://therevolutioncontinues.substack.com.
There
you'll see related article and video links, all the graphics,
and be able to leave comments. You also can become a free or paid
subscriber and receive weekly posts in your email box, along with
occasional special articles just for paid subscribers.
Subscribe to The Revolution Continues on Substack today. Power to the people!
This article is the 501th blog posting of The Revolution Continues.
We began in June 2015, and we're still going strong. Please keep
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years. Thank you.
Russian propaganda poses a much smaller threat to the western world than
the various government agendas that are being rolled out under the
justification of fighting Russian propaganda. --Caitlin Johnstone, The US Empire Will Be Defeated By the US Empire
Atrocity Propaganda and Narrative Control
by C.A. Matthews
There's nothing nasty that's new under the sun. Really, there isn't.
Just when you thought you heard it all, another bit of "disinformation" from the US/NATO proxy war in Ukraine pops up and within a month it's revealed as the grotesque lie that it is. (More on DHS's Disinformation Governance Board here.)
Human rights ombudsman Lyudmyla Denisova was Ukraine's top human rights official until it was revealed that she has been making up obscene stories of Russian soldiers raping defenseless women and children en masse. The Ukrainian parliament found her lurid storytelling to the Western mainstream media to be such an embarrassment and a liability to their cause that they kicked her out of office.
As has been the pattern in prior wars, whether in Syria or Libya,
the media claims got more and more sensational and over-the-top as the
conflict intensified, and as Western powers became more deeply involved,
yet with no concrete or definitive proof.
But one consistent detail in the majority of the stories is that the aforementioned Ukraine human rights ombudsman, Lyudmyla Denisova, is often the central figure feeding Western correspondents the shocking rape stories. (...)
"Ukrainian lawmakers dismissed the country’s ombudsman for human
rights, Lyudmyla Denisova, in a no-confidence vote on Tuesday,
concluding that she had failed to fulfill obligations including the
facilitation of humanitarian corridors and countering the deportation of
Ukrainians from occupied territory," The Wall Street Journal reported late in the day.
"Lawmaker Pavlo Frolov said Ms. Denisova was also accused of making insensitive and unverifiable statements about alleged Russian sex crimes and spending too much time in Western Europe during the invasion," the report added.
"The
unclear focus of the Ombudsman's media work on the numerous details of
‘sexual crimes committed in an unnatural way’ and ‘rape of children’ in the occupied territories that could not be confirmed by evidence, only harmed Ukraine."
It's pretty amazing they shut Lyin' Lyudmyla down since she wasn't afraid of dumping "atrocity propaganda." Atrocity propaganda is a very effective weapon in the arsenal of professional propagandists. It has been used to push for increasing amounts of money and weapons to be given to Ukraine with no debate and little expectation of compensation.
Nothing makes Westerners more horrified and ready to open their wallets than a supposed "reliable source" (often an "anonymous" or insider source like Ms. Denisova or the CIA) spinning a narrative about newborn babies being kicked out of their incubators (Iraq War I) or soldiers being given massive doses of Viagra in order to rape the helpless populace to death (Libya) or huge stockpiles of "Weapons of Mass Destruction" (Iraq War II).
Going back even further to World War I, it was posited that the German Kaiser's troops actually ate babies for dinner as they advanced into Belgium. Rape, child endangerment, and cannibalism definitely make for great attention-grabbing, pro-war headlines.
Why do our corporate-owned politician-puppets and their media lackeys put out such outrageous falsehoods? Why do they constantly whip up hatred of others such as the Russians, a people that most Americans don't see as being very different from ourselves? I think it's simply because the vast majority of Americans don't mind being lied to. Some might even enjoy having a scapegoat to blame for all the world's ills.
Comfortable Americans will allow their emotions and intellect to be manipulated by the current government because somewhere, somehow they feel it will benefit them not to go against the status quo. Or perhaps it's simply because many Americans can't be bothered to double-check dubious tales the mainstream media feeds them since they have more important things to attend to--like watching professional sports or the latest Marvel movie release.
And so the US government and its cronies will keep lying to the public in order to keep pumping billions of dollars of weaponry into a faltering proxy war. The capitalists rest assured that their lies will never be called out because We the Workers are all too stressed and busy trying to survive to make a fuss. We're too confused to see that we're being played in order to make billionaires even richer.
Other examples of recent atrocity propaganda include newspaper headlines declaring, "Too high wages are causing inflation" which implies that wage cuts and a possible dropping of the federal minimum wage are in the works. Atrocity propaganda can include news stories about how it's good to lock up homeless persons for up to six years for camping because they cannot afford skyrocketing rents, thus creating more "slave labor" for the for-profit prison system.
Lyudmyla Denisova may have gone the more salacious route with made-up tales of rape and child abuse, but mainstream media pundits casting doubt about who is at fault for our current hard times is every bit as atrocious. Blaming real-life homeless and dispossessed Americans for their current situation is as cruel and evil as labeling them "cannibals." Hatred is stirred up against the most vulnerable. They are turned into scapegoats, blamed and punished, rather than the actual criminals who put all of us into this untenable proxy war/economic meltdown situation. The wealthy one-percent, who profit immensely from the military-industrial complex, are never held responsible for their actions.
The current government narrative spin says it's working class Americans' fault that gasoline is averaging over $5+ a gallon. We're told we're experiencing food shortages because we won't work during a pandemic. Why are they dumping this atrocity propaganda onto our breaking backs? It's simple--the oligarchs want to keep us lowly workers subdued and confused. If we fall for their lies we'll accept ever-worsening conditions. If today things seem bleak and overwhelming, then we will never have the strength to take on these corrupt bastards and change things and make a better tomorrow.
Only by massive amounts of propaganda would people consent to
unprecedented acts of economic warfare which directly hurt them and
benefit them in no way, shape or form. --Caitlin Johnstone
The abusive relationship we have with those in power must end. Reject the oligarchs' atrocity propaganda and the status quo's narrative control. Turn off the mainstream media outlets and turn on to the podcasters and independent journalists you can find via Rad Indie Media and the links below to gain a wider perspective.
Once you know what's really happening in the world, then you can fight more effectively to make it a better place. We owe it to ourselves to take control of the narrative and tell these professional liars where to shove their atrocious propaganda.
No surprise there. Americans literally have no idea what fascism is, what communism is, what capitalism is, what class consciousness is, what colonialism is, what empire is, what propaganda is, what police are all about. Basically, Americans are the most befuddled confused people
— 🇸🇴⭑ ☭ ⭑ Justice for the Damned ⭑ ☭ ⭑🇸🇴 (@tekstone) June 3, 2022
— Back on Double Secret Probation (@thecraigrpowers) June 1, 2022
When we drop bombs, use guns, throw grenades, hurt, destroy, seize, steal, loot, rape, harm and kill in other countries and normalize that as a form of collateral.. it becomes engrained in the Western subconscious as being a standard way of operating not just over there but here.
The US empire's ruling elite have lost control of the narrative and therefore need to push the idea that many independent journalists are "misinformation" or "fake news." They also try to censor anything outside allowable corporate talking points.
In a near-future dystopian world, hope blossoms where mutual aid and democracy begins...
Zonta’s
world is turned upside down when Jake arrives at the commune to
investigate the disappearance of agents of the Authority. Can she
persuade him to switch sides before the Protectors (antifascist
fighters) take action?
Please buy direct from the small publisher and not via Amazon. Why? Amazon takes a huge percentage of the book's price and leaves very little for the publisher and author to share. Thanks.
Few people sincerely want the truth about the world. Most just want
politicians and pundits to whisper reassuringly in their ear, "Don't
worry. We've got this. Your schoolteachers told you the truth about
everything, and so did the news man. You are on the side of
righteousness." --Caitlin Johnstone, US Interventionism Always Makes Things Worse
Friendly reminder that it's impossible to get a clear understanding of
what's going on in the world without accounting for the fact that very
powerful people within your own society are actively working very hard
to manipulate your understanding in their favor. -- Caitlin Johnstone, US Interventionism Always Makes Things Worse
It's time for a lesson in...
Critical Thinking Skills For The Masses
by Redd Phlagg
Critical thinking is making reasoned judgements that are logical and well thought-out. --Study.com
Function of the CIA:
1. Run secret wars 2. Disseminate propaganda to influence people’s minds
That’s not hyperbole. That’s from the Former Operations Director of the CIA.
Think about this next time you buy the narratives that are crafted to control you. pic.twitter.com/HysmXBejUV
You meet a person, and they become the love of your life. You trust this person and believe every word that comes from their mouth and trust every action they take or ask you to take on their behalf. One day, you come across irrefutable evidence that your beloved has been lying to you, not just once but many, many times. As time goes on, you discover that this person has been lying to you all throughout the time you've known them and are confident that you will never confront them about their lying. They are free to abuse your trust and even possibly abuse you physically, psychologically, and spiritually because they know you will never leave or speak ill of them.
Do you stay in this relationship? What is your payoff for putting up with the lies and abuse?
If you're able to think critically, you should be able to weigh the evidence and come up with a theory about how this person will act in the future based on their past actions. If they have lied repeatedly to you, you will act skeptically about any information they have given you or will give you. You will eagerly double-check whatever claims they make against other authoritative sources. If you believe these sources and discuss your options with others you trust, you should come to the conclusion that it's not worth your effort to remain with this person. You will make the logical decision to leave them.
But human beings aren't logical and rarely use their critical thinking skills when it comes to the people and groups they have emotionally bonded with. We make excuses for other's lies and tell ourselves that we deserve to be lied to. We convince ourselves that the lies we've been told are actually "truths" even if our higher cognitive processes tell us there's no possible way they can be true.
"I'd never accept a lie as the truth!" I hear you say. Are you so sure? "No way would I continue believing anything out of the mouth of anyone who repeatedly lied to me," you insist.
Okay, then answer me this: Do you believe everything the US government has told you about the whys and wherefores about what's happening in Ukraine? Do you believe everything that mainstream media outlets such as NBC News tell you about what's going on there?
If you answered yes to either or both or those questions, the following is going to blow your mind:
NBC News has a new report out citing multiple anonymous US officials, humorously titled "In a break with the past, U.S. is using intel to fight an info war with Russia, even when the intel isn't rock solid".
The officials say the Biden administration has been rapidly pushing out "intelligence" about Russia's plans in Ukraine that is "low-confidence" or "based more on analysis than hard evidence", or even just plain false, in order to fight an information war against Putin. (…)
Just as the smear campaign against Julian Assange trained mainstream liberals to defend the right of their government to keep dark secrets from them, we may now be looking at the stage of narrative control advancement where mainstream liberals are trained to defend the right of their government to lie to them. -- Caitlin Johnstone, US Officials Admit They're Literally Just Lying To The Public About Russia
It's time to use those critical thinking skills... NBC News (a mainstream media outlet) is quoting US government officials who state they're telling outright lies. Do you continue believing these officials who candidly admit to lying?
It wouldn't be the first time US government officials have lied to us about a military action. Do you remember the reason George W. Bush sent our troops into Iraq-- something about "weapons of mass destruction" being found there? Does that ring a bell? It's been verified there were never any WMDs in Iraq. This "false flag" or fictional excuse was concocted to give the US an excuse to invade that country.
And no, none of the 9/11 terrorists came from Iraq. Most of them came from Saudi Arabia. So, why didn't we invade Saudi Arabia? Good question. Invading a country we don't like just made more sense at the time than invading one we did/still do like.
Hey, stop using those critical thinking skills now! It's embarrassing to the US government to point out that they're liars.
When our government wants the American people to believe something or go along with a military action (no matter how abhorrent it may be), they will expect us to keep our minds turned off and our mouths shut.
This year we're supposed to hate all things Russian with a passion and to think there's no such thing as a Ukrainian Neo-Nazi paramilitary unit such as the Azov Battalion. But here's the Pentagon and another mainstream media outlet--Reuters News--reporting about a recent event in Ukraine that you probably have heard about and might have upset you. Warning: I might upset you again by telling you that it's possible that this horrible event might not have even happened or it wasn't quite what you were led to believe:
WASHINGTON, April 4 (Reuters) – The U.S. military is not in a position to independently confirm Ukrainian accounts of atrocities by Russian forces against civilians in the town of Bucha: “The Pentagon can’t independently and single handedly confirm that, but we’re also not in any position to refute those claims.”
If the Pentagon, which includes the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, cannot confirm any of the atrocities that Ukrainian government claimed, then what really happened? Did anything happen? Who can be believed?
Critical thinking skills can help us in this instance. Other sources of information should be consulted and the evidence weighed before jumping to conclusions. According to this source:
The Ukrainian President caused controversy in Greece by including a video message from members of the neo-Nazi Azov battalion in his speech to the Greek parliament. This caused a walk-out by a number of Greek MPs who protested the move on Thursday. (…)
The Azov Battalion is based in Mariupol, and had led a terror campaign against civilians there, including the city's 120,000 Greeks. Greek City Times also reported that the Ukrainian nationalist forces have "killed people for trying to leave the city."
Greece's SKAI news asked Mr. Kiouranas, a Greek who lives in Mariupol, if he was planning on leaving the city, to which he responded:
Since foreigners living in Ukraine have confirmed the violence of the Azov Battalion, and other sources have stated that multiple atrocities have been committed against ethnic Russians by these fascist groups since the 2014 coup when the eastern republics that make up the Donbas region voted to leave Ukraine, then it's possible the Russian Army isn't committing atrocities at all. It seems highly probable that Ukrainian fascists such as the Azov Battalion are killing ethnic Russians and are trying to shift the blame and focus away from them and the Ukrainian government instead.
Now, more than ever we need to use our critical thinking skills to prevent a proxy war over a liquid natural gas pipeline (and possibly American/Ukrainian biolabs working on military grade pathogens) from turning into World War III. And if you don't believe this conflict could turn into a nuclear apocalypse, just read what one former top NATO commander says about how the use of nuclear weapons is a "proper response" in this article, Former NATO Military Analyst Blows The Whistle on West's Ukraine Invasion Narrativehttps://www.rsn.org/001/former-nato-commander-says-western-fears-of-nuclear-war-are-preventing-a-proper-response-to-putin.html
Remain skeptical. Read widely. Don't give your love or trust away automatically to any person, group, political party, or government just because they tell you, "You can believe us! We'll never lie to you!"
Because even our co-opted mainstream media has told us that's completely bogus.
Russia supposedly killed civilians in Bucha that they: -Lived in peace with for a month -Did not ever previously engage in combat with -Were distributing food & aid to -Knew we’re supporters of Russia (white armbands) -Were peacefully leaving during a withdrawal of the city 🤔
Independent journalist Richard Medhurst: "What EXACTLY Happened in Bucha" featuring UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter (video) https://youtu.be/klPYYqhqO74
Russia: We did not and are willing to allow a full UN investigation
The West: No investigation or we wont be able to keep saying Russia did it 🙄
— Michael R. Weinstein, Bookseller #EndTheOligarchy (@fToRrEeEsSt) April 6, 2022
If Russia was trying to hide "guilt in mass killing" then why did they TWICE request a Security Council meeting to call for an INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATION? And why did Britain block the requests? This will now be a bogus investigation!
— Kinkajou51 #IStandWithDonbas 🇳🇮 (@Kinkajou5123) April 5, 2022
Everyone stopped talking about the fact that Hunter Biden was funding dangerous zoonotic pathogen research in level 3 Ukrainian biolabs as soon as the bogus allegations of Russian war crimes in Bucha & Kramatorsk hit the headlines.
BREAKING NEWS: US State department officials leak that when asked what benefit we gain from freezing and starving the EU with Russia sanctions Victoria Nuland responded "less Europeans."
"Western powers insisted that they were trying to prevent this war while doing everything possible to ensure that it happened. Now they say they are trying to end this war while doing everything possible to ensure it continues." -- Caitlin Johnstone
Our guest blogger/historian, Coast Watcher, fills in a lot of gaps in the picture of how Nazis came into being in what is now the country of Ukraine. This background information has been avoided altogether in the mainstream media. Please feel free to share this blog link with others who are scratching their heads over the NATO/Ukraine/Neo-Nazi connection.
The History of Nazism in Ukraine
by Coast Watcher
The
situation in Ukraine is the latest manifestation of racial turmoil
that has lasted for centuries. Once
part of the Soviet Union, Ukraine became independent when the USSR
ceased to exist and the Russian Federation began.
To gain an understanding of the
roots from which the current war sprang, we have to look back over
250 years.
Imperial
Decree
Catherine
II, aka the Great, was born in Stettin (today
Szczecin, Poland), a city in what
was then part of Prussia. Married to Tsar Peter III, who was himself
German, she rose to ultimate authority in Russia following her
husband’s assassination in 1762.
It
would be fair to say Catherine was not impressed by her adopted
country. The modernizing reforms of her predecessor Peter the Great
had lost impetus. Vast swathes of the Russian Empire were still
virtually medieval in nature. Catherine
decided to promote economic and cultural reform by inviting
foreigners to settle within her empire, particularly uncultivated
regions such as the Ukraine province. It shouldn’t be a surprise to
learn that the group she directed most of her energies to were her
fellow Germans. She regarded German settlers as natural supporters of
her rule and a bulwark against the ethnic Russians.
Catherine
promised immigrants from the West numerous incentives: exemption from
military service, self-governance, tax breaks, initial financial aid,
30 hectares (75 acres) of land per settler family. In addition,
freedom of language was guaranteed - in particular to German
immigrants. And above all, the manifesto granted immigrants freedom
of religion.
These
freedoms shouldn’t be underestimated. The pogróm
as an article of the Tsar’s power over his subjects was a terrible
thing to unleash. Most people will know of the pogróms
against Jews in particular that were enacted at times throughout
Russian history. Whole Jewish communities were wiped out, usually by
Cossacks, Russian peasants and townsfolk who were neighbors of the
Jews, all with official sanction.
The settlement by Germans led to large
areas of Ukraine being developed and
improved. Catherine’s program of
reforms created fertile farmland and industries. However,
matters changed quite radically in
the following century when Tsar Nicholas I came to the throne in
1825. His reign was reactionary
and autocratic and led to the rolling back of numerous reforms.
Nicholas had a violent streak and
would not tolerate dissent of any kind. His tendency to use brute
military force against the object of his hatred of the moment led to
crushing oppression of ethnic minorities within the Russian Empire
and the rescinding of German settler privileges in the Ukraine. His
policies caused many
Germans to
emigrate
to the US, Canada, and many other countries. For
those remaining, any love they had for their adopted country withered
dramatically.
The Soviet Union
vs. Ukraine
Following
the Communist Revolution the ethnic Germans of the Ukraine found
themselves in difficulties. Never trusted by native Russians, the
Soviet regime came down hard on the German settlements, leading to
anti-German pogróms,
famine, and the dispossession of people whose families had farmed or
worked in the region for generations.
Nazi Germany declared war on the USSR in 1941 and invaded Russian
territory in Operation Barbarossa. As the blitzkrieg rolled eastward
they found willing collaborators in the Ukraine Germans. Labeling
them Volksdeutsche — ethnic Germans who spoke German and had
German culture, but who were not themselves German citizens—the
Nazis set out to transform Ukraine into a totally German province.
They
recruited heavily into Nazi
Einsatzgruppen (deployment
groups), paramilitary death
squads that were responsible for mass-murder, primarily by
shooting of Jews, gypsies, Soviet
prisoners and everyone else on the Nazi hate list.
Another term for these units was
Schutzstaffel (SS), a designation that appears on the current Ukrainian Azov Battalion uniform.
(Editor's Note: The double S in runic form is synonymous with Nazi death
squads. Therefore, the symbol appearing on the uniforms of the Azov Battalion, should be a cause for alarm. Azov Battalion members profess that they believe in ridding their country of "Asiatic peoples" and ethnic Russians (people who speak Russian as a first language) are seen as "Asiatic" and, therefore, "inferior" to "European" Ukrainians. Battalion members also profess a hatred of the Roma (Gypsy) people and LGBTQ+ persons and have openly bragged about killing them.)
To
add fuel to the ethnic fire, on the orders of the Supreme Soviet all
Russian Germans remaining within Russian control were forcibly
deported to Siberia in the summer of 1941. Approximately half their
number died in the gulags from sickness and starvation. The majority
remained in Siberia until the death of Stalin. Not all of them returned
to Ukraine.
The
collapse of the Soviet Union meant yet another turning point in the
Russian-German saga. Life “in the backyards of the empire” became
increasingly difficult. More than two million Russian-Germans decided
to return to Germany, the country of their ancestors. Germany
accepted them as "late resettlers." Only some 800,000 citizens of
German descent remain in Russia today, most of them in Siberia.
Many returned to the Ukraine region, which subsequently dropped the word "the"
to become the country of "Ukraine".
Vladimir
Vladimirovich Putin is a hard man, in a country known for producing
hard men. Former KGB agent Putin has remained at the top of one of the toughest political systems in the world for over twenty
years.
It’s
no secret that Putin would like to restore Russian hegemony over the
former territories of the USSR. The annexation of the Crimean
peninsula in March 2014 returned control of the vital Sevastopol
naval base to Russia against UN censure. Equally it’s no secret
that he has cooperated with the West over international affairs while
sounding a note of caution against American imperialism and
over-exuberance.
When
Ukrainian paramilitary groups began persecuting ethnic Russians, Jews,
and LGBTQ+ people in the country as a whole and particularly in the eastern region
of the Donbas, Putin
warned the Ukrainian government against supporting these Neo-Nazi groups.
Volodymyr
Oleksandrovych Zelensky, President
of Ukraine, is a former actor and comedian, most noted for his
performance in the TV show Servant of the People in which he
played the president of Ukraine. The series aired from 2015
to 2019. A political party bearing the same name as the
television show was created in March 2018 by employees of Studio Kvartal 95, Zelensky's production company.
Life imitated art when Zelensky
became the head of this party with the help of Ukranian oil billionaire (or "oligarch") Ihor Kolomoisky.
The Pandora Papers, the worldwide probe leaked to the International
Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), included work by
journalists from the Ukrainian media Slidstvо.Info. The Ukrainian journalists connected the shady financial dealings of Zelensky's Studio Kvartal 95 to Kolomoisky. Slidstvo found that they laundered money by passing it through the
Cyprus branch of the Kolomoisky-owned Privatbank.
The Nord Stream 2 oil pipeline built between Germany and Russia will provide Europe with plentiful cheap liquid natural gas, something that would take profits away from Kolomoisky's oil business. The Pandora Papers revealed that both Kolomoisky and Zelensky laundered money through shell companies, greatly enlarging their respective bank accounts, and could stand to lose more money if the Russian pipeline is allowed to undersell their oil interests. (Editor's note: The US and other NATO countries don't want the Nord Stream pipeline to succeed since they want to sell their natural gas to Europe using their own methods of delivery. Less competition means Western oil companies can raise the price of their natural gas worldwide.)
Zelensky (with Kolomoisky's backing) has given overt support and state
funding to the Neo-Nazi paramilitary groups to keep in check ethnic Russians and others who have protested the 2014 coup that put him into power. (An estimated 14,000 ethnic Russians/Russian speakers have been killed in the Donbas region alone in recent years by these paramilitaries.) Zelensky
has allowed NATO groups to provide these ethnic-cleansing paramilitaries with training and equipment.
Recently, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson welcomed the return of
UK troops who had trained the likes of the Azov Battalion, the most prominent of the Ukrainian Neo-Nazi paramilitary groups.
Does anyone see the irony
in the fact that 80 years ago
British forces were part of the massive Allied effort to defeat the
Nazis? Does anyone in the West remember which Allied member took on the most Nazis with the greatest loss of life to their own people? That country was the Soviet Union, now called Russia, with whom NATO is currently at loggerheads primarily over the Nord Stream pipeline and the flow of liquified natural gas to Europe. The Soviet Union lost 27 million people during World War II... Russians do not have fond memories of Nazis for obvious reasons.
Putin has warned NATO against expanding
its membership any further eastward—something NATO has failed to heed. The current situation is not unlike the October
1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. Then, the USSR had established
missiles in Cuba within 92 miles of the American mainland. After
a tense thirteen day
standoff while the world held its breath, the
USSR withdrew its weapons and the situation eased. The recent establishment of a NATO base in
Poland, within 100 miles of Russia's western border, almost perfectly parallels the Cuban Missile Crisis. Alas, Biden is no JFK and Putin is no Nikita Khrushchev.
Economics
Today
Ukraine supplies half of the
world’s sunflower oil exports and is the third largest rapeseed (canola) exporter. It provides
12% of global wheat exports, 16% of corn, 18% for barley, and 19% for canola. More
than 40% of Ukraine’s annual corn and wheat shipments have headed
to the Middle East or Africa. Ukraine
is China’s top supplier of grain, a situation that has deep
implications for that country since it is not an importer of American
grain.
Some economic experts feel that the proxy war in Ukraine is a prelude to a greater mission to disable first the Russian economy and then dismantle the Chinese economy. NATO possibly feels justified in using Ukraine's Neo-Nazi paramilitaries in reaching a satisfactory conclusion to the Cold War that the break up of the USSR never provided the West. Nevermind that the average Ukrainian citizen doesn't get a say in the matter! (Nevermind if Americans and citizens of other NATO countries wind up paying more for food and fuel, too.)
The
Donbas region in eastern Ukraine is known as an industrial
powerhouse, with heavy mining and steel-producing capacity, as well
as having large coal reserves. With this traditionally ethnic Russian region returned to Russia, Ukraine would be deprived of a
substantial percentage of its economic wealth. Deposits of uranium, lithium, and other rare earth metals also add to the potential for profits to whomever ultimately rules Ukraine.
(Editor's note: Whenever a war--proxy or otherwise--breaks out, follow the money to see who really benefits from the situation. Often it's the billionaires or oligarchs who are pushing for war in order to wipe out their competitors and lock up the markets all to themselves. "Freedom" and "self-determination" are not commodities capitalists worry very much about.)
What will happen next?
It’s
hard to predict. The Russians, after all, have made their wishes clear that they will not tolerate NATO bases stationed along their borders. The Western
mainstream media is pumping out a frenzy of anti-Russian propaganda. Alternate sources of
information and insight such as RT America and Sputnik have been pressured into shutting down in the US at the cost of thousands of American jobs.
Anti-Russian propaganda-fueled hysteria among neoliberals reached epic heights this past week with anything and
everything Russian being condemned, closed down, or removed. Russian vodka has been poured down drains and Russian breeders of Russian Blue cats can no longer register their animals with feline pedigree associations and sell them as purebreds, putting ordinary Russian distillers and cat breeders out of work.
So much
for free speech and the 1st Amendment. So much for supporting ordinary workers--either American or Russian.
The
West in the shape of President Biden has issued grave warnings to
Russia that it must not use chemical or biological weapons in its
current war. But really, why would Russia do so when its huge
conventional military force is
clearly dominating the much smaller Ukrainian military? It's hard to understand why Biden would bring up possible American-sponsored biolabs that the US has set up in Ukraine in recent years other than to sound like he's tougher on Putin than his predecessor. And why would Russia resort to using biological weapons in the Donbas, considering it shares a border with Ukraine and wishes to protect the lives of ethnic Russians living there? Therein lies madness.
Russia has warned
the West that it regards shipments of arms and equipment to Ukraine
as legitimate military targets. There’s
every fear that a false flag operation will tip this proxy war between NATO and Russia into a full-scale global war, possibly igniting World War III and ending in nuclear winter. Perhaps an American ship full
of arms will suddenly explode or sink--just like the Battleship Maine did in Havana Harbor in 1898, setting off the Spanish-American War. Looking closely at the history of the United States, any intelligent person will see that the US is rather prone to using such false flag techniques to justify attacking
other countries.
Remember the Gulf of Tonkin during the Vietnam War? WMDs in Iraq, anyone?
Goading
the Russian Bear is a stupid mistake. Don’t complain if you get
mauled.
BIO: Coast Watcher studies the past to predict future events. It's not that difficult if you keep an open mind and don't fall for Western propaganda. To find out who and what's really behind any military conflict, follow the money--even if it's being laundered through an oligarch's offshore bank account.
The Ukrainian Neo Nazi Azov Battalion states that Russians are a part of the "inferior Asiatic peoples" and that's why they should all die. We're teaching white supremacy ideology to American children with this map. How nice. #nonazis#StopHatingRussianshttps://t.co/JMUb30NbmY
— Pls Read TheRevolutionContinues.com (@cynthianna3) March 14, 2022
The first conflict in which the side with biolabs and Nazis are the good guys.
