Naval false flags and the twentieth ‘American Century’

Click here to access article by Bas Spliet from Scrutinised Minds. 

The history of the directors of capitalist ruling classes as related in this long article by Spliet reveal that they will not shrink away from the most criminal humanitarian crimes to promote their class's interests of profit and power. Spliet explains how the directors were able to turn American opposition to war in the late 19th century into support for wars. He examines convincing evidence that led gullible Americans down the path to support US wars and imperialism which began in the late 19th century to the end of the 20th century. Ruling class directors discovered to their astonishment that creating false-flag attacks on naval vessels combined with pro-war propaganda issued by their class's media corporations were able to convert widespread American opposition to wars into strident pro-war sentiment.

Combined with a steady stream of propaganda, however, a number of naval mass casualty attacks blamed on the enemy of the day succeeded in temporarily changing public opinion in favour of war. As a result, at the expense of the lives of many more Americans and people from all over the world, the American empire was born.

The limitations of two of America's brightest intellectuals

by Ron Horn

I will focus on two of America's brightest, historian Alfred W. McCoy and America's informal theologian Chris Hedges (a once divinity student and aspiring theologian, and later a NY Times journalist), in order to illustrate how intellectuals of the upper-middle class function to preserve the ruling capitalist class. I will draw on a recent book by McCoy entitled  In the Shadow of the American Century (also a precursor to the book in a 2010 article by him published by CBS News entitled "The Decline and Fall of the American Empire") and a recent article by Chris Hedges entitled "The End of Empire" in which he references the book by Professor McCoy.

When you examine both of their backgrounds (McCoy's self biography in his book's introduction entitled "US Global Power and Me" and Hedges in Wikipedia), I think there is sufficient evidence to classify their backgrounds as upper-middle class. These people are truly indispensable to running a capitalist society. But their relationship to capitalists, who constitute the ruling class, is very much like the African-American concept of one type of slave relationship with the master of the house or plantation that existed in our period of slavery. Malcolm X colorfully described them as "house Negro" (the servants and maids who worked for the master's family in their home and enjoyed superior privileges) versus the "field Negro" who correspond to ordinary workers.

There was two kind of slaves. There was the house negro and the field negro. The house negro, they lived in the house, with master. They dressed pretty good. They ate good, cause they ate his food, what he left. They lived in the attic or the basement, but still they lived near their master, and they loved their master, more than their master loved himself.

McCoy supports the existing ruling class by the absence of any mention of capitalism, a social system that insures that societies are infected with class conflict; and in order to reduce such conflicts to a minimum, the ruling classes must engage in widespread and ongoing subterfuge to disguise this fact. He accepts capitalism as the only reality, but suggests that eternal vigilance from more people like him could have preserved US dominance in the world. He argues convincingly that the "American Century", which Henry Luce announced in February 1941 to the delight of domestic fascists, will come to an end in about a decade. However he doesn't see any threats to human extinction due to the likely prospects of a nuclear war conflagration or climate destabilization.

While Hedges occasionally criticizes the excesses of capitalism, he continues to insist that our governing system somehow represents "democracy", and his apparent obsessive concern about non-violence (or at least he uses this as a rationale to oppose any form of violence--see the "The Cancer in Occupy"--even against property as well as the police) insures that a revolution can never be achieved. He praises such benign forms of activism as projects like Cooperation Jackson; and in his latest article entitled "Faces of Pain, Faces of Hope" he definitely prefers the mild models of activism such as found in the Catholic Worker Movement and "intentional communities".

They both fear losing the privileges and wealth they have gained from many years of their active participation in ruling class institutions. Their long years of indoctrination in capitalist views and values handicaps them from offering any effective advice to young activists who see the necessity of ending a system which guarantees endless wars, exploitation, the destabilization of the climate, and the likely extinction of humans.

Remembering Che Guevara 50 Years After His Assassination

Click here to access article by James Cockcroft from TeleSur. 

Guevara was another martyr who dedicated his life to serving the interests of ordinary working people against the US-led Empire, a capitalist empire that was trying to crush all revolutionary actions and ideas in order to satisfy their addictions to profits and power in the world. Like other martyrs such as Lenin, Trotsky, Rosa Luxembourg, and Mao Tse-Tung, Guevara will live on in the fond memories of ordinary people and will inspire others to serve the interests of the people against the oppressive rule of transnational capitalists.

In his opening paragraphs the Cockcroft writes that capitalist well-paid ideological agents are, of course, trying to besmirch his memory with the usual deceptions and emphasis on Guevara's mistakes. Crockcroft sets the record straight.

The year 2017 is the 50th anniversary of the CIA-ordered assassination of Che Guevara.

In light of a recent upsurge in denunciations of Che and the Cuban Revolution, it is important to separate fact from fiction.

Here are five important points to take into account, all in historical context, drawn from countless reliable sources, especially from the "References" section at the end of this article.

You may be also interested in another article in TeleSur entitled "Richard Gott on Meeting Che and Covering His Death".

[Russian Revolution part 8 of ?] The state and revolution

Click here to access article by Amy Leather from Socialist Review (Britain).

The author describes the revolutionary ideas of Lenin which he, during the summer of 1917, wrote down in his unfinished book State and Revolution. Here are a few of the most popular ones that inspired people to follow the leadership of the Bolsheviks:

Lenin argues that once people are freed from the “untold horrors and savagery” of capitalist slavery they “will gradually become accustomed to observing the elementary rules of community life…they will become accustomed to observing them without force, without coercion, without subordination, without the special apparatus of coercion which is called the state”.

The need for a workers’ state recedes as there are no longer any capitalists, any classes and consequently no class to be suppressed — and will wither away completely when the norm in society is “from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs”....

[Weekly series of the Russian Revolution of 1917] October 9 - 15: Lenin steps up campaign for insurrection

Click here to access article from World Socialist Web Site. 

I am continuing to post a weekly summary of activities during the Russian Revolution of 1917 in addition to articles by historians and other informed people of that great event. You may be interested to read my introduction to both series if you have not already done so. 

With Trotsky at the head of the Petrograd Soviet, and with the Bolshevik Party in control of a growing majority of other soviets, the Bolsheviks are now the most powerful party in the Russian Revolution. However, significant differences have emerged within the party’s leadership regarding what course to take.

Identity politics and the growth of inequality within racial minorities

Click here to access article by Eric London from World Socialist Web Site.

The most useful aspect of promoting identity politics that London does not make clear is its ability to distract subjects of the capitalist ruling class away from any class analysis or class identification. And a further (to our masters') benefit, which he alludes to, is that it fosters competition between groups over opportunities to serve the ruling capitalist class.

Identity politics has become a key mechanism through which the next 9 percent situated below the top 1 percent advances its grievances within the political establishment, fighting for “space” in the universities, trade unions, political parties, state apparatus, and corporate media. This layer, which forms a principal social base for the Democratic Party, is generally pro-war and supportive of the right-wing policies that have produced a soaring stock market.

How Billionaires Become Billionaires

Click here to access article by James Petras from Global Research.

Under the section "Consequences of Inequalities" he writes about the realities of such inequality:

First and foremost, billionaires and their political, legal and corporate associates dominate the political parties. They designate the leaders and key appointees, thus ensuring that budgets and policies will increase their profits, erode social benefits for the masses and weaken the political power of popular organizations.

Secondly, the burden of the economic crisis is shifted on to the workers who are fired and later re-hired as part-time, contingent labor. Public bailouts, provided by the taxpayer, are channeled to the billionaires under the doctrine that Wall Street banks are too big to fail and workers are too weak to defend their wages, jobs and living standards.

Billionaires buy political elites, who appoint the World Bank and IMF officials tasked with instituting policies to freeze or reduce wages, slash corporate and public health care obligations and increase profits by privatizing public enterprises and facilitating corporate relocation to low wage, low tax countries.

The system of capitalism inevitably degenerates into this reality. In order to eliminate all such undesirable (and worse) effects , we must find a way to end the system and replace it with one that fosters equality, true democracy (providing opportunities for everyone to participate in governing), and harmony with nature.

The Big ISIS and SDF Lies of the US—‘Kurdistan’ and New Gas Wars

Click here to access article by F. William Engdahl from New Eastern Outlook. 

Engdahl concludes his article with this statement:

...because of the recent success of the Syrian Arab Army and allied forces backed by Russian air power, the battle is turning into a direct US-Russia showdown, something in no way conducive to world peace. As repeatedly in their history, the Kurds of Syria and of Iraq are being played by the larger powers in the west for their own game: to totally control the vast energy resources of the entire Middle East and with it, of much of the world. Ultimately the game will fail, though not before senseless and inhuman slaughter continues to take its toll.

I can only agree. And, on the subject of "senseless and inhuman slaughter", with the simple-minded Tweeter (def. 1) in the White House raving about Kim Jong-un, I can only hope and pray that the Deep State manages to control this mad-dog on some kind of leash.

The Six ‘Secret’ Tactics of Empire

Click here to access article by Caoimhghin Ó Croidheáin from Global Research.

Although the author fails to identify the empire in the content of the article, it is obvious that the methods apply to the US-led Empire. He provides a useful and succinct summary of the methods that have been used by US-led Empire operatives in their attempts, sometimes successful, to destabilize and overthrow governments that stand in the way of the Empire's global interests of profits and power.

The 6 ‘secret’ tactics of empire are strategies of change used by governments, usually covertly, to attain political or military ends through means not normally acceptable to the populace as a whole. The strategies are as follows:

Washington's Long War Against Syria

Click here to access article by Stephen Gowans from What's Left. 

Gowans delivers a talk below on Middle Eastern political developments in the past 30 or 40 years with particular emphasis on the subject of his recently published book by the above title. He was invited by the Hands Off Syria Coalition to give a speech in July at the Solidarity Center in New York City. He has been described as a Canadian writer and activist, but now he can lay claim to be an author. He writes, I believe, mostly for What's Left but his articles have been re-posted frequently on many other websites. It is my opinion that he is one of the world's foremost political analysts. 

Gowans begins his approximately 48 minute talk at 12:25m into this video after brief words by other members of the Coalition. He concludes the talk by quoting from another Canadian, Norman Bethune, who served as a medical officer during the Spanish Civil War and the Sino-Japanese War with Mao's armies and said: "...such an organization of society, that permits these enemies of society to exist, must be abolished." Of course, he was referring to a capitalist organization of society. Gowans declares that the theme of his new book is the same.

The social pathology of the Las Vegas Massacre

Click here to access article by Patrick Martin from World Socialist Web Site.

The Las Vegas massacre is a peculiarly American crime, arising out of the social pathology of a deeply troubled society.

What is the social context of this latest episode of domestic mass killing? The United States has been at war more or less continuously for the past 27 years. The US government has treated tens of millions of people in the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Africa as targets for extermination through bombs, bullets, and drone-fired missiles. These wars have penetrated deeply into American culture, celebrated endlessly in film, television, music and even sport.

Social relations within the United States, characterized by the growth of economic inequality on a scale that exceeds any previous era in American history, fuel a culture of indifference, and even outright contempt for human life.

US Proxies in Southeast Asia Include Fake Communists

Click here to access article by Joseph Thomas from New Eastern Outlook. 

Thomas provides many illustrations in Thailand how capitalist operatives in cooperation with local capitalists, who promote the profit and power interest of the US Empire, make rather startling use of deception as they do elsewhere in the world. Of course, Karl Marx and others pointed out a century and half ago the sharp contradictions and conflicts between capitalists and workers. This phenomenon undermines any claim to the legitimacy of capitalist rule; therefore they must hide these contradictions by using their control of nearly all institutions of indoctrination and propaganda to deceive workers. When these institutions fail to dumb down workers, they always rely on violence by their police forces and armies to suppress dissidents.

Read how Thomas arrives at the following conclusion which encourages us to access rely on independent sources of information and improve our critical thinking skills.

If Washington is capable of creating legions of fascists and Wahhabi militants that serve its cause, it certainly can create “Communists” and any other ideological flavour of proxy it believes can serve its interests when and where needed. With Washington possessing such a capability, only real analysis can peel back the layers of money and motivations of any given movement, revealing its true colours, and those who refuse to peel back these layers, may in fact be aiding and abetting empire, not resisting it.

[Russian Revolution part 7 of ?] In Defence of the Russian Revolution - part two

The following is a 21:16m concluding video presentation by Alan Woods (via YouTube) regarding some of  the major effects of the Russian Revolution on not only Russia but the rest of the world. Woods is a British Marxist expert and author regarding issues and history related to Marxism.

In the second of a series of videos celebrating the 100th anniversary of the 1917 Russian Revolution, Alan Woods - editor of In Defence of Marxism, www.marxist.com - examines the lies and slanders used to attack the Revolution, the Bolsheviks, and the ideas of Lenin and Trotsky.

In this second part of "In Defence of the Russian Revolution", Alan examines the nature of the revolution and the subsequent civil war, answering the myths and distortions presented by bourgeois historians about the October Revolution being a "coup" or that Lenin and Trotsky were blood-thirsty tyrants.

As Alan explains, the rhetoric of the capitalists and their apologists reeks of hypocrisy from beginning to end, and it was the counter-revolutionaries in Russia who were responsible for violence.

“Diplomatic Flights used as Cover for Arms Trafficking to Terrorists” [Bulgarian journalist Dilyana Gaytandzhieva]

Click here to access article from FARS news agency in Iran. 

I've posted two previous articles regarding her claims which were mostly based on RT interviews with this Bulgarian journalist (see here and here) who has since been fired. Since then FARS news agency has followed up with this interview (in transcript form) of their own with Gaytandzhieva.

Dilyana Gaytandzhieva is a Bulgarian investigative journalist. In December 2016, she visited liberated neighborhoods of Aleppo where she found Bulgarian-made weapons inside underground warehouses belonging to terrorists. She felt suspicious and traced those weapons to its Bulgarian manufacturer realizing that they were legally exported to Saudi Arabia, which in turn supplied them to terrorists in Syria. As a result of further investigation she discovered that this was just a small part of a bigger international scheme.

FNA has conducted an interview with Dilyana Gaytandzhieva about the result of her investigation into the use of diplomatic flights for supplying weapons to terrorists.

[Russian Revolution series, part 6 of ?] In Defence of the Russian Revolution - part one

The following is a 22:03m video presentation by Alan Woods (via YouTube) regarding some of  the major effects of the Russian Revolution on not only Russia but the rest of the world. Woods is a British Marxist expert and author regarding issues and history related to Marxism. (I will be posting Woods' "part two" of his series in the near future.)

In the beginning of a series of videos celebrating the 100th anniversary of the 1917 Russian Revolution, Alan Woods - editor of In Defence of Marxism, www.marxist.com - examines the lies and slanders used to attack the Revolution, the Bolsheviks, and the ideas of Lenin and Trotsky.

In this first part "in Defence of the Russian Revolution", Alan looks at the gains made by the October Revolution and the planned economy in terms of science, industry, and culture.

[Russian Revolution series, part 5 of ?] Global Empire - The Centenary 1917-2017

Click here to access a 30:24m video production by TeleSur featuring Tariq Ali discussing this topic with Professor Stephen Smith. (Note: Beginning today I will occasionally offer the perspectives of this momentous event by various experts while running the excellent weekly/daily series provided by the World Socialist Web Site.)

To commemorate The Russian Revolution Centenary, Tariq Ali talks to Professor S.A. (Stephen) Smith of All Souls College, University of Oxford....

Safe-Zone Judo as Syrian Forces Cross the Euphrates

Click here to access article by Tony Cartalucci from New Eastern Outlook. 

Cartalucci assesses how the Empire's "Plan B" (Plan A was regime change) which he refers to as "safe zones" is currently working to balkanize Syria, and finds that it has diminishing chances of success in the long term. 

...with Syrian forces on the east bank of the Euphrates, the Syrian government maintains an even greater presence within and along the edges of this tenuous “safe zone.”

Today – just as US policymakers had planned the US and its proxies would do in 2012 – Syrian forces can at any time during this current conflict or after it – expand incrementally into America’s “safe-zone.” The crossing of the Euphrates and the increasingly exhausted political legs the United States stands on regarding its military aggression in Syria, combined with Russia’s direct military intervention upon Damascus’ request – have severely complicated this “safe zone” policy.

It is no longer a matter of “Assad” being “foolish enough to challenge these zones,” they are being challenged, regularly, and by Syrian forces backed by Russian airpower, which is in turn backed by a nuclear deterrence preventing the sort of escalation against Damascus US policymakers envisioned before the Russian intervention.

[Weekly series of the Russian Revolution of 1917] October 2 - 8: Trotsky elected chairman of the Petrograd Soviet

Click here to access this week's account of the historical Russian Revolution from the World Socialist Web Site. (Note: I am posting a series of articles on the Russian Revolution; but they are from my selection of the best sources which, in my well-read judgement, are the most accurate and insightful.)

I will be posting a weekly summary of activities during the Russian Revolution of 1917 as well as articles by historians of that great event. You may be interested to read my introduction to the latter series if you have not already done so. 

How Syria’s Victory Reshapes Mideast

Click here to access article by Alastair Crooke from ConsortiumNews. 

I am departing from my usual practice to ignore speculative articles about the future because I simply could not pass this one up. It is clear that the actions of the Saudi-Israeli-US project of using ISIS to destabilize Syria and installing a more compliant government (Plan A) is coming to an end. 

In the first section Crooke provides a review of the history of the region which sets the stage for what he sees as a more likely second scene in this geopolitical drama in contrast to one which he refers to as "Israel’s New Scheme" (Plan B): using the Kurdish desire for independence to balkanize both Iraq and Syria.  If you have little time, I recommend that you skip down to the subsection entitled "Israel’s New Scheme" where he quickly disposes of this outcome, and proceeds to elaborate the outcome that he sees much more likely. I think you will agree with me that such an outcome will have monumental repercussions on global geopolitics.

RT may close down US based studio

Click here to access article posted on Fort Russ.

Russia Today (RT) may stop broadcasting in the US due to pressure from the US authorities. RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan stated this in an interview on Russia's NTV channel.

According to her, "in the worst case scenario," RT may leave the US territory and no longer broadcast....

Because of the ruling capitalist class's concern over alternative media publishing news and analysis that doesn't conform to their versions disseminated by their media corporations, I it was inevitable that our masters would introduce all types of censorship as they are doing in Google's search engine and YouTube (which is owned by Google) and Facebook. It will only get worse as illustrated by these latest actions to harass RT so much that they too will likely leave our shores. 

I personally have found RT as a very useful and convenient way to learn about what is going on in world, but I've notice increasing difficulties accessing their nightly news program. (Last night their program "crashed" about four times when I was watching it.) US media corporations seem to have vacated any significant coverage of foreign affairs beyond what Trump tweets or speechifies about in a threatening or flamboyant manner. In spite of the fact that his actions are becoming aligned with theirs, Trump continues to be our masters' favorite whipping boy and major distraction from real news coverage. And our masters love any kind of distraction to take our attention away from the criminal acts they are committing throughout the world.