New Events

International

no events posted in last week

Blog Feeds

Public Inquiry
Interested in maladministration. Estd. 2005

offsite link RTEs Sarah McInerney ? Fianna Fail supporter? Anthony

offsite link Joe Duffy is dishonest and untrustworthy Anthony

offsite link Robert Watt complaint: Time for decision by SIPO Anthony

offsite link RTE in breach of its own editorial principles Anthony

offsite link Waiting for SIPO Anthony

Public Inquiry >>

Human Rights in Ireland
A Blog About Human Rights

offsite link UN human rights chief calls for priority action ahead of climate summit Sat Oct 30, 2021 17:18 | Human Rights

offsite link 5 Year Anniversary Of Kem Ley?s Death Sun Jul 11, 2021 12:34 | Human Rights

offsite link Poor Living Conditions for Migrants in Southern Italy Mon Jan 18, 2021 10:14 | Human Rights

offsite link Right to Water Mon Aug 03, 2020 19:13 | Human Rights

offsite link Human Rights Fri Mar 20, 2020 16:33 | Human Rights

Human Rights in Ireland >>

Lockdown Skeptics

The Daily Sceptic

offsite link Climate Change is ?Slowing the Earth?s Rotation? Fri Mar 29, 2024 13:00 | Sallust
If you weren?t already gibbering in your boots at the prospect of devastating climate change, it's time to think again. Apparently, the movement of water from the 'melting icecaps' is slowing the rotation of the Earth.
The post Climate Change is “Slowing the Earth’s Rotation” appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Hancock Fails to Have Bridgen Libel Case Thrown Out Paving Way for Full Trial Fri Mar 29, 2024 11:00 | Sally Beck
Matt Hancock, the ex-Health Secretary, has failed in his bid to have Andrew Bridgen's libel case thrown out after Hancock branded him antisemitic, paving the way for a full trial.
The post Hancock Fails to Have Bridgen Libel Case Thrown Out Paving Way for Full Trial appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link DEI Wokery is Swallowing Small Businesses Too Fri Mar 29, 2024 09:00 | C.J. Strachan
It's not only large corporations with hyperactive HR departments that are succumbing to efficiency-sapping wokery, says C.J. Strachan. Small and medium-sized enterprises are being swallowed up by DEI as well.
The post DEI Wokery is Swallowing Small Businesses Too appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link Are We Being Gaslit Over the Cause of the Princess of Wales?s Cancer? Fri Mar 29, 2024 07:00 | Melissa Kite
First Charles and then Kate ? it's hard to ignore the soaring cancer rate when two members of the Royal Family are diagnosed within weeks. But are we being gaslit about what's behind the surge, asks Melissa Kite.
The post Are We Being Gaslit Over the Cause of the Princess of Wales’s Cancer? appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

offsite link News Round-Up Fri Mar 29, 2024 00:04 | Richard Eldred
A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the virus and the vaccines, the ?climate emergency? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Voltaire Network
Voltaire, international edition

offsite link Moscow attack reminds us of the links between Islamists and Kiev's fundamentalis... Tue Mar 26, 2024 06:57 | en

offsite link Failure to assist a people in danger of genocide, by Hassan Hamadé Tue Mar 26, 2024 06:32 | en

offsite link Yugoslavia March 24, 1999 The Founding War of the New Nato, by Manlio Dinucci Sun Mar 24, 2024 05:15 | en

offsite link France opposes Russian Korean-style peace project in Ukraine Sat Mar 23, 2024 11:11 | en

offsite link Voltaire, International Newsletter N°79 Fri Mar 22, 2024 11:40 | en

Voltaire Network >>

The Trump-Putin Peace, Trade, And Friendship Talks

category international | anti-war / imperialism | other press author Tuesday July 03, 2018 12:11author by Brian Cloughley Report this post to the editors

News that a meeting has been arranged between Presidents Trump and Putin on 16 July was greeted with displeasure in many sectors of the western world, and especially by the military-industrial complex, the cabal of war-profiteering US and European oligarchs whose interests lie solely in maintaining their lucrative arms manufacturing empires. Trade is most important to them — but peace and friendship come way down their page of priorities, because it is enmity and distrust that lead to lucrative sales of weapons.
putin_trump.jpg


Article follows:

News that a meeting has been arranged between Presidents Trump and Putin on 16 July was greeted with displeasure in many sectors of the western world, and especially by the military-industrial complex, the cabal of war-profiteering US and European oligarchs whose interests lie solely in maintaining their lucrative arms manufacturing empires. Trade is most important to them — but peace and friendship come way down their page of priorities, because it is enmity and distrust that lead to lucrative sales of weapons.

UK newspapers reacted predictably to the news, with the right wing Daily Mail stating Fears are mounting that Donald Trump wants a ‘peace deal’ with Vladimir Putin that could fatally undermine NATO. Ministers are becoming increasingly alarmed that the US president could offer the Russian president deep concessions such as withdrawing forces from Europe.

The Times of London recorded thatOne [UK government] minister told the Times: ‘What we're nervous of is some kind of Putin-Trump 'peace deal' suddenly being announced. We could see Trump and Putin saying, Why do we have all this military hardware in Europe? and agreeing to jointly remove that. 'It's hard to be against peace, but would it be real peace?’”

Yes, it would be real peace, because what Russia wants is amicable relations and trade. Trade with the US and the EU and China and every country that wants to trade — including, most importantly, the Baltic States that have been encouraged by the Pentagon-Brussels NATO High Command to imagine that Russia is poised to invade them.

The US defence secretary, General James Mattis, told Estonia’s minister of defence that “Russia is trying to change international borders by force” and at meetings in May with Lithuania’s president and Baltic defence ministers “reassured US allies in the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia of American solidarity with them and of US determination to defend Baltic and other NATO territory against any aggression.”

Of all the absurd concoctions swinging round the Western propaganda world at the moment, the notion that Russia wants to invade Estonia, Latvia or Lithuania is probably the least believable and most laughable. The Russian government fully realises that such action would inevitably result in wider conflict; and that there could be escalation to a shattering nuclear war. Even if it didn’t result in global catastrophe, the occupation of any one of these countries by Russian forces would be cripplingly costly in every way and simply doesn’t make sense.

In the context of the impending US-Russia presidential talks, not a single Western media outlet mentioned that, as detailed in the 2018 World Report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) , “In 2017 the USA spent more on its military [$610 billion] than the next seven highest-spending countries combined... at $66.3 billion, Russia’s military spending in 2017 was 20 per cent lower than in 2016.”

It would be awkward and indeed embarrassing for the Western media to give prominence to SIPRI’s indisputable statement that in 2016 “NATO’s collective military expenditure rose to $881 billion” while “European NATO members spent $254 billion in 2016 — over 3 times more than Russia.

Russia is reducing its expenditure on defence while the US-NATO military alliance, as noted by Radio Free Europe , agreed on 7 June to “reinforce NATO’s presence in a potential European crisis with the deployment of 30 troop battalions, 30 squadrons of aircraft, and 30 warships within 30 days — the so-called ‘Four 30s’ plan.” This, said the Secretary General of the US-NATO military alliance, Jens Stoltenberg, presumably with a straight face, is not “about setting up or deploying new forces — it is about boosting the readiness of existing forces across each and every ally.”

Then the BBC reported that Stoltenberg had put the best face he could on the unwelcome news of reduced tension and possible friendship. He said that “dialogue is a sign of strength... We don’t want a new Cold War, we don’t want to isolate Russia, we want to strive for a better relationship with Russia.” This is the man who declared in March 2018 that the US-NATO military grouping is increasing its numbers of confrontational deployments. He is proud of the fact that at the end of 2017 there were more than 23,000 troops involved in NATO operations, an increase of over 5,000 since 2014. This is a most peculiar way of striving for a “better relationship” with Russia, whose borders and shores are constantly menaced by NATO’s attack and electronic warfare aircraft, missile-equipped ships and tank-heavy troop manoeuvres.

In June, immediately before the start of the World Cup football tournament in Russia the US-NATO alliance (plus Israel) conducted a two-week military exercise in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. 18,000 troops took part in the manoeuvres which, according to the Pentagon’s HQ in Europe, were “not a provocation of Russia.” At the very time that citizens of countless countries were preparing to travel to Russia to enjoy a major sporting jamboree, the Pentagon-Brussels pressure group did its best to confront the country whose defence budget is one third of Europe’s and a tenth of America’s and whose President declared that his overwhelming priority is reduction of poverty and “the well-being of the people and the prosperity of Russian families.”

It is deeply ironical that while the US-NATO military fandangos were in full swing in the Baltic States, it was reported that “Russia on Wednesday [6 June] successfully launched its Soyuz MS-09 spacecraft carrying three crew members to the International Space Station (ISS)...

The spacecraft carried three astronauts : Serena Aunon-Chancellor of the US, Germany’s Alexander Gerst and Russia’s Sergei Prokopyev,

The spacecraft zoomed away in international harmony two days before US Senator Ben Sasse grouched that “Putin is not our friend and he is not the president’s buddy. He is a thug using Soviet-style aggression to wage a shadow war against America, and our leaders should act like it.” With that sort of attitude, widespread in the Congress, it’s going to be difficult to realise Trump’s desire to “get along with Russia” which he observes would be “good for the world, it’s good for us, it’s good for everybody.”

Trump is the most erratic president the US has ever known. He ricochets from malevolent tweeting to spiteful speeches, and is now distrusted by almost every foreign leader of stature. It is difficult to disagree with the opinion of Iran’s foreign minister that he is “impulsive and illogical” but — and it is a very big ‘but’ — at the moment he presents the best chance for rapprochement and amity with Russia.

The fact that Washington’s warmongers so violently oppose his forthcoming talks with President Putin is evidence enough that he is on the right track. Let’s hope that President Putin can keep him on the rails that lead to peace, trade and friendship.

author by anonpublication date Wed Jul 04, 2018 23:16author address author phone Report this post to the editors

12 days before the summit
and just before the world cup final,
how VERY convenient that there is
another Novichok poisoning incident near Salisbury
to remind us how evil the russians are
and safeguard all that money from weapons contracts
and all those spy jobs at MI6 and CIA.

Somebody somewhere is worried!
Someone who doesn't care much about human life!

author by Calpublication date Thu Jul 05, 2018 08:24author address author phone Report this post to the editors

It's obviously psychological operations, psy-ops. Clever mischievous people are trying to manipulate mass emotions. They are supplying fodder like this to the headline writers who work in the redtop newspapers. Brazil for the world cup!

 
© 2001-2024 Independent Media Centre Ireland. Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by Independent Media Centre Ireland. Disclaimer | Privacy