China’s Beidou launched to rival GPS [People's Daily]

By Xin Dingding (China Daily)
December 28, 2011

BEIJING – China started to run its own satellite positioning system, Beidou, on Tuesday as the country climbed the global tech ladder and challenged the monopoly of the West.

Beidou, or Big Dipper, the domestic version of the US Global Positioning System (GPS), started providing navigation, positioning and timing data on a pilot basis to China and the neighboring area for free on Tuesday, Ran Chengqi, director of the China Satellite Navigation Office, said.

The system, with 10 orbiting satellites, covers an area from Australia in the south to Russia in the north. Signals can reach the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region in the west and the Pacific Ocean in the east, Ran said.

With six more satellites to be launched next year, the system will cover a wider area and eventually the entire globe by 2020 with a constellation of 35 satellites, he said.

The accuracy of the positioning service will also improve as more satellites orbit.

During the trial run Beidou can offer positioning to within 25 meters but when the system is officially launched next year accuracy will be enhanced to within 10 meters, he said.

With the system operational China is the third member of an elite group, along with the US and Russia, to develop a satellite navigation system…

Full article link: http://english.people.com.cn/202936/7689654.html

War-related carbon emissions deserves attention [People's Daily]

The Pentagon is a humungous polluter, the worst polluting sub-state entity in the world. I like this article better if one searches and replaces “carbon emissions” with “pollution”. – Zuo Shou

By Liu Jiangyong (People’s Daily Overseas Edition)
08:16, December 26, 2011

Edited and translated by People’s Daily Online

The international community has not paid enough attention to war-related carbon emissions, a major contributor to global warming. If such emissions continue to go unnoticed, there will be a “war over carbon emissions” sooner or later.

War-related carbon emissions can be divided into three categories. The first category are carbon emissions produced during the research and development, production, storage, transportation, and utilization of weapons, equipment, ammunition, and supplies used in the war that a country or group of countries waged against a sovereign state, as well as during long large-scale civil wars.

The second category includes the destruction of urban and rural buildings, infrastructure, industrial and mining establishments, oil and gas facilities, forests, and grassland caused by wars, as well as carbon emissions produced during rescue operations and post-war reconstruction.

The third includes carbon emissions produced throughout the production and exports of weapons, equipment, and ammunition to one of the warring parties in a country or region. The international community should revise the international law based on scientific research to curb war-related carbon emissions because the existing energy conservation and emissions reduction measures are not enough to resolve global warming.

Although estimates on this type of emissions need to be done by scientists, common sense says the fact that cities are devastated by a number of missiles and warplanes and then reconstructed after the war will inevitably lead to the most serious carbon emissions.

Calculated according to output power, a U.S. M1 main battle tank’s carbon emissions are equivalent to those of 10 ordinary Mercedes-Benz cars. Therefore, war-related carbon emissions’ impact on climate change are much greater than those caused by industry, thus belligerent countries’ overall carbon emissions more should be counted in.

After the Cold War, the United States has launched and participated in five high-tech local wars since 1990, namely, the Gulf War, the Kosovo War, the Iraq War and the Libya War. What these wars have brought are ruins on blocks, dark smoke in oil wells and scorched earth.

Long-term local wars lead to the normalization of war-related carbon emissions and increase of global accumulated carbon emissions. It is worth mentioning that the period of local wars overlaps with that of climatic anomaly and warming. The Libyan War lasting for more than six months ended in late October this year, while the global temperature during this period was higher than that in previous years. This is probably not accidental.

However, some developed countries still turn a blind eye on war-related carbon emissions, which greatly affect the global climate. They do whatever they want to, and do not assume any moral or legal responsibilities. On the other hand, they ask the developing countries to assume the same obligations in reducing industrial and domestic carbon emissions. The world seems to have become more and more absurd.

Article link: http://english.people.com.cn/90780/7687391.html

The Mainstream Media Lie about Martin Luther King [Globalresearch.ca]

by A.D. Hemming

Jan. 16, 2012

With a recent Associated Press hatchet job story and character assassination of Martin Luther King Jr coming out in the US mainstream, echo chamber media with it’s pigeonholing Dr King into a corner as only a “black leader” and freezing his life in that August 1963 speech in the US capital speech on civil rights when the struggle was primarily in the US South, we have a full fledged ghettoization of Dr King which we need to remedy by bringing out the real Dr King. The attack on Dr King has been one of talking about he “chain smoked,” used alcohol, and used rough language. Can charges of him “chewing gum in class be far behind?” “Chasing women,” J Edgar Hoover’s favorite almost surely will be brought out of the shadows. But he was human, “Surprise!” Now “assassinate” the below [sic] US mainstream media.

Today on this planet as Martin Luther King Jr said in his Christmas sermon he delivered in his Atlanta church “Our world is sick with war; everywhere we turn we see its ominous possibilities,” because as Dr King said “if we don’t have good will toward men in this world, we will destroy ourselves by the misuse of our own instruments and our own power.” “The Christmas hope of peace on earth and good will toward men” Dr King pointed out “can no longer be dismissed as a dream of some utopian.”

As Dr King concluded “We must either learn to live together as brothers or we are all going to perish together like fools.” “Life is interrelated” as he made so clear.” “We are all caught up in an inescapable network of mutuality tied into a single garment of destiny.”

Dr King made the point of the link between US militarism and racism and poverty which neither the US power elites nor the echo chamber press liked in the least.

When Dr King gave this sermon he talked about his visit to India and how that had depressed him,…with Dr King saying “How can one avoid being depressed when one sees with one’s own eyes evidences of millions [of]…people going to bed hungry at night. How can one avoid being depressed when one sees with one’s own eyes thousands of people sleeping on sidewalks at night.”

He referred to those in the “million in Bombay” and “a half million in Calcutta.”…Dr King put it so well when he challenged “How can we in America stand by and not be concerned?”

Then Dr King’s answer came: In the USA “we spend millions of dollars (currently the figure may be different but the point is the same) to store surplus food.” He said he knew where we “could store that food free of charge — in the wrinkled stomachs of the millions of God’s children in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and even in our own nation, who go to bed hungry at night.” Yes, hunger or the food insecurity as those who like to use euphemisms was and is alive today and well in the USA. We have surpluses for some and nothing for too many others and with regard to money so much surplus for so few and so little for 90 per cent or 95 per cent. What is true of money is true as well of that which money can buy– housing, health care, clothing, and otherwise.

This gap is a “good way” to refuse to have “peace on earth and good will to all” by completely ignoring the “interrelated structure of reality” which Dr King spoke of. Dr King put it so well when he said “No individual can live alone; no nation can live alone, and as long as we try, the more we are going to have war in this world.” We now have a world which as Franklin D Roosevelt would have said is “ill housed, ill fed, and ill clothed.” To get to a solution as Dr King put it so aptly “Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe. our class, and our nation. . . we must develop a world perspective.” “Our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional.”

Each one of us “is somebody” and “a child of God” as Dr King told us. When we say “Thou shalt not kill” as he also said “we’re really saying that human life is too sacred to be taken on the battlefields of the world.” “One day” we must see as Dr King told us that “The Russians are our brothers.” And I’m sure today he would add that “the North [sic] Koreans and Iranians are our brothers.” and despite “our ideological and political differences” with them “one day we’re going to have to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.”

And as King added “When we truly believe in the sacredness” of all humanity “we won’t exploit people, we won’t trample over them with the iron feet of oppression, we won’t kill anybody.”

Edited by Zuo Shou

Article link: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28693

Dr. King family’s civil trial verdict: US government assassinated Martin Luther King [Project Censored]

by Carl Herman (Examiner.com)

Jan. 15, 2012

What then is, generally speaking, the truth of history? A fable agreed upon.” – Napoleon Bonaparte [69]

Dr. Martin Luther King’s family and his personal friend and attorney, William F. Pepper, won a civil trial that found US government agencies guilty in the wrongful death of Martin Luther King. The 1999 trial, King Family versus Jowers and Other Unknown Co-Conspirators, [70] is the only trial ever conducted on the assassination of Dr. King.

The King family’s attempts for a criminal trial were denied, as suspect James Ray’s recant of what he claimed was a false confession was denied. Mr. Ray said that his government-appointed attorney told him to sign a confession in order to receive a trial. When Mr. Ray discovered that his signature meant no trial, his and the King family’s subsequent requests were denied.

The US government also denied the King family’s requests for independent investigation of the assassination.

Therefore, and importantly, the US government has never presented any evidence subject to challenge that substantiates their claim that Mr. Ray assassinated Dr. King.

US corporate media did not cover the trial, interview the King family, and textbooks omit this information. Journalist and author, James Douglass: [71]

“I can hardly believe the fact that, apart from the courtroom participants, only Memphis TV reporter Wendell Stacy and I attended from beginning to end this historic three-and-one-half week trial. Because of journalistic neglect scarcely anyone else in this land of ours even knows what went on in it. After critical testimony was given in the trial’s second week before an almost empty gallery, Barbara Reis, U.S. correspondent for the Lisbon daily Publico who was there several days, turned to me and said, “Everything in the U.S. is the trial of the century. O.J. Simpson’s trial was the trial of the century. Clinton’s trial was the trial of the century. But this is the trial of the century, and who’s here?” ”

For comparison, please consider the media coverage of O.J. Simpson’s trials: [72]…

…The overwhelming evidence of government complicity introduced and agreed as comprehensively valid by the jury includes the 111th Military Intelligence Group were sent to Dr. King’s location, and that the usual police protection was pulled away just before the assassination. Military Intelligence set-up photographers on a roof of a fire station with a clear view to Dr. King’s balcony. 20th Special Forces Group had an 8-man sniper team at the assassination location on that day. Memphis police ordered the scene where multiple witnesses reported as the source of shooting cut down of their bushes that would have hid a sniper team. Along with sanitizing a crime scene, police abandoned investigative procedure to interview witnesses who lived by the scene of the shooting.

The King family believes the government’s motivation to murder Dr. King was to prevent his imminent camp-in at Washington, D.C. until the Vietnam War was ended and those resources directed to end poverty and invest in US hard and soft infrastructure.

Please watch this six-minute video of the evidence from the trial, [73] and this eight-minute video [74] on the FBI’s disclosures of covert operations against Dr. King, including confirmation from his closest friends and advisors.

Coretta Scott King, Dr. King’s wife, is certain of the evidence after 30 years of consideration from the 1968 assassination to the 1999 trial:

“For a quarter of a century, Bill Pepper conducted an independent investigation of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. He opened his files to our family, encouraged us to speak with the witnesses, and represented our family in the civil trial against the conspirators. The jury affirmed his findings, providing our family with a long-sought sense of closure and peace, which had been denied by official disinformation and cover- ups. Now the findings of his exhaustive investigation and additional revelations from the trial are presented in the pages of this important book. We recommend it highly to everyone who seeks the truth about Dr. King’s assassination.” — Coretta Scott King, Dr. King’s wife…

…Let’s summarize: Under US Civil Law, covert US government agencies were found guilty of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Dr. King was the leading figure of the Civil Rights Movement, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, and widely recognized as one of the world’s greatest speakers for what it means to be human. The family’s conclusion as to motive was to prevent Dr. King from ending the Vietnam War because the government wanted to continue its ongoing covert and overt military operations to control foreign governments and their resources.

It is therefore a factual statement that under US Civil Law, the US government assassinated Dr. King…

…People of sufficient intellectual integrity and moral courage will embrace the trial evidence and testimony, jury conclusion, and King family analysis as appropriate and helpful information in seeking the facts…

…We also need to consider the lack of coverage by US corporate media of this compelling evidence, trial verdict, and King family testimony from over 30 years’ analysis of the facts. Recall the evidence of US corporate media reporting being infiltrated by CIA agents to propagandize Americans’ access to information. This included the Director of the CIA’s admission to Congress that they have over 400 agents working in corporate media to make the US public believe what the CIA wants them to believe…

Excerpted by Zuo Shou

Full article link (includes footnotes): http://dailycensored.com/2012/01/15/dr-king-familys-civil-trial-verdict-us-government-assassinated-martin-luther-king/

Post-Kim Jong Il DPRK [Strategic Culture Foundation]

Alexander Vorontsov

Dec. 25, 2011

The death of Kim Jong Il two months before his 70th birthday grabbed the headlines worldwide. False reports of his death had been a recurrent phenomenon, but his passing, when it did happen, came unexpectedly. The communist leader’s death possibly marks a watershed moment between distinct epochs in the history of the DPRK, prompting intense debates over the scenarios of the anticipated transition.

Three overarching themes are present in the flow of essentially unfriendly projections for North Korea:

• Kim Jong Un, late Kim Jong Il’s 28-year old third son and successor, is too young, clearly lacks experience, and possibly has mental health problems, which altogether means that he is unable to be a leader of his country, has no chance to be accepted as such by the population, and is going to be controlled by the elder members of his family clan.

• As a result, various groups within the North Korean political elite will be confronted with the irresistible temptation to not only run the county from behind the scenes, but in the full sense to seize power in the country, the likely outcome being a period of internal strife and a series of military coups, plus total destabilization if not a civil war in the DPRK.

• Given the above, an intervention – launched by the US in tandem with South Korea, by China, or even by both forces – will quickly become imminent, and the North Korean population which is lethally tired of the dictatorial rule will welcome the invaders as liberators. At the bottom line, North Korea will see the long-awaited regime change.

The following circumstances should be taken into account to assess the forecasts realistically. The permanently reiterated doubts over the abilities and mental health of Kim Jong Un, whose status of the “great successor “ has already been confirmed in Pyongyang, notably resemble those expressed regarding Kim Jong Il at the time of his ascension to power in 1994. The myth of Kim Jong Il’s complete inferiority to his father was inflated by the Western media but failed the test of the empirical reality during the June, 2000 inter-Korean summit, as foreign journalists flocked to Pyongyang to accompany the ROK president Kim Dae-jung to discover that the DPRK leader was a healthy, energetic, and highly competent individual. These days, the Western media are putting together the image of a sickly Kim Jong Un but also mention that he went to college in Switzerland, received decent European education, and used to play basketball – and pretend to be overlooking the contradiction.

The current mass expressions of grief in North Korea may seem shocking to foreigners but certainly cannot be written off as insincere. It is true that collectivism is pervasive in the heavily organized North Korea, and that the arrangement affects the way emotions are displayed, but denying that – in line with the Confucian tradition – the perception of the country leader as the father of the nation is widespread among the population and that people are indeed mourning Kim Jong Il would be unfair. The phenomenon – the tendency within the original North Korean political culture to ascribe a special role to the country leader – has a legitimizing impact on Kim Jong Un’s claim to power. It is true that Kim Jong Un is very young, has a minimal record of involvement in state affairs, and, in fact, has held the official successor status for just slightly over a year. Still, he learned a lot over the period of time acting as his father’s apprentice and made no blunders in the process. Importantly, the nation actually sees him as the successor. For example, I gathered from conversations with ordinary North Koreans that they feel deeply impressed by the fact that outwardly Kim Jong Un looks very much like his grandfather, founder of N. Korea Kim Il Sung.

Obviously, both Kim Jong Un and the whole the DPRK are at the moment picking up a tough challenge. From now on a lot will depend on Kim Jong Un’s aptitude, willpower, etc. His elder peers – the stalwarts from his father’s inner entourage – will certainly do their best to help him at the initial phase, but the type of interaction should not be interpreted as evidence that Kim Jong Un will have a purely nominal status. For North Korea, combining the leader’s singular status with collectivism in top-level decision-making is a long-standing tradition, though the balance between the two elements fluctuates. It is worth mentioning in the context that even Kim Il Sung was not invariably the number one figure in North Korea’s party and administration (in the initial stages) and that, even at the peaks of their careers, neither he nor Kim Jong Il sidelined such collective governance bodies as the central committee of the Labor party, the state defense committee, etc.

Predictions that the DPRK will shortly plunge into chaos and that a tide of infighting will sweep over its leadership are completely groundless. Any serious watcher is fully aware of the country’s robust political stability, with nothing like an organized opposition or public protests of considerable proportions in sight.

It is natural that divisions over individual issues do exist in the administration of the DPRK as in that of any other country. Limited controversy erupted over the forms and pace of the economic reform which was launched in North Korea in 2002. An attempt was made in November, 2009 to implement a national currency devaluation which could de facto translate into savings confiscation and was read by experts as an effort meant to make the country revert to the pre-reform condition. In a matter of months, the North Korean government realized that the step was counterproductive and abandoned the whole plan, removing the restrictions fleetingly imposed on market activity. The reversal showed that the reformist faction in the North Korean administration generally prevails over conservatives.

At the same time, the divisions in the DPRK do not seem to escalate into irreconcilable discord. The constant external threat facing the country further cements its administration. Pyongyang is mindful of its opponents’ strategy focused on inducing regime change in the DPRK and monitors the emergency military planning of the US-S. Korea alliance which certainly had special designs to set in motion in the event of a sudden death of the North Korean leader. The developments in Libya and the killing of M. Gadhafi made North Koreans realize what kind of punishment the West administers for defiance. The conclusions drawn in Pyongyang took the shape of a special official statement to the effect that Gadhafi’s key mistake had been to rely on the West’s promises and to scrap Libya’s nuclear program in return for international security guarantees. The statement said that Gadhafi’s regime came under strike as soon as it showed it would not acquire a nuclear deterrent and that N. Korea would never make the same mistake but would upgrade its defense potential including the nuclear capabilities.

The N. Korean political elite and the politically active part of the country’s society have no illusions as to their survival chances in the case of a regime change. More than any ideological directives, such concerns make it maintain full cohesion, stay loyal to the country leader, and ruthlessly suppress any tendencies towards internal discord.

At least in the mid-term, we will see complete continuity in the DPRK’s foreign and domestic policies, with its young leader likely emphasizing allegiance to his father’s legacy. The North Korean approach to the key foreign-policy issues including its relations with Russia and involvement in the six-party talks over the nuclear problem of the Korean Peninsula will therefore remain unchanged. Symbolically, the last foreign visit paid by late Kim Jong Il was a tour of Russia during which he met with Russian president D. Medvedev in August, 2011 in Ulan-Ude. It is a safe bet that the cooperation between Russia and the DPRK will continue and that the key bilateral economic projects will be implemented in its framework as planned.

It should be noted that the recent developments in North Korea opened up new opportunities to its opponents, and time will show in what form they are going to seize them. At the moment US conservatives such as the Republican party’s candidate for presidential nomination M. Romney are urging greater pressure on North Korea in connection with the inexperienced Kim Jong Un’s taking late Kim Jong Il’s place with regime change as the end goal. On the other hand, now comes up an opportune situation to turn the page on the past conflicts and to start cultivating contacts with the young North Korean leader. An expression of condolences is a typical first step under the circumstances. It instills hope that, in contrast to how the situation was handled when Kim Il Sung died in 1994, Seoul sent those this time. No doubt, the biggest role in rebuilding bridges to North Korea could be taken by the USA. Washington’s usual foreign-policy planning strategy is to compile parallel scenarios and to permanently stay prepared to make a political U-turn. The switching from a condition bordering on a real war to fruitful cooperation in the wake of Kim IL Sung’s death and the signing of the 1994 framework agreement provided a vivid example of such flexibility. The Administration of G. Bush made a similar maneuver in 2007.

It became known that over the past several days US Secretary of State H. Clinton engaged in intense consultations with representatives of the countries neighboring North Korea. In particular, she had several phone conversations with the foreign ministers of Russia and China. The contents of the talks remained undisclosed, but hypothetically Washington could be trying to bounce at least some kind of unarticulated consent to regime change in the DPRK out its partners. If this is the case, the probability that the endeavors produced any results is minimal. To stress the importance of its ties with the DPRK, Beijing took an unprecedented diplomatic step when China’s leader Hu Jintao and eight other top Chinese officials visited the N. Korean embassy to deliver condolences.

Alternative schemes may nevertheless materialize in the game played out between Washington and Pyongyang. H. Clinton’s visit to Burma, the country that used to draw Washington’s condemnations in unsurpassed quantities as a “rogue state”, was a bold initiative, and an analogous breakthrough in dealing with N. Korea may yet be brewing (the precedent being M. Albright’s 2000 visit to Pyongyang). In any case, today’s situation offers unique opportunities to break the stalemate in the US-DPRK and inter-Korean relations.

Overall, the situation in the DPRK remains stable, with Moscow and Beijing firmly espousing the peace, stability and status quo on the Korean Peninsula. Washington and Seoul are facing a dilemma of either boosting pressure on Pyongyang with the aim of irreversibly breaking its resistance (a strategy loaded with unlike results and extreme risks, it should be noted) or giving their policies vis-a-vis North Korea a serious facelift.

Article link: http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2011/12/25/post-kim-jong-il-dprk.html

How to Start a War: The American Use of War Pretext Incidents [Globalresearch.ca / Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade]

by Richard Sanders

January 5, 2012

The following article by Richard Sanders published in May 2002, prior to the onslaught of the Iraq war, carefully documents the History of War Pretext Incidents.

This historical review raises an important issue: Is the Pentagon seeking to trigger military confrontation in the Persian Gulf with a view to providing a pretext and a justification to waging an all out war on the Islamic Republic of Iran?

As documented by Richard Sanders, this strategy has been used throughout American military history.

With regard to the confrontation in the Persian Gulf, is the Obama administration prepared to sacrifice the Fifth Fleet based in Bahrain with a view to triggering public support for a war on Iran on the grounds of self-defense.

Those opposed to war must address the issue of the “pretext”and “justification” to wage war.

Of relevance, the “Responsibility to Protect under a NATO “humanitarian” mandate has also been used as a thematic pretext to wage war (Yugoslavia, Libya, Syria),

The 911 Attacks and the “Global War on Terrorism” (Afghanistan, Somalia, Pakistan,…) not to mention the alleged “Weapons of Mass Destruction” (Iraq) have also been used to justify military intervention. Both 9/11 and WMD are being heralded as a justification for waging war on Iran, based on allegation that Iran was behind the 9/11 attacks and that Iran possesses nuclear weapons.

In the words of Richard Sanders [2002]:

“It is vitally important to expose this latest attempt [9/11] to fraudulently conceal the largely economic and geostrategic purposes of war. By asking who benefits from war, we can unmask its pretense and expose the true grounds for instigating it. By throwing light on repeated historical patterns of deception, we can promote skepticism about the government and media yarns that have been spun to encourage this war.

The historical knowledge of how war planners have tricked people into supporting past wars, is like a vaccine. We can use this understanding of history to inoculate the public with healthy doses of distrust for official war pretext narratives and other deceptive stratagems. Through such immunization programs we may help to counter our society’s susceptibility to “war fever.” “

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, January 9, 2012

“Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive!” Sir Walter Scott, Marmion. Canto vi. Stanza 17

Pretext n. [Latin praetextum, pp. of praetextere, to weave before, pretend, disguise; prae-, before + texere, to weave], a false reason or motive put forth to hide the real one; excuse.

Stratagem [Gr. Strategema, device or act of a general; stratos, army + agein, to lead], a trick, scheme or device used for deceiving an enemy in war.

Throughout history, war planners have used various forms of deception to trick their enemies. Because public support is so crucial to the process of initiating and waging war, the home population is also subject to deceitful stratagems. The creation of false excuses to justify going to war is a major first step in constructing public support for such deadly ventures. Perhaps the most common pretext for war is an apparently unprovoked enemy attack. Such attacks, however, are often fabricated, incited or deliberately allowed to occur. They are then exploited to arouse widespread public sympathy for the victims, demonize the attackers and build mass support for military “retaliation.”

Like schoolyard bullies who shout ‘He hit me first!’, war planners know that it is irrelevant whether the opponent really did ‘throw the first punch.’ As long as it can be made to appear that the attack was unprovoked, the bully receives license to ‘respond’ with force. Bullies and war planners are experts at taunting, teasing and threatening their opponents. If the enemy cannot be goaded into ‘firing the first shot,’ it is easy enough to lie about what happened. Sometimes, that is sufficient to rationalize a schoolyard beating or a genocidal war.

Such trickery has probably been employed by every military power throughout history. During the Roman empire, the causes of war — cassus belli — were often invented to conceal the real reasons for war. Over the millennia, although weapons and battle strategies have changed greatly, the deceitful strategem of using pretext incidents to ignite war has remained remarkably consistent.

Pretext incidents, in themselves, are not sufficient to spark wars. Rumors and allegations about the tragic events must first spread throughout the target population. Constant repetition of the official version of what happened, spawns dramatic narratives that are lodged into public consciousness. The stories become accepted without question and legends are fostered. The corporate media is central to the success of such ‘psychological operations.’ Politicians rally people around the flag, lending their special oratory skills to the call for a military “response.” Demands for “retaliation” then ring out across the land, war hysteria mounts and, finally, a war is born.

Every time the US has gone to war, pretext incidents have been used . Upon later examination, the conventional perception of these events is always challenged and eventually exposed as untrue. Historians, investigative journalists and many others, have cited eyewitness accounts, declassified documents and statements made by the perpetrators themselves to demonstrate that the provocative incidents were used as stratagems to stage-manage the march to war.

Here are a few particularly blatant examples of this phenomenon.

[Every war in the following list is thoroughly analyzed by CONTEXT, PRETEXT, RESPONSE, and REAL REASONS; and can be referenced at the original article (see bottom of post for link) - Zuo Shou]

1846: The Mexican-American War…

1898: The Spanish-American War…

1915: World War I…

1941: World War II…

1950: The Korean War…

1964: The Vietnam War…

1983: The Invasion of Grenada…

1989: The Invasion of Panama…

…CONCLUSIONS

There are dozens of other examples from US history besides those summarized here. The “Cold War” was characterized by dozens of covert and overt wars throughout the Third World. Although each had its specific pretexts, the eradication of communism was the generally-used backdrop for all rationales.100

Since the Soviet Union’s demise, US war planners have continued to use spectacular pretext incidents to spawn wars. Examples include Iraq (1991), Somalia (1992), Haiti (1994), Bosnia (1995) and Yugoslavia (1999).

Throughout this time, the US “War on Drugs” has been fought on many fronts. Lurking behind the excuse to squash illicit drug trafficking, are the actual reasons for financing, training and arming right-wing, US-backed regimes, whose officials have so often profited from this illegal trade. The CIA has used this trade to finance many of its covert wars.101 The “War on Drugs” has targeted numerous countries to strengthen counter-insurgency operations aimed at destroying opposition groups that oppose US corporate rule.

Military plotters know that the majority would never support their wars, if it were generally known why they were really being fought. Over the millennia, a special martial art has been deliberately developed to weave elaborate webs of deceit to create the appearance that wars are fought for “just” or “humanitarian” reasons.

If asked to support a war so a small, wealthy elite could shamelessly profit by ruthlessly exploiting and plundering the natural and human resources in far away lands, people would ‘just say no.’

We now face another broad thematic pretext for war, the so-called “War Against Terrorism.” We are told it will be waged in many countries and may continue for generations. It is vitally important to expose this latest attempt to fraudulently conceal the largely economic and geostrategic purposes of war. By asking who benefits from war, we can unmask its pretense and expose the true grounds for instigating it. By throwing light on repeated historical patterns of deception, we can promote skepticism about the government and media yarns that have been spun to encourage this war.

The historical knowledge of how war planners have tricked people into supporting past wars, is like a vaccine. We can use this understanding of history to inoculate the public with healthy doses of distrust for official war pretext narratives and other deceptive stratagems. Through such immunization programs we may help to counter our society’s susceptibility to “war fever.”

Excerpted by Zuo Shou

Article link: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=28554

What is behind US ‘Return-to-Asia’ strategy? [People's Daily]

(China Military Online)
December 27, 2011

Edited and translated by People’s Daily Online

Recently, the PLA Daily interviewed Lin Zhiyuan, an expert on U.S. issues from Department of World Military Research under Academy of Military Sciences on the U.S. strategy to “return to Asia.”

Reporter: While talking about Asia recently, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, “The United States is back,” making it clear that the United States has paid more attention to the Asian-Pacific region than ever, and it will shift its strategic focus to Asia in the future. What do you think of the move?

Lin Zhiyuan: It aims to fully restore the U.S. influence in the Asia-Pacific region. The United States implements a global strategy, which has respective focuses on deployment.

Since the end of the Cold War, the United States started to shift its strategic focus on Asia. However, the American focus on Asia was always interrupted by some major events, such as Asia’s financial crisis and the war on terrorism. Especially over the past 10 years, the United States paid all attention to anti-terrorism and got entangled in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but made slow progress in Asia.

Today’s United States has taken “reviving the United States, leading the world” as its core objective. It changed the past practice of giving top priority to anti-terror, withdrew troops gradually from battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan, accelerated its pace of shifting strategic focus to Asia, and has taken a number of substantial measures.

Reporter: At the 12th round of China-U.S. defense consultation held recently, the U.S. undersecretary of Defense Michael Flournoy said the Pentagon does not regard China as an “enemy.” The China-U.S. relation is distinctive and certainly not “hostile relation.” What’s your opinion?

Lin Zhiyuan: There have been various versions about the China-U.S. relation, which is basically a “neither friend nor foe” relationship. It is a particular relationship between the world’s only superpower and a rising great power, and the most important geopolitical relationship.

The American overall strategy toward China is giving the same priority to cooperation and prevention, but intensifying “security rebalancing” efforts on China, taking comprehensive measures to suppress China, and instigating its allies to pay, contribute and appear to restrain China.

At the same time, the United States has strengthened penetration in China’s surrounding regions through humanitarian aids, military exchanges and arms sales. It has taken various actions in order to show its leadership and appeal to allies.

Reporter: The South China Sea issue has become increasingly sensitive and tense at present. Does America’s returning to the Asia-Pacific region mean it will pay more attention to or get involved in the South China Sea issue?

Lin Zhiyuan: Some thinkers of the U.S. Navy are quite interested in the English geographer Halford Mackinder’s “Heartland” theory. Mackinder said “Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland; who rules the Heartland commands the World Island (Eurasia).”

Mackinder’s followers have applied this strategy to Asia, and believed that controlling South China Sea will make the U.S. air force and navy command East Asia, and consequently command the “World Island”.

Reporter: In fact, the United States has never been away from Asia. What kind of impact will the so-called “return to Asia” strategy bring to the Asia-Pacific region?

Lin Zhiyuan: Currently, the situation in Europe is under the American control, and the situation in the Middle East is beneficial to the United States. The world’s geographic center is transferring from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and the Asia-Pacific region has become the world’s political and economic center.

The United States is eager to find a new way to consolidate its dominant position in this region. As for the interior political situation, the American political struggle has entered a critical stage and the economy maintains depressed. Under such circumstance, the Obama administration needs to be more aggressive in military and diplomacy in order to create favorable conditions to win the presidency election. Therefore, the American global strategy shows a layout of stabilizing in Europe, “shrinking” appropriately in the Middle East and “expanding” in the Asia-Pacific region.

The strategic adjustment of the United States will pose a great challenge to the geopolitical situation in the Asia-Pacific region and even the world order. The American intervention in some regions’ hot spots will result in a more complicated strategic environment for China’s peaceful rise.

Article link: http://english.people.com.cn/90883/7689638.html

US uses ‘hedging strategy’ to deal with China’s rise [People's Daily]

By Wang Tian (People’s Daily)
17:07, December 26, 2011

Edited and translated by People’s Daily Online

In November 2011, the United States held the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) 19th informal leadership meeting in Hawaii. Then, President Barack Obama visited Australia and attended the East Asia Summit, turning into the first U.S. President attending the East Asia Summit. During his visit in the Asia-Pacific region, Obama declared that the United States is a great power of the Pacific and will stay in the Asia-Pacific and play a greater and longer role in shaping the region by adhering to core principles and closely cooperating with its alliances and partners.

In the political area, the United States is fully strengthening its relations with its old alliances and new partners and actively participating in various multilateral organizations. Hillary Clinton also carried out an “ice-breaking trip” in Burma in December of 2011.

In the economic area, the United States is greatly promoting the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), trying to build a high quality and disciplined economic and trade structure in the region.

In the military area, the United States is trying to make its military deployments in the region more comprehensive, flexible and long-lasting, strengthening its military existences in the South East Asia and Australia and improving its alliances and partners’ military powers by carrying out trainings and drills. Taking the “Atlantic network” as the model, the United States is trying to build up a “Pacific network” that will accord with its own interests and outlook of values and include various partnerships and organizations.

China’s rise is one of the main reasons behind the eastward shift of U.S. global strategic focus. Due to the weak U.S. economic recovery and China’s growing economic and political clout, Americans are becoming increasingly worried that a rising China may pose a major threat to their country.

Obama said during his Asia-Pacific journey that the United States would seek more opportunities for cooperation with China including greater communication between the two militaries to promote understanding and avoid miscalculation. At the same time, he stressed the “importance of upholding international norms.”

The New York Times recently wrote in an article, “The Obama administration has been an active practitioner of gunboat diplomacy, a term that refers to achieving foreign-policy objectives through vivid displays of naval might.”

The United States has worked to shore up its ties to old Asian allies, like Japan and South Korea, as well as new giants like India. The goal is “to assemble a coalition to counter-balance China’s growing power.”

Joseph S. Nye, a professor at Harvard University, said in a commentary that the United States is “betting” that China’s rise will be peaceful, but no one knows for sure. Therefore, it created a cautious “hedge” strategy.

Article link: http://english.people.com.cn/90780/7688310.html

Putin: the world is tired of the U.S. dictatorship [Granma Internacional]

Hear, hear – Zuo Shou

Havana — Dec 22, 2011

PRIME Minister Vladimir Putin has affirmed that the world is tired of the dictatorship of the United States, a country only interested in having vassals instead of allies.

During a live television conference with the Russian population, Putin mentioned the situation of Afghanistan, attacked by U.S. forces in October of 2001, without international backing, to supposedly eliminate Saudi Osama bin Laden, Prensa Latina reported.

Subsequently, when the deed was consummated, the United States called on its partners to share responsibility in the war on this state and decided who should do what.

“We would like to be partners with the Americans, but they are only looking for vassals,” noted Putin, who is running in the Russian Federation’s March 2012 presidential elections seeking a third term as head of state.

At the same time, the Prime Minister confirmed that Russia has many allies. “We are going to build a foreign policy which demonstrates that we are not encircled on all sides.”

Putin recalled that during the 2007 vote in Guatemala on Sochi’s bid for the 2014 Winter Olympics, delegates from many regions of the world approached him to say that they were voting for Russia because of its independent foreign policy.

The head of government imposed something of a record in a four-and-a-half hour broadcast encounter with people of various professions and political positions, during which he received 1.7 million questions or concerns and responded to approximately 100 of them.

Article link: http://www.granma.cu/ingles/international-i/22dic-putin.html

DPR Korea Poster Exhibition Opens – VIDEO [KCNA]

A very nice little video featuring DPR Korea propaganda posters. – Zuo Shou

VIDEO LINK: http://www.kcna.kp/userAction.do?action=videoindex&lang=eng&newsyear=2012&newsno=191473