Merkel urges Putin to pull troops back from Ukraine border

Aljazeera    8 Apr 2021

German Chancellor Angela Merkel told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday to pull back a military build-up near the country’s border with Ukraine amid heightened tensions in the conflict-stricken Donbas region.

Ukrainian government troops have battled Russian-backed separatists in the country’s eastern Donetsk and Lugansk regions, which form part of Donbas, since the rebels seized a swath of territory there in April 2014.

Fears of an escalation in hostilities have mounted in recent weeks, with Ukraine raising the alarm about an increase in Russian forces along the countries’ shared border and renewed front-line clashes.

“The Chancellor demanded that this build-up be unwound in order to de-escalate the situation,” Germany’s government said in a readout of a telephone call between Merkel and Putin.

 

 

Turkish President Erdoğan has warned the world Jerusalem “belongs” to Turkey

Breitbart 4 Oct 2020

Erdogan made his public claim Thursday as he addressed Turkish lawmakers during a major policy speech in Ankara. He said:

In this city that we had to leave in tears during the First World War, it is still possible to come across traces of the Ottoman resistance. So Jerusalem is our city, a city from us. Our first qibla [direction of prayer in Islam] al-Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem are the symbolic mosques of our faith. In addition, this city is home to the holy places of Christianity and Judaism.

As the Times of Israel reported, the Ottoman Empire ruled Jerusalem from 1516 to 1917. Modern Turkey, its successor state, has long claimed a connection to the holy city, regularly condemning Israel for alleged attemtps to “Judaize” it and the U.S. administration’s December 2017 recognition of it as Israel’s capital.

Turkey’s claim to ownership and an Islamic proprietary interest in the city defies thousands of years of accepted wisdom that confirms some of Judaism’s holiest sites are located in the West Bank and eastern Jerusalem.

These include the Temple Mount and Western Wall in Jerusalem; the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs in Hebron; and Joseph’s Tomb in Nablus.

That did not stop Erdoğan during his lengthy speech to the Turkish parliament lamenting the fate of Jerusalem and Palestinians and reaffirming his embrace of Hamas, the Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip, and is deemed a terrorist group by Israel, the E.U. and the U.S.

Towards a US-China War? The Creation of a Global Totalitarian System, A “One World Government”?

 Global Research, August 23, 2020

If we step back from the details of daily headlines around the world and try to make sense of larger patterns, the dominant dynamic defining world geopolitics in the past three years or more is the appearance of a genuine irregular conflict between the two most formidable powers on the planet—The Peoples’ Republic of China and the United States of America. Increasingly it’s beginning to look as if some very dark global networks are orchestrating what looks to be an updated rerun of their 1939-1945 World War.   The powers that be periodically use war to gain major policy shifts.

On behalf of the Powers That Be (PTB), World War II was orchestrated by the circles of the City of London and of Wall Street to maneuver two great obstacles—Russia and Germany—to wage a war to the death against each other, in order that those Anglo-Saxon PTB could reorganize the world geopolitical chess board to their advantage. It largely succeeded, but for the small detail that after 1945, Wall Street and the Rockefeller brothers were determined that England play the junior partner to Washington. London and Washington then entered the period of their global domination known as the Cold War.

That Anglo-American global condominium ended, by design, in 1989 with the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the Soviet Union by 1991.

Around this time, with the onset of the Bill Clinton presidency in 1992, the next phase– financial and industrial globalization– was inaugurated. With that, began the hollowing out of the industrial base of not only the United States, but also of Germany and the EU. The cheap labor outsourcing enabled by the new WTO drove wages down and destroyed one industry after the next in the industrial West after the 1990s. It was a necessary step on the path to what G.H.W. Bush in 1990 called the New World Order. The next step would be destruction of national sovereignty everywhere. Here the USA was the major obstacle.

The open space in Orion

“Dark, heavy clouds came up and clashed against each other. The atmosphere parted and rolled back; then we could look up through the open space in Orion, whence came the voice of God. The Holy City will come down through that open space. I saw that the powers of earth are now being shaken and that events come in order. War, and rumors of war, sword, famine, and pestilence are first to shake the powers of earth, then the voice of God will shake the sun, moon, and stars, and this earth also. I saw that the shaking of the powers in Europe is not, as some teach, the shaking of the powers of heaven, but it is the shaking of the angry nations.” Early Writings page 41

Tech revolution may cause World War III, warns Alibaba billionaire Jack Ma

RT24 Jan, 2019

Chinese entrepreneur Jack Ma says the spate of technological advances around the world could lead to a new global conflict between major powers looking to assert their dominance.

“The First World War was because of the first technology revolution. The second technology revolution caused World War II,” he told the audience during a discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

“This is the third technology revolution – we’re coming.”

The Alibaba founder’s comments echoed those he made two years ago, when he said that automation and the rise of artificial intelligence would create internal social upheaval and a geopolitical redistribution of power between the leaders and those left behind.

Though elsewhere in his speech, he wryly remarked that “today, there’s no expert of tomorrow, there’s only experts of yesterday.”

Turkey deploys tanks at border with Syria

Hurriyetdaily  January 14 2019

The Turkish military deployed tanks and armored vehicles to the border province of Hatay on Jan. 13, as Turkey continues its preparations for a planned military operation in the east of River Euphrates in Syria against ISIL and the YPG, which it sees as the Syrian branch of the PKK.

According to Demirören News Agency, several tanks and armored vehicles were dispatched from the eastern province of Erzurum to the border city of İskenderun by train.

The vehicles were unloaded from trains at İskenderun train station and were loaded on to trucks en route to border troops stationed around Cilvegözü border gate under heavy security measures.

Xi Jinping calls on China's army to be battle-ready

Asiaone   Jan 05, 2019 

SHANGHAI - China's armed forces must strengthen their sense of urgency and do everything they can to prepare for battle, President Xi Jinping told a meeting of top brass on Friday (Jan 4).

China is keen to beef up its armed forces amid territorial disputes in the South China Sea and escalating tension with the United States over issues ranging from trade to the status of Taiwan.

The official Xinhua news agency said Xi told a meeting of the top military authority that China faced increasing risks and challenges, and the armed forces must work to secure its security and development needs.

Xi, who is also chairman of the Central Military Commission, said the armed forces must devise strategies for the new era and take on responsibilities for preparing and waging war.

"The world is facing a period of major changes never seen in a century, and China is still in an important period of strategic opportunity for development," he was quoted as saying.

He said the armed forces needed to be able to respond quickly to emergencies, needed to upgrade their joint operations capabilities and nurture new types of combat forces.

Xi's comments followed his remarks on Wednesday that China still reserved the right to use force to achieve "reunification" with Taiwan and prevent the island's independence.

Xi's Taiwan speech came just days after US President Donald Trump signed the Asia Reassurance Initiative Act into law, reaffirming the US commitment to the island's security.

Merkel: EU leaders should one day consider “a real, true European army”

The Guardian   13 Nov 2018

Angela Merkel has said EU leaders should one day consider “a real, true European army” shortly after Donald Trump ramped up a Twitter attack on Emmanuel Macron over the same idea.

Speaking to the European parliament in Strasbourg, the German chancellor backed the bold step in European defence policy, as part of a speech extolling the need for EU cooperation in migration, climate change and counter-terrorism. “The times when we could rely on others is past,” she said.

To a mix of applause and jeers from Eurosceptic MEPs, she said: “We have to look at the vision of one day creating a real, true European army.” The chancellor said the idea would complement Nato, but gave no details on when the ambitious idea could become reality.

Her words echoed those of the French president, who in an interview said Europe needed to better defend itself.

Trump took umbrage at what he saw as a call by Macron for a European army as protection against the US, conflating earlier comments from the French president on cyber threats. The US president escalated his attack on Tuesday with a number of insulting tweets.

Iran's Khamenei urges Muslim nations to unite against U.S.

Yahoo News April 26, 2018

ANKARA (Reuters) - Iran's supreme leader called on Muslim nations to unite against the United States, saying Tehran would never yield to "bullying," state television reported on Thursday.

"The Iranian nation has successfully resisted bullying attempts by America and other arrogant powers and we will continue to resist... All Muslim nations should stand united against America and other enemies," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said.

Iran's top authority criticized Trump for saying on Tuesday some countries in the Middle East "wouldn't last a week" without U.S. protection.

"Such remarks are humiliation for Muslims ... Unfortunately there is war in our region between Muslim countries. The backward governments of some Muslim countries are fighting with other countries," Khamenei said.

Iran and Saudi Arabia have long been locked in a proxy war, competing for regional supremacy from Iraq to Syria and Lebanon to Yemen.

Hundreds of Google employees are up in arms over the company's partnership with the Pentagon in AI technology

RT  8 Apr, 2018

Hundreds of Google employees are up in arms over the company's partnership with the Pentagon in AI technology, fearing it may be used for war. Experts told RT the "questionable" alliance could result in "disaster for humanity."

Google employees wrote a letter to the company's CEO, Sundar Pichai, calling on the US tech giant to immediately pull out of a controversial program that many fear could be used for warfare.

"We believe that Google should not be in the business of war," the letter obtained by The New York Times and published earlier this week stated. 

Gizmodo broke the news about Google's partnership with the US Department of Defense (DoD) last month, adding that Project Maven, whose stated mission is to "accelerateDoD's integration of big data and machine learning," was established in April 2017. The project will see Google developing AI surveillance to help the US military scrutinize video footage captured by US government drones "to detect vehicles and other objects, track their motions, and provide results to the Department of Defense."

Google claims that the technology is human-friendly and is actually designed to "save lives" and "scoped to be for non-offensive purposes." But Noel Sharkey, Emeritus professor of AI at Sheffield University, told RT that the fears of Google employees "are correct."

The Manufacturing of Wars

Global Research March 18, 2018

This carefully research article by Professor Graeme McQueen presents a timely historical viewpoint which is  routinely “censored” by the mainstream media as well by the search engines. The danger of World War III is not front-page news.

Kindly consider forwarding Professor McQueen’s article to your friends and colleagues, crosspost it on alternative media and blog sites.

The threat of World War III is real, yet there is no anti-war movement in sight.  In the US, Canada and the EU, the peace movement is defunct, ignorant of the broader implications of nuclear war.

This is why, dear readers, we call upon your support and endorsement. There is a real “conspiracy” to trigger war. That’s the truth. Establish community networks, spread the word, organize at the grassroots level.

In the words of Prof. McQueen:

“Our task is clear. We must mobilize both our investigative resources and our communication resources to nullify the efforts of those who specialize in the construction and encouragement of war triggers and who wish to keep the war system robust. We lost over 100 million people to war in the 20^th century. Are we really going to let this happen again?” 

Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research Editor, March 18, 2018

***

As we watch Western governments testing their opponents – today Iran, the next day the DPRK, and then Russia and China – we hold our breaths. We are waiting with a sense of dread for the occurrence of a catalytic event that will initiate war. Now is the time to reflect on such catalytic events, to understand them, to prepare for them.

The assassination of Archduke Ferdinand on June 28, 1914 in Sarajevo led to the outbreak of World War I. The Gulf of Tonkin incidents on August 2 and August 4, 1964 enabled what we call the Vietnam War.

Both events were war triggers. A “war trigger”, as I am using the term, is an event that facilitates an outbreak or expansion of hot war–that phase of the war system in which active killing takes place.

War triggers can lead affected populations to cast aside their critical faculties and their willingness to dissent from government narratives. They can also disable moral values and ideological commitments. At the outbreak of World War I the peace movement, the women’s movement and the socialist movement were all shattered.

“It is two minutes to midnight”

Washington Post  January 25, 2018

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists advanced the symbolic Doomsday Clock a notch closer to the end of humanity Thursday, moving it ahead by 30 seconds after what the organization called a “grim assessment” of the state of geopolitical affairs.

“As of today,” Bulletin president Rachel Bronson told reporters, “it is two minutes to midnight” — as close as the world has ever been to the hour of apocalypse.

In moving the clock forward, the group cited “the failure of President Trump and other world leaders to deal with looming threats of nuclear war and climate change.”

The organization — which has 15 Nobel Laureates on its board — now believes “the world is not only more dangerous now than it was a year ago; it is as threatening as it has been since World War II,” Bulletin officials Lawrence M. Krauss and Robert Rosner wrote in an op-ed published Thursday by The Washington Post. “In fact, the Doomsday Clock is as close to midnight today as it was in 1953, when Cold War fears perhaps reached their highest levels.”

The last time the clock advanced so far, the United States had just tested its first thermonuclear device, and the Soviet Union had tested a hydrogen bomb.

Today, Bronson said, “to call the world’s nuclear situation dire is to understate the danger and its immediacy.”

Donald Trump and Social Engineering

Who pose the greater threat in Korea

24.04.2017 By James ONeill

The election of Donald Trump as US President has seen the ramping up of US rhetoric about North Korea. Trump recently demanded that China should use its influence with the North Koreans and if China did not intervene, then, according to an interview Trump gave to the UK Financial Times, the “US would act alone.”

US Vice President Mike Pence, currently on a visit to Australia where he will undoubtedly seek Australian support for the US position, said that his country’s

“era of strategic patience” with North Korea was over.

Trump also claimed to have dispatched “an armada”, by which he was presumably referring to the aircraft carrier the USS Vinson and its support vessels, to Korean waters. Perhaps typical of Trump’s loose association with the truth, the Vinson was at that very time steaming in the opposite direction.

Quite what is to be made of this fresh rhetorical belligerence is not clear. One thing however has been abundantly clear for nearly the whole of North Korea’s short existence and that is US antipathy and refusal to take meaningful steps to resolve what has become a festering problem for East Asia.

Korea was only divided into two parts following the defeat of the Japanese in 1945. The dividing line was the 38^thparallel of latitude, with the Soviet Union occupying the northern part and the US the southern portion.    Read More

Iran and Donald Trump: is war coming?

Alexander Mercouris,  6 February 2017

The conflict between the US and Iran is not rooted in any grand plan for Iranian control of the Middle East. It is the result of US concern about the system of alliances Iran has built up to prevent a repeat of the disaster of the Iran-Iraq war.

If since coming to office the new Trump administration has been making tentative moves towards repairing the US’s fraught relations with Russia, towards Iran it has been acting with heightened hostility.

It has blamed Iran for a missile attack on a Saudi frigate carried out by Yemeni forces, criticised Iran for its missile tests, and slapped more sanctions on the country.  President Trump has made no secret of his strong disagreement with the Iranian nuclear agreement Iran agreed with the Obama administration, and he has also called Iran “the number one terrorist state”.       Read more