Dr Kevin Barrett — Press TV May 19, 2013

Nearly 1,000 American military bases occupy every corner of the planet. US troops have killed more than a million people in various countries during the past decade. Officially, this is all being done in the name of “freedom.”

Yet the USA, once one of the most free countries on earth, is no longer free. It is rapidly becoming a militarized gulag society – a giant open air prison.

The faster Americans lose their freedom, the louder their leaders chant empty, Orwellian freedom slogans. And the loudest and most Orwellian symbol of American unfreedom is the new World Trade Center skyscraper officially named the Freedom Tower, which might more appropriately be called the Unfreedom Tower.

Appropriately enough, the new Unfreedom Tower will be surrounded by $40 million dollars worth of “security infrastructure” including bollards, dual-barricades, street barriers and 11-foot-tall security booths. New York Business Journal lamented the situation in its recent headline: “World Trade Center or armed camp?” According to the New York Times, Lower Manhattan will become “a fortresslike environment” featuring “a fortified palisade of guard booths, vehicle barricades and sidewalk barriers.” New York Magazine quoted one of the planners: “You have these checkpoints that make it look more like an armed camp or a gated community.”

Or an Israeli-occupied territory.

The Unfreedom Tower is the architectural symbol of the new, post-9/11 world. The contradiction between its ostensible symbolic meaning – “freedom” – and the reality on the ground around it is not an accident.

George Orwell famously explained how those who set out to crush freedom do so by violating logic and language. By flooding the airwaves with slogans like “freedom is slavery,” Big Brother’s dystopian government in Orwell’s novel 1984 paralyzes the public’s capacity to think clearly and logically. Once clear thinking is paralyzed, Big Brother can do whatever he wants. As Orwell put it: “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.”

By building a “Freedom Tower” surrounded by an armed camp, symbolizing the loss of liberty that 9/11 was designed to catalyze, the architects of Philip Zelikow’s post-9/11 “whole new world” are systematically and intentionally destroying the American public’s capacity to think.

Zelikow, Wolfowitz, and the other architects of this Orwellian “whole new world” have been using their controlled corporate media to attack the American mind with Orwellian “freedom equals slavery” slogans, beginning just minutes after the Twin Towers were demolished. Practically before the North Tower had finished its ten-second-freefall, the television was blaring that Bin Laden and his friends did it because “they hate our freedoms.” The utter absurdity of this statement was rarely remarked on.

The television then repeatedly told Americans that in order to preserve their freedom, they would have to give up some of their liberty. The fact that freedom and liberty mean the same thing makes this an absurdity. By forcing Americans to internalize such absurdities, the mind-controllers created a whole nation of unthinking automatons, ready to march off to war on transparently ridiculous premises… and to systematically slaughter civilians, rape children in front of their parents as an “interrogation technique,” commit unspeakable sexual crimes at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere, poison much of the Middle East and Central Asia with depleted uranium, murder thousands of innocent people with cowardly drone strikes, and generally perpetrate unspeakable acts on a daily basis.

As Voltaire put it: “Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.” If Voltaire were alive today, he would tell us that people who believe three skyscrapers can disappear at free-fall acceleration through the path of most resistance, due to modest office fires ignited by only two planes, will commit the most hideous atrocities imaginable.

The Unfreedom Tower now looms over an unfree land.

In today’s America, executive-branch death panels oversee a “disposition matrix” in which computers decide which people will be murdered by the government, which ones will merely be disappeared without charges into the global sex torture gulag, and which ones will be arrested and tried in a courtroom. This despite the clear Constitutional statement that in the USA, no one may be “deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.” And the phrase “due process of law” is clearly defined: It means a public, transparent trial by jury, beginning with presumption of innocence, under various safeguards.

The pretext for this annihilation of liberty is the “war on terrorism.” Big Brother tells us that terrorists are likely to strike us all dead at any moment, so emergency measures are necessary. But in reality, terrorism barely even exists. Americans are more likely to drown in their bathtubs, or be hit by lightning, than be killed by terrorists. The whole terror scare is a paranoid hallucination that was carefully scripted and inflicted on the American people by the most depraved and demonic mind-controllers who have ever lived.

Anybody who can see that two plus two make four, not five, can see that the current rulers of the USA are not the Constitutional government. They are treasonous usurpers.

When will Americans break through the checkpoints, overturn the guard booths, overwhelm the barricades, and overthrow the demons-in-human-form who have paralyzed their minds and destroyed their freedoms?

KB/HSN

Source

Nafeez Mosadeq Ahmed — Ceasefire Magazine May 16, 2013

A whistleblower has revealed extraordinary information on the U.S. government’s support for international terrorist networks and organised crime. The government has denied the allegations yet gone to extraordinary lengths to silence her. Her critics have derided her as a fabulist and fabricator. But now comes word that some of her most serious allegations were confirmed by a major European newspaper only to be squashed at the request of the U.S. government.

In a recent  book Classified Woman, Sibel Edmonds, a former translator for the FBI, describes how the Pentagon, CIA and State Department maintained intimate ties to al-Qaeda militants as late as 2001. Her memoir, Classified Woman: The Sibel Edmonds Story, published last year, charged senior government officials with negligence, corruption and collaboration with al Qaeda in illegal arms smuggling and drugs trafficking in Central Asia.

In interviews with this author in early March, Edmonds claimed that Ayman al-Zawahiri, current head of al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden’s deputy at the time, had innumerable, regular meetings at the U.S. embassy in Baku, Azerbaijan, with U.S. military and intelligence officials between 1997 and 2001, as part of an operation known as ‘Gladio B’. Al-Zawahiri, she charged, as well as various members of the bin Laden family and other mujahideen, were transported on NATO planes to various parts of Central Asia and the Balkans to participate in Pentagon-backed destabilisation operations.

According to two Sunday Times journalists speaking on condition of anonymity, this and related revelations had been confirmed by senior Pentagon and MI6 officials as part of a four-part investigative series that were supposed to run in 2008. The Sunday Times journalists described how the story was inexplicably dropped under the pressure of undisclosed “interest groups”, which, they suggest, were associated with the U.S. State Department.

Shooting the Messenger

Continues …

Russia Today — May 19, 2013

Tehran is ready to explain every “suspicious” point of the country’s nuclear program as well as allow experts to Parchin nuclear facility if the IAEA agrees to sign a protocol detailing all its questions, the Iranian ambassador to Russia says.

The protocol should contain all IAEA’s concerns about Parchin and all other objects which the agency suspects of being nuke-oriented,  Seyed Mahmoud-Reza Sajjadi has told the Russian media. “And if they don’t find anything, let’s close Iran’s nuclear file and remove it from the UN Security Council.”

The ambassador recalled that Parchin, which the Agency suspects could have been the site of high-explosives tests related to nuclear weapons, had been fully inspected by the IAEA, but then, he said, the agency wanted to undertake further inspections.

“We agreed with a condition that such a protocol would be signed,” the diplomat said. “We displayed flexibility. We offered – let’s sign a protocol and spell out in detail all accusations.” But international experts want to visit the suspected facility prior to signing the protocol – “this is a game,” the ambassador said.

“We did not see sincerity in the way that IAEA and Yukiya Amano, director-general of the UN nuclear watchdog behaved,” Sajjadi said.

Besides Parchin, the IAEA has suppositions over another Iran’s facility – Fordo uranium enrichment plant – and demands its closure.  Speaking to journalists, Sajjadi noted that Iran was not obliged to close the facility and stop uranium enrichment.

“Have you read the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons? Does it say that we have no right to enrich uranium to 20 percent?” Sajjadi asked.

He said the demand to shut down Fordo and stop uranium enrichment was “unfair and ridiculous” and Iran has become a victim of double standards of the IAEA and the US.

“We doubt the sincerity of the West, because in the past they have done to us illogical proposals, including the closure of Fordo, and promised to allow us to buy gold and metals, as well as to authorize export of petroleum products. But it is unfair and ridiculous proposal ,” said Sajjadi.

“The IAEA was designed to safeguard that no one is developing nuclear weapons. But Israel has a nuclear bomb, and no one cares,” said the Iranian ambassador.

He assured that Iran does not pursue nuclear weapons as supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has made a decision not to build nuclear weapon.

“Religious fatwa is above the law”, Sajjadi stressed.

Moreover, nuclear weapons would not ensure security for Tehran, but “on the contrary would bring risk”, he said.

“Now Iran can develop two or three bombs from the materials it possesses. But if you had a gun with two bullets, would you really go to war against an army?” said Sajjadi.

The Islamic Republic insists it has no interest in nuclear weapons, and says it is enriching uranium for purely peaceful purposes, such as nuclear power.

There have been attempts from both sides to find common ground in the issue, but negotiations have yielded no results.

The latest Iran’s nuclear talks in Kazakhstan in April also brought no breakthrough with negotiators going back to their capitals declaring “positions remain far apart”.

Since then no date or place has been set for new talks.

Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad is expected to visit Moscow on July 1-2 as Russia hosts a forum of gas exporting countries.

“The Iranian president has been invited, and so we are expecting his visit,” Sajjadi said at a meeting, stressing that Ahmadinejad still will be acting president.

Source

AFP — May 18, 2013

France said Friday it is opposed to having Iran attend a peace conference on Syria despite Damascus’s ally Russia wanting Tehran’s presence at the event expected in the first half of June.

Foreign ministry spokesman Philippe Lalliot said: “We do not want Iran. The Syrian crisis is contagious and affects the entire zone. Regional stability is at stake and we cannot see how a country (Iran) that threatens this stability can participate in this conference.”

The new talks are meant to include both the fiercest rebels and members of the regime — a difficulty considering some opposition members’ refusal to recognise President Bashar al-Assad as a negotiating partner.

Moscow is also calling for the inclusion on this occasion of its trading partner Iran and US ally Saudi Arabia as a counterweight.

The Geneva talks were agreed during a May 7 visit to Moscow by US Secretary of State John Kerry and are seen as a rare joint peace push by the two former Cold War rivals some 26 months into the Syrian war.

But US President Barack Obama admits that mistrust lingers between Moscow and Washington and the world community remains particularly concerned by Russia’s arms deliveries to its longstanding ally Assad.

Source

David Lory VanDerBeek — The Rebel.org May 18, 2013

OBJECTIVE

Let me be clear, my objective in sharing prior knowledge of a mass casualty terror drill is to prevent criminal elements in the government from taking this drill live at the jamboree. I want the good people in government to feel confident in maintaining accountability over one another. As an Eagle scout myself, I want the scouts to have a great jamboree.

FEMA JULY DRILL

I have been on the phone with two reliable sources connected with military and a well known private investigative network. The military source decided to come forward because of the Boston bombing and the evidence that it was staged by the FBI.  The source provided information regarding a July FEMA mass casualty terror drill that has been kept a secret from the public. As I’ve previously said, it is not the announced FEMA/DHS/FBI terror drills that concern me, it is the unannounced drills that go live like Boston that concern me because real people can and do die. The source indicated that we need to scrutinize the National Scout Jamboree 2013 for a possible mass government staged false flag attack. The leaders of the event are changing the location of the event for the first time in 30 years. Governor Earl Ray Tomblin of West Virginia has signed an executive order giving DHS, FEMA, and the national guard martial law police power over the event. “Thousands” of national guard soldiers will be there. Governor “Tomblin said he expects several thousand National Guard from West Virginia and across the country on the ground during the Jamboree “in case of an attack … or health crisis.”” There will be 50,000 scouts there with their families. The source provided notes from a government source that FEMA is preparing an unannounced disease outbreak drill caused by conventional and unconventional terrorism in July with 4:1 ratio of mental and “sick” and believes this drill could be held at the Jamboree. Unconventional terrorism is chemical and germ weapons. There will be kill and wounded family members involving sociogenic illness which means that a medical condition will be shared by a mass of people. They will have multiple unexplained physical symptoms. There will be no clear start or stop to the event that will be long term inciting panic and mistrust of public officials. Being at this reserve, the scouts would be in the perfect location to rationalize a quarantine. Rioting/”breaking quarantine”, “noncompliance with vaccination and medical orders” as well as “resisting travel restrictions” are addressed in this powerpoint by the man named as the FEMA expert Steven M. Crimando overseeing the drill scenario If you look at his bio slide, he was a responder to both terrorist attacks on the WTC 1993 and 9/11 and Anthrax threat. In other words, this man is an expert in what would be the 9/11 scale of bio/chemical terrorist attacks.

WHO IS BECHTEL?

Continues …

Tyler Durden — Zero Hedge May 16, 2013

Earlier we reported that the US has now officially landed a Marine force in Israel as well as an assault ship, in a visit that the US Navy promptly assured “is not associated with, nor a reaction to, any world events.” It seems we were not the only ones who read this justification somewhat skeptically: so did Russia. And in a historic event, the Russian Pacific fleet, for the first time in decades, crossed the Suez Canal and entered the Mediterranean, direction Cyprus’ port of Limasol (hi Cyprus – Russia will be arriving shortly) in what is now the loudest implied warning to the US and Israel amassing military units across Syria’s border that Russia will not stand idly by as Syria is used by the Israeli “Defense” Forces for target practice. “The task force has successfully passed through the Suez Channel and entered the Mediterranean. It is the first time in decades that Pacific Fleet warships enter this region,” Capt. First Rank Roman Martov said. This is what is also known as dropping hints, loud and clear.

The group, including the destroyer Admiral Panteleyev, the amphibious warfare ships Peresvet and Admiral Nevelskoi, the tanker Pechenga and the salvage/rescue tug Fotiy Krylov left the port of Vladivostok on March 19 to join Russia’s Mediterranean task force.

The task force currently includes the large anti-submarine ship Severomorsk, the frigate Yaroslav Mudry, the salvage/rescue tugs Altai and SB-921 and the tanker Lena from the Northern and Baltic Fleets, as well as the Ropucha-II Class landing ship Azov from the Black Sea Fleet. The task force may be enlarged to include nuclear submarines, Navy Commander Admiral Viktor Chirkov said last Sunday.

Shore leave for a whole lot of submarines just a few hundred kilometers from Syria? Surely. From Rian.

“The task force has successfully passed through the Suez Channel and entered the Mediterranean. It is the first time in decades that Pacific Fleet warships enter this region,” Capt. First Rank Roman Martov said.

The Defense Ministry said in April Russia has begun setting up a naval task force in the Mediterranean, sending several warships from the Pacific Fleet to the region. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in March a permanent naval task force in the Mediterranean was needed to defend Russia’s interests in the region.

A senior Defense Ministry official said the Mediterranean task force’s command and control agencies will be based either in Novorossiysk, Russia, or in Sevastopol, Ukraine.

Admiral Vladimir Komoyedov, head of the parliamentary defense committee, previously told RIA Novosti that the Mediterranean task force should be comprised of 10 warships and support vessels as part of several tactical groups tasked with attack, antisubmarine warfare and minesweeping.

The Soviet Union maintained its 5th Mediterranean Squadron from 1967 until 1992. It was formed to counter the US Navy’s 6th Fleet during the Cold War, and consisted of 30-50 warships and auxiliary vessels.

It appears that the squadron is being reincarnated and quite rapidly at that.

It also appears that the two key naval forces in the Mediterranean are finally starting to position themselves for what may soon be a face off.

Hopefully Europe’s “anti-manipulation” task force can spook enough majors to push the price of Brent much lower before the moment such an escalation becomes reality.

P.S. Got oil?

Source

Introduction — May 16, 2013

Dzokhar emerges from underneath boat cover during his arrest, apparently uninjured. Click to enlarge

Tsarnaev’s ‘confession’ will not silence the mounting questions over the flaws and inconsistencies in the official account of the Boston Marathon bombing. Particularly after officials have now admitted that Tsarnaev was NOT ARMED when he was arrested, despite earlier police claims that he was wounded in a “shootout” during the arrest.

Such contradictions only add to suspicions as no one actually saw Tsarnaev write his alleged ‘confession’ in the boat. 

All the more so as during his arrest Tsarnaev reportedly sustained injuries to his throat that have since rendered him “speechless”. So although he cannot testify in an open court U.S. authorities will now have a confession with which to prosecute him.

Or so we are being led to believe.

It’s all a little too convenient, especially as it ignores all the other suspect characters who were photographed at the scene and whom the corporate media have still not even mentioned.

How long has it been now? Those photographs clearly indicate that something odd was happening and the Tsarnaev brothers were not involved. Yet the corporate media still hasn’t breathed a word about them.

Instead, they’ve focused on the Tsarnaev brothers while U.S. authorities have built a case against them. So although it could be entirely fabricated, expect the corporate media to continue to focus on the Tsarnaev brothers while studiously ignoring the other characters who were photographed acting suspiciously at the scene.

Even more than with 9/11, the corporate media is helping the authorities piece together the official account of events and sell it to the public. Helping the real bombers to evade scrutiny as they fabricate the “news” and the public is distracted and the guilty evade justice.

In effect, that makes the corporate media complicit in these crimes.

Bloody confession: Tsarnaev ‘wrote note’ inside boat prior to arrest

Russia Today — May 16, 2013

Battered and bloody, Boston bombings suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev reportedly scrawled a confession inside the hull of a boat police found him in after a day-long manhunt. The note says the April marathon bombing was revenge for US actions against Muslims.

The confession specifically named US military actions in Afghanistan and Iraq as motives for the attack, and called the Boston Marathon bombing victims ‘collateral damage’ in the same vein that Muslim civilians had been killed in American led wars, CBS news reports.

“When you attack one Muslim, you attack all Muslims,” the note allegedly added.

Dzhokhar reportedly declared he did not mourn the death of his older brother Tamerlan – the other suspect in the bombings, who died from injured received during a shootout with police – saying he was already a martyr in paradise. Dzhokhar added that he expected to join his brother in the afterlife.

Law enforcement sources told the network the wall the note had been scribbled on was riddled with bullet holes. Police unloaded a volley of shots after Dzhokhar lifted up the tarpaulin, claiming they feared he had another bomb.

He had sustained multiple gunshot wounds and was severely bleeding from injuries to his left ear, neck and thigh. Initial reports said his neck wound was possibly from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a botched suicide attempt, though it was later revealed that Dzhokhar was unarmed when captured in Suburban Watertown Massachusetts on April 19.

His arrest followed a massive manhunt which brought the greater Boston area to a standstill.

Police say the contents of the confession mirror many of the things he communicated to investigators while recovering from his injuries at a hospital several days later. The confession will be admissible in court.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, is currently convalescing in a federal prison hospital in Massachusetts and has been charged with using a weapon of mass destruction in the deadly attack which killed three people and injured 264 near the marathon finish line on April 15.

If found guilty, he could face the death penalty.

Source

Thomas Grove — Reuters May 16, 2013

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Iran must take part in a proposed international conference to end Syria’s civil war, but that Western states wanted to limit the participants and possibly predetermine the outcome of the talks.

Conflicting comments from Russia and the West over Iran’s role in the possible meeting have added to disagreements which already threaten to derail the conference proposed by Moscow and Washington last week.

“Among some of our Western colleagues, there is a desire to narrow the circle of external participants and begin the process from a very small group of countries in a framework which, in essence, would predetermine the negotiating teams, agenda, and maybe even the outcome of talks,” Lavrov said in an interview posted on the Foreign Ministry website on Thursday.

Iran, which supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, has welcomed the proposal and expressed hopes that it would be a part of the process.

Its desire to participate in a June 2012 meeting on Syria hosted by the United Nations in Geneva was a bone of contention between Washington and Moscow.

“One must not exclude a country like Iran from this process because of geopolitical preferences. It is a very important external player. But there is no agreement on this yet,” Lavrov said in the interview given to a Lebanese television station.

The West is loath to see Iran, which has grown increasingly isolated on the international stage because of Western fears it is developing nuclear weapons, being at any such talks.

The meeting, which U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry has said would likely take place in early June, will aim to have the same global powers that attended the 2012 meeting, but this time include representatives of the Syrian government and opposition.

Last year the foreign ministers of the U.N. Security Council’s five permanent members – Russia, the United States, China, France and Britain – all attended the Geneva talks along with Turkey, Kuwait, Qatar, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Arab League head Nabil Elaraby and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton.

PROSPECTS FAR FROM CLEAR

With Syria’s factional and sectarian rivalries more entrenched than ever, however, it is far from clear the warring parties are ready to negotiate with each other.

Most opposition figures have ruled out talks unless Assad and his inner circle are excluded from any future transitional government.

Lavrov also said Saudi Arabia, a foe of both Damascus and Tehran and leading backer of the rebel forces which did not participate in last year’s meeting, should be present.

He added that he would not exclude any political opposition groups, but that “terrorist groups” like the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front had no place at the negotiating table.

He did not mention any of the other rebel groups that operate under the umbrella of the Free Syrian Army.

In Paris, French President Francois Hollande told a news conference that despite an urgency to solve the crisis politically, Russia’s arms sales to Syria proved that Assad’s opponents needed to maintain military pressure.

France and Britain are trying to convince European partners to amend an arms embargo that would allow delivery to Syrian rebels. Russia has been one of Assad’s biggest arms suppliers.

“While the Russians are accepting the idea of this conference they continue to give weapons to Bashar al-Assad’s regime, so we need to have an attitude that balances that out,” Hollande said.

A French official reiterated Paris’ previously-stated stance that Iran could not be part of any talks.

“Iran cannot be part of it because it always tries to mix the Syria debate with the nuclear issue,” the official said.

No venue has been confirmed but Kerry has talked of a “Geneva Two” meeting.

(Additional reporting by John Irish in Paris, Writing By Thomas Grove; Editing by Mike Collett-White)

Source

Marwan Naamani — Associated Press May 16, 2013

ABOARD USS PONCE — Divers leap from a helicopter into the Gulf’s choppy waters to destroy a mine, while a US marine fires at a floating target, as forces from 41 countries gathered for naval manoeuvres facing Iran’s shores.

The mine-sweeping exercise is being held close to the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic mouth of the Gulf that Iran has repeatedly threatened to block if attacked over its disputed nuclear programme.

The US Navy’s 5th fleet invited a group of journalists to attend part of the 25-day exercises which conclude on May 30.

This operation is “purely defensive” and targets no particular country, said Vice-Admiral John Miller, commander of the Bahrain-based 5th Fleet.

But Tehran warned against “provocations” last week as the US-led forces prepared for the exercise in the Gulf.

“All those present must be careful not to carry out provocative actions,” said Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast.

A total of 35 ships are in the Gulf for the International Mine Countermeasures Exercise (IMCMEX), including the USS Ponce, an amphibious transport that has been modified to act as a floating base for mine-sweeping operations.

Also present are the USS Ardent, a mine countermeasures ship, Britain’s RFA Cardigan Bay landing ship, 18 Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUVs) and 6,500 naval personnel.

During the exercise, divers scaled down ropes from Seahawk helicopters near floating mines, stuck explosives to the devices and detonated them remotely.

For underwater mines, the UUVs, remotely controlled from the “war room” aboard the USS Ponce, were sent to place an explosive device next to the mine to take it out.

IMCMEX “is about increasing our capabilities working with our international partners… A defensive exercise in nature,” said Lieutenant Commander Peter Abbott aboard USS Ardent.

He said that in addition to mine countermeasures, the exercise this year included maritime infrastructure protection, as well as protection for oil platforms in the Gulf.

Alongside the US navy, forces from Britain, France and Germany and several Arab countries are taking part.

“For this exercise, the French presence is more important than last year,” said Captain Frederic Benon, adding that the French navy sent a ship and divers for the manoeuvres.

Abbott stressed the need for the exercise by pointing out that waterways should be protected from attempts to block maritime traffic. The task is particularly significant in the case of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a third of global oil shipped by sea passes.

“International Waters need to remain open,” Abbott said.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard is tasked with blocking the Strait of Hormuz in the event of a conflict, but has never been called upon to do it.

But in an apparent response to the exercise, Iran launched its own mine-sweeping exercise east of the Strait of Hormuz, in the Gulf of Oman, state Fars news agency said last week, adding that Iranian naval forces unveiled a “modern anti-mine” system.

Source

Jennifer O’Mahony — Telegraph.co.uk May 15, 2013

The report, published in the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) journal, claims the Stuxnet worm exposed vulnerabilities in Iranian enrichment facilities that would otherwise have gone unnoticed, and that production actually went up in the year after it was allegedly discovered.

Furthermore, the impression in the West that Natanz was under attack left the Iranians to “progress quietly” with enriching more uranium, hindering diplomatic solutions to reducing the threat of a nuclear Iran.

In an analysis of data collected by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Ivanka Barzashka, an academic at King’s College, London, argues that Iran has regrouped and improved centrifuge performance and has started enriching uranium to higher concentrations than before.

Furthermore, since August 2010 the number of operating machines has been “steadily growing” at Natanz.

The Stuxnet worm, which allegedly attacked the Natanz plant by altering the frequency at which motors connected to gas centrifuges that separate uranium isotopes turn, formed part of a wave of digital attacks on the country in 2009 and 2010.

Iran decommissioned and replaced about 1,000 IR-1 centrifuges in the Fuel Enrichment Plant (FEP) at Natanz, late in 2009 or early in 2010.

Barzashka writes that Iran’s ability to successfully operate new machines “was not hindered” and that “Stuxnet’s effects have not simply ‘worn off’.”

“Iran’s uranium-enrichment capacity increased and, consequently, so did its nuclear-weapons potential,” she says.

“Stuxnet was of net benefit to Iran if, indeed, its government wants to build a bomb or increase its nuclear-weapons potential.

“The malware – if it did in fact infiltrate Natanz – has made the Iranians more cautious about protecting their nuclear facilities,” she adds.

Former Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind criticised the report, emphasising that bilateral talks between the US and Iran were the only way to curb Iranian nuclear ambition.

Sir Malcolm, who currently serves as Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee, which oversees Britain’s cybersecurity strategy, told The Daily Telegraph: “What is undoubted is that it [Stuxnet] significantly slowed down the enrichment process.

“Part of the objective of many people in the international community has been to stop, or if you can’t stop, to slow down the Iranian nuclear programme.

“In so far as Stuxnet may have done that, and I emphasise may have done that, it was a plus.

“The most important diplomatic initiative on the table is the offer by the President of the United States for a direct bilateral discussion between the United States and Iran.”

Source

DEBKAfile — May 14, 2013

Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu spent three hours with Russian President Vladimir Putin at his residence in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, Tuesday, May, 14. He came for a last-ditch attempt to head off the supply of advanced Russian anti-air S-300 missile systems to Syria. Instead, the Russian leader turned the conversation around to focus implicitly on Israel’s air strikes against Damascus on May 3 and May 5. After their conversation he issued a warning: “In this crucial period it is especially important to avoid any moves that can shake the situation.”

This was clearly a hands-off caution to Israel not to repeat its attacks on Damascus. And, furthermore, after “shaking the situation” in Syria by its air attacks, Israel was in no position to demand that Russia avoid selling Syria advanced weapons.

The prime minister, for his part, warned that the entire Middle East was in a dangerous state of volatility.

He was accompanied by Israeli Military Intelligence Chief Maj. Gen. Aviv Kochavi. Opposite him sat Mikhail Fradkov, SVR Director.

Kochavi laid before the Russian leader the information Israel had gathered on the state of Syria’s chemical weapons with relevance to their transfer to the Lebanese Hizballah.

Before Netanyahu’s arrival for the meeting, Moscow took two preparatory steps:

1. Russian diplomats leaked to the London-based Arab press a report that the S-300 missiles had already arrived in Syria. According to Al-Quds Al-Arabi, Moscow had delivered 200 launchers (probably missiles) and the Syrian missile teams already knew how to use them.

By this leak, the Israeli prime minister was being informed that his journey to Sochi was a waste of time and that the use of S-300 missiles for shooting down Israeli Air Force planes was no longer controlled by Moscow but by Damascus.

2.  The prominent strategic analyst, Viktor Kremenyuk of The USA and Canada Institute in Moscow, reported Tuesday that Netanyahu arrived in Sochi to indirectly let Putin know that “Israel would destroy the S-300s when they are delivered and start being assembled.”

The deputy director of an important Russian think tank which advises the Kremlin on North American policy does not tend to make idle comments.

debkafile’s Moscow sources interpreted Kremenyuk’s remark as a means of informing the Israeli leader that Moscow was not impressed by such threats. Instead of pushing Putin to stop the S-300 missiles, Israel would be more advantageously employed urging the Obama administration to adopt a more realistic stand on Syria and Bashar Assad.

In Moscow’s view, Washington must be brought to give up its threat of Western military intervention in Syria, of which the Israeli air strikes appeared to Putin as the harbinger, and come to terms with Assad’s presence in any political solution of the Syrian conflict.

These positions the Russian President had conveyed previously to US Secretary of State John Kerry and UK Prime Minister David Cameron. He made it clear to Netanyahu that he stood by them as firmly as ever. Therefore, say debkafile’s sources, so long as both powers remain entrenched in their positions, there is not much hope of their coming together on an international conference to resolve the Syrian conflict.

debkafile’s military sources add: It is also unlikely that the Russian and Israeli leaders had a chance to work out reciprocal ground rules for the Russian officers supervising the S-300 missile operations in Syria to avoiding hitting Israeli Air Force jets or for Israeli bombers to refrain from destroying them.

The S-300 is designed to shoot down planes and missiles at 200-km ranges.

Israel is concerned that Moscow may decided to send the six S-300 batteries carrying 144 missiles due for Syria along with Russian missile and air defense specialists. They will also be available for operating the missiles effectively for downing Israeli Air Force planes striking targets in Syria and Lebanon. Israel will be forced to think twice before attacking the S-300 batteries for fear of hitting the Russian officers. Putin is therefore placing a severe constraint on Israel’s operational freedom by spreading an anti-air missile cover over the Syrian, Hizballah and the Iranian Basij forces fighting for Bashar Assad.

Source

Christopher Bollyn — via Rebel News May 14, 2013

Iranian elections are transparent and democratice. Here two women display the ink on their fingers and the stamp on their identity cards showing they have voted. Click to enlarge

The Islamic Republic of Iran will have a presidential election on June 14, 2013. As an observer of elections in different countries I find that Iranian election procedures are very similar to those of the most democratic elections held in European nations, such as France. Iranians vote on paper ballots that are counted openly in each polling place in the presence of observers. The tally from each polling station is then verified openly and published by the government after the election. These are the most fundamental and essential elements of a transparent and democratic election, and these are exactly the elements that are sadly missing from elections in the United States.

It may come as a surprise but Iranian elections are much more transparent than elections in the United States. The voting process and the counting of the votes in Iran are transparent processes, while most votes in the United States are cast and counted on electronic voting systems run by private companies. The use of computer voting systems in the United States has actually allowed our elections to be stolen because the citizenry has lost its oversight of the crucial vote-counting process entirely. Today, there is virtually no open counting of the votes in polling stations in the United States because nearly all voting “data” is processed in computerized systems – not counted by citizens.

Continues …

Wade Stone — Global Research May 11, 2013

“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.”― Friedrich Nietzsche

Every Spring and Summer, during a period of low pressure over the Persian Gulf, powerful winds known as the “shamals and sharqi,” sweep down from the north and north east into Saudi Arabia, whipping up ever more grains of sand as they head south and south west across the Arabian Desert. Frequently, these sandstorms become gargantuan in size – hundreds of meters high and kilometers wide and in length of dense roiling particulate, choking the lungs of those exposed, blocking out the sun completely and, by the time they are over, burying whole towns, sometimes even large cities like Riyadh, in a meter deep or more of sand.

Sandstorm hitting Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 2012. Click to enlarge

The wind speeds range from 30 to 300 kilometers per hour, and they generally take a semi-circular route, heading back out to the southern gulf and the remaining Gulf States. Indeed, on an annual basis all of the Gulf States combined – UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, suffer through literally hundreds of such sand and dust storms. And most often the winds driving those sandstorms originate from the north and north east (Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, and sometimes even Turkey).

NASA satellite image of typical shamal wind directions

Below is a map showing the location of Iran’s nuclear facilities and uranium mines. Now look again at the previous NASA satellite image and note the primary shamal wind direction.

Think “Fukushima x 10”: Bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities would leave the entire Gulf State region virtually uninhabitable.

Fukushima is, without question, the world’s worst nuclear disaster to date. In fact, many scientists believe, and with good reason, that the Fukushima incident, which is far from over, is the world’s worst environmental catastrophe.

“While the long-term repercussions of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster are yet to be fully assessed, they are far more serious than those pertaining to the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine, which resulted in almost one million deaths (New Book Concludes – Chernobyl death toll: 985,000, mostly from cancer” Global Research, September 10, 2010. For a full account of Fukushima, see “Global Research Online Interactive Reader Series, Fukushima: A Nuclear War without a War, The Unspoken Crisis of Worldwide Nuclear Radiation (Michel Chossudovsky, editor).

Now imagine several large nuclear reactors (Iran’s Bushehr reactor output, for example, is 1000 megawatts, compared to Fukushima Daiichi’s largest reactor which had an output of 784 megawatts), along with several uranium enrichment plants, and certainly military storage sites and quite likely even uranium mines, all bombed to dust within a matter of days. Moreover, unlike the Fukushima Daiichi reactors which suffered only partial meltdowns with much of the fuel rods and spent fuel storages remaining mostly intact, “all” of Iran’s nuclear fuel would be exploded into the atmosphere. And let us not forget that the US-Israeli military ordinances employed to destroy Iran’s nuclear facilities would certainly be tipped with depleted uranium, and very likely would include some mini-nukes.

Indeed, in regards nuclear disasters and environmental catastrophes, Fukushima would absolutely pale in comparison to that caused by the bombing of Iran’s nuclear sites. The nuclear fallout from such an event would be extreme, to put it mildly. Tens, if not hundreds of thousands of innocent Iranians would likely die within the first year of such a strike, while millions more would die within a decade or two of some form of radiation-induced cancer. And since a significant portion of that nuclear fallout would end up either immediately, or over the course of the next weeks and months in the Arabian Desert, where the winds, year after year, would gather it up along with the particles of sand and dust into gigantic roiling irradiated storms (remember, “hundreds” of such sand and dust storms annually), not a person living anywhere in the Gulf State region would be safe from exposure. The Persian Gulf, too, would soon be so irradiated and toxic and lifeless that it might as well be renamed the New Dead Sea.

Some statistics worth recalling: The half-life of cesium-137 is just over 31 years, while that of strontium-90 is approximately 29 years. Plutonium-239, the most dangerous of the above-mentioned radioactive substances, has a half-life of 24,110 years. And uranium, which is the primary target and which will make up the largest percentage of the fallout, has a half-life ranging between 700 million to nearly 4.5 billion years, depending on the type of uranium used—U-235 or U-238. It’s also worth noting that it takes an estimated 20 x the half-life years listed for the radiation from such contamination to dissipate entirely.

Of course, a lot of that radiation would also enter the jet stream, which would then carry it around the globe, depositing it as nuclear fallout everywhere. No nation, no body of water, would be spared. It takes but “one” inhaled or ingested “hot” particle to produce a life-threatening cancer.

Calling for, even so much as contemplating, such a genocidal event is madness; actually carrying it out would be insanity beyond description.

We must conclude, therefore, that the US-NATO-Israeli alliance is bluffing. Shortly before each and every scheduled P5+1 negotiations regarding Iran’s nuclear program, the corporate/government controlled mainstream media in the West ratchets up the threats, with Israel insisting that they will soon bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities if their nuclear program isn’t shut down. We’ve been hearing these same threats for more than a decade now. The very fact that the other Gulf States in the region are in support of the US-NATO-Israeli alliance also suggests that such threats are all smoke-and-mirrors, attempts to scare Iran into accepting whatever demands US-NATO and Israel want.

Surely, the Gulf State monarchs especially are aware enough to realize that, even if Iran is planning to develop a nuclear weapon (for which no evidence whatsoever exists), a nuclear-armed Iran would be far less of a danger to them than a bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities, which would positively guarantee their demise. Even Israel, which is only 1100 kilometers away from Iran, and also experiences regular severe sand and dust storms, would likely suffer dire consequences as a result of the radiation fallout from such an attack.

Has such absolute insanity infected the minds of the Western powers to such a degree that they actually would attack Iran, and in so doing destroy the entire Gulf State region, further irradiate the entire planet and themselves, and quite possibly set off World War III? Or is it all just smoke-and-mirrors, scare tactics and rhetoric, and saner minds will in fact prevail?

Let us all hope and pray for the latter

Source

Jonathan Burch — Reuters May 12, 2013

Protestors shout slogans against Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan's support for 'Syrian rebels'. Click to enlarge

Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of the Turkish city of Antakya on Sunday, a day after bombs killed nearly 50 people in a nearby town as Syria‘s civil war spills into the region.

Several hundred people, mostly leftist and nationalist demonstrators, marched through the center of the city no more than 50 km (30 miles) from the Syrian frontier, carrying banners and shouting anti-government slogans while onlookers cheered.

The protests came after two car bombs ripped through the center of Reyhanli on Saturday, a border town less than half an hour away and the latest flashpoint in the spread of violence from Syria, killing 46 and wounding scores more.

Ankara has blamed fighters loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for the attacks and said they will not go unanswered.

But many in this frontier province of Hatay, a melting pot of sectarian, ethnic and religious groups, some of whom share Assad’s Alawite creed, blame their own government and its policy on Syria for the bloodshed spilling onto Turkish soil.

Turkey has taken in more than 400,000 Syrian refugees, many of whom have settled in Hatay, and has thrown its full weight behind the armed opposition fighting to overthrow Assad, although it denies supplying weapons.

Fighters are able to cross back and forth across the frontier virtually unchallenged, unsettling many on the Turkish side of the border, who say more and more radical groups are joining the opposition ranks.

“We have a message for our people: We will rid our city of the jihadist murderers,” read one of the protesters’ banners.

“Hands off Syria,” read another, with a picture of Turkey’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President Barack Obama wearing military helmets with a fighter jet in the foreground.

“We don’t have a problem with the Syrian refugees who come here to shelter, but we are against the jihadists and murderers on our streets,” one man in the crowd shouted.

“The people of Reyhanli were not alone,” the crowd shouted back, before breaking into chants calling on Erdogan to resign.

Others tried to dispel suggestions their views are based on sectarian or religious lines.

One man stood silently holding a small placard, which read: “Alawites stand together with their Sunni brothers,” a reference to the bombings in Reyhanli which is a predominantly Sunni town.

A boy next him had drawn a crescent moon, a Star of David and a cross, representing Islam, Judaism and Christianity, with the words “This unity cannot be broken,” written above.

(Writing by Jonathon Burch; editing by Andrew Roche)

Source

Suzan Frazer, Mehmet Guzel — Associated Press May 12, 2013

In one of the deadliest attacks in Turkey in recent years, two car bombs exploded near the border with Syria on Saturday, killing 43 and wounding 140 others. Turkish officials blamed the attack on a group linked to Syria, and a deputy prime minister called the neighboring country’s intelligence service and military “the usual suspects.”

The blasts, which were 15 minutes apart and hit the town of Reyhanli’s busiest street, raised fears that Turkey could increasingly be drawn into Syria’s brutal civil war.

Turkey already hosts Syria’s political opposition and rebel commanders, has given shelter to hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees and in the past retaliated against Syrian shells that landed in Turkey.

Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay said the assailants were from Turkey, but were linked to Syria’s intelligence service.

“We have to a great extent completed our work toward identifying the assailants,” he told reporters. “We have established that the organization and assailants have links to the pro-regime mukhabarat (intelligence) organization.”

He did not name the group, but said the aim of the attack was to pit Turks against Syrian refugees in Reyhanli.

Earlier, another deputy prime minister, Bulent Arinc said: “Our thoughts are that their mukhabarat and armed organizations are the usual suspects in planning and the carrying out of such devilish plans,” he said.

Arinc said the attacks were still being investigated, but that If it’s proven that Syrian was behind the attack, Turkey would “do whatever is necessary,” without specifying if that included military action.

One of the car bombs exploded outside the city hall while the other went off outside the post office. Reyhanli, a main hub for Syrian refugees and rebels in Turkey’s Hatay province, is just across the border from Syria’s Idlib province. Private NTV television, citing unnamed security sources, said the explosions were remote-controlled and that plastic explosives were used.

Images showed people frantically carrying the wounded through the rubble-strewn streets to safety. Black smoke billowed from a tall building.

The explosions came days before Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is scheduled to travel to the U.S. for talks, which are expected to be dominated by the situation in Syria. The car bombings also follow allegations by Erdogan the Syrian regime has fired about 200 missiles tipped with chemical weapons.

Syrian mortar rounds have fallen over the border before, but if the blasts turn out to be linked to Syria it would be by far the biggest death toll in Turkey related to its neighbor’s civil war.

Syria shares a more than 500-mile (800-kilometer) border with Turkey, which has been a crucial supporter of the Syrian rebel cause. Ankara has allowed its territory to be used as a logistics base and staging center for Syrian insurgents.

Atalay said 43 people were killed and 140 others were wounded in the blasts. There was no immediate information on the identities or nationalities of the victims.

The bombings” will increase the pressure on the U.S. president next week to do something to show support to Turkey when Erdogan visits him in Washington,” said Soner Cagaptay, an expert on Turkey at the Washington Institute. “Washington will be forced to take a more pro-active position on Syria, at least in rhetoric, whether or not there is appetite for such a position here.”

Salman Shaikh, director of the Brookings Doha Center, said the attack may force Turkey to take action.

“It should be a defining moment for Turkey,” Shaikh said. “It has been supporting the rebels, and there has been strong rhetoric. But this may be a moment where it really has to assert itself – if it is the Assad regime (behind the bombings), and it is quite conceivable it is.”

Turkey’s opposition criticized the government’s policy on Syria, saying its active support of the rebels had put the country’s security at risk.

“Erdogan’s discourse of hatred toward Assad and provocations against the administration in Damascus is coming back to us in the form of attacks and provocations,” said Devlet Bahceli, chairman of a nationalist opposition party.

The force of Saturday’s explosions gutted some buildings, and the charred shells of cars littered the streets.

“Three buildings partly collapsed and became unusable,” Talat Karaca, who witnessed the second explosion from his rooftop, told The Associated Press by telephone. “We couldn’t approach the scene for a long time because of the blaze.”

Khawla Sawah, the medical director of the Union of Syrian Medical Relief Organizations in Reyhanli, said the town’s main hospital was full and many of the wounded were taken to the nearby city of Antakya and to a clinic set up by the Syrian medical relief group on Reyhanli’s outskirts. The center received 11 wounded, including one Turk and 10 Syrians.

She said some of the injured told her that the cars that exploded had Syrian license plates.

Both Sawah and another witness, Suzan Alhasoglu, said the incident raised tension in Reyhanli with angry youths attacking Syrians cars and other targets.

“The authorities are asking Syrians to stay home and not drive around in Syrian cars,” Sawah said. “Syrian doctors at the Reyhanli hospital were asked to go home too.”

Turkey’s military released a statement condemning the attack and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu vowed from Berlin that Turkey would act.

“Those who for whatever reason attempt to bring the external chaos into our country will get a response,” he said.

The U.S. Embassy in Ankara issued a statement condemning the “murderous attack” in Reyhanli and said Washington “stands with the people and government of Turkey to identify the perpetrators and bring them to justice.”

The main Syrian opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, condemned the attack and said it stands together with the “Turkish government and the friendly Turkish people.”

The coalition sees “these heinous terrorist acts as an attempt to take revenge on the Turkish people and punish them for their honorable support for the Syrian people,” it said.

The frontier area has seen heavy fighting between rebels and the Syrian regime. In February, a car bomb exploded at a Syrian border crossing with Turkey, just a few kilometers from Reyhanli, killing 14. Turkey’s interior minister at the time blamed Syria’s intelligence agencies and its army for involvement.

Four Syrians and a Turk are in custody in connection with the Feb. 11 attack at the Bab al-Hawa frontier post. No one has claimed responsibility, but a Syrian opposition faction accused the Syrian government of the bombing, saying it narrowly missed 13 leaders of the group.

In that bombing, most of the victims were Syrians who had been waiting in an area straddling the frontier for processing to enter Turkey.

Tensions also flared between the Syrian regime and Turkey after shells fired from Syria landed on the Turkish side, prompting Germany, the Netherlands and the U.S. to send two batteries of Patriot air defense missiles each to protect their NATO ally.

___

Suzan Fraser reported from Ankara. Associated Press writers Ezgi Akin in Ankara, and Bassem Mroue, Yasmine Sakher and Karin Laub in Beirut contributed to this report.

Source

Elad Benari — Arutz Sheva May 12, 2013

In what may be a warning to Iran, the U.S. Navy said on Monday that envoys from 41 nations had gathered in Bahrain to begin anti-mine drills in the Persian Gulf.

The U.S.-led exercises, which run through May 30, mark the second major show of maritime cooperation in the Gulf in less than a year.

According to a statement published by the Navy, the drills will begin with onshore training and then move to the Gulf for maneuvers including mine-sweeping and search-and-seizure operations.

The last such exercise was held nine months ago, when Israel and Iran were just at the brink of hostilities.

The U.S. Navy stressed that the drills are not specifically tailored to counter Iranian threats, though Iran has threatened more than once to close the Strait of Hormuz, a strategic waterway leading to the Persian Gulf and that is used by 40 percent of vessels that carry the world’s oil to various locations around the globe.

The United States has warned Iran that any attempt to close the strait would be viewed as a “red line” — grounds for U.S. military action.

Iran also has sought to expand its naval capabilities, including plans to launch new submarines. In December the Islamic Republic held naval maneuvers in the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz

Source

Iran to equip IRGC Navy with advanced cruise missiles: Official

Press TV — May 12, 2013

Iran’s Defense Ministry plans to equip the naval fleet of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) with cruise missiles having a range of more than 300 kilometers.

The cruise missiles have different ranges and have super advanced capabilities, Director of Iran’s Defense Ministry’s Aerospace Organization Brigadier General Mehdi Farahi said in a Sunday interview.

“The precision and range of the new missiles have been enhanced compared with those of the 300 km-range missiles that the IRGC Navy already has,” Farahi pointed out.

On April 27, Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi announced Iran’s plans to unveil indigenous ballistic and cruise missiles as well as other new military achievements within the next five months.

In recent years, Iran has made great achievements in its defense sector and attained self-sufficiency in producing essential military equipment and systems.

Tehran has repeatedly assured other nations that its military might poses no threat to other countries, stating that the Islamic Republic’s defense doctrine is entirely based on deterrence.

ASH/HJL/HMV

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News Brief — May 10, 2013

Iran unveiled an advanced new drone Thursday night, named Hemaseh (Epic), in a special ceremony in the presence of Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi. Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the ceremony, Brig. Gen. Vahidi said that the drone has been designed and built entirely by local experts. In addition to being capable of conducting surveillance and reconnaissance missions, it could also carry out armed combat missions.

Earlier, Deputy Defense Minister for Industrial and Research Affairs Mohammad Eslami told reporters that Hemaseh was more capable than other Iran-made UAVs and that it can fly at higher altitudes and enjoys longer flight endurance.

The Hemaseh is the latest in a series of locally designed and manufactured military drones that Iran has unveiled in recent years.

In April, the Iranian Air Defense Force displayed its Sarir (Throne) drones on the occasion of the National Army Day.

Speaking to reporters at the time, Commander of Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base Brigadier General Farzad Esmayeeli stated that Sarir is a long-range, long-endurance radar evading air defense drone.

“Sarir is capable of carrying cameras and air-to-air missiles and tens of this UAV have so far been produced and used,” he said.

Gordon Duff — Press TV May 10, 2013

Striking evidence of the use of American EPW (Earth Penetrating Weapons) nuclear weapons in Syria has come to light. Experts say the proof is irrefutable.

Dramatic video footage from Syria has revealed startling evidence that counters Israel’s claims of “surgical strikes” on weapons headed to Lebanon.

What were said to be air strikes is now proven to have actually been artillery, something easily discernible to even an untrained observer.

What happens next is shocking. While artillery shells rain down on Syrian army positions, from mobile Israeli artillery in direct support and even accompanying rebel forces inside Syria, a huge explosion occurs.

After analysis, it had become clear, Syria had come under attack by Israel using, not just nuclear weapons, but an American nuclear bunker buster bomb, one of several supplied to Israel to use against Iran, one of the last acts of the Bush/Cheney administration.

Submitted for analysis, the footage was compared with tests of the 37,000-pound MOB (Massive Ordnance Penetrator), designed by Boeing to be used against Iran’s underground facilities. There was no similarity whatsoever noted between the Syrian “event” and a conventional “bunker buster” including the GBU 57, the largest conventional weapon every to be used.

More Proof

Colonel James Hanke, former Defense Attaché and Liaison between the Pentagon and Netanyahu’s government , reviewed the footage.

He indicated that the GBU 57 is considered too high a risk for use because of its danger to the earth’s crust.

The Syrian/African fault line spreads into Israel. Were it to be subjected to this kind of explosive power, the threat of an earthquake doing significant damage in Israel is a reality. The nuclear bunker busters have far less penetrating power and, I am not saying that this was a nuclear device, not until more evidence is in, but the ‘event profile’ shows striking similarities.

The other problem with the GBU 57 is delivery. Only two aircraft are capable of delivering this weapon, the B-52 and B-2 Stealth Bomber. Israel does not have these aircraft.

Collapse of UD Air Force Command Structure, Again

Thus, if a MOP where used, it could have only been delivered by the United States Air Force, an organization reeling from recent disasters within its own ranks after a second lapse in nuclear weapons security in a five-year period was discovered at Minot Air Force Base in South Dakota.

Seventeen officers have been removed, a “house cleaning” of unprecedented scale. Back in 2008, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates ordered a restructuring of America’s nuclear security command after a 2007 incident at Minot.

A B-52 was loaded with thermonuclear weapons and flown off the base, violating 84 separate authorization protocols. The plane was later recovered over 1500 miles away under circumstances that have never been adequately explained. What is also not clear is whether the entire nuclear payload was recovered, complete and intact.

Nuclear Use in Iraq Proven

The most important consideration is whether any command organization, be it Israeli, American or any other, would be willing to use nuclear weapons. There is little question that their use has been advocated by both political and military leaders.

The prohibition has been the ability to conceal their use. Events in Iraq have proven such concealment to have worked effectively and when conclusive proof of nuclear weapons use was offered to the media and world scientific community, it was quickly “contained.”

On December 31, 2010, Dr. James Fetzer interviewed Dr. Chris Busby, a bio-medical studies professor at the University of Ulster, engaged in research on the use of Depleted Uranium (DU) in relation to birth defects in Iraqi children.
What Dr. Busby found was startling:

The interesting thing about the uranium was that we were able to measure the isotopic ratio because we were interested to see whether it was, you know, natural uranium or was it DU, which is what we thought it would be. But in fact it turned out to be slightly enriched uranium [with U-235], so, that is to say, it was manmade enriched uranium.
Now enriched uranium is a material that should only be found in a nuclear power station or inside an atomic bomb. So to find it in the hair of the parents of these children with congenital malformations was really astonishing.
So we then went to look to see how this could be, and to cut a long story short, we concluded from various patents from the US patent office that we received from physicists, that it was quite entirely likely that there was a new secret weapon being used, an anti-personnel weapon of some sort which contained enriched uranium or else generated enriched uranium.
…the alternative – which is sort of science fictional and which is entirely possible – I have to say, which is that they have developed a sort of neutron device which uses enriched uranium as part of its components to generate neutrons. And the way it does this is to dissolve tritium in uranium powder…

What Dr. Busby is describing is an Enhanced Radiation Weapon (ERW) or Neutron Bomb. Other variations in America’s secret nuclear arsenal included Minimal Residual Radiation (MRR) weapons.

Evidence of use of “special weapons” has been found at the scenes of more than one terror attack, Oklahoma City, the World Trade Center (9/11), Bali and several others.

The first hard evidence published by qualified scientists involved Fallujah. However, use of nuclear weapons in Iraq and Afghanistan, is said to be relatively common.

Israel’s Bomb Inventory Scandal

One of the greatest “non-secrets” of recent years involves the placement of Israel’s weapons inventory. In 1986, Israeli nuclear weapons technician, Modechai Vanunu, was kidnapped from Italy and taken to Israel where he has been held for over 25 years. His crime; reporting on Israeli’s secret nuclear program at Dimona.

Cables released by Wikileaks revealed that the United States had, in 2006, allowed Libya to build a new chemical weapons facility. What has not been “Wiki-leaked” is that, when the facility was discovered after the fall of the Gaddafi government, it was found to have been run by the Israeli government.

Since those initial reports, nothing more has been mentioned. It is very likely that this illegal facility, inside Libya, is still in Israeli hands.

In June 2010, the USS Grapple, an American naval vessel with an “unspecified” foreign crew, docked at the port of Poti, in Georgia. Ten Israeli torpedo boats, similar to those that attacked the USS Liberty, escorted it.

The ship’s cargo was bombs, including runway and area denial weapons along with the enhanced version of the BLU 113 “Super Penetrator,” a conventional bunker buster weapon weighting 4700 pounds.

Azerbaijani Ploy

These munitions were then transferred to weapons bunkers at a former Soviet airfield inside Azerbaijan where Israel had managed to sequester a number of attack aircraft.

These planes had flown on to Azerbaijan after taking part in joint operations between the Turkish and Israeli air forces.

After their presence was discovered, we have been told the Israeli planes returned home but there is no evidence that the munitions had been repatriated to either Israel or to the United States, their place of origin.

Conclusion

We know and can prove that advanced nuclear weapons have been used in the United States. We have evidence of their use elsewhere in recent years.

We also know that methodologies to conceal their use and manage press leaks have been very effective and have created a combat environment where the “nuclear option” is always “on the table.”

We also have film and photographs from Syria showing something we have no other explanation for. Would Israel use such weapons? Do they have the means? Do they have a motive? Have they had the opportunity?

Do they have sufficient control of press organizations to encourage this kind of blatant recklessness?

I think we all know the answer.

GD/NN

Source

Associated Press — May 9, 2013

Syria will supply “game-changing” weapons to Hezbollah, the chief of the Lebanese militia said Thursday, just days after Israeli airstrikes on Damascus targeted what Israel said were shipments of advanced Iranian weapons possibly bound for the group.

Any attempts to ship advanced Iranian missiles across Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon would likely draw a new Israeli response, and Thursday’s warning by Hezbollah chief Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, if more than rhetoric, could signal a further escalation.

Israel has largely tried to stay out of Syria’s 26-month-old conflict. It never acknowledged the airstrikes, but Israeli officials have signaled Israel’s air force would strike against any shipments of strategic missiles that might be bound for Hezbollah.

Israeli officials said the Lebanese militia has tens of thousands of rockets, but that most of them are unguided. Israeli officials said the shipments targeted twice last week included precision-guided missiles.

Israel and Hezbollah fought repeatedly, including in a month-long war in 2006. During that war, Hezbollah fired thousands of rockets at Israel.

Meanwhile, Hezbollah and Iran have become increasingly involved in Syria’s civil war, supplying troops and military advisers to help Syrian President Bashar Assad fight armed rebels trying to oust him.

Nasrallah spoke Thursday to mark the 25th anniversary of the founding of Hezbollah’s radio station, Al-Nour. His speech was televised to an audience in Beirut, as a security precaution. Nasrallah has rarely appeared in public since the 2006 war, for fear of being targeted by Israel.

Nasrallah said Hezbollah could expect strategic weapons from Syria in the future.

“Syria will give the resistance special weapons it never had before,” Nasrallah said. “We mean game-changing.”

Nasrallah said the shipments of new types of weapons would serve as the Syrian reaction to Israel’s airstrikes.

‘This is the Syrian strategic reaction,” said Nasrallah of future weapons shipments. “This is more important than firing a rocket or carrying out an airstrike in occupied Palestine,” he said. Hezbollah refers to Israel as part of “occupied Palestine.”

The militia chief said the military alliance between Syria and Hezbollah would continue.

“We in the Lebanese resistance declare that we stand by the Syrian popular resistance and give our material and moral support and cooperate and coordinate in order to liberate the Syrian Golan,” he said. Israel captured Syria’s Golan Heights in the 1967 Mideast War and later annexed the strategic plateau.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor, asked to comment on Nasrallah, said: “We don’t respond to words. We respond to action.” The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment.

In a related development, Israeli security officials said Thursday they have asked Russia to cancel the imminent sale of an advanced air defense system to Syria.

The officials said Israel shared information with the United States in hopes of persuading Russia to halt the planned deal to provide S-300 anti-aircraft missiles. Disclosing the deal, the Israeli officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.

Earlier Thursday, the Assad regime said it welcomed efforts by the United States and Russia to try to bring the sides in the civil war to the negotiating table before the end of the month.

Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi said the government is willing to consider any proposals for a political solution of the conflict, while it retains the right to fight “terrorists,” the regime’s term for the opposition fighters and their supporters.

Al-Zoubi did not specifically mention the U.S.-Russian initiative in his brief remarks to reporters in Damascus. The comments were carried by SANA.

The main Western-backed opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, said Wednesday it welcomes the U.S.-Russia effort to reach a political solution but that any transition must begin with the departure of Assad and officials in his regime.

The U.S.-Russian initiative is identical to a plan, set out in Geneva last year, to bring the Damascus regime and opposition representatives together for talks on an interim government. Each side would be allowed to veto candidates it finds unacceptable.

The Geneva proposal also called for an open-ended cease fire and the formation of a transitional government to run the country until new elections can be held.

Even modest international efforts to halt the fighting have failed as neither side in the Syrian civil war has embraced dialogue, underlining their resolve to prevail on the battlefield.

In fighting Thursday, Assad’s forces attacked rebel positions in Aleppo and Idlib in the north, said the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The group said warplanes hit rebels near the Mannagh military air base outside Aleppo.

The rebels stormed the base near the border with Turkey and captured parts of it on Sunday but were later forced to retreat in the face of regime’s superior air power.

In neighboring Idlib province, heavy clashes were underway Thursday outside several army bases near the government-controlled provincial capital, said the Observatory, which relies on a network of informants inside Syria.

In Damascus, the state-run SANA news agency said government troops regained control of one more village and some land near the border with Lebanon on Thursday. The agency claimed troops inflicted heavy losses on the rebels in Aleppo and Idlib.

In Lebanon, a senior security official said several rockets landed Thursday on Lebanese territory, the latest incident of the Syria conflict spilling over the country’s volatile borders. The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with state regulations. There were no reports of casualties in the incident in the northwestern Lebanese town of Harmel.

Turkey’s state-run agency, meanwhile, said the country has stationed a team of eight experts to screen injured Syrians at the border to ensure they are not victims of any chemical attacks.

The Anadolu Agency said a chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defense vehicle, manned by the team, has been deployed at the main Cilvegozu border crossing with Syria.

The team would examine Syrians for signs of chemical agents before sending them to nearby hospitals for treatment, the agency reported Thursday.

Officials in Damascus deny claims the Assad regime has used chemical weapons. The rebels also deny similar allegations.

___

Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey and Aron Heller in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Source

Paul Joseph Watson — propagandamatrix May 8, 2013

The U.S. Army’s top officer has said that the window of opportunity for a military assault on Syria is within the next three to four months and that budget cuts would render intervention after the end of summer unlikely.

Speaking with reporters yesterday Gen. Ray Odierno, Army chief of staff, warned that planned training cutbacks due to the sequester meant that if the Obama administration wanted to give the green light for intervention it would have to act quickly.

“Readiness is OK right now, but it’s degrading significantly because our training is reducing. So, the next three, four months, we probably have the capability to do it,” he said, adding, “Next year, it becomes a little bit more risky.”

Odierno made it clear that the longer it took to make the decision, the less likely the US is to intervene.

“If you ask me today, we have forces that can go. I think it will change over time because the longer we go cancelling training and reducing our training, the readiness levels go down,” he said.

Odierno also praised FSA rebels, the majority of whom have pledged allegiance to and are being led by Al-Qaeda terrorists, for their fighting capabilities and said it was not a matter of if but when they claimed victory.

“I think from what I’ve seen is they have made some significant gains. I think they are controlling the territory. It makes you think that, you know, it’s going to be difficult for the regime over time to survive,” Odierno said.

However, recent victories by Assad’s forces, including the re-taking of central areas of Homs, are being seen by some as a reason for the west’s increased urgency to arm rebel fighters.

Odierno acknowledged the presence of terrorists amongst the FSA ranks, but attempted to downplay their role as comparatively minor.

“With the rebels, we do know there’s some terrorists in there,” he said. “Obviously, we don’t want them to be involved in the outcome, we don’t want them to gain power because of the impact they could have on the rest of the region — regionally and then potentially internationally.”

As the White House prepares to arm militants with heavy weaponry, the US Army and the Obama administration’s support for opposition fighters has puzzled many who point out that the FSA rebels are primarily comprised of sectarian extremists and jihadists who have repeatedly made it clear that they view America as a sworn enemy.

Rebels have been routinely caught ransacking Christian churches, burning US flags, chanting anti-American slogans and singing the praises of Osama Bin Laden as they glorify the 9/11 attacks, while also espousing their desire to fly the Al-Qaeda flag over the White House.

The administration has already sent well over half a billion dollars in aid to such groups, while the CIA has overseen “a secret airlift of arms and equipment” to rebels since early 2012, according to the New York Times.

Appetite amongst the America public for yet another US-led war is noticeably lackluster. A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found that only 10 per cent supported military intervention in Syria while 61 per cent opposed getting involved. Even if President Bashar Al-Assad’s forces used chemical weapons (the only reliable evidence suggests such weapons have actually been used by rebels), the figure favoring intervention remains at just 27 per cent.

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Paul Joseph Watson is the editor and writer for Infowars.com and Prison Planet.com. He is the author of Order Out Of Chaos. Watson is also a host for Infowars Nightly News

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