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Vladislav Ugolny: Ukraine is targeting civilians for retribution in the east while its Western backers turn a blind eye

Tens of thousands of residents of Kharkov region may become victims of Kiev’s “justice”

 https://www.rt.com/russia/563216-future-victims-of-ukrainian-justice/ By Vladislav Ugolny, a Russian journalist based in Donetsk, 23 Sept 22

The Ukrainian offensive in Kharkov Region, launched earlier this month, led to Russia’s armed forces losing control of a number of settlements.

These include the towns of Balakleya, Izium, Kupiansk, Volchansk and a number of villages and small locales. Nevertheless, the Russian army, by concentrating on rearguard battles, was able to avoid significant losses and managed to retreat to the left bank of the Oskol River to regroup.

However, the primary victims of this turn of events were the inhabitants of the aforementioned areas who are now in the hands of Ukraine.

Left behind

There is no exact information about the population of this region. The last census was conducted by Kiev more than 20 years ago, and the country’s statistics are known to be wildly inaccurate. 

At the outset, we can estimate the pre-war population at 200,000 people. After the outbreak of hostilities, some were forced to flee. The number of refugees depended on the intensity of the fighting. For example, in the Russia-border town of Volchansk, people continued to live normally – they had not heard firing in the city since March – and there has always been humanitarian aid. However, the frontline villages south of Izium were virtually wiped off the face of the earth.

In any case, we are talking about tens of thousands of people. Most likely, at least 100,000 people lived in the Russian-controlled territories. Some of them remain under the protection of the Russian army, which controls the left bank of the Oskol, and villages such as Kupiansk-Uzlovoi and Borovaya, which have now become the sites of intense hostilities.

After the beginning of the Ukrainian offensive, some Kharkov Region residents were forced to leave their homes. An evacuation was carried out in Volchansk, Veliky Burluk, Kupiansk and Izium. Various estimates suggest that between 5,000 and 25,000 people have fled to Russia in September alone.

According to Readovka journalists, Voronezh Region accommodated about a thousand refugees. Another small number left Kharkov and headed to the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, in particular to the nearest district center of Svatovo.

In any case, most local residents have remained in situ. Based on the communication with residents of small Donbass front-line towns that have been shelled for eight years, it is safe to say that such a decision is not politically motivated. Residents of such areas, many of whom are older people, those with disabilities, families with household plots or low-mobility relatives who require care, usually cling to their land, homes and traditional way of life to the end. They are the ones who have not evacuated their homes in recent months, and it is they who are now under threat.

Ukraine is preparing ‘mop-ups’

A number of channels have appeared in the Telegram messenger app, one of the leading social media platforms for both sides of the conflict, which publish the personal data of so-called “collaborators.” The basis for accusations could be anything, including communicating with the Russian military or receiving humanitarian aid. Some of these channels are currently blocked, after a wave of complaints to Telegram’s technical support.

Despite this, some remain operational and many dehumanize Russia’s supporters as “zhduny(rus) – waiters.” According to the public consensus in Ukraine, such people who sympathize with Moscow are the cause of the conflict. In the eyes of Ukrainian radicals, anyone who expresses a positive attitude towards Russia is a threat to national security.

Thus, personal data in the early days of the offensive was published for one purpose: to point out enemies so that they would be killed during the “sweep” – a set of actions aimed at establishing control over occupied territory undertaken by the army, mercenaries and nationalist battalions. ‘Mopping-up’ is outside the criminal procedure code and is not regulated by any laws. Law may come to the territory later but, in the very first days, “revolutionary justice” is carried out, without lawyers and with the functions of judge, prosecutor and executioner performed by Ukrainian combatants.

To help their murderous cause, similar channels are being created that publish personal data with calls for lynching. 

After the ‘cleansing’ is completed, elements of the Ukrainian legal system will come to the captured cities. They will focus on the concealment of war crimes committed during the ‘clean-up‘, and instead point the finger at Russia. The last two tasks will be carried out simultaneously, such as in Bucha, and those killed by Ukrainians will be cynically presented as victims of the Russian army.

Demonstrative detentions

According to the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), as of last week 16 people suspected of collaborating with Russian authorities had already been detained. The security agents are first and foremost interested in tax officials responsible for the functioning of local businesses during Moscow’s control of the territory. However, local teachers who switched to teaching the Russian curriculum are also at risk.

Despite international humanitarian law, which obliges the party in control of a territory to preserve the educational process and emphasizes that no harm be done to educators, Kiev seems determined to punish teachers, to use them as an example to others. 

Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine Irina Vereshchuk says that these teachers committed crimes and should be punished for high treason. Such measures by the Ukrainian government are aimed primarily at intimidating educators in Russian-controlled territory. By showing a willingness to prosecute civilian workers, Kiev is raising the stakes.

Ukrainian law enforcement is also known to detain forestry workers, for having helped the Russian army to collect firewood. The details are unknown: whether they supplied the Russians with firewood on a commercial basis, felled the forests entrusted to them, or simply told the soldiers where to chop, remains unknown.

Traditions of Ukrainian ‘justice’

Any civilian living in Russian-controlled territory could be charged with collaboration. Ukraine has a special ministry for the reintegration of “temporarily occupied territories,” which since 2016 has been developing a policy of “filtering” the civilian population. Initially, its activity was concentrated around Donbass and Crimea but its scope has now expanded.

The most striking example is the law ‘On the State Policy of the Transitional Period’, which has been criticized by, among others, the Venice Commission [on constitutional law] for the fact that Ukrainian state policy in the territories it occupies is aimed at investigating only the alleged war crimes of the opposite side, ignoring the goal of establishing the truth about all crimes. This law also introduced differentiated treatment of citizens, depending on their level of interaction with Russia and/or the Donbass republics.

The topic of differentiating guilt – and, according to Ukraine, the entire civilian population is guilty to a greater or lesser degree – was then promoted by all sorts of non-profit organizations. So the Crimean Tatar Resource Center engaged with the Soros Foundation’s ‘Vozrozhdeniye’ and the extremist organization ‘Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people,’ who claim to be the exiled Ukrainian government of Crimea, developed a whole methodology for evaluating the degree of collaboration.

For a demonstration of this scale, Ukrainians cited three respective examples: a doctor at a Crimean city hospital, an acting city council deputy and the ex-chief prosecutor of Crimea, Natalya Poklonskaya.

According to the methodology, the doctor scores 17 points, the deputy 30, and Poklonskaya 86. Thus, any Crimean doctor is already guilty of collaborationism, having 17 points. Since 2014, Ukrainian society, represented by non-profit organizations, has debated the doctor’s degree of guilt and the punishment which ought be meted out. We see the results of such discussions in Kharkov Region.

Preparing the ‘next Bucha’

In addition to fighting teachers and foresters, Ukrainian law enforcement and the media are also busy falsifying war crimes. They open the so-called “cellars” – illegal prisons and torture chambers, in which alleged prisoners of war and civilians were kept. The process of falsification relies on vivid shots – frames with a prayer scratched on the wall of one of the basements.

Another fabrication involved seven Sri Lankan students attending the Kupiansky Medical College, which was allegedly held by Russian military personnel since March, who testified about torture by the Russians.

The official position is simple: angry Russians simply detained and tortured foreigners. That the Russian army in fact evacuated them from Mariupol and Kherson is ignored. For the time being, Sri Lanka’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is asking Kiev to provide more information about its citizens. A fair investigation, however, should not be expected until those Sri Lankans find themselves outside the hands of the Ukrainian state.

Speaking of Kiev’s hand, another media symbol of the “genocide of the Ukrainian people” was presented as the hand of a deceased man with rubber bracelets in the colors of the Ukrainian flag. This was apparent evidence of a hate crime: a man killed for wearing Ukrainian symbols. As it turned out, the body was that of Sergey Sova, a member of the 93rd Mechanized Brigade, who was killed during fighting near Izium.

In general, the only mass graves that Ukrainian propaganda now clings to are the cemeteries organized by Russians, where the victims of the military conflict were buried, including Ukrainian soldiers. There is an inscription on one of the crosses, in particular, “APU [Ukrainian Armed Forces] 17 people, Izium, from the morgue.” Ukrainians claim that there are 440 bodies there. Some of the crosses have memorial plaques, some only an inventory number.

The bodies were buried by the Russian army in accordance with the traditions of the region. Perhaps, of course, among those buried under the cross are Muslims, Jews, or adherents to pagan beliefs popular among Ukrainian neo-Nazi battalions, but the Russians did everything possible on their part to ensure the remains of the enemy were not desecrated.

In normal circumstances, these bodies would have been given to the Ukrainian side in return for the bodies of dead Russian soldiers, but Ukraine boycotted these exchanges due to an unwillingness to admit significant losses. In particular, the son of the aforementioned Sergey Sova learned a few months later about the fate of his father and through the media requested the body be transferred back home for a proper burial. Prior to that, Sova had most likely been listed as missing, a ploy that suppresses official numbers of dead Ukrainian soldiers and avoids compensation payments to their families.

Now, however, the Ukrainian soldiers killed in battle and buried in accordance with the dominant religious traditions in Ukraine will be counted as victims of an “alleged genocide.” After a while, when it is impossible to distinguish whether people were killed in early September or mid-September, they will be presented as victims of the retreating Russian army.

All of this is a sinister and cynical story, the truth of which we can learn only after the return of the Russian army to Kharkov. Only then will the massive machine of lies, propaganda and disinformation, which is the work of the Ukrainian government in the occupied territories, be broken, and the world will be able to learn about the real war criminals. As when we discovered after the liberation of Mariupol and the establishment of control over the buildings of Mariupol Airport, that the Ukrainian Security Service and Azov turned it into a concentration camp, known as ‘The Library.’

September 26, 2022 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, Ukraine | Leave a comment

The deadly game of nuclear escalation

 https://barbadostoday.bb/2022/09/25/btcolumn-the-deadly-game-of-nuclear-escalation/ Article by
Sasha Mehter, 25 Sept 22, by Lenrod Nzulu Baraka

Military mobilisation in Russia has led to thousands of Russians fleeing their country to escape conscription. Russians, perhaps mindful of the 27 million of their countrymen that fell defending the motherland against Nazi aggression, are saying no to the prospects of becoming cannon fodder for another war between Russia and the rest of Europe. Direct flights from Russia to countries that do not require Russians to have visa are already sold out.

Russian mobilisation comes at a time when European and America belligerence is at an all time high. President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen has doubled down on Russian sanctions saying that the sanctions were here to stay and that now was a time to show resolve not appeasement. Maybe she is trying hard to shore up the commitment of European nations that are staring down a bleak winter of discontent.

President Biden fresh from his 60 Minute interview in which he bluntly stated that he was willing to send American troops to assist Taiwan if that country was threatened by invading Chinese forces, amplified Ursula von der Leyen’s hawkish rhetoric. With a very straight face President Biden berated Russia for wanting to extinguish Ukraine’s right to exist as a state.  I guess he forgot what the American government did to Iraq, Libya, and Yugoslavia.In his speech at the UN President Biden reminded his fellow world leaders that no nation should be allowed to pursue imperialistic ambitions without consequences.  He probably winked at the leaders of Israel and Saudi Arabia as he said these words to remind them that his statement did not apply to their nations. The US has used its veto over fifty times to shield Israel from UN resolution condemning Israeli actions against Palestinians. And who could forget the famous fist bump between President Biden and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman after President Biden pariah threat.

Undaunted and undeterred by the European Community, NATO, and the US and its allies, President Putin ordered a military mobilisation of 300 000 reservists. In a televised address to his nation President Putin stated that if the territorial integrity of his nation was threatened, he would use every available means to protect Russia and its people. President Putin’s cryptic weathervane comment in connection with his nuclear statement preceding it, suggests that the deadly game of nuclear escalation has started.

The US and NATO bring to the table an impressive array of military and economic weapons many of which have already been deployed against Russia. On its own, Russia will not be able to withstand the American /NATO assault indefinitely. The longer the Ukrainian war drags on the weaker Russia’s position becomes. A major Russian escalation could however turn the tide in Russia’s favor.

The formal annexation of new Ukrainian territory may fit the bill for an escalation that might prove to be decisive. The West will have to decide whether President Putin is bluffing about his nuclear threat as they decide on an appropriate response. Ukrainian attacks against territory formally annexed by Russia will be interpreted as an attack on Russia by Ukraine. The path to total war will be open and Russia will unleash its most potent weapons on Ukraine and secondly on any NATO or American forces that come to Ukraine’s assistance.

Since Russia will be the underdog in an all out dogfight with NATO and the US, Russia will have to rely on its nuclear arsenal either as a deterrent to outright invasion of Russia by NATO and US forces or as a game changing strategy to decimate the opposition. Russia may very well decide to go nuclear for the same reason the US went atomic against the Japanese. Rather than throwing his population into the meat grinder of a conventional war, Putin may go instead for a few precision strikes designed to instill terror in the camp of the enemy. Once that first nuclear button is pushed everything changes and the world that we know will be transformed.

Lenrod Nzulu Baraka is the founder of Afro-Caribbean Spiritual Teaching Center.

September 26, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | Leave a comment

The Ukraine war could open the nuclear Pandora’s box

If neither Russia nor the West backs down, the scope and dimension of the conflict will change dramatically

Nato could be forced to intervene directly, for example to protect Ukraine’s nuclear reactors, if Mr Zelenskyy requests it. Ukraine is home to 14 reactors in addition to the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia plant in the south-east. In such a scenario, the war would become a European war.

The US, also to help protect the nuclear reactors, might be willing to supply missiles to Ukraine with a range of up to 400 kilometres, long enough to reach Crimea and perhaps even the Russian capital. In which case, according to a Russian expert, Moscow could deploy nuclear weapons.

The National RAGHIDA DERGHAM 25 Sept 22, The war in Ukraine has entered a decisive phase, with Russian President Vladimir Putin ordering referendums in the Donbas last week. The outcome of these referendums, which the West believes Moscow has designated with the purpose of annexing Ukraine’s Russian-controlled regions, will change the rules of the conflict. At the same time, Mr Putin has invoked his government’s nuclear options and declared a partial mobilisation of up to 300,000 conscripts, indicating the expansion of the war in the coming weeks.

It is now clear to anyone who previously thought Mr Putin might take steps to negotiate with Kyiv or back down that he is convinced he can – and is determined to – prevail in Ukraine and will not entertain the idea of a defeat. The Kremlin is not afraid of inviting a western military intervention and has put Nato on edge by talking about victory at any cost, including a nuclear cost.

On the other hand, it is clear that American and European leaders have made their decision in the equation of victory-or-defeat and will not allow Russia to seize Ukraine, no matter the cost. This means that, what appeared impossible a month or two ago is now in the realm of plausibility, meaning direct western intervention in the war, in the event of Russia deploying tactical nukes – which are not strictly “tactical” or “small radius” weapons.

So who will win and who will lose in Ukraine?

First, let’s address the big picture – the US strategy that many believe is to implicate the Russian leadership and its system, if not Russia itself, for calculations related to Washington’s grand strategy vis-a-vis China’s rise. It must be said that no matter the planners’ genius, it requires the target to fall into the trap. Indeed, Moscow did not resist this trap. It even doubled down. Its leadership thought its ultimatums and escalations would force the West to back down and comply with its demands, and therefore, enable a Russian victory in Ukraine. So far, it has lost its bets and continues to follow the path charted for it by the western powers towards an ambush that could prove disastrous for Russia.

Comparisons have been made between Moscow’s intervention in Afghanistan, which eventually led to the break-up of the Soviet Union, and the Ukraine war that could have dire consequences for the Russian Federation. Backing down now could amount to a significant setback for Moscow. Yet, the paradox is that continuing this war carries the same risks, particularly if Russia loses. For this reason, defeat is not a word in its dictionary and not an option for its military, especially after the war exposed the latter’s weaknesses and undermined its prestige.

From Washington’s point of view, defeating Russia helps the American strategy against China. US National Security Council strategists believe that defeating Russia would cause Beijing to lose a strategic partner practically and psychologically. It also means, according to one informed expert, that China would lose its Russian “buffer zone”, forcing it to the frontline in its strategic stand-off with the US………………..

Russia will not allow Ukraine to be shared by the two sides. But nor will Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy back down. He sees Moscow’s failure to remove him from power as a decisive moment in the war. He is also confident that Nato will guarantee Kyiv the military edge. Modern warfare is not limited to what goes on in the battlefield; it’s also a technological war, and Mr Zelenskyy is using Nato’s advanced technology to fight Moscow.

Nato could be forced to intervene directly, for example to protect Ukraine’s nuclear reactors, if Mr Zelenskyy requests it. Ukraine is home to 14 reactors in addition to the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia plant in the south-east. In such a scenario, the war would become a European war. The US, also to help protect the nuclear reactors, might be willing to supply missiles to Ukraine with a range of up to 400 kilometres, long enough to reach Crimea and perhaps even the Russian capital. In which case, according to a Russian expert, Moscow could deploy nuclear weapons.

The Kremlin is seen to be paving the way towards being able to use these weapons. The referendums in the Donbas, to conclude on Tuesday with the Russian expectation that majorities will vote in favour of joining its federation, will be followed by the annexation of those regions. Subsequently, from September 29-30, after the Russian Duma endorses the results, any assault on those regions would amount to an assault on Russia, giving the Kremlin the right to respond by all means necessary, included nuclear ones.

Put differently, according to another expert, “the buffer zone between Russia and Ukraine will disappear, and the war will enter a new threshold that includes the activation of Russian strategic nuclear instruments based on national laws to defend Russian territories using all available means”.

A Russian military victory, if it were to transpire, may require an escalation that would bring with it much destruction. For this reason, the next two weeks will not only be crucial, but possibly also dangerous.  https://www.thenationalnews.com/opinion/comment/2022/09/25/the-ukraine-war-could-open-the-nuclear-pandoras-box/

September 26, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, politics international, weapons and war | Leave a comment

International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons 2022: History, Significance and Celebration

 https://www.news18.com/news/lifestyle/international-day-for-the-total-elimination-of-nuclear-weapons-2022-history-significance-and-celebration-6028441.htmlBy: Lifestyle Desk

The day reminds people of the dangers of nuclear weapons and urges world governments to cooperate and bring about a permanent and complete nuclear disarmament.

nternational Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons is observed on September 26 every year. The devastating impact of the 1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings is well known. This apart, over 2000 nuclear tests have been conducted to date; the last one in 2017, by North Korea. Such tests have caused cancers, birth defects and chronic diseases, among other illnesses in people, and severely damaged the natural world.

Though there has been a reduction in the number of deployed nuclear weapons since the peak of the Cold War, an estimated 12,705 nuclear weapons still exist in the world as of 2022, with the United States and Russia, who appear to be on opposing sides, owning most of them.

History

The United Nations’ (UN) objective to achieve total nuclear disarmament was underlined in the first resolution of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in 1946. Nuclear disarmament was made a priority objective in the first Special Session of the UNGA on disarmament in 1978. The nations which possess nuclear weapons include a doctrine of nuclear deterrence in their security policies.

To raise public awareness about nuclear weapons, the UNGA, in 2009, declared August 29 as the International Day against Nuclear Tests. Then, in December 2013, the UNGA declared September 26 as the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons to mark the high-level UNGA meeting on nuclear disarmament on September 26 that year.

Celebration

Each year, the UN member states, civil society, parliamentarians, non-governmental organisations, mass media, academia, and individuals celebrate and promote the international day through various educational activities.

Significance

The International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons reminds people of the dangers of nuclear weapons and urges world governments to cooperate and bring about a permanent and complete nuclear disarmament.

Nuclear Disarmament

Even though total nuclear weapons elimination remains a dream for now, the 1987 Christopher Reeve-starring film, ‘Superman IV: The Quest for Peace,’ (1987) shows the title character destroying all of Earth’s nuclear weapons. People, however, not aliens, are needed to establish permanent peace. The International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons rekindles that dream each year.

September 26, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, Reference, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Operation Sellafield: inside Britain’s deadliest clean-up job

  Few people ever enter the storage silo at Cumbria’s nuclear facility. David
Collins goes behind the scenes to see how engineers are disposing of waste
six times more radioactive than the Chernobyl explosion. Plus, take our
exclusive video tour.

Liz Truss, picking up where her predecessor Boris
Johnson left off, wants to expand Britain’s nuclear industry to tackle
the energy crisis, increasing capacity from 7GW to 24GW by 2050, providing
power to about a quarter of homes.

The Sellafield project I have come to see is a reminder that the nuclear solution can leave a very long-term legacy of logistical problems. Mistakes have been made in Britain’s
nuclear past; the Sellafield clean-up may provide reassurance that we have
learnt from them.

Britain’s first nuclear power station, Calder Hall,
went online here in 1956, powered by a Magnox nuclear reactor. It was
switched off in 2003. Sellafield may be best known to some as the scene of
the Windscale fire, one of the world’s worst nuclear disasters, which
raged for three days in October 1957.

Milk from cows for 200 square miles
was contaminated and 260 people developed cancer, with 32 dying as a
result.

No power for the national grid or weapons material is produced at
Sellafield today, its role now perhaps less glamorous but essential: making
nuclear waste safe. This waste includes the leftovers from the four EDF
nuclear power stations at Torness, Heysham, Sizewell and Hartlepool, as
well as radioactive materials from the likes of hospital scanners.

Until 2018, it also dealt with others’ waste: Germany, Spain and the
Netherlands would ship hazardous by-products to Sellafield to be processed
and returned in metal barrels. At one point Sellafield was handling 800
tonnes of foreign waste a year at a lucrative fee of £1 million per tonne.

The Magnox Swarf Storage Silo is essentially a nuclear waste dump, its
contents dating from a time when less thought was given to how the waste
should be handled in the long term. According to a 2020 public accounts
committee report, the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, the body
responsible for the clean-up of the country’s nuclear waste, has a
“perpetual” lack of knowledge about the condition of the UK’s nuclear
sites due to Cold War-era mismanagement.

Accurate records were simply not kept. “I wouldn’t judge the future on the history of the past,” says
Halliwell. “I don’t condone what’s gone on previously. But if we
demonstrate we can manage these materials successfully, we can offer some
confidence to an expanded nuclear industry, because I fully believe, given
some of the problems we are experiencing at the moment, that we need a
buoyant nuclear industry for electricity generation.”

The government wants to build more reactors — mostly Small Modular Reactors, or SMRs.
These are basically mini nuclear power stations, with reactors capable of
generating about one third of the capacity of a traditional nuclear power
reactor. Rolls-Royce is developing a type of SMR with help from government
funding. It believes they are clean, low-cost and easier to set up than a
traditional nuclear plant. Sellafield is bidding to build one of the
new-generation mini reactors on its own site, continuing its legacy of
being at the forefront of Britain’s nuclear history.

 Times 24th Sept 2022

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/operation-sellafield-inside-britains-deadliest-clean-up-job-lsslz3cdm

September 26, 2022 Posted by | UK, wastes | Leave a comment

Continuing campaign to stop the dumping of Hinkley nuclear power station mud off Cardiff coast

Campaigners attempting to stop mud from the construction of Hinkley Point
Nuclear Power Station, Somerset, being dumped into Welsh waters, have
announced they are working with leading environmental lawyers Leigh Day to
block the proposals. In February EDF Energy applied to National Resources
Wales for a licence to dump 800,0000 tonnes of mud dredged as part of
building work for the new plant that is being built on the site of the
disused Hinkley Point A facility.

Two years ago, EDF were given permission
to dump 300,000 tonnes of mud from the site off the Cardiff coast, despite
protests and following a Senedd debate. A petition against the latest
proposals received over 10,000 signatures and has triggered a debate in the
Senedd tomorrow. Earlier this month EDF Energy confirmed it will carry out
an Environmental Impact Assessment as part of its licence application. This
agreement reverses NRW and Welsh Government’s previous position that an
EIA was not needed for the dumping they permitted in 2018 just 2.1 miles
off the South Wales coast and 2.5 miles from Cardiff. Leigh Day has now
written to Natural Resources Wales (NRW) requesting full disclosure of
documents on the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)-screening
application from EDF and the agreement with NRW that “environmental
impact assessment is required”.

EDF are also facing a public inquiry over
a controversial fish management system that is being installed at the site
of the new facility. The Environment Agency granted a licence to EDF in
2013 that permitted sea water to be used for the nuclear power station’s
cooling system but required the deployment of a fish deterrent system on
the site to protect marine life in the estuary. Initially the operator
proposed the use of an acoustic deterrent system to reduce the number of
fish being killed by the cooling system but in 2017 abandoned the plans
without suggesting any alternative.

Currently the plant’s proposed Fish
Recovery and Return System will consist of a 5mm mesh barrier set up in the
water intake tunnel to stop large fish from being sucked in while another
channel will divert fish, dead or alive, back out to sea. Last year the
Sunday Times reported that marine and conservation groups estimated that
this system will kill 250,000 fish a day and called for it to be altered or
scrapped. EDF said the FRR will kills an estimated 650,00 fish a year.

Source: Nation Cymru 20th Oct 2020
https://nation.cymru/news/senedd-roundup-leading-environmental-lawyers-join-battle-to-block-mud-dump/

September 26, 2022 Posted by | oceans, politics, UK, wastes | Leave a comment

US-S.Korea to stage joint military drills with nuclear-powered US carrier

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20220926_01 26 Sept 22, The United States and South Korea are set to begin joint military exercises in the Sea of Japan on Monday, with the participation of a nuclear-powered US aircraft carrier.

The drills, involving a strike group led by the USS Ronald Reagan, will continue through Thursday.

The US highlighted the carrier’s deployment near the Korean Peninsula as part of its efforts to boost deterrence against North Korea in a meeting of senior foreign and defense officials from Washington and Seoul earlier this month.

The South Korean government stressed that Seoul and Washington will strengthen their joint defense capabilities and reconfirm their strong resolve to neutralize any forms of missile provocations by Pyongyang.

North Korea criticized South Korea for working with the US to beef up deterrence. Pyongyang said on a state-run website on Sunday that plots for war provocations will only create dreadful destruction.

North Korea on the same day launched a short-range ballistic missile toward the Sea of Japan from an area in or around Taechon, North Phyongan Province. The missile is estimated to have landed outside Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

North Korea also appears to be preparing to fire a submarine-launched ballistic missile, or SLBM, in the city of Sinpho in the eastern province of South Hamgyong.

Washington and Seoul remain on alert for possible further missile launches and other provocations by Pyongyang as North Korea is expected to sharply react to the US-South Korea joint drills.

September 26, 2022 Posted by | South Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

World shouldn’t give up on nuclear disarmament, says Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern

25/09/2022 NewsHub, By Craig McCulloch for RNZ

After a two-year Covid-induced hiatus, the United Nations’ leaders’ summit returned with gusto this week, but against a far darker backdrop than Jacinda Ardern’s last time there.

The general assembly has been dominated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with attention fuelled this week by Vladimir Putin’s barely veiled nuclear threats and expanded war effort.

In an end-of-trip interview with RNZ, the Prime Minister noted the conflicted emotions among leaders in New York: pleased to have “come through” the pandemic, only to then “smack up against such significant hurdles”.

“Everyone was talking in some form about issues like inflation… climate action, and the persistent security threats in Europe,” Ardern told RNZ.

The mere mention of nuclear war added gravity; the conflict was “absolutely” on everyone’s lips, Ardern said.

“It is a worrying time.”… https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2022/09/world-shouldn-t-give-up-on-nuclear-disarmament-says-prime-minister-jacinda-ardern.html

September 26, 2022 Posted by | New Zealand, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Belgium shuts down one reactor, in line with its “40 years life” rule for nuclear reactors

One of Belgium’s seven nuclear reactors
was disconnected from the grid on Friday evening. This follows legislation
passed in 2003 requiring reactors to be shut down after 40 years of
operation.

Belgium has two nuclear power plants: Doel near Antwerp and
Tihange near the town of Huy in Wallonia. The two plants consist of seven
reactors (four at Doel and three at Tihange) covering around 50 percent of
the country’s electricity needs, according to the news website Euractiv.

On Friday, the Doel 3 reactor was disconnected from the power grid in
accordance with the 2003 Nuclear Abandonment Act. The law was passed at the
insistence of the “green” parties that were part of the government at
that time. The legislation stipulates that reactors are to be shut down 40
years after being put into operation. A spokeswoman for the energy company
Engie, which operates Belgium’s nuclear power plants, Nele Scheerlinck,
stated that “the decision was made years ago” and “it is simply not
possible to change plans at such short notice”.

 TVP World 24th Sept 2022

https://tvpworld.com/62949498/belgium-turns-off-nuclear-reactor-despite-energy-crisis

September 26, 2022 Posted by | EUROPE, politics | Leave a comment

Hinkley Mud still needs more testing for radiation

Richard Bramhall, Secretary of the Level Radiation Campaign. Tomorrow the
Senedd will debate a petition calling for an Environmental Impact
Assessment (EIA) to be undertaken ahead of any further dredged material
from Hinkley Point being disposed of at the Cardiff Grounds disposal site.


This is taking centre stage as Electricité de France (EDF) seeks a licence
to dredge huge amounts of mud from the Severn Estuary and dump it on a
shallow sandbank less than two miles from Cardiff.

The Environment (Wales) Act 2016 requires decision-makers to take great care and to consult widely
when there are uncertainties. We argue that there are large uncertainties
about how many uranium oxide fragments are in the mud, and about where they
would go if dumped on Cardiff Grounds, how much genetic damage they would
do to the population of Wales and whether the people who must make the
licensing decisions understand the relevant science.

Source: Nation Cymru 20th Oct 2020
Link:
https://nation.cymru/opinion/why-were-calling-for-more-testing-before-more-mud-from-hinkley-point-is-dumped-near-cardiff/

September 26, 2022 Posted by | environment, UK | Leave a comment

TEPCO to Decide on Price Hike Based on Resumption of Nuclear Power Plant Operations, Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Unit 7, for Businesses from FY2023

Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant of Tokyo Electric Power Co.

September 16, 2022
　On September 16, Tomoaki Kobayakawa, president of TEPCO Holdings, announced that the company is considering raising electricity rates for businesses on the assumption that the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Unit 7 nuclear power plant (in Niigata Prefecture) will be restarted in fiscal 2023. President Tomoaki Kobayakawa of TEPCO Holdings announced on September 16 that the company plans to calculate the range of the price increase based on the assumption that the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Unit 7 nuclear power plant (Niigata Prefecture) will be restarted in 2023. The company aims to reduce the burden on contracted companies by about 200 billion yen. He also explained, “We aim to resume operations as soon as possible, but we have no concrete timetable for this.
　The target is the “high-voltage” and “special high-voltage” rate plans used by commercial facilities and factories, with approximately 170,000 contracts. The company plans to raise the rates so that the market price of electricity can be reflected in the rates. At the same time, a system will be introduced to calculate the cost of nuclear power plants, which have lower generation costs, on the assumption that they will operate for nine months a year, thereby curbing the size of the price increase.
　At the press conference, President Kobayakawa explained, “We are not specifying the timing of the restart. Even if we are not able to restart operations, we will curb the price increase. Although this will cause TEPCO’s bottom line to deteriorate, he said, “We will make efforts to reduce (costs). (Kyodo)
https://www.tokyo-np.co.jp/article/202684?rct=economics&fbclid=IwAR17rA9cf0QQpGSjwSqXtnT9tdA5N8yYfWXgZBY6x25EXh-jxN9GLE8Lva8

September 26, 2022 Posted by | Japan | , | Leave a comment

Busting The Times’ spin on “Great British Nuclear” and “a new atomic age for the UK”

Letter Paul Dorfman: You report that “Great British Nuclear plots a new atomic age for the UK” (Business, last week).

I think not. New nuclear plants are hugely expensive: in recent years they have cost an average of
20 per cent more than the estimate in Europe, and a staggering 100 per cent internationally. They’re also delivered late: construction overruns have averaged 0 per cent in Europe and 90 per cent internationally.

We also shouldn’t forget the horrible mess across the Channel. More than half EDF France’s reactors are offline, many with maintenance and corrosion safety problems due to their age.

Meanwhile last year renewables made up 81 per cent of all new power to the world grid, with nuclear nowhere. That is because utility-scale renewables can be built on time, on budget and for less than a quarter of the cost of nuclear.

 Times 25th Sept 2022

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/admit-it-nuclears-going-nowhere-tclmnr89f

September 25, 2022 Posted by | media, spinbuster, UK | Leave a comment

SCOTT RITTER: Reaping the Whirlwind

an American hegemony defined by a “rules based international order” foisted on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War.

This is what the world has come to — a mad rush toward nuclear apocalypse predicated on the irrational expansion of NATO and hubris-laced Russophobic policies

the current policy of the Ukrainian government and its Western allies of evicting Russia from the Donbass, occupied Ukraine and Crimea. This means attacking Mother Russia. This means war with Russia.

The U.S. and its allies in the “collective West” now have to decide if the continued pursuit of a decades-long policy of isolating and destroying Russia is a matter of existential importance to them

Putin’s order to begin partial mobilization of Russian military forces continues a confrontation between Russia and a U.S.-led coalition of Western nations that began at the end of the Cold War.

 https://consortiumnews.com/2022/09/22/scott-ritter-reaping-the-whirlwind/ By Scott Ritter Consortium News, 22 Sept 22

War is never a solution; there are always alternatives that could have — and should have —been pursued by those entrusted with the fate of global society before the order was given to send the youth of a nation to go off to fight and die. Any national leader worth his or her salt should seek to exhaust every other possibility to resolve issues confronting their respective countries.

If viewed in a vacuum, the announcement of Russian President Vladimir Putin Wednesday, in a televised address to the Russian people, that he was ordering the partial mobilization of 300,000 military reservists to supplement some 200,000 Russian personnel currently engaged in combat operations on the soil of Ukraine would appear to be the antithesis of seeking an alternative to war.

This announcement was made in parallel with one that authorized referendums to take place on the territory of Ukraine currently occupied by Russian forces regarding the question of joining these territories with the Russian Federation.

Seen in isolation, these actions would appear to represent a frontal assault on international law as defined by the United Nations Charter, which prohibits acts of aggression by one nation against another for the purpose of seizing territory by force of arms. This was the case made by U.S. President Joe Biden when speaking at the United Nations General Assembly hours after Putin’s announcement.

“A permanent member of the United Nations Security Council invaded its neighbor, attempted to erase a sovereign state from the map,” Biden said. “Russia has shamelessly violated the core tenets of the United Nations Charter.”

History, however, is a harsh mistress, where facts become inconvenient to perception. When viewed through the prism of historical fact, the narrative being promulgated by Biden becomes flipped. The reality is that since the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991, the U.S. and its European allies have been conspiring to subjugate Russia in an effort to ensure that the Russian people are never again able to mount a geopolitical challenge to an American hegemony defined by a “rules based international order” that had been foisted on the world in the aftermath of the Second World War.

For decades, the Soviet Union had represented such a threat. With its demise, the U.S. and its allies were determined to never again allow the Russian people — the Russian nation — to manifest themselves in a similar manner.

When Putin spoke about the need for “necessary, urgent steps to protect the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Russia” from “the aggressive policies of some Western elites who try by any means necessary to maintain their supremacy,” he had this history in mind.

The aim of the U.S. and its Western allies, Putin declared, was “to weaken, divide and ultimately destroy our country” by promulgating policies designed to cause “Russia itself to disintegrate into a multitude of regions and territories that are deadly enemies with one another.” According to Putin, the U.S.-led West “purposefully incited hatred of Russia, particularly in Ukraine, for which they destined the fate of an anti-Russian beachhead.”

Newton’s Third Law of Motion, that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, applies to geopolitics as well.

On Feb. 24, Putin issued orders for the armed forces of Russia to initiate what he termed a “Special Military Operation” (SMO) in Ukraine. Putin declared that this decision was in keeping with Article 51 of the United Nations Charter and the principles of collective preemptive self-defense as defined by international law.

The goals of this operation were to protect the newly independent republics of Lugansk and Donetsk (referred collectively as the Donbass region) from an imminent danger posed by a build-up of Ukrainian military forces which were, according to Russia, poised to attack.

The stated goal of the SMO was to safeguard the territory and people of the Lugansk and Donetsk republics by eliminating the threat posed by the Ukrainian military. To accomplish this, Russia embraced two primary objectives — demilitarization and denazification.  

Demilitarization of Ukraine would be accomplished through the elimination of all infrastructure and organizational structures affiliated with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO; denazification would involve a similar eradication of the odious ideology of the Ukrainian ultra-nationalist, Stepan Bandera, who was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Jews, Poles and ethnic Russians during the Second World War and in a decade of anti-Soviet resistance after the war ended.

Beginning in 2015, NATO had been training and equipping the Ukrainian military for the purpose of confronting pro-Russian separatists that had seized power in the Donbass following the ouster of pro-Russian Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovich in a violent insurrection, known as the “Maidan Revolution,” spearheaded by right-wing Ukrainian political parties professing loyalty to the memory of Stepan Bandera.

Ukraine had been pursuing NATO membership since 2008, enshrining this goal in its constitution. While actual membership still eluded Ukraine as of 2022, the level of involvement of NATO with the Ukrainian armed forces made it a de facto extension of the NATO alliance.

Russia viewed the combination of NATO membership with the anti-Russian posturing of the post-Maidan Ukrainian government, linked as it was to the ideology of Bandera, as a threat to its national security. The SMO was designed to eliminate that threat.

Two Phases of Russian Operation

For roughly the first six months, the Russian military operation could be broken down into two distinct phases. The first was a blitzkrieg-style effort designed to shock the Ukrainian military and government into submission. Failing that, it was meant to shape the battlefield in a manner that isolated the Ukrainian forces assembled near the Donbass region prior to their decisive engagement by the Russian military in the second phase, which began on March 25.

Phase two of the SMO, the “battle for the Donbass,” unfolded through April, May, June and July, and involved brutal, meat-grinding style warfare in urban terrain and among defensive fortifications that had been prepared by Ukrainian forces over the course of the past eight years.

Russia made slow, agonizing gains, in a war of attrition which saw Russia inflict horrific losses on the Ukrainian armed forces. Such was the extent of the damage done by Russia on the army of Ukraine that by the end of July nearly the entire inventory of Soviet-era weapons that Ukraine possessed at the start of the SMO had been destroyed, along with over 50 percent of its active-duty military component.

Normally, when assessing casualty figures of this magnitude, any professional military analyst would be right to conclude that Russia had, in effect, accomplished its goal of demilitarization, which logically should have been followed by the surrender of the Ukrainian government on terms which would have resulted in the kinds of fundamental political change necessary to implement the Russian goal of denazification and, with it, securing Ukrainian neutrality.

But the very forces which Putin had described in his mobilization address conspired to further their anti-Russian agenda by pouring in tens of billions of dollars of military aid (exceeding, in a manner of months, the entire annual defense budget of Russia) designed not to promote a Ukrainian victory, but rather hasten a strategic Russian defeat.

“Whereas once the primary Western objective was to defend against the [Russian] invasion,” journalist Tom Stevenson noted in an OpEd in The New York Times, “it has become the permanent strategic attrition of Russia.”

But the very forces which Putin had described in his mobilization address conspired to further their anti-Russian agenda by pouring in tens of billions of dollars of military aid (exceeding, in a manner of months, the entire annual defense budget of Russia) designed not to promote a Ukrainian victory, but rather hasten a strategic Russian defeat.

“Whereas once the primary Western objective was to defend against the [Russian] invasion,” journalist Tom Stevenson noted in an OpEd in The New York Times, “it has become the permanent strategic attrition of Russia.”

While Russia was able to stabilize its defenses and ultimately halt the Ukrainian offensive, inflicting huge numbers of casualties on the attacking force, the reality that Russia was facing a new threat paradigm in Ukraine, one which saw the Russian military fighting a reconstituted Ukrainian military that had become a de facto proxy of the U.S.-led NATO alliance.

Confronted with this new reality, Putin informed the Russian people that he considered it “necessary to take the following decision, which is fully responsive to the threats we face: In order to defend our homeland, its sovereignty and territorial integrity, and the security of our people and that of the population and to ensure the liberated areas, I consider it necessary to support the proposal of the Ministry of Defense and the General Staff to introduce partial mobilization in the Russian Federation.”

The U.S. and its NATO allies would do well to reflect on the lesson inherent in Hosea 8:7—sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.

Or, put another way, Newton’s Third Law has come back with a vengeance.

Putin’s decision to order a partial mobilization of the Russian military, when combined with the decision to conduct the referendums in the Donbass and occupied Ukraine, radically transforms the SMO from a limited-scope operation to one linked to the existential survival of Russia. Once the referenda are conducted, and the results forwarded to the Russian parliament, what is now the territory of Ukraine will, in one fell swoop, become part of the Russian Federation — the Russian homeland.

All Ukrainian forces that are on the territory of the regions to be incorporated into Russia will be viewed as occupiers; and Ukrainian shelling of this territory will be treated as an attack on Russia, triggering a Russian response. Whereas the SMO had, by design, been implemented to preserve Ukrainian civil infrastructure and reduce civilian casualties, a post-SMO military operation will be one configured to destroy an active threat to Mother Russia itself. The gloves will come off.

US & NATO Face a Decision 

The U.S. and NATO, having committed to a program designed to defeat Russia via proxy, must now decide whether they continue to follow through with their political and material support for Ukraine and, if so, to what extent. Does the goal remain the “strategic defeat” of Russia, or will the aid be tailored simply to assist Ukraine in defending itself?

These are two completely different goals.

One allows for the continued attrition of any Russian force that seeks to project power from Russian territory into Ukraine but, in doing so, respects the reality, if not the legitimacy, of the Russian incorporation of the Donbass and southern Ukrainian territories under occupation into the Russian Federation.

The other continues to sustain the current policy of the Ukrainian government and its Western allies of evicting Russia from the Donbass, occupied Ukraine and Crimea. This means attacking Mother Russia. This means war with Russia.

For its part, Russia considers itself already to be in a war with the West. “We are really at war with…NATO and with the collective West,” Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in a statement that followed Putin’s announcement regarding partial mobilization.

“We mean not only the weapons that are supplied in huge quantities. Naturally, we find ways to counter these weapons. We have in mind, of course, the Western systems that there exist: communication systems, information processing systems, reconnaissance systems, and satellite intelligence systems.”

Put in this context, the Russian partial mobilization isn’t designed to defeat the Ukrainian military, but to defeat the forces of NATO and the “collective West” that have been assembled in Ukraine.

And if these NATO resources are configured in a way that is deemed by Russia as constituting a threat to the Russian homeland…

“Of course,” Putin said in his address on partial mobilization, “if the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will use all means at our disposal to defend Russia and our people,” a direct reference to Russia’s nuclear arsenal.

“This is not a bluff,” Putin emphasized. “The citizens of Russia can rest assured that the territorial integrity of our homeland, our independence, and our freedom, I reiterate, will be safeguarded with all the means at our disposal. And those who are trying to blackmail us with nuclear weapons need to know that the compass rose can turn in their direction, too.”

This is what the world has come to — a mad rush toward nuclear apocalypse predicated on the irrational expansion of NATO and hubris-laced Russophobic policies seemingly ignorant of the reality that the Ukraine conflict has now become a matter of existential importance to Russia.

The U.S. and its allies in the “collective West” now have to decide if the continued pursuit of a decades-long policy of isolating and destroying Russia is a matter of existential importance to them, and if the continued support of a Ukrainian government that is little more than the modern-day manifestation of the hateful ideology of Stepan Bandera is worth the lives of their respective citizenry, and that of the rest of the world.

The doomsday clock is literally one second to midnight and we in the West have only ourselves to blame

Scott Ritter is a former U.S. Marine Corps intelligence officer who served in the former Soviet Union implementing arms control treaties, in the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert Storm and in Iraq overseeing the disarmament of WMD. His most recent book is Disarmament in the Time of Perestroika, published by Clarity Press

September 24, 2022 Posted by | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Holding ground, losing war

Zelensky’s strategy of defending territory at all costs has been disastrous for Ukraine.

The American Conservative, Douglas Macgregor, Sep 22, 2022,

At the end of 1942, when the Wehrmacht could advance no further east, Hitler switched German ground forces from an “enemy force-oriented” strategy to a “ground-holding” strategy. Hitler demanded that his armies defend vast, largely empty and irrelevant stretches of Soviet territory. 

“Holding ground” not only robbed the German military of its ability to exercise operational discretion, and, above all, to outmaneuver the slow, methodical Soviet opponent; holding ground also pushed German logistics to the breaking point. When holding ground was combined with endless counterattacks to retake useless territory, the Wehrmacht was sentenced to slow, grinding destruction.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, (presumably with the advice of his U.S. and British military advisors), has also adopted a strategy of holding ground in Eastern Ukraine. Ukrainian forces immobilized themselves inside urban areas, and prepared defenses. As a result, Ukrainian forces turned urban centers into fortifications for what became “last stands.” Sensible withdrawals from cities like Mariupol that might have saved many of Ukraine’s best troops were forbidden. 

 Russian forces responded by methodically isolating and crushing the defenders left with no possibility of either escape or rescue by other Ukrainian forces.

Moscow’s determination to destroy Ukrainian forces at the least cost to Russian lives prevailed. 

 Ukrainian casualties were always heavier than reported from the moment Russian troops crossed into Eastern Ukraine, but now, thanks to the recent failure of Ukrainian counterattacks in the Kherson region, they’ve reached horrific levels that are impossible to conceal. Casualty rates have reached 20,000 killed or wounded a month.   

Despite the addition of 126 howitzers, 800,000 rounds of artillery rounds, and HIMARS (U.S. rocket artillery), months of hard fighting are eroding the foundations of Ukraine’s ground strength. In the face of this disaster, Zelensky continues to order counterattacks to re-take territory as a means of demonstrating that Ukraine’s strategic position vis-à-vis Russia is not as hopeless as it seems. 

The recent Ukrainian advance to the town of Izium, the link between Donbas and Kharkiv, seemed like a gift to Kiev. U.S. satellite arrays undoubtedly provided Ukrainians with a real-time picture of the area showing that Russian forces west of Izium numbered less than 2,000 light troops (the equivalent of paramilitary police, e.g., SWAT and airborne infantry). 

The Russian command opted to withdraw its small force from the area that is roughly 1 percent of formerly Ukrainian territory currently under Russian control. However, the price for Kiev’s propaganda victory was high—depending on the source, an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 Ukrainian troops were killed or wounded in a flat, open area that Russian artillery, rockets, and air strikes turned into a killing field. 

Given Washington’s inability to end the war in Ukraine with the defeat of Russian arms, it seems certain that the Beltway will try instead to turn the ruins of the Ukrainian state into an open wound in Russia’s side that will never heal. From the beginning, the problem with this approach was that Russia always had the resources to dramatically escalate the fighting and end the fighting in Ukraine on very harsh terms. Escalation is now in progress. …………………………..

The defense establishment has a long record of success in tranquilizing American voters with meaningless clichés. As conditions favorable to Moscow develop in Eastern Ukraine and the Russian position in the world grows stronger, Washington confronts a stark choice: Talk about having successfully “degraded Russian power” in Ukraine and scale back its actions. Or risk a regional war with Russia that will engulf Europe. ……………………………… more  https://www.theamericanconservative.com/holding-ground-losing-war/

September 22, 2022 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Brainwashed for War With Russia

 https://original.antiwar.com/mcgovern/2022/09/21/brainwashed-for-war-with-russia/ by Ray McGovern ,

Thanks to Establishment media, the sorcerer apprentices advising President Joe Biden – I refer to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, national security adviser Jacob Sullivan, and China specialist Kurt Campbell – will have no trouble rallying Americans for the widest war in 77 years, starting in Ukraine, and maybe spreading to China. And, shockingly, under false pretenses.

Most Americans are oblivious to the reality that Western media are owned and operated by the same corporations that make massive profits by helping to stoke small wars and then peddling the necessary weapons. Corporate leaders, and Ivy-mantled elites, educated to believe in U.S. “exceptionalism,” find the lucre and the luster too lucrative to be able to think straight. They deceive themselves into thinking that (a) the US cannot lose a war; (b) escalation can be calibrated and wider war can be limited to Europe; and (c) China can be expected to just sit on the sidelines. The attitude, consciously or unconsciously, “Not to worry. And, in any case, the lucre and luster are worth the risk.”

The media also know they can always trot out died-in-the-wool Russophobes to “explain,” for example, why the Russians are “almost genetically driven” to do evil (James Clapper, former National Intelligence Director and now hired savant on CNN); or Fiona Hill (former National Intelligence Officer for Russia), who insists “Putin wants to evict the United States from Europe … As he might put it: “Goodbye, America. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

Absent a miraculous appearance of clearer heads with a less benighted attitude toward the core interests of Russia in Ukraine, and China in Taiwan, historians who survive to record the war now on our doorstep will describe it as the result of hubris and stupidity run amok. Objective historians may even note that one of their colleagues – Professor John Mearsheimer – got it right from the start, when he explained in the autumn 2014 issue of Foreign Affairs “Why the Ukraine Crisis is the West’s Fault.”

Historian Barbara Tuchman addressed the kind of situation the world faces in Ukraine in her book “The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam.” (Had she lived, she surely would have updated it to take Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and Ukraine into account). Tuchman wrote:

“Wooden-headedness…plays a remarkably large role in government. It consists in assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting any contrary signs. It is acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by the facts.”

Six Years (and Counting) of Brainwashing

Thanks to US media, a very small percentage of Americans know that:

  • 14 years ago, then US Ambassador to Russia (current CIA Director) William Burns was warned by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that Russia might have to intervene in Ukraine, if it were made a member of NATO. The Subject Line of Burns’s Feb. 1, 2008 Embassy Moscow cable (#182) to Washington makes it clear that Amb. Burns did not mince Lavrov’s words; the subject line stated: “Nyet means nyet: Russia’s NATO enlargement redlines.”Thus, Washington policymakers were given forewarning, in very specific terms, of Russia’s redline regarding membership for Ukraine in NATO. Nevertheless, on April 3, 2008, a NATO summit in Bucharest asserted: “NATO welcomes Ukraine’s and Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations for membership in NATO. We agreed today that these countries will become members of NATO.”
  • 8 years ago, on Feb. 22, 2014, the US orchestrated a coup in Kiev – rightly labeled “the most blatant coup in history’, insofar as it had already been blown on YouTube 18 days prior. Kiev’s spanking new leaders, handpicked and identified by name by US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland in the YouTube-publicized conversation with the U.S. ambassador in Kiev, immediately called for Ukraine to join NATO.
  • 6 years ago, in June 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin told Western reporters of his concern that so-called antiballistic missiles sites in Romania and Poland could be converted overnight to accommodate offensive strike missiles posing a threat to Russia’s own nuclear forces. (See this unique video, with English subtitles, from minute 37 to 49.) There is a direct analogy with the 1962 Cuban missile crisis when Moscow put offensive strike missiles in Cuba and President John Kennedy reacted strongly to the existential threat that posed to the US.
  • On December 21, 2021, President Putin told his most senior military leaders:

  • “It is extremely alarming that elements of the US global defense system are being deployed near Russia. The Mk 41 launchers, which are located in Romania and are to be deployed in Poland, are adapted for launching the Tomahawk strike missiles. If this infrastructure continues to move forward, and if US and NATO missile systems are deployed in Ukraine, their flight time to Moscow will be only 7–10 minutes, or even five minutes for hypersonic systems. This is a huge challenge for us, for our security.”     [Emphasis added.]
  • On December 30, 2021, Biden and Putin talked by phone at Putin’s urgent request. The Kremlin readout stated:
  • On February 12, 2022, Ushakov briefed the media on the telephone conversation between Putin and Biden earlier that day.

Unprovoked?

The US insists that Russia’s invasion was “unprovoked”. Establishment media dutifully regurgitate that line, while keeping Americans in the dark about such facts (not opinion) as are outlined (and sourced) above. Most Americans are just as taken in by the media as they were 20 years ago, when they were told there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. They simply took it on faith. Nor did the guilty media express remorse – or a modicum of embarrassment.

The late Fred Hiatt, who was op-ed editor at the Washington Post, is a case in point. In an interview with the Columbia Journalism Review [CJR, March/April 2004] he commented:

On February 24, 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine.


“If you look at the editorials we wrote running up [to the war], we state as flat fact that he [Saddam Hussein] has weapons of mass destruction.” “If that’s not true, it would have been better not to say it.”

(My journalism mentor, Robert Parry, had this to say about Hiatt’s remark. “Yes, that is a common principle of journalism, that if something isn’t real, we’re not supposed to confidently declare that it is.”)

It’s worse now. Russia is not Iraq. And Putin has been so demonized over the past six years that people are inclined to believe the likes of James Clapper to the effect there’s something genetic that makes Russians evil. “Russia-gate” was a big con (and, now, demonstrably so), but Americans don’t know that either. The consequences of prolonged demonization are extremely dangerous – and will become even more so in the next several weeks as politicians vie to be the strongest in opposing and countering Russia’s “unprovoked” attack on Ukraine.

THE Problem

Humorist Will Rogers had it right:

“The problem ain’t what people know. It’s what people know that ain’t so; that’s the problem.”

Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, a publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in inner-city Washington. His 27-year career as a CIA analyst includes serving as Chief of the Soviet Foreign Policy Branch and preparer/briefer of the President’s Daily Brief. He is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS).

September 22, 2022 Posted by | media, Reference, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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