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Inside Israel’s opportunistic invasion of Syria

Unsurprisingly, the United States has called this blatant and wholly unprovoked aggression an “act of self-defense” by Israel. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that “What Israel is doing is trying to identify potential threats, both conventional and weapons of mass destruction that could threaten Israel, and, frankly, threaten others as well, and neutralize those threats.”

Since the fall of Bashar al-Assad, Israel has carried out an unprovoked invasion of Syria with the support of the U.S. The goals are clear: take strategic land, render Syria defenseless for the future, and redraw the political map of the Middle East. 

By Mitchell Plitnick  December 13, 2024,  https://mondoweiss.net/2024/12/inside-israels-opportunistic-invasion-of-syria/

Even as Bashar al-Assad was scrambling to get out of Syria, Israel was mobilizing its military to take advantage of the power vacuum that Assad’s ouster had created. After five decades of a low-level conflict between the two countries, Israel saw an opportunity to change the calculus, and it seized it.

As of Wednesday, Israel had struck Syria nearly 500 times. Their goal with these attacks has been to essentially destroy Syria’s military capability, and they have already succeeded. Reports by Israeli media claim that well over 80% of Syria’s weaponry, ships, missiles, aircraft, and other military supplies have been damaged or destroyed. 

In essence, Israel has rendered Syria completely defenseless. 

Meanwhile, Israel has seized the de-militarized zone established in 1974. They have taken the remainder of the Golan Heights, particularly the strategic Mount Hermon, which Israel has coveted for its being the highest point in the area and an ideal place for surveillance of both Syria and Lebanon. 

Too few are calling this what it is: an invasion. An unprovoked invasion. 

There has been virtually no pushback from any sector in Israel against this blatantly criminal act. That isn’t surprising, as even the Israeli left can be expected to support the dubious “security” justification for the act. 

What is more troubling is the insufficient pushback from other countries. Many Arab states have condemned Israel’s actions, some even calling it a land grab. France has condemned it as well and called on Israel to withdraw. Germany offered a rather tepid warning.

But where are the calls for sanctions, for freezing trade deals and, especially, weapons sales, to Israel as it invades another sovereign state? Indeed, where is the word “invasion” in much of the rhetoric?

Unsurprisingly, the United States has called this blatant and wholly unprovoked aggression an “act of self-defense” by Israel. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said that “What Israel is doing is trying to identify potential threats, both conventional and weapons of mass destruction that could threaten Israel, and, frankly, threaten others as well, and neutralize those threats.”

As with the genocide in Gaza, even where there is sharp criticism, there is no threat of consequences. That’s true for the United States, and it’s also true for the Arab states that have some means to impose consequences on Israel: Jordan, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain, none of whom have even hinted they might consider severing their relations with Israel.

Ironically, the one Muslim country that did sever relations with Israel over the genocide in Gaza was Türkiye, which is, itself, a U.S. ally that is invading Syria in the wake of Assad’s fall. 

International law and norms of international relations simply don’t exist anymore, not even to the feeble extent they did once. 

Given that it is already clear that no one is going to stop Israel, we have to ask what Israel’s goals in Syria are.

Bashar al-Assad’s relationship with Israel was complicated. He often engaged in anti-Israel rhetoric, and his reliance on Hezbollah and Iran to maintain his position created what was referred to as the “Shi’a Crescent,” which Israel saw as a means to get Iranian weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon. Thus, Israel frequently attacked Syrian sites where it was usually targeting Iranian or Hezbollah forces. They did that so often that it was hardly reported, much less objected to anymore. It became completely normalized in Israel and Washington. 

But Assad also prevented attacks on Israel from Syrian territory. He maintained quiet in the de-militarized zone next to the Golan Heights. This may not seem strategically important, but for Israel—which had faced frequent attacks from Syria for the first 25 years of its existence—it was a big deal. 

To Israel, Assad was no friend, but he was seen as preferable to likely alternatives. In Israel’s view, an embattled Assad, weakened but propped up in office, limited Syria as a strategic adversary to its being a land bridge between Iran and Lebanon. That is why, regardless of Israel’s support for covert CIA operations to support Syria’s rebels, Israel did not press for those rebels to be recruited, armed, and trained to a greater extent than they were, despite some in the U.S. pushing hard for regime change in Syria. 

The 1974 Agreement on Disengagement froze the conflict between Israel and Syria that had reignited in the 1973 war. It created a de-militarized buffer zone on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights, most of which remained under illegal Israeli occupation.

That agreement held until this week, a period of 50 years, which is quite remarkable when one considers all that has gone on in the region since. Israel shattered it after Assad fell. 

The Israeli claim that it was acting to keep the area secure after the Syrian army abandoned its posts there is laughable. The United Nations peacekeeping force, UNDOF (the UN Disengagement Observer Force) was still there, and there was no threat in the area.

Israel’s “legal” justification is even more absurd. Agreements are not made between regimes, nor between specific governments or rulers. They are made between states. Israel’s claim that the fall of Assad means that the Agreement on Disengagement is voided is not only wrong but also dangerous.

By this rationale, any agreement between two countries is meaningless as soon as that government changes. This would imply, just to cite one example, that Israel’s peace treaty with Egypt is invalid, as it was made with the government of Anwar Sadat. When his successor, Hosni Mubarak, was deposed by a popular uprising, the peace treaty should have been voided. It’s a crazy contention, and it is doubtful that Israel, much less the United States, would agree with it in that case, but Israel keeps a straight face when it applies it in Syria. And the U.S. backs them up. 

Israel’s goal in invading the DMZ was to capture Mount Hermon, the highest point in Syria. It’s a mountain range that straddles the Syrian-Lebanese border, so it’s a strategically important site not only because it can conceal low-flying aircraft and some ground movement, but, more importantly, is the ideal spot to spy on Damascus, a lot of the surrounding Syrian territory, and much of Lebanon. It’s a strategic prize Israel has desired ever since it agreed to withdraw to their side of the DMZ.

Whatever territory Israel eventually agrees to relinquish, if it agrees to any at all, it will undoubtedly aim to keep Mount Hermon under occupation. 

Remaking the Middle East

But Mount Hermon was only the beginning of Israel’s goals. 

For the Israeli far right, as represented by the notorious Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, the ideology of “Greater Israel” puts Israeli expansionism in a religious context. But for Israel’s secular majority, its designs are much more grounded in simple dominance, aiming at an unprecedented level of hegemony in the Middle East.

During testimony at his trial on Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made his view of the current regional situation clear, saying, “Something tectonic has happened here, an earthquake that hasn’t happened in the 100 years since the Sykes-Picot Agreement.”

Plainly, Netanyahu sees this moment as an opportunity to redraw the entire political map of the Middle East. 

This is the idea behind the hundreds of attacks Israel has launched at Syrian military targets. While Israel argues that this is being done for “security reasons,” despite the complete absence of any threat emanating from Syria. The U.S. has completely supported this argument, despite it being transparently untrue. 

While Israel initially hinted it was targeting chemical weapons sites that still remained after Assad had been forced to destroy most of his stockpile, the massive bombardment quickly proved that the real goal was to completely destroy Syria’s ability to defend itself as stated above. So, now that Israel has succeeded in eliminating Syria’s military capabilities, what does it imply going forward?

One thing that is very clear is that Syria will be dependent for a long time on other countries for its self-defense. Israel has been instrumental over the years in supporting Arab rulers, even when they did not have friendly relations (the most well-known example being Israel’s aid to Jordan in fighting the PLO in the Black September massacre in 1970).

Given the way Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani has been reaching out to the West, and the way he has avoided speaking out against Israel’s invasion, it may well be that Israel sees itself as a potential “silent partner” supporting a new Syrian regime quietly, but brutally. 

This aligns well for Israel with Türkiye’s activities in the north of the country, where they are pressing the U.S.-backed Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), as well as Turkiye’s support for HTS. While relations between Israel and Turkiye have been severed again over Israel’s genocide in Gaza, Turkish President Recip Tayyip Erdogan is nothing if not a pragmatist when it comes to Israel and the Kurds. If he sees an opportunity to work with Israel to control a new Syria and make it less hospitable for Kurdish nationalism, he will leap at it.

What Netanyahu wants to avoid at all costs is a democratic and independent Syria. As with any Arab state, a state that reflects the will of its people is going to support the Palestinian cause. Not only is that undesirable in itself, but it would undermine the Israeli and Western narrative that depicts support for the Palestinian people as support for terrorism and authoritarianism. 

Targeting Iran

Ultimately, Israel’s strategy, as always, centers on Iran. On Thursday, the Times of Israel reported, “…the (Israeli Air Force) said that after over a decade of evading air defenses over the skies of Syria during a campaign against Iran’s supply of weapons to Hezbollah, it had achieved total air superiority in the area. This air superiority over Syria could enable safer passage for IAF aircraft to carry out a strike on Iran, the military officials said.”

While the report does not necessarily indicate that an Israeli operation targeting Iranian nuclear sites is imminent, it reflects an Israeli belief, and likely an accurate one, that an Israeli attack on Iran that is sufficiently powerful and sustained to damage or destroy the Islamic Republic’s nuclear facilities, many of which are deep underground, is much more feasible now. 

Iran seems to have recognized this and is concerned. In recent weeks, they have responded to the Israeli military successes, and to a resolution by France, Britain, Germany, and the U.S. saying that Tehran was not cooperating sufficiently with the IAEA, by doing the one thing they can: increasing their enrichment of uranium. 

A recent International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) complaint warned that Iran was enriching to 60%, which is close to the 90% threshold needed for a nuclear warhead. This prompted the E3/U.S. complaint. 

On Thursday, Iran accepted greater IAEA scrutiny of its nuclear facilities. While it is only one among several factors for Iran’s decision, it is certain that Tehran’s concern not to give Israel an excuse to launch an attack was one key reason for this reversal.

What this amounts to is a regime of terror that Israel, with full backing from the United States and some of its European allies, is working to completely alter the face of the entire Middle East. A Syrian state that would rely on Western powers—which will inevitably mean Israel, even if covertly—for its security is a first step in that regard. 

Doubtless, Israel has no real plan for how to succeed, but it is gambling on its ability to continue to live by the sword, with full American support. 

December 16, 2024 Posted by | Israel, Syria, weapons and war | Leave a comment

France’s New Nuclear Power Plant Is a Ticking Bomb

Nuclear power plants are vulnerable to climate change, and the rampant rush to revive the nuclear power industry should be stopped.

President Emmanuel Macron’s ambitious plan to revive France’s nuclear energy industry aims for carbon neutrality by 2050. It highlights significant challenges, including climate risks to nuclear sites, such as the Gravelines plant, which faces flooding threats due to rising sea levels. Additionally, the article points to workforce shortages, economic inefficiencies, and geopolitical risks, such as France’s reliance on uranium from Niger, as critical obstacles.

By Rim Longmeng, December 13, 2024 ,  https://www.fairobserver.com/more/environment/climate-change-news/frances-new-nuclear-power-plant-is-a-ticking-bomb/

Despite Europe’s growing skepticism of nuclear technology in the wake of Fukushima, in 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron announced the revival of his country’s nuclear energy industry. Macron’s ambitious program aims to end the country’s dependence on fossil fuels and make France carbon neutral by 2050. The plan will require the construction of 14 new nuclear reactors. At first glance, Macron’s plans seem logical, as nuclear energy already accounts for 70% of France’s energy consumption, and cheap nuclear energy has been the backbone of the French economy since the 1970s. However, the populist tactics of the French leader are raising questions among the country’s population and experts, as the problems of the nuclear industry – which will inevitably arise soon – will be left for future generations to solve after Macron leaves office.

No room for improvisation in the face of climate risks

In its report October 3, 2024 Greenpeace harshly criticized the French government’s plans to build two new EPR2 nuclear reactors in northwestern France near Dunkirk due to the risk of flooding. The new units are scheduled to be operational by 2040, but the problem lies in the site chosen for construction. The chosen site is located in a region already at risk of flooding and will become increasingly vulnerable as climate change worsens.

The Gravelines nuclear power plant is currently the most powerful in Western Europe, already consisting of six 900 MW reactors. The French state-owned energy company EDF has promised to build two more reactors at the same plant on an 11-meter-high platform to protect from flooding. According to EDF experts, the NPP project will sufficiently resist climate challenges until 2070. However, this is only the middle of the plant’s lifespan, which is expected to last 60 years until 2100. Its dismantling is scheduled for the middle of the next century, and EDF promises to “adapt” the project to current climate conditions every 10 years after 2070.

It sounds reckless, as the UN Environment Programme warns of a temperature rise of up to  +3.1°C in the coming decades, leading to sea level rise and a dramatic increase in extreme climate events. Have the French authorities already forgotten the devastating North Sea flood of 1953 and the numerous disasters in France in recent years? Even today, most of the area around the nuclear power plant is below sea level during high tides, and only protective structures built nearby, turning the NPP into a kind of “island,” have saved the region from disaster. Since 2022, the Gravelines Nuclear Power Station has been surrounded by a 3-kilometer-long protective wall, which costs EDF 35 million euros. How much more will EDF spend to ensure the nuclear plant’s safety, and what will happen if nature proves more potent than the fortifications built?

The EDF project documentation contains too many unanswered questions, which exist only thanks to Macron’s political patronage. The facts indicate that constructing new reactors poses an extreme danger to the local population and the environment. Nuclear power plants are vulnerable to climate change, and the rampant rush to revive the nuclear power industry should be stopped.

New Challenges for Macron’s Nuclear Renaissance

By announcing the revival of nuclear energy in the country, President Macron has formally taken a step toward reviving France’s economic, industrial and military power. However, the French economy is not yet ready to fully support such ambitious plans.

Macron’s ambitious plans to build 14 new nuclear power units will face a glaring shortage of qualified personnel. The French nuclear industry currently employs about 220 thousand people. To achieve Marcon’s objectives, the industry will need a significant influx of skilled workers, particularly in the workforce. By 2030, according to EDF estimates, their number needs to be at least doubled. The proposed construction timeline is also impressive. The first Gravelines unit with the EPR-2 reactor is expected to take only eight years to complete. It is worth mentioning the notorious Flamanville nuclear reactor in Normandy, which ended up costing 4 times its initial budget, reaching €13.2 billion, and was launched more than a decade behind schedule. 

The Loss of African Uranium Deposits

France is particularly concerned about the exploitation of uranium from Niger and the potential consequences of losing its supply. For more than four decades, the Orano company, owned by the French state by 45%, has been developing uranium in African countries. Niger is one of the three largest suppliers of this valuable natural resource to France. However, the recent revocation of Orano’s uranium mining license in Niger has cast doubt on France’s energy independence. Representatives of the new Nigerien authorities have stated that uranium has been used to supply Europe with electricity for decades. Still, West Africa remains one of the poorest countries in the world and has not benefited much from exports. Additionally, the economic risks for the French nuclear industry include uranium prices that have reached historical highs, primarily due to European countries’ search for new energy suppliers after 2022. 

According to Macron, promoting nuclear technologies in France should lead the country to complete independence from foreign energy supplies and secure France’s status as the flagship nuclear industry in the EU. The problem is that Macron knows it will not be up to him but to future generations of French politicians to address the problems mentioned above regarding his misleading nuclear policy. 

[Tara Yarwais edited this piece.]

December 16, 2024 Posted by | climate change, France | Leave a comment

Biden Aims to Go Out With a Bellicose Bang

Does the white house get it, any of it? No. See the RT headline, December 2: “White House touts ‘massive surge’ in arms shipments to Kiev.” The article quotes Jake “World War III” Sullivan blabbering about throwing more money down the endless Ukraine drain. You’d think he might have got the November election message that half the country has had it with this war. But no, the morons in charge shout from the rooftops that they will not be deterred from their wickedness and stupidity.

Eve Ottenberg, 13 Dec 24,  https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/12/13/biden-aims-to-go-out-with-a-bellicose-bang/

Having failed thus far to ignite Nuclear Armageddon, what’s up next for the U.S. military industrial complex? I’ll tell you: New bases in Europe, 47 of them, to be exact, in Scandinavia in coming years. That’s Joe Biden’s legacy, a blood transfusion to NATO’s moribund carcass by adding Finland and Sweden and thereby ballooning the Empire’s global military footprint, a footprint of over 800 imperial foreign military bases already bankrupting us Welp, we’re gonna get 47 more, per journalist Patrick Hennigsen, and they’re gonna be near Russia. If you’re a Finn or a Swede, you might want to consider emigrating, since the pusillanimous NATO to which you now belong has set you up as a tripwire for the Atomic Apocalypse. That’s Biden’s legacy.

Don’t think for a minute these bases make anyone safer. Quite the contrary. Besides being hugely provocative and thus endangering the local population, the bases’ U.S. soldiers are in harm’s way. Moscow eloquently demonstrated this on November 25. That was when Russia retaliated for recent ATACMS assaults, manned and operated by U.S. personnel. Most of that personnel are now dead. That’s because Russia shot its unstoppable Iskander missiles at the launchers, killing at least 30 U.S. operators.

Also “up to 40 fighters, mostly from the U.S. were eliminated in a missile strike on a command center…in the city of Kharkov on November 25,” RT reported November 28 [“Russian Defense Ministry reveals response to long-range Ukrainian strikes”]. This is the fate that may await U.S. soldiers on foreign military bases, because Russia’s extensive weapons menu is chock-a-block with all types of hypersonic missiles against which the west is defenseless. And Washington’s so busy provoking Moscow, that the kremlin will much more eagerly share this technology with its allies – China, Iran and North Korea – than it did before Joe “War Is My Legacy” Biden idiotically triggered Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

So dozens of Americans have or will be coming home in body bags, and U.S. weaponry got crushed and surprise! Not a peep in U.S. corporate media. That’s because our news outlets report American, ahem, “Ukrainian” strikes on Russia, using our vaunted but really mainly symbolic ATACMS, and report it with great fanfare, groveling before supposed superlative American weapons, but the consequences? The punishment? Not so much, since, Gee, that might make Biden and by extension Washington look bad. Can’t have that in American legacy news media. But hey, the Hindustan Times reported it, with headlines, like, “Russia Reduces Ukraine’s Western Weapons to Rubble,” and “Ukraine Loses All ATACMS, Storm Shadows? ‘NATO Train’ with Long-Range Missiles Blown Up by Russia.” How reassuring to know some nations still have a free press, even if they are halfway across the globe.

Meanwhile, all-around nitwits in the Biden administration chatter blandly about “Ukraine taking the fight to Russia.” Ukraine? Hello? Is that the new shorthand for the United States? Because make no mistake, the kremlin isn’t under any illusions about who’s firing ATACMS into Russia. Moscow’s leadership knows full well the info downloaded from U.S. satellites is classified and thus only Americans can eyeball it, and that only Americans are allowed to do the targeting. A Ukrainian may push the last button, but everything done before that comes from Washington. And the Russians are mad as hornets. For those of us who dwell in or near major American cities, that paints a big bullseye on us; in fact, the only thing stalling such targeting is the patience and sanity of Russian president Vladimir Putin. But remember, he’s a politician too, and one under tremendous pressure from his right flank to retaliate hard against the U.S.

Luckily, for those of us oddly averse to being incinerated, the recent Russian Iskander strikes, as the Hindustan Times reported, may well have destroyed much of the ATACMS and Storm Shadow cache. And we all know the west lacks the military industrial production depth to replace them quickly. Once the western military cupboard is bare, it will stay that way for a good while. The U.S. simply ain’t the manufacturing behemoth it once was.

In fact, much of our military production depends deeply on supply chains linked to China and, indeed, directly on Chinese manufacturing. And clouding the American defense picture, on December 1, Beijing’s sanctions on “the export of about 700 dual-use items took effect,” reported Asia Times that day, although what really grabbed headlines two days later was Beijing’s ban on sale of three rare earth minerals – gallium, germanium and antimony – to the U.S., a ban predicted in these CounterPunch pages, long ago. China has also sanctioned multiple American defense firms and senior executives. And more such export controls are coming. Bye the way, dual-use refers to civilian-military. So at the very least, Beijing’s new export control list will “prevent the U.S. from obtaining China’s critical metals, rare earths and key electronic parts.” China, long in the cross-hairs of voluble American congressional nincompoops, finally took their blather seriously. Incidentally, it’s not at all clear how these sanctions will affect China shipping weapons materials to Russia. My suspicion is, they won’t.

According to one Chinese military writer quoted by Asia Times: “The launch of the export control list is a precise attack to the heart of the U.S. military industry. This is not an ordinary ‘embargo’ but an all-round blockade to completely cut off the Chinese supply chain that the U.S. relies on.” So Biden’s oft-repeated, imbecilic crowings about war over Taiwan, and congress’ dimwitted howls for attacks on China have consequences, namely, Beijing taking steps to defang the American military beast, a monster directed, apparently, by birdbrains.

Does the white house get it, any of it? No. See the RT headline, December 2: “White House touts ‘massive surge’ in arms shipments to Kiev.” The article quotes Jake “World War III” Sullivan blabbering about throwing more money down the endless Ukraine drain. You’d think he might have got the November election message that half the country has had it with this war. But no, the morons in charge shout from the rooftops that they will not be deterred from their wickedness and stupidity.

China’s list of weapons-necessary products now prohibited from sale to the U.S. includes “computers, electronic devices, chemicals, sensors, lasers and aviation navigation systems. If China uses the list to fight a technology war, the U.S. won’t be able to find alternative products elsewhere.” So, um, about arming and equipping those 47 military bases in Scandinavia, I suppose Uncle Sam could always cannibalize dishwashers and washing machines to propel American weapons, the way the Biden team’s supposed geniuses like commerce secretary Gina Raimondo told us the Russians did in Ukraine (ho, ho!). Or we could use shovels, like the bubbleheads in our corporate media claimed those desperate Slavs did. Those were the same news outlets that told us, early on, Russia would soon run out of missiles. Well, now we learn that in addition to Russia positively BRISTLING with missiles, Moscow has all sorts of unstoppable hypersonic missiles, some of them as powerful as nuclear bombs without the radiation, and evidently, to judge from the Oreshnik, far more precise and capable of busting bunkers hundreds of meters underground. We in the west have failed to assemble even one hypersonic missile, while a few Russian Oreshniks could likely wipe out an entire military base. I guess now they’ll all be pointed at Scandinavia.

Eve Ottenberg is a novelist and journalist. Her latest novel is Booby Prize. She can be reached at her website.

December 16, 2024 Posted by | politics, Ukraine, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Congress Revives Cold War Tactics With New Anti-Communism School Curriculum

The Crucial Communism Teaching Act

Even many members of the Progressive Caucus voted in favor, proving that anti-communism is as popular on the left as it is on the right.

a quickly-escalating Cold War against China

 December 14, 2024  Alan MacLeod,  https://www.mintpressnews.com/congress-revives-cold-war-tactics-with-new-anti-communism-school-curriculum/288830/

Congress has just passed a new bill that will see the U.S. spend huge sums of money redesigning much of the public school system around the ideology of anti-communism. The “Crucial Communism Teaching Act” is now being read in the Senate, where it is all but certain to pass. The move comes amid growing public anger at the economic system and increased public support for socialism.

The Crucial Communism Teaching Act, in its own words, is designed to teach children that “certain political ideologies, including communism and totalitarianism…conflict with the principles of freedom and democracy that are essential to the founding of the United States.”

Although sponsored by Republicans, it enjoys widespread support from Democrats and is focused on China, Venezuela, Cuba and other targets of U.S. empire. The wording of the bill has many worried that this will be a centerpiece of a new era of anti-communist hysteria, similar to previous McCarthyist periods.

The curriculum will be designed by the controversial Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation and will ensure all American high school students “understand the dangers of communism and similar political ideologies” and “learn that communism has led to the deaths of over 100,000,000 victims worldwide.” It will also develop a series titled “Portraits in Patriotism,” that will expose students to individuals who are “victims of the political ideologies” in question.

A Discredited Book

The 100 million figure originates with the notorious pseudoscience text, “The Black Book of Communism.” A collection of political essays, the book’s central claim is that 100 million people have perished as a result of the communist ideology. However, even many of its contributors and co-writers have distanced themselves from it, claiming that the lead author was “obsessed” with reaching the 100 million figure, to the point that he simply conjured millions of deaths from nowhere.

Its methodology was also universally panned, with many pointing out that the tens of millions of Soviet and Nazi losses during World War II were attributed to communist ideology. This means that both Adolf Hitler himself and many of his victims are counted towards the vastly overinflated figure. The book was condemned by Holocaust remembrance groups as whitewashing and even lionizing genocidal fascist groups as anti-communist heroes.

The principal organization promoting the 100 million figure today is the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, which has shown a similar level of both anti-communist devotion and methodological rigor. The group, set up by the U.S. government in 1993, added all worldwide COVID-19 deaths to the victims of communism list, arguing that the coronavirus was a communist disease because it originated in China. It is these people who will be designing the new curriculum that will be taught in social studies, government, history, and economics classes across the country.

China Hawks

One of the central goals of the bill is also to “ensure that high school students in the United States understand that 1,500,000,000 people still suffer under communism.” This is a clear reference to China, a rapidly developing country that, in just two generations, has gone from one of the poorest on Earth to a global superpower, challenging and even surpassing the United States on many quality-of-life indicators.

The bill goes on to detail how the school curriculum will “focus on ongoing human rights abuses by such regimes, such as the treatment of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region” by the Chinese “regime” and its “aggression” towards “pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong,” and Taiwan, who it labels “a democratic friend of the United States.”

Furthermore, many of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation’s “Witness Project” case studies – likely the source for the “Portraits in Patriotism” series – are from China. This includes Rushan Abbas, the founder and executive director of the Campaign for Uyghurs, a pressure group funded by CIA front organization, the National Endowment for Democracy. Abbas was also previously employed as a translator at the notorious Guantánamo Bay torture camp.

The U.S. is currently engaged in a quickly-escalating Cold War against China that includes channeling money and support to separatist movements, including those in Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan, as MintPress News has reported. In September, the House of Representatives passed a bill that authorized $1.6 billion to be spent on anti-Chinese messaging worldwide.

Latin America: a Model and a Target

The other major target of the bill will likely be socialist or communist-led governments in Latin America. The act’s sponsor is Maria Elvira Salazar, a Republican Congressperson representing Miami. A part of Florida’s famously conservative Cuban-American community, in 2023, she introduced the FORCE Act, which attempted to block any U.S. president from normalizing relations with Cuba unless its government is overthrown. She has repeatedly condemned President Biden for easing the (illegal) U.S. sanctions on Venezuela. And in July, she denounced what she described as the “socialist curse in Central America and the Caribbean,” singling out Cuban, Venezuela, Honduras, and Nicaragua as countries requiring regime change.

She is, however, an avid supporter of the far-right President of Argentina, Javier Milei, accepting his invitation to attend his inauguration. Argentina, she said, “is going to set the course and point of reference for the rest of Latin America as to the way that a country should be governed… Free market economy, small government, individual liberties, freedom, private sector, no corruption, that’s what we’re trying to do.”

Perhaps the only foreign country she praises more than Argentina is Israel, whose actions she has supported at every step, even going so far as to denounce what she called the “one-sided pressure for a ceasefire” in Gaza.

Salazar’s bill passed easily, 327-62, with limited opposition from Democrats or Republicans, who voted for and against it in roughly equal measures. Even many members of the Progressive Caucus voted in favor, proving that anti-communism is as popular on the left as it is on the right.

A New McCarthyism?

The imminent passing of the Crucial Communism Teaching Act harkens back to earlier anti-communist periods in American history, namely the Red Scare of the 1910s and the McCarthyist era of the 1940s and 1950s. During those times, organized labor movements were ruthlessly attacked, workers from all professions, including professors, government officials, and teachers, were fired en masse, and some of America’s brightest minds had their careers derailed due to their political leanings. This included singer Paul Robeson, actors like Charlie Chaplain and Marilyn Monroe, playwright Arthur Miller and scientist Albert Einstein.

The point of these operations was to break any opposition to the power of the state and big business and ensure the United States maintained its capitalist course. Today, however, fewer Americans than ever are happy with the current political and economic system. A recent Gallup study found that only 22% of the public are satisfied with how things are going, with a majority responding that they are “very dissatisfied.” Living standards have been stagnating or dropping for decades, and alternative economic systems are becoming more desirable. A 2019 poll from Axios found that 48% of adults under 35 prefer socialism to capitalism, including 57% of female respondents.

There are some signs that Washington is slowly moving towards a new McCarthyist era. President Trump, for example, has promised to carry out mass deportations of leftists once he becomes president, stating:

I will order my government to deny entry to all communists and all Marxists. Those who come to join our country must love our country. We don’t want them if they want to destroy our country… So we’re going to be keeping foreign Christian-hating communists, socialists, and Marxists out of America.”

“At the end of the day, either the communists destroy America, or we destroy the communists,” he explained. But he also stated that American citizens espousing anti-capitalist views would be purged. “My question is, what are we going to do with the ones that are already here, that grew up here? I think we have to pass a new law for them,” he said.

That Trump would actually deport millions of American citizens en masse appears like too drastic a step right now, but it is clear that both Democrats and Republicans are serious in their anti-communist convictions. Therefore, the Crucial Communism Teaching Act will likely only be the start of this campaign.

December 16, 2024 Posted by | Education, politics, Reference, USA | Leave a comment

Remember the dark skies?

100 researchers call out FCC on Musk Starlink launches

By Sarah Fortinsky (The Hill), December 11, 2024
https://space4peace.blogspot.com/2024/12/remember-dark-skies.html

Researchers are urging the federal government to pause further low-orbit internet satellite launches until a comprehensive review is conducted to determine the potential environmental damage that could result.

In a letter to Julie Kearney, chief of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Space Bureau, more than 100 researchers expressed concern about the rapid development of low-orbit satellites and urged international cooperation to determine the best path forward.


“The environmental harms of launching and burning up so many satellites aren’t clear. That’s because the federal government hasn’t conducted an environmental review to understand the impacts. What we do know is that more satellites and more launches lead to more damaging gasses and metals in our atmosphere,” the researchers wrote in the letter.

“We shouldn’t rush forward with launching satellites at this scale without making sure the benefits justify the potential consequences of these new mega-constellations being launched, and then re-entering our atmosphere to burn up and or create debris,” they continued. “This is a new frontier, and we should save ourselves a lot of trouble by making sure we move forward in a way that doesn’t cause major problems for our future.”

The researchers noted that, in just more than five years, tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Starlink service has launched more than 6,000 units that now make up 60 percent of all satellites.

“The new space race took off faster than governments were able to act,” they wrote, adding that regulatory agencies now lack the policies to make fair assessments about “the total effects of all proposed mega constellations.”

They criticized the FCC for granting licenses on a “first-come, first-served basis,” noting orbital space and the broadcast spectrum are not limitless and they require an “unprecedented system of cooperation” with international regulators “to share the commons of our final frontier.”

“Until extensive coordination is in place, we shouldn’t let the commercial interests first to launch determine the rules,” they wrote. 

The researchers also encouraged the FCC to end the “categorical exclusion of satellites” from environmental review, writing, “that launching 30,000 to 500,000 satellites into low earth orbit doesn’t even warrant an environmental review offends common sense.”

December 16, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

US mainstream media missed biggest news story of 2024

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL. 15 Dec 24

As the year winds down, US media reviews the biggest news stories of the year.

But in selecting the biggest story of 2024, US media missed it completely…….…………………………………………..

The biggest story of 2024 was America enabling the Israeli genocidal ethnic cleansing of 2,300,000 Palestinians in Gaza. Throughout ’24, America has supplied over $20 billion sending over 50,000 tons of bombs to obliterate habitable life in Gaza’s 139 square miles. Over 100,000 already dead with no resources left for the remaining Palestinians to survive. Nearly every Palestinian child believes death is imminent according to recent reporting.

But one could watch mainstream media 24/7 and not hear one word about US participation in the most grotesque genocide this century. Mainstream news has fallen in line with the Biden administration narrative that $20 billion and 50,000 tons of weapons, along with US vetoes of UN resolutions to end the genocide, are simply for Israeli self-defense.

There is no reporting on the horrific conditions in Gaza; the obliteration of all schools, universities, hospitals, livable housing, potable water, food supplies. Media ignores the wanton slaughter of their journalistic brethren trying to cover the genocide along with hundreds of aid workers seeking to keep starving Palestinians alive.

Tragically, media censure of the ongoing US enabled genocide is the one issue upon with both conservative and progressive media concur. Genocide and US lockstep participation in it is the issue that date not speak its name.

The US government is fully supportive in word and deed of the most monstrous war crimes imaginable. But when it comes to this inhumane policy…US mainstream media cannot even imagine it, much less report on it.

December 16, 2024 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

A nuclear-free energy future for Hydro-Québec, says Michael Sabia

Marie-Anne Audet, Thursday, December 12, 2024, Le Journal de Montreal,

Hydro-Québec has definitively closed the door to nuclear power, according to its CEO, Michael Sabia, who assured Thursday that energy production will reach new heights with the agreement in principle announced between Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador around the Churchill Falls dam.

If approved, the deal would add 2,400 MW to Hydro-Québec’s production. The Crown corporation also plans to invest $25 billion to launch three new power plants in Labrador

“We are going to increase production between 8,000 and 9,000 megawatts [by 2035]. With the 2,400 megawatts coming from Newfoundland, we arrive at more than 11,000 megawatts of additional power,” he illustrated during an interview with LCN…………………………………………………  https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2024/12/12/un-futur-energetique-sans-nucleaire-pour-hydro-quebec-affirme-michael-sabia
 

December 16, 2024 Posted by | Canada, renewable | Leave a comment

Israel preparing to strike Iranian nuclear sites – media

 https://www.rt.com/news/609279-israel-iran-strikes-report/ 14 Dec 24

Events in Syria have created a window of opportunity, sources have told the Times of Israel.

The Israeli Air Force is preparing for “potential strikes” on Iranian nuclear facilities, military officials have told the Times of Israel.

The Jewish state believes that the surprise takeover of Syria by jihadist rebels has weakened Tehran’s position in the region, which could prompt Iran to speed up its atomic program, the outlet said.

Meanwhile, Israeli airstrikes have taken out most of Syria’s air defenses, clearing the way for an operation against Iran.

Tehran has long insisted that its nuclear program is peaceful and civilian in nature, contrary to allegations by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Iran has sought an atomic bomb. In 2015, the world’s top five nuclear powers struck a deal with Iran to monitor its nuclear activities in exchange for sanctions relief, but the US unilaterally withdrew from the agreement in 2018.

Israel reportedly considered strikes on Iranian nuclear sites after Tehran’s October 1 missile barrage, but did not follow through on those plans.

Netanyahu’s government has used the recent events in Syria to destroy its neighbor’s military capabilities, launching “one of the largest attack operations in the history” of its air force. Earlier this week, Israeli jets struck over 250 targets across Syria, including airports and seaports, air defense and missile sites, military industry facilities and warehouses. Israeli troops also moved beyond the buffer zone in the Golan Heights, claiming Mount Hermon.

Bashar Assad’s government in Syria was overthrown by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militants last week. The jihadist group has not yet consolidated power.

Israel reportedly believes that Iran is “isolated” after the ousting of Assad and that its other main ally in the region, Lebanon-based Hezbollah, has been significantly weakened by the recent IDF offensive there. This could push Iran to speed up its nuclear program and create a window of opportunity for an Israeli pre-emptive strike, according to the Times of Israel.

December 16, 2024 Posted by | Iran, Israel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Some Thoughts On The Mystery Drones

Caitlin Johnstone, Dec 14, 2024

Okay I need to jot down some thoughts on the “mystery drone” thing because it’s way too interesting a story to ignore.

For those who aren’t aware, since mid-November people have been sighting large drones all over the east coast of the United States, and what makes this so interesting is that the US government is claiming they don’t know anything about them. Don’t know who owns them, where they’re taking off from or where they’re landing.

They’re either lying or telling the truth about this, and either way it’s a major story. Either the US government is keeping secrets from the public about huge numbers of drones that have spent weeks flying over populated areas, or they somehow legitimately don’t know what’s going on with these sightings. Contemplating either of these possibilities should widen your eyes a bit.

And to be clear there really does appear to be something up there. Many of the sightings that are being reported are just the result of a fun news story causing people to look up from their smartphones into the night sky for the first time in years and see things they’re not familiar with like planes and stars — but there are also large, hovering aircraft of uncertain origin.

The clearest footage I’ve seen of these mystery drones so far was presented by NewsNation’s Rich McHugh, who actually turned and pointed to one of the craft in the air behind him while reporting out of central New Jersey. It must have been fairly low down because they got a great shot of the thing; it had fixed wings and blinking lights like a plane, but was reportedly only eight to ten feet wide.

McHugh said he and his crew saw some 40 or 50 of the aircraft in the hour they were on location. He interviewed officers from the Ocean County Sheriff’s Department, who told him the drones evade detection because they don’t give off heat like normal drones, and that one vanished when they tried to pursue it with a police drone. A sheriff named Michael Mastronardy told McHugh that one of his officers reported seeing fifty of these drones flying in off the ocean all at once, after which the US Coast Guard reported seeing a number of the same craft over the water.

Michael Tracey, one of the very few western journalists I have any respect for, went drone hunting and reported seeing “one mystery drone with all red lights, hovering quite low, and another with green and red lights, higher altitude, flying in a straight line.”

“It was hovering. If that’s a plane, I’m a horse’s ass!” Tracey tweeted.

So as far as I can tell this is a real thing and not mass hysteria resulting from large numbers of people suddenly looking up and misinterpreting the lights they’re seeing.

But what is it?

As of this writing we’re not getting any answers from the US government. The White House, FBI and DHS are all saying that they don’t assess that the mystery drones have a foreign nexus or pose a threat to national security, but that they also have no idea what they are. All three departments have released statements saying that “many of the reported sightings are actually manned aircraft, operating lawfully,” which sounds intentionally obfuscatory because obviously there are going to be many reports from people misidentifying normal aircraft thrown into the mix, and this is completely irrelevant to all the reported sightings which don’t fit that description…………………………………………………………… more https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/some-thoughts-on-the-mystery-drones?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=153115935&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

December 16, 2024 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

Peter Dutton’s nuclear plan: Mad, bad, and extremely dangerous

Giles Parkinson,  Renew Economy 13th Dec 2024, https://reneweconomy.com.au/peter-duttons-nuclear-plan-mad-bad-and-extremely-dangerous/ [excellent graphs on original]

It might seem weirdly appropriate that the federal Coalition should release its nuclear power policy costings on Friday the 13th, considered an unlucky day in western superstition. But that would be to downplay the sheer lunacy, rank dishonesty, and clear danger in Peter Dutton’s energy plans.

Shows like Edward Scissorhands are horror fantasies played out on a screen. But the Peter Dutton and Ted O’Brien nuclear plan is a horror show we may have to live and breathe. After so many years, the Coalition is still playing culture wars on the most fundamental issues of our time – and all at the behest of the fossil fuel industry.

It doesn’t matter at which level you look at it, this energy policy makes no sense at all. You could look at it backwards, from behind, sideways, leave it out in the sun for a few days, or even bury it in the garden (please do), the only thing that would change is that it might smell more than it does now.

It would likely take until Christmas to go through all the lies, deceptions and misunderstandings that comprise this policy and these costings, but let’s just focus on a couple of the important ones for now.

The reference to the sheer lunacy and the danger of the Coalition policy comes in Dutton’s desire to simply ignore climate science, along with basic engineering and economics.

Emissions reductions are put off to the never never. And, as Dutton revealed in his press conference through his comments on rooftop solar, he simply does not have a clue about the basic concepts of the energy system.

See: “You can’t charge your battery and your car at same time:” Dutton does not have a clue about energy

Dutton and Co simply want to bring a crashing halt to Australia’s only successful emission reductions efforts – the transition to green energy – and walk away from the country’s natural advantages in wind, solar and storage and the industries that are emerging from that.

They even have the chutzpah to claim that it will result in lower emissions. Which, inevitably, is pure bunkum. But, as Donald Trump has demonstrated, if you “flood the zone with shit”, something will stick – mostly to the front pages of mainstream media.

And that’s what we saw on Friday. A planned leak of the findings resulted in claimed headline “savings” – emblazoned across the front pages of the cheer-leading Murdoch media and the AFR this morning – that the nuclear power plan will save $264 billion.

It is of course, a complete nonsense, and obviously so to anyone who is paying attention, or even bothered to read the Coalition document. We are talking about completely different scenarios, and taking traditional accounting methods away from the international norm.

Dutton and his media followers have made a big deal of Frontier Economics costings of the Australian Energy Market Operator’s Integrated System which is the basis of Labor policy.

Frontier concedes, however, that the cost of AEMO’s “step change” plan is about what it says it is – $122 billion, based on the standard accounting practice of “net present value.”

But, at the urging of the Coalition, Frontier has published an additional number, around $600 billion, based on the “real cost” and throwing in some more transmission spending.

Dutton has used that number to insist that AEMO and Labor had lied to the Australian people. But it was the former Coalition government who instructed AEMO to cost it this way. And for good reason – it is standard international accounting practice. It is Dutton and O’Brien who are now spreading the lies.

Indeed, the Frontier Economics report actually reveals that the claimed $264 billion in savings parroted by the mainstream media are from two entirely different scenarios. One is from AEMO’s “Step Change”, the other from the Coalition’s version of “progressive change.”

The actual savings on a like for like basis are much smaller, if you can believe Frontier’s costings of nuclear.

Progressive change assumes that demand will not be as great as forecast by AEMO. It assumes much smaller electrification (thanks to the gas industry) and slower uptake of EVs (thanks to the oil industry). It then ignores the $75 billion a year of extra fuel costs that would result from that.

Now let’s go to the Coalition’s plan to shut down just one third of the main grid’s ageing coal fired generators by 2034 – with the rest trying to stay on line until nuclear power plants can be built.

The Coalition says it still thinks the first nuclear power plant can be built by the mid-2030s. The rest of the industry says this will be pretty much impossible until the mid 2040s.

Keeping the coal fired power stations open will not just increase pollution – both within the grid and the industries that depend on it – it will also puts grid reliability at risk.

This week, AEMO had to issue several lack of reserve alerts as another heatwave approached the eastern states. The main reason was that Origin, despite being promised up to $450 million to keep Australia’s biggest coal generator on line for another two years, reported another breakdown at Eraring.

At Bayswater, a unit is offline because of a tube leak. One third of the coal units in Victoria are also offline due to unplanned outages, and so is the country’s newest and “most efficient” coal generator at Kogan Creek, which is also the country’s largest single generation unit.

Dutton and O’Brien insist that these ageing and increasingly decrepit coal fired power plants will only have to operate “a few years longer”. But they are kidding themselves. Their own modelling confirms that.

They are still setting a timeline of 2035 for the first reactors. Will these be large scale of small commercial small modular reactor. No one has built one, or even got a licence to build one.

The Coalition insists that new nuclear can be built, from scratch, in a country with no nuclear infrastructure or know-how to speak of, no work force and no regulatory base ,in about a dozen years. There’s also a golden replica of the Sydney Harbour Bridge at the bottom of your packet of Cornflakes.

A dozen years is the average “delay” in the big nuclear power plants being built in western democracies – the UK, France, and Finland – all of whom have been operating nuclear power plants for decades.

Dutton and O’Brien are now telling us their nuclear plan will result in 14 gigawatt of nuclear capacity – double what  they previously said. And Frontier’s modelling shows that coal is going to have to last a lot longer, beyond the official lifetime limits of the coal generators.

Even the Australian Energy Council, one of the most conservative of lobby groups that represents the coal generator owners, believes this is a bad idea and “could result in reliability issues.”

But let’s go back to the conventional way of measuring costs – net present value. The Frontier report includes it, at the very last page of its report. It shows that the difference in costs, on their calculations, is actually $62 billion over 25 years for the step change scenario.

But even that is on the basis of some heroic assumptions on the costs of nuclear. Frontier puts the total cost, including 14 GW of new nuclear power plants, at $142 billion (see table above).

Let’s look at the cost of Hinkley C, the first nuclear power station to be built in the UK for decades. At just 3.2 GW, its cost has already blown out to $A92 billion and is running at least 14 years late from its promised timeline. What does the Coalition know that the rest of the nuclear world does not know?

The Coalition’s vision for renewables also beggars belief. Under its modelling, it estimates the share of wind, solar and hydro will be less than 50 per cent in 2050. That’s in the “progressive” plan that appears to be their chosen one.

If you take the current level of renewables, the already committed large scale projects, and the continued roll out of rooftop and behind the metre solar, the Coalition is essentially telling everyone that the construction of new large scale wind and solar more or less comes to an end with their election next year.

The stupidity of the idea is frightening. Quite how the Coalition figures it could keep the lights on in the 2030s and 2040s is beyond belief.

The Coalition are also trying to convince people that somehow their plan does not need new transmission, or much back-up.

All generation needs back-up, and all generation needs transmission. A 1.4 GW nuclear power plant will be nearly twice the size of the current biggest unit in Australia’s main grid, the currently broken Kogan Creek coal fired generator.

That means it needs twice as much back-up, because if it trips suddenly – which it inevitably will, just look at the patchy performance of the new nuclear power plant in Finland – then the market operator needs to be able to fill in the gaps at a moment’s notice. That’s expensive.

And then, of course, is what to do with your rooftop solar. If the Coalition wants its fleet of nuclear power plants to run “always on” then there may be no room on the grid for your rooftop solar.

Your best bet might be to buy a battery, or better still an electric vehicle. You don’t have to leave the grid, but you will want to make sure that you can have power without it. And you sure don’t have to believe Dutton’s nonsense about solar not being able to charge EVs and batteries at the same time.

But the safest and cheaper option might be to ensure these idiots don’t get elected.

December 15, 2024 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Six major NATO states sign document on Ukraine’s accession plans

 https://www.rt.com/news/609282-nato-declaration-ukraine-membership/ 13 Dec 24

The countries have backed Kiev’s “irreversible path” to eventually joining the bloc.

Six European members of NATO have released a joint statement backing Ukraine’s plan to join the US-led bloc, and promising to support the peace terms offered by Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky to Russia.

Moscow has previously rejected Zelensky’s insistence on restoring Ukraine’s 1991 borders as unacceptable.

The foreign ministers of the UK, France, Spain, Germany, Italy and Poland signed a declaration after meeting with the Ukrainian leader in Berlin on Thursday. 

“The goals of a comprehensive, just and lasting peace for Ukraine and durable security for Europe are inseparable. Ukraine must prevail,” the statement said. 

The countries pledged to support an end to the conflict in accordance “with full respect for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

“We reaffirm our commitment to President Zelensky’s Peace Formula, as a credible path towards a just and lasting peace,” the statement read.

Kiev’s backers vowed to “support Ukraine on its irreversible path to full Euro-Atlantic integration, including NATO membership,” as well as “its path towards accession to the European Union.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga thanked the six nations and the EU for “candid discussion and readiness to take concrete steps.” He called for additional sanctions, targeting Russia’s metals sector, shipping, and banks.

“We are closely monitoring the increase in trade with the countries that have not imposed sanctions on Russia,” Sibiga said. 

The meeting in Berlin took place amid uncertainty over whether US President-elect Donald Trump will continue the previous administration’s unconditional military and financial aid to Kiev.

Trump, who takes office on January 20, has described Zelensky as “the greatest salesman on Earth” and promised to do his best to quickly end the conflict through diplomacy. Although he has not yet produced a concrete plan, during the presidential campaign he appeared open to pressuring Kiev to start negotiations with Moscow.

Trump has also blasted outgoing President Joe Biden for allowing Ukraine to use American-made missiles for strikes deep into internationally recognized Russian territory. “I think that is a very big mistake,” he told Time magazine in an interview published on Thursday. 

Russia has rejected Zelensky’s ‘peace formula’ outright, insisting that a peace agreement could only be reached on its terms. Moscow has stressed that Ukraine must renounce claims on Crimea and four other regions, which voted to join Russia in 2014 and 2022.

The Kremlin has also said Ukraine should drop its plan to join the US-led military bloc in favor of becoming a permanently neutral country. President Vladimir Putin has cited NATO’s expansion eastward and military cooperation with Ukraine as one of the root causes of the current conflict.

December 15, 2024 Posted by | politics international, Ukraine | Leave a comment

The Scientists Who Alerted Us To The Dangers of Radiation

 While the $1.7 trillion effort to totally rebuild the U.S. nuclear weapons
complex spurs on the new nuclear arms race with Russia and China, and at
the same time, the United States and twenty-one other countries have
pledged to triple nuclear power capacity by 2050, this is a particularly
appropriate time to seriously consider both the public and individual
health impacts of the many complex parts of the nuclear enterprise.

Do we have thorough and accurate information about this existential issue? Cindy
Folkers’ ‘ The Scientists Who Alerted Us To The Dangers of Radiation’ is an eminently readable and rigorously researched book that
illustrates how, from the beginning of the nuclear age almost 100 years
ago, scientists who questioned the public health and safety of the nuclear
enterprise have been systematically attacked and silenced. Twenty-four
individuals comprise the book’s Honor Roll of Radiation Scientists, with
fourteen Honorable Mentions, each biography noting their place in the
scientific history of health concerns from exposure to ionizing radiation.
Some, like J. Robert Oppenheimer and Linus Pauling, are famous. Most are
more publicly obscure while doing very important work, often making
groundbreaking scientific discoveries working in prominent academic and
governmental positions.

 Progressive Mag 9th Dec 2024

December 15, 2024 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Murder, mayhem, and minerals: The price of the renewable energy revolution

It’s not as if the human and environmental toll of mining is a
particularly well-kept secret. But the full extent of the damage from
mining for the rare earth elements and other metals that go into electronic
devices, electric vehicles, solar panels, and countless additional
components of modern life can be hard to wrap one’s mind around—unless
the mountain of evidence is laid out end-to-end, as in Vince Beiser’s new
book Power Metal: The Race for the Resources That Will Shape the Future.
The book begins with an overview of what Beiser calls “critical
metals,” where they come from, and the history of their discovery and
extraction, before moving on to the current state of mining and processing
critical metals today.

 Bulletin of Atomic Scientists 11th Dec 2024 https://thebulletin.org/2024/12/murder-mayhem-and-minerals-the-price-of-the-renewable-energy-revolution/

December 15, 2024 Posted by | renewable | Leave a comment

TODAY. Australia’s coming Dutton-deluge of nuclear propaganda

 Australian Independent Media, 14 Dec 24,https://theaimn.com/australias-coming-deluge-of-nuclear-propaganda/

There’s something dramatically splendid about King Louis XV of France’s famous statement in 1757 – “After me, the deluge”, interpreted to mean that he knew his reign would leave France in a terrible mess, but meanwhile, let’s enjoy the wealth and fun.

Well, I’m not sure that the predicted election win in Australia for the Liberal-National Coalition will result in wealth and fun, but I think that its aftermath will be a mess.

But, in the meantime, as Peter Dutton has now delivered the Coalition’s statement on the costs of its nuclear power plan, Australia can expect a deluge of another kind – the pro-nuclear propaganda. Australia has had a preview of how this will work, in 2023, with the highly successful campaign to defeat the referendum on an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.

One must give due credit to an American influence – the Atlas Network – for perfecting the spin system. To very briefly outline the work of the Atlas Network: it is a global infrastructure of 500+ ‘Think-Tanks’ including the Centre for Independent Studies, the Institute of Public Affairs and LibertyWorks. Posing as impartial advisers, these “Think Tanks” provide reports and articles designed to direct governments and educational and other social organisations towards policies that improve the profits of big corporations, and remove barriers to their profits. The barriers would be regulations, especially those involved with protecting the environment, and the rights of Indigenous people.

Apart from some funding, and training support, the real focus of the Atlas Network is on LANGUAGE – teaching the stink tanks how to use words to manipulate thinking. George Orwell alerted the world to the way in which fascism uses language, and wrote of “Newspeak”. Now the Atlas Network perfects the method – repetitively using vague and deceptive words to convey a lying message that is aimed at molding public opinion.

Sometimes these words are straight out lies: sometimes just vague words in which the meaning is distorted. The word “elite” is a good example – now used to discredit scientists and other experts so that the public comes to distrust them, and to rubbish their opinions, and their reports, particularly about regulations to protect the environment and Indigenous rights.

FEAR is indeed the currency of the Atlas Network. Fear and distrust of regulations, of officers and organisations involved in human rights and environmental protection. So these stink tanks work to weaken laws, and discredit agencies of human support – such as the United Nations.

Side by side with those messages of fear, come the lying messages of reassurance – for example the story that global heating is not happening, or, if it is, it has nothing to do with human activities such as greenhouse gas emissions. So we don’t need to worry or to do anything to stop these emissions. So we are reassured that nuclear power is “clean “green” “safe” “cheap” “nothing to do with weapons”.

Jeremy Walker explained the process by which the Atlas Network architecture of influence operated in the lead-up to the Voice referendum in 2023.

But we mustn’t let the Americans take all the glory for destroying the Indigenous Voice to Parliament. We have our own Australian spin network – called “Advance”, (sometimes “Advance Australia”). Advance has been around for some years. Financially and ideologically backed by a group of prominent business leaders, Advance’s membership and funding is obscure. Like Atlas, it teaches the think tanks, and some universities, how to word misinformation campaigns about climate change, indigenous rights, and nuclear power. It also spreads these messages via the conventional, and the social media, especially Facebook. Advance is at present working strenuously to discredit and destroy The Greens, the only political party genuinely opposing the nuclear industry.

So – how to deal with the deluge?

Australia has some fine journalists in the mainstream and the alternative media. They are already pointing out the flaws in the Coalition’s argument for nuclear power. Cost seems to be the main one: it is noted that Dutton’s costing is refuted by the CSIRO and the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis. Other big factors are delay, the increased greenhouse emissions, the opposition of some rural communities.

So Australia’s reputable commentators are doing a good job, in shining light on what is now the Coalition’s big election policy – nuclear power for Australia.

The anti-nuclear movement has a history of respectfully answering peo-nuclear proponents, sometimes in the same detailed jargonistic language that nuclear physicists and engineers prefer to use. At the political and academic level, they have done so well, providing effective information and detail. However, apart from Helen Caldicott, no-one has been game to spit it out forcefully to the great unwashed. The result is that – being ‘dazzled with science’, we ordinary mortals are inclined to just give up, and “leave it to the experts”.

Australia, the only continent with one national government, is blessed with world-leading renewable energy resources, and is already well on the way to genuinely clean energy, especially in rooftop solar. Australia now has the opportunity to lead the world in this. Our nuclear-free movement can promote the consciousness of a positive clean energy future for Australia, by using clear, forceful, jargon-free messages.

My worry is that there will now be a well-funded barrage of simplistic pro-nuclear propaganda -that will reach people everywhere, of all levels, especially in the outer suburbs and the regions – where everybody is watching Facebook, YouTube etc, and where in the ‘mainstream’, Murdoch media dominates anyway.

Will the nuclear-free movement be able to counteract the Atlas/Advance language methods? Atlas/Advance are so very good at it – using brief, repetitive, misleading language.They have the “hooray” words – “justice”, “life”, “freedom” and those “positives” – “clean” “green” etc. They have the “negatives” – “Hitler, “taxes” – and words used negatively “elites” “bureaucrat”, “government official” and “public servant”. And as well, they use vague, really, almost meaningless words – that waffle, weaken, and obscure the argument- “may” “can” “could” “might”, “arguably”.

We don’t know when the federal election will take place. At the moment, Peter Dutton’s nuclear plan is receiving much media scepticism. But it’s very early days. Advance is already swinging into action – starting with the anti-Greens campaign. The deluge will follow in no time.

But – I’m hoping that sensible people across Australia will have learned from the debacle of the Voice referendum. There are some very sound and thoughtful people out in the regions – where Dutton says that nuclear reactors will be placed, and these people are already resisting in a clear and practical way.

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Christina's notes | Leave a comment

I cannot keep up with Australian nuclear news

Here’s just a few of the current headlines:

Here’s just a few of the current headlines:

December 14, 2024 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

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