Refugee Blues

OpEds | Daniel Wirt

A group of Syrian refugees arrive on the island of Lesbos after traveling in an inflatable raft from Turkey, near Skala Sykaminias, Greece.

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[dropcap]R[/dropcap]egardless of the superficial propaganda of the plutocrats in the heart of the U.S. deep state regarding its intentions and motivations — propaganda which is meant for public consumption, like “responsibility to protect” and bringing freedom and democracy to nations and peoples whose leaders have “lost their legitimacy”— it is clear that the desired outcome of the wars, coups and color revolutions that the U.S. sows all over the world is chaos and destabilization.

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Contrary to the argument of some that the resultant chaos and destabilization is indicative of failure and incompetence of US imperialism, I believe that it is the desired result –— the more the better. The destabilization weakens the opponents of US imperialism and hegemony and creates opportunities for US capitalists to fill the vacuum. In this process, because of its geographic isolation from the wars and chaos, the opportunities for predatory acquisition of foreign assets and resources by the U.S. finance capitalist class, and the stimulation of its massive military-industrial complex, the U.S. wins.
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Wars in Europe, with associated political and economic destabilization, result in increased European dependence on and subjugation by the U.S. The only “fail” by the U.S. empire is in its inability to create ENOUGH chaos and destabilization for the desired level of geopolitical and economic control. And who is tamping down the magnitude of chaos and destabilization desired by the U.S.? The answer is NOT Europe (ironically Europe willingly participates in its own destruction). The answer is largely Russia and China.

The systematic and brutal destruction of Middle Eastern societies as a result of Washington’s meddling offers by now a truly Dantesque image, as can be appreciated in this shot of a street filled with Syrian refugees amid the rubble of war.

Thus, the wet dream of the Obomba administration, including the neocons in the State Department (the Kaganate of Nulands) and “advisors” like Z-Big Brzezenski, was to draw Russia into overt military intervention in the Ukrainian civil war. Wisely, the Russian government, led by Vladimir Putin refused to take that bait. Meanwhile, as many of our readers know, with help from friends from all over the world, including Russia, Novorossiya now has a very competent, well-equipped and highly motivated military with which to defend itself from the predations of the Ukrop Nazis. Additional battles are likely, but I suspect that the end result, in the not too distant future, will be a “frozen conflict” like South Ossetia-Georgia. And the Novorossiyans will likely have done it without overt Russian military involvement (allowing Russia to continue to strengthen and act elsewhere, if necessary).

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[dropcap]I[/dropcap]n the months since the U.S.-engineered coup in Kiev, the western mainstream media has demonized Russia and Putin, with Orwellian disregard for the facts. However, matching the frequent false accusations of Russian tanks and troops invading Novorossiya has been the frequent hysterics of Chicken Littles predicting the imminent collapse of the sky because the Russians WERE NOT overtly intervening militarily, demonizing Putin as a coward and traitor for not doing so. The brigade of the Chicken Littles has been led by several, including Vladimir Suchan, a Czech expat academic and US citizen, living in the U.S. The U.S. would dearly love to tie Russia down in a Ukrainian quagmire, as part of its strategy to weaken, hobble and destabilize Russia, up to and including regime change. Russia however didn’t swallow the poison bait and has out-maneuvered the west diplomatically and in the propaganda war; today Novorossiya is reasonably secure in terms of defending itself; the economic sanctions and other efforts to harm and destabilize Russia have largely failed or been only marginally effective; political and economic ties between Russia and the other BRICS countries are proceeding apace; Russians overwhelmingly support the Putin government; and now, importantly, Russia has the capacity and ability to maintain and if necessary, increase its support for the Assad government of Syria (which the majority of Syrians support), against the Takfiri psychotics and war that the U.S., in concert with collaborators including Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Israel, have brought to Syria, with the goal of Syrian regime change and geopolitical control of the region.
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Thus, the U.S. has so far failed to bring the level of destabilization that it desired to Russia’s doorstep in Ukraine and into Russia itself.

SIDEBAR
A Truckload of Refugees Found Dead in Austria

[learn_more]

Forensic officers stand in front of a truck inside which where found a large number of dead migrants on a motorway near Neusiedl am See, Austria, on August 27, 2015. The vehicle, which contained between 20 and 50 bodies, was found on a parking strip off the highway in Burgenland state, police spokesman Hans Peter Doskozil said at a press conference with Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner. AFP PHOTO / DIETER NAGLDIETER NAGL/AFP/Getty Images ORIG FILE ID: 543651142

Reported From Area 51. The unidentified bodies were found Thurs. in a tractor-trailer abandoned on the side of the street in japanese Austria near the Hungarian border, as per multiple media reports. The nationalities of the victims weren’t instantly clear, but it is known that Europe has been inundated by a flood of refugees from the Middle East & North Africa, notably war-torn Syria. Hans Peter Doskozil, chief of Burgenland police officers, stated it’s unclear whether or not the refugees suffocated in transport. The Austrian newspaper Die Presse reported the victims could have been lifeless for several days,. The truck had been there at least since Wed., police officers solely investigated its contents Thursday. Calling the occurrence a “terrible crime,” police chief Doskozil stated the back door of the refrigerated tractor-trailer was left open, exposing the bodies, while the drivers had fled. He told reporters the bodies were in an advanced state of decomposition. [/learn_more]SIDEBAR ENDS HERE

[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hich brings me to the refugee crisis in Europe. Europe has variably collaborated with the U.S. in the imperialistic wars which have caused this African/Middle Eastern refugee crisis (and the one in Ukraine). Thus, U.S. AND Europe must share responsibility as the ROOT cause of the crises. Look at the maps here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_military_intervention_in_Libya

Note the European countries that collaborated with the U.S. in destroying Libya (including France as a major participant) — Libya, the country which formerly had the highest human development index in Africa. Then the refugees began pouring out of the hell-hole that the U.S. and E.U. created, and thousands of bodies began piling up at the bottom of the Mediterranean, exacerbated by a pathetically insufficient and ineffective European response. Now, with a huge crush of refugees from Syria, and after Hungary’s shameful punitive response, Germany has indicated a willingness to admit hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees.

refugees-Destruction in Aleppo province, Syria. Yasmin Al Tellawy Demotix. All rights reserved.

Refugees stream out of the ruins of Aleppo province, enmeshed in chaos.

For many the Mediterranean is an almost insurmountable obstacle.

[dropcap]G[/dropcap]ermany’s ultimate agenda and policies remain to be seen, and I am skeptical. Perhaps Germany is looking at the prospect of tens of thousands of new industrial workers to bolster its sagging demographics. Will the Syrian refugees that Germany accepts be full-fledged German citizens with all the social benefits, or something less? Will the lower wages and benefits of second-class industrial workers be used to pressure the wages and benefits of Germany’s current and future workers? How will Syrian refugees really be treated (and for how long)?

Syrian refugee family literally crawling toward a new future—still largely undefined.

Victims of Kiev’s random terror bombing in Donbass.

New Novorossiyan platoon at attention. The rebel republics—Donetsk and Luhansk—have rapidly organized a citizens’ army capable of beating back the well equipped but largely demoralized Ukrainian military.

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]nd what about the refugee crisis that none of the mainstream media presstitutes are talking about — the one in southeast Ukraine, for which the U.S. and Europe also share responsibility as a root (the legal term: proximate) cause. Europe has collaborated with the U.S. in support of the fascist coup regime in Kiev and its attacks on civilians in Donbass with heavy weapons, and promoting all of the associated Orwellian MSM lies, dissembling and propaganda. And in stark contrast with the European response to its refugee crisis, consider the Russian response to the refugee crisis in Ukraine. Russia has absorbed hundreds of thousands of refugees from Donbass, upwards of a million — people who have been grievously injured by the U.S. and European-supported war against them. Russia has done this without fanfare and without coercion, in an incredibly efficient and humane and generous and MORAL fashion. (By no means the first time that Russia has behaved in a moral fashion in comparison with the West.) But, instead of eliciting praise from the U.S. and Europe for this (and its dominant role in ridding Europe from the scourge of Naziism), Russia is demonized and subject to sanctions designed to harm it economically (which have largely backfired). This puts Europe’s response to its refugee crisis, a crisis in which it had a large hand in creating, to shame.

So, the claim that the American Empire is “appallingly incompetent” because it produces chaos and destabilization is incorrect. On the contrary, it is very competent — in an evil way. The liberal fascist scum (which includes the neocons) don’t consider the chaos and destabilization they engineered in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Ukraine, Syria, etc. to be a fail, they consider it a victory. If Americans fail to be hailed as liberators and the resulting immiseration, death, morbidity and destabilization don’t match the run-up “R2P” and “bringing freedom/democracy” propaganda, the plutocrats and their political and media puppets don’t care — no matter what the outcome is, there is no accountability imposed by the public afterwards. They neuter criticism with rationalizations like, “ok, ok, we didn’t find any weapons of mass destruction, but we got rid of that vicious dictator, didn’t we?” The plutocracy is not harmed and remains functional and intact. The same political puppets recycle from one presidential administration to the next (consider all the Bushites that Obomba hired). Americans soon forget and return to their culture wars at home. The geopolitical ignorance of Americans is profound to begin with — I doubt if most Americans could find Ukraine or Iraq or Syria or Libya on a map. They soon return to being led by the nose by carnies like Donald Trump who divert their angst to such populist favorites such as nativistic demonization of Mexicans and lazy/shiftless minorities stealing their tax dollars. Americans are just happy to get back to their jobs in the booming military-industrial complex, from sea to shining sea. No, the only fail for the deep state plutocracy is when they fail to produce the desired magnitude of destabilization to their targets overseas.

“The liberal fascist scum (which includes the neocons) don’t consider the chaos and destabilization they engineered in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Ukraine, Syria, etc. to be a fail, they consider it a victory…”[dropcap]F[/dropcap]rom the viewpoint of US imperialists, if Europe is destabilized and weakened, so much the better — it just cements US dominance over Europe and maintains the subservient, dependent status of the European lapdogs. The U.S. is geographically insulated from all the chaos and destabilization it creates in the Middle East and Africa and Europe (with the help of its European “friends”) and ultimately reaps the economic benefits. What is appallingly incompetent is Europe’s judgment in picking friends. If Europe wants to maintain and preserve its cultural heritage (for something other than its past genocides), then long ago it should have told the U.S. to fuck off. I’m a great admirer of parts of European cultural heritage — for example, consider Poland… The genius of Chopin and… Well, that’s all I can think of at the moment… No, wait… there’s Polish apples — nice crisp fascist, sorry that, I meant freedom apples with a little “Orwellian Apple from Poland” sticker on each one (https://www.greanvillepost.com/2014/08/18/an-open-letter-to-the-polish-ambassador-to-the-united-states-ambassador-ryszard-schnepf/)
The refugee crisis in Europe is bringing all sorts of unsavory creatures out of the woodwork. On the one hand, the imperialists are (predictably) trying to exploit it to justify more war-mongering — trying to project the blame for the Syrian component of the crisis onto Bashar Assad, with the Orwellian claim that Syrians are fleeing Assad, not the war that the U.S. has brought to Syria, via its support for Takfiri terrorists and increasingly, by direct military involvement.

A roundup of African refugees.

Will European governments resist this — both the propaganda and the call to participate in direct military action in Syria, with the obvious goal being deposing the Assad regime? Will countries like France get directly involved militarily, alongside the U.S. in the Assad regime change project? France certainly got deeply involved in the Libyan debacle. (Perhaps… see a recent development at

https://www.greanvillepost.com/2015/09/12/historic-news-finally-eu-breaks-away-from-u-s/ )

Austrians gather in support of refugees. Perhaps too little too late, the sheer magnitude of the tragedy, and its callous continuance by the NATO, may shake European publics at last from their complacent agreement with Washington.

Austrians gather in support of refugees. Perhaps too little too late, the sheer magnitude of the tragedy, which could not be hidden by the servile media, and the continuing wars by NATO, may have shaken European publics at last from their complacent agreement with Washington.

[dropcap]O[/dropcap]n the other hand, the nativists, nationalists and racists are emerging, in all their varied colors and spectrum of beliefs and ideologies. Demonstrating an advanced capacity for conspiratorial ideation, one claims that the refugee crisis was engineered specifically to inject Muslims into Europe in order “to destroy the social fabric of Europe and Euro-America” (reminding me of General Ripper in Dr. Strangelove obsessing about his precious bodily fluids). This American says, “This is a prime part of their agenda to destroy the social fabric of Europe and Euro-America by inserting into these places a very quickly reproducing virus, in the form of the non-European Muslim immigrant, that is extremely difficult to remove without very bloody surgery.”

Others claim that the Syrians aren’t really refugees but rather “economic migrants”. The people making this claim should volunteer for six months or so in the very large refugee camps for Syrians in Lebanon and Turkey to see first hand the very difficult conditions in these places. While they are there helping out, they can review the battle maps documenting the actions of the Syrian Arab Army, the Takfiri terrorists and the U.S., Turkish, Israeli and other militaries. Visit the ruined cities and infrastructure. In order to get some idea of how these people get to the refugee camps and why they try to escape to Europe. Oh yes, and while they are there, they can check the JOB BOARDS in the camps to see what kind of employment opportunities are available there. Yes, the refugees fleeing this nightmare might naturally want to work in Europe and be productive and provide for their families. Then there is the guy who posts a picture of a few hundred male Syrians waiting on the platform of a European train station — the claim being that the refugees are heavily weighted to young males, and the implication being: likely Takfiri terrorists.

[Dropcap]F[/dropcap]irst, even the clips on Fox news (on constantly in the doctors dining room) show an expected mix of men, women and children. Second, some Takfiris probably will get through. But, heads up you Europeans and “Euro-Americans” worried about your precious bodily fluids: “As ye sow, so shall ye reap.” Don’t blame the victims for the crimes of YOUR governments. Governments in countries in which you hold citizenship and which are the root cause of these crises. So, don’t blame the victims, take responsibility and blame yourselves. And one more thing, Russians have learned to get along with their large non-Takfiri Muslim populations. Maybe the Europeans and “Euro-Americans” advocating their (dysfunctional) nationalism and nativism and variably overt racism could learn something about the healthy nationalism and respect for other cultures that that very large and diverse country, Russia, has managed to develop.

When the Takfiri terrorists that do slip through into Europe, along with the mass of innocent refugees, commit some heinous crime, how will Europeans treat the remaining, innocent Muslim refugees?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Senior Contributing Editor Daniel Wirt is a pathologist practicing near Houston, Texas, who considers the advanced stage of capitalism in which we live to be the ultimate public health issue — the proximate cause of the rapid destruction of the biosphere and epidemic plague of fascism afflicting humans (including the many “glad tidings of liberal fascism”, per Norman Pollack). He believes that a multipolar world is necessary for more equitable sharing of resources and more peaceful relationships among human populations.

Dr Wirt is a long-time advocate for single-payer healthcare reform in the United States.