GARY OLSON—We see that the dominant cultural narrative is not hermetically sealed from efforts to produce counter-narratives that connect to other struggles. For example, at M.I.T., students stress that their Gaza protest is not a separate struggle but one struggle synchronizing resistance movements against white supremacy, patriarchy, and issues involving Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico and the exploitation of resources in the Congo. (Austin Cole, Black Agenda Radio, 5/24/24). Interviews with protesters across the country reveal that students have done their due diligence and frequently salted their explanations with “academic terms like intersectionality, colonialism and imperialism, all to make the case that the plight of Palestinians is the result of global power structures that thrive on bias and oppression.“
COLONIALISM
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Vietnam Parades—celebrating hard-won freedoms.
11 minutes readEDITOR—Think what you will of these parades, but remember these are the people who kicked the Empire’s butt in 1975, forcing it to flee their land in a not-too-dignified manner, a prolog to the Afghanistan embarrassment, I guess. The first video commentary, filed by a Chinese netizen, is especially instructive. To date, China, Vietnam, Afghanistan, North Korea, and now, in a special category, Russia, in an existential liberation war—are the only nations that have beaten the Hegemon at the military game. And in each case, the Hegemon came to their homes with ill intent. Each of them can boast thousands if not millions of heroes.
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Why are Israel and the West unravelling in tandem?
17 minutes readALASTAIR CROOKE—So why are Israel and the West unraveling in tandem? Well, it is firstly because they have become so inter-connected at the level of power structures (in both U.S. and Europe) to a point that it is difficult to know who has more heft within these power and media structures: Tel Aviv or the White House.
This means interdependency in terms of each’s international standing, and by extension, vulnerability to any collapse in Global standing.
So, whilst the West today ostensibly eschews literal settler colonialism (other than that practiced by Israel), it nonetheless has pursued a form of rent-seeking, financialised colonialism since WW2. That process also has become a permanent framework to the Western political and geopolitical ecosystem.
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Cambodia Does Not Owe US Explanation Over Chinese Ties / Russian Forces Return to Kharkov
44 minutes readBRIAN BERLETIC—As is the case with so much regarding Western policy analysis, the conclusion that a Chinese military presence in Cambodia equates to plans to wield military power against other nations in the region is pure projection of what Washington itself is doing across Asia, and would like to do with Cambodia specifically. Washington openly seeks to place military bases across the region, having already signed agreements with the Philippines to do so and already having tens of thousands of US troops stationed in South Korea and Japan. There is also the semi-covert and growing US military presence on the rogue Chinese island province of Taiwan. This military presence is openly being expanded for the purpose of encircling, containing, and even directly confronting and fighting China militarily.
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EDITOR—Garland dives deep to explore the nature of Ukraine and the Ukraine War (“the Ukraine Project”, as US neocons call it). For starters, Garland affirms that Ukraine is not so much a nation, let alone an independent, sovereign nation, as Western propaganda claims, as a tool of the West to harm and irritate Russia so as to provoke the conditions for social turmoil that could usher in the overthrow of Vladimir Putin. Ukraine is not making the critical war decisions, notes Garland, and this is especially true for the deployment and use of advanced weapons, whose use is decided and implemented entirely by NATO.
The ultimate end is to remove Russia as a great, peer power blocking US global domination, and the same goes for China and other powers such as Iran, Brazil, and others that may aspire to independent action and sovereign multilateralism. The strategy being used by the West is constant terrorism and war. Having lost the war in Ukraine, a huge humiliation, the West is clearly engaged in a campaign of indefinite terrorism inside the Russian Federation and its BRICS allies. In this effort, the West relies on numerous “assets” cynically created over the years, chiefly ISIS, al-Qaeda and other extreme jihadists.