Declassified files expose British role in NATO’s Gladio terror armies

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KIT KLARENBERG
JUNE 19, 2023

Declassified files expose British role in NATO’s Gladio terror armies

Newly declassified British files shed disturbing light on the origins and internal workings of Operation Gladio, a covert NATO plot deploying fascist terror militias across Italy. Have spies in London applied these lessons in Ukraine?

Newly declassified British Foreign Office files have added disturbing details to the history of Operation Gladio. The covert operation was uncovered in 1990, when the public learned that the CIA, MI6 and NATO trained and directed an underground army of fascist paramilitary units across Europe, deploying its assets to undermine political opponents, including through false flag terror attacks.

Among them was a young Silvio Berlusconi, the media oligarch who served as Italian Prime Minister in four separate governments between 1994 and 2011. Listed as a member of the P2, the secret Cold War-era cabal of political elites devoted to Gladio’s aims, Berlusconi undoubtedly took some weighty secrets to the grave when he died this June 12th.

It is almost impossible to believe that inconvenient truths were not weeded from Britain’s documentary record on Operation Gladio prior to declassification. Nonetheless, the recently released material is highly illuminating. Covering a fraught twelve month period after the first public disclosure of Gladio’s existence, the papers illustrate how London’s foreign intelligence apparatus kept a keen eye on the continent as events unfolded.

The papers not only shed fresh light on the conspiracy, they underline Gladio’s relevance as British intelligence joins its America counterparts in contemporary plots involving secret partisan forces from Syria to Ukraine.

Various passages dotted across the tranche strongly suggest the British knew much more than they publicly admitted about egregious criminal deeds, including the attempted overthrow of an allied Italian government and the kidnap and murder of its leader.

A ‘clandestine resistance network’ goes to work

Gladio consisted of a constellation of “stay behind” anti-communist partisan armies whose ostensible mission was to fend off the Red Army in the event of Soviet invasion. In reality, these forces committed countless violent and criminal acts as part of a “strategy of tension” designed to discredit the left and justify a security state clampdown.

As Vincenzo Vinciguerra, a Gladio operative jailed for life in 1984 for a car bombing in Italy that killed three police officers and injured two, explained:

“You were supposed to attack civilians, women, children, innocent people from outside the political arena. The reason was simple, force the public to turn to the state and ask for greater security…People would willingly trade their freedom for the security of being able to walk the streets, go on trains or enter a bank. This was the political logic behind the bombings. They remain unpunished because the state cannot condemn itself.”

The scandal triggered in Western capitals by the exposure of Gladio dominated mainstream headlines for months. The European parliament responded by passing a resolution condemning the existence of a “clandestine parallel intelligence and armed operations organization [which] escaped all democratic controls, may have interfered illegally in the internal political affairs of member states [and] have at their disposal independent arsenals and military resources…thereby jeopardizing the democratic structures of the countries in which they are operating.”

The resolution called for independent judicial and parliamentary investigations into Gladio in every European state. But aside from inquiries in Belgium, Italy, and Switzerland, nothing of substance materialized. What’s more, investigators heavily redacted their findings while avoiding having them translated them into English. This may help explain why the historic scandal has been largely forgotten.

In this context, the newly declassified documents may be one of the most valuable primary sources to date offering new insights into the origins and internal workings of NATO’s secret terror militias in Italy.

The Bologna station massacre was a Gladio attack perpetrated to blame the left. Gladio was and remains a subterranean terrorist tool of NATO. Google Operation Gladio today and see the filth that comes up.

Take for example an aide-mémoire (see it here) prepared by Francesco Fulci, Italy’s permanent representative to the UN, which was shared at a “super-restricted” November 6th 1990 meeting of the North Atlantic Council, NATO’s principal political decision-making body, then forwarded to senior British officials at home and abroad.

Based on a note provided by Rome’s then-premier Giulio Andreotti to “the Head of the Italian Parliamentary Commission investigating terrorist incidents,” the aide-mémoire begins by noting that following World War II, Western intelligence agencies devised “unconventional means of defence, by creating in their territories a hidden network of resistance aimed at operating, in case of enemy occupation, through information gathering, sabotage, propaganda and guerrilla warfare.”

According to the aide-mémoire, authorities in Rome began laying the foundations of such an organization in 1951. Four years later, Italian Military Intelligence (SIFAR) and “a corresponding allied service” – a reference to the CIA – then formally agreed on the organization and the activities of a “post-occupation clandestine network”:

The “clandestine resistance network” was subdivided into separate branches, covering information operations, sabotage, propaganda, radio communications, cypher, reception and evacuation of people and equipment. Each of these structures was to operate autonomously, “with liaison and coordination ensured by an external base.”

SIFAR established a dedicated, secret section to recruit and train Gladio operatives. Meanwhile, it maintained five “ready deployment guerrilla units in areas of special interest” across Italy which awaited activation on a continuous basis.

“Operational materials”, including a wide variety of explosives, weapons – such as mortars, hand grenades, guns and knives – and ammunition were stashed in 139 secret underground caches across the country. In April 1972, “to improve security,” these arsenals were exhumed, and moved to offices of the Carabinieri, Rome’s military police, near the original sites.

Only 127 of the weapons storehouses were officially recovered. The aide-mémoir states that at least two “were very likely taken away by unknown persons” at the time they were buried, in October 1964. Who these operatives were and what they did with their stolen arms is left to the imagination.

British involvement in the coup effort

Fulci was eventually quizzed by attendees of the North Atlantic Council summit “as to whether Gladio had deviated from its proper objectives.” In other words, beyond operating strictly as a “stay behind” force, to be activated in the event of Soviet invasion. While “he could not add to what was in the aide-mémoire,” Fulci confirmed “weapons used in some terrorist incidents had come from stores established by Gladio.”

SIFAR report unearthed by historian Daniele Ganser confirms guerrilla action against “domestic threats” was hardwired into the operation from its inception. In the Italian context, this entailed systematically terrorizing the left.

As the Italian Communist party surged in polls ahead of the country’s 1948 election, the CIA pumped money into the coffers of the Christian Democrats and an attendant anti-communist propaganda campaign. The cloak-and-dagger effort was so successful in preventing the outbreak of a left-wing government in Rome that Langley secretly intervened in every one of Rome’s elections for at least the next 24 years.

Yet the covert CIA operations were insufficient to prevent Italians from occasionally electing the wrong governments. The 1963 general election saw the Christian Democrats prevail again, this time under the leadership of left-leaning politician Aldo Moro, who sought to construct a coalition with the Socialists and Democratic Socialists. Over the next year, protracted disputes erupted between these parties over what form their administration would take.

In the meantime, SIFAR and CIA black ops specialists such as William Harvey, known as“America’s James Bond,” cooked up a plot to prevent that government from taking office. Known as “Piano Solo,” it dispatched Gladio operatives for a false flag assassination attempt on Moro that would deliberately fail.

According to the plan, the kidnapper was expected to claim they were ordered to kill Moro by communists, thereby justifying the violent seizure of multiple political party and newspaper headquarters, along with the imprisonment of troublesome leftists at the Gladio chapter’s secret headquarters in Sardinia. The plan was ultimately aborted, though it remained on the table throughout 1964.

Moro became Prime Minister without incident and governed until June 1968. Piano Solo fell under official investigation four years later, yet the results were not published until the public first learned of Gladio’s existence. Though the findings omitted any reference to Britain’s role in the planned coup, the newly released documents strongly suggest London’s involvement. (Read them here).

Italy’s then-President Francesco Cossiga requested the ministry hand over “details of UK stay behind measures in 1964,” according to a detailed February 1991 Foreign Office memo on recent developments in the scandal.

Cossiga apparently made this enquiry as a result of a judge “whose investigations into unsolved terrorist attacks first brought Operation Gladio to light,” and who took the “unprecedented step” of demanding the president testify about the conspiracy under oath. By this point, Cossiga had admitted learning of the “stay behind” force while serving as a junior Defense Minister in 1966.

His Foreign Office query strongly suggests British intelligence played a role in Piano Solo, and that the Italian President was well-aware of the plot.

“one or more of Moro’s kidnappers was secretly in touch with the security apparatus”

On March 16th 1978, a unit of the leftist militant Red Brigades kidnapped Moro. He was on his way to a high-level meeting where he planned to give his blessing there to a new coalition government that relied on communist support, when the kidnappers violently extracted him from his convoy. Five of Moro’s bodyguards were murdered in the process.

After almost two months in captivity, when it became clear the government would neither negotiate with the Red Brigades nor release any of its jailed members in return for Moro, the kidnappers executed the former Italian Prime Minister. His bullet-riddled corpse was left in a car trunk to rot, and for authorities to find.

Moro’s murder has inspired widespread and well-founded suspicions that Gladio operatives infiltrated the Red Brigades to push the group to commit excessively violent acts in order to foment popular demand for a right-wing law-and-order regime. More than perhaps any other incident, his killing fulfilled the objectives of the security state’s strategy of tension.

Whether or not Moro was a casualty of Gladio, a declassified November 5th 1990 Foreign Office memo authored by Britain’s then-ambassador to Rome, John Ashton, makes it clear that London knew much more about the case than has ever been disclosed publicly by any official source. (Read the full Ashton note here).

What’s more, according to the British diplomat, the presidential crisis committee responsible for attempting to rescue Moro was part of the notorious P2 – the “subversive Masonic lodge” composed of political elites loyal to Gladio.

According to Ashton, P2 was just one of many “mysterious right wing forces” striving “by terrorism and street violence to provoke a repressive backlash against Italy’s democratic institutions” under the “strategy of tension.” And President Cossiga was completely unaware it had infiltrated his crisis committee.

In April 1981, magistrates in Milan raided the villa of Licio Gelli, an Italian financier and self-identified fascist who founded P2. There, they uncovered a list of 2,500 members which read like a “Who’s Who” of Italian politicians, bankers, spooks, financiers, industrialists, and senior law enforcement and military officials. Among the cabal’s most prominent members was Silvio Berlusconi.

Moro’s “historic compromise,” under which the communists “made possible Andreotti’s government”, would be the party’s “final step before their own entry into government.” Ashton stated that this development “was anathema to P2,” which was “then in virtual control of [Italy’s] security apparatus,” and also to many non-P2 establishment politicians, and also to the US,” and sought to “eliminate once and for all any possibility that the Communist Party…might achieve national power.”

Ashton acknowledged “circumstantial evidence” of “US support for P2.” In reality, P2 founder Gelli was so well-connected to Washington’s national security and intelligence apparatus, the CIA’s Rome station had explicitly charged him with establishing an anti-communist parallel government in Rome.

oversee the recruitment of 400 high-ranking Italian and NATO officers as P2 operatives in 1969. The US was so grateful for Gelli’s anti-communist purge that it made him a guest of honor at the inauguration ceremonies of US Presidents Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan.

Ashton concluded his revealing note by noting the truth about Washington’s involvement in Rome’s blood-spattered “Years of Lead” would “probably never be known.” The full extent of Britain’s involvement in terrorist attacks, government overthrows, destabilization campaigns and other heinous skullduggery under the aegis of Operation Gladio, not merely in Italy but throughout Europe, will almost certainly remain a secret as well, and by design.

It was not until 1993 that the public learned how the US and British gifted munitions to Gladio operatives to foment bloody acts of terror across Italy. As Francesco Fulci told his NATO friends at the “super-restricted” meeting, Washington and London supplied the perpetrators of mass casualty attacks including the 1980 bombing of Bologna Centrale railway station, which killed 85 people and wounded over 200.

Those responsible for these hideous crimes have eluded justice in almost every case. Several of the Bologna massacre’s chief suspects, including committed fascist and confirmed MI6 asset Robert Fiore, escaped to London. Britain refused to extradite him and his co-conspirators despite their convictions in absentia for violent crimes.

The extensive experience British intelligence obtained in Operation Gladio raises questions about the lessons the MI6 has applied to current covert operations in theaters of conflict. As The Grayzone revealed in November 2022, British military and intelligence veterans have trained and sponsored a secret partisan terror army in eastern Ukraine to carry out acts of sabotage in Crimea and other majority-Russian areas. The plan called for the training of cells of ideologically dedicated Ukrainians to “shoot, move, communicate, survive.”

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THE KAKHOVKA DAM DESTRUCTION

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MIKE MIHAJLOVIC
Black Mountain Analysis

KAKHOVKA DAM DESTRUCTION
Technical overview and events prior to the dam collapse
First run JUN 8, 2023

In the days after the event, many comments popped up in the media but what is interesting is that the media (especially the Western one) already started to point fingers at Russia without even properly assessing the event and poorly based on the embedded narratives against one side. Fortunately, that is not the way how any serious analyst wouldl approach the subject. It is too early for a detailed forensic analysis but some parameters can be used as a base.

The intention of this article is to put some light on the technical possibilities of the Kakhovka Dam destruction from the perspectives of engineering and military applications. It is not into the forensic investigation or the technicalities involving calculations and mechanical and structural analysis but an attempt to explain the situation with ordinary language to be understandable by readers with no previous technical background. As that, it can be used as a base for the investigation teams.

In the Kakhovka dam collapse, there is no one single reason, rather a combination of events caused by human factors. The chain of events is logical from the engineering viewpoint. The start was extensive shelling by one side [Ukraine] causing damage to the dam structure and the regulating components such as sluice gates. The next is a water hydrostatic pressure buildup and wave-induced vibrations of the moving mass of water and impact on the likely disabled regulating devices. Carefully calculated discharge of the large water mass upstream corresponds with at first glance unrelated events on the battlefield (startup of the counteroffensive) further supporting the chain of events theory.

Background

The Kakhovka dam and hydroelectric power plant is a part of the Kakhovka Reservoir which is the last dam in a cascade consisting of 6 dams and reservoirs on the Dnieper River.

The cascade consists of:

Kakhovskaya (Nova Kakhovka).

Dnieper Cascade - 6 dams along the river.

The dam was finished in 1956 when the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant was built at Nova Kakhovka. In the years after WWII, the Soviet Union invested in the repair of the dams damaged and destroyed either by Germans or the retreating Red Army during 1941/42 as well as building new dams and reservoirs. During the design and construction period, significant improvements were implemented. Soviets in general put a little bit higher safety factor than the Western counterparts creating the construction resistant to either natural disturbances such as earthquakes or immerse flooding and also taking into consideration WWII experience, especially in the ways of immobilizing and destructing in the case of the occupation. In general, Soviet designs were not typically aesthetically pleasing judging from Western standards but were more robust, more rigid, and resilient.

Immediately after the beginning of the Special Military Operation, the Russian military was able to secure both river flanks including bridges and dam. What happened next is when the Ukrainians received Western weapons – among them 155 mm guided artillery shells Excalibur and HIMARS MLRS, Ukrainian forces started shelling the bridge and dam.

Taking into consideration the vulnerability of the Russian troops in the western areas and the danger that the supply routes over the Dnieper may be cut off (with the destruction of the bridge and dam), Russian general Surovikin ordered a retreat to the eastern side. During this retreat, Ukrainian troops attempted to attack retreating forces but suffering much higher casualties than the retreating Russians. In the media it was celebrated as a victory but in reality that was nothing short of a pyrrhic propaganda victory. The Kakhovka dam stayed virtually divided between the two sides with the frontline going just across the dam. This put a great risk because of the constant shelling (predominantly by the Ukrainian military).

The photographs of the dam of the Kakhovskaya power plant show that one of the dam's sluices was actively leaking water.

Investigative journalist Christian Tribert, posted on his Twitter page satellite images of the Kakhovka dam, which were taken on May 28. According to these images, the lock of the dam was already showing water flow at that time, and a more recent image from June 5 showed an increase in this flow.

Triebert suggested, based on these photographs, that the dam may have been damaged at least a week before the official confirmation of its failure.

On 6 June 2023, the dam was destroyed, and simultaneously Ukraine and Western allies started blaming Russia for that. As of the time of writing, the debate is still ongoing, and no doubts there will be many new theories. In some of these theories, Russia is accused of mining the dam and blowing the gates. Some so-called intelligence reports started to pop. Russia blames the Ukrainian side, and the material evidence such as video clips of the Ukrainian artillery shelling the dam are shown. Statements by high-ranking Ukrainian officials about the plans to destroy the dam were also shown. In any case, after this special military operation is finished, or the war as how is called in the Western media, we can expect a detailed analysis. For now, what we have are the result of the destruction, the events prior to that, and the motives which are related to the gains or losses of what each side can gain and lose.

Typical dam design

Speaking of the dam components and design it is better to have a graphic presentation so the reader can understand the terminology:

The composition of the Kakhovskaya dam and hydropower plant includes:

two earth floodplain dams.

According to Russian sources, the upper part of the Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station was destroyed as a result of the shelling by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, but the dam itself survived. This was announced on June 6 by the mayor of Nova Kakhovka Vladimir Leontiev. As a result of partial damage to the plant, the water level downstream rose several meters. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said they were monitoring the situation at the Zaporizhya Nuclear Power Plant and there is no threat to the safety of it. The plant director Yury Chernichuk noted that the heat removal system for the reactors (6 in total) can be replenished with both water from the Kakhovka reservoir and alternative sources.

According to the Ukrainian and Western media, the dam was mined and blown by the Russians.

In any case, the environmental catastrophe downstream is horrific.

Sluice gates - the road to breach

From the hundreds of photos and videos circulating in the media, it is clearly visible that the top portion consisting of the gates (or to be more precise sluice gates) which regulate the flow and overflow are gone. It is worth now addressing the role of these gates and the technology behind them. Destruction of these gates is something visible and quite dramatic with the water flowing over. What is not visible (for now) is the level of damage that is beneath them. To analyze that, the first thing is that the water level shall drop. Judging by the design of this particular dam, these underwater parts include very thick reinforced or prestressed concrete so the best assumption will be that the base is more or less intact.

The main operational requirements for gates and valves are the control of floods, water-tightness, minimum hoist capacity, convenience of installation and maintenance and above all failure-free performance and avoidance of safety hazards to the operating staff and the public. Despite robust design and precautions, faults can occur and the works must be capable of tolerating these faults without unacceptable consequences.

Gates may be classified as follows:

moving mechanisms – gates powered electrically, mechanically, hydraulically, automatically by water pressure or by hand.

Obviously, in this type of dam, only a few types are involved.

Without getting into the particular blueprints and based on the visual observation, we can assume that the sluice gates at this dam are the regulating one, crest type, service, steel, and concrete with the translatory motion powered electro-hydraulically by gentry crane. The very basic function of the sluice gate is shown in the following pictures:

The movement and forces in this type of sluice gates are very complex and definitely out of the scope of this short article. For the illustration purpose, what happens with the flow is shown here:

Damaging the gates

In the normal operation modes, forces action on the sluice gates is known, however, the Kakhovka dam was exposed to intense shelling by the Ukrainian forces which put the new variables into the equations.

According to reports and evidence, the dam was attacked multiple times. The chronology of the attacks can be found here:

https://twitter.com/MyLordBebo/status/1666575735891296257

Ukrainian shelling of the top of the dam likely damaged the sluice gate and guides. The impact of the heavy 155 mm shells or the HIMARS warheads in the proximity of these mechanisms can definitely cause different levels of damage. The most likely damage is that the sluice gate may be stuck in the current position and the gentry cranes were not able to do any manipulations.

To repair this kind of damage is complex and to perform that in the middle of the war zone is an almost impossible task because of the constant fire.

As guided 155 mm Excalibur shells and HIMARS rockets have high precision, they can be also used to create a “near miss effect” meaning they can be set to explode upon penetration into the water right beside the sluice gates. This means that underwater explosions can affect the gates. Even after the breach, Ukrainian side performed additional shelling.

Underwater explosion

Let’s now discuss the phenomena of underwater explosion:

The physical picture of an explosion of a high explosive charge in water is qualitatively similar to an explosion in the air. However, since water has low compressibility and is a denser medium than air, the numerical values of the explosion parameters differ from the same parameters in air. At the moment when the shell explodes underwater, a detonation wave approaches the boundaries of the charge, a strong shock of the explosion products onto water occurs, and a shock wave develops in it. The density of water at the shockwave front increases at most by a factor of 1.5. As the shock wave propagates in water, all its parameters rapidly decrease. because of this, to achieve the desired effect, the shell needs to explode very closely to the designated target. Irreversible losses during an explosion in water are small, and the energy of the explosion transferred to the shock wave is spent mainly on mechanical work associated with the involvement in the motion of the mass of water, through which the shock wave passes.

The main factors determining the destructive effect of an explosion of a charge in water are shock wave (primary and secondary), hydro flow (created by the movement of the mass of water displaced by the gas bubble and moving behind the shock wave front), an explosion product of the gas bubble (in the case when the target is at a distance). At present, there are no theoretical methods to estimate the destructive effect of the explosion of the explosive charge in water. Since up to 50–60% of the explosion energy is concentrated in the main shock wave, the calculation of the effect of an underwater explosion is commonly limited to the evaluation of the shock wave action. It is assumed that the more intense the main shock wave is, the stronger will be the effect of other associated damaging factors (secondary wave, water flow, explosion products), all other things being equal.

Logically, a larger quantity of the explosive will create a stronger shock wave. The question is how to deliver the large quantity to explode right beside the sluice gate or at the bottom of the dam. The effect of the Dambusters Raid in 1943 is an excellent example of how a large bomb placed by the dam can cause physical damage that will lead to structural failure using the effect of the accumulated water. There is no difference here, just the methods of delivering the required quantities are different. An aerial bomb is out of the question so the explosive can be delivered by unmanned vessels. Nowadays Ukraine is using them to attack far from their shores so application in the Dnieper River is not unreasonable. The question is would they do that? On the night of the dam destruction, no large explosion (corresponding to 300+ kg of high explosive) was reported publicly. It is worth saying now that in some of the previous attacks (as a probability) a vessel or a rocket with 300+ kg of high explosive either on the surface or slightly beneath will definitely derail the heavy steel gate, punch out of the side rail and bend it. No repair can be performed on-site and that gate is permanently out of service.

We can now with certainty say that the explosives either due to shelling or placing are not the major reason for the dam breach, but rather one of the contributors. Saying this, what may be the main reason? It is now pointing to the sheer force of nature - meaning the huge masses of the fast-moving water, the rapid increase in the hydrostatic pressure, and the induced vibrations.

The force of nature

We can now dissect the previously mentioned:

"Still water runs deep" and "Fast water cut the canyon" are two quotes that we can start with.

The mass of water in the Kakhovskaya Reservoir is enormous. We are talking about millions upon millions of cubic meters. This water is a very fast flowing mass. The dam is its obstacle and the sluice gates regulate the flow. If these sluice gates are incapacitated one or another way, or just a portion of them, combined with fast-moving large quantities of the water mass, the force of nature will do the rest - it's highly likely the obstacle will be swept away.

In river hydraulics, there is a way to make large water masses move faster. The solution in the Dnieper Cascade is the dam in Zaporozhie. Whoever controls the dam can close all gates and let the reservoir slowly fill up to the maximum safe level. There is no lack of water upstream. In a coordinated move, taking calculations and hydrodynamics, opening all available gates will make hundreds of thousands of cubic meters of water start to move, first slowly, then accelerating as more mass is added. This mass follows the river bed and it will slam into the next obstacle - the Kakhovka dam. If the regulator gates are not functional, the water mass will impact the dam creating enormous static pressure but also waves will be formed adding additional stress in the form of induced vibrations.

To illustrate these phenomena the following graphics are used:

The impact processes of two overtopping waves are shown in the picture above. Stage (a–c) indicates the impact process of the individual overtopping wave (in gray color). Stage (c–e) shows the interaction between the initial reflected overtopping wave (in grey color) and the following incident overtopping wave (in white color). In Stage (d–d), the piling-up of the following incident wave on the top of the reflected wave can result in a violent impact on a high vertical position on the wall. In Figure 3b, the schematic sketch of the time series signal of an overtopping wave impact including Stage (a–c) is illustrated with a marked dynamic impact peak in Stage (a–a) and the maximum quasi-static force peaks in Stage (b–b) or (c–c). During the initial impact Stage (a–a), the overtopping wave front changes its direction suddenly and results in a sharp dynamic impact peak with a large magnitude and short duration. During the stages of deflection (b–b) or reflection (c–c), the maximum quasi-static force peak is formed with a relative lower magnitude and longer duration, which is governed by gravity. When the maximum quasi-static peak occurs, the instant pressures along the wall are almost linearly distributed.

Consequences

In every investigation, the main question is "Who benefits". In this case, Ukraine can get more because the Russian-controlled side of the river downstream from the dam is a lowland. Russia built field fortifications including trenches, bunkers, and minefields effectively blocking any attempt by anything force large than a section or squad to perform military operations. Flooding the area will effectively neutralize these defense positions and give the Ukrainian side freedom of action, especially special forces, to cross the river.

Flooding caused environmental catastrophes that on a much larger scale affect Russians. Some portion of the Ukrainian-controlled territory is affected but not even close to the size of the Russian portion. The impact on the civilian population is much harder on the Russian side.

Discharge of the water will technically narrow the river upstream the dam so it may be easier to cross. Evacuation of the civilian population requires significant efforts on the Russian side taking valuable transport means from the battlefield. Ukrainian forces downstream may be relieved and sent to the zone of ongoing counteroffensive without fear of any Russian incursion. The propaganda effect, especially aimed at the Western media plays a very important role for the Ukrainian side. Taking aside the authenticity and reality of their claims, for the portion of the Western public, Ukraine is a victim in this case.

Russia doesn't really have a benefit of destroying the dam because it is their civilian population and military downstream that are the most affected. They carefully calculated this event and the consequences and devoted resources to counter it. On the Russian side, it was anticipated that the dam may collapse and that was the major drive to leave previously captured territories on the west bank. General Surovikin's decision to do that, even heavily criticized at the beginning, was strategically sound and reasonable.

One of the biggest issues for the Russian side is the water supply to Crimea. In 2014 Ukraine deprived the peninsula of the water supplies which was re-established again in 2022. Dropping the water level will affect the Crimean water supply canal. For now, reservoirs at the peninsula are filled and supplies collected and time will tell how Russia will deal with that.

The status of the Zaporizhie nuclear power plant is of great importance. Nuclear reactors depend on the water for cooling and depriving it is a recipe for disaster. However, in anticipation of a dam breach as well as the shelling, the reactors are turned off so they require minimum cooling for which the existing cooling water reservoir is more than enough.

The Ukrainian counteroffensive (at the time of writing) is going not really well for the attackers and blowing the dam will definitely not benefit the Russian side. On the other hand, destroying the dam may be a desperate move to deflect attention from the situation on the front.

In any case, the real magnitude of the catastrophe is still to be assessed. That will be possible after the war.

Conclusion

The upper portion of the dam is destroyed. The question is the state of the lower one. For now, we can assume that the bottom portion is intact. Can the dam be repaired? The answer is yes, however, the economic justification will be the major contributor to making the final decision. In any case, nothing will be done until the end of the war.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE
Mike Mihajlovic is an engineer, defense technologies specialist, author, historian, analyst, and former army officer. He is a contributing editor to Black Mountain Analysis.

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Matt Taibbi testifies before Congress on the underhanded growth of digital McCarthyism

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DEFEAT CAPITALISM AND ITS DEADLY SPAWN, IMPERIALISM
ecological murder •

Matt Taibbi
THE RACKET

My Statement to Congress—

'Ranking Member Plaskett, I'm Not A So-Called Journalist': Matt Taibbi Discusses The Twitter Files

Forbes Breaking News

Mar 9, 2023
At today's House Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing, Matt Taibbi spoke about the Twitter files and the suppression of free speech by the federal government.

Taibbi's prefatory note: At around 10 a.m. EST this morning, Michael Shellenberger and I will be testifying at the “Hearing on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on the Twitter Files” for the House Judiciary Committee, in the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government. Just before, around 9:00 a.m., we’ll also be releasing a TwitterFiles “Statement to Congress” thread, which will be submitted to the record. It contains some surprises. His opening:

Chairman Jordan, ranking member Plaskett, members of the Select Committee,

My name is Matt Taibbi. I’ve been a reporter for over 30 years, and an advocate for the First Amendment. Much of that time was spent at Rolling Stone magazine. Over my career, I’ve had the good fortune to be recognized for the work I love. I’ve won the National Magazine Award, the I.F. Stone Award for independent journalism, and written ten books, including four New York Times bestsellers. I’m now the editor of the online magazine Racket, on the independent platform Substack.

I’m here today because of a series of events that began late last year, when I received a note from a source online.

It read: “Are you interested in doing a deep dive into what censorship and manipulation… was going on at Twitter?”

A week later, the first of what became known as the “Twitter Files” reports came out. To say these attracted intense public interest would be an understatement. My computer looked like a slot machine as just the first tweet about the blockage of the Hunter Biden laptop story registered 143 million impressions and 30 million engagements.

But it wasn’t until a week after the first report, after Michael Shellenberger, Bari Weiss, and other researchers joined the search of the “Files,” that we started to grasp the significance of this story.

A focus of this fast-growing network is making lists of people whose opinions, beliefs, associations, or sympathies are deemed “misinformation,” “disinformation,” or “malinformation.” The latter term is just a euphemism for “true but inconvenient.” Undeniably, the making of such lists is a form of digital McCarthyism. Ordinary Americans are not just being reported to Twitter for “deamplification” or de-platforming, but to firms like PayPal, digital advertisers like Xandr, and crowdfunding sites like GoFundMe. These companies can and do refuse service to law-abiding people and businesses whose only crime is falling afoul of a distant, faceless, unaccountable, algorithmic judge.

The original promise of the Internet was that it might democratize the exchange of information globally. A free internet would overwhelm all attempts to control information flow, its very existence a threat to anti-democratic forms of government everywhere.

What we found in the Files was a sweeping effort to reverse that promise, and use machine learning and other tools to turn the internet into an instrument of censorship and social control. Unfortunately, our own government appears to be playing a lead role.

We saw the first hints in communications between Twitter executives before the 2020 election, where we read things like:

Hi team, can we get your opinion on this? This was flagged by DHS:

Or:

Please see attached report from the FBI for potential misinformation.

This would be attached to an excel spreadsheet with a long list of names, whose accounts were often suspended shortly after.

Following the trail of communications between Twitter and the federal government across tens of thousands of emails led to a series of revelations. Mr. Chairman, we’ve summarized these and submitted them to the committee in the form of a new Twitter Files thread, which is also being released to the public now, on Twitter at @ShellenbergerMD, and @mtaibbi.

We learned Twitter, Facebook, Google, and other companies developed a formal system for taking in moderation “requests” from every corner of government: the FBI, DHS, HHS, DOD, the Global Engagement Center at State, even the CIA. For every government agency scanning Twitter, there were perhaps 20 quasi-private entities doing the same, including Stanford’s Election Integrity Project, Newsguard, the Global Disinformation Index, and others, many taxpayer-funded.

A focus of this fast-growing network is making lists of people whose opinions, beliefs, associations, or sympathies are deemed “misinformation,” “disinformation,” or “malinformation.” The latter term is just a euphemism for “true but inconvenient.”

Undeniably, the making of such lists is a form of digital McCarthyism.

Ordinary Americans are not just being reported to Twitter for “deamplification” or de-platforming, but to firms like PayPal, digital advertisers like Xandr, and crowdfunding sites like GoFundMe. These companies can and do refuse service to law-abiding people and businesses whose only crime is falling afoul of a distant, faceless, unaccountable, algorithmic judge.

As someone who grew up a traditional ACLU liberal, this mechanism for punishment without due process is horrifying.

Another troubling aspect is the role of the press, which should be the people’s last line of defense.

But instead of investigating these groups, journalists partnered with them. If Twitter declined to remove an account right away, government agencies and NGOs would call reporters for the New York Times, Washington Post, and other outlets, who in turn would call Twitter demanding to know why action had not been taken.

Effectively, news media became an arm of a state-sponsored thought-policing system.

Some will say, “So what? Why shouldn’t we eliminate disinformation?”

To begin with, you can’t have a state-sponsored system targeting “disinformation” without striking at the essence of the right to free speech. The two ideas are in direct conflict.

Many of the fears driving what my colleague Michael Shellenberger calls the “Censorship-Industrial Complex” also inspired the infamous “Alien and Sedition Laws of 1798.” The latter outlawed “any false, scandalous, and malicious writing against Congress or the president.”

Here is something that will sound familiar: supporters of that law hundreds of years ago were quick to denounce their critics as sympathizers with a hostile foreign power, at the time France. Alexander Hamilton said Thomas Jefferson and his supporters were “more Frenchmen than Americans.”

Jefferson, in vehemently opposing these laws, said democracy cannot survive in a country where power is given to people “whose suspicions may be the evidence.” He added:

It would be a dangerous delusion were a confidence in the men of our choice to silence our fears for the safety of our rights: that confidence is everywhere the parent of despotism.

Jefferson’s ideas still ring true today. In a free society we don’t mandate truth, we arrive at it through discussion and debate. Any group that claims the “confidence” to decide fact and fiction, especially in the name of protecting democracy, is always, itself, the real threat to democracy.

This is why “anti-disinformation” just doesn’t work. Any experienced journalist knows experts are often initially wrong, and sometimes they even lie. In fact, when elite opinion is too much in sync, this itself can be a red flag.

We just saw this with the Covid lab-leak theory. Many of the institutions we’re now investigating initially labeled the idea that Covid came from a lab “disinformation” and conspiracy theory. Now apparently even the FBI takes it seriously.

"Every country does propaganda..and they have to do it to their own population."

'Hear From Him For 30 Seconds...': Dan Bishop Plays Shocking Clip About 'Propaganda' For Matt Taibbi

Forbes Breaking News

Mar 9, 2023

At today's House Weaponization of the Federal Government hearing, Rep. Dan Bishop (R-NC) spoke to Matt Taibbi about ~~alleged~~ threats to free speech.

It’s not possible to instantly arrive at truth. It is however becoming technologically possible to instantly define and enforce a political consensus online, which I believe is what we’re looking at.

This is a grave threat to people of all political persuasions.

For hundreds of years, the thing that’s distinguished Americans from all other people around the world is the way we don’t let anyone tell us what to think, certainly not the government.

The First Amendment, and an American population accustomed to the right to speak, is the best defense left against the Censorship-Industrial Complex. If the latter can knock over our first and most important constitutional guarantee, these groups will have no serious opponent left anywhere.

If there’s anything the Twitter Files show, it’s that we’re in danger of losing this most precious right, without which all other democratic rights are impossible.

Thank you for the opportunity to appear, and I would be happy to answer any questions from the Committee.

SPECIAL ADDENDUM:

LIVE: House Select Subcommittee hearing on the weaponization of the federal government

Fox News

March 9, 2023

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Norman Finkelstein : Russia has the historical right to invade Ukraine (updated with transcript)

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.

Norman Finkelstein & Briahna Gray

The Debrief with Briahna Joy Gray, April 8, 2022.

Source: http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/norman-finkelstein-on-ideology-in-the-classroom-and-ukraine-the-debrief-with-briahna-joy-gray/

BRIAHNA JOY GRAY: Tonight I’ll be joined by the never boring, always brilliant scholar and writer Norman Finkelstein to discuss his latest chapters on a professor’s obligations to manage ideology in the classroom, as well as his thoughts on the Russia/Ukraine crisis. This should be gripping. Download the Callin app for iOS and Android to listen to this podcast live, call in, and more! Also available at callin.com (Note: This is the complete podcast; the transcript only covers the Russo-Ukraine war discussion.)

Transcript:

Question: How much of a similarity maybe do you see between the kind of… the Israeli occupation of Palestine and the way some people handle some of the reactionary and right-wing elements in the Palestinian defense and opposition, versus how some of the left is talking about the Ukraine defense and the Azov battalions… Do you think there’s a comparison? And I’ll just leave the question at that. Thanks.

Norman Finkelstein: Well I have to ask Briahna’s permission to go in a digression…

Briahna: Absolutely.

Norman Finkelstein : Okay. On the question of the Ukraine, the thing that’s troubled me about the public conversation of the Ukraine or hysteria —it’s not even a conversation, it’s hysteria about the Ukraine— is the following: those who are not totally immersed in the mainstream propaganda, some of the people you’ve had on your program and people who are not especially of the left, they have no particular left-wing allegiance, like John Mearsheimer at University of Chicago, or before he passed away Stephen F. Cohen who predicted that if you keep up with this NATO expansion in the Ukraine, there’s going to be a war. He said that in Democracy Now in 2014, and he was right. And other people, Professor Chomsky. I would include in that group several others, and they’ll all say the following thing:

Number one, the Russians were promised that there would be no NATO expansion to the East, that was the quid pro quo for the reunification of Germany after the decomposition of the Soviet Union. The Russians were promised that but the West went ahead. We’re talking about the 1990s: the promises were given, but the West then went ahead and started to expand NATO once, as John Mearsheimer likes to put it there was the first tranche, then the second tranche of expansion… Then NATO starts expanding in Georgia and in the Ukraine. The Soviet Union says it’s a red line.

To stop this, the Soviet Union offers a perfectly reasonable resolution: just neutralize Ukraine like we neutralized Austria after World War II, neither aligned with an Eastern bloc nor aligned with a Western bloc. That seemed to me perfectly reasonable. And the people I mentioned, Mearsheimer, Cohen passed away since but Professor Chomsky and a number of others, they’ll all agree on the reasonableness of Putin’s demands.

And then the reasonableness of those demands, those demands have to, as Briahna says in her paper and as she said this evening, they have to always be seen in context. So what’s the context? The context is the Soviet Union, the former Russia, it lost… the estimates are about 30 million people during World War II. The United States which, if you watch American movies, you would think the US won World War II, it lost about two hundred thousand people. The UK was the second candidate for winning World War II, they lost about four hundred thousand people. The Soviet Union lost 30 million people. Even those who didn’t take courses in the hard sciences can reckon the difference between several hundred thousand and thirty million. Now that’s not an ancient memory for the Russians. If you… I remember Stephen F. Cohen saying “when I grew up in little America —he was from Kentucky— we used to celebrate…” I forgot what was called here Victory Day, V-something, he said “but you know now as adults we don’t celebrate that anymore in the United States, Victory in World War II”, he said, but Russia, he said, they still celebrate V-Day, they still celebrate it. I live in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn. A large part is Russian Jews, a large part is Russian Jews. You go out in May, you go out on the V-Day, and you can see that Russians up to 80 and 90 year olds, they’re wearing medals, they’re medals from World War II. That memory is alive.

And now there’s this Ukraine, where Nazis are playing an outsized role. I’m not saying they’re a majority, but in the political and military life, they play an outsized —disproportionate let’s call it— role. This Ukraine where Nazis are playing an outsized role, are aligned with a formidable military bloc called NATO, NATO keeps advancing and advancing and advancing, closing on Russia, trying to suffocate it… And beginning around 2016, under Trump, begins to arm the Ukraine, pouring in weapons, engaging in military exercises with NATO, behaving very provocatively. And then the Foreign Minister Lavrov finally says we’ve reached the boiling point.

Now everything I just told you, Professor Chomsky, John Mearsheimer and others will acknowledge it. The mainstream press won’t even acknowledge that but people who call themselves just, legitimately call themselves dissidents, although Mearsheimer wouldn’t call himself a dissident, he just calls himself a realist. Nice guy, I consider him a friend, I like him. They’ll acknowledge all that. But then they say the invasion was criminal. Criminal invasion, criminal, criminal, criminal. And my question which I’ve constantly been putting in correspondence is a very simple one: if you agree that for 20 years—more than 20 years, more than two decades—, Russia has tried to engage in diplomacy; if you agree that the Russian demand to neutralize Ukraine —not occupy it, not determine its government, its form of economy, just neutralize it like Austria after World War II—, if you agree that was a legitimate demand; if you agree that the West was expanding and expanding NATO; if you agree that Ukraine de facto had become a member of NATO, weapons pouring in, engaging in military exercises in NATO; and if you agree… You know, Russia lost 30 million people during World War II because of the Nazi invasion, so there’s a legitimate concern by Russia with all of these —if you excuse my language— Nazis floating around in the Ukraine, then the simple question is: What was Russia to do?

I’m not saying I agree with the invasion, I’m not saying it went right, but I think one thing: the invasion showed… you know what the one thing the invasion showed, Briahna, was that Russia is kind of weak militarily, which is why all the more they may have been fearful of a NATO-backed Ukraine filled with Nazis, and probably at some point positioning nuclear missiles on its border. And I think 30 million, 30 million people… Listen to this: I think 30 million people is 30 million arguments in favor of Russia. Now I’m not going to say, because I’m not a general and I’m not a diplomat, so I’m not going… I’m not a military strategist so I’m not going to say it was the wisest thing to do. I’m not going to say it was the most prudent thing to do. But I will say —and I’m not afraid to say it because it would dishonor the memory of my parents if i didn’t say it—, I will say that they had the right to do it. And I’m not taking that back. They had the right to do it. They had if I can call it the historic right to do it. 30 million people (killed during WW2), and now you’re starting again, you’re starting again. No, no, you know I can’t go for it, I can’t go for those who acknowledge the legitimacy of the arguments made by Putin but then call the invasion criminal. I don’t see that.

Now you could say the way they executed it may have had criminal elements. However I don’t know… Well, you went to Harvard Law School, I don’t know if you studied the laws of war, but the laws of war make a very big distinction between ‘jus ad bellum’ and ‘jus in bello’, namely whether the launching of the war was legitimate or whether it was an act of aggression versus the way you conduct the war, ‘jus in bello’. Maybe the conduct, targeting of civilians and so forth, that probably violates the laws of war, but that’s a separate issue under law from “did they have the right to attack”. I think they did. I’m not going to back off from that.

You know, these are for me… even at my age, these are acts of deference to the suffering of my parents. My parents felt a very deep love for the Russian people, because they felt the Russian people understood war. They understood what my parents went through [in the Warsaw Ghetto & Auschwitz] during World War II, so there was a very deep affection… My father even, at the end of his life, he learned fluent Russian because neighborhood is all Russian. And you know, Polish to Russian is not a huge leap but also he liked the Russian people. So in my family growing up, the worst curse (insult)… there were two curses, two curses: curse number one was “parasite”. You have to work. My parents had a very… they had a work ethic. Believe me, I could have lived without the idea of pleasure, it didn’t exist in my house: you had to work. And the second word, the second curse, the second epithet was “traitor”. A traitor. And I know my parents would regard me as a traitor if I denounced what the Russians were doing now. How they’re doing it, as they say, probably there are violations and maybe egregious violations of the laws of war, we’ll have to wait to see the evidence, but their right to protect their homeland from this relentless juggernaut, this relentless pressing on their throats, when there was such an easy way to resolve it…

You know, if you read War and peace, and I suspect you did because you’re quite a gifted writer, obviously you were a reader…

Briahna: I confess, there was a copy on my shelf that I have started many times, but I haven’t… I’ve never finished it.

Norman Finkelstein: I’m surprised… In any case, War and peace is about the invasion of Russia, the war of 1812, and Tolstoy, the centerpiece of War and peace is the great battle of Borodino, and he describes it in this kind of terrifying detail. In the battle of Borodino, 25 000 Russians were killed, or maybe it was all together 25 000, I can’t remember, I think was 25 000 Russians were killed. Why do I mention it? So for Russians the seminal event of the 19th century was the war of 1812 and the invasion of Russia. For the 20th century, it’s World War II, and just in the battle of Leningrad, just Leningrad, not Saint-Petersburg, just Leningrad, a million Russians were killed. There was cannibalism! This is serious, World War II for the Russians. And you want me to just forget about that? That’s just a trivial fact? A trivial fact? No! Now you’ll ask yourself: in all the coverage that you’ve heard about your Russian attack on Ukraine, all the coverage you’ve read and listened to, how many times have you heard that 30 million Russians were killed during World War II? How many times?

Briahna Very infrequently. It’s never stated in this context.

Norman Finkelstein: Absolutely. And Stephen F. Cohen… You know, he was my Professor at Princeton and for a while he was my advisor. He… I didn’t know him well and at the end we had a falling down over my whole dissertation catastrophe, debacle, but Cohen had a genuine affection for the Russian people. He did. He loved the Russians. He loved the Russian people. And so when he begins his presentation… There is a Youtube of him debating the former US Ambassador, Mc Faul I think, Michael Mc Faul. How does he begin? He begins with how Russians remember the V-day. You know, that’s the starting point for me, it’s a starting point.

http://www.twitter.com/caitoz/status/1525620613980643328

Now you might say well, doesn’t your whole argument then justify what Israel does because of what happened to Jews during World War II? It’s an interesting question because the most moving, the most moving speech in support of the founding of the State of Israel, by far the most moving speech, you know who it was given by at the UN? It was given by the Soviet foreign minister Gromyko. And he said it was another act of generosity. Remember I mentioned to you earlier the boy’s act of generosity where he looks past what Trichka says about Black people, and as a student I thought it was a very generous act. So now the Russians lost 30 million people in World War II, but Gromyko says the suffering of the Jews, it was different, it was horrible. Here is a Russian saying that. And he said if a binational State is not possible, they earned their right to a State. So I say I applied the same standard. Now the way Israel carried out its right to establish a State by expelling the indigenous population, appropriating their land and creating havoc and misery for generation after generation, decade after decade, no I’m not going there. But yes I do believe… in recent correspondence with some friends I use the expression “I think Russia has the historic right to protect itself”, not by violating somebody else’s right to self-determination but neutralization, I think that’s legitimate.

Briahna: So I want to ask you this because you know it wouldn’t be right for me to put this question to Ro Khanna and not put this question to you. You are speaking so compellingly about the kind of moral valences of who’s entitled to feeling insecure as a nation, who’s entitled because of the historical cost it has paid to defend itself and to defend whatever you want to call it, you know, democracy in fascism, all of these kinds of words, has paid in terms of the number of human lives and kind of an unmatched price, and I think that’s…

Norman Finkelstein: The Chinese lost about 26 million to the Japanese, so it was close.

Briahna: It’s close but still… And yet when I was talking to Ro Khanna and he was saying well, ultimately he’s arguing on the other side that America is 100% right, Russia’s 100% wrong and this is a just war regardless of the substance. I would push him on this idea, of even if you believe it to be just kind of morally, the act I’m going to have to as a leftist is pushback against the idea that the preemptiveness of the war is okay, and that war is a solution. It is something that we should be tacitly or implicitly condoning. And I wonder what you make of that question.

Norman Finkelstein: Look, Briahna, not to flatter you but you always ask the right questions, and that’s why I was careful in what I said. You referred to the pre-emptiveness. Russia tried for 22 years. That’s giving a lot of time to diplomacy! 22 years is a lot of time!

And the question is: at what point, at what point does Russia get to act? When there are nuclear-tipped missiles on its border? Is that when it gets to act? I don’t agree with that. I think of course you have to give maximum time to see if diplomacy is going to work, absolutely…

Briahna: And then you start fighting? And then you send in troops? Because Norm, this is the… whether or not you believe…

Norman Finkelstein: I’m very happy, I’m very happy to take to heart your question. And that leads me again with the same question that I returned to you and I’ve returned to all of my correspondents over the past six weeks. If it’s clear that all the negotiations are in bad faith, if it’s clear that Ukraine had become de facto a member of NATO, what was Russia supposed to do? You say “don’t send in troops”. Fine. I come from a family that was completely anti-war. My mother used to say “better a hundred years of evolution than one year of revolution”. She had enough of war. I have no problem with your recoiling at the process. But what I’m saying is what was Russia supposed to do?

Briahna: What I’m asking is how you distinguish between your feelings that this is a moral war, this is a justified act, fine, and someone like Ro Khanna’s belief that US intervention, continued support of NATO, Western powers, sending weapons into Ukraine, arming the Azov battalion, is as he puts it a just war. The fact that you are both making these arguments, regardless… I’m not making an equivalent between the value of your arguments but obviously Ro Khanna thinks what he thinks and my point to him was you using vague terms like “just war” is exactly what’s allowed the kind of jingoistic parade to lead us into so many other incursions. So how principally do you distinguish? I understand your feeling and I understand the historical citations and the loss of life that leads you to the conclusions that you’ve been led to, but someone on the other side will say the same thing, someone else said “Well Marshall well this is how many Ukrainians have suffered and this is…”

Norman Finkelstein: But you’re canceling, if I may use that word, you’re canceling the context. You see I began my whole discussion with you, not with the position of Biden or the position of lunatics like Judy Woodruff, you know, and PBS. I said my quarrel is with people on the left who agree with all of my context but then make the leap and say it’s a criminal invasion. And I say to Professor Meirsheimer, Professor Chomsky and many others who acknowledge everything I just said, I say then what was… if you agree with everything I said, what was Putin supposed to do? I don’t see what he was supposed to do. I’m lost. It’s an impasse. I don’t see what…

Briahna: You were making a reference earlier to laws of war and rules before, i don’t know about it, I’ve never studied the laws of war, but it does seem to me that a line is drawn between… and I know that people are going to say something can be constructively war and you know. But in terms of an actual invasion and boots on the ground or missile strikes or things like that, the thing that Russia has to do even if it disadvantages them strategically in some ways is to wait until the other person hits first.

Norman Finkelstein: I don’t agree with that. I would say, as in any case, you have to demonstrate its last resort, and therefore you do have to demonstrate…

Briahna: How do you do that? Because that’s the question, how do you make sure that this is not just the same kind of…

Norman Finkelstein: I’m going to give you a historical analogy, probably the details which you’re unfamiliar with, but just allow me to just sketch it out. So in 1967, Israel launches a war, it occupies the West Bank, Gaza, Syrian Golan heights, and then it occupies this huge area, the Egyptian Sinai. And after the 67 war, about three years later, when Anwar Sadat comes into power, he says “I’m willing to sign a peace treaty with Israel but they have to return the territory they acquired during the 67 war”, because that’s the law : under international law, it’s inadmissible to acquire territory by war. Israel acquired the territory during the june 67 war, so these territories belong to Egypt. Israel says no, we’re not leaving the Sinai. Sadat says “Look, I’m offering you a peace treaty, I’m offering you peace, just return what’s not yours, the Egyptian Sinai”. Israel says no. Then Israel starts creating facts in the ground in the Sinai, it starts building settlements, those same settlements you’re familiar with in the West Bank. And then it announces in 1972 it’s going to rebuild what’s called the old jewish city of Carmel. Egypt says you’re not going to do that. You’re crossing a red line. Egypt says if you don’t stop this we’re going to attack, we’re going to attack. Everybody ignores Egypt because Arabs don’t know how to fight wars. The Arabs were nicknamed after 67, the term of abuse for an Arab was they were “monkeys”, they called them monkeys. They don’t know how to fight wars. Okay? And then come october 1973. Guess what: Sadat attacks. And the Israelis were so shocked they thought the whole thing was over, they called it… Moshe Dayan who was the Defense minister at the time, or the Foreign minister I can’t remember which, I think Defense minister at the time, he says… he made this panicky phone call, he said it’s the end of the third temple. This is it, we’re finished. Well it wasn’t the end of the third temple but it was a significant, heavy loss to Israel, they lost between two and three thousand soldiers, which is the largest number except for the war in 1948.

Now here’s the point: the point is no country in the world, none, including the United States, no country in the world condemned Sadat for aggression, none. And you know, for Israel it was a close call, or it seemed to be. In retrospect it turned out not to me, but it seemed to be a close call. Nobody condemned Egypt. Why? One, its demand was legitimate. Return the Sinai, it’s not yours, it’s our territory. Number two: Sadat tried negotiations for six years. And number three, as hard as he tried to negotiate, Israelis kept provoking and provoking and provoking until they announced rebuilding the old jewish city of Carmel. And Sadat says it’s over and then plans with Syria the attack which happens, what’s called the Yom Kippur war, the october war in 1973.

So now fast forward to Putin: the man was reasonable (neutralize Ukraine), negotiates over 20 years to fighting over this NATO expansion in the East, and then they start provoking them even more, they start pouring weapons into the Ukraine, they start carrying on joint military exercises between Ukraine and NATO. And then all of these swarmy Nazis start to surface. No I’m not saying Nazis control the government but they play an outsized role in the government, in the military. And I don’t see what’s the difference between what Putin did and what Sadat did. I don’t see the difference. I think it was the same thing, and nobody condemns Sadat for aggression. No one.

Briahna: But I’m asking I think a different question. I’m really not interested in litigating any given case mostly because I don’t know what the hell any of these things are about, so like I don’t really… I’m not going to say whether this war is just, that’s for other people to determine. What I do know is that everyone is making that argument on all kinds of sides, including people I know I don’t disagree with. And so many wars have been started with the argument that it is a just war for x, y and z reasons, and it’s okay to act despite there not having been a direct act of aggression against the allegedly aggrieved party. And so all I’m asking is to give some thought to how one would articulate a standard that can’t be so easily abused.

Norman Finkelstein: You know, Rihanna, I agree, it’s like once you grow up in life, you discover that life is very little about principles: it’s mostly about judgment. Principles get you not very far. I remember I got this lesson from Professor Chomsky, as he always puts it in his very lucid, simple terms. He said to me once: “Norman, we all know it’s wrong to lie, but if a rapist knocks in your door and asks “Is your daughter in the bedroom”, there’s a clash of principles there obviously. And so at the end of the day, what is required is not the application of an abstract principle but the faculty of judgment. When principles clash, you have to exercise judgment. You then have to look at particulars, the specifics.

Briahna: Excuse me, I appreciate that, which is probably why, you know, this is the limit, this is the limit of it for me and I’ll… I’m happy to take more questions from people who I’m sure know much more about the particulars. Although your last statement about, you know, principles versus judgment, and you know, the rapist at your door, does make me, it does make me tempted to ask you about what you think about the slap. […]

[If you want to know what Norman Finkelstein thinks about Will Smith’s slap at the Oscars, and other more serious issues, check the full podcast].

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People who live in glass houses…the empire’s accusations increasingly boomerang

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Luciana Bohne

"There is no basis for collective rebellion in today's Chinese society."--Global Times

Because the US has so many skeletons in the closet--genocide, slavery, Jim Crow, lynchings, invasions, subversions, assassinations of world leaders, torture, false flags, sabotage of democracies worldwide, financing and training of international terrorists, death squads, disregard for international law leading to war crimes and crimes against humanity--their once powerful propaganda factory is now but a shadow of its former totalizing power. No sooner do they point a finger at any abuse (generally fabricated) by a foreign entity, than that finger turns into a boomerang that not only accuses themselves but also, in the case of China spectacularly, has the unintended effect of responding with legal measures that increase the safeguarding of national unity and national security.

The case in point is the National Security Law issued following the year-long Black Terror season in the city, instigated by the US and western "partners." US Secretary of State should, therefore, be careful about issuing statements denouncing past detentions by China of "dissenters." These might very well result in a crack-down of these fifth columnists, either bought or bamboozled by Western influencers. Global Times goes into the matter-- https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202107/1228282.shtml...

Luciana Bohne is a retired academic with an abiding interest in truth and social justice.

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ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

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The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

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The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of The Greanville Post. However, we do think they are important enough to be transmitted to a wider audience.

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Read it in your language • Lealo en su idioma • Lisez-le dans votre langue • Lies es in Deiner Sprache • Прочитайте это на вашем языке • 用你的语言阅读

People who live in glass houses…the empire’s accusations increasingly boomerang

"There is no basis for collective rebellion in today's Chinese society."--Global Times

KIT KLARENBERG
JUNE 19, 2023

MIKE MIHAJLOVIC
Black Mountain Analysis

KAKHOVKA DAM DESTRUCTION
Technical overview and events prior to the dam collapse
First run JUN 8, 2023

ABOUT THE AUTHOR / SOURCE
Mike Mihajlovic is an engineer, defense technologies specialist, author, historian, analyst, and former army officer. He is a contributing editor to Black Mountain Analysis.

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