The collapsing US military & economic empire is making Washington & NATO even more dangerous. US could not beat the Taliban but thinks it can take on China-Russia-Iran...a sign of psychopathology for sure. @BruceKGagnon
Going Underground speaks with Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, former Chief of Staff to US Secretary State Colin Powell.
He discusses 9/11 20 years on including the initial reaction to 9/11, how fear and rage drove the Bush Administration’s response to the terror attacks, the military-industrial complex and its desire for endless war which in part fueled the expansion of NATO.
He describes how the US military sabotaged Joe Biden’s withdrawal from Afghanistan and made it look chaotic, how 9/11 can be laid at the feet of Saudi Arabia who he considers the biggest state sponsors of terror, Biden’s executive orders to declassify 9/11 documents and much more!
Photo from one of several national peace in space conferences organized by J. Narayana Rao from Nagpur, India. (Click on the photo for a better view)
On Tuesday and Wednesday of this week two space issue webinars were held in India at two different institutions of higher learning.
They were both hugely successful - at one 75 students and faculty attended the webinar and the second one was even larger with 103 students and faculty attending.
The first was organized by Dr. Sandeepa Bhat B, Professor of Law and Director of the Centre for Aviation & Space Laws, The WB National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata, West Bengal.
The second webinar was organized by Dr. Aruna Kammila, Associate Professor at Galgotias University near New Delhi. She Chairs the Master of Laws program and is Head for Post Graduate Legal Studies. Aruna also serves on the Advisory Board of the Global Network.
Speakers representing the Global Network during these two days were GN board members Dave Webb (UK), Subrata Ghoshroy (Boston), Tamara Lorincz (Canada), Karl Grossman (New York), Aruna Kammila (India), and Bruce Gagnon (Maine).
We thank both Dr. Bhat and Dr. Kammila for extending this kind invitation to the Global Network to meet with those from their institutions.
India is becoming a major force in space operations (it launched an anti-satellite test in 2019), and while officially opposing weapons in space, India sees the US, Russia and China increasing their military space forces and feels it must react.
Thus the world moves closer to a hair-trigger situation as we face the growing possibility of war in space.
Much of these two webinars was devoted to speaking about the growing problems of space junk and pollution from rocket launches. In addition considerable discussion was held about the need for greater focus on space laws that can regulate and restrict the worst inclinations of humankind.
The fact that both of these law schools are diving into this issue is very exciting for the Global Network. We've seen no evidence yet of any western law schools (especially those that focus on space issues from a more corporate perspective) having any interest in working with those of us who are organizing to stop the weaponization and nuclearization of the heavens.
We must give much credit to former GN board member J. Narayana Rao from Nagpur, India who is most responsible for these current events as a result of his tireless work over many years of sharing the Keep Space for Peace message throughout his country.
He is truly the father of the peaceful space movement in India.
Bruce
An update:
Just this morning I received an email from one of the students who attended one of the webinars I described above. Needless to say I am quite happy.
She wrote in part:
"Sir, I want to convey that your presentation inspired me in a lot of ways and I thought of exploring more about the nuclearisation and the conflicts happening in the outer space. I took this as my project to make aware of all my peers to know about this conflict. So for my references and to have a deeper view, I request you to send me the presentation of yours sir to have a deeper understanding with your blessings and if you can help me, I want you to give me some tips regarding this project about how can I take it to the next level sir."
Perth in Australia will be a forward base for nuclear-powered and nuclear weapon-carrying American subs.
by Pepe Escobar
Pax Americana was always a minor character in a zombie apocalypse flick.
Pax Americana is actually The Eternal Return of the Living Dead. “Pax” was never in order; War Inc. rules. The end of WWII led directly to the Cold War. The unipolar moment was an arc from the First Gulf War to the bombing of Yugoslavia. 9/11 launched the Global War on Terror (GWOT), renamed Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) by Team Obama. We are now entering Cold War 2.0 against China.
What former CIA analyst Ray McGovern memorably describes as the MICIMATT (military-industrial-congressional-intelligence-media-academia-think tank complex) never did “Pax”. They do War, in unison, like The Knights Who Say “Ni!” – minus the comic flair.
Take this Knight for the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), the heart of the establishment matrix. CFR specializes in Kissingerian Divide and Rule. Now that applies, in spades, to the Russia-China strategic partnership.
Knights overwhelmingly state the obvious: “Chinese power must be contained”. They sell the current, serial imperial debacle as “grand strategic moves”, in a quirky, lost in translation mixed salad of Gramsci and Lampedusa: a “new order” (engineered by the Empire) is being born via “everything must change so everything may remain the same” – privileging the Empire.
Other Knights even propose the ludicrous notion that the current POTUS, an actual zombie remote-controlled by a teleprompter, is capable of conceiving a “foreign policy for the middle class” , as if the MICIMATT would ever approve a scheme to “advance prosperity in the free world as a whole”. The “free world” has just been stunned by the “prosperity” offered to Afghanistan during 20 “bombing to democracy” years.
And then there are British Knights, who at least should have known their Monty Python by heart, carping about illiberalism and the “regimes created by Xi and Putin” , which will “crumble” and be succeeded by “anarchy and new despotisms.” Same old Anglo haughtiness mixed with piercing ignorance. Oh, those Asiatic “tyrannies” threatening the White Man’s civilizational drive.
We all live in an Aussie submarine
Now it’s all about AUKUS – actually U SUK A. Until recently, only the P5 – the five permanent UNSC members – possessed nuclear-powered submarines. India joined the club, and later rather than sooner, Australia.
Every major player knows the next American war will not be about remote Pacific islands. Taiwan, though, is a completely different ball game. U SUK A is mostly about Taiwan.
U SUK A was finalized at the G7 summit in Carbis Bay last June. That was an Anglo Boys Club affair, discussed exclusively by the Biden-BoJo-Morrison troika – and duly excluding Japan, even as Tokyo all but drew a samurai sword yelling its intent of supporting Taiwan.
The problem is there have been no leaks of the fine print contained in U SUK A. Only spin. Yet it’s already clear that U SUK A goes way beyond building Aussie nuclear subs. Canberra will also have access to Tomahawks, Hornets and even become part of American hypersonic missile research.
But then, in a slip, Australian Defense Minister Peter Dutton gave away the game: U SUK A will allow the upgrading of “the infrastructure in Perth, that will be necessary for the operation of these submarines. I expect we will see…lease arrangements or greater joint operations between our navies in the future.”
Translation: Perth will be a forward base for nuclear-powered and nuclear weapon-carrying American subs.
Why U SUK A now? Let’s go back to WWII – and the same old cartoonish geopolitics of benign Anglo maritime island powers pitted against the “evil” Eurasian heartland.
WWII was the solution to simultaneously prevent Germany from dominating the Atlantic and Japan from dominating the Asia-Pacific (by the way, that’s the correct terminology: “Indo-Pacific” is Empire-speak).
Germany-Japan was all about an alliance that would be predominant across the Eurasian heartland. Now, the Empire of Chaos is being slowly but surely expelled from the Eurasian heartland – this time by the Russia-China strategic partnership.
Those with technical knowledge across the Beltway – not, not the Knights – are aware the US is not a match for hypersonic Russia. Yet the Americans believe they can make life unbearable for Beijing. The US establishment will allow China to control the Western Pacific over their dead bodies. Enter the instrumentalization of Australia.
A big question is what will be the new role of the Five Eyes. With U SUK A, the Anglo Club has already stepped beyond mere intel sharing and spying on communications. This is a military pact between Three Eyes.
Depending on the composition of its new government, Germany could become a Sixth Eye – yet in a subordinate role. With U SUK A, NATO as a whole, fresh from its spectacular Afghan debacle, becomes little else than a semi-relevant vassal. This is all about maritime power.
U SUK A in effect is a Quad Plus, with India and Japan, the Fifth Columnist Asians, only allowed to play the role of, once again, mere vassals. War before 2040
Not surprisingly, the first, concise technical and strategic assessment of U SUK A is Russian, written by Alexander Timokhin and published in Vzglyad, closely linked to GRU intelligence. Here, provided by John Helmer, is an essential English translation.
The key points:
– the extra subs will create a serious, additional threat; “the problem of combating enemy submarine forces will become quite acute for China.”
– Geographically, “Australia can completely block the connection between China and the Indian Ocean.”
– Australia will meet the deadlines only if it lays “more submarines a year than the Americans.”
– It is “possible to quickly make Australia a country with a submarine fleet.” These “gigantic investments and sharp political turns are not carried out just like that. The hegemony of the Anglo-Saxons in the world is seriously shaken.”
And that brings us to the inevitable conclusion: “It is worth recognizing that the world is on the verge of war.”
Join us starting October 15 at 3 pm PDT to view the award-winning film online and on October 17 at 5 pm PDT for a livestream event featuring Joan Baez, David Harris, Daniel Ellsberg, film director Judith Ehrlich and others.
One of the largest and most effective youth-led nonviolent resistance movements in American history grew in opposition to the war in Vietnam.
Inspired by Black America’s crusade for civil rights, hundreds of thousands of young men openly refused to be drafted to fight a tragic war they considered unjust. Several thousand served time in federal prison for their resistance. Their individual acts of courage inspired a mass movement that ended the draft and helped end the war.
Directed by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Judith Ehrlich, The Boys Who Said NO! captures for the first time the story and impact of the historic draft resistance movement, inspiration for social movements today.
Fazebook has been down much of the day. They say it is back up now (6:30 pm EST) but you can't post or share.
Trying to find out what is actually going on is quite instructive. I had a freshman sociology class in Florida where we did a bit of 'Comparing and Contrasting' various media sources. So I repeated that today and here is what I found.
From Sputnik I found this story: Facebook Users Reportedly Being Sold on Hacker Forum Amid Worldwide Outage
The private personal data of 1.5 billion Facebook users is reportedly being sold on a popular hacking forum.
In late September, an announcement was posted on a hacking forum that claimed to have the name, email, phone number, location, gender, and user ID of 1.5 billion Facebook users. One prospective buyer has allegedly been quoted at $5,000 per 1 million Facebook accounts. This would value the entire set of Facebook user data at $7.5 million.
In a subsequent post, the seller alleges to represented a large company that works to scrape Facebook for data. The seller adds that the company has been in operation for at least four years and has over 18,000 clients.
The technical failures at Facebook have even prevented its employees from gaining access to company buildings as their access badges have stopped working. It has also been reported that Facebook's internal platforms are out as well.
Then in an Associated Press story one finds:Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram down in worldwide outage
A massive global outage plunged Facebook, its Instagram and WhatsApp platforms and many people who rely heavily on these services – including Facebook’s own workforce – into chaos Monday.
The company did not say what might be causing the outage, which began around 11:40 a.m. and was still unfixed more than six hours later, although scattered users have reported partial restoration of one service or another. Websites and apps often suffer outages of varying size and duration, but hours-long global disruptions are rare.
You get to decide which is real and which is not....
Bill introduced in Washington to abolish 'Space Force'
Help build support for
'No Militarization of Space Act'
A group of five Democrat
lawmakers have introduced a bill in the House of Representatives that would
abolish the U.S. Space Force after just two years in operation.
The bill, titled the “No Militarization of Space Act”
was introduced last Wednesday by Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) and was
co-sponsored by Reps. Mark Pocan (D-WI), Jesús García (D-IL), Rashida
Tlaib (D-MI) and Maxine Waters (D-CA). The bill has the stated purpose
“to abolish the Space Force as an Armed Force.”
“The long-standing neutrality of
space has fostered a competitive, non-militarized age of exploration
every nation and generation has valued since the first days of space
travel,” Huffman wrote in a statement announcing his bill. “But since
its creation under the former Trump administration, the Space Force has
threatened longstanding peace and flagrantly wasted billions of taxpayer
dollars.”
Huffman said, “It’s time we turn our
attention back to where it belongs: addressing urgent domestic and
international priorities like battling COVID-19, climate change, and
growing economic inequality. Our mission must be to support the American
people, not spend billions on the militarization of space.”
The Space Force was established as
the newest branch of the U.S. military on December 20, 2019. President
Donald Trump began calling for the creation of the Space Force in 2018
and the new military branch received its initial funding through the
2020 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).
Also please contact your member of the House of Representatives
and let them know you want them to support the “No Militarization of
Space Act”. (At this moment we don't have the bill number.)
Space week action: Activists protest Aegis destroyer 'Christening' in Bath
Saturday, October 2 event in Bath, Maine.
Thirty people assembled - the police told a local newspaper reporter that we only had 15 people which was nearly about all that made it into the paper about the protest.
We only had a couple days to alert the public about the event as BIW increasingly is keeping these 'christening' events quiet and not open to the general public.
We'll be back again on Saturday, October 9 at BIW at 11:30 am for another Keep Space for Peace Week protest.
We will continue to call for the conversion of this naval shipyard that builds destroyers. These offensive warships are currently being sent just off the shores of Russia and China in a provocative and dangerous effort to 'control and dominate' the world.
Our climate crisis and desire for true peace demands that we speak out loudly and repeatedly.
During Keep Space for Peace Week J. Narayana Rao in Nagpur, India always organized many events to educate people across his community about space issues. His work spread across India.
J. Narayana Rao Presente!
In remembrance and celebration of J. Narayana Rao from Nagpur, India – Global Network Board Member and our dear friend, colleague and comrade who sadly passed away during the Covid pandemic.
By Bruce K. Gagnon & Dave Webb
In the late 1990's the Global Network held our annual space organizing meeting in Darmstadt, Germany (1997 & 1999). At one of those two meetings J. Narayana Rao from Nagpur, India showed up for the first time. To this day I don't remember how Rao heard about the GN but somehow he did and we were very lucky to have his membership and strong support.
When Rao arrived in Darmstadt he handed me a couple space issue journals that he had put together at his own expense and distributed throughout India. Needless to say I was very impressed.
Rao was from a village near Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh.
In 1958 he went to work for the Indian Railways and joined the Railway Trade Union movement. While in Railway Service and in the Railway Trade Union he was attracted to the peace movement and joined the All India Peace & Solidarity Organization (AIPSO) in 1982. AIPSO is an Indian affiliate of the World Peace Council.
Rao’s zeal to work against nuclear weapons, war, and to support the struggles of the developing countries against imperialist domination led him to believe that unless women and youth are brought into the peace movement there would not be a real movement in India.
With this idea he took the initiative to establish the National Association of Indian Women for Peace and Development and Indian Youth for Peace and Development.
He retired from Railway service in 1994 and after retirement established the Southeast Central Railway Pensioners Association and served as General Secretary.
In 2006 Rao organized a speaking tour throughout India for Mary Beth Sullivan and myself. While on this trip Rao took us to the Gandhi Ashram Sevagram.
He organized space issue conferences numerous times in various Indian cities and invited various GN leaders to speak at the events. All the while he was reaching out to Indian political leaders, academics, union members, students, media and others with our message.
One of the most memorable speaking tours Rao organized was when he took me north to Kashmir during a time of martial law. Just the trip there was a miracle in itself.
Rao was also the organizer of our 2016 speaking tour throughout India & Nepal. GN board members Dave Webb (UK) and Will Griffin (US) were on the trip as well.
In 2019 a space law conference was held in Visakhapatnam at the DSNLU law university and organized by Dr. Aruna Kammila who Rao had earlier brought to the GN. This historic event was the first time that I am aware of where the agenda was to discuss the need for space law to prevent warfare and the colonization of planetary bodies for private profit. The hall was full of students and faculty from 20 law universities across India. It was a great tribute to Rao's vision and determination.
At that time Rao had just had a serious illness and operation and could not come to the conference. I was able to talk with him on the telephone and share with him how well the event was going. I took the opportunity to express my deep love and admiration to him. As it turned out it was the last time I would speak to Rao other than on email.
These days India is having a terrible time with the Covid virus. The country has little public healthcare. Agri-business corporations like Monsanto are attempting to destroy India's long tradition of village farming. Much of the huge population in India has become 'expendable' in the eyes of its corporate friendly government. A 'modern brand' of neo-feudalism is now replacing India's hard fought for democracy - much like the rest of today's world.
The US is attempting to turn the Indian government into an ally against China. India is also becoming a major space power. India's health budget is around $30 billion while they spend $49.6 billion on their military.
Unfortunately Rao was eventually taken by the Covid Corona virus on 18th May. On June 2, 2021 (Rao’s birthday) a Zoom meeting was held for family, friends and fellow members of the Global Network – many wonderful tributes to Rao were made. During the Zoom memorial Rao’s granddaughter paid him the ultimate compliment when she said, “He stepped beyond his abilities”.
Rao will always be remembered by us for his wisdom and understanding, his great organizing skills, his dedication to the cause of peace and for his many other qualities. He was a humble man but extremely effective in his work – he will live long in our hearts and memories.
