Too many blacks in UK for Ukraine refugees

 

 

 

African Diaspora News Channel

Wongel Zelalem reports on Ukrainian refugees that fled their country to live in the UK complaining about being around black people.

U.S. must 'retreat from the region'

 

CGTN Europe spoke to Mohammad Marandi, Iranian American academic and political analyst.

 

Iran and Saudi Arabia have agreed to resume diplomatic relations after seven years of tensions. The two countries released a statement on the agreement which was brokered by China. 

Embassies will re-open within the next two months. 

Riyadh and Tehran severed their diplomatic ties after protesters stormed the Saudi embassy in 2016 over the execution of a Saudi Shia cleric. 

Iranian affairs analyst Seyed Mostafa Khoshcheshm unpacks what led to this breakthrough. 

U.S. regime change in Pakistan continues

 

 

Imran Khan is running at 70-80% in official polls, which is why they have been banned by the puppet regime in Pakistan and why he’s banned from all TV channels.

U.S. using North Korea as pretext to attack China

 North Korea has an estimated military budget of $4 Billion.  That amount is less than that of the NYPD.

 

By K.J. Noh
 
The Japan, ROK, and US military budgets are respectively, 12x, 12x, and 200+x that of North Korea (NK).   

NK does not constitute a military threat.  It is attempting to deter threats the only way it can.  

See here for my detailed article explaining why NK seeks a nuclear deterrent.

Also to be very clear, this escalation in hostilities is only incidental to NK.  NK is a pretext.

This has to do with US plans to roll back and take down China by initiating a multi-front kinetic war in order to maintain US global hegemony in the Pacific and across the Asian continent.  China, the BRICS, the SCO, and BRI-partners are in the process of creating a multi-lateral order that breaks out from the US-led Western Atlantic Rules Based International Order (RBIO).  This signals the decline of western colonial/imperial domination, the end of the 'Washington consensus'/US RBIO, and the recreation of a truly multi-lateral economic and political order (that was previously snuffed out after Bandung through the 'Jakarta method'). US dollar seigniorage and its exorbitant privilege will not be spared if this is successful.  The US will wage war to prevent this pluripolar world from arising and to prevent its extractive, neo-colonial relationship with the rest of the world from being disrupted and its unlimited credit card from being taken away.  

Because of this, the US is escalating to war; and using NK specifically as a pretext to rehearse and escalate war against China.  NK-SK relations were calm when military exercises were suspended.  Now exercises/wargames have been increased 20 fold; non-stop wargames have been taking place over the past 6 months; in reaction, NK has fired some missiles (over 17,000 missiles have been launched & tested by countries other than NK). 

 

During the Korean War (1950-1953) the U.S. forced North Korean and Chinese POW's to build replicas of the Statue of Liberty and St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. U.S. media ran stories and photos of this and proclaimed that the POW's had seen the light and now supported the U.S. war and real 'democracy' for North Korea. 

This coming war is not about Korea per se, but is likely to be dispersed across multiple theaters: the South China Sea, Taiwan island, Korea and across multiple archipelago platforms across the Pacific, especially along the first and second island chains. Japan is key because of its force projection capacity as a remilitarizing power and the bases on Okinawa (Japan has the 5th most powerful military in the world, and will have the 3rd largest military budget soon).  South Korea is key because the ROK army is still under US 'operational control' and will serve as the main military force against China (SK has the largest military manpower in the world -- 3.5 million troops, including reservists; it is the only country of the three to have a meaningful conscription). 

Taiwan is critical for its geostrategic position: the Japanese and the US have historically used Taiwan island as an unsinkable aircraft carrier to launch attacks against China, and it controls the Bashi channel that allows China to move into the blue waters of the pacific for a credible deterrent.  Taiwan island is being prepared as a Kamikaze platform: it is being prepared as a bait; a "suicide" porcupine, a Ukraine 2.0.     

The ruling Democratic People's Party (with close ties to the US and Japan are driving this; the opposition KMT and the vast majority of the people on Taiwan Island are not).  The plan is to keep crossing red-lines and stuffing Taiwan full of weapons and troops until China reacts.  Then, through a 'binding strategy', similar to that used against Russia, the US plans to sanction China and usher its allies into kinetic action.  

Another thing to remember is that Korea-Japan-Taiwan have always been historically-bound triplets: Nothing historic happens in Korea without it affecting Taiwan and vice versa.  A few examples:

1895: China fought a war against Japanese colonial ambitions on the Korean peninsula after a request for help from Korea.  The Japanese won and took Taiwan as war booty.  (This can be seen as the unofficial beginning of the Japanese colonization of Korea; Taiwan and Korea have always been paired colonial beachheads against China)

1950: China was preparing to retake Taiwan island when war broke out on the Korean peninsula, forcing the Chinese to aid NK.  (The Korean war can be considered one prong of a  three-pronged war along Myanmar, Korea, and Taiwan to rollback China.  The war in Myanmar, waged by the KMT lasted until the 1970's).

2023--2025: The US has designs to trigger a war with China over Taiwan Island while simultaneously escalating against NK, a similar dynamic to 1950. 

 

~ K.J. Noh is a scholar and peace activist focused on the geopolitics of the Asian continent. He writes for Counterpunch and Dissident voice, and reports for local and international media.

Latest on AI - very important video

 

 

GNspace4peace

The Global Network's latest educational video. 

This month board member Will Griffin has created one about AI and some of the serious implications involved.

Help us by sharing this video widely as most folks don't know much about AI.

Also considering subscribing to our YouTube channel.

Thanks for watching.

See links to all Global Network social media outlets at https://linktr.ee/space4peace

Bruce

One year mark: My weekly vigil

 

I was on the cold windy street in Brunswick, Maine again today. During the past year, I've gone out to hold a sign saying 'No war with Russia' or the one pictured above about NATO. I've only missed a handful of weeks due to severe weather.

Today I was alone - usually there are 1-2 others who join me at the weekly vigils. During warmer weather we would have 5-6 of us.

Two cars stopped today. The first one rolled down the window and an older man said to me, 'It's the deep state, the neo-cons pushing this war with Russia'. The second car, a younger man, leaned toward me from behind the wheel and said, 'I am whole heartedly with you. No war with Russia'. 

People usually don't stop and roll down their windows to talk. I'll take it as a good sign.

I got one extended middle finger from an older guy driving a luxury car. I chalked him up as likely retired CIA or military. (Camden, Maine on Hwy 1 is a hotbed of retired CIA types.) 

Got a good number of waves and some honks too.

I plan to keep these Thursday peace vigils going as long as necessary.

Coming up on March 18 is the national protest at the White House in Washington. Many national and local groups are endorsing the event. 

Here in Maine on that same day we will do a similar protest on a busy street in Westbrook (next to Portland). 

We will hold our 'No war with Russia' peace vigil on Saturday, March 18 at 1:30 pm in Westbrook. (Intersection of Stroudwater St. & William Clark Dr. (Westbrook Market & Dunkin are there).

 

Co-Sponsors: Maine Natural Guard, PeaceWorks of Greater Brunswick, Maine Green Independent Party, Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, Communist Party of Maine, Party for Socialism & Liberation Maine, Maine Veterans For Peace

Please join us if you can. After the event we will go together to a local Mexican restaurant for a late lunch and discussion.

Bruce 

Free Assange film coming to Maine

 

 

The campaign to free Julian Assange takes on intimate dimensions in this portrait of a father’s fight to save his son. #Ithaka

Filmed over two years across the UK, Europe and the US, this documentary follows 76 year-old retired builder, John Shipton’s tireless campaign to save his son, Julian Assange. 

The world’s most famous political prisoner, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, has become an emblem of an international arm wrestle over freedom of journalism, government corruption and unpunished war crimes.

Now with Julian facing a 175 year sentence if extradited to the US, his family members are confronting the prospect of losing Julian forever to the abyss of the US justice system.

This film will play on March 25 at the Maine Film Center in Waterville, Maine on March 25 at 7:00 pm.

U.S. re-militarizing the Philippines

 

 Click on image for better view

Honolulu Star-Advertiser, Hawaii

 26 Feb 2023 

Washington playing with nuclear fire

 

U.S. has constructed two 'missile defense' bases in Poland and Romania. They can fire MD interceptor missiles (the shield) after a Pentagon 'first-strike attack' or can launch Tomahawk first-strike nuclear capable cruise missiles. A Cuban missile crisis in reverse. (These same launch capabilities are loaded on Navy Aegis destroyers built at Bath Iron Works in Maine.)

 

By Drago Bosnic (Independent geopolitical and military analyst)

SouthFront

Amid incessant NATO aggression and escalation of hostilities within Russia, now also including US-backed Kiev regime terrorists targeting schoolchildren, Moscow has started revamping the doctrinal approach to the use of its strategic arsenal. Rather curiously, the new document, published by the “Military Thought” magazine run by the Russian Ministry of Defense, attracted little attention in Western media. It should be noted that such changes are made only once in several decades or even longer. The strategic posturing of countries, particularly superpowers, is usually “set in stone”, meaning that changes are prompted only by major events of historical proportions.

It was only a week ago that Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Russia is suspending its participation in the New START arms control treaty. Putin cited continuous, blatant US and NATO violations of the agreement as the primary reason for the decision. With the treaty becoming a mere formality, Russia is not bound to honor it anymore, as this would undermine its own strategic security. With that in mind, the Russian Strategic Missile Forces (RVSN) started implementing new ways to deter any possible direct US/NATO attacks on Russia, particularly as the belligerent thalassocracy has repeatedly floated the idea of “decapitation strikes” on Moscow in the last several months.

The authors of the document are Deputy Commander of the RVSN Igor Fazletdinov and retired Colonel Vladimir Lumpov. They argue that the US is on a collision course with Russia, as Washington DC and its vassals are becoming increasingly aggressive due to their political elites’ frustration with the loss of the “sole superpower” status. With America seeing Moscow as the main culprit for this, it plans on defeating Russia in a “single blow”, thus eliminating the main obstacle to total US global dominance. Fazletdinov and Lumpov argue that Washington DC plans to defeat Russia in a “strategic (global) multi-sphere operation”, the primary goal of which will be the elimination of its strategic arsenal.

    “[The US believes] this goal is only achievable in the event of an instantaneous nuclear strike against the RVSN or at least with the deployment of ABM [anti-ballistic missile] systems around Russia. The US plan is to destroy at least 65-70% of Russian strategic nuclear forces as part of its Prompt Global Strike concept, with the rest eliminated by American ABM systems. The US would then launch an all-out nuclear attack on the Russian Federation in order to destroy it,” authors warn, further adding: “We aim to repel a potential [US] nuclear strike, preserve our own nuclear capabilities, suppress the deployed US missile defense systems and cause unacceptable damage in case of [US/NATO] aggression.”

 

 

 

Pentagon 'missile defense' systems - the shield to be used after a U.S. first-strike attack on Russia or China is launched. Washington is encircling Russia and China with these systems. How are those two nations supposed to react to these aggressive US-NATO strategies?

Russia certainly has the capability to almost instantly change its strategic doctrine. Unlike its NATO rivals (including the US itself), Moscow leads the world in several key military technologies, which also include at least a dozen operational hypersonic weapons deployed over the last 5-10 years. And indeed, in early December President Putin stated Russia could adopt a US-style concept of preemptive strikes. The program mentioned by Russian military experts, called PGS (Prompt Global Strike), is a US attempt to develop a capability that enables it to attack enemy strategic targets with precision-guided weapons anywhere in the world within just one hour. Still, the US is yet to deploy a weapon that can achieve that.

On the other hand, with the Mach 12-capable “Kinzhal” air-launched hypersonic missile carried by modified MiG-31K/I interceptors and Tu-22M3 long-range bombers, the Mach 28-capable “Avangard” HGV (hypersonic glide vehicle) deployed on various ICBMs and the Mach 9-capable scramjet-powered “Zircon” hypersonic cruise missile deployed on naval (both submarines and surface ships) and (soon) on land platforms, Russia is the only country on the planet with the capability to immediately implement such a program. And yet, Moscow still refrains from going ahead with such plans, although its justification for this would hold much better than that of the US.

The authors further emphasize “the need to make sure the US was perfectly aware of the impossibility of the complete destruction of our strategic capabilities and the inevitability of a crushing retaliatory nuclear strike”. However, the problem with this is that the establishment in Washington DC has become so detached from reality that they believe the Kiev regime has the capacity to not only “push Russia back from Donbass”, but also “retake Crimea”, despite relevant reports on the Neo-Nazi junta’s staggering losses. It can hardly be expected from them to be aware of Russia’s wholly undeniable capability to obliterate the continental US in minutes.

American policymakers take advice from former high-ranking generals and officers who somehow managed to lose a war against outnumbered and outgunned AK-wielding insurgents in sandals while wasting trillions of dollars and deploying hundreds of thousands of troops during the two decades of continuous NATO aggression in Afghanistan. This is without taking into account the technological disparity which was so overwhelmingly on the side of the aggressors that it can quite literally be measured in centuries rather than decades. Still, delusions and living in parallel reality seem to be a given for the warmongers at the Pentagon.

In addition, considering the fact that Afghanistan became more peaceful and safer after the US and NATO have been soundly defeated and driven out of the country devastated by decades of incessant conflict, this clearly implies that being able to militarily beat the political West is of utmost importance for the safety of any given country. Russia’s new strategic doctrine will certainly ensure this, not just for itself but also for the entire world, as the Eurasian giant will surely remain the only global power with such a capability in the foreseeable future.

Giroux on American fascism

By  Henry Giroux

 "As the United States tips over into the abyss of fascism, state violence must be interrogated within the historical conditions that have both legitimated and normalized it over time. It must be viewed with a long durée of neoliberalism and racist violence that has become normalized in almost every aspect of daily life. The militarization of American society is now readily embraced and revealed in its turn toward a fascist politics. As long as we allow neoliberal capitalism to disconnect the fascist past from the present, the violence will continue as a matter of common sense.

"The histories of repressed others must be made visible, along with the struggles and resistance they have waged against such repression. In this instance, the apocalypse of violence must be addressed not through limited reforms but through a call for eliminating a capitalist society whose history only leads to mass suffering, staggering inequality, endless injustice and fascism itself. Labor historian Michael Yates is right in stating that 'The long rule of capital has created profoundly alienated conditions for nearly all of humanity [and we] cannot afford to settle for incremental changes….The radical upending of the social order is now hard headed realism, the only path forward.' The struggle for revolutionary socialism is no longer a utopian longing. It is an urgent necessity."

~  Henry Giroux is an American-Canadian scholar and cultural critic. One of the founding theorists of critical pedagogy in the United States, he is best known for his pioneering work in public pedagogy, cultural studies, youth studies, higher education, media studies, and critical theory. In 2002 Routledge named Giroux as one of the top fifty educational thinkers of the modern period. 

the Grand exit...

 

 

La grande sortie

The grand exit

is coming,

maybe sooner 

than we think.

 

The Biden 

band of pirates

have used Ukraine

as a $$$ laundering op

from the start.

 

It's worked well 

for many oligarchs.

They don't want 

the gravy train to end.

 

The Russians

fucked it all up.

They are winning.

 

That was not the CIA's

original script,

supplied by screen writers

in Hollywood,

who were instructed

to make the whole thing

entertaining,

with Zelensky getting

the Academy Award....

at least from Sean Penn.

 

US-NATO-Kiev's loss

in Bakhmut,

especially after all 

the 'Ukraine victory' drivel,

is not a 'high mark'

to be presented to the 

warmonger councils meeting in 

Washington,

London, Berlin, Paris and Brussels. 

Wall Street is not happy either.

 

The public is waking up,

they want social spending,

but the Parliament's cupboard is bare....

leaders say they must first 

fight a war against 

the evil Russians,

and Chinese,

and Iranians, 

and Venezuela y Nicaragua,

don't forget Syria, Yemen

and Palestine.

 

African leaders this week,

one after the other,

nearly spit on Macron 

as he limped back home from the 'dark continent'.

He was called out for lies,

publicly and with emotion.

The white boys

are losing control.

 

Russia and China,

have lit a spark

around the Global South,

the sound of it is reverberating

inside the neo-con brains

and they are grabbing 

their crotches and

their big guns.

 

The world freezes,

just for a moment,

and wonders if 

the corporate globalists have plans

to hide their families,

as the nukes ignite,

or do these hard-hearted bastards 

not even care about them?

 

They are blinded

by their love

for the green frog skin.

Their spiritual connection

to Mother Earth

is snapped

like a fallen twig.

 

Will they push the button,

pull the plug?

 

What do we have 

to say about it?

 

Bruce 

Jimmy Dore makes an unexpected appearance

 

 

A good one.....

Gotta have a laugh....

 

 

Estee Palti

Estee writes: I did this skit a while back with my friend Nursemelissa! I left her page down below! Her Nancy Pelosi eyebrows are my favorite 😆 shes a gem ♥️ 

https://www.instagram.com/nursemelissa73official/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y%3D

 ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Estee Palti has become my favorite comedian of late. She does some great stuff. Cracks me up and god knows I need to laugh alot more these sorrowful days.....

Bruce 

PS One more for the road....so to speak

 

US creating tensions with North Korea to pit allies against China

 

 

The greatest threat to peace and stability in northeast Asia is the U.S. Indo-Pacific military encirclement of China.

By Simone Chun
TRUTHOUT

The U.S. military encirclement of China threatens to escalate into an Asia-Pacific war, with the Korean Peninsula at the focal point of this dangerous path. Garrisoned with nearly 30,000 combat-ready U.S. forces manning the astonishing 73 U.S. military bases dotting its tiny landmass, South Korea is the most critical frontline component of U.S. military escalation in northeast Asia.

Three important implications of this grand strategy, which places the Korean Peninsula at the pernicious center of intensified China-U.S. competition, merit attention: (1) the accelerated remilitarization of Japan; (2) the revitalization of extremist hardline North Korea policies in both Washington and Seoul; and (3) the intensification and expansion of belligerent wargames targeted at China and North Korea.

Washington’s anti-China policy, which binds South Korea to the service of U.S. geopolitical strategic interests and keeps it in a subservient client-patron relationship with the U.S., also has the ancillary effect of empowering extremist far right factions in South Korea. These politicians exploit the North Korean threat as justification for domestic repression under South Korea’s National Security Laws — among the most draconian in the world — empowering them to leverage red-baiting and worse against any critics or perceived threats to their grip on power.

Case in point: South Korea’s far right president, Yoon Suk-yeol, who was elected by a razor-thin margin of 0.7 percent barely eight months ago, is already leaving his mark, having established a “republic of prosecution” that pursues the politics of fear and prosecution domestically on the one hand, and subordinates South Korea’s sovereignty to Washington’s interests on the other.

The “most disliked leader in the world” garnered a disapproval rating of 70 percent in a recent Morning Consulting survey, and faces massive and sustained public demand for his immediate resignation. It is noteworthy that in spite of Washington’s stated foreign policy goal of promoting democracy, freedom and human rights, the U.S. remains silent on Yoon’s “atavistic reversion” of vitally democratic South Korea into a newly repressive national security state. According to K.J. Noh, “South Korea’s essential role as the closest and largest military force projection platform against China, its role in a ‘JAKUS’ (Japan-South Korea-U.S. military alliance), its cooperation with NATO, its stated plans to join a Quad-plus, and its assumption of a submissive position toward U.S. decoupling and economic enclosure against China make it far too valuable to criticize or undermine regardless of its excesses.”

First and foremost, in intensifying its offensive against Beijing, Washington has shifted both risk and burden to allies that form its “vanguard against China,” enabling the U.S. to dictate decisions and procure imperial benefits while distributing the costs to vassal states. In order to justify its burgeoning military regional presence and intensified control over South Korea, Japan and Taiwan to bolster its posture against China, the U.S. needs to keep regional tension high. Despite the U.S. position that it is “open to talks” with North Korea, continued sanctions (including those targeting the civilian and medical sector), expansion of the U.S. military presence in the region, intensification of multinational military drills, and continued political rhetoric from Washington ensure that tensions with the north remain elevated. This benefits both Washington and the extremist regime in Seoul, and ensures South Korea’s perpetual relegation to the status of a U.S. neo-colonial state.

Hawkish U.S. policies have consistently failed to garner public support in South Korea. According to a series of polls conducted in 2021, 61 percent of South Koreans support relaxing sanctions against the north and 79 percent support peace with Pyongyang, with an additional 71 percent supporting a formal end-of-war declaration between the two Koreas. These sentiments persist even among Yoon supporters, a majority of whom support an inter-Korean peace treaty, breaking with his rhetoric of a tougher stance toward North Korea. The South Korean Democratic and Progressive Parties, as well as major civil and labor organizations, support military deescalation with the North and maintenance of neutrality in the Washington-Beijing competition. Democratic Party Chairman Lee Jae-myung has repeatedly warned against South Korea becoming a “pawn in the plans of other states,” pledging his party to the principles of independence and sovereignty.

 

A few years from now, after the Biden and Yoon administrations have ended, North Korea will likely not have been denuclearized and South Korea may emerge as the nuclear front line in the U.S. rivalry with China and Russia, setting the stage for the Korean Peninsula to serve as the main battleground in a new Cold War. If Biden has a genuine interest in achieving lasting regional security, he should pursue a broader vision in which nations can coexist. According to the latest poll, a significant majority of Americans support tension-reducing policies with North Korea and China, and 7 in 10 Americans are supportive of a summit between Biden and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Over half of those polled support a full-fledged peace agreement to finally end the 73-year-old Korean War — an unresolved conflict that has left nearly 5 million casualties and forcibly separated 10 million Korean families on either side of the 38th parallel, including more than 100,000 Korean Americans.

Instead of narrowly focusing on the threat of China and exploiting the North Korean threat as a cover for a militaristic and volatile anti-China policy, the Biden administration should recognize that peace in the Korean Peninsula is not only obtainable, but can lay the groundwork for a broader and more stable regional order based on coexistence. 

~ Simone Chun is a researcher and activist focusing on inter-Korean relations and U.S. foreign policy in the Korean Peninsula. She has served as an assistant professor at Suffolk University, a lecturer at Northeast University and an associate in research at Harvard University’s Korea Institute.

German MP: Nordstream was 'massive terrorist attack'

 

Sevim Dagdelen (Left party), member of the German Bundestag, has labeled the sabotage of the #NordStream pipelines a terrorist attack, adding that the German government is obligated to look into the case and find the culprit. 

She believes that both the Nord Stream pipeline blast and the Russia-Ukraine conflict resulted from U.S. hegemony, and the #EU is the biggest victim.

 

 

Despite all the recent humiliation against Germany and reports from credible sources that the US indeed bombed the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines, the German government seems willing to continue maintaining a policy of absolute submission to Washington. In the first week of March, German Prime Minister Olaf Scholz traveled to the US. First, analysts suggested that he was trying to negotiate new economically interesting deals for Berlin. However, conversations with Biden were restricted to the Ukrainian topic, and revealed the submission of the German leader to the American.

Sunday song