Excerpt:
When Martial Law Comes It Will Be Welcomed With Open Arms
In today’s thought for the day, James looks at
a couple of stories that reveal the
truth about the false notion that change
will ever come through the ballot box, and how people can be made to desire their own enslavement.
The idea of a military coup in America has been explored
many times before, like in this article from earlier this year published by
Global Research.
Excerpt:
“The American Military Coup of 2012″: Encroachment upon Basic Freedoms,
Militarized Police State in America
Dunlap cites what he considered a
dangerous precedent, the 1981 Military Cooperation with Civilian Law
Enforcement Agencies Act, an act that sanctioned US military engagement with
law enforcement in domestic “support operations,” including “civil disturbance”
operations. The act codified the lawful status and use of military “assets” in
domestic police work.
Encroachment upon Basic Freedoms
… the American people have been
subject to a series of deeper and deeper encroachments upon our basic freedoms, increasingly extensive deployment of
military operations on the home front, perpetrated by a corporate driven military mission creep that now claims the right and duty to arrest and
detain us on the word of a Pentagon
or White House operative.
President Obama’s signing of the 2012
National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) whose Section 1021 sanctions the military detention of
American citizens without charge, essentially aims to put the last nail in
the coffin of our Constitution, our teetering Republic and our most basic
democratic traditions….
The White House had threatened to
veto an earlier version of the NDAA, but reversed course (of course) shortly before Congress voted on the
final bill, which the President signed on the 31st of December 2011, a day that
will go down in infamy.
“President Obama’s action today is a blight on his legacy because he
will forever be known as the president who signed indefinite detention without charge
or trial into law,” said Anthony D. Romero, ACLU executive director. “The
statute is particularly dangerous
because it has no temporal or geographic limitations, and can be used by
this and future presidents to militarily detain people captured far from any
battlefield.”
According to Senator Dianne Feinstein. “Congress is essentially authorizing the
indefinite imprisonment of American citizens, without charge,” she said.
“We are not a nation that locks up its citizens without charge.” Think again. (Guardian,
12/14/11)
Under the legislation, suspects can be held without trial “until
the end of hostilities.” They will have the right to appear once a year before a committee that will decide
if the detention will continue…. It breaks with over 200 years of tradition in America against using the
military in domestic affairs.”
In America the United States Senate has seized an
unparalleled amount of power and that power has been concentrated in the hands
of a small majority of the 100 Senators who share an ideology of American
Exceptionalism and the right to use military force anywhere they desire, absent
any checks and balances.
A mechanism created by the Senate during the Bush
Administration allows billions of unaccounted for dollars to flow to funding
such missions as the training of “moderate” rebels in Syria. From Salon:
Excerpt:
“Crack cocaine for the Pentagon”: Meet the secret slush fund that’s
getting hawks high
While the right cuts tons of basic
services, here's the secret slush fund the military doesn't want you to
discover.
As budget votes get going this
week, keep an eye on the three most magical letters in Washington: OCO…. –
which stands for Overseas Contingency Operations – represents an escape hatch.
Put money into OCO and it doesn’t count as spent, at least not
against the constraints Congress has shackled itself with for four years. It’s a great deal – as long as you’re part
of the military.
“It’s basically crack cocaine for the Pentagon,” said Gordon Adams,
a professor at American University who worked on defense budgets at the Office
of Management and Budget during the Clinton administration. “It gives you a
flexibility that most domestic discretionary agencies would kill for.”
As OCO became more of what Gordon
Adams calls “magic money,” the White House
got in on the act. They created a $5 billion counterterrorism account and stuck
it in OCO, keeping the fund alive even after Iraq and Afghanistan end. The $1 billion “European Reassurance” fund
to support Ukraine came out of OCO.
Three thousand troops to West
Africa to handle Ebola? OCO. $500
million to train the Syrian opposition? OCO. Even State Department funding
has gone in OCO, as much as $7 billion, over 15 percent of their total
expenditures.
The GOP’s budget resolution for fiscal year 2016, due for votes this
week, takes the OCO ploy to the extreme. The House designated $96 billion to OCO, $38 billion above the
White House’s request, keeping the base budget capped, while flying past it
with “emergency” spending….
Remember that the same lawmakers who voted for that believe we can’t afford to feed hungry
people in America.
Yes, it’s the slush fund that provided military training for
Syrian “rebels” to overthrow the government in Syria, it’s the slush fund that
provided for a CIA coup to remove the elected President in Ukraine and much,
much more. The author of that article, David Dayen is
right the money is like crack cocaine for the Pentagon.
And when a crack addict’s supply is threatened, that crack
addict becomes very dangerous. The
lengths that the crack addict will go to in order to ensure a steady supply of
the drug are now on display in Britain.
The new Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn is threating to cut off the crack
supply to the British military. From
Independent.
Excerpt:
British Army 'could stage mutiny under
Corbyn', says senior serving general
Generals would
not 'allow a prime minister to jeopardise the security of the UK'
A senior serving general has reportedly warned that a Jeremy Corbyn
government could face "a mutiny" from the Army if it tried to
downgrade them.
The unnamed general said members of
the armed forces would begin directly and publicly challenging the labour leader if he tried to scrap Trident, pull out of Nato or announce “any plans to emasculate and shrink the
size of the armed forces.”
He told the Sunday Times: “The Army just wouldn’t stand for it.
The general staff would not allow a prime minister to jeopardise the security
of this country and I think people would
use whatever means possible, fair or foul
to prevent that. You can’t put a maverick in charge of a country’s
security…
Labour's Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn on scrapping Trident and leaving Nato: 'I don't think that is going to
happen…'
The Sunday Times reported that half of Mr Corbyn’s Cabinet have
approached David Cameron to say they are
prepared to defy the whip and vote with the government so long as Mr
Cameron comes up with a coherent plan.
The Army is ready to “use any means possible,
fair or foul” to keep the crack coming, I bet the means they use will be more
foul than fair. That half of Corbyn’s
cabinet are the Tony Blair, Gordon Brown wing that took Britain and America to
war in Iraq with their “sexed up” evidence against Saddam Hussein.
And when Kevin Chambers at Wordpress says it is a “false
notion that change will ever come through the ballot box” he’s right. After all the people in Britain voted Corbyninto office to stop the austerity Cameron has exacted on the people to pay for
the crack cocaine for the military.
The people in Scotland and the UK want the Trident nuclear weapon
program stopped, but the military is threatening to overthrow the government
officials to stop the people’s will.
On October 1, 2015 Mint Press reported that the Canadian and
American military brass have explored combining their militaries.
Excerpt:
Canadian Military Explored Plan To Fully Integrate Forces With U.S.
CBC News has learned that a
Canadian military effort to formally
create integrated forces with the United States for expeditionary operations
included an even more ambitious option — a plan to fully integrate military
forces, explored during a meeting with the top generals from the two countries….
Information provided by the
Department of National Defence shows the
Canada-U.S. Integrated Forces program was led at the highest levels, with then Chief of the Defence Staff Gen.
Tom Lawson and the chairman of the
U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey (now retired), meeting on “several occasions” to hash out
a plan that included an option for “fully integrated forces…”
On Monday, CBC News reported that
the Canadian military had
been working on a plan to create a binational
integrated military force with the U.S., under which air, sea, land and
special operations forces would be jointly deployed under unified command
outside Canada….
Discussion of the plans for an
integrated unit was contained in an October 2013 briefing note prepared by the
military’s Strategic Joint Staff and obtained through access to information.
Government not part of discussions
A Conservative spokesman also said the party had no desire to
establish a “standing integrated force.”
But the new information from the Defence Department shows the planning was
deliberate and sustained, and it happened at the highest levels of both
forces.
Those two comments raise the
possibility the plan was being pursued without
the specific direction or approval of the Conservative government….
There would also be deep concerns about maintaining
national control over the Canadian Forces, particularly as it relates to
questions about the use of force and
varying interpretations of international law.
In the end, the Defence Department says, “Gen. Lawson indicated that Canada was not prepared to field fully
integrated land forces at this time.”
“The two armies do not intend to field formally integrated forces
at this time,” wrote DND spokesman Dominique Tessier in an email….
Norad has also assumed increasing
responsibility to provide warning and target information for naval forces that
protect the maritime approaches to North America.
But those efforts are focused on
defence; the integrated forces planning
was for expeditionary forces to be deployed on operations overseas.
What is even more chilling is the absence of a fourth
estate. The amount of control over the
media in America, Britain and Canada by Rupert Murdoch is a threat to the
security, safety and constitutionally provided freedom of the people of these
nations.
In America, we have Freedom of the Press guaranteed in our
Constitution. This is so the Press can
function as a watchdog for the people, protecting them from the excesses and
abuses of a corrupt government. Seymour
Hersh is one such journalist that has tirelessly reported on government abuse. From Journal NEO:
Excerpt:
Seymour Hersh has risked much over
his decades of journalism. He is a true journalist who has been attacked,
slandered, and shunned by all sides simply because he seems to resist taking
any side.
When he reported on US atrocities
in Vietnam, he was first attacked and denounced as a traitor or worse. In time,
both the truth and Hersh were vindicated and the importance of what he did as a
journalist to both inform the public and serve as a check and balance against
the special interests of ruling power were recognized with a Pultizer Prize.
In 2007, when he exposed the then Bush-administration’s plans to use the Muslim Brotherhood and militant
groups linked to Al Qaeda to overthrow the government of Syria – the result
of which is unfolding today – the New Yorker gladly welcomed his work as a
message they perceived would resonate well with liberal audiences.
But then in 2013, when Hersh brought forward information contradicting the West’s official narrative
regarding a chemical attack on the outskirts of Damascus, the New Yorker
decided not to publish it. His report, “Whose Sarin?” instead found itself
published in the London Review of Books…
Hersh’s report went on in detail
covering the manner in which Western
leaders intentionally manipulated or even outright fabricated intelligence to
justify military intervention in Syria – eerily similar to the lies told to justify the invasion and occupation
of Iraq, and the escalation of the war in Vietnam after the Gulf of Tonkin
incident.
And not only did the report punch
holes through the official narrative, it helped hobble what little momentum was
left for Western military aggression
against Syria based on the lies told by the US and its allies regarding the
chemical attack.
In Hersh’s follow up report, “The
Red Line and the Rat Line,” also published by the London Review of Books, he
revealed information not only further exposing the lies told by the US and its
allies, but suggested NATO member Turkey
and close US-ally Saudi Arabia may have played a role in supplying those
responsible for the attack with the chemical weapons….
Using what they collectively called
“open source intelligence” – watching YouTube videos and looking at Google
Earth – they claimed the type of rocket
and nerve agent used could only have been deployed by the Syrian government.
Recently it was
reported in alternative media sources that the Pentagon has legalized the killing
of journalists. From Counter CurrentNews:
Excerpt:
Pentagon Just Legalized Killing ‘Belligerent’ Journalists As Part of
‘Law of War’
The Pentagon just changed the rules of war to include legitimizing the
killing of any journalists they deem “belligerent.”
The new “laws of war” were released
as part of a book of instructions on legitimate warfare practices approved by the United States military.
This “rule book” of sorts details what the US government deems the acceptable ways of killing those they
claim are the “enemy”… including journalists
whose reporting they do not approve.
The manual explains that the Pentagon considers such journalists
“unprivileged belligerents,” even though they are not “enemy combatants.”
Now, the American 1,176-page “Department of Defense Law of War
Manual” says that it is perfectly legitimate
to shoot, explode, bomb, stab, or cut journalists they deem “belligerent.”
After four years of war in Syria, the world is finally
saying enough is enough. President
Bashar Assad has requested Russian and Iranian military assistance to join his
Syrian forces to fight against the terrorists and rebels that seek to overthrow
the elected government of Assad.
Russia, in compliance with international law, has launched a
bombing campaign to drive back the enemies of the Syrian people. Simultaneously, Iran has ground troops
pushing into Syria to drive out the terrorists and rebels that the U.S. and its
allies have trained and supported. From TheAustralian:
Excerpt:
Vladimir Putin’s muscular play breaks Syria open
This week Vladimir Putin comprehensively
humiliated Barack Obama at the UN.
The contrast could not be starker.
The US President spoke overtime, for more than 45 minutes, but did nothing. The
Russian President spoke for 20 minutes
and transformed the strategic environment in the Middle East.
Obama lectured Putin in public and in private, telling him not to
intervene militarily in Syria.
Putin listened politely enough,
then speedily launched bombing raids in Syria.
Putin said any Russian intervention
in Syria would be directed against Islamic State forces. In fact, although
Australian intelligence does not yet have this fully confirmed, it seems the
strikes were mostly in locations where Islamic State is not a significant
presence. They allegedly hit some rebel
forces trained and approved by the Americans.
Putin’s military move was
accompanied by diplomatic gains. Russia,
Iran, the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad and the government of Iraq,
notionally allied to the US, have joined
in an intelligence-sharing arrangement against Islamic State. The Baghdad government approved the use of
Iraqi airspace by Russian planes and Russian personnel will be stationed at an
intelligence facility in Baghdad.
The Russian moves transform
strategic calculations in Syria and have left Washington completely flat-footed
and almost irrelevant….
All this week at the UN,
Australia’s Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has argued it is essential to seek a
political solution in Syria, that no option should be ruled out — meaning that Assad be allowed to stay in
power — and that negotiating any
solution must involve dialogue with Russia and, more important, with Iran.
For this she has been criticised by some US and Australian
commentators, who believe she may be too accommodating to Iran or that Assad’s bloody record in the
Syrian civil war means he must be
deposed. In fact, Bishop has been
absolutely right. She has been ahead
of the curve and has helped create some extra diplomatic space for the Americans to go where they
now need to go….
The problem is that most of the
Sunni Arab nations such as Saudi Arabia
and the other Gulf states, as well as Sunni Turkey, several European
nations and the US itself, had insisted
that Assad leave office as a precondition for such talks….
Given the degree of international support for Assad, his regime is no
longer likely to collapse. Therefore Bishop’s position is the height of
realism at its most noble — the West must negotiate with the forces on the
ground.
So it looks like the Pentagon’s crack cocaine supply is
going to be cut off and that puts the people of America, Britain and Canada in
a dangerous situation. If the Syrian war
ends and ISIS is eradicated it will be hard to convince the people that they
need to give up the health, wealth and welfare for freedom. In the
words of the song Bobby McGee “freedom is just another word for nothing left to
lose.”
By Patricia Baeten
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