08 Wild Cards – Page 124 – Public Intelligence Blog

2011/11/01

DefDog: Afghan Surge Flops, Viet-Nam Deja Vu

08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Officers Call

More evidence, as if we needed it, of the lack of integrity of this administration…..

New Afghan War Plan Concedes the Surge Fell Short

Spencer Ackerman

WIRED, 1 November 2011

As the Obama administration winds down its troop surge in Afghanistan, it’s adopted a new political strategy for ending the war. And that new strategy represents a tacit concession that the best the surge could accomplish was rescuing Afghanistan from from the brink of total failure.

What was the surge for, anyway? In one sense, as explained by President Obama, it was merely designed to stop the Afghanistan war from deteriorating. But Obama’s generals promised that it would do more — that it would whup the Taliban into suing for peace. And in the broadest sense of all, it would contribute to the Obama team’s ultimate objective for the region: to “disrupt, dismantle and defeat” al-Qaida.

Judged in the narrowest sense, then, the surge worked. Afghanistan is no longer spiraling into greater violence. But it’s failed to accomplish anything beyond that.

Read longer than usual, very pointed analysis of lies, delusions, and failure.

Phi Beta Iota: We've learned to expect a complete lack of integrity in our political, operational, and intelligence leaders. This is so “deja vu” of Viet-Nam. There is no accountability for failure in the US Government.

See Also:

Chuck Spinney: Time Favors the Taliban

Afghanistan Ground Truth: Deja Vu & Nested RECAP

Bob Gates: Flat Out Liar or Just Feeble? + RECAP

US Intelligence Lies to “Defer” to General Petraeus

Journal: Taliban Ramps Up North, Holds South + RECAP

Journal: Putin to Obama–Stay in Afghanistan + RECAP

Journal: William Polk on Afghanistan Non-Strategy Plus Consolidated Journal, Review, and Reference Links for Afghanistan

Chuck Spinney: Bin Laden, Perpetual War, Total Cost + Perpetual War RECAP

Marcus Aurelius: US at Permanent “War” + War RECAP

1961-2011: 50 Years of The Military-Industrial Complex

David Isenberg: Jim Clapper Claims Transformation — Robert Steele Comments on Each Misrepresentation

Worth a Look: Book Reviews on Intelligence (Most)

2011/11/01

Mini-Me: From Arab Spring to Death of the US Empire

02 China, 02 Diplomacy, 03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 06 Russia, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Analysis, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Movies, Policy, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy

‘Arab Spring is about controlling Eurasia'

Includes Video (12:04)

The ultimate goal of the US is to take the resources of Africa and Middle East under military control to block economic growth in China and Russia, thus taking the whole of Eurasia under control, author and historian William F. Engdahl reveals.

The crisis with the US economy and the dollar system, the conduct of the US foreign policy is all a part of breakdown of the entire superpower structure that was built up after the end of WWII, claims Engdahl.

“Nobody in Washington wants to admit, just as nobody in Britain a hundred years ago wanted to admit that the British Empire was in terminal decline,” claims the author, noting that “All of this is related to the attempt to keep this sole superpower not only intact, but to spread its influence over the rest of the planet.”

William F. Engdahl believes the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa is a plan first announced by George W. Bush at a G8 meeting in 2003 and it was called “The Greater Middle East Project”.

Continue reading “Mini-Me: From Arab Spring to Death of the US Empire”

2011/10/25

John Steiner: 10 Years Late, NYT “Sees” Democracy Now!

07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Government, IO Impotency, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth

A Grass-Roots Newscast Gives a Voice to Struggles

Brian Stelter

New York Times, 23 October 2011

EXTRACT

Some fans as well as critics describe “Democracy Now!” as progressive, but Ms. Goodman rejects that label and prefers to call it a global newscast that has “people speaking for themselves.” She criticized networks in the United States that have brought on professional pundits, rather than actual protesters, to discuss the Occupy protests.

Last week, no United States television network covered the filing of a lawsuit in Canada by four men who said they had been tortured during the Bush administration and who are seeking Mr. Bush’s arrest and prosecution. But one of the men, Murat Kurnaz, a former prisoner at Guantánamo Bay, was interviewed at length by Ms. Goodman and her co-host, Juan Gonzalez.

Read full story.

Phi Beta Iota: Now that the rest of the world has seen that the US Courts are generally corrupt and will not entertain law suits against those that led the US to an elective war costing trillions and including crimes against humanity at multiple levels, we anticipate a flood of law suits against George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz, among others. As committed as we are to Truth & Reconciliation (with presidential pardons when full truth has been offered to the public by the individual concerned) we fear that absent a restoration of integrity to the electoral process and to the US Government in the 2012 elections, we are in for a decade of revenge against specific individuals and specific banks now known to have betrayed the public trust.

2011/10/25

Chuck Spinney: Screwing the Greeks – Deeply

03 Economy, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Transnational Crime, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corporations, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Government, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests

Below are two eye opening reports/analyses by two of the best counterpunchers in Alexander Cockburn's and Jeffrey St Clair's stable of bomb throwers. The subject is Greece: its political/economic crisis and the myths surrounding average Greeks being the cause of its crisis.

In the first, Destroying the Livelihoods of Thirteen Million People: The Myth of Greek Profligacy, my friend Marshall Auerback, argues that the masses of the Greek people (the bottom 80% of a highly unequal income distribution) are being set up as scapegoats to pay for a neo-liberal austerity plan that aimed producing income deflation (instead of a currency devaluation) to improve export competitiveness. Auerback explains why this is really a plan of collective punishment that is guaranteed to fail while shredding what is left of Greece's social contract.

In the second, Naxos Hangs On By Its Fingernails: How Greeks Were Driven Back to the Land, Patrick Cockburn presents the reader with a micro-case study of what is happening to average Greeks (i.e. part of the lower 80%) on the island of Naxos, the largest and my favorite island in the windy Cyclades.

Chuck Spinney
Barcelona

Destroying the Livelihoods of Thirteen Million People
The Myth of Greek Profligacy
by MARSHALL AUERBACK,
Counterpunch, OCTOBER 24, 2011

Naxos Hangs On By Its Fingernails
How Greeks Were Driven Back to the Land
by PATRICK COCKBURN
Counterpunch, OCTOBER 18, 2011

Phi Beta Iota: One reason why the Electoral Reform and BigBatUSA endeavors are so important NOW, is because if they succeed in the USA, where Internet connectivity, cognitive surplus, and Occupy awaking have converged, the model can be scaled globally very quickly. At root this is about secular corruption. Pope Benedict XVI had a chance to use Assisi creatively but chose the low road.

2011/10/15

Chuck Spinney: Iranian Plot a Sting, False Flag, or Both?

02 Diplomacy, 05 Iran, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, DHS, Director of National Intelligence et al (IC), DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War

US Attorney General Eric Holder held a press conference on 11 Oct where he claimed Federal authorities had foiled a plot by men linked to the Iranian government to kill the Saudi ambassador to the United States and to bomb the embassies of Saudi Arabia and Israel in Washington (NYT).

The vagueness and innuendo in the language of the complaint filed with the federal court reek of a half-baked sting operation.

For example, attacking the embassy of Saudi Arabia is mentioned as merely a “possibility” of bombing foreign government facilities of Saudi Arabia and “another country” located “within and outside of the United States.”

Phi Beta Iota: Brother Chuck's entire commentary and all three attachments are fully repeated in this post (below the line). The Iranian “plot” is significant because it could serve as a precipitant of revolution in the USA. Combined with OWS and a soccer mom torching herself on the front steps of Capitol Hill, the USA is close to “the perfect storm.”

Below the line full comment by Chuck Spinney and all three attachments in full text online.

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: Iranian Plot a Sting, False Flag, or Both?”

2011/10/14

Dolphin: Documentary to Show Evidence of Alien Contact in Mexico and Guatemala

02 Diplomacy, 08 Wild Cards, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Earth Intelligence, Government

Missed this when it first came out. Multiple countries appear to be declassifying modern extraterrestrial contact information, should be interesting. Note the non-apocalyptic view of 12 December 2012.

Mayan documentary to show ‘evidence' of alien contact in ancient Mexico

Guatemala and Mexico release secret documents and artefacts for forthcoming film Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond

Ben Child

Guardian, 29 September 2011

The ancient Mayans had contact with alien visitors who left behind evidence of their existence, according to a new Mexican documentary.

Sundance winner Juan Carlos Rulfo's Revelations of the Mayans 2012 and Beyond is currently in production for release next year to coincide with the end of the Mayan calendar, reports the Wrap.

Producer Raul Julia-Levy said the documentary-makers were working in cooperation with the Mexican government for what he said was “the good of mankind”. He said the order to collaborate had come directly from the country's president, Álvaro Colom Caballeros.

“Mexico will release codices, artefacts and significant documents with evidence of Mayan and extraterrestrial contact, and all of their information will be corroborated by archaeologists,” he said. “The Mexican government is not making this statement on their own – everything we say, we're going to back it up.”

Read full story.

2011/10/142011/10/14

Penguin: Israel’s Covert Operations Inside the USA

05 Iran, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Government, InfoOps (IO), Intelligence (government), IO Deeds of War, Law Enforcement, Military, Officers Call, Peace Intelligence

Hmmmmm. Does this connect Israel's larger covert operations inside the USA to the specific Iran plot as a possible Israeli covert operation to influence US public and US Congress?

Why I Published US Intelligence Secrets About Israel's Anti-Iran Campaign

Richard Silverstein

Truthout, 14 October 2011

In 2009, Shamai Leibowitz was working secretly for the FBI, translating wiretapped conversations among Israeli diplomats in this country. He passed some transcripts of these conversations to me, which described an Israeli diplomatic campaign in this country to create a hostile environment for relations with Iran. I published excerpts from them in my blog, Tikun Olam.

. . . . . .

The true story was why and how Israeli diplomats were intervening so obtrusively in US political life.

Read full story with many specifics on Israeli lobbying, monitoring, and direct influence (tantamount to threats) against members of the Senate and House of Representatives.

Phi Beta Iota: We do not think the Israeli's are behind the Iranian plot. It may even be that the Iranian liberation nut-jobs are not behind it either, and this is strictly a standard FBI over-reach with a sting that netted a used car salesman. What we do know is that both Congress and the White House have been very irresponsible in their confrontational statements toward Iran, and very irresponsible in failing to challenge the authenticity of this plot in detail.