Antiwar

Even by Washington standards, the Biden Administration’s recent request for $33 billion for military aid to Ukraine was shocking. Surely a coalition of antiwar progressives and budget-hawk Republicans would oppose the dangerous and expensive involvement of the US in the Russia/Ukraine conflict? No! Not only did Congress not object: they added nearly seven billion MORE dollars to the package! In the end, not a single House Democrat voted against further US involvement in the war, and just 57 Republicans said “no” to funding yet another undeclared war. On the Senate side, Majority Leader Chuck […]

The U.S. news media’s treatment of the Ukraine issue has long been characterized by flagrant favoritism. Reports from organizations such as Human Rights Watch, Transparency International, and Freedom House showing that Ukraine’s actual conduct differed markedly from its carefully crafted image as a dedicated young democracy received little coverage in the mainstream press. That willingness to conceal Ukraine’s corruption and authoritarianism has grown even worse since the outbreak of war with Russia. Media coverage moved quickly from ignoring or minimizing inconvenient information about Kyiv’s political and economic system to channeling outright Ukrainian propaganda. For example, multiple unfiltered stories from Ukrayinska Pravda […]

Seeing Russia invade Ukraine, historically neutral Finland has undergone a late conversion and decided to join NATO immediately. Why? Because NATO membership means the world’s strongest power, the United States, under Article 5 of NATO, would go to war against Russia, should it cross Finland’s border. Nervous about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions, Finland wants America legally and morally bound to fight Russia on its behalf, should Putin invade Finland as he invaded Ukraine. From the Finnish point of view, this is perfectly understandable. But why would the United States consent to go to war with […]

At least 32 people were killed, and 12 more were wounded in the latest violence, while 15 bodies were recovered from an old mass grave: Turkish operations against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) left 10 guerrillas dead in northern Iraq. Three more were killed late last week. A bomb killed a Turkish soldier and wounded three more. A security member was killed, along with two militants in Kirkuk province. An operation in Qara Qosh left one Kurdish fighter with injuries. Two militants were killed. One soldier was killed and six more were wounded in Imam Weis. In Baghdad, gunmen wounded two […]

The US House of Representatives just approved another massive military “aid” package for the Ukraine War. The Biden administration had initially requested $33 billion in new money for the war, but leaders of both parties in Congress, eager to support the war, quickly said this was not enough, and raised the total for this package to $40 billion, a truly staggering total. The administration had already spent $14 billion before this latest weapons package. The latest spending spree (at a time when many Americans are struggling with crushing debt loads, lack of baby formula […]

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has been yet another polarizing event in the news cycle. It seems like other topics being covered by the mainstream media that if you do not have the correct opinion then you are some sort of villain, in this case you are a pro-Russian propagandist. So, what is the establishment narrative? Well, it’s simple, the Russian invasion of Ukraine is a threat to western democracy and America should be involved, doesn’t that sound familiar? Establishment Neo-Conservatives and Noe-Liberals started ringing the war bells before it was clear that Russia […]

At least seven people were killed in the latest violence: Near Mosul, five militants were killed in a clash with security forces. Security forces killed a senior ISIS leader in Daquq. A militant was killed in Baiji. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and has been covering Iraqi casualties for Antiwar.com since 2006. View all posts by Margaret Griffis Source link

Thirty years ago, I co-taught a course on the making and use of the atomic bomb at the U.S. Air Force Academy. We took cadets to Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, where the first nuclear weapons were designed and built during World War II, and we also visited the Trinity test site, where the first atomic device exploded in a test conducted in July of 1945. It was after that first test when J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, mused that he had become death, the destroyer of worlds. And […]

Originally appeared at the American Institute for Economic Research. Perhaps the most persistent foreign policy mantra in Washington, voiced by Republicans and Democrats alike, is the importance of American “leadership.” Without US “leadership” the rest of the world is lost. But with Washington’s taking the lead, the rest of the world, friends and foes alike, will follow, doing whatever Americans demand. Thus, if bad things occur, US policymakers assume the problem is lack of “leadership.” After Donald Trump was elected Republicans blamed everything on Barack Obama’s failure to lead. President Joe Biden and fellow […]

The New York Times has a job to do – and it has done that job spectacularly well over the past few months. The Times is a leader, in the opinion of this writer, the leader in spelling out the US narrative on the war in Ukraine, a tale designed to keep up morale, give the war a high moral purpose and justify the untold billions pouring from the taxpayers’ pockets into Joe Biden’s proxy war on Russia. Day in and day out in page after page of word and picture it has been instructing […]

Your friend is taking a taxi to a job. It’s too big a job for him, so you offer to go along to help. You pay the fare and bring along the right tools for him to use. Just after you set out, though, you order the taxi driver to stop and redirect him from your friend’s job site to a destination of your own. Whose ride is it now? Whose job is it now? You are paying the fare, supplying the tools, stopping him from doing his job and pursuing a job of your own. […]

Hats off to Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines for her Senate May 10 testimony on the likelihood of nuclear war with Russia, even though parts of it were surreal, as we discuss below. From an intelligence perspective, she told it like it is. Not only that; she took the quintessential nuclear-use question a step beyond what CIA Director William Burns had told the Financial Times on May 7. Burns pointed out that Russian President Vladimir Putin “doesn’t believe he can afford to lose” in Ukraine. Burns added: “I don’t think this means Putin is […]

At least 11 people were killed, and one was wounded in the latest violence: Nine militants were killed during an operation near Kirkuk at Kraw Mountain. In Sinjar, the body of an Iraqi soldier was discovered. He had been shot in the chest. The body of a young man, who was beheaded, was discovered in Bashiqa. A bomb wounded an elderly man in Sinune. Also, Iran attacked “terrorist bases” in Erbil. Iraq’s foreign ministry condemned the shelling, which occurred in the Sidikan area. No casualties were reported. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and […]

Even New York Times columnist Tom Friedman is getting worried about America sliding into war with Russia. The problem is not the ends, which he shares with the Biden administration. Rather, it is the means. Despite President Biden’s assurance that Washington would not send troops to Ukraine, US involvement in the Russo-Ukrainian war has steadily expanded. Officials from the president on down have been telling the world and, more importantly, Moscow that America is essentially using Ukraine as a weapon to fight the Russian Federation. Observed an obviously disturbed Friedman: “Loose lips sink ships – and they also lay the groundwork […]

Joe Biden promised the world that he was “opening a new era of relentless diplomacy.” Either those were just words or Biden has lost control of his foreign policy. Rather than the birth of diplomacy, the first sixteen months of Biden’s term in office have seen a dearth of diplomacy. On all the major issues, there has been none, and often worse than none. Russia The US has been a non-participant in any of the talks on the war in Ukraine. Antony Blinken, the US chief diplomat, has not spoken to his Russian counterpart […]

Last week, sources leaked to The New York Times that, in Ukraine’s targeting and killing of Russian generals and the sinking of Russia’s Black Sea flagship, the Moskva, U.S. intelligence played an indispensable role. Apparently, our intel people identified and located for the Ukrainian forces what became the targets of their deadly attacks. Why US … Continue reading “Is Ukraine’s War Now America’s War?” The post Is Ukraine’s War Now America’s War? appeared first on Antiwar.com Original. Source link

One supposedly crucial and unfortunate feature separating Ukraine from formal members of NATO is that Kyiv does not have a security guarantee under Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. That provision proclaims that an attack on any NATO member will be considered an attack on all. Some critics of NATO’s unwillingness to respond favorably to President George W. Bush’s 2008 lobbying campaign for Kyiv’s membership insist that the decision emboldened Russia and subsequently led to the February 2022 invasion. If Ukraine had enjoyed an Article 5 guarantee, and especially a U.S. troop […]

Two years ago last Saturday (May 7, 2020) Adam Schiff (D, California), Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, was forced to perform what Nixon co-conspirator John Ehrlichman famously called a “modified limited hangout.” On that day, Schiff released sworn testimony that there was zero technical evidence that Russia – or anyone else – hacked those DNC emails so prejudicial to Hillary Clinton (later published by WikiLeaks). Now, please, before you put me in Putin’s or Trump’s pocket, read on: The testifier was Shawn Henry, the head of the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. For reasons former FBI […]

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss seems intent on promoting grand designs beyond her nation’s abilities. Last month she proclaimed the need for “a global NATO.” She dismissed what she decried as “the false choice between Euro-Atlantic security and Indo-Pacific security. In the modern world we need both.” The transatlantic alliance “must have a global outlook, ready to tackle global threats.” Yet until now, at least, NATO really meant North America and the Others, and North America really meant the US. Alas, Washington already has a major security role in the Pacific and is a potential guardian of Taiwan. Most US policymakers […]

At least 11 people were killed, and 11 more were wounded in the latest violence: Two camel herders were killed by friendly fire in Hadar. The government is investigating why the attack occurred. During an arrest in Shatra, a militant blew himself up and wounded four security personnel. A militia commander was shot dead in Amara. A female body was found in Mosul. She was shot in the head. A bomb in Qayara wounded three people. Gunmen wounded two people in Abu Saida. In Baghdad, gunmen wounded a security officer. A landmine explosion severely injured a farmer in Duhok. Residents believe […]

Volodymyr Zelensky, the embattled President of Ukraine has taken the world by storm. It seems everyone on Earth is singing his praises. It can be easy to feel that he deserves his legendary status. It is almost impossible to imagine him as anything less than a superhero pushing back against tyranny and saving the world. Is this a realistic characterization that anyone can live up to? The war in Ukraine is a devastating and painful mess of towering misfortunes. In making sense of this disaster, it is very difficult to separate ourselves from the finality of what […]

One of the psychologists paid tens of millions of dollars by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency to oversee the interrogation of prisoners in the so-called War on Terror provided new details on Monday about the torture of a Guantánamo Bay detainee at CIA “black site” in Thailand. The New York Times reports James E. Mitchell told a military judge during a pretrial hearing at Guantánamo that Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri – a Saudi national facing possible execution for allegedly masterminding the deadly 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen – broke quickly under […]

At least nine people were killed, and two more were wounded in the latest violence: Turkish strikes on Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) targets in the Qandil Mountains killed five guerrillas. Three civilians were shot to death in Abu Saida. A roadside bomb in Duhok province killed a cyclist from Denmark. In Jalawla, an attack left an Iraqi soldier with injuries. An Iraqi soldier was wounded during an ambush in Tarmiya. No casualties were reported after a rocket attack on the Baghdad home of an intelligence officer with the Ministry of Interior. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from […]

The New York Times reported on May 1 that “the Biden administration” – the same one that ignored Putin’s warnings about Russia’s red line regarding NATO expansion to Ukraine – “increasingly casts aside fears expressed by some early in the war that too much American assistance to Ukraine risked a direct conflict with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.” As direct assistance to Ukraine by the US, UK and its other allies intensifies dramatically, there are several reasons to be increasingly concerned. The Long War The US signaled early that this war was not to […]

I remember when I visited Crimea in 2015, I spoke to a retired Russian naval officer who was a longtime resident of the peninsula. He admitted that Russia had always viewed Ukraine as the little brother in the relationship and that perhaps Russians had underestimated how much some Ukrainians had resented that. I thought about this when I read the following excerpt of a Twitter thread by Alexander Gabuev in mid-March: “The Russian Empire has never perceived Ukraine as a ‘colony’ and thus has never developed a discipline to study Ukraine as “the Other.” When […]

At least 14 people were killed, and three more were wounded in the latest violence: The Iraqi Army announced it has secured the Sinjar (Shingal) area after two days of heavy fighting. On April 18, an Iraqi military convoy ignored a checkpoint run by the PKK-affiliated Shingal Resistance Units (YBS). The militia group is made-up of Yazidi personnel from Sinjar. Tensions built up until two days ago when heaving fighting broke out. At least one Iraqi soldier was killed, and two more were wounded. A dozen of the guerrillas were reported killed as well, and over 200 more surrendered. Over 4,000 […]

The US has no business joining the war in Ukraine, and Congress should refuse to approve any measure that endorses direct intervention in the conflict. Rep. Adam Kinzinger is sponsoring a new resolution authorizing the use of American military force in the war, and it is vital that Congress rejects it. Kinzinger has been one of the loudest agitators for military action in Ukraine, and he wants this authorization in order to give the president a free hand to take the US into a potentially catastrophic war. Kinzinger’s resolution would give the president authorization to […]

Donald Trump has been well relegated to the sidelines of America’s political debate, but the TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) lives on, more virulent than ever. The latter is what’s behind Washington’s descent into the current mindless Ukraine war fever – an outbreak of irrationality that makes even the post-9/11 hysteria seem like an orderly discourse. At the center of this madness, of course, is Vladimir Putin, the Devil Incarnate. Prior to February 24th he had attained that designation in Imperial Washington not because of his rough methods of governance in Russia or small time military […]

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s brutal war on Ukraine, along with his implied threats of nuclear weapons use against any who would interfere, has raised the specter of nuclear conflict. Last month, CIA Director William Burns said that although there is no sign that Russia is preparing to do so, “none of us can take lightly the threat posed by a potential resort to tactical nuclear weapons or low-yield nuclear weapons.” As the war drags on, it is vital that Russian, NATO, and U.S. leaders maintain lines of communication to prevent direct conflict and avoid rhetoric […]

In one of the great foreign policy blunders of modern times, U.S. and European leaders repeatedly disregarded Vladimir Putin’s warnings that Russia would never tolerate Ukraine becoming a NATO military asset. Because of resistance from the French and German governments (which had as much to do with Ukraine’s chronic corruption as with concerns about Russia’s reaction), the Alliance delayed offering Kyiv a Membership Action Plan – an essential step toward membership. Nevertheless, at the 2008 summit in Bucharest, NATO’s existing members ostentatiously insisted that “someday” Ukraine would join the Alliance, and they repeated […]

Originally published in Stark Realities. In a jaw-dropping example of government imposing woke mythology on an individual citizen, a Florida judge has ordered a man who defaced an LGBT mural to write a 25-page essay centered on a thoroughly false premise – that the 2016 massacre at the gay Pulse nightclub in Orlando deliberately targeted the LGBT community. Though that baseless narrative is still embraced by opportunistic activists, pandering politicians, lazy journalists and those they’ve misled, it’s been well-established since 2018 that self-described “Islamic soldier” Omar Mateen chose the club at random […]

During April, 173 people were reported killed in Iraq, and another 149 were wounded. The number of fatalities is considerably higher than last month, when 97 people were killed. The rise is attributable to an increase in activity in northern Iraq. The number of injured also rose from 38 wounded in March. In militant-related violence, at least 13 civilians, 24 security personnel, and 61 militants were killed. Another 30 civilians and 98 security personnel were wounded. The conflict between Turkey and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) guerrillas in northern Iraq continued with a new operation dubbed “Claw-Lock.” Also, skirmishes between Êzîdxan Forces, […]

Originally published at the Independent Speech Forum (Japan) Back in January, during the lead up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Chinese ambassador to the United States delivered a stark warning. Ambassador Qin Gang said that Washington’s growing ties with Taipei could ultimately lead to war between the US and China. “If the Taiwanese authorities, emboldened by the United States, keep going down the road for independence, it most likely will involve China and the United States, the two big countries, in the military conflict,” Qin said. While the West accuses China of practicing so-called […]

MEMORANDUM FOR: The President FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) SUBJECT: Nuclear Weapons Cannot Be Un-invented, Thus … PRECEDENCE: IMMEDIATE REF: Our Memo of 12/20/21, “Don’t Be Suckered on Russia“ May 1, 2022 Mr. President: Mainstream media have marinated the minds of most Americans in a witches’ brew of misleading information on Ukraine – and on the exceedingly high stakes of the war. On the chance you are not getting the kind of “untreated” intelligence President Truman hoped for by restructuring intelligence, we offer below a 12-point factsheet. Some of us were intelligence analysts during […]

President Joe Biden continues to spend with wild abandon. His latest plan to ensure Uncle Sam’s coming bankruptcy is to propose $33 billion “in security, economic, and humanitarian aid” for Ukraine. Why the US? Americans have spent nearly eight decades protecting Europe. European governments, after shamelessly leeching off US taxpayers for the entire Cold War and beyond, should take the lead on underwriting their neighbor under assault from Russia. Playing to the American people’s emotions rather than protecting their interests, President Joe Biden intoned: “We either back the Ukrainian people as they defend […]

Starting on April 15, the Israeli occupation army and police raided Al-Aqsa Mosque in Occupied East Jerusalem on a daily basis. Under the pretense of providing protection to provocative “visits” by thousands of illegal Israeli Jewish settlers and rightwing fanatics, the Israeli army has wounded hundreds of Palestinians, including journalists, and arrested hundreds more.  Palestinians understand that the current attacks on Al-Aqsa carry deeper political and strategic meanings for Israel than previous raids.  Al-Aqsa has experienced routine raids by Israeli forces under various guises in the past. However, the significance of the Mosque […]

According to local news media in Kitsap, Washington, it’s expected to take approximately nine years to complete the six above-ground tanks project shutting down and closing 33 underground Navy fuel tanks at the US military Manchester Fuel Depot in Manchester, Washington and will cost the Department of Defense around $200 million. It took the Department of Defense (DOD) 3 years to begin work on shutting down the tanks after the decision was made. The decision to close and remove the original 33 underground fuel storage tanks and construct six new aboveground tanks was made […]

Joe Biden promised that he would be the president of diplomacy. He promised that, after the turmoil of the bellicose Trump years, he would usher in the age of “relentless diplomacy.” But the US has been absent from negotiations on the war in Ukraine and Secretary of State Antony Blinken hasn’t spoken to his Russian counterpart once since it began. There has been only a weak whisper of diplomacy to Cuba, Juan Guaidó is still the deflated US recognized and backed president of Venezuela and no one seems to remember North Korea. The resuscitation and […]

“Once war is forced upon us, there is no alternative than to apply every available means to bring it to a swift end. War’s very object is victory – not prolonged indecision.” So said Gen. Douglas MacArthur in his April 1951 address to Congress after being fired by President Harry Truman as commander in chief in the Korean War. And what is now America’s goal with our massive infusion into the Ukraine war of new and heavier NATO weapons? Said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on his return from a Sunday meeting in Kyiv with President Volodymyr […]

The Washington bipartisan War Party (the neocons/neolibs, the deep state, and the military-industrial-congressional complex) goes on record in this Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) article telling the world: “What Does the West Want in Ukraine? Defining Success—Before It’s Too Late” (April 22, 2022). This article is written by Richard Haass, President of the CFR. For those who don’t know, Mr. Haass – given his position – is the spokesperson for Washington officialdom on foreign policy. He is on Morning Joe on MSNBC a couple of times a week preaching the “forever war” doctrine to […]

2014 saw two pivotal events that led to the current conflict in Ukraine. The first, familiar to all, was the coup in Ukraine in which a democratically elected government was overthrown at the direction of the United States and with the assistance of neo-Nazi elements which Ukraine has long harbored. Shortly thereafter the first shots in the present war were fired on the Russian-sympathetic Donbass region by the newly installed Ukrainian government. The shelling of the Donbass which claimed 14,000 lives has continued for 8 years, despite attempts at a cease-fire under the Minsk accords which […]

Originally posted at TomDispatch. My father was in the U.S. Air Force in World War II when it was still the Army Air Corps. He was operations officer for the First Air Commandos in Burma. Years later, when I was boy, I can still remember sitting in the back seat of our car with our big black poodle, while my father drove us somewhere, my mother beside him – and the two of them singing hauntingly the first verse of the old Army Air Corps song that began: “Off we go into the wild […]

The US and Australian panic over a security agreement between China and the Solomon Islands is a warning sign of how irrational and dangerous Washington’s anti-China containment policy has already become. The security agreement itself seems to be modest in its terms and includes no basing rights for Chinese forces, but that hasn’t stopped US and Australian officials from denouncing it and trying to strong-arm the small Pacific nation into changing course. One of those US officials, Daniel Kritenbrink, refused to rule out military action if China were allowed to have a base in the […]

Ukraine has won the admiration of much of the world in its defense against Russian aggression. Even in the Global South, whose governments have criticized the West’s selective morality and pressure to sanction Moscow, sympathy runs toward Kyiv. However, Russia, despite its botched initial advance, retains substantial military advantages. What if it wins the war? This is not a popular question in Washington. Kyiv’s stout resistance, unexpectedly symbolized by Volodymyr Zelensky, has created soaring expectations. A combination of factors – Ukrainians fighting for their homeland, Western arms shipments, Moscow’s overconfidence, and other Russian blunders […]

At least 63 people were killed, and 12 more were wounded in the latest violence: At least, 43 militants were killed during a recent operation in Nineveh province. Three Turkish soldiers were killed, and another four were wounded during a rocket attack on their base in Duhok. This brings the number of Turkish soldiers killed in the current operation against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) to eight dead. Another 11 PKK guerrillas were killed this week, bringing the total to 56 dead. In Tarmiya, a suicide bomber killed two security members and wounded three more. A second suicide bomber was also […]

In April 2019, Volodymyr Zelensky received 73% of the run-off vote and was elected President of Ukraine on a platform that featured making peace with Russia and signing the Minsk Agreement. The Minsk Agreement offered autonomy to the Donetsk and Lugansk regions of the Donbas that had voted for independence from Ukraine after the 2014 US backed coup. But despite the massive peace mandate, Zelensky was pushed off the path of diplomacy by ultranationalists who, wielding power beyond their small support, threatened Zelensky “if he continues along this line of negotiating with Putin,” according […]

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is the personification, as well as a harbinger of press freedom in its death throes, with democracy inexorably following – as night the day. Our founders were justly proud of the First Amendment provision that “Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press”. Their successors today seem equally proud of flushing that down the toilet, lest truly free journalism expose and document U.S. war crimes. For that is what Julian Assange did, before the U.S. and the UK, with help from vassal Sweden succeeded […]

“War is a racket, wrote US Maj. General Smedley Butler in 1935. He explained: “A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small ‘inside’ group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.” Gen. Butler’s observation describes the US/NATO response to the Ukraine war perfectly. The propaganda continues to portray the war in Ukraine as that of an […]

Fortunately, President Biden thus far has rejected the most risky policies that hawks are pushing in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Despite being under intense pressure, he continues to rule out proclaiming a no-fly zone, and he flatly rejects suggestions (including from one close political ally) that he consider sending U.S. troops to Ukraine. However, even the policies the administration has embraced entail an unacceptable risk of entangling the United States in a military confrontation with a nuclear-armed power. The United States and some NATO allies are pouring increasingly sophisticated weapons […]

At least four people were killed, and two more were wounded in the latest violence: In Dujail, two militants were killed during an operation. Militants executed a civilian in Hadar. Two militiamen were wounded during an attack in the Hamrin mountains. A suicide bomber blew himself up after security personnel fired up him near Samarra. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and has been covering Iraqi casualties for Antiwar.com since 2006. View all posts by Margaret Griffis Source link

Zbigniew Brzezinski’s book The Grand Chessboard was published 25 years ago. His assumptions and strategies for maintaining U.S. global dominance have been hugely influential in US foreign policy. As the conflict in Ukraine evolves, with the potential of escalating into world war, we can see where this policy leads and how crucial it is to re-evaluate. The need to dominate Eurasia The basic premise of The Grand Chessboard is outlined in the introduction: with the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States is the sole global power Europe and Asia (Eurasia) together […]

Collective security, the official goal of NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, seems plausible on its face. A group of nations ostensibly concerned about a common threat agree to defend one another in the event of an attack. “All for one and one for all,” as the Three Musketeers said. But like many things, the principle, even if sincerely invoked, is more problematic than the first glance indicates. This is particularly true with governments, and in no area more so than foreign policy and armed forces. Schoolyard analogies involving bullies do not hold. NATO was […]

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is terrible and without justification. The United Kingdom’s Lawn Tennis Association came up with a dramatic plan to end the war. It banned Vladimir Putin and his generals from playing at Wimbledon, as well as the grass court circuit preceding the venerable grand slam event. Oops, no. Tennis officials actually said Russian and Belarusian tennis players serving in the military, currently rampaging across Ukraine and committing war crimes against Ukrainian civilians, won’t be able to participate. That punishment is widely seen as more draconian than a war crimes trial. Wait, no again! In fact, the British said […]

At least three people were killed, and 16 more were wounded in the latest violence: Two federal policemen were killed, and two more were wounded during a security operation. A bomb exploded while they were combing the area around Dhuluiya. An attack on a Rutba checkpoint left two civilians and two policemen with injuries. In Baghdad, four civilians were injured in a shooting. A militia commander was killed, and three other militiamen were wounded when a bomb exploded in a desert area of Anbar province. In Sinjar, an old explosive was detonated and injured a civilian. A bomb wounded a militiaman […]

Ask a hundred Americans and you’ll be lucky to find even one who’s ever heard of Minsk II. But ask those same Americans how the Ukraine war started, and you’ll likely get “Russian President Putin woke up one day and decided to re-establish the Soviet empire, starting with Ukraine.” That is because our government and its slavishly loyal media have created a false narrative for maximum propaganda to support pouring billions in weaponry into the Ukraine war zone, ensuring that death and destruction will proceed endlessly. Minsk II was the 2015 agreement hammered […]

At least 24 people were killed, and sseven more were wounded in the latest violence: Turkey raised the number of casualties in operations against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in northern Iraq. The totals for the week are now four dead Turkish soldiers and 45 dead PKK guerrillas. These fatality figures are higher by three Turkish soldiers and 15 guerrillas. In Khanaqin, a roadside bomb killed two people and wounded three more. One Iraqi soldier was killed and four more were wounded in a separate attack on a nearby post. A policeman was killed during an ISIS attack on a police […]

Asked if the U.S. should send troops to fight beside the Ukrainians, Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said Sunday the time may have come. Russian President Vladimir Putin “will only stop when we stop him,” said Coons. “We are in a very dangerous moment where it is important that … we in Congress and the administration come to a common position about when we are willing to go the next step and to send not just arms but troops to the aid in defense of Ukraine.” “If the answer is never, then we are inviting another level […]

A friend, a young journalist in Gaza, Mohammed Rafik Mhawesh, told me that food prices in the besieged Strip have skyrocketed in recent weeks and that many already impoverished families are struggling to put food on the table. “Food prices are dramatically surging,” he said, “particularly since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war.” Essential food prices, like wheat and meat, have nearly doubled. The price of a chicken, for example, which was only accessible to a small segment of Gaza’s population, has increased from 20 shekels (approx. $6) to 45 (approx. $14). These price hikes […]

Reprinted from The Nation with permission of the author. Russia invaded Ukraine in violation of international law, and now we stand on a precipice. Advocates of war are saying that World War III has already begun, and the United States should therefore plunge in. How can they say that? People may finally hurl themselves into an abyss from the sheer terror of falling. I learned something about this mood from a retired Foreign Service veteran. On October 27, 1962, he was sitting in the next room, listening on an intercom with second-echelon State Department […]

At least five people were killed, and another was wounded in the latest violence: Four militants were killed during an operation in Eith. An ISIS sniper wounded a soldier in Albu Siraj. Near Tuz Khormato, the body of a militant was found the morning after clashes occurred. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and has been covering Iraqi casualties for Antiwar.com since 2006. View all posts by Margaret Griffis Source link

At least 11 people were killed, and six more were wounded in the latest violence: Turkey announced 11 more guerrilla deaths during current operations against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) in northern Iraq. A total of 30 guerrillas have been killed, so far. In the ongoing conflict between Iraq and an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) in the Sinjar region, one border guard was wounded. In Jurf al-Nasr, a bomb wounded three militiamen. Two soldiers were wounded in a blast in Abu Saida. A bomb in Tarmiya wounded a soldier. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist […]

On Monday, the Pentagon announced the US will soon begin training the Ukrainian military in using howitzer artillery in an unnamed country. Presumably this will be in a NATO member state. If Russian intelligence found out where, might it attack to stop the howitzers from being deployed against Russian forces in Ukraine? Almost assuredly not, as that would trigger a wider war, invoking NATO’s self-defense provision, which would be catastrophic for Russia. So, while the urgent focus should be on diplomatic negotiations to end this senseless war, arming Ukraine to defend itself in the meantime […]

Most judges and lawyers agree that the war on drugs in the past 50 years has seriously diminished the right to privacy guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment. Now a small group of legal academics is arguing that the war in Ukraine should be used to diminish property rights guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment. Here is the backstory. The Fourth Amendment was written to guarantee that the government may only search and seize persons, houses, papers and effects pursuant to a search warrant issued by a judge after the presentation under oath of evidence demonstrating that the […]

(read part 1) The gist of our two-part series is this: Unlike Ford automobiles, Ukraine was not “Built to Last!” The current CIA director, William J Burns, actually recognized the eventual crackup of Ukraine back in 2008, when he served as U.S. ambassador to Russia. After Ukraine’s NATO aspirations were announced at that year’s Bucharest Security Conference, Burns wrote a secret cable (subsequently published by WikiLeaks) entitled, “Nyet Means Nyet: Russia’s NATO Enlargement Redlines.” The missive to Washington contained a stern warning of trouble to come: Ukraine and Georgia’s NATO aspirations not only touch a […]

The US and its allies are reportedly pursuing a “long-term strategy” that seeks to “isolate and weaken” Russia in response to the war in Ukraine. Like other “strategies” to isolate targeted states through sanctions and threats, this one will use punitive measures to inflict economic pain for its own sake. Western governments are no longer even pretending that Russia can do anything to end the economic warfare against it, and they are laying the groundwork to make the economic war a permanent condition. That bodes ill for the possibility of a negotiated settlement, […]

As Russia’s war against Ukraine rages, there is hope that the even deadlier war in Yemen might finally end. The warring parties have agreed to a ceasefire which, unlike previous pacts, so far has held. This is surprisingly good news, most importantly for the Yemeni people, but also for America’s international reputation. Even as Russia faced global censure for its unjustified aggression against Ukraine and brutal attack on Ukrainian cities, the US and other Western governments continued to back the deadlier Saudi and Emirati campaign against their impoverished neighbor. Despite Washington’s support for the wealthy […]

At least six people were killed, and 18 more were wounded in the latest violence: Two militiamen were killed, and 10 more were wounded during a clash in Kashkoul. Clashes in Akashat, left one militiaman dead. Three militiamen and two civilians were wounded. Two militants were also killed. A Turkish soldier died of injuries received in clashes with the Kurdistan Worker’ Party (P.K.K.) in northern Iraq. Clashes between Iraqi forces and a Kurdistan Worker’ Party (P.K.K.) affiliate in Sinjar continue. An Iraqi soldier and two guerrillas were wounded. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida […]

Sometimes a few words are worth a thousand pictures – at least when it comes to Ukraine. Here’s one of them: The Ukrainian leader said that his country hadn’t been willing to cede territory from the beginning. “Had we been willing to give up our territory, there would have been no war,” Zelensky said. So the question recurs. Why is it worth Washington’s sweeping Sanctions War on Russia, which is destroying the dollar-based global trading and payments system and triggering a worldwide inflationary calamity, to defend every inch of a sketchy map located on Russia’s […]

Americans should be experiencing an uneasy sense of déjà vu. In the last two years, U.S.-trained officers have overthrown West African governments at least four times.  There are indications that other graduates have undermined civilian governments in other portions of the continent. But U.S. military officials have been less than informative. US Africa Command (AFRICOM) can’t explain why there has been a surge in coups. Indeed, AFRICOM insists that it doesn’t even know how often they’ve happened. That position reflects convenient ignorance, at best. Maj. Gen. Andrew M. Rohling, the commander of US Army […]

At least 19 people were killed, and five more were wounded in the latest violence: Turkish launched a new military mission against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) in Dohuk province. Turkey claimed that 19 militants were killed and four Turkish soldiers were wounded. The P.K.K. claimed that 28 Turkish soldiers were killed. The operation took place primarily in Avasin-Basyan, Metina, and Zab. Commandos and special forces participated by land and air. Iraq’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the illegal operation. Near Sinjar, clashes between Êzîdxan forces, loyal to the P.K.K., and Iraqi forces also took place. P.K.K. members apparently refused an […]

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has brought immense suffering to the people of that land, while sparking calls for increased military spending in both the United States and Europe. Though that war may prove to be a tragedy for the world, one group is already benefiting from it: U.S. arms contractors. Even before hostilities broke out, the CEOs of major weapons firms were talking about how tensions in Europe could pad their profits. In a January 2022 call with his company’s investors, Raytheon Technologies CEO Greg Hayes typically bragged that the prospect of conflict […]

If you’re looking for morality tales – clashes between the clearly good and the clearly bad – I suggest you look elsewhere than the geopolitical theater. There we find only conflicts between shades of darker gray. This seems to have been the case throughout history. Empires and would-be empires vied with rival empires and would-be empires for territory, resources, taxpayers, and soldiers. No surprise: governments will be governments, and that’s not good. This is not to say the shades of gray did not differ at all, perhaps even significantly on occasion, but the objective was […]

Even before Vladimir Putin ordered Russia’s invasion of Ukraine some members of the Washington War Party wanted to attack Moscow. As the two-month anniversary of the conflict’s start approaches, an increasing number of US policy warriors appear frustrated that fear of nuclear war is holding back the administration from formally initiating hostilities. They have updated David Farragut’s famous injunction to “Damn the nukes, full speed ahead!” Putin is a ruthless dictator whose brutal aggression against Ukraine is unjustified. Yet the US and European pretense of pious innocence and virginal sanctimony has grown tiresome. The allies knowingly pressed their geopolitical advantage over […]

Like Orwell’s Ministry of Truth, propaganda is pouring out of the US that is shaping our perceptions of the war in Ukraine. It is produced by the CIA, it is pronounced by the State Department and it is published by the media. It is coming from everywhere. The heroes and the villains were cast from the start. The media rewrote history and created the myth of the “unprovoked war.” As if Russia’s launching of an illegal war was not sufficient to cast them as the villain in our minds, the media everywhere added the adjective […]

At least four people were killed, and six more were wounded in the latest violence: In Qara Tapa, two soldiers were killed, and two more were wounded when a bomb they were attempting to defuse blew up. At least one more soldier was wounded in this or a separate bombing. An attack in Eith left two soldiers dead. A soldier was wounded during an ISIS attack in Bastamli village. In Badush, a bomb wounded a policeman. A bomb in Salah ad-Din wounded an army officer. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and has been […]

U.S. corporate media outlets are saturated with pundits – many of them ex-military or national security officials – who take to the airwaves to promote hawkish policies and actions in Ukraine and elsewhere without disclosing their own ties to the arms industry, according to a report published Tuesday. Analyzing punditry across a range of outlets including CNN, MSNBC, and NBC News, Aditi Ramaswami and Andrew Perez at The Lever found that the networks failed to inform viewers that many of their expert guests who called for supplying Ukraine with more weapons to defend against […]

Nuclear sanity: ultimate (or, God help us, immediate) disarmament. Nuclear insanity: ongoing development and deployment, endless investment, eventual (either accidental or intentional) use. Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., addressing Congress several weeks ago, made a heartfelt and powerful case for nuclear sanity, for a revamping of the system of mutually assured destruction, which gives certain national leaders “Godlike powers known as sole authority to end life on the planet as we know it . . .” He went on: “We cannot uninvent the atom, its military applications, and technological knowhow. The nuclear Pandora’s box is sadly […]

There is a reason why Israel is insistent on linking the series of attacks carried out by Palestinians recently to a specific location, namely the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank. By doing so, the embattled Naftali Bennett’s government can simply order another deadly military operation in Jenin to reassure its citizens that the situation is under control. Indeed, on April 9, the Israeli army has stormed the Jenin refugee camp, killing a Palestinian and wounding ten others. However, Israel’s problem is much bigger than Jenin. If we examine the events starting with […]

At least three people were killed, and 14 more were wounded in the latest violence: One soldier was killed and seven more were wounded when a bomb exploded during search operations near Tuz Khormato. A bomb in Wadi al-Shay killed an officer and wounded three soldiers. A shepherd was killed, and his companion was wounded in a blast in Saniya. In Zummar, a drone attack wounded two militiamen. A policeman was wounded in clashes outside of Muqdadiya. Also, a fire killed one person and wounded two more at a displaced persons camp in Dohuk. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is […]

The war in Ukraine has revived Cold War fears of civilization-ending cataclysm in the form of a nuclear war between the United States and Russia. Earlier this month, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres admitted this “bone-chilling” reality: “The prospect of nuclear conflict, once unthinkable, is now back within the realm of possibility.” As unsettling as this development is, it presents us with an opportunity to cultivate awareness of an existential threat we continue to face. In his 1994 book Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, Carl Sagan wrote: “Many of […]

The Israeli government has been trying to keep as low a profile as possible over the war in Ukraine, but Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, seems determined to drag Israel on to center stage. Zelensky made a direct appeal to the Israeli parliament last month, ostensibly asking for weapons, especially the Iron Dome interception system Israel uses to stop short-range rockets fired out of Gaza by Palestinians trying to draw attention to Israel’s 15-year siege of the enclave. But rather than being flattered by the attention, many Israeli politicians objected to Zelensky’s speech. […]

The prime ministers of Sweden and Finland, Magdalena Andersson and Sanna Marin, both signaled Wednesday that they will likely be applying for membership in NATO. The “prospect” is most “welcome,” says The Washington Post: “Finland and Sweden Should Join NATO.” The editorial was titled “A Way To Punish Putin.” Before joining the rejoicing in NATO capitals, we might inspect what NATO membership for these two Nordic nations would mean for the United States. Finland is a nation the size of Germany, but with a population only 4% of that of Russia and a border with Russia […]

As I write this, BBC reports that UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss is “urgently” investigating reports of a chemical weapons attack in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol. The US Department of Defense finds the reports “deeply concerning.” Usually when the western governments start quacking about “chemical attacks,” it means they’re planning to take action of some kind – airstrikes in Syria, sanctions on Russia, what have you – and are looking for an excuse. This doesn’t look like an exception to that rule: Further down in the story, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar […]

“Harris Tells Americans They Will Have to Pay More for Gas To Punish Russia,” proclaimed the New York Times headline recently. So spoke no less an authority on economics than the Vice President of the United States. Harris was on a visit to Poland to reassure a nervous NATO member and to egg on the war in Ukraine at the cost of ever more Ukrainian and Russian lives and higher inflation in the US and the world. Inflation, Already Bad, is Worsened by the War in Ukraine and US Sanctions The Times’s report on Harris’s declaration, […]

At least two people were killed, and three more were wounded in the latest violence: Turkish strikes against Kurdistan Workers’ Party (P.K.K.) targets left one guerrilla dead in Avasin. Gunmen in Zummar killed a shepherd. A bomb wounded two federal policemen in Rashad. A man was seriously wounded when he accidentally stepped on a landmine in Bradost, while he was out gathering plants. Author: Margaret Griffis Margaret Griffis is a journalist from Miami Beach, Florida and has been covering Iraqi casualties for Antiwar.com since 2006. View all posts by Margaret Griffis Source link

Since World War II never has the US been in such danger, or so Washington’s bloated military budget would suggest. “Defense” outlays long ago stopped being about defense as commonly understood, at least of America. Last year’s military spending bill ran $768 billion. Adjusted for inflation it was more than during the Korean War, Vietnam War, and entire Cold War, even with Ronald Reagan’s sizeable buildup.Noted Vox’s Jonathan Guyer: “The only time this bill has been larger, adjusted for inflation, was in 2011, at a moment when the US had a peak in troops in Afghanistan […]

Americans have been shocked by the death and destruction of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, filling our screens with bombed buildings and dead bodies lying in the street. But the United States and its allies have waged war in country after country for decades, carving swathes of destruction through cities, towns and villages on a far greater scale than has so far disfigured Ukraine. As we recently reported, the U.S. and its allies have dropped over 337,000 bombs and missiles, or 46 per day, on nine countries since 2001 alone. Senior US Defense Intelligence Agency […]

The Biden administration’s year-long negotiations to salvage the nuclear deal are close to failing, and it is telling that the reason for the failure will be an issue that has nothing to do with nuclear proliferation. The latest sticking point is the US designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist group, which Iran wants reversed and the US has so far refused to undo. Trump added the entire IRGC to the list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) in 2019 in an unusual move that designated part of another country’s military […]

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has created a humanitarian tragedy for that country, and all reasonable people should want the increasingly bloody conflict to end as soon as possible. Policies that the Biden administration is pursuing, however, threaten to prolong the war and its suffering. The troubling question arises about whether Washington’s policies are merely inept, or whether they reflect a deliberate strategy to bleed Russian forces and inflict a geo-strategic defeat on a great power adversary – regardless of the cost to Ukraine. Indications are mounting that it’s the latter scenario. Even the decision by the United States and other NATO […]

Late last year, a Gallup poll showed that Americans’ trust in the mainstream media has fallen to its second lowest level on record. Only seven percent of Americans responded that they have a “great deal” of trust in the media. That loss of trust has been well-earned by the mainstream media, and it explains the massive growth of independent media and alternative voices on social media. The response to the rise of independent media voices has been a rush to “cancel” any voice outside the accepted mainstream narrative. Citizens of the Soviet Union would read […]

Last month marked the 19th anniversary of the creation of our government’s boastful “Shock and Awe” slogan, the term we used to start our attack on Iraq – an invasion that resulted in the killing of over one million Iraqis, by some estimates, and the death of over 4,000 American service members. Sadly, our justification for going to war was based on a lie. Iraq posed no threat to the United States. There were no weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) to be found. Still, we went ahead and destroyed Iraq and Afghanistan, and supported the decimation […]

University of Chicago Professor John Mearsheimer, widely respected “dean” of the realism school (aka, “offensive realism”) of international relations, has put the conflict in Ukraine in a context that everyone can understand – and needs to understand before it is too late. Speaking at an April 7 webinar, Mearsheimer was, true to form, “offensively realistic”. He explained: (1) the root cause lies in the April 2008 NATO summit Declaration that Ukraine (and Georgia) “will become members of NATO”; and (2) that Russia sees this as an “existential threat” and therefore “must win” this […]

War is a human horror, the best evidence possible for the existence of evil, the role of Original Sin, and the depravity of man. And so it has ever been. The mad slaughter, ferocious bloodlust, and brutal violence of ancient combat is difficult to imagine. The killing was up close and personal. Today, in a supposedly more advanced and civilized age, the sophisticated tools that murder and maim are more distant. Explosives kill on industrial scale, with nuclear weapons able to incinerate entire cities. Aircraft and missiles inflict death from afar, on unseen lands continents and oceans away. Two countries at […]

At least eight people were killed, and 11 more were wounded in the latest violence: An ISIS attack on a road near Rashad left one villager dead and, at least, two wounded. A militiaman was also killed. Two militiamen were wounded. A teacher was also kidnapped. One security member was wounded during a separate attack. In Hit, an attack left two soldiers dead. Several more were wounded. Two bodies were found in Sinjar. A policeman was killed, and two others were wounded during an attack near Muqdadiya. In Anbar, a blast killed one militiaman and wounded two more. A bomb near […]

Much has been said and written about media bias and double standards in the West’s response to the Russia-Ukraine war, when compared with other wars and military conflicts across the world, especially in the Middle East and the Global South. Less obvious is how such hypocrisy is a reflection of a much larger phenomenon which governs the West’s relationship to war and conflict zones. On March 19, Iraq commemorated the 19th anniversary of the US invasion which killed, according to modest estimates, over a million Iraqis. The consequences of that war were equally […]

An unprovoked invasion by one of the world’s largest militaries, armed with a feared arsenal of weapons of mass destruction. Quasi-universal condemnation of the offending state. The international community in disarray over how to respond. I’m not referring to Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February 2022, but Iraq’s of Kuwait in August 1990. Yet one could be forgiven for readily conflating the two, given that the same set of circumstances and contradictions in place now were the very same that existed then. The reaction to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has gone […]