07/30/15

New Report Confirms Findings of Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi

Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) member Clare Lopez believes that in 2011 Hillary Clinton’s State Department was orchestrating its own gun running operation to the Libyan rebels—and that arms dealer Marc Turi has been set up to take the fall for these “illicit arms deals.”

“The Justice Department has charged Turi with lying on an export-license application, alleging he hid his intent to ship weapons and ammunition to Libya in direct violation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 170,” reports Jerome Corsi for WorldNetDaily.

“Marc Turi was set up and framed for something he didn’t do, while others, who actually did collaborate with Qatar and the UAE to deliver the weapons under U.S. and NATO protection and supervision, are not only not prosecuted like Marc Turi, they’re not even mentioned,” Lopez told Corsi.

“Lopez made it clear she was speaking for herself and not for the commission,” he reports.

Corsi has written several previous articles about the work of the CCB, which was established by Accuracy in Media back in 2013. “The commission has been working behind the scenes for the past two years to ensure Congress uncovers what really happened in the Sept. 11, 2012, attack in Benghazi that killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans,” writes Corsi.

“Lopez [said the] ‘key point is that Marc Turi, despite receiving written approval from the U.S. government to broker weapons to Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, never actually went through [with] any weapons purchases or shipments to Qatar, to the UAE or to Libya,” he writes.

Lopez referred to the Citizens’ Commission’s April 2014 interim report, which stated: “Even more disturbingly, the U.S. was fully aware of and facilitating the delivery of weapons to the al-Qa’eda-dominated rebel militias throughout the 2011 rebellion. The jihadist agenda of AQIM, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), and other Islamic terror groups represented among the rebel forces was well known to U.S. officials responsible for Libya policy.”

In fact, “The rebels made no secret of their al-Qa’eda affiliation, openly flying and speaking in front of the black flag of Islamic jihad…” states the report.

When Hillary Clinton’s Libya-related emails were released, they exposed how Mrs. Clinton was interested in arming the rebels before they were “formally recognized by the U.S. or United Nations,” according to Catherine Herridge and Pamela Browne.

Fox News previously reported that Turi had said the “weapons supplied to Libya were in the hands of the U.S. government and the State Department’s Bureau of Political and Military Affairs, headed by key Hillary Clinton aide Andrew Shapiro,” reports Corsi. “Shapiro was responsible to oversee the export control process at the State Department.”

Mrs. Clinton exchanged emails with the Director of Policy Planning for the Department of State, Anne-Marie Slaughter, in the spring of 2011. On March 30, 2011, Slaughter counseled Hillary Clinton that she was “VERY dubious about arming the Libyan rebels.” When Hillary Clinton asked why, Slaughter argued that “sending more arms into a society generally… will result in more violence—against each other” and “adding even more weapons does not make sense.”

Yet Mrs. Clinton emailed her aide, Jake Sullivan, on April 8, 2011, that “FYI. The idea of using private security experts to arm the opposition should be considered.”

Years after the intervention, Libya remains a broken state marred by ongoing violence.

It’s already been established that Mrs. Clinton failed to turn over all of her work related emails, allowed sensitive and classified material on her private email server, and lied about both. Yet we are asked to believe that the more than 30,000 emails that she had deleted and wiped from her server were all personal emails. It’s clear that even her allies in the media are getting nervous about where all of this is headed, since she is the presumed Democratic Party standard bearer. The question is, will she ever be held accountable, and judged by the same standards as others who have “mishandled” classified information? And what about her role in the Libyan and Benghazi scandals? It is looking more and more like the only accountability may come from the American voters.

06/18/15

Napolitano: What If Obama And Hillary Are Hiding The Truth About Libya And Syria?

06/18/15

UAE Port Agreement: More Clinton Pay for Play?

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

Accuracy in Media often asks whether the news media would have covered a story the same way under President George W. Bush as it does under President Barack Obama. The lease provided to Gulftainer USA, a subsidiary of a United Arab Emirates (UAE) conglomerate called Crescent Enterprises, at the vital national security hub of Port Canaveral, Florida, once again confirms the media double standard.

Is this more Clinton shenanigans and conflict of interest? What was Obama’s role, and why are the media ignoring this story?

While in 2006 a multiple port purchase with links to a government with ties to terrorists incited controversy and outrage among the media and in Washington, a UAE terminal lease starting this month has been met with a virtual media blackout.

“In 2006, that concern was over port security and was centered on President George W. Bush approving a deal with Dubai Ports World to operate shipping operations in six major American cities,” writes columnist Ellen Ratner for WorldNetDaily. “The media and the political establishment went ballistic over the revelation.”

Hillary Clinton, then a Democratic senator from New York, was one of the leaders of the successful effort to ultimately block the Dubai Ports World from happening.

“Nine years later, however, a similar announcement is being met with relative silence.”

Ratner points out that Port Canaveral is home to, among other things, a “U.S. Air Force base, a submarine base and NASA’s Kennedy Space center,” making it a national security target. Yet, as Jerome Corsi wrote for WND, “Secretary of Treasury Jack Lew, a former White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, approved the Gulftainer deal without seeking the formal approval of the interagency Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, CFIUS.”

“U.S. Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker, who played a key role fundraising for Barack Obama’s 2008 successful presidential run, appears to have signed off on the Gulftainer deal with Port Canaveral,” reports Corsi.

The Wall Street Journal did report on Gulftainer’s terminal opening on June 12. However, the very short article reads more like a press release, merely repeating the statements of the company’s managing director without including alternative perspectives.

Yet even managing director Peter Richards acknowledges the 2006 parallel. “He said the company had been apprehensive about entering the U.S. market since the controversy surrounding a…deal to give management contracts for terminals at six major U.S. ports, including Miami, to Dubai Ports World, a state-owned enterprise that is, like Gulftainer, based in the United Arab Emirates,” reports Robbie Whelan for the Journal. “The deal was ultimately scuttled after public outcry and politically-charged debate among policy makers in Washington.”

But that’s where The Wall Street Journal’s superficial attempt at reporting ends.

Majid Jafar, the brother of the head of Crescent, is Co-Chair of a program called Business Backs Education launched with Bill Clinton in March 2014. The Gulftainer deal was negotiated under the codename “Project Pelican” for a year until signed in June 2014.

The UAE was also a first-time donor to the Clinton Foundation in 2014, and gave between $1 million and $5 million, according to The Washington Post’s searchable database.

Did the Clintons’ contacts help to seal the deal? Ratner calls the speculation at least “out there,” despite being a “large stretch.” Given the Clintons’ scandal-filled history the media might want to at least look into this one. It actually isn’t much of a “stretch,” but rather just more evidence of the type of pay for play that characterizes much Clinton activity.

“A quick Google search reveals that conservative blogs have suggested the company may have shipped weapons through its ports to terror groups in Iraq and may have help helped Iran ship weapons to Gaza,” reports Ratner. This was “acknowledged by Florida Today,” she writes, and has “prompted protests at the site of Gulftainer’s terminals.”

The mainstream media’s decision to look the other way on more Obama administration malfeasance, and possible backroom deals, should incite outrage equal to, if not greater, than the Dubai Port Worlds incident. “Whether or not Gulftainer is cause for alarm is beyond my judgment, but there is nevertheless a stunning level of hypocrisy in Washington, D.C., over the issue,” commented Ratner, who is definitely not a conservative.

There is more than political hypocrisy here. This is part of the concerted mainstream media attempt to preserve President Obama’s legacy at all cost by not pursuing stories, by not investigating angles, and by not reporting any news that might possibly damage the Obama administration or presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

06/4/15

The Evolution Of The Oil Weapon

In the age of derivatives, swaps, and electronic money transfers, a new form of warfare has emerged: financial warfare.

Recently, the US has passed sanctions on countries such as Syria, Venezuela, and North Korea , but the majority of energy related sanctions passed have been targeted at Iran and Russia.

An estimated 68 percent of Russia’s government revenue is derived from oil and gas exports, while 80 percent of Iran’s revenue comes from oil exports. That presents a very large target for the use of financial weapons.

To understand why financial warfare is now so commonplace, one must understand how it came into existence and what has been achieved taking such an approach.

The oil weapon first came into existence in 1965, when Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal. What resulted from this was a declaration of war by France, England, and Israel. As a way to counter this invasion, Saudi Arabia decided to ban exports to England and France. This embargo turned out to have minimal economic impact, as the US increased shipments to Europe, and international oil companies redirected shipments to England and France.

The next embargo imposed was in 1967, when Arab states imposed an embargo on the US, Britain, and West Germany. This embargo was enacted after a rumor surfaced that Britain and the US were providing air cover for Israeli planes, after Israel bombed Egyptian military airports in the 1967 war. This embargo failed, due to the fact that Arab oil revenues declined. This embargo also wasn’t enforced properly, as Western countries were still receiving oil from Arab countries.

But the most famous incident came in 1973. This was when OPEC issued a new embargo on countries that provided military aid to Israel, in the Yom Kippur war. This proved to have a greater economic impact on Europe and the US, because Saudi Arabia displaced Texas as the world’s swing producer.

The 1973 embargo led to an increase in domestic fuel prices, shortages of gasoline, and the rationing of gasoline fuel. This embargo changed the dynamics of US foreign policy.

After the 1973 embargo, Richard Nixon sent his secretary of state Henry Kissinger to Saudi Arabia with a proposed deal, to ensure that an embargo such as this would never happen to the United States again.

After some revisions, in 1976, the House of Saud and Henry Kissinger finally reached an agreement. The agreement did the following things, according to Marin Katusa’s 2014 book, “The Colder War.” The Saudi’s agreed to:

1. Give the US as much oil as it desired, for general consumption and national security measures. Thus increasing or decreasing oil production to the benefit of the US

2. To only sell oil for US dollars, and to reinvest profits in US treasury securities.

In return, the US guaranteed:

1. The protection of the Saudi Kingdom from rival Arab countries

2. The protection of Saudi oil fields

3. Protection from an Israel invasion.

The Saudi’s agreed to this because, even though they had vast amounts of oil, they didn’t possess an army which could protect them from its surrounding enemies; which included Iran, Iraq, and Israel.

This deal not only secured a steady supply of oil to the US, but allowed the US to expand its global footprint.

How the US and the Saudi’s colluded to topple the USSR

In 1982, a secret declaration for economic war with The Soviet Union was signed. This declaration included:

• No new contracts to buy Soviet natural gas
• Accelerate development of an alternate supply to Soviet gas for parts of Europe
• A plan to substantially raise interest rates on credit to the USSR
• The requirement of higher down payments and shorter maturities on Russian bonds.

This declaration made the USSR’s debt load much more burdensome, but what delivered the final blow to the USSR was the doubling of oil production from Saudi Arabia in 1986. This pushed oil prices down to roughly 10 dollars per barrel, thus vastly decreasing the USSR’s government revenue. This declaration combined with low oil prices, according to James Norman, author of the 2008 book, “The Oil Card,” is what led to the collapse of the USSR.

Today, the international financial system is much more sophisticated. Still, using financial sanctions with the intention of creating a de facto embargo on oil is a widespread practice today – just look at the cases of Iran and Russia.

Source: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/The-Evolution-Of-The-Oil-Weapon.html

By John Manfreda of Oilprice.com

05/20/15

Mike Morell Attempts to Repair His Damaged Credibility

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

Mike Morell, the former Deputy CIA Director and Acting CIA Director, is out with a new book, and has been making the rounds on virtually every TV network. This is supposed to be his time to set the record straight, but he has apparently decided not to do that. Instead, his truthful revelations are mixed in with obvious falsehoods, so it becomes difficult to distinguish one from the other.

We noted his difficulty with the truth back in this 2014 column by former CIA officer Clare Lopez, in which she cited, among other things, that Morell and then-UN Ambassador Susan Rice met with several Republican senators about the editing process that the Benghazi talking points had gone through before Rice used them on the five Sunday morning shows, just days after the attacks in Benghazi that resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens. Lopez, in her column titled “Benghazi and the Politicization of Intelligence,” wrote:

Under questioning from the senators about the talking-points editing process, Morell tried to blame the FBI for cutting the reference to al-Qa’eda terrorism; he said the FBI didn’t want to compromise an ongoing criminal investigation. When Graham called the FBI and told them what Morell had said, ‘they went ballistic,’ Graham said in an interview with Fox News. ‘Confronted with this, Morell changed his statement and admitted that he, and the CIA, had been responsible after all.’

Although Morell has made statements undermining Hillary Clinton and President Obama on other intelligence issues, he is actively assisting both the mainstream media and the Obama administration in an effort to ignore and revise the 2012 events in Benghazi with his new book The Great War of Our Time.

“One of the most striking aspects of Morell’s chapters on Benghazi is his dogged insistence that the attacks were simply the result of a mob spinning out of control,” writes Steven Hayes for The Weekly Standard. “But Morell maintains that the attacks were not planned and claims, repeatedly and bizarrely, that the attackers did not necessarily want to harm Americans.”

This, Hayes notes, does not match the Abu Khatallah indictment, which contends that the objective of the attackers in Benghazi was to “kill United States citizens at the Mission and the Annex.”

A Defense Intelligence Agency email, obtained by Judicial Watch and made public on May 18, shows that the DIA reported on September 16, 2012 that the terrorist attack had been planned 10 or more days prior by Al Qaeda.

“The memo was copied to the National Security Council, the State Department and the CIA,” reports Catherine Herridge of Fox News. “A third DIA memo, dated Oct. 5, 2012, leaves no doubt that U.S. intelligence agencies knew that weapons were moving from Libya to Syria before the attack that killed four Americans.”

Morell refused to comment on the flow of weapons to Syria during his recent Fox News interview with Bret Baier, host of Special Report. Morell’s carefully crafted chapters on Benghazi, a total of 47 pages, deceive so systematically and so completely as to create an entirely false account of these events. He seeks to rewrite history by contradicting other witnesses. All evidence supporting this scandal that is not ascribed to the White House’s stonewalling efforts is reduced to spurious claims or myths.

But it is his word against those on the ground that night—from Gregory Hicks to the former Libyan president, including the security contractors and diplomatic security agents. Morell’s own account is irredeemably sullied by the fact that he won’t even admit to conversations he’s had concerning the CIA’s Benghazi talking points.

“I told my colleagues that I had some concerns about the talking points and that I knew other agencies did as well,” he writes of his controversial participation in a Deputies Meeting. “I did not say what my concerns were. I concluded by saying I would edit the talking points myself and share them with the relevant deputies before sending them to the Hill. McDonough simply said, ‘Thank you, Michael.’” McDonough is Denis McDonough, then-Deputy National Security Advisor, now White House Chief of Staff.

Contrast this with email records obtained by Judicial Watch, and you find that Morell’s assertions prove entirely false. “On the SVTS [call], Morell noted that these points were not good and he had taken a heavy editing hand to them,” states an administration email from September 15, 2012. “[Morell] noted that he would be happy to work with Jake Sullivan and Rhodes to develop appropriate talking points. McDonough, on Rhodes’ behalf, deferred to Sullivan.” Rhodes is Ben Rhodes, former Obama speechwriter, Deputy National Security Advisor, and brother of David Rhodes, the president of CBS News.

“It was agreed that Jake would work closely with the intelligence community (within a small group) to finalize points on Saturday that could be shared with HPSCI [House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence],” it continues.

In order for there to be an agreement, there must first be a conversation involving multiple parties. And the details of this email clearly demonstrate that there was more of a discussion with others than Morell would like to admit.

But the mainstream media aren’t interested in asking Morell about his factual inaccuracies or contradictions.

During a Q&A, Michael Hirsh of Politico asked Morell a softball question on Benghazi, saying, “You say the CIA reevaluated its security posture in Benghazi after that but it’s unclear why State did not do more. Can you explain?”

This approach revealed that Hirsh hadn’t done any independent research, and was hoping that the Benghazi scandal could be “explained” away by the most authoritative—and, in this case, incredibly biased—administration source.

Politico also published an article by Morell, which claims to be “The Real Story of Benghazi.”

Hirsh’s question doesn’t even reflect Morell’s actual statements. “It was only …after the tragedy of 9/11/12…that we learned that only a few security enhancements had been made” at the Special Mission Compound, writes Morell.

Members of the Annex Security Team write in their book, 13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi, that status updates between them (at the CIA Annex) and the Special Mission Compound (located about one mile from the Annex) occurred “usually every Friday.” Does Morell really expect his readers to believe that these two facilities, located so close together, were not aware of each others’ security efforts? Hirsh apparently does.

By informing his readers about unreleased video footage from the night of the attack at the Special Mission Compound (SMC), Morell seeks to establish himself as a first-hand expert on what happened there. He is not. But because the video footage is not available to others, it is impossible to independently verify the facts.

For Politico to have taken Morell at his word without fact-checking is no better than citing anonymous administration officials.

“Some of the attackers were armed with small arms; many were not armed at all,” Morell writes. “No heavy weapons were seen on the videotape.” This contradicts another account, from the book Under Fire: The Untold Story of the Attack in Benghazi by Fred Burton and Samuel M. Katz, which maintains that “Some of the attackers carried RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades] slung over their shoulders, apparently to be used on the armored doors of the safe haven and the TOC [Tactical Operations Center] or to repel any counterattack. The DS [Diplomatic Security] agents knew they were facing superior firepower.”

“…definitely, it was planned by foreigners, by people who—who entered the country a few months ago, and they were planning this criminal act since their—since their arrival, said former Libyan President Mohammed al Magariaf on September 16, 2012 on CBS’ Face the Nation.

But, according to Morell, this is merely a “myth,” a false perception “that the attacks were well organized, planned weeks or even months in advance.”

“What’s more, the failure to anticipate and prevent such attacks would be, by definition, an intelligence failure,” writes Steven Hayes. Such a failure would reflect badly on the CIA, and therefore Morell himself.

Morell contends that there was no tactical warning for the attacks. Instead, “We routinely sent such cables each year on the anniversary of 9/11—but we did want our people and their US government colleagues to be extra vigilant.”

“Be advised, we have reports from locals that a Western facility or US Embassy/Consulate/Government target will be attacked in the next week,” reads the warning described in 13 Hours.

Morell recounts the stand down order with as much dishonesty as his description of the secret Deputies Meeting. “While these calls were being made, the response team was frustrated that it was not moving out,” he writes. “Although the delay was no more than five to eight minutes, I am sure that to those involved it must have seemed like forever.” But, he writes, it wasn’t ordered by anyone up the chain of command and was totally justified.

Morell’s account doesn’t even address whether the security team left with CIA Chief of Base “Bob’s” blessing or otherwise. They did not. And, according to the 13 Hours account, at least 20 minutes “had elapsed since the operators had first mustered at Building C.”

In a firefight, 20 minutes can be an eternity. AST Member Kris Paronto told Fox News’ Bret Baier last year that, without the delay, “Ambassador Stevens and Sean [Smith], yeah, they would still be alive, my gut is yes.”

Admitting as much would concede the CIA’s role in the overall dereliction of duty. Yet Nick Romeo writes for the Christian Science Monitor that although “it’s clear that he wants to defend the reputation of the agency” Morell has credibility because he notices “the many weaknesses and flaws in the design and function of intelligence agencies.”

However, when it comes to the death of four Americans—where it counts—Morell perpetuates the cover-up.

After leaving the CIA in 2013, Morell joined Beacon Global Strategies, started by Hillary Clinton’s “principal gatekeeper”—as described by The New York Times—Philippe Reines. The company serves as a sort of Clinton government-in-waiting. Thus, Morell’s statements become even that much more suspect due to a conflict of interest, while trying to protect Hillary Clinton’s bid for the White House.

And the dereliction of duty could have been prevented. Chief of Base “Bob” had already been given an opportunity to see the February 17 Martyrs Brigade’s lack of action earlier that year when they failed to come to the aid of another operator and Tyrone Woods during an altercation with a group they believed to be Ansar al Sharia. Woods himself later became a September 11, 2012 casualty. Even the Accountability Review Board notes that on the day of the attacks, the militia “had stopped accompanying Special Mission vehicle movements in protest over salary and working hours.”

But it is easier to ignore and marginalize the Benghazi scandal than for journalists to do independent research. Case in point, CNN’s Christiane Amanpour interviewed Morell on May 13 about ISIS and the Osama bin Laden operation, but did not ask him about his false Benghazi narrative.

If Morell has so transparently lied about the death of four Americans and the resulting administration cover-up, why, exactly, should the media trust him on other matters?

05/18/15

US Intel knew about weapons going from Benghazi to Syria

From Hot Air:

And quite a bit more, including the potential for ISIS to rise to seize ground and declare a caliphate. In a memo from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) to the National Security Council, the CIA, and the White House five days after the attack on the consulate in Benghazi, the DIA concluded that the attack had been planned for more than a week and was retribution for an American drone strike that had killed a senior al-Qaeda leader in June 2012. Moreover, the attack had been planned for the anniversary of 9/11 as a propaganda coup for AQ and its affiliate behind the attack, and not just a coincidence as the White House later claimed (via The Right Scoop):

The date of the DIA conclusion (produced by a FOIA lawsuit from Judicial Watch) is remarkable for at least one reason. First, September 16 is an infamous date in the Benghazi timeline, as the date on which Susan Rice did a full Ginsburg to insist that the attack resulted from a spontaneous demonstration tied to an obscure YouTube video. Even though the DIA directly contradicted those talking points supplied by the White House to Rice, they continued to insist on using them for another two weeks, including Hillary Clinton. During that period, the Obama administration kept saying that they had no indication that this was a terrorist plot, even though the president of Libya insisted that it was a planned attack on one of the same shows on which Rice appeared.

As Catherine Herridge and Martha McCallum point out, the memo tells a lot more of the story than we knew before. The consulate and its intelligence operation nearby was keeping an eye on weapons transfers to anti-Assad forces in Syria, one of the proposed reasons why the US would have kept a consulate open in that city for so long. This was taking place at the same time that a number of American politicians were demanding more open support for rebels in Syria, a move that had support from Hillary Clinton and Leon Panetta at the time according to Panetta’s memoir, but which Obama himself was reluctant to embrace — publicly, at least. Mike Morell insisted last week that the US took no part in that weapons movement, but did we need a consulate just to conduct passive intel on arms trafficking?

Why keep up the pretense? Obama was in the middle of an election, and didn’t want to acknowledge that he’d been caught with his pants down. And he may well have wanted to avoid answering questions about secret arms programs to anti-Assad rebels, especially given how that turned out in Syria and Iraq.

Speaking of which, the part about the rise of ISIS is even more interesting. The DIA tried to warn Congress about the threat in January 2014, which is when Obama compared them to the “jayvees.” Sixteen months before that, the DIA had predicted exactly what would happen with the group formerly known as al-Qaeda in Iraq, right down to their declaration of a caliphate in the area that the US had fought so hard to wrest from their control in 2006-8. This memo makes it look as though both Obama and Clinton made a habit of getting caught with their pants down, and concocting cover stories when the failures became too obvious to ignore.

Fox: Newly released Benghazi documents show Obama admin lied about attack

Smoking gun! Hillary knew of Benghazi attack 10 days in advance

04/5/15

Russia… Heating Up The Cold War On The Road To World War III

By: Terresa Monroe-Hamilton

Russian Arctic Troops

Norway is worried over Russia, and so they should be. Add to that list of worriers, NATO. Russian ships have now docked at the once secret Norwegian naval base in the Arctic. It would seem that Norway has become a strategic chess piece once again in what is shaping up to be the road to World War III. Russia has its massive Northern Fleet based on nearby Kola Peninsula. “We sold the only base worthy of the name that we had up there. It’s pure madness,” former vice admiral Einar Skorgen, who commanded Norway’s northern forces, told AFP. Indeed, it is madness and the Russians have swooped in to take advantage of this lunacy. Skorgen and other critics are now claiming that Norway has robbed itself of a crucial foothold in the far north, forcing its submarines to travel hundreds of extra miles from their bases to defend the region. Lack of foresight on the Norwegians’ behalf has given the Russians a strong foothold in a very militarily important geopolitical area.

Now, three Russian military ships have spent the entire winter docked deep within the mountain hideaway, once a closely guarded military facility. “We are the only country along with Russia to have a permanent presence in the Barents Sea, where we share a common border. Obviously our navy should be stationed there, including our submarines,” Skorgen said. “If the ships aren’t there where they are needed, they might as well be scrapped altogether.” He is soooo right on that.

The military base changed hands and was rented to the Russkies to house their research vessels. Really, guys? You fell for that crap? Some of these seismic survey ships are reportedly linked to state-owned energy giant Gazprom. The Norwegians and NATO put this base on their military’s version of eBay and no one – including the US – made a bid. So, a Norwegian businessman sealed the deal in 2013 for a paltry $5,000,000 and turned around and leased it to the Russians. This is a massive joke considering that NATO invested nearly $500,000,000 into the construction of the base. “There are no longer any secrets surrounding this base,” said its new landlord Gunnar Wilhelmsen. “Not since the military and NATO agreed to put it on sale over the Internet, along with photographs of every nook and cranny.”

Historic blunder does not begin to cover this move. Those ‘research vessels’ are military vessels, you idiots, some of them surely updated and modernized versions of the old “fishing trawlers” that the USSR used to send out to plague our Naval exercises. Only the Russians know what is on those ships and what they are doing, but I’ll go out on a limb here and say it isn’t reading survey maps and taking samples. This is a special kind of stupid. The decision to close the base was made by the leftist government of Jens Stoltenberg, who has gone on to become NATO’s current Secretary General and who has warned countries not to lower their guard when it comes to Russia. Ironic much? So, first Jens, being the good socialist he is, closes the base and enables the sale of it to the Russians, then he warns not to trust the Russians. Yes, he is epically stupid, unless he’s working for the Russians that is. That is altogether possible.

Kjell-Ola Kleiven, a blogger writing on security issues in Norway, calls the affair the “biggest blunder in recent history” in an oil-rich country which boasts the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund. Labeling this a ‘blunder’ is being way too kind. “With 7,000 billion kroner in the bank,” he wrote, “you would have thought that the Norwegian nation had the means and savvy to retain ownership of Olavsvern base.” Despite the protests, Norway’s current right-wing government has shown no signs of reversing the decision made by its predecessors. So the conservatives are just as suicidally stupid as the socialists. “There are no plans to re-establish military installations in Olavsvern,” Audun Halvorsen, political advisor to the defence minister, told AFP in an email. “The owner of the site can use it as he sees fit and the armed forces do not have the authority to impose restrictions, nor any mandate to monitor civilian ships that dock there,” he added. “Any suspected irregular activity is a matter for the police and legal authorities.” Well, the fallout from World War III is a matter for the world, buddy. And this sounds like something out of Eric Holder’s pie hole concerning police actions versus terrorism. Historically it has been the job of the left to screw things up and the job of the right to make sure those things are not fixed. You’re all in it together and while your military is telling you, “Danger, danger, Will Robinson!” you blithely sell out your military installations and chastise those who object. What a bunch of unbelievably useful idiots.

So, what do you do when you bet all of your military capital on the Cold War being over, only to find the Russians were kidding? The Cold War never ended, it shifted. Does everyone out there still think Russia is the world’s savior? Because, if you do, you are in for a huge surprise and it won’t be pleasant.

The Spy Who Waged War In The Cold

Taking the Arctic benefits Russia in multiple ways. One of them is the vast oil and gas reserves they can claim. It provides a crucially strategic military vantage point. This by the way, further endangers the US and Alaska specifically. Palin was right when she that said you can see Russia from parts of Alaska, and Russia has their scopes on us as well. By the way, the only climate change that the Arctic is experiencing is the Cold War, which is experiencing a bit of a warming curve.

Russia has been a very busy totalitarian regime as of late. Included in their activities and plans, of course, is Iran. Now that Obama has betrayed Israel and mandated that Iran gets nuclear weapons, the Russians want in on the nuclear fun as well:

Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov then said that a UN arms embargo against Iran should also go.

“Lifting sanctions on Iran, including the arms embargo, would be an absolutely logical thing to do,” said Igor Korotchenko, who heads the Global Arms Trade Analysis Center think tank in Moscow.

“Of key importance to us is the delivery of the upgraded S-300 missiles to Iran… A contract to this effect could be resumed on terms acceptable to both Moscow and Tehran,” he added.

Gee, I suppose they’re only going to use those missiles as peaceful paper weights as well. Nothing to worry about at all.

The Americans are putting on a show of force in this game of smoke and mirrors, where nothing is what it seems. On April 1, American B-52 bombers trained with allies over the Arctic and the North Sea. Officially, the flights were just a training mission. Unofficially, they’re meant to show Moscow that Washington won’t back down from a fight. Wish I believed that. The US Air Force planned the training missions — nicknamed Polar Growl — for months, yet launched its planes shortly after the Kremlin wrapped up a massive war game in Russia’s frigid northern regions. STRATCOM, which oversees America’s nuclear arsenal, including the flying branch’s heavy bombers, organized the practice sessions. It was a show of strength to reassure our NATO allies and send a message to the Russians. But the growl doesn’t really bare any teeth.

From War Is Boring:

But Russian officials no doubt see the flights as a response to their recent impressive Arctic maneuvers. For five days in March, tens of thousands of Russian troops, hundreds of warplanes and helicopters and dozens of ships and submarines gathered for the surprise drills.

“New military challenges and threats demand [a] further boost of the military capabilities of armed forces and special attention is being paid to the condition of the newly-set-up strategic command in the north,” Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu said as the mock battle got under way.

Shoigu was referring to the Arctic headquarters Moscow set up in December 2014. Eight months earlier, Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin announced a massive expansion of military facilities in the country’s sparely populated northern areas.

“We need to strengthen our military infrastructure,” Putin said during a meeting of the country’s Security Council. “In particular, to create — in our part of the Arctic — a unified network of naval facilities for new-generation ships and submarines.”

The Kremlin followed up those plans with a revised, over-arching military doctrine at the end of 2014. The new policy described a world where Washington and its NATO allies were dangerous threats bent on encroaching on Russia’s borders.

And the posturing and game of military chicken continues apace… but it’s pretty clear who has the bigger set here, and who has the “flexibility” going on. In March, Russia tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile. US officials and security analysts say it is a new violation of Moscow’s arms control treaty commitments. Like the Russian bear cares. The March 18th flight test of a new RS-26 missile is part of a large-scale nuclear arms buildup by Russia and is raising concerns about treaty compliance. Moscow is engaged in a major nuclear forces buildup that includes new land-based missiles, new missile submarines and new bombers. Meanwhile, Obama has merrily reduced our nuclear capabilities by a whopping 66%. One does not have to be a mathematical genius to see where that leads.

Russia is using Prompt Global Strike as one of its myriad of excuses for upping their air and missile defense capabilities. They claim we may preemptively strike them, which I highly doubt. Obama is much more likely to go golfing with Putin, than bomb him. The PGS initiative aims to deliver a precision-guided conventional weapon airstrike within less than one hour after Washington deems the target to be a national security threat. But since Obama is soooo flexible, that airstrike is not likely to occur under his command.

Russia claims that Washington’s PGS has an overall structure similar to that of a nuclear triad. It first of all aims to conduct swift strikes from land and sea using already existing intercontinental and submarine-based ballistic and cruise missiles. Air-launched hypersonic missiles currently in development are a second option the Pentagon is working on. In addition there were hypothetical plans of kinetic bombardments from an orbiting space platform. This gives the Russians cover to work on development and implementation of comparable weapons. To counter the supposed American threat, Russia is developing a new generation of mobile surface-to-air missile system – the S-500 – designed among other things to intercept supersonic targets. While the missile for the system is still under development, once it is completed, it would be capable of intercepting any perspective ballistic and aerodynamic targets.

In the Arctic region, Russia has already quickly deployed air defense missile and artillery systems. The Defense Ministry also plans to deploy MiG-31 interceptor aircraft to protect Russian vessels sailing along the Northern Sea Route. They have already placed Pantsir systems in the Arctic. Deployment of MiG-31 on Russia’s Arctic airfields is planned as well. Meanwhile a new fully automatic radar station is undergoing final tests.

While Russia is beefing up militarily, not only have we been reducing across the board, what we do have is horrifically outdated. Many of our nuclear missile silos are using technology that is technologically a joke. For example, CBS News has documented that eight inch floppy disks are still being used in many of our missile silos. At this point, the US military plans to keep Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missiles that were originally deployed in the 1960s and 1970s in service until 2030. Gee, that makes me feel warm, fuzzy and secure. Meanwhile, the Russians now have nuclear subs that are almost silent and we’ve known about them for some time – from 2012:

A Russian nuclear-powered attack submarine armed with long-range cruise missiles operated undetected in the Gulf of Mexico for several weeks and its travel in strategic U.S. waters was only confirmed after it left the region, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.

It is only the second time since 2009 that a Russian attack submarine has patrolled so close to U.S. shores.

Imagine a scenario where Russian nuclear subs approach our coastlines completely undetected and launch a barrage of missiles toward our cities and military bases. We could be wiped out before we even knew what hit us. Red Dawn comes to mind. The Russians know this and what is worse… we know it.

As far as preparing for a nuclear attack… once again, the Russians have been preparing for decades while we have just ignored the threat. Did you know that the Russians have a massive underground complex in the Ural mountains that has been estimated to be approximately 400 square miles in size? In other words, if true, it is roughly five-to-six times as big as the total area of Washington DC, or roughly the land area inside the DC Beltway. They also have dozens of similar, smaller sites throughout Russia. The Russians have also been constructing thousands of new underground bomb shelters in major cities such as Moscow. In the US, we can’t even fortify our power grid. It’s embarrassing and it’s suicidal in the extreme.

According to a Russian think tank, the best way for Russia to solve its problem with America would be to launch a nuclear weapon at Yellowstone National Park and hope it would set off a super volcano, destroying the continent. They are also eying the San Andreas fault. I consider this bluster, but who knows? Surely the Russians know that nuking Yellowstone would almost assuredly not set off the super volcano… in fact, it would probably drain off the caldera. Details. Who says the Russians don’t have a sense of humor?

On a more serious note, the Russians are playing both sides of the fence in Europe. From the far right to the radical left, populist parties across Europe are being courted by Russia’s Vladimir Putin who aims to turn them into allies in his anti-EU campaign. The Front National (FN) in France, Syriza in Greece and Jobbik in Hungary may be the most famous ones, but they are far from being alone. Some, like Britain’s UKIP, have disturbingly adopted a “benevolent neutrality” toward Putin. You’ll remember that countries and entities did the same with Adolph Hitler once upon a war. The Kremlin banks on these parties’ accession to power to change Europe and separate it from NATO and the United States, while aligning with Russia.

Russia is heating up the Cold War on the road to World War III across the planet and especially in the Arctic. She has some very strange bedfellows as well. The true axis of evil comprises Russia, China and Iran, who all have their missiles aimed at us. I think the Cold War is about to get hot as the Russian bear dons a parka and skis north, to Alaska.

01/31/15

Washington Times’ Bombshell Tapes Confirm Citizen Commission’s Findings on Benghazi

By: Roger Aronoff
Accuracy in Media

As Hillary Clinton further delays the announcement of her 2016 run for the White House, more news has broken regarding her role in the 2011 disastrous intervention in Libya, which set the stage for the 2012 Benghazi attacks where we lost four brave American lives.

Two new stories from The Washington Times expose some of the infighting among government agencies and branches of government on this controversial decision, and highlight the key role that Clinton played in initiating the war. You can listen to tapes of discussions between Pentagon staffers, former Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), and the Qaddafi regime for yourself.

This news also validates the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi (CCB) 2014 interim report, which exposed that Muammar Qaddafi had offered truce talks and a possible peaceful abdication to the United States, which Washington turned down.

“[The article] also makes it clear that the Benghazi investigation needs to be broadened to answer the question: ‘Why did America bomb Libya in the first place?’” commented Rear Admiral Chuck Kubic (Ret.), a key source for the CCB’s interim report who was also quoted by the Times.

“Despite the willingness of both AFRICOM Commander Gen. Carter Ham and Muammar Qaddafi to pursue the possibility of truce talks, permission was not given to Gen. Ham from his chain of command in the Pentagon and the window of opportunity closed,” reads Kubic’s statement for our report from last year. You can watch here, from a CCB press conference last April, as Admiral Kubic described his personal involvement in the effort to open negotiations between Qaddafi and the U.S. government.

Now we learn that the likely source of the stonewalling came from the State Department—and Secretary Clinton—herself. “On the day the U.N. resolution was passed, Mrs. Clinton ordered a general within the Pentagon to refuse to take a call with Gadhafi’s son Seif and other high-level members within the regime, to help negotiate a resolution, the secret recordings reveal,” reported the Times on January 29.

Former Defense Secretary Bob Gates indicated in his book, Duty, that he was opposed to the war for national security reasons. He highlighted a division among White House advisors—with Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes, and Samantha Power “urging aggressive U.S. action to prevent an anticipated massacre of the rebels as Qaddafi fought to remain in power.” Add to that list the former Secretary of State.

“But that night, with Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s forces turning back the rebellion that threatened his rule, Mrs. Clinton changed course, forming an unlikely alliance with a handful of top administration aides who had been arguing for intervention,” reported The New York Times on March 18, 2011, the day after UN Resolution 1973 authorizing a “no fly” zone in Libya was voted on and passed.

“Within hours, Mrs. Clinton and the aides had convinced Mr. Obama that the United States had to act, and the president ordered up military plans, which Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, hand-delivered to the White House the next day.”

The Washington Times now reports that “In the recovered recordings, a U.S. intelligence liaison working for the Pentagon told a Gadhafi aide that Mr. Obama privately informed members of Congress that Libya ‘is all Secretary Clinton’s matter’ and that the nation’s highest-ranking generals were concerned that the president was being misinformed” about a humanitarian crisis that didn’t exist. However, one must wonder just how much President Obama implicitly supported Clinton in her blind push to intervene in what was once a comparatively stable country, and an ally in the war against al Qaeda. While this new report is certainly damning of Mrs. Clinton’s actions, and appears to place the blame for the unnecessary chaos in Libya—which ultimately led to Benghazi—on her shoulders, President Obama shares the blame as the ultimate Decider-in-Chief.

“Furthermore, defense officials had direct information from their intelligence asset in contact with the regime that Gadhafi gave specific orders not to attack civilians and to narrowly focus the war on the armed rebels, according to the asset, who survived the war,” reports The Washington Times in its second of three articles. Saving those in Benghazi from a looming massacre by Qaddafi seems to have been a convenient excuse made by the administration for political expediency. Could it be, instead, that President Obama, as well as Mrs. Clinton, put greater value on the rise to power of an “Arab Spring” government with Muslim Brotherhood connections? And, as the CCB interim report shows, the U.S. government was willing to go so far as to facilitate the provision of arms to al-Qaeda-linked rebels in Libya in order to ensure that Qaddafi fell.

Will the mainstream media pick up on these new revelations, or will they cast them aside as another “phony scandal” to throw into their dustbins filled with other stories that might possibly embarrass the Obama administration, or prove to be an impediment to Mrs. Clinton’s path to the White House?

“It’s critical to note that Qaddafi was actively engaged with Department of Defense officials to arrange discussions about his possible abdication and exile when that promising development was squashed by the Obama White House,” noted CCB Member Clare Lopez, a former CIA officer, regarding the failed truce talks. “The Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi has been asking, ‘Why?’ for well over a year now.”

“It is time the American people and the families of those who fought and gave their lives at Benghazi in September 2012 were told why those brave Americans had to die at all, much less die alone with no effort made to save them,” she said.

Clinton, through House Democrats, has indicated that she is willing to testify before the House Select Committee on Benghazi. But Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-SC) recently indicated that the Committee must first examine her emails from the State Department before questioning his witness. This complicates the issue of her testifying, since Mrs. Clinton is in the process of calculating when she will announce her presidential run.

Do the emails that Gowdy has requested from the State Department even extend back to 2011?

Chairman Gowdy identified three “tranches” that his potential questioning would fall under in an interview with Fox’s Greta Van Susteren:

Why was the U.S. Special Mission Compound open in the first place?
What actions did Clinton take during the attacks?
What was Clinton’s role during the talking points and Susan Rice’s Sunday morning talk show visits?

A fourth tranche should be: Clinton’s push to intervene in Libya and how it set the stage for an insecure country and strong jihadist movement willing—and able—to attack the Americans posted there. And while he’s at it, Rep. Gowdy should ask Mrs. Clinton to explain why all of the very legitimate requests for increased security in Benghazi were turned down, and why were Ambassador Chris Stevens’ personal security staff, from the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) directed to store their weapons in a separate location—not on them—on the night of September 11, 2012?