Tag: perpertual war

Meet the British intelligence-linked firm that warped MH17 news coverage

In November of 2022, a final judgment arrived in the trial of alleged perpetrators of the attack on Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17). Russian nationals Igor Girkin and Sergey Dubinskiy, and Donbas separatist Leonid Kharchenko, were convicted in absentia for the murder of MH17’s 283 passengers and 15 crew members. They were ruled to have arranged the transfer of the Buk surface-to-air missile system that reportedly struck the plane.

Oleg Pulatov, the only defendant to seek legal representation during the trial, was conversely acquitted on all charges, which prosecutors will not appeal.

The Malaysian airliner had been purportedly shot down by a missile on July 17th 2014, killing all 283 passengers and 15 crew aboard.

Heavily dependent on information supplied by the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) and the Western government-funded “open source” investigations organization known as Bellingcat, the guilty verdicts appeared to vindicate an established narrative in which Russia and its Donbas allies were solely culpable. 

But as this investigation will reveal, much of the news coverage of MH17 was heavily influenced by a shadowy entity called Pilgrims Group, which is closely tied to British intelligence. 

Staffed and led by British Special Forces veterans, Pilgrims Group is a private security company offering elite security services to London’s embassies, diplomats, spies, and business interests abroad, particularly in high-risk environments. It also trains foreign militaries and paramilitary groups, and provides protection to reporters and their employers. 

It was in the latter context that Pilgrims Group shaped media coverage – and by extension, official investigations – of MH17. The company had maintained a presence in Kiev since the early days of the US-orchestrated Maidan “revolution” in late 2013, shepherding journalists to and from the scenes of major events in Ukraine. In the process, it maintained control over what the reporters under its watch saw and how they understood the situations they encountered.

As such, Pilgrims Group played a pivotal role in the effort by the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) and British intelligence to convict Russia and the Donbas separatists for MH17’s downing. The operation began while the plane’s wreckage remained smoldering on the ground of rebel-controlled territory, and ultimately prevented the initiation of any genuinely independent investigations.

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Slowly But Steadily, the Executive Branch is Bringing Back Widespread Drone Warfare

Not at any other time in the 21st century has the average American kept up less with the Global War on Terror, and now three presidents later, the questions of legality, productivity, and collateral damage remain as unanswered as they’ve ever been.

Over the last 15 months, the number of US drone strikes in Yemen and Somalia has increased greatly compared to the first half of the Biden Administration. On March 1st, AFP reported that local government sources in the Yemeni province of Marib said a US drone strike had killed the al-Qaeda leader Hamad bin Hamoud al-Tamimi, a “judge” of a sort-of “leadership council.”

This came about a month after similar sources reported 3 supposed al-Qaeda fighters killed in a US drone strike in the same province.

Regarding the latter, the 3 men were killed in a car. Evidence at the scene let two experts tracking the US drone warfare program believe it was an R9X Hellfire missile – an expensive and sophisticated bomb typically reserved for “high-value targets.”

“The R9X is for high-value target killing and we don’t have any [sic] ’Who is this guy, why does he merit this now?’” said David Sterman, a senior policy analyst at the Washington-based think tank New America, which for years has tracked US drone strikes in Yemen. “If it is a US strike, it raises substantial questions about what is the state of the US drone war in Yemen.”

Drones haven’t been in the news as much as they were when former-President Donald Trump substantially downgraded the required authority to launch one from the theater commander, who needed the White House’s permission under the Obama Administration, to officers on the ground.

Only recently did Joe Biden’s administration even establish a policy for their use, long after he had used them to supposedly kill al-Qaeda founder Ayman al-Zawahiri last August, and 10 innocent children and men in Kabul the August before that.

Luke Hartig, the former Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council, and former Dept. Director for Counterterrorism under the Sect. of Defense, is one of the only minds in America still actively criticizing drone policy from inside the establishment.

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Biden officials claim rogue Ukrainian Navy Seals pulled off deep sea Nord Stream sabotage, despite Ukraine not having a functioning navy

The people in charge have become comically deficient at spinning tales of ruling class heroism and international intrigue, as evidenced by their latest story about the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines.

From scripts declaring that bat (or pangolin) soup led to a “global pandemic,” to declaring that humanity had achieved a “miracle cure” vaccine (100% effective, said Pfizer) for the coronavirus, and now, distorted, source-free chronicles meant to boost support for the Slava Slush Fund, the lies continue to reach new heights of implausibility.

The New York Times dropped the latest spoon-fed script on Tuesday, with three of its intelligence community stenographers writing that an unnamed “pro-Ukrainian group” is said to be responsible for the September sabotage of Russia’s Nord Stream pipelines.

Speaking truth to power? No no no. Forget about that! The New York Times uses power as an instrument to peddle distortions, completely detached from the truth. It is Soviet Pravda, except that the direct Uniparty affiliation remains an unspoken truth.

The sources for their information on the Nord Stream operation are anonymous intelligence agents. Notably, the reporters on the byline have a reputation for peddling stories for three letter agencies, regardless of the veracity behind their claims. These churnalists are very loyal media assets, as proven by their shameless, routine publishing of unsourced declarations from non-identified, anonymous “intelligence” agents. In exchange, they are awarded with journalism awards.

Making matters more absurd, this “pro-Ukrainian” group acted without the knowledge of the man in charge, President Volodomyr Zelensky, or any of his top deputies, the intelligence agents tell the stenographers.

Now, it’s worth noticing that the New York Times article describes these actors as “pro-Ukrainian.” However, the unnamed intelligence agents also told them it was a “proxy force with connections to the Ukrainian government or its security services,” adding that “officials who have reviewed the intelligence said they believed the saboteurs were most likely Ukrainian or Russian nationals.”

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Pentagon says U.S. will keep military presence in Iraq, 20 years after invasion

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin says the U.S. will maintain a military presence in Iraq, 20 years after the United States invaded Iraq and overthrew President Saddam Hussein.

Austin made the announcement during an unannounced trip to Iraq on Tuesday – two weeks shy of the 20-year anniversary of the invasion.

He said after a meeting with Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani that U.S. forces would remain in the country “at the invitation of the government of Iraq,” Austin according to Reuters.

“The United States will continue to strengthen and broaden our partnership in support of Iraqi security, stability and sovereignty,” he said also said.

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Ukraine Wants the US to Provide Cluster Bombs to Use With Drones

Ukraine has been seeking cluster bombs from the US to use in its war against Russian forces and is now asking for a type of the controversial munition that they want to adapt so they can be dropped from drones, Reuters reported on Monday.

According to House Reps. Adam Smith (D-WA) and Jason Crow (D-CO), Ukraine is seeking the MK-20, an air-delivered cluster bomb. They said Ukrainian officials were asking members of Congress to persuade the White House to sign off on the delivery during the recent Munich Security Conference.

Cluster munitions scatter small bombs over large areas, making them more indiscriminate than other munitions. According to Reuters, the MK-20 releases 240 dart-like submunitions or bomblets after being launched.

The bomblets in cluster munitions often don’t explode on impact, making them a huge danger to civilians who comes across them, similar to land mines. The 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions that bans the weapons has over 100 signatories, but the US, Russia, and Ukraine are not parties to the treaty.

Since Russia launched its invasion in February 2022, both Russian and Ukrainian forces have used cluster munitions. Kyiv was also accused of using the bombs in populated areas of Donestk back in 2014.

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NBC Journalist Added to Ukraine’s ‘Kill List’ After Reporting the Truth About Crimea

NBC News journalist Keir Simmons has been added to Ukraine’s CIA-backed “kill list” after he reported the truth about Crimea, the contested region that seceded from Ukraine to join Russia in 2014, voting in favor of a secession referendum by more than 95%. That action kicked off the first phase of the Russo-Ukrainian War. Now, in 2023, the Ukrainians say that they will not stop fighting until they’ve invaded Crimea and control it once more, albeit, against the population’s will.

Keir Simmons of NBC News issued a recent report from the ground in Crimea, interviewing residents first-hand and asking for their opinions on the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War, and the political tensions at the center of it. According to Simmons, everyone he interviewed was pro-Russia. As a result, Simmons has been added to Ukraine’s CIA-backed “kill list,” joining American citizen Jackson Hinkle and Pink Floyd lead man plus anti-war activist Roger Waters as those who’ve been declared top enemies of Ukraine for not buying into their war and promoting the continued supply of NATO financial and military aid.

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The Military-Industrial Complex and American Fascism

President Dwight D. Eisenhower (Ike) had it right. The military-industrial complex (MIC) is fundamentally antidemocratic The national security state has become the fourth branch of government and arguably the most powerful one. It gets the most money, more than half of the federal discretionary budget, even as the military remains America’s most trusted institution, despite a woeful record in wars since 1945.

A colleague, Christian Sorensen, says that when we look closely at the MIC we see something akin to American fascism. As he put it to me: “Our fascism certainly doesn’t look like past European movements, but it is far more durable, has killed millions and millions (SE Asia, Indonesia, Central America, Middle East), and has manifold expressions: wars abroad, wars at home, surveillance state, digital border, militarized law enforcement, economic warfare in the form of sanctions, militarization of space.”

It’s hard not to agree with him, not in the sense of Hitler’s Germany or Mussolini’s Italy but in the sense of concentrated government/corporate power that draws sustenance from nationalism at home and imperialism abroad. It’s true that America doesn’t have goose-stepping soldiers in the street. There are no big military parades (though Donald Trump once wanted one). It still seems like we have contending political parties. But when we look deeper, a militant nationalism and aggressive imperialism powered by corporations and enforced by government, including notably the Supreme Court, is the salient feature of this American moment.

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US Begins ‘Training Assessment’ For Ukrainian Pilots On F-16s

The White House has so far ruled out calls to provide the Ukrainian government with F-16 fighter jets, but clearly the idea is still on the table and Biden may be close to pulling the trigger amid intense administration discussions.

“Two Ukrainian pilots are currently in the United States undergoing an assessment to determine how long it could take to train them to fly attack aircraft, including F-16 fighter jets, according to two congressional officials and a senior U.S. official,” a weekend NBC report indicates.

“The Ukrainians’ skills are being evaluated on simulators at a U.S. military base in Tucson, Arizona, the officials said, and they may be joined by more of their fellow pilots soon,” the report continues.

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Biden Extends ‘National Emergency’ Due to ‘Extraordinary Threat’ of Russian Actions in Ukraine

President Joe Biden has extended an executive order that declared a “national emergency” in the United States because of Russian actions in Ukraine that conflict with U.S. interests, according to a White House notice.

Signed in March 2014 by then-President Barack Obama, Executive Order 13660 declared “a national emergency” amid the “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States constituted by the actions and policies of persons that undermine democratic processes and institutions in Ukraine; threaten its peace, security, stability, sovereignty, and territorial integrity; and contribute to the misappropriation of its assets,” the March 2 notice states.

While the order was signed after Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine, it has been expanded over the years with additional executive orders, including the taking of additional sanctions.

Just days before the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Biden signed another executive order that “further expanded the scope of the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13660” and “relied on for additional steps taken” in other orders.

“The actions and policies addressed in these Executive Orders continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States,” the White House stated, noting that Biden will continue “for 1 year the national emergency declared in Executive Order 13660.”

The White House stated that executive orders “deal with” individuals who “undermine Ukraine’s democratic processes” as well as threaten the country’s security, peace, and sovereignty.

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NBC Reporter Goes To Crimea, Shocks Viewers By Telling The Truth

Mainstream media correspondents for major US networks rarely, if ever, report from inside Crimea and certainly are nowhere near Russian-held territory in eastern Ukraine. However, this week NBC News chief international correspondent Keir Simmons went to Sevastopol, surrounded by a significant Russian military presence given it is home to the Russian Navy’s Black Sea Fleet, and in a live segment admitted that it’s not at all realistic Zelensky and Ukrainian forces can ever hope to take Crimea. 

This is especially as the “the people there… view themselves as Russian.” Simmons noted that “This is the closest that any US news crew has got to the Russian Black Sea Fleet in many many years.” He explained that “Vladimir Putin will be determined to defend that port – to not have it take it away from him – he may well do pretty much anything to try to achieve that.”

“It is a very, very dangerous standoff.. it’s hard to see how you reach a negotiation over that. There’s military absolutely everywhere, it is a military town,” he continued, before saying…

“When for example Victoria Nuland talks about that at the very least we [the US] want Crimea to be demilitarized, I find myself standing there and wondering, how on earth does that happen?“

Ukrainian officials and pro-Kyiv media pundits are said to be outraged at the segment, given it repeatedly and bluntly referenced that Crimeans see themselves as Russians. Even a separate write-up filed days earlier from inside Crimea and posted to NBC’s website included the following: 

This is not Russia, according to Kyiv, its Western allies and the United Nations. It was annexed by the Kremlin in 2014, with the U.N. calling on Russia to return to its “internationally recognized borders.” And following Moscow’s broader invasion launched a year ago, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has vowed Ukraine will take Crimea back.

But Praskovya Baranova, 73, speaks Russian, feels Russian and lives here.

But it appears that the NBC correspondent, once he was on the ground in a place that few Western reporters ever venture, couldn’t deny the plain truth he was seeing all around him.

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