Archives

Tagged ‘Militarism‘

Jun 21

2012

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The International Campaign to Destabilize Bolivia, The International Campaign to Destabilize Venezuela

Bolivia CIA Colour Revolutions Militarism Morales neoliberalism South America

Anti-democratic Offensive

By May 11, 2012

As the United States Departments of State and Defense gear up for a new round of destabilization campaigns in South America in 2013 and 2014, the second generation of democratic renewal under leaders like Evo Morales faces a grave threat. Unlike the crude coups and dictatorships of the Cold War and earlier banana republics, this anti-democratic offensive makes exaggerated use of ephemeral pseudo activism in the form of color revolutions used so extensively by the CIA in North Africa and Eastern Europe. Recent snubbing of the US and Canada by South American governments at the Organization of American States may signal a resistance to returning to the days of old, but until they reject neoliberalism and its corrupting influence, they are still susceptible to international markets opening the door to US military control.

[Jay Taber is an associate scholar of the Center for World Indigenous Studies, an author, a correspondent to Fourth World Eye, and a contributing editor of Fourth World Journal. Since 1994, he has served as the administrative director of Public Good Project.]

May 09

2012

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The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria

Brookings Institute CFR China Human Rights Watch Imperialism Libya LIFG Militarism NATO Russia Turkey UN

BROOKINGS INSTITUTE ANNOUNCES NEXT MOVE IN SYRIA – WAR

May 9, 2012

ESSENTIAL BACKGROUND >> TURKEY PREPARED TO INVOKE ARTICLE 5 REQUESTING NATO INTERVENTION IN SYRIA

After admitting UN peace plan was a ploy, Brookings predictably scraps it and begins promoting expanded military conflict.

by Tony Cartalucci

Land Destroyer

By the US policy think-tank Brookings Institution’s own admission, the Kofi Annan six-point peace plan in Syria was merely a ploy to buy time to reorganize NATO’s ineffective terrorist proxies and provide them the pretext necessary for establishing NATO protected safe havens from which to carry out their terrorism from. In fact, Brookings actually stated in a recent report, “Assessing Options for Regime Change” (emphasis added):

“An alternative is for diplomatic efforts to focus first on how to end the violence and how to gain humanitarian access, as is being done under Annan’s leadership. This may lead to the creation of safe-havens and humanitarian corridors, which would have to be backed by limited military power. This would, of course, fall short of U.S. goals for Syria and could preserve Asad in power. From that starting point, however, it is possible that a broad coalition with the appropriate international mandate could add further coercive action to its efforts.” –page 4, Assessing Options for Regime Change, Brookings Institution.


Image: Also out of the Brookings Institution, Middle East Memo #21 “Assessing Options for Regime Change (.pdf),” makes no secret that the humanitarian “responsibility to protect” is but a pretext for long-planned regime change.

As if to alleviate any lingering doubts, NATO’s “Alliance News Blog” has confirmed that the US is committed not to “peace,” but rather to the overthrow of Syria’s government and is “already committed to helping [President Bashar al-Assad] fall,” but is “merely looking for the least violent, lowest cost way to get there.” The April 9, 2012 blog entry features an op-ed titled, “US ‘already committed to helping Assad fall’,” and fully admits that the US is equipping the so-called “Free Syrian Army” which has received weapons, leadership, and cash from the NATO-backed Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) terrorists led by notorious mass-murderer Abdul Hakim Belhaj.


Image: NATO’s official “Alliance News Blog proudly reports that the US is already committed to helping “Assad fall” and is simply using the lull in fighting brought on by Kofi Annan’s disingenuous “peace plan” to rearm, reorganize, and redeploy their terrorist proxy forces against Assad. The op-ed featured on NATO’s blog was featured in the LA Times and written by CFR member Doyle McManus

And now, the Brookings Institution itself has predictably declared the Annan “peace deal” a failure and states that the time to “stretch” Syria’s military to the breaking point through expanded foreign-backed unrest has come. In an article titled, “Annan’s Mission Impossible: Why is everyone pretending that the U.N. plan in Syria has a prayer of suceeding?” Brookings Doha Center director Salman Shaikh insults the intelligence of his readership while handing out useful talking points surely to be parroted by the corporate-media over the next few days and weeks. Shaikh depicts the ceasefire’s failure as solely the result of the Syrian government’s belligerence and brutality, while mentioning nothing of the Syrian opposition’s documented and even admitted atrocities. →

Mar 07

2012

4

Avaaz, The International Campaign to Destabilize Syria, The War on Libya - There Was No Evidence

Avaaz Gaddafi Kosovo Libya Militarism Syria Tom Perriello War

The Grotesque and Disturbing Ideology at the Helm of Avaaz

Image: U.S. President Barack Obama with Avaaz co-founder and former U.S. Representative Tom Perriello.

Imperialism under the guise of humanitarianism – the 21st Century Theme within the Non-profit Industrial Complex

 “As far as America’s war against terrorism is concerned [the] senator provides unequivocal support to Barrack Obama.” – The Perriello of Congress website 

In the 2012 winter issue of ‘Democracy Journal’ Avaaz Co-founder and former U.S. Representative Tom Perriello penned a grotesque and delusional article (below) titled “Humanitarian Intervention: Recognizing When, and Why, It Can Succeed”.

The views within the article are a complete reflection and validation of the U.S. administration’s rhetoric intended to justify the annihilation and occupation of sovereign states under the false pretense of “humanitarian intervention” and “responsibility to protect”.

Make no mistake, this is the ideology of the world’s most powerful NGO, that of Avaaz, and the matrix of NGOs within the non-profit industrial complex.

Next week we will begin publication of our investigative report on Avaaz, the Avaaz co-founders, the Avaaz corporate media partners, the Avaaz strategy, and finally, the role Avaaz played in the NATO-led annihilation of Libya, which, prior to the strategically planned and unprovoked invasion by Imperialist states, held the highest standard of living in Africa. This slaughter has left as many as 150,000 Libyans dead. NGOs must be held accountable for paving the way for these crimes against humanity.

Issue #23, Winter 2012

Humanitarian Intervention: Recognizing When, and Why, It Can Succeed

Tom Perriello

The use of force always entails grave dangers and human costs, and progressives have been leery particularly since the Vietnam era of supporting it, even to prevent or end mass atrocities, repression, and other systematic human suffering. Wise leaders will always remain wary of war. But wisdom also requires us to acknowledge two dramatic changes in our ability to use force for good. First, in a single generation, our ability to intervene without heavy casualties has improved dramatically. Second, the range of diplomatic and legal tools for legitimizing such interventions has likewise expanded. During this same period, we have been reminded tragically of the real and staggering human cost of inaction, most notably in the 800,000 lives lost in Rwanda. The tendency to feel less moral responsibility for the results of inaction and to overvalue the risks of acting in difficult situations is natural, but it is ultimately indefensible.

These new conditions present progressives today with a historic opportunity—to embrace a slight tipping of the scales toward action in the age-old balance between the horrors of the world and the horrors resulting from the military actions that might prevent them. This shift should be seen more as a marginal adjustment than as a dramatic ideological recalibration, but this new-generation understanding can mean the difference between paralysis and action. →

May 11

2011

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Conservation International

Capitalism Conservation International Investigation Lockheed Martin Militarism

Exclusive Conservation International ‘agreed to greenwash arms company’

The Ecologist

11th May, 2011

US environmental charity under fire for close links with controversial companies, including Cargill, Chevron, Monsanto and Shell

A leading environmental charity has been accused of corporate ‘greenwashing’ after a senior employee was secretly filmed by undercover reporters discussing ways in which the organisation could help an arms company boost its green credentials, the Ecologist can reveal.

Options outlined by the representative of Conservation International (CI) included assisting with the arms company’s green PR efforts, membership of a business forum in return for a fee, and sponsorship packages where the arms company could potentially invest money in return for being associated with conservation activities.

The sting was carried out by the London-based magazine Don’t Panic, with their journalists posing as representatives of a major international defence corporation.

Don’t Panic have produced a twelve-minute film in which they make the allegations (watch it below).

The female CI employee was recorded describing how the organisation could help the arms company develop key environmental messages, identify target audiences and craft a communications plan as part of one package offered by the charity.

Footage from the meeting shows the CI representative outlining the benefits of a number of the charity’s initiatives, including membership of the ‘Business and Sustainability Council’, which is offered to companies in return for a payment of $37,500 per year.

The payments would secure the company being publicly listed as a partner on the council, facilitate company representatives meeting with other council members – which includes controversial multinationals Shell, Monsanto and Chevron, amongst others – and provide access to CI expertise and networks.

Undercover footage of a Conservation International employee discussing helping an arms company with its green PR

VIDEO:

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/877241/conservation_international_agreed_to_greenwash_arms_company.html

In the meeting, which took place in London in October 2010, the CI employee also outlined how the charity could potentially facilitate the arms company if it wanted to be associated with protecting an endangered species.

The CI manager explained how the organisation could make introductions to relevant NGOs and potentially help the arms company to develop a PR strategy for the venture, if money was invested in a relevant conservation programme.

Film footage shows the CI employee suggesting North African birds of prey as a possible endangered species mascot for the arms company because of the ‘link to aviation’.

In follow up correspondence between CI and the undercover reporters, seen by the Ecologist, CI also outline possible sponsorship options for the arms company, with investment needing to be at least £150,000 over three years.

Close links to big business

Although there is no suggestion of illegality or wrongdoing on behalf of CI, the footage could prove embarrassing to the US-based charity and could fuel growing concerns amongst activists that some NGOs are growing too close to big businesses often linked to environmental destruction and other abuses.

‘That we [the arms company] were not serious about green issues was made clear to Conservation International over and over again [in our meeting],’ Heydon Prowse, from Don’t Panic, said.

‘We told them that one of our key environmental strategies was to recycle bomb shrapnel from battle zones to use again in new bombs and that we were adapting our cluster bomb technology to drop seeds so as to re-forest remote regions. We waited for them to be outraged… they never were.’

CI is linked with at least one other company in the defence sector – Northrup Gruman – which supplies the US military and provides parts for warplanes.

The President and CEO of Northrup Gruman, Wes Bush, also sits on the CI Board of Directors.

CI’s ‘Business and Sustainability Council’ is, according to the organisation, ‘a community of corporate leaders committed to taking positive environmental actions in their businesses.’ Members include a number of controversial companies including Cargill, Chevron, McDonald’s, Monsanto, Walmart, Goldman Sachs, Shell and Bunge.

The corporations commit to paying $75,000 over two years to CI and to send senior representatives to council meetings. The companies are also encouraged to host meetings themselves; one, held in late 2010, examined ‘sustainable agriculture’ and was hosted by Monsanto.

CI recently partnered with the Walt Disney Company on carbon offsetting, working with the media company to set up controversial Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) schemes in Peru and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The organisation also previously partnered with agribusiness giant Cargill as part of a project to ‘create benefits for both business and biodiversity in areas where Cargill operates’. Cargill provided support of $1.5 million to the venture.

Don’t Panic say they were astonished that CI didn’t appear to have any qualms about partnering with an arms company.

‘If we discovered that our elected politicians at DEFRA had been accepting money from these characters it would rightly be a scandal. Should we not expect as much from the charities we donate to who claim to uphold a cause on our behalf?’ said Heydon Prowse.

Conservation International declined to comment when approached by the Ecologist.

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/877241/conservation_international_agreed_to_greenwash_arms_company.html