JANICE KORTKAMP— Her summary of the war against Syria is succint, mordant and spot on: “It is: A terrorist-proxy war. An economic siege war. A political war to undermine the sovereignty and legitimacy of the Syrian state. An attrition war. A media propaganda war. A divide and conquer war…”
AJIT SINGH—The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been central to the rising international prominence of the Uyghur separatist movement. In 2020, the NED boasted that it has given Uyghur groups $8,758,300 since 2004 (including $75,000 in annual funding to the UAA) and claimed to be “the only institutional funder for Uyghur advocacy and human rights organizations.”
“As a result of NED’s support, the Uyghur advocacy groups have grown both institutionally and professionally over the years,” said Akram Keram, a program officer and regional expert at NED. “These groups played critical roles in introducing the Uyghur cause in various international, regional, and national settings against China’s false narratives, bringing the Uyghur voice to the highest international levels, including the United Nations, European Parliament, and the White House. They provided firsthand, factual resources documenting the atrocities in East Turkistan, informing and inspiring the introduction of relevant resolutions, sanctions, and calls for action to hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable.”
CAITLIN JOHNSTONE—The US-centralized empire is circling the planet with hundreds of military bases, working to destroy any nation which disobeys its dictates and brandishing armageddon weapons at its enemies like a drunken hillbilly with a shotgun, and people are still like “Something must be done about China’s intellectual property theft!”
Among the violent and destructive governments in our world, one towers high above all the others in a league entirely of its own. Add in the malign behavior of its allies, who effectively function as arms of the same single empire on foreign policy, and the gap between it and the next-worst offender grows even greater. And yet, somehow, many people act as though this power structure should not face a unique level of criticism and scrutiny.
AJAMU BARAKA—The major contradiction that Marx identified was between the capitalists and the workers. And that’s a continuing contradiction, but at this stage of monopoly global capital and the irrationality of these processes, the major contradiction today, in my opinion, is between capitalism—the capitalist class—and collective humanity. We have to take power from these maniacs if we’re going to survive. So there’s an objective, material need for us to recognize that we have an interest in taking power back from the capitalist class if we want to survive for ourselves and for our children.
MATT EHRET—How has the Biden team chosen to try to counter the Belt and Road Initiative whose existence so dearly threatens the unipolar order upon which his narrow idea of “U.S. interests” rests?
The insanity of the two available options are only matched by their disassociation from reality: 1) unleash a total war of extermination by kicking over the game board or 2) promote an “alternative U.S.-led Belt and Road Initiative” (according to Biden’s own words).
While this second option may sound unbelievable, the fact is that the geriatric Puppet-in-Chief actually stated in his recent call with Boris Johnson that the USA must create “an infrastructure plan to rival the BRI”. Biden went on to say “I suggest we have, essentially a similar initiative… helping those communities around the world that in fact need help”.