VIRTUAL UNIVERSITY

ELIJAH MAGNIER—In the Levant, both US and Russian forces are present in a small area, but with different goals, interests and reasons. Russia seeks the unity of Syria because it is its region of influence. Long-term stability must be established there as an example to other nations. That is not an easy goal to achieve when the US is operating in Syria, interfering with the flow of food, oil and gas in an area considered to be the resource reservoir of the entire country.

DAVID W. PEAR—Everyone should also know about the U.S. 2014 illegal coup in Ukraine. The U.S. was behind a European Union bait and switch offer to Ukraine for eventual membership in the EU. Ukraine was suffering under economic hardships, and the U.S. and EU put stars in the eyes of the Ukrainian people. The psy-op had the Ukrainian people dreaming of a future prosperity, being Europeanized and eventually becoming NATO members. The terms that the EU ended up offering to Ukraine were so deceitful that no Ukrainian president, no matter how corrupt, could accept them. The result was the U.S.-choreographed, the “f*ck the E.U.”, Euromaidan color revolution. U.S. meddling has resulted in thousands of deaths, chaos, and the lives of ordinary Ukrainians has been for the worse for it. The corruption has just changed hands to U.S. profiteers.

Censorship, deplatforming, and de-ranking counterhegemonic content and alternative news, while simultaneously promoting more “authoritative” (i.e., corporate news) content, has so far proven insufficient for the tech and social media giants. They wish to financially and ideologically reestablish the corporate press’s dominance as the manufacturers of public opinion and consent, and as the gatekeepers of information to which the public has access, in addition to recapturing advertising profits by limiting audience access to alternative media sources.

VANESSA BEELEY—Iran has come to the aid of the Syrian air-force helicopters from Hama airport that were transporting water from Sourani Dam in Tartous to limit the expansion of the fires burning in the inaccessible mountain ranges, impossible to reach with fire brigade vehicles. The risk for Iran to assist Syria in this campaign is huge. The terrorist groups are equipped with the US-manufactured ground to air missile launchers which have been used in the past to bring down Syrian aircraft. Fire-fighting planes must necessarily fly low and slow to be most effective which makes them a relatively easy target for the Al Qaeda-linked armed groups armed by the US Coalition members.

September 15, 1970, was a dramatic day in the life of Chilean media mogul, Agustin Edwards Eastman. His day began at 8am, with breakfast in the office of Henry Kissinger, then national security advisor to President Richard Nixon. At 9:15am, Kissinger had arranged for Edwards to secretly see Nixon in the Oval Office. Although there is no documentary record that the meeting with the president took place, later that day at the Madison Hotel in downtown Washington D.C., Edwards became the only Chilean—civilian or military—known to meet face-to-face with CIA Director Richard Helms. At 3:25pm that afternoon, President Nixon called Kissinger and Helms into the Oval Office and instructed them to covertly try to “save Chile” by orchestrating a military takeover. “I have this impression that the president called this meeting,” Helms later testified before the U.S. Senate, “because of Edwards’ presence in Washington and what … Edwards was saying about conditions in Chile.”