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…”
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.
CYNTHIA CHUNG—In other words, the CIA was stating that JIC-502’s frantic lunacy in demanding a military buildup and first strike capability against the Soviets was groundless. That there was no data to support such a claim, and thus such a response would be a reckless and dangerous one.
It became evident to those who wished to push through these permanent war policies that the CIA was going to need “stronger” leadership.
At least, this was the argument made by the Dulles-Jackson-Correa Report which called for a strong CIA Director in the wake of the Cold War. Though Walter Bedell Smith, who would become CIA Director from 1950-53, did much to reorganise the CIA away from the pre-emptive war mongering, it was ultimately Allen Dulles who would take the CIA throne.
P. GREANVILLE—As longstanding supporters of The Grayzone, just about one of the few consistently reliable antiwar/anti-imperialist outfits in what remains of the Western left, we are delighted to see their work making headway and headlines, especially among our common enemies. Contrary to all the noise, there is absolutely zero reason for the constant hysterical hostility, and even less for the talk of war, against Russia, China, Iran and other nations singled out by the empire for imaginary crimes fully manufactured by the West’s engines of disinformation. The world and especially Washington and Britain face no threat whatsoever from the currently designated “rogue nations”, except the threats they themselves create. Meanwhile, via a transparent regimen of suffocating mendacity, Washington, London and their imperialist accomplices seek to demonise their opponents by any means necessary. This is serious. We all know from painful experience with the Big Hegemon’s playbook that character assassination usually precedes actual execution.
PEPE ESCOBAR—The imperialist West and its infernal hypocrisy are driving the world toward war, suggests Pepe Escobar. And to think that in a not so distant past there used to be some flashes of lucidity emanating from the US establishment.
Very few will remember that in 1993 James Baker, former Secretary of State under Daddy Bush, advanced the idea of expanding NATO to Russia, which at the time, under Yeltsin and a gang of Milton Friedmanesque free marketeers, was devastated, but ruled by “democracy”. Yet Bill Clinton was already in power, and the idea was duly discarded.
Six years later, no less than George Kennan – who invented the containment of the USSR in the first place – determined that the NATO annexation of former Soviet satellites was “the beginning of a new Cold War” and “a tragic mistake”.