Weapons Of Mass Ignorance - Case Ukraine Conflict

[AnssiH]

Looking at the way most of the media is handling the Ukraine conflict, my absurd-o-meter has exploded once again. While it's being repaired, I wanted to talk about something important. This is long because I really wanted to point out some important interconnections, and provide a lot of material to do your own research.

 

The bottom line is, regular people never want to go to war. They have to first become convinced that they are under attack by someone. One or the both sides need to get suckered into believing something that is not exactly true before there can be a large armed conflict.

 

Governments on the other hand have plenty of reasons to go to war, but typically the real reasons would not be enough for the people to fight. Would you fight to save a petrodollar monopoly or a fiat currency or the power of elite class? Probably not. But there are ways to incite conflict by starting bushfires and twisting the truth with some useful semantics. If you study the history of the world even superficially, you can see these patterns repeating over and over.

 

Controlling people this way is amazingly easy when there exists overwhelming mass ignorance about the real issues. Everyone should be well aware of many very recent cases of this, but still people keep believing some absurd cartoon version of reality. It's so ironic how the same people who never bother researching beyond the news articles, nevertheless assume that any opposing views are simply resulting from propaganda; "something that can only be believed by those who blindly believe their news". Then they turn around and say "I feel so confused about everything that's happening". So strange.

 

Even most journalists have the attitude that anything outside of standard narrative is not worth researching. There are tons of articles where a simple Google search about the pertinent issues would lead you to somewhat different perspective. I don't believe all the journalists are just lying, I think most of them are just ignorant. But they have a real responsibility in sharing the facts with the public without important omissions, and that's not happening. They should understad, bad journalism kills people.

 

When MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, my first thought was "wow, someone really wants to stir up a bigger fight". And sure enough, just about everyone around me already knew that basically Putin was responsible, before even the first bit of investigation had started. Everyone should realize immediately that there is a great incentive on both sides to shoot a passenger plane down, especially since the mass ignorance will cause everybody to automatically pin the blame on the opposite party without questions. The point of using a passenger plane is that it makes the whole world feel "it could have easily been me", and so brings the conflict to your doorstep. That's the stock solution for stirring up maximum amount of emotion globally, and it has happened many times before. If it was shot down intentionally, it was because someone wanted that response. And if more people understood this, there would be no reason to do these things.

 

Okay, let's look at Ukraine a bit more. You've heard these accusations about neo-nazis inside the Ukrainian government with the US support, which US government is publicly denying. Or maybe you haven't heard anything, then this article contains nice set of links to follow;

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-hughes/the-neo-nazi-question-in_b_4938747.html

 

Obviously every country has got radical elements. When things are "not great" in a country, the amount of radical elements increases, because more and more people believe some cartoon reality where all their problems are caused by X. In the case of the Ukrainian far-right nationalists, it's the Russian ethnic group. Which is a lot of people because Ukraine became independent from Russia relatively recently.

 

The Ukrainian right-wing radicals are these guys;

 

Of course there are pro-russian radicals as well (as well as plenty of perfectly sane pro-russian people), but I'm really trying to point out how dangerously far away the mainstream western media has drifted from reality.

 

Let's look at this little closer. Pay attention to the Svoboda head Oleh Tiahnybok

 

Who is clearly not a fan of negotiations;

http://en.tiahnybok.info/news/comments/00011512/

 

Which somewhat explains why the Russian ethnic group is not even allowed to enter the negotiation table. There are elements who simply want them out of the country.

 

As far as I know, Svoboda really didn't have that much political power until recently. Why did that change now? Consider the pictures in here;

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-u-s-has-installed-a-neo-nazi-government-in-ukraine/5371554

Oleh Tiahnybok meeting with US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, and John McCain. This should start to ring some bells... A stock solution for starting up bushfires is you support the radical elements who are the enemy of your enemy. And if there are not enough radical elements, you throw in some sanctions and watch the radicalism rise. And just bank on your own people staying ignorant so the whole thing doesn't turn into another PR disaster.

 

Just like how the so-called Al-Qaeda started by US creating Afghan fighters from the radical elements of Afghanistan when they were fighting Russia. Just like how Saddam Hussein was supported when it was useful for the western world. Just like how Libyan radical elements, who want sharia law into the country, suddenly received US support to topple over Gaddafi. Some material you can follow later:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/amnesty-questions-claim-that-gaddafi-ordered-rape-as-weapon-of-war-2302037.html

http://journal-neo.org/2014/06/22/the-truth-of-libya-finally-goes-mainstream/

 

And it's being done in Ukraine again with the blessing of the mass ignorance. So are the Ukrainian radicals delivering the violence that is expected from them? What do you think;

WARNING GRAPHIC!

Jump to around 5:00 to see democracy being supported by shooting people who are trying to vote. Anyone okay with this?

 

and

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYjsCJwcPWk

 

and so on. Seriously, we still have a mostly free internet (and let's try to keep it that way). This stuff is not hard to find.

 

And the Odessa fire? This is one of the more objective western accounts. But still they "have no idea why the people couldn't escape", and they even question if it was actually the pro-Russian leader who commanded the people into the building. And if you bother to find some videos freely available on the internet;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3MOEC5wL7U

 

Just watch the first 3 minutes and you should figure it out.

 

And do the US diplomats know about all this? Of course they do, they are banking on it. Did you hear about that leaked phonecall between Victoria Nuland and Geoffrey Pyatt (US ambassador to Ukraine);

Transcript:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26079957

"I'm just thinking in terms of sort of the process moving ahead we want to keep the moderate democrats together. The problem is going to be Tyahnybok [Oleh Tyahnybok, Svoboda leader] and his guys and I'm sure that's part of what [President Viktor] Yanukovych is calculating on all this."

 

I.e. they know the far right thugs could easily become a problem. Except that, they mean a PR problem. And sure enough the phonecall itself did turn into a PR problem, but it was quickly spun into "this was a new low for Russia". Presumably in that they would spy phonecalls like that. I think they are trying to melt my mind with sheer irony, and it's working.

 

This issue is being referred to here as well, where it becomes clearer why the radicals are being supported by the US;

 

The reason they are being supported is that stirring up conflict will activate the other party too, and provide context for exactly what they want to do next. They don't mind letting radicals gain more power, because they think they can just turn around and crush them anytime they want with another spin. Conflicts are profitable, so who cares. And as people are becoming less ignorant about all this, watch it getting spun into "why isn't Putin doing anything to stop the violence?"

 

Whatever your interpretation of this is, the underlying problem is that most of this is not being reported except by amateurs on the internet doing the job the professional journalists should be doing. The mass ignorance allows the stupidity to spread. And that is why it doesn't make sense to most people in the west when Russia is arguing that it is trying to protect Russian ethnic people in Ukraine, and complaining that the Ukrainian government is not protecting its own people. This also explains why there really are a lot of people who are voting for joining Russia. Meanwhile our side is screaming how such voting is illegal, literally months after performing a coup in Kiev. What a joke, but no one seems to be hearing the punchline over their ignorance.

 

Obviously there are other reasons why there is such a strong radical nationalist element in Ukraine now, most likely having to do with similar problem of Russian ethnic thugs running around rampant, and certainly it is possible bushfire tactics were also employed by Russia.

 

So let's take one more step back to some of the real reasons behind the tension, because those reasons are also almost entirely omitted, for some rather obvious reasons if you understand game theory at all.

 

NATO wants to place its missiles into Ukraine, which is basically the same thing as Soviet Union placing its missiles into Cuba but in reverse. NATO argues Russia is just paranoid in thinking the system could be used for offense. Russia argues NATO is good at stirring up wars. They are demanding an equal partnership to the system, and legally binding guarantees that the system won't be used against it, neither of which it is getting. Shouldn't we be asking why that is? Personally I think the whole missile plan is just absurd and can only work to undermine diplomatic relations.

 

But then why is US and EU so aggresssively involved in this conflict? I'm afraid the biggest reason is trade politics, and the risky state of the western monetary system. Remember, the protests that led to the coup of the Ukrainian pro-russian government last February involved Ukraine signing a trade agreement with Russia instead of EU. That's a hint.

 

Understand that a lot of the global trade politics determine the power that different instances have in the global power game. For example, consider the fact that, if the world stops using the petrodollar in their oil trade, then US dollar would most likely return to close to its intrinsic value very fast (which is zero). If you can't use dollars to buy oil, what value would other governments place to the currency?

 

If you google for "Federal Reserve Gold", you get back pictures of massive mountains of gold. Here's to the mass ignorance. The simple fact of the matter is that Federal Reserve does not own any gold. US dollar has not been redeemable in gold for a long time. If there was no petrodollar monopoly across the globe, the other nations would not and could not place any value to it. If they would not place any value to it, the dollar would hyperinflate, and the entire FED debt system would cease to be able to create money for global trade. In other words it would just collapse like a house of cards. The US government is extremely well aware of this, and so you should be. Except that, the more aware you are of the fragility of a currency, the more fragile it gets, so you see the game theory bit here...

 

At the same time, the petrodollar monopoly is obviously problematic to many countries. So why are they not moving away from petrodollar if it's so detrimental to them you ask? Many are trying, but every time they have done so, there has been a most unfortunately timed war or regime change, which has just so happened to switch the country back to petrodollar.

 

The simple fact is that US dollar cannot hold value without the petrodollar monopoly, so just keep a keen eye on this fact when observing the wars US is fighting. Starts to make sense why the US has been so entangled with all the politics and regime changes in the middle east, eh? The more you research, the more obvious this becomes.

 

Iraq;

http://ftmdaily.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/ft_iraq-returns-to-international-oil-market.pdf

"The tender, for which bids are due by June 10, switches the transaction back to dollars - the international currency of oil sales - despite the greenback's recent fall in value. Saddam Hussein in 2000 insisted Iraq's oil be sold for euros, a political move, but one that improved Iraq's recent earnings thanks to the rise in the value of the euro against the dollar."

 

Switch back to dollar even though it would yield less profit. The real reason should be quite obvious by now. Some commentary;

http://ftmdaily.com/preparing-for-the-collapse-of-the-petrodollar-system-part-3/

 

Also in Libya Gaddafi was driving the African trade to switch to gold dinars, which would have been devastating to US and EU who are not really dealing with gold.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/markets/item/4630-gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-have-devastated-dollar

http://rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/

 

Regardless of what you believe of the real motives for the wars in these areas, few facts are undeniable;

 

1. These moves to switch to resource based currency would have dealt a devastating, and possibly a lethal blow to the western monetary system, and similarly to those instances who currently get all their power from controlling the money system.

 

2. Considering 1, it would be naive to simply assume these issues are unrelated and co-incidental.

 

3. Either way, it is absolutely criminal to keep the public ignorant about things that are this important.

 

4. Keeping the public ignorant makes it easier to start unrelated bushfires and justify aggression with them.

 

So what does this have to do with Russia? Well, Russia, China and Iran are planning to move away from Petrodollar. You would think this is somewhat important, and they should say something about it on the news maybe? But somehow you haven't heard too much about it have you? Imagine that.

 

Are you being vigilant, or do you think only crazy people question the news? How about not operating with truthiness anymore. How about also listening to those people who are presenting views that challenge ours? How about not getting suckered into believing the cartoon reality where the Ukrainian conflict is caused by Putin suddenly attacking Ukraine "because he is a madman". Rule of thumb, if you are being told some people are doing something "because they are mad/evildoers/dictators", you should look behind the curtains, just in case. Use the internet, and start stitching up a picture from broader set of facts. Don't just read an article about what someone has said, read the transcripts of what actually has been said. Those are often two very different things.

 

Attempting to get into the head of those you see as your enemy, is not to agree with their views. It is to understand their motives and so to understand the conflict. Only by understanding the conflict, you can understand how to fix it. Mass stupidity has never solved anything. How about stopping the childish sanctions game that has never worked anyway, and start figuring out how to improve the situation of the people who actually live in Ukraine?

 

Just remember, a government, and the nation it is governing, are two different things. There are real conflicts of interest between them. A government protects itself by finding ways to control its people, which fuels anti-government feelings, and becomes a vicious cycle. We have social media, and until some patriot act or spying mechanism prevents you from using it, just make sure you share the facts that the media is failing to report, and so do your share in making us little bit less ignorant. Share these links, or share this post, and just promote the idea that we really should learn from history, and that it really is okay to question what we are being told.

[AnssiH]

And here you go, Petro Symonenko isn't allowed to speak in Ukrainian parliament;

(Uploaded to youtube at May of this year)
It makes no difference at all whether you agree with his opinions or not, but democracy is not about stifling free speech. Especially not in parliament. Democracy requires free information flow to function.

In my view free speech in itself, even if its lies or ignorance, is not a problem. It becomes a problem when massess of people can be held ignorant so easily. People who use force to stop people from talking, are often doing so because they are running some kind of "end-justify-the-means" campaign, and there are plenty of inconvenient truths out there that would hurt their case. It is very common if you start to look behind the curtains a bit.

And is he talking the truth? According to our media, he is just doing Russian propaganda. According to plenty of Youtube videos and other independent reports, he is telling the truth. Watch this, and think about how things get this far;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43i1FRDZSmg

Bunch of ignorant kids running around thinking they are saving the country from evil. Hang all the Russian people? Probably reminds you of something?

The most important point is this; things like Nazi germany and holocaust did not occur because suddenly a half of a nation were genetically evil somehow. It occurred because half of a nation believed they are doing exactly what needs to be done for national security. They didn't want to kill all the jews and communists. They believed they had to. What enables such ideas is mass ignorance over real issues, allowing small groups of people impose their opinion onto the beliefs of large masses.

The kinds of videos above represent inconvenient truths to our media, and by omitting them from their reports they are also perpetrating to mass ignorance that allows stupidity and violence to spread. I don't care what the opinion of a news outlet is, but to not have the balls to report anything that indicates something against their own beliefs is simply undermining democratic mechanisms.

Democracy cannot function if overwhelming majority of people can be kept ignorant about the real issues.

In Ukraine you have kids running around (who probably know very little about WW1 and WW2) led by people who really believe radical nationalism is the way forward. They really do want to get rid of half of the population one way or another, and they are open about this. They are enabled by people in global power game who need radical elements to de-stabilaze the country to stop eastern trade (China & Russia) from gaining more global influence. And those people are enabled by mass ignorance of their own party.

But you don't have to believe this is about trade and global politics. You can believe it is just Putin wanting more land-mass. If you honestly believe that is the case, you have all the right to make that case.

Just make sure you don't support omissions of facts when those facts happen to work against the case you are making.

[HydrogenBond]

If you look at the liberal template, in the west, it preaches social division into men versus women, black versus white, rich versus poor, etc., constantly trying to polarize. Liberalism and socialism is not about working together as one team. It is about division into government and peasants each with different rules.  

 

One possible reason this occurs could be due to a lack of intelligent liberal leaders; more show than go. They are not capable of thinking on behalf of all the people, but only have enough brain power for part of the people. This appeals to students because they too are just learning and can't yet grasp the bigger picture called all. 

 

If you look back at the history of the Democratic party, at one time it was the party of slavery in America. Even then they divided humans into black and white, all the way as two species. It was the Republican party under President Lincoln and others who had larger brain power and could see how both were one thing; human. 

 

Once the slaves were free, the Democrats tied to divide the country into two but the integration was not allowed to dissociate. With the country whole they continued to push for segregation into halves. The Democrats seem to have a dissociated mind that can't integrate opposites into a whole but prefer to divide the whole in pieces. 

 

After Civil rights in America ,where it became illegal to divide culture into black and white, the dissociated mind figured out a clever strategy to once again divide. This is called diversity, where dumb people divide themselves thinking this is good. These all tend to vote democrat. Leaders from other countries of the world have watched this template and are learning to copy. 

 

Scotland was almost dissociated by the template, but there was too much brain power among the people who could think in terms of the bigger picture and the scam was disrupted for now. 

 

The question becomes how do you overcome the scam of the dissociated mind? 

Edited September 28, 2014 by HydrogenBond

[AnssiH]

I'm a bit surprised no one has replied anything to the thread, except for H-bond with somewhat loose connection to what I was talking about. Does everyone think I'm right on the money, or completely delusional? Have anyone done any research?

 

Ukraine conflict really is kind of unique in that people do post material to the internet, and it is not filtered by news corporations and governments. All you have to do is look for it. We have the tools to strip the power of mass ignorance off from our governments. But if you don't look, you must think governments don't trick their people into wars. Yet, all historians agree that that has happened virtually in every single war. Every single one. And we wonder why does history repeat itself?

 

Here's something everyone should watch;

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwXF6UdkeI4

 

Few things I would comment about that film. Pay attention to the fact that government leaders actually do on regular basis have meetings where they are trying to decide what would be the best way to lie to their people. They consider what would sound like the truth to their people. The phone conversation recordings in this documentary are basically exactly that. Yet, everybody operate with "truthiness" value of the news they hear. And wonder how is it that the opposite side "can believe that kind of propaganda".

 

Now H-bond alluded to the difference between US liberals and conservatives, and I cannot help but comment that it must be obvious to everyone by now how hard some of the neo-con policies have failed. The conservative perspective is typically that there exists real evil in the world, and we must destroy it with violence to survive. The liberal perspective is typically that we ought to try and solve our conflicts by increasing our understanding. There may be time and place for either perspective, but I think it's rather childish to assume that Anti-western terrorism is on the rise because world is becoming more insane. It is on the rise because western policies have failed about as hard as they can fail. There is no attempt to understand the world, there is only the attempt to bomb anything that is perceived as a threath. But each bomb throws around seeds of anti-western sentiments, and merely operate as proofs of western aggression.

 

If your policy is to bomb everyone who are against you, you will not succeed until you are the only one left.

 

Robert McNamara comments that, in the Cuban missile crisis, Kennedy and him, they tried to understand the Soviets. You can be sure there were people who thought that understanding your enemy is dangerous hippie bullshit. They really did have to fight with generals who would have launched a Cuban invasion had Kennedy not stopped them. And Soviet Union really did already have nukes ready to go at that point (contrary to the US intelligence), had an invasion launched.

 

Kennedy also wanted to stop Vietnam war from happening, and McNamara believes he would have managed to stop it had he not been shot. And now we know, as McNamara aptly comments, that Vietnam war was basically a total misunderstanding. Johnson et al did not understand the Vietmanese. They saw Vietnam as an element of cold war; they saw a threat that ought to be bombed away. And this perception was based on a false idea that Vietnam was under the spell of China and Russia. When in fact they were fighting China and Russia. And Vietnamese thought US wanted to colonize South and North Vietnam, and they thought they fought for their independence.

 

So, nothing but mass ignorance and unwillingness to understand started the war, and in the end nothing was accomplished, except massive profits by some, and plenty of bodies to bury. Is there anything more pathetic than this?

 

And now, it is clear these lessons of McNamara have not been learned. Ukraine is also stirring up on mere ignorance and stupidity. If you put yourself into the skin of Russian side of the conflict, it's not hard to see a way out of it. Provide security also to the Russian population of Ukraine. Who could be against that? Well, some elements of the current Ukrainian government are strongly against that. Is that a good thing?

 

How childish it is to think sanctions would somehow stop the conflict? Nothing but ignorance, and unwillingness to understand can bring us such ideas. Just like with religions, you are accidentally born to some culture, and yet most people are uncritically ready to believe they happened to be born into the righteous culture, while other cultures are merely cases of some level of insanity. How pathetic.

 

Ps, I'm sure all of you who know something about the Israel Palestine conflict can apply pretty much everything I'm saying directly to that conflict too.

[Buffy]

Personally I've hesitated to comment on this thread precisely because of the parallels with the Israeli-Palestine conflict: the problem here is not so much that there aren't supporting arguments on either side, but that the most extremist idiots on both sides are the ones in power and making absolutely stupid decisions.

 

I'm talking here about the Ukrainian citizens themselves here mostly. The international players are bulls in the china shop, but simply amplifying the idiocy of what's already there simply because they have no choice: like in Syria, you have to work with the groups who have attained power if you want to influence what's going on.

 

Ukraine is indeed somewhat like Vietnam in that it is a critical pawn in geopolitical maneuvering for not just influence but for economic benefits. Putin has identified it as being critical for expanding Russian resources (which the eastern part has in spades) as well as in manufacturing and services (which the western part is developing and why it's residents so heavily lean toward alliance with the EU).

 

As with so many conflicts today, poorly drawn borders from the era of Empire shove dissimilar groups into common territory leading to ongoing conflict.

 

Importantly though, this is a conflict that is just like most: it has at it's core a natural division between groups that share ownership of a "nation" (both territory and identity: cf the split between Greece and Macedonia). Both sides want to own the whole ball of wax without interference from the other side who they consider "lesser" or "illegitimate".

 

The only solution is for the folks in the middle to stop voting for extremist leaders, but they have to have a choice, and where tensions rise, the voices of moderation are often drowned out be cries of fear and indignation about perceived "atrocities" who demand retribution and capitulation.

 

By the way, the last three paragraphs were actually about the US.

 

I believe it will be a while before the human race learns that this basic dynamic is what leads us to pain and suffering. Hoping it does continue to get better though. We're so much better off than we were in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Would be nice to keep going.

 

 

You go to war with the army you have---not the army you might want or wish to have at a later time, :phones:

Buffy

[AnssiH]

Personally I've hesitated to comment on this thread precisely because of the parallels with the Israeli-Palestine conflict: the problem here is not so much that there aren't supporting arguments on either side, but that the most extremist idiots on both sides are the ones in power and making absolutely stupid decisions.

Exactly, and my thesis in the OP is exactly that the reason radicals come in power has its root cause in plain mass ignorance. And I wanted to point out that with free internet we really do have the technology to remove that problem. Now its only a sociological problem anymore; people just need to know when to use google.

 

The reason I referred to material that trivially contradicts the western media view is to demonstrate the obvious mass ignorance being played out in our news sources. And to demonstrate how easy it is to compose a better view yourself. Everyone should understand that from the Russian perspective, we, the westerners, are condoning and promoting the violence shown on those videos.

 

It is always a good idea to watch material from the opposing views. This is a good way to ensure you have more facts (pending interpretation), and also to form an idea of reasons and biases behind particular views. The only unfortunate side-effect of doing this is the depression that sets in when you realize what a farce most of the world is... If I'm allowed to take one more step back, I have to say it is quite amazing to me how few people really understand the role of "belief" in their world views. My mind boggles when I see people constantly confusing "facts" with firm-beliefs.

 

I think when you become exposed to multiple view points and contradicting arguments, your explanation of those arguments explicitly starts to take into account the inherent unreliability of information. Our news sources are simply not reporting issues that contradict with their beliefs, causing most people to never develop this ability. That's just one element causing mass ignorance.

 

I believe it will be a while before the human race learns that this basic dynamic is what leads us to pain and suffering. Hoping it does continue to get better though. We're so much better off than we were in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Would be nice to keep going.

It's important to understand the reasons why radical views gain momentum. Radicals don't see themselves as radicals, they see themselves as individuals pinned down in an extreme situation that demands extreme response. There are extremely radical views held by masses of western citizens, who see themselves as completely normal people just interested of protecting themselves. The fact remains, regular people never want to go to war. They have to first become convinced that they are under attack by someone.

 

There are no people in Iraq who are born with an Isis gene. There are people who believe their problems are caused by western politics, and that they must defend themselves with extreme actions (and anyone who knows anything about the conflict can surely understand why). For them every bomb coming down will serve as a proof that they are right, and merely fighting fire with fire.

 

The unfortunate side effect that occurs in the environment of mass ignorance is that, as soon as a nation has perceived an enemy, it becomes useless or even dangerous to publicly suggest otherwise. Any attempt to spread understanding of the perceived enemy is seen as working with the enemy. And suddenly events like MH17 do not even need to be investigated. And the fact that the motives behind 9/11 attacks are so poorly understood and almost never discussed is extremely telling. These mechanisms are usually boosted with political rhetorics. When George W. Bush said before the invasion of Iraq "if you are not with us, you are against us", I believe most of Europe puked into their mouth a little. I certainly did.

 

Most notable current issue here from a western point of view is the elusive "war on terror". World did not change all by itself into more anti-western place. War on terror is by definition an unwinnable war. It's self-perpetuating money and power machine, fueled by mass ignorance, sold to the public under the banner of "national security". While many people understand this, they are powerless as long as mass ignorance about the associated issues exists. The mechanisms on war on terror are exactly the same as any government paranoia scheme that ultimately targets its own citizens just as much as external powers. I.e. "any attempt to spread undersanding of the perceived enemy can be and will be seen as working with the enemy."

 

Another notable issue is that, there's a direct correlation between the quality of life of a population, and radical views (they are seen as extreme solutions to extreme circumstances). This connection is used consciously in global power game, via setting up massive sanctions to a country. Some part of the population will think the sitting government is to blame, and it doesn't matter if they are a minority or not. This makes it possible to perform a regime change.

 

That is extremely nefarious strategy;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanctions_against_Iraq#Estimates_of_deaths_due_to_sanctions

 

It is hard to gauge the correct number here, but what is telling is that Madeleine Albright and Bill Richardson did believe the UNICEF figures are correct, and they stated it was still "worth the prize".

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOrrOu8uV8o

 

Of course just the fact that she was asked this question was later accused of being "Iraqi propaganda" completely missing the core problem here...

 

And still on the topic of "basic dynamics that lead to suffering"; I think once one understands that there are no "evil genes" that cause people to be born as a terrorist with a massive beard, but instead there are only failed politics and poor quality of life and ignorance, it should become pretty clear how problematic the neo-con global politics really have been. Such policies are only defendable under the assumption that there is real evil in the world, and it is out to get us; "the good folks". And under the assumption that aggression towards that evil will generally deter them from counter-aggression.

 

I think the only reason why such naive views are so popular is because it's such an easy explanation to make. That is why movies usually use that idea as a plot device; it's simple to understand. You don't have to know about history or about the complexities of different paradigms. Little bit of basic game theory applied to the dynamics between voters and politicians reveals easily why those views gain power, in the environment of mass-ignorance.

 

And that is also why a war is always sold to the public under the idea of some kind of humanitarian thing, when in actual fact just cursory research reveals there are reasons directly connected to maintaining wester power and currency.

 

And if you are little bit simple, you probably never come to think about the risks inherent with the "we just must protect ourselves from evil" view. Perhaps the perceived enemy is only seeking to have a good quality of living. Perhaps their views are also ignorant and could be educated. Perhaps they only radicalize instead of symphatize when you bomb them.

 

In the case of Ukraine, the solution to the entire conflict really is laughably simple. Protect the citizens of Ukraine; even those who happen to speak Russia. As of Russia itself, they cannot possibly want anything else from Ukraine but guarantees that Ukrainian government does not turn hostile towards Russia (while also having NATO missles at its disposal, mind you). Not a difficult thing to achieve if you only remove some radical idiots from the equation.

 

Btw, here's John Kerry posing in the same picture with Oleh Tyahnybok;

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Secretary_Kerry_Meets_With_Ukrainian_Members_of_Parliament_March_2014.jpg

 

And about Oleh, notice especially the first reader comment on this page;

https://libcom.org/news/neo-nazis-far-right-protesters-ukraine-23012014

 

The sentiment there is telling of exactly the mechanism how people in the middle become to condone radicalism. The wealthy people in power are seen as someone to blame of the poor economy, thus, condone radicalism (with the added irony that in this case the right-wing radical elements are directly funded by the wealthiest westerners). The situation is very similar to pre WW2 Germany; although thankfully WW2 history is well known by the Ukrainian people.

 

At the same time, I'm afraid the western powers simply do not want Russia to be able to spread its ruble-based trade towards Europe. I think the real solution to that is moneytary reform; an idea the current stakeholders are not happy about.

[sanctus]

 

And that is also why a war is always sold to the public under the idea of some kind of humanitarian thing, when in actual fact just cursory research reveals there are reasons directly connected to maintaining wester power and currency.

 

That reminds me so much of Afghanistan, the Taliban were there in power since more than 20 years (I don't remember exactly how long, but much before the invasion) but it was sold as a humantarian action....so why after 9/11 only and before?

 

Or of Iraq, Saddam supposedly had weapons of mass destruction so the people of Iraq and their neighbours have to be protected. When none were found, there were no heads rolling in politics (eg Powell was still there, Blair too etc...)

[Foghorn]

I have to make this short as I keep getting kicked out.

 

Stalin had a program in place prior to Nazi invasion that starved Ukrainians. Hungry starved.

 

Nazis just wanted to kill Ukrainian jews and enslave the rest, and Christian Ukranians were not aware of their fate.

 

Don't write a paper without the backstory, man, there is ALWAYS a backstory.

 

Ukraine doesn't trust Russia to this day, can you blame them?

[AnssiH]

That reminds me so much of Afghanistan, the Taliban were there in power since more than 20 years (I don't remember exactly how long, but much before the invasion) but it was sold as a humantarian action....so why after 9/11 only and before?

Yes, history repeats itself, and will keep repeating if people don't start educating themselves. It is now easier than ever.

 

In the 70's Afghanistan had a Soviet-minded government, and they had established a treaty that allowed them to call the Soviet military to assist in fights against Mujahideen (jihadists who wanted to uphold "traditions").

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_in_Afghanistan

 

As soon as Russia was involved, the US saw it as an element of Cold War, and CIA covertly supported the radical rebels; those jihadists. Sounds familiar?

 

The CIA support was not insignificant. Accoding to Wikipedia, the funding was "$20-$30 million per year" early on, and ballooned to $630 million per year by 1987. Also; "Weapons supplies were made available through numerous countries; the United States purchased all of Israel's captured Soviet weapons clandestinely, and then funnelled the weapons to the Mujahideen."

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Cyclone

 

You still hear the politicians using the phrase "the enemy of my enemy is my friend". I think they should maybe spend a moment trying to understand the dynamics of a conflict.

 

And as you might well know, those jihadist rebels in Afghanistan are exactly what became the Taliban government. It rose to power with the massive support of US and other western powers. Al-Qaeda is closely related to those same events. "Al-Qaeda" means "the base", which was what the rebels called the CIA supported base that trained them.

 

So this was basically just another de-stabilization and bush-fire run. Note that to this day no one can verify the reasons why the original conflict escalated; different people refer to different events and no one knows what really happened. Probably because what happened was just lies.

 

This also appears to be exactly what happened in Libya. US did in fact support people who want sharia law into Libya, while ironically Gaddafi was in some ways more democratic than western countries are. If that doesn't sound like "the truthiness" to you, then someone jas collected some citations about the whole thing in here;

 

http://tinyurl.com/3pfv3oe

(If the tinyURL breaks, google for "Lies, War, and Empire: NATO’s “Humanitarian Imperialism” in Libya")

 

The opinions and biases are secondary, the main thing is there are citations; there's material everyone should consider. That is how you fight against ignorance.

 

Or of Iraq, Saddam supposedly had weapons of mass destruction so the people of Iraq and their neighbours have to be protected. When none were found, there were no heads rolling in politics (eg Powell was still there, Blair too etc...)[/url]

Now here we get into some really interesting little factoids. I get the impression from some of these top personnel that they really believed there were weapons of mass destruction, somewhat naively. But someone was running that show to their own purposes.

 

Note that the UN did not find the evidence from US intelligence satisfactory for an invasion. There were pictures that were about a decade old, and the claims of uranium enrichments revolved around aluminum tubes that actually could not even physically be used for weapon grade enrichment;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_aluminum_tubes#Tube_specifications

 

Since then, it has become well known that all through Bush' term, the goverment was actively looking for ways to justify an invasion to Iraq. The real reasons to invade is relate to the history of Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi-Arabia, see the documentary "The Power Of Nightmares" for some interesting gacts; http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-power-of-nightmares/)

 

And if you watch the documentary called "Why we fight" http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436971/, you will find some interesting interviews of ex-CIA personnel, complaining how some people inside CIA were changing the intelligence reports sometimes to say the opposite of what they originally said, to make the case of weapons of mass destruction.

 

The most high profile case is something some people hopefully still remember. Joseph Wilson's report about enriched uranium. Under CIA's request he traveled to Niger in 2002 to investigate the idea that Saddam Hussein had purchased enriched uranium. His investigation found it to be highly unlikely that such thing had ever happened, and he provided that view and the reasons in his report.

 

But when Bush still said in a State of the Union address that Saddam had in fact sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa, it prompted Wilson to write this;

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/opinion/what-i-didn-t-find-in-africa.html

 

This was July 6th. At July 14th, Washington Post just so happens to write a column that reveals Wilson's wife is a CIA operative. This was highly classified information, but someone wanted to destroy Wilson's credibility this way.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair

 

There's also a movie about it called "Fair Game";

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0977855/

 

Sometimes it seems like our top diplomats are acting like bunch of children fighting for toys at the sandbox. The saddest part of this is that all the media did actually start to focus onto the trials surrounding the leak, and suddenly everyone forgot that this was about a proof of the government lying about the reasons to go to war...

[AnssiH]

Ukraine doesn't trust Russia to this day, can you blame them?

The Soviet minded people of Ukraine are also Ukrainians. It's a bit strange how western media is always using the kinds of semantics that implies Ukraine is anti-Russia and Russia alone is the aggressor meddling with Ukraine's business. When people start believing that is an objective perspective, that's how they get support for war.

[AnssiH]

Well, if you guys have been following the reporting on Donetsk and Luhansk elections, you've seen the western rhetoric is exactly the same as with Crimean election; invalid and illegal farce of an election, schemed up by Putin to escalate conflict, and no one should be paying attention to any results.

 

The technical standards of the election probably were very poor, but even without elections it should be clear which way they would go; a lot of people in those areas really do feel oppressed by western elements. Increasing the understanding of those problems would be helpful in resolving the conflicts, but instead it's being made worse by naive media reporting. The kind of reporting that discourages people from asking, "why?"

 

Like this, literally the first one I just googled;

http://euromaidanpress.com/2014/11/01/putin-plans-to-escalate-conflict-in-ukraine-after-donetsk-and-luhansk-elections/

 

It is really interesting how the implied message is that bunch of separatist enclaves are just throwing these elections with the help of Russia, as if the people living in that area were overwhelmingly against the idea. It is also implied that the whole thing is basically Putin's idea. Why would it be so? To imply that the honest people living in the area have nothing to do with the idea.

 

If you scroll down you see they are uncritically citing the comments of Andriy Bіletskyi, commander of the Azov battalion. And if you do even a cursory reseach, also the lead of two radical nationalist groups;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_of_Ukraine

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social-National_Assembly

 

Sigh...

 

In Finnish media I saw an interview of some "expert", and it was pretty clear that there was no good understanding of this whole thing there at all. The questions had nothing to do with trying to understand what is going on, there were just basically of the form "Isn't anything enough for Russia?". And when asked whether the sanctions towards Russia have power to resolve the conflict, he said "No, not unless the price of oil will drive Russia into crisis first". The resolution to any conflict has a very universal first step; 1. Understand the conflict from both perspectives...

 

And on that note, back to the main topic; the power of free internet and social media. Sweden recently decided to officially recognize the state of Palestine, and Finland and some other European countries are likely to follow. The comments from the Finnish politicians have been interesting; it is obvious the mainstream politicians are avoiding taking any side too strongly because they fear losing some votes either way (except for the Christian party members, their opinion is pretty clear. Because, bible).

 

While the mainstream media narrative has been fairly pro-Israel, the free internet has allowed little bit wider perspective to penetrate the consciousness of people, basically people are getting little bit less ignorant of the conflict of Israel, and it has become possible to elevate Palestine into a legit party of the world. I mean, I do not believe any of this would have been possible without the Internet; mainstream media is far too biased to report anything objectively, they are always reporting from their pre-conceived notions. But the more people know about the different sides and perspectives on a conflict, the closer we are to reaching a point where senseless demonization turns into actual understanding.

 

However, there are people out there who simply believe that free internet only serves as a corruption; for them it's a place where anyone can lie and people start believing them. There are continous attempts to give the goverments the power to filter and censor the internet. There is a real danger that internet will kind of become a collection of national internets (like already is the case in China) instead of one global thing. If people are ignorant enough about how the world really works, these elements may succeed in their goals. Here is only one example;

 

http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/fsb-will-welcome-russias-internet-server-law/503227.html

 

I think it is a complete mistake to allow moves like these. It would only increase the difference in perspectives and general mass ignorance about the issues around the globe. I think you would be hard pressed to find a single educated person who would honestly think it's a good idea to give governments any control over the internet censorship...

[AnssiH]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senate_Intelligence_Committee_report_on_CIA_torture

 

http://www.vox.com/2014/12/9/7360823/cia-torture-roundup

 

I'm glad to see that the "CIA Torture Report" is receiving the reaction it is receiving. Glad to see there are so many people who are waking up to see how childish and insane the CIA/US position has been, even after lifetime of brainwashing by movies where the heroes torture and it always works great.

 

Back when the pictures from Abu Ghraib prison became public, even I was amazed by the absolute idiocy of what was being conducted (and seeing stupidity seldom amazes me anymore). After the events though, I didn't get the impression that people understood the massive irony, and dangerous stupidity embedded to the whole thing.

 

People defended it as necessary, even though any interrogator - or anyone with half a brain really - can tell you that any information you get by torturing people is bound to be anything they think you want to know, not what they actually know. That is, torture doesn't work if you care about the truth. Failing to see this is just, well, bad science.

 

Some people eat up the "necessity" argument though because, I guess they imagine CIA tortures people for the location of a nuclear device that is just about to go off, just like Jack Bauer would.

 

The second and even more important fact is that the only thing that torturing Iraqi people guarantees is that you create more anti-western terrorism. Massive amount of national funds have been spent to conduct a torture program that has not only caused unnecessary suffering, but also made the world much less secure place for everyone. Every piece of useful information that has been received, has caused ten times more problems that it solved.

 

It's amazing that people who defend the need for the use of violence in these kinds of cituations, often defend their argument with graphs that show that terrorism is on the rise. Is it not a failed policy that has caused that? Have we not been running an idiotic policy for over a decade now, that clearly is only working against us?

 

Perhaps some people also have the impression that interrogation programs like these are ran by hardcore professionals, the best of the best. But in reality you will often find only gross incompetence, and things ran by ignorant and uneducated children.

 

I recommend watching Standard Operating Procedure ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0896866/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1 ) where you find the interviews of the military personnel appearing in those Abu Ghraib pictures.

 

These are people in their early 20's, completely uneducated and ignorant about the world, just doing what they are told to do. The people who orchestrated the program were never punished, only the people who followed orders were punished. They said they started taking pictures because they felt what they were doing was "perhaps a bit wrong".

 

They were not even interrogating the people yet, their task was to "soften up" the people for interrogation. The recent report reveals that this idea came from some psychologists who created the procedure as means to just make people co-operative. The joke is that some people were co-operative already, but the procedure was to "soften them up" first anyway, which sometimes just made them uncooperative. Imagine a 50-something general who actually wants to tell the US military what they want to know, except that the teenagers "interrogating" him were too busy shaving his eyebrows and were not even assigned to ask for any information.

 

They were also torturing people for flimsy reasons, just normal Iraqi people, taxi drivers, and so on. When these people are released, what do you imagine they and their families think about the US exactly? Furthermore, when they went to arrest someone and didn't find them home, they kidnapped the children of the family, under the idea that the person they wanted to arrest would switch himself over.

 

That's right, the US military and CIA kidnapped children into a ridiculous dungeon prison, in the name of "national security". You can be sure that national security went straight down the drain right there.

 

There is one CIA official involved with the torture program who is in Pennsylvania prison now; John Kirakou. He was a whistleblower. So, whistleblwoer was punished, while the other people who ran the program are not only free, but some received tens of millions of dollars of your tax payer money for their great service.

 

There are still people who forcefully defend the torture as a necessary procedure. Some ex-CIA personnel are calling the report "single worst example of Congressional oversight in our many years of government service", and Dick Cheney says what they did was "perfectly justified" and that he would do the same thing again in a heart beat.

 

I don't think they are very strongly attached with reality anymore, or maybe they just are childish enough to believe torture is a great idea, and that they are "the good people" and thus torture is right because it is only targeting those "bad people" who deserve it anyway. Mind-blowing stupidity.

 

The only thing left to do is to start firing people and never let them touch anything having to do with security policies. I hope the report will lead into some very serious actions. Maybe this is the start where people start realizing what creates terrorism, and we collectively wise up a little.

 

Btw, another operation where currently we have the same problem of bunch of ignorant and incompetent people making important decisions in complete secrecy with no oversight is the drone program. I like what John Oliver says here;