Thursday, September 12, 2013

13-09-12 SYRIA: US media v French media v Stratfor emails on Wikileaks

CNN, Washington Post now report that CIA "begins" to arm Syrian rebels.  French media report troups on the ground already last month, and leaked Startfor emails report US meddling for at least a couple of yearts.
CONCLUSIONS:
a) US media are full participants in the deception on the People
b) The Deliberations in US Congress, etc are just a distraction
The powers that be will proceed to do what the powers that be do all along.  The rule of law in the US is just an illusion.
c) No news from Syra can be trusted, except for the body counts.
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1) CNN on September 12, 2013

Official says CIA-funded weapons have begun to reach Syrian rebels; rebels deny receipt


2) Washington Post on September 12, 2013

U.S. weapons reaching Syrian rebels

The CIA has begun delivering weapons to rebels in Syria, ending months of delay in lethal aid that had been promised by the Obama administration, according to U.S. officials and Syrian figures. The shipments began streaming into the country over the past two weeks, along with separate deliveries by the State Department of vehicles and other gear — a flow of material that marks a major escalation of the U.S. role in Syria’s civil war.

3) Le Figaro on August 22, 2013

American, Israeli And Jordanian Troops And CIA Agents Have Entered Syria, Le Figaro Reports

Tyler Durden's picture
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 08/22/2013 16:22 -0400

We have yet to see secondary confirmation of the following breaking news from the second largest French newspaper, Le Figaro, but if accurate, it means the Nobel Peace Prize winning president has just engaged in yet another unsanctioned by Congress war.
From Le Figaro, google translated:
According to our information, the regime's opponents, supervised by Jordanian, Israeli and American commandos moving towards Damascus since mid-August. This attack could explain the possible use of the Syrian president to chemical weapons.

According to information obtained by Le Figaro , the first trained in guerrilla warfare by the Americans in Jordan Syrian troops reportedly entered into action since mid-August in southern Syria, in the region of Deraa. A first group of 300 men, probably supported by Israeli and Jordanian commandos, as well as men of the CIA, had crossed the border on August 17. A second would have joined the 19. According to military sources, the Americans, who do not want to put troops on the Syrian soil or arming rebels in part controlled by radical Islamists form quietly for several months in a training camp set up at the border Jordanian- Syrian fighters ASL, the Free Syrian Army, handpicked.

...

According to this expert on the region, the idea proposed by Washington would be the possible establishment of a buffer zone from the south of Syria, or even a no-fly zone, which would cause opponents safely until the balance of power changes. This is the reason why the United States has deployed Patriot batteries and F16 in late June Jordan.
...
Why is the US, or rather Federal Reserve, desperate for a war with Syria?  It was all explained previously here, but here is the one chart that matters.
In brief: to allow the Untaper once the Taper ends, the US needs to find much more deficit funding needs, and as always there is no place better to achieve this than to spike the contracting spending budget by engaging in war.
And now, the ball is in Putin's court.

4) Startfor/Wikileaks email from December 7, 2011

INSIGHT - military intervention in Syria, post withdrawal status of forces

Released on 2012-03-06 07:00 GMT
Email-ID1671459
Date2011-12-07 00:49:18
Frombhalla@stratfor.com
Tosecure@stratfor.com
A few points I wanted to highlight from meetings today --

I spent most of the afternoon at the Pentagon with the USAF strategic
studies group - guys who spend their time trying to understand and explain
to the USAF chief the big picture in areas where they're operating in. It
was just myself and four other guys at the Lieutenant Colonel level,
including one French and one British representative who are liaising with
the US currently out of DC.

They wanted to grill me on the strategic picture on Syria, so after that I
got to grill them on the military picture. There is still a very low level
of understanding of what is actually at stake in Syria, what's the
strategic interest there, the Turkish role, the Iranian role, etc. After a
couple hours of talking, they said without saying that SOF teams
(presumably from US, UK, France, Jordan, Turkey) are already on the ground
focused on recce missions and training opposition forces. One Air Force
intel guy (US) said very carefully that there isn't much of a Free Syrian
Army to train right now anyway, but all the operations being done now are
being done out of 'prudence.' The way it was put to me was, 'look at this
way - the level of information known on Syrian OrBat this month is the
best it's been since 2001.' They have been told to prepare contingencies
and be ready to act within 2-3 months, but they still stress that this is
all being done as contingency planning, not as a move toward escalation.

I kept pressing on the question of what these SOF teams would be working
toward, and whether this would lead to an eventual air camapign to give a
Syrian rebel group cover. They pretty quickly distanced themselves from
that idea, saying that the idea 'hypothetically' is to commit guerrilla
attacks, assassination campaigns, try to break the back of the Alawite
forces, elicit collapse from within. There wouldn't be a need for air
cover, and they wouldn't expect these Syrian rebels to be marching in
columns anyway.

They emphasized how the air campaign in Syria makes Libya look like a
piece of cake. Syrian air defenses are a lot more robust and are much
denser, esp around Damascus and on the borders with Israel, Turkey. THey
are most worried about mobile air defenses, particularly the SA-17s that
they've been getting recently. It's still a doable mission, it's just not
an easy one.

The main base they would use is Cyprus, hands down. Brits and FRench would
fly out of there. They kept stressing how much is stored at Cyprus and how
much recce comes out of there. The group was split on whether Turkey would
be involved, but said Turkey would be pretty critical to the mission to
base stuff out of there. EVen if Turkey had a poltiical problem with
Cyprus, they said there is no way the Brits and the FRench wouldn't use
Cyprus as their main air force base. Air Force Intel guy seems pretty
convinced that the Turks won't participate (he seemed pretty pissed at
them.)

There still seems to be a lot of confusion over what a military
intervention involving an air campaign would be designed to achieve. It
isn't clear cut for them geographically like in Libya, and you can't just
create an NFZ over Homs, Hama region. This would entail a countrywide SEAD
campaign lasting the duration of the war. They dont believe air
intervention would happen unless there was enough media attention on a
massacre, like the Ghadafi move against Benghazi. They think the US would
have a high tolerance for killings as long as it doesn't reach that very
public stage. Theyre also questiioning the skills of the Syrian forces
that are operating the country's air defenses currently and how
signfiicant the Iranian presence is there. Air Force Intel guy is most
obsessed with the challenge of taking out Syria's ballistic missile
capabilities and chem weapons. With Israel rgiht there and the regime
facing an existential crisis, he sees that as a major complication to any
military intervention.

The post 2011 SOFA with Iraq is still being negotiated. These guys were
hoping that during Biden's visit that he would announce a deal with
Maliki, but no such luck. They are gambling ont he idea that the Iraqis
remember the iran-iraq war and that maliki is not going to want to face
the threat of Iranian jets entering Iraqi air space. THey say that most
US fighter jets are already out of Iraq and transferred to Kuwait. They
explained that's the beauty of the air force, the base in Kuwait is just a
hop, skip and jump away from their bases in Europe, ie. very easy to
rapidly build up when they need to. They don't seem concerned about the
US ability to restructure its forces to send a message to Iran. They gave
the example of the USS Enterprise that was supposed to be out of
commission already and got extended another couple years to send to the
gulf. WHen the US withdraws, we'll have at least 2 carriers in the gulf
out of centcom and one carrier in the Med out of EuCom. I asked if the
build-up in Kuwait and the carrier deployments are going to be enough to
send a message to Iran that the US isn't going anywhere. They responded
that Iran will get the message if they read the Centcom Web Site. STarting
Jan. 1 expect them to be publishing all over the place where the US is
building up.

Another concern they have about an operation in Syria is whether Iran
could impede operations out of Balad air force base in Iraq.

The French representative was of hte opinion that Syria won't be a
libya-type situation in that France would be gung-ho about going in. Not
in an election year. The UK rep also emphasized UK reluctance but said
that the renegotiation of the EU treaty undermines the UK role and that UK
would be looking for ways to reassert itself on the continent ( i dont
really think a syria campaign is the way to do that.) UK guy mentioned as
an aside that the air force base commander at Cyprus got switched out from
a maintenance guy to a guy that flew Raptors, ie someone that understands
what it means to start dropping bombs. He joked that it was probably a
coincidence.

Prior to that, I had a meeting with an incoming Kuwaiti diplomat (will be
coded as KU301.) His father was high up in the regime, always by the
CP's/PM's side. The diplo himself still seems to be getting his feet wet
in DC (the new team just arrived less than 2 weeks ago,) but he made
pretty clear that Kuwait was opening the door to allowing US to build up
forces as needed. THey already have a significant presence there, and a
lot of them will be on 90-day rotations. He also said that the SOFA that
the US signs with Baghdad at the last minute will be worded in such a way
that even allowing one trainer in the country can be construed to mean
what the US wants in terms of keeping forces in Iraq. Overall, I didnt get
the impression from him that Kuwait is freaked out about the US leaving.
Everyhting is just getting rearranged. The Kuwaitis used to be much
better at managing their relations with Iran, but ever since that spy ring
story came out a year ago, it's been bad. He doesn't think Iran has
significant covert capabililiteis in the GCC states, though they are
trying. Iranian activity is mostly propaganda focused. He said that while
KSA and Bahrain they can deal with it as needed and black out the media,
Kuwait is a lot more open and thus provides Iran with more oppotunity to
shape perceptions (he used to work in inforamtion unit in Kuwait.) He says
there is a sig number of kuwaitis that listen to Iranian media like Al
Alam especially.

On the Kuwaiti political scene - the government is having a harder time
dealing with a more emboldened opposition, but the opposition is still
extremely divided, esp among the Islamists. The MPs now all have to go
back to their tribes to rally support for the elections to take place in
Feb. Oftentimes an MP in Kuwait city will find out that he has lost
support back home with the tribe, and so a lot of moeny is handed out.The
govt is hoping that witha clean slate they can quiet the opposition down.
A good way of managing the opposition he said is to refer cases to the
courts, where they can linger forever. good way for the govt to buy time.
He doesnt believe the Arab League will take significant action against
Syria - no one is interested in military intervention. they just say it to
threaten it.

13-09-11 The 40th anniversary of the deposition and assassination of Chille's democratically elected president Allende

Eventually, it all comes home to roost...
Because in Syria, Iraq, Libya, Chille and more - the US is motivated by Human Rights and the desire to establish democratic regimes...
_____
Noam Chomsky: The "Illegal" US Threat On Syria And 9/11
Video 
"My own view is that we should be concentrating on the first 9/11, the one in Chile, which was a much worse attack, by any dimension."
 

The Other 9/11
Salvador Allende's Last Speech
By Peter Rothberg
Forty years ago today, Salvador Allende's democratically-elected government in Chile was overthrown by a US-backed military coup.

13-09-12 NSA ripple effects in criminal prosecutions

TPMDC

Feds Fight To Prevent NSA Disclosures In Criminal Cases

DYLAN SCOTT SEPTEMBER 12, 2013, 6:00 AM 7719 
Solicitor General Donald Verrilli and Sen. Diane Feinstein have put federal prosecutors in quite a bind after they made public comments about the use of secret NSA surveillance in terrorism investigations.
Now defense attorneys in a Florida case are turning the words of those top officials against prosecutors, urging a federal court to force the federal government to disclose whether it obtained evidence against their client through a 2008 amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, known as FAA, which has been at the center of the Edward Snowden leaks.
In a Tuesday filing (see below), attorneys for Raees Alam Qazi — who was charged with planning to blow up a bomb in New York City last December — argued that federal prosecutors were obligated to disclose to them if secret surveillance had been used in the investigation.
READ MORE:

13-09-12 The NSA scandal arrives in israel

No surprise here either... Israel today is a corporatist province of the United States. jz

___

The National Security Agency routinely shares raw intelligence data with Israel without first sifting it to remove information about US citizens, a top-secret document provided to the Guardian by whistleblower Edward Snowden reveals.

13-09-12 The latest from the Omnipotent: FBI investigation of Michael Hastings continues after his death

The Omnipotent Robert Mueller III: If you are a banskster, you have nothing to worry, otherwise, he would get you even in the afterlife...
Posted: 11 Sep 2013 05:30 AM PDT
Michael Hastings sent a cryptic email to colleagues hours before his tragic death.
The FBI is still investigating “controversial reporting” by journalist Michael Hastings even after his death in June. The heavily redacted three-page report about Hastings was released after Al Jazeera and Ryan Shapiro, a doctoral candidate at MIT, had filed a Freedom of Information Act request after Hastings’s death. The FBI still considers Hastings’s work highly sensitive, and even the title of the case file has been withheld due to the ongoing investigation. The FBI opened the investigation into Hastings, who formerly worked at Newsweek, after a June 2012 Rolling Stone article called “America’s Last Prisoner of War” about U.S. solider Bowe Bergdahl’s deployment and capture by the Taliban. Bergdahl is still believed to be held by the Taliban.
Jason Leopold reports for Al Jazeera:
"The FBI documents also stated that in addition to Hastings' report, the agency also submitted one copy of a "blog entry relative to the aforementioned articles" and "one copy of Emails Express Discontent," which is an article about Bergdahl published on June 7, 2012 by the Associated Press that was based on Hastings' Rolling Stone report.
The "blog entry," however, appeared to be lifted from the comments section of the Idaho Statesman newspaper. The comment was apparently written by Gary Farwell, the father of Matthew Farwell, who contributed reporting to the Rolling Stone story and is identified at the bottom of the story as "a former soldier who deployed to Afghanistan."
The undated comment says, in part: "My son, Matthew, had gathered information for three years and did the reporting on the RS story. He introduced Michael Hastings to the Bergdahl’s and they interviewed the family several months ago."
Gary Farwell was unavailable for comment and Matthew Farwell declined to comment. Will Dana, the managing editor of Rolling Stone, told Al Jazeera that he is "concerned" about the FBI documents and said he was unsure why this report by Hastings sparked the FBI’s interest."
Within days after Hasting's death in a fiery car accident, an FBI spokeswoman issued a public statement denying he was under investigation, "At no time was Michael Hastings under investigation by the FBI."
The spokeswoman's comments followed an email Hastings sent to colleagues the day before he died that read: "The Feds are interviewing my close friends and associates." However, that email was referring to the "NSA," according to the subject line.
Hastings, who wrote for BuzzFeed and Rolling Stone, famously brought down U.S. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal in a 2010 Rolling Stone cover story. He was most recently covering Edward Snowden's leak of the NSA's classified domestic monitoring program.
Leopold notes that FBI bureau spokeswoman Laura Eimiller -- who had previously said that Hastings was not under investigation -- told Al Jazeera she still stands by her original comment."Being referenced in an FBI file does not make one the subject of an FBI investigation," she added, referring to the pages the agency released Monday.
You can view the 3-page FBI report on Michael Hastings online here.

13-09-12 Hello world!


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