Who are the real thugs, murderers and terrorists? Oh yeah. The leaders WE have propped up in Kiev. The U.S. and the EU provoked this “revolution”. Is that what democracies do? This is a preview of what our beloved leaders will do on our own soil. There will be blood.
Do not believe any mainstream media propaganda outlet. Do not believe any politician. Notice how both “parties” have fallen into line with a war posture. Boehner sounds like Obama, who sounds like McCain. The War Party is universal.
War benefits the bankers and the mega-corporation arms dealers. Do it for the jobs. War will boost GDP. What’s a little blood from the little people if we can boost EPS. This is all bullish for the stock market.
“Behind The Kiev Snipers It Was Somebody From The New Coalition” – A Stunning New Leak Released
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/05/2014 09:49 -0500
The last time a leaked phone call out of Ukraine was released about a month ago ostensibly by the Russian NSA equivalent, one between US assistant sec state Victoria Nuland and the US envoy to the Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt, it was revealed that the real puppet masters behind the Maidan movement, and the true instigators of the Ukraine “revolution” were none other than the “developed” world superpowers, lead by the US. Also revealed were tensions between the US and EU strategies on how to overthrow the current government, culminating with the infamous “Fuck the EU.” Needless to say the US, which implicitly confirmed the recording, was angry at Russia and accused it of using dirty tricks.
That’s ironic, because when it comes to “dirty tricks” what is about to be presented, blows the top off anything Russia may or has done to date.
Earlier today an even more shocking recording has been “leaked” this time one between the always concerned about human rights EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton and Estonian foreign minister Urmas Paet, in which it is revealed on tape that all those photos of horrifying deaths of Ukrainians by snipers during the last days of the Median stand off, were in fact caused not by Snipers controlled by Yanukovich, but that the snipers shot at both protesters and police in Kiev were allegedly hired by Maidan leaders!
Here is the key exchange, just after 8 minutes into the conversation :
Paet: “All the evidence shows that people who were killed by snipers from both sides, policemen and people from the streets, that they were the same snipers killing people from both sides. … Some photos that showed it is the same handwriting, the same type of bullets, and it is really disturbing that now the new coalition they don’t want to investigate what exactly happened. So there is now stronger and stronger understanding that behind the snipers, it was not Yanukovych, but it was somebody from the new coalition.”
Ashton: “I think we do want to investigate. I mean, I didn’t pick that up, that’s interesting. Gosh.”
Paet: “It already discreditates (sic) this new coalition.”
So first US orchestrates the Kiev overthrow, and now the new “leaders” of Ukraine are allegedly found to have fired against their own people – the same provocation they subsequently used to run Yanukovich out of the country and install a pro-Western puppet government. Of course, said pro-Western coalition has not been discreditated (sic) because Ms. Ashton has sternly refused to investigate, knowing quite well how horribly this would reflect on the new Ukraine “leadership” – a government which shot its own people to fabricate the pretext under which it rose to power.
Is it any wonder then that Russia has responded the way it has?
As for at least one of the affected parties, Estonia, it has just confirmed the authenticity of the recording, and the ministry of foreign affairs has organized a press conference to answer media questions today at 5 pm. From the Valisministeerium:
No. 84-E Foreign Minister Urmas Paet and EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton uploaded to the Internet today, a phone call is authentic.
Paet and Ashton conversation took place on 26 February, following Estonia’s Foreign Minister’s visit to Ukraine, and immediately after the end of the street violence.
Foreign Minister Paet communicate what he had said about the meetings held in Kiev last day and expressed concern about the situation.
“It is extremely regrettable that such an interception is occurring at all”“said Paet., Including its call for today’s photos are not random,” he added.
Yes, it is truly regrettable that the people know the truth.
Full leaked recording below:
Russia Proposes Confiscating US, European Assets If Sanctions Adopted
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/05/2014 10:27 -0500
Following warnings from US and European nations over economic (and travel) sanctions against Russia, the upper house of Russia’s parliament has struck back. As RIA reports, Russia is mulling measures allowing property and assets of European and US companies to be confiscated in the event of sanctions being adopted. Layers are studying the costitutionality of the ‘confiscation’ but cite Europe’s standards (i.e. Cyprus) as precedent. This is further to the threat to “dump US goverment bonds” issued earlier in the week.
Via RIA,
The upper house of Russia’s parliament is mulling measures allowing property and assets of European and US companies to be confiscated in the event of sanctions being adopted against Russia over its threatened military intervention in Ukraine.
The bill’s author, Federation Council constitutional legislation committee head Andrei Klishas, said Wednesday that lawyers are currently studying whether the proposed confiscations would be constitutional.
“But we have no doubts that it clearly corresponds to European standards,” Klishas told RIA Novosti. “The recent events in Cyprus spring to mind, where the confiscation of assets was the main demand made by the European Union in return for economic aid.”
An adviser to President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that authorities would issue general advice to dump US government bonds if Russian companies and individuals were targeted by sanctions over events in Ukraine.
Perhaps that is why the UK backed away from sanctions so quickly?
“..dump US government bonds”
And the gloves are off.
That didn’t take long.
Dennis Kucinich said on Bill O’Reillys “The Factor” last night that the National Endowment for Democracy and the U.S Agency for International Development (USAID, front agency for the CIA) had stoked up those Kiev demonstrations.
Putins actions are very logical under the given circumstances and it appears he has the upper hand. Obama and Kerry are furnishing him with an “OFF RAMP” wtf? I bet Putin is laughing his ass off. Kerry said you just can’t go into another country and impose your will at the end of a gun. He’s a fucking brilliant Statesman maybe if we’re lucky he’ll run for President,.
Where’s our government troll – Vegas?
Is this Russian propaganda Vegas?
Fascinating how Vegas showed up three days ago and has only posted on the Russian threads.
Anyone else smell a paid government troll?
Not even Kucinich knows that Putin hasn’t put any new troops in Crimea, that the 16,000 stationed there were always there and he can increase the numbers to 25,000 any time he wants under existing agreements.
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One guy talks …. a lot
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The other guy ……… doesn’t
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Russia test-fired a Topol nuclear-capable missile just like the one above.
As someone who posts under different names (IraK, Ira, Rodney, An Anonymous, No Shit Sherlock, and a couple of others I’ve temporarily forgotten) and has been called a troll in years past, I say encourage controversial commentators (like Vegas?) or others to post. They and their somewhat well-reasoned arguments add to TBP. For example, I think Stephanie, a persistent outsider, has added interest to TBP. In addition to the usual F-Y- or similar rants, a contra-A’s position often brings a few sharp and witty snips and photos, and a cogent argument.
And on the subject of commenting… On posts I usually read the poster’s short comments and commentators’ short posts. Attached articles I usually quit reading after the first couple of paragraphs. Posters, instead of attaching an article, edit or summarize it. If you want more of your stuff read, limit your self to 300 words or so.
A Monster Reawakens: The Rise of Ukrainian Fascism
A precedent the West will live to regret
by Justin Raimondo, March 05, 2014
With the eyes of the world fixed on Russia’s invasion of Crimea and the prospect of a wider war engulfing all Ukraine, our attention has been diverted from what may be the most significant aspect of this crisis: the ascension of a genuinely fascist mass movement into the corridors of power.
Our “mainstream” media shrugs off what it describes as the presence of “a few ultra-nationalists” at the Kiev protests, but this is nonsense: it is far more than a few. Indeed, the activists of the two main fascist parties in Ukraine – Svoboda and “Right Sector” – provided the muscle the insurrectionists needed to take over government buildings in Kiev and across western Ukraine.
Svoboda (“Freedom”) was founded in 1991 as the Social National Party of Ukraine. The party idolizes Stepan Bandera, whose followers fought on the side of the Nazis during World War II against the Red Army and Ukrainian communist militias. Bandera’s Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) had direct support from the Germans: Hitler wanted them to police Ukraine after the Germans took it, and the OUN organized volunteer militias that actively participated in the Holocaust. “The Jews of the Soviet Union,” declared the Banderists, “are the most loyal supporters of the Bolshevik Regime and the vanguard of Muscovite imperialism in the Ukraine.” When the Germans took Lvov in the summer of 1941, the Banderists sent a message to Lvov’s Jews in the form of a pamphlet which said: “We will lay your heads at Hitler’s feet”! Which they did; the OUN worked with the SS to round up and slaughter 4,000 of the city’s Jews. Their weapons of choice: everything from guns to metal poles.
When Viktor Yushchenko, during his disastrous tenure as President of Ukraine, bestowed on Bandera the posthumous title of “Hero of Ukraine,” the European Parliament formally protested: they were ignored.
Svoboda leader Oleh Tyahnybok, now a top official of the Ukrainian Parliament, is an unrepentant anti-Semite. In the summer of 2004, he made a speech to his followers at the gravesite of a Banderist commander in which he declared: “You are the ones that the Moscow-Jewish mafia ruling Ukraine fears most.” His peroration also made reference to “Kikes” as prominent among those the Banderists fought. Tyahnybok was expelled from Parliament for his remarks, but the “revolution” has installed him back in his seat – and more powerful than ever.
He has plenty of company. Svoboda activists, who already held seats in Parliament, hold no less than eight top Cabinet positions:
Ihor Tenyukh – interim defense minister and a member of Svoboda’s political council. Formerly commander of Ukraine’s navy, in 2008, during Russia’s war with Georgia, he ordered Ukrainian warships to block the entrance of the Russian Navy to the bay of Sevastopol.
Andriy Parubiy – National Security Council chief, co-founded Svoboda back when it was the “Social National” (ahem!) party.
Dmytro Yarosh – deputy head of the National Security Council, i.e. the police, and the founder-leader of “Right Sector,” a militant neo-Nazi paramilitary group that took charge of security in the Maiden.
Oleh Makhnitsky – Svoboda member of parliament, is prosecutor-general.
Oleksandr Sych – Svoboda parliamentarian and the party’s chief ideologist, is deputy prime minister for economic affairs.
Serhiy Kvit – a leading member of Svoboda, is to head up the Education Ministry.
Andriy Moknyk – the new Minister of Ecology, has been Svoboda’s envoy to other European fascist parties. Last year, he met with representatives of Italy’s violent neo-fascist gang, Forza Nuovo.
Ihor Shvaika – agro-oligarch and a member of Svoboda, has been appointed Minister of Agriculture. One of the richest men in the country, his massive investments in agriculture would seem to indicate a slight conflict of interest.
For the first time since 1933, the followers of a movement that valorizes Adolf Hitler and preaches anti-Semitism has entered a European government. The German Nazis, too, were part of a “coalition” government, the other members of which thought they could contain or even “tame” them and prevent a Communist takeover. They were tragically wrong – and the United States and its European allies are taking the same road in backing Hitler’s heirs in Ukraine.
Of course the majority of the government’s supporters are hardly hardcore neo-Nazis: but that isn’t necessary to make this a precedent the West will live to regret. The presence of Svoboda and “Right Sector” legitimizes these movements, and not only in Ukraine. Germany has periodically sought to ban the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party, and the British have taken legal measures against the British National Party: will they now grant the Ukrainian brothers of these so-called hate groups diplomatic recognition and pledges of political and even military support?
What’s interesting about the specific appointments listed above is the prominence of “Right Sector” leader Dmytro Yarosh in the key position of deputy chief of the national police. The “Right Sector” organization came out of the merger of several ultra-nationalist and openly neo-Nazi grouplets, including “Trident,” the Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian National Defense Force, “White Hammer,” and “Patriots of Ukraine.” Yorash boasted at the height of the protests that his group had amassed a large weapons cache, and since they already had the guns it was inevitable they would form the nucleus of the reconstituted police force. With the group’s high profile, and its celebrated status as “heroes of the revolution,” Yorash’s stormtroopers – who wear the red-and-black insignia of the Banderists –will be charged with suppressing anti-government “disturbances” and hunting down “traitors.” Perhaps they’ll throw in a little queer-bashing as well: the nationalists hate gays as well as Jews and all Russian-speakers.
Victoria Nuland thought she could keep Svoboda and “Right Sector” out of the government, but she hasn’t done a very good job so far. And with elections scheduled for May 5, the nationalists are well positioned to take a good chunk of the vote. Arseniy Yatsenyuk, the State Department’s favored candidate, is a bespectacled technocrat notably lacking in the charisma department. Tyahnybok , on the other hand, is a natural demagogue.
No matter how many US taxpayer dollars flow into the coffers of the State Department’s Ukrainian sock puppets between now and May 25, all the money in the world may not be able to contain the forces our interventionists have loosened on the world. The news that the leader of “Right Sector” has called on none other than al-Qaeda to help Ukraine in its battle against Russia is an indication of just what sort of demons we have unleashed – this time.
A little off topic. I know we have a CBC, the Congressional Black Caucus. What I didn’t know, WHAT THE CUC? We also have a Congressional Ukranian Caucus. This country is soooo fucking over.
Zarathustra,
Thanks for that really informative post. It corroborates what Paul Craig Roberts has been saying. Sometimes it feels as if we are living in some latter day version of the Vichy regime in which advancement in government depends on one’s willingness to betray the Constitution and collaborate with the enemy. The enemy in this case being international bankers operating in secrecy through the Federal Reserve, the perpetrators of 9/11 and the media moguls who fabricate false story lines to distract the masses from the plundering of the nation. Roberts maintains that the coup in Ukraine is intended to open the country up to western pilfering by central bankers and to encircle Russia with missiles. It also threatens a major warm water port. He points out that the Russians have existing agreements to maintain 25000 troops in the area, and that much of Ukraine is not just Russian speaking but has been part of Russia for most of recent history. Hence the term “invasion”, bandied about by the ignorant and corrupt spokes-models of mainstream news, is completely misleading.. .
But I wonder, are the neo-cons and their Washington puppets beginning to see their plans backfiring? In Syria and now Ukraine, is all this destruction and chaos really what they wanted? Did they really think they could bully Russia and China into submission. Did these architects of the “new world order” a fair number of whom have Israeli roots, really want to awaken Hitler’s ghost? America’s foreign policy is beginning to seem downright delusional. I mean the hypocrisy, decrying alleged interference by the Russians in another country’s affairs…it’s beyond laughable, so far over the top that it’s immune to parody. We now have a government that is really threatening the security of the nation. Monumental incompetence, arrogance, some evil plan we can’t even imagine, whatever is happening, it doesn’t make any sense, and none of it is good for the people of the United States.
Admin’s reference to Tolkien in his discussion of Google is indeed relevant. The ring of power confers invisibility on whoever wears it, and it is that invisibility that enables the wearer to act without morality, to control other people. The invisibility is itself corrupting. You try to follow the money, but the central bankers exist in their dark guarded towers, manipulating in secret. We can only follow the money as far as the front door of the Fed. We can’t look inside to see what’s really going on. Our owners can see us but we can’t see them.
John Kerry walks into a bar and orders a drink. The bartender asks: “Why the long face?”
Crimea Parliament “Accelerates Crisis”, Votes To Join Russia
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/06/2014 07:24 -0500
While the world is convinced that Putin’s Tuesday press conference was an admission of blinking to the west, the reality is anything but that, and hours ago Crimea’s parliament voted to join Russia on Thursday and its Moscow-backed government set a referendum within 10 days on the decision in what Reuters said is a “a dramatic escalation of the crisis over the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula.” To be sure, the Crimea – which has an ethnic Russian majority – affiliation to Moscow as opposed to Kiev is well-known, yet still the sudden acceleration of moves to bring Crimea formally under Moscow’s rule came as European Union leaders gathered for an emergency summit to seek ways to pressure Russia to back down and accept mediation. And now all Putin has to do is sit back and say the people have spoken and without spilling a drop of blood has effectively split the country in two parts, with the entire east of Ukraine, where pro-Russian sentiment also runs high – sure to follow Crimea. Just as we said from the very beginning.
From Reuters:
The Crimean parliament voted unanimously “to enter into the Russian Federation with the rights of a subject of the Russian Federation”. The vice premier of Crimea, home to Russia’s Black Sea military base in Sevastopol, said a referendum on the status would take place on March 16. The announcement, which diplomats said could not have been made without Russian President Vladimir Putin’s approval, raised the stakes in the most serious east-west confrontation since the end of the Cold War.
Far from seeking a diplomatic way out, Putin appears to have chosen to create facts on the ground before the West can agree on more than token action against him.
EU leaders had been set to warn but not sanction Russia over its military intervention after Moscow rebuffed Western diplomatic efforts to persuade it to pull forces in Crimea, with a population of about 2 million, back to their bases. It was not immediately clear what impact the Crimean moves would have.
European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said in a Twitter message: “We stand by a united and inclusive #Ukraine.”
French President Francois Hollande told reporters on arrival at the summit: “There will be the strongest possible pressure on Russia to begin lowering the tension and in the pressure there is, of course, eventual recourse to sanctions.”
To be sure, the new Kiev government – which may or may not have killed its own citizens in order to rise to power while blaming the atrocities on Yanukovich as described yesterday – has responded in kind to how Putin views them, and declared the referendum illegal and opened a criminal investigation against Crimean Prime Minister Sergei Askyonov, who was appointed by the region’s parliament last week. The Ukrainian government does not recognise his authority or that of the parliament. Still, it is by now far too late for Kiev to enforce its will in Crimea.
In the meantime, and confirming that Putin has all the cards, EU leaders had been set to warn but not sanction Russia over its military intervention in Ukraine after Moscow rebuffed Western diplomatic efforts to persuade it to pull forces in Crimea back to their bases. According to EU sources the leaders gathered in Brussels delayed the discussion on sanctions to Russia to a new meeting in two weeks. As we stated yesterday, due to stern German industrial lobby objection, Europe will never implement full blown sanctions and at best will stick to some optical wristslap which has no real adverse impact on Russia.
But back to the Crimea, where a parliament official said voters will be asked two questions: should Crimea be part of the Russian Federation and should Crimea return to an earlier constitution (1992) that gave the region more autonomy?
“If there weren’t constant threats from the current illegal Ukrainian authorities, maybe we would have taken a different path,” deputy parliament speaker Sergei Tsekov told reporters outside the parliament building in Crimea’s main city of Simferopol.
“I think there was an annexation of Crimea by Ukraine, if we are going to call things by their name. Because of this mood and feeling we took the decision to join Russia. I think we will feel much more comfortable there.”
All the while, Europe is engaged in idiotic meetings and summits, spearheaded by John Kerry, who was quick to point out how constructive the meeting has been. Perhaps it would have been more so if Russia had participated:
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov refused to meet his new Ukrainian counterpart or to launch a “contact group” to seek a solution to the crisis at talks in Paris on Wednesday despite arm-twisting by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and European colleagues. The two men will meet again in Rome on Thursday.
Tension was high in Crimea after a senior United Nations envoy was surrounded by a pro-Russian crowd, threatened and forced to get back on his plane and leave the country on Wednesday.
The EU summit in Brussels seemed unlikely to adopt more than symbolic measures against Europe’s biggest gas supplier, because neither industrial powerhouse Germany nor financial centre Britain is keen to start down that road.
The short, informal EU summit will mostly be dedicated to displaying support for Ukraine’s new pro-Western government, represented by Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk, who will attend even though Kiev is neither an EU member nor a recognised candidate for membership.
After meeting European Parliament President Martin Schulz, Yatseniuk appealed to Russia to respond to mediation efforts.
After a day of high-stakes diplomacy in Paris on Wednesday, Lavrov refused to talk to Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andriy Deshchitsya, whose new government is not recognised by Moscow.
As he left the French Foreign Ministry, Lavrov was asked if he had met his Ukrainian counterpart. “Who is that?” the Russian minister asked.
He stuck to Putin’s line – ridiculed by the West – that Moscow does not command the troops without national insignia which have taken control of Crimea, besieging Ukrainian forces, and hence cannot order them back to bases.
Kerry said afterwards he had never expected to get Lavrov and Deshchitsya into the same room right away, but diplomats said France and Germany had tried to achieve that.
Western diplomats said there was still hope that once Lavrov had reported back to Putin, Russia would accept the idea of a “contact group” involving both Moscow and Kiev as well as the United States and European powers to seek a solution.
Keep hoping. In the meantime, with each passing day, Putin consolidates his new territory even as the west dithers, Europe is unable to obtain the bailout loans it has promised Ukraine, and Kerry keeps talking.
Crimea May (Or May Not) Be Part Of Russia As Of This Moment
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/06/2014 08:49 -0500
Moments ago, Reuters blasted the following headline:
DECREE MAKING CRIMEA PART OF RUSSIA HAS COME INTO FORCE FROM MOMENT OF ADOPTION; RUSSIAN ARMED FORCES ARE ONLY LEGITIMATE FORCES IN REGION -DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER OF CRIMEA
On the surface, this would mean that the Russian annexation of the Crimea if complete (and East Ukraine is coming). Especially when one considers that earlier Crimea also said it could adopt the Russian rouble as its currency and “nationalise” state property as part of plans to join the Russian Federation, a regional official was quoted as saying on Thursday.
The only problem as we reported earlier is that Kiev opened a criminal investigation against Crimean Prime Minister Sergei Askyonov, who was appointed by the region’s parliament last week. The Ukrainian government does not recognise his authority or that of the parliament. In other words, Kiev will not respect the Crimea’s popular choice, even if it is fully supported by Putin, which means that a showdown, one in which Russia proclaims it is defending the democracy of the Crimea against the Kiev government, is now almost inevitable.
Is that what democracies do? –admin
Yes. Today it is Democratic-Republican exceptionalism. Its hegemony under the guise of ‘spreading democracy’ The great game. One Government for of and by the people which means not you.