http://ed.ruvr.ru/data/2011/07/05/1253304378/%D0%A0%D0%B8%D0%BA%20%D0%A0%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%BE%D1%84%20%D1%84%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%BE.jpg"A brutal gratuitous slaying"

Rick Rozoff

Jar2

Ukraine: Nazi-like Victory of US/NATO Lawlessness

March 2 2014

http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/03/02/14/RozoffUKRAINELanguage.MP3

The US/NATO takeover of Ukraine, thought out and planned by the Neo-Conservative geopolitical architects and Zbignew Brezhinsky acolytes in the United States who have been driving the US policy of aggressive war and the destruction of countries since the events of 9-11, is not exactly going according to their plan for attaining complete global domination, uni-polarity and American hegemony.

Their ignorance of the peoples of the countries they are invading and attempting to subvert, their use of everything from Islamic extremists to militarized neo-nazis groups and their threats of sanctions and "prices to pay" are guaranteeing their own failure, and it is about time.

Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff spoke to us about the revocation of a 2012 Ukrainian Federal Law that permitted language rights to linguistic groups which means in areas where Russian is spoken by a majority of people it cannot be used. Mr. Rozoff says that the cultural pogrom we have seen in Ukraine is on a level that is almost unimaginable and compares it to the ascension to power of Hitler's National Socialists in Germany after 1933. Rozoff call the events in Ukraine: "...the worst thing that has occurred in our lifetime for what it signals: the utter triumph of lawlessness internationally, the utter triumph of international gangsterism and I mean the big gangsters in the West who are behind this ultimately and their gutter-snipes and their punks on the streets who are delivering the goods for them." As for financial aid Rozoff says the usurpers in Kiev are simply asking for their pay-off money.

This is John Robles. You are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick, how are you?

Rozoff: Good John, despite the circumstances.

Robles: Yeah, I have no words right now myself. But I would like to hear your take on what is going on right now in Ukraine, and especially with the outlawing of the Russian language?

Rozoff: Ukraine is divided right now. It is not only divided between people who are Russian speaking primarily, or Russian and Ukrainian bilingual, and those fanatics and extremists in Western Ukraine who insist on speaking Ukraine only, Ukrainian rather only. I mean there is linguistic and general cultural geographical divide that exists in the country, but really what we are talking about is ideological and I would argue ultimately moral ofdivisions within the country.

What occurred on Saturday, let’s call it by its proper name, it was the most overt coup that has occurred in Europe since before World War II, there’s no question about that. The only comparison, and we’ve discussed it before, would be something on the order of Benito Mussolini’s march on Rome in 1922.

If the previous colour revolutions, including the so-called "Orange Revolution" in Ukraine in 2004 and 2005 was essentially an illegal seizure of power, and it’s my contention it was, it was at least done under the auspices or under the pretence of it being a parliamentary electoral transition, that is a special election was held and there was a change of regime based on the result of the election, whether or not that was a legitimate election or not.

What happened this past Saturday however is of a totally calibre. What we have seen is a group of violent mob activists, essentially chasing the government out of power, in collusion with certain forces within the Parliament, within the RADA. But for the most part the mob – mob rule – has taken over in Ukraine, and what we are going to see, that given the flavor or the nature of the real core of the opposition on the streets in Kiev, in Lviv and elsewhere in the country, which is: extreme nationalist, fanatically and intolerantly nationalist to the point of fascist, is what we can expect to see is a series of punitive measures, vendettas, pogroms, and these will be directed against first of all political adversaries, there is a statement I believe on Interfax today where a leader of the Party of Regions, formally the governing party only a few days ago after all, only four days ago, stated that we are now operating at gun-point. And he’s a Deputy in the Parliament, in the VerkhovnaRada, and it's something we've all suspected.

That not only have members of the now opposition parties, formally governing parties, operating under duress but that announcements there have been threats to their lives and the lives of their families and that is what I suspect is occurring, and that’s why you see some of the defections if not most that we’ve seen.

We also have to realize that there is a movement afoot, as you indicate, to revoke a 2012 Federal law that permitted language rights to linguistic group that represented ten or more percent of the population and that any given political entity and province, that has now been revoked. That means in areas where Russian is spoken by a majority of people technically, it cannot be used as a state language, one of two state languages.

Similarly with other ethnic minorities, Hungarian and others in the west of the countryor Romanian perhaps. We have already heard about an attack on the synagogue in Kiev. We heard anti-Semitic language, clearly anti-Russian. We’ve seen that monument erected to the victory of the Soviet Union in World War II over Nazi Germany desecrated. We’ve seen a statue to General Kutuzov, who led the Russian Army in the war against Napoleon in 1812, destroyed.

We have seen a cultural pogrom on a level that is almost unimaginable - the only comparison I could possibly think of is shortly after the ascension to power of Hitler’s National Socialists in Germany after 1933, you know the book burnings and the other cultural assaults against ethnic and other minorities in the country, this is what we are seeing right now.

Look, I have right in front of me right now, a photograph of the City Hall in Kiev from 2 or 3 days ago, and there are pillars, columns, in the centre of it. The Svoboda banners or pennants are hanging from both sides – you know the 3 fingers and the fist – a roughly a variation of the art for, you know punch fist salute of all the coloured revolutions. In the middle is a giant representation of Stepan Bandera, the Ukrainian nationalist and accused Nazi collaborationist in World War II. This is what’s taken over in Kiev, this is what’s taken over in much of Ukraine

Robles: What would you say about Secretary of State John Kerry. Two statements I would like you to comment on, one by John Kerry, he says: “Ukraine is going through an extraordinary transition and developments there shouldn’t be viewed as a west against east scenario”.

And also, this is the so-called opposition, or I don’t know if you can call people who have used force to occupy the houses of government as new leaders, but that’s what the western media is calling them.

“The new leaders in Ukraine have promised to fight separatism”, as the European Union and Russia called on them to ensure the country’s integrity’. Can you comment on those two statements?

Rozoff: John Kerry’s comment? I would first of all just counterpoise his comment. There’s a useful duplicity amongst American politicians when they are actually part of the governing administration they speak at least in the public with a degree of restraint that belies their true intention, which came to the fore or was revealed a couple of weeks ago when the Victoria Nuland tape was aired – this is how they talk privately, right, telling the European Union to get aft and dictating terms for the next regime in the Ukraine after the coup that occurred on Saturday.

But while they are speaking at least to the public, to the media, they use restrained language like Mr Kerry, however, within the last 24 hours, John McCain, one of the ranking Senators in the US Senate, and a former presidential candidate not too long ago, was on television stating that it’s a question… (this is a distinction between East and West) there is a conflict between East and West.

The Ukrainian people, he states as though he’s empowered to speak on their behalf, or can divine what their true intentions are, he says the Ukrainian people want to be a part of the West and not the East and then the “East” carries a negative connotation (the reference is clearly to Russia) that there is something inherently bad about the East and about Russia, and of course no sane Ukrainian in Mr McCain’s view would possibly want to affiliate with his kith and kin across the border in Russia, who are seen as inherently inferior or inherently savage and barbarian and so forth.

He also said, and I think this worth … your listeners ought to know about this, that the events and the takeover, the bloody and violent coup in Ukraine last Saturday (he said this twice) should make Russian President Vladimir Putin “a little nervous”.

This is the same McCain who said, right after Muammar Gaddafi was killed in October 2011 that Vladimir Putin ought to pay attention, in so many words that “he is the next”. This is again he is a senior member of the US Senate, a presidential candidate. He is speaking the truth of what the American political establishment means. Kerry is simply sugar-coating his words.

Robles: So they are threatening Vladimir Putin, this a provocation in your opinion?

Rozoff: Again. Well I don’t know what else to say, but McCain twice in the television interview said to Vladimir Putin, given the events, recent events in Ukraine "ought to be a little nervous," that's a quote.

Robles: I see, I see. What about the new “leaders”, these “peaceful protesters” that they are going to fight separatism? Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: Well let’s keep in mind separatism is a two-edged sword and these people have played both bloody ends of it. On the one hand had they not succeeded in bringing down the government, the legally elected and universally, internationally recognized government of Ukraine last Saturday, then they themselves would have played the suffragette’s card in north-west Ukraine, around the Lviv area, calling for independence or breaking away or at least some autonomy status.

Now having taken control of the capital in a putsch, in a coup, they are against separatism, and the US and NATO of course are right behind the extremists, the Molotov cocktails hurling and the sniper rifle wielding extremists who took power on Saturday are coming in (that is the US and NATO and the Europaen Union and saying: “… we will not tolerate separatism or the fragmentation of Ukraine.”

That is an unquestionable reference in the first place to Crimea. That should any efforts be made by these newly established authorities in Crimea to assert the rights, they have the Russian language and so forth, that can then be construed or exploited by the, whatever anarchic mob of gangsters that’s running the affair currently in Kiev that threaten the Crimea and then call on their western patrons to back them up.

Robles: But they actually have under international law and under normal international standards, they have the right to secede from Ukraine if their human rights and their right to self-determination and the right to speak the language that is native to them, if that’s infringed upon, they have the right to secede from Ukraine. SO what they are doing is the exact opposite, they are forcing the breakup of Ukraine themselves..

Rozoff:The may bringing events about that may lead to the fragmentation of Ukraine but I still believe and there is a parallel to theis and a precedent, when the first and the “real” colour revolution succeeded in 2003-2004, that is in Georgia, where Mikhail Saakashvili came to power with an irredentist and uncompromising hostile towards Russia.

His first manoeuvre was within a month or two of taking office was the threatening of an autonomous region within Georgia, just as Crimea is an autonomous region within Ukraine, and I’m talking about Adjara or Adjaria. And he threatened the country there was still slow handful Russian peace keepers there, he actually moved his military right up to the border.

Eventually it lead to the president of Adjara having to flee to Moscow and then they took over the area. This is what I believe the new extremists in Kiev are going to replicate if they can. They are going to have, just like Hitler distinguished himself by remilitarizing the Rhineland and then eventually bombing Spain or moving into the Sudetenland.

Everyone of this ilk needs some military campaign to consolidate power and I fear that threats against Crimea would be the most likely scenario for consolidating some sort of fascistic power in Kiev.

Robles: I see. Where do you see NATO in all of this, Rick, please? That is very important.

Rozoff:It is in a very thick of it. I mean despite the fact that NATO is going out of its way to keep a low profile because to do otherwise is to expose the real essence of what is occurring in Ukraine which is: that a country of vital geostrategic significance, one that is not only close to Russia, but is arguably almost inseparable to it, the way Syrians and Lebanese may have felt in the past is I think how Ukrainians and Russians do now. They see themselves as at one time being part of this one political entity. There are relatives on each side of the boarder and certainly particularly in the Crimea.

NATO has said a couple of things. Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen two days ago, on February, 23 made a statement in to the effect that Ukraine is a vital partner of NATO and NATO is a friend to the Ukrainian people.

Robles: A vital partner?

Rozoff:Yes. Impressing its stamp of NATO, in other words we’ve branded you, we’ve marked you off as our territory and there is an upcoming meeting of defense ministers in Brussels. I believe it is occurring tomorrow, for two days, 26 and 27 our time here.

And there is going to be a regular scheduled meeting – the NATO- Ukraine Commission- something set up to help integrate Ukraine fully into NATO.

As though the coup had never occurred, right. As though there had been no disruption. Everything else has gone by the way aside. I’m sure public transportation, I’m sure health service, I’m sure everything else has been impacted or impeded by the upheaval in Ukraine but not the meeting, the NATO- Ukraine Commission which is going according to their schedule tomorrow.

We had the cases in the past to mention, that even under Yanukovich, and you think how much worse it is going to be now under whatever juntais implanted in Kiev, that even under Yanukovich Ukraine became the first country to assign two naval vessels to permanent NATO maritime operations, one in the Mediterranean, one in the Indian Ocean, operation Active Endeavour and operation Ocean Shield respectively.

Ukraine became the first not-full member of NATO to supply military forces for NATO’s response force. So the process of integrating Ukraine into NATO has been going on for decades. It has been intensified in recent years rather than the opposite. And that opportunity now presents the US and its allies with the opportunity to further absorb and consolidatecontrol over Ukraine.

This is possibly the worst thing that occurred in our lifetime and I do not exaggerate, for what it signals: the utter triumph of lawlessness internationally, the utter triumph of international gangsterism and I mean the big gangsters in the West who are behind this ultimately and their gutter-snipes and their punks on the streets who are delivering the goods for them.

To the tune by the way, as the new even fluid and amorphous regime and Kiev is asking of the West $35 billion in bailout money.

Robles: That is the first thing they got in there, the first thing they did was saying: “Oh, Russian –it is illegal as a language, so therefore other Russians are also illegal. And we need several billion dollars”. That is a first thing they did.

Rozoff:Yeah, they are asking for their pay-off money.

You were listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list.

 Part 1 Ukraine: "Sick fascist filth and gangland violence as political opposition"

20 February, 23:00

http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/02/20/19/18022014_Robles_Rozoff_Part_01.MP3

Ukraine: sick fascist filth and gangland violence as political opposition – Rick Rozoff

With the release of a recent conversation between the US Ambassador to Ukraine and Victoria Nuland plotting the downfall of the current legitimate elected government in Kiev, it is clear who is behind the attempted coup in Ukraine. US backed "activists" with sniper rifles and hand guns are openly firing on police something that would not be tolerated anywhere in the world but which is being portrayed by western leaders as being legitimate opposition protest behavior. However such cold-blooded murder would lead to brains being swept off the street in their cities. According to Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff, who spoke on these issues, what we are color revolution techniques in action and the western media is playing along as a propaganda tool for those behind the scenes.

Hello. This is John Robles Rick Rozoff, I am speaking with Rick Rozoff the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is a regular feature of the Voice of Russia.

Robles: Can you give us an update on what is going on with NATO? A lot of stuff is going on, a lot of attention on Ukraine. And I’d like to ask you about Ukraine. But, first, what is going on with NATO right now?

Rozoff: It is acting true to its new purpose in the post cold war period, as an international military block. For example, just in the last week or so, for the first time ever, a delegation from the NATO military committee, and the military committee in its full form consists of the military chiefs of staff, of all the 28 full NATO members, visited Georgia. And this again is a first, it is unprecedented, and clearly acknowledging, or demonstrating how strategically important Georgia is to NATO’s Eurasia, but ultimately European plans. That is number one.

NATO’s also commenced its air patrols over the North-Atlantic nation of Iceland including warplanes of both Finland and Sweden with the expressed intention of further integrating Finland and Sweden, with an expressed intention of further integrating Finland and Sweden. Of course Finland has a lengthy border with Russia, those two countries into NATO as ultimately four NATO members.

We have to recall that both those nations have troops fighting under NATO command with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan, that Sweden has supplied Griffin military aircraft for the war against Libya 3 years ago (in parts of the word).

Also, the NATO warships have docked in both Puntland, which is a semi-autonomous, really at this point, an independent part of Somalia as well as in the Seychelles, an island nation in the Indian Ocean of the east coast of Africa in recent days. This is part of the permanent NATO military operation, military presence in the Indian Ocean called Ocean Shield, which complements their permanent military naval deployment in the Mediterranean, Active Endeavor, and so forth.

We also noticed the first US guided-missile-warship arriving at the Rota Naval Base in Spain, on the Atlantic coast of Spain, as part of what eventually will be 4 US warships with interceptor missiles, part of the European phased adaptive approach, but ultimately part of the international US and Allied missile shield program, interceptor missile program. So, this gives you some indication of what is going on throughout the world.

There have been other initiatives by NATO in other parts of the world, including in Africa most notably, something that isn’t directly NATO but for all the difference it make, it may as well be. Just a few days ago, in Brussels, which is the headquarters of both the European Union and NATO, the European Union announced a joint military operation in the Central African Republic (CAR). This is done through the military committee of the European Union, comparable to what was done in neighboring Chad a few years ago.

But it is noteworthy that NATO has recruited several non-EU member states to provide troops for that mission including Georgia, Serbia, Canada, Norway, Turkey and the US. This was at an alleged Fourth Generation Conference in Brussels on February the 13th, 5 days ago. That gives you an idea of what is happening internationally.

To segue into our main topic of discussion: today the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen, again called on quote: "All parties of Ukraine to desist from violence."

I could only imagine if a comparable situation, one that’s… what is occurring in Kiev right now, were to be occurring in Brussels, if he say: "All parties in Belgium to refrain from violence", when state security personnel are being shot to death and set on fire with Molotov cocktails, if he would have such a balanced perspective, of course he would not.

Robles: Regarding Ukraine, how many policemen have been injured already there?

Rozoff: The number is rising of course. But the latest report I see is that over 184 police officers have been wounded, 35 of them critically, and at least 7 of them have been shot to death.

Robles: What is the reaction from the US right now? Has Nuland come out condemning any of this? Has anybody in the US condemned this or are they all supporting it?

Rozoff: The US Ambassador to Ukraine, the same Geoffrey Pyatt who was caught on tape with Victoria Nuland in recent weeks, plotting the downfall of the current legitimate elected government in Kiev, threatened sanctions, mentioned the fact that sanctions could be enforced against all parties.

It is impossible to levy sanctions against fascist guttersnipes and mobsters who are on a rampage, they have no assets that can be seized and no trade that can be halted and so forth. So, this is a unilateral threat to the Government of Ukraine, which is under siege, quite literally under siege, with government buildings being stormed, personnel being seized captive, even killed. In the case of the central headquarters of the ruling party in the country, the Party of Regions, where a member… presumably a member… a security office by one account, at their central headquarters in Kiev was murdered.

What we are seeing is almost gangland violence trying to pass itself off as political opposition.

What is very important to noted is that the president of the country Victor Yanukovich is to meet with three major opposition leaders: Yatsenyuk and Klitschko and Tyagnibok at 11:00. So something is going to be breaking at that point but there is a clear coordination between the opposition figures within the Parliament, within the Verkhovna Rada and the Molotov-cocktail-hurling-rifle-wielding so-called opposition outside.

Robles: I’m sorry, Rick, are there charges? Haven’t charges been pressed against Klitschko and, what is his name, Yatsenyuk? Aren’t they facing charges already? And if you could, can you tell us about..you told me before we started about videos you saw, that they were actually… someone had a sniper rifle or something, a rifle with a scope and they were actually just shooting policemen.

Rozoff: That is exactly it, you know anyone who e-mails me at rwrozoff@yahoo.com, I’d be glad to give then a link to that video. It is circulating, somebody in Italy has sent it out and there are several similar videos. This is one of the more stark I’ve seen.

It shows a young, so-called "activist" as US would portray him, with (exactly) a sniper rifle with a scope, firing presumably at police or other security personnel, somebody else has a hand gone and is firing.

So there are weapons on the street. And clearly the fact that 7 security personnel have been shot dead confirms of that that firearms are being used.

Again, I don’t know in which other capital city in the world this sort of behavior would be tolerated, much less portrayed by western leaders as being legitimate opposition protest behavior when what you are talking about is cold blooded murder.

Robles: Can you imagine in the US that people have started shooting police just openly on the street?

Rozoff:I hate to put it in such stark and graphic terms, but the only way I could characterize this is: they’d be sweeping their brains off the street for the next day.

Robles: I mean how can they possibly get away with trying to support this? What are the American people, I mean the average people, thinking about this?

Rozoff:Unfortunately the average person doesn’t go to the Internet and look up videos which are readily accessible. But I would have to say largely in the Russian media as I don’t know anywhere else in the world we are seeing these videos, even there are often times western news agencies – Reuters, BBC and so forth. But because of the controlled nature of news particularly in relation to foreign affairs in the US and other NATO countries we are only seeing the doctored and sanitized version.

And I often argue this, John, I think perhaps even on your show – it is an equivalent of somebody walking into a movie theater where the hero has finally taken enough from the villain and starts fighting back. And when you see that, and only that, it is very difficult to confuse the characters and to believe that the perpetrator is the victim and vice versa. It is one of the methods used by the western establishment. So called news media, which are really propaganda outlets, to portray the "peaceful protestors being assaulted without provocation by brutal security forces".

But again, you are correct in stating: where something like this to happen in Washington DC, or Paris, or London, I can assure you the first police officer who was injured in any manner, would be the cause for a crackdown, the likes of which wouldn’t be forgotten in a hurry. However the trick about the "regime change", so-called "color revolution technique", which is: to place the targeted government in a situation where if they do not respond harshly, they are seen as vulnerable and then the violence is escalated. If they make any effort, no matter how belated, to even defend themselves, it is seen as being a gross violation of human rights and portrayed that way by the western governments and their rather formidable media outlets.

And this is a situation that I believe is occurring right now in Kiev. But we have to..anyone who has seen this, who has gone to my website or Russian websites and has seen the actual fires in downtown Kiev, this is again the capital city of a European country going up in flames, for the second time in 15 years we saw Belgrade similarly set of fire by NATO bombers, what will be 15 years from next month, if this is a new world order what you are seeing is a resumption of fascistic brutal violent uprisings which ultimately are backed by the US and its cohort of NATO military powers. And what I fear right now, if the violence is not halted very quickly in Ukraine you are going to see full-fledged, if not civil war, you are going to see foreign-backed-armed-insurgency, if not comparable in every particular to what’s happening in Syria at least similar in terms of its basic dynamic.

Robles: I’d like to make a comment here for… and this might be a little unusual… for American law enforcement officers, police officers in the US. I’d like to make a plea for them, look at what’s happening to their colleagues in Ukraine and call their senators or whoever and ask them: "How can they possibly support this?" What do you think?

Rozoff: That is a very good point. A lot of Chicago police officers incidentally are of Ukrainian ethnic background, there is a neighborhood not terribly far from where I am called Ukrainian Village, as a matter of fact. And to see their colleagues and there is, let’s be honest, there is a special sense of fraternity or comradery between people of the same professions around the world particularly those that entail some degree of personal danger. And for police officers around the world to be watching this: you know, I would suggest that there is an understanding they themselves could be next if some western supported insurgent uprising of the sort that is occurring on the streets of Kiev.

Incidentally there is a report by INTERFAX Ukraine that armed groups in Western Ukraine and Lviv have been intercepted by security personnel on route to Kiev. So what you are talking about is something almost comparable to, say, Generalissimo Franko’s march on Madrid, Spain in the late 30s counting on the fifth column (the infamous fifth column) supporters within the city to assist them and so forth. But this is nothing less than an effort to topple a legitimate government in Europe in the 21st century through vicious street violence, the sort one may have associated with Adolf Hitler’s attempt to Beer Hall Putsch in 1923 or Mussolini’s March on Rome. This is the kind of sick fascist filth we are seeing in Ukraine.

Robles: I see.

This is John Robles. You were listening to an interview with Mr Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is a weekly feature of the Voice of Russia. You can find other work by me and by Mr Rick Rozoff on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and we wish you the best wherever in the world you may be.

 Part 2 Ex-USSR, Russian Allies: Targets of US, NATO Color Revolution

24 February, 2014 00:05 Download audio file

Ex-USSR, Russian allies: targets of US, NATO color revolution - Rick Rozoff

It is unprecedented that simultaneously three countries that are allies of Russia are being threatened by color revolutions: Venezuela, the Bosnian and the Serb Republic (The Republika Srpska) and Ukraine.

These synthetic uprisings orchestrated by the US/NATO/EU would have been identified as the uprisings of fascistic guttersnipes 100 years ago, but in 2014 they are being portrayed as democracy or freedom movements, by the same people who are organizing them to destroy country after country. Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff says that if something like this was to happen in Washington, London, Paris, Berlin or Rome, this would not have been tolerated for hours, much less days, weeks and months.

Mr. Rozoff also stated that since the fragmentation of the Soviet Union the US and other Western nations have insinuated themselves very deeply into the political structures of former Soviet states, especially in Ukraine and into its internal security apparatus and military through a NATO integration and Partnership for Peace Agreement and the NATO-Ukraine Commission. It should be known, says Mr. Rozoff that the NATO Association Agreement with Ukraine is meant to: “… bring a country with a 1400 km border with Russia firmly into the military pen of the United States and NATO.”

This is John Robles, you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is part 2 of a longer interview. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com

PART 1

Robles: The timing Rick – protests in Venezuela, Bosnia at the same time. It is like they are working on some schedule or something. The Olympics are going on right now and this is all happening in the background. Anything on the timing that you could comment on?

Rozoff: That’s a keen point you are making. There is no question about that – somebody has decided to ignite several fires simultaneously, so as to prevent the timely response, particularly I would argue, by Russia, which is a close political and even, ultimately, military ally of Venezuela, as well as the Bosnian and the Serb Republic (The Republika Srpska) and Ukraine. So that, what you see is three nations, one of them a quasi-nation or, let’s say, an autonomous Bosnian Serb republic, with close political affiliation with Russia being threatened simultaneously through these wretched color revolution scenarios.

That, again, if they were occurring a hundred years ago, say, in the 1920’s or 1930’s in Europe, would be identified for what they were – which is an uprising of fascistic guttersnipes. And the fact that this is being portrayed in any way or form as a democracy or freedom movement is outrageous. And it just shows how far the US domination, if not almost monopoly, controlled international news dissemination has led to black being portrayed as white and vice versa.

Robles: It was 6 p.m. Moscow time when the Ukrainian security services announced that they would be clearing out Maidan Square. They gave them a warning and the Russian Foreign Ministry has called on these oppositionists not to use violence etc. They had a chance to peacefully just break camp and call it a day, just clear the square.

Again, you’ve commented on the violent tactics already, but I just wanted to get that out there, that they were warned in advance. This wasn’t some sudden swoop or something by the security forces. It wasn’t a surprise thing, they knew it and I think it’s a long time in coming. Why do you think they took so long? In my opinion they took way too long to react.

Rozoff: Again, the reason by analogy – were something like this to happen in Washington, or in London or Paris, or Berlin, or Rome, this would not have been tolerated for hours, much less days, weeks and months. If nothing else, the established authorities would have portrayed the existence of the so-called tent cities as being a threat to public health, to impeding the flow of traffic, you know security obviously, a problem or threat, and it would have been cleared up right quickly. That you could be assured of that.

But if you are a government that is under siege by the US and its allies, then no matter what you do it’s wrong. If you demonstrate any lack of resolve, you are seen weak and ready for the kill. If you attempt howsoever timidly to enforce the basic functions of a government by ensuring public security, then you are seen as being heavy-handed and overbearing, and violent, and so forth.

And I would have to say, if I were Viktor Yanukovych (and this applies, by the way, to a lot of heads of state. You know, Maduro in Venezuela, perhaps Lukashenko in Belarus. I don’t know how many around the world), have got to be thinking that what we’ve seen in the past 15 years is that any time a head of state tries to defend his nation against a Western onslaught, he ends up in a prison cell and he ends up dead.

And this has happened with several heads of state, from Ivory Coast to Yugoslavia, from Libya to Iraq. And the message is: it is riding a tiger, it is literally that. If you continue with the process, you are going to be mauled and killed. And if you try to get off, you are going to be assaulted.

Robles: I’m sorry, I think you are right, you are absolutely right. And I think putting that out there like that, I think the presidents of all the countries in the world, especially countries that may be targeted, I don’t think they should be afraid to make a move.

I think the opposite. I think they should get together – all of the independent thinking and all the presidents of countries that are seeking to maintain an independent or sovereign foreign policy, stance or decision, or policies, I think they should all get together and form some sort of alliance so this does not happen again. And I think this stuff has to be just cut off before even it is allowed to grow.

We already know, and I think it is obvious to the world who the actors are, who the puppeteers are, who is pulling the strings, where the financing is coming from. I just don’t understand why, for example, presidents don’t get together and just make this not possible anymore.

Rozoff: You are absolutely correct about that John! And if I could, there is the Aesopian fable, many of your listeners may know about the Cats and the Mouse, where its decided the cat is picking up a mouse, a different mouse every day to devour it. The mice hold a council, and they determine they have to put a bell around the cat in order to know when he is coming. And the world has to bell this cat right now, it should have done it a long time ago.

But on the upside, the Community of Latin America and Caribbean States (CELAC as it from the acronym is known) held a meeting a couple of weeks ago in Havana, Cuba, where they declared the western hemisphere to be a nuclear free zone and a zone of peace. And that is the sort of initiative that has to be taken not only throughout Latin America, but throughout the world.

We have to declare the world to be a zone of peace, free of nuclear and all other weapons, and certainly free of interfering in the internal affairs of sovereign nations and plunging capital cities of countries into violence, such as we are seeing in Kiev right now.

Robles: For one goal, and that’s to replace the president, as far as I see it.

Rozoff: To implant a puppet regime that will be brought into the military orbit of the United States and NATO, that’s the objective.

Robles: I don’t understand it myself. These people they are organizing a coup d'йtat… I mean, the minute they started storming government buildings, I think they forfeited every possible reasonable right, that even unreasonable right they had, to be called an opposition or to be dealt with peacefully. I don’t understand why he is even negotiating with them. They should all be, in my opinion, arrested immediately on the spot.

Rozoff: We have to keep in mind that since the fragmentation of the Soviet Union in 1991, that the US and other Western nations have insinuated themselves very deeply into the political structures of former Soviet states, Ukraine I think as much as any other. And that means into the internal security apparatus of the interior ministry, through the military, through NATO integration and Partnership for Peace, and the NATO-Ukraine Commission, and similar measures where it is a question of how much you can even depend on people within the internal and the external security apparatus because of 23 years of penetration by the West.

Incidentally, before I sign off, I just want to read a couple of brief excerpts from title 2 of the Association Agreement between Ukraine and European Union. The agreement, that not having been signed on November 21st, was the alleged cause for this violent uprising in Ukraine. It included comments like the following:

“The Association Agreement will promote gradual convergence on foreign and security matters with the aim of Ukraine’s ever deeper involvement in the European security area.”

It calls to strengthen cooperation and dialog on international security and crisis management, and so forth. It talks very precisely about the military integration of Ukraine into that of western Europe, into the European Union in the first place, which itself is almost…

Robles: NATO.

Rozoff: Yes, it is NATO. It goes through the Berlin Plus and other agreements. It also calls for: “taking full and timely advantage of all diplomatic and military channels between the Parties” and so forth.

And this goes on. People should know what this Association Agreement is. It is not meant to have workshops and multiculturalism or humanitarian festivals or something of the sort. This is a security-military agreement which is meant to bring a country with a 1400 km border with Russia firmly into the military pen of the United States and NATO.

Robles: And last comment, if you would Rick. You are US-based, you live in Chicago. A lot of people here still entertain an idea, and some of them might be listening right now, people in Ukraine, people in Bosnia, people in Serbia, that somehow the answer to all their problems lies in the West. That somehow, if they welcome the United States into their countries, that they are going to be taken care of and they are going to have better lives and everything else. Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: Yes, two scores. All they need to do is ask the people of Spain, Portugal, Greece and Italy – the southern flank of the European Union – what integration into the Western power structures portents for them.

It portents misery, insecurity, unemployment, indebtedness, bankruptcy, old pensioners jumping out of windows because life doesn’t mean anything to them anymore. This is what subordination to the West means for the people of southern and eastern Europe, and ultimately for the people of the world. That is number one.

Number two, we have to remember that Arseniy Yatsenyuk was Foreign Minister during the Government of Viktor Yushchenko – the US puppet who was implanted in the so-called Orange Revolution – and while he was Foreign Minister, 2000 Ukrainian troops were dragooned to be stationed in a warzone in Iraq.

This is what integration with the West means. It means supplying cannon fodder – unemployed Ukrainian men and women who will be sent to warzones around the world to kill and die. This is what the new world order is. If this is what the West offers the people of the world, the world would be well advised to reject it.

Robles : Are you serious Rick? Come on! Everything is great in America! Isn’t it?

Rozoff: Yes, well they can have Lady Gaga, but they are going to have their son coming home in a coffin.

Robles : Hey Rick, thank you very much. We’ll be speaking with you again next week. I really appreciate it.

Rozoff: Thanks for the opportunity John.

This is John Robles, you were listening to an interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is a weekly feature of the Voice of Russia. You can find other work by me and Mr. Rick Rozoff on our website at the voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and we wish you the best wherever in the world you may be. 

 

 Nuland instructed US ambassador on Makeup of Ukrainian Government

9 February, 19:26 2014  Download audio file

Blaming Russia is natural in US – Andrew Kreig

Last December Victoria Nuland returned to the US after handing out cookies and doughnuts to what can only be described as insurgents in Kiev’s Maidan Square and then returned to give a briefing in Washington to the US-Ukraine Foundation, during which she stated that the US has already “invested” $5 billion dollars in order to bring US “democracy” to Ukraine.

The speech was remarkable in that Ms. Nuland, despite all of the “democratic” and “humanitarian” rhetoric admitted that the US was attempting to overthrow the government. Her recently leaked conversation with the US Ambassador is also historically unprecedented in that it is the first time that proof of plans to overthrow and install a government have been released before the fact. NATO specialist and Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff spoke about the implications of the leaked conversation and what it really means in an interview.

Hello. This is John Robles, I'm speaking to Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. He is also a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia and a geopolitical specialist.

Rick Rozoff

Robles: Again, you were ahead of the curve and ahead of the times here. I'm talking about “Rocky Balboa and the new government lineup for Ukraine” and I'd like to get your comments on that and if possible Victoria Nuland's “staged conversation” or what was it? What is going on over there?

Rozoff: It is yet to be determined the exact nature of the conversation, what appears to be indisputable however, is that the US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian affairs Victoria Nuland, had a conversation (the real question is when?) but had a recent conversation with US Ambassador to Ukraine in Kiev, one Geoffrey Pyatt, and that during this discussion they very “matter of factly”, almost “mundanely” discussed who would comprise, who would constitute a new Ukrainian government, presumably post Yanukovich or at least transitionally.

There is some speculation that the conversation may have been held not during Ms. Nuland's current stay in Ukraine, she arrived there on the 6th of February, but perhaps earlier on January,25th. But whenever the conversation occurred what is remarkable about it is the absolute cynicism, the notion that the Secretary of State can determine who is the most likely person to be Prime Minister or Deputy Prime Minister of a sovereign nation, Ukraine.

Robles: So the conversation was with the ambassador to Ukraine. What were they discussing?

Rozoff: There is no room for opinion, it was blunt and irrefutable what they were discussing which was: what the future Ukrainian Government would look like.

And what Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and US envoy Geoffrey Pyatt were talking about which is, determining among themselves, which of the three major opposition leaders would occupy key posts within the government, a future government to the US' liking and perhaps of the US' design, and which would remain outside the government as an opposition figure. But it was not a matter of expressing opinions on this, the conversation which I have heard and as many of your listeners have, is clearly one where the stage director is giving cues to the actors.

And it is understood that Arseny Yatsenyuk, the head of the Fatherland Party, would become presumably a Prime Minister either under a Yanukovich government (a unity government if you will) or post Yanukovich but that Vitaly Klitschko and the head of Svoboda Party would remain outside the government. That is what Nuland was (I don't even think so much recommending but) dictating.

Robles: They were planning the makeup of the Ukrainian Government amongst themselves?

Rozoff: I would even say the word “ordering” the composition of the next government would not have been an overstatement.

By the way the US ambassador clearly was taking his orders from Nuland. Nuland as Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs and he being an ambassador of course works for the State Department and works for her.

We have to remember of course Victoria Nuland was State Department Spokesman under John Kerry's predecessor Hillary Clinton and was herself under the George W. Bush Administration, the US permanent representative which is, say, an ambassador to NATO.

So she is somebody in a pretty high level operative and is focused on Eurasia but most particularly former Soviet space and it is to be assumed that Mr. Pyatt, about whom I know nothing else, that is he is the Ambassador to Ukraine, may very well be someone comparable to Michael McFaul who is now leaving the ambassadorial post in Moscow. Somebody who you were the first to recognize at his proper value when he arrived, as somebody with no diplomatic experience or training, but someone who is very adept at sponsoring so called “color revolutions” and I assume Mr. Pyatt in Kiev is somebody of the same stripe.

Robles: I think Ukraine is the “color revolution playground” for the US State Department, I don't know. Do you think this may have been a staged leak to try to show that there is no real support for Klitschko, because maybe that was hurting his chances in Ukraine. Maybe he was even possibly facing treason charges or something if he was seen as being their puppet in Ukraine?

Rozoff: That is a technique that has been employed before: where you give the impression of putting distance between yourself and a client so as to boost the independent credentials of that client, I can't rule out the possibility that that is true.

Robles: Was Russia mentioned in this conversation at all?

Rozoff: Yes. Nuland indicated to her underling (I suppose we'd have to say) Pyatt the US Ambassador in Ukraine when she made the infamous statement about the “expletive”, of telling the European Union what to do, I assume your listeners are going to know what I'm talking about, the indication was that she could count on support from the United Nations, that is from Ban Ki-Moon and a Dutch diplomat working for the UN, I'm going to pronounce it in an English manner, Robert Serry, that they would come in and in the words of Nuland “glue this together” or words to that effect, and that the EU presumably (she wasn't quite explicit about this) wasn't moving fast enough for political, regime change in Kiev and that she felt it was imperative that the dates, I suppose, of the color revolution be stepped up because otherwise Russia might be able to intervene and counteract, or act against some of the momentum that was building up in the streets.

So she clearly indicated this was in opposition to Russian actions and clearly implicitly in opposition to Russian interests.

Robles: I see. So she used the expletive because the EU was not moving quickly enough for her.

Rozoff: Right. These are comparatively minor tactical differences. I suppose one has to keep in mind that Nuland came back to Kiev the second time, this was the same moment she was handing out pastries and cookies to protestors in Maidan, in Independent square and elsewhere in Ukraine, so openly and one-sidedly sympathizing with anti-government protestors, protestors is a euphemistic term, I think members of an uprising, of a violent uprising, and was suckering them, was giving them aid, support, moral and material.

And she came back on February 6th to meet with this triumvirate of opposition leaders that we've talked about, Nuland met with them two days ago, yesterday, and then Catherine Ashton from the EU came in exactly the same time to meet with exactly the same three leaders.

So there is every reason to believe what Ashton and Nuland are doing now is what they have been doing all along which is acting in unison, acting in tandem.

Robles: I said before, you were ahead of the curve again. We mentioned… last time we talked about Ukraine pretty much kind of “out of the blue” Rocky Balboa or Sylvester Stallone's role, right? Can you tell our listeners about this picture that has been spread around the Internet and what is all that about?

Rozoff: I have to give you the credit. I think you first conjured up the image of Sylvester Stallone's cinema alter ego, Rocky Balboa, in referenced to Vitaly (Vladimir) Klitschko. But what in fact surfaced, today we are able to circulate it a bit, is a photograph from 2011, of Sylvester Stallone with the Klitschko brothers, altogether the five people in the photograph at least two of them are Klitschko brothers, one of them Vitaly, to announce the launching of “Rocky the Musical”, I swear to God, “Rocky the Musical!!”

Robles: Rocky the Musical?!?!

Rozoff: Rocky the Musical! Which was to have been launched, I suppose it was, in the following year 2012 and in the background the print is in German so I assume this event was staged in Germany, but it was clearly the fictional Rocky Rambo as we talked about in your program if you recollect, Sylvester Stallone composite creature, who is an anti-Russian guerrilla war fighter par excellence and Rocky 4 who wins boxing matches against Russian boxers and so forth. This is the kind of crudely crafted image that is being passed off as politics.

The third figure in this category is supposed to be somebody like Arnold Schwarzenegger. I've been trying to find a photograph of the three together, I believe one exists by the way, if some of your listeners want to try to hunt it up, of Klitschko, Stallone and Schwarzenegger together. This would be the image of politics as they are trying to pass it off to a certain sector of the Ukrainian populace, I don't think too successfully.

Robles: Is Sylvester Stallone popular in Ukraine? I don't think so.

Rozoff: I can't imagine that he is. But I think that Klitschko may very well be trying to model himself not after the real-world “Sly” Stallone but after the cinema fantasies of a combination again of Rocky and Rambo and this may be an image crafted by perhaps some overpaid but not particularly creative or innovative public relations firms that have been hired to support the “Orange Revolution Phase II”.

Robles: So, we have the US State Department now openly, now it is clear, I mean we have been talking about it but now we have evidence and it is perfectly out there, it is clear, that they are actually assigning leaders to countries. Would it be fair to characterize it like that?

Rozoff: That is exactly what it is. And it is not just number two as you made the allusion to the original so called Orange Revolution.

Robles: So, Rick, unprecedented, I think, statements, but maybe they are planted statements, I don't know. What do you think about that?

Rozoff: Again we are talking about Nuland Pyatt conversation, one never knows. But I'll say this: that the fact that Victoria Nuland apologized to the EU suggests that she is part of the game if it is a ploy, and if it is genuine she has just acknowledged that that is her voice, and that is precisely what she said, obscenity and all.

As it had been pointed out by other observers the apologies have not to be extended to the EU, the apologies, if we are in a better world, would be extended to the government and the people of Ukraine who she is attempting to ride roughshod over and to implant a US designed proxy, or equivalent government instead of that elected legally four years ago in Ukraine. So that is where the apology ought to be.

But one thing too that it is a case where perhaps it is fortunate she used the infamous four letter word she did, because as a result of it, the audio has now achieved a degree of exposure circulation, I'm sure it would not have otherwise.

Although the contents of it is starkly almost unprecedented, if we take it at face value; for the first time a major US official is explaining precisely how they institute a government change, a regime change, a coup in fact, and is boasting of it, discussing it in detail “before” the fact.

This is something wasn’t available in Iran in 1953. or Guatemala in 1954 or Iraq in 1963 or the Belgian Congo in 60s. This is something, a historical artifact, that really needs to be paid attention to.

Robles: Do you think it is possible that it is just another distractor from the Sochi Olympics?

Rozoff: The timing of it is certainly a suspect, that much I grant. And we have to maybe take the next chapter in the story which is that: a State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki (Jen I presume is short for Jennifer) refers to the fact that ostensibly/supposedly this audio tape was revealed to the world, posted on Youtube or what have you, by a Russian official, feeds right into the mounting Russophobic campaign that is being built up right now.

And as a matter of fact in the words of State Department spokesman Psaki this is “a new low”, that is a quote from her “a new low”. That is even assuming this is a case that a Russian official has released the audio tape, how he obtained it begs questioning of course, but even if that were true, to suggest something as innocuous as that is an offense to the State Department when State Department members, heads rather, like Nuland herself no less, her attitude to the Europeasn Union seems to be a a new low.

But her former boss Hillary Clinton was constantly berating Russia, saying that Russia and China have got “pay a price” for their positions on Syria, using words such as despicable and so forth to talk about those partners. The low is what the State Department practice is on an ongoing basis.

But the fact was again that it is being used, like you say on the occasion of the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Sochi in Russia, suggest that this is part of yet another attempt to discredit Russia, rather than looking at the context of the discussion itself which ought to be enough to disgrace the US at least diplomatically for some.

Robles: Did anybody offer any evidence that it came from Russia or it is just they are again demonizing Russia as usual?

Rozoff: Yeah, but at a very sensitive moment when Russia is rightly the center of world attention with the opening of the Winter Olympics. And this is not at all different than, for example the fact that the US backed the Saakashivili regime and triggered a Five Day War with Russia in August 2008 exactly as the summer Olympics in Beijing were opened.

Robles: Ok, Rick, thank you very much. I really appreciate you taking the time to speak with me. Take care. Bye.

That was the end of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and as always I wish you the best wherever you may be. 

 Part 1: Ukraine: the Authorities vs Gangsters – Rick Rozoff

27 January, 2014 17:59

http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/01/27/13/Rozoff_Ukraine_Part_01.MP3

The situation in Ukraine is a fluid one and changing by the hour. Although it had appeared that there was a resolution to the protests that had broken out after the government of Ukraine had made the sovereign decision of sticking with Russia and saying no to closer European Union integration, excessive violence from the western backed opposition has spread like a wave throughout the country. The so called Ukrainian “opposition” now resembles something more akin to armed insurgents in Syria involved in a coup d’état than opposition protestors. The situation in Ukraine once again underlines US hypocrisy. The US, which prides itself on protecting its police, supports an “opposition” which is threatening, attacking, kidnapping and setting young police officers on fire. The scene currently playing out in Ukraine has all of the signs of a foreign engineered regime change operation and with the taking of government buildings, has unarguably moved into a scenario where the continuity of the state is in question. Voice of Russia regular and NATO expert Rick Rozoff discussed all of these issues and more as the situation threatens to spin out of control.

Hello. This is John Robles, I'm speaking to Voice of Russia regular contributor Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick. I hope you had some happy holidays. How are you this evening?

Rozoff:I'm doing very good, John. Thanks again for having me on your show.

Robles: Thanks a lot. I was wondering if we can get your views on what is going on in Maidan or Independence Square in Ukraine. It seems like the level of violence is escalating with … looks like no endin sight, I don't know. What do you think?

Rozoff:No, you are absolutely correct. Ukraine has become, you know, the center of attention I think globally right now, you know the sinecure. People are focused on it with good reason in a way it’s replaced Syria as the, how would I put it, proxy conflict between the East and West with the West once again on the offensive. That is in anattempt to do something, nothing short of toppling an elected government of a nation that has close state-to-state relationships with Russia.

And what is happening is fluid of course, but it is also tense and it is also fraught with not only dangerous but potentially catastrophic consequences if the violence that exists in Kiev in and around Independence Square and now by recent reports spreading into parts of Western Ukraine where the hotbeds of nationalist and even fascistic extremism are.

So I think what you are seeing is well-coordinated series of activities that began in Kiev and may very well spread to the Western part of Ukraine.

Robles: I see. What are your views on who is behind all this, and the reasons for it? Now at first they came up with that there was the EU integration, then they were protesting the government, and then they were calling for early elections, then they were protesting against Russia.

Now one of the objects of the protesters' actions is something about some students that were beat several weeks ago. It just seems like they are finding any reason whatsoever to keep escalating and continuing their violence.

During the night there were negotiations and the opposition said they had agreed to the conditions set by the government to stop their violent activities, and then they went out and announced this to their supporters. Their supporters weren’t happy about it and they went back on their word, they said: 'No, we are not going to agree to any cease in our violence'.

And they are continuing with their violence which, they’re throwing Molotov cocktails at Police. All of the Police and the security forces they are suffering severe burns and the violence against the police is escalating.

And of we look at who the leaders are, it brings a lot of questions to my mind – as who is actually running all of this? I mean they’ve got this ex-boxer, he is promoting all this violence.

Can you give us some comments on him and on the resolution by the Russian State Duma yesterday, if you could, regarding the violence?

Rozoff:Yes, the opposition, and again we have to keep in mind in a fluid situation like this, and what we are looking at is really not only destabilization but ultimately a regime change technique or scenario. But what we see is the boxer, you know the heavy weight boxer Vitali Klichko, and two other nationalists emerging as what is a typical color revolution scenario where there is a triumvirate or triad of political leaders.

This was true by the way during the Orange Revolution, so called, in 2004 and 2005. We had Viktor Yanukovich (Yushchenko?), Yulia Tymoshenko and Alexander Moroz as being the triumvirate, modeled after that in Georgia incidentally the preceding year in 2003.

So, the question is begged of course, about whether the public or nominal leadership is really anything more than figureheads, or are anything more than figureheads, and whether in fact there is not something more substantive behind it both internally and of course externally.

So what we are looking at is a degree of violence against police officers that would not be tolerated in any other European country, I can assure you, certainly not in the West. But being cheered on and supported unequivocally by western political leaders in the European Union, in the United States, in NATO I might add.

Yesterday Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Anders Fogh Rasmussen said: 'Violence can never be used for political means'. You know, a lightening bolt should come from the Heavens and strike anyone making a statement like that when they’re the Head of NATO which has used violence for political means uninterruptedly since 1995 in several countries on three continents.

Robles: Well that’s their only tactic. How could you say that?

Rozoff:But of course. But I mean, there is a difference between official use of force by a government to maintain peace in a country, where there could be abuses. There could be excessive use of that force, but at least it is legally sanction, as opposed to people who are a little bit better than gangsters at times hitting Police officers with hammers or throwing petrol bombs at them.

You don't see much of it here in the West but luckily with the Internet we can see a television broadcast around the world. And we've seen the horrifying pictures of the results of the use of so called Molotov cocktails in Kiev. Seeing your young Police officers' heads and arms are on fire and so forth and you can only imagine the degree of, third degree I'm sure, of burns that they suffer as a result of gasoline bombs.

But I think rather than focusing on the mechanics of what is going on, which will be debated ad nauseam in the Western press of course, what is important, to again come back to you, and you and I have had occasion to talk about this before, John, is the regional and ultimately the global context within which the battle for Ukraine, and I would term it exactly that 'the battle for Ukraine' is occurring.

One factor which is very significant but didnot receive the attention it certainly warranted was in the middle of last month, the middle of December, now former US Congressman Dennis Kucinich, he had served in the US House of Representatives for 8 terms, for 16 years. He is a native of my home state of Ohio incidentally, wrote a very revealing article stating that the so called European Union Association Agreement with – an initiative rather - with Ukraine was simply NATO's Trojan Horse in Ukraine.

This is precisely how former Congressman Kucinich put it. And what he did indicate and he shows a fairly good degree of familiarity with all these things are done that Ukraine would first to join NATO and then join the European Union because traditionally that is how it has occurred, you know, with the newer members, with the exception of tiny island nations of Cyprus and Malta.

So that what we are looking at is Ukraine is a geo-strategically pivotal nation, it clearly is that nation that separates what geo politicians or strategists would talk about from East to the West. It borders of course Poland and other nations that are now considered to be in Central Europe for that matter and Russia to its East which of course is in Eastern Europe and even in Eurasia. I mean, in fact, the greater part of Russia being in Asia itself.

What we are seeing is something almost evocative of formal struggles and there is a history of Ukraine being pivotal in that sense. Many of your listeners maybe acquainted either with the 19th century novel TarasBulba, by the Russian novelist Nikolai Gogol, who is from Ukraine or the movie adaptation at the end of the last century, more people might know.

It is a fact that Ukraine is a bone of contention between the westernized Slavic part of Europe, if you will, you know, those who with the Latin alphabet and the Roman-Catholic religion and those with the Cyrillic alphabet and the Orthodox religion which Ukraine for the most part is. And that we've seen similar situations after World War 1, during the World War 2.

In World War 1 Germany, in the first instance, tried to wean Ukraine away from Russia; in World War 2Stepan Bandera and other Nazi collaborators, who were heroes incidentally to the modern nationalists in Ukraine, who under the Yushchenko government rehabilitated, members of the Ukrainian insurgent army and others who had collaborated with the Nazi Germany.

So we are looking at very extremist elements, probably the most visible and prominent of the so called Youth Activist or members of the so called Svoboda or Freedom Party, which up until a few years ago had as its logo a variant of a Nazi swastika. Well let's be very clear about what we are dealing with. There are may be any number of innocent youth who want, going out for a dare, much as Orange Revolution in 2004-2005, but behind it there are some very hardcore nationalists, and Russo-phobic extremists, who whether be known to themselves or not, are serving the purpose of turning yet another country into a battle zone in a renewed post-Cold War East-West conflict.

Robles: Can you give us your views on the statement by the Crimean Parliament and by the Russian Duma yesterday? The Russian Duma is calling for foreign actors, foreign players -we know who we are talking about: the West, the US - to refrain from interfering in Ukraine.

The Crimean Parliament, they adopted a statement with a vote of 78-81 deputies in favor of it. The statement reads: 'The political crisis, the formal pretext for which was a pause in Ukraine's European integration has developed into armed resistance and street fights. Hundreds of people have been hurt and, unfortunately, some people have been killed. The price for the power ambitions of a bunch of political saboteurs - Klichko, Yatsenyuk and Tyagnibok- is too high. They have crossed the line by provoking bloodshed using the interests of the people of Ukraine as cover and pretending to act on their own behalf.'

And they finish up by saying:' The people of Crimea will never engage in illegitimate elections, will never recognize their results. And will not live in Bandera Ukraine.'- they say. So, can you comment on that and on the Russian resolution, if you would?

Rozoff:First of all I want to commend you, as of I think yesterday or perhaps today, of compiling a list of I think significant statements by the Russian State Duma, the Duma or the Parliament in Crimea and others and putting them into a very condensed form that has been very useful to me.

A couple of things: the trio of opposition figures is exactly the triumvirate I alluded to earlier with Vitali Klichko playing what could only be described as a sort of Rocky Balboa meets Rambo, Sylvester Stallone compilation of pseudo populist, right wing, dangerous, and ultimately violent sort of activity.

The Bandera allusion we've talked about earlier, he was a leader during World War 2 of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army and fought against the legitimate political authorities and what was then Nazi occupied Soviet Union, but often times in conjunction with the Third Reich with the Nazis. So they are using the same language you and I had used.

Now, what we are talking about here in Crimea is of the upmost importance. The US has for several years now been waging in conjunction with its NATO allies, annual fairly large scale naval war games called Sea Breeze, and they are conducted in the Crimea dangerously close to where the Russian Black Sea fleet is stationed at Sevastopol. And even though a public outcry led to, or resulted in,a Sea Breeze exercise I think three years ago, perhaps four, being called off, they had been resumed and what has happened over the last two or three years,this is very significant, and I hope your listeners pick up on this – the US as a matter of course has been sending missile cruisers into the Black Sea to go to Crimea, to dock there.

These are what are called the Ticonderoga-class guided - missile cruisers, of the sort that are part of the US international missile, so called missile shield, that is they are to be equipped with Standard Missile-3 interceptor missiles, and these ships are visiting Ukraine on a regular basis.

As the US continues its military takeover of the Black Sea, they've already done this with Bulgaria and Rumania, where they've acquired 8 major military basses in those two countries. Turkey of course is a NATO ally and Ukraine then becomes a very significant factor in the US military takeover of the Black Sea largely through NATO expansion. But what is even I think of more concern – a WikiLeaks document of in the last couple of years, revealed that in 2006 the then Head of the US Missile Defense Agency, he’s now retired, General Henry (or “Trey”) Obering met with Ukrainian officials, this was during the Yushchenko agreement, to recruit Ukraine into the European missile shield.

And in the subsequent year,2007, General Obering headed the Missile Defense Agency visit to Ukraine during the Yushchenko years, their Administration's years, and met with the Defense Minister and other key officials in Ukraine in an effort to bring Ukraine into that. If Ukraine were to join along with Poland, Romania, Turkey and other countries, the beginning stages of the so called European Phased Adaptive Approach for the interceptor missile system, this would be extremely dangerous. This would be such an open provocation to Russia, that I don't see how Russia could not take some fairly dramatic action in response to it.

So when we talk about the factors that are involved we have to keep several significant ones in mind. First of all Ukraine is strategically vital, it is indispensable. In the energy wars that the US and its European Union allies,we should say NATO allies, have been waging over the past decade to try to curtail Russian exports of natural gas and oil to Europe, ultimately perhaps to cut them off altogether in favor of natural gas and oil projects bringing Caspian Sea energy into Europe via the Caucasus, Azerbaijan and Georgia, but of course from there to Ukraine, from Ukraine into the Western Europe. So Ukraine is significant in that sense.

Ukraine is also one of four countries that NATO has announced, four non-NATO countries that are to join the NATO Response Force that is the international strike force that NATO has developed. The other three are Georgia, Finland and Sweden. Of course three of those four countries, all except Sweden, have lengthy borders with Russia. And that Ukraine has been gradually, I think unbeknownst to most people in Ukraine, and certainly outside, has been dragged into the NATO net deeper and deeper and deeper.

Ukraine is, and these are significant facts, so I hope you don't mind my emphasizing them. Ukraine’s second to that became the first,and to date only, non-NATO country to supply a naval vessel to what is now NATO's permanent surveillance and interdiction naval operation in the Mediterranean Sea - Operation Active Endeavor. Ukraine’s second to that became the first, and to date only, non-NATO country to supply a ship to NATO's Arabian Sea -Operation Ocean Shield. Ukraine, during the Kuchma government, supplied 2,000 troops to the United States, NATO inIraq, they have a small contingent of troops serving under NATO's International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan.

That was the end of part 1 of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and as always I wish you the best wherever you may be.

  US/NATO objective: expulsion of Russian forces – Rick Rozoff

25 January, 2014 09:49

Since its creation in 1949, NATO has gone from an organization founded to protect against an imaginary self-conceived attack by the USSR to a global aggressive attack organization. In the final installment of a 2013 year-end-summary interview with the Voice of Russia's John Robles, Rick Rozoff, the owner of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list, discusses the moves by the alliance and what they are planning for the future. According to Mr. Rozoff the alliance was stopped dead in its tracks in Syria in 2013, an event that may portend peace in the future and an end to the US/NATO aggressive wars.

This is John Robles, you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. This interview is in progress.

Rozoff: There are now 500 Swedish troops in northern Afghanistan, 500 Swedish troops! First time again, in 200 years they are engaged in combat operations, 200 years. They have been killed, they have killed. They've engaged in lethal combat in Afghanistan under NATO command.

Again, they supplied a number of war planes for NATO's air war against Libya two years ago. But what happened two or three years ago was in the name of professionalizing, this is euphemism, the Swedish arm forces and this is a demand of NATO, that conscript armies go out, no more draft, strictly professional army and so forth, that every single member of the Swedish arm forces had to sign a waiver that they could be deployed overseas for the first time.

I mean, there was formally a requirement up until then – if you went to Afghanistan was presumably voluntarily. Now every single member of the Swedish army forces has to sign a waiver acknowledging there are prepared to be deployed anywhere in the world. And this is in conjunction with, of course, Sweden officially announcing its joining the NATO Response Force.

Robles: So basically they've given cannon fodder to NATO's army, basically, right?

Rozoff: That is it exactly – to be deployed any place in the world.

Robles: Any time they want? So NATO can just grab soldiers from all these countries which is why they need to expand, isn't it?

Rozoff: Yes. But they do not need necessarily that each country becomes a full NATO member. I think this is a misconception. Georgia under Saakashvili, Ukraine under "Yushchenko and Company" were perfectly fulfilling NATO's demands, a short of full NATO membership.

The ultimate objective as we talked about a few minutes ago was the expulsion of Russian military forces from Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Crimea and Ukraine.

But it is good enough sometimes simply to be a NATO partner. We talked about the Asia-Pacific Pivot – accidents don't occur except in the movies as somebody once told me (bad movies) where too many coincidences occur.

And at the very time that the Obama Administration announces its Asia-Pacific Pivot – that is a shift away from Europe primarily to Asia, that is to contain China after having encircled Russia – there is no other way of interpreting that.

Robles: Sure.

Rozoff: Immediately before the May Summit of NATO in Chicago last year NATO announces a new international program called "Partners Across the Globe".

I don't know, if anyone in 1949 when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was set up ostensibly to defend against a very unlikely if not impossible Soviet assault across the plains of Central Europe were, to be told that decades later NATO was going to institute a program called "Partners Across the Globe" without changing its name to what it ought to be, which is a Global Aggressive Treaty Organization.

And those 8 countries, the initial ones, are going to be more following them are all in Asia. They are, Asia-Pacific rather: Mongolia, South Korea, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq. These are the members of NATO's new program, exactly at the time when the US announces its Asia-Pacific Pivot.

Robles: I see. So, Scandinavia, the Arctic, Iraq and the Middle East, the Asia-Pacific region are all places that NATO is looking to expand.

I'd like to back up just a little bit, because you didn't say too much about the military-industrial complex's relationship with NATO. How important is that relationship? And is that the true driving force of global militarization by NATO? Is it just the military industrial complexes or is it something else?

Rozoff: Several of your guests, in conjunction with yourself have been very good at addressing this issue. Bruce Gagnon, who you've interviewed again recently has made this point repeatedly and very trenchantly me . But behind it all –yes, are the merchants of death, behind them all are the Raytheons, and the Lockheed Martins and Northrup Grumman and the other arms manufactures. There is no question about that.

The latest National Defense Authorization Bill is for a repeated $633 billion. This is 23 years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact.

Robles: We are always talking about US-NATO as if it is one organization because that is what it seems like it has become to me. Would you characterize that, in that manner?

Rozoff: Yes, of course. Except there is a master-slave relationship obtaining between them, or a ventriloquist-dummy relationship.

I remember once the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche referring to certain theologians as gods ventriloquists, people presuming to speak in the name of, right, throwing their voices so to imitate.

What you see when Barack Obama, the President of the US or any president in the US, or a Secretary of State of the US, you can count the hours before the Secretary General of NATO parrots or mimics, exactly the same thing, you are going to hear slightly different words adjusted for the audience, but almost identical. Because they are reading off the same script inevitably.

Robles: That was very clear recently in Ukraine. Do you remember that?

Rozoff: NATO comes out and says: 'Ukraine's future is in Europe'. Think about the unmitigated audacity to make a statement like that.

Robles: And then, at the same time he said: (I think you published it on STOP NATO or maybe it was even in the same speech that you are referring to), he also said that European countries need to throw (he didn't say throw – I'm paraphrasing), more money or need to invest or whatever he said, more money into NATO or the US may decide it is not too interested in being a member of NATO.

Rozoff: That is a common statement by Rasmussen, his job is to hold up the whip hand and crack the whip on the European NATO members to make sure they cough up the minimum of its 2% GDP that is required of NATO members. That is his job, on behalf of the Pentagon and on behalf of the arms manufactures in the US, France, Britain, Germany and Sweden.

He has been engaging in the most disingenuous, the most dishonest characterization I can imagine. Again, that if we don't supply more men and women to kill and die overseas, if we don't put US interceptive missiles on our soil, if we don't spend 2% of our GDP on offensive weapons to be used in wars of aggression abroad, if we don't the US may abandon us to the big bad bear. No. Isn't that the inevitable? I mean, it is subconscious but isn't that the inevitable threat he's making.

Robles: But it is a completely ridiculous one. It is a completely false one. Is there any other threat in the world that you know about, so called, that justifies anything about NATO?

Rozoff: No.

There is no justification, was not in my estimate, but certainly is not now any justification for the first attempt in history to build an international aggressive military formation, because that is what NATO is.

The US has not had a serious military threat, a serious military challenger, it hasn't had a country outside of perhaps Russia, that has even has even been able to defend itself since the end of the Cold War, over 25 years ago.

Let's be clear about that – there is no adversary that necessitates the expansion of the US lead military block from 16 to 28 countries and that include NATO partners around the world. 70 or more countries, which is over 1/3 of the countries in the world, are either full members of NATO or members of various NATO partnership programs, sometimes members of two or three or more.

Robles: So, I would dare say that the US has never been attacked or never been attacked where it could have prevented the attack, with the case of Pearl Harbor there was forewarning but anyway..

Rozoff: Let's agree on this. The continental US has never been attacked by another nation except when the British came in from Canada and burned down the parts of the capital in Philadelphia at the time after, least according the Canadian interpretation, the US threatened to appropriate British Canada by launching invasion thereof. But with that exception the US has never been the victim of military attack by another nation.

Robles: So you got the strongest nation in the world, that has never been attacked and it is constantly saying that everybody is a threat. It is insanity. Maybe this year we will see some sanity returning to the world. What do you think, Rick?

Rozoff: Yeah, I think the fact that there has been success against what had been and unbroken string or succession of political but particularly military strong arming and aggression around the world, that really has characterized the post-Cold War period.

It starts with a war against Iraq in 1991, the military intervention by the US in Somali or shortly thereafter, then the US bombing of Serbian forces in positions in Bosnia in 1994-1995, then the war against Yugoslavia, then the second war against Iraq and the invasion of Afghanistan and on and on and on.

This has been a steam-roller that has been allowed to violate international law, threaten regional and ultimately world peace and that it seems to have stopped, it seems to have been stopped in its tracks, as of last summer in Syria, appears to have been stopped.

And if politically an equivalent of that in the Ukraine has been accomplished recently than what are we seeing is, I don't want to be too fast and loose with the historical analogies, so I won't to revert to the obvious one, but it almost seems like certain powers in Europe that also win from victory to victory from 1939 to 1943. It was eventually stopped in Southern Africa.

Robles: And it was the same thing – preventive invasion, aggressive invasion of course those guys you are referring to didn't have a "responsibility to protect" clause, but..Rick, would you like to give our listeners a holiday greeting?

Rozoff: Yes, I certainly would. I first of all it would be remiss if I didn't thank you and Voice of Russia for the unbelievably generous opportunities you've provided me and so many other people whom I greatly respect, to be able to speak freely on a wide range of issues, to address concerns that simply are not being addressed any place else truthfully, nowhere else, at least as consistently as your show permits us to do.

And I'm astonished, really. You've had people from Michael Parenti to Gorge Galloway, to Michael Ratner, to Bruce Gagnon. This is only within the last week. And I cannot think of any other program anywhere in the world where people of that caliber, with so much to say, so much expertise who are denied most every other opportunity to speak about this and now get to have their voices heard around the world that is such an amazing contribution, not simply to something as abstract as the impartial dissemination of information, though that is important, but to the fact that it is voices that are calling for end of militarism as you mentioned, who imply strongly that $643 billion can be put in the better use in the US than building weapons and that a new world with some mutual respect and fraternity between nations, a real comedy of nations that instead of this 'the winner takes all' sort of attitude whether there is a competition as we have had opportunity to talk about in this show, in this program, this episode.

We can almost take a map of the world and plot out where the next scramble for oil or for raw materials or for military bases or missile sites or so forth – this is going on right now. That has to come to an end and we need a forum in which to have those opinions, counter opinions expressed and you've provided a truly, unparalleled opportunity for so many of us to be able to speak to that. And I thank you and I thank your employer.

Robles: I'm very grateful, humbled by your words, Rick. It is very nice to hear that a lot of the stuff that you hear here does not get said in the West, it does not get said in the media, it does not get said anywhere.

Rozoff: You are correct. Unfortunately, and I'm offering this is an encouragement for other nations who follow the suit, it is unfortunately not being heard in the Chinese media, it is not being heard in the Indian media, it is not being heard in Latin America in English. It is not being heard other places and that needs to be heard, in Africa.

When more and more programs start emmulating your own and providing a similar opportunity you are particularly because of the language you are broadcasting in English of necessity were people from the Anglo sphere, from the US, Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. But we need something comparable where experts from around the world, especially in those countries and regions most immediately affected by the topic or by the crisis that we often times are talking about.

They need to have an outletalso, because they don't have one. And they don't have one in any language. But the fact that they could have it in English which reaches the world market is almost inestimable opportunity for them to be able to speak the truth in the way they are unaccustomed to do. And if there is one advantage (but there are many of course) to the world wide web it is providing exactly that opportunity for the voiceless, right, for those who thought about things and talked about privately but have no opportunity to formulating their thoughts in a given take exchange as what we are doing right now where the end product is something more than what we thought when we began the discussion.

Robles: You are absolutely right. Once again I'm humbled by your wisdom, the way you are able to connect the dots and express the deep and complex thoughts better than I usually can even if I sit down and think about them for a long time.

Rozoff: You are too self-effacing, I won't accept that. Thank you, John.

Robles: Thank you, Rick.

That was the end of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at Voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and as always I wish you the best wherever you may be.

  NATO Expert Rick Rozoff on Current Operations

 

Only US/NATO success in Afghanistan: 40 fold opium increase – Rick Rozoff

 

PART 1: Only US/NATO success in Afghanistan: 40 fold opium increase

January 11 2014  http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/01/10/17/ROBLES_ROZOFF_End_2013_Part_01.MP3

In a review of NATO and US military activity for the year 2013, Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff stated that 2013 saw a slowing of, if not the beginning of a reversal of a 22 year US/NATO/Western drive to assert global dominance economically, politically, culturally and militarily. Among the most important events of the last year, if not the last 20, was the stopping of the invasion of Syria by Russia. According to Mr. Rozoff as US/NATO “slinks away with its tail between its legs” from Afghanistan, the only accomplishment they can claim after 13 years of occupation is that opium cultivation has increased by 40 fold. The military monolith of NATO is having a bad time of late and no matter what they say, the fact of the matter is, they have failed. This is part one of a much longer year end interview with Mr. Rozoff.

Hello, this is John Robles, I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello, Rick.

Rozoff: Hello, John.

Robles: End of another year, things seem to have gone kind of in the opposite direction as they seemed to have been going at the end of last year and the previous year. We of course would like to do a year end summary and get your views on where things are going. So, take it away.

Rozoff: You are correct. I mean, there has been, if you will, countercyclical or countervailing tendency dynamic over the past year and even though those who are superstitious about numbers might have thought 2013 would be an inauspicious one. I think that history will record even, you know, in the short term, that it has been momentous year in a number of ways.

And in particular what we have seen is (for the first time) a slowing up of, if not the beginning of a reversal of, what has been just an inexorable, unstoppable momentum by the West, the US primarily of course, in the entire post-Cold-War period (and we are now talking about 22 years) to assert global dominance economically, politically, culturally, but militarily in the first place.

More than in any other manner of course through the expansion of North Atlantic Treaty Organization, throughout the European continent but ultimately to transform it into a global military force. This is what we talked about a year ago if your listeners will recollect. And of course last year was the year of the NATO summit in Chicago here in May of 2012 and the US and its NATO allies set some fairly ambitious objectives, amongst which were the formal launching of the so called launching of the interceptor missiles system in Europe, the expansion of NATO….

Robles: I’m sorry, if I could interrupt you, just to remind our listeners: this was the first ever (in history) debate, an open debate with NATO, it was supposed to be with officials and you were one of the spokespeople there, speaking for the other side, right?

Rozoff: That is correct, John, thanks for reminding me as well as your listeners of that. That was in May of 2012, so roughly a year and a half ago. And there was a nationally and through Youtube, of course, internationally televised debate, the first of its kind.

Robles: And you did quite well. Anyway, please, go ahead.

Rozoff: Well, the fact was that we were looking at this a year ago, we saw, you know, signs that the uncontested role of the US as the “world’s sole military superpower” and pardon me again for quoting the president of the US Barack Obama whose term that is. He used it, well it will be now 4 years ago, when he received the Nobel Peace Prize and boasted of being the Commander in Chief of the world’s sole military superpower.

But what we’ve seen is that the military monolith has been having a bad time of it lately. And these past years signified, I think, on three or four different scores at least an indication there is a shift in the winds. And the most important by a long shot, the most strategically important is the fact that through Russian intervention, through many instances also, the heroic activities of a small group of individuals, I know you’ve interviewed the British Member of Parliament George Galloway recently, and in one of the segments of the interview you conducted with him which has been posted on voiceofrussia recently. The two of you discussed his role in NATO and maybe as few as three colleagues in the British House of Commons, in putting a spoke in the wheel of the Cameron Administration’s plans, to enter into war against Syria with the US and other NATO allies.

So, we saw that occur in the British Parliament, but we saw the intervention of Russia in the first instance around the question of dismantling the chemical weapons arsenal of the Syrian government as a way of really calling the US’ bluff (that of Secretary of State John Kerry in the first instance) and diffusing a situation were just few days earlier US president Obama had a press conference where he was openly laying the ground work for a Libyan style military intervention in Syria.

So, we saw that stopped. I know, amongst other people myself, drew the parallel between Syria this year and Spain in the 1930s in that, in both cases, in the case of Spain you had the emerging Axis Powers: Nazi’s Germany, Mussolini’s Italy (Fascist Italy), supporting the armed insurrection of the Generalissimo Franco and his Moroccan mercenaries and others against the legally elected Republic the Government of Spain. And that battle in Spain in so many ways portended what was to happen in the entire European continent shortly thereafter, in other words, had the legitimate government of Spain unable to defend itself effectively and fend off an armed insurrection backed by foreign powers, WWII may not have occurred, and 50 million human lives that were lost may not have been lost.

And I think that Syria represented something comparable/analogues to that. But you had in these case Russia, Iran and China stepping in and saying that foreign military powers are not going to intervene and touch off either cataclysm strictly within Syria, but more likely a conflagration that would quickly pull into its vortex almost every country in the Middle East and perhaps even provoke an international crisis. So, we saw that occur.

Robles: I’d like to underline that point you just said about the possible (and people were saying) escalation of a Syrian war into a regional conflict and then into an actual world war. This all begun and caused by NATO, so what does that tell us about their role in the world as far as being an instrument for security and safety?

Rozoff: Your tone seems straightforward but I’m sure it is meant to imply irony and not only irony I think that almost demonical diabolical inversion of the truth, of course. But NATO itself is directly involved in sending batteries of interceptor missiles Patriot Advanced Capability 3 interceptor missiles to Turkey within the last year and a half which is something NATO has done twice in the past, which is to send the same sort (actually they were not quite as advanced a model of the Patriot the current one is even more long ranged and more sophisticated), but in 1991 and again in 2003 that is on the eves immediately of the wars against Iraq in those years 1991-2003 NATO also sent Patriot batteries as well as AWACS aircraft to Turkey for much the same purpose.

So, when US, German and Dutch Patriot batteries were sent to Turkey under NATO command a sensible person would have seen the analogy and reckoned that a war was imminent against Syria and it would include, because Turkey borders Syria and Turkey is a member of NATO, that NATO would have been involved its article 5, mutual military assistance clause, and the full force of a military alliance comprised of 28 countries accounting for some 70% of world military spending ($1 trillion a year collectively in military spending) arraigned against a very weak and isolated Syrian government.

This is what was in the offing just a few months ago we do have to remember. And that but for heroic efforts in the British Parliament as I mentioned but much more; the direct role of the Russian Government in a fairly sophisticated manner intervening diplomatically… This is what diplomacy is about: it is to prevent wars, not to give cover for wars, not to create the pretense for wars but to stop them.

And I believe history will record the Russian diplomatic intervention around Syria, defusing that crisis is both something likely (as Mr. Galloway, Parliamentarian Galloway, said on your show) something that really ought to get somebody in the Russian government for Nobel Peace Prize. As opposed to the person who got it 4 years ago and then immediately went to work waging military aggression around the globe.

So that we had that occur. We had the Edward Snowden affair which is also something that cannot be...

Robles: I’m sorry, as a force for stability, peace and security, you as one of the eminent (I would say) NATO experts in the world, did NATO do anything in the past year that lent to any sort of peace or stability or security for any of the people in the world?

Rozoff: No, of course it didn’t, nor has it ever been designed to do that. So it shouldn’t be surprising.

Another factor though which is not quite as salient or clear-cut, but I think just as important, is the fact that NATO is licking its wounds in Afghanistan, is getting ready to continue the metaphor I suppose, to slink away with its tail between its legs. And this into the 13th year, of not only the longest war in the history of the US, but the first ground war ever waged by NATO, the first military campaign launched and conducted by NATO in Asia, that is outside of Europe. It was followed of course by a war in Africa, the war against Libya two years ago.

Robles: To call that a war, I don’t know if you could call an onslaught of airstrikes and missile shot from hundreds of miles away a war, but basically just shooting fish in barrel, if I could use that expression.

Rozoff: You are correct about that, I should retract the use of the term “war” and just call it unilateral military aggression, overwhelming unilateral military aggression, the difference is (to use a historical analogy I suppose) between the Battle of Okinawa and the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

So we do see the debacle, I think at this point it is irrefutable no matter how much Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen or any of his underlings, or his deputy –Alexander Vershbow former US ambassador to Russia (who is Deputy Secretary General of NATO), no matter how much these people try to put the best face on it, try to save face in fact, by claiming they have achieved anything in Afghanistan, as we know from the head of the Anti-Drug Agency in Russia, the only unarguable accomplishment if you want to call it that of NATO’s military assault in Afghanistan, is the fact that opium production has increased by a factor of 40.

Robles: I just want to underline, he is not just the head of the Anti-Drug establishment here in Russia – YuriyFedotov he is also the head of the United Nations Agency on Drugs and Crime that issued the 2013 opium report. And he himself was quite shocked at the level of heroine production. And Global Research published an expose of photographs of US soldiers guarding and protecting opium fields in Afghanistan. I mean, if you could comment on that, I’d really love to hear what you have to say about what NATO and the US were “really” doing in Afghanistan for 13 years.

Rozoff: On the question of the explosion of opium cultivation and the expansion of heroine abuse and the human tragedy thereof about which I hope I can speak in a second, being the only provable accomplishment or achievement of NATO in Afghanistan, that is simple beyond questioning, that is it, Nothing else has been accomplished.

Taliban is still active, other groups, which by the way, like the Haqqani network or Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin which are led by people the US supported. Supported primarily in the Mujahedeen war in the 1980s, these forces are still active both in Afghanistan and across the border in Pakistan.

There has been no consolidation of a viable representative or even reputable government in Kabul. So this has been an unequivocal debacle first of all for the Afghan people who have suffered immeasurably by 12 more years of dislocation, of night raids, of bombing raids, of other catastrophes, destruction effectively of their infrastructure and their agricultural economy.

And in its place we get again as we talked about a second ago, a 40 fold increase in the opium cultivation. This means, and we have to look at this in human terms, this means hundreds of thousands if not millions of Afghans themselves have become addicted to heroin.

This means that millions in Russia, in Iran, in Central Asia and elsewhere in the general region have become dependent on heroine.

This means tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of deaths through overdose, through HIV, through criminal activity, as a result of this epidemic of heroine.

And this is done under the watch of, at peak strength, 150,000 troops serving under NATO’s International Security Assistance Force.

Certainly the least that the world community could have asked for a military occupation force, which legally incidentally the US and NATO are in Afghanistan, is they would have provided some modicum of a civilian infrastructure, of extermination of the opium cultivation in the country and such like, but clearly evidences the fact that the West had no intention whatsoever in doing anything of the sort.

I don’t have the exact figures at my fingertips, John, but something in the neighborhood of 80% to 90% of total funds that have gone into Afghanistan since the US/British invasion of October 2001 have gone for military and security purposes, that money has not gone into civilian infrastructure, has not gone into building a viable economy and so forth, notwithstanding comments by certain western foreign ministers that they’ve gone in there for alleged humanitarian reasons.

That was the end of part 1 of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at Voiceofrussia.com. Thank you very much for listening and as always I wish you the best wherever you may be.

PART 2: Russian/Chinese prevention of Syrian invasion: historic event

January 13 2014   http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/01/13/14/ROBLES_ROZOFF_End_2013_Part_02.MP3

Russian/Chinese prevention of Syrian invasion: historic event – Rick Rozoff

On the surface it appears that US/NATO lost in Afghanistan. But did they? According to US/NATO’s own assessments and statements Afghanistan has proven to be the testing ground for developing interoperability between NATO members and over 50 nations which provided military forces for the ongoing war in Afghanistan and the consolidation of an international military strike force. Heroin production has also increased 40 fold and has devastated the peoples of many countries while providing black monies for secret operations. There are reports that there is a possible drug route from Afghanistan, through the air base in Manas in Kirgizstan and into the Balkans, probably Kosovo, which is used to get Afghan opium and heroin to market with Hashim Thaçi directly implicated. According to Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff, the lack of oversight of US military installations, such as Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo, makes it possible, if the US wants, to place even tactical nuclear weapons closer to the Russian or Iranian border. In part 2 of a 2013 year end summary Mr. Rozoff discusses those issues and more and cites Russian and Chinese moves to prevent an invasion of Syria as a major historical turning point.

This is John Robles, you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is part 2 of an interview in progress. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com

Robles: Two points I’d like to make and then you can continue any way you’d like. You said you wanted to speak about the human toll, the heroin wreaks on the world. The US taxpayers have spent, as far as I know, the figures I saw were about $7 billion in fighting narcotics production; opium production, heroin production – in Afghanistan. I believe that figure is correct, if I’m wrong, please, tell me. So, they weren’t there to stop heroin production. They weren’t there to get rid of the Taliban, while making secret deals with them and they are going to come back in power even more powerful than they were before. So, what was the real point of 12 years in Afghanistan then?

Rozoff: Well, I mean, I know what the answer to that is, but it is not what generally is offered as an explanation for the invasion, the occupation of Afghanistan. To read between the lines slightly all one needs to do, is read Anders Fogh Rasmussen or any other NATO official on their website. I invite people to visit the NATO website, it is where you are going to find out the truth but you may have to decipher it a bit.

And what you hear again and again is that Afghanistan has proven the testing ground or the training ground for a developing interoperability between NATO members and partners. Again, over 50 nations provided military forces for NATO in the ongoing war in Afghanistan. And what NATO walks away from… the Afghans of course have suffered a disastrous period, the region likewise and the world security has certainly not gained in any manner from the spot, NATO has walked away by having fused or integrated military units from 50 different countries.

People without any sense of history may not appreciate the significance of that fact, but for a moment, you know, the act of belligerence, even in WW II, for example, I’d be surprised if formally there were more than 20 on the side of the allies and now you’ve got 50 serving in one country, under one military command – NATO. That’s what NATO used Afghanistan for. It was simply a training ground for consolidating an international military strike force, what is referred to as the NATO Response Force, the nucleus of which will be this 50-nation alliance that NATO was able to put together inside Afghanistan.

On the question of the human toll of heroin, I’ll be brief on that but I’ll be personal. I worked in the past as a substance abuse counselor. I worked at methadone maintenance clinic. I know what heroin addiction does to people. I’ve seen young women out prostituting themselves. I’ve seen young babies left in their own feces and so forth as their parents are hunting down a fix. I know what heroin does to people. And if you multiply that on the level of hundreds of thousands or millions and this is what is happening, this is the untold cost of the Afghan war.

And you don’t have to look too far. The Russian Government will tell you what the figures are in their own country in heroin deaths and heroin addiction. The Iranian Government will tell you the same. I’m sure the five nations of Central Asia can say something similar. I’m sure that Pakistan and India are suffering this as well. And this is going to take generations to rectify.

Robles: It is an insidious cycle, and I’d really like you to comment on this as well, the whole heroin cycle includes the cultivators, the farmers – right? It begins with them, it ends up with somebody dying in a stairwell in Chicago with a dirty needle in their vein or something. But in between you’ve got government officials, you’ve got even US diplomats, maybe, you’ve got the CIA, you’ve got NATO officials and everyone is making money of it. How much do you think the US and NATO have profited from the entire heroin scheme in Afghanistan?

Rozoff: That’s rich ground for speculation. I would reference I think, as you were talking about the golden triangle earlier, Alfred McCoy he is a Professor, or was at least, a professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He wrote a book on just that topic, about the Southeast Asia during the war in Indo-China.

Robles: I’ve actually read that.

Rozoff: Good, talk about it! Inevitably, all the other plagues follow in the track of war; famine, disease, drug addiction, prostitution, dislocation. It is as sure as the night follows day you are going to find that. However, there is a more insidious side that you are alluding to, which is that one way of in the post WW II period of financing counterinsurgency groups that are artificially governmental in nature is through the drug trade.

This occurred in central America, it has occurred in south America, it has occurred in Indo-China, it has occurred in the Balkans, it is occurring currently in south and central Asia where cutthroat mercenary outfits do the dirty work, particularly for the CIA, and in return are allowed to run narcotics trafficking, perhaps, in conjunction with US military forces, as a way of paying themselves outside of the congressionally scrutinized budget. You know, it is a slush fund or a secret budget of some sort. We just have to assume that’s going on.

There has been discussion, I think there’s even been some degree of proof that there is a drug route that goes now from Afghanistan possibly through the air base in Manas in Kirgizstan fairly directly into the Balkans, probably Kosovo. And we know that criminal gangs or syndicates affiliated with the putative government of Kosovo, of Hashim Thaçi, have been directly implicated in running the preponderance of the drug trade throughout Europe. So, it would seem logical that opium, cultivated, farmed, semi-processed in Afghanistan or even processed into heroin and other by-products would then make their way into the drugs circuit in the Balkans, and from there to the West. It is more than a likely possibility.

Robles: So, this is going through… out of US military installations in Afghanistan to the US base possibly in Kosovo you think or… ?

Rozoff: There has been a discussion about that. And it seems plausible, at the very least. We are talking about the transit center of Manas in Kirgizstan, which is supposed to be closed down finally next year, unless the US raises the bid, as they’ve done in the past to maintain it yet further. But assuming that’s closed down, the US has modernized and expanded several air bases within Afghanistan itself – the Bagram Air Base north of the capital, Shindand near the Iranian border and other places and the US has no intention of vacating those bases ever, I think it is safe in assuming.

So, amongst other things that provide them probably long enough and big enough runways to accommodate strategic aircraft, should the US want to position such in the center of the south Asian region, but also cargo planes – they can bring anything in or out of the country as they choose, much as Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo. It is not under any international supervision. The Kosovo force, the NATO military force in Afghanistan is, at least nominally, under the UN mandate but the US military base in Kosovo – Camp Bondsteel, as far as I know, is not inspected by anybody.

There’s been speculation by the Russian officials that if the US chooses to place nuclear weapons, say tactical nuclear weapons closer to the Russian border or the Iranian border, they could do so in Kosovo without anyone being wised up. So, why not narcotics?

Robles: This collusion in narcotics trafficking has been very well documented and proven. And it doesn’t matter how many times Oliver North said “I have no recollection” I mean, this is a fact of their operations.

Rozoff: Yes, war is a filthy business. It is one that by definition really is without ethics. And if Congress puts up even a titular or nominal opposition in any way or demands any sort of supervision of activities, then the Oliver Norths of the world find some way of getting it done otherwise. And that if means arms to terrorist gangs in central America going south and those same cargo planes coming back with marihuana and cocaine coming north, then what is the objection from the point of view of somebody who is willing to kill innocent people. I mean, if murder is justifiable, then what crime is not?

Robles: And you are alluding to?

Rozoff: I mean, you were mentioning the example during the 1980s of the dirty-tricks-operations… oh, not dirty tricks actually, but covert operations run out of the basement of the White House.

Robles: You hit the nail on the head there. I’m sorry, go ahead Rick.

Rozoff: That's actually an allusion to the Nixon committee to reelect the president tactics in 1972. But, you know, be it whatever it is or however we want to call it. I don’t mean to go off on too much of a tangent on that, that is something that, hopefully, enterprising journalists are going to be able to dig up without spending the rest of their life in a dungeon somewhere for revealing the truth.

But in the interim, what we do know about this past year is that it has signaled the beginning of the slowing down of the post Cold War momentum of the US and its military allies around the world.

They still expanded in certain areas, we can’t deny or minimize that. The Asia-Pacific pivot of the Obama administration starting last year, where the new enemy transparently right at this point is China, which is to be encircled militarily by an increased number of new US military bases, including interceptor missile facilities throughout Asia, aimed clearly at China reproducing something analogous to what’s happened with Russia through NATO expansion on the western-southern borders of Russia.

That is something that has occurred, but we’ve seen I think psychologically, as well as maybe a little bit more tangibly, an important pivot with the situation in Syria, as we talked about. And coming out of that a clear resolve by many nations in the world, and we have to remember that Chinese navy is now assisting Russia, the Chinese Navy right now in the removal of chemical weapons from Syria, which a Russian official was quoted as of yesterday as saying: “… this is the first time Russian and Chinese military have cooperated together in a real life crisis.” I think that’s almost a quote.

So, what we are seeing now is the evolution again, and this is so important to emphasize, to underline, of a model of international multipolarity with the basis on international law. And what that means is if countries like Russia and China, who are simultaneously the mainstays of two very-very important organizations – the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and what is loosely known as the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa now)…

Robles: If I can make a little kind of maybe sarcastic comment, but, are you implying that Russia and China are somehow part of the “international community?”

Rozoff: I know they were written off some time, roughly 22 years ago and you didn’t have to consult their interests in any way or form. That has now changed and it changed pretty demonstrably. And what is evident this past year in particular is that because of consistency and determination we had from both those countries, particularly Russia but China also, we have to recall that in an unprecedented series of actions those three countries three times in succession vetoed the proposed resolutions in the UN Security Council that would have laid the groundwork for a replication of the Libyan model in Syria.

And the fact that Russia and China did not back down even in the face of what is very formidable American ability to mould public opinion internationally and even to have that reflected within the affected countries Russia and China, where media, either from the West or parroting the line of the West oftentimes, is able to influence public opinion domestically in those two countries – that despite all that Russia and China stood their ground, refused to back down.

And we can flash back to some of our earlier programs or interviews with the horribly insulting and condescending, and contemptuous statements made by major US political officials, for example, the former Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, Dr. Susan Rice – the current National Security Advisor – and others who spoke about Russia and China in terms that really do not belong in international diplomacy in any way or form.

But not withstanding all that the fact is a couple of very significant nations – Russia and China – they’ve proven thus far and no farther, I want to say.

They allowed a resolution against Libya in early 2011 to pass the UN Security Council and saw what occurred, which is six months of US and NATO bombardment of the country, as you indicated, and never again this is going to occur. And this is a very important stand that was taken on the issue of Syria. You know, had it not been Syria, it may have been some other nation. But the fact is – historically it was Syria and this is going to be recorded unquestionably as a major historical turning point.

Robles: Thank you Rick!

That was the end of part 2 of an interview with Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at

PART 3: NATO’s Ukrainian Target: The Black Sea Fleet

January 17 2014  http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2014/01/13/11/ROBLES_ROZOFF_End_2013_Part_03.MP3

NATO’s Ukrainian target: The Black Sea Fleet - Rick Rozoff

Robles: Coming up in the next year what countries, what areas should we be watching out for with regard to NATO expansion? We talked a little bit before about the Arctic, it’s heating up, about Scandinavia I think. What other areas do you think NATO is going to try to expand into? And I'd like you, if you could, comment on what does the loss of Ukraine mean for NATO?

Rozoff: Those are the good questions. On the first I would say it is the international analogue of what we in Chicago would call a crime alert. There are street gangs or burglary rings or something other operating in the area and you want to alert people to where they are likely to strike, and we are doing the world a service I think by anticipating that, but let's be real clear, the Ukraine indeed is one of them. Let me reserve that, discussion of that for a moment.

Let’s look at what is happening in Central Africa. We have seen French military intervention in Mali, direct military intervention with the assistance of the United States, the US Africa Command and US air forces Africa, US air forces in Europe and Africa, directly involved in ferrying and/or transporting French troops and armored vehicles and so forth, for what is a direct military action in Mali. We are seeing that replicated right now in the Central African Republic.

And these action … and now we see US Osprey helicopters attacked in South Sudan, where the US is going to become directly involved militarily, there are already calls for US direct military action in retaliation for that attack. We do have to recollect, that maybe a year and a half ago, the Obama Administration signaled, they announced formally, they were deploying special operations troops to foreign nations in Central Africa. Those are exactly the Central African Republic, South Sudan, Congo and what is the fourth - Uganda.

So that the US is already massively involved in Uganda; Ugandan troops are the US's proxies in Somali for the most part, as well as there are some Burundi and Kenyan. So Central Africa is clearly marked up. There is a massive propaganda campaign, many of your listeners may be aware of, by some shadowy mysterious individual to hunt down Joseph Kony of the Lord's Resistance Army, in a video that … promoted by the likes of Oprah Winfrey went viral and to build up a humanitarian justification for direct US involvement in Central Africa, now we are seeing what that really means.

What that really means is a direct US military role in the newest nation in the world South Sudan. It means the US once again supporting their French NATO ally in military conflicts in Africa, following that of Ivory Coast in 2011 where they overthrew the government of Laurent Gbagbo. And recently, last year in Mali, this year in Central African Republic, it is likely to shift into nations like Chad in not too distant future.

So we are seeing what African command was set up to do, which is to oversee, coordinate or to wage war in Africa in conjunction with the US's military allies and NATO friends it appears currently in the first place. So that is one area I would look at.

Robles: What are the US NATO Western interests in Africa for those of our listeners who aren't really aware of what they have to offer down there?

Rozoff: The American political leader Malcolm X said in entertaining but illustrative speech in the early 1960s called 'I don't mean bananas'. And he was talking about what, at that time, the Patrice Lumumba government in Belgian Congo had been overthrown. It is now clear, for all the conspiracy theorists, that the US all but admits that the Central Intelligence Agency was instrumental in the overthrow of his regime, and in his murder.

But what 40 years ago Malcolm X was talking about was the fact that Africa is one of the resource richest continents in the world and increasingly now with material needed for computer technology and energy, of oil in the first place, natural gas secondarily, that Africa is invaluable to the world. And what it represents is an opportunity for the United States and its allies to reclaim control of the African continent effectively.

We do have to remember that every major colonial power in Africa, former colonial power, is a member of NATO: France, Britain, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Turkey, Italy - every single one. So NATO in many ways is a collective of the Western colonial powers internationally, in Asia and in the Western hemisphere as well, South and the Central America, including the Caribbean.

But these are the Africa that we are talking about is a consortium of Western military powers that want to control, the dealing in raw materials, precious and semiprecious metals, or stones and metals and so forth. The diamond trade in South Africa alone is worth looking at.

But we are looking at what are reported to be fairly large reserves of petroleum in Central Africa exactly, with at least tentative plans to have those reserves piped out through countries like Uganda to the Pacific Ocean or the Indian Ocean. And I think it is important that these economic factors be taken into consideration when we look at where our militaries are being deployed and what overall military strategy may be.

The fact that the US set up its first unified combatant command, its first overseas integrated military command since the Cold War, in Africa, is a significant fact and it is not a fortuitous one. It suggests that the battle for Africa is in many ways a strategically important battle for the world resources and control and domination. Africa now is, with the population of over a billion people as of maybe three years ago, the second most populous nation … continent rather in the world, next to Asia.

So it is significant from a number of points of view and the US military is not going to sit aside and watch through diplomatic and economic measures countries like Russia and China are going to become more actively involved in China without putting up a battle to beat them on that board.

Robles: You mean more active in Africa?

Rozoff: Oh, I'm sorry, Africa indeed, pardon me.

Robles: Africa we should be watching at for, what about Scandinavia and the Arctic? Where do you see things - you are usually ahead of the curve Rick - so where do you see things going in the Arctic with NATO expansion and in Scandinavia? And with the continuing ABM placement, the missile shield, do you think they are going to keep doing it?

Rozoff: Yes, there seems to be a renewed interest in, or at least reporting on what five years ago would have been referred to, I certainly referred to it as such at that time as the scramble for the Arctic and what occurred in - it will be shortly five years as a matter of fact the very beginning of 2009 - is that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization held a conference in Iceland, I believe it was called the conference on the High North. High North is the NATO term or euphemism if you will, for the Arctic.

And what they were talking about at that time, this came immediately on the heels incidentally of the - a kind of a parting shot by the George W. Bush Administration in January of 2009 - immediately before his leaving the Oval Office George W Bush, a National Security Agency directive was issued on the Arctic. And it was evident at that time that there were five official claimants to parts of the Arctic Ocean and four of those five were members of NATO: they are the US, Canada, Norway and Denmark.

But other countries like Britain, other NATO members like Britain and Scandinavian countries like Finland, Sweden are getting involved in the oil rush, if I could put it that, amongst other things in the High North, with countries outside the region including China interested in what’s occurring there. But the fact that four of the five official claimants are members of NATO, and that the US is a major one amongst them, signals another potential bone of contention between NATO and Russia.

Russia has the most sizable and I would argue the most legitimate claim to areas, particularly the Lomonosov Ridge comes to mind in the Arctic Circle. And in fact I think it was about 3 or 4 years ago that Norway became the first country in the world to base its military headquarters within the Arctic Circle, it moved it north within the Arctic region.

Robles: I see.

Rozoff: So that we have that going on at the same time as I think you alertly allude to that Scandinavia is being targeted for, all but effective formal incorporation into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. With Denmark and Norway being founding members of NATO, then that leaves of course Finland and Sweden which historically have been neutral, Finland at least since World War 2, Sweden for 200 years. But both of whom have been supplying troops, have been killing and dying in northern Afghanistan under NATO command, International Security Assistance Force. Sweden provided Gripen war planes for NATO's war against Libya in 2011.

So you have Sweden which had been not involved in military conflicts, had been neutral for 200 years, engage in NATO wars in Asia and Africa. I don't know how much of Swedish people really pay attention to this, but Sweden now is formally joining the NATO response force, the international strike force, as well as Finland, Georgia and up until recently the plan was for Ukraine to join them.

So what do we have is, that is not coincidental, that suggests that NATO feels it not only needs to encroach yet further on the Russian border, Finland has a sizable border with Russia of course, but also in the push to the North, to the High North, to the Arctic. And that those two, as you indicate in your question, are related issues, they really cannot be separated and that the US wants dominance at the top of the world as it does in most every other part of the world.

Robles: Can we segue into Ukraine then? And I'd like to get your year end summary on our President Vladimir Putin.

Rozoff:Ukraine became after what appears to be the resolution of the crisis of the crisis, of the catastrophe in fact, in Syria to have been the next point on the chessboard where the US and its western allies decided to face down Russia or challenge Russia by intervening, really interfering in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation, pressuring the government of Victor Yanukovich and his allies in Kiev which was elected expressly to foster cooperative relations with Russia after the government of his predecessor Victor Yushchenko, whose wife of course was born here in Chicago and worked in various capacities for the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush Administrations, people should recall. And after he had turned on Russia, including on pipeline arrangements where Russia was disadvantaged vis a vis Western Europe.

But the Yanukovich government was elected in large part to foster friendly relations with its neighbor of some 1400 km and to have them then be strong armed or pressured by the US and its western allies to sign an Association Agreement with the European Union at the very moment that Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus are in the course of consolidating a Customs Union. Well it is quite evident that the intent is to pull Ukraine away from Russia, shift it in the direction of the European Union and NATO.

And that the European Union, again as we had occasion to discuss, is really the cloak under which Ukraine is to be integrated into NATO. And the ships provided by the government of Ukraine already active, and two ongoing and presumably permanent North Atlantic Treaty Organization naval operations, one in the Mediterranean Sea, the other in the Arabian Sea, first is operation Active Endeavor, the second is Operation Ocean Shield, and the US continues to hold, again as we've discussed before, the annual Sea Breeze military exercises in the Crimea in Ukraine, which is also where the Russian Black Sea fleet is based.

Keep in mind, if you want to talk about geopolitics, that people can envision in their mind a map of that part of the world. Were the government of Syria to have been overthrown and Russia to lose its naval docking facility at least in Tartus, and if the government of Yanukovich is to be overthrown in one manner or another through violence, street uprising, we saw it that the press has proven to be quite adept at pulling off in countries from Yugoslavia to Ukraine 9 years ago, or through a rigged or extra constitutional election that brings about a change of regime in the country, and the Russian Black Sea fleet were to be ordered out of the Crimea which is I'm sure what the US is ordering its allies and the Ukraine to do, or to consider. Then you would have seen the eviction of Russia, not only from the Mediterranean, but except for a narrow strip of Russian territory out of the Black Sea. And this is pretty heavy duty geopolitics, and I think in that sense too the two are not unrelated.

That was the end of part 3 of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the remaining parts of this interview on our website at Voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening and I wish you the best.

PART 4: US Puppet Saakashvili Invaded South Ossetia to Appease NATO

January 17 2014

Mikhail Saakashvili

20-20 hindsight is something we all may have in retrospect but something that at times may be more difficult to attain when there are concerted efforts at obfuscation and twisting the truth. This was the case with the invasion by Georgia of the restive enclave of South Ossetia, an area populated almost entirely by ethnic Russians who held Russian citizenship. We now know, thanks to the untiring efforts of individuals such as eminent NATO expert Rick Rozoff, the entire invasion was a move to evict Russian peacekeepers and settle a “territorial dispute” so that Georgia could join NATO. Sadly for tie-eating-Georgian-leader Mihail Sakashvili Russia defended its citizens and things did not work out as his US instructors had promised. In a long 2013 end of the year summary with the Voice of Russia, long time NATO expert and anti-NATO activist Rick Rozoff details those facts and sheds light on where the alliance is headed in the coming year and onward.

http://static.ruvr.ru/2014/01/17/04/Rozoff_1.jpg

This is John Robles, you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. This is part 4 of an interview in progress. You can find the rest of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com

PART 1, PART 2, PART 3

Rozoff:Were the government of Syria to have been overthrown and Russia to lose its naval docking facility at least in Tartus, and if the government of Yanukovich is to be overthrown in one manner or another either through violence, street uprising, we saw it that the press has proven to be quite adept at pulling off in countries from Yugoslavia to Ukraine 9 years ago, or through a rigged or extra constitutional election that brings about a change of regime in the country, and the Russian Black Sea fleet were to be ordered out of the Crimea which is I'm sure what the US is ordering its allies and the Ukraine to do, or to consider. Then you would have seen the eviction of Russia, not only from the Mediterranean, but except for a narrow strip of Russian territory out of the Black Sea.

And this is pretty heavy duty geopolitics, and I think in that sense too the two are not unrelated.The Russian Black Sea Fleet vessels that have come to Syria recently have left their base in the Crimea, for the most part. By the way, this is a precondition for Ukraine joining NATO rather.

Robles: Evicting the Black Sea Fleet is a precondition?

Rozoff:Well not specifically, but inevitably, and I’ll need to describe how. When NATO re-asserted in 2009, if I’m correct, that Georgia and Ukraine were going to join NATO, that they have been invited to join as full members of NATO, it was with the proviso that two standard NATO conditions be met. And those two conditions are: no foreign military forces on the soil of the country that joins NATO, which is to say – no non-NATO military forces on the soil. That would be the Russian Black Sea Fleet in the Crimea exactly in the case of Ukraine. It would have been at that time Russian - actually it was 2008,it was 2008 because it was several months before the five-day war that the Saakashvili regime instigated in the South Caucasus.

The second condition is no unresolved territorial disputes. I read that immediately at the NATO Summit at the beginning of 2008

Robles: No unresolved territorial disputes?

Rozoff:Such as for example Abkhazia and South Ossetia in Georgia but, arguably, Crimea in Ukraine. You know, at the point where the West could have portrayed or can now say that a largely ethnic Russian constituency in Crimea is interfering with the westernization or the European integration of Ukraine, then were a government like that of Yushchenko to call in Western support, including military support into the Crimea, that would not be beyond the realm of possibilities, that’s number one.

So, what we have here is two things. That I believe the war in the Caucasus in August of 2008 was the inevitable result of what NATO offered to Georgia and Ukraine earlier in the year, which was – once you get rid of foreign military forces, even peace-keepers on your territory and once you integrate restive areas and put them under your thumb, then you can join NATO. This was all but an invitation for Mikhail Saakashvili to invade South Ossetia and following that, had he been successful, Abkhazia. And it was also an invitation for Yanukovych to clamp down on political opponents in Eastern Ukraine.

Robles: That’s the first time I’ve heard that one. Why didn’t we talk about that before? You said it was a condition for them to do that. So, basically they invaded South Ossetia and killed all the Russian citizens there to join NATO?

Rozoff:That is my firm contention of this day, that it was known, it was explicitly stated at the NATO Summit in Bucharest, Romania in 2008 that Georgia and Ukraine were to join NATO as full members. As a matter of fact, there were special commissions set up after the war. After the war in August of 2008 the US set up formal commissions with Ukraine and Georgia and NATO set up something comparable to that, you know a special program for both countries for their integration.

But it is common knowledge, and it was reiterated at the Bucharest Summit, that the two impediments for a nation joining NATO were unresolved territorial disputes within their national boundaries and the presence of non-NATO military forces in the country. Russia in this case was meant vis-à-vis Georgia and Ukraine. And that’s why I’m stating it.

In fact, the Commonwealth of Independent States mandated peace-keeping forces – peace-keeping forces mandated by the CIS! (ofwhich Georgia was a member at that time, before the war, let’s recall) – and that they were mandated to be in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. To NATO, itrepresented an impediment to the full incorporation of Georgia as a full NATO member, Mr. Saakashvili understood that and he acted accordingly. That’s my conviction.

But this applies equally, I would argue,or almost equally to Ukraine because the presence of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Ukraine would be the biggest impediment, absolutely an impediment. It would be a sinequa non of NATO membership to evict the Russian Black Sea Fleet from the Crimea. Mr. Yushchenko understood that perfectly in 2008 too.

But now that with the eastern partnership, because this is what the association agreement with the European Union meant. It is being done under the auspices of a program created also in 2008, exactly the same year, we’re talking about the Bucharest Summit, on the initiative of Poland and Sweden to invite all of the non-Russian, all the former Soviet republics in Europe and the Caucasus, except for Russia (meaning Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia) into the eastern partnership to integrate them into the European Union. Which would mean what? That would mean the effective death of the Commonwealth of Independent States.

How else can that be interpreted? If you’re telling every single non-Central Asian Soviet Republic except Russia that they could be incorporated into the European Union, which is basically co-terminus with NATO. That’s something like 21 out of 28 members of the European Union are members of NATO and the others are partners.

Robles: I don’t think that would ever happen, because all the people have to do is sit down and look at the numbers, like they did in Ukraine and we talked about this before. $100billion in income over 7 years if we join the Customs Union and $1billion in income over 7 years if we join the EU. Plus they would have to divert all theirspending on social programs and everything else into upgrading their military, and becoming NATO compatible.

I don’t think that would ever happen. But, again, NATO was formed and founded to fight the Soviet Union and destroy the Soviet Union, OK or defend against the Soviet Union, however you want to put it. And it seems to me they have just continued along that same road despite the fact that the Soviet Union no longer exists. Would you agree with that?

Rozoff:On the second score I agree. On the first score I think we have to be careful. By the way, a mistake earlier – it is 27 members I believe of the European Union, of which 21 are members in NATO. But the other 6 are all NATO partners in the Partnership for Peace program. So, you know, it’s almost sleightof hand – NATO is EU, EU is NATO, or rather the EU is NATO minus the US and Canada.

Robles: I think people in Serbia know that. I think now people in Ukraine are beginning to realize that. I think people in Poland know that. I think most Russians are now waking up and realizing that but... Go ahead Rick.

Rozoff: However, as we talked about, if at the Bucharest Summit of NATO in 2008 it was told the US puppet regime in Kiev – and that’s all the Yushchenko Government was – you know, he was being led by the nose by his wife Kathy from Chicago. And if anyone doesn’t believe that, I suggest they look into the matter a little more closely. But that all the Government of Yushchenko or the one that would replace Yanukovych now, if some kind of a revived Orange Revolution were to occur, would have to do is to provoke some political crisis in the Crimea.

We know, for example, there’ve been demonstrations by Crimeans, local residents against the US-NATO military exercises – the Sea Breeze exercises that we talked about a few minutes ago. All they would have to do is have a some kind of provocation staged, US uses that as an excuse to protecting Ukraine against Russian proxy subversion or something of this sort, and then you have a real crisis on your hands. So, let’s not dismiss that possibility.

On the first part of the question you asked me – is NATO an outdated organization? That’s one argument by opponents of NATO that I don’t fully share. What it tends to suggest is that NATO was a perfectly legitimate organization at its inception and throughout the Cold War, but now we don’t need it. That is not at all what NATO has been transformed into in the post-Cold War period.

The US and its major allies in NATO – and this is not strictly a US thing – we have to understand that two of the world’s largest arms exporters right now are Germany, which I believe is number three (NATO has worked very well for German death merchants), another major international arms exporter is Sweden. Sweden, which has joined the international NATO response force, has taken good care of its politicians and certainly of its merchants of death as a result of affiliation with NATO. So, this is not simply a matter of an outdated organization to continue on its own momentum with no purpose.

The cliché that’s been used for the last 15 years as “in search of a mission” or “redefining itself” or something of this sort – no, the US instead has seen that, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc as a whole – you know, the Comecon economic union, and the Warsaw Pact military alliance – as one official stated several years ago that basically the US moved the Berlin Wall to the Russian border.

Notwithstanding the assurances by the George H.W Bush Administration to the Mikhail Gorbachev Government that NATO would not move one inch eastward, we can see what is in fact…

Robles: Well, they made that promise they just refused to put it on paper.

Rozoff: I don’t want to belabor this point. And whatever it was, it is no longer such after 1991, and actually earlier than that.

In 1991 the Warsaw Pact, which had already been moribund for years, formally dissolved itself and then, in the same year, in 1991 the Soviet Union fragmented into 15 republics or nations.

So, that the whatever alleged justification that NATO might ever have had, it disappeared, it dissolved immediately. And at that point, if NATO was a defensive organization (I don’t believe it was, but for those who claim it was at any point in its history), then it of necessity had to dissolve itself too at that point. Yes or no?

Robles: What is NATO then? I mean, it wasn’t a defensive organization to begin with, what exactly was it then?

Rozoff: At the moment Berlin fell in 1945 the war waged by the US, France and Britain and the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany became a conflict between the US, Britain and France against the Soviet Union. Everybody knows that.

One war had not ended before the next one – the Cold War – began. And NATO was necessary to sustain permanent US military presence in Europe, consolidate friendly (one might argue – compliant) governments in the major European countries, that would be beholden to the US military and would in fact be integrated politically and militarily with the United States.

However, at that time at least the name of the organization made some sense and some legitimacy when we speak about the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization. Of the original 12 members I believe all but Italy were on or near the Atlantic Ocean. We are now looking at a North-Atlantic Treaty Organization that from 1999 to 2009, that is in one decade, expanded from 16 countries to 28. That is a 40% increase.

Robles: Now North-Atlantic is into eastern Africa, I believe.

Rozoff: It is all over the world. And the 12 new members are all in eastern and central Europe, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, to the Adriatic Sea. And none of them are anywhere near the Atlantic Ocean.

So, if it was a defensive organization to defend democracies and the euro-Atlantic region, then why is up to 28 members, the majority of whom now are not on the Atlantic Ocean.

That’s I think a simple refutation of that claim. I mean, the fact that the three former Soviet republics – Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania – were brought in as full NATO members in 2004 and in the NATO Summit in Turkey seven new nations were brought in at one time – that is unprecedented – right? – except for the original inception.

Robles: I’d like to say one thing. Russia, does that pose a threat to the West. I’m sorry, people. Russia is not threatening America. Russia is not and has never threatened Europe. Russia is not threatening Scandinavia…

Rozoff: No, it is a bogeyman. I mean, you’ve talked about the four phantom enemies. You know, they concoct a man of straw, an imaginary threat and then they… as it was evidenced perhaps in the last year, maybe a little longer than that, a major military official, I believe a Defense Ministry official in Sweden has said: “If Russia invades Sweden, without NATO support we’d be overrun in days.” Now, come on!

Robles: Yes, we wouldn’t last eight hours I think he said.

Rozoff: Okay, it is even worse. In what geopolitical and what psychological universe does one frame scenarios like that? But it is clear that this is evoking images, you know, the absolute, the most horrifying images of the Cold War. You know, Russians are coming. And if: “… we – Sweden – do not join NATO immediately by the time you get home from work, there are going to be Russian troops in Stockholm.”

I mean, this is kind of lunacy that goes on. But because the media, as well as the political establishment in Western countries are so subservient, first of all, to the US and, second of all, to the Western elites as a whole… somebody like that should have been drummed out of his position immediately after making a statement like that. That is alarmism, that is fear mongering.

Robles: Who is this serving? It is serving the military industrial complex, isn’t it?

Rozoff: Including that in Sweden, including Sweden’s ability to sell arms around the world, based on its affiliation with NATO, because of the interoperability of weaponry.

There is something else that is significant and only a handful of people in Sweden, evidently, fully I think taken cognizance of this. About two or three years ago the Swedish Army revamped itself. It had been a territorial defense army, a citizen army and it was meant for one purpose only – in the very-very unlikely, if not impossible, case of foreign military forces assaulting Sweden, the Swedish Armed Forces were to defend Sweden, period.

That was the end of part 4 of an interview with Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the remaining parts of this interview on our website at

 

 Part 1: Russian media has provided an outlet for the censored

December 13 2013  http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2013/12/13/10/RozoffVORpart1.MP3

On December 9 Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a decree covering major changes in Russian state run media including the Voice of Russia. Regular VoR contributor Rick Rozoff discussed his reaction to the changes with the VoR's John Robles and stated that the VoR and Russian media have been very important, especially in the last five years, in bringing the world real news and alternative to western media which is either under US White House control or act as mere echo chambers parroting US Government lines and does not allow important political figures, academicians and others to have their voices heard.

Hello, this is John Robles, I am speaking with Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick, how are you this evening?

Rozoff: Very good John. It's good to be with you again

Robles: You had some interesting things you wanted to say about the Voice of Russia, a station that has been dear, of course to myself, and I think to yourself as well.

Rozoff: Yes, I woke up yesterday morning, as did I think some of the more news conscious people throughout the world and saw the article originally on the Novosti site announcing the fact that Russian information agency Novosti and Voice of Russia would be effectively closed and either folded into a broader media outlet, medium outlet, to be called Russia Today, and I was … we were all shocked of course to see that, me particularly because…

Robles: Well it's a little bit unclear about the name because in Russian it is supposed to be Russia Segodnya, and it is going to be a new organization that is going to include the Voice of Russia, I believe, and elements of RIA Novosti and some other media organizations. So, whether it is related to RT, or Russia Today, that's just in the direct translation for it, as far as I know. But anyway, go ahead.

Rozoff: No, thanks for the clarification. But I was particularly concerned, because it is no secret, but I think it is far past time that the world recognizes it, is that for the past decade, I would say definitely the last 5 years, let's date it from that point, is that the Russian news media has presented the world with an opportunity to hear an alternative to the control of news emanating from, say, the US White House and State Department, and basically nothing other than echo chamber responses from the rest of the western world, and the mass media from the west that is.

So, almost slavishly, dutifully, obedient to the demands of the western governments, so that, we look at the last 5 years, it's been sites like Voice of Russia, RT and others that have presented not only alternative news to the world - and this is not simply in international affairs; it's on incidents like the Occupy Movement here in the United States. You've interviewed several leading members of the Occupy Movement. You know, Julian Assange and Wikileaks, again Voice of Russia, RT and other Russian sites have given an unbelievable outlet to dozens, scores, maybe hundreds of American academicians, political officials. You've interviewed leading members, including the presidential candidate of the US Green Party for example, that could never have dreamt of getting that kind of media exposure in their own country, surely.

One is reminded of the Biblical line about "no prophet is without honor except in his own land", but in any other national media could pinpoint many cases we are talking … you interviewed people like retired professor of economics Edward Herman, people like Steven Cohen or Noam Chomsky, and others have been on Russian media or television and radio regularly over the past 5 years and would never appear, not only on the corporate media in this country, but even on so-called public television or radio, that simply wouldn't be an opportunity available to them.

So, what happens with the Russian news media is an issue, not only of concern to Russian people, and we are talking about foreign language media here. English in the first place because surely in the age on the Internet English is the universal language, and unless there is an outlet countering what's been put out there by Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, major commercial media like Washington Post, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal and so forth, and people aren't going to hear anything, and they're going to believe that that very limited perspective is the only one that exists. That is why the role of the Russian news media, foreign language, English language in the first place, is just vital. There is no way I can overestimate how important it is to the world right now.

Robles: In what international situations or what international events would you say in the last 5 years or so that the Russian media has played a key role in informing and maybe influencing events?

Rozoff: I would almost turn that around, and I am not trying to be paradoxical here in saying in what area or event have they not played that role. But surely, if we are just talking about last 5 years, and we are talking about the Syrian crisis, which in large part has been resolved through Russian intervention, diplomatic in the first instance.

But let's talk about something going on right now. The spokesman for the US State Department, Victoria Nuland, who under current President Obama's predecessor George W. Bush was US permanent envoy, that is Ambassador to NATO, met with her for 2 hours today reportedly with Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovich, and the western media is full of - and this kind of resonates here in Chicago - stating "the whole world is watching" according to Nuland - many of your listeners are maybe old enough to remember that slogan in 1968, it was used by the protesters outside the democratic nominating convention here in Chicago.

But the fact is the world is watching, and what we see in, particularly in the internet age, in the worldwide web – the age of the worldwide web - is that the battle of ideas, the battle of news, who has accurate information, who has alternative perspectives is more important I would argue than it's ever been prior to this in history. It was certainly important during the Cold War, it was important during World War II, but in this era right now what has happened with the weakening and ultimately the demise of the Soviet Union starting in the late 1980s was that a vision emerged, an American vision of the world, and not that of the American people but that of the American elite, and the American government, Wall Street and the Pentagon and the White House and it has been allowed, it has been permitted to hold sway pretty much uncontested for 25 years.

And it is only with the emergence of serious rivals within the world news community that we can begin to have anything like a balanced perspective on events internationally or for that matter within the United States where there is media, and there is news control that narrowly constricts the range of topics and perspectives that's permitted to emerge so that again the world … the people can talk about Al Jazeera, they can talk about other outlets but there is nothing comparable to the role that's been assumed by the Russian news media in the last 5 years. It has simply revolutionized the perspective.

People wake up in the morning around the world and they don't go to the New York Times because they know what they are going to get, and they may not go to Le Monde, they may not go to the London Times but I think they are increasingly turning to sites like Voice of Russia, Interfax, ITAR-TASS, and other Russian sites. That is why it is so indispensable to maintain and independent and principled position for the world, reading and listening and viewing public.

Robles: Now this is a particular concern to Russian officials, and to Russians as well, when discussing international media outlets and Russian media outlets. How do you think, or what is your opinion on how Russian media outlets have promoted Russian policies, Russian ideas and Russia as a country? Do you think it has been fair? Do you think it has been effective at all?

Rozoff: Effective, I would say, yes, keeping in mind that we have decades … there's decades of catching up to do, and there is a fact that I think – I don't want to say subconsciously - but intuitively or implicitly most of the world tends to take the New York Times view of the world, or the London Times view of the world, without even realizing perhaps that they do. They just are so inured or accustomed to reading that sort of news that they assume it is true without asking themselves if there is a different perspective to take.

But, so that the Russian news media internationally, even in terms of portraying its own country, and its own government's behavior at home and abroad is fighting an uphill battle. There is just no question about it.

We also have to keep in mind, and this is a very serious issue, is that with the emergence of – it wasn't called détente of course, but I had almost want to say détente too - during the Gorbachev-Reagan administrations and the former Soviet Union in Russia, where there was a thawing of the Cold War as it would have been described and ultimately the dissolution, and the fragmentation of the Soviet Union in 1991, there was a period in which people thought "well, we are entering into an age of tolerance and cooperation in the world, - and anything but that has occurred.

But I think what is extremely significant is that with the end of Soviet communism there was no end of Russophobia, that not only continued but I would argue in many ways it has been escalated. So that the Cold War era Russophobic hysteria that was … kept the respective populations of western countries terrified - the Russian bear ready to bounce on and devour them - far from having disappeared with the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, has been carefully cultivated. That fire has been stoked consistently by western, both government and media personnel, and it is necessary for the Russian media and another world media to counteract that, in particular.

There is a sort of assumed or unspoken Russophobic world view that unless it is taken pretty firmly, could lead to some very catastrophic international incidents. We don't have to enumerate them but the so-called US missile shield in Europe comes to mind most immediately, US and allied NATO penetration of the Arctic circle with their militaries.

There are so many incidents where stirring up the … blowing on the embers of 60 or 80 years of Russophobic cultivation of unconscious thinking amongst the populace in the west could have dangerous consequences that has to be counteracted. I don't know who other than the Russian media can do that.

Robles: I see, but do you think that our Russian media has been effective in countering for example NATO?

Rozoff: I think it's been principled. Now one thing I'll have to say compared to somebody, here we are talking about myself, who has been reading the American media for maybe 45 years pretty attentively, is that the Russian media is far more balanced. I simply have to say there is, even in government media, or government funded government-controlled media, there are negative statements made about the government I would not expect to see, in the corporate media in the United States, again the New York Times, or the Washington Post, or the Chicago Tribune, or the Los Angeles Times. And I think there is an effort to portray both sides of the story in a way that is conspicuously absent from the major western dailies and the western press agencies.

The fact that Interfax in particular is starting to be picked up by other sources is something I think is significant. I think that Russia needs their press agencies to be more effective than they've done. Up until now, let's be honest about it, two American, one German and one French, maybe if you want to throw in BBC, one British wires, press services are just ruling the world – the Americans of course, are Reuters and Associated Press, the German is Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the French's Agence France-Presse and then the BBC. Almost every online newspaper in the world is either running stories from those 5 agencies or is rewriting them under their own byline, but essentially that is where they get the news. You see it with the sort of bias in any situation from the current one in Ukraine to the recent one in Syria, you have the same world view projected, and it is a world view of a tiny percentage of the human race.

Robles: Right, I've taken … I'm sorry, if we could get into that in just a minute because that's a very, very, very serious and a very important point and one that some people might not even notice exists there. A lot of people say, "Oh well it doesn't matter, I am not political", but when for example covering Syria and all the above news agencies you just mentioned, when the Syrian conflict was looking like it was going to turn into a hot war, of course they were all parroting words like "dictator", and "oppression", and "freedom fighters", and things like that, and "regime".

Rozoff: Yes, that stretches euphemism to the breaking point surely, and you are correct about that. These are intentionally loaded terms, they are not only biased but they are meant to evoke emotional responses rather than even a thinking one. And that they negatively portray targets of US foreign policy, positively promote as you are indicating what are little better than operatives, the criminal nature frequently, the terrorist nature frequently who are then routinely in the western press agencies and the newspapers that cover their material, you know referred to as the State Department wants them to referred to.

And we are seeing now what could be a major military altercation in the East China Sea where China's announced an air zone over what China knows as the Diaoyu and the Japanese as Senkaku Islands. And it is the typical US press wire services where we refer to them 100% as Senkaku.

That was Part 1 of a 3 part interview with Rick Rozoff the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find Parts 2 and 3 on our website at Voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening and I wish you the best wherever you may be.

End of Part 1

  Part 2: Western media provides narrow, constricted, biased, unrepresentative view, unlike Russian outlets

December 16 2013 04:20   http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2013/12/15/23/RozoffVORpart02.MP3

Since the days of the Cold War the West has launched illegal wars against Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and attempted to do the same thing in Syria. They have been successful in avoiding blowback and responsibility due to their monopoly on the corporate controlled media and the fact that most of the media in the world passively accepts their interpretation of world events. This is one of the reasons that alternative media and foreign controlled media are important. For many people in the West, the only truth they can actually get comes increasingly from non-corporate and even “foreign” media sources. The Voice of Russia spoke to Rick Rozoff on media and the current paradigm where journalism has lost the honor and ideals it once had.

You are listening to Part 2 of an interview with Rick Rozoff the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find Part I on our website at voiceofrussia.com.

Rozoff: And we are seeing now what could be a major military altercation in the East China Sea where China's announced an air zone over what China knows as the Diaoyu and the Japanese as Senkaku Islands. And it is the typical US press wire services where we refer to them 100% as Senkaku by the Japanese definition.

Robles: Right, the same thing with the Maldives.

Rozoff: But also occasionally you will see US media, not infrequently by the way, and sometimes government media refer to the Persian Gulf as the Arabian Gulf, which is a direct provocation to the government of Iran, of course; refer to the Russian South Kuril Islands as Japan's northern territory. So what you are seeing is, you know, the sort of political remapping of the world that would be a “casus belli”, I mean it would be a cause for a war under other circumstances, and surely if the situation were reversed so that the war of ideas, the battle of ideas is at least as critical as that of politics, economics and so forth.

And ultimately who presents the most accurate and the most persuasive view of the truth is the person who is probably going to emerge victor, the victor in any contest around the world. And we’ve seen just such atrocious, egregious, unpardonable lies being spewed out by the West, for every war they've conducted over the last 20 years, but particularly in the post-Cold War period - with Yugoslavia, with Afghanistan, with Iraq, with Libya, with Syria. And I for one don't believe the West would have been as successful, or however dubiously successful they have been, as they’ve been, if it wasn't for the fact they could count on basically if not a monopoly then at least a preponderance of news around the world and knowing that most of the world would at least passively accept their interpretation of world events.

Robles: Very good what you've just said and I'm sure everybody will take it to heart and we all agree with you 100%. What you've just brought up raised in my mind recently a new phrase that has come out in alternative media I guess and some other sources that there is a war going on on journalists and on journalism by the US government in particular on whistleblowers, on truth seekers, on anyone who is against the official line. Would you like to comment on that?

Rozoff: That is true, and this is again something that evokes both the Cold War, but I would say probably more World War 2 and the period leading up to it. When in Central Europe, when Nazi Germany became the dominant force in Central Europe, journalists were imprisoned, journalists were tortured, journalists were shot. And we are in a situation right now where truthfully we've already seen the prostituting of journalism, I can't think of any other term for it, where it's become more a profitable and prestigious career than it's become a mission or a vocationin life, where people promote or peddle themselves as the story itself – that is the journalist often times particularly the Tele journalists – often times is the story. And whatever subject matter is being discussed is almost of secondary significance, it's grist to his mill.

And we have to remember that there once was a time when journalists were very dedicated, usually self-effacing, often times anonymous and people who were willing to risk their well-being, their economic well-being, and their lives. And that ideal image of a journalist is something that desperately needs to be revived right now. It, a journalist … journalism rather, can be a dignified and honorable profession instead of what it in many ways has become.

And this again is a distinctly western phenomenon in that the prevalence of corporate media, and mass entertainment media conglomerates that run supposed news sites, so that newspapers, television news programs, radio news programs are put out or issued by the same corporations that are putting out commercials and music videos and cartoons.

Robles: So that basically the days of the intrepid reporter trying to get this scoop, those days are long gone or do you think they are...?

Rozoff: Well certainly on the city beat, I'm living in Chicago where we have two, only 2 newspapers, one is a tabloid. Most of the material in both of them is gathered as we were talking about earlier from the wire services, the press agencies, so that fewer and fewer countries have their own correspondents overseas, or even outside the city there where they’re published. There is a tendency to streamline and consolidate the press.

At one time in Chicago a hundred years ago I'm sure there were dozens of newspapers, literally dozens of newspapers. You had five-star editions; the paper would be publishing five different editions in a day – one newspaper. You had competition between papers -you don't have that anymore. So you don't have that sort of journalist who is really going to go out and fight for his story because that is not what he is paid to do, currently.

But that is more on the local level. I think that what we are talking about is, is the perception of world events, and I would say this: the framework within which we view events and this means basically - there is no other word for it - what is a person's world view? Is that a world view based on equity? Is it a world view based on equity, is it a world view based on peace and development, is it a world view based on fairness and justice - or isn't?

And if you have a world view cultivated throughout the globe based on what are essentially US, British, French and German press accounts of it, then it’s going to be, by definition, a narrow, constricted, biased, unrepresentative view of the news. And you, you hit on it keenly I think when you look at even the most basic terminology that appears in an Associated Press report, let's be honest about it, Associated Press is for all intents and purposes the American government’s press agency.

Robles: Well we can’t, we can’t quote the Associated Press. I don't even know if we can say their name, but go ahead - you said it, so it’s ok.

Rozoff: We are not slandering them; I'm just reporting what it is. You go to a major American press government sources – armed forces online publications like Stars and Stripes, and the US Government, the State Department White House website and there’s photographs in there by Associated Press. The government itself not … doesn’t apparently even pay a photographer to accompany the President.

Here’s where it becomes a little bit more insidious, and this is another vital point I think people have ignored, that the fact that the US government has an obedient presscorps at its beck and call, including Associated Press and Reuters, but pretends that they are independent means one of the ways we can shut down independent journalists, particularly web journalists like ourselves, is through copyright infringement. So, for example, and I'm going to give this point for years, if the Mayor of my city, Rahm Emanuel, goes to a neighboring city like Milwaukee 80 miles away, and makes a statement there and there is a photograph of him there – I cannot put that out on the Internet because it's copyrighted by Associated Press.

Robles: Even though he is a - I don't want to say he is your public official - but I mean your tax Dollars are paying his salary, so...?

Rozoff: That’s correct. So even your content or photographs and other basic elementary material, you would think it was, is permissible to be passed on from one citizen to another - it is not. And you will be reined in quickly; you will be pulled up short, if you without seeking the written permission of Associated Press quote your own public official talking. You certainly can’t be there yourself, and be where these people go, and if you were you wouldn't be a credentialed press person who is allowed to go into the briefing.

Well where else are you are getting this information, except by the government approved private media, which then hides behind copyright infringement. This is a new form of political censorship that is not recognized as such.

Robles: I see. So, the new control mechanism is copyright infringement on the Net?

Rozoff: Yeah, the copyright violation. It's almost to the point where, if you clip out a newspaper article from your local press and mail it to somebody, I guess you could be accused of violating their copyright.

Robles: Maybe you can help me because I have a website, you have a website. Maybe you can tell me what the current standard is, but I remember it was AP that came out with something like: you could not publish more than the first three sentences or something of one of their stories and then include one or two links to it. What is the current standard?

Rozoff: I'd … to be honest with you, I'm familiar with what you are speaking about, I would have to go to each press agency, and each newspaper to see what their particular policy is. But the long and short of it appears to be something quite like that: that you can tease the public with a short introductory ...

Robles: The first paragraph or some … I don't remember what it was, but they had it worked down to something like, even down to a word count or something, but it was pretty specific but ...

Rozoff: But keep in mind, where else if there is no official government site, are you going to find out what your own Congress person, what your own City Counsel person, what your own President has said. Where else you are going to go unless you go to Associated Press, and then if you go there they are going to hold copyright penalties over your head. So you are effectively prevented from even saying what your own elected official said.

Robles: So by default, even just knowing the information, if you even report about it on the Internet you think you could be accused of plagiarizing or copyright or something?

Rozoff: This has happened to me with the Stop NATO mailing list. Roughly three years ago there was a series of websites all more or less subsumed under Military Times, run by the Gannett chain, the chain of newspapers, and they include Defense News, Marine Times, Air Force Times, and so forth. They are all over the country, and they've been taking over small town, medium town newspapers and so forth. And then the printing is done in some other part of the country, and all that, so they are also eliminating jobs.

But anyway, the long and short of what had happened was, an article I had taken from I believe Defense News (part of the Military Times group), and I had sent it out on my private e-mail list - private e-mail list - it had been picked up by somebody (this a Yahoo list) it had been picked up by somebody else in Pakistan, and it was in the archives of a private e-mail list in Pakistan, and I was contacted by an attorney from Defense News and Military Times, saying if I didn't remove it from a site that I don’t … didn't even know exists - I have no idea who runs it - that they would consider legal action against me.

They turned me over to the Yahoo administration, which took their side and told me they would not only close down my e-mail news list, but all my private e-mail accounts, which I've used in the case of Yahoo for 14 years. So, I'm told that any mode of communication I have is being cut off because somebody passed on something - God knows how many times - ended up in another country in the archives of a private e-mail list and I can face a legal penalty.

Robles: When was this, because that sounds exactly like what the SOPA bill was supposed to do and what this new TPP is supposed to be doing. When did that happen?

Rozoff: August of 2011.

Robles: 2011. Was there a legal foundation for that in the United States, or were they just huffing and puffing, or they were testing the water as to how much they could intimidate people, or what's the deal?

Rozoff: When I heard from Yahoo News, they copied and pasted a legal argument against the use of it. Keep an eye on this, it wasn't done for commercial purposes, it wasn't published broadly, it was sent out privately.

Robles:I know, I'm a member of your mailing list by the way.

Rozoff: The only equivalent I could think of in the hard copy age, in the pre-computer age - is that somebody who is interested in fishing or something and they had magazines Field & Stream and they cut out an article about trout fishing, and they mailed it to their friend John, and he liked it so he mailed it to his friend Phil. And somebody caught Phil with the article and threatened the original person with cutting off his mail service.

Robles: It's ridiculous when you take this stuff and put it in real world terms, all this stuff they are trying to do with the Internet. I mean, when Jeremy Hammond - had he in physical terms, as Susan Crabtree told me, when I talked to her right before he was sentenced to 10 years - if you had taken a car and driven right through the front doors of Stratfor and physically stolen all their files, he would have got something like three years and community service or something. And for doing this electronically he gets 10 years.

Rozoff: I know, that’s atrocious.

Robles:I've always wondered, it’s always seemed odd to me that cyberspace and the Internet and in reality it doesn't exist, it's not a tangible place. But why it has such real world effects when small things like this are done is beyond me.

Rozoff: It’s … well it means we have to be honest about this, this is the new totalitarianism, and it’s information totalitarianism. And it’s, amongst other things, the Internet not only permits me to communicate with you, but it permits any powerful entity, governments in the first instance, to monitor the activity of its citizens and the citizens of the world. What else have we learnt by the expose about the National Security Agency, but just that?

But the US is monitoring down to the finest most minute particular: every telephone call, every key stroke, every visit - of everyone on the planet? You would need a million George Orwell’s to be able to anticipate something this far-reaching, this comprehensive, and it’s frightening. And the fact is, we’ve had occasion to talk about it on your show before, that the person in charge of the National Security Agency – a four-star General Keith Alexander - is the same person who was put in charge of US cyber command, which is a cyber-warfare command, pure and simple.

You should certainly alert people to the fact that what we are dealing with right now is a new mode of conducting warfare. What the Pentagon has referred to in terms of cyber-warfare is the fifth battle space – and after land, air, sea and space.

Robles: And it is currently it’s not against armies or governments, or state actors; the target appears to be you and me and Joe Blow and Mary Smith.

That was Part 2 of a 3 part interview with Rick Rozoff the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find Parts 1 and 3 on our website at Voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening and I wish you the best wherever you may be.

End of Part 2

  Part 3: Amid US spying we are living with information totalitarianism

December 19, 2013 22:51   http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2013/12/19/19/RozoffVORpart03.MP3

With the restructuring of the Russian media there are many people worldwide who are hopeful that the changes will produce a balance and a counterweight to the 5 worldwide newswires that are controlled by the West and possess a true and barely transparent bias. The way in which private news agencies make news and information only accessible to governments and bodies and effectively lock out the common people is more like the selling and buying of intelligence. This control of information by the NSA, CIA and other private companies run by the intelligence services are all part of a new paradigm that Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff call “Information Totalitarianism”. Information should be free, and as WikiLeaks says: “Information wants to be free.”

Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Rozoff: We have to be honest about this, it’s the new totalitarianism and it is information totalitarianism. And amongst other things the Internet not only permits me to communicate with you but it permits any powerful entity, governments in the first instance, to monitor the activity of its citizens and citizens in the world.

What else have we learned by the exposé about international security agency, but just that? That the US is monitoring down to the most minute particular, every telephone call, every key stroke, every visit of everyone on the planet.

You would need a million George Orwells today to anticipate something this far reaching this comprehensive and this frightening. And the fact is the person in charge of the National Security Agency 4-star general Keith Alexander, is the same person who was put in charge of US Cyber Command, which is a cyber “warfare” command, pure and simple.

It should certainly alert people to the fact that what you are dealing with right now is the new mode of conducting warfare. What the Pentagon is referred to in terms of cyber warfare - the 5th battle space after land, air, sea and space.

Robles: And it is not against armies or governments or state actors, the target appears to be you, and me, and Joe Blow, and Marry Smith.

Rozoff: In the initial stages. And what I would suspect is that this is almost war time, blackouts and other activities so as not to alert the enemy to the presence of potential bombing targets or something, but in this case it is almost seeing who in a period of crisis might put out heterodox or unapproved information and so let’s compile a dossier on them so that if it ever comes to a serious crisis, military in the first instance, so we know who they are and we know how to round them up.

Robles: Preventative surveillance. Do you remember the film with Tom Cruise? “The Minority Report” I believe it was called. Where they had police that arrested people before they did a crime. You’ve got preventative detention in the US, now we get preventative surveillance.



Rozoff: For our own good of course!

Robles: Of course! It is against every Al-Qaeda terrorist, it is hiding behind every lamppost in Springfield, Illinois.

Rozoff: Actually they may be receiving military training by the Illinois National Guard, I wouldn’t put it past them. That is how they terrify us but in fact they are taking training courses at air training facilities in Florida and so forth. That is true. That is simply the truth, God knows where else they are getting training or arms.

The façade of combating terrorism, I was thinking about that earlier today: if there is one thing the US Government has no right to ever contend, is that it is combating terrorism.

It is certainly recently, currently in Syria, they may be less high profile about it, but they are supporting, as you described accurately with a lengthy series of hyphenated adjectives, the worst kind of terrorists probably known in history are being actively supported by the US.

Let’s end this nonsense about fighting terrorism.

Robles: I think William Blum who I had the honor of speaking to several times put it best, and he was quoted by Osama Bin Laden himself, when he said that it is all the meddling by the US in these Middle Eastern Islamic countries that has caused the terrorists to terrorize.

Rozoff: Even that is too kind of a perspective. I don’t subscribe to it. I don’t believe that Osama Bin Laden had any legitimate complaint against the US government. Quite the opposite. He would have been the playboy non-entity that he was prior to emerging as whatever he became but for the fact that the US ran a proxy war against the Soviet Union and the Afghan Government out of north-west Pakistan in the 1980s – that is where Mr. Osama Bin Laden became a so-called political figure and that is where he became a terrorist in good earnest. And it is not that he had any complaints whatsoever against the US Government, which helped his Jihad to win in Afghanistan.

Robles: Remember that Tim Osman, he was Mr. Tim Osman and he was known to the FBI Station Chief at the time in Los Angeles when he was staying at the Hilton, there have been documents released then, so no big secret there.

Rozoff: Yes, but I know there is an argument that but for US meddling around the world, that the Osama Bin Ladens of the world would not be able to pick up support because people wouldn’t be disgruntled or upset, and even that I contest.

The fact is I don’t doubt that there are elements in the US Government as well as in so-called Al-Qaeda that exploit dissatisfaction or dissention around the world. There is no question about that they do. But that as often as not and far more often than not they’ve been at the beck of the US government working hand and glove with them.

Robles: Anything else you want to finish up about media? It’s been a pleasure speaking with you all these years. I hope we will be able to continue speaking to each other somehow and getting your voice out there and getting the voice of everybody else we’ve talked to and all the wonderful people I’ve interviewed over the years.

Rozoff: We just mentioned William Blum. And he is someone who has written several books and the fact that somebody like him who around the world is viewed as an authority, with good reason, he’d been published in Russia as a matter of fact, celebrating the anniversary of one of his key books.

And the fact that this man cannot even appear on a local college TV station because of the news blackout and censorship in the US but has been interviewed by yourself several times, where he is exposed to a world audience, I think makes our point as concretely and as effectively as it can be made. This is exactly why you need to continue running your show.

Honestly, this is what is needed. We need a 5th one (newswire) in the world, because all you’ve really got is the German Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the France’s Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Associated Press.

Here is another thing. DPA and AFP are really the best. They are maybe better than the Associated Press, they have correspondents in every damn country in the world. And they have news stories. But here is the thing. This isn’t public, you’ve got to subscribe to their press wire service. They don’t have a website except to sell their service.

So, if you are a government agency or you are a big corporation or a think tank, you’ve got access to all the DPA and AFP, I have none.

About 7-8 years ago or maybe 10 years ago I contacted the North-American Bureaus and I said: “How much does it cost to subscribe to get your material?”

The lowest rate I could get if I called myself an independent journalist was $600 a month, $7,200 a year, 10 years ago.

I contacted Interfax North America, they were going to give me $2,400 a year, but I could not reproduce anything.

So, this isn’t news John, this is intelligence for sale. This isn’t meant to get news out and information out to people. It is meant to be an intelligence service like Jane’s Defense Weekly in England, or Stratfor here, where these CIA ex-CIA and MI-5 guys get together and they set up a news service to be sold to businesses and governments.

So, in that point if a real press agency would develop, that is a Russian Press Agency in English, that would be wonderful!

By the way, I have said for years too, the big mistake is that Mercosur and particularly Alban, Latin America have not put out a press agency in English.

Robles: What about ITAR-TASS? You haven’t been on their site?

Rozoff: ITAR-TASS is not very good. It is bad English, bad editing, it’s circumscribed news.

Now and again you find a good story, they have just reformatted and you can’t even read it now.

In the last week they’ve reformatted it, you can’t find anything. Whoever did that should be fired. They’ve made it worse and worse.

Robles: They are good for Russian news because you are not going to find it in very many other places.

Rozoff: Okay, okay, Interfax, if you go to their site, each page has 20 stories, 2 of their stories are accessible, you have to pay for the others.

They tease you, they give you a couple of hyperlinks, they draw your attention or that is maybe the way it is on the west. Why not sell theirs? Because you don’t get anything for free here. That is for sure. The only thing you get for free is the government sources, Radio free Europe, Voice of America etc.

They are more and more themselves relying on the services like AP, Reuters.

Robles: You are telling me that all the news, you have to pay for it. You have to go through a corporation to get it.

Rozoff: You have to go online, take out your credit card and pay maybe $10,000 dollars a year to read what is happening in downtown Bangkok.

Robles: It is going to get so bad pretty soon, they are going to bring back the short waves.

Rozoff: Exactly, like during the resistance in Nazi occupied Europe.

Robles: Maybe that is a good idea with all the surveillance because the shortwave is a way to reach people where they know they are not being surveilled.

Rozoff: Good point. With satellite surveillance now they are going to catch everything.

Robles: Can they actually pick up a shortwave radio when you turn it on?

Rozoff: I don’t know.

Robles: I suppose they can put a small transmitter chip in there or something.

Rozoff: If they want total surveillance, they are going to have it. The only way of combating that is fighting an information war, a clean information war, an above board one.

Let it be known, you are defending a position, but make it a decent position.

Parting

You were listening to part 3 of an interview with Rick Rozoff the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find the previous parts of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening and as always I wish you the best.

End of Part 3

  Part 1: "NATO is worse than an atavism, it is a threat to 21st century security"

December 04 2013 http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2013/12/04/11/12012013_Robles_Rozoff_Part_01.MP3

The West and the United States through its military wing NATO, which has expanded into a global military force, continues to attempt to expand its influence into the former Soviet Space. Although NATO, which is struggling to stay relevant, should have been disbanded at the same time that the Soviet Union collapsed and the Warsaw Pact was dissolved, continues to expand worldwide. Recently the Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Serbia gave a speech in which he called Serbia's membership in NATO a red line for the Russian Federation.

With events in Ukraine and continued war games, which envision military operations against regular army forces in the Caucasus, and the continued building and expansion of the US missile shield even though the supposed purpose of that shield, the Iranian nuclear program, is no longer a threat, NATO continues to show itself as a threat to regional and international security and continues to operate apparently with the goal of existing only to expand itself so as to be, as the US Pentagon recently stated, an "effective tool for the projection of the US force worldwide". The Voice of Russia spoke to Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list about these issues and more.

Hello, this is John Robles, I'm speaking with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Part 1

Robles: Regarding these statements by the Russian Ambassador to Serbia, regarding NATO, and he mentioned the possibility that Serbia could become a member of NATO. That sounds unbelievable to me. I mean, first they invade, they destroyed the country, they've occupied it and now they are going to annex it? Is this a realistic possibility?

Rozoff: It's that paradox, or the appalling prospect thereof, of Serbia ever becoming a full member of NATO, was pointed out by the Russian Ambassador to Serbia, Alexander Chepurin, speaking at the Belgrade Academy for Diplomacy and Security, saying it would (and I am quoting him): "It constitute utter stupidity if somebody from Serbia were to crawl over (presumably, roll over) and beg (to join NATO), after the bombing that incurred damages worth over US $120 billion with Serbia in 1999 during the 78 day bombing campaign by NATO".

So his statement to the Serbs where it would be an act of masochism and tearing up the last shred of national dignity, of course, to do that. However, he actually went on in a very strong language. I mean this is not considered to be diplomatic, I suppose, in the western world.

I'll quote him if you don't mind. He says: "That's the red line that in no way suits Russia" (that is Serbia joining NATO). And he goes on: "NATO was created against the Soviet Union, which is long gone, and it is absolutely unclear what NATO stands for now" and directing himself to his Serbian audience the Russian Ambassador went on "Or do you really want to go to war in Iraq, Libya, or Syria?" Those were his words.

Clearly, the war against Libya two years ago was conducted by NATO. The intended war against Syria, which was only blocked through Russian diplomatic intervention, would have been a NATO – partially at least –NATO operation and what is not generally acknowledged is the war in Iraq in many ways was also a NATO war. In that 23 of the current 28 members of NATO sent troops to Iraq, there was NATO training mission Iraq and so forth so there was involvement, so his comment is well-taken.

And then lastly, rhetorically if you will, talking about NATO to his audience in Belgrade the Russian Ambassador stated that NATO represents – this is a paraphrase in the Serbian account of it – "an atavism from the last century", that is an evolutionary throwback to the era of the Cold War," that is the best characterization and the most charitable one that I can think of.

In fact that new NATO, the new "Post Cold War Global-Expeditionary-War-Fighting NATO" is something worse that an atavism from the last century it is a threat to 21st century security. So we have to keep that in mind.

Is it a realistic prospect? We have to recall that, with various quisling governments in Belgrade over the past decade, that not only has Serbia joined the so-called Partnership for Peace program, which was used to groom the new members of NATO that have joined since 1999, those are 12 new states, all of them in Eastern Europe – but that almost the same day, perhaps a day earlier than the news item in the Serbian media that I mentioned, there was a NATO report about a military exercise going on in Germany.

It was actually reported by the Pentagon's web site, the US Department of Defense's web site under the title "NATO Envisions Post-ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) Train, Advise and Assist Mission" that is building on the 12 years of warfare in Afghanistan, the integration of military forces in over 50 nations under NATO command, "NATO's not moving into" – I'm quoting from the article – "the full spectrum of conflict internationally."

But it's interesting to know that they talk about a particular training held at the Hohenfels training area in Germany by the Pentagon – and I'm quoting from the article – "the training brought US forces and those of Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Norway, Poland, Serbia, Slovenia and Sweden together".

So here we have Serbian troops being trained by the Pentagon for NATO missions abroad including what is all but almost explicitly identified as being the "Next War", or "wars", after that in Afghanistan. So it's not such a far-fetched improbable prospect that Serbia could be dragooned openly or otherwise into NATO.

This comes at the very same time, I think, yesterday, where one of the major newspapers in Sweden announced that Sweden is contributing war planes for the NATO Response Force, which is the international global strike force for the western military block.

So we see the countries being integrated into that rapid response force are: Sweden, Finland, Ukraine and Georgia, meaning three of those four countries border Russia. In Sweden it's not terribly far.

So you're seeing countries that are either part of the former Soviet Union and historical Russia for that matter, Ukraine and Georgia, or countries that have maintained neutrality during the Cold War are now being dragged not only into NATO, into the NATO's broader military nexus, but also into international military strike force.

Robles: Can you comment then on the red line? Who else was drawing red lines all the times in the last couple of years? How can you comment on the recent war games by NATO in Germany where they were apparently, according to the statements on the US Army's web site, training for war against regular army forces in the Caucasus? Who else would that be and then if you would give us your opinion on Ukraine please?

Rozoff: That's a very good connection you've made, the red line of the US President Barack Obama in reference to the alleged or supposed use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government, that being the casus belli, the reason for which Obama and not only the US military but its NATO allies would go to war.

Robles: Hilary Clinton, didn't she run around all the time saying there were red lines?

Rozoff: Yes, that's visual hallucinations perhaps, she was seeing colorful geometrical designs that didn't exist. No, she did, you are correct.

She was also throwing down the gauntlet, let's use this metaphor, I think that's probably a little bit more apt, and her commander-in-chief Obama, of course, also had his red lines but it's worth noting as you pointed it out that the Russian Ambassador to Yugoslavia used the same expression.

I think in both instances, disingenuously from the American point of view, where clearly what happens inside Syria poses no direct or even indirect threat to US national security interests. However, that countries historically close to Russia, geographically close to Russia, joining a US led military alliance, that is currently building a missile shield system along Russia's western border, poses an immediate threat to Russian national security.

So these are false equivalents, the Russian claim that it's a genuine red line that can't be crossed is legitimate, the Americans, including the infamous Hilary Clinton who may very well be the next commander-in-chief of the US armed forces, let us remember, her statements that the events on Ivory Coast or in other parts of the world represented a red line were just irresponsible and reckless use of rhetoric.

Getting back to the military exercise we are talking about, the identified scenario was "active combat operations in the Caucasus", and this a quote by a US military official, who kind of "let the cat out of the bag," stating that: "… in the post-Afghan war period once again, that the new globalized expeditionary NATO was now engaging in a fictitious, "strictly fictitious he insists", but nevertheless, Caucasus-based war games scenario.

And you're correct, there is no other conceivable adversary in that part of the world except from Russia, just as the recently concluded the Steadfast Jazz 2013 war games, military exercises in Latvia and Poland could not have been aimed at any country other than Russia.

The locations where the games are being held, the scenarios, you know, in Scandinavia and for that matter in the Black Sea, the inescapable conclusion is that these war games scenarios are aimed perceptively or potentially against Russia, and I don't know how that can be missed by anyone else.

Which I guess is a good way of segueing into the question of Ukraine; having a lengthy border with Russia, as do Georgia and Finland. And these are again 3 out of 4 non-full NATO members states that have been integrated into the NATO Response Force, the other again being Sweden, which as we had occasion to talk about recently is now contributing war planes for the response force and which contributed Griffin War Planes for the 6-month NATO war against Libya in 2011.

This is supposedly "neutral" Sweden, which incidentally also has 500 troops in Northern Afghanistan engaged in combat for the first time in 200 years in the history of Sweden, in combat operations.

So what we are seeing is that despite the economic crisis and despite the step back or step down by the US around Syria, at least for the moment, that plans for constantly expanding NATO's role globally are not in abeyance and are still being pursued.

Now the news in the West, and I imagine, in the East as well about Ukraine seeming to reject, (the current government, that of Victor Yanukovich in Kyiv) rejecting plans to join the EU, thereby unleashing violent so-called "protests" by Orange Revolution type, US operatives in the streets of Lviv and Kyiv.

Robles: Weren't these the same US-backed and funded opposition that caused that Orange Revolution?

Rozoff: Right, which in turn was based on and led by the leaders of the so-called "Rose Revolution" in Georgia the year preceding that and ultimately back to the so-called "revolution" in Yugoslavia in 2000, a group called Otpor financed by think-tanks and foundations and government agencies in the US.

We've even seen some of the phraseology of the so-called "Maidan Square Revolution" of 2004 in Ukraine cropping up again, and these are young people, very Western-oriented, Western-funded, no question about it, and almost fascistic street thugs, but of a more middle-class background than the traditional gutter snipe sort.

What we have to acknowledge is that even if the current government in Ukraine is fighting pressure exercised under what's called the Eastern Partnership initiative of the EU (with a full blessings of the US of course) an initiative that first saw the light of day in 2008 on the initiative of Sweden and Poland as a matter of fact: Poland now a NATO member and Sweden now a NATO partner: to "wean away from Russia" its non-Central Asian fellow former Soviet Republics which are: Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine in Eastern Europe, and Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia in the Caucasus, and by using the lure, or the bait of the EU to effectively pull them out of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) with other former Soviet Republics, but also ultimately to pull Armenia and Belarus, which are members of the only post-Soviet security bloc, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, and to wean those countries away from that, ultimately towards absorption into NATO.

We have to realize that the EU is often the carrot and NATO is the stick. But in the case of Ukraine and the Eastern Partnership the intent is to get Ukraine into NATO and the EU can sugar-coat the pill.

Your listeners have to note, if they aren't already aware, is that after popular protests halted the exercise for one year, at least over the last two years the US and NATO have resumed their annual Sea Breeze Military Exercises in Ukraine, in the Black Sea, dangerously close to the Russian Black Sea Fleet, and Ukrainian ships are no participating in permanent NATO naval operations, one in the Mediterranean Sea and one in the Indian Ocean: that is Operation Active Endeavour and Operation Ocean Shield in the second.

The first is already in its thirteenth year, that is NATO has arrogated to itself the right to conduct permanent naval patrols in the Mediterranean Sea. This has been going on since November of 2001, and in the case of Horn of Africa and the Arabian Sea in the Indian Ocean, Operation Ocean Shield: increasingly Ukraine, as well as Georgia, Finland and other nations are being integrated into the command structure of NATO even though formally they are not full NATO members.

Ukraine, like Serbia, to jump back to that, not only is a member of the Partnership for Peace Program, which we have talked about being the mechanism by which the US groomed 12 new Eastern European nations as full NATO members, but they have also been granted with an Individual Partnership Action Program, which is the next to last step, in terms of becoming a full NATO member, the penultimate one, is a membership Action Plan, and it's that which they are really grooming Georgia, Ukraine, Finland, Sweden, Serbia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Montenegro and other countries so that they become full NATO members. The US has never given up on that hope.

End Part 1

That was part one of an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find part two on our website in the near future at Voice of Russia dot com. Thanks for listening and I wish you the best wherever you may be.

  Part 2: NATO engaged in wars of aggression against small countries

December 11 2013 http://cdn.ruvr.ru/download/2013/12/11/18/12012013_Robles_Rozoff_Part_02.MP3

Having established itself on the European continent in the devastating aftermath of World War II, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has emerged as a tool for the execution of aggressive wars against small countries that maintain some modicum of independence and for which they are targeted for destruction by the West and NATO. US/NATO are following a policy summed up by the words of former US President George Bush, one of “either you are with them or they will destroy you”, and we have seen proof of that since the invasion of Yugoslavia. As for the encirclement of Russia with interceptor missiles, now that the supposed pretext for that missile shield is gone, the threat from Iran, the intent of the encirclement of Russia is clear, the target has always been Russia. Rick Rozoff spoke to the VOR’s John Robles about this and more.

The West and the United States through its military wing NATO, which has expanded into a global military force, continues to attempt to expand its influence into the former Soviet space. Although NATO, which is struggling to stay relevant, should have been disbanded at the same time that the Soviet Union collapsed and the Warsaw Pact was dissolved, continues to expand worldwide. Recently the Ambassador of the Russian Federation to Serbia gave a speech in which he called Serbia's membership in NATO a red line for the Russian Federation.

With events in Ukraine and continued war games, which envision military operations against regular army forces in the Caucasus, and the continued building and expansion of the US missile shield, even though the supposed purpose of that shield – the Iranian nuclear program – is no longer a threat, NATO continues to show itself as a threat to regional and international security and continues to operate, apparently, with the goal of existing only to expand itself so as to be, as the US Pentagon recently stated, an "effective tool for the projection of the US force worldwide".

The Voice of Russia spoke to Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list about these issues and more.

You are listening to part 2 of an interview with Rick Rozoff. You can find part one on our website at voiceofrussia.com.

Robles: Back to NATO for a minute and the comments by the Russian Ambassador to Serbia. I believe he said that NATO was, and you quoted him saying that NATO was organized and founded to fight the Soviet Union, and it wasn’t clear what its objectives are now, right? What do you think are its objectives? If you can, again. We’ve talked about this many times in the past.

Rozoff: I think the Russian Ambassador’s comments were meant to be rhetorical rather than strictly accurate. He knows what the current objective of NATO is, as do we and, I’m sure, most of your listeners. And what it is is no longer even maintaining the pretence of being a defensive organization, but rather having been transformed into what I would consider to have been an aggressor in the Cold War, to begin with… maybe, perhaps not in terms of a “hot” war, but, nevertheless, setting up a military bloc in a continent that had just been devastated by a world war.

But, nevertheless, what we know is; in the post Cold War period NATO has emerged not as an alleged defender of the territory of its member states, but as an expeditionary military force that is used outside the territory of NATO member states in wars of aggression against essentially defenseless and, for the most part, small countries, that is evidenced, of course, by the 1999 seventy-eight-day air war against Yugoslavia, the six-month air war and naval blockade against Libya, the war against Afghanistan in its 13th year – that’s what NATO is about now.

Robles: Smaller countries that what?

Rozoff: Smaller countries that maintained some modicum of independence and non-alignment and for which they have been destroyed. Let me as blunt as I can be about that. Countries, like Yugoslavia, that were founding members of the Non-Aligned Movement who had to be taught a lesson and in the words of Voltaire from the novel Candide “for the encouragement of others”.

That is; if anyone dreams about maintaining a semblance of neutrality, of military non-alignment, of not permitting their sons and daughters to be dragooned into foreign wars…as perhaps the Russian Ambassador to Yugoslavia, I mean to Serbia, warned his audience. If you really want your sons and daughters to kill and die in countries like Iraq and Libya and Syria, then joining NATO is your ticket to that.

But if you don’t, then in the viewpoint of the US and its major NATO allies you are marked for extinction. You are either with us or against us, to use the infamous terminology of the last American Commander-in-Chief. And I think it is irrefutable at this point that the world’s sole military superpower (and again, that designation is by Barack Obama, that’s how he identifies his own country, for which he is Commander-in-Chief); “… you are either with us or we’ll destroy you.”

Robles: Back to Ukraine a little bit, and this is a little bit away from NATO. The incentive was economic for Ukraine. There would be billions of dollars coming into the country from the European Union. That figure was in the single digit billions in over like a 7-year period, I think. Yet, if they join the Customs Union of Russia, the Republic of Belarus, Kazakhstan and integrate further into other economic blocs, namely Russian-led blocs, the incentives are in the hundreds of billions of dollars in the same period. Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: Yes, thanks for that arithmetic I wasn’t familiar with that but it doesn’t surprise me. The intent of course is to buy off the political leadership of Ukraine, so that somebody retires to Monaco or something with a few billions stashed away as opposed to doing anything for the benefit of the Ukrainian people.

There’s been an energy war being waged for over 20 years. Ukraine is not only targeted by the eastern partnership, but it is one of the countries that contributes to the acronym GUAM; Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova, which the US setup in the early 1990s to act as an energy transit corridor to squeeze Russia out of the European natural gas and oil market.

For a while GUAM was with two Us (GUUAM), because Uzbekistan was in there, but then dropped out. But now it is Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Moldova.

And by the way, John Kerry (the US Secretary of State) has been in Moldova recently, where with the change of government with one of these so-called “color revolutions” recently there is a much more pro-NATO regime.

The thing is, I think we have to remember about Ukraine’s Orange Revolution the occasion to allude to where Viktor Yushchenko through extra-constitutional means was installed as president, essentially, in 2004, when he ran for re-election, he got 5% of the vote, which is a good indication of how popular he truly was with the Ukrainian public.

The US seems to be wanting to punish the Yanukovych Government for making decisions not to align themselves with the West against Russia, not independent of, but explicitly against Russia.

Robles: What do you think about these sanctions? Obama and the US Government is saying they are thinking of sanctions against Yanukovych.

Rozoff: It follows on heels of several years. You talked about the former now Secretary of State Hilary Clinton or the Obama administration as a whole threatening Ukraine because of the court case and the incarceration of Yulia Timoshenko, who was, if you will, Joan of Arc of the Orange Revolution and has been sitting in a jail cell for years now because of crooked natural gas deals. And these are the standard bearers of US democracy or the so-called “democracy” in the former Soviet space.

You know, it is not one thing, it is another. The US has to continuingly exercise pressure and threats and the menace of economic or worse actions against countries to kind of keep them in line.

By the way, before we end this thing, there was a comment a couple of days ago, I think two days ago, by the Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stating that now with the historic, apparent, deal between the US and Iran on Iran’s nuclear program: What conceivable justification can there possibly be for the US and NATO continuing their encirclement of Russia with interceptor missiles.

Robles: Exactly! I was just going to ask you about that. I’m glad you brought that up. And North Korea if you could and Iran.Yes, exactly! What is the point now? What are they going to say now?

Rozoff: I guess, I would ask the question: why didn’t NATO not immediately state (if you are to believe anything they say) that they now see the error of their ways and they are abandoning the phase-adaptive approach interceptor missile system. Of course, they won’t say that, because the target has never been Iran, the target has been Russia. Lavrov has called their bluff.

Robles: Has that had any resonance over there?

Rozoff: Far too little. I mean, I wish people had really seized on that. I’ve seen a couple of comments, but not enough. This is something the whole disarmament and antiwar movement needs to pick up and pick up with a vengeance.

Robles: I think the taxpayers too, I mean American taxpayers are indebted for how many generations?

Rozoff: You are correct!

Robles: I mean, the next, I don’t know, two hundred generations are going to have to pay for the current war debt and they just want to keep building and building it up even more.

Rozoff: Two years ago, when the US military spending was in the neighborhood of $718 billion a year, which is in constant dollars the highest level since WW II, the official military spending came down to something like $2,400 per year for every man, woman and child in the US.

Robles: Against whom? Against some US-backed Al Qaeda terrorists in the desert somewhere in the Middle East?

Rozoff: I have my own opinion about whose assets they truly are, but, I mean that of course is ludicrous.

Robles: Can you comment on where do you think Iran is going? I think that’s very important. That’s going to change the whole game in the Middle East, I think.

Rozoff: Again, assuming even for the sake of argument that Iran is a rogue state, they represented the threat to somebody and now that threat has been diminished, I just don’t buy that argument. It has not been a threat to his neighbours or anybody else, not for centuries surely.

And the fact that a more Western-leaning Government has come to power since the last election, first of all suggests that elections in Iran actually mean something, as opposed to here, where the foreign policy is not going to change in any substantive way because individual on individual/one party wins the election.

But I don’t yet know whether the new Government in Tehran is willing to make peace with the US principally or otherwise and how many concessions they are willing to grant the US in order not to be bombed, I can’t say.

Robles: Can you comment on Netanyahu’s comment? He was huffing and puffing, he was all upset and he said that making an agreement with Iran is granting them some sort of legitimacy, making them a legitimate state. Since when wasn’t the Islamic Republic of Iran a legitimate country?

Rozoff: From the point of view the US and Israel of course it never has been. I mean, they much preferred the hereditary monarch – the Shah of Iran – their close military, as well as political and energy ally incidentally.

And I’m sure in both instances, just like the US, which staged a coup d'état in Iran in 1953 overthrowing Mosaddegh and installing the Shah, until the US and its allies – Israel and Saudi Arabia – which have a joint interest in criticizing Iran, until those three countries install some puppet regime in Tehran, they are not going to be satisfied and they are going to continue to bluster. But I think we have to keep in mind that the sort of government they would envision for Iran would be the one that’s in the least representative or democratic.

Robles: Anything else?

No, but thank you for the opportunity. It’s been a very far ranging, but I hope a coherent discussion and I’m appreciative of the opportunity.

Okay, have a good one Rick.

That was part 2 of an interview in progress. You can find part 1 on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening/reading and I wish you the best wherever you may be.

 The NSA/US/NATO/Cyber Command are not simply passively spying

Download audio file 8 November, 2013 12:19 

The head of the US National Security Agency also heads the US/NATO Cyber Command, an offensive device designed to wage war in what architects call the "Fourth Space". This, in effect means every time you go on-line you are potentially entering a war zone. Recent events surrounding the attempted military aggression against Syria that was stopped by Russia's adept diplomatic efforts and the granting of asylum to Edward Snowden have shown that the days of US domination of the world are coming to an end. According to Voice of Russia regular contributor, Rick Rozoff, the people of the world need to stand up and it's not just their leaders who have been "publically humiliated in front of their own people by being maltreated in the manner they have by their Yankee NATO allies".

Hello! This is John Robles, I'm speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff – the owner and manager of the stop NATOinternational mailing list and website.
Robles: Hello Sir!

Hello John! It is good to be back on your show. Thanks for the invitation.

Robles: And it is a pleasure to be speaking with you again. After US President Barack Obama's loss in Syria being not allowed to attack another country have you seen any changes with NATO strategy? And do you think Obama is going to try to use proxies instead of the US military more so in the future?

Rozoff: I think the second question is perhaps easier to answer than the first, but I'll attempt the first, first.

As we know, starting yesterday the US and NATO have launched major war games in the Baltic Sea Area to be conducted in Poland and Latvia called "Steadfast Jazz". And the latest iteration this being the year it is, "Steadfast Jazz 2013".

This includes participation of 6,000 troops, not only infantry but air and naval components, with the expressed intent to activate and put on a war footing, if you will, the NATO Response Force, which was something envisioned several years ago to be a global rapid reaction force NATO could use to intervene essentially anywhere around the world.

It was actually inaugurated, in its initial manifestation in 2006 with a series of war games off the west coast of Africa. But currently now it is in the Baltic Sea Region in two countries that have borders with Russia; Poland, in this case Kaliningrad and Latvia similarly. So that what you are seeing is saber rattling right on the Russian border.

Were the situation to be reversed and Russia and its military allies were exercising along the Rio Grande, or the Saint Lawrence Seaway, I'm sure the US would have something to say about it.

So in that sense, though this was scheduled long in advance of the most recent developments in Syria. It indicates that the US still intends to use NATO as a military Trojan horse in northeastern Europe, amongst other places and ultimately globally.

On the second score: by the way you are correct in characterizing the developments in and around Syria due to and almost entirely to, adept principled Russian diplomatic intervention over the last few weeks, as having put a spoke in the wheel of the war plans of President Obama and the United States and its NATO allies.

So that, I think to segue into the second part of your question, the US is left with no other alternative, I suppose, than to use proxy forces.

And we have to recall that Secretary of State John Kerry was recently in Saudi Arabia (and he just left there) where he clearly is conspiring with that country and its allies in the Gulf Cooperation Council to wage, perhaps more covert military activities against the Government in Syria.

Robles: Recently, there was an incursion by Israel. Can you tell our listeners about that? Do you have any details on that?

Rozoff: Yes, it bombed the coastal city of Latakia exactly where, according an Associated Press report several days ago, Russian anti-aircraft missiles, air defense missiles, have been moved. And the report, according to the US news service, was that Israel intentionally targeted Russian-made and Russian-provided air defense missiles which had been supplied to Syria, under the rubric, or under the pretense actually, that such missiles were to be moved into Lebanon and given to Hezbollah.

That seems pretty far-fetched, if not beyond the realm of possibilities. Syria certainly needs them inside the country for exactly this sort of defense against Israeli attacks.

So, what we see then is not only an act of international aggression, an action of aggression against a neighbor, by Israel against Syria, but as the target of that attack were Russian air defense missiles, it is also an act of: disrespect for; if not, hostility towards; Russia.

Robles: Why would Hezbollah need air defense missiles?

Rozoff: They indeed need them, but I think in the more immediate sense Syria is not able to part with any, given the fact it is still is essentially under siege, as we've been talking about, that is neighbors like Turkey or Jordan.

By the way, Turkey and Jordan recently concluded a joint military exercise, the intent of which and the target of which, I don't think we need to spell out, is clearly Syria.

And Syria would need all the air defense capabilities that it has for its own defense. And it is certainly not in the position currently to be sharing them with anyone else, including Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Robles: Being in the United States, our listeners know you are based in Chicago. Today marked a holiday that is important for the English; Guy Fawkes Day. There were massive demonstrations planned by supporters of the hacktivist group Anonymous. Have you seen any protests like that in Chicago? Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: I think what is significant about this is that this is indicative of an international outrage over historically unprecedented acts, not only of surveillance / spying, by the United States, particularly by the National Security Agency (NSA), but also that what we are seeing (and I think that this is a significant fact that has eluded many commentators on the issue) is that the individual who heads up the National Security Agency is a four-star general named Keith Alexander, and that with the activation of the full operational capability of the first Pentagon, US Defense Department global command that was not geographically specific (and I'm talking about Cyber Command) which achieved full operational capability in May of 2010, that the intent from the very beginning was to use Cyber Command not (Every military apparatus or program, or command ostensibly is for defensive purposes) but sensible people realize that there is an offensive component to it, and particularly when you are dealing with the self-proclaimed world's sole military superpower (those are Obama's words to describe the United States).

And as many of us warned three and a half years ago that the US was preparing the cyber command to begin a process of international cyber warfare, warfare in the "Fourth Space", as it was described by the US military officials. And the fact that Keith Alexander simultaneously heads up the National Security Agency and is the first commander of Cyber Command I think is a reason to pause for a moment and realize that the United States is not simply passively gathering information by spying on the private phone conversations of the Chancellor of Germany or, according to one report, spying on the Conclave of Catholic Cardinals as they selected the most recent Pope, and who knows what else they are prying into?

But they are also manipulating information, passing on falsified reports, engaging not only in espionage but in sabotage. And who knows the full extent of this?

But the fact that Russia took the principled path of granting asylum to Edward Snowden, a former NSA employee, who first blew the whistle on what was happening, only to have subsequently this become an international scandal and international affair, international incident rather, where everywhere from Brazil to Germany, around the world people are incensed by the gross and in essence the criminal intrusion of the US spy agencies into every nook and cranny, every aspect of their lives.

And this should have been to a degree anticipated by the fact that the US openly acknowledged it was prepared to conduct not only defensive but offensive cyber warfare operations with the introduction and activation of the US Cyber Command 3.5 years ago.

So, these are all related issues. But I don't think there is any way of overestimating the significance of what is going on right now, because this represents, as you indicated vis-à-vis Syria, the fact that the US has suffered two black eyes in short succession, and both I think, are going to go down as historically significant.

The first is that for the first time perhaps the US truly wanted to wage a military aggression against a comparatively small country of maybe 25 million people and Russian intervention and world public opinion, I think, interfered with that and prevented the US from doing it.

And then, almost simultaneously, and again we have Russia playing on the side of the Angels in both cases – preventing war against Syria and then granting asylum to this heroic young man Edward Snowden, who is going to go down in history books as a person who first had the courage to notify the world about the gross abuses of the US National Security Agency, and we are seeing that everything subsequent to that not only confirms the alarm that he had sounded, but on a level that nobody could have anticipated.

Robles: They actually spied on the Vatican Conclave when they were picking the new Pope?

Rozoff: Yes, there were reports to that effect, and to be perfectly frank with you, if the US has capacity (and it does), I would be a surprised if it didn't.

I suspect it is not the first time the US has battled with Vatican policies, both with the Curia and with the Conclaves that have selected the pontiffs.

I personally have my suspicions about their role in 1979 when Zbigniew Brzezinski was the National Security Advisor and the first non-Italian Pope his countryman, subsequently John Paul II, was selected as Pope. That could be a coincidence but it is an astonishing one.

Robles: A lot of questions just popped up. You mentioned Brzezinski, would you like to comment on a statement he made, I guess it was about 2.5-3 weeks ago? He said that American hegemony worldwide is no longer possible. The world, I believe he said, was a "complicated place".

Rozoff: Yes, indeed. You know, it is amazing, a die-hard fanatical ideologue and Russophobe like Brzezinski would finally have to deal with subtlety and complexity and to realize that the world was not the US' oyster as I'm firmly convinced that it is a notion he has subscribed to for all of his professional life.

In fact, things have got beyond his ability to even envision a way where the US could continue to unilaterally manipulate, if not ultimately dominate the world.

But we have to recall that in his book of the late 1990s – the Grand Chessboard – he actually identified the United States as being the first, and to date, only uncontested world superpower. And he offered prescriptions for sustaining that status for decades into the future and the chief component of which is maintaining control of what he referred to as the Eurasian Balkans, which would be the Caucasus, Central Asia, South Asia regions. And basically, this is Halford Mackinder's concept of geopolitics; the world island and whoever controls Eurasia ultimately controls the world, and Brzezinski was simply parroting that basic theme.

What has subsequently occurred, and you can expect from Brzezinski what you would anticipate with somebody who is basically unprincipled and not a little vane, that he will blame subsequent administrations for not following his blueprint, and that's why the US lost control of the world.

He's already made statements of this effect going back to the George W Bush Administration for not handling things as deftly as he would have recommended personally.

So, has the US lost its previously uncontested control of the world? Not yet.

The US still controls Internet portals. The US still has the overwhelming military superiority and so forth. But I think, what we are seeing, it is a kind of jump back a little bit, both with the publically humiliating revelations about the National Security Agency and the utter contempt the US must have for the rest of the world and its so-called allies to be monitoring them, down to the finest particular, without notification and so forth, and the historic (again, I would underline) the historic setback the US suffered in Syria as you indicated at the beginning of this program; both I think are indications that we may be seeing the genuine emergence of a multi-polar world order, a new balance of power in the world; the one that is no longer based on the Cold War or is bilateral, but one that truly can be democratic.

The slogan required in the post-Cold War period is democracy, both within and between nations, I think is a concept that needs to be revived and that we are maybe seeing the harbingers of the new world emerging around these two issues we are talking about – that finally, no ally or subservient vassal (the term is Brzezinski's incidentally "tributaries and vassals", this is how he described other nations around the world paying tribute to the US, who aren't direct allies…

Robles: That sounds like something out of Mein Kampf or something.

Rozoff: Yes, I mean it is almost that bad. It truly is. One thinks of the slogan of Germany at that time, right? "Heute Deutschland und morgen die ganze Welt" – today Germany and tomorrow the whole world.

I think the kind of Imperial Hubris you see in the United States with initially the weakening of the Soviet Union under the Mikhail Gorbachev presidency in the late 1980s, and then with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 those in the US who saw themselves as global policemen and global empire builders, saw their moment and they seized it, and they have in fact not only run but ruined a good deal of the world in the interim.

But those days appear to be coming to an end. And what we all have to hope for is the fact that it happens peaceably and happens with the increased involvement of the populous of the respective countries, rather than depending on the Angela Merkels and Francois Hollandes and others to continue to play ball with the United States even when they are publically humiliated in front of their own people by being maltreated in the manner they have by their Yankee NATO allies.

 Russia’s principled actions made the US/NATO back down

Download audio file  12 November, 2013 10:30   PART 1

By preventing another act of aggressive war against Syria and giving asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden the Russian Federation and due to the efforts of the BRICs countries being led by Russia, the "World’s Sole Military Superpower" has lost the reigns of world domination, and the world has become a multi-polar place once again. This has been another in a long line of failures by US President Barrack Hussein Obama, who has been an ineffective and failed leader domestically and internationally according to regular Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff.

Hello this is John Robles, you are listening to part 2 of an interview with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. You can find the previous and following parts of this interview on our website at Voice of Russia dot com.

This interview is in progress.

Robles: About Obama possibly doing something dangerous in some "refusal" to just quietly step aside… no no no, "Step Aside" might be a little strong, let’s say: "Quietly allow another player to make the world multi-polar."

Rozoff: You described that well and I think that’s exactly it, Does one do the right thing morally and politically and recognize…? It is almost like the heavy-weight boxer who finally realizes he is not going to dominate the game much longer.

Does he retire with some modicum of grace and dignity, or does he stay in the ring and perhaps make a fool of himself and damage somebody else in the process? That is a very good question, but we do have to be cautious and circumspect about this because it is entirely possible that; seeing the reigns of world domination slip through their fingers, major members of the US political elite may decide to do something reckless as you indicate and perhaps even catastrophic but increasingly world public opinion, to the extent it can again become a political force in its own right, we’ve seen in the post cold war era unfortunately, a tendency to supplant mass popular political and social consciousness and activity, by state or state-to-state relations.

That has been a part of the new totalitarianism I would call it, to be honest with you, is that a nation is now completely identified with the state apparatus and that state apparatus with the given administration of the day.

And that the idea of a nation state and a country and a populous and a people seem to be downplayed or downgraded as the result of celebrating the role of, the western states in particular, who have now asserted themselves as planners and made themselves the equivalent of the international community.

It is not unusual to hear the likes of the US president and its western European allies refer to strictly NATO countries, NATO-EU countries, the US and Canada as being the "international community", that has been a trick they have used for the last 20 years, clearly now they can no longer do that.

And the credit is due not to the BRICs countries as a whole, Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, but almost entirely to Russia solely.

Again I want to emphasize and underline and italicize, in every way draw attention to the fact it was Moscow’s intervention around Syria to prevent a war which was clearly right on the horizon some 8-10 weeks ago and I think history will record not only principled and brave but perhaps heroic decision to grant refugee status to Edward Snowden, that signaled to the rest of the world that you could… not so much that the emperor was naked (the emperor is not naked, he’s got an arsenal as well as a wardrobe) but that one could stand up to the unipolar world’s sole military super-power and effectively have it back down. Because that is what’s happened and this is a major historical watershed.

Robles: Thanks for underlining that. The 4th of November was an anniversary date. It was the 5-year anniversary of Obama’s being elected to the post of President of the United States. A lot of people are pointing out his failures as a president even with former president Jimmy Carter calling him an "incompetent loser". Can you comment on that and on a violent, you might say, "homicidal aspect" of Barack Obama that has recently come out?

Rozoff: In the final part of what you said alluding to an excerpt from the book that is to be published where evidently the Commander in Chief Barack Obama in so many words boasted of drone warfare making it easier to kill and in fact those words emanated from him it is an indication of unconscionable, inhumane, how vile and offensive politics that has become in this nation.

But I think rather than focus on his individual traits, rather than psychologizing Barack Obama, the important thing is to realize that somebody who was catapulted from almost total obscurity into the White House in a matter of 4 years (we’ve talked about this before on your show John) going from the Illinois State Legislature to the White House in 5 years, that is unprecedented, and clearly there are some major political forces behind the political career of Mr.Obama and the rapid elevation to the level of "Commander in Chief of the world’s sole military super-power". Those are exactly his words, by the way, of 4 years ago when he received a Nobel Prize for Peace, if you can believe it.

And the fact that he was saddled with the infamous and egregious warmonger Joseph Biden, as his running mate in 2008, which I cannot believe for a moment would have been Obama’s personal choice, and that his White House as soon as he walked in, was taken over by now Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel who is another fairly disreputable and unprincipled individual, I am saying that at my own risk being a resident of Chicago, but let’s be honest.

But what we are looking at is more a figurehead, but I have no doubt that Mr. Obama is a particularly ambitious individual who would get ahead at any cost, he has proven that in Illinois during state legislative and state senate elections, and that he would trample on anyone necessary to get to where he wants to go.

But aside from his personal characteristics what we are looking at is a system that molds people to represent the interests of that system and he is simply the latest in the succession of such people.

Though I would state that in my lifetime, because I am old enough to remember a good number of presidents, I was born on presidential election day as a matter of fact, that the open brutality and cynicism of the heads of states in the United States I think has become more marked and I think now to the rest of the world as well as to many Americans.

Reminder

Robles: How would you characterize Obama’s presidency? Has he had any successes in your opinion Rick?

Rozoff: No! I think that what is really astonishing, is that on the domestic front as well as on the foreign one, no!

But we have to keep in mind we have a political system where at best, (however it is defined even in self-interested or limited or cynical terms) it is all but impossible, we now have built a structural log jam that makes it impossible for any president to get much accomplished. By design!.

So that having 2 officially sanctioned political parties who are able to exclusively raise billions of dollars for their campaign coffers and for heaven knows what else (or slush fund), creates a situation where neither party is going to compromise of course, because they are dependant on their core constituent contributors for money, and if they appear to be reasonable or moderate or compromised in any manner, they may lose some of that.

So what they are putting on is, as we’ve talked about before, a Punch and Judy Show, this is the ultimate World Wrestling Federation (WWF) show, nobody is to believe this is really happening, the blood isn’t real, the person really hasn’t been hit in the head with a metal bar or what happens, but you have to put on a good enough show that it is in fact that which is occurring.

So that no president who doesn’t have a firm control of both houses of congress is going to be able to pass any substantive legislation domestically.

Though in his first term, as we’ll recall, at least for 2 years, Obama, like Clinton in 1993 and ‘94, had control of both houses of congress but his political party still didn’t do anything.

So the inescapable conclusion is nobody is to accomplish anything meaningful.

There are campaign platitudes and bombast that are meant to interest and maybe delude the voting populous but at the end of the day nothing major…

The major banking and corporate interests are going to be able to continue looting the citizenry and the Military Industrial Complex is still going to be given some of the largest military budgets since World War II without there being any country to seriously threaten the United States and that is business as usual and all the major power brokers in the United States are perfectly pleased with that arrangement. Why would they want to change it?

Robles: Personal question, I was looking at your site, how come you had posts in August and then it goes to November?

Rozoff: That is a good question. Somebody is messing with my Word Press site, with the Stop NATO site. I’ve noticed the same thing. As you scroll down instead of it being in chronological order, all of a sudden you have to get past the 4th of 5th, they jump back to any given time, a year ago, 2 years ago, I have no idea why it is happening, but it is part and parcel of a lot of similar inexplicable events.

Robles: I see.

Reminder

Robles: How would you, in one phrase or sentence if it is possible, characterize so far the presidency of Barack Hussein Obama?

Rozoff: It is hard to see these matters in real time contemporaneously, but I think what will be recorded is: the Obama Administration through no blame or credit of its own, is officiating over the decline of the American Empire.

So, what that is going to mean is you can’t be the general of losing army, if you will, and come off with laurels or being praised.

So, he is going to be held accountable I imagine by historians for having overseen the continuation of the decline of the American Global Imperial Realm, just as his predecessor for 8 years George W. Bush, will be seen to have perhaps, overextended, discredited, US military power abroad.

But the legacy of Obama? It will be mediocre, like that of his predecessor and several predecessors in succession. As a matter of fact, I am hard pressed to think of a President … well we are coming up on the 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy who didn’t last most of his term so we have no idea of what he might have done… but I think that is perhaps the last time (and keep in mind we are jumping back half a century), that may be the last time that I think Americans fully expected of the President do something significant, to accomplish anything major and not simply tread water and throw a few favors to the groups that are supporting him.

In terms of any kind of vision, any kind of comprehensive or ambitious program for the nation at home and abroad, the Obama Administration doesn’t have that, could not have it probably under these circumstances and it will be recorded as another mediocre administration that kept the ball rolling and nothing fundamentally changed.

Robles: Didn’t people have great expectations of Obama?

Rozoff: A story is making the rounds today in the internet about Obama’s comments over the past few years about the Affordable Health Care Act, to the effect that those people will have their own insurance policy prior to this recent phase, this year’s phase, of the Affordable Health Care Act could keep their previous insurance. But the long and short of it there is a clear discrepancy between what he had said and what is now in fact the case.

And some Obama advisor, I read, said something like "we have to remember we wanted to keep the message simple and vague … he didn’t say "vague", but in so many words simple and not too complicated".

In other words the hallmark of Obama Administration is going to be, having kept this to an almost insultingly basic and primitive level: "Change you can believe in" and "hope", and so forth, I mean you couldn’t get any more nebulous than that, could you?

When you make very indistinctive or unclear or nebulous statements like that, you can get people stirred up until they walk away and say "Well what does 'Change' mean?" "What does hope mean?"

Hope is a transitive verb, you have to hope in something. Change is generally a transitive verb, you have to change something. But when you use these words intransitively, and use them without the relation to anything concrete, then people walk away with a little boost to their morale, but when they think about it subsequently, when they analyze what they’ve heard it really means nothing.

Robles: Nobel Peace Prize, continues wars, change, things have gotten worse, all his promises about the economy, about jobs, rule of law, protecting whistleblowers, it is all gone quite the opposite.

Rozoff: He’s gone back on, he has betrayed most of his major (particularly foreign policy-wise) most of his pledges, that is for sure.

What we see, (this is a country that developed massed advertising industry, Madison Avenue, this public relation so-called. We are a culture here that places form over content) and it maybe reached its apex with the 2004 presidential campaign where Obama was packaged as a very attractive and fashionable and appealing product and he was then sold to people. But the truth is that people bought the packaging and not the content because the content was not, the first one not fundamentally different than that of his predecessor, (as I believe you are alluding to in the question of Guantanamo and other issues), forced renditions and extraordinary renditions, black sites, drone warfare, which is increased exponentially under Obama.

So that people got a nice symbol. I mean they also got - we can’t downplay the significance of this – a not only African-American, bi-racial man coming into the White House - this is very significant in American terms.

And it was seen as exciting and bold and precedent setting and so forth, and it was, on the surface, but the unfortunate thing is, and I think we have to be very clear about this, Barack Obama is not Dr Martin Luther King, he is not somebody who both comes out of and has built up a mass movement of people, he is not somebody who both comes out of and has built up a mass movement of people.

He is somebody who has played his cards right with the Democratic Party political machine, initially in Illinois and then ultimately nationally to get himself into White House.

When he leaves there will be no Obama Movement left. He will leave and that will be the end of the story.

Robles: Not much of a legacy, is it?

Rozoff: No, there won’t be any concrete legacy unless, heaven forbid, as you were alluding to earlier, somebody in or around his administration decides or they are going to go down in a blaze of glory and do something reckless if not lunatic.

But barring that, and let’s hope that doesn’t occur, no there won’t be anything truly significant.

Again the symbolic social significance of an African-American being elected President is indisputable, that is a major advance. But in terms of what legacy is going to lead to, in social economic policy, in the United States, world relations, no there is not going to be any real legacy.

You were listening to part 2 of an interview with Rick Rozoff the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find the previous and following part of this interview on our website at voiceofrussia.com. Thanks for listening and as always I wish you the best.

 

 

 'The magniloquence of the US’ language is almost pharaonic'

14 October, 10:00 Download audio file

'The magniloquence of the US’ language is almost pharaonic' – Rick Rozoff

While in fact being illegal aggressions and incursions onto the sovereign territories of foreign countries, recent "operations" by the US in Somalia as well as the kidnapping of a Libyan citizen go further to underline the illegality of United States government and their actions around the world. Sadly, the US media has portrayed such events and actions as being “bold military flexing of muscles” and somehow proving that their President and leadership is legitimate and powerful and not to be messed with. Most leaders of the world attempt to show that they are for peace or they are for diplomacy, however, due to the belief by Americans in their own exceptionalism acts of aggression are seen as events to be lauded, applauded and proud of. Nowhere has the western media focused in detail on the fact that the kidnapped Libyan citizen was actually one of the US’ own freedom-fighters and opposition members before he was branded a terrorist and was then kidnapped from his own country. These further acts by the United States against the sovereignty of other nations, while perhaps playing well back home, only go to underline the complete and total illegality of the current regime in America. Such aggression and rapid worldwide military expansion are the largest threat to world peace that has existed since WWII.

Hello, this is John Robles, I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO and the Stop NATO international mailing list.

Robles: Hello, Sir.

Rozoff: Hello, John. Thank you for having me back.

Robles: It is a pleasure to be speaking with you again. Can you give our listeners an update on this NATO “quick reaction strike force”?

Rozoff: Well, the NATO response force, I am glad you raised that. It’s something that was inaugurated truthfully, and I don’t know how much of the world paid attention to that by the time of it, subsequently, but by a series of large scale war games off the coast of West Africa, and the former Portuguese possession, the island nation of Cape Verde, “Cabo Verde”, in 2006 and this was the launching of the NATO response force.

As its name indicates, this is slightly euphemized but more accurate characterization of it would be “global strike force” and the attempt is to employ air, naval and infantry ground forces by NATO forces to be deployed anywhere in the world, at short notice, for a comparatively prolonged period of time and even though there has been some scaling back in terms of the scope, or the dimensions of the force, because of the economic crisis the Western suffered over the last five years. Nevertheless, this is still very active project and we see for example what are going to be fairly large scale, naval-with-air-component, exercises in the Baltic Sea and the Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland area, very surely called steadfast jazz 2013, the latest iteration of that military exercise but also, you know, throughout the world, one needs only to go to the NATO website to see various activities related to launching the response force.

This might appear to be grandiose at this moment, John, you know, given the fact that the West is suffered and I think this is worth noting somewhere in the program, it’s definitely suffered a “diplomatic rebuff” and “political damage” over Syria; in that Russian intervention to prevent US and NATO military aggression against that country has resulted, I think temporarily… I compare to the West and NATO to a boxer, who’s just been hit pretty hard on the head and is still rather stunned and almost swaying, still dangerous, but you know, lacking direction currently and I think that is probably a safe summary of what NATO is up to.

However, we also know, that NATO officials have been traveling to countries like Jordan, to Djibouti, in the West of Africa, so they still entertain hopes of consolidating a global military network.

Robles: Can you comment on this, on these… Well they were actually hostile military incursions into Somalia and Libya, that were supposed to regain Obama’s war president image back in the United States? Can you comment on those events?

Rozoff: That’s an astute observation of yours. This is damage control, or trying to boost the “war credentials”.

The head of state of any other country of course would go out of his or her way to stress how peaceful they are, uniquely with the world’s “sole military super power”, and that term is of course Obama’s; issued on the occasion, in almost Orwellian Newspeak of his receiving the Nobel Peace Prize almost four years ago, but for the world’s sole military super power as you are indicating (I hadn’t thought of it, but I am sure you’re correct, he has to repair the damage occasioned by the fact that he wasn’t permitted to launch war against Syria, by performing bold and determined military actions around the world, his reputation and that of the US as a whole, I suppose, is still somewhat smarting because of the killing of Ambassador Christopher Stevens in Libya, over a year ago and the CIA and State Department personnel with him, so pulling off another “daring” mission, such as the alleged killing of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan or something of that sort, or the storming of a pirate vessel off the coast of Somalia a couple of years ago.

A “Made in Hollywood” approach to restoring confidence in the commander-in-chief so that’s perhaps what in fact occurred in both Somalia and in Lybia.

Robles: I found it interesting that usually these NAVY 6 (Navy Seal Team 6 carried out the Bin Laden assassination and the Somali incursion) missions, they used to be done in secret, you know they were “secret operations”, here it’s all over the news a few minutes after it happens.

Rozoff: Yeah, they have the Kreg (Kragen) lights out to make sure that not a bit of the action is missed. Again though we have to keep in mind that the Obama Presidency, whereas just as militarily reckless, ambitious and irresponsible as its predecessors has focused on politically low cast operations. And they include of course drone warfare and special operations of the sort you are talking about, so that if you send a helicopter gunship, or parachute… however one gets special forces into an area and 2,000 of them get killed, nobody hears about it.

So they are usually low profile, but you are correct in this instance, they are being highlighted and emphasized and celebrated, as an act of “daring-do” but for the most part we can expect from the Obama administration, given the fact that war moral, or “war fatigue” is probably a good term for it, over the last 15 or so years, is such that no prolonged labor intensive military intervention with a lot of boots on the ground is going to “pass muster” with the American population for very long. So that special forces attacks and drone warfare are the trademarks of the Obama administration.

Just a reminder: you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff.

Robles: In the past we have talked about the breaking and destruction of countries such as Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia is a “broken country”, these were hostile incursions into the sovereign territories, in Libya they kidnapped a Libyan citizen. Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: You’re talking about the Prime Minister being kidnapped? Oh you,re talking about the US kidnapping the Libyan citizen..

Robles: I am talking about the “ex-CIA-poster-boy-for-the-opposition” that was…. Actually he had asylum in the UK, and then all of a sudden, he’s uh, (Surprise! Surprise!) al-Qaeda, and he had a 5 million dollar bounty on his head.

Rozoff: Yeah, “the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away” evidently, and once again, let this be a lesson to any unprincipled mercenary extremist who wants to throw his lot in with the United States: he may thrive in the short term but he can be turned on and destroyed by the very power, Washington, that supported him.

You know, certainly, people like Jalaluddin Haqqani and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in Afghanistan can tell you that. Currently, and I am sure it is true for a lot of the, you know, Libyan Islamic fighting force veterans and Al-Qaeda veterans that the US generously supported with weapons and with the 6 months bombing campaign, two years ago in 2011, and they are now, you’re right, when needed, they go from “poster boy” to wanted poster.

Robles: He went from the classic “freedom fighter” to terrorist in not too long of a period.

Rozoff: And vice-versa, they can also go… as in the case of the Kosovo Liberation Army “so-called” in Serbia, they can go from State Department officials branding them terrorists, bonafied, dyed-in-the-wool terrorists and then a couple of months later, when it’s expedient to reappraise them they’re freedom fighters, heroes and democrats.

Robles: Osama Bin Laden is the classic case, I mean he was a great “Mujahidin freedom fighter” in Afghanistan who became terrorist number one.

Rozoff: He either outlived his usefulness or central casting determined in the next chapter of the serial he was going to be a villain whereas he had been a hero in the preceding one.

Robles: Back to the sovereignty question, do you see more of these attacks on these small broken countries coming in the future? I found it kind of disgusting: the media, I can’t remember one of the main media outlets in the US, called it “a powerful flexing of military muscle” in Somalia.

They snuck out of the ocean, they killed some terrorists or al-Qaeda or al-Shabab people, or whoever they killed and then they had to retreat. This was the big “flexing of military muscle”. As far as peace goes it sounds promising but as far as desperation to show: “Oh, we can do whatever we want!”, it sounds dangerous. That’s not really a question but can you give us your thoughts on that point?

Rozoff: Yeah, the muscle flexing, paraphrasing American mainstream media’s celebrating in Somalia, or for that matter, in Libya or anywhere else it occurs, you know, it is really very pitiable, you know, how the “Gods have fallen” indeed, this is a power that sent entire armies into Europe in World War II and waged war against actual formidable military adversaries in the past, which is now reduced to, you know, attacking a nation that’s been in a state of veritable anarchy for 35 years, Somalia, that is really been trifurcated, the US seem to like to trifurcate countries, Iraq and Libya come to mind, but you have Somali-land and other parts, Puntland, you have the country divided up, there is a transitional federal government which has only as much power as US and NATO allied trained troops from Uganda, and Burundi, and Kenya, give it.

Robles: And the United Nations…

Rozoff: Much like Afghanistan and others. So, you know, that the “world’s mightiest military super power and so forth” is reduced to celebrating triumphs of the sort you have describe, suggest far from it being “invincible” and “uncontested” in its military superiority, looks rather pathetic.

Robles: I don’t want to say that too much because, I mean, then they’ll a nuclear missile on some countries to prove how powerful they are.

Rozoff: Don’t “taunt and tempt the Devil”, I agree with you!

Robles: Right, right! I would really like to hear from you, we have been kind of focusing here in the Voice of Russia on the topic of “American Exceptionalism”, as a peace activist, as an expert on NATO what is your opinion on American exceptionalism?

Rozoff: You recall John, you and I discussed just this immediately after Obama’s speech and I think we were, to use the cliché that’s popular over here “ahead of the curve”.

Robles: We usually are, Rick! (laughs)

Rozoff: Well, thank you, sir! Let me return the compliment. But you provide a very comfortable and stimulating environment, where, you know, ideas germinate and come to fruition and I think that’s the case. It’s not something, you know, either of us have sat down and thought out on our own, but in the course of the give and take of a real dialogue, (the Socratic method), new ideas are born, or synthesized, but you know, in fact that’s what occurred and perhaps two days, later Vladimir Putin in a guest editorial at the New York Times focused on precisely that aspect of Obama’s speech, which was the US touting and reiterating and almost turning it into a “Divine Messianic Mission” of being exceptionable… “exceptional” nation.

Robles: Exceptionable, thank you.

Rozoff: Yeah, I am sorry, I am playing off your word, I remember in your column and you are correct. Objectionable, might be a little bit closer to truth but then Obama followed up after his Russian colleague counterpart, Vladimir Putin, statement in the New York Times, by going to the UN, as host, of course, to the General Assembly Meeting and reiterating that the US alone in the human history has not only sought to defend its own interests around the world but that of other nations around the world! I mean this is a degree of grandiosity, global grandiosity, that truly is the geopolitical equivalent of “delusions of grandeur in a bipolar patient” or in religious terms “messianic”, you know, believing they are the savior.

Just a reminder: you are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff.

Robles: That was really evident during the Bush Presidency, I don’t know if you remember the Daily Briefs with the religious quotes and everything else on it.

Rozoff: I am laughing out of… “Bemused” rather than “amused”, I mean there is nothing funny of course that people would appropriate to themselves, arrogate to themselves, divine attributes.

I suppose nobody has really done that since the late Roman Emperors, in other words who deified and self-deified, who in at least one instance, deified their own horse but I am afraid, we are probably dangerously close to that in terms of the grandiosity, the magniloquence of the language, the arrogance of the attitude, the unlimited entitlement, and so forth that we were saying, something almost pharaonic, I mean it’s more the Egypt of the Pharaohs than it is of an “alleged” republic, some 250 years after its founding.

Robles: What about the government shutdown in the US? There was this desperate push for this attack on Syria and then, you know, less than a month later the government shut down. Do you think that’s related?

Rozoff: Maybe the scheduling issues on both were related with each other, though… though you want to talk about “grandiosity” with the Federal Government in part is shutting down, I would have to say, I think most people haven’t even noticed…

 "U.S. shutdown a contrived 'Punch and Judy' show"

Download audio file  16 October, 19:11   

Капитолий конгресс США

Rather than being ashamed for causing the US Federal Government to shutdown, political forces in the US are using it to advance their own agendas and point fingers at each other turning it into a veritable “Punch and Judy” show. Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff spoke about this and more as a discussion on NATO and US military operations went into the funding aspect with a US Government continuing its global military adventures regardless of how hard the people back home have been hit.

Hello, this is John Robles, I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO and the Stop NATO international mailing list.

Robles: What about the government shutdown in the US? There was this desperate push for this attack on Syria and then, you know, less than a month later the government shut down. Do you think that’s related?

Rozoff: Maybe the scheduling issues on both were related with each other, though… though you want to talk about “grandiosity” with the Federal Government in part is shutting down, I would have to say, I think most people haven’t even noticed that people would appropriate to themselves, arrogate to themselves, divine attributes.

I suppose nobody has really done that since the late Roman Emperors, in other words who deified and self-deified, who in at least one instance, deified their own horse but I am afraid, we are probably dangerously close to that in terms of the grandiosity, the magniloquence of the language, the arrogance of the attitude, the unlimited entitlement, and so forth that we were saying, something almost pharaonic, I mean it’s more the Egypt of the Pharaohs than it is of an “alleged” republic, some 250 years after its founding.

Robles: What about the government shutdown in the US? There was this desperate push for this attack on Syria and then, you know, less than a month later the government shut down. Do you think that’s related?

Rozoff: Maybe the scheduling issues on both were related with each other, though… though you want to talk about “grandiosity” with the Federal Government in part is shutting down, I would have to say, I think most people haven’t even noticed… And it's almost like the person who has grossly inflated opinion of him or herself..

I think in many ways the federal government is portraying itself as being indispensable. Of course, any federal government is indispensable to a degree. But the fact that life goes on pretty much the same, despite the petty bickering between the two wings of the dominant political model in the United States, which again is a pathetic spectacle. It is a contrived “Punch and Judy” show, meant I think to distract people more than anything else.

It should lead, in a healthy politicized society with an informed and active citizenry, it should result in a sense of repulsion for both political parties and their leaders, to the extent that people would vote them both out and in the next federal election and look for new political mechanisms or formations.

Robles: That would be wonderful.

Rozoff: Yes, it would.

Robles: I wanted to ask you… another question just came to mind when you're talking about the shutdown of the government, all this bickering and one of the contested points (again we are getting into another topic here but) has been Obama's, so-called, healthcare.

Now I don't see it's being too much of a big help for the poor and those who don't have health insurance. I don't know all the details on it, but what would you say, I mean, to the world audience? He is being characterized, as being some sort of socialist or something, because he is attempting to, or at least pretending to attempt to, provide the American people with healthcare.

Can you give our listeners a little bit of an insight there in the US? What's going on with healthcare and why is that such a contentious issue and what's the real state of healthcare in the United States? Why is that so important?

Rozoff: Although I have not indeed delved into and tried to understand the Affordable Health Care Act, perhaps to the degree I should have to be honest with you, but as we know it's lengthy, it's complicated, it's laborious. It's probably the ultimate omnibus bill that has a little bit of everything for everyone.

And it’s hard to disentangle all the threads of Obamacare, it’s also multi-phased, that is with each success year different components of it are activated.

And this year, for example, is the year at which individuals seeking to go to an insurance exchange and negotiate a private insurance contract are supposed not to be disadvantaged because of pre-existing conditions. That's a very real issue for a lot of people, including relatives of mine.

And I have now in my line of work encountered for the first time, patients who are of lower socioeconomic status, fairly destitute, who have local varieties or affiliations with the Affordable Health Care Act, “Obamacare”, that permits them health insurance they didn't have before, something almost comparable with medicate, to public aid.

But it is so complex that it’s… one would have to spend a good deal of time trying to understand it. And what we need is Occam's Razor, we need something to simplify the process, not complicate it.

In a country where you've got scores of hundreds of insurance providers that make things far more expensive and far more complex than they need to be.. But just to put the matters in perspective, John, the Obamacare initiative, what became Obamacare, the initiative was evocative of (similar to) what the Clinton Administration was attempting to launch in the opening days of their coming into the White House, that is in January of 1993.

Where Hillary Clinton, the first lady, was touring the country, supposedly gaining feedback from healthcare providers and others about launching a national healthcare plan to include, at that time perhaps, 35 million Americans who had no health care insurance, that figure is probably closer to 50 million right now.

And at the time, even though there was poll after poll suggesting that if you included the Canadian system, the single-payer plan system, without naming it's Canadian, (heaven forbid!) xenophobic Americans adopting the system from another country. But if you didn’t identify it as being a Canadian system, that a majority of Americans preferred that to any other alternatives. However, during the course of the debate on what became the Affordable Health Care Act, the Obamacare, that anything like that was not even mentioned, say a comprehensive medicare inclusive program or any kind of government administered, it didn't even have to be a government insurance policy, just government administered single-payer plan, a common program, wasn't even in the running.

So, at the end of the day what you are going to see is tens of millions of uninsured are going to be turned over to the insurance companies, as so many new accounts. That’s the long and short of it

Robles: That's what I was thinking, I mean that's why all the insurance companies are involved in this and it's just a huge “cash cow” for all of them. Especially if they privatize the whole system.

Why is that the Americans view providing something as necessary and normal to the citizens as healthcare is being some sort of move towards socialism? Not all Americans, but I mean, I've seen that accusation all over the place.

Rozoff: We have not progressed at all from, I remember as a teenager listening to former Alabama Governor George Wallace running as a third-party candidate in 1968, denouncing “International Communism” and “Creeping Socialism” and on, I recall it.

There of course was no creeping Socialism, and certainly there isn't now. The kind of Keynesian, modest attempts at a welfare state, that were implemented under the Truman, or the Kennedy or Johnson Administration are long passed, I mean they are discarded for decades.

So the idea that anything that the Federal Government does is “Socialism” is ludicrous of course.

For example, the bailout of the banks and General Motors and so forth was denounced by certain demagogues in the United States as being Socialism. When you bailout the worst representatives, which are considered to be, you know, of “Rapacious Capitalism” and you bail them out with public monies which is to say, working peoples tax-dollars, and that become Socialism: that’s Socialism in reverse. It's the opposite of Socialism.

Robles: Yeah… If we could back to Libya, there has been several events recently in Libya: the kidnapping of the Prime Minister, the kidnapping of this freedom-fighter turned Al Qaeda terrorist and various other events that are taking place and I think a spiral into more instability, because the situation there is getting worse. Can you comment on that?

This was supposed to be another US intervention to get rid of another horrible regime, that has resulted in another destroyed, devastated and completely unstable country. However the Central Bank, and the oil trade were taken over and the oil trade continued in dollars, and the trade from the Central Bank continued in dollars, which I think was the main goal there in Libya. If you could comment on the continuing situation in Libya and how NATO is involved?

Rozoff: That's revelation to me by the way about the stock-exchange and the bank it doesn't surprise me, but that's fascinating, isn't it?

Robles: Anyway, back to destabilized countries, interventions and continuing incursions, please. Sorry.

Rozoff: I mean your description of the scenario or the model is perfectly accurate and it could apply equally to the former Yugoslavia, or to Libya with the necessary changes, you know, perhaps to countries like Ivory Coast, Macedonia and others, Iraq, where the US supports what are clearly unprovoked armed attacks by insurgents who are.. (in most instances based in outside countries) usually contiguous ones but not necessarily..

And then they launch what are just “murderous” raids inside the country when the government then takes measures to protect the civilian population and government personnel, including elementary letter carriers or schoolteachers or police officers. They are then accused of disproportional use of force, of gross human rights violations. And then the US increasingly now and in recent years, under the so-called “Responsibility to Protect Proviso”, then interfere and intervene militarily on behalf of these armed brigands and bandits, calling them rebels in most cases, and that what's happened in Libya.

So what you had was, for 19 days, the fairly recently inaugurated US Africa Command, that's the first overseas regional military command created by the United States since the end of the Cold War we should note, has to then be tried out, has to be tested. And it was, for 19 days they launched so-called operation “Odyssey Dawn” and absolutely blistered Libya with Tomahawk Cruise Missile attacks, bombing raids, Hellfire Missiles from drones, without any… Long surpassing any pretense of their intervening to protect the civilian population.

And then NATO picks up, under operation “Unified Protector” and launches something like 30,000 air sorties over the country, almost 10,000 combat sorties. This is small country of 6 million people. And this goes on for 6 months of concentrated NATO air bombardment. And the end result is, not surprisingly, people like ourselves warned people exactly what was going to come out of this, which is what we see now.

The country is divided into three basically, based on tribal and other differences, that arrival militias and armed grouping that may vary from day-to-day in terms of their allegiance or composition, fighting over the spoils.

But at the same time again NATO has reiterated, just in recent weeks, in the last two or three weeks NATO has reiterated, they’re prepared (NATO is prepared) to provide military training and guidance to the armed forces of Libya. Well, there are no forces of Libya, you indicated that in your comment.

What you have instead is something almost like the Thirty Years War in Europe in the early 1600s, rival groups of looters fighting for dominance in a given area.

 After 70 years, Germany and Japan meet in Georgia

Download audio file   23 October, 11:18  

After 70 years, Germany and Japan meet in Georgia - Rick Rozoff

As the US and NATO begin to pull out of Afghanistan what might wonder and attempt to fathom what they have achieved by invading and occupying the country for over a decade. According to Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list, the entire campaign has been a debacle. Mr. Rozoff is another voice repeating what has clearly been discovered to be the US strategy in the Middle East: import murderous terrorists and Al-Qaeda fanatical mercenaries into a country and use them to destroy it and divide it up.

Hello, this is John Robles, I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO and the Stop NATO international mailing list.

Rozoff: The US supports what are clearly unprovoked, armed attacks by insurgents who are in most instances based in outside countries, usually contiguous ones but not necessarily, and then they launch what are just "murderous" raids inside the country, when the government then takes measures to protect the civilian population and government personnel including elementary: letter carriers, or school teachers, or police officers.

They are then accused of disproportionate use of force, of gross human rights violations and then the US, increasingly now and recent years under the so-called responsibility to protect proviso, then intervenes militarily on behalf of these armed brigands and bandits, calling them rebels in most cases. That’s what happened in Libya.

So what you had was for 19 days the fairly recently inaugurated US Africa Command, that's the first overseas regional military command created by the United States since the end of the Cold war, we should note, you know, has to then be tried out, has to be tested and it was.

For 19 days they launched so-called Operation Odyssey Dawn and absolutely blistered Libya with Tomahawk Cruise Missile attacks, bombing raids, Hellfire Missiles and drones, without any… long surpassing any pretense of their intervening to protect the civilian population and then NATO picks up under Operation Unified Protector and launches something like 30,000 air sorties of the country, almost 10,000 combat sorties!

This is a small country of 6 million people. And this goes on for 6 months, of concentrated NATO air bombardment. And the end result is, not surprisingly, people like ourselves warned people exactly what was going to come out of this, which is what we see now; is that the country is divided into three basically, based on tribal and other differences, that rival militias and little armed groupings that may vary from day to day in terms of their allegiance or their composition, you know, are fighting over the spoils.

But at the same time, again, NATO was reiterated, just in recent weeks in the last 2 or 3 weeks, NATO has reiterated that they are prepared (NATO is prepared) to provide military training and guidance to the Armed Forces of Libya, where there are no armed forces of Libya, you indicated that in your comment.

So what you have instead is something, almost like the 30-years-war in Europe in the early 1600s, rival groups of looters fighting for dominance in a given area.

Robles: Let’s not denigrate the Libyan people too much here because I mean, there is an army in Libya. I mean it’s fragmented, it’s weak but there is a loyal core army in Libya but they are having a very difficult time fighting all these groups that were armed to the teeth.

Rozoff: Then NATO steps in and arms them and trains them, much as they did with the NATO training mission Iraq, NATO training mission Afghanistan, and they walk-in and they train a central army, central armed forces in Libya, to fight the very same Islamic extremists that you indicated, you know, that they bombed the country on behalf of for 6 months.

Robles: About NATO and Georgia, now it seems like they are focusing very closely on Georgia. Where do you see that going? Japan has been there recently. A post on your site says that they are going to be included in the Global Strike Force. Can you tell us about that?

Rozoff: Yes, Georgia remains a major linchpin for US and NATO interests. In the words of various pro-US Georgian officials, really proxies, like Mikhail Saakashvili, who has repeatedly referred to his country as being the gateway between Europe and Asia, which in fact it is geographically and politically perhaps less so, but the intent is the geopolitical purpose of Georgia, is to plant the US and its NATO allies squarely (really where not only Europe and Asia meet) but Europe and Asia and the Middle East meet with Africa not too far away and of course we know there has been a whole series of pipelines: gas, natural gas, rail lines, other fairly strategic enterprises under way, or project under way, of which Georgia is the pivot or the center piece but what is happening most recently, is just today one of the NATO websites announced that Secretary General of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced Georgia will now join the NATO Response Force to bring this discussion full circle. That is the global military expeditionary force that NATO is crafting, Georgia, of course, is not a full member of NATO at this point.

The other allusion you make is even more fascinating. The fact that the Japanese delegation met with the Defense Ministry, meet at the Defense Ministry, in Georgia and the photograph on the Ministry of Defense of Georgia’s website showed a Japanese Officer in a military uniform shaking hands with the Defense Minister of Georgia.

Japan has insinuated itself into Georgia for energy purposes. You know that ultimately the oil and natural gas that’s to flow from the Caspian Sea through Georgia into the Eastern or Mediterranean Eastern Europe…

Robles: Yeah, but Japan?

Rozoff: … could also go in the opposite direction into east Asia.

Robles: I suppose. Very strange to see Japan in Georgia, I was quite astounded by that.

Rozoff: Well, this is where Japan and Germany finally link up, how many years later, almost 70 years later. But whatever they had intended during World War II, here they meet in the caucuses. The German military influence already established there and a Japanese "military official" that was the phenomenal thing about that photograph.

Had they even simply sent a civilian in Japanese defense (so-called self-defense force) you know their equivalent of the defense ministry over there that's one thing, but to send a military official suggests something is on their mind and in the post Afghanistan world, post Afghan war world, NATO in it's own words (and I roughly paraphrasing it) is looking for some way of applying the lessons of Afghanistan elsewhere in the world and the Caucuses, the South Caucuses may indeed be where they intend to move.

Robles: The lessons of Afghanistan? A more than decade long quagmire!? What lessons are there to be applied? I think the main lesson to be applied is fight for peace and keep the soldiers at home. And stop invading other countries.

Rozoff: That's what a sensible and sane and humane person would look at it, that's precisely why NATO views it from the opposite perspective, and what NATO officials talk about, Rasmussen in the first place, is Afghanistan…(this is something that I have contended from the very beginning and we do have to note that as of October 7th) that is at least hear in Chicago 3 days ago, we are now in year 13 of the US and NATO war in Afghanistan. Year 13.

Robles: It's longer than Vietnam already.

Rozoff: It has been for a while, but this is definitely the longest war in American history. It’s NATO's first war in Asia, it's NATO first ground war.

You know, prior to this, NATO essentially waged air wars over Bosnia and the Serb Republic, and then in Yugoslavia in 1999, but this is you know, but what NATO officials are alluding to is the fact that under the structure of the International Security Assistance Force, that NATO took over shortly after the invasion of the country, that troops from over 50 countries, over 50 countries are integrated into a common military command under NATO leadership and that’s something that the world has not taken note of sufficiently in my estimate, and it’s a fact that NATO in fact has reached that degree of integrating a global military force. And when the NATO officials talk about deriving the necessary lessons and so forth from Afghanistan that is what they are talking about. They are talking about the ability to put out an integrated military command including troops, in over a quarter of the countries in the world.

Robles: Another point I think that no one is paying attention to though: I would say, Afghanistan, was a complete failure.

Rozoff: Yeah, it has been a debacle, it truly has. You know, for a while I think there was a fallback position which was; US and company didn't want to win the war, they wanted to maintain military presence in that general area, but now it looks like they may well leave with their tails between their legs. And hundreds of thousands of Afghan people killed, maimed, displaced, traumatized, an entire generation of Afghan children who in many parts of the country never been to school, have no future. This is the legacy that they are going to leave behind. And they could leave, callously indifferent to the consequences of their "intervention". But you know, the Afghan people are going to bear the consequences of course.

Robles: Okay, Rick, I really appreciate you speaking with me.

Rozoff: Yes, thanks for the opportunity. I appreciate it. What I said about the invigorating conversations, the sort creating new ideas is absolutely the truth.

Robles: Thank you very much, Rick. I really appreciate it.

 

 UN Syria resolution may allow action against rebel supporters

29 September 2013 Download audio file

Совет безопасности ООН Совбез ООН резолюция Сирия

The full text of the United Nations Resolution on Syria has been published and, thanks to the efforts of Russia and China, is one of the most balanced to be agreed in the last century. However there remains the threat of a western attack on Syria. In an interview with the Voice of Russia World Service, regular contributor Rick Rozoff also stated that some language in the resolution could even allow for measures to be taken against any party that provides or supports the Syrian “opposition” with chemical and or other non-conventional weapons.

Hello this is John Robles I am speaking with Rick Rozoff the owner of Stop NATO and the Stop NATO international mailing list.

 

Robles: Can you tell us about the United Nations Resolution on Syria? Are there any holes or loops in it that the United States might use to go ahead with a bombing campaign on that country?

Rozoff: I fear there is indeed and actually there are two that I can think of immediately. The resolution itself was adopted unanimously by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council: Russia, China, France, Britain, the United States, and the current ten rotating member states.

It makes some effort to be balanced. It is better than what, I’m sure, The US, Britain and France would have wanted and that’s because of Russia in the first place. The Russian and Chinese influence, I think, trying to introduce a balanced and moderate resolution.

However, it mandates a number of issues, including the monitoring of chemical and other non-conventional weapons inside Syria. Presumably, by all sides. Though, when it comes to compliance issues and ultimately the use of Chapter 7, as they are called, measures against the perpetrators of the violations of chemical weapons regulations but only the state could be held accountable. I hardly see how the rag tag and irregular military forces supported by the West could be held accountable. They could be sanctioned, for example, but I don’t know if they could be bombed.

But what’s most alarming is that the penultimate demand in the resolution, Number 21, and I’m reading it verbatim, decides in the event of non-compliance with this resolution including unauthorized transfer of chemical weapons or any use of chemical weapons by anyone in the Syrian Arab Republic, to impose measures under Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter and what’s important to realize in that, there are several articles under Chapter 7, but the operative one and the one that we are most concerned about right now is Article 42 which reads as follows: Should the Security Council consider that measures provided for in the earlier Article 41 would be inadequate or have proved to be inadequate, they may take such actions by air, sea and land forces as it may be necessary to maintain and restore international peace and security and these include, I’m quoting again, demonstrations, blockade and other operations by air, sea or land forces of members of the United Nations, in other words war.

And what we are talking about, of course, most recently is some equivalent of UN Resolution 1973 in March of 2011 that led to, contrary to what the Resolution asserts: a full six-month war by the Pentagon and NATO against the nation of Libya.

The resolution passed recently does not stipulate Chapter 7 measures, I mean that’s the Russian contribution to have that left out but at the end it leaves a little bit of room for the West – the United States, Britain, France and their allies – to come back to the Security Council and demand implementation of Chapter 7 Military Intervention against the government of Syria.

Robles: Right, but that would still require the approval of all the members of the UN Security Council, wouldn’t it?

Rozoff: Actually, it wouldn’t have to be all members. One permanent member alone could veto it, Russia or China.

In theory it would be unanimous but not necessarily. Russia and China could abstain, vote against and then not veto it and this is what happened with Libya indeed. So either assent or passive assent is guaranteed by voting for or abstaining. Or even voting against and not vetoing.

We’ll see but even though I think that we can pause for a little while and hope that in contravention of the UN Security Council and the recently passed Resolution 2118, the US will not once again act outside of and in direct contradiction to the United Nations, as it did 14 years ago against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and as it did 10 years ago against Iraq and as it has in any number of other cases since the creation of the United Nations.

So I think, a couple of things: there is still the real threat of a US and allied military action against Syria regardless of this resolution but I think that we can agree that the adept Russian diplomatic initiative has put a spoke in the wheel of the western war machine.

Robles: Rick, could you remind our listeners what is Chapter 7, as I’m sure not all people are aware of what it is exactly.

Rozoff: It’s a chapter in the Charter of the United Nations. It stipulates, as I mentioned, what actions the United Nations can take collectively (members of the United Nations).

The actual and full title of Chapter 7 is “Action with Respect to Threats to the Peace, Breaches of the Peace and Acts of Aggression”. So you see how far we have descended the pathway to international lawlessness, when you see that Chapter 7, which was explicitly introduced in the aftermath of World War II, the deadliest war in history, of course, and the one that resulted from acts of territorial aggression by the axis powers, by the fascists and Nazis and imperial Japanese aggressors, has now been turned around, where the major western powers, the United States in the first place, apply Chapter 7 to strictly domestic developments within the borders of a country, a country moreover has not threatened any of its neighbors.

So, I think that’s an important consideration, particularly, the by now – and I’ll tip my hand – infamous “responsibility to protect” provision adopted by the United Nations, which equates the mistreatment of nationals and citizens within a nation to acts of military aggression against other countries, either neighboring or around the world, which in the latter category is something the United States is quite adept at.

I think another concern that we have is the final article in Chapter 7 by the way, and this cuts both ways, this is the sort of logic that could be used by the US and its NATO allies, I mentioned there were two persistent problems that we have to deal with: one of them is that the United States might succeed, in conjunction with its allies, in provoking another situation such as that in the summer of last year (2012), where a Turkish warplane violated the airspace of Syria and was shot down, and then provide the United States and other NATO allies to invoke their Article 5, the mutual military assistance clause, ostensibly in defense of a NATO member, that being Turkey, the only NATO member that borders Syria.

Article 51 reads real quickly: “Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations,” and so forth.

So, failing to get UN Security Council approval, or even the preparatory stages of approval for a military attack against Syria, the US could contrive a situation in conjunction with Turkey, in the most apparent case, to provoke a military action or response from Syria and then go to Brussels and invoke Article 5 of the NATO Charter, and the US could even push for Article 51 of Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter “Defending an Ally.”

Robles: Regarding the language in the text, as I understand, you just said that if “any party” in Syria uses chemical or forbidden weapons the government of Syria will be held responsible. There is no language in there about non-state actors, meaning all these al-Nusra and al-Qaeda affiliates?

Rozoff:No, actually no. Once again thanks to Russian intervention – clearly you see all the fingerprints of the respective permanent members, I think, on this resolution 2118 – but part of the Russian contribution is indeed a statement that neighboring countries have a responsibility to prevent the transfer of chemical and other non-traditional weapons into Syria.

This clause, I would have to assume, was authored by Russia and I’m rather surprised at the western countries for this (for a resolution which contains such a provision) but the immediate countries one suspects, of course, are Turkey and Jordan and possibly Israel – that would permit the transfer… They are already actively aiding the armed insurrection inside the country – and that they will now be held accountable, if I the read resolution properly, for that action.

My only question about that is how practically that could be implemented and which acts of diplomatic demarches, or sanctions, or even military actions would be enforced.

Robles: But there’s no language in there as to the consequences of those guilty of such support.

Rozoff: No specifics but we know what Chapter 7 permits, so technically that could be used even in reference to neighboring countries that are aiding and abetting the bloody uprising and threat against the national sovereignty of Syria.

Robles: Well, technically I think that would be a logical and proper implementation of Chapter 7, wouldn’t it?

Rozoff: Yes, I agree, rather than the way it has been misused, or the way people are talking about misusing it.

For example, the language exactly in the UN Resolution passed recently underscores, and I quote: “No party in Syria should use, develop, produce or so forth chemical weapons”.

It does dictate that the government shall comply with all aspect of the decisions of the Organization for Prevention of Chemical Weapons.

One of the problems is – we talked about adept Russian diplomacy, let’s give it the devil’s due and talk about the equally efficient, I’m afraid, maneuvers by western nations of the US, in the first instance, to create an amorphous, proxy organization, “the Free Syrian Army” and such like, inside the country where it’s very difficult to identify a command structure, much less to hold any individual or individuals responsible.

So, when we see people carving out the internal organs of murdered Syrian soldiers and eating them, when we see captives, civilian and military, beheaded when, as Russia asserts and I am sure it is the case, Syrian rebels are using chemicals weapons, as they did in March in a suburb outside the city of Aleppo and quite possibly did in August of this year, who do you hold accountable?

You can’t sanction them, they are not a state actor and what military action can you take? I mean, the government of Syria is taking the ultimate military action against these people. They are trying to neutralize groups of bandits and brigands with chemical weapons.

  Part 1 9/11: US Created Al-Qaeda for Global Domination

September 11 2013 Download audio file

11 сентября башни близнецы Нью-Йорк трагедия взрыв

Most people in the world remember the September 11, 2001 very clearly. It was a day when the world changed for the worse, when the world was terrorized and outraged by one of the single worst events in world history. Twelve years later no one has been prosecuted for the event and the world now knows that those events served as a catalyst and pretext for endless wars of aggression and domination against any country not under control of the United States. By attempting to convince the public that every independent, and even Russian leaning country, is somehow connected to terrorism the US has managed to launch wars of aggression against countries that never posed it a threat. The world has grown weary of American aggression. One man who has fought the military expansion of NATO and the US for decades, Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff, helped put the events into perspective as the US attempts to engage in yet another war of aggression.

Hello this is John Robles, I am speaking with Rick Rozoff, a regular contributor with the Voice of Russia World Service. We are speaking on the 12 year anniversary of the events of 9/11.

Robles: Hello Rick, how are you?

Rozoff: Very good John, and you?

Robles: I’m very well. It is 9/11 2013. In retrospect can you give us your views regarding those events and how they’ve changed the world and brought us to where we are today?

Rozoff: Sure. If I can be anecdotal to begin with though, I came home from work working the night shift in the emergency room of a hospital, and the attacks on the Trade Tower and the Pentagon occurred in the interim between when I left work and when I returned home.

I returned home to 3 telephone messages, from what I could call the three women of my life: my mother, my only sister and my former lover, and my sister said “are we at war”, my mother said “we have got to change our behavior in the world”, and my former partner stated “did the Palestinians really do it”, because the initial report that many of us heard was that somebody in a phone booth in the Persian Gulf claimed responsibility for the attacks and attributed them to the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which is one of the three groups in the Palestine Liberation organization, but one that has never employed hijacking of aero planes, much less terrorist activity.

So, I think that puts things into perspective immediately for me. And then as the emotion started to die down a bit, and the sense of being stunned, I mean the spectacle, and the monstrous loss of life, and then the immediate fear of course, that the wounded beast that was the Pentagon - Donald Rumsfeld at that time - would really wreak vengeance, not only on the alleged perpetrators of the attacks in Washington and New York, but on any number of other countries and in short order if you recall, some of your listeners recall, that Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld identified, as I recollect, no fewer than 63 countries who he accused of either harboring terrorists or supporting terrorism.

In the words of George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld and other members of the administration at that time, that to harbor terrorists was the same as to be a terrorist and you would be dealt with accordingly, and sweeping statements like “you are either with us or with the terrorists”. So, what we all feared I think shortly after the events of 9/11, even as they were occurring in fact, was that the US might exploit this as excuse to settle scores around the world, which in fact happened in short order to the point where even though those accused of perpetrating the attacks - largely Saudi nationals, we should mention, with a Yemeni or Egyptian thrown in for good measure - but ones who had lived for years in Germany and the United States, had gone to flight school in Florida, here and so forth, apparently with complete impunity without any doubts arising in the mind of law enforcement agencies, if we are to believe the official account.

But even though they did not come from Iraq or Afghanistan or any of the other countries that have been attacked in the interim, under the pretext that we were combating the terrorism that led to the events of 9/11, we also have to remember that immediately the Bush administration started identifying as terrorist their political and ideological enemies during the cold war.

So, there was everything from the revolutionary armed forces of Colombia, the FARC rebels in Colombia, to the New People’s Army in the Philippines, to the Kurdistan Workers Party in Turkey. These are left-wing secular movements that were immediately identified as being terrorists, as though they had some connection with Al-Qaeda, which was ludicrous. But what was ignored from the very beginning was the fact that, if in fact there was a connection with Osama bin Laden, that the US bore direct responsibility for his arising to the level of the terrorist commando or chieftain they accused him of being, because he was one of an estimated 10,000 ethnic Arabs that with US and Saudi connivance, in the first place, were brought to north-western Pakistan in the 1980s.

Robles: I’d like to just underline the fact that Osama bin Laden also went by the CIA code name of Tom Osman, he was actually a CIA agent.

Rozoff: That doesn’t surprise me in the least. He was one of 10,000 alleged Afghan Arabs, as the term was, who had training in US-supported training camps in north-western Pakistan to be used against Soviet forces inside Afghanistan, but particularly against the government of the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan, which was the party of long standing, which had members in parliament for decades, part of their coming to power in the April revolution of 1978.

But there would be no Al-Qaeda, there would be no international movement of extremist terrorist network if the US had not connived with their two major military allies in the Islamic world - Pakistan and Saudi Arabia - that set it up; and to arm them, to train them, to put them into contact with each other in a global network. And even the name of the Islamic extremists armed group in the Philippines, the Abu Sayyaf group has an Afghan connection as well.

So, the US is really at the genesis … was at the genesis of the creation of this international terrorist network. But another point that struck me at the time of 9/11 of 2001 was that there were only three countries at that time that recognized the originally Taliban government, I mean they didn’t have … weren’t represented at the United Nations, but the Taliban governing entity, whatever you want to call it was only recognized by three governments.

Robles: That never stopped the United States, regarding being recognized in the United Nations. I’d like to recall Kosovo again.

Rozoff: Had they chosen to recognize them, when the rest of the world didn’t, that wouldn’t have been an impediment for the United States. But the three nations that in fact did recognize it, and had embassies in Kabul, were Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the 2 nations that worked most closely with the United States to foster the entire Mujahidin organization and movement and war, which in turn spawned the Taliban as surely as night follows day. And the United Arab Emirates.

So, whatever we have seen in the interim, that Pakistan is our major military ally in fighting terrorism in Afghanistan - I mean please - that Saudi Arabia recently signed with the United States the largest bilateral arms deal in history, and that the United Arab Emirates has troops serving under NATO in Afghanistan. United Arab Emirates has troops serving under NATO’s international security assistance force in Afghanistan. They supplied dozens of war planes 2.5 years ago for the 6 months air war against Libya, a secular Arab government.

And these again, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Pakistan are the three US military allies pronounced in the Islamic world, whereas they were the only three governments to formally recognize the Taliban in Afghanistan, but again I suppose people … its assumed Americans aren’t informed about international affairs, and if they are, that they quickly forget yesterday’s news.

So that the entire story about 9/11 has not properly been explored, and instead what we have heard I think are two alternate red herrings, one of them was the Donald Rumsfeld, “we’ve got to drain the swamp … we’ve got to eliminate terrorists bases throughout the world including the 63 countries” and even that led by the way to Rumsfeld setting up a Train and Equip Program in the nation of Georgia where terrorists aided and abetted by the United States and its NATO allies were launching attacks into the Russian North Caucasus across both Pankisi Gorge and the Kodori Gorge. And that the Russian government is lodging complaint after complaint with the Georgian government about them, so Rumsfeld says: “well, in fact, yes there are terrorists operating in North Georgia and attacking Russia, so we are going to set up at first with the Green Berets, and then with the US Marine Corps”, what is now a permanent US military presence in Georgia, which was there of course during the 5-day war, 5 years ago last month, when Georgia attacked South Ossetia and dragged Russia into the conflict.

But the other thing, I think too, just to put it in perspective, 9/11 led to the US and NATO invasion of Afghanistan and spreading throughout the south and central Asian region. And what we now have of course is the longest war in the history of the United States; it will be 12 years old very shortly; its actuality the thirteenth calendar year, which is longer than the war in Vietnam.

Robles: Let’s not forget Iraq and all the other humanitarian interventions.

Rozoff: Yes, then gave rise to subsequent wars, their drone missile campaigns in Yemen and Somali and Libya and Iraq and now Syria of course, and the invasion of Afghanistan was the opening salvo in that effort too.

Really to put into practice, as we remembered 12 years ago, blueprints elaborated by the organizations, like Projects for the New American Century, and others, who had plotted to remake a new Middle East, a broader Greater Middle East, which would extend from Mauritania on the Atlantic Ocean to Kazakhstan on the Chinese border, and that is in fact what has happened. But as a result, we’ve seen the US and NATO bring over a 150,000 troops into Afghanistan at the extreme under NATO command, under ISAF, International Security Assistance Force, which is substantially larger than the peak strength of Soviet troops during the 1980s.

And this is then of course is the longest war in the history of Afghanistan as well, and has led to the expansion of US and NATO military bases in presence in countries like Kirgizstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Pakistan for a while. The effort by the United States and its NATO allies to ensconce themselves squarely in the convergence ground of major powers in the area, especially those gathered under the umbrella of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization – Russia, China and the Central Asian Republics as well as observers like Iran, Turkey and India.

 Part 2 Obama’s Empty Claims Against Syria “Imperial Hubris”

September 11 2013   Download audio file

Obama’s empty claims against Syria “imperial hubris” - Rick Rozoff

The President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin called Obama’s claims that the Syrian Government used chemical weapons "unimaginable nonsense" and US Secretary of State John Kerry a liar, and these statements mildly characterize what the United States is attempting to get away with, another Crime Against Peace. The way the United States is attempting to attack another nation based on lies and empty rhetoric as they continue their geopolitical remapping of the world, is a sign of Imperial Hubris. Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff, from Stop NATO, gave his candid reaction to the latest war speech by the US' "omniscient" Commander in Chief.

PART2

Robles: Your reaction to U.S. President Barack Obama’s speech on Syria?

Rozoff: It was short, there was no new information, to be honest with you, but what was, I think, most disturbing, aside from the almost diabolically self-assured and omniscient demeanor of the Commander in Chief of, again to use his expression, “the world's sole military superpower”, was the fact that he spoke repeatedly about, as everyone knows, their indisputable facts and so forth in relation to the putative or the alleged poison-gas or chemical weapons use in Syria on August of 21st .

His actual terms, if I can bring them up here, suggest that he is privy to information the rest of the world doesn’t have, which is a typical characteristic of Imperial Hubris and we certainly saw that come across in his presentation, statements that all sides agree on the need for action (that is military action against Syria) when, in fact, that’s not the case. This is on text of his address to the nation and, of course, to the world.

I’m reading quotes from the address; "No one disputes that there was a chemical attack in Syria", that’s a quote.

Another quote: "Moreover, we know that the Assad regime was responsible".

He alone, evidently, knows that, because the United Nations inspection team has not filed their report yet. So, we don’t have that to go on.

We have the head of state of Russia, Vladimir Putin referring to that claim as being, and I quote him: “unimaginable nonsense” but somehow Obama and his colleagues in the US Government know everything.

Robles: They keep saying “we know, we know, we know”, I mean Kerry said it 23 times in a recent speech but they haven’t offered any concrete evidence. Have you seen any of this concrete evidence?

I have a friend in England who said that Kerry recently made a reference to the material that was supposed to be on the US State Department’s website and he could not find it, anywhere. This was supposedly some real evidence. Have you seen any real evidence? and then please continue.

Rozoff: No, of course not and moreover, Obama himself, when spending a disproportionate amount of his address talking about, atrocity stories of course, because he knows that’s his trump card for egging on a war.

And again, it’s the equivalent of the so-called Račak Massacre in Yugoslavia, in Kosovo in January of 1999, which was the pretext for the war against that nation, but Obama is simply reiterating, or parroting the sort of information we’ve heard from the State Department’s spokesmen, from Kerry himself, as you alluded to.

You know the statement that “an intercepted telephone call”, I mean, please! This makes the George W. Bush administration look credible, doesn’t it? When a supposed intercepted telephone call, and the trajectory of the rockets that were fired into areas and such like, this is hardly evidence. Much less incontrovertible, or irrefutable evidence, this is instead a hastily concocted pretence.

But nevertheless, in the course of his talk he delves at great length, trying to conjure up in the minds of his listeners and viewers, I suppose, the image of corpses, particularly those of children in the suburbs of Damascus in the incident, whatever the true nature of it proves to be, of August of 21st.

He was pulling on every conceivable heartstring, you know, dead children laid out in rows. “If this can happen to Syrian children, it can happen to American children” and such like. I mean, it was really low demagoguery and it wasn’t even terribly creative.

Robles: He said this could happen to American children too?

Rozoff: He made a statement of that effect, you know, “… if we don’t stop chemical weapons use against the children of Syria, this could someday be American children”.

Robles: So, is he trying to imply that Syria is somehow a threat to America?

Rozoff: It is a very tortured logic, of course but we have to be able to kind of read the code language of the White House and the State Department.

And what we are hearing is: although the Syrian rebels, those who cut out people’s livers and eat them, and videotape it because they are so proud of what they’ve done, or people who kidnap Christian Bishops and hold them if they haven’t tortured them to death and such like are responsible democratic Jeffersonian advocates of liberty, which is basically what Obama asserted; and although there may be the “rare” extremists mixed with them…

And we know that the President of Russia Vladimir Putin called John Kerry what he was – a liar – for repeatedly claiming there were no extremists amongst the rebel factions in Syria.

But what the US has done is reserved the right to claim (talk about this being interesting John) that if the Government of Syria has chemical weapons, they could fall into the hands of extremist rebel groups who could then use them.

The US should know something about that having armed terrorist outfits in Afghanistan and the Balkans and Libya, and so forth. They know that’s exactly what is going to happen.

Robles: There is evidence that they were supplied by the US to these so-called “cannibal rebels”, that’s what I want to call them, and...

Rozoff: And that’s a fitting designation for them, I mean that sums them up perfectly.

And the same sort of Libyan-Islamic-fighting-group-types that killed the US Ambassador, Christopher Stevens, in Benghazi but the US acts like the model of outraged innocence when one of their own terrorist clients occasionally turns against them.

It is occurring incidentally in Afghanistan right now, as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Jalaluddin Haqqani who were two of the major recipients of US military aid during the war against the Soviets and the Afghan Government in the 1980s. So, this is nothing new. This is an old scenario.

But anyway, what the US is doing is once again playing on both sides of the street. On the one hand, they will accuse the Syrian Government of deliberately and seemingly capriciously, just gratuitously, killing their own citizens.

This is what Russian President Vladimir Putin took issue with, when he referred to the fact that the Syrian Government, scoring pretty substantial and even definitive military victory on the ground, why would they use chemical weapons at this point? And moreover, when there is a UN inspection team in the country, why do it then?

So, the US on the one hand will try to… you know, “as we all know”, as Mr. Obama said again today about the fact that supposedly the Syrian Government… “the facts cannot be denied” (that’s a quote actually from his presentation in regard of the Syrian regime).

Robles: What are those facts?

Rozoff: Again, we know there are no such facts but then, what happens is they turn around and state: “Well, if there are chemical weapons in the control of the Government and the rebels might be able to wrest those weapons away from the Government and use them”.

You know, this is disingenuous to the lowest degree and it is simply one or another Casus Belli, one or another alleged justification for going to war.

Robles: Okay, Rick unfortunately we are out of time. Thank you very much.

US Attack on Syria Will be a Historic Crime

6 September 2013, 03:47  Download audio file

сша сирия барак обамаобама буш обама президент сша

Statesmen, diplomats, leaders and countries worldwide are condemning the United States for their obtuse and entirely self serving desire to launch military aggression against Syria, yet another small and almost defenseless nation that the US wants to decimate with their unparalleled military might as they continue to aggressively bomb and attack every nation that attempts to pursue any king of independent foreign or other policy. Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff adds his voice to the growing chorus of people worldwide who are calling on the aggressors to stand down and stop their madness.

Hello, this is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, he’s a regular contributor for The Voice of Russia and the manager and owner of the Stop NATO website and an international mailing list.

Robles: Hello, Rick, how are you?

Rozoff: I am as concerned and as distressed, as I’m sure you and most of the world is currently knowing that we are on the precipice of what could be a disastrous military action by the United States in the Middle East.

Robles: Is it possible that somebody may, at the last moment, talk some sense into those beating-the-war-drums in Washington?

Rozoff: Certainly there have been efforts to do so. Even today such an unlikely person as the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon who was known to have been the United States’ choice for that position and who has generally gone out of his way not to offend Washington in any way, nevertheless reminded the world community and the US, in particular, that there are only two justifications to taking military action against another country.

The first is Article 51 of U.N. Charter that if a country is in imminent danger of attack from the other country, that is self-defense and secondly, if there is authorization through the Security Council. Neither of those criteria, of course, applies in any manner to US plans for military attacks against Syria. That’s number one.

Number two, and I think that is not insignificant, this past Sunday in his weekly address in St. Peter’s Square Pope Francis I, the head of the largest religious organization in the world, the Roman Catholic Church with 1.2 billion adherents, called for an international day of fasting and prayer for peace in Syria. And making statements like, and this is from the press agencies, quotes of his talk, stated quote: “War, never again!” And also made the following statement “Violence never leads to peace. War leads to war, violence leads to violence,” this is an almost unprecedented statement by the religious leader by the largest religious faith in history, the Catholic Church.

And this Saturday he is going for an international day of prayer and fasting, not only for the world’s Catholics, his own flock, but other religious believers and even non-believers. That's number two.

Number three, a statement was quoted today by Interfax, the Russian press agency, quoting the Chairman of the Upper House of the Russian Parliament, the Federation Council’s Defense and Security Committee, Viktor Ozerov, and I am quoting him because it is worth getting these words out more broadly than I expect they have, and his quote says: "If we recognize the supremacy of international law and sovereignty of UN member states, the start of the U.S. military actions against Syria bypassing the U.N. Security Council could only mean one thing, another American aggression against an Arab state." More or less echoing, or paralleling the statements by Ban Ki-Moon.

He further over went on to list what this means in terms of escalation of a long-term pattern, and again this is Ozerov speaking, "The aftermath of the U.S. aggressive operations are still fresh in our memory; Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya... The list could be extended. No arguments can be accepted here in defense of democracy or human rights." As the alleged purpose of those wars, my comment.

And he goes on to say, "What is really happening is that Washington cannot agree that countries exist that do not dance to its tune or play by its rules." That’s the end of the quote by the Russian senator. And that, I think That hits it pretty squarely on the head and gets to the gist of the issue.

Syria's crime is not kowtowing to the United States, capitulating to it. And any other countries, and there aren’t many currently, that have the courage to maintain an independent foreign policy, that have close state-to-state diplomatic economic and military ties, with nations like Russia and China, who are also targeted in this.

And in a way how I envision it, John, is that you have the US, as a wolf outside of a pen of sheep and it's selecting them one by one, as to which it's going to devour. And as long as the sheep permit themselves to be picked off individually and sequentially, then all of them eventually are going to be victims.

And what's needed at this point is what even the otherwise fairly timid Ban Ki-Moon has reminded the world of, that at the most the use of military aggression by one state against another and certainly not one which has military superiority that’s almost incalculable, like the United States vis-a-vis Syria, unless in immediate self-defense or with the U.N. Security Council authorization, neither of which is in the offing. And that is the sentiment of Senator Ozerov from the Federation Council, who said exactly the same thing. “That war outside the Security Council threatens the system of international law, the international global order.”

So I think, given the gravity of the situation and the almost unprecedented comments which I just shared with you, by the head of the United Nations, the head of world's largest religious faith and by the chairman of a key committee of the Upper House of the Russian Parliament, that we're looking at something quite serious right now, and that the world needs to be able to marshal all the resources it has; information, organization, moral resources, in order to combat the threat of a war against Syria, which could quite entirely possibly expand into something not only a regional conflict or conflagration, but into something that could be a global showdown.

We've already talked about this, John, repeatedly that the U.S. has exploited the Syrian crisis, to create a new Cold War with Russia, which is now simply indisputable, and on the heels of the cancelled meeting between Obama and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, the Edward Snowden affair and a number of other things. But what is resting at the base of it, is the U.S. exploiting the Syrian crisis to be berate, denigrate and threaten Russia.

We’ve heard some of the worst rhetoric coming out of Washington vis-a-vis Russia since the Cold War and even worse in certain ways, as we have has ample opportunity to discuss in the past.

So my plea would be that people take to heart very serious, the statements by Ban Ki-Moon, the statements by Viktor Ozerov, the statements by Pope Francis I and realize that something is so severe, so great, so historic at this point that all efforts have to be made between now and, say, the beginning of next week when there's likely to be a vote in both Houses of the U.S. Congress, that world public opinion has to tell Washington, both the legislative and executive branch, "No war! It's against the law internationally! It's a moral crime! And it's an historic crime that will be judged in that manner and its perpetrators will be held accountable!”

Robles: Ok, thank you, Rick! We're out of time! I really appreciate it!

Rozoff: Thank you, John!

US/NATO Attack on Syria Will Cause Regional Conflagration

AUGUST 28 2013

2012 июль коллаж газ сирия газ сирия химическое оружие сирия

With what appears to an imminent western military adventure and yet another act of aggression against a small country on the other side of the world, meaning what appears to be the upcoming unprovoked attack on the sovereign nation of Syria by the United States, Rick Rozoff spoke about the military buildup and the reasons for the West’s continued meddling in the Middle East.

Robles: Hello. This is John Robles. I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop Nato website and mailing list. Hello, Sir.

Rozoff: Hello, John. How are you?

Robles: Not too good in light of the events that are currently taking place. As I’m sure you’re aware…

Rozoff: I think it is a very dramatic and I fear a tragic moment that we are speaking.

Robles: And it seems like there is very little we can do or that anybody can do to influence what has apparently been in the works and a plan by those geopolitical…

Rozoff: Madmen

Robles: Madmen

Rozoff: … or geniuses that constitutes the foreign policy elite of the United States and other western nations to complete your thought, John.

Robles: Thank you.

Rozoff: Yes. That’s exactly what I fear is the case.

Robles: Can you tell us a little bit on the military hardware aspect of this. There is not too many reports out there on that.

Rozoff: We have to keep in mind that, you know, until the people of the Mediterranean basin demand that the US pick up and leave its military, the US is always… the Pentagon is always in position to strike any nation in or near the Mediterranean Sea. But what we do know is that currently assigned to the Sixth Fleet, permanently stationed in the Mediterranean, are no fewer than four guided missile destroyers that are in the eastern part of the Mediterranean even as we speak, including one which played an instrumental role in the opening salvo of cruise missile attacks against Libya in March of 2011.

These are what are referred to in US military parlance as Arleigh Burke-class destroyers. In other words they are the type that will be equipped to carry interceptor missiles, standard missile three, interceptors of the sort that are part of the US missile shield that has been deployed in and around Europe and in the middle East. We know for a fact there are four of those.

There are reports that at least one and possibly two US submarines, and these are the USS Florida and USS Georgia, are deployed off the eastern Mediterranean, each of which … by the way, the Arleigh Burke destroyers I mentioned, the 4 of them, are capable of carrying 70 missiles each. These include cruise as well as other missiles, but the submarines are far more deadly, far more lethal. Each of them is equipped to carry 150 Tomahawk cruise missiles.
One of these two I mention- USS Florida- was, you know, fired something in the neighborhood of a 100 missiles in the attack against Libya, you know also in the Mediterranean, of course, two and a half years ago. So this is what the US has in play.

bles: Sir, they’re planning to use Tomahawks on Syria, is that correct?

Rozoff: This is what they used of course against Libya two and a half years ago, what they used against Yugoslavia in 1999, it was used against Iraq in 2003. You know, again, it’s a coward’s way of waging warfare. You don’t endanger pilots or fixed wing aircraft by flying strikes into the country. You simply fire a cruise missile.

It has devastating effect, of course. And you don’t endanger the life of any US service men, which in a way we have to hark back to the war against Libya again - 2011 - and the fact that after 60 days of waging war, unprovoked war, against a defenseless nation of some six million people.

According to the War Power Resolution, introduced in the US Congress in the early 1970s, President Barack Obama was obligated to come before Congress and present his case for a continuation of the war. He arrogantly refused to do so, stating in his estimate it was not a war because US military personnel were not in harm’s way.

So you can wreakas much devastation, material and human, as one wants to against a smaller defenseless country, but if US service men aren’t danger themselves and it doesn’t constitute a war then the President of the United States (Commander-in-Chief, US Armed Forces), in his opinion, doesn’t feel obligated even to explain to the US Congress what he is doing. So this is what we are talking about with Syria right now.
We also have to remember that Syria and Lebanon, really now, are the only countries in the entire Mediterranean region that have not become US military partners and US military stooges for the most part. And that each new country that falls into the orbit of the Pentagon becomes a military base for attacks on other countries.

I’ve read reports today that the British military bases in Cyprus are being … you know are seeing warplanes coming in. We know the Soudanaval base in Crete in Greece could be used for any attack against Syria. With a change in government in Cyprus at the beginning of this year we can see an even more compliant client regime willing to do the US’s dirty work.

Robles: What have you heard about Iraq, there were some statements by Iraqi officials that they were against the use of their airspace for an invasion of Syria? And then I’d like you to get into what your views on the aftereffects of what this invasion is going to cause.

Rozoff: It’s standard operating procedure, if you will, for countries you know not to openly acknowledge that they’re granting the US and its allies the right to use their airspace to launch attacks. When we’re talking about the cruise missile attacks, in large part depending on where the vessel, whether a surface vessel, or a submarine is firing them, of necessity Syria has a fairly short coast line compared to Libya and to other countries. And we could count on the fact that a goodly number of the cruise missiles, you know, being fired inside Syria would have to pass over the territory of other countries: Jordan, Iraq, come most immediately to mind.

But of course, if there was plausible deniability, and they simply don’t acknowledge that … Saudi Arabia is another … that the US is firing missiles over their territory then no one is the wiser I suppose. But, in the long run, the regime that was put into power and is beholden to the United States and Baghdad says publicly and what it does in fact I think are two different things. And until there’s a larger community of nations in the world ready to stand up for peace and against armed barbarism, then no one country is going to say no to Washington for fear if nothing else it will be the next target.

And I think if you want a parallel with what’s going on right now, you’ll look at that decade that began say with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and China in 1931. It included attack after attack on country after country by the Axis Powers, by imperial Japan, by fascist Italy andby Nazi Germany, which culminated in 1940 with nations like Norway and Denmark, and Greece, and Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, France overrun by these hordes of militarists. For ten years the world saw this naked aggression going on, and the League of Nations could not or would not do anything about it.

Robles: That’s what the United States is doing right now and the United Nations which was organized and formed to stop that from happening ever again has done nothing.

Rozoff: It is worse than has done nothing; it is in fact a complicit partner in the arrangement. The Russian government amongst others has been warning over the last 24 hours that any exacerbation of the conflict in Syria by internationalizing it, that is by having major western military powers and their Persian Gulf allies launch military attacks inside Syria is only going to inflame, exacerbate and worsen. The situation is going to cause a massive conflagration not only in Syria but in the surrounding area.

Countries like Iraq, Jordan, Turkey and others are going to be pulled into this maelstrom, into this vortex, inevitably. And what we are seeing now is maybe a culmination of the decades long so-called broader Middle-East initiative of the United States which is simply to remake the political map from the nation of Mauritania on the Atlantic coast to Kazakhstan on the Chinese border and the US is going to throw this entire area into turmoil in furtherance of its own selfish and for the most part undisclosed geopolitical objective.

You were listening to an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop Nato website and mailing list.

US attack on Syria may cause WWIII - Rick Rozoff

AUGUST 28 2013 Download audio file

сирия война разрушения хомс

If the West is allowed to launch military aggression in Syria, using any pretext, Iran, Russia and China and the few remaining countries in the world who possess independent foreign policies will be left with no remaining buffer between themselves and the US – NATO war machine. Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff spoke about this and more in the second part of an interview covering the current crisis involving US aggression against Syria.

This is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff – the manager and owner of the stop NATO website and mailing list.

Robles: There was a statement from China that there is a threat, that this could culminate into beginning of World War III. Can you comment on that?

Rozoff: People are using this language and I think not without justification. If the parallel we established a few minutes ago about events in Asia and Europe from 1931 to 1941, and we should mention, by the way, that at the end of that decade there was Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union with the largest invasion force in human history and, in the end, the deadliest war in human history. But if at that time World War was grounded in a series of unprovoked and, unfortunately, unopposed acts of military aggression, then the parallel certainly could be extended to include that.

A comment today by a leading Prelate, a leading church official in Syria Antoine Audo, who is the head of what is called the Chaldean Catholic Church in Syria, he made precisely that statement.

He said that: “If there is outside” – which is to say Western and allied – “military intervention inside the country, it could lead to World War III”. Those are exactly his terms. And this is what he said in an interview with Vatican Radio.

Robles: What can you tell us about the region? I mean, in your opinion, for example Israel. I keep thinking that if they are going to destabilize the entire Middle East, right in the middle of it you’ve got Israel. You’ve got all these Islamic fundamentalists, extremists and terrorists and none of them are much in love with the Jewish state. How is Israel going to deal with this? Or is this part of the plan?

Rozoff: It appears to be counterintuitive but we have to recollect that the US’s second closest ally in the entire Middle Eastern region is of course Saudi Arabia, which is theocratic, it is Wahabist at root, you know, a severe form of theocratic government, it is medieval in many respects and particularly brutal.

But the US has no problem and Israel has no problem. You know, reconciling support for the Jewish secular state of Israel on the one hand, and for the medieval hereditary despotism in Saudi Arabia on the other. And the Obama Administration, which now is once again invoking humanitarianism as an excuse for a war, has no problem at all having just completed the largest bilateral arms deal in history with Saudi Arabia.

So, I suppose the average citizen of the US and of the world is not supposed to make comparisons and see just how egregiously contradictory those policies are. And then you claim to be fighting religious extremism, and on the other hand you are arming to the teeth the bastion of religious extremism in the Islamic world.

Robles: You mentioned Obama, you mentioned Egypt and the hypocrisy, and the double dealing that is going on. Have you heard anything about the fact that Obama was connected with Morsi, with the Egyptians, to the attack on the CIA installation in Benghazi where the CIA long-term agent Christopher Stevens was killed? Apparently, he was working on transferring Stinger Missiles to Al Qaeda elements in Syria and Libya.

Rozoff: Yes, that’s the interpretation I’m familiar with too without being able to substantiate it of course. But nevertheless, the US was simply going from strength to strength, it slipped from one massive bombing campaign on behalf of foreign mercenaries and domestic religious extremists in Libya to spreading the Washington- as well as the Saudi-backed Jihad, if you will, from Libya to Syria. And then, of course, that Stevens who incidentally was ensconced in Benghazi in the opening days of the attack against Libya in March 2011, basically, running weapons and Jihadi fighters into Libya for the war against the established Government of Muammar Gaddafi.

So, if the line in the Gospels about “he, who lives by the sword will perish by the sword” has any meaning, I think in the case of Mr. Stevens it is pretty obvious that what he put out in the world, is what came back to get him.

Robles: What about Obama now? Some people are saying that the fact that he was actively funding Al Qaeda and they ended up killing four Americans, is it possible that even with all these illegal aggressive wars and millions of people that have been killed by Bush and Obama – is it possible that these four Americans, including Stevens, might lead to the downfall of this regime, and Obama in particular? Is that realistic?

Rozoff: I don’t think it is realistic, I think it is possible. But I believe that nobody looks too closely into matters like that. And the so-called other side, the Republican Party, on foreign policy issues the political differences end at the shoreline, as has been remarked, and they are not going to look too closely at anything like that.

In fact, even during the two impeachment trials of Nixon in the early 1970s and Clinton at the end of the 1990s, and for that matter the Iran Contra Affair, you know, whenever one party can make some political capital out of embarrassing the other during congressional hearings, they’ll bring them right to the edge of the abyss and then pull them back out of the fear of really exposing what is going on.

I wouldn’t anticipate anything in that respect. I think, if I were a family member of one of those four killed in Benghazi, and I had strong feelings about it, I would be willing to dedicate the rest of my life to investigating what actually happened and who was ultimately responsible for that. But I wouldn’t expect anyone in our suborned and corrupt, and arrogant, and aloof political system to really care about the four people who were killed. And they’ll make points demagogically trying to blame somebody, but I don’t believe anyone has lost any sleep over the demise of Mr. Stevens and his three colleagues.

Robles: One more question. We’ve been going over this for years literally now and it looks like an invasion is just maybe hours away. Any other things you want to say about Bashar Assad and Syria?

Rozoff: I won’t characterize it as an invasion at this point any more than, say, the six-month war against Libya two years ago, it is technically speaking an invasion. And it is a very common modality now. It is one that we saw I think, first of all, in 1999 with the 78-day air war against Yugoslavia, and then saw it with Libya two and a half years ago.

But what we are seeing is that on the ground a heterogeneous grouping of the so-called opposition figures, some domestic extremists, some foreign, and mercenaries are used to be the spotters on the ground and those that attack government installations, and, if possible, bring about retaliation that can then be construed as a massacre, a crime against humanity, which then provides the West – the US and its NATO allies – with the justification for a military intervention, such as the Račak events in early 1999 in Kosovo which were characterized as a massacre by the US and its allies and that led to the air war.

We saw something very similar in Libya and of course that scenario is being played out again in Syria currently. And that permits the US and its allies with the overwhelming superiority and firepower, particularly in terms of missiles and aircraft, to just bombard an essentially defenseless nation which is much smaller than any of the major NATO members of course, and surely the US, with outdated and for the most part ineffective air defenses, to bomb that country into submission on behalf of the rebel forces that have been trained and armed from outside by the US and its allies.

So, we are seeing that scenario played out to perfection. And the only thing missing up until now of course was the sort of Račak massacre pretext. And now we have it.

Robles: So, your final assessment on this supposed chemical attack?

Rozoff: Considering that a year ago the Commander in Chief of the US Armed Forces Barack Obama stated specifically, tipping the hand of the West in terms of what they would use as the alleged reason for military aggression against Syria, that the use of chemical weapons was crossing a red line, and knowing that the Government of Syria would commit political suicide by doing such a thing – it is more than I think any sensible person would expect or could understand. And in fact, I think whatever the details are… and let’s be honest about it, it doesn’t matter what the details are. If Washington wants war, Washington is going to have war. And if it not this pretext, it is going to be another one.

Robles: I think for most sane and intelligent, and peace-loving civilized people in the world the details do matter. But when you have people and all they want is bloodshed, I guess you are right, the details don’t matter.

Rozoff: I mean they do not matter in that. We could spend the few remaining hours we may have left before Damascus is in flames arguing about whether the US lies can be disproven or not, or we can try at the 11th hour to try to marshal international outrage to get this stopped before it begins. That’s my plea.

Robles: What would you tell the international community?

Rozoff: Stop it here, or it is coming to your home! After Syria Lebanon, after Lebanon Iran, after Iran who knows who.

Robles: Last year it was what? Venezuela, China and Russia.

Rozoff: And two years ago it was both Libya and Ivory Coast, let’s not forget. And at this point, honestly, as we’ve talked about before, I sincerely doubt there are a dozen nations in the world, out of 194 members of the United Nations currently, that dare pursue any independent foreign policy and including explicitly in an expressly in military manner, are not tied to the Pentagon’s evolving and expanding international military nexus.

And having one of those dozen picked off today or tomorrow, or any time in the near future, means there are fewer and fewer left. And it is only a matter of time, seriously, before Iran, Russia and China are going to find there are no buffers left, there is nothing between them and the US-NATO war machine.

Robles: Rick, thank you very much. I’ll be speaking to you as this develops, if possible.

You were listening to an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff – the manager and owner of the stop NATO website and mailing list. 

Part 1 Syria is a toe-to-toe conflict between Russia and US - Rozoff

AUGUST 12 2013 20:31  Download audio file

Россия сша Россия

Reactions to recent statements by the outgoing Deputy Director of the CIA recently regarding the supposed threat to US security from the government of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, have caused and precipitated reactions and debate far and wide. The seeming 360 degree complete about face, after more than two years of known US efforts to topple the government of Bashar Al-Assad has many wondering as to the mental fortitude of Washington’s Geopolitical Architect’s.

This is John Robles I am speaking to Mister Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Greeting between Robles and Rozoff

Robles: You know what’s going on, I think, better than anybody. The CIA switches the flip in Syria. First they start secretly arming the extremists, importing mercenaries, terrorists, al-Qaeda to destabilize and overthrow Assad, then they decide they’re going openly arm these people. Now they’re saying the biggest danger is: “… if the government of Bashar al-Assad falls.” Can you make any sense of this for us?

Rozoff: I wish I could. I know what you’re alluding to: a statement by the outgoing, if he has not already left the position, Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, a 33-year veteran of the agency, incidentally, Michael Morell.

He made a statement stating that not only would the overthrow of the Bashar al-Assad government in Damascus be a catastrophe for Syria but for the region, his exact comments according to an interview he granted to the Wall Street Journal, is that the government’s weapons, in the event of an overthrow of the government, would be up for grabs and up for sale, just as in Libya. So it’s a replication of the Libyan model as we warned about!

Now how seriously are we to take this? Is this the deathbed conversion, if you will, of someone who is now leaving ”The Company”, the Central Intelligence Agency, after almost a third of a century there and is able to speak freely, or is this something off the cuff that isn’t to be seen as indicative, or emblematic of a general position, or this is a trial balloon?

You know, we’re dealing with some pretty disreputable people when we talk about intelligence operatives in Langley Virginia and so forth. Their motives are never pure. Let’s be sure about that.

Robles: I seriously doubt that there is some possibility that it’s some independent comment. Calling Syria:”… a top threat to US security” and I quote him, is completely ridiculous.

Rozoff: You know, under the seeming guise, the apparent guise of warning about the unforeseen consequences, or “unintended” consequences, let’s say, of the U.S. getting what it wants in Syria: that is having the government toppled by a motley hodge-podge of terrorists and mercenary elements, who then could go with weapons appropriated from the Syrian government.

He doesn’t say a word, by the way, about the advanced weaponry presented to the Free Syrian Army and getting into the hands of people like al-Nusra, a terrorist organization that’s being supplied by NATO countries and by their allies in the Persian Gulf. That he hasn’t a word to say about of course.

But the models he’s evoking, he explicitly referred to Libya two years ago, but I think the original, once again, is Afghanistan in the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, where the U.S. armed a motley coalition of extremist elements with Stinger Missiles and other advanced weaponry a lot of which is still not accounted for, or has been used in internecine fights between the rival groups of rebels that the U.S. supported in Afghanistan, just as in Libya.

Even as we speak, what there is of a government in Libya has apparently sent a hundred armored vehicles into the capital of Tripoli to try to maintain order, even in the capital of the country. The rest of the country is presumably up for grabs.

Robles: This was just a few hours ago.

Rozoff: That’s correct, I mean just in recent hours. And if this is a model indeed as Morrell (I don’t know if he pronounces his surname MOrell or MorEll, I don’t know where he puts the stress) but, the deputy CIA director is indicating this would happen, he, at another point says, (this by the way is factually true): that the overthrow of the government in Damascus would lead to a destabilization of the region and would affect countries like Jordan and Iraq and so forth. But the U.S. knew that when it began the effort to destabilize and overthrow the government in Syria.

Reminder

Rozoff: The fact that he’s “got religion” or that he’s had a “Damascus Road Conversion” and is all of the sudden concerned about what’s going on seems disingenuous surely, and as you mention, the fact that he would portray a destabilized, or a new regime in Syria, as presenting any sort of national security threat to the United States, is as ludicrous, if not bizarre and delusional, as you indicate it is.

Robles: Do you think there is some possibility… (I mean this is maybe a little far-fetched),but okay! Worst-case-scenario: Is this opening a can-of-worms where they are just going to go in and wipe everybody out?

Rozoff: That’s a distinct possibility but we have to keep in mind the Benghazi incident, U.S. officials may in fact be preparing their own domestic populous for the eventuality that: should the US’s desire be fulfilled and a puppet regime of some sort is installed in Syria, then a similar situation may evolve as to what has occurred, and is occurring in Libya, where there’s anarchy, chaos, internecine bloody fighting throughout the country and where some “innocent” U.S. CIA agents may end up, you know, on the wrong end of a bullet, which is the only concern, of course, they would have in Washington.

I mean what would happen to the Syrian or Libyan people is of absolutely no concern to them, any more than what has happened to the people of Iraq or Afghanistan, for example. But the fact that they concerted effort has been made on the diplomatic front and covertly, in terms of providing fighters, “rat lines” for bringing in terrorist mercenaries into Syria, coordinated by the United States, its NATO allies in Europe and their so-called “democratic” allies, and NATO partners, incidentally, in the Persian Gulf, like Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

Everything is in place… (I don’t know how much importance to really attribute to these statements by Morell) except that some of them, indeed are true. But have been self-evident, appaddictive if you will, for the last year and a half, I mean any sensible person could have told you what would happen, based on similar experiences in Iraq, in Kosovo and certainly most recently in Libya.

We know what to expect. For that matter again, in 1992 in Afghanistan, we know exactly what to expect when the U.S.‘s cohorts and proxies take power. They start carving each other up, they plunge the entire country and the society of that country, into lawlessness and brutality, And then you have the destruction of a nation and a culture.

Robles: Do you think that this is another “repackaging” of a “pretext” for military intervention?

Rozoff: There’s really no enthusiasm about entering into another military conflict in Syria, though we do have to recall that John McCain and Lindsay Graham, once again, a propos the Edward Snowden affair, have threatened Russia with bringing countries like Georgia into NATO, increasing the missile system in Europe, but also, by implication, forcing Russia down, in Syria because this is much larger than just simply replacing the government in Damascus.

This is a question of Russia having more firmly and more consistently than I know post-Soviet Russia to have ever done before in a foreign policy issue, with the possible exception of the Caucasus War five years ago, in South Ossetia. But what we’ve seen over the last two and a half years is that Russia, three times exercising its veto in the United Nations Security Council in conjunction with China. That’s an unprecedented triple veto by two permanent members of the Security Council.

On the question of Syria Russia has committed itself with a persistence and a strength that I believe is unprecedented in the entire post-Soviet period. Whereas Russia has certainly opposed, you know, acts of unjustified military aggression in the post-Cold War period with Iraq ten years ago, with Libya to some degree too, two years ago, with Yugoslavia in 1999 and so forth, you know this is a precedent that Russia has established by defending international law in Syria.

Without any indication that it’s going to back down, meaning that the stakes have been raised appreciably, where for the U.S. to persist in its hell-bent desire to topple the government and effect a regime in Syria is more an open toe to toe conflict with Russia, than it is (as we talked about on previous occasions) than it is simply a matter of changing the government by overthrowing it in Damascus. We are talking about a much more serious proposition right now.

Part 2 Lavrov never loses his cool, Obama infantile – Rick Rozoff

AUGUST 14 2013  Download audio file

 АТЭС Сергей Лавров АТЭС

Any US claim that they are going to launch lethal drone strikes inside Syria as they did several months ago, without even the pretense of having the authorization of the government, is an act of yet further international lawlessness. Voice of Russia regular Rick Rozoff gives his analysis of the recent statements by the CIA with regard to Syria.

This is John Robles. I am speaking to Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner and menager of the Stop NATO website and the International mailing list.

Robles: How do you think that's going to play out with Russia, this new possible pretext? Do you think maybe they are looking for a way out, maybe, or... Do you think that's possible?

Rozoff: There was a comment today by the Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, kind of a back handed slap at the infantile and provocative antics of President Obama, who has postponed, or has canceled, indeed, proposed or scheduled summit with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, and Sergey Lavrov said about the meeting today US time of the Foreign and Defense Ministers, both Secretaries and Ministers of both countries that, you know, it's time for a “grown-up” discussion, on these issues and I think that, you know it, quite clearly, you know, somebody like Sergey Lavrov, the Foreign Minister of Russia, you know, he is a seasoned diplomat, he is mature, he is able to control his emotions and not to make unwanted, almost childlike comments like the ones coming out of the White House...

Robles: No, I think he is a very true diplomat. I mean, I've been watching him for years and years, I've never seen him once... you know...

Rozoff: … lose his cool or say something untoward. You would have to define to Americans certainly anyone 50 years of age or younger what the word “diplomat” means. We've not seen any.

Robles: And it was wonderful, I am sorry, I just want underline it, it was wonderful today, because I actually heard him speak for the first time in English, and his English is wonderful.

Rozoff: I've never heard Lavrov speak in English, but there's again... I can't think of an American Secretary of State...

Robles: Perfect!

Rozoff: … who spoke a second language. That's not necessary if you are the global empire. You know, your tributariers and vassals to quote Zbigniew Brzezinski have to speak your language. And pay you their tribute in the coin of the realm, they have to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s in Caesar’s language moreover.

Robles: So, anyway, back to the CIA proclamation by the Deputy Director. What other insights can you tell us about his comments?

Rozoff: You know, it could be a question as we've eluded to of kind of hedging his bets, should the worst case scenario, (worst case scenario for the world and for Syria) not necessarily for the US occur, and that there is a toppling of the government in Syria and then you have a new hotbed of terrorism that spreads across the border, we have to remember one of the three major fighting groups that the US and company are supporting. In addition to the Free Syrian Army and the Al Nusra Front, is something called the Islamic State of Iraq.

What you have are Sunni extremists, Wahabi extremists, unquestionably supported, armed, financed by Saudi Arabia, fighting inside Syria.

So, not only perpetrating bombings, killings of Shiite, Christians and other minorities inside Iraq, they are spreading this dubious jihad across the border into Syria, and certainly into Lebanon. So, you know what the US may be doing is: in the event the US would succeed in regime change in Syria, they have then already prepared the groundwork for saying: “See we warned you that certain unsavory elements might gain influence or come to the fore, something of that sort...

Robles: O.K., so, no one is going to blame them for arming these enemies to begin with, right?

Rozoff: Yeah they have plausible deniability, we warned you that they were not all a nice group of characters. However it was also roughly almost a year ago when the Obama administration, the White House was talking about the necessity perhaps of waging drone warfare against some of their non-preferred fighters among the rebel groups within Syria, which, I don’t think one was to have taken seriously at that time either.

What it was was that the US would reserve the right to launch drone or perhaps even cruise missile attacks inside the country, and then sugar-coat that by saying they are trying to weed out extremist elements amongst the rebel groups, the rebel armed groups fighting inside Syria.

Robles: Right.

Rozoff: But you know that no country has the right to state that they reserve the prerogative of launching lethal missile strikes inside the territory of any other country.

Robles: Sure, sure. No matter how you paint it, I mean, you can call ti a “preventive air strike” or “humanitarian invention”, or whatever you want to call it, but it is still an act of aggression, which is illegal under international law.

Rozoff: Sure, and we know that just in recent hours the US has succeeded in killing some 34 people in Yemen in drone strikes, but the assumption, as in the case of the Yemen or Pakistan that the government, at least passively permits the United States to do it, if it doesn’t acknowledge it is doing so. But, you know, in the case of Syria, self-evidently, they would not have the permission of the government.

So for the US to claim they are going to launch lethal drone strikes inside Syria as they did several months ago, without even the pretense of having the authorization of the government, it's an act of yet further international lawlessness.

Robles: Yeah, completely. Thanks a lot, Rick, it was a pleasure speaking to you.

Rozoff: Yes, same here, thanks. 

NATO will make sure Russia is an enemy – Rick Rozoff

AUGUST 05 2013  Download audio file

Россия НАТО

Upcoming NATO military exercises envisage an attack on Poland and an Article 5 NATO intervention against A4 in power. To the dismay of Russia, these exercises continue the outdated Cold War thinking of the West, which refuses to let go of such stereotypes and continues to assure peace and understanding between the nations. NATO and the West have an agenda, and that agenda is complete and total military domination of the world. Operation Steadfast Jazz 2013 underlines the real intentions of the alliance and further serves to destabilize the world in a region where countries should be working for peace. It is clear that the West is being controlled by the military industrial complex and that peace is not something they envision. NATO, as an organization, should have been disbanded after the collapse of the Warsaw Pact. But they have done quite the opposite and have continued with a global expansion that has made NATO the single largest military power in the history of the world.

This is John Robles. I’m speaking to Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Rick, how are you this evening for you and morning for me. How are you doing?

Rozoff: I’m doing well, John. I hope you are also.

Robles: Thanks. Very busy lately. We have a lot of stuff going on. NATO is up and jumping almost everywhere we look, making threats to Russia, getting very active in the Baltics. What’s going on, Rick?

Rozoff: You’ve begun the discussion well I think, that’s a string we can pull to bring in the entire fabric. What’s happening indeed, you know, most recently a statement occurred in YLE News in Finland, a news story rather, quoting a Pentagon official, a fairly high-ranking one, one James Townsend, a civilian, he’s Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for European and NATO Policy, I think the fact that the Pentagon views Europe and NATO as one entity essentially is revealing, as the title suggests.

Townsend, the Pentagon official, was basically telling Russia it’s none of their business if the U.S. drags Finland into the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization, and that if Russia is going to say something about it, the U.S. can demonstrate that it too has a say in the matter, or words to that effect. In other words, the US can back down Russia or bluff or threaten it. I mean it really was a threat, and it had a very intimidating quality to his comments.

We have talked, I believe, on your program not too long ago John, about the fact that the military in Sweden, Sweden’s top military commander, not too long ago, a couple or three months ago, came up with an absolutely absurd but dangerous scenario stating that Sweden, hither to of course a neutral country, might have to join NATO because, if Russia attacked it, the Swedish armed forces couldn’t withstand it for five minutes. And we are seeing similar scenarios play out throughout Scandinavia and in the Baltic region.

Basically, this is a concentrated and concerted effort by the United States and its allies to build up a Nordic-Baltic military force. And you had an article yourself in just the last two or three days, the NATO so-called “Phantom Menace” in relation to military activity in Norway.

Of course, Norway has a short border with Russia. Finland has a lengthy borer with Russia. And what we are seeing just in the last few days the fact that the Army Corp of Engineers issued a contract to Kellog, Brown and Root and began the construction of a military facility in Romania, where US interceptor missiles are going to be stationed, that’s right across the Black Sea from Russia, that currently, or very shortly the U.S. is leading air exercises, including paratroop exercises, in Bulgaria.

The US is increasingly expanding and consolidating its military influence in Georgia, which borders Russia, the same as Azerbaijan. But what we are seeing most of right now, another dangerous statement, one you alluded to I believe in your article, is the fact that a deputy defense minister in Russia pointed out the fact that the upcoming military exercise that will be conducted by the US and NATO, this year’s iteration of what’s called Steadfast Jazz, Steadfast Jazz 2013, which is going to occur in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, according to the Russian Deputy Defense Minister statement under the Article 5 scenario, Article 5 is, of course, NATO’s Washington Treaty, the North Atlantic Treaty of 1949 treaty, it is the part of the NATO founding document that states that all NATO members are obligated to militarily defend another one.

So as you clearly indicated in your article, there is no conceivable adversary that fits in that scenario, except for Russia. There would be some potential threat to Poland and to the Baltic states, clearly even with the overly imaginative capabilities of NATO and US officials to attribute military capacities to nations like Iran and north Korea, which they certainly do not have and could not develop.

In the case of the Baltic Sea and Russia’s north-west borders, that would be even beyond absurd, it would be an absolutely ludicrous contention, so that clearly Russia is the portrayed aggressor in this Article 5 scenario. And that goes quite in keeping with the statement by the military chief of Sweden recently, the statement by the Pentagon official about Finland joining NATO.

We have to recall that Finland maintained its neutrality during the Cold War, the half century or more of the Cold War, as did Sweden, only to have both countries right now standing on the doorstep of the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization, where, when they join, they become essentially military outposts for the Pentagon.

Robles: Rick, we talked about that these kind of training exercises by NATO, The Defense Ministry said they were bewildered by these exercises, again we are talking about Steadfast Jazz 2013, that you’ve mentioned I wrote about and you’ve commented about yourself, I believe it was Anatoly Antonov, deputy defense minister of the Russian Federation.

Nobody can understand, and they are baffled by this, why do they continue demonizing Russia, when Russia has done nothing and has no intention and no geopolitical reasoning to engage in any aggression against Poland or these countries. Why do you think, if we can voice it, why are they doing this?

Rozoff: There are two points. The North-Atlantic Treaty Organization, which again I have to give you credit, you mentioned in your article, is the largest – in terms of membership, in terms of its military capability, military alliance or bloc in history, it’s one that is growing daily through partnerships and eventually will expand yet further with full members. But it is one which came into existence in 1949 under the guise of protecting Europe from the Soviet menace, so that the Russian Federation being the successor state to the Soviet Union, I suppose it is incumbent on NATO to keep it around as a boogieman to justify military expansion of the United States into Eastern Europe, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea and eventually if they have their way into the Caspian Sea.

So, the facts speak for themselves. It is painfully evident to me that the U.S. is using an implied if not overtly stated Russian threat as a justification for its military expansion throughout Eastern Europe.

Robles: If there’s no enemy then why do this?

Rozoff: They will make sure that Russia is an enemy. They will do it by baiting it, by intimidating it, by encircling it militarily.

There was an article incidentally today by way of parallel, in Stars and Stripes, the Armed Forces publication in the United States, that quite openly said, you know with a degree of candor you’ll find in a military which you won’t find in a civilian one, that the U.S. is moving sophisticated warplanes to the nations where they have never divulged they are going to be deployed before, including Singapore, Philippines and Australia, in an effort to “surround China.” Those are the exact words in the article of yesterday’s Stars and Stripes.

And they mentioned that what is going now with the Asia Pacific pivot in surrounding China militarily is comparable to what the U.S. did during the Cold War with the Soviet Union, but I would say, and the facts incontestably back this up, that the United States has done in the post-Cold War, post- Soviet period is surrounding the Russian Federation far more than they ever succeeded in doing during the Cold War.

Military buildup around Syria points to another invasion - Rozoff

July 23, 2013   Download audio file 

сирия армия правительственный войска сирия война алеппо

The dressing down and attempted humiliation of General Martin Dempsey, the Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, by superannuated life-time bureaucrat John McCain, was another in a long series of attempts to push the U.S. military into another act of aggressive war by those controlling Washington. With the amassed U.S. and NATO military forces and hardware around Syria and the advancements made by the Syria Army, the likelihood that the U.S. will invade and commit another act of aggressive war against yet another country they have helped to destabilize and tear apart seems very likely. Regular Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff spoke to the VOR about these matters and more.

PART 1

This is John Robles I’m speaking to Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick. How are you this evening?

Rozoff: Very good John.

Robles: What is going on with all the saber rattling surrounding Syria? Do you think there is a chance that the U.S. may be up to something, or that they are planning an invasion in the near future?

Rozoff: They certainly intend direct military action against the government of Syria, and you characterized it correctly by using the term “saber rattling”. Gunboat diplomacy and brinkmanship and other similar terms from the colonial era, I think also are apropos in this context.

What is most disturbing and it’s something that many of your listeners may be aware of by now, but just today the Senate confirmation, actually reconfirmation hearings for the Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff and his second in command, General Martin Dempsey, was dressed down rather rudely and even brusquely by Senator John McCain, who in recent years with his colleagues, Lindsey Graham from South Carolina, and until recently, until he retired, Joseph Lieberman from Connecticut, formed a triumvirate of U.S. Senators, almost like the imperial Roman Pro-Councils that would travel around the world inciting hostilities against other countries. We’ve talked about this on your show before. A traveling war circus is how I characterized it, but you know, McCain and Graham being the two survivors of that trio.

McCain, in so many words humiliated, this is really pretty stark. I’ve just seen the transcripts of it, and accounts of it but I can imagine what this looks like to see a superannuated, life-time bureaucrat like McCain, dress down and attempt to humiliate the head of the U.S. Armed Forces and essentially accusing him of being cowardly and indecisive and irresolute because he won’t go to war against Syria, there is no other way of interpreting McCain’s comments, and then finally browbeating Dempsey, the same Dempsey who had warned earlier this year, in February, that enforcing a no-fly zone over Syria, ipso facto, constituted war, an act of war, which in fact it would be. Finally, coaxing out of Dempsey the statement that no options were off the table and that “kinetic strikes”, meaning airstrikes and strikes on the warships in Mediterranean, were something the U.S. military has considered, so I can’t think of any other way of describing or characterizing or interpreting the comments both by McCain and by the U.S. military chief Dempsey except an avid and almost passionate desire to have some sort of military action taken against Syria.

Now we have to remember, this occurs immediately after joint massive military exercises in two countries bordering Syria led by the United States. That is in both Jordan and Turkey almost simultaneously. They overlapped towards the end of June, “Eager Lion” as it was called in Jordan, where there are 8,000 troops from 19 nations. These are NATO nations, the U.S. and its allies and their Arab allies, through the Mediterranean Dialogue and the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative.

The reports came out, and they were picked up by the Voice of Russia, as a matter of fact, from other press-wires, that the US intended, during the course of those exercises, to retain 700 troops in Jordan along with Patriot Interceptor Missiles of the sort that NATO has now deployed in Turkey and military aircraft, I believe F-16s. And in Turkey you had similar large-scale multinational exercises between NATO members and their Arab allies, involving NATO AWACS surveillance aircraft and 50 fighter jets.

So, you see the potential for military buildup, some of these are annual exercises, like the Eager Lion one in Jordan, but the fact they’re being held in countries bordering Syria, with just the cast of characters you would expect to participate in an attack on Syria, something comparable, perhaps even on a larger scale perhaps, comparable to what was used against Libya two years ago and were used in the invasions and occupation of Iraq both in 1991 and in 2003.

So, we have all this going on at the same time. Incidentally increasing encroachment around Syria, and incidentally one step removed, around Iran with the U.S. son-of-Star-Wars missile shield system, Patriot Missiles and eventually Standard Missile 3 and other interceptors and radars, is a pretty ominous development, it suggests that again they’re preparing for war.

And we have to recall that NATO has only twice before deployed AWACS and interceptor missiles, Patriot Advanced Capability 3 Missiles, and that was in 1993 for the attack against Iraq, and in 2003 for the invasion of Iraq.

So one would be hard-pressed to miss the analogy in the fact that the military buildup, and this is all compounded by, and this came across in the Senate hearings today, it is compounded by the fact that Martin Dempsey, the head of the US military, has acknowledged, what everyone now knows, is that the tide has turned inside Syria, where government forces and their allies have scored fairly decisive, and I think at this point irreversible gains, against internal rebel forces and their foreign mercenary allies, or backbone, and the more desperate the situation becomes for the U.S. and its NATO partners’ proxies inside the country, I think the more apt the hot heads like “McCain and Company” are going to be in terms of pushing a direct U.S. military aggression.

Robles: How far along would you say is the political buildup compared to before the invasion of Libya, before the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan? Do you see the same mechanisms and strings being pulled? Or was McCain kind of on his own here? What’s going on there?

Rozoff: I am glad you asked that question particularly about Libya. This is maybe a study on two different scenarios, opposing scenarios, with Iraq which eventually culminated in the U.S.-British attack on, and invasion of the country in March of 2003, there’d been a build up, I think in a lot of people’s minds, for a year and a half since events of 9-11 2001, it was clear that the U.S. was going to use those attacks in New York and Washington D.C., as a pretext for invading Iraq.

So there was plenty of time to anticipate and to organize against, what was maybe not an imminent, but was certainly an unavoidable, inexorable threat to Iraq, whereas with Libya it was a matter of only some 6 weeks between the first protest that irrupted in Benghazi, and the first U.S. and British cruise missiles that landed inside the country.

So, the turnaround time was appreciably abbreviated, in relation to previous wars such as that 8 years earlier in Iraq in 2003.

I fear then that the Libya precedent is more likely to be at work with Syria, that with the turn of a dime, if you will, that the “U.S. and Company”, which has amphibious assault ships right in the Eastern Mediterranean now, which participated for example, in the Jordanian exercises and in the official U.S. Armed Forces publication Stars and Stripes, they had an article 4-5 days ago the actual quote was “U.S. amphibious assault navy vessels are parked off the coast of Syria”, or words to that effect.

It is clear that the U.S., through the Sixth Fleet in Mediterranean and NATO through Operation Active Endeavour in the Mediterranean, the U.S. Fifth Fleet in the Persian Gulf, that they have the military assets, particularly the naval ones, to put in place very quickly.

NATO is antithetical to the spirit of the United Nations - PART1

9 June, 2013 02:21  Download audio file

колумбия флаг

Columbia may be on a list for membership in NATO further expanding what was originally a North Atlantic defense organization, into a global offensive military bloc, in effect taking over the world. Rick Rozoff spoke about this and more in an interview with the Voice of Russia.

Hello! This is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff the owner of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick! How are you?

Rozoff: Very good John, thanks for having me on.

Robles: Can you give us a little bit of your insights into what is going on down there in Columbia? Now NATO seems to be expanding to South America as well?

Rozoff: Yes, I’m glad you raised that issue. It’s been in the news for the last 24 hours or so. And there have been disclaimers being issued already, particularly by the Colombian Government, which I don’t believe wants to acknowledge it. But the story from Agence France-Presse, the French press service quoted some Assistant Secretary State for the State Department, one Roberta Jacobson, stating exactly, here’s the quote: “Our goal is certainly to support Columbia as being a capable and strong member of lots of different international organizations, and that might well include NATO.”

So, the reference was to Columbia, we’ll talk about this in a moment, but her phraseology certainly suggests that not only is Columbia being prepared as a partner for NATO, but conceivably at some point in the future it might be the first country outside of the Euro-Atlantic area, or the North Atlantic Ocean area to become a member of NATO, according to her language.

There’s been some backtracking on that since, particularly by the Columbian Government.

But I think it is important to realize that the last Chief Military Commander of NATO, Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, James Stavridis, an American Admiral, who prior to coming to that position as both the European Commander… the top military commander of NATO, was the top military commander for Southern Command, which takes in Latin America as a whole: Central America, South America and the Caribbean. And he had mentioned several months ago that Columbia might well be a troop contributing nation, that’s an official designation by NATO, for the war in Afghanistan.

Though for several years now John, there’ve been reports fairly credible that Columbia had already sent security personnel, as well as troops (regular army troops, counterinsurgency troops to be exact) to Afghanistan to serve under NATO, even if not officially. So, this is simply a consolidation and concretization of a relationship that’s been in the making for some time.

Robles: Isn’t there some problem with the international law or NATO’s own charter to just keep expanding like this?

Rozoff: With the international law no, unless somebody goes to the United Nations, I think it’s long overdue incidentally, and stipulates that no nation or group of nations has the right to form an offensive international military bloc that is waging war, legally or illegally, but certainly aggressively, in three continents over the last 14 years as we know, in Southeastern Europe, South Asia…

Robles: Wasn’t that one of the reasons that the United Nations itself was setup to prevent something like what happened with the Nazi Germany?

Rozoff: You’re exactly correct. Wars of aggression or settling border and other disputes between nations by military means was to have been banned. That was also the intent of the League of Nations after WW I and the Kellog-Briand Treaty, and a number of other efforts.

So, in spirit, if not in direct letter, of the United Nations Charter, of course, NATO is antithetical, contrary to the very spirit, as you’re indicating, of why the United Nations was setup, and to trust NATO’s own charter, if in fact they are or ever were supposedly a defensive military alliance set up to defend nations in Western and to some extent Southern, Europe against the perceived threat from Eastern Europe at that time, then we have to recollect that both the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union itself formally dissolved themselves in 1991, 22 years ago.

So, even if people, more credulous than myself I suppose, believe that NATO has anything to do with being a defensive alliance up until 1991, surely they cannot make that representation, that argument currently.

I think what is significant about Columbia is that although the nation of El Salvador is an official troop contributing nation for the war in Afghanistan with a small contingent serving under NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), Columbia, should it be made an official partner of NATO, becomes one on the sixth continent in which NATO will have members and partners.

Obviously, from its inception, in both North America and Europe and subsequent to that there’ve been, in the Mediterranean dialog for example, there are five partner states in North Africa, Libya is soon to be the sixth.

The story that just broke yesterday where; at a defense ministers’ meeting at NATO headquarters, Chuck Hagel the US Defense Secretary and other NATO defense secretaries were talking about NATO offering to train, which is to say build, the armed forces and other security personnel in Libya. So, at least six countries in Africa have, or will shortly have, partnerships with NATO. Same thing in Asia.

And of course Australia is a major NATO ally. It is the second largest non-NATO contributor of troops for the war in Afghanistan, Georgia has now supersceded it as being the first.

So, you have a US-led military alliance that now has, with the inclusion of Columbia, as full members and partners, in every inhabited continent, in every continent but Antarctica. And I actually wrote, a year or more ago, that Columbia, when it joins a broader NATO network around the world, and will do so under the aegis of the newest NATO program called, aptly enough, Partners Across the Globe.

Robles: You’ve predicted all kinds of stuff in the past.

You mentioned Libya a minute ago, what’s the situation right now in Libya? Because the last I heard, it was sinking into a state of anarchy and they were talking about moving in troops, to stabilize the country that was destroyed by their previous invasion.

Rozoff: That’s it, exactly. You know, a six month long NATO bombing campaign and naval blockade had its desired effect.

You are talking about the military of 28 countries, altogether in NATO, representing almost a sixth of the human race with a combined military budget of over a trillion dollars a year, taking on a small, practically defenseless nation, Libya in 2011, and waging a six-month-long so-called operation Unified Protector.

The reason the NATO is now talking about training the security personnel inside Libya, much as it’s done already in Iraq and in Afghanistan, is because the country is devolved into an, almost European 30 Years War sort of scenario, with rival gangs fighting each other, plundering the resources of the country, throwing the country, as you indicate, into turmoil. And it’s been going on for a good two years.

Robles: I remember way back when, I mean, people used to talk about nation building and advanced planning for after these invasions and stuff. They don’t do that anymore, do they? They just go in, take out the leader and who cares what happens afterwards, right?

Rozoff: Yes, you know, “after me the deluge” (Après moi, le déluge) or “after me the catastrophe”, and that’s in fact, that’s a good description of it John. That’s what the Balkans look like, that’s what Iraq looks like, Afghanistan and now Libya, and you know should the West have its way, that’s what Syria would look like, in sort order, you’d have gangs like Al Nusra and others, running rampant, running riot, throughout the country, and throwing it into complete chaos and pandemonium…

Will Syrian “rebels” swear they’re not going to eat someone’s organs? PART2

Download audio file  21 June, 2013 06:48  

The US and its NATO allies are backing what can only be described as murderous cannibalistic savages in Syria but according to Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff: “Apparently, nobody is too gruesome, too ghoulish, too fiendish for the US and its NATO allies not to portray them as freedom fighters, fund them, arm them, train them and bomb the country they're attacking on their behalf.”

Hello, this is John Robles. I'm speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Advance planning for after these invasions and stuff: they don't do that anymore, do they? They just go in, take out the leader and who cares what happens afterwards, right?

Rozoff: Yes, you know, “after me the deluge” (Après moi, le déluge) or “after me the catastrophe”, and that’s in fact, that’s a good description of it John. That’s what the Balkans look like, that’s what Iraq looks like, Afghanistan and now Libya, and you know should the West have its way, that’s what Syria would look like, in short order, you’d have gangs like Al Nusra and others, running rampant, running riot, throughout the country, and throwing it into complete chaos and pandemonium.

Robles: I'm glad you mentioned Syria. Before we began recording, you mentioned something about President Vladimir Putin and something he said, which I think reflects really well on the situation that the West is promoting in Syria.

Rozoff: Yes, I didn’t get to read the entirety of it but on Interfax today Russian President Vladimir Putin, in discussing the upcoming Geneva meeting on Syria, the one negotiated by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and American Secretary of State John Kerry, made the comment, I don’t know off the cuff, or quite directly perhaps, that he hopes that the Western-backed opposition forces don't include in their numbers any cannibals.

And that was clearly an allusion to a videotape that has been making the rounds for the last month or so, where a commander of the so-called “rebel” outfit in Syria (I assume it was a corpse at the time they got started on it) carved up the body of a Syrian soldier identified, they condemned the victim, as having been a member of another branch of Islam, Alawite, and apparently he thought he was eating the heart, I mean he needs some remedial anatomy lessons. But the people who watched the video (I’ve seen it and it it is enough to sicken one) but people watching suggest he actually cut out part of a lung and ate it, red and steaming.

Robles: Oh my God!!

Rozoff: And from what I’ve read subsequent to that, somebody interviewed this very same person about it and he defended that action, and suggested in so many words that the Alawite religious minority in Syria as a whole could face such a fate.

Robles: And these are…? I just want to underline this. These are the same “opposition freedom fighters” quote unquote, that the US wants to arm to the teeth and deliver weapons to?

Rozoff: That’s it, exactly! When the US Senator John McCain, a self-appointed ambassador of war around the world…

Robles: Didn't McCain say that they'll make sure the weapons are only going to the hands of those…what word did he use? The…?

Rozoff: “Moderates, responsible” forces.

What do they do? Take the Scouts Pledge? I mean, they’ll put the hand in the air and swear that they are not fanatics and they are not going to ingest and eat somebody’s internal organs?

I think they obviously know who's going to receive the weapons. But again, if the lessons of Libya, Kosovo, Afghanistan tell us anything – it is that the US not only cannot and will not prevent weapons going into the hands of the most extreme and brutal elements, it will exactly select those elements for the lion’s share of the weapons, as it did with the likes of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and others in Afghanistan in 1980s, as it did with Hashim Thaçi and Ramush Haradinaj and creatures like that in Kosovo in the late 1990s.

So, this is not to be taken seriously. But the fact is, yes, these are exactly the elements that would likely be the beneficiary of US and European arms, with the EU also dropping the ban on weapons for opposition forces within Syria, a move that has been condemned rightly by Russia, amongst other nations.

In the “proud” tradition of the Afghan Mujahidins, supported by the US in the 80s, that skinned the Soviet conscripts alive and threw acid in the face of female teachers while being funded to the tune of billions by the US Government.

Or the organ harvesting and sex slaving, and drugs smuggling Kosovo Liberation Army in the Balkans. And now we are seeing something quite similar in Syria.

Apparently, nobody is too gruesome, too ghoulish, too fiendish for the US and its NATO allies not to portray them as freedom fighters, fund them, arm them, train them and bomb the country they're attacking on their behalf.

Robles: My goodness!

John Kerry, he's made some pretty reasonable sounding statements regarding Syria. He also made some pretty harsh statements to Israel which I found refreshing, I might say.

Rozoff: Yes, he could hardly not appear to be comparatively better, you know, coming on the heels of Hillary Clinton. You know, the devil incarnate, if he were to succeed Clinton, would probably have the world’s sympathy for a short period of time only because of how horrendous his predecessor would have been.

And we have to keep in mind, this is Hilary Clinton who roundly condemned Russia and China saying not long ago – a year ago – that Russia and China would have to "pay a price", that’s a quote from her, vis-a-vis Syria.

She condemned the Russian federal elections in December of 2011 as "being neither free, nor fair”. This is somebody who was on a rampage almost every week ordering some head of state to step down from Ivory Coast to Yemen, from Libya to Syria, so that any modicum of moderation or civility, as Kerry, I agree with you is exhibiting currently, appears all that is much better and contrast to what came before him.

I'm a little bit upset about the statement, however, that the US has now entered late and perhaps so belatedly as to be ineffectual in the process of reaching a political decision in Syria, because that certainly leaves open the prospect that as no diplomatic solution of the crisis inside the country is possible, the US may reserve a military option and intervene in some other manner. But I think you're absolutely correct that those comments were at least an indirect jibe at his predecessor Hilary Clinton, who instead of demanding a regime change and taking the most hostile and uncompromising, and recalcitrant position on the issue, you know, had she even gone through the motions of suggesting genuine diplomatic measures, including at the UN…

Robles: Oh no, she constantly went on and on about the “forceful removal”…. And that's all she wanted to talk about.

Rozoff: That's true. And even if that was the US objective, and clearly it was and remains so, there are certain diplomatic protocols one can abide by in civilized nations, where you don't make it so overtly obvious and you don’t insult other people in the way that she did Russia and China.

I mean truthfully in my life, I’m 60 years of age, and I can remember Secretaries of State going back to the Kennedy administration and perhaps the Eisenhower one, and I can’t remember anyone making statements quite as insulting and uncompromising, and just gratuitously hostile as Clinton, the one I just cited about “Russia and China would have to pay a price”.

Robles: Oh yes! Well, that was one of the more I think moderate ones coming from her.

Rozoff: Yes, this is the same person who, you know, the day after she had gone to Tripoli to order the hit on Muammar Gaddafi, who was in hiding and the following day was killed in a very brutal and appalling manner, and she was shown the picture of his battered and mutilated corpse, and her first comment was: “Wow!” You know, as though you are talking about some 11-year-old girl seeing a new dance step or something. And shortly thereafter she was shown something else on a cell phone and her exact comment was: “We came, we saw he is dead”.

Robles: This was the one she did I think with Barbara Walters, where she was giggling and seemed to be beside herself with joy, right?

Rozoff: That’s it. You know, some pretty adolescent girl on her first date or something, but you are talking about the gruesome murder of a head of state and a man who was almost 70 years of age. This is the sort of person we are talking about.

We also have to recall that Kerry was the Democratic Party nominee for the Presidency in 2004, and he lost. And Clinton, I think it’s no secret, is the front-runner for the democratic nomination three years from now for the presidency. And there may be a certain amount of professional rivalry, resentment on the behalf of Kerry towards Clinton.

He certainly cannot appreciate coming into the State Department and inheriting a good deal of what Ms. Clinton I’m sure has left him, but not that the world unfortunately, really holds Foggy Bottom to account, the way it ought to. And Hilary Clinton still even has a celebrity status around the world for reasons that really defy my imagination.

But, yes, I agree that Kerry's statement seemed to be in some manner an admission that the US diplomacy had been dismally unsuccessful in the question of Syria, and that perhaps it's too late to really do much diplomatically. But I don't think it's the best statement to say ahead of the Geneva meeting that was agreed upon by him and by the Russian Foreign Minister. I think holding out some optimism might not be a bad idea.

Robles: Coming into this Geneva conference, the Foreign Minister of France made statements that he had “no doubt” that chemical weapons” were used” in Syria.

Gennady Gatilov, he's the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, said he doubted the likelihood that there were chemical weapons used in Syria, so far these have been mostly media reports. He's also shed doubts on reports that chemical weapons were intercepted in Turkey that were supposed to have gone to the Syrian opposition.

What do you make of all this chemical weapons talk right before the summit? Mr. Gatilov said all that stuff should be put on a backburner and we should concentrate on convening this summit.

Rozoff: Maybe an effort of sabotage the meeting, in fact. And we have to recall two things, President Barack Obama several months ago talked about the use of chemical weapons by the Government forces. He said nothing about the opposition ones.

In Syria, his expression "a red line" that would have been crossed by the Government in Damascus with the unavoidable conclusion, you know, the weapons of mass destruction, or chemical weapons argument, exactly is an integral part, and really the major justification of the US attack on and the invasion of Iraq ten years ago.

And we are not talking about people who are terribly imaginative or innovative, they are going to use the samecasus belli, the same excuse they used last time for a war, if they can do it.

And the accusation of the Sarin gas or some other chemical weapon is being used by the Syrian Government forces would provide as close an approximation to the excuse of a rationale used to the attack on Iraq 10 years ago as any I can think of.

And then, moreover, as it’s already been identified, as you’ve mentioned, by the Secretary of State and by the President of the United States as being the so-called red line that cannot be crossed, a line on the sand, which would then I suppose permit the United States to circumvent a traditional alleys or avenues of resolution like the United Nations and perhaps just plunge in militarily claiming it was such an emergency situation they had no choice but to act unilaterally. So, it is fraught with dangers certainly.

You were listening to an interview in progress with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Visit our website in the near future for the continuation of this interview with Rick Rozoff.

Self-defense has become act of war for the U.S. and NATO PART3

26 June, 13:25  Download audio file

The delivery of S-300 defensive missile batteries to Syria would protect the country from the types of attacks carried out by Israel and the U.S. but the West views such self-defense measures as an act of war and says that the ability of countries not friendly to the U.S. and its allies to defend themselves, in particular Syria, would upset the “balance of power”. Regular Voice of Russia contributor spoke about this, Manning and more in his latest interview with the Voice of Russia.

You are listening to an interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of the Stop NATO website and International Mailing List.

Robles: What is your opinion on S-300s? What can you tell us about S-300s? How will that change the situation?

Rozoff: A retired General stated that with batteries, I think the estimate was 10 to 12 S-300 missiles, that the territory of Syria as a whole would effectively be protected from what are the likely sorts of attacks the United States and Israel would launch against it, which are cruise missiles and missiles launched from aircraft, fixed-wing aircraft, and in that sense give Syria something that the previous victims of US-NATO attacks, Libya, Yugoslavia, Iraq, surely did not have, which is effective control of their air-space and the ability to defend their air-force and other military assets from marauding western war planes bombing them.

So, it is very significant if they obtain them. Of course like most of your listeners, I have heard disparate, and at times conflicting, accounts of how imminent the arrival of S-300 is and everything from next year to they’re on their way, there is probably misrepresentation of statements by President Bashar Assad that they are already there.

Then of course there have been statements by Israeli government officials that they “would not tolerate” that. Can you imagine? They “would not tolerate” a sovereign nation Russia, delivering on a contractual agreement to supply strictly defensive weapons.

Robles: That was a 2010 agreement. I just wanted to remind everybody out there. That agreement between Russia and Syria that goes back to 2010 and these are defensive weapons as well. Russia stated that all the contracts were legal, they’re transparent, they don’t go against any international sanctions or anything. These were long ago in the making.

You’ve mentioned Israel as well and several statements were made by prominent politicians and officials in the west that this would upset the balance of power between Israel and Syria. What do you make of that statement? In other words, Israel can’t just bomb Syria with impunity any time it wants or what?

Rozoff: That is exactly how I would interpret that statement, and what a hubristic statement, and the fact that comments like that would be reported dutifully and uncritically by the major press wire services of the west, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least if U.S. government officials echoed sentiments of that sort.

The balance of power means: “My side has uncontested superiority over yours, and I can strike your side without having to worry about retaliation”.

Anyone who upsets that balance of power, I mean it is not an equal balance of power is it? It is a very one-sided one. It suggests that; heaven forbid somebody had the audacity to try to defend themselves, because once they do that, then it is a call for direct military attack on them because we can’t allow them the ability to defend their own territory. This is what I hear.

So that means that the old-fashioned notions, if you will, that each country has the right to defend its own territory are no longer operational and that now if you are with the U.S., or one of its major allies, you have the right not only to set up impenetrable missile shields over your country, but you have the right to demand that bordering nations, that they not protect their skies and they not protect themselves and if they do, that is seen as what? An act of war?

Robles: Unbelievable. Rick we haven’t talked about Bradley Manning before but I’d like to get some of your opinions because he did attempt to expose a lot of the stuff that we talk about all the time. What is your opinion on the Bradley Manning case it just started off, his so-called trial, if you want to call it that?

Rozoff: It is a travesty not a trial and it’s drumhead justice, with the “justice” in italic or quotation mark.

He is being prosecuted as an example to others so that anyone within the military with a shred of decency that is appalled by atrocities of the sort that he, the noted video that I think most people are familiar with, was able to help the Wikileaks expose, will think twice about it because they can see the example that has been made out of Manning.

And this is, for a country that prides itself, or dictates rather, to the rest for the world the need of transparency and so forth, and command responsibility, even with the leaders of other nations to conduct trials of this sort is a self-indictment and I think it will go down in history as some of the most infamous show trials.

Robles: They are trying to say that he aided the enemy. Do you know any actual damage that he did or in some way that he actually aided the enemy? Some damage he did to NATO or the west other than revealing crimes and the criminality of their behavior?

Rozoff: I do not. You know that what I’ve read, this is very basic synopsis of it, but the prosecution is claiming that he directly or indirectly, at first hand or second hand, I can’t see how it could be a first hand really, delivered information directly into the hands of our enemies, or words to that effect. That is what I’ve read earlier today.

I don’t know what they could conceivably be speaking about that out there. Unless they are suggesting by releasing information to Wikileaks and that in turn somehow getting on the Internet, that anyone in this world of 7 billion people who has access to the internet could see.

Robles: So, basically what they are saying, is if you have some information, you publish it, if Osama bin Laden had read it, then you are guilty of aiding the enemy.

Rozoff: That is the sort of perverse and reverse logic they are using right now. And first of all that excludes motive, if I had no motive to provide information that would, in any way or form, embolden so-called enemy combatants anywhere in the world, but if inadvertently through no intention and no action on my own such as the result, and I am held accountable for it as though I deliberately intended that to come about.

Robles: We are on the short wave here, probably going out to anybody in the world, penguins in Arctic and little green men on the moon could probably listen to us if they wanted to. Are we giving the enemy information if somebody in Al-Qaeda has a short wave tuned in or they get on a satellite radio or something and tune us in?

Rozoff: I think there is a distinction between information and encouragement and I think what we are getting dangerously close to right now, is that government privacy is now paralleling in many ways very dubious concepts of copyright infringement, the intent of which is to make the dissemination of almost any kind of information illegal. Either it is branded as espionage or as piracy and the idea that something I say may be heard by somebody who passes it on to ten generations of other people and/or different links in the chain and eventually somebody says; “That encourages me to go out and do something violent or illegal”, that is no justification for preventing free speech.

Nobody can control what happens with comments, innocent, peaceful comments that a person makes, how they could be distorted and passed on and viewed inaccurately by a third or a tenth or a hundredth party who then acts on it in some manner.

You know that is so farfetched. Really it shouldn’t be even discussed but in the case of Bradley Manning unfortunately, this is what I understand pretty much to be the case.

If he were the conduit through which information that might not otherwise have appeared on the internet, appears there, and then months or years later somebody sees it and uses that as the pretext, if not as the reason, for doing something that he is exp facto held accountable for what somebody he has never met, has done, seems ludicrous to me, it really does. But it is a frightening precedent of course. And it has a chilling effect on anyone who wants to do disseminate information that the government might find to be inexpedient.

Robles: Are you getting any blowback or feedback or anything from your efforts?

Rozoff: As with anyone in this situation you can well imagine, I have a website Stop NATO and every so often somebody posts comments from the U.S., somewhere from the Defense Department or the British Ministry of Defense most recently and these are people who try to be very chummy as if that they just happened across the website in the course of their reading and take issue with an article or something that is there. But they are clearly information officers and it is their job to troll the internet and to find…

Against the billions of dollars they have to propagandize, billions of dollars they have to conduct operations both overt and covert and to influence people’s thinking, heaven forbid one, there’s one individual sitting with a website some place trying to disseminate contrary information, that person has to be silenced, in the name of “democracy” or “freedom” or “free flow” of information or something.

Robles: They watch everybody. It is crazy.

Rozoff: They have a zero tolerance towards dissent, and that is what the Bradley Manning and the Julian Assange cases really should demonstrate to the world: is that somebody who uses freedom of expression and so forth as an excuse to criticize other governments around the world, will tolerate absolutely no dissent in their own country, and will brand any kind of dissent as being espionage.

Robles: But any dissent anywhere else is ok, it is freedom of speech and democracy.

Rozoff: It is to be applauded. As a matter of fact we were speaking of Hillary Clinton earlier announcing that she was going to tweet in Russian, Chinese, Hindu and Farsi.

Robles: That never worked out, did it?

Rozoff: Evidently the governments of those countries know how to combat a propaganda campaign.

Robles: I mean the State Department couldn’t get the word “restart” right,the wrote “ocerload” so I don’t see how they could actually come up with a legible and intelligent tweet once a day. I think that would be too much.

Rozoff: I believe you are right.

Robles: Especially in 4 or 5 languages. I mean come on, they couldn’t translate one word right.

Rozoff: I’ve seen the State Department stumble over standard English on occasion, I can only imagine how they would do with the foreign tongues.

Robles: Okay. Let’s not… They deserve to be bashed Rick. Anyway, are you still there or what?

Rozoff: I’m still here.

Robles: I thought maybe they cut the line already. Alright, anyway. So we are probably going through Menwith Hill to the NSA and all this so, do you want to say hi to the spooks? No it’s okay, just kidding.

Rozoff: I’ve known them for so long that it’s almost… but who knows?

But you know, there are figures right now, I just saw the NATO analysis of the Syrian situation that even though something like 80% of the Syrian population now supports Assad even if they didn’t before. The ratings have never been higher, that 20% supports the opposition.

So, the numbers are shifting. This is a pragmatic consideration. This is somebody who may have opposed the government 2 years ago but this has been given by the alternative of a bunch of armed gangs running around the country, better the government than anyone else.

Robles: What about the minority populations? There are certain Jewish parts of the population in Syria, Christians, there are Coptics,a host of … There is an Armenian population. How do they all feel about arming these Islamic lunatics? I’m sorry.

Rozoff: I mean the armed extremists, who are in a large part, foreign mercenaries. That is something else we have to recollect. These are not just domestic extremists and others, including cannibals, as we have established. But in many cases, from around the Islamic world, this very much parallels with what happened in Afghanistan in the 1980s where the United States and Saudi Arabia helped organize Jihadis from around the world to come to north-west Pakistan to fight in Afghanistan and against Afghanistan.

And we are seeing a parallel that now we have an international mercenary squad with combat experience not only in Afghanistan and Pakistan, but in Russian North Caucuses and the Balkans and North Africa, and the minorities, we have to recall that Syria is an extremely diverse, mosaic of cultures and traditions and religions, confessions. Going back millennia, going back as a matter of fact to 6-7 thousand years, Syria is Mesopotamia. There are a good number of ethnic Syrians to this day in the country.

Robles: What is going to happen to all these… To this wonderful mosaic of humanity? What is going to happen if these insurgents come into power?

Rozoff: We know exactly what is going to happen based on the experiences in Kosovo and Iraq is that the ethnic and religious minorities are going to be terrorized into fleeing the country, they are going to be murdered and persecuted in large numbers.

Several weeks ago 2 Orthodox bishops were kidnapped in Syria and they are still being held incommunicado. One was a Greek Orthodox Bishop, another was a Syriac, you know a Syrian Orthodox Christian Bishop and for all we know they could be dead.

And this is what other religious and ethnic minorities within the country know to expect, in the event of a so-called “rebel” victory in the country.

Much as what we’ve seen in Iraq were prior to the invasion of the country 10 years ago, you had an estimated population of half a million Chrisitans, for the most part Syrians, that number has been cut by 50% with 250,000 who have fled or been killed. And what you see is an ethnic and confessional purging of a country.

The just horrid mass killings in Iraq, which are also similarly motivated, the attacks tend to be overwhelmingly against Shiite Muslims and against Christians, perpetrated by the same kind of Wahhabi extremists backed by Saudi Arabia, backed by the United States.

Similar things have occurred in Kosovo. We do know the groups, apparently the premier fighting force within that armed opposition is Al-Nusra, which is a Wahhabi extremist Saudi-oriented or backed Sunni theocratic fighting force, one the U.S. even dissociates them from, essentially considering it a terrorist organization. But you know, that’s been exactly the model that was used in Afghanistan in the 1980s and subsequently in Bosnia and Kosovo in the 1990s and was used in Libya 2 years ago and is being used in Syria now.

You were listening to an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff, the Owner of the Stop NATO website and International Mailing List. You can find the previous parts of this interview on our website at 

PART1 European Guantanamo or the reason the US wants Serbia to give up Kosovo

17 May, 16:33  Download audio file

Гуантанамо тюрьма решетка арест рука

The U.S. military base in Kosovo was constructed in 1999 without consulting with the government of Serbia and the largest U.S. military base built outside of the U.S. since the Vietnam War. The site was apparently used for extraordinary renditions and has been referred to as a “little Guantanamo”. This is a very little known fact as NATO, the U.S., the European Union and the West are in the process of forcing Serbia to effectively give up Kosovo, and indicates the real motive for the West’s support of the Kosovo Liberation Army which it had deemed a terrorist organization in the past. Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of Stop NATO spoke about this and more in an interview with the Voice of Russia.

Hello! This is John Robles, I'm speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the owner of the stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick! How are you?

Rozoff: Very good John! Thanks for having me on.

Robles: It’s a pleasure to be speaking with you. How much importance would you give to the 200 US-NATO troops being stationed in Italy? And why US-NATO troops? These troops are being stationed for possible operations in Libya. How do you think that reflects on the operations to remove Muammar Gaddafi by the US?

Rozoff: It’s a continuation of that policy, of course. And as it is now, you know, two years ago and two months, 26 months ago that the military campaign against Libya was launched, initially, as we have to recall, by the US Africa Command (AFRICOM) that began it for the first 19 days and then it was taken up by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for six months thereafter. And this meant to signal and meant in fact to be the first activation of AFRICOM as a war fighting force on the African continent, and also the NATO’s first open military incursion on the Africa, and certainly not the last. This was meant to be an opening salvo and not an isolated incident.

What is significant about the impending deployment of what is minimally, and I think we should emphasize, 200 US Marines, and some reports estimate up to 500, these are members of what the US Marine Corps refer to as the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force that only recently was moved into Spain, and then it is being transitioned from Spain into Italy for use in North Africa. So, I think we can see the push to the south and the east to employ State Department slogan or expression of few years ago where the US is going to deploy very shortly four guided missile cruisers to the Naval Station Rota in Spain, a Marine Expeditionary Strike Forces really of the sort we are talking about going to the Sigonella base in Sicily.

This is the same base that the US has another Marine Corps detachment already deployed to. And this is actually a separate one that has already been assigned to the same naval station Sigonella. We should also recall that in the beginning of this year, in January the Governor of Sicily put a stop to plans that the US had for putting on its missile on a satellite surveillance facility in Sicily, on the island.

You know, big plans are afoot and the US is going to move in something called the Mobile User Objective System, global satellite facility, to Sicily. That seems to have been stopped but the troops are coming in, with the avowed purpose John, of intervening in Libya and Benghazi or elsewhere as the U.S. sees fit.

Robles: What exactly is that system that you just mentioned?

Rozoff: The photographs I’ve seen of it suggest that it truly is mobile, I mean it is something comparable to some of the Patriot Advanced Capability Missile Systems that the US has put in Poland and Turkey and Israel. It is described as being a satellite communication system. I’m not sure what precisely it was meant to monitor in Sicily, but I would guess the entire Mediterranean Sea, perhaps most notably part of the eastern Mediterranean. But as to the precise range and purpose of the missile system, I’m not familiar with that.

Robles: I see. So, this is some new technology?

Rozoff: Yes… There are similar ones, that are called Mobile User Objective Systems deployed in Australia, as well as in the US states of Hawaii and Virginia. But I’m not sure how they are integrated with other military capabilities.

Robles: What else has happened with NATO in the last month that you think our listeners should know about?

Rozoff: They’ve had series of meetings of foreign ministers, of chiefs of defense staff and others in the recent months. The focus, according to NATO of course, is wrapping up the Afghan mission which I don’t think will ever be definitively finished. But the drawing down or the eventual phased withdrawal from Afghanistan, the continuation of the operation in Kosovo, the Serbian province (the province wrenched from Serbia), and the continued naval operations in the Mediterranean Sea, what is called operation Active Endeavour, and ongoing, presumably permanent, naval operations in the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean, the so-called operation Ocean Shield.

So, NATO is still in ways that we have discussed on many an occasion in the past continuing permanent military operations way outside the area of the North Atlantic Ocean, ultimately globally. Nothing outstanding in any particular regard but I think the continuation of these policies.

Robles: How many bases was NATO going to leave in Afghanistan? And what can you tell us about Kosovo, can you give us some details on that as well?

Rozoff: The statement about the US maintaining military bases in Afghanistan after the complete withdrawal of US-NATO troops, well, we can’t say complete, I mean there are estimates that as many as 14,000 US NATO troops will stay in the country; but after the bulk, at one time 152,000 US and other NATO troops in Afghanistan are withdrawn, according to President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan, the US has clearly indicated to him, I think the word “demanded” would not be too strong a word, that the US or the Pentagon wants to maintain nine military bases inside the country. And they are situated in the north, south, east and west, and that is near the borders of the former Soviet Central Asian Republics, but also Iran and Pakistan, and in some cases not terribly far from the narrow strip of land that connects Afghanistan to China.

And they include of course the major, you know, arguably, at any point in future, strategic air bases like Bagram and Kandahar and Shindand and elsewhere in the country. As we’ve talked about on many occasions I think any sensible person has figured out that the US and its Western allies don’t intend to vacate the southern Central Asian region in the immanent future, if at all.

Robles: You just mentioned Karzai, I was just reminded about his recent revelation that he’d been receiving garbage bags full of money from the CIA for over a decade. Can you comment on that as far as NATO goes? And regarding the US-NATO troops, do you think there is any specific reason why only US-NATO troops are going to be staying in Afghanistan?

Rozoff: Let me start with the second one first because I think it is the easiest. The facts are fairly incontestable, It is not going to be only US troops. The US will maintain 9 military bases evidently, that’s what it intends to do. But NATO itself is transitioning from what is currently known as the International Security Assistance Force, initially it was presented, if you can believe this, under the rubric of a peacekeeping force in the early part of this century, and it quickly devolved into a war fighting force and to a combat force. And once that mission ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) is finished, then NATO will continue in Afghanistan training the Afghan National Army and other security personnel basically to be a Western proxy army in the south Central Asian region. That’s the easy part.

The question about Mr. Karzai being lavished with a good deal of American largesse, that shouldn’t surprise anybody. It is to be assumed I suppose that the US buys off foreign leaders, certainly those it’s implanted in power, like Mr. Karzai, who is not a foreigner, is not an alien to American shores. One of his brothers for example ran, for years, a restaurant pretty much in my neighborhood here in Chicago. And the family, I’m sure, already has a mansion set up in this country to flee to, when they have to, and to take as much of the CIA cash as they can with them back home, repatriate it if you will.

Robles: You mentioned Kosovo a few minutes ago. You said that NATO had met regarding Kosovo and KFOR. Anything new there?

Rozoff: The US and its Western allies, in the later case I’m talking about people in Brussels whether they are wearing the European Union or the NATO hat, it doesn’t seem to matter much, but I’m sure they employed all their typical subversive powers of persuasion to convince the Coalition Government in Belgrade, in Serbia to acknowledge the independence of Kosovo, not formally, practically . And NATO has pretty substantially withdrawn the amount of troops in Kosovo because they turned the province over to their proxy forces there. The former leaders of the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army, whose leaders are heading up the Kosovo Security Force which is a fledging army being trained by NATO.

So, once the country is turned over to surrogates, the NATO troops can clear out and go on to the next war zone which is effectively what happened since 1999. At one point, in June of 1999 there were 50,000 troops in Kosovo under NATO command or under KFOR, the Kosovo force. And that number has dwindled down to perhaps a tenth of that right now. But the US still maintains Camp Bondsteel and Camp Monteith. The first, Camp Bondsteel is repeatedly the largest overseas U.S. military base built since the war in Vietnam. And there is no indication that it intends to vacate that base. As to what it is doing with it, that’s a question worth pursuing.

Robles: Where is that base?

Rozoff: In Kosovo.

Robles: And you say that’s the largest foreign base that the U.S. has?

Rozoff: What I’ve read and given the acreage, the size of the base, it seems to be the case. It is the largest base that the U.S. has built overseas since the war in Vietnam. Since the 1960s.

Robles: And that’s in Kosovo?

Rozoff: That’s in Kosovo. It was constructed in 1999, I think it was with Kellog Brown and Root, that built the bases almost everywhere else. It’s in Kosovo and it is a fairly mammoth complex. Camp Monteith is a sister base considerably smaller than Bondsteel. But Bondsteel, which is by the way named after a US serviceman who was killed in Vietnam, there’s been speculation that Camp Bondsteel could have been used for extraordinary renditions during the so-called global war on terrorism.

There’s also been discussion from the sources in Russia amongst other places, that should the US want to deploy strategic resources in Camp Bondsteel. And by that we mean either interceptor missiles or perhaps even nuclear weapons. Who would be the wiser and who in the inner circle, Hashim Taci and Pristina, would say “no”.

Robles: When was this base built?

Rozoff: In 1999 it was constructed and it’s been operating ever since. So, you are talking about 14 years now. And there is no indication, you know, unless you accept the US and NATO line, matters have been stabilized in Kosovo and they are going to step down troops, again, which I think they have, I think about 90% of the initial deployment, amount of troops rather, 15,000 troops have been withdrawn but Camp Bondsteel is still there. It is in the eastern part of Kosovo. And in addition to being a US military base it is also NATO headquarters for what’s called Multinational Brigade East.

And ahem… I am looking at the exact size of the place, it is 955 acres. That’s pretty sizeable! And it was built on Serbian land without consulting with the Government of Serbia. I gues the KLA Official in Pristina rubber stamped it. By August of 1999, two months after the US and other NATO troops came into Kosovo, the construction of the base was pretty much under way. Apparently 52 helipads were constructed and shortly thereafter franchise restaurants.

Robles: Right there at the beginning, was it like that it was already constructed as if it would be a permanent fixture?

Rozoff: By all indications exactly that. I cannot see what the motivation would be to build something that large which is still operative to this day…

Robles: You said they had “franchise restaurants” and things like that in there?

Rozoff: I’m looking at it on the computer now. You know, Burger King, Taco Bell and so forth built in there. You know, gymnasiums, health clubs. It is a whole city practically. And evidently, somebody with the Council of Europe, Álvaro Gil-Robles (There’s a name for you John!) Human Rights NEvoy to the Council of Europe, referred to Camp Bondsteel in 2005, and this is a quote: as a “smaller version of Guantanamo” after visiting the facility. So, evidently the US did use it for extraordinary renditions, and so-called black operations or black renditions.

Robles: So, that would give us a very-very-very clear and undisputable reason why the West is so interested in guaranteeing the independence of Kosovo.

Rozoff: Right! And that was the statement made by many of us who opposed the war against Yugoslavia in 1999. When the US constructed that base, it was almost began immediately after the NATO coming into Kosovo, that it was ex post facto proof that the US had military designs in the region and that the war against Yugoslavia was simply an opportunity to expand its military into the region.

Robles: I see.

Rozoff: Which in fact is what has ensued!

PART2 NATO has never offered to cooperate with Russia

23 May, 01:24  Download audio file

NATO has never offered to cooperate with Russia - Rozoff

Western support for KLA terrorists and support for the self-declared independence of Kosovo are part of a pan-Albanian plan for the region, NATO is reaching its tentacles into space and there has never been any real offer of cooperation by NATO to Russia, all of these issues were recently discussed with regular Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list.

You're listening to an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff, the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find part 1 of this interview on our website at english.ruvr.ru.

Robles: So they needed a base somewhere in that area, geographically, and Kosovo fit the bill, right?

Rozoff: Fairly much that. Again, I think we have to understand that there's no supervision. There's no oversight in terms of what's going on in Kosovo. Certainly there's no real government in Pristina. I mean the Thaçis and Haradinajs, and these other terrorist cutthroats from the former Kosovo Liberation Army are neither able to question the US, nor would they have any desire to, I mean they are simply puppets.

Robles: Right! That was a terrorist organization and it always was. It never was anything else.

Rozoff: An American official in 1998 Robert Gelbard actually at the time, and he reversed himself subsequently, but at the time stated that the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army was a terrorist organization in his estimate. In fact, it was and is.

I mean it's formally disbanded, but in effect, I'm sure there are late-night-meetings where they get together and reminiscence over dragging people on barbed wire and murdering them to harvest their organs, and dealing in narcotics and women and weapons, and body parts, and so forth. This is the nature of the monsters that the U.S. and its NATO allies have waged war on behalf of.

Robles: That would explain, I think, to a lot of people who might not understand why the U.S. would have supported, what I could describe as Muslim terrorists, against Christian victims.

Rozoff: I would de-emphasize the religious aspect, I truly would, in the sense that: Kosovo was an amazingly rich and diverse mosaic of ethnic and religious cultures prior to the U.S. and NATO intervening. That is in addition to ethnic Albanians who comprise the majority and ethnic Serbs…

Robles: I just mentioned that because even at the time a lot of Americans themselves couldn't understand why the US was supporting Muslims against Christians.

Rozoff: We have to recall that other ethnic minorities: Roma (so called Gypsies), Egyptians, Ashkalies, Bosnians, Gorans, Turks and others who are predominantly Muslim have also been harassed and killed and driven out of the province by Thaçi and his former KLA officials. So, it seems to be more racial. In terms of pan-Albanian than it is religious.

Robles: Do you really think there's that angle there? Or is it just whoever cut a better deal with the United States?

Rozoff: There's Albanian-American Civic League, former U.S. Congressman Joseph DioGuardi is the godfather of that. And he's been amazingly successful at lobbying, and I use that term loosely and perhaps charitably, but influencing American politicians: everyone from Robert Dole to the current Vice President Joseph Biden who is someone who has appeared at the Albanian-American Civic League functions and fundraisers, with hefty honoraria I am sure. And I'm sure Mr. Biden walked away with a lot of money.

I've heard them and I’ve seen the videos on YouTube and some amazingly provocative statements, openly calling for the use of military force against the government of Yugoslavia and Serbia at that time but clearly on behalf of a pan-Albanian agenda. And I think that’s very important to realize, that the five stars on the Kosovo flag supposedly represent five different ethnic groups within the province. But I think the more seasoned observer realizes that that means five different nations in which ethnic Albanians reside and which are envisioned by the likes of Hashim Thaçi to be united in one greater Albania.

Those would of course be not only Kosovo and Albania itself, but parts of Monte-Negro, other parts of Serbia and Macedonia and Greece. So, you have an irredentist expansionist mindset there and you have NATO go to war for 78 days on behalf of that project.

Robles: I see, Rick, we have to move on because I want to ask you a little bit about the US Strategic Command. Now it appears that NATO and the US are planning to not only take over the world, but take over the universe.

Rozoff: Very good! That's it. Do you want me to comment on that?

Robles: Sure, can you give our listeners some details about what is going on with NATO and space, if you would?

Rozoff: That's true, I mean not content with expanding its tentacles around the Earth, now the heavens are going to be an area for NATO expansion. And I'm thinking particularly about a story that came out yesterday, it was issued by the press wire service of the U.S. Armed Forces, what’s called American Forces Press Service from the Pentagon. And a Deputy Commander of the US Strategic Command, and it is one of nine unified combatant commands the Pentagon has, and most of them tend to be regional in nature: Northern Command, Southern Command, Africa Command and so forth. But this one is strategic and as you are indicating covers not only the entire world, but reaches into space.

Strategic Command was actually… replaced the former Strategic Air Command during the Cold War period. In 1992 it was renamed Strategic Command and then in 2002 it merged with the US Space Command. So, it is a command that takes in all nuclear weapons, you know, strategic forces, the so-called missile defense, which we’ve talked about many times before, that is encircling the planet with interceptor missile systems. But also it takes in the heavens, takes in space.

And the statement was made by the Deputy Commander of the Strategic Command or the report on it was a couple days ago, he is actually the Deputy Director of Global Operation, and he talked about building an alliance in space, partnerships in space comparable to what the U.S. has on earth. So, I think we’d be safe in understanding that being some approximation of a parallel to: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and other military alliances the US has.

And again, when you read the Pentagon’s own accounts of these things, often times the statements are amazingly candid, I mean they would be cleaned up appreciably by the time they got to the mainstream media. But this fellow in question, the Deputy Commander of Global Operations, actually this is a paraphrase, but he said that space is vital to military operations providing an array of capabilities that give space-faring nations’ forces’ a military advantage. In other words, if you control space you could win a war on earth. I think it is essentially what he was saying.

And you know, he again drew the parallel that just as on, paraphrasing again on this of the same account, he said: recognizing the value of multinational coalitions for operations in the land, maritime and air domains, the officials of U.S. Strategic Command here, hope to forge a coalition that shares assets and capabilities in space. That’s the opening sentence of the article.

Robles: Listen, one more question, I just recalled this, now, the U.S. made a statement a couple of weeks ago, I don’t know if you recall this, that they were thinking of declassifying some missile parameters to assuage Russia's concerns regarding the ABM shield. Have you heard anything about that? Can you comment on that? Do you think that’s sincere and… any ideas?

Rozoff: I’m vaguely familiar with that. Is it sincere? No it is not. I mean they’ll try to assuage Russian concerns by giving them a sense a false confidence, perhaps.

There is no indication that the United States intends to fully incorporate Russia as a partner, even in regional missile defense systems, such as that in Europe, much less into a global missile system, which Russia would be kept quite clearly outside of.

So, assuaging Russian concerns: that sounds like more talk, to me, and we’ve had several years of that talk without any results.

Robles: I see. This was after the recent Russia-NATO Council meeting. And that was supposed to be one of the results from it, but you think that’s just hot air, right?

Rozoff: It is. It is window dressing, it’s cosmetic and it is meant to make the U.S. and NATO look like they are trying to reach some understanding with the “paranoid recalcitrant” Russia that “refuses to work with them”. We know how these propaganda tricks work and this is simply another indication of it.

So that U.S. and NATO officials can go back and say: “We’ve made repeated offers to our Russian partner which, unfortunately, misinterprets what the intent of the global interceptor missile system is.”

Even though, every now and again Ronald Reagan is invoked or evoked as the inspiration for this program, which means “Strategic Defense Initiative”, which means “Star Wars”.

Robles: I’ve read a news item last week titled something like: “Russia refuses NATO offer of cooperation.” Do you know of any NATO offers of cooperation that Russia has refused?

Rozoff: None whatsoever. There are no such offers. Again, when Russia has asked to, if you will, compartmentalize the missile defense of Europe, to engage into what is called sectoral or regional components where Russia takes responsibility for a certain area, what we hear time and again is: “NATO will not outsource its security to a non-NATO member”, meaning Russia. So, that Russia will have no role whatsoever in any joint or collaborative efforts to create a genuine missile shield, but instead it will be consulted, as you were alluding to at the beginning of the discussion on this subject. Russia will be consulted or, in other words, the U.S. and NATO will tell Russia damn well what they want to tell them and nothing else.

Robles: What exactly would you say to someone who says: “NATO has offered to cooperate with Russia?”

Rozoff: John, we are next-door neighbors and I’m building a shield over my house as I’m arming myself to the teeth. And I’m telling you: “Don’t worry about it because I’m not your enemy”. And your weapons very shortly will not be able to retaliate against me if I should open fire on you first, but… “Don’t worry about it because we are friends and partners”, I mean nobody falls for something like that.

Robles: Okay…

Rozoff: I mean, if you make yourself impregnable, if you make yourself invulnerable as you are moving… Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov again, just three or four days ago, said: “NATO military hardware is moving up to the Russian border”, as indeed it is. And this includes the fact that just a couple of days ago the U.S. moved the first squadron of F-16 strategic fighter jets into Poland for permanent deployment, in a country that borders Russian territory, the Kaliningrad District. And already, as of three years ago, the U.S. moved interceptor missiles into Poland, maybe 35-40 miles from the Russian border.

Robles: I wanted to underline that fact for some people who may not really follow NATO and maybe don’t really know what they are really doing. And people might actually believe that for some reason Russia refused to cooperate. That’s why I just wanted to get that point very well across.

Rozoff: Russia has been begging for genuine cooperation and has been rebuffed at every turn, as again, the U.S. and NATO are saying: “This is our operation and we’ll tell you what we want to about it, but you are not going to influence it in any way or form.”

Robles: Okay. I know that. You know that. I just want to make sure our listeners know that as well.

Rozoff: Good.

Robles: Rick, thank you very much. Unfortunately, we are out of time.

Rozoff: I understand. But thanks again John, I appreciate it.

PART 1 NATO’s global expansion unparalleled in history and fraught with catastrophe

27 April, 2013 08:45 Download audio file

НАТО NATO

US controlled NATO dangerously and relentlessly continues its global expansion, "something unparalleled in history and something fraught with, not only danger, but with catastrophe." In order to further hide the fact that the United States is taking over the world militarily through NATO, cleverly designed and marketed "programs" such as the Partnership for Peace, the Mediterranean Dialogue, the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, the Partners Across the Globe and the newly created Aspirant Nation category, are being used to hasten their, for the most part quiet, yet massive expansion.

Hello! This is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr Rick Rozoff, the owner and editor of the stop NATO website and mailing list.

Robles: Hello Rick! How are you this afternoon, I suppose it is?

Rozoff: It’s evening here, and is probably morning there, but I’m doing fine. It’s good to talk to you again John.

Robles: Yes, it’s a pleasure to be speaking with you again. NATO’s push into East Asia and Balkan marine training exercises. Can you fill us in on the latest?

Rozoff: Yes, I’m glad you chose those two examples in relation to the formerly North Atlantic Treaty Organization, now essentially redefined by itself and by its main sponsor and director the United States, the Pentagon, you know, as a global military force.

By the Balkans we of are of course talking about Russia’s north-west border, and with the parts of Asia, that the Secretary-General of NATO went to last week, South Korea and Japan, we are talking about north-east Asia. So, you see on either side of the Eurasian landmass, on either side of Russia indeed, the fact that the US is employing NATO as a global military intervention force.

I’ll start with the second one first perhaps. Anders Fogh Rasmussen Secretary-General of NATO made the first-ever-visit by a NATO Secretary-General to the nation of South Korea, the Republic of Korea, where he signed a special partnership program with that nation. This is a country of course, which is still in a, “technically” a state of war with its northern neighbor, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. And it is one where the Deputy Secretary-General of NATO, as we discussed in your program not too long ago, Alexander Vershbow, recently mentioned, or alluded to the fact, and pretty strongly asserted it in fact that; should a military conflict erupt between North and South Korea and the US intervene on behalf the South, that NATO could activate its article 5 mutual military assistance clause and enter the fray against North Korea, which almost inevitably would have to pull China into the vortex and you might have a global conflagration.

But also Rasmussen, after he visited South Korea, went to Japan where he signed a partnership arrangement, or understanding, with Japan as well. And I should mention, something we’ve had occasion to talk about before John, but I don’t think it sunk in properly with a lot of listeners around the world, is that roughly a year ago immediately preceding the NATO Summit in Chicago, from where I’m speaking, NATO announced the launching of its latest military partnership program which is called, and this is a rare bit of candor, it’s called Partners Across the Globe. And it includes four countries in the Asia-Pacific region, which formerly had been referred to by NATO as “Contact Countries” capital C in both cases, who had lent military support, and we are still doing so to this day by the way, for the war in Afghanistan. Those four countries are exactly South Korea and Japan, and also Australia and New Zealand.

But the new Partners Across the Globe, which is just in its infant state, it is likely, if NATO has its way, to expand pretty substantially, includes in addition to the four countries I’ve just mentioned; Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mongolia and Iraq, that is all countries in the broader Asia Pacific region.

Robles: If I understand this correctly, South Korea, Japan, you said, New Zealand and Australia, they are now “de facto” NATO members and they fall under article 5?

Rozoff: Not quite. They are NATO partners, now officially NATO partners, under the category of the new Partners Across the Globe, and there is discussion within NATO, particularly within the ruling circles in the United States, I should add, those in the White House, but particularly in the US Senate, the likes of John McCain come to mind, you know, people who are saber-rattling war mongers, to be frank with you, and ones who have mooted the point quite openly, particularly with the five-day war between Georgia and Russia, when Georgia invaded South Ossetia in August of 2008, that what these architects of US and of general Western foreign policy have been advocating is: the application of the article 5 NATO mutual defense clause to NATO partners as well as NATO members.

So, in this case it would in fact apply to Japan or to South Korea, or to that matter to Afghanistan or Pakistan in various scenarios. But what I was laying out earlier was something a little different, that if conflict erupted between the two Koreas and the United States inevitably intervened on behalf of its military client South Korea, and then North Korea responded in any way to the United States: then NATO would do what it did in 2001 after the attacks in New York and Washington DC on September 11th and invoke its article 5 mutual defense clause ostensibly to defend the United States against North Korea.

Robles: Is this official now, they can use article 5?

Rozoff: Since the creation of NATO they can always use article 5 supposedly in defense of any NATO member state. But you know, the discussion now is in terms of partners as well as members. But let me give you an idea of the extent to which things are going on.

At the end of the last month, March, NATO held what it referred to as a military partnership coordination workshop in Bosnia, in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia. Bosnia is currently, this is another new category, and there is a proliferation of new NATO categories and partnerships and so forth, but this one is called “Aspirant Nation”, those nations aspiring to NATO membership. And they currently are: Bosnia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Georgia.

These are the four countries that NATO has clearly indicated are going to be the next full member states. Of course one could argue that Georgia is not technically in Europe is all. At the end of March this workshop event was held in Bosnia. It included 28 partnership nations from the Partnership for Peace, the Mediterranean Dialogue, the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative and the new Partners Across the Globe.

So, in addition to the 28 NATO member states these are 28 more states. These are, by the way, not all of NATO’s partners around the world by any stretch of the imagination, but 56 nations from around the world under one military command, that US dominated of course.

Again, I hope it gives your listeners an understanding of how, the expanding international NATO network is something unparalleled in history and something fraught with, not only danger, but with catastrophe, if its momentum is not arrested.

As we’ve talked about several times in this show and you have initiated the discussion on more than one occasion, Russia has been seeking assurances from the United States and NATO for at least a decade, that the joint US-NATO interceptor missile system that is already in phase 1, and it is to go through three more phases to take in almost the entire European continent, ostensibly against Iran, and if to believe what Washington and Brussels say, North Korea, which is ludicrous, it is an absurdity, but in fact it is targeting Russia.

Russia has sought assurances that the missile system is not aimed at it. It’s received verbal assurances to that effect but nothing else. And the US and NATO have adamantly refused to engage in what is called sectoral, or at least sort of joint missile defense enterprise, with Russia, which is what Russia has been seeking. Particularly through the NATO-Russia Council which had been in abeyance for several years after the war with Georgia in 2008, with NATO of course supporting Georgia before, during and after the war. And Russia had then not participated in the council but has resumed its participation.

I should mention that with Russia being involved in that bilateral partnership with NATO, that means that every country in Europe, and I really wish your listeners would take this in, every country in Europe, excluding the five micro-states, is either a member of NATO or a member of NATO partnership program.

PART 2 Terrorism: It is a duplicitous game which the US is good at playing

17 May, 16:33  Download audio file

Комитет народного сопротивления Палестина оружие терроризм экстремистские группировки экстремизм боевики

One of the Boston Marathon bombers praised U.S.-backed-terrorists operating in Syria against President Bashar Al-Assad shortly before he set off the bombs which tore through the crowds at the finish line in Boston. Rick Rozoff considers the implications of the fact that these Chechen born terrorists were given asylum by the United States. For the U.S. terrorism is okay when it happens to other countries, especially if it assists in attaining geopolitical goals. Mr. Rozoff from Stop NATO, also talks about plans by NATO, already in place, to pull Syria and Lebanon into NATO once their regimes are changed.

You are listening an interview in progress with Rick Rozoff, the Owner of the Stop NATO website and mailing list. You can find part one on our website at English.ruvr.ru.

Rozoff: I really wish your listeners would take this in: that every country in Europe excluding the 5 micro-states, is either a member of NATO or a member of a NATO partnership program, except for at the moment, Cyprus but with the change in government in Cyprus several weeks ago the new administration has indicated clearly they are going to join NATO’s Partnership for Peace Program, which now means that every European state is either NATO member or NATO partner, every one, bar none!

Robles: I think that is what they wanted.

Rozoff: Of course it is, but if we had had this discussion 20 years ago, and somebody were to tell you in a generation in the future every country in Europe would be…, and we have to remember the anecdote about, at the time, the US Secretary of State James Baker assuring the first and last president of the Soviet Union Michael Gorbachev that NATO, would not expand one inch or one foot or one mile eastward.

Robles: At that point I think we would have agreed that NATO would be dissolved right after the Warsaw Pact was dissolved.

Rozoff: But now it has ensconced itself firmly as a political force in East Asia, throughout the Mediterranean, in the South Caucuses, in Central Asia, in the Middle East... One other thing we should mention before I forget, in-between the Baltic States and Northeast Asia, is the Persian Gulf, and in the last week or so, the United Arab Emirates has opened up an Embassy at NATO Headquarters.

NATO has divulged, more than acknowledged, that it has a military training site right now in Kuwait. A NATO delegation recently went to several Persian Gulfs, it has a military partnership, I mentioned earlier, as one of the four that participated in the Bosnia event, that is called the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative, set up 9 years ago in 2004, at the NATO summit at Istanbul, Turkey, which has pulled in the Persian Gulf sheikdoms and monarchies in the Gulf Cooperation Council, into a formal military alliance with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

So, now we have NATO: this is the best way I could encapsulize it, NATO is not only aimed at Russia and Russia’s western and southern borders, it is now increasingly situating itself or entering into military partnership with nations facing China, and it is consolidating a military partnership in the Persian Gulf aimed squarely at Iran.

Robles: Anything new with Syria, Israel, this 123 million dollar assistance package for the poor Syrian insurgents?

Rozoff: You perhaps have seen, or many of your listeners have seen or read, the statement that one of the two suspects, the one is killed I believe, in Boston, (at the bombing at the Boston marathon), supposedly hours before, or shortly before his death, posted on his Facebook account or some other site, his support for these anti-government rebels in Syria.

I don’t know if that’s been substantiated but it sounds plausible and it is at precisely that time when the Vice President of the United States, Joseph Biden, announces 123 million dollars in supposedly non-lethal aid to the very Syrian rebels being praised by the mastermind of the bomb attack in Boston last week. So, that’s, I think more than an irony. I think it is an indication about where the US really stands on the question of international terrorism if it affects any country other than itself and its allies.

Robles: So, this terrorist, he was praising the terrorists in Syria that the US is funding?

Rozoff: That is it, exactly.

Robles: We can go back to agent Tom Ossman (Osama Bin Laden), who was created I believe and funded by the US from the beginning, Al-Qaeda, the Taliban, I think the whole thing with terrorism and the US is: they have supported it, they’ve backed it, it’s back-fired time and time again.

Rozoff: Backfired at the very least, but I think it is even more insidious than that. It is almost as though a modern day Doctor Frankenstein stitches together some misshapen monster who goes on a killing spree but until he actually assaults the Doctor’s own bride, what he has done is either permitted to occur, or encouraged, or supported. And even after striking the creator’s own homeland, the creator still supports it abroad when it’s convenient because there are cross border and other separatist attacks that really have to be characterized as terrorist, if the word terrorism has any meaning.

Robles: Do you agree that the entire war on terror paradigm requires terrorists to continue existing and the entire militarization of the planet requires an enemy? I mean, if they don’t have one, they’ll have to create one to justify their own existence.

Rozoff: To paraphrase Voltaire: if terrorism didn’t exist it would have to be created, or something, to replace communism after 1991, but I think even more than that, to compare great things to small: every so often you read in the local press, as I read here in Chicago, about some firefighter in the suburban community who has been charged with arson, with the understanding that, the more fire there are, the more work there is for him.

It is far be it for me to openly accuse any particular law enforcement agency of doing that, but it is certainly not beyond the realm of possibilities that that occurs, and I think this also should be brought to people’s attention: now that Chechnya is on people’s minds because of the attack in Boston, even though it is a real question whether the two young men did it, and I think enterprising journalists, especially investigative-journalists, really ought to find out the history of how the two alleged perpetrators and their family achieved asylum in the United States and whether in fact they didn’t receive political refugee status. And if so, that could only be in reference to alleged Russian government persecution, could it not? I don’t see any other scenario.

Robles: There are many Chechens who have asylum, known cop killers....

Rozoff: Yes, Mr. Tsakaev.

Robles: I mean he was supposedly guilty of killing over 23 police officers.

Rozoff: John, but my point is because of the topicality of the tragedy in Boston, that we have a couple things: we have the fact that the perpetrators may very well have received political refugee status, or family members did, because of alleged persecution by the government of Russia, that is number one.

Number two we do know now, that the Russian government, Russian intelligence, probably the Federal Security Bureau, contacted the FBI 2 years ago, and asked that the older brother be monitored, and the FBI gave them a clean bill of health, let’s do that.

But I am raising another issue that most people haven’t thought about: that after the attacks in the United States on 9/11 of 2001, then Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld at one point, I believe in a telephone conversation mentioned the Kodori Gorge in Georgia, which connects Georgia with Russia.

Russia has been complaining for years that the Georgian government was permitting Chechen and other terrorists to operate out of the Gorge, out of the valley, to launch attacks inside Russia and Rumsfeld mentioned that.

Now at the time I think that was considered to be an effort for him to try enlist Russian support in the so-called “global war on terrorism”, but what in fact occurred, was immediately afterwards the Pentagon, “he”, deployed special forces instructors to Georgia to train the Georgian military, in what is called a “trained and equipp program”, which persists to this day. It was handed over by the Green Berets to the US Marine Corps.

With the fact that the alleged perpetrators in Boston are ethnic Chechens: does this give the United States an opportunity to increase its intelligence and military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan under the guise of fighting the Chechen terrorists who struck “the heartland of America”. Right?

Robles: After 9/11 they invaded Afghanistan and Iraq, even though they were 19 Egyptian terrorists, they didn’t of course invade Egypt and we’re thinking: “Okay, now they’re going to what? Invade Chechnya?”, but this is Russian territory.

Rozoff: They couldn’t openly intervene there. So my suspicion would be again: under the pretense of fighting the very same forces they have backhandedly supported, as you indicate, for the past 28 years, which is Chechen and Dagestani separatists (religious theocratic extremists) that the US will beef up its military presence in Georgia and possibly Azerbaijan. Which is something long under way and which I am sure they had intended, otherwise, this provides the rational for doing so. So, I would be concerned about that.

The US I am sure will: make (how sincere or not) overtures to Russia to help it solve the problem with certain terrorists. As you indicate, not only in London but in Washington, major ethnic Chechen and Dagestani separatist leaders have been granted political asylum, sometimes in rather lucrative positions, with think tanks and other organizations here in the United States as well as Britain.

So, it’s a duplicitous game, that is what the US is good at doing; supporting something backhandedly behind the closed doors in one sense, and openly proclaiming the opposite, it won’t be the first thing that’s occurred.

We should keep in mind since we were talking about Georgia that wha is now called… there is another new phenomenon that people are probably not aware of, something called Black Sea Rotational Force. The US Marine Corps, I believe 3 years ago, set up something called a Black Sea Rotational Force, it is based 6 months of the year in Romania, and its task is to train with, which is to say, to integrate the militaries of 14 nations in the greater Black Sea Region.

But also in the Caucuses, including Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, all of the Balkan States, but also I believe Moldova for sure and I am quite sure Ukraine into the bargain.

But the Black Sea Rotational Force of US marines recently staged joint military exercises with the Georgian armed forces in Agile Spirit, is now going to be deployed, even though it is way out of its area of responsibility, to the Baltic States for this year’s Baltic operations: BALTOPS where they participated last year incidentally.

So, people think that with the budgetary cutbacks resulting from the financial crisis that began almost 5 years ago, that the US is cutting back its military presence around the world. That is not true.

The government of Spain now, has permitted 500 US marines, a US military strike force, and military aircraft to be based in southern Spain for operations in Africa. This is just openly, how I described it.

And this is in addition to the fact that, roughly last year, Spain announced that it would permit the United States to base 4-guided missile destroyers as part of the interceptor missile system, (of Phase 1 of NATO”s interceptor missile system in Europe, to patrol the Mediterranean Sea.

A guided missile destroyer can fire interceptor missiles but can also fire an offensive missile. That is what it was designed for.

These are four more ships in addition to the US 6th Fleet in the Mediterranean Sea, and NATO’s so-called operation “Active Endeavor” which has been active since 2001 have turned the Mediterranean sea into a private Pentagon-NATO preserve, which it is. And now, as I alluded to earlier, with the last European hold out Cyprus, coming into NATO’s camp and Libya soon to join NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue in the attempt to drag post-Assad Syria and Lebanon into that NATO program turning the entire Mediterranean Sea Basin into NATO’s sea.

Robles: You mean NATO’s already taken steps to pull post-Assad Syria into NATO?

Rozoff: You heard this from me but I’ve been saying it for 2 years. And one thing I did predict before; the fact was that when NATO took over from US-Africa Command, the air war and naval blockade against Libya, 2 years ago, so-called Operation Unified Protector, that at the end of it, Libya which has been the only north African country not a member of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue. That it would be incorporated into the Mediterranean Dialogue, that fact was stated immediately after the overthrow and murder of Muammar Gaddafi by no less authorities than the US ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder and the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen who confirmed that.

Now that would mean that the only two countries in the area of responsibility of the Mediterranean Dialogue would be Lebanon and Syria and I have no question in my mind that they are targeted, after the regime change in both countries, to be incorporated into a NATO program! As, I believe, the United States intends both Yemen and Iraq, to be pulled into the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative with the Persian Gulf monarchies.

Robles: Oh my God! Rick, sorry we have to stop because I have to read the news.

The US/NATO Want to expand into the Asia-Pacific Region, DPRK Serves That Purpose

4 April,  201303:20  Download audio file

US Air Force B-2

213,000 military personnel are involved in live fire training “exercises” involving nuclear capable hardware near North Korea’s borders. Hence it is no surprise North Korea feels threatened. Even if North Korea did not exist as the “evil” threat in the region, the United States would need to create a boogey man to justify its pre-planned military expansion in the Asia-Pacific region. Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff, from Stop NATO, spoke about these things and more in this interview.

I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Could we get your views on what is going on currently in North Korea?

Rozoff: Yes, what we are seeing is intensification of saber-rattling, of gunboat diplomacy, by the United States in the first instance, but standing behind is its two major military allies in the area; the Republic of Korea, South Korea, and Japan.

What is going on currently, as many of your listeners may know, is the second part of a two-part annual military exercise that the United States holds with the South Korean government. And those… It’s two parts as I mentioned, first, is something called “Key Resolve,” which started in February, is now completed, and currently now, until the end of April, until the last day of April, is basically a field exercise called “Eagle Foal” F-O-A-L.

And all together this joint exercise… The first is a computer simulated… basically a command-post exercise, and the second is a live-fire field exercise, but all together they entail the participation of 13,000 US military personnel, 200,000 South Korean military personnel “troops.”

What is most alarming about this year’s however, is the fact that in recent days the United States deployed two B-2 Strategic Long-Range Nuclear Bombers, they flew non-stop from the Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri to South Korea to fly over the Korean peninsula. These are nuclear capable bombers, that is they are capable of dropping nuclear payloads.

The US has also deployed or is in the course of deploying B-52s which are also long-range strategic bombers used most infamously in the war against Vietnam in the 1960s and early 1970s. And most recently we heard that F-22 Stealth Fighter Jets are also being deployed as part of the exercises, and in addition to the USS McCain Guided Missile Warship which is an Aegis-Class, something I think we talked about several times in this program that is, it is equipped to fire the Standard Missile 3 Interceptor Missile.

Robles: The B-2s, was that originally planned as part of the exercises?

Rozoff: I think we can only speculate on whether, or rather at which point the United States decided to deploy the B-2s and whether this was an intentional provocation, you know to up the ante.

The interpretation of course, in the ever obedient western media, obedient that is to the government line; is that this is to assure the South Koreans and perhaps Japan as well, the Japanese government, of US resolve vis-à-vis North Korea and such like.

I mean this is blustering, I don’t think we have to take that seriously. What in fact the US is doing is raising the ante substantially, not simply against North Koreans, you know, it has been my contention, as you know John for years, that North Korean is really: I don’t want to play with words, a “Red Herring”, but it is really a pretext for US military buildup in the Far East and North East Asia, aimed not so much at North Korea, as at China and Russia.

And what we’ve seen in recent days, the new Defense Chief Chuck Hagel, has announced the deployment of 14 more ground-based long-range interceptor missiles to Alaska, all together there will be 30, ostensibly again to exclusively address missile threat from North Korea, which I believe personally is probably exaggerated, I think there is a hyperbolical presentation of the threat posed by North Korea. But nevertheless, at the end of the day the US has consummated the Asia Pacific pivot with a vengence.

Robles: North Korea is making statements themselves that are extremely bellicose, I guess. If they are saying they are going to hit targets in the US, what would you make of those statements?

Rozoff: I would urge caution on two scores, first of all, I don’t know about the reliability of the translation of the North Koreans statements. That is not to say they have not made what are basically blustering statements.

I think it is very simple for a small nation with a fairly ineffectual military to make threats. The rest of the world doesn’t have to take them tremendously seriously. When the US makes threats, the world should take it eminently seriously because the US has delivered on threats in the past, in the recent past.

I think the most important thing to understand here is it is part of a pattern of behavior, that over the last two and a half years or so, where the US clearly, openly has announced that it is going to shift the preponderance of its military might, including first strike capabilities to the Asia Pacific Region, including 60% of Naval Forces, submarines and strategic air forces.

So, if North Korea didn’t exist, it would almost have to be invented, I would argue, according to that scenario. There has to be some alleged reason, or rational, or threat in the region that would permit the United States, first of all, to increase its own military forces in the area but also to consolidate the creation of Asia Pacific analogue of NATO, which has been long in the offing and long in the making.

South Korea, we have to recall, is one of 8 countries that roughly a year ago was announced to be part of North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s latest partnership program, Partners Across the Globe, that’s the name if it. Japan is another. And the Deputy Secretary General of NATO within the last 48-72 hours, I am talking about the former to U.S. Ambassador of Russia Alexander Vershbow, stated openly that if North Korea were to attack the United States, that is an unlikely possibility unless in retaliation, that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization could invoke its article 5, so called mutual defense clause, meaning the entire 28 nation North Atlantic Treaty Organization would be at war with North Korea.

Robles: What would you make of the translations? I’ve also read some reports but they’ve pretty much been muffled I think and kind of brushed aside that the actual translations were wrong. But then again North Korea has not issued any redactions to those statements.

Rozoff: Much along the lines of what you’ve just said is that, the “red Headlines,” maybe the opening paragraphs stating that the reports that North Korea was prepared to hit the mainland of the United States, or Guam, or Okinawa and so forth, I am sure they are, in the event of a war between the two countries, and let’s keep in mind there is truce, not a peace settlement, technically North Korean, The People’s Democratic Republic of Korea and the United States are in a state of armed hostilities, there has never been a formal peace settlement, so when one or the other launches hostilities, it is really a resumption of something that happened 60 years ago rather than something entirely new.

Another factor though that needs to be addressed is the fact that North Korea is one of only 3 countries that borders both Russia and China. The other two are Mongolia and Kazakhstan and the United States and its NATO allies have been extremely aggressive in trying to consolidate their control, including the military sphere, over both Mongolia and Kazakhstan.

NATO targets hackers and patriotism is a crime if you are not with NATO – Rozoff

23 March, 15:57 1  Download audio file

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In a new directive, the “North Atlantic” Treaty Organization (NATO), has now made it part of its military doctrine to target hackers and hacktivists who are operating for “ideological, political, religious or patriotic” reasons, effectively making patriotism for a country not part of NATO, religion not in keeping with NATO’s approved religion, and anything opposed to NATO and its global expansion a crime and those guilty eligible for assassination by drone. Even George Orwell would have never dreamt up something so “Orwellian”. In an interview regular VOR contributor Rick Rozoff spoke to the Voice of Russia about this and more.  

I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner and Manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list. 

Robles: NATO has been very active lately. Can you give us a few details about what they are up to and maybe a little bit about this new Cyber-War Directive where NATO is declaring hackers military targets?

Rozoff: That is exactly what the new NATO manual identifies hackers as being: as fair game for military attacks, both cyber and otherwise, incidentally.

So, it is not so much retaliation in the cyber sphere strictly, as potentially launching a cruise missile at them, I’m sorry, a drone-fired missile, as one of your guests recently, Bill Blum said about Julian Assange. I believe his words were that; “…there is drone with Julian Assange’s name on it.”

And NATO then reserves the right to launch attacks, cyber and otherwise, on anyone they identify as being a hacktivist, that is hacking into military and even civilian sites in Europe and this is coordinated through what is called a “NATO Center of Excellence on Cyber Affairs” and “cyber warfare” really, in the capital of Estonia, Tallin which was set up directly to confront Russia several years ago after an alleged Russian-based series of attacks on websites in Estonia.

But NATO has been active on a number of other fronts too, as you mentioned in your question. First of all, they have crafted the third or the latest annual national program for the nation of Georgia.

Robles: I am sorry. Can I ask you one question regarding the cyber manual? Is this an official part of military operations or is this just some sort of “draft guidelines” or something?

Rozoff: No, it is official NATO doctrine as of the publication of the manual.

Robles: So, can they actually, seriously, physically, “target” anyone they deem to be a hacker threat with a drone missile?

Rozoff: I didn’t hear them specify they would use “a Hellfire Missile fired from a Predator Drone” but the terminology I’ve seen is that the attacks against the hackers, incidentally anywhere in the world, could be done either: fighting fire with fire, that is through “cyber denial of access” or other attacks, on the hacktivists, or other measures deemed “legal”, is the language I am familiar with.

But we have to keep in mind that the major military power, the founder of NATO and the “prime mover" to this day within it, the United States, reserves a right to use drone missile attacks within its own borders against its own citizens, according to Attorney General Eric Holder of late.

So, it shouldn’t surprise us that the military bloc headed by the United States arrogates to itself the right to launch military attacks, and this is quite in keeping also incidentally, with the US Cyber Command, which has set up in 2010, the first “Cyber Warfare Command” set up in the world, and wherever the US goes, NATO is sure to follow, and very quickly thereafter, so it shouldn’t surprise us.

This was discussed, incidentally, roughly a year ago at the NATO summit in Chicago; that cyber warfare was one of the major components, one of the major emphases that NATO was placing, in the addition to things, “matters” like so-called missile defense: that is interceptor missile programs and the development and extension of the NATO Response Force, for military interventions globally.

It is worth noting that today news also quotes Supreme Allied Commander of Europe for NATO, who was also the commander of US-European Command, Admiral James Stavridis, stating that NATO essentially has contingency plans for replicating the Libyan scenario inside Syria. This is as of today.

As I was about to explain NATO has crafted the latest annual national program for the nation of Georgia. So, NATO is active on a number of fronts, and some of the stories I’ve mentioned indicate: they are way out of the territorial area of responsibility for the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization, if they are talking about military actions in Syria, which incidentally follows the report of a couple of days ago, that the US is considering drone strike inside Syria.

So, once again US and NATO are working in tandem. Georgia of course is in the South Caucasus and nowhere near the North-Atlantic Ocean, and hackers anywhere around the world, who are fair game for NATO attack, cyber and otherwise, extend the pervue for NATO operations globally, which is what they have striven for, and what they have arrived at.

Reminder

Robles: This manual, it says: “…a private citizen, who on his or her own, initiates, engages in hacking for, inter alia: ideological, political, religious or patriotic reasons”, if the hacktivist isn’t working directly within an “official military organization”, NATO says they could “still” be targeted. So, does that mean that “Anonymous” members could be targeted, or bloggers?

Rozoff: I would certainly draw that conclusion, but you see, I would go a step further: when they mention that; if the motives are ideological, political, moral and so forth, then what is to prevent them considering somebody who is selling what they consider to be disinformation, or “inconvenient but accurate” information, then from being a target themselves.

Robles: I could be a target! I mean my views, I think, would fall into all of those areas but…

Rozoff: That is right, any political adversary who is using the Internet in any capacity, counter to what NATO, how NATO envisions the world being structured, technically I suspect. You know as you mentioned, even an individual hacker with no organizational affiliation could, according to the terminology of the excerpt you just read, be considered a target, a potential target.

Robles: Hacking could be almost anything really! I mean it could be someone who’s just downloaded a picture from NATO’s site and added some words to it, or something.

Rozoff: On the NATO website itself it expressly forbids the use of any material, print or image, if in anyway it mocks or ridicules NATO.

So, now it is apparently a crime (copyright laws would be used) but in essence, this is political censorship. If anyone used material, garnered or gleaned, from the NATO site in a way that NATO didn’t approve.

Keeping in mind that North-Atlantic Treaty Organization is a consortium of western military powers that is funded through those governments, of the respective member states of the country, the United States overwhelmingly, and that as a citizen of one of those countries, you do not have the right to use information on those sites even though your tax monies are being used to support it, if NATO determines that you are in some manner, not treating them with proper respect.

So, this is another instance, another example, of the US dominated military bloc, essentially letting the world… “putting the world on notice” rather, that you either toe-the-line or you could be punished!

Robles: This last phrase here, it says; that anyone who initiates, (in hacking), which could be almost anything, for “patriotic” reasons: so that would mean, any person, on the planet, who loves their own country, if it is not a NATO member and who does something on the Internet, could be targetted for NATO assassination?

Rozoff: That certainly how I would interpret that comment and I think you are right to highlight, or to emphasize the world “patriotic”, as though somehow that is an evil motivation, ipso facto, that in the globalized militarized world envisioned by the United States and its NATO allies, if their patriotic sentiments are in opposition to having their country destroyed by NATO rockets and bombs, then they are, by that very fact “criminals”, I suspect, and can be targeted appropriately or correspondingly.

 Hugo Chavez was a humble man who transformed the world

7 March, 12:27    Download audio file

Hugo Chavez was a humble man who transformed the world - Rozoff

Hugo Chavez was a humble man from humble origins who did more than anyone else to lift up and unite the countries and the people of Latin America after being subjugated to decades of US imperialism. He was an inspiration and a beacon who will be sorely missed by many. Hours after the passing of the late President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, Rick Rozoff spoke with John Robles about the legacy and the positive changes the late leader single-handedly brought to the world.

Robles: In our discussions of NATO expansion, US imperialistic movements all over the globe, many times we’ve talked about Hugo Chavez and his independence and the way he stood up to the US. Can you give us your opinions of the great achievements of Mr. Hugo Chavez?

Rozoff: The late and very much lamented, Hugo Chavez was a remarkable man but in many ways remarkable despite the fact that he was not remarkable. That is: he was born in a very humble family, one that might even be described as impoverished. He was born in a village. He was of part Indigenous, that is: Native American, Indian background, as well as reportedly of African background.

He was somebody who resembles people like you or me, our parents, our grandparents: people who haven’t gone to elite schools, people who have not been born in privilege and have been selected from birth, if you will, for positions of honor and power. A simple man who applied himself and developed his talents and his abilities, but most of all his dedication.

We have to remember that his election as President of Venezuela in 1999 set the stage for, heralded, a whole series of election victories and transformations throughout Latin America, Central as well as South America, in countries like Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Nicaragua, El Salvador, that he himself was the prime mover in setting up what is known by the acronym of ALBA (The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America) that he was the prime mover in setting up something by the acronym of CELAC (The Community of Latin American and Caribbean States), the Bank of the South, TeleSur (the television network for the South America).

It was this one man instrumental in turning the tide of Latin America and in many ways of the southern hemisphere of the world that has been wracked by the neoliberalism of the 1990s.

And his actions have been described, I think very accurately John, as having, on his initiative that we have seen the reversal of 200 years of the Monroe Doctrine.

A few years ago when Russian and Venezuelan vessels participated in a joint naval exercise in the Caribbean. It was exactly in that context, it was remarked that this had basically reversed the 200 years of the Monroe Doctrine, that is of Washington and the United States claiming exclusive sphere of influence throughout the entire western hemisphere.

And that this was the doing of Hugo Chavez, this humble former soldier, who became 14-year-president of Venezuela, one who read distributed the wealth from petroleum and other industries in the country to benefit the agrarian, as well as the rural poor, or offered major economic assistance, including to subsidize energy deals with countries throughout the Caribbean and Latin America, even with parts of the United States, as a matter of fact, New York City.

He reconfigured the power relationships not only in the Western Hemisphere, but globally, in a way that could not had been foreseen.

You know, the head of state of a country that isn’t a tremendously large one, isn’t a tremendously powerful one, certainly not in military terms, but this is a man who made frequent visits to Russia, to the African continent, to the Middle East, to China, who cultivated relationships with the emerging multi-polar world, particularly those nations represented in BRICS: Brazil, Russia, India, Russia, China and South Africa. And he was arguably the most persuasive advocate for a newly emerging system of multi-polarity in the world, of anyone I know.

Reminder

Robles: Let me ask you about Nicolas Maduro the Vice President. Yesterday he said that Hugo Chavez’s cancer was part of a conspiracy against him and basically he had been poisoned by enemies.

He also expelled two US military attachés from the country. Would you care to speculate on those accusations, thta he made?

Rozoff: On the first accusation, you know that the suspicious incidents of cancer amongst independent Latin American heads of state; in Argentina, in Bolivia, earlier in Brazil, in Venezuela, even one can argue, with Fidel Castro in Cuba, that there certainly is room for legitimate suspicion and investigation.

I might recommend a book that was published in the last couple of years with the intriguing title “Mary’s Monkey”, a book written about the late Mary Sherman and about CIA linked operations in the early 1960s to actually develop the types of cancer for use against political adversaries. So, it’s not that far-fetched an accusation.

On the second score, the fact that the two US Embassy personnel have been declared persona-non-grata and expelled from, or invited to leave Venezuela, I think what is of most concern to us right now is the fact that, should a new election be held because of the death of Hugo Chavez, that the United States would certainly kick into high gear the entire color revolution operation that has been employed in the past; in Yugoslavia, Georgia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Lebanon and so forth. But we may see it done on a much more ambitious scale even than we saw in the countries that I’ve just mentioned, just as Venezuela has been the bellwether, has been the prototype for the transformation that has occurred throughout Latin America in the last 14 years. So, the US sees it, I suppose as the transformation, the revolution, that needs to be reversed first.

Robles: Rick, if we could maybe about a minute more and I really appreciate you speaking with me at this late hour.

Rozoff: Thank you for the opportunity.

You know, I think when talking about somebody like Chavez, who again was as humble and unpretentious person as any of us could hope to be, that in speaking of him nevertheless, you know it is almost a paradox, I am reminded of the lines in the Bible, in the Gospel, that I don’t feel worthy to lace his sandals.

I mean I can pay him a tribute, but it’s a tribute of a very simple person who was immensely grateful and stands in eternal admiration of everything that he has done.

 And all the people that he has made enthusiastic about the process that he in many ways initiated, and that his faith and the faith that he has instilled in them will continue. And I’m very much saddened with his demise. I’m very proud of his accomplishments.

I’m very confident that Latin America and the world will continue towards a world that is really worthy of mankind.

 Iran's drones would serve Washington right

15 February, 2013 11:14   Download audio file

Iran's drones would serve Washington right - Rozoff

NATO continues to surround the Russian Federation with their missiles, which according to Mr. Rozoff, may soon number in the thousands and NATO also continues to aggressively seek to "integrate" country after country into their "alliance". Rick tells us why the Western media has gone quiet on Syria and comments on the fact that Iran is now producing its own drones, which were reversed engineered from captured American drones. As always Rick has his finger on the pulse.

Robles: Can you give our listeners an update on the latest happenings with NATO please?

Rozoff: Yes. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is continuing its expansion, at least its efforts to expand globally. Within the last few days we’ve seen overtures made by leading NATO officials to previously neutral countries like Ireland, Finland, Sweden in efforts to recruit them into the alliance.

The Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen is in Ireland now, but prior to departing for Ireland, which historically has been a neutral nation during the Cold War, he gave an interview to the Irish Times where he extended an invitation essentially for Ireland to join NATO as a full member.

The Deputy Commander of Allied Command Transformation, the NATO command in the United States in Norfolk Virginia, within the last week or two as well, has welcomed Finland which borders Russia, as a strategic partner of NATO and talked about the further integration of that nation into the NATO sphere of influence and military operations.

And then the commander of the military forces, the top commander in Sweden a couple of days ago made a very provocative statement to the effect that if a war ensued between Sweden and Russia (How probable is that, right?) that Sweden wouldn’t last two days against Russia’s military might and that’s why Sweden needs to be in NATO.

So, as we are seeing there is a concerted effort to consolidate North Atlantic Treaty Organization control over the entire European continent, I mean they are not going to rest until every nation has been pulled in it as a full member. So, we have that going on.

And then we have, although not formally a NATO operation, we have the French military campaign in Mali in northwest Africa with the active assistance of the US, Britain, Germany and other major NATO powers. And so, you know, just off the top of my head, I mean that’s what is going on with NATO: it is consolidating its domination of Europe and it is extending its reach outside of Europe to the point where, an official with the German Marshall Fund of the United States, recently stated that NATO is basically, I don’t want to say a three-ring circus, but something to that effect, saying that there is a ring that is Europe and there is beyond that ring Asia and Africa (this is from Mark Jacobson an Atlantasist think tank expert).

So, we see the persistence of the US dominated military bloc’s efforts to extend itself. As a matter of fact, something I don’t want to forget, the current Russian Ambassador to NATO Alexander Grushko said a couple of days ago at a meeting in NATO headquarters, that Russia would not tolerate NATO declaring itself and functioning as, I believe his words were “an international energy security guarantor”, which is another role that NATO has arrogated onto itself.

Reminder

Robles: Can you tell us anything about, there were reports last week that the infamous missile shield, including Romanian installations, was not workable? Have you heard anything about that?

Rozoff: Yes, there were reports to that effect and one wonders, you know, if these are calculated leaks or if they have any authenticity. I don’t know. But you might recall there were similar concerns expressed about the earlier George W. Bush Administration’s plans for interceptor missiles in Poland that are called ground-based midcourse interceptors. But the concerns that you’ve read or you are alluding to rather are premised on the fact that Iran is supposedly going to be able to develop intercontinental ballistic missiles that need interception in places like Romania and Poland, and I would argue that’s an absurd contention in the first place. So, the basic premises and the conclusions drawn from them would be similarly inaccurate. So, I wouldn’t give too much credence to those reports. The US is still going ahead them.

As a matter of fact in a recent statement by Anders Fogh Rasmussen “the NATO chieftain”, he boasted particularly about the missile defense “so called” or the interceptor missile system as being, as he put it, at the core of NATO’s defense posture.

He boasted about the deployment of 6 Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Interceptor Missile Batteries to southeastern Turkey which have now come unde formal NATO command and control. And he also talked about European countries emulating or joining the US by providing warship with interceptor missile radar and with the interceptor missiles themselves.

We should keep in mind, and I don’t know how well it is known in Russia and elsewhere, is that the United States currently has 62 what are called Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers and 22 Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruisers, that is altogether 84 warships, that currently, at least the destroyers, can carry as many as 90 missiles apiece.

And it is precisely these ships that are now referred to as Aegis-Class or are in the process of becoming such: that is are equipped to carry, or will be carrying, standard Missile-3Interceptor Missiles of the sort that are going to be based on the ground in Poland and Romania from 2015 to 2018. But the 48 missiles that are going to be in Poland and Romania, 24 apiece, are a formidable challenge enough to Russia. But the fact that there may be several hundred, even thousands, of missiles placed on the US cruisers and destroyers is a much more serious consideration.

Robles: Can you tell us a little bit about what is going on with Syria right now? Everything’s gotten real quiet. After they’ve put those missiles in Turkey, the Patriots you just spoke about, and as we’ve said in the past in our discussions: when they go quiet something is up.

Rozoff: I know what you are talking about John. Watching old adventure films whenever the insects and the animals in the forest or the jungle became quiet, you became nervous. And a situation similar to that I’m sure is obtaining in relation to Syria.

We also have to remember though there is a changing of the guard in Washington. With the Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, who more than anyone else I’m sure has been instrumental in pushing through a campaign of regime change in Damascus, out and John Kerry replacing her as the chief foreign policy diplomat in the US, similarly with the Pentagon with Defense Secretary and with the CIA Director.

So, there may be a short reprise for Damascus, for Syria at this point until the second term Obama Administration’s foreign policy team is in place in which case we may see even mounting offensive again.

Robles: There were reports we’ve just had that Iran captured a US drone, last year, and they reverse engineered it and are now producing massive quantities of their own drones.

Rozoff: It would serve Washington right if they did, I mean it truthfully would. The US has pioneered international drone warfare, this is something it has developed over the last decade, actually over the last 12 years. It is a new form of warfare, it is global in scope, it is deadly as we know.

You were listening to an interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff the manager of the stop NATO website and mailing list.

Visit our site in the near future for part 2 of this talk.

Countries will start to shoot down US drones

26 February, 14:31 10 

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The world is just starting to take notice of the expansion of US drone usage worldwide. US drones are becoming increasingly larger, deadlier and greater in number (now at approximately 8,000) and pose a threat to world peace. In addition for NATO’s AFRICOM and the US, Mali is important due to its strategic location near uranium reserves, hence the recent military operations in the country, which are characterized as another “energy grab” by Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff.

This is John Robles. I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner, Manager and Editor of the Stop NATO website and mailing list.

Part I

This is part 2 of an interview in progress.

1Robles: There were reports that Iran captured a US drone last year and they reverse-engineered it and are now producing massive quantities of their own drones. Would you like to comment on that?

Rozoff: It would serve Washington right if they did, I mean it truthfully would. The US has pioneered international drone warfare, this is something that has developed over the last decade, actually over the last 12 years. It is a new form of warfare, it is global in scope, it is deadly, as we know.

My personal estimates are the amount of people killed by the drone missile attacks, Hellfire missiles fired by drones in no fewer than 6 countries at this point John: in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen, probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 5,000, by some accounts including Pakistan’s Dawn Newspaper a couple of years ago, they estimated the 96% of those killed in Pakistan were civilians and had no connection with Al-Qaeda.

So, the fact that the US is covering the globe, including our own country I fear, with surveillance drones, but also with lethal drones capable of firing missiles, is something the world should counteract, and if one of their drones gets taken down and is duplicated by another country, I don’t see how the US could complain, except for copyright violations.

Robles: How are they going to react if one day Iran decides to assassinate somebody in the United States with the drone?

Rozoff: That’s an unlikely possibility. Unfortunately, there is only one nation that has done that, at least on any scale. I don’t know what Israel has done in that respect with their drones but I believe that the US is really alone.

And we have to keep in mind incidentally that in the year where the so-called “Global War on Terror” was inaugurated, or launched, in 2001, the Pentagon had 200 drones in its arsenal, these are almost entirely surveillance drones.

As of last year the estimate is the Pentagon had 8,000 drones, which is a 40 fold increase.

These are increasingly larger, capable of carrying more, and larger, and more lethal weaponry, we are talking for example about the Predator drone, the most common one, now being superseded by the Raptor and perhaps even more sophisticated and deadly versions of unmanned aerial vehicles in the future.

So, this is something the world is finally, a bit belatedly, taking note of: is that once again one country and one country only reserves to itself the right to launch aerial assassinations around the globe without having to account to its own laws in Congress, much less to the international community.

Robles: So, you don’t think it is possible that in the coming years other countries will start countering US drone strikes with their own?

Rozoff: I think they will shoot them down, I mean as has happened in Afghanistan. It was brought down by the Iranians evidently according to the account you related.

There will be anti-drone measures taken by other countries. I don’t know of any other country that advances the interest targeting people for murder around the world.

Robles: Sure, they could start targeting the people who are running the drone programs as being a threat to their citizens.

Rozoff: I would hate to speculate on that score and I would probably end up in penitentiary somewhere if I did. Sorry. (coughs)

Robles: Let’s not do that.

Reminder

Rozoff: We do have to see that the US is substantively engaged in supporting the French military operation, indeed the French “war” in Mali, that US aircraft are refueling French war planes, Rafaels and Mirages, for air attacks inside the country, US cargo planes are transporting… the US Air Force is running an operation in France to transport troops and material including weapons inside Mali for the campaign.

And we have to recall that the US military has been involved in Mali itself for several years now. An incident perhaps four or five, perhaps even more, years ago, occurred where a US military transport plane was shot at, and caught fire, that is, from gunfire from the ground by Tuareg Rebels in the north where the US was aiding and abetting the government of Mali against the rebels in the north, engaged in the counterinsurgency war.

So, that is something not new to the United States and that is part of what is called Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative, which is a misnomer, it grew out of the Pan Sahel Initiative of the US state department supposedly to combat Islamic terrorism in the Sahel Region, that is the area south of the Sahara Desert, that runs all the way from the Atlantic Ocean to the horn of Africa, that is very strategically vital part of the world, and US-Africa Command, AFRICOM, has run any number of special forces war games, you know, military exercises in Mali, but in the general region under the code name of Operation Flintlock, so the US has been involved pretty substantially in that.

The same US air units that are supporting the French in Mali currently are those who supported AFRICOM and NATO’s war against Libya two years ago. You know, operating out of Britain in the first place.

So, what we see is further expansion of military operations inside Africa, which have included in recent years, NATO air-lifting Burundian and Rwandan troops into Somalia for the ongoing fighting there, the US assisting that, including with air strikes, drone missile attacks.

So, what you are seeing is kind of a war front extending around the same latitude that Sahel is at, but all the way from West African and Mali to East Africa and Somalia, and in-between increasingly in areas like the western part of Sudan, Darfur, the Central African Republic.

The US and its NATO allies, and its NATO allies are, we have to recall, all the major colonial powers that had formally divided up and ruled the African continent: Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, later on Germany and Italy, also Turkey during the Ottoman period, and this is a force that is not going back to supposedly restore order or pacify Africa again. I am sure the Africans on the ground, if not their governments, are nervous, they recollect what happened the last time these guys were there.

Robles: Now, Rick, back to Mali there for a minute: a few minutes ago you mentioned something about NATO being a guarantor of energy supplies. Right?

Rozoff: Uh huh.

Robles: I read an article by somebody, I can’t exactly remember where it was, they said the whole purpose for the French assistance of the Malian Government was to ensure the delivery of Uranium to France from Niger. Do you know anything about that?

Rozoff: It is extremely good point, the estimates I’ve read is that 80% of energy produced in France is from nuclear power plants. They are dependent of course on Uranium to run those plants, and Mali and neighboring Niger, area sources for a good deal of that Uranium, and the fighting that’s been going on for a number of years in the north of Mali with the Tuareg Rebels: in large part the Tuaregs wanted not only autonomy and a certain degree of participation in the central government in Bamako, but also wanted some say into what happened with the proceeds of the Uranium mines in the north of the country where they reside. So, in large part I think we can see this, as being another energy resource grab!

You were listening to the interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner, Manager and Editor of the Stop NATO website and mailing list.

End of Part 2. Please visit our site in the near future for the third and final part of this interview. 

The US Was Killing Russians Defending their Homeland Rick Rozoff

1 February, 2013 17:00  Download audio file

The story of the Polar Bear Expedition or what was also called the American North-Russia Expeditionary Force is told by the Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff. The operation took place between 1918 and 1919 and saw at least 5,000 US troops sent into Russian territory to kill Bolsheviks in the North of Russia. The goals were to secure weapons cached in the North, assist Czechoslovakian forces who were fighting the Bolsheviks and overthrow the Communist Government.

Robles: Soon we are coming upon the 95th anniversary of an event that very few people know about. Would you like to tell our listeners a little bit about what that event is?

Rozoff: Sure, I would. And that’s something that first came to my attention through a… in a very personal way which I’ll describe in a moment. But the event, or the operation we are talking about, is something that is proverbially known as the Polar Bear Expedition. The formal designation for it was the Northern Russia Expedition or the American North-Russia Expeditionary Force. And what that was, was the deployment somewhere in the neighborhood of 5,000 US, troops starting in September of 1918 and continuing into at least July of 1919, in northern Russia, fighting armed forces of the Russian Government of that time, which was after the October Revolution in Russia… So it was the Government of Lenin.

But that American troops were sent, in some instances, after the armistice was signed, from the trenches in France, and in some cases directly from the state of Michigan to fight near the Arctic Circle in Russia.

In 1972 the last time I saw my maternal grandfather, my mother’s farther, shortly before he died. I knew that he had been in Pershing’s Allied Expeditionary Force, they’ve been with the US forces in France in World War I. And I happened to ask him, I was a very young man at the time, and I happened to ask him: what happened after the armistice was signed and the troops were demobilized in France. And his colorful characterization of it was, and I quote him, he said: “They sent us to fight the Bolsheviks”. That’s a quote I can recall, you know, 41 years ago almost.

And in fact I knew that his unit had received basic training at what was called at that time Camp Custer, after George Custer, “General Custer”, later became Fort Custer and it is outside the Battle Creek, Michigan.

My grandfather was born in Michigan, though spent most of his life in the Canadian province of Ontario. But when the US entered World War I in 1917, he enlisted in the US Army and was trained in Camp Custer. And it is from there, from the 85th division trained at Camp Custer, that regiments were selected to fight in Russia in 1918-1919: that’s the Polar Bear Expedition or operation.

Over a hundred US troops were killed in fighting, scores of others died because of disease and other ailments, probably hundreds wounded. There is no telling how many Russian citizens were killed by the American troops during that period.

And what happened, almost four years ago now, a documentary film was made and shown in the state of Michigan where Camp Custer is. And amongst other people attending the show and praising the so-called Polar Bear Expedition was the senior senator from the state of Michigan Carl Levin who at the occasion of the unveiling of the film, stated, and I’m quoting from a Michigan newspaper at the time, in 2009: “It is a perfect time for us to meet, a perfect place. There are lessons to be learned in history, there are lessons here.”

I’m not sure which lessons senator Levin was referring to but the fact that for the last four years the United States has renewed its claim to the Arctic Ocean, at the expense of other nations, Canada in the first instance, but Russia most directly, one would guess. You know, the fact that the US is celebrating its first effort in the Arctic region, the first combat operation against Russia in 1918 and 1919, I think is something worth noting.

Robles: So, this was on Russian territory, it was on Russian soil and this involved…

Rozoff: Yes, I remember my grandfather telling me, again I have to go back a number of years, I tend to recall him saying he was deployed in Murmansk. But what I’ve read on the subject subsequently suggests that it’s not terribly far from there Archangel (Arkhangelsk) and that the US troops were sent there, the traditional understanding of it evidently is that the British War Minister at the time, who was Winston Churchill, prevailed upon the American President Woodrow Wilson to deploy the troops, supposedly for a number of objectives, one of which was to secure armaments that have been stored there during the war before the Russian Revolution and the withdrawal of Russia from the war.

The second of all,was, really to fight the newly founded Government in Russia, the Bolshevik Government. And thirdly to support Czech Legion, which were Czechoslovak, for the most part Czech soldiers, who had served in the Russian Army during World War I and then became anti government, you know, fighters against the Government after the Revolution of November 1917.

So, I think the third factor, that is supporting the Czech Legion, is a more plausible explanation for the involvement of the US troops and suggests that nothing less than countering the Russian Government at that time and ultimately overthrowing, it was the intent of the deployment of the American soldiers.

Robles: I see. Can you tell us any details about the operation that people might not have ever heard about?

Rozoff: With what reading I’ve done on the subject, it wasn’t of course the entire division that was sent. It was, I believe, two or perhaps three, regiments from the 85th division that were deployed.

They arrived in Archangel at the very beginning of September of 1918, and at least, according to one account I’ve read, they were placed under British Command with other, evidently British armed forces, in the area as well.

The British supposedly had arrived in Archangel a month earlier, early August of 1918, and apparently the Russian forces had already moved the armaments or the material that the British intended to seize or secure, and that led to an expedition up river evidently, the Dvina River, with acts of fighting between indigenous Russian forces and American troops.

And by most accounts, early on, this was winter time of course, it was maybe in October or so, the American campaign clearly had come to a dead end, it wasn’t successful. Their attempts to link up with the Czech troops fighting the Government of Moscow were unsuccessful. And it was prolonged into the summer of 1919 but ultimately abandoned.

The casualties again that I… actually I’ve seen by one account, an estimated 110 American soldiers were killed in fighting with Russian forces.

Robles: And this was actually US troops on Russian territory killing Russians.

Rozoff: People defending their soil, you know, their territory.

Robles: Why were they placed under UK Command?

Rozoff: I suspect because the fact that British soldiers have been sent to the same area, the Archangel-Murmansk region, a month earlier to prepare, it was easier for them to get there I guess. But we know that Britain had played a role in the interim period between the February Revolution in 1917 in Russia and the October one, that is during the provisional Government of the Kerensky period, in trying to secure the continued involvement of the Russian Government, whatever it was, whatever it turned out to be, in the war.

And the Kerensky Government indeed, I’m sure under the pressure and perhaps no little bribery from Britain, France and the United States did continue Russian involvement in the war, one which cost several million Russian lives.

Mr. Rick Rozoff is the manager and the owner of the stop NATO website and mailing list, and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.

Why were weapons cached in Russia by the West?

12 February, 2013 17:00  Download audio file

Why were weapons cached in Russia by the West? - Rozoff

Voice of Russia regular contributor Rick Rozoff continues with the story of the Polar Bear Expedition or what was also called the American North-Russia Expeditionary Force. The operation took place between 1918 and 1919 and saw at least 5,000 US troops sent into Russian territory to kill Bolsheviks in the North of Russia and to secure weapons that had been cached there. To this day it remains a mystery why exactly the weapons were there and sadly the killing of Russians continues to be something to be proud of for certain American polticians.

Hello! This is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff. He is the manager and the owner of the stop NATO website and mailing list, and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.

Robles: And this was actually US troops on Russian territory killing Russians?

Rozoff: The people defending their soil, you know, their territory.

Robles: Why were they placed under the UK Command?

Rozoff: I suspect because the fact that British soldiers had been sent to the same area, the Archangel-Murmansk region, a month earlier to prepare, it was easier for them to get there I guess. But we know that Britain had played a role in the interim period between the February Revolution in 1917 in Russia and the October one, that is during the provisional Government of the Kerensky period, in trying to secure the continued involvement of the Russian Government, whatever it was, whatever it turned out to be, in the war.

And the Kerensky Government indeed, I’m sure under the pressure and perhaps no little bribery from Britain, France and the United States did continue the Russian involvement in the war, one which cost several million Russian lives. And with the accession to power of the Bolsheviks in the October Revolution the first thing they did was withdrawal from the war.

I would suspect that the British military and intelligence personnel were already situated in northern Russia with the intent of not only continuing the Russian war efforts while Russia was in the war during the tsar’s period, but also to ensure that no Russian government would come to and maintain itself in power, that would withdraw from the fighting.

Robles: Murmansk is very-very far from the center of power, from Moscow and from what was Leningrad. For the listeners one more time, can you clarify why they were deployed in such a remote location?

Rozoff: I can’t honesty give you an explanation for that, except that the their official reason for the deployment were to secure ammunitions that have been shipped there by the British, I’m not sure for whom.

Robles: Geographically, if you would picture it like Washington DC and troops fighting in northern Maine for example….

Rozoff: Murmansk is not that terribly far north from St. Petersburg which was the capital until October 1917 when the capital was shifted to Moscow. So, I mean if they wanted to advance on the Russian capital, let’s say, with the Czech and other foreign fighters commanded by the British and French, and American troops. I don’t think it would have been out of the question to have launched an offensive from the north on the capital.

Robles: And that would have been totally unexpected I think.

Rozoff: Possibly! This is beyond my expertise, I have to confess.

Robles: Ok, so no real reason other than that there were possible weapons there. Why would that they’ve been storing weapons that far north in the first place?

Rozoff: What I’ve read doesn’t really give me a definitive answer to that question. Rather for example, these were weapons that have been shipped there earlier in the war for using by the tsarist Russian government. Or it seems likely that these were weapons shipped by Britain and perhaps France after the… well, of course you know the deployment of September 1918 predates the Armistice actually at that time which didn’t occur until November.

It is possible, because of the revolution in February and in the subsequent October Revolution, which I guess could not have been anticipated but it occurred, that these weapons may have been intended precisely for Czech and other fighters, either White Russian fighters or foreign fighters inside Russia to be used against the new government in Moscow when it came to power in October, and perhaps as a safeguard against the Kerensky Provisional Government. But again, this is something that is completely beyond my expertise.

Robles: This is a real mystery. What became of the weapons?

Rozoff: The weapons, according to the accounts that I’m familiar with, the Russian forces anticipated the American move and moved them upstream on the Dvina River and out of reach for the American soldiers who were sent to seize them, which led as I alluded to earlier to the fact that the American forces actually somehow managed to move up river in pursuit of both the weapons and the Russian forces that had removed them, and in my understanding successfully, but along the way engaged in fighting that resulted in the deaths not only of 110 troops but I would assume an equal, if not a larger number of Russian forces.

Robles: Has there ever been an official apology or exchange of notes, or anything on these operations and this incident?

Rozoff: No, to the best of my knowledge. And the fact that a senior senator, one of the longest serving senators in the country, Carl Levin as I mentioned, almost four years ago applauded this military operation and stated that it is a lesson for the future and so forth, which suggests that far from there being any remorse or misgivings by the US Government, they seem to be particularly proud of what they’ve done.

Interestingly enough, my paternal grandfather had been born in Russia, as my last name might suggest, and he came to the US before World War I. And my maternal grandfather was born in the US and was sent on the Polar Bear Expedition. So, in 1918-1919 I had one grandfather who was born in Russia who was in the US and one who was born in the US who was in Russia. That’s an interesting twist of fate.

Robles: Was your Russian grandfather battling American forces?

Rozoff: My Russian grandfather was working at steel mill and not even making munitions to the best of my knowledge.

Robles: Well, maybe you just don’t know that.

Rozoff: That’s true, he died when I was very young I’m afraid.

Robles: That’s sad to hear. Rick thank you very much for this bit of history and this bit of a mystery, I think.

Rozoff: Well put! History and mystery, it may be the beginning of further research into the subject.

 

 The US did not set up US/AFRICA Command as a social service agency - Rozoff

28 January, 2013 12:29   Download audio file  

The US did not set up US/AFRICA Command as a social service agency - Rozoff

Regular Voice of Russia Contributor Rick Rozoff discusses Syrian defenses and how they are preventing a Western invasion, Russian-Syrian cooperation, the pretext of the war on terror to invade countries which he says was part of phase 2 of the US/NATO global expansion, other pretexts used to justify military expansion, the ties between al-Qaeda and the US and the massive expansion by US/NATO into the African continent which will, in effect, bring all of Africa under US/NATO control.

Robles: There’ve been reports that Russian anti-aircraft and defensive systems are the only thing stopping a US invasion of Syria. How much credence would you give to those reports?

Rozoff: I think that’s a very plausible contention. And that in fact over the decades, during the Soviet period and in the post-Soviet period, that Russia has maintained military-to-military ties with the Government in Syria and has, as is the Russian policy, provided strictly defensive weapons to an ally, to a client state, to Syria.

And that I’m sure anyone in the know about this thing wouldn’t be talking about it. But I think it is a safe assumption that Syria has an integrated air defense system that is substantially more advanced and effective than anything that the countries that have been in recent years the victims of US-NATO military onslaughts have had. For example Libya and certainly Afghanistan, Iraq after over a decade of sanctions, and perhaps even Yugoslavia. So, one of the factors, as you mention, that may have already prevented more reckless provocative military action by Western powers against Syria is the fact that Syria has the ability to protect itself.

As you are aware of and this has been mentioned by the Russian officials is the deployment of the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Interceptors in Southeastern Turkey may in fact, in part, be to effectively enforce a no-fly zone over the border land, you know, the area on the other side of the Syrian border, to prevent aircraft, as well as cruise missiles or other theatre missiles, from being used in that area, and as such, may be preparatory to plans to cripple or neutralize the Syrian air defense system on a more ambitious scale. That’s certainly a possibility.

While reflecting on developments in Syria, and even more so, developments by outside players meddling in internal affairs in Syria, and I’m talking of course about the United States and its NATO allies and their allies in the Gulf Cooperation Council; the monarchies and sheikhdoms in the Persian Gulf, we have to recall that Russia does have its only military facility in the entire Mediterranean in Tartus, in Syria, and that, affecting, as the West and its Persian Gulf allies intend to, regime change in Damascus would inevitably lead to the eviction of the Russian Naval Forces, or their ability to use the facility in Tartus.

We also have to recall that Syria is the only Arab country currently that has particularly close state-to-state relations with Russia, as it does with Iran, same category, and that with the displacement or the replacement of the Government in Damascus we will see the entire Mediterranean Sea basin turned into a Pentagon-NATO stronghold. With no… Libya being knocked out last year and Lebanon presumably going the way of Syria, so that Russian strategic interests in the Mediterranean would be seriously hurt with the overthrow of the Government in Syria and its replacement by a US puppet regime.

Robles: Can you give a prediction, more or less, or see where things are going into Africa?

Rozoff: Yes, along with the so called pivot to the Asia-Pacific region, which is meant to create an alliance based on a model of NATO by the US and the several of its NATO allies, like Britain and France who are past colonial powers in the East Asia and the Asia-Pacific region as a whole, to encircle and contain China much as NATO expansion in Europe is aimed to do it vis-à-vis Russia, but we are also seeing the increased military focus on Africa by the United States, by the entire continent, following in the wake of the creation of the US-Africa Command. The latest, and in terms of the number of countries included, the largest, overseas US regional military command in history.

And because nations like China, Russia, India and others are reaching out to Africa for trade, economic and natural resource purposes, we are seeing the US increasingly intensifying its military presence and activity on the continent. A recent article many of your listeners may be aware of, documents the United States is to deploy, initially at least, limited contingents of military forces to 35 nations in Africa. Depending on how one counts them there are 54 members of the African Union, so that’s a pretty sizeable percentage of the total number of countries in Africa. And that’s in addition of course to the US-NATO war against Libya in North Africa last year.

Robles: So, what exactly are they going to be doing in these 35 countries?

Rozoff: Most of what we’re talking about will be covert activities. The official explanation is “fighting al-Qaeda forces in Africa”. I cannot believe there are 35 nations in Africa that are threatened by al-Qaeda in Africa or anything like it.

Robles: That’s been the whole pretext of this global expansion and this global war on terror. When is this going to stop? How is this going to stop? I mean: how can they just keep doing this over and over? Invade country after country after country on the same fantasy pretext? I mean: no one is ever going to be able to stop this until we all become slaves or what?

Rozoff: You are raising a very interesting question, particularly as it seems to be a real drum beat for military intervention in Mali, in Northwest Africa, and again, ostensibly to combat al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Robles: I mean they created al-Qaeda, for Christ’s sake!

Rozoff: Yes, that’s the irony that I think needs to be emphasized, is the fact that while the US and its NATO allies are actively supporting al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda -linked foreign fighters and terrorists against governments in Libya and Syria, and who knows where else tomorrow, they are using the pretext of fighting al-Qaeda to introduce military forces into Africa, throughout the continent of Africa indeed. So, I think we can take that at face value, that this is a charade, this is a pretence.

We should also of course, since we talked about earlier, the fact that the US has pivoted to the Asia-Pacific region after having subjugated the greater Middle East, that somebody is playing off an old script, if you will, when they come up with these sorts of bogus excuses, because that really belongs to phase 2, if you will, of post-Cold War global US military expansion. So, they need a new script writer in the State Department and the Pentagon.

Robles: Regarding?

Rozoff: The reason why they are increasing military forces in Africa. We know for example that last year the Obama Administration announced a deployment of (special operations) special forces troops to four countries in Central Africa to fight the Lord’s Resistance Army. And they were going to Uganda, the Central African Republic, Congo, South Sudan. So, in that case it is clearly not al-Qaeda. The US military forces have been involved in counter-insurgency operations in Mali for several years and not against al-Qaeda but against ethnic Tuaregs.

So, they’ll use whatever excuse, I guess is at hand, you know, fighting pirates in the Horn of Africa, or pirates in the Gulf of Guinea, or the Lord’s Resistance Army in Central Africa, but at the end of the day, the US did not setup the US-Africa Command as a social service agency. They set it up as the scaffolding for increased US military activities in Africa. And what we’ve seen, with the confirmation of the fact that the Pentagon is going to deploy new military forces to 35 nations, is that the US is intent on establishing a permanent military presence throughout the length and breadth of Africa.

PART1 Clinton's language has no place in international diplomacy

16 January, 2013 11:32    Download audio file

Clinton's language has no place in international diplomacy - interview

VERY VERY STRANGE Collage FROM "The Voice of Russia"

The owner of Stop NATO, Rick Rozoff, recently spoke to the Voice of Russia about NATO's global plans and Russian-US relations. In part 2 of our interview Mr. Rozoff states that the US has been intentionally baiting and insulting Russia as it enroaches on Russia geopolitical space, he says that it is only the diplomatic maturity and the sense of responsibility of the Russian Government that has prevented the situation from becoming a far worse crisis.

Part 1 of a 2012 NATO review

You took part in a debate. Can you remind our listeners about that?

Yes. NATO planning committee in Chicago, under the pressure from the ad hoc coalition that was protesting the NATO Summit and other forces, agreed to have a televised debate between the two NATO spokespeople and two people taking the opposite position, that is, people in opposition to the world’s first global military bloc. And initially this was to have included two fairly high-ranking NATO officials who were subsequently pulled and that was cancelled. Subsequent to that, the plan was to bring on the NATO side two former US Ambassadors to NATO and that plan was scrapped.

So, eventually two university professors in Chicago with some military background were brought on to defend the NATO position and two of us – a woman who had been a veteran US marine, or a veteran of the Iraq war and myself put forward the anti-NATO position. But because the resources available to the people who sponsored this think tank in Chicago, it was not only televised globally on YouTube but lengthy extracts have appeared on Chicago television. So, for the first time ever I suppose, at least here in the US, the anti-NATO forces were given an opportunity to air their grievances against the bloc.

Has there been any blowback?

Yes, in fact even at the time an ire of intimidation and fear-mongering was intentionally pushed by the city administration, and I’m sure the White House is behind it. The very day of the demonstration, for example, the two daily newspapers had banner headlines announcing a terrorist plot in Chicago. That is, that five people had been arrested ostensibly for planning pipe bombs or Molotov cocktails or something of the sort. But the case has really gone no place. But it was enough to intimidate people.

I personally spoke to people at the demonstration and to people I work with who, in both cases, stated that friends or relatives of theirs had intended to come to the demonstration but were scared off by this fact. There was an effort made to intimidate the people and to keep them away from anti-NATO activities. Nevertheless, there was a respectable showing in the march. It included people like the Reverend Jesse Jackson, who was at the front of the march, but it also included several dozen young US former service members who had fought in the Iraq and Afghan wars.

The Russian-US working group, the NATO group recently met. Where did you see Russian-NATO-US relations going? Was it worse than you thought or better?

Let’s say no better, no worse. But it is surely no progress. We know for example, there is now a new Russian representative in the NATO-Russia Council who has replaced his predecessor. That format is still active. It had not been, of course, for a long period of time after Georgia's invasion of South Ossetia in August of 2008 and the fact that the US and NATO both immediately afterwards set up special cooperation formats with Georgia to all but award it for its aggression and to pledge continued support to the Saakashvili regime and Tbilisi, as well to modernize its so called defenses, which is in many cases offensive military capabilities.

What we have seen is that the US and NATO still resolutely refuse Russian offers to provide legal guarantees for the interceptor missile system in Eastern Europe. They have sabotaged and effectively destroyed the Russian offer to setup sectoral defense where Russia would have interceptor missiles covering a certain swath of land and then it would be picked up by NATO and the US. So, at every turn the US and NATO are spurning Russian offers to cooperate on a genuine defense system and forging ahead with the unilateral system that, in its initial deployments, will be on countries either bordering Russia or comparatively close to it. You know, Poland and Romania in the first place.

But we do have to recollect that the very same PAC-3 missiles that are heading to Turkey were deployed to eastern Poland in May of 2010, a battery was stationed there and which remains there, which is only in estimated 40 miles from the Russian territory, from the Kaliningrad District. So, I think it is irreputable, what’s happening is that the US and NATO are encroaching upon Russian geopolitical space and essentially taunting Russia. And every effort made by Russia to extend offers of cooperation and so forth are essentially being refused.

What’s your opinion on where Russia-US relations are going?

In many ways the US attitude towards the Russian Federation is even more abrasive and dismissive than the US attitude and behaviors towards the Soviet Union during the Cold War and I think that’s an incontestable fact. With the recent passage of the so called Magnitsky Bill in the US, what we’re seeing – is almost gratuitous efforts to belittle or demean or insult Russia and whenever Russia attempts to take any countermeasures they are accused of.

This is slightly off the point, but I mean it gives you an indication of where the things are going, when Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus tried to setup a customs union, we had the Secretary of State Hilary Clinton warning about the resovietization the former Soviet space. That’s a brash and almost lunatic claim, but this is what passes muster in today’s world. And the US feels that – well, they can make accusations like that, so contemptuous are they, of Russia, and I would add of the rest of the world for that matter, but we are talking about Russia.

And this follows on heels of now I guess the former US Ambassador to the UN Susan Rice and Hilary Clinton herself over the past years using words like “despicable” and so forth in relation to Russian actions, particularly in the UN. And I’m old enough to remember the Cold War, and I frankly do not remember leading US diplomats using that kind of language in relation to the Soviet Union, the sort of language we are now hearing.

I don’t remember anything like that myself.

But this is a sort of imperial hubris that accompanies some nation that’s reached the same sort of delusions of grandeur that an individual afflicted with bipolar disorder might. “Being the world’s military superpower”, and that quote is from President Barack Obama, - “they are allowed to engage in any kind of swagger they choose to and that they can insult one of the major nations in the world – Russia, and one more over whose military capacities are the only ones that seriously rival the US”. So, to insult and provoke, and Russia the way it is doing – it is only the diplomatic maturity and the sense of responsibility of the Russian Government that’s prevented this from flaring up and becoming a far worse crisis.

 But one wonders when the next provocation is going to occur. The next time Russia is going to be accused of resovietazing the former Soviet space, the next time they are going to be called “despicable” or “shameful”? Such language has no role whatsoever in international diplomacy and really casts a very dark mark on the ruling elite in the US.

PART2 NATO is in phase 3 of its global expansion

9 January, 2013 12:50   Download audio file

‘NATO is in phase 3 of its global expansion’ – Rozoff

NATO is engaged in completing phase 3 of its post-Cold War global expansion, and the global nature of what once was the "North Atlantic" alliance is now official, says the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website Rick Rozoff in part one of a 2012 year-end summary interview on the activities of NATO. He also talks about NATO’s military activity in regards to “partners across the globe”, a bilateral organization of cooperation which initially consisted of 8 countries, all in the Asia-Pacific region: Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Australia, South Korea, New Zealand and Japan.

Part 2 of a 2012 NATO review

Hello, this is John Robles, I’m speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, he’s the owner and manager of the Stop NATO website and international mailing list.

Robles: Could we do a quick review of the events that have been taking place with NATO and where do you think they’re going?

Rozoff: It’s been another year of the expansion of the U.S. dominated military block. That was highlighted, I suppose, by the summit that was held here, in Chicago, in May of this year, where amongst other things, NATO announced the fact that it retains its status as a nuclear alliance, meaning it maintains offensive nuclear weapons in Europe, for use in the European theater and perhaps in the Middle East.

NATO had also announced in May at the summit that it had achieved initial operational capability of the so-called European Phased Adaptive Approach Interceptor Missile System, with the now permanent deployment of interceptor missile warships in the Mediterranean and a command-and-control center in Germany. And that’s preparatory, of course, to placing 48 or more land-based interceptor missiles in Poland and Romania in the upcoming years.

What we see most alarmingly this year, and it’s a theme that needs to be dwelled on somewhat, is the active expansion of NATO military hardware into, what, the Secretary General of NATO Anders Fogh Rasmussen repeatedly refers to as “the alliance’s southeastern border”, meaning Turkey, and southeastern Turkey at that: where Turkey meets with not only Syria, but with Iran and Iraq.

At the beginning of this year the U.S. under NATO auspices moved in an X-Band transportable interceptor missile radar facility to Turkey, and after the placement of the interceptor missile radar, the U.S. and NATO consolidated two; what are called Allied Land Command Centers, in Europe, and had moved them into Turkey into one command.

And, as we know, that within the next week or so, we’re to see the deployment of Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Interceptor Missile Batteries in southeastern Turkey along with several hundred U.S., Dutch and German troops to accompany those.

So what we’re seeing is that NATO is shifting its emphasis towards the southern-most and eastern-most member of the alliance: Turkey, and is making a bid to expand its influence and perhaps to engage in active military operations in the Middle East. So that I think is the most significant aspect of NATO’s expansion so far this year.

That, in addition to, another development that occurred immediately prior to and then was officially enshrined during the summit in May, which was the creation of new non-geographically specific partnership format called “Partners Across the Globe”, this is the official designation that NATO knows it by, and it initially consists of 8 countries, all in the broader Asia-Pacific region, the Middle-East – East Asia: they are Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Australia, South Korea, New Zealand and Japan, so we’re seeing the open manifestation of NATO now as an international military force.

Reminder

Robles: What about the expansion into Central and Eastern Asia?

Rozoff: That, of course, as you know has been under way since 2001 with the invasion of Afghanistan and currently the United States and NATO still maintain military facilities, not only in Afghanistan, but in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The talk is for the U.S. and its NATO allies to eventually withdraw, of course, from those nations, but I wouldn’t expect to see that happen in the imminent future and I think their long-term plans are to maintain Pentagon and NATO military capacities in Central and South Asia, with Afghanistan being the hub of those operations but, as mentioned with NATO Partnership for Peace Allies, like Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, maintaining some sort of U.S. and NATO presence in the countries. However there was an intriguing article in China’s People’s Daily that suggested that what we’re seeing right now with the U.S. pivot or shift to the Asia-Pacific region is basically Phase 3 of the U.S. global military expansion in the post-Cold War Era.

The first phase was, of course, the expansion of NATO into Central and Eastern Europe, where it has now absorbed as “full members”, every single former Warsaw Pact country outside of the Soviet Union, in addition to, of course, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and two former Yugoslav Republics and Albania. That was the first phase.

The second phase, what was referred to from 2001 onwards as being the “greater” or the “broader” Middle East Project: that is where the U.S. in conjunction with its NATO Allies expanded influence from Northern Africa all the way to the Chinese border, in nations like Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan.

And the third phase then being the only part of the world that hasn’t come under the boot of the Pentagon: the Asia-Pacific Region, and I think that’s a pretty astute analysis and I think that three-phase model is a very accurate one.

Robles: So, Rick in “your” opinion, what were the main events of NATO during the past year?

Rozoff: As mentioned: the fact that they announced that they have initial capability for their European and Mediterranean based interceptor missile systems, which is really the opening salvo in creating a global missile shield. Initially, it will be in Eastern Europe and the eastern Mediterranean, but it’s expanding already throughout most of the world. That’s probably the most single significant fact with NATO expansion; is they’re on a new ‘plane of battle’ if you will.

It’s no longer simply positioning themselves: ground forces or even air forces. Now they’ve quite openly proclaimed that they’re setting up what is potentially a first strike: son of ‘Star Wars’ as it is colloquially known, an interceptor missile system that could potentially impede the ability of a nation, that has been either targeted or attacked, to launch effective retaliation because of a series of sea-based and land-based interceptor missiles. That would have to be the most significant and most dangerous initiative by NATO this past year.

Robles: What about the summit in Chicago and all the events related to that?

Rozoff: By holding a NATO Summit for only the second time in the United States, the only preceding one was in 1999 in Washington D.C., which marked the 50th anniversary of the founding of NATO, but to have held that only for the second time in the United States and then in the very heartland of the country, in Chicago, rather than in the administrative capital of the country, Washington: drew a lot of attention to an alliance that many Americans had either neglected to inform themselves about or had downplayed the significance of, but when it came to Chicago it forced a lot of people to take notice of it, and as a result there was a coalescence of peace forces and other anti-war and anti-intervention forces that gathered in a series of actions in Chicago, but culminating in, by some accounts 15-20 thousand people, the large anti-NATO protest on the second day of the summit in Chicago, so it has brought to people’s attention both within the United States and I think globally, the scope and the potential danger of the world’s only military alliance.

Closing 

NATO controlling Turkish missile batteries

30 November 2012, 08:20  Download audio file

NATO controlling Turkish missile batteries - interview

Regular Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO International, once again made sense of the plans and activities of the NATO Alliance and gave his candid and frank views as to the intentions and plans, already in place by NATO, to secure uncontested and permanent military domination of the entire planet. As NATO continues its stealthy global expansion, Rick as always, has his eye on the ball

Robles: This is John Robles. I am speaking with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the Owner of Stop NATO International.

What can you tell our listeners about the deployment of Patriot Missile Batteries on the Turkish-Syrian border?

Rozoff: We know as of today, at least Moscow time Tuesday that inspection teams are being deployed by NATO to Turkey on the Syrian border to evaluate sites for placing NATO Patriot Advanced Capability-3 Missile Interceptor Batteries. We don’t know for certain but it appears as though they are German and Dutch teams, because Germany and the Netherlands are the only two NATO countries in Europe that have the Patriot Advanced-3 Capability Missiles.

Robles: Does this mean that there is going to be permanent NATO troop deployments in Turkey or are these batteries going to be controlled by Turkish forces?

Rozoff: The argument will be made, that the Turkish armed forces have some over-sight or rights to inspect but they will not be controlling the batteries, which will be controlled by military personnel from the respective countries that are sending them there and those appear to be Germany and Netherland.

A couple things real quickly: we should recall that in the beginning of this year under NATO auspices the United States deployed what is called an X-Band Transportable Missile Radar to southeastern Turkey and this is something that is part of the European Phased Adaptive Approach Program that NATO endorsed at its summit in Portugal in 2010 but announced here in Chicago in May to have achieved initial operational capacity or capability, and this is part of the general European-wide and Mediterranean Sea-wide interceptor missiles system the United States is installing.

And in addition to that NATO was consolidated two land command sites in Western Europe and is shifting them to Turkey. So, what we are seeing is with the deployment of the Patriot Missiles, we are seeing a major shift by NATO from its founding countries or countries that joined the Alliance shortly after it is foundation, that are countries like the Netherlands or Italy or Germany, have been shifted increasingly to what NATO Secretary General Rasmussen, again the other day, referred to as NATO’s south eastern border by which he means the Syrian border, the border of Syria and Turkey. So this is part of a process of NATO constantly expanding to the south and to the east. And in the case of Turkey because it is the southernmost and certainly the easternmost member of the Alliance we are seeing a shift of interceptor missile radar, interceptor missiles, what are called theater interceptor missiles like the Patriots, and at the same time moving a major land command to Turkey from Western Europe. This is all part and parcel of the shift.

Robles: So what are the public reasons as opposed to the real reasons? The real reasons are eastward and southward NATO expansion, if I understand correctly?

Rozoff: Yes. That is correct. But we also have to remember that South-Eastern Turkey borders not only Syria but Iran and is close to Iraq. So, what we are seeing again, this is again just since the last summer, we have seen increased Turkish military penetration/incursions into Northern Iraq, ostensibly to hunt down fighters with the Kurdistan Workers Party, the PKK, and these include air-strikes as well, as well as moving infantry into Iraq in clear violation of the sovereigntyof Iraq, and at the same time of course starting in August of last year with Turkey moving not only troops but armored vehicles up to the Syrian border. And this is, if you will a triangle, where Turkey, Iran and Syria come together and not terribly far from the Iraqi border.

It’s been my contention, as you know, and we’ve talked about this in previous shows, that NATO is using Turkey as its springboard and its strike force in the greater Middle East particularly in the area we talked about, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

Robles: Now you watch all the troop movements, you watch the buildups very carefully. What’s your make on plans to invade Iran and Syria, for lack of a better word… And Israel… how do you think Israel in the current situation in Gaza has been affected or has been promoted by NATO and the West etc.?

Rozoff: I am glad you asked that question because the pieces do come together and one of them is the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip of earlier this month, so called Operation Pillar of Defense, began exactly 2 days after, by my count: a 23 day, military exercise between the United States and Israel, was held in Israel.

The military exercise was called Austere Challenge 2012, and it included the testing of no fewer than 5 different interceptor missile systems, 2 American, 3 Israeli, the Americans, which are the Patriot Advance Capability-3 Interceptors, and sea-based, so-called Aegis Class Standard Missile 3 Interceptor, of the sort that, in a land-based version, are going to be deployed in Romania and Poland.

I don’t have to tell your listeners, in the case of Poland, a country that borders Russia, and Romania, a country that faces Russia across the Black Sea, there are to be as many as… at least I should say, 48 of the Standard Missile 3s deployed in those two countries.

Four years ago the United States based or deployed its first X-Band Transportable Missile Radar in Israel and that is one that has, according to the US Armed Forces Missile Defense Agency, a range of 2,900 miles, depending on how it is directed. That is enough to take in the entire western border of Russia for example, all the way to the Arctic Circle. It is exactly the same model that was placed in Turkey earlier this year.

There is now discussion incidentally of placing them in the Persian Gulf, possibly in Bahrain or Qatar, and also in South-East Asia. There is one already in Japan, but there is discussion of about 1 or 2 in the Philippines. So, we are talking about what Russian officials correctly have identified as a Global Interceptor Missile System.

Robles: This is not a defensive system, is it? I mean, from whom?

Rozoff: By no means is it a defense system, it has two basically eminently non-defensive capabilities, one of them is as part of what is potentially a first strike system, which means: this goes with the interceptor missiles as well as radar that accompanies them, and in both instances, what was envisioned originally by the Ronal Reagan administration in early 1980s and referred to as the Strategic Defense Initiative, what most people know by the nick-name of Star Wars, though billed as a defensive system as its very name indicates, nevertheless, as it was viewed at the time and should be viewed now because now what we are seeing is the implementation, the initial implementation of that system.

And what it potentially gives to the United States and its allies is the potential to after having first launched devastating first strikes, either in conventional or nuclear attacks against the target nation, to then be able to knockout whichever missiles have survived that first strike and any retaliatory attacks, with interceptor missiles that can knock them out. That is the real threat.

Now whether that is to be used in that fashion or whether it’s a kind of a blackmail gambit to let the country know that, should the US and its allies strike first, let’s talk about Iran, in the first place, that if any missiles are still left in a silo or any portable missiles haven’t been targeted, then the so-called missile shield would be capable of knocking those missiles out of the air before they could effectively be fired in retaliation.

Robles: Eliminating a counter-strike from their targets completely.

It would be the equivalent of somebody out in the street firing at you from a bullet-proof car.

NATO in the process of surrounding China

5 December 2012, 16:31  Download audio file

NATO expansion into the Middle East, the systematic surrounding of the People's Republic of China, the current state of relations between Russia and NATO and what appears to be broken promises and continued aggression on the part of the US and incumbent President Barack Obama – these topics are discussed with Rick Rozoff, a regular Voice of Russia contributor and the owner of Stop NATO International.

Part 1

Hello, this is John Robles. I’m speaking with Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO International. Eliminating counter-strike from target completely?

Yeah, that would be the equivalent of somebody out on the street firing at you from a bullet-proof car – they can shoot at you and you can’t shoot back. It’s fought with a lot of dangerous scenarios. And it’s viewed with suspicion and with good reason. In recent days the governments not only of Russia, but of Syria and Iran have spoken out very forcefully about the deployment of the NATO Patriot missiles in Turkey, because the governments of three countries I just mentioned see the potential of an expansion of the system to the point where it could serve the purpose that I just described.

Can you tell us a little bit about NATO’s role in Israel and Gaza? What about future plans for taking out Syria and Iran?

I’m sure their contingency plans for just those two scenarios – I don’t know what they are. And they have not been publicly divulged. However, we should remind ourselves at the very special relationship that has existed for almost 20 years between NATO and Israel. Israel is one of 7 members of the special military partnership program set up by NATO, I believe in 1994, called the Mediterranean Dialogue. This is the program to foster both bilateral and collective military cooperation between NATO and 7 countries in North Africa and Middle East. They are Mauritania, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, Jordan and Israel. But several years ago amongst those 7, Israel was the first to be granted with what’s called “individual partnership program” under the auspices of the Mediterranean Dialogue. That’s always been particularly good relationship because of that. NATO Secretary Generals have visited Israel. One of them, the proceeding one, visited Israel immediately after the last dissolve on the Gaza Strip in Dec, 2008 – Jan, 2009. Another curious fact about Israel, - it’s the only country in the Middle East, in fact, the only country outside of Europe that falls within the area of responsibility of the Pentagon’s European Command, the Chief Commander of whom, currently Admiral James Stavridis, is simultaneously the top military commander of NATO in Europe, that’s called Supreme Allied Commander of Europe. By that very fact, the fact that the U.S.-European Command and its commander over lapses with NATO and its top military commander, in fact the two commanders are one in the same person, also indicates the special relationship that exists between NATO and Israel.

What’s your prediction for Egypt and for the whole situation in the Middle East with Gaza and Israel and all the “Arab Spring” countries? They seem to be going in a dictatorial direction, how’s that going to affect NATO relations?

Throughout the Arab world there were pretty generous expectations about the so-called Arab Spring. And people anticipated a complete democratic transformation, but at the end of the day - and we’re talking about 1.5 year after the resignation of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and his replacement for a year and a half by what can only be described as a military junta in Egypt in the interim which saw an exacerbation of violations of civil liberties, mass arrests and martial law. What we see now, afterwards, is that Egypt remains another stalwart of NATO’s Mediterranean Dialogue military partnership. The government has not even suggested that Egypt move out of that program. Second of all, Egypt continues to get its 3 billion dollars a year in U.S. assistance aid, which is overwhelmingly military in nature. The “Bright Star” military exercises that have occurred regularly between the US and Egypt in Egypt have in fact been suspended since the beginning of the Arab Spring. But I have not seen any information that they are not going to be resumed at any point in the future. So, I don’t want to say that the more things change, the more they remain the same, but there certainly is no indication now, that in terms of its general foreign policy orientation that the government Morsi in Egypt isn’t any different than the Mubarak government.

What should we be watching out for in the next few weeks?

The big question, of course, is the missile deployment on the Syrian border. And if this were simply an isolated incident – we’ve just discussed that it’s not. It is in tandem with the deployment of the missile radar facilities in Turkey and Israel –Turkey this year, Israel four years ago. But we also have to recall that a similar development has occurred twice before, where NATO has deployed the same Patriot missile batteries, though they’re more advanced now and have longer range, up to 600km is the latest figure I have seen. This was done in 1991 and in early 2003. In both instances – immediately before military assaults on Iraq. To see the third deployment of NATO Patriot missiles to Turkey suggests, if the pattern holds true, that the military action against Syria is planned. But at the very least we know this, and Russian officials have mentioned this most prominently, that with missile enhancement capabilities they could effectively be used to enforce a no-fly zone over northern Syria. They can now knock out ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and aircraft. And even though the Turkish government and NATO are denying the fact that they intend to use missiles for this purpose, there’s no reason why they could not use the deployment of NATO interceptor missiles to enforce a de-facto no-fly zone over Syria in the manner that it was done in Libya last year.

Aren’t there any international rules that have to be followed before the U.S. and NATO can go and deploy whatever weapons they want in whatever country they want?

Unfortunately, no. The United Nations permits in its charter, for one or more countries to seek military assistance from an ally if they can portray themselves as in some manner being threatened. Of course, Turkey isn’t threatened by Syria. It’s an absurd contention on the part of NATO and the West, as the Turkish government suggests it is. Nevertheless, that’s the rubric under which they requested and now are going to be granted the NATO missile. So, technically, it’s not illegal. If missiles are used over Syrian territory to maintain a no-fly zone – that’s clearly a violation of the sovereignty of Syria and that’s violation of international law.

Can you give us a brief outline of NATO’s up and coming plans for Russian relations?

Russia’s certainly been accommodating, very obliging through the NATO-Russia Council in terms of participating in the Northern distribution network for the transport of nonlethal supplies to Afghanistan, presumably out of Afghanistan in some point in the future. Russia’s made the offer for joint interceptor missile defense participation, but NATO has insisted that their program is distinct, and Russia cannot be incorporated in any common program. So what we see is example after example of the Russian government making overtures and having them refused by Washington and by Brussels. And we also have to realize the Anti-Ballistic Treaty, the Treaty of Unconventional Forces in Europe and others have been severely jeopardized, damaged because of movement of U.S. and NATO military hardware into countries that are not covered by the CFE Treaty. I’m talking about the Baltic States and certain Balkan states and the fact that the U.S. is aggressively moving ahead with the interceptive missile system despite repeated reservations and even warnings by Russia. It seems like the US is not acting in good faith and not terribly interested in cultivating a productive relationship with Russia.

We talked before about the presidential elections. There’s not going to be any change with Obama? He’s not going to become friendlier towards Russia, is he?

I know the speculation you’re alluding to. The unguarded comment to Medvedev that suggested that he was going to be or could be. A lame-duck presidency cuts both ways. It allows a well-meaning chief executive to do things he might not do otherwise because he doesn’t have to run for reelection, as you mention. On the other hand, as perhaps we saw with the escalation of violence in the Middle East and other activities very shortly after the reelection of Barack Obama, that it also gives him free hands to do things in the destructive manner, where he’s not going to be held accountable either.

Where do you see Obama going?

A continuation of the same. In terms of geopolitics, let’s keep in mind, his first trip overseas after his reelection was to Southeast Asia, where he visited Thailand, where American presidents have visited in the past, but he was in Burma and Cambodia. To the best of my knowledge, it’s the first time an American President had visited Myanmar at all, and perhaps definitely the first time Cambodia in the last 40 years or more and perhaps ever. The emphasis or pivot toward the Asia and Pacific region, which is clearly targeted against China to rally regional powers into economic and ultimately military alliances with the U.S. to isolate and encircle China. What we saw from President Obama, almost immediately after his reelection, is he’s staking out territory in Southeast Asia and putting China on notice.

 

US Elections: No Enthusiasm This Time

7 November 2012, 01:00 Download audio file

"There’s a malaise in the country. There’s very little enthusiasm about the election. Contrasted with, four years earlier, where there was a tremendous amount of excitement”, says regular Voice of Russia contributor Rick Rozoff, the owner of Stop NATO International. Rick speaks about third party candidates barred from "public" debates, the Chicago-style-one-party-heriditary-political-system and Mr. Obama been placed in the White House by monied interests.

Robles: Rick, what do you make of Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein being prohibited from taking part in the presidential debates, and then her arrest and being held in some warehouse: what do you make of that? And a tag on that question: who would you support for US President?

Rozoff: First of all, that’s a travesty. It’s part of history of that that goes back for decades – I’m thinking particularly of the 2000, 12 years ago, presidential campaign – where Ralph Nader was the nominee and was the candidate of the U.S. Green Party. With decades of activism in support of consumer and other affairs and so forth, and not being allowed to speak at any of the public debates.

And what they do – they set up a circular argument which is: as somebody doesn’t have poll ratings that suggest that they are a viable contender to win the elections, so they cannot gain access to national media. But without the access to national media, they have no viability as a candidate!

So they use these insincere and disingenuous arguments as a way of keeping it “in-house” between the Democratic and Republican Parties who are serving the interest of the same small elite in this country both at home and abroad. They’re beholden to the same monied interests. So I’m sure that you’ve seen, and some of your listeners perhaps are aware, that the estimates this year on the spending just on the presidential campaign by both candidates is to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.5 billion dollars and that the total expenditure on federal election campaigns, this year, that is Senate/House will be as the presidency will be as much as 6 billion dollars. So to be able to play in that league, if you will, you cannot be an independent principled political party or individual. So the Green Party is getting it in the neck again. But the incident you’re describing about the forcible incarceration under primitive conditions is a shame to any country that calls itself Democratic, or open, or transparent!

Robles: Who are you going to vote for? Are you going to vote?

Rozoff: Americans never acknowledge who they vote for. It’s very difficult. I’m not going to vote for either of the two major party candidates. I have only once done it in my lifetime and I sincerely regretted it afterwards. I generally vote for a third party candidate, when I do vote.

But I think what you are going to see… We’re already sensing, so let’s be honest, there’s a malaise in the country. There’s very little enthusiasm about the election. Contrasted with, four years earlier, where there was a tremendous amount of excitement about the elections. Which, I think was due to the precedent setting, or breaking, nature of the Obama campaign four years ago, but so little having been accomplished over the past four years, both because of bottlenecks in both Houses and Congress between the two leading parties and also, I think, because of lack of determination by the incumbent to do anything that would rock the boat.

People, who are going to be voting on November, 6th for the most part are doing it out of the sense of civic obligation. They’re certainly not doing it out of any sense of enthusiasm!

Robles: Would you say Obama’s first term was a success or failure?

Rozoff: It depends on how we define success and failure in the current climate: economic and political climate. I would not have wanted to walk into the Oval Office in January of 2009 inheriting what anyone would who had done that. In terms of internal indebtedness, in terms of political estrangement from the populous, in terms of the worst economic crisis, arguably, in the history of the United States structurally, certainly since the Great Depression of the 1930s, so I don’t know what success would have meant under those circumstances.

If one wasn’t willing to take on the very system itself then there was no possibility of affecting any sort of transformation that would have meant anything. And I don’t know to what extent Obama simply wasn’t able to nor to what extent he was interested in, doing that. But the fact remains: nothing has changed in four years.

Robles: What’s your opinion on Obama? Do you think all his promises of change were just empty rhetoric just to get into the White House? And, in your opinion, was it a matter of him not wanting to change something or was it a matter of him not being able to? In your opinion.

Rozoff: I’m from Illinois, I’m from Chicago where Obama started his political career it’s the spring-board that took him into the White House. And he was a comparative unknown in the state, relatively unknown in the city to be honest with you. When a Senate seat in Illinois opened up in 2004, and he was catapulted into that position directly from a state legislative position. So he had no previous history in Washington, not even as a Congressman and went directly into the U.S. Senate and then 4 years later into the White House.

This certainly indicates that somebody had invested very heavily in Mr. Obama and his political future and had groomed and primed him for a major role. So we’re not talking about somebody who comes into politics with the a base of support, with any political support of his own, we’re talking about somebody who simply is marketed properly and placed in the right place at the right time.

So not having built political supporters or having built the political formations or alliances that could assist him once he got into federal office then he had to rely on those around him. The fact that Joseph Biden was selected as his Vice Presidential running mate four years ago – I don’t believe Obama chose him personally and Obama having only served four years of a 6-year Senate term, whereas Biden had servedin the Senate for 36 years, certainly suggested to me, even at the time, that Biden was selected to be the power behind the throne, or the gray eminence, to effectively be running the White House. And then you have Chicago political movers and shakers like David Axelrod and Rahm Emanuel, and so forth, who were in many ways running the White House from the moment Obama walked in, so how much autonomy, how much power Obama has ever had, is an open question.

Robles: I may be going into taboo territory here, but I’ve heard this contemplated before – that Obama was put into the White House to pacify the minority population who were becoming increasingly angered and agitated by what they see as racist U.S. policies and discrimination, etc.. Do you find any credence in something like that?

Rozoff: The enthusiasm we spoke about four years ago with the first Obama campaign which is noticeably absent this time, was in large part, because he was, someone who at least, one of his two parents was of non-European ancestry, of African ancestry. So that, there was a feeling amongst African-Americans in the first place that something that would have been considered impossible, even a brief while before, that is the prospect of an African-American President, a head of state in the United States, became a distinct possibility. Then when he won the election, of course, there was a tremendous sense of gratification, enthusiasm, validation. But that wore thin when matters really didn’t change substantially, year after year and now we’re four years later and there’s no noticeable change in unemployment figures and percentage of African-Americans and other non-European minorities amongst those unemployment figures which is disproportionately high. Likewise African-Americans, Hispanics and other non-European minorities have higher rates of social displacement, lack of health care, lack of opportunities. So, you know, structurally nothing essentially has happened. Even if, one can argue, a moral precedent has been set, that’s broken down the color barrier, and assures all honest Americans, of course, that regardless of which continent somebody’s ancestors came from, they are noy inherently inferior to anybody else, that was done but I suppose something like that is done once and only once, and the precedent having been established, you cannot do it again, you can’t re-invent the wheel.

Robles: What would you say, who controls power structures to the U.S.?

Rozoff: I would refer your listeners to a book that I believe is still in print, a 1956 volume by the American sociologist C. (Charles) Wright Mills, called “The Power Elite” where he analyses exactly, the main pillars or the main sources of power in the United States and the situation hasn’t changed dramatically, in the interim between the time the book came out and now.

What we are talking about with the presidential election, of course: you are talking about whoever it is that is contributing 6 billion dollars to Congressional, Senate and the presidential campaign. You’re also talking about the party bosses, the Republican, Democratic Party elite who often times make decisions. One can question, for example, four years ago that when Hillary Clinton dropped out of the Democratic Party Primary ahead of the Democratic National Convention in 2008.

Robles: And I believe for that she received the State Department Seat.

Rozoff: That evidently was the trade-off, with the expectation that she might have a shot at the White House, as you were talking about earlier, in 2016. Who knows? I mean these are back-room deals, quite in keeping with Chicago political tradition, keeping, in fact, that even Hillary Clinton herself was born in Chicago, to be honest with you John, about a mile from my apartment.

So she’s not foreign to the Chicago machine-style political orientation. And Obama’s Chief Political Adviser David Axelrod is certainly not, unaware, or unaffiliated with that tradition, the first Chief of Staff for Obama, after he came into the Oval Office in 2009. Rahm Emanuel, is now the Mayor of Chicago. He replaced Richard Daley, son of mayor-for-life, Richard Daley, whose brother, the second Richard Daley’s brother, William Daley,took over as White House Chief of Staff after Rahm Emanuel stepped down to run for Mayor of Chicago.

So you see this incestuous relationship and the fact that it tendss to gravitate around Chicago and Chicago-style politics. We are a one-party-system. We’re exclusively a one-party system. The Chief Executive for 71 years, every mayor for 71 years, belonged to the Democratic Party.

We have the 50 member City Council which is Chicago’s legislative body and even though the elections for that body, for Alderman as they’re called, are non-partisan that is one doesn’t have to declare one’s party affiliation, everyone in Chicago knows that all 50 members are also Democrats. So you have a one-party-political-system with hereditary rule sometimes: where one mayor-for-life hands off the baton to his son, who stays there as long as he chooses to or until he dies!

Robles: That sounds like a fiefdom or a kingdom or something!

Rozoff: I’ve remarked perhaps even to you before that the State of Illinois’, the Chicago-land areas’ Hillary Clinton, as Secretary of State, really ought to have some pangs of conscience when she criticizes governments in Syria or North Korea, because their one-party systems with hereditary rule when her own home town, or own birthplace, Chicago is exactly in that category!

One of the latest books by the great American novelist Gore Vidal who has recently died is called “The United States of Amnesia”. And I think the title speaks volumes. That people tend to forget or chose to forget events shortly after they occur and that this is evidently what Hillary Clinton is banking on under who knows what pressure. But, nevertheless, acknowledging that the State Department, that she, ultimately herself is responsible for not having provided adequate security for the American Consulate in Benghazi. As we talked about a few minutes ago that she is evidently confident that Americans won’t recall that four years from now and if they do, they won’t attribute tremendous importance to it.

"No substantive difference between Obama and Romney’s foreign policies"

26 October 2012, 13:14, Download audio file

There is “little meaningful difference” between the Democrats and the Republicans and successive administrations in the US when it comes to foreign policy issues. The owner of Stop NATO International Rick Rozoff gave his assessment of the candidates after the US Presidential Debates, he also spoke about the US' repositioning on Syria and Hillary Clinton's seeming admission of the failure of her policies in the Middle East.

You watched the US presidential debates. What is your opinion on foreign policy changes, if any, that will occur if, for example: Romney is elected president or Obama, or everything is pretty much the same?

I don’t think there is any substantive difference between the foreign policy orientations of the two presidential candidates. There is very little discussion about foreign policy in the second debate of earlier this week and most of it appeared to be Romney’s contention that he would call out and humiliate China for undervaluing its currency more than anything else. The one topic that was addressed however was Libya and that presumably only because the US Ambassador of the country, Christopher Stevens was killed Benghazi and there seemed to be an exchange between the two candidates Obama and Romney over responsibility for that action. But what was conspicuous by its absence, what was not discussed, which is to say, whether the 6 and a half months air-war, naval blockade against Libya last year was legitimate, in any manner, both candidates seem to agree that it was, at least they said nothing to the effect that it wasn’t, including the fact that the 1973 war powers resolution was not only ignored but, a fact one can argue, neutralized and destroyed in the process, when president Obama refused to appear before Congress after 60 days into the armed hostilities and seek continued authorization, or seek authorization at all for the military actions against Libya. So, there was no substantial difference between the two candidates.

That would be a violation of law, has that been anywhere in the public debate in the US regarding Obama, has anyone brought that up?

Everyone is ignoring it! There had been some discussion 60 days after the commencement of military hostilities against Libya last year which began on March 19, 2011. There were arm-chair analysts talking something or other about it, but there was no demand by the populace on their congressional representatives to take up the issue nor to the best of my knowledge was there any discussion in Congress except for outgoing Ohio democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich who did raise the issue, and I believe Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul likewise, but those are two other 535 members of the bicameral congress in the United States.

What do you make of the latest developments from the US State Department, if I can ask you a multi-pronged question here? Okay, Hillary Clinton admitted she was at fault for Benghazi, what do you make of that? Do you think that is going to change anything? How will the election results affect Hillary Clinton’s 2016 chances? And what do you make of Nuland’s statements saying that they would like more help from Russia regarding Syria?

You had written an article yourself, John, where you address all those issues very poignantly and perceptively in my estimate. The fact that Victoria Nuland, who is a former US Ambassador to NATO of course during the previous administration of George W. Bush, to demonstrate once again, how little meaningful difference there is between the 2 political parties and successive administrations in the United States when it comes to foreign policy issues. But the fact that Nuland made that right on the heels of her referring to Russia being, and I quote her, “morally bankrupt” because, ostensibly, allegedly something or other was shipped from Russia, or was being shipped from Russia to Syria and intercepted by Turkish war planes, and the Syrian passenger plane was forced down and so forth, with 17 Russian citizens on board who were mistreated. And Nuland had to acknowledge there was nothing illegal in the Russian action if any but that nevertheless it was morally bankrupt, so for her to turn around and entreat Russia to assist the United States in Syria seems odd to say the least.

In terms of Hillary Clinton accepting the responsibility for not providing adequate security measures to the US Consulate in Benghazi which resulted in the deaths of 4 Americans including the ambassador, who of course was Hillary Clinton’s employee, as she is the Secretary of State. I don’t understand the byzantine workings of Federal Government, you know, who out maneuvered whom on this one, but it certainly is Hillary Clinton getting a black eye and Obama getting off the hook for responsibility for that action, whether that is the actual chain of command, or not is questionable, I don’t see that it is, but ahead of a re-election bid by Barack Obama of course Hillary will take the fall as evidently she had with the expectation presumably, to segue into the other part of your question, that 4 years from now no one in the United States will remember what has occurred 4 years earlier.

You think so? Do you think Nuland’s admission was… I’m sorry, Nuland’s statement, was an admission of failure by the US regarding their policies in Syria?

Now I have to give credit where it’s due here, it was your own article that alerted me to her comment which I would not have been aware of. Certainly it resonates with the feeling of futility or defeat even, arguably that the US, try as it may, to not only bring about forcible regime change in Damascus but to, in the process isolate, back down, humiliate Russia over the issue is proven to be a signal failure, and now she has to go back to the very same power, the country, Russia that she hours before referred to as being morally bankrupt and seek their assistance, and maybe extricating the United States from a non- tenable situation in Syria right now. Your implication that that is what it is, I think is accurate.

What is your opinion on Benghazi?

This is another case where one questions the motives of those issuing appraisals or evaluations of what happened. It should certainly have been fairly apparent to the United States, through all branches of the American government, foreign policy establishment, rather, the United States. What had occurred in Benghazi within hours of the incident, and instead what you’ve seen is evasion, equivocation, efforts to try to attribute it to something for the most part extraneous and accidental which is, say, the videotape, or the preview, or the trailer for a low budget video on the prophet Mohammed, you know, causing a spontaneous uprising against the United States, somehow knowing that the US Ambassador would be in the Consulate at that point and so forth. That seems hardly credible. It seems rather that the very same Al Qaeda linked extremists forces that the United States and NATO supported last year against the government in Libya, had simply struck back at their former masters. They’d bitten the hand that fed them if you will. I think it is a much more likely scenario. What in fact has happened is that armed militias simply continued doing what they were doing beforehand.

Georgian Elections Beginning of End for Saakashvili and Turkish-Syria Border Clash

4 October 2012, 15:14  Download audio file

Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list comments on latest developments in Georgia and NATO’s emergency meeting surrounding the situation on the Turkish/Syrian border and its role in the region. He claims that: “NATO countries and their Allies in the Persian Gulf aren’t going to back down no matter what Syria does.”

Hello Rick. How are you?

Very good John.

I’d like to speak with you a little bit about the latest developments in Georgia... and with NATO... and with Turkey and Syria of course. IF could start out with the parliamentary elections in Georgia. They look like maybe the beginning of the end for Saakashvili. In your opinion if he goes and relations are normalized with Russia, how will this affect NATO’s long-term geopolitical plans in the region?

That’s an interesting proposition, I certainly hope that better relations with Russia will ensue with the departure of Mr. Saakashvili who has been a disaster both for his own country and the region. However, I would temper our enthusiasm right now and of course you are referring to the fact that the opposition Georgian Dream party garnered 55% in the parliamentary election which is a handsome victory, they really trounced Saakashvili’s party. And the individual Saakashvili will eventually depart as president not immediately evidently as he is refusing to step down until the presidential election but his likely successor, the head of Georgian Dream political party, or coalition I guess it is, Bidzina Ivanishvili has announced today that his first stop, when he does become president, his first visit will be the United States. So, I don’t think we are going to see a qualitative difference in foreign policy orientation even with the change of political parties at the top in Georgia right now and of course the head of Georgian Dream has also announced that he is sustaining or maintaining his country’s commitment to joining both the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. So, time will tell but I wouldn’t be overly optimistic about a dramatic transformation.

So, you think NATO’s plans, and their integration or drawing in of Georgia, into the NATO fold... That will remain unchanged?

It will remain unchanged from the point of view of Brussels and certainly of Washington, which has invested, as you indicated in an article 2 days ago, has invested so much in Georgia, that it is not going to allow the change of a president, or the replacement of the current president to affect their geopolitical designs in the South Caucasus as a whole, but certainly in Georgia in particular.

What do you think about the opinion of the Georgian people, I mean, if they decide that they don’t want this?

This is an encouraging aspect, I mean, it is clearly a referendum on Saakashvili and he clearly was rejected by a handsome majority of the Georgian electorate which is an indication of what many people inside and certainly outside of the country suspect which is that Saakashvili has ruled through fair means or foul, usually foul, and that he did not have the mass support, as was evidenced by the parliamentary vote, you know, that he always claimed to have, and that his contentions or his boast in that respect of course being echoe dutifully by western leaders, US, in the first place. And I am not quite certain if the west puts all of their eggs in his basket and has now had them broken or if the West was not instrumental in supplanting him with his successor. It is a matter of speculation to this point. But the question you raised about better relations with Russia is something that has been pledged by the presumed next president of the country and that will probably be more on the economic front, John, than it would in terms of Georgia’s relationship with the Pentagon and with NATO.

I see...

Reminder

Now... Speaking of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen just had his term extended and he said his main goal is ending the so-called "mission" in Afghanistan. How does this coincide with plans by NATO to keep bases in Afghanistan for the "very" long term?

I think, as you're intimating, part of the logic perhaps in extending Rasmussen’s post as Secretary-General of NATO is to not change horses in mid-stream, if you will, to have the same person in place, the head of the military alliance which runs the International Security Assistance Force, through the so-called draw-down or transistion period scheduled for 2014. Not that he's going to be there in 2 years. But that, ahem, to make a change at this point would be disadvantageous to the west in terms of US plans to maintain major air bases and other military facilities in the country, and we are talking about the Bagram Air Base of course outside of Kabul, the Shindand Air Base not terribly far from the Iranian border and other major potentially strategic military facilities in Afghanistan. The US has already announced, you know, both military and political elected officials, have announced that the US is not leaving and Anders Fogh Rasmussen has said repeatedly, recently as a matter of fact, that just because the troops will be drawn down in 2 years, doesn't mean NATO is leaving Afghanistan, NATO intends to stay there as it has stayed in Kosovo for 13 years and still maintains a presence in Iraq as a matter of fact.

Last time we talked about NATO’s silence and the fact that they were probably planning something, most obviously an invasion of Syria comes to my mind. Last night Turkey attacked Syria in retaliation for supposed attack, which killed several citizens of Turkey. With all of the mercenaries and terrorist ammassed on the Turkish and Syrian border can we be sure that this was the Syrians that did this? And... anyway... what's your view? Do you think this will be the catalyst, that NATO apparently wants, to invade Syria?

It could well be, but it's certainly a marked escalation of provocations that have been occurring since last summer. We recall of course the Turkish warplane that violated the air space of Syria in June and was shot down by Syrian air defenses, and then towards the very end of July-beginning of August, Turkey deployed troops, tanks, armored personnel carriers and missile batteries to within 2 kilometers of the Syrian border ostensibly in pursuit of fighters in the Kurdistan Worker's Party. So, there has been a steady escalation of provocations and what appear to be, you know, attempts to bait or to provoke Syria into some sort of military response, which would then be portrayed as an active aggression, permitting Turkey once again, as it did last night (Brussels time), and as it did in June which is going to NATO headquarters in Brussels convening a meeting of what's called the North Atlantic Council, that is the Ambassadors of the 28 NATO member states, and pledging their collective support to Turkey in any mlitary confrontation with Syria. So in the very least what has occurred...

Incidently, so I don't forget the point:There’s no definitive proof right now that the mortar shell that landed in the Turkish village, resulting in the tragic deaths of 5 civilians and the wounding, I believe of 8 others, it has not been established that this was fired by Syrian government forces, and as you indicate the fact that there are ragtag groups of insurgents fighting for, ahem, and we don’t even know the nationality in many instances, but, with different political orientations and different agendas, gives us reason to believe that the mortar shell or the explosion could have been caused by them, by the rebels as well as by the Syrian government. However, I think it’s imperative that we recall that just the preceding day there were 2 terrorists bombings in the Syrian city of Aleppo that killed as many as 50 people, killed as many as 50 people, wounded as many as 122, by recent accounts I have seen. This is a city very close to the Turkish border. And, ah, you know, it defies logic to, ah, to not take into account the fact that these terrorist atrocities could well have been committed by individuals who have been allowed free passage across the Turkish border.

We have to recall that no other country would tolerate this sort of armed attack from a neighboring state without some kind of action.…

Reminder

Rick gives example of US War of 1812...

…but this is something countries do: they defend their borders! And to suggest that Syria has no right to do that is evidently, as the West maintains, is first of all foolhardy and is another example of double standards.”

I don’t think the issue was that they were defending. They’re saying that Syria bombed first apparently.

Nobody in their right mind is going to suggest that the Syrian government intentionally launched mortar attacks inside Turkey.

Sure, sure..

The very worst thing the Syrian government can be accused of doing is miscalculating and accidentally firing a mortal shell across the border. This is something entirely different than a planned act against the neighboring nation.

The NATO Council met last night and they have come out warning Syria to stop its “aggression against Turkey”. What do you make of this statement?

“This was an emergency meeting of North Atlantic Council, it is one of the few occasion where it has met at night, to underline the urgency of this. And the actual NATO statement includes the following passage, and this verbatim:“In the spirit of indivisibility of security and solidarity deriving from the Washington Treaty, that is the founding treaty of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Alliance continues to stand by Turkey and demands the immediate cessation of such aggressive acts against an Ally.” That’s part of the statement. And Anders Fogh Rasmussen was also quoted, stating, his concerns about events, and I am quoting him here: “On our South-Eastern border.” That is the Turkish-Syrian border is now officially proclaimed as NATO’s South-Eastern border. Suggesting strongly, that NATO sees this as an attack against the entire military alliance as well as against Turkey….

….What was discussed at the meeting was the so-called Article 4 provision in the Washington Treaty, or what’s actually called the North Atlantic Treaty, the founding document of NATO: which states, “The parties that are NATO member states will consult together whenever in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the parties is threatened.” That certainly suggests that NATO once again reserves the right to respond collectively in alleged defense of Turkey.”

Would you agree that they’re just waiting for the right chance to invade Syria?

“That’s exactly it. What’s remarkable is the very day before, whatever the nature of the incident is that resulted in the deaths of the Turkish civilians near the border, the Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia, Genady Gatilov warned reporters of potential NATO intervention against Syria! The quote from him says, “In our contacts with our partners both in NATO and in the region we’ve called upon them not to look for pretext in order to carry out a military operation.” That’s a quote from the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister. And, ah, a paraphrase of his comment stated explicitly that some provocation could occur at the Turkish-Syrian border that may give NATO the green light to intervene in Syria, so, within 24 hours or perhaps less precisely such an event occurrs.

Hypothetical, if you will: What if Bashar al-Assad comes out, he condemns the deaths of the five Turkish citizens and initiates an investigation? Would that stop NATO, do you think?

The Syrian government has already expressed regret over the deaths of the Turkish civilians without being able to establish the cause of those deaths. And, ahem, my assumption will have to be at this point, that the “fix-is-in” and that no matter what the Syrian government says or does, Western plans – that is plans of NATO nations and their Gulf Cooperation Council allies in the Persian Gulf, they’re not going to back down. They are nothing if not relentless, we have seen that demonstrated repeatedly in the recent years in Yugoslavia, in Iraq, in Libya, and now Syria. And whatever the Syrian government can issue, and probably already has issued statements that should defuse the crisis but everything rides on how Turkey chooses to respond. We know that they’ve already launched artillery attacks inside Syria and according to Today’s Zaman, one of the leading newspapers in the country in Turkey, tanks, missile batteries and other military hardware have been moved up to the Syrian border again as it was at the end of last July.

RecepTayyip Erdogan said that any military equipment belonging to the Syrian armed forces which were to approach the border would be seen as a threat. Does that mean that Syria does not have the right to protect their borders?

Evidently that is what Erdogan means and what his western backers, his NATO allies intend which is to say that Syria has no right to protect its own borders from cross-border insurgent and terrorist attack, but that Turkey reserves the right to strike inside Iraq at will, to move, as we talked about a couple of times, fairly massive military formations up to the Syrian border, but that Syria doesn’t have a reciprocal right to protect its own border. Keep in mind Syria is a country under siege, not Turkey.

Right, right.

Yesterday the Iraqi government mentioned for example that they are going to hold a vote in the parliament about rescinding the right of foreign troops to be stationed in Iraqi territory and that’s direct allusion to Turkish troops that are in the northern part of the country in the majority Kurdish area of northern Iraq, and have been there since 1995. So, Turkey reserves the right to station troops inside bordering countries even with the opposition of the central government, reserves the right to launch airstrikes and infantry attacks and so forth inside neighboring countries but disallows Syria the right to protect its own territory.

Very good point.

Reminder

What is your prediction, I am very interested to know, where do you think this is going to go? What do you see happening in a week or two?

You know, there is an optimistic perspective and there is one that’s been kind of tempered by experience. And the second suggests that the fact that Turkey has directly struck inside Syrian territory intentionally and as we’ve discussed a moment ago, it is uncertain who fired the mortar round that caused recent deaths in Turkey but even for the sake of argument, if it was Syrian military, it was certainly, almost definitely, not a conscious and deliberate attempt to fire inside Turkish territory. So, the fact that Turkey has launched a deliberate military strike inside Syria given the situation in that country over the past 18 months, is again an escalation of this conflict to a hitherto unprecedented dangerous level, and that’s what is important to note. What NATO, the United States and Turkey plan, we could speculate but I would say, you know, the comments you eluded to by Erdogan and by other Turkish officials are extremely bellicose at this moment and certainly suggest that they are willing to threaten Syria if not act further against it.

Thank you very much Rick, anything else you'd like to finish up with? We're almost out of time.

Yes. This isn’t immediately related to Syria though on one instance it actually is. I am going to cite 2 examples. There were reports in the last few hours of demonstrations in the Iranian capital of Teheran that are allegedly motivated by economic factors including the fact that, if the story is true, that their currency, the real. has been devalued by 1/3 because of the crippling sanctions instituted, enforced by the United States and its NATO allies in the first place. There may be efforts to destabilize the situation, or at least distract the attention of Iranian government preparatory to a Turkish-NATO attack on Syria. There is also, and this is not so far-fetched as it may sound on the surface, there is also an upcoming presidential election in Venezuela. And the preferred method of the United States to undermine and ultimately overthrow the handful of governments in the world that still have an independent foreign policy orientation have to be seen not strictly in relation to Syria, but the fact that: if successful in Syria, the US would be further emboldened to step up with regime change and possibly even military intervention plans for nations like Iran and Venezuela and others after them.

Thank you very much, Rick, I really appreciate it.

Yeah, and I hope you get some sleep, John.

Okay...

PART1 NATO Holds Secret Meeting Approving Syrian Operation

5 September 2012, 12:02  Download audio file 

Rick Rozoff spoke to the Voice of Russia's John Robles regarding the recent "quiet" of NATO and among the topics he touched upon were a secret meeting by NATO which apparently approved military operations against Syria. Mr, Rozoff says that NATO and its Western allies are attempting to isolate Russia and China politically and using Syria as a pretext. 

NATO has decided to stop training Afghan soldiers. Can you tell our listeners a little bit about what you know about that? That seems to be the latest development. They’ve been very quiet lately, which worries me.

It worries us both, John. Yes, in fact NATO suspended, I suppose, what’s called the NATO Training Mission in Afghanistan to develop, I guess, a more comprehensive and reliable system of, to use their own word, "vetting" potential recruits of the Afghan national army and this is after, as your listeners know, an unprecedented series of so-called “Green on Blue” attacks by Afghan military personnel against US and other NATO forces in the country. Simultaneously of course the United States’ armed forces in Afghanistan have announced that they are going to suspend if not terminate the training of Afghan police personnel, so it signals the west falling deeper and deeper into an intractable quagmire in South Asia.

Would you characterize this as part of an overall failure of US policy and NATO policy in Afghanistan?

Yes, it’s demonstrable, it's a signal, an indication of catastrophic failure in Afghanistan of course. On October 7th, which, say, next month, the US and NATO will be in Afghanistan for their 11th year and it’s certainly not produced any successful results, it’s led to the dislocation, impoverishment and in many instances, killing, of Afghan civilians without any measureable achievements even according to what the West itself claimed it had intended to do in Afghanistan when the first troops were sent there on October 7th 2001. However, I should mention, we are talking about a quiet NATO and for the most part they have been, arguably since the summit here in Chicago in May, but certainly over the last month or so, nevertheless, NATO is about to launch a fairly large scale air exercises, a series of air exercises in Czech Republic, something called Ramstein Rover 2012, which will include the participation of 12 nations, presumably, both NATO full member states and partners, and this is a test of what are called Forward Air Controllers by NATO, by the United States Joint Terminal Air Controllers. These are the people who call in support including attacks in Afghanistan. So, the fact that such a large scale air exercise clearly targeted either towards Afghanistan specifically, John, or with applicabilities for an Afghan-style operation elsewhere in the world afterwards, suggest that the US and NATO plans for Afghanistan have certainly not ceased and contrary to pledges that both US and NATO will draw down or withdraw troops from Afghanistan in 2 years it certainly suggests that they are planning an ongoing military operation.

On Saturday September 1st an article was published on the Internet. They say that NATO has secretly authorized an attack on Syria. Do you know anything about that?

Yes, I do. It’s by Gordon Duff who was a former US intelligence official. It’s actually quite a valuable work. In the article he talks about a meeting of NATO’s military committee in recent days where there were 2 topics on their agenda, one was Greenland, which he passes very quickly as it’s not of primary importance, but the second was on Syria. And what Duff indicates in his article rather convincingly, I am persuaded, is that NATO is elaborating plans for military action in, and against, Syria. I think it’s noteworthy that the meeting of the military committee that the author refers to is nowhere addressed on the NATO websites including on the main NATO homepage. I don’t know how Duff gained access to that information, but certainly it suggests that NATO is keeping a low profile so as not to divulge what its plans may be.

I’ve seen some reports say that NATO is actually targeting Bashar Assad and the Ayatollah of Iran for regime change. Do you know anything about that?

You know, it’s nothing that we are going to see NATO openly acknowledge but it’s common wisdom at this point, or conventional wisdom. To use the expression that's current, "the road to Teheran runs through Damascus” which is to say that the proxy war by NATO forces and their allies amongst the Arab Gulf sheikdoms and the Persian Gulf is, say, a warm-up exercise, if you will, for a comparable campaign against Iran. In that sense, if you want to draw a historical parallel, it’s much like the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s where forces on both sides of the political divide in Europe and in the world gave support either to the Spanish Republic that is to the elected government or to the military insurgents of Generalismo Franco. To update that parallel, just as Mexico and the Soviet Union had sent military and other aid to the Spanish Republic, so Hitler and Mussolini supplied troops and war planes against the government. And something comparable is accruing in Syria now where the United States and NATO allies. There was recent story in the British press, that at least 200 special forces troops from Britain and France, leading NATO members of course, are active on the ground, and your listeners I am sure have heard or read comparable reports. So that what you have is a proxy war by the NATO forces and their sheikdom allies in Persian Gulf not only directly against Syria but by proxy against Iran which, as you indicated in your comments, is the ultimate target. Though as we've had occassion to discuss before on your show, John, the other two targets of the campaign against Syria are of course Russia and China, you know, diplomatically at this point. But one wonders if the Russian North Caucasus, China’s Xinjiang province could not be made into the next Syria at some point in the future.

What is NATO’s position on intervention by Russia and China in Syria and Iran?

Of course there is no question about military intervention by Russia and China at this point but if you are talking about Russia and China’s defense of international law in the cases of both Syria and Iran, the position of NATO which has not been formulated as a collective position by the alliance, but certainly listening to the statements by the foreign ministers and the heads of states of the major NATO powers, the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and others, it’s patently obvious that Russia and China are being criticized and in fact are being excoriated for having the alleged temerity to defend the territorial integrity and national sovereignty of other members of the United Nations such as Syria and Iran. So, the NATO members acting in collusion if not completely collectively under the banner of NATO are criticizing and more than criticizing, are attempting to politically, and diplomatically isolate Russia and China using Syria as a pretext.

That was PART I of the interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list.

PART2 NATO: Secret Mission in Syria

18 September 2012, 11:24  Download audio file

Rick Rozoff spoke to the Voice of Russia's John Robles regarding the recent "quiet" of NATO. Mr, Rozoff says that NATO and its Western allies are attempting to isolate Russia and China politically and using Syria for that purpose.

On July 4th Rasmussen talked about global NATO. At the same time another NATO official talked about closer cooperation with the Gulf Cooperation Council. What can you tell us about that?

It is very good of you to make that connection. And certainly the speech you are alluding to by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, I did a work on it, it is a very brief speech, by the way, and I believe I counted 27 times he used the words – global, globally, international and world – in reference to NATO. So, the so called North-Atlantic Treaty Organization has appropriated or arrogated onto itself the right to be a global military intervention force. And the Persian Gulf is one of the key geopolitically strategic areas where they are concentrating.

And this is again, in cahoots with the US talking about perhaps expanding the deployment of the so called X-band – portable missile shield radar sites of the sort that were placed in Turkey this year or in Israel four years ago into the Persian Gulf, into one of the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council, as the US is exporting Patriot Advanced Capability-3 and Terminal High Area Defense Interceptors into those countries, so we are talking about a major military buildup - anti-missile, naval – and other forms of military buildup in the Persian Gulf states which are linked to NATO under what is called the Istanbul Cooperation Initiative of 2004 which was an overt effort by NATO to replicate other partnership programs around the world focusing on the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council.

I read somewhere that someone was calling for Israel to join NATO. Is that realistic do you think?

There was an article two days ago, if I’m not incorrect - the time zones are different of course, in Haaretz, the leading Israeli daily newspaper, calling for just that – for the formal inclusion of Israel into the NATO vis-à-vis the confrontation with Iran which would inevitably then pull the entire NATO alliance, including nuclear powers – the US, France and Britain – into any military conflict that could be initiated by Israel against Iran. It is not the first time the statements of this sort are being made. Indeed, Israel as a member of the Mediterranean dialog and military partnership with NATO, it was the first country to be granted an individual partnership initiative under the rubric of the Mediterranean dialog.

It is the only country in the Middle East, I don’t know how many of your listeners know this, that is not subordinate to the Pentagon’s Central Command which takes in all the rest in the Middle East as a matter of fact, from Egypt all the way to, say, Kazakhstan. Israel alone remains under the US-European command area of responsibility and the Chief Military Commander of the European Command is simultaneously the Chief Military Command of NATO in Europe, the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe. So, that Israel has a very unique relationship with NATO, to begin with. And because of this geographical situation it may not be possible to be incorporated as a full member state, but politically and ultimately militarily has functioned as such for a long time.

A lot of eyes right now are on the upcoming presidential elections in the US. How would the current plans of NATO change if Republican Mitt Romney is elected president?

What we’ve seen since the creation of NATO in 1949 initially by the Democratic President Harry Truman, but its first military commander – the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe was Dwight Eisenhower who would succeed Truman as the President of the US and he was a Republican. Whatever differences exist domestically between the two major political parties and whatever shades of difference may exist between them on international affairs, one thing that is invariable and uniform is the endorsement of NATO as the US’s military arm in Europe. And as we’ve seen, since the Afghan operation began almost 11 years ago increasingly, and the Middle East Asia and with the war against Libya last year in Africa, I wouldn’t expect to see any substantial difference, not even a shade of difference to be honest between a second Obama or the first Romney Administration, in relation to NATO.

You’ve heard about his comments regarding Russia being geopolitical enemy number 1 etc. What do you make of those? Do you think it is just rhetoric? Or do you think he is really serious and if he becomes President, he is going to take an extremely hard line towards the countries he stated he would?

It is bold, I mean it is rhetorical and it is meant to achieve short term political gains in the presidential election in November. At the same time it is authentic and it is a serious danger, as you’ve pointed out, among the best commentaries I’ve read on the subject are on the Voice of Russia. But sometimes rhetoric gets ahead of itself and then a person’s acts on their own are reckless misperception or a commitment to the rhetoric they’ve been espousing. And I would by no means underestimate the danger of Romney Administration in terms of becoming even more provocative and even more bellicose towards Russia. And that’s a distinct possibility and it is definitely a factor in the presidential election.

How do Americans feel about that?

About the question of bating Russia, bating the Russian bear again as though we are living in the very depths of the Cold War and in many ways even worse. I wish I could tell you my fellow Americans have a decided opinion one way or any other on the matter. But the news media is such in this country, if I may speak poorly of your colleagues across the ocean, that superficial issues are dwelled on. The media event such as the Clint Eastwood speech at the Republican National Convention for example grabbed all the headlines. And substantive issues of the sort you have raised tend to be buried and people either don’t hear about them or hearing about them don’t pay a particular attention them. That’s a tragedy.

The US relations towards Russia and particularly any escalation and provocations against Russia would be plenty bad as they are. As within the world’s two major nuclear powers, I ought to be frank about that, it is the matter of the outmost importance and certainly deserves a lot more attention than it is receiving in the media. And as a result the average American voter, when they walk in the polling booth in November, on their list of priorities Russian-American relations are going to be very low if they exist at all.

Ok, Rick is there anything else that you’d like to finish up with?

No. but again I want to commend the Voice of Russia on it excellent coverage of international affairs. But it is very perceptive reporting on events within my country. Often times we don’t read comparable coverage from local news sources.

So, you are saying to get good news on the US you have to…

Go to the other side of the world

US and Allies Arbitrarily Violate International Law

16 August 2012, 10:00 Download audio file

Mr. Rozoff discusses General Assembly resolutions on Syria and how the US and its allies are circumventing standard procedure in order to win a propaganda battle. “Everything that the West and its Persian Gulf allies have done over the last seventeen months has worsened the situation, [costing] more Syrian lives,” Rozoff said.

This is part 3 of the interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff – the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list.

What do you make about Kofi Annan’s sudden, I don’t know how unexpected it was for those in the know but it was unexpected for many, to see Kofi Annan all of a sudden decide not to renew his mandate?

Which was due to expire at the end of this month.

It didn’t surprise me. I would just tell you frankly, I believe that his stepping down was coordinated with the introduction of the resolution in the General Assembly which was introduced by the current Secretary General – Kofi Annan’s successor Ban Ki-moon – who lambasted the Syrian Government, made comparisons to Rwanda and Bosnia in the 1990s as though suggesting that what happened in Syria was a replication of these precedents I’ve mentioned. And again, you know, poisoned the well, or prejudiced the vote by his comments. We have to recollect that Kofi Annan himself would never have been Secretary General of UN if, the then US representative to the UN, the Secretary of State later, Madeleine Albright hadn’t single-handedly rammmed through his nomination and secured his position at the expense of Boutros Boutros-Ghali who was running for reelection for that position.

So, Kofi Annan was the US’s man in the United Nations for two terms. And if anything I was rather surprised he hadn’t tipped his hand earlier in terms of supporting the West’s position. But you know, in fact he did to some extent at the Geneva meeting with the so called action group. There were different interpretations of what came out, there was Russia’s and China’s for example and there was his which intimated or stated I think even more explicitly that Bashar Assad had to step down as President and the Government had to cede power to some sort of coalition. So, it doesn’t surprise me in the least. I think these events were coordinated and then the fact that he received a guest editorial in the Financial Times, the morning of the General Assembly vote, as I recollect last Friday, explaining his position all seems to be a fairly coordinated campaign.

What do you think about: several Russia officials made statements that the resolution actually served to worsen the situation in Syria?

Yes, it does. And everything that the West and its Persian Gulf allies have done over the last seventeen months has worsened the situation, cost more Syrian lives, led to the further destabilization, in many ways made irreparable damage to the nation of Syria, which one would now have to assume, ah, is the intent. For example Vitaliy Churkin also said after the vote last Friday [August 3, 2012] that to take the vote to the General Assembly while the Security Council was still deliberating on the Syrian issue was a violation of the UN Charter.

So, the US and its allies have again circumvented the standard procedure in order to win a propaganda battle, but a propaganda battle that will continue as we were just talking about with an escalation in the loss of Syrian lives as a result. The West and its Saudi allies and Qatari allies will sacrifice the life of every last Syrian if they accomplish their geopolitical objectives which are not only regime change in Damascus, it is also to prolong the perceived isolation of Russia and China. That’s the significance of this vote last Friday more than anything else.

Syria is much more the pretext than the actual issue being discussed because what is at issue right now – is whether the US and its allies can arbitrarily violate international law, whether they can subvert the concepts of the territorial integrity and national sovereignty of states, whether somebody sitting in the, you know, State Department can determine who has to step down as a head of state, who is going to replace him. And the US has done this in a least four occasions since early last year, I’m talking about Ivory Coast, Libya, Yemen and now Syria. And there is every reason to believe that if they are successful in Syria, then they would move on to the next countries. And I would suggest that the twelve of countries that voted against the resolution on Friday are exactly the twelve countries that are going to be targeted.

Can you list those countries for our listeners?

Yes. The twelve countries that voted against the resolution are Russia, China, Syria, Iran, Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Myanmar, Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.

And you think all those countries are on a hit list for regime change?

Each except for Myanmar decidedly are. And I’m a bit surprised that the former Burma, Myanmar, voted against the resolution as it had not voted against the resolution in February.

Why do you think they did this?

I have no idea. I would have thought that since Hilary Clinton’s visit to Myanmar last November that she had pretty much shifted Myanmar away from China and towards the UN. So, frankly I have no explanation for why they voted against the resolution unless they sensed something. If you’d asked me a year ago it would have been self-evident why Myanmar voted against it, because it itself was targeted for a regime change at the time. Somebody has them on the checklist and I think it is important that they are not able to make checks in each box. And if developments in Syria, that is Western and allied efforts to overthrow the Government in Syria, are thwarted with the continued opposition of Russia and China in the first place, then I don’t think we have to worry about the other eleven nations because of course Syria is one of them. But should they be successful in Syria, then I think the remaining eleven nations are likely targets.

Listen, one last question regarding Syria, which you just brought up again. About a week ago it looked like Assad was all but finished. What do you think Assad’s chances are, and the current Syrian Government’s chances are, of staying in power?

Barring a direct foreign military intervention I think, better with each passing day. The successful campaign to secure Damascus and now Aleppo, the two largest cities in the country, have given the lie to the media propaganda in the West in the first place about the fact that there was no unity within the Government, that the Syrian nation and people were divided, that the Government had no substantive support…

Yes, they were talking about everybody bailing out, that the high officials saw no future, and… after the assassination at the security building.

That’s a good point you raise. With the murder by a suicide bombing of four leading officials of the Government, including the Defense Minister, the Deputy Defense Minister…

And the Intelligence head I believe it was.

Yes. The reports in the West were that this is “the final nail in the coffin”, to quote Leon Panetta – the Pentagon Chief, with the Syrian Government and it was only a matter of days if not hours before it fell and so forth. And we’ve seen quite the reverse occur. We’ve seen the Government reestablish control over the capital Damascus, as well as Aleppo. And basically what are going on now are mopping up operations. And it also demonstrates that the Syrian military is firmly in support of the Government. 

 

Iran vs Poland and UNGA’s Plans for Syria

9 August 2012, 19:00  Download audio file

Rick continues listing the reasons why the ABM system in Poland is directed against Russia and discusses the fact that last Friday’s General Assembly’s resolution was drafted by Saudi Arabia and then co-sponsored by Bahrain and Qatar. VoR asked Mr. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list, to comment on matters related to these issues. Part II.

Why did the Polish President refuse to answer who the ABM system in Poland is targetted against and why is it clear they are being installed against Russia?

Try to imagine, first of all, how Iran would have the capability of launching basically intercontinental ballistic missiles over Poland, presumably over the Arctic Circle to hit the United States. I mean that’s the impossibility, fellacious from the very beginning. When the Obama administration scaled that back somehow by suggesting that standard missile 3 interceptors, which have a shorter range, could be used to intercept Iranian missiles, then it begs the question "where?". At what point do you intercept the Iranian missiles?The trajectory and the range of the standard missile-3’s could potentially intercept in some place south of Poland but where – Ukraine, the Caucuses? They don’t carry a charge, they’re kinetic hit-to-kill missiles, as they're called. So, you know, presumably no real damage is done in the fallout over the intended country. I don’t know that Ukraine or Armenia or whoever would be affected by this, would be consulted before this happening. But one thing that gives a “lie” to the entire argument, the deployment of any sort of interceptor missiles in Poland is aimed against Iran, is the fact that in May of 2010 the US moved a Patriot short range interceptor missile battery into the city of Morag in Poland, which is I believe only about 40 miles or 35 miles from the Russian territory of Kaliningrad.

And these are short range missiles?

Right, which can only be placed against presumed Russian missiles coming in. I mean they haven’t arranged to do anything in regard to Iran, so there is talk about how Poland, wanted an insurance from the United States if they put the longer range missiles in they'd have protection, but the protection clearly is not from Iran, or they wouldn’t put short range Patriot interceptors near the Russian border. The inescapable conclusion is that the Patriots are there as at least a symbolic signal to Russia.

What’s your take on the United Nations General Assembly vote from last week’s Friday? You wrote a very interesting article about it for your website.

Yes, it is a second vote of that nature in the General Assembly this year. There was earlier one in February and then it was re-dated last Friday. It is comparable to what the United States did in January of 1980 when the Carter administration went to the General Assembly, and, of course, General Assembly resolutions are non-binding, the Security Council would have to authorize anything substantive, like an article 7 on military intervention, for example. But what the Carter administration did in January of 1980 was to go to the General Assembly and get an overwhelming vote condemning the initial Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, which had occurred only a couple weeks earlier towards the end of September in 1979. But it wasn’t so important in terms of rallying or marshalling support within the world community fronting action. It was more a propaganda victory for the States, which then could portray the Soviet Union as being an aggressor in Afghanistan and justify its own covert involvement in supporting the Afghan Hafizullah Amin, and everything that is entailed, everything that happened to Afghanistan in the interim. So, what happened in February, what happened last Friday clearly is out of the same playbook, if you will, with what happened in 1980s. What the United States and its NATO allies have done is they introduced a resolution that appears on the surface to be somewhat balanced but is weighted heavily against the government in Damascus and calls for amongst other things the introduction of, a roughly paraphrasing it, a pluralistic multi-party political system within Syria. And Syria though is dominated by the Ba’ath party, actually does have multi-party system in the Parliament. The resolution, and I think your listeners have to know this, was drafted by Saudi Arabia and then co-sponsored by Bahrain and Qatar. So, you have hereditary monarchies, the least democratic nations in the world, drafting a resolution being pushed by the United States and its Western allies, its NATO allies, calling for political transformation in Syria, along the lines what I indicated with the paraphrase, but there is no sense of irony evidently in the world to realize that of all countries in the world that have been chosen to draft that resolution at Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain, and Qatar and, I think, Egypt at one point co-sponsored it, these are the worst possible examples, and again reveals the abject hypocrisy of the west to be talking about a democratic transformation and the transition, governmental transition in Syria and at the same time hiding behind the likes of Saudi Arabia to affect that.

Teaming up with the Al-Qaeda, to bring that about?

Nobody is denying the fact that there are Jihadists, Wahhabi, Salafist, Al-Qaeda, elements operating in Syria’s part of the so called Free Syrian Army, and the United States seems to be willing as it did last year in Libya under very similar circumstances to not only tolerate but to assist that process. But going back to the vote, there were 133 countries voting in favor, only 12 voting against, some 31 abstaining. The abstentions are from countries that are hesitant to generally support the United States in its more aggressive moves around the world but, to be more honest, to have taken a principle position 31 countries by right they should have voted against it. It includes nations ranging from Ecuador to Vietnam, to Surinam, and other nations that have more or less independent foreign policy orientations. But what is frightening is that both in the February vote and last Friday there were only 12 nations out of 193 in the General Assembly that voted against the resolution – Russia, China, Syria. But only 9 other nations have stood with them. Those 9 nations as we talked about before in your program, are nations that are already targeted for Syrian or Libyan style regime change program themselves, nations like Zimbabwe, Belarus, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Venezuela, and others, or simply by standing up to the United States, or, say, allies of Saudi Arabia, have declared themselves targets for Syrian style subversion interaction regime change. It’s a very sad moment in the world where the US and its allies have managed to corral that higher percentage of general assembly members nations in the world in fact to support what was clearly a one-sided resolution aimed against the government of Syria, and in the words of the Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin he said something of the affect that the resolution acted as though there were no armed opposition in the country attaching no blame to the opposition for any of the violence.

He came down on government officials, that these are insurgents trying to take over the government and trying to engage in a violent overthrow of the official government of the country and the resolution just placed all the blame on the government.

That’s exactly what it did. And in regard again to the sponsors, these great models of Euro-Atlantic or Transatlantic democracy like Saudi Arabia and Qatar and Bahrain, the Syrian Ambassador of the United Nations referred to them quite justly, quite accurately as despotic oligarchies, which is precisely what they are. Nobody in the west appears to be embarrassed to have allowed these three countries to sponsor and Saudi Arabia to draft a resolution calling for what they have the audacity to refer to as democracy.

Ukraine Forced into NATO

19 July 2012, 15:16 Download audio file

In a recent interview, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has urged Ukraine to settle the issue of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and remove obstacles in relations with the alliance, in what can be viewed as yet another NATO attempt to steer Ukraine towards the integration of this former Soviet state in the US-led military bloc. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO, believes NATO is not relented in its ambition to incorporate Ukraine into NATO ultimately as a full member.

Secretary General of NATO Rasmussen is urging Kiev to remove obstacles in relation to NATO. Can you tell us about that?

It’s NATO’s intention to bring Ukraine into NATO’s full membership which is why there’s special NATO-Ukraine commission that was set up roughly 4-3.5 years ago with the expressed purpose of doing that. At the 2008 NATO summit in Bucharest, the countries of Ukraine and Georgia both hadn’t received the green light – if you will - to join NATO’s full members, but to be granted with Membership Action Program which is a final stage before full NATO accession. So a compensatory mechanism was set up which is the commission I mentioned both for Ukraine and Georgia. And despite the change in government – Yanukovich replaced Yushenko - NATO is not relented in its ambition to incorporate Ukraine into NATO ultimately as a full member. So Rasmussen’s comments are in line with that policy of NATO. And of course two military exercises in Ukraine have recently been concluded this month including the annual Operation Sea Breeze which is run by the US. It’s supposedly a joint US-Ukrainian military exercise, naval in the Black sea, not too far from the headquarters of the Russian Black Sea Fleet. Given Ukraine’s location, its size, its role and the armaments industry in both Soviet space and so forth - it’s a key acquisition for NATO. It doesn’t surprise me that Rasmussen is laying down these terms to Ukraine.

They talk about human rights, the Timoshenko case, Lutsenko, what do you think about their claims?

They’re going to overrule decisions made by the Parliament in Ukraine, by the President. They’re going to trample in the laws of Ukraine in order to support their clients, Yulia Timoshenko, the gas princess in the first instance. The sort of dictate almost from the West in relations to Timoshenko is all about ordering the Yanukovich government to release her and so forth. It’s a further example of the interference of the US in internal affairs of sovereign nations. They want their allies, their operators, the former Victor Yushenkos and the current Yulia Timoshenko to be free and to operate further on the Western agenda in Ukraine.

Hillary Clinton keeps making statements - it’s kind of become a habit for her – towards Russia. What about her last statement? Can you comment on this?

The most recent is probably the worst. It’s probably too low even for Hillary Clinton. And it’s saying quite a bit. And what we’re speaking about is of course her talk on so-called Friends of Syria Meeting in Paris on July, 6th, where she stated to the representatives of the estimated 100 nations and organizations transparently in attempt to rally them against Russia and China for having the temerity to defend international law and as we just mentioned the noninterference in the internal affairs of sovereign nations vis-à-vis Syria. One has to watch her as she’s making these statements, you know, waving her hand in the air and being almost hysterical. She stated that the problem was that Russia and China were not paying the price for their position in relation to Syria and that they would have to pay a price and that the so-called world community would have to ensure that they do. So, I mean, this is the crudest form of intimidation.

What do you think she meant exactly by ‘paying a price’?

It’s hard to say. Diplomatically, of course. Economically, perhaps. You know maybe what the US and their allies want to do with Russia and China in relation to Syria is the same that they did with several countries including Russia and China in relation to Iran, they increasingly slap sanctions on a country like Iran or Syria and start sanctioning countries dealing with it. Something like the situation obtained in in 2003 when the George W. Bush Administration started accusing perhaps dozens of countries of selling the so-called “dual-use” equipment to the government of Iraq and threatening them with – if you will – second generation sanctions, - if you got to be alluding to that you know economically as well as diplomatically punishing Russia and China. However, the tone of what she stated, suggested that she was talking about something more, almost threatening Russia and China politically, who knows what? But it was a further thing removed from diplomatic language that one can imagine. But given the fact that she is the Secretary of State of the administration that probably proclaims itself in amusing President Obama’s own words “the world’s sole military superpower,” she evidently feels she can make statements like that with impunity and that nobody is going to hold her to account for that. Unfortunately, the world is not. It gets worse, I suppose, with each succession of Secretary of State, but this is a low point. She made a statement in February this year, the second time that Russia and China jointly vetoed the resolution on the UN Security Council aimed against Syria where – to use her own words – she referred to Russia and China as being ‘despicable’. I think that the rest of the world should take notice as to how the US treats even major powers, the world’s second economic power, China, and one of the world’s two major military powers, Russia. If they can be referred to in such derogatory and abrasive terms then you don’t need a WikiLeaks’ revelation to understand what US thinks of the governments of other nations.

Can you tell our listeners about the recent attack on a NATO convoy to Afghanistan through Pakistan?

Being attributor to a Pakistani-Taliban group or the Haghani network – I’m not sure who’s been accused of having torched the 12 NATO tankers - but I would say, John, more than anything else this is indicative, I believe, as a general sentiment within Pakistan which is not in favor of renewing transit NATO convoys from Pakistan into Afghanistan. I’m sure there’s overwhelming opposition to collaboration with NATO for the war in Afghanistan for no other reason than that the people in Western Pakistan don’t relish the cousins on the other side of the border being killed by NATO helicopter gunship attacks or in other military attacks including some of the horrible atrocities that have occurred just this year for example. And what we’re seeing again is that to accommodate NATO is to betray one’s own nation, and one’s people no matter where it occurs. 

PART1 US Forcing Former Soviet Allies into NATO

22 July 2012, 22:59 Download audio file

In the second part of an interview with the Voice of Russia, NATO expert Rick Rozoff outlines the U.S. plans to bring former Soviet Republics and allies into the alliance’s sphere of influence and away from Russia, isolating Russia and China, and eventually surrounding them with NATO member countries. Mr. Rozoff also speaks of U.S. plans to stay in Afghanistan

This is John Robles, you are listening to an interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list, and a contributing writer to www.globalresearch.ca

An article appeared in one of the major newspapers. I’ve heard it referred to as the major newspaper in Slovenia, a couple of weeks ago that stated that the largest and worst mistake made by the Government of Slovenia was joining NATO, that what that has entailed is far from defending the territory of NATO’s member states, that it is simply waging wars worldwide. That was followed very shortly thereafter, a couple of days ago, by the Head of the Orthodox Church in Montenegro, the Metropolitan, who made a similar statement. He said the NATO should breakup, that it is guilty of waging aggression upon people throughout the world.

So, I think what you are starting to see even in south-east Europe and perhaps other nations that have been dragooned into NATO without first thoroughly explaining to the population what NATO membership entails. And what it entails in the case of countries like Slovenia and Montenegro is sending their sons and daughters off to some endless and useless war like that in Afghanistan. And what is happening in Pakistan is not too similar to that, it is a case where if a government, if a regime, accommodates NATO demands, they are violating the trust and undermining the wellbeing of their own nation and their own people, and this is in fact what is going on in Pakistan.

We heard a statement by Hilary Clinton before that supply route was opened.

Yes, I haven’t read the complete text by Hilary Clinton but I’d bet anything the substance of it was that she regrets the unfortunate incident or words to that effect that occurred in Salalah where 24 Pakistani military personal were killed last November. But certainly something short of acknowledging that the US had committed a crime. We have to recall that wasn’t too long of Hillary Clinton made a tour to Central Asia where she went to, I believe, Kirgizstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan. And shortly thereafter as your listeners know, Uzbekistan suspended its participation in the Collective Security Treaty Organization with Kirgizstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus and Armenia.

So, it appears that the State Department has succeeded once again in pulling a country out of an organization of which Russia is a member and through which Uzbekistan was allied with Russia, to separate it from Russia and China and to pull it into the US orbit. After Clinton left Paris on July 6 we know she went to Afghanistan where she proclaimed Afghanistan a major non-NATO ally of the US meaning they get preferential arrangements with weapons and so forth. But identifying Afghanistan as a strategic American military ally indefinitely. So, that hardly suggests the US intends to leave the area.

But I think even more significant than that was after having left Afghanistan and gone for a one day conference on Afghanistan to Japan, is that she then went to Mongolia, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia. And if your listeners are as old as me, or older, they recall that all four of those countries were political allies of the Soviet Union during the Cold War period, Mongolia since almost the formation of the Soviet Union, but in the case of the unified Vietnam and Laos from 1975, and Cambodia after the overthrow of the pro-Chinese Khmer Rouge in 1979.

So, if we need any further evidence of the US far from having ended the Cold War, it is simply consummating its victory of 20 some years ago by moving on the territory that is geographically close, and in many cases, as in Laos and Vietnam, bordering China, and in the case of Mongolia bordering both Russia and China. And recruiting not only political and economic, but ultimately military allies throughout the world, but more particularly now in Eurasia and in the backyard of Russia and China both, Central Asia fits into that pattern. If the five former Soviet Central Asian republics are increasingly integrated into the US sphere of influence, then this essentially isolates Russia and China in Eurasia.

Hilary Clinton said that the US had never planned to leave Afghanistan.

You know, the US’s cards are truly not on the table when it comes to Afghanistan. I heard the same statement and it is remarkable because a few years ago, perhaps when she first became the Secretary of State, about that time, she made what on the surface was one of the more candid statements I’ve heard by any US military official about the genesis of the crisis in Afghanistan. Acknowledging in so many words that it was the US support for the so called Mujahidin forces in, operating out of northwest Pakistan, from the late 70’es through to 1992, that was really the basis for all the disorganization and the conflict that has occurred in Afghanistan since then, she made that statement maybe three or four years ago.

But she then mouthed the conventional American wisdom on the subject saying – our mistake – I’m paraphrasing her – was then to have pulled out and left the country to internal fighting between the US’s former Mujahidin allies, and in fact that occurred as we know after 1992 when they were rocketing parts of the capital of Kabul in rivalry amongst each other. And subsequent to that by four years the Taliban marches in and takes control of the country. So, what Clinton’s most recent statement at the donor’s conference, or the Conference on Afghanistan in Japan, seems to be simply a reiteration of that – we won’t make the same mistake. If we overthrow the Government in Afghanistan and allow our clients to takeover, we will this time stay there and support them, is how I read that.

Moving on to Syria. A Syrian general, Major General Adnan Salo, he was the former Head of the Chemical Weapons Unit of the Syrian Army, he’s made public statements calling for NATO intervention, although he says limited military intervention is needed. He said that they need two airstrikes on the presidential palace to get rid of Assad. Do you think this is going to happen?

I sincerely hope it doesn’t. And I similarly hope that this is simply bravado. But it could be too a trial balloon to see what the world’s reaction is to inflammatory statements of this sort. The idea that you bomb the presidential palace in the name of protecting civilians or humanitarian concerns and so forth shows you just how far down the road to barbarism the world has evolved over the past twenty years. It won’t be the first time that’s happened of course, efforts to bomb the presidential palace in Yugoslavia in 1999. And apparently anything is a fair game at this point.

Why is the US trying to provoke Russia?

THIS WORK IS STILL ACCESSIBLE AND HAS BEEN CAREFULLY ARCHIVED HERE:

ORIGINAL PUBLISHED ARTICLE ON THE VOICE OF RUSSIA DELETED BY SPUTNIK: Why is the US trying to provoke Russia?

http://ed.ruvr.ru/data/2011/07/05/1253304378/%D0%A0%D0%B8%D0%BA%20%D0%A0%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%BE%D1%84%20%D1%84%D0%BE%D1%82%D0%BE.jpgWhy is the US trying to provoke Russia?

Recent statements by Hillary Clinton regarding Syria and the Russian Federation; a provocation or something else?

20 June 2012, 18:26 Download audio file

Recent statements by Hillary Clinton regarding Syria and the Russian Federation; a provocation or something else?

Hello, this is John Robles. You are listening to the interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager and the owner of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.

I’d like to talk to you about the recent statements by Hillary Clinton regarding Syria and the Russian Federation and the seeming provocation by the U.S.

You are referring of course to the statement earlier this week when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused Russia of sending helicopter gunships to Syria, more or less in her words for the expressed and exclusivHello, this is John Robles. You are listening to an interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager and the owner of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.

I’d like to talk to you about the recent statements by Hillary Clinton regarding Syria and the Russian Federation and the seeming provocation by the U.S.

You are referring of course to the incident earlier this week when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused Russia of sending helicopter gunships to Syria, more or less in her words for the express and exclusive intent of murdering Syrian civilians. You know an absurd contention but a very dangerous provocation.

Why do you think the U.S. is set on, it seems to me, provoking Russia?

You're using the right word. These are actions that usually, ordinarily rather, are employed against a nation with which the U.S. is at loggerheads and is considering potential hostile actions against. This is wild rhetoric, it's reckless, it’s unjustified of course and it’s not even so much evocative of the Cold War period; in many ways it is even worse than some of what we heard during even the most stressful years of the Cold War.

Why is the U.S. taunting Russia, why is it challenging it, why is it attempting to discredit and humiliate it? I think I am using the right verbs. I can only say that Russia, by standing its ground and maintaining its position on the territorial integrity and sovereignty of nations and continuing to oppose unilateral and lawless intervention, military intervention in the first place, into the internal affairs of sovereign nations, is an obstacle to U.S. plans for extending its military and political influence globally and to affect in the specific case of Syria and other nations so-called regime change to bring about a geopolitical configuration more favorable to the United States. Russia is standing on the way of that, then, has to be condemned and excoriated by the United States in an effort to win international support against Russia. And any fabrication, any exaggeration, any outright lie that serves that purpose, will be something that U.S.
government officials will not hesitate to employ.

What kind of things are they saying in the U.S. press about Russia right now?

We are seeing the gutter journalism mill churned up of course. There was an article in the Los Angeles Times yesterday by a regular contributor that has a statement to the effect that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions in Syria in supporting tyranny and dictatorship and so forth are in his genes, that is presumably that as a Russian he is genetically programmed to support genocide and dictatorship and so force.

This was in U.S. press?

This was in the Los Angeles Times, one of the major dailies in the United States. And the fact that filth like this can be published quite openly, and uncontested evidently, is something that truthfully I don’t recall during the Cold War where the U.S. government and its obedient mass media at least attempted to draw a distinction between, let’s say, the Soviet government and the people of the Soviet Union. Now, evidently the actions of the Russian government are attributed to some genetic deficiency within the Russian people. This is horrific, it’s almost evocative of the Hitler period.

Hillary Clinton, as she decided to make some serious anti-Russian remarks during a press conference at the Brookings Institute, you wrote something about the fact that in the background there was an Israeli flag. Do you think it was done on purpose and how was it played out in the Arab countries?

These are both very penetrating questions, so I’ll attempt to answer them. She was speaking at the Brookings Institution, which has given the Barack Obama administration amongst other personnel, on leave from the Brookings Institution, Dr. Susan Rice, who is the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Ivo Daalder who is the U.S. ambassador to NATO and other officials, so that is a venue dear to the likes of Hillary Clinton but she was speaking with Israeli President Shimon Peres and that was the occasion presumably for the Israeli flag being in the background, though I didn’t see an American flag.

She was sitting down when she made the wild accusation that Russia was sending helicopter gunships to be used against Syrian civilians, because that’s what she stated, and in the meantime incidentally waving her arm in the air and almost shaking her fist, I guess for rhetorical effect. The irony or the fact that anyone watching that on Youtube throughout the world and particularly in the Arab world watching her make one of her more provocative statements to date in relation to Russia as she is all but draped in the Israeli flag would certainly send a message other than what she intended I suppose, unless it was intended as you imply. And I certainly can’t answer that.

But we do have to recall that her comment is not an isolated one. It was backed up by her spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, spokesman for the State Department, former U.S. ambassador to NATO incidentally. It was backed up by Jay Carney, White House spokesman, and others who have immediately afterwards made comparable statements indicting Russia for an event that as we now know never occurred.

Every few years there seems to be an intensification of the Russia-baiting initiative. It's generally stirred up the press in the United States and perhaps even more so in Britain. There have been recent articles in the Daily Telegraph, there have been some in recent months in the Guardian, including by Simon Tisdall, who's their deputy editor, and it’s the worst sort of anti-Russian vitriol that, again, I have seen since the Cold War and perhaps worse than anything I saw during that period, and it is clear that the U.S. wants to complete its transformation of the Middle East as they would perhaps refer to as. That is, the overthrow of secular, non-monarchical governments in Arab countries in favor of the U.S.’s dearest military client in the world right now – Saudi Arabia - with whom it signed a $60 billion arms deal late last year as your listeners will recall, which by my calculations is probably the largest bilateral military weapons package in human history, and the fact that the democracy-loving and freedom-promoting and so forth United States (those are all in italics, ironic italics) is siding with the likes of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and other monarchic, theocratic regimes in the Persian Gulf and working hand-in-glove with them, much as the United States and Saudi Arabia did against Afghanistan starting since 1978, when the Saudis provided the funds and not a few fighters for the Mujahideen war and the United States provided weapons and advisers.

And we seem to see a resumption of that bilateral strategic, or geostrategic, alliance between United States and Saudi Arabia. Russia stands in the way. First of all, Russia’s government is very principled is demanding adherence to international law, to particularly non-interference in the internal affairs of sovereign nations as we’ve talked about, and the United States is the opposite. They feel emboldened to, feel driven by, I would add, the need to interfere in and topple the governments of any number of countries in the world, and because these two nations, Russia and the United States, are so fundamentally opposed on that key principle of international relations, then the United States has to isolate, has to discredit and has to politically if not otherwise crush Russia in order to have its position become the dominant one, one that is uncontested.

Thank you.

You were listening to the interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager and the owner of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.e intent of murdering Syrian civilians - you know absurd contention but a very dangerous provocation

PART2 OSCE to Monitor Anti-NATO Protests in Chicago

14 May 2012, 17:33  Download audio file

Interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to GlobalResearch.ca. He will be debating NATO officials in Chicago on May 17th in a first ever event where those opposed to NATO are allowed to voice their concerns.

I heard that on the 17th of May you are planning to debate former NATO officials and current NATO officials. This is first debate of this type in history I believe. Can you tell our listeners a little bit about that?

Thank you for asking, John. It’s scheduled Thursday evening at 6 o’clock in downtown Chicago at what’s called the Pritzker Military Library, it’s probably an apt site for the discussion of NATO. As I’ve last heard two spokespeople advocating the NATO position, and those are Nicholas Burns, former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs in the State Department and current NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary for Political and Security Affairs James Appathurai are going to be presenting the NATO position. I’ve been asked to be one of two what identified in Chicago media as protesters who are going to be speaking against NATO. Initially Andy Thayer who is a leader in the coalition against NATO G8 War and Poverty Agenda (CANG8), for short, was to be the other speaker from the anti-NATO position. I now hear that a representative from either Iraq or Afghanistan war veterans, is going to be speaking instead of Andy Thayer, so it will be the two of us.

Can you tell me a little bit of the format?

In my understanding each of the four of us is going to give a presentation and then there will be questions field from the audience. It’s going to be a very select group, there’s going to be 100 people permitted into the library in addition to media.

Who was behind the planning of this event?

It’s sponsored by the local Chicago think tank. Though, it’s my understanding, John, that somehow, I don’t know who contacted whom, the prime mover in permitting a discussion that has both sides being heard was emanated from the White House.

You mentioned before we started something about two OSCE parliamentarians. Are they going to be in attendance?

I heard from another leader of CANG8 that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) announced that they were going to send two, perhaps three European parliamentarians as part of the delegation to monitor the protest in the city of Chicago’s response to that, which would mark only the second time that an OSCE delegation has been sent to the United States, and the previous time was during 2008 presidential election and if in fact that’s true and that materializes, that may in part have led to the White House having them to make a concession to allow some form of public debate on the issue because to be frank with you, there has been none up until now. When the decision was made between the White House and Mayor of Chicago Rahm Emanuel last year there was no debate, there was no discussion with the City Council of Chicago and the neighborhoods that are going to be effected pretty adversely, as no community leaders and so forth were consulted, it was dealt with as a fait accompli.

How did you become involved in this? Were you chosen?

Andy Thayer of CANG8 invited me to join him initially, now it looks like it may be again an Iraq or Afghanistan war veteran and myself presenting the anti-NATO position.

Can you tell our listeners a little bit of what NATO was doing to promote their position in the U.S. and why and where all this money is coming from? So they’ve made a huge PR campaign in the Chicago area, I believe.

There is a host committee for the NATO Summit, which is headed up by former political officials but there is corporate sponsorship that is matter of fact goes to the website for the NATO Chicago Summit, they’ll have the corporate logos of major Fortune 500 type companies that have raised an estimated $37 billion (Mr. Rozoff apologized and asked that billion be corrected to million. Robles)  in corporate moneys for the summit in addition to what the Federal and the City Government are going to spend. The argument that many people make including myself that NATO is essentially the international armed wing of the one percent could not be made any more effectively or vividly than visiting the website for the Chicago Summit and looking at corporate logos that stand behind the NATO meeting on May 20 and 21.

Recently somebody, NATO spokesman I think, said that NATO was the war machine for any percent.

I believe that comment emanates from Ivo Daalder who is U.S. Ambassador and NATO currently and he is somebody who 6 years ago co-authored an article that was published in Washington Post and also on the website of the Brookings Institution where Daalder is on leave as a senior fellow, but the title of article was “Global NATO”. So, we are talking about somebody who in fact envisions, and keep in mind he is the envoy for the most part the member of the military block, the United States, and that somebody that for several years has been touting in exactly those words, the concept of an international worldwide NATO that can intervene (at will) any place it chooses. Any organization that has waged war in three continents since 1999 as NATO has, in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan and Libya, is certainly a war machine.

What can you tell our listeners about G8 Summit being moved to Camp David and what’s the relation between that and the NATO Summit happening in Chicago?

The two were to have occured not simultaneously but back to back. The G8 Summit was to have occurred on the 18th and 19th of this month and the NATO Summit on the 20th and 21st. And when the news first broke in spring of last year that Chicago would host them both, the announcement was made simultaneously, it was, if you will, a package deal, then several weeks ago the White House rather abruptly and without any explanations, the accounts in Chicago are that the Mayor himself, Emanual wasn’t even aware of the fact that it was being pulled until he heard it on the news. I can tell you my personal supposition, which is this: that in the interim between the time it was announced both the G8 and the NATO Summit to be held in the United States and the announcement by the White House they were relocated the G8 Summit to Camp David in Maryland, the Occupy movement sprang into existence in September of last year and I would assume that the White House was afraid that the demonstrations against both Summits would be large enough to create a political embarrassment, both for the city of Chicago and for the country, certainly for the Administration and thought that by relocating the G8 Summit they could take attention away form the NATO demonstration. I believe that it has backfired. Instead there will be a large public demonstration on the 20th . I am hoping that it will be possibly the largest counter-NATO demonstration ever held against the backdrop of the Summit. If you recall in Lisbon, Portugal in November 2010, I’ve heard estimates from 10-30 thousand protesters. It would be my sincerest wish that the people of Chicago and the joining states could turn out a force larger than that.

Larger than 30,000 people?

That would be ideal. Larger that 10,000 would be great.

Time to Draw a Line for NATO

1 March 2012, 13:03 Download audio file    

Interview with Mr. Rick Rosoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to www.globalresearch.ca Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has written is a white paper regarding Russian security and the upgrading of Russian military forces in response to NATO’s expansion. Can you give us some view insights into this?

Interview with Mr. Rick Rosoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to www.globalresearch.ca

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has written is a white paper regarding Russian security and the upgrading of Russian military forces in response to NATO’s expansion. Can you give us some view insights into this?

I’m probably not that familiar with all the particularities as you are but I think I understand the gesture which is right in the phase of increased military hardware by the United States and its NATO alliance being brought closer to Russia’s border and we are talking particularly about the so called missile shield that is placing interceptor missiles capable of knocking out other nations’ missiles and radars to accompany those missile deployment. So that Russia needs to be able to protect its strategic military potential against the efforts to neutralize it.

Early this month Prime Minister Putin made a comment and a pretty straight forward one that neither Iran nor North Korea poses any missile problem so that this development he, quite accurately by the way, described as a global missile shield with the European component. And that reflects what was said by the Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov early this year, he used the same expression because in fact that’s what it is – it’s an effort to be able to have sea and land based interceptor missiles placed strategically to achieve global dominance. Putin was also alluding, without naming it as such, to what we understand to be as a grand global strike concept.

When he said that certain countries, and he meant the United States in the first place without naming it, are developing the capability to deliver high precision, long range missiles with conventional loads and that’s a grand global strike. And as the Prime Minister put it, strategic weapons are of the same effect, it’s just another word but they have the same ability to upset the international balance of military force in the world but also to be able to ultimately destroy the military potential of other countries short of using nuclear weapons. That’s grand global strike.

What do you think about the current situation? Last time we talked about Ambassador McFaul and this before there was supposed to be this bigger opposition rallies. They’ve come and gone, they were a big disappointment, I’m sure, for Mr. McFaul. What do you think about this orange threat, is it really a threat?

Now it looks like it’s been diffused, I mean there are certainly efforts taken by the usual cast of characters – a broad gallery of US agencies like the US Agency for International Development, USIA and others.

Do you think the Russian Federation has the technology to be able to neutralize the attempted neutralization of its own forces?

Yes, counterneutralization, if you will. I sincerely hope it does. Recently it has been confirmed that the US is deploying a four-aged class guided missile destroyers permanently to the Rota naval base in Spain, to be used in the Mediterranean and that’s adding to the recently deployed missile shield radar in Turkey and so forth. And also the United States confirmed after the meeting of the US and Georgian Presidents – Barack Obama and Mikhail Saakashvilli, that the US is going to help rebuilding the so called military defense capability of Georgia.

Another comment by Vladimir Putin that has been reported today, he is talking about the fact that certain countries, and again we know who he is speaking about – the United States and its NATO allies, are fomenting and stalking conflicts near and on the borders of Russia and its allies. I have paraphrased but your listeners will get the idea. And earlier we talked about the efforts by certain officials in the United States and I’m sure the US embassy in Moscow fomented the so called color revolution type political activities in Russia and having failed that, and these people, and I’m talking about the West, of course are intended to win and to have their will forced in the world by fair or foul means. And as they fail in one respect, they resort to another.

We have to keep in mind by the way as the presidential elections are coming up the political elite in the United States and other NATO capitals hold against Vladimir Putin. Aside from all domestic and foreign policy issues there is one overriding grudge their bear against him and that’s for a nine minutes speech at the Munich Security Conference in February of 2007. For people familiar with the Aesopian fable about the cat and the mice, what he did was, he belled the cat. He identified to the world and the world heard him that in the past twenty years it’s been the emergence of, and I use his own wording, a unipolar world. I believe these are the exact terms of the time where there is now one center of power, one center of force, one center of decision making and the world battles under that sort of unilateral domination.

And it’s for that speech, I believe more than anything else, it is for that that he will never be forgiven and it’s for that the United States would not like to see him become the President of the Russian Federation but of course again they are not going to be able to prevent it. But what the US is doing relentlessly of course is increasing its strategic and missile shield capabilities dangerously close to Russia’s borders, from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea of the Caucuses. 

McFaul, he was the supposed the architect of this “reset”, now people are saying that if Vladimir Putin becomes the President of the Russian Federation again the “reset” will be over. What do you think about that?

I think the “reset” can’t be over, I think it was stall-born. I don’t believe that there can be anything in the public relations gamboled by the United States. The fact that the US and NATO still refuse to give Russia any guarantees whatsoever that the so called European Phased Adaptive Approach Missile Shield System, which becoming more ambitious with each succeeding phase, is not targeted against Russia. And in fact what Vladimir Putin said recently was that as Iran and as North Korea are not the threats or betrayers, then the missile shield is indeed aimed at Russia and the same does the strategic potential on the west of the country.

In one year what do you see the relations between Russia and NATO?

If NATO continues to aggressively assert itself as a self proclaimed international security provider, to use the youth, which is a military alliance willing and able to intervene in the internal affairs of other nations with military means to its disgrace, then Russia is going to have to draw a line and the world is going to have to draw a line.

Russia’s Nuclear Forces in Danger?

23 March 2012, 12:41   Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the Manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a Contributing Writer to GlobalResearch.ca.

What do you think will be some of the evidence that Ministry of Defense will present very soon proving the ABM shield is a danger to Russia’s nuclear forces?

You are referring of course to the statement by Russian Defense Minister Serdyukov about a conference that will be held in Moscow in early May.

One can speculate about what evidence the Russian Defense Ministry and government as a whole is prepared to present but if we are to trust an account run in today’s RosBusinessConsulting, quoting Kommersant, the newspaper, there are some concerns that the velocity of the Standard Missile 3, SM-3’s, that the U.S. intends to deploy in Romania and Poland as well as their ship-based equivalents. Should that velocity be intensified that in the words of the Russian daily the U.S. NATO missile system could threaten Russian strategic nuclear potential.

There is another component to that, incidentally, which is; from its inception, Prompt Global Strike program is to include intercontinental ballistic missiles, which the U.S. states will be equipped with non-nuclear warheads, with conventional warheads. Of course taking the U.S.’ word on that, that an ICBM would be used to deliver a nuclear warhead, nevertheless this is a question of trust; whether a country like Russia and China takes the word of the United States that the ICBM heading towards them or in the general direction of their country, is or is not equipped with a nuclear warhead, and this has been a consistent pattern on behalf of the Pentagon and the White House, on one hand, and NATO headquarters and Brussels, on the other, or jointly rather. Where they are loathe to divulge any meaningful details and they are certainly not willing to give any assurances, which would include for example the possibility of Russia inspecting both radar and the missile sites that have been installed and will be installed in South Eastern Europe and Turkey as well as throughout Eastern Europe.

We have to keep in mind by the way what we are talking about with the U.S. system is something that in the autumn of 2009, the incoming at that time Obama administration, referred to as the European Phased Adaptive Approach. That is, it’s a four-pronged process of introducing increasingly larger and more sophisticated missile and radar deployments in the area of the Baltic Sea in Poland, in the area of the Black Sea in Romania, and recently what’s referred to as a Forward-based X-Band Transportable Missile Radar facility in Turkey, which is now operational. And this is the U.S. component, the major component of the Phased Adaptive Approach. However, at the NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal in November of 2010 NATO endorsed the U.S. plan and is integrating it with two other NATO programs, one of which is called Active Layered Theatre Ballistic Missile Defense and the other – NATO program that goes by the acronym of MEADS, Medium Extended Air Defense System, which is a joint project of the United States, Germany and Italy. Incidentally, the Active Layered Theatre Ballistic Missile System was… achieved interim operational capability last November, where there was for the first time a live fire exercise of a missile for that purpose. So what we are looking at is an increasingly broad stratified sophisticated anti-ballistic missile system, which includes an intensification of what are refered to as Aegis class U.S. warships, which carry the sea-based version of the Standard Missile 3. Just last week the Netherlands announced it is going to upgrade four frigates for radar purposes for the U.S. NATO missile system.

What can you tell our listeners about the upgrades?

There are constant upgrades, that aren’t always publicly acknowledged, for example, in May of 2010 the opening salvo of the U.S. interceptor missile system in Europe was fired when the U.S. deployed a Patriot Missile Battery in Polish city of Morag on the Baltic Sea, which is only some 40 miles from Russian territory from the Kaliningrad district, and this is the newest and most sophisticated longest range version of the Patriot, it’s referred to as Patriot Advanced Capability-3, but there is also an enhancement, which is called Missile Segment Enhancement that permits an even greater distance, and I believe what Russia fears is the Standard Missile 3, which has been used up until now strictly on ships, will be, when they are based on land in Romania, Poland and who knows where else after that, also enhanced in such a manner to give them greater velocity and greater range.

The other thing Russia has to be worried about is that more advanced interceptor missiles could follow the SM-3’s and thinking particularly of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, the acronym is THAAD, that can intercept not only short and medium, but intermediate range missiles, (there is actually a distinction between medium and intermediate) and then behind that what the George W. Bush administration had planned to install in Poland, 10 Ground-Based Midcourse weapons, which can intercept missiles in space. So, you know, U.S. and NATO assurances have been proved less than trustworthy in the past, there is no reason to believe that the U.S. may exceed its announced goal, the four-phased European Adaptive Approach and institute in its place or in addition to that, more advanced weapons like the THAAD and the ground-based midcourse weapons.

Recently Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov offered NATO the Vostochny airport in Uliyanovsk. Have you heard about this?

I have no idea what Russian national interest Mr. Lavrov is defending. You know, we have to keep in mind that referring to NATO and the Pentagon as partners, when just this week as a matter of fact there’s an unprecedented NATO war game going on in the Arctic with 16,000 troops, and that’s of course could only be aimed against Russia, and simultaneously 300 U.S. marines are in Georgia conducting the second of what have now become annual, joint military exercises called Agile Spirit. So that you have the southern border of Russia and the north-western border of Russia with U.S. and NATO military exercises going on, and to accommodate NATO in any manner by setting up a transit center in Ulyanovsk to ease their transition out of Afghanistan seems to me perhaps not the most well advised move. I believe to allow NATO and U.S. cargo planes to fly over Russian territory, with assurances in that case that they don’t carry surveillance equipment and so forth, is something I would want to look into very closely before I permitted it to occur were I an official of the Russian government.

Parting

Violence in Russia Would Satisfy US

4 February 2012, 21:08   Download audio file

Interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

I’d like to speak today a little bit about color revolutions. I think we will go back to Saakashvili, Mr. McFaul might play into this and all these demonstrations going on all over the world.

Yes, one of the more significant developments of the past decade is, you know, what is euphemistically referred to as color revolutions, and you are right, to cite the example of the current head of state, I hesitate to call him president, Mikhail Saakashvili in Georgia, who came to power on the back of the prototype of the color revolution, what was called “The Rose Revolution”. It was shortly thereafter followed by a comparable development in Ukraine, the so called “Orange Revolution”, and the following year the US State Department and its various adjuncts stepped up the pressure to replicate that model in several countries both within the former Soviet Union and outside it. I’m thinking of the so called “Tulip Revolution” in Kyrgyzstan in March of 2005 and subsequently the “Cedar Revolution” in Lebanon and a number of others in the interim. It’s a method for unconstitutionally unseating a standing head of state through a series of what are referred to as demonstrations and other non-violent actions but which in many cases are very coordinated efforts to attempt to delegitimize the standing government in the eyes of its populace and certainly to do so in the eyes of the international community. They generally occur, the prototype again being in Georgia in 2003, they generally occur against the backdrop of national elections.

Do you see parallels in Russia 2012 after parliamentary elections leading into presidential elections?

Well, the fact that the parliamentary and presidential elections are occurring so close together, the parliamentary elections in December and of course March 4th the presidential election, gives time for, what is referred to by Russian political analysts sometimes, political technologies to be able to be put in place and to build up momentum. We have to recall for example that maybe the real prototype of the color revolutions is what is enduringly known in the West as the “Bulldozer Revolution” in Yugoslavia in the year 2000, that at that time there were methods of communication by anti-government forces that were fairly limited compared to those in existent now.

For example, I just saw in Novosty a few minutes ago the fact that the Russian “Opposition”, or the coalition of opposition forces claims to have recruited 30,000 people, I can guess their age incidentally, through social networks, that is social media like Twitter and Facebook. It was roughly a year ago today that the US Secretary State Hillary Clinton announced at the State Department, which at that time had recently started that Twitter feed in Arabic and Farsi, revealing languages considering what has happened in the interim, was going to expand those Twitter feeds into Russian, Hindi and Chinese. So, the social networks that are recruiting people for anti-government marches in Russia are ones that the State Department openly acknowledges as playing a direct role in, meaning its interference in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation of course and it’s interfering particularly in terms of elections.

What can you tell us about the new Ambassador to Russia – Mr. McFaul? I think what he did was unprecedented, I can’t think of any other examples ever, anywhere in the world where an ambassador has come into a country and the first thing he does is meet with opposition politicians and opposition leaders, an opposition, I might add, that appeared not long ago.

Yes, immediately ahead of the presidential elections. Were the situation to be reversed, any newly appointed Russian Ambassador who acted in that manner, would be declared persona-non-grata and expelled from the country. The fact that on the second day on the job Mr. McFaul, who came to that position from being in the Obama Administration’s National Security Council Advisor on Russian and Eurasian Affairs revealingly enough and who was cited as having acted as the so called advisor to Russian President Boris Yeltsin in 1996 during the presidential election, one that, the results of which were controversial even on this side of the Atlantic.

There’s a…on the Wikipedia entry on Mr. MacFaul, there is a quote attributed to Russian news portal in which McFaul delivered an interview and described himself, if this account is to be trusted, as, and I quote Wikipedia quoting McFaul, “a specialist in democracy, anti-dictator movements and revolutions”. This fellow in fact sees himself in that capacity and on the second day again, of his taking charge of his position as the US envoy to Russia, he met with the coalition of opposition forces, then to claim in any way or form that he is not interfering in the internal affairs of Russia is ludicrous.

Why would the US be interested in doing this now?

The United States wants to weaken Russia in any capacity regardless of who the head of state would be. The fact that Vladimir Putin in his earlier term as President of the Russian Federation made statements challenging the uni-polar world, one power dictating terms to the rest of humanity and so forth, hardly endeared him to Western policy makers, particularly those who would like to see NATO expansion progress into the South Caucasus and into the Ukraine and so forth. It’s very important to note that the first two official colored revolutions, those in Georgian and Ukraine were followed immediately by an intensification of the integration of those two countries into arrangements with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

As a matter of fact that in the year of 2008, shortly after Georgia provoked a war with Russia by invading South Ossetia, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization setup what they call Annual National Programs with both Georgia and Ukraine and the United States setup roughly at the same time what were called Charter on Strategic Partnerships with both Georgia and Ukraine. So, colored revolutions are followed by increased NATO integration as certainly as night follows day.

But I think there are a number of objectives in terms of Mr. Mcfaul’s appointment to the ambassadorship to Russia and what his role is likely to be between now and the presidential elections on March 4th, the US may not realistically expect to be able to affect the outcome of the Russian election. But they certainly can attempt the standard color revolution approach of discrediting government institutions in the country, trying to alienate and antagonize sectors of the electorate and also on the international scene to try to discredit Russia as a whole. They have several degrees of objectives if you will, and just simply bring chaos or dissension, you know, if some form of violence can be provoked in the process, the US would be even more satisfied with the outcome.

It is one thing to engage in a standard electoral or political opposition to the government, it is another thing to accept foreign monies from a power that’s increasingly hostile. I mean we have established the fact that no one less than the Secretary of State Hillary Clinton states that the State Department is tweating in the Russian language to an audience in Russia, and this is the same Hillary Clinton who said the parliamentary elections in December last year were “neither free nor fair”, so you can imagine what the content is of the State Department propaganda going into people’s cell phones in Russia.

Parting

Saakashvili: NATO’s Favorite Little Despot

25 January 2012, 13:46 Download audio file 

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list, a contributing writer to GlobalResearch.ca, and a regular contributor to the Voice of Russia.

Mikhail Saakashvili, some have called him NATO’s favorite despot.

I think that’s an accurate characterization of Mr. Saakashvili, yes.

He made some statements that the Russian Empire is about to collapse.

Yeah, he’s been making statements along that line for a couple of weeks, maybe longer. It’s a repeated leitmotif for Mr. Saakashvili that the Empire, I take it that’s a borrowing from a person he no doubt admired greatly, Ronald Reagan, and his, 30 years ago, his reference to the former Soviet Union as being "The Evil Empire". I imagine Saakashvili knows what sort of terminology to use to be picked up in the west, but yesterday he made quite characteristic comments, but were they to be made by any other head of state, they would certainly raise a few eyebrows around the world, but not when it comes from Mr. Saakashvili. For example, speaking again about Russia, Russia was now, and I quote him - “like crazy”- because Georgia not only survived the war that it provoked with South Ossetia and Russia in August of 2008. And since he came into power in the back of the so-called “Rose Revolution” in 2003, Mr. Saakashvili - U.S. educated incidentally, Columbia graduate - he’s clearly modelled himself after a medieval Georgian monarch, one David the Builder, and in his speech yesterday Mr. Saakashvlili evoked once again King David and Queen Tamara. But then at another point, referring to Russia, and I am quoting this from Civil Georgia, an English language website from the nation, this is in Georgia’s political reality, “Political vampires, mummies and various monsters will not be able to return”, and so forth. So, this sort of lunatic verbiage is what we’ve come to expect from Mr. Saakashvili, notwithstanding which, however, he remains, as I mentioned, a pet despot of NATO countries, and their political darling outside the Euro-Atlantic area.

Why?

He serves their purposes. He and his regime have recently authorized the deployment of another large military unit of Georgian troops to Afghanistan to serve under NATO’s international security assistance force. When they arrive to join their cohorts already there, the Georgian troop contingent in Afghanistan will be the largest of any non-full NATO member, exceeding even the 1550 troops that Australia currently has in Afghanistan. So they are providing cannon fodder.

How many troops are there from Georgia?

It will be over 1600.

Back to Afghanistan, can you fill us in also, you know about this scandal with the marines and that trophy video?

For those of us who have seen it, I assume you have and I regret that I have, it is - I don’t even know the proper adjectives to use in a case like this - appalling, repugnant, but also I am afraid, reflective of the attitude of the 21st century new colonial troops that NATO has deployed, you know, in the Balkans and South Asia and so forth, and U.S. military forces around the world who evidently believe they can commit any kind of, not only gruesome, but degrading act of any sort; you know, an ultimate insult to the nation, of course, of which they are occupying with impunity, because there is no force big enough to make them pay the consequences of this sort of actions. You are, of course, referring to a video that’s gone around the world of four, what are identified as four U.S. marines in Afghanistan, joking while the four of them urinate on the corpses of what are identified as Taliban fighters, dead Taliban fighters. Heaven knows who they truly were, but to commit an action like that is appalling to a degree imaginable, and the soldiers, of course, are treating this as all good fun, U.S. marines, and it’s part of a series of similar behaviors including cutting off body parts as trophies and such like, in the name of spreading civilization and democracy to Afghanistan.

Do you think, maybe this was orchestrated?

As I was just saying that anyone who was killed in Afghanistan or on the other side of the border in Pakistan is automatically referred to not only by the U.S. and NATO officials but by their ever-obedient mass media in the west as being Taliban or al-Qaeda. They could simply be militiamen; they could be people fighting to defend their country against foreign occupation. But on the broader question of whether the timing of the release of these videos, one can never rule out in the world of psi-ops and black-ops, that provocative material is released or permitted to be released at a given period with an ulterior motive.

Anyone who’s fighting against the United States is actually some sort of weird terrorist, even if they're defending their own country.

Right. That could be like Serbian women in northern Kosovo, who are…

Sure, terrorists!

Yeah, they are “terrorists” for, you know, opposing NATO actions to deprive them of what's left of their homeland. It can be Libyans defending their country against bombings.

They all are terrorists.

Evidently anyone with any shred of dignity, self-respect and national pride would be referred to as terrorist.

Can you give our listeners a rundown, what’s the real situation there on the ground?

There may be a sincere desire by the United States to extricate itself from Afghanistan by making whatever deal they have to cut, even with their alleged adversaries, you know their adversaries of the last decade. You know, militarily it’s gone catastrophically for the U.S. and NATO and it’s the longest war in America’s history.

After 10 years what are they leaving behind?

Devastation, dislocation, hundreds of thousands of Afghans forced to flee their towns and villages; heaven knows what sort of unexploded ordnance, depleted uranium, and so forth have been strewn throughout the country in the past 10 years, certainly, nothing good; and heroin-opium cultivation epidemic, of course.

What about the thousands of men in prison in Afghanistan accused of being terrorists, being detained indefinitely without charges?

In far from closing down the torture chambers in Guantanamo Bay, or in Bagram, in Afghanistan, and so forth, as you are alluding to, the U.S. government now, the White House, has officially signed off on the Defense Authorization Act that would permit the internment of U.S. citizens under basically martial law conditions, military trials without recourse or access to the standard legal protection.

I talk a lot against NATO. You do too. Could we be called terrorists?

You know, that’s probably more serious a question than we both realize at the moment.

So, we should really be afraid that we could be picked up and taken to Guantanamo tomorrow?

Technically speaking, even American citizens residing in the United States might be susceptible to that sort of treatment.

Where Will America’s Imperial Hubris Lead To?

29 December 2011, 20:18   Download audio file  

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

Can you give us the latest on NATO and your predictions for 2012, as far as the ABM system in Europe and NATO global expansion in general? I know it’s a big question.

The past year, of course, has been a momentous one. I think it’s has been a very troubling one in many regards. What we’ve seen this year in regard to NATO and what we’re likely to see an intensification of next year, 2012, is a follow-up on the strategic concept, as they call it, adopted at the Lisbon summit in November 2010, which is unveiling and unleashing NATO as an increasingly global political and military player. We saw this with the seven-month air war campaign against Libya, of course, earlier this year when NATO flew an estimated 26,000 air missions against a small country with six million people, over 9,000 of which were combat sorties. We are seeing that as a template. That’s pretty much what NATO officials and heads of state of major NATO countries have characterized it. We are likely to see more of that most prominently, of course, – it can’t be missed – in one manner or another in relation to Syria, but with any number of other potential military interventions. Your listeners are probably aware of the fact that the Collective Security Treaty Organization met in Russia two days ago, on the 10th anniversary of the founding of the only security block within the CIS, amongst former Soviet States. And one of the statements – rather straightforward and candid – was warning about military intervention in the internal affairs of the countries beset by domestic problems. That’s clearly an allusion to the Libyan action by the major NATO powers but also in reference to the current crisis in Syria. A Wednesday statement by the White House saying that the government of Bashar al-Assad “does not deserve to rule Syria” is an indication that, far from being humbled by the recent symbolically important, I suppose, withdrawal of the final US military forces from Iraq, far from being humbled by the debacle on Iraq and the equally catastrophic experience in Afghanistan, the US is still ordering heads of state to resign, as they did earlier this year in Ivory Coast, in Libya and may tomorrow in Belarus, Venezuela and a number of other countries. We still see the imperial hubris of the major Western countries, US in the first instance, in determining who else is not fit to govern most every country in the world.

What was the connection with Gbagbo? You mentioned Ivory Coast.

Earlier this year, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, President Obama and other major US officials ordered Gbagbo to step down. They didn’t recognize the results of the runoff election last December in Ivory Coast. The irony is – it’s so transparent it has to be undeniable – in the US a comparable situation, of course, and a far worse situation, existed in 2000 where George W. Bush received half a million votes less than his opponent and through the decision made by the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, Bush, the recipient of the fewer votes was designated the elected president of the United States. Something comparable happened with the decision by the Elections Commission in Ivory Coast but the US, which has one set of rules for itself and another for the rest of the world, determined that the decision reached by the court in Ivory Coast was invalid and the one in 2000 in the US was valid, because it was in the US.

I thought that maybe there was a NATO connection that I hadn’t heard anything about there in Ivory Coast.

No, there wasn’t a NATO connection, but French military forces were instrumental in assaulting government buildings in Abidjan, the commercial capital of the country, and directly in the capture of Gbagbo. NATO countries, if not collectively under the banner of NATO, were certainly instrumental there. I’ve sighted that as part of the pattern over past year Washington has ordered in some many ways heads of state to step down, including Saleh, the President of Yemen, Assad in Syria, and Gbagbo in Ivory Coast and Gaddafi in Libya. So, it’s four heads of state that they ordered to step down this year.

Can you tell our listeners a little bit about Kosovo and Serbia?

Yes. I have friends in Kosovo and I have friends from Kosovo – ethnic Serbs and others. The situation is that of the few remaining non-Albanian ethnic minorities in Kosovo, I’ve seen estimates as high as 250,000 ethnic Serbs who have fled the country in terror. Several thousands have been killed, of course, since NATO came in June of 1999. I’ve seen comparable figures for Roma people, so-called Gypsies, including Ashkalis and Egyptians, as they are known in Kosovo. Other ethnic minority groups suffered similarly. And today I saw a few days ago a tape of the so-called “president” of Kosovo meeting Hillary Clinton at the White House to sign an agreement on protecting the cultural heritage of Kosovo, when several hundred Orthodox monasteries, churches, cemeteries and so forth have been desecrated and destroyed. It’s not ignorance. Clinton knows pretty well this story. Her husband, after all, is the person responsible for starting a 78-day bombing campaign against Yugoslavia, which wrested Kosovo from Yugoslavia and Serbia. This is again the imperial arrogance I was speaking about earlier that Washington arrogates to itself the exclusive prerogative, or at least in relation to its NATO allies and certain key non-NATO allies, to determine how national boundaries can and cannot be drawn, which political entities are to be recognized as legitimate countries, such as when NATO recognized the state of Kosovo but denied the same right to nations like Abkhazia or South Ossetia.

"U.S not in a position to criticize Russian elections"

8 December 2011, 17:00   Download audio file   

Interview with  Rick Rozoff , the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca. Mr. Rozoff also worked "against the Chicago political machine" for approximately 25 years, from 1976-2000, including as: a ward-wide voter registration coordinator, the founder and leader of an independent ward organization, a congressional district coordinator for Mayor Harold Washington's 1987 reelection bid, a campaign manager in two state representative and one alderman election, and as a third party candidate for state office.

What’s the reaction there to the Russian elections? We’ve heard a lot of statements that I think are way out of line from the US State Department, in particular Hillary Clinton. What’s your opinion of those statements?

They are outrageous. They are unwarranted. Regardless of what the actual details are about the recently concluded Duma elections, parliamentary elections in Russia, the statements emanating, as you mentioned, from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and others, are arrogant to a degree. If the situation were reversed and Russian and/or others major political figures in other nations commented similarly on US elections, which are not without their flaws as we can talk about, I hope, there would be the strongest possible protest from the State Department and the White House. You know, statements by Clinto, for example that she has serious concerns about the elections on Sunday, presuming to speak on behalf of the Russian people, stating that Russian voters deserve, an I quote: “a full investigation of electoral fraud and manipulation.” end quote. This is somebody who is from the Chicago suburb of Park Ridge. And like her commander-in-chief, Barack Obama, who is from Chicago and is a product of the Chicago political machine. They are hardly in a position to complain about electoral fraud, and manipulation, and ballot box stuffing. They are products of the political machine that all but invented the process. I’ve spoken with a fellow Chicago resident who had lived in the former Soviet Union and talked about the fact elections were held, where election days were holidays so that people were off work and could not only vote but could participate in the political process, including in the polling place, which is not a luxury accorded to Americans, though we hold ourselves up, of course, as being the model for democratic processes, including elections. She (Clinton) made this statement about the recently concluded parliamentary elections in Russia, in State Duma and stated, mentioning again, in her own words, “electoral fraud and manipulation.”

What are some of the other flaws in the US system? Can you tell us something about foreign observers? Why aren’t they allowed into the US?

The second question is particularly fascinating! The first: “Their name is legion”, to use the line from the Gospels. That is there are so many flaws in the American electoral system, not least of which of course is that next year several billion dollars are going to be spent by lobbyists and others to choose their candidates, buy their candidates into office, what is politely put an auction block. I’ll give you the best example I can think of. Today at work in Chicago most everyone were glued to television sets to learn which sentence was going to be passed down on former Governor Rod Blagojevich on 18 counts of corruption. He was sentenced to 14.5 years, as it turns out. We have to recall his major transgression was trying to sell the Senate seat, of at the time incoming US President Barack Obama. During the course of the initial trial, Blagojevich mentioned that he had had several phone calls with Rahm Emanuel – who is now the mayor of Chicago; at the time he was Chief of Staff of the White House – about just that, about selling, the Senate seat, or selling the right to appoint the successor to the incoming president of a country that President Obama in December of 2009 referred to as “the world’s sole military superpower.” But it’s tolerated in the US simply because the US is the US, what's referred to as “American exceptionalism,” so that even though we have an electoral system tainted by billions of dollars changing hands as almost all offices go to the highest bidder. As to foreign observers, the US will not tolerate any intrusion on its own sovereignty – but will interfering in the grossest fashion imaginable in other peoples’ internal political processes.

 Regarding NATO?

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has recently presumed again to lecture Russia, just as Hillary Clinton does, on how Russia should conduct its elections. Rasmussen is telling Russia, though he is in no formal position to do so, how to defend itself, saying for example that Russia should not follow up on the pledges and on some of the actual commitments made by President Medvedev to increase surveillance radar and other surveillance installations in North-East Russia and to reposition tactical missiles in both Kaliningrad Enclave near North-East Russia and so forth. But the statement by Rasmussen was particularly condescending and patronizing, at one point basically telling the Russian government they’d better take care of their own people first, or words to that effect, again just reeking of arrogance and contempt. This sort of talk one expects from a NATO chieftain and Rasmussen, though less abrasive than some of his predecessors, feels empowered evidently to tell major nations like Russia what they ought to and ought not to do in terms of defending the borders of their own country. I should add that the current US permanent representative to NATO, Ivo Daalder, made a statement two days ago where he said the US and NATO are forging ahead with the interceptor missile system in Europe, and I believe I am quoting him word for word: "whether Russia likes it or not.”

He said that?

That's correct. If anything, we are hearing more and more ambitious plans. For example, the Upper House of the Romanian Parliament, their Senate, yesterday ratified the agreement of the US to station 24 anti-missile -3 interceptors in Romania, which as we know is immediately across the Black Sea from Russia. This is in conjunction with the comparable deployment of missiles in Poland in addition to the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missiles that are already present in Poland; the radar missile defense facility that will be placed in Turkey. And there is a discussion now about maybe in the dozens, maybe in the scores of NATO nations’ warships being converted to the so-called Aegis combat system so that they could be equipped with either radar or in most instances missiles, Standard Missile-3s for what’s called the European Phased Adaptive Approach, a US-NATO missile system. So they are forging ahead at all fronts, at the same time the Secretary General of NATO is lecturing Russia on what it should or should not do in terms of self-defense. And the US Ambassador to NATO, who is a pretty influential person in his own right – he is a former senior fellow with the Brookings Institution, I am talking about Daalder of course – who could make such a curt and arrogant statement, as the one I just cited, you know: that the US and NATO are going ahead with the missile shield "whether Russia likes it or not.”

Hypersonic Missile: To Target Russia

28 November 2011, 18:23   Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

The first thing that is on everybody’s minds is President Medvedev’s statement regarding NATO. Why at this late date exactly, at this juncture?

In a rather alarming manner we’ve seen the recruitment, for the US missile system in Europe at large, through the mechanism of NATO, in the last couple of months where in addition to the countries where we know there are going to be US interceptor missiles stationed the extension of foreign based X-Band radar facility in Turkey but we’ve also seen the recruitment of nations like Spain, the Netherlands and others into what the While House and the Pentagon curiously refer to as the European Phased Adaptive Approach Missile System, one that is going to proceed in four phases, but the third and fourth phase, with the introduction of very advanced-stage, what are called Standard Missile-3 Land-Based Interceptors, that the understanding is that these can be employed not strictly for defensive purposes but to target all Russian strategic deterrent forces and capabilities rather in Europe.

Recently, the US and NATO conducted tests for their new hypersonic missile. Could you tell the listeners a little bit about that?

Earlier this month, the US DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency).  And it’s actually an interdepartmental weapon system, its part of what’s called Conventional Prompt Global Strike, or sometimes simply Prompt Global Strike. Last year, for example, the Obama administration asked for somewhere in the neighbourhood of the third of a billion dollars for this year to develop this capacity. It’s meant to deliver conventional weapons attacks, or conventional attacks on any site on the planet within no more than 60 minutes. And what happened earlier this month was that the US army tested the Advanced Hypersonic Weapon (AHW), which traveled an estimated 7,400 km/h, which is over six times the speed of sound. In August, an unsuccessful test of AHW-related component was to have traveled at 27,000 km/h, which is known as over MACH 20 – that is 20 times the speed of sound. To be hypersonic one has to exceed MACH 5, or five times the speed of sound. What happened the day before President Medvedev’s statement about moving mobile ISKANDER missiles into the Kaliningrad District, but also potentially into Belarus and into the Southern Krasnodar Region, which would be closer and closer to US missiles in Romania and to the NATO radar facility in Turkey, the day before the Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov mentioned that Russia’s new air-defense systems are capable of intercepting any kind of missiles, including US interceptor missiles but also he explicitly mentioned  hypersonic weapon.

He said that explicitly? Hypersonic?

Yes, he said it specifically in reference that had been conducted a couple of weeks earlier by the US.

You mentioned earlier this was a part of the Prompt Global Strike System? Is this a first-strike system?

I’ll read you a comment that was made a couple of years ago by the person who is now retired. It was Deputy Chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, US military General Cartwright, who stated that the proclaimed intent of the Prompt Global Strike was to deliver a conventional missile or heavy bombers – you know, long-range bombers – anywhere in the face of the Earth within an hour. Marine General James Cartwright, who is now retired, stated: “At the high end, strikes could be delivered in 300 milliseconds,” which is a fraction of a second. There was a comment by another person, who is retired, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Defense, William Lynn, who stated roughly the same things but a year and a half ago. He said: “The next air warfare priority for the Pentagon is developing a next-generation, deep-penetrating strike capability that can overcome air defenses,” meaning again that this first-strike capability or part of a general first-strike capability that would permit the US to strike fast, deep and undetected presumably into the interior of countries that have advanced air defense systems. I can only think of three countries that would match that description – Iran, to a lesser extent, and Russia and China, to a greater.

How would this all tie in with the Cyber Warfare Center that’s been active recently in Estonia?

Yes, in 2008, NATO set up one of what they call, what NATO calls a Center of Excellence, a Cyber Defense Centre in the capital of Estonia, in reaction to alleged cyber attacks, real or alleged. So that we have three components being integrated, one of them being the so-called Global Missile Shield. But, first of all, there is no real assurance that the missiles, in fact pack a non-explosive warhead. They are supposed to be what kinetic or hit-to-kill missiles but at any time that the US chooses I suspect put a strategic warhead on one of these missiles and when they are deployed in Poland or Romania no one would be the wiser. We know that the momentous statement by President Medvedev on Wednesday cited the fact that Russia was not consulted about anything. In his own words, the US rather blithely announces after the fact or rather that the President or Defense Minister of Russia have to read in western newspapers US plans to deploy, under NATO auspices, 48 Standard Missile-3 interceptors in Romania and Poland, 24 each, and, as he put it, it’s presented to us as an accomplished fact. With that lack of consultation, with that lack of openness, transparency, one could, with great justification, fear the ultimate purpose of US missiles in nations like Poland and Romania or ship-based versions of Standard Missile-3 that will be deployed in the Baltic Sea – and they may well find their way into the Black Sea.

Does the West Want Arms Race in Europe?

29 November 2011, 18:36   Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to GlobalResearch.ca.

About a month ago, NATO tested first-strike capabilities of using mobile radar in Turkey. Why would a defensive system need to test offensive capabilities? We have the cyber warfare center. You said it also can be used as an offensive tool by the US. We have hypersonic missile tests and the Prompt Global Strike system. I think these are pretty good reasons for the Russian Federation to be worried, to put it mildly, as to the intentions of the West. Why would the West want to start an arms race in Europe? Why would this be profitable? Why not include Russia as part of the sectoral approach system? It’s probably a rhetorical question but can you touch upon it?

There is no rational answer to it, certainly not a persuasive from the point of view of the West. For example, as you mentioned, Russia is far from simply arbitrarily and firmly opposing the creation of a unilateral US interceptor missile system in Europe.  The entire western flank of Russia is affected by this of course– from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. Russia went out of its way. Russian political leadership went out of its way to be accommodating to offer, for example, the Gabala radar site in Azerbaijan it maintains in conjunction with NATO. It offered this sectoral approach where Russia would cover part of affected area and NATO the other and so forth, the integration and communication. But we know that several things have occurred this week, and so far this month – the advanced hypersonic weapon test earlier this month, the statement by Sergei Serdyukov, the Defense Minister of Russia the day before Medvedev’s statement, stating that Russian Air Defense is now to be equipped to protect Russian nuclear strategic capability in the European part of the Russian Federation, but also that the US announced – and was soon followed by 14 NATO allies – that they are effectively pulling out of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, blaming Russia for it, of course, for it, because Russia suspended its activities with the CFE, as it’s known, in 2007 – but did so because the US and its NATO allies refused to ratify amendments to the treaty. The US has used the presence of a comparatively small contingent of Russian peace-keepers in Transdnester and, before Mikhail Saakashvili launched an assault against South Ossetia and began the 5-day war with Russia in August of 2008, the existence at that time of, again, a small contingent of Russian peace keepers in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, using that as an excuse for basically suspending, for not ratifying, amendments to the CFE Treaty. And we have, as you know, President Medvedev’s statement on Wednesday, the fact that Russia may be compelled to suspend its activities in or withdraw from the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). This is a very momentous week in terms of security in Russia and the fear of not only a new arms race, a new missiles race but something perhaps even more ominous than that. What we are looking at is a brinksmanship, lawlessness – I don’t know what other words to use to describe it – very bold and threatening actions by the US and its NATO partners to move missiles up to Russia’s borders, in the case of Poland, which joins Kaliningrad, and perhaps Aegis-class warship equipped with Standard Missile-3 interceptors in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Russia and, of course, the 24 Standard Missile-3 land based missiles that are going to be placed in Romania, directly across the Black Sea from Russia. I believe that President Medvedev mentioned precisely that – on our borders and in waters bordering Russia and so forth. What we are seeing is an almost calculated provocation, as I would characterize it. That’s the best interpretation. The worst is that the US and NATO are building up the military capability of neutralizing Russia’s strategic deterrent capability in the west and the south of the country. And I suspect that, having a military budget of some $730 billion, which is constant dollars, World War II level the highest since 1945, I’m reminded of the old expression that the abuse of power inevitably results in the power to abuse. As long as the US has built itself into, in Obama’s terms, “the world’s sole military superpower,” it feels it’s going to operate with impunity.

Would you say it’s time for the world to be very concerned here?

It’s way past time to be very concerned. I don’t know if it occurred at this year’s General Assembly Session at the UN but I know that, in preceding years, Russia and China jointly went to the General Assembly and introduced resolutions, talking about yet another threat, which is the militarization of space by the US. This is the ultimate part of the so-called global missile shield. So there will be a space component to this in addition to land, air and sea-based interceptor missiles and components. So the world has sounded alarm, at least major nations have. But I would like to see both the Security Council and the General Assembly convene on emergency session, to be honest about it, to demand that this rampant militarization of world stop. Two years ago, The Financial Times talked about $123 billion arms package for Saudi Arabia and three of its Persian Gulf allies with the US. The Saudi component of that is estimated at $60-67 billion, which is a single largest bilateral military deal in human history. We’ve seen incomparable deals with countries like Canada, Australia, Japan. You don’t build up this kind of military capability, unless, at the very least, you are going to use it to blackmail somebody. We recall that on Wednesday president Medvedev statements were very tempered. He was mentioning certain contingency plans that would only be put into operation if the US didn’t eventually heed the plea by Russia to notify it of its missile deployment plans and not pose a threat, or a potential threat, to Russian strategic interests and so forth. This wasn’t a threat. This was rather stating that Russia would be compelled to introduce certain defensive measures if the US and NATO continued to turn a deaf ear to Russia’s offers of cooperation but also to the expression of its concern. One major Russian official – that may have been Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, I’m not sure – says the US claims to be defending its own territory by building up a missile defense system but that missile defense system is encroaching on Russian borders.

Iraq 2003/Iran 2011: Parallel Can't Be Missed

10 November 2011, 17:22    Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

You’ve read the IAEA report on Iran. Can you give us your quick overview?

Yes. It’s a very lengthy, involved, detailed, technical document. It actually has 65 different sections, 23 pages on the online edition. IAEA claimed to give an authoritative interpretation of the document. But there are certain points that stick out repeatedly on several occasions. For example, the report mentions that Iran may have been working on an alleged military component to its nuclear energy policy prior to 2003 – and I’m roughly paraphrasing the report – and may still be doing so. So, there are several qualifiers, the word ‘maybe’ being the chief one. Additionally, sources of information about the current situation with the enrichment of uranium, with the development of the industry as a whole and also with alleged military components like detonators and so forth, the report cites information provided by ten member states, but on several occasions by one member state. The member states are never identified. My supposition would be that the US is the first and the remaining nine are NATO allies and perhaps Israel.

Do you think that the internal US political situation has anything to do with the release of this report at this time?

It may well have everything to do with the release of the report at this time. There was an unsigned editorial in Global Times in China, which is a publication of the ruling party, the Communist Party of China, which suggests exactly: the economic crisis unparallel, one could argue, in the US and in Europe, is such that this would give rise to adventurous and even ‘catastrophic’, to use the word of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, ‘catastrophic’ actions in the Middle East, meaning strikes against Iran. In fact, that has been mentioned by several Russian diplomats, by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov recently, by Deputy Minister Gennady Gotilov, I believe today, where he suggests that one of the major purposes of the release and of the details and the media representation of it in the west is to prepare the ground for, in his own words, ‘change of the regime in Iran.’ So, there is a transparent political motive. Other, much more frightening statement, of course, is that of President of Israel Shimon Peres over the past weekend that the military option is quickly overriding diplomatic ones in dealing with Iran over its nuclear program.

It seems pretty obvious, I think, to a lot of people that rhetoric is being built up in order to launch an invasion. A lot of people believe this would really destabilize the entire Middle East even further. What do you think?

It’s an interesting use of the word ‘rhetoric’. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has recently sounded the alarm about what he termed ‘militarist rhetoric' in the Middle East and warned about potentially catastrophic consequences as a result of that. Yes, you are correct. A script that would have been rejected by even a third-rate Hollywood studio about an alleged assassination plot comes within weeks of the release of the IAEA report on Iran’s civilian nuclear power plant program. So, all the pieces seem to be falling into place. And the statement here, in Chicago, on November 9 by the Russian Foreign Ministry that the release of the report and the political interpretation placed on the IAEA report is, not in my own words, frighteningly reminiscent of what was does in the UN Security Council in the early 2003, when the US made a similar claim about Iraq at that time developing weapons of mass destruction. A parallel could hardly be missed.

What is the view by the men in the street in the US? Are they buying it this time?

I’m not in a position to comment. I haven’t read polls, which I don’t think have been conducted. There is healthy skepticism among the general population, even in relation to the recently concluded war in Libya, where polls – I’m sure your listeners are familiar with them –showed the majority of Americans not supporting the military action. So, military strikes against Iran – one could assume – would meet with the similar response amongst the general population in the US. However, we have to keep in mind how fairly disenfranchised the average American, including myself, is in the political process.

What I see as a parallel, also that nobody is talking about, with Iraq and Iran was that Iran is, I think, attempting and trying to cooperate actively with the IAEA. But the IAEA seems not to want to listen to them and come to their own conclusion. Do you think it is a fair assessment?

That is exactly what’s happening – and again, in the words of a Russian diplomat within the last day or two – that the content of the report has been ‘twisted’ and placed in the service of political agenda. Political agenda, as he alluded to earlier, may very well have to do with domestic policies in the US, both related to the presidential election of next year and with congressional and senatorial elections. But also, because of the economic crisis, American people… Let me just share one anecdote with you very quickly. I am a native of Johnston, Iowa. The lead story in the local newspaper, the Johnston Vindicator, says that Johnston currently has the highest poverty rate in the US – 49.1%. There are 250 people applying for every job, for the most part a minimum-wage part-time job. And when you have almost half of the total city living in poverty, then self-serving and unprincipled politicians are going to point people’s animosity and hostility elsewhere they are going to do it overseas. And Iran appears to be the lightning rod that is slated to receive that animosity. Johnston is particularly concerned– as I know a lot of people around the world are –about the prospect of military strikes against Iran. I needn’t tell anyone what the consequences would be. This will involve a general conflagration in the area and perhaps even globally. Whereas in the past attacks against nuclear reactors in other countries, such as that in Iraq in 1983 and recently by Israel in Syria against an alleged nuclear reactor, have been contained or limited in their scope, a massive series of strikes against the Bushehr power plant in Iran would be nothing of that sort. It’s be something of an entirely differ magnitude. And the fact that the Russian foreign minister, two deputy foreign ministers, the Foreign Ministry collectively and so forth have issued some of statements in past few days suggesting this is a much graver situation then what we have faced over the last ten years of repeated speculation about or even threats of military strikes against Iran.

Gaddafi Assassination: A Brutal Gratuitous Slaying

22 October 2011, 11:42   Download audio file

Interview with Mr. Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and the contributing writer to www.globalresearch.ca.

How are you today, Mr. Rozoff?

Rather distressed by the news of this morning or yesterday morning, in your case.

Ok, what is your first impression?

It was a brutal gratuitous slaying of an almost 70-year-old man. You know, killed after being captured. And if, you know, the intent of 216 days of NATO bombing was to kill him in the first place which is you know clearly the case, the multiple bombings of his compound  in Tripoli, you know the one, which killed his son and two grandchildren, you know it is clearly targeting for killing and I suppose NATO can now claim success. It has got what it wanted.

President Barack Obama said that there is going to be pulling out of Libya very soon so in your mind does that mean the objective has been met?

Yes, it has entirely. Regime change, take over the Africa largest oil reserves, the incorporation of Libya which hitherto had been the only Northern African country that was not incorporated into NATO’s so called Mediterranean dialogue is now according to Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen been slated for the military partnership with the North Atlantic Alliance, so in every sense their objective has been accomplished. It certainly nothing that it’s going to benefit the Libyan people.

You don’t see this as being  justice for the oppressed Libyan people? I mean there are people saying that Gaddafi was a terrible guy. He killed thousands so he deserved to die.

You know, there is so much just, what term do I want to use? Low taste, gratuitous, reveling in the murder of this man, who was born 70 years ago in the very city he was murdered in on the 216th day of NATO bombing of his country. He was born under Italian fascists’ occupation and he died under NATO occupation. I think, you know, the parallel there can’t be missed, including the fact that Italy supplied some of the warplanes that have devastated his country, since the middle of March, since March 19th . If he was the monster they’ve portrayed him as being and you know I invite your listeners to go to the NATO website and see some of the crude caricatures they’ve had over the last few days of Gaddafi, and, you know, wall graffiti and so forth, portraying him in a demeaning and belittling way, to further dehumanize him preparatory to murdering him.

Alright, I saw some television coverage of his naked body being thrown around like a piece of meat, I am sorry for the expression.

Yes, after they brought him to Misrata. You know, this sickening, barbaric and worse than barbaric treatment and, you know, it’s a long line of this going on, this is true with Slobodan Milosevic in Yugoslavia, Saddam Hussein in Iraq. You know that a leader of the country that doesn’t cow-tow entirely. And I am not putting all these people in the same basket, it’s not in my capacity. Let’s rephrase that. Any leader whose time has come according to the United States and NATO can expect death. You know, Hussein was hanged, Gaddafi was captured. You know, whereas he was considered to be, he was only nominally so, but he was considered to be the head of the state and even the head of the military. In the bombing of his private residences, in the name of, under the guise of being command and control centers suggests that he was considered by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to be in charge of the Libyan Military so when he was captured on that Thursday, his treatment was governed by the Geneva Conventions, but instead he was shot through the head and murdered. This is the new regime that is being implanted in Libya and for all West’s talk of the rule of Law and humanitarian concerns and so forth this is a graphic image just like the death of Slobodan Milosevic in a veritable dungeon in the Netherlands because he was denied proper medical treatment in Russia and the grotesque hanging of Saddam Hussein. You know, this is the image of a new world order, a world order and all its transparent barbarism.

What do you mean he was denied medical treatment in Russia?

Russia offered to make a deal with the international criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia to bring Slobodan Milosevic to Moscow for medical treatment but he was denied that and he died shortly thereafter. Even more foul play but the message is very clear.

Do you see a pattern, I am sorry to interrupt you there. Do you see a pattern here, I am sure you do, between Hussein, Osama Bin Laden and now Gaddafi? I mean, we have countries, for example, Hussein and Gaddafi, they pretty much stopped their weapons’ programs. They cooperated with the CIA, in this case from what I’ve heard, and it’s pretty much a given, Gaddafi was assisting the war on terror fight by the United States by allowing rendition flights to Libya. He stopped his weapons programs. Do you see a pattern here?

Yes, that’s a very clear pattern. That’s the United States and NATO Alliance use somebody whatever purpose they want to and then get rid of them and kill them afterwards. You know, Slobodan Milosevic had political risk to himself inside, you know, at that time the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia but played a role in negotiating  an end to the armed hostilities in Bosnia and in gratitude for which his country was bombed for 78 days in 1999 by the United States and its NATO allies and subsequently he was left to die in prison.

He had a deal with the CIA, I think, it came out, and I think that it’s pretty much a part of the public record that he believed that he was going to be protected.

I don’t know the details about that but at the end of the day what we see there is a lot of corpses and we see corpses of heads of state. You know, we have to recall that again even though he was a titular a nominal head of state, Muammar Gaddafi was the longest reigning leader in the world. He is the one personal link since Fidel Castro, the president of Cuba, retired, he was the last link between the post-World War II, national liberation struggles and the emergence of new nations, and he is also the last link between the cold war era and the post-cold war era that is issued in NATO an International Military strike forth that can topple governments. You know, NATO boasts on its website as of today of flying over 26,000 air missions over a country of 6 million people well over 9,000 of those combat sorties. So this monster has been unleashed over the last 20 years and Libya will not be the last country. That you can be assured of.

What do you think is going to happen next?

I don’t know if Libya is able to be put back together again. The Western powers incited regional and tribal differences in order to topple the former Gaddafi government and believing you can put that Genie back in the bottle along with the commander of the National Transitional Council, who is somebody the United States captured and incarcerated in Guantanamo. Former fighter in Afghanistan and in so called Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, you have Al Qaeda elements, tribal separatists – they’ve created real Pandemonium here and now they claim that they want to stabilize Libya. I don’t see it happening. At the end of the day, the so called no-flight zone and Humanitarian intervention, NATO has transparently waged a  war on the government on behalf of insurgents, period. This was clearly the intent from the beginning and now, you know, it’s successful.

NATO Planning First-Strike Again

19 October 2011, 16:02  Download audio file   No transcript

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

Related http://www.eutimes.net/2014/06/us-plans-first-strike-nuclear-attack-on-russia-and-china/

US Advances Reagan’s Star War Plans for Global NATO and Global Military Domination

9 September 2011, 13:28   Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca. They tried to shut you down over the weekend. Can you tell us what happened? Yes, thank you for asking.

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

They tried to shut you down over the weekend. Can you tell us what happened?

Yes, thank you for asking. The Stop NATO website was shut down by its host WordPress on Friday without any plausible explanation, just with a vague statement about “concern over some content on your site.” The site is a reputable news one and it took 24 hours and a good deal of pressure from sources around the world before WordPress relented and allowed the site to be reactivated. They didn’t close it down, it just prevented me from posting any new material. Of course, by the nature of these things it’s hard to determine whether it was a conscious political decision, but one has to allow this possibility. Anyway, we are back online for the time being and thank you for asking.

Turkey has recently agreed formally to host NATO anti-ballistic missile elements on its territory.

What I understand, the agreement of Turkey that they are going to station what’s called Forward-Based X-Band Transportable Missile Radar of the sort that installed in Israel three years ago by the US, in the Negev Desert, which has by the way a range of 4,300 km (2,500 ml) but if aimed in the proper direction could take in the entirety of Western Russia and a good deal of Southern Russia. And it’s an equivalent of what is to be based in Turkey, aimed exclusively against Iran but I think only the credulous would believe that. This has to be seen, of course, following the decision reached at the NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal, last November to incorporate all NATO nations and US-NATO Missile Defense Agency plans for a global NATO. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has recently clarified we are not talking about regional or even European continent-wide interceptor missile systems but one that is international in scope. And bringing it into Turkey – there’s incidentally been discussions going back ten or more years from respective heads of Missile Defense Agency of the US Defense Department about situating interceptor missile facilities not only in Turkey, but also in nations like Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan. So, there are plans to extend US-dominated interceptor missile system from Europe to east and south, that is into the Middle East and presumably into the South Caucasus and all the way to Central Asia.

Of those countries that you’ve mentioned, which are in the process of soon signing formal agreements with NATO that you know of?

Every single one of them has an advanced partnership program with NATO, except for Turkey, which is, of course, a member. But I think another important consideration is that Romanian President Traian Basescu said last week that the US in Romania are very soon signing an agreement for the stationing of 20 Standard Missile-3 interceptor missiles in Romania, which is part of what the Obama Administration terms Phased Adaptive Approach, there are actually four phases of the SM-3, and Lockheed Martin is establishing a testing facility for what will be the most advanced, which is SM-3 block to go online in 2020. There will be an intermediate to go online in 2015 but they will be based, estimates are 24 each, in Romania and Poland. And we have to recall that last year the US moved the first Patriot Advanced Capability-3, an advanced version of Patriot interceptor missile, into the Polish city of Morag, which is only some 35 miles away from the Russian border.

I would like to add that accompanying the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missiles in Poland are a hundred or more US servicemen, which are the first foreign troops to be stationed on Polish soil since the breakup of the Warsaw Pact, and the Forward-Based X-Band Radar of the sort they set up in Israel includes something in the neighborhood of a hundred US troops, which are the first foreign troops stationed in Israel for a long period of its history and the situation with Romanian SM-3, where a hundred US troops will also be stationed – we are seeing export of US military personnel and equipment to the east and to the south. I think it’s noteworthy that the announcement by the new State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland, who from 2003 to 2008 was US permanent representative to NATO. This is the person who announced that Turkey is going to host US-NATO interceptor missile radar facilities.

NATO is making overtures to India and India looks like they are considering working with them as well.

The actual announcement was made by another very interesting fellow, the current US ambassador to NATO, Ivo Daalder, who incidentally 5 years ago co-authored a piece in Foreign Affairs, the monthly publication of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), with the intriguing title of Global NATO, the opening  sentence of which states that NATO has gone global and openly advocated at that point that NATO incorporate as full members, not simply as partners, what he deemed to be the world’s democracies, amongst which was India. We are talking about people pursuing a long-term agenda. What the US is reactivating now with the inclusion of NATO is realization of Reagan’s so-called “Star Wars” plan, that is the one that allowed the US and its allies to be impenetrable to any retaliation or any capability of retaliating by other countries that might be subjected to attacks by the US and its allies.

We have to recollect that the Head of State of the US. Currently President Barack Obama, ironically, paradoxically, distressingly on the occasion of delivering his Nobel Peace Prize speech openly boasted that the US was “the world’s sole military superpower.” And I think to maintain that status in the face of a weakening US economy, with the rise of the BRICS nations and so forth, with trends that suggest that the US is under the grime internationally that Washington holds its military supremacy and that the country has the ability to retaliate, particularly in strategic terms. And when we are talking about the latest proposed model of the SM-3 we are talking about one that could threaten Russia as well as China. I could argue that North Korea and Iran are a pretext for developing a global Star Wars system that would place both Russia and China within a circle of US and allied interceptor missile system.

NATO missile elements in India would protect or annul what threat for NATO?

There is no threat to NATO at all in my estimate, so that’s a fictitious claim. What in fact you are seeing is consolidation of what observers have warned about for a decade – the emergence of an Asia-Pacific NATO.

Libya: Another Country for NATO

31 August 2011, 18:23   Download audio file

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca.

Can you shed a little light on the situation in Libya, in particular with NATO?

As you know, I’m in Chicago, not in Tripoli, so I’m observing events from afar. Yet there is an old roman expression which says “The game is best viewed by the spectator.” So, what I have to say I think is trying to situate developments in Libya, whatever they are on the ground, within both original and even international context. And, within that network, we know today that the African Union has refused recognition to the so-called Transitional National Council, comprised of what by all accounts is a fairly motley, heterogeneous grouping of anti-government forces in Libya, aided and abetted by major NATO powers like France, Britain, the US and Italy and also by Persian Gulf monarchies like Qatar and the United Arab Emirates. So, the fact that the continent, on which Libya, has located has collectively refused recognition to the new rebel regime I think is significant, as is the fact that Russian Foreign Ministry has voiced its concerns and its opposition to any plans that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization may entertain for either placing troops on the ground in Libya, ostensively under the guise of peacekeeping or stabilization force, but also I think more prominently voiced some concern about the prospect of NATO military facilities and the opposed Gaddafi.

Would you characterize everything that you heard and seen as a true revolution of the people or is it some sort of a western-backed insurgency in your opinion?

I think, by universal accord, those people are celebrating the apparent overthrow of the government in Libya as a triumph of a people’s power democracy or however they choose to phrase it. What is unquestionable is in fact that, whatever the nature of the rebel coalition is, it would never succeed in consolidating support outside of Libya, much less moving into the capital, if it had not been for over 20,000 NATO air missions since March 31 and almost 8,000 combat air sorties in the same period of time. Additionally, more and more information is emanating from sources in Britain, newspapers in Britain  and elsewhere that special operations troops, special forces from several major NATO countries, including I believe the CIA that is acting on the streets of Tripoli.

Are they hunting Gaddafi or providing air support for the rebels?

There is no question about that. The attempt, or rather the intent of the United Nations Resolution 1973 adopted in March to “use all means necessary to protect Libyan civilians” was being extended and in essence violated by France, Britain, Italy, the US, Canada and other major NATO nations to wage what can only be characterized as a war against the incumbent government in Libya and this includes, according to the NATO’s own statistics, over 2,000 air missions flown over Libya since March 31, of which almost 8,000 are combat sorties. And what is documented even in western news sources, western newspapers for example, is that as recently as today Muammar Gaddafi’s hometown has been attacked by NATO warplanes and earlier, a couple of days ago, the major governmental compound in Tripoli was attacked by as many as 64 missiles. These attacks are coordinated with the military activities of rebel groupings, so that NATO basically bombs them into areas, including the capital and including other cities in Libya. So, the coordination of NATO’s aerial and naval blockade of Libya with the rebel forces is unquestionably an act of participation on behalf of one of the belligerent forces against the other – the government of Libya. And in that sense it’s a perfect parallel to what happened in Yugoslavia in 1999, where NATO bombed the country mercilessly for 78 days in coordination and in conjunction with the so-called Kosovo Liberation Army.

You mentioned that some people from Global Research.ca are in Libya, in Tripoli, and they are trapped in a hotel there.

Actually, the international press corps is there. But there are particular concerns about Canadian-based journalist Mahdi Nazemroaya and also French journalist Thierry Meyssan, who have voiced concerns about their well-being. Their position is very well-known as not parroting the official line of the western countries and that information I’m sure has been passed on by establishment western journalists within the hotel to rebel forces in Tripoli. And there is concern by the two journalists I’ve mentioned that their lives may be in danger.

What do you see as NATO’s role in Libya after Gaddafi is gone?

Time will tell. But assuming that this is a scenario, we have a lot to go on. I mean we have the fact that the Turkish Foreign Minister announced yesterday that NATO’s role will continue in Libya after the installation of the rebel government, the so-called Transitional National Council. And similar soundings have emanated from major figures and NATO countries that suggest that, far from NATO’s role ending, it may in a certain sense just be beginning. And that parallels almost identically what happened in Yugoslavia in 1999 and what has happened in Afghanistan in the past decade, where bombs itself into a country and sets up military bases and doesn’t leave. The US still has Camp Bondsteel in the current Serbian province of Kosovo, which is a large, expensive base, by some accounts the largest overseas military base built by the US since the war in Vietnam. And that remains there over 20 years after the end of the 78-day bombing campaign against Yugoslavia. Similarly, the US has upgraded pretty substantially airbases in Afghanistan, including those near Central Asia and close to the Iranian border, and there is no indication they are ever going to abandon them, as they are not going to abandon military bases in Iraq and other places. It’s a lot easier to bring NATO into one’s country or have them coming than to get them out.

US Afghan strategy: senseless and merciless

22 July 2011, 15:04   Download audio fle

Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca in Canada.

I want to ask you some questions about the transfer of command in Afghanistan from General Petraeusto General Allen. Do you see any definitive change in the situation in the country in the near future?

No, I don’t. This is the latest in the series of rotations of the top military commanders simultaneously, of course, throughout the US’s so-called Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) and NATO’s International Security Assistance Force. Two years ago, Gen. David McKinnon was ousted and replaced by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, who in turn was kicked out in favour of Gen. David Petraeus. And now we have a Marine General John Allen stepping in. Throughout that succession series of top commanders, I think, have gone from bad to worse, and, with recent events in Afghanistan, there is no reason to believe anything is going to be subsequently changed and certainly not improved. We do know that each success of commanders intensified the brutality and intensity of military actions, that Petraeus most notably had increased the so-called night raids, special forces operations, which, as often as not, resulted in deaths of Afghan civilians but also in intensification of air raid. We know, for example, that, as of the end of last month, the first half of this year, almost 15,000 Afghan civilians were killed, which is the highest in the six-month period in the war and certainly higher than it was a year ago during the same period. There is also a recent report that stated that in the last two years that 250,000 – a record – of Afghan civilians have been forced to flee their towns and villages because of the intense fighting. So, if there is any index, there is no way of portraying the situation in Afghanistan as having become any better.

Why is the US in Afghanistan? Did I ask you this question?

I’ll give you my personal estimate and I think it’s the one that became apparent with the initial thrust into Afghanistan almost ten years ago, which occurred less than three months after the founding of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in the summer of 2001. My supposition is going to be – not withstanding the hunt for Osama bin Laden and whatever else was presented as the casus belli for the invasion of Afghanistan and its continuation for ten years – that, in essence, the US and its Western allies wanted to plant itself firmly at the point of confluence where Russia, China, Iran, India, Pakistan and other nations might be able to cooperate in building a multipolar alternative to the US-dominated unipolar world and being in Afghanistan and the environs. We have to keep in mind that the US and its NATO allies, their military facilities, are still based in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and the latest of now – Pakistan, where the US has been told to leave the base, from which it was waging drone missile attacks, which have killed 2,500 or so people in Pakistan, last year was the highest with almost a thousand people killed. And they are proceeding that there is something like 714 people killed in Pakistan by US drone missile attacks and out of those 714 five are either al-Qaeda or Taliban fighters.

Five?

Five. And let’s assume, several hundred, if not a thousand or more civilians have been killed in the drone attacks, which are not, of course, being spread with increased intensity not only in Afghanistan and Pakistan and, earlier, in Iraq, but in Yemen, most recently in Somalia and, of course, with the deployment of US Predator drones in Libya, in that country. So we now have six countries, in which the US is waging drone warfare. And I think we will see the intensification of that mode of warfare under Gen. Allen as he assumes the command of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan. Even now the Pentagon is not responsible for those attacks. The Central Intelligence Agency is – and guess who is taking over that agency in September?

Petraeus?

Yes. So, there will be continuity on that end that the top West military commander in Afghanistan is now in charge of the US government agency that is waging the drone attacks. So I think one will be justified in expecting an escalation of drone attacks inside Pakistan. The carnage inside Afghanistan is keeping pace with the killings by drone missile attacks, Hellfire missiles inside Pakistan.

How would you characterize the entire campaign by NATO and the US in Afghanistan? As a complete failure, or were there any gains?

There was an article recently by the US Department of Defense, Pentagon’s press agency, American Force’s press service that just happened to mention in passing that Shindand Air Base in the Herat Province has tripled in size recently to become the second largest military air base in Afghanistan next to that of Bagram. Last year, the US and its NATO allies stepped up the extension of air bases in Afghanistan – I mean in Kandhar, in Mazar a Sharif, in Jalalabad in addition to Bagram and Shindand – they are going to have air bases that control the entire region, a good deal of the Greater Middle East, if you will, in addition to continuing troop transit. They’ve also set up the northern distribution network that way. It’s an amazing access of air, ground, rail and truck transportation in the Northern Afghanistan, which now includes 13-15 former Soviet Republics, all except Moldova and Ukraine currently. Men and material are being moved in and out, and this is an amazing net work, when you look at it, including just recently the first air flight from the US over the North Pole and then over Kazakhstan into Afghanistan. So, in terms of building up a military network around the world – and we also have to remember there are troops from over 50 countries serving under NATO in Afghanistan, which is the largest amount of countries offering troops for one military commandment of one nation in world history. We also have to recall that Afghanistan has become a training ground, if you will, to place US-NATO allies and partners in real life combat situations, to integrate the militaries of at least 50 countries under, basically, US command, using English as their common language. I’m arguing that Afghanistan was a laboratory for integrating the militaries of these various countries.

NATO and the Militarization of the Arctic

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Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to Global Research.ca

Canada has announced that they will be conducting large-scale exercises in the Arctic. NATO also announced claims on the Arctic. What can you say about the militarization of the Arctic?

It’s something that has been under way, rather in earnest, for the last four years. What I think is most noteworthy is that Canadian Defence Minister Peter MacKay, while visiting his nation’s troops in Afghanistan last week, accompanied by the top military commander of Canada, Walter Natynczyk, who’s by the way being voted for a top NATO post – at least Canada is promoting that – mentioned this year ‘s now annual “Canadian sovereignty exercises” in the Arctic Ocean codenamed Operation Nanook that this year’s will be the largest to date, with at least a thousand Canadian military personnel participating. Last year’s Operation Nanook was the largest to date at that time, which included 900 Canadian troops. But I think what’s even more revealing than the size of the Canadian contention was that for the first time ever – and these exercises began in 2007 and were referred to as “Canadian sovereignty exercises” – they occurred directly in response to Russia renewing territorial claims on the Arctic Ocean, particularly using the Lomonosov and the Mendeleev Ridges to sustain their claim.

Do you know what the current status of the claimed zone of the Lomonosov Ridge is?

They have to be adjudicated in the United Nations. These were, in some sense, all but abandoned in waning days of the former Soviet Union by the Mikhail Gorbachev Administration. But Russia, over the last six or so years, has expressed renewed interest in the arctic for a number of reasons. There was a US geological survey perhaps two or three years ago that suggested that as much as 30% of hitherto undiscovered gas and 13% of oil resources exist in the Arctic Ocean. So, there are natural resources that are involved. Of course, now, with the melting of the Polar Ice Cap and the opening of much fabled Northwest Passage north of Canada, which connects the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans that would allow nations – China as one – to circumvent the Panama Canal or even longer journeys for commercial shipping and for the shipping of natural resources, the Arctic is taking on increasing not only economic, but, one can argue, geostrategic importance at the moment. But Russia is simply pursuing, as any nation could and should, I suppose, its national, economic and other interests of the Arctic. But, as a response, Canada started holding regular military exercises in the Arctic – the Operation Nanook maneuvers. And last year, as I was going to mention, for the first time ever the exercises included the participation of militaries from other countries, and those two countries were the United States and Denmark. The United States and Denmark along with the fifth claimant to the Arctic territory, Norway, are, of course, members of the North Atlantic treaty Organization. Russia alone of arctic claimants is not. And it’s ironic or revealing, as you will, that Denmark and the US are the only two countries that have direct territorial disputes with Canada: in the case of the US – with the Beaufort Sea, which is claimed simultaneously through the US’s State of Alaska and Canada’s Yukon Territory; and, on the other end – the Eastern and something called Hans Island, which is claimed by both Denmark through its Greenland possession and by Canada. So that, although the only real disputes that exist, are between the US and Canada, and Denmark and Canada, nevertheless, these three countries, three NATO members, engaged in common military exercises last August – Operation Nanook 2010 – with the clear indication that NATO countries are closing ranks against the only non-NATO claimant, which, of course, is Russia.

Are you saying that NATO has an interest in the Arctic?

Yes, most surely. And it’s acknowledged it. In January 2009, in the last days of the George Bush Administration, the White House issued a Presidential National Security Directive, Directive 66, in relation to the Arctic. And it claimed amongst other things that not only does the US contend with Canada for the part of the Beaufort Sea, but the US maintains the Northwest Passage as international waters, whereas Canada claims that it’s entirely its own. And the National Security Directive #66 included amongst other things that the US warships and warplanes would have free passage through that area. And within, I believe, about couple of weeks after that, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization held an unprecedented summit in Iceland something to the effect of security prospects in the High North, at which point NATO openly acknowledged having strategic interests in the Arctic region. This meeting was top-level. It was attended not only by the Secretary General of NATO, but by the Alliance’s two top military commanders, Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, who, as you know, was an American commander at all times, but also Supreme Allied Commander Transformation, which is based in Norfolk, Virginia, as well as the head of the NATO military Committee. I mean, they weren’t talking about the weather. It was clear that NATO has charted out the Arctic as yet another area. And this is quite in line with the new NATO strategic concept, which was adopted at Lisbon Summit of the military block last November that highlighted in particular so-called energy security issues, that NATO has a self-appointed role, or mission, to protect energy security in the Caspian Sea, in the Gulf of Guinea of West Africa and indeed everywhere in the world – but certainly not in the Arctic.

For whom?

For the interests, I presume, of the leading NATO member states – the United States, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and so forth – as against the rest of the world.

NATO Ambition is Global Domination

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Interview with Rick Rozoff, the manager of the Stop NATO website and mailing list and a contributing writer to the web site Global Research.ca.

My first question regards Russia, and NATO, and the integrated ABM shield that Russia has been, for want of a better word, pushing for. Implementing a sectoral defence architecture is what Russia was looking for. What are the chances of this happening, in your opinion?

By all indications after the meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Sochi, there are few opportunities or prospects of this occurring in terms of – using your wording – an integrated ABM system. No. NATO, with the US constantly barking orders at it, one assumes, is adamantly opposed to a sectoral approach that would permit the integration of Russian interceptor missile, radar and other operations with those of NATO. NATO insists on going it alone, if you will. And, as always, when it makes overtures to Russia, bringing Moscow in as a junior partner. We have to recall that at the Lisbon Summit of the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization last November the US missile system, what is now called the Phased Adaptive Approach, initiated by the Obama Administration almost two years ago has been endorsed heartily, that is unanimously, by NATO. So, what we are talking about is a continuation of the US interceptor missile system in Europe, throughout Europe, covering the entire continent, excluding perhaps Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. The overtures have been made for the last decade to try to enlist Ukraine as part of the NATO project. And those efforts are still not dead, if they haven’t born fruit to date. First of all, I think, at the root of this issue is what the true intention of the so-called Aegis Ashore, or Phased Adaptive Approach – Obama Administration and former Secretary of Defence Robert Gates’ project, which is a four-phased programme to bring Standard Missile-3 interceptors, which to date have been ship-based and to place them on land. The reports are, as the third and the fourth phases arrive in the upcoming years, that as many as 20 Standard Missile-3 advanced types will be placed each in Poland and Romania – and that’s in addition to the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 theatre interceptor missiles that are already placed in Poland. And then, of course, the ship-based versions on Aegis class cruisers and destroyers will be deployed as Washington sees fit – in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea, and the Baltic Sea. What we’re seeing is an almost impenetrable missile shield being erected along the entire western flank of Russia. You know, Russia is not allowed to be an integral part of that system and with projected or anticipated more sophisticated versions of the Standard Missile-3 that are able to intercept both intermediate and perhaps even long-ranged rockets, in the words of several Russian officials, civilian and military, this potentially threatens Russia’s strategic interests. So, you mean, is there any hope that they have been wrangling over this for a long time? The fact that Dmitry Medvedev became the first Russian or Soviet head of state ever to attend a NATO summit, as he did in Lisbon last November, while NATO was formally endorsing a continent-wide that some people refer to as “Son of Star Wars”. Perhaps, somebody in the Kremlin at that time had hopes that NATO would listen to reason. But I think the evidence of the Sochi NATO-Russia Council meeting suggests that NATO is not budging, it is not prepared to compromise.

Some Russian experts are saying that there was more progress made in Sochi. You see the opposite?

I’m just quoting Russian officials, including Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov both on the issue of Libya, the war against Libya, as well as the interceptor missile defence system, which is still fantastically described by the US and by NATO, by NATO Secretary GeneralAnders Fogh Rasmussen as being aimed at some 23 countries, I believe, some astronomical number of nations that are supposedly developing ballistic missiles. But nations that are usually identified are, of course, Iran, Syria – interestingly enough, given the current situation in that country – and others. I cannot, for the life of me, understand in terms of trajectory or anything else why 20 advanced Standard Missile-3 interceptors are to be placed in Poland to intercept missiles from Iran. It’s nonsensical as the George W. Bush version – putting ground-base midcourse missiles there.

Backing up a little bit: some experts say that NATO should have been disbanded when the Warsaw Pact was dissolved. NATO was designed, in fact, to contain the USSR and continues to operate in such a manner. What do you think about that statement? As far as the ABM shield goes, I agree with you about trajectory and the location – I mean that there could be no other reason for it rather than to contain Russian missiles.

You know, the Patriot Advanced Capability Missiles were placed in Poland, in the city of Morag 60 km from the Russian territory, to believe against whom else these missiles have been deployed, with accompanying US military personnel who are manning them. You now have the first permanent deployment of foreign troops in Poland since the breakup of the Warsaw Pact 20 years ago. Should NATO be disbanded? It should never have been formed, that having been done in 1949, most assuredly it should have been a precondition, as a matter of fact, for the former Soviet government of President Gorbachev that, while discussing the breakup of the Warsaw Pact and so forth, a quid pro quo reciprocity should have been demanded that NATO should have been disbanded. The fact that instead, within one decade, from 1991 to 2009, it increased its membership by 75%, going from 16 countries to 28 countries, all 12 new countries in Eastern Europe, of course, from the Baltic to the Adriatic Seas. And every one of them either former members of the Warsaw Pact, Albania for a short while – or former republics of Yugoslavia – is a clear indication NATO expansion eastward is meant not only to contain Russia, I would argue it’s meant to confront Russia.

 

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