By Francis Lee for the Saker Blog There is a human tendency to cling on to cherished beliefs even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. There was a time, during the heady days of Jacques Delors and the Social Chapter, when the EU appeared to represent a social-democratic and neutral geopolitical bloc; a third force between the USSR as it then was and the US/NATO – this,
The cold, reptilian eyes of William Colby By Ken Leslie for the Saker Blog One of the persisting delusions of the modern liberal thought states that the humanity has succeeded in overcoming its worst primitive instincts and is happily sailing towards some kind of liberal utopia populated by reasonable, objectively-minded, educated technocrats who are capable of reducing any problem to a linear combination of variables to be modelled and
By A.B. Abrams for the Saker Blog Marking the 75th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean Workers’ Party, today the oldest ruling party in the world, a major military parade in Kim Il Sung Square, Central Pyongyang, sent a number of important messages regarding the state of North Korea’s ongoing conflict with the United States. The two countries has been officially at war for 70 years as of 2020,
by Pepe Escobar with permission and first posted at Asia Times Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s Foreign Minister, is the world’s foremost diplomat. The son of an Armenian father and a Russian mother, he’s just on another level altogether. Here, once again, we may be able to see why. Let’s start with the annual meeting of the Valdai Club, Russia’s premier think tank. Here we may follow the must-watch presentation of the
South Front The Azerbaijani Armed Forces have been developing their advance on Armenian positions in the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region. On October 19, they captured 13 more villages in the Jabrayil district. The capturing of Soltanli, Amirvarli, Mashanli, Hasanli, Alikeykhanli, Gumlag, Hajili, Goyarchinveysalli, Niyazgullar, Kechal Mammadli, Shahvalli, Haji Ismayilli and Isagli was personally announced by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev. Early on October 20, Azerbaijani forces also reached the town of Tumas
By Matthew Ehret for the Saker Blog It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Vice President of the World Bank Carmen Reinhardt recently warned on October 15 that a new financial disaster looms ominously over the horizon with a vast sovereign default and a corporate debt default. Just in the past 6 months of bailouts unleashed by the blowout of the system induced by the Coronavirus lockdown, Reinhardt noted
By Ramin Mazaheri and cross posted with PressTV Watching the incredible bias of how the US media covers this presidential election assures the world of two things: 1. The largest divide in the United States is not urban/rural, White/Black, sexual, nor the male/female divide recently brought to the fore by #MeToo. It is not even a Democrat/Republican divide, because every outsider sees that these two groups are fundamentally united on
South Front The Armenian-Azerbaijani war, which started on September 27, continues in the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region despite international diplomatic efforts to de-escalate the conflict. Offensive operations of Azerbaijani forces continue at the same time as the Azerbaijani government claims that it is committed to the ceasefire regime. The first humanitarian ceasefire entered force in Karabakh on October 10 and collapsed on the next day, while the second one started on
By Cynthia Chung for the Saker Blog Today we see the continuation of the over seven decade’s long ruse, the targeting of individuals as Russian agents without any basis, in order to remove them from the political arena. The present effort to declassify the Russiagate papers and exonerate Michael Flynn, so that he may freely speak of the intelligence he knows, is not a threat to national security, it is
By Katerina for the Saker Blog In this one, which I promise to be the very LAST of my essays, I would like, first of all, to do a short re-cap on the responses to my three previous ones – feedback so to speak. Always useful. Although in this essay the main subject will be the reflections on a rather unfortunate current relationship between Russia and USA, in the same
By Chris Faure for the Saker Blog Bolivia went to the polls yesterday for the first election since the coup d’état in November 2019, that removed Evo Morales from the leadership and from the country and put the country under a western backed right wing coup government. This coup was carried out for lithium, as Morales was developing the Lithium sector and had made agreements to start the long road
By Allen Yu for the Saker Blog Donald Trump was elected with a mandate to make deals and “drain the swamp.” I had my doubts he could make a difference in the geopolitical realm. But even on economic matters, he has not had a lot of success. His Tiktok saga reveals just how far he has left people down. Trump’s demand for a fire sale of Tiktok hit a legal
by Pepe Escobar and first posted at Asia Times No Washington-designed “maximum pressure” has been able to derail a crucial milestone this Sunday: the end of the UN arms embargo on Iran, in accordance with UN Security Council 2231, which has endorsed the 2015 JCPOA deal. The JCPOA – or Iran nuclear deal – was unilaterally ditched by the Trump administration. But that, notoriously, did not prevent it from engaging
Written and produced by SF Team: J.Hawk, Daniel Deiss, Edwin Watson The West is facing an unprecedented threat to its hegemony, as more agile, innovative, and cohesive non-Western powers are growing by leaps and bounds, to the point of making a transition to a global non-Western hegemony for the first time in history. During the last five centuries, the baton had passed from one European power to the next, and
by Straight-Bat for the Saker Blog For quite some time, I have been alarmed with the general lack of understanding on modern India among the readers and activists (Indians and foreigners alike). As soon as “India” word appears on the paper or computer screen, a section of the readers start imagining the philosophical and religious connotation of the word, they try to realise how great saints spent whole life to
South Front The Azerbaijani Armed Forces have been developing their advance on Armenian positions in the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region. As in the previous several days, the main clashes are taking place in the southern part of Karabakh. As of October 16, Azerbaijani forces finally took full control of the town of Hadrat and started an operation to push the remaining Armenian units out of the town’s surroundings. Despite this, Armenian
By Godfree Roberts selected from his extensive weekly newsletter : Here Comes China Editorial : Before we start with Godfree’s news, a short commentary on Pompeo’s attempt to create an type of NATO by way of the QUAD. Plot Spoiler – did not work. From Moon of Alabama The US administration revived the 2007-2008 Quadrilateral Security Dialogue and rebranded it as the U.S.-Australia-India-Japan Consultations Quad. The aim was to turn
By Ramin Mazaheri for the Saker Blog The 10-year anniversary of France’s anti-burqa law was just celebrated by France’s most deranged. The law was always just a means to distract from new, Brussels-imposed austerity measures despite the start of the Great Recession, and also – from the perspective of the journalist-class: a way to give journalists work, which Sarkozy was very good at and which Jupiter Macron will not deign
About 1,000 members of Syrian militant groups deployed by Turkey to support the Azerbaijani advance in the Nagorno-Karabakh region have laid down their arms and refused to participate in hostilities, Armenian media outlets and military-affiliated sources claimed. They insist that Syrian militants were just used as cannon fodder and did not receive their promised money. According to sources loyal to the Syrian opposition, the number of Turkish proxies that died
by Pepe Escobar and cross posted with Strategic Culture Foundation The whole planet is enthralled, appalled, shocked and awed by the spectacle of democracy as enacted under the shadow of messianic imperialism – complete with a slew of slimy, smoking gun October Surprises. We’re in total Frank Underwood territory. And as befits the ultimate “society of the simulacrum” pictured by Baudrillard back in the swingin’ 1980s, all those similarities with
