Monday, February 23, 2015
The U.S.-Backed Government In Ukraine Is Starting To Lose The Civil War (Duh)
The mainstream media in the U.S. is being very quiet about this, but the truth is that the U.S.-backed government in Kiev is starting to lose the civil war. This week, the separatists captured the very important railway junction of Debaltseve despite the fact that a ceasefire is supposed to be in place.
Buoyed by a constant influx of Russian weapons and supplies, the separatists have gained a clear upper hand in the conflict. But this was not supposed to happen. When protest groups that were funded, organized and advised by organizations in the United States violently overthrew the democratically elected Ukrainian government, the Obama administration was hoping that the Ukrainian people would rapidly embrace their new pro-western leaders.
More @ End Of The American Dream
Kissinger Lied, by Frank Snepp
The first great book on Vietnam.
Excerpt
At one point a Vietnamese woman who had borne a child she said was my own called to say she would kill herself and the boy if I couldn’t rescue them. I told her to call back in an hour — I’d help her then. But when she called back I was downstairs briefing the Ambassador on another useless piece of intelligence, and she made good on her promise, adding two more deaths to those already weighing on my conscience.
When my time came to leave that night, with the last CIA contingent in the Embassy, we had to push Vietnamese out of the way in the halls to get to the chopper on the roof. I couldn’t look into their eyes.
Retreat is the most difficult of all military operations. But as a matter of honor you do not leave friends on the battlefield. In the evacuation of Saigon over half of the Vietnamese who finally got out escaped on their own with no help from us until they were far at sea.
The last CIA message from the Embassy declared: Let’s hope we do not repeat history. This is Saigon station signing off.
*******************************
Point-Counterpoint: Rory Kennedy’s Oscar Nominated Vietnam Doc
by Frank Snepp
Similarly, while giving Kissinger an unchallenged opportunity to speak his mind, she ignored the fact that what he said on camera about trying to negotiate a two-Vietnam stalemate as part of the Paris accords was at odds with now declassified Nixon White House tapes.
In these recordings Kissinger can be heard declaring cynically that he was hoping simply to preserve the Saigon regime through the next U.S. election cycle and then meant to blame South Vietnam’s collapse on its own incompetence.
More @ Frank Snepp
Ron Paul: Interventionism Kills: Ukraine One Year Later
It was one year ago last weekend that a violent coup overthrew the legally elected government of Ukraine. That coup was not only supported by U.S. and European governments -- much of it was actually planned by them. Looking back at the events that led to the overthrow it is clear that without foreign intervention Ukraine would not be in its current, seemingly hopeless situation.
By the end of 2013, Ukraine's economy was in ruins. The government was desperate for an economic bailout and then-president Yanukovych first looked west to the U.S. and Europe before deciding to accept an offer of help from Russia. Residents of south and east Ukraine, who largely speak Russian and trade extensively with Russia were pleased with the decision. West Ukrainians who identify with Poland and Europe began to protest. Ukraine is a deeply divided country and the president came from the eastern region.
At this point the conflict was just another chapter in Ukraine's difficult post-Soviet history. There was bound to be some discontent over the decision, but if there had been no foreign intervention in support of the protests you would likely not be reading this column today. The problem may well have solved itself in due time rather than escalated into a full-out civil war. But the interventionists in the U.S. and Europe won out again, and their interventionist project has been a disaster.
More @ Townhall
America’s Freelance ISIS Killers
The so-called Islamic State has recruited copious cannon fodder from around the world, along with quite a few ferocious fighters. But its toughest opponents on the ground, the Kurds of Iraq and Syria, are attracting Western ex-soldiers for their ranks who are determined to see the self-proclaimed “caliphate” not only “degraded,” as Washington puts it, but destroyed.
At a Kurdish Peshmerga base on the fluid battle lines outside the ethnically and religiously mixed Iraqi city of Kirkuk, three American fighters sat down with The Daily Beast. We were less than half a mile from the black flags of ISIS, as the would-be Islamic State is widely known, and the soldiers asked that I not give too many details about their identities. They worry that their families could become special targets for a fanatical fighting force whose battlefields, like its targets, seem limitless.
More @ The Daily Beast
Uprising at detention facility housing illegal aliens in Texas
On Friday, as many as 2,000 inmates at a detention facility in south Texas seized control of a section of the Willacy County Correctional Center, a privately owned prison contracted through the federal government. And no, you probably haven’t heard much about this on the national news.
The uprising led to an extended standoff between guards and inmates. Reports from Saturday afternoon indicated that the facility was secure, and the inmates, who had been wielding pieces of pipe, were compliant – although officials were still in “talks” with them to regain control of the entire prison.
According to early reports, the disturbances at the facility were enough to bring in additional law enforcement:
More @ Liberty Unyielding
This Is The Biggest Problem Facing The World Today: 9 Countries Have Debt-To-GDP Over 300%
Via Jonathan
If anyone has stopped to ask just why global central banks are in such a rush to create inflation (but only controlled inflation, not runaway hyperinflation... of course when they fail with the "controlled" part the money paradrop is only a matter of time) over the past 5 years, and have printed over $12 trillion in credit-money since Lehman, the bulk of which has ended up in the stock market, and which for the first time ever are about to monetize all global sovereign debt issuance in 2015, the answer is simple, and can be seen on the chart below.
It also shows the biggest problem facing the world today, namely that at least 9 countries have debt/GDP above 300%, and that a whopping 39% countries have debt-to-GDP of over 100%!
If anyone has stopped to ask just why global central banks are in such a rush to create inflation (but only controlled inflation, not runaway hyperinflation... of course when they fail with the "controlled" part the money paradrop is only a matter of time) over the past 5 years, and have printed over $12 trillion in credit-money since Lehman, the bulk of which has ended up in the stock market, and which for the first time ever are about to monetize all global sovereign debt issuance in 2015, the answer is simple, and can be seen on the chart below.
It also shows the biggest problem facing the world today, namely that at least 9 countries have debt/GDP above 300%, and that a whopping 39% countries have debt-to-GDP of over 100%!
More @ Zero Hedge
"Ride The Thunder" Honour & Triumph In Vietnam: Movie deals death blow to vicious lies about Vietnam
Via Carl
"Ride The Thunder" Honour & Triumph In Vietnam (2009 The Book)
(The book is one of the best on Vietnam)
Fix Bayonets!"
"And they began to yell and scream and curse like mad men. Rebel Yells, blood curdling Rebel Yells. Just like the men who followed Stonewall Jackson and Jeb Stuart. Here in the godforsaken jungles of Vietnam one hundred years later another crazy-like-a-fox Virginian was ordering men to fix bayonets and charge."
"......the story of Le Ba Binh is so incredible, the reader will find himself wondering if he was really a film character. Le Ba Binh can teach leftwing Americans, safe in their Constitution-backed country, the folly of appeasement. His saga, which cannot be detailed here, will serve as a signpost of honor for adults and children alike."
Le Ba Binh's 700-man South Vietnamese Marine force facing 20,000 North Vietnamese......
"As long as one Marine draws a breath of life, Dong Ha will belong to us."
Nine time wounded Lt. Col. Le Ba Binh Binh served 13 years in heavy combat and another 11 years in prison camps.
**********************
Excerpt
In the early 1970s, under President
Richard Nixon’s “Vietnamization” program, the war was being turned over
to South Vietnam. Botkin’s film tells the little-known story of a few
courageous American and Vietnamese Marines who fought valiantly to
thwart the Communist invasion – nearly saving South Vietnam – during
North Vietnam’s all-out attack on South Vietnam from the DMZ known as
the 1972 Easter Offensive.
In a true-life story, the film shows how, when the unrelenting North Vietnamese Army of 20,000 soldiers and 200 tanks reached the bridge at Dong Ha, their offensive was stopped in its tracks by a small force of just over 700 Vietnamese Marines and U.S. military advisers.
Even though the South Vietnamese Marines had nearly won on the battlefield, they would suffer terribly, starving and spending long years at hard labor after the war as part of the communists’ re-education process.
In a true-life story, the film shows how, when the unrelenting North Vietnamese Army of 20,000 soldiers and 200 tanks reached the bridge at Dong Ha, their offensive was stopped in its tracks by a small force of just over 700 Vietnamese Marines and U.S. military advisers.
Even though the South Vietnamese Marines had nearly won on the battlefield, they would suffer terribly, starving and spending long years at hard labor after the war as part of the communists’ re-education process.
The Three Types of Insurgencies
Via Michael
There’s a sizable number of those in the Patriot community who believe that restoring Liberty will come to violence and, of those, a great number believe that an insurgency is the way forward.
Insurgencies are often how the disaffected few, be they religious, ethnic, or political/ideological groups, respond to the perceived tyranny of the many. But the track record of insurgencies is fairly weak; less than 40% of them have succeeded since 1945. According to Max Boot, insurgent/guerrilla-expert-extraordinaire, of the 443 insurgencies since 1775, only 25% of them were successful. And since 1945 over 50% of government counterinsurgencies have succeeded. On its face, that doesn’t say much for the likely success rate of a nationwide insurgency.
What’s much more likely is that we see fragmented secession movements, backed up with credible threats of force on behalf of burgeoning insurgencies. This is what I see as a much larger trend on a longer time frame, not what’s right around the corner. We could easily be another ten years out from this scenario, barring any catastrophic events until we get there. I think this nation’s current trajectory — the Magic Marxist Muslim and all — still gives us three to five years, at least. (When people are expecting eventual calamity, it’s easy for them to overly simplify things and expect it to happen tomorrow, which is what we see with many in the Patriot-Prepper community. The times are getting dire, but not that dire.)
There’s a sizable number of those in the Patriot community who believe that restoring Liberty will come to violence and, of those, a great number believe that an insurgency is the way forward.
Insurgencies are often how the disaffected few, be they religious, ethnic, or political/ideological groups, respond to the perceived tyranny of the many. But the track record of insurgencies is fairly weak; less than 40% of them have succeeded since 1945. According to Max Boot, insurgent/guerrilla-expert-extraordinaire, of the 443 insurgencies since 1775, only 25% of them were successful. And since 1945 over 50% of government counterinsurgencies have succeeded. On its face, that doesn’t say much for the likely success rate of a nationwide insurgency.
What’s much more likely is that we see fragmented secession movements, backed up with credible threats of force on behalf of burgeoning insurgencies. This is what I see as a much larger trend on a longer time frame, not what’s right around the corner. We could easily be another ten years out from this scenario, barring any catastrophic events until we get there. I think this nation’s current trajectory — the Magic Marxist Muslim and all — still gives us three to five years, at least. (When people are expecting eventual calamity, it’s easy for them to overly simplify things and expect it to happen tomorrow, which is what we see with many in the Patriot-Prepper community. The times are getting dire, but not that dire.)
More @ Guerrilla America
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