https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpf3SakR0HM
Thursday, September 3, 2020
JAPAN’S SLOW ROT AND SUBSERVIENCE TO THE US WILL LIKELY CONTINUE
By Andre Vltchek, RT.
September 2, 2020
https://popularresistance.org/japans-slow-rot-subservience-to-the-us-will-likely-continue/
https://popularresistance.org/japans-slow-rot-subservience-to-the-us-will-likely-continue/
Do Not Judge Shinzo Abe’s Japan By Those Shiny New Structures Of The Tokyo Osaka Maglev Project That Will Be Soon Connecting The Industrial Heartland Of Nagoya With The Capital City.
Japan’s longest-serving prime minister is stepping down, and the nation appears to be in shock. But people are stunned simply because the protocol was broken (even if unwell, ill, a Japanese leader is not supposed to abandon his post, abruptly), not because they are fearing or expecting great political, economic, or social upheavals. Japan is a country of continuity, and, during the last decades, of gradual and very slow decline.
Shamed By China, Controlled By The United States
Here, no one is expecting a revolution or collapse of the system to take place. Japan is the most stable and most predictable country on earth. It is a staunch Western ally, without its own foreign policy and very little of its own opinion about the world. Several decades ago, the country used to rebel – against capitalism and the Western rule – but the administrations of Koizumi and Abe broke the spine of rebellions, gently, by wrapping up the nation into a comfortable duvet, guaranteeing a mildly sclerotic but still cozy existence for the majority.
Shinzo Abe understands Japan. It is his country, and he is its native son. He also understands the establishment and how to deal with the United States. He is more pro-market than Trump, he despises North Korea more than the West does, and he is ‘politely’ but determinately antagonizing China.
China has been his huge ‘psychological problem’. It is because, in the past, Japan’s collaboration with Washington ‘used to pay off’, at least in terms of the quality of life. Japan used to be the second-largest economy in the world, and its standard of living used to be much higher than in most Western countries.
Then the Chinese economy bypassed that of Japan. And soon after, Japanese travelers to the People’s Republic of China began returning with ‘frightening tales’: Chinese cities and the countryside were blooming. Chinese trains were suddenly running faster than shinkansen, Chinese museums and opera houses were more lavish than those in Japan, and the public spaces and social projects were dwarfing those in the increasingly capitalist Japan. Poverty levels in China are rapidly declining, while in Japan they are on a slow rise.
This was not supposed to be like that, Japanese people were exclaiming! Anti-Chinese sentiments erupted, and Shinzo Abe did nothing to stop them. On the contrary.
Instead of reforming and investing in the people, the two mightiest capitalist countries on earth – the United States under Trump and Japan under Abe – turned against China with unimaginable force and spite.
But under Abe, Japan began falling behind its other ancient rival, South Korea, too. And its arch-enemy, the country which Japan helped to destroy after WWII, North Korea (DPRK), is still there, undefeated and strong.
Self-Censoring Truths About Japan
Instead of reimagining Japan, Shinzo Abe began censoring the past of the country, as well as its already submissive media.
My good friend, David McNeill, an Irish professor at the prestigious Sofia University in Tokyo, who also worked for the NHK, Japan’s national broadcaster, once explained to me:
“There is so much self-censorship in Japanese media, now. And the government is issuing ‘guidelines’, so called ‘Orange Book’, for instance: how to treat anything that is ‘contagious’… or anything related to history. There are instructions to writers and translators. For instance: never use words like Nanking Massacre, except when you quote foreign experts. Or Yasukuni Shrine – never use the word ‘controversial’ in connection to it.’ We cannot write about ‘sexual slaves’ from WWII.”
It is a well-known fact that Japanese mass media outlets do not take a position on any major world events related to Russia, China or Iran, until Western publications or networks such as the BBC or CNN provide ‘guidance’. I used to work for one of the major Japanese newspapers, when covering ‘sensitive’ international topics we had to seek permission to publish from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Mr. Taira Takemoto, a civil engineer based in Osaka wrote for this report:
“Frankly speaking, Abe has spent lots of effort selling Japan to the US, with President Obama or President Trump. There are many pending issues that need to be sorted out from the 1960 US-Japan Security Treaty to the issue of numerous US bases to trade to an increasing hostility of Japan and the US toward China, as much as DPRK. In the international arena, I do think he has subjugated Japan to the hands of the West, in particular the US.”
Optimism Is Hard To Come By
Yet, forget about Tokyo for a while. To understand today’s Japan, visit its central part, urban and rural, and you will understand how deep the rot under Abe was. Outside cities like Suzuka or Yokkaichi in Mie Prefecture, rice fields and bamboo forests are dotted with rotting carcasses of cars. Many houses are in disrepair. The bus lines are abandoned. Main roads are lined up with unhealthy fast food joints, not unlike those in the US suburbia. Many public playgrounds for children are unmaintained or gone.
A once-glorious cultural life has been decaying, even before the Covid-19 pandemic. Huge cultural centers, once the pride of the country, are mostly empty, with tall grass growing between the buildings.
Blue tents of homeless people are pitched in almost all public parks of Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, and other major cities.
Ms. Mikiko Aoki, a social worker, living in Nagoya, has mixed feelings about Shinzo Abe:
“The news of [the] PM’s resignation surprised us all as we did not see it coming. I guess we had gotten used to him.
I think he has presided over some important domestic works from the recovery of the big earthquake in 2011 to the preparation of the hosting of the postponed Tokyo Olympics. But the social situations in Japan are no better than before. In fact, I think they are worse, with the aging population and less investment of the state on public services and support to families in need. I don’t think there will be any different with a new prime minister. After all, he will come from the same party! Nothing changes.”
Geoffrey Gunn, a leading Australian historian and Professor Emeritus at Nagasaki University, is concerned about Japan’s increasingly aggressive role in the region:
“All changed when the Abe government nationalized the Senkaku/Diaoyu [Islands]. The status quo changed because now Japan declares that there is actually no dispute over these so-called disputed islands. Therefore, the Tokyo government has angered China. China is indignant with this change of the status quo.”
What Is Next Should Be Much More Important Now Than Who Comes Next
Unfortunately, in Japan, there is no expectation or hope for the essential political changes. Political clans divided the territory, surprises are very unlikely. Japan’s Communist Party has many members, but it is always weak when it comes to elections.
Japan will continue to decline, but extremely slowly, one could even say ‘elegantly’. The standard of living is still extremely high. The aging population will continue enjoying generous pensions and benefits but younger generations have been tightening their belts. The era of lifetime employment is over. Part-time jobs with no security are the only future for millions of young graduates.
Confrontations with China, the Koreas, and to some extent Russia will continue for years to come, or at least for as long as the United States will be igniting them.
Yoshihide Suga, 71 years old and often described as a ‘lieutenant’ of Mr. Abe, is expected to ‘join the race’ for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) nomination. Were he to ‘win’, not much would change, except that he may be less cautious regarding Covid-19. Japan’s hermetically closed borders could open, and foreign tourists and business travelers could be welcomed, a scenario not unlike that in some European countries. Little more would change.
During our conversation, David McNeill passed an unflattering verdict on Abe’s era:
“Abe will probably be seen as a political caretaker rather than the conservative radical he set out to be. The fact that he failed to rewrite the hated constitution means he will probably see the last seven and a half years as a failure.”
And Suga? David replied without hesitation:
“On this, I agree with Koichi Nakano who wrote for the New York Times: ‘Suga will attempt to continue Abe politics without Abe, like John Major after Thatcher.’”
As for me, being locked out of Japan, one of my homes, for the entire six months, is a tragedy.
Prime ministers come and go. Occupation armies will, one day, disappear as well. Rotting car carcasses will fully decompose. But the depth of Japan, as well as its beauty, will never vanish. Frustrated Japanophiles are bitching about the country, but stay.
Obama—Once an Advocate of Change—is Now One of the Biggest Obstacles to Change
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KzUk1tfxKw
HUNDREDS OF LAWYERS FILE COMPLAINT AGAINST JUDGE OVER TARGETING STEVEN DONZIGER
By International Association of Democratic Lawyers.
September 2, 2020
https://popularresistance.org/hundreds-of-lawyers-file-complaint-against-judge-over-targeting-steven-donziger/
Note: The persecution of Steven Donziger deserves nationwide attention. It exposes the abuse of power by Chevron and the corruption of US courts in support of corporations. Donziger won a major case against Chevron for the widespread pollution it causes in Ecuador. After winning a more than $9 billion judgment for indigenous people in Ecuador, Chevron went after Donziger with abusive legal actions. A senior judge, Lewis A. Kaplan, abused his judicial power in support of Chevron. We interviewed Steven on Clearing The FOG radio, Steven Donziger Challenged A Corporate Polluter And Won, Now They’re Trying To Ruin Him. You will be shocked by his story and recognize the importance of his case. Donziger is a creative, aggressive fighter for the underdog against major corporate power. He has shown strong ethics and Judge Kaplan and Chevron have turned these realities upside down. – KZ
Complaint Signed By 37 Organizations Representing 500,000 Lawyers Worldwide Details Shocking Violations Of The Code Of Judicial Conduct By U.S. Judge In Long-Running Chevron Retaliation Campaign .
Chevron and Kaplan targeted Donziger after he helped Indigenous peoples win a landmark $9.5 billion judgment against the company in 2011 for dumping oil waste in the Amazon.
Dozens of legal organizations around the world representing more than 500,000 lawyers along with over 200 individual lawyers today submitted a judicial complaint documenting a series of shocking violations of the judicial code of conduct by United States Judge Lewis A. Kaplan targeting human rights lawyer Steven Donziger after he helped Indigenous peoples win a historic judgment against Chevron in Ecuador to clean up the pollution caused by decades of oil drilling with no environmental controls.
The complaint was formally filed by the National Lawyers Guild in conjunction with the International Association of Democratic Lawyers (IADL). IADL was founded in Paris in 1946 to fight to uphold the rule of law around the world and has consultative status with UN agencies.
Five pages in length with a 40-page appendix with 15 exhibits, the complaint is to be turned over to the chief judge in the federal appellate court in New York that oversees the trial court where Kaplan sits. The complaint is signed by an unprecedented number of legal organizations from approximately 80 countries collectively representing 500,000 lawyers.
The Chief Judge of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, Robert Katzmann, has a duty to read the complaint and determine whether he will appoint a committee to investigate and issue findings.
The complaint could result in a censure of Kaplan or even his removal from the bench.
“We wrote this judicial complaint after studying the record in this case and coming to the conclusion that Judge Kaplan has been acting as a de facto lawyer for Chevron in this litigation. He has shown a shocking pattern of escalating efforts to harm Mr. Donziger for his advocacy of the rights of indigenous people in Ecuador spanning a 10-year period,” said Jeanne Mirer, the President of the IADL. “The violations constitute a clear breach of the norms set out in the judicial canon of ethics that govern the behavior of judges in the United States. We believe the complaint demands urgent investigation by Judge Katzmann to stop this pattern of abuse and to prevent a highly regarded human rights lawyer from being unjustly convicted.”
The complaint documents what its authors say is a pattern of ethics violations committed by Judge Kaplan, a former tobacco industry lawyer. Kaplan denied Donziger a jury, put in place a series of highly unusual courtroom tactics, severely restricted Donziger’s ability to mount a defense, and through his had picked judge to try him for criminal contempt has had him detained him at home for more than one year on contempt charges that were rejected by the U.S. Attorney, and allowed him to be prosecuted by a private law firm that has Chevron as a client. He also imposed enormous fines on Donziger without a jury finding that have all but bankrupted him.
The complaint alleges that the “statements and actions of Judge Kaplan over the last ten years show him to have taken on the role of counsel for Chevron … rather than that of a judge adjudicating a live controversy before him.” It added, “By these standards, he has violated his duty of impartiality under the canons of judicial conduct.”
The complaint concluded that Judge Kaplan since 2010 has “beyond all bounds of reason” tried “to destroy Steven Donziger, both personally and professionally” and “by extension has blocked the access to remedy for the 30,000 Indigenous clients from the Ecuadorian Amazon that he has represented since 1993.”
“Complainants are very concerned that the persecution of Mr. Donziger by Judge Kaplan and Chevron will have a chilling effect on the work of other human rights lawyers, acting as a warning of the consequences they will suffer should they try to hold major corporations accountable for their human rights violations,” the complaint said.
Organizations signing the complaint also include the Center for Constitutional Rights; Lawyers Committee for Human Rights; National Conference of Black Lawyers; the Confederation of Lawyers of Asia and the Pacific (including lawyers from Japan, Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Pakistan); the African Bar Association, which includes lawyers from 61 nations; and the Indian Lawyers Association, among several others. The IADL also has members from more than 50 nations.
Also signing the complaint are more than 200 individual lawyers, including Professors Charles Nesson and Lawrence Lessig of Harvard Law School; Marie Toussaint, a member of the European Parliament; Sarah Leah Whitson, the former Middle East Director for Human Rights Watch; Scott Badenoch, Jr., the Co-chair of the Environmental Justice Committee of the American Bar Association; and Bill Bowring, Professor of Law, Birkbeck College, University of London.
In 2011, Donziger helped Indigenous peoples win a $9.5 billion environmental judgment against Chevron after it was found to have deliberately dumped billions of gallons of oil waste in a huge of swath of Amazon rainforest in Ecuador. Donziger represented 30,000 indigenous and local Ecuadorian communities that had been decimated by the dumping, with rates of childhood leukemia and other cancers skyrocketing. The court ruling was affirmed by six appellate courts in Ecuador and Canada, including the high courts of both countries.
As part of an avowed campaign to “demonize” Donziger, and despite accepting jurisdiction in Ecuador, Chevron came back to the United States and filed a civil “racketeering” case against the lawyer and all 47 named plaintiffs from the rainforest that potentially sought $60 billion in damages — the highest personal liability in U.S. history. The company steered the case to Judge Kaplan, who denied Donziger a jury and then let Chevron pay a witness at least $2 million while moving him and his entire family from Ecuador to the United States. Chevron lawyers coached the witness, Alberto Guerra, for 53 days before Kaplan let him testify against Donziger; Guerra later admitted under oath that he had lied repeatedly. Kaplan also refused to let Donziger testify on direct.
Prominent trial lawyer John Keker called the proceedings before Kaplan a “Dickensian farce” driven by the judge’s “implacable hostility” toward Donziger. In the meantime, 29 Nobel laureates and several human rights organizations have criticized the harassment of Donziger by judicial authorities and have demanded his immediate release.
After the Canadian Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Ecuadorian plaintiffs, Judge Kaplan last year filed unprecedented criminal contempt charges against Donziger after he appealed post-judgment discovery orders to turn over to Chevron his attorney-client privileged work on his computer and cell phone. A judicial order requiring an attorney to disclose confidential work product to adversary counsel is thought to be unprecedented. That appeal is scheduled to be argued on Sept. 15 while Kaplan is trying to drive Donziger to trial on the contempt charges on Sept. 9, despite the fact Donziger’s lawyers cannot travel from out of town during the COVID-19 pandemic and not a single criminal trial has been held in the district since March.
In another unusual move, after the U.S. Attorney’s Office refused to pursue Judge Kaplan’s contempt charges the judge appointed a private law firm, Seward & Kissel LLP—which is known for its extensive financial ties to the oil and gas industry—to prosecute Donziger in the name of the government while being paid an hourly rate by taxpayers. The firm immediately pushed for Donziger’s pre-trial detention and later disclosed that Chevron was a direct client of the firm.
Donziger is now in his 13th month of home detention in a misdemeanor case where the longest sentence ever imposed on a lawyer convicted of the charge is three months of home confinement.
The judicial complaint follows the formation last week of a case monitoring committee comprised of a separate group of prominent lawyers that also has been critical of how judicial authorities in New York have treated Donziger. The committee includes Michael Tigar, chair of the American Bar Association’s Section of Litigation; Nadine Strossen, a former president of the American Civil Liberties Union and a New York Law School professor; and Stephen Rapp, a former U.S. Department of State ambassador-at-large for the Office of Global Criminal Justice.
In a news release last week announcing its formation, the committee said that “trial monitoring committees are often seen in high-profile cases around the world, but they’re most often employed in developing countries with problematic judiciaries.”
“It is unusual for a case in the United States to have such deep problems that a trial monitoring committee feels the need to attend,” said attorney Scott Badenoch, who helped organize the group.
Download the files:
Cover letter
Complaint
Appendix
Don't Believe The Polls, A People's Party, Double Standard Policing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi2JWixy3tY&ab_channel=RedactedTonight
IS THE US DELIBERATELY TRYING TO PROVOKE A MILITARY CRISIS WITH RUSSIA?
By Ted Galen Carpenter, The American Conservative.
September 2, 2020
https://popularresistance.org/is-the-us-deliberately-trying-to-provoke-a-military-crisis-with-russia/
NOTE: Sputnik News offers a different version than the one below of the recent collision between US and Russian vehicles, backed up with videos of the incident. They report the US military was blocking the Russian vehicles from passing and it was the US that ran into a Russian vehicle as it tried to pass. – MF
A dangerous vehicle collision between US and Russian soldiers in Northeastern Syria on Aug. 24 highlights the fragility of the relationship and the broader test of wills between the two major powers.
According to White House reports and a Russian video that went viral this week, it appeared that as the two sides were racing down a highway in armored vehicles, the Russians sideswiped the Americans, leaving four U.S. soldiers injured. It is but the latest clash as both sides continue their patrols in the volatile area. But it speaks of bigger problems with U.S. provocations on Russia’s backdoor in Eastern Europe.
A sober examination of U.S. policy toward Russia since the disintegration of the Soviet Union leads to two possible conclusions. One is that U.S. leaders, in both Republican and Democratic administrations, have been utterly tone-deaf to how Washington’s actions are perceived in Moscow. The other possibility is that those leaders adopted a policy of maximum jingoistic swagger intended to intimidate Russia, even if it meant obliterating a constructive bilateral relationship and eventually risking a dangerous showdown. Washington’s latest military moves, especially in Eastern Europe and the Black Sea, are stoking alarming tensions.
There has been a long string of U.S. provocations toward Russia. The first one came in the late 1990s and the initial years of the twenty-first century when Washington violated tacit promises given to Mikhail Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders that if Moscow accepted a united Germany within NATO, the Alliance would not seek to move farther east. Instead of abiding by that bargain, the Clinton and Bush administrations successfully pushed NATO to admit multiple new members from Central and Eastern Europe, bringing that powerful military association directly to Russia’s western border. In addition, the United States initiated “rotational” deployments of its forces to the new members so that the U.S. military presence in those countries became permanent in all but name. Even Robert M. Gates, who served as secretary of defense under both George W. Bush and Barack Obama, was uneasy about those deployments and conceded that he should have warned Bush in 2007 that they might be unnecessarily provocative.
As if such steps were not antagonistic enough, both Bush and Obama sought to bring Georgia and Ukraine into NATO. The latter country is not only within what Russia regards as its legitimate sphere of influence, but within its core security zone. Even key European members of NATO, especially France and Germany, believed that such a move was unwise and blocked Washington’s ambitions. That resistance, however, did not inhibit a Western effort to meddle in Ukraine’s internal affairs to help demonstrators unseat Ukraine’s elected, pro-Russia president and install a new, pro-NATO government in 2014.
Such provocative political steps, though, are now overshadowed by worrisome U.S. and NATO military moves. Weeks before the formal announcement on July 29, the Trump administration touted its plan to relocate some U.S. forces stationed in Germany. When Secretary of Defense Mike Esper finally made the announcement, the media’s focus was largely on the point that 11,900 troops would leave that country.
However, Esper made it clear that only 6,400 would return to the United States; the other nearly 5,600 would be redeployed to other NATO members in Europe. Indeed, of the 6,400 coming back to the United States, “many of these or similar units will begin conducting rotational deployments back to Europe.” Worse, of the 5,600 staying in Europe, it turns out that at least 1,000 are going to Poland’s eastern border with Russia.
Another result of the redeployment will be to boost U.S. military power in the Black Sea. Esper confirmed that various units would “begin continuous rotations farther east in the Black Sea region, giving us a more enduring presence to enhance deterrence and reassure allies along NATO’s southeastern flank.” Moscow is certain to regard that measure as another on a growing list of Black Sea provocations by the United States.
Among other developments, there already has been a surge of alarming incidents between U.S. and Russian military aircraft in that region. Most of the cases involve U.S. spy planes flying near the Russian coast—supposedly in international airspace. On July 30, a Russian Su-27 jet fighter intercepted two American surveillance aircraft; according to Russian officials, it was the fourth time in the final week of July that they caught U.S. planes in that sector approaching the Russian coast. Yet another interception occurred on August 5, again involving two U.S. spy planes. Still others have taken place throughout mid-August. It is a reckless practice that easily could escalate into a broader, very dangerous confrontation.
The growing number of such incidents is a manifestation of the surging U.S. military presence along Russia’s border, especially in the Black Sea. They are taking place on Russia’s doorstep, thousands of miles away from the American homeland. Americans should consider how the United States would react if Russia decided to establish a major naval and air presence in the Gulf of Mexico, operating out of bases in such allied countries as Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.
The undeniable reality is that the United States and its NATO allies are crowding Russia; Russia is not crowding the United States. Washington’s bumptious policies already have wrecked a once-promising bilateral relationship and created a needless new cold war with Moscow. If more prudent U.S. policies are not adopted soon, that cold war might well turn hot.
https://popularresistance.org/is-the-us-deliberately-trying-to-provoke-a-military-crisis-with-russia/
NOTE: Sputnik News offers a different version than the one below of the recent collision between US and Russian vehicles, backed up with videos of the incident. They report the US military was blocking the Russian vehicles from passing and it was the US that ran into a Russian vehicle as it tried to pass. – MF
A dangerous vehicle collision between US and Russian soldiers in Northeastern Syria on Aug. 24 highlights the fragility of the relationship and the broader test of wills between the two major powers.
According to White House reports and a Russian video that went viral this week, it appeared that as the two sides were racing down a highway in armored vehicles, the Russians sideswiped the Americans, leaving four U.S. soldiers injured. It is but the latest clash as both sides continue their patrols in the volatile area. But it speaks of bigger problems with U.S. provocations on Russia’s backdoor in Eastern Europe.
A sober examination of U.S. policy toward Russia since the disintegration of the Soviet Union leads to two possible conclusions. One is that U.S. leaders, in both Republican and Democratic administrations, have been utterly tone-deaf to how Washington’s actions are perceived in Moscow. The other possibility is that those leaders adopted a policy of maximum jingoistic swagger intended to intimidate Russia, even if it meant obliterating a constructive bilateral relationship and eventually risking a dangerous showdown. Washington’s latest military moves, especially in Eastern Europe and the Black Sea, are stoking alarming tensions.
There has been a long string of U.S. provocations toward Russia. The first one came in the late 1990s and the initial years of the twenty-first century when Washington violated tacit promises given to Mikhail Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders that if Moscow accepted a united Germany within NATO, the Alliance would not seek to move farther east. Instead of abiding by that bargain, the Clinton and Bush administrations successfully pushed NATO to admit multiple new members from Central and Eastern Europe, bringing that powerful military association directly to Russia’s western border. In addition, the United States initiated “rotational” deployments of its forces to the new members so that the U.S. military presence in those countries became permanent in all but name. Even Robert M. Gates, who served as secretary of defense under both George W. Bush and Barack Obama, was uneasy about those deployments and conceded that he should have warned Bush in 2007 that they might be unnecessarily provocative.
As if such steps were not antagonistic enough, both Bush and Obama sought to bring Georgia and Ukraine into NATO. The latter country is not only within what Russia regards as its legitimate sphere of influence, but within its core security zone. Even key European members of NATO, especially France and Germany, believed that such a move was unwise and blocked Washington’s ambitions. That resistance, however, did not inhibit a Western effort to meddle in Ukraine’s internal affairs to help demonstrators unseat Ukraine’s elected, pro-Russia president and install a new, pro-NATO government in 2014.
Such provocative political steps, though, are now overshadowed by worrisome U.S. and NATO military moves. Weeks before the formal announcement on July 29, the Trump administration touted its plan to relocate some U.S. forces stationed in Germany. When Secretary of Defense Mike Esper finally made the announcement, the media’s focus was largely on the point that 11,900 troops would leave that country.
However, Esper made it clear that only 6,400 would return to the United States; the other nearly 5,600 would be redeployed to other NATO members in Europe. Indeed, of the 6,400 coming back to the United States, “many of these or similar units will begin conducting rotational deployments back to Europe.” Worse, of the 5,600 staying in Europe, it turns out that at least 1,000 are going to Poland’s eastern border with Russia.
Another result of the redeployment will be to boost U.S. military power in the Black Sea. Esper confirmed that various units would “begin continuous rotations farther east in the Black Sea region, giving us a more enduring presence to enhance deterrence and reassure allies along NATO’s southeastern flank.” Moscow is certain to regard that measure as another on a growing list of Black Sea provocations by the United States.
Among other developments, there already has been a surge of alarming incidents between U.S. and Russian military aircraft in that region. Most of the cases involve U.S. spy planes flying near the Russian coast—supposedly in international airspace. On July 30, a Russian Su-27 jet fighter intercepted two American surveillance aircraft; according to Russian officials, it was the fourth time in the final week of July that they caught U.S. planes in that sector approaching the Russian coast. Yet another interception occurred on August 5, again involving two U.S. spy planes. Still others have taken place throughout mid-August. It is a reckless practice that easily could escalate into a broader, very dangerous confrontation.
The growing number of such incidents is a manifestation of the surging U.S. military presence along Russia’s border, especially in the Black Sea. They are taking place on Russia’s doorstep, thousands of miles away from the American homeland. Americans should consider how the United States would react if Russia decided to establish a major naval and air presence in the Gulf of Mexico, operating out of bases in such allied countries as Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.
The undeniable reality is that the United States and its NATO allies are crowding Russia; Russia is not crowding the United States. Washington’s bumptious policies already have wrecked a once-promising bilateral relationship and created a needless new cold war with Moscow. If more prudent U.S. policies are not adopted soon, that cold war might well turn hot.
Conservatives' New Talking Points - How Many Lives Are Too Many?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4B5Pl2AGXQ&ab_channel=TheBenjaminDixonShow
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