“The overall objective of AIR is to make the the CIA stronger, smarter and the most effective intelligence agency in the world. A strong, effective CIA is absolutely fundamental to US National Security and the safety of our citizens.”
Brad Johnson – Retired CIA operations officer and multiple time Chief of Station (COS). President of Americans for Intelligence Reform.
25 JUNE INTEL REPORT
By Barry Webb
EGYPT
The host of the sin’at al-mawt (Industry of Death) program on the Saudi-owned
al-arabiyya TV channel interviewed an Egyptian Counter Terrorism expert on 21 June. The Egyptian guest claimed that ISIS leader al-Baghdadi has recently urged his supporters and cells to escalate their attacks.
In this context, the Egyptian CT expert, in answer to a question as why it is taking so long for Egypt to quell the terrorist uprising in the northern Sinai, also claimed that ISIS is inserting “highly trained operatives” into the Sinai. These operatives are then supplemented and supported by the local terrorist infrastructures already in place.
COMMENT:
That answer still leaves me unsatisfied. The population of the Sinai is not that great that they could continually replace the terrorists being killed by the Egyptian military with an endless supply of new terrorists–even if ISIS is infiltrating a few “highly trained” operatives into the Sinai now and then. My guess is that pro ISIS and Muslim Brotherhood types from among Egypt’s general population are travelling to the Sinai, and then slipping away to join these active terror cells.
ALGERIA
A new development in the Arab Spring 2.0 movement taking place in Algeria is the Berber Amazigh people beginning to raise their voices anew. The Berbers, or Amazigh who speak an Hamitic language they call Tamazigh, are distantly related to the Ancient Egyptians, who also spoke an Hamitic language. The Berber, or Amazigh, people live throughout all of North Africa, in Libya, Algeria, Mali, Niger, Morocco, and Mauritania, with their largest concentration being in Algeria. And, they are the area’s original pre-Islamic inhabitants going back even before Phoenician and Carthaginian times in the 2nd millennium B.C.
Over the years since the Islamic conquests of the 7th century they have all converted to Islam and have been subsumed politically by Arab-Islamic rulers, first by the Caliphate, and more recently by the Arab dictatorships that have gained power in North Africa with the withdrawal of European Colonialism.
During the Algerian war for independence from France, the Amazigh began to dream of a governing system allowing them parity with Arabic-speaking Algerians, only to be squelched once again by Arab overlords. But now, with the Arab Spring 2.0 in full swing, and the days of the Arab military dictatorship numbered, the Amazigh are once again raising their voices not just for language parity, but for a more decentralized state allowing them more autonomy.
IRAN/AFRICA
According to the Saudi-owned al-arabiyya TV, Iran’s IRGC al-quds force is currently training “sleeper cells” in Africa in order to attack Western targets in response to the U.S. boycott. Some of the countries mentioned include Sudan, Chad, and Niger.
COMMENT: This would be in line with Iran’s current policies of:
One, to push the envelope vis-à-vis the U.S. as far as they can, to create as much confrontation as they can without causing a full-scale U.S. military attack. This is supposedly to shore up “patriotism” at home in light of the Mullah’s sagging popularity.
Two: Iran believes that it can avoid a direct attack by the U.S. by using “proxies” to do its dirty work: The Houthis in Yemen, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Hashd (Shi’a militia in Iraq that lobbed missiles near the U.S. embassy in Baghdad), and now “sleeper cells” in Africa are examples of these proxies.
TURKEY
On 21 June al-arabiyya TV reported that Turkey has sent warships into the Aegean Sea “to protect” the two Oil/Gas drilling ships they have operating in waters the economic exploitation of which Cyprus claims was allotted to it by International agreement.
Egyptian media has reported that Egypt is considering boycotting Turkish goods. Popular Egyptian TV talk show host Amru Adeeb has called on Egypt and all of its Gulf allies to boycott Turkey over this and other issues.
Meanwhile, there are indications that the Trump administration may side with the planet’s number one state sponsor of terrorism. The U.S. Ambassador to Greece, Geoffrey Pyatt, in a 15 May 2019 speech at the 7th annual Hellenic Air Force Academy Air Power Conference, made comments that sent shivers up and down all Greek spines. This speech made the Greeks fear that the Trump administration will force Greece and Cyprus to accommodate Turkish drilling in Greek and Cypriot waters.
ANALYSIS:
Mr. Pyatt is an Obama appointee, so there is the possibility that he was exceeding his authority in this speech. However, I personally fear that siding with Turkey against the Greeks would be of a piece not only with the Trump administration’s recent behavior, but with the entire West’s behavior vis-à-vis Turkey over the last several hundred years.
It was Trump, who last December invited Turkey to invade Northern Syria so it could rape, rob, and exterminate all Kurds, Christians, and Yazidis who didn’t want to be ethnic cleansed. It was Trump who tried so hard to sell F-35s and other weaponry to the world’s top state sponsor of terrorism. So, why not let the Turks also abuse the Greeks?
The excuse, of course, is to keep Turkey in NATO, which is, of course, the exact opposite of what we should be doing. Instead of being afraid that Russia might lure Turkey out of NATO, we should be encouraging, and celebrating the Russians pulling Turkey out of NATO. Heck, we should even pay the Russians to pull Turkey out of NATO–since we don’t seem to have either the guts or the brains sufficient to push them out ourselves.
As long as Turkey is a member of NATO Russia is helpless to attack its 800-year worst enemy. A Russian dismemberment of this terrorist-supporting state would be a huge gift not only to the Greeks, but to the world as a whole. But, as long as Turkey is a member of NATO, any Russian attack against it would force the United States and the rest of NATO to come to the aid of this terror state.
There is a misguided view in Washington (on the part of both Republicans and Democrats) that Turkey’s current “rogue” behavior is entirely the fault of its current leader Erdogan, and that once Erdogan is out of the picture, Turkey will return to its “normal” self as a loyal, peace-loving, member of NATO. I hate to disillusion all the inside-the-beltway experts, but Turkey’s current behavior is its normal self. With the break-up of the Soviet Union, and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in all of the surrounding countries (as well as within Turkey itself) turkey can’t help but return to its normal self as a vile, arrogant, expansionist, jihadi state.
For example, in 1974 when the pre-Erdogan Turkey was a “good” NATO member, they invaded Greek inhabited Cyprus which wanted to re-unite with fellow NATO member Greece. The U.S. and the rest of NATO all looked the other way as Turkey raped, murdered, and ethnic cleansed its way across northern Cyprus–irrespective of the fact that the Greeks had been living there for 3,000 years, 2,000 years before the Turks left their yurts in east central Asia.
The point is that seven decades of pretending to be a “good” NATO member cannot erase the seven centuries of Islamist Jihadi expansionism exhibited by Turkey’s Ottoman empire–and the lust to return to those glory days. Furthermore, Turkey has something “going for it” other than Islamofascism, and this is an ideology of Turkish racism that makes Hitler’s Nazism look like boy scout stuff.
Yet, the West has always kowtowed to Turkey. Trump’s predecessor, Obama, openly sought to aide Turkey in reconstituting the Ottoman Empire. During the 19th century Russia tried twice to dismember the Ottoman Empire so as to give the Christians of the Middle East some breathing room, and to give Constantinople back to the Greeks–as well as to eliminate the constant threats to its own southern border. But in each case Britain and other Western powers came to the aide of the “sick man of Europe.”
In the 16th century when the Turks were raping, murdering, and ethnic cleansing their way across Catholic and Eastern Orthodox central Europe (even besieging Vienna in 1529), the protestant states of Western Europe sided with the Turks with no less a person than Martin Luther saying that “the Sultan is far preferable to the Pope.”
The result of European inaction against Turkish aggression, and pro-Turkish bias, is the checkerboard nature of the Balkans which led to the disastrous WWI (which in turn led to WWII), as well as the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
A SAUDI VIEW
Writing in the London-based, and Saudi-owned ash-sharq al-awsat newspaper, the Saudi journalist Mashari azh-Zhaayidi expressed a more optimistic view in his 24 June essay: bi-itijaah seqout mihwar turkiyya w-iiraan w-qatr (towards the fall of the Turkey, Iran, Qatar axis). In this regard he pointed to symbolic “defeats” by each of these terrorism supporting states.
Qatar’s alleged “defeat” came with the victory of General Muhammad wold
al-Qhazawaani in the Mauritanian elections to succeed the previous president Muhammad wold ‘Abd al-‘Aziz. He also pointed to the fact that a couple members of the U.S. Congress have questioned Qatar’s influence in the United States.
Iran’s alleged “defeat” comes at the hand of the U.S. embargo and other pressures being placed on the Iranian regime.
Turkey’s alleged defeat, according to azh-Zhaayidi, came with Erdogan’s AKP candidate losing the recent election for mayor of Istanbul.
ANALYSIS
We would be wise to not breakout the Champaign bottles just yet. While the Mullahs in Iran are losing popular support and are sitting on a deteriorating economy, they are still very capable of causing mayhem around the world with their support of terrorism, and the use of proxies to do their dirty work.
As for Qatar’s “defeat,” the Qatar-supported opposition in Mauritania is threatening an Arab Spring type of resistance. And, while a couple members of the U.S. Congress may have recently been made aware of Qatar’s shady influence on our media and politics, most of their colleagues in both parties actually applaud Qatar’s influence. So, don’t hold your breath over the possibility that anything might be done about it.
Finally, Erdogan’s defeat in the local Istanbul elections do not constitute a rejection of Erdogan’s aggressive foreign policy. These results do not reflect the feeling of the majority of Turks nationwide, nor do they even reflect the feelings of Istanbul voters on anything other than the deteriorating economy in Turkey. Turkey’s Islamofascism and overt racism are still intact, in Istanbul as well as in the countryside.
TURKEY’S DEAD BODY PROBLEM
For most of the past year all we’ve heard from Turkey and their al-jazeera cheerleader is how Saudi Arabia should be severely punished for having killed one of their own (Saudi) citizens (Jamal Khashoqji) on Saudi territory (the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul). Well, now, it so seems that Turkey has killed a Palestinian they had thrown into a Turkish jail in Istanbul.
The Turks claim that he was arrested for spying on behalf of the United Arab Emirates, and that he committed suicide. The story out of Istanbul is that Zaki Mubarak was found hanging from the bathroom door in his one-person cell in Silivri prison when guards arrived to give him food. The Turks said that Zaki Mubarak was a 55-year old retired major general and a “senior intelligence official.” But the dead man’s brother asked how can anyone who doesn’t speak Turkish be a spy in Turkey? The family also soundly rejected the idea that Zaki would commit suicide. This view is supported by Turkey’s refusal to let them see the autopsy report.
COMMENT: I think that Zaki Mubarak really was a spy, and here is why:
Zaki Mubarak’s family has given numerous conflicting accounts as to exactly what Zaki Mubarak did, and why he was in Turkey. His son said he had gone to Turkey to look for a job. A brother, named Zain ad-Din, said that Zaki had gone to Turkey to open up a restaurant. Zain ad-Din, on another occasion said that Zaki was a “respected lecturer.” Another family member said he had a PhD in political science, but his daughter said he told her to “study Chemistry and become a doctor like him.”
ANALYSIS:
The fact that Zaki Mubarak’s family had so many conflicting accounts of what it was that he did is a sure marker that he was in intelligence and wanted his family to be kept in ignorance of that fact . . . for their own safety.
I have pieced together the following from the family’s scattered accounts, and from other sources:
Zaki Mubarak, a resident of Gaza (where his family still lives), was an intelligence agent for the Ramallah-based Palestinian authority until 2007. In 2007 Hamas won the elections in Gaza and brutally cracked down on PA employees and supporters.
So, Zaki Mubarak (an outspoken critic of Hamas) then “escaped” to the UAE. Once in the UAE, rumors have it that he hooked up with one Muhammad Dahlan, a Palestinian who now resides in the UAE.
The Muhammad Dahlan story is a fascinating one that deserves to be summed up here. He started out as a Fatah activist in his youth. As such he was arrested by the Israelis no less than 11 times. During his multiple stays in Israeli prisons he became fluent in Hebrew, and also grew into a more “mature” world view, one that had no room for the radicalism of Hamas.
Resuming his Fatah connections, he became a security wonk and at one time had 20,000 men under his command in Gaza. In 2003, he was appointed as the Palestinian Minister of State for Security, though he was replaced the following year due to PA political infighting.
With the Hamas take-over in 2007-08, Dahlan relocated to the west bank. For the next several years, Dahlan was in and out of PA politics, and in and out of the PA security apparatus.
Throughout his early career in Fatah politics and security matters, he was the darling of the Arab media. He was young, vigorous, handsome, and articulate, in contrast to the gerontocracy that dominates Palestinian politics. Everyone saw him as the leader of the future for the Palestinians. The Bush administration, and the Europeans, applied pressure to have him appointed as the successor to PA leader Mahmoud Abbas.
That may have been too much for Abbas to handle. To make a long story short, Dahlan soon fell out of favor in PA politics. His Palestinian enemies accused him of aiding the Israeli Mossad in taking out a couple of Hamas operatives. He was expelled from Fatah in 2011 when Abbas accused him of murdering former PA leader Yasser Arafat. So, Dahlan hightailed it to the UAE where he became employed as a security and intelligence advisor.
Throughout his career he had been a vitriolic critic of Hamas, calling them nothing but a bunch of “murderers and theives.” He had also shown a willingness to work with Israelis and Americans. He is said to also be close to Egypt’s President as-Sisi, and I suspect that Dahlan may have played a key role in brining the UAE and Israel closer together (even if only under the table).
Which brings us back to Zaki Mubarak. Like Muhammad Dahlan, Zaki Mubarak was an outspoken critic of Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood. As a PA intelligence operative in Gaza (pre-Hamas days), he would have known Muhammad Dahlan very well, in fact probably worked for him and/or with him.
Thus, it should not be surprising that two former PA intelligence and security types, who share a hatred of Hamas, and hold the same “moderate” political views, and who both found exile in the UAE . . . I mean, it would be bizarre if they didn’t hook up in their new digs. I think it safe to say, then, that Zaki Muhammad was a spy, and that he was working for and with Muhammad Dahlan on behalf of the UAE.
Therefore, the Turkish accusation that Zaki Muhammad was in Turkey to spy on Arab Islamist radicals was probably true. Turkey is the world’s number one state sponsor of terrorism, the godfather of ISIS, and the home of thousands of Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood operatives. So, if one wanted to spy on Arab radicals, Turkey is a good place to be–even if he didn’t speak Turkish.
Turkey’s ruling AKP party is a clone of the Muslim Brotherhood, so it would only be natural for them to want to arrest anyone spying on their Arab terrorist clients.
But, what is not natural is murdering captured spies while you’re holding them in prison.
Civilized countries like the U.S. and Russia (and its USSR predecessor) all hold/held captured spies for a possible later trade–because you know that sooner or later your opponent will pick up one or more of your spies. Civilized countries exchange spies. Turkey kills.
Now, with all of Turkey’s creating a storm over Saudi Arabia’s handling of the Khashoqji affair, and the Saudi’s refusal to turn Khashoqji’s body over for an autopsy, guess who refused (for weeks) to turn Zaki Mubarak’s body over to his family so they could have it autopsied? Guess who refused to send an autopsy report to the family?
And this, raises another question. Where is the American media on all of this? The U.S. and European media, and politicians, have all taken Turkey’s, and the Muslim Brotherhood’s side on the Muslim Brotherhood member Khashoqji’s murder (with the exception of President Trump), but are entirely silent on Turkey’s handling of the Zaki Mubarak case.
Could the double standard in U.S. media coverage possibly have to do with Khashoqji’s being a Muslim Brotherhood operative (and therefore being a darling of Qatar and
al-Jazeera), and Zaki Mubarak’s being an opponent of the Muslim Brotherhood (and therefore one of the “bad” guys in the view of Qatar and al-Jazeera)?
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Barry Webb has logged a 25-year career as an Arabist for the NSA, has two MA degrees in related subject matter, and is currently a Senior Fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform. He is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
18 JUNE INTEL REPORT
By Barry Webb
ENERGY NEWS
MBS-Egypt TV talk show host Amru Adeeb, in his show al-hakayya (the story) aired on MBS- Egypt on 15 June, reported that Egypt is becoming an “energy hub for Europe as well as Africa.”
In this context he noted that Egypt has signed a deal to deliver natural gas to Europe, and plans are underway to export electricity directly to Europe. This project will entail laying underwater cables from Egypt to Cyprus, from Cyprus to Crete, and Crete to Greece from where the energy could be fed to all of Europe.
On the same program, the Egyptian talk show host also reported on friction developing between France, Greece, and Cyprus on one side, and Turkey on the other side, over natural gas wells in Cypriot waters. France has a deal with Cyprus allowing it to drill for natural as in Cypriot waters (which Greece also supports, as “Big Brother” to Cyprus). However, as reported previously, Turkey has also started drilling in Cypriot water, and this without permission from the Cypriot government. France then, recently ordered Turkey to withdraw from Cypriot water.
On 16 June, Erdogan, in a speech to supporters, indicated that the entire Eastern Mediterranean was Turkish territorial waters. Erdogan then belittled Cyprus as being inconsequential and threatened to use military force to ensure “Turkish rights.”
COMMENT: Meanwhile, not only is the U.S. completely AWOL on this issue, but it still lusts to sell this #1 state sponsor of terrorism powerful F-35 jets!
Make no mistake about it, Turkey’s annexation of chunks of N.W. Syria and occupation of chunks of N.W. Iraq (all reported earlier), while the U.S. whimpers its approval and the rest of the world looks the other way, has only whetted the appetite of this fascist state to make ever more encroachments on its neighbors’ territories and rights in the same way that Europe’s acquiescence to Hitler’s early belligerence led to WWII.
Turkey’s current ongoing harassments against Greece and its little brother Cyprus needs to be seen in that light, and if the West does not come down hard on Turkey for this, we’ll all be sorry later.
On another matter, on 16 June, Amru Adeeb commented on the UAE’s minister of foreign affairs visiting Egypt to meet with President as-Sisi so as to obtain reassurance on Egypt’s commitment to the defense of the Gulf states. Adeeb was dismissive of that saying that as-Sisi’s position has always been clear: “Egypt is totally committed to the defense of its Gulf Allies. The security of the Gulf states is Egypt’s security.”
COMMENT: The visit of the UAE FM at this time to obtain Egyptian reassurance should be seen in the context of the rising tensions in the Gulf due to Iran’s increasingly belligerent behavior.
Also, on 16 June, Adeeb commented on a report aired on rival al-jazeera where an Egyptian professor cast dispersion on the four rashideen (the first four Caliphs, called the “rightly guided ones by Muslims). According to this professor, these four “rashideen” were not the “rightly guided ones” tradition claims, but were in fact spies for the Quraish which the Quraish had embedded into Muhammad’s entourage.
The MBS-Egypt talk show host Adeeb, who is usually rather animated anyway, really went ballistic over this saying it was going to cause fitna (stark disturbances) all throughout the entire Islamic world. Then he went on the castigate Qatar (which hosts and supports al-jazeera) of not only causing fitna, but of supporting terrorism.
COMMENT: The so-called “four rightly guided Caliphs” are Abu Bakr, Umar, Uthman, and ‘Ali. The real problem that Muslims have with these four rashideen is not so much that the four rashideen might have been spies for the Quraish, but that they never existed.
These four Caliphs, according to Islamic mythology, are the ones who engineered the expansion of the early Caliphate after Muhammad’s death, giving the Arab/Islamic empire control over all of the Levant, Egypt, most of North Africa, and most of what was once the Persian empire.
If that were true, one would expect that the contemporary histories of all of those literate countries would have made some mention of this. After all, we have Egyptian Coptic writings of that era in our museums as well as Syriac-Aramaic histories, Greek-Byzantine histories, Persian histories . . . and yet none of these sources speak a single word of any of these four “rightly-guided ones.” Oh, they do talk about the Arab and “Saracen” conquests of their lands, but nary a word about these supposedly great historical figures.
That is because they never existed! The entire “history” of the origin of Islam and its early expansion was back-written decades later, in the very late 7th and early 8th centuries . . . and it is all, or mostly all, fiction.
Therefore, I submit that this interview on al-jazeera by this Egyptian intellectual is exactly the sort of thing needed by the entire Islamic community. Causing such a ruckus as it did, it might actually lead to increasing numbers of Muslims to begin to question other assumptions “tradition” has foisted upon them. And, these questionings and discussions are exactly what are needed to begin the process of veering towards a reformation/restructuring of Islam–without which Western Civilization will go the way of the Byzantine and Persian empires.
Also, I think that we need to give Egypt’s President as-Sisi some credit, despite his heavy-handedness against the Muslim Brotherhood and other political opposition, for creating an atmosphere where issues of this sort can be broached by intellectuals and public figures without fear of legal repercussions from the state (though such individuals still have to fear assassination from the Brotherhood’s thugs.
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Barry Webb has logged a 25-year career as an Arabist for the NSA, has two MA degrees in related subject matter, and is currently a Senior Fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform. He is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
MUHAMMAD’S NIGHT JOURNEY
By Barry Webb
What it is: The basis of the story is that one night while Muhammad was sleeping in Mecca, the angel Gabriel came and woke him and had him mount the mighty steed Buraq, usually described as a steed with supernatural powers. Buraq took Muhammad to Jerusalem where he found Abraham, Jesus, and other prophets. There Muhammad led these great prophets in prayer. Muhammd then mounted a ladder and climbed all the way into the seven heavens where he once again sees all the prophets, as he ascends through the various levels of heaven. He eventually reached the seventh heaven where he talks with God.
Even though it takes 100,000 light years just to cross our one galaxy of the Milky Way in a starship, Muhammad manages to do the entire universe in just one night . . . while climbing a ladder!
Muhammad’s “night journey,” or laylat al-isra’ w-al-mi’raaj, is one of the most amazing stories found in Islamic culture. As we can see, it is very fanciful, and at times humorous. As a result, many Islamic scholars have discounted it, believing that it is not mentioned in the Qur’an and is nothing but stories that found their way into the ahadeeth (a collection of supposedly sacred sayings of Muhammad inspired by the angel Gabriel). The problem for these Islamic scholars (by trying to deny the night journey) is that it actually is in the Qur’an, or at least sort of.
The 17th chapter (or sura) of the Qur’an is actually titled al-isra’ (meaning the “night journey). The first verse of that sura says: Glorified is he who caused his servant to travel by night from the inviolable Mosque (Mecca) to the furthest Mosque (Jerusalem).
While it is true that no more details of this fantastic journey are given in the Qur’an, Muhammad’s biography by ibn Ishaq (written 130 years after Muhammad’s death) provides several versions of this story, apparently passed down by word of mouth from those who knew Muhammad.
Before I get into the details of this story, I have to say something about that 17th sura which mentions the night journey. Muslim scholars classify it as one of the “middle Meccan” suras. I find that assumption to be outrageous for a couple of reasons:
First, Most authentic (so-called) Mecca suras are written in a childish, choppy style of short two, or three word “sentences,” like children’s nursery rhymes. Whereas all of the Medina suras are written in a flowing, easier to read, prose with (usually) superior syntax and grammar (in the original Arabic). And, the surat al-isra’ is written in the style of the Medina suras.
Second, Muhammad’s final wife, ‘Aisha, is often quoted as a witness who said that “his body never left the room” indicating that it was only a vision, and not a physical journey (even though other accounts do make it out to be an actual physical journey). And, Muhammad did not marry ‘Aisha until late in his life, shortly before he returned to Mecca to conquer it. Meaning that this sura had to be a Medina sura.
Third, this “night journey,” whatever it was, allegedly took place “when Islam had spread in Mecca among the Quraysh and all the tribes” (ibn ishaq, 263, p.181). This sentence describes a time late in Muhammad’s life after he had returned from Medina to conquer Mecca. Because his earlier stay in Mecca only netted him a max of 200 followers, all from among the citizens of Mecca, and none from any of the other tribes–according to the Islamic sources themselves.
FIRST STOP: JERUSALEM
Buraq was truly an amazing animal because each of his strides covered a distance as far as the eye could see. Buraq had also been around for a long, long time, since other prophets before Muhammad had ridden on him. The Arabic word buraaq, is derived from barq meaning “lightning.” So, you might say that the steed Buraq was as fast as lightning.
The story begins while Muhammad was sleeping in the Hijr (refers to Mecca) the angel Gabriel woke him during his sleep. Gabriel then led Muhammad outside and there was good old Buraq. The animal is described as white, half mule and half donkey (an interesting trick since mules are sterile), and it had wings on its sides with which it propelled its feet (an interesting anatomical feature, indeed).
Buraq was more than surprised to see Muhammad. Heavenly steed that he was he “shied” when Muhammad approached him. Gabriel then admonished the white steed saying “Are you not ashamed, O Buraq, to behave in this way? By God, none more honorable before God than Muhammad has ever ridden you before.” The poor animal was so ashamed that he broke out into a sweat and stood still so Muhammad could mount him.
Muhammad and Gabriel then arrived at Jerusalem (none of the accounts ever say what means of transportation Gabriel used to get there). Visiting the temple at Jerusalem Muhammad found Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and a bunch of other prophets, whereupon Muhammad led them all in prayer (showing Islam’s superiority over all other religions).
THE ASCENT TO HEAVEN
A popular folk belief among many Muslims is that Muhammad rode the steed Buraq from Jerusalem up to heaven. However, the accounts given in ibn Ishaq say that Muhammad used a ladder. “A ladder was brought to me finer than any I have ever seen.” Muhammad and Gabriel then mounted it until they came to one of the gates of heaven called the Gate of the Watchers. There they were greeted by an angel called “Isma’il,” and under his command were twelve thousand angels each of which had twelve thousand other angels under their command. That comes to something like 144 Billion angels, an obvious takeoff on the 144,000 of “super saved” individuals of Christian tradition (The Revelation 7:3-8).
As Muhammad travels through this “lowest rung of heaven” he sees sinners being tortured for their sins. In the second heaven he sees Jesus and John the Baptist (but I thought that he had just seen Jesus back down in Jerusalem?).
In the third heaven Muhammad sees Joseph, and in the fourth heaven the prophet Idris. Idris, in Islamic tradition is the first of the prophets after Adam. He is identified with the Enoch of the Bible, and with the Greek Hermes Trismegistus, and the Egyptian god of wisdom Thoth.
On to the fifth heaven Muhammad sees Aaron, brother of Moses. In the sixth heaven is Moses himself. In the seventh heaven he meets Abraham. Abraham then takes Muhammad into “paradise” where he sees “a damsel with dark red lips. And I asked her to whom she belonged, because she pleased me much when I saw her, and she told me ‘Zayd bin Haritha.'”
Now, this is really interesting on a couple of levels. First, because Zayd bin Haritha in real life was Muhammad’s adopted son, and it was Zayd’s wife in real life about whom Muhammad lusted over. So he had a “vision” where Allah tells him that it is permissible for him to marry his adopted son’s wife, and that it would be wrong for him “to deny that which Allah has caused you to desire” (Qur’an 33:37). And, so Muhammad did indeed marry his adopted son’s wife. So, in this trip to heaven we see Muhammad having yet another vision implying sexual lust, over Zayd’s wife.
Second, this idea of entering “paradise” and seeing a beautiful maiden reminds me of the ancient Indo-Iranian myth of the worthy soldier, priest, or ruler being met on the bridge linking earth with “paradise” being met by a beautiful young maiden.
Thirdly, this episode plays into the “babes in heaven” fantasies of Islam which reached its apex in the 72 virgins lore of the Islamic ahadeeth.
FIFTY SHADES OF PRAYER, or IS IT JUST FIVE?
While roaming the 7th heaven, Muhammad comes face to face with God. God tells him that he has to go back down to earth and tell the people that they have to pray 50 times a day. So, Muhammad begins his trek back down through the layers of heaven. As soon as he steps down into the sixth heaven he runs dab smack into Moses and tells Moses that God ordered him to command the people to pray 50 times a day. Moses says that’s way too much. People are weak, they could never stick with that tough of an assignment. So, Muhammad goes back up to the 7th heaven to argue with God and got the number reduced down to 40. Stepping back down to the 6th heaven he told Moses the results, and Moses said, “nah, that’s still to high, go back up there and keep trying.”
So, up and down Muhammad went arguing with God to get the sentence reduced, and then being prodded by Moses to get back up there and tell God that it is still too much. So, finally God agrees to reduce the number of prayer calls to just five times a day.
Thus, Muslims believe that this little story is the reason why Shari’a law demands Muslims to pray five times a day, even though the Qur’an never mentions more than three prayer calls a day. This part of the story was obviously invented to deflect the Muslims’ ability to recognize the real reasons why shari’a demands five prayers a day in conflict with the Qur’an. And, this real reason is that the idea of the five prayer calls a day is one of the many Persian Zoroastrian customs the inventors of Islam imported into their religion.
DANTE’S INFERNO AND ISHTAR’S DESCENT INTO THE UNDERWORLD
In reading Muhammad’s journey through the seven layers of heaven, any student of western literature would easily recognize Dante’s inferno.
But there are even earlier parallels. The Babylonian fertility goddess Isthar’s descent into the underworld where the dead go, for example. First off, Ishtar encounters “gates,” just as Muhammad encountered “gates” up in the various levels of heaven . . . where the dead people go.
Each “gate” that Ishtar goes through, takes her through a layer of the underworld.
But guess how many layers, or “gates” Ishtar encounters and goes through in the underworld? Yeah, that’s right, seven–paralleled by Muhammad’s seven heavens.
In order to enter each new level, Ishtar has to remove an article of clothing until she is completely naked upon reaching the seventh level (a precursor of Salome’s “Dance of the Seven Viels”).
There, Ishtar also has to divest herself of her life (and her body) and face Ereshkigal, the Goddess of the underworld devoid of everything except her spirit. Perhaps presaging Muhammad’s alleged “out of body experience.”
And, of course, the Ishtar story was borrowed from an even earlier Sumerian story of the Sumerian fertility goddess Inanna’s descent into the underworld involving, yes, seven layers.
BIBLICAL PARALLELS
The ladder that Muhammad ascended to heaven on reminded me of the story about “Jacob’s ladder” in Genesis 29:10-13.
A new testament parallel is found in I Peter 3:18-22. In this story Jesus Christ, like Ishtar, is put to death in the flesh, but with his spirit still vibrant “he also went and preached unto the spirits in prison.” What prison are these “spirits” in? The prison of the same underworld that Ishtar and Inanna visited, the 1st layer of heaven that Muhammad visited.
The difference between Jesus and Muhammad here is that Jesus preaches to these sinners to give them one more chance to see the light so they can repent and find a better resting place in the afterworld. Muhammad, on the other hand, simply passes right on by these sinners suffering in torment totally unconcerned about their fate. I think that illustrates the different attitudes of the two religions: Christianity is about helping others. Islam is entirely self-absorbed like its Jew-hating, infidel beheading, sex-slaving “prophet.”
After ministering unto the sinners, Jesus then ascends up to the highest level, to God’s right hand. This is, of course, echoed by Muhammad’s ascending up to the highest level of heaven to be in God’s presence (and Ishtar’s reaching the seventh level of the underworld to face Ereshkigal).
THE BOOK OF ENOCH
But now, we turn to the best example of all, and this is Enoch’s ascension into heaven. Genesis 5:22 mentions that “Enoch walked with God: Enoch walked with God; and he was not; for God took him.” This passage could simply mean that Enoch died. But the full story of Enoch was fleshed out in a collection of apocryphal literatures written in the century before and century after the birth of Christ. The book of Enoch itself is believed to have been written during the earliest years of Christianity, and had a considerable influence on the New Testament writers.
Enoch’s ascension is told in the first book of Enoch: 3-22. Unlike Jesus and Ishtar, but like Muhammad, Enoch did not really have to die because he lived to come back to earth to tell his sons about his journey–just as Muhammad was to return to earth to tell his followers about his journey.
Unlike Muhammad, Enoch did not have to climb all the way up to heaven on a ladder, no, he was born aloft on the wings of angels. Strangely though, Enoch describes 10 heavens, rather than seven. However, at one point of this journey, Enoch is stranded and left alone on the 7th level of heaven. He cries out to God to help him, and shortly who should show up to accompany him through the eighth, ninth, and tenth levels? None other than the angel Gabriel, who was to play the same role for Muhammad six and a half centuries later.
SUMMARY
Muhammad’s much ballyhooed night journey to Jerusalem and ascension to heaven was cobbled together from a long list of previous such journey’s to the seven layers of the afterworld, and the face-to-face meetings with God. Inanna, Ishtar, Enoch, Jesus, and Muhammad all have similar experiences of going through “layers” in the afterworld before meeting up face-to-face with deity.
The Muhammad story itself reads more like a disjointed dream than an actual experience. Even Islamic scholars today are beginning to recognize that the night trip to Jerusalem never did occur. For one thing, in the seventh century it took a full month to travel from Mecca to Jerusalem, so to claim that Muhammad did it one night sort of negates the veracity of the story. Even his wife ‘Aisha claimed that his body never left the room.
Another serious problem with the Muhammad story is the claim that he prayed in masjed al-aqsa (the furthest mosque) in Jerusalem. There were no mosques in Jerusalem until after the Arab conquest in the late 630s. Jerusalem was taken in 638, six years after Muhammad’s death. The masjid al-aqsa was not built until around 700, probably in 705.
Therefore, it is safe to say that this entire story of the night journey to Jerusalem was back-written many decades after Muhammad’s death.
These facts are important for today’s Israeli-Palestinian struggle. This is because the only claim that Arabs and Muslims have to Jerusalem is this alleged tenuous dream of Muhammad which was back-written decades after Muhammad’s death–even if there was such a person a this Muhammad.
For decades I have always said that the only reason Jerusalem is important to Islam is because it is important to Christians and is the only holy site for the Jews. Therefore Islam just had to steal it away.
Muslims can counter by saying that Jerusalem is important because it was the first gibla (meaning the city that Muslims must face when they pray). In fact, some of the early “mosques” are alleged to be oriented towards Jerusalem instead of Mecca.
But this is because the Arabian portion of Islam evolved out of the Jewish Ebionite Christianity which was popular in Arabia during the 5th and 6th centuries. And, the “northern” portion of Islam was cobbled together from elements of the Christianity of the followers of Bishop Arius, the Gnostics, and Talmudic Christianity, all of which, like the Jewish-Christian Ebionites in Arabia, would have venerated Jerusalem as the holy city. Besides, Mecca did not become an important site in Islam until at least 630 when Muhammad conquered it, if one believe the traditional Islamic interpretation of Islam’s origins. In the skeptic’s view, that shown by history, linguistics, and archaeology, that of the “out-of-Arabia” origin of Islam, Mecca was not chosen as Islam’s holy site until sometime around 700 A.D.
Ironically, the “out-of-Arabia” view of the origins of Islam gives Muslims a much stronger connection to Jerusalem than does their own made up, back-written stories about Muhammad’s night journey and ascension to heaven.
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Barry Webb logged a 25-year career as an Arabist for the National Security Agency, has two MA degrees in related subject areas, is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform www.intelreform.org, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA Spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
28 MAY Arabic News update
By Barry Webb
SUDAN
The vice president of the military junta now controlling Sudan, General Muhammad Hamdan was recently interviewed by a correspondent from Egypt’s al-ahram newspaper. During the interview General Hamdan thanked Egypt for its role in terms of siding with the “revolution.”
Based on this interview, and a host of other news items that have come in regarding the Sudan situation, the background to this is that the former dictator al-Basheer, in addition to being a clowning thug, was also pushing the Islamist/Muslim Brotherhood/Erdogan agenda in Sudan. There is no way that Egypt could sit by and watch Turkey gain an ever stronger foothold in its southern neighbor. So, I suspect that Egypt had a lot to do with stirring up, and supporting, the demonstrations that brought al-Basheer down.
Other news reports have shown that leading junta members have also indicated they want positive relations with Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E., key allies of Egypt and important sources of funds for reconstruction.
However, the Junta has also notified Turkey that they can keep its holdings on Sudan’s Suakin Island. The island once hosted an Ottoman naval base, and supporting entities. Erdogan considers these installations to be a “museum” of Ottoman history. An agreement was signed last December to allow Turkey to restore the naval base and pertinent buildings so as to make it a “tourist” destination. However, there are accounts that Turkey plans to dock naval ships there as well as civilian vessels. That could become an issue given the Sudanese Junta’s open attempts to forge ties with Egypt and its Gulf allies.
During his al-ahram interview, Gen. Hamdan noted that there are divisions within the “freedom and change” protest movement. In this regard he indicated that “foreign” elements are meddling with certain factions in the movement.
Other reporting out of Egypt points the finger at Turkey for smuggling weapons into Sudan to support its factions there, and at Qatar for providing “money laundering” services for the pro-Brotherhood/Erdogan factions.
Gen. Hamdan stated in his al-ahram interview that he is a “target” of the “deep state.” Yes, he actually used that uniquely Trumpian term, the Arabic of which is “ad-dawlah al-‘ameeqah.” He supported this contention by pointing out that since al-Basheer had ruled for thirty years, he had plenty of time to make sure his cronies were well entrenched in the military and all branches of the civilian government.
‘Abd al-Ghufar Shaker, also writing in al-ahram, claims that the “deep state” is also embeded in the 10-member ruling military council and that it is trying to so divisions within the protest movement to pave the way for bringing back the dictatorship to restore law and order. Mr. Shaker also noted additional challenges facing Sudan in the aftermath of al-Basheer’s removal, and foremost of these include the tribal nature of the country and its huge geographic size, being the largest single geographic entity on the African continent. He would not be surprised if some of the regions broke off like the primarily Christian Southern portion already has done.
He blamed the al-Basheer regime for having cultivated and promoted ethnic difference among the people, which has led to forms of discrimination.
LIBYA
The Saudi-owned al-arabiyya TV channel has reported that Turkey recently shipped 40 armored vehicles to the Islamist-supported Sirraaj government in Tripoli, for use against the Gen. Haftar forces. This Turkish shipment docked at the harbor in Masrattah, to the east of Tripoli. Militia from Marattah have also joined in the fight against the Haftar forces besieging Tripoli.
The Turkish arms shipments represent a flagrant violation of the UN “embargo” against any weapons shipments going to either side in this dispute. Unfortunately, no one in the international community seems to give a hoot what Turkey does.
Another report from al-ahram this week quotes a “Gallup” poll showing that people in the Middle East region believe that the ongoing civil war in Libya will spill over into the neighboring countries (which would include Tunisia, Algeria, Chad, Niger, Sudan, and Egypt, all of which share a border with Libya).
The pro-MB al-jazeera TV station is claiming that two Russian-built IL-76 transport aircraft registered to Khazakhistan, but owned by an Emirati company are making regular flights bouncing around between Egypt, Israel, and Jordon allegedly to deliver arms and/or troops to the Haftar forces besieging Libya. If true, this report would add Israel, Jordan, Khazakhistan, and possibly Russia to the ever growing list of countries getting involved in one way or another in the Libya quagmire.
MORE TURKEY
Al-arabiyya TV has also reported that the oil rig Turkey has set up off the coast of Cyprus, in Cypriot-claimed waters has already begun drilling. This is another flagrant violation of international norms committed by Turkey, but ignored by the international community. Cyprus’s allies of Egypt and Israel are now too distracted with hot wars in their own backyards to want to take on Turkey, and Cyprus’s big brother Greece certainly can’t do it alone.
This is yet another example of NATO member Greece being left to cry in the wind alone when fellow NATO member Turkey tramples its rights.
ALGERIA
After weeks of surprisingly well-disciplined, peaceful demonstrations against the “establishment” ruling regime–demonstrations that have continued long after the aging former President Boutiflika stepped down–al-Jazeera TV has reported that violence between the police and the demonstrators has broken out. The demonstrators are demanding that all vestiges of the “establishment” be ousted. Yet, they are also demanding that “democratic” elections be held immediately without offering any mechanism for those elections to be sponsored, conducted, and voted counted afterwards.
COMMENT: The Algerian situation is developing into a recipe for the “wrong” elements in the protest movement to take over (i.e. the pro-Turkey Islamist).
Sudan is looking more and more like a recipe for dismemberment with Turkey, Chad, Egypt and its allies each carving out their own niches based on tribal divisions.
The Libyan Civil war sees no quick ending, and will likely spill over into its neighboring countries as mentioned above.
The greater Middle East conflagration that everyone hopes won’t happen, may already be happening under our noses. Add to the Libyan situation the worsening developments in Algeria, Sudan, and the potential for spillover into Libya’s other neighbors, plus Egypt’s ongoing war against Islamist in the Sinai, the full scale war in Yemen which is now affecting Saudi and Emirati cities and installations, the on-going civil war in Syria, with the outside powers of Russia, Iran, and Turkey intervening with often opposing objectives, then throw in the resurgence of ISIS in Iraq, as well as Syria . . . stir, and then add Turkey’s infringement on Cypriot waters for oil production . . . looks like we’re already there. And, that’s even without talking about the Iran vs. U.S. scenario.
LYONS, FRANCE
The Lyons, France bomber has been identified by French authorities as a computer student from Algeria. He had been in the country only a few months.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA and is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform at www.intelreform.org. He is also the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
IT’S BA-A-ACK! TWA 800:
From Mehrabad to Montoursville with love?
By Barry Webb
On 20 May 2019 President Donald Trump held a rally in the tiny Pennsylvania town of Montoursville. This raises the obvious question of . . . why? Trump is famous for basking in the adoration of huge crowds of 20,000-30,000 for his rallies. Montoursville has a total population of 5,000.
In the special election held the following day, Republican Fred Keller won by a comfortable 2-1 margin. He obviously did not need Trump’s help. Besides, there are many other towns in Pennsylvania’s 12th district larger than Montoursville, including the well-known Williamsport. But Trump choose Montoursville. Why?
Could TWA 800 have had anything to do with it?
On 17 July 1996, 16 French-club students from Montoursville High School and five of their chaperones boarded the Boing 747-131 for the TWA 800’s transatlantic flight destined for Paris and Rome. Twelve minutes later the plane exploded apart over the Atlantic ocean at nearly 14,000 feet, just off East Moriches on Long Island. In all, there were 230 passengers, four pilots, and 14 flight attendants on board. There were no survivors.
After four years of salvage, recovery and investigations, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the cause of the crash was a “defect” in the insulation around certain unspecified wires which allowed a “short” in those wires to ignite the “vapors” in the empty fuel tank causing the whole plane to explode.
Case closed, right?
Then why did Trump choose to hold a rally in tiny Montoursville, instead of the much larger nearby Williamsport–and in a district in which the Republican candidate was going to win hands down anyway?
Could it be because virtually no one on this planet believes the “official” explanation of what happened–including some of the investigators themselves?
Here is why so many people believe that the “official” explanation was a “cover-up” by the Clinton administration and the “Deep State” so the American public wouldn’t panic during the last few months before a presidential election:
An air traffic controller at NY TRACON allegedly claims that radar “indicated vertical movement intersecting TWA 800,” and then TWA 800 disappeared from the radar screen. Numerous eye witnesses claim to have seen a “streak of light,” or “vapor trails” ascending from the ocean towards the plane, striking the plane, and then the plane exploded. Two weeks later the FBI allowed the New York Times to interview only one of the 144 (at that time) witnesses, and he was one who only saw it “out of the corner of his eye.” The NTSB eventually identified 258 eyewitnesses who had allegedly seen a glowing object streaking towards the aircraft. At least 58 had followed the object from the horizon (i.e. from the ocean). The NYT interviewed none of those 258.
Here is another interesting factoid. The deputy Attorney General who oversaw the investigation, Jamie Gorelilck, left the Justice Department in 1997 to take a job with Fannie Mae, the government-run home loan outfit. She would make more than $25 million dollars over the next six years. A government worker would be lucky to make 1/20 of that amount in six years. She also turned up in 2004 as the primary author of the highly flawed 9/11 report.
Interesting?
Trump’s visit to tiny Montoursville, Pennsylvania has brought all of the old conspiracy theories back out of the closet.
There have been theories galore: Everything from an exploding meteorite coming apart just at the right time and place to intercept the aircraft, to a U.S. Navy training exercise gone awry, to a bomb placed on board, to an al-Qaeda strike as a prelude for 9/11.
But there is one rather obvious explanation that no one has mentioned yet–at least not on this side of the Atlantic–not during the original investigation two decades ago, and not now.
THE IRANIAN CONNECTION
On 03 July 1988 an Iran Air Airbus A300, flight #655 took off from Iran’s Mehrabad International Airport in Tehran, Iran. It stopped at Bandar Abbas International airport in Bandar Abbas, Iran to pick up more passengers before taking off again for its destination of Dubai International Airport on the other side of the Persian/Arab Gulf.
Personnel aboard the USS Vincennes operating in the area thought that the Iranian airliner was a military aircraft on a hostile mission (or so the official explanation goes), so they shot it down. 274 civilian passengers and 16 crew members all lost their lives that day.
When TWA was brought down eight years later, most everybody in the Middle East automatically assumed that it was retaliation for Iran Air flight #655. That possibility was never entertained on this side of the Atlantic. After all, if it indeed was a missile, the most likely weapon was a Stinger missile which can be fired by a single person holding a hand-held launching device, and which was designed to bring down aircraft at up to 15,700 feet, and everyone just “knew” that Iran did not possess Singer missiles–even though we had donated thousands of them to al-Qaeda’s MKK precursor in Afghanistan during their war against the Soviets in the 80s.
But, no way Iran could have Stinger missiles and be responsible for TWA 800, right?
So, why did Trump decide to visit tiny Montoursville now?
Could it have anything to do with the increasing tensions between Iran and the U.S.? The war drums that are beating in both capitals? Could it be that as tensions rise, more evidence keeps spilling into the public domain about Iranian cooperation with al-Qaeda and complicity in 9/11 (meaning that Iran likely had all the Singer Missiles it wanted by the mid-1990s), and Trump is building a case for war against Iran?
Or, could Trump only be sending a message for entirely domestic reasons?
–Michael E. Horowitz, the current Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Justice (of which the FBI is a part) is currently conducting investigations into DOJ and FBI “improper actions” regarding the Hillary Clinton e-mail scandal and the FISA abuses which led to the Mueller investigation of Trump.
–John W. Huber, the U.S. Attorney for the district of Utah, is also reportedly still conducting an investigation into broader “Deep State” abuses involved with the Trump dossier, alleged “spying” on the Trump campaign, etc., and is allegedly coordinating his efforts with Inspector General Horowitz. Their report is expected to be released soon.
–Republican Senator Lindsay Graham has been leading a Senate investigation into alleged “Deep State” abuses regarding all of these issues.
–Current U.S. Attorney General, William Barr, has recently announced that he has assigned a “team” to investigate CIA and FBI “Counter Intelligence spying” on the Trump campaign.
–Trump has long been threatening to release the FISA warrant applications which allegedly would show fraud on the part of a number of FBI and DOJ officials. Rumors have it that this will be done soon.
So, could Trump’s visit to Montoursville be a message that investigations into “Deep State” corruption and cover-ups are reaching clear back into the 1990s?
Above, we mentioned a Jamie Gorelick, who oversaw the grossly flawed TWA 800 investigation, and was the primary author of the flawed 9/11 commission report of 2004.
The head of the CIA during the time of the investigation of the TWA 800 takedown, having been appointed in 1997, was Clinton dandy George Tenet.
Guess who was the head of the CIA when 9/11 happened? That’s right, George Tenet.
This is important because the upper echelons of the CIA had more than ample evidence in the weeks leading up to 9/11 that al-Qaeda was going to attack sites in Washington and New York City in early September (actually one piece of evidence even pinpointed the date). All that evidence was discounted because much of it entailed Iranian cooperation with al-Qaeda, and the upper echelons of the CIA refused to believe that Shi’a Iran and Sunni al-Qaeda could ever have anything to do with each other.
Guess who Tenet’s right-hand man for Counter Terrorism and Middle East issues was?
Clinton Crony John Brennan.
Yes, the same John Brennan who spearheaded (along with Robert Mueller) efforts to abolish all training materials and delete all data bases where any connection was made between any sort of “Islam,” (even “radical Islam), and any sort of “jihad,” including terrorism. These actions were taken at the behest of entities which are part of the terrorist organization Muslim Brotherhood’s tentacles in the United States–yes that Muslim Brotherhood which is a declared enemy of the United States, thus making Brennan’s and Mueller’s actions a clear case of treason according to Article III section 3 of the U.S. Constitution.
Their treasonous actions by the way, led to the deaths of more Americans than did the downing of TWA 800.
So, now, as these investigations into “Deep State” misbehaviors, frauds, and crimes (up to and including treason) are intensifying, increasing numbers of fingers are being pointed to the likely instigator and ringmaster for all of the efforts against the Trump campaign and Trump personally. And, guess who this ringmaster is turning out to be?
John Brennan.
Interesting, no?
For those of us who are spectators of the blood sport of full contact politics, and who get goose bumps of joy from watching “paybacks” . . . fasten your seat belts. (Not that Trump every enjoys punching back at his attackers). I have a very sneaky feeling that Trump’s rally in little Montoursville last Monday was a signal that the fun is about to begin. Or so we can hope.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA, is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform (www.intelreform.org), and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His personal website is: www.barrywebbauthor.com.
21 MAY Arabic News update
By Barry Webb
On 17 May the al-arabiyya TV program Sin’at al-Mawt interviewed two experts on Iranian affairs. The topic of the program was the attack against the oil tankers off the coast of the U.A.E. near Fujairah.
The Gulf-based expert believed that the operation against the oil tankers required the technologies and techniques of a state actor, and were not representative of a terrorist group like ISIS or the Houthis. However, later in the program he admitted that the Houthis could have done it after receiving training and equipment from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The Arabic-speaking, but London-based, expert noted intercepts of Iranian leaders talking about “doing something.” In this context he mentioned the head of the IRGC, the head of Iranian intelligence, the top figures from Iranian military and government discussing what they should do. The bottom line, is that the consensus settled on the idea of setting mines near Fujairah.
The Gulf-based expert then added that “Iran, the Houthis, Hizbollah, Iraqi Shi’a militia, they are all one,” meaning that even if the Houthis did it, they were acting on behalf of Iran. He added that none of these groups does anything without directives from Tehran.
The London-based expert said that the Iranians had no desire, or intentions, to attack military forces, because that would bring about a sure reprisal. But by attacking oil tankers they hoped to be able to generate enough international pressure against the United States to force it to lift the embargo.
Comment: In other words, Iran was saying that “if we can’t sell our oil to the outside world, we have the capability to prevent others from also selling their oil to the outside world.
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Dr. Halah Mustapha, writing for al-ahram’s editorial page on 18 May 2019, noted that Iran has released some of their “thought prisoners” in an attempt to win back some of their deteriorating public support. She also believes that should a war start up between Iran and the U.S. that it would spread, involving other countries, in the region and internationally.
She also pointed out that the U.S. has the upper hand in this confrontation and/or any potential war that might break out, and that in the end, Iran’s only viable option will be to sit down and renegotiate with Trump.
In closing she added that Trump will likely get re-elected.
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On 20 May, the Dubai-based, Saudi-owned TV channel al-arabiyya noted that Ahwaz Arabs have reported that Iran has moved S-300 missiles in to the Ahwaz region.
Comment: The Ahwaz region is in Iran’s far west, and is adjacent to Iraq and the Tigris River region. Its population are mostly Arabs, and Saudi Arabia has been cultivating them for years. The S-300 missiles are a Russian-built anti-aircraft system that pre-date the S-400 system that Russia is selling to Turkey.
This move, and this news, tell us a few things. One, is that by moving these missiles closer to Iraq, Iran might be expecting American air raids to be coming from the West. Two, Iran expects that war is imminent. And, three, the fact that it was a Saudi TV station that reported this news, and that the intelligence came originally from “Ahwaz Arabs,” indicates that the Saudis likely have “humint” sources embedded within the Ahwazi Arabs inside Iran.
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On 20 May al-Arabiyya also reported that Turkey has been selling “phony real estate contracts” to Saudis. In other words, the Turks have been pitching grandiose real estate projects in Turkey to wealthy Saudi investors who have forked over huge sums for these projects only to find that the projects did not exist. (See the article below for more on Turkey’s shenanigans.
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Hisham Nijar, writing for Egypt’s al-ahram editorial page on 19 May, believes that the current Arab Spring 2.0 taking place in Sudan, and which brought down the al-Basheer regime was a huge blow to Erdogan’s Ottoman Empire scheme similar to the dethronement of Muhammad Mursi’s brief Muslim Brotherhood (MB) regime in Egypt (2012-2013).
He supports his contention that the al-Basheer regime was a MB regime and a tool of Erdogan’s by the fact that al-Basheer and several of his cronies were received warmly in Istanbul when they escaped the wrath of the Sudanese people–along with stolen money. He added that this pilfered money will be pumped into the “black market” organization that Erdogan and “those close to him” operate all over the world–which includes money laundering, smuggling, suspicious deals, and the financing of terrorism.
In Nijar’s view, now that it looks like the Sudanese people, as exemplified by the “freedom and change” forces, and the army, are reaching agreement about the future of Sudan–a future that calls for it to return to the (moderate) Arab fold and to distance itself from the MB-Erdogan circles–Erdogan is in a real stew. Mr. Nijar then, believes that Erdogan will try to get the Sudanese people to lose faith in their revolution and turn back to the ikhwani (MB)/”Erdogani” solution for stability. Mr. Nijar therefore blames
al-Basheer holdovers in the army and Erdogan for the murder of the strikers as part of their plan to instill dispair in the hearts of the Sudanese people.
Only time will tell whether or not Mr. Nijar is correct in his assumption that the exile of the thug al-Basheer really means a new beginning for Sudan and a defeat for the Erdogan and Brotherhood axis. Or, will the Islamists end up running the show anyway?
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabist for the NSA, is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform (www.intelreform.org), and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
LEAKED DOCUMENTS MAKE CLEAR QATAR’S FINANCING OF MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATIONS IN CANADA
Posted on www.ahram.org.eg on 18 May 2019.
Filed by Islam ‘Azzam.
(Translated from the Arabic by Barry Webb)
The book Qatar Papers was recently published in France by the authors Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot. This book contains documents that were leaked from a Qatari government office, and it nails down the names and dates and conclusion of the direct payments by Qatar to organizations connected with the international Muslim Brotherhood in Europe. Moreover, the book also noted the existence of similar documents pertaining to North America. So, this was the thread that Tom Quiggen, the Canadian researcher and author, grasped on to in order to be able to obtain a single copy of these documents. And, according to what Quiggen affirmed to al-ahram, it is these documents that affirm the Qatari government’s payments to Muslim Brotherhood-linked organizations in Canada and the United States.
In spite of the fact that Quiggen, so far, has refused to give the details about the names of the Canadian persons and entities connected with facilitating the arrival of these funds for the Brotherhood organizations in Canada, and these are organizations some of which the Canadian government had previously placed on lists of banned groups and organizations and which finance terrorist organization outside of Canada, nonetheless Quiggen agreed to grant al-ahram the right to publish some of the information which he obtained in the documents.
Quiggen affirmed from the beginning that the documents make it clear, with evidence, what he had previously gathered from his previous researches connected with eight organizations that are calling for “political Islam” in Canada. Moreover, the documents affirm the involvement of nine prominent Canadian politicians in the facilitation of millions of dollars to enter Canada to finance organizations that publicly encourage violence. The documents point out that the Canadian politicians embroiled in this belong to the three major political parties in Canada, and these are the Liberal Party, the opposition Conservative Party, and the Progressive Democratic Party.
As for the organizations that have obtained financing from Qatar, Quiggen affirmed that all of them are organizations specific to Islamic cultural centers, mosques, and Islamic schools in all of the Canadian provinces. But the most important thing is that these organizations do not at all deny their relationship with political Islam both within Canada and overseas. But what is most astonishing is that these organizations, via their official websites in the English language, are calling for “radical Islam” and encouraging the killing of non-Muslims, as well as domestic violence. And, among these documents is a notorized document for financing in Canada one of the projects Yusuf al-Qaradhawi presented to the Qatari government.
In asking Quiggen as to the possibility of the Canadian government being aware of the existence of these documents, Quiggen answered that they most certainly do know about them. So, it is sufficient to say that one of the political names involved in the facilitation of the entry of these monies into Canada is none other than a current minister in the Federal government.
When al-ahram asked Quiggen as to whether Canadian law does not prohibit the foreign financing of civilian organizations, Quiggen said that that is true, but it does prohibit the financing of extremist organizations, and it prohibits the financing of organization that might have some relationship with terrorism.
As for what Quiggen thought the Canadian government’s reaction would be after the documents are published, he expressed his belief that the preliminary response would be an attempt to discredit the allegations and cast doubt on the credibility of the documents, but after that they will have to admit to the fact that millions of dollars have entered Canada to finance extremism and terrorism.
He added that Canada is a Democratic country that holds in high esteem the value of personal freedoms for the enacting of laws for monitoring the financing of groups suspected of links to terrorism and extremism. And, it is incumbent upon the government to take several measures for monitoring this financing and to identify their sources and to ban them if the matter requires it. This is what the previous government did, but with the arrival of the current federal government four years ago these measures have been negated for unknown reasons.
Quiggen said that there was a law drafted to ban the financing of religious organizations by entities outside of Canada but the discussion of this law in Parliament was cancelled in spite of the fact that it was a logical matter and internationally acceptable. For example, if Canada wanted to finance the construction of a mosque or a church in a country like Qatar, the Qatari law would prohibit that.
What Tom Quiggen said about the way the current Canadian government deals with organizations that support political Islam and calls for violence raises a lot of questions, especially given what we know about one of the big Canadian Engineering companies in the City of Montreal, namely the company implicated in the scandal of the Canadian prime minister being dragged into the investigation proceedings regarding corruption which the judiciary launched some months ago concerning the activities of this company when it sold one of its headquarters in a commercial neighborhood in the center of Montreal to the Canadian institute for Islamic culture in a deal completely financed by Qatar al-khairiyya (Qatar Charity) which is a Qatari government entity. The value of the deal approached 11 million Canadian dollars.
Perhaps this matter is purely coincidental, but if we take into consideration that the company’s activities depend upon its participation in numerous projects in the Middle East and the Arab Gulf area, then the matter stirs numerous suspicions regarding the current prime minister’s support for this specific company.
COMMENT: Egypt’s state sponsored newspaper al-ahram was interested in this story because Egypt is trying to exterminate the Muslim Brotherhood both domestically and internationally. Much of the monies that Qatar sends to MB affiliates in the U.S., Canada, and Europe end up financial illegal MB activities in Egypt. As if to punctuate this fact, a tourist bus was bombed this weekend near the pyramids.
On the U.S. front, we can all hope that the Trump administration can use these documents proving that CAIR, ISNA, etc. are being financed by a foreign government as the smoking gun needed to shut them down. As for Canada, as long as the Obama clone not so true dough is sitting in the PM office . . . lot’s of luck.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabist for the NSA, is currently a senior fellow in Americans for Intelligence Reform www.intelreform.org, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
CONGRESS SURRENDERS TO JIHAD
By Barry Webb
The U.S. Congress has taken two actions this week which indicates that they have become Muslim Brotherhood (MB) occupied territory. Not that the MB and/or its offshoots like ISIS and al-Qaeda are sitting in the Congressional chambers aiming their AK-47’s at the honorable members. No, that is not really needed—not when the members themselves or so willing to do the jihad’s bidding on their own accord.
The first piece of idiocy was the discussion about bringing Libyan General Khalifa Haftar to the States to try him as a war criminal.
Their alleged justification for exercising U.S. jurisdiction on a General on the other side of the planet is based on the belief that Haftar might somehow hold U.S. citizenship.
Why do they think General Haftar is a war criminal? Because the Muslim Brotherhood/Qatar told them so (via al-Jazeera and the Washington Post, which takes dictation from al-Jazeera on Middle East issues).
What is happening is that while General Haftar’s forces are bombing and shelling legitimate military targets, civilians are being killed. Did we not kill a few civilians during WWII? War is dirty. But it is even dirtier now in the Middle East. Here is why:
Ever notice why the Israelis are accused of war crimes every time they try to defend themselves against Hamas attacks? This is because Hamas stashes all of their weapons in schools, hospitals, etc., and fire their missiles from heavily populated areas. They’ve even been known to round up children and force them to gather around obvious targets, such as missile launching mechanisms. Then, when the Israelis strike the offending legitimate military target, the brave Hamas “fighters” film it on their cellphones as the children are being blown apart. They then upload these images to the internet. Al-jazeera blast it all over the world, then CNN, Washington Post, New York Times and the usual suspects here in the states dutifully do the rest.
The Houthis have been doing the same thing in Yemen causing world public opinion to come down on the Saudis for “war crimes.”
LIBYA
The city in Libya that general Haftar is attacking is controlled by radical Islamist militias composed of al-Qaeda, ISIS, and Ansar ash-Shari’a personnel. Does anyone seriously think that they aren’t doing the same thing that the Houthis and Hamas do in terms of making sure that there are plenty of civilian casualties for al-Jazeera to show the world?
General Haftar brought his troops up to Tripoli from eastern Libya precisely because of the terrorist militias that control the place. We should be rooting him on and even offering him help—even though our spineless European friends kid themselves into believing that the figure-head Sirraaj “government” in Tripoli is actually worth preserving.
The July 2018 issue of the “close to MI6” British magazine, Eye Spy, has also noted that “Analyst warn that he (Sirraaj) remains largely a figurehead with little control over militias” (page 13).
The same issue of the same magazine wrote that even though former dictator Qadhafi halted his nuclear program in 2003 (when he saw what the U.S. did to his buddy Saddam Hussein), he failed to eliminate his weapons grade yellow cake.
“As for Libya, the general consensus of the intelligence community is that a great many nuclear materials have not been fully recovered in Libya” (Eye Spy, p. 13).
To sum up, General Hafter is not only trying to liberate the citizens of Tripoli from the criminal grips of the terrorist gangs, he is also trying to prevent any of these militia groups from getting their hands on Qadhafi’s left over nuclear materials.
So, by our beloved and erudite members of Congress talking about shutting Haftar down over “war crimes,” they are essentially voting to let al-Qaeda and the like have at those nuclear materials, as well as the Uranium mines that the Iranians were trying to get their fingers into as early as 2015 (Eye Spy, p. 12).
TURKEY
The other bit of Shari’a compliance our honorable never-take-any-payments-from-Qatar members of Congress exhibited this week was when they invited Jamal Khashoqji’s fiancé to come and testify before the Democrat-dominated House Foreign Affairs committee.
I have reported before that the Democrats were going to try every trick in the book to use Trump’s cordial relations with Saudi Arabia and his lack of over-bearing enthusiasm for terrorism sponsor Qatar as a possible tool with which to pummel Trump, if not to bring him down, now that their long-hoped for Mueller report has fizzled out. This most recent stunt has to be seen in that light.
Khashoqji, a high school best buddies with Usama bin Laden, was ten times more dangerous. The two believed in the same goals, Shari’a for all, and exterminate the Jews. They just followed different paths with Khashoqji’s path being far more subtle, hence the greater danger.
The fact that he was working for Qatari intelligence as well as Turkish intelligence and the terrorist organization the Muslim Brotherhood should have been enough to warrant him the same consideration we gave to his buddy Usama bin Laden.
The Saudis, who felt threatened by Khashoqji’s ambitions for regime change, certainly thought so. So they took him out. We took out Usama bin Laden. At least the Saudis did it on what amounted to Saudi national territory (Embassies and Consulates are considered to be the actual soil of the country running the embassy or consulate).
The only people making a big deal out of the Khashoqji affair are the #1 and #3 top state sponsors of terrorism, Turkey and Qatar, terrorist group MB, al-Jazeera, and their puppets in the West (MSM).
The Congress persons wasting Congressional time and taxpayers funds for this circus should be exposed and censored.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabist for the NSA, is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform (www.intelreform.org), and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is: www.barrywebb3@hotmail.com
May 13, 2019 ARABIC NEWS SUMMARY
By Barry Webb
EXPLOSIONS DAMAGE FOUR TANKERS OFF UAE COAST
A Norwegian tanker, a UAE tanker, and two Saudi tankers were reportedly damaged by unspecified acts of terrorism off the coast of Fujairah, one of the Emirates of the United Arab Emirates. The Fhujairah port is just outside of the Straights of Hurmuz and is a hub for picking up oil from the UAE and portions of Saudi Arabia.
Talking heads on al-Jazeera have speculated that either the culprit is likely a party that is trying to edge the U.S. into a war with Iran. In this regard they mentioned Israel and/or regional parties such as Saudi Arabia or the UAE itself.
My view is that since the damage was so minimal that there were no casualties and no leakage of oil, that it was likely not a state actor. Most likely a “lone wolf” or two acting on behalf of ISIS, or the Houthis of Yemen, against whom Saudi Arabia and the UAE are fighting.
ANOTHER BODY DISAPPEARS IN TURKEY
For most of the past year, Turkey has been trying to use the Khashoqji affair to turn the world against Saudi Arabia. And, Democrats have been trying to use it with which to demonize Trump because he has maintained cordial relations with Saudi Arabia (the alleged guilty party), and for being “not friendly enough” with Qatar.
In this context, the Turks have been constantly berating Saudi Arabia for not releasing an autopsy report, and for not turning the body over to the family for burial. The Saudis are claiming that they don’t know what happened to the body, after all, Kashoqji was killed in Turkey.
Well, now, great loyal NATO ally that the Turkey is, they have a missing body scandal of their own they are trying to ignore.
A young Palestinian man named Zaki Mubarrak, who once worked for the Palestinian Intelligence services but left the Gaza strip in 2007 after Hamas seized control, was recently arrested by Turkish authorities under the accusation of spying for the U.A.E. (Although, other rumors speculate that he was in Istanbul investigating the Khashoqji affair.)
The Turks then reported that he had committed suicide in prison, by hanging himself. The family claims he was murdered in prison.
The Turks have refused to return the body to the family for burial, and have refused, even, to hand over the results of the autopsy—exactly what they’ve accused the Saudis of in the Khashoqji affair.
.
SUDAN
Members of deposed and jailed former dictator al-Basheer’s family have fled to Istanbul to avoid a similar fate.
As the Arab Spring there begins to look more and more like a Turkey/Muslim Brotherhood run show, Egyptian, Saudi, and UAE support is beginning to solidify around the military junta currently in charge.
The Military junta, in turn, has forced into retirement personnel most closely associated with the former al-Basheer regime in an attempt to present a new face to the public, and to garner more foreign support.
LIBYA
General al-Mismari, the spokesman for General Haftar’s movement, has accused the Sirraaj government in Tripoli (that it is trying to topple) of using Turkish drones to attack Haftar’s forces.
Al-Mismari has accused Turkey of supplying these drones via the port at Masratta, Libya, and demands a UN investigation.
There is a theoretical international ban on arms shipments to either of the sides in Libya’s civil war, but Hafter’s forces have been receiving aid from Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Egypt, while the planet’s top three state sponsors of terrorism, Turkey, Iran, and Qatar, have been supplying aid, and jihadi fighters to the Sirraaj government. So, al-Mismari’s complaints about Turkish drones are likely to have no effect.
QATAR
Human Rights watch has criticized Qatar for withholding citizenship from the entire tribe of
al-Ghufraan, even though this tribe is one of the original inhabitants of the peninsula. The current ruling click in Qatar withdrew the citizenship of this tribe shortly after the coup in 1996 that brought this pro-Muslim Brotherhood branch of the Qatari royal family to power.
This 1996 coup in Qatar, BTW, goes to the very roots of the Saudi-Qatari feud. The Saudi royal family had very close relationships with the Ruling Qatari royal family prior to 1996. So, the 1996 coup was like a dagger in the hearts of the Saudi royal family.
Nonetheless, the Saudis continued to have cordial, though somewhat strained, relations with the Qataris due to Qatar’s membership in the Gulf Cooperation Council.
However, those relationships reached the breaking point with Qatar’s increasing support for the Muslim Brotherhood and other radical groups, while the Saudis were trying to distance themselves from that sort of thing.
I suspect that the al-Ghufraan tribe had supported the same branch of the Qatari ruling family that the Saudis did, which would explain why the current ruling click in Qatar withdrew their citizenship.
SIN’AT AL-MAWT (A weekly program on a Saudi-owned TV channel)
This week’s report focused on an impressive study of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in Europe conducted by two French investigative journalists called QATAR PAPERS. This study reportedly contains actual documents of money transfers from Qatari entities to Muslim Brotherhood entities in Europe, but particularly, France.
The principal tool Qatar uses is a “charity” called Qatar al-Khairiyyah (which means Qatar charity). Qatar uses this charity to funnel funds into Mosques and other MB entities across the continent of Europe. The Muslim Brotherhood then uses that Qatari money to finance other front groups that then finance the terror cells.
According to this study, Qatar has invested nearly $90 million U.S. dollars on the MB in Europe.
Qatari funds are also used to finance Tariq Ramadhan’s legal fees as he battles rape allegations. At one point he withdrew a lump sum of $590,000 Euros from a Qatari account. Earlier reporting had Tariq Ramadhan being paid $35,000 a month by Qatar.
Tariq Ramadhan, BTW, is the grandson of Hasan al-Banna, the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The host of the sin’at al-mawt show spent most of the show’s half hour interviewing the chief editor of a magazine called Xtreme watch. The interviewee was a native speaker of Arabic based in Paris, and had read the full QATAR PAPERS report.
According to this interviewee, the charter for the Qatar al-Khairiyyah “charity” is the same that Hasan al-Banna drew up for the Muslim Brotherhood, and this is to “be like an octopus to spread tentacles all over the world.”
He added that Qatar will only give aid to mosques that are radical MB mosques, while reiterating that the MB is the mothership of all terrorist entities. Even ISIS.
Qatar al-Khairiyyah often uses other names to disguise the fact that it is donating money to suspicious groups. They also use offshore banks in places like Singapore, Monaco, and Luxemburg.
The money launderers, he says, are as much an enemy as are the suicide bombers.
MB entities in Europe can further disguise their activities by doing “good works.” That way authorities think that these are actual charity organizations. Of course, we see that same thing here in the States where organizations like CAIR and MSA actually do enough “good works” to fool our inside-the-beltway morons into thinking that they are charitable organizations.
The interviewee went on to say that President Macron appears to have caught on to Qatar’s funding of political Islam in France, because copies of the QATAR PAPERS have been delivered to Macron and other chief French officials.
Unfortunately, according to the interviewee, Qatar has bribed members of parliament in Great Britain to have them vote on issues favorable to Qatar. Later in the show he added that French politicians have also been bought off.
So, here, we have to ask . . . if British and French politicians have been bought off by Qatar, and Qatar has also purchased the “journalists” for the Washington Post, the New York Times, and other U.S. news entities, and “think tanks,” as we know from other reporting, is it possible that Qatar would also “refrain” from buying off select members of the U.S. Congress and the Senate?
Both Senator Robert Menendez, and Representative Adam Schiff have mentioned the need to be favorable to Qatar in very suspicious circumstances. While everyone is talking about looking at President Trump’s tax returns and bank accounts, perhaps we ought to take a look at the bank accounts of some of these Senators and Congresspersons. Just saying.
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Barry Webb is a Senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence reform (www.intelreform.org), has had a 25-year career as an Arabist for the National Security Agency, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why American and its allies are losing the war on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
MAY 05-09 ARABIC NEWS SUMMARY
By Barry Webb
Understanding what is taking place in Libya, and why, requires understanding who the good
guys are and who the bad guys are. The easiest way to do this is to take a look at who is
supporting whom.
Fa’ez Sirraaj, a former Libyan parliamentarian, was hand-picked by the EU to head up a
provisional coalition government, based in Tripoli, Libya’s capital. In addition to having the
approval of the EU, the Sirraaj government also enjoyed the approval of the Obama
administration and the UN.
So, Obviously, they are the good guys, right?
Opposed to the Sirraaj government is General Haftar, who had risen to that lofty ranking while
serving in the army of the deposed, and hated, dictator Qadhafi.
So, Haftar and his army are obviously the bad guys, right?
So, let’s take a look at who is supporting whom, and I don’t mean in terms of just diplomatic
recognition, I mean in terms of providing significant aid.
Last time we reported that a couple of the terrorist groups supporting the Sirraaj government
went to Iran seeking an arms deal? Well they got one. Iran had already shipped several M-302
missiles which arrived at the Libyan port of Masratta on 05 May. These long-rang missiles are
intended for use by the Sirraaj government against the forces of Haftar.
Turkey has also stepped up its aid to the Sirraaj government.
So, now you have Iran, Turkey, and Qatar all provided significant aid to the “internationally
recognized” Sirraaj government in Tripoli. The world’s top three state sponsors of terrorism all
scrambling to do their best to keep the Sirraaj government propped up. Wonder what they
have to hide . . . shold the Sirraaj government fall . . .
Supporting General Haftar’s operations are Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the U.A.E., all three of
whom have declared the Muslim Brotherhood to be a terrorist organization.
I think there is a message there, and it behooves all western governments to pay attention.
Also, of note, is that the Qatari owned and based al-jazeera TV reports on the Libyan situation
from the standpoint of a strong bias in favor of the Sirraaj government and strongly against
General Haftar’s efforts.
Whereas, the Saudi-owned, Dubai-based al-arabiya TV reports from the standpoint of a strong
bias in favor of general Haftar’s efforts and bias against the Sirraaj government.
MORE TURKEY
–Turkey is set to drill an oil well just West of Cyprus, in water that Cyprus claims as within their
territorial waters. Egypt has joined Greece and Cyprus in protesting Turkey’s move.
–Related to this is that Turkey’s aggressiveness in the Eastern Mediterranean has led to the
formation of an informal quasi alliance between Greece, Egypt, and Israel, along with Cyprus.
Serbia and other Eastern European states are interested in joining this alliance.
SUDAN
–Starting to look more and more like the Arab Spring in Sudan is being taken over by Islamists
directed by Turkey. There was another large demonstration in front of the Egyptian embassy
protesting Egyptian influence. Smells like Turkish influence.
TURKEY’S PLANS FOR NORTH AND EAST AFRICA.
A couple of years ago I read an essay in an Egyptian paper that Turkey is using soap operas to
seduce the Arab and Islamic peoples.
These soap operas are set in the height of the Ottoman Empire and are designed to glorify, and
even mythologize, that fanciful past. The aim of the Turks here is to make the Islamic people
come to love, and long for, the mythological glory days of the Ottoman Empire’s Caliphate
more than they love their own country. This, to ease Erdogan’s takeover of all Islamic
countries.
These soap operas are produced in all the languages spoken by Islamic peoples. For the Arab
world, Turkey hires Arabic-speaking actors to portray these figures from Ottoman history. The
same soap operas will also be produced in Urdu, using Urdu-speaking Pakistani actors, and so
on.
So, it appears that the Turkish meddling in Sudan, the Libyan civil war, and probably Algeria as
well should be seen in light of Erdogan’s multi-faceted campaigns against those countries.
CHINA’S NEW SILK ROAD
–Called “road and belt” project
–One connects West China with a Pakistani port on the Indian ocean
–Another connects West China with an Iranian port.
–Both of these skirt Afghanistan.
–This “Road and Belt” project will eventually connect Egypt to China, and Egypt is thrilled to
death to be a part of China’s “Road and Belt” projects.
–Egypt (with Chinese help) is also building a super trade corridor connecting Cairo with South
Africa, to link the entire continent of Africa with the Chinese “Road and Belt” system.
–China has additional ambitions to link all of Europe with this “Road and Belt” system.
–Result will be all three continents of Europe, Africa, and Asia will be firmly linked to China and
the Chinese economy. Guess who is left out?
MUELLER WITCH HUNT/RUSSIA COLLUSION: An analysis of Robert Mueller and his motivations.
By Barry Webb
Let us start with the qualifications, or lack thereof, of Robert Mueller to be a special prosecutor investigating the alleged “collusion with Russia” by one Donald J. Trump.
We will progress from there to the real collusion with Russian elements engaged in by our own CIA in an attempt to interfere in the U.S. presidential elections of 2016.
How about Uranium One? Think it was just Hillary Clinton who was involved? Nine members of the Obama administration, including Eric Holder, and former FBI director Robert Mueller (in the CFIUS committee) voted in favor of allowing the Russians to control 20% of America’s Uranium. I always said, wouldn’t you just love to see the bank accounts of those nine people during the time surrounding that event? Do you really believe that the Clinton’s kept all of the $145 million dollars the Russians paid them?
According to Wikileaks, in 2009 Sec. State. Clinton commissioned FBI director Mueller to deliver a 10-gram sample of enriched (weapons grade) Uranium to Russian intelligence. The transfer was made during a Tarmac meeting in Moscow in the fall of 2009 (Love those Tarmac meetings). Clinton apologists have insisted that this transfer of Uranium had nothing to do with the Uranium One deal, or with Clinton’s role in the CFIUS deal.
As a former intelligence officer myself, I find it strange that the FBI director would be tasked with a job that one would expect should have been handled by either the CIA or the Department of Energy. The CIA at that time was headed by Bush holdover Gates, a straight shooter, which might explain why Clinton turned to Mueller, a long-time deep state swamp critter with an extensive history of shady deals.
When Russian bribery efforts in the Uranium One case came to light, guess who Mueller put in charge of the investigation? Fellow deep state swamp critter Rod Rosenstein, the physical and ideological clone of Nazi Deep State operative Heinrich Himmler (don’t believer me? Google the photos). Mueller and Rosenstein then suppressed knowledge of the Russian bribery case.
But it now appears that 2012 was the banner year for Mueller and company to engage in criminal and treasonous activities. Remember the HSBC bank case where said bank was accused of (and admitted to) engaging in money-laundering activities for Drug cartels and terrorist groups? Guess who was a member of the HSBC board of directors during the time these crimes were committed? Mr. purer-than-driven-snow James Comey. HSBC was let off the hook by the payment of a fine. Guess who handled the case? US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Loretta Lynch, who was then rewarded by Obama with the post of U.S. Attorney General replacing Eric Holder, who was AG at the time of the Russian bribery scandal and this HSBC scandal. Does the swamp take care of its own?
The above can be found in Jerome Corsi’s new book “Killing the Deep State,” as well as a variety of other sources.
But now for the treason. Former Air Force intelligence officer Stephen Coughlin in his book Catastrophic Failure: Blindfolding America in the Face of Jihad documented that in February of 2012 both Robert Mueller and John Brennan colluded and collaborated with elements from the Muslim Brotherhood to rid America’s intelligence and law enforcement entities of valuable data bases, books, and training manuals connected with the war on terror (p. 379). Former DHS officer Phil Haney speaks of the same thing in his book See Something, Say Nothing: A Homeland Security Officer Exposes the Government’s Submission to Jihad, p. 141). But neither Haney nor Coughlin connected all the dots, linking these acts to treason. So I will do it here:
In 1991 the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) produced a document titled: An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America.
This document, in Arabic, was obtained by the FBI in a raid on a safe house in Northern Virginia, in 2004. It was later used in the Holy Land Foundation trial of 2008 when Muslim Brotherhood elements connected with CAIR were found guilty of supporting terrorism. I have in my hands a copy of the original 1991 Arabic, and a copy of the English translation used in the 2008 Holy Land trial.
This so-called “memorandum” is more like a “manifesto,” it is essentially a declaration of war on the United States and Canada. It does not shy away from using the term “Civilizational Jihad.”
A key passage on page 4 of the Arabic original of this long, multi-page document calls on MB brothers and sympathizers in America to destroy and uproot our civil society and civilization, so it can be replaced by Shari’a law.
Egypt’s state-sponsored al-ahram newspaper on 30 August 2016 also carried a long multi-page essay on this same MB document, reaching the same conclusion as above, e.g. that the goal of the MB was to destroy the civil society and civilization of America and replace it with Shari’a law. Civilizational jihad.
In other words, in this document the MB essentially declares war on our constitution. So, now to connect the dots, Both Mueller and Brennan not only violated their oaths of office (to defend and protect the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic) by collaborating and colluding with a declared enemy of the United States and its constitution, but also aided and abetted that same enemy by obeying that enemy’s command to destroy Counter Terrorism training materials and data bases. And, that, folks, is the definition of treason: Article III, section 3.
Russia, though a competitor and an irritant, is not an openly declared enemy of the U.S., therefore collusion with it is not a crime. However the MB is a declared enemy, therefore aiding and abetting it is a crime . . . the crime being treason. Now, does anybody out there seriously believe that Mueller and Brennan deleted all of these data bases and burned and shredded all of these books and training manuals in every intelligence and law enforcement agency down to the local cops . . . without Obama’s knowledge and approval?
In May of 2012 the Obama administration also issued “hands off” orders to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, and US Customs and Border Protection officers pertaining to Muslims of all strips–even radicals. So, this “hands off” policy imposed by the Obama administration allowed Muslim Brotherhood leaders and others with Islamic supremacist beliefs and affiliations to travel freely in and out of the United States (Haney, p. 132).
So, in other words, we have not only Brennan and Mueller committing treason, but also Obama. So, what were the results of their treason?
After all these CT data bases were deleted, and executive orders given, allowing terrorist to roam freely in our country, the following terrorist acts were committed between 2013 to 2016:
Boston Marathon Bombing, Tennessee Military Recruiting Stations, Oregon Junior College, San Bernadino, and Orlando. The toll: 82 Americans killed, and 353 Americans wounded on American soil. No one has been held accountable.
(There is more than enough evidence here for the injured survivors and the families of those killed by these terrorist acts to launch very successful class action lawsuits against Mueller, Brennan, and Obama. All three of these men should spend the rest of their lives in Ft. Levenworth for the damage they have done to the United States–a damage that has long outlived their years of “service” in the government.)
The Russians even gave us direct warnings about the Tsarnaev brothers (Boston), and about the Oregon shooter. Obama gave orders to ignore Russian warnings because “Russia is not valid at this time.” (Translation: Obama was peeved at Putin).
NOW FOR THE RUSSIA/TRUMP DOSSIER
While Sean Hannity and others screech about a tiny mouse in the room (the Dems paying Fusion GPS 12 million for dirt on Trump), they totally ignore the 20-ton elephant that takes up 99% of that same room.
In the first place, we don’t know how much, if any, of that $12 million GPS received from the Democrats were paid to Christopher Steele. Certainly GPS would have wanted to keep some (or all) of it for themselves. And, even if Steele received some of it, we would have no evidence he paid even a dime to unknown Russians for the production of the salacious material in the dossier. No, we’re talking about much bigger fish than the Democrat’s $12 million dollars.
Ever wonder why John Brennan has been so strident, almost psychotic, about demonizing Trump publicly in tweets and on TV? Check this out:
London-based EYE SPY magazine, which is close to Britain’s MI6 organization, reported (April 2017 issue, pp. 20-22) on two Russian cyber Geeks whom their employer, Russia’s FSB spy organization, had arrested for “violating their oaths of office and collaborating with a foreign intelligence agency” (Later identified as the CIA).
These two cyber geeks were apparently the ones who put together much of the salacious (and probably doctored) material (videos, audio tapes, and other “hacked materials”) which were used in the Steele dossier.
The equivalent of $14.1 U.S. dollars was found by the FSB in the residence of Dimitri Dukuchayev, one of the cyber Geeks, a major in the FSB. The Russians swear that the money came from the CIA. It can be assumed that the other geek, Sergei Mikailov, a Col. in the FSB, must have received at least that much himself. Plus, they used at least one middle man, an ex KGB general named Oleg Erovenkin (who was chief of staff to an oligarch close to Putin), to get the materials to Steele (and/or the CIA).
So, we are talking probably dozens of millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars paid by Brennan’s CIA to Russian operatives to produce materials that (Brennan hoped) could be used to interfere in the U.S. presidential elections of 2016 and/or bring Trump down were he to actually win the election.
Ever wonder why, if the whole purpose of the Mueller investigation was “Russia collusion” based on the Trump/Steele dossier . . . ever wonder why Mueller and his merry gang of over a baker’s dozen Trump haters have never raised a finger to actually investigate . . . what their whole premise is base upon–the Dossier?
As a footnote, the alleged Middle Man Erovenkin (surprise, surprise) turned up dead (slumped over in the back seat of his car) before the FSB could question him. Though the hospital he was taken to pronounced the cause of death, a heart attack, just about everyone in Russia suspects foul play. Foul play . . . but by whom?
The timeline of this is interesting: The existence of the Dossier was made public to the media in October 2016–but only after Brennan personally gave DNI James Clapper the okay to release it to CNN. Two months later, in December, middle man Erovenkin is taken out before he can be questioned. Then, one month after that (after FSB officials had combed Erovenkin’s computers, phone data, etc. for contacts) the FSB arrested the two above-mentioned cyber geeks in January of 2017.
And, so, these are the clowns (Mueller, Comey, Rosenstein, and Brennan) who have spearheaded the plot to: 1. Clear Hillary Clinton, and 2. To bring down Trump.
And we’re supposed to assume, as Trey Gowdy said, that everything is being handled correctly, that the FBI did exactly as the American people would want them to?
(Several news sites on the net are now reporting that FSB Col. Sergei Mikailov has been sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Russian court. His partner, Dimitri Dukuchayev is awaiting trial. Dukuchayev, I believe, was the ringer leader of this scandal from the Russian side.)
MUELLER PLAYS DEFENSE
There is an old adage I think that came from football: The best defense is a good offense.
If you have a ball-hogging offense that can eat up the clock and score lots of point, you won’t need much of a defense because the other team won’t have the ball in their hands with enough time to score any points of their own.
For the last two plus years we’ve seen the Democrats play that game, launching countless investigations into everything related to Trump. Their game plan is to stay on offense, keep Trump (and the Republicans) on the defensive constantly so they don’t have time to launch counter investigations on such things as FISA abuse and who really paid for the Dossier.
And, of course, Robert Mueller was a large part of the Democrat game plan. He knew at least 19 months before he issued his report (if not from the moment he was brought on board) that the Dossier was false, the FISA warrants were illegal, and there was no collusion between Trump and Russia. And, yet, knowing all of that, Mueller persisted in perpetuating a $35,000,000 fraud against the American people. Why?
SEMPER FIE FI FO FUM
Apologists for Mueller always point to the fact that Mueller was a marine. He served in Vietnam, was wounded, and honored with a medal. Well, Adolph Hitler also served his country in wartime, was wounded during WWI, received a medal. Then went on to “public service” where he was responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people.
The only qualities of the Marine Corp that Mueller has retained, is his dogged persistence. Put him on a case as a prosecutor, and he will get a conviction. It does not matter whether his target is innocent or guilty, he will get that conviction. Another notch on his gun handle. No boy scout he.
Which is why the Democrats and the Deep State were overjoyed to see Mueller picked as special prosecutor–and why fellow swamp critter Rod Rosenstein hand-picked his old fellow traveler to do the dirty.
Mueller’s job was not to prove Russian collusion, because the only collusion was by the Democrats and Mueller’s buddies in the Deep State. No, Mueller’s job, pure and simple, was to destroy Trump. So, knowing that there was no Trump/Russia he perpetuated the fraud for as long as he could hoping that Trump would slip up, say something that Mueller could use as a secondary charge. A face-to-face interview would have served that purpose had Trump fallen for it.
Mueller has a long history of getting people to admit to crimes they didn’t commit just so he could get a prosecution. And, he has a long history of destroying the lives of innocent people and their families . . . in his quest for yet another notch on his tainted pistol handle. Dirty cop, he.
(Remember the anthrax scandal where Mueller’s false accusations and pursuit ended up costing the U.S. taxpayers millions).
Thankfully, Trump didn’t fall for the face-to-face with pit viper Mueller, but Trump being Trump, there was always the chance that he’d say something, or tweet something that Mueller could use as a secondary charge of “obstruction” or something.
And, Mueller and his Trump-hating psychopaths dutifully recorded every one of Trump’s Trumpisms, and thinking outloud-isms. But, in the end they couldn’t make the case.
At this point, when Mueller finally decided to give up the charade, he had a duty to make a decision not only on Trump/Russia, but on the issue of “obstruction of justice.” Mueller’s failure to do so left the door open for the Democrats to continue playing offense. If not Trump/Russia, then “obstruction of Justice.” If not obstruction of justice, then it’s Trump’s relationship with Saudi Arabia, or his not being friendly enough with Qatar (to paraphrase California Representative Adam Schiff, and New Jersey senator Robert Menendez).
Qatar, BTW, is one of the world’s top three state sponsors of terror, and is the primary state financier of the Muslim Brotherhood, which in turn financed numerous other subsidiary jihadi terrorist groups. So, I do believe that Schiff’s and Menendez’s fondness for Qatar needs to be investigated.
MUELLER COLLUDES WITH DEMOCRATS
Isn’t it ironic that the Democrats are demonizing Trump for “being cozy with dictators,” and even using that allegation as a basis for additional investigations into the possibility of beginning impeachment proceedings? This, from a basket of political bullies who cheered Trump’s predecessor for kissing up to the murderous Castro regime in Cuba, for submissively telling the then Russian president that “he’d be more flexible after the elections,” for granting Iran the right to pursue nuclear weapons in the 2030s while turning 150 Billion dollars over to them to use for terrorist purposes, and not to mention his “coziness” with Egypt’s former Muslim Brotherhood dictator Muhammad Mursi.
With this background on the Democrat’s obsession with investigating everything Trump, Mueller timed the release of his so-called testy letter to Attorney General Barr, just prior to Barr’s testimony before Congress, so as to give Congress some red meat to use on Barr. The only motivation for that, on Mueller’s part, is to allow Congress to remain on the offensive.
And, so, then the Democrats attacked Attorney General Barr because they can’t get to Trump since there is no collusion and no obstruction of justice.
WHY MUELLER, THE DEMOCRATS, AND DEEP STATE NEED TO STAY ON OFFENSE
If the FISA applications and the Steele dossier origins and funding were ever investigated, it would bring down and possibly send to jail some of Mueller’s best friends. Not to mention any names such as James Comey, Rod Rosenstein, and John Brennan.
But even worse than that, opening up those investigations could lead to a larger investigation including several other crimes committed during the Obama years. These could include the Hillary Clinton e-mail scandal, and Mueller’s own treasonous actions in 2012 vis-à-vis the Muslim Brotherhood. Investigating these scandals in turn, would lead right back to the Obama White House and could put dozens of other deep state swamp critters behind bars–including Mueller himself.
Bottom line, Mueller, and his fellow “Deep State” swamp creatures, are fighting for their lives, and will do anything to keep their opposition on the defensive–and to make the public so sick of “investigations” that launching any counter investigations against the real criminals now becomes nearly impossible. That was the Democrat Party, Deep State objective all along, and they have been hugely successful following that strategy because they have a very corrupt national media playing ball with them.
My evaluation is that if these investigations are either not started, brushed aside, or not followed to their logical conclusions (i.e. responsibility being place on those who deserve it), then the United States is well on the way to becoming a third-rate banana republic.
(Note: Much additional information on this so-called “Spy Gate” is contained in a 65 page opus by Jeff Carlson, and posted on The Epoch Times on 28 March 2019. This includes such morsels as Britain’s GCHQ collecting intelligence on then Candidate Trump as early as late 2015, and then transmitting that intelligence to entities in the United States. And, an indication that Brennan had an advance knowledge of the Steele dossier a month prior to the FBI’s reaching out to Steele asking for any and all the information he had on team Trump. This would seem to support the above-mentioned EYE SPY Reporting on CIA payments to rogue Russian cyber geeks to compile at least a portion of the dossier.)
Mr. Attorney General William Barr, you and your Department of Justice have a lot of work cut out for you.
———————————————————————
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA. He is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is: www.barrywebbauthor.com
ARABIC NEWS SUMMARY
By Barry Webb
–28 April 2019: The Qatar-based al-jazeera TV channel reported the view that the Israelis,
United Arab Emirates (UAE), and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), are pushing the Trump
Administration into a war with Iran.
–On the Libya issue, al-jazeera gave a full ½ hour airtime to a spokesman for the UN-recognized
Sirraaj government in Tripoli. The spokesperson’s main point was that the Sirraaj Government
would never negotiate with General Haftar.
–Erdogan said that he would defend Tripoli from attack at all costs.
–Popular Egyptian talk show host on MBS-Egypt, Amru Adeeb, interviewed General Ahmad al-
Mismarri who reported that Turkey is conveying an-Nusra terrorists (al-Qaeda franchise in
Syria), as well as other jihadis, to Tripoli to aid the Sirraaj government. Al-Mismari also claimed
that mercenaries from Chad and other countries have joined the Tripoli militia groups.
–On another story, Amru Adeeb reported that Turkey is playing games in Sudan as well.
–Also on 28 April, al-jazeera reported that in Khartoum there were protests in front of the
Egyptian embassy, protesting “Egyptian interference.”
–29 April, the Saudi-owned, Dubai-based al-Arabiya TV channel reported that there were
protests in front of an Islamists office in Khartoum.
–Arab Spring 2.0 breaks out in Tunisia (the birthplace of the first Arab Spring in 2011), after
government forces killed several farmers. The crowds shouted ash-sha’b yoreed asqaat an-
nizhaam (The people want to bring down the regime) which was the slogan used across the
Arab world during the first Arab Spring.
–Egypt’s state newspaper, al-Ahram, quoted President as-Sisi telling the Italian leader that
Egypt supports Haftar and will never negotiate with terrorism (a reference to the Sirraaj
government).
–Popular Egyptian talk show host on MBS-Egypt, Amru Adeeb, reported that during the battle
for Tripoli, General Haftar’s army captured some Turkish soldiers.
–Also, on 29 April, al-Arabiyya TV reported that one of the militia groups from Tripoli went to
Iran seeking a weapons deal.
–30 April an extremist-run media outlet al-Furqan released a picture of ISIS leader al-Baghdadi
which was then shown on most of the world’s TV outlets.
COMMENTARY
Okay, so there is a civil war taking place in Libya. How can we tell the good guys from the bad
guys?
On one side you have the “legitimate” Libyan government headed by Faa’ez Sirraaj, handpicked
by the EU, and internationally recognized by the UN.
On the other side you have General Haftar who is attacking that “legitimate” government.
General Haftar rose to that lofty ranking while serving under the dictator Qadhafi. Most of his
army is also made up of people who had also served in the military under Qadhafi. A lot of
people inside and outside of Libya, believe that General Haftar and his army are tainted by their
former association with Qadhafi.
Therefore, obviously, Haftar is the heavy here, and Sirraaj is the “good guy” under siege trying
to defend international legitimacy.
However, when we take a closer look at who is supporting whom, we get a completely different
picture. While Sirraaj was hand-picked by the EU, and while the EU and the rest of the world
may wring their hands over the situation in Libya, the only countries providing direct military
aid to the Sirraaj government are a list of the planet’s top three state sponsors of terrorism:
Turkey, Iran, and Qatar.
When Sirraaj was first selected to head the new government, there were groans from some
quarters because of a suspicion that Sirraaj was either a supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood,
or a sympathizer. Then, when we look at his “legitimate” coalition government, who are his
coalition partners? Why, al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Ansar ash-Shari’a (of
Benghazi scandal fame).
And, who are the supporters of General Haftar? Egypt, KSA, and the UAE, all three of whom
have declared the Muslim Brotherhood to be a terrorist organization and don’t want to see it
set up in power on Egypt’s doorstep.
In a bizarre twist, French troops have been noted among General Haftar’s forces attacking
Tripoli, even though France, as a member of the EU, theoretically supports the Sirraaj
government. Ah, but there is oil in Libya. Lots of it. The French have apparently calculated that
General Haftar is the only force in Libya capable of eliminating the chaos and establishing law
and order over the entire country. Therefore, they want to get in on the ground floor so that
French companies will be granted oil extraction rights in Libya once that hoped for peace and
stability are established.
Now, as for General Haftar being tainted by his former association with the Qadhafi regime, he
retired before the Arab Spring began. He therefore never engaged in firing upon the Libyan
people. He came out of retirement to reform the army only after Qadhafi’s removal and only
after Libya had fallen into chaos.
This equation then lends support to contentions by al-arabiyya and General Haftar’s
intelligence, that the Sirraaj government, and the Tripoli that it controls, are hotbeds of
terrorism. It also supports the Libyan contention that nearly every terrorist on international
“most wanted” lists are in Libya. Some of these, like Saif al-‘Adel, have a 10 million dollar
bounty hanging over their heads. The safest place for these individuals would be in Tripoli
under the protection of the Sirraaj government.
Anyone want to bet that ISIS leader al-Baghdadi isn’t there as well? He has not been seen
publicly for five years. There have been several reports of his being killed in Iraq, then in Syria,
with an equal number of reports refuting those reports.
Here are the only things that we actually do know about him: Several years ago he was
wounded during an American bombing raid of an ISIS caravan. He was then smuggled into
Turkey where he was given medical treatment, then the Turks smuggled him into Libya. There
were other reports that al-Baghdadi had told some of his followers that he was going to Libya
to set up another center of operations to guard against the possibility of ISIS holdings in Iraq
and Syria being lost to the international forces fighting against them. Since then, there have
been no valid reports of al-Baghdadi’s appearance anywhere else, much less valid reports of his
death.
SUDAN
We have an equally confused situation in Sudan where it looks like two groups of civilian
protestors and a military tainted by its being the same military that served under the ousted
dictator al-Basheer. And here, as in Libya, the only way to tell the players without a program is
to look at who is supporting whom.
The Sudanese military junta has thanked Egypt, KSA, and the UAE for their diplomatic support.
We also have reports of Turkey being involved with the protestors combatting the military.
SUMMARY
There are Arab Spring type demonstrations, revolts, and outright civil warfare, taking place in
Sudan, Libya, Tunisia, and Algeria. There is solid evidence that Turkey is an active participant in
the civil war in Libya, along with some evidence that they are involved in the Sudanese Arab
Spring. I cannot help but believe that Turkey is also involved in the Algerian mess, and if not in
Tunisia. Certainly, they will be there too if that Arab Spring 2.0 develops legs there.
All of this must be seen as a part of Erdogan’s grand design to recreate the old Ottoman Empire
Caliphate, as is his current military occupations of northern Syria, and ever increasing chunks of
Iraq.
ADVICE TO THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION
Make a firm decision to come out in favor of General Haftar in Libya, and delegitimize the
Sirraaj government in Tripoli.
Rein in Turkey firmly before Erdogan’s fantasy of an Ottoman Empire caliphate 2.0 become a
reality, because that would not only spell the death of Egypt and Israel, but would be a calamity
for Europe and the rest of the West as well.
The Epoch Times
The Mueller Investigation and the Chinese
April 30, 2019
By Brad Johnson
Commentary
From my perspective as a career CIA operations officer, the Mueller investigation is amazingly revealing in ways it was never intended to be.
The battle lines have long been drawn, with the left claiming impeachable offenses and President Donald Trump claiming a witch hunt.
Yet, the release of the Mueller report appears to strongly support Trump’s position, not only since Mueller determined that no “collusion” with the Russians took place, but because evidence suggests he and the FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) leadership were aware of this fact at least 18 months before the investigation’s conclusion—but continued it anyway.
Occam’s razor indicates the most likely explanation for continuing a legal investigation where no legal justification exists was a political desire to do so: Mueller and FBI and DOJ leadership were philosophically opposed to Trump, just like the rest of the so-called “resist” or “resistance” movement.
Many here in the United States have argued that the resistance movement is not real, but there is direct evidence to the contrary. For example, in 2018 we saw a young woman named Reality Winner badly damage her life by purposely leaking a classified document to the press only because she believed it would damage Trump. She is still in jail serving a more than five-year sentence.
In March, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) officer Ron Hansen was convicted of spying for the Chinese over a long period of time. His sentence will be handed down in September where he is expected to receive a relatively light sentence of 15 years in exchange for his cooperation with U.S. authorities.
His initial motivation for spying against the United States appears to have been money. During the investigation, however, a number of Hansen’s conversations were captured and transcribed, revealing that Hansen hated Trump, was deeply committed to the resist philosophy, and viewed working against Trump as his duty.
Hanson’s betrayal of the United States was discovered when he approached another DIA officer and pitched to him the idea of spying for the Chinese, as well. It appears that resisting the Trump presidency played a significant role in the pitch. Hansen seems to have argued in the pitch that, in addition to a large monetary payout from the Chinese, it was a good way to fight back and “resist” the current administration.
Having been directly involved many times in exactly these types of human intelligence recruitment operations, I can tell you that the pitching of another DIA officer was something that the Chinese intelligence service studied very closely and approved every aspect of long before it took place.
The implication here is conclusive and astounding: The Chinese intelligence service and the Chinese government leadership as a whole have one public window into the resistance movement, and that is the Mueller investigation. The Hansen pitch makes clear that the Chinese have concluded the resist movement inside our own government is something they can exploit for their own ends.
If the Chinese have concluded that the resistance movement is an opportunity for them, then likely so have the Russians, and probably other foreign adversaries, as well. And if our enemies have concluded the resistance movement is an opportunity for them, then anyone concerned about foreign interference in U.S. affairs would be naive at best to continue to claim it’s not a national security threat to us.
It’s long past time to add a question to the polygraph required to receive a top-secret clearance confirming that one’s personal political beliefs are not more important than protecting classified information.
Regardless, the Chinese have just told us all we need to know about the true motivations behind the Mueller investigation—and countless other leaks and roadblocks set up throughout the federal government to resist the duly elected president of the United States.
TRUMP SET TO DECLARE MB TO BE A TERROR ORGANIZATION
By Barry Webb
Al-Jazeera has reported that U.S. President Donald Trump has asked his agency heads to
make preparations for declaring the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood to be a terrorist
organization. This news comes in the wake of Egyptian President al-Sisi’s recent visit to
Washington. Al-Jazeera is also reporting that this request by Trump has raised a
firestorm within the Trump administration, with NSC head Bolton and Sec. State Pompeo
supporting the move, but nearly everyone else–including the CIA against it.
While this move by Trump, in my view, is way too little, way too late, it is also
disturbing for other reasons. First off, is the probability that it will be limited to declaring
only the Egyptian branch of the MB to be a terrorist organization, while giving the rest of
this international organization a free pass–including its front entities here in the United
States that are doing so much to curtail free speech while all the time imposing creeping
shari’a.
I also find it most disturbing that anyone in the Trump administration, CIA, or
Department of Defense would be opposed to the idea of declaring the entire Muslim
Brotherhood a terrorist organization, much less be opposed to restricting that designation
to just the Egyptian branch (as some of them still are). This illustrates the need for all of
these people to be given some sort of briefing, seminar, or short course on the MB–
including a required reading of their manifesto for North America.
Equally disturbing was that Trump did not seem to be able to come up with the idea of
declaring even the Egyptian MB a terrorist organization until the Egyptian president
briefed him on it. That tells me that none of Trump's advisors, including the head
honchos at the CIA, thought it worth while to brief the president about the MB. This
reminds me of an incident early in the Trump presidency when he was on the verge of
declaring the MB to be a terrorist organization, based on advice from Ted Cruz and other
conservatives up on the hill. But then the king of Jordan came to visit and told him not to
do it, because Jordan has 15 MB members sitting in its parliament, and this would make
things very difficult for the king.
Trump may well have been getting pressured from other sources as well as the king of
Jordan, such as then head of the National Security Council H.R. McMasters, a suspected
MB sympathizer and other elements of the administration.
The argument in favor of giving the MB a pass due to its membership in the Jordanian
parliament, and that doing so would disrupt U.S. relations with Jordan, was incredibly
flimsy and ill-informed. Four other Arab countries (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and
the UAE) have all declared the MB to be a terrorist organization, yet all four have
continued to maintain solid relations with Jordan and king Abdalla. Israel and Russia
have also declared the MB to be a terrorist organization, and yet they too maintain
relations with Jordan.
And now we see the same argument being presented here as Trump is once again
considering the idea of declaring the MB to be a terrorist organization. Only now, it is
not only Jordan that has MB members in its parliament, but Tunisia also. And, this, dear
folks, is why Trump felt compelled to scale down his request to declaring only the
Egyptian chapter of the MB to be a terrorist organization. Far too many “experts” in the
pentagon, and the intelligence apparatus, are ignorant of what the MB is and what its
goals are. They are also ignorant of the multiple tentacles that the Jihad utilizes.
Just because a MB chapter in say, Tunisia, has publicly eschewed the use of violence to
achieve their aims does not mean that the MB international as a whole has eschewed the
idea of replacing the U.S. Constitution with shari’a law–including that so-called peaceful
MB franchise in Tunisia.
Case in point: The Egyptian branch of the MB vowed to give up violence when most of
them were in prison and incapable of doing anything violent. This taqiyya innocence
helped pave the way for Egyptian Anwar as-Sadat to let the MB out of prison. They then
repaid his act of kindness by spinning off a militant group to assassinate him. The MB
itself has continued to form its own “military wings” where youths are trained in hand-to-
hand combat, and the use of other forms of violence. These actions have taken place on
the grounds of the supposedly moderate al-Azhar university (according to Egyptian
sources).
This so very peaceful branch of the MB hasn’t hesitated to use violence when other
means have failed to attain their goals and/or whenever it appears to them that the use of
violence will succeed.
In the meantime, thousands of those “peace-loving” MB members had fled Nasser’s crack
down, and ended up teaching in Saudi schools and colleges. One of the products of this
MB educational influence was one Usama bin Laden, a true lover of non-violence he.
All MB groups, and their affiliates and front entities across the globe ascribe to the same
founding motto have the same goal in mind, and this is to replace existing non-Islamic
governing systems with Shari'a law. All methods to achieve that goal are on the table:
Violence, emigration, settlement, propaganda, infiltration of political, legal, military, and
intelligence organs of the host nation, and up to and including violence whenever
possible. All of these techniques and methods are considered to be a part of the overall
jihad, a part of “religious warfare.”
One only has to read their founding motto to understand how they feel about conducting
violent jihad when they can get away with it: “Jihad (religious warfare) is our way, and
death on behalf of Allah is the loftiest of our wishes.”
If that is not enough, then these “experts” in our decision-making bodies should look at
the Brotherhood’s emblem which features the word w-a’adou underneath two crossed
swords. The word w-a’adou means “and, prepare . . .” and it is the first word of verse 60
in the 8th sura (chapter) of the Qur’an, a verse that goes on to promote the idea of
“preparing whatever weapons one can get a hold of so you can terrorize Allah’s enemies
and your enemies, and others whom you do not know, but Allah knoweth them.”
What this means for America, is that the MB front entities like CAIR, ISNA, and MSA
can continue to harass, demonize, and shut down truth tellers, so that their civilizational
jihad may proceed a pace without any interruptions.
The only way to stop this creeping jihad in our own backyard (“aimed at eliminating and
uprooting our civil society, civilization, and constitution, and replace it with shari’a”) is to
declare the entire international MB to be a terrorist organization. Then, and only then,
can we roll up the MB’s front entities here in the U.S. Anything less than that is criminal
and tantamount to treason. Because, unless we take this step, we are cooperating with
and aiding and abetting a declared enemy who wants to destroy our way of life and
replace it with sanctified Jew-hate, wife beating, FGM, child brides and the like.
The Epoch Times
Why Are Venezuelan Drug Traffickers Burning Planes?
April 16, 2019
By Brad Johnson
Recent reporting has revealed that Venezuela has become deeply involved in narcotics trafficking.
As a socialist regime, Venezuela is quite comfortable trafficking cocaine, to begin with. They feel justified in doing so because of the sanctions imposed, which hurt their ability to get their hands on hard currency, and as a way to strike back at the United States.
This concept comes directly from one of the main tenets pushed on Venezuelans by the founder of the socialist regime, Hugo Chavez, and that is asymmetrical warfare.
Chavez viewed the United States as the great enemy to be destroyed, but recognized it could not be done through direct confrontation. They settled on the concept of asymmetrical warfare as a way to indirectly chip away at the power of the United States—helping to transport cocaine and other drugs to the United States exactly fits the bill. It destroys a segment of our youth and absorbs huge amounts of resources in treatment, law enforcement, and even jail space.
Cuban Precedent
Venezuela is not the first nearby socialist country to become involved in narcotrafficking. Back in the 1980s, in the cocaine cowboy days of Pablo Escobar and the Medellin, Colombia, cartel, Cuba made exactly the same decision. They became involved in narcotrafficking to obtain hard currency and bypass U.S. sanctions, just as the Venezuelans have done in today’s world.
There were many photographs taken from the air that showed speedboats moving cocaine through isolated Cuban beaches. Forward-looking infrared (FLIR) photographs showed airplanes moving cocaine from Colombia to Cuba for onward transportation.
All of this was made public and it created particular problems for the Cuban socialist strongman Fidel Castro, who often traveled internationally, including to the United Nations in New York.
Castro was in the process of being indicted as a narcotrafficker, and would have become even more deeply isolated, as he would not have been able to leave his island stronghold. He came up with a cold-hearted but practical solution. On July 13, 1989, he executed by firing squad Gen. Arnaldo Ochoa, Ministry of Interior Col. Antonio de la Guardia, and their closest aides, Capt. Jorge Martinez and Maj. Amado Padrón, respectively, for narcotrafficking.
Not only could Castro then claim the guilty were punished and, therefore, he was in the clear, but Ochoa was a popular figure in Cuba and was considered a war hero who was well respected among the troops. Ochoa’s execution neatly eliminated a potential rival for Castro, who only ever had one strategy in Cuba, which was to maintain his absolute power.
The liberal left here in the United States argued that Castro was not involved or aware of Cuba’s involvement, but it’s completely ludicrous to suggest that millions of dollars of difficult-to-come-by hard currency could be pumped into the economy without anyone noticing on a small island of only 10 million inhabitants that’s tightly controlled by an unquestioned dictator.
Anyone coming to a conclusion of this nature would “require the willing suspension of disbelief,” as Hillary Clinton once said.
It’s worth noting that asymmetrical warfare is precisely the concept that Russia is using so successfully against the United States at this very moment. Russian intelligence is using the willing dupes in the Democratic Party to sow discord and chaos by fraudulently claiming the election of President Donald Trump was in some way illegitimate.
There’s one aspect of Venezuelan involvement in narcotrafficking that is particularly interesting and has yet to be properly explained.
Destroyed Planes
As noted, twin-engine aircraft and other small aircraft have been used for many decades to move cocaine to different locations and countries so it can then be smuggled into the United States. What’s new is that Venezuelan cocaine smugglers burn or otherwise destroy the planes after only a single use of moving cocaine to Honduras on its way to the United States.
The explanation suggested by the media is that the cocaine trade is so lucrative that that’s how the cocaine business is now done. However, that’s just simply not the case.
Cocaine has always been such an enormous money maker that narcotraffickers could have easily afforded to destroy the small planes after a single use, but it’s never been done before through the decades.
There’s nothing to gain by doing so. According to a CNN report, Venezuela has greatly increased its involvement and is now making nearly daily flights to deliver cocaine and growing. Any suggestion that Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro is unaware or uninvolved in narcotrafficking is either ill-informed or is covering for the socialist regime.
This is made abundantly clear just by the fact that perhaps more than 300 aircraft are being used out of Venezuela and then destroyed in Honduras. Those aircraft have to be flown in from somewhere outside of Venezuela and it’s just plain stupid to suggest hundreds of small planes are being flown into Venezuela without the military dictatorship in power being aware.
The United States is fully aware of the problem and has accused various Venezuelan officials of drug trafficking, including Maduro’s second-in-command Diosdado Cabello.
The interesting question remains: Why are the Venezuelan’s burning or destroying the aircraft used to transport cocaine and where are the replacement aircraft coming from?
As everyone is aware, the Venezuelan socialist regime has held onto power against the will of their people with the help and support of Cuba, Iran, China, and Russia. At this point, we need to ask the question: Are the aircraft being destroyed to disguise Venezuelan government involvement and the aircrafts’ point of origin, and are Cuba, Iran, China, and Russia involved in supplying them?
SUDANESE MILITARY THANKS ARAB ALLIES
By Barry Webb
In a report aired on the Saudi-owned, Dubai-based, al-arabiyya TV channel on 27
April 2019, Shams ad-Deen al-Kabashi, a spokesman for the Sudanese Military
Council (TMC) that has assumed control of the country, has thanked Egypt, Saudi
Arabia (KSA), and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for their “support.”
In previous reporting the TMC has claimed that their discussions with the leaders
of the popular civilian protests (which have led to the arrest and imprisonment of
former president al-Basheer and some of his supporters) have been fruitful
(although Egypt’s al-Ahram is reporting that the protesters are still protesting
because they want an immediate transfer of power to civilian rule).
This Arab Spring 2.0 coup has been accomplished with minimal bloodshed in
contrast to the Arab Spring 1.0 of 2011-2012. Turning power over to “civilian”
rule immediately sounds to me like a one-way ticket to Muslim Brotherhood rule
like we saw in Egypt in 2012.
The singling out of Egypt, KSA, and the UAE for praise by the TMC raises some
interesting questions. Such as:
Did Egypt, KSA, and UAE engineer the protests and dethronement of al-Basheer?
Or, did they simply offer advice on how to quell the protests and engineer a
change of personnel at the top without resorting to violence, and/or a radical
change in the system of government?
Or, are Egypt, KSA, and UAE only offering “congratulations,” and “recognition” of
the TMC as the “sovereign” authority in Sudan?
What ever the real answers to those questions are, the interest of these three
Arab countries in the Sudan equation is a positive development regardless of the
level they actually played in terms of the outcome. Here is why:
The former ruler, al-Basheer, was a prancing, preening, thug, a caricature in a
Sacha Baron Cohen comedy, and an embarrassment to the entire Arab world.
Certainly, the neighboring moderate Arab states had plenty of reason to want to
deep six him.
Also, during the Arab Spring 1.0, though many of these uprisings were popular
and spontaneous, once under way the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) assumed
control of the movements. This has led to much bloodshed in most of those
countries, the collapse of governments, and contributed to the rise and expansion
of ISIS. In Egypt the MB actually got itself elected to power (with a little help from
its friends in the Obama administration).
The “moderate” Arab states of Egypt, KSA, and UAE do not want to see a repeat
of that catastrophe, so they may well have stepped in to influence events in one
way or another.
In addition, the MB clone and world’s number one state sponsor of terrorism
Turkey has been showing interest in East Africa for several years. There was a real
danger that the Arab Spring 2.0 in Sudan could have easily been taken over by
Turkey and the MB, had the three “moderates” not moved in to head it off.
It still remains to be seen whether or not the alleged “understandings” between
the TMC and the protestors will hold, and whether or not there will be a peaceful
transition of power, or whether or not the MB actually ends up gaining control of
the situation in Sudan. However, the involvement of Egypt, KSA, and the UAE
should be seen as a positive for the international interests who want to see
stability in the M.E. and Red Sea region, and a curtailing of MB and other radical
influences.
TRUMP’S WITHDRAWAL FROM SYRIA:
By Barry Webb
Reflections on, and future consequences of.
Trump’s 19 December 2019 announcement of his decision to withdraw all U.S. forces
from Syria was met with mixed responses from his supporters and opponents alike. Most
of the Left (including the media), which praised Obama for his ill-fated and ill-advised
pullout from Iraq, has, of course demonized Trump for pulling out of a theater where we
were far less involved than that of Iraq. The libertarian and anti-military elements of the
Left were generally favorable.
The Right was even more divided than was the Left. My own reaction the moment I
heard of Trump’s Syria decision was a huge groan of pain. This was Trump’s Neville
Chamberlain moment. This was Trump channeling his best Obama. This withdrawal,
though it entailed fewer troops in a country where we had a much smaller footprint,
would have the same disastrous results (or perhaps worse) than did Obama’s Iraqi
withdrawal–as shall be demonstrated in this essay.
But first, I would like to make a disclaimer. I am a Trump supporter–especially in light
of the way the Left and the media have been resuscitating the corpse of the Russia,
Russia hoax, using the MBS/Khashiqji nonsense, and every other gimmick they can think
of to bring him down. Indeed, many on the right justify their support of Trump’s Syria
mistake on their perceived need to support him 100% no matter what, as the only path for
shielding him from the Left’s continuous attacks and the media’s refusal to recognize
when Trump does something right–such as providing more jobs for Blacks and other
minorities. The media might mention the improving employment numbers, but never
will they give credit where credit is due.
Thus, I too plan to vote for Trump again. He has done far more good overall, than harm–
and I see nothing on the horizon at this time from either party that would make me want
to switch. That being said, I do reserve the right to criticize any president of the United
States–even one that I support–when that president makes a mistake. Indeed, criticizing
One’s president when they make a serious mistake makes your support for him when he is
right (and beleaguered on all sides) much more credible.
Unfortunately, events since Trump’s Syria announcement have proven my initial negative
reactions to be the correct ones, as this essay will demonstrate.
REASONS FOR MAINTAINING AN OCCUPATION
Obama’s cutting and running from Libya after helping to destroy its existing government
and military establishment, and his withdrawal from Iraq both demonstrate the validity of
the three primary reasons why a victorious nation must be willing to maintain a long term
occupation in a totally defeated nation long afterwards. These three reasons are spelled
out in detail in my book Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are
Losing the War on Terror, pp. 444-446. But, briefly, they are this:
One: To make sure that the bad guys don’t return to power, in one form or another.
Two: To protect the new government, or entity, from conquest and/or harassment from
neighboring or rivaling powers.
Three: To nudge and guide the new government towards a more equitable, humane, and
democratic method of government.
The prime examples of this are the success stories of Germany and Japan after WWII.
Guess what, folks, we are still there! In both countries. Because our predecessors
learned from their mistakes in WWI that it is much easier, and cheaper, to maintain a
benign occupation of a defeated nation than it is to keep going back to fight the same
wars all over again and again every time you turn around.
Somehow, we have unlearned that lesson, and Obama’s withdrawal from Iraq led directly
to the coming back into power of the old bad guys, namely the remnants of the Saddam
Hussein regime that we had just deposed, and the remnants of the Abu Mus’ab
az-Zarqawi terrorist group that the Saddam regime had hosted and coddled. ISIS was
formed in Turkey by the remnants of those two groups, then they became the de facto
ruling entities in huge portions of both Iraq and Syria.
Consequences? We had to go back to the Middle East to fight another war involving
many of the same bad guys we had kicked out of Iraq. In the meantime, neighboring bad
guy Iran has virtually taken over the Iraqi government that we had set up to replace the
Saddam regime, and bad guy Turkey not only unleashed ISIS against Iraq, Syria, and the
rest of the world, but has itself conducted bloody strikes against the territories of both
Iraq and Syria in regions inhabited by our allies the Kurds.
And, it is those same two neighboring bad guy state sponsors of terrorism that most
threaten Syria in the aftermath of our pullout from that beleaguered country.
IRAN’S GOALS
Iran’s goals in Syria are to complete their “Shi’a arch” above Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and
Israel, giving it a complete belt from Iran to the Mediterranean Sea. The American
presence in eastern Syria was a major roadblock in the way of Iran’s plans. Remove that
obstacle and Iran has a straight shot.
During the process of the war, Iran has placed 80,000 troops into Syria (although Iran is
now claiming 200,000 in Syria). Most of these troops are militias composed of fighters
from no less than 67 different countries, but they are all acting under the orders of, and
the leadership of, Iran. The American presence in Syria represented the sole negotiating
item we had for being able to eventually get those troops out.
Thus, allowing Iran to not only occupy much of Syria, but to complete its “Shi’a arch”
will allow it to more easily and effectively threatened the countries of Saudi Arabia,
Jordan, and Israel.
TURKEY’S GOALS
Erdogan’s long term goals are to re-establish the old Ottoman Empire Caliphate with
himself as its head, and to do so in alliance with the Muslim Brotherhood which is a
dominant (though partially latent) power in virtually all Arabic speaking countries.
Erdogan, and his goals in this respect, have been enthusiastically endorsed by the current
theological head of the international Muslim Brotherhood Yusuf al-Qaradhawi.
Step number one in terms of achieving that goal was for Turkey to take over its closest
neighboring Arab countries. Erdogan originally hoped that ISIS would be the hammer
that would bring down the governments of Iraq and Syria after which Turkey could move
in “to restore order” to the applause of “world opinion.”
Having Iraq and Syria under Erdogan’s “neo-Ottoman” control would then open the door
for an easy takeover of Jordan, Lebanon, and possibly Saudi Arabia. This would then
put pressure on Egypt and the rest of the dominoes throughout North Africa to also fall
into place. You can just imagine how tickled the Israelis would be then.
While Turkey’s ISIS plot has fallen apart, Erdogan’s goals have not changed, they are
only delayed a bit. Time for plan “B” which is to use the war on ISIS as cover for
exterminating Kurds and taking over parts of Syria itself without using a proxy.
It is in this context that Trump looked the other way when Turkey moved into Syria’s
Afrin region of N.W. Syria (which is adjacent to the Turkish border), and ethnic cleansed
the place. The excuse was Turkey’s claim that the resident power there, the Kurdish
PKK, is a terrorist group that threatens Turkey, therefore state sponsor of terrorism
Turkey believes that it has the right to defend itself against potential “terror” acts from the
PKK.
A LITTLE HISTORY
A little history is in order here to understand why Turkey, and the rest of NATO,
considers the PKK to be a terrorist group. Before discussing the PKK and why it is at
odds with the Turks, we also need to go back into Ancient history. This is because the
Kurds predate the Turks in the region by a good 1,500-2,000 years.
Modern Kurds are descended from three major groups of the ancient world: The
Assyrians, the Medes, and the Elamites. If one were to look at a map of the Assyrian
Empire (10th-7th centuries), the first thing you notice is that its territory corresponds
almost exactly to the areas where Kurds live today, namely northern Iraq, eastern Turkey,
northwest Syria, and in a sliver of northwest Iran that is adjacent to Iraq.
In 626 B.C. The last remnant of the Assyrian Empire was wiped out by Babylon in
alliance with the Medes out of what is today northern Iran. The Medes exploited
Assyria’s defeat by annexing most of its territory to its own growing empire. Ethnic
Medes then began flooding into these regions and mixing with the mostly Semitic-
speaking former Assyrian citizens. But, again, the regions where today’s Kurds live
corresponds almost exactly to that old Mede empire, minus most of its Iranian holdings.
The final piece to the puzzle came in the 5th century B.C. when the new power on the
block, the Persian Achaemenid empire, deported all of the Elamites from their homeland
in southern Iran (to make more room for themselves) to the former Mede controlled
regions which are now inhabited by the Kurds.
As a result, the modern Kurdish language is neither Semitic, nor Indo-European, but
something else, most likely a mixture of Elamite and the proto-Iranian that the Medes
spoke. However, most Kurds today also speak Arabic and are Sunni Muslims. In fact,
Islam’s greatest hero during the Crusades, salah ad-deen (Saladin), was a Kurd.
The Crusades were actually touched off by the Turks’ first incursion by force into the
Anatolian peninsula at the battle of Manzikert in 1071 when they defeated the Byzantine
army and captured the emperor. The result of this battle gave the Turks control of most
of the Anatolian peninsula–including the regions where Kurds had been living for
thousands of years.
After the Crusades, the Kurdish areas of the Middle East (in Syria, Iran, and Iraq, as well
as Anatolia), like most of the rest of the Sunni-dominated regions, became a part of the
Ottoman Empire, headed by the militaristic Turks. In 1916, when it became apparent that
the once powerful Ottoman Empire would be no more after WWI ended, the British and
French got together to decide how to carve up the former Ottoman territories. This was
called the Sykes-Picot agreement. The bottom line is that everyone in the Middle East
got their own independent state . . . except for the Kurds.
The descendants of the heroes of the Crusades (from the Muslim side), and the original
inhabitants of the region predating the Arabs as well as the Turks, now found themselves
not only the sole party without a state of their own, but divided up between the new state
of Syria, the new state of Iraq, Iran, and even the defeated Central Power enemy of the
West, the Turks, got a huge state which included the greater part of Kurdistan.
Can anyone blame the Kurds for being ticked off?
THE COLD WAR ERA
During the Cold War, with the West embracing Turkey into NATO as a counter-point,
and a thorn, in the side of the Russians who dominated the Soviet Union, the Russians
corresponded by cultivating relations with the Kurds whom the Russians understood
would have deep grudges against the Turks (historically Russia’s number one enemy
going back to the 13th century).
The result of this Soviet/Russian cultivation of the Kurds was the formation of the far-left
Kurdistan Workers Party, the Kurdish acronym of which is the PKK. While America’s
CIA was cultivating a Turkish terror group called the “Grey Wolves” to create mayhem
in Soviet territories, the Soviets encouraged the PKK to do the same inside Turkey.
Thus, the reason why the United States and NATO declared the PKK to be a terrorist
group is because of its attacks against Turkish interests at the behest of the Soviet Union
–even though the PKK consider themselves to be merely “freedom fighters.”
From a Cold War peak of 50,000 fighters, the PKK has dwindled to less than 4,000.
After the fall of the Soviet Union it called a cease fire vis-à-vis the Turks and tried to
rebrand itself as a political party. However, after 2004 with Erdogan becoming
increasingly dictatorial and fascist, PKK remnants have resumed the fight, but this time
only against Turkish military and intelligence targets. They have also moved away from
their old far-Left Socialism and have been agitating merely for some sort of autonomy in
Turkey similar to that enjoyed by the Kurds in Iraq, rather than a full-fledged
independent state.
So, it begs the question as to why they are still considered to be a terrorist group by the
United States and NATO. This question kind of answers itself: Because Turkey is still a
member of NATO, the United States and other NATO countries allow the Turks to
dictate to them who the good guys are and who the bad guys are in the near and middle
east.
And, the Turks consider all Kurds to be PKK terrorists–even the YPG Kurds that bore
the brunt of the ground fighting side-by-side with American forces against ISIS.
Which brings us back to Trump’s decision to pull out of Syria. To understand the
enormity of Trump’s decision to pull out of Syria, one only has to look at the timeline.
THE TIME LINE
The genesis of Trump’s decision to pull out of Syria began with a phone call with
Turkey’s Erdogan on 14 December 2018. This phone call was intercepted by just about
every intelligence organization on the planet, and then leaked.
One version of this phone call has Trump being the initiator of the call. The other version
has Erdogan being the initiator of the call. One version has Trump asking Erdogan to
move into Northern Syria to finish off ISIS, so that he (Trump) could fulfill his campaign
promise to “bring all the American troops home.” The other version of the call has
Erdogan “ordering” Trump to go ahead and pull out and “leave the remnants of ISIS to
us.”
On 19 December 2018 Trump formally, and publicly, announced his decision to pull all
the American forces out of Syria–in what he thought would be a feel-good moment days
before Christmas.
And I let out a huge groan of pain–as did Secretary of Defense “Mad Dog” Mattis and
many others. Here is why:
Turkey under Erdogan has become an Islamo-fascist, and a Turkish racist fascist state.
Erdogan’s ruling party, the AKP (Justice and Development), is a clone of the international
terrorist group the Muslim Brotherhood. The state ideology of Islamism mixed with
Turkish “Grey Wolf” racism is at least as vicious as anything Hitler’s Nazi party came up
with.
Prior to that fateful 14 December 2018 phone call, Turkey’s state ideology and behavior
had been on full display for the entire world to see when they moved into Syria’s Afrin
region. They did not just exterminate remnant PKK members. No, they exterminated
every Kurd, Christian, and Yazidi they could find. It you’re a Turk, that’s what you do
(If I may paraphrase some recent Geico ads).
Actually, though, Erdogan did not use his own regular army troops. No, he used irregular
militias to do most of the dirty work. Who were these militia troops? Remnants of ISIS,
al-Qaeda, and Muslim Brotherhood groups. A real fine collection of the world’s worst
terrorist organizations. The very groups that Americans and their YPG allies were
supposedly fighting. They had to sit in the neighboring region of Manbij and watch in
horror as Erdogan’s hired thugs ethnic cleansed the Afrin district.
It is with this background that Trump invited the world’s number one state sponsor of
terrorism, and the 21st century’s new “Hitler” to move into the Manjib district so he could
exterminate the very Kurds who had been fighting and bleeding side-by-side with our
American boys.
Which begs the question of why? How could this happen?
GUT INSTINCTS
My take on Trump is that he is a generalist. He has operated most of his life on “gut
instincts.” These gut instincts have generally served him well in the world of business,
and even in the world of politics it won him the world’s top prize his first time out
without ever having run even for “dog catcher” previously.
Even as president, his gut instincts have generally served him well. His over-all policies
on the economy, on getting tough with Iran, North Korea, China, and others, have been
spot on. While Trump’s gut instincts are generally correct, no one has ever accused him
of being exceedingly knowledgeable of all the basic facts and details of a given situation.
This is where his advisors are supposed to come in.
So, where were his advisors on that Turkey thing? Was James Mattis the only one in the
room who was aware of what Turkey was up to? Where was John Bolton on that? Gina
Haspel? Mike Pompeo?
Trump had never made a secret of his desire to withdraw from Syria. It was a campaign
promise. He also repeated that desire in the Spring of 2018. That’s when his advisors, all
of them, should have stepped in and said “no, Mr. President, and here’s why . . .”
WHAT IN THE “H” IS GOING ON IN WASHINGTON?
My own gut feeling about “inside the beltway” policy makers of both parties is that they
all have their heads so far up their anti-Russia, pro-NATO (fill in the blank), that they
can’t see Turkey as anything other than a solid, NATO ally . . . therefore, one of the good
guys.
Or, conversely, those few who are somewhat aware of what Erdogan is up to, actually
believe that Erdogan is an aberration and that as soon as he is out of the picture (from old
age or whatever), that Turkey will return to its natural, pro-West, democratic self. So,
therefore, there was no need to warn Trump about Turkey’s intentions. The
mindboggling ignorance of history that attitude represents makes me as sick as did
Trump’s Syria pullout decision. I’ve got news for these people. Erdogan is the natural
Turkey. The cold war, pro-West Turkey was the aberration. Turkey will continue its
racist, Islamist, fascists, neo-Ottoman trajectory with or without Erdogan.
This is why Trump blindly allowed/invited Erdogan into the rest of Northern Syria that
he had already not gobbled up, because, hey, Turkey is a member of NATO, right? And,
they’re in the area, so why not let them clean up the rest of ISIS?
Groan.
The thought of any American president even talking to Erdogan on the phone (regardless
of who initiated the call), just makes me ill–much less inviting him to take over even
more territory. Can you imagine FDR calling up Adoph Hitler and asking him to take
over Czechoslovakia?
THE RUSSIA-TURKEY CONNECTION
Some on the right have tried to rationalize Trumps move as a brilliant stroke of
Machiavellian geostrategic chess play on the belief that it would drive a wedge between
Putin and Erdogan. This is wrong for a whole bunch of reasons, foremost of which is
that Turkey is still a member of NATO.
To remind everyone, Turkey has been Russia’s number one enemy for 800 years, ever
since they allied with the Mongol take down of the first Russian state in the 13th century.
Since then there have been numerous Russo-Turkish wars. Putin is well aware of the
history between his country and Turkey, and he is playing Erdogan like a violin. He is
trying to woo Turkey out of NATO–which would be the best-case scenario for the West,
as well as for Russia, because that might be the only way we could ever get rid of this
albatross around our necks (NATO has no provision for evicting rogue members).
But, sadly, Turkey is still a member of NATO, so, if Trump’s Syria pullout should “drive
that wedge” between Putin and Erdogan, and it should lead to war . . .
Should Russia then be forced to attack Turkey, over the Syria problem, then the U.S. (and
the rest of NATO) would be forced to go to war so as to defend the world’s number one
state sponsor of terrorism against the planet’s last remaining Christian great power
(Remember, Obama said America is no longer a Christian nation).
Really brilliant guys.
No! Kick Turkey out of NATO first. Then, and only then, do you drive a wedge
between Erdogan and Putin.
WHAT HAS ACTUALLY HAPPENED IN SYRIA SINCE TRUMP’S
ANNOUNCEMENT
The first thing that happened was that Defense Secretary Gen. James Mattis submitted
his already prepared letter of resignation when Trump refused to back off on his plan to
pull all American troops out of Syria (more on that in a moment).
Then our Kurd allies in the Manbij region (east of Aleppo, just south of the Iraqi border),
not being stupid, immediately gave up their dreams of a semi-autonomous region of their
own, and promptly offered Syria’s president Assad a full surrender in return for the right
to live–because they knew that Erdogan would have them all exterminated as soon as the
Americans left. Interestingly, all through this 8-year Syrian war, the YPG Kurds
studiously avoided any hostilities with Assad’s Syrian forces as an insurance policy–so
they would have an escape clause in the event their fickle American allies (see Vietnam,
Somalia, Iraq) should depart like the proverbial deadbeat husband who skips out without
paying any alimony, and thus the Kurds dream of a semi-autonomous state of their own
should collapse.
Damascus then sent troops to the Manbij province. These troops discreetly did not enter
Manbij city where U.S. troops were still located, but instead set camp to the west and
northwest of the city so as to act as a buffer, and deterrent, to any Turkish forces that
might invade. Reports out of the Middle East had it that there were Russians embedded
into these Syrian forces for added deterrent.
In the meantime, while all of this was going on (and starting even before), al-Qaeda had
taken over the province of Idlib which is located just to the south of Afrin, and west of
Aleppo.
In the Afrin region, the Turks, after ethnic cleansing the place, repopulated it with
Turkic-speaking peoples from several other countries–repeating exactly what they did to
northern Cyprus in 1974 (when we had another president who was distracted by being
investigated). Arabic media reports now claim that the primary language there is
Turkish, and Turkish-signed restaurants and other businesses now dominate the scene in
Afrin.
Erdogan has established a branch of his Muslim Brotherhood clone AKP party in Afrin,
and has also firmly announced that his troops are in Syria to stay. Period.
Erdogan and Putin, instead of having a wedge driven between them as some had hoped,
kissed and made up. Putin then gave Erdogan the green light to take over Idlib province,
provided that token Russian troops and observers are included (to make sure the Turks
behave themselves). The Turkish move into Idlib coming down from Afrin was done
without firing a shot, indicating that there was likely some prior cooperation between the
Turks and al-Qaeda. Egyptian talk show host Amru Adeeb on 11 March 2019 read a
report claiming that the Syrian MB (closely allied to al-Qaeda) asked Erdogan to occupy
North Syria.
The so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) is actually nothing more than a Turkish-backed
al-Qaeda faction, proving that there was indeed cooperation between al-Qaeda and
Turkey all along (Rossomando, John, U.S. Envoy Met with Syrian Rebel Leader Who
Expressed Solidarity with al-Qaeda, posted on www.investigativeproject.org, 20 Feb.
2019).
Hey, folks! Wasn’t it al-Qaeda that attacked us on 9/11? Isn’t that the whole reason we
initiated military actions in the Middle East? Doesn’t anyone remember 9/11?
Apparently not, because the Obama administration actually cooperated with al-Qaeda
factions, sometimes in conjunction with Turkey, and sometimes based on its own
initiative. “The Obama administration spent $500 million training and equipping Syrian
rebels linked with the FSA” (Rossomando, www.investigativeproject.org, 20 Feb.).
So, the Trump administration has seemed so far to also be totally oblivious to the
al-Qaeda part of the equation.
All of this was a result of an American administration being too laser focused on just
defeating ISIS while being distracted by politicized investigations coming from Robert
Mueller’s team and a Democrat controlled Congress, and while China and North Korea
negotiations were in flux.
PROOF THAT TRUMP FINALLY RECOGNIZED HIS MISTAKE
Trump, for whatever reason, was totally oblivious to the history between Kurds and
Turks, and oblivious to Erdogan’s intentions in Syria. What he needed was a big slap in
the face to wake him up. What he got were actually two slaps in the face. One was
Mattis’ resignation letter. The second was the Kurds we had been allied with basically
surrendering all of their dreams to the Assad regime, proving that Mattis was right.
Once made aware of the severity of his mistake, and the severity of the Erdogan’s
intentions, Trump immediately tried to make amends. First, he almost pleadingly
proclaimed how he didn’t want the Kurds to get hurt. Then, he did backtrack, sort of,
without calling it a backtrack. He announced that the pullout would be delayed until ISIS
was totally defeated, then he added that he would keep 200 American troops there with
the YPG Kurds without specifying for how long (rumors have it that the actual number
will be closer to 1,000. So, in the end, not much of a “pull out.” Translation: Trump did
backtrack, but would never admit it publicly).
In January, after the holidays, Trump sent Bolton and Pompeo to the Middle East to do
damage control. Bolton’s mission was primarily to dissuade Erdogan from doing
anything naughty, but not being the most diplomatic person on the planet, he basically
ordered Turkey to not make any moves into Syria unless cleared by the U.S.
Erdogan responded by refusing the meet with Bolton, and saying that nobody tells
Turkey what to do. Then he massed even more troops and heavy artillery on the border
with Syria (these were later seen to move into Idlib, as above).
Pompeo, after trying to convince the Israelis and our Arab allies that the U.S. is not
abandoning the Middle East, then told the Kurds that they should “beg the Turks for
protection.”
And, I wanted to throw the TV through my living room wall when I heard that. The fact
that Pompeo could even make such a statement means that he did not even begin to
understand who the Turks are and what their intentions in Syria and the Middle East as a
whole are. And, if Pompeo did not understand these basic facts, makes me believe that
President Trump still did not fully comprehend the situation–even after the two above-
mentioned slaps in the face–otherwise how could he send his Secretary of State into the
region so ill informed?
WHAT IS WRONG HERE?
This entire scenario begs the question of why Trump made that announcement, then acted
so surprised when it blew up in his face? So, I have to ask again, where were his advisors
on all of that? Coats, Pompeo, Bolton, Haspel, Mattis, why could they all not converge
as a group on the oval office in the spring of 2018 when Trump had repeated his
campaign promise to withdraw the troops from Syria?
Was Mattis the only one who had the foggiest idea about what the reality on the ground
was in the Middle East? Or, did they all actually try to dissuade the president only to
have him think he knew better than his advisors?
Pompeo’s above-mentioned pleading with the Kurds to beg Erdogan for mercy tells me
that it may have been a combination of advisors not being as well versed in the situation
as they should have been, and a head-strong president whose only thought was to fulfill a
campaign promise.
Don’t get me wrong, Trump’s current crop of above-mentioned advisors are heads and
shoulders above their predecessors in the Obama administration, and probably also going
back through the Bush and Clinton administrations. Unfortunately, that still leaves an
ocean of room for stupidity, incompetence, and just plan misunderstanding basic facts.
Maybe there’s just something in the water there in D.C. that makes people suddenly
become stupid.
CONSEQUENCES
Erdogan’s establishment of his AKP “Justice and Development” party in Afrin amounts to
a de facto annexation of the region. This is Erdogan’s Sudetenland. This is the new/old
Caliphate folks. This is Ottoman empire 2.0.
Once American troops are completely out of the region, expect the ISIS sleeper cells in
place in Iraq and Syria to become active again in regions not already controlled by
Turkey (to do Turkey’s dirty work for it). This will be ISIS in new clothing, as an Iraqi
official put it. ISIS 2.0.
As Iran and Turkey both strive to increase their holdings in Syria, they are bound to
collide. Russia is allied to the Damascus regime which would be eliminated in a Turkish
scenario. Iran is also allied to the Damascus regime and Russia. So, this U.S. withdrawal
might eventually lead to the “wedge” being driving between Putin and Erdogan. With the
U.S. being allied to Terror sponsor Turkey, thanks to NATO, say hello to WWIII.
Any serious conflict over Syria between NATO and Turkey on one side, and Russia and
Iran on the other could quickly spill over into the Ukraine and East European theaters.
Most of the Middle East would line up on one side or the other. With this going on, and
the U.S. thus tied down, how could China resist doing what it wants to do in the Far East?
FINAL THOUGHTS
People may wonder why I am so against a U.S. pull-out from Syria, while I approve a
total U.S. pull-out from Afghanistan . . .
American boys are fighting, dying, and having their body parts blown off in Afghanistan
for one reason, and one reason only . . . and that is to make China rich.
China wants to construct two new “Old silk roads” one a super highway for truck traffic
linking western China with Pakistan’s Indian ocean coast. The other, a high-speed rail
corridor linking western China with Iran. These transit corridors will give China more
direct access to Middle East oil and open up the Middle East to Chinese products.
Both of these transit corridors, while avoiding Afghanistan, skirt its border making
tempting targets for terrorist and criminal gangs operating in a failed state. Having U.S.
troops there in Afghanistan to keep the lid on things saves China from the trouble of
having to play policeman itself.
In Syria we should have hung around in order to prevent two neighboring powers
(Turkey and Iran) from entering the vacuum. In Afghanistan we should want the two
neighboring giants of Russia and China to come in and try to keep peace. Perhaps having
a China bogged down in Afghanistan might prevent them from seeking mischief in
Taiwan, Japan, or other areas of east Asia.
To be sure, the U.S. had plenty of reason to enter Afghanistan in the first place, to exact
vengeance against al-Qaeda and kill bin Laden, and as many of his lieutenants as
possible. Once that was accomplished, we should have left. Picking a fight with the
Taliban should not have been part of the game plan. Here is why:
The Taliban were not a terrorist organization. True, they harbored al-Qaeda and fought
to protect al-Qaeda once we had entered the theater, and true, they are a totally disgusting
collection of worthless protoplasm with their public stoning to death of women who are
victims of rape, their public beheadings in front of stadium crowds, etc., but they
themselves were not international terrorists. They were nothing but a local Afghani tribal
grouping. I stress the word tribal because that explains the Taliban’s behavior.
In tribal culture, once you’ve offered the hospitality of your tent to a guest, the shame and
honor culture demands that you also become your guest’s protector. No harm should
come to him while he is a guest in your tent. Even if your guest has gone out and hurt
someone else, then returned to your tent, you are still honor bound to protect him and
ensure his safety while he is in your tent. For you to fail to fulfill your obligation of
protection would incur so much shame upon you that the only way to restore your honor
would be to commit suicide.
So, when the U.S. demanded that the Taliban turn Usama bin Laden over for his 9/11
responsibility, the Taliban reacted in the only way that their tribal shame and honor
culture would allow them–regardless of bin Laden’s guilt. Thus, not only could they not
turn bin Laden over, but they were also honor bound to fight for him when we invaded.
Our boots-on-the-ground approach there also automatically triggered the “defensive
Jihad” mentality of most Afghanis. Hence the impossibility of ever winning a war there.
Another issue is that the Afghan “government” that we’ve set up there composed of
Uzbekis and Tajikis . . . are not much better than the Pashtu that the Taliban is based on.
So, let the Chinese and Russians keep order in their neck of the woods. Why us?
THE ULTIMATE CONSEQUENCES OF THE SYRIA PULLOUT
We have, over the years, built up a reputation (particularly in the Middle East) of being
an ally that cuts and runs with Syria now added to the list of Vietnam, Somalia, and Iraq.
The moral being that in any way with the United States . . . all you have to do is survive,
and you’ll eventually win because the U.S. will leave sooner or later.
This belief on the part of many in the Middle East is compounded by basic Islamic
culture.
In Islamic culture, if your enemy pulls out of a conflict, even though technically winning,
that is seen as a sign of weakness in Islamic eyes. And, any sign of weakness invites
aggression. This is supported by the Qur’an:
So, do not get weak in the knees and call for peace when you have the upper hand, for
Allah is with you and He will not hold your actions against you (Qur’an 47:35).
In other words, whenever the Muslims have the upper hand in any war, they are supposed
to finish the job. The corollary to that in the minds of Muslims is that any power that
does not “finish the job” in any battle and pulls out (like we did in Iraq and
now in Syria) is a sign of weakness–even if the departing party has the upper hand.
And, weakness invites aggression. So, in the near future we can expect to see a renewed
surge at all levels by the jihadi forces.
SHAME, SHAME, SHAME . . . ON FRANCE:
The take down of Notre Dame and its significance
By Barry Webb
European Churches are vandalized, defecated on, and torched nearly every day. As a
consequence of the current on-going Muslim invasion, in 2018, there were 1,063 reported
deliberate acts of damage to Christian churches, statues, etc. in France alone. That is
nearly three a day.
The pro-Muslim Brotherhood and terrorism-sponsoring natural gas state of Qatar has
recently funded the construction of a mega mosque overlooking the area where Charles
Martel inflicted history’s first defeat on advancing Islamic jihadi invaders at the battle of
Tours in 732. Islam, is nothing, if not very cognizant of symbolisms.
So, with this background, the sacred ground of Tours surrendered to Islam, and with an
accelerating vandalization and desecration of churches sweeping France, we’re supposed
to believe that the take down of Notre Dame at the beginning of one of Christianity’s
most holy weeks was . . . an accident?
Yes, of course. It was spontaneous combustion. Such things do happen, you know. And
the pyramids were built by aliens.
Perhaps the Notre Dame fire was nothing more than just another example of “Work Place
Violence” . . . like Fort Hood, San Bernardino, and the Pulse night club in Orlando.
Let us look at the facts. Notre Dame was built in 1163, and in nearly 900 years of
existence there was never a single fire, yet, this April 2019 fire started “accidently” in two
different places, according to French TV. Notre Dame Cathedral survived the turmoil of
the Middle Ages, the Protestant Reformation, the thirty-years’ war, the French Revolution,
the Franco-Prussian war, WWI, and WWII, only to be taken down by a fire that started
“accidently” in two different places, in a city that had recently seen an accelerating rash
of Islamic desecrations of churches, including, Islamic attempts against Notre Dame
itself, and coincidentally when the other symbol of France’s identity and existence,
Charles Martel’s victory over invading Muslims, had just been desecrated by the
terrorism sponsoring state of Qatar.
Of course, it just had to be a self-starting fire.
Oh, excuse me. French authorities are now saying the fire was caused by an “electrical
short.” Yes, of course, in two places at the same time.
A brief walk through history is in order here:
Islam is obsessed with destroying the culture and the history of countries that it conquers,
and the symbols of those cultures and histories. This is why the Taliban destroyed those
historic statues of Buddha. This why the “Islamic State” destroyed 3,000 year-old
Assyrian artwork and sculptures. This is why the Obama-approved Muslim Brotherhood
(when they were in power in Egypt 2012-2013) had been drawing up plans to take down
the 5,000-year-old pyramids–before they themselves were taken down by the Egyptian
people and military.
Just look at what Islam has done to symbols and centers of other religions during its 1400
years of existence:
First it took over the pagan Arab religious center in Mecca and made it the primary focal
point of Islam and the place to which all Muslims were supposed to make a pilgrimage to
at least once in their lifetimes.
Then, it took over the Christian patriarchal city of Jerusalem and built two mosques on
grounds sacred to Judaism. Next it took the patriarchal city of Antioch, the patriarchal
city of Alexandria, and finally, the patriarchal city of Constantinople. Only Rome
remained out of their grasp. But not for lack of trying. Several jihadi invasions during
the Middle Ages succeeded in raping nuns on altars and desecrating numerous churches,
and killing priests . . . but the Vatican remained safe and sound behind its protective
walls. Walls that really worked.
With this background we are supposed to be surprised that Islam has built a mega
mosque on Charles Martel’s sacred ground? And, with this historical background, we are
supposed to believe that the fire that took down the 900-year old Notre Dame Cathedral
and symbol of Western Civilization self-started in two different places, at the beginning
of holy week?
Yes, maybe that mega mosque at Tours also self-assembled–by accident.
Let’s be honest now. There is a prophecy in the ahadeeth about the latter days where
Jesus Christ is supposed to “break the cross” (in a reference to post Nicaea Christianity)
and “kill the pigs” (a reference to the Jews as pigs, according to Qur’an 5:60). This
prophecy is found in the Ahmad collection of ahadeeth 2:406, where Abu Hurrairah
quotes Muhammad as saying:
I am the closest of all the people to Jesus son of Mary, because there is no other prophet
between him and myself. He will come again, and when you see him, you will recognize
him. He is of medium height and his coloring is reddish-white. He will be wearing two
garments and his hair will look wet. He will break the cross, kill the pigs, abolish the
gizya tax, and call the people to Islam.
This prophecy, and a few other similar ones, are why the radical fundamentalist Muslims
have been increasing their killing of Jews and their attacks on Christians and symbols of
Christianity—because they think that they are doing Allah’s work, helping to speed up
the time when Jesus returns to finish the job of “breaking the cross,” and “killing the
Jews.”
But, of course, Notre Dame was destroyed by an electrical short. In two separate places
simultaneously, by accident.
But, not to worry. French President Macron is going to set up a committee to make plans
for rebuilding Notre Dame, not in its original manifestation, no, but to make it “more
beautiful, and more modern.”
Yes, I can hardly wait to see what sort of multi-cultural platypus Macron’s Politically
Correct committee will come up with.
Wanna bet it won’t have a large worship room for every faith represented in today's
France, except that one worship room will be larger than all the others? Wanna bet this
won’t be the worship room facing Mecca, with prayer rugs and a mihrab for ministering
to the faithful?
Shame, shame, shame on you France, for allowing the desecration of the blood of Charles
Martel’s heroes–and the stabbing of all Western Civilization in the heart.
Will the tower of London be Europe’s next mega mosque?
————————————————————————————————
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator/analyst for the NSA, is currently
a senior fellow for Americans for Intelligence reform, and is the Author of Confessions of
an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website
is: www.barrywebbauthor.com
The Epoch Times
Surveillance Versus Spying
April 16, 2019
Commentary
There’s so much being said about what was done to the 2016 Trump campaign—be it surveillance or spying—by pundits, lawyers, the extreme left wing, and just about anyone else who is paid to go on television and talk.
There’s a great deal of talk, but little that makes actual sense when examined. Everyone on the left, including the mainstream media and pretty much everyone in the Democratic Party, is trying to break this important discussion down to an insignificant argument over semantics.
But there’s a clear and important distinction, and it has nothing to do with semantics.
The left argues more or less that it’s an outrage that a “legal” act of mere surveillance be sullied with the tag “spying.” As a retired CIA operations officer, let me clarify and break down the differences.
There are many indications that the original Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) request was not legal but, in fact, something far worse. It appears to have been illegal.
Everyone involved who signed the FISA request has been documented to have known the Steele dossier was bought and paid for by the Clinton campaign and they were fully aware that not a single item of information in the dossier was confirmed to be true.
Yet, a FISA request is also an affidavit, and the FBI and Department of Justice (DOJ) leadership signed the FISA request and gave their oath to a judge that everything in that request was true to the best of their knowledge. The request didn’t include the fact that the Steele dossier was produced by the Clinton campaign and wasn’t an actual intelligence document.
Much of the aforementioned documentation was put together by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) on the House Intelligence Oversight Committee, who put it into a memo called The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Abuses at the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which was released to the public on Feb. 2, 2018.
A redacted version of the FISA request also has been released and we know that former FBI Director James Comey, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, and former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates all signed off on the request.
Once approved, it had to be renewed every 90 days by both the FBI and DOJ leadership and submitted to a judge for approval. Comey signed three FISA extension applications and McCabe signed one. Yates, Rosenstein, and then-acting Deputy Attorney General Dana Boente each signed one.
The fact that the initial request and several subsequent extensions were approved by a judge has been the principal argument by Democratic Party leadership as to why there is no basis to suggest spying took place. Here’s the problem.
I read the original redacted FISA request and it’s reasonably conclusive that the Steele document was the main, if not the only, “evidence” cited as the need for the surveillance request. The signatories on the request didn’t tell the judge two very important things. As previously mentioned, firstly, they didn’t reveal the Steele document was from the Clinton campaign and not an intelligence product. They will argue this is not a lie, but the fact remains, it’s a critical piece of information that wasn’t provided and a textbook example of a lie of omission. The second problem is the signatories all knew the information in the Steele document was either unconfirmed or false.
Nunes has forwarded eight criminal referrals to Attorney General William Barr. The details have not yet been made public, but I think it’s a safe bet that Comey, McCabe, Yates, Boente, and Rosenstein have some serious legal problems looming large on the horizon.
The distinction between spying and surveillance may also play into the pending criminal investigations. Let me make the difference clear. There’s a legal requirement for all intelligence agencies that if we suspect a person in a U.S. organization is a spy for the Russians or any other country, then we must, by law, inform the owner or person in charge of said organization.
There’s no mistake here—at no point was then-candidate Trump informed that the FBI suspected a person working on his campaign to be a spy for the Russians. That’s a violation of the law and likely to be referenced in the Nunes referrals.
Worth recalling is that during the same general period of time under similar circumstances, the FBI discovered that Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) had had a Chinese spy working on her staff for 20 years. The FBI met with Feinstein and alerted her, as they are required to do by law.
If President Donald Trump had been informed at the time that the FBI suspected an employee of the campaign was a Russian spy, then what they did would have been surveillance. The fact the FBI violated the law and didn’t inform Trump means the surveillance was spying. Period.
Brad Johnson is a retired CIA senior operations officer and a former chief of station. He is president of Americans for Intelligence Reform.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
U.S. CONGRESS VOTES TO SUPPORT TERRORISM
By Barry Webb
In Mid-April 2019 the U.S. Congress voted to cut off funds going to the U.S. support of
the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and United Arab Emirates (UAE) war efforts in
Yemen.
The source of this idiocy is the sophisticated dis-information efforts put out by the Houthi
rebels in Yemen, their terrorism supporting Iranian benefactors, the terrorism-supporting
Wahhabi/Muslim Brotherhood regime in Qatar, and its propaganda organ Al-Jazeera.
You see, the Houthis and their supporters have learned well from the HAMAS experience
vis-à-vis Israel. Hamas likes to place its ammunition and weapons depots and rocket-
launching and manufacturing sites in civilian areas and/or next to (or even inside of)
schools and mosques. Therefore, whenever Israel defends itself against HAMAS attacks,
HAMAS can guarantee that schools and mosques will be destroyed, and lots of civilians
will be killed–preferably women and children. In fact, during times of conflict HAMAS
will go around and round up children and imprison them at rocket-launching sites,
weapons depots, etc., in order to guarantee the maximum number of casualties among
children.
HAMAS then films these “Israeli atrocities” uploads them to the internet where they then
make all of the international “news” feeds. And, all the bleeding-heart liberals in the
West weep their crocodile tears over the “brutal Israeli war-crimes” of dismembered
children. These mis-informed drones then pressure their politicians in the West to force
Israel to stop committing “war crimes.”
This process is now being repeated with regards to the war in Yemen. The Saudis and
Emiratis are now getting the same treatment (from the ignorant Left and corrupted media
in the West) that Israel usually gets. To be sure, the Saudis are no angels, but the people
they are fighting are even worse. And, from a geo-strategic standpoint allowing Iran to
set up shop in Yemen, on the border with Saudi Arabia would be a disaster not only for
our Sunni Arab allies in the region, but for the entire West as a whole (For details on this
See Majid Rafizadeh’s The US Must Stop Iran’s Takeover of Yemen, and Soeren Kern’s Is
Iran Winning in Yemen, both posted recently on www.gatestoneinstitute.org).
This (Yemen issue) is tied closely to the ongoing feud between Qatar on the one side, and
on the other side its Gulf neighbors and former allies Saudi Arabia, the United Arab
Emirates, and their allies–as is the Khashoqji affair discussed on this site previously. In
the wake of being excommunicated by the KSA and UAE for its support of the Muslim
Brotherhood and other terrorist organizations, the tiny (but natural gas-rich) shaykhdom
of Qatar sought other allies, so it turned to fellow terrorism-supporters Iran and Turkey.
In the meantime, Qatar has paid Billions of dollars to purchase the way Americans think.
This money has bought off think tanks, such as Brookings, and Journalists working for
the Washington Post, New York Times, and CNN, among others. Qatar also funds
Middle Eastern Studies departments in American universities to complete the cycle of
thought control. Qatar has even provided social studies text books to American K-12
schools indoctrinating American students with the Islamist message, and asking them to
“express their loyalty to Qatar.”
God forbid that any of our honorable Senators or Congresspersons should take any
money from the terrorist-sponsoring state (and Iranian ally) of Qatar, but that is really not
needed for them to vote the way Qatar wants them to, since they get all of their Middle
East knowledge and viewpoints from the likes of CNN and the Washington Post, both of
which virtually take dictation from al-Jazeera–as was (and is) exemplified during the
Khashoqji affair.
The UAE is also being heavily criticized by the pro-Muslim Brotherhood TV channel of
al-Jazeera for its activities in eastern Yemen where it has set up military bases and
conducted raids against suspected terrorist strongholds. What terrorists you might ask are
in eastern Yemen?
Why, none other than al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). AQAP is considered
to be the largest, most active, and most powerful of all al-Qaeda franchises on the planet.
And for good reason. You see, Eastern Yemen is essentially the region of Hadhramawt
(which, BTW, means “Civilization of Death”), and the Hadhramawt is where Usama bin
Laden’s father came from. In fact, the bin Laden clan is so numerous in the Hadhramawt
that the name is almost like “Smith” in a U.S. phone book. Usama bin Laden himself
quickly became a folk hero in the Hadhramawt–especially after 9/11.
And we’re supposed to condemn, and sanction the UAE for killing terrorists and taking
prisoners? I thought that al-Qaeda was the whole reason we went to war in the Middle
East in the first place. Just because the Democrats have chosen to belittle, or totally
ignore, 9/11 doesn’t mean that half of the Republicans have to tag along. Or does it?
In other words, any Congressional vote to curtail American equipment, technical, and/or
intelligence sharing aid to the KSA/UAE war effort in Yemen, is a vote in support of the
terrorism of al-Qaeda, Iran, and Qatar.
Fine work indeed, by the U.S. Congress.
To sum up, by voting to weaken the KSA-UAE war effort in Yemen, they are also voting
to increase terrorism-sponsoring Iran’s dominance of the region (not to mention granting
al-Qaeda freedom of operation). Indeed, Iranian officials, including Supreme guide
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, now openly boast that they control no less than four Arab
capitals: Baghdad, Damascus, Beirut, and now Sanaa. Can Washington D.C. be far
behind?
—————————————————————————————————-
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator/analyst for the NSA, and is the
author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA Spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War
on Terror. His website is: www.barrywebbauthor.com
TOP TEN STATE SPONSORS OF TERRORISM
By Barry Webb
The criteria used for making these selections were:
–Does the country actually operate terrorist groups in the territory of other countries?
–Does the country finance 3rd party terrorist groups operating in the territory of other
countries and/or provide military equipment and/or training to said terrorist groups.
–Does the country support other known state sponsors of terrorism either through the
sale of weapons to them, the sending of cash, and/or providing military protection for
said state sponsors of terrorism.
–Does the country provide diplomatic cover for other state sponsors of terrorism.
–Does the government of said country allow international terrorist groups to recruit
freely within its borders and/or allow the front groups of known terrorist groups to collect
donations which are sent to 3rd party countries for terrorist acts there.
Using this criterion, the first three selections were rather obvious, and easy. Numbers 4
through 10 were much more difficult and perhaps interchangeable. But with all of this in
mind, here is the list as of April 2019.
1. TURKEY
Turkey. Turkey served as the incubator for ISIS, then once they had launched ISIS into
action in neighboring Iraq, and then Syria, they continued to help finance it by selling its
stolen oil on the black market, and by providing transportation to jihadi wannabes from
all over the world to facilitate their joining up with ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
Turkey provided medical care for wounded ISIS fighters, including its chief Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi. Turkey also smuggled al-Baghdadi into Libya where he would be safe from
allied attacks.
Turkey continues to arm ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Muslim Brotherhood militias in Libya, and
has formed its own militias composed of ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Muslim Brotherhood
personnel with which to ethnic cleanse portions of northern Syrian. Turkey remains as
one of the primary supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood international.
Egyptian sources claim that ISIS’s stolen millions are safely stashed in Turkish banks.
The Turkish fascist Grey Wolves terrorist group, once outlawed by the Turkish state,
and which tried to assassinate Pope John Paul, is now a part of Turkish mainstream, and a
favorite group of Erdogan. In addition to harassing and terrorizing minorities inside
Turkey itself, Turkey has established numerous cells and franchises of this group all over
the world. In Germany and other West European countries, the Grey Wolves have
enough clout, through the threat of violence, etc., to hold Europe nearly hostage to
Erdogan’s whims.
Turkey also supports the Maduro regime in Venezuela which has become a chief transit
point for Middle Eastern terrorists to enter the new world, interface with Latin drug
cartels, and smuggle personnel, drugs, and God knows what else, into the United States.
2. IRAN
Some would place Iran in the top slot based on the sheer volume of terrorist activities it
supports. But, I felt that Turkey edged Iran out of first place due primarily to its
extensive involvement with ISIS, the most vile terrorist entity in history. Iran,
nonetheless has an impressive record in its own right.
Iran’s own Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corp (IRGC) conducts terrorist activities in Iraq
and Syria, and via its al-quds (Jerusalem) brigade, it trains numerous other terrorist
groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah and is active across the globe.
Iran and/or its IRGC and al-quds units have staged bombings in Europe, Asia, and South
America.
Iran also operates terrorist training camps in the Tri-border region of South America, and
is one of the leading rogue nations that supports the failed Maduro regime in Venezuela,
which Iran then uses as a funnel for launching terrorist personnel towards the United
States.
Iran supports far leftist and revolutionary entities across Latin American, and in Europe
as well–not to mention the U.S. Democrat Party since the 1990s. Iranian money aided
Spain’s Marxist podemos party to win seats in Spain’s parliament. Podemos used the
slogan si se puede to gain supporters. The literal translation of si se puede is “it can be
done” but is usually translated as “Yes we can.”
This was the slogan used by the mass murderer Che Guevara, and by the Democrat
candidate for the U.S. presidency in 2008, Barack Obama.
Shi’a Iran coordinated with Sunni terrorist group al-Qaeda in the run-up to 9/11, and has
since maintained a close working relationship with it. For example, Iran has allowed, and
still allows, al-Qaeda to use its training camps in South America where Hezbollah also
trains.
3. QATAR’ This tiny natural gas rich country not only is a close ally of the top two state sponsors of
terrorism above, but has earned impressive credentials of its own.
Qatar is the primary state financial supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood International.
Qatar also finances and arms al-Qaeda and other MB spin off groups in several countries,
chiefly Syria and Libya.
Qatar is paying Tariq Ramadhan 35,000 Euros per month. Who is Tariq Ramadhan, and
why is this important? Tariq Ramadhan, who has been under trial in France for sexual
harassment and rape, is the grandson of MB founder Hasan al-Banna. I doubt seriously
that Qatar would be paying him that much just out of nostalgia for his grandfather. He
has to be doing a heck of a lot for Qatar and the MB cause.
Qatar flies out-of-region jihadis into Libya to join ISIS, al-Qaeda, and MB groups there.
Egyptian reporting indicates that Qatar’s ministry of defense might be actually training
terrorist militias in Libya.
Qatar’s penetration of the American political and media arenas, and its influence over the
American political decision-making have prevented that giant from declaring the MB to
be a terrorist group, and helps to prevent the United States from taking any action to
unravel the ideological and theological underpinnings of terrorism.
4. THE UNITED STATES
This country has made tremendous progress under the Trump regime, moving from the
lofty first place it held under the Obama regime (refer to Ch. 15 in Confessions of an (ex)
NSA spy for details), down to fourth by 2019. Unfortunately, much more house cleaning
needs to be done.
The United States thus continues to cling to the 4th spot for the following reasons:
The U.S. continues to coddle Turkey and Qatar, two of the top three state sponsors of
terrorism, by selling weapons to both countries, and refusing to call them out for their
own support of international terrorism, thus providing them with diplomatic cover for
their activities.
The United States also continues to maintain large military bases in both countries which
serve as a “shield” protecting these state sponsors of terrorism from any possible military
retaliation by any of the countries they are abusing by supporting terrorism in these 3rd
party countries.
In Syrian and Egyptian quarters, the United States is blamed for Turning Erdogan and the
MB loose against the Arab World. Even with Obama gone, this resentment still holds
true after two years of Trump, because of Trump’s apparent encouragement of Erdogan’s
conquests of N. Syria, and his lack of action against the MB.
The Trump administration also recently sold weapons to the ruling regime of Nigeria
some of which are used by the Islamic Fulani tribesmen against minority Christian
groups in Nigeria.
The U.S. continues to allow dozens of front entities for Hamas and the Muslim
Brotherhood to recruit large fan bases, to propagandize, and to collect funds for use
overseas. These entities are also deeply entrenched in the U.S. political system and exert
tremendous pressure to silence free-speech so their activities may go undetected and
uninterrupted.
So, while the United States leads the world in fighting the War on Terror with one hand,
with its other massive hand it (perhaps unwittingly) continues to ensure that Terrorism
will flourish across the face of the planet for a long time to come.
5. U.K.
The U.K is still a part of Europe as I write this, but may soon be out. At any rate, they
deserve special attention because it is considered to be the capital of the Muslim
Brotherhood International, edging out Turkey and Qatar for that dubious title.
This is based on the absolute freedom of operation that MB members are allowed in the
UK, and the vast amount of sums from donations that the MB and its allies are able to
collect and use for terrorist purposes in the Middle East and elsewhere.
Huma Abadin’s brother, a high official in the MB, resides in the UK.
The UK also shares in the sins of the EU which are mentioned below.
The UK, like the U.S., is one of the leaders in terms of physically fighting the War on
Terror, while at the same time it pursues bone headed policies that guarantee that the
planet will be plagued by the cancer of terrorism for many years to come.
6. EUROPEAN UNION
The EU coddles and trades with all of the top three state sponsors of terrorism.
The EU has placed itself in a near hostage situation vis-à-vis state sponsor of terrorism
number one, Turkey, while also coddling Iran, and continuing to trade with it while
sometimes paying lip service to Trump’s call for re-instating the boycott.
As a pseudo hostage to Erdogan, the EU allows the Turkish fascist terrorist group the
Grey Wolves to roam freely throughout the continent where they can harass and
intimidate Turkish ethnic groups there to support Erdogan policies, collect funds, and
pressure European governments to adhere to pro-Erdogan policies.
The EU also allows the MB to operate freely within its member countries, resulting in
huge sums flowing from Europe to Middle East terrorist entities.
The EU also tends to take hostile political and diplomatic positions towards any Middle
Eastern state that takes measures to halt religious extremism and jihadism. The EU thus
helps to perpetuate the cycles of violence in the Middle East, and in Europe itself.
7. LEBANON
Lebanon has been taken over by Iran’s puppet terrorist group the Lebanese Hezbollah.
Lebanon itself, has thus become a state sponsor of terrorism–even though the majority of
the Lebanese people (primarily the Christian and Sunni elements) are peace-loving, anti-
terrorist individuals.
8. PAKISTAN
The Pakistani intelligence service has long been divided 50/50 on whether to support the
U.S. in the War on Terror, or to be active participants . . . on the side of al-Qaeda, etc.
That ambivalent attitude is pervasive throughout the Pakistani military and government.
As a result, Pakistan has done less than nothing to root out the al-Qaeda and ISIS cells
that operate more or less freely in its territory.
Pakistani intelligence entities themselves run terrorist activities in India’s Kashmir
province, and in India proper, such as the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
Pakistan also allows Balochi tribesmen resident in the SW corner of Pakistan, to conduct
terrorist attacks against Iranian interests across the border (not that we should care about
that little bit of shenanigans).
9. SUDAN
While Sudan does not actually run terrorist operations on the soil of other countries soil
(except for one exception to be mentioned shortly), it has always been a safe haven for
groups like al-Qaeda and ISIS to set up shop, recruit volunteers, and collect funding.
With neighboring Libya in a state of chaos with over 300 militias operating just across its
borders, Sudan could not resist sending its own personnel to operate one or more of these
militias.
10. RUSSIA
While Russia is the one state most responsible for turning the tide on ISIS in Syria, it,
like the U.S., UK, and EU, continues to support terrorism in other ways.
Russia diplomatically supports the number two state sponsor of terrorism, Iran, and sells
weapons to it.
Russia has recently added the number one state sponsor of terrorism to the list with
weapons sales to Turkey. Expect to see more such arms deals in the near future.
Russia also supports the Maduro regime, having sold weapons to it and offered training
to its military and security personal so that they can better terrorize the Venezuelan
population. Russia also lends diplomatic support to the Maduro regime allowing it
continue to function as a terrorist transit depot.
Russian state institutions have done nothing to reign in Russian Mafia activities, either at
home or abroad. The Russian mafia is now reputed to be the most powerful of crime
cartels in Mexico, and thus plays a role in the crime/drugs/terrorism nexus on the U.S.
border.
DIS-HONORABLE MENTION:
Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, China, Iraq, Cuba
If I have left anyone’s favorite country off of this list, I apologize for the oversight.
———————————————————————————————
Barry Webb is a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform, and is the author
of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on
Terror. His website is: www.barrywebbauthor.com
The Epoch TImes
Brad Johnson
April 14, 2019
Commentary
Chaos is growing in Venezuela, with a murder rate that’s one of the highest in the world and the outcome far from certain. The now poverty-stricken country, living with electrical blackouts, widespread starvation, rampant corruption, and disease, is a study in the consequences of socialism when fully implemented.
Socialism was forced on Venezuela following a 40-year period of relative stability and prosperity that began shortly after World War II. At that time, Venezuela used its newly discovered vast oil reserves and capitalism to quickly develop its petrol business and economy as a whole. They enjoyed an economic growth rate nearly as large as the United States and became the richest country in Latin America, with an economy larger than China and one of the largest in the world.
I had the pleasure of visiting Caracas, the Venezuelan capital, toward the end of this era of prosperity and can testify that it was everything you would expect with a large, well-educated middle class, a working legal system, and a prosperous economy. The robust economy was not a one-trick pony that depended entirely on the oil industry, as some have tried to argue, to deflect blame for the current economic problems away from socialist policies.
The last president during the 40-year period of relative stability and prosperity in Venezuela was Rafael Caldera. Long after his death, Caldera remains significant because of what he represents. Caldera was twice president of Venezuela and is widely recognized even to this day to have been an honest and brilliant man. Once his second term as president was completed, he quietly retired to his home with his family, much as did the first president of the United States, George Washington.
Throughout his career, Caldera espoused democracy, pluralism, and social reform. Even during periods of less revenue, due to lower world oil prices, during his first presidential term (1969–1974), Caldera was dedicated to housing, infrastructure, and education. He doubled the number of public high schools and built three times the number of universities, colleges, and technical institutes, and built hundreds of thousands of houses and other buildings and structures such as highways, railroads, dams, and aqueducts.
During his second term (1994–1999), he made also made the fight against corruption a central theme. He was the product of 40 years of peace and prosperity and was a genuine and honest servant of his people, believed in a free and open economy in the capitalist tradition, and both the legal and social-justice systems worked well for everyone—the exact opposite of what we find today in Venezuela.
The former military officer and dedicated socialist Hugo Chavez, who was legally elected to replace Caldera as president in 1999, made every effort to fully implement socialism and erase from Venezuelan memory the 40 years of successful civilian democratic rule. Early on, Chavez consolidated his power and convened a constitutional assembly to give himself the power to dismantle democratic values and institutions. This theme, to erase the past, is carried forward today by the political left and mainstream media in the United States, who are apologists for the failed socialist policies of Chavez that were faithfully implemented.
In a twist of irony, Caldera published his last book in 1999, in which he stated that “Venezuelans learned to live in liberty. Any political project that ignores this reality is condemned to failure.” This prophecy is in two sentences why Chavez and current socialist strongman Nicolas Maduro have to destroy any memory of Caldera and democracy, so that they can’t be compared to the wealth and social justice that so successfully existed under an earlier capitalist and democratic system.
The reality is that as president, Chavez wildly and irresponsibly overspent and used all oil funds and any other revenue he could get his hands on for his socialist populist policies, such as the redistribution of wealth, redistribution of land, and centralized “worker-owned” cooperatives.
As the oil industry began to fail from lack of reinvestment, low prices, and the removal of everyone with any expertise in the industry, the economy began to contract, and Chavez widened his effort to obtain money from any available source to continue his already failing socialist programs.
Chavez turned on foreign firms and would periodically do things such as raising royalty rates on oil and invent unpaid back taxes to fraudulently charge firms billions of dollars. Chavez also forced foreign companies to turn over large portions of their business operations to Venezuela as part of selective nationalization, to the point that several of the largest left in exasperation.
Chavez did temporarily obtain a lower unemployment rate and bolstered other statistics that made the Venezuelan economy look much stronger than it really was by essentially stealing money where he could in order to prop up his policies. These statistics are, to this day, touted by the left in the United States and all socialist apologists to argue that the Chavez tenure was somehow positive. The truth is, of course, the opposite.
As the economy continued to deteriorate and shortages developed under his mismanagement, Chavez doubled down on additional socialist policies and instituted price controls, forced production quotas, nationalized large farms, seized many supermarkets, and nationalized industries.
Raping the economy by taking all the wealth for his short-term spending destroyed any possibility of long-term prosperity. The socialist logic for Chavez was that economic decisions should be based on social concerns rather than profit motive, which is naturally the precise difference between something being sustainable or not, and why socialism always fails.
Today, Maduro has replaced Chavez, who died of cancer in 2013. Maduro wasn’t selected for his brilliance, courage, or charisma, since he lacks all three. He was picked for his loyalty to the strongman dictator Chavez. He’s now in command under terrible circumstances and utterly and completely over his head. He will select the path of least resistance that allows him to keep his life and ill-gotten gains. Right now, it’s easiest for him to stay in power and attempt to crush any and all resistance.
Show him a path that doesn’t end well and Maduro will grasp at any chance to make it out as best he can. The Venezuelan police and military leaders are all loyal to Maduro and a coup isn’t likely, but this has to be stopped.
Parking a carrier task force off the coast, and a couple of overflights would probably do it.
LIBYA UPDATE
AL-ARABIYYA SATELLITE TV CHANNEL 09 APRIL 2019
By Barry Webb
General Mismari, the spokesman for General Haftar’s forces, claimed that the UN-recognized provisional government of Fayez Sirraj is closely allied with a cornucopia of extremist groups. Among these extremist groups are ISIS sleeper cells. Note that General Mismari, and other Libyan sources, had reported previously that al-Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Ansar ash-Shari’a were active in Tripoli, the seat of the Sirraj government. General Mismari had also previously reported that al-Qaeda bigwig Saif al-‘Adel, who has a ten million dollar reward outstanding for information as to his location, is among those in Libya. Saif al-‘Adel is wanted by the U.S. for his role in the 1998 East Africa Embassy bombings.
As if in verification of General Mismari’s accusations that the Sirraj government had allowed extremist militias to roam freely in Tripoli, and was even using them as the major part of its armed forces, the United States just evacuated many of its personnel from Tripoli while admitting that the U.S. had been keeping 300 troops there to protect the Embassy. This raises the question as to why the U.S. would need 300 troops to guard an Embassy in Tripoli . . . unless that city was overrun with extremist groups. And, yet, the U.S. and most of the rest of the international community has been supporting the Sirraj government while treating Haftar’s army (composed mostly of former members of Qadhafi’s military) as a pariah.
That being said, there are rumors out of the Middle East that the French have been supporting Haftar, and that some French military personnel had been killed in the recent fighting with militias allied to Sirraj. The speculation from Arabic commentators is that the French want to be first in line for Libya’s oil once this is all over and Haftar become the ruler of Libya. Russia also appears to be leaning towards Haftar, as do Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the U.A.E.
Finally, the position of General Haftar, as expressed by General Mismari, is that both sides, Haftar based in Benghazi and the east, and the Sirraj government based in Tripoli in the west, would stay out of each other’s territories—with the provision that Sirraj would rid Tripoli of the terrorist groups roaming the city. Sirraj’s failure to make any effort on that endeavor is why Haftar decided to take care of Tripoli himself. My view is that the U.S. and other rational international entities ought to side with Haftar as the only force in Libya capable of establishing law and order and stability. Indeed, Haftar’s forces have already proven themselves capable, by liberating several towns and regions from extremist groups.
Barry Webb is a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence reform, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
JARED KUSHNER’S SECURITY CLEARANCE
By Barry Webb
News has recently broken that a so-called “whistleblower,” Tricia Newbold, has come
forward to identify Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner as one who had been denied
security clearance by unidentified “career officials.” Carl Kline, who headed the Trump White House’s personnel security office overruled the “concerns” of these “career officials” allegedly under Trump’s orders.
Perhaps Newbold and other security officials; are correct in that Kushner is totally
unqualified to hold a security clearance. But, one can not tell that from the information
provided. Furthermore, Kushner’s performance as a foreign policy advisor to President
Trump has been nothing but exemplary. After two years of service, there is no evidence
what-so-ever of any even remotely questionable behavior to indicate that he has been
unduly influenced by a hostile power. On the contrary, the entities pushing the Kushner-is-not-qualified agenda (the WAPO and the Congressional Democrats) are themselves acting on behalf of a hostile foreign power either wittingly or unwittingly.
Before getting into the weeds of this issue, let me say upfront that though I voted for
Trump I highly disapproved of his bringing his daughter and son-in-law to the White
House with him. That smacked of nepotism–almost as smelly as the sort we saw when
JFK made his brother Attorney General. However, Trump, being a political amateur and
not knowing who he could trust in the cesspool that is Washington D.C., perhaps
deserves a little slack on that point. President Trump had the right to have at least one or
two people near him whom he knew he could trust. The performance of individuals like
Jeff Sessions, Mike Cohen, and H.R. McMasters (and undoubtedly many others)
illustrated that point. But, what really galls me, and the reason I am writing this essay is the incredible double standards exhibited by the way Security Clearances are dished out in general, Tricia Newbold’s hypocrisy in particular, and the hypocrisy in the way the media and the Democrats in Congress are handling this matter.
As someone who knows a few things about security clearances, I feel compelled to set
the record straight for the thinking segment of the American public.
There were, of course, no reasons given for the initial denial of Kushner’s security
clearance except that a background check revealed vague concerns regarding foreign
influence, personal conduct, and other business interests. Let me see if I’ve got this right. Under the personal conduct allegation, that could be anything from the weed he might have smoked when he was 15, or a neighbor or any other associate that he may have had contact with, who had a grudge against him who might have said something negative about him when the FBI und to interview people who knew Kushner.
Now then, foreign influence and other business interests, that’s a good one. If I
remember right, Kushner, like the rest of his family, had a lot of business interests–
including those with foreign countries. Let me see if I’ve got this right. Kushner was an
international business man whom the Trump-haters want to delegitimize for the simple
reason that he did . . . international business.
Now, really. Just about everyone who is financially successful enough to win a Senate or
Congressional seat, has business interests with foreign countries. The real issue is
whether or not any of those interests would affect an individual’s foreign policy
decisions.
While none of these foreign interests were mentioned by Newbold, the Washington
Pest (typo intended) reported in 2018 that officials in the United Arab Emirates, Israel,
Mexico, and China were among those who discussed ways to influence Kushner by
leveraging his business dealings and lack of foreign policy experience.
Hey, folks! News flash! Every single country in the world constantly discusses ways,
and possibilities, for influencing every single highly-placed individual in every other
country on the planet. This is especially true for the United States, since Washington,
D.C. is the Rome of the 20th and 21st centuries. Everyone wants influence in
Washington, and most are willing to pay dearly for it.
Does anyone seriously think that the American people are stupid enough to believe that
virtually every important Obama administration official was not subject to the same
discussions by foreign officials? Besides, just because foreign officials are discussing ways to influence a WH official is a galaxy away from any proof that said WH official is actually being influenced–proof of which should be necessary for a security clearance to be denied.
DEEP STATE SHENANIGANS
This entire scenario smells of nothing but deep state contortions to demean the Trump
White House, if not to destroy it all together. In that regard, the timing of Tricia
Newbold’s “whistleblowing” has to be considered very interesting: It comes only after
the Russia Russia hoax has been crushed. So, the deep state Trump-hating Obama
holdovers are desperately seeking other avenues, any straw they can pick at, to try to
overturn the constitutional 2016 presidential election results.
Let us start with the foreign officials had allegedly discussed ways to influence
Kushner allegation. Where on earth could the WAPO learn that intelligence? That above Top Secret intelligence would have started as phone call intercepts picked up by
the NSA. But who in the NSA would be responsible for leaking this to the Post?
The first persons to process these intercepts would be the translators of the Arabic,
Spanish, Hebrew, and Chinese phone conversations. This raw intelligence would then be
written up into a report by a reporter. It would then be passed on to a supervisor who
would then kick it up to the next level of the food chain, and so on until it reached the
super grades on the top floor. Only then would it be passed on to the CIA and or WH
and/or other pertinent entity.
If this intelligence were valid, then it would be passed on to whom ever was handling
Kushner’s security clearance so that Kushner could be advised/warned about this. The
purpose of this intelligence would be to protect Kushner, by informing him of the plots
surrounding him so as to help him be on guard, and be aware of what foreign parties are
up to. The purpose of that intelligence in no way shape or form should have been used to
deny Kushner’s security clearance. So, who is it that leaked this intelligence to the Post
and/or Democrats up on the Hill? It could have been anyone along the entire food chain
of people who handled that intelligence mentioned above–anyone who had enough of a
hatred for Donald Trump, the Trump White House, and the U.S. constitutional system to
want to violate their own security clearances by leaking that intelligence.
Now, what about that whistleblower Tricia Newbold? Have you seen her picture? It
was in the media the other day. She looks so much like squeaky Fromme it gave me
the creeps. Squeaky Fromme, you know, the nut case Manson follower who tried to
assassinate President Ford in 1974. Yeah, I know, I shouldn’t make fun of a whistleblower, except that she is no whistleblower. Where was Tricia squeaky Fromme Newbold when Obama packed the upper levels of our intelligence agencies, including the White House’s own National Security Council, with sympathizers of the Muslim Brotherhood, an enemy entity which has vowed to uproot our constitution and replace it with Sharia law?
There was nary a peep from Tricia Squeaky Fromme Newland, or any of the other
deep state operators, over the blatant, harmful, foreign influence in the Obama
administration–while these same intelligence community officials are turning
cartwheels (and leaking like sieves) to expose Trump administration personnel over the
slightest little hint of maybes and allegedlies. The glaring double standards that this illustrates should make every single American burning hot angry.
THE QATAR CONNECTION
Much of what has been going on in terms of the accusations surrounding Kushner, and
the WAPO’s and the Democrats efforts to bring Trump down, are connected to the
current feud between Saudi Arabia and its ally the U.A.E. on one hand, and Qatar on the other. To fully understand this feud, and how it affects our policies, one should read the Khashoqji report I contributed to this site a while back. But briefly it goes like this:
Since 9/11, 2001, Qatar has been the primary state sponsor and financier of the Muslim
Brotherhood organization. The Muslim Brotherhood organization has been declared a
terrorist organization by six countries, including Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E.
Qatar is also one of the world's top three state sponsors of terrorism (behind Turkey and Iran), not only for their support of the Muslim Brotherhood, but also for their support of Hamas, and terrorist groups in Libya, and elsewhere in North Africa and the Middle East.
PURCHASING THE WAY AMERICANS THINK
Natural gas-rich Qatar has paid Billions of dollars to influence the way Americans think.
These billions have gone towards purchasing entire news entities, influential websites,
journalists working for the Washington Post, New York Times and others, and God
forbid that any of our Senators or Congresspersons should be up for sale.
Democrats who have been pushing the hardest to have Trump impeached have mentioned Trump’s lack of positive enthusiasm for Qatar as a reason for investigating him, now that Russia is dead. And, Kushner’s good relations with senior U.A.E. (an ally of the U.S.) government officials have been given (seriously) by Adam Schiff as reasons for
investigating both Kushner and Trump. In all the talk about Trump’s tax returns, wouldn’t you just love to see the tax returns of Schiff and other Democrats pushing the get Trump narrative? Just to see how much, if any, Qatar is paying these individuals?
CONCLUSIONS
One of the goals of Americans for Intelligence Reform is the de-politicization and
de-weaponization of our intelligence agencies. That should include also the way
security clearances are granted, or not granted, and to remove double standards from the
decision-making process. To recommend a Jared Kushner be denied his security
clearance while the same officials tripped all over themselves to hire Muslim
Brotherhood officials during the Obama era, is one example of a double standard–very
harmful to our national security.
Another glaring double standard is their tendency to deny security clearances to red
blooded and patriotic American males because their electronic footprints show that they
have looked at pictures of naked women on the internet, while the CIA was granted
permission (during the Obama era) to actively seek to hire transexuals–not in the name
of gender diversity, and not because they had certain individuals in mind who were
subject matter experts, but simply for the purpose of viewpoint diversity. In other
words, because such individuals (who would have been immediately rejected in previous
decades) were suddenly being sought out for the simple reason that they were “weirdos.”
Then there is the age discrimination issue. Age discrimination in terms of employment
opportunities is against the law, as is any discrimination based on gender or race. Except
that all of our intelligence agencies practice age discrimination with vigor–because they
know they can. The State Department, however, is the only one that openly admits it.
On their website they openly state that if you are over 59 1/2 don’t even bother applying.
In other words, just when a person is at the peak of their skill set, and has gained peak
subject area knowledge and instincts . . . our intelligence agencies are not interested.
With relish they turn away highly qualified people who want to serve their country, and
then trip all over each other in their rush to hire America-haters like Edward Snowden,
Reality Winner, and Daniella Greene all of whom could not wait to defect to hostile
entities and/or leak gobs of highly classified material.
The sole justification for hiring these people was that they were . . . young.
And people wonder why are intelligence agencies were surprised by the rise of ISIS.
Only in America.
What makes this age discrimination thing so silly, is that science tells us our life
expectancy is constantly rising. 60 is the new 40, and 80 is the new 50. Some scientists
are telling us that there is no reason why we can’t live to 120, or even 200 if we take
proper care of ourselves. And, yet, our intelligence agencies forbid the hiring of anyone
past the age of 59 1/2, regardless of their qualifications and health. Insane.
——————————————————————————————–
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the National Security
Agency, is currently a senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform, and is the
author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the
War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
5 April 2019 INTEL UPDATE
By Barry Webb, senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform
HOT BREAKING NEWS ON LIBYA
Troops of the “Libyan National Army” loyal to General Hafter are advancing from east Libya towards the
capital Tripoli. Warfare is expected to break out any moment between forces loyal to the UN-
recognized government of Libya based in Tripoli and headed by Fayez as-Siraaj, and the advancing
Haftar forces.
A LITTLE BACKGROUND
When the Arab spring broke out in Libya in 2011, the Obama administration “led from behind” in
conjunction with the NATO allies of Britain and France, to destroy the existing Libyan army, and bring
down the corrupt, dictatorial Mu’ammar Qadhafi regime. The primary reason for the Obama
administration’s move was to “create a condition of chaos so that the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) could
seize control of Libya.”
What resulted was total chaos with multiple terrorist groups, of which the Muslim Brotherhood was
only one, competing for turf. The infamous Benghazi scandal occurred in the midst of that situation. So,
the Obama-Hillary chaos came back to bite them. (Except that it was because of a video.)
In the end, the EU hand-picked one Fayez as-Siraaj to head a Libyan “unity” government in hopes of
bringing some sort of badly-needed peace and stability to Libya. This turned out to be a joke.
So, General Haftar, who had retired from Qadhafi’s army prior to the Arab spring, came out of
retirement to re-assemble some sort of effective Libyan fighting force from the rubble left by the NATO
bombing and the Terrorist rampages. At first, Hafter’s army was nothing but a rag tag group barely
hanging on by a thread.
Meanwhile, Egypt overthrew it’s Obama-Hillary supported Muslim Brotherhood (MB) government in
Egypt, and the new regime headed by General as-Sisi fearful of the terrorist chaos in neighboring Libya
(especially after 21 of its citizens were beheaded by ISIS on a Libyan beach) began to support Haftar’s
army with equipment, training, and air raids against terrorist targets.
WHO SUPPORTS WHOM
When Siraaj was fingered by the EU to head the new Libyan “government” in Tripoli, there were
suspicions raised in some circles that Siraaj was close to the MB, if not an actual member–sort of a poor
man’s Muhammad Mursi. In addition to the EU, the Siraaj government was supported by the Obama
administration and the UN.
Meanwhile, General Haftar’s army, which set up headquarters in Benghazi after clearing most of the city
of its terrorist groups, came to be supported by Saudi Arabia and the UAE, in addition to Egypt.
More recently, the U.S., under Trump, has shifted its enthusiasm from Siraaj to the Egyptian-supported
Haftar.
LATEST ARABIC NEWS REPORTS FROM THE SCENE.
The Qatar-based, pro-MB TV channel Al-Jazeera is reporting on the Haftar movements towards Libya in
a very negative light, and as an attack against the “internationally recognized legitimate government of
Libya.”
The Dubai-based and Saudi-owned TV channel al-arabiyya, on the other hand, has reported favorably on
General Haftar’s movements. Following are a gist of reports from a pair of Libyan experts on terrorism
interviewed by an al-arabiyya news anchor on 04 April 2019:
The capital, Tripoli, is controlled by the MB and other terrorist gangs including al-Qaeda, ISIS, and the
Ansar ash-shari’a (of Benghazi scandal fame).
Siraj is considered too weak to handle the situation, so the people of Tripoli have asked General Haftar
to relieve them of the terror gangs.
All of the terrorist gangs based in Tripoli are gearing up to resist Haftar’s advance on the city. The militia
forces of MB-controlled Masratta (a coastal town east of Tripoli) have vowed to come to the defense of
Tripoli.
Tripoli is now at a stage of heightened alert.
The UN’s Gutierez is in Tripoli at this moment showing the UN’s support for the failed Siraaj government
and pleading for dialogue rather than military confrontation.
U.S., Russia, EU, and even the U.A.E. are all urging all sides to refrain from violence.
Yet, both the Trump-led U.S. administration and Russia now favor Haftar as the best available solution
for Libya. Even Europe is now beginning to realize that the only solution to Libya’s chaos is a strong man
with an effective military.
Haftar has proved his effectiveness by seizing vast territories in southern and western Libya, including
some oil wells, from the terrorist groups.
It will be interesting to see how CNN and other U.S. media outlets (that usually take dictation from the
pro-MB al-Jazeera and Qatar) cover the Libya situation.
30 MARCH 2019 INTEL UPDATE
By Barry Webb, senior fellow with Americans for Intelligence Reform
The following information was reported on the program sin’at al-mawt (Industry
of death) on the Dubai-based, Saudi owned satellite TV channel al-Arabiyya. This
is a weekly half-hour program that discusses aspects of international terrorism
and jihadism. For this installment, the program host was in Libya where he first
interviewed a Libyan maritime officer, and then a Libyan journalist who tracks all
the radical groups operating in Libya. Following are the main take-away points
from that program aired on Friday 29 March 2019.
—Though ISIS radicals were supposedly driven from the coastal city of Sirte, Libya,
in 2018, the ISIS black flag still flies over a few buildings—and, most ominously,
the port of Sirte remains as the primary artery for Qatar and Turkey to ship
jihadis, arms, and cash for ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Muslim Brotherhood groups.
—Even though the city of Benghazi is the Headquarters for the anti-jihadi army of
Egyptian-supported General Khalifa Haftar, Benghazi harbor also still remains as a
conduit through which the Jihadis are getting supplies from the outside.
(The above two items were reported by the maritime officer. The remainder of
this wrap-up will come from the Libyan journalist who has specialized in following
radical movements since the fall of Qadhafi. This journalist had a large screen full
of icons, each icon represented either a terrorist he was following, or a jihadi
group. When he touched the icon, it would bring up an entire page of info on the
individual or group.)
—Nearly every terrorist on international “most-wanted” lists are here in Libya.
—One of the chief suspects in the killing of the U.S. ambassador (Stevens, in the
Benghazi incident), fled Libya for Turkey. Turkey has steadfastly refused to
extradite him to America, and instead sent him to Tunis where he joined the
ansar ash-shari’a (which participated in the Benghazi job) and is now active again
in Libya.
—Saif al-‘Adel (the sword of justice), al-Qaeda’s chief military figure, is also
among the international “most wanted” currently present in Libya.
—Qatari ministry of defense officers have been seen and filmed interacting with
jihadi groups in Libya. So, they are not just delivering supplies, they are most
likely actually involved in the training of some of the jihadi personnel.
COMENTARY
The same TV program sin’at al-mawt reported the week previously that Qatar
was flying foreign jihadis and equipment into the NE Libyan city of Derna which is
under the complete control of ISIS.
The U.S. has offered a $10,000,000 reward for information on Saif al-‘Adel’s
location, due to his alleged part in the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in East
Africa. He joined the Egyptian army in the mid-70’s, did some training in the
Soviet Union, and rose to the rank of Col. Before leaving the Egyptian army in
1981. He was considered to be an expert in explosives. After leaving the army he
joined the Egyptian Islamic Jihad terrorist group. As such, he was accused in 1987
of plotting to overthrow the Egyptian government.
After charges were dismissed he fled to Afghanistan to fight the Soviets who had
once trained him. He is believed to have opposed the 9/11 operation on the
grounds that it would backfire, though he was thought to be connected with the
kidnapping of journalist Daniel Pearl in 2002. After the Soviets were booted out
of Afghanistan, he stuck around for awhile to train the Taliban.
At some point during the 1990s he was in Southern Lebanon (along with a few
other al-Qaeda bigwigs) training a group called “Hezbollah al-Hejaz.” This is
significant for a couple of reasons. First off, the term “Hezbollah,” which means
“Party of God,” is a term used almost exclusively by Shi’a terrorist groups aligned
with Iran. Therefore, this is yet one more example of al-Qaeda-linked Sunni
terrorists cooperating with Shi’a groups aligned with Iran. A fact of life that
“inside-the-beltway” experts refuse to acknowledge.
“Al-Hejaz” refers to the western part of Saudi Arabia where the pan-Islamic Holy
Sites of Mecca and Medina are located. Thus, the very name of this group
indicates that its primary purpose is to wrest the Islamic Holy Sites from the hands
of the Saudis, if not to overthrow the Saudi government itself. Al-Qaeda’s helping
to train this group is significant.
Since “Saif al-‘Adel” is an obvious movement name, it was originally thought that
his real name was Mohammed Ibrahim Makkawi. On 29 February 2012 a person
of that name flew into the Cairo airport whereupon Egyptian authorities promptly
arrested him (because that name was on international watch lists). After he
donated a couple of fingernails to his Egyptian interrogators the unfortunate
fellow was finally able to convince them that he wasn’t Saif al-‘Adel.
It is now thought that his real name is Salah ad-Deen Zaidan. According to
Wikipedia, however, the FBI, however continues to misidentify him as
Mohammad Ibrahim Makkawi.
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA, and is the
author of the book Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are
Losing the War on Terror. Information on how to purchase the book can be found
on his website: www.barrywebbauthor.com
The Epoch Times
DIA Officer Spied for Chinese as Part of ‘Resistance’
March 29, 2019
Commentary
There’s currently extensive news reporting on the former Defense Intelligence Agency officer Ron Hansen, who spied on the United States for the Chinese intelligence service. He was caught by American authorities and made a plea arrangement, likely facing 15 years in prison when sentenced this coming September.
In return, Hansen will tell U.S. intelligence everything he did and everything the Chinese asked of him. This sort of plea deal in cases of this kind are common. It’s of real value to find out what the enemy, the Chinese in this case, learned from their spy and the techniques they used to communicate with him, how they passed him money, what information and people they targeted, and so on. This teaches us what to look for in the cases of other Americans who might be spying for the Chinese.
Also, knowing what the Chinese learned lets us accurately assess the damage done and what Chinese priorities are. Their priorities are more interesting then one might think. The Chinese would ask a trusted spy of this nature exactly what they wanted to know, and from this we can thereby learn where the gaps existed in their information and, perhaps more importantly, where no gaps existed. No gaps means they know the information from some other source. You can see where that takes us, and why it would be useful.
To someone with my background, one of the aspects of this case that really floats to the top is the motives of Hansen to spy for the Chinese to begin with. In his case it appears that money was high on his list, and he was apparently well paid, which is not common for the Chinese. This is certainly a measure of the harm he did to the United States.
For any students of such things, the intelligence agencies of the rest of the world always consider greed to be the weakness of Americans. Hansen also spent time in Taiwan as a young man, where he learned to appreciate the country and culture. Finally, just uncovered by Bill Gertz at The Washington Free Beacon, buried in the transcripts of phone conversations, we learn that Hansen hated President Donald Trump passionately and viewed working against Trump as his duty.
This is not the first time an individual believed that resisting Trump justified leaking classified information. In 2018, Reality Winner was sentenced to five years and three months in federal prison for leaking classified information to the press that she thought would damage Trump.
These are just two examples of the poisonous atmosphere the resistance movement within the liberal Democratic Party has created. Most of the leadership at Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and National Security Agency (NSA) are overwhelmingly liberal and take it unto themselves to betray their oath of office to support the Constitution of the United States of America for political motives.
In the bowels of bureaucracy, it is “mainstream” to talk openly about how best to resist the lawfully elected president of the United States, and it shows up everywhere. There was a time when most in government were professionals first, but those days are gone, and now it’s overwhelmingly personal politics first.
We don’t have to look very far back to remember Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) had a Chinese spy on her staff for about 20 years, who was her office director and her driver when she was in San Francisco. She claimed that since the Chinese spy was in California and did not have direct access to classified information kept only in Washington D.C., it was all a big nothing burger.
What is almost beyond belief is that this was accepted by everyone, including Congress and the cast of characters at the DOJ, FBI, CIA, and NSA who all know better.
Being an expert on exactly this sort of case, please let me authoritatively point out this was a fantastic opportunity for the Chinese and a stunning success from their perspective. Any CIA officer who successfully recruited a similar person to spy on the Chinese leadership for 20 years would be a rock star. This was a truly big deal and very damaging to U.S. interests. Anyone who says differently is ignorant or a liar, and yet absolutely nothing has been done.
Wouldn’t it be worth knowing if over a 20-year period, the chief of staff who was a spy for the Chinese recommended or hired people to work on Sen. Feinstein’s Washington D.C. staff? Are they still there now or did they move to work in another senator’s office?
One other point worth noting, Sen. Feinstein’s estimated net worth is $94 million. Most of that comes from her husband Richard Blum’s private equity firm, who does much of his business with none other than the Chinese.
Did any of the tens of millions of dollars made by the Feinstein family have anything to do with the Chinese spy or Chinese intelligence? Can you imagine if Donald Trump’s wife made tens of millions of dollars doing business with Russia and it was discovered that Trump’s chief of staff was a Russian spy on his staff for 20 years?
China is probably the greatest long-term strategic threat the United States faces, and the socialist liberal movement within the Democratic Party has given birth to the resist movement to fight behind the scenes against the duly elected president of the United States. This negative force in American politics is so poisonous that it justifies in the mind of liberals almost any action, no matter how wrong.
It is clear, the leadership, particularly at the FBI and DOJ, are staunch Democratic supporters and appear to buy into the resist movement to the point they are willing to overlook glaring, significant damage to U.S. national security only because looking into the matter would hurt a senior Democratic senator.
It seems they will also invent an investigation against political opponents, and the fact this plays into the hands of our enemies like the Chinese is not even a consideration for them.
The Epoch Times
Mueller Investigation: The Aftermath
March 28, 2019
By Brad Johnson
Commentary
If you are paying any attention, you are aware that the Mueller investigation of President Donald Trump for alleged collusion with the Russians was completed and turned over to Attorney General William Barr, who, as required by law, prepared a summary of the findings for the White House and Congress.
The kicker, of course, is that the report confirmed there was no evidence or any reason to believe that Trump or anyone associated with the president had anything to do with colluding with the Russians. While a segment of the public might be surprised, everyone around Washington—and I really mean everyone—knew this conclusion was coming, including all of the Democrats.
In case of any doubts to this claim, in the weeks leading up to the investigation being completed, House Democrats pre-positioned themselves by moving to take impeachment off the table and by starting their own investigation and publicly stating they would call dozens of witnesses as part of this “new” investigation.
Normally, you would expect the Democrats to drop the whole subject like the hot potato it is, since it blew up in their faces and makes them look bad to their base. At the same time, it badly damages the credibility of the mainstream media that so adamantly supports Democrats.
The problem for Democrats is they have the tiger by the tail and can’t let go. There are two huge reasons for this: First, the Democratic base of voters has been promised that Trump was going to be taken out politically, and they aren’t going to stand for less; take a look at what they are saying on Twitter if you have any doubts. If Democratic politicians just walk away, their voter base will go ballistic, and we will observe a Democratic primary Armageddon like never before.
Remember, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez knocked off a popular and well-established Rep. Joe Crowley in a very safe New York primary. Nobody called that one in advance, and Democrats haven’t forgotten this lesson.
The second, and more important, reason is that some of the Democrats are at real personal risk in a legal sense, and this is the area where we will spend the next two years, leading to the 2020 elections. Now that the Mueller investigation is over, everyone is beginning to ask how this whole fiasco started, and that’s the tiger the Democrats own and have by the tail.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) has already stated publicly that he’s going to investigate how this case got started when there was no underlying crime. Significantly, President Trump is now in the clear and will take his gloves off and get involved in the fight. If you enjoy paybacks, make sure to sit in the front row; we all know Trump loves to counterpunch.
Very quickly, we’re going to see Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the House Intelligence Oversight committee chair, and former Obama administration CIA Director John Brennan, and many other senior officials from the intelligence community come under the spotlight. They are the ones who gave serious gravitas to allegations against the president, and often made public comments to the effect that they were aware of classified details, had seen conclusive evidence, and were certain that Trump is guilty of collaborating with the Russians.
Since we now know those claims are false and no such evidence exists, we need to look closely at why they would knowingly make these false statements. There is really only one explanation that seems to fit all the facts, and that would be if Brennan and the others collaborated to create and use the Steele dossier as an attempt to take the presidency away from Trump.
If true, this is serious beyond belief and seems to constitute treason. Many others, including just recently, several sitting ambassadors have been implicated, and a number of senior Justice Department and FBI officials have long been under suspicion.
The first key step that we will see publicly over the next few months is a close examination of the original FISA application that allowed the warrant that kicked off the FBI investigation of the Trump campaign. A version was released, which I duly read, but it was very heavily redacted, meaning about 70 percent of the report was blacked out.
Even so, it’s very clear that the FISA request was based almost exclusively on the Steele dossier and that’s going to come to light. That’s a serious problem for the Democrats, because everyone who signed the FISA request has been documented to have known in advance that the dossier was either false or unconfirmed at best and they used it anyway. That is illegal by itself, and was then was further used to create the Mueller special counsel investigation.
Next will be the scope memo, which was what gave Mueller the authority and parameters by which he was to conduct his investigation.
Brad Johnson
March 21, 2019 Updated
The Epoch Times
Commentary
Another Russian disinformation operation has recently been reported in the news.
There have been rumors for decades that childhood inoculations cause children to have autism. Those rumors and other vaccination debates have been stirred up by Moscow and the SVR, which is the successor organization to the KGB. Make no mistake, it’s the same Russian intelligence officers and the lessons they’ve learned through the decades running these types of disinformation campaigns.
The purpose of the social media bots and trolls is to sow discord and sap resources.
Children who get sick use medical resources, and it impacts the parents and possibly even their place of employment. At the state level, medical professionals, nurses, and doctors use thousands of hours to go to community meetings and to conduct one-on-one meetings with parents to explain that inoculations are safe. Most pediatricians are also fully aware of this problem, and have to take time away from treating patients to speak to parents and explain.
Millions upon millions of dollars and countless hours of time are spent in the United States alone to combat this issue.
The outrage from the left here in the United States will never be forthcoming, since it would mean taking a stance against Russia, which they still see as the heir of the Soviet Union and their darling.
However, in this case, where is everybody else? The intelligence community, which claims so loudly to be fully accountable to the public, is silent. They could actually be useful here, yet do nothing. I am outraged; am I alone?
Successful Campaigns
Other similar and effective Russian propaganda operations, while usually aimed at the United States, aren’t always run in the United States. Take, for example, two long-term propaganda operations started by the Soviets in the 1980s. Both mainly existed outside of the United States and are virtually unheard of here. Both targeted the underdeveloped world, and both had measurable success.
The first is extensive and targeted HIV and AIDS.
HIV is thought to have originated from eating monkeys that carried a similar virus; it spread from Africa to the rest of the world and has been a deadly scourge. From the beginning, the United States has led the charge to cure and treat AIDS. The Russians quickly realized this presented them with the opportunity for a “twofer.” They published through the press, which they control or influence, hundreds of articles that claimed AIDS was created by the U.S. military as part of weapons research, and that the disease escaped their control and was inflicted on the world. Lots of people in developing nations still believe this to be true, and it takes away any credit the United States might have garnered by fighting AIDS.
The second example concerned the overseas adoption of babies.
Extensive negative press was run against adoption overseas by U.S. citizens. The claim was that Americans were adopting babies to harvest their organs for transplants as part of a disgusting money-making scheme. There were actual riots in the streets in Latin America over exactly this issue. You can bet your bottom dollar those riots weren’t spontaneous and were organized and paid for as part of the operation.
I wrote an article on propaganda, called “Great Disinformation Campaigns from History That Live On and Prosper Today.” In it, I outlined a Soviet disinformation campaign that for many decades has successfully convinced people that the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (Nazi Party) was something other than a socialist party. I pointed out that the Nazi Party even has the word “socialist” in its name and is yet somehow not supposed to be socialist. I argued that this is the most successful disinformation campaign run ever.
The political left in the United States, which was always friendly to the Soviet Union, has picked up this Russian propaganda piece and made it their own. They are the “useful idiots” Stalin loved to use for his own ends. Academia in the United States has been so fully duped by this particular Russian propaganda campaign that almost every political science faculty in almost every university in the United States teaches that political systems are somehow circular by nature, and conclude that the Nazis and the USSR, who were nearly identical in their organization and methodology, were somehow magically opposites.
Hopefully, you are asking yourself why educated people, many with doctorate degrees, would teach something so silly and obviously false. The answer is simple enough: They are willing dupes because it fits their leftist political agenda. Since the left doesn’t allow debate and conservatives aren’t well represented in academia, it goes unchallenged.
The Nazis are still so hated by everyone that the left has to have some way to distance itself from them. The USSR, which had the exact same problem, gave them the solution. Stalin’s words still flow from the mouths of our political science faculties.
Brad Johnson is a retired CIA senior operations officer and a former chief of station. He is president of Americans for Intelligence Reform.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
REFLECTIONS ON THE CHRISTCHURCH MASSACRE
By Barry Webb
To begin, let me say that any person regardless of race, religion, or ethnic group who walks into a house of worship were worshippers have gathered together to worship what ever they are worshipping, and regardless of whatever race, religion, or ethnic group the worshippers belong to, and opens up fire with the intent to kill as many people as he can, like shooting toads in a barrel, that person is a coward, and is the scum of the earth–or total nut case.
But, just as evil is the person who shoots up a nightclub during peak hours with the intent to kill as many as possible . . . just because he doesn’t approve of the skin color, accent, or sexual orientations of those inside.
Just as evil is the person who throws a Molotov cocktail, grenade, or other explosive device into a house of worship with the intent to kill as many worshippers as possible, just because those worshippers aren’t Muslims, or if Muslim don’t belong to the right brand of Islam.
Just as evil is the person who waits just outside an Ariana Grande concert with an automatic weapon so as to kill as many concert goers as he can when they exit the concert, because he knows that the concert goers are young girls and this was part of a wider-scale plot to reduce the target country’s potential breeding population.
Obviously, what is needed at this point in the aftermath of the Christchurch massacre, is to allow sanity and realism to prevail.
On one level, the New Zealand shooter was right. We are in the midst of a war. This is a war that Islam has declared on us based verses in the Qur’an and ahadeeth that are so numerous I could spend the next ten pages quoting them. The only problem with this war is that the West has failed to recognize that fact. But, the New Zealand shooter was wrong in the method he choose to fight this war.
Our war is not against individual Muslims as people, it is against the ideology of Islam which is something completely different. Rather than killing innocent worshippers in a mosque (and giving ammunition to the enemies of Western Civilization), this war must be fought in the minds of the Muslims themselves. And, the bullets and the bombs must be the reality of their own scriptures, and not real bullets and bombs. For a preview of what these “bullets” and “bombs” might look like, read the Islam section of my book listed below, and/or the “Blogging the Qur’an” section of my website listed below.
For some interesting insights on the possible motives of the Christchurch shooter, click on Brad Johnson’s video interview posted on www.intelreform.org
EXPLOITING A TRAGEDY TO SILENCE FREE SPEECH
Radical Islamists and the hard Leftists in the West have been trying for years to silence any and all intellectual and academic discussion of Islamic texts that promote jihad and acts of terror. The actions of the New Zealand shooter have played right into their hands.
The term used by Islamists and Leftists to stigmatize all those who offer intellectual, scriptural, and/or academic criticism of the Islamic texts that promote jihad and violence against “the other” is “Islamophobia.” This termed was coined by the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) which dominates the UN general assembly in imitation of the American Left’s successful usage of the “Homophobia” term to demonize anyone who opposed “gay rights.”
The OIC has used the “Islamophobia” label to get the UN general assembly to okay the condemnation of anyone practicing “Islamophobia” but they have failed so far to get all the member nations to enact “Islamophobia” laws in their own countries. The Christchurch massacre has given Islamists the world over the perfect tool for accomplishing that goal. The Islamists and the Leftist have skillfully lumped those engaging in legitimate academic critiquing of Islamic texts in with the nut cases like the piece of detritus that opened up fire on Mosque worshippers in New Zealand.
On the Islamic side, everyone from the state-level OIC down to the terrorist group level such as the Muslim Brotherhood (declared a terrorist group by six countries) and its front groups in the U.S. such as the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) (declared a terrorist group by the U.A.E. for its deleterious effect on U.S. policies) have jumped on board to exploit the New Zealand tragedy to further their agenda to silence any and all criticism and critiquing of Islam and/or any Islamic “sacred” texts. In short, to kill the U.S. First Amendment.
That will give the Islamists a free hand to accomplish their goal to “eliminate and destroy the Western civil society and culture from within and to destroy their haughty house by their own hands and the hands of the believers in order to complete their removal so that Allah’s religion shall be over all religion” (from the Muslim Brotherhood’s Explanatory Memorandum for the general strategic goal of the group in North America. p. 4 of the Arabic original which was seized in an FBI raid of a Virginia safe house in 2004).
Another trick that the Islamists and the Leftists skillfully pull is to lump any sort of intellectual, academic, or textual critiquing of Islam with hatred of all Muslims. That is what the term “Islamophobia” does for them. Unfortunately our media and political classes are ignorant enough of the issues involved to fall for that.
In countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran, people are routinely killed for doing just that. Even in Egypt intellectuals have been killed for academically critiquing Islam. More recently, others have been put in prison. A high profile case of a couple of years ago illustrates the problem:
An Egyptian TV talk show host named Dr. Islam al-Beheri, who himself is a doctoral graduate in Islamic law from Egypt’s al-Azhar university (the closest thing Sunni Islam has to a Vatican) hosted a show dedicated to talking about Islam and issues related to Islam. Becoming alarmed at the rise of ISIS and the increasing frequency of Islamic terrorist acts in Europe and elsewhere, he began calling for a reformation of Islam. In his diatribes he began condemning the books of ahadeeth (supposed sacred sayings of Muhammad not a part of the Qur’an), as well as the sunna (traditions of everything that Muhammad supposedly did and said–also considered sacred), and the sira (the biography of Muhammad, how we can know of all the things Muhammad did and said that good Muslims should follow according to Qur’an 33:21).
All of these works were composed 100-300 years after the death of Muhammad, so Dr. al-Beheri thought he would be on safe ground by stimulating discussion on the possibility of desanctifying all of these works except for the Qur’an. Indeed, President as-Sisi himself had said much the same thing in his own calls for an Islamic reformation. Well, though al-Azhar couldn’t charge the president, private citizen Dr. Islam al-Beheri had no such protection. The Shaykhs of al-Azhar hauled him into court and had him sentenced to prison for five years for the crime of isa’at al-islam (insulting or denigrating Islam).
Fortunately President as-Sisi had his sentence commuted after a few months in the slammer. Dr. al-Beheri is a free man now and has started up a new TV show called “Free Islam.”
But, don’t think for a moment that the international state-level OIC, the governments of countries like Iran, Qatar, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, and groups like the international Muslim Brotherhood and its front groups in the U.S.A. like CAIR and its allies wouldn’t just love to be able to impose those sorts of laws here in the West. That is exactly why the Islamists at all levels are playing this Christchurch massacre for all it is worth. It was manna from heaven for them.
The crime of “insulting Islam” is closely related to the crime of “slander” in Islamic jurisprudence. “Slander” in Islamic jurisprudence is saying anything to a Muslim, or about a Muslim, that he (or she) would not like–even if what is said is true. This, would, of course include any comment about his/her religion–even if true–that the Muslim would not like. This definition (along with more details) is presented by the Shafa’i scholar Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Masri in his classic book on Islamic Jurisprudence ‘umdat as-salik, pp. 730-732 along with quotes from Muhammad himself as related by several of the ahadeeth.
To put all this together, what this means is that any non-Muslim who says anything, I mean anything, about Islam that any Muslim does not like–even if it is true–that person has committed slander against the Muslim, and has also “insulted Islam.” These are only a few examples of Islamic jurisprudence, or shari’a, that the Islamists are itching to have imposed upon the West. In Islamic countries these “crimes” (even when committed by a fellow Muslim) earn the person anything from five years in prison to death, depending upon the country.
Incidents like the Christchurch massacre do nothing except aid the Islamists in this endeavor. Meanwhile the entire Left in America, from the DNC and its leading politicians down to its low-life base of “Antifa,” and “BLM,” are only too quick to assist this effort by lumping everyone who opposes jihad mass murder and Shari’a oppression into the category of “far right extremists” and placing them in the same basket as the KKK and Aryan Nation.
MEDIA DOUBLE STANDARDS
The media in the west has long been known for its biased reporting with regards to domestic politics, but what is really tragic is their rank double standards when it comes to reporting on any event or incident in which Muslims are the victims verse their coverage of similar acts when Christians are the victims.
Christian houses of worship are routinely bombed and shot up with worshippers inside on an almost weekly basis clear across the continent of Africa (including in pro-West Egypt), and South Asia from Pakistan to the Philippines. These events are barely mentioned in our media, if at all. It is as if our media and political classes believe that Christians living in those countries deserve to be killed, just for being there–even though in many cases they were there long before Islam arrived. Egyptian Copts, for example, go back several thousands of years before the imposition of Islam over their daily affairs. And, yet, they, the descendents of the pyramid builders, are being slaughtered like sacrificial lambs in their own homeland. Where is our beloved media on that?
In fact, anyone who does dare to report on those atrocities against Christians, such as Robert Spencer does on his www.jihadwatch.com, is branded as a “racist,” and “bigot,” and, yes, as an “Islamophobe.”
Yet, when a white European type shoots up a couple of mosques like the Christchurch moron did, all hell breaks out. You never hear the end of faux lamentations, and the linking of everyone to the left of Karl Marx (including President Trump and all those who voted for him) with the horrendous deed.
Don’t you just love the hypocrisy of it all?
And so, the big push to silence any sort of criticism of Islamic texts, persons, or practices is on full speed ahead, and is being aided “by their own hands,” thanks to the idiocy of the Left. This is why I think it appropriate to conclude with a quote from Robert Spencer’s recent posting on the Christchurch incident on www.frontpage.com:
“If and when we are all silenced, however, the jihad will not stop. The multicultural paradise will not dawn on the planet; in fact, there will be more jihad violence and strife than ever. There just won’t be anyone around who dares to oppose it.”
Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA, and is the author of Confessions of an (ex) NSA spy: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
The Epoch TImes
Corruption from the Left—the Tip of the Iceberg
BY Brad Johnson
March 13, 2019
On March 12, a couple of Hollywood actresses and some business leaders were among dozens of wealthy parents charged in a multimillion-dollar college admissions scandal that also implicates a number of leading universities in the United States.
So far, the University of Texas–Austin, Wake Forest, Georgetown, Yale, University of Southern California (USC), University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), and Stanford universities have been implicated. Most of the news coverage so far focuses almost exclusively on the parents, who are alleged to have paid bribes to get their unqualified children into top universities.
The reports carefully avoid the real issue, which is the corruption that exists at our universities—which have long been controlled by the left. Just think about this for one moment, about the way it’s being reported by the mainstream media.
Anytime a criminal pays off a judge or a politician, it’s not the criminal paying the bribe who is the focus, it’s the judge or politician who accepted the bribe who receives the attention. They are the ones who betrayed public trust and are the greater criminal in many ways.
These universities shouldn’t be ignored as part of the problem, and there needs to be punishment or, at the very least, reforms imposed to stop this form of corruption that exists within the multibillion-dollar industry of higher education.
Make no mistake, the university system is a huge government-subsidized moneymaker for the left, and part of a method used to funnel money back to leftist politicians. The left is going to do and say anything to protect and cover for corrupt universities.
We’ve already seen some of the left-wing reporting from sources, such as CNN, go so far as to link the scandal to President Donald Trump. This is dishonest at best and an attempt to cover up at worst. It’s just more proof that the left thrives within a corrupt system and needs to be stopped.
The System
In my previous career, I lived much of my adult life overseas. Like everything, that is a double-edged sword, but I have had the opportunity to see more of the world and how it works than most people.
Part of that opportunity was to live in socialist countries and see the reality of how those systems work. One of the very first things always seized by the left when taking control of a country is the education system. We have even seen this to be the case in the zones that were conquered by the terrorist group ISIS. In the former Soviet Union, it was no exception, and the university system there was tightly controlled and completely corrupt in much the same manner that universities in the United States have been corrupted by the left.
For example, in Eastern Europe, the grading system is different than in the West. Here, students receive letter grades of A, B, C, etc. There, students receive a number grade of 1–10, with 10 being high (good) and 1 being low (bad). Even though the USSR no longer exists, this system lives on in Russia and Eastern Europe.
The children of party leaders and the wealthy get their choice of what university they want to attend, which is what we’re seeing is the case here in the United States. It doesn’t stop there either; it continues for the full education of the student in question.
One of the actresses charged in this scandal is Lori Loughlin, who is alleged to have paid a bribe to get her daughter accepted at USC. Her daughter, Olivia Jade, was accepted at USC and monetized her time there by making deals with Amazon and apparently others, and running a YouTube show. She made it clear in those video recordings that she was there to party and would continue her social schedule, which includes a lot of travel.
Considering she wasn’t even able to meet the admissions requirements, there’s no way she would be able to maintain the grades needed to not flunk out when she was not attending classes or perhaps even taking exams. This is a page right out of the Soviet Union book and how it still works to this day.
There’s even a term for the children of the rich and powerful in Russia and Eastern Europe—they’re known as golden children. When they attend universities, they also make no changes to their lifestyles—they travel, and miss classes and exams as they wish.
Famously, the grading system reveals exactly how this works. A normal student, no matter how brilliant, almost without exception receives a grade of 9 or lower in the system. The highest grade of 10 is reserved for those golden children who don’t actually have to earn their grades. Everyone there knows and understands that when you see a graduate’s transcripts, if they have straight 9’s as their grades, they’re brilliant; if they have straight 10’s, they’re connected.
This is the path we’re walking with our university system here in the United States, with the left in charge. What an ugly, evil, two-tiered world they’re creating.
The Epoch TImes
Sen. Booker Hides Behind Pot’s Smoke Screen
BY CHRISTOPHER C. HULL
March 4, 2019
See through the smoke screen.
In September 2018, Daniel Lopez, who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia and was “self-medicating” with marijuana, stabbed his brother Thomas to death.
On Feb. 28, Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), a Democratic candidate for president of the United States, rolled out the Marijuana Justice Act, which would legalize pot nationwide.
No matter where you stand on this issue, this is a bad idea.
Here’s why.
Specifically, the bill would remove marijuana from the U.S. list of controlled substances, legalizing it on the federal level. It also would retroactively expunge criminal records of those charged with marijuana possession. Finally, it would allow those serving time for possession to petition for re-sentencing and provide them with resources like job training.
This is not the first time Booker has experimented with drug legalization. Two years ago, when he introduced a so-called “racial justice” bill, he put marijuana legalization at its center.
Booker’s prior measure would have penalized states with racially-disparate arrest or incarceration rates for marijuana-related crimes, even if offenders were in fact racially disparate.
At the time, Kevin Sabet of Smart Approaches to Marijuana, a group opposed to pot legalization, argued, “Given the opioid epidemic, [Booker’s] legislative energy would be much better spent implementing solutions to that crisis. But the Big Marijuana lobbyists are probably very happy.”
Overdoses
Last year, the number of Americans who died from drug overdoses topped 70,000 for the first time, a nearly 10 percent increase over the previous year, driven by the opioid epidemic.
In particular, the Center for Disease Control’s National Center for Health Statistics reported a 45 percent spike in deaths from synthetic opioids such as fentanyl and tramadol in particular.
Coupled with a soaring suicide rate—more on that below—such overdoses lowered U.S. life expectancy for the second year in a row.
Though pot enthusiasts claim legalization is a way to reduce such deaths, Keith Humphreys wrote in The Washington Post that “studies of individuals show that using medical cannabis is correlated with higher rates of using and misusing opioids.”
For instance, according to a 2018 study, those who used marijuana were almost three times as likely to Likewise, a JAMA Internal Medicine study found that states legalizing marijuana had 55 percent higher overdose rates. Data associated with the study demonstrate that an avalanche of deaths in legalizing states buried early findings that marijuana legalization might slightly help with opioid overdoses.use opiates three years later.
Legalization and Teen Use
While marijuana advocates tout studies finding legalization does not lead to increased teen marijuana use, a 2018 study found a 26 percent increase in frequency of use for teens who were already marijuana users.
Marijuana legalization leads to a loss of awareness of its risks, according to one study of perceptions of pot among eighth- and 10th-graders following recreational marijuana legalization in Washington state.
Beginning in the mid-2000s, the percentage of high schoolers who reported having smoked marijuana began to increase, accompanied by a sharp decrease in the percentage of 10th- and 12th-graders who view regular marijuana use as risky.
In fact, Colorado, an early adopter of legal marijuana, is now the No. 1 state in America for marijuana use among both pre-teens and those 12 to 17 years old.
The Colorado Department of Education likewise found that “drug-related school suspensions, expulsions, and law enforcement referrals increased dramatically from 2008 through 2011.”
It’s not just Colorado. One national addiction treatment network reported, “90 percent of adolescents seeking treatment are admitted with marijuana being their primary drug of choice.”
Such adolescent use of marijuana is linked to use of alcohol and cocaine—which together all help predict opioid addiction—as well as mental health problems, risky sexual behaviors, and poor school performance.
In fact, according to one expert, teen use can cause a permanent IQ drop of six points, “similar to the consequences of lead poisoning.”
A 2012 study found that “the most persistent adolescent-onset cannabis users evidenced an average 8-point IQ decline from childhood to adulthood,” and shows persistent use beyond adolescence is associated with an IQ drop of as much as 10 points.
Pot Use Exploding
It gets worse.
According to Alex Berenson, former New York Times reporter and author of the new book “Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence,” “almost everything you think you know about the health effects of cannabis, almost everything advocates and the media have told you for a generation, is wrong.”
Berenson reported that marijuana and its active ingredient THC are most commonly prescribed for pain relief, but in July 2018, “a large four-year study of patients with chronic pain in Australia showed cannabis use was associated with greater pain over time.”
In fact, even Rob Kampia, the co-founder of the Marijuana Policy Project, acknowledged to Berenson he “always viewed medical marijuana laws primarily as a way to protect recreational users.”
Yet, as legalization measures like Booker’s proliferate, and the disinformation campaign in which he participates takes hold, the number of heavy pot smokers is exploding.
Berenson reports the number of Americans who smoked marijuana at least 300 times a year, the definition of “daily use,” nearly tripled from 2006 to 2017, approaching the number who drink alcohol every day.
Mental Illness
Contrary to drug dealer deceptions, there is such a thing as marijuana abuse or addiction. Its technical name is “diagnosable cannabis use disorder,” and from 2006 to 2014 it tripled. It accounts for 11 percent of all psychosis cases in emergency rooms, reaching 90,000 cases, about 250 a day.
One potential reason: The potency of the drug has exploded as well. Between the 1970s and today, as farming and cloning technologies evolve, marijuana’s THC content has increased about 10-fold.
Which leads to even worse news: Berenson found “a mountain of peer-reviewed research in top medical journals” shows marijuana can cause or worsen mental illness.
For example, teens who smoke marijuana regularly approximately triple their risk of schizophrenia.
More generally, the National Academy of Medicine in 2017 reported that “cannabis use is likely to increase the risk of developing schizophrenia and other psychoses; the higher the use, the greater the risk.”
Likewise, a 2010 study found a towering 27 percent of schizophrenics had been diagnosed with cannabis use disorder.
Violence
And on average, along with mental illness comes violence.
In a 2017 speech that called for legalizing pot, Booker claimed states that have done so “are seeing decreases in violent crime.”
Well, actually, no.
The first four states to legalize marijuana for recreational use saw a five-year increase of 37 percent for murders and 25 percent for aggravated assaults, far greater than the national increase.
This is not a surprise. For instance, Berenson reported that a 2013 journal article studying 1,600 psychiatric patients in southern Italy found marijuana use was associated with a 10-fold increase in violence.
Likewise, a 2007 study of defendants who had committed homicide during psychotic episodes found almost two-thirds reported misusing marijuana—“more than alcohol and amphetamines combined.”
There’s more.
According to a 2012 study in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence of more than 9,000 adolescents, “marijuana use was associated with a doubling of domestic violence.”
One in 2017 found that drug use, nearly always being marijuana, “translated into a five-fold increase in violence,” Berenson said.
The deaths are not always deliberate. Marijuana is associated with more child deaths from abuse and neglect than alcohol, and “more than cocaine, methamphetamines, and opioids combined” according to reports from Texas, one of the rare states that tracks perpetrators’ drug use.
Berenson dug up a 2009 study by an Oxford University psychiatrist and epidemiologist finding that schizophrenics in particular “are five times as likely to commit violent crimes as healthy people, and almost 20 times as likely to commit homicide.”
Not only are schizophrenics 20 times more likely to kill you, they are also more likely to kill themselves.
For instance, a 2006 study found that after the first release for a schizophrenic episode, “not taking any regular antipsychotic medication was associated with a 12-fold increase in the relative risk of all-cause death and a worrying 37-fold increase in death by suicide.”
Another study found schizophrenics’ lifetime suicide risk is 4.9 percent, 350 times America’s overall age-adjusted suicide rate in 2017.
And to reiterate: Teens who smoke pot about tripled their risk of schizophrenia in one study, and 27 percent of schizophrenics had been diagnosed with cannabis use disorder in another.
In sum: More marijuana, more mental illness, more murder.
Drug Dealers
Booker claimed, “The war on drugs has not been a war on drugs, it’s been a war on people.”
Actually, the war on drugs has been a war on drug dealers.
And even when states legalize drug dealers, the evidence suggests that drug dealers are not only still drugging people, but statistically speaking, still killing them as well.
Now they want to kill many, many more, not to mention ruining lives and burning away intellect.
Remember Daniel Lopez, and his brother Thomas, whom they helped kill.
As recently as 2015, Booker declined to support marijuana legalization in a Vox interview.
He was right then, and he’s wrong now.
See through his smoke screen.
The Epoch Times
Uzbek Official Confirms Taliban Talks
BY CHRISTOPHER C. HULL
March 4, 2019
Uzbekistan’s ambassador to the United States, Javlon Vakhabov, confirmed his government “had very substantive talks” with a Taliban delegation visiting his nation last August, reportedly to discuss the Afghanistan peace process and withdrawal of foreign forces.
The Taliban, a fundamentalist Islamic dictatorship, held control of Afghanistan for the five years leading up to the al-Qaida attack against the United States on Sept. 11, 2001, until a U.S.-led coalition ousted them from power in response, and has battled them ever since.
Vakhabov’s remarks come as U.S. and Taliban negotiators had their highest-level meetings yet in their drive for a peace agreement in America’s longest war.
Asked what Uzbekistan was doing to prepare for the eventuality that the current Afghan government may not survive, Vakhabov reiterated the Uzbek government is focused on “figuring out” two issues: economic support for war-torn Afghanistan, and the ongoing peace process there.
In March 2018, the ambassador noted that the Uzbeks hosted a conference in Tashkent attended by U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas A. Shannon Jr.
The Tashkent conference followed a Kabul confab, at which Afghan President Ashraf Ghani laid out a potential process for ending the conflict.
In Tashkent, Shannon noted that “It is the violence of the Taliban that creates the instability that enables these terrorist groups to continue operating in Afghanistan,” saying the United States and its allies were “fully committed to ensuring that the Afghan government has the capabilities to deny the Taliban any military path to victory.”
Conference participants, Shannon said, could help by “prevent[ing] materiel, financial, or political support to the Taliban.”
The United States sought “a negotiated settlement that leads the Taliban to stop violence, break ties with all terrorist groups, and respect the Afghan constitution, including its protections for women and minorities,” according to Shannon.
Vakhabov argued the main goal of the Tashkent conference was to develop the “key principles for peace” in Afghanistan.
In July, following Tashkent, Americans expressed willingness to meet directly with the Taliban about ending the conflict, jettisoning a prior commitment such talks would include the current Afghan government.
Soon thereafter, a Taliban official revealed such a meeting had taken place in Taliban-allied Qatar with Alice Wells, Washington’s top diplomat for South Asia.
Taliban officials also held three days of talks with the U.S. special representative for Afghanistan in Qatar, Zalmay Khalilzad, in November. A prior report from The Wall Street Journal suggested it was the second meeting in the preceding four months.
Those talks included Khairullah Khairkhwa, the former Taliban autocrat of the western Afghan city of Herat, and Mohammad Fazel, a former Taliban militant leader.
Both Taliban figures were among the five that the Obama administration released from Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in 2014 in exchange for U.S. deserter Bowe Bergdahl.
Last month, the Uzbek Foreign Minister reiterated an offer to host talks between Afghan government officials and Taliban negotiators.
Finally, on Feb. 25, U.S. officials began the highest-level talks yet with the Taliban, including with the jihadi organization’s deputy leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. Prior talks stalled when Taliban representatives said they didn’t have the authority to discuss either a ceasefire or participation of the current Afghan government, both supposedly U.S. prerequisites for a deal.
Yet direct talks with the Taliban continue over Afghan objections.
According to professor Stephen B. Young, a Vietnam War-era official in the Office of Civil Operations and Rural Development Support, Americans negotiating with the Taliban “behind the backs of our allies” echoes the exclusion of South Vietnamese forces from the disastrous deal then-Nixon National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger struck with the Communist regime in Hanoi.
Young argues, “Kissinger had implied in his memoirs … Nixon did all this stuff.” But Young, who approached Nixon with what he had learned about Kissinger’s diplomacy based on a review of raw cables from the time, reports that Nixon “looked surprised—maybe even a little bit shocked.”
Nixon said, “No, I don’t remember any of this,” Young recalls, saying, “His face went grey.”
With respect to current negotiations with the Taliban, Young concludes, “The lesson is: Don’t cut out your allies. … If you cut your allies out against a determined ideological ally, you have basically turned against your country.”
Vakhabov stressed that his government’s talks with the Taliban took place after having consulted with and gained the approval of both Washington and the regime in Kabul.
“In this regard, Uzbek government endeavors are fully supported by the U.S. government—even supported by very our tough neighbors,” the Pakistanis and Iranians, whom Vakhabov reported were “very supportive.”
The Uzbek ambassador addressed a private luncheon at the offices of the World Trade Center of Washington in the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center on Feb. 19.
A TALE OF TWO CITIES, A TALE OF TWO MURDERS:
Reflections on, and Ramifications of, the Khashoqji Affair.
By Barry Webb
The first city, obviously is Istanbul, and the “murder,” if that is what is really was, was that of Jamal Khashoqji.
The second city is Buenos Aires, and that murder will be exposed later in this essay.
The purpose of this essay will not be to determine the right or wrong of what happened in Istanbul in October of 2018, nor is it to justify murder and assassinations of any sort–especially not those conducted in an embassy or consulate which should be considered sanctified places of safety for all citizens of the country that owns the facility.
Rather, the purpose of his essay is to examine motivations and point out winners and losers from this event so that readers may better understand the large-scale geostrategic ramifications of the Khashoqji affair.
WHERE’S THE BEEF?
Remember that old burger ad where the old lady asks “where’s the beef?” Well, in the Khashoqji case we all have to ask “where’s the beef, or body?”
Y’know, when you sit down to read a murder mystery novel, the first thing you see (read about) is a dead body. Then you spend the rest of the novel trying to figure out “who dun it” as you pick up clues along the way. Real murders are solved in much the same way.
But, in the Khoshoqji case everything is turned on its head. We had the crime (murder) identified, and the perp (Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman) identified from the very first day–without there being any actual evidence of a crime. There was no body, and there still isn’t any body. Yet, we know who “did” it. Now isn’t that funny?
THERE WAS JUST TOO MUCH THAT DID NOT ADD UP
One thing that made me very, very suspicious from the very beginning about this whole affair was that everything we learned about the case, every shred of intelligence, was provided by Turkish intelligence and police entities.
Since Turkey is a “loyal” NATO “ally,” everyone in Washington from our senators down to the dregs inhabiting the Washington Post building believed every word that the Turks said. However, those who are familiar with the history and the current events of the Middle East (in terms of who hates whom, who is allied to whom) had to take every word coming out of Turkey with a huge train load of salt.
Not that the Saudis are all that trustworthy. I ordinarily wouldn’t trust them as far as I could throw them–but I trust the Turks far less. Not only has loyal NATO ally Turkey become the planet’s #1 state sponsor of terrorism (sorry Iran, you’ve been demoted), which renders everything they say or do suspect, but, you see, there is an historical enmity between Saudi Arabia and the Turks that goes back centuries which plays a role in their current actions and opinions of each other. Unfortunately all of our policy makers, and opinion makers (the media), seem to be ignorant of that history, which in turn leads to misjudgments on far too many critical issues.
TOO MUCH HULLABALOO
Another thing that made me very suspicious about this whole issue was the excessive hullabaloo over it. I’m not saying that killing people is a nice thing to do, but dictators snuff out journalists all the time with nary a whimper of protest from the media figures making such a fuss like they did over this one. This essay, by design, is more about double standards than it is about the rights or wrongs of assassinations.
Considering that all of the fuss was being generated by Erdogan’s Turkey made me doubly suspicious. No one on the planet has been as abusive of journalist than has NATO “ally” Erdogan. For example Hrant Dink, a Turkish journalist of Armenian descent who had been very critical of Erdogan was gunned down in a drive by shooting as he left his place of employment on 19 January 2007. Of course, Turkish authorities were able to determine years later that the perp was . . . (drum roll, please) . . . one of those dastardly Kurds. Since then Erdogan has had hundreds of journalists jailed, tortured, and probably worse–without the slightest whimper of protest from the same media entities making such a big deal about the Khashoqji affair. Funny, huh?
As if all of that wasn’t enough, the Arabic language satellite TV channel al-Jazeera was devoting nearly all of their programming to the Khashoqji affair 24/7 regurgitating every single word coming out of Turkey as gospel, while adding much of their own anti-Saudi propaganda to sweeten the pie. Why?
Why in the H%$# does al-Jazeera care so much about a controversial Saudi Journalist who went missing in Istanbul? Because al-Jazeera is based in Qatar, and Qatar has been declared a supporter and a financier of terrorism by Saudi Arabia who had Qatar kicked out of the Gulf Cooperation Council based on those charges. Because, in fact, Qatar does support terrorism in Libya and elsewhere, and supports and hosts the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), the fountainhead of all Sunni terrorism–and Khashoqji was a key member of the Muslim Brotherhood. And, al-Jazeera is a pro-Brotherhood channel.
Erdogan’s ruling AKP is a clone of the Muslim Brotherhood, and Turkey supports the Brotherhood’s efforts worldwide, including 24/7 efforts to topple Egypt, a key ally of Saudi Arabia. And, oh, BTW, as soon as the Kingedom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and its allies kicked Qatar out of the GCC, Qatar alligned itself with Iran and fellow MB supporter Turkey. Turkey now has military bases in Qatar with about 10,000 troops.
KHASHOQHI’S SHADY PAST
Before we get into Khashoqji’s relationship with the Washington Post, and why U.S. politicians are so obsessed with punishing the alleged perp Muhammad bin Salman (MBS), we should take a quick look at Khashoqji’s profile.
Khashoqji was a high school buddy of Usama bin Laden. They both joined the Muslim Brotherhood together and had the same goals of establishing a “true” Islamic State as a prelude to reviving the Caliphate. However, they took different pathways to accomplish those goals. Khashoqji thought he could help bring it about through subterfuge, via the pen and “bait and switch” techniques. Usama bin Laden was more honest. He believed that revolution and violence was best and quickest way. In fact, before pulling the 9/11 incident, he openly declared war on the United States not once, but twice.
Khashoqji, BTW, blamed the Jews for 9/11 so as to deflect blame from his old buddy, then he admitted to crying when bin Laden was finally killed.
(The above section taken from The Looming Tower, by Lawrence Wright which in turn was based on the author’s interviews with Khashoqji himself).
THE TURKEY CONNECTION
American media made much hay about Khashoqji being a journalist for the Washington Post. In fact, he was only a stringer, contributing an occasional Muslim Brotherhood propaganda piece disguised as journalism. He spent as much, or more, of his time in Istanbul where he contributed articles to several Turkish news entities. Turkey, remember, is essentially a Muslim Brotherhood-run country that helped ISIS get started, and continued to finance them during their rampages across Syria and Iraq. Turkey, of course, continues to finance and supply arms for terror groups across the Middle East as well as conducting its own “ethnic cleansing” operations in Iraq and Syria.
This puts the lie to the American media and politicians eulogizing this individual as some great champion of free speech and a free press. He was no such thing.
Yes, I know, the media will defend their position by saying that Khashoqji founded an organization called DAWN (Democracy for the Arab World Now), which sounds to touchy-feely sweet to naïve western ears (because they think that it proves that he was a champion of Democracy and the free press and freedom of speech that the moniker implies). Problem is, to the MB “Democracy” is just a tool that they can use to gain power, after which they can jettison it like the Mursi regime was doing in Egypt before they were deposed.
Khashoqji’s hero, Turkey’s president Erdogan, once said that “Democracy is a train. We will ride that train until it takes us to where we want to go, then we’ll get off that train.”
It would be foolish to think that Khashoqji’s world view was any different.
THE FIANCE
Another element of this affair that did not add up was the Fiance Khashoqji was supposed to marry. The Arabic website www.alarabiya.net posted a picture of Khashoqji’s wife in Saudi Arabia whom he was dumping so he could marry the Turkish Khadija. The Saudi wife not only had born him two sons, but she holds a PhD and is beautiful to look at.
As for the Turkish fiance, the kindest thing one could say about her is that Islamic clothing becomes her. As a guy, I can say that there is no way he is dumping this Saudi woman for that Turkish woman . . . unless . . .
What the Turkish “fiance” does have is connections. She is part of Erdogan’s inner circle. Some say she was a high-level intelligence figure.
THE QATAR CONNECTION
Now we get to answer the question as to why Qatar and its satellite TV channel were so interested in the alleged assassination of an individual who was not a Qatari citizen and who (on the surface), did not work for any Qatari entity.
We mentioned before Khashoqji’s association with the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). By default he had essentially become the head of the Saudi branch of the MB.
Qatar is the major financier of the Brotherhood, with Turkey being #two. The Saudi Crown Prince’s alleged assassination of the head of the Saudi branch of the MB was a huge blow to both Qatar’s and Turkey’s geostrategic plans for the Middle East.
In addition, there was current hostility between Qatar and Saudi Arabia over Qatar’s being evicted from the Gulf Cooperation Council, as mentioned above.
But the connection goes even deeper.
Maggi Salem of the Qatar Foundation International (a Clone of the Clinton Foundation with close connections to the Qatari government) wrote the guidelines for Khashoqji’s Washington Post articles. Translation: The Qatari government was essentially dictating to Khashiqji what he should write. He was essentially an agent for the Qatari government, in addition to being an agent for the Muslim Brotherhood. Through his Turkish “fiance” he was also likely an agent for Turkey’s intelligence unit MIT, and there is speculation that he was not just a “double” agent, or a “triple” agent, but that he was a “quadruple” agent working on behalf of elements within America’s CIA. These would be “Deep State” Obama holdovers who hold the same world view as the Obama administration and its clients in Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood.
THE AL-JAZEERA-WASHINGTON POST LOVE FEST
One of the things that struck me early on, and raised my “suspicions” antenna was the way the U.S. media was regurgitating al-Jazeera’s propaganda almost word for word (after translation from the Arabic). It was as if the Washington Post, CNN, and the others were taking dictation from Qatar in their reporting on the Khashoqji affair.
A prime example of this occurred the day after the alleged event. A Mr. Fuqara’, who is the head of the al-Jazeera Washington office held a “love-fest” with the “journalists” from the Washington Post, allowing them to vent their anger over the dastardliness of the Saudi Regime, and MBS in particular, for this gruesome murder. This event was not held in al-Jazeera’s DC offices, nor was it held inside the WAPO building. No, they staged it (and I mean staged) directly in front of the WAPO building so that the Washington Post signage on the building above the entrance would be the backdrop for these champions of Democracy journalists–thus ensuring that it would be blasted to the world via al-Jazeera’s satellite technology so as to lend the full “authority” of the Post to Post to al-Jazeera’s propaganda.
Oh, there is one more link between this case and American media. CNN has a franchise in Turkey: CNN Turk. So, all the Turkish propaganda could be funneled through that franchise to CNN America and broadcast to the American public and politicians, while WAPO and its other allies in America’s leftist media were doing the same with Qatari propaganda.
ONE MORE THING THAT DID NOT ADD UP
If you want to assassinate someone, say a pesky journalist . . . there are a number of ways to do it. You can have a single agent follow them into a restaurant, pretend to be a regular customer, then when the target is not looking drop certain biological or chemical properties into their soup, or drink. Or, you have an agent run them over with a vehicle, or you arrange for an auto accident. All of these methods require only one agent to do the job. A simple drive by shooting requires only two people, a driver and one agent to do the shooting.
The one thing you don’t want to do is to send in 15 guys who all fly in on only two jets (charter jets at that), and who all arrive on the same day into the major city of a country that has hated your guts for hundreds of years. Then they all 15 stay at the same hotel, and they all leave on the same day after the alleged killing. That is so obvious it is like hiring a skywriter to blazen across the sky “we did it.”
So, either the Saudis were extremely stupid, or MBS wanted the world to know so as to send a message to other dissidents, or something else is going on.
True, the Israelis sent 26 agents into the U.A.E. in 2010 to take out Mahmoud
al-Mabhouh, leader of a Hamas military cell–but, not all of these people were killers. Some were just trackers, others to provide intel, and yet others just to act as decoys. The main point, however, is that all 26 arrived at different times on different regular civilian airlines, and from numerous different countries and carried passports from all the different countries. And, they all departed at different times, on different airlines, heading for different countries. Everybody “knows” that the Mossad did it, but there is no “proof” because the Israelis left no trail.
DID MBS REALLY DO IT?
Now we need to discuss the issue of whether or not Khashoqji was actually murdered, and if so, whether or not MBS is the culprit.
First we’ll discuss the possibility of whether or not this might have been a “false flag” operation aimed at discrediting MBS, or to even bring him down. So, let’s look at the facts, that is, what do we actually know for sure.
As for the tapes that the Turks claim they have recording Khashoqji being killed, they would have been credible had the Turks presented them right away. But, since they did not come to light for a full month, or more, this certainly gave the Turks plenty of time to manufacture anything they wanted to. With today’s technologies it is not too difficult to make an audio tape, or a video recording, do what ever you want it to do. Just ask the two rogue Russian cyber geeks who manufactured the salacious tapes that went into the Trump dossier. Had the Turks loaned these tapes to America’s NSA the geeks there could have determined whether or not they were legit, or had been tampered with. Instead, the Turks refused to hand over the tapes to anybody’s intelligence agency for examination.
There is video evidence of Khashoqji entering the Saudi consulate 02 October 2018 via the front entrance. These videos are likely legit because they were presented the very day of Khashoqji’s disappearance. There is no video evidence of him leaving the consulate.
Of course, any competent intelligence agency could easily hack into the consulate’s systems and turn off the cameras. So, that was a ho hum.
Based on this flimsy evidence, Turkish authorities immediately began their propaganda campaign that Khashoqji had been murdered inside the consulate. Turkey’s allies in Qatar immediately began regurgitating the Turkish propaganda without any expressions of doubt 24/7. U.S. media followed suit.
The Turks invented all sorts of scenarios to explain what happened: Khashoqji was strangled. Then he was sawed up into little pieces and hidden somewhere. They were just sure that his body, or parts of it, were in a wooded area some distance away from the consulate. So they sent sniffer dogs there along with crew to dig the place up–and a camera crew to take the pictures of them “trying” to find Khashoqji. Or, at least, made a big scene of doing so. Of course, nothing. Then they said they were sure that the body was in the trunk of a car parked in an Istanbul parking garage. Again, a big scene on al-Jazeera of Turkish officers opening up car trunks. Nope. Nothing there. Oh, then the body, or pieces of it, must be buried either on the Consulate grounds somewhere, or in the yard of the Saudi Consul’s home. Nope, not there either.
Then the Turks came up with the fanciful idea that the 15-member MBS team used some sort of acid to completely dissolve Khashoqji’s body. They finally ended up with the theory that the body was cut up into pieces, then transported in suitcases to the airport where it was taken out of the country. This forces the Turks to then claim that while they inspected one of the Saudi chartered aircraft, they had failed to check the other one. So all the evidence must have been on that other aircraft.
Okay. Perhaps. Maybe the Saudis are hiding the body fragments somewhere in the Rub’ al-Khali (the great Empty Quarter).
As I review this section on 04 March, I see on al-Jazeera TV that the Turks now claim that they have found an “oven” on the property of the Saudi Consul’s home in Istanbul. This “oven” is fairly large. It is of the type that potters use to fire their pots. It is basically a kiln, based on the photos shown on al-Jazeera. But, of course, there is no evidence from these photos of the “oven” being on the property of anyone, much less the Saudi consul. Turkish authorities had searched the property of the consul’s home twice previously, including once shortly after the alleged murder. Funny that it took them six months to discover this oven.
But there is one other little tidbit that came up early, and that has been completely forgotten.
THE DOUBLE?
Several news entities reported that the day of Khashoqji’s alleged murder, a “double” wearing Khashoqji’s clothes was seen exiting the rear of the consulate. People in nearby buildings had apparently witnessed this. This alleged “double” was also reportedly seen at various places around Istanbul–then inexplicably “disappeared.”
Turkey and Qatar’s al-Jazeera dismissed this as a ruse pulled by the Saudis so as to make people think that Khashoqji was still alive and well somewhere in Istanbul. Perhaps it was. But, what if? What if that really was Khashoqji? That would certainly explain why no evidence of a body has ever been found.
However, the Saudis later, under a great deal of pressure from the international community (thanks to Turkish and Qatari constant propaganda), admitted that Khashoqji was killed inside the consulate, however they don’t know where the body is.
SO WHO DID IT
The allegations are that certain individuals close to MBS were the ones who carried out the operation. However, the video evidence that the Turks provided of the alleged suspects entering and departing the airport was so blurry that you could not make out any of their features. But, even if so, there are still valid doubts that MBS is responsible.
When Anwar as-Sadat, a former president of Egypt, was assassinated in 1981, he was assassinated by members of his own military. The moral to that is that just because individuals close to a world leader commit a crime, does not mean that the leader is responsible. Sadat most certainly did not order his own soldiers to execute him.
If this were true, this begs the question of why? Why would security officials close to MBS commit a crime that would make their boss look real bad and possibly lead to his dismissal?
MBS has made a lot of enemies with his reforms. Granting women the right to drive did not sit very well with a lot of the fundamentalists in the magic kingdom. Nor did his partial opening of the country to kafir tourism. His hinting that someday Christian churches could be built in Saudi Arabia had to give the Wahhabis heart attacks. But it was something else that may have set off a plot against MBS.
Why was Anwar as-Sadat killed? Because he visited Israel and gave a speech before the Israeli Knesset. In the fall of 2017 MBS made a secret visit to Israel. True, it was secret and he did not speak before the Knesset, but al-Jazeera found out about it and broadcast it to Arabic speakers everywhere.
So, why not just assassinate MBS, instead of some journalist who is on the side of the radicals anyway? Perhaps MBS was too well guarded. So, they chose an action that would embarrass him and perhaps bring him down. Perhaps. But that does not make a lot of sense. Why would the fundamentalists kill not just one of their own, but one of the important cogs in their plan to recreate the real Caliphate. Which takes us once again back to:
THE DOUBLE ONCE AGAIN
Assuming that the “double” was not a double, but Khashoqji himself pulling a fast one so as to create a “false flag” operation, he would have needed a support group of some sort in order to spirit him away and keep him hidden for a while. That support group could have come from the Muslim Brotherhood who had every reason in the world to want to harm MBS. Or, the support could have come from Turkish intelligence itself.
If this seems far-fetched, and into political thriller territory, let us remember that this is the Middle East. And, all factions, Iranians, Turks, Muslim Brotherhood, ISIS, al-Qaeda, etc., are operating on the assumption that we are living in the last days.
The Iranians believe that they have been selected by Allah to lead the Muslims, Sunni and Shi’a alike, in that prophesied great war against rum (Western Civilization) in preparation for the return of Jesus Christ and the final judgment day. The Palestinians believe that they have been selected by Allah to be the spearhead of that great army from Khorasan that is to retake Jerusalem in the Latter Days.
And, Turkey’s Erdogan believes that he has been selected by Allah to recreate the Ottoman Empire Caliphate in preparation for that great last war against Western Civilization. One of the goals of Erdogan’s policies to achieve this reunited Caliphate is to dethrone all of the existing secular Arab governments and replace them with MB governments which would then join with Turkey (whose ruling AKP party is a clone of the MB) in reconstituting the real Caliphate. This is why Turkey has been supporting terrorism throughout the Arab Middle East.
Coincidentally, the Muslim Brotherhood is more than willing to “give its power unto the beast.” MB spiritual leader, the Qatar-based Yusuf al-Qaradhawi has stated that Erdogan is the “Muslim’s best hope,” and has done everything except publicly declare him to be the Caliph.
SO WHAT DOES ALL OF THIS HAVE TO DO WITH KHASHOQJI
The Shi’a have a prophecy about the return of the “hidden Imam.” The Sunni have prophecies about the appearance of a figure called the mahdi, or, “the guided one.”
So, what if Khashoqji was just spirited away somewhere to be “resurrected” at some critical point in the future as both “the hidden Imam,” and the mahdi?
Can you imagine what a tool that would be for Erdogan to unite the entire Islamic world into a new, gigantic Caliphate with him as its Caliph? Erdogan, BTW, possesses exactly that fantasy.
Far fetched? Unlikely. Maybe. But I will bet you that MBS thought that something of the sort was in the works. Here is why:
All together six countries in the world have declared the MB to be a terrorist organization: Russia, Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., Bahrain, Egypt, and Israel, with the KSA doing so in 2010. This made Khashoqji, automatically, an enemy of the state of the KSA. Nonetheless, they tolerated him for awhile–until MBS’s crackdowns in 2017.
Jamal Khashoqji then became essentially the de-facto leader of the Saudi branch of the MB (after most of the others had been jailed or killed). His proposed marriage to a high-level Turkish intelligence figure, and part of Erdogan’s inner circle (which made no sense for any other reason) would represent a symbolic wedding of the Muslim Brotherhood with Turkey. And, in the Middle East symbolism is everything.
So, if Khashoqji really was killed, and if MBS really was the instigator, he certainly had good reason to fear what Khashoqji and the Turks were up to.
Let me finish this portion of the essay with several quotes from a Middle East-based female reformer:
“There is an increased fear, and rightly so, about the free expression of extreme religious ideas and opinions that are polluting our social, cultural, economic, and political orders in the Arab world, which is why Jamal Khashoqji stands as an enemy to free thinkers–Muslims and (regional) states that turned against politics disguised as religion.
“Khashoqji’s assassination was not an attack on Western values . . . His first loyalty was not to American citizens, but . . . to spread the ideas of his Muslim Brotherhood” (Aliya al-Ganis, A War to Achieve Modernity, posted on www.gatestoneinstitute.org on 18 January 2019).
“There can be no political reform and democracy in any Arab country without accepting that political Islam is a part of it” (Khashoqhi, as quoted by Aliya al-Ganis above).
“Because Khashoqji wanted an uprising against the Saudi royal family, the Prince was facing fears and possibly the threats of being assassinated by those opposing his reforms. (Alia al-Ganis).
“Therefore, when a religious extremist such as Khashoqji is lost on the front line, my thought to him is: You got what you deserved” (Alia Ganis, A War to Achieve Modernity, posted on www.gatestoneinstitute.org on 19 January 2019).
So, this is the great champion of “democracy” that our media and politicians have gushed their false sympathy for, and virtually deified. Time’s “man of the year.”
And, this is the man whose “disappearance” the Democrats are using as a bludgeon with which to beat Trump, since their “Russia, Russia” hoax has petered out.
Keep this hypocrisy in mind as we turn now to that other murder in that other city.
BUENOS AIRES
The pertinent murder here was that of Argentine public prosecutor Alberto Nisman. Following is the background to the case.
In 1992 a suicide bomber in a pick-up blew up the Israeli embassy with collateral damage to a nearby Catholic church. 29 civilians were killed, and 242 wounded (most of them Argentine citizens, including some children). A group calling itself “The Islamic Jihad” claimed responsibility. The group came out of the terrorist triangle of the tri-border area and was linked to Hezbollah and Iran. NSA intercepts proved that Iran had prior knowledge of the attack. This attack occurred in the midst of negotiations between Iran and Argentina for the purpose of the former purchasing nuclear fuel from the latter, which consequently fell through.
In 1994 an Iranian-linked terrorist from the terrorism triangle blew up a Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires killing 85 people and wounding dozens more.
In 2003 Israeli intelligence discovered that one Ibrahim Hussein Berro has an honorary plaque in Hezbollah-held territory in Lebanon for driving the explosives laden van into the Jewish center.
After years of foot dragging and cover-ups so blatant, obvious, and corrupt that they’d make an Obama administration blush . . . just kidding (actually they would, and did, applaud the cover-up efforts as we shall see), the Argentine government finally got around to appointing Alberto Nisman in 2006 to investigate not only Iran’s role in the operation, but the cover-up. This appointment was made only after tremendous public pressure was applied.
Mr. Nisman, who was Jewish by the way, went right to work . . . and ran dab smack into one brick wall after another. Argentine government and security authorities erected every road bock in front of him that they could think of.
THE OBAMA CONNECTION
When Obama began running for president in 2008, he began colluding and collaborating with the Iranians (a declared enemy of the United States). He let them know that he was most eager to obtain a nuclear agreement from them. The Iranians responded by saying that they would consider some sort of a deal–providing a third party could provide them with nuclear fuel for their “peaceful” reactors.
In 2010 Argentine President Kirchner, in a speech before the UN, claimed that in 2010 Obama official Gary Simone ordered her to provide nuclear fuel to Iran in turn for oil.
Other sources have claimed that Argentina was also supposed to provide grain to Iran for the oil.
Another of Iran’s first demands to Obama was that the Nisman investigation had to be dropped. Otherwise, no deal.
Western diplomatic sources have claimed that the Obama administration, on several occasions, did urge Argentina to halt, or limit, Nisman’s investigation.
However, in spite of the pressure, Alberto Nisman plugged on, and after years of hard work, harassment, and death threats, he finally was able to begin to compile a portfolio of evidence linking, not only just Hezbollah, but Iran to the 1994 bombing.
As the nuc negotiations with Iran dragged on, and the Obama administration got increasingly desperate to obtain some sort of deal, any deal, with the Iranians before his administration was over, the Iranians, smelling the weakness, applied increasing pressure on Obama to get the Nisman investigation halted, and to get Argentina to supply grain and nuclear fuel to Iran in turn for oil. Do that, or no deal.
In late 2014 rumors swirled that Nisman had nearly concluded his investigations. He was thus scheduled to testify before the Argentine Congress on 19 January 2015.
In December of 2014 an Obama administration official visited Argentina. An unofficial report has Obama basically ordering Argentina to halt the Nisman investigation.
On 18 January 2015, one day before he was to testify before the Argentine Congress, Alberto Nisman’s mother found him dead in his apartment.
A pistol owned by Nisman was found beside him. Argentine security personnel declared the death to be suicide. But the Argentine public would not have it. They demanded a full investigation into Nisman’s death, because Nisman had purchased the pistol out of fear that his life was in danger.
Due to the corruption of Argentine’s security services the public, and the Argentine Congress, demanded that the investigation be turned over to another entity not associated with Buenos Aires politics and corruption. So the Argentine border security forces were enlisted. Their investigation has recently (2018) determined that Nisman’s death, was, in fact a murder and not a suicide as originally reported.
So, who did it? Was it the Iranians, in order to ensure that the Nuclear deal (that they were to benefit from immensely) went through? Was it the Obama administration, so desperate for some sort of legacy, any legacy, that they would do anything to obtain it? Or, was it the Kirchner government hoping to hide their role in the cover-ups?
All three of these entities profited from the Iranian nuclear deal.
SO WHERE WAS THE UPROAR OVER THIS MURDER?
Even if Obama was not directly involved in Nisman’s murder, he certainly had to be pleased by it, because now the nuc deal could go through. Yet, our media has been virtually silent about this murder, and the resultant investigation.
The media, of course, are expected to be dishonest and guided by double standards. But where were our Republican senators and Congresspersons? These swamp critters who are weeping and moaning the loudest over the death of a Muslim Brotherhood propagandist, each trying to outdo the other in showing their false outrage, are shamefully silent about the entire Nisman cause.
So, let’s keep these double standards in mind as we now turn to the:
RAMIFICATIONS OF THE KHASHOQJI AFFAIR
Who were the winners? And who were the losers?
The winners, are Iran, Turkey, Qatar, and the Muslim Brotherhood.
The losers are Saudi Arabia, MBS in particular, Israel, Egypt, and the Trump Administrtion
THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION
The fact that Trump was rightfully hesitant to excommunicate Saudi Arabia from the community of nations, has given the Democrats a tool with which to beat him. The Democrats have been able to exploit the bi-partisan fake revulsion over the murder of a Muslim Brotherhood propagandist to paint a picture of Trump as being “too friendly to tyrants.” The hypocrisy of that effort is farcical coming from the political party that strove to empower the Muslim Brotherhood and Iran (both of whom are declared enemies of the United States, and are totalitarian systems) when they were in power.
Does Saudi Arabia have an atrocious human rights record over all? Of course, but their critics in that area give Turkey and Iran a free pass though their human rights records are equally repugnant.
Saudi Arabia was also to play a key role in the Trump administration’s “Deal of the Century” to solve the Israeli-Palestinian deal. Excommunicating the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) effectively kills those efforts.
IRAN
Iran is a winner because ostracizing Saudi Arabia removes from the table any chance of a serious U.S. attempt at regime change. Were the U.S. to launch a serious effort to bring down the Iranian regime, they would need the KSA as an ally, and as the launching pad for assembling forces.
Iran is a winner because the Khashoqji affair has given impetus to international pressure, including in the U.S., to halt all arms shipments to Saudi Arabia over its alleged human rights abuses in Yemen. If the Saudis are forced to abandon their war against the Iranian-supported Houthi rebellion in neighboring Yemen, then Shi’a Iran gets a client state on Sunni Saudi Arabia’s doorstep. Even if Saudi Arabia somehow continues the war, but with fewer resources, that will only prolong the suffering of the Yemeni people.
Iran is also using this crisis to drum up support for the fake Nuclear deal among the Europeans and Trump’s political enemies in the U.S.
TURKEY
Turkey is a winner because while it is directing the world’s attention to the alleged Saudi complicity in the Khashoqji murder, no one is looking at their wholesale extermination of Christians, Kurds, and Yazidis in Northern Syria.
Turkey can also use this crisis to gain standing in the Islamic world at Saudi Arabia’s expense, and to further its goal of establishing a renewed Caliphate under its leadership.
ISRAEL AND EGYPT
Israel and Egypt lose whenever Saudi Arabia is weakened. They both also lose anytime the positions of Iran and/or Turkey are strengthened, and they lose when hopes of an Israeli/Palestinian deal fade.
SAUDI ARABIA TURNS EAST
Just as the western powers are excommunicating Saudi Arabia, ostracizing MBS, and banning arms sales to KSA, along with other goods, MBS was making a trip east with stops in Pakistan, India, and China. He signed some massive economic deals with these Asian giants, and, it is rumored, secured a promise from Pakistan to station thousands of troops in KSA as a deterrent to Iranian ambitions. There are rumors that the deals with Pakistan also include help in developing a KSA nuclear program. As an historical note, there have always been rumors of a secret Saudi site (manned by Pakistani scientists) underground near the remote southern city of as-Sulayyil
MBS’s deals with China included, for the first time, a program for the teaching of the Chinese language in Saudi schools. Think about that for a moment. For the past 150 years English has been the primary foreign language taught in Saudi schools, and the KSA’s foreign policy has always been tied more closely to England and America than any other countries. What if that umbilical cord is cut by those wanting to exploit the Khashoqji affair for cheap political gains, and the result is that the KSA turns to sucking at the Chinese teat, instead of the Western one? Think in terms of seismic shifts in the geostrategic balances of power in the Middle East-Far East region.
Perhaps some of our Politicians really do understand some of these issues, but feel that the greater good is that they have to make some sort of a strong statement about the importance of human rights. However, given their double standards and hypocrisies over similar political murders as discussed in this essay, that line of reasoning holds no water. Before our illustrious senators and congresspersons talk themselves into a frenzy of doing something really stupid that will not only destroy America’s geostrategic interests in the Middle East, but set human rights performances in the KSA back decades, if not centuries . . . I ask them to think . . .
Whatever miniscule advances in human rights Saudi Arabia has made at whatever glacial pace over the past half century or so, has been entirely because of the effects of western influence on it. So, stop and think for a moment what is going to happen to those human rights advances already achieved, much less that impetus for moving forward on more human rights if the KSA is forced to hook up with countries that have zero interests in human rights?
China has been making great inroads into Africa and the Middle East by telling countries “We don’t care what religion you are, we don’t care what your state ideology is, we don’t care what your human rights record is, all we want is to do business with you–no strings attached.”
Thus, it is extremely painful to watch on TV as our senators and congresspersons of both parties insist upon prostrating themselves in abject submission before the dictates of
al-Jazeera, the MB, and terror sponsor Turkey, as they quake in fear over what the Washington Post might say about them if they don’t.
IT NEVER HAD TO HAPPEN
All of this could have been avoided had the Trump administration declared the Muslim Brotherhood to be a terrorist organization the very first day that the Republicans had control of the House, Senate, and the White House.
Had that been done, Khashoqji would have never been allowed inside the United States when he declared asylum status in the summer of 2017. Banning Khashoqji for terrorist MB connections would have forced him to seek residency elsewhere, in a Muslim Brotherhood-friendly country like Turkey or Qatar. His murder would then not have been an American issue, the media and Democrats would have been less likely to pick it up and run with it as a political tool–for fear it could backfire on them for being supporters of terrorism.
American failure to declare the MB to be a terrorist organization has not only damaged the Trump administration on this issue, but has also allowed two MB sympathizers to be admitted to Congress. This issue will lead to many more American tragedies as long as the MB and its affiliates are allowed to operate freely in the United States.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA and is the author of “CONFESSIONS OF AN (EX) NSA SPY: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror.”
ARAB SPRING 2.0: Will it Come to Egypt?
By Barry Webb
Egypt’s neighbor to the South, Sudan, and near neighbor to the West, Algeria, are both experiencing massive demonstrations as I write this in early March of 2019. Watching these popular uprisings unfold on TV reminds me too much of the first Arab Spring we saw in 2010. That Arab Spring resulted in mass chaos across the Middle East, the rise of ISIS, and the flood of “refugees” into Europe to destabilize that continent. If this current Arab Spring 2.0 spreads it could have even greater consequences.
SUDAN
The primary claim of the protestors in Sudan is for Sudan’s president “for Life” Omar
al-Bashir, who has ruled for 30 years, to step down.
There is certainly reason enough for the people of Sudan to want to see him gone. He acts like a total buffoon, swishing a cane, or a sword, around like a neighborhood bully, or some cartoon image from a Sacha Baron Cohen movie. His legacy has been anything but stellar, having committed genocide against his black Muslim citizens in Darfour province, and presiding over the secession of South Sudan.
News reports claim that the protests appear to be led by “the professional class” who are demanding “Democracy.” This sounds good to western ears. The problem I have with this is that in Egypt it is the “professional” class of doctors and lawyers who have historically been the strongest supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood–and its terrorist offshoots. Just ask Dr. Aiman azh-Zhwahiri. I would expect that the same situation exists in Sudan. And, “Democracy” to an Islamist is only a tool to be used as a means to power, after which that tool is discarded in favor of Allah’s law, or Shari’a. Just ask Turkey’s dictator Erdogan.
There are unconfirmed reports that followers of the late hard line Hussein at-Turabi are key figures in these protests. So, if today’s rumors are correct that Bashir has agreed to step down, and “Democracy” is imposed, I for one will not be surprised if the Muslim Brotherhood, or a clone, ends up in power in Khartoum.
ALGERIA
The primary impetus for the demonstrations in Algeria is the attempt of its 85-year old, wheelchair-bound president “for life” to run for a 5th term. He was recently seen on live Arabic TV saying “ana ra’is lilabd” (I am president for all eternity). Arabic TV channels have also reported that even his own cabinet members have joined the marchers demanding that he not run for that 5th term.
On an historical note, during the 1990s, Algeria fought a vicious civil war with Islamic radicals. In 1991 Islamists won the national elections, which the army quickly nullified. The Islamists then took on the military in a civil war that was largely supported by most of the people. However, as time went on, and the Islamists began showing their true colors with extreme brutality, killing journalists, foreigners, and children, the tide eventually turned against them. However, these Sunni Islamists, during their hay day, were very close to the Shi’a Iranians and were receiving instructions on how to conduct and win a revolution. At one point, government control was reduced to the capital of Algiers–and even that was unsafe for western diplomats to venture out of their embassy compounds.
With this background, one has to expect that the Islamist current is still very strong in Algeria, though it has laid low for the past nearly 20 years. Given the opportunity of free, truly “Democratic” elections, do not be surprised to see the Muslim Brotherhood or a clone come to power in Algeria.
EGYPT
Egypt’s government and state media portray a stable, and prosperous Egypt safe for tourists to flock to, and ripe for foreign investment and growth. Indeed, on the surface, it appears that President Abd al-Fatah as-Sisi’s government does have a firm handle on things. They have thrown thousands of Muslim Brotherhood members and their sympathizers in prison. On the economic front the as-Sisi government has invested heavily into infrastructure–including the building of thousands of new cities. And, in the past several years, since as-Sisi has come to power, the country has claimed an annual economic growth rate of a Chinese-esque 5-8 percent.
Yet, under the surface things be a bubbling. When as-Sisi first came to power, he was
rather vocal in calling for a reformation in Islam. The term he used was islah, which is somewhat stronger than our word for “reformation.” Islah means something more like “restructuring,” or “repair.”
After the Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris in January of 2015, as-Sisi went so far as to call for the de-sanctification of the ahadeeth and the sunna, as well as doing away with the books on Islamic jurisprudence, namely the hanbali, hanafi, shafa’i, and malaki schools (all of which were written in the 9th and 10th centuries).
As-Sisi’s call for islah received some notable support among Egypt’s westernized intellectuals as well as among a handful of the editorialists for Egypt’s state-run al-ahram newspaper and a popular TV talk show host named Dr. Islam al-Beheri.
But from the clergy? A deafening silence (except for Dr. al-Beheri, who is a graduate of Egypt’s conservative al-azhar university). From Egypt’s allies such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the United States, etc.? A deafening silence.
Worse, when al-Sisi asked Ahmad at-Tayyib, the top Sheikh at Egypt ‘s al-Azhar (which is the closest thing to a “Vatican” that Sunni Islam has), to condemn ISIS, he received a verbal slap in the face. Since then as-Sisi has been virtually silent on the subject of islah for Islam. He talks about islah for the economic sphere, but no more for the religious sphere. In fact , at a recent speech at Cairo University (a traditional hotbed of fundamentalism), as-Sisi’s only words for those training to become teachers were to teach that Islam is a “religion of peace and toleration” (which is the “Disneyland” Islam I speak about in my book, and flies in the face of what the Qur’an, ahadeeth, sunna, and sira actually teach. And, this, in turn, totally ignores the problem with Islam and takes the whole ideas of an islah in Islam off the table and sweeps it firmly under the rug.
It is clear that as-Sisi has come to realize that if he pushes too hard on the issue, or tries to force it down the throats of the al-azhar Imams and Sheikhs, he will lose in a bloody revolution.
Unfortunately, such a revolution may happen anyway, even without as-Sisi getting tough with al-azhar. Caught in his sweeps of Muslim Brotherhood members have been thousands of secular protestors as well. This heavy-handed approach to security has angered much of the population. The government tries to keep a lid on things by continually pushing the narrative of Egypt ‘s gains while behaving like a police state.
But it gets worse.
Reports out of Egypt claim that al-azhar itself is dominated by secret Muslim Brotherhood members and their (not so secret) sympathizers. In other words, al-azhar, the bastion of “moderate” Islam in the Sunni world essentially adheres to the same “interpretation” of Islam as does al-Qaeda, ISIS, the Taliban, and the Saudi Wahhabis.
In the fall of 2019 an Egyptian expert on extremist groups appeared on al-arabiya, the Saudi-owned, Dubai-based satellite TV channel. He talked about a new group called
al-murabitoun (those who live in the garrisons), which he claimed is spreading throughout the Egyptian army. The Egyptian expert said that there are dozens of
al-murabitoun cells throughout the army–and they are being led by “extremist” officers.
This is perhaps the most frightening bit of news coming out of the Middle East. The population of Egypt is 100 million and growing. The country has the largest, most powerful army in the Middle East bristling with the latest western weaponry. The army is also the one institution that all Egyptians–Muslims, Christians, secularists, atheists, and socialists–all have traditionally looked up to, respected, and considered to be “Egypt itself.” To see extremism spread throughout the officer corps, as well as the rank and file, bodes ill not only for Egypt, but for the entire Middle East (and beyond).
The online alarabiya.net published a similar article claiming that there are currently four terror organizations operating in Egypt today: al-murabitoun, ISIS in the Sinai, hasim, and jund al-khelaafah (soldiers of the Caliphate). Other sources have added a fifth terror group: liwa’ ath-thawrah (Brigades of the Revolution) which is a military wing of the Muslim Brotherhood, as is the hasim group.
Interestingly, the U.S. State Department has recently declared both liwa’ ath-thawrah and hasim to be terrorist organizations. This raises the question as to why they don’t go ahead and declare the mother ship, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) itself, to be a terrorist organization?
Other reporting out of Egypt claims that the MB operates a sort of “parallel” economy and has amassed huge funds. They also receive massive donations from cells and front groups overseas, particularly Britain and the United States.
So, how is as-Sisi’s reformation coming along? Recent polls show that 84-86% of Muslims in Egypt and Jordan support the death penalty for Muslims who leave the religion, and similar percentages support stoning for adultery. Moderate Islam that ain’t.
That is right out of shari’a law. That is Saudi Arabia, Iran, ISIS, and al-Qaeda. And, Egypt and Jordan were supposed to be two of the most modernized, westernized countries of the Arab world.
A Syrian journalist residing in Turkey has reported that there are 2,000 MB media members in Turkey who man 10 TV stations and several radio stations (all of which blast pro MB and anti as-Sisi propaganda into Egypt 24/7). Turkish and Qatari money are supporting these efforts.
TO SUM UP
You’ve got Arab Spring-type revolts taking place in Sudan and Algeria, a full scale civil war next door in Libya, an ISIS insurgency in the Sinai which the Egyptian army has been trying to put out since as-Sisi came to power, you’ve got al-azhar harboring secret support for the MB, the MB secretly amassing massive amounts of money, and you’ve got 10 TV stations and several radio stations based in Turkey blasting MB propaganda into Egypt 24/7. Then add to this that over 80% of the Muslims in Egypt say they want shari’a law. How long do you think the as-Sisi regime can last under this pressure?
Proof that the regime realizes that it is in trouble is the fact that the state run media outlets are constantly praising the “nation state” idea, and how important it is to be proud of Egypt and one’s Egyptian-ness. They feel that this is necessary because the MB and other Islamists are trying to tear down the “nation state” concept and replace it with the “umma,” which stands for all of Islamdom (in other words, a Caliphate).
I love Egypt. I spent a year of my life there in the mid-’70s learning Arabic, and I would like nothing better than to see Egypt lead the Arabs, and the entire Islamic world, into a true islah of the Islamic religion–returning it back to its pre-Medina roots–its Jewish, Christian, and Ebionite roots. In other words, to de-sanctify all the passages in the ahadeeth, the Qur’an, and the books of Islamic jurisprudence that sanctify (based on Qur’an 33:21) Jew-hating, beheading, slavery, rape, sex slavery, wife beating, and militant jihad against all non-believers.
I have a vision of the current as-Sisi government feasting in safety behind the fortified walls of their castle, imagining that the barbarians at their gates have no chance of breaking in. But when I look closers at that castle . . . I see that it sits on top of a sea of Middle Eastern sand. And, when the wind blows, and that sand sifts . . .
When I watch some of the Arabic song and dance variety shows on Lebanese and Egyptian TV, I find it hard to believe that the culture that produces a people who love music and dance so much could be the same culture that produces terrorists, and wants to stone adulterers and kill apostates. But those singing, dancing, and music loving Muslims are in the minority. And, they are not true Muslims, even if they think they are. They are “Disneyland Muslims,” or “fake” Muslims as some call them. They sit in the same castle as does as-Sisi and his regime.
Another way to view this is to imagine that a “Titanic” has already sunk, and what you see on the surface of a bubbling, churning sea are all of the secular, music loving Muslims, reformers, and government figures paddling away in their inflatable lifeboats hoping to reach dry land before . . .
Swarming just below them are legions of giant, great white sharks, each twice the size of a life raft. Just a flick of a tail, a nudge of a nose . . .
And, while the sound track from “Jaws” plays, president as-Sisi uses the technique of carrot and extreme stick, hoping that brute force can keep the sharks at bay.
Should Egypt blow, it will touch off a new chain of jihadi groups taking power all over the Middle East. The reverberations will be felt throughout Europe and America as well where powerful Muslim Brotherhood entities and front groups have already taken up root.
It is in this environment that the MB front group the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) has demanded that the FBI’s “terrorist watchlist” be investigated for possible bias against Muslims. I can hardly wait to see what that will lead to.
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Barry Webb had a 25-year career as an Arabic translator for the NSA and other government entities and is the author of CONFESSIONS OF AN (EX) NSA SPY: Why America and its Allies are Losing the War on Terror. His website is www.barrywebbauthor.com
The Epoch Times
The Thing No One Is Talking About in National Intelligence Strategy
Brad Johnson
February 26, 2019
Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats on Jan. 22 released a public version of the 2019 National Intelligence Strategy (NIS), which is due every four years. There was a lot of reporting that a new NIS had been published and even a little push back on certain elements.
Most noticeably, there was a push to modify the emphasis of the NIS and increase the importance of global humbug—excuse me—global warming as a national security threat. I’ll write about that specifically in the near future.
What’s been missing from the news coverage almost entirely, and is screaming loudly for notice, is any level of critical analysis of what the NIS actually states and what it means for the security of everyday Americans.
Let’s start the dissection by taking a snapshot of a small section of the press release introduction to the NIS and applying some critical thinking.
The press release says: “The 2019 NIS focuses on:
• Integration—harnessing the full talent and tools of the IC [U.S. Intelligence Community] by bringing the right information, to the right people, at the right time.
• Innovation—making the IC more agile by swiftly enabling the right people, and leveraging the right technology, and using them efficiently to advance the highest priorities.
• Partnerships—leveraging strong, unique, and valuable partnerships to support and enable national security outcomes.
• Transparency—earning and upholding the trust and faith of the IC’s customers and the American people.”
The first two items, integration and innovation, are essentially the type of meaningless filler you find in any long government report. The right people, the right information, the right technology, the right time, because we want to do a really, really, really good job. In government, you have to have filler of this nature to increase the length of the report, because a long report is clearly more important than a short report. A short report that gets right to the point can only be produced in the private sector, where they expect results.
Integration and innovation can be immediately be filed under “B” for blah, blah. Nothing there is of any use or real significance, so let’s move on.
Now, however, we come to something deeply significant that’s been glossed over by absolutely everyone: partnerships and transparency. It requires some explanation as to what these points really mean. They seem simple but are actually cloaked in intelligence terms, and my focus is limited here to human intelligence.
Espionage
We begin with the key concept of espionage in its simplest form, which is to say, recruiting a spy from another country. There are lots of variations, but here we’re talking about the basic example of a person from any given foreign country who secretly agrees to provide us with his county’s classified information that we can’t otherwise get. We don’t tell anyone else and take many precautions to keep the spy safe and keep his information flowing. He’s considered a unilateral reporting source or unilateral spy. This is the sweet spot in the espionage business and where you want all your reporting to come from, because it’s the most reliable.
One additional note on unilateral spies: They’re way more important than you might initially think. How do you find out where to point your satellite, or which phone number to tap, or which apartment is being used as a safe house, or who is the courier carrying information back and forth between terrorist leadership? How do you know what those 100 tanks sitting on the border are going to do tomorrow morning? The unilateral spies tend to keep everything moving and tell you where to look, even if they don’t have all the details themselves.
Another variation of a spy is one that we get from an overseas partner with whom we maintain a liaison relationship. The problem with this type of spy recruitment is that you can’t ever control who knows about it, nor can you ever fully trust or verify the person or his information. That’s not a condemnation of spies originating from an overseas partner, which can be of real value, but merely pointing out the clear and obvious limits and weaknesses.
Another weakness is the motive on the part of the overseas partner to give us one of their spies. In a word, it’s money. Can you trust what you get if the motive is money? This use of money as our main tactic is openly acknowledged in the NIS report, where it clearly states we are leveraging our partnerships. Leverage is an economic term: You put money in and gain control of more than what the money alone could buy. Your home mortgage used to buy a house is a classic example.
Here’s where partnerships and transparency are drawn together, and the enormous and dangerous significance to our national security exposed.
Hopefully, you are asking yourself what the advantage is of turning to our overseas partners for spies and why we would we do it when it’s so clearly flawed. It’s a simple answer: It’s legal. You’re not committing espionage or breaking any laws. If you’re not breaking laws, then you can be transparent, and this is why we are pouring our efforts into our overseas partnerships instead of the traditional and more effective espionage.
This policy was implemented by former CIA Director John Brennan, with his “modernization” of the CIA, and as far as I know, we’re the only country in the entire world stupid enough to do this. All of our enemies and most of our friends are conducting espionage against us at this very moment.
The Epoch Times
Stirring the Peace Pot
By Brad Johnson
February 26, 2019
Commentary
The Jerusalem Embassy Act was passed in the United States on Oct. 23, 1995, to some fanfare as well as protests, after which it was quickly placed on the back burner to languish.
The conservative Congress at the time knew all too well how the political system works and slipped in a hidden gem, or poison, depending on your perspective. The law required the move to Jerusalem but allowed the president the use of six-month waivers, based on “national security” grounds.
The waiver was used repeatedly by Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, and so the law was never implemented, remaining on that pesky back burner. Then, along came President Donald Trump, who also initially signed the six-month waiver. But he’s his own man and a pragmatist before he’s a politician.
On Feb. 23, 2018, Trump announced that the U.S. Embassy in Israel would move to Jerusalem. The U.S. Embassy officially relocated to Jerusalem on May 14, 2018, on the 70th anniversary of the Israeli Declaration of Independence. It’s been high drama on the world stage since with riots, people hurt or killed, and condemnation from both the EU and U.N.
Support has been shown by Guatemala also moving its embassy, and Romania, Bulgaria, Paraguay, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic being supportive to one degree or another. Austria, Romania, Hungary, and the Czech Republic accepted Israel’s invitation to attend the U.S. embassy event, even though the EU officially boycotted the ceremony.
Breaking the Status Quo
The fact is, Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, regardless of the location of anyone’s embassy. It’s ultimately an empty gesture to pretend otherwise, and for the United States to do so merely maintains the stalemate that’s existed for decades and only benefits the Palestinian obstructionists. Ever the negotiator, Trump recognized it’s better to fulfill his promise, move the embassy to Jerusalem, and stir up the situation to see if the stalemate can be broken. As a result, it does appear more options are on the table.
John Bolton, the president’s national security adviser, has stated that a one-state solution is a possibility that should be considered. Up until now, conventional wisdom dictated a two-state peace solution.
The celebrations and drama aside, the real importance of the move to Jerusalem is its impact on negotiations with the Palestinian leadership. An actual peace deal would stop the massive flow of money and international support to the Palestinians and reduce them to leadership of a small country, where they would be expected to run the gauntlet of elections and actually provide results to an expectant civilian population.
No one up until now figured out a way past the conundrum of making a peace deal look better than the status quo to the Palestinians.
Trump may have figured out a way forward, and supporting Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and the concept of a one-state solution might be just enough to make something happen. That’s way better than doing nothing.
The Epoch Times
Let Me Count McCabe’s Lies
Christopher C. Hull
February 19, 2019
With apologies to Elizabeth Barrett Browning: How does former FBI official Andrew McCabe lie to thee?
Let me count the ways.
First through third, the Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Inspector General (OIG) reported in February 2018, that McCabe three times “lacked candor” about an October 2016 leak. Moreover, the OIG found that McCabe approved that leak “to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership.”
Thus, said the OIG, McCabe’s leak didn’t fall within a public-interest exception to the rule against such disclosure, which “constituted misconduct.”
Fourth, McCabe approved the leak in response to then-presidential candidate Trump, who had linked McCabe overseeing the Clinton exoneration to Clinton-connected contributions to his wife, Jill, a former Democratic state Senate candidate.
McCabe’s leak was intended to “rebut the notion that partisan bias affected the DOJ’s investigation of a possible pay-for-play scheme run by then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton through her family charity, the Clinton Foundation.” The report that resulted “indicated the DOJ, led by then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch, constrained the FBI’s efforts to move forward with the investigation.”
Now, DOJ talking points said the answer to whether McCabe played any role in his wife’s campaign was, “No. Then-[Assistant Director] McCabe played no role, attended no events and did not participate in fundraising or support of any kind.”
Yet in June 2017, Circa reported that on social media, McCabe could be seen at an event wearing his wife’s campaign T-shirt.
Ultimately, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions fired McCabe for “lacking candor.”
According to 18 U.S. Code Section 1001, whoever “knowingly and willfully makes any materially false statement” in a matter within the jurisdiction of the executive branch can be imprisoned for up to five years, or worse.
Luckily for McCabe, apparently DOJ only prosecutes that crime against Trump supporters nowadays. Instead of serving time in prison, McCabe is on a book tour.
Which brings us to lie No. 5:
In an interview aired on Feb. 17, McCabe claimed, “I was fired because I opened an investigation into the president.” That’s strange, because Sessions fired him in March 2018, yet that investigation only became public in January.
Worse, in that interview, McCabe didn’t say he opened a new investigation. He said he directed his team to document “where are we and what steps do we need to take going forward” on the Russia “witch hunt” to put it on the most solid ground possible.
If he only ordered a review of existing investigations, how was he fired for opening one?
No. 6: When the interviewer asked what connection McCabe had to the Clinton email investigation at the time of Jill McCabe’s bid for office, he claimed, “none.”
According to Business Insider, that’s true, and Newsweek reportedsomething similar.
But internal FBI talking points acknowledge that in the Clinton email investigation, “FBI Headquarters asked the Washington Field Office for personnel to conduct a special investigation. McCabe was serving as [assistant director] and provided personnel resources.”
So, no matter what mainstream media outlets claim, McCabe lied about that, too, either in writing the talking points, approving them, or dictating their content.
Finally, lie No. 7 is when McCabe said he “wasn’t willing to lie to keep” his job.
What should we do about McCabe’s lies?
As I’ve already argued, for newly confirmed Attorney General Robert Barr to merely reestablish lines of authority and make clear what the rules are has little long-term value.
The lesson so far: Democrats and DOJ/FBI bureaucrats can flout that authority and break those rules—and the law—and though they may be demoted, fired, have to resign, or lose an election, they won’t be charged, let alone convicted.
Therefore, first, Barr should begin to restore a semblance of balance to the DOJ and FBI.
In the 2016 election cycle, DOJ employees gave 85 percent of their political contributions to Democrats. In the 2018 election cycle, with Republican political appointees in place, DOJ employees still gave 78 percent of their contributions to Democrats.
They have every legal right to do that.
We have every legal right to point out that DOJ has become a partisan organization, prosecuting Republicans while holding Democrats and its own favored employees harmless.
Second, Barr should also open a grand jury investigation into the Clintons’ $132 million in questionable foreign contributions, including from Russian-linked sources; their aides’ potential destruction of evidence, including“breaking her phones in half or hitting them with a hammer”; and finally, potential DOJ and FBI malfeasance in covering all this up and facilitating spying on the Trump campaign.
Otherwise, McCabe will literally lie for the rest of his life.
After he’s gone, the 33 Democratic historians for every one Republican at elite universities will record whatever version of those lies is of most value to the left.
Begging Browning’s indulgence once more: McCabe shall but lie to thee better after death.
The Epoch Times
Great Disinformation Campaigns From History That Live On and Prosper Today
By Brad Johnson
January 28, 2019
Commentary
Two of the most successful intelligence disinformation campaigns that survive to this day were put forth by British Intelligence and the Russian KGB during, and shortly after, World War II.
During World War II, the British made a spectacular technological advancement in the form of early radar that allowed them to target German bombers flying toward England, particularly at night when they were extraordinarily difficult to intercept. The radar was fabulously successful, and many a new British fighter ace was baptized by fire through shooting down German bombers.
Naturally, they wanted to hide this fact for as long as possible, so we can imagine the long meetings that took place to come up with a plan. One of the golden rules of disinformation is that the best lies are based on truth, a tenet often still used today.
In this case, they chose to lie using real information and settled on the fact that carrots are high in Vitamin A (beta carotene), which is a vitamin useful to eyesight. This was the true fact that was then stretched to substantiate the lie that British pilots had extraordinarily good night vision that allowed them to intercept and shoot down so many German bombers at night.
A substantial propaganda campaign was undertaken to convince the British public of the truth of the false statement in order to have German spies pick up the information and pass it back to the German military. No clear records are known that indicate if the disinformation campaign had any impact on the Germans, but it was so successful with the public that it benignly lives on to this day.
Nazis
The USSR KGB of days gone by had just as great a success, if not greater, albeit less benign. Following World War II, when the atrocities of the Nazi regime came to light, it also surfaced just how similar the governments of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) were to each other. This was both a problem for the USSR, who had just occupied much of Eastern Europe, but also distasteful, since the Nazi and USSR leftist dictatorships had been implacable enemies.
As part of the early Cold War efforts, the CIA jumped into the fray and mounted a large information campaign, pointing out the truth of the similarities. Jews who had survived the holocaust under the Nazi’s or Jews who had survived the purges of the USSR’s Joseph Stalin were integral to the information campaign. Note that this is correctly classified as a clandestine information campaign and not a propaganda campaign, since the information was in fact true.
This effort was destroyed by The New York Times, who made public the CIA backing. The source of the information was almost certainly the USSR, who may have leaked the information to The New York Times or passed it through some other means.
At the same time, the Soviet Union put in place a propaganda countermeasures campaign, painting the Nazi regime as a fascist “conservative” movement and therefore not a socialist movement at all. This not only survives as a widespread false concept today, but also, because of its success as propaganda, it has been built upon using a variation on the central theme.
A quote often attributed to the UK war-time Prime Minister Winston Churchill (though probably not said by him) is: “The fascists of the future will be called anti-fascists.” This has come to fruition, as a number of today’s socialist movements have adopted many of the early Nazi tactics used in their rise to power.
One need look no further than today’s Antifa (Anti-Fascist) organizations for a perfect example.
Just like the “brown shirts” used by Hitler to help him rise to power, they march in the streets, wear a uniform (black hoods), attempt to stifle other opinions, use physical intimidation, and openly espouse the use of violence for political action. These were precisely the type of activities used by the Nazi brown shirts to help Hitler rise to power. These extreme tactics and violence are both tacitly and openly supported by the left in the United States.
This past October, Antifa held large demonstrations in the famously left-wing Portland, Oregon, where they were filmed verbally attacking an elderly man in his vehicle and abusing an older wheelchair-bound woman, among many other similar acts. This, while police stood by watching innocent people being abused and taking no action.
This association or cooperation seems to run even to the highest levels within the Democratic Party, with the son of Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine being widely reported to be affiliated with Antifa following his arrest after a protest involving the group. Sen. Kaine was the Democratic vice-presidential running mate of presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Leftist philosophy brought us Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Chairman Mao, and Sadam Hussain, to name a few, and continues to inflict most of the violence on the world that has killed many millions.
The Epoch Times
Clinton Email Scandal and FBI/DOJ Corruption
By Brad Johnson
January 22, 2019
Commentary
Clinton Email Scandal and FBI/DOJ Corruption
We have seen a growing list of senior officials at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Department of Justice (DOJ) being fired or leaving in disgrace. Now the New York Times informs us that the FBI began an investigation in May of 2017 looking at whether President Donald Trump was a spy for the Russians.
The accusation was naturally completely devoid of any evidence, and so it does seem a safe bet that it was purely political and another stain on the FBI and DOJ. Even in the face of direct and conclusive proof of political corruption, the FBI and DOJ leadership appear to continue unchallenged, since they are lacking any form of checks and balances.
I remind everyone of the classified documents found on former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s laptop that were discovered as part of the dissemination of indecent material to a minor case against him. Each of those classified documents is illegal to have on a private laptop at home, period. Intent is completely irrelevant. Former FBI Director James Comey openly admits the crime took place, but not only was it not investigated as a crime, it was also said to be a crime.
The following quote is taken directly from Comey’s July 5, 2016, statementclearing Hillary Clinton from any wrong-doing with regard to these classified documents:
“From the group of 30,000 e-mails returned to the State Department, 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received. Eight of those chains contained information that was Top Secret at the time they were sent; 36 chains contained Secret information at the time; and eight contained Confidential information, which is the lowest level of classification. Separate from those, about 2,000 additional e-mails were ‘up-classified’ to make them Confidential; the information in those had not been classified at the time the e-mails were sent.”
Two points from this are extremely important. First, according to Comey,there were at least 2,110 individually classified documents on that laptop that were discovered by examining approximately 30,000 emails. Each one of those is individually a crime. No intent or any other qualifications are needed for this to be illegal. It is very black and white: You have classified documents at home, that is illegal. Lots of people have gone to jail for exactly that crime.
Second, something that is never discussed in mainstream media is the process of how a classified document can end up in someone’s personal email. All classified computer systems are fully closed systems. That is to say, there is no possible way to make a mistake where a classified document gets sent to a non-classified system, like to a private email address, by accident.
Let me explain how this particular crime was committed. The classified documents were printed; on each document was a header and footer that gave the classifications and other information. Those were cut off or concealed and then the document was scanned. Once scanned, it could be attached to a private email and sent out to anyone and they were not marked classified that way. This is also highly illegal, of course, but is the only way it can realistically be done under these circumstances.
You will notice Clinton never says whether anything was classified or not; she always states that “nothing was marked classified at the time.” That’s a convenient lawyerly answer if one knows that the headers and footers were all cut off. If you were wondering what it means to “up-classify,” just take a classified document, cut the headers and footers off so it is not marked classified, and then when it is “found” you “up-classify” it by marking it classified again. An additional point worth making is that it’s child’s play to see which printer(s) were used to print the classified documents and who was doing it.
The full case is actually even worse. The FBI agent initially in charge of exploiting the Weiner laptop told the Office of the Inspector General (IG): “I have private Hillary Clinton emails, number one, and BlackBerry messages, number two. I’m telling you that we have potentially 10 times the volume that Director Comey said we had on the record. Why isn’t anybody here? And … I said the thing that also bothers me is that Comey’s testimony is inaccurate.”
The FBI agent clearly implies that he believes more than 20,000 classified documents is a more accurate number and that, in his opinion, Comey was lying to the American public. The FBI eventually moved the laptop to Quantico for further exploitation, and the IG report documents that eventually just under 50,000 documents were examined, many of which were duplicates of the initial 30,000 documents examined.
The dirty little secret that has not been well reported is that, according to the IG report, the laptop contained “approximately 1,355,980 items, or files.” As everyone knows, each file can contain a large number of individual documents or emails. So according to the FBI, more than 1,300,000 documents and perhaps a much higher number of documents were not looked at to see if they contained classified information.
This whole situation stinks to the high heavens of political corruption. The Senate confirmation hearings for William Barr as the next U.S. attorney general tasked Barr to dig into this specific case and to overhaul the DOJ/FBI corruption.
Probably more significantly, a federal judge just ordered discovery on the Benghazi/Clinton email scandal. This is a devastating loss for the DOJ/FBI, since now organizations such as Judicial Watch will be able to submit Freedom of Information Act requests and demand testimony from everyone involved.
If there is more to learn about Benghazi or more classified documents to be found among the million-plus documents ignored by the FBI, the corruption will be out in the light for all to see. This is going to be one of the big stories for 2019 and will define the battle lines between liberals and conservatives.
Thousands of Suspected Terrorists Try to Enter America Each Year
The porous southwest border—where Border Patrol says it catches just 35 to 40 percent of illegal crossers—poses a major security threat
The Epoch Times
BY CHARLOTTE CUTHBERTSON
January 9, 2019
WASHINGTON—Every day, an average of 10 known or suspected terrorists are prevented from entering the United States, according to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). These are individuals flagged on a U.S. terror watch list; most are encountered at airports or even while still overseas as they apply for a visa.
On top of that, 3,000 “special-interest” aliens were apprehended at the southwest border last year, DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said on Jan. 4.
Special-interest aliens (SIAs) are labeled as such for their travel patterns and behavior. They hail from dozens of countries in the Middle East, South Asia, and North Africa, where terrorist groups operate.
“This does not mean that all SIAs are ‘terrorists,’ but rather that the travel and behavior of such individuals indicates a possible nexus to nefarious activity (including terrorism) and, at a minimum, provides indicators that necessitate heightened screening and further investigation,” DHS said in a statement on Jan. 7.
“Often these are individuals who have obtained false documents, or used smugglers to evade security across multiple countries. In addition, some have engaged in criminal activity that could pose a danger to the United States, and some are found to have links to terrorism, after additional investigative work and analysis by CBP personnel.”
And SIAs are using the porous southwest border to get into the United States.
Nielsen said the number of terror-watchlisted individuals who are encountered at the southwest border has increased over the past two years.
In fiscal 2018, Border Patrol agents apprehended a total of nearly 400,000 aliens crossing the southwest border illegally—the vast majority of whom were Central Americans seeking asylum.
But those are only the ones who are caught.
Chris Cabrera, a Border Patrol agent in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley and a spokesman for the National Border Patrol Council, said in congressional testimony in March 2015, that “at best, we apprehend 35 percent to 40 percent of the illegal immigrants attempting to cross. This number is even lower for drug smugglers, who are much more adept at eluding capture.”
At the end of 2017, Cabrera said he believed that percentage hadn’t increased.
If so, that would mean 1.14 million individuals crossed the southwest border illegally in fiscal 2018, with 400,000 being apprehended, while 740,000 others evaded capture.
In April 2017, then-DHS Secretary John Kelly said that the United States still faces the highest terror-threat level in years.
“We face very real threats from so-called special-interest aliens that move at great expense from vast distances outside the hemisphere along the network into the United States,” Kelly said.
“These individuals pay TCOs [transnational criminal organizations] huge sums of money to transport them from, for example, the Middle East or Asia, through South and Central America and into the United States,” he said.
“We don’t get to vet them. We don’t know their intentions. We don’t know they’re here. They slip into our country unnoticed, living among us, and we are completely blind as to what they are capable of.”
Controlled Flow
Todd Bensman, senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, has been following the phenomenon of special-interest aliens for years.
“The capacity for terrorists to reach the U.S. southern border has been hiding in plain sight,” said Bensman, who served for nine years as a counterterrorism intelligence manager for the Texas Department of Public Safety’s Intelligence and Counterterrorism Division.
“But still, the threat and response to it likely remain unevaluated as a whole, perhaps due to its existence outside the main lanes of public consciousness and comprehension,” he said.
Bensman recently returned from Panama and Costa Rica, which are both common travel corridors for special-interest aliens on their way to the U.S. border.
“Panama and Costa Rica have essentially become human smugglers, moving thousands of migrants to the U.S. border,” Bensman said in a video.
He said the governments of Panama and Costa Rica have a policy called “controlled flow.”
The policy means the two governments provide migrants, including special-interest aliens, with accommodation, food, medical treatment, and transport northward to Nicaragua, Honduras, and Mexico—”where organized smugglers can take over again,” Bensman said. The idea is to move the migrants out of their respective countries as quickly as possible.
Controlled flow was put in place around 2016, when large numbers of Haitian migrants were heading to the United States. However, aside from a few Haitian families, Bensman only saw young males in the migrant flow during his trip.
“For anybody to say that they’re not coming or that they don’t exist, I interviewed them, I saw hundreds of them, all coming to the U.S. by land,” Bensman told The Epoch Times. “They’re all going to apply for asylum—it gets them in the door. It’s totally the golden ticket.”
During his trip, he interviewed migrants from Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.
Bensman said a Panamanian military official told him that they collect 700 migrants a week from the Darien jungle in southern Panama after they exit Colombia. The migrants are placed in a camp near the main Panamanian highway and then bused to Costa Rica. The military official said he didn’t know if terrorists were among the migrants.
The United States does have a footprint down there, though. Bensman said the biometrics of the migrants are taken on U.S.-bought equipment in both Panama and Costa Rica.
“I’m told numerous terrorist suspects have been caught as a result,” Bensman said. One example is Ibrahim Qoordheen, a Somali who was detained in Costa Rica in March 2017, after the United States discovered he had possible ties to al-Shabaab.
In 2016, six Pakistanis with suspected ties to al-Qaeda were deported after being discovered in Panama en route to the United States.
On Dec. 19, 2018, Sharafat Ali Khan, 33, was deported to Pakistan after serving a short prison sentence for facilitating an alien-smuggling operation from Brazil, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Khan helped smuggle at least 100 aliens from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh through South and Central America to the United States, according to ICE.
“Khan and his co-conspirators charged each alien between $3,000 and $15,000 to facilitate their travel to the United States. Several of the individuals smuggled by Khan’s organization had suspected ties to terrorist organizations,” ICE said.
It’s difficult to find public information to corroborate Homeland Security’s large numbers of known or suspected terrorists, or special-interest aliens, because terrorism-related cases are usually classified due to the sensitivity of using foreign intelligence networks.
“So what happens is, we catch them at the border or en route, they’re on terror watchlists, they’re dealt with in secret, and the public almost never learns about them,” Bensman said. “There’s a whole other kind of national security infrastructure that’s brought to bear for SIAs, that doesn’t apply to any other kind of migrant.”
Why Haven’t We Seen Another 9/11?
Bensman puts it down to luck and the work beyond the public eye as to why another 9/11-type attack hasn’t occurred.
“We’re catching some of these guys and we’re getting them out back home, and getting rid of them before the American public even becomes aware of it,” he said. “There’s no metric for an explosion that never happens.”
Brad Johnson, a retired CIA operations officer and president of Americans for Intelligence Reform, said the structure of terror networks also changed after 9/11.
The very vertical, highly organized structure of al-Qaeda has given way to a more horizontal, free-for-all type of terror organization such as ISIS.
ISIS has advocated for lone-offender attacks in Western countries. Recent ISIS videos and propaganda have specifically advocated for attacks against soldiers, law enforcement, and intelligence community personnel, according to FBI Director Christopher Wray.
Subsequently, the more common terror attacks in recent years have been individual or small group attacks using a variety of methods.
The Islamic terrorist Sayfullo Saipov killed eight people and injured 11 others when he drove a rented pickup truck into cyclists and runners on a bike path in lower Manhattan, New York City, on Oct. 31, 2017.
Saipov had emigrated legally to the United States from Uzbekistan in 2010, when he was given a green card through the Diversity Visa Lottery Program—a program that President Donald Trump has said he wants to end.
In April 2013, two brothers killed three people and wounded more than 260 others with two homemade pressure cooker bombs placed near the finish line of the Boston Marathon. The surviving brother, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, cited Islamist beliefs as the motivation for carrying out the attack.
“Certainly, Islamic extremism is the bedrock of the terrorism that we face today,” Johnson said. “[It’s] mainly driven by Islamic terrorists, but in cooperation with a lot of other individuals who believe that the United States needs to be damaged or destroyed or at least minimized.”
FBI Open Cases
The FBI had about 1,000 open ISIS-related investigations across 50 states in the United States in 2018, according to Wray.
“We’ve made hundreds of arrests of terrorism subjects,” he said at a Senate hearing on Oct. 10, 2018.
“Those include things like the arrest of a guy plotting to attack San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf on Christmas Day with a combination of vehicles, firearms, and explosives, or the arrest … of a Wisconsin woman maintaining a virtual library of instructions on how to make bombs, biological weapons, and suicide vests to assist self-proclaimed ISIS members. We’ve also disrupted a plot to blow up a shopping mall in Miami or to blow up a number of these celebrations of July 4th in Cleveland.”
International Versus Domestic Terrorism
The FBI classifies terrorism as “international” or “domestic.”
International terrorism is an attack inspired by, or associated with, a foreign terrorist group, such as ISIS. Examples include the Saipov truck attack, the 2015 San Bernardino shooting that killed 14 and wounded 22, and the 2016 Orlando nightclub shooting that killed 49 and injured 53. All perpetrators announced allegiance to ISIS.
Domestic terrorism is perpetrated by individuals or groups that are inspired by or associated with primarily U.S.-based movements that espouse “extremist ideologies of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature,” the FBI states.
Examples include the 2015 racially based Charleston church shooting by Dylann Roof that killed nine, and the 2014 Las Vegas shooting of two police officers and a civilian in an ambush-style attack by a married couple who held anti-government views and wanted to start a revolution.
Mentally deranged individuals whose goal is to kill as many people as possible—such as the mass shootings at the Sandy Hook, Connecticut, school, the Aurora, Colorado, movie theater, and Virginia Tech—aren’t classified as domestic terrorism.
Travel Ban
The Immigration and Nationality Act states that the president may “suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens” whenever he “finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States.”
Early in his presidency, Trump attempted to weed out potential terrorists by adding a higher level of scrutiny to travelers from several terror-prone countries.
While his first executive orders to that effect, commonly known as the “travel ban,” were blocked by federal circuit judges, the final version was eventually allowed by the Supreme Court to go into full effect while lower courts work out appeals.
Each of the eight countries identified has tailor-made restrictions, but citizens from most of them will be unable to emigrate to the United States under the new ban. The countries are: North Korea, Syria, Chad, Libya, Yemen, Iran, Somalia, Venezuela, and Iraq.
There are also terror threats who are already legally residing in the United States, often by lying on visa or green card application forms—which directly ask about ties to organizations that are against the United States.
In January 2018, the Department of Justice and DHS issued a joint report about convicted terrorists and the immigration system.
The report found that approximately three of every four individuals (402 out of 549) convicted of international terrorism-related charges between Sept. 11, 2001, and Dec. 31, 2016, were foreign-born individuals who entered the United States through the immigration system.
A significant number of terrorists have entered the United States solely on the basis of family ties and extended-family chain migration, of which the joint report provided several examples.
Mufid Elfgeeh, who benefited from chain migration, was sentenced in 2016 to more than 22 years in prison for attempting to recruit fighters for ISIS.
Mahmoud Amin Mohamed Elhassan, who entered the United States as a relative of a lawful permanent resident, pleaded guilty in 2016 to attempting to provide material support to ISIS.
Obama Policies
Johnson blames the policies of former President Barack Obama for the creation of ISIS.
“When Obama took power in the United States, he kind of came up with a two-pronged policy. On the one hand, he took his foot off the throttle, if you will, on counter-terrorist operations,” Johnson said.
At the same time, Obama “reached out the hand of friendship to terrorist groups in, in essence—certainly a lot of the Islamic movements and particularly the Muslim Brotherhood,” he said.
“And, of course, into that vacuum is where ISIS was created.”
Johnson said the worldwide “lone wolf” attacks seen around the world are one of the results of those policies, but acknowledging that would be politically damaging to the left.
“So you have a certain number of people certainly in the press and so on that don’t want to damage the reputation of President Obama.” Johnson said. “So there’s a lot of hesitancy to admit that ISIS does a lot of these attacks.”
International Links
Johnson said it’s a mistake to think terror-related attacks on the West aren’t linked.
“There’s an attack in San Bernardino, there’s an attack in Orlando, there’s an attack here and there, and they’re taken as a U.S.-centric thing. There’s an attack in France in Strausberg and it’s taken as a French-centric thing,” he said.
“From the terrorist perspective, that is just simply untrue. The people doing these acts are not tied to a country. They’re tied to a philosophy. So their perspective is: take it to the West, wherever and whenever you can. So of those taking place, almost all, if not all, are taking place as part of a coordinated effort.
“Yet on a world stage, we have all of these attacks taking place weekly or monthly, all over the world using all of the precise same methodology and everyone looks at it … like, oh, that’s nothing to do with us. That’s all separate, unrelated, but if the MO is the same, how can you possibly conclude they’re unrelated? It’s dangerous stupidity in action. And it’s politically driven.”
Concerns mounted in 2015 and 2016, when terrorists started to infiltrate the massive refugee flows mostly out of Syria and into Europe.
In a two-year span from the end of 2015, more than 300 people were killed and thousands more were injured in ISIS-inspired attacks, including those in Paris (mass shootings and suicide bombings), Brussels (two suicide bombings), Nice (truck attack), Berlin Christmas markets (truck attack), Manchester Arena (suicide bomb), London Bridge (van and stabbings), and in Barcelona (van attack).
Will We See More Attacks?
The goal of the seemingly random terror attacks is to claim a political victory by forcing a nation into a state of alert, or a state of fear, Johnson said.
The FBI’s Wray said that, despite significant losses of territory, “ISIS remains relentless and ruthless in its campaign of violence against the West and has aggressively promoted its hateful message, attracting like-minded extremists.”
“Unlike other groups, ISIS has constructed a narrative that touches on all facets of life, from family life to providing career opportunities to creating a sense of community,” Wray said Oct 10, 2018. “The message is not tailored solely to those who overtly express signs of radicalization. It is seen by many who click through the internet every day, receive social-media notifications, and participate in social networks. Ultimately, many of the individuals drawn to ISIS seek a sense of belonging.”
Wray said that although al-Qaeda maintains its desire for large-scale, spectacular attacks, counterterrorism pressure has degraded the group.
“In the near term, al-Qaeda is more likely to focus on supporting small-scale, readily achievable attacks against U.S. and allied interests in the Afghanistan/Pakistan region,” he said.
“Simultaneously, over the last year, propaganda from al-Qaeda leaders seeks to inspire individuals to conduct their own attacks in the U.S. and the West.”
Still, Johnson said, it’s difficult to gauge and quantify just how much of a threat exists with terrorists.
“Are they a real threat today? Absolutely. Are they dangerous? Absolutely. Are they killing people? Absolutely,” he said. And terrorists are “absolutely” coming into the United States—this is something certainly well-established through many venues.”
https://www.theepochtimes.com/thousands-of-suspected-terrorists-try-to-enter-america-each-year_2761769.html
Withdrawal From Syria Is Right, but We Mustn’t Abandon Kurds
By Brad Johnson
January 3, 2019
Commentary
President Donald Trump recently decided to withdraw all U.S. military presence from the Syrian theater of operations. This has been reported by the media to have been both abrupt and widely criticized, neither of which is particularly true. The most important criticism was said to come via the resignation of Secretary of Defense Gen. Jim Mattis.
Many of the critics come from the ranks of the Republicans, although the conservative GOP base that makes up the majority of the support for the president, as well as many that lean libertarian, has a much more positive perspective on the withdrawal. Many voted for Trump because of his libertarian stance on staying out of foreign adventures.
Long before being elected, candidate Trump was vocally and clearly against these sorts of U.S. military forays, certainly including the second Iraq War. No one should be particularly surprised by this decision, and there is nothing tricky taking place. The president has been very straightforward from the beginning, and pulling out of Syria is a clear continuation and implementation of his foreign policy.
Trump is the type of person who is comparatively easy to understand. He comes from the private sector, which, unlike the government sector, expects results. Trump clearly believes that action should be closely linked to the desired outcome. An action is used to obtain a specific goal, and if that action doesn’t get you closer to the goal, then you stop the action. This is exactly what led Trump to make the decision to pull out of Syria.
The U.S. military presence in Syria is a nebulous thing, with U.S. forces controlling a large but insignificant corner of Syria with no Syrian boots on the ground to hold the territory. We ultimately put in millions of dollars to train Syrian troops to fill that role and fight the ISIS terrorist group, and never put a significant number of combat-ready Syrian troops in the field.
Initially, there was even hope that building a U.S.-backed Syrian army would put pressure on Russian-backed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to resign. Not only was there no significant progress on any of these goals, but the U.S. position in Syria also didn’t provide any particular advantage in negotiations, which is really the minimum gain that would make the effort worthwhile.
The Assad regime, with Russian backing, is firmly in control, and nothing we have been doing uniquely moves our interests forward. Trump made the correct decision based on the simple, straightforward facts. However, there are three big problems with the decision to pull out of Syria, and those are the Kurds, the Kurds, and the Kurds. What the United States is doing to the Kurds is a travesty. The Kurds have been loyal allies in both Syria and Iraq and have even held off the annihilation of small Christian villages by terrorists in regions they control. While the president made the correct decision, it’s not the right decision if we abandon the Kurds in Syria to the Turks.
The Turks are very clear that they classify the Kurds as terrorists and intend to kill them all. The solution here goes back to the aftermath of World War I, when Syria and Iraq were more or less randomly created largely by Great Britain and France, according to their own interests and with complete disregard to the local populations. The nations of the world have been pushing back for decades, freeing countries colonized and controlled by the European powers. Now is the time to push back once again and recognize a free and independent Kurdistan. We would anger certain countries such as Turkey, in particular, but they are no longer the friends and allies they once were.
On the other hand, we would gain a long-term and loyal ally with an independent Kurdistan—and in a region where future problems are almost certainly guaranteed. For Trump, while the following quote has been attributed to many different people, I have selected Gen. George S. Patton: “Audacity, audacity, always audacity.”
The Epoch Times
Mattis: His Big Mistake
By Brad Johnson
January 3, 2019
Commentary
After President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw all U.S. military presence from the Syrian theater of operations, Secretary of Defense Gen. Jim Mattis decided to resign his post. In a one-page letter of resignation, Mattis made his reasons quite clear. He stated: “We must do everything possible to advance an international order that is most conducive to our security, prosperity, and values, and we are strengthened in this effort by the solidarity of our alliances. Because you have the right to a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other subjects, I believe it is right for me to step down from my position.”
While the media likes to report that Mattis was the adult in the room at the Oval Office, that was inaccurate from the beginning. Mattis does indeed have decades of experience in the military as a retired Marine four-star general. But there is a universal truth that isn’t often mentioned publicly: All generals who get their third or fourth star are political. They learn to be adept politically or they don’t achieve the rank.
Relationship With Trump
One of the talents that is a must-have along the way is how to manage upwards effectively. This was one of Gen. Mattis’s talents when interacting with the president, not the anti-Trump fantasy world of the mainstream media that consistently implied Mattis would magically manipulate Trump during their interactions, stopping him from spilling evil onto the world. The fact is, Mattis did what any military professional would: He gave the best information he had, he expressed his opinion and recommendations, and waited for the decision from the president, which he accepted as the lawful orders of a superior. This is a method that is very easy for Trump to process, and the two got along well. Mattis, being personally quite liberal, did create a number of areas of contention within the administration, particularly with regard to personnel. He had a number of pitched battles over bringing in liberal friends to positions of importance in the administration. As with all such political battles, you win some and you lose some, and so it went for Mattis.
All that aside, Mattis resigned over the issue of Trump’s decision to pull out of Syria. From his letter of resignation, it’s clear that the reason was linked to the relationships we had built in the region, particularly with the Kurds.
Mistake
Mattis is correct that, without help, the Kurds are going to be ruthlessly tracked down by the Turks and killed. He believes that the moral dilemma created by abandoning the Kurds to destruction at the hands of the Turks is something he wasn’t willing to accept, which is understandable. However, this is a classic blunder on Mattis’s part. He’s linking the Syrian pullout and support to the Kurds as a single issue, when, in fact, they are two separate issues. The president is making the correct decision to pull out of Syria. The original objectives of creating a significant Syrian fighting force to combat terrorists and pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to leave, as well as limiting Russian influence, have all failed utterly and completely. Some good was done against ISIS, but outside of that, nothing permanent or even of long-term value was accomplished. The Syrian countryside controlled gives us no advantage in negotiations, and the Assad regime, with Russian backing, has further consolidated its influence and control. Staying permanently in Syria for such slim gains makes no sense.
With his resignation, Mattis has abandoned the Kurds for a second time by leaving, when he could stay and argue to support them. Trump made a good decision to pull out. Let’s hope he makes another good decision and supports the Kurds, although he’ll have to do it without Mattis acting like the adult in the room.
The Epoch Times
Khashoggi Is Being Used by Muslim Brotherhood, Turkey to Play the Media
By Brad Johnson
December 27, 2018
The media reporting on the murder of Muslim Brotherhood activist Jamal Khashoggi greatly exceeded its value as a news story long ago, and is now being driven strictly by politics.
The Muslim Brotherhood government in Turkey, under the iron-fisted leadership of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has masterfully played the situation to its advantage to create a rift between the United States and Turkey’s regional rival, Saudi Arabia.
The Turks have long had very robust intelligence capabilities and, clearly, the Saudi consulate in Istanbul was fully penetrated with listening devices, at the very least. The slow drip of information supplied to the mainstream media is being played very well by the Turks, and mainstream media sources are willing accomplices without regard to consequences, because the situation can be used to criticize President Donald Trump.
This drip of information will continue as the professional and experienced Turks select appropriate moments in the news cycle, and continue to play the U.S. media like a fine violin.
CIA Connection Unlikely
CIA Director Gina Haspel was recently asked to brief congressional overseers about what the CIA knows about the Kashoggi murder. I don’t have, or for that matter, need, any insider information to know exactly what she told them.
There are many reasons why the CIA wouldn’t have a direct reporting source inside such a small “hit squad,” such as the one that killed Khashoggi. It would always have been difficult to have a spy reporting back to the United States within such a small unit, but it would be impossible in this day and age.
As former CIA Director John Brennan publicly and proudly proclaimed during an NPR interview, today’s CIA disdains even the thought of having a reporting source who is involved with anything illegal. With the modernization of the CIA implemented under Brennan, this decidedly odd philosophy for an intelligence agency was cemented in place and has been left unchanged by subsequent CIA directors. As a result, congressional oversight was given probabilities by the current CIA director.
The probability is that the killing of Khashoggi was ordered, or at the least tolerated, by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, or Prince MBS as he has come to be known. Prince MBS does appear to have consolidated his power, and therefore, it’s likely he was aware of the plan to murder Khashoggi; he may very well have given the order. That said, we don’t know it for a fact and we will almost certainly never know for sure.
There is a chance, albeit a small one, that he didn’t know. That will play out, as cases of this nature almost always do. One, or perhaps a few, of the people involved will be arrested and punished to some degree or another. There has already been an arrest of one of the men allegedly involved.
Lack of Comparison
What isn’t being discussed by anyone, however, underscores the stunning hypocrisy of the mainstream media’s reporting—and profoundly underscores the purely political nature of using the news to criticize Trump.
Compare the large number of murders that have taken place in the United Kingdom by the Russians over the past few years. According to BuzzFeed News, 14 Russians have been murdered, most likely by Russian intelligence, which BuzzFeed has documented in its reporting. Personally, I would put the number at well over 20 in the UK alone.
Unlike Crown Prince MBS, Russian President Vladimir Putin has had decades to consolidate his power and has done so very effectively. He comes out of the KGB, and there is absolutely no reason to believe that anything happens within Russian intelligence that Putin doesn’t directly control. These are very precise one-for-one comparisons, and yet, the press doesn’t care a whit about the Russians who were murdered.
So, we have a Saudi killed in Turkey, probably by a Saudi intelligence hit squad, compared with a long list of Russian citizens killed in the UK, probably by Russian intelligence hit squads. Putin has far greater control over Russia than does the crown prince over Saudi Arabia, which makes Putin’s personal involvement even more certain.
However, the mainstream media runs a constant drumbeat of news about the Saudi murder, but, for the most part, ignores a killing spree by the Russians.
The Epoch Times
Meng’s Arrest Shows Trump Is Serious About Crackdown on China’s Trade Practices
By Brad Johnson
December 10, 2018
The essence of the legal problem faced by the chief financial officer for Huawei, Meng Wanzhou—who was arrested in Canada earlier this month—is the allegation that, at her direction, the Chinese telecommunications company Huawei was actively transferring technology to Iran, in violation of U.S. sanctions.
While this has received quite a bit of attention from the media, the important aspects of this case are being completely ignored. We have long known that technology was making its way to pariah countries such as Iran, and certainly, China and Russia are at the forefront of such activities.
From a U.S. legal perspective, going after Huawei is going after low-hanging fruit, an easy legal target. The evidence is going to be voluminous and conclusive, if it ever goes to trial. That, of course, is one of the key questions. In Canada, where the arrest was made at the United States’ request, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has defended Canadian actions by stating the arrest isn’t politically motivated. I believe this is absolutely correct from Canada’s perspective.
As the case moves toward extradition, however, the real question is whether it will remain non-political. Can the weak and malleable Trudeau remain non-political and let justice run its course? Will he allow Meng (also known as Sabrina Meng) to be extradited to the United States to stand trial, or will Canada bow to Chinese pressure?
Trudeau, who has a track record of susceptibility to political pressure, may find it difficult to stand up to the Chinese. Time will tell, but this will be a close-run thing at best; if released, Meng will immediately flee to China.
From the U.S. perspective, the selection of Meng and Huawei for prosecution is very political and gives us profound insights into the high-level negotiations between China and the United States. The Trump administration has stated clearly that any deal with China has to be “real” or there will be no deal at all. Publicly, China has attempted to push back, as we have seen in their reaction to President Donald Trump’s threats to install tariffs on Chinese goods if they don’t remove unfair trade practices against U.S. goods.
The theft of U.S. technology has been one of the stumbling blocks in negotiations, as well, which remains underreported. It’s clear the Chinese didn’t take the president’s warnings on this issue seriously, even though it has to have been one of the important topics stressed in the talks. The arrest of Meng is a bold response on the part of the United States and Trump, and a kick in the teeth of the Chinese intended to show the seriousness of the U.S. position.
The question is whether the Chinese receive this message and deal honestly, or we can expect a wave of The completely ignored but by far most important new development out of this case is that the president has the courage to prosecute these sorts of crimes which are so political in nature. The importance of this can’t be overstated.
For many decades and through many U.S. administrations, we have watched technology make its way to countries that are enemies of Western civilization and the United States, and almost nothing has been done to stop it. Trump has now made it categorically clear that there is a new sheriff in town, and one who isn’t afraid to enforce the law and face sharp political opposition.
There are many companies from many countries involved in this sort of illegal activity; they’re involved because they can make serious money through these activities. Huawei is just one of many and isn’t particularly significant from a legal perspective of the United States as a result. They are large and very active, so it is easier to build a case against them, which is what makes them low-hanging fruit. It could have been any one of a large number of other companies.
The Chinese perspective is diametrically opposed; Meng represents something hugely important for them. Her father was the founder of Huawei and that isn’t possible without being completely tied to Chinese leadership. Meng is a second-generation golden child and represents one of the action arms of the Chinese government’s foreign policy. She represents something fundamentally important to China and they will fight hard to get her home safely to China. Similar arrests to further emphasize the point and continued pushback from the Chinese.
Almost comically, China is arguing that Meng’s human rights are being violated just as the BBC is running a special expose on the well-documented Chinese “gulag” where innocent Chinese dissidents and others are imprisoned with no regard whatsoever for their human rights.
The Epoch Times
How Terrorists Communicate Through Social Media
By Brad Johnson
November 8, 2018
Tradecraft is defined as the methods used in clandestine operations such as espionage. Establishing a secure form of communications is tradecraft 101.
A common tradecraft communications tactic used by terrorists was to video, from the back seat of a car, someone driving around listening to loud music, perhaps in Syria or elsewhere. The perspective shows only the side of the driver and the front seat with a newspaper lying on the seat next to the driver, with nothing to identify the location.
You cannot see the driver’s face, so only the newspaper provides a date and location, which identifies the particular message. After several minutes of driving around, the driver picks up the newspaper to reveal a handwritten note. After leaving sufficient time to read the note, it is covered by the newspaper again, and shortly thereafter the video is posted to YouTube. It’s a boring upload to YouTube that no one will watch all the way through other than the person for whom the note is intended.
Under these circumstances, current algorithms are not capable of reading the handwritten notes, and an actual human would have to review each and every posting to detect such communications, which is simply not practical. The person receiving the message merely surfs YouTube and, even if later investigated by the FBI, no records of these sorts of communications are detectable.
To YouTube’s credit, they have been able to eliminate most of these videos, but as soon as one form of communication is detected, terrorists change tactics and another method pops up.
Lone Wolf
In 2017, Björn Stritzel a reporter for Bild, a German-language news magazine, pretended to be an Islamist willing to carry out an attack. Over several months, the reporter was given videos and received detailed instructions and motivational speeches on how to conduct a “lone wolf” attack by his two English-speaking ISIS handlers.
To cover his communications with ISIS he was advised not to communicate via Telegram—an encrypted instant messaging service—because ISIS uses it for spreading propaganda; better to use the similar messaging service Wickr for planning the attack. They also instructed that just before the attack he was to set the self-destruction timer for the messages to one minute. That way they could remain in contact until right up until the moment of the attack, and then all sent messages would be deleted on both devices and proof of their contact destroyed.
By its nature, social media lends itself to be used as part of terrorist communications tradecraft. Social media is everywhere, and two people located on opposite sides of the planet can routinely talk to each other and exchange information in complete privacy. Terrorists worldwide take full advantage of this fact to employ solid tradecraft in their communications.
ISIS, Al-Qaeda, and Hezbollah have routinely used YouTube and other social media in such a way that their communications are extraordinarily difficult to detect. They use social media to securely spot, assess, develop, and recruit susceptible individuals worldwide to conduct attacks.
The official policy of the U.S. government remains that “lone wolf” attacks are just that, acts of unstable individuals with no ties to terrorist groups or anyone else. This is in spite of a long laundry list of nearly identical attacks taking place all over the world, and in spite of clear evidence that these attacks are driven by ISIS and other terrorist groups. How is it possible that our official policies in this regard remain the same?
The Epoch Times
We May Be in for a Bumpy Ride
BY BRAD JOHNSON
November 15, 2018 Updated: November 15, 2018
Very soon, under mounting political pressure from all sides, special counsel Robert Mueller is going to complete his investigation of alleged collusion between Russia and President Donald Trump. Mueller and his team are reportedly working on the final report now.
There is a large surprise lurking just under the surface that will come out on the heels of the final investigation report—nothing to do with Russia or the president, but everything to do with the investigation itself.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant request that was used to initiate spying on the Trump campaign, and subsequently to justify the special counsel investigation, is going to be fully declassified. At that point, the real importance of the investigation will begin.
Having read the redacted version of the FISA warrant request, it’s clear that the only significant evidence used was from the so-called Steele dossier, which was an opposition research political document that was paid for by the Clinton campaign via Fusion GPS and not based on facts.
FISA Approval
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, or FISA, is a U.S. federal law that establishes procedures for the physical and electronic surveillance and collection of “foreign intelligence information” between “foreign powers” and “agents of foreign powers” suspected of espionage or terrorism. The act also established the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to approve any requests for surveillance warrants by federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies.
FISA was introduced on May 18, 1977, by Sen. Ted Kennedy and was signed into law by President Jimmy Carter on Oct. 25, 1978. A FISA warrant request by the U.S. attorney general and director of national intelligence must be certified in writing, under oath, and supported by appropriate affidavits.
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein was the reviewer and one of the individuals who certified, with his signature and under oath, the FISA warrant that allowed the controversial wiretaps of the Trump campaign.
The FISA request for wiretaps Rosenstein signed used the anti-Trump political opposition research from the Steele dossier to link Trump and his campaign to the Russians.
As has been often reported, one of the claims presented in the dossier was that then-candidate Trump had traveled to Russia and hired prostitutes to urinate on a bed that the Obamas had once used. According to the Steele dossier, Russian intelligence filmed the incident and used the recording to blackmail Trump into doing Vladimir Putin’s bidding.
From the perspective of one of the rare individuals who is actually experienced in intelligence recruitment operations, the whole idea is both stupid and funny in equal portions. If the whole story is ever uncovered and the identity of the person who came up with the bed-wetting idea is discovered, they will surely go to their grave the object of derision.
Regardless, even to this day, nothing of significance in the Steele dossier has been verified, and Rosenstein was reportedly fully aware the FBI didn’t vet the information, as required by law. If true, it means Rosenstein lied under oath when he certified the information in the FISA warrant was true and may have broken other related laws and regulations.
Up until now, Rosenstein has been the person who decides whether to pursue criminal charges against the author of the dossier, former British spy Christopher Steele. Rosenstein was sent a criminal referral against Steele on Jan. 4 by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). To this date, Rosenstein has not taken action.
The problem is, of course, that the Steele dossier was used to get the wiretaps that Rosenstein subsequently got approved. Steele, who also was an FBI source over a period of years, very possibly could provide testimony that would be very problematic for Rosenstein himself and other senior officials.
With the new acting U.S. Attorney General Matthew G. Whitaker taking the reins at the Department of Justice, he will be the person who decides whether to act on the criminal referral against Steele. We may be in for a bumpy ride.
The Epoch Times
Migrant Caravans Part of Larger Plan to Damage US
BY BRAD JOHNSON
November 1, 2018 Updated: November 1, 2018
Commentary
The caravan of migrants that originated from Honduras is still en route to the U.S.’s southern border, with a second column now underway, and information that there’s a third one in its early stages.
Recently, Vice President Mike Pence said that Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez told him the caravan “was organized by leftist groups in Honduras financed by Venezuela and sent north to challenge our sovereignty and challenge our border.”
In the days following that revelation, additional supporting details and evidence were reported by the left-leaning Wall Street Journal, the conservative Heritage Foundation, and others that confirm Venezuela’s involvement. Venezuela has a long and well-documented history of antagonism towards the United States, and has declared itself a member of an “axis of unity,” working with Iran, Cuba, and others, against “U.S. imperialism.”
In fact, Iranian intelligence and military officers are embedded in Venezuela’s equivalent organizations, and not just in low-level support positions, but also in higher-level positions of authority. The same and more can be said about the highly professional intelligence agency of Cuba, which has long been a thorn in the side of the United States.
Death by a Thousand Cuts
Venezuela, in conjunction with its friends and supporters, has implemented a strategy of asymmetrical warfare in an attempt to attack the United States, since they lack the military capability to inflict a direct defeat.
Asymmetrical warfare is the new modern term, with a mildly convoluted definition, for an ancient concept made well-known by the Chinese. It’s remembered from history as “death by a thousand cuts;” that is, inflict damage whenever and however you can to weaken your enemy, to the point where they can ultimately be defeated.
These columns of illegal migrants are purposely designed and implemented to inflict damage to the United States and undermine U.S. sovereignty, while avoiding direct conflict. They were likely conceived and financed by Iran, then implemented by Venezuela working closely with the Cubans and Nicaraguans to sow political division and chaos in the United States and absorb resources at little expense to them.
To make this work, there is close cooperation and coordination with transnational criminal organizations, such as narco-traffickers and gangs, which are active particularly throughout Mexico and who are very strong near Mexico’s shared border with the United States.
An Alliance
Less well-known and understood is the Bolivarian Alliance, better known by its acronym from Spanish as Alianza Bolivariana or ALBA.
ALBA was founded by Venezuela and Cuba in 2004 and is an association of leftist governments in Latin America and the Caribbean who also cooperate on economic and propaganda efforts with like-minded governments in the region. They are supported by Iran, China, and Russia, who all share the United States as their common foe. ALBA operates extensively and almost entirely unopposed, and its underlying strategy remains constant, which is to damage and ultimately destroy the United States using asymmetrical warfare.
As a retired CIA career intelligence operations officer, I can assure everyone that the intelligence services of Iran, Russia, China, Cuba, and Venezuela, as well as the trained intelligence personnel from all terrorist groups and any others who have access, consider this migrant column an irresistible opportunity to infiltrate people into the United States. I certainly would, if in their position.
The Guatemalan president reported that about 100 people arrested out of the column marching towards the United States have links to terrorism, including ISIS. Former CIA Director and current Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has warned publicly just how dangerous Venezuela is and that the threat needs to be taken seriously.
As a professional in the intelligence world, I understand that the United States has enemies. I understand that cooperation exists between terrorist groups, transnational criminal groups, and hostile foreign governments. It is the way of things.
However, we find ourselves in the predicament where the liberal Democratic Party leadership and the liberal mainstream media seemingly operate in agreement with the activities of these forces, who intend to damage and ultimately destroy us.
Brad Johnson is a retired CIA operations officer and a former Chief of Station. He is president of Americans for Intelligence Reform.
Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
The Daily Caller
OPINION: Trump Administration Calls Out Eurocracy Over Free Speech
5:34 PM 09/11/2018 | Opinion by Christopher C Hull PhD
This morning, the Trump administration officially objected to the latest attempt by a Europe-based multilateral organization to shut down free speech, joining a chorus of complaints by activists and even European members of parliament.
The United States Mission to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (USOSCE) expressed concern in its opening statement about the largest European gathering of human rights organizations of the year, which takes place in Warsaw, Poland.
Referring to a new Code of Conduct required by OSCE Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) to register for the meeting, the Trump administration statement said in part:
[T]he United States must object to certain provisions of the Code of Conduct promulgated by ODIHR.
A number of the provisions amount to content-based restrictions on the participation of civil society.
We need not — and do not — agree with all of the ideas espoused here to defend the right of civil society to participate.
When we disagree with the ideas presented, we should respond with alternative viewpoints, not censorship.
We are disappointed that the Code of Conduct appears to formalize the latter approach.
It should be revised.
The Code of Conduct is, in part, a reaction to a free speech delegation that has attended the annual meeting for a decade, according to senior U.S. officials and meeting participants.
The Daily Caller
Who Is The New York Times’ Anonymous?
5:26 PM 09/07/2018 | Opinion
Christopher C. Hull | Contributor
Personnel is policy. President Trump has just learned this lesson yet again — the hard way.
In a New York Times op-ed, an anonymous senior Trump administration figure has outed him or herself as a Trump opponent.
For those of us watching the White House’s hiring process, this is painfully unsurprising. The administration has been systematically stacked with anti-Trump, globalist, establishment, Left-leaning swamp creatures.
Which of them could it be? Here are my top candidates — and, more importantly, candidates who should be replaced to fix the problem going forward.
Brian Hook
On August 16, Secretary of State Pompeo named outspoken Trump critic Brian Hook special envoy to coordinate the United States’ economic pressure campaign against Iran.
Brian Hook, who served as a senior policy advisor, was an open Trump critic since before the 2016 election.
Before the election, Hook told Politico (which then described him as “one of a small, die-hard set of the Republicans who have been wandering outside this season, getting wet, locked out of their own house”): “Even if you say you support him as the nominee, you go down the list of [Trump’s] positions and you see you disagree on every one.”
Hook also co-founded the John Hay Initiative, a group that organized a letter of over 100 Republican foreign policy experts who would refuse to back Trump (though Hook did not sign the letter himself).
A conservative author wrote of him, “Trump should know what he’s getting himself into: if he hires Brian Hook, he will be opening his arms to a member of the very establishment he campaigned against.”
And Hook has been called “one of the worst George W. Bush administration officials who worked on U.N. issues”.
Unsurprisingly, during his tenure in Trump’s State Department, Hook has been accused of lifting the limit of refugees allowed into the U.S. in direct opposition to President Trump’s wishes.
Moreover, according to one senior Trump administration official, Hook just completed an Iran Deal tour of Europe, stressing that though Trump has canceled the Iran Deal, all of its instrumentalities should be left in place until a new one is signed.
Then, on August 10, a public report claimed that Hook is in line to be Special Envoy For Iranian Affairs.
It seemed impossible, given that Hook opposes the president’s Iran policy and has worked against it internally for more than a year, according to multiple sources inside the administration.
But then in mid-August, Secretary Pompeo confirmed it.
Not only is this a disaster for serious foreign policy hawks who have battled internally and externally to toughen the U.S. line on the world’s largest state sponsor of terror. It is a disaster for President Trump, as Secretary Pompeo has just elevated someone opposed to the president’s Iran policies – all policies, according to Hook himself – to implement them.
The likely result is a rapid return to reports of internal dissent on Iran from the time of globalist Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Obama general H.R. McMaster as National Security Advisor.
Andrea Hall
In early August, two independent sources confirmed that under consideration to replace Hook was Andrea Hall, a career CIA bureaucrat and Obama holdover under McMaster, who had been a direct report to fierce Trump critic and outed Iran Deal liar then-Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes.
Ironically, a paper from Hall’s doctoral work suggests that she has a soft spot for Russian dictator Vladimir Putin: She was pro-Putin back when Putin was cool.
“Russia has received few tangible benefits from its cooperation with the United States,” Hall claimed in the paper, saying that Washington was “ignoring Russian concerns.”
“Given that Putin has received significant criticism for his foreign policy concessions and that he has valid concerns about the Russian economy, Washington would be wise to help Russia achieve some of its goals, as well, in order to cement this partnership,” according to Hall.
The Nuclear Threat Institute, a think tank co-founded by CNN godfather Ted Turner, co-sponsored the paper.
A senior Congressional official confirms, “She was a real problem” at Trump’s NSC.
Now, the latest rumor is that Hall is unlikely to get the position. Of course, she continues to advise Secretary of State Pompeo, in spite of her toxic past and anti-Trump positions.
Carrie Cabelka
Carrie Cabelka is likely not herself the New York Times’ anonymous op-ed writer, but she shouldn’t be excluded completely. It is no surprise that anti-Trump bureaucrats like Hook and Hall continue to thrive, given that Cabelka continues to serve as State Department White House Liaison. A four-month-old piece about her recounts:
[Trump transition team official and Breitbart News contributor Robert] Wasinger considers another State Department official, however, an even bigger obstacle to implementing the Trump agenda and placing genuine Trump loyalists in the administration.
‘I think the biggest problem that we have right now is the White House liaison there, Carrie Cabelka, who has an active screen up against all these Trump loyalists – campaign officials,’ he said.
Wasinger accuses Cabelka of preventing Trump campaign supporters who secured Schedule C appointments from getting the pay they had on a temporary basis. ‘She reduced virtually all of their salaries while giving herself a huge campaign bump,’ he explained.
‘That’s offensive enough, but what’s more offensive to me and to a lot of people is the active screen she has up against Trump campaign folks, Trump loyalists, people that really want to affect the president’s agenda.’
In their place, according to Wasinger, Cabelka has championed candidates like acting Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Susan Thornton whom Wasinger described as a “leftist career foreign service officer.”
(Thornton, who in March of 2017, replaced another Obama holdover whom the Trump Administration had put in the job, Daniel R. Russel, is still serving today, though an Administration source says Thornton is retiring.)
Wasinger expanded on that, saying, “Carrie Cabelka’s the tip of the spear in keeping out our people and getting in establishment career types. You know, quite frankly, we campaigned against them. I think the president should set up a basic test … I think people that work for him should have at least voted for him. … I just can’t imagine that these people did.”
The last line of the piece is, “These people are not only … not loyal, they’re working against [President Trump] on a daily basis, and it’s gotta be fixed.”
Johnny DeStefano
But it won’t get fixed and, in fact, more anonymous opponents will continue to be installed to work against Trump behind the scenes, as long as President Trump retains Johnny DeStefano.
DeStefano is a former aide to ousted House Speaker John Boehner, initially named personnel director by establishment kingpin Reince Priebus, who got a promotion and reportedly still retains authority over the Presidential Personnel Office (PPO).
By all reports, DeStefano is a terrific guy whom Trump likes personally but has nevertheless arguably overseen a vast effort to place Bush administration veterans and establishment moderates throughout the Federal Government.
In fact, one former Trump White House official named DeStefano as the single most significant problem the president faces in enacting his agenda. That’s on a list that includes Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi.
Why?
Because, as the president is learning yet again, personnel is policy.
Christopher C. Hull, Ph.D., the Executive Vice President of the Center for Security Policy, served four tours on Capitol Hill, including most recently as the Chief of Staff for U.S. Rep. Steve King, (R-Iowa). He is the author of Grassroots Rules.
________________________________________
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of The Daily Caller.
The American Spectator
Terrorism and the Press
At the Washington Post, None Dare Call It a Conspiracy by Christopher C Hull, PhD.
June 4, 2018, 12:05 am
Islamic jihadists haven’t been out to get us from the inside? A list.
As the late, great novelist Joseph Heller wrote in his hilarious, terrifying novel of World War II’s insanity Catch-22, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.”
Or, as Andrew C. McCarthy III, former Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who led the 1995 terrorism prosecution against the “Blind Sheik” Omar Abdel Rahman 11 other defendants convicted of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, once put it, “you can’t have a conspiracy without a conspiracy theory.”
Both come to mind given the Washington Post’s Abigail Hauslohner charge, in her unprofessional smear piece against my former colleague Fred Fleitz, that the Center for Security Policy, where I serve as Executive Vice President, “propagates the conspiracy theory that Islamists have infiltrated the U.S. government.”
Conspiracy theory?
Would Ms. Hauslohner like to explain Abdurahman Alamoudi, founder of Pentagon’s Muslim chaplain program and State Department civilian ambassador, convicted of operating on behalf of foreign intelligence agencies and later identified by Treasury Department as a top Al-Qaeda fundraiser, who is still in prison for his terrorist activities — while to my knowledge not a single one of his chaplains has been removed from our military?
How about Al-Qaeda security chief Ali Mohamed, who infiltrated the Army Special Forces and double-crossed the FBI?
Or Anwar al-Awlaki, who was feted at a luncheon inside the still-smoldering Pentagon following the 9/11 attacks hosted by the Army’s Office of Government Counsel, and led prayers for congressional staffers inside the U.S. Capitol, before being outed as an Al-Qaeda cleric who ultimately was made subject to a kill-or capture order signed by President Obama in 2010 and was killed by a U.S. airstrike on September 30, 2011?
Or Hesham Islam, one-time senior advisor for international affairs for Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England and the Pentagon’s point-man for Muslim outreach, who invited representatives from terror-tied Islamic groups into the Pentagon, as well as a Lebanese ambassador who was a known proxy of the Syrian government in violation of U.S. policy — until an investigation determined that he had “embellished, if not fabricated, major elements of his official biography” and he resigned?
Or Omar Alomari, whom the Obama Administration named to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Countering Violent Extremism Working Group, who it turned out was spreading “Islamist propaganda,” and was ultimately fired after lying to investigators about a previous job firing and failing to disclose his former position with the Jordanian government?
Or U.S.-based Hamas operative Kifah Mustapha, who got a guided tour of a top-secret National Counterterrorism Center and partnered with the FBI-Chicago Field Office?
Or U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan, a military psychiatrist, who shot and killed 14 people at Fort Hood’s Soldier Readiness Processing Center in Texas in 2009, and was sentenced to death in August of 2013?
Or Louay Safi, who lectured deploying troops at Fort Hood weeks after the deadly attack there, authorized “preemptive strikes” against troops attacking Muslims, and was ultimately named an unindicted co-conspirator in a Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror support trial?
Or Imad Hamad, an attendee of the January 2010 summit then-Department of Homeland Secretary (DHS) Janet Napolitano held with American Muslim leaders, who is linked to the Marxist-Leninist terrorist group Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, has supported the Islamist terrorist group Hezbollah, and in a television interview in 2002 on Fox’s Detroit affiliate, supported a Palestine Authority TV program that urged children to become suicide bombers, calling the program “patriotic”?
Or Salam Al-Marayati, another Napolitano summit attendee, who according to press reports has long been criticized for extremist views and statements, whose nomination to the National Commission on Terrorism in 1999 former House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo. withdrew because of Al-Mayarati’s extremist politics, and who once said, “When Patrick Henry said, ‘Give me liberty or give me death,’ that statement epitomized jihad?”
Or Hammam Khalil Abu Mallal al-Balawi, the Jordanian doctor and double agent for al Qaeda financed by the Pakistanis, who infiltrated Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost province wearing a suicide vest and exploded it, killing four CIA agents including the CIA base chief, a mother of three, and three CIA contractors, the biggest loss of life suffered by the U.S. intelligence agency since an attack in Beirut in 1983?
Or the Spring 2010 Countering Violent Extremism Working Group that followed, which according to a whistleblower within DHS, included six individuals linked to Egypt-based Jamāʻat al-Ikhwān al-Muslimīn, commonly known as the Muslim Brotherhood, the oldest and largest Islamist group in the world — and which likely as a result recommended that “discussions regarding how to improve local law enforcement crime reduction efforts should be delinked from the current academic and policy discussions on ‘radicalization’ and ‘countering violent extremism’ until such time that the understanding of these phenomena matures” — that is, that DHS should cease to investigate even a sanitized version of jihad?
Or Seddique Mateen, the father of the Orlando shooter Omar Mateen, who served as an FBI informant, and persuaded the FBI that his son was not a threat, leading to the largest mass shooting in American history?
These examples are facts. Attempts by reporters like Ms. Hauslohner to dismiss them as a “conspiracy theory” only helps those who wish to harm her and her family — and yours.
Remember, Ms. Hauslohner: Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.
U.S. News & World Report
Decertifying a Bad Deal
Trump eased the stranglehold of a bad deal so that Congress can focus on the task at hand: preventing a nuclear Iran.
By Christopher Hull Contributor, Oct. 13, 2017, at 5:15 p.m.
As expected, President Donald Trump announced today that he would decertify the 2015 Iran deal. But he also went further, contradicting Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and other commentators on whether Iran has complied with that accord.
At a news conference this morning, Sec. Tillerson stated flatly, “We don’t dispute that they’re under technical compliance.”
Yet President Trump disputed exactly that. “The Iranian regime has committed multiple violations of the agreement,” he said.
“For example,” Trump continued, “On two separate occasions, they have exceeded the limit of 130 metric tons of heavy water.”
This is a matter of public record. In November 2016, the IAEA announced that Iran had for a second time that year exceeded the heavy water limits supposedly agreed to in the Iran deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA.
Likewise, in a July 2017 letter, Sens. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Ted Cruz, R-Tex., David Purdue, R-Ga. and Marco Rubio, R-Fla. reiterated that:
Iran has repeatedly exceeded the limits the JCPOA places on its heavy water stocks. Heavy water is key to Iran’s plutonium pathway to nuclear weapons. However, Iran has twice exceeded the JCPOA’s heavy-water cap and has claimed a right to produce unlimited amounts of heavy water and retain ownership of those stocks as long as it claims to be “seeking” an international buyer. In doing so, Iran has effectively read the heavy-water limitation out of the JCPOA.
Trump also charged, “Until recently, the Iranian regime has also failed to meet our expectations in its operation of advanced centrifuges.”
This also is a matter of public record. For instance, early on, in February 2015, the IAEA reported that Iran had disconnected controversial reactors that had experts debating whether they were a violation of existing agreements, part of the lead-up to the JCPOA during its negotiation.
Moreover, the Cotton, Cruz, Purdue and Rubio letter contended:
Iran is currently operating more advanced nuclear centrifuges than it is permitted under the JCPOA, maintains more advanced centrifuges than required for its permitted enrichment activities, and has announced the capability to initiate mass production of more advanced centrifuges.
In addition, the president opined, “The Iranian regime has also intimidated international inspectors into not using the full inspection authorities that the agreement calls for.” Moreover, said Trump, “Iranian officials and military leaders have repeatedly claimed they will not allow inspectors onto military sites, even though the international community suspects some of those sites were part of Iran’s clandestine nuclear weapons program.”
Trump is correct. The Cotton, Cruz, Purdue and Rubio letter laid it out this way:
Perhaps most concerning is Iran’s refusal to grant international inspectors access to nuclear-research and military facilities. International Atomic Energy Agency (“IAEA”) inspectors are entitled to visit any location in Iran to verify compliance with the JCPOA’s ban on nuclear weapons development. However, Iran’s refusal to grant inspectors physical access and other forms of access makes it possible-if not highly probable, given Iran’s history of duplicity-that it is concealing additional violations of the JCPOA.
Most damning, however, is that just last month, the IAEA itself admitted that it did not have the power to monitor Iran’s compliance with a key section of the JCPOA.
“Our tools are limited,” IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano said, with respect to the JCPOA’s Section T, a ban on “activities which could contribute to the development of a nuclear explosive device.” “In other sections, for example, Iran has committed to submit declarations, place their activities under safeguards or ensure access by us. But in Section T, I don’t see any (such commitment).”
Director Amano went further, hoping that parties to the JCPOA would hash the issue out. “More clarification would be helpful,” he said. In fact, he said, the parties do not even agree that the IAEA is supposed to be monitoring activities which could contribute to the development of a nuclear explosive device. “Russia has a different view. They believe that it is not the mandate of the IAEA. Others have different views and discussions are ongoing.”
Trump Is Handing Iran a Nuke
Decertifying the nuclear deal almost assuredly enables Tehran’s nuclear ramp-up.
Michael H. Fuchs Oct. 13, 2017
Question: If the UN’s nuclear watchdog doesn’t have the power to watch “activities which could contribute to the development of a nuclear explosive device,” who cares whether it says Iran is complying with other portions of the deal?
Finally, charged Trump, “There are also many people who believe that Iran is dealing with North Korea.” This is an open secret often ignored by those trying to defend the JCPOA. After all, if Iran and North Korea are working together, then in theory Iran already has access to – and in fact may be helping underwrite – the advanced nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles the North has been testing.
The untrue trope that Iran is in compliance with the JCPOA is often repeated in the media and by the deal’s supporters. For instance, the EU’s top diplomat said recently that “All sides are implementing – so far – fully the agreement, as it has been certified by the IAEA eight times.” After the most recent report, mendacious Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif claimed that “verification of Iran(ian) compliance with (the) JCPOA.” Even the right-leaning Washington Times reported this morning that “the U.N. nuclear watchdog has repeatedly said that Iran is in compliance with requirements regarding its nuclear programs.”
Unfortunately, all that’s false.
On one hand, in March of this year, the head of IAEA made clear that while it serves “as eyes and ears of the international community, we are on the ground 24/7, and we can state that the JCPOA is being implemented.”
On the other hand, the IAEA chief added, “it is the responsibility” of each JCPOA member to reach an “interpretation” and a “judgment,” of “whether or not (Iran is) in compliance.” This is exactly what Trump did today.
Tzvi Kahn, a senior Iran analyst at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, argues that “none of the IAEA’s reports states that Iran has complied with the JCPOA.” Instead, in his view, “the IAEA’s mandate primarily entails monitoring and reporting on Tehran’s nuclear-related actions (or lack thereof) pursuant to the JCPOA’s provisions.”
The Global Damage of Decertification
Trashing the Iran deal will have ripple effects well beyond Washington.
Paul B. Stares Oct. 13, 2017
Finally, Cotton, Cruz, Purdue and Rubio have pointed out that Iran is in open violation of the agreement in at least one additional way:
German intelligence agencies in 2015 and 2016 reported that Iran continued illicit attempts to procure nuclear and missile technology outside of JCPOA-approved channels.
But regardless of whether or not Iran is in technical compliance, or whether Trump and Tillerson agree that the U.S. should be exiting the Iran deal – which they do not – they were aligned today in their assessment that the deal is a bad one, and that Iran is a bad actor.
Thus the challenge before Congress and the Trump administration now is to stop worrying so much about how to maintain compliance with the Iran deal. The JCPOA frontloaded the benefits, backloaded responsibilities and evaded key issues to allow Iran to continue to develop nuclear weapons while waiting for the deal to expire, when in spite of President Obama’s explicit claim, it would have a mile-wide way to mushroom clouds, with no way to stop it.
Instead, both must assess how to actually stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon – which includes putting all nuclear-related sanctions back in place, adding new ones to strangle the regime itself, strengthening internal and external opponents to the Mullahs and seeking a way to destroy facilities the Obama deal didn’t touch.
And if Congress doesn’t do the job – again – President Trump can, and must.
The Daily Caller
Turkish NATO Delegation Walks Out of Event Over Dissident Speech
10:33 PM 09/19/2017 | US
Christopher C. Hull | Contributor
PHILADELPHIA — Turkish representatives to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)’s Parliamentary Assembly walked out of a Middle East Forum (MEF) event Tuesday when it became clear a dissident would speak there.
According to Daniel Pipes, MEF president, speakers invited to the event held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, included both Cem Utkan of the Turkish Embassy and Emre Çelik, president of the Rumi Forum.
Çelik is a supporter of Turkish Sunni cleric Fethullah Gülen, whom Turkey publicly blames for the failed coup d’etat against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan that occurred in July 2016.
“When we invited Çelik, Turkey decided no, he’s not welcome,” said Pipes at the conclusion of his remarks in the plenary session of the event. The Turks made clear through its NATO intermediaries that unless Çelik were removed from the program, the event would be cancelled.
“We felt we had no choice but to accede and remove his name from the program. As Americans, that troubled our conscience,” he added.
Accordingly, Pipes said, “Mr. Çelik has agreed to speak and he will address us here…In the spirit of freedom of speech, I’m bringing him in to speak anyway.”
Two members of the Turkish delegation stood up and began to argue vociferously with event organizers and the head of the NATO delegation, Thomas Michael Jopling, a Conservative Member of the U.K. House of Lords. At the same time, two staff members from the Turkish Parliament stood and joined the other Turks, preparing to leave.
Jopling prevailed upon Pipes to allow him to speak before Çelik, as well as upon the Turks to remain for his remarks. “I don’t mind at all,” a Turkish representative is heard to say in a video taken of the event.
At the outset of Jopling’s remarks, he excoriated MEF for the change in plans. “All I will say on the bombshell that you have tipped into our proceedings,” he began, was that “a verbal agreement was made that the gentlemen here would not speak,” referring to Çelik. “That is unacceptable.”
As Jopling’s remarks drew to an end, Pipes joined him at the podium, contending that the agreement was made under duress.
Jopling then departed along with the Turkish delegation.
During Çelik’s remarks, which followed the walkout, he contended, “The autocratic tendencies of President Erdoğan [do] not encourage democracy in a fragile region. Example: President Erdoğan’s overreaching the rule of law.”
Çelik argued that Erdoğan’s overreaches “include the purge of some 120,000 employees that has left key vacancies in police, intelligence, and military” in the wake of the 2016 coup attempt.
After the event, MEF tweeted, “Ultimately, @NATO must decide if it will live up to its mission or if it will let one member state dictate its discussions worldwide.”
The event also featured conversations on regional realities in the Middle East, dealing with Syria, and both violent and non-violent jihadi activity in the West.
The Daily Caller
Report: Chinese Government Has Placed 100+ Facilities In US Universities
1:13 PM 04/26/2017 | Education
Christopher C. Hull | Contributor
The Chinese government has quietly set up over 100 teaching and research centers to promote China’s point of view on college campuses across the U.S., and operates over 500 analogous programs at American K-12 schools, according to a report released today by the National Association of Scholars (NAS).
The new report, Outsourced to China: Confucius Institutes and Soft Power in American Higher Education, details how the facilities “frequently attract scrutiny because of their close ties to the Chinese government.” According to the report, authored by Rachelle Peterson of NAS, Confucius Institutes are “largely funded by a Chinese government agency, which screens teachers and selects textbooks.” The report charges that in these facilities, “intellectual freedom, merit-based hiring policies, and other foundational principles of American higher education have received short shrift.”
For instance, according to a summary of the report, the Institutes’ curricula “avoid Chinese political history and human rights abuses, portray Taiwan and Tibet as undisputed territories of China, and tend to respect China’s censorious speech preferences.” Likewise, official policy of the Chinese agency sponsoring the facilities, known as the Hanban, requires Confucius Institutes to adhere to Chinese law. The Hanban also serves as “the conduit by which college presidents and administrators enjoy trips to and state dinners in China.”
The report profiles twelve specific Confucius Institutes, documenting “the hiring policies, funding arrangements, contracts signed by the university, [and] pressure on affiliated faculty members.” The NAS charges that the Institutes “educate a generation of American students to know nothing more of China than the regime’s official history.”
“Confucius Institutes represent a direct assault on the American norms of academic freedom and transparency. It is inappropriate for the Chinese government to free-ride on the authority and prestige of the American higher education system,” said Peterson. “U.S. colleges and universities should cease outsourcing their courses to the Chinese government and should close their Confucius Institutes.”
Peter Wood, president of the National Association of Scholars, charged that Confucius Institutes “have nothing to do with Confucius, and everything to do with advancing the interests of one of America’s global adversaries.”
The report was released today at an event in Washington, D.C., “Red Star Over Campus: How China’s Confucius Institutes Court Western Colleges and Universities.” The event also included a screening of “In the Name of Confucius,” which according to event sponsors is “the first documentary exposé of China’s multi-billion dollar Confucius Institute, a Chinese language and culture program set up in partnership with foreign educational institutions.” The Chinese have managed to place the facilities in over 1,500 universities and schools worldwide since 2004.
“In the Name of Confucius” tells the story of Canada’s largest school board grappling with the opening of the world’s largest Confucius Institute. In it, school trustees “find themselves embroiled in a growing global controversy.”
The documentary includes a former Confucius Institute instructor and defector whose discrimination complaint led to the first closure of one of the facilities on a North American campus. It also includes the charge that the Chinese consulate rallied supporters of the planned Canadian facility.
The controversy injects a new element into a roiling debate over American freedom of speech on campus, which has crested in the Trump era.
NAS recommends that “[c]olleges and universities with Confucius Institutes should either shut them down or take specific steps to distance themselves from the Chinese government,” and that “Federal and local governments should also exercise oversight to determine whether Confucius Institutes pose a threat to national security and human rights.”
Representatives for Confucius Institutes could not immediately be reached for comment
Middle East Forum
The White House Commission on Radical Islam: A Recommendation
Christopher C. Hull
February 22, 2017
Executive Summary
This paper for the Middle East Forum (MEF) lays out a responsible approach to implementing President Donald J. Trump’s commitment to create a domestic commission focused on halting the spread of what he termed “radical Islam.”[1]
In August 2016, Donald Trump gave a speech on how to “Make America Safe Again” in which he said, “One of my first acts as President will be to establish a commission on radical Islam.” This paper lays out a responsible approach to establishing such a commission.
I. How should the commission be structured?
A responsible commission would be housed in the White House, with members selected by the President and a chairman reporting to the National Security Advisor. The commission should include as ex-officio members the Attorney General, Secretary of Homeland Security, Director of the CIA, and Secretary of Defense, with a designated liaison from each; be empowered by a joint resolution of Congress to subpoena documents, compel testimony, and grant immunity; and be prepared that its reports may be used as evidence in later criminal proceedings. The President should delegate responsibility for taking action to his National Security Advisor. Finally, the commission should be charged to hold field hearings at sites of important jihadi strikes and events revealing Islamist subversion.
II. What should the commission’s mandate be?
The commission’s mandate should be to explain the core convictions of radical Islam; chart how Islamists recruit and deploy jihadis and expose networks that support “radicalization”; develop new protocols for police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners; examine “political correctness” and how to deal with the problem of radical Islam in an honest way; explore where radical Islam gets its resources and how they can be cut off; seek ways to deny radical Islam use of the Internet; recommend what changes should be made to immigration practices; and summarize how America and its allies can halt the spread of radical Islam’s and ultimately defeat it.
III. Whom should the commission include?
The commission should include experts on terrorism and radical Islam; voices for reforming Islam; current or former elected officials; representatives of law enforcement, intelligence, the military and/or the diplomatic community; representatives of the technology industry; and victims of radical Islam and their families.
IV. How Should the Commission Charge the Government with Implementing Its Recommendations?
Agencies that provide a liaison should be tasked with preparing raw data and materials for each topic the commission considers. Then, for each of the reports that it prepares, the commission should produce drafts of supporting documents such as executive orders; legislation; law enforcement referrals; requests for proposal (RFPs); memos to state and/or local governments; recommended personnel changes; and recommended budget changes.
The Context: Making America Safe Again
On August 15, 2016, then-Republican presidential nominee Trump gave a speech in Youngstown, Ohio on how to “Make America Safe Again.” President Trump began the speech, “In the 20th Century, the United States defeated Fascism, Nazism, and Communism. Now, a different threat challenges our world: radical Islamic terrorism.”
Trump ticked off Islamist attacks, first in America then in Europe, and other atrocities Islamic State was committing in pursuit of what he called the “hateful ideology of radical Islam.” He charged that “Anyone who cannot condemn the hatred, oppression and violence of radical Islam lacks the moral clarity to serve as our President.” Finally, he called for a “new approach, which must be shared by both parties in America, by our allies overseas, and by our friends in the Middle East,” namely “to halt the spread of radical Islam.”[2]
In that speech, President Trump made this specific commitment:
[O]ne of my first acts as President will be to establish a commission on radical Islam – which will include reformist voices in the Muslim community who will hopefully work with us. We want to build bridges and erase divisions.
The goal of the commission will be to identify and explain to the American public the core convictions and beliefs of radical Islam, to identify the warning signs of radicalization, and to expose the networks in our society that support radicalization. This commission will be used to develop new protocols for local police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners.[3]
Foreshadowing such a shift, on February 2, 2017 Reuters reported that the Trump administration “wants to revamp and rename” the Obama Administration’s Countering Violent Extremism (CVE) program so that it focuses solely on Islamist extremism.” According to the report, CVE “would be changed to ‘Countering Islamic Extremism’ or ‘Countering Radical Islamic Extremism.'[4]
In order to help make certain this shift is fact-based, strategic, and transcends this one program, this proposal will address the following open questions pertaining to the proposed commission on radical Islam:
1. How should the commission be structured?
2. What should its mandate be?
3. Who should be on it?
4. How should it charge the government with implementing its recommendations?
This paper is a first attempt to answer those questions, and to do so through a responsible lens, recognizing that:
1. There is a broad space for reform-minded Muslims to operate in America and the world;
2. Radicalism and extremism do not permeate all of Islam; and
Radical Islam uses certain tenets of Islam to achieve what are in fact political ends.
With that perspective, the paper will sketch a commission on radical Islam, with care to respect America’s First Amendment protections of religion and speech, while confronting the thorny truth that jihadis do, in fact, crown their evil deeds with Qur’an quotes.
I. HOW SHOULD THE COMMISSION BE STRUCTURED?
To maximize the chances of success, a responsible commission would:
1. Be established by executive order, modeled on Appendix C below, which should:
a. Stipulate that the commission be housed in the White House, with members selected by the President, including one or more from each of the following categories:
i. Experts on terrorism and radical Islam
ii. Voices for reform of Islam
iii. Current or former elected officials
iv. Representatives of the law enforcement, intelligence, military, and/or diplomatic communities
v. Representatives of the technology industry
vi. Victims of radical Islam and their families
b. Provide that the chairman should report to the National Security Advisor
c. Include as ex officio members the Secretaries of the following agencies, with a designated liaison from those agencies selected by the President, or an alternative by mutual consent of the President and Secretary:
i. The Department of Justice (DOJ): Responsible for retrieving DOJ and FBI materials requested by the commission, as well as referring potential violations of federal law identified or uncovered by the commission to be utilized by the DOJ and/or FBI, as directed by the commission’s chairman
ii. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS): Responsible for retrieving DHS materials requested by the commission, as well as relevant information identified or uncovered by the commission back to DHS as directed by the commission’s chairman
iii. The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA): Responsible for retrieving intelligence materials requested by the commission, as well as shepherding intelligence identified or uncovered by the commission back to the relevant agency, including any findings that might be utilized by the CIA in particular, as directed by the commission’s chairman
iv. The Department of Defense (DOD): Responsible for retrieving military materials requested by the commission, as well as delivering and implementing any taskings, as directed by the commission’s chairman
d. “[D]elegate responsibility for evaluating and taking action, where appropriate, with respect to all public recommendations” from the president to the National Security Advisor for all recommendations deemed appropriate by the commission, pursuant to Section 6(a) of the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA)[5]
e. Designate the General Services Administration (GSA) to provide fiscal and administrative support to the commission pursuant to FACA Section 12[6]
f. Provide for a two-year term, which may be renewed by the President or National Security Advisor by appropriate action prior to the expiration of such two-year period pursuant to FACA Section 14[7]
2. Described in an advisory committee charter prepared by the staff and approved by the chairman, to be filed with the Administrator of the GSA and the Library of Congress, and which pursuant to FACA Section 9(c) must include:
a. The committee’s official designation
b. The committee’s objectives and the scope of its activity
c. The period of time necessary for the committee to carry out its purposes
d. The agency or official to whom the committee reports
e. The agency responsible for providing the necessary support for the committee
f. A description of the duties for which the committee is responsible, and, if such duties are not solely advisory, a specification of the authority for such functions
g. The estimated annual operating costs in dollars and man-years for such committee
h. The estimated number and frequency of committee meetings
i. The committee’s termination date, if less than two-years from the date of the committee’s establishment; and
j. The date the charter is filed.[8]
3. Empowered by a joint resolution of Congress[9] to subpoena documents, compel testimony, and grant immunity, learning a lesson from the Tower Commission on the Iran-CONTRA scandal[10]
4. Prepared that the commission reports may be used as evidence in later criminal proceedings similarly to the Tower Commission, Rogers Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger accident, and Warren Commission on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy[11]
5. Staffed with at least:
a. A staff director, with:
i. A terminal degree in Islamic studies, security studies, international affairs, American government, or an equivalent
ii. Background in counter-terror public policy work
iii. Experience working within both state and federal governments
iv. Management background including responsibility for staffs of government employees focused on public policy matters
b. A research director, with:
i. At least a Bachelor’s Degree in security studies, international affairs, political science, or equivalent
ii. Six or more years’ experience in conducting terrorism research, including familiarity with key domestic terrorism and material support cases
iii. Strong subject matter expertise on history and doctrine of radical Islam, and on foreign and domestic Islamist movements
iv. Experience providing oral and written briefings related to Islamist doctrine, history and organizations to legislators, law enforcement, and intelligence officials
c. A staff counsel, with a terminal degree in law and a specialty in counter-terror and background in prosecution, law enforcement, and/or the military
d. A legislative director, with both strong counter-terror subject matter expertise and extensive experience in Congress
e. A communications director, with both strong counter-terror subject matter expertise and relationships with the media
f. A staff secretary, who should be responsible for meeting the administrative requirements of FACA Sections 10 and 11 in cooperation with the GSA
6. Charged to hold field hearings at sites of important Islamist terror strikes and events revealing Islamist subversion, in order to “identify and explain to the American public the core convictions and beliefs of radical Islam, to identify the warning signs of radicalization, and to expose the networks in our society that support radicalization,”[12] including taking testimony on the relevant core convictions and beliefs of the perpetrators and how they relate to radical Islam, to seek potential warning signs before the attacks, and to expose the networks that initiated and supported the perpetrators’ radicalization, including potentially at:
a. Ground Zero in New York City, NY.
b. The Pentagon, Arlington, VA, which was struck by Flight 77 on September 11, 2001
c. Shanksville, PA, where Flight 93 crashed on September 11, 2001
d. Ft. Hood, TX, the site of the Islamist attack by Nidal Malik Hassan on November 5, 2009
e. San Bernardino, CA, near the site of the Islamist attack by Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik on December 2, 2015 at the Inland Regional Center
f. Orlando, FL, near the site of the Islamist attack by Omar Mateen on June 12, 2016 at the Pulse nightclub
g. Boston, MA, near the site of the Boston Marathon bombing on April 15, 2013 by Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Tamerlan Tsarnaev
h. Little Rock, AR, near the site of the drive-by shooting of two U.S. soldiers by Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, born Carlos Leon Bledsoe, outside a military recruiting office on June 1, 2009
i. Philadelphia, PA, where the FBI secretly taped an October 1993 meeting of Hamas leaders and activists conspiring to conceal cash transfers to Palestinian terrorists, as well as hatching the concept for what would become the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR)[13] and/or
j. Dallas, TX, where the Holy Land Foundation trial was held between July and September of 2007.[14]
________________________________________
II. What Should the Commission’s Mandate Be?
Then-candidate Trump already spelled out his first cut of the commission’s mandate, namely:
The goal of the commission will be to identify and explain to the American public the core convictions and beliefs of radical Islam, to identify the warning signs of radicalization, and to expose the networks in our society that support radicalization.
This commission will be used to develop new protocols for local police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners.[15]
In addition, to avoid past challenges with presidential national security commissions in which “presidential expectations are sometimes unmet, as commissions issue damning reports with unforeseen and explosive consequences,”[16] the Administration should spell out in detail the commission’s charge, as recommended below.
Overall, the commission should “begin with a blank piece of paper on American policy toward the global Jihad movement,” as a former Reagan Defense Department official put it, “thereby providing an objective and independent assessment of the assumptions and the actual record of the U.S. government since 9/11.”[17] The commission, this official said, should “start with the premise…of an exercise in competitive analysis,” like the so-called “Team B” approach to accurately assessing the Soviet nuclear threat commissioned by then-CIA Director George H.W. Bush during the Ford Administration in May 1976, and subsequently acted upon reactively by the Carter Administration and proactively by the Reagan Administration, [18] arguably helping ultimately lead to America’s Cold War victory.[19]
Specifically, the commission’s mandate should be to consider and as appropriate issue separate reports and recommendations, rather than a single final report, on each of the following issues:
1. “[I]dentify[ing] and explain[ing] to the American public the core convictions and beliefs of radical Islam,” as then-candidate Trump set as one of the commission’s goals.[20] Specifically, in order for the public to fully grasp the challenge that radical Islam represents, the commission should consider including in its report common Islamist beliefs potentially out of step with American values, including the following:[21]
i. Adultery should be punished by stoning to death.[22]
ii. A woman should have four adult male witnesses to prove she’s been raped or face charges of adultery.[23]
iii. Homosexuality should be a death penalty crime.[24]
iv. Leaving Islam should be punishable by death.[25]
v. It should be permissible for a parent to kill their own child for any reason with no legal consequences.[26]
vi. All females should be circumcised to ensure their chastity.[27]
vii. The word of a man in court of law can only be countered by that of two women.[28]
viii. A female should inherit one-half what her brother inherits.[29]
ix. A man has the right to beat his wife if he thinks she’s disobedient.[30]
x. An adult man should be allowed to marry a pre-pubescent girl.[31]
xi. A father should have the right to forcibly marry off his daughters to anyone he chooses whether she agrees or not.[32]
xii. A husband ought to be allowed to forbid his wife to leave the home without his permission.[33]
xiii. A man should be allowed to sexually abuse a female baby or child so long as he doesn’t physically injure her.[34]
xiv. A man has the right to multiple wives, but a woman should only have one husband.[35]
xv. There is no such thing as marital rape, because a man should be able to use his wife when and how he likes, with or without her consent.[36]
xvi. Slavery should be legal.[37]
xvii. Raping women seized in offensive warfare and keeping or selling them as sex slaves should be permissible.[38]
xviii. Offensive warfare to force those who don’t accept your religion to submit to it is not only permissible but obligatory before God.[39]
xix. Beheading those who do not believe as you do is what God wants.[40]
xx. Chopping off hands and/or feet is an acceptable legal punishment for theft.[41]
xxi. Lashing people in public for moral offenses, like having sex outside of marriage, should be permitted by law.[42]
xxii. Making it a criminal offense to drink alcohol on penalty of public whipping is acceptable.[43]
xxiii. Verbal or written criticism of your religious beliefs should be criminalized, possibly even by the death penalty.[44]
xxiv. Only the people belonging to your own religion should have the right to own a gun.[45]
xxv. Anyone outside of your religion should be forbidden from building or repairing a house of worship.[46]
xxvi. Laws passed by an elected congress or parliament are by their very nature illegal and that only laws revealed by the deity of your religion should be allowed.[47]
xxvii. Any government established by laws and rules other than the ones allowed in your religion should be overthrown by force or subversion and replaced with one that only allows your religion.[48]
xxviii. Government should enforce public dress code rules.[49]
xxix. Women and girls should always be segregated in public from men and boys who aren’t part of their immediate family.[50]
xxx. The only food that ought to be allowed to be sold is food that is grown and processed according to the rules of your religion.[51]
xxxi. Everybody should have to follow the exact same diet and fasting rules that are obligatory in your religion on penalty of public whipping.[52]
xxxii. Jews are an inferior people who should be denigrated and demeaned and not treated equally in court.[53]
xxxiii. It’s wrong to obey laws or help law enforcement officers if that might lead to negative consequences for you or someone else belonging to your religion.[54]
xxxiv. You are allowed to lie if the objective is permitted, and required to if the objective is required.[55]
2. “[I]dentify[ing] the warning signs of radicalization.” As then-candidate Trump suggested, the commission should chart the ways in which Islamists in the West recruit, indoctrinate, train, and deploy jihadis in order “to expose the networks in our society that support radicalization,”[56] including potentially:
a. The list of “Islamist Organizations in America” compiled by The Clarion Project, perhaps the most recent and up-to-date list publicly available[57]
b. The “List of Unindicted Co-conspirators and/or Joint Venturers” in Attachment A of U.S. v. Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, et al., [58] as well as the rest of the materials for that case, which the commission should subpoena immediately from the U.S. Department of Justice, and ultimately release as part of this report
c. The “List of Islamist Organizations under U.S. Senate Scrutiny” published by Middle East Forum (MEF) in 2004 and updated in 2005, which provides an authoritative guide to the 25 U.S. Islamist groups which at that time the Senate Finance Committee’s chairman and ranking member stated “finance terrorism and perpetuate violence,” including the Holy Land Foundation which was in fact rolled up by federal prosecutors;[59] and
d. The list of “our organizations and the organizations of our friends” from “An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Brotherhood in North America,” the May 1991 memo written by Mohamed Akram, a.k.a. Mohamed Adlouni, for the Shura Council of the Muslim Brotherhood.
e. As the author of a scholarly work on the psychology of terrorism put it: “Identify the infrastructure, across the media, academic, and political landscape, of the Islamist Supremacist movement.” [60]
f. The list of mosques and Islamic centers in the United States having the most links to illegal activities of any kind, including but not limited to terrorist attacks, to determine
i. What would be the proper constitutionally-sound and prudent way to monitor such facilities systematically when probable cause exists, and
ii. Any patterns as to how mosques and Islamic centers linked to radical Islam are being funded and built, and what existing laws, policy changes, and/or legislation might be useful in breaking that pattern.
3. The commission should explore potential counteractive steps to radicalization, according to the author of a scholarly work on the psychology of terrorism, such as:
a. “Promoting and supporting institutions of pluralistic Islam within the United States”
b. “Promoting the identity of America in institutions vulnerable to recruiting efforts by Islamists.”
c. “Establishing leadership within Islam in America for advocacy, education and outreach (to replace CAIR)”
d. “Establishing a means of tracking different political organizations who advocate Sharia, raise money for terrorist causes abroad, or support Islamism (political Islam) in the U.S. and creating a due process for the intelligence community to evaluate said organization and any need to distance it from elected officials and lawmakers”
e. “Working with Congress to establish anti-lobbying laws that do not allow political or campaign contributions from Islamist sources and Islamic theocracies”
f. “Cracking down on undisclosed lobbying contacts by representatives of state sponsors of terror, by stringently applying existing law”; and
g. “Dismantl[ing] the infrastructures of organizations that seek to impose Sharia law by force”
h. “Dismantling the infrastructure in campuses and in academia and curriculums though collaborative initiatives with the Department of Education (DOE) and the NSA”
i. “Working with Congress to pass laws that prevent endowing positions that enable embedding curricula that are hostile to American interests”
j. “Re-examining collaborative relationships with hostile countries, including the governments of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, that allow for embedding curricula in American universities”
k. “Rethink[ing] “exchange” [programs] – we can lend them our academics as exports, but we will be careful to screen the ideology and educational practicum of those who seek to educate in the United States.”
l. “Cultivat[ing] civic requirements in higher education and college curricula that specifically educate about the United States’ contributions to other cultures, and other countries”
m. “Requir[ing] students from Muslim countries who study in the United States to enroll in civics courses that espouse American values and American virtues, including America’s contributions to the rest of the world”
n. “Requir[ing] Middle Eastern study programs to feature curricula about American contributions to the Arab World”
o. “Dismantling the infrastructure of the Islamist Supremacist movement in the publicly funded news media though collaborative initiatives with the Federal Communications Council (FCC) and NSA”
p. “Working with Congress to pass laws to withhold Federal funding from universities that use curricula that are hostile to American interests”
q. “Develop[ing] legislation to require American public broadcasters [etc.], and to provide grants for private media companies with foreign operations to air similar programming”; and
r. “Prohibit[ing] any publicly funded media from broadcasting anything that promotes Sharia as a political or judicial system”[61]
4. “Develop[ing] new protocols for local police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners,”[62] as then-candidate Trump envisioned, including by:
a. Designing the “new screening test” that then-candidate Trump called for during the campaign, saying:
A Trump Administration will establish a clear principle that will govern all decisions pertaining to immigration: we should only admit into this country those who share our values and respect our people.
In the Cold War, we had an ideological screening test. The time is overdue to develop a new screening test for the threats we face today.
In addition to screening out all members or sympathizers of terrorist groups, we must also screen out any who have hostile attitudes towards our country or its principles – or who believe that Sharia law should supplant American law.
Those who do not believe in our Constitution, or who support bigotry and hatred, will not be admitted for immigration into the country.
Only those who we expect to flourish in our country – and to embrace a tolerant American society – should be issued visas. [63]
b. Considering which of the specific modifications the Obama Administration made to U.S. training materials should be reversed by the Trump Administration, and what further enhancements of those materials it should make
c. Directly and explicitly rebutting both the “Countering Violent Extremism” narrative of the Obama Administration and the “War on Terror” narrative of the Bush Administration, laying out instead a new approach along the lines of President Trump’s call to “recognize this ideology of death that must be extinguished,” [64] and translating that approach into protocols for local police officers, federal investigators and immigration screeners to recognize and repel Islamists
d. Incorporating into the new protocols the results of a January 14, 2016 Middle East Forum study, “Islamism Responsible for More U.S. Murders than ‘Right-Wing’ Extremism”,[65] which debunked the New America Foundation (NAF) report “Terrorism in America After 9/11” that purported to find the opposite, claiming terrorists were “as American as Apple Pie.”[66]
e. Drawing lessons from success and failures in other countries, including potentially the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium, Israel, Egypt, India, Singapore, and Bangladesh. [See for instance Appendix D: The Case of the United Kingdom]
5. Examining why, to quote then-candidate Trump, “political correctness has replaced common sense in our society,”[67] and how we overcome it to deal with the problem of radical Islam in an honest, bipartisan and rational way.
The lines of inquiry for such an examination might include gathering expert testimony and documentation on:
i. The philosophical and historical development of political correctness (PC)
ii. The stated objectives of the PC movement identified in that exploration
iii. The evidence that the PC movement is achieving those objectives in the West
iv. The strategies and tactics developed by the PC movement
v. How radical Islam fits into those strategies and tactics
vi. The degree to which Islamists are leveraging the PC narrative
vii. The likely result of continued leveraging of the PC movement by radical Islam
viii. The likely result of continued cooperation for the PC movement and radical Islam, based on their stated objectives
ix. The lines of eventual conflict between PC and radical Islam
x. How America might respond to the PC movement and radical Islam to arrive at a state in which Americans discuss, report and act on Islamist threats openly and rationally.
6. Exploring where radical Islam is getting its resources, and how can they be cut off. Specific questions the commission might examine:
a. How do federal, state and local governments subsidize radical Islam, including in grants and tax subsidies to Islamist organizations, funding to Islamist research and researchers, trainings that mislead decision-makers about the nature of radical Islam, etc.?
b. How can we persuade Congress and the State Department to stop funding the Palestinian Authority, which channels those resources into hatred at every level of its society?
c. How can we persuade Congress, the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development to stop funding illicit charitable efforts in the Gaza Strip, which serve to prop up the ruling Hamas regime?
d. How might America redirect resources flowing to the United Nations and related international fora, where radical Islam is among the best funded and represented forces, into an international security organization dedicated to victory over radical Islam?
e. What individuals, universities, companies and foundations are providing resources to organizations and organizers of radical Islam? How might they be best warned about the impact of their contributions?
f. How can America get Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Gulf States to stop funding radical Islam in their countries and worldwide?
g. How should America’s struggle to achieve victory over radical Islam inform this Administration’s energy policy, especially with respect to oil?
h. What are all of the diversity, cultural sensitivity, and multicultural programs that the U.S. federal government currently conducts, funds, or mandates? What effects have these programs had, and are these effects in the national interest? Which, if any, should be modified, discontinued, or replaced entirely?
i. How might the federal intelligence community (IC) and law enforcement agencies best be reformed in order to maximize America’s return on investment in the fight against radical Islam?
7. Seeking ways to deny Islamists’ use of the Internet use of the Internet. As then-candidate Trump said in his speech, “We cannot allow the Internet to be used as a recruiting tool, and for other purposes, by our enemy – we must shut down their access to this form of communication, and we must do so immediately.” [68] For the commission, doing so should include potentially:
a. Recognizing that the Internet is not so much a tool as its own battle-space, that is, another front in the war on radical Islam, which must be treated as such in order to achieve victory there[69]
b. Taking testimony from and reviewing documents on the performance of technology companies such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Google with respect to radical Islam to understand the degree to which they are acquiescing to Islamists’ demands to stifle free speech without having them imposed on them by law
c. Creating the online equivalent of the Cold War’s Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in the Muslim world to boldly promote and defend Western values and sharply contrast failures of radical Islam[70]
d. Learning from the techniques and insights of the hacker the FBI refers to as the “Batman of the Internet,” known only as @th3j35t3r (the Jester), who hacked into the Global Islamic Media Front, as well into Islamic State itself after the Charlie Hebdo jihadi attack in Paris on January 7, 2015, including potentially:
i. Creating kinetic effects based on Stuxnet-style cyberattacks on, e.g., state assets (dams, nuclear weapons centrifuges, etc.) controlled by Islamist hostiles, including but not limited to Iran and Islamic State
ii. Building counter-jihad botnets (a.k.a. “zombie armies”), that is, networks of Islamists’ private computers infected with software allowing them to be controlled as a group without the owners’ knowledge, specifically to attack Islamist sites and computers with spam and/or viruses
iii. Redirecting denial-of-service attacks aimed at U.S. sites to hostile sites or those of the countries in which attacks originate
iv. Studying Cozy Bear, APT29 and The Dukes, the “threat group” operated since 2008 and attributed to the Russian government, which allegedly conducted the hack of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) beginning in the summer of 2015
v. Extracting key information from radical Islamists either for intelligence or publication and shaming purposes
vi. Tapping the wealth of knowledge in private companies in threat mitigation, intelligence-gathering, counter measures, and offensive capabilities – talent the Jester says is “chomping at the bit” to help the U.S. government
vii. Targeting and taking down radical Islamist websites, especially as many smaller sites as possible to “herd” sympathizers to the largest sites which are “easier to control;” and/or
viii. Setting up thousands, then hundreds of thousands, and ultimately millions of social media bots to mock, deride, and heap shame on radical Islam’s messages online[71]
e. Replicating on a global scale Internet Haganah, the online operation run by A. Aaron Weisburd where he:
i. “[T]rawl[ed] online in search of the press statements and videos that terrorists release to rally their supporters”
ii. “[Went] undercover, logging on to restricted forums (if he has been able to get a password) and visiting the many open sites advocating jihad”
iii. “[W]ork[ed] to figure out where [the terrorist press releases and videos were] coming from”
iv. “[E]ither shame[d] service providers into shutting down the sites that host them or gather[ed] what he terms “intel” for interested parties”
v. “[M]aintain[ed] a blog to rally his own side, providing an outlet for people eager to contribute their time and money to the fight against terrorism;” and
vi. [B]ecause Weisburd closely monitor[ed the blog’s] traffic, he [could] watch the jihadists watching him.”[72]
f. Running industrial-scale social media banning operations along the lines as those conducted on a one-off basis by counter-jihad blog The Jawa Report[73]
g. Learning lessons from deterring jihadis from the use of cell phones a generation ago[74]
h. Using kinetic and/or financial means to deter use of online fora to spread the evils of radical Islam;[75] and
i. Reviewing the proposal made by then-Congressman Mike Pompeo, R-KS, for a “comprehensive, searchable” database of domestic personal records.[76]
8. Reviewing what changes should be made to immigration practices, both within the Administration and in law through Congress, to address the threat of radical Islam, including answering the following questions:
a. Were there any violations of U.S. law in the amnesties provided by the Obama Administration, including the expenditure of money without Congressional authorization? If so, they should be referred to law enforcement authorities.
b. How should the refugee, asylum, and (immigration-specific) parole programs be reformed, redirected, or ended in order to best make America safe again?
c. How might we better track non-citizens within the United States and help repatriate those found to be participating in the spread of radical Islam?
d. How can the federal government assist states with both resources and personnel in securing their border facilities, including potentially the use of National Guard and/or military assets?
e. How might we amend relevant sections of the Immigration and Nationality Act (U.S. Code Title 8)? These include both:
i. Existing entry bans that:
1. Bar entry based on activities intended to overthrow or control the U.S. government by violent or illegal means or totalitarian party membership
2. Bar entry based on terrorist activity or association
ii. Existing bases for denying naturalization:
1. Failure to “positively attach” to the principles of the Constitution
2. Advocacy for the imposition of anti-Constitutional totalitarian rule
Specifically, the commission should consider whether:
iii. 8 U.S. Code Section 1182(3)(C)(iii) should be amended by adding the following at its end (the current Exception for Officials C (ii) relating to diplomats and legal representatives of other governments would remain):
Any alien who the consular officer or the Attorney General knows, or has reasonable grounds to believe, rejects the supremacy of the United States Constitution, including the laws and regulations enacted and the common law judicially developed pursuant to it, as the sole governing legal authority or otherwise seeks to limit that supremacy as the sole governing legal authority within the jurisdiction of the United States is inadmissible.
Any aliens who advocate, teach, fundraise for, take oaths or pledges in support of or who are members of or affiliated with any organization that advocates or teaches the overthrow by forceful or subversive means of the government of the United States to establish a totalitarian form of government applying laws incompatible with the United States Constitution, either through their own utterances or through any written or printed publications issued or published by or with the permission or consent of or under the authority of such organization or paid for by the funds of, or funds furnished by, such organization, are inadmissible.
iv. Changes should be made to a provision granting de facto extension of U.S. First Amendment protections to non-citizens seeking entry: 8 U.S. Code Section 1182(a)(3)(C)(iii). The statements, beliefs and associations of anyone attempting to enter the U.S. should certainly be open to scrutiny and potentially cause exclusion if they evince an attachment to an anti-constitutional ideology like radical Islam. Non-resident aliens outside the country should have no expectation of First Amendment or any other rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. Therefore, the section entitled “Exception for other aliens” highlighted below should be repealed.
(iii) Exception for other aliens
An alien, not described in clause (ii), shall not be excludable or subject to restrictions or conditions on entry into the United States under clause (i) because of the alien’s past, current, or expected beliefs, statements, or associations, if such beliefs, statements, or associations would be lawful within the United States, unless the Secretary of State personally determines that the alien’s admission would compromise a compelling United States foreign policy interest.
v. 8 U.S. Code § 1424 (4)(A) should be amended as follows:
(4) who advocates or teaches or who is a member of or affiliated with any organization that advocates or teaches (A) the overthrow by force or violence or other unconstitutional means of the Government of the United States or established forms of law; and/or
vi. 8 U.S. Code § 1424 (5)(E) should be amended as follows:
(E)…the economic, international, and governmental doctrines of world Communism, or the establishment in the United States of a totalitarian form of government which supplants the U.S. Constitution; or….
9. Summarizing, given the results of the prior investigations, how specifically America and its allies can halt the spread of radical Islam and ultimately defeat it. President Trump called for a “new approach, which must be shared by both parties in America, by our allies overseas, and by our friends in the Middle East,” namely “to halt the spread of radical Islam.”[77] What should that new approach be? For instance, the commission might consider:
i. Defeating the ideology of radical Islam just as we defeated the ideologies of Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Communist Russia – recognizing that each required a different strategy – working with allies such as Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who has explicitly set the same objective;
ii. Restoring respect for the rule of law in immigration, securing America’s borders and enforcing the laws on the books, as well as improving those laws so that they better defend us from the threat of radical Islam;
iii. Using the West’s economy and culture to overpower radical Islam over time, as we did in the Cold War;
iv. Transforming our view of technology from a tool of radicalization into a battle space in which we must triumph completely;
v. Cutting off the bloodflow of money to the cancer of radical Islam – not just to designated foreign terrorist organizations (FTOs), but to the mosques, Islamic Centers and subversive groups founded and funded by radical Islamists worldwide, many funded directly by Saudi Arabia and its ilk;
vi. Respecting the self-determination of our allies in the Middle East, including the Kurds, Balochis, Yezidis, and Assyrian and Chaldean Christians, to help the people on the ground to redraw the Western-imposed maps that have created so many unstable and ultimately violent nations; and
vii. Using our kinetic power, backed up with industrial might as we have in the past – but only as a complement to the other battle fronts, not a replacement for fighting in them.[78]
________________________________________
III. Whom Should the Commission Include?
The discussion of the commission’s structure above included the general recommendation that the commission should include one or more individuals from the following categories:
1. Experts on terrorism and radical Islam
The commission should include a core group of those who have deeply studied and written about the threat America faces. As a former Reagan Defense Department official pointed out, anyone selected for the commission should be clear-eyed about Islam’s role in creating that threat, and must not be complicit in the current system’s failures.[79]
Those who might be considered include:
· Alan Dershowitz, law professor at Harvard University, author of Why Terrorism Works: Understanding the Threat, Responding to the Challenge
· Steve Emerson, the Investigative Project on Terrorism
· Prof. Rohan Gunaratna, head of the International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) at Nanyang Technological University (Singapore)
· Philip B. Haney, founding member of DHS, author of See Something, Say Nothing
· Sam Harris, author of five New York Times bestsellers, including Islam and the Future of Tolerance (with Maajid Nawaz)
· Douglas Murray, the Henry Jackson Society (UK)
· Daniel Pipes, the Middle East Forum, author of Militant Islam Reaches America; In the Path of God: Islam and Political Power
· Patrick Poole, national security and terrorism consultant with works published in Middle East Review of International Affairs, the Journal of International Security Affairs and Middle East Quarterly
· Dr. Michael Welner, forensic psychiatrist, author of Psychopathy, Media, and the Psychology at the Root of Terrorism
· Sam Westrop, senior fellow at the Gatestone Institute; former head, Stand for Peace (UK)
2. Voices for Reform of Islam
In his speech, Mr. Trump expressed a desire to “include reformist voices in the Muslim community who will hopefully work with us. We want to build bridges and erase divisions.”[80]
Then-candidate Trump selected an excellent criteria for that selection: that Muslims be “reformist voices.”[81] Note the implications of both words: An information warfare expert in the counter-terror space points out that the call for those who are “reformist” implies that Islam is in need of reform, which of course it is. Agreement on that point should be the minimum qualification for service on or testimony to this commission, the expert argues.[82] And “voices” means he or she is one of the few courageous Muslims who have spoken out. Unless a Muslim or former Muslim has previously publicly stated that Islam is in need of reform, that Muslim simply does not meet the President’s criterion.
One reform-minded Muslim, a national leader, recommended including a designated number of reformist Muslims on the commission – at least two or three – so that the commission benefits from a range of views. He also urged setting a number of non-Muslims, which given the number of categories would be a minimum of five, and a maximum of perhaps eight, such that the commission’s size does not become ungainly.[83]
In addition, among these individuals, there should be one Urdu and one Farsi speaker. Moreover, according to a founding member of DHS, the commission needs to have one or two native Arabic speakers. “Without that,” he says, “you’re driving blind. Most of the real sources are in Arabic.”[84]
Finally, the information warfare expert notes that “We must not allow Muslims [alone] to define for us what the threat is. If it’s something that humans are capable of perceiving, it’s not just Muslims who can do it.” That is, those selecting commission members should keep in mind that being a Muslim neither uniquely qualifies someone to understand the threat, nor guarantees that the individual will correctly communicate the threat even were that understanding perfect.[85]
With all that in mind, those to be considered might include:
Dr. Tawfik Hamid, former member of Jamaa Islamiya
Dr. M. Zuhdi Jasser, M.D., President and Founder of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD)
Asra Nomani, author and former Co-Director of the Pearl Project
Shireen Qudosi, writer and editor of Qudosi Chronicles
3. Current or Former Elected Officials
Anyone selected from among the ranks of elected officials must have demonstrated both a grasp of the perils of radical Islam and the courage to speak plainly about them.
Some options would include:
U.S. Senator Tom Cotton, R-AR
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-GA
Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, R-NY
Former House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Pete Hoekstra, R-MI
U.S. Senator Jim Lankford, R-OK
Former U.S. Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, D-CT
U.S. Senator Bob Menendez, D-NJ
CIA Director Mike Pompeo, (ex officio), represented by the Deputy Director or another designee
Attorney General Jeff Sessions (ex officio), represented by the Assistant Attorney General, National Security Division, or another designee
4. Representatives of Law Enforcement, Intelligence, Military and/or Diplomatic Community
Those on the front lines facing down the threat know best what it looks like. For that reason, the commission should include representatives of law enforcement, the military and/or the diplomatic community, including potentially:
Amb. John Bolton, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
David A. Clarke, Jr., Sheriff of Milwaukee County
Richard Higgins, former Defense Department official, Combatting Terrorism and Technical Support Office, Irregular Warfare Section, and Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations/Low Intensity Conflict
DHS Sec. John F. Kelly (ex officio), represented by the Director, Homeland Security Advisory Council or another designee Defense Sec. James Mattis (ex officio), represented by the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense and Global Security Affairs or another designee
Andrew C. McCarthy, former Assistant U.S. Attorney who led 1995 World Trade Center terrorism prosecution against Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman
Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey
Robert Reilly, former head of diplomacy at the United States Information Agency (USIA)
5. Representatives of the Technology Industry
The above-mentioned reformist Muslim leader, Zuhdi Jasser, recommended expanding the categories of the commission to include a member of the technology community – someone who understands the latest incarnations of media and social media – while acknowledging that the Internet is only “the final trigger” by which Islamists communicate. That, he said, was the lesson of a recent report that came out: We have exaggerated the problem of so-called “online radicalization.” Evaluating it on a case-by-case basis, it becomes clear that online activity is only an avenue, not the single path today’s jihadis tread.[86]
The challenge with selecting a member of the technology industry, especially in media and/or social media, is that those leaders have it so uniformly wrong. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, for instance, have all faced criticism – and now even lawsuits – for allowing Islamist traffic and/or shutting down voices critical of radical Islam.
Accordingly, those who stand out as likely candidates include:
“Rusty Shackleford,” the alias of the Editor-in-chief Emeritus of counter-jihad blog The Jawa Report
Peter Thiel, the former head of PayPal and an early investor in Facebook
J. Michael Waller, Ph.D., former Annenberg Professor of International Communication at Institute of World Politics and faculty member at the Naval Postgraduate School in information operations and strategic influence
A. Aaron Weisburd, founder of Internet Haganah, which “appl[ied] weaponized information to problems related to terrorism and hostile foreign intelligence services.”[87]
6. Victims of Radical Islam and Their Families
Arguably those with the greatest stake in the outcome of the fight are those who have already paid the heaviest price. Accordingly, the commission should represent victims of radical Islam and their families. Ideal candidates include:
Melvin Bledsoe, father of Carlos Leon Bledsoe, a.k.a. Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad
Tim Brown, former New York firefighter, 9/11 victim
Daris Long, father of U.S. Army Private William Long, murdered by Carlos Leon Bledsoe, a.k.a. Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad
Terry Strada, national chairwoman of 9/11 Families United For Justice
________________________________________
IV. How Should the Commission Charge the Government with Implementing Its Recommendations?
The commission is not worth establishing if its results will gather dust on a shelf. Accordingly, the recommendations above include a number of measures to see that this does not happen.
For instance, note that the structure of the commission includes that the President delegate responsibility for evaluating and taking action to the National Security Advisor for all recommendations deemed appropriate by the commission.[88] Such a delegation might allow for immediate implementation of findings that are time-sensitive.
Likewise, note that the structure contains not only ex officio membership for each Secretary but also a liaison from the DOJ, DHS, CIA, and DOD. That recommendation is intended not only to facilitate gathering necessary materials, but also to drive implementation of the commission’s directions once ordered by a U.S. official, and to facilitate referring potentially criminal, intelligence, or national security matters directly to the agencies responsible for each.
Moreover, each of the agencies that provide a liaison should also be tasked with preparing relevant raw data and materials for each topic under consideration by the commission, to make certain the commission has the information the agency considers important in making determinations relative to its areas of authority.
Finally, overall, the commission can increase its impact by, for each of the reports that it prepares, crafting drafts of:
1. Executive orders and/or tasking memos to federal agencies directing them to take action to fix a problem that may legally be addressed by the Executive Branch alone, to be submitted confidentially to the National Security Advisor for his or her consideration
2. Pieces of legislation embodying any policy changes that require Congressional approval, to be submitted confidentially to the National Security Advisor for distribution to relevant agencies and offices for review, and ultimately for submission to Congress for consideration, hearings, markup, and approval
3. Law enforcement referrals of individuals and/or entities found to be violating civil or criminal law, along with all relevant public and nonpublic documentation the commission uncovers, to be submitted confidentially to the commission liaison from the DOJ for consideration for investigation and/or prosecution
4. Supporting documents to be provided either to the public as appendices to the report or confidentially to the CIA for provision to the relevant intelligence agencies for their utilization as appropriate
5. Requests for proposal (RFPs), including suggested budgets, for goods or services required in order to implement a recommendation
6. Memos to state and/or local governments from relevant agencies communicating new requirements in order to receive federal funding for any given program that the commission deems may legally be made under existing statute and that would be salutary in defeating radical Islam, for submission to the liaison for the agency in question and/or the National Security Advisor for consideration
7. Recommended personnel changes, including potentially initiating, restructuring, increasing, decreasing, or eliminating staffing in a given department, and/or commendations, recriminations, or terminations recommended based on specific employee performance, for submission to the commission’s liaison for the agency in question and/or the National Security Advisor for consideration; and/or
8. Budget changes, including potentially initiating, reallocating, increasing, decreasing, or eliminating funding in given areas, for submission to the commission’s liaison for the agency in question and/or the National Security Advisor for consideration.
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Appendix A: Full text of Donald J. Trump’s speech on Radical Islam
August 15, 2016, as prepared for delivery
Thank you. It is great to be with you this afternoon.
Today we begin a conversation about how to Make America Safe Again.
In the 20th Century, the United States defeated Fascism, Nazism, and Communism.
Now, a different threat challenges our world: radical Islamic terrorism.
This summer, there has been an ISIS attack launched outside the war zones of the Middle East every 84 hours.
Here, in America, we have seen one brutal attack after another.
13 were murdered, and 38 wounded, in the assault on Ft. Hood.
The Boston Marathon Bombing wounded and maimed 264 people, and ultimately left five dead – including 2 police officers.
In Chattanooga, Tennessee, five unarmed marines were shot and killed at a military recruiting center.
Last December, 14 innocent Americans were gunned down at an office party in San Bernardino, another 22 were injured.
In June, 49 Americans were executed at the Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, and another 53 were injured. It was the worst mass shooting in our history, and the worst attack on the LGTBQ community in our history.
In Europe, we have seen the same carnage and bloodshed inflicted upon our closest allies.
In January of 2015, a French satirical newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, was attacked for publishing cartoons of the prophet Mohammed. Twelve were killed, including two police officers, and 11 were wounded. Two days later, four were murdered in a Jewish Deli.
In November of 2015, terrorists went on a shooting rampage in Paris that slaughtered 130 people, and wounded another 368. France is suffering gravely, and the tourism industry is being massively affected in a most negative way.
In March of this year, terrorists detonated a bomb in the Brussels airport, killing 32 and injuring 340.
This July, in the South of France, an Islamic terrorist turned his truck into an instrument of mass murder, plowing down and killing 85 men, women and children – and wounding another 308. Among the dead were 2 Americans – a Texas father, and his 11-year-old son.
A few weeks ago, in Germany, a refugee armed with an axe wounded five people in a gruesome train attack.
Only days ago, an ISIS killer invaded a Christian church in Normandy France, forced an 85-year-old priest to his knees, and slit his throat before his congregation.
Overseas, ISIS has carried out one unthinkable atrocity after another. Children slaughtered, girls sold into slavery, men and women burned alive. Crucifixions, beheadings and drownings. Ethnic minorities targeted for mass execution. Holy sites desecrated. Christians driven from their homes and hunted for extermination. ISIS rounding-up what it calls the “nation of the cross” in a campaign of genocide. We cannot let this evil continue.
Nor can we let the hateful ideology of Radical Islam – its oppression of women, gays, children, and nonbelievers – be allowed to reside or spread within our own countries.
We will defeat Radical Islamic Terrorism, just as we have defeated every threat we have faced in every age before.
But we will not defeat it with closed eyes, or silenced voices.
Anyone who cannot name our enemy, is not fit to lead this country. Anyone who cannot condemn the hatred, oppression and violence of Radical Islam lacks the moral clarity to serve as our President.
The rise of ISIS is the direct result of policy decisions made by President Obama and Secretary Clinton
Let’s look back at the Middle East at the very beginning of 2009, before the Obama-Clinton Administration took over.
Libya was stable.
Syria was under control.
Egypt was ruled by a secular President and an ally of the United States.
Iraq was experiencing a reduction in violence.
The group that would become what we now call ISIS was close to being extinguished.
Iran was being choked off by economic sanctions.
Fast-forward to today. What have the decisions of Obama-Clinton produced?
Libya is in ruins, our ambassador and three other brave Americans are dead, and ISIS has gained a new base of operations.
Syria is in the midst of a disastrous civil war. ISIS controls large portions of territory. A refugee crisis now threatens Europe and the United States.
In Egypt, terrorists have gained a foothold in the Sinai desert, near the Suez Canal, one of the most essential waterways in the world.
Iraq is in chaos, and ISIS is on the loose.
ISIS has spread across the Middle East, and into the West. In 2014, ISIS was operating in some 7 nations. Today they are fully operational in 18 countries with aspiring branches in 6 more, for a total of 24 – and many believe it is even more than that. The situation is likely worse than the public knows: a new Congressional report reveals that the Administration has downplayed the growth of ISIS, with 40% of analysts saying they had experienced efforts to manipulate their findings.
At the same time, ISIS is trying to infiltrate refugee flows into Europe and the United States.
Iran, the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism, is now flush with $150 billion in cash released by the United States – plus another $400 million in ransom. Worst of all, the Nuclear deal puts Iran, the number one state sponsor of Radical Islamic Terrorism, on a path to nuclear weapons.
In short, the Obama-Clinton foreign policy has unleashed ISIS, destabilized the Middle East, and put the nation of Iran – which chants ‘Death to America’ – in a dominant position of regional power and, in fact, aspiring to be a dominant world power.
It all began in 2009 with what has become known as President Obama’s global ‘Apology Tour.’
In a series of speeches, President Obama described America as “arrogant,” “dismissive” “derisive” and a “colonial power.” He informed other countries that he would be speaking up about America’s “past errors.” He pledged that we would no longer be a “senior partner,” that “sought to dictate our terms.” He lectured CIA officers of the need to acknowledge their mistakes, and described Guantanamo Bay as a “rallying cry for our enemies.”
Perhaps no speech was more misguided than President Obama’s speech to the Muslim World delivered in Cairo, Egypt, in 2009.
In winning the Cold War, President Ronald Reagan repeatedly touted the superiority of freedom over communism, and called the USSR the Evil Empire.
Yet, when President Obama delivered his address in Cairo, no such moral courage could be found. Instead of condemning the oppression of women and gays in many Muslim nations, and the systematic violations of human rights, or the financing of global terrorism, President Obama tried to draw an equivalency between our human rights record and theirs.
His naïve words were followed by even more naïve actions.
The failure to establish a new Status of Forces Agreement in Iraq, and the election-driven timetable for withdrawal, surrendered our gains in that country and led directly to the rise of ISIS.
The failures in Iraq were compounded by Hillary Clinton’s disaster in Libya. President Obama has since said he regards Libya as his worst mistake. According to then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, the invasion of Libya was nearly a split decision, but Hillary Clinton’s forceful advocacy for the intervention was the deciding factor.
With one episode of bad judgment after another, Hillary Clinton’s policies launched ISIS onto the world.
Yet, as she threw the Middle East into violent turmoil, things turned out well for her. The Clintons made almost $60 million in gross income while she was Secretary of State.
Incident after incident proves again and again: Hillary Clinton lacks the judgment, the temperament and the moral character to lead this nation. Importantly, she also lacks the mental and physical stamina to take on ISIS, and all the many adversaries we face – not only in terrorism, but in trade and every other challenge we must confront to turn this country around.
It is time for a new approach
Our current strategy of nation-building and regime change is a proven failure. We have created the vacuums that allow terrorists to grow and thrive.
I was an opponent of the Iraq war from the beginning – a major difference between me and my opponent.
Though I was a private citizen, whose personal opinions on such matters [were] not sought, I nonetheless publicly expressed my private doubts about the invasion. Three months before the invasion I said, in an interview with Neil Cavuto, to whom I offer my best wishes for a speedy recovery, that “perhaps [we] shouldn’t be doing it yet,” and that “the economy is a much bigger problem.”
In August of 2004, very early in the conflict, I made a detailed statement to Esquire magazine. Here is the quote in full:
Look at the war in Iraq and the mess that we’re in. I would never have handled it that way. Does anybody really believe that Iraq is going to be a wonderful democracy where people are going to run down to the voting box and gently put in their ballot and the winner is happily going to step up to lead the country? C’mon. Two minutes after we leave, there’s going to be a revolution, and the meanest, toughest, smartest, most vicious guy will take over. And he’ll have weapons of mass destruction, which Saddam didn’t have.
“What was the purpose of this whole thing? Hundreds and hundreds of young people killed. And what about the people coming back with no arms and legs? Not to mention the other side. All those Iraqi kids who’ve been blown to pieces. And it turns out that all of the reasons for the war were blatantly wrong. All this for nothing.
So I have been clear for a long time that we should not have gone in. But I have been just as clear in saying what a catastrophic mistake Hillary Clinton and President Obama made with the reckless way in which they pulled out.
After we had made those hard-fought sacrifices and gains, we should never have made such a sudden withdrawal – on a timetable advertised to our enemies. Al Qaeda in Iraq had been decimated, and Obama and Clinton gave it new life and allowed it to spread across the world.
By that same token, President Obama and Hillary Clinton should never have attempted to build a Democracy in Libya, to push for immediate regime change in Syria or to support the overthrow of Mubarak in Egypt.
One more point on this: I have long said that we should have kept the oil in Iraq – another area where my judgment has been proven correct. According to CNN, ISIS made as much $500 million in oil sales in 2014 alone, fueling and funding its reign of terror. If we had controlled the oil, we could have prevented the rise of ISIS in Iraq – both by cutting off a major source of funding, and through the presence of U.S. forces necessary to safeguard the oil and other vital infrastructure. I was saying this constantly and to whoever would listen: keep the oil, keep the oil, keep the oil, I said – don’t let someone else get it.
If they had listened to me then, we would have had the economic benefits of the oil, which I wanted to use to help take care of the wounded soldiers and families of those who died – and thousands of lives would have been saved.
This proposal, by its very nature, would have left soldiers in place to guard our assets. In the old days, when we won a war, to the victor belonged the spoils. Instead, all we got from Iraq – and our adventures in the Middle East – was death, destruction and tremendous financial loss.
But it is time to put the mistakes of the past behind us, and chart a new course.
If I become President, the era of nation-building will be ended. Our new approach, which must be shared by both parties in America, by our allies overseas, and by our friends in the Middle East, must be to halt the spread of Radical Islam.
All actions should be oriented around this goal, and any country which shares this goal will be our ally. We cannot always choose our friends, but we can never fail to recognize our enemies.
As President, I will call for an international conference focused on this goal. We will work side-by-side with our friends in the Middle East, including our greatest ally, Israel. We will partner with King Abdullah of Jordan, and President Sisi of Egypt, and all others who recognize this ideology of death that must be extinguished.
We will also work closely with NATO on this new mission. I had previously said that NATO was obsolete because it failed to deal adequately with terrorism; since my comments they have changed their policy and now have a new division focused on terror threats.
I also believe that we could find common ground with Russia in the fight against ISIS. They too have much at stake in the outcome in Syria, and have had their own battles with Islamic terrorism.
My Administration will aggressively pursue joint and coalition military operations to crush and destroy ISIS, international cooperation to cutoff their funding, expanded intelligence sharing, and cyberwarfare to disrupt and disable their propaganda and recruiting. We cannot allow the internet to be used as a recruiting tool, and for other purposes, by our enemy – we must shut down their access to this form of communication, and we must do so immediately.
Unlike Hillary Clinton, who has risked so many lives with her careless handling of sensitive information, my Administration will not telegraph exact military plans to the enemy. I have often said that General MacArthur and General Patton would be in a state of shock if they were alive today to see the way President Obama and Hillary Clinton try to recklessly announce their every move before it happens – like they did in Iraq – so that the enemy can prepare and adapt.
The fight will not be limited to ISIS. We will decimate Al Qaeda, and we will seek to starve funding for Iran-backed Hamas and Hezbollah. We can use existing UN Security Council resolutions to apply new sanctions.
Military, cyber and financial warfare will all be essential in dismantling Islamic terrorism.
But we must use ideological warfare as well
Just as we won the Cold War, in part, by exposing the evils of communism and the virtues of free markets, so too must we take on the ideology of radical Islam.
While my opponent accepted millions of dollars in Foundation donations from countries where being gay is an offense punishable by prison or death, my Administration will speak out against the oppression of women, gays and people of different faith.
Our Administration will be a friend to all moderate Muslim reformers in the Middle East, and will amplify their voices.
This includes speaking out against the horrible practice of honor killings, where women are murdered by their relatives for dressing, marrying or acting in a way that violates fundamentalist teachings.
Over 1,000 Pakistani girls are estimated to be the victims of honor killings by their relatives each year. Recently, a prominent Pakistani social media star was strangled to death by her brother on the charge of dishonoring the family. In his confession, the brother took pride in the murder and said: “Girls are born to stay home and follow traditions.”
Shockingly, this is a practice that has reached our own shores.
One such case involves an Iraqi immigrant who was sentenced to 34 years in jail for running over his own daughter claiming she had become “too Westernized.”
To defeat Islamic terrorism, we must also speak out forcefully against a hateful ideology that provides the breeding ground for violence and terrorism to grow.
A new immigration policy is needed as well
The common thread linking the major Islamic terrorist attacks that have recently occurred on our soil – 9/11, the Ft. Hood shooting, the Boston bombing, the San Bernardino attack, the Orlando attack – is that they have involved immigrants or the children of immigrants.
Clearly, new screening procedures are needed[.]
A review by the U.S. Senate Immigration Subcommittee has identified 380 foreign-born individuals charged with terrorism or terrorism related offenses between 9/11 and 2014, and many more since then.
We also know that ISIS recruits refugees after their entrance into the country – as we have seen with the Somali refugee population in Minnesota.
Beyond terrorism, as we have seen in France, foreign populations have brought their anti-Semitic attitudes with them.
Pew polling shows that in many of the countries from which we draw large numbers of immigrants, extreme views about religion – such as the death penalty for those who leave the faith – are commonplace.
A Trump Administration will establish a clear principle that will govern all decisions pertaining to immigration: we should only admit into this country those who share our values and respect our people.
In the Cold War, we had an ideological screening test. The time is overdue to develop a new screening test for the threats we face today.
In addition to screening out all members or sympathizers of terrorist groups, we must also screen out any who have hostile attitudes towards our country or its principles – or who believe that Sharia law should supplant American law.
Those who do not believe in our Constitution, or who support bigotry and hatred, will not be admitted for immigration into the country.
Only those who we expect to flourish in our country – and to embrace a tolerant American society – should be issued visas.
To put these new procedures in place, we will have to temporarily suspend immigration from some of the most dangerous and volatile regions of the world that have a history of exporting terrorism.
As soon as I take office, I will ask the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security to identify a list of regions where adequate screening cannot take place. We will stop processing visas from those areas until such time as it is deemed safe to resume based on new circumstances or new procedures.
The size of current immigration flows are simply too large to perform adequate screening.
We admit about 100,000 permanent immigrants from the Middle East every year. Beyond that, we admit hundreds of thousands of temporary workers and visitors from the same regions. If we don’t control the numbers, we can’t perform adequate screening.
By contrast, my opponent wants to increase the flow of Syrian refugees by 550% percent.
The United States Senate Subcommittee on Immigration estimates that Hillary Clinton’s plan would mean roughly 620,000 refugees from all current refugee-sending nations in her first term, assuming no cuts to other refugee programs. This would be additional to all other nonrefugee immigration.
The Subcommittee estimates her plan would impose a lifetime cost of roughly $400 billion when you include the costs of healthcare, welfare, housing, schooling, and all other entitlement benefits that are excluded from the State Department’s placement figures.
In short, Hillary Clinton wants to be America’s Angela Merkel, and you know what a disaster this massive immigration has been to Germany and the people of Germany – crime has risen to levels that no one thought would they would ever see. We have enough problems in our country, we don’t need another one.
Finally, we will need to restore common sense to our security procedures.
Another common feature of the past attacks that have occurred on our soil is that warning signs were ignored.
The 9/11 hijackers had fraud all over their visa applications.
The Russians warned us about the Boston Bombers, here on political asylum, and the attackers were even twice interviewed by the FBI.
The female San Bernardino shooter, here on a fiancé visa from Saudi Arabia, wrote of her support for Jihad online. A neighbor saw suspicious behavior but didn’t warn authorities, because said they didn’t want to be accused of racially profiling – now many are dead and gravely wounded.
The shooter in Orlando reportedly celebrated in his classroom after 9/11. . He too was interviewed by the FBI. His father, a native of Afghanistan, supported the oppressive Taliban regime, and expressed anti-American views – and by the way, was just seen sitting behind Hillary Clinton with a big smile on his face all the way through her speech. He obviously liked what she had to say.
The Ft. Hood Shooter delivered a presentation to a room full of mental health experts before the attacks in which he threw out one red flag after another. He even proclaimed that “we love death more than you love life!”
These warnings signs were ignored because political correctness has replaced common sense in our society.
That is why one of my first acts as President will be to establish a Commission on Radical Islam – which will include reformist voices in the Muslim community who will hopefully work with us. We want to build bridges and erase divisions.
The goal of the commission will be to identify and explain to the American public the core convictions and beliefs of Radical Islam, to identify the warning signs of radicalization, and to expose the networks in our society that support radicalization.
This commission will be used to develop new protocols for local police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners.
We will also keep open Guantanamo Bay, and place a renewed emphasis on human intelligence. Drone strikes will remain part of our strategy, but we will also seek to capture high-value targets to gain needed information to dismantle their organizations. Foreign combatants will be tried in military commissions.
Finally, we will pursue aggressive criminal or immigration charges against anyone who lends material support to terrorism. Similar to the effort to take down the mafia, this will be the understood mission of every federal investigator and prosecutor in the country.
To accomplish a goal, you must state a mission: the support networks for Radical Islam in this country will be stripped out and removed one by one.
Immigration officers will also have their powers restored: those who are guests in our country that are preaching hate will be asked to return home.
To Make America Safe Again, We Must Work Together Again
Our victory in the Cold War relied on a bipartisan and international consensus. That is what we must have to defeat Radical Islamic terrorism.
But just like we couldn’t defeat communism without acknowledging that communism exists – or explaining its evils – we can’t defeat Radical Islamic Terrorism unless we do the same.
This also means we have to promote the exceptional virtues of our own way of life – and expecting that newcomers to our society do the same.
Pride in our institutions, our history and our values should be taught by parents and teachers, and impressed upon all who join our society.
Assimilation is not an act of hostility, but an expression of compassion. Our system of government, and our American culture, is the best in the world and will produce the best outcomes for all who adopt it.
This approach will not only make us safer, but bring us closer together as a country.
Renewing this spirit of Americanism will help heal the divisions in our country. It will do so by emphasizing what we have in common – not what pulls us apart.
This is my pledge to the American people: as your President I will be your greatest champion. I will fight to ensure that every American is treated equally, protected equally, and honored equally. We will reject bigotry and oppression in all its forms, and seek a new future built on our common culture and values as one American people.
Only this way, will we make America Great Again and Safe Again – For Everyone.
Thank you.
Source: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/donald-trump-terrorism-speech-227025
Appendix B: Selected Presidential Commissions, 1900-2016
Philippine Commission – “Taft Commission” (1900)
Commission on the Organization of Government Scientific Work (1903)
Committee on Department Methods – “Keep Commission” (1905–1909)
President’s Commission on Economy and Efficiency (1910–1912)
President’s Committee on Economic Security (CES) founded 1934
President’s Commission on Administrative Management – “Brownlow Committee” (1937)
Commission to Investigate the Japanese Attack on Pearl Harbor – a.k.a. “Roberts Commission” (1941)
President’s Committee on Civil Rights (1946)
President’s Scientific Research Board (1946)
Presidential Commission on Higher Education (1947)
Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government – Hoover Commission (1947)
President’s Committee on Equality of Treatment and Opportunity in the Armed Services (1948)
President’s Committee on Religious & Moral Welfare & Character Guidance in the Armed Forces (1948)
President’s Water Resources Policy Commission (1950)
President’s Communications Policy Board (1950)
President’s Commission on Migratory Labor (1950)
President’s Commission on Internal Security and Individual Rights (1951)
President’s Commission on the Health Needs of the Nation (1951)
President’s Commission on Immigration and Naturalization (1952)
Commission on Intergovernmental Relations – a.k.a. “Kestenbaum Commission” (1953)
Presidential Commission on the Status of Women (1961)
The President’s Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy – a.k.a. “Warren Commission” (1963)
President’s Review Committee for Development Planning in Alaska (1964)
President’s Commission on Crime in the District of Columbia (1965–1969)
President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice (1965–1969)
President’s Commission on Budget Concepts (1967–1969)
National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence (1969)
President’s Blue Ribbon Defense Panel (1969-1970) (urged 60% cuts in Pentagon staffs)
President’s Commission on Campus Unrest (1970)
President’s Commission on Financial Structure and Regulation – a.k.a. the “Hunt Commission” (1970-1971)
National Commission on Fire Prevention and Control (1971)
President’s Commission on Olympic Sports (1975)
U.S. President’s Commission on CIA activities within the United States – a.k.a. Rockefeller Commission (1975)
President’s Advisory Board on International Investment (1977)
Presidential Advisory Board on Ambassadorial Appointments (1977)
President’s Commission on Mental Health (1977)
President’s Commission on Military Compensation (1977)
President’s Commission on Foreign Language and International Studies (1978)
President’s Commission on the Coal Industry (1978)
President’s Commission on Pension Policy (1978)
Presidential Commission on World Hunger (1978)
President’s Commission on the Holocaust (1978)
President’s Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island (1979)
President’s Advisory Committee for Women (1979)
President’s Commission for a National Agenda for the Eighties (1979)
President’s Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine & Biomedical & Behavioral Research (1979)
Advisory Committee on Small and Minority Business Ownership (1980)
President’s Commission on United States-Liberian Relations (1980)
President’s Committee on the International Labor Organization (1980)
President’s Committee on Small Business Policy (1981)
President’s Council on Spinal Cord Injury (1981)
President’s Commission on Hostage Compensation (1981)
President’s Private Sector Survey on Cost Control – a.k.a. “Grace Commission” (1982)
National Commission on Excellence in Education (1983)
Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident – a.k.a. “Rogers Commission” (1986)
President’s Special Review Board (Iran-Contra) – a.k.a. “Tower Commission” (1986)
President’s Commission on Organized Crime (1986)
President’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Defense Management -a.ka. “Packard Commission” (1986)
President’s Commission on the HIV Epidemic (1987)
President’s commission on aviation security and terrorism (1990)
President’s Commission on Veterans Education (1996)
Presidential Advisory Commission on Holocaust Assets in the United States (1998)
President’s Commission To Strengthen Social Security (2001)
President’s Commission on Excellence in Special Education (2001)
Commission on the Future of the United States Aerospace Industry (2001)
National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States – a.k.a. 9/11 Commission (2002)
President’s Commission on the United States Postal Service (2002)
President’s Commission on Implementation of United States Space Exploration Policy (2004)
Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction (2005)
National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform (2010)
Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future (2010)
National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling (2010)
Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity (2016) – 12 members
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Appendix C: Sample Executive Order Creating a White House Commission on Radical Islam
White House Commission on Radical Islam
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered as follows:
Section 1. Establishment.
There is established the White House Commission on Radical Islam (the “Commission”).
Sec. 2. Membership.
(a) The Commission shall be composed of not more than [7-11] members who shall be appointed by the President those with experience in or representing Experts on Terrorism and Radical Islam, Voices for Reform of Islam, Current or Former Elected Officials, Representatives of Law Enforcement, Intelligence, Military and Diplomatic Communities, Representatives of the Technology Industry, Victims of Radical Islam and/or their Families, or any other area determined by the President to be of value to the Commission in carrying out its duties.
(b) The President shall designate from among the Commission members two members to serve as Co-Chairs.
Sec. 3. Mission.
The Commission shall hold field hearings at sites of important Islamist terror strikes and events revealing Islamist subversion, and in a series of separate reports:
(a) Explain to the public the core convictions of radical Islam
(b) Chart how Islamists recruit and deploy jihadis, as well as how they penetrate society with their doctrines, to expose the networks that support radicalization
(c) Develop new protocols for local police officers, federal investigators, and immigration screeners
(d) Examine “political correctness” and how we overcome it to deal with the problem of radical Islam in an honest, bipartisan and rational way
(e) Explore where radical Islam gets its resources and how they can be cut off
(f) Seek ways to counter Islamists’ use of the Internet; and
(g) Summarize how America and its allies can halt the spread of radical Islam and ultimately defeat it.
Sec. 4. Administration.
(a) The Commission shall be housed and officed in the Executive Office of the President.
(b) The Commission’s Chairman shall report in to the National Security Advisor
(c) The President shall name a designated liaison from the Commission to the Department of Justice (DOJ), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and Department of Defense (DOD)
(d) The Commission shall be empowered by a joint resolution of Congress to subpoena documents, compel testimony, and grant immunity, and be prepared that its reports may be used as evidence in later criminal proceedings.
(e) The President does hereby:
a. Delegate responsibility for evaluating and taking action, where appropriate, with respect to all public recommendations of the Commission to the National Security Advisor for all recommendations deemed appropriate by the Commission, pursuant to Section 6(a) of the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA)
b. Designate the GSA to provide fiscal and administrative support to the Commission pursuant to FACA Section 12
c. Provide for a two-year term, which may be renewed by the President or National Security Advisor by appropriate action prior to the expiration of such two-year period pursuant to FACA Section 14.
Sec. 5. General Provisions.
(a) To the extent permitted by law, and subject to the availability of appropriations, the relevant Agencies shall provide the Commission with such administrative services, funds, facilities, staff, and other support services as may be necessary to carry out its mission.
(b) Insofar as the Federal Advisory Committee Act, as amended (5 U.S.C. App.) (the “Act”), may apply to the Commission, any functions of the President under that Act, except for those in section 6 of the Act, shall be performed by the Administrator of General Services.
(c) The Members of the Commission, if otherwise uncompensated for their service, shall serve with compensation for their work on the Commission at Executive Schedule Level 2, and shall be allowed travel expenses, including per diem in lieu of subsistence, to the extent permitted by law for persons serving intermittently in the Government service (5 U.S.C. 5701-5707).
(d) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(1) authority granted by law to a department, agency, or the head thereof; or
(2) functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(e) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
[signed]
Donald J. Trump
The White House,
[date].
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Appendix D: The Case of the United Kingdom
In the United Kingdom, according to Sam Westrop, currently Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute and the former head of UK-based non-governmental organization (NGO) Stand For Peace:
1. Policy was until early 2009 soft on Islamist organizations, including those close to or backed by Jamaat-e-Islami,[89] originally founded in British India in 1941 by Sayyid Abul A’la Maududi with the original objective of establishing “God’s governance,” out of concern that the result of the existing Muslim League program would “not be an Islamic state based on the Sharia but a mirror image of Godless, Western, secular democracy.”[90]
2. The group followed Indian Muslim, and then Pakistani, immigration to the UK, and is now regarded as one of the two primary sources of Islamist thought and organizations worldwide, along with the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood.[91]
3. The UK decided not just to engage with Islamists like these but actually give them money as well, which also included local and police grants that likely ran into the tens of millions of pounds, [92] and which continued even after the 7/7 attacks in London.
4. That changed in 2009, when it emerged that Daud Abdullah, the head of the Muslim Council of Britain, had signed what was known as the Istanbul Declaration, [93] which denounced “this malicious Jewish Zionist war over Gaza.”[94]
5. In response, there were immediate calls to cease funding MCB and other Islamist causes, including from at least one reformist Muslim, Irfan Al Alawi, international director of the Centre for Islamic Pluralism.[95]
6. The UK government began to say to itself, “Maybe we’ve been funding the wrong people,” according to the former head of the UK-based NGO. After the incident, left-leaning journalists investigated and found that the UK government had been giving money to all sorts of hateful and violent Islamists, which was particularly damaging as the Labor Party entered new elections. What the UK learned at that time was that Islam in the country was incredibly diverse, with hundreds of political sects – and that “Islamists did not represent ordinary Muslims, who didn’t like or care about the groups purporting to speak for them.” [96]
7. In a 2007 poll, for instance, a towering 94% of British Muslims said that they did not believe that the MCB, for instance, represented their views.[97]
8. The lessons culminated when UK Conservative leader David Cameron gave a speech saying flatly that the multicultural strategy the UK had employed relative to Islamism had failed. The UK realized that their approach had been “a bit like turning an anti-Skinhead program over to right-wing groups,” said the former UK NGO head. In response, the UK “government started rolling back every form of perceived understanding about how to approach the issue” – in particular, defunding the groups associated with Salafi, Deobandi, and Muslim Brotherhood Islamism. Some Islamist charities have had millions in tax-exempt pounds pulled back from them. The government “changed almost completely the CVE” program that it had put together. Today, the UK government refuses to meet with or speak to MCB. By now, both the British and French governments have realized that there’s no point in talking to them, because “When you work with them, you’re abandoning Muslim voices to the Islamists.”[98]
About the Author
Christopher C. Hull, Ph.D., is the President and Campaign Manager of IMI, in which capacity he has just completed an 18-month contract running the Counter Jihad Campaign for the Center for Security Policy.
Dr. Hull is a former chief of staff for Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, in which capacity he was the internal point person for the Iowa Freedom Summit, which brought a dozen-odd potential presidential candidates to the Hawkeye State in early 2015 and helped launch the 2016 nomination contest.
Before joining Rep. King, he spent 15 years in public affairs, including founding his own online lobbying technology company and serving as Senior Vice President and Campaign Manager, U.S. Public Affairs, at Hill & Knowlton.
Before moving to public affairs, Chris held politics and policy positions, serving as a press secretary in the U.S. House of Representatives, a legislative assistant in the U.S. Senate, a communications aide in a national party committee, a researcher in a major think tank, and the majority staff director of a state Senate.
Dr. Hull holds a doctorate in government with distinction from Georgetown University and an undergraduate degree magna cum laude, also in government, from Harvard University. He is the author of Grassroots Rules: How the Iowa Caucuses Help Elect American Presidents, published by Stanford University Press in November, 2007.
He has been published or quoted in television, print, radio and online outlets including the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, USA Today, NPR, MSNBC, Bloomberg, Reuters, National Journal, CNBC, The Hill, Hotline, New York Newsday and U.S. News & World Report.
________________________________________
[1] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016. Note that the term “radical Islam” is itself a recommended topic for the Commission to consider.
[2] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[3] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[4] Julia Edwards Ainsley et al., “Exclusive: Trump to focus counter-extremism program solely on Islam – sources,” Reuters, February 2, 2017, accessed February 2, 2017.
[5] See Pub.L. 92−463, 86 Stat. 770, as amended, Section 6(a).
[6] See Pub.L. 92−463, 86 Stat. 770, as amended, Section 12.
[7] See Pub.L. 92−463, 86 Stat. 770, as amended, Section 14.
[8] See Pub.L. 92−463, 86 Stat. 770, as amended, Section 9(c).
[9] See S.J.Res. 80 — 96th Congress: A joint resolution to confer certain powers on the Presidential Commission appointed to investigate the …”
[10] Alan A. Block, “The Origins of Iran-CONTRA,” The Organized Crime Community: Essays in Honor of Alan A. Block (Springer Science & Business Media, 2007), ed. Frank Bovenkerk and Michael Levi, p. 2.
[11] See Appendix B: Selected Presidential Commissions, 1900-2016.
[12] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[13] P. David Gaubatz and Paul Sperry, Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That’s Conspiring to Islamize America (Los Angeles: WND Books, 2009).
[14] “A Short Course, Part 13: The Holy Land Trial: On the Trail of the Muslim Brotherhood” Shariah: The Threat to America, Report of Team B II (Washington, D.C.: The Center for Security Policy, 2010), accessed January 16, 2017.
[15] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[16] See Kenneth Kitts, Presidential Commissions and National Security: The Politics of Damage Control (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2005).
[17] Interview by author with former Reagan Defense Department official, January 17, 2017.
[18] Interview by author with former Reagan Defense Department official, January 17, 2017; see also Richard Pipes, “Team B: The Reality Behind the Myth,” Commentary Magazine, 82 (4), October 1, 1986.
[19] “America’s Cold War victory” is used to refer to the consensus that the Soviet bloc’s collapse marked an important turn of the tide in international affairs, not to imply a belief that America did, or has, won the ideological battle with Marxism or its multiple mutant offspring.
[20] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[21] The original list of beliefs on which the following list is based was compiled by staff at the Center for Security Policy, July 28, 2016. Note that all sources are to original Islamic texts and readers are encouraged to verify them for themselves.
[22] Sahih al-Bukhari, “Bab al Janaiz, Vol. 2, p. 90; Vol. 3, “Bab al Wakalah fi al Hudud”, p. 65; Vol. 7, “Kitab al Ayman”, p. 218; Vol. 8, “Bab al Rajm,” pp. 24. 29. 34, 135; Sunan Al Tirmidhi, “Kitab al Hudud”, Vol. 4, pp. 27, 33, 34.
[23] Qur’an 24:4-5.
[24] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section o12.0, The Penalty for Fornication or Sodomy, p. 610-11.
[25] Qur’an 16:106.
[26] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section o1.2, pp. 583-84.
[27] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book E, Purification, Section e4.3, pg. 59.
[28] Qur’an 2:282.
[29] Qur’an 4:11.
[30] Qur’an 4:34.
[31] Qur’an 65:4.
[32] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book M, Marriage, Section m3.4, p. 518-9.
[33] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book M, Marriage, Section m10.4, p. 538; Section m3.7, p. 520.
[34] “Tahrirolvasyleh, Fourth Edition, Darol Elm, Qom” by Ayatollah Khomeini.
[35] Qur’an 4:3.
[36] Qur’an 2:223.
[37] Qur’an 23:5, Qur’an 70:30, Sahih Bukhari, Vol. 7, p. 137.
[38] Qur’an 33:50, Qur’an 23:5.
[39] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section 01.2, p. 584; Book O, Justice, Section o9.0, Jihad, p. 599, Qur’an 8:39.
[40] Qur’an 47:4.
[41] Qur’an 5:38-39.
[42] Qur’an 24:2
[43] Sahih Al Bukhari, “Kitab al Hudud”, Vol. 8, pp. 13, 14, 15.
[44] Reliance of the Traveler/Umdat al-Salik, Book R, Holding One’s Tongue, Section r2.0, Slander, p. 730; Qur’an 49:12; Qur’an 104.1; Qur’an 68:11.
[45] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section o11.0, Non-Muslim Subjects of the Islamic State (Ahl al-Dhimma), p. 607-9 (Pact of Umar).
[46] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book O, Justice, Section o11.0, Non-Muslim Subjects of the Islamic State (Ahl al-Dhimma), p. 607-9 (Pact of Umar).
[47] Qur’an 8:39.
[48] Qur’an 8:39; Qur’an 9:5; Qur’an 9:29.
[49] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book M, Marriage, Section m2.3, p 512; Section m2.7, pg. 513.
[50] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book M, Marriage, Section m2.3, p. 512.
[51] Qur’an 5:3; Qur’an 6:118-9.
[52] Qur’an 2:183-5.
[53] Qur’an 2:65, Qur’an 5:60, Qur’an 7:166.
[54] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book R, Holding One’s Tongue, Section r7.0, Giving Directions to Someone Who Wants To Do Wrong, p. 743-44.
[55] Reliance of the Traveler/’Umdat al-Salik, Book R, Holding One’s Tongue, Section r8.0, Lying, p. 744-46.
[56] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[57] The Clarion Project, “Islamist Organizations in America,” accessed January 25, 2017.
[58] “List of Unindicted Co-conspirators and/or Joint Venturers,” Attachment A, U.S. vs. Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, et al.
[59] Daniel Pipes, “That List of Islamist Organizations under U.S. Senate Scrutiny,” Middle East Forum, originally posted January 14, 2004, updated December 14, 2005, accessed January 25, 2017.
[60] Interview with author of scholarly work on the psychology of terrorism, January 18, 2017.
[61] Interview with author of scholarly work on the psychology of terrorism, January 18, 2017.
[62] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[63] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[64] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[65] Johanna Markind ,”Islamism Responsible for More U.S. Murders than ‘Right-Wing’ Extremism,” Independent Journal Review, January 24, 2016, accessed January 25, 2017.
[66] Peter Bergen et al., “International Security In Depth: Terrorism in America After 9/11,” New America Foundation, accessed January 25, 2017.
[67] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[68] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016. Note that the term “radical Islam” is itself a recommended topic for the Commission to consider.
[69] Interview by the author with former Defense Department official with experience in Irregular Warfare Section and Combatting Terrorism and Technical Support Office, January 28, 2017.
[70] A. Ross Johnson, “RFE/RL History,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, December 2008, ed. Martins Zvaners, accessed January 30, 2017.
[71] See Team Herman, “The world’s most patriotic American hacker, the Jester, gives first ever radio interview,” MYNorthwest.com, November 15, 2016; Kim Zetter, “An Unprecedented Look at Stuxnet, the World’s First Digital Weapon,” November 3, 2014; “Group: APT29, The Dukes, Cozy Bear,” ATT&CK (Adversarial Tactics, Techniques, and Common Knowledge), all accessed January 27, 2017.
[72] Nadya Labi, “Jihad 2.0,” The Atlantic, July/August 2006 Issue, accessed January 27, 2017.
[73] See e.g. Howie, “Meanwhile in Austria,” The Jawa Report, posted January 26, 2017, accessed January 27, 2017; Howie, “Banned From Jihadtube :Boobies; Not banned from Jihadtube, Death to America,” The Jawa Report, posted January 23, 2017, accessed January 27, 2017.
[74] Interview by author with Member of Congress and chairman of relevant subcommittee, January 5, 2017.
[75] Interview by author with Member of Congress and chairman of relevant subcommittee, January 5, 2017.
[76] Mike Pompeo and David B. Rivkin, Jr., “Time for a Rigorous National Debate About Surveillance,” Wall Street Journal, January 3, 2016, accessed January 30, 2017.
[77] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[78] These seven points were drawn from an interview by the author with a Member of Congress and chairman of relevant subcommittee, January 5, 2017.
[79] Interview by author with former Reagan Defense Department official, January 17, 2017.
[80] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[81] Politico staff, “Full text: Donald Trump’s speech on fighting terrorism,” August 15, 2016, accessed December 9, 2016.
[82] Interview by author with information warfare expert in the counter-terror space, January 18, 2017.
[83] Interview by author with reform-minded Muslim national leader, January 16, 2017.
[84] Interview by author with Founding Member of the Department of Homeland Security, January 16, 2017.
[85] Interview by author with information warfare expert in the counter-terror space, January 18, 2017.
[86] Interview by author with reform-minded Muslim national leader, January 16, 2017.
[87] A. Aaron Weisburd, LinkedIn profile, accessed January 27, 2017.
[88] See Pub.L. 92−463, 86 Stat. 770, as amended, Section 6(a).
[89] Interview by author with Sam Westrop, former head, Stand For Peace, a UK-based non-governmental organization (NGO), January 16, 2017; see also Kurt Barling, “What’s the risk to London?” BBC, May 15, 2008, accessed January 19, 2017.
[90] Irfan Ahmad, “The Jewish hand and the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind,” in Peter van der Veer and Shoma Munshi (eds.), Media, War, and Terrorism: Responses from the Middle East and Asia (London: Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004), p. 138.
[91] Olivier Roy, The Failure of Political Islam. (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1994), p. 35. “The origins of today’s Islamist thought and organisations can be traced to the Society of the Muslim Brotherhood, created by the school teacher Hasan al-Banna in Egypt in 1928, and the Jamaat-i-Islami of Pakistan, established by [Sayyid Abul A’la Maududi].”
[92] Interview by author with Sam Westrop, former head, Stand For Peace, a UK-based non-governmental organization (NGO), January 16, 2017.
[93] Jamie Doward, “British Muslim leader urged to quit over Gaza,” The Guardian (London), March 8, 2009, accessed January 19, 2017.
[94] Vikram Dodd, ‘Muslim Council accuses government of undermining independence,’ The Guardian (London), March 26, 2009, accessed January 19, 2017.
[95] Jamie Doward, “British Muslim leader urged to quit over Gaza,” The Guardian (London), March 8, 2009, accessed January 19, 2017.
[96] Interview by author with Sam Westrop, former head, Stand For Peace, a UK-based non-governmental organization (NGO), January 16, 2017.
[97] Sam Westrop, “UK: Multiculturalism vs. Islamism,” Gatestone Institute, April 18, 2014, accessed January 19, 2017.
[98] Interview by author with Sam Westrop, former head, Stand For Peace, a UK-based non-governmental organization (NGO), January 16, 2017.
The Wall Street Journal – Opinion
A Beautiful Oath, Sullied by Politics
The Obama administration opens a loophole for new citizens unwilling to ‘bear arms’ to defend America
By Christopher C. Hull
Aug. 4, 2015 7:28 p.m. ET
My wife Val became an American citizen on June 9. I would tell you the naturalization ceremony was moving and that I was rapt throughout, but most of the time I was chasing our 2-year-old son in the hallway outside.
Please see the link for the full story.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-beautiful-oath-sullied-by-politics-1438730914
U.S. News and World report.
Nuke the Deal
The president ran a U.N. end-run around Congress, now the legislature must reassert itself.
By Christopher Hull, Contributor July 22, 2015, at 2:45 p.m.
Congress should seize the opportunity provided by the Obama administration’s missteps on the Iran nuclear deal to defeat the deal using its constitutional authority, rather than relying on an agreed-upon process that President Barack Obama effectively mooted by seeking United Nations approval first and which his administration seems to have already violated.
Back on May 7, the Senate voted 98-1 to pass a framework under which to consider the then-forthcoming Iran deal. It had been negotiated with Sens. Bob Corker of Tennessee and Ben Cardin of Maryland, the chairman and top Democrat, respectively, on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Corker-Cardin agreement – which is of dubious constitutionality – set up an arbitrary process that leaned heavily toward the president, giving Congress 60 days to review the Iran deal, and requiring an affirmative vote to defeat it, which Obama could veto.
As a result, assuming Obama would indeed veto such a measure as he insists he would, the threshold Iran deal opponents must reach to defeat it under Corker-Cardin is a two-thirds majority in both the House and the Senate, the proportion necessary to override a veto.
Until this week, Democrats and even many Republicans might have been loath to set aside the Corker-Cardin process, considering the overwhelming margin by which it was passed. Those who voted for the bill ultimately even included Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, a leading voice against the deal, who said at the time that the legislation “may delay, slightly, President Obama’s ability to lift the Iran sanctions and it ensures we will have a Congressional debate on the merits of the Iran deal.”
Except that now it won’t.
That’s because Monday morning, the U.N. Security Council approved the Iran deal, without waiting for the U.S. Congress to consider it. This in spite of Corker and Cardin imploring the president to wait for their process to take place. In a letter to the president last week, they quoted Obama’s own words back to him, arguing that the U.N. reviewing the agreement before the Congress “would be contrary to your statement that ‘it’s important for the American people and Congress to get a full opportunity to review this deal … our national security policies are stronger and more effective when they are subject to the scrutiny and transparency that democracy demands.’”
But he didn’t wait.
Regardless, the death knell of the Corker-Cardin process may have been sounded Tuesday night, when Kansas Rep. Mike Pompeo and Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, both Republicans, revealed that the Iran deal includes secret side-agreements the Obama administration appears to have deliberately withheld from Congress. That move is a prima facie violation of Corker-Cardin, which mandates that the administration provide everything to Congress, namely the “annexes, appendices, codicils, side agreements, implementing materials, documents, and guidance, technical or other understandings and any related agreements, whether entered into or implemented prior to the agreement or to be entered into or implemented in the future.”
Apparently the administration didn’t.
So now is the time to act for the Iran deal’s growing number of opponents. Here’s how Congress can reassert itself and kill this deal, in five easy steps:
First House and Senate Members should immediately introduce a concurrent resolution deeming that for Congress’ internal purposes, the Iran deal is a treaty. A concurrent resolution lacks the force of law, but who cares? So does the president deeming his deal as not a treaty. Such resolutions, as the Senate’s website notes, are “used to express the sentiments of both of the houses.” The Budget Resolution is an example of how they are used – they determine the parameters of how an issue will be considered within the context of Congress.
Granted, to do so, the Senate must reach 60 votes, to overcome an expected filibuster by the president’s supporters. But such a move would have to be bipartisan anyway. So the resolution should be put on the table in the House first and, second, House Democrats who have expressed serious concerns about the Iran deal should be brought into a room to discuss it. There’s at least a baker’s dozen of Democratic lawmakers who have raised these concerns and insisted that Congress have a voice in this process: Steny Hoyer of Maryland, Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii, Eliot Engel, Nita Lowey, Grace Meng and Steve Israel of New York, Brad Sherman and Adam Schiff of California, Dan Lipinski of Illinois, Ann Kirkpatrick of Arizona, Albio Sires of New Jersey, and Ted Deutch and Alan Grayson of Florida.
This group is most likely to be willing to stand up to the president’s end run. And they would help eliminate cover for the rest of the caucus: Were they to support the concurrent resolution, no pro-Israel member, no moderate Democrat and no Hoyer loyalist would be safe opposing it.
As the House is in talks, the Senate should, third, bring a group together, too. Republicans could convene it, and invite such middle-ground GOPers as Sens. Rob Portman of Ohio, Susan Collins of Maine, Jeff Flake of Arizona and of course Corker himself. But the invitation list should also include Democrats like Ben Cardin of Maryland, Charles Schumer of New York, Bob Menendez and Cory Booker of New Jersey, Gary Peters of Michigan, Ron Wyden of Oregon, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Jon Tester of Montana, Tom Udall of New Mexico, Chris Coons of Delaware and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut.
Again, these are Democrats who have expressed the most concern about the Iran deal. A meeting with them could tease out the subgroup of six that could agree on language and seal the deal. In the context of a bipartisan House vote, getting to six in this list should be achievable.
Fourth, once they have reached agreement with the support of all 54 Republicans and at least six Democrats, the Senate could bring up the concurrent resolution, end debate and pass it.
[
READ:
What Now for Israel ]
This would mean that, fifth, in Congress’ eyes at least, the Iran deal is a treaty meaning that it requires a two-thirds majority to ratify it. That means the final step is to bring up the deal in the Senate and defeat it, requiring only 34 votes to do so.
It is likely that the president would refuse to accept the result of Congress’ action, since the concurrent resolution would not have the force of law. The Security Council has already acted, after all. He may simply go about his business, doing everything under the law he can to ease sanctions on Iran – and potentially more than that.
Likewise, China and Russia are likely to move forward with sanctions relief, since they are likely to begin arms shipments and other trade to the rogue Iranian state as quickly as possible.
[
READ:
If North Korea Got the Bomb, Iran Will Too ]
But the Obama administration has already made clear that even if Congress defeats the deal, it expects the sanctions regime to collapse anyway, since the deal does not provide for approval by appropriate legislative bodies within the signatories – except, of course, in Iran and the United Nations, which astonishingly enough the deal explicitly provides for without mentioning the U.S. Congress.
What’s more, the resolution requires 90 days before going into effect. By the time it does, it could be a dead letter – at least with respect to the United States. That is, the Congress will already have denied U.S. sanctions relief required under the deal. Will Iran’s legislature-like body, controlled by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, approve the deal under those circumstances? Will the European Union?
If not, sanctions relief would be only partial, and limited to aggressive players on the world stage.
So the best choice Congress has is to make clear what its position is, and conform to the Constitution rather than to a mooted and violated process that may not meet legal muster anyway. And regardless of the legal merits, every other nation on earth would know that this deal will only last as long as Barack Obama is president.
After all, even Hillary Clinton is now hedging her bets…
Christopher Hull, Contributor
Curbing politicization, returning now to espionage
Why CIA must stay out of politics and get back to the espionage business
By Brad Johnson – – Thursday, September 13, 2018
ANALYSIS/OPINION:
Former CIA Director John Brennan recently lost his top secret security clearance, a move that will negatively impact his ability to make money in the lucrative world of U.S. government contracting.
Mr. Brennan complained bitterly that his First Amendment free speech rights were violated by the action — a ridiculous argument since Mr. Brennan remains a paid commentator and speaks his mind freely on NBC and MSNBCnational news networks seemingly at will. In fact, the lack of a clearance will enhance Mr. Brennan’s ability to speak out on issues he thinks are important.
Not being read in to current intelligence means Mr. Brennan needs to worry less about mixing classified information with his on-air remarks or tweets and thus lowers the risk of breaking the law.
A more likely hidden agenda behind Mr. Brennan’s anger toward President Trump for pulling his clearance is that no longer belonging the club of those with access to secrets will complicate any plans by the former CIA director to hold in-depth discussions with close associates who now fill the senior ranks at the CIA.
Few outside the agency know of Mr. Brennan’s stunning success in consolidating both a disastrous vision of CIAmodernization and in placing close associates into current senior intelligence positions.
Mr. Brennan made no secret of his plan to stay on at CIA had Hillary Clinton won the election 2016. And his reforms and supporters at the agency kept him in a position to be politically relevant had he maintained his clearance.
The courageous move by Mr. Trump to buck the intelligence bureaucracy and strip Mr. Brennan of the security clearance so far is the only initiative taken by the president to curb politicization at CIA. That politicization, including in intelligence reporting, reached its zenith under Mr. Brennan.
Mr. Trump seems unaware that the CIA deck is now solidly stacked against him. The agency is now in a position to become potentially a strong force in the current highly charged political environment.
The Brennan modernization plan implemented during his four years at CIA helped to better organize the CIA’s cyber warfare capabilities, as was widely announced.
But the reforms did so at the cost of nearly eliminating entirely CIA’s ability to conduct unilateral foreign espionage operations. Espionage — the stealing of secrets in support of national security — before Mr. Brennan was a central focus of CIA and the reason for its founding after World War II. It remains a key element of American national security.
The people who came up through the ranks of Mr. Brennan’s politicized CIA, however, continue to hold high-level positions. Current Director Gina Haspel selected Vaughn F. Bishop as CIA deputy director. Mr. Bishop was handpicked by Mrs. Haspel in an extraordinarily unusual and possibly unique decision that brought Mr. Bishop out of retirement for the second time to fill a senior position at CIA. Mr. Bishop previously was also handpicked by Mr. Brennan and brought out of retirement to serve in a key position as ombudsman for the Brennan modernization program announced in 2015.
The No. 3 position at the CIA, the chief operating officer (COO), also was recently announced by Mrs. Haspel. He is Andrew Makridis, who was also called back from retirement. Mr. Makridis, like Mr. Bishop, also was selected by Mr. Brennan to fill another key CIA position as head of the task force that implemented the entire modernization program. The selected but not yet publicly named head of intelligence for the National Security Council (NSC) also is a favorite of Mrs. Haspel and, again, is said to be a close Brennan associate.
Earlier in her career, Mrs. Haspel was selected for a second tour in London as chief of station, a highly unusual move. Mrs. Haspel has never been asked or offered any comment on whether she had any role in the now-infamous Christopher Steele anti-Trump political dossier even though she served two stints as station chief in London, the point of origin of the Steele dossier. Knowing the capabilities of British domestic and foreign intelligence, it is unlikely Mr. Steele produced the dossier without the knowledge and perhaps the connivance of M-6 and M-5.
During her Senate confirmation hearings, Mrs. Haspel made clear she intends to double down in supporting the short-sighted, anti-espionage reform that is the Brennan modernization program.
Mrs. Haspel rounded out her leadership team in filling the ranks of the CIA with Mr. Brennan’s acolytes by choosing a career CIA officer to be the new chief diversity and inclusion officer, a senior and influential position.
It is deeply revealing of intelligence priorities that CIA has created a senior leadership position for diversity issues but lacked an equivalent senior leadership post for unilateral espionage activities.
Nearly every country in the world of any significance runs espionage operations against the United States, including some of our closest allies. And a strong espionage program is absolutely fundamental to our national security.
CIA urgently needs to reform its espionage operations to produce real intelligence about an increasingly dangerous world. America’s national security depends on it.
• Brad Johnson is a retired CIA station chief and operations officer, and president of Americans for Intelligence Reform.
Copyright © 2018 The Washington Times, LLC.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/sep/13/curbing-politicization-returning-now-to-espionage/
By Brad Johnson – – Wednesday, April 25, 2018
A group of former senior intelligence officials recently published a letter supporting Deputy CIA Director Gina Haspel as the nominee to be the next CIA director.
Critics of Ms. Haspel have focused most of their questions about her suitability for the position on her past role in the agency’s interrogation programs for captured terrorists after the September 11 attacks.
The debate so far is largely centered on the past and has ignored important questions about whether Ms. Haspel is the right person to bring much-needed reform to the CIA in the aftermath of disastrous reforms put in place under the administration of President Barack Obama.
A key indicator of concerns that should be raised about Ms. Haspel is the endorsement she received from Mr. Obama’s CIA director, John Brennan, who has revealed himself a bitter partisan and critic of President Trump.
During his tenure as CIA director, Mr. Brennan worked closely with Ms. Haspel in drafting and launching the CIA’s so-called “modernization” plan.
As someone who spent a career in the shadowy world of intelligence, I can attest this damaging modernization went largely unnoticed by the public and never received the attention it should have from the agency’s congressional overseers and the public. The Brennan reforms will have a long-term impact by severely limiting the CIA’s espionage capabilities — and they should be reversed by the next CIA director.
Under Mr. Brennan and with the support of Ms. Haspel, the modernization plan systematically dismantled and destroyed the CIA’s operations division — the heart of the agency’s critical mission of using people to steal vital secrets around the world.
To avoid critical reaction, the weakening of the CIA’s operations branch was disguised under the modernization program by announcing with great fanfare the creation of a new Directorate of Digital Innovation. The new bureaucratic entity sought to redirect the agency toward using cyber capabilities as a key intelligence-gathering tool.
Historically, the operations division was staffed by an elite cadre of highly trained specialists schooled in the dark arts of espionage and capable of operating around the world — from places like Beirut to Beijing.
Many of us who devoted our lives and careers to the clandestine service as CIA operations officers were shocked to hear Mr. Brennan announce two years ago that based on his modernization plan he no longer regards CIA as being in the espionage business. “We don’t steal secrets,” Mr. Brennan astonishingly revealed in an interview with NPR.
Instead of bolstering traditional espionage work, the CIA modernization plan limited the agency’s use of recruited spies and agents as sources of the human-based information America urgently needs to support its national security interests.
The Brennan plan instead called for other nations’ intelligence services to provide the CIA with spies as intelligence collectors. This is tantamount to the Air Force giving up its aircraft, or the Navy mothballing its fleets in order to rely on overseas friends to supply aircraft and ships when the United States needs them.
Real espionage involves first and foremost the recruitment of spies or reporting sources who steal information from other countries or organizations such as terrorists and foreign government.
An important feature of this process is that no one should know that our spies are stealing the information. Keeping the operations clandestine is fundamental to the credibility and reliability of the information. It’s like playing a hand of poker and knowing the cards held by other players without them knowing about it. Unilateral intelligence sources are the coin of the realm in the intelligence business and cannot be matched by the current emphasis of relying on liaison with friendly services.
When another intelligence service arranges for their spies to supply sources for CIA, the origin of the information is known to them and there is no way to control who else receives it. In a worst-case scenario, the intelligence will be compromised by these foreign states’ sources mixing damaging disinformation with reliable intelligence.
Perhaps the deadliest example of this over-reliance of foreign sources was the 2009 suicide bombing of a CIA operating base in Afghanistan. Seven CIA officers and contractors were killed when a terrorist double agent who was trusted by Jordan’s intelligence service blew himself up at the base.
Continuing this policy relying on foreign services would be just as unreliable as asking “overseas friends” to dispatch aircraft and ships on behalf of the United States in a crisis or conflict.
During the past year that Ms. Haspel has been CIA deputy director and running the agency’s day-to-day operations, she has done nothing to turn this dire situation around.
The problem can be seen in the CIA’s training facility near Williamsburg, Virginia, known as The Farm.
The facility is where future CIA officers are trained and under the Brennan modernization program, training was so denigrated that its courses have become a disastrous mishmash of half-baked concepts guaranteed to further diminish vital American espionage capabilities.
A more damaging aspect of the problem would be if these foreign-origin reporting sources were passed off to the White House and congressional oversight officials as CIA sources who were unilateral spies instead of merely contacts provided to the agency by other countries.
For those like Mr. Brennan who believe the CIA should not be stealing secrets, this process could be subverted into a paperwork exercise of running these faux overseas contacts through a seemingly legitimate source validation process and categorizing them as “recruited assets.”
This could be done in a bid to make the CIA appear to have its own recruited sources other than what they actually are and allow senior agency officials to assert that the CIA is on the right track and getting back to the basics of espionage.
The Senate, as it reviews Ms. Haspel’s qualifications to be CIA director, needs to take a closer look at the nominee and know clearly that she was part of a damaging CIA reform program. The Brennan modernization was a step backward and should not be continued as the United States confronts a growing array of threats that require the best intelligence support possible.
Copyright © 2018 The Washington Times
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/apr/25/fixing-a-weakened-espionage-brand/
Published by The Millennial Review By Brad Johnson - June 13, 2017 God, Country, Honor. Several years after retiring from a 25-year career with the CIA, I started a company which often works with the US Military. As many of you may be aware, the military has a custom of challenge coins, a self-designed coin which represents the unit and its traditions. It soon became very common to exchange coins between units and the custom has grown to include almost every government and law enforcement agency and even many associations or private companies. It has even spread to other countries. Doing business with the military, it made sense to design a coin of my own. Having a company logo, it became the front of the coin. The back however required thought. I chose the American Eagle for the center and ultimately, I selected the words God, Country, Honor to surround it because they were the words that I carried with me overseas often during periods of armed conflict. I immediately received pushback for the selection of these words. Honor. Taking personal responsibility for what you do and say, knowing the difference between right and wrong. If given too much change in a store, do you return the extra money? Do you balance other responsibilities to dedicate the time and energy to your family and loved ones they deserve from you? Do you treat your friends fairly and with respect? Do you defend yourself and others when they are wronged? Perhaps small things but this is where honor is nurtured and grows. Bravery is often born from honor, the ability to act even though you are afraid or disadvantaged. Chick-fil-A fast food restaurants are closed on Sundays to allow employees to attend church services and spend Sundays with their family and friends. To do this they give up the revenue they would earn on what is one of the largest sales days and suffer wide spread criticism from the left. Brave and honorable behavior. Country. US exceptionalism springs from The US Constitution, a document which represents something much more than just ourselves and is the greatest document ever written by man for man. I would be happy to accept the argument that there was a healthy dose of divine inspiration included. I swore an oath to uphold and protect the Constitution which is under constant assault by many on the left here in the US who would undermine it. Although retired from the CIA, I am still dedicated to this purpose. It provides the framework of freedom which has given rise to more individual wealth and social justice than at any other time in the history of mankind. Those laws and freedoms that let us live our lives as we wish, to keep the fruits of our labor, to be the best we can be, all flow from our Constitution. Even though we as individuals will be forgotten, our efforts even now are a beacon of light all around the world and this light will shine for some 1,000 years out into the future and inspire greater peace and prosperity for our distant descendants. God. Oddly the word that should require the least comment, instead engenders the most pushback. In the simplest of terms, religion is a belief system which among other things, provides a moral compass. Very active leftist Atheist and Agnostic groups in the United States wish to eradicate Christianity from any visible place in our culture. Even if one should choose a life without religion and to ignore the first four of the ten commandments, why throw out the moral teachings as well? Honor your parents? Don’t lie, steal, commit murder or adultery or covet that which is not yours? I personally refer to these building block concepts of faith as "core values" and having a place in our culture should be supported by all. The central mission of the CIA is to recruit people to spy for us and provide information that we have no other way to obtain. The activity is Human Intelligence (HUMINT) or espionage and is a key capability which impacts almost every aspect of National Security and is an important part of keeping our country safe. When HUMINT sources or spies are recruited both the CIA officer and the individual often put their lives at risk. Both the ability to successfully ask someone to take these sorts of risks and working through the moral and ethical questions to accomplish this are directly linked to core values. This can be summed up in a simple question, why would someone trust you with his/her life if they cannot see in you a core faith that makes you reliable and trustworthy whether they share your values or not. Take the word of a dedicated patriot when I say we are a better and safer place for these three little words.