World's Number One Terrorist flagging China as security challenge! What a joke?

NATO to target China – Stoltenberg

Beijing poses a “systemic challenge to security,” according to Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. 
NATO plans to deepen its cooperation with partners in Asia as a response to a rising “security challenge” coming from China, which refuses to condemn Russia’s ongoing military operation in Ukraine, the US-led bloc's Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg revealed during a press conference on Tuesday.

He announced that the bloc will host foreign ministers from member states as well as Finland, Sweden, Georgia, and the EU. However, the Norwegian-born official also noted that its Asia-Pacific partners – such as Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea – have been invited as well, stating that the current security crisis has “global implications.”

The ministers will discuss new strategic concepts which will account for the military conflict in Ukraine, but will also include for the first time the issue of China’s “growing influence and coercive policies on the global stage which pose a systemic challenge to our security and to our democracies.”

“We see that China has been unwilling to condemn Russia’s aggression and has joined Moscow in questioning the right of nations to choose their own path,” said Stoltenberg, urging that democracies must stand up for their values against “authoritarian powers.”

According to the US government-funded Freedom House, five of NATO's thirty members are not considered to be full democracies – Turkey, Hungary, Albania, North Macedonia & Montenegro.

He expressed hope that the bloc would be able to deepen its cooperation with its Asia-Pacific partners in areas such as “arms control, cyber, hybrid and technology.”

Since the start of Russia’s military offensive against Ukraine, Beijing has held off on taking a particular stance on the issue, calling for a peaceful resolution to the conflict but refusing to condemn Moscow’s actions or join the sweeping economic sanctions imposed on Russia by the likes of the US, Canada, the UK, the EU, Japan, Australia, and other nations.

For the last few weeks, the US has increasingly been putting more pressure on China to “pick a side,” with Joe Biden warning Beijing of potential “consequences” and “costs” should China choose to back Russia in the Ukraine conflict, either militarily or by helping circumvent international sanctions.

[ RT ]

Anonymous

United States Dollar At Risk of Losing Dominance, Goldman Sachs Warns

The US dollar is dealing with some of the same challenges that the British pound faced in the early 1900s, before it went into decline, Goldman Sachs said in a research note released on Thursday. The Wall Street bank warns that the greenback could lose its global dominance.

The move by Washington and its allies to freeze much of the Russian Central Bank’s foreign currency reserves has raised concerns that countries could start moving away from the dollar. Analysts explained the risk as due to worries about the power the dollar grants the US.

The challenges that Goldman Sachs named include the fact that the US has a relatively small share of global trade compared to the dominance of its currency in global payments. Another issue is that the country has a deteriorating “net foreign asset position,” with rising foreign debts. In addition, the nation faces geopolitical problems, such as the conflict in Ukraine.

The Goldman Sachs economists also said the nation’s large debts due to the fact that it is a big importer of goods could be a particular problem.

The British pound, which was once the world’s reserve currency, was displaced by the US dollar in the middle of the 20th century. International investors were more reluctant to hold pounds after Britain amassed huge debts in World War II, the bank’s analysts noted. “If a reserve currency issuers’ debt is allowed to grow relative to GDP, eventually foreigners may grow reluctant to hold more of it,” they wrote.

Anonymous

Ukraine - The most civilised war

 If one is to compare the brutality and wanton bombing and destruction of Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan by the Americans and the western powers, the invasion of Ukraine is like boy scouts at play. The damage and lost of lives in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan were in the hundreds of thousands, with indiscriminate bombings of civilians  and shamelessly calling them war collaterals, not human lives. This is how mean and cruel the Americans and the western powers were against the Muslims and Arabs, treating them like sub humans.

Putin's invasion of Ukraine was carefully considered and executed with great care not to harm the civilians. The attacks were mostly on military targets. The choice of weapons too were measured. Some civilian casualties were unavoidable as they were too close to military targets. But some were due to their role as human defence shields used by the Ukrainians, when they attacked the Russians. And worse, some were deliberately killed by the Ukrainians to blame it on the Russians.

From the very beginning, there were a lot of restraints placed on the Russian forces that were as good as tying their hands behind their backs. And they had to take several casualties as a result, not able to use all the massive fire power at their disposal, not allowed to freely fire at their targets, with great consideration to avoid hitting the civilians. Safe corridors were set up for the civilians to leave the war zones. Never heard of such things in the Arab and Muslim countries invaded by the evil Americans and the western powers.

With so much care and restraints, the accusation of war crimes against the Russians, the so called massacre in Bucha, civilian casualties, were laughable. Why would the Russians do such things in the dark? They could simply blast Kiev and all the civilian quarters like what the Americans did in Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan. And they would have suffered lesser casualties and Kiev and all the major cities would have been flattened. 

The attacks and killings of Ukraine civilians were black ops as reported by the Ukrainians themselves, with Ukrainian dressed as Russian soldiers to attack Ukrainians civilians and booming civilian residential areas. Such allegations were standard playbook of the evil Americans, false flag incidents, fabricated lies, propaganda etc etc were all hallmarks of the American black ops operators.

The conduct of the Russian invasion into Ukraine is as civilised as one can get in a war. In many parts of Ukraine, life was quite normal. Even in the cities under attacked, there was no reckless and irresponsible and unrestrained bombings of the people. But the Ukrainians are showing how treacherous they are, with a very considerate Russian forces not blowing them up into smokes, they turned around to accuse the Russians of despicable acts that were either fabricated or committed by themselves.

And the Anglo Saxon devils are everywhere, doing what they knew best, thinking that the rest of the world are stupid to believe in their standard black ops and propaganda to demonise the Russians. If only the Russians were as ruthless and cruel as the Americans and the western forces, there would be no silly and mischievous Ukrainians to turn around to bite them. Ukraine were have fallen and the cities flattened, and Russia would have taken control of the whole country.

The hard evidence on the ground, the Russians have been extremely careful not to harm the civilians in Ukraine, and allowing them to flee before the bombs were dropped were reported in the msm. The Russians know that the world is watching and would not want to be seen to be as  ruthless and unprincipled as the evil Americans and the West. The accusations of massacre by the Russians is so ludicrous. Only the white face liars could come up with such a ridiculous lie.

The moral of the story is never to be kind to the devils, like never be kind to snakes. They would turn around to bite you for sparing them.

Ukraine - Western propaganda does not work any more

When propaganda and lies is used extensively, you know the USA and the West are really desperate and that events are not going well and according to plan. They practically have exhausted all their weapons against Putin and have no more left to do further damage to Russia. They do not know what to do and are just using propaganda, thinking it will work. Not in this age of social media, where open source information is holding it's own against the fake news generated by the MSM. People have learnt to be discerning, preferring to look elsewhere for real news instead of relying on the untrustworthy MSM.

Of course, those that swallowed the fabrication trotted out by the MSM before the invasion of Iraq will find no difficulty in believing the propaganda now regurgitated by MSM about Russian soldiers driving tanks over their commander, shooting down their own planes, poisoning their own kind, eating dogs because they do not like their rations.

As for the accusation of war crimes purported to be committed by Russian soldiers, have the ICC say a thing about Ukrainian soldiers using civilians as human shields, being issued guns to fight, and Ukraine soldiers purposely hiding their weapons inside hospitals and schools? In fact the Washington Pose and New York Times actually admitted all these things done by the Ukrainian soldiers. What about the earlier genocide in the two breakaway republics. No investigation needed as the ICC was deep in slumber and is now awake at the right time and place.

The economic war waged on Russia has failed big time. The Ruble is now as strong as before the war started. Joe Biden gloated that the USA and the West will bring the Ruble down to 200 Rubles to the US$ and collapse the Russian economy. The reverse is now happening. Not only has the sanctions failed, it backfired badly as the rest of the world have been alerted and awakened, asking will we be next. Countries are fast distancing themselves from the US$.

It must have really hurt the US$ so much that they even warned India not to undermine the US$. That clearly shows that attack on the US$ is their 'Achilles Heel' This is the only way to bring down the evil empire. Perhaps they are thinking of taking out India like they took out Iraq and Libya. India is in some difficulty right now trying to balance their allegiance. 

 Anonymous

Ukraine - When truth becomes lies and lies become truth

 

“In war, truth is the first casualty.” This quote has been attributed to Aeschylus, a 6th BCE Greek tragedian noted for his “copious use of imagery, mythic allusion, grand language, wordplay and riddles.” It is only fitting, therefore, that the man who first gave word to the concept of modern-day war-time propaganda would see his quote come to life in the present-day Ukraine. The Kiev government and their Western information warfare advisers may have coopted all of Aeschylus’ playwright devices to craft a modern-day tragedy in the Ukrainian town of Bucha that exemplifies the notion of the lie as not just a byproduct, but also a weapon of war.

The main source of the Bucha tragedy reports is a videotape, taken by the Ukrainian National Police, of one of their convoys driving through a street in the town. A dozen or so corpses litter the roadway, many of them appearing to have been bound. This video has gone viral, producing a pandemic of anguish and anger that has swept over much of the world, capturing the attention of heads of state and the head of the Catholic Church alike, resulting in a tidal wave of condemnation and outrage directed at Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin. The cause-and-effect relationship between the video and the global backlash is clear – the former could not exist without the latter.

For its part, Russia has vehemently denied the allegations, and has requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss what the Russian Foreign Ministry has called the “criminal provocations by Ukrainian soldiers and radicals” in Bucha. The presidency of the Security Council is held by Great Britain, and the British mission to the UN has denied the Russian request, stating that a discussion on Ukraine currently scheduled for Tuesday, April 4 would serve as a forum for any discussion about Bucha.

One would think that the Security Council, which has shown a readiness in the past to meet on short notice to discuss the events coming out of Ukraine, would seek to accommodate Russia’s request on a matter of such importance. The goal of the British, however, does not appear to be the rapid search for truth and justice, but rather to buy time to allow the political fallout from the alleged massacre in Bucha to develop further.

One example of this tactic manifesting itself is the reaction of US President Joe Biden. “You saw what happened in Bucha,” he explained in comments to reporters, adding that Russian President Vladimir Putin “is a war criminal.” Biden took advantage of the Bucha crisis to advocate for the delivery of more weaponry to Ukraine. “We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight,” he said. “And we have to gather all the detail so this can be an actual – have a war crimes trial.”

All this from the president of a country which has refused to recognise the International Criminal Court. For reasons which should be obvious to anyone willing to apply some critical thought.

- Scott Ritter (ex-US Marine Corps intelligence officer and author of 'SCORPION KING: America's Suicidal Embrace of Nuclear Weapons from FDR to Trump.' He served in the Soviet Union as an inspector implementing the INF Treaty, in General Schwarzkopf’s staff during the Gulf War, and from 1991-1998 as a UN weapons inspector)

Anonymous