DEATH STALKS US SAILORS JUST BENEATH THEIR UNWARY CREWS

By Christopher P. Cavas 4:25 p.m. EST January 24, 2015

Despite Numbers, Experts Question Combat Effectiveness

(Photo: Larionov Vladimir Yefimovich, ITAR-TASS/Newscom)

WASHINGTON — The Russian Navy's submarine force is on a roll.
Four different kinds of submarines are under construction and more are coming. The country expects to lay down five new nuclear submarines in 2015.

The Navy is accepting Borey-class nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, Yasen-class nuclear attack submarines, and Kilo- and Lada-class diesel electric attack submarines. Six Kilos are being built for Vietnam and more are offered for export.
This rate of construction is beginning to look more like Cold War days rather than the lethargic shipbuilding rates prevalent since the 1990s.

By comparison, the US only recently returned to building two nuclear attack submarines per year, and industry is gearing up to begin construction of a new class of ballistic submarines in 2021 — a three-subs-per-year construction rate not seen since the Reagan era.

Combine the revived Russian submarine construction rate with President Vladimir Putin's aggressive stances of the past year, along with the steady drumbeat of Chinese naval expansion, and the question might be asked — is a submarine race going on?

"I know a lot of folks like the term arms race, but I think it's more complicated than that," said Thomas Mahnken, a former US defense official and now a professor at the Naval War College. "There's definitely competition going on — with the US, other NATO navies, China — but there's also modernization going on. An increasing portion of what Russia is doing is replacing aging systems or systems that already have been retired."

"I would be skeptical," cautioned Norman Friedman, a longtime naval analyst and author. "There's a history in that country of laying down things that don't get finished for a long time. No question they'll lay down the subs, but actually building them after that is a more interesting question."

The Russians frequently issue proclamations that they intend to increase naval construction, including statements about building a fleet of aircraft carriers. But ship construction remains modest, and the Navy remains largely a collection of Cold War relics. Yet Russia has a long tradition of building tough and innovative submarines.

"The Russians have put their money where their mouth is with regard to submarine construction and development," said Bryan Clark, a former US Navy submariner and strategist, now an analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. "They see that as a way to generate an asymmetric advantage over US forces. If they can develop a really high-end submarine force like they did in the Cold War, it would create a problem for US naval planners and strategists thinking through how to deal with a potential Russian threat — one that could emerge without a lot of warning."

Construction Delays

The most lethal new subs are those of the Yuri Dolgoruky class, also known as the Project 955 Borey class. Construction of the Dolgoruky has been a protracted affair — the ship was laid down at the Sevmash military shipyard in Severodvinsk in 1996 but not launched until 2007. Sea trials began in 2009, but development of the ship's primary weapon, the Bulava intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), itself has been fraught with problems. It was only in 2014 that the submarine submerged with a full load of 16 ICBMs, according to Russian media.

A second Borey, the Alexander Nevsky, was laid down in March 2004 and began sea trials in 2011. Like the Dolgoruky, the ship and its missiles have experienced numerous problems, and trials continued at least through 2013. Vladimir Monomakh, the third Borey, was commissioned last December after eight years of construction and trials.

Three more Boreys are under construction, and Russian Navy chief Adm. Viktor Chirkov said in December two more would be laid down in 2015, for a total of eight, all expected to be in service by 2020.

The design of the Dolgorukys uses many features of earlier submarines. In fact, the first units used pieces and components built for earlier submarines that were either scrapped or never finished. Russian media reports indicate the Vladimir Monomakh used significant hull components of the decommissioned Akula-class attack submarine Ak Bars.

"I get the feeling for all the big talk from the Russians about building a new fleet, they're probably having trouble getting stuff," Friedman said. "For the first subs, they used pieces from earlier subs."

The Dolgoruky carried out an operational test firing of a Bulava in October, the Itar-Tass news agency reported — the third successful test launch since a September 2013 failure — and two more will take place in 2015.

Meanwhile, construction of Yasen-class Project 885M nuclear attack submarines is picking up. The first unit, Severodvinsk, was commissioned at the end of 2013 after a 20-year construction period, during which the submarine underwent significant re-design. A second unit, laid down in 2009 at Sevmash, could be delivered this year.

Two more Yasens were laid down in 2014. Itar-Tass reported on Dec. 26 that Mikhail Budnichenko, head of Sevmash, said three Project 885 Yasen-class subs would be laid down this year along with two Boreys.

Non-nuclear submarine construction also continues. Along with several Kilo-class subs being built for the Russian Navy and export, at least one more Lada-class diesel-electric submarine is to begin construction this year.

Numbers vs. Effectiveness

But can Russia sustain this prodigious submarine construction effort?

"The naval production we're likely to see this year is an artifact of decisions made some time ago when oil prices were fairly high and before a number of Western countries imposed sanctions on Russia," Mahnken said. "Whatever the Russians do this year, I think it'll be very hard for them to sustain naval production going forward."

Added Friedman: "Putin doesn't have that much money. And with the drop in oil prices, they have very bad problems."

With the post-1990 decline in shipbuilding, Friedman said, the shipyards have lost much of their submarine-building expertise.
"A lot of people quit the yards" when construction all but ended, he said. "If they lost a lot of their smarter people, there's a difficulty in recreating what they had. Coming back 15 years later and trying to recreate it is kind of dubious."

Clark agreed.

"Their industrial base is weakened from two decades of not being used," he said. "You've got a significant reduction in the number of skilled engineers, the aging out of people who otherwise would be part of the Russian design base.

"While Russian engineering and technology development is top-notch, they don't necessarily have the people to be able to do all the legwork necessary to take an idea into a reality. That's why you see things like submarines taking 10 or more years to construct, because they just don't have the design and construction base to support high-rate production."

But are the new submarines cause for worry?

The Yasen attack subs "are probably what you could get in 1989, plus improved combat systems," Friedman said. "They got access to microprocessors and things like that. But they're not going to the insertion of new technology, because they're not that flexible. But I would guess the combat systems have improved substantially."

Clark sees no cause for alarm in the pace of Russian submarine construction.

"They don't have very many submarines today, and they certainly don't have very many frontline submarines that would be anywhere close to US submarines," he said. "The best submarines the Russians are producing are perhaps equivalent to some of the older US submarines currently in use. It would take a while for the Russians to build up enough of those to where they create a potential problem for the US.

"The main concern," Clark added, "is that even a small number of very good submarines can be problematic from an intelligence-gathering and surprise strike kind of perspective. But they're not able to cause a debilitating effect to a fleet."
E-mail ccavas@defensenews.com

CFR Says China Must Be Defeated, & TPP Is Essential to That!

With the Rothschilds now with beacheads on every shore, there's nary a safe climate for individual liberty.
Rothschild Link Source Library (multi-lingual)
Wikipedia is consistently cleansed of Rothschild Zionist links to modern companies, people, events and concepts. NFU

Eric Zuesse
 

Wall Street’s Council on Foreign Relations has issued a major report, alleging that China must be defeated because it threatens to become a bigger power in the world than the U.S.

This report, which is titled “Revising U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China,” is introduced by Richard Haass, the CFR’s President, who affirms the report’s view that, “no relationship will matter more when it comes to defining the twenty-first century than the one between the United States and China.” He says that the report he is publishing argues that “strategic rivalry is highly likely if not inevitable between the existing major power of the day and the principal rising power.” Haass says that the authors “also argue that China has not evolved into the ‘responsible stakeholder’ that many in the United States hoped it would.” In other words: “cooperation” with China will probably need to become replaced by, as the report’s authors put it, “intense U.S.-China strategic competition.” 

Haass gives this report his personal imprimatur by saying that it “deserves to become an important part of the debate about U.S. foreign policy and the pivotal U.S.-China relationship.” He acknowledges that some people won’t agree with the views it expresses.

The report itself then opens by saying: “Since its founding, the United States has consistently pursued a grand strategy focused on acquiring and maintaining preeminent power over various rivals, first on the North American continent, then in the Western hemisphere, and finally globally.” It praises “the American victory in the Cold War.” It then lavishes praise on America’s imperialistic dominance: “The Department of Defense during the George H.W. Bush administration presciently contended that its ‘strategy must now refocus on precluding the emergence of any potential future global competitor’—thereby consciously pursuing the strategy of primacy that the United States successfully employed to outlast the Soviet Union.”

The rest of the report is likewise concerned with the international dominance of America’s aristocracy or the people who control this country’s international corporations, rather than with the welfare of the public or as the U.S. Constitution described the objective of the American Government: “the general welfare.” 

The Preamble, or sovereignty clause, in the Constitution, presented that goal in this broader context: “in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.” 

The Council on Foreign Relations, as a representative of Wall Street, is concerned only with the dominance of America’s aristocracy. Their new report, about “Revising U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China,” is like a declaration of war by America’s aristocracy, against China’s aristocracy. This report has no relationship to the U.S. Constitution, though it advises that the U.S. Government pursue this “Grand Strategy Toward China” irrespective of whether doing that would even be consistent with the U.S. Constitution’s Preamble.

The report repeats in many different contexts the basic theme, that China threatens “hegemonic” dominance in Asia. For example:

“China’s sustained economic success over the past thirty-odd years has enabled it to aggregate formidable power, making it the nation most capable of dominating the Asian continent and thus undermining the traditional U.S. geopolitical objective of ensuring that this arena remains free of hegemonic control.”

The report never allows the matter of America’s “hegemonic control” to be even raised. Thus, “hegemony” is presumed to be evil and to be something that the U.S. must block other nations from having, because there is a “traditional U.S. geopolitical objective of ensuring that this arena remains free of hegemonic control.” In other words: the U.S. isn’t being “hegemonic” by defeating aspiring hegemons. The report offers no term to refer to “hegemony” that’s being practiced by the U.S.

The report presents China as being supremacist, such as what (to quote again from the report) “historian Wang Gungwu has described as a ‘principle of superiority’ underwriting Beijing’s ‘long-hallowed tradition of treating foreign countries as all alike but unequal and inferior to China.’ Consistent with this principle, Henry Kissinger, describing the traditional sinocentric system, has correctly noted that China ‘considered itself, in a sense, the sole sovereign government of the world.’” America’s own ‘Manifest Destiny’ or right to regional (if not global) supremacy is not discussed, because supremacism is attributed only to the aristocracies in other countries, not to the aristocracy in this country.

Rather than the “general welfare,” this document emphasizes “U.S. Vital National Interests,” which are the interests of America’s aristocrats, the owners of America’s large international corporations.

This report urges:

“The United States should invest in defense capabilities and capacity specifically to defeat China’s emerging anti-access capabilities and permit successful U.S. power projection even against concerted opposition from Beijing. … Congress should remove sequestration caps and substantially increase the U.S. defense budget.”

In other words: the Government should spiral upward the U.S. debt even more vertically (which is good for Wall Street), and, in order to enable the increased ‘defense’ expenditures, only ‘defense’ expenditures should be freed from spending-caps. Forget the public, serve the owners of ‘defense’ firms and of the large international corporations who rely on the U.S. military to protect their property abroad.

The report says that China would have no reason to object to such policies: “There is no reason why a China that did not seek to overturn the balance of power in Asia should object to the policy prescriptions contained in this report.” Only a “hegemonic” China (such as the report incessantly alleges to exist, while the U.S. itself is not ‘hegemonic’) would object; and, therefore, the U.S. should ignore China’s objections, because they would be, by definition ‘hegemonic.’ Or, in other words: God is on our side, not on theirs.

“Washington simply cannot have it both ways—to accommodate Chinese concerns regarding U.S. power projection into Asia through ‘strategic reassurance’ and at the same time to promote and defend U.S. vital national interests in this vast region.”

The authors make clear that U.S. President Obama is not sufficiently hostile toward China: “All signs suggest that President Obama and his senior colleagues have a profoundly different and much more benign diagnosis of China’s strategic objectives in Asia than do we.”

Furthermore, the report ends by portraying Obama as weak on the anti-China front: “Many of these omissions in U.S. policy would seem to stem from an administration worried that such actions would offend Beijing and therefore damage the possibility of enduring strategic cooperation between the two nations, thus the dominating emphasis on cooperation. That self-defeating preoccupation by the United States based on a long-term goal of U.S.-China strategic partnership that cannot be accomplished in the foreseeable future should end.”

The report’s “Recommendations for U.S. Grand Strategy Toward China” urges Congress to “Deliver on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, … as a geoeconomic answer to growing Chinese economic power and geopolitical coercion in Asia,” but it fails to mention that the Obama Administration has already embodied the authors’ viewpoint and objectives in the TPP, which Obama created, and which cuts China out; it could hardly be a better exemplar of their agenda. The authors, in fact, state the exact opposite: that Obama’s objective in his TPP has instead been merely “as a shot in the arm of a dying Doha Round at the World Trade Organization (WTO).” They even ignore that Obama had cut China out of his proposed TPP.

Furthermore, here is what President Obama himself told graduating West Point cadets on 28 May 2014:

“Russia’s aggression toward former Soviet states unnerves capitals in Europe, while China’s economic rise and military reach worries its neighbors. From Brazil to India, rising middle classes compete with us, and governments seek a greater say in global forums.” He was saying that these future military leaders will be using guns and bombs to enforce America’s economic dominance. This is the same thing that the CFR report is saying.

His speech also asserted: “I believe in American exceptionalism with every fiber of my being. … The United States is and remains the one indispensable nation. That has been true for the century passed and it will be true for the century to come.” (That even resembles: “Henry Kissinger, describing the traditional sinocentric system, has correctly noted that China ‘considered itself, in a sense, the sole sovereign government of the world.’” Obama is, in a sense, saying that America is the “sole sovereign government in the world.”)

He made clear that China is “dispensable,” and that the U.S. must stay on top.

However, there is a difference between Obama and the CFR on one important thing: Obama sees Russia as the chief country over which the U.S. must dominate militarily, and China as the chief country to dominate economically. But in that regard, he is actually old-line Republican, just like his 2012 opponent Mitt Romney is. 

The only difference from Romney on that is: Obama wasn’t so foolish as to acknowledge publicly a belief that he shared with Romney but already knew was an unpopular position to take in the general election.

Furthermore, whereas the CFR report ignores the public’s welfare, Obama does give lip-service to that as being a matter of concern (just as he gave lip-service to opposing Romney’s assertion that Russia is “our number one geopolitical foe”). After all, he is a ‘Democrat,’ and the authors of the CFR report write instead as if they were presenting a Republican Party campaign document. No ‘Democrat’ can be far-enough to the political right to satisfy Republican operatives. The pretense that they care about the public is therefore far less, because the Republican Party is far more open about its support of, by, and for, the super-rich. Mitt Romney wasn’t the only Republican who had contempt for the lower 47%. But even he tried to deny that he had meant it. In that sense, the CFR’s report is a Republican document, one which, quite simply, doesn’t offer the public the lip-service that Obama does (and which he politically must, in order to retain support even within his own party).

Perhaps on account of the CFR report’s condemning Obama for not being sufficiently right-wing — even though he is actually a conservative Republican on all but social issues (where China policy isn’t particularly relevant) — the report has received no mention in the mainstream press, ever since it was originally issued, back in March of this year. For whatever reason, America’s ‘news’ media ignored the report, notwithstanding its importance as an expression of old-style imperialistic thinking that comes from what many consider to be the prime foreign-affairs mouthpiece of America’s aristocracy — the CFR. The report’s first coverage was on 2 May 2015 at the World Socialist Web Site, which briefly paraphrased it but didn’t even link to it. Then, Stephen Lendman wrote about the CFR report. He briefly paraphrased it and passionately condemned it. He did link to the report. But he didn’t note the WSWS article, which had first informed the public of the CFR report’s existence — an existence which, until the WSWS article, all of America’s ‘press’ had simply ignored.

The present article is the first one to quote the CFR report, instead of merely to paraphrase and attack it. The quotations that were selected are ones presenting the report’s main points, so that readers here can see these points stated as they were written, rather than merely as I have interpreted them. My interpretation is in addition to, rather than a substitute for, what the report itself says.

———-

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of  They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity, and of Feudalism, Fascism, Libertarianism and Economics.

source

America’s Retreat From Victory: General George C. Marshall's Betrayal of His Country by Sen. Joseph McCarthy

This could easily be one of the best short books you could read to get a snapshot of how we got into the mess we're in today. If you're a veteran, you too, will be infuriated. Certainly for older home-schoolers. [Link for online reading at end of post]

Also:  The Real McCarthy Record 

AUDIO CLIP 3min.	Marshall mission to China, 1951
Speaker	McCarthy, Joseph, 1908-1957
Description	Senator McCarthy describes the alleged role played by General George C. Marshall in the fall of Nationalist China to Communist forces. McCarthy discusses the secret instructions that guided the General's mission to China at the end of World War II. On June 14, 1951 McCarthy had delivered a long speech against Marshall on the floor of the Senate, and this excerpt provides a sample of how he treated Marshall in subsequent addresses. These particular remarks were made at the weekly luncheon of the Rotary Club in Huntington, West Virginia.

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Rothschild may have already become the Custodian for China's Gold

We 1st published this post about a year ago, again more recently 05.11.14 - but still no mainstream financial "journalists" have dared touch it. No surprise here. Had you forgotten Hank Paulson's more 70+ trips to China when he was with Goldman Sachs setting himself to be the US Treasury Secretary?

Read December 2014 post:
ICBC: A New Global Currency & Gold Setup Is Being Conceived

Perhaps we were too quick to pass over the world gold fixing stories and manipulations recently.  Reading this banking article from the 1990s is a good lead-in for our strong suspicions that manipulations will go on as usual business in China. Then, at the appropriate time we the serfs will come to realize that Rothschild's syndicated ICBC bank is the controlling factor (custodian, central bank?) for Red China's gold.

▶ World Currency US Dollar About To Collapse/NWO, Mark, & US WW3 With Russia & China Around The Corner - YouTube

Published on Nov 1, 2014

World Currency US Dollar About To Collapse/NWO, Mark Of The Beast, & US WW3 With Russia & China Around The Corner/Government Lies & Deception. God Bless & Jesus Saves. Accept Jesus As Your Lord & Saviour Today. Romans 10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. America In Bible Prophecy Revelation 14:8-13, 16:17-20, 17, & 18, Isaiah 13, 14, 18, 47, & 48, Jeremiah 50 & 51, Habakkuk 1 & 2. Ephesians 5:11-16 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. 

For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. But all things that are reproved are made manifest by the light: for whatsoever doth make manifest is light. Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. See then that ye walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qguq3Uix0lk#t=295

Are YOU Ready for Your Sons & Daughters to Die for the Corporatist State?

Are your children, grandchildren, spouses, or siblings ready to die to protect the plunder and status quo of the corporate globalist neocons? Play this PPS slide program to help you with an answer.

US Neo-Cons and Corporate Fascists for Hong Kong Democracy?

Many "Occupy Central" supporters now admit the US National Endowment for Democracy's (NED) role in ongoing chaos in Hong Kong and simply say, "so what?" Here's what... 

November 4, 2014 (Tony Cartalucci - LD) - James T. Griffiths of the South China Morning Post was preparing a hit piece on analysts exposing the US role behind Hong Kong's ongoing street protests organized by "Occupy Central." Through a series of various logical fallacies, Griffiths was attempting to undermine and discredit these alternative news sources that have filled in the missing pieces intentionally left out by larger, subjectively pro-Western media monopolies and reporters like Griffiths himself. 

In a conversation with Griffiths, after discussing the unscrupulous nature of his tactics, he finally conceded that indeed, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) was providing cash for certain political groups to carry out their activities in Hong Kong. Griffiths would claim in response to the suggestion that "Occupy Central" taking US cash constituted sedition that: 

If you think a pro-democracy NGO handing out money to pro-democracy organisations is creepy, then sure.

Only NED is not a "pro-democracy NGO." It is a functionary of the United States government and more specifically the US State Department whose very existence is to serve US interests, not those of the many nations its various funding arms, including USAID and NED, meddle in.

Neo-Cons and Corporate Fascists for Democracy? 

Griffiths' backpedaling is typical. First denying "Occupy Central" was funded from abroad, but since forced to concede otherwise, he is now claiming that such foreign funding constitutes no conflict of interest and is merely the promotion of "democracy."  It appears, however, that Griffiths either is being dishonest, or is uninformed about the true nature of the National Endowment for Democracy. He refused to comment when presented with a full list of NED's board of directors.

NED and its subsidiaries, Freedom House, the International Republican Institute (IRI), and the National Democratic Institute (NDI), despite the lofty mission statement articulated on their websites, are little more than fronts for executing American foreign policy. Just as the US military is used under the cover of lies regarding WMD's and "terrorism," NED is employed under the cover of bringing "democracy" to "oppressed" people. However, a thorough look at NED's board of directors, as well as the board of trustees of its subsidiaries definitively lays to rest any doubts that may be lingering over the true nature of these organizations and the causes they support.
 
More importantly, for the many well-meaning left-leaning liberals intrigued by, and tempted to support "Occupy Central," revelations that "Occupy Central" is in fact a far-right Neo-Con corporate-fascist scheme to expand a confrontation with China and extort from Beijing geopolitical and economic concessions should at the very least give pause for thought.

The Neo-Cons  

Upon NED's board of directors are Neo-Conservatives including Elliot Abrams, Francis Fukuyama, Zalmay Khalilzad, Will Marshall, and Vin Weber, all signatories of the pro-war, pro-corporate Neo-Con Project for a New American Century. Within the pages of documents produced by this "think tank" are pleas to various US presidents to pursue war against sovereign nations, the increase of troops in nations already occupied by US forces, and what equates to a call for American global hegemony in a Hitlerian 90 page document titled "Rebuilding Americas Defenses."

The "Statement of Principles," signed off by NED chairmen Elliot Abrams, Francis Fukuyama, Zalmay Khalilzad, and Vin Weber, states, "we need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in preserving and extending an international order friendly to our security, our prosperity, and our principles." Of course this "international order," is merely a poorly disguised euphemism for global neo-imperialism. Other Neo-Con that signed their name to this statement include Freedom House's Paula Dobriansky, Dan Quayle (formerly), and Donald Rumsfeld(formerly). Paul Wolfowitz, Dick Cheney, and Eliot Cohen also signed their names to this document.

A PNAC "Statment on Post-War Iraq" regarding a wholehearted endorsement of nation-building and continued occupation features the signatures of NED chairman Will Marshall, Freedom House's Frank Carlucci (2002), and James Woolsey (formerly), along with Martin Indyk (Lowy Institute board member, co-author of the conspiring "Which Path to Persia?" report), and William Kristol and Robert Kagan both of the warmongering Foreign Policy Initiative. It should be noted that the Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI) is, for all intents and purposes, PNAC's latest reincarnation and in 2011 featured an open letter to House Republicans calling on them to disregard the will of the American people and continue pursuing the war in Libya. 
READ MORE

Violence Erupts As Hong Kong's Leader Threatens To Use "All Necessary Measures To Restore Social Order"

Having tried (unsuccessfully) to break up the pro-democracy protesters in the heart of Hong Kong using local triad gangs (as opposed to the optics of actual police), it appears the Chinese government is rolling back from its "wait-and-see" approach and becoming more aggressive once again. Hong Kong's Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, as DPA reports, demanded protesters end their blockade of major roads by Monday, or the government will take "all necessary measures to restore social order." Tensions continue to rise, with clashes breaking out sporadically, as the protesters have broken off talks with the government. As fears of another Tiananmen square debacle loom, former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten noted, "I cannot believe it would be so stupid as to do anything like send in the army."

At least 37 people were injured yesterday in the violence, taking the number of those hurt throughout the protests to 131, health officials said.

Theseare not the images the world has come to think of with regard to Hong Kong...

Following yesterday's non-police triad-based pro-government gangs attacks...

Hong Kong's Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok Saturday said 19 people were arrested on Friday when clashes broke out between Occupy Central protestors and anti-Occupy people.

Clashes happened in Mong Kok and Causeway Bay, two major commercial areas of Hong Kong, from Friday afternoon to early Saturday morning, leaving some citizens and police officers injured.

In regard to queries that the police were not capable of handling the clashes in time, Lai explained that as the crowd grew bigger in Mong Kok, fights scattered in different locations, making it more difficult for the police to deal with them.

Of the 19 people arrested, eight of them are suspected to have triad backgrounds, according to Lai.

"We do not approve any of this violence. Hong Kong is a lawful society. Every citizen in Hong Kong should abide by the law. Nobody wishes to see what has happened yesterday," he said, adding that the police would faithfully and truthfully enforce the law with patience.

Which led to dialogue with the government to cease...

"The government and police have allowed triads and thugs to use violence to attack peaceful protesters, cutting off the road to any conversation, and should be responsible for any fallout that results," the Hong Kong Federation of Students said in the posting on its Facebook page titled "Road to Dialogue Must be Shelved."

It appears the government is firming its position once again... (as DPA reports,)

Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying calls on pro-democracy protesters to end their blockade of major roads by Monday, adding that the government will take "all necessary measures to restore social order."

In a video message, he says access roads to government headquarters must be opened by Monday to allow civil servants to return to work, and that roads on Hong Kong Island must be cleared so that schools can re-open.

*  *  *

"I am indeed very concerned about the clashes we have seen in Mong Kok," Carrie Lam, the city's second-highest ranking official, told reporters yesterday. "These protests on the streets have great vulnerability to turn into critical violence between the protesters and the anti-protesters."

The last British Governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, has some strong opinions on the way ahead for Hong Kong,

It is not wholly true to say that the eyes of the entire world are on Hong Kong. They would be, of course, if people in mainland China were allowed to know what is happening in their country's most successful city. But China's government has tried to block any news about the Hong Kong democracy demonstrations from reaching the rest of the country – not exactly a sign of confidence on the part of China's rulers in their system of authoritarian government.

Before suggesting a way forward for Hong Kong's ham-fisted authorities, three things need to be made clear. First, it is a slur on the integrity and principles of Hong Kong's citizens to assert, as the Chinese government's propaganda machine does, that they are being manipulated by outside forces. What motivates Hong Kong's tens of thousands of demonstrators is a passionate belief that they should be able to run their affairs as they were promised, choosing those who govern them in free and fair elections.

Second, others outside of Hong Kong have a legitimate interest in what happens in the city. Hong Kong is a great international center, whose freedoms and autonomy were guaranteed in a treaty registered at the United Nations. In particular, the United Kingdom, the other party to this Sino-British Joint Declaration, sought and received guarantees that the survival of Hong Kong's autonomy and liberties would be guaranteed for 50 years.

So it is ridiculous to suggest that British ministers and parliamentarians should keep their noses out of Hong Kong's affairs. In fact, they have a right and a moral obligation to continue to check on whether China is keeping its side of the bargain – as, to be fair, it has mostly done so far.

But, third, the biggest problems have arisen because of a dispute about where Hong Kong's promised path to democracy should take it, and when. No one told Hong Kongers when they were assured of universal suffrage that it would not mean being able to choose for whom they could vote. No one said that Iran was the democratic model that China's Communist bureaucracy had in mind, with the Chinese government authorized to exercise an effective veto over candidates.

In fact, that is not what China had in mind. As early as 1993, China's chief negotiator on Hong Kong, Lu Ping, told the newspaper People's Daily, "The [method of universal suffrage] should be reported to [China's Parliament] for the record, whereas the central government's agreement is not necessary. How Hong Kong develops its democracy in the future is completely within the sphere of the autonomy of Hong Kong. The central government will not interfere." The following year, China's foreign ministry confirmed this.

The British Parliament summarized what had been said and promised in a report on Hong Kong in 2000. "The Chinese government has therefore formally accepted that it is for the Hong Kong government to determine the extent and nature of democracy in Hong Kong."

So, what next?

The peaceful demonstrators in Hong Kong, with their umbrellas and refuse-collection bags, will not themselves be swept off the streets like garbage or bullied into submission by tear gas and pepper spray. Any attempt to do so would present a terrible and damaging picture of Hong Kong and China to the world, and would be an affront to all that China should aspire to be.

The Hong Kong authorities have gravely miscalculated the views of their citizens. Like the bad courtiers against whom Confucius warned, they went to Beijing and told the emperor what they thought he wanted to hear, not what the situation really was in the city. They must think again.

Under the existing plans, there is supposed to be a second phase of consultations on democratic development to follow what turned out to be a counterfeit start to the process. Hong Kong's government should now offer its people a proper second round of consultation, one that is open and honest. Dialogue is the only sensible way forward. Hong Kong's citizens are not irresponsible or unreasonable. A decent compromise that allows for elections that people can recognize as fair, not fixed, is surely available.

The demonstrators in Hong Kong, young and old, represent the city's future. Their hopes are for a peaceful and prosperous life in which they can enjoy the freedoms and rule of law that they were promised. That is not only in the interest of their city; it is in China's interest, too. Hong Kong's future is the main issue; but so, too, is China's honor and its standing in the world.

*  *  *

For some context - this is the scale of the protests...

h/t @WilliamsJon

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Terrorism and Turmoil: US Containment of China

October 2, 2014 (Tony Cartalucci - LD) - 

With Hong Kong's "Occupy Central" fully exposed as US-backed sedition, readers should be aware that this latest turmoil is but one part of a greater ongoing campaign by the United States to contain and co-opt the nation of China.

As early as the Vietnam War, with the so-called "Pentagon Papers" released in 1969, it was revealed that the conflict was simply one part of a greater strategy aimed at containing and controlling China.
Three important quotes from these papers reveal this strategy. It states first that:


"...the February decision to bomb North Vietnam and the July approval of Phase I deployments make sense only if they are in support of a long-run United States policy to contain China."

It also claims:
"China—like Germany in 1917, like Germany in the West and Japan in the East in the late 30′s, and like the USSR in 1947—looms as a major power threatening to undercut our importance and effectiveness in the world and, more remotely but more menacingly, to organize all of Asia against us." 

Finally, it outlines the immense regional theater the US was engaged in against China at the time by stating: 

"there are three fronts to a long-run effort to contain China (realizing that the USSR "contains" China on the north and northwest): (a) the Japan-Korea front; (b) the India-Pakistan front; and (c) the Southeast Asia front." 

While the US would ultimately lose the Vietnam War and any chance of using the Vietnamese as a proxy force against Beijing, the long war against Beijing would continue elsewhere.



This containment strategy would be updated and detailed in the 2006 Strategic Studies Institute report "String of Pearls: Meeting the Challenge of China's Rising Power across the Asian Littoral" where it outlines China's efforts to secure its oil lifeline from the Middle East to its shores in the South China Sea as well as means by which the US can maintain American hegemony throughout the Indian and Pacific Ocean. The premise is that, should Western foreign policy fail to entice China into participating in Wall Street and London's "international system" as responsible stakeholders, an increasingly confrontational posture must be taken to contain the rising nation.

This proxy war has manifested itself in the form of the so-called "Arab Spring" where Chinese interests have suffered in nations like Libya that have been reduced to chaos by US-backed subversion and even direct military intervention. Sudan also serves as a proxy battleground where the West is using chaos to push Chinese interests off the continent of Africa. 

More recently, political turmoil has hit Southeast Asia. Thailand has only just recently ousted a US-proxy regime headed by dictator Thaksin Shinawatra, while neighboring Myanmar attempts to stave off sedition headed by US-British political fronts led by Aung San Suu Kyi. 

Within China itself, the US wields terrorism as a means to destabilize and divide Chinese society in an attempt to make the vast territory of China ungovernable. In the nation's western province of Xianjiang, the United States fully backs violent separatists. 



Indeed, first and foremost in backing the Xinjiang Uyghur separatists is the United States through the US State Department's National Endowment for Democracy (NED). For China, the Western region referred to as "Xinjiang/East Turkistan" has its own webpage on NED's site covering the various fronts funded by the US which include: 

• International Uyghur Human Rights and Democracy Foundation $187,918  

To advance the human rights of ethnic Uyghur women and children. The Foundation will maintain an English- and Uyghur-language website and advocate on the human rights situation of Uyghur women and children. 

• International Uyghur PEN Club $45,000
  To promote freedom of expression for Uyghurs. The International Uyghur PEN Club will maintain a website providing information about banned writings and the work and status of persecuted poets, historians, journalists, and others. Uyghur PEN will also conduct international advocacy campaigns on behalf of imprisoned writers. 
• Uyghur American Association $280,000
  To raise awareness of Uyghur human rights issues. UAA's Uyghur Human Rights Project will research, document, and bring to international attention, independent and accurate information about human rights violations affecting the Turkic populations of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. 
• World Uyghur Congress $185,000
  To enhance the ability of Uyghur prodemocracy groups and leaders to implement effective human rights and democracy campaigns. The World Uyghur Congress will organize a conference for pro-democracy Uyghur groups and leaders on interethnic issues and conduct advocacy work on Uyghur human rights.

It should be noted that the above list was taken from NED's website in March 2014 - since then, NED has deleted several organizations from the list, as it has done previously regarding its support in other nations ahead of intensified campaigns of destabilization it wished to cover up its role in. 

All of these NED-funded organizations openly advocate separatism from China, not even recognizing China's authority over the region to begin with – referring to it instead as "Chinese occupation."

Of the March 2014 terror attack in Kunming, the US-funded World Uyghur Congress would even attempt to justify it by claiming Chinese authorities have left the separatists with little other choice. The US State Department's "Radio Free Asia" report titled, "China's Kunming Train Station Violence Leaves 33 Dead," reported:

World Uyghur Congress spokesman Dilxat Raxit said in an emailed statement that there was "no justification for attacks on civilians" but added that discriminatory and repressive policies provoked "extreme measures" in response.

From full-blown proxy wars in the 1960's spanning Southeast Asia, to the US-engineered "Arab Spring" in 2011, to terrorism in Xinjiang and turmoil in Hong Kong today - what is taking place is not a battle for "democracy" or "freedom of expression," but an existential battle for China's sovereignty. For whatever problems the Chinese people have with their government, it is their problem and theirs alone to solve in their own way. Using the promotion of "democracy" as cover, the US would continue its attempts to infect China with US-backed institutions and policies, subvert, co-opt, or overthrow the political order in Beijing, and establish upon its ashes its own neo-colonial order serving solely Wall Street and Washington's interests - not those of the Chinese people. 

Image: Protest leader Benny Tai - fully entwined with the US State Department's National Democratic Institute - sitting as a director for years of the Centre for Comparative and Public Law (CCPL) which collaborates with and receives funding from the US government - calls for the "occupation" of Hong Kong. Hong Kong was already occupied - by Britain from 1841 to 1997.

For the mobs of "Occupy Central," many have good intentions, but the leadership is knowingly in league with foreign interests seeking to subvert, divide, and destroy the Chinese people - not unlike what China had suffered at the hands of European powers in the 1800's to early 1900's. 

Source LandDestroyer