America’s Post World War II Global Dominance Has Just Ended
March 21: “GEOPOLITICS: Washington nervous: China, Japan and South Korea forge an Alliance.” This news story reports:
“For the first time in three years, the foreign ministers of the three countries met. They agreed on Saturday in Seoul to work towards a summit of their leaders, and to take on problems with the interpretation of history [which have separated them till now]. They also expressed their intention to continue to work for a free trade agreement and for new multi-party talks on North Korea’s controversial nuclear program.”
Here’s the important context of that: The U.S. in WW II conquered Japan, which had invaded China and conquered Korea; but, now, Japan, China and South Korea are moving toward one-another, while China, and indirectly the BRICS group of rising economic powers as a whole — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — are making their move past the previous U.S.-European control of the world. Furthermore, these Asian powers are collectively inviting North Korea to move toward them, and to join this group, which would finally bring an end to the stalemated hostilities between South and North Korea. So: welcome to the 21st Century! (For more details on that, see the terrific news reporting in GEN.)
And, in addition: for these three economic powerhouses to “work for a free trade agreement” that’s outside the orbit of Obama’s secret negotiations for his TPP or Trans-Pacific Partnership with them, may mean that they all will be less likely to accept the trade-deal that he is trying to negotiate collectively with them. So: this three-party ministerial meeting is, in itself, potentially an extremely important historical event. But it is part of this larger and interconnected whole, which is far more important than any trade-deal. ....
http://www.globalresearch.ca/americas-post-world-war-ii-global-dominance-has-just-ended/5438479
Topic: Ron Paul: "A War Based On Lies Cannot Be Fixed With Another War" (Read 645 times)
Good grief, the US would be so much better off had we elected Ron Paul as the President but the media and all the complexes that feed off big government foot us tooth and nail, not to mention misrepresenting the man to the general public. However, he taught many souls about free markets and non-interventionism and set his son (Rand) on course to accomplish what he couldn't.
He's the only politician I've ever heard consistently speak the truth about the mess we're in, revealing how we got into this mess, as well as clear, sensible solutions to get us out of it.
Yes and no. He is obviously right with what he says, the economy is completely F'd and the dollar will fail, and the price of gold will rise, I agree, but at the moment none of those things have actually happened, even if they seem imminent.I think future historians will look back and see that he was right, and wonder why no one listened. The problem is that in the here and the now, it doesn't really help anyone to listen to him (or read zerohedge btw) otherwise you would be sat in your bunker filled with guns, ammo and canned food waiting for everything to go tits up, which is hasn't and it might be a long time until it does.
Defense contracters won't have peace, no money in it 
He's the only politician I've ever heard consistently speak the truth about the mess we're in, revealing how we got into this mess, as well as clear, sensible solutions to get us out of it.
It's not worth risking lives for an elite of greedy bankers that pivot people against people and nation against nation.
Armaments and of course war so the armaments stocks can be used and replenished is gigantic business and nobody really questions the bills when the fight is for democracy, god and country. And of course businessmen create business opportunities to the best of their abilities
It's not worth risking lives for an elite of greedy bankers that pivot people against people and nation against nation.
Submitted by Ron Paul via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity,
Twelve years ago last week, the US launched its invasion of Iraq, an act the late General William Odom predicted would turn out to be “the greatest strategic disaster in US history.”
Before the attack I was accused of exaggerating the potential costs of the war when I warned that it could end up costing as much as $100 billion. One trillion dollars later, with not one but two “mission accomplished” moments, we are still not done intervening in Iraq.
President Obama last year ordered the US military back into Iraq for the third time. It seems the Iraq “surge” and the Sunni “Awakening,” for which General David Petraeus had been given much credit, were not as successful as was claimed at the time. From the sectarian violence unleashed by the US invasion of Iraq emerged al-Qaeda and then its more radical spin-off, ISIS. So Obama sent the US military back.
We recently gained even more evidence that the initial war was sold on lies and fabrications. The CIA finally declassified much of its 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, which was the chief document used by the Bush Administration to justify the US attack. According to the Estimate, the US Intelligence Community concluded that:
'[W]e are unable to determine whether [biological weapons] agent research has resumed...' And: 'the information we have on Iraqi nuclear personnel does not appear consistent with a coherent effort to reconstitute a nuclear weapons program.'
But even as the US Intelligence Community had reached this conclusion, President Bush told the American people that Iraq, "possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons" and "the evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."
Likewise, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s “bulletproof” evidence that Saddam Hussein had ties with al-Qaeda was contradicted by the National Intelligence Estimate, which concluded that there was no operational tie between Hussein’s government and al-Qaeda.
Even National Security Advisor Condolezza Rice’s famous statement that the aluminum tubes that Iraq was purchasing "are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs," and "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud," was based on evidence she must have known at the time was false. According to the NIE, the Energy Department had already concluded that the tubes were "consistent with applications to rocket motors" and "this is the more likely end use."
It is hard to believe that in a society supposedly governed by the rule of law, US leaders can escape any penalty for using blatantly false information – that they had to know at the time was false – to launch a pre-emptive attack on a country that posed no threat to the United States. The fact that they got away with it simply makes it all the easier for Washington’s interventionists to try the same tricks again. They already did with Libya and Syria. It is likely they are also doing the same with claims of a Russian “invasion” of Ukraine.
Last week President Obama correctly blamed the current chaos in Iraq on the Bush Administration’s decision to invade. He said, “… ISIL is a direct outgrowth of al Qaeda in Iraq that grew out of our invasion. Which is an example of unintended consequences. Which is why we should generally aim before we shoot.”
However, if the US intervention in Iraq created the “unintended consequences” of ISIS and al-Qaeda, how is it that more US intervention can solve the problem?
A war based on lies cannot be fixed by launching another war. We must just march home. And stay home.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-24/ron-paul-war-based-lies-cannot-be-fixed-another-war
Twelve years ago last week, the US launched its invasion of Iraq, an act the late General William Odom predicted would turn out to be “the greatest strategic disaster in US history.”
Before the attack I was accused of exaggerating the potential costs of the war when I warned that it could end up costing as much as $100 billion. One trillion dollars later, with not one but two “mission accomplished” moments, we are still not done intervening in Iraq.
President Obama last year ordered the US military back into Iraq for the third time. It seems the Iraq “surge” and the Sunni “Awakening,” for which General David Petraeus had been given much credit, were not as successful as was claimed at the time. From the sectarian violence unleashed by the US invasion of Iraq emerged al-Qaeda and then its more radical spin-off, ISIS. So Obama sent the US military back.
We recently gained even more evidence that the initial war was sold on lies and fabrications. The CIA finally declassified much of its 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, which was the chief document used by the Bush Administration to justify the US attack. According to the Estimate, the US Intelligence Community concluded that:
'[W]e are unable to determine whether [biological weapons] agent research has resumed...' And: 'the information we have on Iraqi nuclear personnel does not appear consistent with a coherent effort to reconstitute a nuclear weapons program.'
But even as the US Intelligence Community had reached this conclusion, President Bush told the American people that Iraq, "possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons" and "the evidence indicates that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."
Likewise, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s “bulletproof” evidence that Saddam Hussein had ties with al-Qaeda was contradicted by the National Intelligence Estimate, which concluded that there was no operational tie between Hussein’s government and al-Qaeda.
Even National Security Advisor Condolezza Rice’s famous statement that the aluminum tubes that Iraq was purchasing "are only really suited for nuclear weapons programs, centrifuge programs," and "we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud," was based on evidence she must have known at the time was false. According to the NIE, the Energy Department had already concluded that the tubes were "consistent with applications to rocket motors" and "this is the more likely end use."
It is hard to believe that in a society supposedly governed by the rule of law, US leaders can escape any penalty for using blatantly false information – that they had to know at the time was false – to launch a pre-emptive attack on a country that posed no threat to the United States. The fact that they got away with it simply makes it all the easier for Washington’s interventionists to try the same tricks again. They already did with Libya and Syria. It is likely they are also doing the same with claims of a Russian “invasion” of Ukraine.
Last week President Obama correctly blamed the current chaos in Iraq on the Bush Administration’s decision to invade. He said, “… ISIL is a direct outgrowth of al Qaeda in Iraq that grew out of our invasion. Which is an example of unintended consequences. Which is why we should generally aim before we shoot.”
However, if the US intervention in Iraq created the “unintended consequences” of ISIS and al-Qaeda, how is it that more US intervention can solve the problem?
A war based on lies cannot be fixed by launching another war. We must just march home. And stay home.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-24/ron-paul-war-based-lies-cannot-be-fixed-another-war
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