zaterdag 6 juli 2019

Pentagon Remains world’s largest producer of greenhouse gases.

M.I.C.

Pentagon Has Emitted Over a Billion Metric Tons of Greenhouse Gases in Its War on Terror

With over 800 military bases in more than 80 countries, the Pentagon remains the “world’s largest institutional user of petroleum” and “producer of greenhouse gases.”

by  Kevin Gosztola 

Shadowproof — The United States military has emitted over a billion metric tons of greenhouse gases since the beginning of the global war on terrorism in 2001, according to a report from Brown University’s “Costs of War” project.
It is equivalent to the annual emissions of 257 million passenger cars, “more than double the current number of cars on the road in the U.S.”
With over 800 military bases in more than 80 countries, the Pentagon remains the “world’s largest institutional user of petroleum” and “producer of greenhouse gases.”




The Pentagon is not transparent when it comes to fuel consumption or greenhouse gas emissions. However, the project used the Department of Energy’s emissions data for the report’s estimates.
In 2017, the Pentagon’s greenhouse gas emissions were about 59 million metric tons. That same year, this was more than Finland (46.8 million metric tons), Sweden (50.8 million metric tons), or Denmark (33.5 million metric tons).
At least 400 million metric tons of greenhouse gases are a result of consumption in war zones in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and Syria.
According to the report, “From 1998 to 2017, the U.S. purchased 2.4 billion barrels of petroleum fuel. Since the 9/11 attacks, annual fuel purchases have averaged more than 120 million barrels of all types of fuel. Between 2010 and 2015, the armed services purchased an average of 102 million barrels of fuel per year from the DOD.”
It is estimated the Pentagon consumed more than 85 million barrels of “operational fuel” in order to power its fleets of ships, aircraft, and combat vehicles. They also used the fuel for “contingency bases.” In total, $8.2 billion was spent.
Since 2001, the [Pentagon] has consistently consumed between 77 and 80 percent of all U.S. government energy consumption,” the report notes.
Installations that support operations, as well as military non-armored vehicles, are notorious in their guzzling of fuel. There are apparently 60,000 HUMVEEs that remain the U.S. Army’s fleet. They get about “four to eight miles per gallon of diesel fuel.”
Domestic and overseas military installations account for about 40 percent of the Pentagon’s greenhouse gas emissions.
The report briefly details how jet fuel is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions.
Aircraft are responsible for hundreds of tons of C02. Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan involved massive airstrikes, and materials were flown to setup bases for occupations.
“Similarly, the U.S. war against ISIS in Syria and Iraq, which began in August 2014, has entailed tens of thousands of aircraft sorties for various missions—from reconnaissance, to airlift, refueling, and weapons strikes.  A B-2 Bomber on a mission from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri might be refueled many times.
The project cites the following example from January 18, 2017: “Two B-2 Bombers, accompanied by 15 KC-135 and KC-10 aerial refueling tankers made a 30-hour round trip mission from Whiteman Air Force Base to Libya to drop bombs on ISIS targets in Libya.”
As the report mentions, the project did not account for emissions caused by the “burning of oil by sabotage” or the destruction of oil infrastructure. Nor did it account for energy consumed in the process of reconstruction efforts or the impact of deforestation.
“In Afghanistan, war-caused migration and illegal logging appear to be the chief cause of deforestation. The causes of deforestation in Iraq are complex but include war.”
While the U.S. military has plenty of resources to move to renewable energy, it has remained dependent on petroleum, which is a boon for the oil and gas industry.
Switches to renewable power generation between 2011 and 2015 have only offset less than one percent of the Pentagon’s greenhouse gas emissions.
The closure of U.S. military bases in addition to the end of wars would go a long way toward diminishing the U.S. government’s gigantic carbon footprint. Any plan to address climate change should contemplate demilitarization, given what is outlined in this report.
As Alice Slater, the New York director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, wrote for The Nation, U.S. military bases are not only responsible for such massive amounts of greenhouse emissions but also devastating impacts caused by pollutants and toxic weapons.
“From Agent Orange in Vietnam, depleted uranium in Iraq, and munitions dumps and firing ranges in Vieques, Puerto Rico, to a toxic brew of poisons along the Potomac River, communities and soldiers as well as children born subsequent to exposure to these toxins are suffering a broad range of illnesses and inherited genetic damage, while the U.S. government ducks any accountability for the harm caused by its mindless dumping and reckless burial of untreated toxic military wastes,” Slater described.
Countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia that have been impacted the most have been largely unable to convince or pressure the U.S. military into funding clean-up projects.
When one adds the toxic effects of U.S. military bases to the enormous amount of emissions over the past couple decades, it becomes clear a climate plan should include climate reparations for affected countries too.
Feature photo | U.S. Army Reserve Soldiers during a training exercise in Fort Irwin, Calif., June 10, 2019. Photo | Dvids
Kevin Gosztola is managing editor of Shadowproof Press. He also produces and co-hosts the weekly podcast, “Unauthorized Disclosure.“
Source | Shadowproof


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Russia Beating U.S. in Race for Global Influence


Vladimir Putin
The 150-page white paper, prepared for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says the U.S. is underestimating the scope of Russia's aggression under the leadership of Vladimir Putin. | Yuri Kadobnov/Pool Photo via AP


DEFENSE

Russia beating U.S. in race for global influence, Pentagon study says


 A divided America is 
failing to counter Moscow's efforts to undermine democracy and cast doubt on U.S. alliances, says the report, which warns of a surge in 'political warfare.'

By 
 
06/30/2019 06:11 AM EDT
 
Updated 
The U.S. is ill-equipped to counter the increasingly brazen political warfare Russia is waging to undermine democracies, the Pentagon and independent strategists warn in a detailed assessment that happens to echo much bipartisan criticism of President Donald Trump's approach to Moscow.
The more than 150-page white paper, prepared for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and shared with POLITICO, says the U.S. is still underestimating the scope of Russia's aggression, which includes the use of propaganda and disinformation to sway public opinion across Europe, Central Asia, Africa and Latin America. The study also points to the dangers of a growing alignment between Russia and China, which share a fear of the United States' international alliances and an affinity for "authoritarian stability."
Its authors contend that disarray at home is hampering U.S. efforts to respond — saying America lacks the kind of compelling “story” it used to win the Cold War.
The study doesn't offer any criticisms of Trump, but it comes amid continued chaffing by security hawks in both parties who have objected to the president's repeated slights at U.S. alliances in Europe and Asia, public affection for authoritarian leaders like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un, and his habit of scoffing at the evidence that Russia interfered in the 2016 election. A grinning Trump added to that pattern Friday in Osaka, Japan, where he got a chuckle out of Putin by admonishing him, "Don't meddle in the election, president."
In interviews with POLITICO, other Russia watchers supported the report's warnings that the U.S. needs to up its game.
"Russia is attacking Western institutions in ways more shrewd and strategically discreet than many realize,” said Natalia Arno, president of the Free Russia Foundation, an anti-Putin Washington think tank that recently completed its own study of Russian efforts to undermine the West. “The attacks may seem more subtle and craftier, but they are every bit as destructive as governments are influenced, laws are changed, legal decisions are undermined, law enforcement is thwarted and military intervention is disguised."


The unclassified “Strategic Multilayer Assessment” marks a clear warning from the military establishment to civilian leaders about a national security threat that strategists fear, if left unchecked, could ultimately lead to armed conflict.
"In this environment, economic competition, influence campaigns, paramilitary actions, cyber intrusions, and political warfare will likely become more prevalent," writes Navy Rear Adm. Jeffrey Czerewko, the Joint Chiefs' deputy director for global operations, in the preface to the report. "Such confrontations increase the risk of misperception and miscalculation, between powers with significant military strength, which may then increase the risk of armed conflict."
The Pentagon paper, which has not been widely disseminated, assesses Russia's intentions in an attempt to understand what drives its strategy, outlines a range of malign activities attributed to Russia in regions as diverse as Africa and the Arctic and lays out ways the United States could strengthen its response. Among other steps, it recommends that the State Department spearhead more aggressive "influence operations," including sowing divisions between Russia and China. 
The study addresses what it refers to as Moscow's "gray zone" activities — the emboldened attempts by Putin's regime to undermine democratic nations, particularly on Russia's periphery, using means short of direct military conflict. 
"These activities include threatening other states militarily, or compromising their societies, economies, and governments by employing a range of means and methods to include propaganda, disinformation, and cultural, religious, and energy coercion," writes Jason Werchan, who works in the strategy division of the U.S. European Command, the military headquarters responsible for deterring the Russian military, in one chapter.


Yet the report laments the lack of a unified message within the United States, in turn due to a lack of coordination or agreement among executive branch agencies and Congress. 
Belinda Bragg, a research scientist for NSI, a government consulting firm that specializes in social science research, adds in the study that "we need to better articulate U.S. interests and strategy to both ourselves and others."
But that requires coming to an agreement about what the U.S. message should be, said Anna Borshchevskaya, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who wrote a chapter about Russian efforts to win over both governments and opposition forces in Africa.
“We still have a story to tell but because we are so polarized and are doubting ourselves we have a narrative problem,” Borshchevskaya said in an interview.“Russia does not.”
Another crucial step, Bragg recommends, is to develop a better understanding of how much target populations trust the United States "and have in place strategies to bolster that trust when it is low."
The paper also raises alarm about what the authors view as a burgeoning anti-American alliance by Russia and communist China, who have traditionally been fierce competitors despite being on the same side of the Cold War's ideological divide. Steps to counter that could include sowing Russian distrust of China's expanding power on Russia's eastern periphery, as well as Beijing's economic and infrastructure projects on multiple continents. 
“The world system, and America’s influence in it, would be completed upended if Moscow and Beijing aligned more closely,” warns Werchan. 


On the other hand, the assessment sees an urgent need for cooperation with Russia in key areas — especially in the realm of nuclear weapons.
"It is clear that a fresh round of arms racing threatens," writes another of the study's Pentagon contributors, John Arquilla, a director at the Naval Postgraduate School. "The United States can either embrace this, hoping to outpace the Russians, or try to head off such a costly competition with a rededicated arms control/reduction policy."
Such an approach should also seek to "corral" other nuclear weapons states such as North Korea, China, Iran, India and Pakistan, Arquilla wrote. "Revisiting Ronald Reagan's offer to Russia, made back in the '80s, to share research on ballistic missile defense, would be an adroit move as well."
Arquilla acknowledged that former President Barack Obama failed in his attempted "reset" with Russia failed, and that "Trump wanted to do this but he was derailed by the electioneering apparently orchestrated by Moscow."
"Still it is not too late for such a move," he wrote. "After all the United States works closely with Russia on space operations. Is it a bridge too far to hope for more cooperation at the terrestrial level?"
The greatest check on Putin's ambitions could be the Russian people, said the study, which pointed to evidence of deep public wariness about Moscow's foreign policy, including the 2014 invasion of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula, military support for Russian separatists and "the Kremlin's assertions that the US is a looming external danger."
Survey data compiled for the study by Thomas Sherlock, a professor at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, suggests "relatively weak approval among the [Russian] public for a forceful external posture, including intervention in the 'near abroad' to check American power or protect Russian-speakers from perceived discrimination."
Even Russian elites seem skeptical of Putin's strategy, the paper contends. "While both elites and members of the mass public are supportive of restoring Russia's great power status, they often define a great power and its priorities more in terms of socio-economic development than in the production and demonstration of hard power," it says. "These perspectives increasingly come into conflict with those of the Kremlin."
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Gabbard on meeting with Assad

CNN Exclusive: Rep. Gabbard on meeting with Assad

 Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard just returned from a secret trip to Syria and told Jake Tapper in a CNN Exclusive said any reconciliation would have to involve Syrian President Bashar Al Assad.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ID223ToMVxM&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR0Q4yq_2O_8jEL4o1068xecKCh2NqP_Mx6o3T7pVkNXjA4jhAS8J-q1ov4

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Secret Israeli Unit Hiding Zionist Crimes

Secret Israeli unit systematically purging documents related to Israel's history, Nakba crimes: Report

Sat Jul 6, 2019 08:08AM [Updated: Sat Jul 6, 2019 08:23AM ]
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Jewish militias escort Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian city of Ramle in 1948. (Photo via Haaretz)
Jewish militias escort Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian city of Ramle in 1948. (Photo via Haaretz)
Israel's ministry for military affairs has formed a secret unit tasked with concealing sensitive historical documents, with a special focus on censoring chilling revelations related to the expulsion of Palestine's original inhabitants, according to a report.
Malmab, also known as the military affairs ministry's department for "defense establishment security", has been conducting the operation for two decades, placing historic documents in concealed vaults, Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported.
The now-concealed documents, which contain previously accessible files sometimes even cited by researchers, cover various aspects of Israel's murky history, including its nuclear weapons program, foreign relations and the expulsion and genocide of the Palestinian people.
Yehiel Horev, who launched and headed the project until 2007, believes concealing the documents, specifically the ones related to the expulsion of 700,000 Palestinians in 1948, remembered  as "Nakba Day", is essential in avoiding further upheaval among the region's Palestinian residents.
Asked by Haaretz about the motive behind hiding previously published documents, Horev explained that the measure was taken to delegitimize studies done about the expulsion of Palestinians, denying researchers credible references to back up their claims.
“The question is whether it can do harm or not. It’s a very sensitive matter. Not everything has been published about the refugee issue, and there are all kinds of narratives. Some say there was no flight at all, only expulsion. Others say there was flight. It’s not black-and-white," he said.
'The Jewish Nazis'
Israel has asserted that the mass exodus of Palestinians, which paved the way for the formation of the regime in 1948, happened as a result of Arab politicians who had encouraged the population to leave the territory.
Concealed documents revealed by the report, however, present a different narrative, admitting that as much as 70 percent of displaced Palestinians were driven out of their lands as a direct result of "Jewish military operations."
Displaced Palestinians shown leaving their village at an unknown location in 1948. (Photo via UNRWA)
One such document from 1948 even describes the specific causes of the exodus from specific Arab localities, making references to the notorious Jewish Irgun and Lehi (also known as the Stern Gang) killing squads.
Ein Zeitun – “our destruction of the village”; Qeitiya – “harassment, threat of action”; Almaniya – “our action, many killed”; Tira – “friendly Jewish advice”; Al’Amarir – “after robbery and murder carried out by the breakaways”; Sumsum – “our ultimatum”; Bir Salim – “attack on the orphanage”; and Zarnuga – “conquest and expulsion.”
The Irgun and Lehi militias were most notorious for their role in the April 1948 Deir Yassin massacre, killing hundreds of villagers in a village populated by no less than 600 residents.
According to the report, among other chilling revelations describing systematic killings, looting and abuse that were later concealed by Israeli authorities, was a document describing the 1948 destruction of the Palestinian Safsaf village in 1948 where an Israeli settlement was later built upon.
“Safsaf [former Palestinian village near Safed] – 52 men were caught, tied them to one another, dug a pit and shot them. 10 were still twitching. Women came, begged for mercy. Found bodies of 6 elderly men. There were 61 bodies. 3 cases of rape, one east of from Safed, girl of 14, 4 men shot and killed. From one they cut off his fingers with a knife to take the ring,” read the document.
One concealed document detailing the Jewish expulsion operations described the raids as being comparable to "Nazi acts".
Members of Haganah, the Jewish military force, expel Palestinians from Haifa during the Nakba on 12 May 1948. (Photo via AFP)
The revelations come as Israel has been facing growing international scrutiny over its occupation and abuse of Palestinians in recent years, with the Tel Aviv regime finding itself struggling to assert its legitimacy in world public opinion.
Influential pro-Zionist historian Benny Morris has predicted that Israel may disintegrate in the near future, given that it can no longer subjugate Palestinians using the openly discriminatory practices it was founded upon, given increasingly sensitive global public opinion on the matter. 
Morris, however, is known to be a staunch supporter of Israel's expulsion of Palestinians.
Israel "would not have come into being without the uprooting of 700,000 Palestinians. Therefore it was necessary to uproot them. There was no choice but to expel that population," said Morris in an interview with Haaretz in 2004.


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Rob de Wijk als Goed Betaalde Atlanticus


Aangezien ik zelden Nederlandse kranten lees -- ze zijn te 

provinciaals -- weet ik nu pas dankzij een lezer van mijn 

weblog dat de Atlanticus Rob de Wijk op vrijdag 14 juni 2019 

het volgende in Trouw heeft verkondigd:


Politici kunnen niet zomaar alles zeggen


In Den Haag valt te horen dat burgers mondig genoeg zijn om zelfstandig afwegingen te kunnen maken, echt van nepnieuws te onderscheiden en gewapend tegen complottheorieën zijn. Dat zou de Nederlandse burger uniek in de wereld maken.
Veel Britten geloofden de leugens van politici over de opbrengsten van de brexit en de bewering dat de EU een groot anti-Brits complot is.
https://www.trouw.nl/opinie/politici-kunnen-niet-zomaar-alles-zeggen~b6253240/
Wat wordt hier allemaal beweerd door Rob de Wijk én wie is Rob de Wijk precies? HP/De Tijd schreef het volgende over hem:
Van al zijn invloed getuigen ook zijn lidmaatschappen van de Strategic Advisors Group van de Atlantic Council in Washington en de Senior Steering Group van de NATO Special Forces Headquarters. Zijn betrokkenheid bij het laatstgenoemde gremium, in de vorm van een briefing in het Intelligence Fusion Center in Afghanistan, zou kunnen verklaren waardoor hij in zijn wekelijkse column in dagblad Trouw kon claimen al enige maanden voor de dood van Osama bin Laden in mei 2011 ongeveer op de hoogte te zijn geweest van diens Pakistaanse onderduikadres...
Kortom, De Wijk is een alles behalve onafhankelijke bron, wiens nauwe banden met de Atlantic Council hem zelfs geheime informatie oplevert. Zonder overdrijven kan gesteld worden dat Rob de Wijk een goed betaalde propagandist is van  de NAVO, en dus van het westers militair-industrieel complex. Dit maakt hem alles behalve betrouwbaar. Ik citeer nogmaals HP/De Tijd van 2 december 2017:
Zowel vriend als vijand kwamen afgelopen zomer op de late zaterdagavond royaal aan hun trekken in het door WNL (De omroep van Wij Nederland. svh) uitgezonden televisieprogramma Weg van de wereld. Daarin verkenden De Wijk en collega-historicus (en voor een blauwe maandag VVD-parlementariër) Arend Jan Boekestijn (58) als weldenkend duo aan de hand van enkele thema’s de veranderende internationale betrekkingen. Samen maken ze al een paar jaar een radioprogramma voor BNR (het nieuwe seizoen van Boekestijn en De Wijk is in oktober begonnen), waarin ze onder leiding van een presentator op de zaterdagochtend verbaal tegen elkaar opbieden.
In Weg van de wereld werden de internationale kwesties besproken met telkens een andere prominente logé (de toenmalige minister van Buitenlandse Zaken Bert Koenders was de eerste) op een daartoe afgehuurd visueel verleidelijk Utrechts landgoed. De twee waren kundig gecast, want niet alleen voerden de gastheren tegenover elkaar het hoogste woord, we kregen hen ook nog te zien terwijl ze boodschappen deden, kruiden plukten, de maaltijd bereidden, pianospeelden, wijntjes schonken, een motorfiets bereden dan wel een baantje trokken in het zwembad (waarbij met name aan de hand van de beeld- en badvullende Boekestijn bleek dat de wereld van de internationale betrekkingen bepaald geen slankmakertje is).
'We stelden ons ten doel een programma te maken waarin ingewikkelde zaken aan de orde kwamen, maar dan niet in een Buitenhof-achtige setting en waarnaar wél zou worden gekeken. Ik wilde het graag met Arend Jan doen omdat onze interactie bleek te werken bij BNR.'
https://www.hpdetijd.nl/2017-12-02/rob-de-wijk-orakel-uit-het-westen/ 
Twee feiten vallen hier op: beide heren met hun nauwe NAVO-banden nodigden als eerste de PVDA-er Bert Koenders, minister van Buitenlandse Zaken, uit. Welnu, minister Koenders was sinds 2015 mede verantwoordelijk voor het steunen van terroristen in Syrië, zoals medio 2018 zelfs door de mainstream-pers werd bevestigd. Rob de Wijk, wist dit al veel eerder. Net als ik was hij op de hoogte van het feit dat de prominente Franse journalist Thierry Meyssan al in augustus 2012 hierover had bericht in Voltaire Network. Meyssan schreef:
No one doubts that terrorism in Syria is being sponsored by NATO and the GCC (Samenwerkingsraad van de Arabische Golfstaten. svh) but until now it was being carried out behind a veil of hypocrisy. Unable to bombard and raze the country because of the Russian and Chinese double veto, the Western powers and their Arab partners decided to bleed the country while setting it up for an attack by mercenaries. Then on February 12 came the call to jihad issued by Ayman al-Zawahiri. Suddenly, NATO, the GCC and al-Qaeda found themselves pursuing the same objective. Notwithstanding, Brussels took the view that the Egyptian sheik’s declarations were his alone and were therefore unworthy of comment as if to underline that NATO doesn’t revise its positions in response to such fatwas. This rationale remained unconvincing because it ignored the issue of the common objectives shared by the self-proclaimed advocates of democracy, on the one hand, and Islamism, on the other. It did allow appearances to be preserved. The masks are now off. The Western powers have acknowledged their links with terrorists.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-west-and-the-glorification-of-terrorism/32193   
Desondanks hield de kennelijk toch zo goed geïnformeerde Rob de Wijk zijn kaken stijf op elkaar, want dit soort informatie was/is taboe in de mainstream-media. En dat betekent: slecht voor de carrière van een klussende zzp-er. 

 Een ander punt is het feit dat De Wijk de VVD-er Arend Jan Boekestijn als partner had gekozen.  Bekend is dat Boekestijn de gekste dingen roept over van alles en nog wat. Ik kan me nog herinneren dat hij op tv, samen met mevrouw Kroes, beweerde dat Saddam over massavernietigingswapens beschikte en dat het Westen daarom Irak onmiddellijk moest binnenvallen. De inval in Irak was -- zonder mandaat van de Verenigde Naties -- het klassieke voorbeeld van een 'agressieoorlog,' dat wil zeggen van een oorlogsmisdaad bij uitstek, waarvoor nagenoeg de gehele nazi-top in 1946 ter dood werd veroordeeld. Ik durf hier de stelling aan dat Rob de Wijk niet alleen de Nederlandse 'rechtsstaat' ondermijnde, maar tevens het internationaal recht. Boekestijn had juridisch vervolgd moeten worden vanwege zijn oproep om met grof geweld een souvereine staat binnen te vallen, net zoals de nazi's destijds deden. Zo iemand nodig je niet uit om het grote publiek te informeren over oorlog en vrede. Hoeveel slachtoffers moeten er vallen voordat corrupte opiniemakers beseffen dat dit volstrekt niet kan? Ik zou Rob de Wijk, die ik al zo'n dertig jaar ken,  wij beiden werkten bij de VPRO, willen adviseren: De Wijk, een toontje lager, kerel! Welke oorlog heb jij van nabij meegemaakt? Meer daarover later. 



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