In The News: Sunday

It appears that Israel is taking this drone's intrusion into Israeli airspace very seriously:

Israeli Planes In 'Mock Raids' Over Lebanon

The Air Force carried out “mock raids” at medium altitude over southern Lebanon Sunday, hours after Israel said all indications are that Hizbullah launched a drone that was downed inside Israel on Saturday, according to the Arabic language Naharnewspaper.

Israel previously has carried out surveillance flights over southern Lebanon, which is under control of the Hizbullah terrorist organization. Sunday’s flights, which have not been confirmed by Israel, apparently were a response to the drone.
A Lebanese television station stated that Hizbullah was responsible for the drone infiltration into Israel’s air space, while Iran’s propaganda machine tried to divert attention from Hizbullah and claim the drone Israel downed was mistakenly launched by the United States

UAV Intrusion: Iranian Act Of Belligerence Against U.S. And Israeli Military Targets

Four months ago, on July 20, Hizballah’s leader Hassan Nasrallah said in a speech, “The resistance movement will surprise Tel Aviv in any future war.”

Hizballah with Iranian backing almost certainly proved its point Saturday, very likely in collaboration with its Palestinian ally, Hamas.

 
As it is, the sophisticated aerial surveillance vehicle was able to cover the space over the IDF’s southern facilities, the town of Beersheba and the Israeli Air Force base at Nevatim before it was shot down over the Yatir forest south of Mt. Hebron. Its primary missions may have been to record the electronic signatures of the Dimona nuclear reactor’s air defense systems and the American X-band radar station in the Negev, which is linked to the US X-band station in Turkey.

Together, they are the “forward eyes” of the joint US-Israeli shield against Iranian ballistic missile attack.As it is, the sophisticated aerial surveillance vehicle was able to cover the space over the IDF’s southern facilities, the town of Beersheba and the Israeli Air Force base at Nevatim before it was shot down over the Yatir forest south of Mt. Hebron. Its primary missions may have been to record the electronic signatures of the Dimona nuclear reactor’s air defense systems and the American X-band radar station in the Negev, which is linked to the US X-band station in Turkey. Together, they are the “forward eyes” of the joint US-Israeli shield against Iranian ballistic missile attack.

As it is, the sophisticated aerial surveillance vehicle was able to cover the space over the IDF’s southern facilities, the town of Beersheba and the Israeli Air Force base at Nevatim before it was shot down over the Yatir forest south of Mt. Hebron. Its primary missions may have been to record the electronic signatures of the Dimona nuclear reactor’s air defense systems and the American X-band radar station in the Negev, which is linked to the US X-band station in Turkey. Together, they are the “forward eyes” of the joint US-Israeli shield against Iranian ballistic missile attack.

It is therefore important in this context to recall a more recent and explicit threat, this one by Brig. Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s ground forces, who said on Sept. 23 that his country was not waiting to be attacked but ready to carry out preemptive operations against the US and Israel.

They decided initially to down helicopter by electronic means and capture it intact in an attempt to establish who sent it and study its systems. However, the Iranian controllers fought back – hence the cyber battle rocking back and forth over southern Israel for nearly half an hour - before shooting it down.

However, Israel’s leaders were struck dumb and caught unawares by Iran’s audacity in springing on them an overt act of belligerence against their own and American military installations housed in the Negev. Israel officials have vowed to respond to an obvious act of war.

Our intelligence experts note that before the Israeli Air Force fighters scrambled to shoot it down, the intruder would have had enough time for its surveillance equipment to beam to its Iranian control station, wherever it was, the electronic signatures of US and Israeli military installations within its purview in the South and the Negev. 

The alien aircraft should have been intercepted the moment it flew in from the Mediterranean and entered the skies of the Gaza Strip. By then, it was clearly seen heading toward Beersheba. Had there been weapons aboard, the incident would have ended in a worse disaster, reminding Israel of its worst nightmare: an Iranian plane flying over with a nuclear bomb.

If the intruder came to spot the gaps in that shield, it would have succeeded.

Tehran would also have noted the time lapse before Israel acted: The IDF asked the Defense Minister Ehud Barak what to do instead of acting at once and Barak passed the buck to the prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu.

The image the IDF spokesman put out of a ball of fire in the sky was misleading. On its way down to earth, the vehicle broke up into fragments large enough to offer up important secrets to Israel’s military researchers.

Western Propagandists Attempt To Trigger Catastrophic Turkish-Syrian War

Bloomberg, Guardian, Ynet, and others are all posting in their headlines an identical unconfirmed report that Turkey and Syria have “agreed” to establish a 6 mile wide “buffer zone” running the length of the Turkish-Syrian border.

The Syrian government has told its military to keep aircraft at least six miles (10 kilometers) from Turkey’s borders after a deadly shelling incident left five Turks dead, according to the Turkish news website Today’s Zaman.The news site cited Turkey’s ntvmsnbc.com, which quoted “reliable sources” yesterday as saying that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has ordered its warplanes and helicopters to honor the buffer. Neither Turkey’s government nor Syrian officials confirmed the report.

The United Nations said on Thursday proposals to set up secure safe zones in Syria to help end the 17-month conflict raised “serious questions” and would need to be studied carefully.Ahead of a meeting on the humanitarian situation in Syria, France and Britain warned Syria’s President Bashar Assad that military action to secure buffer zones for civilians inside the country was an option.

While the idea of a buffer zone is meant to look like a knee-jerk reaction to a still unjustified exchange of fire on the Turkish-Syrian border, with lingering conflicting reports over who was responsible for initially targeting the Turkish town of Akcacle, in reality this has been planned since at least March of this year, where the idea was proposed by the corporate-financier funded Brookings Institution in their “Middle East Memo #21″ “Assessing Options for Regime Change” where it stated specifically (emphasis added):

Now wait for it - here it comes, as predicted months ago at the outset of this conflict:

Image: The Brookings Institution, Middle East Memo #21 “Assessing Options for Regime Change (.pdf),” makes no secret that the humanitarian “responsibility to protect” is but a pretext for long-planned regime change.

Clearly,  a “buffer zone” is the next step for Western designs aimed at exacting regime change in Syria and would be a move the Syrian government would not readily agree to. It was also a step that merely needed a pretext to move forward. It appears that the West has found (or manufactured) their pretext. The unconfirmed reports floated by allegedly “reputable” news agencies, citing “high placed sources” in the Turkish media reeks of propaganda, public perception management, and psychological warfare.

Additionally, it should be noted that this policy of seeking a “buffer zone” IS NOT A TURKISH POLICY. It was imagined, planned, and is being ceaselessly promoted by corporate-financier interests emanating from the United States, the United Kingdom, and France, and is merely being parroted by increasingly unpopular elements within Turkish politics, specifically the government of Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

New York Times Concedes That It Is Unknown Whether Syrian Artillery Came From Rebels Or Government

The mainstream American press has trumpeted for days the claim that Turkey is “retaliating” for artillery fire coming from Syrian government forces on the Syrian-Turkish border near the town of Akçakale.Because Turkey is a member of Nato (for 50 years), a declaration of war by Turkey could well drag Nato into a conflict.

The Turkish people don’t like the turn of events … thousands of Turks  took to the the streets in Ankara and Istanbul after Turkey’s parliament approved military operations against targets in Syria following the mortar attacks.

The New York Times concedes:It was unknown whether the mortar shells were fired by Syrian government forces or rebels fighting to topple the government of President Bashar al-Assad. The Turkish response seemed to assume that the Syrian government was responsible.Many alternative news sources claim that this was a “false flag” attack to justify a Turkish attack on Syria.

Indeed, before the mortar attacks, Russia warned of such a possibility:Russia expresses its concerns about the tense situation on the Syria-Turkey border and warns both to avoid tension.***Russia has urged restraint between Turkeyand Syria so as to avoid possible cross-border conflicts while telling world powers that they should not seek ways to intervene in the Syrian war.

Both Syrian and Turkish authorities “should exercise maximum restraint” since radical members of the Syrian opposition might deliberately provoke cross-border conflicts for their own benefits, Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov said yesterday. The diplomat said Moscow has been worrying about the situation on the Syria-Turkey border… Turkey has sent a diplomatic note to Syria over the mortar bomb that hit the southeastern province of Akçakale on Sept. 28.

And false flag attacks have been planned to bring about regime change in Syria for 50 years (and the neocons planned regime change in Syria 20 years ago.)

But another possibility is that Syrian army forces were shooting at Syrian rebels near Akçakale and accidentally fired mortar a tad bit too far … across the border into Turkey.Indeed, Turkey has been sheltering and training Syrian rebels,  and Akçakale is a key Syrian rebelsupply route, which has seen numerous skirmishes in recent months.Turkey has also been testing Syrian air defenses by sending its fighter jets into Syrian air space, and hasthreatened intervention for quite a while.

Moreover, in March, the Brookings Institute called for a multi-front assault on Syria to effect regime change, which includes attacks from Turkey. In its report entitled “Assessing Options for Regime Change”, Brookings argued (page 6):

In addition, Israel’s intelligence services have a strong knowledge of Syria, as well as assets within the Syrian regime that could be used to subvert the regime’s power base and press for Asad’s removal. Israel could posture forces on or near the Golan Heights and, in so doing, might divert regime forces from suppressing the opposition. This posture may conjure fears in the Asad regime of a multi-front war, particularly if Turkey is willing to do the same on its border and if the Syrian opposition is being fed a steady diet of arms and training. Such a mobilization could perhaps persuade Syria’s military leadership to oust Asad in order to preserve itself.

Advocates argue this additional pressure could tip the balance against Asad inside Syria, if other forces were aligned properly.The bottom line is that we don’t know whether the recent mortar attacks near Akçakale were a false flag attack by the Syrian rebels to justify war by Turkey against the Asad regime or an attempt by Syrian government troops to hit rebels gone too far, and accidentally ending up in Turkey.

One thing is for sure: this incident can’t be taken in a vacuum, especially since a large proportion of the rebel fighters are Al Qaeda.

And this:


The Largest Economy In The World Is Imploding Right In Front Of Our Eyes

You have probably guessed it by now - the largest economy in the world is the EU economy.  Things in Europe continue to get even worse.  Greece and Spain are already experiencing full-blown economic depressions that continue to deepen, and Italy and France are headed down the exact same path that Greece and Spain have gone.  Headlines about violent protests and economic despair dominate European newspapers day after day after day.  European leaders hold summit meeting after summit meeting, but all of the "solutions" that get announced never seem to fix anything.  In fact, the largest economy on the planet continues to implode right in front of our eyes, and the economic shockwave from this implosion is going to be felt to the four corners of the earth.


On Friday, newspapers all over Europe declared that Greece is about to run out of money (again).The Greek government says that without more aid they will completely run out of cash by the end of November.Of course the rest of Europe is going to continue to pour money into Greece because they know that if they don't the financial markets will panic.But they are also demanding that Greece make even more painful budget cuts.  Previous rounds of budget cuts have been extremely damaging to the Greek economy.The Greek economy contracted by 4.9 percent during 2010 and by 7.1 percent during 2011.Overall, the Greek economy has contracted by about 20 percent since 2008.This is what happens when you live way above your means for too long and a day of reckoning comes.The adjustment can be immensely painful.

But don't look down on Greece.  They are just ahead of the curve.  Eventually the U.S. and the rest of Europe will go down the exact same path.Just look at Spain.  When Greece first started imploding, Spain insisted that the same thing would never happen to them.But it did.

By itself, Spain is the 12th largest economy in the world, and right now it is a complete and total mess with no hope of recovery in sight.But Greece and Spain are not alone in seeing their economies implode.As I wrote about recently, the number of unemployed workers in Italy has risen by more than 37 percent over the past year.The French economy is starting to implode as well.  Just check out this article.The unemployment rate in France is now above 10 percent, and it has risen for 16 months in a row.

It is just a matter of time before things in Italy and France get as bad as they already are in Greece and Spain.

As I have said so many times before, the next wave of the global economic crisis is rapidly approaching.  Depression is already sweeping much of southern Europe, and it is only a matter of time before it sweeps across northern Europe and North America as well.

Neither Obama or Romney is going to be able to stop what is coming.  The global economy is getting weakerwith each passing day.  The central banks of the world can print money until the cows come home, but that isn't going to fix our fundamental problems.

The largest economy in the world is imploding right in front of our eyes and nobody seems to know what to do about it.

If you believe that Barack Obama, Mitt Romney or Ben Bernanke can somehow magically shield us from the economic shockwave that is coming then you are being delusional.Just because what is going on in Europe is a "slow-motion train wreck" does not mean that it will be any less devastating.Yes, we can see what is coming and we can understand why it is happening, but that doesn't mean that we will be able to avoid the consequences.