The UK Budget 2016.

Last Wednesday (16/3/16) the UK government announced the 2016/17 national budget.

In May voters in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland will go to the polls in their national assembly elections. On the same day voters in London, England will elect a new Mayor and members of the London Assembly. There will also be elections in roughly half of England's local councils.

In June all of the UK will go to the polls in a referendum to decide whether to leave or remain in the European Union (EU).

As such it was clear that the Chief Finance Minister (Chancellor of the Exchequer) George Osborne had been instructed to make this budget as bland as possible.

This is exactly what he did with the majority of the budget being taken up with the implementation of changes to tax policy that had been agreed at a meeting of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) back in November 2015. 

In order to get excited about these 86 changes you probably already need to be working as a tax accountant. For example I could tell you about the new way that future interest payments can be offset against current profits for the purposes of corporation tax. However I fell asleep halfway through writing that sentence.

In terms of the EU referendum it seems clear the government's calculation is that the poor working classes are too stupid to understand the issue so will simply vote to leave due to immigration. Therefore the outcome of the vote will be decided by middle-class voters who tend to lean towards the governing Conservative (Tory) Party. 

As such both Osborne and the Prime Minister David Cameron who both support the remain campaign were clearly using this budget as a desperate attempt to get those voters to like and therefore agree with them.

The most obvious part of this effort was the increase personal income tax free allowance to £11,000 by 2017. This will obviously benefit taxpayers across all three tax brackets. However it will be particularly beneficial to people who are just at the boundary between the 20% basic rate paid up to £31,780 (£41,780 incl the allowance) and the 40% higher rate paid beyond that up to £150,000.

The other headline grabbing announcement was a new tax of soft-drinks (soda) levied in three bands depending on their sugar content. This has been dubbed; "The Sugar Tax."

Rather like the MMR vaccine in the early-2000's sugar in food has become a bit of an obsession amongst emotionally unstable middle-class parents in the posher parts of London. 

These are the sort of people who their baby supplies from Jessica Alba's "Honest Company" and religiously follow every update of Gwyneth Paltrow's "Goop" lifestyle website. As far as they're concerned there is no greater sin a parent can commit than giving child sweets. On the sugar issue they have an (organic) homegrown campaign hero in the form of Jamie Oliver who is certainly a better TV personality than he is a cook.

So by imposing the sugar tax Osborne gets to give all those neurotic middle-class parents a warm fuzzy feeling inside and showing that he shares their priorities.

The problem is that this sugar tax is not levied at the point of sale like say the tax on tobacco products. As such there is absolutely no guarantee that manufacturers and retailers will pass the tax onto the end consumer causing prices to rise. 

This rise in price in order to reduce consumption is the core reasoning behind this type of "Sin Tax." However with the sugar tax estimated to bring in £520m per year you suspect a drop in consumption is the last thing the Chancellor wants.

In a similar vein the budget also included wildly off-topic plans to remove all British schools from government control by 2020. 

The next day this was followed up by plans to scrap the qualification that sees student teachers having to train on the job for a minimum of one year and then pass a test to prove they're competent. Instead the head teacher - or as is becoming more common general manager - of a school can arbitrarily declare anyone they want to employ to be a qualified teacher.

The same middle-class parents who consider Haribo to be the new way of spelling Hitler view this as a way to create boutique, artisanal learning environments for their delightful progeny. Tristam's father who does something very clever in the city can come in and teach maths while Jocasta's nanny can help out teaching the children Mandarin which will be vital when the Chinese run the World.

As such along with the sugar tax this plan was introduced to produce a warm, fuzzy feeling all the way from Battersea to Clapham South.

The problem arises when you leave the cosseted world of South London for poorer areas where schools see much less engagement from parents who are earning significantly less than £40,000 per year. There are particular problems in northern cities such as Bradford where Islamic extremists and some Ultra-Orthodox Jews see this absence of government oversight in education as license to teach children their own brand of medieval babbling that has no place in the real world. 

In fact it was this national inconsistency in education standards that caused the then Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher to introduce a standardised national school curriculum - "The National Curriculum" - in 1988. In order to allow for schools to be taken out of local government control it was announced in the budget that this national curriculum is to be scrapped.

The real reason behind these educational reforms of course is that schools under local government control have to negotiate pay and conditions deals with Trade Unions for teachers under collective bargaining agreements. Schools outside of local government control don't.

 
In protest at the Chancellor's slashing of education budgets these teaching unions - the National Union of Teachers (NUT) being the largest - went out on strike in 2015. They're going to go out on strike later this month. It appears that in order to extract his revenge George Osborne has decided to adopt a scorched earth policy with not even the achievements of his cherished Margaret Thatcher being spared.

What's turned out to be the real headline grabber though is cuts to disability benefit. Specifically Personal Independence Payments (PIP's). Unlike Employment Support Allowance (ESA) PIP's are intended primarily as an in work benefit. The idea being that they help meet the additional costs of living with a disability.

All the recent news coverage produced a rather good example in the form of a woman with Multiple Sclerosis (MS). 

Although her condition is not yet so bad it stops her from working part time in an office job - I think telesales - it does significantly restrict her mobility preventing her from doing household chores. As such she has no choice other than to pay someone to come into her home to do those chores for her. Without PIP's to pay for that she would have to ask her employer for a pay-rise. Her employer would then likely chose to employ someone else landing her back on ESA.

Putting aside for a moment the fact that George Osborne is a spiteful excuse for a human being the attention the proposed cuts to PIP's generated seemed intended to serve two political purposes.

The first of these is Britain's relationship with the EU. Particularly at the emergency EU Council (EUCO) summit that began the following day.

Up until around 2013 disability benefits were my sole source on income. However through the changes that brought ESA and PIP's into being I was suddenly declared healthy and ineligible. Other groups of people who magically been declared healthy under the new system include the recently deceased. 

So although none of this current argument actually applies to me and hasn't applied to me for so long I've forgotten how long its been it's a convenient way to bring up the more general topic of Britain's behaviour towards me.

This has been a long term source of tension between the UK and the EU. It light of the war against ISIL it's become a particularly contentious issue. After all one element of EU meddling the leave campaign want free the UK from is this notion that you can't just force people to work for you for free. I believe it's known as "Slavery."

In a similar vein the budget also announced that Value Added Tax (VAT) - a type of sales tax - on women's sanitary products - the so-called "Tampon Tax" would be scrapped. This was done in defiance of EU rules that class those products as a luxury. However I believe it was the UK that insisted on that rule in the first place. 

At the EUCO meeting it was announced that the EU regulation would be scrapped making the UK budget change lawful. This was intended to support the remain campaign by demonstrating the UK's ability to win concessions from the EU.

The other purpose was to fire the opening shots in the run-up to the 2016 Summer Olympics to be held in Rio de-Janerio, Brazil.

Despite all this guff about ancient Greece the modern Olympics were invented by the UK at the end of the 19th Century. However since then it appears that Britain has not being receiving as much attention as it thinks it deserves. So in the 1960's Britain invented the Parallel or Para-Olympics for disabled athletes. 

For the 2012 Para-Olympics that were of course held in London, UK the British broadcaster Channel 4 developed a special show called "The Last Leg." 

Shown at the end of each day of competition this took a light-hearted look at the day's events helping to explain disabled sport in between stupid jokes about competitors whose names sounded a bit dirty and that guy who tripped over in the crowd while carrying a tray of drinks. The show was a huge success particularly amongst the competitors and if anything almost made the Para-Olympics cooler than the Olympics.

Unfortunately Channel 4 then decided to cash in by trying to turn The Last Leg into a regular satirical news show similar to the globally famous "The Daily Show" without much success. Things got really bizarre when they ran a series of The Last Leg in January and February of 2014. However the series ended pretty much the week before the 2014 Winter Olympics started.

This year The Last Leg will be getting back to its roots and broadcasting live from Brazil throughout the Para-Olympics.

Although it's terrible as a satirical news show "The Last Leg" is very good when it comes to disability and disability rights issues. For example the main presenter Adam Hills is a single below the knee amputee while one of his co-presenter Alex Brooker would probably be classed for Para-Olympic competition as a single below the knee and double below the elbow amputee.

As such they've been extremely vocal and probably the only mainstream critics of the government's cuts to disability benefit payments. This current argument over PIP's is far from new. Every budget and mini-budget since the spring of 2010 have included savage cuts to some form of disability benefits amid cuts to pretty much everything else.

Just the week before the 2016 budget the cuts to ESA announced in the 2015 budget finally passed into law. The delay was caused by the fact the upper house of Parliament - the House of Lords - had rejected them several times. This forced the government to invoke a little used procedure whereby a proposal that has been passed by the lower house - the House of Commons - four times can bypass the House of Lords to become law.

In response to the government forcing through an unpopular measure in the face of stiff opposition most of that week's episode of The Last Leg was dedicated to a rant against Ian Duncan Smith - the senior Work and Pensions minister who devised all these cuts. The general gist was that Duncan Smith should give up the country mansion that his wife's rich daddy pays for and try and live on £3,500 a year. However I've cleaned that up a lot.

So when the news broke that Duncan Smith had been forced to resign over the latest round of disability benefit cuts a lot of people were interested to see how The Last Leg would respond when they went live around two hours later. Thus boosting The Last Leg's profile ahead of the summer Olympics.

True to form The Last Leg claimed all the credit for the resignation. This is partly true. After all there's no point giving the show such a big global stage as the Olympics only for the main topic of conversation to be what a venal and hypocritical embarrassment to the human race Ian Duncan Smith along with most of the rest of the British government really is.

At around 18:35 on 21/3/16 (UK date) I've got a tiny little bit more to add. After dinner.

Edited at around 19:55 on 21/3/16 (UK date) to add;

Obviously by announcing that he'd chosen to resign in protest against a policy that he had devised and pushed for throughout most of his political career Duncan Smith was to some extent claim the moral high ground. Given what a meaningless pantomime British politics has become I wouldn't be too surprised if this was simply laying the groundwork for Duncan Smith to return around the time of the autumn budget statement as a gesture to show how the Conservative Party had regained it's compassion.

However Duncan Smith's resignation statement seems to have been calibrated to trigger discussion about the big elephant in the room of British politics.

The big headline for the budget should have been that Osborne had missed his macro-economic targets such as cutting the deficit and reducing government borrowing. However the response to this was muted by the fact that in his six years as Chancellor Osborne has not managed to hit a single macro-economic target despite all the cuts.

The reason for this is simply that his austerity plan is a scam. It's merely a lie he tells the proles to allow him to carry out a rabidly right-wing restructuring of not only the British economy but also British society. At this point I'm seriously thinking that by attacking everyone Osborne is simply trying to kill off his own insecurities and failures.

There was a general consensus that the British public would get wise to this scam and give Osborne and the Conservatives the boot at the May 2015 General Election. However as if in an effort to prove we can't cope democracy the British public ended up giving the Conservatives a majority while the Labour Party simply impolded leaving the bizarre witterings of Jeremy Corbyn as the voice of opposition.

Osborne and Cameron have clearly taken this as a sign that they're free to do whatever they like. For example despite being told to deliver a bland budget Osborne has still managed to produce one containing such vicious attacks on the disabled and the trade unions it makes Thatcher seem like a bit of a lefty.

If the electorate won't vote Osborne out of office and he won't do the decent thing and resign we might be getting to the point where we have just let Prince Phillip shoot him.      

20:15 on 21/3/16 (UK date). 

Operation Featherweight: Month 20, Week 4, Day 3

On Thursday (17/3/16) the Syrian Kurdish political parties led by the largest - the Democratic Union Party (PYD) - announced their intention to form a Kurdish region as part of a Syria united under a federal system.

As Syria began to collapse back in 2011 the Kurds established three autonomous Cantons in the north of the country. The Afrin Canton in the west, the Kobane Canton in the centre and the Cizre Canton in the east. Although they did lose control of part of Afrin Canton they did succeed in linking the Kobane and Cizre Cantons creating a de facto Kurdish state along a 400km (240 mile) stretch of the border with Turkey.

As such to give up this Kurdish state by allowing it to become a federal region of Syria would be a massive step backwards in the quest for Kurdish nationhood.

Fortunately rather than being a legitimate suggestion the announcement which came under Russian advice was intended to influence the United Nations (UN) sponsored negotiations on Syria's future that are currently taking place in Geneva, Switzerland.

As I said when these talks opened on Monday (14/3/16) they are the absolute last thing that anybody who wants to bring peace and stability to Syria would involve themselves in. I was particularly surprised by the speed at which the Saudi drawn up list of the "Syrian Opposition" accredited to participate in the negotiations - known as the "High Negotiations Committee (HNC)" - was accepted as legitimate.

Long before you get into the dark arts of diplomatic delaying tactics there are very serious and legitimate problems with the membership of the HNC. Amongst the most serious of these is that it contains a group called the Army of Islam/Jaish al-Islam (JAI).

Although small the JAI is an extremely nasty Sunni extremist group. Back at the start of July 2015 JAI released a propaganda video in which they beheaded 12 prisoners. Those prisoners were members of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). JAI justified their execution on the grounds that ISIL was not extreme enough and should be doing more to violently cleanse the Levant region of all other ethnic/religious groups - particularly Shia Muslims.

Another significant problem with the HNC is that no Kurdish group is represented by it. This is a problem because Syria's Kurds are the nation's largest minority group making up around 10% of the population. By excluding this group you can't help but wonder whether the HNC's true purpose is in fact to continue ISIL's crimes against humanity by cleansing the Levant region of minority ethnic/religious groups such as the Yezidi Kurds.

To my mind Russia's attempts to participate in the Geneva talks albeit from the sidelines rather than blocking them entirely underline the critical flaw in Russia's approach to the Syria conflict. Despite all the smear stories in the western press it is clear that Russian President Vladimir Putin has fallen down the same strategic rabbit hole as US President Barack Obama by thinking that the Geneva talks are in any way the solution to Syria's problems.

Instead Syria first needs to be liberated from the foreign forces that have occupied the nation these past five years. Then and only then can the UN begin to broker an end to hostilities and possible political reforms amongst the Syrian population and only the Syrian population.

One of the key tasks that must be completed in order to liberate Syria from the foreign occupying forces such as ISIL, the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusra Front (ANF) and the Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant (FML)/Harakat Ahrar ash-Sham al-Islamiyya (Ahrar al-Sham) is the cutting of the supply lines of these groups.

Particularly the roughly 100km (60 mile) corridor between Azaz and the Euphrates River along Syria's border with Turkey that has become known as "Erdogan's Pocket."


Obviously Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan wants to keep this pocket open so he can continue to supply ISIL, ANF and Ahrar al-Sham. The flow of cheap oil from ISIL controlled territory into Turkish oil refineries is said to be particularly profitable for Berat Albayrak - Erdogan's son-in-law.

Equally obviously though Erdogan cannot publicly say that he wants to keep this supply line open because he is sponsoring terrorism and genocide. So instead he's made up this very elaborate conspiracy theory whereby allowing Kurds to control territory they've controlled for hundreds of years would suddenly pose a threat to Turkey's national security. 

Under no interpretation of international law does any country - including Turkey - have the authority to dictate what happens in the internal politics of a neighbouring country. Despite this though the US is continuing to indulge Erdogan and not making any effort to close this terrorist supply line.

Therefore Thursday's announcement by Syria's Kurds was extremely counter-productive. As it has been widely misundersood it makes it much harder to argue that the closing of Erdogan's pocket would not lead to the establishment of a Kurdish state at a time when the US in particular is showing very little will to argue for the closing of Erdogan's pocket.

That said on Thursday (17/3/16) the US-led coalition - Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) - did carry out limited air-strikes against ISIL positions in the town of Marea. This is very much the spiritual heart of Erdogan's Pocket sitting just 20km (12 miles) south-east of Azaz on the western boundary. 

Obviously this could interpreted as the US sending the message to Turkey that it is not happy about Erdogan's Pocket remaining open and could be open to the idea of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) moving in from their current positions a few kilometres to the west to seal it. 

So today Turkey has decided to send back a message of its own with a suicide bombing in Istanbul that so far appears to have killed 5 people and wounded 30 more - mainly foreign tourists. 

This bombing will inevitably be blamed on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Despite all evidence to the contrary - such as the four month Battle of Kobane - in Erdogan's grand conspiracy theory the PKK, the PYD, the YPG, ISIL, the People's Democratic Party (HDP), the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party–Front (DHKP-C) and the Gulen movement are all the same organisation. In more recent incarnations of the conspiracy they are all being backed by Russia in an effort to destroy Turkey.

Therefore as with last Sunday's (13/3/16) suicide bombing in Ankara, the grenade & gun attack on a police bus in Istanbul on March 3rd (3/3/16), the February 17th (17/2/16) bombings in Ankara and Stockholm, Sweden and the February 18th (18/2/16) bombing in Diyarbakir the primary intention was to force the Turkish population and the international community to unite behind Erdogan and keep Erdogan's Pocket open as Turkey battles Russian terrorism.

The attack appears to have specifically targeted nationals of the Republic of Ireland with at least two of its citizens being killed. 

As I've mentioned before during the Cold War the PKK existed as part of a sort of arc of resistance including the African National Congress (ANC) in South Africa, the Black Panther Party (BPP) in the US, the Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) in Spain & France, the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) in Palestine and the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) in Northern Ireland. 

As such the history of these movements - particularly the Irish Republican movement - has become a convenient, coded way for people to talk about Turkey's role in the Syria conflict. For example I have on occasion also referred to Erdogan's Pocket as "Garvaghy Road" after the street in Belfast famously at the centre of the "Drumcree Stand-off (2000)."

It would appear that Turkey is not as knowledgeable on the history of Irish Republicanism as the people who participated in it. By forcing the Republic of Ireland into a discussion over repatriation of the dead and injured along with the investigation Turkey appears to be trying to find out some the details that maybe aren't on the Wikipedia pages.

The history of particularly the Irish Republican movement is being used as a metaphor for Turkey's role in the Syria conflict. Turkey is also struggling with that metaphor. However I included this information here based on an early report that 2 of the 5 dead were Irish citizens. Now the dust has settled it's emerged that report was incorrect.

It now turns out that only 4 people were killed in the attack. Of those 4 one is an Iranian national. The other 3 are Israeli nationals. They were touring the city as part of an Israeli organised, Hebrew speaking tour party. The other 12 people in that party have been seriously wounded in the attack. As such it appears that it was this Israeli group had been targeted by the bomber.

Although they have a long-standing alliance with the PLO the PKK don't really consider Israel or Jews to be their enemy per se. Turkey's ruling Justice & Development Party (AKP) however is very anti-Semitic and has very real problems with Israel.

Things really began to deteriorate on May 31st 2010 (31/5/10) when a flotilla set sail from Turkey in an effort to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza. The Israelis stopped this flotilla with the boarding of the MV Mavi Mamara being particularly controversial.

Interestingly a number of the Turkish activists aboard the Mavi Marmara have since gone on to join ISIL. This includes Yakup Bulent Alniak who was killed by a US strike in Syria's Idlib province in September 2014.

Recently Turkey has been moving to try and repair its relationship with Turkey. As such this attack could have been an attempt to establish a channel of communication. However I think it's much more likely that the AKP nutbag who carried out the attack was just really, really anti-Semitic.

This latest bombing comes of course just after a big summit between the European Union (EU) and Turkey to try to solve the irregular migrant crisis that has been caused by Turkey's attacks on Syria and its attempts to weaponise the refugee crisis that it has in turn created.

The UK's big contribution to this summit was the publication on Wednesday's (16/3/16) of the new national budget. This is obviously a large topic that I was hoping to deal with separately today. However the part that is relevant to the EU meeting was the proposed cuts to disability benefit payments that have since led to a highly stage-managed scrapping of the policy and the resignation of the relevant senior minister - Ian Duncan Smith.

From 2004 to roughly 2013 this type of benefit was my sole source of income. Then in 2013 the UK government re-wrote the rules almost specifically to exclude me. Since then I've been surviving on charm, luck and forward planning. The UK's behaviour towards me has long been a source of tension between the UK and other EU member states.

A particularly contentious incident occurred during 2013. Here a local property development firm tried to have me jailed for life by framing me a charge equivalent to attempted murder relating to some minor damage to one of their properties. In order to show his support for the property development firm Erdogan rushed ahead with plans to develop a shopping mall where Istanbul's Gezi Park meets Taksim Square.

This was obviously intended to trigger protests which Erdogan could then condemn. However what were intended as small protests rapidly became a lighting rod for all those in Turkey opposed to Erdogan growing into several months of unrest. By some estimates roughly 6% of Turkey's population were prepared to put themselves at risk of arrest and serious injury by participating in the protests.

Today's bombing occurred in Taksim Square where most of the protests were centred.

Erdogan may also have been tempted to go ahead with today's bombing by the crash earlier today by the crash of a "Fly Dubai" civilian passenger jet in Rostov-on-Don Airport on the Black Sea coast of Russia. I will be back to deal with that after dinner.

17:45 on 19/3/16 (UK date).

Edited at around 20:05 on 19/3/16 (UK date) to alter the above and add;

When it comes to Russia's longstanding opposition to ISIL civilian plane crashes are of course a very sensitive topic.

Things began with the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 on March 8th 2014 (8/3/14). This took place during the 2014 Winter Olympics/Para-Olympics being held in Sochi, Russia. It was an attempt to disrupt the Olympics after ISIL's supporters were denied US permission to launch direct mass casualty terror attacks against the Olympics itself.

Then of course there was the July 17th 2014 (17/7/14) crash of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 over the self-declared autonomous region of Ukraine. Despite the fact the investigation found the Ukrainian government was to blame by allowing a civilian aircraft to fly into an area where an air-war was taking place this led to sanctions being placed on Russia that remain in place to this day.

Over the last month or so the Netherlands have indicated that they have come under renewed pressure from the US to ignore Ukraine's - at best - criminal negligence and continue with attempts to prosecute Russia over the crash. That is despite there being absolutely no evidence of Russian responsibility.

Then on October 31st 2015 (31/10/15) Russian Kogalymavia flight 7K9268 was bombed out of the skies over Egypt killing all 224 Russian civilians onboard. Although it is subject to debate ISIL claimed to have carried out the bombing in order to punish Russia for its air campaign in Syria. Curiously no-one seems to be anywhere near as interested in bringing justice to the victims of this crash as they are over MH17.

Therefore it is possible that Russia brought down FlyDubai flight B738 in order to force the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to feel its pain over 7K9268 and rumours to that effect have certainly begun to circulate on the Internet. Obviously this is the sort of thing that would tempt Erdogan into thinking that today's bombing in Istanbul could be used as evidence of "Russian Aggression!"

However that conspiracy theory starts to fall apart when you realise that no Emiratis were killed in the crash. However 44 Russian citizens were killed. Killing 44 of your people and none of enemies people is a very strange way of making your enemy feel your pain.

One of the main things that it crippling the EU's ability to respond to the threat of ISIL and the refugee crisis it has created is the attitudes of the newer member states such as Poland and the Baltic states. They are so blinded by their irrational hatred of Russia that they would prefer to ally themselves with ISIL in the hope of hurting Russia. 

This has been particularly true of the situation in Ukraine where the legitimate government was overthrown during the 2014 Winter Olympics in an effort to support ISIL. Rostov-on-Don is around 100km (60 miles) from the Ukrainian border.

Poland's relationship with the EU is itself mired in a controversial plane crash. 

This one occurred on April 10th (10/4/10) when a Polish Air Force Tu-154 crashed on landing at Smolensk, Russia killing all 96 onboard. The victims included the Polish President, a former Polish President, the head of the Polish military, the head of the Polish central bank, numerous Polish civil servants and 18 Polish Members of Parliament (MP's).

This crash was caused by a mix of bad weather and frankly human stupidity. For example the cockpit voice recorder revealed that the President Chief of Staff who was not a pilot over-ruling the pilots and insisting the weather was safe enough to land in because the President had a schedule to keep. Then of course there is the fact that you just don't put that many important people on the same aircraft. You often think twice about putting them in the same room.

However as often happens with such a shocking national tragedy numerous conspiracy theories about the crash have sprung up over the years. 

The most credible of these centre on the fact that the then Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk was struggling to drive through EU mandated reforms. All those aboard the flight were members of the right-wing Law & Justice Party (PiS) which opposed him. Therefore the conspiracy theory is that Tusk ordered the plane crash in order to kill his political opponents and pass the reforms the EU demanded.

Donald Tusk is currently the President of the EU.

On October 25th 2015 (25/10/15) the PiS were returned to power in the Polish elections. Since then the party has lurched so far to the right it's bordering on the Nazism that is routinely practised in neighbouring Ukraine. 

In the most recent controversy Poland's Constitutional Court - the nation's highest - rejected PiS reforms that would prevent the Court from rejecting unconstitutional legislation introduced by the PiS. As not to make it legally binding the PiS refused to officially publish this ruling. In response around 50,000 Poles took to the streets in protest on March 12th (12/3/16).

In what seems like a transparent attempt to distract the protesters the PiS have now decided that the Smolensk crash was the result of a Russian conspiracy. Of course anyone who criticises the PiS is immediately accused of being a Russian conspirator including legendary anti-Soviet activist and second President of Poland Lech Wałęsa.

Therefore the more reasonable conspiracy theory is that the UAE caused the plane to crash in order to kill Russian citizens as an attack on Russia. However because it is an Emirati operated aircraft people like Erdogan would be able to spin it as "Russian Aggression." After all it was the Ukrainians who caused the MH17 crash. Yet we're still blaming the Russians.

The connections with the 2010 Smolensk crash would of course allow the UAE and their Gulf allies to assess the current mood within the EU vis-a-vis Poland, Ukraine and Russia.

However I think it is vitally important to remember that landing a large passenger jet in bad weather - particularly snow - is extremely difficult. 

B738 had actually aborted an earlier landing attempt and had been circling the airport for some two hours waiting for the weather to clear before running low on fuel. Early indications are that only final approach wind sheer caused the aircraft to flip driving the wing into the ground.

Obviously there will be questions over why the aircraft circled for two hours waiting for the weather to clear rather than diverting to an alternate airport. However I suspect we'll discover that the budget airline was more concerned about having to pay for accommodation and onward travel for the passengers than the safety of the passengers.

As such unless dramatic new information comes to light I'm comfortable to work under the assumption that this was just a plane crash.

21:50 on 19/3/16 (UK date).



 



 





  

When the Night Has Come. And the Land is Dark.

Just hold a press conference to pat yourself on the back.

On March 7th (7/3/16) the European Union (EU) met with Turkey to discuss the migrant crisis that Turkey has inflicted on the EU. As I explained this time last week the proposed agreement reached was ridiculous.

So in ridiculous in fact that the only rational explanation was that it had been designed specifically to force Hungary to veto it. In issuing that veto Hungary would be forced to admit that its demand that the EU seals its borders before putting in place a plan to distribute Syrian refugees is unworkable. This would increase pressure on Hungary to drop its legal challenge that is preventing that distribution plan going into effect.

The problem was that even before I wrote my post last week France and Germany didn't so much blink first as fully fainted in fear. As a result rather than forcing the Hungarian veto they instead replaced the March 7th agreement with one so watered down it is utterly meaningless.

Today's meeting where this new proposal appears to have been accepted has only just ended. As a result an official version of the agreement has not yet been released and I've not had time to properly digest the pirate version.

However the current situation is that if an irregular migrant lands in the EU from Turkey - typically on the Greek islands - they have to apply for political asylum. This is the process by which it is decided whether they are a refugee or not. If they are found not to be a refugee they can be deported back to their country of origin which in this case is Turkey. This process can take several years with numerous appeals until a decision becomes final.

Under the new agreement if an irregular migrant lands in the EU from Turkey they have to apply for political asylum. If they are found not to be a refugee they can be deported back to their country of origin which in this case is Turkey. This process can take several years with numerous appeals until a decision becomes final.

So under this new agreement the situation is exactly the same as it was before the agreement.

Rather than simply deporting failed asylum seekers - at this point "illegal immigrant" is the correct term - back to Turkey the EU has now agreed to accept a Syrian refugee for every illegal immigrant deported. However this is almost a moot point because we're unlikely to be actually deporting anyone until around 2019 and even then that will only be if Turkey stops the flow of irregular migrants into the EU.

Fortunately the EU has also decided to water down the ransom that will be paid to Turkey. The promised E3bn stays but the plans to increase that to E6bn appears to have been scrapped. The plans to grant Turkish citizens visa free access to the EU are still on the table but only if the conditions are met. That offer has been on the table for a very long time but Turkey has not yet been able to meet the conditions yet. It is unlikely that it will be able to meet them any time soon.

Likewise the plan to open new chapters on Turkish EU membership is still on the table. However the Turkish military continues to occupy northern Cyprus. As an EU member Cyprus has the power to veto the opening of all chapters except the one on budgetary standards. I suspect that's going to continue.

So in terms of the irregular migrant crisis I am really struggling to see what this new agreement changes in any way, shape or form.

On the bigger issue of how to end the conflict in Syria which is producing all the refugees sadly this agreement can only be counter-productive. I really think we are now at the point where Turkey needs to be formally designated not only as a state sponsor of terror but also as a state sponsor of genocide. Such a designation would lead to Turkey being cut off completely from the international community.

However through this agreement the EU has decided to pull Turkey close to it by locking the two in years of negotiation and diplomatic contact. That is only likely to embolden Turkey to escalate the crisis making the situation far worse.

16:20 on 18/7/16 (UK date).

Operation Featherweight: Month 20, Week 4, Day 1.

On Tuesday (15/3/16) Russia began withdrawing its air forces from Syria.

As I explained at the time this placed almost sole responsibility on the US to complete two tasks that are vital to the defeat of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and associated groups.

The first of these tasks was to block the resumption of the Train & Equip program.

In the 14 months it operated between August 2014 and October 2015 Train & Equip was the mechanism by which the US transferred training, weapons and other equipment to ISIL's replacement - the Army of Conquest/Jaish al-Fatah (JAF). This is a coalition of numerous groups of which the two largest are the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusra Front (ANF) and the more extreme Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant (FML)/Harakat Ahrar ash-Sham al-Islamiyya (Ahrar al-Sham).

What the US would do is bring JAF fighters out of Syria into Turkey where they would be trained and equipped under cover names such as Division 30 (D30), Division 13 (D13) and the Falcons of the Levant/Suqur al-Sham. They would then be sent back into Syria where they would immediately 'defect' and rejoin the JAF to fight alongside ISIL against the Syrian government.

The second task was to seal the roughly 100km (60 mile) stretch of Syria's border with Turkey between the Euphrates River and the town of Azaz which has become known as "Erdogan's Pocket." Or seeing as it's Saint Patrick's Day - 'Garvaghy Road.' This corridor is being used by Turkey to supply the JAF. They don't even bother use proxies such as D13 and D30 and instead are happy to supply ANF and Ahrar al-Sham directly.

Both of these objectives have become critical in the last week or so due a series of chemical weapons attacks.

The first of these took place on March 8th (8/3/16) when JAF forces - including D13 - used Yellow Phosphorous to attack positions belonging to the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) within Aleppo City. Throughout the conflict the YPG have of course consistently been the most effective anti-ISIL force in Syria despite receiving only a fraction of the support given by the US to the JAF.

The second attack occurred on March 10th (10/3/16) in the Iraqi town of Taza - 10km (6 miles) south of Kirkuk. Here ISIL used both Chlorine and low-grade Sulphur Mustard Gas against the civilian population. This wounded 600 civilians and killed an infant girl prompting mass protests from the local residents.

As always seems to be the case when faced with a job to do the US responded by throwing a loud tantrum in an effort to make it everybody else's problem. This took the form of shutting down the entire Washington D.C underground rail (Metro) system for 29 hours between for 04:00 (GMT) Wednesday (16/3/16) and 09:00 (GMT) today.

You may remember that back on January 12th 2015 (12/1/15) L'enfant Plaza station which sits at the centre of the D.C Metro system had to be evacuated after it filled with a noxious gas.

This occurred at a time when the Obama administration was trying to justify its support for ISIL and associated groups by accusing the Syrian government of dropping barrel bombs filled with Chlorine gas on civilians. The problem with that was that as with all the other accusations made by the Obama administration against the Syrian government there was scant evidence that it was actually happening.

As I foolishly demonstrated just the other week the ingredients to make Chlorine gas exist in pretty much every building in the developed World. Therefore any time any building - particularly large industrial ones - is damaged in a conventional explosion it is likely that a small quantity of Chlorine gas will be released alongside various toxic chemicals such as cyanide gas from burning plastic.

Plus it is extremely easy for a psychological warfare outfit like Syria Civil Defence (AKA: "The White Helmets") to splash a bit of Chlorine about following an explosion in an effort to smear their enemy.

Then of course there is the issue that Chlorine gas is only technically considered a chemical weapon because all forms of gas are banned during warfare. Therefore while the civilian police can douse civilian protesters in as much tear gas as they like soldiers aren't actually allowed to use it against each other during war.

Rather than being a poison Chlorine is merely an irritant like tear gas or pepper spray. As such it simply irritates the tissues in the lungs causing you to cough in much the same way that sometimes house dust irritates the tissues in the nose causing you to sneeze.

Obviously though Chlorine is a more powerful irritant than dust and often exists in higher concentrations so the coughing fits it produces are longer and more violent. So while being exposed to Chlorine gas is an extremely unpleasant experience that is all it is.

The January 2015 evacuation of L'enfant Plaza station therefore was to highlight just how melodramatic and unwarranted the accusations the Obama administration were making against the Syrian government actually were. French speakers may even have got the distinct impression that Obama was being referred to as a child.

The Yellow Phosphorous and Sulphur Mustard Gas being used by ISIL and associated groups are a much more serious proposition than Chlorine.

They are both blister agents that cause chemical burns similar to the type of thermic burns you would get from touching a hot stove. On the relatively tough tissue of the skin these cause blisters which are extremely painful and carry with them a very real risk of infection and sepsis. However they completely destroy the soft tissues in the eyes, nose, throat and lungs. This causes people to effectively drown in a mixture of their own puss and blood.

With Sulphur Mustard Gas being a lot more difficult to produce than Chlorine this creates the obvious question of where ISIL and their associates are getting their supplies from.

You may remember that back in 2003 the US invaded in Iraq on the pretence of protecting the World from chemical weapons that Saddam Hussein could unleash in just 45 minutes. After occupying Iraq for the next 9 years the Americans eventually determined that there weren't even chemical weapons in Iraq to begin with.

While this was going on it was no secret that the Syrian government had vast stockpiles of chemical weapons including Sulphur Mustard and much more serious nerve agents such as Sarin and VX. However under United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Resolution 2118 (2013) all of Syria's chemical weapons along with pre-cursor agents were removed from Syria and destroyed in August 2014. By the Americans.

Therefore the only way that ISIL and their allies can access chemical weapons is by importing them from a third nation.

That nation is strongly believed to be Turkey and the supply route is that stretch of border between Azaz and the Euphrates. Then of course there is the persistent question of why the chemical signatures of the Sarin used in Ghouta in 2013 didn't match anything in the Syrian government's stockpile.

This latest round of trouble on the D.C Metro centred on a stretch of track between "Foggy Bottom" and "Federal Triangle" stations.

The Republic of Ireland is currently preparing to mark the 100th anniversary of the so-called "Easter Rising" of 1916. There is a very famous song about this uprising called "Foggy Dew." The Iraqi town of Taza sits in a triangle of territory between Kirkuk, Baiji and Tikrit. The year long failure to liberate this triangle from ISIL control has become a symbol of the US' failure to devise a strategic plan to liberate any of Iraq from ISIL.

Therefore the intention of the D.C Metro closure was to make a lot of noise about this chemical weapons/Turkey issue. Particularly while the US Special Envoy on ISIL - Brett McGurk - was attending the annual Suli Forum in Iraq Kurdistan. However the resounding message seemed to be that fixing the problem would simply cause Washington too much disruption.

As the D.C Metro system re-opened this morning it became clear that once again the US had failed on both of those vital tasks.

Last night Train & Equip resumed with the US deploying 47 trained fighters along with weapons and equipment from Turkey into Syria. Their route of entry was Garvaghy Road. Even assuming that the problem with the vetting system have been resolved deploying such a small number of fighters into an area where they're surrounded by thousands of enemies can only be interpreted as an attempt to have them killed/captured and their weapons and equipment seized by Al Qaeda.

That dual failure by the US prompted Turkey to gloat loudly.

This took the form of a mythical Kurdish separatist group known as the "Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK)" to claim responsibility for Sunday's (13/3/16) terrorist bombing in Ankara. That is despite everybody knowing that the Turks carried out the attack themselves to make it look like a Russian retaliation for a terror attack Turkey carried out in Nazran, Russia on Friday (11/3/16).

The TAK were formed in 2003/4 by the Turkish Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). Their purpose was to prevent the Justice & Development Party (AKP) forming an alliance with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) against the MHP. The name "TAK" is actually a play on "AK" which is how the AKP refer to themselves.

The British government actually did something similar following the Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland in 1998. In an effort to derail the agreement by discrediting the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) they set up a mythical splinter group calling themselves the Real Irish Republican Army (RIRA). In the summer of 1998 between the Good Friday Agreement being signed and it going into force RIRA carried out the Omagh Bombing. This killed 31 civilians making it by far the worst terror attack carried out in the 30 years of the Troubles.

It almost goes without saying that two weeks after the February 17th (17/2/16) Ankara bombing which was also blamed on TAK the trial of the only Omagh bombing suspect - Seamus Daly - was halted by the Judge on March 1st (1/3/16). This was to send the message to Turkey that Britain is well aware that RIRA and the British Crown are one and the same thing.

Back on December 23rd (23/12/15) TAK were blamed for a small explosion aboard a Pegasus Airlines plane at Istanbul's Sabiha Gokcen Airport that killed one. Here they were being used to discuss re-starting Train & Equip - particularly to the Falcons of the Levant group.

As such today's claim of responsibility by TAK for the March 13th (13/3/16) Ankara bombing was Turkey giving a big f*ck you to this European Union (EU) Summit on the refugees crisis by going;

"Yeah we carried out the Nazran bombing. We also carried out the Ankara bombing. And guess what; We've got US support for both!"

Germany responded by today closing it's Embassy in Ankara and its Consulate in Istanbul on the grounds that Turkey represents an imminent terrorist threat. We will see if they will stick to that position within the EU meeting or whether it is just US-style noise without purpose.

Today the Obama administration finally declared ISIL actions to be genocide. This is an almost entirely symbolic gesture which does rather beg the question of why it took them 20 months to make it.

Sadly this declaration does not mean that the Obama administration has suddenly developed a moral problem with ISIL's behaviour. Instead it is an entirely cynical move calculated to win the 2016 Presidential Election for Hillary Clinton by waging a bloody battle with Congress over the appointment of a Supreme Court Justice.

Yesterday (16/3/16) Obama addressed the nation to announce Merrick Garland as his choice for Supreme Court Justice. With Obama long ago giving up any right to appoint Supreme Court Justice's this will be blocked by Congress. The election meme that the Democrat campaign have dreamt up for this battle is a call for Congressional Republicans to; "#DoYourJob!"

On Monday (14/3/16) both Republican and Democrat members of Congress passed a motion by 383-0 giving Obama until today to declare ISIL as perpetrators of genocide.

It is obviously very difficult for Obama to demand that Congress does its job while he is very clearly refusing to do his.

17:50 on 17/3/16 (UK date).

 



 

Operation Featherweight: Month 20, Week 3, Day 6.

The fundamental problem throughout the war against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) is that US President Barack Obama looks at their actions and their ideology yet simply cannot see anything wrong.

Looking only at the events surrounding Sinjar/Shingal mountain and ISIL's treatment of the Yezidi ethnic group since August 2014 the group has massacred over 5,000 people. It has kidnapped in excess of 7,000 people - mainly women and young girls - in order to subject them cruel and inhuman treatment such as rape and sexual slavery. ISIL has forced more than 10,000 people from their homes and then destroyed those homes along with religious and cultural buildings in the area.

Throughout ISIL have taken great pride in explaining that their actions were done to erase the Yezidis from existence.

This makes ISIL's actions one of the clearest examples of genocide the world has ever seen. Even the Nazis tried to disguise their actions to some extent.

However Barack Obama refuses to acknowledge the crimes against humanity committed by ISIL. Last night the US House of Representatives - the lower House of Congress - passed a resolution by 383 votes to 0 giving the Obama administration until Thursday (17/3/16) to formally condemn ISIL's crimes against humanity. We await Obama's response.

Being unable to see that ISIL's ideology and actions are both wrong and indefensible Obama has equally been unable to see that granting ISIL and associated groups safe-haven in Iraq, Syria and now Libya is possibly the worst idea that the world has ever seen.

So when in August 2014 overwhelming public pressure forced Obama to take action his intention was never to defeat ISIL. Instead it was to re-brand them in a form that was palatable to the public.

The first step was that the "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" suddenly became just "Islamic State."

Removing the word "Levant" from the name removed the biggest clue to the apocalyptic and nihilist objective of the group - to religiously and ethnically purify the medieval Levant region to trigger the final battle that would herald God's return to Earth. It also helped to disguise how this ideology is commonly shared amongst so many of the groups Obama likes to term "moderate."

One of ISIL's key allies is a group known as the Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant (FML)/Harakat Ahrar ash-Sham al-Islamiyya (Ahrar al-Sham). After all what is a state if not a collection of freemen.

The reason why Ahrar al-Sham's close allegiance and shared ideology with ISIL had to be kept secret is that throughout 2014 and 2015 the US' main effort was not to defeat ISIL. Instead it was to train, equip and arm Ahrar al-Sham.

Despite this deceit Obama's support for extremist groups could not be kept secret forever.

On the night of September 18th 2015 (18/9/15) the US sent fighters it had trained and equipped into Syria. These are believed to be members of a group known as "Division 30 (D30)" and a group known as the "Falcons of the Levant/Suqur al-Sham."

Both immediately joined up with Ahrar al-Sham and took their weapons including BGM-71 TOW anti-tank missiles with them. This led to the US Train & Equip program being formally scrapped on October 9th 2015 (9/10/15).

Despite the suspension of Train & Equip the problems of the program continued to live on. Officially a ceasefire went into effect on February 26th (26/2/16).

However this has not stopped another US backed group - Division 13 (D13) - fighting alongside Ahrar al-Sham and Al Qaeda's Syrian affiliate Al Nusra Front repeatedly attacking the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) within Aleppo City. The attacks have frequently involved the use of chemical weapons including chlorine gas and yellow phosphorus.

Amid mounting pressure on March 13th (13/3/16) D13 were forced to claim that their base had been overrun by Al Qaeda. This was a pretty pitiful attempt to explain why US supplied weapons were being used by extremist groups to commit war crimes.

To the surprise of absolutely no-one Ahrar al-Sham did not take all this international support and use it to fight against their main ally ISIL. Instead they used it to assist ISIL by heading in the opposite direction to fight the Syrian government. This removed the main pressure on ISIL and allowed them to advance including into the central ancient city of Palmyra in June 2015.

In a remarkable act of charity on September 30th (30/9/15) Russia decided to enter the conflict. It's objective was to push Ahrar al-Sham and ANF back to the positions they occupied when the US entered the conflict in August 2014. This would once again contain ISIL in the north-east of Syria and give the US time to push ISIL out of Iraq into that small area around Raqqa where they would be defeated.

While Russia was doing all this work to correct the west's mistakes for free all the west needed to do was a teeny, tiny little bit of work to protect itself.

Take for example these UN sponsored talks currently going on in Geneva, Switzerland. Although it pains me to say it aloud these are the absolute last thing that any rational person would want. They force everyone together in a high pressure environment denying them the space to perform the delicate tasks that need to be completed.

Therefore rather then howling from the rooftops about how these talks need to begin the west should have been trying to delay them. Rather than Saudi Arabia simply submitting a list of groups party to the talks and it being accepted you would think that this would be a process that would drag on for months. During that time Saudi Arabia would be repeatedly forced to explain why it thinks Ahrar al-Sham are in any way moderate or acceptable.

Likewise it shouldn't have been too difficult for western governments to give off the record briefings to domestic news editors explaining who all these groups are and why they're a problem. It certainly seems a lot easier than all the recent Belfast nonsense that just seems to be noise without purpose.

Unfortunately not only was the west unable to lift a finger to help itself it couldn't even maintain basic levels of diplomatic civility. For example US/NATO General Breedlove's accusation that Russia had weaponised the refugee crisis several months before Russia became involved in the conflict was as unnecessary as it was ridiculous.

Needless to say the Russians sense of charity eventually ran out. Yesterday (14/3/16) Russia announced that it was withdrawing forces from Syria starting today.

However I think the main reason behind the Russian withdrawal is that over the past nearly six months they have achieved 90-95% of their objectives.

Although they have not cut the supply line between Turkey and Aleppo City they have pushed ANF and Ahrar al-Sham allied forces out of Latakia province and pushed them back to Aleppo City in Aleppo province. Within Idlib, Hama, Homs, Damascus, Daraa and As Suwayda provinces the terrorist forces have been significantly depleted and denied access to the main supply routes.

This makes it extremely unlikely that they will be able to launch any significant new offensive in the coming months. In fact it is beacuse they were on the brink of total defeat they demanded the ceasefire to allow them time to re-group.

These gains have forced the Russians to take a look at what the US has achieved over the same time in Iraq. The answer is not much.

Back on December 28th (28/12/15) Ramadi which sits around 90km (55 miles) west of the capital Baghdad was liberated. Since then Iraqi forces have been slowly working to clear ISIL from the small towns and villages along the Euphrates River to Hit in the north and Fallujah to the east. Progress has been painfully slow with ISIL still able to mount attacks in and around Ramadi.

Not only has there been an agonising lack of progress around Ramadi there still seems to be the complete lack of any strategic plan to drive ISIL from Iraq.

This is really summed up by the sulphur mustard gas attack that ISIL launched against the city of Taza which sits around 10km (6 miles) south of Kirkuk on Saturday (12/3/16). This wounded 600 civilians and killed an infant girl causing mass protests calling for air-strikes against the ISIL firing positions.

Back at the end of February US Special Forces captured Sleiman Daoud al-Afari who is the head of ISIL's chemical weapons program. The reason why the US kept this quiet is that with al-Afari not being in regular contact with ISIL leadership they initially did not realise that he'd been captured. During this time the US were interrogating him to build up an intelligence picture of ISIL's chemical weapons capability.

This started to bear fruit when on Thursday (10/3/16) when the US was able to carry out air-strikes targeting that chemical weapon capacity. What the US wants to do now is continue to build up an intelligence picture in order to completely eradicate ISIL's chemical weapons. By launching the attack on Taza ISIL were trying to force the US' hand to get them to reveal what information they've already gathered.

Although the mustard gas attack was horrific it was really the final straw for the people of Taza because they've been coming under almost constant conventional artillery fire for almost two years now. This is really disappointing because Taza sits inside this triangle of territory that sits between Baiji, Tikrit and Kirkuk.

You may remember that in the spring of 2015 Iraqi forces launched an operation to liberate Tikrit. Having done that they then stopped rather than pushing ahead to clear ISIL out of that triangle of territory around Hawija. Since then ISIL have been able to once again seize territory around the main road linking Baghdad to Tikrit and continue their attacks on civilians in places such as Taza.

Therefore you would think that the priority would be quickly completr the clearance of ISIL from the areas around Ramadi before moving on to finally clear them out of the Kirkuk triangle. However with training bases being built troops being deployed all the military planning seems to be utterly focused on liberating the northern city of Mosul which will be the Iraqi forces toughest job.

As such the Russians have realised that while they've pretty much completed their task it could be as much as a year before the US is able to push ISIL out of Iraq if indeed that operation ever starts. While the Russians are waiting for the Americans to sort themselves out they may as well send their pilots home to sleep in their own beds and eat dinner with their families. After all they can be re-deployed to Syria in about six hours.

The Russian withdrawal has rather dumped the US in the sh*t though. In recent weeks the US has been coming under increasing pressure to restart the failed Train & Equip program. With Russia involved the US was able to brush of these calls as not to escalate the situation. Now that the Russians have withdrawn the US only option is to insist that the program stays closed because they want it to stay closed. And it must stay closed

Then of course there is the issue of "Erdogan's Pocket." This is a roughly 100km (60 mile) corridor of land in northern Syria between roughly the town of Azaz and the Euphrates River. It is being used by Turkey to supply weapons and fighters to ANF and Ahrar al-Sham in Aleppo City.

The US did have the option of quietly letting Russia support the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) liberate this area from the west. Now the US' only option is to support the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF/QSD) to liberate it from the east. And it has to be liberated.

Of course this extra pressure being dumped on the US is a bit of a worry because at every point over the last 7 years whenever Obama has come under pressure he has simply crumpled like a paper bag.

17:50 on 15/3/16 (UK date).

Operation Featherweight: Month 20, Week 3, Day 5.

On Friday February 26th (26/2/16) a 14 day ceasefire began in Syria. This obviously expired last Friday March 11th (11/3/16). However it seems to be continuing to rollover on a day-by-day basis.

Away from the formal ceasefire Russia and the Syrian government's unilateral decision to also stop fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the Al Qaeda affiliated Al Nusra Front (ANF) and all associated groups also appears to be continuing.

With no plan of their own this situation seems to have left the US roaming the earth looking for someone to tell them what to do next.

The first part of this tour saw US Vice President Joe Biden travel to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) last Monday (7/3/16). Despite it being an Islamic Monarchy and Dubai's trashiness of the nations such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Bahrain that make up the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) the UAE is certainly the most moderate and sensible.

The main topic of conversation seemed to be this renewed threat to attack Russia if Russia continues to fight ISIL, ANF and associated groups.

This threat first emerged in the summer of 2013 and culminated in a series of suicide bombings in the Russian city of Volgograd in the weeks running up to the 2014 Winter Olympics that were held in the near-by city of Sochi. The overthrow of the Ukrainian government and the sanctions of Russia that followed were an American apology for helping to stop terror attacks on the Olympics itself.

With the 2016 Summer Olympics taking place in Rio de Janerio, Brazil in the coming months Turkey in particular seems to be lobbying hard for a repeat of what happened during the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. That is the Georgian government once again launching an attack on its ethnically Russian minority civilian population forcing Russia to intervene to protect them. As with Ukraine that would provide an excuse for sanctions to be placed on Russia. At Turkey's urging the frozen conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan also seems to be heating up again.

In order to promote discussion about this topic the US-led Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) on March 4th (4/3/16) carried out a targeted air-strike against a senior ISIL commander by the name of Tarkhan Tayumurazovich Batirashvili (AKA: "Abu Omar al-Shishani" "Omar the Chechen"). Although a member of the Chechen ethnic group Batirashvili is a Georgian national and a former member of the Georgian Special Forces who is both a veteran of the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and the 2008 attack on Georgia's ethnically Russian minority.

In terms of senior ISIL commanders that CJTFOIR could locate to target with an air-strike who represent the growing tensions between Turkey and Russia one of Batirashvili's aliases "Al-Shishani" is close enough to the name of the Syrian town of "Al-Shadadi." This was the last place that the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF/QSD) were able to liberate from ISIL before US pressure forced them to stop.

In the days before Biden's arrival two US nationals were killed in a car crash in the UAE. One of the deceased - Victoria McGrath - was reasonably famous as one of the more photogenic survivors of the April 15th 2013 (15/4/13) bomb attacks on the Boston Marathon. The crash was a result of a two-seater sports car carrying four people being driven by a drunk man at over 100mph in a 25mph zone. Presumably the Canadian driver - Cody Nixon - thought he and Ms Nixon would only be making headlines for getting arrested.

The Boston Marathon bombing was many, many things. However the fact that the two attackers - the Tsarnaev brothers - were Muslims from the Russian Caucus region of Chechnya was intended as the US throwing it's support behind the threat to attack Russia if it continued fighting ISIL, ANF and associated groups.

Turkey clearly took all this as permission to launch attacks against Russia. So on Friday (11/3/16) a car bomb exploded outside a Mosque in the Nazran area of the Russian Caucus region of Ingushetia which sits right on the border with Georgia. Ingushetia is a majority Muslim area. 

However the dominant form of Islam practised there is Sufi Islam. Predominately but not exclusively a form of Shia-Islam Sufism represents the polar opposite of the extreme Salafi, Sunni-Islam practised by groups such as ISIL and Al Qaeda. The bombing seems to have been a Salafi attempt to assassinate a Sufi Iman who is opposed to ISIL, Al Qaeda and associated groups.  

In the hours before the explosion a Turkish newspaper with extremely close ties to the ruling Justice & Development Party (AKP) published an editorial announcing that Russia would soon experience the wrath of Turkey and the wrath of Islam. Sunni extremists like those who support the AKP do not consider Shias or Sufis to be Muslims.

In response to the Nazran attack the US State Department changed its advice to US citizens travelling to Turkey warning of looming terrorist threat. The message quite simply being that having carried out the Nazran attack Turkey represents an imminent terrorist threat.

Unfortunately that seems to have been too subtle for Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the AKP. So on Sunday (14/3/16) they unleashed yet another terrorist bombing on the Turkish capital Ankara. So far that bombing has killed 32 and wounded more then 100.

The specific location of the bombing is what I suppose you would describe as a public transport hub. It is a railway station where numerous different lines intersect. It is also a point where various different bus and tram lines intersect. As such it is packed with people changing between buses, trams and trains.

The Russia city of Volgograd which was targeted back in December 2013 functioned as the main transport hub for the Sochi Olympics. Rather than flying directly into Sochi visitors to the Olympics would fly into Volgograd and then either drive or use public transport to get to Sochi. The specific targets hit there were a railway station and a trolley bus/tram stop outside of a railway station. 

While it is yet to be determined how truthful it is the Turkish authorities are claiming that the bomb was loaded into a black BMW car. Although amid all the Russian I'm not fully aware of the context the recurring image of the Nazran bombing was of a black BMW - or possibly Mercedes - car torn apart by the explosion.

As such the Ankara bombing was staged to make it look like Russia had teamed up with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to carry out an attack in revenge for the Nazran bombing. Therefore the entire World and the all of Turkey's voters had better unite behind Erdogan and the AKP to defend the nation from the scourge of Russian and PKK aggression.

I actually thought the decision to immediately blame the PKK directly showed a distinct lack of creative flair. I honestly expected them to go for something more exotic such as the Revolutionary People's Liberation Front/Party (DHKP-C) or the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK) as they did with the February 17th (17/2/16) Ankara bombing or the October 10th (10/10/15) Ankara bombing.

The second leg of Biden's trip took him to Israel on Tuesday (8/3/16). Here the main topic of conversation seemed to be the massive number of lone-wolf terror attacks that Israel has experienced over the past six months. This is of course the result of ISIL sitting just across Israel's border in Syria calling for people to carry out lone-wolf terror attacks against the "Zionist Crusaders."

To this end the US staged a lone-wolf terror attack on Tuesday evening along the Tel Aviv sea-front close to Jaffa port. What made this attack slightly unusual is that most attacks in Israel occur near Jerusalem where Israel meets Palestine. Tel Aviv however is slap bang in the middle of Israel and isn't really disputed. The attack also occurred close to where Biden was dining with his family and a US tourist - Taylor Force - was killed.

What appears to have happened is that a local CIA asset has let it be known where and when Biden would be dining. At the same time they've nudged the Vanderbilt University tour group that Force was travelling with in the same direction. If the two met they would get the headline. If they didn't it would still be a terror attack close to where the US Vice President was dining.

It must be said though that even with a US citizen being killed I did initially struggled to distinguish that attack from the two other attacks that took place in Israel that day.

The third leg of Biden's trip took him to Jordan on Friday (11/3/16). Although an Islamic Monarchy Jordan is one of the most sensible nations in the region. Sitting directly on the border with Syria they can see that the war going on there has nothing to do with overthrowing a dictator and building a prosperous democracy. These days it's not even a sectarian Sunni/Shia conflict anymore. It's simply a nation and a people being destroyed. 

We need to put a stop to all that before we can even entertain discussions about niceties such as elections and constitutional reforms.

Sadly with lots of talk about it being a slow process that will take lots of patience the US' message to Jordan seemed to be that they should quit complaining and just learn to enjoy the bloodshed.

On Wednesday (9/3/16) the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) received a special briefing on Iraq's Mosul Dam. 

As with January's briefing on global warming in East Africa this type of session is normally used to give UN staffers an opportunity to sit the Americans down and explain to them exactly what they're doing wrong. Unfortunately I can't really tell what was being discussed because I think a range of topics were being discussed. Rest assured though that the actual Mosul Dam was at the absolute bottom of that list.

The problem with the Mosul Dam is that it was really badly designed to begin with. The weight of the structure combined with the effect of the water causes the porous rock on which it is built to erode forming effectively sinkholes. Eventually the Iraqis are going to have to build a whole new dam. However this problem has been known about since the dam opened in 1984 and is easily managed by constantly pouring cement into the holes. The current problem is that ISIL have seized control of the near-by factory that produces this cement.

You may remember that this year's Oscars was dominated by a 2012 French TV show "Les Revenants." Set in a French town a major plotline is concerns that the dam at the centre of the town will collapse flooding it. They are particularly interested in these sinkholes and caverns that keep mysteriously appearing beneath the dam.

Another big theme at the Oscars was the English Actress Charlotte Rampling. Particularly her work exploring the rise of ISIL-style nihilist ideology in Liliana Cavani's so-called "Nazi Trilogy." Although not part of the trilogy Rampling also appeared in the 1977 Nazi themed movie "The Damned." I suspect that of the four movies that is probably the easiest to hold a UNSC briefing on.

On Thursday (10/3/16) US Secretary of State John Kerry picked up the baton from Vice President Biden to make the trip to Saudi Arabia. As always this saw the US immediately throw itself prostrate at the feet of Saudi King Salman al-Saud.

Just before Kerry departed the US let it be known that it intends to blame Saudi Arabia's arch enemy Iran harmlessly hacking into a US dam back in 2013. This was the US going; "We didn't understand the UNSC briefing. BUT WE'RE GOING TO BLAME IRAN ANYWAY!!!!"

Later in the day there was the downright surreal announcement that a US Court had ordered Iran to pay USD10bn in compensation for the September 11th 2001 (11/9/01) terror attacks. Those attacks were of course planned by a Saudi national and carried out by 15 Saudi nationals including one who was housed in the Saudi Embassy. There is absolutely no indication let alone evidence that Iran was in any way involved in the attacks. 

In fact in a previous compensation case against Saudi Arabia the same Judge - George Daniels - had ruled that nations have what is termed Sovereign Immunity in the matter and therefore could not be held liable for compensation.

Judge Daniel's reasoning appears to be that Iran supports the Lebanese political party/militia Hezbollah who the US classes as a terror group. Therefore with all terrorists being exactly the same Hezbollah and therefore Iran must've been responsible for 9/11. Even if Hezbollah are on the opposite side of the sectarian divide to Al Qaeda.

At the invitation of the Syrian government Hezbollah are currently fighting in Syria against Saudi-backed terror groups such as ISIL and ANF. As such in February 2016 Saudi Arabia joined the US and Israel in declaring Hezbollah as a terrorist group and last week forced the Arab League to follow suit. The US is obviously signalling it's support for this move regardless of the destabilising effect it is having on Lebanon.

On Sunday (13/3/16) John Kerry travelled to Paris, France to discuss the way forward on Syria and Iraq with various European leaders. To make sure that King Salman's orders continued to ring in his ears that day Saudi Arabia carried out in Cote d' Ivorie (Ivory Coast) that so far has killed 18.

The main objective here seems to be this hideous Paris draft agreement which ratified will prevent any action being taken to combat climate change either now or at any point in the future. With the ratification process beginning with a signing ceremony in April Saudi Arabia is desperately trying to scare up votes to make the so-called 12/12 Atrocity a reality.

Initially the Saudis were trying to achieve this by putting pressure of East/Central African nations such as Kenya and Ethiopia through Al-Shabaab based in Somalia. However of late the US has begun gently indicating that it might be prepared to support those nations against the terrorist onslaught. For example last Sunday (6/3/16) the US claims to have killed 150 Al-Shabaab fighters in an air-strike. On Tuesday (8/3/16) the US appears to have carried out a Special Forces raid against Al-Shabaab.

In response the Saudis seem to be shifting their attention to West/Central African nations. There is obviously Boko Haram who are active in Nigeria and its neighbours. However the Saudis also seem to be resurrecting Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) who were responsible for the 2012 Islamist takeover of northern Mali. 

Although significantly weakened just before the 2015 COP21 Summit AQIM launched an attack on a hotel in Mali's capital Bamako. In an effort to show that they can operate outside of Mali's borders on January 15th (15/1/16) launched a similar attack against a hotel in Ouagadougou, the capital of Mali's neighbour Burkina Faso. 

Sunday's attack on hotels in Cote d' Ivorie sees AQIM's reach extend even further. The hope seems to be to give the impression that they will be able to threaten the areas of west Africa beyond Boko Haram's reach.  

At around 17:40 on 14/3/16 (UK date) I've still got a little more to add. After dinner.    
  
Edited at around 19:25 on 14/3/16 (UK date) to add;

Beyond threatening Cote d' Ivorie and its West African neighbours Sunday's attack was also intended as a threat to the US and the European nations John Kerry was meeting with in Paris.

Of the European colonialists France maintains a much closer relationship with its former colonies than anybody else. It's a bit of quiz trivia worth remembering that in terms of timezones France is actually the largest nation on Earth because it includes all of it's former colonies. Therefore if a terror attack occurs in a nation like Cote d' Ivorie it forces the French security and intelligence services to engage in much the same way as if the attack had occurred in France.

The nature of the attack with gunmen walking along the beaches of numerous hotels shooting at everything that moved is exactly the same as the June 26th 2015 (26/6/15) attack on tourists on the beaches of Sousse in Tunisia. Claiming the lives of 30 British citizens this was the UK's single worst loss of life in a terrorist attack since the July 7th 2005 (7/7/05) bombings in London. 

However it was not only British citizens who were killed in that attack and holiday makers from across Europe - particularly Germany and Russia - used to flock to winter holidays in Tunisia and Egypt. One suspects the attacks in those countries were intended to drive European tourists to Turkish beaches instead. 

Due to its colonial past and its more recent history of civil wars many Ivorians have actually migrated to Europe - particularly France and the UK. Seriously I think you would be surprised how frequently I overhear Ivorian French when I'm going to the shops or generally running errands. Many of these dual nationals frequently return to Cote d' Ivorie to go on holiday or meet up with relatives. 

Therefore if an attack occurs in a country like Cote d' Ivorie many European governments will have to prepare themselves for the death of their citizens and the evacuation of their relatives. Although its yet to be confirmed I strongly suspect that the four French nationals killed in the attack form part of this group.

The hotel that does seem to have been worst hit by the attack - Etoile du Sud - had been scheduled to host a recruitment fair for American universities including the University of Florida. The keynote speaker at that event was US Assistant Secretary of Commerce Marcus Jadotte although the US delegation had not arrived at the time of the attack. 

That of course sent the message to the US that not only could its citizens be attacked but also its senior government officials could be targeted. However I think mainly it was intended as an enquiry as to what conclusions VP Biden had come to following his similar brush with terror in Israel.

Today the latest round of UN sponsored negotiations between Al Qaeda affiliated groups and the Syrian government have begun in Geneva, Switzerland. 

At best the objective of these talks is to freeze the conflict giving ISIL, ANF and associated groups limited but permenant safe-haven within Syrian. At worst its objective is to overthrow the Syrian government giving ISIL, ANF and associated groups free-run of the place and whatever nation Erdogan wants to declare himself Emperor of next.

Displaying stunningly poor judgement both the US and France used the start of these talks to once again criticise Russia for fighting ISIL, ANF and associated groups. So this evening Russia announced that it is to start withdrawing its forces from Syria tomorrow.

This is essentially Russia turning around to the US and the EU and going; 

"Well if you can't keep a civil tongue in your heads you're going to have to solve this mess on your own."    

I believe that's known in the trade as; "Throwing a big gay hissy fit."

20:00 on 14/3/16 (UK date).

    



 

Chicago Plumbs New Depths.

You may remember that way back on August 9th 2014 (9/8/14) the Black Lives Matter (BLM) political group was born in the US with the death of Micheal Brown.

This was part of a co-ordinated effort to bring violence, racial hatred and frankly tin foil hat style lunacy into the political mainstream.

It's objective was to sweep the Democrat Party to a majority in both houses of Congress at the November 2014 mid-term election on a popular wave against 'Republican Racism!" It failed and the Democrats went on to suffer their worst election result in almost 70 years.

Since then absolutely nothing has been done to reign in Black Lives Matter and protect US democracy from their nonsense.

The way that the Democrats use of violence and cynical playing of the race has seemingly brought the US to the brink of civil war was the main theme of the 2016 Super Bowl. It was nice though the way that Beyonce was welcomed back into the fold once she stopped her fringe, extremist nonsense.

The way that Black Lives Matter have become the boot boys for the new McCarthyism was also a major theme at the recent Oscars.

The US is currently in the grips of yet another election campaign and this time the Democrats are focused entirely on getting Hillary Clinton elected President.

It should come as no surprise then that once again Black Lives Matter are out in full force. On Friday (11/3/16) they attacked a rally by presumption Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump in Chicago, Illinois forcing it to be cancelled amid violence and threats to public safety.

In terms of a riot this was pretty tame. However as an attack on democracy it was very serious.

For example back in October 2015 the Kurdish Movement for Change (Gorran) Party tried a similar stunt when they sent protesters to attack the offices of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) in the Iraqi city of Sulaimani. In response to that outrage Gorran were suspended from all political activity and remain suspended to this day.

On February 23rd (23/2/16) the new Government of National Accord tried holding its first session in that bastion of political stability Libya. Using the tactics of Black Lives Matter in Chicago extremists opposed to that government tried using blockades and violence to prevent the session from taking place. The following day the US' own State Department issued the following statement;

"We are deeply concerned by reports that a small hardline minority used physical intimidation and threats to disrupt the February 23 session of the House of Representatives in Tobruk in order to prevent a vote on the Cabinet. We strongly condemn all attempts to obstruct the Libyan political process."

In terms of reigning in Black Lives Matter to protect America's democracy it should be relatively easy.

Due to the organisations associated with large scale theft (looting), illegal narcotics distribution and violence they fit the criteria of a criminal street gang. Certainly since the terror attack that killed two police officers in New York City on December 20th 2014 (20/12/14) Black Lives Matter has also fitted the criteria of a domestic terror group.

Either of these designations would make membership of Black Lives Matter or association with the through the use of slogans, display of colours or hand gestures used by the group an arrestable offence.

Even without reaching for those extreme measures through their repeated attempts to deny access to a host of public facilities members of Black Lives Matter could be prosecuted for numerous violations of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that they claim to cherish so much.

Failing that members of Black Lives Matter could simply be prosecuted for the various, everyday criminal acts they commit. For example every person who had entered the private venue where the Trump rally was being held with the intention of disrupting it can and should be prosecuted for criminal trespass.

What makes Friday's events interesting is that up until now Black Lives Matter have been protected by the Obama administration in its role as the head of the Federal Government.

However the Secret Service is under as much obligation to protect all the Presidential candidates including Donald Trump as it is President Obama. That duty goes far beyond the men in sunglasses and the side of the stage to making sure the threats are resolved long before they ever get that close.

If the Obama administration continues to prevent the Secret Service from doing their job in order to protect Black Lives Matter and their attacks on Obama's political opponents then that would represent a very serious abuse of power.

13:20 on 13/3/16 (UK date).