This morning it took me a full three hours to catch up on events overnight.
It is perhaps fortunate then that I merely have to copy & paste most of this from a post I wrote just 10 days ago.
If you cast your minds back to the summer of 2014 you may remember that
former US President Barack Obama and his Democrat Party were in dire
straits.
With the ethnic cleansing of the town of Sinjar/Shingal in Iraq the
genocidal hatred of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) had
become so clear that the world was no longer able to turn its back.
Under immense public pressure Obama had been forced to deploy US
aircraft to bring an end to these crimes against humanity.
Having spent the previous three years creating and supporting ISIL and
their associates Obama was really not happy about being forced to fight
them and was in desperate need of a distraction.
Also the Democrats really, really wanted to seize control of both houses
of the US Congress in the November 2014 mid-term elections.
So the Democrats responded to this pressure by making up a story of an
innocent young black man named Michael Brown who had been murdered by a
police officer as he had his hands up in surrender in the town of
Ferguson, Missouri.
On the back of this lie the Democrats formed a street army marching under the banner of "Black Lives Matter."
The purpose of this group was to use violence and the threat of violence
to impose on America the notion that black people should not be
punished when they choose to break the law.
In Ferguson Black Lives Matter immediately went to work unleashing a
full year of rioting that lasted from August 9th 2014 (9/8/14) until
August 11th 2015 (11/8/15).
Ultimately though in Ferguson they failed.
In response to the violence the police officer in question was called before a Grand Jury.
Here they heard the truth that Micheal Brown had committed a robbery at a
local convenience store and when challenged by the police launched into
a violent assault in which he attempted to steal the police officer's
firearm.
Therefore the killing was found to be entirely lawful and no charges
were filed. This is something that should have been obvious on day one
of the investigation.
Despite this the Democrats continued to rally behind their street army.
In March of 2015 a Department of Justice (DoJ) report found no evidence
of wrongdoing in the Ferguson police department. Having falsely accused
the police for six months the then Attorney General Eric Holder was
forced to resign over his conduct
However this did not stop his replacement Loretta Lynch using the
apparatus of state along with the threat of violence from the street
army to force Ferguson police to no longer prosecute black offenders.
I
understand this legal action is still to be brought before the Supreme
Court where the Obama administration does not exactly have a strong
record.
Obviously the Black Lives Matter movement's;
"unlawful use of force and violence against
persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian
population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or
social objectives"
Means that every gathering, every speech, every
social media posting and every riot by the group is an act of domestic
terrorism against the US.
However there have been a number of murders and attempted murders tied to the group.
On March 12th 2015 (12/3/15) members of Black Lives
Matter gathered outside Ferguson police HQ the same way they had done
every night since August 2014. As they had also done every night since
August 2014 members Missouri State Police formed a cordon to stop Black
Lives Matter attacking the building.
On this particular night members of Black Lives
Matter opened fire on the police. They succeeded in hitting two officers
in the head/neck seriously wounding them.
In response to this Black Lives Matter and much of
the US news media went full tin foil hat brigade. They immediately
claimed that the shootings had been the work of some shadowy government
agency conducting a "False Flag Operation" to discredit the group.
I particularly remember the CNN reporter Don Lemon
claiming that is was impossible for a 9mm handgun which is certified for
use at 250 yards/metres to hit a target at a mere 100 yards. He went on
to speculate whether some type of 9mm weapon had been created in some
sort of secret lab specifically to carry out the shootings.
So Don Lemon didn't actually accuse the CIA of carrying out the shootings live on national TV. However he strongly implied it.
It was after two days of this type of reporting that
another CNN reporter was dragged - almost literally by his ear - to a
local firing range. There he was quickly taught how to hit a target at
100 yards with a 9mm handgun.
Then of course there was the Black Lives Matter rally
in Washington D.C on December 14th 2014 (14/12/14). Here movement
leader Al Sharpton called for a "Diversity of Tactics" in the groups
fight against the police.
Seven days later on December 20th 2014 (20/12/14) a member of Black Lives Matter - Ismaaiyl
Abdullah Brinsley - ambushed two New York City police officers,
shooting and killing them as they sat in their patrol car in Brooklyn.
Despite these two clear terror attacks the Obama administration
continued to refuse to designate Black Lives Matter as a domestic terror
group and prosecute their members/leaders accordingly.
On June 17th 2015 (17/6/15) a member of the public became frustrated at
the US governments failure to protect its citizens from the terrorist
threat of Black Lives Matter. So he took matters into his own hands
killing 9 members of the group at a planning meeting in Charleston,
South Carolina.
Across the globe people who run their own police departments and
criminal justice systems looked at events in Charleston and concluded
that the neutralisation of 9 terrorists as they planned future attacks
could not be considered a criminal act. As such they pleaded with Obama
to disband his Black Lives Matter terror group.
I am still not sure about how much detail I want to go into about the extent of these warnings.
However the UK seemed to lead the line with the murder of Sarandev Singh
Bhambra in Mold, Wales on January 14th 2015 (14/1/15). This was linked
to the neo-Nazi "Britain First" street army which is extremely similar
in nature to the US Black Lives Matter group. This of course was further
referenced in the lawful killing of UK MP Jo Cox on June 16th 2016
(16/6/16). A day before the anniversary of the neutralisation of the
Charleston cell.
Although I don't really have time to go back through my notes to list
every example events in Charleston triggered a cacophony of developed
nations just laughing in Obama's face and pleading with him to stop.
The October 2nd 2015 (2/10/15) plea from Sydney, Australia particularly
sticks with me. After all it's come to something when even Australia
are telling you to grow up and develop a culture.
Do I need to reiterate
the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest?
At this point so many developed nations have pleaded with Obama to see
sense before he drags the US into civil war and turns it into some sort
of third world banana republic the phrase; "We told you so" has lost all
meaning.
Even the 2016 Superbowl pleaded with Obama and Beyonce to
abandon the (Huey) Newton Black Panthers civil war nonsense and return
to mainstream society.
Unfortunately Obama and the Democrats are either too evil or just too damn stupid to listen to reason.
As such they seem to have made the conviction at all costs of the
Charleston accused a core plank of their 2016 campaign. This of course
eliminates any possibility of a fair trial making an acquittal a legal
certainty.
Obviously Black Lives Matter have still not been designated a domestic
terror group. That is because the Democrats need their street army for
the 2016 Presidential campaign. Their mission now is to silence any
opposition to the Democrat Party and Hillary Clinton.
Citing just one example of many on April 15 2016 (15/4/16) Black Lives
Matter were sent to prevent presumptive Republican Party nominee Donald
Trump holding a campaign rally in Brooklyn, New York.
Fast forwarding to this Tuesday (5/7/16) the FBI released the results of
its investigation into Hillary Clinton. As I said at the time this was
completely devastating.
With it having been found that Hillary Clinton had violated the 1917
Espionage Act on 110 occasions she will never hold a US government job
ever again. Particularly not the office of President.
And with that suddenly the street army received fresh marching orders.
This began on Tuesday (5/7/16) with the release of a video showing the
death of a black man - Alton Sterling - in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Although it is not shown in the video or apparently any of the
subsequent media coverage the incident began with a call to the police
that a man very closely matching Alton Sterling's description had been
threatening members of the public with a gun.
As part of their duty to protect black lives the police responded to
this call. However based on what happened next I can see why they won't
bother in the future.
Arriving on the scene the police identified Alton Sterling as the man
most likely to have been threatening passers-by with a gun.
Therefore to protect the public and themselves they moved to handcuff
and search Sterling in order to begin their investigation and establish
whether a crime had been committed.
However as with Michael Brown in Ferguson Alton Sterling very much
objected to this lawful and reasonable request by the officers. Instead
he launched into a violent assault on the officers.
In the course of this assault it became obvious to officers that
Sterling was in possession of a lethal weapon. Therefore they were
obligated by law to use lethal force to prevent Sterling from using that
weapon against either themselves of members of the wider public.
Some people are trying to argue that the officers should have waited
until Sterling had drawn his gun and fired it at them. These are people
who've clearly never been punched full in the head in the course of a
knock down, drag out brawl.
Having dealt with numerous violent offenders over a great many years
however the law is quite clear on this point. Given the precedent of
Graham V Connor (1989) examples of defence of self/other under common
law do not come clearer than this case.
Even CNN were forced to admit
this.
However like I said that was the day that Hillary Clinton's political career ended.
So rather than just informing the public the then Attorney General
Loretta Lynch abused her position by opening a baseless Federal civil
rights investigation in a clear attempt to incite the street army.
Then on Wednesday (6/7/16) we had the shooting of Philando Castile in St
Paul, Minnesota during a traffic stop. This is a much more curious
incident.
Castile had a permit to carry a concealed weapon and was in possession of that firearm.
As part of his training for that weapons permit Castile would have been
instructed that during such a traffic stop he should place his hands on
the dashboard, calmly inform the police officer that he is carrying a
concealed weapon and await further instructions from the officer.
Before being granted that permit Castile would have had to sign a legal
declaration that he understood and would follow that procedure.
However this is not what Castile chose to do.
Instead Castile chose to repeatedly shout; "I've got a gun" while
reaching into his pockets. He was repeatedly told to stop doing that by
the officer.
However Castile refused and continued. Under law this obligated the
police officer to take action to protect himself and the wider public.
Despite the repeated provocations the officer still declined to use
lethal force against Castile. Instead he chose to shoot him in the arm
which would not normally be a life threatening injury.
What caused Castile to bleed out and die though was his girlfriend Diamond Reynolds.
She decided to obstruct the provision of life saving aid to Castile by
refusing to comply with the officer's instructions and bizarrely
broadcast the incident live on Facebook via a cellphone that should have used
to call an ambulance.
As a few people have mentioned Ms Reynolds actions seem remarkable
similar to the radical Islamist terror attack that occurred on June 13th
(13/6/16) in Magananville, France.
Here Larossi Abballa murdered two police officers and during the
ensuring stand-off broadcast his actions live on Facebook calling for
others to carry out attacks against police officers.
The death of Philando Castile of course occurred against a backdrop of
Black Lives Matter protests following the Alton Sterling case in which
leaders were calling for people to "Give their lives for the cause."
Minnesota is of course well known as the main source in the US for radical Islamist recruits for ISIL and associated groups.
The US has been repeatedly warned about the overlap between the vile
quasi-Islamic hate group "The Nation of Islam" and the vile
quasi-Islamic hate group "ISIL." Particularly around the recent funeral
of Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali.
Curiously Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department have shown no
interest in launching a Federal investigation into the Castile case.
Thursday (7/7/16) of course saw FBI Director James Comey appear before
the US Congress to explain his decision not to criminally prosecute
Hillary Clinton for 110 acts of Espionage against the US.
The only explanation he could offer was that he didn't want to.
At that point lawyers across the globe fell about laughing.
The Democrats of course were extremely angry that Comey's moral
cowardice in failing to prosecute Hillary Clinton was being exposed to
potential US voters.
Obviously I don't have time to check the transcript and quote every
Democrat's comments word for word. However I think the general tone can
be summed up by;
"HOW DARE THE RACISTS REPUBLICANS DEMAND THE LAW IS UPHELD WHEN
INNOCENT BLACK MEN ARE BEING ASSASSINATED BY THE RACIST KU KLUX KLAN
BROTHERS IN THE POLICE EVERY DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
That afternoon Barack Obama himself decided to participate in this
culture of incitement. He issued a Facebook statement which subtly but
clearly stated that the Hillary Clinton campaign has a serious problem
and called Black Lives Matter to the streets.
Later in the day Obama intended to issue a further incitement to
violence in a televised address to the nation. However words were had.
So although Obama took some of the aggression from his address he failed
to retract his Facebook call to arms and continued to refuse to disavow
Black Lives Matter.
Answering Obama's call Black Lives Matter did indeed take to the streets
that night. This led to violent disorder in Los Angeles, California,
New York City, New York, Washington D.C and of course Minnesota.
However the most violent incident of the night occurred in Dallas,
Texas. Here at least one gunman affiliated to Black Lives Matter opened
fire on police officers murdering five and wounding seven others.
On Tuesday (12/7/16) Obama attended a memorial service for the five murdered Dallas police officers.
However Obama actually delayed the start of that memorial service for almost an hour because he was too busy telephoning members of the Black Lives Matter campaign associated with both the Sterling and Castile families.
Obama then used his address to the memorial service to try and equate those two lawful killings with the murders of five police officers.
The memorial service mockingly played Obama off - Oscars-style - to the strains of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic." As in; "His 'truth' is marching on."
It almost goes without saying then that Obama has again failed to properly designate Black Lives Matter as a domestic terrorist group and police them appropriately.
To make matters worse Loretta Lynch has still failed to end the baseless, politically motivated and racial biased Federal investigation into the entirely right and proper lawful killing of Alton Sterling.
As a result Black Lives Matter have continued their terrorist activities. The situation has been particularly bad in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Here there have been near daily violent clashes between police and members of Black Lives Matter.
Shortly after Obama's appearance in Dallas police in Louisiana confirmed that over the course of the previous weekend they had disrupted a plot by four Black Lives Matter members to steal weapons in order to launch another Dallas style terror attack against police.
One of the most worrying developments from Baton Rouge is that on July 9th (9/7/16) the New Black Panther Party (NBPP) announced that they were heading to join Black Lives Matter on the streets. They immediately carried through on their threat.
Not to be confused with Huey Newton's Black Panther Party of the 1970's the NBPP is an extremely nasty and violent off-shoot of the Nation of Islam. It is viciously anti-Semitic and wishes to create a separate Black nation within the United States through violent insurrection.
The NBPP are so unpleasant that the Black Panther Party actually have a standing injunction to prevent their name being used by what they and the Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC) view as a racist hate group.
Yesterday (7/7/16) three more police officers were murdered in Baton Rouge in a Dallas style terror attack.
The perpetrator who was killed in the course of the attack has been identified as Gavin Long, a 29 year old African American.
Long's extensive online presence reveal him to be a member of Black Lives Matter. He was particularly angered by the Alton Sterling case which Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department have been working to portray as some sort of crime.
Long also claims to have been a member of the Nation of Islam.
Having clearly decided a long time ago that violence and extremism is the only true form of Islam Barack Obama clearly views the Nation of Islam to be a Muslim group. However he is almost entirely alone in that belief.
As with the inner workings of Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan's mind the Nation of Islam's ideology is extremely difficult to explain to a rational audience.
However essentially they believe that 66 million years ago the Black race arrived on what was an uninhabited Earth as an alien race. The scientists of this master race then built spaceships which shaped the topography of Earth including creating a large explosion which blew part of it away creating the moon.
Within that superior Black race the Nation of Islam consider 85% of it to be the
deaf, dumb and blind masses. A further 10% of the Black race are made up
of so-called "Slave Makers" who are constantly trying to enslave the
85%. The remaining 5% are the members of the Nation of Islam and
referred to as the "Righteous Teachers." They consider themselves at war
with the Slave Makers in an effort to free the minds of the 85%.
It would be considered the duty of one the "Righteous Teachers" to kill any Black man working as a police officer because they would be a "Slave Maker" oppressing the 85%.
The Nation of Islam believe that the White race was created by the devil
Jew Jacob on the Greek island of Patmos. This is where John the Apostle
or John of Patmos is believed to have written the Biblical book of
Revelations. However the Nation of Islam believe that it was here that
Jacob began a 600 year program of eugenics that saw him murder dark
skinned children until a light skinned, white race was created.
Long's claim that he was a member of the Nation of Islam is currently being investigated to see if it is true. However the fact he would be claim to be a member of the group certainly demonstrates that he was at the very least inspired by them and their ideology.
In conducting his terror attack Long wore black military style fatigues and covered his face with a mask. This is the uniform of the New Black Panther Party.
However under immense pressure from the continuing unwarranted Depart of Justice investigation Louisiana police investigating yesterday's attack are not allowed to refer to it as a terrorist attack.
Instead they're being forced to parrot the line;
"There is no known motive behind the murders."
17:40 on 18/7/16 (UK date).
Monday, 18 July 2016
Saturday, 16 July 2016
Pray For Turkey.
Pray for the World.
In the 2001 the former Mayor of Istanbul Recep Tayyip Erdogan formed the Justice & Development Party (AKP) as a vehicle to sweep him to power in Turkey. In November 2002 the AKP won a landslide victory in the General Election.
The problem was that as Mayor of Istanbul in 1997 Erdogan attended a rally for the radical Islamist Welfare Party which at the time he was a member of. At that rally Erdogan called on party supporters to;
"Turn the Mosques into their barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers."
Rather unsurprisingly this call for Muslims to take up arms against the Turkish state was deemed an incitement both to violence and to religious and racial hatred.
As a result Erdogan was jailed for 10 months, banned from ever again holding political office and the Welfare Party was disbanded as a threat to national security.
Erdogan's conviction and ban from ever again holding public office obviously prevented him from taking up the office of Prime Minister in 2002.
With Hillary Clinton having been found to have committed 110 offences of espionage against the US and the Obama administration refusing to prosecute it is frightening how similar current US politics are to Turkish politics back in 2002.
If the Obama administration does not reverse its decision and prosecute Hillary Clinton or she fails to unilaterally withdraw from the 2016 President election Turkey could well be the type of country America becomes in the future.
Obviously Erdogan wasn't going to let a little something like the law of the land prevent him from seizing power. So in 2002 the AKP's co-founder Abdullah Gul simply became Turkey's Prime Minister in Erdogan's place.
Gul's sole purpose as Prime Minister was to annul the ban of Erdogan holding political office. This task was rapidly completed allowing Erdogan to become Prime Minister in March 2003.
Having seized power Erdogan almost immediately set about making sure that Turkey's law, Courts and other apparatus of a democratic state could never challenge his authority ever again.
Within months of taking up the office of Prime Minister Erdogan declared that there was secretive organisation called "Ergenekon" that was plotting to overthrow his government on behalf of the Global Zionist Conspiracy.
Stories of the Ergenekon group continued for the next 10 years resulting in 254 senior military and civil service officials being convicted to life imprisonment for treason against Erdogan. It almost goes without saying that those 254 vacancies were immediately filled with members of the AKP.
In 2015 the Ergenekon cases were reopened after independent forensic examinations revealed that many of the documents entered into evidence in the case were forgeries.
This merely prompted Erdogan to declare the conspiracy to be much wider than previously thought accusing the journalists who'd had the documents tested of being part of the "Gulen Movement."
Existing really only in Erdogan's brain the Gulen Movement is supposedly a vast CIA conspiracy against him that is fronted by Fethullah Gulen an Islamist preacher based in Pennsylvania. Whenever anyone disagrees with Erdogan they are immediately dismissed as Gulenists.
Following the revelation that much of the evidence had been forged the convictions in the Ergenekon case were annulled in April 2016. Obviously the wrongly imprisoned have not been allowed to return to their jobs which are now occupied by AKP members.
Just as the Ergenekon trials were reaching their climax in 2010 Erdogan suddenly uncovered another vast conspiracy against him. This time known as "Sledgehammer." On this occasion 365 senior military and civil service figures such as Judges were arrested and replaced by AKP members.
Again much of the evidence produced by Erdogan in the case was found to have been faked. Again Erdogan labelled those who proved the evidence to be fake to be members of the Gulenist conspiracy. After pointing out that the trials were in no way fair the Istanbul Bar Association itself was prosecuted for conspiring against Erdogan. All cases are currently being appealed.
The reason why Erdogan has been so desperate to remove any domestic oversight of his rule is quite clear. His policies should terrify any right thinking person.
In terms of foreign policy Erdogan is a neo-Ottoman.
That means he wants to re-establish the Ottoman Empire that stretched from Austria across the middle-east through Africa to Morocco. Erdogan wants to rule this Islamic Caliphate as Sultan with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi - leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) - as its Caliph.
To this end Erdogan has aggressively supported Islamist terror groups in Tunisia, Libya, Palestine. In Egypt he attempted to install the Islamist puppet regime of Mohammed Morsi and has backed terror groups to wage a low intensity war against Egypt ever since Morsi was overthrown by the Egyptian people in 2013.
It almost goes without saying that Erdogan has been an energetic supporter of ISIL in both Syria and Iraq. As I've really spent the last two years detailing Erdogan's support for ISIL it would take me far too long to list every example of the support he has given to the group here.
However one that really sums up Erdogan's rule occurred in January 2014 when the Attorney General of Turkey's Adana province was tipped off that a convoy carrying illegal weapons to terror groups in Syria was passing through the province.
Obviously the Attorney General and the local police stopped the convoy, seized the weapons and arrested those involved.
This prompted the Erdogan regime to arrest the more than 50 people involved in stopping the convoy on charges of treason for interfering with a National Intelligence Organisation (MIT) delivery of weapons to extreme Islamist terror groups active in Syria.
This story was broken by the Cumhuriyet newspaper. Erdogan responded by accusing the newspaper and the journalists of being part of the Gulenist conspiracy and prosecuted them for treason.
Just in May the journalists - Can Dundar & Erdem Gul - were jailed for five years for publishing the story. As he was arriving at Court Dundar survived an assassination attempt when an AKP member opened fire on him.
In March 2016 Turkey's biggest selling newspaper Zaman made the mistake of criticising Erdogan for the way it was cracking down on journalists and the free press. This led to a Turkish Court - staffed by AKP members of course - to order the newspaper to be shut down and placed under government control.
On March 6th (6/3/16) Turkish police physically seized Zaman's offices from its staff replacing them with AKP members. Funnily enough the new state run Zaman thinks that Erdogan is the greatest man to have ever lived and Turkey's one true saviour.
It is not just journalists writing about Erdogan's foreign adventures who have reason to be fearful. Erdogan's domestic policies are just as dangerous and just as unpleasant.
As part of Turkey's secular constitution the wearing of the Islamic hijab in areas of the public sector such Parliament, Courts and Schools is strictly forbidden. Rather than being Islamaphobic this was a rule introduced by Muslims.
Erdogan has long campaigned for this ban to be scrapped. His own wife has made a point of wearing the hijab at all times - even when carrying out official duties - and in 2008 Erdogan amended the constitution to exclude universities from the ban.
Erdogan's campaign for women to adhere to Islamic modesty standards has triggered a collapse in women's rights in Turkey with instances of rape, sexual assault, forced marriage and child marriage all skyrocketing.
You may remember how the French/Turkish movie "Mustang" was denied the 2016 Best Foreign Language Oscar as not to embarass US Vice President Joe Biden over his support for the Erdogan regime.
Just on June 5th (5/6/16) - in a speech to the Women's Democracy Association - Erdogan declared that women who choose to work rather than becoming wives and mothers are "deficient" and "inhuman."
Turkey's women are not alone in suffering at Erdogan's hands. The 2015 Gay Pride march in Istanbul was banned for being "un-Islamic." The marchers marched anyway so Erdogan's police attacked them.
Shortly after an AKP linked newspaper celebrated the recent Orlando terror attack as; "50 Perverted Homosexuals Killed" the same thing happened with the 2016 Gay Pride march. On this occasion even members of the German Parliament were arrested and assaulted by Erdogan's thuggish police force.
Even people who want to do something as simple as listen to music must live in fear in Erdogan's Turkey.
On June 18th (18/6/16) a small group of fans of the band Radiohead were listening to their new album in a record store in Istanbul. The AKP's street thugs attacked them with clubs and bottles threatening to burn them alive in the building for going against Islam by listening to music.
Fellow Istanbul residents rallied behind the victims of the attack calling for those responsible to be punished. Erdogan's police responded by attacking the demonstrators.
It almost goes without saying that this constant repression has seen Erdogan's popularity plummet.
In May of 2013 some 7 million people - roughly 1/10th of Turkey's entire population joined the Gezi Park/Taksim square protest calling for Erdogan to stand down.
Needless to say rather than heeding the will of the people Erdogan sent in the police to violently crush the protests killing 11 and injuring more than 8,000.
Erdogan then declared the protests to be not a sign of his own unpopularity but further work of the Zionist/Gulenist conspiracy against him.
As always the task of explaining the inner workings of Erdogan's mind to a rational audience is proving to be a hard one.
At around 16:40 on 16/7/16 (UK date) I'll be back to add more on what is likely to be a long night.
Edited at around 20:00 on 16/7/16 (UK date) to add;
In March of 2013 Erdogan's two terms as Prime Minister came to an end. However he refused to step down continuing to hold the office until August 2014 when he simply switched to the ceremonial non-executive role of President.
If anything this further damaged the popularity of both Erdogan and the AKP. They paid the price for this in the June 2015 General Election.
Here the AKP hoped to win the 330 seats needed to give them the 60% qualified majority needed to change the constitution to scrap term limits and make Erdogan an executive President. All without public approval. As it happened the AKP only succeeded in winning 258 seats - falling 17 seats short of a governing majority.
This really should have been the end of Erdogan and the AKP. It was simply a question of the other three main parties led by the Republican People's Party (CHP) forming a coalition and then repairing Turkey's fractured relationship with the international community including NATO.
However then US President Obama stepped in save Erdogan.
Following the July 20th (20/7/15) Suruc bombing against Turkey's Kurds Obama telephoned Erdogan and gave him permission to declare war on both Turkey's Kurdish population and the Kurds across the entire region. Including in Iraq & Syria where they are fighting ISIL - who carried out the Suruc bombing.
This of course immediately drove a wedge between the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and the People's Democratic Party (HDP) ending the possibility of an anti-AKP coalition.
It also allowed Erdogan to portray himself as the wartime leader wrapped in the national flag while introducing increasingly draconian controls on the media and political opponents under the guise of "fighting terror."
Buoyed by the wartime fervour Erdogan called a snap General Election in November 2015. On this occasion the AKP managed to scrape together just enough votes to secure 317 seats. Not enough to change the constitution but just enough for the AKP to rule alone.
This election took place against the backdrop of the government being at war against 20% of the Turkish population and journalists and publishers being dragged through the Courts on trumped up charges of espionage and treason.
As a result it was only the US that recognised Turkey's November 2015 General Election as free and fair. The Council of Europe monitoring mission described the election by saying;
"This campaign was unfair and characterised by too much violence and fear."
Citing specifically;
"Criminal investigations of journalists and media outlets for support of terrorism and defamation of the president, the blocking of websites … and the effective seizure of some prominent media outlets reduced voters’ access to a plurality of views and information."
Despite being the only developed nation to consider Turkey's November 2015 election as legitimate the US still refused to respect either its result or the Turkish constitution.
Rather than conducting business with the Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu - the recognised holder of democratic executive power - the US continued to deal only with Erdogan as if he still had legal authority in Turkish policy.
In May 2016 Erdogan decided that Davutoglu was getting to big for his boots and dismissed him in favour of Binali Yildirim. Erdogan had no lawful authority to make that decision.
Following the November 2015 electoral coup Erdogan seems to have become even more power crazed and out of control.
Reading the Turkish media it seems that over the past 8 months hundreds of opponents of the AKP and just random members of the public are being rounded up every week on vague charges of being part of the; "Parallel State"- by which I think Erdogan simply means; "The State."
Then of course there has been Erdogan's attempts to weaponise refugees from Syria to blackmail the European Union (EU) into handing over 15% of its budget and grant Turkish passport holders visa-free access to the trading bloc.
This of course has been linked to the November 13th (13/11/15) Paris Massacres and the March 22nd (22/3/16) Brussels attacks. Three days prior to the Brussels attacks Erdogan quite clearly and publicly said to an AKP rally; "Brussels will be [attacked] next."
So to all who do this sort of thing for a living it has been clear that the pressure was reaching a tipping point. Erdogan would soon be overthrown and Turkey would be returned to democracy and civil society.
I personally thought that the NATO intelligence agencies should have been working with the Turkish military alongside the MHP and the CHP to make sure this transition was a swift and smooth as possible. Failing that I thought they could at least pretend that they couldn't see what was going on and remember to act all surprised when it finally happened.
Therefore I find US President Obama's decision to once again step in to protect Erdogan on multiple occasions extremely hard to understand.
This began on June 27th (27/6/16) when well known CIA agent Rihanna released the much trailed single "Sledgehammer." This of course shares its name with what Erdogan had claimed was a giant conspiracy to overthrow him. However it was also extremely significant that it was Rihanna releasing this single.
Rihanna is currently on her first tour since the 2013 Diamonds World Tour. It was during the European leg of this tour that the Islamist puppet regime that Erdogan had helped install in Egypt was overthrown.
This was the result of 30% of the Egyptian population signing a petition calling for Morsi to stand down. This was followed by roughly 15-20% of Egypt's population taking to the streets in protest and staying there day and night until Morsi stood down.
Obviously in a democracy faced with that level of public opposition a President would either stand down or at the very least call a fresh election. However as with Erdogan Morsi is no democrat so he refused.
This forced the Egyptian military to take control of the situation an usher Morsi out of power. The Egyptians then held a constitutional referendum and a Parliamentary election to confirm that was indeed the will of the people.
However enraged by the loss of his puppet Erdogan and his supporters in the AKP continue to allege that this was some sort of a coup d'etat. Primarily to block further progress in Egypt's revolution.
Therefore Rihanna singing about Sledgehammer whilst on tour seemed to be a coded warning by the US to Erdogan and the AKP that a coup was coming and they had better be prepared to resist it.
Erdogan responded almost immediately with the staged terror attack on Istanbul's Ataturk airport on June 28th (28/6/16).
Key to the Sledgehammer plot was claims that loyalists to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk would stage a series of terror attacks across Istanbul and down a plane in order to spread chaos to justify the military taking control of the country.
Therefore domestically the purpose of the June 28th attack was to prepare AKP supporters to prepare to resist any moves against Erdogan by whipping them up into a frenzy over a potential coup plot.
Due to the similarities between Erdogan's rise to power and Turkish politics at the start of the century the news of July 5th (5/7/16) that Hillary Clinton is now prohibited from becoming US President raised in the temperature in Turkey even further.
However beyond deploying the Black Lives Matter street army in support of Hillary Clinton a faction within the US government took this as a further opportunity to warn Erdogan of his impending demise.
On July 9th (9/7/16) a video claiming to be on behalf of the "Anonymous" hacking group appeared online calling for a "Day of Rage" against police in 39 US cities last night (15/7/16).
As the name suggests Anonymous has no official membership structure instead being a loose umbrella term that anyone can use. People normally associated with Anonymous and Black Lives Matter seem to know nothing about this particular video. In fact I think only 30 people answered its call.
However the language of a "Day of Rage" is synonymous with the Muslim world and the so-called "Arab Spring." Particularly the Egyptian revolutions in 2011 and 2013. In fact it seems impossible for Muslim protesters to call a demonstration without referring to is as a; "Day of Rage."
As such this video and the police response it triggered in the US seemed a barely coded warning to the Turkish police who are staunchly loyal to Erdogan that the Turkish military would be making their move on Friday (15/7/16). The Turkish police had better be ready to resist.
One of the first things the Turkish military did in making their move last night was to take control of the state broadcaster and put out a message that Erdogan had been overthrown and that people were to remain in their homes overnight.
Almost immediately following this announcement the US news network CNN broadcast a bizarre interview with Erdogan conducted over Apple's Facetime. In this interview that was broadcast nationally CNN allowed Erdogan to call on his supporters to take to the streets to fight the military to restore him to power.
Apparently while all this was going on Erdogan telephoned a number of European leaders asking for their support. Nobody was prepared to take his calls.
However US President Obama took it upon himself to call Erdogan and then release a public statement announcing that the US would not back the Turkish military.
With the Turkish military not being prepared to open fire on the crowds of AKP supporters who flooded the streets they were overwhelmed and Erdogan was returned to power.
Already Erdogan is using this as an excuse to further hollow out democratic institutions. Some 150 Judges have already been arrested and a further 2,775 dismissed from their post. As with the Ergenekon and Sledgehammer accusations they have already been replaced by AKP members.
Most worrying though has been today's developments at USAF base Incrilk which is where the bulk of anti-ISIL operations are conducted from and is home to 50-90 US nuclear warheads. Erdogan has ordered this base to be shutdown and cut off power to it.
As such Erdogan appears to be holding anti-ISIL operations and part of the US nuclear arsenal hostage.
I know I'm in danger of over using this phrase of late but after yet another screw up of epic proportions surely Obama is under arrest.
Or at least being psychologically assessed to determine if he is medically fit to continue in post.
22:05 on 16/7/16 (UK date).
In the 2001 the former Mayor of Istanbul Recep Tayyip Erdogan formed the Justice & Development Party (AKP) as a vehicle to sweep him to power in Turkey. In November 2002 the AKP won a landslide victory in the General Election.
The problem was that as Mayor of Istanbul in 1997 Erdogan attended a rally for the radical Islamist Welfare Party which at the time he was a member of. At that rally Erdogan called on party supporters to;
"Turn the Mosques into their barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers."
Rather unsurprisingly this call for Muslims to take up arms against the Turkish state was deemed an incitement both to violence and to religious and racial hatred.
As a result Erdogan was jailed for 10 months, banned from ever again holding political office and the Welfare Party was disbanded as a threat to national security.
Erdogan's conviction and ban from ever again holding public office obviously prevented him from taking up the office of Prime Minister in 2002.
With Hillary Clinton having been found to have committed 110 offences of espionage against the US and the Obama administration refusing to prosecute it is frightening how similar current US politics are to Turkish politics back in 2002.
If the Obama administration does not reverse its decision and prosecute Hillary Clinton or she fails to unilaterally withdraw from the 2016 President election Turkey could well be the type of country America becomes in the future.
Obviously Erdogan wasn't going to let a little something like the law of the land prevent him from seizing power. So in 2002 the AKP's co-founder Abdullah Gul simply became Turkey's Prime Minister in Erdogan's place.
Gul's sole purpose as Prime Minister was to annul the ban of Erdogan holding political office. This task was rapidly completed allowing Erdogan to become Prime Minister in March 2003.
Having seized power Erdogan almost immediately set about making sure that Turkey's law, Courts and other apparatus of a democratic state could never challenge his authority ever again.
Within months of taking up the office of Prime Minister Erdogan declared that there was secretive organisation called "Ergenekon" that was plotting to overthrow his government on behalf of the Global Zionist Conspiracy.
Stories of the Ergenekon group continued for the next 10 years resulting in 254 senior military and civil service officials being convicted to life imprisonment for treason against Erdogan. It almost goes without saying that those 254 vacancies were immediately filled with members of the AKP.
In 2015 the Ergenekon cases were reopened after independent forensic examinations revealed that many of the documents entered into evidence in the case were forgeries.
This merely prompted Erdogan to declare the conspiracy to be much wider than previously thought accusing the journalists who'd had the documents tested of being part of the "Gulen Movement."
Existing really only in Erdogan's brain the Gulen Movement is supposedly a vast CIA conspiracy against him that is fronted by Fethullah Gulen an Islamist preacher based in Pennsylvania. Whenever anyone disagrees with Erdogan they are immediately dismissed as Gulenists.
Following the revelation that much of the evidence had been forged the convictions in the Ergenekon case were annulled in April 2016. Obviously the wrongly imprisoned have not been allowed to return to their jobs which are now occupied by AKP members.
Just as the Ergenekon trials were reaching their climax in 2010 Erdogan suddenly uncovered another vast conspiracy against him. This time known as "Sledgehammer." On this occasion 365 senior military and civil service figures such as Judges were arrested and replaced by AKP members.
Again much of the evidence produced by Erdogan in the case was found to have been faked. Again Erdogan labelled those who proved the evidence to be fake to be members of the Gulenist conspiracy. After pointing out that the trials were in no way fair the Istanbul Bar Association itself was prosecuted for conspiring against Erdogan. All cases are currently being appealed.
The reason why Erdogan has been so desperate to remove any domestic oversight of his rule is quite clear. His policies should terrify any right thinking person.
In terms of foreign policy Erdogan is a neo-Ottoman.
That means he wants to re-establish the Ottoman Empire that stretched from Austria across the middle-east through Africa to Morocco. Erdogan wants to rule this Islamic Caliphate as Sultan with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi - leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) - as its Caliph.
To this end Erdogan has aggressively supported Islamist terror groups in Tunisia, Libya, Palestine. In Egypt he attempted to install the Islamist puppet regime of Mohammed Morsi and has backed terror groups to wage a low intensity war against Egypt ever since Morsi was overthrown by the Egyptian people in 2013.
It almost goes without saying that Erdogan has been an energetic supporter of ISIL in both Syria and Iraq. As I've really spent the last two years detailing Erdogan's support for ISIL it would take me far too long to list every example of the support he has given to the group here.
However one that really sums up Erdogan's rule occurred in January 2014 when the Attorney General of Turkey's Adana province was tipped off that a convoy carrying illegal weapons to terror groups in Syria was passing through the province.
Obviously the Attorney General and the local police stopped the convoy, seized the weapons and arrested those involved.
This prompted the Erdogan regime to arrest the more than 50 people involved in stopping the convoy on charges of treason for interfering with a National Intelligence Organisation (MIT) delivery of weapons to extreme Islamist terror groups active in Syria.
This story was broken by the Cumhuriyet newspaper. Erdogan responded by accusing the newspaper and the journalists of being part of the Gulenist conspiracy and prosecuted them for treason.
Just in May the journalists - Can Dundar & Erdem Gul - were jailed for five years for publishing the story. As he was arriving at Court Dundar survived an assassination attempt when an AKP member opened fire on him.
In March 2016 Turkey's biggest selling newspaper Zaman made the mistake of criticising Erdogan for the way it was cracking down on journalists and the free press. This led to a Turkish Court - staffed by AKP members of course - to order the newspaper to be shut down and placed under government control.
On March 6th (6/3/16) Turkish police physically seized Zaman's offices from its staff replacing them with AKP members. Funnily enough the new state run Zaman thinks that Erdogan is the greatest man to have ever lived and Turkey's one true saviour.
It is not just journalists writing about Erdogan's foreign adventures who have reason to be fearful. Erdogan's domestic policies are just as dangerous and just as unpleasant.
As part of Turkey's secular constitution the wearing of the Islamic hijab in areas of the public sector such Parliament, Courts and Schools is strictly forbidden. Rather than being Islamaphobic this was a rule introduced by Muslims.
Erdogan has long campaigned for this ban to be scrapped. His own wife has made a point of wearing the hijab at all times - even when carrying out official duties - and in 2008 Erdogan amended the constitution to exclude universities from the ban.
Erdogan's campaign for women to adhere to Islamic modesty standards has triggered a collapse in women's rights in Turkey with instances of rape, sexual assault, forced marriage and child marriage all skyrocketing.
You may remember how the French/Turkish movie "Mustang" was denied the 2016 Best Foreign Language Oscar as not to embarass US Vice President Joe Biden over his support for the Erdogan regime.
Just on June 5th (5/6/16) - in a speech to the Women's Democracy Association - Erdogan declared that women who choose to work rather than becoming wives and mothers are "deficient" and "inhuman."
Turkey's women are not alone in suffering at Erdogan's hands. The 2015 Gay Pride march in Istanbul was banned for being "un-Islamic." The marchers marched anyway so Erdogan's police attacked them.
Shortly after an AKP linked newspaper celebrated the recent Orlando terror attack as; "50 Perverted Homosexuals Killed" the same thing happened with the 2016 Gay Pride march. On this occasion even members of the German Parliament were arrested and assaulted by Erdogan's thuggish police force.
Even people who want to do something as simple as listen to music must live in fear in Erdogan's Turkey.
On June 18th (18/6/16) a small group of fans of the band Radiohead were listening to their new album in a record store in Istanbul. The AKP's street thugs attacked them with clubs and bottles threatening to burn them alive in the building for going against Islam by listening to music.
Fellow Istanbul residents rallied behind the victims of the attack calling for those responsible to be punished. Erdogan's police responded by attacking the demonstrators.
It almost goes without saying that this constant repression has seen Erdogan's popularity plummet.
In May of 2013 some 7 million people - roughly 1/10th of Turkey's entire population joined the Gezi Park/Taksim square protest calling for Erdogan to stand down.
Needless to say rather than heeding the will of the people Erdogan sent in the police to violently crush the protests killing 11 and injuring more than 8,000.
Erdogan then declared the protests to be not a sign of his own unpopularity but further work of the Zionist/Gulenist conspiracy against him.
As always the task of explaining the inner workings of Erdogan's mind to a rational audience is proving to be a hard one.
At around 16:40 on 16/7/16 (UK date) I'll be back to add more on what is likely to be a long night.
Edited at around 20:00 on 16/7/16 (UK date) to add;
In March of 2013 Erdogan's two terms as Prime Minister came to an end. However he refused to step down continuing to hold the office until August 2014 when he simply switched to the ceremonial non-executive role of President.
If anything this further damaged the popularity of both Erdogan and the AKP. They paid the price for this in the June 2015 General Election.
Here the AKP hoped to win the 330 seats needed to give them the 60% qualified majority needed to change the constitution to scrap term limits and make Erdogan an executive President. All without public approval. As it happened the AKP only succeeded in winning 258 seats - falling 17 seats short of a governing majority.
This really should have been the end of Erdogan and the AKP. It was simply a question of the other three main parties led by the Republican People's Party (CHP) forming a coalition and then repairing Turkey's fractured relationship with the international community including NATO.
However then US President Obama stepped in save Erdogan.
Following the July 20th (20/7/15) Suruc bombing against Turkey's Kurds Obama telephoned Erdogan and gave him permission to declare war on both Turkey's Kurdish population and the Kurds across the entire region. Including in Iraq & Syria where they are fighting ISIL - who carried out the Suruc bombing.
This of course immediately drove a wedge between the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and the People's Democratic Party (HDP) ending the possibility of an anti-AKP coalition.
It also allowed Erdogan to portray himself as the wartime leader wrapped in the national flag while introducing increasingly draconian controls on the media and political opponents under the guise of "fighting terror."
Buoyed by the wartime fervour Erdogan called a snap General Election in November 2015. On this occasion the AKP managed to scrape together just enough votes to secure 317 seats. Not enough to change the constitution but just enough for the AKP to rule alone.
This election took place against the backdrop of the government being at war against 20% of the Turkish population and journalists and publishers being dragged through the Courts on trumped up charges of espionage and treason.
As a result it was only the US that recognised Turkey's November 2015 General Election as free and fair. The Council of Europe monitoring mission described the election by saying;
"This campaign was unfair and characterised by too much violence and fear."
Citing specifically;
"Criminal investigations of journalists and media outlets for support of terrorism and defamation of the president, the blocking of websites … and the effective seizure of some prominent media outlets reduced voters’ access to a plurality of views and information."
Despite being the only developed nation to consider Turkey's November 2015 election as legitimate the US still refused to respect either its result or the Turkish constitution.
Rather than conducting business with the Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu - the recognised holder of democratic executive power - the US continued to deal only with Erdogan as if he still had legal authority in Turkish policy.
In May 2016 Erdogan decided that Davutoglu was getting to big for his boots and dismissed him in favour of Binali Yildirim. Erdogan had no lawful authority to make that decision.
Following the November 2015 electoral coup Erdogan seems to have become even more power crazed and out of control.
Reading the Turkish media it seems that over the past 8 months hundreds of opponents of the AKP and just random members of the public are being rounded up every week on vague charges of being part of the; "Parallel State"- by which I think Erdogan simply means; "The State."
Then of course there has been Erdogan's attempts to weaponise refugees from Syria to blackmail the European Union (EU) into handing over 15% of its budget and grant Turkish passport holders visa-free access to the trading bloc.
This of course has been linked to the November 13th (13/11/15) Paris Massacres and the March 22nd (22/3/16) Brussels attacks. Three days prior to the Brussels attacks Erdogan quite clearly and publicly said to an AKP rally; "Brussels will be [attacked] next."
So to all who do this sort of thing for a living it has been clear that the pressure was reaching a tipping point. Erdogan would soon be overthrown and Turkey would be returned to democracy and civil society.
I personally thought that the NATO intelligence agencies should have been working with the Turkish military alongside the MHP and the CHP to make sure this transition was a swift and smooth as possible. Failing that I thought they could at least pretend that they couldn't see what was going on and remember to act all surprised when it finally happened.
Therefore I find US President Obama's decision to once again step in to protect Erdogan on multiple occasions extremely hard to understand.
This began on June 27th (27/6/16) when well known CIA agent Rihanna released the much trailed single "Sledgehammer." This of course shares its name with what Erdogan had claimed was a giant conspiracy to overthrow him. However it was also extremely significant that it was Rihanna releasing this single.
Rihanna is currently on her first tour since the 2013 Diamonds World Tour. It was during the European leg of this tour that the Islamist puppet regime that Erdogan had helped install in Egypt was overthrown.
This was the result of 30% of the Egyptian population signing a petition calling for Morsi to stand down. This was followed by roughly 15-20% of Egypt's population taking to the streets in protest and staying there day and night until Morsi stood down.
Obviously in a democracy faced with that level of public opposition a President would either stand down or at the very least call a fresh election. However as with Erdogan Morsi is no democrat so he refused.
This forced the Egyptian military to take control of the situation an usher Morsi out of power. The Egyptians then held a constitutional referendum and a Parliamentary election to confirm that was indeed the will of the people.
However enraged by the loss of his puppet Erdogan and his supporters in the AKP continue to allege that this was some sort of a coup d'etat. Primarily to block further progress in Egypt's revolution.
Therefore Rihanna singing about Sledgehammer whilst on tour seemed to be a coded warning by the US to Erdogan and the AKP that a coup was coming and they had better be prepared to resist it.
Erdogan responded almost immediately with the staged terror attack on Istanbul's Ataturk airport on June 28th (28/6/16).
Key to the Sledgehammer plot was claims that loyalists to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk would stage a series of terror attacks across Istanbul and down a plane in order to spread chaos to justify the military taking control of the country.
Therefore domestically the purpose of the June 28th attack was to prepare AKP supporters to prepare to resist any moves against Erdogan by whipping them up into a frenzy over a potential coup plot.
Due to the similarities between Erdogan's rise to power and Turkish politics at the start of the century the news of July 5th (5/7/16) that Hillary Clinton is now prohibited from becoming US President raised in the temperature in Turkey even further.
However beyond deploying the Black Lives Matter street army in support of Hillary Clinton a faction within the US government took this as a further opportunity to warn Erdogan of his impending demise.
On July 9th (9/7/16) a video claiming to be on behalf of the "Anonymous" hacking group appeared online calling for a "Day of Rage" against police in 39 US cities last night (15/7/16).
As the name suggests Anonymous has no official membership structure instead being a loose umbrella term that anyone can use. People normally associated with Anonymous and Black Lives Matter seem to know nothing about this particular video. In fact I think only 30 people answered its call.
However the language of a "Day of Rage" is synonymous with the Muslim world and the so-called "Arab Spring." Particularly the Egyptian revolutions in 2011 and 2013. In fact it seems impossible for Muslim protesters to call a demonstration without referring to is as a; "Day of Rage."
As such this video and the police response it triggered in the US seemed a barely coded warning to the Turkish police who are staunchly loyal to Erdogan that the Turkish military would be making their move on Friday (15/7/16). The Turkish police had better be ready to resist.
One of the first things the Turkish military did in making their move last night was to take control of the state broadcaster and put out a message that Erdogan had been overthrown and that people were to remain in their homes overnight.
Almost immediately following this announcement the US news network CNN broadcast a bizarre interview with Erdogan conducted over Apple's Facetime. In this interview that was broadcast nationally CNN allowed Erdogan to call on his supporters to take to the streets to fight the military to restore him to power.
Apparently while all this was going on Erdogan telephoned a number of European leaders asking for their support. Nobody was prepared to take his calls.
However US President Obama took it upon himself to call Erdogan and then release a public statement announcing that the US would not back the Turkish military.
With the Turkish military not being prepared to open fire on the crowds of AKP supporters who flooded the streets they were overwhelmed and Erdogan was returned to power.
Already Erdogan is using this as an excuse to further hollow out democratic institutions. Some 150 Judges have already been arrested and a further 2,775 dismissed from their post. As with the Ergenekon and Sledgehammer accusations they have already been replaced by AKP members.
Most worrying though has been today's developments at USAF base Incrilk which is where the bulk of anti-ISIL operations are conducted from and is home to 50-90 US nuclear warheads. Erdogan has ordered this base to be shutdown and cut off power to it.
As such Erdogan appears to be holding anti-ISIL operations and part of the US nuclear arsenal hostage.
I know I'm in danger of over using this phrase of late but after yet another screw up of epic proportions surely Obama is under arrest.
Or at least being psychologically assessed to determine if he is medically fit to continue in post.
22:05 on 16/7/16 (UK date).
Friday, 15 July 2016
Well That Wasn't Very Nice.
As they do every year the people of France yesterday (16/7/16) celebrated Bastille Day.
This marks the anniversary of the July 14th 1789 storming of the Bastille prison in Paris. Although the Bastille only contained 7 prisoners at the time its storming by the people was a great symbol of the popular resistance against the corrupt and cruel French Monarchy. It marked the start of the French Revolution.
As such Bastille Day is very much the French equivalent of America's Independence Day. It is celebrated in much the same way with it being a public holiday on which people gather with family and friends and attend large public firework displays.
Last night one such celebration on the Promenade de Anglais in the southern port city of Nice ended in tragedy when a man drove a 25 tonne truck through the gathered crowds. So far 84 people have been confirmed to have been killed. Although hopefully it will not come to pass that number could rise as high as 134 with at least 50 people remaining in critical condition in hospital.
The driver of the truck who was killed bringing the attack to an end has been identified as Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel a 31 year old French/Tunisian dual national of Muslim heritage.
Although he is known to the French police for a range of criminal activity including armed robbery Bouhlel had not previously been linked to radical Islamist terrorism. There is certainly no indication that he had travelled to Syria or Iraq to train with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) or an associated group.
As such unlike the November 30th (30/11/15) Paris Massacres or the March 22nd (22/3/16) Brussels attacks this seems to have been the work of a homegrown terrorist rather than a cell that had been trained in Syria or Iraq and then dispatched to Europe to commit acts of terror. Obviously the extent to which Bouhlel had been inspired and/or directed by ISIL is still something that needs to be very carefully investigated.
After all the fact that I am about to say it demonstrates that what I am about to say should be widely known by any ISIL supporter or anyone who has been following the war against them in any level of detail. I am even worried that I myself may have inadvertently been the online intermediary in this attack.
Although it has been some two months since I've covered the war against ISIL directly those two months have seen significant defeats handed to ISIL.
On June 26th (26/6/16) the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) finally liberated the city of Fallujah from ISIL.
The liberation of Fallujah effectively ended ISIL's presence in the vast Anbar province that makes up roughly a third of Iraq's territory. It also reduces the threat to the Iraqi capital Baghdad which sits around 50km (30 miles) to the east. Crucially it also freed a population of around 270,000 from ISIL taxation significantly denting the group's finances.
The big problem with the ISF's Anbar operation is that it began before the operation to liberate the city of Tikrit and the surrounding Saladin province had been fully completed. As such a significant ISIL presence remains in that area. However in comparison to liberating Ramadi and Fallujah clearing ISIL from the areas between Baghdad and Kirkuk should be relatively easy.
This will allow for an operation to liberate Mosul - ISIL's de facto capital in Iraq. Once that is complete all of Iraq will have effectively been liberated from ISIL with the group being forced back into Syria.
Following the liberation of Fallujah the ISIL leadership itself seems to know that the end is coming for them.
There have been numerous rumours that ISIL's senior leaders are being instructed to prepare their fighters to leave both Iraq and Syria and reassemble in Libya. This means that the US-led Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) continued failure to close the supply/escape route known as "Erdogan's Pocket" or "Garvaghy Road" is becoming an ever more critical issue.
However while ISIL's leadership are preparing for the group's evacuation from Iraq and then Syria for the morale of their supporters it has become increasingly important for ISIL to show that they remain a potent force.
So following the liberation of Fallujah ISIL have carried out a series of brutal attacks on Baghdad.
The most significant of these occurred on July 3rd (3/7/16) in the predominately Shia Muslim Karrada district of the city where families had gathered to celebrate the end of Ramadan. Although the majority of the deaths were caused by the ensuing fire rather than the attack itself this killed 275 people making it the worst terror attack in Iraq's history. Take a moment to think about what that means.
While the Anbar operation was underway and prior to the liberations of Ramadi and then Fallujah ISIL extensively targeted Baghdad's Shia districts. Then the objective was to increase tension between Shias and Sunnis in order to prevent Shia militia's collectively known as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) from operating in the predominately Sunni Anbar province thus slowing down the operation.
At the time the point was made that the successful completion of the Anbar operation would reduce the threat to Baghdad. Therefore ISIL's renewed attacks on Baghdad are intended to undermine those claims.
Also while the Anbar operation has been underway protests against Iraq's Shia dominated government have taken place under the leadership of prominent Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
As such ISIL's latest attacks on Baghdad's Shia neighbourhoods seem intended to further undermine confidence in the Iraqi government in order to force more of the Shia population to join the protests. Judging by the way that today's protests have brought tens of thousands to the streets of Baghdad's Tahrir square prompting the Internet to be shut down across the city ISIL's plan seems to be working.
Obviously ISIL's ultimate aspiration in supporting al-Sadr's protest movement is to bring down the Iraq government meaning that there is no Iraqi military to fight them. Failing that though ISIL seem intent on tricking the people of Baghdad into demanding the government deploys more forces to protect Baghdad. Those forces of course then can't be deployed to the areas surrounding Tikrit and Mosul further delaying the complete liberation of Iraq.
The other big recent humiliation for ISIL has been the recent Euro 2016 football tournament held in France. In the weeks running up to this tournament ISIL repeatedly threatened that they would launch a horrific terror attack against it on the scale of the Paris Massacres. With ISIL being unable to deliver on that promise the group and its supporters have got to be feeling like complete failures.
In terms of finding local recruits to avenge ISIL's recent failures in Europe France was always going to be at most risk. That is because simply it has the largest Muslim population of any European nation. Also as was discussed extensively at the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest France has a longstanding problem with integration which helps fuel radicalisation.
In terms of why Nice was the scene of last night's attack it might be something as simple as the fact that is where Bouhlel lived and is therefore the area that he is most familiar with and comfortable in.
However even if he wasn't specifically directed by ISIL there are a number of factors which could have caused him to decide that there and then was the time to make his stand for the group;
Refugees and the Front National: I once again have to start by saying that the overwhelming majority of those fleeing Syria and Iraq are not terrorists and pose no threat to Europeans. In fact by definition a person cannot be considered a refugee if they support a group like ISIL or in any way pose a terror threat.
However the problem is that we are certainly not doing a satisfactory job of screening irregular migrants to determine whether they are refugees or terrorists.
So while you have people like US President Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau shouting; "Refugees Welcome" to convince us of how much they care the German intelligence services have been quietly whispering phrases like; "Identified and Liquidated." It turns out the most recent season of "Homeland" was extremely accurate in certain respects.
With CJTFOIR continuing to refuse to block ISIL's escape route to Libya up Garvaghy Road the Mediterranean migrant route is becoming a particular area of concern. Both at Eurovision and just the other day (12/7/17) the Italian's have been complaining about how a certain someone's out of control ego is holding their feet to the fire. Nice sits on the Mediterranean coast right next to Italy.
It is a long standing part of Al Qaeda strategy that within global society there is a distinct area where Muslims exist. There is another distinct area where non-Muslims exist. However in societies such as France there is a third space where Muslims and non-Muslims exist alongside each other. There are very fancy Arabic names for these three spaces which for the life of me at this point I just cannot remember.
Al Qaeda's strategy is focused on using terrorism to destroy this third space forcing Muslims and non-Muslims apart as a precursor to a war that will see the Muslims wipe out the non-Muslims. In this version of reality even Shia Muslims are considered non-Muslims.
In France you have the fascist Front National (FN) party led by Marie Le Pen. They seem to share Al Qaeda's desire to destroy this third space driving Muslims and non-Muslims apart. Of course though the Front National believe it is the non-Muslims who will win this war to end all wars.
In April 2017 France will hold its Presidential election. Playing on fears of immigration and terrorism the Front National is hoping to do extremely well in this election. There is even talk of Le Pen becoming France's next President.
By conducting a terror attack in an area close to an area heavily associated with the Mediterranean migrant route it is entirely possible that Bouhlel was trying to campaign for Le Pen in the hope the Front National will ally with ISIL in destroying that third space.
The English Way: The Promenade des Anglais where last night's attack to place translates as; "The English Walkway" or simply; "The English Way." It was built by British MP Lewis Way in 1820 as a way to help an influx of beggars who'd flocked to his favourite holiday resort.
Although it made many grievous mistakes in the early days of the war in Syria recently the UK has been very vocal about the need to defeat ISIL and associated groups and end the war once and for all. This included the liquidation of British MP Jo Cox on June 16th (16/6/16).
This of course was intended to end the EU referendum campaign a week early.
However it looked to do that by promoting discussion about the radical Islamist groups that Jo Cox supported in her role as the founder and chair of the perversely named "Friends of Syria" Parliamentary group. These are groups her husband Brendan Cox continues to support through the 'charitable' foundation he has set up in her name. This has prompted quite a lot of discussion between nations.
Clearly at least one of ISIL's supporters view Jo Cox and the groups she supported as vital allies in ISIL's war.
Tonight sees the start of Britain's "The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC" (The Proms) classical music festival. Taking its name from the way that people would promenade or stroll around public spaces such as the Promenade des Anglais this is considered one of the World famous highpoints of the British social calendar.
As such it is entirely possible that Bouhlel was trying to threaten The Proms as a way to frighten Britain into changing its position and intimidate others from following "the English way."
The poor darling of course failed to realise that these days The Proms are held almost exclusively at the Royal Albert Hall. From a security perspective that single venue is extremely easy to protect.
Plus not even the Nazi Blitzkrieg and the destruction of the Queen's Hall venue in 1941 was enough to stop The Proms dear.
As seems to be my catch phrase these days at around 16:40 on 17/7/16 (UK date) I have a tiny bit to add after dinner.
Edited at around 22:45 on 17/7/16 (UK date) to try and work out why my blog is having a weird allergic reaction to the word "Mediterranean" and add;
Rihanna: I personally do not think this is a significant factor in the attack. However it has been talked about and will certainly be talked about now. Therefore I really have to discuss it if only to help rule it out.
As I've previously mentioned Rihanna on her "ANTI" tour of Europe and the US. Today she was supposed to be playing at the Allianz Stadium in Nice. Therefore she was in Nice last night during the terror attack. Although I can't say that I've looked at her travel plans in enough detail to confirm this it is certainly possible that Rihanna was staying in one of the hotels along the route of the attack.
On June 27th (27/6/16) Rihanna released the single "Sledgehammer" taken from the movie "Star Trek Beyond." This was an extremely bad move on Rihanna's part because "Sledgehammer" could be interpreted as a reference to the 2003 Sledgehammer conspiracy in Turkey.
In this long running story Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recept Tayyip Erdogan claimed that the "Parallel/Deep State" which is sworn to uphold Turkey's secular constitution and values established by the nation's founder Mustfa Kemal Ataturk were plotting to overthrow him in a military coup.
However the evidence in support of Erdogan's claim such as documents produced on Microsoft Office 2007 were found to be distinctly lacking in credibility. As such Sledgehammer is widely viewed as a complete fabrication by Erdogan in order to justify the jailing of hundreds of secular civil servants/military leaders so they could be replaced by Islamists loyal to Erdogan's own Justice & Development Party (AKP).
At the time I said that it was extremely unwise for Rihanna and her CIA handlers to bring this topic up at such a sensitive time. That was the abridged version. What I would have liked to have said is;
As a valued NATO member the Turkish Establishment has a long and proud history of defending the values of secularism and democracy against dark forces. Erdogan once described democracy as being like a train. It is something that you ride on until you reach your destination. Then you get off and forget about it.
Since arriving at his destination of power Erdogan has persued an extremely aggressive Islamist policy both at home and abroad.
It is on the foreign policy front where his behaviour has been most destablising as a full supporter of ISIL. It is due to Erdogan that CJTFOIR was prevented for a long time from using USAF base Incirilk to defeat ISIL. It is also due to Erdogan that CJTFOIR remains banned from closing ISIL's main supply route - "Erdogan's Pocket/Garvaghy Road."
On the democratic front Erdogan hit a big of a snag in January 2015 when his term limit as Prime Minister expired forcing him to take up the ceremonial role of President. In the June 2015 Parliamentary election Erdogan hoped that this AKP would secure a qualified majority allowing him to make the office of the President an Executive role from which he could rule for all eternity.
Unfortunately the Turkish people disagreed with him and the AKP not only fell short of a qualified majority they fell short of an absolute majority.
Then suddenly on July 20th (20/7/16) an ISIL suicide bombing took place in the Turkish city of Suruc killing 33. With the full support of then US President Barack Obama Erdogan then declared war on Turkey's Kurdish population. Presumably because Kurds in Syria and Iraq had the cheek to fight ISIL.
Wrapped in the flag of nationalism Erdogan then decided to hold another Parlimentary election in November 2015. Again the AKP fell short of the qualified majority it craved. Erdogan is currently in the process to expelling Kurdish MP's from Parliament reducing the number of MP's needed for a qualified majority.
So what I would have liked to have said is;
"The Turkish Establishment and the Turkish people have had enough of Erdogan and his extremism. They will soon remove him from power. Incirilk will be fully opened, Garvaghy Road will be sealed and the ISIL Consulate in Ankara will be closed.
STOP TRYING TO PROTECT HIM!"
In response to the Sledgehammer single there was an ISIL terror attack on Istanbul's Ataturk airport in which 141 people were murder. Even though they were responsible for the attack domestically it was used by Erdogan and the AKP to prepare the Turkish population for the coup attempt the US had warned him to guard against.
Like I said though I don't think Rihanna's involvement in the Nice terror attack was planned or a trigger for anything.
Depending on how widely it was advertised locally it may have been a contributing factor to Bouhlel's individual motive. However I essentially functioned as Rihanna's social worker throughout 2013. The fact that she recently performed concerts in my native London still came as a surprise to me.
So along with the Nice Jazz Festival which was also cancelled I suspect that Rihanna's presence was entirely secondary to the fact that Bastille Day was the one day of the year that the Promenade des Anglais was packed with people making it the perfect target.
00:05 on 18/7/16 (UK date).
This marks the anniversary of the July 14th 1789 storming of the Bastille prison in Paris. Although the Bastille only contained 7 prisoners at the time its storming by the people was a great symbol of the popular resistance against the corrupt and cruel French Monarchy. It marked the start of the French Revolution.
As such Bastille Day is very much the French equivalent of America's Independence Day. It is celebrated in much the same way with it being a public holiday on which people gather with family and friends and attend large public firework displays.
Last night one such celebration on the Promenade de Anglais in the southern port city of Nice ended in tragedy when a man drove a 25 tonne truck through the gathered crowds. So far 84 people have been confirmed to have been killed. Although hopefully it will not come to pass that number could rise as high as 134 with at least 50 people remaining in critical condition in hospital.
The driver of the truck who was killed bringing the attack to an end has been identified as Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel a 31 year old French/Tunisian dual national of Muslim heritage.
Although he is known to the French police for a range of criminal activity including armed robbery Bouhlel had not previously been linked to radical Islamist terrorism. There is certainly no indication that he had travelled to Syria or Iraq to train with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) or an associated group.
As such unlike the November 30th (30/11/15) Paris Massacres or the March 22nd (22/3/16) Brussels attacks this seems to have been the work of a homegrown terrorist rather than a cell that had been trained in Syria or Iraq and then dispatched to Europe to commit acts of terror. Obviously the extent to which Bouhlel had been inspired and/or directed by ISIL is still something that needs to be very carefully investigated.
After all the fact that I am about to say it demonstrates that what I am about to say should be widely known by any ISIL supporter or anyone who has been following the war against them in any level of detail. I am even worried that I myself may have inadvertently been the online intermediary in this attack.
Although it has been some two months since I've covered the war against ISIL directly those two months have seen significant defeats handed to ISIL.
On June 26th (26/6/16) the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) finally liberated the city of Fallujah from ISIL.
The liberation of Fallujah effectively ended ISIL's presence in the vast Anbar province that makes up roughly a third of Iraq's territory. It also reduces the threat to the Iraqi capital Baghdad which sits around 50km (30 miles) to the east. Crucially it also freed a population of around 270,000 from ISIL taxation significantly denting the group's finances.
The big problem with the ISF's Anbar operation is that it began before the operation to liberate the city of Tikrit and the surrounding Saladin province had been fully completed. As such a significant ISIL presence remains in that area. However in comparison to liberating Ramadi and Fallujah clearing ISIL from the areas between Baghdad and Kirkuk should be relatively easy.
This will allow for an operation to liberate Mosul - ISIL's de facto capital in Iraq. Once that is complete all of Iraq will have effectively been liberated from ISIL with the group being forced back into Syria.
Following the liberation of Fallujah the ISIL leadership itself seems to know that the end is coming for them.
There have been numerous rumours that ISIL's senior leaders are being instructed to prepare their fighters to leave both Iraq and Syria and reassemble in Libya. This means that the US-led Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) continued failure to close the supply/escape route known as "Erdogan's Pocket" or "Garvaghy Road" is becoming an ever more critical issue.
However while ISIL's leadership are preparing for the group's evacuation from Iraq and then Syria for the morale of their supporters it has become increasingly important for ISIL to show that they remain a potent force.
So following the liberation of Fallujah ISIL have carried out a series of brutal attacks on Baghdad.
The most significant of these occurred on July 3rd (3/7/16) in the predominately Shia Muslim Karrada district of the city where families had gathered to celebrate the end of Ramadan. Although the majority of the deaths were caused by the ensuing fire rather than the attack itself this killed 275 people making it the worst terror attack in Iraq's history. Take a moment to think about what that means.
While the Anbar operation was underway and prior to the liberations of Ramadi and then Fallujah ISIL extensively targeted Baghdad's Shia districts. Then the objective was to increase tension between Shias and Sunnis in order to prevent Shia militia's collectively known as the Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF) from operating in the predominately Sunni Anbar province thus slowing down the operation.
At the time the point was made that the successful completion of the Anbar operation would reduce the threat to Baghdad. Therefore ISIL's renewed attacks on Baghdad are intended to undermine those claims.
Also while the Anbar operation has been underway protests against Iraq's Shia dominated government have taken place under the leadership of prominent Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
As such ISIL's latest attacks on Baghdad's Shia neighbourhoods seem intended to further undermine confidence in the Iraqi government in order to force more of the Shia population to join the protests. Judging by the way that today's protests have brought tens of thousands to the streets of Baghdad's Tahrir square prompting the Internet to be shut down across the city ISIL's plan seems to be working.
Obviously ISIL's ultimate aspiration in supporting al-Sadr's protest movement is to bring down the Iraq government meaning that there is no Iraqi military to fight them. Failing that though ISIL seem intent on tricking the people of Baghdad into demanding the government deploys more forces to protect Baghdad. Those forces of course then can't be deployed to the areas surrounding Tikrit and Mosul further delaying the complete liberation of Iraq.
The other big recent humiliation for ISIL has been the recent Euro 2016 football tournament held in France. In the weeks running up to this tournament ISIL repeatedly threatened that they would launch a horrific terror attack against it on the scale of the Paris Massacres. With ISIL being unable to deliver on that promise the group and its supporters have got to be feeling like complete failures.
In terms of finding local recruits to avenge ISIL's recent failures in Europe France was always going to be at most risk. That is because simply it has the largest Muslim population of any European nation. Also as was discussed extensively at the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest France has a longstanding problem with integration which helps fuel radicalisation.
In terms of why Nice was the scene of last night's attack it might be something as simple as the fact that is where Bouhlel lived and is therefore the area that he is most familiar with and comfortable in.
However even if he wasn't specifically directed by ISIL there are a number of factors which could have caused him to decide that there and then was the time to make his stand for the group;
Refugees and the Front National: I once again have to start by saying that the overwhelming majority of those fleeing Syria and Iraq are not terrorists and pose no threat to Europeans. In fact by definition a person cannot be considered a refugee if they support a group like ISIL or in any way pose a terror threat.
However the problem is that we are certainly not doing a satisfactory job of screening irregular migrants to determine whether they are refugees or terrorists.
So while you have people like US President Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau shouting; "Refugees Welcome" to convince us of how much they care the German intelligence services have been quietly whispering phrases like; "Identified and Liquidated." It turns out the most recent season of "Homeland" was extremely accurate in certain respects.
With CJTFOIR continuing to refuse to block ISIL's escape route to Libya up Garvaghy Road the Mediterranean migrant route is becoming a particular area of concern. Both at Eurovision and just the other day (12/7/17) the Italian's have been complaining about how a certain someone's out of control ego is holding their feet to the fire. Nice sits on the Mediterranean coast right next to Italy.
It is a long standing part of Al Qaeda strategy that within global society there is a distinct area where Muslims exist. There is another distinct area where non-Muslims exist. However in societies such as France there is a third space where Muslims and non-Muslims exist alongside each other. There are very fancy Arabic names for these three spaces which for the life of me at this point I just cannot remember.
Al Qaeda's strategy is focused on using terrorism to destroy this third space forcing Muslims and non-Muslims apart as a precursor to a war that will see the Muslims wipe out the non-Muslims. In this version of reality even Shia Muslims are considered non-Muslims.
In France you have the fascist Front National (FN) party led by Marie Le Pen. They seem to share Al Qaeda's desire to destroy this third space driving Muslims and non-Muslims apart. Of course though the Front National believe it is the non-Muslims who will win this war to end all wars.
In April 2017 France will hold its Presidential election. Playing on fears of immigration and terrorism the Front National is hoping to do extremely well in this election. There is even talk of Le Pen becoming France's next President.
By conducting a terror attack in an area close to an area heavily associated with the Mediterranean migrant route it is entirely possible that Bouhlel was trying to campaign for Le Pen in the hope the Front National will ally with ISIL in destroying that third space.
The English Way: The Promenade des Anglais where last night's attack to place translates as; "The English Walkway" or simply; "The English Way." It was built by British MP Lewis Way in 1820 as a way to help an influx of beggars who'd flocked to his favourite holiday resort.
Although it made many grievous mistakes in the early days of the war in Syria recently the UK has been very vocal about the need to defeat ISIL and associated groups and end the war once and for all. This included the liquidation of British MP Jo Cox on June 16th (16/6/16).
This of course was intended to end the EU referendum campaign a week early.
However it looked to do that by promoting discussion about the radical Islamist groups that Jo Cox supported in her role as the founder and chair of the perversely named "Friends of Syria" Parliamentary group. These are groups her husband Brendan Cox continues to support through the 'charitable' foundation he has set up in her name. This has prompted quite a lot of discussion between nations.
Clearly at least one of ISIL's supporters view Jo Cox and the groups she supported as vital allies in ISIL's war.
Tonight sees the start of Britain's "The Henry Wood Promenade Concerts presented by the BBC" (The Proms) classical music festival. Taking its name from the way that people would promenade or stroll around public spaces such as the Promenade des Anglais this is considered one of the World famous highpoints of the British social calendar.
As such it is entirely possible that Bouhlel was trying to threaten The Proms as a way to frighten Britain into changing its position and intimidate others from following "the English way."
The poor darling of course failed to realise that these days The Proms are held almost exclusively at the Royal Albert Hall. From a security perspective that single venue is extremely easy to protect.
Plus not even the Nazi Blitzkrieg and the destruction of the Queen's Hall venue in 1941 was enough to stop The Proms dear.
As seems to be my catch phrase these days at around 16:40 on 17/7/16 (UK date) I have a tiny bit to add after dinner.
Edited at around 22:45 on 17/7/16 (UK date) to try and work out why my blog is having a weird allergic reaction to the word "Mediterranean" and add;
Rihanna: I personally do not think this is a significant factor in the attack. However it has been talked about and will certainly be talked about now. Therefore I really have to discuss it if only to help rule it out.
As I've previously mentioned Rihanna on her "ANTI" tour of Europe and the US. Today she was supposed to be playing at the Allianz Stadium in Nice. Therefore she was in Nice last night during the terror attack. Although I can't say that I've looked at her travel plans in enough detail to confirm this it is certainly possible that Rihanna was staying in one of the hotels along the route of the attack.
On June 27th (27/6/16) Rihanna released the single "Sledgehammer" taken from the movie "Star Trek Beyond." This was an extremely bad move on Rihanna's part because "Sledgehammer" could be interpreted as a reference to the 2003 Sledgehammer conspiracy in Turkey.
In this long running story Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recept Tayyip Erdogan claimed that the "Parallel/Deep State" which is sworn to uphold Turkey's secular constitution and values established by the nation's founder Mustfa Kemal Ataturk were plotting to overthrow him in a military coup.
However the evidence in support of Erdogan's claim such as documents produced on Microsoft Office 2007 were found to be distinctly lacking in credibility. As such Sledgehammer is widely viewed as a complete fabrication by Erdogan in order to justify the jailing of hundreds of secular civil servants/military leaders so they could be replaced by Islamists loyal to Erdogan's own Justice & Development Party (AKP).
At the time I said that it was extremely unwise for Rihanna and her CIA handlers to bring this topic up at such a sensitive time. That was the abridged version. What I would have liked to have said is;
As a valued NATO member the Turkish Establishment has a long and proud history of defending the values of secularism and democracy against dark forces. Erdogan once described democracy as being like a train. It is something that you ride on until you reach your destination. Then you get off and forget about it.
Since arriving at his destination of power Erdogan has persued an extremely aggressive Islamist policy both at home and abroad.
It is on the foreign policy front where his behaviour has been most destablising as a full supporter of ISIL. It is due to Erdogan that CJTFOIR was prevented for a long time from using USAF base Incirilk to defeat ISIL. It is also due to Erdogan that CJTFOIR remains banned from closing ISIL's main supply route - "Erdogan's Pocket/Garvaghy Road."
On the democratic front Erdogan hit a big of a snag in January 2015 when his term limit as Prime Minister expired forcing him to take up the ceremonial role of President. In the June 2015 Parliamentary election Erdogan hoped that this AKP would secure a qualified majority allowing him to make the office of the President an Executive role from which he could rule for all eternity.
Unfortunately the Turkish people disagreed with him and the AKP not only fell short of a qualified majority they fell short of an absolute majority.
Then suddenly on July 20th (20/7/16) an ISIL suicide bombing took place in the Turkish city of Suruc killing 33. With the full support of then US President Barack Obama Erdogan then declared war on Turkey's Kurdish population. Presumably because Kurds in Syria and Iraq had the cheek to fight ISIL.
Wrapped in the flag of nationalism Erdogan then decided to hold another Parlimentary election in November 2015. Again the AKP fell short of the qualified majority it craved. Erdogan is currently in the process to expelling Kurdish MP's from Parliament reducing the number of MP's needed for a qualified majority.
So what I would have liked to have said is;
"The Turkish Establishment and the Turkish people have had enough of Erdogan and his extremism. They will soon remove him from power. Incirilk will be fully opened, Garvaghy Road will be sealed and the ISIL Consulate in Ankara will be closed.
STOP TRYING TO PROTECT HIM!"
In response to the Sledgehammer single there was an ISIL terror attack on Istanbul's Ataturk airport in which 141 people were murder. Even though they were responsible for the attack domestically it was used by Erdogan and the AKP to prepare the Turkish population for the coup attempt the US had warned him to guard against.
Like I said though I don't think Rihanna's involvement in the Nice terror attack was planned or a trigger for anything.
Depending on how widely it was advertised locally it may have been a contributing factor to Bouhlel's individual motive. However I essentially functioned as Rihanna's social worker throughout 2013. The fact that she recently performed concerts in my native London still came as a surprise to me.
So along with the Nice Jazz Festival which was also cancelled I suspect that Rihanna's presence was entirely secondary to the fact that Bastille Day was the one day of the year that the Promenade des Anglais was packed with people making it the perfect target.
00:05 on 18/7/16 (UK date).
Friday, 8 July 2016
Black Lives Matter: The Domestic Terrorist Group.
If you cast your minds back to the summer of 2014 you may remember that former US President Barack Obama and his Democrat Party were in dire straits.
With the ethnic cleansing of the town of Sinjar/Shingal in Iraq the genocidal hatred of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) had become so clear that the world was no longer able to turn its back. Under immense public pressure Obama had been forced to deploy US aircraft to bring an end to these crimes against humanity.
Having spent the previous three years creating and supporting ISIL and their associates Obama was really not happy about being forced to fight them and was in desperate need of a distraction.
Also the Democrats really, really wanted to seize control of both house of the US Congress in the November 2014 mid-term elections.
So the Democrats responded to this pressure by making up a story of an innocent young black man named Michael Brown who had been murdered by a police officer as he had his hands up in surrender in the town of Ferguson, Missouri.
On the back of this lie the Democrats formed a street army marching under the banner of "Black Lives Matter."
The purpose of this group was to use violence and the threat of violence to impose on America the notion that black people should not be punished when they choose to break the law.
In Ferguson Black Lives Matter immediately went to work unleashing a full year of rioting that lasted from August 9th 2014 (9/8/14) until August 11th 2015 (11/8/15).
Ultimately though in Ferguson they failed.
In response to the violence the police officer in question was called before a Grand Jury.
Here they heard the truth that Micheal Brown had committed a robbery at a local convenience store and when challenged by the police launched into a violent assault in which he attempted to steal the police officer's firearm.
Therefore the killing was found to be entirely lawful and no charges were filed. This is something that should have been obvious on day one of the investigation.
Despite this the Democrats continued to rally behind their street army.
In March of 2015 a Department of Justice (DoJ) report found no evidence of wrongdoing in the Ferguson police department. Having falsely accused the police for six months the then Attorney General Eric Holder was forced to resign over his conduct
However this did not stop his replacement Loretta Lynch using the apparatus of state along with the threat of violence from the street army to force Ferguson police to no longer prosecute black offenders. I understand this legal action is still to be brought before the Supreme Court where the Obama administration does not exactly have a strong record.
Obviously the Black Lives Matter movement's "unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives" means that every gathering, every speech, every social media posting and every riot by the group is an act of domestic terrorism against the US.
However there have been a number of murders and attempted murders tied to the group.
On March 12th 2015 (12/3/15) members of Black Lives Matter gathered outside Ferguson police HQ the same way they had done every night since August 2014. As they had also done every night since August 2014 members Missouri State Police formed a cordon to stop Black Lives Matter attacking the building.
On this particular night members of Black Lives Matter opened fire on the police. They succeeded in hitting two officer in the head/neck seriously wounding them.
In response to this Black Lives Matter and much of the US news media went full tin foil hat brigade. They immediately claimed that the shootings had been the work of some shadowy government agency conducting a "False Flag Operation" to discredit the group.
I particularly remember the CNN reporter Don Lemon claiming that is was impossible for a 9mm handgun which is certified for use at 250 yards/metres to hit a target at a mere 100 yards. He went on to speculate whether some type of 9mm weapon had been created in some sort of secret lab specifically to carry out the shootings.
So Don Lemon didn't actually accuse the CIA of carrying out the shooting live on national TV. However he strongly implied it.
It was after two days of this type of reporting that another CNN reporter was dragged - almost literally by his ear - to a local firing range. There he was quickly taught how to hit a target at 100 yards with a 9mm handgun.
Then of course there was the Black Lives Matter rally in Washington D.C on December 14th 2014 (14/12/14). Here movement leader Al Sharpton called for a "Diversity of Tactics" in the groups fight against the police.
Seven days later on December 20th 2014 (20/12/14) a member of Black Lives Matter - Ismaaiyl Abdullah Brinsley - ambushed two New York City police officers, shooting and killing them as they sat in their patrol car in Brooklyn.
Despite these two clear terror attacks the Obama administration continued to refuse to designate Black Lives Matter as a domestic terror group and prosecute their members/leaders accordingly.
On June 17th 2015 (17/6/15) a member of the public became frustrated at the US governments failure to protect its citizens from the terrorist threat of Black Lives Matter. So he took matters into his own hands killing 9 members of the group at a planning meeting in Charleston, South Carolina.
Across the globe people who run their own police departments and criminal justice systems looked at events in Charleston and concluded that the neutralisation of 9 terrorists as they planned future attacks could not be considered a criminal act. As such they pleaded with Obama to disband his Black Lives Matter terror group.
I am still not sure about how much detail I want to go into about the extent of these warnings.
However the UK seemed to lead the line with the murder of Sarandev Singh Bhambra in Mold, Wales on January 14th 2015 (14/1/15). This was linked to the neo-Nazi "Britain First" street army which is extremely similar in nature to the US Black Lives Matter group. This of course was further referenced in the lawful killing of UK MP Jo Cox on June 16th 2016 (16/6/16). A day before the anniversary of the neutralisation of the Charleston cell.
Although I don't really have time to go back through my notes to list every example events in Charleston triggered a cacophony of developed nations just laughing in Obama's face and pleading with him to stop.
The October 2nd 2015 (2/10/15) plea from Sydney, Australia particularly sticks with me. After all it's come to something when even Australia are telling you to grow up and develop a culture. Do I need to reiterate the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest?
At this point so many developed nations have pleaded with Obama to see sense before he drags the US into civil war and turns it into some sort of third world banana republic the phrase; "We told you so" has lost all meaning. Even the 2016 Superbowl pleaded with Obama and Beyonce to abandon the (Huey) Newton Black Panthers civil war nonsense and return to mainstream society.
Unfortunately Obama and the Democrats are either too evil or just too damn stupid to listen to reason.
As such they seem to have made the conviction at all costs of the Charleston accused a core plank of their 2016 campaign. This of course eliminates any possibility of a fair trial making an acquittal a legal certainty.
Obviously Black Lives Matter have still not been designated a domestic terror group. That is because the Democrats need their street army for the 2016 Presidential campaign. Their mission now is to silence any opposition to the Democrat Party and Hillary Clinton.
Citing just one example of many on April 15 2016 (15/4/16) Black Lives Matter were sent to prevent presumptive Republican Party nominee Donald Trump holding a campaign rally in Brooklyn, New York.
Fast forwarding to this Tuesday (5/7/16) the FBI released the results of its investigation into Hillary Clinton. As I said at the time this was completely devastating.
With it having been found that Hillary Clinton had violated the 1917 Espionage Act on 110 occasions she will never hold a US government job ever again. Particularly not the office of President.
At around 22:10 on 8/7/16 (UK date) I will pick this up later. Possibly tomorrow.
Edited at around 23:35 on 8/7/16 (UK date) to add;
And with that suddenly the street army received fresh marching orders.
This began on Tuesday (5/7/16) with the release of a video showing the death of a black man - Alton Sterling - in Baton Rogue, Louisiana.
Although it is not shown in the video or apparently any of the subsequent media coverage the incident began with a call to the police that a man very closely matching Alton Sterling's description had been threatening members of the public with a gun.
As part of their duty to protect black lives the police responded to this call. However based on what happened next I can see why they won't bother in the future.
Arriving on the scene the police identified Alton Sterling as the man most likely to have been threatening passers-by with a gun.
Therefore to protect the public and themselves they moved to handcuff and search Sterling in order to begin their investigation and establish whether a crime had been committed.
However as with Michael Brown in Ferguson Alton Sterling very much objected to this lawful and reasonable request by the officers. Instead he launched into a violent assault on the officers.
In the course of this assault it became obvious to officers that Sterling was in possession of a lethal weapon. Therefore they were obligated by law to use lethal force to prevent Sterling from using that weapon against either themselves of members of the wider public.
Some people are trying to argue that the officers should have waited until Sterling had drawn his gun and fired it at them. These are people who've clearly never been punched full in the head in the course of a knock down, drag out brawl.
Having dealt with numerous violent offenders over a great many years however the law is quite clear on this point. Given the precedent of Graham V Connor (1989) examples of defence of self/other under common law do not come clearer than this case. Even CNN were forced to admit this.
However like I said that was the day that Hillary Clinton's political career ended.
So rather than just informing the public the then Attorney General Loretta Lynch abused her position by opening a baseless Federal civil rights investigation in a clear attempt to incite the street army.
Then on Wednesday (6/7/16) we had the shooting of Philando Castile in St Paul, Minnesota during a traffic stop. This is a much more curious incident.
Castile had a permit to carry a concealed weapon and was in possession of that firearm.
As part of his training for that weapons permit Castile would have been instructed that during such a traffic stop he should place his hands on the dashboard, calmly inform the police officer that he is carrying a concealed weapon and await further instructions from the officer.
Before being granted that permit Castile would have had to sign a legal declaration that he understood and would follow that procedure.
However this is not what Castile chose to do.
Instead Castile chose to repeatedly shout; "I've got a gun" while reaching into his pockets. He was repeatedly told to stop doing that by the officer.
However Castile refused and continued. Under law this obligated the police officer to take action to protect himself and the wider public.
Despite the repeated provocations the officer still declined to use lethal force against Castile. Instead he chose to shoot him in the arm which would not normally be a life threatening injury.
What caused Castile to bleed out and die though was his girlfriend Diamond Reynolds.
She decided to obstruct the provision of life saving aid to Castile by refusing to comply with the officer's instructions and bizarrely broadcast the incident live on Facebook via a cellphone should have used to call an ambulance.
As a few people have mentioned Ms Reynolds actions seem remarkable similar to the radical Islamist terror attack that occurred on June 13th (13/6/16) in Magananville, France.
Here Larossi Abballa murdered two police officers and during the ensuring stand-off broadcast his actions live on Facebook calling for others to carry out attacks against police officers.
The death of Philando Castile of course occurred against a backdrop of Black Lives Matter protests following the Alton Sterling case in which leaders were calling for people to "Give their lives for the cause."
Minnesota is of course well known as the main source in the US for radical Islamist recruits for ISIL and associated groups.
The US has been repeatedly warned about the overlap between the vile quasi-Islamic hate group "The Nation of Islam" and the vile quasi-Islamic hate group "ISIL." Particularly around the recent funeral of Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali.
Curiously Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department have shown no interest in launching a Federal investigation into the Castile case.
Thursday (7/7/16) of course saw FBI Director James Comey appear before the US Congress to explain his decision not to criminally prosecute Hillary Clinton for 110 acts of Espionage against the US.
The only explanation he could offer was that he didn't want to.
At that point lawyers across the globe fell about laughing.
The Democrats of course were extremely angry that Comey's moral cowardice in failing to prosecute Hillary Clinton was being exposed to potential US voters.
Obviously I don't have time to check the transcript and quote every Democrat's comments word for word. However I think the general tone can be summed up by;
"HOW DARE THE RACISTS REPUBLICANS DEMAND THE LAW IS UPHELD WHEN INNOCENT BLACK MEN ARE BEING ASSASSINATED BY THE RACIST KU KLUX KLAN BROTHERS IN THE POLICE EVERY DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
That afternoon Barack Obama himself decided to participate in this culture of incitement. He issued a Facebook statement which subtly but clearly stated that the Hillary Clinton campaign has a serious problem and called Black Lives Matter to the streets.
Later in the day Obama intended to issue a further incitement to violence in a televised address to the nation. However words were had. So although Obama took some of the aggression from his address he failed to retract his Facebook call to arms and continued to refuse to disavow Black Lives Matter.
Answering Obama's call Black Lives Matter did indeed take to the streets that night. This led to violent disorder in Los Angeles, California, New York City, New York, Washington D.C and of course Minnesota.
However the most violent incident of the night occurred in Dallas, Texas. Here at least one gunman affiliated to Black Lives Matter opened fire on police officers murdering five and wounding seven others.
This should come as a surprise to absolutely no-one.
After all if you'd been following my Twitter feed that night you would know that the atmosphere in the US had become some poisonous and so filled incitements to violence I actually opted to follow the Euro 2016 match between France and Germany for a break.
Despite the rampant hooliganism and the ever present threat of radical Islamist terrorism it still somehow managed to be more chilled out then US politics.
There is clear evidence that the Dallas terrorist had acted on behalf of Black Lives Matter in a intentional; "unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives"
However Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department are still refusing to designate it or Black Lives Matter as domestic terrorism and take appropriate action.
Instead Lynch decided to declare her support for Black Lives Matter and imply that they will be protected by her office during any future attacks.
This has had the effect of declaring open war against police officers in the US.
Already today we have seen police officers attacked in similar ambushes in Ballwin, Missouri, Valdosta, Georgia and Bristol, Tennessee.
Despite his haste to address the nation last night we are still waiting for Barack Obama to address these four terrorist attacks on US soil.
00:45 on 9/7/16 (UK date).
With the ethnic cleansing of the town of Sinjar/Shingal in Iraq the genocidal hatred of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) had become so clear that the world was no longer able to turn its back. Under immense public pressure Obama had been forced to deploy US aircraft to bring an end to these crimes against humanity.
Having spent the previous three years creating and supporting ISIL and their associates Obama was really not happy about being forced to fight them and was in desperate need of a distraction.
Also the Democrats really, really wanted to seize control of both house of the US Congress in the November 2014 mid-term elections.
So the Democrats responded to this pressure by making up a story of an innocent young black man named Michael Brown who had been murdered by a police officer as he had his hands up in surrender in the town of Ferguson, Missouri.
On the back of this lie the Democrats formed a street army marching under the banner of "Black Lives Matter."
The purpose of this group was to use violence and the threat of violence to impose on America the notion that black people should not be punished when they choose to break the law.
In Ferguson Black Lives Matter immediately went to work unleashing a full year of rioting that lasted from August 9th 2014 (9/8/14) until August 11th 2015 (11/8/15).
Ultimately though in Ferguson they failed.
In response to the violence the police officer in question was called before a Grand Jury.
Here they heard the truth that Micheal Brown had committed a robbery at a local convenience store and when challenged by the police launched into a violent assault in which he attempted to steal the police officer's firearm.
Therefore the killing was found to be entirely lawful and no charges were filed. This is something that should have been obvious on day one of the investigation.
Despite this the Democrats continued to rally behind their street army.
In March of 2015 a Department of Justice (DoJ) report found no evidence of wrongdoing in the Ferguson police department. Having falsely accused the police for six months the then Attorney General Eric Holder was forced to resign over his conduct
However this did not stop his replacement Loretta Lynch using the apparatus of state along with the threat of violence from the street army to force Ferguson police to no longer prosecute black offenders. I understand this legal action is still to be brought before the Supreme Court where the Obama administration does not exactly have a strong record.
Obviously the Black Lives Matter movement's "unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives" means that every gathering, every speech, every social media posting and every riot by the group is an act of domestic terrorism against the US.
However there have been a number of murders and attempted murders tied to the group.
On March 12th 2015 (12/3/15) members of Black Lives Matter gathered outside Ferguson police HQ the same way they had done every night since August 2014. As they had also done every night since August 2014 members Missouri State Police formed a cordon to stop Black Lives Matter attacking the building.
On this particular night members of Black Lives Matter opened fire on the police. They succeeded in hitting two officer in the head/neck seriously wounding them.
In response to this Black Lives Matter and much of the US news media went full tin foil hat brigade. They immediately claimed that the shootings had been the work of some shadowy government agency conducting a "False Flag Operation" to discredit the group.
I particularly remember the CNN reporter Don Lemon claiming that is was impossible for a 9mm handgun which is certified for use at 250 yards/metres to hit a target at a mere 100 yards. He went on to speculate whether some type of 9mm weapon had been created in some sort of secret lab specifically to carry out the shootings.
So Don Lemon didn't actually accuse the CIA of carrying out the shooting live on national TV. However he strongly implied it.
It was after two days of this type of reporting that another CNN reporter was dragged - almost literally by his ear - to a local firing range. There he was quickly taught how to hit a target at 100 yards with a 9mm handgun.
Then of course there was the Black Lives Matter rally in Washington D.C on December 14th 2014 (14/12/14). Here movement leader Al Sharpton called for a "Diversity of Tactics" in the groups fight against the police.
Seven days later on December 20th 2014 (20/12/14) a member of Black Lives Matter - Ismaaiyl Abdullah Brinsley - ambushed two New York City police officers, shooting and killing them as they sat in their patrol car in Brooklyn.
Despite these two clear terror attacks the Obama administration continued to refuse to designate Black Lives Matter as a domestic terror group and prosecute their members/leaders accordingly.
On June 17th 2015 (17/6/15) a member of the public became frustrated at the US governments failure to protect its citizens from the terrorist threat of Black Lives Matter. So he took matters into his own hands killing 9 members of the group at a planning meeting in Charleston, South Carolina.
Across the globe people who run their own police departments and criminal justice systems looked at events in Charleston and concluded that the neutralisation of 9 terrorists as they planned future attacks could not be considered a criminal act. As such they pleaded with Obama to disband his Black Lives Matter terror group.
I am still not sure about how much detail I want to go into about the extent of these warnings.
However the UK seemed to lead the line with the murder of Sarandev Singh Bhambra in Mold, Wales on January 14th 2015 (14/1/15). This was linked to the neo-Nazi "Britain First" street army which is extremely similar in nature to the US Black Lives Matter group. This of course was further referenced in the lawful killing of UK MP Jo Cox on June 16th 2016 (16/6/16). A day before the anniversary of the neutralisation of the Charleston cell.
Although I don't really have time to go back through my notes to list every example events in Charleston triggered a cacophony of developed nations just laughing in Obama's face and pleading with him to stop.
The October 2nd 2015 (2/10/15) plea from Sydney, Australia particularly sticks with me. After all it's come to something when even Australia are telling you to grow up and develop a culture. Do I need to reiterate the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest?
At this point so many developed nations have pleaded with Obama to see sense before he drags the US into civil war and turns it into some sort of third world banana republic the phrase; "We told you so" has lost all meaning. Even the 2016 Superbowl pleaded with Obama and Beyonce to abandon the (Huey) Newton Black Panthers civil war nonsense and return to mainstream society.
Unfortunately Obama and the Democrats are either too evil or just too damn stupid to listen to reason.
As such they seem to have made the conviction at all costs of the Charleston accused a core plank of their 2016 campaign. This of course eliminates any possibility of a fair trial making an acquittal a legal certainty.
Obviously Black Lives Matter have still not been designated a domestic terror group. That is because the Democrats need their street army for the 2016 Presidential campaign. Their mission now is to silence any opposition to the Democrat Party and Hillary Clinton.
Citing just one example of many on April 15 2016 (15/4/16) Black Lives Matter were sent to prevent presumptive Republican Party nominee Donald Trump holding a campaign rally in Brooklyn, New York.
Fast forwarding to this Tuesday (5/7/16) the FBI released the results of its investigation into Hillary Clinton. As I said at the time this was completely devastating.
With it having been found that Hillary Clinton had violated the 1917 Espionage Act on 110 occasions she will never hold a US government job ever again. Particularly not the office of President.
At around 22:10 on 8/7/16 (UK date) I will pick this up later. Possibly tomorrow.
Edited at around 23:35 on 8/7/16 (UK date) to add;
And with that suddenly the street army received fresh marching orders.
This began on Tuesday (5/7/16) with the release of a video showing the death of a black man - Alton Sterling - in Baton Rogue, Louisiana.
Although it is not shown in the video or apparently any of the subsequent media coverage the incident began with a call to the police that a man very closely matching Alton Sterling's description had been threatening members of the public with a gun.
As part of their duty to protect black lives the police responded to this call. However based on what happened next I can see why they won't bother in the future.
Arriving on the scene the police identified Alton Sterling as the man most likely to have been threatening passers-by with a gun.
Therefore to protect the public and themselves they moved to handcuff and search Sterling in order to begin their investigation and establish whether a crime had been committed.
However as with Michael Brown in Ferguson Alton Sterling very much objected to this lawful and reasonable request by the officers. Instead he launched into a violent assault on the officers.
In the course of this assault it became obvious to officers that Sterling was in possession of a lethal weapon. Therefore they were obligated by law to use lethal force to prevent Sterling from using that weapon against either themselves of members of the wider public.
Some people are trying to argue that the officers should have waited until Sterling had drawn his gun and fired it at them. These are people who've clearly never been punched full in the head in the course of a knock down, drag out brawl.
Having dealt with numerous violent offenders over a great many years however the law is quite clear on this point. Given the precedent of Graham V Connor (1989) examples of defence of self/other under common law do not come clearer than this case. Even CNN were forced to admit this.
However like I said that was the day that Hillary Clinton's political career ended.
So rather than just informing the public the then Attorney General Loretta Lynch abused her position by opening a baseless Federal civil rights investigation in a clear attempt to incite the street army.
Then on Wednesday (6/7/16) we had the shooting of Philando Castile in St Paul, Minnesota during a traffic stop. This is a much more curious incident.
Castile had a permit to carry a concealed weapon and was in possession of that firearm.
As part of his training for that weapons permit Castile would have been instructed that during such a traffic stop he should place his hands on the dashboard, calmly inform the police officer that he is carrying a concealed weapon and await further instructions from the officer.
Before being granted that permit Castile would have had to sign a legal declaration that he understood and would follow that procedure.
However this is not what Castile chose to do.
Instead Castile chose to repeatedly shout; "I've got a gun" while reaching into his pockets. He was repeatedly told to stop doing that by the officer.
However Castile refused and continued. Under law this obligated the police officer to take action to protect himself and the wider public.
Despite the repeated provocations the officer still declined to use lethal force against Castile. Instead he chose to shoot him in the arm which would not normally be a life threatening injury.
What caused Castile to bleed out and die though was his girlfriend Diamond Reynolds.
She decided to obstruct the provision of life saving aid to Castile by refusing to comply with the officer's instructions and bizarrely broadcast the incident live on Facebook via a cellphone should have used to call an ambulance.
As a few people have mentioned Ms Reynolds actions seem remarkable similar to the radical Islamist terror attack that occurred on June 13th (13/6/16) in Magananville, France.
Here Larossi Abballa murdered two police officers and during the ensuring stand-off broadcast his actions live on Facebook calling for others to carry out attacks against police officers.
The death of Philando Castile of course occurred against a backdrop of Black Lives Matter protests following the Alton Sterling case in which leaders were calling for people to "Give their lives for the cause."
Minnesota is of course well known as the main source in the US for radical Islamist recruits for ISIL and associated groups.
The US has been repeatedly warned about the overlap between the vile quasi-Islamic hate group "The Nation of Islam" and the vile quasi-Islamic hate group "ISIL." Particularly around the recent funeral of Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali.
Curiously Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department have shown no interest in launching a Federal investigation into the Castile case.
Thursday (7/7/16) of course saw FBI Director James Comey appear before the US Congress to explain his decision not to criminally prosecute Hillary Clinton for 110 acts of Espionage against the US.
The only explanation he could offer was that he didn't want to.
At that point lawyers across the globe fell about laughing.
The Democrats of course were extremely angry that Comey's moral cowardice in failing to prosecute Hillary Clinton was being exposed to potential US voters.
Obviously I don't have time to check the transcript and quote every Democrat's comments word for word. However I think the general tone can be summed up by;
"HOW DARE THE RACISTS REPUBLICANS DEMAND THE LAW IS UPHELD WHEN INNOCENT BLACK MEN ARE BEING ASSASSINATED BY THE RACIST KU KLUX KLAN BROTHERS IN THE POLICE EVERY DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
That afternoon Barack Obama himself decided to participate in this culture of incitement. He issued a Facebook statement which subtly but clearly stated that the Hillary Clinton campaign has a serious problem and called Black Lives Matter to the streets.
Later in the day Obama intended to issue a further incitement to violence in a televised address to the nation. However words were had. So although Obama took some of the aggression from his address he failed to retract his Facebook call to arms and continued to refuse to disavow Black Lives Matter.
Answering Obama's call Black Lives Matter did indeed take to the streets that night. This led to violent disorder in Los Angeles, California, New York City, New York, Washington D.C and of course Minnesota.
However the most violent incident of the night occurred in Dallas, Texas. Here at least one gunman affiliated to Black Lives Matter opened fire on police officers murdering five and wounding seven others.
This should come as a surprise to absolutely no-one.
After all if you'd been following my Twitter feed that night you would know that the atmosphere in the US had become some poisonous and so filled incitements to violence I actually opted to follow the Euro 2016 match between France and Germany for a break.
Despite the rampant hooliganism and the ever present threat of radical Islamist terrorism it still somehow managed to be more chilled out then US politics.
There is clear evidence that the Dallas terrorist had acted on behalf of Black Lives Matter in a intentional; "unlawful use of force and violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives"
However Loretta Lynch and the Justice Department are still refusing to designate it or Black Lives Matter as domestic terrorism and take appropriate action.
Instead Lynch decided to declare her support for Black Lives Matter and imply that they will be protected by her office during any future attacks.
This has had the effect of declaring open war against police officers in the US.
Already today we have seen police officers attacked in similar ambushes in Ballwin, Missouri, Valdosta, Georgia and Bristol, Tennessee.
Despite his haste to address the nation last night we are still waiting for Barack Obama to address these four terrorist attacks on US soil.
00:45 on 9/7/16 (UK date).
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