Obama hands the baton over to Putin's Russia

This headline from the NY Post just about says it all

Obama has turned Putin into the world’s most powerful leader

Putin to U.N.: America Is Destroying the World, and Only We Can Stop It

Putin Wins: US Suspends Syrian Rebel Training Program

21^st Century Newswire,

29 September, 2015

Game over.

Watch a video of this report here:

Just hours after the incredible speech delivered by Russian President Putin at the United Nations General Assembly, the US has quietly announced that it will be suspending its program of training allegedly ‘moderate’ rebels in Syria to fight against the Assad regime.
Colonel Steve Warren told Foreign Policy that US forces were now looking to ‘re-evaluate’ their efforts, which the news outlet calls a ‘humiliating setback‘.

While the US will continue to support those rebels it has already trained and deployed, it will no longer deploy new fighters.

Russia called the US move of arming and training rebels in Syria ‘social engineering‘, with Putin being the only world leader to publicly take a stand against Western actions.
Things are looking up for the Syrian army. (Photo Credit: Elizabeth Arrott)

Yesterday, Putin called for the West to respect the ‘valiant’ efforts of Assad’s government and the Syrian army in their fight against terrorism. Therefore, this move can easily be understood as the single biggest development in the on-going crisis in Syria, as it removes support from forces seeking to destroy Assad – a clear victory for Putin.

This cessation of support for forces fighting against Assad will strengthen the Syrian fight against ISIS. Perhaps, if that support was instead used in coalition with Russia’s own efforts in the region, ISIS would be gone in almost no time at all.

America’s ‘Train Wreck’ Middle East Policy Is Now Exposed As Total Fraud

21^st Century Newswire,

29 September, 2015

21st Century Wire says…
As 21WIRE reported yesterday, Russian president Vladimir Putin’s opening gambit at the UN General Assembly in New York City has sent shock waves through the geopolitical fault lines.In his speech at UNGA 2015, President Putin completely exposed the hypocrisy and willful deception of western actions in Syria. He decried the continued export of so-called ‘democratic’ color revolutions and when referring to the Middle East he asked, “how did that turn out?“

From drones to regime change, the world is now seeing what an utter failure every aspect of US foreign policy has been in the Middle East over the last 25 years.
Australian MP and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Julie Bishop, normally an obedient robot when it comes to following the orders of the Anglo-American Empire, has suddenly stumbled upon a patch of common sense on Middle East policy. 

Needless to say, this did not go over very well with Washington DC’s finest…

Julie Bishop’s Epiphany on the Road to Damascus

Sean Stinson
The Aim Network

It comes as welcome news that Australia is set to abandon its opposition to Bashar al-Assad as part of a durable peace settlement in Syria.

The recent military escalation by Russia and reported sightings of Chinese war ships in the Mediterranean in the last week must come as something of an embarrassment to the war hawks in Washington, and the knives may well be out for whichever rookie secretary forgot to register the war on terror as a trademark. Still this has done little to change the tri-partisan rhetoric coming out of Canberra.“I don’t for a moment shy away from the comments that we have made in the past about the illegitimacy of the regime.”
“President Assad unleashed chemical weapons on his own people, and the death and destruction in Syria is appalling and at unprecedented levels,” Ms. Bishop recently said in an address to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

In hearing these remarks I can’t help be reminded of the outrageous claims and bald faced lies which led us into war in Iraq in 2003. Whatever happened to all those weapons of mass destruction which Saddam was stockpiling? Was he able to secretly shield them from UN weapons inspectors with an invisibility cloak? Perhaps the same cloak that Dr Assad is using to hide his chemical weapons arsenal? Or the one that Iran is evidently using to conceal its uranium enrichment program?

Not to put too fine a point on it, but when the executive director of Human Rights Watch is leading the cheer for the removal of the legitimate government of a sovereign nation state which currently enjoys the support of 80% of its people, one might wonder if we are being told the whole truth.

Having taken part what now seems like an age ago in the rallies against the 2003 invasion of Iraq – the biggest protests Australia has seen since the Vietnam War, I’m more than a little miffed at the lack of public outrage at Australia’s compliance in 2015. Perhaps the media is doing a better job of selling its lies and deception this time around, but so far I remain unconvinced. I am tired of the blatant propaganda surrounding this illegal war. I’m tired of the persistent references to “civil war” in a country which is clearly being attacked by outside forces. I’m tired of hearing the government of Syria constantly referred to as “the Assad regime”, and carnal knowledge of dead animals aside, I’m well tired of David Cameron referring to Bashar al-Assad as a butcher.

So far as Washington’s support for terrorists is concerned, there’s no putting the cat back in the bag. I have argued this extensively in other essays, but it doesn’t take a political analyst to see that Obama, Netanyahu, Ergdogan, Salman and Abdullah before him have been working hand in glove with various terror groups to destabilize and ultimately remove the Syrian government for their own nefarious ends. Washington’s war hawks have bypassed congressional appropriations by directing their client state Saudi Arabia to deploy radical anti-Syrian (and often anti-US) militants against Assad, unleashing a wave of terror on the region. Playing both sides against the middle may have some merit in games of strategy, but willingly supporting terrorists who commit atrocities against civilians by any other name is still a war crime.

CONFUSED: President Obama now a victim of his own twisted official narrative on Syria.

Of course there are many players in this proxy war, each with their own interests: Obviously there’s the US and its allies, who in their relentless quest for world domination just can’t seem to keep their grubby hands out of other people’s business. In their latest adventure, United States Secretary of State John Kerry and the late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia in collusion with Wall Street insiders had contrived to control the entire region’s oil and gas reserves and to weaken Russia and Iran by selling cheap oil to China.

There’s Russia, whose soft underbelly comprises almost every country ending in ‘stan’ from which Islamist extremists might enter its borders. Already feeling the squeeze of tough trade sanctions since the shooting down of MH17, this manipulation of the oil market, despite weakening its economy, will likely strengthen its resolve.

There’s Israel, a newly created, US backed, militarised rogue state whose original British colonial design includes not just the annexation of both the West Bank and Gaza but of all the land from the Nile to the Euphrates including parts of Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, the Sinai, Iraq and Saudi Arabia. (The plan for Greater Israel involves the Balkanization of surrounding Arab states, beginning with Iraq, which is to be divided into Shia and Sunni territories and a separate Kurdish state.)

There’s China, an emerging superpower now lumbered with a stalling economy and forced to choose between a ready supply of cheap oil and the prospect of the war in Syria spilling into Iran, Southern Russia and eventually breaching its own western borders.

There’s Germany, which seems to have embraced the prospect of close to a million new low paid workers with the same enthusiasm with which it welcomed the surge of cheap skilled labour at the close of the Soviet era (an attitude perfectly consistent with EU ambitions to enforce human misery through austerity.)

And then there are the endless hordes now beating a path to Europe in what’s been called the biggest mass movement of refugees since WWII. It’s not just the Alawites, Yazidis and other religious and ethnic minorities once protected under Syria’s Ba’athist government who now face a grim future, but the entire Syrian population, of whom more than half are now internally displaced or have fled in fear for their lives. Pray tell what conceivable form of ‘regime change’ would ever allow these people to return to their homes?

Syria was and is the last secular nation state in the Middle East, and as has been argued by many, not least President Putin himself, it is for the people of Syria and nobody else to decide who will govern them. Russia is now working in concert with Iran, Hezbollah and other regional partners to end the horror brought to bear by Washington’s incessant meddling, and while Obama still condemns Russia’s strategy as “doomed to failure” and continues to demand Assad’s ultimate resignation, this outcome is looking increasingly less likely.

While China’s last minute arrival is obviously a game changer, it’s not like the US were never invited to the party. Putin’s attempts to forge an alliance of nations to deal with the growing threat of global terror have never specifically excluded US participation, but with the US demonstrably the world’s greatest sponsor of terrorism, it does make things a little awkward. As well as Iran, Iraq, Hezbollah and the Syrian Arab Army, the new coalition looks likely to include all members of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO); Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kirghizstan, and Tajikistan. This poses an obvious question right off the bat. Is Washington really afraid that Russia’s intervention will make matters worse in Syria? Or rather that putting an end to ISIS once and for all might render the US irrelevant?

What emerges from this picture is a strong sense that Washington’s war hawks are losing, or have lost, their grip over Middle East politics. The Iranian moderates who are inclined to cooperate with the West for economic reasons are naturally allied to Russia where the Syrian ISIS threat is concerned; the Gulf monarchies seem only too happy for Russia to broker a peace between warring Shi’ite and Sunni factions, and with Russia now flexing its military muscle, Netanyahu is hardly likely to be spoiling for a fight either.

Whether or not any of this could lead to a lasting peace in the Middle East it’s too early to say, and with the likes of Carly Fiorina now set to trump Trump for the GOP candidacy, and Hilary Clinton still a likely choice for the Democrats, Washington’s campaign for global hegemony is unlikely to end any time soon. It does however seem that we may have reached a turning point. Could the battle for Syria prove a victory for peace and diplomacy in an increasingly multi-polar world? Or is this how WWIII begins?

Obama Goes Potty at UN

Obama's Gutless fantasy ridden diatribe humiliates Americans while Putin "tells it as it is"

Washington Never Joins a Coalition That It Cannot Control

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s message at the UN General Assembly was stark; either sovereign states get together in a broad coalition against all forms of terror, and the principle of statehood is respected as enshrined in the UN charter - or there will be chaos.

By Pepe Escobar

Information Clearing House,

29 September, 2015

This UN General Assembly revealed that the Obama administration's perpetual newspeak does not cut it anymore. A review of UN speeches by both Putin and Obama is almost painful to watch. Putin acted like a serious global statesman. Obama acted like a poseur flunking a screen test.

Putin's key talking points could not but be easily accessible to the Global South — his prime audience, much more than the industrialized West.

1) The export of color — or monochromatic — revolutions is doomed.

2) The alternative to the primacy of statehood is chaos. This implies that the Assad system in Syria may be immensely problematic, but it's the only game in town. The alternative is ISIS/ISIL/Daesh barbarism. There's no credible "moderate opposition" — as there was not in NATO-"liberated" Libya.

3) Only the UN — as flawed as it may be — is a guarantor of peace and security in our imperfect, realpolitik geopolitical environment.

Gotta slay those myths

Washington believed its own Arab Spring myth in 2011, betting that after Tunis and Cairo, Damascus would fall in a flash.

The Beltway believed its own myth of "moderate rebels" taking power.

The Beltway did not listen to Syrian minorities warning about the danger of an extremist Sunni/Salafi-jihadi take over.

Thus the current Syrian tragedy; the end result of a formidably complex power play, political and religious, Syrian, regional and global.

ISIS/ISIL/Daesh — for all its barbarism — may eventually win a few battles, but it won't control the whole of "Syraq".

To defeat the cancer, there's only one possibility: a real military campaign conducted by a real coalition including the US, Russia, Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia.

Washington though never joins a coalition that it cannot control at will.

Thus a possible road map of what may lie ahead — as debated by Obama and Putin, face to face, for 90 minutes in New York; a two-headed coalition, one led by the US, the other led by Russia, but "coordinating" on the ground.

Still, Moscow will be struggling to form a wide-ranging coalition duly approved by the UN.

The task is immense. "Syraq" will have to be reconstituted.

That implies an Iraq acceptable for all Iraqis — and that's impossible to accomplish without Iran. And a Syria acceptable to all Syrians — and that's impossible without Iran and Russia.

Washington after all would have never been able to accomplish both in the first place. The Empire of Chaos specializes in nation breaking, not nation building.

Gotta slay that dragon

Gorbachev wanted to integrate the USSR in the European family — aiming for a Europe from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Post-Soviet Russia though was not even invited to enter the house. What happened was NATO colonization of the former Soviet space.

Gorbachev dreamed that the West would share peace dividends with Russia. What Russia got instead was a neoliberal shock — and a humiliated society treated as a loser of the Cold War. Exceptionalism prevailed.

Under Putin, Russia tried once again a strategic partnership with the EU. Does anyone remember Sergey Lavrov as late as 2011 swearing that modernization of Russia was ready to go as a pan-European project, just as in the time of Peter the Great?

Yet by 2007, Putin had changed the game, and was ready to openly contest the unipolar "order" — and slowly but surely project Russia back to the geopolitical limelight.

Post-Ukraine, still under sanctions, but armed with a strategic partnership with China, the time for a checkmate is now.

In New York, Putin even proposed the lineaments of a New World Order. The genuine article, not that "vision thing" concocted by Daddy Bush post-collapse of the USSR.

It would be an equitable, fair world order — where state sovereignty is respected, sanctions are meaningless, NATO ceases to expand ad infinitum and exceptionalism does not apply.

The devil will be in the (many) details, of course. For instance, if a coalition to fight ISIS/ISIL/Daesh is forged and blessed by the UN, it will need the — virtually impossible — cohabitation of Sunnis and Shi'ites.

And in the near future, Brussels will have to tame visceral internal antagonism to have the European Union interacting with the Russia-led Eurasia Economic Union (EEU), which by that time will be totally integrated with the China-led New Silk Roads.

What's certain — for the overwhelming majority of the Global South — is that the Empire of Chaos made a mess everywhere, from Northern Africa and Southwest Asia to Russia's western borderlands.

Putin now rides into the hellish mess ready to slay the dragon of chaos — and the machinations of the Empire of Chaos. His sword? The UN. No wonder checkmated neocons, neoliberalcons and "humanitarian" imperialists can barely conceal their apoplexy.

Obama Deifies American Hegemony

Paul Craig Roberts

Sputnik,

29 September, 2015

In his UN General Assembly address, Obama attempted to cover up Washington's massive war crimes, crimes that have killed and displaced millions of peoples in seven countries, with feel good rhetoric about standing up to dictators.

Today is the 70th anniversary of the UN. It is not clear how much good the UN has done. Some UN Blue Hemet peacekeeping operations had limited success. But mainly Washington has used the UN for war, such as the Korean War and Washington's Cold War against the Soviet Union. In our time Washington had UN tanks sent in against Bosnian Serbs during the period that Washington was dismantling Yugoslavia and Serbia and accusing Serbian leaders, who tried to defend the integrity of their country against Washington's aggression, of "war crimes."

The UN supported Washington's sanctions against Iraq that resulted in the deaths of 500,000 Iraqi children. When asked about it, Clinton's Secretary of State said, with typical American heartlessness, that the deaths of the children were worth it. In 2006 the UN voted sanctions against Iran for exercising its right as a signatory of the non-proliferation treaty to develop atomic energy. Washington claimed without any evidence that Iran was building a nuclear weapon in violation of the non-proliferation treaty, and this lie was accepted by the UN. Washington's false claim was repudiated by all 16 US intelligence agencies and by the International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors on the ground in Iran, but in the face of the factual evidence the US government and its presstitute media pressed the claim to the point that Russia had to intervene and take the matter out of Washington's warmonger hands. Russia's intervention to prevent US military attacks on Iran and Syria resulted in the demonization of Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin. "Facts?!, Washington don't need no stinkin' facts! We got power!" Today at the UN Obama asserted America's over-riding power many times: the strongest military in the world, the strongest economy in the world.

The UN has done nothing to stop Washington's invasions and bombings, illegal under international law, of seven countries or Obama's overthrow by coup of democratic governments in Honduras and Ukraine, with more in the works.

The UN does provide a forum for countries and populations within countries that are suffering oppression to post complaints-except, of course, for the Palestinians, who, despite the boundaries shown on maps and centuries of habitation by Palestinians, are not even recognized by the UN as a state.

On this 70th anniversary of the UN, I have spent much of the day listening to the various speeches. The most truthful ones were delivered by the presidents of Russia and Iran. The presidents of Russia and Iran refused to accept the Washington-serving reality or Matrix that Obama sought to impose on the world with his speech. Both presidents forcefully challenged the false reality that the propagandistic Western media and its government masters seek to create in order to continue to exercise their hegemony over everyone else.

What about China? China's president left the fireworks to Putin, but set the stage for Putin by rejecting US claims of hegemony: "The future of the world must be shaped by all countries." China's president spoke in veiled terms against Western neoliberal economics and declared that "China's vote in the UN will always belong to the developing countries."

In the masterly way of Chinese diplomacy, the President of China spoke in a non-threatening, non-provocative way. His criticisms of the West were indirect. He gave a short speech and was much applauded.

Obama followed second to the President of Brazil, who used her opportunity for PR for Brazil, at least for the most part. Obama gave us the traditional Washington spiel:

The US has worked to prevent a third world war, to promote democracy by overthrowing governments with violence, to respect the dignity and equal worth of all peoples except for the Russians in Ukraine and Muslims in Somalia, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan.

Obama declared Washington's purpose to "prevent bigger countries from imposing their will on smaller ones." Imposing its will is what Washington has been doing throughout its history and especially under Obama's regime.

All those refugees overrunning Europe? Washington has nothing to do with it. The refugees are the fault of Assad who drops bombs on people.

When Assad drops bombs it oppresses people, but when Washington drops bombs it liberates them. Obama justified Washington's violence as liberation from "dictators," such as Assad in Syria, who garnered 80% of the vote in the last election, a vote of confidence that Obama never received and never will.

Obama said that it wasn't Washington that violated Ukraine's sovereignty with a coup that overthrew a democratically elected government. It was Russia, whose president invaded Ukraine and annexed Crimera and is trying to annex the other breakaway republics, Russian populations who object to the Russophobia of Washington's puppet government in Ukraine.

Obama said with a straight face that sending 60 percent of the US fleet to bottle up China in the South China Sea was not an act of American aggression but the protection of the free flow of commerce. Obama implied that China was a threat to the free flow of commerce, but, of course, Washington's real concern is that China is expanding its influence by expanding the free flow of commerce.

Obama denied that the US and Israel employ violence. This is what Russia and Syria do, asserted Obama with no evidence. Obama said that he had Libya attacked in order to "prevent a massacre," but, of course, the NATO attack on Libya perpetrated a massacre, an ongoing one. But it was all Gaddafi's fault. He was going to massacre his own people, so Washington did it for him.

Obama justified all of Washington's violence against millions of peoples on the grounds that Washington is well-meaning and saving the world from dictators. Obama attempted to cover up Washington's massive war crimes, crimes that have killed and displaced millions of peoples in seven countries, with feel good rhetoric about standing up to dictators.

Did the UN General Assembly buy it? Probably the only one present sufficiently stupid to buy it was the UK's Cameron. The rest of Washington's vassals went through the motion of supporting Obama's propaganda, but there was no conviction in their voices.

Vladimir Putin would have none of it. He said that the UN works, if it works, by compromise and not by he imposition of one country's will, but after the end of the Cold War "a single center of domination arose in the world"-the "exceptional" country. This country, Putin said, seeks its own course which is not one of compromise or attention to the interests of others.

In response to Obama's speech that Russia and its ally Syria wear the black hats, Putin said in reference to Obama's speech that "one should not manipulate words."

Putin said that Washington repeats its mistakes by relying on violence which results in poverty and social destruction. He asked Obama: "Do you realize what you have done?"

Yes, Washington realizes it, but Washington will not admit it.

Putin said that "ambitious America accuses Russia of ambitions" while Washington's ambitions run wild, and that the West cloaks its aggression as fighting terrorism while Washington finances and encourages terrorism.

The President of Iran said that terrorism was created by the US invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and by US support for the Zionist destruction of Palestine.

Obama's speech made clear that Washington accepts no responsibility for the destruction of the lives and prospects of millions of Muslims. The refugees from Washington's wars who are overflowing Europe are the fault of Assad, Obama declared.

Obama's claim to represent "international norms" was an assertion of US hegemony, and was recognized as such by the General Assembly.

What the world is faced with is two rogue anti-democratic governments-the US and Israel-that believe that their "exceptionalism" makes them above the law. International norms mean Washington's and Israel's norms.

Countries that do not comply with international norms are countries that do not comply with Washington and Israel's dictates.

The presidents of Russia, China, and Iran did not accept Washington's definition of "international norms."

The lines are drawn. Unless the American people come to their senses and expel the Washington warmongers, war is our future.

The Russia-Iran-Iraq-Syria Joint “Information Center” against America’s ISIS Foot Soldiers

Russia has taken the initiative in the Middle East. Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria have made an agreement to set a joint information center to coordinate their operations against ISIS. The center will be based in Baghdad.

The main goal of the center will be gathering, processing and analyzing current information about the situation in the Middle East – primarily for fighting IS. The Iraqi army’s joint operations command confirmed the agreement on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the Syrian troops took control of the hills overlooking the Eastern Ghouta region east of Damascus, pushed the Jaish al-Islam terrorist group from there. Positions on the top hills allow to maintain supply routes in the sector.

From Pepe Escobar -

"OK, guys, here's how it works. We'll pull a Donbass in Syria. Daesh will fall into the trap, just like the Ukrainian army did. Our Sukhois will cut off supplies for Daesh in western Syria. We will create multiple cauldrons. And then the Syria Arab Army, the Iraqi militias led by Soleimani and the Iranian advisers will finish the job. Popcorn? "

From Mark Sleboda -

Yes - the New Cold War does have an ideological facet, as well

ex Unipolar Universalism vs Multipolar Particularism

Obama: Everyone believes as we do
Putin: No, we don't.
Obama: Yes, you do.
Putin: No, we REALLY don't.
Obama: You will after we finishing "liberating" you.
Putin: *sigh* ‪#‎HereWeGoAgain‬

Vice News claims: "US senior official: Putin and Obama agree on joint strikes against ISIS"

http://fortruss.blogspot.co.nz/2015/09/us-senior-official-putin-and-obama.html

September 29, 2015 - 

Vasiliy Ablyazimov, PolitNavigator - 

Translated for Fort Russ by J. Arnoldski 

“Putin and Obama agreed on coordinating air strikes against ISIS” - according to Vice News. 

Citing an anonymous source, the American publication Vice News writes that after a 90 minute meeting US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed on coordinating air strikes against ISIS terrorists. 

The publication reads: “After US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin traded barbs during their speeches at the UN General Assembly on Monday, the leaders of the two countries met for 90 minutes behind closed doors inside the deliberation room of the UN Security Council.

The bilateral meeting, which took pace in the company of ministers and advisers, including Secretary of State John Kerry, was perhaps the most exciting and anticipated political event amidst a year of general disagreement. The discussion was largely devoted to the civil war in Syria, where Russia has recently increased its military presence, sending personnel, planes, and automobiles.”

Six Russian Su-34 Fullback bombers have just arrived in Syria

Six Sukhoi Su-34 aircraft have eventually arrived at Latakia to join the Russian contingent already there.

Images allegedly shot around the al-Assad International Airport clearly show one Russian Fullback about to land at the airbase in western Syria where 28 Russian aircraft have arrived last week.