Why the U.S. Military is Woefully Unprepared for a Major Conventional Conflict

9 November 2018 — South Front
Written and produced by SF Team: Brian KalmanDaniel Deiss, Edwin Watson

[This is an extract from much longer document “Why the U.S. Military is Woefully Unprepared for a Major Conventional Conflict“, which was originally released by SouthFront on October 10, 2018 and well worth reading]

Introduction

In the Department of Defense authored summary of the National Defense Strategy of the United States for 2018, Secretary James Mattis quite succinctly sets out the challenges and goals of the U.S. military in the immediate future. Importantly, he acknowledges that the U.S. had become far too focused on counter-insurgency over the past two decades, but he seems to miss the causation of this mission in the first place. U.S. foreign policy, and its reliance on military intervention to solve all perceived problems, regime change and imperialist adventurism, resulted in the need to occupy nations, or destroy them. This leads to the growth of insurgencies, and the strengthening of long simmering religious radicalism and anti-western sentiment in the Middle East and Central Asia. The U.S. military willfully threw itself headlong into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

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N. Ireland: Unquiet Graves (Trailer)

9 November 2018 — Vimeo

Unquiet Graves: The story of the Glenanne Gang details how members of the RUC and UDR, (a British Army regiment) were centrally involved in the murder of over 120 innocent civilians during the recent conflict in Ireland. It will detail how members worked hand in hand with known sectarian murderers in the targeted assassinations of farmers, shopkeepers, publicans and other civilians in a campaign aimed at terrorizing the most vulnerable in society. Now known as the Glenanne Gang, the group of killers rampaged through Counties Tyrone and Armagh and across into the Irish Republic in a campaign that lasted from July 1972 to the end of 1978.
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It’s time to break up capitalism’s love affair with plastic By Amy Leather

9 November 2018 — Climate & Capitalism

A valuable invention is massively misused in the service of profit, producing unprecedented waste and pollution. How can we stop the plastic plague?


Plastic is bad, isn’t it? That is certainly the new consensus. And no wonder there has been a public outcry. Many of us have been shocked by images like those on Blue Planet of a sperm whale with a stomach full of plastic waste, albatrosses feeding their young plastic or turtles trapped in plastic bags.

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UK Government Goes Full Orwellian: DNA, Fingerprint, Face, Voice: Biometric Data for Every Single Citizen in the UK

9 November 2018 — TruePublica

We’ve been warning about this moment since the first day TruePublica went online. We said that the government would eventually take the biometric data of every single citizen living in Britain and use it for nefarious reasons.  DNA, fingerprint, face, and even voice data will be included. But that’s not all.

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Black Agenda Report 9 November 2018: The Most Important Mid-Term Election of Our Lives? Not Really; Corporate Dems VS the Monster They Empowered; Black People Need Birthright Citizens

9 November 2018 — Black Agenda Report

Was This Really The Most Important Mid-Term Election of Our Lives? Maybe Not.

– Bruce A. Dixon , BAR managing editor Every two years we hear it’s the most important election of our lifetimes. Some know better. Some tell us this because their careers depend on it. But for the rest of us, what IS the truth.

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Will Kemp Get Away With Suppressing Georgia’s Black Votes?

9 November 2018 — TRNN

Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State, Brian Kemp, has declared victory in a heated gubernatorial race, but Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams is not conceding. Kemp purged tens of thousands of votes as part of a crackdown that adversely impacted black voters. We speak to attorney, activist Anoa Changa and investigative journalist Greg Palast.

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The Fires that Foretold Grenfell—Documentary reveals how UK governments ignored lessons of previous fire tragedies By Margo Miller

9 November 2018 — WSWS

Documentary directed by filmmaker Jamie Roberts and first shown on BBC Two, now available on BBC iPlayer.

The Fires that Foretold Grenfell, a well-researched, powerful documentary, is essential viewing for anyone seeking to understand the causes of and background to the June 2017 Grenfell fire tragedy. It includes harrowing interviews with survivors of five fires across the UK over a span of 45 years, their families and firefighters.

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