Several million people have now read my articles on the lack of evidence of Russian government guilt for the Salisbury attack. That’s over 300,000 unique visitors on this little blog alone so far, and it has been repeated on hundreds of sites all over the internet. My own tweets on the subject have been retweeted over 12,500 times and received 8 million impressions. I know that journalists from every mainstream media outlet you can mention have seen the material, because of numerous tweets from them none of which address any of the facts, but instead call me a “Conspiracy nutter” or variants of that, some very rude.
Yet what I wrote has not been refuted. It would be very easy to refute were it not true. The government would just have to say “Porton Down have stated that they have definitely identified the nerve agent as made in Russia”. They have not said that. Most extraordinarily, not one mainstream media “journalist” has asked a minister the question: “You keep using this phrase the nerve agent is “of a type developed by Russia”. Are you able to confirm it was actually made in Russia?” .
There is no excuse for this. Literally hundreds of mainstream media “journalists” have slavishly reproduced the propaganda phrase “of a type developed by Russia” without a single one of them every querying this rather odd wording, or why it is the government always uses that precise wording again and again and again.
It goes without saying that not a single mainstream media “journalist” has reported that fact either that until recently Porton Down believed that “novichoks” had probably never actually been synthesised successfully and that the OPCW has never banned them on the grounds that there was no evidence of their physical existence.
Finally I wish to repeat these important facts:
1) Israel has major undeclared stocks of chemical weapons
2) Israel is one of a handful of countries, including North Korea, not to ratify the Chemical Weapons Convention and commit to destroy its chemical weapons
3) Israel is not a member of the OPCW and refuses to declare its chemical weapon stocks to the OPCW.
These are also facts you will never, ever see reported in mainstream media and entirely predictably the corporate lickspittles of the mainstream media have been out in force on socal media justifying their refusal to act on any of the information I have given on the grounds I am an “anti-semite”. A more extreme example of using any criticism of Israel to allege anti-semitism is hard to conceive.
The contribution of Jewish people to human development in fields including science, literature, music, art and commerce has been simply magnificent and utterly disproportionate to their numbers. The genocidal policy of Israel towards the Palestinians these last seventy years, and its rogue state status as regard chemical and nuclear wmds is a completely different question, for which I in no way blame the generality of Jewish people. In fact my position on this is the opposite of a BDS position. I actually want Israel to join OPCW, be a full member and cooperate in the destruction of its chemical weapon stocks.
I think I might now have a vodka. Of a type developed by Russia. Made in Warrington.
Can I have a biscuit for every time I hear a British official saying that closing the British Council in Russia hurts the Russians most? Actually no; I’d get fat.
These “white man’s burden” types don’t know how they sound. They are that far up their own fundaments. They are basically saying that what they do in w*gland is for the w*gs’ own benefit, the w*gs ought to be grateful, and they can do jolly fine without the w*gs, but the w*gs, on the other hand, might find they soon put bones back through their noses if they throw the white man out.
The British Council is a soft power organisation that markets the British brand and also provides official posts for several MI6 officers. The word “state” has appeared in many recent speeches by Britain’s political pillocks when they talk about Russia. For some reason they don’t use it so much when they’re talking about the US, France, Germany, or indeed even when they mention the world’s only nuclear-armed monarchy that they either work for directly or support. Well the BC is part of the British state. And if that makes any Tories readers go red in the face when they read it, good. Guess what – the BBC is part of the state too.
Don’t tickle the tail of that GAZPROM dragon…
Now that Russia has opened a criminal investigation into the attempted murder of a Russian citizen in Salisbury we can expect the investigation to move into high gear.
Any alleged reappearance of Novichump or its precursors or derivatives in say, Syria, within the next few days is likely to be met by a bsrrage of US Tomahawks and in that respect the residents of Salisbury should consider themselves lucky.
Part of the objective could certainly be connected with propaganda about the use of chemical weapons elsewhere in the near future, yes. You could well be right about that.
How many Tomahawks would get launched from US ships before the ships got put out of action by Russian cruise missiles is another matter.
It doesn’t matter how many Tomahawks are launched.
“On the morning of 7 April 2017, 72 hours after the attack, the United States launched 59 cruise missiles on Shayrat Airbase, a Syrian airfield near Shayrat…” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khan_Shaykhun_chemical_attack#Missile_strike
About three of those missiles actually struck the airfield, killing five or six Syrians and doing virtually no operational damage. Most of the missiles went wildly off course, falling into the sea or landing in random places.
Russia can scramble the electronics of US aircraft, wraships and missiles.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Shayrat_missile_strike
Exactly. Wonder when the F-35’s are going to fly?
I hope you are not right. If Novuchok gets into Syria, or is already there, it will have got there via the White Helmets. Empires in decline are always run by idiots who think they can restore the empires. Unfortunately there has never been such destructive force on the planet as there is now. As a child I used to think the Book of Revelation did not belong in the New Testament, and that all those many headed beasts and fantasy creatures were the products of somebody on a different planet. Now if I think of the bit about “And I saw a new heaven, and a new earth, for the old earth had passed away” I am more of the opinion that St John the Divine was some kind of prophet.
Naw, John. However, I do agree that here are many people who would work towards it being a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Very neat. We always told you that Russia is supporting the bad guys and now we know because they are supplying them with CW of the type developed by Russia.
“Anyway, the announcement came one day after retiring Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, went upside the administration*’s head on the subject of its delay in implementing the mandated sanctions. And there seems to be little doubt that the strong response by Great Britain to the poisoning of a Russian spy and his daughter, apparently at the instigation of the Russian government, may have shamed the president* into doing something that he’d avoided doing for the better part of six months. He even acknowledged that the Russians were behind the attempted murder in Salisbury. Baby steps, tovarich. Baby steps.”
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a19446355/trump-implement-russia-sanctions/
On Jeremy Corbyn’s record on chemical weapons.
We urgently need to talk about Jeremy Corbyn’s record on chemical weapons
March 17th, 2018
https://www.thecanary.co/uk/analysis/2018/03/17/urgently-need-talk-jeremy-corbyns-record-chemical-weapons/
Just one example of very many similar instances –
‘A long record of campaigning against chemical weapons
Parliamentary records show that Corbyn has consistently campaigned against chemical weapons – and the arms trade as a whole, for that matter. Few Conservative MPs can claim to have done the same.
In 1993, Corbyn signed an early day motion (EDM) calling for
.. the complete elimination of chemical weapons, believing that they are hideous instruments of warfare and mass destruction which have caused unimaginable suffering to soldiers and civilians in both the developed and developing worlds
The motion called the Chemical Weapons Convention a “historic human achievement” and looked forward to “rapid universal adherence to the Convention”. It urged the Preparatory Commission to “make the verification regime an effective one, in order to ensure the strict and successful implementation of the Convention”. 84 MPs backed the motion. None of them were Conservatives.’
In this context it is worth noting that both Russia and Syria have recently had thier chemical weapons destroyed and certified by the OPCW. On the the other hand the US has not and is still in possession of chemical weapons and of course Israel as pointed out above has lots of undeclared chemical weapons and is not even subject to the OPCW because they have not signed the convention.
“There are special forces on the ground in Syria from the US – they no longer deny it – the UK, France and a number of other countries”
Lavrov said in an interview to the Kazakh state broadcaster published on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s website on Saturday. “Thus, it’s not so much of a ‘proxy war,’ but rather a direct involvement in the war,” the diplomat stressed.
Interesting timing – timing of NATO, not for Russia. No wonder our media are so active softening the public up for action in Syria which will inevitably involve NATO attacking Russian forces.
The thing is today to find a peer who knows what he writes and leads us out of the mud , thanks Craig for being such a person
Has Craig been ennobled? 🙂
“Has Craig been ennobled? ?”
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
It can, surely, only be a matter of time. Having sacrificed his own high-flying career to expose human rights abuses in Uzbekhistan, where he was ambassador at the time (https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2004/jul/15/foreignpolicy.uk), and then having devoted his subsequent years to campaigning for human rights across the world, Craig must now be the darling of the British establishment – not to mention the liberal press, such as the Guardian …
(Or, perhaps not, since it would appear that the Guardian has in fact banned Mr. Murray, from writing for it, following his trenchant criticism of its ex-editor, Alan Rusbridger https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2014/06/rusbridger-the-worlds-worst-editor/), and its Middle East ‘expert’-in-chief Jonathan Freedland: https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2017/01/trump-and-the-media/).
Slainté??
you were doing real good Graig until that last bit
unfortunately thats the red line you absolutely mustn’t cross, you’ve now blown it
Showcased this on Socialist Fight
https://socialistfight.com/2018/03/17/craig-murrays-refutes-anti-russian-disinformation/
Rattling the putative operational ‘Dagger’ missile was interesting just before Pootie gets reelected with Saddam’s numbers.
And don’t promote the video as ‘evidence’ . We’re all familiar with fake news and its proliferation..
Bravo Craig!!! Bravissimo! Your input to the fight for objective supply of information on planet Earth in time of harsh propaganda and silencing of any critical thinking and reason is of vital importance. Thank you for your courage and perseverance!
Raising my glass to you Craig, filled with a spirit (a double) of a type developed in Scotland made by Scots and enjoyed by all that try it. prosit!
Certain forces in British society are stoking up war hysteria to stop Jeremy Corbyn becoming Prime Minister. Like in the Falklands war and many other times, an atmosphere of war hysteria always puts the left on the back foot. It enables the supporters of capitalism to portray the left as unpatriotic, as traitors and soft on defence. We mustn’t fall for it.
The Parson Green event is also in the news. Although the Daily Mail has fallen into line on the Russia, their reporting of Parsons Green, front page today, seems determined to expose the whole thing, by showing pictures from the event/drill that refute the story. Such as a bomb bucket in a un-melted plastic bag and a serene looking victim wearing a cartoon toothache bandage.
Hmm. Why isn’t he at 99% approval?
https://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2018/03/economist-explains-13
Another thing that I’ve always had hard time understanding is why even a slight criticism of Israel, even when it is well grounded in facts, is immediately labelled as anti-semitism BUT any criticism, not to use a harsher word, of Russia is not seen as anti-russianism (a neologism i suppose) ? Many people become oblivious of their adopted anti-racism and anti-discrimination stance the moment it comes to Russia. It is believed to be a virtue to pour dirt onto a nation when this nation is Russians. Any significant or even slightly significant input of Russia/Soviet Union to the world history be it science, WWII or culture is being either erased from school textbooks, news, or twisted to create a distorted picture. However, anything negative is inflated and exaggerated to no limit. Have Russians somehow inherited the destiny of black people in the West? Or does the West have an inherit psychological need to have a target to exercise their need for humiliating a people to prove their superiority? The need that can be so fruitfully exploited by the policy makers to direct the herds where they need them to go? Does anybody else see a bigger picture in all this? As Trump says “Sad, it’s sad”. Gosh, I’ve never quoted Trump before hahaha!
Poor Putin…even Al Capone gave out Turkeys at Christmas and look at how he was rewarded…syphilis!
Ben, as some already mentioned here you are an odd one. Poor Putin?! I was talking about a nation not Putin. But your reaction just proves my point.
Putin has 80% support amongst Russians.
But there is no correlation….?
Following your logic of correlation, the world should despise and bully 50 percent of the US citizens who voted for Trump? And Iraqis who officially supported to almost 100 percent Saddam? Thus, the people who support a leader you don’t like must be discriminated and destroyed? Good that in the civilized 21 century you can justify racism!
Do you really require an answer for that Kat? Solzhenitsyn was a hero of the ‘West’ after the Gulag Achipelago yet became an unperson after 200 Years Together. Bizarre coincidences I’m sure.
“It was Uri who enlightened me regarding the Nes Ziyyona facility. It was, he said, an ABC warfare laboratory – ABC standing for atomic, bacteriological, and chemical. It was where our top epidemiological scientists were developing various doomsday machines. Because we were so vulnerable and would not have a second chance should there be an all-out war in which this type of weapon would be needed, there was no room for error. The Palestinian infiltrators came in handy in this regard. As human guinea pigs, they could make sure the weapons the scientists were developing worked properly and could verify how fast they worked and make them even more efficient.”
The Other Side of Deception by former Mossad Katsa Victor Ostrovsky.
Heads up. Could be something could be nothing:
https://www.rt.com/news/421589-us-preparing-syria-provocations-airstrikes/?utm_source=browser&utm_medium=push_notifications&utm_campaign=push_notifications
Hole in one.
Now we have more of the pieces in the jigsaw puzzle.
Well done, Craig, your last three articles have reestablished your credentials with the Putin shills and apologists and demonstrate, by their return to your usual anti-Israel position, that you’ve recovered from the fright you got when you were sued by that journalist.
Treble vodkas all round!
There’s plenty of TV stations, newspapers, politicians and pundits on board with the groupthink, John. No cause to feel threatened by one sceptical blog.
I guess it was Lenin who said ‘if you are not with us you are against us’ Great logic John! What about admitting that the world has at least some complexity and it’s not black or white, pro-Putin or pro-Israel? If you criticise Israeli foreign policy you are automatically pro Putin? Craig’s call is that we should look into facts as objectively as we can. And not pretend the facts that we don’t like or that don’t quite support our beliefs system don’t exist.
I suspect someone in the know gave him a tip about Colonial Palestine. And that’s why he dropped that little nugget
Three questions:
(a) Would Mossad dare to conduct a false flag assassination operation on British soil? They didn’t dare kidnap Mordechai Vanunu, but enticed him to Rome first.
(b) Perhaps Theresa May had access to other secret intelligence pointing to the Russians?
(c) If the Russians didn’t do it, who did?
(a) Changed days with respect to almost complete control of the media.
(b) Perhaps she is just lying.
(c) Any combination of Israel, the UK and the US.
Re C. There are many possibilities as to who did it (if indeed it happened as I’m starting to wonder). We may never get to the bottom of it. Many miscarriages of justice occur because the public can’t bear the feeling that nobody has been brought to justice for a particularly heinous crime.
“(a) Would Mossad dare to conduct a false flag assassination operation on British soil? They didn’t dare kidnap Mordechai Vanunu, but enticed him to Rome first.”
Read Gideon’s Spies.
1) Were they running various security aspects of the London Underground on 7/7?
There are unanswered questions concerning whether Mossad was a signed up partner to that false flag event.
2) Would they dare do so uninvited or would the UK invite them in on the orders of the USA?
Bombing Syria for Israel may in part be paid for by Israel organising false flag in UK.
Questions being posed, not conclusions being drawn….
I’ve read allegations that it was Mossad operatives that killed David Kelly. I have no idea whether there is any truth to those allegations.
This is the problem when “espionage” gets carried away with itself. It really is like a bunch of over grown public school boys(and now girls) pratting about because it all so exciting. Let’s remember that every war that ever happens is about money. Control of resources, what ever you see are the mid term goals – the end result in enrichment of the few at the expense of the many. It doesn’t matter if it’s a poisoned spy or missiled hospital which is why the details are almost irrelevant.
All of this aside, fourteen bodies have been recovered, including those of four little ones, after a boat from Turkey heading for Greece foundered off Agathonisi. Three people survived. Four are missing.
May they rest in peace.
http://news.sky.com/story/bodies-of-14-people-found-off-greek-island-after-migrant-boat-sinks-11293365
Sea temperature currently?
The article does not state the nationality of the ‘migrants’ as Sky calls them. They are human beings Mr Murdoch.
Moscow will or has already expelled 23 British diplomats, in retaliation to the British government doing the same.
Meanwhile there are reports that a chemical attack is imminent in southern Syria, near the region between Israel and Jordan, where they border Syria, and that the chemical attack will be traced back to Assad and Putin.
It could be propaganda, or it could be an attempt by Russia and Syria to preempt a possible chemical attack by the chief suspects, who’ve not ratified the with the CWC.
Yeah… the last paragraph isn’t great. I can sympathise with you over the abuse you get but the Israel thing is the least interesting and least scientific part of all this.
This should be an argument championing the scientific process, empirical evidence and peer review. We want to see the evidence proving the chemical was manufactured in Russia. Everything else is unimportant.
Well done for reaching so many people, Craig, with your great work lately. Fearless voices like yours are invaluable. They’re a sham, worse than ever today, the corporate media’s anti-intellectual lynch mob.
Do you realise that Ms Scripal is an injured Russian citizen who has been kidnaped by Her Majesties Government represented by Theresa May, between 12 and 14 March when she was transferred into the care of the British intelligence whilst in hospital and unconscious. This has potentially compromised all the evidence of her poisoning in a legal sense, so much so that apparently some international lawyers are considering a Habeas Corpus application to the British Courts to force the government to relinquish her back to civilian police care.
rubbish if you statement is true that would mean shut up russia gavin,boris and may and the labour friends of tory blair are accomplice in high crimes criminal acts that are also treasonous a direct threat to the realm.
no no no i maybe blind but i have an eye for an honest face boris and may have the look of innocent party here hare here already.
shirley it is time for you big bullies to start picking on putin and his henchmen and stop picking on major figure heads of are lgbt plus minus community
Have you seen this nonsense in the Guardian – https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/mar/16/russian-spy-poisoning-attack-novichok-chemist ? it’s so contradictory, I almost didn’t think it worth mentioning except it quotes Mirzayanov himself.
The lack of logic in the Mirzayanov quotes sticks out like a sore thumb, so why did the “journalist” not ask him the obvious questions?
e.g. How did they smuggle the “high-level senior scientist” through customs, and at which secret high-level facility did he prepare the weaponised version of the Novichok?
Surely getting a scientist with the appropriate knowledge (from Russia?) into a high-level facility here is a task rather more difficult than smuggling in the “two relatively benign, non-banned substances” which are required to produce the Novicok.
Even better questions concern where the ex Soviet scientists who worked on Novichoks took their knowledge to post 1989 and whether such countries possess chemical weapons and are signed up members of OPCW.
You do not need to smuggle a Russian scientist out if they are already US or EU citizens free to travel UK unhindered….
And if ex Soviet scientists have lived in the West for 25 years, likelihood is that the West know enough about Novichoks to assemble a weapon on their own….
The funniest part of this debate is watching the simultaneous credibility and lack of credibility Mirzayanov has.
When he’s saying it can be manufactured on a tabletop, he’s credible. Even though the OPCW says Novichok doesn’t exist. Who remembers.
When he’s saying that this is a Russian doing, he instantly transitions to not credible.
Will this be part of the bigger context?
“…..And so we now wait for that flashing, red headline saying that US ships in the Mediterranean have launched a missile attack on Syria, just like a year ago. Only this time Russia – which is allied with the Assad regime – is not planning to be on the defensive, and according to Russia’s Defense Ministry, “US instructors” are currently training militants to stage false flag chemical attacks in south Syria, i.e., the catalyst that will be used to justify the US attack on Assad. The incidents, the ministry said, will be used a pretext for airstrikes on Syrian government troops and infrastructure.
“We have reliable information at our disposal that US instructors have trained a number of militant groups in the vicinity of the town of At-Tanf, to stage provocations involving chemical warfare agents in southern Syria,” Russian General Staff spokesman General Sergey Rudskoy said at a news briefing on Saturday.
Moscow and Damascus have repeatedly warned about upcoming chemical provocations, and have highlighted that banned warfare agents have been used by the militants. Of course, none of that matters to the Western press which has its marching orders to expose the bloodthirsty killer Assad as an irrational despot who will use the exact same military method month after month and year after year, knowing well the response he will get from the US…..
Meanwhile, just a few days ago, Syrian government forces reportedly captured a well-equipped chemical laboratory in Eastern Ghouta. Footage from the facility has been published by the SANA news agency…..
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-03-17/russia-claims-us-training-syrian-militants-false-flag-chemical-attack-justify
I think your fears are well grounded Brian Davey. It all looks like an updated version of failed Saddam’s scenario to justify the invasion by non-existant CW. Which makes me think a lot must be at stake for the interested parties to undertake such a dirty, elaborate campaign. In Salisbury and Syria.
Once again….brilliant!
I’m currently enjoying a large glass of white, of a type developed by France, and now made in Kent.
Cheers!
Bodgers, the shambling oaf of Carlton Gardens, has now made a direct connection (in WaPo) between Putin’s concealment of Assad’s use of chemical weapons and Putin’s use of CW in Salisbury.
There’s something quite brain-rotting in the water supply at Eton College.
You know the OPCW – that organisation that Murray, Corbyn et al are insisting be brought into Salisbury – have reported that Assad is in fact gassing his own people? Then Putin vetoed further investigation by OPCW?
What’s the point in demanding the OPCW be brought in when its conclusions are only selectively acknowledged? One may as well not bother to ask them for help at that point.
The OPCW did not adhere to the basic tenets of chemical weapons investigation. Chain of custody regulations were not followed and the OPCW never actually visited the site, instead relying on the statements of terrorist sympathisers, the White Helmets. The OPCW claimed that it was too dangerous to access the alleged scene of the crime. Was that the fault of the the Russian or Syrian government’s? No, the investigators didn’t want to be paraded on TV in orange jumpsuits like other Westerners who were unlucky enough to be treated to this very unique extremist hospitality. Putin didn’t veto further investigation, the Russian government did, for the reasons I just stated above. It’s all very straightforward really, if the OCPW followed their own specific guidelines, Russia would have had no choice but to accept their conclusions but they didn’t
The first written record of vodka was in Poland – but never say that to a Russian.