The ruling Establishment has learnt a profound lesson from the debacle over Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction. The lesson they have learnt is not that it is wrong to attack and destroy an entire country on the basis of lies. They have not learnt that lesson despite the fact the western powers are now busily attacking the Iraqi Shia majority government they themselves installed, for the crime of being a Shia majority government.
No, the lesson they have learnt is never to admit they lied, never to admit they were wrong. They see the ghost-like waxen visage of Tony Blair wandering around, stinking rich but less popular than an Epstein birthday party, and realise that being widely recognised as a lying mass murderer is not a good career choice. They have learnt that the mistake is for the Establishment ever to admit the lies.
The Establishment had to do a certain amount of collective self-flagellation over the non-existent Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, over which they precipitated the death and maiming of millions of people. Only a very few outliers, like the strange Melanie Phillips, still claimed the WMD really did exist, and her motive was so obviously that she supported any excuse to kill Muslims that nobody paid any attention. Her permanent pass to appear on the BBC was upgraded. But by and large everyone accepted the Iraqi WMD had been a fiction. The mainstream media Blair/Bush acolytes like Cohen, Kamm and Aaronovitch switched to arguing that even if WMD did not exist, Iraq was in any case better off for having so many people killed and its infrastructure destroyed.
These situations are now avoided by the realisation of the security services that in future they just have to brazen it out. The simple truth of the matter – and it is a truth – is this. If the Iraq WMD situation occurred today, and the security services decided to brazen it out and claim that WMD had indeed been found, there is not a mainstream media outlet that would contradict them.
The security services outlet Bellingcat would publish some photos of big missiles planted in the sand. The Washington Post, Guardian, New York Times, BBC and CNN would republish and amplify these pictures and copy and paste the official statements from government spokesmen. Robert Fisk would get to the scene and interview a few eye witnesses who saw the missiles being planted, and he would be derided as a senile old has-been. Seymour Hersh and Peter Hitchens would interview whistleblowers and be shunned by their colleagues and left off the airwaves. Bloggers like myself would be derided as mad conspiracy theorists or paid Russian agents if we cast any doubt on the Bellingcat “evidence”. Wikipedia would ruthlessly expunge any alternative narrative as being from unreliable sources. The Integrity Initiative, 77th Brigade, GCHQ and their US equivalents would be pumping out the “Iraqi WMD found” narrative all over social media. Mad Ben Nimmo of the Atlantic Council would be banning dissenting accounts all over the place in his role as Facebook Witchfinder-General.
Does anybody seriously wish to dispute this is how the absence of Iraqi WMD would be handled today, 16 years on?
If you do wish to doubt this could happen, look at the obviously fake narrative of the Syrian government chemical weapons attacks on Douma. The pictures published on Bellingcat of improvised chlorine gas missiles were always obviously fake. Remember this missile was supposed to have smashed through ten inches of solid, steel rebar reinforced concrete.
As I reported back in May last year, that the expert engineers sent to investigate by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) did not buy into this is hardly surprising.
That their findings were deliberately omitted from the OPCW report is very worrying indeed. What became still more worrying was the undeniable evidence that started to emerge from whistleblowers in the OPCW that the toxicology experts had unanimously agreed that those killed had not died from chlorine gas attack. The minutes of the OPCW toxicology meeting really do need to be read in full.
actual_toxicology_meeting_redacted
The highlights are:
“No nerve agents had been detected in environmental or bio samples”
“The experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure”
I really do urge you to click on the above link and read the entire minute. In particular, it is impossible to read that minute and not understand that the toxicology experts believed that the corpses had been brought and placed in position.
“The experts were also of the opinion that the victims were highly unlikely to have gathered in piles at the centre of the respective apartments, at such a short distance from an escape from any toxic chlorine gas to much cleaner air”.
So the toxicology experts plainly believed the corpse piles had been staged, and the engineering experts plainly believed the cylinder bombs had been staged. Yet, against the direct evidence of its own experts, the OPCW published a report managing to convey the opposite impression – or at least capable of being portrayed by the media as giving the opposite impression.
How then did the OPCW come to do this? Rather unusually for an international organisation, the OPCW Secretariat is firmly captured by the Western states, largely because it covers an area of activity which is not of enormous interest to the political elites of developing world states, and many positions require a high level of technical qualification. It was also undergoing a change of Director General at the time of the Douma investigation, with the firmly Francoist Spanish diplomat Fernando Arias taking over as Director General and the French diplomat Sebastian Braha effectively running the operation as the Director-General’s chef de cabinet, working in close conjunction with the US security services. Braha simply ordered the excision of the expert opinions on engineering and toxicology, and his high-handedness worked, at least until whistleblowers started to reveal the truth about Braha as a slimy, corrupt, lying war hawk.
FFM here stands for Fact Finding Mission and ODG for Office of the Director General. After a great deal of personal experience dealing with French diplomats, I would say that the obnoxious arrogance revealed in Braha’s instructions here is precisely what you would expect. French diplomats as a class are a remarkably horrible and entitled bunch. Braha has no compunction about simply throwing around the weight of the Office of the Director General and attempting to browbeat Henderson.
We see now how the OPCW managed to produce a report which was the opposite of the truth. Ian Henderson, the OPCW engineer who had visited the site and concluded that the “cylinder bombs” were fakes, had suddenly become excluded from the “fact finding mission” when it had been whittled down to a “core group” – excluding any engineers (and presumably toxicologists) who would seek to insert inconvenient facts into the report.
France of course participated, alongside the US and UK, in missile strikes against Syrian government positions in response to the non-existent chlorine gas attacks on Douma. I was amongst those who had argued from day one that the western Douma narrative was inherently improbable. The Douma enclave held by extreme jihadist, western and Saudi backed forces allied to ISIL, was about to fall anyway. The Syrian government had no possible military advantage to gain by attacking it with two small improvised chemical weapons, and a great deal to lose in terms of provoking international retaliation.
That the consequences of the fake Douma incident were much less far-reaching than they might have been, is entirely due (and I am sorry if you dislike this but it is true) to the good sense of Donald Trump. Trump is inclined to isolationism and the fake “Russiagate” narrative promoted by senior echelons of his security services had led him to be heavily sceptical of them. He therefore refused, against the united persuasion of the hawks, to respond to the Douma “attack” by more than quick and limited missile strikes. I have no doubt that the object of the false flag was to push the US into a full regime change operation, by falsifying a demonstration that a declared red line on chemical weapon use had been crossed.
There is no doubt that Douma was a false flag. The documentary and whistleblower evidence from the OPCW is overwhelming and irrefutable. In addition to the two whistleblowers reported extensively by Wikileaks and the Courage Foundation, the redoubtable Peter Hitchens has his own whistleblowers inside OPCW who may well be different persons. It is also great entertainment as well as enlightening to read Hitchens’ takedown of Bellingcat on the issue.
But there are much deeper questions about the Douma false flag. Did the jihadists themselves kill the “chlorine victims” for display or were these just bodies from the general fighting? The White Helmets were co-located with the jihadist headquarters in Douma, and involved in producing and spreading the fake evidence. How far were the UK and US governments, instrumental in preparing the false flag? That western governments, including through the White Helmets and their men at the OPCW, were plainly seeking to propagate this false flag, to massively publicise and to and make war capital out of it, is beyond dispute. But were they involved in the actual creation of the fake scene? Did MI6 or the CIA initiate this false flag through the White Helmets or the Saudi backed jihadists? That is unproven but seems to me very probable. It is also worth noting the coincidence in time of the revelation of the proof of the Douma false flag and the death of James Le Mesurier.
Now let me return to where I started. None of the New York Times, the Washington Post, the BBC, the Guardian nor CNN – all of which reported the Douma chemical attack very extensively as a real Syrian government atrocity, and used it to editorialise for western military intervention in Syria – none of them has admitted they were wrong. None has issued any substantive retraction or correction. None has reported in detail and without bias on the overwhelming evidence of foul play within the OPCW.
Those sources who do publish the truth – including the few outliers in mainstream media such as Peter Hitchens and Robert Fisk – continue to be further marginalised, attacked as at best eccentric and at worse Russian agents. Others like Wikileaks and myself are pariahs excluded from any mainstream exposure. The official UK, US, French and Spanish government line, and the line of the billionaire and state owned media, continues to be that Douma was a Syrian government chemical weapons attack on civilians. They intend, aided and abetted by their vast online propaganda operations, to brazen out the lie.
What we are seeing is the terrifying rise of the zombie state narrative in Western culture. It does not matter how definitively we can prove that something is a lie, the full spectrum dominance of the Establishment in media resources is such that the lie is impossible to kill off, and the state manages to implant that lie as the truth in the minds of a sufficient majority of the populace to ride roughshod over objective truth with great success. It follows in the state narrative that anybody who challenges the state’s version of truth is themselves dishonest or mad, and the state manages also to implant that notion into a sufficient majority of the populace.
These are truly chilling times.
In the next instalment I shall consider how the Establishment is brazening out similar lies on the Russophobe agenda, and sticking to factually debunked narratives on the DNC and Podesta emails, on the Steele Dossier and on the Skripals.
——————————————
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This is not new. For many years now, the policy of the USA government at least has simply been to hell with the fall out, just go ahead and do what they were going to do because there will be plenty of time afterwards to deal with any criticisms which they’ll ignore anyway.
Such is the way of the world in the 21st century and you can see this attitude seeping into every day life too.
The US government is becoming more and more reckless in its behaviour. The cover story (WMDs, nasty dictator, whatever) is something they’ll figure out later. They can make a few vague noises in the meantime and then stick with whatever main story they prefer later. It doesn’t have to be credible. Repetition gives everything a spurious sense of reality.
What is new is the complete takeover of mainstream media, across all major western countries, by the US security services. There is no mainstream dissenting voice to expose the truth any more. Any individual or small-scale organisational dissent is drowned out. Or, in the cases of Assange and Manning, slowly crucified ‘pour encourager les autres’
Fine article, Craig. This is really the biggest issue of our times
Agree. There are so few real journalists and so many commentators who are little more than gossip columnists and mouthpieces for government. The handful of real journalists named who actually challenge the official versions are close to retirement and I see nobody of substance to replace them. That is the tragedy and the issue that needs addressing.
Do not despair, Ros Thorpe. There are a great many real journalists, young and old, reporting from ‘trouble spots’ around the world and providing informed analysis. They don’t work for the MSM so most people never come across them, except when there is a concerted MSM campaign to discredit them. When outstanding ethical journalism is available gratis with one mouse click, I can’t understand why so many people waste their time with the MSM.
Great article, Craig.
One of the most chilling paragraphs in Robert Fisk’s piece yesterday for the Independent on this: https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/syria-war-chemical-weapons-watchdog-opcw-assad-damascus-russia-a9262336.html
Was this :
Alex[the inspector – who gave his name to his audience, but asked to be called “Alex”] also said that a British diplomat who was OPCW’s chef de cabinet invited several members of the drafting team to his office, where they found three US officials who told them that the Syrian regime had conducted a gas attack and that two cylinders found in one building contained 170 kilograms of chlorine. The inspectors, Alex remarked, regarded this as unacceptable pressure and a violation of the OPCW’s principles of “independence and impartiality”.
Why risk the OPCW’s credibility in such a blatant fashion? The OPCW undoubtedly has an important role and its independence and analysis should be beyond reproach.
The name of the British diplomat (omitted by Fisk) is Bob Fairweather. Perhaps Mr Murray’s contacts can provide some background.
Suppose it’s like with the Katharine Gun revealed spying on diplomats and officials at the UN, in the lead-up to the Iraq war. For some reason the UK and US officialdom feel the ends always justify the means. They operate by Ovid’s Heroides (ca. 10 BC), exitus ācta probat -“the outcome justifies the deeds” principle. Which can lead to truly monstrous deeds.
I think the establishment attacking criticism of its actions as “Russian apologist” and Putin-bot is taking on Nazi dimensions. It’s all false and evidence-free yet repeated as though unequivocally proven. It’s all so very sinister and likely to lead to war.
The day you realise that the US has no interest in any honest appraisals by any body, anywhere in the world, unless it results In US control of another economy, will be the day you will not be surprised by this happening.
Sooner or later someone is going to get the slogan: ‘Promote World Peace, kill an American today’ to go viral despite the best efforts of Facebook, Google censorship etc.
Americans simply do not understand their own evil: if they did, they would withdraw from all international affairs for 70 years.
What is so stupid about your post is that you encourage killing everyday Americans for what their country is doing to Iraq, Syria, etc. Did it ever occur to you that there are millions of everyday Americans who are totally against what their government is doing? Yes, I know it may come as a shock, but it’s true. It is the Lockheed Martin/ U.S. DOD Pentagon / Washington 1% elite who call the shots. Not the American peasantry you idiot.
“What is so stupid about your post is that you encourage killing everyday Americans…”
What i so stupid about your post is that you evidently did not read Rhys’ comment. Or, if you did, you cannot understand simple English.
Rhys did not encourage anything. He speculated about what might happen some day.
A very measured piece by Robert Fisk in The Independent from Wednesday. No hysterics, just presenting facts as the stand.
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/syria-war-chemical-weapons-watchdog-opcw-assad-damascus-russia-a9262336.html
Durn – just as I posted my wish list!
Pretty much tallies.
Over the New Year, the most disturbing conversation with some right-on, lefty, vegan, xr, SJW’s in their 50’s was about two issues.:-
1. I asked what percentage of the total vote they though would be reasonable as postal votes?
The answers i got ranged between 5% – 15%!
(Yet they think Labour got thrashed because the Guardian says so).
2. Why Julian Assange is still in high security and being slowly killed (like Steven Biko – because they remember the song) when he has completed the sentence for bail jumping?
And seeing as there were no charges by Sweden, ever, that he was supposedly on bail for?
The answer i got was because he was a rapist who refused to face his accusers !
(Because that is what the Groaniad said and still does about him!)
They would not accept that the ‘victims’ stories didn’t hold up one was an agent of the US. They’d rather believe that the women were coerced into withdrawing! And so the mud sticks.
These fucking sjw’s have turned into zombies by consuming the Groaniad and BBC/C4 churnilism for their entire lives! Like the proverbial boiled frogs they are doomef.
Hell they can’t even remember that before the Council Tax and the Community Charge (Poll Tax) there were Rates – which they thought only home owners paid!
Dumb dumb fuckers in their cosy liberal lifestyles – they are all but tory numb skulls!
I smiled and agreed that their great understanding of issues was absolutely fabulous and fantastic and we are lucky to have their sensiblities so clearly on display!
DunGroanin – very funny article – indeed “they are all but Tory Numbskulls”.
A search for “Syrian chemical attack” generates Khan Shaykhun (2017) as the first hit. The Douma “attack” (2018) drops down to number three.
The MIC manipulate events to “manage” search results. Just after Ian Henderson’s devastating report was leaked, the American military announced a new “chemical attack” “details to follow”. Needless to say, no further “details” ever emerged, but Henderson’s report dropped down the search list.
Khan Shaykhun has been back under the umbrella of the Syrian Government for half a year now.
They are still pushing the White Helmets nonsense and Assad bombing schools in Idlib Province, even today.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-50971869
What I would like to see is reporters going to re-taken areas of Syria and asking the locals, do you prefer life under Assad or the White Helmets and their mates.
“What I would like to see is reporters going to re-taken areas of Syria and asking the locals, do you prefer life under Assad or the White Helmets and their mates”.
Nice idea, Michael – so would I.
Unfortunately, if any employed journalist were to do so he would rapidly become unemployed.
Already done, Tom. Vanessa Beeley has visited Syria and done numerous interviews with people about the White Helmets and their mates. Ditto Eva Bartlett.
https://21stcenturywire.com/author/21vbeeley/
Great article but very frightening. Makes me realise I am not wrong when I question the MSM narrative
Mr Murray
My view is very simple. When the Establishment are beyond conscience, beyond humanity, beyond even remembering what the concept of dignity actually involves, they must be removed immediately, forever, from any positions of influence or responsibility.
They will not go, so they must be attacked, as they attack others. MI6 building south of the river should be hit with a missile strike with an ordered attrition rate of 100.0%. The same must happen to GCHQ and Fylingdales. Ditto every analogous organisational site in the USA It must become a career suicide to join MI6, the NSA etc.
I am absolutely principled in my refusal to bomb innocent civilians and absolutely coldblooded in my willingness to exterminate the security services. They do not operate on our behalf, they operate as organised criminals interfacing with the absolute worst of inhuman scum. They set up slush funds beyond democratic oversight through sex trafficking, human trafficking, trade in human organs, large scale drug trafficking and any amount of illegal arms smuggling. They are constantly fomenting wars, organising false flag deaths yet that puke-inducing expression ‘national security’ gives them a free pass to make the IRA seem like the Holy Mother Mary.
There need to be consequences for false intelligence: sexing up intelligence must be a firing squad offence. I want the murderers of David Kelly executed in the centre of London and every child aged 11-16 in the UK must be forced to watch that execution live on TV. I am sick of the BBC claiming children cannot know about the evil of this world: children need to see that if you wilfully murder an honest man you get your just desserts. They need to know that the rules for security services are different to civilian life and that execution of psychopathic criminals in the security services is highly desirable. Just like children should watch an MI6 organiser of paedophile rings have their sexual genitals mutilated. They need to know these things…….
But they will not, because every media outlet is stuffed full of security service operatives, drones and those under blackmail. I have seen how the security services operate and they have no interest in any concept of decency. Never admit error, never apologise is how they operate. Democracy does not work where they are concerned and no-one should have any delusions that it can.
Sounds a bit medieval and not sure it would have a positive outcome but I understand your fury. I look at our leaders and feel physically sick which is why I’ve stopped watching TV or reading newspapers. Our security services seem to be completely perverted and one wonders if anyone has any control over then. It’s depressing
The very words “decency” and “democracy” can be applied as the ruling powers see fit. The role of the media is to provide whatever spurious justification is necessary to cover the events of the state.
Why the ages of 11-16 specifically?
It’s strange how the press and the government have such a visceral hatred for Putin which seems to be based on his complete taming of the Russian media to state propaganda machines. Perhaps they were just jealous?
Nah, it’s just the fact the US’s preeminence as the world’s supreme hegemonic power, its wealth and financial clout/domination etc can brook no rival power, not even as an equal. Hence China and Russia’s sanctions and new trade barriers. There is method in the madness behind the endless wars, false flags and aggressions, no doubt. Added to this desire is the relentless lobbying of Israel and KSA for the US to ‘deal with’ regional foes.
Had to laugh at reports in recent days about how UK ministers tried to bring Russia into Nato in 1995. Presented by Malcolm Rifkind, then defence secretary, to a Chequers strategy summit, the plan was to dispel Kremlin suspicions of the alliance’s eastwards expansion. The MoD wanted Russia to become an “associate member” of Nato. Imagine that.
I was being ironic. The barefaced hypocrisy of attacking Putin for being autocratic and democratic
Don’t simplify, then you will understand.
Do not divide the world into black and white, and everything will fall into place.
The options of “cooperation” that the West is ready to offer, are simply unacceptable for Russia. Russia would be content with a simple calm neutral partnership.
From our point of view, the West understands only two extremes, either a lover or an enemy. It’s weird for us, because there is still a huge spectrum between “love forever” and “murder out of hatred”.
We have literally no sensible and intelligent MPs left. Now it is reactionary clowns spouting xenophobic sound bites to create fictional enemies. I despair.
My own opinion is that uncompromising ‘black and white’ view of the world is due to the uncompromising nature of ‘winner take all’ politics we have in the UK, US and the political system it’s created.
Our govts simply couldn’t operate as they do under much more accountable multi-party, proportional systems. In the US, there is a cosy consensus between the top players in both the main parties. Snowden mentioned The Gang of Eight – a colloquial term for a set of eight leaders within the United States Congress who are briefed on classified intelligence matters. In the UK it’s the same, Cameron shielded Blair and his deeds and Blair would’ve done the same, no doubt, for Cameron. It’s why the security state is so unaccountable and so very powerful in both countries too. Both countries are dominated by ruthless hawks seeking western hegemony, who know they’ll never have to answer to anyone because the politics is so predictable.
It’s essentially a problem with democracy and democratic accountability.
And indirectly Blair protected Thatcher over the Al Yamamah arms deal.
We are indeed a deeply sick country, a situation in which I see no immediate change.
It’s deeply depressing.
Scotland leaving the union would trigger a wider constitutional / democratic rethink in how England is governed.
We’d have to dump FPTP, lest suffer eternal Tory rule. I think people would demand a change.
“…. his complete taming of the Russian media to state propaganda machines.”
How do you know? Do you speak/read Russian? Which Russian media do you regularly read/watch? I do read Russian blogs and newspapaers every day and I find more critisism of putin there than in any western paper. So please elaborate.
I’m Russian mate. I know
Are you Russian russian, or? Sorry for the question, just to make it clear. There are a lot of people claiming to be russians, while in fact they are … I’m sorry, I said I’m sorry, really… e.g. an Israeli citizen residing in London and all he can show to support the claim is his/her knowlege of russian language and some time spend in USSR when a child.
We have now the new test of Russian-ness (thanks Mrs. May and Mr. Johnson and Mr. SurrupandGoAway) You just need to look at the reaction of a person, when you tell him/her: “Если бы Скрипаля просто п*зданули ледорубом, и то было бы меньше палева”
Not been there for many years. Changed my name to an English one but maiden name is Kovalenko. I stopped reading Russian press after several great journalists were murdered.
Oh, I see.
My father’s ancestry is Kuban Cossaks deriving from Zaporizhyie. Balachka (ukrainian-russian surgik) is my both branches grandma’s language, I easily understand it together with pure Ukrainian mova. My grand-grand-pa’s family was repressed and deported to Kazakhstan as ‘unreliable element’.
My mom’s ancestors are from Voronezh. My aunties and unckles scattered from Omsk, Syberia in the North to Nalchik, Kabarda-Balkaria in the South.
I identify myself as a drain of all possible Slavic mentalities with deep ties with local Black Sea muslim and christian mentalities. The most respected grand-grand-ma (as a very wise woman!) had jewish patronim Markovna.
Really, it’s easier to say – I’m Russian, than to describe how it is all blends in me.
That’s a rich heritage. My roots are tartar and my relatives are from all over Russia but right now are in Xotchkova which is just outside Moscow. Sorry I have no Cyrillic letters on my device.
here is my New Year gift for you, Ros Thorpe 🙂
Another way to determine your nationality. This is very simple. Imagine, you are moving to a new workshop. The room is still empty, and it means a great echo! You just sing a song to test reverberation, the song that comes to mind first.
And then it turns out that you have chosen an ancient folk song out of all the songs of the world! Cool, huh?
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1dg3cPWEQSjh8N4uS7ceW0jqstyIMXsBC/view?usp=sharing
—
I’m not a professional singer, sorry 🙂
Arbat moi arbat ti maya religiya
Yes, An Ice pick would have been more certain. Providing it had a Made in Russia lable then there could not have been any doubt about the perpetrators!
Sorry, pete, you failed the test. No offence please, just not the russian response.
Dear Ros Thorpe, I’m sorry to say Bulat Shalvovich died when I was 9 years old.
Not been there for many years, you say. The hole life passed since, I say.
My generation is keen on other songs.
My favorite is Old Tailor’s song (Old Jew’s song)
performed by Rosenbaum
https://youtu.be/r-0qNVT_I4s
and native eastern motive is distinct here in Michael Shufutinsky’s version
https://youtu.be/a99mRWtZ9u0
—-
Peace of paradise.
The stars above the small-town are high and bright.
I sing to myself, I cut fabric for clothes.
Night has fallen.
Children, you have rest. The day was very hot.
I keep doing a stitch by stitch, ‘couse penny is hard to get now.
Oh, wei!
There was time, I had some strength… It’s no more of it!
My hair is mowed, and my coat is worn out, by the Years…
There lived a Jew once, who said:
“This too shall pass”.
The sun will roll over the edge,
But it will still be born again!
I’m sorry that it’s not possible for me, too…
Who will dress them all to fashion, when I’m…
Ros, if you have read “1984” you will see that Mr Putin has been appointed to the role of Emmanuel Goldstein. He is the universal scapegoat, the lightning conductor for the people’s righteous anger at everything that has been done to them.
A similar idea was expressed by Sigmund Freud in his last book, “Civilisation and its Discontents”. Marvelling at the apparent possibility of civilised societies being formed of human beings with their huge propensity to insensate violence, he specualted that it could only happen if the latent hatred of the people could be directed at some external target. (Interestingly and rather ominously, this was exactly the same conclusion reached by Hitler and the Nazis – and now by their successors, the creatures of Washington).
Thank you Craig and Happy New Year.
An utterly brilliant detailed blog.
“The Integrity Initiative, 77th Brigade, GCHQ and their US equivalents would be pumping out the “Iraqi WMD found” narrative all over social media. Mad Ben Nimmo of the Atlantic Council would be banning dissenting accounts all over
the place in his role as Facebook Witchfinder-General.”
Lets not forget “Phil Cross” altering wiki pages to deceive.
Yeah I go along with the idea that the OPCW is captured, how else could you explain their position on Douma and the whistleblowing.
The billionaire owned media, not only backs and twists the narrative they help manufacture consent. I’d go as far as to say the global corporations and the very wealthy also aid and abetted in the mass lying and deception.
Sadly lying politicians are now seen as the norm in political process. They just don’t seem to be held accountable. The likes of Obama who had a free hand to carry out his global assassination progamme, where drones were sent to kill anyone without judge or jury that America thought might be a threat to it.
Hume said the force is on the side of the government, but the people also have the force, if they recognise it, and use it.
Nothing will change until we the masses change it, an example of this I’d say is only the people of America can change aggressive American foreign policies.
That’s why the upcoming Labour leadership contest fills many with dread.
Corbyn, for all his many faults, at least you knew where he stood from his past activism. What stance either of the favourites: Keir Starmer and Rebecca Long-Bailey would take on say, the UK joining military action against with Iran, is anyone’s guess? Starmer isn’t the Blairite some present him as , but his history as DPP and the fact he resigned in the ‘crap coup’ to support centrist Owen Smith suggests he’s certainly not going to be any sort of champion of the left.
All those in favour of Scottish Independence who couldn’t piss on Corbyn fast enough may well come to rue the day.
Labour did nothing for Scotland, except hold it back, there’s more Giant Panda’s in Scotland now than Labour MP’s.
J
The only thing we rue the day of is the Barons and Lords who signed up to the Treaty of Union 1707.
I hope you’re right.
“Corbyn, for all his many faults, at least you knew where he stood from his past activism. ”
Corbyn was always (if elected) going to be a temporary fix. Even now that he’s on the way out, the media cannot help dissecting his tenure in a demeaning way, its as if they are afraid the corpse (Corbynism) may spring back to life and take the day.
Labour will, have five years of carping from the sidelines to get it right. As Johnson begins dismantling anything in the UK that smells of socialism.
Meanwhile the corporate media will be waiting eagerly to get their negative media hooks into the next Labour party leader.
“Corbyn was always (if elected) going to be a temporary fix”.
No politician can ever be more than a temporary fix – usually very temporary (on the order of hours).
“An honest politician is one who stays bought”.
And there are damn few of those.
Good point. When it comes to the media’s portrayal of politics I see two themes. Demonise, beyond reason and belief, the politicians they do not like and see as a threat. The other theme is to never really hold power to account. The Tories have been in power for 9 years and have governed while the economy has performed badly on many measures.
The question is how do we reverse this collusion of power between secret service, state and media? 5 years of a new government won’t do it.
Starmer was as obvious an Establishment plant in the shadow cabinet as Amber Rudd was one in the Johnson cabinet.
Imho.
Goose
“at least you knew where he stood from his past activism.”
Aye right – like Richard Leonard both CND but happy to keep the nukes on the Clyde. If Westminster wants nukes then they should park the subs on the Thames.
This article deals with media complicity although I have not watched it yet:
https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2019/12/24/newsweek-reporter-quits-after-editors-block-coverage-of-opcw-syria-scandal/
Hardly began with Iraq though.
Mau Mau massacre cover-up detailed in newly-opened secret files
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/nov/30/maumau-massacre-secret-files
Government misbehaviour in Kenya was excoriated at the time by a distinguished Conservative MP. He was later drummed out of British politics on the charge of being a racist.
I don’t know what his real crime was. Perhaps it was his routine scepticism about US government policies and actions.
What was his name again? Awfully clever chap. It’s on the tip of my tongue.
Alan Clarke?
Worth remembering that Oswald Mosley crossed the floor to Labour in response to Auxie/Black and Tan outrages in Ireland, and being critical of accepted wisdoms led him to the dead end of Fascism.
So one has to wonder if the likes of Powell and Mosley were indeed prophets of some sort, or just blokes who relished the bad boy persona ? Both appear to have forecast some events that eventually came to pass. 🙂
Thanks for the new blog, Mr. Murray. I intended to refrain from commenting during the holidays, because, frankly, your site has the ability to completely absorb my attention. But I can’t stay away when such an important question arises.
I don’t want to go so far in reasoning, as thinking whether ‘they’ killed those victims with their own hands. I am empathetic to a huge range of human emothions, but I can’t imagine a human being, which is able to touch corpses of women and babies, move them, lay them in the right position, create scenery, apply makeup, prepare the scene for video shooting.
This is beyond understanding, because normally every person has sacred things inside, irrational feelings for a dead body, general understanding what is right and what is wrong. I mean, we can understand the worst motives, we can feel the worst emotions, but we have a fringe inside of us, a moral regulator that prevents us from performing actions based on these emotions.
Perhaps mad maniacs can do terrible things, but it’s hard for me to imagine that a whole team of human beings has crossed this line, and it’s even harder to imagine that their actions were approved by even more human beings, and no one objected against it.
I don’t know who we are fighting against. I just know for sure that people don’t do that.
There are many drugs that can induce that lifeless appearance: sweet drinks laced with tranquilizers eg. the benzodiazepine family . The kind of drugs that I’d imagine in a stressful war zone will be in heavy demand.
That was the scary thing at the time the footage came out with the BBC news here in the UK, playing it seemingly on an endless loop to agitate the British people into demanding action from their politicians (that’s how war propaganda works, right?). I remember how easy it would be to make young people cry with pepper spray, to wash out their eyes (as shown) and drug people to look lifeless. Sorry if that sounds callous, but ‘the first casualty, when war comes, is truth’.
Actually, I have Muslim friends, to put it bluntly, I have been living side-by-side with them all my life. These are my neighbours and some are the husband of my aunt and ex-husband of my sister and wives of my other friends, etc. Close relationships.
If I apply my living experience to Douma, then personally I have huge doubts that such an operation with dead bodies of apparently Muslim women and children, could be performed by Muslims.
Rather by people for whom the next 20-30-40 dead arabs are just “inevitable war casualties”.
I’ve no idea if it were partly or wholly staged, I merely think would be possible to stage such a thing without people being killed.
Beyond individual incidents, I would say it’s been a very brutal war with or without some alleged CW attack sideshow anyway. Whole cities and towns have been leveled, absolutely horrendous destruction by Assad and Russia. Other players in the region wanting ‘regime change’ are the hidden hand behind the mayhem though. There is enough blame to go round.
I have no illusions that the newspapers in my country downplay the casualties and losses from our participation in the war. But I’m sure that the Russians simply do not have such opportunities in Syria, as the Americans with their allies have, with their surveilance and hi-teck weapons, to arrange such a provocation.
Besides, I am 100% sure that Assad expects to regain power over the country and to live with these people, he is of the same blood with them. Russia partly shares this view, it happened so, historically, that we are also part of this mentality, and we border this, and on our territory this rightfully lives on.
But the USA and European countries, these are newcomers, foreigners, all they want is temporary benefits.
Tatyana
A peaceful 2020 to ye from Scotland..
And Goose too.. I hope yous are not actually Pondering ” The Fact “.. that the evil B*+%#££$$ of ISIL – or What ever name the Western Backed Monsters call themselves these days – are not capable of moving dead children around.
I have seen photographs from Libya, That would prove they are well Evil enough
Keep drinking the western lamestream media koolaid – others aren’t that easily fooled
You omit mention of Raqqa obliterated by USA and allies but given barely a squeak in the media save for the Amnesty report that appeared long after the event when the interest died down.
I’ve seen the videos of muslims sawing the heads off struggling women they just raped. Seen them laugh as they decapitate a boy. Seen the heads of Christians placed on stakes of the village they butchered.
I have absolutely no doubt any jihadist would deliberately murder anyone to stage a false flag if it furthered his aims.
i have no doubt some of the christians that fomented these wars in the first place would keep encouraging them if it furthered their aims. do you?
I do not know jihadists, except for the vague knowlege of the goals of those who tried to establish the Caucasus Emirate here in Russia (because I’ve visited their web-site and seen it with my own eyes).
But even those jihadists did not do these terrible deeds to their women and children. They saw the enemy in us, the Russians.
I just exclude Beslan, it was an absolutely unimaginable story, I can’t imagine e.g. my uncles from Nalchik who would have been so dissatisfied with the Russian government that they could kill several hundred Caucasian children because of the protest. Just think of it – to kill your own children because you don’t like foreign government- it’s madness, their fellow-soldiers would stop them for sure. Love of caucasian people to their kids is even more than love of jewish people to theirs. It is something that is considered to be precious and sacred!
Beslan is just unbelievable. I strongly suspect that the executioners were not native in Beslan.
Russia brought some of the people seen in the Douma ‘attack’ video to the Netherlands and there was a press conference refuting the western claims. Their story was that men had shown up caused panic, and they’d been dragged into staging the whole thing. Now our western media dismissed that as a sick stunt staged by Russia. But the people presented to the media spoke freely and even took questions. It didn’t look forced or coerced and everyone seem calm i.e., merely like testimony; including from the younger ones. A father and his son seen in the video(seen crying )while a man supposedly washes chemicals off him with an hosepipe.
Imagine the Skripals doing an open press conference like that taking questions.
Goose, this little boy was Hassan Diab. I believe that names are important. The video of his eyewitnessing to the United Nations is April 26, 2018
in Russian it is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ4kJ8QpQXQ
If it is still not translated into English and not covered by your MSM, than, it is question to you, isn’t it?
@Aristides, why is the video still not translated into English language and still not covered by your MSM?
No one had stolen their childhood, like Greta’s. Perhaps this is the case? Diab’s family are not professional actors and opera singers, they don’ receive grants. Diab’s family are ordinary Syrians, killed every day, who cares one more one less. Not a white vulnerable Swedish autistic girl, but a simple Arab boy who can be easily sacrificed. Who remembers his name, eh?
United Nations are so united, you know…
@Tatyana.
It was covered on all our news channels: BBC , ITV Channel 4 and Sky News. But it was portrayed by our TV reporters simply as a coerced performance; a stunt by Russia in order to deny clear guilt around CW use.
From what I saw, the people like Hassan Diab, seemed to be honestly recollecting what happened. No hesitation and fluid memory recall. You couldn’t force someone to act like that.
@Goose
The very fact that the boy is alive and arrived for testimony, this already serves as the proof that there was no fucking chemical attack, where he was shot as a victim, isn’t it? And the fact that the United States and its allies refused to attend this event should convey something to your citizens, or not?
As far as I know, your country does not consist of stupid people, unable to summarize 2 and 2 and get 4. If this is already too complex a logical construction, how did you get Sherlock Holmes, I wonder?
@Aristides
I know they are capable of incredible inhumanity, there are truly awful crimes happening in the ME that would seem far-fetched even in horror films. Sadistic toerags doing all manner of evil to captured prisoners. Someone even posted a video on twitter, on Trump’s official account, showing young kids beheading captured Syrian troops etc to Islamic music . Really sick stuff, needless to say it rightly got taken down pretty quickly.
@Tatyana (January 2, 23.20)
“The fact that the US and its allies refused to attend this event should convey something to your citizens, or not?”
Indeed. When presented with ‘the truth’ the Western establishment’s reaction is simply to arrogantly pretend it doesn’t exist, and can’t exist without their active endorsement.
The same happened when numerous independent researchers from several countries convened at the UN by invitation of Russia on 20 December 2018, producing irrefutable evidence (including video testimonies of named and identified former White Helmets, Syrian citizens and doctors) that the White Helmets were allied to jihadist terrorist organisations and involved in organ trafficking. The UK’s Vanessa Beeley also addressed the forum via video link. The US and its allies refused to attend the session as if by doing so would immediately discredit the presented evidence. Needless to say, Western mainstream media made no mention of the event either.
p.s. Happy New Year to you, Tatyana.
“We see now how the OPCW managed to produce a report which was the opposite of the truth.”
The truth is whatever the final report said, Craig. Recalls W Bush era official:
“The aide said that guys like me were ‘in what we call the reality-based community,’ which he defined as people who ‘believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.’ […] ‘That’s not the way the world really works anymore,’ he continued. ‘We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do'”
The OPCW scandal is right there with Iraq-WMD-Hoax, still not a single news media have reported on it in the mainstream media besides Fox news.
And its not right-wing media that refuse to cover it but liberal, leftist mainstream media.
Didn’t you previously write that Mr Blair is untouchable due to Crown immunity from prosecution?
Hasn’t the Cherry court case established that nobody, including the Crown itself, is above the law?
So, why still no prosecution of Mr Blair? I’m not suggesting he’s guilty of anything though. That would be for a court to decide.
Because the only court that try him is The International Court of criminal Justice over which the UK has a veto. See Peter Oborne s book.
Craig
Whilst you are at it you may also like to investigate the Labour AS hoax.
https://twitter.com/lauramstuart9/status/1210356934714499074?s=21
Indeed. The longest running, most cynical gaslighting exercise in British media history and maybe an even more unsettling example of everything Craig warns of above. As Alexei Sayle said, “There can be no greater injustice than anti-racists being accused of racism by racists.” The loudest accusers were those who most relish invading and trashing brown people’s countries and bombing innocents into dust.
you have to be a brave person indeed to venture into that territory. Baroness Tonge is the latest victim to have succumbed to the crime of speaking out. The full might of the Israeli Lobby is a truly frightening thing to behold.
Most newspaper comment columns have algorithms which automatically remove comments which might be described as anti-Israeli, particularly if they use the word ‘Jew’. Even this blog, I suspect, brings comments with the word up for inspection by the moderators.
You don’t have to suspect. It does. We used to have a serious problem with actual anti-semitic commenters (some of whom were I am pretty sure a security service operation to attempt to discredit the blog).
Not forgetting that old witch, Ann Clwyyd, who perpetuated the lie that babies were being thrown out of incubators by Saddam Hussein.
And not forgetting BLiar’s partner in the crimes, George W Bush. He and BLiar are still alive whereas millions in Iraq were either killed, shredded or burned. The country is still a wreck, 16 years on.
bush not just alive, but hanging out with friends like michelle obama, who called him a “dear, sweet man”. all one club.
Thank you, Craig for your excellent summary. The toxicology meeting report is very interesting:
They say an autopsy on any of the alleged victims would be “pointless” because their lung tissue will be too “degraded”.
And that:
“To elicit expert opinions … the toxicologists were shown numerous open source videos and photographs of alleged victims at the suspected scene of use of chemical weapons.”
I take it that “open source” in this context means “found on the internet”?
I am not a doctor, but I am confident that an assessment of the cause of death of individuals cannot be ascertained on the basis of photographs and videos found on the internet!
And Mr Henderson’s statement:
“Observations at the scene of the two locations … suggest that there is a higher probability that both cylinders were manually placed at those two locations rather than being delivered from an aircraft.”
This is criminal. That a full scale regime change war could have been planned on the basis of this is jaw dropping. It really is. There is no evidence to justify the air strikes. None whatsoever!
In my opinion wars and military action should never be started on this basis anyway. The OPCW is being used by the West as a means to start war, when it is supposed to be there to prevent it.
‘I take it that “open source” in this context means “found on the internet”?’
As someone who has been involved with the software industry for over 45 years, I submit that anyone who could use the term “open source” to refer to photographs and videos is an ignoramus (or deliberately deceitful).
Even the somewhat traditionally-biased Oxford English Dictionary says:
open-source
n adjective Computing denoting software for which the original source code is made freely available.
I’m glad you’ve mentioned that. It annoys me a little when I see ‘open source’ used to describe reports or photos. It’s difficult to know exactly what it means in this context. I think what it’s meant to imply is that the source is not known or declared therefore must be reliable. Which is shabby logic I believe. Bellingcrap refers to itself as open source investigative journalism. I guess from that we could say that ‘open source’ = propaganda for which Bellingcrap need not take responsibility for its veracity.
chilling times indeed when you have deep-state digital puppeteers like Cummings, Bannon etc. able to propagate this zombie state narrative to a mass audience with such an already deliberately weakened immune system.
Brilliant Post Craig..Thanks
I have been watching this OPCW Story’s new revelations the last few weeks .. With my Jaw on the floor.. That as you say, the frightening thing is the lies are so Brazen now.. But not a surprise.
Frightening times indeed for what the Elite, and MSM lies have in store for the World.. Especially the ME.. And those souls of Dark Skin.
It’s important to notice that the Douma business did not actually lead to war. They tried but failed.
Laguerre
All Ra Best For 2020
BUT ” They tried but failed.”
That is Absolutely NOT the most important issue here
Craig, this is truly magisterial work. You truly put the dysfunctional imbeciles that masquerade as our mainstream media to shame.
I take issue with only one part of this article: the idea that the ruling establishment have NOT learned the lesson that “it is wrong to attack and destroy an entire country on the basis of lies”. The undoubted wrongness of this simply does not compute in the eyes of the ruling establishment. If the destruction of a country achieves their geopolitical aims, any means to bring about this destruction are justified. Power is the only morality in this psychopathic calculus.
George Mcl
“…the ruling establishment have NOT learned the lesson that “it is wrong to attack and destroy an entire country on the basis of lies…”
wanna a fresh example?
https://ria.ru/20200101/1563067991.html
“The torchlight procession has been completed. About 1 thousand citizens are participating in it. 250 law enforcement officers ensure public safety and order. (*!!!*) No violations of public order have been recorded,” the police website said.
—-
anytime, in any country, the establishment will find that stratum that will gladly respond to lies. But more importantly, the rest of the population will be silent, afraid and “no-violations-of-public-order-have-been-recoreded”.
That’s what the establishment relies on.
Compare it to 2010 Victory day
https://andreistp.livejournal.com/4744272.html
An excellent piece Mr. Murray, and I thank you for bringing your observations and information from contacts we dont have to our attention. Incidentally, re your link to Peter Hitchens – there is no way I’m taking any notice of anything said by one who describes President Putin as “a sinister tyrant”. Perhaps he should study the man and his history with a mind free of prejudice before he makes such comments. They lessen his credibility in my assessment.
You always should have a critical mind for anything you read. And that means not assuming that just because part of an article is dodgy, the rest of it is too. I suspect that Peter Hitchens may be described as “paleoconservative” and much of what he writes strikes me as …well, dumb basically. The irony is that someone like him may occasonally have more perceptive things to say than others who might be described as “progressive”. Even Donald Trump can have something to say e.g. when he noted that the media had it in for him and was then denounced as a “conpsiracy theorist” …by that very media. This obviously doesn’t make Trump trustworthy. But as they say, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
I have to take issue with what you say here. I too find his characterisation of Putin annoying, but Peter Hitchens does have some very worthwhile things to say and can always argue his points carefully. He is generally very supportive of the Russian position, eg on Ukraine.
Mr Hitchens is often misunderstood because he is on the right politically, but he hates the Tories and is one of the few (if not only) Western mainstream journalists who openly wishes to see NATO disbanded.
He wrote of the Baltic Republics in 2017:
“In the time between their departure and their supposedly frightened scurry under Auntie NATO’s skirts 13 years later. (Thirteen years!) , there was no attempt made by Moscow to reassert control, despite (in two of the Baltic states) some rather stupid and indefensible treatment of the Russian minorities there. Perhaps they wish they had acted. As the Baltic States’ membership of NATO now puts Western forces in Narva 85 miles from St Petersburg, about the same distance as the short journey from Coventry to London. I’d like to see the US response if Canada joined a Russian military alliance and Russian troops were stationed in Montreal, four times as gfar form New York as Narva is from Petersburg.”
Full article here:
“Lemmings, NATO, the Russian Threat and the Merchants of Death – Some things people believe just aren’t true”
https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2017/02/lemmings-nato-the-russian-threat-and-the-merchants-of-death-.html
In the article Peter explains that NATO was expanded in response to lobbying from American arms manufacturers.
Well being honest he was a KGB agent, a weird guy whose sexuality is something of a mystery and an authoritarian. I lived in Moscow when his Nashi thugs started attacking foreigners. It wasn’t a pretty sight.
Huh?
“Well being honest he was a KGB agent…”
In other words, a member of his country’s security service. Like the FBI or MI5. Every country has one (or more) and they all have to use direct methods on occasion. Many senior American politicians have headed up the CIA, for instance – yet they are not criticized for it.
“…a weird guy whose sexuality is something of a mystery…”
What a weird thing to say. What do you mean by “a weird guy”, and what evidence have you for that? It sounds like sheer nonsense to me. Do you perhaps mean that he’s a Christian?
As for Mr Putin’s sexuality, (A) I believe he is married; and (B) it’s a private matter and none of your business. Maybe if he was a transsexual you would cut him some slack?
“…and an authoritarian”.
Gosh, the president of the largest country in the world, which is faced by greater threats than any other country without exception, and which has a tradition of authoritarian government. How amazing.
My dictionary defines “authoritarian” as “favouring or enforcing strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal freedom”. What government can you cite that does not? If you break the law (or merely annoy the ruling clique) in the UK or USA, rest assured that you will meet some people who favour and enforce strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal freedom. They’re called “the police”.
“I lived in Moscow when his Nashi thugs started attacking foreigners. It wasn’t a pretty sight”.
Oh, you mean the way foreigners were beaten up and abused during the World Cup?
As far as I know “Nashi” just means “Ours”. Wikipedia describes it as “a government organized non-governmental organization”, which I found very helpful and enlightening.
Thank you for this very important post.
I think the next logical question is simply this: where does this lead?
Absent palpable outrage, it seems likely to lead to epic disaster: dystopia, war, etc.
Also important to note: Obama ended the ban on propaganda ops against US citizens in 2013. The Empire is a bi-partisan project.
!!
I agree with your post. However, one of the important points you make is that Trump is indeed basically an Isolationist. He was the least worst choice in the last Presidential election and will be the least worst choice in the next one.
The reason for the trumped up (sorry…) Impeachment is not because of any high crime or misdemeanor, unless not going to war with Russia is such, but to try to remove him and regain control by one of the Globalist Elite, or at least destroy his prospects at the next election.
Trump does not want a war, with anyone basically; the American people have had enough of those, and he understands that.
Trump recently hosted the President for life of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in the White House, now Trump knows Erdogan is a very power hungry character, who is trying to undermine Cyprus and has decided in invade Libya, I am sure the Oil will not be part of his reasoning. It will not turn out well for the people of Cyprus or Libya.
Trump wants to stop Erdogan being part of the largest military project of all time, F-35,
on his part Erdogan is likely to remove Trump from Incirlik, which the Yanks paid for, apparently the U.S.A. keeps Nuclear weapons at Incirlik.
If Trump doesn’t want a war then why he is he trying so hard to start one?
– No follow-thru on North Korea peace;
– Seizing Venezuela government assets and threatening Cuba and Nicaragua;
– Occupying Syrian oil fields;
– “Locked and loaded” for war with Iran and a virtual trade embargo;
– Continuing the aggressive stance toward Russia;
– Continuing support for the Saudi war on Yemen.
= = =
IMO the clumsy non-impeachment of Trump is a self-goal arranged by establishment Democrats to re-elect Trump and blame the “radical left” / “socialists” for his re-election. The US Deep State is very happy with the MAGA Nationalist they installed in 2016. They still need him to help them meet the challenge from Russia and China.
!!
The Douma affair is a good case where, in spite of all the lies, it did not change the situation by a whit. Trump was still not encouraged to launch a war of regime change on Syria. As Obama before him. The prospects of such a war are not good. Russians, Syrian resistance, etc.
The same with Iran. It’s fine to blame Iran for something that happened in Iraq, but it won’t lead to anything, because the risks of attacking Iran were evaluated already in 2012, and rejected as too risky. The situation hasn’t changed.
The present tendency is provocation of internal rebellion, as in Hong Kong. That can’t work in Syria, as rebellion is worn out. In Iran they’re still trying, with the ethnic minorities. What the US doesn’t understand is that the Iranian regime is populist, appeals to the mass of the lower classes. The exiles, journalists, want a return to the days of the Shah.
And MH17 – the one that Kerry had seen the satellite evidence of the rocket launch but no one showed it to the JIT.
And the 1 million Ujghurs – a remarkable claim backed up with no evidence whatsoever (it would mean 400 camps to be spotted by Satellite, they haven’t proven 2).
And the 1 million+ HK demonstrators which once upon a time was only an organiser estimate.
And even Litvinenko – where the secret evidence prepared for the chair of the “Public” inquiry was presented by a certain Christopher Steele, colleague of Skripal runner, Pablo Miller.
Dhouma and the missiles – if I recall hardly any of the missiles hit their target. Either proof that the basic Russian missile system used by the Syrians is infinitely better than the best Nato can throw at it, or proof that the US and other Nato partners knew full well that the claim was a hoax and so tried to minimise the damage (they tried the same thing with Iran soon after, asked where to direct the missiles and got told to get lost).