Fourteen Republicans in the House Oversight and Reform Committee sent a warning letter to World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressing grave concerns about his questionable reaction to what they called the Chinese government’s role in exacerbating the COVID-19 pandemic, including its large-scale propaganda campaign…
Fourteen Republicans in the House Oversight and Reform Committee sent a warning letter to World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressing grave concerns about his questionable reaction to what they called the Chinese government’s role in exacerbating the COVID-19 pandemic, including its large-scale propaganda campaign.,Fourteen Republicans in the House Oversight and Reform Committee sent a warning letter to World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus expressing grave concerns about his questionable reaction to what they called the Chinese government’s role in exacerbating the COVID-19 pandemic, including its large-scale propaganda campaign. source: The Investigative Journal,The Investigative Journal
The security and defence policies of Britain and the other Western democracies are approaching a strategic crossroad. NATO has launched a “reflection process” to strengthen its political dimension. The British government is embarking on the most comprehensive appraisal of national security strategy in a generation. Yet the coronavirus plague will dramatically affect the direction of both reviews. The massive economic impact of Covid-19, with its implications for defence expenditure, and the clear evidence of the devastating potential of biological weapons, will inevitably cause a major rethink of national security resources, capabilities and threats. Meanwhile, the UK remains the leading European military power and NATO ally. Its exit from the EU does not affect this except that the UK is now less able to constrain EU ambitions to create defence structures separate from NATO, which will only weaken the Alliance and delight potential enemies.
Much has rightly been made of the importance of the Commonwealth network as part of the U.K.’s increased global presence – in terms of trade and security as well as values. There is great scope for enhancing this – but we should not forget other friends such as Georgia, on Europe’s vital eastern flank, one of just six Black Sea states, and a country where Britain has interests at stake.
At a time when NATO’s cohesion is under threat, and most European allies spend far too little on defence, Georgia is regarded as one of NATO’s closest operational partners. It contributes troops to the NATO Missions in Afghanistan at a higher level proportionately than any other country. The pro-Western government in Tbilisi is determined to fulfil the decision made by the NATO Alliance at its 2008 Bucharest Summit that Georgia will became a member of NATO. This is a goal shared both by the ruling Georgian Dream party, and by the population at large, where support for NATO membership runs at around 80%.
If this sounds fanciful – a small country, 20% of which has been illegally occupied by Russia since 2008, joining the largest Western military alliance – the process is in fact well underway. The NATO-Georgia Commission, meeting in Batumi in October 2019, agreed to refresh the so-called Substantial NATO-Georgia Package, already in existence for five years. It underlined increased Alliance support for Georgia including Coast Guard training and enhanced interoperability between Georgian patrol boats and NATO’s Standing Naval Forces. The Georgian government has recently acceded to NATO’s cybersecurity platform, becoming only the second non-NATO country (after Finland) to join the platform. The timing is no coincidence. Tbilisi has been on the frontline not just of territorial aggression but of cyber and disinformation attack from Russia, and the Georgian government, working hand-in-hand with the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and US intelligence services, has exposed Russian GRU efforts to cripple parts of the Georgian government’s online ecosystem.
It is for this reason that Prime Minister Giorgi Gakharia has explicitly called on Britain, and other NATO partners, to engage more assertively and consistently to support Georgia’s security, arguing that “Georgia’s geography, its defense and security attachments, and its proven commitment to Western and trans-Atlantic objectives make it an essential pillar of emerging strategies for NATO cooperation”.
Britain is no stranger to the Caucasus and fully supports Georgia’s economic and security aspirations including Georgia’s integration into European and Euro-Atlantic structures. Its commitment is set out in the comprehensive Strategic Partnership and Cooperation Agreement signed by Boris Johnson’s British Government with Georgia in October 2019. In addition to a comprehensive Free Trade Agreement, the 359-page document includes measures to combat terrorism and organized crime, respect the territorial integrity of Georgia and improve regional cooperation and confidence-building, as well as security undertakings. It should be noted that Britain also has strong positive relations with two of Georgia’s key neighbours, Turkey and Azerbaijan, for which Georgia provides the crucial bridge for the export of its Caspian oil to Europe.
The Georgian economy is growing at an impressive 4.5% per year, and the World Bank rates the country as the seventh best place in the world to do business (above 26 of the 27 EU countries) and recent economic and social reforms have resulted in poverty being cut in half in just a decade. Georgia places 12th in the latest global Index of Economic Freedom published by the Heritage Foundation, just 2 points below the UK and, incredibly, ahead of the US. The economic opportunity for the UK, and Georgia, is clear.
A dynamic economy is a key condition for security in such a volatile region of the world, stable democracy is another. Recent democratic reforms – the Georgian Dream government led a cross-party agreement on a new electoral system that was welcomed by the US, NATO and EU – have cemented Georgia’s pro-Western commitment.
For our part, Britain can once more engage in its own way with friends in many different – and challenging – areas of the world now that it has reasserted full control of its foreign relations, international aid, trade, and economic and security partnerships. Clearly, Britain’s long-standing and closest allies will be the priority for these intensified global relationships. But there are many other countries that respect the integrity and stability of British institutions, our intelligence, security and defence expertise, and the practical, robust experience that Britain brings to world affairs. Georgia was among the first of our friends to back post-Brexit Britain and seek a close future partnership. In return, we must now show our good faith and strengthen our relationship both with Georgia and with its friendly neighbours.
Recently, the World Health Organization and other sensitive souls have instructed the media (and the West in general) to stop referring to the new strain of coronavirus as the “Wuhan” or “Chinese” flu because of the racist connotations that this may entail.
It is common practice to often name diseases after the people who first described the condition -Asperger’s syndrome after Hans Asperger, Parkinson’s disease after James Parkinson, Alzheimer’s disease after Alois Alzheimer, and so on. Relatedly, naming viral diseases after a population or the site of their first major outbreak is also a customary modus operandi; West Nile Virus, Guinea Worm, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Ebola etc. Admittedly, viruses “come” from someplace, after all, thus people tend to gravitate towards disease-naming structures, which reference place names; on this note, I doubt we came up with “Lyme disease” because of some deep animosity towards Connecticut. Not to mention that “COVID-19” or “H1N1” do not exactly roll off the tongue. The latter was, until very recently, widely referred to as the “Spanish flu,” the world’s worst pandemic on record, killing an estimated 50-100 million people worldwide. The term “Spanish flu” has now retroactively fallen into disfavor as well, and to be fair there is some historical evidence that suggests that the virus may have actually originated in France or…China, but tracing the origins of another deadly virus back to China (!) is rather unfashionable right now. Spanish it is, then.
It is no secret that the Chinese government has been far more effective in stopping the spread of information about the coronavirus than in stopping the spread of the coronavirus itself. It was recently revealed that government officials destroyed samples and suppressed vital information that could have helped mitigate the impact of this new strain of coronavirus. The government reportedly silenced doctors who warned about the disease. Some were censured for “spreading falsehoods” or sharing test results with colleagues, and some were forced to write apology letters admitting that they ‘disrupted the social order’. Then again, the practice of punishing whoever reveals embarrassing truths has been the order of the day since at least the time of Confucius, in the sixth century B.C. and is an effective means of coercing stability in China. Now, however, muzzling the messenger has helped spread the deadly COVID-19, which has infected some 75,000 people.
But why did both SARS and the current epidemic break out in China? Well, eating game animals has a long history in China and supports a massive industry that has been encouraged by the state as a source of income for poverty-affected areas. Until January, breeding exotic animals had been a thriving business. Additionally, in recent years, the consumption of wild animals had also become associated with higher social status and wealth. For years, the Chinese government encouraged the commercial use of wild animals, promoting the practice as a way to “accelerate the growth of farming”. So, as news of the Wuhan virus spread online, videos showing Asian people eating bat soup started circulating widely on social networks, with captions suggesting that eating bats was a possible source of the Chinese coronavirus outbreak. A specific video showing a young Chinese woman, supposedly in Wuhan, biting into a virtually whole bat as she held the creature up with chopsticks soon became viral and thousands of Twitter users blamed the supposedly “dirty” Chinese eating habits -in particular the consumption of
wildlife- for the outbreak. Nonetheless, it was later revealed that the video was not set in Wuhan at all, where bat isn’t a delicacy. It wasn’t even from China. Instead it showed Wang Mengyun, the host of an online travel show, eating a dish in Palau, a Pacific island nation.
Unsurprisingly, at a time of heightened fear over a viral pandemic, images of Chinese people or other Asians eating insects, snakes, or mice made clickbait headlines, effectively re-introducing the old narrative that the Chinese and their so-called ‘disgusting’ eating habits were at the epicenter of the virus. Indeed, scientists suspect, but have not proven, that the new coronavirus passed to humans from bats via pangolins, a small ant-eating mammal whose scales are highly prized in traditional Chinese medicine. Wet markets where live animals are sold, mostly for medicine or food, still exist in most Chinese cities, and the Huanan Seafood Market was originally believed to be the source of this outbreak. China temporarily shut down all such markets in January, warning that eating wild animals posed a threat to public health and safety.
Generally speaking, many Chinese people would probably gourmandize dishes that most Westerners would consider unusual if not repulsive, but our dietary cultures and what kind of animals they include vary a lot and are quite arbitrary. Vegetarianism is ethically congruent but deploring the eating of dogs, while feasting on amiable pigs, isn’t really. And it goes both ways: A lot of East Asians, for instance, find the taste of lamb revolting. Dietary habits are as broad inside China as they are outside; the Cantonese habit of eating “everything with four legs save the table and everything that flies but the airplane” is a standing joke in the rest of the country. Now, when it comes to the much-dreaded Covid-19, it is not what is being eaten that matters as much as the poorly regulated conditions of China’s wet markets i.e. workers inadequately trained on public health management or food safety standards, the lack of hygienic practices and barriers at markets, and the absence or bribing of regulators and health inspectors. The H1N1 virus, after all, started not in any rare, uncommon species, but in pigs.
Actually, what lies beneath all that is a deeply-engraved cultural imperative; many wild animals in China are killed not for culinary reasons but due to folklorish or esoteric beliefs. Traditional Chinese medicine is based on the premise that certain foods have healing powers, a notion that encourages some hazardous habits. There is, for instance, the concept of jinbu, which roughly means ‘nourishing by taking in (food)’. This holistic theory rests on the assumption that food is not only fuel, but medicine for the body. Well-known kinds of jinbu include tiger bones for ulcers, typhoid, dysentery, burns etc; dried pangolin scales are used to treat malarial fever and deafness, while gallbladders and bile harvested from live bears are good for treating jaundice; bats, which are thought to be the original source of both the current coronavirus and the SARS virus, are believed to be able to cure eye diseases -especially the animals’ granular feces. Recent field studies suggested that masked palm civets (a mammal native to Asia and Africa) might have served as intermediate hosts between bats and humans. When stewed with snake meat, apparently, palm civets are said to cure insomnia. As a matter of fact, in many people’s eyes, animals are living for man, not sharing the earth with man. It is also thought that animals killed just before serving are more “jinbu” potent, which is one reason the more exotic offerings in wet markets tend to be sold alive (“wet” because the meat sold was only recently slaughtered, which also makes it more virus-friendly). To top it all, the government has been heavily promoting traditional Chinese medicine, especially under President Xi Jinping’s new nationalistic
undercurrent, and while officially pharmaceutical companies following this model eschew the wildlife trade, these beliefs have become firmly embedded in the Chinese collective consciousness.
Nevertheless, these practices are not legion across China. Nor are they uniquely Chinese. But the avian influenza was likely transmitted to humans from chickens in a “wet” market, too. Scientists have been warning for years that the eating of exotic animals in southern China “is a time bomb.” The Chinese government is perfectly capable of enforcing policies in wet markets to make sure that there is no food safety risk (and by extension that it is not killing everyone in the world with preventable zoonotic diseases); but is it truly willing?
If the fallout from the Wuhan outbreak changes anything for the better, it may be that it gives a push towards reform and streamlining of the control and management of wet markets. Unified management, along with thorough hygiene and regulation standards could also help prevent the next catastrophe. But as with so many past disasters in China, it could also mean a brief period of change before profitability and entrenched interests take precedence once again. Nonetheless, it is necessary to investigate the real causes behind this deadly epidemic, whatever their nature -because if we don’t, we will only be inviting the next one; and soon.
Yvonne Marie Antonoglou is a Senior Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington, D.C. based think tank. The Gold Institute actively engages in the discussion of foreign policy and defense concerns by those who have not only thought deeply about them, but who have actively participated in efforts to affect them. By providing both coherent thoughts, and recommended actions to address various issues, the Gold Institute aims to bring real solutions to real problems in real time
Everyone has their own favorite part of the Superbowl. Some people eagerly await the Game, the commercials, or the half time show. Halftime at the Superbowl is generally borderline family friendly fare for the millions of fans watching during their yearly ritual of watching the Super Bowl with family and friends. Admittedly in years past there have been ‘wardrobe malfunctions’ involving Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake. However, as bad it was, we were not mired in the investigations into sexual abuse by actor Bill Cosby, Hollywood director Harvey Weinstein, and Jeffrey Epstein.
Perturbed that Beyoncé and Jay Z did not stand for the National Anthem, my expectations for the half time show were quickly dashed when I realized that the NFL had failed miserably, allowing cheap sexual messages of bare skin and provocative dancing to take over the screen. What seemed missing to me was the loud and echoing message from the global #Me too movement, the one that highlights the rampant sexual abuse that is de rigueur and seemingly so prevalent in the entertainment business. Surely, TV executives haven’t lived with their heads in the sand during the past year and know just how important messaging is to the youth of this country? It seems like they are saying to do as I say, but not as I do.
We live in the most tolerant and women friendly country in the world. Yet it appears that the openly tolerant are actually intolerant and that sexual innuendo and female objectification is alive and well and helps to sell time for ads. In fact what transpired last night highlights how out of touch the organizers of the Superbowl must be to allow this raunchy and provocative show to go ahead: Jennifer Lopez making her entrance sashaying and cavorting off a stripper pole; she goes on to tear off her skirt to showcase her ripped abs and toned legs. She is 50. I get it. Show some modesty and self – respect Jennifer.
You would be forgiven for thinking this was strictly Adult entertainment.
In the age of the #MeToo movement, it seems incredibly hypocritical to tell our young and impressionable youth, that it’s okay to act provocatively on screen in front of millions of people, to wear skimpy clothing that seem to get more skimpy as the song is progressing, but yet don’t behave like we do, because doing so may just get you into trouble. Either we objectify women, or we don’t. We can’t have our cake and eat it. Seems like a tremendously mixed message, and one that we as the adults in this country, are sending to our youth. Enough is enough.
The Iranian regime is at a low point. This evil empire of the Middle East is in trouble due to several reasons, both political and economic.
Those who seek to topple the Iranian regime should seize the opportunity to tighten the net around Iran. It is in the interest of the United States and its allies, including those in the Middle East such as Israel and the Arab states. Getting rid of the Iranian regime will serve the Iranian people, as well. The anti-Iranian coalition has to initiate and increase steps against the Iranian regime.
Some of the protesters are supposed to be on Iran’s side since they are Shiites. (Iran is mostly Shiite, unlike most of the Arab states.) The protesters demand improvements to their quality of life by adding jobs and fixing public services. They also oppose Iran’s intervention in their country. They go against their own governments, which in both Lebanon and Iraq are heavily influenced by Iran and its allies. The demonstrations, therefore, are another part of the struggle against Iran. The anti-Iranian coalition needs to be cautious here in order not to allow Iran and its partners to argue that the unrest is planned by other states.
Nevertheless, those who just want a better life and wish to reduce Iran’s grip on their country should receive aid.
There were protests in Iran itself in recent years. The Iranian regime had managed to survive the recent wave of protests that occurred in November. More than 300 Iranian civilians were killed by the Iranian regime during the crackdown.
It shows how desperate the Iranian regime has become. The next wave of demonstrations against it might be stronger than the last one. The anti-Iranian coalition has to support the protesters, yet be careful not to give an excuse to the Iranian regime to present demonstrations against it as a Western plot.
The Iranian regime has not done enough to provide basic needs to its people. The 1979 revolution promised a lot for the Iranian people but failed to deliver. In spite of Iran’s potential and its vast oil fields, many of the people there are struggling to make ends meet. This is because the regime is corrupt and ineffective.
Furthermore, the regime prefers to pour its money into adventures in the Middle East.
Iran is involved in several wars in the region, supporting its allies in countries such as Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Lebanon. The cost to Iran has been more than $20 billion in Syria alone. Iran sees that as necessary for its national security but so far this approach certainly has not paid off for the Iranian people.
This policy is executed at the expense of raising the living standards of the Iranian people. Iran’s strategy also brought heavy sanctions against it that crippled its economy and caused more suffering to its people. It is causing enormous resentment against the Iranian regime. Iran is digging its own grave.
The Iranian regime has high ambitions: to be the superpower of the Middle East.
Therefore, Iran gives its protégés not just money but also weapons and advisers. Sometimes, Iran even sends its own troops to fight in places like Syria. All that effort demonstrates how eager Iran is to expand — regardless of the cost for many in the region, including many Iranians. The anti-Iranian coalition has to be strong and united so it can block and contain Iran. It will weaken Iran and buy time until the regime there collapses.
Iran is striving to build nuclear weapons. This project has been going on for several decades now and it is very expensive, another example for Iran’s willingness to ignore the needs of its people in favor of other goals.
Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons in order to have enough military strength to do whatever it wants. Iran has breached the 2015 nuclear agreement that is supposed to limit its nuclear capabilities. If the country actually tries to produce the bomb, it must be stopped by the anti-Iranian coalition. All the options have to be on the table, including the military one.
The Iranian regime is doomed to fail; it is only a matter of time considering the country’s foreign and domestic policy. The huge cost of corruption, poor management of domestic affairs and eagerness to take over the Middle East will eventually bring it down. Meanwhile, the economic pressure on Iran is growing. The anti-Iranian coalition must continue.
This article was originally published as an Op-Ed in The Western Journal on 20 December 2019.
We are living through a period of increasing threat to our security. This comes from dangerously well-equipped rogue states, from international terrorism, and from random hi-tech dissidents. Each threat requires a different type of response. Yet public opinion in Britain is apparently not convinced of the need to spend more on defence and security, which is the foremost duty of the state.
Britain’s defence faces additional challenge at this moment. At home, there is the possibility of an extreme Left-wing government whose leaders have expressed support for the Queen’s enemies and for regimes most hostile to western democratic values. Abroad, the EU is now obsessed with two essentially French ideas of “strategic autonomy” and a European Defence Union. These will lead to separation from transatlantic allies and from non-EU European states, including Britain and Turkey.
Over the years, national vetoes on EU policy have been removed in more and more policy areas and EU competences have been expanded at the expense of our national governments. It is now proposed that previously sacrosanct areas of foreign and defence policy will be handled by ‘Qualified Majority Voting’ – national governments would then no longer have ultimate responsibility for the deployment, equipment and lives of their armed forces.
Josep Borrell, a member of the Spanish Socialist Workers Party, has just been anointed as the new EU Foreign and Defence chief, the so-called High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. He will control over 139 EU ’embassies’ with nearly 7,000 staff costing some £500 million. He has a military staff, scanning the globe for opportunities to run up the EU flag on military operations. So far it has notched up some 30 operational “Common Security and Defence Policy missions”. Most were self-generated. Few stand up to scrutiny. There was no requirement for the EU as such to be involved in any of them.
France’s leadership has always seen Britain as a ‘Trojan horse’ for American influence on European security. They have been trying to remove this influence for the past 60 years. France left the military part of NATO in 1966 while keeping her seat at the NATO top table. She returned in 2009 only to be the driving force in creating separate EU defence structures that imitate NATO. The highest European strategic priority should be to ensure the continued commitment of the US to the security of Britain and continental Europe, as the ultimate guarantor of peace. NATO, an inter-governmental organisation, is designed to achieve
this. The EU will never have the necessary strategic credibility to deter our potential adversaries.
Military capabilities take time to develop but are quickly lost. Aware how drastically our armed forces have been cut over the past 30 years, many of us have persistently called for a significant increase in real defence spending in the UK and for upgrading NATO. At the same time we have opposed EU defence policy, not through any shallow motive, but because we see it for what it is – a political project.
The continental states, but also Britain, all need to spend more on national defence capabilities, revitalising NATO and stepping up to form coalitions of the willing rather than meekly going along with the creation of alternative EU structures, which sap material and political resources and send the wrong signals to our enemies.
Those pushing European integration see the defence realm as key to their political objectives. Far from strengthening the alliance of the democracies at this time of unprecedented challenge, the ‘EU army’ idea will further dilute what limited capabilities exist, blur responsibility, and send the wrong signals to our adversaries. The EU also aims to create a defence industrial development programme with common procurement rules that would effectively keep the Americans out of the EU defence market. All this will lead to division and a widening of transatlantic difference. In time of crisis, the democracies are best served by sitting around the same table to decide on a response. NATO is designed for precisely that. In spite of the fact that 22 EU countries are also NATO members, the EU wants to meet separately, keeping the Americans out. Moscow and Teheran can only be delighted.
Our incoming Prime Minister will face many immediate and enormous challenges. High among these will be our national defence and security. Clearly someone with Jeremy Corbyn’s beliefs cannot be allowed anywhere near our armed forces, our nuclear deterrent, our defence industries or our intelligence services. Boris Johnson is well aware that improved defence capabilities are not only essential for our national security, but central to our ambitions to enhance our global presence post-Brexit and to play a leading role in the development of our hi-tech industries. In support, much will need to be done to develop positive public understanding.
Rather than us being the needy one, Britain must once more become the indispensable ally that others need.
How an Islamist Organization Set Up a Top Member of the Trump Administration With The Complicity of a Venal Press and Corrupt Politicians.
The set-up
This story starts, as so many others, with officers in the Obama administration misrepresenting the truth, and goes on to the criminal targeting of an American hero in a caper that, as I am writing this, still goes on.
It started at the Act! Meeting on July 15, 2016. In the first part of this video you can see President Obama lying about himself, Radical Islamic terrorism and then candidate Donald Trump. On minute 10:30, General Flynn walks into the stage and by minute 13:30 he expresses his opinion on Obama’s friend, Tagypp Erdogan, and the military coup then taking place in Turkey.
What General Flynn stated then is as absolutely true today as it was the day he stated it, to wit: Turkey is a NATO ally that until very recently was seeking entry into the European Union. Under Kemal Atatürk it was established as a secular state with a strict separation between church and state, and under its Constitution it was the military’s resposibility to ensure the protection of that secular state.
Erdogan’s Welfare Party, reborn as the Justice and Development Party, has been at pains to destroy that secular state since its irruption in the Turkish political scene in the 80’s in association with that other Islamist, friend of the Clintons and head of the Hizmet Movement, Fetullah Gülen.
Listen to General Flynn. He is no friend of political Islamism, and he states so with unusual candor. He was not happy with the Obama administration’s coziness with the Turkish radical Islamists, and states so with equal candor. That did not endeared him to President Obama or his minions.
Keep that in mind, for this is ground zero of a scandal still unfolding before our eyes.
On September 15, 2016, General Flynn’s consulting firm, The Flynn Intel Group (FIG), filed a Lobbying Registration form under the Lobbying Disclosure Act of 1995. Notice that the firm was already registered, and this filing was merely to add a new client, Inovo AB, of the Netherlands.
Everything the General stated in that op-ed is true and consistent with his views before and after any work his firm may have done on behalf of Inovo AB. Indeed, Turkey is our NATO ally, whether Erdogan and his minions like it or not. Yes, our ally is in trouble, in the grasp of an Islamist movement that aims to throw it back to the Middle Ages; and yes, Fettulah Gülen is both a friend of the Clintons, to whom he owes his fraudulently obtained residence in the US, and he “portrays himself as a moderate, but he is in fact a radical Islamist.”
Turkish Minute‘s hit piece was the first to describe Inovo as a Turkish government entity linked to Erdogan. As we shall see, a falsehood that the American press and, worse, the Independent Counsel were too lazy or too corrupt to vet, and totally debunked by Judge Anhony J. Trenga on July 9, 2019, as he precluded any mention of it in a trial associated with FIG: “it is further ORDERED that Defendant Bijan Rafiekian’s Motion In Limine to Preclude the Government from Arguing that Turkey Funded FIG’s Work for Inovo AG be, and the same hereby is GRANTED…”
These planted articles in the partisan press mimicking the one in Fetullah Gülen’s broadside were deemed sufficient grounds for a letter from the ineffable and quite unlamented Elijah Cummings on November 18, “requesting documentation.”
This was the signal for large media corporations and partisan bloggers to pick up the canard and run with it.
The first one to bite was, not surprisingly, NBC. Then came, in quick succession, Witf, Quartz, Commentary, NBC, The New York Times, Fortune, PBS News Hour, Foreign Policy, AEI and last, but not least, The Huff & Puff, with this jewel by Jessica Schulberg. Ms. Schulberg, either the most ignorant scribe in a profession riddled by ignoramuses, a functionally illiterate nincompoop or, more likely, a willing participant in a shameless campaign to discredit Trump’s nominee to head the NSC, carps: “Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn said in July that the military’s attempt to overthrow the government was ‘worth clapping for.’ Now he calls Turkey an ally.” In point of fact, Turkey was then and is now a valuable NATO ally of the US; the Turkish Army’s declared objective of performing its Constitutional duty to act as guarantors of the secular Turkish state was, indeed, “worth clapping for;” and despite the whining of the American left, Erdogan and his Islamist minions are NOT Turkey. The fallacies in this article are the same that were later picked up by the Special Counsel, if somewhat embellished.
The barrage ended as suddenly as it had begun. As if whoever was pushing the narrative had decided it was time for a pause, the news disappeared from the American press just as the FBI began its “investigation” into General Flynn based on the patently false narrative concocted by an Islamist publication controlled by Fetullah Gülen with assistance from Rep. Elijah Cummings, lest that other and equally false charade, the “Russia investigation,” proved insufficient.
It was February 2017 before any mention was made of the Turkey caper again. This time, it was ushered in by the Washington Post as part of a “timeline” leading to the General’s resignation.
Then, on March 7th 2017, following pressure by DoJ officials, a new Flynn Intel Group FARA registration took place. It contained a disclaimer that, as far as FIG knew, “Inovo is a privately owned company that has not received, directly or indirectly, funds or financial support from any government during the course of its engagement of Flynn Intel Group Inc., including the Republic of Turkey.”
Yet, the following day, the Associated Press quickly went on the spin: “A lawyer for the former U.S. Army lieutenant general and intelligence chief said in paperwork filed Tuesday with the Justice Department’s Foreign Agent Registration Unit that Flynn was voluntarily registering for lobbying thatcould be construed to have principally benefited the Republic of Turkey.” And the headline read: Former Trump aide Flynn says lobbying may have helped Turkey. Of course, neither can that benefit be inferred from the FARA filing, nor has anyone at any time since provided any proof of such a relationship.
The canard was safely planted in the American consciousness, and it was time to let the Special Counsel do its job.
Anybody who has taken even a cursory look at General Flynn’s career would know that whoever suggests that he may, at any time and for whatever reason, been in cahoots with or attempted to assist in any way the leader of an Islamist movement is a driveling galoot, a brainless parrot or a shameless liar. Oftentimes, all three, as the articles quoted above show. The idea is simply preposterous. Yet, months of endless repetition through a myriad of news outlets took their toll and be it through ignorance or malice, many in Washington subscribed to the canard without the slightest effort to get at the root of it. This was, in turn, exploited by those who were only too happy to create problems for the fledgling Trump administration.
By May 2017, the story had all but died, though it has been revived, like clockwork, on the first week in November of every year since, notably, and with more vigor than usual, as I discussed in social media at the time, on the eve of the charges filed against General Flynn.
On September 13, 2017, an article saw the light on NBC News: Mike Flynn’s Son Is Subject of Federal Russia Probe, by Julia Ainsley, Carol Lee and Ken Dilanian, three partisan hacks and the most prolific pushers of that absurd “Russia” canard.
“Michael G. Flynn, the son of President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, is a subject of the federal investigation into Russian meddling in the presidential election and possible collusion between Moscow and the Trump campaign, according to four current and former government officials.
The inquiry into Flynn is focused at least in part on his work with his father’s lobbying firm, Flynn Intel Group, three of the officials said. It’s unclear when the focus on Flynn began.”
“The younger Flynn,” the three scribes added for effect, “worked closely with his father, whose connections to foreign governments, including Russia and Turkey, have been a subject of federal and congressional investigations.”
We know how those “investigations” started in July 2016 (Russia) and in December 2016 (Turkey), made public when Acting Secretary of Justice Sally Q. Yates invoked an obscure—and probably unconstitutional—law, the “Logan Act” to justify her meddling based on an equally absurd theory planted using the same methods as the Turkey Canard…but let’s take a closer look.
The investigation on General Flynn, fraudulently concocted by Sally Q. Yates, was ostensibly over two phone calls he had made as part of his work as designated National Security Advisor, fully sanctioned and with knowledge of the outgoing administration’s State Department and, as usual, set up by illegal leaks to the press to frame the story:
“As you know, the Committee has been very concerned regarding the purported unauthorized disclosures of classified information, particularly when they pertain to intelligence collection on, or related to, U.S. persons (USP). To take a prominent example, a January 12, 2017 article in a major newspaper was the first to claim that “Retired Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, [then President-Elect] Trump’s choice for national security adviser …. phoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak several times on Dec. 29. Such stories would appear to contain the unauthorized disclosure of USP identities. This potential misuse is a key reason why the Intelligence Comununity (IC) has developed robust ”minimization procedures” for the protection of USP information, including requiring the “masking” of USP identities in most circumstances.” See page 189 of the House Intelligence Report.
The Report’s conclusions are damning: “U) Finding #22: General Flynn pleaded guilty to making a false statement to the Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding his December 2016 conversations with Ambassador Kislyak,even though the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents did not detect any deception during Flynn’s interview.” And, we might add, even though the FBI cleared General Flynn of any wrongdoing two days before that interview, as reported on January 23rd by the Washington Post.
Why did General Flynn, then, took a plea at all? How did we get to that point? As President Trump stated on December 13, 2018, “They gave General Flynn a great deal because they were embarrassed by the way he was treated…” and we are going to dissect that process now.
…
General Flynn was interviewed regarding those conversations on January 24, 2017, barely a day after the FBI announced the end of the investigation, by two FBI agents led by the now infamous Peter Strzok and Joe Pientka. Strzok conducted the interview and Pientka was responsible for taking notes and producing the report. That interview was arranged by Deputy Director Andrew McCabe under orders from Director James Comey. Later, Mr. Comey admitted that the purposefully ignored protocol to ensure that General Flynn would NOT have the assistance of Counsel. Still, Strzok and Pientka found the general to be open, candid and truthful, just as none of the other characters involved (Sally Yates, James Comey and Andrew McCabe) seemed to agree on the predicate for the investigation.
…
We now know that, for months, the DoJ and later the Special Counsel failed to break General Flynn into admitting any wrongdoing for the simple reason that, as the FBI knew since January 23rd, 2017, there was no wrongdoing.
Then it all changed. Taking a page from Andrew Weissman’s misdeeds in the Arthur Andersen caper a few years earlier, the Special Counsel began threatening the general with involving his family in endless litigation, regardless of the absence of predicate: Give us something or we are going after your son, too.
The threat took on an ominous public dimension with that piece from Ainsley, Lee and Dilanian on September 13, 2017, resuscitating the Turkey Canard and threatening the general’s family, to boot. Still, it did not work. Until November 5, 2017, that is.
“Federal investigators have gathered enough evidence to bring charges in their investigation of President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser and his son as part of the probe into Russia’s intervention in the 2016 election, according to multiple sources familiar with the investigation.”
Really? They had evidence? Not really. But the threats finally had the desired effect.
Facing the possibility of his son being endlessly dragged through court on trumped-up charges, the man who had faced danger and enemy fire on behalf of his countrymen countless times caved in and negotiated a deal that involved pleading to a BS charge of lying to FBI investigators regarding the two phone calls in exchange for his son’s freedom from harassment.
The Plea Agreement, drawn on November 30, 2017 was filed the following day with Judge Rudolf Contreras, a friend of former AG Eric Holder and FBI agents Peter Strzok and Lisa Page with many explanations due in reference to FISC orders to spy on the Trump campaign.
As part of that agreement, General Flynn signed a Statement of the Offence, copping to two “serious crimes”: that of not revealing that he had asked the Russian ambassador “not to escalate” after the Obama administration recklessly expelled 35 Russian diplomats days before a new administration was sworn in, and that he “did not remember a follow up conversation.”
As insurance, and as a reminder of the consequences if he reneged, he was made to add a paragraph on the Turkey canard, for which NO CHARGES were ever proffered:
Where did that FARA filing come from? As you will recall, FIG had filed its FARA registrations timely, adding INOVO as a client in September 2016. Yet, in March of 2017, as General Flynn was under investigation for the Russia hoax, he was under great pressure from the DOJ to make and additional filing. The effort was spearheaded by David Laufman:
“the FARA division, including Mr. David Laufman, Department of JusticeNational Security Division, Chief, Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, wereputting unprecedented pressure on Covington to complete and file the FARA registration for Flynn Intel Group (“FIG”). Mr. Laufman directed this effort despite the fact he tendered his resignation just days before his high pressure phone call to Covington (the same day of Mr. Flynn’s resignation as National Security Advisor) in which it would appear that Mr. Laufman was threatening subpoenas before Covington even filed. Indeed, the FARA unit was so eager to have FIG’s filing that Ms. Heather Hunt—then head of the FARA section—responded to Covington at 10:50 pm the night it was filed.”
As part of the Plea Agreement, General Flynn waived indictment, thereby relieving the prosecutors from any burden of proof, and waived his right to trial, thereby surrendering himself to the will of the Court.
On December 1st, 2017, Judge Contreras presided over the Plead Hearing: “Why don’t you go through the facts that you think you can prove at trial?” He asked the prosecutor. A lengthy exposition followed regarding the phone calls to the Russian ambassador, but no reference was made, and no questions were asked, regarding the singular closing statement to the Statement of Offense, the immateriality of the alleged false statements, and the lack of benefit for the defendant on a lopsided agreement where no underlying crime existed. And just like that, with a few more formalities, Judge Contreras accepted the plea.
On December 7th, barely six days after accepting this obnoxious plea, for reasons that are still unclear, Judge Contreras recused himself and the case was reassigned to Judge Emmett Sullivan.
A few days later, as was his custom, Judge Sullivan entered an order demanding that the prosecution disclose all “evidence [that] is material either to guilt or to punishment,” what is generally known as a “Brady” order.
On February 16th, 2018, he further clarified his Brady order“Finally, if the government has identified any information which is favorable to the defendant butwhich the government believes not to be material, the government shall submit such information to the Court for in camera review.”
After a series of delays and requests for postponement, Judge Sullivan called the parties to his presence on Agust 15th, 2018, before he would consent to any further delay:
“It was easier to bring you in and have a discussion, especially since I’ve never had the occasion to meet with this group, and there was a level of discomfort at the thought of just appearing at a sentencing proceeding for someone I’ve never met before, so I didn’t want to do that. So this gives me an opportunity to engage with Mr. Flynn and with counsel and to discuss the issue of sentencing, which is foremost.” He ended the very short session with: “I’ve read the transcript. I was deprived of the opportunity to engage you at the plea sessions, the case was before another judge. It’s difficult to discern demeanor, but I read the transcript. We’ll have discussions on the sentencing date, and I’m sure I’ll have some questions for you or your attorney.”
As we shall see, that he did.
While charges were never filed against General Flynn on the Turkish matter, the Special Counsel periodically raised the subject. The most egregious reference was made in the “Sentencing Memorandum” filed on December 4, 2018, states”
“On election day in 2016, the defendant published an op-ed for the Turkey project that called for the removal of a cleric residing in the United States whom the President of Turkey blamed for the failed coup in that country. See Michael T. Flynn, Our ally Turkey is in crisis and needs our support, THE HILL (Nov. 8, 2016). The cleric’s responsibility for the coup attempt was a subject of great debate, and the defendant’s op-ed about the cleric’s role was valuable to the Republic of Turkey’s efforts to shape public opinion. The defendant falsely represented in his FARA filings that the op-ed was written at his own initiative, as opposed to for the Turkey project and the Republic of Turkey, and thus again deprived the public of the very transparency FARA was designed to ensure. The defendant’s false statements impeded the ability of the public to learn about the Republic of Turkey’s efforts to influence public opinion about the failed coup, including its efforts to effectuate the removal of a person legally residing in the United States.”
Think about this.
General Flynn was never charged in connection with any crime involving the Republic of Turkey. His opinion article in The Hill was the exercise of an American citizen of his right under the Constitution to express his opinion without hindrance, AND IN PUBLISHING THE SAME HE DID NOT DEPRIVE ANYONE OF ANYTHING. Further, the prosecution alleged that facts (whether relevant or not) were false, without providing any rational for their assertions, an impossibility given the nature of the OPINION piece.
In fact, if there was anyone who was being deprived of anything, it was General Flynn, facing unsubstantiated allegations on matters that were not related to his case without the possibility of challenging it in court or confronting his accuser.
As to the unfounded accusation that he had published that op-ed “for the Turkey project and the Republic of Turkey,” perhaps we should be reminded that nowhere did the prosecution ever submitted ANY proof that would back-up any such work on behalf of the Republic of Turkey.
Mueller’s Special Counsel managed in that short sentence, to trample upon three dear amendments in our Bill of Rights, the most damning, perhaps, that of attempting to criminalize opinion.
Alas, the Judge could not help but be influenced by this grievous assault on our liberties, but not in the way I expected. With consternation, sitting beside Sarah Carter and Tom Fitton and not far from Sidney Powell, I heard the Judge go on a rant (for which he later apologized) stating that IF these facts were true, the general may have committed treason. The work of the Special Counsel was done.
A galactic sized “IF.”
I expected the General’s counsel to go ballistic over this shameful display. Nothing. Crickets. Not one mention of the prosecution’s efforts to criminalize legal behavior to influence the court.
No wonder he sacked them.
It started well enough. Judge Sullivan stated that “I cannot recall any incident in which the Court has ever accepted a plea of guilty from someone who maintained that he was not guilty, and I don’t intend to start today.”
Fair enough.
But when General Flynn refused to take down his plea and insisted he was ready for sentencing, the Judge changed his tone:
“In certain special circumstances, I have over the years appointed an independent attorney to speak with a defendant, review the defendant’s file, and conduct necessary research to render a second opinion for a defendant. Do you want the Court to consider appointing an independent attorney for you in this case to give you a second opinion?”
Again, the answer was no.
“Do you still want to plead guilty, or do you want me to postpone this matter, give you a chance to speak with your attorneys further, either in the courtroom or privately at their office or elsewhere, and pick another day for a status conference? And I’m happy to do that.
The reply: “I appreciate that, but no, Your Honor.”
After making some very pointed questions regarding the misconduct of Peter Strzok and Andrew McCabe (who, by then, had repeatedly committed perjury before Congress and been sacked from the Special Counsel and the FBI), and discrepancies in the various memoranda of the FBI interview and the 302, the Judge insisted:
“Mr. Flynn, anything else you want to discuss with me about your plea of guilty? This is not a trick. I’m not trying to trick you. If you want some time to withdraw your plea or try to withdraw your plea, I’ll give you that time. If you want to proceed because you are guilty of this offense, I will finally accept your plea.”
General Flynn’s answer: “I would like to proceed, Your Honor.”
Then Judge Sullivan went into a rehash of the case:
“I’m going to request that you gentlemen have a seat because I want to, for the record — and again, because I wasn’t the original judge who accepted the plea in the first instance, I want to talk about the plea agreement and the facts that are relevant for the Court’s consideration…”
And he went on a long discourse finally arriving at the point that concerns us:
“Finally, Mr. Flynn made false statements or omissions regarding his contacts with foreign governments, specifically, the Republic of Turkey, when filing documents with the Department of Justice pursuant to the Foreign Agents Registration Act, commonly referred to as FARA.
On March 7th, 2017, Mr. Flynn filed multiple documents pursuant to the Foreign Agents Registration Act. In the filings, he made false statements or omissions by stating that his company, the Flynn Intel Group, Incorporated did not know whether or the extent to which Turkey was involved in a project he and his company performed, quote, for the principle benefit of Turkey, end quote, when, in fact, Turkish officials had supervised, approved, and directed the work his company performed…Finally, Mr. Flynn made a false statement that an op-ed he
published in the Hill on November 8th, 2016 was written at his own initiative, when it was actually written for Turkey’s benefit at its direction and under its supervision.
At the time the Turkish officials were directing and supervising this work, Mr. Flynn was also serving as a senior national security official on the Trump Campaign.”
None of this is true, and later events at another court prove that the prosecution was purposely misleading the Court.
None of this is remotely related to the charges at hand, and yet, the Judge swallowed it hook, line and sinker, leading him to his final matter:
“Mr. Flynn’s total offense level is 4. And having no other criminal history, his criminal history category is 1. Therefore, the applicable Guideline range is zero to six months of incarceration with one to three years of supervised release…Is Mr. Flynn still cooperating with and providing assistance to the government?”
Yes he was. In the trial being brought against two of his associates on FIG, Bijan Rafiekian and Ekim Alptekin.
After a lengthy interrogation relating to that trial, the Judge addressed General Flynn:
“So, if you proceed to sentencing today, which is your prerogative and only yours, the Court will have to impose a sentence without fully understanding the true extent and nature of your assistance. Do you understand that?”
The one who was not understanding was, alas, the Judge:
“Two months later you again made false statements in multiple documents filed pursuant to the Foreign Agents Registration Act. So, all along you were an unregistered agent of a foreign country, while serving as the National Security Advisor to the President of the United States.
I mean, arguably, that undermines everything this flag over here stands for (indicating). Arguably, you sold your country out. The Court’s going to consider all of that. I cannot assure you that if you proceed today you will not receive a sentence of incarceration.”
Alas, General Flynn was never an agent for a foreign country, registered or not, and, since his original FARA registration for FIG was on September 15th, 2016, he was never an unregistered agent for ANY entity. Further, when he acted as a registered agent for INOVO, a private Dutch corporation, he was NOT holding ANY government job, let alone National Security Advisor.
Two years of fake news and the misleading statements filed by the Special Counsel, together with the ineptitude of general Flynn’s attorneys had left the judge with the wrong picture. Further wild speculation ensued on Turkey, General Flynn and even General Petreaus. Still, Judge Sullivan did NOT want to proceed to sentencing, and called for a recess.
Upon his return, he was all apologies:
“I made a statement about Mr. Flynn acting as a foreign agent while serving in the White House. I may have misspoken. Does that need to be corrected?”
“MR. VAN GRACK: Yes, Your Honor, that would be correct, which is that the conduct ended, I believe, in mid-November 2016.”
“All right. That’s what I thought, and I felt terrible about that. I just want the record clear on that…All right. I also asked about — and this is very important — I also asked about the Special Counsel’s Office. I also asked questions about the Special Counsel and the — and other potential offenses for the purpose of understanding the benefit, if any, that Mr. Flynn has received in the plea deal. I wasn’t suggesting he’s committed treason. I wasn’t suggesting he committed violations. I was just curious as to whether or not he could have been charged, and I gave a few examples. And, you know, there are a lot of conspiracy theorists out there. I’m not taking the elements of any of the uncharged offenses into consideration at the time of sentencing.”
Bet you someone pulled his ears in recess.
Of course, the American lugenpresse made headlines with Judge Sullivan’s rant and conveniently relegated his apologies to a footnote, at best.
The trial of Bijan Rafiekian and Ekim Alptekin,in the Eastern District Court of Virginia, in Alexandria,exposed the Turkey Canard for the fraud it is: A lie concocted by the propaganda arm of an Islamist organization, peddled by dishonest scribes and politicians to create a narrative then used by corrupt officials in the DoJ and the Special Counsel to browbeat a US general into admitting wrongdoing that never took place in order to destabilize a duly elected President and his fledgling administration.
Indeed, we have seen how an article in the propaganda rag of the Hizmet Islamist movement created the Turkey Canard with the assistance of Rep. Elijah Cummings and Democrat operatives pretending to be journalists. Then, we saw how that lie was exploited by SC Mueller, Andrew Weissman and a slew of discredited FBI agents to bring pressure upon General Flynn to plead guilty to some BS process crime where no underlying crime had been committed and no lie had been told.
Before we get into the unraveling, there is the question of why was General Flynn chosen as a target.
The Target
The first time I wrote about the case of former National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn, in May of 2017, I stated that I thought the general had not committed any crime.
I still do not think so.
But in the last year and a half I have come to the conclusion that others have, and the actions of the Special Counsel have done nothing but reinforce that notion.
To understand the targeting of General Flynn and its implications, we have to go back to the days in which he joined General Stanley McChrystal in Iraq. Most will remember General McChrystal as the man sacked by the Obama administration after some members of his staff made disparaging comments regarding the Appeaser-in-Chief in a Rolling Stone interview.
But few know him as the man who, together with General Flynn, revolutionized the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), creating the most effective network to combat terrorism, and leading to the death of Abu Musab al-Zarkawi and Osama bin-Laden.
After his return to the US, General Flynn continued his work in the highest levels of our intelligence community until his nomination, on April 17, 2011, as Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).
After hours of otherwise normal statements, in which General Flynn referred to the threats facing this nation from China and Russia to Iran and Islamic terrorism, the bomb dropped. You can find it on pages 28-29 of the transcript (bold is mine):
“Senator CRUZ. Did either of you during those seven and a half hours have any conversations with Secretary Clinton during that attack?
Mr. CLAPPER. I did not.
General FLYNN. No, Senator.
Senator CRUZ. Okay, thank you. Previously this committee had a hearing with then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and General Dempsey in which Benghazi was discussed at considerable length. General Dempsey at the time expressed his views—and I’m paraphrasing, but—that the nature of the attack, and in particular the fact that multiple mortar shells hit a rooftop, demonstrated to him at the time that it wasan organized military attack.And he said something to the effect of that he thought it was obvious that it was an organized military effect. I would be interested with both of you if you agree with that assessment that it was obvious at the time?
Mr. CLAPPER. No, sir, it was not. The one thing they did—there were really two or three phases of the attack.I would characterize the attack on the Temporary Mission Facility much more of a vandalism and looting thing. The mortar attack which took place, it took about 10 or 11 minutes, demonstrated some operational proficiency. I would commend to you, which I don’t know if you’ve seen it, sir, a briefing that we put together that visually recreates as best we could what the actual events. I’d be happy to have that brought to you so you could see our best replication of what occurred during the phases of the attacks.
Senator CRUZ. I would be appreciative of that, thank you. General Flynn, do you have anything to add on that?
General FLYNN. I would just say that, you know, personally my instincts were that what we were watching was, particularly on the specific date, wasclearly something that was not what I would call normal activity, based on the strategy assessments that had already been made over the last number of months. And I know that from our perspective there was a sense thatthis was probably more organized, and we of course judged that over the next few days.
Boom.
While Director Clapper was taking pains to disregard General Dempsey’s assessment of the Benghazi attack as not a military operation but “more of a vandalism or looting thing” akin, perhaps to a hooligan’s tantrum after a poor performance of England’s team at the Euro Cup, here comes the new guy with an honest assessment. Essentially, General Flynn called bullshit on Director Clapper’s testimony and on the official mantra of the Obama administration. In a public hearing. In front of cameras. Without theatrics: Vandalism my Rhode Island butt, he seemed to say. This was an organized attack, planned over several months, and what we observed afterwards confirms it.
General Flynn did his duty that day. He provided the Senate with straight, unvarnished, honest answers. And in the process, he made powerful enemies. His answers showed others in the intelligence community for the lying partisan hacks they were. Robert Mueller, James Clapper and John Brennan were shown for the asses they were. And they never forgave him for that.
If Director of National Security Clapper, CIA Director Brennan and FBI Director Mueller resented General Flynn’s honesty and — as it turned out — his accurate assessment, things were about to get worse.
Over the following two years, Congressional records abound of instances in which General Flynn refused to play ball and compromise National Security for some fleeting political scheme of the Obama administration, including his refusal to doctor intelligence reports to satisfy the political dictates of the White House until, on 30 April 2014, a year ahead of schedule, he was pushed out of the DIA.
Obama could not tolerate the head of the DIA exposing his absurd lies anymore.
Despite latter day claims from Obama operatives and their minions in the press, there was no conflict with General Flynn other than his refusal to compromise National Security in the altar of political expediency and, in fact, he remained as DIA Director for months until his successor was approved and continued to hold security clearance. In fact, the Obama administration renewed his National Security Clearance as late as January 2016.
But then he did, again, the unthinkable.
Rather than go gentle into that good retirement night and spend his remaining years surfing or knitting socks, he went public with his opposition to the insane policies the Obama administration was pursuing in Syria, such as arming al-Qa’ida factions, enabling Russia and Iran and isolating democratic forces there; as well as the infamous Iran deal and the enabling of Hezbollah in Mexico, and calling for much needed transparency.
Almost immediately the press attacks began, initially in Politico and Mother Jones, moving on into The Atlantic and the New York Times. Those attacks reached fever pitch when General Flynn became one of the most prominent campaigners for candidate Donald Trump, and became an outright effort at political assassination when he became President-elect Trump’s designated National Security Advisor.
About the time they began pushing the Turkey Canard floated by the scribes of Fetullah Gülen.
Here we have a man who refused to compromise his integrity to cover for the Obama administration’s lies in Benghazi, and who knew exactly how President Obama snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory in Iraq bungling the fight against terrorism, how it screwed-up our relations with Middle Eastern countries and how it empowered Islamists from Ankara to Teheran…about to become National Security Advisor!
In late of 2016, as the President-Elect was being spied on as he had been during the campaign pursuant to fraudulently obtained FISA warrants, a decision was made to stop General Flynn from taking the lid off of the proverbial can of worms and to destabilize the incoming President.
The Plot
This decision was made at the highest levels of the Obama administration and it involved top officials, from John Brennan (who was to be head of the NSA if Hillary Clinton had been elected), Ben Rhodes, Susan Rice, Sally Yates, James Comey, and a score of second tier acolytes, from Andrew McCabe to Tashina Gauhar. The now infamous battle cry in the offices of Andrew McCabe, Deputy Director of the FBI, “F*ck Flynn then F*ck Trump”, while dramatic, did not originate there, but much, much higher in the totem pole.
Fearing, perhaps, the consequences of her actions, Secretary Rice sent to herself a peculiar email on her way out of the White House. In it, she memorialized a meeting at the Oval Office on January 5, 2017, in which disgraced DAG Sally Q. Yates and Director James Comey were present, together with VP Biden and Secretary Rice.
“President Obama began the conversation by stressing his continued commitment to ensuring that every aspect of this issue is handled by the Intelligence and law enforcement communities ‘by the book’. The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective. He reiterated that our law enforcement team needs to proceed as it normally would by the book.”
“By the book.” Why would it be otherwise? Methinks he protests too much.
Never mind this jewel: “The President stressed that he is not asking about, initiating or instructing anything from a law enforcement perspective.”
Why would anyone, least of all the President of the United States, feel the need to stress what he is NOT asking about? It does not happen that way. I have been to hundreds of meetings and seen minutes and transcripts from thousands more. They all stress what is being asked about, not what isn’t. The only reason why Sec. Rice may have slipped that sentence there, is to create a narrative of “plausible deniability.” If the brown stuff ever hit the fan…the President was sure to stress that is not what he wanted. A rather sophomoric attempt, even by Ms. Rice’s standards. Maybe she should have stressed that any subsequent investigation was no more than a “spontaneous demonstration.”
As if to prove this point, the narrative was stressed ad nauseam by the lugenpresse, like Trevor Aaronson’s piece in The Intercept on December 19,2017, as General Flynn was being forced to accept bogus charges, “The FBI Routinely Abuses Its Powers but the Trump Investigation Has Been By the Book.” Sure. By the book! By who’s book, though, nobody is saying.
Sec. Rice was not done: “From a national security perspective, however, President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia.”
Who gave the outgoing President the authority to limit access to information to his duly appointed successor?
Under what article of the US Constitution or Federal Statute was Mr. Obama entitled to keep his successor in the dark?
Alas, we now know that the entire Russia Canard was concocted by the Clinton campaign in collusion with the Obama administration with the sole purpose of defeating candidate Trump and, when that failed, to impede a smooth transition of power.
Sally Yates and James Comey left the room with marching orders. As Director Comey’s disgraced Deputy so inartfully put it three weeks later: “First we f*ck Flynn, then we f*ck Trump.”
At the same time that disgraced Deputy Director McCabe was launching his battle cry on the 7th floor of the Hoover building, Sally Q. Yates was pulling straws to give the putsch a semblance of legality. This is the same Sally Q. Yates canned for refusing to implement an Executive Order she deemed “unconstitutional” (as if the arrogant galoot had any power to determine the constitutionality of anything) and which the Supreme Court found “squarely” within the President’s authority (so much for Ms. Yates “ruling”on a Constitution she seems to be insufficiently informed).
Like Mussett’s “Mimi Pinson,” out went Sally Yates in her battle gear to execute the orders emanating from the White House:
Mimi Pinson est une blonde,
Une blonde que l’on connaît.
Elle n’a qu’une robe au monde,
Landerirette!
Within the confines of her limited legal mind, all Ms. Yates could do was to rescue from oblivion a law that no one had the testicular fortitude to invoke in over two centuries: The “Logan Act.” In January of 2017, accompanied by Mary McCord, head of the DoJ NSD, she tried to push that theory to the White House counsel Don McGahn, fresh from that infamous meeting in the Oval Office, and Peter Strzok’s “informal” interview with General Flynn, and in May she moved full steam ahead in a media campaign to smear the general on that flimsiest of basis.
The Logan Act (1 Stat. 613, 18 U.S.C. § 953, enacted January 30, 1799) is an 18th Century law that was used in only one indictment in the early 19h century and never used to prosecute anyone for the good reason that any prosecutor with more than two days of schooling knows that it would never survive a constitutional challenge. Besides, contrary to Ms. Yates insinuations, General Flynn was not acting as a private individual in his conversations with Amb. Kislyak but as a member of the transition team, fully authorized by and with knowledge of the DoS and the incoming and outgoing administrations.
In her meetings with the White House, Yates invoked her “fears” that General Flynn “might be compromised with the Russians” and suggested he should be sacked.
President Trump, confronting an unprecedented campaign within the government to damage his transition, with John Brennan withholding security clearances, the Vice President sophomorically sinking his foot in his mouth, the DoJ NSD interfering in the flow of information between AG Sessions and the NSC and Acting AG Yates undermining government policies at every turn, and receiving bad advise from Chris Christie and Reince Priebus, finally gave in. The President was trying to reach across the aisle and believed Christie’s and Priebus’ advise that General Flynn needed to be “sacrificed” given the animosity he provoked in Obama’s and Clinton’s partisans, but he was ruefully mistaken.
Priebus went as far as to ask Kathleen McFarland to write an email stating that the President hadn’t ordered Flynn to discuss sanctions with Amb. Kislyak. McFarlane refused. To her credit, she was not going to lie.
“Now that we fired Flynn, the Russia thing is over,” Christie tells us President Trump said to him over lunch. And he probably believed it.
Alas, to those bent on disrupting his presidency, that was not perceived as an olive branch but as a sign of weakness, and their efforts redoubled leading to the appointment of Robert Mueller as Special Counsel to investigate the absurd idiocy of “Russia Collusion,” whatever that means.
Robert Mueller brought aboard as his right-hand man Andrew Weissman, one of the most corrupt prosecutors to disgrace the legal profession in this country, to go by his demeanor in the Arthur Andersen case a decade earlier, with his convictions of Arthur Andersen employees overturned by the Supreme Court 9-0 and everyone asking how can anyone be convicted on the commission of no-crime.
As Justice Scalia pointed out: “It doesn’t make any sense to make unlawful the asking of somebody to do something which is, itself, not unlawful.” Like, say, an incoming NSA contacting his counterparts and advancing the incoming administration’s policies.
Weissman, in turn, brought in a variegated collection of rogues and perjurers that had been pushing this fantasy since the campaign, and who had been instrumental in the effort to legitimize a salacious if false “Dossier” commissioned by the Clinton campaign as the predicate for this sordid affair.
An Instrument of Oppression
One of the oldest instruments of oppressive regimes is the enactment of convoluted laws that, in the words of Cotton Mather are “as impossible for us to know, as dangerous for us to break,” thereby rendering every citizen of this commonwealth a criminal.
Our forefathers were right on the mark: The purpose of ambiguous and obscure laws is no other than to subject every citizen to the possibility of being prosecuted for violations of law he was in no position to understand, let alone follow. Never mind that inanity (Logan Act) invoked by Sally Yates. FARA legislation falls into such description. So much so, in fact, that Judge Anthony Trenga, in open court on June 28, 2019, was forced to state that he needed further study because “That’s what I’m having trouble understanding here,it’s a convoluted statute.” making any interpretation of it a difficult exercise.
If a Federal judge has trouble interpreting a statute, the rest of us are doomed to be pawns of unprincipled prosecutors and subject to their will.
The Unravelling
In the end, judge Trenga delivered a blow to the prosecution in the Rafikian case, and an even bigger one to the Flynn case:
“The proffered evidence reflects discussions between Alptekin and Rafiekian concerning the retention of FIG’s and Flynn’s consulting services,none of which on their face reflect or suggest any agreement tohave Rafiekianoperate as an undisclosed Turkish agent or cause the filing of a false FARA statement.The evidence does reflect the interest and involvement of the Turkish government in the project…”
“…but those references are in the context of Alptekin’s then on-going, preliminary, formative business discussions with FIG…Moreover, any inference of an agreement by Rafiekian to act as an undisclosed Turkish agent is substantially undercut by his contemporaneous conduct, which included seeking out legal advice concerning his FARA disclosure obligations in August 2016 (from Covington) and again in September 2016 (from Kelley), and subsequently filing an LDA disclosure statement pursuant to Kelley’s advice. Similarly, the FARA statement and related filings do not reflect the existence of the alleged conspiracy to act as undisclosed Turkish agents or to cause the filing of a false FARA statement, or Rafiekian’s knowing participation in any such conspiracy. The government contends that the FARA statement contains materially false statements, attributable to Rafiekian. But what was disclosed in the FARA statement is not sufficient to allow any inference of the alleged conspiracies.”
The allegation in question, as the one invoked by SC Mueller in the Flynn case, was that:
“In late October and early November 2016, Gen. Flynn of Flynn Intel group developed an op-ed article based, in part, on the research conducted by Flynn Intel group under the Inovo engagement. The op-ed was not written or published at the request of, or under the direction or control of, Inovo, the Republic of Turkey, or any other party. No compensation was received for the publication of the op-ed. In addition to Gen. Flynn, Bijan Rafiekian and an editor, Hank Cox, participated in the drafting. Inovo, Mr. Alptekin, and the Republic of Turkey did not participate in the drafting. Nonetheless, the op-ed addresses the subject matter related to the research that Flynn Intel Group conducted for Inovo, and a draft of the op-ed was shared with Inovo in advance of publication. No changes, other than technical edits, were made in the op-ed based on feedback from Inovo. To the best of our knowledge, Inovo did not communicate with the Republic of Turkey regarding the op-ed or provide the draft op-ed to the government.”
What is the crime? One may ask, and the answer remains what we posited all along: NONE.
Additionally, as General Flynn continued to refuse to lie to conform to the prosecution’s narrative, an effort was made to change his status from witness to co-conspirator.
Judge Trenga would have none of it:
“the proffered co-conspirator statements are excluded on the basis thatthe United States has not presented sufficient evidence of a conspiracytoestablish the co-conspirator statements hearsay exception under Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(2)(E)”
This came to the attention of Judge Sullivan, who immediately requested the parties to inform him how this developments affected the Flynn case before him. The reply by Sidney Powell is damnably clear:
“The government’s remarkable effort to reverse its direct, affirmative judicial admissions to the EDVA Court and representations to counsel that Mr. Flynn was not considered a co-conspirator in the Rafiekian case does not diminish his extraordinary cooperation and assistance to the government. Judge Trenga ruled the government has not even proffered sufficient evidence of any“conspiracy”to allow co-conspirator hearsay into evidence—much less a conspiracy involving Mr. Flynn.”
“As new counsel for Mr. Flynn briefed for Judge Trenga, the government raised new questions, to which Mr. Flynn gave truthful answers the prosecutors did not like; however, Mr. Flynn’s testimony remains consistent with his grand jury testimony, and it is truthful. The government’s attempted retraction of its judicial admissions that Mr. Flynn is not a co-conspirator appears to be in retaliation for Mr. Flynn’s truthful testimony because it is contrary to Mr. Van Grack’s “view”of the matter—the mere suggestion of which prompted his angry outburst.”
“Furthermore, as we briefed for Judge Trenga, the government, which ‘is no ordinary party to a controversy,’ should be bound by its repeatedrepresentations to the court and to counsel. These are judicial admissions.”
“The documents, only a few of which Mr. Flynn provided to Judge Trenga, demonstrate the FARA division, including Mr. David Laufman, Department of Justice National Security Division, Chief, Counterintelligence and Export Control Section,were putting unprecedented pressure on Covington to complete and file the FARA registration for Flynn Intel Group(“FIG”). Mr. Laufman directed this effort despite the fact he tendered his resignation just days before his high-pressure phone call to Covington (the same day ofMr. Flynn’s resignation as National Security Advisor) in which it would appear that Mr. Laufman was threatening subpoenas before Covington even filed. Indeed, the FARA unit was so eager to have FIG’s filing that Ms. Heather Hunt—then head of the FARA section—responded to Covington at 10:50 pm the night it was filed.”
“Neither he [General Flynn], nor the Statement of Offense, recited that he authorized the filing knowing or intending it to be false. He cannot acquiesce to the government’s demand for that testimony, because it is not true. His former lawyers’ own notes reveal that he instructed them to “Be precise.” He cannot and will not testify otherwise.”
“But lack of evidence of a conspiracy as to Rafiekian would apply in spades to any involvement of Mr. Flynn. Significantly, despite Mr. Flynn’s endless cooperation, Judge Trenga recognized thatthe government proffered nothing from Mr. Flynn to establish the existence of any conspiracy.”
“The court also held that the disclosures in the FARA statement itself do not‘allow any inference of the alleged conspiracies’.”
“…former counsel had all the emails and information that the government claims supports a ‘conspiracy’ and more when they completed the FARA filing. Moreover, according to Covington’s own notes, and consistent with what they told Mr. Flynn, prior counsel admittedly ‘did not necessarily go through every doc; were trying to capture high-level info of who client was and nature of work’.”
Throughout this process, General Flynn has been candid, open and cooperative. According to judge Trenga:
“As part of his cooperation, Flynn, in his capacity as CEO and Chairman of FIG’s Board of Directors, (1) authorized Covington to share with the U.S. Attorney’s Office certain information concerning the preparation of the FARA filing; (2) authorized FIG’s former in-house General Counsel to be interviewed regarding the legal advice he provided to FIG before Covington’s retention regarding FIG’s obligation to file under FARA; (3) submitted to interviews by the U.S. Attorney’s Office about the FARA submission and the factual information he and others shared or did not share with Covington lawyers who were working on preparing the FARA filing; and (4) authorized Covington to disclose to the U.S. Attorney’s Office the factual representations made to them by FIG personnel in connection with the FARA filing; the source of those factual representations; information concerning who reviewed drafts of the FARA filing and their comments, corrections, or questions thereto; and how they received communications from FIG personnel concerning the contents of the FARA filing.”
All of this required hundreds of hours of interviews, numerous travels from Rhode Island to Washington and hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees at General Flynn’s expense for the benefit of the government. But the prosecution would have none of it. Faced with the Generals refusal to conform his testimony to their narrative in spite of what he knew to be true, they returned to the threat of involving his son in baseless litigation:
“Mr. Flynn cooperated even further with the government in trying to clear up the prosecutors’ misunderstanding of some crucial facts and in response to their questions and demands. Instead of seekingand confirmingthe truth, prosecutors doubled-down, putting prior counselin conflict with hisformer clientand his partner’s own contemporaneous notes. Then,the government made a sealed, ex parte filing, complete with a gag order that would not allow Mr. Flynn to discuss the developments even with his wife, and an FBI agent called Michael G. Flynn (Mr. Flynn’s son) to question him despite knowing he was represented by counsel.They have now put his son on the witness list. Mr. Flynn made a significant production to the government on June 27, 2019, for which he specifically waived attorney-client privilege and protections of the work-product doctrine with respect to contemporaneous notes and emails from prior counsel. The notes show conclusively that even though one member of Mr. Flynn’s former firm may not recall some points, another member’s contemporaneous notes establish that Mr. Flynn’s statements to former counsel were consistent with his testimony to the grand jury and EDVA prosecutor.” See here.
Final Recap
Let’s recap. Turkish Minute, an online portal allegedly published by anonymous “Turkish journalists in exile” but actually the child of Yavuz Altun, publishes an article smearing General Flynn and fabricating what we may rightfully call “The Turkish Canard,” suggesting some laughable connection between the general and the Erdogan administration. Launched on November 6th, 2015, in Paris at the time Yavus Altun was also editor of “Püff,” a satirical supplement to “Zaman” the newspaper of the Islamist “Hizmet Movement” led by Fetullah Gülen.
Once supportive of Erdogan, the paper was seized by the Turkish government in March 2016 as part of the crackdown that followed the falling out of favor of Hizmet and Gülen. The Paris based online version, Turkish Minute, escaped the crackdown and continued as the propaganda arm of the Hizmet Movement, as it does to this day.
After a few additional articles, all referring to the first ones by Chuck Ross and Yavus Altun in Politico, The Daily Caller, The Intercept and Yahoo News, Rep. Elijah Cummings sent a letter to VP-elect Pence requesting information: “President-elect Trump promised during his campaign that he would ‘drain the swamp,’ but his top national security advisor is Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, whose firm is reportedly being paid to lobby the U.S. Government by a close ally of Turkey’s president. It is unclear how Lt. Gen. Flynn was reportedly allowed into intelligence briefings during the campaign despite these apparent conflicts of interest.”
The letter makes specific reference to Michael Isikoff’s piece in Yahoo, a sequence reminiscent of the “Steele Dossier” double play, in with Isikoff’s publication of the “Dossier” leaked to him was then used as supporting evidence for the “Dossier” itself before FISC, only a few months before this caper.
Isikoff writes: “A Trump transition spokesman did not respond to questions about whether Flynn had made such disclosures. But Rep. Elijah Cummings, the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the terms of the memorandum raise questions about whether Flynn is even eligible to continue to receive national security briefings at this point.”
In other words, Cummings feeds the information concocted by Yavus Altun and parroted by Chuck Ross to Isikoff who is then used as a source by Cummings, whose letter then is quoted by Isikoff opening the door to NBC, The New York Times and PBS’ News Hour and, through syndication, across the planet.
And that’s how you set-up a target and get him ready to be abused by a combination of prosecutorial misconduct, abuse of power and exploitation of ignorance.
Incidentally, neither Isikoff, nor Cummings nor any of the meretricious participants in this fraud risk naming the “close associate of Mr. Erdogan” they invoke, lest they face an uncomfortable denial.
If there was a conspiracy in this three-ring circus, we might call it a Conspiracy of Dunces, in which President Obama conspired with members of his cabinet (Susan Rice, Joe Biden, Sally Yates and almost certainly Loretta Lynch and Ben Rhodes) to undermine candidate, President-elect and then President Trump’s transition of power by creating unnecessary international conflicts on the eve of President’s Trump’s inauguration and then using the crisis to undermine his appointments with the assistance of John Brennan, James Clapper, James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, Bruce and Nellie Ohr and a score of “career” bureaucrats in the White House and the Department of Justice, and using those same actors and the connivance of Judge Rudolph Contreras to spy on Mr. Trump’s campaign and transition team making Watergate look like a youthful prank in comparison.
During what we now know to be the fraudulent “Russia Collusion” investigation, they also took allegations from the Islamist Hizmet movement to imply that General Flynn was secretly working, of all people, with Taggyp Erdogan to advance the interests of his own Islamist government, all the while assisted by unscrupulous pen-pushers like Chuck Ross and Michael Isikoff in an incestuous circle in which partisan hucksters pushed narratives in the press that were then legitimized by equally unscrupulous politicians to be used by unscrupulous prosecutors.
General Flynn was thus forced into a Faustian bargain: Admit to a “crime” he did not commit or face not only his but his son’s financial ruin. For almost three years now, they have held Damocles’ sword over him and his son while ensuring his voice is silenced, not only in regards to his case but on any of the issues this country may benefit from his vast experience.
In the intervening time, after dozens of millions of dollars and with the unlimited power of the government at their disposal, Mr. Mueller and his band of “angry Democrats” were forced to admit what we already knew: That the “Russia Collusion canard” was just as absurd as it sounded from the beginning.
And now we know that the fantastic story whipped up by the minions of Fetullah Gülen and used unmercifully by the Special Counsel to threaten General Flynn into compliance was what we always knew it was: A hoax. A lie. A fraud.
Judge Trenga, finally, has spoken the truth:
“the United Statesmay not argue or state to the jury that Turkey, in fact, funded the work by Flynn Intel Group, Inc.(“FIG”) under the contractual arrangement between FIG and Inovo, BV.”
All the allegations made by the lugenpresse and by the prosecutors in the Flynn and Bijan cases are so false a slander, indeed, that it could not be mentioned in court!
There is no evidence, not even by the low standards required at this stage to state in any way that Turkey funded the work by FIG or General Flynn for INOVO AG. None.
And that is what Judge Sullivan relied upon last December to chastise a man of impeccable service to this country for over 30 years!
Flynn’s attorneys at Covington, whom he hired to help him navigate the FARA waters in 2016 and upon whose counsel he relied during the filing process and afterwards, transferred “hundreds of thousands of documents” that his new defense team had to study before they could effectively defend him.
Hundreds of thousands of documents.
And, one might add, over five million dollars in attorney’s fees for a simple plea on an alleged process crime. Some lawyers do know how to bilok a case for all its worth.
Now, as we await Judge Sullivan’s determination of General Flynn’s counsel’s Motion to Compel and subsequent filings, with a tentative sentencing hearing scheduled for December 18th next (a year to the day of the first one) General Flynn will, as a soldier who has seen it all in combat, continue to bear his cross with stoicism and will come out of this still as an American with an abiding love for his country and his countrymen, ready to sacrifice what needs be to the nation he adores and the ideals he holds sacred.
The shame of this grievous injustice lays squarely on the liars and rogues who enabled, concocted and executed this scheme, and on the rest of us, who allowed this travesty to happen in what was once called the Land of the Free.
With our Mid-East policy in disarray, China and Russia have not missed a beat and are stepping in to fill the gaps. It is clear the intention of their advances in technological research and development (R&D), military and otherwise, is to surpass the U.S.’s global distribution and ultimately become the dominant player in this area. As recently as May 2019, it has been reported that U.S. allies in the region have been meeting with the Chinese to become a Cyber hub for their Belt and Road Initiative.
While President Trump has been engaging China on trade talks, Xi Jinping has continued the largest military buildup of the last hundred years. On October 1st China’s military exhibited to the public much of their high-tech weaponry, of which about half have never been seen before, leading many to question what they are not showing.
With Russia’s hypersonic weapons and China’s cyber and space capabilities, it is no longer enough to keep up with the Jinpings, but rather is the time for the U.S. to step up and leave these questionable characters in our technological rearview mirrors. One such opportunity for the U.S. to take a significant step forward is with the upcoming merger of Raytheon Co (RTN) and United Technologies Corp (UTX). The mergers of such companies would create innovation powerhouses that would not only place the U.S. on track but give the necessary bandwidth to surpass competing nations in relatively short form.
In 1889 the commissioner of the U.S. patent office, Charles H. Duell, was widely quoted as saying, “Everything that can be invented has been invented,” something that in 2019 we know is farthest from the truth. The race for technological advances within the defense sector has a far greater impact than in any other sector. In an age where there is a renewed weapons race between the U.S. and its adversaries, mergers like this one between Raytheon and United Technologies become ever more significant.
Just recently, a Saudi oil field was attacked by 18 drones allegedly from Iran. No longer are attacks of this precision that have global ramifications only able to come from superpowers like the U.S. or Russia or China, but also now by rather small countries like Iran.
China has emerged as a global science and technology leader, with strong funding in research and development (R&D), which from 2000 – 2016 has risen to almost 25.1% in global R&D. Russia is leading the race in hypersonic technologies, something that the United States has yet to be able to defend against, and Iran has placed a great deal of their efforts in weaponizing Cyber and EMP. The U.S. is currently in catch up mode.
With every passing day, month and year, our weapon systems and those of our adversaries become more and more advanced and our systems more antiquated. Just recently, it was reported that Strategic Automated Command and Control Systems (CACCS), the communications system that controls the U.S. nuclear program would no longer use 8inch floppy disks. Arguably our most important weapons program is using a system that was created 50 years ago when the Oldsmobile Cutlass was the bestselling American car.
With the 21st century weapons race well underway and insufficient to keep up with the Jinpings technologically, we must also surpass the Jinpings in research and development (R&D).
Looking back on the past 15 years, there is little doubt that the 9/11 attacks profoundly altered the landscape of international security. Over the last decade and a half, there has been a tremendous multiplication of counter terrorism measures, laws, policies at regional, national and international levels. The events of 9/11 and -more recently- the phenomena of ISIS, “homegrown terrorism” and “foreign fighters”, set states and international bodies on an accelerated path of law making and institution-building, (Kaunert & Leonard, 2012). Domestic and international counter terrorism initiatives include specific provisions to permit, require and fund technologically innovative measures to counter terrorism; thus smart borders, (smart) surveillance, data retention/collection and sharing, passenger name record exchange etc., feature heavily in the hyper technologized operational continuum of contemporary counter terrorism, “where the production, retention, processing, and deployment of data has taken centre stage”, (De Londras, p.1., 2017). Although an array of difficult questions stems from the current risk prevention rationale regarding counter terrorism practices and the balancing act between security and democratic oversight, this study will take a step back from the specifics of technological advancements (in relation to counter terrorism measures) to focus on a more structural, ethical and deontological aspect: effectiveness. It is no secret that research conducted to evaluate the actual effectiveness of counter terrorism measures is worryingly insufficient or outright non-existent. Taking into account that the adoption of certain counter terrorism practices can potentially have implications with regard to human rights, institutional liberties, core democratic principles and the Rule of Law, it is crucial that engaged and systematic efforts in researching the effectiveness of counter terrorism measures are implemented in a rigorous way. The lack of empirical research is -by no means- a problem exclusive to counter terrorism but empirical evaluation is vital in clarifying and debunking prevailing beliefs regarding counter terrorism practices, (Jackson, 2016). It must be noted, however, that one can discern a number of challenges and technical difficulties when attempting to measure the effectiveness of counter terrorism. Van Um and Pisoiu argue that a major point of contention is the lack of a universally accepted notion of what an effective counter terrorism policy is supposed to bring about, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). In other words, there is a need for a solid conceptual framework that could provide a critical overview of effectiveness -understood in terms of the extent to which objectives for the measures implemented have been achieved-.
Framing Context
It is perhaps trite to remark that terrorism –and counter terrorism for that matter- did not begin on 9/11; rather, terrorism has long been employed as a modus operandi by organizations and individuals, attempting to achieve sociopolitical and/or other goals. For certain countries, violence associated with terrorism has long been a fact of life and many of these countries have had relevant anti-terrorism legislation in place for years, (Sunga, 1997). Thus, in effect, laws, policies and regulations (occasionally with a plethora of implications for the social equilibrium) pursuant to a risk prevention/securitization rationale are nothing new at the domestic level, (de Londras, 2017).
It is also not the case that the concept of “transnational terrorism” is fundamentally or qualitatively new. Standard terrorist operating procedures -i.e. shopping center bombings, assassinations, suicide bombings, hijackings, civilian aircraft bombings, spree shootings etc. – were repeatedly observed far before 9/11, (Jarvis, 2008). Nevertheless, 9/11 did represent a significant, path-breaking moment in a broader historical trajectory, since it was collectively perceived as an unfathomable trauma, ushering in a qualitatively new time of fear and insecurity, (Jarvis, 2008). Yet, for all of that, it is safe to say that the September 11 attacks certainly marked the end of an era and the beginning of another, mainly because they sketched the contours of contemporary counter terrorism and shaped the context in which the notions of justification, effectiveness and impact (of counter terrorism measures) are analyzed.
Conceptualizing Effectiveness
The conceptualization of effectiveness (of counter terrorism measures) has been complicated by the variability and multidimensionality of the empirical phenomenon it seeks to describe. In other words, the understanding of effectiveness is largely dependent on the perspective, priorities and broader purposes of the person or entity making the assessment, (SECILE, 2016). In the abstract, effectiveness could be positivistically equated with “the achievement of general objectives”. In the context of counter terrorism, however, this simple methodological continuum is complicated by three exogenous variables: i) the fact that particular counter terrorism measures are part of a broader operational framework and may have both meta objectives (relating to overall security matters) and specific objectives (relating to the measure in particular), ii) the fact that both the meta- and specific objectives may not be lucidly elaborated iii) the possibility of certain measures devised for one purpose being applied to other issues or having unexpected effects in relation to other areas, (SECILE, 2006).
As already suggested, a universally accepted definition or framework of counter terrorism effectiveness does not exist in the literature to date, (Van Dongen, 2009). The literature is currently limited to a hypothesized conceptual self- evidence or specific indicators regarding stand-alone terms such as impact, success, effects, etc., (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). Subject-matter expert Martin Mazé defines effectiveness based on whether the measures “actually make a difference” and particularly focuses on the societal impact as an effectiveness indicator. He expressly notes that ex post facto evaluations rely heavily on outputs rather than impact per se; subsequently the effectiveness analysis “risks excluding key societal indicators”, (Martin-Mazé, p.5, 2013). It is worth noting at this point that the societal perception regarding the effectiveness of counter terrorism measures is also largely determined by three different arguments, central to the rationality of the Western political discourse: the exception argument, the balancing metaphor (between security and liberty) and the trade- off model, (de Londras, 2015). These conceptual continua are the ideological backbone of the societal perception of CT effectiveness. This (societal) approach of CT effectiveness is often analyzed through an output-outcome-impact trichotomy, an epistemological framework originally developed by Young (2001), (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011, Martin-Mazé, 2013). Generally speaking, output effectiveness would refer to the adoption of a measure, policy instrument, or regulation in response to a threat; in this instance, effectiveness is assessed in relation to the behavior of the policy makers charged with the implementation, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). Outcome effectiveness, contrarily, would examine the direct and measurable effects that a given policy framework has in real life; as in, it would also take into account the behavior of the targeted group (in addition to the policy-makers) in relation to the short-term objectives of the specific CT policy implemented, such as disrupting the financial flows or the recruitment process of a terrorist organization, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). Finally, impact-effectiveness depends on the behavior/reaction of the targeted audience alone, with regard to the long-term objective of the CT policy, namely its success or failure in reducing or stopping terrorism, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011).
It is interesting to note that the effectiveness denominator is not something that most legal analyses tend to focus on, in general; they rather focus on the necessity, legality and proportionality of CT measures, (Vermeulen et. al., 2013). Vermeulen, Deering and McCarthy argue that effectiveness is predominantly evaluated in a factual sense and is assessed by reference to the intended results a CT measure is supposed to produce, (e.g. “expedition of the prosecution of suspected terrorists or the freezing of suspected terrorists’ assets”), (Vermeulen et. al., p.16, 2013). The legal perspective may not directly make out a prima facie case of effectiveness but it does consider other variables such as whether a CT measure is compliant with democratic values and principles and/or whether it is “strictly required by the exigencies of the situation”; thus, implicitly taking effectiveness into account as well, (European Commission Report on CT measures, p.6, 2010).
Measuring Operational Effectiveness (from a Law-Enforcement Perspective)
A wide spectrum of different methods has been put to use in the study of CT operational effectiveness, with qualitative methods and impact effectiveness being the most prevalent epistemological approaches, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). This “clinical” analysis is somewhat understandable, since the ultimate objective of any CT measure or policy is to actually have an effect on terrorism and numbers tend to offer clearer policy-relevant indicators, (LaFree, 2006; Horgan and Braddock, 2010). However, measuring operational effectiveness practically can be a frustratingly tedious task, given the large number of quantitative studies in the field and the difficulty to clearly establish the reliability and validity of the relevant indicators, (Van Um & Pisoiu, 2011). One basic factor that influences the overall validity and reliability of indicators and complicates the structured and systematic consideration of CT measures, is the fact that most studies focus only on individual measures -i.e. the increase in law enforcement powers or legislation, criminalising acts as terrorism, racial profiling or data mining (Omotola, 2008; Harcourt, 2006; Jonas and Harper, 2006) -, or on a preferential selection thereof i.e. disrupting terrorist financing, roving patrols, security/defensive barriers, infiltration of terrorist organizations (Morag, 2005); arrests, sweeps/searches, confiscation of goods/funds, entering enemy territory, detaining or questioning, foiling attacks, sting operations, hostile actions (strikes/killings), (Pratto et. al., 2009). Along similar lines, Hewitt proposes a classification scheme albeit with largely unspecified criteria; from a law-enforcement stand point, he looks at anti-terrorist legislation, emergency powers, ceasefire and negotiations and the use of security forces, (Hewitt, 1984). Occasionally, there is no specific mention of concrete counter terrorism measures; they are rather evaluated as a whole in cost-benefit assessments, (Stewart and Mueller, 2009; Zycher, 2009).
From a law enforcement perspective, operational effectiveness is -quite often- approached in the literature through the outcome-effectiveness basis. The study of outcome-effectiveness, in this sense, can be quite problematic due to the lack of systematization, convenient selection of indicators and a certain haziness as to “whether certain elements should be considered indicators or side effects”, (Van Um & Pisoiu, p.9, 2011). Most authors tend to systematize indicators through a dichotomous categorization; the root causes of terrorism and the operational ability of the targeted organization (resources, public support, recruitment, etc.), (Della Porta, 1992). Most studies fall into the second category and take one or more operational aspects into consideration. Della Porta, for instance, argues that “the number of terrorist…arrests (can be taken) as an indicator of state success” and therefore its effectiveness, (Della Porta, p.160, 1992). Byman focuses on the “level of domestic support for counter terrorism operations, operational freedom and the disruption of the adversary’s command and control structure”, (Byman, p.413, 2003), while Perl suggests that operational effectiveness should be measured by reference to the degradation of terrorist capabilities and infrastructure, (Perl, 2007). Relatedly, Malvesti provides a comprehensive set of indicators and notes that one needs to take into account the “critical nodes” in a terrorist infrastructure, such as: the political base, financial networks, communication channels, sanctuary, intelligence network, weapons, cells and leadership, (Malvesti, p.21-25, 2002). Spencer proposes a more holistic approach, stating that the operational effectiveness of counter terrorism measures may also be purposively understood; if the implemented law enforcement measures manage to reduce the popular fear of terrorism, they can be considered effective, (Spencer, 2006).
In their report regarding the operational perspective, de Londras, Downing and Doody stress that operational effectiveness is directly proportional to “the satisfaction at operational level(s) of the original objectives that were to be achieved by the introduction of a CT policy or measure”, (de Londras et al, p.17, 2013). Nevertheless, they stress that a clear rationale for the policy and/or measure in question needs to be accurately defined along with an adequate monitoring mechanism so that effectiveness –for all intents and purposes- can actually be assessed, (de Londras et al, 2013).
It is worth noting that certain studies place a very high premium on impact effectiveness as well, with respect to the operational effectiveness of relevant (law enforcement) CT measures. Impact effectiveness is usually evaluated in relation to indicators associated with terrorist activity, i.e. a. number of attacks, recidivism rates for deradicalisation programmes of individuals (Noricks, 2009) and the degree to which group radicalization programmes are capable of preventing further terrorist activity (Ashour, 2008). In this context, Horgan and Braddock propose a more comprehensive assessment scheme, the Multi Attribute Utility Technology, consisting of two sets of indicators: a. the rate of terrorism, subordinated domestic terror rates and recidivism and b. the popular support for the government, “boosted morale and political capital”, (Horgan and Braddock, p.283, 2010). Noricks, however, notes a major difficulty within this category of effectiveness: the limited amount and reliability of data, such as the accurate reporting and tracking of re-arrests in the case of recidivism (Noricks, 2009). Numerous scholars tend to use instead of impact,outcome indicators i.e. the number of killed/arrested terrorists and the destruction of the terrorist infrastructure (Floros & Newsome, 2009, Schmid & Sing, 2008). It should be mentioned, nevertheless, that this particular indicator could lead to faulty assumptions, since operatives are easily replaceable, thus the arithmetic analogy does not necessarily reveal the potential or the size of a terrorist organization; therefore, any assessments regarding the impact, dynamics or future attacks would -at best- be probabilistic, (Probst, 2005; Spencer, 2006; Stohl, 2006).
Finally, a comparatively smaller body of literature uses output effectiveness for the evaluation of counter terrorism measures. This method is relatively unproblematic because its indicators are easily delineated. These include the production of strategies, organization reform and legislation (9/11 Commission report, 2006), the establishment of authorities or the implementation of legislation, (Alexander, 2006; Keohane, 2005).
De Londras observes that the introduction (and subsequently the effectiveness evaluation) of counter terrorism policies -particularly in the European Union- is generally structured around ex ante impact assessments, which basically “can only ascertain predicted impacts and thus estimate the proportionality, effectiveness and appropriateness of the proposed technology or measure”, (de Londras, p,12, 2017). So, in essence, ex ante impact assessments are purely speculative and they cannot determine effectiveness as a matter of fact. She proposes instead an “ex post facto” review, (currently rare in the context of counter terrorism), of how the measure or technology is actually working, how it is widely perceived, what its real impact is, how much it is costing and so on, so that effectiveness can be assessed “in the broad and vital sense”, (de Londras, p,12, 2017).
In sum, academics have used a wide variety of methods to assess the overall effectiveness of counter terrorism responses and have reached very different conclusions regarding how effective counter terrorism policies actually are.
Conclusion
While effectiveness could be regarded as one of the most essential aspects of any counter terrorism policy, its study is cumbered by both epistemological underdevelopment and a lack of a canonical scientific basis. Conceptually, there is a wide variety of indicators/measures/techniques taken into consideration, and in numerous categorizations, from comprehensive strategies to a set of measures and/or individual ones. The incremental methodological complexity is directly analogous to a series of validity and reliability issues, which explain the –partly- divergent results obtained. Another major hindrance is the data availability and quality as well as the lack of empirical data, the limited nature and/or manipulability of statistics and the “impossibility of capturing some disruptive successes in statistical form”, (SECILE, p.25, 2013). The limitations of a statistical and/or qualitative evaluation should also be born in mind, as statistics are not necessarily objective and/or exhaustive indicators of effectiveness, (SECILE, p.27, 2013). In designing mechanisms for evaluating effectiveness, qualitative empirical research should be conducted, in order to identify potential conditions that could be operationalized in assessment variables. Furthermore, policy makers must bear in mind that much of counter terrorism is -in effect- mutative in nature (shifting threats, priorities, geopolitical realities) and effectiveness itself may change over time, depending on the particular circumstances; hence, the effectiveness of CT measures requires constant re-evaluation, occasionally beyond a statistical and/or quantitative basis.
References:
– Alexander, Y., (ed.) (2006), “Counterterrorism Strategies. Successes and Failures of Six Nations”, Potomac Books, Dulles, Virginia
– Ashour, O. (2008), “Islamist De-Radicalization in Algeria: Successes and Failures”, The Middle Eastern Institute Policy Brief, 21, p. 1–10
– Byman, D. (2003), “Measuring the War on Terrorism: A First Appraisal”, Current History, 102(668), p. 411–416
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