{"id":354840,"date":"2018-04-01T22:43:31","date_gmt":"2018-04-01T21:43:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=354840"},"modified":"2018-04-02T00:06:21","modified_gmt":"2018-04-01T23:06:21","slug":"u-s-russia-making-preparations-world-war-iii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/editorials\/u-s-russia-making-preparations-world-war-iii\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. and Russia Making Preparations for World War III"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse<\/span><\/p>\n

The anti-neoconservative Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who had been the chief aide to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and had opposed America\u2019s invading Iraq, spoke on March 2nd explaining<\/span><\/a> how the U.S. and Russia are drifting ever-more-rapidly into World War III. He said it\u2019s essentially the same way that England and Germany drifted into WW I: being sucked in by their entangling web of foreign alliances. However, as he sees it, the role that Sarajevo<\/span><\/a> played to spark world-war in 1914, is being performed this time by Israel. Instead of the Bosnian Serb Gavrilo Princip igniting the war by assassinating in Sarajevo the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria, Benjamin Netanyahu is igniting this war throughout the Middle East, by escalating his campaign to conquer Shiites in Iran, Syria, and Lebanon \u2014 overthrowing and replacing the governments there (which would then become controlled by allies of the anti-Shiite Sunni regime in U.S.-Israel-allied Saudi Arabia), and also aiming ultimately to expand Israel itself, to take over Jordan so as to confirm biblical prophesy. <\/span><\/p>\n

And, as Wilkerson sees it, Netanyahu is also fronting for the Saud family: the Israel lobby is fronting not only for Israel\u2019s aristocracy, but for Saudi Arabia\u2019s<\/span><\/a>. (Whereas Israel works both inside and outside the U.S. Government to control the U.S. Government, the Sauds, which are the world\u2019s richest family<\/span><\/a>, work only inside the U.S. Government, by outright buying it; so, unlike the Jewish billionaires who control Israel, they don\u2019t need acceptance by the American people; and each time the Sauds try, they fail at it<\/span><\/a>.) However, since Wilkerson\u2019s speech was being sponsored by organizations that oppose Israel\u2019s lobbyists, most of it dealt with Israel\u2019s side of the Israel-Saud alliance that controls U.S. foreign policies (especially in the Middle East). (The U.S. aristocracy\u2019s hostility toward Russia is, however, its own; it is primary for America\u2019s billionaires, but not for Israel\u2019s aristocracy, and also not for the Sauds \u2014 both of which aristocracies are instead focused mainly against Iran and Shiites.) <\/span><\/p>\n

Wilkerson thus criticized especially \u201cwhere Israel is headed \u2013 toward a massive confrontation with the various powers arrayed against it, a confrontation that will suck America in and perhaps terminate the experiment that is Israel and do irreparable damage to the empire that America has become.\u201d Here is how he described the likeliest \u201ctripwire\u201d for what would become global nuclear annihilation:<\/span><\/p>\n

They want a Greater Israel for a number of reasons, security reasons, you know, the old biblical prophecies and so forth. So I think they\u2019re going to try to keep this in the air to start with. You\u2019re going to see some bombing. I think you\u2019re going to see in the next six months, they\u2019re going to take Lebanon on. They\u2019re going to take Hezbollah on in Syria and Lebanon. When that doesn\u2019t work or when Hezbollah present to them, as they did in July 2006, with some new options in terms of what Hezbollah can do to them and maybe even the Lebanese Armed Forces do too, it might get tricky. Then there might be armored formations, ground units, infantry and so forth. That\u2019s when the door opens for general conflict.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

There is a question asked, too, about the <\/i>[U.S. military] base <\/i>[recently placed in Israel]. Here\u2019s why I think we put the base there. … We put the base there for the same reason we have tripwire forces in other places. We put the base there so that there can be no question in the minds of the American people when the president directs U.S. forces into Israel equipped to go into Syria because we will have been attacked. The disposition of that base is just sitting on an Israeli Air Base and we put the Stars and Stripes up and declared it a U.S. Air Base. It\u2019s for Patriot batteries as far as I know. But it\u2019s there and it\u2019s U.S. territory. So, when missiles start flying or \u2014 God forbid \u2014 the RGC <\/i>[Iran\u2019s Republican Guard Corps] actually tries to put guerillas into Israel proper, then we are being attacked, too. So, when we go to Congress, if Trump feels like he has to go to Congress \u2014 he isn\u2019t going to have to probably \u2014 Congress is going to be demanding that the president take action. \u2026<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

If so, then the U.S. Government will be at war against Russia, too, not merely against Iran and Hezbollah. \u2026 So, the thing that ought to be happening right now is that the United States and Moscow, despite all this mess <\/i>[Russiagate, Skripal, etc.] that\u2019s been created between us, ought to be cooperating to bring the two parties that really need to talk \u2014 to talk, Riyadh and Tehran \u2014 and get them to deal with their problems diplomatically and then turn that diplomatic success on to the Syrian conflict which is being fueled principally by Saudi money with Prince Bandar in charge.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

He\u2019s saying that this isn\u2019t at all an \u2018Israel-versus-the-Arabs\u2019 thing, nor even fundamentally a Russia-versus-America thing (at least not in the Middle East) but instead a Sunni-versus-Shiite thing, at root. And, he\u2019s right<\/span><\/a>. The fundamental Middle-Eastern conflict is intra-Islamic, not between religions. But (and he never talks about this; almost nobody does), it\u2019s really between blocs of aristocracies, not really between different nations\u2019 publics. In terms of publics, the American people are victimized by the American aristocracy and by its allied Saud family, and by its allied Israeli aristocracy<\/span><\/a>; but America\u2019s media are controlled by America\u2019s aristocracy; and, so, hide these facts, in order to make these invasions by the U.S. possible \u2014 politically acceptable to the duped public (like Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, etc., were).<\/span><\/p>\n

Bandar is the person who was paying, out of his and his wife\u2019s own personal checking accounts, flight-training etc. for at least two of the 15 Saudis who were preparing to do the 9\/11 attacks<\/span><\/a>. In 2017, U.S. President Donald Trump personally sold, to the Saud family, $350 billion in U.S. weaponry and training<\/span><\/a>. That sale was the biggest part yet, of Trump\u2019s plan to restore U.S. manufacturing. And basically, Trump is now owned by the Sauds, and this (in addition to his own billionaire Israel-backers) means that he needs to be gung-ho for invading Iran, and certainly not for overthrowing the Sauds<\/span><\/a>. He needs to support aristocracies that are the chief enemies of the American public. This is realpolitik<\/span><\/a>, in a world that\u2019s controlled by psychopaths. It\u2019s today\u2019s world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wilkerson said, \u201cWe might have the stirrings of 1914 as utterly stupid as we now know those stirrings to have been.\u201d But would this really be just \u201cstupidity,\u201d or, perhaps, something more \u2014 and worse? He evidently knows that it\u2019s far more, and that it involves not only the Sauds and their agents, but also the Israelis and their agents:<\/span><\/p>\n

This is Joseph Goebbels territory. Karl Rove<\/i> [George W. Bush\u2019s chief propagandist] is envious. The Foundation for Defense of Democracies as the heir to the Project for the New American Century, Bill Kristol\u2019s Iraq-bound think tank, leaves that pack of wolves disguised as warmed over neocons lavishly funded by the likes of Paul Singer<\/i> [one of Trump\u2019s top financial backers]. It has even spawned the Institute for the Study of War. A fascinating Orwellian title if there ever was one<\/i> [it\u2019s run by former PNAC people]. It should be<\/i> [called] the Institute for War.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been asked why is it that you ascribe to FDD and now the ISW such nefarious motives. I was asked this by the New York Times\u2019 editorial staff when they published my op-ed on Iran a few days ago. My answer is simple. Because that is precisely what FDD is attempting to do. Just as Douglas Feith, undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Office of Special Plans, did in 2002 and 2003 for Richard Bruce Cheney to lead us in the war with Iraq.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

If this is true, then the Skripal matter, and all of Russiagate\u2019s pressures upon Trump to bring America to war against Russia and against Russia\u2019s allies (such as Iran, Syria, and China), would fit also as being parts of that broader plan, which would fulfill the objectives both of the Saud family, and of Israel\u2019s aristocracy \u2014 and, of course, of America\u2019s aristocracy, which have long wanted to conquer Russia. <\/span><\/p>\n

The NATO PR agency Atlantic Council<\/span><\/a> announced on March 25th that, as the neoconservative Daily Star<\/i> in London expressed the matter<\/span><\/a>, \u201cDefence experts at the Atlantic Council have now laid out the \u2018significant threat\u2019 from Russia on the edge of Europe.\u201d Now that NATO has expanded right up to Russia\u2019s very borders<\/span><\/a>, NATO wants its populations to know that Russia is threatening NATO by massing troops and weapons on NATO\u2019s borders. (It\u2019s as if Russia had taken Mexico and then blamed America for being \u2018aggressive\u2019 and \u2018threatening\u2019 by doing defensive military drills on our own territory.) The next day, the Daily Star<\/i> headlined \u201cVladimir Putin orders WAR DRILLS as Russia tensions ready to snap with West\u201d<\/span><\/a>. Then, on March 29th, they headlined \u201c\u2018This is very rare\u2019 Russia warship ‘to fire missiles SIX MILES off Sweden coast\u2019\u201d<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The aristocracies of Israel and of Saudi Arabia will likely have the support of the aristocracies in the U.S. and UK, in their planned war against Russia and its allies. Like WWI, and WW II, this is a joint enterprise; but, this time, unlike in WW II, America will be out to conquer Russia<\/span><\/a>, not to conquer Germany. Russia is the nation that has, by far, the most natural resources; and aristocracies always value land more than they value the populations that are on it, for whatever they can exploit out of the conquered ones, especially because dealing with the natives can mean more trouble than it\u2019s worth. For examples: native populations didn\u2019t do too well in U.S., nor in Australia, nor in Africa, nor in Palestine. Russians aren\u2019t the goal; Russia (the land) is. But, as usual, the aristocracies have first been knocking off the leaders of the allies of the country that\u2019s the main target \u2014 such as in Iraq, and in Libya, and in Syria, and in Ukraine<\/span><\/a>. Now, the allied aristocracies are getting ready to go in for the kill<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

As regards the view from the opposite side, it was well summarized by Joe Hargrave in his recent \u201cWhat Putin Wants Is The Most Important Issue Of Our Time\u201d<\/span><\/a>, in which he accurately represented what Putin has been both saying and doing. <\/span><\/p>\n

And as regards Wilkerson\u2019s recommendation: it was for the U.S. to abandon Israel, so that Netanyahu won\u2019t be able to start WW III. (Wilkerson closed by saying: \u201cThe country that will have started it all, the relationship, unbalanced as it is that will make it possible, is Israel. That\u2019s the danger we face.\u201d) Of course, the Sauds won\u2019t allow that, and they might even renege on their $350 billion U.S. weapons-purchase commitment if we did it. The Israel lobby would secretly carry the Sauds\u2019 water on that, and the Sauds pay well for any service provided to them; so, those lobbyists would have access to virtually unlimited funds, some of which would, of course, ultimately find its way not only into politicians\u2019 campaigns, but also into America\u2019s \u2018news\u2019 media. Thus, corporations such as Lockheed Martin can get loads of free PR (sales-promotion), for American \u2018nationalism\u2019, which is the military-industrial complex\u2019s form of internationalism.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014<\/span><\/p>\n

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of\u00a0 They\u2019re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010<\/i><\/span><\/a>,<\/i> and of<\/span> \u00a0<\/i>CHRIST\u2019S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity<\/i><\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eric Zuesse The anti-neoconservative Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who had been the chief aide to U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell and had opposed America\u2019s invading Iraq, spoke on March 2nd explaining how the U.S. and Russia are drifting ever-more-rapidly into World War III. He said it\u2019s essentially the same way that England and Germany drifted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1254,"featured_media":354841,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461,519],"tags":[30,96,67,59,524,20344,754,1024],"class_list":{"0":"post-354840","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-editorials","8":"category-newswire","9":"tag-big-brother","10":"tag-cover-up","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-military","13":"tag-russia","14":"tag-sauds","15":"tag-syria","16":"tag-ww3"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1254"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=354840"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354840\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/354841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=354840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=354840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=354840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}