Category Archives: Pols and Pundits

Gore Vidal Dead: Clever Satirist, Deluded Moralist

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Gore Vidal died.

He said some accurate things about American foreign policy [which I admired], wrote some famous books I’ve never read [well, actually I did read “Myra Breckinridge” and disliked it] and was a clever fellow altogether, at least, all the clever people say so. 

But, hmm…I don’t really have anything to say except, let’s see…

I really don’t give a fuck. Look, am I going to sit and weep every time a young

hooker decrepit old pansy man dies?  feels as though she’s been taken advantage of ?

[That was Gore Vidal defending his good friend Roman Polansky, guilty of forced sodomizing and rape of a 13 year-old girl, after feeding her drugs.]

[Further note. The derogatory term (pansy) is intended to be satirical.  I have no animus against gays or gay rights, in fact, I fully support them.]

But, since the entire blogosphere is singing Vidal’s praises, without any reference whatsoever to his many negative traits, including venomous attacks on people ranging from Truman Capote to Charlton Heston,  I decided to break my usual rule of not saying anything negative on someone’s death and point out how mean a man he was in some ways, personally.

There was, for instance, his trick of embarrassing heterosexual males by implying homosexuality, the most famous instance of which was his encounter with Charlton Heston, who was not amused.]

And more here about the venom behind the urbanity:

About Truman Capote:

“Vidal made no secret that he detested the author of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and In Cold Blood, saying once: “Capote I truly loathed. The way you might loathe an animal. A filthy animal that has found its way into the house.”

When asked ‘What was Capote doing that you didn’t like?” Vidal shouted: “Lying! The one thing I hate most on this earth. Which is why I do not have a friendly time with journalists.” He called Capote’s death “a good career move” and added “Every generation gets the Tiny Tim it deserves.”

Stephen Moss in The Guardian has a good piece about a man who wrote brilliant essays and over-rated novels, and  carried his perceptive and prescient anti-imperial criticism into pointless America-bashing that finally undercut his own criticism.

“Does age bring wisdom?” a questioner from the floor asked Gore Vidal? There was a short pause. “No, it brings senility.” Cue a wave of applause from the vast audience that had come to touch the hem of the man Adam Boulton, who had the tricky task of interviewing Vidal, called “the greatest essayist since Montaigne”.

That’s a big claim, but not necessarily wide of the mark: Vidal’s essays on politics and literature are magnificent and will live long after the weighty novels he is keener for us to read and remember are gathering dust.

The wind-lashed encounter with Boulton was a ramble – an old man (Vidal, not Boulton) peering into the nooks and crannies of a fascinating life – but, happily, it was punctuated by some memorable one-liners. Asked who his successor as the great contrarian would be, he said: “I’m not holding the door open.” Lifting his walking stick and brandishing it like a mitre, he intoned: “I’m still the bishop of Rome.”

His advice to young people – “Grow up.” Questioned about his famous line that “when a friend succeeds, a little part of me dies”, he insisted it had been a joke – the books of quotations may have to be rewritten. The Republicans he called “a mindset rather than a party – a group of like-minded people compelled by greed and with a capacity for character assassination.” Asked by Boulton if Bobby Kennedy (who Vidal heartily disliked) would have made a better president than George W Bush, he replied: “You would make a better president than Bush!” Could an intellectual ever be elected president? “Well,” said Vidal, “accidents happen.”

[LR: Being anti-Bush or anti-Republican, is, after all very popular in intellectual circles, so it is hardly evidence of great courage to attack either of them from the safety of Europe.]

The one-liners, if you could catch them above the howling wind, kept coming: Vidal’s mind, which has a deeply ironic and subversive bent, is sharp, even if at 82 the body is frail. But are one-liners enough? There is substance in Vidal’s worldview – the Jeffersonian belief in the autonomy of the states, the fear of centralised power, the opposition to US entanglements abroad (he even said US involvement in the second world war was undertaken for selfish reasons) – but these days it gets hopelessly lost. He has become a turn.

His ceaseless negativity is also wearing. Perhaps that is the prerogative of the old, but the attack on the US is so unremitting that he undermines his own assault. “America is a country where no one can be phoney enough” – it sounds good, but is it true? It seems phoney to me. This is the country, after all, he has chosen to return to after his long sojourn in Italy.

Vidal has things of value to tell us – that the US administration has used 9/11 to tear up supposedly inviolable personal freedoms, that America cannot be both republic and empire, that all US politics is based on money, property, business. It was a telling moment when Boulton mentioned the picture in Vanity Fair that linked Vidal, Kurt Vonnegut and Norman Mailer, three octogenarians pitching against America’s misguided, self-interested interventions in the Middle East. That got a large and deserved burst of applause.

Where were the voices of the younger generation was the implication? Is the art of engagement dying? Ironically, Christopher Hitchens, seen by some as a possible heir to the waspish Vidal, has engaged – but on the side of so-called liberal interventionism. Hitchens was in the audience and asked a loaded question – was it true Vidal had said the Bush administration knew 9/11 was coming? Vidal shot back that he’d never said such a thing, and that in any case Bush – his questioner’s hero – was too incompetent to have carried out so strategically devastating an attack.

[LR: Notice that Hitchens and Vidal reinforce the propaganda frame-work, by denying any validity whatsoever to the view that the government itself might have been complicit. How is this different from the Michael Moore brand of Democrat anti-establishmentarian critique?]

Vidal avoided that trap, but the uncommitted observer was still left wanting a more coherent picture of what should replace Bush. Even old guys – and it is poignant that Vidal is now the last of that Vanity Fair trio alive – have to do more than mock the vanities of the world. And beyond welcoming an Obama presidency as a sign that the US might be growing up,

[LR: Again, how deep really is criticism of this kind? ]

Vidal has little positive to say. Bush is an idiot, McCain a dimwit – not even a war hero, because “all he ever did was crash his plane; he didn’t even try to escape”; even Roosevelt wanted only to become “emperor of the west”. Sorry, but I don’t buy that latter point: there is a point where glib contrarianism becomes hollow and self-defeating; the enemy of thought.

Did he have any words of wisdom to offer at the dusk of a long life, asked a youthful member of the audience? Vidal had none, which seemed rather sad. It doesn’t suggest senility – the mind is strong, the wit undiminished – but it does suggest that irony can only take you so far.”

War On India: Is Massive Electricity Outage Sabotage By Elites?

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Power Grid failure hit India States Affected What is causing power grid failure in India? What is an electrical grid?.

Update

Soutik Biswas at the BBC has some interesting facts about India’s power consumption:

  • Despite its soaring energy needs, India has one of the lowest per capita rates of consumption of power in the world,734 units, as compared to a world average of 2,429 units. This is nothing compared with say, Canada, (18,347 units) and the US (13,647 units). China’s per capita consumption (2,456 units) is more than three times that of India.
  • The low per capita consumption is despite the fact that the power sector has been growing at more than 7% every year.
  • Other interesting points Biswas makes: India’s electricity is mostly derived from coal, with about a fifth from hydro-elecric power; the main problems are massive subsidies to rich farmers, pervasive theft, and failures in transmissions and distribution; there is no shortage of money (this contradicts the usual mythology).
  • The most telling statistic: At the time of Independence, about 60% of India’s power sector was privately owned. Today, about 80% of the installed capacity is in the hands of the government

Update: I should point out how calm most of India looks in the pictures of the outage. There seems to be more panic in the Western media.

I can only imagine what would happen here if the entire population of the US (double that, actually) was plunged into darkness.

Part of the reason is that Indians are used to this sort of thing.

Rolling electricity cuts are common. In Tamil Nadu where a huge number of multinationals have relocated and heavily tax the system, there are current cuts practically every day, from anywhere between 4 hours and 12.

Usually, customers get notice and have time to arrange their day around the cut. But still, in temperatures of 45 degrees Celsius, it can be dangerous to have go without a fan, let alone an air conditioner, especially for older people, like my parents.

But, there hasn’t been a major power failure like this since 2001.

Causes of the current shortages include massive subsidies to farmers, pervasive current theft, and price controls. However,  for private industry to come in and suddenly take over would also have terrible immediate effects. The smart thing would be to improve the existing infrastructure, remove the subsidies, and crack down on theft.

Update: The AtlanticCities.com explains why it took longer to restore power in DC than in India.

“That’s 10 days for less than half a million people [in DC] compared to about 6 hours for most of the power to be restored to the roughly 350 million affected by the outage Monday, or compared to the 6 hours it’s taken Tuesday to restore power to 75 percent of the more than 670 million people affected by this latest outage. The Times of India notes that the last major outage – in 2001, affecting a region home to 230 million people – was resolved in 16 hours.”

“http://m.theatlanticcities.com/technology/2012/07/why-indias-massive-power-outages-get-fixed-more-quickly-dcs/2775/

Update:: A piece in Zdnet in June 2012 describes a new Indian security initiative that involved allowing some government agencies to carry out cyber attacks, apparently as a preemptive move. So, the Indian government had been anticipating a cyber attack and even planning one, if necessary. Curious.

India is taking steps to protect its cyberinfrastructure by designating relevant government agencies to carry out offensive cyberattacks on other countries when necessary.

The country’s National Security Council (NSC) will soon approve the “comprehensive” plan and designate the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) and National Technical Research Organization (NTRO) to carry out offensive cyber-operations if needed, sources told The Times of India in a report Monday. All other intelligence agencies will be authorized to carry out intelligence gathering abroad, but not offensive operations.

Update: A piece in the Telegraph of July 30 (the first day when the NE grid was down) quotes a businessman saying it felt like a cyberattack:

There is no way India can become an economic world power with such outages that leave a third of the country paralysed” businessman Virender Kapoor said. Its almost as if somebody had launched a crippling cyber attack on its power grid, he declared.

Update: An article in Economic Times, (India) July 19, 2012, reported a warning by McAfee (a computer security firm) that electric grids are easy to attack and can have a major impact. So, two weeks before a historic power outage occurs, a mainstream outlet runs a warning about a massive outage occurring, helpfully spelling out the details and warning that air defense systems could also be at risk?

“If a rogue state, terrorist, or malcontent wanted to debilitate a major city or even an entire country, how could it make a widespread, immediate, and lasting impact? Quite simply, by striking at the facilities that produce and distribute the electrical power that everything else depends on!

“Anything from the lights and appliances in your home to heart monitors in hospitals to air defense systems-anything could be compromised by a single, targeted attack on the energy grid. Only today, the weapon of choice is not a rocket launcher, but rather, malicious software code-malware that is skillfully designed to destroy, disrupt, or take control of the complex systems on which the grid runs,” Tom Moore, vice president, Embedded Security at McAfee said.

What’s more, it is modernization that has made the cyberthreat worse. The old systems were not sufficiently interconnected to make them that vulnerable.  The new systems, the Smart Grids, like Smart phones, are actually far more vulnerable to attack because they contain programs and embedded information that trojans or viruses can attack. Often, when modernizing, security and encryption are after thoughts…or might be just too expensive to consider.

“Moving systems from a manual process to one that is internet connected gave energy grid operators real-time info and allowed administrators to telecommute and field workers to re-program systems from remote locations through their smartphones however this also opened all their systems to the outside world.”

From what I can tell, India is trying to upgrade to smart grids.

That could make the system even more vulnerable, although it might help the single biggest problem after the aging infrastructure – the theft of electricity.

Update: Here’s another clue, in Rothschild-owned Reuters:

Stretching from Assam, near China, to the Himalayas and the northwestern deserts of Rajasthan, the outage was the worst to hit India in more than a decade and embarrassed the government, which has failed to build up enough power capacity to meet soaring demand.

If you have been following the Rothschild media for any length of time, a piece like this immediately gives the  game away. Who  thinks about the embarrassment of a government when hundreds of millions of people in the tropics have to go without electricity?

Most normal people are stunned or saddened, because they’re thinking of the people.

If the government actually is behind the failure in some way, it’s not an embarrassment, it’s criminal. And if the government’s not, then it’s an attack of some kind, in which case, it’s either criminal or some kind of state or non-state terrorism.

But embarrassment is the kind of thing only someone conducting a psyops would impute.

Update: Another clue that there is something fishy going on is that this occurred during the monsoon

season, when the demand on electric power-grids is lower than at other times. Correction: I read now that the monsoon was weaker than usual so there was an increase in electric usage to draw on well water:

The problem has been made worse by a weak monsoon in agricultural states such as wheat-belt Punjab and Uttar Pradesh in the Ganges plain, which has a larger population than Brazil.

With less rain to irrigate crops, more farmers resort to electric pumps to draw water from wells.

Also highly relevant to the blackout is the controversy over nuclear energy. While some people want to supplement the overloaded electric grid (overloaded because of economic growth), with nuclear power, others are understandably concerned about the potential for accidents in such a highly populated region of the world. That has led to rioting and protests against nuclear plants, like the one in Kudankulam Tamil Nadu, where usage of electricity is particularly heavy. A collapse of the electricity grid is an excellent way to force the issue and also strike a major blow to the country.

Update: I found some confirmation for my suspicions in comments made by executives responding to the crisis:

The failure happened without warning just after 1 p.m., electric company officials said.
“We seem to have plunged into another power failure, and the reasons why are not at all clear,” said Gopal K. Saxena, the chief executive of BSES, an electric company that services South Delhi, in a telephone interview. It may take a long time to restore power to north India, he said, because the eastern grid has also failed, and alternate power sources in Bhutan and the Indian state of Sikkim flow into the east first.
About two hours after the grid failure, power ministry authorities said some alternate arrangements had been made. “We are taking hydro power from Bhakhra Nangal Dam,” in northern India, said Sushil Kumar Shinde, the power minister, in a televised interview.”

I also found a statement contradicting claims that the outage was caused by an overdraw from state governments::

“No official reason for the Monday’s failure has been given, although some local news reports pointed fingers at state governments which were overdrawing power.

That assessment is too simplistic, Mr. Saxena, of BSES, said. There are controls in place on India’s electricity grids that override an outsized power demand. “We have one of the most robust, smart grids operating” in the world, he said. It would “not be wise” to give an assessment of what happened at this time, he added.”

Update: (July 31, 4:19PM) A couple of Pakistani websites are claiming that this was a Pakistani-Chinese cyberattack and that the Indian media has been told not to report on it.

This sounds pretty flimsy to me.

Even under Emergency in Mrs. Gandhi’s time there was no way to keep the press quiet.  But I’ll be on the look out. The timing of this, following the mysterious rioting in the strategic NE, is suspicious.

Update  : I was finally able to get through to family members, who tell me that the power failure mostly affects the north.  So, again, there is some hype about the situation. I’ll be adding info as I find it.

Update

SF Gate:

The massive failure – a day after a similar, but smaller power failure – has raised serious concerns about India’s outdated infrastructure and the government’s inability to meet its huge appetite for energy as the country aspires to become a regional economic superpower.

LR: The elites have been demanding that the government make it easier to invest in India’s infrastructure (public utilities), which they claim hasn’t been opened up at the speed at which they want:

Rothschild-affiliated Lakshmi Mittal on April 30, 2012

“India still has a tremendous potential to grow, but the slow progress in the infrastructure sector was proving to be an impediment, said Lakshmi Mittal, chairman and CEO of steel giant ArcelorMittal. He was in Bhatinda, Punjab in India recently where his company has set up Hindustan Mittal Energy Ltd (HMEL), a joint venture between state-run Hindustan Petroleum and Mittal Energy.

“Indian condemning millions to stay poor, Lakshmi Narayan Mittal says,” PTI, Times of India, June 20, 2012.

PM Manmohan Singh has responded that some of the problems have arisen because of Eurozone problems (where India has loaned money toward the bailout of European bankers) and also because of vehement press criticism of crony-capitalism that has made government officials extremely wary of doing anything. “Bollygarchs At Bay,” Investor’s Fresh New, July 31, 2012.

“Many foreign businesses have fallen foul of India’s tricky regulatory system but analysts note that it is domestic companies in sectors dependent on regulation that seem to be struggling more than most. Those with weaker links to government, such as consumer goods or pharmaceuticals, are proving more resilient.

A stark example is provided by Ambit Capital, a Mumbai-based broker. Its “politically connected companies” index ranks 75 big Indian businesses with either “strong connectivity to the political establishment” or fortunes that rely on state licences. For most of the past five years, they outperformed the 500 leading shares on the Bombay Stock Exchange. The pattern flipped last year, a trend that seems to be growing.”

ORIGINAL POST:

This is being called the largest black-out ever, affecting over 600 million people. (Hype?)

Power Fails Again in India, Wall Street Journal:

(I will add links to support my argument when I have time, so bear with me….)

“A massive power failure hit India’s north, east and northeast regions Tuesday, forcing offices and factories to shift to emergency generators and raising more questions about the state of infrastructure in Asia’s third-largest economy.

A commuter walked past an information board at a

The blackout was even more wide-reaching and severe than the power failure that plunged several states in northern India into darkness Monday.

Some 20 of India’s 28 states were affected Tuesday, and as many as 600 million people – half of India’s population – reportedly impacted. Monday’s blackout, which was caused by a failure of the northern grid, affected eight states with a total population of around 370 million.

Tuesday’s power outage was caused by the failure of the power supply networks in the north, east and northeast regions at 0730 GMT, according to the National Load Dispatch Center, a unit of Power Grid Corpof India Ltd. It added that work is on to restore the grid.

A commuter walked past an information board at a train station in New Delhi, Monday.

Power Minister Sushilkumar Shinde also said that efforts are being taken to resume supply as soon as possible, especially to essential services.

The electricity failure resulted in a widespread breakdown of transport and other services. A spokesman for the Northern Railways and Eastern Railways said about 200 trains were stopped in their tracks.

Metro rail services in New Delhi and its suburbs were halted as well, a spokesman for the Delhi Metro Rail Corp. said.

At Delhi’s international airport, diesel generators were switched on quickly to ensure services were not interrupted.

Arup Roy Choudhury, chairman of NTPC Ltd., India’s largest power generator by capacity, said the company’s coal-based power plants have stopped operating.

“We are expediting [the process of restarting the plants and will supply] first to the railways within the next one hour,” Mr. Choudhury said.

The government has already announced the appointment of a three-member panel to study the causes of Monday’s power failure. The committee will submit its report in 15 days’ time.

Comment:

There is a strong suspicion in my mind that this is sabotage at some level.

First.

I have been compiling growing evidence of  low-grade psychological warfare directed against India in the Western media: – The Time cover of Manmohan Singh as an underachiever, the barrage of misleading information about the Rajat Gupta trial, the publication of highly tendentious biographies of canonical Indian figures and Hindu leaders, accompanied by inflammatory and mendacious press articles, coupled with attacks in India by secular authorities (in bed with Western elites) against Hinduism and on Hindu temples, where vast amounts of gold still exist.

Second. In “Breaking India,” Rajiv Malhotra has described in detail how western-funded NGOs are encouraging secessionist activity.

The US state dept has made a U-turn and gone from condemning the Tamil Tigers as a terrorist movement to now supporting them as victims of Sri Lankan genocide.

(Bruce Fein’s career shows this about turn). Western elites are behind the foundation-funded Afro-Dalit movement, which aims to control the south of India, by westernizing it and breaking it off from the north.

The south includes the highly industrialized Tamil Nadu state, Andhra, the relatively wealthy Kerala region, as well as the Poona-Mumbai region, and it has not been affected.

The majority of Western corporations are located here.

Third.

Earlier this year, there were reports that a part of RAW (Indian intel) had fallen out with the Mossad. This followed on the Indian government’s commencement of barter and non-dollar trade with Iran, a move sure to discomfit the US government.

According to reporter Wayne Madsen, Indian intelligence has been cracking down on Mossad. (There is a division in RAW between those who want to stand firm against the globalist cabal, and those who want to be on the winning team).

Fourth.

There was a recent attack on an Indian fishing boat by a US naval vessel, leading to fatalities; in early July this year, there was a cyberattack on India’s naval HQ in Vizag, from which sensitive information was stolen apparently by hackers with Chinese IP addresses.

In the last few days before the outages, there were accounts of serious rioting/attacks against Muslims by Christian and Hindu tribes in the NE (near China and Burma).  Around a hundred were killed and thousands were displaced.

Fifth.

There is extensive Mossad/CIA activity in the NE area (near Burma) and in India as a whole, relating to the drug-trade that is now finding an HQ in Kochi in Kerala (where there is an ancient Jewish community, supposedly dating to the time of King Solomon) and in Mumbai, where there are numbers of Chabad houses through which the drug-money is laundered and where spies and saboteurs find refuge.

Sixth

Mossad and CIA have admitted being behind the creation of the Stuxnet virus and were behind David Headley, the alleged mastermind of the Mumbai bombing. Some allege that parts of Indian intelligence colluded with CIA and Mossad.

India was a minor victim of that virus when it first raised its head a couple of years ago.

[Check out my blog posts on Stuxnet.  I was one of the earliest bloggers to even follow the story and to allege it was an Israeli operation, not due to any so-called anti-Semitism on my part, but because I am aware that Israel leads the world in this area of technology.

Ditto with the Headley story, which was blogged here as well. ]

Seventh

The NE region is the area in which the electricity grid collapse began. Burma has recently been opened up and there has been some talk about Jewish republics being created there.

One such group is the Bnai Menashe in the NE part of India:

“Hillel Halkin, a well-known writer and translator who has lived in Israel for three decades, has written a fascinating new book out about his growing interest and belief in the Bnai Menashe, a group of some 5,000 people in a remote corner of northeastern India who live as observant Jews, claiming a link to the biblical tribe of Menashe. The book, Across The Sabbath River: In Search of a Lost Tribe of Israel, describes how Halkin’s skepticism was reversed after visiting the community, which began in the 1970s and has been guided for the last two decades by Eliahu Avichail, an Orthodox rabbi in Jerusalem. Over the years he has helped some 600 of the Bnai Menashe settle in Israel, where they underwent formal conversion. Another 100 arrived last month and more of their brethren would like to join them.

Michael Freund is a former New Yorker living in Jerusalem who has come to espouse the cause of the Bnai Menashe. A Modern Orthodox Jew who served as deputy director of communications and policy planning in the Prime Minister’s office under Benjamin Netanyahu, Freund, after visiting the community, has agreed to succeed Rabbi Avichail as head of Amishav, the organization championing the Bnai Menashe.

He believes that groups like the Bnai Menashe and the descendants of the Marranos “constitute a large, untapped demographic and spiritual reservoir for Israel and the Jewish people.” And while Freund opposes outright proselytization, citing traditional Judaism’s hesitancy about such an approach, he says that since groups like the Bnai Menashe have taken “the first step in our direction, it is time that we reach out and help them as they undergo the process of returning to the Jewish people.

The NE area is strategically-positioned between China and India, and has been the site of considerable secessionist activity over the last decade.

In 2009, two researchers claimed that a second Israeli state was emerging in India: “Second Israeli state emerging in India: “New Jersualem” movement eyes take over of three eastern states, near center of opium production,” John Kaminski and Arun Shrivastava, August 19, 2009

:A second “nation” of Israel today is nearing completion smack dab in the middle of the world’s premier drug producing region, the Golden Triangle of Burma — located right on the border between India and the military dictatorship now known as Myanmar, which is the real model of the human future.

Activities presaging the creation of a second Israeli state are well-known in India, but not elsewhere. Most everyone remembers how the first Israel popped onto the world scene in 1948 and has continued mass murdering its neighbors and hapless nations that fall under its sway ever since.

Precisely, political stealth moves over the last three decades and an aggressive outreach effort by “rabbis from Israel” to convert inhabitants of the three easternmost provinces of India to Judaism have been reported for years by Indian patriots in the Himalayan foothills who seek to return their country to its much longed for pre-British liberty.

The Deccan Chronicle, a newspaper in Hyderabad, reported that by means of “a ritual bath,” rabbis promise penniless Christian, Muslim and pagan converts a trip to Israel and preferred employment status, then buy votes of peasants, take over local boards and pass laws to legalize their manipulations, the same way they do everywhere else.

While the core issue in this geopolitical expansion of Rothschild-Rockefeller money empire that controls the world is proximity to the centuries old center of opium production run by the generals in Myanmar, the creation of a new Israeli state in the exact center of China, India and Southeast Asia augurs badly for the peoples of the region, as the current level of destabilization among Israel’s neighbors in the Middle East clearly illustrates.

And not to be forgotten is that the world’s oldest still functioning oil field is located in this area and Tripura state is reported to be floating on a sea of natural gas.”

The left and many non-governmental human rights group claim that the trouble in the NE is simply indigenous rebellion against multinational land-grabbing and government abuse of those who protest .

(The area is rich in minerals).

The right and the government claim that this is Naxalite-Maoist provocation, using the cover of trade-unions.

“There is enough documented information which reveals that trade unions are the new hunting grounds of Maoists. If we get good evidence that there was indeed a Maoist link to the Maruti violence, then we would invoke the anti-terror law,” a senior IB official told ET on condition of anonymity. The official says intelligence agencies suspect the attack on the Maruti plant was “premeditated” and believe that the union leaders could have links to top Maoist leaders. He cautioned it was early to reach any conclusion.

Former home secretary GK Pillai told ET: “The government has had information that Naxals have been trying to infiltrate labour organisations in urban areas for a while now. That information was passed on to states, and in some places action was taken.”

In recent days, there have been reports of violent rioting in the NE and the displacement of thousands of people.

Here is a report from France24

“”This time, it seems the violence was set off after a Muslim youth group in the district of Kokrajhar called for a strike to protest the removal of a signboard at a local mosque. This was followed by a series of drive-by killings, before large-scale rioting broke out on July 19. Roving bands of armed men – reportedly from both sides of the conflict – torched hundreds of houses, leaving both Bodos and Muslims homeless.

The indigenous Bodos represent just 10 percent of the population of Assam state. Since the early 1970s, the state has seen a steady influx of immigrants from Bangladesh. The rising number of Muslim immigrants has been cause for worry among Bodos, who are afraid that this could thwart their hopes of establishing an independent state.
[Hindu nationalists see this immigration as a kind of infiltration and subversion of the country.]
India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who visited both a Bodo and a Muslim refugee camp in Assam state on Saturday, promised “a proper inquiry into the tragic incidents”, as well as a three billion rupee (44 million euro) relief package for the region.”
And most significantly, no one seems to be able to say what set off the rioting.
“No one can explain how the violence started. They tell me they usually have good relations with the Bodo people. Muslims have lived in Bodo areas for a very long time – some even speak Bodo. Though this is not the first time Muslims and Bodos have clashed, the violence still seems to have taken them by surprise.”

Now comes the report of the grid being hit in the north (Monday) and spreading to most of the rest of the country (Tuesday)

There is not doubt in my mind that this is sabotage.

Eighth

Naturally, the Trojan horse Anna Hazare group (blessed by Wikileaks and heavily supported by Western NGOs of the “color revolution” variety) claims that the outage is an Indian government conspiracy.

That conspiracy theory covers the first few pages of Google already, very conveniently.

Just now, I noticed several sites referring to “Bhagat Singh” and praising revolution in India.  Here is one identifying itself as Naxalite and asking Indians to join the revolution. It looks like some kind of intelligence-created OPTOR! style site to me.

If the grid got hit only yesterday, how is it that Anna Hazare has so quickly come up with this theory and Google has already taken it up so fast? This means that any other interpretation of events  – for eg. that it is  likely orchestrated by the Western elites – is unable to get a hearing.

I know that when I posted my Goldman articles on LRC in 2008, they were rarely linked or passed around. A couple of them in fact landed up on sites like “Assassinated Press.” But any rumor passed on by NGO-backed journalists gets read over international radio, passed around in a flash, and rises to the top of Google searches. [As soon as I said this, of course, this post rises in Google!]

In fact, whenever I post a controversial piece like this one, I notice my home page on Google searches doesn’t change. I also notice an increase in spam and evidence of browser hijacking.

This is a pattern I’ve seen over and over.

I think there is a fair possibility that some parts of the Indian government (those colluding with outside interests, whether left-communist or right-corporatist) might be involved in the sabotage, but there is no doubt in my mind that the puppet-masters are Western elites.

The attack might be part of the show of strength necessary to collapse the government or force its hand.

[Added: I also wonder if it could be a kind of “war-gaming” by parts of the government for its own ends? ]

Anna Hazare’s grandstanding over the grid failure is also getting the headlines. This is the same way in which the Anna  movement got off the ground in the first place, at lightning speed, overtaking the indigenous resistance movement. Anna Hazare, like OccupyWallStreet, has the blessings of the western elites.

The elites need to break up India so as to have its constituent parts under control.

The idea is to stir up the Indian masses and to show the Indian government that it is the elites who are really in charge. Thus, Lakshmi Mittal (who is hand-in-glove with the Rothschilds) delivered an ultimatum to the Indian government recently, to “grow” or else.

Ninth (and the most controversial and speculative).

There were two massive earthquakes in Indonesia earlier this year (once was 8.9), of a magnitude that should have set off tsunamis that would have been in the direction of India.

In fact, there were tsunami warnings, but nothing came of it. The earthquakes took place off the Aceh province, which is just where the 2004 Asian tsunami had its origin. Had there been a similar tsunami from the earthquakes this year, it would have hit the Kudankulam nuclear plant which is at the tip of the peninsula, right on the Indian ocean. It would have been Fukushiima all over.

“More than 1 million people live within the 30 km radius of the KKNPP which far exceeds the AERB (Atomic Energy Regulatory Board) stipulations. It is quite impossible to evacuate this many people quickly and efficiently in case of a nuclear disaster at Koodankulam.”

The 2004 tsunami, which killed over 250,000 people hit, India and Sri Lanka.  I speculated then that it might have been caused by underwater nuclear testing in the Indian ocean.  Coincidentally,  the southern half of Iran has been struck by a massive drought (as have the grain-belt (heartland region) of the US and three quarters of Mexico) this past year.

Note:

I was unable to get through on the phone to India when I tried.

Notes:

“”Wikileaks takes credit for Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption campaign,”  MSN, April 20, 2011

http://news.in.msn.com/national/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5111803

A Real History Of Conservativism..

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Ah. At last, some truth in advertising.  Clyde Wilson at LRC brushes off some forgotten conservatives and sets them down against what passes for conservatism today. May he find some more of these old codgers and create an alternative line of descent for modern conservatives without a taste for bullying and bribing the world.

“The true conservatives have been those who wanted to let the American people alone and not hector and dragoon them into schemes of “progress” and foreign entanglement.

Conservatism, for us, has been a powerful and eloquent train of thinkers who have opposed the Hamilton/Lincoln regime of state-capitalism and the Roosevelt/Bush/Irving Kristol agenda of “global democracy.” Our conservatism stands strongly contra to the historic Republican party and to “neoconservative” imperialism. In this we are not so much out-of-step as some may think. Russell Kirk, “the father of modern conservatism,” considered Alexander Hamilton to be no conservative but rather a dubious “innovator.” And more than once Kirk lamented that “the conservative disposition” in the United States has too often been misunderstood by identifying it with rent-seeking behaviour.

As we have tried to show, many of the great figures of American literature – James Fenimore Cooper, H.L. Mencken, William Faulkner – fit well into our scheme of true American conservatism. The thinkers Dr. McClanahan and I have presented are perhaps not so much forgotten as they are unheeded, but they are all good men who have warned tellingly of the march toward the regime of regimentation and exploitation that is now established.”

Mitt Romney: Jerusalem Is Zionist and Jewish, not Christian Or Muslim

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itt Romney lands in his favorite country and declares for it (“In Israel, Romney declares Jerusalem to be capital,” AP, July 29):

“On Israeli soil, U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Sunday declared Jerusalem to be the capital of the Jewish state and said the United States has “a solemn duty and a moral imperative” to block Iran from achieving nuclear weapons capability.

“Make no mistake, the ayatollahs in Iran are testing our moral defenses. They want to know who will object and who will look the other way,” he said. “We will not look away nor will our country ever look away from our passion and commitment to Israel.”

Comment:

“Since when do Presidential candidates stand on foreign soil and pledge to conduct U.S. foreign policy in accordance with the desires of the foreign government on whose soil they are standing?” asks the DailyKos correctly (https://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/29/1114809/-You-re-not-President-yet-Mitt).

You’ll notice this is the same position that Ron Paul has recently taken (“Ron Paul shocks campaign staff with new position on Israel,” Business, April 13, 2012).…. albeit for constitutional reasons.

Does that bother me? Yes, I admit it does, even though Dr. Paul’s reasoning is perfectly valid….if you use strictly ideological arguments and forget politics,  history, and prudence.

It’s one more piece of evidence that Dr. Paul’s non-interventionism is weighted in favor of  Zionism.

I blogged as much last year – Ron Paul’s Zionist non-interventionism.

The whole thing bothers me, even though the campaign manager quoted in the piece, Douglas Wead (here he is blogging on the subject) has a tendency, reportedly, to put his own spin on Paul’s statements or actions.

It also bothers me that Ron Paul’s chief legal advisor is Bruce Fein, who has an extensive background as a lobbyist for foreign governments ( “Def(e)ining choice: Bruce Fein, the Turkish Lobby, and the Ron Paul campaign,” Nanour Barsoumian, The Armenian Weekly,January 20, 2012) that is completely at odds with Paul’s rhetoric against special interests.

I’ve blogged about Bruce Fein before and commented about him at other sites.

It was Bruce Fein who lobbied in support of US recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, instead of as an international city, belonging equally to Islam, Christianity, and Judaism — which has been the position taken by the US State Department these many years (http://jerusalem.usconsulate.gov/about_the_embassy.html).

Sure, the State Dept. is left-leaning. But the left gets many things right, and I’m neither ideologically rigid enough nor partisan enough not to recognize when they do..

Last year, there was a seminal case that centered on whether a young Israeli-American dual citizen born in Jerusalem should have Jerusalem listed as his place of birth on his passport, or Israel. (“Court may rule on US stand on Jerusalem,” Barbara Ferguson and Tim Kennedy, Arab News, May 12, 2011)

The State Department  resisted all appeals from the parents and the case went to the Supreme Court, which decided in favor of having Israel on his passport, thereby setting a precedent for any judge who wants to overthrow US foreign policy from the bench.

That’s how the New World Order Works. Through judicial fiat.

The red-herring that constitutionalists dangle before everyone is the overweening power of the President and the constitutional limits that need to be set on it. That’s all very well and perfectly true,  except, again, the devil is in the details.

Who sets limits on Congress and the judiciary, both bribed and bought by  Zionists?

The media?

Also owned by Zionists.

It’s Zionists all the way down.

While the Paul/Rothbard anarcho-capitalist philosophy rails against secretive government and  executive over-reaching, you’ll notice that it also equates all commercial advertising and political donations with free speech.

Murray Rothbard, the principal intellect behind the hybrid movement,  also defended the decriminalization of bribery and blackmail. See M.N. Rothbard, Man, Economy and State, 443 n. 49, 1993, (http://mises.org/books/mespm.pdf).

Whom does that help? The Zionist financiers who buy  Congress and bribe and bully the Judiciary.

So, what the left hand (constitutionality) giveth, the right hand (anarcho-capitalism) taketh away.

Using the letter of the law to circumvent its spirit is legalism.

Depending on which sect of conspiracy theory you favor, you can blame this on Jesuitical or Talmudic casuistry… or on perfidious Albion.

I prefer more academic terminology. Like, phony-baloney.

You notice I didn’t use the politically correct terminology, which would be “pro-Israeli” Congress and “pro-Israeli” President.  Because Israel, the nation-state, is only one part of this and because nation-states seem to be slated for demolition in the near future.

Israel  is the cockpit, but not the whole plane.

If the Zionists want something, they can get it equally through extra-legal means or the most snow-white constitutionality. Paul’s constitutionalism, however well-meaning, has acted as nothing more than window-dressing.

I don’t think he can be blamed for it. It may not be something he or anyone can really help.

But it’s lesson should be clear.

Politics is not only not the answer. At this point, it is a diabolical diversion.

Ron Paul and Herman Cain Only Non-Deadbeats

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LRC blog comments on a Politico piece about presidential dead-beats (“Presidential also-rans stiff small businesses, ” David Leventhall and Robin Bravender, Politico, July 29, 2011):


Bachmann, other candidates stiff small businesses
Posted by Lew Rockwell on July 29, 2012 09:05 AM

Politico goes down the list of shame, but for some reason neglects to mention the one non-deadbeat, Ron Paul.

Comment:

Ron Paul wasn’t mentioned, true. But why did Lew Rockwell emphasize Bachmann? The Politico piece emphasized her too and buried the Democrat names at the back.

It also buried Herman Cain’s notable difference from the crowd. He paid his vendors personally and ended up being owed by his own campaign, as well as Gingrich’s.

Even Bachmann was actually less in debt to vendors than the other candidates (under a million compared to multiple millions for the others, all of whom are richer than she was).

So why would a former paleo-libertarian pick on Bachmann?

Pandering to the left?

Is Tolstoyan Anarchism The Same As Rothbardian Anarcho-Capitalism?

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I smell more smoke…and mirrors..

Agora-affiliated  Jeff Berwick

[in an interview today with Agora-affiliated Daily Bell]:

“Tolstoy was an anarchist.”

Agora-afflicted Lila Rajiva

[in a monologue with herself over coffee as she looks over Tolstoy’s astrological chart – just kidding! – and recalls the millions of words of  Lev she actually read decades ago, if only in translation]:

Yes, Tolstoy was an anarchist.

He was also anti-capitalist and anti-property, and, by the end of his life,  he was also anti-sex, anti-church, anti-religion, anti-mysticism, anti-technology, anti-capital punishment, and anti-art.

He worshiped the Russian peasant.

He excoriated himself for having written “War and Peace” and “Anna Karenina”.  He wanted to give away everything he owned, even though his children and his poor wife (who had slaved over his manuscripts for years) opposed him.

And most of this extremism came out of his own psychodrama (as Gandhi’s “issues” came out of Gandhi’s psychodrama).

Tolstoy killed a man in a duel in his youth, fought in wars in which he killed his enemies, and contracted an STD from an early experience of sex (perhaps his earliest).

He had such an enormous sexual appetite that he was always taking up with underclass women and then suffering bouts of self-loathing and revulsion toward them.

He often threatened his wife with a gun, while cussing her out.

Then he had a “dark night of the soul” and became a different man.

You know what happens. An alcoholic swears off drink. Then he becomes even more of a nuisance than he was before. He follows you around, a thermos of coffee clutched to his heart, the lingo of AA on his lips. You feel sorry for him. He’s off liquor. But he’s not cured.

Same thing with Tolstoy.

For the Mises-Agora-hard-money (gold-bug) libertarian circle of co-investors and co-thinkers (to which Jeff Berwick belongs) to pretend that Tolstoy’s anarchism is equivalent to the anarcho-capitalism of the gold-bug, secessionist, philo-Semitic-yet-Dixiecrat, finance-capital-friendly, anti-democratic, Rothbardian  wing of American political and economic thought is, frankly, nonsense.

But it’s terrific marketing if you want to neutralize the anger of a  whole bunch of  anarchist youngsters, oldsters, and hipsters,  by channeling it into anti-nation state ideology in the service of the new KKK – Korporatist-Krisismongering-Kleptocrats.

And make a few bucks doing it too.

Wink.

Murray Rothbard: Hooray For Che!

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File under ideological insanity – Rothbard gives props to the people’s poseur, Che Guevara, whom even the anarchist left today has rejected:

“What made Che such an heroic figure for our time is that he, more than any man of our epoch or even of our century, was the living embodiment of the principle of Revolution. More than any man since the lovable but entirely ineffectual nineteenth-century Russian anarchist, Mikhail Bakunin, Che earned the title of “professional revolutionary.” And furthermore, to paraphrase Christopher Jencks in a recent perceptive, if wrongheaded, article in the New Republic, we all knew that his enemy was our enemy–that great Colossus that oppresses and threatens all the peoples of the world, U. S. imperialism.

Trained as a physician in Argentina, witnessing CIA-fomented counter-revolution by the thug Castillo Armas in Guatemala, Guevara dedicated the rest of his life to the Revolution. He found a promising field first in Cuba, where, as everyone knows, Che was second only to Fidel Castro in waging and then winning the revolution there.”

and this:

But in his mighty heart Che could not refrain from leaping a whole raft of stages, from plunging romantically but recklessly into the premature adventure of armed struggle in Latin America. And so, with tragic irony, Che Guevara, in his daring and courage, was betrayed by the very Bolivian peasantry whom he was trying to liberate, and who barely understood the meaning
of the conflict. Che died from violating his own principles of revolutionary war.

And this, enthusiastically quoting from Fidel Castro’s praise of Che:

“Newspapers of all tendencies have univermlly recognized Che’s virtues… . He is an almost unique example of how a man could win the recognition and respect of his enemies, of the very enemies he faced with his arms in his hands, of those who have been ideological enemies and have nevertheless expressed feelings of admiration and of respect toward Che.”

Murray Rothbard, “Ernesto Che Geuvara: RIP,” Mises.org http://mises.org/journals/lar/pdfs/3_3/3_3_1.pdf

See also this article from a strict anarcho-capitalist position about Rothbard’s misrepresentation of his views to placate or mislead followers: The 10 Points Of The Libertarian Party Abolitionist Caucus.pdf.

Note – My main objection to an-cap positions is that they are easily manipulated by the state (national and transnational) for its own ends. An an-cap world is possible, but only spottily.

Now, in contrast to Rothbard’s glowing portrait, here is a more candid assessment of Che’s actual record from the anarchistlibrary.org (Che Guevara: why anarchists should view him critically):

Organise, Issue 47, Winter 1997/1998
flag.blackened.net

QUOTE: “After all, the Che cult is still used to obscure the real nature of Castro’s Cuba, one of the final bastions of Stalinism.”

QUOTE: “He demanded the death penalty for “informers, insubordinates, malingerers and deserters.” He himself personally carried out executions. Indeed the first execution carried out against an informer by the Castroists was undertaken by Che. He wrote: “I ended the problem giving him a shot with a.32 pistol in the right side of the brain.” On another occasion he planned on shooting a group of guerrillas who had gone on hunger strike because of bad food. Fidel intervened to stop him. Another guerrilla who dared to question Che was ordered into battle without a weapon!”

QUOTE: “With the Castroite victory in 1959, Che, along with his Stalinist buddy Raul Castro, was put in charge of building up state control. He purged the army, carried out re-education classes within it, and was supreme prosecutor in the executions of Batista supporters, 550 being shot in the first few months. He was seen as extremely ruthless by those who saw him at work. These killings against supporters of the old regime, some of whom had been implicated in torture and murder, was extended in 1960 to those in the working class movement who criticised the Castro regime. The anarchists and anarcho-syndicalists had their press closed down and many militants were thrown in prison. Che was directly implicated in this.”

QUOTE: “Photo opportunities with the peasantry and proletariat, good looks and a dramatic death in no way exonerate him from his historical role in the suppression of the popular classes, state terror and capitalism, and changing Cuba from the semi-colony of one great power the US, to another, the USSR.”

QUOTE: “I’d like to confess, papa, at that moment I discovered that I really like killing” “Hate will be an element of the battle, a merciless hate for the enemy, that will inspire the guerrilla-soldier to superhuman efforts of strength and changes him into an effective, violent, selected, in cold blood killing machine”

Bandit-Bankster Corzine Protected By Holder and Freeh

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Human E vents:

“Considering the magnitude of the failure at MF Global, where over a billion dollars’ worth of client’s money was “vaporized” under legally questionable circumstances, many observers are amazed that chief executive Jon Corzine hasn’t gotten in more legal trouble.  Corzine, of course, has huge Democrat Party political connections, including a career as the Democrat governor of New Jersey, and in the Senate.  He’s a big money bundler for the Obama re-election campaign, and has continued putting big bucks in the Obama coffers long after his disgrace.

But there might just be some other reasons for Corzine’s remarkably smooth skating after the MF Global collapse, as reported by Wynton Hall at Breitbart News: documents uncovered by the Government Accountability Institute reveal that “now-defunct MF Global was a client of Attorney General Eric Holder and Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer’s former law firm, Covington & Burling.”

Furthermore, MF Global’s bankruptcy trustee hired the former law firm of Associate Attorney General Tony West.  The trustee is former FBI director Louis Freeh, who hired Eric Holder as a trial counsel when Freeh was working as the general counsel for MBNA America Bank in the early 2000s.  Freeh was a character witness at Holder’s Senate confirmation hearings for the Attorney General position.

The tight web of connections between Justice officials and the banking industry have led many members of Congress to demand a special prosecutor to investigate the MF Global collapse.  It looks like one more affair that Eric Holder’s politicized Justice Department cannot be trusted to investigate.”

Stupid Party Leader Tells Stupid Party To Keep Being Stupid

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H/T LRC blog:

“Former Texas Rep. and House Majority Leader Dick Armey said Thursday that while Mitt Romney will receive diligent support from tea party activists across the country, he’s not exactly everything they’re looking for.”

Sure. That’s why all those social- conservative activists went to bat yet again for the GOP. They get called everything from “bat-shit crazy” to American Taliban, only to have the party commissar tell them that crony-capitalist, socialistic fascist finance-capital in white-face is really, really different from crony-capitalist, fascistic-socialist finance-capital in black-face.

Dr. Paul, this is what you did by going light on Romney and hitting hard at everyone else.

Of a bad lot, Herman Cain was the best choice for the right….if you had to choose from the two parties. [Correction: I meant, to run along with Ron Paul. I think on his expressed positions, Paul was the best choice, but one the establishment would never have let win. Cain was the best among those it would have accepted and Paul could have hopped on to that ticket.]

Personally, much as I disagree with her methods and objectives, Lila Rose did more for social conservatives on her own than the whole party.

She actually almost got me rethinking my pro-choice stance.

Herman Cain would have trumped the race card. He came from outside politics and outside the financial sector.

He was smart and would have been teachable on economics. He and Paul would have been an unbeatable team, from a marketing perspective.

This year’s elections was the GOP’s to lose.

And, predictably, they’ve just about done that.

The Truth About Dragan Mihailovich and Serbia’s Chetniks

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Statement by Richard L. Felman, USAF, in front of the Serb National Federation, on July 7, 1987 and entered into the Congressional Record on Draga Mihailovic and the Serb Chetniks on November 19, 1987

President Stone, Reverend Clergy, Distinguished quests, members of the SNF, and fellow Chetniks:

Moja braco i sestre, (“my brothers and sisters” in Serbian language)

May I first express my deep appreciation to President Stone and all members of the Serb National Federation for inviting me to your 3 Day Serbian Day Weekend. I know it is a most important event and I am delighted you have asked me to share it with you.

Chetnik leader
General Draža Mihajlovi?

Before getting into my speech I would like to acknowledge how appreciated it is that today (July 17th) is the very day in 1946 that General Mihailovich lost his life to a Communist Firing Squad. I say it is appropriate because were it not for Draza Mihailovich and the Grace of God, I would not be shading here before you today. I have said it before and will say it again: I owe my very life to General Mihailovich, the Chetniks and the Serbian people and because of this whenever I get together with the Serbian people it is like a family reunion and fill me with much emotion. If I may state it as simply as possible: “OO MOM SERTZU YA SAM SERBEEN.” (This is the pronunciation script of “U mom srcu ja sam Srbin” – in Serbian or “In my heart I am a Serb” – in English.)

My feelings, however, go far deeper then just gratitude for saving my life. I say that because when I was shot down in Yugoslavia, I had the opportunity to know first hand what truly remarkable people the Serbians are … and the bond of brotherhood that we formed during the war continues to this day. In every Serb I met I always found a sense of honor and sense of freedom that is second to none … and in this day and age I feel privileged to know people who still maintain these values and have such a strong commitment to their God, their family and their heritage.

I was in England a while ago to celebrate the European Chetnik Congress and Karageorgevich Day. Needless to say the Serbian Hospitality and food were out of this world. But the outstanding part of my visit was meeting with the Serbian Youth and seeing how intense they were about carrying on their priceless heritage… Their parents told them about the American Airmen that Mihailovich had rescued but I was the first one they met and their questions were endless. I spent a great deal of time with them and came away inspired by their enthusiasm.

I am reminded of them as I see the young people in the audience today. If I may I would like to say to them: “Thank God you were blessed with such a proud heritage. I saw with my own eyes the blood shed by your parents and grandparents just so it could be passed on to you .. Be proud of this priceless treasure you have and preserve it the rest of your days… So many of today’s youth are troubled and searching for answers in many strange ways. You have all the answers you need right here in your own church and your own heritage.”

So much for the Sunday Sermon, and now I would like to tell you of my first introduction to the Serbian people an how I won my Ravna Gora Badge as an honorary Chetnik. The one good thing the Germans did during WWII was shoot me down, giving me a chance to meet the Serbian people. During World War II, I was returning from an air raid on the Ploesti oil fields in Roumania when my B-24 Bomber was attacked by German ME-109s over Yugoslavia. We managed to shoot down two of them before my pane caught fire and we were forced to bail out from 20,000 feet.

As soon as I landed I was immediately surrounded by about 20 Chetniks all shouting “Amerikanski”… Before I knew it they each took turns hugging and kissing me (only the men mind you, not the women). As my leg was bleeding, they carried me to a nearby kucha (house in Serbian) for treatment. They had no medical supplies, but they did have a bottle of slivovitza [Serbian plum brandy] and used it to clean my wound… Once that was done, we all sat around and drank what was left in the bottle.

Shortly after that, an elderly man about ninety motioned for me to follow him. I had no idea what he wanted but limped after him until we came to a small wooden chapel. He then got down on his knees, clasped his hand in prayer and motioned for me to kneel down beside him. It was a most unforgettable sight! Here we were: strangers from 2 different countries, we spoke two different languages and practiced two different religions. But in those few moments we were united as brothers kneeling to give thanks for my rescue to the one God we all worship: It was one of the most moving experiences of my life.

It would be impossible for me to relate all the many wonderful things the Chetniks and the Serbian people did for me and my fellow American fliers. As our numbers increased, each man would tell of his own personal experiences. They told how the people went hungry in order to give them what little food they had. How many of them slept on the floor so that the Airmen could have the comfort of their beds. How they risked their lives to protect us from the German patrols. Not once did I hear anything but the highest praise from the 500 Americans rescued by General Mihailovich………

….Before getting into the concluding part of my speech, I would like to make brief mention of a matter of a personal nature which is added reason for my admiration of the Serbian people.

Besides being one of the American Airmen rescued, by the Serbian people, I am also a Jew! It is a matter of historical fact that Serbia was one of the very few countries where anti-Semitism was not permitted.

In the old kingdom of Serbia, and later in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, the Jews were, by law, equal members of the community and enjoyed all the rights and privileges of other citizens. This is so very remarkable when you consider the persecution of the Jewish people throughout history.

The historical goodwill between the Serbs and the Jews does not seem strange when you consider the many parallels in our history. We both suffered cruel persecution, both have been driven from our homeland and today we are both dispersed throughout the world.

One other amazing similarity is that both our peoples fought battles to the death for their belief in the freedom and dignity of man. The Jews at Masada and the Serbs in Kosovo.

In keeping with this same love of freedom, many Serbs risked their lives during World War II to save countless Jews from Nazi death camps. This is something we can never forget and for which I and The Jewish People will always be grateful……

Permit me to read what President Truman had to say in awarding him the highest combat award our nation can bestow on a foreign national:

“LEGION OF MERIT – CHIEF COMMANDER: General Dragoljub Mihailovich distinguished himself in an outstanding manner as Commander-in-Chief of the Yugoslavian Army Forces and later as Minister of War by Organizing and leading important resistance forces against the enemy which occupied Yugoslavia, from December 1941 to December 1944. Through the undaunted efforts of his troops, many United States airmen were rescued and returned safely to friendly control. General Mihailovich and his forces, although lacking adequate supplies, and fighting under extreme hardships, contributed materially to the Allied cause, and were instrumental in obtaining a final Allied victory. March 29, 1948. Harry S. Truman.”

We now know that from this day forward there is a symbol on American soil that established a permanent bond between Gen. Mihailovich, President Truman and 500 grateful Americans… and it is here for all the world to see!

Since the end of WWII we have made great strides in trying to repay our debt of honor to the man who saved our lives. Permit me to read just a partial list of those who have joined us in support of General Mihailovic:
Presidents Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon and Reagan;
The United States Senate;
hundreds of United States Congressmen;
the Secretary of the Air Force, Thomas Reed;
The Department of Interior;
The National Capital Memorial Advisory Committee;
the United States Ambassador to Yugoslavia, Laurence Silberman;
the Chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Clement Zablocki;
a United States Commission of Inquiry;
the Arizona State Senate;
the governors of Alaska, Kansas, Kentucky, Indiana, Massachusetts, Nebraska, and Texas;
the mayor of Los Angeles, Tom Bradley;
Bishops Firmilian, Iriney and Manning;
John Wayne;
The American Legion;
Polish War Veterans;
George Meany and the AFL-CIO;
the Teamsters Union;
The Heritage Foundations;
The Coalition for America;
The New Your Times;
Washington Post and Washington Times,
Toronto Sun, Christian Science Monitor, etc., etc…

And this is only a partial list. Incredible as it may sound, the only ones in the entire world who have not supported and continue to oppose us are the Communist Government of Yugoslavia and our own State Department….

..  What is even more bizarre is that our own State Department chose to take sides against us (its own combat veterans) and side with a Communist government that openly supports and justifies international terrorism.[LR: Tito’s government]

Bob Stone was there in the hearing room and I’m sure he can tell you more about the most incredible alliance of opponents American ever had to face in their own country. Had this been a court of law, the opposition would have been thrown out as completely irrelevant – but this was the political arena where truth takes a back seat to what is politically expedient.

If even the slightest semblance of doubt existed as to what the truth was, it was exploded beyond all recognition when the Encyclopedia Britannica published its revised account of Gen. Mihailovich and the CIA released (under the Freedom of Information Act) the previously unpublished top secret intelligence file on the activities of all parties in Yugoslavia during WWII. Here was the on-the-scene American intelligence reports to the President of the United States exposing all the propaganda lies that have stood in our way since 1944. If ever there was a smoking gun, this was it. And those who still insist on the propaganda fairy tale about Mihailovich’s collaboration, I suggest they join hands with those who believe in the tooth fairy, the Easter bunny and the flat earth theory.

Now that we have the top secret CIA Intelligence File an the same opposition continues to stand in our way, the American Airmen are publicly offering to pay the sum of $100,000 to the United States Government if the State Department or any of Mihailovich’s political opponents can prove in an American court of law the treacherous lies they continue to make against him in opposing our petition before Congress.

What’s more, if they have any respect for the service to the United States of America, the American Veteran represents, I suggests they should speak up now or forever hold their peace. We do not have another 40 years. You can bet your life we are justifiably outraged and fighting mad. Quite frankly, even if our offer were for ten times that amount, we have no fear it will ever be accepted. Under the close scrutiny of an American Court, the facts contained in the CIA file would prove to be an embarrassment and even humiliation to all those parties who continue to oppose us…..”

Richard L. Felman is president of the National Committee of American Airmen Rescued by General Mihailovich).