Instruction: Write an article about: Ex Guantánamo detainee: Ron DeSantis aided torture, laughed at force-feeding. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: GOP, Guantánamo Bay, Republican Party, Ron DeSantis, torture

Output:
Former Guantánamo prison camp detainee Mansoor Adayfi said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a top US presidential helpful, was complicit in torture and laughed when hunger strikers were violently force-fed.

A former detainee at the US military’s prison camp at Guantánamo Bay said Florida Governor Ron DeSantis was complicit in torture when the Republican politician served there as an Army lawyer.
According to the ex prisoner, DeSantis was brought in to break a hunger strike, and he laughed when detainees were violently force-fed by US torturers.
He described these horrors in an interview with journalist Mike Prysner, on his podcast Eyes Left.
Prysner spoke with Mansoor Adayfi, a Yemeni man who was held at Gitmo, without charge, from 2002 to 2016.
DeSantis is a presidential hopeful who is widely considered a top candidate for the Republican Party in the 2024 election. Today he serves as governor of Florida, the third-most populous US state, and he was previously a member of the House of Representatives.

After graduating from elite Yale University, DeSantis briefly taught at an expensive private school, where students recalled he was sympathetic to the white-supremacist Confederacy in the Civil War.
DeSantis went on to study at Harvard Law School. As an avid supporter of the US “war on terror,” he also joined the Navy.
He served as a lawyer in the military’s judicial arm the Judge Advocate General’s Corps (JAG), going on to advise top officers as they committed atrocities in the illegal US occupation of Iraq.
But before he went to Iraq, DeSantis was sent to work at Guantánamo Bay in 2006, where he helped oversee the US torture camp there located on occupied Cuban territory.
While DeSantis has mentioned his time at Gitmo to gain political capital, he has always been very vague about what he did there, and public records related to his service are largely redacted.
There is not much mainstream corporate media coverage of DeSantis’ time in Guantánamo, and the little reporting that exists whitewashes it, claiming he was there to make sure the US military was following the law.
Adayfi told Prysner in the podcast interview that DeSantis was stationed in Gitmo specifically to break a hunger strike that started in 2005. Hundreds of prisoners refused to eat to protest the inhumane conditions in the torture camp, in which several detainees died.
“They brought in a collection of new ruthless individuals to break the strike,” Adayfi recalled. He said that DeSantis told the detainees he was there to help them, “but it was a trap.”
DeSantis monitored the hunger strikers, gathered intelligence, and advised military officials at the torture camp.
When US prison guards began to force-feed the detainees, Adayfi reported that DeSantis simply watched the torture and laughed.
“We were crying and screaming,” he said. “We were tied to the feeding chair. And that guy was watching. He was laughing.”
While DeSantis has tried to market himself in domestic US politics as a right-wing “populist,” he completely follows bipartisan neoconservative orthodoxy on foreign policy.
DeSantis is a hawk who praised the US “war on terror” and participated in the illegal military occupation of Iraq. He has since pushed for new wars on both China and Iran.
DeSantis strongly supports the illegal US blockades and sanctions on Cuba and Venezuela, and he praised US-led coup attempts in Venezuela and Nicaragua.
Boasting that “Florida is the most Israel-friendly state in the country,” DeSantis even moved to criminalize protest against the apartheid regime.
DeSantis has tried to crush the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which advocates for basic Palestinian human rights.


Instruction: Write an article about: How Trump and John Bolton attempted a coup in Venezuela. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Donald Trump, John Bolton, Nicolás Maduro, podcast, Venezuela

Output:
Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor John Bolton wrote a book, “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” detailing the US coup attempt and hybrid war against Venezuela.

Donald Trump’s neoconservative US National Security Advisor John Bolton admitted on CNN he “helped plan coups d’etat” in Venezuela and “other places.”
Multipolarista editor Benjamin Norton analyzes Bolton’s book “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” which details the US hybrid war on Venezuela.

The following is an excerpt from the Multipolarista report “Trump advisor John Bolton admits planning US coups in Venezuela and beyond“:
Trump fired John Bolton in September 2019, partially due to his failure in the Venezuela coup attempts.
In 2020, Bolton published a 500-page tell-all memoir, titled “The Room Where It Happened.” He was offered a $2 million advance for the book, and promised millions more in royalties.
The memoir turned Bolton into a media celebrity. He cashed in on the opportunity to criticize Trump for supposedly not being enough of a warmonger.
“The Room Where It Happened” mentions Venezuela and Venezuelans more than 300 times, and has a 35-page chapter dedicated specifically to detailing his coup attempt, titled “Venezuela Libre” (Free Venezuela).
Bolton did not hide his neocolonialist worldview in the book, once again invoking the nearly 200-year-old Monroe Doctrine.
Fearmongering about Venezuela’s alliance with China, Russia, Iran, and Cuba, he declared, “America had opposed external threats in the Western Hemisphere since the Monroe Doctrine, and it was time to resurrect it.”
Bolton wrote that Trump shared this colonialist mentality. He claimed the president said that Venezuela is “really part of the United States,” and that “it would be ‘cool’ to invade Venezuela,” according to White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly.
“Trump still wanted a military option,” Bolton emphasized. This is consistent with what former Defense Secretary Mark Esper described in his book.
The neoconservative national security advisor also boasted in the book that the Trump administration’s coup attempt against Venezuela had bipartisan backing from both Republicans and Democrats “on the Hill, where support on both sides of the aisle for our hard line in Venezuela was almost uniform.”
“And the press coverage was uniformly favorable,” he added contently.
Bolton pointed out the coincidental timing that, “Shortly after I became National Security Advisor, while Maduro was speaking at a military awards ceremony on August 4, he was attacked by two drones.”
Maduro said his government has intelligence proving that Bolton had planned the assassination attempt.
Showing his sadistic streak, Bolton wrote that the photos of Venezuela soldiers running away from the killer drones was “hilarious.”
In a meeting after the drone assassination attempt, Bolton wrote that “Trump said to me emphatically, ‘Get it done,’ meaning get rid of the Maduro regime. ‘This is the fifth time I’ve asked for it,’ he continued.”
The national security advisor noted that Trump’s secretary of state, former CIA Director Mike Pompeo, was strongly in agreement, stating “‘we should go to the wall’ to get Maduro out.”
Bolton added, “Trump insisted he wanted military options for Venezuela and then keep it because ‘it’s really part of the United States.’”
Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and National Security Advisor John Bolton in April 2019
Trump had made it clear that he was considering invading Venezuela as far back as August 2017, Bolton pointed out. In a press conference that August, Trump had stated, “We have many options for Venezuela, including a possible military option, if necessary.”
In the memoir, Bolton admitted that that illegal unilateral sanctions the United States imposed on Venezuela were aimed at “driving the state-owned oil monopoly’s production as low as possible,” in an attempt “to crash Maduro’s regime.”
“Trump stressed that he wanted the ‘strongest possible sanctions’ against Venezuela,” Bolton wrote.
Trump also “wanted assurances regarding post-Maduro access to Venezuela’s oil resources, trying to ensure that China and Russia would not continue to benefit from their deals,” he added.
Bolton stressed that Trump had great “interest in Venezuela’s oil fields,” and he recalled that the US president insisted “we should take the oil in Venezuela after ousting Maduro.”
Similarly, Bolton recalled numerous stories that showed how Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs banker and hedge fund manager, was most concerned about the interests of US corporations.
He wrote that Mnuchin frequently “talked to oil-company executives.” Mnuchin was concerned about remaining “US oil-and-gas assets in Venezuela,” and “worried that steps in the banking sector would hurt Visa and Mastercard.”
Bolton also revealed he pressured the UK government to illegally freeze more than $1 billion of gold reserves that Venezuela held in the Bank of England.
He celebrated sanctions as instruments of US financial warfare, declaring that “they’re about using America’s massive economic power to advance our national interests. They are most effective when applied massively, swiftly, and decisively, and enforced with all the power available.”
Boasting of the sadistic sanctions he imposed on Venezuela, Bolton gleefully wrote, “we had Maduro by the windpipe and needed to constrict it.”
Trump with National Security Advisor John Bolton and CIA Director Gina Haspel in January 2019
In an incredibly hypocritical moment of his book, Bolton accused the Venezuelan government, without any evidence, of supposedly trafficking drugs. But he simultaneously fondly recalled a meeting he had “in my office with Honduran President Juan Hernandez, who was similarly optimistic, in contrast to the situation in Nicaragua, on his border.”
Honduras’ right-wing authoritarian leader Juan Orlando Hernández (JOH) came to power after a US-backed military coup in 2009. JOH was a key US ally, and joined Washington in recognizing Guaidó. JOH was also a notorious drug dealer.
In 2022, JOH was extradited to the United States, and the Justice Department said “Hernandez allegedly partnered with some of the largest cocaine traffickers in the world to transport tons of cocaine.”
Bolton concluded the chapter lamenting that the various US-sponsored coup attempts in Venezuela failed.
He also complained that Trump was not supportive enough. While Trump had pushed for extremely aggressive policies against Venezuela, he apparently did not much have faith in Guaidó, calling him “weak” and allegedly joking that he was the “Beto O’Rourke of Venezuela.”


Instruction: Write an article about: Media regurgitates fake news from US spies, risking World War III with Russia. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: AP, Associated Press, media, Poland, Russia, Ukraine

Output:
Top news outlet the Associated Press falsely claimed Russia fired a missile at NATO member Poland, risking World War III. This fake story came from an anonymous US spy. AP’s correspondent insisted, “I can’t imagine a U.S. intelligence official would be wrong on this.”

Top Western media outlets published a false report claiming Russia attacked Poland with a missile. This fake news originated with an anonymous US intelligence official, whose unsubstantiated accusations were mindlessly regurgitated by the press.
On November 15, two people in Poland were killed in a missile attack that crossed over Ukraine’s western border.
NATO and Polish officials later admitted that this missile was likely fired by accident by Ukrainian authorities. But soon after it happened, many Western media outlets blamed Russia.

Given that Poland is a member of the US-led NATO military cartel, a Russian attack on its territory could have triggered a direct US military entry into the proxy war in Ukraine, potentially risking World War III between two nuclear superpowers.
One of the main culprits in amplifying the false claim that Russia had attacked Poland was leading US news agency the Associated Press (AP).
The AP reporter who published the fake news, James LaPorta, had been fed the story by a US spy.

The website Semafor obtained internal communications between LaPorta and his colleagues using the chat app Slack.
A screenshot of the messages shows that a “senior American intelligence official” had told LaPorta that “Russian missiles crossed into Poland,” killing “at least two people.” The anonymous US spy also claimed that “missiles entered Moldova.”
Credit: Semafor
LaPorta said the unnamed source in the US intelligence agency had been “vetted by Ron Dixon,” referring to the vice president of news and head of investigations at the Associated Press.
AP editor Lisa Leff asked if the website could publish the claim, or if it needed “confirmation from another source and/or Poland.”
LaPorta replied, “that call is above my pay grade.”
The AP correspondent based in Warsaw, Poland, Vanessa Gera, chimed in, arguing they should publish the fake story, because, “I can’t imagine a U.S. intelligence official would be wrong on this.”
Source: Semafor
The AP’s deputy news director for Europe, Zeina Karam, ultimately approved the fake story. She wrote, “Yes, should be ok, I see source vetted by @rnixon,” in reference to the vice president.
Karam previously served as AP’s news director for Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq.
Lisa Leff, the AP editor, subsequently sent out the news alert, stating that a “senior U.S. intelligence official says Russian missiles crossed into NATO member Poland, killing two people.”
By publishing the fake news, the AP set off an international scandal that could have triggered a direct US military attack on Russia.
To try to save face, the AP fired LaPorta on November 21.
But the Associated Press told the Washington Post that it does not plan on punishing Gera, Leff, Karam, or any of the editors who obediently echoed the unsubstantiated claim of an unnamed US spy.
This controversy shows how cozy mainstream corporate media outlets are with US intelligence agencies, and how anonymous spies feed them claims that are often false, but that serve Washington’s foreign-policy interests.
LaPorta himself previously worked for the US military. The Post noted that he is a “former U.S. Marine who served in Afghanistan, [and] he joined AP in April 2020 after several years as a freelance reporter.”
But he was too close to his US government sources, and he got burned.


Instruction: Write an article about: FBI spied on and harassed Black revolutionary who was killed and set on fire. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Black liberation, Black Lives Matter, Darren Seals, FBI, Ferguson, Michael Brown, police, police brutality, racism

Output:
The FBI harassed Black revolutionary Darren Seals and compiled a 900-page report on his organizing against racism and police brutality in Ferguson, Missouri, birthplace of Black Lives Matter. He was shot to death in 2016, then set on fire in his car.

The FBI harassed Black revolutionary Darren Seals and compiled a 900-page report on his organizing against racism and police brutality in Ferguson, Missouri, birthplace of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Seals was shot to death in 2016, then set on fire in his car in an unsolved murder.

Local St. Louis media outlet the Riverfront Times obtained a declassified copy of the more than 900-page FBI report on Seals.
The FBI fully redacted approximately 860 of the pages, and partially redacted parts of the remaining roughly 45 pages.
In the report, the FBI called Seals “a self-described revolutionary who has espoused somewhat militant rhetoric and has access to weapons.”
The Riverfront Times article shows how the FBI used local police to harass Seals.
In June 2016, the activist was “investigatively detained” by local police who pulled over Seals in his car on FBI orders.

Seals had proudly described himself on his Twitter account as a “Revolutionary, Activist, Unapologetically BLACK, Afrikan in AmeriKKKa.”
Although he was one of the co-founders of Black Lives Matter, Seals was very critical of the nonprofit-industrial complex and the attempt to co-opt the popular movement.
A working-class activist who made a modest living as on an assembly line at General Motors, Seals harshly criticized people like DeRay Mckesson, who were handpicked by the corporate media, funded by billionaire-backed corporate foundations, and turned into so-called “leaders” of what had been a grassroots movement.
Mckesson used his media celebrity to make large amounts of money, doing ads for corporations. He also joined the Democratic Party, unsuccessfully ran for office, and endorsed Hillary Clinton for president.
Seals condemned them as opportunistic “sellouts.” He ridiculed: “Let me start an organization; give me a couple grants; start me a couple Gofundmes; tweet a little bit; and now they’re big shots; they’re traveling the world.”
“They’re in these orgs, getting paid $5000, $10,000 a month, traveling the fucking world, speaking like y’all are fucking helping the community, but you ain’t doing shit for the community.”
“We got blood, sweat, and tears in the streets, for nothing,” Seals added. “People risked their lives; people lost their jobs, lost their homes. There are cats in prison right now, doing five, 10 years for Mike Brown shit. This shit was real.”
“We could have changed the fucking world. All you wanted was a fucking donation, and a couple Twitter followers”
Seals also criticized capitalism and US imperialism.
“Money is the root of all evil; being broke is the root of all evil; white supremacy is the root of all evil in this country,” he said. “That’s why the government, they’re going to war every year, taking resources, land, gold, oil.”
“I didn’t get in it for no money,” Seals explained. “First of all, I didn’t even know you could make money off that type of shit, like I didn’t know shit about soliciting grant funds.”
“I came out there strictly to talk about racism, educate people, let them know how we need to come together,” he said.
He emphasized, “We need grassroots organizations from the people in the community, people who genuinely give a fuck, people from the struggle.”
“Leadership don’t come from Yale, Princeton; leadership don’t come from Harvard. They ain’t been through this shit.”
“They ain’t gonna sacrifice their life for this shit. They ain’t gonna die for y’all or y’all’s kids. They don’t want to lose their motherfucking position.”
“I don’t give a fuck about none of this shit. You kill me tomorrow; I ain’t never gonna not speak on this, on the real. And they know that. They knew that when they met me.”
“That’s why they made sure my face ain’t get too big.”


Instruction: Write an article about: US threatened to invade International Criminal Court. Now it loves ICC for targeting Putin. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: África, African Union, Antony Blinken, AU, Burundi, colonialism, Gambia, ICC, ICJ, International Court of Justice, International Criminal Court, John Bolton, José Bustani, Karim Khan, Mike Pompeo, neocolonialism, racism, Rome Statute, Russia, South Africa, Ukraine, Vladimir Putin

Output:
The US government imposed sanctions on the International Criminal Court, threatened to arrest judges, and passed a “Hague Invasion Act”. Previously, the ICC only prosecuted Africans. But now that it wants to arrest Russian President Putin, Washington praises the court (while still refusing to join it).

(Se puede leer este artículo en español aquí.)
Many countries in the Global South have denounced the International Criminal Court as a neocolonial institution, biased in favor of the West. Its leadership has been dominated by Europeans, and as of 2016, only Africans had been brought to trial at the court.
In a rare point of agreement, the United States has also opposed the International Criminal Court (ICC) since its inception. The US is not a member of the ICC, and Washington has even imposed sanctions on its top officials and threatened to arrest judges and prosecutors.
In fact, when the court first opened in the Netherlands in 2002, the United States passed a law known as the “Hague Invasion Act”, according to which Washington threatens to send its soldiers to free anyone being tried at the ICC who is a US citizen or is deemed important to its “national security” interests.

But after relentlessly attacking the ICC for its 21-year history, Washington has suddenly done a 180, and now publicly supports the ICC in its attempt to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin.
On March 17, the ICC’s Polish president, Piotr Hofmański, issued an arrest warrant for Putin, over alleged atrocities committed in the proxy war in Ukraine between NATO and Russia.
The ICC arrest warrant was issued almost exactly 20 years to the day after the beginning of the US invasion of Iraq, which caused more than 1 million deaths, and which even United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said was illegal and violated the UN Charter.
Not a single US official was held responsible for the war crimes committed in Iraq. But the ICC now has its sights on Russia.

Russia is not party to the ICC. Ukraine is not a full member either.
Moscow said the “criminal prosecution is obviously illegal” and is a reflection of the Western-dominated court’s “clear hostility” to Russia.
Despite the fact that the United States is not a member of the ICC, President Joe Biden strongly supported the court’s arrest warrant.
In collaboration with the European Union, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is pressuring countries that are members of the ICC to comply and arrest Putin.
This is quite a reversal for Blinken, because in March 2021, when the court was investigating Israel over war crimes it committed in the occupied Palestinian territories, the top US diplomat published a furious statement denouncing the ICC.
Blinken roared:
The ICC has no jurisdiction over this matter. Israel is not a party to the ICC and has not consented to the Court’s jurisdiction, and we have serious concerns about the ICC’s attempts to exercise its jurisdiction over Israeli personnel. The Palestinians do not qualify as a sovereign state and therefore, are not qualified to obtain membership as a state in, participate as a state in, or delegate jurisdiction to the ICC.
Like Israel and the United States, Russia is not a member of the ICC. But just two years after arguing that the court cannot investigate non-member Israel over its war crimes, Blinken is suddenly insisting that the ICC must take action against non-member Russia on behalf of non-member Ukraine.
Blinken’s predecessor went so far as to impose sanctions on top ICC officials.
In 2020, when President Donald Trump was in office, the ICC opened an investigation into war crimes committed in Afghanistan by the US, NATO, and Afghan government allies.
In response, Trump’s former CIA Director turned Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivered an angry rant denouncing the court.
“We oppose any effort by the ICC to exercise jurisdiction over U.S. personnel. We will not tolerate its inappropriate and unjust attempts to investigate or prosecute Americans”, he declared in March.
Pompeo blasted the ICC as “an embarrassment” and “a so-called court which is revealing itself to be a nakedly political body”. He asserted that “we are exposing and confronting its abuses”.
The top US diplomat even threatened the family members of top ICC officials, vowing, “We want to identify those responsible for this partisan investigation and their family members”.
Later that September, the US State Department hit the court’s chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda and her colleagues with sanctions.
BREAKING: In shocking attack on #ICC @secpompeo threatens collective punishment against named staff of the court and their FAMILIES for court's ongoing investigation into #Afghanistan crimes that implicate US  https://t.co/OsCTrC5YJs
— Sarah Leah Whitson (@sarahleah1) March 17, 2020

When the Biden administration entered office in early 2021, it removed these US sanctions on the ICC. But Washington still kept attacking and undermining the court.
US state media outlet Voice of America cited Blinken, who stressed that Washington continued “to disagree strongly with the ICC’s actions relating to the Afghanistan and Palestinian situations” and object to ICC “efforts to assert jurisdiction over personnel of non-States Parties such as the United States and Israel”.
That is to say, the Biden administration strongly opposed the ICC’s efforts to investigate US and NATO war crimes committed in Afghanistan and Israeli war crimes committed in the occupied Palestinian territories.
But now that the ICC is going after Putin, the political class in Washington is ecstatic.
The military leadership in the Department of Defense, on the other hand, is more cautious.
The New York Times reported in early March, just a week before the ICC issued its arrest warrant for Putin: “The Pentagon is blocking the U.S. from sharing evidence on Russian atrocities in Ukraine with the International Criminal Court, officials said. Military leaders fear setting a precedent that might pave the way for it to prosecute Americans”.
Breaking News: The Pentagon is blocking the U.S. from sharing evidence on Russian atrocities in Ukraine with the International Criminal Court, officials said. Military leaders fear setting a precedent that might pave the way for it to prosecute Americans. https://t.co/xnHCjkkZnK
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 8, 2023

The International Criminal Court is only 21 years old, but it has clearly demonstrated an extreme bias toward the Global South, and against Africa in particular.
The Los Angeles Times published an article in 2016 that clearly illustrated the one-sidedness: “Only Africans have been tried at the court for the worst crimes on Earth”.
Only Africans have been tried at the court for the worst crimes on Earth https://t.co/lxy2AEejbX
— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) October 24, 2016

That same year, Canada’s state media outlet CBC reported: “International Criminal Court facing exodus of African nations over charges of racism”.
CBC acknowledged that “nine of the 10 cases currently under investigation by the ICC are based in Africa”.
Burundi, Gambia, and South Africa condemned the ICC as a racist institution, vowing to withdraw from the court.
Gambia’s information minister said the ICC “is in fact an International Caucasian Court, for the prosecution and humiliation of people of colour, especially Africans”.
In 2016, Gambia did withdraw from the court.
South Africa left as well – although its high court later revoked the withdrawal.
In 2017, the African Union called on its members to leave the ICC.
African intellectuals have since continuously denounced the ICC as a neocolonial institution.
How colonialism's legacy continues to plague the International Criminal Court https://t.co/wuV2K1tzTG
— The Conversation Africa (@TC_Africa) July 16, 2020

Gambian ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda appeared to try to change the court’s reputation by opening the investigations into US and NATO war crimes in Afghanistan and Israeli war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The Trump administration hit back with sanctions and threats. Israel’s far-right Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu responded by baselessly accusing the ICC of “anti-semitism”.
But Bensouda’s efforts – as minimal as they were – were thwarted when her nine-year term ended in 2021.
She was replaced with the ICC’s current prosecutor, a Karim Ahmad Khan, a British lawyer.
Khan is the brother of right-wing politician Imran Ahmad Khan, a former member of Parliament for the UK Conservative Party (who also happens to be a convicted pedophile).
Almost immediately after Karim Khan took over the ICC, he ended the investigations into US and NATO war crimes in Afghanistan and Israeli war crimes in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Reuters cited Afghan human rights activist Horia Mosadiq, who called Khan’s decision “an insult to thousands of other victims of crimes by Afghan government forces and U.S. and NATO forces”.
This story should be a huge scandal:
The new International Criminal Court prosecutor, @KarimKhanQC, quietly dropped the investigation into US war crimes committed in Afghanistan, supposedly "due to lack of resources"
More impunity for US war criminalshttps://t.co/KFXR7RUDOv
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) October 6, 2021

Khan claimed in 2021 that the ICC was struggling with a lack of resources and would instead focus on “the scale and nature of crimes within the jurisdiction of the court”.
But the issuing of an arrest warrant for the president of Russia – a non member – over alleged atrocities committed in Ukraine – which is not a full member either – clearly contradicts Khan’s purported commitment to focus on “crimes within the jurisdiction of the court”.
The Israeli media revealed that Israel, which is not a member of the ICC, had “worked hard behind the scenes” to pressure countries that are parties to the court to elect Khan as chief prosecutor.
It keeps getting better: Now the report says Israel “worked hard behind the scenes” to get #KarimKhan elected to #ICC pic.twitter.com/rdSF3vaK59
— Noa Landau נעה לנדאו (@noa_landau) February 12, 2021

In 2022, the Times of Israel praised Khan, noting that the “new ICC prosecutor has not issued a single public statement nor taken any single public action regarding Israel-Palestine to date”.
The Israeli newspaper added excitingly, “Many Israeli officials believe that Bensouda would already have taken actions and maybe even have issued arrest warrants had she continued in office past her nine-year term”.
Washington’s opposition to the International Criminal Court goes back to before it was even officially opened in 2002.
On the last day of 2000, just three weeks before his term ended, US President Bill Clinton signed the Rome Statute that laid the foundations for the ICC. But his successor President George W. Bush later “unsigned” the treaty.
The Bush administration then waged a political war against the newly created ICC.
Arch-neoconservative John Bolton, who helped lead Bush’s State Department, called the US withdrawal from the ICC “the happiest moment of my government service”. (Bolton also threatened the family members of the chief of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, José Bustani, telling him, “We know where your kids live”.)
Even the billionaire oligarch-funded lobby group Human Rights Watch, which is notorious for its pro-Western bias, warned in July 2002 that the “principle of universal justice is still under serious threat from Washington”. And that was before the US government passed the notorious “Hague Invasion Act”.
Following Bush, Presidents Obama, Trump, and Biden have refused to re-sign the Rome Statute, meaning the US is not a member of the ICC.
After Trump appointed Bolton as his national security advisor, the neoconservative hawk promised in 2018: “We will provide no assistance to the ICC. We will not join the ICC. We will let the ICC die on its own. After all, for all intents and purposes, the ICC is already dead to us”.
Bolton even threatened to arrest ICC judges and prosecutors, proclaiming, “We will ban its judges and prosecutors from entering the United States, we will sanction their funds in the US financial system, and we will prosecute them in the US criminal system. We will do the same for any company or state that assists an ICC investigation of Americans”.
US threatens to arrest ICC judges if they pursue Americans for Afghan war crimes https://t.co/ljCNvPgjWV pic.twitter.com/k7Dc0Q4Ldb
— FRANCE 24 (@FRANCE24) September 10, 2018

Only 123 countries are members of the ICC. (The United Nations recognizes 193 countries on Earth, meaning less than two-thirds are parties to the ICC, and these nations represent less than half of the global population.)
Prominent countries that are not state parties include the US, Israel, Ukraine, Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Cuba, Vietnam, Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar.
Signatories of the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court
Despite popular confusion, the ICC is not an organ of the United Nations. The court is independent from the UN’s official judicial arm, the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
While the ICC was founded in 2002, the ICJ opened in 1945. Further compounding the confusion is the fact that both are located in the Hague, in the Netherlands.
The ICJ litigates state disputes, whereas the ICC focuses on individuals.
But the ICJ has been very limited in its capabilities due to a fundamental problem with the structure of the UN: permanent members of the Security Council can use their veto to block the implementation of the court’s decisions.
The United States has done precisely this, effectively neutering the ICJ.
In 1984, Nicaragua took the US to the Hague over its support for the Contras, far-right death squads that systematically used terrorism against civilians in an attempt to violently overthrow the Central American nation’s revolutionary Sandinista government.
In the case Nicaragua v. United States of America, the ICJ found Washington guilty of violating international law, by supporting the Contra terrorists and putting mines in Nicaragua’s ports.
The ICJ ordered that the US pay Nicaragua reparations. But Washington refused to do so, and used its veto in the Security Council to prevent any implementation of the ruling.


Instruction: Write an article about: US now world’s top LNG exporter, as Europe boycotts cheaper Russian gas. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: energy, Europe, gas, LNG, Russia, Ukraine

Output:
The USA has rapidly become the world’s biggest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG), tied with Qatar. Europe replaced Asia as the top market for US LNG in 2022, boycotting cheaper Russian energy over the proxy war in Ukraine.

The United States has rapidly become the world’s biggest exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG), tied with Qatar.
A significant reason for this meteoric increase is because Europe replaced Asia as the top market for US LNG in 2022, as Brussels pledged to boycott Russian energy over the proxy war in Ukraine.

Among the principal importers of US LNG are France, Spain, Britain, the Netherlands, and Italy.
Europe is now paying significantly more for expensive US LNG than it had previously for Russian pipeline gas.
As of 2022, Europe had the highest energy prices on the planet. This was a key factor in fueling an inflation crisis that spread worldwide, and hit Europe especially hard.
Bloomberg reported that the “US tied Qatar as the world’s top exporter of liquefied natural gas” in 2022, calling it “a milestone for the meteoric rise of America as a major supplier of the fuel.”
The outlet added that the United States, “which only began exporting LNG from the lower-48 states in 2016 and has seemingly overnight become a dominant force in the industry.”
A graph from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) illustrates the monumental shift in US LNG exports in just six years.

S&P Global reported in September 2022 that European imports of LNG made up the “lion’s share” of US exports in the first six months of 2022.
Global imports of US LNG nearly doubled from $10.8 billion in the first half of 2021 to $21.2 billion in same period in 2022.
“Many U.S. LNG export cargoes departed for Europe in the first half of 2022 as the war in Ukraine prompted a scramble for LNG supplies,” S&P Global wrote, adding that “LNG market experts have warned that shipments of LNG cannot quickly replace curtailed pipeline imports from Russia and that the region’s need for significant LNG volumes will remain strong.”
The market intelligence unit stressed that Europe has the highest gas prices on Earth. Its benchmark energy price hit a historic high of roughly €320 per megawatt hour in August.
S&P Global followed up with another report in November, stating that the “European energy crisis has put US natural gas in high demand and in a position of acute geopolitical relevance.”
The financial information firm used the same language, that the “lion’s share headed to Europe following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February” and the escalation of the NATO-Russia proxy war.

The industry monitor LNGPrime reported that France, Spain, the Netherlands, Japan, and Italy bought nearly half (46.4%) of total US LNG exports in May 2022.
Reuters noted in December 2022 that US LNG prices had approximately doubled in the previous year. It added that US LNG exports to Europe increased by a staggering 137% in the first 11 months of 2022, compared to 2021.
The news wire added that “the United States will remain the primary supplier of LNG to Europe for at least 2023. This will likely generate even greater revenue for U.S exporters after a record 2022, which totaled $35 billion through September, compared to $8.3 billion over the same period in 2021.”
This massive spike in energy prices is causing economic chaos in Europe. Politico published an article in November 2022 titled “Why cheap US gas costs a fortune in Europe.”
It pointed out that US LNG is almost four times more expensive in Europe. And it is not just North American corporations that are profiting from this substantial markup, but also European importers and resellers.
Even France’s right-wing President Emmanuel Macron, a former investment banker, complained to French industrial executes, “In today’s geopolitical context, among countries that support Ukraine there are two categories being created in the gas market: those who are paying dearly and those who are selling at very high prices… The United States is a producer of cheap gas that they are selling us at a high price… I don’t think that’s friendly.”
Politico added, “Macron’s dig conveniently ignored that the largest European holder of long-term U.S. gas contracts is none other than France’s own TotalEnergies.”
In 2018, the CEO of Austrian fossil fuel company OMV estimated that Russian pipeline gas was 50% cheaper than US LNG. The corporate executive, Rainer Seele, said, “I think it is about 50% difference between LNG and Russian gas.”


Instruction: Write an article about: Intersectional imperialism: US military’s new ideology reflected in Thomas Friedman’s ‘one hard fist’ of diversity. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: military, New York Times, Thomas Friedman

Output:
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman boasted that “the real source of” US military power is diversity, and Washington’s “ability to blend” different racial groups “into one hard fist”.

Influential New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, in an April 18 article on his visit to NATO-occupied Afghanistan with Joe Biden, provided the clearest example yet of the newly hegemonic ideology of intersectional imperialism.
“The real source of our power,” Friedman wrote, is the racial diversity of US society, and especially that of its military.
It is the fact that US Special Forces teams — the symbol of Washington’s ubiquitous covert operations and meddling across the globe — are “made up of a collection of Black, Asian, Hispanic, and white Americans. It is our ability to blend those many into one hard fist”, he boasted.

This has become the US empire’s modus operandi: Justify imperial exploitation and expansion by claiming that Washington is spreading enlightened views of anti-racism, feminism, and LGBTQ equality.
The strategy is not entirely new. The US and NATO exploited women’s rights to rationalize a 20-year military occupation of Afghanistan. Israel, too, frequently uses pinkwashing to defend its colonial violence against the Palestinian people.
But US hawks are now eagerly proselytizing a kind of inverted “White Man’s Burden” — one that preaches a superficial version of “anti-racism” while still fundamentally reinforcing the centuries-old colonial trope that the empire is helping to “civilize” the barbaric hordes in the rest of the world.
The incredible hypocrisy just beneath the surface of this liberal-imperialist philosophy was reflected in the condescending tone of Friedman’s column, which portrayed the Afghan people as knuckle-dragging brutes.
In one of such patronizing passages, Friedman lamented the surge in Trumpian racism at home in the United States, writing, “I confess that I wonder if we have become more like the Afghans and not the Afghans more like us”.


Instruction: Write an article about: CIA’s ‘Havana Syndrome’ conspiracy implodes: Here are media’s worst fake news stories. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: China, CIA, CNN, Fox News, Havana Syndrome, media, New York Times, Russia, The Guardian, The Independent, Washington Post

Output:
The CIA admitted US spies/diplomats aren’t being attacked by foreign adversaries. “Havana Syndrome” is mass hysteria. Here are the top corporate media outlets that spread this bogus conspiracy theory.

For five years, major corporate media outlets have cited anonymous US government officials to baselessly accuse Russia, China, and/or Cuba of attacking Washington’s spies and diplomats with “pulsed microwave weapons,” “directed-energy arms,” or other exotic technologies that might as well have been lifted from a B science fiction movie.
There was never an iota of evidence for this ridiculous conspiracy theory, which has now totally collapsed, but it spread like wildfire through the mainstream press.
As recently as November 2021, the Washington Post — one of the US intelligence community’s most reliable media partners — broadcast an extraordinary threat to the world: “CIA director warns Russian spies of ‘consequences’ if they are behind ‘Havana Syndrome’ incidents.”

A year before that, in December 2020, the New York Times promoted a bizarre conspiracy theory: “Report Points to Microwave ‘Attack’ as Likely Source of Mystery Illnesses That Hit Diplomats and Spies.”
The US newspaper-of-record quoted an official report, commissioned by the State Department and conducted by the United States’ brightest scientific minds, that concluded that a group of North American spies and diplomats allegedly suffering from “dizziness, fatigue, headaches, and loss of hearing, memory and balance” had been targeted by “directed, pulsed radiofrequency energy” weapons.

This January, however, natsec reporters’ favorite conspiracy theory hit a curb at 90 miles an hour, flipped over, and exploded.
“CIA says ‘Havana Syndrome’ not result of sustained campaign by hostile power,” NBC News reported on January 19. In an internal assessment, the spy agency admitted that there was no evidence of foreign attacks, and it ruled out the possibility, saying there were other medical explanations for the symptoms.
It is clear that top US intelligence officials approved the leak of this story, because the article was co-authored by Ken Dilanian, a veritable CIA roadie who was once disowned by his former employer the LA Times for doing unethical propaganda on behalf of the spy agency.
The CIA officially conceding that Russia, China, and Cuba are not attacking its spooks with scary ray guns should put in the nail in the coffin of an outlandish conspiracy theory that, over five years, has been promoted by basically every major English-language media outlet, including the most respected newspapers in both the United States and Britain.
Multipolarista reviewed this onslaught of fake news coverage and found that “Havana Syndrome” conspiracies were eagerly promoted by the following establishment networks:
We have assembled a collection of some of their most outrageous fake news stories below.
We discussed this scandal with Dr. Robert Bartholomew, a medical sociologist and leading expert on mass hysteria and social panics, who correctly predicted all of this in his 2020 scholarly book “Havana Syndrome: Mass Psychogenic Illness and the Real Story Behind the Embassy Mystery and Hysteria.”
A medical expert explains how he knew Russia/China/Cuba weren't attacking US diplomats with microwave guns, and "Havana Syndrome" was mass hysteria.
I documented how top media outlets promoted this fake news story: https://t.co/KbajqIUGer
Full interview: https://t.co/TEj41yq096 pic.twitter.com/uFUhFj9Vhr
— Benjamin Norton (@BenjaminNorton) January 23, 2022

“I can summarize the book in one sentence,” he told us: “When you hear the sound of hoof beats in the night, first think horses, not zebras.”
“The doctors at the American State Department went for the most exotic, far out, far-fetched explanations early on. They went on a search for unicorns when they should have stuck to mundane explanations,” Bartholomew said.
“My first career was as a journalist,” he continued. “And this is a case of bad journalism, bad government, and bad science.”
Bartholomew cautioned that the Havana Syndrome scandal is an example of the problem of politics mixing with science.
“When you break it down and you start analyzing the studies that were done, it’s like, whoa, it’s actually a really methodologically flawed study, and probably never should have been published in the first place,” he explained.
You can watch or listen to our full interview here:

It’s quite instructive to review how top media outlets enthusiastically promoted this bogus story. It shows how the most respected newspapers in the United States and United Kingdom are more than willing to publish harebrained conspiracy theories when it does political damage to NATO’s adversaries.
All of these scoops were fed to reporters in the corporate media by their handlers in the CIA and Pentagon. These stenographers never exercised a shred of skepticism, mindlessly attributing the outlandish accusations to anonymous officials.
Fox News declared in June 2021 that Russia was suspected of targeting US diplomats “in ‘Havana Syndrome’ attacks” not only abroad, but even in Washington, DC.

MSNBC followed up with a ludicrous video in August 2021 titled “Sen. Shaheen: Russia ‘at the top of suspect list’ for directed energy attacks on Americans.”

Back in August 2017, Time magazine stated unequivocally that “U.S. Diplomats in Cuba Were Injured by a ‘Sonic Weapon.’” This is objectively false.

Some reports were careful to add qualifiers that there was no solid proof that Russia, China, or Cuba were behind these so-called “attacks,” but it was always presumed that they were exactly that: attacks.
The idea that Havana Syndrome was the result of a foreign power intentionally seeking to harm North Americans was indisputable to the press. It was holy dogma, and simply could not be challenged.
The question on the minds of the CIA/Pentagon water boys (and girls) in the corporate media was not whether or not US spies and diplomats are being attacked, but rather by whom? Which villainous US adversary?
The mainstream press didn’t stop to question if this was an attack; instead it immediately went to the question: What weapon is responsible? Exotic microwave weapons? Directed energy? Ray guns wielded by fur hat-wearing Russian communist bears wrapped in tin foil?
In May 2018, CNN gave credibility to the neo-McCarthyite conspiracy with a report titled “What we know about the possible ‘sonic attacks’ in Cuba and now China.”

This massive fake news campaign was then given a stamp of approval from the New York Times, with a September 2018 article titled, “Microwave Weapons Are Prime Suspect in Ills of U.S. Embassy Workers.”
This blockbuster story was on the front page of the Gray Lady, and had the subtitle, “Doctors and scientists say microwave strikes may have caused sonic delusions and very real brain damage among embassy staff and family members.”
The article is filed online under the Times’ science vertical.

The fact that these outlandish accusations were published in the US newspaper-of-record gave other media outlets the green light to run with the conspiracy theory. And they went wild.
In October 2020, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, a close ally of the CIA, published a column titled “Russia is an obvious suspect in Havana Syndrome, but the evidence is inconclusive.”

Then in December 2020, NBC News published a similar article titled “‘Havana Syndrome’ likely caused by pulsed microwave energy, government study finds.”
One of the co-authors of this story was Ken Dilanian, the CIA whisperer who published the article this January suddenly admitting that Havana Syndrome was not caused by attacks.

The UK government-backed BBC mindlessly echoed the conspiracy: “‘Havana syndrome’ likely caused by directed microwaves – US report.”

This latest episode in widespread mainstream fake news — like the Russiagate hysteria or WMDs conspiracy — shows how Western corporate media outlets don’t require a single shred of evidence to make extraordinary, outlandish accusations against Washington’s Official Enemies.
If a US government official intimates something about Beijing, Moscow, or La Habana being involved in some supposed evil-doing, the bellicose stenographers in the press will find 200 reasons why we should instantly believe the politically motivated accusations — and anyone who doubts such baseless claims is branded a “conspiracy theorist” or “Kremlin shill.”
In April 2021, CNN went so far as to claim that “Havana Syndrome” attacks were taking place in the heart of Washington.
“US investigating possible mysterious directed energy attack near White House,” CNN reported.

Then in May, CNN followed up the story with an equally preposterous part two: “US investigates second suspected case of mystery ‘syndrome’ near White House.”

A few days later, perhaps the most respected media outlet in the United States, if not the world, the Associated Press, joined in the fake news hysteria.
“Growing mystery of suspected energy attacks draws US concern,” the AP reported.

Politico took the conspiracy theory even further that same month, pointing the finger at Moscow in a story titled “Russian spy unit suspected of directed-energy attacks on U.S. personnel.”
This “exclusive” scoop was attributed exclusively to anonymous US government officials, naturally.

Across the pond in June 2021, The Guardian ran a story titled “Microwave weapons that could cause Havana Syndrome exist, experts say.”
It was written by the leading UK newspaper’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger, a hardline hawk who is also quite friendly with Western intelligence agencies.

In September 2021, British newspaper The Independent ran the ridiculous clickbait article “What is the ‘Havana syndrome’? Inside the creepy ‘directed energy’ attacks on US diplomats.”
What is really creepy is how hordes of Western reporters will obediently regurgitate the same fake news without a scintilla of skepticism.

But the conspiracy theory just wouldn’t die — it was too politically useful.
In October 2021, Politico declared, “U.S. investigators increasingly confident directed-energy attacks behind Havana Syndrome.”

The liberal magazine Slate pondered, “Are Russians Using Microwaves to Attack Americans?”

On the other side of the Atlantic, the UK’s Sunday Times declared, “US diplomats hit by new Havana Syndrome attack.”

Then in November 2021, the Washington Post published its risible report, “CIA director warns Russian spies of ‘consequences’ if they are behind ‘Havana Syndrome’ incidents.”
This story was echoed by many other media outlets, including Washington’s most respectable pro-Trump website, The Hill, which declared, “CIA director says there will be consequences if Russia is behind ‘Havana Syndrome’ attacks.”

And it wasn’t just media outlets; academia joined in as well.
In September 2021, respected academic website The Conversation ran a ridiculous story called “Scientists suggest US embassies were hit with high-power microwaves – here’s how the weapons work.”
The article was written by Edl Schamiloglu, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering and associate dean for research and innovation at the University of New Mexico’s School of Engineering.
The website published a Brobdingnagian disclosure statement: “Edl Schamiloglu receives funding from AFOSR, DARPA, and ONR to perform basic research on the development of high power microwave sources. He also receives support from industry (Verus Research, General Atomics Electromagnetic System Division). He serves as Chair of IEC SC77C which develops civilian standards to protect equipment and infrastructure from IEMI.”

In September 2021, The Conversation followed up with another article titled “Directed energy weapons shoot painful but non-lethal beams – are similar weapons behind the Havana syndrome?”
It was written by Iain Boyd, a professor of aerospace engineering sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder, who disclosed that he “receives funding from the U.S. Department of Defense, the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA, Lockheed-Martin Corporation, Northrop-Grumman Corporation, L3-Harris Corporation.”

The weapons industry-backed website Defense One re-published the same article with the title “Are Directed-Energy Weapons Behind the Havana Syndrome?”
This headline was indirectly answered by the sub-head: “As an aerospace engineer and former Vice Chair of the U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, I can attest to the effectiveness of such weapons.”
With “experts” like these…

The list of fake news stories goes on and on.
Virtually every major English-language media outlet did its part in helping to spread this conspiracy theory on behalf of the US government — as they did with the Russiagate racket at the exact same time.
Now that the CIA has admitted there are no Russian ray guns or Chinese microwave weapons involved, will anything change? Will anyone or any institution be held accountable?
Well, if the total impunity for the fervent promoters of the “Putin controls Trump” conspiracy is any indication, it is very unlikely that there will be any consequences. Mindlessly regurgitated the claims of anonymous spooks to feed baseless conspiracy theories that help advance US foreign-policy interests is, in reality, the job description for mainstream “national security” reporters.
If we had the glasses from John Carpenter’s classic “They Live,” that’s exactly what New York Times job listings would say.


Instruction: Write an article about: US sends Ukraine $228 million per day in military aid to wage proxy war on Russia. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Joe Biden, military-industrial complex, Russia, Ukraine

Output:
The Joe Biden administration pledged Ukraine $39.87 billion in military aid between February and August 2022, for an average of $228 million per day, fueling a brutal proxy war causing tens of thousands of deaths.

The Joe Biden administration pledged Ukraine $39.87 billion in military aid in the six months between February and August 2022, for an average of $228 million per day, fueling what even former US government officials admit is a “brutal proxy war” that is causing tens of thousands of deaths.
Researcher Stephen Semler documented the 21 distinct military aid packages that the Joe Biden administration approved for Ukraine in the year between August 2021 and August 2022, at a total of $40.13 billion.
Two of those 21 pledges were approved before Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Excluding these two presidential drawdowns from August and December 2021, which are worth $260 million combined, the Biden administration passed $39.87 billion for military aid in Ukraine between February 25, 2022 (the day after the Russian invasion) and August 19, 2022.
This $39.87 billion in pledged military aid divided by the 175 days between February 25, 2022 and August 19, 2022 comes out to an average of approximately $228 million per day.
This spending does not include the billions more that the US government has pledged in economic aid to Ukraine. It likewise excludes the tens of billions of dollars of military aid that European countries have approved for Ukraine.

“How much military aid has Biden sent to Ukraine?,” Stephen Semler, Speaking Security

“51% of young Americans support tuition-free public college,” CNBC:
A survey from the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics found that 51% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 support eliminating tuition and fees at public colleges and universities for students from families that make up to $125,000, and making community college tuition-free for all income levels for an estimated cost of $47 billion.
“Russia Is Right: The U.S. Is Waging a Proxy War in Ukraine,” Hal Brands, Bloomberg / The Washington Post
“Austin’s assertion that US wants to ‘weaken’ Russia underlines Biden strategy shift,” CNN
“America’s Hesitation Is Heartbreaking,” Eliot A. Cohen, The Atlantic
“Commando Network Coordinates Flow of Weapons in Ukraine, Officials Say,” New York Times
CIA and Western special ops commandos are in Ukraine, directing proxy war on Russia


Instruction: Write an article about: US bombing of Iraq and Syria is illegal aggression – Occupiers have no right to ‘self-defense’. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Iraq, Joe Biden, Syria

Output:
Militarily occupying Iraq and Syria is a thoroughly bipartisan policy in the United States. And bombing West Asia has become a favorite pastime that unites both Democrat and Republican presidents.

(Puedes leer este artículo en español aquí.)
The United States believes it has the right to bomb, militarily occupy, and economically strangulate any country, anywhere, without consequence. But the peoples of the world are standing up more and more to the global dictatorship of US hegemony.
On June 27, Washington launched airstrikes against forces in both Iraq and Syria, two sovereign countries that are illegally occupied by the US military and that have repeatedly called for American troops to leave.
The US attack proved to be a gift to the genocidal extremists in ISIS: it helped provide cover as remnants of the so-called “Islamic State” launched a terror attack on a power grid in northern Iraq. Similarly, the US bombing killed several members of Iraqi government-backed units who had been protecting their nation from ISIS and al-Qaeda.
This is far from the first time Washington has clearly been on the same side as far-right Takfiri fanatics. Current US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan admitted in an email to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2012 that “AQ is on our side in Syria.” And the US government supported al-Qaeda extremists in its wars on Yemen and Libya.
In addition to aiding notorious terrorist groups, these US strikes on Iraq and Syria were glaringly illegal under international law. They constitute a clear act of aggression against the peoples of West Asia, who for decades have struggled for self-determination and control over their own, plentiful natural resources — resources that the US government and its all-powerful corporations seek to control and exploit.
The Pentagon tried to justify its attack claiming it was an act of “self-defense.” Absurdly, the US Department of Defense — the world champion in violating international law — even cited international law to try to legitimize the airstrikes.
In reality, the US military’s very presence in Iraq and Syria is illegal. And under international law, a military power that is illegally occupying a territory does not have the right to self-defense. That is true just as much for apartheid Israel in its settler-colonial aggression against Palestine as it is for the United States in its imperial wars on the peoples of Iraq and Syria.
Iraq’s prime minister, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, made that clear. He condemned the US strikes as a “blatant and unacceptable violation of Iraqi sovereignty and Iraqi national security.”
In January 2020, in response to Washington’s assassination of top Iranian General Qasem Soleimani and Iraqi Commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis — a criminal act of war against both Iraq and Iran — the democratically elected parliament in Baghdad voted 170 to 0 to expel the thousands of US troops occupying Iraq.
Washington simply ignored the vote, silencing the voices of the Iraqi people — while threatening more economic sanctions on their government. The Pentagon stressed that the vote was nonbinding, but even the US government-backed RAND Corporation acknowledged that there “is no treaty or status of forces agreement (SOFA) authorizing the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq.”
Likewise, the United States is illegally occupying one-third of Syrian sovereign territory. The internationally recognized government in Damascus has repeatedly called on the US military occupiers to leave, but they have refused, in a flagrant violation of Syrian sovereignty.
“The presence of Americans in Syria is a sign of occupation, and we believe that all nations and governments must stand up to their unlawful presence in the region,” Syrian Prime Minister Imad Khamis declared in 2020, after the US assassinations of the top Iraqi and Iranian military leaders.
While former Republican President Donald Trump radiated a kind of neocolonial arrogance, boasting that US troops would illegally remain in Syria because “we want to keep the oil,” the Democratic Joe Biden administration has not acted much differently.
President Biden appointed hardline neoconservative operative Dana Stroul as the top Pentagon official for Middle East policy. In 2019, Stroul bragged that Washington “owned” one-third of Syrian territory, including its “economic powerhouse,” which includes the vast majority of the country’s oil and wheat reserves.
Stroul’s promotion was an unambiguous sign that the Democrats are endorsing the same sadistic, Trumpian strategy to militarily occupy Syria, steal its natural resources, starve its government of revenue, deny its people gasoline and bread, and prevent reconstruction of what Stroul snidely referred to as the widespread “rubble.”
The reality is that militarily occupying Iraq and Syria is a thoroughly bipartisan policy in the United States. And bombing West Asia has become a favorite pastime that unites both Democratic and Republican presidents.
Trump launched airstrikes against Syria in April 2018 on totally unsubstantiated accusations that Damascus had carried out “gas attacks,” claims that have since been proven false by multiple whistleblowers from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Then in December 2019, the Trump administration bombed anti-ISIS militias in both Syria and Iraq.
Biden carried out a similar, illegal attack on these same fighters in eastern Syria in February 2021. It was yet another example of Washington serving as the de facto air force for the remnants of the so-called “Islamic State.”
The December 2019, February 2021, and June 2021 US airstrikes targeted the Iraqi government-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMFs), known in Arabic as the al-Hashd al-Sha’abi. The Pentagon stated unequivocally in its official statement on the June bombing that it was attacking Kata’ib Hezbollah and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada, two prominent Iraqi armed groups in the Hashd.
The Department of Defense misleadingly referred to these units as “Iran-backed militia groups.” The US government and the corporate media outlets that act as its obedient mouthpiece always describe the Hashd as “Iran-backed” to try to downplay their role as indigenous protectors of Iraqi sovereignty and deceptively portray them as foreign proxies of Washington’s favorite bogeyman.
In reality, the PMFs are Iraqi units supported by the elected, internationally recognized government in Baghdad. And the Hashd played a leading role in the fight against ISIS, al-Qaeda, and other extremist Takfiri groups in both Iraq and Syria — while the United States, apartheid Israel, and NATO allies spent billions of dollars backing Salafi-jihadist death squads in their genocidal war on the people of Syria.
The Hashd do indeed receive assistance from Tehran, and they have every right to. Iran is Iraq’s neighbor, after all, whereas the United States is on the other side of the planet. But Washington, NATO, and their de facto stenographers in the corporate press corps seek to discredit all resistance to criminal US aggression in West Asia by erasing its organic, indigenous roots and lazily depicting it as a vast conspiracy controlled by an omnipresent Iranian puppet-master.
The PMFs made it clear that they will not tolerate Washington’s assault on their nation’s sovereignty. “We reserve the legal right to respond to these attacks and hold the perpetrators accountable on Iraqi soil,” the Hashd declared.
Unlike the US military occupiers, the people of Iraq and Syria do have a right to exercise self-defense in response to strikes by foreign aggressors. They can legally resist American military occupation and neocolonialism, just as the people of Palestine have the right to resist Israeli military occupation and Zionist settler-colonialism. This is a right enshrined in international law — and an inalienable right that any nation would defend.
If Washington wants to stop attacks on its troops, there is an easy way to do that: withdraw them from the region, where they are not wanted. American soldiers will be much safer at home.
(This article was written for Al Mayadeen English.)


Instruction: Write an article about: Is a huge war coming? US bombs Yemen, Iraq & Syria. Israel bombs Gaza & Lebanon. Both threaten Iran.. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Ansarallah, Donald Trump, Gaza, Houthis, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Joe Biden, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, Yemen

Output:
The US military is attacking Yemen, Iraq, and Syria, while Israel bombs Gaza, Lebanon, and Syria. Both are threatening Iran. Is a large Middle East (West Asia) war coming?

The brutal war that Israel is waging on Gaza is increasingly becoming a regional conflict.
Since October, the United States and Israel have bombed not only Gaza, but also Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.
Now, the U.S. government is even threatening Iran with war. President Joe Biden sent the Iranian government a private message while the U.S. military was bombing Yemen on January 13. He said threateningly, “We’re confident, we’re well prepared”.

While this is happening, South Africa has introduced a case in the International Court of Justice, the top United Nations judicial authority, which accuses Israel of committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
South Africa’s case has garnered support from dozens of countries across the Global South.
This case has frightened Israel and its sponsors in Washington. They are apparently seeking to expand the conflict into a regional war, to try to win more sympathy and to turn attention away from what South Africa and many countries have referred to as a genocide in Gaza.
In fact, top UN experts have been warning precisely this for months: that the Palestinian people face “the risk of genocide in Gaza”, and that there has been a “failure of the international system to mobilise to prevent genocide”.
The Financial Times reported in December that, in just two months of Israeli bombing, Gaza had become one of the most heavily bombed areas in human history.
Israel's genocidal war has made Gaza one of the most heavily bombed areas in human history.https://t.co/jd4D7e32tM
— Geopolitical Economy Report (@GeopoliticaEcon) January 19, 2024

Now that Israel faces formal charges of genocide at the Hague, many officials in Washington are concerned, because the U.S. is directly complicit in the war crimes that Israel is committing.
The Joe Biden administration has sent billions of dollars of weapons and military aid to Israel.
In fact, the US State Department has bypassed Congress two times, using emergency measures to send weapons to Israel. This is rather strange, because Congress is full of people who strongly support Israel, and would without a doubt have approved these arms shipments.
This appears to indicate that the US government does not even want a debate about these arms shipments. Washington is concerned about people focusing their attention on its complicity in arming Israel. So it is simply choosing to do so quietly, without Congress’ approval.
And the U.S. is involved in these conflicts in many other ways, not simply by arming Israel.
In fact, the U.S. military has 57,000 personnel stationed all across the so-called Middle East, or more accurately, West Asia.
These are just the U.S. military personnel that are publicly disclosed. It is likely that the U.S. also has covert special operations forces that are not accounted for among this 57,000.
The U.S. has more than 57,000 personnel in the Middle East.
Eastern Mediterranean: 12.500Jordan: 3.500Egypt: 500Syria: 900Iraq: 2.000Israel: 100Saudi Arabia: 2.500Kuwait: 10.000Bahrain: 4.500Qatar: 10.000UAE: 5.000Red Sea: 4.500
Source: FT pic.twitter.com/4vpeVx9xzy
— Clash Report (@clashreport) January 12, 2024

In just a few months, the U.S. has bombed Yemen, Iraq, and Syria.
On January 11, the United States launched airstrikes against dozens of targets in Yemen.
The New York Times referred to these as US attacks on the so-called “Houthi militia” in Yemen. But this is very misleading.
The “Houthis”, which are officially known as Ansarullah, represent the government for the majority of the Yemeni population.
This was acknowledged even by the mainstream Washington, DC-based think tank the Brookings Institution. It published an article in 2023 by a former CIA analyst, Bruce Riedel, who admitted that “the Houthis have created a functioning government”, one that “includes representatives of other groups”.
“Some 70 to 80% of Yemenis live under the Houthis’ control”, Riedel wrote.
He conceded that Ansarullah had its origins in the grassroots in Yemen, opposing the U.S. invasion of Iraq and Washington’s subsequent wars and interventionist policies across West Asia.
At Brookings, the former CIA analyst likewise confessed that the United States had spent six years supporting a scorched-earth “war led by a neighbor most Yemenis hate”, that is to say, Saudi Arabia. He added, “Air strikes, blockades, and intentional mass starvation are the characteristics of a war the United States has supported”.
The United Nations estimated that this U.S.-Saudi war killed at least 377,000 Yemenis from 2015 to the end of 2021.
So when the United States launched dozens of attacks inside Yemen this January, Washington was continuing a war that it has waged against the de facto Yemeni government for nearly nine years. The so-called “Houthis” are not just a “militia”; they are leading the government.
And while it was previously Saudi Arabia that was relentlessly bombing civilian areas in Yemen (using U.S.-made planes and bombs, with intelligence and targeting assistance from the Pentagon), now it is the United States that is cutting out the middle man and attacking Yemen directly.
Moreover, the New York Times acknowledged in its report on the Biden administration’s airstrikes that Ansarullah has “greeted the prospect of war with the United States with open delight”.
One of Ansarullah’s most important leaders said in a televised speech, “We, the Yemeni people, are not among those who are afraid of America. We are comfortable with a direct confrontation with the Americans”.
As if that weren’t enough, after this prominent Yemeni leader said publicly that his country is prepared to fight against the United States, a day later, on January 12, the U.S. again launched airstrikes against Yemen.
Reporting on the second US attack, the New York Times commented, “The strikes come amid fears of a wider escalation of the conflict in the Middle East”.
This description is quite euphemistic. In reality, the U.S. is creating a wider conflict in the region by expanding the war, and attacking not only Yemen, but also Iraq and Syria.
On January 4, the Biden administration carried out an act of war against Iraq.
The New York Times reported that the U.S. launched a drone strike in the capital Baghdad. An Iraqi government spokesman referred to this as a “flagrant violation of the sovereignty and security of Iraq”. He characterized the U.S. attack as “no different from a terrorist act”.
The U.S. targeted an Iraqi militia known as Harakat al-Nujaba. This organization is part of the Iraqi government, the New York Times conceded, writing that “it remains part of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces, a security organization that is in turn part of the government’s broader security forces”.
So the U.S. was attacking Iraq’s security forces.
However, in 2019, the Donald Trump administration had declared this Iraqi state institution to be a so-called “terrorist” organization. And now the Biden administration is continuing Trump’s policy of attacking the Iraqi government.
In response to Washington’s assault on his country, Iraq’s prime minister, Mohammed Shia al-Sudani, publicly called for the U.S.-led foreign troops in his country to leave.
U.S. troops have consistently occupied Iraq since the illegal invasion of 2003. The U.S. war has gone through phases, but it has basically never ended.
It should be emphasized that al-Sudani is by no means an anti-U.S. leader. In Iraqi politics, there are many anti-U.S. figures; he is not one of them. But even he is now publicly stating that Washington needs to stop occupying and attacking his country, and that its troops need to leave.
Nevertheless, the website Breaking Defense, which is close to the Pentagon, responded to al-Sudani’s comments reporting: “Despite Iraqi PM’s call, US troops won’t likely leave Iraq anytime soon”. It cited U.S. analysts with internal access.
So this is essentially acknowledgment that the U.S. maintains a neo-colonial occupation of Iraq.
This is not the first time that this has happened. Back in January 2020, Donald Trump ordered the assassination of the top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and the senior Iraqi security official Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis. The latter was a commander of the Popular Mobilization Forces, which are officially part of the Iraqi government, and which were absolutely instrumental in the war against ISIS.
These leaders, Soleimani and al-Muhandis, were two of the most important people in the fight to defeat ISIS. Trump assassinated both of them in a blatant act of war, not only against Iran, but also against Iraq.
In response to this U.S. act of war, Iraq’s democratically elected parliament (which was ironically created by the United States) voted to expel the U.S. troops occupying the country.
Trump say no, refusing to leave. The far-right U.S. president then threatened to impose sanctions on Iraq.
Despite the U.S. government’s flagrantly neo-colonial policies, the Western media’s coverage of Iraq essentially portrays the situation as if Iran were secretly in control of the country.
When the U.S. carries out acts of war against Iraq, killing Iraqi officials who are part of the Iraqi state’s security apparatus, the Western media misleadingly describes these murdered Iraqi officials as “pro-Iran military commanders”.
This propagandistic rhetoric is reminiscent of how the Western media invariably refers to Yemen’s so-called Houthis, Ansarullah, as “Iran- backed”, trying to depict them as Iranian proxies. The same is true for Lebanon’s indigenous resistance group Hezbollah.
This is part and parcel of a Western media propaganda narrative that seeks to justify U.S. acts of war and neo-colonial policies against sovereign governments across West Asia.
Another clear example of this is recent U.S. attacks in Syria.
In November, the U.S. military launched airstrikes in sovereign Syrian territory. The BBC reported on this illegal U.S. act of war writing, “US airstrikes target more Iran-backed bases in Syria”.
The double standard is quite clear when one considers how these same Western media outlets would never dare to refer to attacks by Palestinian groups on Israeli military forces as strikes on “pro-U.S. forces” in “U.S.-backed bases”.
In fact, as Geopolitical Economy Report has documented, the U.S. is maintaining an illegal military occupation of Syria, and in particular of the nation’s oil-rich territory, where much of its wheat is also produced.
The stated policy of U.S. officials is to starve the Syrian government of revenue that it needs to rebuild after a decade of war fueled by the United States devastated the country.
In December, there was a resolution introduced in the Senate calling to withdraw the U.S. troops occupying Syria’s oil fields. It failed to pass in a vote of 13 to 84.
The US military has illegally occupied Syrian sovereign territory since 2014, preventing Damascus from accessing its own oil and wheat fields.
The Senate voted 13-84, rejecting a resolution to withdraw US troops.https://t.co/RC27DFnleC
— Geopolitical Economy Report (@GeopoliticaEcon) January 5, 2024

While the U.S. is bombing Yemen, Iraq, and Syria, Israel is also attacking multiple countries in the region.
In October, Israel repeatedly bombed airports in Syria, in both Aleppo and Damascus, killing Syrian troops.
In January, Israel launched many more attacks on Syria. And once again, the Western media misleadingly portrayed these Israeli acts of war as “strikes on Iran-linked targets in Syria”.
The Western media seeks to make everything about Iran, implying that Tehran controls all of these governments, when in reality it is the U.S. and Israel that are at war with many sovereign states in the region.
Israel has also been repeatedly assaulting its neighbor, Lebanon.
Amnesty International acknowledged that Israel has attacked southern Lebanon with white phosphorus, a horrific weapon that is banned by many countries.
Amnesty International emphasized that Israel has been killing Lebanese civilians in illegal, “indiscriminate” attacks.
But Israel is not only attacking southern Lebanon; it has also carried out drone strikes inside Beirut, the capital of the country.
Lebanon’s resistance group Hezbollah has long defended the country’s sovereignty, expelling Israel in 2000 after the colonial regime carried out an illegal military occupation of Lebanon for 15 years.
Hezbollah has said Israel’s attacks in the capital Beirut cross a red line and are risking a wider regional war.
While the Western media warns that U.S. and Israeli attacks on countries in the region “raise the specter of a wider regional war”, the reality is that Washington and Tel Aviv are already at war with Yemen, Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon.
It is obvious that the main target of U.S. and Israeli neo-colonial wars in West Asia is Iran.
This was confirmed by a former top U.S. military general and NATO commander, Wesley Clark, who revealed back in 2007 that, after the attacks on September 11, 2001, Washington made plans to overthrow the governments of seven countries in the region in five years.
In an interview with Democracy Now host Amy Goodman, Clark said that the U.S. had plans “to take out seven countries in five years, starting with Iraq, and then Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and, finishing off, Iran”.
In late 2023 and early 2024, the U.S. government has made this link clearly in public statements. Washington publicly blamed Iran for Ansarullah in Yemen launching attacks on ships in the Red Sea that are traveling to Israel, that are providing support to Tel Aviv as it carries out war crimes and faces charges of genocide at the Hague.
A top U.S. official claimed, “Iran is a primary, if not the primary enabler or supporter or sponsor of the Houthis”, and the U.S. government claimed that Iran is “involved in every phase” of what Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin called “illegal, dangerous and destabilizing attacks against U.S. and international vessels and commercial vessels”.
War hawks in Washington are using this as an opportunity to openly call for a U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.
John Bolton, the neoconservative extremist who served as Donald Trump’s national security adviser and was an architect of the Iraq War under former President George W Bush, published an article in the conservative British newspaper The Telegraph titled “The West may now have no option but to attack Iran”.
Bolton released that call for war on Iran on December 28. He likely coordinated it with Israel’s former prime minister, Naftali Bennett, who on the same day published an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal titled “The U.S. and Israel Need to Take Iran on Directly”.
In his article, Bennett boasted that when he was prime minister, Israel carried out numerous attacks on Iranian soil. He also admitted that Tel Aviv assassinated Iranian officials.
Bennett called to “empower domestic opposition [in Iran], ensure internet continuity during riots against the regime, strengthen its enemies, increase sanctions and economic pressures”.
In his last paragraph, Naftali Bennett said in no uncertain terms, “The U.S. and Israel must set the clear goal of bringing down Iran’s evil regime”.
Using colonial language, the former Israeli prime minister declared that the so-called “civilized world” must overthrow Iran’s government.
This is clearly what all of this is heading toward: Some bellicose officials in the U.S. and Israeli governments want not only a wider regional war, but more specifically a full-out war against Iran.
Many of these hard-line imperialists in Washington have salivated for many years at the idea of war with Tehran. Back in 2015, Bolton wrote an article for the New York Times straightforwardly titled “To Stop Iran’s Bomb, Bomb Iran”.
In fact, Michael Freund, a former spokesman for Israel’s current far-right prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, published an op-ed this January in the Jerusalem Post titled “Iran is already at war with Israel and the US”. In this piece, he insisted that “Israel and America must act now”, calling for war with Tehran.
Freund’s bio conspicuously noted that he was previously “deputy communications director under Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu”. It is quite possible that he coordinated this article with Netanyahu himself.
On January 3, there was a terror attack on civilians in the Iranian city of Kerman. More than 90 Iranians were killed, at an event that was commemorating the anniversary of the Trump administration’s assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the top Iranian general.
Western media outlets claimed that “ISIS” carried out this attack. Iranian intelligence officials said one of the terrorists who planted the bombs that killed at least 94 civilians had Israeli nationality.


Instruction: Write an article about: Debunked: Media falsely claims China is building spy base in Cuba. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Afghanistan, Bountygate, China, CIA, Cuba, Havana Syndrome, media, Russia

Output:
Media outlets claimed China is building a secret station in Cuba to spy on the US, citing anonymous intelligence officials. But the Pentagon admitted this story is false. It is part of an information warfare campaign against Beijing, and could sabotage attempts at diplomacy.

Anonymous US intelligence officials used the media this June to spread a rumor claiming that the Chinese government is building a massive spy base in Cuba, 100 miles from Florida.
There was however a glaring problem with this story: The US Department of Defense said it is false.
Top Pentagon officials came out publicly and clarified that the reports are “not accurate”, that China is in fact not building a spy base in Cuba.

This is the latest example of a series of false stories that have been laundered through the mainstream corporate media by US spy agencies, particularly the CIA, which seek to advance US foreign policy interests and demonize adversaries like China, Cuba, and Russia.
Recent disinformation campaigns of similar provenance have included Havana Syndrome – the debunked myth that Cuba, China, and/or Russia was supposedly attacking US spies and diplomats with pulsed microwave weapons – or “Bountygate” – the false CIA claim that Russia was paying the Taliban bounties in order to kill US soldiers during the war in Afghanistan.
The CIA has perfected the art of using the media to manipulate public opinion, to push people in certain political directions and manufacture consent for war.
One of the co-founders of the CIA, Frank Wisner, famously said the spy agency has contacts all across the media and can play the press like a “mighty Wurlitzer” – a kind of old musical instrument.
The latest disinformation operation started on June 8, when the Wall Street Journal published an article titled “Cuba to Host Secret Chinese Spy Base Focusing on U.S.”.
The report relied entirely on the claims of anonymous “U.S. officials familiar with highly classified intelligence”.
Just a few hours after this Wall Street Journal exclusive bombshell came out, Reuters quoted the Pentagon denying the claims.
A US Defense Department spokesman, Brigadier General Patrick Ryder, stated, “I can tell you based on the information that we have, that that is not accurate, that we are not aware of China and Cuba developing a new type of spy station… In terms of that particular report, no, it’s not accurate”.
In fact, after the article was published in the Wall Street Journal, the newspaper updated the story with a quote from the spokesman for the US National Security Council, John Kirby.
“This report is not accurate”, Kirby reiterated.
Kirby previously served as the Pentagon’s press secretary. This shows how it is US spy agencies that are spreading this false story about China, whereas the US military recognizes that there is no evidence, and may be concerned of the political consequences.
Despite the fact that the Pentagon publicly denied the story, many other major US media outlets echoed the rumor.
The New York Times, CNN, and Politico published their own versions of the debunked story, all citing anonymous US officials.
CBS News warned with a paranoid, cold war-style tone, “Prospect of Chinese spy base in Cuba unsettles Washington”.
For its part, Cuba forcefully condemned these reports, stating that they are false.
Cuba’s Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernandez de Cossio said the accusation is “untrue and unfounded”, arguing that the articles were “promoted with the malicious intention to justify the unprecedented reinforcement of the economic blockade, destabilization and the aggression against Cuba”.
Cuba rejects any “foreign military presence in Latin America and the Caribbean, including the numerous military bases and troops of the US, and especially the military base that illegally occupies a portion of our national territory in the province of Guantánamo”, Fernandez de Cossio emphasized.
A spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry, Wang Wenbin, pointed out, “Spreading rumors and slander is a common tactic of the US”.
“The US has illegally occupied the Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba for a long time, engaged in ulterior activities, and imposed an embargo on Cuba for more than 60 years”, Wang said.
The Chinese official argued that Washington “should reflect on itself, stop interfering in Cuba’s internal affairs under the banner of freedom, democracy and human rights, and immediately cancel its commercial and financial blockade of Cuba”.
It is not clear why exactly anonymous US spies would spread gray propaganda that even the Pentagon acknowledges is false. But it may have the effect of sabotaging any attempts at improving diplomatic relations between China and the United States.
In fact, just two days before this false story in the Wall Street Journal came out, there were reports that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was planning a visit to China within the upcoming weeks.
The paranoid media campaign put pressure on Blinken to cancel the trip.
MSNBC strongly implied that the secretary of state should do so, in an interview with the National Security Council spokesman, John Kirby.
Something very similar happened in February, when the press manufactured a scandal about a Chinese balloon that entered US airspace.
US officials later admitted that the floating object was likely a weather balloon that had been blown off course by unexpected weather.
However, the US military spent millions of dollars shooting down the object, along with several other balloons – one of which was later reported to belong to a hobbyist club called the Northern Illinois Bottlecap Balloon Brigade and which probably cost around $12.
The February media scare successfully demonized China among the US public and had the impact of pressuring Secretary of State Blinken to cancel a trip that he had planned to Beijing.
US admits weather pushed Chinese balloon off course, US shot down hobbyists’ $12 balloon in $2M missile attack

The Pentagon may also be motivated to slightly push back against the information war that US intelligence agencies are waging on China because the Defense Department is concerned that this hybrid war could escalate into a conventional armed conflict.
Politico reported this June, “The Pentagon Is Freaking Out About a Potential War With China (Because America might lose)”.
The article disclosed that the US military has held numerous war games to scope out a potential crisis with Beijing, and Washington has faced disastrous consequences.
The former vice chair of the Pentagon’s powerful Joint Chiefs of Staff, General John Hyten, confessed that the Chinese military “just ran rings around us”.
Politico wrote:
Dozens of versions of the above war-game scenario have been enacted over the last few years, most recently in April by the House Select Committee on competition with China. And while the ultimate outcome in these exercises is not always clear — the U.S. does better in some than others — the cost is. In every exercise the U.S. uses up all its long-range air-to-surface missiles in a few days, with a substantial portion of its planes destroyed on the ground. In every exercise the U.S. is not engaged in an abstract push-button war from 30,000 feet up like the ones Americans have come to expect since the end of the Cold War, but a horrifically bloody one.
And that’s assuming the U.S.-China war doesn’t go nuclear.
“The thing we see across all the wargames is that there are major losses on all sides. And the impact of that on our society is quite devastating,” said Becca Wasser, who played the role of the Chinese leadership in the Select Committee’s wargame and is head of the gaming lab at the Center for a New American Security. “The most common thread in these exercises is that the United States needs to take steps now in the Indo-Pacific to ensure the conflict doesn’t happen in the future. We are hugely behind the curve. Ukraine is our wakeup call. This is our watershed moment.”
A similar disinformation operation occurred in 2020, when US spy agencies spread a false story known as “Bountygate”.
The New York Times took the lead in this information warfare campaign, in a June 2020 report titled “Russia Secretly Offered Afghan Militants Bounties to Kill U.S. Troops, Intelligence Says“.
The newspaper quoted anonymous “American intelligence officials [who] have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing Coalition forces in Afghanistan – including targeting American troops”.
This story was lampooned from the beginning, because the US had been militarily occupying Afghanistan for 19 years as of 2020, and it was never explained why the Taliban would need to be bribed in order to attack the foreign soldiers occupying their homeland.
But the intention behind the gray propaganda became clear just a few days after this false story was plastered across the media.
The US House of Representatives Armed Service Committee cited the dubious rumor in order to justify voting on July 1 to block the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, thereby extending the war.
Meanwhile, a mere two weeks after this report came out, the Pentagon publicly stated that it was probably not true.
Then US Defense Secretary Mark Esper and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said they had found no evidence to substantiate the claims of “Bountygate”.
“All the defense intelligence agencies have been unable to corroborate that report”, Esper said, in testimony before the House Armed Services Committee.
A year later, in 2021, when the scandal had largely been forgotten, the Daily Beast released an article quietly acknowledging, “U.S. Intel Walks Back Claim Russians Put Bounties on American Troops”.
NBC News also reported: “Remember those Russian bounties for dead U.S. troops? Biden admin says the CIA intel is not conclusive”.
The media outlet added, “The Biden administration made clear [on April 15] that the CIA has only ‘low to moderate confidence’ in its intel on alleged Russian bounties for U.S. troops”.
This story revealed that it was the CIA that had promoted the false “Bountygate” myth in the first place.


Instruction: Write an article about: Inside Operation Gladio: How NATO supported Nazis and terrorists. Use the themes and topics represented by the tags provided as guidance for the content. It's not necessary to include the exact tag words in the article, but the article should reflect the essence and context of these tags.

Input: Asa Winstanley, CIA, Europe, fascism, NATO, Nazis, Operation Gladio, podcast, Soviet Union

Output:
Journalists Benjamin Norton and Asa Winstanley discuss Operation Gladio, the NATO “stay behind” networks in which the CIA armed former Nazis and fascists to wage war on the left.

Multipolarista host Benjamin Norton is joined by journalist Asa Winstanley to discuss Operation Gladio, the NATO “stay behind” networks in which the CIA and other Western intelligence agencies recruited, armed, and trained former Nazis, other fascists, and right-wing terrorists to wage a war on the left.

You can also watch the video at Rokfin or Rumble.

You can also download the podcast for free at Substack.
Follow Asa on Twitter at @AsaWinstanley.
Support Asa’s reporting at his Substack.
Read Asa’s reports: