Did Putin Order the Salisbury Hit?
By Patrick J. Buchanan
Posted on March 20, 2018
Britain has yet to identify the assassin who tried to murder the double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury, England. But Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson knows who ordered the hit. "We think it overwhelmingly likely that it was (Russian President Vladimir Putin’s) decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the U.K."
"Unforgivable," says Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov of the charge, which also defies "common sense."
On Sunday, Putin echoed Peskov: "It is just sheer nonsense, complete rubbish, to think that anyone in Russia could do anything like that in the run-up to the presidential election and the World Cup… It’s simply unthinkable."
Putin repeated Russia’s offer to assist in the investigation.
But Johnson is not backing down; he is doubling down.
But Johnson is not backing down; he is doubling down.
"We gave the Russians every opportunity to come up with an alternative hypothesis … and they haven’t," said Johnson... Why Russia is the prime suspect is understandable. Novichok was created by Russia’s military decades ago, and Skripal, a former Russian intel officer, betrayed Russian spies to MI6.
But what is missing here is the Kremlin’s motive for the crime.
Skripal was convicted of betraying Russian spies in 2006. He spent four years in prison and was exchanged in 2010 for Russian spies in the U.S. If Putin wanted Skripal dead as an example to all potential traitors, why didn’t he execute him while he was in Kremlin custody?
Why wait until eight years after Skripal had been sent to England? And how would this murder on British soil advance any Russian interest?
Putin is no fool. A veteran intelligence agent, he knows that no rival intel agency such as the CIA or MI6 would trade spies with Russia if the Kremlin were to go about killing them after they have been traded.
"Cui bono?" runs the always relevant Ciceronian question. "Who benefits" from this criminal atrocity? Certainly, in this case, not Russia, not the Kremlin, not Putin.
All have taken a ceaseless beating in world opinion and Western media since the Skripals were found comatose, near death, on that bench outside a mall in Salisbury.
Predictably, Britain’s reaction has been rage, revulsion and retaliation. Twenty-three Russian diplomats, intelligence agents in their London embassy, have been expelled. The Brits have been treating Putin as a pariah and depicting Russia as outside the circle of civilized nations.
Russia is "ripping up the international rulebook," roared Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson. Asked how Moscow might respond to the expulsions, Williamson retorted: Russia should "go away and shut up."
[Alleged] Putin sympathizers, including Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, have been silenced or savaged as appeasers for resisting the rush to judgment.
The Americans naturally came down on the side of their oldest ally, with President Donald Trump imposing new sanctions.
We are daily admonished that Putin tried to tip the 2016 election to Trump. But if so, why would Putin order a public assassination that would almost compel Trump to postpone his efforts at a rapprochement?
Who, then, are the beneficiaries of this atrocity?
Is it not the coalition – principally in our own capital city – that bears an endemic hostility to Russia and envisions America’s future role as a continuance of its Cold War role of containing and corralling Russia until we can achieve regime change in Moscow?...
Was this act really ordered by Putin and the Kremlin, who have not only denied it but condemned it?
Or was it the work of rogue agents who desired the consequences that they knew the murder of Skripal would produce – a deeper and more permanent split between Russia and the West?
Only a moron could not have known what the political ramifications of such an atrocity as this would be on U.S.-British-Russian relations.
And before we act on Boris Johnson’s verdict – that Putin ordered it – let us recall:
* The Spanish, we learned, did not actually blow up the battleship Maine in Havana Harbor in 1898, which ignited the Spanish-American War.
* The story of North Vietnamese gunboats attacking U.S. destroyers, which led to the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and 58,000 dead Americans in Vietnam, proved not to be entirely accurate.
* We went to war in Iraq in 2003 to disarm it of weapons of mass destruction we later discovered Saddam Hussein did not really have.
Some 4,500 U.S. dead and tens of thousands of wounded paid for that rush to judgment. And some of those clamoring for war then are visible in the vanguard of those clamoring for confronting Russia.
Before we set off on Cold War II with Russia – leading perhaps to the shooting war we avoided in Cold War I – let’s try to get this one right.
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of Churchill, Hitler, and “The Unnecessary War”: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World.
To find out more about Patrick Buchanan and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Web page at www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2017 CREATORS.COM
Read more by Patrick J. Buchanan
- Time to Get Over the Russophobia – March 8th, 2018
- Is That Russia Troll Farm an Act of War? – February 19th, 2018
- Is US Being Sucked Into Syria’s War? – February 12th, 2018
- Nunes Duels the Deep State – February 5th, 2018
- Too Many Wars. Too Many Enemies. – January 29th, 2018
Read the complete article:
A dangerous collective insanity has taken
over the political and 'news' media elites of much of the Western world - the UK, US,
Australia, and other countries that recklessly align with them.
Remember Iraq? - dodgy intelligence cooked up to fit the policy. Now it's anti-Russia hysteria, without the necessity of actual evidence or independent examination, which could lead to more disastrous wars, including between nuclear armed powers.
If there was real investigative journalism left in the Western corporate-state owned media, everyone should know this already. Instead, the role of the corrupted 'news' media is to whip up public sentiment based on lies, fear and ignorance, to advance the selfish interests of the Military-Industrial Complex.
When demonizing the designated 'enemy', the normal legal principle of “innocent until proven guilty” need not apply. It is also not necessary to add that most important word “alleged” before making unproven accusations of guilt.
If the truth must be told, for 'plausible deniability', it will be hidden somewhere less likely to be seen. Meanwhile, the official narrative dominates the headlines, front page, and lead stories, where getting the desired message across really counts.
This is not proper journalism; it is propaganda.
When news reporters lie; innocent people die.
So here are some alternative investigative articles that will shine light in ways that the corporate-state media will not.
- Bruce
Russian to Judgment: Who Poisoned Sergei
Skripal?
The all-purpose “Russia did it” explanation makes no sense
By Justin Raimondo
Posted on AntiWar.com, on March 15, 2018
"The all-purpose 'Russia
did it' explanation makes no sense... It makes no sense. But then again, war
propaganda doesn't have to make sense, it has only to inspire fear and
loathing... Don't fall for it: instead ask the question... Where's the
evidence?"
Read more:
Of A Type Developed By Liars
n
Craig Murray, a former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan,
explains why the official narrative about the 'UK-Russia chemical attack' story
should not be believed:
"...It is very carefully
worded propaganda.
Of a type developed by liars..."
Of a type developed by liars..."
Read the article:
First Recorded Successful Novichok Synthesis
was in 2016 – By Iran, in Cooperation with the OPCW
By Craig Murray
March 17, 2018
“The line that novichoks can only be produced by Russia is now
proven to be a complete lie…
Despite the lying propaganda regurgitated by virtually every corporate and state “journalist”, in truth it is now proven beyond dispute that “of a type developed by Russia” has zero evidential value and is a politician’s weasel phrase designed deliberately to mislead the public. The public should ask why.
Despite the lying propaganda regurgitated by virtually every corporate and state “journalist”, in truth it is now proven beyond dispute that “of a type developed by Russia” has zero evidential value and is a politician’s weasel phrase designed deliberately to mislead the public. The public should ask why.
…in late 2016, Iranian scientists set out to study whether novichoks really could
be produced from commercially available ingredients. Iran succeeded in
synthesising a number of novichoks. Iran did this in full cooperation with the
OPCW and immediately reported the results to the OPCW so they could be added to
the chemical weapons database.
This makes complete nonsense of
the Theresa May’s “of a type developed by Russia” line, used to parliament and
the UN Security Council. This explains why Porton Down have refused to cave in
to governmental pressure to say the nerve agent was Russian. If Iran can make a
novichok, so can a significant number of states…
…Iran acted absolutely
responsibly in cooperating with the OPCW… Russia has cooperated in the OPCW
destruction of all its chemical weapons stocks, completed last year, which
included regular OPCW inspection of all the sites alleged to have been in the
original “novichok” programme…
Extraordinarily, only yesterday
the Guardian was still carrying an article which claimed “only the Russian
state” could make a novichok.
Despite the lying propaganda regurgitated by virtually every corporate and state “journalist”, in truth is it is now proven beyond dispute that “of a type developed by Russia” has zero evidential value and is a politician’s weasel phrase designed deliberately to mislead the public.
The public should ask why.”
Despite the lying propaganda regurgitated by virtually every corporate and state “journalist”, in truth is it is now proven beyond dispute that “of a type developed by Russia” has zero evidential value and is a politician’s weasel phrase designed deliberately to mislead the public.
The public should ask why.”
Read the complete article:
The Novichok Story Is Indeed Another Iraqi WMD Scam
By Craig Murray
March 14, 2018
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48995.htm
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48995.htm
Bothered By Midgies
By Craig Murray
March 16, 2018
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48994.htm
March 16, 2018
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/48994.htm
Hear Craig Murray,
a former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan:
a former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan:
BBC Radio 5 Interview on Skripal Attack
(14:50) - 18 Mar, 2018
Russian Scientists Explain 'Novichok' - High
Time For Britain To Come Clean
By Moon
Of Alabama
March 21, 2018
“…The name
'Novichok' comes from a book written
by Vil Mirzanyanov, a 1990s immigrant to the U.S. from the former Soviet Union.
It describes his work at Soviet chemical weapon laboratories and lists the
chemical formulas of a new group of lethal substances.
AFP interviewed the
author of the 'Novichok' book about the Salisbury incident: he is convinced
Russia carried it out... The
only other possibility, he said, would be that someone used the formulas in his
book to make such a weapon.
"Russia did it", says
Mirzanyanov, "OR SOMEONE WHO READ MY BOOK".
Western media claimed that Vil Miranzayanov is
the developer of the 'Novichok' chemicals. It turns out that this is not the
case.
Interviews with two retired Russian chemists, both published only
yesterday, tell the real story… Vladimir Uglev, like Renk and Miranzayanov,
notes that these agents "of a type developed by Russia" can now be
produced by any sufficiently equipped laboratory, including private ones.
Uglev mentions a
criminal use of one of the agents in the 1990s… Journalist Mark Ames, who
worked in Moscow at that time, remarks: This
muddles the narrative a bit —"novichok" used in 1995 Moscow mafia
poison hit on top mobster Ivan Kivelidi. So: 1) novichok [is] in mob hands too…
A new article in the New Scientists confirms the
claims by the Russian scientists that the 'Novichok' agents which may have
affected the Skripals may have been produced elsewhere: Weapons experts have
told New Scientist that a number of countries legally created small amounts of
Novichok after it was revealed in 1992 and a production method was later
published…
In an interview with Deutsche Welle British
Foreign Minister Boris Johnson admits that Porton Down had
(illegal?) 'Novichok' agents when the incident in Salisbury happened…
But
Porton Down did not agree with the British government to claim that the
supposed nerve agent was "made by Russia." It only agreed to the compromise formulation "of a type developed by Russia" i.e. it could have
been made anywhere…
As usual in the military-industrial complex the
people who push such scares, are the ones who profit from them.
The British Morning Star points to one former British
military intelligence officer, Colonel (rtd) Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, as a
common protagonist in the Skripal case, in the claims of Syrian chemical weapon
use and in commercial interests around chemical weapon defense…
Other British agents involved in
the Skripal case are Pablo
Miller who recruited Skripal
for the MI6. He was a friend of Skripal, also lived in Salisbury and worked for
Christopher Steele, the former(?) MI6 agent who produced the 'dirty dossier'
about Donald Trump for the Clinton campaign…
How could the British government be
sure of "Russian" involvement within a week and even expel Russian
diplomats when the primary chemical experts on the issue will need three weeks
for their first analyses and the British police predicts a several months long
investigation?
The Russian scientists and their
government have explained their history and position in relation to 'Novichoks'
and the Skripal incident. It is high time now for the British government, its
scientists at Porton Down and its greedy mafia of former(?) British
intelligence officer and their criminal Russian emigres to come clean about
their own roles in it.”
Read the complete story, and
read/post public comments:
and here:
30 Questions That Journalists Should be Asking
About the Skripal Case
By Rob SLANE
EDITOR'S CHOICE | 25.03.2018
Online Journal, Strategic Culture Foundation
There are a lot of issues around the case of Sergei and Yulia
Skripal which, at the time of writing, are very unclear and rather odd.
There
may well be good and innocent explanations for some or even all of them. Then
again there may not. This is why it is crucial for questions to be asked where,
as yet, there are either no answers or deeply unsatisfactory ones.
Some people will assume that this is conspiracy theory
territory. It is not that, for the simple reason that I have no credible theory
— conspiracy or otherwise — to explain all the details of the incident in
Salisbury from start to finish, and I am not attempting to forward one. I have
no idea who was behind this incident, and I continue to keep an open mind to a
good many possible explanations.
However, there are a number of oddities in the official
narrative, which do demand answers and clarifications. You don’t have to be a
conspiracy theorist or a defender of the Russian state to see this. You just
need a healthy scepticism, “of a type developed by all inquiring minds!”
Below are 30 of the most important questions regarding the case
and the British Government’s response, which are currently either wholly
unanswered, or which require clarification…
If there are any journalists with
integrity and inquisitive minds still living in this country, I would be
grateful if they could begin doing their job and research the answers to these
sorts of questions by asking the appropriate people and authorities.”
More on this and other subjects on Rob
Slane’s blog:
Read all 30 questions that investigative
journalists should be asking about the Skripal poisoning:
20 More Questions That Journalists Should be
Asking About the Skripal Case
By Rob SLANE
EDITOR'S CHOICE | 29.03.2018
Online Journal, Strategic Culture Foundation
“To my knowledge, none of the questions I wrote in my
previous piece – 30 questions That
Journalists Should be Asking About the Skripal Case – has been
answered satisfactorily, at least not in the public domain.
Yet despite the
fact that these legitimate questions have not yet been answered, and many
important facts surrounding the case are still unknown, the case has given rise
to a serious international crisis, with the extraordinary expulsion of Russian
diplomats across many EU countries and particularly the United States…
And so,
for what it’s worth, here are 20 more important questions that I think that
journalists ought to be asking regarding this case:...”
According to this article by Moon of Alabama, the U.S. State
Department itself now admits that UK blaming Russia for the Skripal poisoning
was “a lie, concocted in a common propaganda operation with the U.S.
government” from the very beginning:
“…The U.S. State Department says that its campaign to use the
Skripal incident as a tool against Russia started on March 6, only two days
after the incident and six full days before the British government raised
accusations against Russia. In her press briefing on March 27, the U.S. State
Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert talked about the coordinated ousting of
Russian diplomats by some "western" countries:
“Our Deputy Secretary
Sullivan, Assistant Secretary Wess Mitchell, and many others…worked
tirelessly over the past three weeks to achieve this unprecedented level of
cooperation and also coordination…”
Yet the British prime minister made her
allegations against Russia only on March 12…”
Also from this Moon of Alabama article:
"…Today, 25 days after the incident, the police say they suspect that the Skripals were poisoned from the front door of their home. Today, 25 days after the incident, they removed the front door… The Skripals were said to have left their home at 9:00am in the morning. They collapsed relatively sudden at 4:00pm in the afternoon. Is this seven hour delay consistent with being severely affected by a "military grade" highly toxic nerve agent?...
But even if a nerve agent of the 'novichok' type was involved
the jump to allegations against Russia is completely baseless. David B. Collum is Professor for Organic Chemistry at Cornell University. He really, really
knows this stuff:
Dave Collum @DavidBCollum -
I will say it again: Anybody who tells you this nerve agent must
have come from Russia is a liar--a complete and utter liar. They are simple
compounds…”
Also from this Moon of Alabama article:
“An editorial (recommended) in the Chinese Global Times captures the utter disgust such behavior creates elsewhere:
“The fact that major Western
powers can gang up and "sentence" a foreign country without following
the same procedures other countries abide by and according to the basic tenets
of international law is chilling...
It is beyond outrageous how the US and
Europe have treated Russia. Their actions represent a frivolity and
recklessness that has grown to characterize Western hegemony that only knows
how to contaminate international relations.
Right now is the perfect time for
non-Western nations to strengthen unity and collaborative efforts among one
another.”…
From: Last Act Of 'Novichok' Drama Revealed - "The Skripals' Resurrection" (March 29,2018)
REVEALED:
Pentagon’s $70 Million Chemical & Biological Program at Porton Down in UK
By Dilyana Gaytandzhieva
March 28, 2018
“The Pentagon has spent at least $70 million on military
experiments involving tests with deadly viruses and chemical agents at Porton
Down – the UK military laboratory near the city of Salisbury… A total of 122,050
animals have been exposed to deadly pathogens, chemicals and incurable diseases
over the last decade (2005-2016)…
Porton Down is just one of the
Pentagon-funded military laboratories in 25 countries across the world, where
the US Army produces and tests man-made viruses, bacteria and toxins… and are
located in former Soviet Union countries such as Georgia and Ukraine, the
Middle East, South East Asia and Africa.
[They] are not under the direct
control of the host state as the US military and civilian personnel is working
under diplomatic cover. As the local governments and communities are prohibited
from public disclosure of sensitive information about the foreign military
program running on their own territory – the full extent of the public risk
will always remain unknown…”
- Dilyana Gaytandzhieva is a Bulgarian-based investigative journalist, specializing in covering conflicts and terrorism in Middle East and Asian conflicts, and international weapons trafficking operations.
Salisbury Incident Report: Hard Evidence For Soft Minds
Written by ORIENTAL REVIEW on 28/03/2018
“The
UK government’s presentation on the Salisbury incident, which was repeatedly cited in recent days as an “ultimate
proof” of Russia’s involvement into Skripal’s assassination attempt, was made public earlier today.
This
6-paged PDF is a powerful evidence of another intellectual low of British
propaganda machine. Open it and you can tell that substantially it makes only
two assertions on the Skripal case, and both are false:
First. Novichok is a
group of agents developed only by Russia and not declared under the CWC” – a
false statement.
Novichok was originally developed in the USSR (Nukus Lab, today in Uzbekistan, site completely decommissioned according to the US-Uzbekistan agreement by 2002). One of its key developers, Vil Mirzayanov, defected to the United States in 1990s, its chemical formula and technology were openly published in a number of chemical journals outside Russia…
Novichok was originally developed in the USSR (Nukus Lab, today in Uzbekistan, site completely decommissioned according to the US-Uzbekistan agreement by 2002). One of its key developers, Vil Mirzayanov, defected to the United States in 1990s, its chemical formula and technology were openly published in a number of chemical journals outside Russia…
Second. “We are without doubt that Russia is responsible. No
country bar Russia has combined capability, intent and motive. There is no
plausible alternative explanation” – an
outstanding example of self-hypnosis…
The
prominent British academician from the University of Kent Prof. Richard Sakwa
has elaborated on
this on March 23 the following way: Rather than just the two possibilities outlined by
Theresa May, in fact there are at least six, possibly seven…
The
authors of this “report” mixed up a very strange cocktail of multitype
allegations, none of which have ever been proven or recognized by any
responsible entity (like legal court or dedicated official international
organization).
Of
course we are not committed to argue on every cell, but taking e.g. “August 2008 Invasion of Georgia” we
actually can’t understand why the EU-acknowledged Saakashvili’s
aggression against South Ossetia is exposed here as an example of “Russian
malign activity”…
Have
you totally lost your minds, ladies & gentlemen from the Downing Street?”
20 reasons why Skripal nerve
agent story is fake news - former BBC Salisbury reporter Tony Gosling
(AUDIO - 1:01:45)
Hillary Clinton Ordered Diplomats To Suppress
'Novichok' Discussions
By Moon Of Alabama
March 31, 2018
“…some additional
details of the history of 'Novichok' nerve agents come to light. Details on
'Novichok' nerve agents were published in a 2007 book by Vil Mirzayanaov, a
Soviet scientist offered asylum in the United States.
After the publication,
the U.S. and the UK actively suppressed international discussions about the
book and the 'Novichok' chemical weapon agents.
Documents from the
U.S. State Department published by Wikileaks show that then Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton directed her diplomats to not talk about Novichok and to play
down the matter should it arise in chemical weapon control talks…
In 1997 the Russian Federation and other states of the former
Soviet Union joined the Chemical Weapons Convention and destroyed their
chemical weapon stocks and production facilities.
One production and test
facility for the 'Novichok' agents was in Nukus, Uzbekistan. In 1999 the
U.S. helped to dismantle that facility. It
surely acquired additional knowledge about everything that was produced there.
In 2008 Mirzayanov published a book about his story and the chemical
agents developed under the 'Foilant' program. The book included the chemical
formulas of the agents… U.S. State Department documents published by Wikileaks
provide that the U.S. and the UK tried to suppress any discussion of the book…
The above is not the only involvement of
"CLINTON" in the 'Novichok' and Skripal affair. The Hillary Clinton
presidential campaign paid the British company Orbis to create the 'dirty
dossier' about Trump and his alleged connections to Russia. Christopher Steele,
a former(?) MI6 agent, and his former(?) MI6 colleague Pablo Miller wrote the
dossier, claiming that its information came from Russian sources. Pablo Miller
was the MI6 agent who had recruited Sergej Skripal as a spy for the
UK.
Miller lives in Salisbury where Sergej Skripal lives and where he and his
daughter were allegedly attacked with a 'Novichok' nerve agent. Miller was a
friend of Sergej Skripal and regularly met him. It is quite possible that some
of the shoddy rumors in the Steele dossier were sourced from Skripal or from
his daughter Yulia. The incident in Salisbury could well be related to the
dossier or other dubiously alleged campaign issues.
It is intriguing that the U.S. and the UK tried to downplay
any discussion of 'Novichoks' and the book. Why did they do so?
Until 2016 the OPCW's Scientific Advisory
Board (SAB) as well as scientists at the UK weapon laboratory in Porton
Down sowed doubts about the very existence of
'Novichoks'…
The British government insinuates that Russia is
the only country that could make 'Novichok' agents and must therefore have
attacked the Skripals. This is obviously nonsense. The U.S. and the UK were
deeply involved in the 'Novichok' issue. They certainly tried and succeeded to
re-create these substances.
After the formulas of the nerve agents were
published by Mirzayanov, the U.S. and the UK suppressed discussion of the
issue. The OPCW professed to know nothing about them. Only after Iranian
scientists independently re-created the agents and published about them were
they added to the OPCW database.
Three questions come to mind which the U.S. and
British government should be pressed to answer:
- Why did the
Clinton State Department and the British government suppress international
talks about the 'Novichok' agents?
- Why did
they try, successfully it seems, to keep the issue out of the OPCW's
Scientific Advisory Board?
- Why were
the substances kept out of the OPCW database until independent Iranian
scientists finally re-created them?”
Read the complete article, and read/post public
comments:
Porton Down experts unable to verify precise
source of novichok
Defence lab unable to definitively say where nerve agent that
poisoned Sergei Skripal and his daughter came from
By Steven Morris and Pippa Crerar
The Guardian, Tuesday April 3, 2018
“British scientists at Porton Down have not been able to
establish where the novichok nerve agent used to poison Sergei and Yulia
Skripal was made, it has emerged. Gary Aitkenhead, the chief executive of the
Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) at Porton Down, Wiltshire,
said it had not proved it was created in Russia…
The comments are bound to be seized on by Russia, which
insists it was not behind the attack and claims the British government’s
accusations that it is behind it are a provocation…
Asked if it was possible to establish where the novichok
was made, Aitkenhead added: “At this stage, with the work that we’ve done thus
far, we’ve been able to establish that it’s novichok or from that family. We
are continuing to work to help to provide additional information that might
help us get closer to the question that you ask but we haven’t yet been able to
do that.”…
"It's The Cover-Up" - UK Foreign
Office Deletes Tweet, Posts False Transcript, Issues New Lies
By Moon
of Alabama
April 4, 2018
“…The British government is trying to cover-up the lies it made
with its false allegations against Russia. The cover-up necessitates new lies
some of which we expose below.
Yesterday the head of the British chemical weapon laboratory
in Porton Down stated that the laboratory cannot establish
that the poison used in the alleged 'Novichok' attack in Salisbury was produced
by Russia. This was a severe blow to the British government allegations of
Russian involvement in the poisoning of Sergej and Yulia Skripal.
Now the British government tries to hide that it said that
the poison used in the Salisbury was 'produced in Russia' and that Porton down
had proved that to be the case. The government aligned media are helping to stuff the government lies
down the memory hole. We all need to make sure that the new lies get exposed
and that the attempts to change the record fail…
It is
obviously the British government which at first rejected OPCW involvement and
not the Kremlin. The OPCW is by statute a technical agency, not a
court. It will release a technical assessment of the involved agent and not a
judgment on responsibility or guilt.
The attempted cover-up by the Foreign Office of the lies the
British government spread about the case has already failed. To play down
the original strong claims against Russia as mere 'suggestions' is comical.
Allegations that Russia was or is holding up a serious international
investigation are also false. It was Britain which at first rejected the CWC
and OPCW involvement.
The fact that the British government even makes these
attempts must be seen as acknowledgement that it has no case and lied in it its
official statements to the global public. It now covers its trail with more
lies. What else is the British government lying about?”
Read the complete article, and read/post public
comments:
Knobs and Knockers
By Craig Murray
April 5, 2018
“What is left of
the government’s definitive identification of Russia as the culprit in the
Salisbury attack? It is a simple truth that Russia is not the only state that
could have made the nerve agent: dozens of them could.
It could also have been
made by many non-state actors… David Collum, Professor of Organo-Chemistry at
Cornell University…has stated that his senior students could do it…
There simply is no basic investigative journalism
happening around this case.
So given that the weapon itself is
not firm evidence it was Russia that did it, what is Boris Johnson’s evidence?
It turns out that the British government’s evidence is no more than the
technique of smearing nerve agent on the door handle. All of the UK media have
been briefed by “security sources” that the UK has a copy of a secret Russian
assassin training manual detailing how to put nerve agent on door handles, and
that given the nerve agent was found on the Skripals door handle, this is the
clinching evidence which convinced NATO allies of Russia’s guilt…
Two questions arise. How credible is
the British government’s possession of a Russian secret training manual for
using novichok agents, and how credible is it that the Skripals were poisoned
by their doorknob…
Can somebody explain to me the scenario
in which two people both touch the exterior door handle in exiting and closing
the door?...
The second problem is that the Novichok family of nerve
agents are instant acting… If the nerve agent was on the door handle and they
touched it, the onset of these symptoms would have occurred before they reached
the car. They would certainly have not felt like sitting down to a good lunch
two hours later…
This narrative simply is not remotely credible…
These are some of the problems I have
with the official account of events. Boris lied about the certainty of the
provenance of the nerve agent, and his fall back evidence is at present highly
unconvincing. None of which proves it was not the Russian state that was
responsible. But there is no convincing proof that it was, and there are
several other possibilities.
Eventually the glaring problems with the official
narrative might be resolved, but what is plain is that Johnson and May have
been premature and grossly irresponsible…”
Read the complete and compelling
article on Craig Murray’s blog:
An Extremely Boring Video.
Do Not Watch It.
By
Craig Murray
April
6, 2018
VIDEO
(18:38)
“I
have managed to get hold of a copy, which you can see here, of my lengthy
interview with Sky News about the Skripals yesterday, which Sky refused to put
online because they allege I was boring. With the warning you might therefore
be very bored, you may watch it if you wish…
Kay Burley then appeared to suggest…that
Sky News could not put the interview online as they did not record it and do
not hold a copy, which is plainly untrue (and would be illegal under their
broadcast license)…
It is my policy when invited by journalists, to give
considered and courteous answers to the particular questions which they ask.
This is as opposed to what politicians do, which is to spout pre-prepared
soundbites irrespective of what they are asked. I appreciate that mine is a
very old-fashioned approach…
But you must judge for yourself…”
I found
it not in the least boring!
Watch
the video interview (18:38) here:
The Economics
Behind The Skripal Poisoning
Michael Hudson
- The Hudson Report
The long history
of collaboration between Russian oligarchs and Western banks, how it fits into
the larger neoliberal project.
Posted April 06,
2018.
AUDIO (17:27):
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