The European Union Times |
- How Russia and Germany may save Europe from war
- Life may be found under frozen surface of Jupiter’s moon
- Bulgaria Charges Seven with Promoting Islamic State, Propagating War
- Turkey bans media coverage of ex-ministers corruption investigation
- Russian battleships training in the English Channel
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Posted: 28 Nov 2014 02:58 PM PST
 The US-propelled vassal Petro Poroshenko, currently starring in the oligarch dance in Ukraine this week advanced the proposition that Ukrainians in the near future, after his “reforms”, will be asked to vote on whether to join NATO. Let’s be serious here. Some of you may be familiar with the concept of “shatter belt” – territories and peoples that historically have been squeezed between the Germanic Eagle and the Russian Bear. As we stand, the whole shatter belt – apart from Ukraine and Belarus – has become NATO members. Were Ukraine to become a NATO member in – albeit remote – future, the shatter belt buffer zone would disappear. This means NATO – essentially the US – planted right on Russia’s western border. Washington has just announced that it will be pre-positioning more military vehicles in Europe, to be used in exercises or “potential military operations.” This is perfectly in tune with the relentless US “think tank-land” spin that NATO and the US will be “forced” to balance their commitment to security in Eastern Europe against potential Russian “aggression.” As Ukraine, the Baltic States and Poland persist in compounded hysteria about such “aggression,” the option of a post-MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) US-Russia nuclear war is now – casually – back on the discussion table. At least there’s a countercurrent; strands of informed Americans are wondering why the US should be paying for Europe’s defense when European GDP is larger than the US’s.  Now for the “threat” of nuclear war in Europe – bogus or otherwise. It’s pointless to compare the US and Russia strategic nuclear capabilities based on numbers, but not on quality. Take the compounded GDP of US, Germany, France and England and compare it to Russia; it’s a victory by a landslide. Then examine the strategic nuclear scenario, and it’s a totally different story. GDP alone does not “win” anything. Washington/Wall Street elites are now deep into nuclear war paranoia. A few studies at least hint at the obvious; glaring US strategic weakness. Consider some of the basics: - Russian ICBMs armed with MIRVs travel at about 18 Mach; that is way faster than anything in the US arsenal. And basically they are unbeatable. - The S-400 and S-500 double trouble; Moscow has agreed to sell the S-400 surface-to-air missile system to China; the bottom line is this will make Beijing impermeable to US air power, ICBMs and cruise missiles. Russia, for its part, is already focusing on the state of the art S-500 – which essentially makes the Patriot anti-missile system look like a V-2 from WWII. - The Russian Iskander missile travels at Mach 7 – with a range of 400km, carrying a 700kg warhead of several varieties, and with a circular error probability of around five meters. Translation: an ultimate lethal weapon against airfields or logistic infrastructure. The Iskander can reach targets deep inside Europe. - And then there’s the Sukhoi T-50 PAK FA. NATO clowns dreaming of a war on Russia would have to come up with an ironclad system to knock out these Iskanders. They don’t have any. Additionally, they would have to face the S-400s, which the Russians can deploy all over the spectrum. Think of a hefty batch of S-400s positioned at the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad; that would turn NATO air operations deep inside Europe into an absolutely horrendous nightmare. On top of it, good ol’ NATO fighter jets cost a fortune. Imagine the effect of hundreds of destroyed fighter jets on an EU already financially devastated and austerity-plagued to death. As if this was not enough, no one knows the exact extent of NATO’s strategic capabilities. Brussels is not talking. Extra-officially, these capabilities are not exactly a marvel. And Russian intelligence knows it. Still assuming those NATO clowns would insist on playing war, Moscow has already made it very clear Russia would use their awesome arsenal of 5,000-plus tactical nuclear weapons – and whatever else it takes – to defend the nation against a NATO conventional attack. Moreover, a few thousand S-400 and S-500 systems are enough to block a US nuclear attack. None of this hair-raising Apocalypse Now scenario is even taking into account the Russia-China alliance – the major, game-changing Eurasian story of the 2010s.  In a nutshell; Beijing knows the US surface fleet is obsolete – and undefendable. And needless to add, all of these Chinese modernizing developments are proceeding way faster than anything in the US. A modest proposal The spin in the US has been relentless; Russia is expanding towards a 21st century empire. Here, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov explains in detail how this is undiluted rubbish. What has actually happened is that Moscow deftly called the Brzezinski-inspired bluff in Ukraine – with all its overtones. No wonder the Empire of Chaos is furious. And yet there is a solution to defuse the current, hysterical rush to war logic. Here I have examined in some detail how Washington is playing Russian roulette. Now it’s time to advance a modest proposal – as it has been discussed by a few concerned analysts from the US, Europe and Asia. Essentially, it’s very simple. It’s up to Germany. And it’s all about undoing Stalin. Stalin, at the outset of WWII, took East Prussia from Germany and moved the eastern part of Poland into Ukraine. Eastern Ukraine was originally from Russia; it is part of Russia and was given by Lenin to Ukraine. So let’s have East Prussia returned to Germany; the eastern part of Poland returned to Poland; and eastern Ukraine as well as Crimea – which Khrushchev gave to Ukraine – returned to Russia. Everyone get its share. No more Stalin. No more arbitrary borders. That’s what the Chinese would define as a “triple win” situation. Of course the Empire of Chaos would fight it to death; there would be no more chaos manipulated to justify a crusade against bogus Russian “aggression”. The ball is in Germany’s court. Now it’s up to East Prussians to present the facts to Angela Merkel. Let’s see if she’s able to get the message. Source           |
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Posted: 28 Nov 2014 02:46 PM PST
 Fresh analysis of Hubble telescope data bolstered suspicions that under Europa’s icy shell there is a tidally-heated ocean of liquid water that could be capable of containing the building blocks of life. “For the first time in the history of humanity, we have the tools and technology and capability to potentially answer this question (of the existence of life beyond Earth), and we know where to go to find it; Jupiter’s ocean world, Europa,” says NASA astrobiologist Kevin Hand. NASA scientists initially thought that the Jovian moon was frozen solid, but vapor plumes originating from its surface were observed on telescope data. NASA has requested public funding for the initiation of a mission to Europa. Back in July, it called for proposals for science instruments that could be used on the long trip to help search for signs of life on the moon. “The possibility of life on Europa is a motivating force for scientists and engineers around the world,” said NASA’s John Grunsfeld at the time. Source      |
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Posted: 28 Nov 2014 02:35 PM PST
 The group, which was found to have propagated ideas relating to Islamic State organisation, comprised Bulgarian nationals of Roma origin who used Arab names to communicate among themselves. Imam Ahmed Musa Ahmed, a Muslim spiritual leader in the Roma neighbourhood of the city of Pazardhik, was the group’s chief, according to the prosecution. Earlier on Wednesday, prosecutors formally charged Ahmed Musa Ahmed with membership of a group propagating war and anti-democratic ideology.The imam has rejected the charges, according to his defence lawyer Elvira Penkova. The group was arrested during a large-scale operation against extolling the ideology of Islamic State. The operation was conducted by the State Agency for National Security, or DANS, under the supervision of the Chief Prosecutor’s Office on Tuesday and Wednesday. DANS Chairman Vladimir Pisanchev told a press briefing the group “isn’t an Islamic State cell but it could have been one”. According to Pisanchev, the investigation has found out that members of the group were allegedly attempting to recruit fighters for Islamic State. Islamist jihadists had used the homes of group members as transit points, Pisanchev added. The operation is part of an investigation of suspected “propagation of a fascist or another anti-democratic ideology or a forced change of public and state order established by the Constitution” and “propagation of war”. Both crimes carry jail terms or fines under Bulgaria’s Penal Code. Imam Ahmed Musa Ahmed is appealing an earlier four-year jail sentence he had been issued for propagating radical Islam ideology. Source      |
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Posted: 28 Nov 2014 01:29 PM PST
 On Tuesday the Turkish court ruled that the ban was issued to “prevent damage to the individual rights” of the former ministers. A commission has been set up by Turkey’s parliament to investigate allegations against the former interior, environment, economy and EU ministers back in May. The parliamentary commission’s first meeting was held in July and is due to conclude its work by December 27. All four ministers have denied the accusations. Turkey’s Supreme Board of Radio and Television says if media outlets violate the inquiry converge ban, they may face penalties. The former parliament members were implicated in the corruption scandal late last year. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who was prime minister at the time of the scandal, said the allegations were a plot to depose him. Turkey’s Journalists’ Association has labeled the ban as censorship. At the beginning of the month Turkey applied fresh bans on media outlets deemed to have critical views of the government’s policies. The Turkish Foreign Ministry reportedly stopped sending statements and phone text messages to various media outlets such as Today’s Zaman and Zaman daily newspapers. Source      |
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Posted: 28 Nov 2014 01:16 PM PST
 “Today a squadron of warships and support vessels of the Northern Fleet headed by a large anti-submarine ship, the Severomorsk, crossed the narrowest part of the English Channel and passed into the Bay of the Seine,” said Russia’s defense ministry. The crews held a series of survival exercises in case of flooding or fire, as well as anti-submarine training. After the training, in one of the world’s most crowded waterways, where the squadron was constantly shadowed by the British Navy’s HMS Tyne offshore patrol vessel, the task force went further and anchored in the international waters of the Seine Bay to wait out a storm.  “They are not holding exercises. They’re just waiting in a zone where they are allowed to be several times a year,” the French Navy’s information service said as cited by Reuters. “Our information indicates that the ships are transiting and have been delayed by weather conditions. They are not exercising in the Channel, as some Russian headlines would have us believe,” said NATO’s military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Jay Janzen. Russia’s Navy reported that the crews are not going to sit out the storm in an idle manner. Instead, the crews will train in repelling underwater warfare attacks and practice radio-electronic warfare.  While sailing in high latitudes, Russian sailors trained by providing assistance to a vessel in distress. They also did electronic communication training and cargo transfers from ship to ship. When NATO patrol aircrafts approached the task force in North Sea waters, air raid alerts were sounded and crews trained air defense maneuvers. Combat duty assignments of the large anti-submarine ship, the Severomorsk, specifically practiced the detection and elimination of waterborne targets.  The task group left its homeport of Severomorsk above the Arctic Circle on November 20 and has already covered 1,700 nautical miles, crossing successively the Barents Sea, the Norwegian Sea and the North Sea before entering the Strait of Dover. Northern Fleet warships will steam for the Gulf of Aden to protect vessels there from Somalia pirate attacks. Source     |
