from Breitbart:
(AFP) — The US military has removed some equipment from Syria, a defense official confirmed Thursday, following a report that the pullout ordered by President Donald Trump is now underway.<
“I can confirm the movement of equipment from Syria,” the official told AFP. “For security reasons, I am not going to provide further details at this time.”
by Alex Christoforou, The Duran:
RT CrossTalk host Peter Lavelle and The Duran’s Alex Christoforou take a quick look at ‘The Thucydides Trap’, which posits that when one great power threatens to displace another, war is almost always the result…and why the United States and China are staring at three options going forward in a multi-polar world order.
by Glenn Greenwald, The Intercept:
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP’S December 18 announcement that he intends to withdraw all U.S. troops from Syria produced some isolated support in the anti-war wings of both parties, but largely provoked bipartisan outrage among in Washington’s reflexively pro-war establishment.
Both GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of the country’s most reliable war supporters, and Hillary Clinton, who repeatedly criticized former President Barack Obama for insufficient hawkishness, condemned Trump’s decision in very similar terms, invoking standard war on terror jargon.
from Russia Insider:
The U.S. military is finally withdrawing (or not) from its base at al-Tanf. You know, the place that the Syrian government long claimed was a training ground for Islamic State (ISIS) fighters; the land corridor just inside Syria, near both the Iraqi and Jordanian borders, that Russia has called a terrorist hotbed (while floating the idea of jointly administering it with the United States); the location of a camp where hundreds of U.S. Marines joined Special Operations forces last year; an outpost that U.S. officials claimed was the key not only to defeating ISIS, but also, according to General Joseph Votel, the commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East, to countering “the malign activities that Iran and their various proxies and surrogates would like to pursue.” You know, that al-Tanf.
by Dave Hodges, The Common Sense Show:
In August of 2018, the Pentagon released a report that was not covered in our corporate controlled media. Subsequently, I have learned that the Pentagon held a closed door briefing on the topic of the Chinese preparing to unleash a series of Pearl Harbor type of attacks against the United States.And as will be revealed later in the article, it led me to ask the right questions of deep cover sources regarding China and the commencement of World War III.
The readers may be wondering where I obtained this information? It certainly wasn’t from the MSM in America. The reports surfaced in places like New Zealand and France. And of course, as stated, I have deep cover sources revealing what the Deep State is actually up to.
from ZeroHedge:
China has activated its “ship killer” Dong Feng ballistic missiles after a US navy ship traveled within 12 nautical miles of the Parcel Islands “to challenge excessive maritime claims and preserve access to the waterways as governed by international law,” according to a US Pacific Fleet Spokesman.
In the 1990s, China laid claim to all of the Parcel Islands using a straight baseline around the entire archipelago, which it has labeled the Xisha Islands. The boundary is not recognized by international maritime law, while Vietnam and Taiwan have also laid claim to the islands.
by Caitlin Johnstone, Caitlin Johnstone:
On the first of April last year I published an article titled “Ignore The Words Of US Presidents. Watch Their Actions Instead.“, about Trump’s claim that his administration would be pulling troops out of Syria “very soon”. Watching the actions and ignoring the words is a personal policy I’ve found very useful in dealing with top government figures who understand that power has nothing to do with truth and everything to do with narrative control, and in that particular case the president’s claims were quickly memory holed after a highly suspicious chemical weapons allegation in Douma a few days later. The president’s words said the troops were leaving, and what actually happened was the US bombing the Syrian government for a second time in a year while troops remained where they were.
by Ron Paul, Ron Paul Institute:
I’m starting to wonder whether President Trump has any power over US foreign policy at all. Many people believe that the US president is just a figurehead, with actual foreign policy firmly in the hands of the deep state. Trump’s latest dramatic U-turn on pulling troops from Syria certainly feeds such theories.
When President Trump announced just a couple of weeks ago that the US was removing its troops from Syria and possibly reducing troops from Afghanistan, the neocons, the media, the military-industrial complex, and the left-wing “never-Trump” people were livid. They were silent when President Obama made the horrible decision to overthrow Assad in Syria and sent weapons to jihadists to do so. They never said a word when billions of dollars were committed to this immoral and dangerous “regime change” policy. They weren’t interested in the rule of law when President Obama thumbed his nose at Congress and sent troops into Syria.
by Caleb Maupin, New Eastern Outlook:
The line from James Mattis that seemed to stand out the most was “Because you have the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other subjects, I believe it is right for me to step down from my position.”
Mattis spent the prior paragraphs of his resignation letter describing the threats of terrorism, the importance of US military alliances, and the perceived danger of Russia and China. He then dropped the subtly worded bombshell sentence, indicating that Trump did not share these views which are considered to be the standard perspective of the global situation by US mainstream media.
by Robert Bridge, Strategic Culture:
As historians know, events of great significance are sometimes put into motion by some seemingly irrelevant occurrence. This week’s shot across the bow of the mainstream media by one of its erstwhile members probably won’t trigger a stampede for the exits, but it did provide for a timely wake-up call.
Although probably no more harmless than the fluttering of a butterfly’s wings deep inside the Amazon rainforest, news that veteran journalist William M. Arkin severed relations with NBC over its relentless pro-war, anti-Trump narrative was exactly the message the omnipotent media kings needed to hear as attacks on alternative (i.e. conservative) voices have reached totalitarian proportions.
by Geoffrey Grinder, Now The End Begins:
In a promotional video published on the website of state arms manufacturer Norinco, the deadly bomb was airdropped by a H-6K strategic bomber onto a plain, producing a gigantic ball of fire and black smoke. The video, released at the end of December, marked the first public display of the country’s most powerful non-nuclear bomb, according to state-run newspaper Global Times.
China has developed and tested a new aerial bomb, dubbed the country’s answer to the ‘Mother of All Bombs’ built by the United States. Military experts said the Chinese bomb could eliminate fortified ground targets
from Global Times:
The Guard of Honor of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army marches in Tiananmen Square. The flag-raising ceremony on the morning of the first day of 2019 at the square in downtown Beijing attracted more than 100,000 people from across the country. Photo: IC
Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday demands the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to strengthen its crisis awareness and enhance battle-related activity as the country faces increasing challenges.
“The world is facing a period of major changes never seen in a century, and China is still in an important period of strategic opportunity for development,” Xi said at a meeting of Central Military Commission (CMC) on Friday, warning that various risks and challenges were on the rise.
from Press TV:
Russia’s Defense Ministry says tens of thousands of foreign-sponsored Takfiri terrorists were killed during its military’s counter-terrorism airstrikes against militant redoubts in Syria last year.
The ministry, in a statement released on Thursday, announced that more than 23,000 militants were eliminated over the course of the offensives.
A total of 159 battle tanks, 57 armored vehicles, more than 900 cannons and nearly 3,000 pickup trucks with machine guns mounted on them were destroyed as well.
