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Friday, November 8, 2019

The Deep State And The NSC

Phil Giraldi, a former CIA officer, has a nice piece up at Zerohedge this morning. Giraldi is no fan of Donald Trump but is disturbed at what's going on in the National Security Council. He sees Alexander Vindman--probably the actual originator of the "whistleblower" hoax--as a window into that world, and its distortion of American interests. I offer some excerpts. The entire article can be read here: Deep State On The National Security Council: Colonel Vindman Is An "Expert" With An Agenda.

The current frenzy to impeach President Donald Trump sometimes in its haste reveals that which could easily be hidden about the operation of the Deep State inside the federal government. ... 
The prepared opening statement by Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, described as the top Ukraine expert on the National Security Council (NSC), provides some insights into how decision making at the NSC actually works. ... 
Vindman, Ukrainian both by birth and culturally, clearly was a major player in articulating and managing US policy towards that country, but that is not really what his role on the NSC should have been. As more than likely the US government’s sole genuine Ukrainian expert, he should have become a source of viable options that the United States might exercise vis-à-vis its relationship with Ukraine, and, by extension, regarding Moscow’s involvement with Kiev. But that is not how his statement, which advocates for a specific policy, reads. Rather than providing expert advice, Vindman was concerned chiefly because arming Ukraine was not proceeding quickly enough to suit him, an extremely risky policy which has already created serious problems with a much more important Russia. 
Vindman apparently sees Ukraine-Russia through the established optic provided by the Deep State, which considers global conflict as the price to pay for maintaining its largesse from the US taxpayer. Continuous warfare is its only business product, which explains in part its dislike of Donald Trump ... “”When I joined the NSC in July 2018, I began implementing the administration’s policy on Ukraine. In the Spring of 2019, I became aware of outside influencers promoting a false narrative of Ukraine inconsistent with the consensus views of the interagency. This narrative was harmful to US government policy. While my interagency colleagues and I were becoming increasingly optimistic on Ukraine’s prospects, this alternative narrative undermined US government efforts to expand cooperation with Ukraine.” 

Translation: A narrative that is "inconsistent with the consensus views of the interagency" is ipso facto a "false narrative" and "harmful to US government policy." Nota Bene: Not necessarily harmful to the United States, but harmful to the "consensus views of the interagency" which constitute, according to Vindman, the only legitimate source for "US government policy."

Alexander Vindman clearly was pushing a policy that might be described as that of the Deep State rather than responding to his own chain of command where it is the president who does the decision making. He also needs a history lesson about what has gone on in his country of birth. President Barack Obama conspired with his own version of Macbeth’s three witches – Rice, Power and Jarett – to overthrow the legitimate government of Ukraine in 2014 because it was considered to be too close to Moscow. ... Since that time, Ukraine has had a succession of increasingly corrupt puppet governments propped up by billions in foreign aid. It is now per capita the poorest country in Europe. 
Washington inside-the-beltway and the Deep State choose to blame the mess in Ukraine on Russian President Vladimir Putin and the established narrative also makes the absurd claim that the political situation in Kiev is somehow important to US national security. The preferred solution is to provide still more money, which feeds the corruption and enables the Ukrainians to attack the Russians. 
Colonel Vindman, who reported to noted hater of all things Russian Fiona Hill, who in turn reported to By Jingo We’ll Go To War John Bolton, was in the middle of all the schemes to bring down Russia. ..., the objective was to punish the Russians and prolong the conflict in Donbas for no reason at all that makes any sense. 
... 
The combined visions of Russia as an aggressive, expansionistic power coupled with the brave Ukrainians serving as a bastion of freedom is so absurd that it is hardly worth countering. Russia’s economy is about the size of Italy’s or Spain’s limiting its imperial ambitions, if they actually exist. Its alleged transgressions against Georgia and Ukraine were both provoked by the United States meddling in Eastern Europe, something that it had pledged not to do after the Soviet Union collapsed. Ukraine is less an important American ally than a welfare case, and no one knows that better than Vindman, but he is really speaking to his masters in the US Establishment when he repeats the conventional arguments. 
... The United States and Ukraine are and must remain strategic partners, working together to realize the shared vision of a stable, prosperous, and democratic Ukraine that is integrated into the Euro-Atlantic community.” 
Alexander Vindman does not say or write that the incorporation of Ukraine into NATO is his actual objective, but his comments about “integrating with the West” and the “Euro-Atlantic community” clearly imply just that. The expansion of NATO up to Russia’s borders by the rascally Bill Clinton constituted one of the truly most momentous lost foreign policy opportunities of the twentieth century. The addition of Ukraine and Georgia to the alliance would magnify that error as both are vital national security interests for Moscow given their history and geography. Vindman should be regarded as a manifestation of the Deep State thinking that has brought so much grief to the United States over the past twenty years. Seen in that light, his testimony, wrapped in an air of sanctimoniousness and a uniform, should be regarded as little more than the conventional thinking that has produced foreign policy failure after failure.

It's unfortunate that so much of the bipartisan legislative branch is captive to the Deep State and those in whose interest the Deep State operates. As sundance likes to say, there are trillions at stake. The result is that "US government policy" is formulated with little regard for real American interests. When a president comes along with different ideas, motivated by a desire to forward American interests that benefit the people who are footing the bills ... Well, we see the result.

28 comments:

  1. Motivation matters. George Soros views Ukraine as a failed state that is ripe for economic looting. He purchased the Obama Administration as his mechanism for that heist and they dutifully instigated the coup that allowed Soros to place his stooges in power. Then Congress approved billions in foreign aid, which was promptly stolen providing some side income for Biden and other corrupt DC politicians. And they also used Ukraine as an armory for building a rebel army in Syria. And if you think these folks are harmless, just note that in the space of a few years they have converted the Democrats into the party of warmongering. Such is the power of memetic indoctrination. There really is no end to the extent of criminality spawned by Obama and his minions.

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    1. Absolutely. Soros' fingerprints are all over this. But neither the Left Globalists nor the Neocons care. Who's looking out for America? If anyone is, they become a target.

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    2. "just note that, in the space of a FEW years, they have converted the Democrats into the party of warmongering...."

      Moreover, it quite looks like Obama reignited the culture wars through Trayvon Martin, in order to dissipate energy from Occupy, and to re-direct Leftist energies away from the finance industry, and into race conflicts.
      W/o Obama's W.H. power, Soros etc. would likely have had to tread much more carefully.

      "There really is no end to the extent of criminality".
      Yeah, black-letter criminality, but also stupendous malevolence/ degeneracy.
      This all really is One for the Ages.

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    3. And, this degeneracy built on previous Orgies of Malgovernance, from Reagan's amnesty for Illegals in '86, thru Clinton/ Reno in Waco, and Dubya in Iraq and on Wall St. bailouts.
      No wonder Obama figured, that the MSM etc. would let him crap into our mouths at will.
      I was relieved that Trump beat HRC, but I didn't imagine how great a bullet this miracle helped us dodge.

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    4. "I was relieved that Trump beat HRC, but I didn't imagine how great a bullet this miracle helped us dodge."

      I think that's exactly it for many people. They knew it could be bad, but the extent of the outright criminality is pretty amazing. I really don't think anyone expect that. Dirty fundraising, BS rhetoric--yes. Enlisting foreign intel services, suborning our own IC and DoJ--most didn't suspect it.

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    5. And, the ratcheting-up of race and gender hate, see e.g. M.E. Dyson, at
      https://www.NYtimes.com/2016/07/10/opinion/sunday/what-WHITE-america-FAILS-to-see.html , and S.D. Walters, at
      https://www.WashingtonPost.com/opinions/why-cant-we-HATE-men/2018/06/08/f1a3a8e0-6451-11e8-a69c-b944de66d9e7_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.0c2d3a64c7e8 .
      These, the Elite papers of the country!

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    6. That the NYT would've let Dyson puke out, hours or so after the BLM-type smoked 5 Dallas cops, lines like "whiteness is blindness”, and charge that "you, white America" are "shooting HATE inside our muscles", really got my attn.

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  2. Embellishing on Mark's musings, here's my conspiracy theory...

    Obama and Clinton did horrible things in the US, in Ukraine and around the world during the period 2009-2017. Things which were immoral and criminal and if known and prosecuted would destroy their reputations and land them in jail.

    These things were so horrible that they must remain covered up forever.

    Hillary Clinton's putrid personality is the manifestation of a human being deep into a criminal conspiracy to cover up crimes.

    Cover ups are always dangerous, but covering these things up forever was not so daunting when it was 'certain' Clinton would win the election.

    When it became apparent that Clinton might lose (email scandal, Sanders mischief, DNC hack) and then, when she did lose, a coverup became an overwhelming neccesity.

    Brennan, Clapper and Comey were enlisted, along with the rest of the now-all-too-familiar names. Everyone involved is too compromised to decline involvement.

    Impeachment is and always has been the main strategy since the conspirators could not be certain Trump would not expose them before his term of office ended. If they had any hopes about Trump playing ball these were erased in early 2017 when Trump accused Obama of wiretapping him. The gloves were dropped.

    Everything that is unfolding - everything - is part of the strategy to protect Obama and Clinton by impeaching -- and destroying Trump. The co-ordination comes from them and their advisors. I imagine the Lawfare group is in the middle of it.

    Schiff, Nadler, Pelosi...and Ciamarella, Vindman, Taylor...and dozens of others...are merely subordinates playing their assigned parts. They have to play...the stakes are too high.

    Because the stakes are so high, the players are playing their assigned parts ruthlessly. Destroying reputations and lives is fair game. Ask Devin Nunes and Jeff Sessions. Ask Michael Flynn and Carter Page. Ask Maria Butina and Svetlana Lokhova. Ask George Papadopoulos and Paul Manafort. Ask Roger Stone. Ask Donald Trump's family. Ask Julian Assange. Dare I mention (well, this is a conspiracy theory), ask Seth Rich.

    This game is for all the marbles. Clinton and Obama are at risk of losing everything. No one will stand down.

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    1. "Impeachment is and always has been the main strategy since the conspirators could not be certain Trump would not expose them before his term of office ended. If they had any hopes about Trump playing ball these were erased in early 2017 when Trump accused Obama of wiretapping him. The gloves were dropped."

      One of the reasons that I love Donald J Trump.

      "He fights."

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    2. I said above that "Obama and Clinton did horrible things in the US, in Ukraine and around the world during the period 2009-2017. Things which were immoral and criminal and if known and prosecuted would destroy their reputations and land them in jail".

      Of course, most of us were oblivious to the machinations of Obama, Clinton, et al (Biden) in Ukraine during the Obama years. I have surmised in my 'conspiracy theory' post (above) and elsewhere that these doings were deeply immoral and criminal.

      Along comes Israel Shamir who has interviewed Oleq Tsarev, a Ukrainian politician with personal knowledge of US political involvement in Ukraine.

      Here's a link to the interview: http://www.unz.com/ishamir/the-plundering-of-ukraine/

      I find Tsarev's narrative confusing and ambiguous, but the subject matter of the interview alone suggests enormous involvement by Americans in Ukraine matters with much money changing hands during the period in question.

      As I conclude in my 'conspiracy theory' post above, there is every good reason for Obama and Clinton to want to cover this up and every good reason to believe they would pursue impeachment if they thought it necessary to achieve their ends.

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    3. I guarantee you there's a lot of money involved here.

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  3. -->outside influencers promoting a false narrative of Ukraine inconsistent with the consensus views of the interagency. This narrative was harmful to US government policy<--

    I noticed this argument early on. It's a little chilling that there's so little pushback--forget that it exists at all.

    The Deep State runs the affairs of government, while politicians are just figureheads doing the bidding of the Deep State. It's the Comey, et al. argument that it's for "them" to decide who the "leaders" should be.

    Apparently, that the president (or anyone, for that matter) should question the interagency consensus is an impeachable offense.

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    1. As we're about to find out, right? "Abuse of power" apparently means having a different opinion that the "interagency consensus."

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  4. Mark:

    The rhetoric on this blog regarding the deep state has been steadily racheting up recently. I suggest we should all cool it just a bit, that we should all remember that deep staters are part human and should be treated as such.

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    1. Any examples of rhetoric on this blog suggesting that deep staters aren't part human and should be treated as non-human. Or are you just indulging in some well ratcheted rhetoric?

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    2. "The rhetoric on this blog regarding the deep state has been steadily racheting up recently."

      I, for one, would love to see some counter evidence that Comey, Clapper and Brennan, and Mueller and Schiff (and dozens of collaborators) in fact acted legally, decently and appropriately in the matters of the Clinton email server, the predication and prosecution of Crossfire Hurricane and the Mueller investigation, and now the Ukrainian allegations.

      Unfortunately the evidence is tending to show deeper and deeper wrongful involement of these 'deep staters' in these matters. It is quite understandable that commenters on this blog would ratchet up the rhetoric since we are seeing an increasingly compelling case that the national police and security powers of the federal government were marshalled in an attempt to destroy the opposition candidate and then the duly elected President of the United States.

      Its an outrage.

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  5. Sundance at CTH is now positing that the Deep State is attempting to blackmail Trump (and by extension, Barr/Durham) into censoring or killing off the OIG report or they will not permit the re-authorization of the Patriot Act later this year. Barr is known to be heavily invested in the capabilities that this legislation affords the various IC departments and may be vulnerable to this type of blackmail.

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    1. I read that earlier--in fact I bookmarked it for future reference.

      Off the top of my head, I'm not sure that "blackmail" is the right word. In my initial skim of the article/blog I took it to mean that this delay was by agreement of all parties--Barr and the IC.

      Yes, I agree re Barr. He's very pro executive, and that includes the IC and Fed LE generally. I rarely criticize him, but I do have differences. Barr's known views are another reason why I don't think this is "blackmail" but rather a consensus. Whether this is a straight reauthorization or whether any safeguards--safeguards worth more than the paper they're printed on--were added isn't clear. Barr did speak critically of "spying," so presumably he (with his strong intel background) is well aware of and disapproves of the abuses. I wouldn't expect him to compromise on a principle, but don't know whether we have the whole story yet.

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    2. Let me expand a bit more. The issues involved are very complex. I think we know that Barr is determined to turn the IC inside out to get to the bottom of the IC's weaponization against the Constitution and We The People. That's all to the good. I don't know his views on FISA type surveillance generally, or whether abuse can be prevented by strict enforcement of regs. Again, it's complicated. I do regard his views on war powers and some other areas as perhaps simplistic. All complicated issues--there's that word again. We'll just have to see how this works out. sundance can be alarmist and simply wrong on these things.

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    3. So, Mark, do you doubt sundance's take on this re-authorization stuff, as related to a bid to censor or kill off the OIG report?

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    4. If what he's suggesting is that this is an attempt to pull the plug on the FISA report in any substantial way then, yes, I do doubt that. I trust Barr enough that I can't seem him allowing that. However, if the question is, Could there be a deal to hold it up until the law is reauthorized (in Dec at the latest--could be tomorrow), that might be possible.

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  6. An essential element of Trump's situation is that any effort to improve US-Russia relations has been treated as proof that he colluded with Vladimir Putin to meddle in the 2016 election.

    That is why President Obama evicted the Russian diplomats at the end of December 2015 and issued his preposterous intelligence assessment at the beginning of January 2016.

    The situation was concocted in order to "prove" that Trump had colluded with Putin. That situation continued to the present day.

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    1. I agree, Mike. And to that extent the Deep State has been successful in handcuffing Trump to an uncomfortable extent.

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  7. I'll bet that "evicted the Russian diplomats at the end of December 2015 and issued his preposterous intelligence assessment at the beginning of January 2016" meant the dates to be, respectively, Dec. 2016, and Jan. 2017.

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  8. meant the dates to be, respectively, Dec. 2016, and Jan. 2017.

    Thanks for that correction.

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  9. Reading this entry, I clearly see the wisdom in the unitary executive theory. We the People elected Donald Trump and he is carrying out what he promised to do.

    If We the People don't like his changes, we can vote in a new president with a different vision. Vindman is not mentioned in the Constitution. Pay he must, as Yoda might say.

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