Friday 26th of April 2024

recruiting fodder...

fodderfodder

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this special episode of “Working People,” we talk with three veterans about how the military and the class system (in the U.S. and around the world) go hand in hand.

 

How does the military market itself to the poor and marginalized (and why is that marketing so effective)? How does our broken economy ensure a constant stream of recruits who will be sent to fight endless imperialist wars just so they can pay for college or finally be accepted as a worthy citizen? What happens to these recruits when they’re serving and when (or if) they leave? Why is it that so many features of military life and America’s self-perpetuating war machine translate to an accepted status quo in which women, LGBTQ folks, and non-white recruits are subjected to vicious harassment, violent assault, or worse?

 

In this important conversation, we’re joined by Triste Ordex, Marine Corps vet and national organizer for Vets for the People; Amber Mathwig, a former 10-year Navy Master-at-Arms and organizer with About Face: Veterans Against the War; and Clarke, a Navy veteran, organizer with the Democratic Socialists of America, and commercial diver.

 

See more:

https://therealnews.com/woke-washing-the-us-military-meat-grinder

 

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news corp hates china...

 

Is News Corp back onto weapons of mass destruction?

 

By Dr Alison Broinowski AM. She is Vice-President of Australians for War Powers Reform. She joined the Australian Foreign Service in 1963, lived in Japan for a total of six years, and for shorter periods in Burma, Iran, the Philippines, Jordan, South Korea, the United States of America and Mexico, working alternately as an author and Australian diplomat.

Since leaving the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, she has received a PhD in Asian Studies from ANU, and has continued to lecture, write, and broadcast in Australia and abroad on Asian affairs and cultural and political issues.

 

 

Australians born in the last century remember how the ‘war on terror’ began in 2001. The same con trick is being tried on us again, for war with China.

It has taken a little over a month for Australia’s leaders to succeed in distracting us from the alleged past misdeeds of Ministers and SAS service people, with the time-honoured trick of finding something worse. Instead of remaining a health problem, COVID-19 has become, or been made into, a national security and economic problem.

Providence dropped the pandemic in the lap of the war-hungry among us. Instead of joining the world’s countries in a common effort to investigate and contain it, Australia obliged our US ally by politicising the WHO inquiry, provoking damaging retaliation from China. Already it is enabling American exporters to snap up our market share. Having proved what useful idiots we are, Australians are now being set up to return the Government at the next election for its handling of the virus.

How are we being set up? By News Corp, whose journalist Sharri Markson has been off writing a book, What Really Happened in Wuhan, about China’s plans for ‘virus warfare’. It appears in October, and reveals the results of a US State Department investigation into the origins of COVID-19, citing Chinese military scientists and public health officials who in 2015 identified SARS coronaviruses as new ‘genetic weapons’. Originating in animals, they could be manipulated in the laboratory into a virus that would spread among humans. Markson quotes a former US Air Force Colonel, asserting that WWIII ‘will certainly be a biological war’.

If these deadly pathogens are warehoused in China ready for WWIII, the implication is, Australians should be very afraid, and do whatever it takes to ward off this existential danger, including forcefully pushing back against China for having them. It sounds just like WMD all over again.

And it is, but not because China doesn’t have ‘Gain of Function’ (GOF) coronaviruses in its laboratories, theoretically for research on antigens against them: this is known. But because Americans have been collaborating with them for years, and working on Gain of Function viruses themselves, using the same research excuse to get around the Biological Weapons Convention.

Experiments with dangerous pathogens, even in high-security laboratories, cause dozens of accidents a year, including in the United States, in the UK, and in Australia. From 2013, when the Obama administration banned GOF research, millions of dollars were sent to support the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which also worked with the University of North Carolina and the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) at Fort Detrick in Maryland. Its research collaboration with the US began in the 1980s, and headed by Dr Antony Fauci, included work on GOF viruses with bat expert Dr Shi Zhengli.

The Fort Detrick facility was shut down from mid-July2019 by the Centres for Disease Control (CDC), which cited inventory deficiencies and breaches of biosafety protocols. The commanding officer was sacked, a local newspaper, The Frederick News-Post, reported. In October,success in developing a chimaeric coronavirus, a potential biological weapon, was announced by Johns Hopkins University.

In November 2019, when Fort Detrick was partially reopened, ABC (US) quoted the National Center for Medical Intelligence stating that intercepts and satellite imagery showed a new virulent contagion spreading in Wuhan. Analysts briefed the Pentagon and the White House that ‘it could be a cataclysmic event’. Chinese doctors didn’t observe the new contagion until 26 December 2019. China identified it to WHO as a coronavirus on 30 December. COVID-19 (SARS-Cov-2) was named on 8 January 2020. The American Centers for Disease Control called their Chinese counterparts on 3 January and afterwards, offering cooperation, which was declined.

‘Crimson Contagion’ was a series of simulations which anticipated aspects of COVID19, staged from May to August 2019 by the US Center for Health Security. The fourth one, ‘Event 201’, gaming a coronavirus epidemic in the US, included Chinese and Australian participants. It was run in New York on the day the World Military Games began in Wuhan, 18 October 2019. Uncharacteristically, the 300-strong American team won few medals, but their hotel recorded some 40 cases of the virus among employees and guests. The Chinese Foreign Minister accused US service people of introducing it to Wuhan, while Trump claimed China had deliberately let it spread.

Among competing narratives about the origin of the pandemic, one, originally discounted, suggested escape of a Gain of Function virus from the Wuhan Institute of Virology and its transmission to humans. In 2020 Dr Shi and Dr Fauci repeatedly denied that COVID-19 came from WIV, as did 27 scientists writing to the Lancet on 18 February, defending its origins in nature. But Trump and Pompeo claimed they knew that it did, and WIV’s funding was abruptly suspended by the National Institutes of Health in late April.

US Intelligence agencies deduced that mobile phone silence at the WIV from 7 to 24 October 2019 indicated a ‘hazardous event’, but they didn’t mention the simultaneous shut-down of Fort Detrick. In late 2020 NSA Director Robert O’Brien alleged that Chinese had ‘repurposed [the virus] into a bioweapon’ for geopolitical advantage, which sounded like a reference to America’s own GOF operations. In January 2021, his deputy, Matthew Pottinger, cited US intelligence showing that the pathogen escaped through a ‘leak or an accident’ from WIV. In March, the WHO’s Director-General admitted that the team had not thoroughly investigated a possible leak from a Wuhan laboratory.

The remaining possibility, a ‘leak or accident’ involving a GOF virus from Fort Detrick, is not being considered.

A resolution of these conflicting explanations of COVID-19 is unlikely to be found soon, if ever, no matter how independent are those who inquire into it. The consequences, which include mutations and further pandemics, are potentially disastrous. Worse is war. Before Australians are led into an unwinnable conflict with China, we should remember the false premises on which we fought other wars.

 

Read more:

https://johnmenadue.com/back-to-weapons-of-mass-destruction/

 

Since News Corp was not allowed to "trade" in China, despite our Mr Murdoch marrying a Chinese woman (don't be cynical, you bastard out there), News Corp has been gunning to defeat China. Any mean will do... Virus, Taiwan, war, etc...

 

 

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expendable recruits...

Cannon fodder is an informal, derogatory term for combatants who are regarded or treated by government or military command as expendable in the face of enemy fire. The term is generally used in situations where combatants are forced to deliberately fight against hopeless odds (with the foreknowledge that they will suffer extremely high casualties) in an effort to achieve a strategic goal; an example is the trench warfare of World War I. The term may also be used (somewhat pejoratively) to differentiate infantry from other forces (such as artillery troops, air force or the navy), or to distinguish expendable low-grade or inexperienced combatants from more militarily valuable veterans.

The term derives from fodder, as food for livestock. Soldiers are the metaphorical food for enemy cannon fire.

 

Read more:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannon_fodder

 

 

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war shocked...

 

 

by A L Jones

 

“When I put my hand up [with PTSD], I was basically told to ‘f’ off. The second time I did it, I was told I was lying. . . . It does stall your career, if not halt it completely, you’re less of a person—especially for the guys you’re less of a man for owning up to having issues”. A former Australian soldier. 

 

 

It’s just as well Scotty’s not in the military. Because he wouldn’t be. Like the insurance company policy of not responding until receipt of the claimant’s seventh letter (why seven?), Scotty could no more do what he’s asked than he could go solar.

Regardless, on receipt of the seventh letter, Scotty reluctantly launched a royal commission into Defence and veteran suicide. What circumstances led to the commission? Of myriad problems, the most troubling is this: Compared to their compatriots, medically discharged men veterans are at a much higher risk of self-harm.

You’d say, given existing medical diagnoses, that’s unsurprising. But nearly three times at risk of suicide? Yes, on average, during the period 2002 to 2018. The figures for voluntary veterans, on the other hand, mirror those of Australian men overall (female veteran suicides are few).

Why the higher risk of suicide among medically discharged vets? The reasons are hidden in plain sight, as are the solutions. That does not mean the solutions will fly – far from it.

First, some background. How high is the number of suicides among male veterans? Easily answered? For our government, apparently not. The sector, say some analysts, “is flying blind”. The current government figure is 419 in the period 2001-17. Veteran Scott Harris begs to differ; he has counted 731 for the same period. What is clear is that more Australian veterans have lost their lives by suicide than have been killed on active duty since 2001.

Trauma forms a common backdrop for suicide. ‘Shell shock’, that invisible injury much maligned during WW1 (Malingerers! Cowards!), is now understood as a psychological response to intensely traumatic events. Post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, as it is now known, affects roughly five per cent of the general population, the most common cause being motor vehicle accidents.

PTSD may affect up to 20 per cent of military veterans (depending on circumstances). Sufferers may find themselves reliving, over and over, the feelings aroused by the original trauma, often relating to direct-combat or dangerous-war-zone experiences.

Researchers enquiring into the causes of veteran suicide – among them, veteran Ben Wadham and analyst Deborah Morris – point to several contributing factors. Alarmingly, some of the most egregious are systemic to the ADF itself. Not to pick on the ADF of course (it is, after all, holding the gun). No, all military institutions – given five millennia under patriarchy – shine bright with every prejudiced ‘ism’ under the sun.

Clearly, myriad circumstances contribute, directly and indirectly, to suicidality among veterans – trauma, poor health, lack of support, and so forth. But here I’m pointing to inherent structural factors. Wadham and Morris say the very structure of the ADF encourages “abuse, bullying, harassment and denigration of military personnel”. Moreover, the institution itself gets in the way of veterans accessing financial, mental and physical support.

To really understand the problem, its solutions, and, crucially, why leaders have danced around veteran suicide – ‘war is hell, after all’ – we must dig deeper. To come clean here, I am not a scholar of military affairs. I study the psychology of gender and abuse, and what follows is my best guess as a psychologist.

Arguably, when soldiers are exposed to traumatic events, something else sinks the boot into them while they’re still down, namely, two of the most dangerous lies ever invented. The first? If a man is not a winner, he must be a loser. Second, if he’s not a man’s man, then — shame upon shame — he must somehow… maybe unconsciously… be feminine. If a man is not beating back demons — including his own — then he’s as weak as the proverbial.

A man who is shamed, say the old myths, has forfeited his masculinity… and to lose his masculinity is to be feminised… and to be feminised is to become as worthless as women are under patriarchy. Not worth living. Under such circumstances, who wouldn’t kill to retrieve one’s honour, one’s life? The fear of being feminine is known as ‘femiphobia’. As an aside, as regards so-called honour killings, for example, the question is not why some men kill women; it is why most men – enculturated as they are into this brutal system – do not.

‘Am not!’ yells the toddler—his eyes filling—to the big boys on the see-saw. ‘Am not, am not, am NOT!’ And his little body is wracked with sobs as he turns toward his mother. Australian playground.

Where does femiphobia come from? The little boy’s fear of being feminine starts as soon as he is introduced to older male peers (typically earlier). For the rest of his life, that peer group will police his gender behaviour and attitudes. A single pheromone of so-called femininity – even if only imagined – and all hell breaks loose.

Of course, male peers are not the only gender police:

“I divorce my son!”, she said. “I go there and he has an apron on and he’s doing the dishes! I didn’t bring up my son to do this! He’s a woman! I divorce him!” – Greek-Australian woman. “There is a feminist march to purge our institutions of masculinity, from the military to universities” – Miranda Devine. “The ‘diversity’ revolution that Lieutenant General David Morrison inflicted on the Australian Army now threatens to diminish our war fighting capability” – Miranda Devine.

These absolutist, black-or-white, all-or-nothing beliefs are demonstrably untrue. But that is of no consequence in the face of five millennia of patriarchal rule. Not just women and children, but young men too, have reason to fear the old men – the gender police – of the tribe.

The lies about honour and shame, that a shamed man, for example, has lost all value, are so ingrained, so naturalised as to have become part of our psychological DNA. And nothing short of consciousness-raising can help us break free. And that would be right up the military’s alley – challenging its own ideas about what it takes to be a man.

We tend to not share our feelings and thoughts as we feel it appears un-masculine and because we fear being ridiculed by our peers and society. Unfortunately, men are portrayed . . . as powerful, solitary and confident heroes. 18-year-old ‘Taylor.’

Traditional ideals of masculinity, as described by ‘Taylor’ above, are increasingly seen by researchers as injurious, both to men and to those around them. Just as debilitating is the open or camouflaged abuse suffered by many boys as they are growing up. What better way of showing a boy he must be tough than by attacking him? And so it goes.

Abuse is endemic to patriarchal systems. And it starts early. On average, eight out of every ten American boys report having been sexually abused. Boys aged ten or eleven made up nearly 90 per cent of victims of church-worker abuse in one Australian state.

In the US, military victims of sexual abuse, more so than civilian victims, suffer more serious long-term effects, including PTSD, anxiety, dissociative, and personality disorders, substance abuse, and double the rates of self-harm and suicide attempts.

Abused boys and men often blame themselves for being attacked, just as they might blame women as ‘asking for’ sexual assault. Following the same logic, the boys see their own unconscious ‘femininity’ as responsible – after all, why would a man assault me unless something about me attracted him?

Could the way that many military men think about masculinity be a factor, along with PTSD, in provoking suicidal feelings

We are born into our culture as fish are into water. Though permeated by it, we cannot see it. Just as fish do not ask, ‘Where is the sea?’, we do not ask, ‘Where is this system you speak of? This is just the way things are’.

Look, really look, at this system. It rests on the toxic notion that the female is a ‘mutilated male’(Aristotle) or is simply naturally inferior (Freud). The lie has run deep in warrior’s veins for at least five millennia. The system says weakness equals feminine. Hence, whenever men experience trauma or PTSD, they are at risk of interpreting their natural human responses – fear, horror, disgust, helplessness, rage, and so forth – as weakness.

By the above logic, a medical discharge signifies weakness, and the man may see himself as having been intolerably feminised by his physical or mental injury. The shame may lead him to attack what he perceives to be the feminine in himself (self-harm or suicide) or, for example, in his partner. Aman in this situation is at risk of tearing into himself and/or those closest to him.

Returning to the question of solutions, why are our leaders unlikely to action the recommendations of veterans and analysts? Men who begin to question their own enculturation as men will inevitably question the culture itself. Our military leaders fear that ditching its honour-and-shame mentality – which is central to its traditional functioning – will eventually bring the entire edifice crashing down.

As with Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick’s past inquiry into the ADF’s treatment of women, the fear is palpable. Said soldier-turned-MP, Phillip Thompson, recently: The ADF has ‘gone a little bit woke over the past few years’.

Blame former Chief of Army Morrison, I say. More generous souls said he’d been woke, that is, he had his consciousness about sexism raised. Morrison’s enemies said he’d been feminised by his fireside chats over tea and scones with Liz ‘Medusa’ Broderick.

Murdoch journo Miranda Devine said Morrison had been… no, not Rogered, but rather, ‘Brodericked’. And, said Devine, ‘next to be “Brodericked” was the AFP’: ‘Take a male institution, add a sexism scandal, and call Broderick & Co to the rescue’.

MP Thompson’s ‘little bit woke’ worry is standard-issue brotherhood anxiety about what civil society can do to military men. Civil society, says Wadham, is “the military’s feminine”. So, wouldn’t delving into the femiphobic core of the matter radically destabilise the institution itself?

What institution of masculine honour wants to confront its own fear of being weakened, feminised and thereby made worthless in the eyes of men? A psychologist would say, ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway. Plenty have, and they’ve lived to fight another day. How else will we mature as a species?’Perhaps the military will make an appointment.

And, as a nation, could we move away from imperialist aggression and the coalitions of the killing to adopt the perfectly honourable defensive position that many nations do? Would these solutions satisfy those of imperialist bent – the old femiphobic men of the tribe? Would Scotty go solar?

 

 

 

Read more:

https://johnmenadue.com/veteran-suicide-secret-mens-business/

 

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no morning tea in the trenches...

The military has been ordered to stop holding morning teas which celebrate diversity and inclusion, as Defence chiefs remind personnel their "primary mission" is to protect Australia.

Key points:
  • A directive sent out today said changing language protocols and morning teas was "not required"
  • It said nothing should distract from Defence's mission to protect Australia's national security interest
  • The message came just days after Defence celebrated its LGBTI members at morning teas

In a directive issued on Friday, the Defence Chief and Defence Secretary told ADF members that "Defence represents the people of Australia" and that it "must at all times be focused on our primary mission to protect Australia's national security interests".

"We must not be putting effort into matters that distract from this," General Angus Campbell and Defence Secretary Greg Moriarty wrote.

"To meet these important aims, changing language protocols and those events such as morning teas where personnel are encouraged to wear particular clothes in celebration are not required and should cease."

The order is in stark contrast to a message issued to ADF members earlier this month, encouraging them to support their LGBTI colleagues on International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, Interphobia and Transphobia (IDAHOBIT) on May 17.

 

Read more:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-21/defence-chief-angus-campbell-political-correctness-morning-teas/100156436

 

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joe is deranged...

In the middle of a speech to military personnel Friday in Hampton, Virginia, President Joe Biden said, looking towards the family who was being honored, “I love those barrettes in your hair … She looks like she’s 19-years-old”… with her legs crossed."

In the speech, Biden said, “I’m honored to be joined today by Governor Northam and by two great representatives of the Commonwealth: Congresswoman Luria and Congressman Scott.”

 

The president continued to say “thank you” to those who “represent these service veterans” in the Commonwealth.

Biden went on to say he was “especially honored to share the stage with Brittney,” whose husband, Major Nathan Bean, is currently deployed.

Biden continuing to talk, looking towards Brittney and the rest of her children, whom he named but not clearly, to say, “I love those barrettes in your hair, man.” This must have been in reference to the daughter, Margaret Katherine.

Then the president added, “I tell you what — and look at her; she looks like she’s 19-years-old, sitting there with her — like a little lady with her legs crossed.”

He then noted Brittney is on “triple duty” since she’s “a veteran, a military spouse, and a teacher.”

 

Read more:

 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/05/28/watch-joe-biden-to-veterans-daughter-i-love-those-barrettes-in-your-hair-looks-like-shes-19-years-old/

 

see also:

https://saraacarter.com/watch-biden-makes-creepy-remark-to-young-girl/

 

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Joe is deranged... OH — AND NOT A PEEP FROM THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA...

 

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a racket...

 

By Caitlin Johnstone, an independent journalist based in Melbourne, Australia. Her website is here and you can follow her on Twitter @caitoz

 

Vice President Kamala Harris spent the weekend under fire from Republicans, which of course means that Kamala Harris spent the weekend being criticized for the most silly, vapid reason you could possibly criticize her for. 

Apparently the likely future president tweeted “Enjoy the long weekend,” a reference to the Memorial Day holiday on Monday, instead of gushing about fallen troops and sacrifice.

That’s it, that’s the whole entire story. That silly, irrelevant offense by one of the sleaziest people in the single most corrupt and murderous government on earth is the whole entire basis for histrionic headlines from conservative media outlets like this Harris, the born politician, was quick to course correct.

“Throughout our history our service men and women have risked everything to defend our freedoms and our country,” the veep tweeted. “As we prepare to honor them on Memorial Day, we remember their service and their sacrifice.”

Which is of course complete bullshit. It has been generations since any member of the US military could be said to have served or sacrificed defending America or its freedoms, and that has been the case throughout almost the entirety of its history. If you are reading this it is statistically unlikely that you are of an age where any US military personnel died for any other reason than corporate profit and global domination, and if you are it’s almost certain you weren’t old enough to have had mature thoughts about it at the time.

Whenever you criticize the US war machine online within earshot of anyone who’s sufficiently propagandized, you will invariably be lectured about the second World War and how we’d all be speaking German or Japanese without the brave men who died for our freedom. This makes my point for me: the fact that apologists for US imperialism always need to reach all the way back through history to the cusp of living memory to find even one single example of the American military being used for purposes that weren’t evil proves that it most certainly is evil.

But this is one of the main reasons there are so very many movies and history documentaries made about World War Two: it’s an opportunity to portray US servicemen bravely fighting and dying for a noble cause without having to bend the truth beyond recognition. The other major reason is that focusing on the second World War allows members of the US empire to escape into a time when the Big Bad Guy on the world stage was someone else.

From the end of World War Two to the fall of the USSR, the US military was used to smash the spread of communism and secure geostrategic interests toward the ultimate end of engineering the collapse of the Soviet Union. After this was accomplished in 1991, US foreign policy officially shifted to preserving a unipolar world order by preventing the rise of any other superpower which could rival its might.

A 1992 article by The New York Times titled  “U.S. Strategy Plan Calls For Insuring No Rivals Develop“, reporting on a leaked document which describes a policy known as the Wolfowitz Doctrine after then-Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Paul Wolfowitz, reads as follows:

 

In a broad new policy statement that is in its final drafting stage, the Defense Department asserts that America’s political and military mission in the post-cold-war era will be to insure that no rival superpower is allowed to emerge in Western Europe, Asia or the territory of the former Soviet Union.

A 46-page document that has been circulating at the highest levels of the Pentagon for weeks, and which Defense Secretary Dick Cheney expects to release later this month, states that part of the American mission will be “convincing potential competitors that they need not aspire to a greater role or pursue a more aggressive posture to protect their legitimate interests.”

 

The classified document makes the case for a world dominated by one superpower whose position can be perpetuated by constructive behavior and sufficient military might to deter any nation or group of nations from challenging American primacy.

This is all US troops have been fighting and dying for since the Berlin Wall came down. Not “freedom”, not “democracy”, and certainly not the American people. Just continual uncontested domination of this planet at all cost: domination of its resources, its trade routes, its seas, its air, and its humans, no matter how many lives need to be risked and snuffed out in order to achieve it. The US has killed millions and displaced tens of millions just since the turn of this century in the reckless pursuit of that goal.

And, as Smedley Butler spelled out 86 years ago in his still-relevant book War is a Racket, US military personnel have been dying for profit. Nothing gets the gears of industry turning like war, and nothing better creates chaotic wild west environments of shock and confusion during which more wealth and power can be grabbed. War profiteers pour immense resources into lobbyingthink tanks and campaign donations to manipulate and bribe policy makers into making decisions which promote war and military expansionism, with astounding success. This is all entirely legal.

It’s important to spread awareness that this is all US troops have been dying for, because the fairy tale that they fight for freedom and for their countrymen is a major propaganda narrative used in military recruitment. While poverty plays a significant role in driving up enlistments as predatory recruiters target poor and middle class youth promising them a future in the nation with the worst income inequality in the industrialized world, the fact that the aggressively propagandized glorification of military “service” makes it a more esteemed career path than working at a restaurant or a grocery store means people are more likely to enlist.

Without all that propaganda deceiving people into believing that military work is something virtuous, military service would be the most shameful job anyone could possibly have; other stigmatized jobs like sex work would be regarded as far more noble. You’d be less reluctant to tell your extended family over Christmas that you’re a janitor at a seedy massage parlor than that you’ve enlisted in the US military, because instead of congratulating and praising you, your Uncle Murray would look at you and say, “So you’re gonna be killing kids for crude oil?”

And that’s exactly how it should be. Continuing to uphold the lie that US troops fight and die for a good cause is helping to ensure a steady supply of teenagers to feed into the gears of the imperial war machine. Stop feeding into the lie that the war machine is worth killing and being killed for. Not out of disrespect for the dead, but out of reverence for the living.

 

Read more:

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/525293-caitlin-johnstone-world-domination/

 

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fodder in the stars...

 

The Pentagon may not be sure if UFOs are aliens, but it certainly seems to believe in astrology. After shrugging off criticism of its new 'woke' ads, the US Army is doubling down with an Instagram story touting the zodiac.

 

“Wondering what your zodiac sign says about the kind of soldier you could be in the army? You'll just have to click through our Instagram story to find the answer because our lips are sealed over here," said the post, with subsequent slides listing the assignments that supposedly best matched the potential recruits’ horoscopes.

 

“I know you’re going for diversity but...” tweeted Defense One editor Kevin Baron, adding a link to a satirical article from The Onion.

 

Comments to Baron’s tweet ranged along the lines of “Please tell me this isnt real?” and “I wanted this to be fake so badly,” to “This is evidence that the terrorists have already won.”

It wasn’t any better on Instagram, either: “Not again.” “Please no.” “Please God no.” “This is sad.” “This is what the army has become. Glad I retired.” “Stop.”

 

Last month, the army was blasted over a series of animated recruitment ads dubbed 'The Calling', seeking to appeal to women and minorities in line with the Biden administration’s policy to promote “equity” in all things. 

A mashup of one of the ads – featuring a woman named Emma who grew up “with two moms” – with Russian and Chinese recruitment videos was retweeted by Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas) who criticized the American “emasculated military.” 

Cruz was then blasted by online Democrats for spreading “Russian propaganda.” That sentiment was echoed over the weekend by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who said such “talking points” could be “capitalized” on by US “adversaries” like China and Russia.

 

The military was doing a “great job of recruiting the right kinds of people,” Austin told CNN. 

“We represent the United States of America. We ought to look like America and not only in the ranks,” he added, “but our leadership should look like America.”

 

Read more:

https://www.rt.com/usa/525734-army-instagram-horoscope-astrology/

 

See also:

the yellow peril, again...

 

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a bit nazi...

Hedrick (2004) has recently brought to light an American appropriation of a highly distinctive Athenian religious ritual: the Oath of the Ephebes. In the later fourth century B.C. (and perhaps much earlier), eighteen-year old Athenian males who were being inducted into military service took a sacred oath. In the middle decades of the twentieth century, students at a number of American colleges and universities were made to chant the ephebic oath:

 

I will not disgrace my sacred arms

nor desert my comrade, wherever

I am stationed.

I will fight for things sacred

and things profane.

And both alone and with all to help me

I will transmit my fatherland not diminished

but greater and better than before.

I will obey

the ruling magistrates

who rule reasonably

and I will observe the established laws

and whatever laws in the future

may be reasonably established.

If any person seek to overturn the laws,

both alone and with all to help me,

I will oppose him.

I will honor the religion of my fathers.

I call to witness the Gods. . .

The borders of my fatherland,

The wheat, the barley, the vines,

And the trees of the olive and the fig.

(Transl. Clarence A. Forbes, punctuation modified; in Swift 1947, p. 4)

 

The explicit intention of university administrators who promoted this startling recreation of an ancient Greek ritual was to promote in the citizens of a modern state an active civic spirit capable of sustaining a great democratic nation through periods of military and social crisis. 

 

Read more:

https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev.polisci.11.112006.143750

 

Read from top.

 

 

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