And why I am switching balances from the most noble and important – but momentarily meaningless – job to something more rewarding… February 1, 2019 Just yesterday, I posted this extremely important and modest appeal – the Basel Appeal – on our foundation’s homepage, The Transnational, here. It was disseminated to social media, among others, my FB profile, TFF’s and my public figure page. Facebook … Continue reading Peace illiteracy
Jan Oberg comments on NATO and the need for a much larger citizens-taxpayers movement against militarism since, for almost 70 years since 1949, NATO has failed miserably in creating the peace it says it aims at. In addition it is systematically violating its Treaty. Continue reading Why NATO is obsolete – some arguments
Does the U.S. have anything constructive and benign to offer the world anymore?In this comment on PressTV I list a series of arguments against these new sanctions which were passed by the US Senate two days later. Continue reading New sanctions on Russia, Iran and North Korea
I read dozens of articles every day about various conflict zones, commentaries, war reports and – the few times it happens – possibilities of peace. I read about Syria in particular as I have since I visited Damascus and Aleppo in December 2016.
It’s important that one does not, over time, develop the disease called “psychic numbing” – an excellent concept developed by Robert Jay Lifton, a former TFF Associate.
Today I stumbled upon an article in the Omaha World Herald by Washington Post’s David Ignatius under the headline “The Star-Crossed History of CIA Paramilitary Action.”
I’m not going to discuss that article but would like to call your attention to this sentence – that Ignatius does not even dwell on:
One knowledgeable official estimates that the CIA-backed fighters may have killed or wounded 100,000 Syrian soldiers and their allies over the past four years.
I fail to understand it. I read it again. I’d urge you to do likewise.
A debate on PressTV between Jan Oberg and Jim Walsh, MIT Here is a link to a partial transcript Continue reading The BAN Treaty – it’s significance and why some have isolated themselves from civilisation
There should be a lower intellectual level to the statements by a US Secretary of Defence. There should be a debunking of the unethical behaviour that repeatedly state that there is only a political solution to Syria and continue to use only violence. There should be a discussion about international law here. There should be a discussion of what is morally defensible in this case, … Continue reading Intellectual nonsense about Syria
Udenrigsminister Anders Samuelsen siger til DR den 4. juni 2017 at det ikke dur med “dialogkaffe” når man skal bekæmpe terrorisme.
Efter at 7 mennesker er blevet dræbt i endnu et angreb i London – hvis gerningsmænd og motiver vi endnu ikke kender – mener han ifølge Ritzau/DR at der skal sættes “hårdt imod hårdt”.
Med denne tilgang – krigskaffe kunne man måske kalde den? – vil Danmark og udenrigsminister kun opnå at bidrage til mere terrorisme.
Den er helt gal i analysen af hvad problemet er, i fornægtelsen af vestverdens forkerte “krig mod terroren”, der siden 2001 har medført at 80 gange flere mennesker dør per år på kloden end før 9/11 (iflg. The Global Terror Index).
Siden 9/11 har medier og politikere kun talt om hvordan terrorhandlinger begås, hvem der begår dem og hvordan man kan gardere sig, første og fremmest ved at dræbe terrorister.
This is TFF Live on Facebook – the live broadcast I do now and then because live broadcasts have a much larger dissemination than articles, images, texts and Youtube videos. You may find more here. I argue why I believe NATO belongs to the past and should have been dissolved when the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact dissolved in 1989. I also say a … Continue reading NATO should be dissolved – 8 arguments
Here I am with my friends Donald, Bibi, Sara and Melania… And speak a little about the stupidity of scapegoating Iran for everything, of giving Saudi Arabia even more weapons – and being bribed by it – of creating the preconditions for more warfare and about the fact that NATO is setting up shop in Kuwait and there are plans to have a Gulf NATO … Continue reading Discussing Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia
Just a thought… Continue reading What foreign policy if the US had no weapons?
I had the pleasure and honour to comment on the Iranian defence minister’s views on the nuclear deal, on a nuclear-free Middle East, terrorism and more. Continue reading Iran on nuclear deal and nuclear-free Middle East
“The Debate” of April 16, 2017 on Iran’s PressTV between Richard Millett and myself is important to me. I think it will be for you too in the sense of clarifying two approaches and positions on Syria. Its focus is on the difference in media coverage of the terrible events in Khan Seykhoun and al-Rashideen but there is much more to it. I’ll keep on … Continue reading Syria – two perspectives illustrated
TFF LiveApril 12, 2017 The secretaries of state, Tillerson and Lavrov meet today. We seem to enter a stage of what must appropriately be perceived as a frosty new Cold War. In the worst of cases this can lead to a new Cuban Missile Crisis. God forbid! Continue reading The US/NATO confrontation with Russia is dangerous
Here my 6th photo series from Aleppo – hashtag #keepfocusonaleppo.
Lund, Sweden – March 24, 2017
Can the almost total destruction of Eastern Aleppo be used constructively?
Only if we are willing to ask and dialogue about this:
• Why does the world go on investing US$ 2000 billion annually in warfare and US$ 30 in all the UN does – only to create destruction of people, places, past and future?
• How absurd, how meaningless – indeed how far must it go to destroy the West itself – before we learn to conflict intelligently?
•
I’ve see much destruction during my work in conflict zones the last 25 years. But nothingcompares with Aleppo and the destruction of Syria and its people.
Continue reading “The Meaninglessness of War: Aleppo”A quick comment – expressive of a slight frustration. It doesn’t even occur to the reporter – the Washington Post’s bureau chief in Beirut – that she is talking about international aggression. Can everybody just use Syria for whatever games they please? Welcome to follow me on my new public page. Continue reading Peace plan for Syria – first steps
Videoinspelning av Jan Öbergs föredrag i Stockholm februari 2017 Inspelningen är uppdelad i två delar: Del 1: Vittnesrapport från Aleppo60 min. Del 2: Debatt och vägar till fred i Syrien45 min. Bakgrund10-14:e december 2016 vistades Jan Öberg i Aleppo. Med sin unika erfarenhet från staden ifrågasätter han den gängse massmediarapporteringen, argumenterar för ett nytt sätt att se på konflikter på och ger förslag till den … Continue reading “Vittnesrapport från Aleppo, en annorlunda konfliktanalys och vägar till fred i Syrien”
TFF PressInfo # 405 Lund, Sweden – February 24, 2017Failed conflict analysis To analyse a conflict is as necessary as the diagnosis for the doctor: You either get to a solution/treatment or you don’t. If the diagnosis is deficient, you don’t. You instead risk killing the patient. And it’s deficient of you stare only at “evil” cells and blame the patient for a life … Continue reading Keep focus on Aleppo and global dimensions of Syria
A 30 min debate about NATO, Ukraine, Crimea, Yugoslavia, Syria the eternal enemy images and the – obsolete – philosophy on which NATO builds. Time for something new, I argue in the debate with former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defence under Reagon, Mr. Lawrence J. Korb who at the time was in command of 70% of Pentagon’s budget. Here in TFF PressInfo # 403 is … Continue reading Discussing NATO with a former U.S. Ass. Sec. of Defence
Fourth photo story from Aleppo: “Faces of Aleppo. Just out of 4,5 years of occupation hell” January 25, 2017 Unique photos from Eastern Aleppo in Syria when it was finally liberated on December 11-12, 2016. The people you see here have just come out to freedom from 4,5 years of the occupation by what can be called RIOTs – Rebels-Insurgents-Opposition-Terrorists – mostly the latter. And most … Continue reading Faces of Aleppo
New year’s night, January 1, 2017 This girl had come out of Eastern Aleppo after four dark years of occupation by Western-backed terrorists – too many to name. People who for no reason had destroyed her home, her part of that beautiful city. Perhaps half of her life living in fear, perhaps having lost family members. I do not know. I met her on December 14 … Continue reading The little girl from Eastern Aleppo
The old years went – in as little a time as it takes to turn around and see who is tapping you on your shoulder. And it is the new, the next year.
I hope it will pass too – in as little time as it takes for me to turn my head and look forward again – because the face of 2017 doesn’t look good or kind to me.
Neither do the next ten or so years.
Beyond that the world will become a better place. If, that is, if we survive and don’t destroy it all.
It is actually already becoming a better place!
The thing that has too pass – or pass away – is the United States Empire.
In a few years it will go the way Rome and all the rest plus the Ottoman, British and Soviet empires did. No empire lasts forever.
But before we go for it – a video from Beirut, December 2016:
Some indicators of Empire dissolution
The indicators, the cracks, in the Empire are there for all to see – the Americans and other Westernes will be the last and remain in denial for some time until the discrepancy between the self-image and the reality, the self-delusion, has grown too big. Like East Germany or Russia at in the early 1980s.
The rest of the world, the non-West sees some of these cracks quite clearly:
Continue reading “As we move into the new year – 2017”Have just published the second of a series of photo stories from Syria – “Humans in liberated Aleppo”. You can subscribe to this page for photo stories which ensures that you’ll get an email as soon as they are posted on my Exposure page. I’d be most grateful if you’d share this link too. And here is a little background to this photo story: Unique photos … Continue reading Humans in liberated Aleppo