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Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/26/2017 6:01:42 PM
	RUSSIAN SENATOR: U.K. WILL BE 'WIPED OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH' IF IT USES NUCLEAR WEAPONS BY TOM O'CONNOR ON 4/25/17 AT 4:26 PM A senior Russian politician responded aggressively Monday to comments by the U.K.'s defense minister suggesting pre-emptive use of nuclear weapons against Russia is an option for London, claiming the U.K. would be completely annihilated by Russia's nukes in response. Russia's Frants Klintsevich, who heads the defense and security committee in Moscow's upper house of parliament, said the U.K. would be "literally wiped off the face of the Earth by a counter strike." Earlier that day, U.K. Defense Minister Michael Fallon said during a radio show that the U.K. could consider a preemptive nuclear attack amid recent political tensions between Russia and Western governments, according to The Moscow Times. Fallon said the U.K.'s military would only make combat use of its Trident nuclear program in extenuating circumstances, but refused to say exactly what those conditions would be. Related: Russia tests next generation anti-aircraft S-500 missile system "In the most extreme circumstances, we've made it very clear that you can't rule out the use of nuclear weapons as a first strike," Fallon told BBC Radio 4's Today program, according to The Independent. "The whole point about the deterrent is that you have got to leave uncertainty in the mind of anybody who might be thinking of using weapons against this country," he added after being asked to specify what circumstances warranted the use of such warheads. The mushroom cloud from the first hydrogen bomb test, as photographed on Enewetak, an atoll in the Pacific Ocean, in 1952, by a member of the United States Air Force. Russia has begun developing the R-28 Sarmat or Satan 2, which could produce a nuclear charge of at least 40 megatons, or four times that of the first hydrogen bomb.AIR FORCE/REUTERS "In the best case this statement can be seen as a form of psychological warfare, which in this context is particularly disgusting," Klintsevich said, according to the state-run TASS Russian News Agency.The U.K. possesses an estimated 215 nuclear warheads, making it one of nine nations believed to maintain nuclear weapons stockpiles—and it is the smallest inventory of any signatory of the Treaty of the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which was opened for signature in 1968 and put into force in 1970. Russia is thought to possess the largest nuclear weapons stockpile of any nation in the world, with an estimated 7,300 nuclear warheads and plans to expand its nuclear capability. Klintsevich criticized Fallon's threat as empty. He also brought up the U.S.'s use of atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II in 1945, which resulted in the death of at least 225,000 people, according to the University of California, Los Angeles's Asian American Studies Center. Klintsevich said that such times have "irrevocably passed," like the "former greatness of the British Empire." The U.K. has joined a number of Western governments—including the U.S., France and Germany—in criticizing Moscow's recent moves to expand its political and military influence. The Western military alliance NATO and Russia have accused each other of military provocations as they undergo parallel arms escalations along Europe's borders. Last year, the U.S. created four NATO battle groups in the Baltic states and Poland in an effort to bolster NATO's defenses against what the multinational military organization perceived as Russian aggression. Russia has moved nuclear-capable missiles to the region and conducted its own regional drills. (Newsweek)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/26/2017 11:28:28 PM
	China Finally Sends U.S. Positive Messages On North Korea APRIL 25, 2017 By James Holbrooks On Monday, the tone of the mainstream narrative on North Korea was somewhat conflicting — though certainly a little brighter. Even as President Donald Trump was saying the “status quo” in North Korea is “unacceptable” and that the United Nations should impose sanctions on the tiny Asian country, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N, Nikki Haley, said the U.S. is “not trying to pick a fight” with leader Kim Jong-un. “We are not going to do anything unless he gives us reason to,” she said on NBC, referring to the idea that the U.S. would use a first-strike option against North Korea. Continuing, Haley tied in the other major player in the scenario: If you see him attack a military base, if you see some sort of intercontinental ballistic missile, then obviously we’re going to do that. But right now we’re saying ‘Don’t test, don’t use nuclear missiles, don’t try and do any more actions,’ and I think he’s understanding that. And China’s helping really put that pressure on him. Indeed, U.S.-China relations on the issue of North Korea do appear to be a tad less contentious currently, with China seeming a little more willing to acknowledge the country as a threat. According to some analysts, this could actually be a new Chinese strategy. According to the opening paragraph of a CNBC piece that ran Monday titled “China is sending the US a new message about North Korea”: Beijing appears to be sending fresh signals about its view on North Korea, in order to convince U.S. President Donald Trump to take less aggressive action against the rogue nuclear state, several political analysts say. Speaking to CNBC, John Delury, associate professor of Chinese studies at South Korea’s Yonsei University, says China is trying to get the U.S. to reevaluate the situation. “One thing we’re seeing is a tactical adjustment on Beijing’s part to Trump,” Delury said. “There’s a kind of game here where Beijing is playing along to a certain extent, almost to call Trump’s bluff, and to get the Americans to recognize they have the key in their hand to unlock the problem.” Pointing out the reality of what a military conflict in the region would look like, the analyst says the solution to the problem has nothing to do with warships and fighter jets: The key is not military. When you start to look carefully at the military options, they are horrific, just given the economic vulnerabilities of everyone in this neighborhood. The key the U.S. has is diplomacy. Director of the Northeast Asia Cooperative Security Project, Leon Sigal, seems to agree. Speaking to CNBC, he suggested the economic front should be the main strategic avenue. “The main leverage we have is that the North Koreans want a new relationship with us because they don’t want to become too dependent on China,” he said. Speaking in Australia Monday, Vice President Mike Pence also presented a more positive sentiment. Acknowledging increased Chinese efforts to ease tensions, he said a military entanglement is not necessarily a foregone conclusion: We truly believe that, as our allies in the region and China bring that pressure to bear, there is a chance that we can achieve a historic objective of a nuclear-free Korea peninsula by peaceful means. Meanwhile, however, Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel just discussed the “urgent security challenge” posed by North Korea on a phone call. Further, Japanese warships have now joined the carrier fleet steaming its way to the Korean peninsula, and South Korea is in talks with the U.S. military about doing the same. Creative Commons / Anti-Media / Report a typo (activistpost.com)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/26/2017 11:44:05 PM
	Somehow the U.S. Has Killed 70k ISIS Fighters — Twice as Many as It Says Exist April 25, 2017 at 11:31 am Written by Darius Shahtahmasebi (ANTIMEDIA Op-Ed) In June 2014, around the time ISIS was making headlines across the world, theWall Street Journal reported that the terror group had 4,000 fighters in Iraq. In September 2014, the CIA released an estimate claiming ISIS had between 20,000 and 31,500 fighters combined in both Iraq and Syria, including 15,000 who were foreign fighters. Almost half were foreign fighters? That’s some organic uprising taking place in Syria. One month before the CIA’s estimate, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) released an estimate of their own that placed ISIS’ membership at well over 50,000 fighters in Syria, alone (including 20,000 non-Syrians.) But SOHR is run by one man who owns a clothing shop in Coventry, England. He was once quoted as saying “I came to Britain the day Hafez al-Assad died, and I’ll return when Bashar al-Assad goes.” This bias is rarely reported in the corporate media, which regularly cites SOHR. Regardless of the exact numbers, the U.S.-led re-intervention into Iraq had already begun in June 2014 (before these estimates had been released.) Understandably, the total number of ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria has fluctuated somewhat — it has both increased and decreased over time — since the U.S. began a bombing campaign in both countries that was supposedly designed to “degrade and destroy” them. But they left the terrorists’ $50 million a month oil revenue completely intact. That’ll show them. For some reason, the U.S. decided to leave this task to the Russians, who targeted ISIS’ lucrative source of revenue on America’s behalf (only for a NATO member to shoot down their jets in response). The number of ISIS fighters supposedly killed by the U.S.-led coalition has also been somewhat disputed. At the end of last year, U.K. Defense Secretary Michael Fallon estimated that the coalition had killed a whopping 25,000 fighters during the campaign. However, a senior military official told CNNat around the same time that the Pentagon’s conservative estimate was that the U.S. air campaign had killed a staggering 50,000 ISIS fighters. In its most recent published numbers, the Pentagon claims to have killed over 70,000 militants since June 2014 while only killing a mere 229 civilians. That’s an alleged hit rate of over 99 percent. Of course, we know this to be a false estimate. I’m not just referring to the ludicrously low number of civilians killed; the idea that the U.S. killed 70,000 ISIS militants is so outlandish it begs the question: What would actually remain of a terror group that initially had 30,000 fighters, if a total of 70,000 fighters (more than double their estimated membership) were killed just for good measure? Further, as the LA Times extensively reported, the U.S. refuses to acknowledge the mounting evidence surrounding civilian casualties: “But Airwars, a nonprofit with a staff of journalists and researchers who keep detailed records and conduct independent research, said its figures showed at least 3,111 civilians have been killed in 552 strikes for which it has significant evidence: Either the coalition has specifically confirmed the strikes, or it has confirmed strikes in the area on that date and Airwars has two or more credible sources.” As the air campaign intensifies, with direct decision making being delegated to generals on the battlefield with little oversight — courtesy of the Trump era — Iraqi civilians are being massacred by the thousands. In March of this year, an aerial bombardment killed well over 200 civilians in Mosul. Iraqi Vice President Osama Nujaifi called the attack a “humanitarian disaster.” But it’s not a humanitarian disaster — it’s a blatant war crime. Latest figures show that in March alone, the U.S. air campaign killed 1,782 civilians in Iraq and Syria (far more civilian deaths than Russia caused.) According to Airwars, the coalition’s death count grew so large that the organization was forced to put a complete halt to vetting casualties caused by the Russian military, as the coalition’s death toll had far surpassed that of the Russians. According to the LA Times, U.S. Army Col. Joe Scrocca, a Baghdad-based spokesman, admitted its civilian casualty count is conservative. However, the real shamelessness of this is his rationale for not confirming civilian casualties. As reported by the Times: “Military reports usually do not include accounts from the scene, he said, because many are in enemy territory. They don’t often include interviews with victims and other witnesses because they can be difficult to identify and find, he said.” Yes – precisely. Yet late last year, the media was sure Russia was committing an absolute massacreupon the civilian population in Aleppo in areas that were held by al-Qaeda affiliates — areas even theNew York Times admitted may have only housed tens of thousands of residents to begin with. Who investigated these casualties in Aleppo? Mosul is an enormous city in Iraq; as many as 650,000 civilians are at direct risk. The fighting is taking place in densely populated areas, and civilians are being buried in the process. At least Lt. General Stephen Townsend, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and Syria, has admitted the coalition has made mistakes, right? He also courageously made it clear that “we have never targeted them [civilians], not once.” This warped rationale of justifying mass murder was captured brilliantly in Professor Noam Chomsky’s email exchange with attention-seeking atheist Sam Harris, completely unrequested on the part of Chomsky. Chomsky stated: “And of course they knew that there would be major casualties. They are not imbeciles, but rather adopt a stance that is arguably even more immoral than purposeful killing, which at least recognizes the human status of the victims, not just killing ants while walking down the street, who cares?” Chomsky and Harris were discussing former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s decision to destroy a Sudanese pharmaceutical plant. The politics are the same some decades later. B-b-but – we are liberating the Iraqis, so the price is worth it, right? The other horrifying aspect of this is that the propaganda we are fed through our television sets does not even mention the fact that for the Iraqis who survive the ordeal and don’t get buried under cement and rubble, this is not a liberation. In their eyes, this is the brutal takeover by one group of extremists from another group of extremists. A poll conducted last year, as reported by the Washington Post, found that 74 percent of Sunni respondents did not want to be liberated by the Iraqi army on its own. One hundred percent of the respondents said they did not want to be liberated by the Shiite militias or the Kurds. The Shia militias, backed by Iran, have been documented carrying out numerous atrocities and revenge acts against the Sunni population of Iraq. As noted by Luke Coffey, a former special adviser to the British defense secretary: “These attitudes by Iraq’s Sunni population probably explain why even though Fallujah has been surrounded for more than a year by Iraqi security forces there has not been a popular uprising by the Sunni inhabitants against ISIL.” Iraqis’ lack of desire to unite against ISIS says more about the people attempting to liberate them than it does about life under ISIS. This is not to say that the Iraqi people shouldn’t be freed from living under the reign of a terror group, but if they are being killed by the thousands in the process, I ask: Who is the terror group? Opinion / Creative Commons / Anti-Media / Report a typo
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/27/2017 12:18:18 AM
	Bride of ISIS: From 'happily ever after' to hell By Ben Wedeman and Waffa Munayyer, CNN Updated 1424 GMT (2224 HKT) April 26, 2017 (CNN) Islam and Ahmed met online, looking for their "happily ever after" through a Muslim dating site. But instead of bringing love and contentment, their marriage left Islam trapped in a living nightmare. Fast forward four years -- and three husbands - and she and her two small children are caught in limbo in northern Syria. Islam Mitat met her first husband on a Muslim dating website -- then he took her to live in ISIS territory. Islam Mitat is from Morocco; Ahmed Khalil was originally from Kabul in Afghanistan, but had moved to the UK and become a British citizen by the time they met on Muslima.com. Mitat dreamed of a career as a fashion designer, and saw a British husband as a way out of her drab existence in the Moroccan town of Oujda, near the Algerian border. Months after their first online encounter, Khalil traveled to Morocco with a woman he said was his sister. He met Mitat's family, and proposed marriage, showing them bank statements to prove his intentions were serious. "He was a normal person," Mitat recalls, though she says he did make her swap her regular choice of clothing -- tight jeans and t-shirts - for long dresses. After they were married, the couple traveled to Dubai, and from there to Jalalabad in Afghanistan to meet Ahmed's family. Mitat says she only stayed in Afghanistan for a month, because of the security situation there, before returning home to Morocco. 'Holiday' in Turkey Khalil went back to Dubai, but shortly afterward he called her with news. "He told me had a job in Turkey," she says, "and we're going to go for a holiday too, me and him." The "holiday" got off to a strange start. Instead of heading to a resort or a hotel, the couple flew to Gaziantep, on southern Turkey's border with Syria. A certified copy of Ahmed Khalil's passport shows his birthplace as Kabul in Afghanistan. A man who spoke only Turkish drove them to a house full of men, women and children. The women and children were in one room, the men in another, Mitat says. She was confused, and asked the other women where they were going. "We're going hijra," they explained. To Syria. Hijra was the journey of the Prophet Muhammad and his followers, the fledgling Muslim community, from Mecca to Medina in 622 to escape persecution. In a modern context, it signifies escape from the tyranny of the enemies of Islam to the realm of the faithful. "When we were in Dubai he told me, 'I have for you a surprise, but I will give it to you in Turkey.' This is the surprise: to go in Syria," she says. When she objected, Khalil's response was blunt. "You are my wife and you have to obey me," she says he told her. Mitat says she wanted to tell Turkish border officials about her predicament, but says that as she and the others approached the Syrian border, the guards opened fire so they ran into Syria. When asked about the incident on the border, a Turkish police spokesman said he could not share information about individual cases. Death in battle Once inside the country, they headed to the nearby town of Jarablus, to a guesthouse for "muhajarin" -- those who were making hijra to the so-called caliphate - like them. Mitat says the place was packed with people from "everywhere" -- the UK, Canada, France, Belgium, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Saudi Arabia. No sooner had they arrived, than Khalil was sent off for a month of military training, leaving Mitat, who was now pregnant, behind. Once he'd been trained, ISIS sent Khalil to fight. He was killed on his first day, in the battle of Kobani. After his death, Mitat says she was terrified and didn't know what to do; banned from talking to ordinary Syrians, she was forced to stay within the muhajirin community. She moved in with her husband's brother and his family, who had also traveled to Syria, but when her brother-in-law was killed too, ISIS moved her into a guesthouse, where she stayed until her son, Abdullah, was born. As Kurdish fighters closed in, ISIS told Mitat she had to marry again and get out of the area to safety, so she wed a friend of her first husband, a man known as Abu Talha Al-Almani (his name means "the German"). He took her to Manbij, northeast of Aleppo, before moving again, this time to Raqqa as Kurdish forces closed in. A month after they got there, Mitat says she divorced Abu Talha because he wouldn't let her leave the house. She says fear played a major role in her decision not to leave immediately. Islam says she was told that other people who tried to leave had their children taken away, or were forced into weeks of intense Islamic studies. Life in ISIS's heartland All the while, Mitat was trying to escape with little Abdullah. ISIS did its best to keep her and other muhajarin away from local Syrians who might help them, and smugglers hesitated to help, because they faced execution if caught. Others asked exorbitant fees -- as much as USD $5,000 -- according to Mitat. Eventually ISIS compelled her to marry for a third time, this time to a man who Mitat describes as a gentle soul, called Abu Abdallah Al-Afghani. This name - given to him by ISIS -- indicates he was of Afghan origin. Mitat, though, says he was Indian, and that his mother lived in Australia. She says he may have been an Australian national. Although ISIS propaganda videos portray life in Raqqa as a believer's paradise, Mitat says it was anything but. It's "like you're dead, it's not life," she recalls. She says she was "always scared, always hearing bombs, guns, shooting." In recent months, food began running short, and power and water cuts grew longer. Mitat had a second child, daughter Maria, with her third husband, but the more difficult the situation became, the more eager she was to flee. Escape from Raqqa She says ISIS forced Abu Abdallah to help defend the town of Tabqa, up the Euphrates river from Raqqa, from US-backed Kurdish and Arab fighters. He was killed shortly afterward. This was Mitat's opportunity to finally leave Raqqa. Keeping her husband's death a secret from neighbors and acquaintances, she sold off all her possessions and used the money to pay smugglers to get her safely to a Kurdish YPG checkpoint. The YPG, or People's Protection Unit, a Marxist group that has been fighting ISIS across northern Syria, handed Mitat and her two children, Abdullah, who is almost two, and 10-month-old Maria, over to intelligence officers who interrogated her and were eventually convinced she was telling the truth. The family is now staying in a YPG safe house in northeastern Syria. Islam Mitat, from Morocco, has found refuge with her children in a YPG safehouse northeastern Syria. The YPG has contacted the Moroccan Embassy in Beirut about Mitat. CNN also reached out to the embassy via phone and email about her case; we did not receive a response. Her father in Morocco hopes King Mohamed VI will see CNN's reports about his daughter and step in to bring her home. Mitat, though, isn't so eager to return. She's worried about the safety of her children. She hopes that because the father of her first child is a British national, the family will be given British passports. Or, she says, she hopes to move to Australia to live with the mother of her last, late husband, Abu Abdallah Al-Afghani. But more than anything, after her odyssey from Morocco to Dubai to Afghanistan to Turkey to Syria, she's confused. "I don't know where I will go," she says. "I don't know because my life is destroyed." And it all started with a click on a website. (CNN)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

Luis Miguel 1162 61587 Lima	RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES? 4/27/2017 12:32:35 AM
	Trump Asks All 100 U.S. Senators To Attend Rare White House Briefing On North Korea APRIL 26, 2017 By Mac Slavo With a U.S. Naval Fleet set to fully arrive off the North Korean coast this week and the rogue state’s leader Kim Jong-un reportedly continuing to expand his nuclear program and missile testing, President Donald Trump told United Nations Security Council ambassadors that the status quo must change. The President has asked that new sanctions be placed on North Korea, something his predecessors attempted to implement with little success. But unlike his predecessors, Trump’s latest moves suggest he is prepared to commit U.S. forces to North Korea should the state fail to comply with demands to stifle their nuclear program, and according to a new report from Reuters, the President is doubling down on his efforts, hinting that he is indeed preparing military action. Top Trump administration officials will hold a rare briefing on Wednesday at the White House for the entire U.S. Senate on the situation in North Korea. All 100 senators have been asked to the White House for the briefing by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said White House spokesman Sean Spicer on Monday. While administration officials routinely travel to Capitol Hill to address members of Congress on foreign policy matters, it is unusual for the entire Senate to go to the White House, and for all four of those officials to be involved. Wednesday’s briefing was originally scheduled for a secure room at the Capitol, but President Donald Trump suggested a shift to the White House, congressional aides said. Washington has expressed mounting concern over North Korea’s nuclear and missile tests, and its threats to attack the United States and its Asian allies. Having all 100 U.S. Senators attend what is essentially an intelligence briefing about a country that has repeatedly threatened the United States with nuclear attack suggests that the President is looking to convince Congressional members that we may need to declare war on North Korea if they refuse to comply with new and existing sanctions. Given that the United States now has a Naval strike group in the region, China has massed 150,000 troops on the border and Russia is quickly following suit, it appears that it is only a matter of time before a North Korea invasion becomes a reality. As we’ve witnessed in recent weeks, Kim Jong-un appears to be stepping up his rhetoric, as well as his military aspirations. While the state has been allowed to run freely for the last decade by ignoring sanctions, President Trump has made clear that he is ready and willing to take military action as evidenced by his missile strike on Syria and most recently, the dropping of the Mother of All Bombs on an Islamic State cave complex in Afghanistan. North Korea is a different animal altogether. They are reportedly nuclear capable, so there is a real possibility that they could launch a devastating attack on South Korea, Japan or even the West Coast of the United States, leading to hundreds of thousands of casualties and widespread geo-political and economic chaos. Thus, any attack initiated by President Trump will likely result in a response from North Korea, which could ultimately lead to a much wider conflict as we really don’t know which side Russia and China are on. President Trump likely understands the seriousness of the situation, which would explain why he has invited 100 Senators to the White House for an intelligence briefing. Per the Constitution, only Congress can declare war, and it appears this is exactly the direction we’re headed. (activistpost.com)
	"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)
	+1

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