NewsTrust - Foreign Policy - Most Recent Stories: News (Independent)

Mitt Romney's Dangerous Foreign Policy Team: Nostalgic for Bush, Hellbent on War with Iran

Wed, 02 May 2012 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Alex Kane - May. 02 (News Analysis) - Romney’s persistent knocks on Obama’s foreign policy make clear that, while the economy will be the number-one issue this year, foreign policy will be a close runner-up. Behind Romney’s statements on world affairs is a group of close advisers whose views harken back to the Bush administration’s belligerent neoconservative brand of US foreign policy--not the best idea, considering how discredited it has become. “The most striking aspect of Romney's approach to foreign policy is its lack of creativity -- its brazen willingness to recycle Bush-era talking points, attitudes, and of course personnel,” said Peter Certo, a researcher at Right Web, a project of the Institute for Policy Studies.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.7 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Latin America v. Obama: U.S. Policy on Cuba, Drug War, Economy Under Fire at Colombian Summit

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Apr. 16 (News Analysis) - Historian Greg Grandin analyzes the U.S.-Colombia "free trade" deal and the deepening split between much of Latin America and Washington following the Summit of the Americas in Colombia. The summit, which was marred by a U.S. prostitution scandal, concluded Sunday without agreement on the key questions of whether Cuba should be allowed to attend the regional meetings and on the issue of the legalization of drugs. Latin American leaders said Cuba should be invited to the next Summit in Panama in 2015, but the United States and Canada dissented. Ecuador's President Rafael Correa boycotted this year’s meeting because of Cuba's exclusion. On Sunday the United States announced that a free trade agreement with host country Colombia will come into effect in May, far earlier than expected. The agreement had earlier been deferred because of Colombia's weak record on workers rights, including murders and attacks on union activists. [Transcript to come. Check back soon.]

NewsTrust Rating: 4.1 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Seymour Hersh: US Training Iranian Terrorists in Nevada

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

AlterNet - By Amy Goodman, Seymour Hersh - Apr. 11 (Special Report) - the Bush administration secretly trained an Iranian opposition group despite its inclusion on the State Department’s list of foreign terrorists.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.7 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

What’s Happening in Syria?

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Consortium News - By William Blum - Apr. 08 (News Analysis) - It’s difficult to know what’s happening in Syria not only because of the confusing violence but because the Western news media has lost nearly all credibility when it comes to reporting on Muslim countries, at least those on America’s and Israel’s enemies lists.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.8 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

"Merchant of Death" Viktor Bout Sentenced to 25 Years; Trial Ignored His Ties to U.S., Dick Cheney

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Apr. 06 (News Report) - Notorious arms smuggler Viktor Bout, known as the "Merchant of Death," has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for conspiracy to commit terrorism. Our guest, former United Nations arms trafficking investigator Kathi Lynn Austin, says the case allowed American companies to avoid exposure of their collusion with with the U.S. government and private companies linked to Dick Cheney during the Iraq war, even after United Nations sanctions against him in 2004. Authorities say Viktor Bout was involved in trafficking arms to dictators and stoking conflicts in Africa, South America and the Middle East. He has also been accused of furnishing weapons to al-Qaeda and the Taliban, and achieved particular notoriety for selling arms in Rwanda in 1998, just four years after the Rwandan genocide. [includes rush transcript]

NewsTrust Rating: 4.2 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

The new abolitionists: Henry Kissenger, George Schultz, Bill Perry, Sam Nunn, and Sidney Drell

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

thebulletin.org - By Hugh Gusteraon - Mar. 30 (Special Report) - Philip Taubman's new book, The Partnership: Five Cold Warriors and Their Quest to Ban the Bomb, recounts the story of five front-rank Cold Warriors who have become nuclear abolitionists in their old age. They are: Henry Kissinger, President Richard Nixon's national security adviser and secretary of state, 85; George Schultz, President Ronald Reagan's secretary of state, 88; Bill Perry, President Bill Clinton's secretary of defense, 82; Sam Nunn, former chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, 72; and Sidney Drell, a scientific adviser to the US government and physics professor at Stanford University, 85. In their professional careers, each contributed in important ways to the nuclear arms race.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.9 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Not a Great Deal for Asia

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 00:00:00 -0700

American Prospect - By Kevin P. Gallagher - Mar. 13 (News Analysis) - The Trans-Pacific Partnership is best understood as President Barack Obama’s extension of the Bush-era doctrine of “competitive liberalization.” Frustrated with pushback at the World Trade Organization by nations like China, Brazil, India, and South Africa, the United States seeks a coalition of the willing to import a commercial framework that rewards private firms at the expense of the common good. That policy regime is ailing in the U.S. and gets worse when exported. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) certainly isn’t about raising standards of living. The most ambitious estimates of the gains from the TPP suggest that participating nations will gain a mere one-tenth of 1 percent of the gross domestic product. Sixty percent of the projected gains go to Vietnam and the United States, and the other 20 percent goes to Malaysia—largely because the U.S. already has trade pacts with the other proposed big players in the TPP. However, the proposed deal is far from popular in Asia. In ...

NewsTrust Rating: 4.6 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Leaked Stratfor Email Suggests Secret U.S. Indictment of WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Feb. 29 (News Report) - "Somehow you have a private intelligence company, Stratfor, a 'shadow CIA,' as people have called it, having information about this sealed indictment—secret again—that Julian Assange doesn’t have, that WikiLeaks doesn’t have, that his lawyers don’t have," says Michael Ratner of the Center for Constitutional Rights, who is a legal adviser to both Assange and to WikiLeaks. "What you see here is secrecy, secrecy, secrecy." News of the indictment comes less than a week after Army Private Bradley Manning was arraigned for allegedly leaking classified U.S. military and State Department doc

NewsTrust Rating: 4.4 average - 5 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Wikileaks Publishes Millions Of Confidential Emails From Security Firm

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Huffington Post - Feb. 27 (News Report) - The anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks began publishing on Monday more than five million emails from a U.S.-based global security analysis company that has been likened to a shadow CIA.

NewsTrust Rating: Not rated yet - See Info » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Jeremy Scahill: U.S. Has Ignited Islamist Uprising in Impoverished, Divided Yemen

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Feb. 16 (News Report) - Has U.S. counterterrorism policy in Yemen strengthened the very threat it sought to eliminate? We speak with journalist Jeremy Scahill, who reports in a new cover story for The Nation magazine that U.S. drone strikes, civilian drone casualties and deepening poverty in Yemen have all contributed to the rise of an Islamist uprising. "The arrogance of the U.S. was always thinking that whatever U.S. official was sent to Yemen was smarter than Ali Abdullah Saleh," Scahill says. "[Saleh] was a master chess player, and he milked counterterrorism as his cash cow... [U.S.-supplied] forces have almost never been used to actually battle anyone determined to be terrorists. They've existed primarily for the defense of the Saleh regime." [includes rush transcript]

NewsTrust Rating: 4.5 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Noam Chomsky: The Decline of American Empire (Part 2)

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

AlterNet - By Noam Chomsky - Feb. 15 (News Analysis) - Favored dictators are supported as long as they can maintain control (as in the major oil states). When that is no longer possible, then discard them and try to restore the old regime as fully as possible (as in Tunisia and Egypt). The general pattern is familiar: Somoza, Marcos, Duvalier, Mobutu, Suharto, and many others. In one case, Libya, the three traditional imperial powers intervened by force to participate in a rebellion to overthrow a mercurial and unreliable dictator, opening the way, it is expected, to more efficient control over Libya’s rich resources (oil primarily, but also water, of particular interest to French corporations), to a possible base for the U.S. Africa Command (so far restricted to Germany), and to the reversal of growing Chinese penetration. As far as policy goes, there have been few surprises.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.3 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Obama’s Chess Match with Israel/Iran

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Consortium News - By Gareth Porter - Feb. 14 (News Analysis) - Israel, Iran and the Obama administration are engaged in a three-dimensional chess match that could end in a destructive war or a negotiated agreement on Iran’s nuclear program. Much of the maneuvering has occurred through public hints and private feints, Gareth Porter reports for AlJazeera.

NewsTrust Rating: Not rated yet - See Info » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

The State of Obama’s Facts

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

FactCheck - By Brooks Jackson, D’Angelo Gore, Eugene Kiely, Robert Farley, Ben Finley, Lori Robertson - Jan. 25 (Fact Check) - The president’s State of the Union address got the facts right — mostly. Obama said “the Taliban’s momentum has been broken” in Afghanistan. But targeted assassinations continue, and at least one independent foreign policy expert says the enemy may just be waiting until the U.S. leaves. The president said a get-tough tariff on tire imports from China has saved more than 1,000 U.S. jobs. But tire industry officials say Chinese imports have simply been replaced by imports from other countries. He took credit for putting “more boots on the border than ever before.” That’s true, but the big increase was under George W. Bush. And a decrease in illegal border crossings is due mainly to the lack of jobs in the U.S., experts say. Often the president’s facts and figures were accurate — but not the whole story. It’s true (barely) that Bush issued more new regulations than Obama at the same point in their presidencies — but Obama didn’t mention that his cost more. The president pointed proudly to increased oil drilling, increased U.S. oil production, and declining dependence on imports. But understandably he passed over any mention of chronically high gasoline prices, which hit a record of sorts last year. And he boasted of recent increases in jobs — which still number nearly 1.7 million fewer than when he took office.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.5 average - 11 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

What's Happening in the Persian Gulf Explained

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Mother Jones - By Adam Weinstein, Hamed Aleaziz - Jan. 03 (Special Report) - The basics: Iran and the United States appear to be heading for a showdown in the Persian Gulf. Amid already-high tensions over Iran's advancing nuclear program, the US has imposed harsh new economic sanctions on the regime in Tehran and begun to move se

NewsTrust Rating: 4.4 average - 3 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Slip-Sliding to War with Iran

Thu, 29 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Consortium News - By Robert Parry - Dec. 29 (News Analysis) - With the typical backdrop of alarmist propaganda in place, the stage is now set for a new war, this time with Iran. The slightest miscalculation (or provocation) by the United States, Israel or Iran could touch off a violent scenario that will have devastating consequences.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.4 average - 5 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Fact check: GOP national security debate

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

FactCheck - By Brooks Jackson, Lori Robertson, Robert Farley - Nov. 23 (Fact Check) - The latest GOP debate was thin on memorable moments or major factual bloopers, but we do have some leftover claims to dispute before we shut down for the Thanksgiving holiday. We wouldn't want anybody's turkey dinner to be spoiled by worries that terrorists have come over the border with Mexico, for example. We also found misstatements about an oil pipeline, presidential contacts with Iran and cuts to the defense budget.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.1 average - 5 Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Fact-checking the CNN-think tank debate

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

PolitiFact - By Bill Adair - Nov. 23 (Fact Check) - Eight Republican candidates will be debating on national security issues tonight at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington. The candidates are Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry, Ron Paul, Jon Huntsman and Rick Santorum. We'll be watching the debate and updating this story with our fact-checks. >>More

NewsTrust Rating: 3.7 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

As NATO Ends Libyan Bombing Campaign, Is the U.S. Seeking Greater Military Control of Africa?

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Nov. 01 (News Analysis) - While NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen hailed the campaign as a success, many analysts say NATO’s intensive bombing campaign violated its U.N. mandate. "The role that NATO played in Libya has been a very, very problematic one, a very troubled one, and ultimately is going to have a very long-term, deleterious impact on Libya’s future," says Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies. "The notion that the NATO bombings somehow was to do nothing but protect civilians is simply not the case."

NewsTrust Rating: Not rated yet - See Info » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Petraeus’s CIA Fuels Iran Murder Plot

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Consortium News - By Ray McGovern - Oct. 13 (News Analysis) - Before Ignatius’s article, I had seen no one allude to the fact that much about this crime-stopper tale had come from the CIA. In public, the FBI had taken the lead role, presumably because the key informant inside a Mexican drug cartel worked for U.S. law enforcement via the Drug Enforcement Administration.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.7 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Russia and China veto proposed UN resolution on Syria

Wed, 05 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

OpenGlobe - By C628, OpenGlobe contributors - Oct. 05 (News Report) - Russia and China vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution condemning the Syrian government's crackdown on protestors late on Tuesday, leading Western supporters of the bill to voice their anger at the decision. The proposed resolution would have condemned the Syrian government over its crackdown on protesters, as well as referring to the possibility of "targeted measures" against Syria. The text had been rewritted three times by drafters France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Portugal in response to Russian and Chinese objections over teh use of the word "sanctions" in earlier versions, leading to the introduction of the "targeted measures" language.

NewsTrust Rating: 3.7 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Mitt Romney repeats claim that Obama went around the world apologizing for the United States

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

PolitiFact - By Angie Drobnic Holan - Sep. 29 (Fact Check) - In a debate in Orlando on Sept. 22, 2011, Mitt Romney charged that President Obama has gone around the world apologizing for America. President Obama "went around the world and apologized for America," Romney said, in response to a question about Israel and the Middle East. Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, has made this charge several times. The first time we checked it was when he made the charge is his own book, No Apology: The Case for American Greatness.

NewsTrust Rating: Not rated yet - See Info » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

How Washington Creates Global Instability

Mon, 19 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Tomdispatch.com - By Nick Turse - Sep. 19 (News Analysis) - It’s a story that should take your breath away: the destabilization of what, in the Bush years, used to be called “the arc of instability.” It involves at least 97 countries, across the bulk of the global south, much of it coinciding with the oil heartlands of the planet. A startling number of these nations are now in turmoil, and in every single one of them -- from Afghanistan and Algeria to Yemen and Zambia -- Washington is militarily involved, overtly or covertly, in outright war or what passes for peace.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.4 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Columbia Spent U.S. Anti-Drug Aid on Hiding Government Ties to Drug Rings

Mon, 22 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

yahoo.com - By Ujala Sehgal - Aug. 22 (News) - The U.S.-funded counterinsurgency campaign against a Marxist rebel group in Columbia was viewed as so successful that it has become a model for strategy in Afghanistan. But things were not what they seemed: the Washington Post reports that U.S. ally and former president Alvaro Uribe has been implicated in "egregious abuses of power and illegal actions," involving U.S. aid an "possibly U.S. officials" -- all under the cover of fighting drug trafficking. American cash, equipment, and training were sent to Columbia to help break up cocaine-smugglers, but were actually used "to carry out spying operations and smear campaigns against Supreme Court justices, Uribe’s political opponents and civil society groups."

NewsTrust Rating: 2.4 average (not enough reviews) - See Reviews » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

Violence Spikes in Iraq as U.S. Considers Ways to Extend Occupation Past December Deadline

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Amy Goodman - Aug. 19 (News Report) - Today, roughly 46,000 U.S. troops remain in the country, along with more than 64,000 private contractors. This week, as Iraq suffers its deadliest violence of the year, there is increasing speculation that the Obama administration will extend its occupation of the war-ravaged nation. Earlier this month, the Iraqi government authorized talks on whether to approve keeping thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq beyond a withdrawal deadline of December 31.

NewsTrust Rating: 4.4 average (not enough reviews) - See Review » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer

As Biden Visits China, Author David Wise on "Tiger Trap: America’s Secret Spy War with China"

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Juan Gonzalez, Amy Goodman - Aug. 18 (News Report) - Vice President Joe Biden arrived in China yesterday to begin a five-day trip aimed at reassuring leaders there of the stability of the U.S. economy and to begin building a relationship with that country’s most likely next president, Xi Jinping. The visit to the largest foreign creditor to the United States falls right after the downgrade of the U.S. credit rating by Standard & Poor’s, and just days after the Financial Times reported that Pakistan gave Chinese officials access to the wreckage of the top-secret U.S. stealth helicopter that crashed in the compound of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad during the U.S. raid in May.

NewsTrust Rating: Not rated yet - See Info » - Review It Visit NewsTrust | About | Sign Up | Disclaimer