A document (1, pdf) produced last December by the UK
Foreign and Commonwealth Office, headed: “ UK Humanitarian Aid in
Response to The Syria Conflict”, makes interesting reading.
The British government it states, has spent “over £100
million” since 2012, “working closely with a range of actors” to “find a
political solution to the conflict and prepare to rebuild the country
in the post Assad era.” (Emphasis added.)
“Our efforts … include providing more than £67 million of support to the Syrian opposition.”
One of the “actors” to benefit from hefty chunks of British
taxpayers moneys is the Syrian National Coalition whose website (2)
states, under “Mission Statement and Goals”:
“The coalition will do
everything in its power to reach the goal of overthrowing the Assad
regime …” and to “Establish a transitional government …” (Emphasis added.)
Thus the UK government is overtly supporting the illegal overthrow of yet another sovereign government.
This all reads like a re-run of Ahmed Chalabi’s (image right) Iraq National Congress and Iyad Allawi’s Iraq National Accord, backed by the British and US governments to equally criminally overthrow Saddam Hussein.
Iraq’s football pitches, gardens and back yards turned
graveyards, probably three million deaths between the embargo, the 1991
thirty two country assault, the 2003 blitzkrieg and invasion – ongoing –
the ruins of the “Cradle of Civilisation” of which Syria is equally
custodian, are silent witness to that gargantuan crime against humanity –
and history. Will Washington and Whitehall never learn – or is
destruction of civil societies, Nazi-like aggression, illegal overthrows
and rivers of blood their raison d’être?
Incidentally, Foreign Office accounting farcically
includes: “more than £29 Million to reduce the impact of the conflict on
the region.” Stopping dropping British bombs would surely be the most
practical way to do that – and persuading their US “coalition partners”
to do the same. Yet more nauseating, murderous, hypocrisy.
Talking of reducing “the impact of conflict on the region” –
here is what the UK is contributing to destroying it – courtesy again
the (un-consulted) British taxpayer:
“Each of the RAF’s Tornado GR4 jets costs £9.4 million, and each flight costs around £35,000 per hour.“Two Tornados are typically used for each flight, and each flight lasts anywhere between four and eight hours. Even at the lowest estimate, each flight costs £140,000.“Their cargo is four Paveway bombs and two Brimstone missiles, costing £22,000 and £105,000 per unit respectively.“That’s £298,000 plus the cost of the flight which is £438,000, and that’s an optimistic estimate. If the jets carry Storm Shadow missiles – which cost a cool £800,000 a pop – and conduct an eight-hour mission, the total cost is a hell of a lot higher, and none of this takes into account the cost of fuel.” (3)
The British government document informs that:
“To date, there are over 2,700 volunteers in 110 civil defence stations across northern Syria, trained and equipped with help from UK funding … The ‘White Helmets’ as they are more commonly known … “
The
“White Helmets” of course, only work in the areas held by the
“moderate” organ eating, child decapitating, human incinerating,
crucifying “opposition.”
In Foreign Office parlance, under the heading: “Moderate
armed opposition: £4.4 million”, it is explained that this has been
devoted to “life saving equipment”, presumably for the head choppers
since the “life savers” appear to be their guests. Indeed the “White
Helmets” website states that: “They are the largest civil society organisation operating in areas outside of government control …” (Emphasis added.)
Also, near farcically, the Foreign Office informs: “We have
also funded Law of Armed Conflict training to help commanders train
their fighters to understand their responsibilities and obligations
under international human rights and humanitarian law.” Given their
track record of near unique, mediaeval barbarity, the “training” is
clearly falling on deaf ears.
The UK of course, is in no position to lecture on the law
of armed conflict since the newly unelected Prime Minister, Theresa May,
has vowed to halt all cases against British service men and women
brought by Iraqis who allege torture, murder of relatives, and varying
unimaginable abuses. So much for “responsibilities and obligations under
human rights and humanitarian law.”
British generosity is seemingly boundless in murderous
meddling in other nations. “Media activists” have been given £5.3
million: “UK funded projects are helping establish a network of
independent media outlets across Syria, whose work has included sending
out messages about personal safety after the regime’s chemical weapons
attack in Ghouta and, more recently, active reporting produced by civil
society groups and the likes of the ‘White Helmets’ across Twitter and
Facebook accounts.”
The “regime’s chemical weapons attack on Ghouta” has of
course, been roundly disproved despite the best efforts of Western
propaganda. As Eric Draitser has written (4):
“What makes that incident significant, both politically and historically, is the fact that, despite the evidence of Syrian government involvement being non-existent, the Obama administration nearly began a war with Syria using Ghouta as the pretext.“As the months have passed however, scientific studies amassing an impressive body of evidence have shown that, not only were Washington’s claims of ‘certainty’ that Assad’s forces had used chemical weapons in their war with extremist fighters utterly baseless, but in fact the reality was quite the opposite – the rebels were the most likely culprits of the attack.”
The cynic might ponder that funding “media activists” and
the “The White Helmets” to possibly “actively (mis)report” is blatant
propaganda. As the propoganda master, Joseph Goebbels knew: Propaganda
is the art of persuasion – persuading others that your ‘side of the
story’ is correct – with mega money and resources thrown at the
“persuasion.”
The UK’s arguable illegal munificence also extends to: “ …
working with other international donors to establish and build up the
Free Syrian Police (FSP) a moderate police force in
opposition-controlled areas … “
Breathtaking. Another re-run of Iraq:
Disband the police, army, all structures of State – and
Iraq is the soul searing, haunting, admonishing ghost, mourning the
vibrant, cohesive, civil society (for all its complexities, as most
societies) it was prior to the embargo and Iraq Liberation Act (1998)
which stated that: “It should be the policy of the United States to
support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power
in Iraq…” and signed into law on 31st October 1998, by President Bill
Clinton.
As mentioned previously, there is now of course the Syria
Accountability and Liberation Act of 2010 (H.R. 1206.) Spot the
parallels.
“The White Helmets” have also benefitted from $23 million
from the US, according to State Department spokesman, Mark Toner (27th
April 2016) and €4 million from the government of the Netherlands. Last
week Germany announced increasing this year’s donation to €7 million.
Japan has also chipped in.
A great deal of money, it would seem, is being thrown at
insurgents and illegal immigrants in a sovereign country, awarding
themselves the title of Syrian Civil Defence. Yet they do not even have
an emergency telephone number. As Vanessa Beeley (5) has pointed out in
extensive writings on the subject, the real Syria Civil Defence was
established in 1953, is a Member of the International Civil Defence
Organisation whose partners include the UN Department of Humanitarian
Affairs – and as all national emergency services, they have a telephone
number: 113.
Among the myriad tasks the “White Helmets” claim to
undertake is: “The provision of medical services – including first aid –
at the point of injury.” Why then were they trained not by expert first
responders, paramedics, civil emergency operatives, but by a mercenary,
sorry “private contractor”?
According to Wikipedia: “Founder of Syria’s White Helmets,
James Le Mesurier is a British ‘security’ specialist and ‘ex’ British
military intelligence officer with an impressive track record in some of
the most dubious NATO intervention theatres including Bosnia and
Kosovo, as well as Iraq, Lebanon, and Palestine. Le Mesurier has also
been placed in a series of high-profile posts at the United Nations,
European Union, and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.”
Equally interesting is Le Mesurier’s own site (6):
“James has spent 20 years working in fragile states as a United Nations staff member, a consultant for private companies and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and as a British Army Officer. Much of his experience has involved delivering stabilisation activities through security sector and democratisation programmes. Since 2012, James has been working on the Syria crisis where he started the Syrian White Helmets programme in March 2013. In 2014, he founded Mayday Rescue, and is dedicated to strengthening local communities in countries that are entering, enduring or emerging from conflict. (Emphasis again added.)
“Democratisation programmes” eh? George Orwell’s “Nineteen
Eighty-four” had a “Re-education Committee”, but let’s not get too
carried away.
On Tuesday 11 October 2016, the UK’s arguably combative Andrew Mitchell MP,
ex-Royal Tank Regiment, who allegedly called Downing Street Police
after an altercation “f ***** g plebs”, was granted an emergency
three-hour debate in the House of Commons on Syria after allegations by
the ‘White Helmets’ that Russian military jets and Syrian helicopters
were bombing civilians in eastern Aleppo.
Mitchell stormed the debate all guns blazing, calling the
alleged situation “akin to the attack on Guernica during the Spanish
civil war” and suggesting the RAF should be empowered to shoot down
Russian and Syrian aircraft. He also pushed for a “no fly zone.” As is
known from Libya, that is a Western-only fly zone obliterating all in
its sights. Guernica indeed.
Again of course, all but Russian and Syrian aircraft are
there illegally, but Andrew Mitchell is being advised among others by
former CIA Director General David Petraeus, who was also former
Commander of US Forces in Afghanistan and of Multinational Forces in
Iraq. Not really a mini think tank, some might speculate, where the rule
of law is going to have highest priority.
Mitchell also called for extra funding for – you guessed it – “The White Helmets.”
Incidentally, there are rigid protocols for first
responders, paramount among which is to protect the injured, the
traumatized, from publicity and identification, in their vulnerability.
“The White Helmets” are seemingly never without camera
crews handy recording a small body, face facing the camera, dust
covered, blood spattered, clothes awry, in the arms of the “rescuer.”
“Lights, camera, action”? Heaven forbid.
Notes
The original source of this article is Global Research
Copyright © Felicity Arbuthnot, Global Research, 2016
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