Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

When referring to the Suharto regime, the BBC deliberately ignored the dark side of the US’s and Britain’s role and their support of the brutal, murderous regime.  “ Yet today Indonesian politics is dominated by the same powerful, wealthy figures who prospered under Suharto.” “Indonesia has had just two directly elected presidents over a 20-year period, both of whom have been moderate, effective and popular, delivering steady economic growth.” It sounds the type of ‘democracy’ we want. After all, Indonesia is the largest ‘Muslim’ country, and that is the type of a ‘Muslim’ country we need to see. But no, “ Indonesia's democracy - the third largest in the world - appears to be in rude health.” We have heard this before: ‘India, the largest democracy in the world’. “ The Indonesian state - built up methodically by Suharto - has survived much. The violent upheavals of the late 1990s, rising jihadist terrorism in the early 2000s that many thought would unravel it, the experiment with d

Under the header “They mustn’t forget why they struck down Allende,” the magazine announced in October 1973 that: “The junta has been the victim of a campaign of organised hostility in the west as well as of its own mistakes”. The article continued: “Perhaps the imposition of martial law, the mass interrogations and the summary execution of snipers would not have aroused so much criticism if there were a clearer understanding of the events that precipitated the coup.” The magazines Latin American editor Robert Moss would go on to become a speechwriter for Margaret Thatcher, who  described  Pinochet as Britain’s “staunch, true friend” and praised the former dictator for having “brought democracy to Chile.” The Economist’s and Britain’s role in the coup of 1973 against Allende Related Liberalism at Large The World According to the Economist

“Telepneva and Williams both trace with regret the arc of movements that started off calling for freedom and self-determination but ended up running neocolonial or authoritarian regimes. Williams’s portrayal of Lumumba and Nkrumah is hagiographic at times, but she also offers an alternative story of national liberation, told from the perspective of ‘minor’ characters, including Thomas Kanza (Lumumba’s ambassador to the  UN ) and Nkrumah’s secretary, Erica Powell. What emerges from these testimonies is not a picture of tragedy, romance or against-the-odds heroism, but a sober assessment of the tough and sometimes impossible choices facing left-wing anti-colonial activists who were under pressure from foreign enemies and foreign allies alike. ‘For better or worse,’ Telepneva concludes, ‘the Africans in this story were agents of their own liberation,’ however brief it turned out to be.” Africa’s cold war

The CIA does not know (?)

‘Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe’

The perpetrators are not Muslims and the victims are Westerners or Ukrainians . Therefore, the story – like broader conflict in Congo – will not be ‘hyped’, followed everyday and religion blamed, for ‘our values’ have not been attacked. According to the BBC , “ War has ravaged the east of the country for the past 20 years. Five million people have died as a result of conflict. Related Africa's Leaky Giant

“Speaking to CNN yesterday, John Bolton — a national security adviser under Donald Trump, who also served under George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan — volunteered that he’d helped plan coups in other countries. He was drawing a distinction between what Trump had done on January 6, 2021, encouraging rioters to march on the Capitol, and his own portfolio. ‘As somebody who has helped plan coups d’état, not here, but you know, other places,’ he said, ‘it takes a lot of work and that’s not what [Trump] did. It was just stumbling around from one idea to another.’  The US  has a  long history  of  removing elected  politicians of which  it does  not  approve .” Latin American coups upgraded

A review of  Nazi Billionaires: The Dark History of Germany’s Wealthiest Dynasties  

“Even if I’m cut to pieces, the people won’t let your British lackey rule. You slaves!” The Times ran a series, likely drafted by the notorious academic spy Ann Lambton, describing the oil nationalisation crisis as a product of the faulty “Persian character", while “the horse-faced Oriental” Mosaddegh was a hysterical symptom of an old feudal order that couldn’t take responsibility for its own shortcomings. Can the prime minister, a seasoned politician three decades his senior, not see the British themselves are ruthless? That they are trying to starve the people into submission with sanctions? That they provoke the religious fundamentalists who shot him, leaving him with this shattered leg, forever leaning on a cane to just get across a room? In the service of US and British geopolitical interests

If only Assange had been Navalny

Afghanistan 1978-2021: A brief summary

A good summary. But did the lights stay on?

The US Never Interferes in Other Countries’ Elections? Related Joe, here is a book on the CIA website Killing Hope - US Military & CIA Interventions Since WWII

Written 6 years ago. Some of the things U.S. and its allies did or threatened to do to Iran

 Rereading Edward Said’s Orientalism after capitol riots

“We have driven Cuba inch by inch into alliance with the Soviet,’ Norman Mailer wrote, ‘as deliberately and insanely as a man setting out to cuckold himself.’ Castro never wanted to be beholden to the Soviets. He had downplayed the role of the local Communist Party (Partido Socialista Popular) in preparing the ground for his own revolution. But there were only so many options for a single-crop economy of seven million people ninety miles from the Florida coast.”  Fidel Castro and the Making of the 1960s

 Washington’s Bullets: A History of the CIA, Coups and Assassinations

It’s a good summary. You need a private or institutional subscription to read the whole article. 50 years ago Palestine captured a generation’s dream

30 years ago A revolution compromised

Some of this reminds me of how five or six years ago in a class of seven students in a UK elite university three of them (two Germans and one British) were in favour of a "benevolent dictator" (in the Arab context). The bloody horrors of Pinochet showed how capitalism will react when it's threatened