Trump Has Taken the Handcuffs off Our War Machine

By Oliver Stone, Oliver Stone's Facebook Page

21 April 17

o It Goes� I confess I really had hopes for some conscience from Trump about America�s wars, but I was wrong -- fooled again! -- as I had been by the early Reagan, and less so by Bush 43. Reagan found his mantra with the �evil empire� rhetoric against Russia, which almost kicked off a nuclear war in 1983 -- and Bush found his �us against the world� crusade at 9/11, in which of course we�re still mired.

It seems that Trump really has no �there� there, far less a conscience, as he�s taken off the handcuffs on our war machine and turned it over to his glorified Generals -- and he�s being praised for it by our �liberal� media who continue to play at war so recklessly. What a tortured bind we�re in. There are intelligent people in Washington/New York, but they�ve lost their minds as they�ve been stampeded into a Syrian-Russian groupthink, a consensus without asking -- �Who benefits from this latest gas attack?� Certainly neither Assad nor Putin. The only benefits go to the terrorists who initiated the action to stave off their military defeat. It was a desperate gamble, but it worked because the Western media immediately got behind it with crude propagandizing about murdered babies, etc. No real investigation or time for a UN chemical unit to establish what happened, much less find a motive. Why would Assad do something so stupid when he�s clearly winning the civil war? No, I believe America has decided somewhere, in the crises of the Trump administration, that we will get into this war at any cost, under any circumstances -- to, once again, change the secular regime in Syria, which has been, from the Bush era on, one of the top goals -- next to Iran -- of the neoconservatives. At the very least, we will cut out a chunk of northeastern Syria and call it a State.

Abetted by the Clintonites, they�ve done a wonderful job throwing America into chaos with probes into Russia�s alleged hacking of our election and Trump being their proxy candidate (now clearly disproved by his bombing attack) -- and sadly, worst of all in some ways, admitting no memory of the same false flag incident in 2013, for which again Assad was blamed (see Seymour Hersh�s fascinating deconstruction of this US propaganda, �London Review of Books� December 19, 2013, �Whose sarin?�). No memory, no history, no rules -- or rather �American rules.�

No, this isn�t an accident or a one-off affair. This is the State deliberately misinforming the public through its corporate media and leads us to believe, as Mike Whitney points out in his brilliant analyses, �Will Washington Risk WW3� and �Syria: Where the Rubber Meets the Road,� that something far more sinister waits in the background. Mike Whitney, Robert Parry, and former intelligence officer Phil Giraldi all comment below. It�s well worth 30 minutes of your time to read.

Lastly, I enclose Bruce Cumings�s �Nation� analysis of North Korea, as he again reminds us of the purposes of studying history. Can we wake up before it�s too late? I for one feel like the John Wayne veteran (of war) character in �Fort Apache,� riding with the arrogant Custer-like General (Henry Fonda) to his doom. My country, my country, my heart aches for thee.

Mike Whitney, �Will Washington Risk WW3 to Block and Emerging EU-Russia Superstate,� Counterpunch, http://bit.ly/2oJ9Tpn

Mike Whitney, �Where the Rubber Meets the Road,� Counterpunch, http://bit.ly/2p574zT

Phil Giraldi, �A World in Turmoil, Thank You Mr. Trump!� Information Clearing House, http://bit.ly/2oSCGrW

Robert Parry, �Did Al Qaeda Fool the White House Again?� Consortiumnews, http://bit.ly/2nN88c0

Robert Parry, �Neocons Have Trump on His Knees,� Consortiumnews, http://bit.ly/2oZ5GyN

Robert Parry, �Trump�s Wag the Dog Moment,� Consortiumnews, http://bit.ly/2okwZTE

Robert Parry, �Mainstream Media as Arbiters of Truth,� Consortiumnews, http://bit.ly/2oSDo8A

Mike Whitney, �Blood in the Water: the Trump Revolution Ends in a Whimper,� Counterpunch, http://bit.ly/2oSDEo4

Bruce Cumings, �This is What�s Really Behind North Korea�s Nuclear Provocations,� The Nation, http://bit.ly/2nUEroH