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An Air Force airman who was recently stationed at Tower 22 tells The Intercept there’s much more to the base than managing supplies

The United States government would have you believe the military base in Jordan where three soldiers were killed in a drone strike is a mere “logistics support base.” In truth, the facility also serves as a base for US drones used to conduct reconnaissance and target identification in Syria and Iraq, according to a report from The Intercept‘s Ken Klippenstein. 

The base in Jordan, which is called Tower 22, is positioned just six miles from the Syrian border, and close to the Al-Tanf base where US servicemembers are based inside Syria. After a Jan. 28 drone attack on Tower 22 killed three soldiers and wounded dozens more, US Central Command described the facility as a “logistics support base” housing some 350 Army and Air Force personnel. 

However, an Air Force airman who was recently stationed at Tower 22 tells The Intercept there’s much more to the base than managing supplies:

“To call Tower 22 a logistics support base is complete bullshit. The main purpose of Tower 22 is to operate drones to spy on insurgents in Iraq and Syria, for targeting purposes. The main objective I witnessed was taking out targets.”

According to the airman, intelligence collected in Tower 22’s drone operations is used by USAF units at other bases, including Jordan’s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, to carry out airstrikes in the region. 

CENTCOM says the base is used to give “support to the coalition for the lasting defeat of ISIS.” The claimed ISIS mission is central to the legal justification for the continued US military presence in Syria, which relies on an expansive interpretation of Congress’s 2001 authorization to use military force (AUMF) against terrorists and others who facilitated the 9/11 attacks.  

However, that’s all a pretense: The principal purpose of US operations in Iraq and Syria is to limit Iranian influence in the region, to include countering Iranian-allied militant groups, while also weakening the Syrian government by depriving it of access to its own oil fields. 

“Whatever they’re doing there, there’s very little evidence that it’s counter-ISIS,” State Department veteran and International Crisis Group senior adviser Brian Finucane tells The Intercept. “The counter-ISIS mission is the only legal basis there is for the U.S. to be there. There’s no legal basis to have U.S. troops in Syria to be countering Iran.”

In December, the Senate overwhelmingly rejected a bill proposed by Sen. Rand Paul that would have asserted that the 2001 AUMF does not apply to Syria. Said Paul at the time: 

“It seems to me, though our 900 troops have no viable mission in Syria, that they’re sitting ducks. They’re a tripwire to a larger war, and without a clear-cut mission, I don’t think they can adequately defend themselves, yet they remain in Syria.”

While Tower 22 is just across the border from Syria, Paul’s words proved all too prescient for those killed and wounded at the base on Jan. 28. In an earlier Intercept report, an airman previously stationed at the base — perhaps the same one quoted in the latest story — said, “The air defenses were minimal, if any…We had a radar system called TPS-75 that was broken 80 percent of the time I was there.”

The sitting ducks at Tower 22 paid a steep price for their decision to enlist, and for their government’s unrelenting support of Israel, to include the ongoing, massively destructive campaign in Gaza. When claiming responsibility for the attack on Tower 22, a senior official in a coalition of Iraqi militias said, “As we said before, if the U.S. keeps supporting Israel, there will [be] escalations. All the U.S. interests in the region are legitimate targets, and we don’t care about U.S. threats to respond.”

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Someone tossed fireworks inside the vehicle

A Waymo self-driving car was targeted and deliberately set ablaze by a group of people in San Francisco’s Chinatown on Saturday evening. This incident is part of a rising trend of hostility towards autonomous vehicles, highlighted by an individual late last year on X: “The AI crusades have begun.“

Local media outlet NBC Bay Area reports the self-driving Jaguar was traveling on Jackson Street, between Stockton and Grant, around 2100 local time when 10 to 15 people attacked it. 

Videos on X show a group of people vandalizing the self-driving car. 

Then someone tossed fireworks inside the vehicle, and that’s when the fireworks show began. 

“We are working closely with local safety officials to respond to the situation,” Waymo said in a statement to The San Francisco Standard. The startup added that the car was not transporting any passengers at the time of the incident. 

This comes after a string of attacks on self-driving cars across the progressive crime-ridden metro area.

Back in July, we pointed out that members of Safe Street Rebels, a group that says these cars are “polluting, dangerous & murderous,” were coning driverless cars across the city. 

Why would people be fighting against the machines? As Goldman recently explained, “AI Will Lead To 300 Million Layoffs In The US And Europe.”

As one X user said last year, “The AI crusades have begun.” 

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Global borrowing topped a record $300 trillion last year

Major economies that fail to address their mounting debt issues will die a “fiscal death,” the head of investment and wealth advisory Laffer Tengler Investments, Arthur Laffer, has warned.

In an interview with CNBC this week, he predicted a “decade of debt,” adding that the borrowing crisis has embraced both developed and emerging countries, and it is not going to “end well.”

Global debt has surged by $100 trillion from a decade ago and hit a record of $307.4 trillion last September, amid the biggest surge in global interest rates in 40 years, according to the economist. 

Wealthy countries such as the US, UK, France, and Japan account for more than 80% of that increase due to their uncontrolled accumulation of debt. China, India, and Brazil saw the most pronounced growth of borrowings among emerging markets.

“I would expect that some of the bigger countries that don’t address their debt issues will die a slow fiscal death,” Laffer said, adding that some emerging economies “could quite conceivably go bankrupt.” While low-income countries are at high risk of debt distress, repaying debt would be particularly problematic for high-income countries due to an aging population and a lack of workforce, the economist warned.

The most recent report by the Institute of International Finance shows that the share of debt has hit a staggering 336% of global GDP compared to an average debt-to-GDP ratio of 110% in 2012 for advanced economies, and 35% for emerging markets.

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30 Years of Russia Seeking Peace with the West

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“Putin, like Trump, is anathema to Davos globalists, but I think he warmed the hearts of silent patriots in many nations who deeply distrust unregulated, global bureaucracies that seem mostly to protect corrupt billionaires, some of whom promoting manifestly crazy policies.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin, like Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, is “anathema to Davos globalists”, Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel told Sputnik, stressing that the timing of Putin-Carlson interview was perfect.

Tucker Carlson‘s interview with Vladimir Putin has attracted over 190 million views on X (formerly Twitter) as of February 11.

“I think it was fortunate that the interview occurred well before the heart of the primary season so that voters got a fair chance to see the interaction for themselves in a long format forum that was, fortunately, not interrupted by pesky commercials,” Charles Ortel, a Wall Street analyst and investigative journalist, told Sputnik.

“My guess is that getting on Putin’s calendar for such a long interview was a challenge, so I imagine it suited both parties to have this video out well in advance of the nominating convention for Democrats and of the general election. It would be great to have one or even more follow-ups in coming months,” he added.

“I also think the contrast between Putin’s measured and thoughtful perspectives, having been a world leader for a quarter century with the lack of gravitas — to put it politely of Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and many others in both parties who are surface-level, donor-captured, soundbite specialists was stunning. This contrast was remarkable considering Biden’s post-interview meltdown before what remains of the ‘press’,” Ortel continued.

The Wall Street analyst noted that judging from viewership statistics, the corporate — and political donor-controlled — media is destroying itself.

He stressed that “no political interview has garnered nearly as much coverage as Putin’s recent sit down with Tucker,” adding that he expects “it will, in the end, change the thinking of most open minds.”

Clinton Family Had Reasons to Fear Putin Interview

Prior to the historic interview, US corporate media pundits and Democratic political figures urged Americans to ignore Carlson’s show. Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton called Tucker a “useful idiot”, claiming that the US journalist “parrots Vladimir Putin’s pack of lies about Ukraine.”

Clinton’s remarks before the interview echoed those of Soviet-era apparatchiks who said of Nobel Prize-winning novel Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak: “I haven’t read Pasternak, but I condemn him.”

“Hillary Clinton’s star set long ago while Tucker Carlson is, today, one of the most followed and fair-minded voices on earth,” Ortel said, commenting on Clinton’s rant. “Certainly, the Clinton family has much to fear as 5 November 2024 looms.”

The Wall Street analyst, who has carried out a private investigation into allegations of fraud by the Clinton Foundation over several years, noted that “there are serious unanswered questions over how much foreign government and oligarch money may have funded Hillary’s political campaigns in 2005-6, 2007-8, and 2015-16, including donations from Ukraine’s [oligarch] Victor Pinchuk and his wife.”

He added that there are also “reasonable concerns as in the case of the Bidens, that the Clinton family exploited their offices to enrich themselves for decades, illegally.”

“Hillary Clinton will not be remembered well in history,” Ortel said. “She coasted into national politics, at first, in sympathy over the Lewinsky affair as she had no actual ties to my home state of New York. As Senator, she promoted foreign adventurism in Afghanistan and Iraq that clearly failed. Meanwhile her husband advanced a boldly crooked set of scam charities we have previously covered that bilked governments and other donors of billions of dollars, for which there has never been honest accounting.”

“For a generation, globalists have protected and promoted power couples like the Clintons, especially media barons. With the rise of X and evident chronic failures of unchecked globalist schemes, many malefactors including the Clintons have much to fear as Trump surges towards potential re-election and then a necessary retribution and restoration of law and order under our Constitution,” the investigative journalist pointed out.

US Deep State Withheld Key Facts About Ukraine Conflict

Ortel argued that Putin’s history lesson to Carlson, tracing the causes of the Ukrainian conflict from the very start, was an excellent choice given that most Americans simply do not know much about Russia’s history and development.

“Leaving aside the early centuries but starting in 1654, when Russia had already a long history, America did not even exist then and most colonial experiments had been dismal failures,” the Wall Street analyst stated. “Even so, until Biden, American presidents jealously tried to defend our national borders and interests so it is entirely reasonable for Russia to do so at any time but certainly from 1992 forward.”

When the Ukraine conflict erupted, the Biden administration and the compliant US media sold Americans a “riskless, noble cause in supporting Zelensky,” Ortel noted. However, key facts about the conflict were purposefully withheld by the Deep State, he stressed.

These key facts included, in particular, the February 2014 coup d’etat, American interference in the 2014 Ukraine election, corruption of the Biden family — and others — by Ukraine oligarchs, the role of neo-Nazis and the massive pilfering of aid to a leadership that certainly is not “democratic,” “peaceful,” or freedom-loving, according to Ortel.

“Putin, like Trump, is anathema to Davos globalists, but I think he warmed the hearts of silent patriots in many nations who deeply distrust unregulated, global bureaucracies that seem mostly to protect corrupt billionaires, some of whom promoting manifestly crazy policies,” the Wall Street analyst said.

Even though Russia has been painted by the American mainstream press as a dread enemy of the US, “the American heartland and the Russian people likely share much in common and might benefit greatly from clear interaction, which sanctions certainly impede,” he highlighted.

“Perhaps one simple answer explains much – American and British defense contractors need an enemy to promote arms sales and Russia is their preferred designee. Remember, defense contractors are among the most important contributors directly and indirectly to politicians,” Ortel said. “Overall, one consequence of the interview is that Putin came across as a thoughtful and reasonable defender of Russian interests who, in my opinion, may have been too patient with US-UK aggression since 1992.”

Biden’s Inflicting Damage on US Economy, Security & Global Standing

During the interview with Carlson Vladimir Putin wondered as to why the Biden administration is inflicting damage on the American economy, security and global standing.

Ortel said those serious questions must be answered.

“Uncertainty is a great enemy in the important process of long-term investing. The Biden ‘Administration’ daily makes mockery of domestic and international law. These ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ cannot simply be washed away in the 2024 election with a Trump landslide. Indeed, there must be a full accounting for corruption that courses through the American system and many of our NATO allies,” the analyst believes.

Ortel assumed that the Obama-Biden “war on capitalism” that began in January 2009 is “chiefly responsible for destroying legitimate aspirations of private sector workers and their families who simply wish to sell competitive products and services to the world from American platforms.”

“The bi-partisan addiction to deficit-spending and debt is crippling this and future generations of Americans,” he said. “But the worst damage wrought by Biden is that many now correctly question who his master may be and even whether he and his family actually serve America’s interests.”

Still, one area where Ortel disagreed with Vladimir Putin was on the subject of China’s economic growth. The Wall Street analyst believes that China’s economy is groaning under too much real and shadow debt, and he questions whether capital investments seen in gross domestic product (GDP) accounts are profit-making.

Meanwhile, after the 2024 election, “America should think much more carefully about our budget and capabilities for foreign entanglements because, in truth, we have pressing internal issues to address concerning our bloated, counterproductive domestic bureaucracies,” he pointed out.

Americans and Russians are talented and laborious people who could work out solutions which would be beneficial not only for their respective nations, but for the whole world, according to the analyst.

“On major issues particularly in math, science and engineering, I believe the best Russian and American minds might make major breakthroughs. In the near future too, I hope our people may connect directly, bypassing the corrupt vested interests here in America,” Ortel concluded.

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30 Years of Russia Seeking Peace with the West

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A poll conducted by ABC News has found that a whopping 86 percent of Americans feel that Joe Biden is not mentally fit to run the country. The poll was carried out Saturday, after the […]

The post ABC News: ‘90% of Americans Think Joe Biden Has Dementia’ appeared first on The People’s Voice.