Clearly upset by the strengthening alliance of Russia and China, Iain Duncan Smith has taken to the pages of the Telegraph to lament the emergence of what he calls a “new axis of totalitarian states” supposedly posing a dire threat to the civilised world of the democratic west. Continue reading “Iain Duncan Smith’s ‘Axis of Totalitarianism’”
If you believe “we may be sleepwalking towards a global war” it’s time to wake up
Robert Tombs is a professor emeritus of history at the university of Cambridge and a contributor to mainstream newspapers such as The Telegraph, The Spectator and The Times. He is without doubt a high profile bourgeois historian and has therefore built a career on being an expert at repackaging bourgeois propaganda. His most recent article is no exception, published by The Telegraph on the 31st of December 2021, titled “Like in 1914 or 1939, we may be sleepwalking towards a global war that nothing can stop”.
Before we begin it’s worth noting that the subtitle “there are lessons from previous conflicts that could prevent another from starting” contradicts the title’s thesis that there is nothing that can stop the global war we are sleepwalking towards. The truth is Prof. Tombs does not intend to provide such lessons that might help avert the global war because his career is based upon doing the exact opposite, that is, helping us “sleepwalk” towards it. Continue reading “If you believe “we may be sleepwalking towards a global war” it’s time to wake up”
Who is the greatest threat to the British worker?
In its recent piece titled “The West’s allies are falling like dominoes”, The Telegraph tells us that our biggest threats today are Russia and China. Apparently, the greatest concerns of the head of MI6, Richard Moore, are “Beijing’s large-scale espionage activities in the UK,” its “pernicious influence”, and its “’debt and data traps’, as these “consolidate Chinese influence across the globe.” It also tells us that, according to Sir Nick Carter, the retiring head of Britain’s Armed Forces, Russia “was the most acute threat to our country”. And now Carter’s rhetoric is being echoed by the new head, Admiral Sir Tony Radikin. So, who should we believe is the most acute threat to the average British worker in terms of espionage and physical danger? Continue reading “Who is the greatest threat to the British worker?”
Still Searching For That Soviet ‘Holocaust’
The “Holodomor” is still being pushed by a collection of Anglo nations and Ukrainian ultra-nationalists and fascists. The origin of this legend stems from a famine which occurred in Ukraine and parts of Russia in 1932.
Throughout the 1930s rabid anti-communists and Nazi sympathisers would try to tie the famine to the fault of the Soviet government. This would rapidly evolve to accusations of genocide and a “planned starving of Ukraine by the Soviet government”.
Why the Soviet government would starve parts of Russia, Belarus and Eastern Ukraine to “suppress Ukrainian nationalism” was never explained by the adherents of these lies.
When it was originally pushed back in the 1930s it was done so by Nazi sympathisers like William Randolph Hearst who commanded the formidable ‘Hearst Press’ renowned for it’s “yellow journalism” (or “fake news”).
The Hearst Press faked photos and pretended their journalists had spent a year in Ukraine during that period.
In reality the journalist they sent went for two weeks and never left the Moscow area.
In Douglas Tottles book, Fraud, Famine and Fascism he examined the numerous faked photographs that were first through the Hearst Press and their organs then again in the 1980s alongside Robert Conquest’s book Harvest of Sorrow. Continue reading “Still Searching For That Soviet ‘Holocaust’”
The Bond Delusion
With a new instalment of the 007 franchise having finally been released after a lengthy covid imposed delay, the fictional spy character became the subject of headlines when it was announced that actor Daniel Craig would be stepping down from the role.
As fans agonised over whether the so called ‘woke’ trend in popular culture would result in the character being recast with a female or black actor in the role, a host of journalists were spurred to pen their own personal affirmations of affection for writer Ian Fleming’s suave, unflappable MI6 agent.
One such article, published in the Times on the 13th November and titled ‘How James Bond beat the Soviet Union’, loosely reviews a recent book by Fleming’s nephew James Fleming, Bond behind the Iron Curtain, which hones in on the role perceived to have been played by the 007 films and books in the ‘culture war’ between the imperialist and socialist camps during the cold war. Continue reading “The Bond Delusion”
A frenzy of NATO propaganda
We are at present being subjected to what can only be described as a campaign of intense anti-Russia activity and propaganda by the British government. War rhetoric is escalating at a frightening pace. On instruction from its US master Britain has announced the deployment of some 600 troops to the Ukraine-Russian border using the narrative of a likely imminent invasion of Ukraine by Russian forces.
Further north, British troops have joined the 15,000 Polish troops stationed along the Poland-Belarus border, where they are stopping refugees from crossing into Poland. NATO allies claim Belarus is trafficking in refugees and giving them access to Europe via the Polish border. This coordinated manoeuvring around Russia by NATO allies follows the provocation by Britain earlier in the year when it sent a British warship into Russian territorial waters in the Black Sea. Continue reading “A frenzy of NATO propaganda”
BBC’s flawed understanding of China’s history leads to confusion
In the first of a three-part look at ‘China’s changing role in the world’, the BBC’s China correspondent Stephen McDonnell looks at the CPC’s recent moves to tackle income disparity and intervene in social and cultural behaviour. But approaching these with the shallow misunderstandings of pre- and post-reform China typical of Western mainstream commentators, he is unable to answer the questions he sets himself.
The notion that the Cultural Revolution was a ‘disastrous quagmire’ out of which China needed to be dragged is one of these misunderstandings.
It is not hard to look at the data – none other than the Financial Times has laid out in no uncertain terms the progress that took place in Mao’s China: life expectancy nearly doubling, adult illiteracy falling from 80% to just 23%, and the achievement of gender equality in elementary education. Contrary to being a quagmire that China needed dragged from kicking and screaming, the FT states that “Without these, the rapid growth after the 1979 opening and reforms would not have been possible.” (Lessons from the first 70 years of the People’s Republic of China by David Daokui Li) Continue reading “BBC’s flawed understanding of China’s history leads to confusion”
Reclaiming history is a flawed fight without Marxism
Articles in the Sunday Telegraph and Daily Express on the 29th August introduce their readers to ‘History Reclaimed’, a group consisting of academic scholars who have set themselves the task of counteracting the current trend for removing references to, or revising drastically the way historical figures associated with slavery, colonialism and racism are presented in society.
The academics behind the organisation are attempting to push back at what they view as ideologically motivated, over zealous gestures that seek to blacken the names of important historical figures without regard to the context of the time they lived in. Continue reading “Reclaiming history is a flawed fight without Marxism”
Winds of time sweep away the rubbish heaped on Stalin’s grave
As we’ve previously reported before, Stalin’s popularity keeps rising in the territories of the former USSR with 48 percent of Russians supporting the idea of a monument to Joseph Stalin to mark the next anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory in World War II. By comparison, 20 percent of respondents oppose the idea and 29 percent are indifferent.(Meduza, Levada Center: Number of Russians in support of Stalin monument has doubled since 2010, August 4, 2021).
Continual support for commemorating the legacy of Stalin’s leadership amongst the Russian people has various sections of the corporate media, (who strive to meticulously curate journalistic narratives for the benefit of the ruling class) in hysterics.
This gave rise to a recent article in the Moscow Times – lamenting Stalin’s popularity within the Russian Federation specifically. (The Moscow Times, Why Is Stalin’s Popularity On the Rise?, July 23 2021) Continue reading “Winds of time sweep away the rubbish heaped on Stalin’s grave”
Soviet statues and the Superstitions of a Class in Terminal Decline
In the psyche of the modern imperialist mindset, there is often displayed a unique, often morbid fascination with Soviet era statues and monuments, especially when they can be found languishing in derelict or partly dismembered conditions. Writing in the Mail Online, Isabel Baldwin’s August 4th article “Spooky Stalins and Lonesome Lenins” covers a photo documentary exhibition currently being exhibited in Portland, Oregon, by American photographer Matthew Moore which perfectly encapsulates the superstitious and titillating nature of the bourgeois fixation with this theme. Continue reading “Soviet statues and the Superstitions of a Class in Terminal Decline”