The hysterical, mostly anti-semitic, allegations against Israel of ‘war crimes’, with their disturbing overtones of the 1930s, over the perfectly proper counter-terrorist operation in Gaza, reveal a grotesque misapprehension of the Law of War. It is NOT a war crime to kill civilians in the course of conducting combat operations.
Those accusing Israel of war crimes are not only legally illiterate, but historically illiterate as well. Sadly, the majority of deaths in the majority of wars in recorded human history have been civilians. If you include the German Spanish Flu WMD campaign from 1918 to 1920 (it should really have been called ‘Hun Flu’), which murdered upwards of 30 million people, the overwhelming majority of fatalities in World War I were civilian, including as it happens three of my great-uncles.
It IS a war crime to deliberately rape or murder a civilian. The ‘Hun’s’ Spanish Flu campaign was undoubtedly a war crime. It is not a war crime if the civilian casualties are collateral, as they were in Gaza. Nor is it a war crime to attack a UN facility, if the UN has permitted that facility to be used by terrorists.
Readers of Spyhunter will not have been surprised by the IDF attacks on UN facilities. I predicted there would be more, and I was right. The UN is not neutral in the Global War on Terror. The organisation has made its terrorist sympathies quite clear. UN buildings and personnel involved in terrorist activities, whether directly or as criminal accessories, are therefore a legitimate target.
______________________________
John Foster Dulles
The UN’s criminal support for Hamas is consistent with the organisation’s disgraceful history. Its charter was drawn up by the notorious German (Abwehr, then DVD) spy, John Foster Dulles, who later supported fellow DVD operative Colonel Nasser’s aggression against the Anglo-French Suez Canal. The UN backed the ridiculous 1953 ceasefire in Korea, with the result that half the country still labors under a brutal totalitarian dictatorship.
Not content with supporting war crimes, the UN put an actual war criminal, Kurt Waldheim, formerly of the SD, in charge in 1972. As I point out in Spyhunter Waldheim was not made Secretary-General of the UN in ignorance of the fact that he was a German war criminal, but because of it. Upset at the release of the hostages and the deaths of DVD-backed Palestinian terrorists, unsurprisingly Waldheim supported fellow war criminal Idi Amin over the brilliant Entebbe Raid. He really was a piece of work.
In Rwanda the UN’s so-called peacekeepers ran away and left helpless woman and children to die. The ‘peacekeepers’ were acting in accordance with orders from UN HQ New York, which was fully supportive of the Hutu genocide.
UN support for Hamas is the last straw. The civilised, Judeo-Christian powers, including Israel, Russia, the UK and the US, should withdraw from the UN en masse.
______________________________
The ICJ and ICC
The same goes for the pointless International Court of Justice, which became a joke in legal circles after its biased decision against Israel over ‘The Wall’ (2004, No 131). That was a political, rather than a legal, ruling, which brought the court into disrepute. Again as revealed in Spyhunter, the international jurist Sir Hersch Lauterpacht, formerly an ICJ judge no less, was a German agent.
The International Criminal Court is another international legal farce. Like the ICJ it has revealed itself to be obsolete in the Global War on Terror. The appalling murder of James Foley was not just an indictment of Isil and militant Islam generally, but of the entire postwar international system.
The 1945 settlement has brought war and instability, not peace and security. It has failed utterly. It is time that the UN, ICJ and ICC paid the institutional price for this failure.
______________________________
The Foley Murder
I entirely agree with those who have said that the video of poor James Foley’s decapitation was staged. Clearly it was. The issue however is not whether the video was staged, but whether Isil murdered James Foley. Equally clearly, they did. So far as I am aware, all Western intelligence agencies accept the image of his decapitated body as genuine.
Manifestly he was murdered by ISIL, which has claimed responsibility. The French claim that Isil is run by Mossad need not be taken seriously.
_____________________________
Sgt Blackman RM
I did say that I would return to Sgt Blackman’s case, but there has been a development. I was approached, purportedly on his behalf, and asked if I would represent him pro bono.
I have confirmed my willingness to do so with his solicitors, but it is entirely a matter for him and them whether I am instructed.
Since there is a possibility that I might act as counsel (I put it no higher than that), I shall not be commenting further on the case. The gag on barristers commenting on a case kicks in at the point where there is a realistic possibility that they might be involved in it professionally.
_____________________________
Marine Brandon Raub
Since I am not licensed to practise law in the Commonwealth of Virginia there is no reason at all for me not to comment on this disturbing case! As some readers may know Marine Raub was seized from his home in VA in August 2012, on the specious pretext that he was mentally ill. Oddly enough the arresting officer decided to collapse, having heard Marine Raub’s conspiracy theory about 9-11.
Marine Raub’s political opinions largely lack factual foundation, but you could say the same of most Democrats and Liberal Democrats, and all believers in man-made global warming. If having an irrational political opinion not supported by the facts were grounds for detention, the asylums would be full of politicians and mainstream journalists!
This was clearly political psychiatry, i.e. alleging insanity as a pretext for locking up someone with whose opinions you disagree. I may disagree with Marine Raub’s opinions, whilst respecting his service to his country, but I defend to the death his right to hold them. I have read the impressive appellate brief filed on his behalf by the Rutherford Foundation and respectfully agree with it.
________________________________
Douglas Carswell’s Defection to UKIP
The big political news in Britain this week was Doug Carswell MP’s defection to UKIP. This was only a surprise to any one who had not read Spyhunter, where I point out the extent of German influence on the Cabinet Office. Many Tory MPs labour under the delusion that the Prime Minister is in charge of the government.
This is obvious nonsense. David Cameron is only a figurehead. British policy and the makeup of the government are largely determined by the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Jeremy Heywood. Since he is totally opposed to EU withdrawal it follows that the Coalition Government is.
My understanding is that David Cameron has privately agreed with Sir Jeremy that he will resign in spring 2017, after the EU renegotiation fails. A Tory leadership contest, in which Cameron would support George Osborne, has been pencilled in for May 2017. Osborne has been careful to disassociate himself from the referendum promise, which is not binding on the Tory Party, only David Cameron.
Doug Carswell understands this, as do UKIP (I supplied a copy of Spyhunter to Nigel Farage, the charming UKIP leader). Realising, obviously, that the referendum pledge is a phoney, he became, briefly, UKIP’s only MP. Admirably, he then resigned his seat and will contest the resulting by-election in Clacton on behalf of UKIP.
Cameron’s position is now in jeopardy, as word of his betrayal spreads throughout the Tory Right. Only the tactically illiterate (with respect) Bill Cash MP is likely to continue supporting the government. Bill, a nice chap, has bought into the referendum pledge hook, line and sinker. The trouble is that Bill is a gentleman, if I may say so, and has trouble when dealing with people who are not, like David Cameron, whose trade (you could scarcely call it a profession) is public relations, i.e. spin.
The next step, ideally, will be Cameron’s removal during the forthcoming party conference, which, boringly, is being held in Birmingham, at the end of next month (it should be by the seaside). The Tory Party could then cut a deal with UKIP and pull the rug from under the Coalition. The General Election could be held at the end of October or early in November.
Some of you may have noticed that the Attorney-General who failed to stop the malicious prosecution of me over Operation Vulcan, Dominic Grieve, has been sacked, as were the DPP and the D-G of MI5 before him. The then D-G of ‘Box’, Jonathan Evans, backed my arrest, and the then DPP, Keir Starmer QC, named for the German spy Keir Hardie, sanctioned my prosecution. Some of you might think that these departures are not entirely coincidental. I couldn’t possibly comment.
_____________________________
Response to Jonas Alexis
Conditions in Gaza are undoubtedly pretty grim, but that is a consequence of the entirely lawful blockade, which is a perfectly proper and proportionate response to the mounting of terrorist attacks on Israel from the enclave. Stop the attacks and the blockade will be lifted.
The bombing of Dresden was not only deliberate, it was a carefully planned and superbly executed military operation. It was a lovely bit of bombing, with nice grouping, good target marking, an outstanding performance from the Master Bomber, accurate navigation and fine flying. You couldn’t ask for a better series of raids, given the technology of the day, unless you were a ‘Jerry’ living in Dresden of course.
Jonas’s comments, with respect, lacked intellectual rigor. I did not suggest that the bombing of Dresden was accidental, as though the RAF and USAAF were really aiming at Munich and bombed Dresden by mistake. What I suggested is that it was a perfectly proper and lawful military operation, conducted against a legitimate strategic target. By early 1945, Dresden was the fourth largest center of armaments production in Nazi Germany. It also lay athwart the Red Army’s line of advance, and was an important communications node.
The tasking request actually came from Russian General Andropov, a nice man by all accounts, who also wanted the western allies to whack Chemnitz and Leipzig, and rightly so. The Left, which proclaims itself as anti-fascist, has tended over the years to buy into the hysterical casualty figures produced by the Nazis, who also of course believed in man-made global warming, claimed that Auschwitz was just a labor camp and that Hitler was a military genius.
Frederick Taylor, whose book Dresden is the most balanced account of the raids (the BBC asked me to review it), estimates that only about 25,000 died. Even that figure, in my opinion, is about 50% too high. As I point out in Spyhunter ‘Jerry’ failed to produce casualty lists, i.e. the figures are estimates, and are in no way based on a proper casualty list.
Left wing and pro-German critics tend to assume that all those who died were civilians. Leaving out the fact that civilians who were part of the Nazi war machine, i.e. war workers, were a legitimate target, the argument is obvious nonsense. Many of the fatalities would have been of military or auxiliary personnel, government officials, Gestapo officers, etc.
I would have thought a ratio of 50% collaterals was about right, well within acceptable limits for the conduct of military operations. Of course the deaths were sad, and these comments may sound heartless to those ignorant of the realities of strategic air power, but World War II was pretty cruel. If the Germans could not take the casualties they should not have started the war. There it is.
In a leap, but not of logic, with respect, I am then accused of supporting the mass rape of German women and girls by the Soviet occupation forces. Frankly, I have no idea where that notion comes from. I condemn the use of sexual violence in war.
However the Russians believe in reciprocity. They were only doing to German women what their brutal menfolk had done to Russian women. I have no doubt at all that the rape policy would not have been adopted had the Germans behaved in a proper military fashion when occupying Russia. What goes around tends to come around, I’m afraid. If your troops behave with brutality, and you go on to lose the war, you cannot be heard to complain too loudly if your own people are brutalised. The answer, surely, is not to be brutal in the first place.
There is not much point with respect Jonas arguing that Mao and Stalin were pretty nasty in their own right. Yes they were, but since each was a German (Abwehr/DVD) asset, it scarcely undermines my point about historic German nastiness.
I don’t use footnotes in my columns, as they are intelligence columns, not dull academic treatises. I try not to do dull. If it’s of any comfort to Jonas, Spyhunter is fully annotated. If Naval History publish the article I’ve just submitted on the history of naval intelligence, you will see a different style of writing. I try to entertain as well as inform.
And yes, in World War II the Allies were the Good Guys and the Germans and Japanese were the Bad Guys. The Italians, as usual, were on both sides. If Jonas thinks that the Axis were the Good Guys, perhaps he could consider shortening his surname by a couple of letters, no offense intended?
_________________________________
Classic Movie of the Week – Thunderball (1965), dir. Terence Young
Rik van Nutter as Felix Leiter
This is my second favorite Bond. It really is a cracking intelligence thriller. More than that, it, and the book on which it was based, of the same name, make a serious intelligence point: nuclear weapons are vulnerable to theft by highly sophisticated organizations. Ian Fleming modeled his fictional SPECTRE on the DVD of course.
The first theft of nuclear material on a large scale came with the B-52G which was forced to ditch warming up SRAM nuclear munitions off the coast of Somalia in the Gulf War. The first nuclear weapons were stolen by the DVD not long after – that was the batch of three ARMSCOR type weapons, which ended up firstly in Iraq, then in North Korea, which detonated them. Then we had the sabotage of the Kursk in 2000.
Because I have been involved in the tracking of some of these missing devices, I have some fellow feeling for Bond and Leiter, as they race against time to save a couple of Western cities. Life sometimes does imitate art, but in this case art was imitating life to begin with.
The flying scenes, involving an Avro Vulcan, are quite well done. The special effects (the ditching, e.g.) look dated to our eyes, but were no doubt pretty good by the standards of 50 years ago. In the book of course Ian Fleming uses a fictional type of bomber, which turns south before entering Canadian radar coverage.
Rik Van Nutter is quite a good Leiter, although he never reprised the role. Dear old Desmond Llewellyn was really starting to enjoy the role of ‘Q’ by now. Once again, the supporting cast was superb. Special mention should be made of Leonard Sachs as a Group Captain, and Edward Underdown as the Air Vice-Marshal. He was reputedly Ian Fleming’s first choice for the role of OO7 and you can see why. As an Air Vice-Marshal he was straight out of central casting, indeed viewers could have been forgiven for thinking that the RAF had lent Eon Productions a real AirVice-Marshal.
The plot moves quickly and is quite credible, if you’ve ever tried to hunt down a stolen nuclear warhead. The use of the Fulton Recovery System (used on a Boeing PB), originally developed for the CIA, at a time when it was being rumored in the Intelligence Community that it had been used in taking off two of the shooters of President Kennedy from a facility in the Gulf, is particularly interesting. There is no mention of a Fulton Surface to Air Recovery System in the book, which was published in 1961, nearly a decade after it was developed.
August 31st 2014
Spyhunter
Michael Shrimpton is a barrister, called to the Bar in London 1983. He is a specialist in National Security and Constitutional Law, Strategic Intelligence and Counterterrorism.
Michael was formerly an Adjunct Professor of Intelligence Studies in what was then the Department of National Security, Intelligence and Space Studies at the American Military University.
Michael’s ground-breaking, 700 page intelligence text “Spyhunter: The Secret History of German Intelligence” was published in England by June Press on April 14th 2014.
Michael Shrimpton was a barrister from his call to the Bar in London in 1983 until being disbarred in 2019 over a fraudulently obtained conviction. He is a specialist in National Security and Constitutional Law, Strategic Intelligence and Counter-terrorism. He is a former Adjunct Professor of Intelligence Studies at the American Military University.
We See The World From All Sides and Want YOU To Be Fully Informed
In fact, intentional disinformation is a disgraceful scourge in media today. So to assuage any possible errant incorrect information posted herein, we strongly encourage you to seek corroboration from other non-VT sources before forming an educated opinion.
Due to the nature of uncensored content posted by VT's fully independent international writers, VT cannot guarantee absolute validity. All content is owned by the author exclusively. Expressed opinions are NOT necessarily the views of VT, other authors, affiliates, advertisers, sponsors, partners, or technicians. Some content may be satirical in nature. All images are the full responsibility of the article author and NOT VT.
