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AMY GOODMAN: CNN is reporting the Trump administration has prepared an arrest warrant for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Attorney General Jeff Sessions confirmed the report at a news conference on Thursday.

REPORTER: Can you talk about whether its a priority for your department to arrest Assange, once and for all, and whether you think you can take him down?

ATTORNEY GENERAL JEFF SESSIONS: We are going to step up our effort and already are stepping up our efforts on all leaks. This is a matter thats gone beyond anything Im aware of. We have professionals that have been in the security business of the United States for many years that are shocked by the number of leaks. And some of them are quite serious. So, yes, it is a priority.

AMY GOODMAN: Last week, CIA chief Mike Pompeo blasted WikiLeaks as a, quote, "hostile intelligence service," in a stark reversal from his previous praise for the group. Pompeo made the remarks last week at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in his first public address as CIA director.

MIKE POMPEO: Its time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is: a nonstate, hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia. ... In reality, they champion nothing but their own celebrity. Their currency is clickbait, their moral compass nonexistent. Their mission, personal self-aggrandizement through destruction of Western values.

AMY GOODMAN: In his speech, Pompeo went on to accuse WikiLeaks of instructing Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning to steal information. He also likened Julian Assange to a "demon" and suggested Assange is not protected under the First Amendment. Its been nearly five years since Julian Assange entered the Ecuadorean Embassy in London seeking political asylum, fearing a Swedish arrest warrant could lead to his extradition to the United States.

For more, we go to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where were joined via Democracy Now! video stream by Glenn Greenwald, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and one of the founding editors of The Intercept. His recent piece is headlined "Trumps CIA Director Pompeo, Targeting WikiLeaks, Explicitly Threatens Speech and Press Freedoms."

Glenn, welcome back to Democracy Now! Your response to this latest news that the U.S. government, that the Justice Department, is preparing an arrest warrant for Julian Assange?

GLENN GREENWALD: Whats interesting is, the Justice Department under President Obama experimented with this idea for a long time. They impaneled a grand jury to criminally investigate WikiLeaks and Assange. They wanted to prosecute them for publishing the trove of documents back in 2011 relating to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, as well as the U.S. State Department diplomatic cables. And what they found, the Obama Justice Department found, was that it is impossible to prosecute WikiLeaks for publishing secret documents, without also prosecuting media organizations that regularly do the same thing. The New York Times, The Guardian, many other news organizations also published huge troves of the documents provided by Chelsea Manning. So it was too much of a threat to press freedom, even for the Obama administration, to try and create a theory under which WikiLeaks could be prosecuted.

Fast-forward five years later, theres been a lot more WikiLeaks leaks and publications, including some really recent ones of sensitive CIA documents, as well as having spent all of last year publishing documents about the Democratic National Committee, which means theyve made enemies not just of the right in America, but also the Democratic Party. And the Trump administration obviously believes that they can now safely, politically, prosecute WikiLeaks. And the danger, of course, is that this is an administration that has already said, the President himself has said, the U.S. media is the enemy of the American people. And this is a prosecution that would enable them not only to prosecute and imprison Julian Assange, but a whole variety of other journalists and media outlets that also routinely publish classified information from the U.S. government.

AMY GOODMAN: So lets go back to what CIA chief Mike Pompeo said in his first address as CIA director.

MIKE POMPEO: The days like today, where we call out those who grant a platform to these leakers and so-called transparency activists. We know the danger that Assange and his not-so-merry band of brothers pose to democracies around the world. Ignorance or misplaced idealism is no longer an acceptable excuse for lionizing these demons.

AMY GOODMAN: And CIA chief Mike Pompeo continued.

MIKE POMPEO: Julian Assange and his kind are not the slightest bit interested in improving civil liberties or enhancing personal freedom. They have pretended Americas First Amendment freedoms shield them from justice. They may have believed that, but theyre wrong. Assange is a narcissist who has created nothing of value. He relies on the dirty work of others to make himself famous. Hes a fraud, a coward hiding behind a screen.

AMY GOODMAN: Julian Assange responded to the comments earlier this week while speaking with Jeremy Scahill on the Intercepted podcast.

JULIAN ASSANGE: Pompeo said explicitly that he was going to redefine the legal parameters of the First Amendment to define publishers like WikiLeaks in such a manner that the First Amendment would not apply to them. What the hell is going on? This is the head of the largest intelligence service in the world, the intelligence service of the United States. He doesnt get to make proclamations on interpretation of the law. Thats a responsibility for the courts, its a responsibility for Congress, and perhaps its a responsibility for the attorney general. Its way out of line to usurp the roles of those entities that are formally engaged in defining the interpretations of the First Amendment. For anyfrankly, any other group to pronounce themselves, but for the head of the CIA to pronounce what the boundaries are of reporting and not reporting is a very disturbing precedent. This is not how the First Amendment works. Its justits just legally wrong.

The First Amendment is not a positive definition of rights. Its a negative definition. It limits what the federal government does. It doesnt say the federal government must give individuals rights and enforce that. It limits what the federal government can do to take away a certain climate of open debate in the United States. So, the First Amendment prevents Congress and the executive from engaging in actions themselves which would limit not only the ability of people to speak and to publish freely, but would also limit the ability of people to read and understand information, because it is that climate of public debate which creates a check on a centralized governmental structure from becoming authoritarian. Its a right, from that perspective, for all the people, not just the publisher.

AMY GOODMAN: So thats Julian Assange speaking on the Intercepted podcast. Glenn Greenwald, if you can respond to bothboth Julian as well as the CIA director, Pompeo, and what hes alleging?

GLENN GREENWALD: I think the key point here to understand is the way in which governments typically try and abridge core freedoms, because what they know is that if they target a group that is popular or a particular idea that people agree with, there will be an uprising against the attempt to abridge freedom. So what they always do, for example, when governments try and abridge freedom of speech, is they pick somebody who they know is hated in society or who expresses an idea that most people find repellent, and they try and abridge freedom of speech in that case, so that most people will let their hatred for the person being targeted override the principle involved, and they will sanction or at least acquiesce to the attack on freedom because they hate the person being attacked. But what happens is, the abridgment then gets institutionalized and entrenched. And that way, when the government goes to start to apply this abridgment to other people that you like more, its too late, because youve acquiesced in the first instance. And thats why groups like the ACLU, when they want to defend civil liberties, are oftenso often defending the most marginalized and hated groups, like neo-Nazis or white supremacists or the KKK, because thats where the attacks happen.

This is what Mike Pompeo is strategizing to do now and what Jeff Sessions wants to do, as well, is they know WikiLeaks is hated on all sides of the political spectrum. The right has long hated WikiLeaks because of all the publications they did of Bush-era war crimes, and Democrats now despise WikiLeaks, probably more than anybody else that they hate, because of the role that Democrats believe WikiLeaks played in helping to defeat Hillary Clinton. And so, what Jeff Sessions is hoping, and probably with a good amount of validity, is that Democrats, who should be the resistance to these sorts of attacks, will actually cheer for the Trump administration while they prosecute WikiLeaks, because they hate WikiLeaks so much, and that U.S. media outlets, which also hate WikiLeaks, wont raise much of a fuss. And that way, this very dangerous precedent of allowing the CIA and the Trump Justice Department to decide who is and who is not a journalist, what types of journalism are protected by the First Amendment and what types arent, will be entrenched as precedent. And that way, the next time theres a leak that they hate in The New York Times or by NBC News, they will have this theory, that everybody signed on to, that said that the First Amendment doesnt apply to certain people if you publish documents that are sensitive enough, or if you work enough with certain sources before the publication, that youre deemed a collaborator. Thats what makes this moment so dangerous for core press freedoms.

AMY GOODMAN: Let me get your response to this other point that CIA chief Mike Pompeo made.

MIKE POMPEO: In January of this year, our Intelligence Committee determined that Russian military intelligence, the GRU, had used WikiLeaks to release data of U.S. victims that the GRU had obtained through cyber-operations against the Democratic National Committee.

AMY GOODMAN: Glenn Greenwald?

GLENN GREENWALD: Well, first of all, theres been no evidence, of course, presented by the U.S. government that thats actually true. Theyve stated that over and over, but theres been no evidence presented of it so far.

But lets assume for the sake of argument that theyre actually telling the truth, that the Trump CIA director is being honest and that thats really what happened. What does that mean in terms of WikiLeaks? Nobody suggests that WikiLeaks did the actual hacking. In this case, even if what theyre saying is true, it would mean that WikiLeaks received information from a sourcein this case, a foreign governmentand then published that information that every U.S. media outlet in the country deemed newsworthy, because they constantly reported on it. This is a very common practice, where U.S. media outlets receive information from sources, often foreign sources, including officials within foreign governments, and then publish or report on the information that theyve been provided. If you allow that process to be criminalized simply because WikiLeaks source in this particular case happened to be a foreign government or a foreign intelligence agency, you are, again, endangering press freedoms in a very substantial way, because that is something that media outlets do very often. Thats where they get their information from.

AMY GOODMAN: And lets turn to CIA Director Mike Pompeo talking about your news organization, that you co-founded, Glenn, The Intercept.

MIKE POMPEO: The Intercept, which has in the past gleefully reported unauthorized disclosures, accused WikiLeaks in late March of, quote, "stretching the facts" in its comments about the CIA. In the same article, The Intercept added that the documents, quote, "were not worth the concern WikiLeaks generated by its public comments."

AMY GOODMAN: Glenn Greenwald, your response?

GLENN GREENWALD: So that was an article written by one of our reporters assessing WikiLeakss journalism. We criticize the journalism of pretty much every media outlet. Weve certainly written far more scathing critiques of The New York Times and NBC News and The Washington Post when theyve published fake stories or when theyve done misleading and deceitful journalism. So the fact that weve been critical of some of WikiLeakss journalism, just as WikiLeaks has sometimes been critical of ours, doesnt justify turning them into felons and prosecuting them. If bad journalism or making poor journalistic choices can now justify having the Justice Department prosecute you, there will be no media organizations left. So, he was trolling there by citing one of our articles that was mildly critical of WikiLeakss journalism, but that obviously does not remotely justify prosecuting WikiLeaks for having published secret documents.

AMY GOODMAN: So, what happens right now? There is Julian Assange inside the Ecuadorean Embassy for almost five years now. What does it mean that there is an arrest warrant from him by the United Statesfor him?

GLENN GREENWALD: Well, thatsthats a really significant question, Amy. And when Mike Pompeo made his speech, the one that youve been playing, it was very deliberately threatening. He was saying things like "We are no longer going to allow them the space to publish this information. This ends now." And the question that you just raised is the towering one for me, which is, OK, so the U.S. government indicts WikiLeaks and issues an arrest warrant for Julian Assange. It doesnt change the fact that hes currently in the Ecuadorean Embassy, where he has received asylum. And remember, the reason the Ecuadorean government gave Julian Assange asylum in the first place was because they said they were worried that if he were extradited to Sweden, that that would then be used to send him to the United States, where he would be prosecuted for publishing information, for doing journalism. That was always what Ecuador was most worried about. So it seems very unlikely that Ecuador is going to voluntarily withdraw its asylum.

So then the question becomes: Do they have any plans to physically seize Julian by invading the Ecuadorean Embassy, something the U.K. government actually thought about doing early on? Do theyare they trying to do a deal with the new Ecuadorean government to provide them benefits, or threaten them, in exchange for handing Julian over and withdrawing the asylum? Or is this just theater? Is this just show? Is this just a way of the Trump administration showing that theyre trying to crack down on leaks? I dont think we know the answer to that question. But the asylum that Julian has should prevent the U.S. government from apprehending him, even if they do decide to go ahead and indict WikiLeaks.

AMY GOODMAN: Chelsea Manning is about to be released in May. The argument that hes making that Julian Assange solicited Manning, the information, your final comment, Glenn?

GLENN GREENWALD: So the Obama administration, when they were trying to prosecute WikiLeaks, thought about: How can we do this in a way that makes it so that were accusing them of more than just publishing? And they said, "Maybe we can find evidence that Julian actually participated with Chelsea Manning in the theft of this material." And ultimately, they found no evidence whatsoever to support that theory. Nonetheless, Mike Pompeo asserted that this was true, obviously in anticipation of trying to use this as a theory to say, "Were not prosecuting WikiLeaks for publishing. Were prosecuting them for collaborating or conspiring in the theft of this information." Theres been no evidence ever that the Obama administration found. And I seriously doubt the Trump administration has found evidence for that, as well, but they asserted it in order to say, "Were not prosecuting them for publishing."

AMY GOODMAN: Were going to leave it there, but, of course, were going to continue to follow this. Glenn, thanks so much for joining us.

GLENN GREENWALD: Thanks, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Glenn Greenwald, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, one of the founding editors of The Intercept.

When we come back, an explosive new investigation by Allan Nairn. Vice President Mike Pence has just left Indonesia. Well talk to the journalist. Stay with us.

See original here:
As U.S. Preps Arrest Warrant for Assange, Glenn Greenwald Says Prosecuting WikiLeaks Threatens Press Freedom for ... - Democracy Now!

Since MSNBCs Rachel Maddow is still preoccupied with the supposed influence of Russia on President Donald Trump and the American political process, we suggest that the publication of a new book called Communism for Kids by MIT Press is worthy of her attention. On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the 1917 Russian revolution, this book offers a glimpse into an uprising that was global in scope and which has not only destroyed the moral fiber of Russia, but has also done enormous damage to America.

The author of Communism for Kids, Bini Adamczak, writes that the Russian revolution instilled new hope, particularly in women and people who did not identify themselves within the hetero-normative paradigm. The destruction of the family, she writes, was the goal. With the revolution, the right to legal abortion, both sexes right to divorce, the decriminalization of adultery, and the annulment of the sodomy law (which had previously prohibited homosexuality) were implemented and enforced, she explains.

In Moscow, one could find international communes led by gay communists, she says. Drag kings could become legitimate members of the Red Army. Participants of the revolutionary debates decided upon the destruction of the family, demanded the legalization of incest, and advertised the practice [of] polygamy.

Queer communism is the battle cry of these modern Marxists, who label themselves Queer communists and identify with the origins of the Russian revolution.

Its doubtful that Maddow, despite her obsession with Russia, will turn to this fascinating topic, since she is one of the liberal medias open advocates of the homosexual lifestyle. She is a favorite of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA), which now calls itself the Association of LGBTQ Journalists.

On Thursday, in New York City, CNNs Don Lemon hosteda star-studded event for the NLGJA designed to raise tens of thousands of dollars for the organizations programs. More than 350 journalists, news executives, dignitaries and allies attend this event each year in what has become one of New York Citys must-attend media events, the advertisement for NLGJA says.

The corporate media sponsors include Comcast/NBC Universal, Fox News, ABC News, CNN, CBS News and the New York Post.

Despite the virtual integration of the corporate media and the gay rights movement here in the U.S., Communism for Kids author Bini Adamczak writes that more advances have to be made in the field of queer politics, using the strategies of Marxist revolution. Eventually, she says, modern reproduction technologies could be used to completely abolish the sexes.

Transgender liberation is the next major frontier. She notes that In her autobiographically inspired novel Stone Butch Blues, Leslie Feinberg grants readers a powerful insight into the connectedness of queer politics. Feinberg, a Marxist member of the Workers World Party, was identified as an anti-racist white, working-class, secular Jewish, transgender, lesbian, female, revolutionary communist. Her last words before she died were, Remember me as a revolutionary communist. Hasten the revolution!

Another prominent advocate of transgender liberation is Bradley/Chelsea Manning, the former U.S. Army analyst sentenced to prison for espionage for his/her collaboration in the release by WikiLeaks of thousands of top secret intelligence reports. Former President Obama commuted Mannings sentence, which was originally 35 years in prison for espionage, and he/she will now be released on May 17, after only seven years in prison. Manning was an open homosexual in the Army before deciding to become a woman.

WikiLeaks walks like a hostile intelligence service and talks like a hostile intelligence service, declared President Trumps new CIA director, Mike Pompeo. It has encouraged its followers to find jobs at CIA in order to obtain intelligence. It directed Chelsea Manning in her theft of specific secret information. And it overwhelmingly focuses on the United States, while seeking support from anti-democratic countries and organizations.

Yet Pompeo has not indicated whether the lax rules that are in place at the CIA and other intelligence agencies, permitting mentally disordered and confused transgender individuals to gain employment and get top secret security clearances, will be changed.

It is time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really isa non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia, Pompeo said. In January of this year, our Intelligence Community determined that Russian military intelligencethe GRUhad used WikiLeaks to release data of U.S. victims that the GRU had obtained through cyber operations against the Democratic National Committee. And the report also found that Russias primary propaganda outlet, RT, has actively collaborated with WikiLeaks.

In his article for AIM, CIA Funding and Recruiting LGBT, Alex Nitzberg wrote about how the CIA maintains its own employee organization called ANGLE, which stands for the Agency Network for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Officers and Allies. Last December 16, the CIA itself announced that ANGLE had received an award for promoting LGBT issues.

Obamas CIA Director John O. Brennan was quoted as saying, It is difficult to overstate how heartening this progress has been to me. Indeed, one of the highlights of my tenure has been seeing the LGBT community blossom under the leadership of ANGLE and its cadre of devoted alliesa group to which I proudly belong.

Brennan was also an ally of Muslim and pro-communist CIA employees. He personally voted communist before joining the agency in 1980.

The CIA has released a documentary ANGLE of Ascent, highlighting the key role CIA leaders have played in building inclusive environments and focusing on the cultural shift that occurred within the Agency since the signing of Executive Order 12968, which gave LGBT officers the right to obtain a security clearance and serve openly in the Federal Government.

The CIA exists to gather and assess intelligence in order to protect Americas national security, wrote Nitzberg. Americans must decide whether they believe the CIAs involvement in recruiting from and funding LGBT events serves to advance those objectives.

But Americans are not given the opportunity to pass judgement because they are kept in the dark by elements of the news media in bed with the homosexual and transgender movements. As part of this collusion, Pompeo will be encouraged to continue Brennans pro-LGBT policies at the CIA. He will be threatened with the charge of homophobia if he decides to return the CIA to its mission of protecting Americas secrets.

Dari Alexander, WNYW; Jason Bellini, The Wall Street Journal; Gio Benitez, ABC News; Dan Bowens, WNYW; Frank Bruni, The New York Times; Kenneth Craig, CBS News; John Bannon Dias, News 12; Willie Geist, MSNBC; Kendis Gibson, ABC News; Sunny Hostin, The View; Preston Konrad, celebrity stylist; Steve Lacy, WNYW; Brett Larson, FOX News Headlines 24/7; Kyle Marimon, Fresco News; Jared Max, FOX News Headlines 24/7; John Meyer, Fresco News; Michael Musto, OUT.com; Court Passant, CBS Corporation; Lydia Polgreen, The Huffington Post; Caroline Que, The New York Times; Gus Rosendale, WNBC; Carolyn Ryan, The New York Times; Michelangelo Signorile, SiriusXM; Baruch Shemtov, WNYW; Lauren Simonetti, FOX Business Network; Steve Sosna, NBC4; Joanna Stern, The Wall Street Journal; Joe Toohey, WNYW; Kris Van Cleave, CBS News; and Jana Winter, investigative reporter.

Excerpt from:
'Queer Communism' Finds its Voice - GOPUSA

By Sethumadhavan N

Communism seems to be the flavour of the season as far as Malayalam cinema is concerned. Recently we saw the release of Tom Emmattys Oru Mexican Aparatha (Tovino Thomas) and now we have Sidhartha Sivas Sakhavu (Nivin Pauly) as well. And theres Amal Neerads Comrade in America aka CIA (Dulquer Salmaan) that is due for release shortly. Whats common to all these films is not just that the communist background, its also that these films are being headlined by a popular leading man as well, that surely means that there is definitely an attempt to bring back the theme of communism in Malayalam films. And considering that it is now the LDF-led government in power back in Kerala, this seems to be more than just a casual coincidence. Sidhartha Siva who started off making award winning feature films turned to mainstream commercial films with Kochavva Paulo Ayappa Coelho last year. And with Nivin Pauly on board Sakhavu he has taken a big leap in his career as a filmmaker.

Nivin Pauly plays two different characters, Krishna Kumar and Sakhavu Krishnan. Krishna Kumar is a youth communist leader who is eager to climb up the political ladder by all possible means. Sakhavu Krishnan is a veteran communist leader and social worker, who enjoys the respect of people around him thanks to his good work over the years.

One fine day unknown to both of them, the lives of Krishna Kumar and Sakhavu Krishnan get entwined in an interesting fashion. Krishna Kumar is asked to donate blood to a patient who is about to undergo a surgery and hence he lands up at a Government hospital. It is only much later that he comes to know that the patient is Sakhavu Krishnan. In the course of the day Krishna Kumar slowly goes on to know the life story of Sakhavu Krishnan in detail. The story shifts between the two time zones regularly, one symbolising the past during the heydays of Krishnan when he was an active communist leader, and the present as seen through the eyes of Krishnan.

Beginning with the voice over of Krishnan it is made very clear by Sidhartha Siva that the film would be a positive tribute to communism and its ideologies. The film is indeed a eulogy of sorts to the communist way of life and why the philosophy is so relevant in Kerala. Now this is a tad risky considering that there is a possibility of alienating a certain section of the audience which is not so fond of political dramas or has a different perspective on communism. The writing by Sidhartha Siva at times results in making the proceedings quite slow in a few places, the duration of 164 minutes making it appear slightly stretched overall. And its necessary to note that the film clearly paints Sakahvu Krishnan in extremely positive shades all the way. Luckily the spotlessly white portrayal of Sakhavu Krishnan is balanced by that of the more practical and contemporary Krishna Kumar.

The film benefits a lot by getting the period look (the 1970s) well taken care of, George C Williamss cinematography and the choice of locations aiding the same. Prashant Pillais music goes well with the flow of the film. Of the supporting cast, Althaf as Mahesh provides some laughs while Binu Pappu as Prabhakaran Eerali, Krishnans foe turned close friend, Sreenivasan as the doctor treating Sakhavu Krishnan and Baiju as Garudan Kangani, the right hand man of the tea estate manager leave an impact.

Of the women while Aparna Gopinath and Gayathri Suresh have nothing much to do, Aishwarya Rajesh as Sakhavu Krishnan does well despite her limited scenes. Needless to say the main reason why the film works is Nivin Pauly who brings in a spirited performance, portraying both the contrasting characters in a manner that makes one nearly overlook the issues with the film.

Sakhavu is not as splendid a film as one might have expected, but it is a film that does not mislead the viewer and is definitely worth an outing at the cinemas.

Read the original:
Sakhavu movie review: Introduction to communism - Bangalore Mirror - Bangalore Mirror

A century ago Congress declared war on Imperial Germany. It was a bizarre decision: the secure New World voluntarily joined the Old World slaughterhouse, consigning more than 117,000 Americans to death for no intelligible reason.

The chief outcome of the war was to sweep away several reasonably benign if imperfect ancien regimes while loosing various totalitarian bacilli. All too naturally, even, seemingly, inevitably, emerged communism, followed by fascism and Nazism. The so-called Great Wars unfinished business was finally settled only in World War II, after consuming as many as 80 million lives.

In April 1917 Europe had been at war almost three years. On June 28, 1914 a Serbian terrorist killed Archduke Ferdinand, the heir to the Hapsburg throne of Austro-Hungary. Vienna accused Belgrade of complicity in the crime, which in fact was promoted by Serbian military intelligence. But the Russian Empire came to Serbias defense. Imperial Germany sided with its ally, Austro-Hungary. France backed its treaty partner, the Russian Tsar.

Berlins troops rolled through Belgium to attack France; Great Britain came in against Germany. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire joined the latter, known as the Central Powers. Romania and Italy backed the Entente. Rome sold its participation to the highest territorial bidder, winning promises of Austro-Hungarian lands at wars end. Japan saw an opportunity to grab Germanys Pacific territories and also joined the conflict.

The resulting horror vindicated Americas decision to remain aloof. The alliance system turned out to be a transmission belt of war. Millions upon millions of people died as a result.

There was little too choose between the two sides. The many failings of the German-led Central Powers were highlighted, and exaggerated, by brilliant British propagandists aided by Americas establishment Eastern press. In fact, however, no one had clean hands.

Every combatant bore blame for the conflict, starting with Serbia, which was complicit in an act of state terrorism. The Entente members were no tribunes of liberalism. Certainly not the anti-Semitic despotism of the Tsar. Belgium was a despotic colonial power; the Belgian Congo may have been the most misgoverned territory in Africa. Great Britain was a more benign ruler, but still brutally suppressed any subject people who sought to run their own affairs. France was an angry revanchist power, determined on war to win back territory seized by Berlin in the Franco-Prussian War. Italy sold its peoples blood for land. Some alliance.

The only sensible decision was for America to stay out. There was no conceivable threat to the U.S. The Atlantic insulated America from invasion. More important, prior to Washingtons intervention no European power had a quarrel with the U.S. It really didnt matter much to the American people whether Tsar Nicholas or Kaiser Wilhelm was Europes dominant monarch, France regained territory it had lost after grabbing it in prior conflicts, or the ramshackle Hapsburg empire of Austro-Hungary maintained its influence in the Balkans. To paraphrase Germanys late Iron Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, the results werent worth the blood of a single American infantryman.

Unfortunately, however, in the midst of the disastrous Progressive Era, as social engineers grabbed political power to ply their arrogant trade, a Republican Party split allowed Woodrow Wilson to win the presidency in 1912. There was perhaps no president more sanctimonious and certain of his own righteousness. He was, it was said, hoping to fill the first vacancy in the Trinity. His ambitions did not stop at remaking America. He desired to transform the entire world. And that required that the U.S. become a combatant since otherwise his grandly unrealistic schemes for a new global order would be ignored. He was precisely the wrong man to have in the White House with Europe aflame.

He could not tell Americans he wanted to take them into war because of his megalomaniacal desire to dictate international affairs. Instead, he took Great Britains side in the wars maritime disputes and allowed events to play out. The result was as he wished.

London employed skilled propaganda agents in America, who used faked atrocity stories to blacken Germanys reputation (which made listeners less willing to believe what turned out to be true reports a couple decades later). British ships also cut the transatlantic cable, allowing London to control news that reached America.

Britain violated international law and the rights of neutral nations, most importantly America, while imposing a starvation blockade on Germany. The latter retaliated with U-boat warfare, a new innovation. When submarines attempted to comply with the dictates of traditional maritime warfareby surfacing to challenge British merchantmanBritish ships rammed and sink the subs. So Berlin proceeded to torpedo British vessels without warning.

American lives were lost and President Wilson made an astonishing claim: U.S. citizens had an absolute right to book passage on armed merchant vessels designated as reserve cruisers carrying munitions through a war zone. The most famous case of allowing London to mix bullets and babies, as a frustrated Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan pointed out, was the Lusitania. It was torpedoed on May 7, 1915; it sank as a result of the secondary explosion of the ammunition it was carrying. Despite his pretense of neutrality Wilson made his biases clear: England is fighting our fight, and you may well understand that I shall not, in the present state of the worlds affairs, place obstacles in her way when she is fighting for her life and the life of the world. Recognizing that Wilson was determined for war, Bryan resigned the following month.

In an attempt to forestall U.S. intervention, Berlin backed away from unrestricted submarine warfare. President Wilson won reelection as the man who kept America out of war. But he pushed military preparedness and was frustrated by his inability to impose his will on the combatants. As the conflict dragged on and hundreds of thousands of men died on both sides in fruitless trench war on the Western Front, Germany decided to return Britains favor by trying to starve the island nation into submission. In January 1917 Berlin unleashed unrestricted submarine warfare.

On February 3 Wilson broke diplomatic relations with Berlin but held off on formal entry into the conflict, fearing that he lacked sufficient public support. On April 2 he requested that Congress declare war, claiming that the recent course of the Imperial German Government to be in fact nothing less than war against the Government and people of the United States. It was nothing of sort: Wilsons eloquence was calculated dishonesty. Indeed, he expressed shock that a government that had hitherto subscribed to the humane practices of civilized nations would engage in submarine warfare but conveniently ignored Great Britains illegal blockade which targeted the Central Powers civilian populations.

There was strong resistance from a handful of Senators more concerned about Americas interests than Wilsons fantasiesmost notably Minnesota Progressive Republican Robert La Follette, a genuine American hero. However, the reluctance of Americas heartland counted for little. On April 6 the House followed the Senate in voting for war and propelled America into the Europeans last imperial conflict.

Americas entry was a disaster for the U.S., Europe, and the rest of the world. Washingtons assistance was critical for the allied victory. However, no American other than Wilson benefited as a result. The U.S. troops were brave but ill-trained; American commanders were incautious and ambitious. Thousands of brave soldiers and Marines died unnecessarily.

As for Europe, Washingtons assistance was critical for victory. With the collapse of Russias Tsarist government in April and Soviet revolution in November, Germany was able to shift troops to the west and make one last attempt at victory. But that effort failed. Without Americas involvement a compromise peace loomed likely as the exhausted powersthe French military mutinied while Austro-Hungary teetered on the edge of collapse and German morale plummeted. Alas, the infusion of U.S. aid and troops put the Entente over the top.

However, Wilsons subsequent attempt to dictate a glorious peace through the war to end war, as he termed it, proved to be a disaster. The Versailles peace conference wantonly violated his famed 14 Points as fellow allied leaders plundered the losing powers, traded subject populations as casino chips, trashed principle whenever it was to their advantage, and manipulated his idealistic vision to suit their pragmatic ends. The losers had no stake in maintaining the settlement: Germans called it the Diktat. Even some of the victors, most notably Italy, were unhappy at not gaining more loot. The French military commander Ferdinand Foch presciently said of the agreement: This is not peace. It is an armistice for 20 years.

The Bolsheviks came to power in Russia a few months after Americas entry into the war, creating the first Communist nation. After the conflict ended Benito Mussolinis Blackshirts put the fascists in power in Italy. Around the same time World War I veteran Adolf Hitler took over a small nationalist party, beginning his rise to power in Germany. The following years allowed the former combatants to catch their breath before returning to the unfinished business of 1918.

World War II followed naturally.

The most obvious modern Wilsonians are the Neoconservatives. Alas, the result of their handiwork in Iraq had the same catastrophic character as Wilsons decision to drag America into World War I. The major difference is that Iraq was of minor geopolitical stakes compared to Europe. Wilson inadvertently set in motion a process that destroyed huge portions of the globe and slaughtered tens of millions of people. The Neocons merely wrecked the Middle East and killed hundreds of thousands.

Good intentions are never enough to justify government action, especially foreign policy. Woodrow Wilsons nominal idealism proved to be deadly. Americans should ponder the lessons of his fateful course a century ago. Its time for U.S. presidents to work hard for peace rather than take what has become the far easier path to war.

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Woodrow Wilson Pushed U.S. Into World War I And Communism, Fascism And Nazism Resulted - Huffington Post

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, details began to emerge about the CIAs covert role in using art as a tool for political ends during the Cold War. The policyknown as "long leash"was initiated to showcase the creativity of American artists such as Jackson Pollock, Robert Motherwell and Mark Rothko in the face of "rigid" Soviet artistic constraints.

The United States government wanted to use the soft power of modern American art to combat Communism. Among the most effective of these initiatives was the Congress for Cultural Freedom which funded a number of cultural projects including a major exhibition titled "The New American Painting" that toured Europe in the late 1950s.

Suspicions about the almost sudden spread and funding of American art movements such as Abstract Expressionism led critic Max Kozloff to describe it in a 1973 essay as "a form of benevolent propaganda." But while much is known about CIA funding for American art during the Cold War, their support for Arab art during the same period has rarely been discussed.

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In his 2013 book America's Great Game: The CIA's Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East, Hugh Wilford documents the extent of the relationship between the spy agency and a "pro-Arabist" organization known as the American Friends of the Middle East (AFME).

One of the 24 Americans that founded the AFME in 1951 was Kermit Roosevelt Jr., a career intelligence officer who played a leading role in the CIA-backed coup to remove the democratically-elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953.

Unlike the Congress for Cultural Freedom, however, the AFMEs goals were primarily internal, seeking to get the truth about the Middle East before the American public," according to its first annual report. Wilfords book notes that Roosevelt channeled the CIA funding to the AFME to "foster American appreciation for Arab society and culture, and to counteract the pro-Israel influence of US Zionists on American foreign policy regarding the Arab-Israeli conflict."

A man walks past "Baghdadiat" by Jewad Selim at the Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art in Doha December 14, 2010. Selim was one of a number of Arab artists promoted in the U.S. by the AFME. REUTERS/Mohammed Dabbous

The financing allowed the AFME to conduct numerous non-oil and trade activities including funding student exchanges, lectures, promoting diplomatic ties and holding cultural activities. The AFME soon established a Department of Intercultural Relations that oversaw the funding of art exhibitions and visits by Arab artists to the U.S..

In 1954, the AFME funded a major touring exhibition, lecture series and media appearances by Jewad Selim, one of Iraq's most celebrated artists, which saw 21 paintings and drawings and seven sculptures flown in from Baghdad and displayed in the L. D. M. Sweat Museum in Portland, Maine, the de Braux Gallery in Philadelphia, the Bellefield Avenue Gallery in Pittsburgh and the headquarters of the Mid-western office in Chicago.

The tour finished with an exhibition at the AFME's newly leased headquarters, which was known as Middle East House in New York City (the AFME eventually relocated to Washington D.C. in 1958). Selim sold a number of works in the U.S. and gave a painting titled "Woman with Watermelon to Middle East House" that was then hung in their offices.

In 1955, the AFME organized four art exhibitions by Middle Eastern artists including Syria's Fateh Moudarres, Egypt's Jirair Palamoudian and Salah Taher, who was then director of the Egyptian Museum of Modern Art. Iranian, Turkish and Pakistani artists were also recipients of AFME's largess.

In fact in 1957-58 the AFME sent Pakistani art to Baghdad and Tehran in what appears to be an attempt to improve relations between Americas regional allies. The AFME was particularly active in the year 1962-63 as it provided "assistance in scheduling interesting exhibitions" to galleries in New York, Minneapolis, Evanston, San Francisco, Spokane and Pittsburgh.

"Woman selling material" (1953) by Iraqi artist Jewad Selim was amongst the works exhibited by AFME in the US. Bonhams

In 1965 the AFME funded exhibitions by Iraqi photographer Latif Al Ani, paintings by Tunisia's Jalal Gharbi, etchings by Sudan's Mohamed Omar Khalil and Hassan Bedawi Omar along with pottery work by Nasif Ishag George. The following year the AFME organized an exhibition of paintings and sketches of female Iraqi artist Widad Al-Azzawi Al-Orfali and her compatriot Faik Hassan at Middle East House.

The AFME funded many more art exhibitions including for Syrian artists Louay Kayyali and Mamdouh Kashlan but not all of them were documented in detail. For instance the 1967, AFME Annual Report states that it funded "exhibitions of Iraq's leading painter and seven other artists" although none are explicitly named.

These exhibitions would attract a range of people, including writers, intellectuals and celebrities as well as diplomats including ambassadors from Egypt, Libya and Saudi Arabia. It is worth noting that these artists were most likely unaware of any CIA connection to the support that their exhibitions would receive.

It is unclear exactly how much CIA money ended up at the AFME officially its funding came from numerous sources, including oil giant Saudi ARAMCO, with an impressive budget that peaked in 1955 at $500,000 (the equivalent of $4.4 million in 2016).

A 1967 New York Times article uncovering CIA funding was a blow to the AFME, but the U.S. government's support for Arab art has continued to the present day under the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs although its goals have drastically changed.

A recent study by the RAND Corporation titled "Artists and the Arab Uprisings" notes that the previous two U.S. administrations identified the "role that cultural outreach can play in achieving the long-term U.S. goals of combating extremism and promoting democracy and reform in the region."

The AFME changed its name to AMIDEAST in the 1970s, but in its two decades of existence as the AFME it played a major role in showcasing Arab art to an American audience. Some of the artists supported by the AFMEsuch as Iraqs Jewad Selim, who in 1959 designed the iconic Monument for Freedom in Baghdadwent on to play significant roles in the contemporary art movements of their respective countries and beyond.

Furthermore, it appears that most of the exhibitions that were funded were targeted inward at an American audience, in a way making them a reverse "form of benevolent propaganda" by using the work of modern Arab artists to build stronger cultural bonds.

Today, however, we see a plethora of exhibitions including Barjeel Art Foundations 2017 hat trick displays at Yale University Art Gallery, the Hessel Museum of Art and the Katzen Arts Center at the American University. These shows highlighting Arab art are being showcased in an increasingly inward-looking United States. But this time they are largely funded not by the CIA, but the Arab world itself.

Sultan Sooud Al Qassemi is a UAE based writer and founder of the Barjeel Art Foundation.

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How the CIA Secretly Funded Arab Art to Fight Communism - Newsweek