Around The Empire

Swapcast with Foreign Policy Focus podcast host Kyle Anzalone, on the firing of Trump's national security advisor, John Bolton.

FOLLOW Kyle on Twitter: @Kyaaale. SUBSCRIBE to the Foreign Policy Focus podcast at the Libertarian Institute.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

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Recorded on September 14, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. Trump Oval Office press conference on Bolton firing
2. Pushback with Aaron Maté: Ex-CIA analyst on why he predicted John Bolton's firing
3. Around the Empire: Ep 111 John Bolton and Escalation With Iran feat Kyle Anzalone
4. Washington Post: How clashes with Trump led to John Bolton's firing

Guest: Elijah Magnier. We discuss the recent Israeli bombings in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, the political situation and the impending retaliation by Hezbollah. Also we talk about the purpose and importance of the occupation of al Tanf and the battle for Idlib including Turkey's realignment and the Astana agreement.

Elijah Magnier is a veteran war correspondent and political analyst with over 35 years of experience covering the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

FOLLOW Elijah Magnier @ejmalrai. Read and support his work at ejmagnier.com

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon. SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on August 30, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Timestamps:

2:30 Recent Israeli bombings in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq, violation of 2006 rules of engagement

10:30 Hezbollah warnings of retaliation, preparation for war

14:00 Political situation in Lebanon and Israel, Hezbollah response before Israeli elections

22:45 Hezbollah response to recent attacks is imminent

29:00 Political impact on Netanyahu, Trump/Netanyahu alliance, risk to American soldiers after bombings in Iraq

36:00 Israeli launched attacks in Iraq from an American base

41:45 Al Tanf base, economic warfare

49:30 Situation in Idlib, Syrian army advance, Turkey realignment and withdrawal of support for former allied jihadi groups; Astana agreement

Reference Links:

1. Why Netanyahu Dares to Hit Iran's Backyard in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon: Israel Accepts Hezbollah's Challenge, Elijah Magnier
2. Hezbollah Will Respond to Israel But When? And at What Cost? Elijah Magnier

Guest: Whitney Webb. We continue the discussion on Whitney's multi-part investigative journalism articles on the Jeffrey Epstein affair, the multi-national criminal enterprise, with an American wing that is whole heartedly bipartisan and perennial. Today we focus on Part 4 of the series: From "Spook Air" to the "Lolita Express": The Genesis and Evolution of the Jeffrey Epstein-Bill Clinton Relationship.

Both familiar and unfamiliar names and events turn up in this episode. Iran Contra, Bill & Hillary Clinton, Mena, Arkansas, Rose Law Firm, William Barr, BCCI, PROMIS, Systematics, Danny Casolaro, Jackson Stephens, Adnan Khashoggi, and more. Part 4 is the final piece of this series but not really the end, and Whitney gives us some hints about spinoff investigations that will be pursued.

Whitney Webb is a MintPress news journalist and the co-host of the MintCast podcast. She is based in southern Chile and has contributed to numerous independent media outlets with writing and interviews and Whitney is the 2019 winner of the Serena Shim Award for Uncompromised Integrity in Journalism.

FOLLOW @_whitneywebb, find her work at MintPress News and the MintCast podcast. Support her work by contributing to MintPress News or by becoming a patron at patreon.com/MintPressNews.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon.

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Recorded on August 23, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. MintPress: From "Spook Air" to the "Lolita Express": The Genesis and Evolution of the Jeffrey Epstein-Bill Clinton Relationship (Part IV of "Too Big to Fail" investigative series by Whitney Webb)
2. Around the Empire: Ep 115 Epstein, Trafficking & Blackmail feat Whitney Webb
3. Around the Empire: Ep 117 The Mega Group and the Epstein Affair feat Whitney Webb

Guest: Mark Sleboda. Mark Sleboda joins us today from Moscow to talk about political affairs in Ukraine and the recent snap elections in the Ukrainian parliament, the Rada. The "throw the bums out" trend continues and the new president,Volodymyr Zelensky and his brand new political party now has a rare absolute majority and they begin the task of actually governing this troubled state.

Mark is an International Affairs & Security Analyst, a US Navy veteran, a university lecturer and a foreign policy realist.

FOLLOW Mark on Twitter @MarkSleboda1 and on Facebook, look for his appearances on RT, Sputnik and other international channels.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon. SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on August 7, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Timestamps:

01:30 Ukraine presidential and snap parliamentary elections, Zelensky, "Servant of the People", rejection of Poroshenko, anti-corruption, vague policies that appeal to East and West Ukraine, new inexperienced Zelensky party in Rada with diverse policy positions, no party platform or ideology

11:00 Oligarch Kolomoisky, originally pro-Maidan, funded & armed nationalist/neo-Nazi battalions, Privat Bank, fled country with IMF funds, self-exiled and later returned, possibly created Zelensky

16:30 Zelensky continues orientation toward EU and the West, Minsk agreement, privatization and austerity

18:30 Civil war, refusal to talk with Donbass separatists leaders, relations with Russia

21:30 Ukrainian economy

27:30 Control of military and national guard, intelligence services

30:30 Ukraine elections and parties (also with an introduction to Mark's pets voicing their opinion in the background :) (see photos in reference links)

44:00 VICE article (see reference links) propaganda on the far-Right militias, influence on Europe, missiles found in Italy, blowback of Western proxies, current situation with neo-Nazi militias, previous contradictory work of VICE in Ukraine

Reference Links:

1. Around the Empire: Ep 99 Ukraine feat Mark Sleboda
2. Netflix: Servant of the People
3. VICE: FAR-RIGHT EXTREMISTS HAVE BEEN USING UKRAINE'S WAR AS A TRAINING GROUND. THEY'RE RETURNING HOME.
4. Pics of Mark's pets (including Morrigan the crow)

Guest: Carl Zha. A wide-ranging discussion about colonial Hong Kong, the transition back to China, and the social and economic changes that developed. We analyze the current Hong Kong protests, the forces at work and the prospects for a military crackdown or peaceful resolution.

Carl Zha is an engineer, historian, podcaster, and a Caltech Alum. His podcast, Silk and Steel, is about China, US-China Great Power competition and the history of Empires, past and present.

FOLLOW @carlzha, SUBSCRIBE to his podcast Silk and Steel and listen to his previous podcast, Clash.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon.

SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on August 15, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. Promo Video of PLA troops stationed in Hong Kong since 1997
2. New York Times: Opinion: A Hong Kong Protester's Tactic: Get the Police to Hit You
3. Documentary: The Gate of Heavenly Peace
4. The Silk and Steel Podcast

Guest: Douglas Valentine. We talk about the CIA, foreign intelligence and liaison operations, Donald Trump and the Jeffrey Epstein affair.

Douglas Valentine is an author, investigator, journalist and poet. He's the author of many books, including "The Phoenix Program: America's Use of Terror in Vietnam," and "The CIA as Organized Crime: How Illegal Operations Corrupt America and the World." He is well known for his extensive research and interviews of numerous CIA officers, former CIA director William Colby and others involved in the Phoenix Program. The Phoenix Program was a large operation that involved kidnapping, torture, and assassination. Its goal was the destruction of the Viet Cong insurgency, a political and paramilitary movement that worked against the United States and the US-backed South Vietnamese government during the Vietnam war.

FOLLOW Douglas Valentine @dougvalentine77 and find his books, writing and archives on his website www.douglasvalentine.com.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon. SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on July 29, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Timestamps:

2:30 Clip from Andrew McCarthy interview on expectations for the IG report on Russiagate/Spygate, foreign intelligence and liaison operations

7:45 Origins of CIA, political police force, liaison operations, Trump and Epstein, gangsters, ideology based in capitalism, makes it possible for people like Trump & Epstein to thrive, anti-communism/socialism, patriarchy, system enables sexual predatory activity

14:00 Mafia is a model for capitalist corporate enterprises, CIA exempt from laws, all intel services organized similarly, CIA tries to shape social and political environment in other countries for US business enterprises

18:30 To control other countries CIA must control criminal underworld in those countries, Various tactics like sexual blackmail used to coerce businessmen and officials in other countries, partners with organized crime for blackmail, arms and drug trafficking

22:30 1980's Donald Trump wanted to advance his business overseas, money laundering

26:00 CIA has intel on American businessmen and makes use of them to do its bidding in the US without conducting operations here, immunized and covered up by the national security state

31:30 Five directorates of CIA, directorate of operations has two parts. Foreign intelligence/liaison branch spies and recruits assets, partners with and bargains with foreign intelligence services.

41:30 Recruiting people to spy on their own countries, wittingly or unwittingly. Creates many "proprietary companies" including charitable entities and NGOs, intelligence operations under cover of civic action.

46:00 Assets like Epstein are expendable. Trump became president, so not expendable. Ghislaine Maxwell and blackmail operations. Operations will never be revealed because covered by national security laws

50:30 Women can also perpetuate the corrupt, patriarchichal system. Details of various spectacles aren't very important in the big picture, as nothing will change until the system is changed

Reference Links:

1. John Batchelor Show 7/25/19: Durham and Horowitz aim to answer the hard questions about Spygate [and Liaison Operations]
2. Book: "The Phoenix Program: America's Use of Terror in Vietnam"
3. Book: "The CIA as Organized Crime: How Illegal Operations Corrupt America and the World"
4. www.douglasvalentine.com

Guest: Whitney Webb. We continue the discussion on Whitney's multi-part investigative journalism articles on the Jeffrey Epstein affair, his ties to intelligence and organized crime, trafficking networks and sexual blackmail operations, and the origins of the Epstein case, going back decades. We focus on Part 3: Mega Group, Maxwells, and Mossad: The Spy Story at the Heart of the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal,

Whitney Webb is a MintPress news journalist and the co-host of the MintCast podcast. She is based in southern Chile and has contributed to numerous independent media outlets with writing and interviews and Whitney is the 2019 winner of the Serena Shim Award for Uncompromised Integrity in Journalism.

FOLLOW @_whitneywebb, find her work at MintPress News and the MintCast podcast.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon.

SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on August 7, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. Around the Empire: Ep 115 Epstein, Trafficking & Blackmail feat Whitney Webb
2. Mega Group, Maxwells, and Mossad: The Spy Story at the Heart of the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal, Whitney Webb, MintPress News

Guest: Major Danny Sjursen, US Army (ret.). We discuss what Danny refers to as "The Tulsi Effect" and its impact of forcing the issue of war onto the Democratic party agenda and the 2020 presidential election.

The issue of war and foreign policy is something that liberals and progressive candidates would much prefer to ignore in debates and on the public stage. As Danny Sjursen wrote: "This was ever so apparent in the first two nights of Democratic primary debates this week. Foreign policy hardly registered for these candidates with one noteworthy exception: Hawaii Representative Tulsi Gabbard—herself an (anti-war) combat veteran and army officer." All of this is true, and stunning, especially given that our country "remains mired in several air and ground wars from West Africa to Central Asia."

Tulsi has made ending the wars a centerpiece of her campaign and even though she is not a frontrunner she does stand out for making this her priority and not only that, she is forcing the issue of war onto the Democratic agenda. We also talk about Joe Biden's Iraq War problem, Trump's chaotic and contradictory foreign policy cabinet, the silent anti-interventionist majority in America and the state of the anti-war movement.

Major Danny Sjursen is a retired US Army strategist and former history instructor at West Point. He served tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan. He is the author of a memoir and critical analysis of the Iraq War titled: Ghostriders of Baghdad: Soldiers, Civilians, and the Myth of the Surge. His articles are published by numerous media outlets: antiwar.com, The American Conservative, Truthdig, TomDispatch and others. He is the co-host of the Fortress on a Hill podcast.

FOLLOW Danny @SkepticalVet, find his podcast at Fortress on a Hill.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon. SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on July 10, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. The Tulsi Effect: Forcing War Onto the Democratic Agenda, Danny Sjursen, The American Conservative
2. Tulsi Gabbard Was the Clear Winner of the Democratic Debates, Truthdig, Danny Sjursen
3. Here's one way Democrats can defeat Trump: be radically anti-war, The Guardian, Mark Hannah, Stephen Wertheim
4. Putting the Warriors on Terror on Trial, Danny Sjursen, antiwar.com
5. Giving Trump Credit (But Not Too Much) on Iran, Danny Sjursen, antiwar.com
6. Troika Fever, Danny Sjursen, TomDispatch

Guest: Whitney Webb. We discuss Whitney's multi-part investigative journalism articles on the Jeffrey Epstein affair, his ties to intelligence and organized crime, trafficking networks and sexual blackmail operations, and the origins of the Epstein case, going back decades. We focus on Part 2 of the series, titled Government by Blackmail: Jeffrey Epstein, Trump's Mentor and the Dark Secrets of the Reagan Era.

Whitney Webb is a MintPress news journalist and the co-host of the MintCast podcast. She is based in southern Chile and has contributed to numerous independent media outlets with writing and interviews and Whitney is the 2019 winner of the Serena Shim Award for Uncompromised Integrity in Journalism.

FOLLOW @_whitneywebb, find her work at MintPress News and the MintCast podcast.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Find all links at aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon.

SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on July 26, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. Hidden in Plain Sight: The Shocking Origins of the Jeffrey Epstein Case, Whitney Webb, MintPress News
2. Government by Blackmail: Jeffrey Epstein, Trump's Mentor and the Dark Secrets of the Reagan Era, Whitney Webb, MintPress News
3. WSJ: Jeffrey Epstein's Pilots Are Subpoenaed in Sex-Trafficking Investigation
4. NYT: How Jeffrey Epstein Used the Billionaire Behind Victoria's Secret for Wealth and Women

Guest: Dr. George Szamuely. We talked about the strengthening alliance between Russia and China, the shock and concern expressed by US officials after recent meetings and comments by the Chinese and Russian leaders and about the American policy decisions and imperial adventures over the last few decades that made that convergence inevitable. We discussed the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, Brzezinski, McFaul and the long history of opposition to detente with Russia by factions of the US national security state. Then we talked about how this relates to Russiagate as well as recent developments in that arena.

George Szamuely is the author of Bombs for Peace: NATO's Humanitarian War on Yugoslavia and a senior research fellow at the Global Policy Institute.

FOLLOW George at @GeorgeSzamuely Read his book Bombs for Peace: NATO's Humanitarian War on Yugoslavia.

Around the Empire is listener supported, independent media. Pitch in if you can at Patreon: patreon.com/aroundtheempire or paypal.me/aroundtheempirepod. Website: aroundtheempire.com.

SUBSCRIBE on YouTube. FOLLOW @aroundtheempire and @joanneleon. SUBSCRIBE/FOLLOW on iTunes, iHeart, Spotify, Google Play, Facebook or on your preferred podcast app.

Recorded on June 15, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.

Reference Links:

1. China's Xi calls Putin his 'best friend' against a backdrop of souring US relations, CNBC
2. Book: Bombs for Peace: NATO's Humanitarian War on Yugoslavia, George Szamuely