WTF-NATO?!

"Don’t be so proud of this technological terror you’ve created"
- Lord Vader
*******************************************
FIREFOX * LOAD FASTER * FIREFOX * LOOK BETTER
*******************************************
ARTICLE 5:
"The Parties of NATO agreed that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all. Consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence will assist the Party or Parties being attacked, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area."
- The North Atlantic Treaty, signed in Washington, D.C. on 4 April 1949.
*******************************************
NATO is a nuclear alliance established specifically to counter the military potential of the old Soviet Union with superior numbers. Nowadays, the whole idea of NATO deserves consideration. The activities of the organisation... scrutiny. Since the fall of the Berlin wall and subsequent collapse of the Warsaw Pact, this was a Cold War coalition with an enormous budget that had had no war fighting experience at all, no remaining adversaries and therefore no justification for it's own existence - so they had to create one. In 1999 they used sophisticated propaganda techniques to manufacture the appearance of a 'genocide' in Kosovo as opposed to what it really was: a really shitty situation for all parties which often resulted in casualties. We now know that story had no validity but this was the story they told to justify war on Serbia, a cultural and military ally of NATO's old nemesis, Russia. This fell completely outside of NATO's mandate as no member country had been attacked. Later, the events of September 11, 2001 gave them carte blanche to expand operations worldwide. Indeed when Bush "accidentally" used the "C" word on the lawn of the White House, it was immediately upon returning from the Camp David meeting of NATO countries' representatives where the 9/11 attacks where officially deemed "...an attack on us all" -- the first time in it's 52 years of existence that a NATO article was ever invoked. The unfortunate word Bonesman Bush uttered was "Crusade".
The treaties signed with NATO regarding the placement of interceptor missile bases in Poland and radar stations to operate them in Czechoslovakia this February (with America picking up most of the costs) immediately following Kosovo's secession from Serbia was a 1-2 dick slap in Putin's face. Now I have no *special* love for Russia and certainly none for Vladimir Putin but I can't see why the Cold Allies wanna play it this way. Not with so many nukes in the mix (remember nukes??). Not unless they prefer the old rules of the Cold War and everything that paradigm supposedly justified...
The original Neo-Con Think Tank propagandists who grew to prominence in those dark days, the Heritage Foundation, who nowadays bring us the Coulters, Limbaughs and fathered the whole rest of the Republican Media Echo Machine, is working closely with those former Eastern Bloc countries and NATO, re-shaping both their economic and defence policies.
For their part, NATO is drafting it's own alarming new policies:
"The risk of further proliferation is imminent and, with it, the danger that nuclear war fighting, albeit limited in scope, might become possible.
THE FIRST USE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS MUST REMAIN IN THE QUIVER OF ESCALATION AS THE ULTIMATE INSTRUMENT TO PREVENT THE USE OF WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION."
- NATO Commanders' manifesto titled "Towards a Grand Strategy for an Uncertain World - Renewing Transatlantic Partnership", January 2008
The United States, Britain and France - hell, even the Soviet Union had a strict No First Strike military policy throughout the Cold War, but now this single option military alliance with no other tools of diplomacy is reserving just that privilege: the right to strike first with nuclear weapons "to prevent the use of weapons of mass destruction"?? what weapons are these that could be anywhere near as destructive as a nuke?
The manifesto also calls for an overhaul of NATO decision-taking methods including:
* a new pact drawing the US, NATO and the European Union together in a "grand strategy"

* a new "directorate" of US, European and NATO leaders to respond rapidly to crises

* an end to EU "obstruction" of and rivalry with NATO.

* A shift from consensus decision-taking in NATO bodies to majority voting, meaning faster action through an end to national vetoes.

* The abolition of national caveats in NATO operations

* The use of force without UN security council authorisation when "immediate action is needed to protect large numbers of human beings"
*******************************************
Ultimately, due to the enormous disparity in military spending and might, America is the big player in this alliance with the most to gain monetarily from arms sales to member states and politically from appearing to be working with partners while doing exactly as she pleases in Europe as ever.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s military operations are split into two Strategic Commands both commanded by a senior U.S. officer so that U.S. troops never come under control of a foreign power.
*** more soon on current NATO missions, NATO complicity in the Pentagon's extraordinarily illegal renditions program, the NATO diversion of member countries' resources from U.N. Peacekeeping obligations, use of poisonous depleted uranium (D.U.) munitions and Star Wars Weapons ***
NATO's website
NATO at wikipedia
NEW: natochannel.tv
(a propaganda machine is born)
Operation Allied Force, 1999
really... OAF!
globalsecurity.org, the best military info site online
NATO - Game Over Campaign
Bombspotters entering the military base of
Kleine Brogel in 2001 for weapons inspection
NATO mp3's on DemocracyNow!
NATO DEBATE Jul 09 '97
Cost of Expanding NATO Mar 11 '98
Opposition Stalls NATO Expansion Apr 06 '98
Oil Interests in the Caspian Sea Apr 02 '99
Serb Historian Responds to Report On NATO Bombing May 10 '00
NATO’s War Crimes in Yugoslavia Jun 08 '00
NATO Declares Evidence of Bin Laden 9/11 Oct 02 '01
A Discussion On The U.N. and NATO Oct 09 '01
Kosovo’s Independence: Genuine Liberation or Front for US-NATO Expansion? Feb 19 '08
"SEISMANIA" - NEVER EVER FORGET :P
NATO-NWO?
Dateline: Kosovo
"Greetings, Hato"
is it fascism yet ?
LINK-->Air Force is Above All
"If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot
stamping on a human face -- forever."
- George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four