Flaunting British Neo-Imperialism in Asia-Pacific

January 10, 2018 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - For over a century, the British Empire exerted control over Asia-Pacific, outright colonising India, Burma, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia while influencing and encroaching upon greater China, Siam and beyond.

It exploited the people and natural resources of the region, fuelled conflict as it waged war with rival European powers seeking to carve out their own colonies in Asia and left an enduring impact on the region, including ethnic and territorial feuds still unfolding today, e.g. the Rohingya crisis in present-day Myanmar.

Rather than make restitution for its decades of war, conquest and exploitation, the United Kingdom today eagerly seeks to reassert itself in the region alongside the United States who has also spent over a century in the region pursuing what US policymakers openly admit is American "primacy."

The Diplomat, a US-European geopolitical publication focused on Asia-Pacific, described this development in its article, "The British Are Coming (to Asia)."

The article featured a single image, that of the HMS Queen Elizabeth, one of the UK's newest warships and its largest. It is one of two "colossal warships" UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson recently pledged to send across the globe to aid Washington in its growing confrontation with Beijing.

The author, US Air Force Major John Wright currently serving as Japan Country Director, International Affairs, Headquarters Pacific Air Forces, Honolulu, Hawaii, attempts to construct a positive argument for the UK's involvement thousands of miles from its own shores.

The article admits that the US has few capable allies in the region willing to "comply with mutual defence needs beyond their own territory." It admits that the US has increasingly looked beyond Asia for partners. The UK then, is about as beyond Asia as any potential partner could be.

The article notes that the UK has already deployed warplanes to Japan in addition to the aforementioned future deployment of British warships to the region. It also suggests that:

...the U.K. could revive the old trick of acting as a “fleet in being;” its ability to steam where and when it pleased while possessing no major territory would throw off regional rivals’ military calculus and force them to commit precious reconnaissance assets to monitoring the United Kingdom.

In other words, a European military would be deployed in and harass "rivals" across Asia alongside US warships already engaged in regional meddling. This, the author concludes, "would be a great benefit to stabilising the security troubles of the region."   

Yet, when considering what actually drives "security troubles of the region," it is evident that the presence of US forces far beyond US territory, for example, stationed in South Korea and conducting military exercises along North Korea's borders in a deliberate attempt to provoke Pyongyang is the problem, not the solution. The addition of British warships and aircraft in the region will only further multiply "security troubles" evident in the author's own comments regarding the need for "regional rivals" to commit to tracking and keeping in check British warships.

Omitted from Major Wright's nostalgic review of the UK's historic role in Asia-Pacific was the concept of "gunboat diplomacy," where the British Empire coerced Asian states into making lopsided concessions to London or face British naval firepower. Chunks of Siam were carved off under threat of British "gunboat diplomacy," Hong Kong was outright seized by it and other nations likewise were forced by threat of military aggression to make concessions that benefited only the British.

US "primacy" in Asia-Pacific today closely resembles British "gunboat diplomacy." While literal gunboats training cannons on the capitals of targeted states is no longer feasible, other means of coercion are. These include options categorised under "soft power" including US-European-funded opposition groups which may or may not include armed components. There is also economic warfare. When Thailand ousted US-proxy Thaksin Shinawatra and his political allies from power, the US pursued a campaign of economic sabotage aimed at Thailand's seafood industry and tourism sector.

The Quad: US Searches Edge of Asia for Allies to Contain Beijing

December 28, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - There has been a recent buzz promoted around the so-called Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) - a coalition of sorts counting the United States, India, Australia, and Japan as members. Promoted by familiar corporate-financier funded policy think thanks, the Quad is being portrayed as a step past Washington's ill-fated "pivot to Asia" to address its waning power in the region.

Understanding that the US "pivot" was meant to co-opt and coerce Southeast Asia into forming a united front aimed at containing China's economic, diplomatic, and military rise in the region in order to preserve and perhaps even expand US primacy in Asia Pacific, helps explain why it ultimately failed, and goes far in explaining what the Quad is and why it is being so eagerly promoted.

The Pivot's Failure and Declining American Power 

Southeast Asia, through the supranational Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) resisted attempts by Washington to realign regional policy to suit US interests at the cost of ASEAN's growing ties with Beijing.

There were various components to the pivot including US efforts to undermine, overthrow, and replace with obedient client regimes the governments of several ASEAN states including Myanmar, Thailand, and Malaysia.

The expansion of US "soft power" across ASEAN was a part of this component, particularly through the US State Department's ongoing long-term efforts via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and its "Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative" (YSEALI) launched in 2013.

These efforts have so-far failed, with only limited success in placing a US client regime in power in Myanmar in the form of Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party.

Image: Thailand's Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has sealed several pivotal economic, infrastructure, and military deals with China since ousting the US-backed government of Yingluck Shinawatra from power in 2014. 

Elsewhere - in 2014 - the US-backed government of Yingluck Shinawatra, sister of long-time US ally Thaksin Shinawatra, was ousted in a military coup. Protests in Malaysia led by the US-funded and directed "Bersih" front have yet to materialize substantial results. And in Cambodia, the government under Prime Minister Hun Sen has begun an aggressive campaign to uproot and expel the US State Department's media and opposition fronts including the arrest of opposition leader Kem Sokha and the dissolution of his Cambodia National Rescue Party - a move that may be replicated in some form or another by other ASEAN states if successful.

Another component was a series of artificial conflicts the US manufactured and then served as mediator in resolving surrounding the ongoing South China Sea territorial dispute. ASEAN collectively refused to become involved, and even supposed claimants in the dispute - Vietnam and the Philippines - have drifted away from the hardline approach proposed by the US to confront Beijing.

Western Media Consumed by Myanmar Monster of Own Creation

December 23, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Years ago, those confronting and questioning the Western media's "pro-democracy" narrative regarding Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, her National League for Democracy (NLD) political party and her supporters including saffron-clad supposed "Buddhist monks," were ridiculed and dismissed.

Warnings that Suu Kyi's political movement was nothing more than a foreign-funded attempt to co-opt the people and resources of the Southeast Asian state of Myanmar - a former colony of the British Empire still referred to widely in the West by its colonial nomenclature, "Burma" - were dismissed as mere conspiracy theories.

Meanwhile, concerns that violence targeting Myanmar's Rohingya minority was in fact being bolstered by Suu Kyi's rise to power were intentionally and concertedly sidestepped by the Western media who attempted to conceal the true nature of Suu Kyi's political party and the core "values" of her support base and shift blame onto the ruling military-led government.

It was inevitable that upon taking power, Suu Kyi and the NLD - enabled by decades of US-UK-EU financial, political, and material support - the progressive veneer applied to this "democracy icon" would begin to peel, and the true nature of her and her followers would reveal itself.

Consumed by a Monster of Their Own Creation 

In an immense amount of irony, prominent Western media organizations like Reuters now find themselves decrying the very government they themselves spent decades helping into power, as the government cracks down on reporting over the ongoing Rohingya crisis.

Two Reuters employees - Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo - were reportedly arrested after illegally obtaining documents from Myanmar police. Reuters and the myriad of faux-human rights advocates that conspired with the US, British, and European governments to put Suu Kyi into power are now calling on the Myanmar government - though not Suu Kyi by name - to release their colleagues.

Reuters employee Andrew Marshall has recently flooded his social media accounts with desperate pleas for his colleagues' release, citing US "demands" that Myanmar release them, and alluding to the debt Suu Kyi and the NLD owed the foreign press for their role in bringing them to power.

Yet even now, as Reuters finds two of its own rendered as collateral damage in the wake of Suu Kyi and the NLD's ascent into power, both this most recent row regarding Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo and the ongoing Rohingya crisis are only obliquely linked to Suu Kyi by the Western media. Marshall - for example - continuously cites "Myanmar's president - Suu Kyi's ally" as supporting the prosecution of his colleagues - either unaware or unwilling to admit that Suu Kyi herself created and currently occupies the highest office - State Counsellor - referred even by the Western press as the "de facto" head of the Myanmar government.

EU "Restoring" Ties with Thailand Symbolic, Foreign Interference Will Continue

December 21, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - A mid-December announcement by the European Union was made stating that the EU had agreed to restore ties with the Southeast Asian Kingdom of Thailand "at all levels" after suspending them in 2014 in the wake of a military coup which ousted the government of Yingluck Shinawatra.

AFP reported in its article, "EU resumes official contacts with Thai junta," that:

The bloc said developments in Thailand this year, including the adoption of a new constitution and a pledge by junta chief Prayut Chan-O-Cha to hold elections in November 2018, meant it was "appropriate" to resume ties.

The announcement however, was conditional. AFP  also reports:

But the European Union repeated its call for the restoration of full democracy and said it was still concerned about harassment of human rights activists and the curtailing of free speech in Thailand.

What the AFP article and the EU statement both fail to mention was the context of the 2014 coup, the nature of the government it ousted from power and precisely which groups have been subjected to the so-called "curtailing of free speech."

The EU's move, which was immediately supported by the US embassy in Bangkok, is likely an attempt to pressure the current interim government from further delaying elections and holding them prematurely, thus likely returning political proxies associated with Yingluck Shinawatra to power.

Returning a US-European Proxy to Power 

Yingluck Shinawatra was sister to ousted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Thaksin Shinawatra held office from 2001-2006, committed serial human rights abuses including the extrajudicial killing of nearly 3,000 in a "war on drugs" in just under 90 days in 2003. He also eagerly censored his political opponents and critics in the media either through courts or through physical intimidation and violence. Several of his critics were either assassinated or disappeared over the course of this time in office.

In 2006, the Royal Thai Army swiftly and without bloodshed, ousted Thaksin Shinawatra from power. Since Shinawatra's removal from power in 2006, he and his supporters have conducted an on-and-off campaign of terrorism, violence, arson, political assassinations together with a concerted propaganda campaign attacking Thailand's independent institutions including the nation's courts, its military and its constitutional monarchy. Together, these institutions represent insurmountable roadblocks to Shinawatra's return to power. They also, by no coincidence, impede foreign interests from entering and fully exploiting Thailand, its population and its natural resources.

It has been groups associated with Shinawatra's efforts to attack and undermine Thailand's institutions that have been targeted by the "curtailing of free speech."  These groups also so happen to enjoy extensive funding, political and material support from the embassies of the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and the EU.

US-EU diplomats regularly organise events to foment opposition to Thailand's government, right in the heart of Shinawatra's former political stronghold of "Isaan," or northeastern Thailand. The EU has demonstrated zero respect for Thai sovereignty and its offer to "restore ties" to the nation are loaded with preconditions undermining Thailand's national interests. 

The aforementioned AFP article also characterised the ousted government of Yingluck Shinawatra as representing a certain level of "democracy." However, Yingluck Shinawatra openly campaigned in 2011 as her brother's admitted proxy. Thaksin Shinawatra currently resides abroad evading jail after a criminal conviction for abuse of power was handed down by Thai courts in 2008. In other words, the "democracy" AFP claims Yingluck Shinawatra's government represented in reality amounted to a convicted criminal running the government remotely through a nepotist-appointed proxy. In truth, it represented neither "democracy" nor adhered to even the most elementary underpinnings of rule of law.

What Southeast Asian Muslims' Response to US-Jerusalem Embassy Move Means

December 15, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - US President Donald Trump's announcement to move the US embassy in Israel from the city of Tel Aviv to Jerusalem has ignited protests, tensions and fears of future conflict across the Middle East. Protests and posturing have followed the announcement from a wide variety of demographics.

Predictably, Muslim communities across the Middle East have voiced their opposition. This includes both Sunnis and Shia'a who have even united at rallies organised by Hezbollah in Lebanon. Middle Eastern Christians have also attended such events as well as having staged their own protests.

Other nations, such as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, have predictably condemned the United States and Israel, while simultaneously continuing their collaboration with both in terms of undermining Syria.

While it is tempting to see the ongoing conflict through a primarily religious lens, however, geopolitics appears to be a much more relevant target and motivation driving US foreign policy and the very predictable reaction it has provoked.

This is especially so, considering how large Muslim communities beyond the Middle East have reacted, particularly in Southeast Asia.

Southeast Asia's Muslims Muted Over Move 

Southeast Asia is home to an estimated 240 million Muslims. They compose a majority of the populations in Indonesia (the most populous Muslim nation on the planet), Malaysia and Brunei. Muslims also make up a sizeable minority in nations including Singapore, the Philippines, Thailand and Myanmar.

Despite the significant number of Muslims in Southeast Asia, the fervour over America's announcement was relatively muted.

There were indeed protests held in Malaysia and Indonesia including by parties with past or present affiliations with the regimes of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and organisations such as the Muslim Brotherhood, but beyond these symbolic protests, little more has unfolded. 

Thailand: US Creating "Space" For Destabilisation

December 13, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - In late November, the US, Canadian and British embassies along with several other European partners as well as the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and Amnesty International, organised what they called the "Isaan Human Rights Festival" in northeast Thailand.

Foreign embassies have funded and directed a number of events to breath new life into the political proxies of ousted former prime minister, Thaksin Shianwatra in pursuit of regime change in Thailand. 

US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) funded media front, the "Isaan Record" in its article, "Rare human rights event gathers Isaan communities and foreign diplomats," claims (our emphasis):

The 8th Annual Isaan Human Rights Festival brought together 17 communities from across the region, activists, scholars, and international and Thai students. Ambassadors from Finland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom were in attendance, as well as political officers from Canada, the European Union and the United States. National Human Rights Commissioner Angkhana Neelapaijit also attend the event. 

Hosted by Mahasarakham University’s College of Politics and Governance, the festival opened a rare space to discuss the human rights situation in the Northeast.

While the US-funded media outfit mentioned funding provided by the Germany-based Heinrich Böll Foundation, it failed to mention other sponsors whose logos were clearly visible in media used throughout the event.

Creating Space for Destabilisation and Conflict 

The foreign-sponsored "festival" takes place against the backdrop of a currently dormant Thai political crisis. In 2014, the Thai military ousted then Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, sister and publicly admitted proxy of Thaksin Shinawatra, a convicted criminal hiding abroad to evade a jail sentence and who was himself ousted in 2006 in a similar coup.

Since Thaksin Shinawatra's ouster in 2006, he has led a campaign of terrorism, street violence, armed insurrection and assassinations. This includes riots in 2009 that saw sections of Bangkok lit ablaze and at least two shopkeepers gunned down by looting Shinawatra supporters. The following year, Shinawatra organised up to 300 heavily armed militants who fought for weeks in the streets of Bangkok against the military, leaving nearly 100 dead and culminating in citywide arson.

Shinawatra supporters have been banned from gathering in Thailand for good reason. They are used by Shinawatra's political proxies to incite unrest, violence and substantial bloodshed in pursuit of regime change.  

The most recent coup was precipitated when Shinawatra's militants began murdering anti-Shinawatra protesters in the street. Armed with assault rifles and grenade launchers, hit-and-run attacks targeted protest camps across Bangkok and even those that sprung up in other provinces. Over 20 would die, including women and children.

Look Who's Interfering: Tillerson's Thai Election Comment

December 10, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson released a press statement regarding Thailand's National Day. In it he expressed diplomatic greetings and well-wishing to the Thai people, but failed to resist also expressing American exceptionalism - stating, "we look forward to Thailand holding elections next year."

While the statement may seem rather innocuous at first glance, it is anything but.

Returning a Murderous Proxy to Power 

Thailand's elections have been put on hold, following a 2014 military coup ousting the US-backed regime of Yingluck Shinawtra who served openly as her brother Thaksin Shinawatra's proxy.

Thaksin Shinawatra resides abroad in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, a convicted criminal evading a 2-year jail sentence for abuse of power. He too was ousted from power in a military coup in 2006.

Before being removed from power, he oversaw a brutal "war on drugs" in 2003 that left nearly 3,000 extrajudicially killed in the streets over the course of just 90 days. He also attempted to unilaterally sign a US-Thai free trade deal without parliamentary approval, sent Thai troops to participate in the US invasion of Iraq, and allowed Thai territory to be used as part of the US CIA's extraordinary rendition program.

Since being deposed from power in 2006, Shinawatra has organized street mobs, militants, and terrorists, killing scores of people, conducting campaigns of mass arson, bombings, and assassinations as part of his bid to seize back power.

He regularly meets members of his Pheua Thai Party (PTP) in Hong Kong, and has been allowed to travel across Europe, to the UK, and even to the US to conduct business despite being a fugitive and despite his human rights record.

ISIS Helps US Keep Military's Foot in Philippines' Door

December 7, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - Current US ambassador to the Philippines, Sung Kim, recently congratulated the Philippines' armed forces and the US military for their successful completion of KAMANDAG, a joint military exercise held for the first time this year.

The US embassy in the Philippines on its website noted that:

KAMANDAG, which will run until October 11, is an acronym for the Filipino phrase “Kaagapay Ng Mga Mandirigma Ng Dagat,” or “Cooperation of Warriors of the Sea,” emphasizing the close partnership between the Philippine and United States militaries. KAMANDAG will increase overall U.S. and Philippine readiness, improve bilateral responsiveness to crises in the region, and further reinforce our illustrious decades-long alliance. Leading up to the commencement of KAMANDAG, AFP and U.S. forces completed bilateral humanitarian and civic assistance projects at schools earlier this month in Casiguran, Aurora.

The embassy also made particular note that the exercise would "increase counterterrorism capabilities," which is particularly convenient considering the current crisis Manila faces on its southern island of Mindanao, where parts of the city of Marawi are still being held by militants linked to the Islamic State.

News outlets including across the United States and Europe, have noted that fighting in Marawi is backed by foreign interests and includes foreign fighters. Reuters in an article titled, "ISIS-Linked Mmilitants Fighting in Marawi City are 'Paralysed': Philippine Army," would report:

The battle for Marawi has raised concern that ISIS, on a back foot in Syria and Iraq, is building a regional base on the Philippine island of Mindanao that could pose a threat to neighboring Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore too. 

Officials have said that, among the several hundred militants who seized the town, there were about 40 foreigners from Indonesia and Malaysia but also fighters from India, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Chechnya. 

The strike on Marawi City suggested to many that pro-Islamic State factions wanted to establish it as a Southeast Asian "wilayat" – or governorate - for the radical group, a view reinforced by video footage the military found last week showing the fighters plotting to cut the town off completely.

With militants in Syria and Iraq clearly the recipients of extensive state sponsorship, particularly from the United States and its closest regional allies, it stands to reason that their ambitions thousands of miles away in the Philippines are likewise state-sponsored.

As to why the US and its allies would sponsor terrorism in the Philippines, the answer is surprisingly simple and straight forward.

US Seeks to Keep Its Foot in the Door

With the election of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, US-Philippine relations became increasingly strained. Beyond the political leadership in Manila, overall pragmatic considerations regarding Washington's waning influence in Asia Pacific and Beijing's rise have put increasing distance between the United States and its former colonial holdings in the Philippines.

Manila's unwillingness to help Washington leverage tensions in the South China Sea against Beijing have become a particular point of contention, hindering Washington's attempts to use the Philippine armed forces as a proxy to hem in Chinese interests across the region.

US Looks to Southeast Asia to Unleash its ISIS Hordes

November 26, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Western think tanks have been increasingly busy cultivating a narrative to explain the sudden and spreading presence of militants linked or fighting under the banner of the self-proclaimed "Islamic State" (ISIS) across Southeast Asia.

This narrative - these think tanks would have audiences believe - entails militants fleeing Syria and Iraq, and entrenching themselves amid supposedly sectarian conflicts in Southeast Asia. The think tanks conveniently never mention how tens of thousands of militants are funding the logistical feat required to move them to Southeast Asia or sustain their militant operations in the region once they arrive.

Among these think tanks is the so-called International Crisis Group (ICG). In its report, "Jihadism in southern Thailand – A phantom menace," it claims:

The decline of the Islamic State (ISIS) and the advent of ISIS-linked violence in South East Asia evince the possibility of a new era of transnational jihadist terrorism in the region. 

Recurring, albeit unsubstantiated, reports about ISIS activity in Thailand have prompted questions about the vulnerability of the country’s Muslim-majority deep south and, in particular, its longstanding Malay-Muslim insurgency to jihadist influence.

While ICG claims that "to date" there is no evidence that ISIS has made inroads in southern Thailand, it warns:

But the conflict and a series of ISIS scares in Thailand are fanning fears of a new terrorist threat. Such fears are not irrational, though they are largely misplaced and should not obscure the calamity of the insurgency and the need to end it. 

Direct talks between insurgent leaders and the government are a priority; a decentralised political system could help address the principal grievances in the south while preserving the unitary Thai state.

In essence, ICG is warning of a crisis it itself admits is unlikely, then recommends that Bangkok pursue a course of action it already is taking - talking with militant leaders in its southern most provinces.

The lengthy ICG report - in reality - is just one of many reoccurring and premeditated attempts to place the notion of ISIS militancy taking root in Thailand into the realm of possibility. Just as the US and its allies have used ISIS as a geopolitical tool elsewhere in the world, and more recently, in Southeast Asia itself - particularly in the Philippines - a longstanding US goal in Thailand is to find and exploit sociopolitical and sectarian fault lines across which to divide, destroy, and control the Thai state.

It was in a 2012 leaded memo drafted by the US Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) that admitted the US and its allies sought the creation of what it called at the time a "Salafist" (Islamic) "principality" (State), specifically in eastern Syria where eventually ISIS would base itself before joint Russian-Iranian-Syrian operations uprooted and expelled them.

The 2012 report (.pdf) states specifically (emphasis added): 

If the situation unravels there is the possibility of establishing a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in eastern Syria (Hasaka and Der Zor), and this is exactly what the supporting powers to the opposition want, in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion (Iraq and Iran).

Thus, if ISIS is a geopolitical tool first designed and deployed by the US and its allies to subvert, isolate, and overthrow the government of Syria, it follows that ISIS' expansion into other regions of the world US foreign policy is facing increasingly insurmountable challenges is also very much planned and fueled by US policymakers and the special interests that sponsor them.

Who is the ICG and Why are They Promoting ISIS Fear? 

ICG is a corporate-funded and directed policy think tank and network that creates and leverages conflicts under the guise of "preventing" them.

It claims on its website that:

Crisis Group aspires to be the preeminent organisation providing independent analysis and advice on how to prevent, resolve or better manage deadly conflict. We combine expert field research, analysis and engagement with policymakers across the world in order to effect change in the crisis situations on which we work. We endeavour to talk to all sides and in doing so to build on our role as a trusted source of field-centred information, fresh perspectives and advice for conflict parties and external actors.

Yet a look at its sponsors and membership reveals a Westerners-only club of corporate-financier special interests, lobbying groups, lawyers, and politicians linked directly to the US State Department, the UK Foreign Office, or governments beholden to either or both.

Understanding Soft Power: Western Journalists Use Bangkok For Regional Agitation

November 24, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - The so-called Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand (FCCT) is located in downtown Bangkok and includes the regional offices of many of the United States' and Europe's largest media organizations. It also includes a large, swank clubhouse complete with a restaurant and bar, where events are held.

The FCCT on its website offers a lengthy, self-aggrandising and somewhat incoherent explanation as to what function it actually serves, claiming:

The FCCT moved into a penthouse floor with access from a corridor already filling up with foreign media offices. The Maneeya today houses AsiaWorks, the BBC, ABC, ITN Channel 4, NBC, InFocus, Al Jazeera and the Financial Times, among others. This guarantees the FCCT constant journalist traffic, imbuing it with the feel of a genuine press club. It has a good bar and decent enough kitchen but makes no pretensions to emulating the grandeur of its counterparts in Hong Kong or Tokyo - nor the fakeness of the "FCC" in Cambodia, a bar and restaurant with one of the best views in Asia but no hacks. 

In reality, it is a regional hub where US and European lobbyists and agitators, posing a journalists, coordinate events, programmes and propaganda campaigns targeting not only Thailand itself, but Thailand's Southeast Asian neighbours.

Image: FCCT aiding in political stunt on behalf of ousted regime.

It was at the FCCT, the club proudly boasted, that former education minister and political lieutenant of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Chaturon Chaisaeng held a press conference to grandstand while turning himself into the military after the 2014 coup. It was organised specifically to have the cameras of the West's biased media machine capture the moment soldiers arrested him, depicting Thailand as a state overwhelmed by a brutal military dictatorship.

The FCCT claims that by hosting the army's spokesman the next week, the FCCT is "doing something right" by playing an impartial and unbiased role. Those familiar with Thai politics and the absolutely biased nature both events were spun in favour of the ousted Shinawatra regime and the interests in Washington, London and Brussels sponsoring him, and at the cost of the new government's credibility, know otherwise.

A Hub for Agitation 

The FCCT had recently scheduled an event with the US State Department-funded Virginia-based Boat People SOS organisation. The FCCT admits in its announcement that the event was intended to:

...discuss the overall human rights situation in Vietnam, the imprisonment of at least 165 prisoners of conscience with heavy sentences, and the recent launch of the NOW! Campaign, an initiative by 15 human rights organisations around the world, calling for the immediate and unconditional release of these men and women.

The FCCT claims that the event was cancelled after several meetings with the police and military.

US Cuts Funds for Disarming Explosives It Dropped on Cambodia

November 15, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - In an article by Thai PBS titled, "US cuts 2018 funding for demining operations in Cambodia," it's revealed that next year's meager $2 million in US government funding for demining operations of US unexploded ordnance (UXO) in eastern Cambodia leftover from the Vietnam War has been discontinued without warning or explanation.

The move caused confusion across Cambodia's government, as well as across partner nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Cambodia participating in the US program.

Speculation over the move revolves around growing tensions between Washington and Phnom Penh as the United States desperately attempts to reassert itself in Asia Pacific, while Asian states - including Cambodia - continue to build closer and more constructive ties with Beijing at the expense of Washington's waning influence.

Cambodia has recently exposed and ousted a myriad of US-funded fronts posing as NGOs and independent media platforms executing a campaign of US-backed political subversion. This includes the disbanding of the Cambodia National Rescue opposition party and the arrest of its leader, Kem Sokha, who bragged of his role in a US conspiracy to overthrow the Cambodian government and install him into power.

Tensions in Cambodia represent a wider, regional trend where US footholds face increasing scrutiny and resistance as Washington's abuse of "NGOs," "rights advocacy," and "democracy promotion" is systematically exposed and rolled back.

Cut or Renewed, US UXO Assistance is Meaningless  

The US embassy in Cambodia would claim after receiving backlash for the move that the US had unilaterally decided to shut down funding in order to open up bidding for a new and "world-class removal program" - the details of which have yet to be confirmed or released.

The US boasts that it has spent "more than 114 million dollars" over the past 20 years to clear explosives it itself helped drop on Cambodia as part of its nearly two decades-long war in Vietnam and wider intervention in Southeast Asia - or in other words - the US has spent over 5,000 times less in 20 years on removing UXO in Cambodia than it does annually on its current military operations around the globe. In fact, a single F-35 Joint Strike Fighter warplane costs roughly the same amount of money the US has spent on demining Cambodia over the last 20 years.

There are an estimated 6 million pieces of UXO still littering Cambodia, which since the end of the Vietnam War and the rule of the Khmer Rouge have cost nearly 20,000 Cambodians their lives - with casualties still reported monthly.

Efforts that last 20 years, cost as little as a single warplane in Washington's current arsenal, and still leave people dead or maimed monthly indicate efforts that are halfhearted - a diplomatic stunt more than sincere reparations or humanitarian concern.

Doubling Nothing is Still Nothing 

In neighboring Laos, the United States left an estimated 80 million submunitions littering the country, or about 11 for each man, woman, and child that lives there. 20,000 people have also been killed by UXO in Laos and many more have been maimed.

Chevening "Scholarships" and Modern Day Imperialism

November 13, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - In 1983 the British government created Chevening as an international award scheme aimed at developing what it calls "global leaders." It is funded and directed by the United Kingdom's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and includes both scholarships and fellowships for individuals selected by British embassies around the world.

The Chevening website itself states:

Chevening offers a unique opportunity for future leaders, influencers, and decision-makers from all over the world to develop professionally and academically, network extensively, experience UK culture, and build lasting positive relationships with the UK.

The website also states that (our emphasis):

Chevening Awards are an important element in Britain’s public diplomacy effort and bring professionals, who have already displayed outstanding leadership talents, to study in the UK. The objective of Chevening is to support foreign policy priorities and achieve FCO objectives by creating lasting positive relationships with future leaders, influencers, and decision-makers.

In other, simpler and more frank terms, Chevening is a means of producing agents of British influence through the indoctrination of foreigners involved in their respective nation's media, politics, policy making and analysis.

And while Chevening has only been around since 1983, the tool of imperialism it represents is quite ancient.

Roman historian Tacitus (c. AD 56 – after 117) would adeptly describe the systematic manner in which Rome pacified foreign peoples and the manner in which it would extend its sociocultural and institutional influence over conquered lands.

Far from simple military conquest, the Romans engaged in sophisticated cultural colonisation.

In chapter 21 of his book Agricola, named so after his father-in-law whose methods of conquest were the subject of the text, Tacitus would explain:

His object was to accustom them to a life of peace and quiet by the provision of amenities. He therefore gave official assistance to the building of temples, public squares and good houses. He educated the sons of the chiefs in the liberal arts, and expressed a preference for British ability as compared to the trained skills of the Gauls. The result was that instead of loathing the Latin language they became eager to speak it effectively. In the same way, our national dress came into favour and the toga was everywhere to be seen. And so the population was gradually led into the demoralizing temptation of arcades, baths and sumptuous banquets. 

And perhaps the most striking observation of all made by Tacitus was as follows:

The unsuspecting Britons spoke of such novelties as 'civilization', when in fact they were only a feature of their enslavement. 

Centuries later, Chevening alumni boast openly about their scholarships and fellowships. It is included in their bios on social media and prominently featured in biographies and résumés that accompany editorials and job applications.

They believe it to be a high rung upon the ladder of civilisation that they have reached, when in reality, it is nothing more than a modern-day feature of indoctrination, manipulation and exploitation.

Pivot to, or Brawl in Asia? West Already Targeting Thailand's New King

November 3, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Not even a day had passed after the funeral rites for Thailand's revered and respected former head of state, King Bhumibol Adulyadej before the Western media began launching attacks on his heir and current Thai head of state, King Maha Vajiralongkorn.

It is a development widely predicted - with the United States and its European partners long-eager to pursue regime change in Thailand as part of a wider strategy to either control or destabilize Southeast Asia as a means of hindering China's regional and global rise.

First Shots 

The AFP in its article, "Protected by draconian law, King Rama X begins to make his mark," would cite rumors and half-truths in an attempt to depict Thailand's new head of state as a shadowy, unpopular, and despotic figure that remains "unpredictable."

The article claims that Thailand's "draconian law" prevents criticism of its highest institution, citing the arrest of a "student activist" for sharing a BBC article slandering the head of state.

What AFP and other articles consistently and intentionally fail to mention is that these "student activists" are US and European funded and directed agitators, enjoying direct support from the US, British, and EU diplomatic missions in Thailand. Embassy staff often accompany their agitators to police stations and appearing in public with their family members.

Image: Canadian embassy staff publicly supporting the family of the above mentioned jailed "student activist" Jatupat Boonpattararaksa, exposing such "activism" as little more than foreign-backed agitation and subversion.  

In other words, those targeted by Thailand's "draconian law" are engaged in both treason and sedition and could easily be charged and sentenced for either - or both - and are instead granted lesser sentences, many of which are pardoned long before they are fully served.

Similar articles have been appearing in the BBC, CNN, AP, and other mainstays of Western propaganda before and after the passing of King Bhumibol Adulyadej last year and upon the succession of his son and heir.

The Reality of Thailand's Monarchy

Shifting Blame as US Agenda Unfolds in Myanmar

October 25, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - As violence continues to unfold in Myanmar's western Rakhine state against the nation's Rohingya ethnic minority, the agenda driving the conflict is likewise unfolding in a more transparent and direct manner. 

As was predicted - the US is shifting blame away from the US-backed client regime headed by Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League of Democracy (NLD) party the US installed into power in 2015 - and toward Myanmar's independent institutions, including the nation's still powerful military. 

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in a recent talk before the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington D.C. (PDF) laid the blame squarely on Myanmar's military, claiming: 

...we’re extraordinarily concerned by what’s happening with the Rohingya in Burma. I’ve been in contact with Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the civilian side of the government. As you know, this is a power-sharing government that has – that has emerged in Burma. We really hold the military leadership accountable for what’s happening with the Rakhine area.

Reuters in an article titled, "Lawmakers urge U.S. to craft targeted sanctions on Myanmar military," would report: 

More than 40 lawmakers urged the Trump administration on Wednesday to reimpose U.S. travel bans on Myanmar’s military leaders and prepare targeted sanctions against those responsible for a crackdown on the country’s Rohingya Muslim minority.

And Freedom House - a subsidiary of the US government and corporate-funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED) - would also publish a piece titled, "Does Democracy’s Toehold in Myanmar Outweigh the Lives of the Rohingya?," shifting the blame away from the very regime it worked for decades to put in power, and target Myanmar's military.

It claimed:

In less than two months, more than half a million Rohingya have fled to neighboring Bangladesh to escape the destruction of entire settlements, systematic rape, and the mass slaughter of men, women, and children. This horrendous violence is perpetrated by the military, with assistance from elements of the local Rakhine Buddhist population.

It is clear that the confined nature of Myanmar's ongoing Rohingya crisis will not lead to the same type of nationwide militancy observed in Syria. It is also clear that the United States is likewise confining its condemnation for the violence not to the ultra-violent elements that it cultivated under Suu Kyi's political movement for decades, but on the military who often stood between Rohingya communities and violent onslaughts. 

The pressuring and weakening first, then either co-opting or overthrowing of Myanmar's current military leadership under the pretext of the current crisis will invite a larger and expanding US and European role in Myanmar's internal affairs. Secretary Tillerson alluded to precisely that in his recent remarks, claiming: 

And so we have been asking for access to the region. We’ve been able to get a couple of our people from our embassy into the region so we can begin to get our own firsthand account of what is occurring. We’re encouraging access for the aid agencies – the Red Cross, the Red Crescent – U.N. agencies to – so we can at least address some of the most pressing humanitarian needs, but more importantly so we can get a full understanding of what is going on. 

Someone – if these reports are true, someone is going to be held to account for that. And it’s up to the military leadership of Burma to decide what direction do they want to play in the future of Burma, because we see Burma as an important emerging democracy, but this is a real test.

With US ally Saudi Arabia fueling a militancy under the guise of a Rohingya "resistance," the US will also be able to justify military aid, joint-operations, and even permanent US military facilities - however meager - that will present a serious obstacle to Chinese influence in the nation and in the region. It will also be an obstacle that once erected, will be difficult to dismantle as America's enduring and unwanted military presence in the Philippines is proving to be.  

China and Thailand: Tank Tracks and Train Tracks

October 21, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - While Thailand undergoes a sensitive transition with the October funeral for its head of state, the widely respected and revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the Southeast Asia constitutional monarchy, home to 70 million and one of the strongest regional economies, continues forward with solid footing in its, and the region's realignment with its neighbours and East Asia, particularly China.

The Royal Thai Army took delivery this month of the first 28 Chinese-built VT4 main battle tanks (MBTs), with possibly over 100 additional tanks to be acquired in the near future. The growing fleet of VT4 MBTs joins other Chinese-built armoured vehicles in Thailand's inventory including over 30 VN-1 and over 450 Type 85 armoured personnel carriers.

The acquisition of Chinese military equipment by Thailand's armed forces also includes 3 submarines as well as joint-development of multiple rocket launchers. There is also a growing number of joint Thai-Chinese military exercises including Blue Strike 2016, which followed Falcon Strike 2015. The exercises involved both nation's marine and air forces respectively and represent an alternative to what was once the United States' exclusive domain in Southeast Asia.

In addition to growing Thai-Chinese military ties, both nations are moving forward with infrastructure projects including massive railway initiatives. Construction is set to start in November of this year on the Thai-Chinese high-speed rail network. The first stage will link Thailand's capital of Bangkok to the northeast province of Nakhon Ratchasima. Eventually, China and its Southeast Asian neighbours plan to create a high-speed rail network running from China all the way to Singapore via Laos, Thailand and Malaysia. Construction in Laos is already underway.

American Counterstrokes 

It is clear that Bangkok benefits from its growing relationship with Beijing. Washington, which openly and for decades has sought to hinder Beijing's regional and global rise, has little to offer as an alternative. Worse still, Washington has filled the void left by its inability to offer constructive military and economic ties with a regiment of political interference, coercion and even confrontation.

Bangkok is home to numerous foreign governmental organisations posing as "independent" nongovernmental organisations (i.e. Prachatai, Thai Netizens, Thai Lawyers for Human Rights, the New Democracy Movement and iLaw) fully funded by the United States government and a number of private US and European-based foundations, serving US and European interests. These foreign fronts seek to pressure the Thai government to adopt a system of economics and government that interlocks with and is subservient to US and European institutions, while overwriting Thailand's own independent institutions, particularly the military and the constitutional monarchy.

Additionally, the US has attempted to push through one-sided free trade agreements including the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) which eventually unravelled and was abandoned by Washington itself.

Image: Disingenuous foreign-funded fronts hiding behind rights advocacy used to project US power and influence into Thailand are a poor substitute for the sort of economic and military cooperation China has chosen and goes far in explaining America's waning influence in Asia Pacific. 

Thailand, which possesses a unified population, a formidable military and a strong, resilient economy, has weathered multiple attempts by the United States and its European partners to impose a client state through politicians like the recently ousted Yingluck Shinawatra and her brother, Thaksin Shinawatra.

US Meddling Across Southeast Asia

October 17, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - At a time when US political leaders decry with little evidence what they claim is a pandemic of "Russian interference" in Western political affairs from Western Europe to North America, years of documented evidence exist of this very same interference in the domestic affairs of other nations around the world, funded and directed not by Moscow, but by Washington D.C.

Across Southeast Asia alone is an interlocked, deeply rooted and heavily financed network of American-backed agitators and propagandists, operating behind the cloaks of journalism and rights advocacy, working to upend local, independent political institutions and replace them with a system created by and serving exclusively the interests in Washington that created them.

Shedding Light on US Interference in the Philippines

The Manila Times in a recent article titled, "CIA conduit funding anti-Duterte media outfits," would shed light on US government money being channelled into the Philippines for the explicit purpose of manipulating public perception, particularly regarding politics.

The article cites the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), and its grantees, the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ), the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR), and the Vera Files.

The article outlines the funding, stating:

NED documents show that for 2015—the earliest year for which data is available—2016 and 2017, it gave the PCIJ $106,900; Vera Files $70,000, and CMFR, $278,000. (Another funder of Vera Files is Reporters without Borders, which is also recipient of NED funds.)

Even if NED wasn’t a CIA conduit, it is an institution funded by the US government, and therefore advances US interests. Shouldn’t we be outraged that the US government is funding anti-Duterte media outfits here?

It also points out that this US interference in Filipino politics fits into a much larger, global pattern of political interference engaged in by the US government. The article cites US interference in Ukraine in particular, noting that it was US backing that eventually led to the overthrow of the elected government there between 2013 and 2014.

The article's author, Rigoberto Tiglao, attempted to contact several of the Filipino US NED grantees, only to be confronted or evaded, a response typical of US NED grantees worldwide when questioned about their foreign funding, the dangerous conflicts of interests they are indulging in and the contradictions of posing as independent media organisations entirely dependent on foreign government funding.

Pressure on the Philippines through US-funded media is only one of several fronts the US is using to transform, direct and determine the future of the Philippines as a nation. It has placed direct political pressure on Manila to cooperate in confronting Beijing over the South China Sea. It has also attempted to use Saudi-funded terrorism in the Philippines' south as a vector to reintroduce a significant and expanding US military presence across the archipelago nation.

The use of terrorism as both a pressure point against Southeast Asian states and as a pretext for a US military presence is a tactic the US is attempting to reuse everywhere from Indonesia and Malaysia, to southern Thailand and neighbouring Myanmar. So is the use of US NED-funded organisations operating under the guise of independent journalism or rights advocacy.

Beyond the Philippines: Thailand and Cambodia 

Thailand faces a similar landscape of compromised opposition organisations posing as independent, yet entirely funded by the US government and US-based corporate foundations. These include Prachatai, Thai Netizens, the New Democracy Movement, the Isaan Record, Thai Lawyers for Human Rights and even the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Thailand (FCCT).

Like their Filipino counterparts, they pose as proponents of democracy and as human rights advocates, but cover current events in a transparently one-sided manner, excusing or omitting abuse and corruption among the opposition and targeting only Thailand's independent institutions, particularly the military and the monarchy.

In Cambodia, US government funding goes one step further, funding the entire opposition, hosting them in Washington D.C. and creating an entire media network to skew public perception in favour of this foreign enterprise and the interests that propel it.

How the West is Trying to Recreate Myanmar's Crisis in Thailand

October 13, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Media platforms either directly funded by the United States government or by their political proxies in Thailand, including US-funded Prachatai and Khao Sod English, have begun investing increasing amounts of energy into fueling a currently non-existent sectarian divide in Thai society.

They are concentrating their efforts in promoting the activities of a small anti-Muslim movement in Thailand's northeast region often referred to as Issan. Issan - it is no coincidence - is also the epicenter of previous US efforts to divide and overthrow the political order of Thailand via their proxy Thaksin Shinawatra, his Pheu Thai Party, and his ultra-violent street front, the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD or "red shirts"). Shinawatra and his political proxies were ousted from power in 2014 by a swift and peaceful military coup.

Today, temples affiliated with Shinawatra's political network are turning from a tried and tired, primarily class-based narrative, to one targeting Thailand's second largest religion - Islam, in hopes of dividing and destroying Thai society along sectarian lines.

From northern cities like Chiang Mai to the northeast in provinces like Khon Kaen, suspiciously identical movements, with identical tactics, organized across social media platforms like Facebook are protesting Mosques, calling for specific acts of violence against Muslims, and using the same sort of factual and intellectually dishonest rhetoric peddled by veteran Western Islamophobes used to fuel the West's global campaign of divide, destroy, and conquer everywhere from the US and Europe itself, to Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and more recently, Myanmar and the Philippines in Southeast Asia.

Tools of Empire: Divide and Conquer 

Myanmar, which borders Thailand, currently finds itself at the apex of nationalist and racist-driven violence targeting its primarily Muslim Rohingya ethnic minority. Groups of supposed "Buddhists" who form a more deeply rooted version of what the US and its proxies are trying to create in Thailand, were used to both create a deep sectarian divide where once there was coexistence, and to help put the US and European-funded political network of Aung San Suu Kyi and her National League for Democracy (NLD) party into power.

Image: Aung San Suu Kyi, sectarian extremists posing as "Buddhist monks," and the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) together in Washington D.C. 

The humanitarian crisis created in Myanmar serves several functions for the US and its European partners who have meticulously cultivated it over the course of several decades.

First, it allows the West to continuously hold significant leverage over the current government - one who at any moment may be tempted to break away from its decades-long Western sponsors and collaborate with a more local, sustainable, and constructive partner like China.

Second, because the Rohingya crisis is highly localized to Myanmar's western state of Rakhine, it also presents a highly controlled conflict the US can use to introduce foreign-funded terrorism, and in turn, create a pretext for Western "counter-terrorism" assistance in the form of US and European troops, military assets, and even bases on the ground.

A small contingent of Saudi-funded and directed militants has already been introduced into Myanmar's ongoing crisis and will likely be expanded until US military "assistance" and thus the first stage in establishing a permanent military presence in Myanmar can be justified.

This would fulfill a long-term goal the United States has sought to achieve in Southeast Asia - the permanent positioning of US military assets in a nation directly bordering China.

China vs US: Singapore's Role in Asia Pacific

October 7, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - In early August, a Chinese-American professor, Huang Jing, and his wife were expelled from Singapore. He is accused of collaborating with foreign intelligence agents, according to the South China Morning Post.

While the Singaporean government has yet to disclose which nation's intelligence agencies he is accused of collaborating with, the South China Morning Post and other US-European influenced newspapers in the region have attempted to suggest it is China.

Huang Jing sought assistance from the US embassy in Singapore upon hearing the accusations. He is also a former fellow of the US-based corporate-funded policy think tank, the Brookings Institution, and in particular was a fellow at the institution's John L. Thornton China Center.

Regardless of the truth behind his past and current affiliations, attempts by the US and European media to signal this as a win for American influence across Asia Pacific and a strike against Beijing have been ongoing.

The South China Morning Post would later publish a more balanced editorial titled, "What Singapore is Saying by Expelling China Hand Huang Jing," stating:

It marked the first time in more than two decades that Singapore had publicly booted out an alleged functionary of a foreign power for interference in its domestic affairs. 

Singapore did not name the country Huang Jing was supposedly working for, but most people assume it is China, the country of his birth. The affair has sparked intense discussion and speculation. Since such expulsions are invariably symbolic, the question is what Singapore is trying to communicate. 

The editorial cites Huang's comments made encouraging more neutrality from Singapore regarding the US-China South China Sea row as well as noting Singapore's "overboard" support for the Trans-Pacific Partnership which was part of America's recent and floundering "Asia pivot."

It concludes by stating, "Singapore was – and remains – a great believer in a strong US presence in the region." But the editorial also notes that Singapore-China ties are growing stronger and that the recent spat may not be as significant as others may hope. It may simply be Singapore attempting to establish boundaries amid a growing relationship.

Ultimately, Singapore's perceived affinity for the US or China was, is and will always be directly proportional to America and China's respective socioeconomic power both regionally and globally. As the United States and China trade places in terms of influence and importance in Asia Pacific, Singapore's relationship with both states will change accordingly.

US Proxies in Southeast Asia Include Fake Communists

October 5, 2017 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - A quick geopolitical audit of Washington's political and military proxies around the globe reveals a tangled web that, at first glance, appears contradictory and incoherent.

Fascists in Kiev who hold extreme views regarding race and religion enjoy equal standing in Washington with Wahhabi militants across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Two groups who would otherwise find themselves ideologically opposed, instead find themselves working toward a common cause, one on behalf of Washington.

And Washington itself, which would appear at first glance diametrically opposed to both fascism and Wahhabism, instead counts both among its closest and most reliable facilitators and functionaries around the globe.

And while the rank and file of Americans, Ukrainians and Wahhabi militants may genuinely believe in otherwise contradictory and incompatible ideologies, cursory research reveals that the leadership of all three groups are motivated by money and the influence it buys far more than their alleged, respective ideologies.

In Southeast Asia, Wahhabi-inspired militants also serve Washington's interests across the region. They are joined by neo-liberal academics and journalists who eagerly serve Washington, London, Brussels and the Western clubs and networks these neo-liberals seek memberships within.

But there is also another curious and perhaps ironic member of this otherwise contradictory alliance, supposed "Communists" and "socialists."

Thailand's "Communists"and the Capitalists They Love  

The most transparent example of this is found in Thailand in the form of the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD). The UDD is led by prominent members of Thailand's former Communist Party including Weng Tojirakarn and his wife Thida Thavornseth. While the UDD claims to be an independent "people power" movement, it is little more than a street front of, by and for the Pheu Thai Party (PTP).

PTP in turn is the creation of billionaire Thaksin Shinawatra who served as Thailand's prime minister from 2001 until 2006 when he was finally ousted from power during a swift and bloodless military coup.

Since 2006, Shinawatra has mired Thailand in political turmoil as he attempts to seize back power, temporarily holding it by proxy through his brother-in-law Somchai Wongsawat and more recently through his own sister, Yingluck Shinawatra.

Shinawatra is currently living abroad as a convicted criminal and a fugitive. He enjoys significant backing from the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union where he is allowed to regularly travel and conduct business.

Shinawatra has a lengthy list of lobbying contacts in Washington D.C. including firms such as Baker Botts headed by James Baker. Both Baker and Shinawatra shared roles in the private equity firm, The Carlyle Group, in the late 1990's before Shinawatra ascended in Thai politics.

Another lobbyist that has supported Shinawatra is Kenneth Adelman who also concurrently served as a trustee of Freedom House, one of several US State Department fronts that work to undermine one government on behalf of another favoured by Washington.

Today, Shinawatra, his PTP and the UDD continue undermining political stability in Thailand with the help of a massive and growing network of nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) funded by the United States, the United Kingdom, the EU and private foundations like convicted financial criminal George Soros' Open Society.

The UDD's leadership regularly receives directives from Shinawatra, its membership openly and shamelessly professes fealty to Shinawatra and during rallies regularly feature video call-ins from Thaksin Shinawatra himself. While the UDD claims to be an independent "people power" movement, it is in reality nothing more than people "powering" a billionaire's foreign-backed political machine, with nothing at all to do with empowering the actual people involved.

In simpler terms, the return of Shinawatra, his PTP and its UDD street front to power upon Thailand's political landscape will be a victory for "imperialism," not a strike against it.

Not Everything That is Red is Communist

The UDD is also commonly referred to as the "red shirts," both for the red shirts members literally wear during US colour revolution-style protests and to invoke Communist ideology and symbolism as a unifying theme for the movement.

Analysis by Analogy: Myanmar is not Syria

September 27, 2017 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Many geopolitical analysts and commentators have noted many worthwhile similarities between the Syrian crisis and the one now unfolding in the Southeast Asian state of Myanmar. However, what is different about these two crises is just as important as what is the same.

The Similarities 

Particular focus has been placed on evidence emerging that US-ally Saudi Arabia is serving as an intermediary fueling militancy in Myanmar's western Rakhine state. The militants, however, consist of a foreign armed, funded, and led cadre, constituting a numerically negligible minority of the Rohingya population they claim to represent, and are in fact no more representative of the Rohingya people than militants of Al Qaeda and the so-called "Islamic State" are representative of Syria or Iraq's Sunni Muslim populations.

While it is crucial to point out the foreign-funded nature of a militancy attempting to co-opt the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, it is equally important to understand precisely where this militancy fits into Saudi Arabia's and ultimately its American sponsors' larger plans.

Another similarity pointed out by analysts is the use of US and European-funded fronts posing as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). These include larger organizations like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, as well as organizations on the ground in Myanmar funded by the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED), its various subsidiaries including the International Republican Institute (IRI), the National Democratic Institute (NDI), Freedom House, USAID, and Open Society.

These organizations are intentionally seeking to control the narrative, inflame rather than smooth over tensions, and create a pretext for wider and more direct intervention in Myanmar's expanding crisis by Western nations.

Analysts and commentators, however, cannot stop here. They must commit to equal due diligence in unraveling what stands behind Myanmar's government - who it was that assisted them into power during the relatively recent 2016 elections, who built up their political networks across the country over the course of several decades, and what role their actions play in Western designs for the nation's near and intermediate future.

The Differences 

Syria's government is the creation and perpetuation of localized special interests - backed by various alliances ranging from the former Soviet Union in the past, to Russia, Iran, and to a lesser degree China in present day.