by John Helmer, Moscow 
  @bears_with

The British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS, MI6) continues to celebrate itself as the master of deception operations, at least when it comes to fooling their own population and their US allies. Successful deception is the principal weapon London contributes in its special relationship with the US, since in money, men, weapons, and military technology it lags far behind.

Fooling the enemy, however, is not something Perfidious Albion is good at.

The last time the British succeeded was Operation Mincemeat in 1943 when the corpse of a Welsh tramp suicide, dressed up to look like a courier of secret military plans, was floated on to a Spanish beach for the purpose of fooling Adolf Hitler and the German High Command on when and where the Allies planned to launch their D-Day offensive in Europe. The operation appears to have succeeded in deceiving the Germans; that’s the version the British keep repeating.  

In 2018 the British tried again with a fresh deception operation, also with a corpse,  to convince themselves and the world that the Russian military, ordered by the Kremlin, had attacked on British soil with a nerve agent weapon, first targeting Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia; then as collateral damage a county policeman; and finally, after four months had elapsed,  a woman who had accidentally sprayed herself with the nerve agent which had been found abandoned in a dumpster, disguised as a perfume atomiser. The cause of death of Dawn Sturgess, the last and only fatal victim of the alleged Russian attack, is still being investigated in secret, ahead of a public inquiry due to commence in London in October.  

This is the Novichok deception operation, the first British success in the 81 years since Operation Mincemeat. Except that the new operation didn’t deceive the Russians like the old one had the Germans.  

Instead, it has become the justification for the British Government going to war against Russia for reasons which no vote of parliament, no media investigation, and no public opinion poll has disputed over six years. The deception of themselves has been the powerful result of the Skripal case.

Listen to Chris Cook of Gorilla Radio lead the discussion of how and why the Skripal case has been, and is still,  more persuasive politically and militarily than the case of Julian Assange. Unlike Sergei Skripal, Assange has survived years of British imprisonment; and unlike Yulia Skripal, he is now a free man.  As the broadcast was going to air, the news broke that Assange had been released from  Belmarsh prison in a plea bargain between the British, US and Australian governments.  

Also breaking news during the broadcast was the claim that the Russian Air Force had shot down a US Air Force drone off the Crimean shore in Black Sea airspace. There is no confirmation of the claim, which first surfaced in the Russian military blogs.   They have been calling for this strike in retaliation for the Sevastopol missile attack on Sunday. Read the lead to that story here.  

Click to listen to the podcast: https://gradio.substack.com/

For the introduction to this broadcast, access to the 20-year Gorilla Radio archive, and Chris Cook’s blog, click here  and here.  

by Editor - Monday, June 24th, 2024