By

21st Century Wire

SPECIAL FEATURE

Once again, we’ve arrived at our New Years Eve wrap-up, showcasing some of the most compelling and downright conspiratorial stories of the year. This past year was one of thee most polarizing ever, exposing some of the fundamental flaws in the current globalized command and control system. Unlike the establishment gatekeepers, when we use the word ‘conspiracy’ here, we are not talking about theories, but actual bona fide conspiracies and their cover-ups.



There were a number of honorable mentions this year which would have been good enough to break into the top ten in previous years, but not this one…

On the international scene, the world got a taste of what “Peace in the Pacific” might look like, as détente broke out on the Korean Peninsula, when North Korean leader Kim Jung-un sat down with South Korea’s Moon Jae-in to discuss a future without war, and with President Trump hoping to catch some of the kudos as he angles for the de-nuclearization of the Peninsula. Meanwhile, Trump proceeded to turn economic warfare into a national pastime, first by unilaterally pulling out of the Iran Nuclear Deal and immediately slapping harsh sanctions on Iran. Trump then waged economic warfare against America’s top trading partners, including China, sending the stock market on one roller coaster ride after another. Over in Europe, the BREXIT debacle continued to ferment between London and Brussels, while a number of right-wing and populist movements continued to sweep across the EU, confounding pundits and analysts along the way. In the US, endless #MeToo sex scandals plagued Hollywood and the media, while the #NPCMeme nearly broke Twitter. We also witnessed the surreal Beatification of John McCain by the US political and media establishment, with a strange week of ceremonies and eulogies in honor of one of the most belligerent warmongers American history, but not to be outdone by the state funeral for President George H.W. Bush a few months later, who was given a similar saint-like, posthumous treatment. Later in the year, we also witnessed NATO and its proxy Ukraine nearly came to blows with Russia over the Kerch Strait provocation in Crimea – as the West’s case for war with Russia continues to press forward.

The most important thing to bear in mind about 2018 is that nearly all of the marquee plots exist within either Trump or Russia framework, or both simultaneously. We can see that a sizeable portion of international politics is now being driven by domestic US politics – with the public left to believe that all roads lead back to Moscow, or to Trump Tower. By using these two skeleton keys, and you can skillfully surf almost all of the top conspiracies of 2018…



10. Parkland – Another day, another mass shooting, or so it seemed. Upon closer review, all anomalies aside, the facts clearly show how this crisis event was used to drive a partisan political agenda by the media and the Democratic Party. They’ve almost become routine in America, complete with the usual scripted media template: breaking news of a lone gunman with mental issues who goes on an AR-15 rampage at a school, shopping mall or airport. That very character materialized again in the form of 19 year-old Nikolas Cruz, named as the suspect in the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, apparently killing some 17 students and staff. However, never in the history has such an off-beat tragedy become such an overtly politicized event. Aside from the usual horror and outrage, what was unique about this incident was how rapidly it was transformed into a national political campaign, within hours in fact. No sooner were the bodies counted that a hand-picked group of good-looking, photogenic and camera-friendly students were being shuttled from one corporate media outlet to another, for around-the-clock interviews, coached by a team partisan TV producers and political operatives, and soon after speaking at public rallies around the country. What made this post-tragedy theatrical performance all the more contrived though, was how the over-arching imperative was not confined to elevating the issue of ‘gun control,’ or even the fact it was used as an anti-Trump media launching pad, but rather by using the emotive spectacle as a political platform for registering new Democratic Party voters in time before the 2018 US Midterm Elections. This drama took place in Florida’s Broward County, a hot bed of political corruption and organized crime, which for some unknown reason has also become a regular venue for a string of freak events – like the Ft. Lauderdale Airport shooting, and last October with another seemingly made-to-order political event right before midterm elections with faux a letter bomb extravaganza by alleged pro-Trump ‘MAGA Bomber’, Cesar Sayoc. Looking back, what’s perhaps even more bizarre is how fast all of these consumable “breaking” dramas fade from public view.



9. 2018 Midterm Circus – Normally, midterm elections pass without much fanfare, and rarely is it ever treated as a life and death national emergency. Never in US history has there been a more politicized midterm election than this one, with a series of dramatic plots and twists, all lined-up to try to sway or energize voters. Months before the election the media were already ginning up fear of “Russian Meddling!” – which of course never actually materialized. The Russian canard also prompted Facebook to instigate a mass political purge of alternative and conservative pages from its platform in the weeks before the midterm elections – a level of partisan corporate election interference never seen before in US history. Also set in motion just in time for the election was the Migrant Caravan of some 5,000 prospective immigrants from Central America hoping to rush the US southern border in November. This was coupled with a media campaign custom designed to shame President Trump and the Republican Party for not being compassionate enough in allowing for open borders to accommodate a seemingly unlimited number of migrants (future Democratic Party voters) into the country. Despite denials by various “fact checking” websites, it turned out that the Caravans have been mainly organized by a charity that’s bankrolled by NGOs funded by Democratic Party financier George Soros. While the Caravan was steaming along, a Congressional inquisition was also underway with Trump’s Supreme Court Justice pick, commonly known as the ‘Kavanaugh Hearings,’ which quickly descended into a #MeToo circus, with judge Brett Kavanaugh besieged by various and sundry women, including the opposition’s star witness, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford,who had accused Kavanaugh of a drunken high school sexual indiscretion some 35 years earlier, although she admitted she could not remember the details. As it turned out, most of the women accusers later admitted they had fabricated their stories and worked with partisan lawyers and media outlets in order to try to derail the confirmation of justice Kavanaugh. But the real piece de resistance came just days before voters were set to go to the polls. As if by magic, numerous fake letter bombs all appeared at the same time and same day at the homes and office addresses of Democratic Party luminaries George Soros, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Maxine Waters, Robert De Niro, and ex-CIA spook chieftain John Brennan. Bizarrely, Brennan’s fake package was addressed in care of CNN’s Manhattan headquarters – which allowed Democratic Party-oriented network CNN to sound the alarm dramatically announcing on-air they were evacuating its studios. These faux letter bombs were supposedly sent by one Cesar Sayoc, a Trump-supporting nutter dubbed (oddly, in advance of any evidence) by the media as the #MAGABomber (this made-to-order hashtag was deployed within minutes of news breaking). Naturally, the entire incident was blamed on Trump by CNN and others. Not to be out done, less than 48 hours later another ‘lone gunman’ appeared, identified as one Robert Bowers, a distraught middle aged social media user who stormed into the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, PA, and shot 11 people. Aside from talk of ‘antisemitism’, the Pittsburgh event also helped to propel the issue of gun control back into the headlines ahead of the election, but more importantly, the shooting was used by mainstream media outlets who claimed that Trump was somehow responsible for the shooting – a clear case of the corporate media using what was an apparent tragedy in order to gain political leverage just days before an election. Needless to say, Americans were relieved when the 2018 midterms were finally over.



8. ‘Antisemitism in the Labour Party!’ – Undoubtedly, one of the biggest threats to the transnational war machine, and to Israel’s 70 year illegal occupation of Palestine – is the prospect of UK Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn assuming the office of Prime Minister. As a result, the mainstream corporate media establishment and the Israeli Lobby have been working overtime to try and cut-down or discredit Corbyn in any way possible. Led by Rupert Murdoch’s Times of London, the establishment press have accused him of being an IRA terrorist, or an ISIS sympathizer, and of course, a Kremlin spy. This full-on assault was engineered by a conclave of pro-Israeli Zionist groups within the Labour Party, including LFI (Labour Friends of Israel), the JLM (the Zionist ‘Jewish Labour Movement’), backed up with endless fake stories about ‘Corbyn’s antisemitism’ planted in the mainstream media – all trying, but clearly failing to paint Corbyn as a raving anti-semite. As activist and Palestinian advocate, Miko Peled points out, the problem is not anti-Semitism but Corbyn’s stance on Palestine. “These Zionist groups want to get rid of Corbyn because of his principled stance on Palestine, Israeli colonialism and occupation of Palestine, and they use anti-Semitism labels because they think it will work,” said Peled. One should not underestimate just how deeply embedded the Israeli Lobby is in US and UK politics, and how The Lobby wages covert warfare in order to make sure American and British politicians are doing its bidding. The facts speak for themselves.



7. Gilet Jaunes aka Yellow Vests – This past autumn in Paris, Yellow Vests began to appear on the streets of Paris. At first, the world didn’t take much notice, but it wasn’t long until this protest developed into one of the most significant grassroots political movements in living memory – and nearly bringing the French government of globalist Emmanuel Macron to its knees. Naturally, the media tried the blame the movement on Russia, which was laughable. The Yellow Vests, or Gilets Jaunes, in French, sprouted up as an organic “leaderless movement”, but is described by a fearful mainstream press as ‘populist.’ They had initially gained steam in November, marshaling support against the government’s diesel fuel tax hikes, but quickly morphed into a general expression of anger against Macron, and even the EU. The movement is spreading beyond France too. Their complaint seems to be similar to so many people who’ve been scorned by the false promise of globalization and the all-singing and all-dancing technocracy espoused by social engineers and masters of high finance in Brussels. The sums simple don’t add up anymore for the working man and women, and now they are dedicated to disrupting a system which they believe no longer works for them. Watch this space in 2019.



6. Julian Assange – In 2018, it became clear that concerted moves were afoot between the US and Ecuadorian governments, conspiring in behind closed doors to bring WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange’s eight year standoff to an end. However, what our bought-and-paid-for corrupt corporate mainstream media won’t tell you is that Assange is actually holding the line for press freedom – and his fate may ultimately determine the future of the Fourth Estate. While US officials like Secretary of State Mike Pompeo repeatedly accuse WikiLeaks of being “a non-state hostile intelligence service,” the reality is that Julian Assange and Wikileaks are a publisher and therefore should be protected under freedom of the press. Moreover, the US has no legitimate legal jurisdiction over Wikileaks which resides overseas. In order to force WikiLeaks into Washington’s legal field of gravity, the Western establishment is trying to frame Assange and WikiLeaks as somehow part of the official Trump-Russian Collusion conspiracy theory, which led the Establishment to draft in help from what has recently become the premier deep state disinformation and propaganda outlet, the UK’s The Guardian newspaper, and one of its many serial fabricators, ‘journalist’ Luke Harding who invented an elaborate front page story about how Trump’s campaign manager Paul Manafort (a central ‘person of interest’ in Robert Mueller’s Special Counsel investigation into alleged Trump-Russia Collusion) had visited Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, supposedly as part of some secret Russian plot to put Donald Trump in the White House in 2016. This was clearly a move to slander Assange ahead of a possible extradition to the US following the revelation a secret sealed Grand Jury indictment filed years earlier. The tea leaves say this situation may soon come to a head – and when it does, either way, the trans-Atlantic Establishment will have to show their true face.



5. Trump Brings the Troops Home – Just before Christmas, President Trump attempted to do what no other US President has ever done, which is come good on his campaign promises. Trump shocked the world and the US foreign policy and military establishment when he announced the withdrawal of US troops from northeastern Syria, along with a draw-down of 7,000 troops (out of 14,000) from Afghanistan. The announcement came as a surprise to even the most ardent anti-interventionists who had all but resigned themselves to an indefinite US military presence in both those overseas locations. Trump’s decision triggered the resignation of Defense Secretary James ‘Mad Dog’ Mattis, supposedly in protest. As 21WIRE pointed out, the Military Industrial Complex will not let go of Afghanistan easily, as “The Generals” immediately began to disregard Trump’s remarks claiming they were ‘a rumor’. On Syria, it only took a week for Trump to back-pedal after a desperate intervention from the unhinged Neoconservative warmonger, Senator Lindsey Graham, who seems to have convinced the President not to fully withdraw from the illegal occupation in Syria. Bottom line: don’t trust the mainstream headlines, and certainly don’t trust the promises of politicians. – no matter how good they sound.



4. Khashoggi – If you believe everything you’ve heard from the mainstream press and the CIA, on 2nd October, Jamal Khashoggi, a well-known journalist and occasional critic (and hardly a dissident) of the Saudi government, walked into the country’s consulate in Istanbul, where he was supposedly murdered, and his body hacked to pieces by a bone saw, before the crime scene was ‘cleaned’ by a Saudi version of Harvey Keitel in Pulp Fiction. Apparently, the Saudi Arabian government half owned-up to the crime, with its public prosecutor saying that Khashoggi was killed by a ‘rogue’ intelligence operation. Here’s the real kicker though: his body has not yet been found. In any court of law in the world, no guilty verdict could ever be reached in murder case without habeas corpus. But when it’s trial by media with high geopolitical stakes – pretty much anything can make it over what would normally be a much higher bar of justice. Ditto with Skripal, and ‘Assad’s chemical weapons’, too. The CIA’s well-timed announcement fingering Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as the man who ordered the gruesome killing was then used to corner Trump who was attempting to salvage a lucrative US arms deals with the Kingdom. “Why is Trump is doing business with a murderer?” crowed the headlines. Aside from slating Saudi Arabia in the global court of public condemnation, the other upside of this affair is that it placed a spotlight on the US-UK partnership with Saudi in prosecuting the brutal 4 year war on Yemen, and has provided the US with an unlikely, yet smooth exit from a highly illegal military operation started by Barack Obama in March 2015. Every week it seems that the Turkish media is drip-feeding possible evidence, like secret ‘unreleased’ photos, or a new grainy CCTV video depicting something which might be construed as evidence – all in an effort to shore-up the official conspiracy theory, but still not definitive. So the murder of Khashoggi may not be a game of Clue, but it certainly resembles one. Still waiting for that body to turn up…



3. Integrity and The ‘New Knowledge’ – For those who know that the entire Russiagate conspiracy is a complete dud, Christmas came early this year. A cache of allegedly hacked documents posted on an Anonymous website revealed an international network, ironically called the “Integrity Initiative,” which is spread across NATO member states comprised of bureaucrats, politicians, journalists, academics, and military intelligence officers – all running a clandestine anti-Russian propaganda operation funded by the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), and with help from NATO, and deep state-linked Silicon Valley corporation Facebook. Integrity’s mission seems to be instigating and sustaining a New Cold War with Russia, by constantly driving fake news stories into the western press designed to create a climate of fear around all things Russian. The leak proved what many had suspected for years, but couldn’t yet prove existed. The operation is the brainchild of a Scotland-based think tank, with the cryptic title of the Institute for Statecraft, complete with a fake address, but whose members read like a who’s who of deep state intelligence operatives. Just follow the money and you’ll soon see that this is no ordinary ‘think tank’ initiative. Over in the US, a similar revelation came to light which exposed something amazing – that supposed ‘Russian meddling’ was actually run by a group of “tech specialists who lean Democratic,” New Knowledge has ties to both the US military and intelligence agencies. In other words, Democratic Party operatives bankrolled and ran a “false flag” meddling operation designed to be blamed on Russia. Admitted by even the New York Times, the group’s CEO and co-founder Jonathon Morgan previously worked for DARPA, the US military’s advanced research agency, along with partner, Ryan Fox, from the National Security Agency (NSA) and Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC). Together they perpetrated election interference by constructing their own “Russian Bot Farm” to give the false impression that the Russians were backing Republican candidate Roy Moore in Alabama’s special Senate election in 2017. Moore would go on to lose by a small margin. What Integrity and New Knowledge demonstrate is that everything the Western political establishment and media have accused the Russian government of doing – but never presented any evidence to prove it – is actually being done by agencies in the US and UK, against their own people. If that’s not a true black pill moment, then nothing is.



2. Skripal – If ever there was dazzling operation of international intrigue, obtuse statecraft, and pure Orwellian propaganda, it has to be the Skripal Affair. The plot goes like this: evil Russian assassins come to a sleepy Wiltshire town to launch a deadly chemical weapons attack against retired former Russian spy (technically a Russia-UK double agent), Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. The murder weapon: an esoteric chemical weapon known as Novichok, which UK authorities assured us was the deadliest nerve agent known to man. Only it wasn’t, as both the Skripals survived somehow, although never to be seen in public ever again. The motive: no apparent reason, just Putin being mean. “There’s no logic in it; it doesn’t make sense, and I don’t think it needs to make sense, because essentially what the media is doing is propagandizing the population in favor of the madman theory. That’s critical to do when you’re trying to start aggression against a country,” says Moon of Alabama. The story has since been advanced to ratchet-up western sanctions against Russia, and lay claim to the narrative that “Russia launched the first chemical weapons attack on European soil since WWII.” So the story goes, and it keeps going, with new innovative, just-in-time plot lines conjured to bridge the reality gap by NATO’s convenient, but as yet unofficial ‘open source’ investigative agency, Bellingcat. Yes, a truly unbelievable story. We’ll just leave it at that.



1. R.I.P. Liberal World Order – Of course, the big ticket item has to be the one which challenges the enduring post-World War II world order. Ever since Donald Trump was sworn-in early 2017, the globalist establishment have been commiserating in their various journals of record – about the end of the ‘Liberal World Order’. And they all seem to be blaming it on the ascendency of Donald Trump who they believe is buttressed by the Alt-Right and Vladimir Putin, all of whom are hell-bent on dismantling 70 years of progress and all of the various multilateral international institutions starting with the UN. So the narrative goes. If CFR luminaries like Richard Haas are to be believed, this historical collapse of the liberal elite order is all because of Trump, uneducated Brexit voters, the Russians, and anti-immigration nationalists in Europe. “Liberalism is in retreat. Democracies are feeling the effects of growing populism. Parties of the political extremes have gained ground in Europe. The vote in the United Kingdom in favor of leaving the EU attested to the loss of elite influence. Even the US is experiencing unprecedented attacks from its own president on the country’s media, courts, and law-enforcement institutions,” said Haas in March. The refusal of the liberal intelligensia to admit the real reasons why their order is coming apart at the seams will only hasten its demise. Perhaps it is because of their own arrogance and out-of-touch relationship with the other 90% who work for living, as well as the endless wars for profit, transnational corporate monopolies, and spiraling taxes, fees and fines across the board. Rather than have an honest ‘come to Jesus moment,’ instead they are throwing their toys out of the pram – just look at the diabolical media coverage across CNN, the New York Times, Washington Post, the BBC, and the like. Rather than learn or listen to the throngs of protesters in France, German, Brazil, Italy, Greece, or Sweden, instead, elites are doubling down on their Trump-Russia conspiracy theories. It’s for this reason too that the Yellow Vest movement is completely lost on the CFR crowd. It’s true, the world is changing, and rapidly. Granted, it’s not certain that whatever replaces the current world order will be any better than its predecessor; if we are honest about why the old order is no longer fit for purpose, then there is less chance that any real progress is going to be made going forward. Let that be the underlying lesson of 2018.



HAPPY NEW YEAR.

SEE PREVIOUS TOP TEN CONSPIRACIES:

2017 Top Ten Conspiracies

2016 Top Ten Conspiracies

2015 Top Ten Conspiracies

2014 Top Ten Conspiracies

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