Bombing Russia and Media Censorship

I think this is a serious first for news. As I noted days ago, GQ spiked their article on allegations that the Russian FSB (and their Putin regime) were behind the 1999 false-flag bombings in Russia. The article was not run in Russia at all and was hardly marketed in the US. So Gawker scanned pages of the actual article in English and asked its readers to help translate it into Russian. The result? The Russian article that should have run - and pretty well translated actually. Check out both the English language scans they have up and the Russian translation. Congrats to the entire group project on this.

But let me just remind everyone that about 3 years ago, I reported very similar allegations as they related to the assassination of Alexander Litvinenko. My sources believed that SVR was involved in the Litvinenko hit and possibly some elements of the FSB. But the key allegations made in the GQ piece about the 1999 bombings implicated the FSB. Mine did as well. Moreover, my sources implicated the FSB in the Beslan Massacre (to which Politkovskaya was headed to report when she was poisoned, but survived - the second attempt on her life was successful. she was assassinated in October of 06).

Just as an fyi for those who do not know, SVR and the FSB together used to be what was known as the KGB. When the KGB was broken apart, these organizations were regrouped, but much of the Cold War elements, such as the S Directorate still exist.

The GQ info is using sourcing different from my own, but focusing entirely on the FSB.  In any case, here is what I wrote in 06:

"Former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who passed away late last week from what many intelligence officials have indicated they believe to be a state-sponsored assassination, was likely the victim of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki (SVR), well-placed sources tell RAW STORY.

Specifically, two former Cold War CIA officers, who still on occasion provide consulting work for the CIA, point to the S Directorate of SVR, which is in charge of black operations and other allegedly highly illegal transnational activities. They believe that the murders are closely tied to terrorist activities within Russia, and likely do involve Russian President Vladimir Putin."

<snip>

"Although none of the sources interviewed for this article were able to say too much regarding what is an ongoing investigation into the two murders, several former intelligence sources pointed to alleged false-flag bombings that were carried out in Russia starting in 1999.

A false-flag operation is one in which an attack is carried out by one government or entity and made to seem the work of another. In modern times, the term has become synonymous with Operation Gladio, a series of false-flag bombings inflicted on Italy by certain far right members of elements in the government and military, the aim of which was to frame opposition parties in order to discredit them, as well as to force that nation as a whole to move politically right of center. This method was known as the Strategy of Tension.

The Russian bombings bear all the hallmarks of such operations, including the most well-known of these bombings, in which a car bomb was detonated in front of an apartment building in the city of Buynaksk that served as military housing for Russian soldiers, killing more than sixty residents. The attack was blamed on Chechen separatists and was used to justify attacks on suspected Chechen sympathizers and alleged co-conspirators, as well as on Chechnya itself. Other bombings soon followed, leading to then-Prime Minister Vladimir Putin declaring war on the separatist region, which had gained de facto independence following the breakup of the Soviet Union.

But it was not until the failed Rayzan bombing attempt that the suspected role of the Russian government in the bombings began to be alleged publicly. In mid-1999, a group of agents of the Russian Federal Security Service, or Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti (FSB), were found placing explosives at an apartment complex in the city of Rayzan. The FSB is the Russian equivalent of the FBI, and it and the SVR are the two arms of what used to be known as the KGB. The materials used in this incident were similar to those found at the other bombings committed throughout 1999, but th FSB denied any involvement in the previous terrorist attacks and described the Rayzan bombing plot as a domestic counter-terrorism exercise.

The Russian Duma -- the lower house of the Federal Assembly -- attempted to investigate the bombings, but the Kremlin would not cooperate or provide requested documentation."

 

The Gawker translation is of extreme importance. The fact that there is almost an entire media black-out of these allegations is astonishing. Why is this so important?

Because during a much earlier period, Europe was rocked by the same allegations. In particular, elements of the Italian military were revealed to have bombed their own people in order to frame a left leaning group, members of which ended up in prison.

This operation was called Gladio. That kind of abuse of power, if it goes unchecked, is dangerous to every country and every person. Gladio affected nearly every Western European nation without the leadership of that nation even being aware at the time. For an excellent report on the Gladio assassinations and bombings, see the BCC documentary also entitled Gladio. You can watch it here. And just like with the bombings in Russia, the US media made little attempt to report the Gladio horrors.

So if you have not heard of this, don't worry, you are not alone.

UPDATE

Apparently the link to the BBC documentary is not working. I found it, however, posted on Google videos and I am including it here, in three parts:

Follow Larisa Alexandrovna on Twitter: www.twitter.com/larisa_a

Comments

[Hissyspit]

"So if you have not heard of this, don't worry, you are not alone."

So many stories in the past decade fit that categorization. And it is getting worse for U.S. "mainstream" media. Thanks for keeping an eye on it, Larisa.

[guard]

Thank you for this post. Unfortunately, "false flag" operations are only admitted to occur in countries other than the U.S. A.
Here they are called "conspiracy theories" and any factual evidence whatsoever can thereby be ignored.

[davidly]

I admire your work Ms. Alexandrovna. It is a shame that you have to maintain a certain distance from those who would insinuate that the problems alluded to in this post are not limited to the actions of intelligence and military operation on the other side of the former iron curtain.

To take one example: The horrible travesty that was the assassination of Ms. Baburova - which is/was, unfortunately, only one in a longer line of such vicious methods of suppression in Russia - dare not lead a serious journalist such as yourself to make comparisons to the mysterious death of Gary Webb. In other words, one remains marginally marginal as long as they resist the temptation to expose their own government's nefarious deeds. Mr. Webb, on the other hand was marginalized on the most brutal way.

It shouldn't be any mystery as to why these stories don't have legs in the US. It's convenient to point to the mafia-like corruption in the former Soviet republic, but one shouldn't dwell too long on such matters as it might lead him to question the eerily similar occurrences right under his nose.

[guard]

Thank you, sir.

[unitron]

"Journalist James Bamford summarized Operation Northwoods in his April 24, 2001 book Body of Secrets:

Operation Northwoods, which had the written approval of the Chairman and every member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called for innocent people to be shot on American streets; for boats carrying refugees fleeing Cuba to be sunk on the high seas; for a wave of violent terrorism to be launched in Washington, D.C., Miami, and elsewhere. People would be framed for bombings they did not commit; planes would be hijacked. Using phony evidence, all of it would be blamed on Castro, thus giving Lemnitzer and his cabal the excuse, as well as the public and international backing, they needed to launch their war."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

Just in case you were thinking that it couldn't happen here.

[longdayzjourney]

I'm not at all surprised at the media blackout. Could you imagine the bloody outrage of citizens once they realized that their governments engage in domestic terrorism in order to achieve political objectives? It opens a dark and murky world that most people do not want to examine. Besides, if you are familiar with Operation Mockingbird, the use of journalists and news organizations to provide cover for intelligence agencies, who may engage in these unspeakable false flag attacks, is very plausible. Thanks for the post.

[DLSteinhardt]

One need not be a 9/11 Truther to recognize the utility to corrupt, warlike regimes in setting up false enemies to crush, ruthlessly, on demand.

[Sagantech]

Very interesting, thank you for posting this. Unfortunately it seems that false-flag events are not that uncommon.