Extreme punishments

Retribution and revenge are dangerous motivations in the hands of people with power. All I knew about Kevin Spacey until now was that he was a phenonimally good and mesmerising actor. So he's gay! So what? But he's a late late admitted gay AND he's accused of behaving very inappropriately with a 14-year-old male actor 30 years ago during a drunken party. No condoning here, but unless Spacey turns out to have been a serial predator all his life, why on earth is the book being thrown at him? It's like he has suddenly overnight turned ino Dracula. Netflix, I'm sure an upholder of moral values, has cancelled the next series of House of Cards, actors are shunning him, people are whispering "we knew all about Kevin", and the Daily Mail has splashed on it Online as if our very existence is now at stake. This is Kevin Spacey, right? Not the Yorkshire Ripper! I have no doubt that other male actors will creep forward and say they had nasty experiences a long time ago but how long does this purging and witch hunting have to go on? Kevin Spacey, as far as a lot of people are concerned, is now an ex-person. It's sad, very sad, and the latest example of how human weaknesses are now being treated like the Middle Ages used to treat suspected witches. Thus the witch hunt analogy. Punishment has to be extreme. Take also the case of ex-President Carlos Puigdemont of Catalonia. He is no General Franco. He didn't seize power by force and kill dissenters in the streets. He's a democratic fellow who wanted to fulfil his dream of leading an independent country within Spain. I don't support his cause and, technically, he acted unconstitutionally by holding a referendum, and thus the vote in favour of a Catalan Republic was not recognised around the world. nor by a lot of people in Catalonia and certainly not in Spain as a whole. But the Madrid prosecutors want to charge him with sedition and treachery and put him away for 30 years. Now that smells more of Franco than the badly-haircutted former president of Catalonia's misdeeds. It's about seeing to be tough, so no one ever again will dare to declare independence within the territory of Spain. But to me it smacks of revenge and retribution. Harvey Weinstein deserves the extreme punishment of banishment if even half the allegations against him are true. But Puigdemont is no Guy Fawkes, and Kevin Spacey, so far as we know, is not a monster from hell, and still a brilliant actor.

Russia scandal gets closer to Trump

When dirt flies it tends to stick. However many tweets emanate from Donald Trump expressing his innocence, the first charges arising from the Robert Mueller investigation linked to key former members of his campaign team may potentially build the foundations of a case aainst the president himself. Trump has repeated a hundred times that there was no collusion with the Russians to win the presidency. I'm sure he believes that to be true. But the first drip drip accusations from the illustrious former director of the FBI are going to be highly damaging to Trump. These are people, especially Paul Manafort, who were closer to his ears than most. These were trusted advisers. Did Trump ever have any inkling that Manafort might have been allegedly engaged in money-laundering millions of dollars from pro-Russian political groups? Well of course the president has tweeted that this was all a long time ago and has nothing to do with him. We don't know whether Robert Mueller thinks Trump is an innocent party. But he has gone ahead with indicting Manafort on serious charges and the dirt will fly closer to the White House as a result. However, the big story, and the one that Trump must be most concerned about, is the deal that seems to have been reached between Mueller and George Papadopoulos who briefly served as a foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign. He has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his links to a Russian who was close to Putin's elite inner circle. That's a serious felony. But he is obviously telling Mueller everything he knows. The question is, what DOES he know and does any of it put Trump in a dodgy light? If Trump can spell Papadopoulos in his quick-fire tweets, I expect we're going to hear some denunciations of his former aide in the near future. Trump shouts about Hillary Clinton's alleged wrongdoings and wants the FBI to switch their attention to her. But he's the president. What's at stake here for the president and for the nation is potentially huge. Hillary is yesterday's presidential candidate.

Nagging thought about Lee Harvey Oswald

All the files on the JFK assassination released a few days ago have now been trawled through, pored over and examined by journalists and conspiracy lovers. Nothing really emerged that could honestly be described as a revelation. As I blogged before, Lee Harvey Oswald did it and that's that. But there remains one little aspect of Oswald's life that still bothers me. The nagging thought won't go away. Why, after living in the Soviet Union for three years, after telling the Russians he wanted to defect, after making it clear he loved everything about the Soviet Union (until he had lived in Minsk for a couple of years), did the American embassy in Moscow give him a new passport and allow him to return to live in the US with his wife and young daughter? Why did the US immigration people at the airport where he arrived back from the Soviet Union not take him to one side, put him into one of those little rooms and grill him to death? Why didn't the FBI swoop to the airport and take him away and interrogate him? Why didn't the CIA tell the FBI that Oswald was a potential Russian agent, even if he wasn't? Did the CIA station in Moscow keep an eye on the former US Marine and did the CIA head of station ever think to himself: "This nutty guy Oswald might just turn out to be a real baddie?" Is there a super secret CIA file on Oswald and if so, is it one of the 300 documents that Trump allowed to remain classified? That's a lot of questions. But it seems absolutely extraordinary that Lee Harvey Oswald was allowed to enter the US after three years in the Soviet Union, and just carry on his life in Dallas as if he was a perfectly ok citizen. Totally bizarre. Think of today. Trump doesn't want anyone to enter the US unless they have been questioned, scanned, body-searched etc. I know it's a different era and I know Oswald had an American passport, so he wasn't an alien. But IF the FBI/CIA/Immigration Service had stopped Oswald walking through passport control and taken the trouble to investigate him thoroughly, PERHAPS the young, charismatic, inspirational John F Kennedy would not have been assassinated on November 22, 1963.

Trump off to confront Kim Jong-un

Donald Trump is off to the Asia-Pacific next month, including South Korea. It will provide him with a golden opportunity to stand inside the demilitarised zone (DMZ) at Panmunjon, gaze into North Korea with binoculars and put two fingers up in the air, aimed at the Little Rocket Man sitting in his palace in Pyongyang. Please God, Trump does no such thing. It would not just be provocative, it might spur Kim to do something dangerous for all of us by way of retaliation. I'm not suggesting Trump should tiptoe around South Korea, not mentioning the dreaded Kim, but a two-fingered salute across the North Korean border would knock whatever diplomatic possibilities there might be left to smithereens. The only time I went to Panmunjon was many years ago in the company of Sir Geoffrey Howe, the then UK Foreign Secretary. Sir Geoffrey was the mildest of men who understood the intricacies of diplomacy and would never have even considered doing anything in Panmunjon which might be considered an insult in Pyongyang. Yet he raised his hand at one point, I think to scratch his nose or to make a point to one of the flunkies around, and North Korea made a huge fuss, claiming that the British Foreign Secretary had made a gesture of defiance towards the border. It was nonsense but propaganda is something which is inbred in the North Korean regime. The demilitarised zone is probably the most tense piece of territory on the planet. South Korean armed guards stand staring at North Korean armed guards across the divided zone, and no one, NO ONE, smiles or sneezes or twitches. It's totally bizarre. The North Korean "headquarters" consists of a frontage but no rooms behind. It's just a facade, like a fake movie construction. But you never underestimate the power of hatred and paranoia. If Trump were to go to Panmunjon, every single move he makes will be interpreted in a hostile manner by the North Koreans. I think it would be better for the world not to let Trump go to the DMZ!! Especially since there are currently three US carrier strike groups in the area which is highly unusual and deliberately symbolic. The three carriers, USS Theodore Roosevelt, USS Nimitz, and the Japan-based US Ronald Reagan, represent a massively potent reminder to Kim of what could come his way if he were ever to consider firing a nuclear missile at the US. What we don't need is for Trump to blow a raspberry while standing in the Panmunjon DMZ and setting off World War Three.

The Catalonian madness

The decision by the Catalonian parliament to go for independence inside the borders of Spain is the latest example of madness in our world. The Scots wanted independence in these tiny British Isles, but thank goodness the voters in Scotland said no...just. But they'll have another go at some point in the future. Catalonia is now in a dangerous position. They have decided to be independent of the rest of Spain but how can this work? Will they build a wall around themselves? Will they have a separate economy? Will they be barred from the European Union? Madness, pure madness. The so-called president of Catalonia who looks like a second-rate librarian thinks Catalonia will survive as a wonderful rich nation all by itself. But a helluva lot of people who live in Catalonia in places like Barcelona and the seaside resort of Sitges, don't want independence. The referendum was won by the independence supporters but only the independence supporters voted! What's dangerous is that Madrid is now going to turn all autocratic and force Catalonia to stay within a united Spain. I see troops being sent to Barcelona to keep the peace. No one wants that. But no one is doing anything about it. The EU just says it's up to Spain to sort it out, Theresa May says Britain won't recognise Catalonia. So no one outside Spain is prepared to get involved. Spain for years faced terrorism from the Basque separatists, so it's not the first time this scenario has been raised, but the Basque Eta terrorists used death and violence in their cause. Will the Catalonians turn nasty? Surely there must be a way of resolving this issue without causing mayhem?

Lee Harvey Oswald did it!

It always seemed bizarre that a little man, somewhat inconsequential and ordinary-looking, could have been solely responsible for squatting on the sixth floor of a building in Dallas, Texas, and with unerring accuracy shoot President John F Kennedy in the head while he was sitting in his open-top Lincoln convertible. Bizarre but true. There have been so many conspiracy theories since that traumatic point in history on November 22, 1963 that many of them have appeared more believable than the official Oswald assassin verdict. But that's the wonderful thing about conspiracies. If they are really cleverly outlined, they do become credible. The Russians, Cubans, CIA, Mafia et al have all been blamed over the years. But the fact is the Warren Commission headed by the then Supreme Court Chief Justice, uncovered not a scrap of evidence that pointed to a wider conspiracy. So unless the FBI and CIA, in giving evidence, deliberately left out bits that undermined the Oswald only story, then the Warren Commission was right. There was no evidence, so no conspiracy and only Oswald to blame. The release of all the remaining classified pages from the near-five million already made public will make no difference to the official line that has been taken for 54 years, although I have no doubt the conspiracy squirrels among the true aficionados will discover some paragraph or some quote or some footnote that will help their cause. Trump tickled their palates by saying the classified stuff was very interesting. Interesting yes, but a bombshell? No, I doubt it. The little ex-Marine did it and two days later he himself was killed by Jack Ruby, a nightclub owner. Why Ruby shot him in the stomach, apart from professed patriotic reasons, will continue to enthuse the conspiracy theorists for ever.

Hillary and THE dossier

Well well, something Trump can complain about and for good reason. It is now claimed the infamous dossier by Christopher Steele, ex-MI6 officer, which came up with all that salacious stuff about what the president, before he was president, got up to in a Moscow hotel, was partly paid for by the Clinton campaign. I wonder if that is true. But it has given Trump a breather from all the nasty stuff building up within the Republican Party about his suitability to be sitting in the White House. We're going to get a flow of Trump tweets denouncing Hillary whether the story in the Washington Post is accurate or not. The dossier was always highly controversial and disputable. No one really believes that Trump allowed or asked for prostitutes to pee on him as he lay on the bed in his hotel room during a business trip to the Russian capital. The so-called golden shower moment is a bit of fantasy. I think. What seems really strange about the story claiming Hillary and co paid for the dossier is that when the Steele report was originally leaked, it was stated quite clearly that the research carried out by the former MI6 officer had been funded by an unnamed senior Republican!! So who was it, Hillary or a Republican? Trump of course leapt at the suggestion that it was Hillary. Why wouldn't he? After all, despite having the mighty US intelligence community at his disposal, he gets most of his Tweet ideas from newspapers or television. It's rather paradoxical, isn't it? He accuses the media of producing fake news except when it suits his purposes. I recall that bizarre occasion when a retired American judge claimed on Fox News that the director of Britain's GCHQ intelligence-gathering centre had resigned in protest at the use of GCHQ's eavesdropping capabilities to spy on Trump Tower, at the behest of President Obama. It was total nonsense but Trump and his then White House spokesman Sean Spicer made a great fuss about the abuse of power by Obama. Trump believed Fox. But Fox, or at least the retired judge, got it wrong. Now whether Hillary funded the Steele dossier or not, Trump has once again seized on it. The only thought I have is that if someone wanted to dig up dirt on Trump to spoil his presidential hopes, does it not make more sense for it to be the Democrats rather than the Republicans who would want such information? Just a thought!

Fatal delay in rescuing Green Berets

The ambush by 50 Isis militants in West African Niger which left four American special forces soldiers dead has raised so many questions that the Pentagon is still trying to find out what went wrong and why no one came to their rescue for TWO hours. Twelve members of the elite US Army Green Berets were supposedly on a routine training mission with a bunch of Nigerien soldiers on October 4, close to the border with Mali when they were attacked with machinegun fire, rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire. The ambush took place outside the border village of Tongo Tongo. It's not clear why the Green Berets and Nigerien soldiers turned up at night in a small convoy of trucks. But it seems they spent the night nearby and in the morning started chatting up the locals which went on for a long time, certainly longer than they had anticipated. They must have been gathering intelligence about hostile militants in the area. Then there was the sound of gunfire outside the village. Thinking there was a terrorist attack underway, they rushed off and straight into an ambush. The gunfire was a faked attack to draw the Green Berets and Nigerien soldiers into a trap. According to General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, no call for air support was made for a whole hour, even though they were heavily outnumbered. When a call was finally made, an American surveillance drone apeared overhead within minutes, providing real-time video of the firefight underway. But it seems the drone, a Predator or Reaper, was unarmed, so no Hellfire missiles were dropped. The French Air Force has Mirage jets in the region because of France's ongoing military operations in northern Mali against Isis and al-Qaeda militants. But it took the Mirage crews 30 minutes to scramble and another 30 minutes to get to Tongo Tongo and, according to General Dunford, they fired no weapons once they got there but made several sweeps over the scene of the fighting. Perhaps it was just too risky to open fire. It was several hours later that French armed helicopters and a Nigerien "quick-reaction" force arrived to evacuate the dead and wounded. Three Green Berets were dead, two more were wounded, and five Nigerien soldiers were also dead. A fourth US soldier, a mechanic serving with the special forces, was found 48 hours later. He had mysteriously gone missing and it's still not clear under what circumstances he was killed. Much of the media attention has been on the spat between Trump and the widow of Sergeant La David Johnson, the 25-year-old special forces mechanic, after Trump made a mess of his condolence telephone conversation. The widow said he made remarks that caused her to break down in tears. But the ambush itself, why the rescue attempt was delayed, and why the Green Berets, not supposedly on a combat mission, were in an area known for its hostile environment will increasingly become the story. It looks like people in the village of Tongo Tongo tipped off the Isis-linked militants, and they were set up. A tragedy for the families of the four dead American soldiers, and a huge question mark for US Africa Command and the Pentagon over what went so badly wrong.

CIA on the military warpath

Most people probably think of the CIA as a huge organisation focusing on spying operations overseas, hunting for intelligence to track down terrorist leaders such as Osama bin Laden and, occasionally, masterminding coups in faraway places. All of which is true. But the Central Intelligence Agency has a special military or paramilitary section which is effectively the organisation's special forces wing. Over the years there has been much debate within the agency and within different political administrations over how military the CIA should be, especially when the Pentagon's Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) which includes the legendary US Navy Seal Team 6 and the US Army's Delta Force,has the firepower and expertise to run covert missions anywhere on the planet. But the CIA's Special Activities Division (the paramilitary set-up) which frequently teams up with JSOC, remains a potent force. Now, it seems, Mike Pompeo, the heavyweight director of the CIA, wants the Special Activities Division to get stuck in in Afghanistan, hunting for Taliban leaders, senior or junior, to put maximum pressure on the insurgents to drive them to the peace table. It may sound an odd concept, trying to persuade the Taliban to talk peace when the US is doing its very best to kill as many of them as possible. Actually, it does have logic. The Taliban, after all, practice exactly the same battlefield strategy, killing and maiming on an increasingly expanding scale in the hope that the Kabul government will surrender and the Americans will go home. So the Taliban will understand why Mike Pompeo wants to send in his boys to join the US special forces counter-terrrorist units who are already attempting to eliminate al-Qaeda, Isis and top Taliban leaders. The CIA, and its British counterpart, MI6, have played key roles in Afghanistan ever since 2001. It was CIA paramilitaries who joined up with the warlords of the Northern Alliance in 2001 to drive the Taliban out of the country, along with Osama bin Laden and his gang. The video snatch of a long-haired CIA paramilitary riding a horse at galloping speed as part of an offensive against fleeing Taliban was one of the enduring images of the war that toppled the Taliban from government. Sending the CIA paramilitaries back in strength into Afghanistan fits in with Trump's strategy to put renewed pressure on the Taliban. But it won't please those members of Congress who believe that the CIA should be about human intelligence, not shooting wars. What they really mean is that if the CIA Special Activities Division starts killing off Taliban leaders, their actions will not be accountable in the way such missions are if JSOC is involved. Anything the Pentagon does in Afghanistan is accountable to Congress. Anything the CIA does in Afghanistan is classified as secret.

Raqqa removed from the planet

I'm afraid the Russians are right. The US-led bombing campaign against Raqqa, now the former stronghold of Isis, has reduced the city to an obliterated rubbish tip. It's a tragic consequence of mass bombing that however carefully targeted the airstrikes and however brilliant the pilots are in finding the right grid reference, the resulting explosion and blast brings buildings down. The pictures of Raqqa are horrific. What motivation is there for people to return to their homes from refugee camps if their houses are just a mountain of dust and rubble or have no front wall or roof? More than 1,000 civilians in Raqqa have died. Many of them no doubt at the hands of the brutal Isis occupiers. But the airstrikes will have taken their toll. When you see the pictures it looks like the bombing was indiscriminate. It wasn't, otherwise the US coalition would be facing war crimes but even the most precise laser-guided missiles do not have the ability to kill a group of Isis snipers hiding in a building without bringing the roof down over their heads. One more building destroyed. The Russians who, by the way, reduced Aleppo to ruins with ITS bombing campaign, accused the US of turning Raqqa into a Dresden, the German city that was flattened by allied bombing in the Second World War. Well, that's a deliberately emotive comparison. The bombing of Dresden was NOT a precision operation, it was a fully intended annihilation mission with no thought for the city's civilians. Indeed, it was aimed at the German citizens to try and bring the war to an end. It was in February 1945. Dresden was not a military city, it was not full of Panza divisions or German snipers. The thousands of pounds of munitions, including incendiary bombs, dropped on the city left Dresden in ruins. Moscow's reference to Dresden is unjust, but the before and after pictures of Raqqa do not help the cause of the Americans and British who want to see the defeat of Isis in the Syrian city as a victory.

Bannon batters Bush

There is a headline in the Daily Mail in the UK today which says "Brian Batters Britain". It's a great headline, referring to Storm Brian hitting the British coast with 70mph winds. I don't know who thought up Brian as a name for a wind but after Monty Python's Life of Brian movie, taking a satirical view of the life of Jesus, this name has wonderfully funny connotations. Apologies to everyone called Brian. But it also made me think of another potential alliterative headline, "Bannon Batters Bush". Steve Bannon is America's most right wing political commentator - a stab-in-the-face type of man who just says what he thinks, never mind the consequences. A bit like his erstwhile boss, Donald Trump. He hated what George W Bush had to say the other day which was basically pointing out, without naming Trump, that America was deeply divided and what a shame that was. Ok, so it was a bit hypocritical of Bush to say such a thing. After all, his politics, and, in particular, his invasion of Iraq in 2003, didn't exactly unite the country. But he was doing his best, as was Obama by coincidence, to emphasis the importance of moving away from extremist language and behaviour. There is no question that America HAS become more dividided, and more factional, and less tolerant under the current president. And people like Steve Bannon are also to blame. They are people who do not reason or placate or seek conciliation. They shout and bellow and point and denounce and condemn and insult. So, Steve Bannon, calm down, take a day off, be nice to someone.

North Korea on the cusp

What is the difference between "on the cusp", "very close to" and "on the point of"? We have had all these descriptions from US officials when referring to North Korea's ability to put a nuclear warhead on a long-range ballistic missile and fire it off to reach one or other city in America. CIA director Mike Pompeo's choice of phrase yesterday - "on the cusp" - I think was intended to indicate that North Korea was pretty well there right now, but just had a few minor glitches to sort out. That was possibly one step further than the assessment by the Defense Intelligence Agency in August that North Korea had probably mastered the art of miniaturising a nuclear waread to fit on the end of a ballistic missile capable of reaching the US. It's semantics but probably the most lethal and dangerous semantics ever devised. "On the cusp" implies that Kim Jong-un is maybe weeks away, a couple of months at the most, from completing his plan to be able to launch a nuclear attack on the US if he so desired. Now no one thinks he will do it because the response would bring destruction to North Korea on a scale not seen since the bombing of Dresden in the Second World War. But Kim Jong-un put it rather succinctly the other day when he said he would not start a dialogue with Washington UNTIL he had a weapon able to hit an American city with a nuclear blast. So it's a Catch 22 situation. Yes to dialogue - and according to that North Korean defector the other day, Kim is desperate for dialogue with Washington - but not yet. Not now Kim is on the cusp of realising his dream. And that means a Catch-22 for Trump, too. He has made it plain he will not allow Kim to have a ballistic missile that can hit America with a nuclear weapon. So, if diplomacy fails, he may have to resort to military action. But everyone knows for sure that diplomacy is not on Kim's mind until he has his golden deterrence weapon to stop the US from launching an attack on his country. But, silly man (Kim, that is), the US, and that includes Trump, absolutely has no intention of attacking North Korea PROVIDED he doesn't build THAT weapon and prove to the world that it can reach the US. It's not just Catch-22, it's Catch-44. Both sides are stuck in a terrible groove. Once Kim has his nuclear-tipped ICBM, he's never going to give it up even if the US and the rest of the world offer him a trillion dollars in aid and investment and McDonalds goes big across North Korea. So, sadly, tragically, scarily, I see no way out of Trump's dilemma other than military action of some sort, not an all-encompassing strike to hit everything, but a devastating blow to put Kim's nuclear plot into the dustbin.

Kelly tries to rescue Trump

I think we've got to the point in President Trump's administration when pretty well anything he says or does is going to be massively criticised in the media. His telephone conversation with the widow of one of the four Green Beret commandos killed by militants in the West African country of Niger while on a training mission sounds somewhat cackhanded. To tell a grieving widow that her husband knew what he signed up for when he joined the elite special forces unit is not the most sympathising comment he could have made. But I cannot believe for one moment that Trump actually meant to insult her. As a multi-millionaire businessman, I assume he has never had to ring a family before to pass on his condolences for the loss of a spouse, son or daughter. So, now as president, he clearly has not grasped the importance of finding the right words to soothe a woman in tears. I'm sure he meant well, he just didn't perform his consoling duties in the right way. If it hadn't been for the nosey congresswoman listening in in her car outside, none of this would have been made public. But she started haranguing Trump and suddenly it was the main story on the front page of every newspaper. Then the grieving widow was forced to acknowledge that she had been upset by Trump's comments. The trouble is Trump then came out and denied he had said anything insulting and claimed the congresswoman's statement was a total fabrication. This was backed up in an extraordinary intervention by General John Kelly, Trump's chief of staff, who said Obama had never rung him when his son was killed while serving in Afghanistan. Very loyal of Kelly I'm sure but it hasn't really helped. The point is, Trump did his best but his best, as we have all come to realise, is not often very satisfactory. But the wailing and cries in the newspapers have been overwhelmingly over the top. The poor widow needs to be left alone to grieve. Having the president of the United States ringing up to do his duty as the commander-in-chief is only going to help if he knows exactly what to say, not from some prepared White House script but from the heart. This Trump clearly failed to do.

Xi Zinping for ever

I really can't face ploughing through three and a half hours of President Xi Zinping's speech but the general thrust of it is pretty clear. He thinks in his first five years that he has done a fantastic job and expects to do even better in the next five and would probably like to carry on into his nineties please. The economy, he boasts, is booming and it's time for China to straddle across the world like a supreme power. Well I thought that was what Beijing has been trying to do for years, grabbing all the minerals they need across Africa and elsewhere in return for huge contracts to build roads, railways, hospitals - all part of the Great Silk Road, China's spreading trade routes across the globe. Chinese influence is everywhere. I was in Antigua not that long ago and there were Chinese workers in tin hats en masse, constructing an airport terminal. Not to mention what Beijing has been up to, illegally, in the South China Sea, transforming coral reefs into concrete islands with runways, missile shelters, radar facilities and Chinese take-away restaurants. Not sure about the last item, but you get the picture. China is expanding territorially. Xi Zinping, a purveyor of socialism with its own Chinese character, as he put it, is now hoping to spread the good news of communism with a Beijing face to other parts of the planet. In other words, President Xi is frightfully pleased with himself and appeared to have impressed everyone at the Communist Party Congress, except one former Chinese leader who was fast asleep. He had heard it all before. With all this power at his fingertips you would have thought he could solve the North Korea problem with a gance of his disapproving eyes. But no, according to some North Korean defector who has come out of the woodwork, Kim Jong-un can't stand the Chinese president. He is alleged to have muttered to his quivering cronies that Xi Zinping was a son of a bitch! Well I guess you don't get to become leader of China without being a son of a bitch, even a beaming son of a bitch like President Xi. So China rules the waves, well certainly the waves in the South China Sea.

Isis caliphate disintegrates

The fall of Raqqa, Isis's self-professed caliphate capital in Syria is the best news since the recapture of Mosul in Iraq. Now this wretched militant organisation and its army of foreign fighters have been reduced to a scattering of mini locations in Iraq and Syria and, hopefully, will soon be driven out of the region altogether. Three years have gone since Isis grabbed huge chunks of territory in Iraq and Syria and settled in for a long, brutal occupation. Three years sounds a long time but there were US commanders who predicted the campaign to defeat Isis would take much longer. Isis is not yet defeted as such, the brand continues to threaten freedom-loving people, but its aim of establishing its own permanent kingdom across Iraq and Syria has failed. As with al-Qaeda, heavy defeats have not destroyed them totally and Isis has sprung up in all sorts of different places, such as Libya and Afghanistan. But, following such mighty losses in their two chosen countries, let us hope that the momentum for the black-flag carrying militants will be brought to a shuddering halt. Foreign fighters from around the world who volunteered to support Isis must surely now be thinking, what's the point! The campaign by the US-led coalition has been quite remarkable. There was much scepticism that the coalition would ever achieve success against such a determined network of fanatics. But the doubters have been proved wrong. Thousands of Isis fighters have been killed and their seized territory has been won back. Obama started it all off, but Trump definitely added firepower and more flexibility to bring the hoped-for defeat of Isis to a more rapid conclusion. The end result, of course, is not just about the slaughter of Isis. Thousands of civilians have died, too, towns and cities where Isis hid behind the Syrian and Iraqi populations have been devastated, and it will take visionary diplomacy to sort out the political future of Syria. But Isis's dreams of a caliphate are finally over.

Hillary does go on!

For quite some time during the 2016 US presidential election campaign, pretty well everyone thought/assumed that Hillary Clinton would win because surely it was impossible for a man like Donald Trump who admitted he once groped a woman and thought it was fun could actually become president. The person above all others who assumed Hillary was going to win was Hillary herself. That was both arrogant and, unfortunately for her, very very shortsighted, nay, blinkered. Ever since the presidency of Donald Trump began, Hillary has been telling the world, or perhaps I should say those who can be bothered to listen, that she is still astonished that she lost and blames a whole lot of things, except her own totally inadequate campaign which was lacking any real warmth. She never gave herself to the crowds. She was just Hillary on her platform offering to the American people the only option, in her view, for a better America. ie with her as president. That's all past now, but not for Hillary. She's in the UK at the moment promoting yet another book about the Great Mystery of her failure to beat Trump. How could the American voters have let her down so badly?! Listening to her now is painful. She cannot get round the fact that she was lawfully beaten. If it hadn't been for WikiLeaks, the Russians, James Comey, Trump's lies etc etc, she would now be sitting in the Oval Office rather than whingeing about her unfair fate at the Cheltenham Literary Festival. Ok, she's got a book to promote and she obviously gets all the same old questions about why she failed to win the presidency and how she has come to terms with it. But we're getting the same old answers. We've heard them non-stop since she lost the election. She needs a new life, not one buried in failure and disappointment. Just think, Hillary, you're not having to confront Rocket Man Kim Jong-un, you're not going to be blamed for causing the next world war and you don't have to deal with Putin who hates you. So think positive, and enjoy spending the money from your huge royalties.

What does Putin really think?

All this focus on North Korea and Iran and Trump's warlike tendencies, it would be intriguing to know what President Putin really thinks about it all. Trying to get into the Russian leader's mind is clearly difficult, if not impossible. But we do know that Putin's great dream is to turn Russia into a major power once again, a new form of Soviet Union with satellite states happy to be Putin-controlled or at least Putin-patronised. But he is somewhat challenged in this effort because of the Russian economy which has been battered by the drop in oil prices, sanctions by the West for his Crimean and Ukrainian military interventions, as well as bad financial management and corruption. But he must also spend time on worrying about what Trump will do next, and whether the genuine threat from North Korea and the anger in Iran over the US president's dismissal of the nuclear deal could have an impact on his plans for Russia, and, most importantly, his desire to stay president for as long as possible. Putin is not going to retire...ever. My conclusion is that Putin is probably seriously concerned about both Iran and North Korea. It's not in Russia's security interests to have a nuclear-bomb-possessing Iran which shares its northern border with three former Soviet states, nor would Putin want a war on the Korean peninsula, any kind of war, either conventional or, especially nuclear. So, President P, how about some Moscow diplomacy? Kim Jong-il, father to Kim Jong-un, once took a train - the Kim dynasty, heavy-armoured train - all the way to Moscow. This was in 2001. Nobody really knows whether the journey was worth it, it was all very secret. But perhaps, assuming the train is still around, Putin could get on the phone and invite Kim Jong-un to Moscow. It would be a sensational move. The "Rocket Man" on his train going for talks with Putin. The world would hold its breath. Of course, Kim might turn down the invite, but it just might be tempting for him. As for Iran, I doubt Putin could do much with Ayatollah Khamenei, but the way things are right now between Tehran and Washington, he'd probably have a better chance to bend his ear than either Trump or Rex Tillerson. After all, Russia signed the Iran nuclear deal. Putin must have thought it was a good idea. So, President P, time for some dazzling diplomacy.

Was the Iran nuclear deal naive?

When some of the most brilliant minds from the US, China, Russia, UK, France and Germany (at least I assume there were some brilliant minds) got together to negotiate the Iran nuclear deal, I assume they thought it through and worked out what all the potential benefits would be. But did they really, that's what worries me? I am pretty sure that everyone, or actually mostly the Americans - John Kerry and co - held to the notion that if Tehran could be persuaded to hold back on their suspected nuclear weapons programme in return for lots of cash once sanctions had been lifted, Iran and its leaders would feel so warm towards the US and the other big powers and life in general that they would stop doing what they had been doing ever since the revolution in 1979 when men with long beards took over the country from the West-supported Shah of Iran. In other words, cause trouble everywhere and foment revolutionary thoughts throughout the Middle East. The Revolutionary Guard Corps, and in particular the dangerously active Quds Force, is a byword for violent intervention and skulduggery. The Quds Force which reports directly to Ayatalloh Ali Khamenei is like a combination of Russia's Spetnaz special forces and the old-style KGB. Trump is dying to put them on America's global terrorism list. Anyway, I think the Iran deal negotiators must have thought that the Ayatollah would wake up after the nuclear agreement had been signed in 2015 and think to himself: "Ok, let's give up all this nasty stuff and join the international community and start loving everyone. I'll ring the Quds Force straightaway." If they thought that they were kidding themselves. People with revolution in their blood don't become ordinary citizens overnight. To them, the nuclear deal was a nuclear deal, nothing else. There was no clause, no sub-section, no annexe, no footnote which said: "We also agree to stop sponsoring terrorist organisations and to work for peace in Syria." So if that was in the dreams of the Big Power negotiators when they persuaded Tehran to limit all their nuclear-enrichment and other potential weapon-linked activities for ten years (yes, ten years), then they were naive. The Quds Force is busier than ever, their budget has been increased, they are threatening US warships in the Gulf as often as they want, they are scheming in Iraq and Syria etc etc. This is what annoys Trump, no, enrages Trump. Why sign a deal which still allows the Revolutionary Guards to wage their wars in the Middle East? He's right, but then the terms of the nuclear negotiations were restricted to the nuclear programme from the very beginning. The rest was just wishful thinking on the part of Kerry and co. So that's where we are today. The other powers have reacted negatively to Trump's Friday speech which has provided Iran with the perfect response. They will stick with the deal, they say, making America's negotiating partners feel good about themselves, and Trump is on his own. Perfect for Tehran.

Trump versus everyone

Washington is awash with talk once again of impeachment or the 25th Amendment under which a president can be deemed to be unfit for office. What is going on? The momentum of anger and concern about Trump seems to be accelerating. Washington of course is infamous for creating and believing conspiracies and right now the conspiracy machine is overheating to boiling point. There are so many Republicans now coming forward with their fears about a presidency in crisis that there has to be a core of truth in all the latest rumours. Vanity Fair has claimed, through sources, that Trump hates nearly everyone in the White House. There are just a few exceptions. The "lucky ones" are not identified. Someone said on US TV today that if General John Kelly, the chief of staff, were to resign, then that would be it for Trump and his presidency. If Kelly can't keep Trump on the straight and narrow then there's no one on the planet who could. Kelly is not a quitter and I'm sure he will stick with the job for as long as he can. It would certainly be a disaster for Trump were he to resign in exasperation or sheer overwork. It has to be said that with so many leaks going on about life in the White House it is time Trump got a grip of his administration and started to grab the headlines with some positive moves: produce a tax reform system everyone will support, build roads, improve the transport system, stop threatening wars, get real friendly with your fellow leaders in allied countries, show the world what strong and stable leadership (sorry Theresa May, I know that's your favourite phrase) really means. If he fails to change the mood music in Washington soon, then his toughest critics may be right, he won't complete his first full term, let alone win an election for a second. Even Steve Bannon, his old mucker, is now saying that. I assume Trump hates him too.

IQ Test second round

I guess Rex Tillerson would have been irritated by Trump's claim that he had won the IQ test - see yesterday's blog - so here's a second round: Question: Who have been the best White House advisers so far? Trump: Steve Bannon, Mike Flynn and Mad Dog Mattis. Tillerson: Mattis, John Kelly, HR McMaster and, eh, me. Question: How many key people have been sacked from the administration? Trump: Not enough. Tillerson: Lost count. Question: What is Bradley Manning called now? Trump: Same as before, TRAITOR. Tillerson: Chelsea. Question: Would Hillary Clinton have made a better president? Trump: Next question. Tillerson: Is Trump going to see my answer? Question (just for Tillerson): Is Trump a moron? Tillerson: In the strict sense of the word, absolutely.....eh, not. Question: What should be done with the Iran nuclear deal? Trump: Tear it up and start again. Tillerson: Tehran is honouring the deal, so..... Question: What's stopping you from your doing your job on a daily basis? Trump: General Kelly. Tillerson: White House. Question: Where were three Green Berets killed the other day? Trump: Nigeria. Tillerson: Niger. Question: What's the capital of Niger? Trump: Ha, I know that one, Lagos. Tillerson: Niamey. Question: Name three African countries ending in the letters, bia. Trump: Nambia, Gambia, Zambia. Tillerson: Gambia, Zambia and Namibia. Question: What's the best achievement of the new administration so far? Trump: Everyone's better off than under Obama. Tillerson: Have to think about that one. Question: Is the world going to survive under this administration? Trump: Not with me around. Tillerson: Not with Trump around. Question: Is your job safe? Trump: Don't be silly, I had the biggest majority in US history. Tillerson: Just waiting for my pink slip.

Trump v Tillerson in IQ test

Trump has, sort of, challenged Rex Tillerson to an IQ test and boasts that he, Trump, would win any time. So let's set the test and see what happens: Question: What's the name of Kim Jong-un's youngest sister? Trump: Little Rocket Girl. Tillerson: Kim Yo Jong. Question: What's the name of their mother? Trump: Who cares. Tillerson: Ko Yong Hui. Question: Who was Jang Song Thaek? Trump: What's with all these Rocket Man questions? Tillerson: Kim's uncle who was executed. Question: Why does China still support North Korea? Trump: It's beyond me. Tillerson: It's to stop the US from dominating the whole of the Korean peninsula. Question: Name three islands in the South China Sea being militarised by Beijing. Trump, looking pleased: They're all called Spratly. Tillerson: Fiery Cross, Mischief and Subi. Question: Who poses the greatest political threat to Washington? Trump: Robert Mueller. Tillerson: Vladimir Putin. Question: With which country do you associate the special relationship? Trump: Used to be Mexico but no longer. Tillerson: Japan. Question: What about the United Kingdom? Trump: What about the United Kingdom? Tillerson: Of course they're special too but not if they leave the European Union. Question: What does Brexit mean to you? Trump: Terrific idea. Tillerson: A disaster for the UK. Question: Is Merkel more powerful than ever? Trump: Not as powerful as me. Tillerson: No, she was weakened by the German election result. Question: Where is Luxembourg? Trump: No idea. Tillerson: It's the home of that w..ker, Jean-Claude Juncker. Question: Do you think an EU army will improve security in Europe? Trump: An EU army? You've got to be joking. Tillerson: no no no no. Question: Do you think your job is safe? Trump: Yes. Tillerson: No. Trump announced he had won by a huge margin.

What a corker from Corker

There have been so many slanging matches, mostly by Twitter, involving Donald Trump, but the latest one between Trump and one-time close friend Senator Bob Corker that it deserves special attention. Corker was one of Trump's early campaign supporters. He was highly regarded by Trump, so much so that, despite Trump's denials, Corker WAS considered as a possible candidate as Secretary of State. As Republican chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee, he was a natural for the State Department. Far more of an obvious choice than Rex Tillerson who had been in oil all his working life. Anyway, the love affair between Trump and Corker is over, because they have had a corker of a row. Corker has as good as said Trump is a danger to the United States and a danger to the universe. He didn't say Trump was unfit to be president but indicated that if it wasn't for the calm and wise counselling from Jim Mattis, Defence Secretary, Rex Tillerson at Stiate and John Kelly as chief of staff in the White House, we would have all gone to hell in a handcart, as the expression goes. So it seems, Mattis, Tillerson and Kelly - and probably a bit of General HR McMaster too at the National Security Council - have prevented Trump from launching into World War III. Well, I think that's a touch of an exaggeration, although it's emphasised quite a lot by the New York Times in its story about the row. Trump doesn't want World War III, deep down, but he likes to flirt with the idea in his tweeting when he shouts and screams at his favourite bogeymen, Kim Jong-un and the whole of the Iranian regime. Corker is a venerable senator with a lot of influence although not for much longer because he has made it clear he does not wish to stand again for election to the Senate. However, whie he is still in the Senate he will play a crucial role in guiding or not guiding Trump's legislation through the legislative process. Corker and his band of fed-up, disillusioned Republicans are not in the mood to help their president becasue they are seriously worried about him. What a mess, Donald. Why don't you make some friends instead of pissing everyone off!!

Trump's latest threat to North Korea

Only "one thing will work with North Korea", says Trump in a new tweet. The US president really knows how to tease, doesn't he? What does he mean by this and, more importantly, what will Kim Jong-un think he means by this? Everyone naturally assumes Trump is talking about the use of force. This phrase has been used before to warn Saddam Hussein, Colonel Gaddafi etc etc. So Trump has finally decided that all this diplomatic sanctions stuff is never going to stop the North Korean dictator from building his nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles, and it's time for action. Send in the Marines!! Or, much more likely, send in the B2s and B52s. Well, no. I don't think that's what Trump has in mind. I'm pretty sure that Jim Mattis, that cunning old fox running the Pentagon, has produced an option for action that is far more subtle. The one thing that MIGHT work with North Korea is the removal of Kim Jong-un, or, as the director of the CIA said recently, the separation of the North Korean leader and his inner circle from the rest of the population. Now, "separation" is a highly ambiguous word in this sort of context. Does it mean annihilation, capture or something to do with cyber targeting, in other words, separating Kim Jong-un, by cyber attack, from his military commanders and rocket operators? If that's the case, then what Trump meant when he said that only one thing will work with North Korea was a scenario in which Kim Jong-un is somehow deprived of his powers to attack or retaliate against the United States or its allies in the region. Separate the leader from his deadly powers, then total confusion reigns. It's a clever idea but I'd love to know how Mattis and his cyber advisers plan to carry this out. If things get more and more dangerous in North Korea, we might wake up one morning to find that Kim Jong-un has mysteriously disappeared! Trump's tweet will have set Kim thinking...I think.

Las Vegas killer wanted to live

The Clarke county sheriff Joe Lombardo whose sombre face is now familiar around the world, believes that the las Vegas mass murderer had an escape plan and wanted to survive after his onslaught from his room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel. To me it seems inconceivable that a man who takes suitcase-loads of weapons and ammunition up to his room and open fire for nine minutes through a window he had smashed could actually think he could calmly take the lift down, check out at reception and call a taxi to the airport. I mean who is he kidding? Within minutes the Vegas Strip was filled with more armed police than any gambler used to sitting untroubled in front of his fruit machine would have seen in his whole life. Stephen Paddock was doomed the first time he put pressure on the trigger of the automatic weapon. He was going to end up dead whatever fantasy plot he had to go off and live in peace and luxury with his girlfriend in the Philippines. But even though the odds were totally against him emerging unscathed from his hotel room, perhaps Sheriff Lombardo is right. He had planned the shooting so meticulously, presumably over months as he increased the size of his armoury, that maybe he had a future in mind, not death by his own hand. Let's assume the future plan goes something like this: he sends off his girlfriend to see the family in the Philippines, then transfers $100,000 to her bank account and tells her before she leaves: "I'll join you soon." Marilou Danley, apparently unaware of what he has stored in his garage, packs her bags and innocently flies off to see her family, fully expecting to be joined by her caring boyfriend in due course. But Paddock had no chance of fulfilling this dream if this scenario is accurate. How could he possibly have got himself to the airport and off to the Philippines without being stopped by the police. Once they had found an empty room on the 32nd floor, the biggest manhunt since 9/11 would have been instigated. So whether he had an escape plan or not, it's irrelevant. Paddock was a dead man the moment he started firing.

Why did you do it Stephen Paddock?

It's all too late of course, but why did Stephen Paddock kill 59 people and wound 520? What can his motivation have possibly been? As no one seems at this stage to have any idea, perhaps his girlfriend, Marilou Danley, will be able to throw some light on the inner workings of Paddock's mind. Surely, if she had lived with him she would have had some indications of a dangerous individual, or at least someone with extreme views? Did she know about all his weapons, for example? And if she did, did she not mention it to anyone else, like Paddock's astonished I-know-nothing brother? It is possible, of course, for two people to live together and know very little about each other. It goes on everywhere. But if a man is planning to spend a certain day killing and wounding hundreds of his fellow citizens, you would have thought he would have given some hint of a troubled mind to his girlfriend. Somehow, I suspect she will tell the FBI she knows nothing and that, like Paddock's brother, she is astonished that the man she thought she knew was a mass murderer. None of which will help the poor FBI who are struggling to find any motivation for the worst shooting massacre in modern American history. The huge armoury of weapons and the small cameras purchased to keep watch in the corridor outside his hotel room in case the police turned up indicate long-term planning. Perhaps the most appalling statistic I heard was that it took Paddock just nine minutes to kill and wound all those people. That tells you everything about his choice of weapons and the unbelievable killing power of the automatic assault rifles which he had so easily purchased from a local gunshop. Terrifying!!

The lurking demons inside Stephen Paddock

By all accounts so far from family and neighbours, Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas slaughterer, was just an ordinary American multi-millionaire who gambled a lot and owned several houses, none of them properly decorated. His brother appeared before television cameras to express his astonishment that he could have carried out such an unbelievable atrocity. He had previously shown no interest in guns. Well, there we have it in a nutshell. Nobody who knew Stephen Paddock had a clue about the real him. He seemed quiet and normal but down in the depths of this man's being was a psychopath desperately waiting to get out. But nobody knew it or suspected it. This is so often the case. Whenever there is a mass murder or a terrorist attack, neighbours, family and friends appear before the cameras and declare that this individual or that individual couldn't possibly have been involved because he used to say hello nicely to everyone every morning, never lost his temper, was kind to children and always shopped in the local supermarket. But this supposedly kind, gentle neighbour/brother/son/uncle was actually an extreme, totally radicalised jihadist terrorist or a mass killer who had shot dead his whole family or whatever. So no one really knows what goes on in the minds of people who appear on the surface to be like you and me. Take this Stephen Paddock, now dead from his own hands. The only ingredient that stands out is that his father was a convicted bank robber who was once on the FBI's Most Wanted List and had psychopathic tendencies. That doesn't guarantee that his children will turn out bad but it's definitely a potential pointer to trouble ahead. But why did Stephen Paddock wait 64 years before truly demonstrating the dark side of his character? We don't know much about his childhood so far. Maybe he killed the family cat at the age of five or shouted abuse at his grandmother. But, judging by his brother's bewildered remarks, there can't have been anything so awful in his childhood days that the family was just waiting for an explosion. Yet it seems incredible that after more than six decades on this earth Stephen Paddock should just gather together a whole armoury of weapons and set off to kill as many people as he could before killing himself, without there being something, something in his previous life to indicate such a total breakdown of normality. Isis claims he was one of theirs, a Muslim convert. But he wouldn't have had time in between all his casino toing and froing making and losing thousands of dollars to convert to anything. And wouldn't his brother have suspected there was something going on? So I dismiss that. This wasn't an Islamic thing. This was Stephen Paddock putting into action what had been building up inside him for years but none of those closest to him had any idea about it. It's a lesson but how do you learn from it when someone you have known all your life suddenly steps out of the normal world and enters the darkest of dungeons.

It could only happen in America

How is it possible for a 64-year-old man to book into a Las Vegas hotel with a suitcase-full of assault rifles and guns and stacks of ammo and just open the window of his room and start firing at random at crowds of people below enjoying a music festival. He presumably asked for a room with a view of the area where the music festival was to take place. It's just so easy in America. No restrictions on buying guns - well none that mean anything - not even a licence required in this case apparently, and so every opportunity for a man with a grievance or a killing obsession or revenge or whatever the motive may be, to kill as many people as possible before being shot by the police. America is a wonderful, invigorating country. I lived there for three years and loved every moment. But surely in these days of terrorism and hatred the US can think of some way of stopping people walking into a gunshop and saying:"Good morning, I think I'll have that one, that one, and oooh I like the look of that one, is it semi or fully automatic?" It's total madness. Why can't the American people see that? Those who love their guns always say, "It's not the gun that kills people, it's the person holding the gun." Well, yes, that's strictly true, but it's a trite and stupid answer. If guns were not so freely available, the potential madmen intent on killing people wouldn't have access to these weapons. No US president has got even close to closing gunshops and banning guns except with the strictest of licences. Obama waffled on about it every time there was a shooting massacre at a school but never had the courage to take on the National Rifle Association, set up, unbelievably to protect gun owners' "rights". Trump who presumably has a weapon in every cupboard will definitely not be the president to confront the NRA. In fact no one ever will. Perhaps Bernie Sanders, if he had become president, might have had a go, but he would have failed too because of the mighty NFA lobbying of Congress, and all the hunting, shooting and fishing senators and congressmen. So this latest gunman has left this earth after killing or wounding more than 570 people from a hotel window. It is beyond belief. And the terrible thing is, it will happen again and again and again and again.....

Kim shuns dialogue

So that didn't last long. It seemed like a good idea when Rex Tillerson revealed there were direct talks going on with North Korea. But apparently the North Korean guy the other end of the phone, presumably a senior flunky at the foreign ministry, showed no interest in talking. Well surprise surprise. But Tillerson should keep trying no matter what his boss, Donald J Trump says/tweets. There's no harm in having a chat, unless of course the only response from Pyongyang was: "Go to hell." Trump tweeted that Rex Tillerson was wasting his time and vowed to do what had to be done. So back to war talk then. So much for that briefest of moments when a tiny hint of hope was raised by the US secretary of state. There is a basic impasse here. Trump wants to stop North Korea's nuclear weapon and ballistic missile programme, and Kim Jong-un is determined to carry on. There's not a whisker of compromise in the air on either side. Perhaps Kim's strategy is to reject talks to start with and then come up with something that suggests a ccncessionary tone during the tenth phone call from Washington. But I fear ths is wishful thinking. Trying to persuade Kim to surrender his beloved nuclear programme is like attempting to tell Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, to abolish the Revolutionary Guard. I think Tillerson WILL carry on trying to talk to Pyongyang, that's his job after all. But if he gets nowhere and the Rocket Man, or Little Rocket Man as Trump called him today in a tweet, launches more and more longer-range ballistic missiles and carries out larger-scale nuclear tests, military action of some sort from the US will become inevitable. I reckon there's a nine-month to twelve-month window. After that, if there is no movement towards diplomacy by Kim during that time, the rockets are going to fly, but this time towards Pyongyang!