War is a Racket (1935)
By Smedley D. Butler
In this current moment where the specter of a new war with Iran looms, the searing critique of Major General Smedley D. Butler in War Is a Racket resonates with chilling relevance. Published in 1935, Butler’s work exposes war as a meticulously orchestrated "racket," where a small, organised minority—those "creatures that run the show from the shadows"—reap colossal profits while the masses bear the costs in blood, grief, and economic ruin. Drawing from his decades as a decorated Marine, Butler unveils the machinery of war profiteering, noting, “Out of war a few people make huge fortunes,” while soldiers and civilians shoulder “newly placed gravestones” and “shattered minds.” His revelations find echoes in Understanding Bankers’ Wars, which traces how financial elites, from the Napoleonic era to World War I, engineered conflicts to amass wealth, manipulating nations into debt and destruction. Yet, Butler’s indictment is not merely historical; it serves as a call to question the single minded ambition of those who, as Neema Parvini highlights are the "organised minority" in The Populist Delusion (2022), wield disproportionate power to shape global destinies.
Butler’s legacy extends beyond his written words to his courageous stand against a hidden chapter of American history: the 1933 Business Plot. As detailed in The Business Plot, a cabal of wealthy industrialists and bankers sought to overthrow President Franklin D. Roosevelt and install a fascist dictatorship, a scheme thwarted by Butler’s whistleblowing. This critical event, suppressed for decades, reveals the audacity of those “creatures” who, nearly a century ago, aimed to go “full fascist” in America, underscoring their persistent ambition to control from the shadows. Butler’s role in exposing this coup, referenced in You Knew What You Signed Up For during an interview with Chase Spears, highlights his moral clarity in confronting elite machinations.
Butler’s grim accounting—“mangled bodies,” “broken hearts and homes,” and “back-breaking taxation for generations”—lays bare the asymmetry between the few who profit and the many who pay. His proposed solutions, such as conscripting capital alongside soldiers and limiting military reach to defensive purposes, challenge the status quo with radical pragmatism. Yet, as Understanding Bankers’ Wars suggests, the entrenched power of financial elites often subverts such reforms, perpetuating cycles of conflict. This introduction frames Butler’s War Is a Racket as a timeless exposé, urging readers to interrogate the motives behind modern wars and the organised minority orchestrating them, lest history’s lessons remain unheeded.
With thanks to Smedley D. Butler1.
War is a Racket: Original 1935 Edition: Butler, Smedley D.
All Wars are Banker's Wars - remember
reduced to rubble
Iran Shatters Israel’s Illusion of Invincibility
The myth of Israeli military invulnerability lies in rubble.
What’s proven to be a historic and humiliating turn for Israel’s Zionist regime, Iran has dealt a blow not just to Israel’s infrastructure — but to the very foundation of its psychological warfare. The illusion of supremacy and impunity has collapsed in real time.
Israel’s cyber-assisted strike on Iranian military and nuclear infrastructure was supposed to be a game-changer. Executed in tandem with a sophisticated cyberattack that disabled Iran’s air defence systems for approximately eight hours, the operation was designed to disorient, disrupt, and dominate. It failed. Spectacularly.
Within ten hours, Iranian technicians restored their systems. By hour twelve, the first wave of Iranian ballistic missiles rained down across Israel — targeting military command hubs, critical intelligence sites, and, notably, the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot.
The Iron Dome — long held up as a marvel of modern defence — was useless. US-deployed THAAD systems guarding the IDF’s military headquarters also failed under the barrage. This wasn’t just an act of retaliation. It was an unveiling. But the world already knew the Iron Dome was a just a plastic bubble. Iran demonstrated that last year with its responses to the attacks and assassination of one of it’s top IRGC generals and killing of staff at its consulate in Damascus with its retaliatory strikes of Operations True Promise 1 and 2. Operation True Promise 3 is as Iran said would be more devastating and frighteningly destructive.
Israel’s model of warfare has always been pre-emptive, provocative, and deeply reliant on its assumption of strategic superiority.
From assassinating Iranian scientists to bombing airfields in Syria and flattening apartment blocks in Gaza, Israel’s actions have consistently escaped consequences. It fights without fear of retaliation, armed with American munitions and diplomatic impunity. Its strategy depends on hitting others — but never being hit.
Israel’s doctrine of one-sided warfare is now bankrupt. The retaliatory strikes by Iran did more than damage Israeli infrastructure — they shattered the myth that Israel is untouchable. What we are witnessing is not just a military failure, but an existential crisis for the Zionist regime. Its greatest weapon — fear — no longer works.
It's evident Iran’s restraint has brought no peace. Instead, it has emboldened Israel to take ever more dangerous steps, convinced of its own invulnerability. The message is clear: non-nuclear nations have no real sovereignty in the eyes of the West or its proxies.
In this reality, Iran has only one path to ensure its security: nuclear deterrence. Not as a weapon of aggression — but as the sole viable shield against perpetual threats from a nuclear-armed neighbour with a record of regional destruction.
Israel's refusal to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty while stockpiling nuclear warheads under US protection is a provocation. Its demand that Iran remain non-nuclear, while it carries out military strikes across sovereign borders, is not just hypocritical — it’s suicidal policy by design. Iran’s nuclear pursuit is no longer about prestige. It is about survival.
The US is no longer the force it once was. As Washington scrambles to maintain control in Ukraine, it has now begun diverting munitions and air defence systems intended for Kyiv to Israel — highlighting an overstretched empire trying to prop up too many proxies at once.
Russia, meanwhile, has made clear that it stands behind Iran through the January 17 Strategic Partnership Agreement. Article 3 of the pact ensures that neither party will assist an aggressor. Article 5 lays the groundwork for expanded military cooperation. That is not theory — that is strategy in motion.
Iran’s alliances with Russia, China, and a constellation of anti-imperial actors in the Global South has repositioned it from isolated pariah to pivotal power. In contrast, Israel’s reliance on American protection and European silence is growing brittle.
This war is not just about missiles. It is about whose order defines the Middle East — and who has the courage to defy it.
For the first time in its modern history, Israel is being hit in a way it cannot hide. Social media is flooded with footage of Iranian missiles striking with impunity. The “startup nation” now finds itself scrambling to explain why its expensive defence systems failed, why its most protected military sites were breached, and why its population is suddenly experiencing the fear it has inflicted on others for decades.
The strategic tide is turning. What we’re seeing is not just retaliation. It’s the beginning of recalibration. A region exhausted by Israeli impunity has finally seen that the Zionist regime bleeds.
And that changes everything.
No Link To Modern Humans?
6,000-Year-Old Skeletons Have Distinctive DNA With No Link To Modern Humans
- Ancient human remains found in Colombia reveal a previously unknown population lineage.
- The skeletons, ranging from 6,000 to 500 years old, do not match any known local indigenous groups.
- Genetic analysis of 21 individuals was published in Science Advances, highlighting unique ancestry.
In a major archaeological breakthrough, scientists revealed that ancient human remains, unearthed in the Bogota Altiplano in central Colombia, do not match any indigenous human population in the region. The skeletons are 6,000 to 500 years old, and the study revealed that some of the individuals belonged to a previously unknown population. A team of researchers studied the genetic data of 21 individuals and published findings in the journal Science Advances in May.
Earlier studies have revealed that two lineages existed - northern Native American and southern Native American. It developed when people started to move south after first arriving on the continent from Siberia. The southern Native American is further divided into at least three sub-lineages.
However, scientists have yet to find the exact time and other details when the first people would have moved from Central America to South America.
Also read | Scientists Observe Light Of "Cosmic Dawn" With Telescope On Earth For The First Time Ever
"We show that the hunter-gatherer population from the Altiplano dated to around 6000 yr B.P. lack the genetic ancestry related to the Clovis-associated Anzick-1 genome and to ancient California Channel Island individuals," the study noted.
"The analysed Preceramic individuals from Colombia do not share distinct affinity with any ancient or modern-day population from Central and South America studied to date," the study added.
"Colombia_Checua_6000BP can thus be modeled as a previously undescribed distinct lineage deriving from the radiation event that gave rise to multiple populations across South America during its initial settlement," it mentioned.
The study author, Andrea Casas Vargas, a researcher at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, told CNN on Wednesday (June 11) that the research team was "very surprised" with the findings.
"We did not expect to find a lineage that had not been reported in other populations," Vargas added.
Kim-Louise Krettek, lead author and a PhD student at the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution in Germany, said, as quoted by Express UK, that this area is key to understanding "how the Americas were populated".
"It was the land bridge between North and South America and the meeting point of three major cultural regions: Mesoamerica, Amazonia, and the Andes." Krettek added.
The study is very important, Vargas said, adding that it is the first to sequence complete genomes in ancient samples from Colombia.
Vargas said that the results raise questions "as to where they came from and why they disappeared.
"We are not certain what happened at that time that caused their disappearance, whether it was due to environmental changes, or if they were replaced by other population groups," she said, further adding that more research will provide some answers, hopefully.
Breach at White House?
What We Know
In February 2025, a Starlink terminal was installed on the roof of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, part of the White House complex. It was managed by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), a Musk-linked office.
The terminal broadcast a wireless network labeled “Starlink Guest.” It allowed internet access to government laptops, personal devices, and visiting systems, without routing traffic through federal VPNs or firewalls.
By mid-March, whistleblowers reported large data transfers from devices connected to the Starlink Guest network. These were unlogged and invisible to federal cybersecurity monitors.
In April, a similar Starlink system deployed at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) triggered an even more severe alert: logs were erased, malware was detected, and login attempts from a Russian IP address using valid credentials were blocked solely due to location restrictions.
The full scale of the breach is still unknown. However, the evidence suggests that this was not an isolated incident but rather a systemic problem.
What Must Happen Now
Immediate disconnection of all DOGE-installed Starlink systems on federal property.
Instant cessation of all DOGE activity in every federal agency.
Independent investigations into DOGE’s presence at all federal agencies.
Mandatory disclosure of all DOGE deployments, network traffic, and credential provisioning.
Prosecution and removals: If anyone at DOGE facilitated, concealed, or profited from unauthorized access, they must face legal and professional consequences.
Permanent policy bans on third-party ISP access and personal devices within executive offices.
This is not a scandal. This is a failure of structural security and oversight. The breach may have happened. However, failing to act now would be a breach of duty.
Some might say the damage is already done. DOGE has had months inside Social Security, the IRS, and agencies across the federal system. We’ve seen what they do with Starlink: disable the logs, route around the firewalls, and expose credentials. There’s no reason to believe other agencies are any more secure.
That doesn’t mean we stop asking questions. It means we start asking harder ones, and demanding consequences, not just investigations.
"We call it a twisted plasmoid."
A HIDDEN WORLD OF SOLAR ACTIVITY: In the 17th century when Anton van Leeuwenhoek looked through a microscope and saw bacteria for the first time, he revealed a new "world of the small" and forever upended the field of biology. Is the same thing about to happen to solar physics?
Maybe. A paper just published in Nature Astronomy reports a new technology for seeing very small things in the atmosphere of the sun. It's a system of adaptive optics that corrects for turbulence in Earth's atmosphere. A test run in July 2023 on the 1.6 m Goode Solar Telescope in California's Big Bear Lake produced an immediate discovery:
"We became astounded witnesses to a
strange, short-lived object," recalls the research team, led by
Dirk Schmidt of the NSF National Solar Observatory. "We call it a
twisted plasmoid."
The plasmoid is unlike anything seen inside the sun's atmosphere before. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory was observing at the same time
and saw nothing. The Big Bear adaptive optics system is so good
at correcting turbulent blur, it outperforms space telescopes.
A movie of the plasmoid shows a narrow
stream of plasma less than 100 km wide moving like a flagellate under
van Leeuwenhoek's microscope. The front of the stream "suddenly stopped
and collided with its own rear half," before fading away. Other
structures observed by the team may be as narrow as 20 km across.
The
1.6-meter Goode Solar Telescope in Big Bear Lake. The steady
temperature of the water surface helps keep the air around the telescope
calm
It's not clear whether this is a significant discovery or just something idiosyncratic and weird. We'll soon find out. The researchers plan to install the same system on the giant Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii, where adaptive optics on its 4-meter mirror could reveal an even greater menagerie. Let the plasmoid hunt begin!
For more images from the new adaptive optics system, click here.
If fascism does one thing well, it is spectacle
America’s Off-Shore Concentration Camps
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Photograph Source: Casa Presidencial – CC0
Our offshore concentration camps, for now, are in El Salvador and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. But don’t expect them to remain there. Once they are normalized, not only for U.S.-deported immigrants and residents, but U.S. citizens, they will migrate to the homeland. It is a very short leap from our prisons, already rife with abuse and mistreatment, to concentration camps, where those held are cut off from the outside world — “disappeared” — denied legal representation and crammed into fetid, overcrowded cells.
READ: https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/06/12/americas-off-shore-concentration-camps/
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