TFF Blog

I don’t think I’ve ever witnessed in all my years of journalism such an hysterical outpouring against a presidential statement as I’ve seen the last week. President Donald Trump has even been accused of treason by prominent columnists and politicians. There’s barely a voice of dissent in the media. (Maybe it’s written but not published.) No wonder that even some of my normally open-minded friends feel that things are as bad as they are made out to be. Sorry to say it, as I’ve told them, they are being brainwashed. The issue is Trump’s dishing of his intelligence services during his press conference with President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki. He denied their conviction that Russia had meddled in the election that brought Trump to power. In standing by Putin’s denial on this he speared the sacred heart of the American foreign policy establishment, the so-called “Blob”. Only Republican voters stood...

• This is the second of two articles about the coming end of NATO as we know it and what can be done. The first you find here. It may be good to have at least browsed that one before you read on here. The Banality of Militarism In the field of science, business and culture, new ideas, innovative methods, doing new things and doing old things in new ways are activities usually rewarded and admired. That keeps these fields vibrant, alive and interesting to others too. However, in the field of the all-pervasive, omni-present paradigm of basic military defence and security thinking and policy – drop peace because no one has a peace policy – no such dynamics exist. The same old tune is played over and over again – to make you fearful and pay: The same old tune is played over and over again – to make...

• On the occasion of the NATO Summit in Brussels and the Putin-Trump meeting in Helsinki This analysis comes in two parts – one critical and one constructive: This one on “NATO’s crisis and the Transatlantic conflict” and the second on “Make NATO civilian and civilised.” My apologies for writing a bit long, it isn’t comme il faut nowadays. But I happen to be a researcher who believes in knowledge, background and intellectual arguments in fields such as defence, security and peace – in other words, belonging to a race threatened by extinction in the era of fake and marketing. Indeed, so old fashioned am I that I don’t believe in world security matters being dealt with in Twitter- or spin doctor- style or in narratives and diplomacy conducted through advertisement videos. The follow-up second part of this analysis can be found here. • • When the Berlin Wall came...

Man kan vælge at læse en rapports resultater, som man gerne vil læse dem, man kan også bestræbe sig på at læse en rapports resultater så objektivt, som man formår, eller man kan lade være med at læse den overhovedet og videreformidle, hvad andre har læst. Det sidste er højst sandsynligt tilfældet for de danske medier i forbindelse med OPCW’s undersøgelse af det ”formodede” kemiske angreb i Douma i Syrien, som nyhedsmedier verden over kunne rapportere om for fire måneder siden den 7. april 2018. Den 5 juli. 2018 udkom OPCW med de foreløbige resultater af deres undersøgelse.   Da nyheden tikkede ind i april om, at et kemisk angreb i Syrien havde fundet sted, var reaktionen fra omverden i første omgang forståelig, da billederne talte deres tydelige sprog. En video begyndte at florere, der viste, at børn i Douma blev sprøjtet til med vand og fik proppet inhalatorer i...

  • On July 6, 2018 there was a meeting in Vienna concerning the JCPOA, or the Iran nuclear deal, and how to handle it after the U.S. withdrawal from the deal and the U.S. attempts to isolate Iran further and suffocate its 85 million people even more by trying to prevent it from selling its oil and simultaneously have Saudi Arabia increase its production. The participants were China, Russia, Germany, France and the UK and the meeting was chaired by the EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini. Here is a PressTV report about it. And here is the EU’s document that was produced at the meeting. According to TFF director, Jan Oberg, the major problems with this is that the EU, Russia and China have known for many months that President Trump would withdraw from the deal and also has an almost personal hate of the country and of...

  Jonathan Power  July 3, 2018 At last week’s European summit the leaders spent most of the time discussing immigration restrictions. Yet the Syrian rush through the Mediterranean is now a trickle. The African migration is down by 95%. No wonder that Emmanuel Macron, the young (40) president of France, was frustrated. Although he spent hours trying to liberalize the consensus on immigration restrictions he really wanted to spend most of the summit on reforming how the Eurozone works. An inner group of 19 members use the Euro as their currency. The heads of state went backwards, spending most of the summit’s time on yesterday’s problem. Macon wanted to focus on the future, to stave off a repeat of the near collapse of the Euro eight years ago. A month ago he and Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany fashioned the Meseberg Declaration, an 8-page document. The two countries make up...

    290475″ data-end=”1530428399″> Take a look at the short video below that Facebook suddenly sends me today, Saturday June 30, 2018 about my being so important for communities and how great Facebook is at creating a community feeling worldwide. Many thanks, I guess I am supposed to say. Well, I don’t. First, I detest these – I assume, artificial intelligence-based – videos where everything is soooo filled with stock photos, stock happy children, all dancing and having a gooood stock time and the stock music is just mechanical sing-along kitsch…OK, just had to let it out! Second, Facebook has destroyed the worldwide reach TFF and I had until about a year ago – thanks to their “algorithm”, political interference and tracking. We’re basically – that is, 90% or so – reaching only people in Denmark, Sweden and other Nordic countries and the rest outside. All the people I interacted...

Oberg comments directly after the EU Summit on a series of issues, among them also defence and security. Here is the document from the European Council and nobody seem to contemplate the link between EU/NATO armament (arms exports), military intervention and NATO/EU countries ravaging one country after the other and the refugee flows. So, there is no end in sight unless the EU/NATO fundamentally changes interventionist and war policies which they are not likely to do (see the document) – and that may spell the end of the EU itself. Like terrorism, Europe’s refugee “problem” will be a perpetuum mobile until somebody has the moral and intellectual courage to stop and think and ask: What are the basic reasons we face these problems? That is why the discussion is now about borders, border control and reception centres far away – and not about refugees, asylum seekers (but ‘migration’ which is...

  Af Jan Øberg Det er mere end 7 år siden volden brød ud i Syrien, i Daraa. Det er det, TV2 vil fortælle os om hér. Og tidligere har fortalt hér. Skønt de mange år har man desværre ikke lært den lektie, der er så enkel: At volden kun er symptom på underliggende konflikter. At det det handler om ikke er volden/krigshandlingerne – men det der har fået volden til at bryde ud. At man kun kan komme frem til en fredelige fremtid hvis man forstår hvad konflikterne handler om. At medier, der kun fokuserer på volden men ikke kerer sig det mindste om årsagerne til den, gør volden meget mere “naturlig” og “uundgåelig.” I det aktuelle tilfælde stiller TV2 sig helt klart på de unge mænds side, der med våben i hånd bekæmper deres egen regering. De fremstilles som helt, der har startet krigen og – ja, hvordan...

  By Nikolaj Nielsen and Damiano Bacci Brussels, June 27, 2018 Originally published by euobserver here Five years ago, Italian and EU leaders stood in silence as they watched coffins pile up in a warehouse on the island of Lampedusa. “Coffins of babies, coffins with the mother and the child that was born just at that moment. This is something that profoundly shocked me,” Jose Manuel Barroso, then EU commission president, said following his visit. It was early October 2013, when some 373 people had drowned off Lampedusa’s coast in their efforts to seek help, asylum, and opportunities in Europe. The European Commission then quickly announced big plans to curb the deaths. Border surveillance would be stepped up, boats rescuing people would not face sanctions, regional protection, resettlement and legal ways to access Europe would be offered, and diplomatic channels stepped up with African countries. A similar refrain would be...

  Navel-gazing can sometimes be a good thing. But, as the self-help books and articles advocate, looking at one’s achievements to date to boost one’s morale is always a good step forward before attempting to improve the mind and spirit. Europe’s summit opens on Thursday. With immigration the central point on the agenda it’s going to be a big one. So what is the central achievement that won the EU the Nobel Peace Prize six years ago? It’s the abolition of war among EU countries. Today Europe is the most peaceful part of the world with the highest human rights standards of anywhere. Europe used to be the most war-stricken place on earth. Between 1648 and 1789 Europe was the site of 48 wars. The British army was at war in some part of the world throughout the entire nineteenth century. The twentieth century saw two world wars, centered in...

. This exciting opportunity stimulated the development of a bigger idea that combines Oberg’s work for peace and art photography with a focus on the Chinese-initiated Silk Belt and Road Initiative, the largest and most visionary in today’s world in terms of linking people and cultures into cooperation rather than confrontation. In various ways the project – with the Road as metaphor – stretches from Shanghai over Myanmar, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Iran and Syria to Venice and seeks to promote cooperation and peace in the process. It’s a joint project between Oberg PhotoGraphics and TFF. The “Silk PeaceArt Road” project is made public at this very early development stage where only little funding is secured to encourage you to share co-operative ideas, share contacts you may have in China and along the Silk Road or to potential partners, artists, sponsors, art institutions, etc.   Summary in 7 elements 1. To stay...