THREAD: Seeing quite a lot of people reporting - often with surprise as they've never interacted before - that disgraced former DHS 'disinfo expert' Nina Jankowicz has blocked them. It would be unsurprising if Amil Khan of Valent Projects gave her a blacklist to work from.
In wake of @MaxBlumenthal and I exposing how Khan and @PaulMasonNews conspired to get The Grayzone deplatformed, he took to Twitter to declare article had primarily been shared by "coordinated networks" of bots and trolls, and that information on these had been passed on...
These charges completely false. Khan was even repeatedly challenged on this nonsense by a supporter of his (in since deleted tweets). Assumed this to be a copium-inspired lie, but no - he truly believed this. And tens of thousands of people will have been put on lists as a result
Note Khan's invocation "information laundering", subject of infamous Scary Poppins video. Good reason to believe Khan and Jankowicz are familiar with one another too, because she sat on advisory board of Open Information Partnership. He is named as part of it in leaked documents
As I wrote for @MintPressNews, Open Information Partnership is a British Foreign Office information warfare operation acknowledged to be a "troll/disinfo factory". mintpressnews.com/uk-propaganda-… Some participating orgs have fascist ties.
It's sinister enough Khan - who has a history of running covert state propaganda campaigns - is compiling info on people online and passing it on to authorities because they shared an article, there is a high risk that many of them will be banned from social media as a result...
Khan's company Valent Projects receives millions from USAID - never been advertised publicly - for tackling 'disinfo' in various countries. In practice this entails approaching Facebook etc posing as independent researchers, and having government critics banned en masse.
A leaked Valent report on "inauthentic behaviour" and "coordinated networks" related to the Ethiopian civil war offers some insight into Khan's research methods. It's difficult to know where to start dissecting the idiocy and insanity contained in it...
For example, Valent identified 150 accounts that used hashtag #NoMore most, and assumed them to be primarily bots, but Botometer didn't validate this. Rather than conceding they were wrong, concluded the bots were in fact so "sophisticated" they escaped detection 🥴🥴🥴🥴
Khan then tracked where these users were based, finding some were in the same place, leading him to conclude a single person was running multiple accounts. In reality, these users just listed a particular city on their profile, not their precise coordinates...
I also make an appearance. Khan claims a thread I posted about him and his company suggested I have
"access to information obtained through espionage/security links". In reality, I just posted things I'd found via search engines, and LinkedIn...
This would be amusing, except a large number of activists, journalists and academics within and without Ethiopia flagged as suspicious/bots by Khan have been permanently suspended, or shadowbanned. This not only damages reputations and livelihoods, but even more sinisterly...
Serves as a tool of regime change. The mainstream media - in particular CNN - was tubthumping for US intervention in Addis Ababa, and whitewashing the brutality of the US-backed TPLF. Were it not for independent reporters and activists challenging this false picture, it is highly
Likely there would've been US boots on the ground eventually. Valent's work also serves to keep corrupt, unpopular, repressive Western-backed regimes in power by silencing legitimate criticism.
As such, Facebook and Twitter must never allow Khan's analysis to influence their decisions ever again, urgently review each and every suspension they have enacted due to Valent's interventions, and reveal what information and 'analysis' has been passed to them by the company.
Addendum: Very striking how many people are finding out they're blocked by Jankowicz as a result of this thread, particularly given many are highly obscure accounts. This is as good as proof Jankowicz was given a list. No way she came across these people organically.
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🧵: For those within the Empire's inner core, the full, seismic implications of Trump's "aid" suspension may not be fully obvious. But here in the Balkans, where USAID/NED has penetrated every sphere of public, political and even daily life, the impact is absolutely monumental.
In Bosnia, all basic functions of the state were post-war forcibly outsourced to USAID, NED, Soros, etc. On top of enfeebling the local population, it created enormous opportunities for grift and corruption, which anyone who could took full advantage of.
Not every country in the region is quite so dependent, although there are entire sectors of local economies where the only employment opportunities are with USAID/NED/etc-funded orgs. And this isn't restricted to the Balkans - similar story elsewhere in the former Soviet sphere.
🧵: Relatedly, I find effort to frame low intensity Donbas civil war Kiev was losing post-Maidan as an unadmitted Russian invasion Ukraine was winning *very* interesting. British intelligence at the forefront, obviously. It was laying foundations for what happened in Feb 2022.
Take for instance this Times article from 2016, which claims Ukraine was experiencing "the Third World War on a tiny scale" in Donbass, and the conflict exposed "secrets" of Russian military doctrine and strategy the West could capitalise on. Complete and utter fantasy.
This article resulted from visit of Ukrainian ultranationalist paramilitaries to UK, arranged by British intelligence. They met with the British Army, journalists, and politicians. Bios of these fighters suggest they were exaggerating their military records *greatly*.
🧵: Answer to this is manifold. Foremost of course, the imperial braintrust was in early 2022 extremely deluded about US/NATO power. Elements remain so today. But in many ways, a Ukrainian loss produces major potential US gains economically, politically and militarily.
On first point, in October 2022, Pentagon released a National Defense Strategy. It failed to once mention China and Russia's 'no limits' partnership, or consider the risk war with one of its major adversaries would mean war with them all, and defeat:
Then too, US officials weren't aware of extent of their defence industrial base's destruction, and enormous problems they would have replenishing ammunition, armour, vehicles and other materiel sent to Ukraine at any pace or scale. This simply wasn't considered until recently.
🧵: ASTONISHING article in TIME about how the Biden administration never had any intention or even desire to help Ukraine win, and was always just going to step away at its behest at some point. We all *knew* this but to have it confirmed is important.
Interesting passage confirming what @TheGrayzoneNews has been reporting since 2022 - the US was legitimately concerned about the proxy war escalating and avoiding that was a key objective, about which the British have consistently been - and remain - furious.
@TheGrayzoneNews Ukraninains likewise furious. Untold billions spent and sent, Washington paying salaries of *all* state workers and keeping country barely functional with 'aid' and 'stimulus', and it ain't enough. Kiev got set up for this and was always going to be betrayed. Stings, doesn't it?
🧵: Western media been frenzied den of worst imaginable takes and 'analysis' from 'journalists', pundits, officials, spooks on Russia consistently, pretty much every minute, since the proxy war started. But let's focus on just one episode - Prigozhin's 'rebellion' in June 2023.
Wagner 'rebellion' was completely irrelevant publicity stunt that resulted in nothing. Prigozhin - who many Russians hadn't even heard of - had zero public or institutional backing. There was no chance of unseating Putin, even vaguely threatening his power, or achieving anything.
However, Western mainstream collectively lost its mind over this incident. @TheGrayzoneNews collated some of the funniest, most hysterical overreactions from dickheads like McFail and @anneapplebaum, who genuinely believed civil war had erupted.
🧵: As I go over some material strongly suggesting Britain was secretly aiding HTS for years prior to their seizure of Damascus, I'm reminded of how often MI6 programs indirectly seem to assist ISIS. It's really quite amazing how frequently this has happened, by total accident.
In 2017, the Foreign Office decided it'd be a perfect time to secretly run a psychological warfare campaign to deter Afghans from joining the Taliban, right when the Taliban was engaged in a bitter civil war against ISIS-K. I wonder what prompted this 🧐
Funnily enough, in leaked docs related to the effort, it is repeatedly acknowledged by the MI6 cutout running it Afghanistan's puppet government had zero legitimacy or power outside Kabul itself. Occupation officials and the media weren't publicly saying that in 2017, were they?