[Music]
Okay, we did it. Thank you. Ide
Welcome to Sputnik orbiting the world
with me George Galloway
and me Gadri
Henry Scoop Jackson was a cold war hawk
veteran of the US Congress always
pushing for more weapons more war and
for a long time harbored a raft of
anti-semitic views yet when the British
neocons were casting around for a peg to
hang their top hats on. They oddly
fastened upon the obscure and largely
forgotten Henry Jackson. Now
turbocharged with pro-Israel fervor and
anti-Islamist fanaticism, the HJS has
become the font of some of the most
poisonous right-wing agitation in this
country. A group of British academics
together with the Cordoba Foundation
have recently published chapter and
verse about the go-to guys for a witch
hunt.
We're joined by the CEO of the Cordoba
Foundation, the redoubtable Anus Altei.
Annas, welcome.
Tell the public if you would about the
Henry Jackson Society. I know about them
and hate them so much. I'm I'm I'm not a
dispassionate commentator on it. So,
better if you sum them up, please.
Well, first of all, George Bry, thank
you for for inviting me back. It's
always a pleasure. um you know as you
put
and ignoble failures of neoconservatives
on on every single level whether it be
on home fronts in the United States in
the United Kingdom throughout Europe or
in their ventures abroad such as in Iraq
and and elsewhere
we're still talking about them and the
reason is and this is why what we
attempt to do in the report we attempt
to uncover exactly what the Henry
Jackson Society stands for, who funds
it, who stands behind it, who is linked
to it, who is part of the structure whom
they present from time to time that
gives you and I the aura that there are
so many out there who are against us.
Actually, it's not so many. They all
belong to the very same basket. And the
basket is the Henry Jackson Society.
On the face of it, you see, you'd think
such people wouldn't be able to show
face in public.
You'd think so. The anti-terrorism
agenda that they drove through has led
to more terrorism. The war in Iraq has
turned into uh almost an apocalypse.
It's almost impossible to overstate the
size of the disaster. the
neoconservative
uh Bush and Blair years now look
incredibly toxic to anyone.
Even even the right even the right wing,
they want nothing to do with either Bush
or Blair.
But these people are just as aboliant as
ever and just as asserbic uh acidic
actually as as ever. Where do they get
the goal? Well, they're driven by two
main things I believe. The first is an
ideology. They they are very very much
ideologues despite them coming from
various backgrounds, political, media,
business, trade, some of them education,
some of them health, military or the
such, but ultimately they all believe
deeply in the new conservative message.
That's very very important by the way
because I can I can you and I know I
mean we can stand a politician whom we
disagree with. We can uh you know
disagree with anyone on on any other
issue and usually you'd win that
particular argument. But the when you
have an ideologue as we do have in even
our government of today we have
ideologues not politicians that is where
things turn as you put it acidic. The
other element is finance. They have a
lot of it. They have huge backings and
we're talking about corporations worth
tens of millions. We're talking about a
structure of organizations. If you were
to put them all together in one pot,
they would be worth billions, several
billions, actually. And the interesting
thing is this. Time and time and time
again, whilst whilst the names are, you
know, if you wish, the who's who of
general right-wing, sometimes even
far-right wing policies and economic and
social spheres and the such in the UK
and in America,
ultimately, and this is what we find
time and time again in the report, the
thread always leads back to Tel Aviv.
And they never give up uh their Trojan
horse fiasco. Uh, it was another
disaster for them in the sense that it
was debunked as a forgery,
but still they speak of it.
They trump it. They they they they
flaunt it. It's as though they have no
shame. But that's the ideologue.
I doubt if the money's I've not uh got
to the section on finance yet, but I'm
guessing that the money doesn't come
from Tel Aviv, though the inspiration uh
does. Isn't the money American money
mainly?
Yes, very very much so. But but it's but
it's usually it's usually people who are
interlin with either the Zionist find
foundations here in the UK in America.
Apac very very very strongly features in
this report. It's about people who visit
Israel quite a lot. They take that kind
of emotional and ideological fuel from
you know every now and then and they're
they're they're leading the charge. So
you know Israel figures quite quite
prominently in in the whole operation.
Certainly, Israel is one of their uh if
you like sacred cows. They they it's an
article of faith
for neoconservatism.
Uh and uh that much is clear from the
report. Uh how much of a two-way street
it is, I'll I'll wait till I get to it
because my my take on Israel is that
they take other people's money rather
than give uh uh people money. Uh but I
could be wrong about that. But the scale
of the penetration of British civil
society by these people is very very
large. They have members in the cabinet.
They have uh somebody on the question
time panel every other week. Uh they
they are um dragged out uh every time
there's an issue or an incident. They
have to have their point of view and yet
they represent uh a very tiny fraction
of
very tiny numbers. Yeah, you're
absolutely right. Very tiny. If if you
were to draw a map, we'd be the the vast
majority and they would be, you know,
the the dot the dot that's, you know, is
there somewhere. But in terms of
influence, in terms of where they are,
where they stand, the reach,
the finances, it's uh it's it's really
scary. And the thing is that these
people because of the leverage they that
they have they wield whether it be
political or financial or otherwise. Um
they know how to play this game. And
therefore in recent years they've even
gone to the extent of establishing
so-called Muslim organizations but who
serve that particular agenda. You know
who am I to speak? I mean there's a
Muslim with a beard you know a sheh no
less who speaks you know in those
particular lang those particular terms.
So who am I to disagree with wi with
with someone who's more knowledgeable
such they're very very good at that. you
know, in in the UK, one of their their
biggest components that's has done so
much damage over the years for everyone,
not just for the Muslim community, for
everyone is, for instance, the Quillian
Foundation.
Yeah.
You know, propped up as um the foremost
counter extremism, counter
radicalization organization led by
Muslims with a Muslim cleric somewhere
sitting um but serving an agenda that
has nothing to do with uh with with most
of us. One might describe them as a kind
of Trojan horse. One might. Absolutely.
A few uh episodes ago, we spoke about
Uber, which is a 50 billion dollar uh
corporation from the US and they pay
actually people to work online to push
their their their business. So is that
also a platform for the Henry Jackson
Society of course or is
social media social media uh is
extremely important to them and they
realize that social media today looms
you know it plays probably a far larger
role than the mainstream media than the
BBCs of this world of skies or ITVs or
this and there are tens of thousands
this is a very very conservative
estimate tens of thousands of whom
immediately
go on the attack. And that's why, you
know, we post an article where we're
presenting an idea, you know, why don't
we think about humanity, about, you
know, how peace really should look like
something like that on those particular
lines
and we're inundated. Inundated. It's
like a hammer comes in from everywhere
and it's those troops that they have at
the ready at the click of a button.
Well, look, this raises the $64,000
question, as the Americans used to call
it. How come they're so good at it and
we're so bad? How come they can
construct such a on the right at least,
hegimmonic project uh whilst we're two
men and a dog handing out cycllo style
leaflets outside tube stations?
Listen, George, you you're right. It is
the question. And uh I have to say we
actually did a launch at the University
of Bath with the authors of the report,
the four authors. And they were they're
a brilliant team. You know, Spinwatch is
an organization that I, you know, I I
invite everyone to go and look up
because they are doing investigative
not journalism, but investigative
reporting and research. Research that
really matters to each and every one of
us on a on a sterling scale. Now, their
leader, Professor David Miller from the
University of Bath, he said something
which, you know, resonates with what
you've just asked. He said, "If nothing
else, if nothing else, you have to give
them credit for their tenacity and for
their level of organization and
dedication." Um, it's true. You know,
since we're right and they're they are
so wrong, why is it that we can't um
organize? I think we can. I think we
can. I think we do ourselves a lot of
discredit when uh, you know, we we we
think of ourselves in in low terms. I
think we're better than that. We're much
much better than that. We just need a
little bit of organization. Plus, I
think that these reports help to let
people know exactly what's out there so
that they can then mobilize, to react,
and to counter.
Well, we now have uh an election coming
up with Jeb Bush likely facing Hillary
Clinton.
Again,
as Henry Kissinger once said in another
context, it's a pity both can't lose. Uh
but uh one of them is going to win
and uh both are neocons essentially,
right? uh so they're not going away uh
any time. So this report is going to be
an essential reading uh for
on this point George whilst you're
absolutely right that the power is uh
mindboggling if you wish if you look at
it I mean it sort of fills you with
dread as to how much power they levy but
just let me point to one uh one thing
one of the major proponents and
organization that make up the Henry
Jackson Society um is a very very much
declared openly declared Zionist
federation and organization
up until recently
It was given that any prime minister who
came to become prime minister of Britain
would be one of the patrons and
therefore just a few years ago that
particular organization had not only the
prime minister by the way but the
leaders of all the major parties as
patrons. Today we stand with that
organization having none of the leaders
of the main parties nor even the David
Cameron the prime minister as patrons.
So you see there is there is some sort
of backdraw and we need to capitalize on
that. Now whether that's because people
are realizing that this is a losing game
or whether they're realizing that rather
than this being an asset it's more of a
liability. I think it's something for us
to pay attention to.
Food for thought. Uh the report is
outstanding. Everyone should get
themselves a copy of it. Annas Altei,
thanks as always for coming on board
this footnick. After a short break, one
of Britain's growing number of
independent investigative journalist
Mark Watts will be right back.
[Music]
Welcome back to Sputnik. As the British
print and even mainstream television
media market continues to shrink, so
does any nent ambition they might have
had to expose the rich and the powerful.
That's increasingly left to the likes of
Wikileaks and our next guest, Mark Watts
of Exor News, who are filling the space
where honest journalism used to be maybe
in Fleet Street. Mark Watts, welcome to
the Sputnik. Tell us first what happened
to the mainstream media that left a gap
that XRO is admirably filling.
Well, I think actually we can largely
blame accountants because accountants
were saying in most media companies that
we don't need this investive journalism.
It's incredibly labor intensive. It
requires a lot of work and it's just
troublesome. And moreover, they said um
we can just rewrite wire copy from press
association, associated press, Reuters
and so on. just rewrite wire copy and
press releases. It's very cheap to do
and we get lots of column inches for not
so much money. And the problem is the
readers and the viewers are not
interested in this guff. And if you look
back at the stories that have really
galvanized people that have been dug up
by journalists, it's always the
investigative ones. And I I wouldn't
write off the mainstream media
completely on this score. Um they
occasionally have, you know, little
bursts of activity in this in this area.
We had before X-RO came into existence
the MP's expenses scandal exposed by the
Telegraph. Sure. Which was which was a
good piece of work and well executed.
But o overall you know there's less and
less willingness to tackle as you put it
the rich and powerful.
Now uh the once upon a time we remember
it those of us of a certain age anyway
the Sunday Times Insight team uh and so
on. But the big stories of today are
increasingly being led by you. Uh in
particular, the uh pedophile stories,
the rich and powerful and the ring that
may or may not have existed around
Westminster and Whiteall and the clubs
adjacent. Uh why have they been so quiet
on this? Is it accountancy or is it
because they're part of the same
establishment?
I think it's a bit of both. Um, and I
think one of the
aspects of this scandal that we're
uncovering here, um, is the failure of
the media to have tackled this story.
And this is not a recent failure. This
is not just recently where newspapers
had less willingness to investigative
journalism. This goes back decades. Now,
XRO was formed to, as we put it, hold
power to account. We've done a whole
series of stories about a whole series
of subjects. We revealed civil servants,
senior civil servants working off
payroll. um a useful mechanism if you
want to minimize tax. We uh revealed an
extraordinary uh recording of Rbert
Murdoch talking to a group of his
journalists about how he knew all about
the practice of bribery that had been
going on um at the News of the World in
particular right from when he bought it.
So he was aware of the practice. But one
of the investigations that we've done
actually over about three years and
still continuing uh is what we call the
Westminster Pedophile Network. And this
really gets to the root of how power in
Britain works. And the media has shown
uh precious little interest in exposing
that in the past. Not just the media of
course, but the prosecutorial uh
authorities. The government has made a
terrible hash of the inquiry that they
set up, losing not one but two heads of
that uh inquiry. The very controversial
decision, not entirely closed yet, I
think, not to prosecute Lord Janer.
can say what we know is that there was
multiple child sex abuse perpetuated by
very powerful people in British in the
British establishment and there were
multiple failures to police this to
prosecute this or to expose it in any
way shape or form. So, it's multiple
failures on the part of the police, the
the entire criminal justice system, the
government, and yes, the media. And what
we're doing really at XRO by the by the
stories that we've uncovered is we're
forcing the authorities in the same way
as we're in fact forcing the mainstream
media to tackle this subject. This is
undoubtedly the biggest political
scandal in postwar Britain.
This story would be nowhere as important
as it now is. and it still has a long
way to go to match its importance if it
were not for Exo and people like you.
Uh, have you felt the hot breath of the
establishment in any way on your on the
back of your neck as you as you nosed
around on this story?
Um, yes. So, we we certainly we're
certainly aware of um some skull
duggery, shall we say, here and there.
Um, we've been very alive to it. Um and
so far uh we've managed to navigate what
is a very very difficult story. I mean
you know the people who are affected uh
is utterly traumatic for them and
remains so even if it's many years even
decades after their abuse. Um we we
talked to many uh whistleblowers um from
from the police for example and criminal
justice system who
many honest coppers did try
absolutely absolutely and were lent on
from above
and that's that's a big part of this
scandal and and of course they're
desperate for the truth to be known
actually in reality there's a kind of
symmetry here between journalists and
police officers quite often they want to
do the they want to do the the proper
job but somehow someone more senior than
them stops them. Now, so far we've
established
at least credible allegations that there
were people in Downing Street, there
were people in the House of Commons,
there were people in the House of Lords,
there were people in the British
diplomatic corps, others in the Civil
Service more generally, even some judges
and police officers have begun to pop
into this frame. Is this something
peculiar? I choose the word carefully.
Is this something peculiar to the
British ruling class? Uh why would such
powerful people take such terrifying
risks?
We don't know every all the answers to
these questions and that is a a question
that is sort of begging there. Um and we
we don't know the answer to that. Um all
we can do is uncover the evidence step
by step as we have done over three
years. Um, so we've put put ourselves
put Britain in a position where even the
authorities that have been so reluctant
to act in the past have had to
acknowledge the reality of this of this
scandal. So we have had an overarching
inquiry commissioned because of the uh
evidence that we had raised. We have had
um the police open up a whole series of
uh investigations specifically into
prominent people and pedophilia. We have
had the IPCC, which regulates the police
here in Britain, uh say that they're
looking at at least 17, the number keeps
going up, at least 17 separate cases of
corruption, and that's their word, of of
of cases where they believe there have
been cover-ups where police operations
were closed. And I, you know, we've
spoken to people who are involved in
some of those operations and and and it
happened. That is absolutely what
happened.
Just um a general back off the topic. a
question that uh I was pondering about
after seeing this meme uh titled
investigative journalism today and you
see a man behind the computer on social
media it was mocked but I was wondering
to what extent it does reflect today's
journalism and it's part of
investigative journalism because if you
think about investigative journalism you
think of oh president men was that the
film with Hoffman
what you imagined all journalists would
want to be exactly
but Now, it turns out they were getting
their stories from hacking the telephone
messages of celebrities and following
social media.
Yes, but there was a lot of that going
on in in in Fleet Street or they've all
departed Fleet Street. We're left in
Fleet Street. We're the only Fleet
Street. How remarkable.
We're the only ones there.
Well, that's very
real journalism returns to Fleet Street.
But coming back to the social media
point, I mean, social media is is
effectively a tool um which is actually
very useful. It's a way that um people
might contact us sources can come
through us this way. It's a way of us
amplifying you know the stories that
we're doing. And for example I mentioned
the overarching inquiry that happened.
It happened because we did a series of
stories. One that exposed evidence to
some MPs colleagues of yours George um
from the Labour Party Conservative Party
and Liberal Democrats cross party group
really decided we've got to do something
about this and we we must have this
overarching inquiry. initial group of
seven and this mushroomed. Why did it
mushroom? This was totally ignored by
the mainstream media. It was Twitter. It
was followers of us at XRO news on
Twitter that were just tweeting to us,
should we ask our MP whether they would
join this?
And we said, well, if you want to, up to
you. And they did in quite large
numbers. And we know the MPs were
somewhat bombarded uh by will you join
uh will you sign up to this letter? And
we had I think by the end about 146 MPs
in pretty quick time saying yes we want
this overarching inquiry. And that is
what forced Theresa May the Home
Secretary to order it against a very
very reluctant David Cameron.
Mark you you made a very portentous uh
statement which uh I'm still chewing
over and I think you're right. This is
the biggest scandal in Britain for well
since the war I think you said. Not sure
there were bigger ones before the war.
Uh and yet the only people who have been
outed are the dead or the uh Alzheimer
uh um sufferer who can't any longer be
brought to justice. How long before real
live names still in politics in some
cases at least still in the houses of
parliament
uh emerge at least on your pages if not
on the mainstream?
Well, there is something that's holding
us back on that particular score about
naming those names who we haven't so far
named
as a result of the work we've done to a
large extent. There are active criminal
investigations going on and and we're
talking uh to abuse survivors who are
the key witnesses in those cases and in
some cases they only happened because
those abuse survivors came to us first
of all and and then ended up speaking to
the police and the police took them to
be credible because obviously in the
past people like that were often totally
dismissed and and there are active live
um police investigations into a whole
array of people and we obviously do not
want to do anything that could in any
way damage the prospects of justice. So
there are two things that we're seeking
here. XRO's role is to expose the truth,
but there's a there's a wider thing
about justice. Now I I would say you
can't get to justice without the truth.
But certainly the people who are talking
to us really want that end point to be
reached. So we have to be very very
careful that we don't do anything that
could damage that and and throughout the
three years we have very closely abided
by that. And in a word, will justice be
done?
I'm hoping at least we'll get the truth.
Well, I don't have my hat on, but I take
it off to you. Fantastic. Exo News, Mark
Watts, thanks for coming on the spot,
Nick.
Thank you very much.
And now it's your turn to tell us what
you think through the portals of social
media. What's rattling guy?
Henry Jackson Society. Who, what, why?
Ricardo Picasso answers just another
neocon think tank to tide the government
by until parliament finally becomes a
great big one. Then what happened to
investigative journalism? Warren
Springthorp says the best are always
ostracized for thinking outside the
mainstream media. The rest are people
just happy to cottow the Murdoch and co
fear loss. And that's all that we've got
for this week
which alas means that's the end of the
show. You can stay in touch with us on
Twitter at RT_Sputnik and on Facebook on
Sputnik on Russia Today. It's goodbye
from me Gatri
and from me George Galloway. It's been
marvelous.
[Music]