News Sites You Ought to be Reading
“Among the calamities of War may be justly numbered the diminution of the love of truth, by the falsehoods which interest dictates and credulity encourages.” Samuel Johnson, 1758.
All wars end with negotiations.
“Think nine times before speaking” (Confucius)
“Listen before you think” (instructions to attorneys)
Commentary:
Counterpunch, some of my favorite people write for this site, however, it is very inconsistent as is much of the left in the USA: https://www.counterpunch.org/
The Duran (Alex Christoforou and Alexander Mercouris, both of whom have their own personal channels, too, to which they post almost daily updates): https://www.youtube.com/hashtag/theduran and https://theduran.locals.com/
The Grayzone (Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate, primarily): https://thegrayzone.com/
Chris Hedges Report and commentary: https://chrishedges.substack.com/
Caitlin Johnstone independent journalism from Australia and the US: https://caitlinjohnstone.com/
Richard Medhurst (A British-Palestinian journalist who also posts daily): https://www.richardmedhurst.com/
Naked Capitalism commentary on finance and politics: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/
RealClear US Domestic Policy analysis: https://www.realclearpolicy.com/
Robert Scheer 60 years of journalism: https://scheerpost.com/
Intelligence reports:
Consortium News: https://consortiumnews.com/
Covert Action Magazine, the grandfather of former CIA whistleblowers: https://covertactionmagazine.com/
Mintpress: https://www.mintpressnews.com/
Moon of Alabama: https://www.moonofalabama.org/
Follow the Money:
Open Secrets about money in politics: https://www.opensecrets.org/
Sarawak born investigative journalist Clare Rewcastle-Brown: https://www.sarawakreport.org/
Sludge relentlessly uncovers corruption: https://readsludge.com/
ZeroHedge for professional investors: https://www.zerohedge.com/
China:
CCTV China Closed-Circuit Television: https://english.cctv.com/
CGTN China Global Television Network: https://www.cgtn.com/
Global Times: https://www.globaltimes.cn/index.html
Hong Kong: https://www.fridayeveryday.com/author/nury-vittachi/
ShanghaiEye (slightly similar to the Indian Republic World in its occasional tendency to mimic our legacy media, but reliable overall): http://www.shanghaieye.com.cn/
India:
Indian Punchline, M. K. Bhadrakumar is a former member of the Indian diplomatic corps and specialist on the former Soviet Union and Asia. This is my favorite site for learning about the real reasons diplomacy by other means is employed: https://www.indianpunchline.com/
Republic World (an Indian news channel that often mimics Western media but manages to get quite a bit of real news out as well): https://www.republicworld.com/
Middle East:
Arab independent media Al Mayadeen: https://english.almayadeen.net/
West Asian news from the cradle of civilization: https://thecradle.co/
News from Iran: https://nournews.ir/En/
News from the Middle-East: https://triloguenews.com/
World news from Türkiye: https://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/world/
Latin America and the Caribbean:
Latin America and the Caribbean: https://www.telesurenglish.net/
Enjoy their reality-based reporting and analysis!
Background to understand how we got here and where we’re going:
Andrew Bacevich, After the Apocalypse: America’s Role in a World Transformed (American Empire Project), New York: Metropolitan Books, 2021.
Andrew Bacevich and DanielA. Sjursen, Paths of Dissent, Soldiers Speak Out Against America’s Misguided Wars, New York: Metropolitan Books, 2022.
Andrew J. Bacevich, “The Reckoning That Wasn’t, Why America Remains Trapped by False Dreams of Hegemony”, Foreign Affairs, March/April 2023, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/andrew-bacevich-the-reckoning-that-wasnt-america-hegemony
Lady Borton, After Sorrow, An American Among the Vietnamese. 1995. Lady Borton presents the “American War” from the view of the courageous peasants on the ground, underneath the B-52’s and Agent Orange.
Stephen F. Cohen, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_F._Cohen#Writings_and_activities
Michael Herr, Dispatches, New York: Knopf, 1977.
William M. Hammond, Reporting Vietnam, University Press of Kansas, 1998 (very critical of the military and politicians)
Alfred W. McCoy, The Politics of Heroin in Southeast Asia, CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade, New York: Harper & Row, 1972.
Alfred W. McCoy, To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2021.
Reporting Vietnam, American Journalism 1959–1975, The Library of America, 1998 (collection of articles) https://www.loa.org/books/128-reporting-vietnam-american-journalism-1959-1969
John J. Mearsheimer international relations: https://www.mearsheimer.com/
Oliver Stone, documentary on events leading up to the current crisis: Ukraine on Fire: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TjeW5pPHg0
David Talbot, The Devil’s Chessboard, Allen Dulles, the CIA, and the Rise of America’s Secret Government, London: William Collins, 2015.
Tiger Force, The Pulitzer Prize winning investigation series by the Toledo Blade 2003. https://www.toledoblade.com/special-tiger-force This is proof that history is news if no one knows about it. The series was made into a book in 2006: Michael D. Sallah, and Mitch Weiss, Tiger Force: A true Story of Men and War. New York, Little Brown,2006.
Nick Turse, Kill Anything That Moves; The Real American War in Vietnam, Metropolitan Books, 2013. This is a must read.
Report of Msgr. Carlo Maria Viganò of the Vatican on the war in Ukraine, the oldest and most reliable intelligence service, https://www.marcotosatti.com/2022/03/07/declaration-of-msgr-carlo-maria-vigano-on-the-russia-ukraine-crisis/
Stephen Wertheim, Tomorrow, the World: The Birth of U.S. Global Supremacy, Harvard University Press, 2020.
Some novels more real than fiction:
Karl Marlantes, Matterhorn, https://www.npr.org/2010/04/22/126170933/matterhorn-a-beautiful-brutal-vietnam-war-epic
Bảo Ninh, The Sorrow of War (from the NVA perspective), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sorrow_of_War
Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Things_They_Carried
Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer (ARVN double-agent who escapes, gets to California, then CIA infiltrates them back and much more), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sympathizer and the follow up: The Committed, 2021.
Andrew X Pham, Catfish and Mandala; The Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vientanam, Picador, USA, 1999. Born in Vietnam in 1967, the Vietnamese-American moved with his family to California after the war. A return to his roots clouded in others’ memories of war.
And from a Zero collective author, why Vietnam is still with us: