foreignpolicy--2020-10-06--QAnon’s Creator Made the Ultimate Conspiracy Theory

When news of U.S. President Donald Trump ’ s COVID-19 diagnosis broke just after midnight on Friday , QAnon followers reacted with glee—not because the president , who they idolize , was sick , but because the news must mean that “ the storm , ” the great revelation where Trump would arrest his enemies for their crimes , was coming .
Most of those who believe in the convoluted QAnon conspiracy theory hold that the pandemic is fake , and so the move could only indicate that the president was going undercover , and that the final revelation was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the end of history .
Cults have used the promise of the apocalypse to recruit followers .
New religions have attracted adherents with missives about the coming holy war .
The philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel wrote that history itself would come to a grinding halt , as things couldn ’ t possibly get better than Protestant Germany in the early 19th century .
Usually these movements have a built-in expiration date .
If the prophesied end doesn ’ t come , followers tend to move on .
But , eventually , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It has been called everything from a virulent conspiracy theory to a mass delusion , a cult , and a complete scam , and yet it ’ s growing daily .
It seems set to send some faithful followers to Congress , it has earned the tacit acknowledgement of the president , and it still maintains a core following of about 600,000 people on Facebook alone , despite efforts by the platform to ban QAnon outright .
QAnon followers have attempted political violence , and links between apparent acts of domestic terrorism and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ February and March , just 3 percent of Americans surveyed by Pew Research said they had heard or read “ a lot ” about QAnon .
By September , more than 30 percent told Civiqs the teachings of the elusive pseudonymous leader Q were partly or mostly true .
QAnon is growing , and fast .
In many ways , QAnon is the culmination of Trump ’ s America : paranoid , deeply critical of journalists and experts , obsessive in its defense of the president .
Zoom out , though , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doomsday cults and new religious movements .
It is the ideological successor of the satanic panic of the 1980s , and of older , even darker ideas like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion .
It has more in common with the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo than the Republican Party of Dwight D. Eisenhower .
From its modest origins on a far-right message board , it is now a behemoth , absorbing a set of ideas that have long lurked below the surface .
It has vacuumed up every paranoid thought @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and society .
While it hasn ’ t predicted the end of the world , Q warns its followers that a “ storm is coming.
” The ultimate battle between good and evil is around the corner .
Apocalyptic vibes radiate through all of Q ’ s messages .
And , critically , the particular idiosyncrasies of Q ’ s warped worldview may contain clues to the man behind the curtain .
Scroll through the thousands of posts from Q and its followers , and you ’ ll see that there ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Every theory , from John F. Kennedy ’ s assassination to mind control , can fit neatly into QAnon .
In Q ’ s world , where the deep state knows no bounds and shows few scruples , it seems evident that the terrorist attacks of 9/11 were an inside job .
That the few dynasties that secretly run the world ’ s banking system are real and active .
That even the British conspiracy theorist David Icke ’ s stories of lizard people could be true .
It ’ s not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a product of the channels on which it started .
In the dark recesses of the 4chan and 8chan message boards , these theories have long been bandied about .
The core tenets of QAnon are not so much novel as they are a reflection of what the users of these boards wanted to see .
That ’ s no coincidence , according to Fredrick Brennan , the founder of 8chan .
While he has distanced himself from his former site in recent years , he believes he knows who is really behind @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the podcast Reply All , Brennan laid out his belief that Q was , originally , an 8chan moderator who had created the character to cosplay with fellow users , as part of a running bit where posters pretended to be anonymous security-cleared American officials .
To that end , many of the early tenets of Q were borrowed wholesale from the 8chan message boards .
In early 2018 , before hitting the big time , Q ’ s so-called drops of information included cryptic messages like “ we haven ’ t started @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sacrifices.
” Other drops from the same time made oblique references to the CIA and its “ ability to harvest.
” That has spun off an entire homegrown conspiracy around the supposed harvesting of the chemical adrenochrome .
Q followers believe that the satanic human trafficking operation is all a means to abduct children and extract adrenochrome from their brains , injecting the chemical to stay young .
Never mind that adrenochrome , while it has been touted for its mild hallucinogenic properties , isn ’ t produced by the human body .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ this theory has spread , Brennan said .
He pointed out that adrenochrome harvesting has been “ a big thing ” on 8chan for years .
“ I ’ d never seen it anywhere else , personally , ” Brennan said .
The puppet master behind Q must have known they would find a receptive audience for it .
But QAnon doesn ’ t just repeat 8chan drivel—it borrows from decades of conspiracies and remixes them into something modern and new .
Its followers , meanwhile , crowdfund their own additions to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ them .
It gives adherents the distinct feeling that they are uncovering some secret , like detectives on a case .
Like they are pulling the string between the pushpins on their corkboard .
While other conspiracies suffer from a lack of confirmation , every newspaper headline or oblique tweet is , for QAnon followers , proof positive of their predictions .
Every negative story about Q is evidence of the deep state pushing back .
Every Trump tweet can be a coded message encouraging QAnon to work harder .
It ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ every event has an occult significance , hidden from most but revealed to initiates .
The chaos and suffering of the real world are given significance and purpose .
Nearly every facet of modern life is just a cheap plywood set piece , hiding a plot that spans across the world and through time .
What ’ s so surprising is that Q managed to break free of the message boards on which it began .
That , too , was carefully choreographed , Brennan said .
Sites like 8chan are generally irreligious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cultural Christianity of the United States , but users on those message boards tend to focus on cultural and ethnic nationalism instead .
That ’ s one clue suggesting that , while the person behind Q may be well versed in 4chan and 8chan , they have their own motivation and influences—and plans for broader American appeal .
It ’ s something that points to Brennan ’ s theory : that Q is , currently , 8chan owner Jim Watkins .
While a moderator may have originally run the account , a series @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Watkins—who took control of 8chan after Brennan quit in disgust for its tolerance of far-right extremism—is running the show .
It ’ s all a ruse , Brennan believes , for Watkins to amass American political influence from his expat headquarters in the Philippines .
“ He knows Christianity is a way , in the United States , to get something to go big , ” Brennan told me .
He said that “ the time I knew him best , between 2015 and 2018 , I never saw him go to church @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hymn.
” “ He knows Christianity is a way , in the United States , to get something to go big.
” Meanwhile , Q ’ s messianic prophecies have warned its followers of the evil influences of satanic temples and the supposed threat of anti-Christian symbology everywhere .
There are even Zoom-based church services for Q followers .
The exact tenets of the “ Qvangelicals ” are as murky as Q ’ s oblique 4chan posts , however .
Its efforts to hijack faith have led pastors to warn their followers away @ @ @ @ @ @ @ June : “ We are living in Biblical times .
Children of light vs children of darkness .
United against the Invisible Enemy of all humanity.
” But even as its doctrine borrows heavily from Christianity , QAnon also dips into other movements .
In April of this year , Q dropped a link to a YouTube video with a command to “ Clear your mind .
Heal.
” The video was uploaded by an English electronic music group that is particularly popular with yoga enthusiasts .
It was notably out of character @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Brennan notes , for Watkins .
“ Watkins has tried to get 8chan into yoga for a long time , ” he said .
When Brennan worked with Watkins , out of his office in Manilla , the staff had to do yoga with the boss if “ they wanted to be in Jim ’ s favor.
” He was also big into ambient music , similar to the music Q linked to .
“ He would constantly try to sell me on the binaural beats , ” Brennan said .
“ And @ @ @ @ @ @ @ make fun of him.
” In one of the final editions of the official magazine of the esoteric Japanese movement Aum Shinrikyo in 1995 , it was announced that Shoko Asahara , the group ’ s leader , “ formally declares war on the ‘ world shadow government ’ that murders untold numbers of people and , while hiding behind sonorous phrases and high sounding principles , plans to brainwash and control the rest .
Japanese awake !
The enemy ’ s plot has long since torn our lives to shreds.
” Soon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subway with sarin gas , killing 12 people .
These movements succeeded through simple tactics .
They appealed to a human desire to be brought in on a secret .
They inoculated their followers against outside criticism .
( The Heaven ’ s Gate cult warned followers “ all religions have been spawned from the misinformation … propagated by space-alien races.
” ) They built not just a worldwide conspiracy , but the tools to fight back against the supposed conspirators .
They gave each follower a leading role in one of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cults needed to build that world from scratch .
QAnon , however , has picked up existing movements and communities , like a snowball rolling down a hill and collecting debris .
By bringing in existing movements , enveloping them into its mass , QAnon absorbs a quasi-credibility and an existing fan base .
Notably , QAnon builds heavily on The Protocols of the Elders of Zion , one of the world ’ s most enduring conspiracy theories .
Written around the turn of the 20th century , the text contends in its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of some 300 Jewish elders control all of Europe .
The text is a lazy forgery , a jumbled plagiarism of a political pamphlet against Napoleon III and a novel rife with anti-Jewish stereotypes .
It was probably written by the failed writer Matvei Golovinski in order to solidify opposition against leftist revolutionaries in Tsarist Russia .
Yet The Protocols was useful propaganda for Adolf Hitler .
It has become required reading in some Islamist circles .
It also had a fan in Jim Watkins .
“ Jim also read the [ Protocols @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ He doesn ’ t believe it was a forgery.
” When Brennan mentioned his Ukrainian heritage , he said , Watkins immediately “ espoused the Khazar theory to me.
” The theory revolves around the historical Khazar empire , which began nearly two millennia ago in and around modern-day Ukraine .
The theory , however , has very little basis in historical fact .
According to a rundown of the theory , posted to the anti-Semitic and pro-Russian website Veterans Today , the evil Khazar empire practiced “ Babylonian black-magic , also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ involved occult ceremonies featuring child sacrifice , after ‘ bleeding them out , ’ drinking their blood and eating their hearts.
” Tsarist Russia , this conspiracy goes , defeated the child-kidnapping empire in the 13th century , but the Khazars went underground , operating as a secret society .
They are responsible for the fall of King Charles I and have supposedly infiltrated the world banking sector and the British monarchy for their own criminal and nefarious ends .
This is a particularly arcane conspiracy .
But , as Brennan said , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conspiracy theories.
” As is Ron Watkins , his son , who also works for his emerging media empire .
The Khazar theory suggests that the underground mafia eventually took the name Rothschild , plugging the historical fiction into some virulent , modern anti-Semitism .
That concept has become integral to the movements of several modern conspiracy theorists , including Lyndon LaRouche , a perennial candidate for American high office and father of much monetary policy quackery .
LaRouche died last year , but the political action committee bearing his name has gone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ movement once being notionally left-wing .
The LaRouchePAC warned in 2004 that George Soros , funded by the Rothschilds , was secretly financing a campaign “ to destroy a nation ’ s ability to resist imperial rule.
” Many familiar with David Icke know him for his theory that the ruling class is , in fact , a space-and-time-traveling reptilian super race .
But his writing , like LaRouche ’ s , draws heavily on The Protocols and invokes the Rothschilds constantly .
Icke , a U.K. citizen , wrote in 1998 that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Princess Diana were full of Satanic rituals ” and posited that a secret cabal , including Queen Elizabeth , used MI6 to kill Princess Diana because “ she threatened their power.
” This constellation of bullshit can be found throughout Q ’ s drops .
As Q itself wrote : “ Realize Soros , Clintons , Obama , Putin , etc .
are all controlled by 3 families.
” In other posts , it lists the three families : The House of Saud , George Soros himself , and the Rothschilds .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
What did she find out ?
Why was she running ?
” and invoked the idea of a secret British government , propped up by MI6 .
For decades , these have been the theories of outsiders .
LaRouche , Icke , and the Khazar theory may be punchlines to the general public , if they ’ re recognized at all , but they have found a vehicle to the mainstream in QAnon .
“ Not too long ago , it would be unpalatable for an American audience to say , just @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , you ’ re part of an international satanic conspiracy , ” Brennan said .
For decades , these have been the theories of outsiders .
LaRouche and Icke have railed against world governments .
They have seen themselves as revolutionaries .
QAnon is different , and it shares a troubling similarity with The Protocols : It is a forgery and a conspiracy designed to protect power , not challenge it .
It teaches its masses that the powerful are actually vulnerable and must be defended .
The movement has appeared in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the hip to the man in the White House , but it is also preying on a generation steeped in moral panics .
In the 1980s and 1990s , a wave of fear set across North America .
Conservative-minded Americans felt that the social mores of society were crumbling , opening the door to godlessness .
Heavy metal music and occultism perpetuated that belief .
So when children began recounting stories of strange happenings at their day cares , parents leapt into action .
Thousands of reports sprang up across the United States @ @ @ @ @ @ @ workers and teachers were conducting satanic rituals on the children in their care .
Some went to prison on flimsy evidence , and some remain incarcerated .
Through it all , there is no conclusive evidence that any of the alleged abuse actually occurred .
As a 1992 FBI report concluded , “ the public should not be frightened into believing that babies are being bred and eaten , that 50,000 missing children are being murdered in human sacrifices , or that satanists are taking over America ’ s day care centers or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fear and panic over satanism from the evening news .
Coverage of the horrors in the nation ’ s Satan-worshipping day cares resonated , while the sheepish retractions , if they were ever aired , went ignored .
QAnon offers an updated version of that thought-world for prospective followers with no interest in esoteric conspiracy theories .
It ’ s a story of fear , warning that pipelines of trafficked children run through the United States , and that no child is safe .
Most recently , it has also become married to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , according to Brennan .
“ The first time that Q espoused a coronavirus conspiracy theory , it was a conspiracy theory that Ron had posted on his Twitter , ” he said .
“ And hours after the drop , he removed it.
” The 8chan owner ’ s son tweeted the debunked theory that COVID-19 was a lab-made bioweapon three times between January and February , while Q dropped the theory that the pandemic was preplanned in mid-March .
Beyond that , there is something for the anti-vaccine crowd .
Lots @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conspiracy theories normally more identified with the left , like 9/11 truthers , have something in QAnon .
QAnon is the culmination of more than a century in magical thinking , from cults that profess the end of the world to conspiracy theories that tell of a shadow world government to moral panics that warn of dark secrets behind every door .
It ’ s a world where individual people hold the keys to a hidden truth , if only they choose to look for it .
This is a reality where everyone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but where the final battle of good versus evil is fast approaching .
This is the end of history .
We ’ ve never seen a movement that ties together a constellation of delusions and beliefs like this .
But the next one could be around the corner .

When news of U.S. President Donald Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis broke just after midnight on Friday, QAnon followers reacted with glee—not because the president, who they idolize, was sick, but because the news must mean that “the storm,” the great revelation where Trump would arrest his enemies for their crimes, was coming. Most of those who believe in the convoluted QAnon conspiracy theory hold that the pandemic is fake, and so the move could only indicate that the president was going undercover, and that the final revelation was coming.
When news of U.S. President Donald Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis broke just after midnight on Friday, QAnon followers reacted with glee—not because the president, who they idolize, was sick, but because the news must mean that “the storm,” the great revelation where Trump would arrest his enemies for their crimes, was coming. Most of those who believe in the convoluted QAnon conspiracy theory hold that the pandemic is fake, and so the move could only indicate that the president was going undercover, and that the final revelation was coming.
People have always looked forward to the end of history.
Cults have used the promise of the apocalypse to recruit followers. New religions have attracted adherents with missives about the coming holy war. The philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel wrote that history itself would come to a grinding halt, as things couldn’t possibly get better than Protestant Germany in the early 19th century. Usually these movements have a built-in expiration date. If the prophesied end doesn’t come, followers tend to move on. But, eventually, the jig has to be up.
Enter QAnon.
It has been called everything from a virulent conspiracy theory to a mass delusion, a cult, and a complete scam, and yet it’s growing daily. It seems set to send some faithful followers to Congress, it has earned the tacit acknowledgement of the president, and it still maintains a core following of about 600,000 people on Facebook alone, despite efforts by the platform to ban QAnon outright. QAnon followers have attempted political violence, and links between apparent acts of domestic terrorism and the movement are increasingly apparent.
In February and March, just 3 percent of Americans surveyed by Pew Research said they had heard or read “a lot” about QAnon. By September, more than 30 percent told Civiqs the teachings of the elusive pseudonymous leader Q were partly or mostly true. QAnon is growing, and fast.
In many ways, QAnon is the culmination of Trump’s America: paranoid, deeply critical of journalists and experts, obsessive in its defense of the president. Zoom out, though, and QAnon is the amalgam of decades of doomsday cults and new religious movements. It is the ideological successor of the satanic panic of the 1980s, and of older, even darker ideas like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. It has more in common with the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Shinrikyo than the Republican Party of Dwight D. Eisenhower. From its modest origins on a far-right message board, it is now a behemoth, absorbing a set of ideas that have long lurked below the surface.
It has vacuumed up every paranoid thought and half-baked idea about power, government, and society. While it hasn’t predicted the end of the world, Q warns its followers that a “storm is coming.” The ultimate battle between good and evil is around the corner. Apocalyptic vibes radiate through all of Q’s messages.
And, critically, the particular idiosyncrasies of Q’s warped worldview may contain clues to the man behind the curtain.
People march during a "Save the Children" rally outside the Minnesota state Capitol building in St. Paul on Aug. 22. Hundreds of rallies around the country, meant to decry human trafficking and pedophilia, were scheduled for the date, some linked to social media accounts promoting the QAnon conspiracy.
QAnon traces its lineage back to a single, disproven conspiracy: that, in 2016, a pedophile ring tied to the Democratic Party had been exposed. John Podesta, Anthony Weiner, and Hillary Clinton were all involved, satanism was at play, and Comet Ping Pong, a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., was the headquarters for the whole operation. Trump was about to launch mass arrests, fringe players promised, that would expose the whole conspiracy.
Scroll through the thousands of posts from Q and its followers, and you’ll see that there’s no new conspiracy under the sun. Every theory, from John F. Kennedy’s assassination to mind control, can fit neatly into QAnon. In Q’s world, where the deep state knows no bounds and shows few scruples, it seems evident that the terrorist attacks of 9/11 were an inside job. That the few dynasties that secretly run the world’s banking system are real and active. That even the British conspiracy theorist David Icke’s stories of lizard people could be true.
It’s not surprising, as Q is very much a product of the channels on which it started. In the dark recesses of the 4chan and 8chan message boards, these theories have long been bandied about. The core tenets of QAnon are not so much novel as they are a reflection of what the users of these boards wanted to see.
That’s no coincidence, according to Fredrick Brennan, the founder of 8chan.
While he has distanced himself from his former site in recent years, he believes he knows who is really behind QAnon.
On a recent episode of the podcast Reply All, Brennan laid out his belief that Q was, originally, an 8chan moderator who had created the character to cosplay with fellow users, as part of a running bit where posters pretended to be anonymous security-cleared American officials.
To that end, many of the early tenets of Q were borrowed wholesale from the 8chan message boards. In early 2018, before hitting the big time, Q’s so-called drops of information included cryptic messages like “we haven’t started the drops re: human trafficking / sacrifices.” Other drops from the same time made oblique references to the CIA and its “ability to harvest.”
That has spun off an entire homegrown conspiracy around the supposed harvesting of the chemical adrenochrome. Q followers believe that the satanic human trafficking operation is all a means to abduct children and extract adrenochrome from their brains, injecting the chemical to stay young. Never mind that adrenochrome, while it has been touted for its mild hallucinogenic properties, isn’t produced by the human body. But it’s no coincidence that this theory has spread, Brennan said.
He pointed out that adrenochrome harvesting has been “a big thing” on 8chan for years. “I’d never seen it anywhere else, personally,” Brennan said. The puppet master behind Q must have known they would find a receptive audience for it.
But QAnon doesn’t just repeat 8chan drivel—it borrows from decades of conspiracies and remixes them into something modern and new. Its followers, meanwhile, crowdfund their own additions to the conspiracy, which Q regurgitates back to them. It gives adherents the distinct feeling that they are uncovering some secret, like detectives on a case. Like they are pulling the string between the pushpins on their corkboard.
While other conspiracies suffer from a lack of confirmation, every newspaper headline or oblique tweet is, for QAnon followers, proof positive of their predictions. Every negative story about Q is evidence of the deep state pushing back. Every Trump tweet can be a coded message encouraging QAnon to work harder.
It’s a world of meaning, in which every event has an occult significance, hidden from most but revealed to initiates. The chaos and suffering of the real world are given significance and purpose. Nearly every facet of modern life is just a cheap plywood set piece, hiding a plot that spans across the world and through time.
What’s so surprising is that Q managed to break free of the message boards on which it began. That, too, was carefully choreographed, Brennan said.
Take Q’s growing piousness.
Anti-child trafficking protesters and apparent QAnon adherents demonstrate near the White House in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 6.
Sites like 8chan are generally irreligious places. Digital neo-Nazis may appreciate the cultural Christianity of the United States, but users on those message boards tend to focus on cultural and ethnic nationalism instead.
That’s one clue suggesting that, while the person behind Q may be well versed in 4chan and 8chan, they have their own motivation and influences—and plans for broader American appeal. It’s something that points to Brennan’s theory: that Q is, currently, 8chan owner Jim Watkins.
While a moderator may have originally run the account, a series of security blunders has convinced Brennan that Watkins—who took control of 8chan after Brennan quit in disgust for its tolerance of far-right extremism—is running the show. It’s all a ruse, Brennan believes, for Watkins to amass American political influence from his expat headquarters in the Philippines.
“He knows Christianity is a way, in the United States, to get something to go big,” Brennan told me. He said that “the time I knew him best, between 2015 and 2018, I never saw him go to church, I never saw him read a hymn.”
“He knows Christianity is a way, in the United States, to get something to go big.”
Today, Watkins’s YouTube features him singing religious hymns and reading Bible verses.
Meanwhile, Q’s messianic prophecies have warned its followers of the evil influences of satanic temples and the supposed threat of anti-Christian symbology everywhere. There are even Zoom-based church services for Q followers. The exact tenets of the “Qvangelicals” are as murky as Q’s oblique 4chan posts, however. Its efforts to hijack faith have led pastors to warn their followers away from Q.
As Q wrote in June: “We are living in Biblical times. Children of light vs children of darkness. United against the Invisible Enemy of all humanity.”
But even as its doctrine borrows heavily from Christianity, QAnon also dips into other movements. In April of this year, Q dropped a link to a YouTube video with a command to “Clear your mind. Heal.”
The video was uploaded by an English electronic music group that is particularly popular with yoga enthusiasts. It was notably out of character for Q.
But not, as Brennan notes, for Watkins.
“Watkins has tried to get 8chan into yoga for a long time,” he said. When Brennan worked with Watkins, out of his office in Manila, the staff had to do yoga with the boss if “they wanted to be in Jim’s favor.” He was also big into ambient music, similar to the music Q linked to. “He would constantly try to sell me on the binaural beats,” Brennan said. “And I would try my best not to make fun of him.”
History is littered with cults and movements that have crafted a new world for their followers. A world where something revolutionary is happening just below their feet, and the only key to seeing it all is to wake up. As a favorite expression of conspiracy theorists, borrowed from the Matrix movies, is “take the red pill.” At their least damaging, these movements are a home for disaffected and frustrated people looking for a comforting alternative to a society in tumult. At their worst, this detachment from reality inspires acts of terrorism.
In one of the final editions of the official magazine of the esoteric Japanese movement Aum Shinrikyo in 1995, it was announced that Shoko Asahara, the group’s leader, “formally declares war on the ‘world shadow government’ that murders untold numbers of people and, while hiding behind sonorous phrases and high sounding principles, plans to brainwash and control the rest. Japanese awake! The enemy’s plot has long since torn our lives to shreds.” Soon after that Aum Shinrikyo attacked the Tokyo subway with sarin gas, killing 12 people.
These movements succeeded through simple tactics. They appealed to a human desire to be brought in on a secret. They inoculated their followers against outside criticism. (The Heaven’s Gate cult warned followers “all religions have been spawned from the misinformation … propagated by space-alien races.”) They built not just a worldwide conspiracy, but the tools to fight back against the supposed conspirators. They gave each follower a leading role in one of the most important moments in history.
Those cults needed to build that world from scratch. QAnon, however, has picked up existing movements and communities, like a snowball rolling down a hill and collecting debris. By bringing in existing movements, enveloping them into its mass, QAnon absorbs a quasi-credibility and an existing fan base.
Notably, QAnon builds heavily on The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, one of the world’s most enduring conspiracy theories. Written around the turn of the 20th century, the text contends in its introduction that the “hidden hand” of some 300 Jewish elders control all of Europe.
The text is a lazy forgery, a jumbled plagiarism of a political pamphlet against Napoleon III and a novel rife with anti-Jewish stereotypes. It was probably written by the failed writer Matvei Golovinski in order to solidify opposition against leftist revolutionaries in Tsarist Russia.
Yet The Protocols was useful propaganda for Adolf Hitler. It has become required reading in some Islamist circles. It also had a fan in Jim Watkins.
“Jim also read the [Protocols] before,” Brennan said. “He doesn’t believe it was a forgery.”
When Brennan mentioned his Ukrainian heritage, he said, Watkins immediately “espoused the Khazar theory to me.” The theory revolves around the historical Khazar empire, which began nearly two millennia ago in and around modern-day Ukraine. The theory, however, has very little basis in historical fact.
According to a rundown of the theory, posted to the anti-Semitic and pro-Russian website Veterans Today, the evil Khazar empire practiced “Babylonian black-magic, also known as Secret Satanism” which “involved occult ceremonies featuring child sacrifice, after ‘bleeding them out,’ drinking their blood and eating their hearts.” Tsarist Russia, this conspiracy goes, defeated the child-kidnapping empire in the 13th century, but the Khazars went underground, operating as a secret society. They are responsible for the fall of King Charles I and have supposedly infiltrated the world banking sector and the British monarchy for their own criminal and nefarious ends.
This is a particularly arcane conspiracy. But, as Brennan said, Watkins “definitely is very hyper-aware of conspiracy theories.” As is Ron Watkins, his son, who also works for his emerging media empire.
The Khazar theory suggests that the underground mafia eventually took the name Rothschild, plugging the historical fiction into some virulent, modern anti-Semitism.
That concept has become integral to the movements of several modern conspiracy theorists, including Lyndon LaRouche, a perennial candidate for American high office and father of much monetary policy quackery. LaRouche died last year, but the political action committee bearing his name has gone all in on Trump, despite his movement once being notionally left-wing.
The LaRouchePAC warned in 2004 that George Soros, funded by the Rothschilds, was secretly financing a campaign “to destroy a nation’s ability to resist imperial rule.”
Many familiar with David Icke know him for his theory that the ruling class is, in fact, a space-and-time-traveling reptilian super race. But his writing, like LaRouche’s, draws heavily on The Protocols and invokes the Rothschilds constantly.
Icke, a U.K. citizen, wrote in 1998 that “The assassinations of President Kennedy and Princess Diana were full of Satanic rituals” and posited that a secret cabal, including Queen Elizabeth, used MI6 to kill Princess Diana because “she threatened their power.”
This constellation of bullshit can be found throughout Q’s drops.
As Q itself wrote: “Realize Soros, Clintons, Obama, Putin, etc. are all controlled by 3 families.” In other posts, it lists the three families: The House of Saud, George Soros himself, and the Rothschilds. In another: “What happened to Diana? What did she find out? Why was she running?” and invoked the idea of a secret British government, propped up by MI6.
For decades, these have been the theories of outsiders.
LaRouche, Icke, and the Khazar theory may be punchlines to the general public, if they’re recognized at all, but they have found a vehicle to the mainstream in QAnon.
“Not too long ago, it would be unpalatable for an American audience to say, just because you have a Jewish last name, you’re part of an international satanic conspiracy,” Brennan said.
For decades, these have been the theories of outsiders. LaRouche and Icke have railed against world governments. They have seen themselves as revolutionaries.
QAnon is different, and it shares a troubling similarity with The Protocols: It is a forgery and a conspiracy designed to protect power, not challenge it.
It teaches its masses that the powerful are actually vulnerable and must be defended.
QAnon supporters attend a rally for U.S. President Donald Trump hosted by Long Island and New York City police unions in support of the police in Suffolk County, New York, on Oct. 4.
Of course, approaching the public with tales of secret fake evil empires and international banking conspiracies didn’t work for Icke or LaRouche.
So what’s special about Q?
The movement has appeared in a perfect storm. It is joined at the hip to the man in the White House, but it is also preying on a generation steeped in moral panics.
In the 1980s and 1990s, a wave of fear set across North America. Conservative-minded Americans felt that the social mores of society were crumbling, opening the door to godlessness. Heavy metal music and occultism perpetuated that belief.
So when children began recounting stories of strange happenings at their day cares, parents leapt into action. Thousands of reports sprang up across the United States and Canada, alleging that day care workers and teachers were conducting satanic rituals on the children in their care. Some went to prison on flimsy evidence, and some remain incarcerated.
Through it all, there is no conclusive evidence that any of the alleged abuse actually occurred. As a 1992 FBI report concluded, “the public should not be frightened into believing that babies are being bred and eaten, that 50,000 missing children are being murdered in human sacrifices, or that satanists are taking over America’s day care centers or institutions.”
Yet many Americans remember the fear and panic over satanism from the evening news. Coverage of the horrors in the nation’s Satan-worshipping day cares resonated, while the sheepish retractions, if they were ever aired, went ignored.
QAnon offers an updated version of that thought-world for prospective followers with no interest in esoteric conspiracy theories. It’s a story of fear, warning that pipelines of trafficked children run through the United States, and that no child is safe.
A man wearing a Corona beer bag and a Querdenker Q flag attends a gathering of coronavirus skeptics on the eve of a planned protest march in Berlin on Aug. 28. The Querdenker group sees the pandemic as a conspiracy, and many Querdenker followers sympathize with the QAnon movement.
QAnon is a buffet, offering something for everyone.
Most recently, it has also become married to the COVID-19 conspiracy crowd—again, no coincidence, according to Brennan.
“The first time that Q espoused a coronavirus conspiracy theory, it was a conspiracy theory that Ron had posted on his Twitter,” he said. “And hours after the drop, he removed it.” The 8chan owner’s son tweeted the debunked theory that COVID-19 was a lab-made bioweapon three times between January and February, while Q dropped the theory that the pandemic was preplanned in mid-March.
Beyond that, there is something for the anti-vaccine crowd. Lots for the climate change deniers. Even conspiracy theories normally more identified with the left, like 9/11 truthers, have something in QAnon.
QAnon is the culmination of more than a century in magical thinking, from cults that profess the end of the world to conspiracy theories that tell of a shadow world government to moral panics that warn of dark secrets behind every door. It’s a world where individual people hold the keys to a hidden truth, if only they choose to look for it. This is a reality where everyone in power has a dark purpose, but where the final battle of good versus evil is fast approaching.
This is the end of history. We’ve never seen a movement that ties together a constellation of delusions and beliefs like this.
But the next one could be around the corner.


foreignpolicy--2020-10-06--Trump’s Illness Is Not a National Security Crisis

The implication was that Trump ’ s illness had created new national security dangers for the United States .
Perhaps an adversary ( or conceivably , a restless ally like Turkey ) might see Trump ’ s weakened condition as an ideal moment to challenge the status quo in some fundamental way .
Would China put the screws on Taiwan , or would President Vladimir Putin throw an elbow in the Baltic ?
Might the always-unpredictable North Korean leader Kim Jong Un decide that this was the perfect time to test a long-range missile , or would Iran see this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ United States for the assassination of General Suleimani ?
One can ’ t rule these and other gambits out completely , but the fear that the republic is in peril because the president was and is sick strikes me as wildly overblown .
I wouldn ’ t call it good news ( although I enjoyed the brief respite from Trump ’ s obnoxious and factually challenged tweeting ) , but it hardly meant that the United States had entered a precarious moment of peril .
First , this view implicitly assumes that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are willing , able , and above all ready to seize any opportunity to make mischief the minute they think our guard is down .
It portrays ceaseless U.S. vigilance as the only thing standing between our foes and their various evil schemes , and implies that they are ready to strike at a moment ’ s notice and are just waiting for the optimal moment .
The real world doesn ’ t work that way , however : Even when contingency plans do exist , it takes time to put them in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the odds of success , the likely reactions of other countries , and the possibility that the United States will respond no matter what shape a president is in .
Second , although the Trump administration is not exactly a model of rational decision-making , competent staffing , or disciplined inter-agency collaboration , responsible officials are still in their jobs and still control powerful military and economic capabilities .
We do have a vice president , a notoriously headstrong secretary of state , experienced commanders in the field and on the joint chiefs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of expertise embedded at the National Security Council and other relevant agencies .
Trump may have once declared that he was the only one that matters , but that statement was more a reflection of his own narcissism than a statement of fact .
Nobody could confidently assume that putting Trump in Walter Reed for a few days would paralyze the entire government .
And we should all count our blessings that John Bolton wasn ’ t around to start another war while Trump was receiving oxygen and steroids .
Third , America @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more to gain from doing nothing than from trying to take advantage of Trump ’ s distress .
Napoleon once advised : “ Never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake , ” and one suspects that leaders from Moscow to Caracas to Beijing have taken considerable satisfaction from watching the United States descend into polarized incompetence on Trump ’ s watch .
Heck , they may even get to watch a full-blown constitutional crisis if Trump loses the election in November but tries to remain in office illegitimately .
Given @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will sit tight and do nothing to disturb current trends .
And it ’ s not like other countries weren ’ t taking advantage of the United States before Trump fell sick .
The Saudis are still waging war in Yemen , the Chinese are getting their economy restarted and throwing their weight around with India , and Iran has continued to creep closer to the bomb and worked to isolate the U.S. within the Security Council , aided in no small part by the administration ’ s ham-handed diplomacy .
Trump ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Erdogan , is provoking a crisis in NATO by pressing territorial claims against Greece , and his Brazilian buddy President Jair Bolsonaro is promising to do even more to destroy the Amazon rainforest despite the potential environmental consequences .
Trump didn ’ t have to get sick for others to take the measure of the man and exploit his manifold weaknesses .
Lastly , history offers some reassurance here too .
President Dwight D. Eisenhower suffered a serious heart attack in September 1955 , but there ’ s no evidence that foreign powers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ advantage .
Ike also had what was described as a mild stroke in 1957 , and it was as much a non-event in global terms as his earlier problem ) .
President Ronald Reagan was shot by a would-be assassin in March 1981 , but nobody saw this as the perfect moment to launch a coup , an invasion , or anything else .
This pattern isn ’ t surprising : Earlier IR scholarship suggested that states rarely jump through even big “ windows of opportunity , ” and the president being under @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) just isn ’ t that large an opening .
To repeat : it ’ s not a good thing when the nation ’ s chief executive is laid low , and it ’ s reasonable to hope for his rapid recovery .
But the real crisis is the pandemic itself , which continue to lay waste to lives , economic prospects , America ’ s reputation for competence , and maybe its long-term power position .
That ’ s the real national security problem , not the health of one particular individual @

There’s a lot to worry about these days—a pandemic, economic recession, shifting balances of power, resurgent nationalism, a potentially contested election in the United States, and so on—and then President Donald Trump was infected with the virus he once promised would disappear “like magic” and taken to Walter Reed Hospital. To make sure we were maximally worried, the Washington Post offered a click-baity headline: “National Security Experts Describe a Distracted and Potentially Vulnerable Country.”
There’s a lot to worry about these days—a pandemic, economic recession, shifting balances of power, resurgent nationalism, a potentially contested election in the United States, and so on—and then President Donald Trump was infected with the virus he once promised would disappear “like magic” and taken to Walter Reed Hospital. To make sure we were maximally worried, the Washington Post offered a click-baity headline: “National Security Experts Describe a Distracted and Potentially Vulnerable Country.”
The implication was that Trump’s illness had created new national security dangers for the United States. Perhaps an adversary (or conceivably, a restless ally like Turkey) might see Trump’s weakened condition as an ideal moment to challenge the status quo in some fundamental way. Would China put the screws on Taiwan, or would President Vladimir Putin throw an elbow in the Baltic? Might the always-unpredictable North Korean leader Kim Jong Un decide that this was the perfect time to test a long-range missile, or would Iran see this as an opportune moment to repay the United States for the assassination of General Suleimani?
One can’t rule these and other gambits out completely, but the fear that the republic is in peril because the president was and is sick strikes me as wildly overblown. I wouldn’t call it good news (although I enjoyed the brief respite from Trump’s obnoxious and factually challenged tweeting), but it hardly meant that the United States had entered a precarious moment of peril.
First, this view implicitly assumes that the world is filled with dangerous renegades who are willing, able, and above all ready to seize any opportunity to make mischief the minute they think our guard is down. It portrays ceaseless U.S. vigilance as the only thing standing between our foes and their various evil schemes, and implies that they are ready to strike at a moment’s notice and are just waiting for the optimal moment. The real world doesn’t work that way, however: Even when contingency plans do exist, it takes time to put them in motion and any antagonist must still weigh the odds of success, the likely reactions of other countries, and the possibility that the United States will respond no matter what shape a president is in.
Second, although the Trump administration is not exactly a model of rational decision-making, competent staffing, or disciplined inter-agency collaboration, responsible officials are still in their jobs and still control powerful military and economic capabilities. We do have a vice president, a notoriously headstrong secretary of state, experienced commanders in the field and on the joint chiefs of staff, and a fair bit of expertise embedded at the National Security Council and other relevant agencies. Trump may have once declared that he was the only one that matters, but that statement was more a reflection of his own narcissism than a statement of fact. Nobody could confidently assume that putting Trump in Walter Reed for a few days would paralyze the entire government. And we should all count our blessings that John Bolton wasn’t around to start another war while Trump was receiving oxygen and steroids.
Third, America’s most serious adversaries may have more to gain from doing nothing than from trying to take advantage of Trump’s distress. Napoleon once advised: “Never interrupt an enemy when he is making a mistake,” and one suspects that leaders from Moscow to Caracas to Beijing have taken considerable satisfaction from watching the United States descend into polarized incompetence on Trump’s watch. Heck, they may even get to watch a full-blown constitutional crisis if Trump loses the election in November but tries to remain in office illegitimately. Given those inviting possibilities, sensible U.S. foes will sit tight and do nothing to disturb current trends.
And it’s not like other countries weren’t taking advantage of the United States before Trump fell sick. The Saudis are still waging war in Yemen, the Chinese are getting their economy restarted and throwing their weight around with India, and Iran has continued to creep closer to the bomb and worked to isolate the U.S. within the Security Council, aided in no small part by the administration’s ham-handed diplomacy. Trump’s pal, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is provoking a crisis in NATO by pressing territorial claims against Greece, and his Brazilian buddy President Jair Bolsonaro is promising to do even more to destroy the Amazon rainforest despite the potential environmental consequences. Trump didn’t have to get sick for others to take the measure of the man and exploit his manifold weaknesses.
Lastly, history offers some reassurance here too. President Dwight D. Eisenhower suffered a serious heart attack in September 1955, but there’s no evidence that foreign powers saw this as an opportunity to take advantage. Ike also had what was described as a mild stroke in 1957, and it was as much a non-event in global terms as his earlier problem). President Ronald Reagan was shot by a would-be assassin in March 1981, but nobody saw this as the perfect moment to launch a coup, an invasion, or anything else. This pattern isn’t surprising: Earlier IR scholarship suggested that states rarely jump through even big “windows of opportunity,” and the president being under the weather (or even fully incapacitated) just isn’t that large an opening.
To repeat: it’s not a good thing when the nation’s chief executive is laid low, and it’s reasonable to hope for his rapid recovery. But the real crisis is the pandemic itself, which continue to lay waste to lives, economic prospects, America’s reputation for competence, and maybe its long-term power position. That’s the real national security problem, not the health of one particular individual.


foreignpolicy--2020-10-06--Turkey’s Caucasus Adventure Risks Another Crisis in NATO

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh has fueled a fresh fight within NATO , with alliance members pushing Turkey to dial back its aggressive foreign policy and support a cease-fire in the Caucasus .
As the conflict over the disputed territory has escalated over the past week , leaving over 200 people dead and hundreds more injured , NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called on Turkey to defuse the situation , given its decades of support for Azerbaijan .
“ We are deeply concerned by the escalation of hostilities .
All sides should immediately cease @ @ @ @ @ @ @ visit to Ankara , the Turkish capital , on Monday .
“ I expect Turkey to use its considerable influence to calm tensions.
” But Turkey has dug in its heels , defying a joint call from the United States , France , and Russia for an immediate cease-fire in Nagorno-Karabakh .
“ We look at the calls coming from around the world , and it ’ s ‘ immediate cease-fire.
’ What then ?
There was a cease-fire until now , but what happened ?
” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In crisis after crisis in recent years , Turkey ’ s relations with many of its NATO allies have frayed , but they ’ ve never fully collapsed .
Turkey has purchased Russian air defense systems and angered Washington .
Turkey has squared off with Greece and France in the Eastern Mediterranean , invaded northeastern Syria , and waded into the civil war in Libya .
All that came after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ’ s authoritarian turn in the wake of a 2016 coup attempt .
Now , many are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ close it might be , especially with a potential U.S. administration under presidential candidate Joe Biden signaling a much tougher line on Turkey than the Trump administration ’ s coddling .
Turkey ’ s lurch into the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict , including the use of Syrian mercenaries that serve as its proxy army , has put some powerful NATO members in the odd position of coordinating its message with Moscow , which has long sided with Armenia .
( Many alliance members are on the other side of Turkey in ongoing conflicts in Syria @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the conflict could spiral into wider regional confrontations ; both Turkey and Israel have a close security relationship with Azerbaijan , Russia has a defense pact with Armenia , and neighboring Iran is trying to play a role in mediating the conflict .
The latest conflict is already reverberating inside NATO .
Canada this week announced it was halting some weapons sales to Turkey after allegations its equipment was used by Azerbaijani forces .
Turkey ’ s foreign ministry quickly shot back , accusing Canada of “ double standards ” by continuing to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ war in Yemen .
Conventional arm-twisting might not work .
Experts say Turkey is honing a style of mercenary-led combat—backed by drones for close air support—that lends itself to flashy propaganda coups , if not guaranteed battlefield successes .
Turkish military propaganda could leave a lasting—if outsized—impression of Ankara ’ s might on the battlefield , as it did during a battle in the contested Syrian province of Idlib earlier this year .
“ All you see is the strikes .
It ’ s very powerful imagery , ” said Aaron Stein , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Policy Research Institute .
“ In Idlib everyone forgets that Turkey lost .
All people remember is Turkey kicking Russian ass.
” “ It ’ s lowered the barrier to entry , it ’ s made combat less risky to them , and it ’ s highly effective propaganda , ” he added .
If bilateral tensions spill over into NATO deliberations , it could hamstring the alliance ’ s ability to make decisions on other areas of importance , related to Russia , the Middle East , or other threats facing the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decision-making , meaning nothing is decided until all 30 members agree .
“ We still run a huge risk of bilateral disputes being imported into NATO and … blocking NATO ’ s ability to do business , ” said Lauren Speranza , the director of trans-Atlantic defense and security at the Center for European Policy Analysis .
“ That ’ s nothing new , but the combination of Turkey ’ s latest actions has pushed those discussions to the next level .
There are now debates about how to make Turkey recognize the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for almost 70 years largely because it anchors NATO ’ s southern flank , guards the gateway to the Black Sea , and acts as a corridor to the Middle East .
That geopolitical leverage gives it a lot of room to maneuver .
“ Turkey in recent years has undertaken a much bolder foreign policy , ” said Rachel Rizzo , an expert on trans-Atlantic security with the Truman National Security Project .
“ The United States and Europe both know that Turkey is better as an ally , but that doesn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a thorn in everyone ’ s side.
” Turkey has certainly caused some pain .
Whether its purchase of advanced Russian weapons or its incursion into Syria , threatening the lives of Kurdish forces who fought alongside U.S. troops to battle the Islamic State , Turkey ’ s aggressive foreign policy has riled NATO allies for years .
But Ankara has always been able to play up its pivotal geographical position—and the fact that it has one of the biggest armies in the alliance .
“ It ’ s always been within our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ West , but because of that , Turkey has been able to rebuke the West out of one side of its mouth and then have direct access to the U.S. and allies with the other , ” Speranza said .
Turkey ’ s missteps have angered Congress , if not the Trump administration .
Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers are pressuring the administration to do more to crack down on Turkey .
“ There is very deep worry and concern about where Turkey is going , and more particularly where Erdogan is taking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said a Republican congressional aide .
“ There ’ s an effort to try to get the administration to be more forceful with them.
” The aide said that the administration was using sanctions authorities to confront Turkey , but “ nowhere near to the level that Congress wants to see or is demanding .
”

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh has fueled a fresh fight within NATO, with alliance members pushing Turkey to dial back its aggressive foreign policy and support a cease-fire in the Caucasus.
The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh has fueled a fresh fight within NATO, with alliance members pushing Turkey to dial back its aggressive foreign policy and support a cease-fire in the Caucasus.
As the conflict over the disputed territory has escalated over the past week, leaving over 200 people dead and hundreds more injured, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called on Turkey to defuse the situation, given its decades of support for Azerbaijan. “We are deeply concerned by the escalation of hostilities. All sides should immediately cease fighting,” Stoltenberg said during a visit to Ankara, the Turkish capital, on Monday. “I expect Turkey to use its considerable influence to calm tensions.”
But Turkey has dug in its heels, defying a joint call from the United States, France, and Russia for an immediate cease-fire in Nagorno-Karabakh. “We look at the calls coming from around the world, and it’s ‘immediate cease-fire.’ What then? There was a cease-fire until now, but what happened?” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Tuesday during a visit to Azerbaijan.
In crisis after crisis in recent years, Turkey’s relations with many of its NATO allies have frayed, but they’ve never fully collapsed. Turkey has purchased Russian air defense systems and angered Washington. Turkey has squared off with Greece and France in the Eastern Mediterranean, invaded northeastern Syria, and waded into the civil war in Libya. All that came after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s authoritarian turn in the wake of a 2016 coup attempt.
Now, many are wondering where the breaking point is—and how close it might be, especially with a potential U.S. administration under presidential candidate Joe Biden signaling a much tougher line on Turkey than the Trump administration’s coddling.
Turkey’s lurch into the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict, including the use of Syrian mercenaries that serve as its proxy army, has put some powerful NATO members in the odd position of coordinating its message with Moscow, which has long sided with Armenia. (Many alliance members are on the other side of Turkey in ongoing conflicts in Syria and Libya.) Analysts fear that the conflict could spiral into wider regional confrontations; both Turkey and Israel have a close security relationship with Azerbaijan, Russia has a defense pact with Armenia, and neighboring Iran is trying to play a role in mediating the conflict.
The latest conflict is already reverberating inside NATO. Canada this week announced it was halting some weapons sales to Turkey after allegations its equipment was used by Azerbaijani forces. Turkey’s foreign ministry quickly shot back, accusing Canada of “double standards” by continuing to export arms to countries involved in the war in Yemen.
Conventional arm-twisting might not work. Experts say Turkey is honing a style of mercenary-led combat—backed by drones for close air support—that lends itself to flashy propaganda coups, if not guaranteed battlefield successes. Turkish military propaganda could leave a lasting—if outsized—impression of Ankara’s might on the battlefield, as it did during a battle in the contested Syrian province of Idlib earlier this year.
“All you see is the strikes. It’s very powerful imagery,” said Aaron Stein, the director of research at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. “In Idlib everyone forgets that Turkey lost. All people remember is Turkey kicking Russian ass.”
“It’s lowered the barrier to entry, it’s made combat less risky to them, and it’s highly effective propaganda,” he added.
If bilateral tensions spill over into NATO deliberations, it could hamstring the alliance’s ability to make decisions on other areas of importance, related to Russia, the Middle East, or other threats facing the trans-Atlantic alliance. NATO operates with consensus decision-making, meaning nothing is decided until all 30 members agree.
“We still run a huge risk of bilateral disputes being imported into NATO and … blocking NATO’s ability to do business,” said Lauren Speranza, the director of trans-Atlantic defense and security at the Center for European Policy Analysis. “That’s nothing new, but the combination of Turkey’s latest actions has pushed those discussions to the next level. There are now debates about how to make Turkey recognize the consequences.”
Turkey has remained in NATO for almost 70 years largely because it anchors NATO’s southern flank, guards the gateway to the Black Sea, and acts as a corridor to the Middle East. That geopolitical leverage gives it a lot of room to maneuver.
“Turkey in recent years has undertaken a much bolder foreign policy,” said Rachel Rizzo, an expert on trans-Atlantic security with the Truman National Security Project. “The United States and Europe both know that Turkey is better as an ally, but that doesn’t mean Turkey isn’t a thorn in everyone’s side.”
Turkey has certainly caused some pain. Whether its purchase of advanced Russian weapons or its incursion into Syria, threatening the lives of Kurdish forces who fought alongside U.S. troops to battle the Islamic State, Turkey’s aggressive foreign policy has riled NATO allies for years. But Ankara has always been able to play up its pivotal geographical position—and the fact that it has one of the biggest armies in the alliance.
“It’s always been within our interest to keep Turkey anchored in the West, but because of that, Turkey has been able to rebuke the West out of one side of its mouth and then have direct access to the U.S. and allies with the other,” Speranza said.
Turkey’s missteps have angered Congress, if not the Trump administration. Both Democratic and Republican lawmakers are pressuring the administration to do more to crack down on Turkey.
“There is very deep worry and concern about where Turkey is going, and more particularly where Erdogan is taking Turkey in all of this,” said a Republican congressional aide. “There’s an effort to try to get the administration to be more forceful with them.” The aide said that the administration was using sanctions authorities to confront Turkey, but “nowhere near to the level that Congress wants to see or is demanding.”


foreignpolicy--2020-10-06--The Peruvian Poor Can’t Breathe in the Pandemic

The Peruvian Poor Can ’ t Breathe in the Pandemic At the height of the coronavirus pandemic , Peruvian hospitals were on the verge of collapse , patients were lying in corridors for want of beds , and people were dying in the streets due to shortages of oxygen .
Peru ’ s 32 million people are the worst hit per capita in the world , with almost 800,000 cases and more than 32,000 deaths since the pandemic started .
The week of Sept. 23 , the Ministry of Health reported more than 11,000 new cases and 185 deaths , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ August , between 5,000 and 10,000 cases per day was common .
Underpinning these losses were a deeply deficient health care system , coupled with financial mismanagement by the country ’ s leadership .
Peru had initially hoped to avoid the scourge of the virus entirely .
On March 16 , nine days after the first infection in the country was diagnosed and before anyone had died , Peru entered into a quarantine that , although intended to last only 15 days , is still in effect in some provinces and cities .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ establishments—such as hospitals , food stores , and banks—were able to remain open .
These limitations did not prevent cases from reaching the thousands in a few days .
“ These measures did not work well , because Peru is an informal country ; these are structural social issues that have been around for many years , ” said César Ugarte , an epidemiologist and researcher at the Lima-based Instituto de Medicina Tropical Alexander von Humboldt .
In Peru , around three out of every four workers are working informally , and many @ @ @ @ @ @ @ without access to basic services .
In Indigenous populations , limited access to health care and continued government neglect have been responsible for the loss of countless lives .
The strong impact of the pandemic on the country was exacerbated by the near impossibility of obtaining medical oxygen—a shortage that continues .
The sudden and disproportionate demand due to the large number of respiratory infections in such a short time caused the price of oxygen to rise tenfold , when it was available at all .
It was a predictable problem : Most @ @ @ @ @ @ @ countries , do not have their own oxygen generators and instead have to source it from outside .
This affects public hospitals , which depend on the government , and the problem is even more noticeable in rural areas , where most oxygen generators , already short in number , are out of operation due to a lack of repair services .
The black market , which has been cornered by several powerful individuals , has concentrated what little oxygen there is in the hands of the rich .
The government has produced @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which is instead being addressed by organizations with small funding campaigns , or churches , as is the case with “ Respira Perú ” ( “ Breathe Peru ” ) , a program promoted by the Catholic Church that seeks to bring oxygen generators to the country ’ s most remote cities .
In the last month , the situation has eased a little : “ Until a month and a half ago , doctors told me there were no beds , no oxygen .
Five weeks later , I talk to my @ @ @ @ @ @ @ me that yes , there is a bed , that I can bring a patient in , ” said Ugarte , who currently works directly with COVID-19 patients .
“ It ’ s not that everything has been released , but the system has been hit so hard that now it is having a few minutes to breathe.
” That breathing room is waning , though , and the second wave of the pandemic is about to hit .
“ We are beginning to learn now that there are many infected people who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ symptoms .
There are a lot of these people , but they are invisible , ” said Jaime Miranda , the director of the Center of Excellence in Chronic Diseases at Cayetano Heredia University .
He explained that the Peruvian health system—focused on curing the disease and not on offering long-term treatment—is not adapting well to the situation , and it was not so adapted to the needs of the population before .
“ With a highly aging population and where the problems are more and more chronic , that have no cure @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the problems , but also guarantee a continuity of care , a chronic accompaniment , ” he said .
“ We are told that Peru is growing , that Peru is advancing , and that we have had years of stability , but the pandemic has come and has exposed , quickly and abruptly , how precarious and vulnerable and how weak the social fabric of the country is , including the health sector , ” Miranda added .
“ One of the things that is striking about Peru is that it is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ stories in terms of economic growth , increasing GDP , or reduction in poverty , ” said Christopher Hewlett , an anthropologist who specializes in Indigenous studies in the region .
“ There are many international organizations and institutions that have held up Peru as a good model—but when you ’ re on the ground , it becomes clear that that growth and that increasing wealth was increasing inequality , because the access to actual good health services was not really improving during that time.
” Despite its sustained economic growth in recent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in health has been low , with public spending reaching only 3.2 percent of GDP , a figure far below the 4 percent average in the region and one of the lowest in South America .
Added to this is endemic corruption that has plagued the region and siphoned away the funding needed to fight the pandemic .
According to Transparency International ’ s Corruption Perceptions Index , Peru ranks 101st out of 198 countries analyzed , far behind some other Latin American countries such as Chile , Argentina , and Uruguay .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ measures on a scale of 1 to 100 , where 100 represents total transparency , is 36 , placing Peru in a similar position to some other countries in the region , such as Panama and Brazil .
“ As a result of the Odebrecht incident , ” Ugarte said , referring to the global corruption scandal involving a Brazilian company that paid bribes to important political leaders around the world , including four former Peruvian presidents , “ it was seen that in addition to the roads , the other inflated constructions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many regions were half-finished when the pandemic occurred , stopped by corruption.
” Miranda noted : “ For many World Health Organization indicators , Peru is doing very well .
It ’ s true , we could say it ’ s fine , but if you just look at the isolated parts without looking at the context , you lose the rest , and then you realize that the situation is not really as it seems.
” Rural areas were worst-hit by the lack of construction funds for new health centers .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to build those hospitals in rural areas , but what ’ s sad is that they did invest , but it was so poorly done , ” Hewlett said .
“ There was very little oversight , there was corruption , but when you build a hospital that costs you millions of dollars , and you go over budget , and you go over time , and then when finally it is done it was built on a flood plain .
That ’ s disheartening.
” The fragmentation of the health system and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In addition to the public health system , which serves approximately 60 percent of the population , Peru has a contribution-based health system , accessed by those on fixed salaries ; the private system , which is outside of state control ; and an extensive military health care system .
Before the pandemic , these were disconnected from each other—and when the pandemic came , burdensome bureaucracy and administrative problems made it difficult to interconnect them in the first few months , something that would have saved thousands of lives by making more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ also a highly centralized country , with the capital , Lima , accounting for over half of GDP .
Most hospitals , intensive care beds , and sites with access to oxygen are in Lima , which meant that in the jungle towns—and in smaller cities that together hold millions of people—there was often no access to health care , inflating the number of dead .
“ Iquitos [ the largest city in the Peruvian Amazon ] was a disgrace the first few months , simply because no capacity had been built there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Peruvians often heading abroad , many cities also suffered a lack of doctors .
Lima has 12 doctors per 1,000 people ; Peru as a whole has 1.3 .
But even worse hit than the smaller cities were Indigenous populations .
“ When the pandemic arrived , the Peruvian state issued a state of emergency decree , but the public policies were made from a purely urban perspective , in Lima , ” said Maria Pesantes , a medical anthropologist and researcher at the Cayetano Heredia University .
“ The Indigenous population lives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ precarious health system , and certain prevalent diseases and health conditions like high rates of anemia and tuberculosis make them more vulnerable .
When the containment policy was made , no thought was given to how something specific should be done to include all their territories.
” Health centers in these regions are not only sparse , but also suffer a serious lack of personnel and supplies .
“ Often what happens is the hospitals don ’ t have the right medicines or the right equipment , so the patients are told … @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the hospital doesn ’ t have it , so they have to find private treatment instead , ” Hewlett explained .
Health center staff , who are usually nurse technicians—who have only studied for three years—or recent graduates are also often not prepared to work with Indigenous populations , who not only speak their own languages but also often have traditional health practices .
“ There is a lot of prejudice toward Indigenous practices , so the health personnel don ’ t know how to reach the population , ” Pesantes said .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ culture and knowledge means that , in addition to the geographical distance , there is a distance of empathy .
The population does not feel welcome in a system that does not take into account their reality.
” The rapid action of Indigenous organizations in closing their territories and implementing various forms of protection was overshadowed by government actions that , although well intentioned , led to tragedy .
“ A voucher was issued for people in situations of poverty and extreme poverty , and this meant that people in the communities had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ city to pick it up , at a bank , and these became the spaces where these people were infected , bringing the virus to the whole community , ” Pesantes said .
“ For these populations , one could say that the state has been a vector of contagion.
” Despite this , the pandemic has also made the system stronger , exponentially increasing the number of beds in intensive care , which were few , and accelerating the development of many laboratories .
Doctors who learned on the fly during the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the future .
What is needed now , experts say , is a plan—not only to deal with the second wave , but also to continue to improve in the future .
For Pesantes , it is investment in the health system—and in all those aspects that have been neglected in recent years , such as rural areas and training in intercultural health—that will allow Peru , once all this is over , to emerge stronger from the pandemic .
Another lesson , she says , is that the government must listen to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ignored for decades but who are , in the end , the ones who know most about their own territories .
“ Although we are a little behind , I think it is necessary to make a plan to prepare for the second wave that will come in a few months , ” Ugarte said .
“ We already have experience , we already know how things should be handled , we already know what medications not to use , and we already know what things to do and what things not to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the same mistake that Madrid or Paris are making right now .
”

At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Peruvian hospitals were on the verge of collapse, patients were lying in corridors for want of beds, and people were dying in the streets due to shortages of oxygen. Peru’s 32 million people are the worst hit per capita in the world, with almost 800,000 cases and more than 32,000 deaths since the pandemic started. The week of Sept. 23, the Ministry of Health reported more than 11,000 new cases and 185 deaths, and in the months of July and August, between 5,000 and 10,000 cases per day was common. Underpinning these losses were a deeply deficient health care system, coupled with financial mismanagement by the country’s leadership. Peru had initially hoped to avoid the scourge of the virus entirely.
At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Peruvian hospitals were on the verge of collapse, patients were lying in corridors for want of beds, and people were dying in the streets due to shortages of oxygen. Peru’s 32 million people are the worst hit per capita in the world, with almost 800,000 cases and more than 32,000 deaths since the pandemic started. The week of Sept. 23, the Ministry of Health reported more than 11,000 new cases and 185 deaths, and in the months of July and August, between 5,000 and 10,000 cases per day was common. Underpinning these losses were a deeply deficient health care system, coupled with financial mismanagement by the country’s leadership. Peru had initially hoped to avoid the scourge of the virus entirely.
On March 16, nine days after the first infection in the country was diagnosed and before anyone had died, Peru entered into a quarantine that, although intended to last only 15 days, is still in effect in some provinces and cities. Most businesses closed, and only essential establishments—such as hospitals, food stores, and banks—were able to remain open. These limitations did not prevent cases from reaching the thousands in a few days.
“These measures did not work well, because Peru is an informal country; these are structural social issues that have been around for many years,” said César Ugarte, an epidemiologist and researcher at the Lima-based Instituto de Medicina Tropical Alexander von Humboldt. In Peru, around three out of every four workers are working informally, and many families live in harsh and unhealthy conditions without access to basic services. In Indigenous populations, limited access to health care and continued government neglect have been responsible for the loss of countless lives.
The strong impact of the pandemic on the country was exacerbated by the near impossibility of obtaining medical oxygen—a shortage that continues. The sudden and disproportionate demand due to the large number of respiratory infections in such a short time caused the price of oxygen to rise tenfold, when it was available at all. It was a predictable problem: Most hospitals in Peru, unlike in other countries, do not have their own oxygen generators and instead have to source it from outside. This affects public hospitals, which depend on the government, and the problem is even more noticeable in rural areas, where most oxygen generators, already short in number, are out of operation due to a lack of repair services. The black market, which has been cornered by several powerful individuals, has concentrated what little oxygen there is in the hands of the rich.
The government has produced no real solution to the problem, which is instead being addressed by organizations with small funding campaigns, or churches, as is the case with “Respira Perú” (“Breathe Peru”), a program promoted by the Catholic Church that seeks to bring oxygen generators to the country’s most remote cities.
In the last month, the situation has eased a little: “Until a month and a half ago, doctors told me there were no beds, no oxygen. Five weeks later, I talk to my colleagues at the hospital and they tell me that yes, there is a bed, that I can bring a patient in,” said Ugarte, who currently works directly with COVID-19 patients. “It’s not that everything has been released, but the system has been hit so hard that now it is having a few minutes to breathe.”
That breathing room is waning, though, and the second wave of the pandemic is about to hit. “We are beginning to learn now that there are many infected people who are beginning to have chronic, long-term symptoms. There are a lot of these people, but they are invisible,” said Jaime Miranda, the director of the Center of Excellence in Chronic Diseases at Cayetano Heredia University. He explained that the Peruvian health system—focused on curing the disease and not on offering long-term treatment—is not adapting well to the situation, and it was not so adapted to the needs of the population before. “With a highly aging population and where the problems are more and more chronic, that have no cure, we need not just to solve the problems, but also guarantee a continuity of care, a chronic accompaniment,” he said.
“We are told that Peru is growing, that Peru is advancing, and that we have had years of stability, but the pandemic has come and has exposed, quickly and abruptly, how precarious and vulnerable and how weak the social fabric of the country is, including the health sector,” Miranda added.
“One of the things that is striking about Peru is that it is been marked as one of the success stories in terms of economic growth, increasing GDP, or reduction in poverty,” said Christopher Hewlett, an anthropologist who specializes in Indigenous studies in the region. “There are many international organizations and institutions that have held up Peru as a good model—but when you’re on the ground, it becomes clear that that growth and that increasing wealth was increasing inequality, because the access to actual good health services was not really improving during that time.”
Despite its sustained economic growth in recent decades, the country’s investment in health has been low, with public spending reaching only 3.2 percent of GDP, a figure far below the 4 percent average in the region and one of the lowest in South America. Added to this is endemic corruption that has plagued the region and siphoned away the funding needed to fight the pandemic. According to Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, Peru ranks 101st out of 198 countries analyzed, far behind some other Latin American countries such as Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay. Its corruption score, which Transparency International measures on a scale of 1 to 100, where 100 represents total transparency, is 36, placing Peru in a similar position to some other countries in the region, such as Panama and Brazil.
“As a result of the Odebrecht incident,” Ugarte said, referring to the global corruption scandal involving a Brazilian company that paid bribes to important political leaders around the world, including four former Peruvian presidents, “it was seen that in addition to the roads, the other inflated constructions were hospitals, and several hospitals in many regions were half-finished when the pandemic occurred, stopped by corruption.”
Miranda noted: “For many World Health Organization indicators, Peru is doing very well. It’s true, we could say it’s fine, but if you just look at the isolated parts without looking at the context, you lose the rest, and then you realize that the situation is not really as it seems.”
Rural areas were worst-hit by the lack of construction funds for new health centers. “It’s difficult to get people to build those hospitals in rural areas, but what’s sad is that they did invest, but it was so poorly done,” Hewlett said. “There was very little oversight, there was corruption, but when you build a hospital that costs you millions of dollars, and you go over budget, and you go over time, and then when finally it is done it was built on a flood plain. That’s disheartening.”
The fragmentation of the health system and its slowness were also critical factors. In addition to the public health system, which serves approximately 60 percent of the population, Peru has a contribution-based health system, accessed by those on fixed salaries; the private system, which is outside of state control; and an extensive military health care system. Before the pandemic, these were disconnected from each other—and when the pandemic came, burdensome bureaucracy and administrative problems made it difficult to interconnect them in the first few months, something that would have saved thousands of lives by making more equipment and care available.
Peru is also a highly centralized country, with the capital, Lima, accounting for over half of GDP. Most hospitals, intensive care beds, and sites with access to oxygen are in Lima, which meant that in the jungle towns—and in smaller cities that together hold millions of people—there was often no access to health care, inflating the number of dead. “Iquitos [the largest city in the Peruvian Amazon] was a disgrace the first few months, simply because no capacity had been built there,” Ugarte said. With educated Peruvians often heading abroad, many cities also suffered a lack of doctors. Lima has 12 doctors per 1,000 people; Peru as a whole has 1.3.
But even worse hit than the smaller cities were Indigenous populations. “When the pandemic arrived, the Peruvian state issued a state of emergency decree, but the public policies were made from a purely urban perspective, in Lima,” said Maria Pesantes, a medical anthropologist and researcher at the Cayetano Heredia University. “The Indigenous population lives in remote areas, they have a precarious health system, and certain prevalent diseases and health conditions like high rates of anemia and tuberculosis make them more vulnerable. When the containment policy was made, no thought was given to how something specific should be done to include all their territories.”
Health centers in these regions are not only sparse, but also suffer a serious lack of personnel and supplies. “Often what happens is the hospitals don’t have the right medicines or the right equipment, so the patients are told … that they get a prescription, but the hospital doesn’t have it, so they have to find private treatment instead,” Hewlett explained.
Health center staff, who are usually nurse technicians—who have only studied for three years—or recent graduates are also often not prepared to work with Indigenous populations, who not only speak their own languages but also often have traditional health practices.
“There is a lot of prejudice toward Indigenous practices, so the health personnel don’t know how to reach the population,” Pesantes said. “This lack of respect for Indigenous culture and knowledge means that, in addition to the geographical distance, there is a distance of empathy. The population does not feel welcome in a system that does not take into account their reality.”
The rapid action of Indigenous organizations in closing their territories and implementing various forms of protection was overshadowed by government actions that, although well intentioned, led to tragedy. “A voucher was issued for people in situations of poverty and extreme poverty, and this meant that people in the communities had to go to the nearest town or city to pick it up, at a bank, and these became the spaces where these people were infected, bringing the virus to the whole community,” Pesantes said. “For these populations, one could say that the state has been a vector of contagion.”
Despite this, the pandemic has also made the system stronger, exponentially increasing the number of beds in intensive care, which were few, and accelerating the development of many laboratories. Doctors who learned on the fly during the first wave are now more prepared for the future. What is needed now, experts say, is a plan—not only to deal with the second wave, but also to continue to improve in the future.
For Pesantes, it is investment in the health system—and in all those aspects that have been neglected in recent years, such as rural areas and training in intercultural health—that will allow Peru, once all this is over, to emerge stronger from the pandemic. Another lesson, she says, is that the government must listen to the Indigenous people, who have been ignored for decades but who are, in the end, the ones who know most about their own territories.
“Although we are a little behind, I think it is necessary to make a plan to prepare for the second wave that will come in a few months,” Ugarte said. “We already have experience, we already know how things should be handled, we already know what medications not to use, and we already know what things to do and what things not to do. We can’t make the same mistake that Madrid or Paris are making right now.”