The Castle Report

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Darrell Castle tries to make sense of the Syrian Civil War which has been raging sometimes hot and sometimes cold for many years.

Transcription / Notes:

THE NEO-OTTOMAN EMPIRE

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 13^th day of December in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about the Syrian Civil War which has been raging sometimes hot and sometimes cold for many years. It’s very difficult to make sense out of something that makes no sense, but I will try to do so.

This is the Christmas season here in the Castle household and therefore it is the last Friday that I will be able to bring the Castle Report this year. I will join you again, God willing, on Friday, January 3, 2025. Enjoy the holidays with those you love and by all means celebrate Christmas.

The title of this report indicates that I am taking the position that Turkey won the Syrian Civil War because the fall and removal of strong man Bashar al Assad paves the way for strong man Recep Tayyip Erdogan to emerge and reap the benefits of the demise of the Assad family’s hold over Syria which has lasted for some 60 years. Erdogan came to power in Turkey in 2014 and my position is that he imagines himself to be the return of Suleiman the Magnificent who ruled the Ottoman Empire in the 1500’s when it was at the peak of its power. The Ottoman Empire served as the connection between the Middle east and Europe for some 600 years.

The Ottoman Empire, sometimes referred to as the Turkish Empire, ruled the Middle East until it was defeated and dissolved with the British and American victory in World War l. The destruction of the Ottoman Empire led to the power vacuum that has existed, at least to some degree, until today. Great Britain created the nations of the Middle east after its victory by simply drawing lines on the sand and making a map with those lines as separate countries which were really just a collection of Nomadic Tribes. I believe Erdogan came to power in Turkey with a dream of returning his country to the greatness it once had and he is currently going about the business of rebuilding the Ottoman Empire under Turkish control.

His rebuilding uses overt war as we have recently seen, but it also operates through diplomacy and even subterfuge which he used to gain acceptance into NATO. Yes, that’s right, this Muslim country of Turkey, whose culture, religion, and way of life is completely averse to those of the West is a full-fledged NATO member. A close member of Erdogan’s inner circle of advisors recently said in a public interview that the goal of the Erdogan administration is the destruction of Western Civilization. The NATO alliance should remove Turkey because of that, but the problem is that the NATO charter has no provision for involuntarily removing a member or kicking someone out.

A majority of NATO members may want Turkey out but the alliance is pretty woke right now and must think this is a woke world, so they try to read the tea leaves and apparently that requires more fear of being labeled Islamophobic than it does having an enemy nation in its midst. Erdogan, in the meantime, apparently seeks to Islamize Europe through Muslim immigration. He has, in essence, held Europe hostage and demanded money to prevent refugees from traveling upward from Syria through Turkey into Europe. The Europeans have paid the ransom in the past but right now one out of every 20 Syrians in the world resides in Germany thanks to Erdogan and the policies of former Chancellor Angela Merkel.

I could go on with this Neo-Ottoman story all day but to sum it up a little he is putting together a collection of Sunni nations in opposition to the Shiites that have ruled Syria in the past by way of Iran and to some extent Iraq. This is a coalition against Iran in other words, which brings me to how this played out in the war. I imagine that right now the leaders in Iran are feeling regret that they allowed their proxy in Gaza, Hamas, to launch the October 7, 2023, attack on Israeli civilians. That attack led to a general war between Israel and the proxy terrorist forces, of Iran. The civil war that ousted Assad from power would not have been possible without Israel’s destruction of Hezbollah in Lebanon as well as the other forces which helped Iran resupply Hezbollah with the missiles which have been raining down on Israel.

Assad could no longer be resupplied in Syria by Iran and apparently the Iraqi military was unwilling to help him. He was crumbling under the assault from three directions and to avoid capture he just got on a plane and flew to Moscow where he reportedly holds significant personal assets including real estate. Putin has said he would grant his old friend asylum. Erdogan apparently believes that the collection of Sharia Jihadists now in charge of Syria will be inclined in his direction. A Sunni Muslim group calling itself Hayat Tahrir al Sham or HTS was the prime mover in the conflict that ousted Assad. The group was previously associated with Al Qaeda and is officially designated a terrorist group by the United States as well as Turkey. That is part of the confusing mess that is Middle East politics.

Turkey’s military has protected the group in northern Syria by shielding them from attacks by pro-Assad military. Turkey also has served as a conduit for resupply of food and weapons to the group. Turkey is also the conduit for international aid into the region as well, so when the United States through some UN agency, delivers a few hundred million of aid it filters through Turkey and thereby gives Turkey influence and legitimacy.

I’m going to pause the military discussion for a moment and talk about all this aid coming from the United States taxpayers into the Middle East as well as into Ukraine. To a very large degree the aid is a self-perpetuating chain of money laundering for the officials on the ground like Zelensky in Ukraine and Erdogan in Turkey. They receive the billions from America which creates the money on a computer. The money is then simply added to the already existing 36 trillion of debt which burdens the American people in terms of future prosperity. The recipients of the aid dollars use part of it to contribute to the reelection efforts of various American politicians who then vote to give them more aid. Yes, folks I’m afraid that the reality is that this whole thing is at least partially a giant money laundering scam but that is international relations today.

This is all part of the problem with democracy and with democratic governments today. The problem with the welfare/warfare state as it conducts its affairs in the Middle East is that the more resources it gets, the more power it has. That concept is then transferred to those who wind up at the feeding trough as well. The more power the state has the more corrupt and parasitic its rulers become, and the more difficult it becomes to ever bring it under control.

So, finally Assad is out of the picture and Erdogan is ready to cash in on the investment he has made in all these terrorist groups for many years. The investment, to a large degree, has been made with American money, your money and mine, but it’s not like we got nothing for it. This is all part of the campaign started by Obama when he first took office which he called Assad must go. It took some years but he finally achieved his goal. Even though Erdogan appears hostile to the U.S. a lot of times he knows where his money comes from. In return, Turkey lets the U.S. operate a large Air Force base called Incirlik in Turkey for use attacking targets all over the region. That base, Incirlik, is also where the U.S. stores nuclear weapons as a threat or warning for everyone in the area, especially Russia I presume.

This has made the Turkish American relations a lot more difficult. The U.S. has long supported the Kurds including giving them weapons and other supplies while Turkey considers them a hostile force on the Turkish border extending into Turkey from Syria and Iraq. The U.S. begged the Kurds to help destroy ISIS, but I’ll wager they are now glad the Kurds didn’t destroy ISIS. This is some of the intrigue that probably seems like fun to the chess masters who run or presume they run world affairs. The U.S. and Turkey are both NATO allies, but Turkey considers the Kurds a hostile enemy right on the Turkish border and the U.S. arms the Kurds presuming they will help fight ISIS which has been instrumental in the overthrow of Assad. Did you get all that folks. Me either, but as confusing as it seems there are people who purport to understand it. The jest of it all is that it serves to make Turkey feel betrayed and therefore even more hostile.

Iran, as the chief and most hated enemy of Israel, comes out of this a big loser. The Iranians must feel embarrassed and even humiliated by their loss of an entire region. They are cut off and unable to resupply Hezbollah and therefore, Hezbollah is virtually powerless and virtually dead. Israel is free then and very much alive in the region. What does Israel want from all this war and bloodshed. Does the Jewish state want only to live in peace with its friendly neighbors as its leaders say or does it want territorial expansion into what many call “Greater Israel.”

Netanyahu said in his speech about the fall of Assad that Israel seeks peace with the Jihadi militias which toppled the Assad regime and also the other groups which occupy the area including the Kurds, the Druze militias, and the groups that once made up Al Quada and ISIS. He didn’t mention Turkey but one must presume that the hostilities between those nations will continue. He wants peace with those who want to live in peace with Israel and to prosper going forward or so he says.

In the meantime, Israel deployed paratroopers into Syria and the Golan Heights which once served as a kind of demilitarized zone between Hezbollah and Israel. Now, however, Netanyahu recently said, “the collapse of the Syrian regime is a direct result of the severe blows with which we have struck Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran.” He went on to say in a video address from the Golan Heights, that Israeli forces secured the entirety of the region as a security measure, and now the 1974 agreement between Israel and Assad is dissolved after Assad fled the country.

A 155-mile demilitarized zone to act as a buffer was established by the United Nations after the 1973 Yom Kippur war between Israel and a coalition of Arab states. Israel, through its military, now controls this entire region and Netanyahu made it clear that this region is part of Israel forever as he put it. The UN says that the Israeli occupation is a violation of the agreement, but Israel says no that agreement was dissolved when Assad fled to Moscow. So, greater Israel or just self-defense. I suppose we will know more in time.

Where does the United States stand in all this destruction. Does the U.S. have a role to play here other than the obvious one that a stable Middle East is in the best interest of the U.S. Despite ISIS helping to topple Assad, the U.S. continues to bomb suspected ISIS targets in Syria. Last Sunday, the day that Damascus fell to rebel forces, the U.S. hit 75 ISIS targets in Syria. Waves of B-52 strategic bombers, F-15 strike fighters, and A-10 air to ground jets struck targets all over Syria. U.S. officials stated that the strikes were not connected to the days events in Damascus but also pointed out that the targets were no longer defended by Russia which I suppose also implies that they once were. Very confusing because one almost needs a program to even figure out who the players are let alone which team they represent.

Apparently these attacks were ordered by Joe Biden upon his hearing his successor’s statement about the Assad fall. Trump said that since the Russians and Iranians are both on the run he doesn’t see that the U.S. has a further role to play in it. In other words, I surmise that he meant. This is not our war so let’s stay out of it. Biden then ordered the bombing attacks on the people who led the attacks against the enemy Assad. The President made a speech from the White House and admitted that he ordered the attacks to make sure there could be no resurgence of ISIS. That makes no sense at all and I’m still trying to find some sense in it. Quote from the President.

“It’s a moment of historic opportunity for the long-suffering people of Syria to build a better future for their proud country. It’s also a moment of risk and uncertainty. As we all turn to the question of what comes next, the United States will work with our partners and the stakeholders in Syria to help them seize an opportunity to manage the risk.”

Finally, folks, Donald Trump says this is not our war and we should stay out of it, but Joe Biden in his own words, says that the U.S. must lead all over the world and I guess he thinks that requires giving away money which is really just more debt and also making all regional wars bigger and worse.

At least that’s the way I see it,

Until January 3^rd folks,

This is Darrell Castle,

Thanks for listening.

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Darrell Castle talks about the decision of President Joe Biden to issue a blanket, all-encompassing pardon for his son Hunter despite repeatedly promising he would not do so.

Transcription / Notes

TAINTED LEGACY?

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 6^th of December in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about the decision of President Joe Biden to issue a blanket, all-encompassing pardon for his son Hunter. The pardon covers all acts known and unknown including the crimes for which he was convicted and the crimes for which he pled guilty as well as any crimes from murder to treason which are currently unproven but which may have occurred between January 1^st 2014 and December 1^st 2024.

So, the pardon is now a done deal. The most surprising thing about it is that it was not surprising and many, including me, thought the president was lying when he repeatedly said he would never pardon his son. Hunter was convicted of crimes and pled guilty to others but none of those addressed what might be in that laptop portrayed to us by the media as Russian disinformation. It doesn’t matter anymore does it? There is no longer a reason to wonder if the laptop contained any secrets about influence peddling by Hunter’s father, the big guy. Whether or not that last statement is completely true or whether there is wiggle room to some extent is up to congress.

The President said repeatedly that he would not pardon his son but in true Biden fashion, he did. Pardons reside with presidents and governors who are supposed to use them to correct an injustice, but sometimes they are used for other purposes such as rewarding a political donor or to avoid hostile testimony from the one pardoned. That brings me to why this is up to congress to some extent at least. If congress wanted to conduct hearings into influence peddling by then former president Biden it could call Hunter to testify.

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Darrell Castle talks about the decision of President Biden to authorize Ukraine to fire U.S. made ATACMS missles deep into Russia putting The United States and NATO on a path of nuclear confrontation with Russia.

Transcription / Notes

ONLY 60 DAYS LEFT TO DESTROY THE WORLD

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday, the 22^nd day of November in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about the decision of President Biden or whatever cabal that runs this country, to authorize Ukraine to fire U.S. made ATACMS missiles deep into Russia. With only about 60 days left to serve the President has to work fast to get the United States into a nuclear confrontation with Russia. That will be his legacy I predict.

Please remember that next week is Thanksgiving week so no Castle Report. I plan to spend some time with family just catching up and giving thanks for another year and I hope you will do something similar as well.

I will start by giving you a quote from Dennis Kucinich who Had the best take on this decision:

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Darrell Castle talks about some of the nominees President elect, Donald Trump, has made for his cabinet should he be allowed to assume the office to which the American people have elected him.

Transcription / Notes

DISRUPTIVE FORCE AT THE PENTAGON

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 15^th day of November in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about some of the nominees President elect Donald Trump has made for his cabinet should he be allowed to assume the office to which the American people have elected him. Since I have a strong interest in the U.S. military and the best interests of its service members, I will therefore emphasize the nomination of Pete Hegseth to be Secretary of Defense.

I was hoping for Tulsi Gabbard to come out of the turmoil as Defense Secretary but as Trump so often says, hope is not a strategy. She just seemed like she would be the perfect way to give the middle finger to the deep state but it seems that Trump has come up with a different way that even I had not thought of. I say even I had not thought of because I spend a lot of time thinking of ways the deep state could get the middle finger.

The way that Trump chose was the nomination of Pete Hegseth who for the last 8 years has worked for Fox news. I will confess to being a little embarrassed because until his nomination was announced, I had not even heard of Pete Hegseth. I had to do a deep dive into who this man is and very quickly so the first thing I did was read his book “The War on Warriors” to learn something about him. Thank goodness for Amazon and especially for Kindle. I probably shouldn’t be too embarrassed though because since I don’t watch TV news or anything else on TV for that matter it’s not surprising that I had not heard of him.

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Darrell Castle talks about the results of the presidential election. What does Trump’s victory over Kamala Harris and the entire woke agenda mean or at least what does it mean to me?

Transcription / Notes

DOOMSDAY AVERTED—FOR NOW

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 8^th day of November in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about the most obvious topic in the world today and that is the presidential election. What does the overwhelming Trump victory over Kamala Harris and the entire woke agenda mean or at least what does it mean to me.

Doomsday averted—for now, what does that mean. It means that certain burdens the nation had been bearing for many years can now perhaps be lifted. There is at least hope they can be lifted. This election was about those burdens and the American people just do not want them anymore. Completely open borders with nations such as El Salvador, Venezuela, and Mexico emptying their prisons and insane asylums onto our border.  Murderers and rapists invited into the country to prey on Americans with no accountability for their crimes.

 Little boys and little girls sexually mutilated because of the parents’ mental illness or their school’s mental illness. Despite decades of legal effort to ensure girls have equal opportunity for school sports, they were totally disregarded while men who said they were women were invited into their locker rooms. Costly wars that threaten our future with no benefit to the American people at all. Crime rampant and out of control in our once beautiful cities. Businesses closing because in many places shoplifting and car theft are no longer even crimes. I could go on but those are at least some of the things that a large majority of voters rejected, but many on the left wail and ask why don’t the people want these things as we do.

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Darrell Castle talks about the wars currently ongoing on the border of Russia and Ukraine as well as the wars in the Middle East between Israel and other countries and various terrorist groups all supported and supplied by the various state enemies of Israel. The question is, do these wars have anything to do with our national interests and if not, why are we involved in them.

Transcription / Notes

FIGHTING THE WARS OF OTHERS

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 25^th day of October in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking primarily about the wars currently ongoing on the border of Russia and Ukraine as well as the wars in the Middle East between Israel and other countries and various terrorist groups all supported and supplied by the various state enemies of Israel. The question for this Report is, do these wars have anything to do with our national interests and if not  why are we fighting them and why are we even involved in them.

Next week I will be involved in some personal issues near week’s end and so I will not be with you next Friday. This is, therefore, my pre-election Castle Report but God willing I will join you again on Friday the 8^th of November.

I suppose Ron Paul had the best line I’ve heard about the US commitment to fighting wars that have nothing much to do with American interests. “When you take on the role of the world’s policeman, don’t be surprised when countries who cannot fight their own wars call 911.” Yes indeed, that is what is happening now and it continues to threaten America and the future of our people by bankrupting them, by abusing and stealing their labor, and by threatening to drag them into another World War.

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Darrell Castle talks about a new Department of Defense directive 5240.01 which allows the US military to use lethal force against American citizens when assisting police authorities in domestic disturbances.

Transcription/Notes

MILITARY USE OF LETHAL FORCE IN AMERICA

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle report. This is Friday the 18^th day of October in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about a new Department of Defense directive 5240.01 which allows the US military to use lethal force against American citizens when assisting police authorities in domestic disturbances. This Directive changes the relationship between the American people and their military and coming this close to the election might indicate civil disturbances, otherwise known as a coup, are expected in case of a Trump win.

Yes, it seems that politicians on the Democrat side of the political spectrum, apparently unable to articulate any position on any issue that might be of vital importance to the electorate or the American people in general, are unleashing their inner demons to fuel the fantasies of a few prominent people on the left. The DOD directive allowing the use of lethal force by the US military inside the US is particularly frightening to me for many reasons.

It seems to be a clear violation of the Posse Comitatus Act and the intent of that act which prohibits use of US military in a law enforcement capacity. Posse Comitatus originally passed in 1878, limited the power of the federal government in a law enforcement capacity. It was originally intended to get the military out of law enforcement in the south post-civil war. It has been expanded and reinforced many times, the last being the Defense Authorization Act in 2022. The act has some grey areas for politicians to wriggle through such as the fact that it doesn’t apply to the various state guards or even to the Coast Guard which has law enforcement responsibility offshore.

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Darrell Castle talks about the fate of the First Amendment, especially the freedom of Americans to speak their minds without running their thoughts through a government-controlled censor.

Transcription/Notes:

THE ANTI-FREE SPEECH MOVEMENT

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 11^th day of October in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about what is perhaps the most important issue on the ballot this November and that is the fate of the First Amendment especially the freedom of Americans to speak their minds without running their thoughts through a government-controlled censor.

Should the federal government be the arbiter of what the public should be able to read or hear. That is the question I will talk about especially how some prominent Democrats have answered that question. Some of the richest and most powerful people on planet earth are now calling for Americans to be censured. That word sounds so benign that it has to be defined before it has any impact. The First Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees that the government can not legally prevent Americans from speaking their minds or expressing their opinions verbally or in print. In other words, the government is not legally permitted to censor us. That is the basic foundation of free people and it is the First Amendment for a reason.

Hillary Clinton seems to have taken the lead in the campaign to restrict our freedom and she has taken her efforts globally by encouraging other countries to restrict the speech of their citizens. She recently asked European governments to censor Elon Musk because he permitted unregulated speech on X. She also went on CNN to talk about how discouraging it is that censorship is such a tough sell to the American people. She said the road the anti-free speech advocates have traveled on has been a rocky and difficult one. “There are people who are championing it, but it has been a long and difficult road to getting anything done.”

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Darrell Castle talks about Democrats in general and Kamala Harris in particular and their complete indifference to the suffering of the people in the Southeast of the United States along with their priority of making America a one-party state similar to the pre-breakup Soviet Union.

Transcription / Notes:

UNFIT TO LEAD

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 4^th day of October in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be talking about Democrats in general and Kamala Harris in particular and their complete indifference to the suffering of the people in the Southeast of the United States along with their priority of making America a one-party state similar to the pre-breakup Soviet Union.

Times of crises are the toughest test of leadership and in that regard our current non-leadership fails miserably. Yes, it seems that Vice President Harris is a lot more comfortable begging her Hollywood friends for money than she is providing aid and comfort to Americans who are suffering and have truly lost everything. Finally, after several days of photo ops and fundraising she was apparently told by the Secretariat of Democrats who direct her that she should go down to Georgia to show some sympathy to all those southern deplorable peckerwoods who have lost everything.

I thought about calling this Castle Report the devil went down to Georgia but I was afraid I might run afoul of whoever owns the rights to that song. It would also be an insult to the song and especially to Charlie Daniels. This disaster has been a different kind of disaster for Biden-Harris and her efforts to become President. Who would vote for this completely unfit and unfeeling woman after seeing her response to this disaster. Democrats and illegals I guess. Well, there are a lot of people in the Southeast United States who will not be able to vote at all this year except maybe the dead ones who can vote Democrat of course.

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Darrell Castle continues his discussion of the two attempted assassinations of Donal Trump in light of the recently released 94-page report by the Senate Committee tasked with investigating the Butler, Pennsylvania attempted assassination in which Trump was wounded.

Transcription / Notes

THE U.S. GOVERNMENT MUST WANT TRUMP DEAD

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. This is Friday the 27^th day of September in the year of our Lord 2024. I will be continuing my discussion of the two attempted assassinations of Donald Trump in light of the recently released 94-page report by the Senate Committee tasked with investigating the Butler Pennsylvania attempted assassination in which Trump was wounded.

I really struggled with the topic this week because I normally try to look at the most important issue in the world and that is the brink of nuclear war on which the world now sits. In addition, Israel has alerted its armed forces to prepare for a ground invasion of Lebanon. Therefore, war involving the United States appears inevitable and even imminent. I decided, however, to continue with the assassination story despite the U.S. Government’s willingness to risk the destruction of the world in a nuclear holocaust. Perhaps Trump’s seemingly narcissistic statement that he is the only one who can stop World War III is not narcissism but truth.

Maybe that is why the United States Secret Service (USSS) which is supposed to be the best protective organization in the world appears to be completely incompetent. Yes, there are lots of coincidences appearing in the two attempts to kill Trump and the Senate’s 94-page report, while critical of the USSS, paints them as primarily mistakes and coincidences. I will try to look at all the smoke emanating from Washington, Pennsylvania, and Florida, and point out that there might be a little fire going on in all that smoke.