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The only "conspiracy" is that it is called an attack without evidence. It's so easy to do that, and is hardly conspiratorial in nature. No one's making any claims about the real causes or what really happened here. It is the usual ordeal, you take some happenstance, often heavily distorted, and frame your enemies for it. This is especially common with regards to cybercrime. People will eat it up, often no matter how little it conforms to common sense.

There have been instances of false-flag operations, most notably the Gulf of Tonkin incident which served as pretext for an escalation of the Vietnam war. But it doesn't have to be to serve its purpose.

> What reason would the USIC have for lying about this?

There's an entire industry revolving around blaming geopolitical enemies of wrongdoing without evidence, where the intelligence community plays a key part. This is done in order to control the narrative, steer the public perception and to keep a semblance of adherence to international law, in order to justify unilateral political, economic or military hostility. The reality is always more nuanced, and it's definitely a safe bet to not believe whatever empty accusations they come out with.

Controlling the narrative like they do, the cumulative effect of it is that they are able to convince the public of quite crazy assertions, which would be rightly treated as conspiracy theories had they come from some other source. These crazy assertions of course requires equally crazy political reactions. E.g. people genuinely believe that most US geopolitical enemies are literally rogue, bandit states, requiring draconic policing by the US. It's a children's view of the world, leading people to look the other way when it harms innocents.

The intelligence community has a looong history of doing this. It's a central part of the playbook which is readily admitted in more casual contexts.

I'm pretty sure consulting firms exist primarily because they provide labor liquidity.

> Few people truly love working with consultants

This is kind of a prejudiced view, as consultants are often there long-term, and no different than other workers in practice. The only difference is who's got the formal responsibility for their contract.

More projection from the bbc.

They are known for cooperating with the intelligence community in planting fake news and narratives about the enemies of the UK, just like they accuse their enemies of. There was a recent leak which documented that.

https://greatgameindia.com/bbc-regime-change-russia/

But you did try to back your claim with a source when challenged on this point, didn't you? Clearly we're not simply "expressing opinions" here.

That video doesn't support your statement at all. Besides, I don't think Alan Watts is an authoritative source on Buddhism regardless.

Buddhism is closer to Stoicism than you think. There's plenty of suttas where the Buddha explains how virtuous behavior leads to good outcomes to you even in this life (like high regard among your peers), and even material rewards (like wealth). All good outcomes ultimately boil down to virtuous behavior. This is the workings of Karma, one of the most central concepts in Buddhism. In Buddhism, rewards follow virtuous behavior by necessity, and if not in this life, then in the next.

It's really odd of you saying that for Buddhism, life a "dance". This is really not what Buddhism is about. Sounds more like Nietzsche to me (an anti-buddhist). Buddhism is about virtue, the four noble truths and following the noble eight-fold path.

'old age is fine, if you lived a good life beforehand' - this truly rings true in Buddhism, as your actions in this life determines your place of rebirth in the next.

That doesn't seem quite accurate to me. I think fear of death generally revolves around a fear of loss, not a fear of pain or illness. Death represents the loss of your every possession, every opportunity, your contact with loved ones, unresolved guilt, unattained dreams, etc.. It is an absolute state of loss, and given how extremely loss-aversive humans generally are, a fear of death seem to naturally follow.

It doesn't support your statement that the USSR was a nation of starving peasants either way, which you were not justified in thinking before reading my post ;-)

> Instead, the starving people were the peasants who had their produce expropriated, which was sold to acquire the imported materials and machinery that the soviets could not yet produce themselves.

That's kind of misleading, given how the average USSR citizen had more food on their plate than even in the US https://nintil.com/the-soviet-union-food/

...are you thinking of the pre-WW2 famines?

Ah, yeah. I am a little surprised to be honest.

Look up COINTELPRO. They used a combination of framing, deceit, labeling people terrorists and criminals in order to systematically undermine a political movement (and still do, covertly). That's not even talking about how they operate abroad. Individual rights means nothing when the state deems you a threat of some kind.

Hm, what are you implying?

That's just not true. The Chinese don't consider themselves unfree, the CCP is very popular, and its approval rate has only increased in recent decades. Moreover, the US does not have a very good reputation around the world. Who envies their predatory health care system? Their high-cost system of education? Their oppressive police force? The world recognizes the failure of the US in providing for their citizens, "freedom" is ultimately just the excuse for society being the way it is.

Individual rights are not processes of checks and balances. Those rights can be withdrawn in a jiffy, whenever required or convenient. What good does the right to bear arms do you as an individual when you're deemed a dangerous criminal, or as a group when you're deemed a terrorist organization? What good does the right to free speech do you if your speech is inconsequential?

> The fact that if a piece of evidence is acquired against you in an unlawful way it cannot be used against you in court as a US citizen

The US has repeatedly manufactured and framed political dissidents when it has felt politically threatened historically. Those rights you're talking about were useless to them.

You can't really draw a direct comparison between PRC and the US, and ask how China would react to a 'Chinese Chomsky'. Their respective conditions and rational incentives for population control are not very similar. The US (after the fall of the USSR) is a country who's stability has not truly been threatened by criticism and dissident voices, while China is a state which has been and currently is extremely vulnerable and threatened by instability, unrest and separatism, and is consequentially on high alert.

Reaction to criticism and dissidence not really a principled stand in the eyes of a state. The way the US clamped down hard on leftist political groups and organizations during the Cold War is rather the actions of a country believing itself to be threatened by instability and unrest. Political figures who fronted harsh criticisms against the government have routinely been assassinated or framed and arrested. COINTELPRO is a program which shows how political repression works the US when it feels politically vulnerable.

Oh, please. Just because my opinion does not reflect western geopolitical interests it must be "Russian propaganda" according to you? Way to shut down dissenting opinions by labeling it propaganda.

Domestic forces have always proven to be much more of a threat than foreign ones. The end result will entirely depend on will of the Belarusian people, and whether or not foreign backers holds off for another day given the Belarusian response to these protests. In the case of a dramatic escalation of the situation, there will likely be foreign military support (for both sides), but no kind of foreign invasion. So how this turns out, if there will be a separation of the country like in Ukraine or not, is quite impossible to say right now, at least in my eyes.

If you think there will not be a violent reaction to a coup in Belarus you are very wrong. People outside Ukraine thought that the Ukrainian coup would represent a peaceful transition once completed, due to the unpopularity of Yanukovych. It resulted in a bloody civil war and the rise of ultra-nationalism, because coups represent much more than a transition of the presidency, they represent a fundamental shift in governmental power and the interests it serves.

This is possibly going to be another Ukraine - a civil war. Who wants that? Certainly not the Belarusian people.