Part of long-planned attempt to spur defections, divide and destroy Syria, as articulated in Brookings Institution's "Assessing Options for Regime Change." - While the idea of a buffer zone is meant to look like a knee-jerk reaction to recent escalations, in reality this has been planned since at least March 2012, where the idea was proposed by the corporate-financier funded Brookings Institution in their "Middle East Memo #21" "Assessing Options for Regime Change" where it stated specifically (emphasis added):

"An alternative is for diplomatic efforts to focus first on how to end the violence and how to gain humanitarian access, as is being done under Annan’s leadership. This may lead to the creation of safe-havens and humanitarian corridors, which would have to be backed by limited military power. This would, of course, fall short of U.S. goals for Syria and could preserve Asad in power. From that starting point, however, it is possible that a broad coalition with the appropriate international mandate could add further coercive action to its efforts." -page 4, Assessing Options for Regime Change, Brookings Institution.

Foreign troops in Jordan, including US troops, may be playing a role in providing additional pressure south of Syria while Turkey attempts to pressure Syria from the north. The idea is to stretch out Syrian forces, relieving NATO-backed terrorists operating within the country. Of course, while the Western media claims these are merely troops helping with "humanitarian" concerns, they are undoubtedly doing all in their power to present Syria with a credible threat to force Syria to divide its troops, while attempting to stoke paranoia and panic in the minds of Syrian officers and politicians the West hopes to lure into defecting.

Panetta directing Pentagon to begin ramping up network-security efforts. - The Pentagon is mobilizing its cyberwarfare arsenal in preparation for a massive assault on U.S. networks that could "paralyze the nation," said Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta. "A cyber attack perpetrated by nation states or violent extremist groups could be as destructive as the terrorist attack of 9/11," Panetta said Oct. 11 in a speech to corporate leaders of Business Executives for National Security, a nonpartisan group. The nation today faces the cyber equivalent of a "pre-9/11 moment," he said somberly.

CISPA necessary to avert ‘Cyber-Pearl Harbor’ – Panetta

At least 18 people were killed and another six wounded today in a US drone strike against the Orakzai Agency, with the drones firing several missiles at a compound [allegedly] belonging to Maulana Shakirullah, a commander loyal to the Bahadur Group. - The Bahadur Group, a loose-knit militant faction run by Hafiz Gul Bahadur was initially part of the Tehreek-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and still uses the name despite a falling out between Bahadur and the Mehsud leadership of the TTP at large. Bahadur’s group has deals in place with the Pakistani military promising mutual non-aggression during Pakistan’s operations against the Mehsud factions of the TTP. The identities of the victims are unclear, but local officials say that several Afghan nationals are believed to have died in the attack. This is not a tremendous shock, as the area attacked is not far from the border and large numbers of Afghan Pashtuns continue to live in the Pakistani tribal areas since the 2001 US invasion.

The European Union has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for six decades of work in advancing peace in Europe. - The committee said the EU had helped to transform Europe from a continent of war to a continent of peace. The award comes as the EU faces the biggest financial crisis of its 54-year history, with many of its member states mired in recession. The last organisation to be given the award outright was Medecins Sans Frontieres, which won in 1999. Announcing the award, Nobel committee president Thorbjoern Jagland acknowledged the EU's current financial problems and social unrest. But he said the committee wanted to concentrate on the body's work over six decades of advancing "peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights". The committee president highlighted the EU's work in sealing the reconciliation between France and Germany in the decades after World War II. And he praised the organisation for incorporating Spain, Portugal and Greece after their authoritarian regimes collapsed in the 1970s.

Nigel Farage: The EU has created poverty and unemployment for millions - "This goes to show that the Norwegians really do have a sense of humour. The EU may be getting the booby prize for peace because it sure hasn't created prosperity. The EU has created poverty and unemployment for millions. In the last two years the EU has caused huge animosity between the countries of Northern and Southern Europe. Just look at Frau Merkel being welcomed with Nazi flags in Athens, and German newspapers slagging off the Greeks as work-shy wonders. After watching European Council President Van Rompuy cheerleading for war in Libya with Colonel Gaddafi, this idea of the EU getting a Nobel Peace is ridiculous."

Financial Times: EU wins Nobel Peace Prize
Wall Street Journal: EU Wins Nobel Peace Prize
Reuters: EU wins 2012 Nobel Peace Prize, despite debt crisis

One man introduced indefinite detention and expanded the deadly global drone war. Another was the architect of the deliberate mass killing of civilian populations in Indochina. What do they have in common? Both are Nobel Peace laureates.

Gandhi never got one. Al Gore did. In one of the stranger ironies befitting of both Kafka and Orwell, sometimes the makers of permanent war are awarded for bringing temporary peace. Sometimes they don’t even get that far.

With the winner of the 2012 Nobel Prize set to be announced in Oslo, Norway on Friday, the shadow of Barack Obama still looms large. In 2009, the committee awarded the current US president "for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." Nominations for the award are due by February 1, meaning Obama had served as America's executive for less than two weeks when the Norwegian Nobel Committee selected him. Perhaps it was wishful thinking. Since then, Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act into law, making it legal to indefinitely detain US citizens. There are also the deadly drone wars in Yemen and Pakistan, the war waged in Libya, the Afghan surge and a secret "kill list” revealed this year by The New York Times, which grants a select few American officials the option to mark perceived national security threats – foreign citizens or otherwise – for assassination. Ironic, yes, but they never could have known.

The Nobel Peace Prize Committee announces its 2012 winner on Friday with prize watchers favoring dissidents from Russia and Belarus or religious leaders working on Muslim-Christian reconciliation. "It was a unanimous decision and it was not particularly complicated," Thorbjoern Jagland, the head of the selection committee, told the Aftenposten newspaper. Jagland said that the winner, decided several weeks ago, is generally known to the public and the decision could generate some controversy. "I expect that there will be some debate, we hope there will be," Jagland told broadcaster TV2. Norwegian public broadcaster NRK, often thought to have strong sources, said there would be a single winner this year, unlike 2011 when three women won, and the prize could go to the dissidents in East Europe, a bishop in Mexico or the European Union itself. The prize will be announced at 5 a.m. EDT / 11:00 CET.

The Investment Banking Awards are the Oscars of the financial world. Dished out for so-called 'innovation', some of the world's richest bankers gather together to congratulate each other on devising ever more creative ways to make obscene sums of money. One of 2012's most profitable scams was the bankers' 'innovative' approach to a key interest rate called LIBOR. Virtually every bank at the event was involved in illegally colluding to rig LIBOR, ensuring that they would always be the winners in the multi-million pound bets they were making on the markets. When we noticed that this money-spinner had been overlooked in the ceremony, we decided to show up and make sure the LIBOR-riggers got the recognition they deserve...

Paul Craig Roberts and Nomi Prins: The Real Libor Scandal
Paul Craig Roberts: Libor Fraud Now Part of the System - Video
James Petras: Financial Crime in London’s “Parasites Paradise”, Or the Best Sanctuary Money Can Buy

WikiLeaks will begin publishing 200,000 files relating to the presidential election. The GI (Global Intelligence) files are emails obtained through a hack on private intelligence firm Stratfor, which were leaked to WikiLeaks by Anonymous.

These GI Files releases will shed insight into key U.S. federal election players… Through this release WikiLeaks aims to inform the U.S. electorate in an unbiased way through the release of source documents from one of the most oddly influential companies in the U.S. today.

Statfor, “a secretive multi-national private intelligence firm, providing services to large corporations, and government agencies” has a revolving door with government offices and thus the leaked emails could be a source of important information on both Democrats and Republicans in this election. Wednesday marks the beginning of the document dump, so it may take some time before any dirt is dug up.

A third self-described anarchist from the Pacific Northwest has been jailed by federal officials for refusing to speak before a secretive grand jury that the accused have called a politically-motivated modern-day witch-hunt.

Leah-Lynn Plante, a mid-20s activist from Seattle, Washington, was ushered out of court by authorities on Wednesday after refusing for a third time to answer questions forced on her by a grand jury — a panel of prosecutors convened to determine if an indictment can be issued for a federal crime. Plante was one of a handful of people targeted in a series of raids administered by the FBI and the Joint Terrorism Task Force on July 25 of this year which the feds say were in conjunction with an investigation into acts of vandalism that occurred during May Day protests in Seattle nearly two months prior. As part of their probe, search warrants were issued at multiple residences of activists in the area, including Plante’s, demanding that dwellers provide agents with “anti-government or anarchist literature” in their homes and any flags, flag-making material, cell phones, hard drives, address books, and black clothing. Plante recalls in a POST published this week to her Tumblr page:

On the morning of July 25th, 2012, my life was turned upside down in a matter of hours. FBI agents from around Washington and Oregon and Joint Terrorism Task Force agents from Washington busted down the front door of my house with a battering ram, handcuffed my house mates and me at gunpoint, and held us hostage in our backyard while they read us a search warrant and ransacked our home. They said it was in connection to May Day vandalism that occurred in Seattle, Washington earlier this year. However, we suspected that this was not really about broken windows. As if they had taken pointers from Orwell’s 1984, they took books, artwork and other various literature as “evidence” as well as many other personal belongings even though they seemed to know that nobody there was even in Seattle on May Day. While we know that knowledge is powerful, we suspected that nobody used rolled up copies of the Stumptown Wobbly to commit property damage. We saw this for what it was. They are trying to investigate anarchists and persecute them for their beliefs. This is a fishing expedition. This is a witch hunt. Since then, thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request, we have learned that this Grand jury was convened on March 2nd, 2012, two months before the May Day vandalism even took place.

The Syrian commercial jet forced to land in Ankara mid-flight between Moscow and Damascus Wednesday evening was carrying munitions for the Syrian Defense Ministry, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Thursday. - "It is absolutely clear who sent the cargo and who was going to receive it. This was munitions from the Russian equivalent of our Mechanical and Chemical Industry Corporation being sent to the Syrian Defense Ministry," Erdogan told journalists, referring to the state-run Turkish manufacturer that supplies the country's army. "The examination [of the seized cargo] is continuing and the necessary will follow," the PM added. The Syrian Foreign Ministry refuted the allegations as “absolutely untrue” in a brief statement on Thursday. Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi stressed that the plane was not carrying ammunition or any other illegal cargo. Earlier on Wednesday Ankara had sent a diplomatic memo to its Arab neighbor on grounds that the plane was carrying "certain equipment in breach of civil aviation rules."

Syria: Erdogan keeps lying over plane (Engineer: No suspicious items found on Syria-bound plane)