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“Lawfare is the use of the law as a weapon of war, and it is the newest characteristic of 21st Century Combat.” — Colonel Charles Dunlap

Lawfare is the weaponized use of the law to annihilate a political or business enemy. Common tactics used in Lawfare include: forum shopping – when public prosecutors transfer a case to a jurisdiction with a friendly judge; excessive use and abuse of coerced plea bargain testimonies which are often the only evidence presented; suppressing evidence beneficial to the defense; and close collaboration with the media to create a public spectacle. One example of the later tactic is the time Brazilian Java Jato judge Sergio Moro ordered former Economy Minister Guido Mantega to be forcibly removed from his wife’s chemotherapy session and tipped the press off in advance, to create a media circus around his arbitrary arrest on charges he was later ruled innocent of.

There are indications that US DOJ use of Lawfare was piloted in the US before being rolled out through Latin America. In July, 2008, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced it was filing corruption charges against Senator Ted Stevens (R/AK) for allegedly receiving illegal reforms on a vacation property, damaging his reputation and causing him to lose his first election in over 36 years. Like future cases in Latin America, there was no material evidence presented, just a coerced plean bargain testimony made by a man who was trying to get out of jail. Months after the election, Stevens was ruled innocent, and in 2012 Judge Emmett Sullivan ruled two DOJ officials guilty of proprietorial misconduct. Nearly all of the tactics cited in the kangaroo court persecution of Ted Stevens would go on to be used against Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva within the ambit of the the US DOJ-backed Lava Jato (Car Wash) investigation. Coincidence or not, it is clear that these tactics would soon be exported throughout the Americas and the World, especially through partnerships with local law enforcement officials within the ambit of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

What is Lawfare?

As two members of Lula’s defense team, Cristiano Zanin and Valeska Martins wrote with legal scholar Rafael Valim in their 2021 book Lawfare: Waging War through Law it first appeared as a military term in the 1970s, but gained popularity in a series of texts by US Air force Colonel Charles Dunlap starting in 2001, when he wrote, “Lawfare is the use of the law as a weapon of war, and it is the newest characteristic of 21st Century Combat.”

Originally described as a weaponized use of international human rights law to criticize military campaigns by the US and Israeli governments on human rights issues and to weaken support for things like the war in Iraq, it was alluded to in the in the Pentagon’s March, 2005 National Defense Strategy, which refers to law as “the weapon of the weak who use international legal cases and terrorism to usurp America.”

Soon, however, military strategists began suggesting that Lawfare could be more than just something that the US government had to defend against and that it could also benefit national security, being preferable to expensive and destructive forms of war, and more neutral definitions of the term began to emerge. Dunlap later wrote that Lawfare could be converted into a “strategy of using or misusing law as a substitute for traditional military means to achieve military objectives.”

In 2016, Orde Kittre published the book Lawfare: law as a weapon of war and, based on the ideas of Dunlap, tried to perfect the concept of Lawfare by breaking it into two elements: 1) the use of the law to create effects similar to those achieved in conventional military actions; and 2) actions motivated by the desire to weaken or destroy an adversary.

As international attention drew to the kangaroo court procedure initiated against former Workers Party Brazilian President Lula da Silva in 2016, his defense team began referring to it as a form of Lawfare. As Martins told this author in an interview conducted in 2018, “when people say we are politicizing the defense, this is a lie because, in reality, this is a technical diagnosis. When we understand that, technically speaking, there is no material evidence, that the accusations are illogical, that the legal arguments are misrepresented, we come to the unequivocal conclusion that we are dealing with a process of Lawfare.”

As they worked with international human rights lawyers to publicize Lula’s plight, Zanin, Martins and Valim created their own definition of the term: the abuse and misuse of the law in a violent manner to conduct political persecution.

The law was certainly abused during the political persecution of politicians throughout Latin America within the ambit of the Lava Jato investigation, which started in 2014 as collaboration between the US Department of Justice (DOJ), the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC), the Swiss Federal Police and a local district attorneys office and judge based out of the conservative Brazilian city of Curitiba. The investigation crippled Brazil’s national development project, bankrupted many of its largest companies, transferred billions of dollars in fines to the United States and ultimately resulted in the illegitimate presidency of a neofascist former army captain named Jair Bolsonaro who is currently facing genocide charges in the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague. Initially presented to the US media as a legitimate partnership within the ambit of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) through a series of 2016 press releases by the Department of Justice itself, it later came out that investigators violated national sovereignty laws by engaging in secret, bilateral communications, including years of secret meetings between Brazilian prosecutors and a group of 18 FBI agents led by Leslie Bakshies.

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act

The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) of 1977, is a US federal law that was originally conceived to prohibit US companies from committing acts of bribery overseas. Twenty years later, a modified version of the law was incorporated into an international treaty, the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention of 1997, which enabled the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and Department of Justice (DOJ) to act in any signatory nation in consort with local authorities. At this point, according to the modified terms of the law, these international partnerships enabled US authorities to investigate any foreign company or individual located in a Convention signatory nation that has a US bank account, owns real estate in the US, has stock traded in the US, or even that has ever conducted any type of transaction in US dollars, as long as the investigation is conducted in partnership with local law enforcement officials. It was the FCPA, for example, that enabled FBI agents to raid FIFA headquarters in Zurich in 2015 and arrest several non-US citizens on foreign soil.

In his academic paper, “The uncomfortable truths and double standards of bribery enforcement,” legal scholar Mike Koehler shows how the US government selectively uses the FCPA to advance its own objectives. According to Koehler, uncomfortable truths that weaken the US moral authority to act as international anti-corruption police include: how the US government actively participates in bribery; how the highest levels of the US government knowingly engage in and support private bribery; how the identity of the alleged bribe payer influences the US government’s enforcement of bribery laws; the subtle difference between US government and private sector attempts to influence foreign government action; and how the US government employs overblown and inconsistent rhetoric regarding bribery enforcement.

It’s common knowledge that the CIA gave away bags of money to government officials in Afghanistan. So why would the US Department of Justice (DOJ), the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the FBI be so worried about corruption in Latin America that the US government would prioritize the issue in the 2017 National Security Strategy if it isn’t political?

The fact that Brazil signed the Anti-Bribery Convention in 1997 enabled the DOJ to work as a partner—some critics argue it took the lead—in Lava Jato, levying billions of dollars in fines on Brazilian companies in civil cases, generally based in the Southern New York Court District. In 2015, Lava Jato judge Sergio Moro bankrupted Brazil’s five largest engineering and construction companies by refusing to treat them as too big to fail – like the US government did with Goldman Sachs during the subprime mortgage crisis – and paralyzed all of their operations for 6 months due to the alleged actions of a few of their business executives. Studies show that this arbitrary action by a district court judge in Curitiba caused 500,000 direct and 3.6 million indirect job layoffs and a 2.5% drop in GDP growth in 2015, severely damaging the reputation of President Dilma Rousseff during the lead up to the April, 2016 parliamentary coup, which was also helped by Lava Jato Judge Sergio Moro’s illegal wiretapping of a conversation between President Rousseff and former President Lula, which he edited to make her look as bad as possible then shared with Brazil’s largest TV network, O Globo, on the eve of the impeachment vote. The Lava Jato investigation was also responsible for the election-year, arbitrary political imprisonment of ex-President Lula for reforms to an apartment the prosecutors were unable to prove he ever owned or set foot in. Although the signs of judicial and prosecutorial overreach in Lava Jato were crystal clear by 2016, after hacker Walter Delgatti (who is currently facing a 300 year prison sentence) shared leaked Telegram conversations showing illegal collusion between Lava Jato prosecutors and the judiciary with the Intercept, Brazilian Federal Police, the Supreme Court and Lula’s defense team, all doubts about the criminal nature of Lava Jato were put to rest.

Lava Jato started in Brazil, but soon, with support from the US DOJ, it expanded across Latin America and Lusophone Africa and was used used to attack politicians in other countries where Brazilian engineering and construction companies like Odebrecht and OAS operated. Attempts to use it against Venezuelan politicians failed due to the wise decision of that government to never sign the FCPA agreement, but dozens of politicians in other countries were targeted. Here are a few examples:

Jorge Glas – Ex-Vice President of Ecuador

Arrested in October 2017, Progressive International board member Jorge Glas was sentenced to 6 years in prison by Ecuadoran Lava Jato prosecutors for allegedly receiving bribes from Odebrecht construction company, based on the plea bargain of a single, corrupt business executive, José Conceição Santos, who received a reduced sentence and partial asset retention in exchange for his testimony. He was released on parole in November, 2022.

Mauricio Funes – Ex-President of El Salvador

In June, 2018, a judge in El Salvador issued an arrest for former President Mauricio Funes and 30 top members of the FMLN, based on coerced plea bargain testimony transcripts supplied by Brazil’s Lava Jato task-force, taken from corrupt businessmen who received sentence reduction and partial retention of their illicit assets in exchange for their testimony. Already living in Nicaragua at the time, they were unable to arrest him and he lives there to this day.

Rafael Correa – Ex-President of Ecuador

In April, 2020, an Ecuadoran kangaroo court sentenced Rafael Correa to 8 years in prison and barred him from running for office for 25 years based in part on coerced plea bargain testimony from an Odebrecht executive that was shared by the Lava Jato Taskforce. With Ecuador currently in chaos, the former President has been living in political exile in Belgium since 2017.

Gleisi Hoffmann – President of Brazilian Workers Party

After Lula was illegally barred from running for President in September, 2018, one of the names cited to replace him was Gleisi Hoffmann. A rising star in the PT, the Lava Jato taskforce tried to annihilate her political career by frivolously accusing her of receiving illegal campaign donations from Odebrecht without any material evidence, while using illegal leaks to create a media circus over an arbitrary search and seizure operation in her house in 2016. Since Hoffmann was a Senator at the time, her case was taken directly to the Supreme Court where she was ruled innocent by a vote of 11-0, due to, as in the case of Lula and so many other victims of Lava Jato, a total lack of material evidence in a case that was entirely built on coerced plea bargain testimony by corrupt business executives who changed their story several times before receiving massive reduction of prison sentence, transfer to house arrest and partial retention of millions of dollars in illicit assets.

Lava Jato – an investigation which has now been proven to be critically flawed due to criminal collusion between chief judge and prosecutors – has spread its tentacles all over the world. In Mozambique, it resulted in the arrest of former Transportation and Communications Minister Paulo Zacula, and Lava Jato was also used to accuse prominent politicians of corruption in the Dominican Republic, Panama and Angola. As Lula defense lawyer Valeska Martins emphasizes, Lawfare is a tactic that can be used against any political enemy from across the political spectrum. Three right wing former Presidents of Peru were sentenced to prison due to coerced plea bargain testimonies by corrupt, imprisoned Brazilian businessmen, with former President Alan Garcia committing suicide on the day they were coming to arrest him him.

Conclusion

Although frivolous criminal investigations against politicians and business leaders as tactics to gain an upper hand over rivals has certainly been engaged in as long as politics and business have existed, the concept of Lawfare as a hybrid war tactic really begins in the 21st Century, in actions that seem to have been piloted by the US DOJ within the US itself before being applied selectively to advance US business and political interests abroad. The US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, initially created in the 1970s a means to reduce the ability of US companies to bribe foreign officials overseas – in theory strengthening sovereignty in countries around the world – has been transformed into a weapon used as justification to arrest foreign political leaders and bankrupt foreign competitors to US corporations. Furthermore, the we can see the toxic legacy of this imperialist strategy in the form of local initiatives, unrelated to the FCPA, that use similar Lawfare tactics to annihilate political enemies such as Argentina’s Vice President Cristina Kirchner. With a new round of electoral victories of the working class left in Latin America, it is more important than ever to develop defense strategies against Lawfare.

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Brian Mier is a correspondent for teleSUR English in Brazil, and editor of the book Year of Lead: Washington, Wall Street and the New Imperialism in Brazil. He has lived in Brazil for more than 25 years. Brian is a host of a weekly program on Brasil 247 and he’s an editor of Brasil Wire.

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Drawing on a national database of over four million people, researchers in New Zealand have found a strong association between Pfizer’s mRNA Covid shot and kidney injuries.

In the three weeks after a mRNA jab, the risk of acute kidney injury rose 60 percent, the researchers found. They reported almost 1,800 extra cases – the equivalent of over 100,000 extra cases of kidney injury in the United States.

The finding was posted as a “preprint” in The Lancet’s database on Friday, Jan. 20. It is the third signal from a large government-managed database linking the Pfizer’s mRNA shots to serious side effects in only the last six weeks.

(There’s nothing cute about kidney injuries! 2279+2370-1446-1425=A LOT. Or 1778, to be specific.)

SOURCE

The authors did not define “acute kidney injury,” a term that can cover anything from relatively benign changes on laboratory tests to a serious loss of renal function.

Still, the finding is yet another signal of the potential cardiovascular risks of the mRNAs. The kidneys essentially function as filters for the blood, and renal injuries often result from reduced blood flow to the kidneys.

The researchers also found elevated rates of heart inflammation, blood clots, and platelet damage in the weeks after one or both of the shots. In all, they found a statistical link between the Pfizer shot for four of the 12 conditions they examined.

The finding is particularly strong because the researchers did not have to depend on voluntary reporting. Instead, they compared New Zealand’s national health records to its national database of people over five who received the vaccine. Just over 4 million New Zealanders, including 95 percent of adults and teenagers, received the shots, providing a large pool to track.

The researchers then compared the number of “adverse events” they found to historical background rates.

In addition, New Zealand had relatively low rates of Covid for most of the period during which people received the Pfizer jabs, so Covid itself cannot be blamed for the excess injuries.

Four of the five researchers on the paper work for the New Zealand government, which has avidly promoted the shots. It is probably only coincidence that they opened their discussion of the findings with the good news: “BNT162b2 vaccination was not found to be associated with the majority of the selected AESIs. [adverse events of special interest].”

Yes, the Pfizer jab was associated with only some of the possible side effects the researchers examined, not every single one.

Look on the bright side, people.

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The pastoral image that “farming” may still conjure for many will suffer a shock as Beyond Pesticides reports, in this Daily News Blog, about developments in the agricultural universe, including massive consolidation in the industries that supply seeds and agrochemicals to conventional farmers. A January 2023 report from Philip H. Howard, PhD updates previous work of his (see here and here) on these trends during the past couple of decades, and focuses on the most-recent (2018–2022) developments. The net conclusion is that the four largest agrochemical companies — Bayer (Monsanto), BASF, Corteva, and Sinochem (which recently subsumed ChemChina/Syngenta) — are exerting increasing leverage over an agricultural system that concentrates power and wealth, while threatening health, the environment, and access to food.

The machinations of these industries for profit, power, market penetration, and privatization of aspects of the natural world are hardly new. The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) summarizes some aspects of the situation in saying, “Land and seed once belonged to no one and were shared by all, replicating the giving essence of the natural world. Today, these precious resources are tightly controlled and commoditized inputs. The modern U.S. food and agriculture system is designed to maximize a narrow concept of economic efficiency which fails to prioritize the well-being of small family farmers, rural communities, or the land.”

Increasing mechanization, industrialization, consolidation, and privatization of genetic information and of data all contribute to the dynamic and entropic world in which conventional agriculture currently operates. Aspects of the shifting paradigms in agriculture during the past 75 years can be traced to multiple factors, including World War II innovations in materials science, chemical weapons development, and other technologies; the so-called “Green Revolution”; advances in genetic science and biotechnology in the last couple of decades; and most recently, the advent of uses of Big Data and the technologies that enable it.

To begin with one of those: the dawn of genetically modified seed that would resist the assaults of applied herbicides was a game changer for the agrochemical industry and ratcheted up sector consolidation (see below). Glyphosate-resistant seed meant that farmers could plant the seed and use Roundup (glyphosate) liberally because it would not harm the plant — but would knock down weeds.

NSAC writes: “To create and mass produce a seed that would resist Roundup, Monsanto needed a captive supply of germplasm [seed]. ‘One of their main strategies,’ noted [Kiki] Hubbard [of the Organic Seed Alliance], ‘was to buy up smaller [seed] firms to access their varieties and simply insert their GE traits without needing to do any of the breeding work themselves. . . . Monsanto thus began to acquire small and regionally based seed companies, exponentially multiplying their supply of germplasm and restricting the distribution of these varieties which had been carefully bred to possess ideal traits. These foundations enabled Monsanto to become the first company to genetically engineer a plant cell and eventually mass produce a Roundup Ready line of seed.”

The company promoted the heck out of this pairing of proprietary seed plus herbicide, and competitors took note. With Monsanto’s development of its flagship glyphosate herbicide (Roundup), and its acquisition of seed companies that resulted in the 1996 debut of “Roundup Ready” soybean seed, the consolidation that now characterizes most parts of the food supply system was off and running. Now, several huge companies (see below) sell genetically modified (GM) seed for use with their herbicide products.

Not so many years ago, there were six large agrochemical companies that sold pesticides and (in some cases) synthetic fertilizers and seeds to agricultural operations. Beyond Pesticides has covered several of the huge mergers of the past decade-plus that have reduced that number to four, including Bayer’s acquisition of Monsanto, the Dow–DuPont merger (which then reconfigured to DuPont and Corteva), and the ChemChina acquisition of Syngenta (with ChemChina subsequently acquired by Sinochem in 2021). ChemChina had already been scooping up many smaller seed companies over the past decade; multiple of Bayer’s seed divisions were also sold off to BASF, another chemical giant, in 2018.

Bayer, DowDupont, Sinochem, and BASF now control more than 60% of global proprietary seed sales. Globally, sales are dominated by Corteva and Bayer. Notably, Bayer is the inheritor of the beleaguered but ubiquitous glyphosate herbicides, most notably Roundup, that are still in extensive use around the world and often paired with GM seeds for important commodity crops, such as corn, soy, cotton, and increasingly, wheat and oat crops.

Dr. Howard — faculty member in the Department of Community Sustainability at Michigan State University, and member of the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (iPES-Food) — points out in his 2016 book, Concentration and Power in the Food System: Who Controls What We Eat, that control of much of the world’s food supply system by so few entities has enormous impacts on human health, biodiversity, the environment broadly, agricultural workers, and rural communities.

In his 2023 report, Recent Changes in the Global Seed Industry and Digital Agriculture Industries, Dr. Howard goes on to note that the impacts on people “tend to disproportionately affect the disadvantaged — such as women, young children, recent immigrants, members of minority ethnic groups, and those of lower socioeconomic status — and as a result, reinforce existing inequalities.”

Indeed, a year ago, a report — written by the Open Markets Institute and submitted to the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law by — begins with this: “Food system consolidation is a danger to all Americans.” It goes on to say, “Just a handful of corporations control critical junctures in the U.S. food supply chain, from seeds and fertilizers to processing to grocery shelves. This concentration of capacity and control increases supply chain fragility by putting more production in fewer hands and fewer places. This consolidation is also what gives these corporations the market power necessary to dictate prices paid to producers and push down workers’ wages, even while they charge consumers more.”

Beyond Pesticides would add that this consolidation makes the products agrochemical companies offer, and the harmful practices they engender, even more entrenched in the operations of most conventional farming. These large companies’ size gives them more influence on governmental and commercial decision makers; more leverage in supply chains and their sector marketplace, and thus, more control of what products are available to producers; and deeper pockets with which to fight challenges to their products and business models. This is true in the U.S. and much of the so-called “developed” world, and increasingly, these companies are making inroads into less-Western, less-mechanized, and heretofore less “agrochemically saturated” agricultural areas around the globe. (See more below.)

Behind the retail food outlets (which are themselves being gobbled up by larger and larger “parent” companies) are these behemoth actors in the food system. These entities exist to make money; they do not, unless forced (or sometimes incentivized) to do so, center human or environmental or community health, or equity concerns, in their business models.

The interest of these corporations is now expanding beyond the production and sale of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, and seeds, often genetically modified. In the face of the issue of developing organismic resistance to agricultural chemicals’ efficacy, increasing public distaste for the noxious products these companies offer, and more governmental regulation of their products’ use, some have begun investing in firms that specialize in “biologicals” for pest control. Syngenta, Corteva, and Bayer have all entered into this business realm.

Syngenta’s website characterizes this emerging sector as “harnessing nature to protect and promote plant growth effectively and sustainably,” and notes its entry into both biocontrols (i.e., use of natural pest enemies) and biostimulants (i.e., products with substances or microorganisms to improve growth and boost yield). The company describes biologicals as “derived from or inspired by nature,” which is the “tell.” The companies are likely uninterested in selling what organic farmers use — largely, naturally occurring substances — but rather, once again, in creating genetically modified organisms and/or synthetic versions of natural “substances or microorganisms” to deploy in agriculture and into the environment. Syngenta speculates that the biologicals market will double in a few short years, and that the company expects to “secure market leadership” by 2025.

In addition, some companies are exploring and/or expanding into the digital agriculture space (i.e., the application of robotics, software, automation, and sophisticated data analysis to agricultural operations). The 2023 report notes some corporate aspirations: “Executives at agricultural machinery firm John Deere, for example, said they want to ‘build a world of fully autonomous farming by 2030,’ and Dan Rykhus, CEO of precision agriculture company Raven Industries, is certain that autonomous machinery is ‘the future of farming.’” A recently published book by Kelly Bronson, PhD, The Immaculate Conception of Data suggests, according to Dr. Howard, that “the site of power in the food system has moved from seed and chemicals (or seeds paired to be useful only with chemicals) to data.”

Critics note that the agrochemical and agro-biotech industries have used the myth of the “Green Revolution” of the mid-20^th century in their promotion of “the next big things” in agriculture, whether GM seeds paired with herbicides, or synthetic “biologicals,” or über-mechanized and digital farming. Glenn Davis Stone, of Washington University, revises our understanding of the Green Revolution, and comments, “Today the biotechnology industry and its allies zealously promote the legend as a flattering framing for the spread of genetically modified crops. A Monsanto chief even recounted the aging Borlaug [— Norman Borlaug, credited with the short-stalked wheat with very high yield potential when heavily fertilized that was the linchpin of said revolution in India —] tearing up because while he lived through the Green Revolution, he would not live to see the ‘Gene Revolution’ which might save Africa. . . . [T]he push for a ‘Green Revolution for Africa’ today is very real.” (Note, e.g., China’s investment in “industrializing” agriculture in multiple African countries. See also, pushback against United Nations cooperation with industry, in order to protect agroecological activity.)

Taken together, Dr. Howard writes in this 2023 report, the trends cited above “have blurred previously distinct boundaries between seeds, agrochemicals, and biotechnology, and more recently, between other sectors, including biologicals (‘plant protection and strengthening products that are derived from or inspired by nature’) and digital agriculture (the growth of robotics, software, automation, and sophisticated data analysis in agriculture).”

Taken together, these trends reflect an intensifying industrialization of agriculture and a landscape that some economists might readily deem an “oligopoly.” Control over more parts of the food supply system translates to more power to set prices, dictate practices, and more. Dr. Howard adds, “Such high levels of concentration can also threaten political sovereignty, or lead to additional consequences, including negative impacts on communities, labor, human health, animal welfare, and the environment.”

The Open Markets Institute report is not a fan of consolidation; it asserts, “Food companies and some economic analyses argue that decades of consolidation promoted efficiency and brought down food prices. Recent supply chain disruptions reveal the tradeoffs of prioritizing efficiency over resiliency, diversity, and safety nets. . . . Rebuilding a resilient, sustainable, and equitable food supply chain requires rules of fair competition that encourage businesses to focus on socially beneficial innovation and investing in workers and infrastructure rather than exploiting their brute bargaining power to wring cash out of other people’s pockets. It requires strict assurances of safety and dignity on the job as well as a living wage for workers. And it requires changes in corporate governance to hold corporations accountable to invest in capacity and act in the interests of the public rather than the interests of financiers.”

These industrialization and consolidation trends continue to be very concerning. As long ago as 1999, scientist-researchers at the University of Missouri, led by Dr. William Heffernan, wrote this: “New firm names emerge, often the result of new joint ventures, and old names disappear. But underlying these changes is a continuing concentration of ownership and control of the food system. These structural changes are so strong that they often undermine the desired and expected outcomes of much of the agricultural policy developed over the past couple of decades. These structural changes, often referred to as ‘the industrialization of agriculture,’ have progressed to the point that some agricultural economists now refer to the agricultural stage of the food system as ‘food manufacturing’. . . . One often hears the statement that agriculture is changing and we must adapt to the changes. Few persons who repeat the statement really understand the magnitude of the changes and the implications of them for agriculture and for the long-term sustainability of the food system. It is almost heresy to ask if these changes are what the people of our country really want or, if they are not what is desired, how we might redirect the change. The changes are the result of notoriously short sighted market forces and not the result of public dialogue, the foundation of a democracy.”

In the face of these trends, and the power of the corporations that shape how agriculture is deployed, both in the U.S. and globally, the importance of protecting and promoting alternative approaches is greater than ever. Beyond Pesticides works for the advancement of organic regenerative agricultural strategies that genuinely work with natural systems, do not use synthetic petrochemical inputs (fertilizers and pesticides), and have at their heart the health and welfare of people, communities, soil, environment, biodiversity, and more. It is critical that small- and medium-scale organic agriculture holds true to its origins and principles, and serves as an increasingly robust and viable alternative and counterpoint to the agrochemical and agro-biotech industries, which do not serve or protect consumers, farmers, the environment, or planetary sustainability.

A recent Substack post by Charles Eisenstein offers relevant inspiration. “The core of the old story is hollowing out. . . . The void beneath the power, the wealth, the control, the comfort grows intolerable. . . . Cracks spread through the superstructure. Truths long denied seep out through the cracks. Contradictions erupt through the broken crust. People stop believing the stories that held the world in place. . . . [A]ll of us were born with a biologically encoded Great Expectation which the modern world falls far short of. Yet that expectation never truly dies. It can go dormant for years, for decades, but its ember stays alive at the center of the cold ash of innumerable disappointments. Today many of us are gently brushing away the ash and blowing on the coal within. It bursts back into flame. It is the flame of hope — not the false hope of wishful thinking and ignorance of reality, but the true hope that is a premonition of an authentic possibility, a possibility we have agency in creating. . . . [T]here are two basic kinds of work we may to do. . . . The first is to dismantle the structures, habits, beliefs, and powers of the old story. . . .The second is to grow the structures of the new story” — which can build, as he writes, “the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible.”

Help us build that world in agriculture and the food system, and amplify the message, by protecting and growing organic — join us, organize and advocate, and buy organic!

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The United States Army is facing its worst recruiting environment since 1973, when the conscription era ended and the current all-volunteer force was formed.

In an email sent out to service members on Monday, the Army’s recruiting office made it clear that the military is in atrocious shape, facing “the most challenging recruiting environment since the establishment of our All Volunteer Force In 1973.”

Additionally, the Pentagon is now offering “Army Recruiting Ribbons” and promotion points to service members who successfully recruit enlistees.

Last month, the Pentagon finally stood down on its disastrous mRNA mandate, which harmed readiness, injured countless service members, and became a primary driver for the recruiting crisis. Moreover, the Pentagon revealed that there were no plans to reinstate the 8,000+ service members who objected to and faced discharge over the unlawful mandate.

The full letter is published below (emphasizing key portions in bold):

Dear Soldiers, Civilians, Family Members, and Soldiers for Life:

When duty calls, our Army stands ready. Right now, your Army needs you! We face the most challenging recruiting environment since the establishment of our All-Volunteer Force in 1973, but our goal has not changed: to recruit America’s best and brightest volunteers. We call on you to ensure quality Soldiers serve on our team and continue the legacy of service so that we remain the best trained, best led, and best equipped Army in the world.

We ask all Soldiers to share their personal Army story in new ways to ensure we remain the first choice for Americans who want to serve their country. Your experience can help us address the misconceptions about our great Army in your communities and among your peers. The Army offers teamwork and purpose while achieving something that matters across 178 Military Occupational Specialties, offering over 1,800 certifications and highly transferable skills sets.

Army mission success depends on our ability to remain manned, ready, and able to fight and win! We have created a network of initiatives to help recruit and retain our Nation’s best talent, including two referral incentives driven by Soldier suggestions:

Army Recruiting Ribbon. All Soldiers will be eligible to earn the new Army Recruiting Ribbon for a valid referral of someone who both enlists and ships to Army Initial Military Training (IMT). This honor may be awarded up to four times, as indicated with a numerical device added to the ribbon. Soldiers in the grades of E-4 or E-5 receive 10 promotion points for each award of the ribbon, up to a total of 40 promotion points.

Early Promotion. Under the Soldier Referral Program (SRP) Pilot, Soldiers in the grades of E-1, E-2, and E-3 may receive one rank advancement for providing a valid referral of someone who both enlists and ships to Army IMT. Soldiers may receive only one advancement for participation in this initiative throughout their entire careers, initiated within 60 days of the referred Soldier shipping to IMT.

To be eligible, Soldiers must be in good standing and not pending legal action. The U.S. Army Recruiting Command is responsible for validating referral and departure of the trainee to IMT.

You are our greatest asset. We ask you to tell the Army story—to tell your story—and help other Americans understand the valuable opportunities our Army has to offer. We remain committed to maintaining our standards, investing in America’s youth, and recruiting the quality Soldiers our Army needs to fight and win our Nation’s wars.

   //SIGNED//

Michael A. Grinston

James C. McConville

Christine E. Wormuth

Sergeant Major of the Army

General, United States Army

Secretary of the Army

Chief of Staff

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***

The transformation of Ukraine into untarnished, saintly victim, symbol of democracy and civil society savaged by brutish Russia, has been nothing less than remarkable.  The endemic corruption of a state captured by oligarchic tendencies and its own breed of kleptocrats has somehow gone by the wayside, only interrupted by the occasional symbolic purge by the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Lo, before us, the Athenian project writ large in eastern Europe, deserving of protection.

Each arms shipment is made and justified on the basis of Ukraine’s civilizational imperative, proclaimed as not merely European but global.  It is a spectacular refit verging on pantomime.  But occasionally, a few cracks in the show appear.  For one, Zelensky’s desperate effort to make his impoverished and war ravaged country appealing to investors, and who that message is being sold to, is telling.

In his January 23 address to the National Association of State Chambers, the Ukrainian President rubs and massages the US ego with stretchy analogies.  He links the creation of a business with defending Ukraine.  It seems that fighting and dying in the Ukraine War “is like starting your own business and working day from morning till night, every day, so that one day you can see how your dream is becoming true – when you finally have your own operating business.”  (Someone really ought to furnish him with Arthur Miller’s sober corrective Death of a Salesman.)

Ukraine is held out as a receptacle awaiting the joyful stuffing of cash and capital.  “We have already managed to attract attention and have cooperation with such giants of the international financial and investment world as Black Rock, J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs.  Such American brands as Starlink or Westinghouse have already become part of our, Ukrainian, way.”

Zelensky does little to differentiate civilian and military enterprises, though it is clear he would, at this point, prefer the immediate reward of weapons rather than US banking and financial services.  These are all part of that anti-democratic continuum that is the military industrial complex.  “Your brilliant defence systems – such as HIMARS or Bradleys – are already uniting our history of freedom with your enterprises. We are waiting for Patriots. We are looking closely at Abrams.”

While he calls the Russian effort predatory in nature, he ignores the predatory corporate nature of those companies he praises and embraces.  Goldman Sachs has an extensive record of undermining civil society in a number of countries, leaving a trail of unaccountable financial devastation.  It remains, to use Matt Taibbi’s famous description, “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money”.

Most recently, its lengthy involvement in the looting of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (IMDB) led to the conviction of one single junior partner, a lamentable effort suggesting that white collar crime not only pays but pays handsomely.

Dennis M. Kelleher, President and Chief Executive Office of Better Markets, offers a summary that cannot be bettered.  “Without Goldman’s imprimatur and management of the private placement of $6.5 billion of bonds in three offerings in less than a year, there would have been no money to launder or loot, no money to bribe, buy votes and corrupt democracy and justice, and no murder of a prosecutor investigating those activities.”

Of that amount, the then Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak and his cronies were most grateful, reportedly making off with half the stash.  Goldman’s own reward for engineering the entire, jaw dropping steal: $600 million.

These are warnings best heeded in the corridors of Kyiv.  But Zelensky is no mood for lessons in US corporate history and its extensive record of global pillaging.  Last October, he held a meeting with representatives of the Great Vampire Squid.  Goldman Sachs Executive Vice President John Rogers and Co-Head of the Office of Applied Innovation and President of Global Affairs Jared Cohen were on hand to smell out opportunities, blood funnel at the ready.  Gullibly, the president told them of his appreciation “when such people are not afraid and come to Ukraine to support us.”  Such companies would “bring something new and create jobs for Ukrainians.  That is what we need.”

Charmingly, Zelensky wished to convince both Rogers and Cohen that measures were needed to counter the spread of disinformation.  Perhaps this was not the strangest briefing: the investment bank is infamous for its own brand of disinformation in cooking the books.

In his National Association of State Chambers address, the Ukrainian president insists that “everyone can become a big business by working with Ukraine”, covering “all sectors – from weapons and defence to construction, from communications to agriculture, from transport to IT, from banks to medicine.”  A country weakened and depleted by war is a potential bankster’s playground, offering a chance for cheap pickings, low-cost investment efforts for high returns and minimum regulations to police abuse.  And a few lucky politicians can get wealthy along the way too.

Names such as Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan, far from being paragons of democracy, malign it.  The boardroom member and shareholder are not electors of political representatives, even if they manipulate electoral outcomes and the decisions of governments.  Many Ukrainians are in for a nasty surprise.

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Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.  He currently lectures at RMIT University. He is a regular contributor to Global Research and Asia-Pacific Research. Email: [email protected]

Featured image: President Zelensky hailed as a ‘democratic’ leader

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***

We have confirmation from the highest sources that Russia and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) are considering using gold for pan-Asian trade settlements, fully replacing dollars and euros.

In an article written for Vedomosti, a Moscow-based Russian newspaper published on 27 December, Sergey Glazyev, a prominent economic adviser to Vladimir Putin who is heading up the Eurasian Economic Union committee charged with devising a replacement for dollars in trade settlements sent a very clear signal to that effect. It appears he will drop earlier plans to design a new commodity-linked trade currency because it has been superseded.

Furthermore, increasing numbers of nations have joined or have applied to join the SCO as dialog members, including Saudi Arabia and other important Gulf Cooperation Organisation members. The economic benefits of discounted energy, China’s investment capital, and sound money are the ingredients for a new, Asia-wide industrial revolution, while the economies of the western alliance sink under rising prices, rising interest rates, collapsing financial markets, and collapsing currencies.

While it will mark the end of the road for the western alliance and its fiat currencies, Putin must be careful not to take the blame. Now that the alliance is racking up tanks and other equipment for the Ukrainians, they are actively promoting a new battle, with NATO getting almost directly involved. It is that action which will drive up commodity prices, undermine western financial markets, undermine government finances, and ultimately collapse their currencies. 

Putin is likely to use NATO’s impetuous action in defence of Ukraine as cover for securing Russia’s future as an Asian superstate, which will be the west’s undoing.

Introduction

We forget, perhaps, that from 1 March 1950 the Soviet rouble was on a gold standard at 4 roubles 45 kopecks for 1 gram of pure gold until 1961, when Khrushchev devalued it and refixed it to the dollar. Stalin had been a signatory to the Bretton Woods agreement but refused to join it and make the rouble subservient to the dollar as its intermediary for a gold standard.

The Soviets’ rouble was eventually driven off its gold standard by disastrous economic policies. Faced with reforming the command economy system and accepting the economic failures of communism, in 1961 the currency had to give way. This is worth mentioning to remind us that the Russians are no strangers to a gold standard, were not brought up with Keynesian beliefs inculcated in their institutions and are probably viewing the west’s fiat currencies in that light. From unhappy experiences, they are also fully aware of the power of the dollar’s hegemony, and in the absence of military action that it is America’s weapon of choice.

Out of adversity, comes opportunity. By cutting Russia off from the west’s SWIFT system a year ago, the western alliance focused Russian minds. At a stroke, her fiat currency reserves were made worthless, and being beyond the western alliance’s control the real value of her gold reserves made supreme. It has ensured that for Russia and her allies’ gold was to be valued at a significant premium to the alliance’s fiat currencies. Furthermore, US insistence that gold no longer provides an anchor for currencies is now exposed to the Asian hegemons as little more than a self-serving sham.

It is in this light that we must view Russia’s struggle to conduct trade without using the dollar, the euro, and other western alliance currencies for settlement. Dollar credit created offshore by Chinese and other friendly banking systems without using the US correspondent banking system is a stopgap. But in practice is a limited solution, and liable to disruption by further American sanctions against participating banks. Furthermore, it does nothing towards a solution for doing away with western currencies for pan-Asian trade settlement entirely.

As a substantial net exporter, Russia is left with relying on China’s renminbi — not an ideal solution — and accepting soft Asian currencies: Indian rupees, Turkish lira, Iranian rials, and others. Undoubtedly, this spurred a committee under the aegis of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), incorporating Russia and the lesser states of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Armenia to design a new trade settlement currency. In a preliminary announcement last year, the head of this committee, Sergey Glazyev, suggested it would be based on the currencies of the member states and a basket of commodities relevant to their trade. Furthermore, it was a currency system intended to be available for other nations to join.

Last June, in an article for Goldmoney I argued that Glazyev’s initial proposal was impractical, and he should be using a gold backed currency to achieve his objectives. Subsequently, there was some resonance with this view, because in July Glazyev proposed a new Moscow gold exchange, ostensibly to replace Russia’s loss of access to the London market for Russian mined gold and its refiners. His involvement in this project was not just coincidental. At that time, in an update to his initial proposal Glazyev pointed out that gold together with a basket of commodities could act as “collateral for a new settlement currency” (i.e., a modified EAEU plan), giving easier access for all members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. 

The ground was shifting. There was little doubt that Glazyev’s original plan was being abandoned, dropping national currencies out of the proposed construct, and enhancing the role of gold. But it was still the case that the inclusion of a basket of commodities would be bettered and simplified by using gold alone as “collateral” for the trade currency. Furthermore, the geopolitical imperative was evolving at pace.

Enter the Middle East…

In recent months it has become clear that Saudi Arabia saw its future to be more aligned with the China-Russia axis than the west, and specifically members of the western alliance. In part, this was perhaps the natural consequence of the American led “unfriendlies” — as Putin called them — planning to do away with carbon fuels entirely in the next decade or two. And while Asian nations, such as China and India were paying lip service to climate change, it was clear they would continue to use fossil fuels. It was time for the Saudis and other oil and gas exporting members of the Gulf Cooperation Council to enter into long-term supply agreements with China, India, and other members of the wider SCO family. Accordingly, the Saudis announced their intention to join BRICS, Qatar announced a 27-year natural gas supply agreement with China, and President Xi was welcomed on a state visit to Saudi Arabia when mutual trade agreements were signed.

Egypt and Qatar became dialog partners of the SCO in September, and Saudi Arabia was admitted in November. The SCO has also agreed to admit Bahrain, the Maldives, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Myanmar as dialog partners. Bearing in mind that the SCO is dominated by China and Russia, both of which want to replace the dollar, the inclusion of these members of the Gulf Cooperation Council who until now have accepted dollars exclusively for energy sales must be causing consternation in Washington. While some GCC members have been careful to not rattle Washington’s cage, the Saudis have been clear that they are now prepared to accept other currencies for oil, signalling a wider transfer from petrodollars to petroyuan.

What we cannot know is what, if any, assurances the Saudis sought and were given as to the relative soundness of the yuan and the other Asian currencies they would receive for oil relative to the dollar. The purchasing power of the dollar beginning to decline more rapidly is reflected in higher price inflation, and its long-term prospects as a pure fiat currency must have been part of the Saudi’s equation. But given that oil exports to the western alliance were set to decline and be replaced by Asian demand, a currency switch would be on the cards anyway.

Central to these considerations would have been Glazyev’s plans for a new commodity backed currency capable of being offered to the wider SCO membership, which the Saudis have now joined. And having dropped the national currencies element in the proposed new EAEU trade settlement currency, Glazyev would have been forced to accept that the only way such a currency would work practically would be to base it on gold as proxy for a basket of commodities. As all roads were said to lead to Rome, everything points to gold. The EAEU currency proposal was now dead before arrival.

In an article entitled “Golden rouble 3.0: How Russia can change foreign trade infrastructure”[i]written for Vedomosti, a Moscow-based Russian business newspaper published on 27 December, Glazyev laid out his latest thoughts. Furthermore, it was co-authored by Dmitry Mityaev, who is Assistant Member of the Board for Integration and Macroeconomics of the Eurasian Economic Commission — so this article is not just Glazyev’s musings, and we can assume it carries official weight.

From this article, the EAEU currency commission now appears to have dropped the proposal for a new currency entirely, using gold instead as the principal means of settling trade imbalances. Presumably, the requirement to make payments in gold could be circumvented if one or more national currencies went onto a credible gold standard. Unless trade imbalances are substantially compensated for by investment flows, this may have to be the case. The implication is the rouble will readopt a gold standard due to a lack of outward investment relative to the trade surplus, reviving the gold backing (though not the relationship) that the Soviets operated between 1944 and 1961.

To reinforce the importance of a return to a gold standard, both Russia and the Saudis heading up OPEC+  will be aware of the true cost of the fiat petrodollar regime for their primary export product — crude oil.

In August 1971, when the Bretton Woods agreement was abandoned, crude oil was priced at $3.56 a barrel and the market price for gold was $42.85. Converting this into ounces of gold per barrel gives us a value of 0.0831 ounces. Today, the gold price of oil is 0.0417 ounces per barrel, roughly half. In other words, using gold Glazyev can demonstrate that the true cost to OPEC+ of dollarisation has been to halve the value of their export revenues since the Bretton Woods agreement was suspended. By accepting a new trade settlement medium tied to gold, this US enforced erosion of oil values will cease. And to compensate for the loss of oil’s value from the ending of Bretton Woods, the gold price in dollars would have to be double that of today at over $3,800. 

The evidence mounts therefore, that gold provides a framework within which Glazyev intends to operate. That he must be thinking this way has become fundamental to his approach, confirmed by his many references to gold in his article for Vedomosti, to the rouble’s history tied to gold, and to the US’s debasement of petrodollars. In the UK at least, Russian media appears to be censored, so Glazyev’s Vedomosti article (referenced in endnote 1) may not be available to many readers in the west. Therefore, for ease of reference the salient points in the English translation of his detailed article are summarised as follows:

• In the nine months to September, Russia’s trade surplus with members of the EAEU, plus China, India, Iran, Turkey, The United Arab Emirates etc. was $198.4bn equivalent, against $123.1bn for the same period last year. In other words, the western alliance’s sanctions have failed to suppress Russia’s oil revenues, merely redirecting their sources.
• The trade surplus with SCO members has allowed Russian companies to pay off external debts, replacing them with borrowing in roubles. [Glazyev doesn’t make this point, but a return to the gold standard would reduce borrowing costs substantially.]
• Russia became the third largest country using renminbi for international settlements, accounting for up to 26% of foreign exchange transactions in the Russian Federation. The share of settlements in soft currencies is growing for SCO members, dialog partners and associates, replacing dollars, and is expected to increase further. 
• Since these currencies are subject to exchange rate and possible sanctions risk, the best way to offset these risks is to buy non-sanctioned gold from China, the UAE, Turkey, possibly Iran, and other countries in exchange for local currencies.
• Gold purchased by the Russian Central Bank can be stored in central banks of friendly countries for liquidity purposes and the rest repatriated to Russia.
• Gold can be a unique tool to combat western sanctions if used to price all major international goods (oil, gas, food, fertilisers, metals, and solid minerals). This would be “an adequate response to the west’s price ceilings”. And “India and China can take the place of global commodity traders instead of Glencore or Trafigura”.
• Gold (along with silver) for millennia was the core of the global financial system, an honest measure of the value of paper money and assets… It was cancelled half a century ago, tying oil to the dollar. But the era of the petrodollar is ending. Russia, together with its eastern and southern partners has a unique chance to jump ship from a dollar-centred debt economy.
• By signing the Bretton Woods agreement but not ratifying it, for the USSR “Golden Rouble 2.0” played an important role in post-war Soviet industrialisation. Now the conditions for “Golden Rouble 3.0” have objectively developed.
• Sanctions against Russia have boomeranged against the west. It now faces geopolitical instability, rising prices for energy and other resources [i.e., yet more price inflation].
• In 2023, [there will be a shift from] risky investments in complex financial instruments to invest in traditional assets, primarily gold. Gold’s increasing prices towards Saxo Bank’s forecast of $3,000 per ounce will lead to a substantial increase in the values and quantities of gold reserves. Large gold reserves will allow Russia “to pursue a sovereign financial policy and minimise dependency on external lenders”. [Note that in addition to official reserves it is known that Russia has at least a further 10,000 tonnes — more than the officially declared total for the US Treasury.]
• Central banks are adding to their gold reserves. China has an export ban on all mined gold. According to the Shanghai Gold Exchange, customers have withdrawn 23,000 tonnes of gold. India is considered the world champion in gold accumulation…. Gold has been flowing from West to East… Is the West’s central bank gold safely earmarked, or is it all “de-done” through swaps and leasing? The west will never say, and Fort Knox’s audit will not either.
• Over the last 20 years, gold mining in Russia has almost doubled. Gold production may well grow from 1% of GDP to two or three per cent… Already, Russia’s annual gold production is set to rise from 300 tonnes to 500 tonnes… giving Russia a strong rouble, strong budget, and a strong economy. [Note that in this statement Glazyev reveals that he expects most of the increase of mine output is to be in its value measured in dollars.]

Glazyev is all but saying for definite that Russia will enact Golden rouble 3.0. And we should be in no doubt that Russia is backing away from the west’s fiat monetary system and sees far higher gold prices expressed in its currencies. The only question is the speed with which it is moving in this direction. 

What Glazyev did not mention in his Vedomosti article, other than his reference to western central banks not necessarily having possession of their gold reserves, would be the consequences for the dollar and other western fiat currencies of gold becoming the trade settlement medium throughout Asia, or of the rouble returning to a gold standard. Inevitably, holders of dollars and financial assets, totalling some $30 trillion, would make comparative value judgements not just for the dollar but also for their exposure to other fiat currencies. Not only would this cause private sector actors engaged in cross-border trade to re-evaluate their exposure to fiat currencies, but the whole system of currency reserves held by central banks could come under threat.

The indications are that Putin supports Glazyev’s thesis. But he has a wider remit, including military strategy over Ukraine. NATO is committed to send Ukraine tanks to fight a new battle, expected to start shortly when the ground freezes. In the process, NATO is about to become more directly involved in the conflict. We should be in no doubt that after an apparent stalemate, in recent months this proxy conflict is about to become a more direct involvement between NATO and Russia. 

Almost certainly, the forthcoming military escalation will destabilise financial markets in the western alliance. A renewed crisis of energy and commodity price increases seems certain, which will lead to fears in the western alliance’s financial markets of higher price inflation for longer, driving bond yields up and equities lower. Neo-Keynesian investors might expect the uncertainty arising from renewed military action to drive global liquidity into the dollar, which is their traditional safe haven rather than gold. But US-centric markets fail to appreciate that at $30 trillion the currency and financial assets are already over-owned by foreigners, while physical gold is not. And they fail to appreciate that Putin can exploit this weakness.

For that would be a good time for Putin to open a war on the financial front as a major blow to the dollar’s hegemony. Under cover of the battlefield, Russia could let markets drive up prices of nearly all her exported commodities, while continuing to give preferential terms to her economic allies in the SCO. It would then be seen as a market response to the western alliances’ political imperatives. But soaring energy and commodity prices will reflect a sharp decline in the purchasing power of the dollar and its fiat currency cohort of euros, yen, and sterling.

Yet again, in pursuing purely political objectives, the alliance would be seen to be entirely responsible for collateral financial damage.

The banking system is swimming naked on an ebb tide

Being entirely fiat, the western alliance’s currencies are horribly vulnerable to Sergei Glazyev’s plans for settling trade in gold, and its implied extension into a standard for the rouble itself. If this analysis is correct, and the evidence that it is so is mounting, then China is capable of following with its renminbi. It has the required characteristics for a gold standard to work as well — export surpluses, high savings rate, low price inflation, and interest rates that truly reflect price stability.

Make no mistake: as well as its official reserves, China has more gold than any other nation. And as Glazyev points out, at 23,000 tonnes its citizens are also very big holders as well as the state and should be supportive of a gold standard. By way of contrast, with an unknown portion of the western alliance’s gold reserves swapped and leased and its entrenched Keynesian denial of gold’s monetary role, its entire fiat currency system could rapidly become at risk of extinction.

At first sight, it may seem an extraordinary claim, but the last to see the danger to a currency are usually those wholly dependent upon it. Americans naturally believe that in difficult times, everyone turns to the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. And given the contemporary zeal with which everyone is beholden to the state and its paper, as an investment strategy this belief is usually correct in a self-fulfilling fashion. Only one in a million will say it is not prices that are rising, but understands that the currency is losing purchasing power. But there always comes a time when a sufficient challenge to a fiat currency is mounted by events that all myths are demolished.

It is not just a fiat currency which is threatened, but the institutional structures upon which it depends. In this regard, a Bank for International Settlements’ working paper entitled The Bank of Amsterdam and the limits of fiat money published only this month is timely[ii]. The paper’s Abstract sets out the current problem well:

“Central banks can operate with negative equity, and many have done so in history without undermining trust in fiat money. However, there are limits. How negative can central bank equity be before fiat money loses credibility? We address this question using a global games approach motivated by the fall of the Bank of Amsterdam (1609–1820). We solve for the unique break point, where negative equity and asset illiquidity renders fiat money worthless.”

The authors tell us that the Bank of Amsterdam was set up by the municipality of Amsterdam to deal with the large quantity of gold and silver coins of multiple jurisdictions, many either clipped or debased which circulated in this international trading centre. It was a bank of deposit. Customers would deposit coins and account balances were recorded in favour of the depositor. These deposit balances could be transferred to other account holders or withdrawn in specie for a small fee. It was a considerable improvement on settling transactions with coin alone.

In the words of the working paper, the bank become a proto-central bank, without initially undermining its credibility. In 1683 the bank matching deposits to coin, creating balance sheet credit. The description of the bank being a proto-central bank fits because the bank was effectively conducting quantitative easing, centred on buying in coin for fiat currency and credit, rather than for government debt as is the case today. And over time, the bank began to extend further credit, particularly to the Dutch East India Company. To cut a long story short, its balance sheet ended up with a growing and lethal combination of bad and illiquid debt as the fortunes of the Dutch East India Company declined, representing 71% of the bank’s assets while its stock of metal more than halved. As the BIS’s working paper pointed out:

“The Bank’s insolvency – and the inability of the city authorities to recapitalise it – are important elements in its downfall. The Bank’s income sources comprised mainly fees from the receipt system and interest margins on loans. However, while the loans to the VOC [Dutch East India Company] became non-performing, the bank had not been rebuilding capital to cover these losses, as profits were regularly distributed to the city. Moreover, it had neither the seigniorage income of modern central banks, nor an adequate fiscal backstop. The City of Amsterdam did make limited attempts to recapitalise the Bank, but the funds were quickly diverted back to city coffers… From the perspective of modern central banking theory, the City of Amsterdam’s fiscal capacity was insufficient to provide the sovereign backing of an institution that had become a proto-central bank.” 

There is a high degree of resonance with the current situation, except instead of lending to a major corporate borrower, central banks are financing their governments, which are undoubtedly ensnared in debt traps being sprung by rising interest rates. The assumption that governments have the fiscal capacity to backstop their central banks in a way in which the City of Amsterdam was unable to do is also questionable.

The authors then proceed to mathematically model the conditions that led to the Bank of Amsterdam’s failure and the consequences for the currency. They claim that “there is a unique break point, defined as the state of the economy at which the agio [the relationship between the values of bank credit and coin] breaks below the target band and the value of bank money falls to zero”.

It is commonly said that modern central banks cannot go bust because they can “print” new currency. And it is assumed that respective governments with their fiscal capability can always bail them out as a last resort. Therefore, the relationship between a central bank’s balance sheet equity and its illiquid liabilities is commonly regarded as immaterial — it can and often does operate with negative equity. But, as the BIS working paper shows, there must be a break point, where these conditions are no longer enough to save a central bank and its credit in the form of its currency and deposit obligaions.

It is interesting that the BIS decided to publish this working paper only now. We can probably take it to imply that some analysts at the BIS are concerned that the current central banking cohort is in danger of the Bank of Amsterdam’s fate. This view has some support from its conclusion. It concludes with:

“Overall, our analysis demonstrates the value in reviewing historical precedents for understanding the monetary systems of today. In a context of high inflation, high global uncertainty, and competition between both sovereign currencies and now cryptocurrencies, it is particularly relevant to understand monetary competition and the factors that could lead to shifts between different monetary regimes.”

This is Zoltan Pozsar’s Bretton Woods III expressed in bank-speak. With the shift from fiat currencies to commodity-backed currencies now upon us, that time has probably arrived. While the Bank of Amsterdam took a considerable time to decline and fail, the failure of the western central banking cartel could be sudden. Rising interest rates lead to losses on central bank assets acquired through QE, and interest payments on commercial bank reserves increase as well. The Fed, European Central Bank, the Bank of Japan, and others which have swollen their balance sheets through quantitative easing are not only in negative equity but are sinking even deeper into bankruptcy. The Bank of England has only escaped this fate so far through the prescience of a former Governor who persuaded the UK’s Treasury to shoulder bond losses: but it is still beholden to paying commercial bank interest on their reserves.

Bizarrely, we should not rule out central banks failing first, thereby bringing down commercial banks. Commercial banks are more operationally geared than they have probably ever been, and with an economic downturn increasingly certain, loan losses threaten to wipe out their shareholders’ equity. Their exposure to financial markets, which was predicated on low interest rates which are now rising, brings forward systemic risks, even without the Ukraine war entering another round. But we can see from the military build-up that energy and commodity prices are going to rise again and wholesale and consumer prices as well. Interest rates will follow, central bank negative equity will rise, and over-leveraged banks will almost certainly need to be rescued. 

All the troubles of the Bank of Amsterdam are suddenly revisiting the western alliance’s central banks. Shortly, we won’t need to “solve for the unique break point where negative equity and asset illiquidity renders fiat money worthless”, as the authors of the BIS working paper put it.

Instead of a mathematical model proving something which is driven mainly by human perceptions, we can express the break point very simply. Central banks had a choice, which they no longer have. They could have chosen to protect their currencies by allowing markets to set interest rates and refusing to finance higher budget deficits. Instead, they are talking up only small interest rate increases, presumably hoping the price inflation problem will simply go away, while governments make little or no attempt to rein in their spending.

But they are in it too deep now to take that choice. With the exception of the ECB which has no specific government to turn to, they could have recapitalised themselves, and be in a position to guarantee the integrity of the entire commercial banking system. They still have that primary duty, but without the ability to do so. The BIS’s break point for their currencies has already passed.

Summary

We rely on central banks to ensure the commercial banking network’s integrity. At the least, the need for accelerated currency and credit inflation to support a tottering financial system upon which the western alliance depends can be the only solution — at the expense of their currencies.

That the western alliance is sinking into a debt crisis of its own making is unarguable. Its geopolitical strategy run by yesterday’s hegemon has already backfired by driving up energy prices for the benefit of its enemies. The time has come for Russia to oversee the financial coup de grace. Oversee it, because Russia will use the cover of the western alliance’s aggression and the consequences for its markets and financial system to deliver the blow. Russia is thinking ahead, while the alliance is in gung-ho mode. 

Just as the consequences of banning Russia from SWIFT did not appear to have been thought through in advance, the consequences of a new phase of the war over Ukraine are dismissed. In initially at least, in the west a move to gold by Russia will be seen as a defensive response to protect the rouble and the value of Russia’s pan-Asian exports, and a deliberate attack on western fiat currencies will not be suspected. The evidence will be seen in a gold price which rises beyond expectations.

Russia will not make formal announcements about gold standards, because there is no need. Nor will China: instead it might reveal an increase in gold reserves. And having dropped the EAEU trade settlement currency as the intended replacement for the dollar, the SCO will effectively adopt gold in its place.

Initially, a soaring gold price valued in dollars will not create undue alarm in the western establishments: after all, it has been demonetised. This will be followed by denials of its importance. But as Sergey Glazyev put it in his Vedomosti article, gold will be used to price all major international goods (oil, gas, food, fertilisers, metals, and solid minerals). That being so, these prices will be stable with low interest rates, while prices and interest rates will be soaring in dollars. And it will then become obvious to a wider public that it is not prices that are soaring, but dollars collapsing.

But as fiat dollars, euro, yen, and pounds lose purchasing power against not just gold but all commodities, comparisons are bound to be made between the relative success of the Russia-China axis embodied in the SCO, the EAEU, and BRICS. Driven by Chinese savers, capital investment, discounted energy, and sound money Asia will boom.

And there will be little that America and its NATO allies can do to stop it. 

*

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Notes

[i] See https://www.vedomosti.ru/opinion/columns/2022/12/27/957178-zolotoi-rubl?utm_campaign=vedomosti_public&utm_content=957178-zolotoi-rubl&utm_medium=social&utm_source=telegram_ved (Western censorship permitting)

[ii] BIS Working Papers No 1065, January 2023

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***

The BRICS grouping of five emerging economies is considering alternatives to the dollar-dominated payment system which is skewed in favour of very wealthy countries, South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor has said.

Pandor said one of the motivations for BRICS, which has Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa as members, to establish the New Development Bank in 2014 was to reduce their dependence on the dollar-based system, according to the Russian state-owned news agency Sputnik.

“We have always been concerned by the fact that there is a dominance of the dollar and that we do need to look at alternative,” she said.

“The systems currently in place tend to privilege very wealthy countries and tend to be really a challenge for countries, such as ourselves, which have to make payments in dollars which costs much more in terms of our various currencies. So I do think a fairer system has to be developed and it’s something we’re discussing with the BRICS ministers in the economic sector discussions,” Pandor added.

South Africa is the current chair of BRICS. The comments come at a time when several countries are trying to facilitate bilateral trade in their local currencies as the global economy tries to recover from the pandemic shock.

For instance, India and Russia are in talks to boost rupee trade. India has also taken steps to expand its UPI-based payments system to some neighbouring countries such as Nepal and Bhutan.

The South African minister also said that her country warned the US that the bill seeking to counter Russia’s “malign activities” in Africa needs to be removed because they violate international laws.

The bill, if enacted, will direct the US secretary of state to come up with a strategy to counter Russian influence in Africa and holding African governments accountable for aiding Russia’s “proxies” through sanctions and other restrictions.

*

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***

The de-dollarization of the global oil industry is in a treacherous mission creep phase. Things like this don’t happen quickly, but determinedly and gradually, not exactly fitting into today’s media headline game that only considers instant developments. But it is happening and the tide will not be turned based on current and near and medium-term geopolitical developments. Credit Suisse’s Zoltan Pozsar recently warned clients, in essence, that the de-dollarization of the global oil industry is in full swing–even if we can’t see the final end game from here. 

And it’s all about China, of course. Pozsar does the OPEC math for us.

Some 40% of proven oil reserves belonging to OPEC+ members is owned by Russia, Iran and Venezuela–all of whom are selling to China at major discounts, and all of whom are on board with Beijing’s petro-yuan plan.

The countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)–most notably Saudi Arabia and the UAE–account for another 40% of proven oil reserves, and they are increasingly cozying up to China.

The remaining 20% is also accessible to China, and China is already the largest importer of crude in the world.

 

What it all means is that de-dollarization is marching to the beat of a fairly steady drum. In terms of global trade, the yuan accounts for around 2.7% of settlements, while the dollar accounts for 41%. These are the numbers that prompt the new trend of instant gratification to suggest this is not an imminent threat to the dollar. They are wrong. The biggest threats take a significant amount of time to develop. From here on out, the pace will pick up momentum.

China and the GCC

As Oilprice.com reported earlier in December, Chinese President Xi Jinping has pledged to ramp up efforts to promote the use of the yuan in energy deals, suggesting at a summit in the Saudi capital that the GCC countries should make full use of the Shanghai Petroleum and Natural Gas Exchange to carry out its trade settlements in yuan.

The year we just exited should be considered the year in which the petro-yuan really took hold, as China forges a path of increasingly oil and gas purchases from places that are petro-yuan friendly. Russia’s war on Ukraine and the Western sanctions response has only acted as a further catalyst.

In a note to clients carried by the Irish Times, Pozsar warns: “China wants to rewrite the rules of the global energy market”, and it will do it by first removing the dollar from the orbit of the Bric countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China) that have been affected by the “weaponization” of dollar foreign exchange reserves meant to punish Russia and keep Putin from filling his wartime coffers.

What’s happened here is a window of enormous opportunity for Beijing, which has now told the Gulf countries that they are absolutely guaranteed buyers for oil and gas, for payment in yuan, with Xi promising to “import crude oil [and natural gas] in a consistent manner and in large quantities from the GCC”.

Xi’s trip to Saudi Arabia in early December was precisely about the yuan. This was the defining moment for the petro-yuan. It was an invitation, and it was well-received. China and Saudi Arabia signed over $30 billion in trade deals during the visit. That’s $30 billion in leverage that will only help further promote the petro-yuan plan.

More than 25% of China’s crude imports come from Saudi Arabia, and it seems inevitable that the GCC will gradually adopt the petro-yuan, even if there will be a lot of roadblocks along the way due to their exposure to Western financing.

What Western minds are banking on–quite literally–is the fact that China alone has $1T in U.S. Treasury bonds. And as for the Saudis, they are truly tied to the Western financial system and the petrodollar. De-pegging the riyal from the dollar, though it has been discussed very quietly (only from a purely research perspective), would be a rather dramatic shock for the Kingdom–one the Crown Prince won’t likely be willing to risk for a very long time. But he will actively discuss oil deals with China in yuan.

The Chinese goal is much more patient than any Western mind can fathom. It’s about slowly chipping away at the dollar’s throne in oil and commodities markets, and as the reserve currency of choice. That is what Brics and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is all about.

And with every geopolitical upset on the level of Russia-Ukraine, and with every tightening of the sanctions screws by the West, Beijing gets a little further with its petro-yuan goals.

There won’t be any announcement. There won’t be any loud noise. It will happen gradually. It will happen very slowly. And the West will struggle to find its footing when a new global energy order emerges in the longer-term future.

*

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Alex Kimani is a veteran finance writer, investor, engineer and researcher for Safehaven.com. 

Featured image is from OilPrice.com

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***

On January 14, Russia launched a series of missile strikes that targeted military and energy infrastructure across Ukraine. It was the first large-scale strike in two weeks. Although Russia’s defense ministry said that “[a]ll designated targets were hit” in the attack, a powerful Kh-22 Russian missile also struck a nine-story apartment building, killing forty-four people.

Associated Press called it “the deadliest attack in one place since a Sept. 30 strike in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region.” Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, called the missile strike “inhumane aggression” because it directly targeted civilians and said that “There will be no impunity for these crimes.”

The only dissenting voice came from Ukraine, where Oleksiy Arestovich, then a senior advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, made the early suggestion that the missile may not have targeted the apartment building but may have struck it after being intercepted by Ukrainian air defenses.

Arestovich said in an interview that the incoming missile “was shot down. It apparently fell on the [apartment] block. But it exploded when falling.”

A spokesman for Ukraine’s high command says Ukraine lacks the ability to intercept Kh-22 missiles. Arestovich has now resigned as a presidential advisor, saying that his statement was “a fundamental mistake.”

On Facebook, Arestovich wrote,

“Everybody understands perfectly that the tragedy would not have happened if it was not for the Russian strike.”

“Nobody will blame Ukraine. Just like it was not blamed when our air defense missile fell in Poland, killing two Polish citizens,” he added.

When the Russian missile landed in Poland, Ukraine dissented from the accepted analysis that the missile was shot down by Ukraine’s air defense system, risking an Article Five–triggered war with NATO; when the Russian missile struck the apartment building, Arestovich dissented from the accepted view that the missile was not shot down by Ukraine’s air defense system.

Whether Arestovich is right or wrong, the U.S. may want Ukrainian officials “to tread more carefully with how they were speaking,” as CNN reported National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has urged them.

On January 10, Ukraine’s defense minister, Oleksii Reznikov, told a Ukrainian TV station that Ukraine has “already become a de facto member of the NATO alliance.” He added that Ukraine’s formal accession to NATO “is an absolutely realistic possibility.”

Five days later, Reznikov repeated that claim, telling the BBC that “Ukraine as a country, and the armed forces of Ukraine, became [a] member of NATO. De facto, not de jure (by law). Because we have weaponry, and the understanding of how to use it.”

Reznikov said that there was nothing controversial about his claim: “Why [would it be] controversial? It’s true. It’s a fact. I’m sure that in the near future, we’ll become member of NATO, de jure.”

Zelensky had previously made the same claim, that “De facto, we have already completed our path to NATO.”

Yet despite Reznikov’s claim, those statements are controversial—and the U.S. may have particular interest in tempering them. Ukrainian statements risk escalation to a war between Russia and NATO, as well as feed the Russian concern that Ukraine will enter NATO. If true, they confirm the Asia Times‘s claim that Russia is “now in a direct war with the US, that this is now an American war,” or, as Putin said on September 21, that Russia is fighting “the entire Western military machine.” On the same day Reznikov made his statement to the Ukrainian media, the Russian security council secretary, Nikolai Patrushev, told the Russia media that “The events in Ukraine are not a clash between Moscow and Kiev – this is a military confrontation between Russia and NATO, and above all the United States and Britain.”

Reznikov seems to have gone even further, lending credence to Russia’s concern that the U.S. and NATO are backing a war not to defend Ukraine but to weaken and defeat Russia. He has claimed that “in Madrid at the NATO summit, they clearly defined that, for the next ten years, their main threat is the Russian Federation. Today, Ukraine is removing this threat. We are carrying out the NATO mission today without losing their blood with the loss of our blood. That is why we need to spend their weapons for them.”

This statement is provocative for three reasons. First, it recasts the war as not a Ukraine–Russia war but as a NATO–Russia war, emphasizing Ukraine’s role as a territory on Russia’s border that is being flooded with NATO infrastructure and weapons. Second, Reznikov’s statements reaffirm Russia’s fear that, even if Ukraine isn’t de facto in NATO, NATO is de facto very much in Ukraine. Reznikov’s statement strikes at the key demand of Russia’s December 17, 2021 proposal on security guarantees: not just that NATO not expand to Ukraine, but that there be no deployment of NATO weapons or troops to Ukraine.

Third and finally, it also recasts the war as a preemptive war to remove the threat of Russia rather than a defensive war against Russian aggression. It reinforces the Russian fear that Ukraine was being turned into an increasingly well-armed “bridgehead for confrontation with Russia” with the intent, as U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said, of weakening Russia “to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.” It reshapes the war into an intentional, deliberate, and hostile NATO mission.

The U.S. may want Ukraine to speak more carefully because, despite Reznikov’s assurance, some of their recent statements are controversial. They risk not only prolonging the war, but potentially even escalating it.

*

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Ted Snider is a columnist on U.S. foreign policy and history at Antiwar.com. He is also a frequent contributor to Responsible Statecraft as well as other outlets.

Featured image: View of a civilian sports club gym and sporting goods store damaged following a Russian rocket attack the city of Kiev, Ukraine. (Drop of Light/Shutterstock)

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***

The US Marine Corps on Thursday formally opened a new military base in the US territory of Guam as part of Washington’s military buildup in the Asia Pacific that is aimed at China.

The base is still under construction but will eventually house 5,000 US Marines, likely by the end of 2024. According to The Wall Street Journal, the purpose of the base is to prepare for a potential war with China in the islands of the western Pacific Ocean.

David Berger, the commandant of the Marine Corps, said that US Marines would be the first to be deployed in the event of a war with China. “We don’t want to fight to get to the fight. We want to already be inside, so if there’s a conflict, the stand-in forces are already forward,” he said.

The Marine Corps has been revamping to better prepare for war with China by creating units that are more mobile and can quickly move around islands in the region. The US is deploying one of these units, known as a Marine Littoral Regiment, to Okinawa by 2025, which will be armed with anti-ship missiles.

According to Kyodo News, the new base in Guam will host 4,000 US Marines that will be transferred from Okinawa. The US and Japan agreed to reduce the military burden on Okinawa, which hosts over 70% of US bases in Japan, over local opposition to the US presence. But the plans to deploy the Marine Littoral Regiment further entrenches the military presence in the Okinawa prefecture.

There is also local opposition to the expansion of the US military presence in Guam, as Kyodo reported anti-base demonstrators protested against the opening of the new Marines Corps facility. An activist said that the military buildup will make Guam “a target for a war that we didn’t want to be part of.”

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Dave DeCamp is the news editor of Antiwar.com, follow him on Twitter @decampdave.

Featured image: US naval base in Apra Harbor, Guam. (US Navy / Codie L. Soule / Flickr)

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***

Russia announced it will consider the use of depleted uranium akin to a nuclear attack.

Konstantin Gavrilov, head of the Russian delegation to the Vienna Negotiations on Military Security and Arms Control, said during a plenary meeting of the OSCE Forum for Security Cooperation,

“We know that Leopard 2 tanks, as well as Bradley and Marder armored fighting vehicles, can use depleted uranium shells, which can contaminate terrain, just like it happened in Yugoslavia and Iraq,” he said. “If Kiev were to be supplied with such munitions for the use in western heavy military hardware, we would regard it as the use of ‘dirty nuclear bombs’ against Russia, with all the consequences that entails.”

The USG and NATO have stocked depleted beryllium and uranium ammunition in Europe. Bradley Fighting Vehicles, according to the CIA’s propaganda conduit, Voice of America, will soon arrive in Ukraine. The M242 gun mounted on the Bradleys uses Depleted Uranium (DU) ammunition. Additionally, the Challenger tanks the UK is sending use 120 mm sabot rounds surrounded by a jacket of DU.

“DU is used throughout Afghanistan and Iraq, mostly in aircraft, tank, and Bradley Fighting Vehicle ammunition,” reports Iraq Veterans Against the War.

During the Iraq invasion, the USG fired DU rounds into civilian neighborhoods. “Coordinates revealing where US jets and tanks fired nearly 10,000 DU rounds in Iraq during the war in 2003 have been obtained by the Dutch peace group Pax,” The Guardian reported in 2014.

According to [the IKV Pax Christi] report, which is due to be published this week, the data shows that many of the DU rounds were fired in or near populated areas of Iraq, including As Samawah, Nasiriyah and Basrah. At least 1,500 rounds were also aimed at troops, the group says.

It should be noted that an attempt to verify this information on the IKV Pax Christi website produces a page warning the site is dangerous and may have been hijacked. In other words, it was decided information about DU poisoning in Iraq and Afghanistan, including serious birth defects, is not something distracted plebs should be allowed to read.

In 2013, the World Health Organization attempted to downplay DU contamination in Iraq. Remarkably, and at odds with ample evidence, the WHO reported findings on spontaneous abortion, stillbirths, and congenital birth defects in Iraq “are consistent with or even lower than international estimates. The study provides no clear evidence to suggest an unusually high rate of congenital birth defects in Iraq.”

It really is amazing webpages posting this information disappear. Instead, I will link to The Guardian’s post on the topic which is, obviously, too controversial for the average citizen of the West. After all, if such information revealing the psychopathy of the USG and its national security state-created “defense” department were readily available, people may oppose, in far larger numbers than now, the USG’s role in Ukraine.

Iraq did not have WMDs, as Bush and his neocons insisted despite a complete lack of evidence, and therefore could not respond effectively to the invasion of its country. This is far from the case with Russia.

Both Gavrilov and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, along with Russian State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, have warned that the delivery of long-range missiles to the Zelenskyy regime, as Volodin is quoted as saying by Sputnik International, “will lead to a global disaster and retaliatory measures from Moscow with the use of more powerful weapons.”

Gavrilov stressed Moscow will “undertake harsh retaliatory actions” if the USG persists in delivering long-range missiles and also depleted uranium, which Russia considers on par with a “dirty bomb.”

It is now manifestly apparent the West is eager to attack Russian cities. It will provide top-shelf weapons to accomplish its mission of destroying Russia, killing thousands if not millions of its people, and busting the country into malleable little dictatorships dutifully following neoliberal orders.

Russia will not do this. It remembers, every May 8, the “Great Patriotic War” that defeated the Nazi Wehrmacht as Operation Barbarossa, the largest invasion in history, came to a grinding halt amidst the brutal Russian winter.

The German Generalplan Ost to engage in ethnic cleansing, the genocide of “untermenschen,” and the colonization of Eastern Europe (lebensraum) failed miserably. It is conservatively estimated 26 million Russians died defending their country from Nazis who wanted nothing more than to kill them.

Is it possible the neocons driving this suicidal effort to “weaken” Russia are not capable of understanding that Russia, with its justifiable paranoia of invasion (before Hitler, there was Napoleon), will do everything in its power, as it did during WWII, to prevent what the neolibs and neocons have in mind?

I sincerely believe hubris, narcissism, and “exceptionalism” have warped the minds of people like Victoria Nuland and the despicable Senator Lindsey Graham. Nothing, short of nuclear war and its horrific consequence, will make these people think twice about the stupidity of a short-sighted Generalplan Ost of their own.

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, Kurt Nimmo on Geopolitics.

Kurt Nimmo is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from the author

---

“Towards a World War III Scenario: The Dangers of Nuclear War” 

by Michel Chossudovsky

Available to order from Global Research! 

ISBN Number: 978-0-9737147-5-3
Year: 2012
Pages: 102

PDF Edition:  $6.50 (sent directly to your email account!)

Michel Chossudovsky is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), which hosts the critically acclaimed website www.globalresearch.ca . He is a contributor to the Encyclopedia Britannica. His writings have been translated into more than 20 languages.

Reviews

“This book is a ‘must’ resource – a richly documented and systematic diagnosis of the supremely pathological geo-strategic planning of US wars since ‘9-11’ against non-nuclear countries to seize their oil fields and resources under cover of ‘freedom and democracy’.”
–John McMurtry, Professor of Philosophy, Guelph University

“In a world where engineered, pre-emptive, or more fashionably “humanitarian” wars of aggression have become the norm, this challenging book may be our final wake-up call.”
-Denis Halliday, Former Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations

Michel Chossudovsky exposes the insanity of our privatized war machine. Iran is being targeted with nuclear weapons as part of a war agenda built on distortions and lies for the purpose of private profit. The real aims are oil, financial hegemony and global control. The price could be nuclear holocaust. When weapons become the hottest export of the world’s only superpower, and diplomats work as salesmen for the defense industry, the whole world is recklessly endangered. If we must have a military, it belongs entirely in the public sector. No one should profit from mass death and destruction.
–Ellen Brown, author of ‘Web of Debt’ and president of the Public Banking Institute   

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***

 

 

 

 

Samira is a young Zanzibari woman who had a big dream. To leave home, have a family and study for a career. In many countries this is done as a matter of course. However, in some places there are many struggles and difficulties, both social and financial, that must be faced.

In Samira’s Dream, we follow Samira over a period of seven years as she grows and develops without losing sight of her objectives. The length of time taken to make this documentary reminded me of the fictional film Boyhood which is made and takes place over a period of 12 years, an accomplishment whereby “we watch the actors getting older for real, which gives their characters a sense of authenticity.”

The same can be said for Samira’s Dream as we see the difficulties and real problems she faces over the years, where even being filmed exerted so much pressure at one point that she asks for it to be stopped. She was never sure that she could overcome all the problems she encountered along the way, and the sometimes tense atmosphere during the filming added to the authenticity. As the film’s director Nino Tropiano noted: “Werner Herzog said that filmmaking is not about aesthetics, it is about athletics. In other words, you have to work hard.”

Samira’s Dream (Ndoto Ya Samira) (2022) – Trailer

This is easy to forget in an age where everyone seems to be constantly taking selfies and filming themselves doing the most insignificant things. Having a documentary made about you would be many teenagers’ greatest fantasy and desire. Yet, in societies where liberal freedoms cannot be taken for granted, and your dreams are not easily accomplished (especially for women), there is no sure ending.

Samira gets knocked down, and she gets up again, and again. She works hard, gets help wherever she can, and has the support of a husband who (although anxious about the effect her high level of education might have on their marriage) still gives her wishes his blessing.

For Tropiano this long project was not like Michelangelo’s sculpture where a start had already been made on the block of marble he fashioned into David. The film took shape very gradually, as Tropiano explains:

“Here I am thinking where will I start? I called a friend of mine who had spent a few months in Zanzibar. Where is that!? A traditional Muslim society. That’s intriguing. One of her photos in particular, struck me. A group of young female students walking out of a madrassa in a very orderly manner. It was then I knew the subject matter for my film – female education. So, I needed to write down a synopsis of some sort. I imagined a young woman coming from a remote village, who dreams of moving to town to get a college education. By following her life, I would have a film.”

Even when Tropiano arrived there, he still did not have a subject for his documentary. A chance meeting with a friendly group of schoolgirls led to some general interviews and his choice of Samira for “her natural charisma, open-minded attitude, and cheerful approach”. Diplomacy then ensued as he had to gain the trust of the local people, the Shia Leader of the community, and the teachers in town. Over the next 7 years, a friendship built up which allowed for a constant revisiting and filming that made for a much deeper story than a single visit would have told. By keeping a low-key profile he was able to fly below state officialdom and keep costs down. Over the years Tropiano was able to gain the confidence of the people, demonstrated by the relaxed humour and friendly disposition of the protagonists while, at the same time, capturing the natural beauty of the landscape and the colourful clothes of the people in some beautiful photography.

Nino Tropiano came to Ireland in the mid-90s where he graduated from the National Film School in Dublin with a 50-minute film entitled My Daughter Does Madonna. He went on to direct and produce Mary’s Last Show, Class Reunion and a short film called The Fall. Later his documentary Chippers (2008) was awarded Best Documentary Memorie Migranti at Gualdo Tadino in 2010.

Chippers: The story of the Italian community in Ireland

Click here to view the video

 

Even though fish and chips is an English fast food tradition, by a strange quirk of fate it was mainly Italians who set up the fish and chip shops all over Ireland. Tropiano delves into the history of the Italian peasant farmers who sought work abroad and ended up selling English traditional food to the Irish. Irish efforts to mimic the business soon discovered that selling fish and chips was hard work with very long and unsociable hours.

Tropiano’s ability to be a fly-on-the-wall and let ordinary people tell their own story is very evident in Chippers and this style of filmmaking pays off handsomely in Samira’s Dream. With a minimal voiceover, much of the narrative is conveyed in Samira’s own words.

His own struggles to get funding, the difficulties of getting to Zanzibar and the problems of production and editing, could have led him to give up the project altogether. He notes:

“Each time I got turned down when I applied for funds, I faced an existential crisis, followed by an upsurge that fed in me the ability to see things in perspective. In hindsight, things went the way they were meant to.”

However, Tropiano is also aware of Western tropes, a trap whereby authors/filmmakers/artists make themselves the centre of their own work and lose sight of their original intention: “I faced many obstacles along the way and I suspect that in the hands of other filmmakers, Samira’s story would have come second with the focus shifted towards the struggling life of a filmmaker trying to tell a story in Africa. I resisted the temptation to put myself into the film, to narrate some thrilling backstories in fear they might divert from Samira’s quest into the unedifying and morally bankrupt African tale Western audiences generally look for and festivals tend to love and give awards to.”

This predicament faced by the artist is discussed by the writer James Joyce who discusses creativity (in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man) in terms of the developing maturity of the the artist:

“The image, it is clear, must be set between the mind or senses of the artist himself and the mind or senses of others. If you bear this in memory you will see that art necessarily divides itself into three forms progressing from one to the next. These forms are: the lyrical form, the form wherein the artist presents his image in immediate relation to himself; the epical form, the form wherein he presents his image in mediate relation to himself and to others; the dramatic form, the form wherein he presents his image in immediate relation to others.”

Tropiano moves away from making his art about himself, or about his encounters with others. He takes himself out of the equation while guiding his project in such a way that it becomes a story that the real hero, Samira, can take centre place in, all the while providing inspiration for many women who aspire to achieve similar educational goals.

It is so easy in Western society to fulfill the role of the individualist, Romantic hero telling of his adventures far away from home in distant lands. Western cinema is full of heroes and superheroes, but to create something which turns an ordinary local into an extraordinary example and symbol is a real achievement in art.

Back in Zanzibar at a music and film festival, Samira’s Dream (Ndoto Ya Samira in Swahili) was to be screened. After two hours of dancing to live music Tropiano was called to the stage to speak:

“I prepared a little speech in Swahili and the crowd jeered at my blunders. Then magic happened. There were about six hundred people, and they sat, remaining glued to the screen till the end. That was my reward: I realised the film deserves to be promoted and be seen as it creates a true sense of awareness in Tanzania.”

Samira’s Dream is a story that takes us through the hardships and joys of life, over a timescale that is a rare experience in cinema and which demonstrates dedication to a craft and an idea which takes time to be perfected and achieved so well.

 

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Leopards vs. the Russian Bear. Alert Memorandum for the President

By Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, January 26, 2023

We are aware that the just-reported decision to send Abrams tanks to Ukraine responds to Berlin’s coy insistence that “you go first.” Now Leopard tanks from Germany and other allies will also be sent. Trouble is that those few that make it into Ukraine will be late to the party.

Bill Gates Warns Australia to Prepare for the Next Pandemic — Which Could be Man-made and Far More Brutal Than COVID

By Alexandra Bruce, Aidan Wondracz, and Associated Press, January 26, 2023

In the interview, Bill Gates admits that the vaccines are not blocking infection, they don’t stop variants and they have a very short duration. This, after he and his cohorts spent the past three years demanding that we take the vaccine or be ousted from society because the vaccines “stopped the spread” and were “effective”.

Did Germany Just Officially Declare War on Russia?

By Drago Bosnic, January 26, 2023

During a debate at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock bluntly stated that Germany and its allies are at war with Russia. The unexpected admission, although essentially true, is quite shocking given the fact that many Western officials have been insisting they aren’t directly involved in the conflict with Moscow.

COVID Vaccine: Deaths in England Surge Again

By Alex Berenson, January 26, 2023

The death surge in highly mRNA vaccinated countries continues this winter. Meanwhile, less-vaccinated countries are reporting normal or below normal mortality rates. The latest bad news for vaccine advocates came from the British government this morning.

“No evidence of any vax benefit”. COVID Vaccine “Makes the Problem Worse”. Professor Byram Bridle

By Steve Kirsch, January 26, 2023

According to Professor Bridle, at best, there are no benefits for the COVID vaccines. But the data shows they make the problem worse in every metric: infections, hospitalizations, and deaths. You’ve been completely misled by the medical community about these vaccines.

Mossad and CIA Are Training Christian Extremist Militia in Lebanon

By Steven Sahiounie, January 26, 2023

Covert training camps in the Jordanian desert are currently the site of British and American trainers developing young Lebanese men, loyal to the Christian warlord, Samir Geagea, according to chief editor of Al Mariah magazine, Fadi Abu Deya.  In an interview given to Al Jadeed TV, Abu Deya claimed Geagea is sending fighters to Jordan for military training which is supported by the US and UK.

What Can the United States Bring to the Peace Table for Ukraine?

By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies, January 26, 2023

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has just issued its 2023 Doomsday Clock statement, calling this “a time of unprecedented danger.” It has advanced the hands of the clock to 90 seconds to midnight, meaning that the world is closer to global catastrophe than ever before, mainly because the conflict in Ukraine has gravely increased the risk of nuclear war.

North Korea and the “General Theory of Juche”(主體:주체): Seven Questions

By Prof. Joseph H. Chung, January 26, 2023

The Juche is certainly the most debated ideology but the least understood and it is even the target of hostile attack. It has been perceived in the Western media and the mainstream academics as an ideology poorly conceived and badly structured. Indeed it has been regarded even as an ideology designed to justify perpetual dictatorship of Kim’s family.

Zelenskyy Regime Calls for BlackRock to Do Business in Shell Shocked Ukraine

By Kurt Nimmo, January 26, 2023

On January 24, the former television comedian and current president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, told banksters and corporate titans that death, destruction, and misery are fantastic business opportunities. His pitch was delivered via video to the National Association of State Chambers in Boca Raton, Florida.

The World Comes to DC to Demand Biden Drop the Case Against Julian Assange

By Sam Carliner, January 26, 2023

A group of legal experts, press freedom activists, journalists, and public figures filled a ballroom at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to organize international opposition to the United States government’s extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

Ukraine: Is the Hammer About to Fall?

Mike Whitney, January 19, 2023

WEF Davos – The New Sodom and Gomorrah?

Peter Koenig, January 19, 2023

The Whole of Europe Turned Into a Battlefield

Manlio Dinucci, January 22, 2023

Video: Pfizer’s “Secret” Report on the Covid Vaccine. Beyond Manslaughter. The Evidence is Overwhelming. The Vaccine Should Be Immediately Withdrawn Worldwide

Prof Michel Chossudovsky, January 18, 2023

New Zealand: From Worst to Even Worse? The WEF-YGL Political Intrusion

Peter Koenig, January 23, 2023

The World Economic Forum (WEF) Calls for Destruction of America’s Middle Class

Kurt Nimmo, January 22, 2023

A Pandemic of Lies: MHRA Confirms COVID Is Man-Made & the Vaccines Are Not Based on the “Virus” But Instead on Computer-Generated DNA

The Expose, January 23, 2023

Officially Approved by the EU: Four Insects Hiding in Your Food

Free West Media, January 19, 2023

The War in Ukraine Will End with a Bang. Soon.

Philip Kraske, January 23, 2023

The U.S. Is Already Preparing for the Next War

Danny Haiphong, January 20, 2023

“It’s Not Socialism”: China is a Capitalist Cheap Labour Economy, Based on Exceedingly Low Wages

Prof Michel Chossudovsky, January 22, 2023

Russia Preparing New Plan to End War

Drago Bosnic, January 24, 2023

Situation for Kiev Is “Very, Very Difficult”. US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Milley

Lucas Leiroz de Almeida, January 23, 2023

The New Zealand Government Reaches for Total Medical Control

Guy Hatchard, January 21, 2023

All Masks Thrown Off. The Euro-Atlantic Elites Meeting in Davos, Profit Driven War on Ukraine

South Front, January 24, 2023

The WEF and WHO – Are They Running a Death Cult? A WHO / Pharma controlled Worldwide Tyrannical “health system”

Peter Koenig, January 10, 2023

World Economic Forum’s “Young Global Leaders” Revealed

Jacob Nordangard, January 21, 2023

U.S. Now Considering to Invade Russia: NYT

Eric Zuesse, January 23, 2023

Ukraine Had Lost the War Before It Even Started

Prof Michel Chossudovsky, January 25, 2023

A Hard-Edged Rock: Waging Economic Warfare on Humanity

Colin Todhunter, January 22, 2023

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***

Introduction by Alexandra Bruce

On January 23rd, 2023 Bill Gates joined Lowy Institute Executive Director Dr Michael Fullilove in Australia to talk about global health, pandemic preparedness, food security and climate change.

In the interview, Bill Gates admits that the vaccines are not blocking infection, they don’t stop variants and they have a very short duration. This, after he and his cohorts spent the past three years demanding that we take the vaccine or be ousted from society because the vaccines “stopped the spread” and were “effective”.

The “conspiracy theorists” were right again.

***

Here is an excerpt from an article on the Daily Mail Australia:

Bill Gates Warns Australia to Prepare for the Next Pandemic — Which Could be Man-made and Far More Brutal Than COVID

By AIDAN WONDRACZ FOR DAILY MAIL AUSTRALIA and AUSTRALIAN ASSOCIATED PRESS

• Bill Gates warned Australia to prepare for pandemic
• Tech billionaire said next one could be man-made 

Tech billionaire Bill Gates has warned Australia to be ready for the next pandemic, which could be man-made and far more brutal.

Mr Gates told the Lowy Institute think tank in Sydney on Monday that political leaders needed to set aside their differences and work together to prepare for the next virus.

He called for greater global cooperation using the Covid-19 pandemic as an example of how countries could improve on their response if they worked together.

‘Compare the economic cost of being prepared for the next one to the cost of this one, over $US10trillion economic loss,’ he said.

‘With the pandemic we were foolish not to have the tools, the practice and global capacity to be on standby like we do with fire or earthquakes.’

Click here to read the full article on Daily Mail.

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A group of legal experts, press freedom activists, journalists, and public figures filled a ballroom at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to organize international opposition to the United States government’s extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

For the Belmarsh Tribunal, United Kingdom parliamentarian Jeremy Corbyn flew more than 3,670 miles to speak in person on January 20, 2023. Other speakers flew in from Italy and Croatia.

In fact, very few of the delegates on the tribunal organized by Progressive International were from the D.C. area.

This was the fourth iteration of the Belmarsh Tribunal. Previous editions were held online in London and New York. The gatherings of journalists, legal scholars, whistleblowers, and public figures represent growing international opposition to the United States’ attempt to extradite Australian publisher Julian Assange to the U.S. under Espionage Act charges.

Echoing leading civil liberties organizations and international newspapers, tribunal delegates made the case for why the prosecution against Assange poses an unprecedented threat to global press freedom.

Amy Goodman, host of “Democracy Now!” and tribunal co-chair, emphasized, “From Ankara to Manila to Budapest to right here in the United States, state actors are cracking down on journalists, their sources, their publishers in a globally coordinated campaign to disrupt the public’s access to information.”

“A landmark case in this campaign is that of Julian Assange,” Goodman added.

The International Implications Of The Assange Case

Nearly thirteen years ago, Julian Assange appeared at the National Press Club to show the world the “Collateral Murder” video.

At a time when the U.S. public still held some faith in the so-called “War on Terror” as a worthwhile endeavor, the leaked U.S. military footage revealed to the world the chaotic, often brutal nature of these U.S. interventions. It showed U.S. troops killing Iraqi civilians, as well as two Reuters journalists.

For exposing war crimes like those in the “Collateral Murder” video, Assange faces extradition to the U.S. where he would be tried under 17 counts of violating the Espionage Act. If convicted, he could be sentenced to 175 years in prison.

The charges announced while Donald Trump was president marked the first time the United States government had pursued an Espionage Act case against a publisher. President Joe Biden’s administration has largely ignored calls to drop the charges.

As noted, there is no shortage of individuals and organizations warning that putting Assange on trial will have a chilling effect on the First Amendment. The threat has been recognized by the editorial board of The New York Times, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, and Pentagon Papers whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, who was a delegate on the tribunal.

The case has international implications. Assange is an Australian citizen, but the United States has deemed it appropriate to try him under U.S. laws.

At best, this gives any undemocratic regime an easy opportunity to detract from their own attacks on the press by pointing the finger at the United States. At worst, it emboldens the U.S. to go after any reporter from any country of origin who publishes true and unflattering information about U.S. foreign policy. Plus, this case creates a playbook for other governments to copy in order to silence adversarial journalism.

Italian investigative journalist Stefania Maurizi testified at the Belmarsh Tribunal about her attempts to uncover the lengths the U.S. and other governments have gone to silence WikiLeaks and its sources. She closed her remarks with an appeal to the American public and media.

“I am aware that you are dealing with so much right now, but this case marks a point of no return for the United States and our democratic societies,” Maurizi contended. “In an authoritarian society, you cannot reveal war crimes, torture, and state criminality at the highest level, as Julian Assange did, and remain free and safe. They’ll kill you. In a democracy, it must be possible.”

Photo: Kevin Gosztola

An Appeal To Elected Politicians

Given the severity of the case, the Biden administration is facing growing condementation from organizations in the U.S. and around the world. The Belmarsh Tribunal and the organizations behind it have played an important role in amplifying the world’s calls for the United States to drop the charges against Assange.

Progressive International, which organized the tribunal, has focused on uniting various progressive movements, leaders, and media outlets from around the world.

The group has assembled prominent international voices, like Corbyn and Maurizi, through Belmarsh Tribunal events: President of Ecuador Rafael Correa, Greek economist and politician Yanis Varoufakis, former Guantanamo Bay detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi, Afghan feminist Selay Ghaffar, Indian Marxist historian Vijay Prashad, and Croatian philosopher and regular co-chair of the Belmarsh Tribunal Srecko Horvat.

Horvat said during his opening remarks, “United States, it’s really sad that someone like me has to come from Croatia to talk about the First Amendment.”

In his testimony, WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson spoke about meeting with various leaders of governments in Latin America over the past months, who denounced the case. These leaders included the presidents of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico.

The Belmarsh Tribunal will convene again in March in Sydney, Australia.

Last year, Anthony Albanese, the newly- elected Prime Minister of Australia urged the Biden administration to bring the pursuit of Assange to a “close.”

Despite the international pressure, the Biden administration has given no indication that it intends to drop the charges. All but a few elected officials in the U.S. have remained silent about the case, with relatively little interest from members of Congress.

From the National Press Club, just a few blocks away from the White House, Corbyn directly called on elected officials in the United States to pay attention and break their silence.

“Some politicians in a number of countries have spoken up, but I appeal to elected politicians in the United States, speak up to defend democracy,” Corbyn said. “Speak up against the powers of the Espionage Act. And speak up for Julian Assange, because our human rights are under threat all over the world.”

“Our actions around the world, in support of Julian, in support of the right to know can, and I believe will change the course of what’s going on.”

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Featured image: Jeremy Corbyn, member of the United Kingdom parliament, at the Belmarsh Tribunal in Washington, D.C. (Photo: Sam Carliner) 

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***

During a debate at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock bluntly stated that Germany and its allies are at war with Russia. The unexpected admission, although essentially true, is quite shocking given the fact that many Western officials have been insisting they aren’t directly involved in the conflict with Moscow. Baerbock made the statement during a discussion over sending “Leopard 2” heavy tanks to the Kiev regime. Most mainstream media conveniently ignored her words, but numerous experts were alarmed and warned that Berlin just essentially declared war on Russia.

This stands in stark contrast to claims of other German officials who have been extremely careful with their statements for nearly a year, insisting that their country is not directly involved in the Ukrainian conflict and citing uncontrollable escalation as their primary concern. However, this official stance is now in serious question, as one of the country’s top officials just effectively nullified all of their efforts. Annalena Baerbock started her statement at PACE with the following:

“And therefore I’ve said already in the last days – yes, we have to do more to defend Ukraine. Yes, we have to do more also on tanks. But the most important and the crucial part is that we do it together and that we do not do the blame game in Europe, because we are fighting a war against Russia and not against each other.”

Ironically, Chancellor Olaf Scholz and his now former defense minister Christine Lambrecht have been accused of being “weak” on arming the Neo-Nazi junta. They have frequently insisted that it would be dangerous to get more directly involved in NATO’s proxy war against Russia. However, it seems that the much more hawkish Baerbock is willing to say the quiet part out loud. Moscow immediately reacted to the comments, with Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova saying this is yet another proof that the political West was planning a war on Russia for quite some time now.

“If we add this to Merkel’s revelations that they were strengthening Ukraine and did not count on the Minsk agreements, then we are talking about a war against Russia that was planned in advance. Don’t say later that we didn’t warn you,” Zakharova said.

Baerbock’s comments come on the heels of nearly a year of direct Russophobic narrative, including openly declared plans for war with Russia. In mid-November, Der Spiegel published leaked German Defense Ministry documents, revealing that the Bundeswehr is preparing for war with Russia. The secret draft titled “Operational guidelines for the Armed Forces” was authored by none other than the German Chief of Staff, General Eberhard Zorn himself. He stressed the need for a “mega-reform” of the German military and clearly identified Russia as an “immediate threat”.

The claim makes little sense, as Germany is now over 1,500 km away from Russia, with Belarus, Poland and Ukraine standing between the two countries. While such assertions made some sense at the height of the (First) Cold War, when the Soviet Union had over half a million soldiers stationed in East Germany alone (in addition to other Warsaw Pact member states), the situation is effectively reversed nowadays. NATO is the one encroaching on Russia’s western borders, with the crawling expansion including coups and other interventions in various Eastern European and post-Soviet states. After decades of this creeping aggression and Moscow’s futile attempts to build a comprehensive partnership with the political West, Russia was forced to launch its counteroffensive.

Back in early March, the German government announced a dramatic increase in defense spending, including a €100 billion budget for the Bundeswehr, essentially double in comparison to 2021. Although this will inevitably put additional pressure on the already struggling German economy, ravaged by the sanctions boomerang from its failed economic siege of Russia, Berlin’s suicidal subservience to Washington DC seems to take precedence. Much of Germany’s prosperity was based on access to cheap Russian energy, now a thing of the past thanks to Berlin’s resurgent Russophobia.

In addition, Germany also uniquely holds historical responsibility on a scale virtually no other country in the world does, especially towards Russia. During the Second World War, it launched a brutal invasion of the Soviet Union, killing nearly 30 million people and destroying virtually everything in its path. Worse yet, after approximately 80 years of denazification in the aftermath of its WWII defeat, Berlin still decided to support the Neo-Nazi junta in Kiev, effectively renouncing its own official postwar political position. This also includes German weapons that are killing Russians, both soldiers and civilians.

Alarmed by the dramatic shift in rhetoric, many in Germany are already pointing out the fact that the country is repeating the same historical mistake by antagonizing Russia. Petr Bystron, an AfD (Alternative for Germany) member of the German Parliament, reminded his colleagues in the Bundestag of the consequences of sending German tanks to fight Russia in Ukraine:

“It’s an interesting approach you’re taking here. German tanks against Russia in Ukraine. By the way, your grandfathers have already tried to do it then with the Melnyks and Banderas [Ukrainian Nazi collaborators during WWII] and what was the result? Untold suffering, millions of deaths on both sides, and in the end, Russian tanks here in Berlin. And two of them are still here, in front of the Bundestag. You should pass by them every morning and remember it!”

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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

Featured image is from InfoBrics

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***

Several sources of data emerged in 2021 pointing to a biopharmaceutical public health disaster with the COVID-19 vaccine campaign.

Pfizer recorded 1223 deaths occurring shortly after administration of their product within the first 90 days of use starting December 10, 2020. Pantazatos and Seligmann reported an excess in all-cause mortality from vaccine administration and US census data during 2021 between 146k and 187k, with a midpoint of 166k deaths.

By the end of December, 2021, the CDC VAERS system had reported ~8K with an under-reporting factor of 30, the casualty estimate from that source was 240k. In a recent paper published in BMC Infectious Diseases, Dr. Mark Skidmore used a valid representative survey to learn from population reporting. A total of 22% knew of someone who was seriously injured by the vaccine and the estimate based upon deaths attributed to the vaccine by respondents was 278K deaths.

Skidmore, M. The role of social circle COVID-19 illness and vaccination experiences in COVID-19 vaccination decisions: an online survey of the United States population. BMC Infect Dis 23, 51 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12879-023-07998-3

In the Skidmore analysis, the average age of death reported was 48 years. This paper is important since it triangulates with two other sources for the same time interval with a conclusion that approximately one quarter of a million American lives where lost during the first year of the catastrophic COVID-19 vaccine campaign.

During 2021 the Delta outbreak took an additional toll with lives lost to the infection and there was no evidence to support a tradeoff.

That is, no randomized, double-blind, placebo controlled trial of COVID-19 vaccination demonstrated a reduction in death as a component of a primary or secondary endpoint.

The consent form for immunization does not list mortality reduction as an expected benefit yet it mentions death is possible with the vaccine. I anticipate more direct sources of information will become available including vaccine administration information from the CDC linked with the National Death Index. No matter what source is used, the number of deaths is far too large and the campaign should have been terminated for excess mortality before February, 1, 2021.

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Sources

Public Health and Medical Professionals for Transparency

Pantazatos S, Seligmann H. COVID vaccination and age-stratified all-cause mortality risk. ResearchGate Oct 2021

Skidmore, M. The role of social circle COVID-19 illness and vaccination experiences in COVID-19 vaccination decisions: an online survey of the United States population. BMC Infect Dis 23, 51 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12879-023-07998-3

Featured image is from NaturalNews.com

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ALERT MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: VETERAN INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS FOR SANITY (VIPS)
SUBJECT: Leopards vs. the Russian Bear

Decisions in an Intelligence Vacuum

Dear President Biden:

We are aware that the just-reported decision to send Abrams tanks to Ukraine responds to Berlin’s coy insistence that “you go first.” Now Leopard tanks from Germany and other allies will also be sent. Trouble is that those few that make it into Ukraine will be late to the party.

What your advisers should have told you is that none of the newly promised weaponry will stop Russia from defeating what’s left of the Ukrainian army. If you have been told otherwise, replace your intelligence and military advisers with competent professionals – the sooner the better.

Poorly Served

It has long been clear that you have not been adequately briefed on two issues of major importance: (1) the war in Ukraine, and (2) the strategic partnership between Russia and China. We chose this genre of “ALERT MEMORANDUM” because we want to prepare you for a major shock. Russia’s winter offensive is about to roll over the Ukrainian army. At that point, unwelcome choices will have to be made. Off-ramps must be sought – again, the sooner the better.

Your intelligence advisers seem blissfully unaware of what is coming. Still less do they appear able to offer you options to head off further disaster for Ukraine without still more dangerous escalation. As for China, the partnership with Russia is now so close that there is now a risk of a two-front war with two strong nuclear powers strongly supporting each other against the U.S.

Escalation Dominance

President Obama conceded, in a 2016 interview with The Atlantic, that Russia has escalation dominance in Ukraine, adding that Ukraine is a core interest of Russia but not of the US Thus, he warned, “we have to be very clear about what our core interests are and what we are willing to go to war for.” Moreover, Obama’s warning came several years before the Russia-China entente took the solid shape it enjoys today.

Several of us undersigned were intelligence officers during Vietnam 55 years ago, when the Vietnamese Communists mounted a fierce country-wide offensive at Tet (late Jan. – early Feb. 1968). Earlier, smiley-face intelligence reporting from the military in Saigon left policymakers totally unprepared for the debacle. Recrimination was so widespread and bitter that President Johnson announced the following month that he would not run again for president.

VIPs’ Record on ‘Fixed’ (Corrupted) Intelligence

Twenty years ago, before the US/UK attack on Iraq, we warned President George W. Bush repeatedly that ‘justification’ for such an attack was based on false intelligence. (See, for example, “Today’s Speech By Secretary Powell At The UN” and “Iraq Intel: Forgery, Hyperbole, Half-Truth.”) Five years later, the Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Jay Rockefeller, releasing the bipartisan conclusions of a 5-year committee investigation, summed them up with these words:

“In making the case for war, the [Bush] Administration repeatedly presented intelligence as fact when in reality it was unsubstantiated, contradicted, or even non-existent.”

‘Nonexistent’! Ponder that. Manufactured, fraudulent. In our Feb. 5, 2003 Memo on Secretary of State Colin Powell’s speech, we warned that the unintended consequences of an attack on Iraq were likely to be catastrophic. We also urged President Bush to widen the circle of his advisers “beyond those clearly bent on a war for which we see no compelling reason.”

President Biden, please consider widening your circle now. Bring in new blood, with proven experience and the ability to weigh things dispassionately and understand the perspectives of other countries.

Ukraine: No Compelling Reason

The issuances of your current top intelligence advisers rival those of Bush’s and Cheney’s fixers in disingenuousness. Their statements run from dishonest to naïve (see below). They betray a woeful lack of understanding of Russia’s strategic concerns and its determination to use its formidable military power to meet perceived external threats. The statements also reflect abysmal ignorance regarding how US behavior has led willy-nilly to a profound shift in the world correlation of forces in favor of Russia and China – to include making them military allies in all but name.

CIA Director William Burns was to be the proverbial ‘adult in the room.’ And yet we hear him promoting the notion that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was “unprovoked.” Burns was US ambassador 15 years ago when Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the US what to expect if Ukraine became a member of NATO. To his credit – back then – in a Feb. 1, 2008 cable to Washington titled “Nyet Means Nyet: NATO Enlargement Redlines,” Ambassador Burns reported:

“NATO enlargement, particularly to Ukraine, remains ‘an emotional and neuralgic’ issue for Russia, but strategic policy considerations also underlie strong opposition to NATO membership … . “In Ukraine, these include fears that the issue could potentially split the country in two, leading to violence or even, some claim, civil war, which would force Russia to decide whether to intervene.”

So much for “unprovoked.”

Intelligence Illusions

A review of statements made last month by CIA Director William Burns and National Intelligence Director Avril Haines turned up the following:

On Ukraine:

“What we see, at least at CIA, is a reduced tempo in fighting … as winter sets in. The Russian military is badly battered now.” (WB)

“We’re seeing kind of a reduced tempo … and sort of a slow-down … And we expect that likely to be what we see in the coming months. … And then once you get past winter … what will the counteroffensive look like … we actually have a fair amount of skepticism as to whether or not the Russians will be, in fact, prepared for that. … I think more optimistically for the Ukrainians in that timeframe.” (AH)

“We see shortages of ammunition … They [the Russians] are quite quickly [burning through military stockpiles of munition] … I mean it’s pretty extraordinary and our own sense is that they are not capable of indigenously producing what they are expending at this stage … their precision munitions are running out much faster.” (AH)

On China:

“Well, I think Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin have formed a pretty close partnership over recent years. A few weeks before Putin launched his invasion in Ukraine, when they met at the Winter Olympics in Beijing, they proclaimed a friendship without limits. There actually are some limits to that partnership … (WB)

Comment: In VIPs’s view, more important by far is that Putin got XI Jinping’s tacit approval for invading Ukraine when the Beijing Olympics were over. Whatever “limits” Burns has in mind pale in significance compared with XI’s willingness to give Putin, essentially, a waiver on China’s bedrock Westphalian principle of non-interference.

“China continues to play sort of both sides of this game, right? I mean they are continuing to work with Russia on a variety of things. They continue to do things like have meetings. … We don’t see anything that is determinative of military assistance. But there are things on the margins that concern us.” (AH)

Comment: On the margins? The tectonic shift to a two-against-one in the triangular superpower correlation of forces is deemed “on the margins” – not worth mentioning?

Putin: ‘This Is Simply Crazy’

Speaking on Oct. 27 at the Valdai International Discussion Club, President Putin questioned the sanity of those who would “spoil relations with China at the same time they are supplying billions-worth of weapons to Ukraine in a fight against Russia. …

“Frankly, I do not know why they are doing this. … Are they sane? It seems that this runs completely counter to common sense and logic … This is simply crazy. … Such irrational actions are rooted in arrogance and a sense of impunity.”

An Off-Ramp on Ukraine?

Also at Valdai on Oct. 27, Putin dropped a broad hint that, as the Russian army moves west, Moscow might agree to halt before taking Odessa, in return for concessions from US/NATO/Ukraine. A coy Hungarian journalist told Putin he was planning to visit Odessa. “Should I apply for a Russian or Ukrainian visa two years from now?” he asked.

We wonder if your advisers have told you of these remarks by Putin in response. (A missed opportunity?)

Odessa can be an apple of discord, a symbol of conflict resolution, and a symbol of finding some kind of solution to everything that is happening now. It is not a question of Russia. We have said many times that we are ready to negotiate … But the leaders of the Kiev regime have decided not to continue negotiations with the Russian Federation. It is true that the final word belongs to those who implement this policy in Washington. It is very easy for them to solve this problem: to send the appropriate signal to Kiev that they should change their position and seek a peaceful solution to these problems. And that will do it.

We don’t think Russia wants to occupy all, perhaps not even most, of Ukraine. In return for flexibility on the part of Washington/Kiev, we suggest the Russians might consider stopping their advance at the Dniepr River and try to arrange talks to create some kind of demilitarized zone from Odessa northward roughly along the Dniepr. This would leave Ukraine with access to the sea. It may not be too late to follow up on Putin’s late-October hint at Valdai. What’s to lose?

All possible off-ramps should be explored seriously. The alternatives are all quite grim.

Bottom Line

Russia is not only determined to prevail but has the means to prevail in Ukraine – the infusion of arms form the West notwithstanding. Paraphrasing President Obama, Russia sees an existential threat in Ukraine, while Ukraine poses no serious threat to the US It is a fact of life that nuclear powers do not tolerate existential threats on their border. And there is zero evidence to support the charge that “after Ukraine, Putin will go after other European countries.” The old Soviet Union is dead and gone. R.I.P.

Nor can Putin be dismissed as paranoid. He has heard from the lips of US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin:

“One of the US’s goals in Ukraine is to see a weakened Russia. … The US is ready to move heaven and earth to help Ukraine win the war against Russia.”

Can the US achieve Austin’s goal? Not without using nuclear weapons.

Thus, there is a large conceptual – and exceptionally dangerous – disconnect. Simply stated, it is not possible to “win the war against Russia” AND avoid WWIII. It is downright scary that Defense Secretary Austin may think it possible. In any case, the Kremlin has to assume he thinks so. It is a very dangerous delusion.

FOR THE STEERING GROUP,
VETERAN INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS FOR SANITY (VIPs)

• Richard H. Black, Senator of Virginia, 13th District; Colonel US Army (ret.); former Chief, Criminal Law Division, Office of the Judge Advocate General, the Pentagon (associate VIPS)
• Bogdan Dzakovic, former Team Leader of Federal Air Marshals and Red Team, FAA Security, (ret.) (associate VIPS)
• Graham E. Fuller, Vice-Chair, National Intelligence Council (ret.)
• Philip Giraldi, CIA, Operations Officer (ret.)
• Matthew Hoh, former Capt., USMC, Iraq and Foreign Service Officer, Afghanistan (associate VIPS)
• Larry C. Johnson, former CIA and State Department Counter Terrorism officer
• John Kiriakou, former CIA Counterterrorism Officer and former senior investigator, Senate Foreign Relations Committee
• Karen Kwiatkowski, former Lt. Col., US Air Force (ret.), at Office of Secretary of Defense watching the manufacture of lies on Iraq, 2001-2003
• Ray McGovern, former US Army infantry/intelligence officer & CIA analyst; CIA Presidential briefer (ret.)
• Elizabeth Murray, former Deputy National Intelligence Officer for the Near East, National Intelligence Council & CIA political analyst (ret.)
• Pedro Israel Orta, former CIA and Intelligence Community (Inspector General) officer
• Todd E. Pierce, MAJ, US Army Judge Advocate (ret.)
• Scott Ritter, former MAJ, USMC; former UN Weapons Inspector, Iraq
• Coleen Rowley, FBI Special Agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal Counsel (ret.)
• Lawrence Wilkerson, Colonel (USA, ret.), Distinguished Visiting Professor, College of William and Mary (associate VIPS)
• Sarah G. Wilton, CDR, USNR, (ret.); Defense Intelligence Agency (ret.)
• Robert Wing, former Foreign Service Officer (associate VIPS)
• Ann Wright, retired U.S. Army reserve colonel and former U.S. diplomat who resigned in 2003 in opposition to the Iraq War

*

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***

I interviewed virologist Dr. Byram Bridle, Associate Professor, Department of Pathology, Guelph University, Ontario

He points out that there is no evidence of benefit. If anything, all the evidence shows the vaccines INCREASE risk of infection, hospitalization, death

***

According to Professor Bridle, at best, there are no benefits for the COVID vaccines.

But the data shows they make the problem worse in every metric: infections, hospitalizations, and deaths. You’ve been completely misled by the medical community about these vaccines.

There isn’t a single “expert” in the world who is willing to show Professor Bridle that he got it wrong.

Here’s my latest interview with Professor Byram Bridle:

Ratings so far: 63 thumbs up; 0 thumbs down.

If you don’t have time to watch the whole thing, here’s the takeaway:

1. Byram is pissed. Pfizer’s own trial with over 40,000 participants showed NO EVIDENCE of a mortality or hospitalization benefit. If anything, it showed the reverse. (See Figure 1 below). The “benefits” were not statistically significant because the effect sizes were tiny.
2. The focus needs to be on the absolute risk reduction which is miniscule.
3. Each shot increases your risk of COVID infection (See Figure 2 below)
4. There has NEVER been a vaccine in medicine which made you more likely to be infected, yet reduced your risk of hospitalization/death. NEVER.
5. There is NO PLAUSIBLE MECHANISM OF ACTION which would enable these vaccines to reduce your risk of hospitalization and death. Why hasn’t anyone explained this? Will you debate Professor Bridle? Why not?
6. In short, there are no benefits to these vaccines. You’ve been completely misled by the medical community about these vaccines and there isn’t a single “expert” in the world who is willing to show Professor Bridle that he got it wrong.

Figure 1. This shows that Pfizer’s own data shows that the vaccine increased your risk of severe adverse events, hospitalization, and death. This is the best case since the vaccine matched the variant.

Figure 2. The CDC wants you to ignore this excellent study by the Cleveland Clinic of over 51,000 participants (their employees) which clearly shows that the more shots you get, the greater the risk of infection. All participants were working age employees of the hospital. This is real-life data and the pro-vax community hopes you will never read the study.

UK doctors speak out

If you haven’t yet seen this video of the UK doctors speaking out, check it out. It’s consistent with the data Byram presented:

UK doctors who are not afraid to speak out. They will lose their license because they speak the truth — this is how “science” works nowadays. Speaking the truth is no longer acceptable to the medical community.

Meanwhile, the US Senate is focused on more urgent issues than saving lives: Taylor Swift ticketing problems

Most people think dying suddenly is a more important issue…

but the US Senate clearly believes that Taylor Swift tickets are much more important:

I can’t get a single US Senator (other than Ron Johnson) who is interested in exploring why so many people in the US are dying suddenly. It’s really strange.

Summary

This interview with Professor Byram Bridle makes it crystal clear that the COVID vaccines make the pandemic worse; that’s what the highest quality evidence shows.

There was no evidence in the gold standard trials that the vaccines decrease your risk of hospitalization or death. If anything, it’s the reverse. Even with 44,000 people in the trial, the effect was too small to achieve statistical significance!

This evidence has been in plain sight for over a year. By my estimate, over 500,000 people have been killed by these vaccines in the US alone. No prominent expert anywhere in the world will debate me or any of my colleagues about this. Byram pleaded in this video for anyone to show he is wrong.

But the US Senate is focused on looking into more important issues, namely Taylor Swift concert ticketing issues.

I hope that someday, members of Congress (other than Senator Ron Johnson) will return my calls. Maybe in a couple of years, after we have the concert ticketing problems all sorted out.

*

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The Mexican government has announced a moratorium on solar geoengineering experiments following an unauthorized small scale experiment by a U.S. startup. How will the decision impact the plans of globalists who aim to use geoengineering as a gateway to world governance?

Only weeks ago, Luke Iseman, the CEO of Make Sunsets, the company behind the experiment, announced to the world that he had released two weather balloons filled with reflective sulfur particles as part of publicity stunt meant to spark conversation around the science of geoengineering.

Geoengineering is a controversial science of manipulating the climate for the stated purpose of fighting man-made climate change. There are several types of geoengineering, including Solar Radiation Management (SRM) or solar geoengineering.  Stratospheric aerosol injection, or SAI, is a specific solar geoengineering practice which involves spraying aerosols into the sky in an attempt to deflect the Sun’s rays. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is currently developing a five-year research plan on solar geoengineering.

Iseman launched the balloons in Baja California, Mexico without seeking approval from the Mexican government or local authorities. This prompted the Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources to release a statement condemning the experiment and banning further solar geoengineering attempts until further notice. The Mexican government also said it will practice the precautionary principle to protect communities and the environment against potential dangers of geoengineering.

The Secretariat noted that “studies show negative impacts due to the release of these aerosols and that they cause meteorological imbalances”. The statement also mentions previous international agreements which are designed to limit the use of geoengineering techniques, including the 2010 United Nations (UN) Convention on Biological Diversity, which established a moratorium on the deployment of geoengineering.

The Center for International Environmental Law applauded Mexico’s response and called on “all governments to take steps to ban solar geoengineering outdoor experiments, technology development, and deployment.”

Luke Iseman, CEO of Make Sunsets, appears to be something of a climate change extremist. In December, Iseman told Climate Change News that the experiment was “part entrepreneurial and part provocation, an act of geoengineering activism”. Iseman also said that within his company, “We joke slash not joke that this is partly a company and partly a cult”.

Iseman also recognized that some groups will make him “look like the Bond villain”, but he believes “it’s morally wrong, in my opinion, for us not to be doing this”.

The Potential Dangers of Solar Geoengineering

The Mexican Secretariat promised further coordination with experts to review the existing scientific research to “expose the serious risks that solar geoengineering practices represent for the environment, peoples and their community settings”. The Secretariat also acknowledged that,

“there are enough studies that show that there would be negative and unequal impacts associated with the release of these aerosols, which cause meteorological imbalances such as winds and torrential rains, as well as droughts in tropical areas; in addition to generating impacts on the thinning of the planet’s ozone layer”.

For the last decade I have reported on studies highlighting the dangers posed by solar geoengineering. For example, in 2018, I reported that a team at University of California, Berkeley found evidence that geoengineering will likely reduce the yields of certain crops. The researchers came to this conclusion by studying previous volcanic eruptions in Mexico and the Philippines. The 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines and El Chichon in Mexico in 1982 caused a decrease in wheat, soy, and rice production due to the volcanic ash blocking sun light.

The researchers concluded that “projected mid-twenty-first century damages due to scattering sunlight caused by solar radiation management are roughly equal in magnitude to benefits from cooling”.

One of the other dangers of solar geoengineering is the potential loss of blue skies. According to a report by the New Scientist, Ben Kravitz of the Carnegie Institution for Science has shown that releasing sulphate aerosols high in the atmosphere would scatter sunlight into the atmosphere. He says this could decrease the amount of sunlight that hits the ground by 20% and make the sky appear more hazy.

Although a number of authorities have warned about the dangers of geoengineering techniques, the risks are seen as secondary to the perceived risks of climate change. The interesting thing to note is that although proponents of geoengineering hail it as the solution to climate change and sustaining life, research indicates that geoengineering could actually have the reverse effect of heating the Earth.

According to a 2013 study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, if geoengineering programs were started and then suddenly halted the planet could see an immediate rise in temperatures, particularly over land. The study, titled “The impact of abrupt suspension of solar radiation management”, seems to indicate that once you begin geoengineering you cannot suspend the programs without causing the very problem you were seeking to resolve.

Further, in February of 2015, an international committee of scientists released a report stating that geoengineering techniques are not a viable alternative to reducing greenhouse gas emissions to combat the effects of climate change. The committee report called for further research and understanding of various geoengineering techniques, including carbon dioxide removal schemes and solar-radiation management before implementation.

The scientists found that solar geoengineering techniques are likely to present “serious known and possible unknown environmental, social, and political risks, including the possibility of being deployed unilaterally.” The report was sponsored by the National Academy of Sciences, the U.S. intelligence community, NASA, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the U.S. Department of Energy.

The Intelligence-Military-Weather Manipulation Complex

As more studies confirm the dangers posed by geoengineering technologies it’s time for an honest public conversation about the reality of geoengineering programs. While any suggestion that these programs may actually already be taking place is derided as the “chemtrails conspiracy theory”, one must only look at the history of U.S. military and intelligence interest in modifying and controlling the weather.

Geoengineering itself is part of a broader category of weather manipulation technology that also includes more common tools like cloud seeding. Cloud seeding was used in the Vietnam War as the U.S. military attempted to flood the Viet Gong with rain storms as part of Operation Popeye.

From 1967 to 1972, the U.S. military conducted cloud-seeding operations over the Ho-Chi Minh trail during the Vietnam War. Cloud-seeding typically involves planes flying overhead and spraying silver iodide into the air. The goal in Vietnam was to extend monsoon season and flood out the enemy. It was reported that the operations were “tightly controlled” by Henry Kissinger, who was serving as Secretary of State at the time. Operation Popeye is the first modern example (that we know of) where attempts were made to use weather as a weapon of war.

In April 1976, the New York Times wrote about the situation and the challenges weather modification created:

“Can a nation that tampers with natural balances deny responsibility for what follows? This question, together with recognition that United States policy condemns warfare aimed at civilians, prompted Senator Claiborne Pell in 1973 to introduce a resolution calling for an international treaty to prohibit environmental warfare ‘or the carrying out of any research or experimentation directed thereto.’ The Senate voted 82 to 10 to approve the resolution, which lacks force of law.”

The international treaty referred to is the Environmental Modification Treaty implemented and signed by the United States and other nations to halt global weather modification in the wake of the bad publicity. The Times noted:

“Unfortunately it is far weaker than the Senate resolution. For example, it fails to prohibit military research or development of environmental‐modification techniques, and allows all ‘peaceful’ work on such things.”

Essentially, as long as a nation claims they are conducting peaceful weather modification they are not violating the treaty. There is also a 1996 document entitled “Weather as a Force Multiplier: Owning the Weather by 2025”  in which the U.S. Air Force discussed a number of proposals for using the weather as a weapon of war.

The weak enforcement of the Environmental Modification Treaty or UN agreements and lack of a mechanism to enforce and punish violations of the treaty, has also been used as a way to call for global governance schemes. I warned back in 2017 that Geoengineering was a gateway to global government.

The U.S. military is not alone in their interest in geoengineering technology. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has also discussed the potential use of geoengineering.

In 2015, I reported that Professor Alan Robock gave a speech where he discussed the possibility that the CIA is using the weather as a weapon of war. Robock has previously conducted research for the intergovernmental panel on climate change (IPCC). Robock stated he was phoned by two men claiming to be from the CIA, asking whether or not it was possible for hostile governments to use geoengineering against the United States.

“I got a phone call from two men who said we work as consultants for the CIA and we’d like to know if some other country was controlling our climate, would we know about it?”

[…] “I’d learned of lots of other things the CIA had done that haven’t followed the rules and I thought that wasn’t how I wanted my tax money spent. I think this research has to be in the open and international so there isn’t any question of it being used for hostile purposes.“

One year later, in June 2016, John Brennan, then-Director of the CIA, spoke at a Council on Foreign Relations meeting about threats to global security. Brennan mentioned a number of threats to stability before discussing the science of geoengineering. Brennan said the technologies “potentially could help reverse the warming effects of global climate change.”

Brennan specifically mentions stratospheric aerosol injection. As Brennan notes, SAI is “a method of seeding the stratosphere with particles that can help reflect the sun’s heat, in much the same way that volcanic eruptions do. Brennan goes on to claim that an SAI geoengineering program could limit global temperature increases, a claim that has been disputed in several studies.

With all we know about the lies of the CIA, the U.S. government, and military, is it really that outlandish to suspect the U.S. government (and other governments) could be shielding the public from the truth regarding geoengineering programs?

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***

The Middle East is set to deepen its foothold in Europe’s energy market when a ban on Russian diesel and petroleum products kicks in on 5 February, bolstered by new refineries, favourable geography and potentially, additional shipments of Russian product.

Europe has rushed to stockpile diesel ahead of the ban, even increasing purchases from Moscow before its largest external supplier is cut off, in a bid to prevent shortages of the fuel which is a lifeblood for the farming, construction, manufacturing and transportation industries.

“The Middle East turns out to be a big winner to replace Russian material in Europe,” Ed Morse, the global head of commodities research at Citigroup, told Middle East Eye. “And then further benefit from it by importing Russian material themselves.”

Gulf states have already traded places with Russia in the crude market, redirecting sales to Europe, while Moscow muscles in on their traditional customers in Asia with cut-rate prices.

The global energy trade’s rewiring is a result of western penalties imposed over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

On 5 December, EU states banned Russian crude and G-7 countries instituted a $60 per barrel price cap. While Europe largely managed to wean itself off raw Russian oil ahead of the ban, it has continued to rely on it for refined products like diesel.

Before the war in Ukraine, Russia accounted for about half of Europe’s diesel imports. In December, the EU and UK purchased 663,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Russian diesel – about 40 percent of total seaborne shipments -underscoring the supply crunch the bloc faces in less than three weeks.

Gulf exports of crude, along with refined products like diesel, fuel oil and jet fuel to Europe have surged in early 2023, as the EU scours the market for new suppliers.

In the first 12 days of 2023, the UAE exported 133,000 bpd of petroleum and related products to Europe, breaking monthly records for January since 2017, according to data shared with MEE by Kpler, a firm that tracks petroleum shipping. Saudi Arabia’s exports of 282,000 bpd in the same time period surpass entire January levels since 2019.

The diesel ban comes at a fortuitous time for Gulf states, just as they prepare to roll out a slew of new mega-refineries.

Kuwait is especially well-placed to capitalise on the ban, Morse from Citigroup says.

The tiny emirate is ramping up production at its new al-Zour refinery – one of the largest oil refineries in the world – which will have the capacity to process 615,000 barrels of crude a day when it is fully operational. In November, Kuwait shipped its first batch of jet fuel from the site.

“They are prepared with new refining capacity to sell diesel into Europe…and actively take market share,” Morse said.

Kuwait’s diesel sales to Europe in the first 12 days of January underscore how Gulf producers have pounced on disruptions in the global energy market to boost exports.

Monthly diesel exports from Kuwait to Europe stood at 59,000 bpd as of 12 January, almost triple the levels for all of January 2022, and about 900 percent more than January 2021, according to Kpler.

Saudi Arabia is ramping up its Jazan refinery, which is expected to produce more than 200,000 bpd of diesel when it reaches full capacity later this year. Oman’s Duqm refinery is also slated to open at the end of 2023. Analysts say it will increase the sultanate’s ability to refine crude into diesel and other fuels by about 200,000 bpd.

Despite the Middle East’s new heft, analysts warn Europe will have to turn to a multitude of fuel suppliers, including the US and India, to fill Russia’s void. Middle Eastern diesel imports into Europe peaked in September at 500,000 bpd, but were still below the continent’s normal flow from Russia.

“For the Middle East to fully displace all Russian diesel going to Europe, it would require a massive redirection of flows away from other, non-European receivers of Middle East diesel,” Jay Maroo, lead crude analyst at Vortexa, told MEE.

“What is more likely to happen is a rise in supplies to Europe from multiple exporters,” he added.

‘Sprinkle it like Salt Bae’

The Middle East may also buy shunned Russian products on the cheap and re-export them, putting the region in a sweet spot to play both sides of the looming ban, analysts say.

This past summer, Saudi Arabia gorged on cheap Russian fuel oil, allowing crude the kingdom normally uses for domestic needs – like running air conditioners – to be exported at higher prices abroad.

“The ultimate truth is that oil products are fungible,” Clay Seigle, director of global oil service at Rapidan Energy Group, told MEE. “If you use some, that frees up others to be diverted elsewhere.”

Egypt, a small-time energy producer compared to Saudi Arabia, has also jumped into the game. Cairo imported record levels of Russian fuel and furnace oil last year, re-exporting much of it to Saudi Arabia but also burning it at home to free up natural gas for export.

“With the February 5 ban, there are more opportunities for that kind of displacement or substitution,” Seigle said.

Tunisia offers a vivid example of the cottage industry that has sprung up “washing” Russian material, where petroleum products are imported and then relabelled under a different country of origin to make them more palatable.

The energy-poor North African country started importing huge quantities of Russian naphtha in August. Imports of the liquid hydrocarbon peaked at 61,000 bpd in October, up from zero the previous years, according to Kpler. The Naptha was re-exported abroad, mainly to South Korea.

Tunisia is the “transhipment story in real life”, Viktor Katona, an analyst at Kpler, told MEE. Transhipment is the process where goods are unloaded from one ship and loaded onto another ship to complete the journey.

Katona predicts the Tunisia model will be replicated across North Africa once the EU’s diesel ban and G-7 price cap on petroleum products takes effect. Russia is already ramping up diesel shipments to Morocco.

“These countries are on the Mediterranean where shipping voyages to Europe are short,” he said. “I can see a lot of symbiotic relationships between the Russians and North African countries.”

Those best placed to capitalise on transhipment have big storage facilities, analysts and traders say. Egypt has such terminals at the ports of Ain Sokhna and Sidi Kerir, and the UAE has Fujairah. Russia’s state-owned energy giant Lukoil moved its trading operations to Dubai last year.

According to EU rules, Russian crude must be “substantially transformed” in order to be exempt from sanctions. Technically, blending Russian diesel with another batch may not skirt the ban, but analysts say the rules are opaque, and in practice, it’s difficult to trace diesel’s origin.

“In effect, if you take a cargo of Russian diesel into Algeria or Egypt and sprinkle it Salt Bae style with a few drops of someone else’s diesel, it’s no longer Russian,” Katona said, in reference to the famed Turkish cook’s practice of sprinkling salt.

Seigle, from Rapidan energy, said western regulators are unlikely to track such activity because the aim of sanctions is to limit Moscow’s ability to profit from petroleum sales while keeping Russian supplies on the market.

“If enough Russian volumes go un-purchased, and Russia is forced to reduce production, then some Russian gas oil could be removed from the market,” he said. “The interest of western governments is to prevent a major price spike.”

‘So that we can come in’  

The potential to make lucrative returns repackaging Russian products could also draw in Turkey, which has already emerged as one of the top buyers of shunned Russian oil.

In December, Russia exported 175,000 bpd of diesel to Turkey, a record high according to Kpler data since 2018. So far, the Russian intake has not corresponded with a subsequent rise in Turkish diesel exports, but that could change with more Russian diesel flowing to Turkey this month.

“Turkey says it wants to position itself as a transhipment hub for Russian gas, but it could be a huge transhipment hub for Russian crude products with its Aegean refineries,” Katona said.

But Ankara’s reliance on Russia for supply, like other potential hubs that lack oil reserves, might be too blatant a play for European countries looking to go cold Turkey on the Kremlin’s offerings. Buyers could also be turned off by market uncertainty.

“I don’t see Turkey able to play a middleman role buying cheap Russian oil and product,” Gregory Gause, an expert in Middle Eastern politics at Texas A&M University, told MEE.

“The Russians could get mad at the Turks and simply not sell them oil. That is the Russian playbook. Where would that leave buyers?” he added.

The big winners of Europe’s energy divorce from Russia are traditional Gulf petrostates, as the diesel ban “reinforces” their status as a linchpin in the global oil market, Gause said. It’s a development that may have geopolitical and economic implications as the EU moves to deepen ties with the Arab monarchies.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz visited Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar as part of a grand Gulf tour in September to secure energy shipments. On Wednesday, the German leader told Bloomberg he believed Europe’s largest economy would avoid a much-anticipated recession thanks to Berlin locking in new suppliers.

Gulf investments in Europe may serve as a metric for the durability of this new era of rewired fuel flows.

“Traditionally the Saudis have made investments in refining in regions where they sell their crude,” Gause said, pointing to projects in Asia as an example.

Some early signs have emerged. In November, Aramco completed three deals with a Polish refiner and fuel retailer. In one acquisition, which materialised just before the war in Ukraine erupted, the Saudi state-owned oil giant gained a 30 percent stake in Poland’s second-largest refinery.

“The investments will widen Aramco’s presence in the European downstream sector and further expand its crude imports into Poland,” the company said in a press statement on 12 January.

Gulf states have traditionally shied away from Europe, which they view as a declining oil market with ageing populations and lofty green energy goals, as opposed to Asia. Europe has also put more red tape around fossil fuel investments, but with Russia’s invasion, both have been forced to make a U-turn.

In October, Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said the kingdom was eyeing more sales to Europe.

“We are engaged with so many governments. Just to give you an example, Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Romania and others. They are going through a phase of debottlenecking their supply chains and supply systems to ensure that we can come in.”

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***

The finest modern military thinker, Maj. Gen J.F.C. Fuller, wrote “the true objective of war is not military victory but the peace that follows it.’

Amen. Besotted by tribalism and propaganda, we often forget why we are fighting and what changes the current war will bring. We think killing fellow humans is a noble quest rather than the basest Stone Age behavior.

Case in point, the current war in Ukraine. There, ex-Russians now rebranded “Ukrainians” are battling Russia’s not so competent armies.

The United States and its vassals are pouring arms and money galore into the rebellious Ukraine – over $100 billion to date. This is an amazing amount of money considering hardly anyone in the US had ever heard of Ukraine and certainly couldn’t find it on a map, and that this flood of money comes from the US which is itself on the financial ropes and operating on borrowed money.

Getting America so deeply involved in the obscure Ukraine War was thanks to truly monumental propaganda produced by the six US government-controlled TV channels and court newspapers. Its 24-7 happy news about Ukraine and constant vilification of re-demonized Russia.

We are in fact involved in a war that dares not speak its name. Russia denies it’s a war at all and claims to be fighting a recrudescence of Euro fascism. The US and its subservient allies also deny a war is going on, while pouring arms and munition on an almost WWII scale into Ukraine – whose government the US spent $5 billion overthrowing.

Russia won’t call this war a war, still pretending it’s a `police action’ – rather like the past US invasions of Panama, the Dominican Republic and Haiti. But, as western arms and covert troops pour into Ukraine and Russia can’t manage to field adequate troops or weapons, holding on to the ‘police action’ fiction is preposterous.

What’s happening in Washington is that the Democrat neo-liberals smell Russian blood and are intoxicated by the prospect of first Russian defeat in Ukraine, then the collapse of the current Russian federation made up of 83 supposedly sovereign units. Russia is very fragile and vulnerable to foreign-engineered unrest. Russia’s Far East is dangerously exposed between US and Chinese ambitions.

The dramatic transformation of most of the formerly staunch communist republic of Ukraine into an arch-anti-communist Kiev republic is a dire warning signal for Moscow. Russian leader Dimitry Medvedev just warned that Russia’s defeat in Ukraine would trigger a nuclear war. He could be right.

The leading American neocon, Victoria Nuland, boasted that it cost only $5 billion to overthrow Ukraine’s former inept communist regime and replace it by a TV actor, Volodymyr Zelensky. The Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine don’t even have a capable spokesman.

It’s by now clear that the so-called non-war in Ukraine is dangerously escalating towards a full-scale US-NATO-Russia war that might turn into World War III. The duty of great powers is to keep world affairs calm.

Instead, the US and its European satraps keep pouring fuel on the fire. Ukraine, once infamous as Europe’s most corrupt nation, is happily gulping down the billions from the US and Europe. Swiss banks are making a killing. So too arms manufacturers who had been facing flat or declining sales before this jolly little war.

Germany, the keystone of NATO power, is caught between its sensible goal of keeping good relations with Moscow and its subservience to Washington. If the Ukraine war intensifies, Germany will be caught in the middle – an obvious target for Russian tactical nuclear strikes.

Who in Washington has begun to add up the costs of keeping post-war Ukraine going. Without a steady inflow of billions from the US and its rich allies, Ukraine will likely collapse into warring fiefs. Worse, if Russia is somehow defeated, who will assume its financial upkeep and prevent this nuclear superpower from running amok? Will China sit back and allow its only major ally to be splintered? Would militants in China’s leadership not beat the war drums to re-occupy border regions lost in the 19th century to Imperial Russia?

Time for the Great American power to act to bring peace and stability, not more war.

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U.S. leaders and their media allies have fostered numerous, self-serving myths about the war in Ukraine. One myth is that Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine was entirely unprovoked, since NATO’s expansion to Russia’s border was not a hostile act. Another fable is that Ukraine is a freedom-loving democracy. Still another is that the Russia-Ukraine war is not merely an ugly turf fight between 2 corrupt, autocratic regimes, but is instead part of an existential global struggle between democracy and authoritarianism. Failure to sustain “democratic” Ukraine, the story goes, would jeopardize the entire “rules-based international order.”

US and NATO officials likely do not believe a word of those arguments, even as they avidly circulate such propaganda. However, they do seem to subscribe to another, more dangerous myth: that the Alliance can provide ever greater amounts of financial aid and more powerful weaponry to Ukraine without becoming an active belligerent in the war. The latest development is a commitment by the United States and Germany to send heavy battle tanks (Abrams and Leopard 2s) to Kyiv – a step that hawks had been advocating for weeks.

The United States also has approved the transfer of Patriot air defense missiles to Kyiv. Despite continued wariness, the Biden administration may even change its policy about supplying Ukraine with long-range artillery rockets capable of striking targets inside Russia. A dramatic escalation of US and NATO involvement in the Ukraine war is taking place – and that move is yet another reckless provocation toward Russia.

The Biden administration and NATO are playing a very dangerous game by engaging in such an escalation of its assistance to one side in an increasingly emotional and destructive conflict. Washington’s approach is to use Ukraine as a pawn (a proxy) to bloody and perhaps even defeat the Russian invaders, without NATO ending up in a direct war with Russia. It is a replication of the strategy Washington used in Afghanistan, providing military aid to the rebel mujahidin to harass, bleed, and eventually force the Soviet Union to execute a humiliating withdrawal.

However, using the same strategy in Ukraine is vastly more dangerous. By virtue of its greater size and more important location, Ukraine is a crucial strategic stake for Moscow in ways that Afghanistan never was. Therefore, the Kremlin is unlikely to tolerate the humiliation of losing the war. Russia’s focus since Ukraine’s surprising territorial gains in its autumn offensive has been on destroying that country’s infrastructure, especially its power grid, and to inflict unbearable casualties on Ukrainian troops. Given that Russia’s population is more than 3 times larger than Ukraine’s, and its military forces are also much more numerous, Kyiv’s ability to win this new war of attrition on its own is improbable. NATO’s dramatic, risky escalation of its military assistance to Kyiv suggests that Western leaders may have reached a similar conclusion, and decided that they cannot sacrifice their pawn.

The Kremlin’s anger at NATO’s deepening involvement in the Ukraine war has been building for months. Yet US and NATO leaders seem oblivious to the danger that the Russian government will decide at some point that it can no longer tolerate NATO being an unofficial belligerent in the war. Vladimir Putin’s longtime top aide, Dmitry Medvedev, has already contended that NATO is at war with Russia.

The conventional wisdom among members of transatlantic foreign policy blob is that such warnings are just posturing – that Russia would never dare take military action against a NATO member. It is not a comforting realization that many of the same individuals were equally certain that Moscow’s repeated warnings since 2007 that any attempt to make Ukraine a NATO member or military asset would cross a “red line” for Russia were just a bluff. The war in Ukraine is definitive evidence that such assumptions were wrong.

What if the conventional wisdom in the West that Russia will continue indefinitely to tolerate NATO’s provision of ever more powerful weapons to Moscow’s enemy proves equally erroneous? Russia’s national symbol is the bear, and a bear is one dangerous animal. A cornered bear is an especially dangerous animal. Western policymakers would be wise to remember that point before pushing the Russian government into a corner with respect to the Ukraine war.

Belligerent status in a war is like pregnancy in one important sense. It is not possible to be half-pregnant. Likewise, it is not possible for the United States or other NATO countries to be “sort of” non-belligerents in the Ukraine war. Washington and its allies have sought to maintain such an impossibly precarious status, but they are now careening toward becoming full-fledged belligerents, regardless of attempts to preserve the legal fiction to the contrary. One cannot overstate the danger of that strategy.

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Ted Galen Carpenter, a senior fellow in defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute, is the author of 13 books and more than 1,100 articles on international affairs. His latest book is Unreliable Watchdog: The News Media and U.S. Foreign Policy (2022).

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***

The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis published a jaw-droppingly misleading graph that portrays China as spending more on its military than the US. In reality, the Pentagon’s budget is roughly three times larger.

In an attempt to grossly exaggerate China’s defense spending, and simultaneously downplay the US military budget, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis published a jaw-droppingly deceptive graph.

If a student presented this in a statistics 101 class, the teacher would likely give them an F. But because it involves Washington’s public enemy number one, Beijing, the US regional reserve bank was awarded a Golden Star for exemplary service in the New Cold War.

The St. Louis Fed listed the world’s top six countries by military expenditures, but used two separate axes: the spending of China, Russia, Britain, India, and Saudi Arabia was depicted on the left axis, which went from $0 to $300 billion; but a separate right axis was created just for the United States, which went from $400 billion to $1 trillion.

This extremely misleading graph made it look as though China spends more on its military than the United States.

An analysis looks at how defense spending among the nations with the highest expenditures has changed since 1992 and what may have driven the changes https://t.co/3ln08vOKAo pic.twitter.com/yqK6MqwQUm

— St. Louis Fed (@stlouisfed) January 22, 2023

But in reality, China’s defense budget in 2021 was $270 billion, whereas that of the US was $767.8 billion – nearly three times larger (in constant 2020 US dollars).

The Pentagon budget subsequently ballooned to $782 billion in 2022 (in 2022 dollars), and $858 billion in 2023 (in 2023 dollars).

If the graph were edited to put all of the countries on the same axis, one can see how massive US military expenditure is compared to other top spenders:

When the St. Louis Fed published the deceptive graph on Twitter, it went viral, garnering hundreds of negative responses.

Michael P. McDonald, a professor of political science at the University of Florida, quipped, “If they’re willing to put this out, just imagine the internal analyses the Fed conducts to manage the economy”.

In an accompanying report, the St. Louis Fed admitted that China’s 2021 defense spending was just 1.7% of GDP, “which was the lowest share among the six nations in the figure”.

Moreover, Beijing’s military expenditure as a percentage of GDP has stayed very consistent since the early 1990s, with no increases.

“China’s defense-to-GDP ratio has been almost a flat line since 1992 at around 2%, suggesting that its defense outlays have grown almost proportionally to its GDP”, the Fed conceded. “In turn, this means that the rapid rise of China’s defense spending seen in the first figure reflects the rapid rise in its GDP”.

But the US Department of Defense has dubbed China its top “threat”, and major media outlets like Foreign Policy have acknowledged that the Pentagon is preparing for war with Beijing.

This new cold war hysteria is reflected in shockingly unprofessional displays from supposed economic and political experts.

A much more accurate graphic created by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation shows how, as of 2022, the United States spent more on its military than the next nine largest spenders combined – including China, India, the UK, Russia, France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Japan, and South Korea (and several of these countries are close US allies).

Beijing’s military spending is even smaller when it is measured per capita.

China is the most populous country on Earth, with more than 1.4 billion people – four times larger than the US population of just over 330 million.

When measured per capita, US military spending is close to the world’s highest, just under Israel and the United Arab Emirates, at $2351 per person as of 2020 (in constant 2019 dollars).

China’s per capita military spending that same year was a mere $175, representing only 7% of per capita US military spending. (Russia’s was $423 – lower than that of Lithuania, Portugal, and Belgium.)

And all of these US spending figures could be conservative, as they are based on the official Pentagon budget. Actual US military expenditure is often estimated to be even higher, and the Defense Department has failed every audit it has attempted, with tens of trillions of dollars worth of spending that is unaccounted for.

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***

Covert training camps in the Jordanian desert are currently the site of British and American trainers developing young Lebanese men, loyal to the Christian warlord, Samir Geagea, according to chief editor of Al Mariah magazine, Fadi Abu Deya.  In an interview given to Al Jadeed TV, Abu Deya claimed Geagea is sending fighters to Jordan for military training which is supported by the US and UK.  Gegea’s media office has denied this allegation and has threatened to file a lawsuit against Abu Deya. The militia is allegedly tasked with attacks on Hezbollah, the Lebanese resistance group.

However, from a reliable source inside Lebanon, Israel’s Mossad are training fighters loyal to Geagea in his headquarters at Meraab, Baalbek, and Dahr Al Ahmar.

In May 2008, Geagea told the Lebanese media Al Akbar that he had 7,000 to 10,000 fighters ready to face off with Hezbollah, and was asking for US support. Lebanon continues to be one step away from a new civil war along sectarian lines.

Geagea is supported by Saudi Arabia who demand Hezbollah to be demilitarized.  The US shares this view with Saudi Arabia and Israel, who view the group as a terrorist organization. Saudi Arabia is willing to help Lebanon with their financial recovery, but their condition is that Hezbollah must be weakened.

Geagea is one of the most powerful politicians in Lebanon, despite being sentenced to life in prison for murder in 1995. He killed his political opponents, and blew up a church full of worshippers, even though he is Christian to whip up sectarian hatred.

Recently, he came under scrutiny for a new militia called “God’s Soldiers” who are located in Ashrafiah, a neighborhood of Beirut. These are young Christian men who most often work as security guards and look like they are professional body builders or wrestlers. Defenders of the group claim they are simply a neighborhood watch group protecting property from robbery. However, Geagea has a past history of heading a group known as “Young Men” who were fighters during the civil war.

Hezbollah is not only a defense force, which has prevented a second Israeli invasion of south Lebanon, and a resistance force demanding the withdrawal of Israelis from the occupied Shebaa Farms, they are also a political party with a sizable elected membership in parliament in the free democratic elections held in May. Most Lebanese, regardless of their support of Hezbollah, agree that Hezbollah has been the only defense force capable of defending the southern border.

Lebanon is now referred to as a failed state. Once called the ‘Switzerland of the Middle East” for its private and secure banking services, and its winter ski resorts in the mountains, it began a financial collapse in 2019 which has seen the country hit rock-bottom currently. Wealthy Arabs from the Persian Gulf used to flock to Lebanon for their famous nightclubs and Casino. The tourists are gone from Lebanon amid the financial collapse which has seen Lebanese migrants leaving in small boats to find a better life in Europe.

Protesters began street violence in 2019 demanding the ruling political elite step down. These politicians included remnants of the war-lords of the 1975-1990 civil war, like Geagea.

The Governor of the Central Bank of Lebanon, Riad Salameh, has been discovered to have run the bank for decades in a Ponzi scheme, which wiped out hard currency, and caused the banks to freeze accounts. Some Lebanese became so desperate to access their own money, they resorted to armed hold-ups to get their own funds released.  In several cases, the funds were needed for emergency medical care as there are no public hospitals in Lebanon.

European countries began issuing arrest warrants for Salameh on charges of money laundering, corruption, and personal enrichment of public funds.  He has remained free, and still holds his position in charge of all the public funds for Lebanon, while enjoying the protection of the US Ambassador to Lebanon, Dorothy C. Shea who has said removal of Salameh is a ‘red line’.  European charges relate to billions of dollars that Salameh and his brother have deposited abroad. Recent rumors floated that the US was promoting Salameh to become the next president.

In 2016, Salameh hosted a conference at the US Embassy in Lebanon. The Financial Action Task Force was set up to stop money laundering to safeguard the integrity of the banking sector. Salameh was the fox in the henhouse.

The US-NATO attack on Syria began in 2011 for regime change. The US and their western allies, including Israel, wanted to break the political alliance between Syrian president Bashar al-Assad and Hezbollah. In 2012, the CIA began a covert training operation in the Jordanian desert, and in 2013 President Obama signed approval of the operation which trained young men to fight in Syria.

In 2013, former deputy CIA director Michael J. Morell said in a CBS interview that the most effective fighters on the battlefield in Syria are the Radical Islamic terrorists. “And because they’re so good at fighting the Syrians, some of the moderate members of the opposition joined forces with them,” he said.

The Syrian refugee camp Zatari in Jordan was the home base of the fighters, who would train with the CIA and slip over the border into Syria and later return to their families safe in the camp.

In 2017, President Trump shut down the $1 Billion CIA program in Jordan.  From the beginning, many advisors had cautioned that the weapons the US was supplying to the ‘rebels’ would later fall into the hands of terrorists following Radical Islam, such as Al Qaeda, Jibhat al-Nusra and ISIS. Their warning became reality, after the ‘rebels’ became partners with the Radical Islamic terrorists who did not fight for freedom, or democracy, but for the goal of establishing a government in Damascus following the political ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB).  Obama had promoted the MB in the US, Libya, Egypt, Tunisia and Syria. The political platform of the MB is identical to Al Qaeda. The big difference is that ISIS carries black flags and the MB wear suits and ties. Eventually, the Obama-backed MB was defeated in Egypt, Tunisia and Syria. In Libya, the MB control the Tripoli administration backed by the UN. The armed conflict in Syria finished by 2017 with the US supported Al Qaeda affiliate, Jibhta al-Nusra, only in control of an olive growing province, Idlib.

Jordan’s King Hussein was one of the first Arab leaders to call for the Syrian President to step down. Jordan is one of the largest recipients of US foreign aid, which was a reward for their peace treaty with Israel.

King Hussein supported the US-NATO attack on Syria and hosted the terrorist training camps in the desert as well as a huge Syrian refuges camp which was used to house and feed the wives and children of the terrorists being trained. But, the US-NATO attack on Syria failed. In September 2021, the border crossing between Syria and Jordan re-opened.

On October 4, 2021 the King spoke with Assad by phone in the first phase of a reconciliation between Amman and Damascus, similar to the repair in relations between Syria and Bahrain and UAE. Turkey is now in the same process, and reports suggest Saudi Arabia may follow.  Arab leaders realize that they must not blindly follow orders by Washington to start or support wars in the Middle East which end up in failure.

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This article was originally published on Mideast Discourse.

Steven Sahiounie is a two-time award-winning journalist. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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***

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has just issued its 2023 Doomsday Clock statement, calling this “a time of unprecedented danger.” It has advanced the hands of the clock to 90 seconds to midnight, meaning that the world is closer to global catastrophe than ever before, mainly because the conflict in Ukraine has gravely increased the risk of nuclear war. This scientific assessment should wake up the world’s leaders to the urgent necessity of bringing the parties involved in the Ukraine war to the peace table.

So far, the debate about peace talks to resolve the conflict has revolved mostly around what Ukraine and Russia should be prepared to bring to the table in order to end the war and restore peace. However, given that this war is not just between Russia and Ukraine but is part of a “New Cold War” between Russia and the United States, it is not just Russia and Ukraine that must consider what they can bring to the table to end it. The United States must also consider what steps it can take to resolve its underlying conflict with Russia that led to this war in the first place.

The geopolitical crisis that set the stage for the war in Ukraine began with NATO’s broken promises not to expand into Eastern Europe, and was exacerbated by its declaration in 2008 that Ukraine would eventually join this primarily anti-Russian military alliance.

Then, in 2014, a U.S.-backed coup against Ukraine’s elected government caused the disintegration of Ukraine. Only 51% of Ukrainians surveyed told a Gallup poll that they recognized the legitimacy of the post-coup government, and large majorities in Crimea and in Donetsk and Luhansk provinces voted to secede from Ukraine. Crimea rejoined Russia, and the new Ukrainian government launched a civil war against the self-declared “People’s Republics” of Donetsk and Luhansk.

The civil war killed an estimated 14,000 people, but the Minsk II accord in 2015 established a ceasefire and a buffer zone along the line of control, with 1,300 international OSCE ceasefire monitors and staff. The ceasefire line largely held for seven years, and casualties declined substantially from year to year. But the Ukrainian government never resolved the underlying political crisis by granting Donetsk and Luhansk the autonomous status it promised them in the Minsk II agreement.

Now former German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Francois Hollande have admitted that Western leaders only agreed to the Minsk II accord to buy time, so that they could build up Ukraine’s armed forces to eventually recover Donetsk and Luhansk by force.

In March 2022, the month after the Russian invasion, ceasefire negotiations were held in Turkey. Russia and Ukraine drew up a 15-point “neutrality agreement,” which President Zelenskyy publicly presented and explained to his people in a national TV broadcast on March 27th. Russia agreed to withdraw from the territories it had occupied since the invasion in February in exchange for a Ukrainian commitment not to join NATO or host foreign military bases. That framework also included proposals for resolving the future of Crimea and Donbas.

But in April, Ukraine’s Western allies, the United States and United Kingdom in particular, refused to support the neutrality agreement and persuaded Ukraine to abandon its negotiations with Russia. U.S. and British officials said at the time that they saw a chance to “press” and “weaken” Russia, and that they wanted to make the most of that opportunity.

The U.S. and British governments’ unfortunate decision to torpedo Ukraine’s neutrality agreement in the second month of the war has led to a prolonged and devastating conflict with hundreds of thousands of casualties. Neither side can decisively defeat the other, and every new escalation increases the danger of “a major war between NATO and Russia,” as NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg recently warned.

U.S. and NATO leaders now claim to support a return to the negotiating table they upended in April, with the same goal of achieving a Russian withdrawal from territory it has occupied since February. They implicitly recognize that nine more months of unnecessary and bloody war have failed to greatly improve Ukraine’s negotiating position.

Instead of just sending more weapons to fuel a war that cannot be won on the battlefield, Western leaders have a grave responsibility to help restart negotiations and ensure that they succeed this time. Another diplomatic fiasco like the one they engineered in April would be a catastrophe for Ukraine and the world.

So what can the United States bring to the table to help move towards peace in Ukraine and to de-escalate its disastrous Cold War with Russia?

Like the Cuban Missile Crisis during the original Cold War, this crisis could serve as a catalyst for serious diplomacy to resolve the breakdown in U.S.-Russian relations. Instead of risking nuclear annihilation in a bid to “weaken” Russia, the United States could instead use this crisis to open up a new era of nuclear arms control, disarmament treaties and diplomatic engagement.

For years, President Putin has complained about the large U.S. military footprint in Eastern and Central Europe. But in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. has actually beefed up its European military presence. It has increased the total deployments of American troops in Europe from 80,000 before February 2022 to roughly 100,000. It has sent warships to Spain, fighter jet squadrons to the United Kingdom, troops to Romania and the Baltics, and air defense systems to Germany and Italy.

Even before the Russian invasion, the U.S. began expanding its presence at a missile base in Romania that Russia has objected to ever since it went into operation in 2016. The U.S. military has also built what The New York Times called “a highly sensitive U.S. military installation” in Poland, just 100 miles from Russian territory. The bases in Poland and Romania have sophisticated radars to track hostile missiles and interceptor missiles to shoot them down.

The Russians worry that these installations can be repurposed to fire offensive or even nuclear missiles, and they are exactly what the 1972 ABM (Anti-Ballistic Missile) Treaty between the U.S. and the Soviet Union prohibited, until President Bush withdrew from it in 2002.

While the Pentagon describes the two sites as defensive and pretends they are not directed at Russia, Putin has insisted that the bases are evidence of the threat posed by NATO’s eastward expansion.

Here are some steps the U.S. could consider putting on the table to start de-escalating these ever-rising tensions and improve the chances for a lasting ceasefire and peace agreement in Ukraine:

• The United States and other Western countries could support Ukrainian neutrality by agreeing to participate in the kind of security guarantees Ukraine and Russia agreed to in March, but which the U.S. and U.K. rejected.
• The U.S. and its NATO allies could let the Russians know at an early stage in negotiations that they are prepared to lift sanctions against Russia as part of a comprehensive peace agreement.
• The U.S. could agree to a significant reduction in the 100,000 troops it now has in Europe, and to removing its missiles from Romania and Poland and handing over those bases to their respective nations.
• The United States could commit to working with Russia on an agreement to resume mutual reductions in their nuclear arsenals, and to suspend both nations’ current plans to build even more dangerous weapons. They could also restore the Treaty on Open Skies, from which the United States withdrew in 2020, so that both sides can verify that the other is removing and dismantling the weapons they agree to eliminate.
• The United States could open a discussion on the removal of its nuclear weapons from the five European countries where they are presently deployed: Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium and Turkey.

If the United States is willing to put these policy changes on the table in negotiations with Russia, it will make it easier for Russia and Ukraine to reach a mutually acceptable ceasefire agreement, and help to ensure that the peace they negotiate will be stable and lasting.

De-escalating the Cold War with Russia would give Russia a tangible gain to show its citizens as it retreats from Ukraine. It would also allow the United States to reduce its military spending and enable European countries to take charge of their own security, as most of their people want.

U.S.-Russia negotiations will not be easy, but a genuine commitment to resolve differences will create a new context in which each step can be taken with greater confidence as the peacemaking process builds its own momentum.

Most of the people of the world would breathe a sigh of relief to see progress towards ending the war in Ukraine, and to see the United States and Russia working together to reduce the existential dangers of their militarism and hostility. This should lead to improved international cooperation on other serious crises facing the world in this century–and may even start to turn back the hands of the Doomsday Clock by making the world a safer place for us all.

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Medea Benjamin is the cofounder of CODEPINK for Peace, and the author of several books, including Inside Iran: The Real History and Politics of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Nicolas J. S. Davies is an independent journalist, a researcher with CODEPINK and the author of Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq.

Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies are the authors of War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, available from OR Books in November 2022. They are regular contributors to Global Research.

Featured image: The 2023 Doomsday Clock statement – Image credit: the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

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***

Is Larry Fink, CEO of the investment colossus BlackRock, worried about an Iskander missile taking out his office in midtown Manhattan (or Washington, Palo Alto, Boston, Atlanta, etc.)? No, of course not. But maybe he should.

On January 24, the former television comedian and current president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, told banksters and corporate titans that death, destruction, and misery are fantastic business opportunities. His pitch was delivered via video to the National Association of State Chambers in Boca Raton, Florida.

Addressing a Chambers of Commerce meeting in Boca Raton today, Zelensky thanks BlackRock, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, and others for their support of Ukraine. Adds that sending Ukraine heavier weapons, like Abrams tanks, represents a "big business" opportunity for US corporations pic.twitter.com/N1h8OVECLt

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) January 24, 2023

The Man in Green said,

“We have already managed to attract attention and have cooperation with such giants of the international, financial and investment world as BlackRock, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, [and] such American brands as Starlink or Westinghouse have already become part of our Ukrainian way… Everyone can become a big business by working with Ukraine, in all sectors, from weapons and defense to construction, from communication to agriculture, from transport to IT, from banks to medicine. And I believe that freedom must always win. And I invite you to work with us right now.”

Indeed, Ukraine is a near-perfect environment for modern corporate-crony business and financial operations. It is the most corrupt nation in Europe. It is up there with Colombia and Brazil. According to Transparency International’s 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index, Ukraine ranked 122nd out of 180 countries in 2021.

BlackRock is no stranger to criminal behavior. In 2018, police raided its offices in Germany. “The raid is part of the country’s biggest post-war fraud investigation, known as the cum-ex scandal,” Deutsche Welle reported.

In 2015, BlackRock was charged by the SEC “with breaching its fiduciary duty by failing to disclose a conflict of interest created by the outside business activity of a top-performing portfolio manager.”

In 2020, Mexico accused the company of taking “direct and indirect control of five energy infrastructure projects, including two pipelines considered to be of national security, and six oil exploration blocks.” In other words, standard neoliberal “stakeholder” behavior.

“Passively Funding Crimes Against Humanity: How Your Savings May Be Financing Internment Camps and Forced Labor in China” is a report released by Hong Kong Watch. The report lists corporations involved in making “a return” on the persecution of Muslim Uyghurs in China. BlackRock, HSBC, UBS, Invesco, Deutsche Bank, and others invested pension funds in the “construction of repressive infrastructure” in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.

Moreover, BlackRock is heavily invested in the death merchant industry. William Hartung writes:

The company’s “U.S. aerospace and defense” fund has billions of dollars invested in major weapons contractors like Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Boeing, General Dynamics, and Northrop Grumman… Much of this funding goes to pay for weapons we don’t need at prices we can’t afford, from Lockheed Martin’s defective F-35 combat aircraft to General Dynamics’ next-generation ballistic missile firing submarine.

Code Pink, the progressive antiwar group, has accused BlackRock and other corporations of raking in billions on the destruction of the Amazon rainforest.

Even though BlackRock says that it will focus on environmental sustainability, it continues to invest in companies that slash and burn the planet’s lungs. BlackRock is cashing in on the destruction of the Amazon by investing millions in oil, mining, and agribusinesses that not only destroy the rainforests but displace indigenous communities. Additionally, BlackRock decided to invest its money in the Brazilian meatpacking company JBS, another company that contributes to deforestation. The destruction of the Amazon Rainforest is at an all-time high.

Larry Fink rubs elbows with the Saudi Crown Prince, a medieval monarch who had the journalist Jamal Khashoggi carved up. Saudi Arabia stands accused of serious human rights abuses in its war on the people of Yemen. “The situation in Yemen has been labeled as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis in the poorest country in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia has been accused of war crimes for rape, torture, and aerial attacks,” notes Code Pink.

Vanity Fair was spot on when it posted an article titled, “Larry Fink’s Not Gonna Let a Little Murder Spoil His Fun in Saudi Arabia.”

Zelenskyy’s recent announcement of an “anti-corruption” crusade is nothing if not a PR effort designed to clean up Ukraine’s image as a corrupt state run by oligarchs and on-the-take government officials. The Man in Green vowed during his presidential campaign to clamp down on corruption, never mind his connection to the top-dog oligarch, Ihor Kolomoisky.

However, political expediency and optics have severed the relationship between the two, revealing the level of backstabbing and treachery in Ukraine’s post-coup government. Kolomoisky is no longer of any use. He is now radioactive and faces possible prosecution by the USG.

Zelenskyy’s much-ballyhooed effort to clean house and refurbish Ukraine’s abysmal record on corruption has resulted in criminal elements stealing even more money from the impoverished people of Ukraine.

🇺🇦Rats leaving the sinking ship

Ukraine's deputy chief of staff of Zelensky has run away, grabbing billions

He wrote a statement of his own resignation, grabbed – $620 million (23 billion hryvnias), and ran away. pic.twitter.com/APzgsKyo26

— Hawkeye1745 (@Hawkeye1745) January 24, 2023

Finally, in order to put all of this into perspective, consider Zelenskyy and the Panama and Pandora papers. “The leaked documents suggest he had—or has—a previously undisclosed stake in an offshore company, which he appears to have secretly transferred to a friend weeks before winning the presidential vote,” The Guardian reported in late 2021.

The files reveal Zelenskiy participated in a sprawling network of offshore companies, co-owned with his longtime friends and TV business partners. They include Serhiy Shefir, who produced Zelensky’s hit shows, and Shefir’s older brother, Borys, who wrote the scripts. Another member of the consortium is Ivan Bakanov, a childhood friend. Bakanov was general director of Zelenskiy’s production studio, Kvartal 95.

Ukraine is a near-perfect business opportunity for transnational corporations and banks, especially the crony-capitalist powerhouse of BlackRock. In Ukraine, BlackRock does not need to worry about going to court and paying out large sums of money for its “prohibited transactions relating to the management, operation and administration” of 401(k) retirement plans, a scam that “selected and retained high-cost and poor-performing investment options, with excessive layers of hidden fees that are not included in the fund expense ratios” of the 401(k) plan.

In short, pensioners were ripped off in basically the same way the average Ukrainian is ripped off by oligarchs and the state.

Of course, BlackRock’s lucrative wunderbar rebuilding of Ukraine will no doubt come to naught as the Russian Federation is in the process of chipping away at Ukraine’s civil and industrial infrastructure, which began as a response to the Zelenskyy regime’s suicide bombing of the Kerch bridge linking Crimea and Russia.

Larry Fink may not be dissuaded, however. If a profit can be realized out of the twisted remains of the corrupt, dictatorial, and genocidal Zelenskyy regime, Fink will undoubtedly go for it, so long as governments, pushing wheelbarrows of fiat dollars, promise to pay for reconstruction in what will be a rump state, a shadow of its former nazified self.

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Kurt Nimmo is a regular contributor to Global Research.

Featured image is from the author

German Foreign Minister: We Are at War with Russia

By Kurt Nimmo, January 26, 2023

Go figure. Why did German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock announce in English that Germany is now at war with Russia? Is this how the Bundestag operates? How is it that ministers can declare war without the informed consent of the German people? Is English now the preferred language of the German government?

Is Fear of Freedom an Invitation for Fascism?

By Julian Rose, January 25, 2023

By grasping the relevance of the seeming hypocrisy ‘fear of freedom’, it becomes possible to understand the composition of the psychosis currently running rampant through the central arteries of society. What we are dealing with is the willingness of a large proportion of society to give-in to the will of a perceived authority figure or figures. To do so without ever questioning the logic or rational of what that authority is doing or demanding.

Allegations of Genocide Return to Peru

By J. B. Gerald, January 25, 2023

The Peruvian Prosecutor’s Office has placed she who claims the country’s presidency, Dina Bolurate under investigation for crimes including genocide, resulting from her government’s treatment of protesters who prefer the elected President Pedro Castillo.

Can You Smell What the Year of the Rabbit Is Cooking?

By Pepe Escobar, January 25, 2023

Davos 2023 has come and gone: an extended exercise in Demented Dystopia with peaks of paroxysm. At least a measure of reality was offered by Liu He’s address. A limited but competent analysis of what he said is infinitely more useful than torrents of barely disguised Sinophobic “research” vomited by U.S. Think Tankland.

Latest Resignation Scandal Reveals Massive Scope of Kiev Regime’s Corruption

By Drago Bosnic, January 25, 2023

It’s hardly news that the Kiev regime is one of the most corrupt in the world. This issue was raised by many in the political West after NATO and EU governments decided to prop up the Neo-Nazi junta regardless of the cost or consequences.

Lula Just Became the First BRICS Leader to Publicly Condemn Russia’s Special Operation

By Andrew Korybko, January 25, 2023

Newly re-elected three-time Brazilian leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who’s popularly known as Lula, just shattered the foreign policy expectations of his multipolar base by becoming the first BRICS leader to publicly condemn Russia’s special operation.

Did COVID Vaccine Injuries Influence FAA’s Revision of Electrocardiogram Test Limits for Pilots?

By Michael Nevradakis, January 25, 2023

A recent update to the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) electrocardiogram (EKG) test limits for pilots has some aviation and medical experts questioning if the FAA’s move is concerned that COVID-19 vaccine injuries may be contributing to an ongoing shortage of pilots.

Leaked Files: How Britain Trains Jordan to Spy on Its Citizens

By Kit Klarenberg, January 25, 2023

Leaked documents reviewed by The Cradle reveal that Britain secretly trained Jordanian security services in techniques used by the notorious UK security and cyber agency GCHQ, which provides signals intelligence to the British government and its armed forces.

Zelenskyy Regime to Forcibly Conscript Hungarians in Transcarpathia

By Kurt Nimmo, January 25, 2023

The Zelenskyy regime is desperate. It is reportedly losing more than 300 soldiers a day in eastern Ukraine. The latest effort by the doomed regime to throw men and foreign war materiel at a slow and overpowering Russian advance in Donbas will completely fall apart.

The Teacher’s Task: Understanding and Helping

By Dr. Rudolf Hänsel, January 25, 2023

On 24 January is: “International Day of Education / UN International Day of Education / World Day of Education”. This day of action, first observed in 2019, aims to recognise the role of education in peace and development and as a public good.

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***

Go figure. Why did German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock announce in English that Germany is now at war with Russia?

Germany's FM, Annalena Baerbock: "We are fighting a war against Russia,"

They are openly saying it. They are literally saying US/NATO are at war with Russia. pic.twitter.com/80cERnKHHK

— Hassan Mafi ‏ (@thatdayin1992) January 25, 2023

Is this how the Bundestag operates? How is it that ministers can declare war without the informed consent of the German people? Is English now the preferred language of the German government?

Or does Baerbock intend her message for a larger audience than Germany’s bureaucrats? Imagine a USG political careerist standing on the floor of the Senate or House speaking to his colleagues in German or Khoe–Kwadi.

The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, said that the supply of German tanks to Ukraine is a pre-planned war against Russia🤷‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/JDigPtSVKN

— NOËL 🇪🇺 🇺🇦 (@NOELreports) January 25, 2023

“If we add this to Merkel’s revelations that they were strengthening Ukraine and did not count on the Minsk agreements, then we are talking about a war against Russia that was planned in advance. Don’t say later that we didn’t warn you,” responded Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry.

The German people really need to get rid of these neocon-ish politicians, same as America needs to not only divest the government of these psychopaths but round them up and put them on trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

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Уколико је текст „Основног споразума“ о Косову и Метохији који дуже време кружи у медијима на албанском а од 20. јануара и на друштвеним мрежама, на српском, бар близак аутентичном, може се рећи да то није споразум, осим што се тако зове и има чланове, већ ултиматум да Србија у пракси (de facto) призна насилну сецесију своје Покрајине. Текст приписан лидерима две највеће демократије у Европи Макрону, председнику Француске Шолцу, канцелару Немачке, као ауторима, представља још једно грубо кршење резолуције СБ УН 1244, основних принципа демократских међународних односа, Повеље УН, Париске повеље и Завршног документа ОЕБС. Текст инспирисан силом и величином, понижава Србију и српски народ налажући да Србија испоштује равноправност, суверенитет, територијалн интегритет и државне симболе тзв. Косова и свих других држава, осим свој сопствени   суверенитет, територијални интегритет и своје међународно признате границе потврђене од стране УН, ОЕБС, других МО, као и од специјалне Бадинтерове комисије. 

Шолц-Макроново папир захтева да се Србија не противи чланству тзв. Косова у свим међународним организацијама, укључујући УН. Од Србије се очекује да сарађује у разграђивању сопствене целовитости, сопственог уставног поретка и међународног угледа како „случај Косова“ нико не би могао да користи као преседан за једностране сецесије. У прихватању ултиматума од стране Србије аутори виде пут да пет чланица ЕУ и 4 чланице НАТО (Шпанија, Румунија, Словачка, Грчка и Кипар) признају тзв. Косово и да тако залече унутрашње нејединство у ЕУ и НАТО. Циљ је, такође, да се на Србију као жртву агресије НАТО 1999. превали сва одговорност за жртве, разарања и последице коришћења оружја са осиромашеним уранијумом. Коначно, да се Србија уврсти у тзв. „савез демократија“ успостављен да буде фронт против Русије и Кине.

Тзв. предлог Шолца и Макрона претворен у иницијативу ЕУ коју подржавају САД и најновије активности «петорке» у Београду представљају узурпацију и прејудицирање права и одлука СБ УН као јединог органа за питања мира и безбедности, ниподаштавање резолуције СБ УН 1244 као општеобавезујућег правног акта највише снаге, увлачење  Србије као мирољубиве, војно неутралне и независне земље, у глобалну коннфронтацију. Ово безобзирно, једнострано и самовољно понашање, осим што је антисрпско, бременито је несагледивим последицама.

Косово и Метохија није у замрзнути конфликт како се то тврди на Западу и понавља у Београду, нити се решава ултиматумом Србији. Прихватањем ултиматума не спашавају се ни мир ни безбедност Срба у Покрајини. Тако се само гомила конфликтни потенцијал, подстичу други сепаратизми, понижава Србија и српски народ. Прави узрок и срж проблема око Косова и Метохије је у геополитици доминације и експанзије водећих сила Запада на Исток. НАТО свим силама настоји да тзв. Косово и целу Србију, претвори у одскочну даску за експанзију на Исток, да Србију окрене против Русије. Тај проблем се не може решити прихватањем ултиматума већ инсистирањем на поштовању Устава, међународно признатих граница Србије и резолуције СБ УН 1244. И када би прихватила ултиматум Срби на Косову и Метохији ће и даље бити небезбедни, одузету имовину им нико неће вратити, 250.000 протераних Срба и других неалбанаца и даље неће моћи да остваре право на слободно и безбедно враћање, српска државна и друштвена имовина остале би и даље узурпиране. Србија треба да буде свесна да би прихватање ултиматума само допринео убрзању опасних трендова конфронтације и ескалације, како у регионалним тако и у европским размерама.

Евентуална сагласност Србије за чланство тзв. Косова у УН и друге МО значило би признавање његовог међународно-правног субјективитета са свим последицама од ескалације до стварања Велике Албанијe на рачун државних територија Србије и више других балканских држава. Има ли у Србији још икога ко би поверовао у нове гаранције и обећања Запада? Зар нас није и Ангела Меркел колико јуче упозорила да се клонимо њихових гаранција! Или је наша лаковерност прешла у фазу без граница!

Обећања самоуправе за Србе, заједнице српских општина («по уставу Косова», Шоле), «формализовање статуса СПЦ» ни најмање не мењају карактер Шолц-Макроновог (ЕУ) ултиматума, зато што је суштина у захтеву да Србија фактички, а потом и формално-правно, призна независност тзв. Косова, његово чланство у УН и друге МО. Све друго је део, мање или више убедљиве, дипломатске козметике и тактике «чувања образа» жртве.

Историја опомиње да се мир, стабилност и бољи живот не чувају прихватањем ултиматума на штету суверенитета и територијалног интегритета. И тзв. Минхенски споразум из 1938. о одузимању Судетске покрајине од Чехословачке, ултиматум рађен иза леђа Русије, ондашњи лидери Немачке, Француске, Италије и Велике Британије јавно су представљали као спашавање мира у Европи. Веома је опасно што садашњи лидери наведених земаља Запада нису свесни лекција такве историје.

Однос према Уставу, резолуцији СБ 1244, међународно признатим границама Србије и међународном праву нису ствар ултиматума или једнократне погодбе већ односа према  опстанку Србије као старе европске државе и српске нације као фактора мира, стабилности и напретка на Балкану, у Европи и свету. Такав статус и углед Србије потврђује и већина земаља света, око 2/3 становника планете, који нису, нити желе да признају илегалну творевину као државу, укључујући и не мали број земаља које су, на молбу Србије, повукле своја ранија признања не плашећи се ултимативних притисака Запада да то не чине.

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I am revisiting Dr Erich Fromm’s seminal work ‘Fear of Freedom’ (also published as ‘Escape from Freedom’) as the basis of this article. To understand the causative agent behind major trends in society, one must uncover the chief psychological forces at work at any one time.

By grasping the relevance of the seeming hypocrisy ‘fear of freedom’, it becomes possible to understand the composition of the psychosis currently running rampant through the central arteries of society.

What we are dealing with is the willingness of a large proportion of society to give-in to the will of a perceived authority figure or figures. To do so without ever questioning the logic or rational of what that authority is doing or demanding.

Probably the best known example in recent history of this, is the behaviour of the masses of German society at the time of the rise of Adolf Hitler.

In ‘Fear of Freedom’ Fromm devotes a considerable number of pages to an analysis of the human motivation – or lack of it – that enabled Hitler to hypnotise his people into into obeying his often completely irrational and incoherent demands. To accepting conditions that, with the application of just a small amount of emotional and rational thought, would automatically be rejected by ordinary sentient individuals.

As Covid ‘lock-downs’ and Klaus Schwab’s demand for a ‘Great Reset’ are revealing, the same sequence of top-down irrational authoritarianism is repeating this phenomenon with seemingly very similar affect.

There are certain conditions that must prevail in order for it to be possible for very large numbers of people to capitulate to the commands of an authoritarian figurehead.

The chief ones are: a generally low sense of self esteem; an insecure prevailing financial situation and a fear of stepping out of line with the pattern of behaviour of fellow humans.

It is this last factor which can be the most potent element of self betrayal.

Freedom is not won by avoiding commitment or confrontation. On the contrary, freedom is achieved by taking responsibility and facing the foe. The former interpretation has been made popular by an age in which technology and machines in general have assumed greater importance than human relations. Where basic human responsibility has been off-loaded onto a computer.

A great deal of superfluous ‘luxuries’ of our consumer fixated society are the result of a fascination with ‘the gadgets of leisure’. The emphasis on ‘convenience materialism’ eventually eclipsing the social need for cooperation and interactive mutual support.

The US founder of modern advertising Edward Bernays, played a significant role in launching this trend by developing a method which he called ‘engineering consent’; deceiving customers about their supposed need for products empty of genuine value or merit and often destructive of human and environmental health. Bernays’s notion of ‘engineering consent’  was also applied politically, to leverage support for one or other political party.

But the ability to deceive can only work if the recipient has surrendered his/her commitment to fundamental life values that underpin a humane, fulfilling and creative existence.

In a sense they work in tandem. In Fear of Freedom, Fromm reveals that the desire to control and the desire to be controlled are not opposites, but symptoms of the same basic sickness. The sadist and the masochist are both expressions of extreme alienation and deep fear. The fear of facing the responsibility of freedom. Which means seeking the truth and taking control of one’s destiny.

The sadist in someone arises when that person adopts a fixed position or inherited ideal as a secure totem upon which to dedicate their adult life. This action serves to crush the manifestation of the natural, innate creative and humanitarian energies, that left to their own devices lead the individual towards the realisation of his/her true potential.

Of course, following this creative urge initially brings with it a sense of insecurity. One is ploughing one’s own path – not following someone else’s. It requires courage.

But to reject this ‘road to freedom’ out of fear of the unknown, is to block the spontaneous social, mental and spiritual development of the growing individual. To create a barrier against the directions passed to us by our souls. And that causes a deeply distorted version of ‘the true path’ to become manifest in its place.

The Perversion of the British Political Elite

For example, at the British private Preparatory Boarding School I attended from the age of eight to twelve, the head master was a sadist. He saw his role as turning-out boys as ready leaders of a (dying) British Empire.

To achieve this aim, the subtle emotional state inherent in all children, had to be knocked-out and overlaid by a conformism to the fixed concept of ‘manhood’; a requirement to fulfil the demands of becoming ‘a leader of the Empire’. 

Chief among the characteristics of such a leader is the ability and readiness to kill for a cause. The cause, in this case, being to uphold the ‘unquestioned superiority’ of British colonial rule. With this conviction being uppermost in the mind, the killing is to be performed coldly, without emotion. 

The headmaster of my primary school kept four canes in a glass fronted cupboard in his study. Each having a slightly different ‘whackability’. Any boy falling foul of his wrath was subjected to ‘six of the best’ from one or other of these canes. 

A boy’s bruised and bleeding backside was then patched-up by the matron who looked after children’s health. But for the mental trauma there was no matron and no sympathiser. 

The headmaster was an imposing athletic figure and when he whacked, it was with full venom and sadistic satisfaction. The general ethos of the school was carried-out in the name of ‘toughening-up’  little boys still emotionally attached to their mothers.

Perverts featured prominently among the staff. The Latin master would regularly run his hands up one’s shorts while correcting home work. And the physical training teacher, a Sargent Major, was an equally lecherous individual whose military training was put to full effect in keeping his gymnastic pupils in order. 

Please understand that this school (which is no longer) was the training ground for the political elite; a sister school of the infamous Eton College, the breeding ground for eligible future politicians and Prime Ministers, followed by the blue chip universities of Oxford and Cambridge. 

When one considers the deep sickness on display amongst the upper echelon of political (and non political) ‘leaders’ in the UK today, one can see at what an early age it was already being fostered.  Pedophilia, child molesting and even child sacrificing, are not perversions that come from nowhere. 

The roots of many top-down diseased minds are buried in traumas that started when they were children – and are now being played-out via reversed roles – a pattern that many psychological treatise on psychotic individuals have revealed. 

It’s a fine line that separates the psychotic and the Satanic; and it is perhaps no surprise to find that there are two Masonic Lodges situated within the Houses of Parliament at Westminster. 

At the heart of the exclusive upper echelons of the British establishment is a largely unspoken commitment to maintaining a self engendered sense of being ‘of the gods’. Thus gifted the right to impose rules on those ‘below’ which will ensure recipients remain in a broadly socio-economic condition of serfdom, and that the perpetrators of that serfdom will be fed according to their addictive need. The need for a ‘sense of power’ to compensate for an inner emotional void and state of abject spiritual poverty. 

As Fromm explains in his analysis of the behaviour of Adolf Hitler, the Nazi leader despised those who submitted to his will, but respected those who stood-up to him. 

This is the coward’s formula which incorporates a form of self loathing concerning one’s own inner weakness.  The lack of any pathway towards the realisation of a deeper ‘I’. 

This quirky and contradictory power-v-serfdom trait is evident in the way the City of London maintains its demonic grip over global financial affairs. 

It has been reported to me that during a ritualistic annual pilgrimage to ‘The Temple’ at Lincoln’s Inn at the heart of the City of London, the British Monarch walks, head lowered, three paces behind the Lord Mayor while passing through ‘The Gates of the Temple’. 

The quasi-religious symbolism is clear: money is power and power is everything. Even a Monarch will acknowledge his/her indebtedness to those who control vast empires of wealth.  But that same monarch will feel a general sense of disdain for the tens of thousands whose hard labour and poor wages underpinned the pompous halls of wealth occupied by their masters. 

In conclusion, from my own experience (as a survivor) of the sadistic power used to prevent young people from following their natural inclinations to creative expression and warm co-habitation, it is evident that ‘fear’ is at the very root of the depraved and schizophrenic behaviour patterns so evident in most so called ‘leaders’ of today. 

Look no further than the fear imposed Covid bandwagon, with it’s fear fuelled lock-downs and fear fashioned threats against digressers. Symptomatic of a psychosis running deep within the veins of the small club whose grip on this world is essentially the same grip as the headmaster of my Preparatory School school sought to exert on his unfortunate pupils. 

The leaders of The World Economic Forum, The World health Organisation, The United Nations, The Bank of International Settlements, The International Monetary Fund, The World Bank, Black Rock, Bayer-Monsanto/Cargill, to name just a few tyrannical oppressors of the people, are the modern day imposers of the empires that the British were once so proud to force upon the indigenous cultures of other lands. 

They, with the help of government and on the orders of a secret cabal, reach into the cupboard for the same canes in order to whack any dissenters, as did the headmaster of my Preparatory School in order to bring into line any rebellious pupils. It’s a revolving door and those entering and leaving are closely connected with each other. 

They are a form of dark brotherhood – witness the Skull and Bones Club of Yale University – sworn to protect and maintain the lie, the opposite of which they dare not face. The lie that the only way to avoid responding to the innate urge of the soul to set sail on the path of truth, is to accept one’s destiny as a clone like devotee of the soulless and vindictive gods of materialism. 

As part of the turmoil of conflicting forces manifesting today, the silver lining is that a great shake-down of all old conscious and subconscious addictions to hierarchical and slavish patterns of existence is starting to manifest. 

A whole new paradigm of spirit based love and respect for all elements of creation is beginning to emerge. Is moving ever further into a territory once seen as a secure fortress against the manifestation of truth. 

As Erich Fromm so clearly recognised ‘Fear of Freedom’ and the trauma it imposes on the self and on others, is not a permanent state. Embracing real freedom is an act of love. A courageous act of recognition of our oneness with all humanity. A commitment to take responsibility for the world we were born into as well as for the flourishing of our own special creative contribution to the evolution of that world.

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Julian Rose is an early pioneer of UK organic farming, writer, international activist, entrepreneur and holistic teacher.  He is Co-founder of the Hardwick Alliance for Real Ecology HARE https://hardwickalliance.org/. Julian’s latest book ‘Overcoming the Robotic Mind – Why Humanity Must Come Through’ is strongly recommended reading for this time: see www.julianrose.info

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name.

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The Peruvian Prosecutor’s Office has placed she who claims the country’s presidency, Dina Bolurate under investigation for crimes including genocide, resulting from her government’s treatment of protesters who prefer the elected President Pedro Castillo. Now much of her government is under investigation for genocide (“genocide, qualified homicide and serious injuries”): Alberto Otarola (the prime minister who just resigned), minister of defense Jorge Chavez, minister of the interior Victor Rojas, a previous prime minister Pedro Angulo and previous Minister of the Interior Cesar Cervantes. ⁽¹⁾

How did this happen? An intractable well entrenched right wing Congress impeded the people’s elected President’s agenda, brought charges against him and his appointees for corruption and tried three times to impeach him. To forestall an impeachment attempt Pedro Castillo dissolved the Congress, as allowed by Peruvian law. Publicly unverified reports may establish a meeting between the U.S. Ambassador (a former CIA agent) and Peru’s Minister of Defense ⁽²⁾ who threw his support instead to the right-wing Congress: Castillo was displaced on Dec. 7, 2022. Immediately the U.S., Canada, European Union, supported as Peru’s president, Dina Bolurate, Castillo’s vice-president. Bolivia, Argentina, Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia among others supported President Pedro Castillo.

As of January 15th Security forces murdered about 50 protesters, including the victims of the Ayacucho massacre (Dec. 15, 2022) and Juliaca massacre (Jan. 9, 2023), in military actions by police and armed forces against Indigenous peoples, mestizos, workers who seem to be without weapons.

Displaced president Castillo is in prison, accused of attempting to overthrow the democratic process with a coup. Castillo, Indigenous, was a teacher, a union leader, a Marxist, elected in 2021 by a small majority in a race against Keiko Fujimori who wouldn’t concede defeat.

Keiko Fujimori’s forces included an entrenched Fujimori political machine and the extreme right wing. She enjoyed the support of the current U.S. Ambassador and U.S. literati favorite, the nobelist Vargas Llosa. Keiko Fujimori assured supporters her primary mission if elected was to free her father, former president Alberto Fujimori, serving extended prison sentences for human rights crimes such as murder, kidnapping etc., and embezzlement, bribery, corruption. In 2017 the elder Fujimori was pardoned by then President of Peru Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, in exchange for support in Peru’s Congress to further Kuczynski’s political agenda. The pardon was overturned by Peru’s Supreme Court in 2018 and Fujimori re-imprisoned.

Allegations of genocide accompanied Fujimori the father’s near extermination of the largely Indigenous/mestizo Shining Path (Sendero Luminoso), as well as his programs of sterilizing Indian women and men without their informed consent. Fujimori’s victories were assured by application of ruthless military force. Victims of his domestic policies were most often mestizo or Indigenous peoples but most of the military was equally mestizo and Indigenous so the huge numbers of fatalities of Shining Path adherents couldn’t be ethnically or racially differentiated from military casualties, unless one supposed a genocide of the Indigenous related population by setting one part against the other.

Through crimes of atrocity Fujimori the father gathered extremist support which remained an element of control through fear by Peru’s privileged elite. It was not surprising that as soon as Castillo took office he and his appointees came under attack from the elite’s attorneys, usually with charges of corruption. His platform for election included promises to redistribute Peru’s mining resources.

The Parliament which serves right wing corporate interests began a series of impeachment attempts. After Fujimori’s total war on the Shining Path anyone resisting fascism became a “terrorist.” The workers / protesters recently murdered by Security forces were described on police records as “terrorists.” ⁽³⁾

In a sense this story is the familiar destabilization and takeover of a non-NATO country by the CIA. Like corporate programs, CIA policies seem not to be limited by one administration or another or time-reliant on individual leadership, but endure in waiting until applicable.

However since inception of such takeovers the world has changed.

In Venezuela of 2002, President Hugo Chávez was displaced by a parliamentary coup of the Euro-privileged – those who serve corporate interest, yet was re-instated by the people because of his strong identification with the people’s interests, mestizo, Euro, Indigenous, Black – workers. His chosen successor Nicolás Maduro has remained in power as the elected President despite the unsuccessful attempt by the U.S., Canada, the U.K etc. to replace him with their puppet, Juan Guaidó, in a putsch which attempted the theft of a portion of Venezuela’s gold reserves.

In Guatemala the former dictator – U.S. and Israel supported Efraín Ríos Montt was convicted of genocide in 2013 for his mangement of the dirty war against the Indigenous people / workers, a judicial decision vacated by the elite’s corruption of the judicial system and challenged until his death.

In 2019 the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales (Indigenous) was replaced by the well-honed manipulative politics of Jeanine Ãñez a Senator backed by the U.S. and the country’s elite. Currently she serves 10 years in prison convicted of crimes against the state for her part in the coup.

In Brazil, 2022, a Trumpian coup by supporters of former fascist President Jair Bolsonaru was squashed by the legitimate government of socialist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

Leftists, socialist leaders, Indigenous allied leaders, are challenged by capitalist usually racist interests. Generally the poor, the workers, the majority are largely Indigenous or of mixed blood, so the European oriented elite’s control risks falling under the caveats of the Convention on Genocide.

Concerning Canada, in 2022 Pope Francis publicly understood Canadian historical treatment of First Peoples as a genocide. And the House of Commons found the Residential Schools Program to have been a genocide – the government’s initial attempts to classify its treatment of the children as victims of “cultural genocide” gives way to a people’s recognition of “genocide.” The issue of “genocide” as applied to contemporary treatment of some First People’s tribes, has not reached the courts. In Canada application of the Convention is ultimately at the discretion of the Minister of Justice.

By 2023 we live in a world where European colonialism was called to account in the 1960’s with the liberation struggles of Africa. North America’s disappearance of for instance 6 million Indians in lands which became the USA is increasingly recognized as a genocide rather than a conquest or settlement of uninhabited regions. A different mindset evolves in our understanding of history and of genocide.. Covert programs of taking over nations of basically Indigenous peoples by replacing their leaders with puppets of the Euro-elite becomes genocidal.

Points to consider:

One of the first acts proposed under Peru’s right wing Congress after it ousted President Castillo was to strip the Amazon’s uncontacted tribes of land areas reserved for them, to deny them protection and safety on lands sought by resource extractors. ⁽⁴⁾ The legislation gives evidence of a clear intent to destroy a racial. ethnic group.

The allegations of genocide which became an issue during Fujimori’s attempts to extinguish the flame of Sendero Luminoso – the Shining Path, and the clarity of his efforts to sacrifice the Indigenous related population by advancing U.S. and U.N. sourced birth control programs on native peoples without their informed consent, become more easy to prove. Attempts to charge Fujimori the father with genocide for these crimes appeared and disappeared for twenty-five years and remain unadjudicated, signifying extreme opposition to application of the Convention itself in Peru, to politicians on the far-right or in mafia-like political families. On January 11, 2021, the most recent attempt to hold a hearing on the forced sterilization of several hundred thousand Peruvian women and directly accusing Fujimorri the elder, his health ministers and various doctors, was closed after an hour due to the court’s inability to translate all twelve of the dialects spoken by native Quechua witnesses. ⁽⁵⁾

On January 17th 2023 people from all through Peru attempted to march together in Lima to express the will of the Four Nations (not the British four nations but those derived from the ancient nations of the Inca empire): remove Dina Bolurate from 0ffice and free Pedro Castillo from prison. ⁽⁶⁾. To begin with…. There is momentum throughout Peru to counter the coup by Peru’s Congress and reinstate Pedro Castillo as the people’s elected President.

The crime of Genocide has no statute of limitations. Aspects of the crime are cumulative. The successes of genocide’s perpetrators become evidence of guilt which the judicial systems of the Americas are likely to confront as they gain control of their own resources. This is likely to be accompanied by the increasing political power of Indigenous peoples and their rights to resource land. It’s to the interest of Peru’s privileged to assure just representation to the Peruvian people.

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, nightslantern.ca.

Notes

1. “Genocide investigation opened against Peru president after protest deaths,” Agence France-Presse, Jan 11, 2023, The Guardian.

2. “CIA Coup in Peru Explodes into Violence,” Kurt Nimmo & Ben Norton, Jan. 13, 2023, Global Reseach.

3. “Peru’s President Dina Boluarte appoints new intelligence chief,” Diego Lopez Marina, Jan. 10, 2023, Perú reports.

4. «Peru lawmakers propose bill to strip Indigenous people of protections,« Dec. 23, 2022, The Guardian.

5. “Peru’s government forcibly sterilized Indigenous women from 1996 to 2001, the women say. Why?” Ñusta Carranza Ko, Feb.19, 2021 The Washington Post.

6. “Thousands of Farmers Continue Advancing Towards Lima,” Jan. 17, 2023, Telesur.

Featured image is by Julie Maas from nightslantern.ca

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***

Liu He studied economics at Renmin University in China and got a Master’s from Harvard. Since 2018, he’s one of China’s Vice Premiers – along with Han Zheng, Sun Chunlan, and Hu Chunhua. He’s a Director of the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission and heads the China Financial Stability and Development Committee. Anyone around the world who wants to know what will drive China’s economy in the Year of the Rabbit must pay attention to Liu He.

Davos 2023 has come and gone: an extended exercise in Demented Dystopia with peaks of paroxysm. At least a measure of reality was offered by Liu He’s address. A limited but competent analysis of what he said is infinitely more useful than torrents of barely disguised Sinophobic “research” vomited by U.S. Think Tankland.

Liu He pointed to some key numbers for the Chinese economy in 2022. Overall 3% growth may not be groundbreaking; but what matters is value-added for high-tech manufacturing and equipment manufacturing going up by 7.4% and 5.6% respectively. What this means is that Chinese industrial capacity continues to move up the value chain.

Trade, predictably, reigns supreme: the total value of imports and exports reached the equivalent of $6,215 trillion in 2022; that’s an increase of 7.7% over 2021.

Liu He also made it clear that improving the wealth of Chinese citizens remains a key priority, as enounced in the 2022 Party Congress: the number of middle class Chinese, by 2035, should jump from the current 400 million to an astonishing 900 million.

Liu He pointedly explained that everything about Chinese reforms revolves around the notion of establishing “a socialist market economy”. This translates as “let the market play a decisive role in resources allocation, let the government play a better role.” That has absolutely nothing to do with Beijing privileging a planned economy. As Liu He detailed, “we will deepen SOE [State-Owned Enterprises] reform, support the private sector, and promote fair competition, anti-monopoly and entrepreneurship.”

China is reaching the next level, economically: that translates as building, as fast as possible, an innovation-driven commercial base. Specific targets include finance, tech, and greater productivity in industry, as in applying more robotics.

On the fin-tech front, a resurgent Hong Kong is bound to play an extremely important role starting by 2024 – most of it in consequence of several Wealth Management Connect mechanisms.

Enter, or re-enter the key role of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area – one the key development nodes of 21^st century China.

What is known as the Greater Bay Area’s Wealth Management Connect is a set up that allows wealthy investors from the nine mainland cities that compose the area to invest in yuan-denominated financial products issued by banks in Hong Kong and Macao – and vice-versa. What this means in practice is opening up mainland China’s financial markets even further.

So expect a new Hong Kong boom by 2025. All those dejected by the collective West’s morass, start making plans.

Dual circulation hits Eurasia

As expected, Liu He also referred to the key Beijing strategy for this decade: “A new development paradigm with domestic circulation as the mainstay and domestic and international circulations reinforcing each other.”

The dual-circulation strategy reflects the Beijing leadership’s emphasis on simultaneously boosting China’s self-reliance and its vast export market footprint. Virtually every government policy is about dual circulation. When Liu He talks about “spurring of China’s domestic demand” he’s sending a direct message to global exporters – Eastern and Western – focusing on this ever-growing, gigantic mass of Chinese middle class consumers.

On the geopolitical and geoeconomic Big Picture, Liu He was diplomatically circumspect. He just let it filter that “we believe that an equitable international economic order must be preserved by all.”

Translation: the New Silk Roads, or BRI, as well as the integration efforts of BRICS+, the SCO and the EAEU will be on the forefront of Chinese policy.

And that brings us to what should become one of the key stories of the Year of the Rabbit: the renewed drive along the New Silk Roads.

Few better than the Chinese, historically, understand that from Samarkand to Venice, from Bukhara to Guangzhou, from Palmyra to Alexandria, from the Karakoram to the Hindu Kush, from deserts that used to engulf caravans to gardens of secluded harems, a formidable pull of economic, political, cultural and religious factors not only linked the extremities of Eurasia – from the Mediterranean to China – but determine and will continue to determine its centuries-old history.

The Ancient Silk Roads were not only about silk but also spices, porcelain, precious tones, fur, gold, tea, glass, slaves, concubines, war, knowledge, plagues – and that’s how they turned into the symbol of Eurasia-wide “people to people exchanges”, as Xi Jinping and the Beijing leadership extol it today.

These processes involve archeology, economics, history, musicology, compared mythology; so, keeping up with the past, the New Silk Roads also mean all manner of exchanges between East and West. The perpetual history of non-stop trade, in this case, is only the material base, a pretext.

Before silk there was lapis lazuli, copper, incense. Even if China may have only opened itself to the outside world on the 2^nd century B.C. – because of silk – Chinese tradition, in the oldest Chinese novel, The Chronicle of the Son of Heaven Mu, tells the tale of Emperor Mu visiting the Queen of Sheba already in the 10^th century B.C.

The exchanges between Europe and China may have started only in the 1^st century B.C. The men who actually traversed the Eurasian immensities were actually few. It’s only in the year 98 that the Chinese ambassadorship of Gan Ying departs for Da Qin – that is, Rome. He never arrived.

In the year 166, the Antoninus Pius ambassadorship, allegedly sent by the Emperor himself, finally hits China; but in fact that’s just an adventurous merchant. For 13 centuries there was a huge exploratory void.

Despite the prodigious advances of Islam and the omnipresence of Muslim merchants since the 7^th century, it’s only in the 13^th century – at the time of the last Crusades and the Mongol conquest – that Europeans picked up again the road towards the East. And then, on the 15^thcentury, the Ming emperors succeeding the Mongols totally closed China to the outside world.

It’s only due to a certain extent to the Jesuits in the 16^th century that a meeting finally happened – 17 centuries too late: Europe finally started to acquire some knowledge of China, even as it dreamed about it over and over again, since chic Roman patricians were enveloped in transparent silk robes.

It’s only around 1600 that Europeans seem to have become aware that Northern China and Southern China are on the same continent. So we may conclude that China really became known in the West only after the “discovery” of the Americas.

Two worlds ignored each other for so long – and still, all along the watchtowers in the middle of the steppes, trade kept moving from one side of Eurasia to another.

Now it’s time for another historical push – even as a discombobulated Europe is kept hostage by a cabal of imperial Straussian neo-cons and neoliberal-cons. Duisburg, in the Rhur valley, the world’s largest inland port, after all remains the key Iron Silk Road hub across BRI, linked by endless railways to Chongqing in China. Wake up, Young German: your future is in the East.

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Pepe Escobar, born in Brazil, is a correspondent and editor-at-large at Asia Times and columnist for Consortium News and Strategic Culture. Since the mid-1980s he’s lived and worked as a foreign correspondent in London, Paris, Milan, Los Angeles, Singapore, Bangkok. He has extensively covered Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia to China, Iran, Iraq and the wider Middle East. Pepe is the author of Globalistan – How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War; Red Zone Blues: A Snapshot of Baghdad during the Surge. He was contributing editor to The Empire and The Crescent and Tutto in Vendita in Italy. His last two books are Empire of Chaos and 2030. Pepe is also associated with the Paris-based European Academy of Geopolitics. When not on the road he lives between Paris and Bangkok. 

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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This article was first published in May 2023.

*** 

Outstanding video production by Matt Orfalea.

From the outset in January 2020 we have been accused by the mainstream media of  “spreading disinformation”.

Who was spreading “fake news”? 

Who was behind the fear campaign? Amply documented, there never was a Covid-19 pandemic. 

“Least we forget how intensely we were lied to by the government, medical, and media establishments, watch this 11-minute collection of celebrities, medical officials, media, and politicians blaming the “COVID Threat” on the unvaccinated. (Dr. Paul Craig Roberts)

***

“Let us be under no illusions, the Covid Jab is not only “experimental”, it’s a Big Pharma “killer vaccine”. The mainstream media has indulged in systematic propaganda with a view to sustaining The Big Lie.

We are living the most serious crisis in World history: An unprecedented crime against humanity applied Worldwide. More than 14 billion doses of the mRNA vaccine have been marketed and distributed to a World population of 8 billion people.

When the Lie Becomes The Truth. There is no moving Backwards” (Prof. Michel Chossudovsky)

VIDEO by Matt Orfaleo: Mainstream Media Propaganda to the n-th degree

On the nature of the pandemic and what the mainstream media has failed to report see the following:

Biggest Lie in World History: There Never Was A Pandemic. The Data Base is Flawed. The Covid Mandates including the Vaccine are Invalid, By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, May 14, 2023

 

The Covid “Killer Vaccine”. People Are Dying All Over the World. It’s A Criminal Undertaking, By Prof Michel Chossudovsky, May 24, 2023

 

You can also download Michel Chossudovsky’s E-book (pdf). See details below. 

Price: $11.50 Get yours for FREE! Click here to download.

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Price: $11.50 Get yours for FREE! Click here to download.

We encourage you to support the eBook project by making a donation through Global Research’s DonorBox “Worldwide Corona Crisis” Campaign Page. 

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***

It’s hardly news that the Kiev regime is one of the most corrupt in the world. This issue was raised by many in the political West after NATO and EU governments decided to prop up the Neo-Nazi junta regardless of the cost or consequences. Experts, politicians, journalists and others repeatedly warned that the funds, weapons and other assets sent to Kiev should be subjected to extensive scrutiny. And yet, these audits weren’t only flatly rejected in most cases, but those requesting them were even accused of being “Russian shills” or “Putin apologists”, supposedly supporting Russia’s “unprovoked aggression” in Ukraine. The deeply corrupt oligarchs running the country couldn’t have possibly hoped for a better chance to essentially steal tens of billions of dollars of Western “aid”.

However, the scale of the theft has become so massive that not even the Kiev regime could turn a blind eye, forcing it to simultaneously fire over a dozen high-ranking officials. The media are already calling it the biggest mass resignation and corruption scandal in recent history, including allegations such as bribery, embezzlement and mismanagement of “aid” funds for purchasing food, etc. The now-former officials were also caught buying sports cars, throwing lavish parties and going on expensive vacations while regular Ukrainian citizens suffer the consequences of the Neo-Nazi junta’s suicidal subservience to Euro-Atlantic “values”. The scandal involves a top adviser to Volodymyr Zelensky and four deputy ministers, including two defense officials. In addition, governors of at least five oblasts (regions) were fired, including those in Zaporozhye and Kherson.

Oleg Nemchinov, head of the Secretariat of Cabinet of Ministers compiled a list of officials who were forced to resign:

• Deputy Prosecutor General Oleskiy Symonenko
• Deputy Minister for Development of Communities and Territories Ivan Lukeryu
• Deputy Minister for Development of Communities and Territories Vyacheslav Negoda
• Deputy Minister for Social Policy Vitaliy Muzychenk

The list also includes the governors of Dnepropetrovsk, Zaporozhye, Kiev, Sumy and Kherson oblasts, while the defense ministry confirmed its deputy minister Vyacheslav Shapovalov was fired. He was in charge of logistics for the Kiev regime forces and was accused of signing food contracts at inflated prices. Shapovalov used public funds (most of which are now provided by the political West) to purchase military rations, enabling extra profits for contractors and himself. The Kiev regime is still trying to downplay the scandal, calling it a “technical error”, but even some mainstream media are unconvinced. On January 24, Politico published the details of Shapovalov’s scheme:

“An exposé from the Ukrainian news website ZN.UA revealed last week that the defense ministry purchased overpriced food supplies for its troops. For instance, the ministry bought eggs at 17 hryvnias per piece, while the average price of an egg in Kyiv is around 7 hryvnias. According to ZN.UA, a contract for food procurement for soldiers in 2023 amounted to 13.16 billion hryvnias (€328 million).”

And yet, the now-former deputy minister insists his resignation is purely altruistic and that he’s stepping down so as “not to pose a threat to the stable supply of the Armed Forces of Ukraine as a result of a campaign of accusations related to the purchase of food services.”

As the scandal grows in scope, some mainstream media are resorting to damage control and are trying to downplay the crimes. The deputy head of the presidential administration Kyrylo Tymoshenko, accused of using public funds for his lavish lifestyle, is now being whitewashed by Western state-run media, such as the BBC, which is claiming that “Tymoshenko was implicated in several scandals during his tenure, including in October last year when he was accused of using a car donated to Ukraine for humanitarian purposes.” However, in early December, local media presented evidence that Tymoshenko drove expensive sports cars to and from mansions which cost up to $25,000 per month in maintenance only.

Other Western state-run media are also trying to downplay the scandal and are even blaming Russia. The AFP claims that “Ukraine has long suffered endemic corruption, including among the political elite, but efforts to stamp out graft have been overshadowed by Moscow’s full-scale war that began in February,” adding that “Kyiv’s Western allies, who have allocated billions of dollars in financial and military support, have been pushing for anti-corruption reforms for years, sometimes as a precondition for aid.”

The scandal also includes luxury vacations abroad, with Deputy Prosecutor General Symonenko caught vacationing in Spain this winter while the vast majority of Ukrainians can’t afford basic necessities. Due to public outcry, the Kiev regime has even banned top officials to go abroad for vacations. In addition, mere days before the latest scandal, Deputy Minister of Infrastructure and Communities Development Vasyl Lozynskiy was accused of receiving bribes to force the purchase of generators at greatly hiked-up prices. And to top it all, Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov himself might be directly involved in the scandal.

It should be noted that the aforementioned officials are directly involved in overseeing tens of billions of dollars provided by taxpayers in the US, EU and elsewhere, people who are being impoverished as a result of the political West’s comprehensive aggression against Russia. The scandal could also explain why the Pentagon has been “unable” to track over $20 billion in weapons as the black market became flooded with Western-made arms. And yet, the Kiev regime frontman Volodymyr Zelensky is requesting a trillion dollars for the alleged “reconstruction” of Ukraine.

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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. 

Featured image is from InfoBrics

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***

Watch this interview between Scott Ritter and Col. Douglas MacGregor on the trajectory of the Ukraine war and the solution for Ukrainian self-determination. 

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***

Attendees at the exclusive January 2023 World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Switzerland, included FBI director Chris Wray, MI6 chief Richard Moore, Secretary-General of NATO Jens Stoltenberg, the CEOs of Amazon, BlackRock and Pfizer (just to name a few), Gates Foundation executives and Cybernetics School director Genevieve Bell

The publisher of The New York Times and CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria were also in attendance, as were Ukrainian President Zelensky and a long list of other presidents, prime ministers, ministers, senators, House representatives, commissioners, governors, mayors, bankers, royalty, officials from the UN and Red Cross, as well as military, customs and space agency officials

The people gathering at this meeting, which is by invitation only, are among the ones deciding how the rest of us are going to live our lives, what rights we’ll have regardless of local constitutions, and how the world is to be run

The WEF works closely with the World Health Organization and the United Nations to make sure the UN’s sustainable development goals are met. The sustainable development goals are the foundation upon which the WEF’s Great Reset agenda is built

The WEF is also helping the WHO seize power through its pandemic treaty. If enacted, member states will surrender their sovereignty to the WHO, making it a de facto one world governing body

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As reviewed by comedian Jimmy Dore of “The Jimmy Dore Show” in the video above, the World Health Organization began drafting a global pandemic treaty in mid-2022, which would grant it the sole power to make decisions relating to global biosecurity, including but not limited to the implementation of a global vaccine passport/digital identity, mandatory vaccinations, travel restrictions and standardized medical care.

As noted by Dore, “Then they can just shut your bank account down when you do something they don’t like, like protesting.” Indeed, in 2022, the Canadian government seized the bank accounts of people who had donated money to the trucker convoy, and this was basically a preview of the kind of power the WHO would have.

Treaty Members Will Surrender Their Sovereignty

Even if centralizing biosecurity were a good idea, which it’s not, the WHO would not be at the top of the list of organizations to be charged with this task. In his monologue, Dore quotes my May 2022 article, “What You Need to Know About the WHO Pandemic Treaty,” which was republished by The Defender:¹

“As just one example, the WHO didn’t publicly admit SARS-CoV-2 was airborne until the end of December 2021, yet scientists knew the virus was airborne within weeks of the pandemic being declared. The WHO also ignored early advice about airborne transmission.

So, it seems clear that the effort to now hand over more power to the WHO is about something other than them being the most qualified to make health decisions that benefit and protect everyone. With this treaty in place, all member nations will be subject to the WHO’s dictates … even if the people have rejected such plans using local democratic processes.”

In short, every country that signs onto the WHO’s pandemic treaty will voluntarily give up its sovereignty and the bodily autonomy of all its citizens. Making matters worse, we aren’t even told exactly who the people are who will make this decision, so we, the people, don’t know who to contact to make our voices heard.

How the Globalist Cabal Infiltrated Governments Worldwide

This is all happening outside the democratic process, and that’s intentional. The globalist cabal realized they could not convince billions of people into giving up their rights and freedoms. Instead, they focused on installing their own people in key positions around the world, so they could then make decisions that benefited the cult.

A key player in this global takeover plan is the World Economic Forum (WEF), founded in 1971. A great number of the installed globalists are graduates of the WEF’s Forum of Young Global Leaders,² (formerly the Global Leaders for Tomorrow school³), where they’re indoctrinated in technocratic ideals such as transhumanism which, whether they realize it or not, is nothing but eugenics rebranded.

Transhumanism, like eugenics, is about creating a superior race; in this case, a race augmented by and through technology rather than selective breeding. As of the end of 2022, the Young Global Leaders community had more than 1,400 members from 120 nations, and in addition to political leaders, alumni also include “civic and business innovators, entrepreneurs, technology pioneers, educators, activists, artists [and] journalists.”

The Young Global Leaders forum is not the only incubator of technocrats, but it’s one of the most well-recognized. WEF founder Klaus Schwab has openly bragged about the number of Young Global Leaders alumni that have successfully infiltrated governments around the world, including Canada, where more than 80% of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet are former WEF students.

Trudeau himself is also a Young Global Leader graduate. In a 2017 interview (video below), Schwab stated:⁴

“This notion to integrate young leaders is part of the World Economic Forum since many years … What we are really proud of now is young generation leaders like Prime Minister Trudeau … We penetrate the cabinets. I was at a reception for Prime Minister Trudeau and I know that half of his cabinet, or even more than half of his cabinet, are actually Young Global Leaders.”

The WEF’s Takeover of the UN

The Young Global Leaders school was founded in 1992, the same year Agenda 21 was introduced. This makes sense, as they’re part of the same plan. Agenda 21 is the actual action agenda for the United Nations’ sustainable development plans, while the WEF trains propagandists and implementers.

While the UN and WEF have clearly worked hand in hand since 1992, in June 2019, they signed a strategic partnership agreement to accelerate the implementation of the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development by further strengthening collaboration and coordination between the two organizations.⁵

Hundreds of Organizations Condemn WEF-UN Partnership

In a September 2019 open letter⁶ to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, more than 400 civil society organizations and 40 international networks condemned the partnership, calling it a “corporate capture of global governance,” and called on Guterres to end it.

“We are very concerned that this WEF-UN partnership agreement will de-legitimize the United Nations and provide transnational corporations preferential and deferential access to the UN System,” the letter states.

“The UN system is already under a big threat from the US Government and those who question a democratic multilateral world. However, this corporatization of the UN poses a much deeper long-term threat, as it will reduce public support for the UN system in the South and the North.

It is our strong belief that this agreement is fundamentally at odds with the UN Charter and with intergovernmental decisions on sustainable development, the climate emergency, and the eradication of poverty and hunger.

This public-private partnership will permanently associate the UN with transnational corporations, some of whose core essential activities have caused or worsened the social and environmental crises that the planet faces. This is a form of corporate capture.

We know that agribusiness destroys biodiversity and sustainable and just food systems, oil and gas corporations endanger the world’s climate, Big Pharma weakens access to essential medications, extractive corporations leave lasting damage to countries’ ecologies and peoples, and arms manufacturers profit from local and regional wars as well as repression of social movements.

All these sectors are significant actors within the World Economic Forum. The provisions of the strategic partnership effectively provide that corporate leaders will become ‘whisper advisors’ to the heads of UN system departments, using their private access to advocate market-based profit-making ‘solutions’ to global problems while undermining real solutions embedded in public interest and transparent democratic procedures …

The UN’s acceptance of this partnership agreement moves the world toward WEF’s aspirations for multistakeholderism becoming the effective replacement of multilateralism.

WEF in their 2010 The Global Redesign Initiative argued that the first step toward their global governance vision is ‘to redefine the international system as constituting a wider, multifaceted system of global cooperation in which intergovernmental legal frameworks and institutions are embedded as a core, but not the sole and sometimes not the most crucial, component.

The goal was to weaken the role of states in global decision-making and to elevate the role of a new set of ‘stakeholders’, turning our multilateral system into a multistakeholder system, in which companies are part of the governing mechanisms.

This would bring transnational corporations, selected civil society representatives, states and other non-state actors together to make global decisions, discarding or ignoring critical concerns around conflicts of interest, accountability and democracy.”

The WEF Actively and Intentionally Undermines Democracy

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In mid-January 2023, WEF members, Young Leaders alumni and other VIPs gathered in Davos, Switzerland, for their annual get-together. As reported by UnHerd columnist Thomas Fazi:⁷

“Alongside heads of state from all over the world, the CEOs of Amazon, BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase, Pfizer and Moderna will gather, as will the President of the European Commission, the IMF’s Managing Director, the secretary general of Nato, the chiefs of the FBI and MI6, the publisher of The New York Times, and, of course, the event’s infamous host — founder and chairman of the WEF, Klaus Schwab …

Founded in 1971 … the WEF is ‘committed to improving the state of the world through public-private cooperation,’ also known as multistakeholder governance.

The idea is that global decision-making should not be left to governments and nation-states — as in the post-war multilateralist framework enshrined in the United Nations — but should involve a whole range of non-government stakeholders: civil society bodies, academic experts, media personalities and, most important, multinational corporations …

While this may sound fairly benign, it neatly encapsulates the basic philosophy of globalism: insulating policy from democracy by transferring the decision-making process from the national and international level, where citizens theoretically are able to exercise some degree of influence over policy, to the supranational level, by placing a self-selected group of unelected, unaccountable ‘stakeholders’ — mainly corporations — in charge of global decisions concerning everything from energy and food production to the media and public health …

[There] is little doubt as to which interests Schwab’s brainchild is actually promoting and empowering: the WEF is itself mostly funded by around 1,000 member companies … which include some of the world’s biggest corporations in oil (Saudi Aramco, Shell, Chevron, BP), food (Unilever, The Coca-Cola Company, Nestlé), technology (Facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Apple) and pharmaceuticals (AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Moderna).

The composition of the WEF’s board is also very revealing, including Laurence D. Fink, CEO of Blackrock, David M. Rubenstein, co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, and Mark Schneider, CEO of Nestlé.

There’s no need to resort to conspiracy theories to posit that the WEF’s agenda is much more likely to be tailored to suit the interests of its funders and board members — the world’s ultra-wealthy and corporate elites — rather than to ‘improving the state of the world,’ as the organization claims.”

The Goal of the 0.0001% Is to Rule Over the Rest of Us

Considering how proud Schwab is of his WEF members, one wonders why the attendance list to his annual Davos meeting is confidential. Whatever the reason for that might be, The Dossier recently acquired a copy of that list.⁸

Attendees at the exclusive January 2023 meeting included FBI director Chris Wray, MI6 chief Richard Moore, Secretary-General of NATO Jens Stoltenberg, the CEOs of Amazon, BlackRock and Pfizer (just to name a few), Gates Foundation executives and Cybernetics School director Genevieve Bell.

The publisher of The New York Times and CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria were also in attendance, as were Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and a long list of other presidents, prime ministers, ministers, senators, House representatives, commissioners, governors, mayors, bankers, royalty, officials from the UN and Red Cross, as well as military, customs and space agency officials.

The people gathering at this meeting, which is by invitation only, are among the ones deciding how the rest of us are going to live our lives, what rights we’ll have, regardless of local constitutions, and how the world is to be run. The rest of us have no say in the matter.

As noted by UnHerd:¹⁰

“… there is no denying that the WEF wields immense power, which has cemented the rule of the transnational capitalist class to a degree never before seen in history.

But it is important to recognize that its power is simply a manifestation of the power of the ‘superclass’ it represents — a tiny group amounting, according to researchers,¹¹ to no more than 6,000 or 7,000 people, or 0.0001% of the world’s population, and yet more powerful than any social class the world has ever known …

It was only a matter of time before these aspiring cosmocrats developed a tool through which to fully exercise their dominion over the lower classes — and the WEF proved to be the perfect vehicle to do so.”

The Globalist Cult

One insider has described the WEF’s Davos gathering as “a Ponzi scheme” and “a cult,” according to investigative journalist Michael Shellenberger, who wrote about the WEF in a January 15, 2023, Substack post.¹² Apparently, the WEF is getting concerned about the fact that more and more people are starting to realize what they’re actually up to.

“The World Economic Forum … is fighting back against conspiracy theorists who say it and its founder Klaus Schwab are seeking global domination through a ‘great reset’ aimed at stripping the masses of their private property, de-industrializing the economy, and making everybody eat bugs.

”Own nothing, be happy’ — you might have heard the phrase,’ wrote World Economic Forum (WEF) Managing Director Adrian Monck last August. ‘It started life as a screenshot, culled from the Internet by an anonymous anti-semitic account on the image board 4chan …

But what Monck claimed was inaccurate. The phrase, ‘Own nothing, be happy,’ hadn’t originated on 4chan; it originated on WEF’s website.”

Meat will be a special treat. Read more: https://t.co/RiQP6tpkfp pic.twitter.com/7BcRHgnWTx

— World Economic Forum (@wef) April 9, 2018

Indeed, for some reason, these globalists are continuously describing their plans in reports, white papers, on websites, in videos (such as the one above) and at meetings. Yet when people put the puzzle pieces together, they cry “conspiracy theory.” The WEF’s plan may rightly be called a conspiracy, but none of it is theoretical because they’ve described it in black and white. Schwab even published a book about The Great Reset that anyone can peruse.

In the final analysis, what they’re really objecting to and are trying to draw attention away from is the fact that people don’t like their plan and are calling it for what it is — a global coup d’état, a power grab by cultists who are unsuited to rule because their ideology¹³ is based on eugenics, depopulation and undemocratic top-down authoritarianism. Even in the face of collapsing birth rates, the WEF still insists overpopulation is a dire threat.¹⁴

Summary

So, to recap:

Billionaires Plotting How to Depopulate

As mentioned, one of the reasons I believe the 0.0001% are unfit to rule the world is because of their anti-human ideology. Billionaires have held many secret meetings over the years to figure out the best way to depopulate.

In a January 8, 2023, Substack article,¹⁷ the Naked Emperor describes the “Good Club,” which first met in 2009. The meeting, which was funded and attended by Bill Gates, included George Soros, Warren Buffett, David Rockefeller, Ted Turner, Eli and Edythe Broad, Michael Bloomberg, Oprah Winfrey, Peter Peterson, Julian Robertson Jr., John and Tashia Morgridge, and Patty Stonesifer.

The meeting was held at the home of Sir Paul Nurse, then-president of the Rockefeller University. Nurse is now the director of the Francis Crick Institute, which was founded by a eugenicist. Crick’s intention behind the Institute was to rehabilitate eugenics and “make it respectable again.”

As recently as 1970, Crick stated that “evidence for the equality of different races did not really exist.” That same year he also wrote that sterilization through bribery was the only answer to rid the world of people with poor genes. Depopulation and eugenics were also on the agenda for the 2009 “Good Club” meeting. Each participant was given 15 minutes to present their case, and while several issues were brought up, all agreed that depopulation was a priority.

They also agreed that whatever strategy was employed it needed to be independent of government, as government agencies were deemed unable to head off the looming disaster of overpopulation.

As noted by the Naked Emperor, “if all they were doing was planning on how to save the world, they would be transparent and encourage everyone to help them on their mission.” But that’s not what they’re doing.

Is that because their ideas might be considered abominable by the average person? Sure, it’s easy to decree that people of a certain class don’t deserve to live — if you’re not in that class!

Ask parents of autistic children if they would be willing to euthanize their kids, for example, and I’m sure you’d get an earful. Or ask people over 65 to submit to automatic euthanasia and see how many takers you get. People work their entire lives just to enjoy the leisure of that last decade or two.

The Rise of Anthropocene Anti-Humanism

The idea of billionaires plotting to get rid of other people, but not themselves or their own families, is repugnant to most. But it might be even worse than that. Remarkably, as reported by the Naked Emperor, we’re now seeing the emergence of a cult that embraces the total annihilation of ALL mankind.

“The revolt against humanity is still new enough to appear outlandish, but it has already spread beyond the fringes of the intellectual world,” he writes.¹⁸

“This is called Anthropocene anti-humanism, ‘inspired by revulsion at humanity’s destruction of the natural environment.’ For all we know, these billionaires could be part of this cult and influencing policies based on these views.

In the 21st century, Anthropocene anti-humanism offers a much more radical response to a much deeper ecological crisis. It says that our self-destruction is now inevitable, and that we should welcome it as a sentence we have justly passed on ourselves.

Some anti-humanist thinkers look forward to the extinction of our species, while others predict that even if some people survive the coming environmental apocalypse, civilization as a whole is doomed. Like all truly radical movements, Anthropocene anti-humanism begins not with a political program but with a philosophical idea …”

Is Anti-Humanism or Transhumanism Driving the Globalists?

Do the 0.0001% ascribe to anthropocene anti-humanism, or are they transhumanists at heart? As explained by the Naked Emperor:

“Transhumanism, by contrast, glorifies some of the very things that anti-humanism decries — scientific and technological progress, the supremacy of reason. But it believes that the only way forward for humanity is to create new forms of intelligent life that will no longer be Homo sapiens.

Some transhumanists believe that genetic engineering and nanotechnology will allow us to alter our brains and bodies so profoundly that we will escape human limitations such as mortality and confinement to a physical body.

Others await … the invention of artificial intelligence infinitely superior to our own. These beings will demote humanity to the rank we assign to animals — unless they decide that their goals are better served by wiping us out completely.”

Judging by the planned direction the WEF is taking us, I’m convinced transhumanist philosophy underpins its political agendas. Schwab also has not been shy about the WEF’s transhumanist ideals.

He even coined the term “Fourth Industrial Revolution” to describe the planned merger of man with machine. Such a merger, in turn, allows for the direct control of each individual from the outside. Just like you can remote control a computer, so would you be able to remote control an individual whose brain was connected to the cloud.

Technocracy Is Here

A prescient warning from 1975. We now live in this abyss! pic.twitter.com/NLOU8KFh2r

— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) January 9, 2023

In 1975, Sen. Frank Church (video above) warned that the technological advancements of that time already posed a direct threat to the citizens of the United States, and that were a dictator to infiltrate or take control of the country, there would be no escape from the tyranny.

Fast-forward to today, and his words are more than a little prescient. As noted by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., “We now live in this abyss!”¹⁹ The question is, how do we get out of this abyss, which was intentionally created for us by the 0.0001%?

I believe the only way out is by rejecting surveillance technologies such as Google and Google-based devices while simultaneously building parallel economies, industries and communities that operate outside of their control system. None of that is easy, but we have no other choice. If you accept their system, you accept enslavement.

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Notes

¹ The Defender May 10, 2022

² Young Global Leaders

^3, 4 Tfig Global News July 18, 2022

⁵ FIAN.org January 16, 2020

⁶ Open Letter to Antonio Guterres September 2019

^7, 10 Unherd January 16, 2023

⁸ Dossier Substack January 9, 2023

^9, 11 Carnegie, Superclass: The Global Power Elite and the World They Are Making

¹² Public Substack January 15, 2023

^13, 17, 18 Naked Emperor Substack January 8, 2023

¹⁴ Twitter WEF April 5, 2018

¹⁵ STAT October 8, 2021

¹⁶ Twitter Ghebreyesus November 15, 2019

¹⁹ Twitter Robert F. Kennedy Jr January 9, 2023

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Newly re-elected three-time Brazilian leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who’s popularly known as Lula, just shattered the foreign policy expectations of his multipolar base by becoming the first BRICS leader to publicly condemn Russia’s special operation. Unlike his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro who refused to do so and thus received a lot of flak in the US-led Western Mainstream Media (MSM) for his pragmatism, Lula crossed the line and even compared Russia’s involvement in Ukraine to the US’ in Venezuela.  

In remarks that he made while in Buenos Aires on Monday, one of the literal founders of BRICS shockingly declared that “In the same way that I am against territorial occupation, as Russia did to Ukraine, I am against too much interference in the Venezuelan process.” Quite clearly, he was implying that Russia’s military efforts to restore the integrity of its national security red lines in Ukraine after NATO crossed them there are morally equivalent to the US’ unprovoked aggression against Venezuela.

Lula is of course entitled to his opinion and has the legal right as the head of the Brazilian state to publicly express his views about what’s indisputably at this point become a proxy war between the US-led West’s Golden Billion and the jointly BRICS– & SCO-led Global South of which Russia is a part. That said, so too do observers also have the right to critique his unexpectedly sharp attack against Moscow’s special operation, especially since it betrays the expectations of his multipolar base at home and abroad.

Brazil should seek to pragmatically balance between both de facto New Cold War blocs following the path pioneered by fellow BRICS member India over the past year instead of its leader inserting himself into the debate like Lula just did to make a hyper-partisan statement that’ll obviously offend his Russian counterpart. There’s little doubt that Lula is domestically aligned with the US’ ruling Democrats’ liberal-globalist ideology, but he still at least publicly claims to share Russia’s multipolarinternational one too.

He could have expressed a much more balanced approach towards this conflict if he wanted to exactly as his counterparts in fellow BRICS members China, India, and South Africa have done over the past year. Instead, the same man who’s famous for his masterful use of words chose to compare Russia’s special operation in Ukraine to the US’ Hybrid War on Venezuela, which makes one wonder whether this was a rare faux pas from that famous public speaker or a deliberately unfriendly statement.

Whatever his true intentions might have been, there’s no denying that his remark sends mixed signals, especially since it came on the same day that he declared Brazil’s interest in creating a common currency for BRICS. He’ll soon be headed for the US early next month though to rub shoulders with his country’s “frenemy” with whom it’s locked in a relationship of complex economic and military interdependence and which was responsible for his jailing a few years back.

It’s indeed possible that Brazil can pragmatically balance between the US-led West’s Golden Billion and the jointly BRICS- and SCO-led Global South of which it’s a part just like India has successfully done, but for that to happen, then Lula’s rhetoric should replicate Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s wherein he declines to publicly condemn Russia’s special operation, let alone compare it to naked US imperialism. Hopefully this was just a rare faux pas by Lula and not a signal of what’s to come with his foreign policy.

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This article was originally published on Andrew Korybko’s Newsletter.

Andrew Korybko is an American Moscow-based political analyst specializing in the relationship between the US strategy in Afro-Eurasia, China’s One Belt One Road global vision of New Silk Road connectivity, and Hybrid Warfare. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

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A recent update to the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) electrocardiogram (EKG) test limits for pilots has some aviation and medical experts questioning if the FAA’s move is concerned that COVID-19 vaccine injuries may be contributing to an ongoing shortage of pilots.

The FAA on Oct. 26, 2022, changed its Guide for Aviation Medical Examiners (AME), increasing the acceptable “PR interval” from 200 to 300 milliseconds — a 50% increase.

The PR interval — the time it takes for an electrical impulse to be transmitted from one part of the heart to another — is a key indicator of heart health.

The FAA did not publicly announce the revision and, according to Just the News, also has not disclosed the data used to justify the change.

US Freedom Flyers (USFF), an advocacy group opposed to COVID-19 vaccine mandates for pilots, detected the change last month, The Epoch Times reported.

The USFF and some vaccine safety advocates suggested the FAA revised the limits because airlines’ vaccine mandates, which some argued violated FAA regulations, resulted in a significant number of pilots sustaining adverse events.

The revelations surfaced amid claims the FAA did not investigate multiple cases of vaccine-injured pilots, including incidents where disaster nearly occurred, and that there is increasing demand for unvaccinated pilots.

Some critics called for FAA officials to resign, alleging the vaccines endangered the health of pilots and the public.

‘A lot of pilots and a lot of damage’

According to Just the News, federal agencies “are withholding the data behind recent decisions that relate or may relate to COVID-19 vaccines and severe adverse events.”

The FAA “raised the maximum so-called PR interval for first-degree atrioventricular [AV] block to 300 milliseconds, with no regard to age, on the list of ‘normal variants’ that don’t require deferment in the absence of ‘symptoms or AME concerns.’”

This means the FAA now considers more health conditions to be acceptable.

Steve Kirsch, founder of the Vaccine Safety Research Foundation, said the new range “accommodates people who have cardiac injury.”

Multiple pilots have come forward to report cardiac injury and other adverse effects following their COVID-19 vaccination, as previously reported by The Defender.

Josh Yoder, a commercial pilot and co-founder of USFF, told The Epoch Times he believes the FAA’s changes are “a ticking time bomb on a level like we’ve never seen,” and that they increase the odds that a pilot’s heart condition will go undetected, which increases the risk of an aviation disaster.

Kirsch called the changes “extraordinary,” adding, “They did it hoping nobody would notice.” He said the change is “a tacit admission from the U.S. government that the COVID vaccine has damaged the hearts of our pilots. Not just a few pilots. A lot of pilots and a lot of damage.”

The FAA disputed the claims — as did media “fact checkers.”

There is “no evidence of aircraft accidents or incapacitations caused by pilots suffering medical complications associated with COVID-19 vaccines,” the FAA told The Epoch Times.

But Kirsch and others said this is because the FAA never investigated those incidents.

The FAA also said, “When making changes to medical requirements and guidance, the FAA follows standard processes based on data and science.”

Yet the agency did not release the data used to make the revision, despite media requests, including from Tucker Carlson, host of Fox News “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”

In a statement to Just the News, the FAA claimed it followed “standard processes based on data and science” that allowed it to “safely raise the tolerance used to screen for a certain heart condition.”

Federal Air Surgeon Dr. Susan Northrup said the FAA has “seen no evidence” of vaccine injuries that led to “aircraft accidents or pilot incapacitations.”

The Associated Press, in a “fact check” said the FAA’s revision wasn’t prompted by adverse events among pilots following COVID-19 vaccination. The AP, citing the FAA, said, “This change was made in response to new scientific evidence” from the FAA’s “cardiology consultants.”

Cardiologists weigh in

In a Jan. 5 essay, cardiologist Thomas Levy, M.D., J.D., called the FAA’s new guideline “arguably a shocking one, as many pilots are in the same age range when heart attacks occur without any early symptoms but with a normal ECG — the ECG being the only mandatory heart-related test.”

“A fatal heart attack from very advanced coronary artery disease could occur 10 minutes after the normal ECG was recorded,” Levy added.

While a PR interval longer than 200 ms doesn’t prove, on its own, that there is a heart problem, it “shouldn’t be ignored,” Levy told The Epoch Times, and warrants additional testing, as the heart may “no longer [be] completely healthy, and the conduction rate is slowing down.”

A PR interval even slightly exceeding 200 ms “is clearly associated with arrhythmias in the future, pacemakers, and early death,” Levy said, adding that this is especially concerning in light of the increased prevalence of myocarditis in recent years, noting that the condition can contribute to a longer PR interval.

A sudden burst of adrenalin, such as one caused by a stressful in-flight situation, can bring this problem to light, said Levy, adding that myocarditis can strike suddenly and without prior warning signs.

Military flight surgeon Dr. Theresa Long, during an appearance on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” said the new interval “does not improve safety.” She noted that unlike military pilots, who get EKGs annually regardless of age, commercial pilots receive one at age 35 and then annually starting at age 40.

Long told The Epoch Times cardiologists have always told her, “It would be negligent … to see a PR interval of 290 and do nothing.” Long said she was puzzled and concerned by the FAA’s new limit and that it was not typical for the agency to make such a change without citing specific evidence or studies.

Former FAA safety inspector Stephen Carbone called the new guidelines “nothing short of safety sacrilege” and an “assault on aviation safety,” adding, “I can’t highlight enough how dangerous this is and how irresponsible.”

Dr. Peter Chambers, a retired U.S. military special operations flight surgeon, said the new guidelines remove “the ‘safety zone’ that allows us to catch the problem early,” adding, “You’re not even allowed to ask the questions” about adverse health effects experienced by vaccinated pilots.

What’s behind pilot shortage?

Epidemiologist Dr. Andrew Bostom said the most likely explanation for the FAA’s change “is very benign and practical: the airlines are losing pilots by attrition.” Bostom didn’t attribute the attrition to pilot vaccine injuries, but others are making this connection.

Kirsch, for instance, wrote:

“I’ll take an educated guess as to why [the FAA] did that. I believe it is because they knew if they kept the original range, too many pilots would have to be grounded. That would be extremely problematic; commercial aviation in the U.S. would be severely disrupted.

“In other words, the COVID vaccine has seriously injured a lot of pilots and the FAA knows it and said nothing because that would tip off the country that the vaccines are unsafe. And you aren’t allowed to do that.”

Kirsch noted that the timing of the October 2022 change — two years after the onset of the pandemic — rules out COVID-19.

“October 2022 is late for COVID,” Kirsch said. “If it was due to COVID, it would have happened well before now. They can make changes every month.”

According to a July 2022 report by Oliver Wyman Insights, “an impending pilot shortage was on the horizon” in early 2021, and it is now materializing, due to an aging workforce and mandatory retirement age of 65, and “a wave of early retirements at the height of the pandemic,” though the report didn’t specify the reason for that.

Vaccine-injured former pilot Bob Snow confirmed for The Defender the growing shortage of pilots in the U.S., noting that “former military aviators are a traditional source of pilots for the airlines, but the military no longer produces pilots in large numbers, so there is now a shortfall.”

“The airline industry does not seem as attractive to the younger generation as with prior generations,” Snow added.

FAA not investigating pilot vaccine injuries

The FAA never imposed a vaccine mandate on pilots, but the agency did issue “guidance” for pilots to get vaccinated. Many airlines and employers did impose mandates.

FAA regulations prohibit pilots from taking non-FDA-approved medical products, such as those issued under an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA), but the FAA overlooked this rule when advising pilots to receive the COVID-19 vaccines — which were issued under an EUA.

The Defender has previously reported on adverse events sustained by multiple commercial, military and private pilots and by air traffic controllers, following their COVID-19 vaccination. Some pilots lost their jobs, some even lost their lives.

Snow, for instance, suffered a heart attack six minutes after landing his commercial flight and is currently unable to fly, while Cody Flint narrowly averted a crash of his own.

When Kirsch emailed Northrup last week, soon after the change in the FAA’s guidelines were known, and he later spoke with Northrup by phone. According to Kirsch, Northrup revealed that neither she, nor anyone else at the FAA, investigated incidents like Snow’s.

Kirsch wrote:

“At first I thought she was lying, but it turns out she was telling the truth. She’s seen no evidence because even though she admitted on the call that she knew about Bob Snow, nobody at the FAA ever bothered to call him. Ever!!! So they’ve never seen the evidence because they deliberately refused to look at the evidence!!”

Kirsch asked Northrup to provide the data the FAA used to justify the guidelines change, to investigate pilot vaccine injuries and to host a public roundtable to “discuss the ‘safe and effective’ narrative” regarding COVID-19 vaccines and pilot safety.

He also asked Northrup to respond to the Aug.1, 2022, revelation by author Alex Berenson, a former journalist with The New York Times, that the pilots’ union at a major U.S. air carrier internally reported a 300% rise in long-term disability claims among its mostly vaccinated members.

“If she doesn’t hold a roundtable,” wrote Kirsch in one blog post, “it will be further confirmation that the FAA is afraid to investigate the safety issues.”

Kirsch also publicly called on Northrup to resign, adding that “if she doesn’t, the FAA should fire her” as “she has put the lives of pilots, FAA employees, and the public at risk by her abject failure to investigate safety concerns associated with the COVID vaccines.”

Kirsch added:

“I know of people inside the FAA and pilots who have been killed or permanently disabled because they followed the FAA’s directive to be vaccinated. Susan has not called any of these people to investigate. Nobody from the FAA has. That is a dereliction of duty.”

Kirsch noted that Northrup’s husband, John Hyle, is a pilot who “refused to take the COVID vaccine due to safety concerns.”

Others expressed similar concerns about the FAA’s actions — or inaction. At the Jan. 21 Restore Freedom Rally in Orlando, Florida, Yoder said, “The FAA is not upset that they’re killing pilots. They’re upset that we caught them.”

On Jan. 22, Yoder tweeted:

"The Airlines should have demanded of the FAA that they do proper studies on these substances before they were injected into pilots. This would have stopped the entire program if the Airlines had pushed back. The FAA did zero safety studies."@JoshYoder

— US Freedom Flyers (@USFreedomFlyers) January 22, 2023

Kirsch is planning a roundtable in collaboration with USFF, The Highwire and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.). Kirsch described it as “a public hearing where we will put all the pilot and FAA employee injuries in full public view, including what actions the FAA took to investigate each injury.”

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Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D., based in Athens, Greece, is a senior reporter for The Defender and part of the rotation of hosts for CHD.TV’s “Good Morning CHD.”

Featured image is from CHD

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Anti-monopoly advocates on Tuesday praised the Biden administration and eight states for launching a federal antitrust lawsuit that could break up Google, which is accused of illegally dominating the digital advertising market.

“Competition in the ad tech space is broken, for reasons that were neither accidental nor inevitable,” states the complaint filed by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and Virginia in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

“One industry behemoth, Google, has corrupted legitimate competition in the ad tech industry by engaging in a systematic campaign to seize control of the wide swath of high-tech tools used by publishers, advertisers, and brokers, to facilitate digital advertising,” the complaint continues.

“Having inserted itself into all aspects of the digital advertising marketplace, Google has used anti-competitive, exclusionary, and unlawful means to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technologies,” the document adds, urging the court to force the Alphabet-owned company to sell off its ad tech products.

Echoing the complaint, Demand Progress executive director David Segal pointed out that “Google’s monopoly in the advertising technology market functionally forces publishers and advertisers to use its services.”

“We’re glad to see the Department of Justice demand a breakup of this tech giant, directly taking on its unfair, anti-competitive practices,” he said. “This move is critical to protect our democracy, increase innovation, and strengthen small businesses.”

🚨NEW: @JusticeATR is holding @Google accountable for illegally monopolizing the market for online ads.

We applaud the DOJ for pushing a pro-competition agenda that actually enforces laws on the books and protects the general public from Big Tech.https://t.co/2syPzCm3wp

— The Tech Oversight Project (@Tech_Oversight) January 24, 2023

American Economic Liberties Project director of research Matt Stoller also welcomed the suit, declaring that “we’re thrilled to see the Department of Justice finally demand a breakup of Google’s advertising monopoly.”

“As the Justice Department’s suit meticulously documents, Google is a buyer, broker, and digital advertising exchange with pervasive conflicts of interest,” Stoller said. “Google regularly abuses this power, manipulating markets, muscling out any form of competition, and inspiring fear across the commercial landscape.”

“The DOJ’s suit, which comes alongside a similar suit from a coalition of state attorneys general and efforts in Congress to bring fairness to digital ad markets, shows clearly that Google’s days of unbridled dominance are numbered,” he asserted.

Bloomberg noted Tuesday that “state attorneys general have filed three separate suits against Google, alleging it dominates the markets for online search, advertising technology, and apps on the Android mobile platform in violation of antitrust laws.”

This is the DOJ’s first case against the tech giant under President Joe Biden but follows another filed just months before he took office. In response to the new filing, a Google spokesperson said that “today’s lawsuit from the DOJ attempts to pick winners and losers in the highly competitive advertising technology sector. It largely duplicates an unfounded lawsuit by the Texas attorney general, much of which was recently dismissed by a federal court. DOJ is doubling down on a flawed argument that would slow innovation, raise advertising fees, and make it harder for thousands of small businesses and publishers to grow.”

JUST IN: AG Merrick Garland announced the Justice Department, along with 8 states, filed a civil antitrust lawsuit against Google.

‘Google has used anticompetitive, exclusionary, & unlawful conduct to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its [digital ad] dominance.' pic.twitter.com/ji2Drydhym

— NowThis (@nowthisnews) January 24, 2023

Meanwhile, Open Markets Institute executive director Barry Lynn argued that “today’s lawsuit by the Department of Justice against Google for the monopolization of advertising will be remembered as one of the most important antitrust cases in American history. No previous corporation has ever posed such a direct threat to U.S. democracy, or to individual freedom of expression, action, and thought.”

Along with heaping praise on the DOJ’s Antitrust Division, Lynn highlighted the impacts of Google’s dominance:

The breadth and scope of Google’s threat to the American way of life is astounding. Never before has a single private institution concentrated so much power and control over so many corners of our nation’s political economy. But the most dangerous threat of all is Google’s theft of advertising dollars through large-scale and pervasive surveillance that, since before the Revolution, have ensured the independence and economic health of America’s free press. The cost has been enormous. Tens of thousands of journalism jobs destroyed. Thousands of newspapers and other news outlets bankrupted. Every publisher, no matter how big, made fearful of speaking out.

Stacy Mitchell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, stressed that “by picking the pocket of small businesses, small newspapers, and other publishers, Google actively extracts resources from communities that need them most and threatens a free, local press that lies at the heart of our democracy,”

“After decades in which enforcers looked the other way as the tech giants amassed market power, this lawsuit is yet another sign that our antitrust enforcers are again embracing their responsibility to safeguard American liberty and democracy by breaking up monopolies like Google,” she said. “We applaud the Justice Department’s action today.”

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, who joined other DOJ leaders for a Tuesday press conference about the case, pledged that “no matter the industry and no matter the company, the Justice Department will vigorously enforce our antitrust laws to protect consumers, safeguard competition, and ensure economic fairness and opportunity for all.”

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***

On December 21, the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, spoke to Congress in an effort to get more financial and military support from the American government. Zelenskyy spoke of peace, freedom, and interconnection as the main goals of the Ukrainian fight but that Ukraine needed American resolve. Zelenskyy stated:

From the United States to China, from Europe to Latin America and from Africa to Australia, the world is too interconnected and interdependent to allow someone to stay aside and at the same time to feel safe when such a battle continues. Our two nations are allies in this battle, and next year will be a turning point . . . when Ukrainian courage and American resolve must guarantee the future of our common freedom.

After his speech, Congress passed a $1.7 trillion spending plan with $45 billion going to Ukraine. This money is supposed to be used for the Ukrainian war effort, but President Biden insists that he has no intention of sending US combat troops to Ukraine; he was not the first leader to make such a promise.

Parallels in History

Just as in World War I, World War II, and Vietnam, it is never just military support. President Wilson, President Roosevelt, and President Johnson all promised that they would not send Americans into a war. President Wilson created a campaign slogan of “he kept us out of war.” FDR created the lend-lease program to arm the British and later the Soviets, all the while keeping “neutrality.” Presidents Kennedy and Johnson sent military aid and advisors to support the South Vietnamese government until the United States sent combat troops after the Gulf of Tonkin incident. Despite the promises of these politicians, war was the result.

Although we don’t know the plans of Western government officials, we can analyze their previous plans and policies: broken promises, broken treaties, sanctions, and coups that built up the mistrust between East and West and caused the harmful consequences we see today.

Western Expansion in the East

On February 24, 2022, just hours after the initial invasion, President Putin went on TV and gave his reasons for the invasion, stating:

I am referring to the eastward expansion of NATO, which is moving its military infrastructure ever closer to the Russian border. It is a fact that over the past thirty years we have been patiently trying to come to an agreement with the leading NATO countries . . . In response . . . we invariably faced either cynical deception and lies or attempts at pressure and blackmail.

NATO expansion has always been a concern for the Russian Federation since its start in 1991, when American, British, French, and German diplomats promised not to expand NATO. But this was a broken promise, as Alan Sabrosky, former head of strategic studies for the US Army War College, put it:

Well, it was the sort of thing where we could do it. There was a drunken lout named Yeltsin as president of Russia, and there was very little we couldn’t do. We plundered Russia economically and plundered it politically. Yeltsin was completely incapable of responding in an effective way to any expansion of NATO beyond its borders. We could do it, and so we did.

Bill Clinton would bring countries such as Poland and Hungary into NATO, breaking earlier promises, but would deny a Russian request for NATO membership in 2000. President George W. Bush extended membership to the Baltic countries and Slovakia in 2004, and he worked toward adding Georgia and Ukraine into the fold in 2008. But this was not the start of the war in Ukraine; that war would begin in 2014 with the NATO-backed overthrow of the Ukrainian government.

Known as the Maidan Revolution, this NATO-backed coup overthrew the Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych. We know this was backed by NATO because of a recorded phone call from the Estonian foreign minister Urmas Paet to the EU head of foreign policy, Catherine Ashton. In the call, Minister Paet talks of suspicious members of the new government coalition ordering the sniper murders in Independence Square that killed protesters and police alike. In fact, Maidan activist Ivan Bubenchik confessed that during the massacre, he had shot Ukrainian police officers. After this coup, Russia annexed Crimea, and secessionist rebels seized Donbass from Ukraine, which sparked a civil war that rages on to this day.

These suspicious members were from neo-Nazi parties like Azov and Svoboda, the same groups that led violent clashes with the police. In a phone call whose transcript was leaked in 2014, assistant secretary of state Victoria Nuland and US ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt discussed whom they favored in the new opposition government and agreed that Vice President Biden should give them an “atta-boy.” The transcript states:

Pyatt: So let me work on Klitschko and if you can just keep . . . we want to try to get somebody with an international personality to come out here and help to midwife this thing. The other issue is some kind of outreach to Yanukovych but we will probably regroup on that tomorrow as we see how things start to fall into place.

Nuland: So, on that piece Geoff, when I wrote the note [US vice-president’s national security adviser Jake] Sullivan’s come back to me VFR [direct to me], saying you need [US vice president Joe] Biden and I said probably tomorrow for an atta-boy and to get the deets [details] to stick. So, Biden’s willing.

In the call, Nuland and Pyatt also talked about working with Oleh Tyahnybok and his neo-Nazi Svoboda party; members of this party as well as members of the Azov Battalion once again spearheaded the attacks on police. In the call, Nuland said that Tyahnybok would “be a problem” but that members of the Svoboda party like Oleksandr Sych would get positions in the new government’s cabinet.

Conclusion

One of the best analogies that came out of this war was from Scott Horton from antiwar.com: if the Russian government overthrew the Canadian government and the now anti-American government threatened to kick US naval bases out of Alaska and started a war with secessionists in Vancouver, British Columbia, we would be plotting regime change within hours.

This war is a direct result of war hawk American policy, which installed an anti-Russian government in Ukraine; expanded a military alliance on Russia’s doorstep; gave billions of dollars’ worth of weapons to fight Russian-backed secessionists in Donbass, ending missile treaties and installing silos in Poland and Romania; and waged an economic war on the Russian population through sanctions. We now see the consequences of the US government’s actions.

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John Kennedy is a recent graduate of Hartford Magnet Trinity College Academy. Economists such as Murray Rothbard, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, and Ludwig von Mises have captured his interest in Austrian economics and inspired him to start writing.

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***

When the United States involves itself militarily in a conflict, it often finds it hard to get itself out, let alone avoid deep entanglements that blow well past lines it had drawn at the start of the intervention. 

It happened in Vietnam, when U.S. military advisers helping the South Vietnamese fight Viet Cong eventually became U.S. soldiers fighting an American war. It happened in Afghanistan, when an initial invasion to capture al-Qaida and overthrow the Taliban morphed into a nearly two-decade-long nation-building project. And it could be happening right now in Ukraine.

Little by little, NATO and the United States are creeping closer to the catastrophic scenario President Joe Biden said “we must strive to prevent” — direct conflict between the United States and Russia. Despite stressing at the start of the war that “our forces are not and will not be engaged in the conflict,” current and former intelligence officials told the Intercept back in October that “there is a much larger presence of both CIA and US special operations personnel” in Ukraine than there was when Russia invaded, conducting “clandestine American operations” in the country that “are now far more extensive.”

Among those clandestine operations, investigative journalist and former Green Beret Jack Murphy reported on Dec. 24 to little mainstream attention, is the CIA’s work with an unnamed NATO ally’s spy agency to carry out sabotage operations within Russia, reportedly the cause of the unexplained explosions that have rocked Russian infrastructure throughout the war. This is the kind of activity that skirts dangerously close to direct NATO-Russia confrontation.

To put it into perspective, consider the way that swaths of the U.S. political establishment viewed the mere act of Russian meddling in the 2016 election an “act of war” — outrageous, but orders of magnitude less serious than helping to carry out infrastructure attacks on another country’s soil.

Meanwhile, the United States and its NATO allies have serially blown past their own self-imposed lines over arms transfers. At the start of the war, the New York Times cautioned that the overt supply of even small arms and light weaponry “risks encouraging a wider war and possible retaliation” from Moscow, while U.S. officials ruled out more advanced weaponry as too escalatory. It took less than two months for the Biden administration to start sending these more risky tranches of high-powered arms.

By the end of May, it was sending advanced rocket systems that just weeks earlier it had considered too escalatory, on the strict condition that Ukraine didn’t use them to strike inside Russian territory, something they feared could spark escalation drawing in NATO — until that line too, was eventually breached. The Pentagon admitted this past December it had given Ukraine the go-ahead to attack targets in Russia after all, in response to Moscow’s destruction of Ukrainian infrastructure.

“The fear of escalation has changed since the beginning,” one defense official explained to the Times of London, with the Pentagon less worried ever since Russian president Vladimir Putin pulled back on his nuclear threats in October.

As the Ukraine war effort has stalled and Russian forces have made small advances, NATO arms transfers have now escalated well beyond what governments had worried just months ago could draw the alliance into direct war with Russia, with the U.S. and European governments now sending armored vehicles and reportedly preparing to send tanks. Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov had predicted as much in October last year.

“When I was in D.C. in November, before the invasion, and asked for Stingers, they told me it was impossible,” he had told the New Yorker then. “Now it’s possible. When I asked for 155-millimeter guns, the answer was no. HIMARS, no. HARM, no. Now all of that is a yes. Therefore, I’m certain that tomorrow there will be tanks and ATACMS and F-16s.”

It remains to be seen how long before U.S. opposition to such military aid goes the way of its earlier opposition to the heavy weaponry it’s already sent, or how long the administration will continue to hold out on sending long-range drones, which a bipartisan group of senators is currently pushing for and which Russian officials have explicitly warned would make Washington “a direct party to the conflict.”

As the nature of arms transfers has expanded, so have war aims. The alliance’s initial goals were to help Ukraine defend its independence and sovereignty by repelling a Russian invasion bent on regime change. Two months later, U.S. officials were publicly talking about “victory” and inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Russia that would leave it “weakened.” Biden has repeatedly vowed to support Ukraine “as long as it takes,” even as Zelensky and other officials have made repeatedly clear their goals are now to retake Crimea, something that could spark nuclear escalation.

Talk of diplomacy is again nearly absent from U.S. commentary on the war, far outnumbered by calls for drastic escalation of NATO involvement to achieve Ukrainian victory, often on the basis that any other result would deal an existential blow to the West and the entire liberal global order.

“If Russia wins the war in Ukraine, we will see decades of this kind of behavior ahead of us,” Finland’s progressive Prime Minister Sanna Marin recently said at Davos, as she pledged to back the Ukrainian war effort for 15 years if necessary. “We have to make sure that in the end, Ukrainians will win. I don’t think that there’s any other choice.”

And it seems as of last week, the Biden administration is poised to cross yet another major line, with the New York Times reporting that U.S. officials are strongly considering giving Ukraine the green light to attack Crimea, even while acknowledging the risk of nuclear retaliation that such a move would carry. Fears of such an escalation “have dimmed,” U.S. officials told the paper.

By escalating their support for Ukraine’s military, the U.S. and NATO have created an incentive structure for Moscow to take a drastic, aggressive step to show the seriousness of its own red lines. This would be dangerous at the best of times, but particularly so when Russian officials are making clear they increasingly view the war as one against NATO as a whole, not merely Ukraine, while threatening nuclear response to the alliance’s escalation in weapons deliveries.

NATO governments are increasingly painting the conflict to their publics not as a limited effort to help one country repel an invasion from a larger neighbor, but rather as an existential battle for the survival of the West, mirrored in the Russian leadership’s own evolving view of the war as a battle for survival against hostile Western powers. Notably, this has happened despite the Biden administration’s public endorsement of diplomacy late last year.

If the intention is to keep this war a limited, regional one between two neighboring states with NATO playing only a peripheral, supportive role, all of these trend lines point in the exact opposite direction. Unless officials make a concerted effort to de-escalate and pursue a diplomatic track — and prominent voices in media and politics create the political space for them to do it — Biden’s vow to avoid World War Three will mean as much as President Johnson’s 1964 promise not to “send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.”

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***

Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has compared Qassem Soleimani to a Rembrandt painting and said the “only” civilians endangered by the US drone strike on the Iranian general were those also travelling on his commercial aircraft.

Soleimani, head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s elite Quds Force and longtime US foe, was killed by a Reaper drone as he left Baghdad airport in the early hours of 3 January 2020.

In his memoir Never Give an Inch: Fighting for the America I Love, released on Tuesday, Pompeo says the Trump administration expected Soleimani to be quickly replaced with the next best option, but claims no one could match the general’s “combination of authority, brains, brutality, and public appeal inside Iran”.

“Trying to replace him would be like trying to replace an original Rembrandt. Good luck with that, as there is simply no good substitute,” he writes.

Pompeo, who was head of the CIA before becoming Donald Trump’s secretary of state in 2018, is dismissive of the risk to civilian lives the operation posed. He describes raising the complications surrounding a strike on an international airport “almost as an afterthought”.

“I was comfortable with the risk, as we had a plan for controlling the airspace for the most important five minutes,” Pompeo recalls.

“The only civilians potentially in harm’s way would be those on Soleimani’s commercial aircraft.”

Middle East Eye reported at the time that Soleimani arrived at Baghdad airport on a Cham Wings flight from Damascus after visiting Beirut. His baggage and travel documents were handled by national security officials.

Soleimani was hit by a Hellfire missile as his convoy left the airport. The strike killed the general and nine others, including Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the godfather of Iraq’s Iranian-backed paramilitaries.

“Hellfire missiles came screaming down. American power, American technology, and American justice slammed into his vehicle,” Pompeo writes.

An Iraqi paramilitary leader told MEE at the time that two cars passed Soleimani’s convoy before the strike, briefly jeopardising the operation.

Pompeo describes sending messages to Iran and “the ayatollah”, presumably meaning Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. One said: “This was not an attempt to decapitate the regime.”

He also says the United States’ allies in the Middle East were aware of the impending strike.

“The Israelis also were ready, knowing that Iran could choose to retaliate against them. In the same way, we had worked with our Gulf Arab partners, giving them a heads-up without revealing our specific plans,” he says.

Pompeo, who is expected to declare his intention to be a Republican candidate in the 2024 US presidential election, says he expects retaliation from Iran to this day.

“We know Iran has the capabilities to operate inside the United States, so a year and a half after leaving public service, I still retain a security detail,” he writes.

“Trip to the grocery store? Diplomatic security will shadow me while I evaluate which eggplant looks the ripest. Susan’s going to get her hair done? Let’s hope Hezbollah sleeper agents aren’t casing the salon. Son’s getting marred? Agents will need to send an advance team to the church.”

“I will probably never drive my own car again or enjoy the level of privacy that I once had,” he adds.

Soleimani’s killing, which was preceded by escalating violence between the United States and Iran and its allies, prompted Tehran to fire a barrage of missiles at US targets in Iraq in retaliation, wounding several American soldiers.

Expecting a US attack following the missile strike, Iranian forces mistakenly shot down a Ukrainian passenger jet, killing all 176 passengers and crew.

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Featured image: The Baghdad murders of anti-ISIS commanders Qassem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al Muhandes triggered an unprecedented Iranian ballistic missile attack on US military bases in Iraq. (Photo Credit: The Cradle)

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***

Leaked documents reviewed by The Cradle reveal that Britain secretly trained Jordanian security services in techniques used by the notorious UK security and cyber agency GCHQ, which provides signals intelligence to the British government and its armed forces.

Over three intensive, week-long, Foreign Office-funded training sessions conducted between June 2019 and March 2020, members of the Public Security Directorate’s shadowy Special Branch, handpicked by the British Embassy in Amman, were taught the finer points of “digital media exploitation.”

In theory, the purpose of the exercise was to assist “evidence gathering agencies in Jordan to effectively extract data from digital devices” to enhance their investigative capabilities, and improve the standard of prosecutions, particularly in the field of terrorism.

This would in turn enable enhanced sharing of evidence between Amman and London, “and lead to increased operational cooperation.”

Tried and tested tactics

As readers of The Cradle will well-know by this point, the officially stated noble objectives of Whitehall’s assorted security support and reform programs in West Asia may not align with the underlying reality of these efforts.

For example, this outlet has previously revealed how British operatives and technology are placed in Lebanon’s intelligence services under the guise of teaching them how to use digital forensic tools. This allows London to closely monitor their activities – and Lebanese citizens.

Those programs are delivered by British government contractor Torchlight, a company staffed by UK military and intelligence veterans with high-level security clearances. The same company was also behind the training provided to Jordan’s Special Branch.

According to its submissions to the Foreign Office, based on a “comprehensive on-site visit” in 2018, the Directorate’s operatives were already “satisfactorily equipped in terms of hardware and software” to conduct “digital media exploitation.”

Spying on citizens

However, Torchlight felt that they were not “adequately trained to fully exploit the potential of the equipment they possess.” Given the resources available to the Directorate, this “potential” could be highly concerning.

For example, Torchlight has noted that Special Branch uses Cellebrite’s suite of digital intelligence products. Cellebrite, an Israeli company with clients including multiple repressive governments, produces technology capable of breaking into encrypted devices and extracting and analyzing all data within it.

While the firm has helped solve murky murder cases, overwhelmingly it is deployed to monitor the activities of human rights activists, journalists and dissidents.

The professional backgrounds of Torchlight staffers involved in the Jordanian training project raise additional concerns. It was led by the company’s Head of Digital Intelligence, Andy Tremlett, a cyber and electronic warfare specialist who spent over a decade in senior positions at GCHQ.

Along the way, he was “charged with the provision of support to the most specialized and discreet areas” of British Special Forces operations, and responsible for expanding the agency’s “overseas footprint” and “potential delivery platform.” These positions granted him “vast experience in how to use and exploit digital material,” and integrating different forms of intelligence in broader espionage operations.

‘Destroy, deny, degrade and disrupt’

Further details of Tremlett’s ability to “exploit” the private data of targets aren’t offered, although he is said to have “spent a significant portion of his career within the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Group (JTRIG).” The existence of this unit was exposed by US National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2014, and the details of its operations are truly shocking.

JTRIG’s explicit mission is to employ a variety of dirty tricks to “destroy, deny, degrade and disrupt” enemies and “discrediting” them, by planting “negative information” about them online, and manipulating discussions on internet forums and social networks.

A leaked presentation on JTRIG’s covert activities shows this harassment extends to changing an individual’s social media profile pictures to take their paranoia “to a whole new level” or simply deleting their online presence, writing anonymous blog posts “purporting to be [by] one of their victims” to damage their reputations, emailing and texting their work colleagues, neighbors and friends, and arranging “honey trap” stings.

“A great option. Very successful when it works,” the presentation states in regard to the latter strategy. “Get someone to go somewhere on the internet, or a physical location to be met by a ‘friendly face.’ JTRIG has the ability to ‘shape’ the environment on occasions.”

Writing incriminating blog posts was said to have “worked on a number of different ops,” with “Iran work” cited as a particularly effective example, although this is not expanded upon. Elsewhere, it is disclosed that JTRIG “significantly” disrupted the Taliban’s communications network by bombarding them with phone calls, texts and faxes “every 10 seconds or so.”

Evidently, it was not digital forensics with which Torchlight’s training modules were primarily concerned. In fact, JTRIG operations related to “digital media exploitation” were, per the leaked presentation, primarily concerned with placing information on “compromised” electronic devices, including “damning information, where appropriate.”

Protecting the British-installed monarchy

In Jordan, criticism of King Abdullah II – a member of the Hashemite dynasty installed on thrones across West Asia by the British following World War I, and himself a British Army veteran – and government officials and institutions is a very serious crime.

Journalists are routinely subject to harassment, arrest and prosecution by authorities for even mildly critical reporting or social media posts. And protests over rising hardship among the general population are becoming more frequent.

The prospect of Amman’s secret police being proficient in JTRIG’s malicious methods is therefore disturbing by definition. The ease with which they could be abused to ruin the lives of objectors, and/or jail them on bogus charges, is clear.

Britain’s willingness to export these techniques to Jordan is not surprising. The strict and widely criticized Cybercrime Law, which restricts freedom of expression online and citizens’ right to privacy, makes the country a perfect staging ground for London’s nefarious activities elsewhere in West Asia, and helps keep their presence and intentions secret.

For example, from the early days of the Syrian crisis, Britain operated a site located 45 minutes from Amman where fighters in the proxy war were trained. Leaked files related to the project predicted that some of these individuals would go on to join Al-Nusra and ISIS and that equipment would be stolen and used by them.

Despite this, the Foreign Office was unconcerned about these prospects, likely because there was little risk that they, or the training program more generally, would ever be publicly exposed.

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***

In an effort to combat rampant corruption in Iraq, the US has implemented several strict measures, including sanctions on Iraqi banks and the rationing of dollars. Rather than dissuade smuggling and fraud, the measures are only exacerbating Iraq’s economic crisis.

With every fluctuation in the exchange rate of the Iraqi dinar against the dollar, the political and social situation in the country becomes increasingly complex. The same country that managed to beat back ISIS and color revolutions, today is witnessing turmoil caused by the US.

The US Federal Reserve has imposed strict measures on Iraqi banks under the pretexts of preventing smuggling and money laundering. This prompted the US Treasury Department to ration the dollar payments to Baghdad from Iraq’s own oil revenues, causing the Iraqi national currency to decline from 1,460 (the official rate) to 1,640 dinars overnight.

Implementing US policies

The financial situation is further complicated by the ambiguity of the Iraqi government and the Central Bank over these US measures, which came into effect in late 2022.

Iraq’s Central Bank Governor Mustafa al-Jubouri appears to be convinced uncertain policy that saved him two years ago – when former Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s government raised the official exchange rate for the dollar from 1,182 dinars to 1,460 dinars – will save him again.

Jubouri is handling the current crisis in a cold and calculated manner, constantly reminding Iraqis of the increase in the Central Bank’s dollar reserves – now said to exceed $100 billion – as though it was his personal achievement, and the reason he was named governor years ago.

However, there are some vitally important details that Jubouri chooses to ignore. The Central Bank governor, for instance, has stated that Iraq is implementing the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) – despite the fact that Iraq is not a member of this group.

Jubouri deliberately confuses the aforementioned US group with Iraq’s membership in the Gulf Financial Action Task Force (MENAFATF), which is “of a voluntary and cooperative nature, established by agreement between the governments of its members, and it is independent of any other international body or organization.”

Since 2018, FATF has removed Iraq from the special monitoring process known as the “Continuous Global Compliance Process to Combat Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing,” after Baghdad’s approval of the Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Law.

Despite not being a member of FATF, Iraq has implemented its recommendations to establish an electronic platform for selling dollars linked to the global SWIFT system, the Belgian-based banking messaging system that ties countries to the distinctly western financial system.

According to experts, this platform will be, in the long term, an alternative to the legally stipulated window for selling currency, and is almost completely outside the control of the Iraqi government.

Sanctioning Iraqi banks

The recent crisis began with the imposition of sanctions by the US Treasury Department on three Iraqi banks owned by businessman Ali Muhammad Ghulam al-Ansari, followed by sanctions on 16 further Iraqi banks. Another 23 banks remained operating as clients of the currency window in the Central Bank.

This sudden measure caused a decrease in the central bank’s sales of dollars by about 40 percent, which led to a decline in supply and a surge in demand, resulting in an increase in the price of the dollar to more than 1,550 dinars.

But this is not the whole story. Sources within Iraq’s Central Bank have confirmed to The Cradle that Baghdad had been informed of the US Treasury’s procedures two years ago, but the Kadhimi government and Jubouri chose to ignore them, with the US turning a blind eye due to the special relationship that linked the previous government with Washington.

These sources have also revealed that last July, the US Treasury Department invited the Association of Private Banks, headed by Wadih al-Handal (close to the UAE) and his deputy Tamkeen al-Hasnawi (close to the Sadrist movement) to a training workshop on electronic platform procedures that was held in Istanbul.

Notably, the ministry excluded from the invitation those banks that “happened” to be recently sanctioned.

Crippling the economy

A senior Iraqi official revealed to The Cradle that a series of meetings were held in the fourth quarter of 2022 in Amman, Jordan between the Central Bank of Iraq and the US Treasury, during which the latter submitted documents showing clear operations of smuggling of dollars outside of Iraq.

Among the documents submitted by the Americans was evidence of “importing one million refrigerators, at a price of $4,000 each” through Sulaymaniyah – an exaggerated price, given that the Iraqi market does not demand a huge quantity of this durable commodity. The US Treasury alleges that the document was forged and that its intent was instead to obtain a large amount of US dollars illicitly.

A member of the Iraqi parliament’s Finance Committee, who declined to be named, explained to The Cradle that the US Treasury had previously followed a particular schedule in providing Baghdad with dollars – sending $2.5 billion every three months that were transported by five planes.

Since 2018, these funds have begun to feature traceable serial numbers. During the Amman meetings, the US Treasury informed Iraq’s Central Bank that quantities of these dollars were being monitored in a number of regional countries, after their exit from Iraq through the UAE.

Consequently, Washington moved to reduce its dollar transfers by almost half, and to slow down most financial transfer procedures from Iraq – now taking about 15 days to complete – which have paralyzed the Iraqi market and surprised the Baghdad government.

Note that the dollars being transferred to Iraq consist of Iraqi funds deposited in US banks.

A source close to the Central Bank governor, who declined to be named, told The Cradle Arabi that these measures are aimed at preventing the smuggling of dollars to Iran, Syria, and Lebanon.

He reveals that the Central Bank verbally instructed Iraqi commercial banks not to sell dollars to travelers to the three countries. The source adds that the latest development – per US instructions – is to prevent the transfer of dollars from Iraq to Lebanon, even through tourists.

It is important to note that, for years, Iraq has required banks to sell up to $ 5,000 in cash to travelers, providing they produce an entry visa and airline ticket to their destination country.

Why does the US control Iraq’s dollars?

Iraqi financial sources point to the main dilemma: Since 2003, all Iraqi oil revenues have been paid into an account with the US Federal Reserve. Although Iraqis formed a sovereign government after the US invasion and occupation of their state, Iraq is still restricted from opening accounts for its oil earnings outside the United States.

This dilemma is causing an additional problem for Iraq. Its Central Bank funds are deposited in multiple accounts – amounting to about $ 99 billion (November 2022 figures), deposited in central banks in a number of countries ($ 13.8 billion), in securities ($ 52.8 billion), in international banks ($ 8.15 billion), in addition to about $ 7.3 billion in physical gold in Iraq and abroad.

Washington, given its dominance of the global financial system, has the ability to control all funds of Iraq’s Central Bank through threats or sanctions, even though these funds are not deposited exclusively in US banks.

But Iraq’s oil funds, which due to the 2022 global oil price hike also amount to more than $ 90 billion, remain – contrary to any economic, financial, or even accounting principle – in one account in the United States of America.

These funds belong to the Iraqi state and are controlled by the country’s Ministry of Finance, not by the Central Bank. This reality gives Washington greater control over the movement of foreign exchange in Iraq, without even being at the political table in Baghdad.

An Iraqi economic analyst says that successive governments are still subject to the decision of the “first American ruler of Iraq after the occupation,” Paul Bremer, and no one has thought of diversifying the risks by depositing oil money in various banks around the world instead of keeping it in a single US account.

With Washington’s unchallenged ability to control the dollar in Iraq – and thus the value of the Iraqi dinar – even prominent Saudi daily Asharq Al-Awsat published an article in December blaming US political diktats for the recent deterioration of the Iraqi dinar.

Entitled The Iraqi dinar is reeling under the pressure of US measures against “laundry” banks, the article – in a newspaper owned by Saudi royals – writes:

“The crisis began even before the implementation of the new financial system in the [Iraq’s] central bank, when the Americans told Sudani’s government that the rise of the influence of the political wing close to Tehran in state institutions should not reach political financial institutions, along with sensitive security agencies such as the intelligence services.”

No one in Iraq and abroad denied what was published in the Saudi paper. It is hard to conclude that the recent deterioration of Iraqi dinar is due to any other factor than this American political decision.

Yet, even today, not a single Iraqi official has emerged to call for linking the dinar to a basket of currencies – something that would protect Iraq from the dollar weapon. Nor has a single Iraqi official challenged the danger of Iraqi oil revenues being paid into a solitary account in the United States, based on a decision issued when US troops occupied Iraq.

The case of Iraq provides concrete evidence that dollar dependence is detrimental to a country’s economy and monetary policies – particularly one that is heavily reliant on energy exports. For Iraq, which has a history of political instability and economic challenges, the arguments for diversifying its trade and adopting alternative currencies are more compelling than ever.

*

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***

The Zelenskyy regime is desperate. It is reportedly losing more than 300 soldiers a day in eastern Ukraine. The latest effort by the doomed regime to throw men and foreign war materiel at a slow and overpowering Russian advance in Donbas will completely fall apart.

The regime is now busy abducting potential bullet stoppers in the Zakarpattia Oblast (Ruthenia), situated in the Carpathian Mountains of southwestern Ukraine, between Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania.

“Due to heavy losses, which exceed all previous ones, radical methods are used to replenish the numbers [of troops]. According to local sources, the Ukrainian authorities plan to call up 10,000 people from Transcarpathia by spring,” Hungarian journalists told EuroWeekly.

The Zelenskyy regime has apparently taken a page from the British Royal Navy during the Age of Sail. The British employed press gangs to crew ships during war and peacetime. Refusal to be impressed resulted in a one-way trip to the gallows.

“Almost every settlement in Transcarpathia has been for several days now undergoing forced conscription into the army. In the area of ​​the city of Berehove, in Nagysholes, on Sunday the market was surrounded. 70 people were taken away from there,” the post continues.

According to the Budapest news outlet’s observations, this forced conscription into the Ukrainian army “can almost be called a kidnapping of people. In addition, the persecution and deprivation of property of the remaining Hungarians have reached an unprecedented cruel level in Transcarpathia.”

“Recently, peasant mothers hailing from largely Hungarian populated villages within Transcarpthia staged protests in support of their sons who had been conscripted into the Ukrainian army,” Denis Pilas, a Transcarpathian activist, told HuffPost after the Maidan coup in 2014. “In the midst of war with Russian separatists in the east, many young men didn’t want to be shipped out… The Hungarians watch Hungarian TV and read Hungarian newspapers. They are only loosely integrated into society and in general they haven’t been very pro-Ukrainian.”

The forced conscription of ethnic Hungarians in Transcarpathia has a political aspect. Viktor Orbán, the PM of Hungary, is a critic of the war in Ukraine.

Hungary's 🇭🇺 PM Viktor Orban concerned over the deaths of Hungarians killed in Ukraine. Ukrainian military has been disproportionately conscripting ethnic Hungarians from the Transcarpathian Oblast, Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/mq5TFKB04F

— Edward Garbarino (@EIGARBARINO) January 21, 2023

In response, the ultranationalists in Ukraine have added Orbán to the Mirotvorets death list. They are now prepared to take revenge on the average Transcarpathian of Hungarian ethnicity by kidnapping and throwing him into the Russian meat grinder.

“There is a sort of purposeful policy, which besides narrowing the rights of all minorities, tries to portray the Hungarian minority as the enemy in Ukrainian public opinion,” Laszlo Brenzovics, the only ethnic Hungarian in the Ukrainian parliament, told the Associated Press in 2018.

The ultranationalists of Ukraine believe all ethnic minorities—Romanians, Belorussians, Crimean Tatars, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Poles, Jews, and Armenians—are untermenschen that must be ethnically cleansed.

“The current situation is clearly among the worst ones,” Tárnok Balázs wrote in 2021, prior to Russia’s SMO.

“Ukraine, by violating the rights of all minorities, is alienating its closest NATO allies in the region, just as it needs them the most. Ukraine is fighting the wrong war – instead of negotiating a closer partnership with NATO, Kyiv is implementing discriminatory policies against its own loyal ethnic minority citizens, and thus, achieving the result that Russia wants: keeping tensions high, staging provocations and dividing Ukrainians along ethnic lines.”

That may have been the case before Russia’s SMO. However, Ukraine’s mistreatment of minorities is now ignored by the USG and its corporate war propaganda media.

The USG, the UK, and the Europeans are not worried about nazi-ultranats persecuting and ethnically cleansing minorities. The USG is obsessively concerned with making sure its crumbling empire and its devalued fiat dollar remains king in a unipolar world. Everything else, including the welfare of the American people, comes in a distant second.

If resisting Russia requires the crime of kidnapping Hungarians by nazi-ultranats in Transcarpathia and shipping them to die in a Russian military “boiler” (a cauldron, or encirclement), that is the price the USG believes innocents must pay for its futile and criminal effort to remain top dog perched on a mountain of rotting corpses.

*

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, Kurt Nimmo on Geopolitics.

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***

In an article published here in November 2018, I referred to the statement of the UK representative of a UN organisation named the International, Impartial, Independent Mechanism to Assist in the Investigation and Prosecution of Persons Responsible for the Most Serious Crimes under International Law Committed in the Syrian Arab Republic since March 2011.

I will repeat that statement because it is relevant to the current situation in Syria. That person stated,

“We must demonstrate that those who have committed the most serious crimes of international concern can have no place to hide. There must be no impunity for the horrendous acts taking place on a daily basis in Syria. There must be justice for the victims.”

The UK representative said this without any sense of irony, without any sense of shame, for, of course, it is the United Kingdom, the United States of America, Canada and their gang who have committed war crimes, and crimes against humanity beyond number in Syria since they instigated the uprisings against the government of Syria, beginning in 2011, supported their allied terrorists groups to attack Syrian armed forces and civilians, and imposed their illegal sanctions on the people of Syria.

The history of the war against Syria by the US and UK, Israel and their allies is well-known, the cruel sanctions, the aerial bombings, the missile attacks, the assassinations, the torture, the illegal occupation of the Golan Heights by Israel with US support, and, finally, the US invasion of Syria that began in 2015 with US special forces raids into its territory on a number of occasions that year and 2016 and the formal entry of US forces on March 8, 2017. Their invasion has continued to this day.

During the summer of 2017 US forces laid waste the city of Raqqa, Their carpet bombing of the city, their heavy artillery strikes and use of white phosphorous shells, banned under international law, killed hundreds of civilians, and today Raqqa lies in ruins.  Their terrorist allies laid waste Aleppo, Damascus and numerous other cities and towns and villages with a savagery as common to US trained groups, as it is to the US forces themselves.

The Americans gave all sorts of pretexts for this invasion, none of which were true and none of which gave them any legal basis for their aggression, for that is what their actions were; direct and brutal aggression against a sovereign nation in violation of the Nuremberg Principles established in 1946, in violation of the Kellog-Briand Pact of 1928, in which all these nations agreed not to attack any other nation, and in violation of the UN Charter, all of which the aggressor nations were subject to as part of international law and their own domestic law.

The invasion ordered by President Obama, making him a war criminal, expanded in scope until President Trump ordered American forces to be pulled out in 2019.  But US forces still remain in occupation of the northeastern parts of Syria. Their exact number is not known but it is at least one thousand and probably higher than that as they continue to build bases controlling the important oil fields that provide much of Syria’s energy needs and cash for exports as well as areas of wheat production vital to the survival of the Syrian state and its people.  The Americans continue to provide their usual pretexts for this, such as “fighting terrorism” “containing Russian influence in the Middle East, or supporting the Kurdish forces opposing both Syria and Turkey.

On January 10, 2023, in the magazine Defense One, William Roebuck, an American with the long title of Former Deputy Envoy for the Global Coalition against ISIS, repeated all these pretexts as justification for the American invasion but added, in calling for the invasion to continue,

“Our presence also blocks Russian consolidation of its military mission in Syria, undercutting one of the key sources of Moscow’s surprisingly resilient prestige in the region and hence lending support to our Ukraine policy efforts,”

thereby linking the US invasion and occupation of Syria to the US-NATO aggression against Russia in Ukraine.

Of course Mr. Roebuck could not cite any legal reasons or justifications as to why the US should be able to continue its occupation, because there are none, but as is common with all American and NATO governments and their officials, they could not care less about the law or morality.

The Syrian government states the situation clearly.

Om January 12, the Syrian Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform, Muhammad Hassan Qatana, affirmed that the exceptional circumstances that Syria is passing through because of the terrorist war, instigated by the United States, and unilateral coercive measures have badly affected achievements of many years of sustainable development and caused large losses.

On January 13, Syrian Petroleum and Mineral Resources Minister, Bassam Tu’ma, said that the US occupation of parts of the Syrian territory, including oil resources, and the illegal sanctions imposed by Washington on Syria, cause great suffering on the Syrian People.

These statements follow the August 22, 2022, report in Tass that,

“According to the Syrian Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources, U.S.-led entities illegally export up to 66,000 barrels of oil daily, representing 80% of the daily production of hydrocarbons. The scale of Washington’s oil theft has reached a peak. Because of this the humanitarian situation in the country remains difficult, millions of Syrians face energy, food and water shortages and are in need of basic necessities.”

“Russia and Syria strongly condemn the plundering of the natural resources. The US-backed Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces currently control most of Syria’s eastern and northeastern Al-Hasakah, Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa provinces. The US military command has established nine military bases there since 2015. Damascus views the US military presence in Syria as an illegal occupation.”

On December 14, 2022, the Syrian government in a statement to the Security Council stated,

“Syria condemns the actions of the US occupation forces and demands an end to the illegal US military presence on its territory.

“Syria draws the attention of the international community to the systematic plundering of the natural resources of the Syrian people by the United States and associated paramilitary units,” the statement said.

“Damascus,” it said, “demands the return to the Syrian state of the captured oil and gas fields and the payment of compensation for the stolen resources.” The ministry’s statement provides data on the losses that Syria has suffered in recent years from the theft of its oil, gas and other minerals, as well as wheat. They are estimated by Syria at $19.8 billion. In addition, the bombing by the Air Force of the Western coalition caused the country damage worth $2.9 billion.”

The Syrian Foreign Ministry said

“further silence of the UN Security Council on the aggressive policy of the United States and the violation of the principles of international law is unacceptable.”

“It’s impossible to ignore the suffering of Syrians as a result of the sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union, which have disastrous consequences for the daily lives of citizens and don’t allow them to receive the necessary services, fuel, household gas, electricity, especially in winter,” the statement said and concluded with,

 “the blockade and coercive measures of the West against Syria are tantamount to war crimes, they increase the suffering of the people and slow down the process of post-war reconstruction.”

War crimes they are, yet, as the Syrians noted, nothing is said in the collective west in defence of Syria.  Nothing is said about the crimes of the Americans and their allies, either by their governments, or their media. How can we expect them to since they are all complicit in these crimes?

Since the Americans will not leave unless forced to, it will take operations by the Syrian Army to drive out the invader, but that is complicated by the continuing incursions and occupation of parts of northern Syria by the Turks intent on ridding themselves of the Kurdish threat. Hopefully the on-going talks between Turkey and Syria with the participation of Russia will lead to a resolution of that issue so that Syria can, with the help of its allies, finally take action against the invading US forces.

All the while the US and its NATO allies along with their puppets in Kiev rant on about “Russian war crimes” in Ukraine and call for international tribunals.

Yet it is they who should face trial and punishment for the war crimes committed by them over the years, including the nuclear attacks on Japan in 1945 for which the Americans have never been brought to account, a crime which, as President Biden said on January 13, in a surreal meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister, referring to the the use of nuclear weapons, is “a crime against all humanity.”

The world will not forget Hiroshima and Nagasaki, even if the Japanese government pretends to, nor the American and allied crimes and the millions of dead in Korea, Vietnam, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, and all the other crimes, too many to list here, that they have committed around the world to support their interests.

Who will try them? Who will bring them to justice?  Only the future can provide the concrete answer, but the reckoning is coming, of that we can be sure.

*

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Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto. He is known for a number of high-profile war crimes cases and recently published his novel Beneath the Clouds. He writes essays on international law, politics and world events. He is a regular contributor to Global Research. 

 

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***

“The Doomsday Clock is sounding an alarm for the whole of humanity,” said the Elders chair. “We are on the brink of a precipice. But our leaders are not acting at sufficient speed or scale to secure a peaceful and liveable planet.”

“We are living in a time of unprecedented danger, and the Doomsday Clock time reflects that reality.”

That’s what Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists president and CEO Rachel Bronson said in a statement Tuesday about the historic symbol being set at 90 seconds to midnight, or global catastrophe, after three years at 100 seconds to midnight.

As the bulletin’s annual statement explains, the clock—created in 1947—has reached its current position due to “an exceedingly dangerous nuclear situation,” largely from Russia’s war on Ukraine; inadequate global action to tackle the climate emergency; a “daunting array” of biological threats, exemplified by the Covid-19 pandemic; and “disruptive” technologies enabling the spread of disinformation.

“90 seconds to midnight is the closest the clock has ever been set to midnight, and it’s a decision our experts do not take lightly,” Bronson noted. “The U.S. government, its NATO allies, and Ukraine have a multitude of channels for dialogue; we urge leaders to explore all of them to their fullest ability to turn back the clock.”

Watch the full announcement:

While the nearly yearlong Russian invasion—with fighting over a nuclear power plant and thinly veiled threats of using weapons of mass destruction—is a primary reason humanity is now closer than ever to apocalypse, experts from across the globe emphasized that it’s far from the only threat.

The Elders chair Mary Robinson, a former president of Ireland and U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, stressed that “the Doomsday Clock is sounding an alarm for the whole of humanity. We are on the brink of a precipice. But our leaders are not acting at sufficient speed or scale to secure a peaceful and liveable planet.”

“From cutting carbon emissions to strengthening arms control treaties and investing in pandemic preparedness, we know what needs to be done,” she said. “The science is clear, but the political will is lacking. This must change in 2023 if we are to avert catastrophe. We are facing multiple, existential crises. Leaders need a crisis mindset.”

From Common Dreams: Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.

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Jessica Corbett is a staff writer for Common Dreams.

Featured image: The Doomsday Clock was set at 90 seconds to midnight on January 24, 2023. (Photo: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists)

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Einführung

Am 24 Januar ist: „Internationaler Tag der Erziehung / Internationaler UN-Tag der Bildung / Welttag Bildung“. An diesem Aktionstag, der erstmals 2019 begangen wurde, soll die Rolle der Bildung für Frieden und Entwicklung sowie als öffentliches Gut gewürdigt werden.

Als Pädagoge und Psychologe möchte ich zu diesem Tag den Brief des Nobelpreisträgers Albert Camus an seiner Lehrer Monsieur Germain vom 19. November 1957 und einen Auszug aus der Antwort seines Lehrers am 30. April 1959 zitieren. Beide Briefe wurden im Anhang von Albert Camus‘ Roman „Der erste Mensch“ veröffentlicht (1).

Camus‘ Brief an seinen Lehrer

19 November 1957

Lieber Monsieur Germain,

Ich habe den Lärm sich etwas legen lassen, der in diesen Tagen um mich war, ehe ich mich ganz herzlich an Sie wende. Man hat mir eine viel zu große Ehre erwiesen, die ich weder erstrebt noch erbeten habe. Doch als ich die Nachricht erhielt, galt mein erster Gedanke, nach meiner Mutter, Ihnen. Ohne Sie, ohne Ihre liebevolle Hand, die Sie dem armen kleinen Kind, das ich war, gereicht haben, ohne Ihre Unterweisung und Ihr Beispiel wäre nichts von alldem geschehen. Ich mache um diese Art Ehrung nicht viel Aufhebens. Aber diese ist zumindest eine Gelegenheit, Ihnen zu sagen, was Sie für mich waren und noch immer sind, und um Ihnen zu versichern, dass Ihre Mühen, die Arbeit und die Großherzigkeit, die Sie eingesetzt haben, immer lebendig sind bei einem Ihrer kleinen Zöglinge, der trotz seines Alters nicht aufgehört hat, Ihr dankbarer Schüler zu sein. Ich umarme Sie von ganzem Herzen.

Albert Camus

Antwort des Lehrers (Auszug)

Algier, am 30. April 1959

Mein lieber Kleiner,

(…).

Ich finde keinen Ausdruck für die Freude, die Du mir mit Deiner reizenden Geste und der Art, dich zu bedanken, gemacht hast. Wenn es möglich wäre, würde ich den großen Jungen, der du geworden, und der für mich immer „mein kleiner Camus“ bleiben wird, fest an mich drücken.

(…).

Der Pädagoge, der seinen Beruf gewissenhaft ausüben will, läßt keine Gelegenheit aus, die Schüler, seine Kinder kennenzulernen, und sie bietet sich ständig. Eine Antwort, eine Geste, eine Haltung sind äußerst aufschlußreich. Ich glaube also den netten kleinen Kerl, der Du warst, gut zu kennen, und das Kind enthält im Keim oft den Mann, der es werden wird. Deine Freude an der Schule war überall spürbar. Dein Gesicht verriet Optimismus. Und wenn ich Dich beobachtete, habe ich nie etwas von der wirklichen Situation Deiner Familie geahnt.

(…).

*

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Dr. Rudolf Lothar Hänsel ist Schul-Rektor, Erziehungswissenschaftler (Dr. paed.) und Psychologe (Dipl.-Psych.). Nach seinen Universitätsstudien wurde er wissenschaftlicher Lehrer (Professor) in der Erwachsenenbildung: unter anderem Leiter eines freien Schul-Modell-Versuchs und Fortbildner bayerischer Beratungslehrkräfte und Schulpsychologen. Als Pensionär arbeitete er als Psychotherapeut in eigener Praxis. Bei einer Öffentlichen Anhörung zur Jugendkriminalität im Europa-Parlament war er Berichterstatter für Deutschland. In seinen Büchern und Fachartikeln fordert er eine bewusste ethisch-moralische Werteerziehung sowie eine Erziehung zu Gemeinsinn und Frieden. Für seine Verdienste um Serbien bekam er 2021 von den Universitäten Belgrad und Novi Sad den Republik-Preis „Kapitän Misa Anastasijevic“ verliehen.

Noten

1. Camus, Albert (1995). Der erste Mensch. Reinbek bei Hamburg, S. 376ff.

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***

 

 

 

Introduction

On 24 January is: “International Day of Education / UN International Day of Education / World Day of Education”. This day of action, first observed in 2019, aims to recognise the role of education in peace and development and as a public good.

As an educator and psychologist, I would like to quote on this day the letter of the Nobel Prize winner Albert Camus to his teacher Monsieur Germain on 19 November 1957 and an extract from his teacher’s reply on 30 April 1959. Both letters were published in the appendix of Albert Camus’ novel “The First Man” (1).

Camus’ letter to his teacher

19 November 1957

Dear Monsieur Germain,

I have allowed the noise that has been around me these days to subside somewhat before addressing you most sincerely. I have been paid far too great an honour which I neither sought nor asked for. But when I received the news, my first thought, after my mother, was of you. Without you, without your loving hand extended to the poor little child that I was, without your instruction and example, none of this would have happened. I don’t make much fuss about this kind of tribute. But this is at least an opportunity to tell you what you were and still are to me, and to assure you that your efforts, the work and the generosity you put in are always alive in one of your little pupils who, despite his age, has not ceased to be your grateful disciple. I embrace you with all my heart.

Albert Camus

Teacher’s reply (extract)

Algiers, 30 April 1959

My dear little one,

(…).

I cannot find an expression for the joy you gave me with your lovely gesture and the way you thanked me. If it were possible, I would hug tightly the big boy you have become and who will always remain for me “my little Camus”.

(…).

The teacher who wants to do his job conscientiously never misses an opportunity to get to know his pupils, his children, and it is constantly offered. A response, a gesture, an attitude are extremely revealing. So I think I know well the nice little fellow you were, and the child often contains in its germ the man it will become. Your joy at school was palpable everywhere. Your face betrayed optimism. And when I watched you, I never suspected anything about the real situation of your family.

(…).

*

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Dr. Rudolf Lothar Hänsel is a school rector, educationalist (Dr. paed.) and psychologist (Dipl.-Psych.). After his university studies, he became an academic teacher (professor) in adult education: among other things, he was head of an independent school model trial and in-service trainer of Bavarian guidance counsellors and school psychologists. As a retiree, he worked as a psychotherapist in private practice. He was rapporteur for Germany at a public hearing on juvenile delinquency in the European Parliament. In his books and articles, he calls for a conscious ethical-moral education and an education for public spirit and peace. For his services to Serbia, he was awarded the Republic Prize “Captain Misa Anastasijevic” by the Universities of Belgrade and Novi Sad in 2021.

Note

(1) Camus, Albert (1995). The first man. Reinbek bei Hamburg, p. 376ff.

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New US Research Finds “Worrying” Evidence Linking Monsanto Weedkiller to Cancer

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New research by top US government scientists has found that people exposed to the widely used weed killing chemical glyphosate have biomarkers in their urine linked to the development of cancer and other diseases.

Debt Ceiling Hysteria and Hypocrisy

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House Republicans are demanding that President Biden and Senate Democrats agree to include spending cuts with the debt ceiling increase. However, President Biden and the congressional Democrats are refusing to negotiate with Republicans. Rather, they and their allies in the mainstream media are lambasting Republicans for their “irresponsibility” in seeking to include spending cuts with an increase in the debt ceiling.

Right & Left to Join in D.C. Protest: “Not one more penny for war in Ukraine.”

By John V. Walsh, January 25, 2023

On February 19, Washington, DC, will witness a protest against the war in Ukraine that marks a sharp departure from past demonstrations. The lead demand is simple and direct, “Not One More Penny for war in Ukraine.” It is a demand that emphasizes what we in the US can do to end the war, not what others can do. After all, the only government we have the power to influence is our own.

Egyptian Economic Crisis Has Hit Syrian-Owned Businesses

By Steven Sahiounie, January 24, 2023

When the US-NATO attack on Syria for regime change began in 2011, many Syrians began to leave the country for safer areas. After the Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Mursi won in a US manipulated election, many Syrians who were followers of the Muslim Brotherhood, packed up and left for Egypt.

How the U.S. Obtains New NATO Members by Subversion, Followed by Coup, Followed by Ethnic Cleansing

By Eric Zuesse, January 24, 2023

This is the pattern that has been used ever since the Soviet Union ended in 1991 when the ‘anti-communist’ excuse for America’s post-WW-II global imperialism has no longer been available to use (such as had earlier been the case in Korea, and in Vietnam, and in Guatemala, and in Iran, and in Chile and so many other lands), prior to 1991.

China’s Economy Outlook 2023 in the Context of the World Economy

By Peter Koenig and CGTN, January 24, 2023

China has entered new partnerships with the BRICS+, as well as a new strong alliance between China, Russia and Iran, as Iran has become a full-fledged member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization – SCO. China has already 2 years ago “discounted” trade and investments with the west, notably with the US and Europe, and instead concentrated on the ASEAN countries.

All Masks Thrown Off. The Euro-Atlantic Elites Meeting in Davos, Profit Driven War on Ukraine

By South Front, January 24, 2023

In January 2023, all masks were thrown off. The Euro-Atlantic elites, motivated after their meetings in Davos, realized that there was no more need to cover their true intentions with hypocritical appeals to “save the young Ukrainian democracy for the sake of world peace.”

Creating a Sacred Unity of Peoples, Cultures and Nature for the Americas

By Emanuel Pastreich, January 24, 2023

The United States of America is a term that contains in it all the hope and all the contradictions of our country, and of the Americas. That hope dates far back in the past, to the inspiring words of the Declaration of Independence that articulated a form of governance that was, at least in terms of its potential, unprecedented.

Russia Preparing New Plan to End War

By Drago Bosnic, January 24, 2023

In the last several months, the Russian military has been conducting intensive training for approximately 300,000 newly mobilized soldiers, in addition to other preparations that would enable it to deliver a final knockout punch and end hostilities in Ukraine.

The Idea of Socialism Can Only Flourish in Peace and Freedom

By Dr. Rudolf Hänsel, January 24, 2023

In modern times, the Age of Enlightenment, people developed new ideas. But the socialist idea, the anti-militarist idea of peace, freedom, equality, justice and solidarity was shipwrecked. It was the hope of the proletarians of the whole world. We have all neglected these beautiful thoughts and thus destroyed them. There is no politics, no explanation of human concerns without knowledge of psychology.

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The people in charge have found a term that should at least suggest some meaning: thermal recycling. Four federal states state that they have thermally recycled a total of 17.25 million expired corona masks. Translated this means: They were burned.

This is the result of a WELT survey of all countries. 6.1 million masks were destroyed in Baden-Württemberg, 5.5 million in Saxony, five million in North Rhine-Westphalia and 656,000 in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Eleven federal states announced that they had not yet disposed of any corona masks, but that they were partially planning to do so. Thuringia could not provide any information about the type of recycling.

The Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) in Berlin has also “energetically recycled” masks in the past few months. The number is so far “less than a million pieces,” said a spokesman on request. The destroyed masks were bought at the height of the pandemic. They have passed their sell-by date without a buyer having been found for them beforehand. At federal and state level, the majority were surgical, FFP2 and similar masks.

In October last year it was announced that the federal government wants to dispose of up to 800 million expired masks. According to WELT information, this was taken over by the disposal company Remondis in the Euskirchen warehouse in North Rhine-Westphalia. According to documents, November 11, 2022 to November 30, 2023 was agreed as the period. “Energy recovery” is also to take place at the storage locations in Augsburg, Dresden and Crailsheim in the district of Schwäbisch-Hall.

The federal and state governments are sitting on a mountain of masks worth billions. According to the Federal Ministry of Health from September, there are a total of 3.7 billion masks in the federal inventory, around 20 percent of which are the subject of legal disputes and cannot be handed over. According to a spokesman on Tuesday, 1.4 billion certified surgical masks and 260 million FFP2 masks can currently be delivered. Most of these will last until the end of next year.

“I’m often the only mask wearer in the room”

As a sign that the pandemic is not over, Health Minister Lauterbach also wears a mask at the World Economic Forum. He wants to set an example. So far it hasn’t made school: “I’m often the only mask wearer in the room,” he says in the WELT interview with Jan Philipp Burgard.

In addition, the federal states have a total of 180 million corona masks, as the responsible health and interior ministries announced on request. Bavaria (68.5 million), Lower Saxony (24.6 million) and Hesse (22.6 million) stock the most masks. In twelve federal states, a total of 54.3 million of the masks will expire this year or next. These are mostly medical surgical masks.

You can only burn what you bought yourself

Several ministries want to have more masks destroyed in the future. The problem: So far you can only burn those that you have bought yourself. For masks that were procured by the federal government and then distributed to the federal states, they need the approval of the federal government.

“The Hessian Ministry of the Interior and Sport, together with many ministries from other states, is turning to the federal government with an urgent request to either take back the unusable protective masks from federal deliveries or to agree to their destruction by the states, as ongoing storage costs are incurred,” says a spokesman. Unfortunately, approval has not yet been obtained. “The Federal Ministry of Health refers to open customs issues that have not yet been clarified by the Federal Government.”

The Ministry of the Interior in Saxony also reports that it is waiting for the masks procured by the federal government “until legal questions have been finally clarified”. The Saarland announced that it planned to destroy 1.8 million masks from the federal inventory. A spokesman for the Health Senate in Hamburg says: “The preparations have been made.” When asked when approval can be given, a spokesman for the Federal Ministry of Health answered evasively: “The BMG is in regular contact with both the federal states and the General Customs Directorate.”

Karsten Klein, chairman of the FDP parliamentary group in the budget committee of the Bundestag, criticizes the previous government’s overprocurement: “The traffic light coalition inherited a huge and very expensive mask mountain from Jens Spahn. As important as the federal government’s support for the procurement of masks was at times in 2020, under Spahn it resulted in a real buying spree that completely lost sight of the need,” said Klein about the former Federal Minister of Health from the CDU.

In future crises, procurement must be based on reliable demand forecasts and there must be better coordination between the federal and state governments. “There must be no immense over-procurement and thus a waste of taxpayers’ money.” The Federal Ministry of Health must now “at all costs” look for ways to give away masks before their shelf life expires. Depending on the mask type and manufacturer, this is usually between two and five years.

Kathrin Vogler, health policy spokeswoman for the Left Group in the Bundestag, also criticizes the destruction: “Instead of distributing leftover masks to people free of charge at train and bus stations or in doctor’s offices, the federal states and the Ministry of Health are now destroying millions of masks.” This shows that those responsible have not even begun to understand the social dimension of infection control. “Prevention measures such as masks and tests must be available to everyone with low thresholds and as free of charge as possible.”

Almost six billion euros in procurement costs in the federal government alone

At the beginning of November, the Budget Committee of the Bundestag called on the government to ensure that the personal protective equipment in the federal inventory “is definitely recycled as needed before the expiry date expires” and that options for free and fee-based disposal are also examined in order to ensure disposal “to be avoided due to exceeding the expiry date”.

In addition, masks are stored in addition to the federal inventory as part of the “National Health Protection Reserve”. The establishment of the reserve was decided by the then federal government in mid-2020 in order to prevent future shortages. According to the Ministry of Health, there are currently 245 million masks in reserve, some of which will expire at the end of 2023.

But doubts about the usefulness of the reserve are increasing. In November, the budget committee asked the government to implement a proposal from the Federal Court of Auditors and to examine “whether physical storage for the federal healthcare system is necessary and economical at all” and at which authority this should best be located – as well as what alternatives to one Stockpiling at the federal government may exist.

Overall, mask procurement is a very expensive affair for the taxpayer. The costs at federal level alone have totaled 5.8 billion euros since the beginning of the pandemic. For this purpose, 4.2 billion surgical masks and 1.7 billion FFP2 masks were procured.

In the past, the Federal Court of Auditors has repeatedly criticized that under the leadership of ex-Health Minister Spahn, there was a “massive over-procurement” of masks that would have been “avoidable”.

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A group of 160 mostly American lawyers recently urged President Joe Biden to remove Cuba from the U.S. State Sponsors of Terrorism list, a designation acknowledged as meritless and politically motivated by critics and proponents of the policy alike.

Noting that numerous former Latin American and Caribbean heads of state, as well as “hundreds of civil society organizations and thousands of citizens” have asked the Biden administration to lift Cuba’s State Sponsors of Terrorism (SSOT) status, the attorneys called on the president “to immediately initiate a review and notification process to remove Cuba from the SSOT list.”

“There is no legal or moral justification for Cuba to remain on the State Sponsors of Terrorism list,” the attorneys argued in an Alliance for Cuba Engagement and Respect (ACERE) letter. “Given the tremendous economic, social, humanitarian, and commercial effect placement on the SSOT list has had for the Cuba people, maintaining it for such pretextual reasons continues to be a stain on U.S. foreign policy.”

There is no legal or moral justification to list Cuba as a state sponsor of terror. This important letter signed by 160 lawyers makes that clear. We’re proud to have helped gather signatures! #LetCubaLive https://t.co/62wLuIn5BH

— CODEPINK (@codepink) January 23, 2023

In 2015, then-President Barack Obama removed Cuba from the SSOT during a promising but ultimately short-lived rapprochement between the two countries that abruptly ended when former President Donald Trump took office in 2017. The lawyers’ letter is a point-by-point refutation of the criteria cited by then-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo when the outgoing Trump administration re-listed Cuba as an SSOT in January 2021.

These include Cuba’s refusal to extradite members of the National Liberation Army, a leftist rebel group from Colombia, who traveled to Havana for peace negotiations with the Colombian government. Such an extradition, the lawyers noted, would have violated Cuba’s obligation to ensure the safety and well-being of all participants in the peace talks.

Pompeo also cited the fact that Cuba harbors U.S. fugitives wanted for acts of political violence committed nearly half a century ago, even though no other country has been placed on the SSOT list for such a reason. Aside from ignoring all the Cuban exile terrorists who enjoy not only citizenship but sometimes even heroic status in the United States, the lawyers note that “international law clearly prohibits extradition for acts of political violence.”

As the letter states:

To the extent that the 1904 extradition treaty between Cuba and the United States remains in effect and continues to be honored by both parties, it contains a standard political offense exemption. This exception is premised upon a concept familiar to the United States, which is that “individuals have a right to resort to political activism to foster political change.” Indeed, this is precisely the sort of “activism” that the United States designates millions of dollars to each year for regime change in Cuba.

“Policy—and electoral—concerns appear to have always kept Cuba on the SSOT list, rather than actually meeting the legal requirements to be on there,” the lawyers’ letter contends, citing a former Clinton administration Cuba expert who admitted that “frankly, I don’t know anyone inside or outside of government who believes in private that Cuba belongs on the terrorist list.”

“People who defend it know it is a political calculation,” the expert added. “It keeps a certain part of the voting public in Florida happy, and it doesn’t cost anything.”

Much of that “certain part of the voting public in Florida” consists of Cuban-Americans, who—especially among the older generations—vehemently support isolating Cuba as long as it remains socialist.

“Frankly, I don’t know anyone inside or outside of government who believes in private that Cuba belongs on the terrorist list.”

Earlier this month, Rep. María Elvira Salazar (R-Fla.)—the daughter of Cuban exiles who believes that even the sort of democratic socialism found in many of the world’s freest and most developed nations brings “misery, oppression, and exile”—introduced the FORCE Act. The proposed legislation would bar Biden from removing Cuba from the SSOT list “until the regime grants basic human rights protections.”

Cuba was first placed on the SSOT list by the Reagan administration in 1982. By that time, the island nation and its socialist government had endured a decadeslong campaign of U.S.-backed exile terrorism, attempted subversion, failed assassination attempts, economic warfare, and covert operations large and small in a fruitless policy of toppling longtime leader Fidel Castro. Cuba says U.S.-backed terrorism has killed or wounded more than 5,000 Cubans and cost its economy billions of dollars.

There is no comparable—or any—history of Cuban terrorism against the United States.

In stark contrast, the Reagan administration removed Iraq, then ruled by the dictator Saddam Hussein, from the SSOT list just days before Cuba was added. This was so that the U.S. could supply Hussein’s forces with weaponry used to kill both Iranians and Iraq’s own restive Kurdish and Shi’a people. Top officials in the Reagan and George W. Bush administrations knew that Iraqi forces were using chemical weapons—some of whose components came from the United States and its allies—against both Iranians and against Iraqi Kurds in the genocidal Anfal campaign, but gave Hussein diplomatic cover until he ordered an invasion of Kuwait in August 1990.

The resolution by the Berkeley City Council (CA) marks 1 of the 65 different docs passed across the US, demanding the withdrawal of #Cuba from the SSOT list & the lifting of the blockade.

We thank the ppl of the US, which each day expresses its solidarity through these efforts. pic.twitter.com/NUdwNCbvj7

— Lianys Torres Rivera (@lianystr) January 3, 2023

More than 100 progressive groups and over 10,000 people have signed petitions and open letters urging Biden to lift Cuba’s SSOT designation.

Last October, leftist Colombia President Gustavo Petro asked U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to end the “injustice” of Cuba being listed as a sponsor of terrorism.

From Common Dreams: Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.

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Brett Wilkins is a staff writer for Common Dreams.

Featured image: CodePink led a November 2, 2022 rally against the U.S. economic blockade of Cuba outside the White House in Washington, D.C. (Photo: CodePink)

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Bees are likely to be at high risk from exposure to glyphosate, the most widely used weedkiller in the world, via contaminated wildflower nectar and pollen after pre-harvest spraying (desiccation), according to new research from Trinity College Dublin and Dublin City University scientists in Ireland.

Glyphosate is the most frequently used weedkiller within the European Union and is also very common in other parts of the world. The residues the Irish scientists found in nectar in this study exceeded the European maximum permitted levels of glyphosate in honey and honey bee products, which suggests they could be harmful to honeybees and those eating the honey.

Residues of glyphosate have previously been found in nectar and pollen collected by bees foraging on plants that have been selectively targeted with weedkiller, but this is the first time it has been reported in unsprayed wildflowers growing near sprayed fields. Glyphosate is intended to only kill plants but it has been shown to harm the digestive systems of honeybees and bumblebees, which makes them more vulnerable to infections, and it may have other negative consequences.

This is the first time glyphosate has been reported in unsprayed wildflowers under conventional farming conditions and while more research is needed to find how much higher glyphosate concentrations would be in directly sprayed plants, the researchers stated that wild bees and honeybees will visit the contaminated wildflowers to collect pollen and nectar. They will thus be exposed to glyphosate and that could impact their health and the critical pollination service they provide.

In three of the studied locations, glyphosate residues were found in pollen and nectar of the blackberry flowers within a week after spraying took place. When the weedkiller was used as a pre- or post-emergence spray on oilseed rape crops (two months before sampling), no residues were detected. Knowing that bees may be exposed to glyphosate residues in the environment makes it important that more research takes place to assess the glyphosate impact on multiple bee species.

The Trinity College Dublin scientists stated that they recommend the immediate investigation of glyphosate as a desiccant before harvesting crops to better understand how this impacts non-target flowering plants growing near crop fields to enable a greater evidence base for evaluation of the renewal of market authorization for glyphosate in the European Union.

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New research by top US government scientists has found that people exposed to the widely used weed killing chemical glyphosate have biomarkers in their urine linked to the development of cancer and other diseases.

The study, published last week in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, measured glyphosate levels in the urine of farmers and other study participants and determined that the presence of high levels of the pesticide were associated with signs of a reaction in the body called oxidative stress, a condition that causes damage to DNA. Oxidative stress is considered by health experts as a key characteristic of carcinogens.

The authors of the paper – 10 scientists with the National Institutes of Health and two from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) – concluded that their study “contributes to the weight of evidence supporting an association between glyphosate exposure and oxidative stress in humans.” They also noted that “accumulating evidence supports the role of oxidative stress in the pathogenesis of hematologic cancers,” such as lymphoma, myeloma and leukemia.

“Oxidative stress is not something you want to have,” said Linda Birnbaum, a toxicologist and former director of the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences. “This study increases our understanding that glyphosate has the potential to cause cancer.”

The study findings come after the CDC reported last year that more than 80% of urine samples drawn from children and adults contained glyphosate. The CDC reported that out of 2,310 urine samples taken from a group of Americans intended to be representative of the US population, 1,885 were laced with detectable traces of glyphosate.

Glyphosate is the most heavily applied herbicide in history, both in the US and globally. One of the best-known glyphosate-based products is Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller. Roundup has been used by farmers as well as consumers for more than 40 years. Officials with Monsanto and its German owner Bayer AG have always assured the public and regulators that exposure to the weed killer does not pose a threat to human health.

Bayer said the new NIH study has many “significant methodological limitations that affects its reliability,” and said the results conflict with other government research.

“The increased oxidative stress found in the study could have been caused by any number of non-glyphosate related factors or a combination of them, and the study does not support the conclusion that glyphosate is the cause,” Bayer said in a statement.

People are exposed to glyphosate by using products made with the chemical and also by eating food and drinking water contaminated with the pesticide. Scientists have found glyphosate residues in an array of popular foods and in waterways across the US.

Notably, in the new paper, the NIH and CDC scientists said that while their study focused on farmers who were exposed to glyphosate when they sprayed it on fields, they saw similar results in “non-farmers.”

The findings suggest “these effects may apply more broadly to the general population who are primarily exposed through ingestion of contaminated food and water or residential applications,” the study authors wrote.

The study is so significant that it warrants regulatory attention, said some independent scientists.

“This is a top level team of investigators and a highly credible study to which regulators need to pay attention,” said Phil Landrigan, a pediatrician and epidemiologist who worked for years at the CDC and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and now directs the Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good at Boston College.

Michael Antoniou, a scientist with the department of medical and molecular genetics at King’s College in London who has been researching glyphosate for years, said the results were “worrying,” with “major health implications.”

Critical timing

The new government-funded study comes at a time when both the EPA and European regulators are completing updated assessments of glyphosate safety, and as health advocates are pushing for limits on use of the chemical or requirements that products such as Roundup be labeled with a cancer warning.

A European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) spokesperson said the agency was aware of the study and would consider whether or not the findings add “new evidence” as the agency completes its new glyphosate assessment. EFSA’s conclusions are due in July.

The EPA also said it was looking over the new study and would “carefully review” the findings as it finalizes its assessment.

“EPA takes very seriously our duty to protect human health and the environment,” the agency said in a statement.

The study also comes as Monsanto and Bayer remain mired in litigation brought by tens of thousands of cancer patients who claim exposure to Roundup caused them to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma. The company has already agreed to pay out more than $11 billion to settle the bulk of the claims – without admitting any liability – but many cases have not settled and civil trials are continuing.

Bayer is also facing a surge in investor unrest and calls for a break-up and the ouster of top leaders after the company lost 40% of its market value following its 2018 acquisition of Monsanto.

Bayer maintains that glyphosate does not cause cancer and that products made with it can be used safety. The company states on its website that EPA and other regulatory reviews provide an “extensive body of research” that back the company’s safety pledge.

Though some countries have moved to ban glyphosate products, regulatory agencies in many countries say there is a lack of evidence connecting glyphosate herbicides to cancer, and that it is one of the safest and most effective herbicides available.

Last year, a risk assessment committee of the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) concluded after reviewing multiple studies that there was no justification for classifying glyphosate as a carcinogen.

Many large US farm groups, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, American Soybean Association, National Corn Growers Association, National Association of Wheat Growers, National Cotton Council, and American Sugarbeet Growers Association, also say that glyphosate doesn’t cause cancer.

The EPA has said for years that it considers glyphosate as “not likely” to be carcinogenic, and in a 2020 updated review, the agency reiterated it saw no “human health risks of concern.” But the agency was forced to withdrawthat safety determination last year after a federal appellate court invalidated the EPA’s assessment.

The court ruling said that the EPA did not properly follow scientific guidelines when it determined glyphosate was not carcinogenic, ignoring expert advice from scientific advisers and using “inconsistent reasoning.”

The EPA now is revisiting its glyphosate evaluation and expects to issue a decision for glyphosate in 2026. 

Cancer not only concern

Debate over the safety of glyphosate has persisted for years and intensified after the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), a unit of the World Health Organization, declared it “probably carcinogenic to humans” in 2015.

The new findings are not the first to look at glyphosate and oxidative stress. Animal studies and cellular studies have also found an association. But there are only a handful of such studies in humans.

The NIH study is the “largest investigation to date of the relationship between glyphosate exposure and oxidative stress markers,” said Jonathan Hofmann, an author of the study from the NIH’s National Cancer Institute.

Scientists say it is important to examine substances that may cause oxidative stress because a large body of scientific evidence suggests that long-term oxidative stress contributes to the development not only of cancer but also a range of chronic conditions, such as diabetes, heart disease, and reproductive problems, including male infertility.

One prior human study related to glyphosate and oxidative stress was published last year by a team of scientists specializing in public and environmental health at several US universities.

Those researchers analyzed 347 urine samples collected from pregnant women, finding that higher levels of oxidative stress biomarkers were seen in the samples containing concentrations of aminomethyl phosphonic acid (AMPA), a substance created when glyphosate breaks down in soil and water.

The authors of that paper noted that glyphosate and AMPA have been shown to disrupt hormone function and warned that more research was needed due to glyphosate’s “persistence within the environment, and potential for adverse effects during pregnancy.”

The new NIH study is considered part of the Agricultural Health Study (AHS), a long-term examination of the health impacts of pesticide use on farmers funded by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in collaboration with the EPA.

Other AHS studies have provided sometimes conflicting findings on the question of whether or not glyphosate can cause cancer, but the scientists authoring the latest research said their study was distinctive for several reasons, including using urinary glyphosate exposure measurements and pesticide exposure histories for study subjects and including people who are not farmers.

The researchers said that though the associations between glyphosate and biomarkers of oxidative stress “mainly appear to reflect effects of recent occupational exposure, there was also some evidence of associations with longer-term exposure.”

Investigators at the NIH are exploring potential opportunities to follow up on these findings and address needs for future research, Hofmann said.

Lorette Picciano, executive director of the Rural Coalition alliance of farm workers, said she hopes the EPA will pay attention to the study.

“People are dying of these cancers,” she said. “This study is very important.”

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This article is co-published with The Guardian.

Featured image is from SHTFplan.com

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Major US banks, including Wells Fargo, Bank of America, JPMorgan, and others, will push into the digital wallet space in the second half of this year to take on Apple Pay and PayPal. 

Early Warning Services LLC (EWS), the bank-owned company that operates the money-transfer service Zelle, will be managing the new digital wallet, according to WSJ. The wallet has yet to be named but will be separate from Zelle and allow shoppers to pay at merchants’ online checkouts with linked debit and credit cards.

EWS plans to offer the new digital wallet later this year and can handle up to 150 million debit and credit cards during the initial launch. Consumers in good standing with banks will be eligible for the new service.

The purpose of the digital wallet is to take on third-party wallet operators such as Apple and PayPal, according to people familiar with the matter. They said banks are concerned about losing businesses if a digital wallet is not released soon. Even though Goldman Sachs’ consumer unit that manages the Apple Card is a money-losing business, there is a plan to launch a high-yield savings account and buy now, pay later program.

The move towards electronic and contactless payments has been gradual but could soon be thrown into hyperdrive if enough consumers adopt EWS’ new wallet. It was during the Coronavirus pandemic when the government, Federal Reserve, and corporations urged people to avoid unnecessary physical transactions that increased the push toward a cashless society.

Recall the pivot toward a cashless society was clear as day. Perhaps the coin shortage during the pandemic was a test run. And anyone who dared mention a looming cashless society was deemed a ‘conspiracy theorist.’

Just remember who is also shaping the world and influencing politicians and corporations away from a cash economy:

Dethroning cash as king. How digital payments are enabling a shift away from the cash economy https://t.co/FUYE2KHVfn @WEFUpLink pic.twitter.com/QpRmA61JXz

— World Economic Forum (@wef) February 22, 2022

The dystopic view is that a cashless society could mean governments and corporations will have even more control over our wallets — and that’s frightening.

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This week the US government reached its 31.4 trillion dollars borrowing limit, better known as the “debt ceiling.” This led to a showdown among House Republicans, President Biden, and congressional Democrats.

House Republicans are demanding that President Biden and Senate Democrats agree to include spending cuts with the debt ceiling increase. However, President Biden and the congressional Democrats are refusing to negotiate with Republicans. Rather, they and their allies in the mainstream media are lambasting Republicans for their “irresponsibility” in seeking to include spending cuts with an increase in the debt ceiling.

America’s national debt is approximately 122 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), meaning the government owes more than the population produces. Interest payments on the national debt follow in size behind other federal budget big spending areas of Social Security, Medicare, and “defense.” While interest payments are made, the national debt continues to grow each year.

Government spending steals resources from the private sector. Thus, there is less capital available for private businesses to grow and create new jobs. Government spending also contributes to price inflation and the declining value of the dollar as the Federal Reserve monetizes the debt. One reason the Fed cannot allow interest rates to rise anywhere near where they would be in a free market is that it would cause the federal government’s interest payments to rise to unsustainable levels. Considering these facts, it should be clear that the irresponsible ones are those who think the government should increase its credit limit without cutting spending.

This is not to say that establishment Republicans like House Speaker Kevin McCarthy are heroes of fiscal restraint. Rather, McCarthy, like most Republicans, objected neither to increased spending nor to debt ceiling suspensions when Donald Trump was president. Further, any Republican spending plan will likely continue increasing spending on the military-industrial complex while refusing to address the looming cost problems with Social Security and Medicare.

While some Republicans are willing to discuss reforms to Social Security and Medicare, most are still too afraid of the “senior lobby” to support any changes in the programs — even if such changes will not harm current beneficiaries. Consequently, it is unlikely Congress will pass meaningful entitlement reform — at least until it is forced to do so because the Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds run out of money. Insolvency is projected for the Medicare Trust Fund in five years and for the Social Security Trust Fund in 12 years. Of course, Congress may be able to avoid making tough choices since the Federal Reserve will likely cut government benefits, along with workers’ wages and the value of savings, via the inflation tax.

Following early reports that the House Republican leadership was open to supporting cuts in military spending, there arose a predictable cry from Republican hawks that any reduction in spending would leave the US and its allies vulnerable to our enemies. The limited cuts considered, though, would still keep America with a military budget exceeding the combined military budgets of the next nine biggest spending countries. After some pressure from the military-industrial complex’s loyalists and propagandists, most Republicans retreated from supporting defense cuts.

A problem with many fiscal conservatives is they accept the premise of the welfare-warfare statists. Thus, they are unable to make consistent principled arguments supporting spending cuts and opposing spending increases. The key to restoring a free society is for a critical mass of individuals to reject statism.

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A deputy defense minister and the deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office both offered their resignations on Tuesday amid allegations of corruption.

The high-level departures came soon after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced changes to personnel at the highest level after the highest-profile allegations of graft since Russia launched its invasion.

Who’s resigned, and why?

The defense ministry carried a statement saying Vyacheslav Shapovalov‘s resignation was “a worthy deed” that would help retain trust in the ministry. Local media have reported that his departure was linked to a scandal involving the purchase of provisions for the Ukrainian military. Food contracts were allegedly signed at inflated prices.

Separately, the deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, said he had asked the president to relieve him of his duties. Tymoshenko was among officials linked last September to the embezzlement of aid earmarked for Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region worth more than $7 million.

Click here to read the full article on DW.

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Featured image: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivers an address in Kiev, Ukraine, April 15, 2022. (Credit: Ukrainian Presidency)