E.I.R.STRATEGIC ALERT WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
Volume 31, No. 44 - November 2, 2017
Cooperation among U.S., China and Russia Could End Geopolitics, Open a New Era The leaders of the three major nuclear powers of the world have moved to improve relations among themselves and to strengthen cooperation in various areas. That should be welcomed as excellent news by reasonable, peace-loving people all over the world. And yet, in Europe as in the United States, the mainstream media and most of the political class insist on branding Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping as dangerous would-be or actual dictators, and in the case of the U.S. President as mentally unstable. The campaign against Donald Trump orchestrated by the powers that be (“deep state”), as we have reported, is particularly vicious, and motivated by the fact that he threatens to take the United States out of the geopolitical “great game”. But Trump has not given in, as evidenced in a live interview he gave to Lou Dobbs of Fox News on Oct. 25. “I want to say this: I think it would be great if we got along with Russia”, which is a major nuclear power, Trump stated. Among other things, it would help settle the “North Korea situation”, and overall be “a good thing, not a bad thing”. On China, Trump told Dobbs that he just spoken to the President Xi and “congratulated him on his big victory” at the Communist Party of China’s (CPC) National Congress (cf. below). “I happen to think he’s a very good person. Now with that being said, he represents China, I represent the U.S.A., so, you know, there’s going to always be conflict. But we have a very good relationship.” That sets the stage for the 11 day trip Donald Trump will make to Asia, beginning on Nov. 3, with the high point being his state visit to China on Nov. 8-9. He is likely to have a oneon-one with Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the APEC summit. The White House has reported that some 40 businessmen will be traveling with the President, including the giants such as General Electric, Honeywell, Westinghouse, Boeing, Caterpillar, etc. It is expected that during his visit to China and also to Japan, proposals will be made for large-scale investments from both those countries in infrastructure projects in the U.S. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who just led his party to an impressive showing in snap legislative elections, firmly intends to continue to improve relations with Russia and also with China, and will meet President Putin at the APEC summit, where he also hopes to talk to Xi Jinping. Abe will be hosting Donald Trump in Tokyo on Nov. 5-7.
If positive cooperation can be established among the United States, Russia and China on a win-win basis, that would indeed usher in “a new era”, freed of geopolitical, zero-sum game thinking. Chinese President Xi Jinping Calls for an “Ever Promising Future” The 19th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, which concluded on Oct. 25, was extraordinary for a number of reasons. Most importantly, President Xi Jinping insisted on the need to advance toward a “community of shared future of mankind” in international relations, in which the policies beneficial to all of mankind take precedence over national concerns. That puts a tremendous responsibility on the Chinese leadership and people, he said. The deliberations of the Congress were primarily focused on the overriding need to improve the living conditions of the population not only in China, but worldwide. In that context, the Belt and Road Initiative was integrated into the constitution of the party, as was the “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era”. That formulation called forth wild comparisons to Chairman Mao from Western pundits, but Xi has continually stressed that China does not want to imitate any foreign model, nor impose its own on other countries. His thinking includes an insistence on win-win cooperation, and a social and economic policy rooted in Confucianism. The final resolution notes that over the last five years under Xi Jinping’s leadership, the party “has developed new ideas, new thinking, and new strategies,” and launched major initiatives. It reiterates the two-stage development plan laid out by Xi: from 2020 to 2035, China will achieve modernization, and from 2035 to 2050, China will become “a great modern socialist country that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced, harmonious, and beautiful.” The resolution states that China will “actively promote international cooperation through the Belt and Road Initiative, and continue to take an active part in reforming and developing the global governance system.” The party will favor a new form of international relations “featuring mutual respect, fairness, justice, and win-win cooperation and a community with a shared future for mankind”, and work together with others to build a “beautiful world that enjoys lasting peace, universal security, and common prosperity.” Xi Jinping, in his closing address to the CCP, communicated
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a resolute sense of future-oriented optimism and mission for China, noting that the “miserable plight of old China, which had been bullied by foreign aggressors following the Opium War of 1840” had ended, and that poverty and weakness were being overcome. He underscored that the “aspirations of the people to live a better life must always be the focus of our efforts”. Today, he went on, more than 1.3 billion Chinese people, “live in jubilation and dignity”, and the country “radiates with enormous dynamism... The Chinese people and the Chinese nation embrace brilliant prospects.” Schiller Institute Representatives Interviewed on CPC National Congress * On Oct. 23, Xinhuanet.com/English ran an interview with Helga Zepp-LaRouche, under the title “CPC National Congress Ensures Bright Future for Chinese People”. She noted that the “Chinese Dream” which aims to achieve rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is a great inspiration, not only for China, but also for the rest of the world. (http://news.xinhuanet.com/ english/2017-10/23/c_136700504.htm) “You can feel the optimism that has been created in China when you talk to the ordinary people, including youths, which is in stark contrast to the cultural problems of the so-called ‘youth culture’ in the United States and Europe,” Zepp-LaRouche is quoted as saying. She said she had traveled to China several times in recent years and was impressed by the CPC’s ability to make highlevel strategic plans and execute them. She also welcomed the institutions set up by Beijing to finance projects in developing countries. * Michael Steger, the president of the Schiller Institute in the San Francisco area, gave an interview to Xinhua on Oct. 25, which was also published in China Daily , in which he welcomed the influence of China on the sustainable growth of the world economy and thereby on international stability (http://europe. chinadaily.com.cn/business/2017-10/26/content_33734879. htm) In addition to the economy, Steger also brought up the great success of the Chinese space program, “such as the successful Long March Rockets and the lunar Chang’e program”, and well as a leading fusion experiment in China: “the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST), the world first experimental superconducting tokamak magnetic fusion energy reactor developed by China in 2006, which truly represents the energy of the future.” To be noted that as a representative of the Schiller Institute, Michael Steger participated in the People’s Daily Media Forum on the Belt and Road on Sept. 17-21,in China. He is one of the 14 attendees chosen to be foreign advisors of the daily’s new Center for International Studies. * In a program on U.S. reactions to the CPC Congress on Oct. 25, China Global Television Network (CGTN), the premier English-language network for China, questioned William Jones, EIR’s Washington bureau chief. He noted how difficult it is for Americans to be properly informed of China if they only read the New York Times or the Washington Post, “ because they seem to write their articles from preconceived ‘templates’ on China rather than from the events that are actually occurring there.” Jones underscored the importance of including in the CPC constitution the Belt and Road, a project which “changed the course of history.” “Prior to the Belt and Road, the world was on a downward path. But the initiation of this project launched
an upward trajectory for mankind and has created great optimism and received great support from the developing world and even from the countries of the developed world. Why Beijing Isn’t Worried about “Junk” Investments Abroad As the trans-Atlantic financial system nears another implosion, numerous mouthpieces have attempted to place the blame on China, for creating too much risky debt through its investments in the Belt and Road Initiative (cf. SAS 42/17). That argument was forcefully refuted by Wade Shepard on Oct. 26 in Forbes , the leading business publication in the United States. Shepard has followed the progress on the New Silk Road for years, and is truly excited by its perspectives. In response to an article in Bloomberg of the previous day, which stated that 41 of the 68 partner nations in the BRI have junk-rated sovereign debt or have withdrawn from ratings, Shepard notes that that is exactly the point of the initative. China aims to assist countries that are now “economically devastated, infrastructurally lagging, and politically troubled” to build their way to the future (https://www.forbes.com/sites/wadeshepard/2017/10/26/ why-china-doesnt-care-that-most-of-its-overseas-investmentsare-junk/#1aecfbff70cf). Shepard gives examples from Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Greece, and across Africa, where the nations are in crisis or extremely poor, and adds: “While it’s true that the Belt and Road goes through areas of major financial risk these are also regions that have the potential to produce huge long-term economic and political gains. China is essentially going around the world making big investments in places that nobody else will touch under the premise that after being linked into the BRI these countries will develop and their economic outlooks will eventually change considerably. Long-term here doesn’t mean three or four years, but three or four decades.” China has acquired a great deal of experience in such development, Shepard underlines, as a country ”that completely rebuilt itself in 30 years, constructing over a hundred new cities and turning former backwaters like Wuhan, Changsha and Chengdu in some of the most economically dynamic places in the world.” In a previous article, Shepard reported that the overseas mergers and acquisitions of private Chinese companies’ have been cut by 42% in 2017, compared to 2016, after the government limited “speculative” investment abroad. At the same time, outbound investments in BRI infrastructure have totalled $33 billion through September, compared with $31 billion for all of 2016. As Russiagate Implodes, Special Counsel Mueller Escalates the Witch Hunt The news of the last days on the so-called Russiagate provided a sharp kick-in-the-teeth to those alleging that there was Russian “meddling” in the 2016 presidential election to favor Donald Trump, and as well as “collusion” between the Trump team and the Russians. U.S. intelligence agencies claimed they have proof of the charges, but no solid evidence has yet been produced to back them. The charge that the Russians had “hacked” the Democratic National Committee (DNC) computers, and released emails harmful to Hillary Clinton’s candidacy to Wikileaks , in an attempt to aid Trump, was thoroughly refuted by top technical experts from the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, which demolished that narrative (cf. SAS 33-37/17).
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Now comes the confirmation that the famous dossier which asserted that Trump is subject to Russian blackmail, due to evidence of sexual improprieties that is in Putin’s hands, was paid for by the Clinton campaign and the DNC. An attorney for the Clinton campaign, Marc Elias, stated that he hired the intelligence firm Fusion GPS, on behalf of the Clinton campaign, to conduct “opposition research” against Trump. Fusion GPS hired a former top spy from Britain’s MI6, Christopher Steele, who produced the dossier, which was then used, presumably by the Obama Administration and the FBI, to obtain FISA warrants to conduct surveillance against Trump campaign officials. From there, Russiagate was off and running.1 It has now also been confirmed that then-FBI Director James Comey was prepared to pay Fusion GPS to continue Steele’s investigation of Trump when the Clinton campaign dropped it, which is an alarming use of that intelligence service to influence a presidential election. Special Counsel Robert Mueller is now finally under attack for his numerous conflicts of interest and past coverups, when he was FBI director. One prominent example is an editorial in the Wall Street Journal on Oct. 26, which calls for his removal. Among Mueller’s conflicts of interest cited is the most obvious, that he is a close friend of his successor at the FBI, James Comey, and that it was Comey’s firing which triggered the naming of an “independent” special counsel in the first place. It is very likely that Comey will soon be the subject of a Congressional investigation. As the pressure mounts on Mueller, he has counter-attacked by issuing his first indictments on Oct. 30. Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign manager from June to August 2016 and one of his associates, Rick Gates, surrendered to the FBI on that day, and pleaded not guilty to charges of money laundering and false statements related to affairs going back well before Trump’s candidacy. The indictment contains no mention of the Trump campaign. But the purpose of the move, expected for months now, is to create a media hype just as President Trump is preparing to leave for a crucial series of meetings in Asia, beginning Nov. 3, and to intimidate his associates. Germany Sinks Deeper into Energy Disaster The German government’s energy policy of prioritizing and subsidizing renewable energy sources has ruined the entire German and European market for new coal and gas power plants, Siemens CEO Joe Kaeser said on Oct. 20. He announced on the same occasion that Siemens will move out of this sector entirely, thus eliminating several thousands of highly-qualified jobs, with details to be made public in November. His company will only be involved in the construction of new gas power plants abroad, for instance in the giant project of 8 gas power plant complexes presently under construction in Egypt. As far as the inefficiency of wind power is concerned, the devastating assessment of two government bodies -- the Federal Grid Agency and the Anti-Cartel Office -- was made public by the Bild-zeitung on Oct. 27. Under the front page banner headline, “Windmill Insanity”, the tabloid noted that no less than 6,700 MW of newly-built wind power facilities were installed in Germany over the past year, but many of them are not connected to overland power lines, so the “power” they do generate cannot be transferred anywhere. And when the wind is too strong, of course, the windmills have to be turned off to avoid damage. Such unused wind power facilities cost the taxpayers an extra €643 million, on top of the 18 bn they already provide
to subsidize “renewables”. Concretely, an average household pays €280 per year to subsidize this nonsense which makes the kilowatt/hour price in Germany (28.7 cents) almost twice as high as in the neighboring Netherlands (14.7), and 80% more than in the United Kingdom (17.1) or France (16.0). With that, energy-intensive branches of the industry have no future in Germany. A side effect of this situation which makes the less-subsidized coal and natural gas power expensive and non-competitive against wind and solar, is that heating oil prices have gone up by 18%. Already in 2016, the utilities cut off the power supply to more than 330,000 German households, because they could not afford the high bills. Wide discontent with this situation accounts for the drastic vote losses suffered by the Green Party, but also by Chancellor Merkel’s Christian Democrats in recent elections. It is Angela Merkel who decreed the exit from nuclear power shortly after the Fukushima incident in 2011 and gave the green light for transforming the country’s power sector into one that is entirely supplied by “renewables” by 2050. Now, she is attempting to bring the Greens into the next government coalition, but one of their key preconditions is to have all coal power facilities closed down as of 2018. South-West Asia Prepares for Post-Isis Era When Secretary of State Rex Tillerson visited Riyad, Saudi Arabia on Oct. 22, he witnessed the launching of a new Iraq-Saudi Council, the aim of which is to build closer ties between the two countries to counter the influence of Iran. His visit is part of the Trump Administration’s “new strategy” for containing Tehran, but it is delusional to attempt and build it on a Saudi-Iraqi partnership. Just as unrealistic is the scheme to transform the Gulf Cooperation Council into a proto-NATO organization to combat the terrorism in the region and beyond. While Washington is obsessed with Iran, local players are actually looking to push back against the Sunni versus Shia conflict and establish an independent Iraq, free from outside control by Iran, Saudi Arabia or the United States. Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the leading Shia cleric in Iraq and a fervent patriot, is pressing for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Brigade to withdraw from Iraq, now that ISIS has been defeated. He is also calling for the domestic Shia militias to be disbanded or absorbed into the national armed forces. Next spring, new elections will take place, and there is some hope that a Sunni-Shia coalition slate can be put together under current Prime Minister al-Abadi, who is expected to seek reelection. Although al-Abadi comes from the same Dawa Party as former prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, a close Iran ally, he would like to diminish Iranian influence in the country. He is aligned with some Sunni politicians and with the populist firebrand Muqtada al-Sadr, who commands a base that is also looking to get out from under the thumb of foreign powers, including both the United States and Iran. The Syria situation is also moving into a new phase, since the US-backed Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) took control over the former ISIS capital of Raqqa in late October. Pentagon sources emphasize that the Russians clearly knew of the SDF move into Raqqa and made no effort to interfere. What is less certain is the scope of any agreement between Washington and Moscow over the future fate of Syria. The U.S. wants to prevent the consolidation of a “Shia corridor” running from Tehran through Damascus and on to Beirut.
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Moreover, Russian military officials have accused Washington of allowing ISIS fighters to escape from Raqqa, thus missing an opportunity to wipe out foreign fighters, including many from the Caucasus region of Russia, who may now attempt to get back home to wage a terror war against Moscow. Replenishing Lake Chad with Transaqua Featured at International Meeting in Rome At the three day International “Water and Climate Summit”, which took place in Rome Oct. 23-25, the issue of Lake Chad and the Transaqua project were publicly and prominently addressed. On the opening day, Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni brought up the “case of Lake Chad, a lake feeding a basin of seventy million people and several countries, whose very serious crisis in the last decades has produced major effects: they speak about two and a half million displaced people in that basin.” He also recognized the evident connections between the “water crisis of Lake Chad and the emerging of terrorist threats in some of those regions and in particular (...) of Boko Haram”. He added that Italy is “trying to help with its foreign policy to revive Lake Chad”. Those remarks by PM Gentiloni gave the executive secretary of the Lake Chad Basin Committee, Sanusi Abdullahi, the opportunity to ask for help in financing the great water-transfer project known as Transaqua. Speaking in the last panel of the second day, Abdullahi first thanked Gentiloni for having addressed the issue and then, in answer to a question by EIR correspondent Claudio Celani on what kind of assistance he expects from the Italian government, the head of the LCBC said Rome should finance the feasibility study. Abdullahi recalled that the first idea of a water-transfer plan, called Transaqua, was developed by the Italian firm Bonifica many years ago. The LCBC has now made a deal with PowerChina for an update of the situation of Lake Chad and Bonifica is a partner in the project. Indeed, the two firms have agreed to study the feasibility of the entire Transaqua project, and within that study, the feasibility of a first section of “inter-basin water transfer”. In that context, the Commission is seeking more support, in particular to conduct the feasibility study and make sure that the program “is economically viable, sustainable and in this regard we want the government of Italy to support us financially and politically (....) to actualize this dream.” New Silk Road: How China’s Win-Win Approach Is Transforming the World More than one hundred diplomats, business leaders, China experts, French-China friendship associations, parliamentary attaches, students of Far East civilizations, etc., attended a highly successful seminar in Paris, on Oct. 24, co-organized by the Schiller Institute and the Geopolitical Academy of Paris on the theme presented in the title above. This seminar covered the essentials of the Chinese project, the Confucian philosophy which inspires it, the principles of physical economics, as well as concrete examples taken in particular from Africa. We can only give a very brief resume here, but all speeches will be posted on www.institutschiller.org. The seminar was opened by Mr. Ali Rastbeen, president and founder of the Paris Academy of Geopolitics, who noted that the Belt and Road initiative (BRI) not only secures China’s trade routes and energy supplies, but is also an alternative to the present unipolar order, and potentially holds the key for easing
tensions in the Middle East. Helga Zepp-LaRouche, president of the Schiller Institute, focussed her remarks on the far-reaching repercussions of the 19th Communist Party Congress for the future of China and the world. The editor in chief of Nouvelle Solidarité , Christine Bierre, showed that the real inspiration for the win-win model is Confucianism, which is very much opposed to geopolitics. Realizing the common aims of mankind includes an ambitious space exploration policy, was the theme of a presentation by Sebastien Drochon of the Schiller Institute science team in France, who gave an overview of the Chinese program. He was followed by Karel Vereycken, Publication Manager of Nouvelle Solidarité, who took up the very practical question of how to finance such projects. Sebastien Périmony of the French Schiller Institute explained how, with the emergence of the BRICS and the BRI, Africa has just entered into an era of co-development, bringing to an end not only colonization but also the bad joke called “development aid”. The Schiller Institute was most pleased to have the participation of Mr. Mana Boubabakari, the technical director of the Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC), who gave an overview of the current efforts to restore lake Chad through water transfer projects such as Transaqua (cf. above). Michel Raimbaud, a former French ambassador to Mauritania, Sudan and Zimbabwe, and former director of the French Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless persons (OFPRA), showed how important the BRI and the Maritime Silk Road are for the Middle East, focusing more especially on Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. He was followed by Paul Bonnenfant, a former researcher at the CNRS, in its Institute of Research and Study of the Arab and Muslim world, who spoke about a country which was an important station on China’s Silk Road for many centuries and which is being destroyed today by a Saudi-led coalition supported and armed by the Western powers. That country is Yemen. Former French Presidential candidate Jacques Cheminade wrapped up the speeches by going through the underlying economic principles needed to ensure real growth, through public productive credit and investments in infrastructure. That is the system of Alexander Hamilton and Mathew and Henry Carey in the United States, of Friedrich List, and of France’s indicative planning. Mark Your Calendar The Schiller Institute is holding an international conference on the theme “Fulfilling Mankind’s Dream” near Frankfurt, Germany, on November 25-26. Contact the Schiller Institute for more information: (49) 611 205 2065, or si@schiller-institut.de
E.I.R. STRATEGIC ALERT www.eir.de Published by: E.I.R.GmbH, Bahnstr. 9a, 65205 Wiesbaden Tel.: 0611/73650, Fax: 0611/7365101, Email: info@eir.com Verantwortl. f. d. Inhalt: Dean Andromidas, Claudio Celani Subscription: EUR 3000/ ISSN 0936-7527 © E.I.R. GmbH Alle Rechte vorbehalten, auch die des Nachdrucks von Auszügen, derphotomechanischen Wiedergabe und der Übersetz
