E.I.R.STRATEGIC WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
ALERT Volume 33, No. 28, July 11, 2019
Reviving the “Spirit of Singapore” Is Key to an Order of Peace The initiatives launched around the June 28-29 G20 summit in Osaka continue to reverberate, as the “New Paradigm” in international affairs takes shape. As we reported last week, the bilateral meetings on the sidelines of that summit led to signifi- cant strategic openings, in particular the consultations among Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Moon Jae-In and Shinzo Abe, who hosted the G20 meet.
Since then, top negotiators in Washington and Beijing have resumed trade talks and more are planned. Both Trump and Xi have expressed confidence that a solution acceptable to both sides will be found. As for Russia and the United States, efforts will also be made to resolve the deadlock in arms reduction negotiations. It was announced last week that Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and U.S. Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Andrea Thompson would hold “full format talks” in Geneva on July 17-18 on the issue, in particular on a New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty).
The most spectacular result of the months-long diplomatic efforts by heads of state – although it was very much down- played in western media-- was the meeting between North Ko- rean Chairman Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump on June 30 in the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas after the conclusion of the G20 meeting, which re-initiated talks on de- nuclearization (cf. SAS 27/19). Key roles in making that pos- sible were also played by Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, and South Korean President Moon. The latter reportedly urged the US President to ease the sanctions on Pyongyang gradually, rather than insisting on full compliance from the North Korean side before making any concessions.
A key flash point nonetheless remains Iran, where the situ- ation could escalate quickly into a major conflict, if only by miscalculation. As a result of the United States pulling out of the JCPOA nuclear agreement one year ago, Tehran has now announced it will no longer comply with the provisions of that agreement. Then on July 4, in an obvious move to provoke an- other crisis, British Royal Marines seized a supertanker off the coast of Gibraltar, which was suspected of carrying Iranian oil to Syria, in violation of EU sanctions. Spain protested against the impounding (carried out in a Hollywood film style), as the tanker was in Spanish territorial waters.
Ominous in this respect are the comments of the British Am-
bassador to the United States, Sir Kim Darroch, which were leaked on July 6 in the Daily Mail. In one cable, he wrote that Trump was not “fully on board” on any attack against Iran, but he was surrounded “by a more hawkish group of advisors”, and therefore, “just one more Iranian attack in the region could trigger yet another Trump U-turn.” In particular if it involves the loss of a single American life, the ambassador added.
Therefore, one must expect the war party to orchestrate a new “false flag” operation to place the blame on Iran. US Na- tional Security Adviser John Bolton, a notorious warmonger, immediately called the impounding of the tanker “excellent news”.
If Donald Trump is to succeed in his stated intention to “not police the world” (cf. below), he needs to revive the “spirit of Singapore” that animated his first axiom-busting summit meet- ing with Kim Jong-un in Singapore one year ago, and defini- tively sideline the war party, also known as the British Empire faction, on both sides of the Atlantic. The most effective and immediate way to do so, is to proceed with the full exoneration of Lyndon LaRouche.
Is Trump Ready to Take on the Brits Full-Force? The substantive meetings President Trump held with both Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping in Osaka show that he has been freed from some of the constraints imposed on him by Rus- siagate. He is also well aware (at least partially) that the British establishment and secret services have played a lead role in the regime change operations against him, as well as in the various deployments which had sabotaged previous potential summits with the Russian and Chinese leaders. London’s dirty role was again highlighted in the leak of secret cables sent by the British Ambassador to Washington, Sir Kim Darroch, which included many derogatory comments about Donald Trump and his administration, as well as hints of the use of “false flag operations” (cf. above).
The cables published by the UK’s Daily Mail on July 6 also show how Sir Kim, a career intelligence officer cum diplomat, recommended cultivating British assets as close to President Trump as possible in order to “flood the zone” of advice he receives. This in itself should trigger a full investigation into foreign interference in the US.
Trump’s address to the nation on Independence Day July 4, also reflected a new sense of confidence, and an understanding of the true enemy of America. The American republic, he said,
was forged in its battle against the British Empire, in one of several references to the uniqueness of the American revolu- tion. After quoting from the opening of the Declaration of Independence, Trump reminded the audience that the British “had come to crush the revolution in its infancy.” He recalled how General Washington’s soldiers “toppled a statue of King George and melted it into bullets for battle.”
Donald Trump also made highly significant remarks showing why he has incurred the wrath of the “war party” in an inter- view with Tucker Carlson of Fox News, which have received next to no coverage in European media.
Afghanistan: In the interview done in Japan but not aired until July 1, Trump pointed out that the US has been there for 19 years, and is not there to win a war, but has become a po- lice force. “We’re the policeman for the whole world,” and we shouldn’t bet there. Russia, he said, “doesn’t police the world... they police Russia.” China doesn’t police and doesn’t “have troops everywhere. What they have is, they have people taking the minerals out of the ground. They don’t have troops.”
Iraq: In discussing the attacks on the World Trade Center, Trump said in an aside that the Bush Administration “attacked the wrong country.” The terrorists “didn’t come from Iraq.” What he did not mention is that that 15 of the 19 terrorists in the 9/11 attack were Saudis...
Destruction of US cities: When Carlson brought up the clean cities in Japan, as opposed to the filth, the graffiti and the junkies on the streets of New York, San Francisco, etc., Trump indicated that action by the federal government might be taken to end such a “disgraceful” situation, which would include the fast growing numbers of homeless people. He blamed it on the policy of “sanctuary cities”, which began about two years ago due to the “liberal establishment”.
EU: Same Old Song, Same Old Paradigm If one more proof were needed of the European Union’s bank- ruptcy, it came last week in the form of the brawl over the top positions in EU institutions. In particular, the nominations of German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen to the post of President of the European Commission and of IMF Director Christine Lagarde to head the European Central Bank demon- strate that EU leaders are not ready to draw the lessons from the disaster created by the deadly mix of austerity, loans with harsh conditionalities attached, and disinvestment. Instead, they cling to the policy that has made Europe increasingly ir- relevant over the past decades, be it economically, strategically or in terms of fundamental science and education.
Likewise, the campaign for the European Parliament in May failed to address the shortcomings of EU policies, limited as it was to fake choices such as “democracy or populism.”
Speaking of the Parliament, the core EU leaders have also demonstrated how unimportant democracy is for them. Dis- missing the politicians who came out as the winners of the May 25 elections, they wheeed and dealed until they came up with their own candidates for the top posts. Thus, neither the con- servative German politician Manfred Weber was chosen to head the Commission as planned, nor the socialist Dutch politician Frans Timmermans. The latter ended up as a nominee for Vice President of the Commission, while Weber was even rejected as head of the European Parliament, in favor of the Italian so- cialist Sassoli whose nomination came out of nowhere.
The failure of Chancellor Angela Merkel to secure a post for Weber and instead opt for von der Leyen has increased frictions inside the German government coalition, to such an extent that it may even fall. There is strong opposition among German
Social Democrats in the Bundestag as well as in the European Parliament to von der Leyen, who has been severely discredited by her disastrous record as Minister of Defense.
In addition, both von der Leyen and Lagarde have the de- struction of the Greek economy on their consciences -- Lagarde as a member of the Troika (EU, ECB, IMF) and especially be- cause of the wrong calculations on the effects of the austerity memorandum imposed on Greece, and von der Leyen because she even proposed that Greece should offer its gold reserves as collateral for EU funds!
The sovereignist front, led by Italy, claimed a partial victory as they successfully blocked the Timmermans option which, if approved, would have opened the way for the monetarist Jens Weidmann to head the ECB. As part of the horse-trading in the approval of the “strange couple” von der Leyen-Lagarde, the disciplinary procedure against Italy was dropped.
Whether the current candidates will be approved by the Strasbourg Parliament in its plenary session July 15-16, is still up in the air. The fact that the winners of recent elections were discarded and that the different groups of the new parliament had no say in nominating replacements, has caused broad dis- content. Thus, political paralysis in European institutions ap- pears to be foreordained, which is not a good omen for the chances of joining the New Silk Road dynamic, but will acceler- ate the centrifugal tendencies in the EU.
Eurasian Cooperation and Libya on Agenda of Vladimir Putin’s Visit to Rome Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to Rome on July 4 brought Italy and Russia one step closer to the New Paradigm. His talks were dominated by the Libya crisis and economic co- operation. On the first, Putin and Italian PM Giuseppe Conte called for an immediate ceasefire and the resumption of the political dialogue among the factions – thus anticipating the content of the UN Security Council Resolution passed two days later. During their joint press conference, the Russian President stated emphatically that he is not backing one faction leader against the other, and called on “those who created the prob- lem”, i.e. NATO, to commit to rebuilding the state institutions in Libya. Russia is not sitting at the window but will help in the effort.
As for economic cooperation, the Italian government reiter- ated its belief that sanctions are not useful and committed to work during the next six months to shift EU policy towards eliminating them.
Although no specific deals were concluded on this occasion, the views expressed by Italian government official Michele Ger- aci are indicative of the importance Rome gives to developing economic relations with Russia in the framework of the Belt and Road project. He was asked about that specifically in an interview with Sputnik. Geraci – who is the architect of Italy’s China policy and attended the working dinner with Putin – an- swered: “The Belt and Road includes all our partners in Asia, including Russia and other countries. So it’s an opportunity to increase trade with China directly of course, but also with any other country that is in between, along the road, including of course Russia.
“Now I am beginning to extend the way I see Europe. When I talk about trade partnership, I talk less and less about Eu- rope, and more and more about the New Eurasia, the Eurasian bloc of countries with whom we can have partnership. We do this of course with Russia, we do this with the Central Asian countries-- infrastructure development and energy and even agriculture in some of them. This for us is very important, and
EIR STRATEGIC ALERT WEEKLY NEWSLETTER 2 N° 28 / 2019
British Foreign Minister Issues Empty Threats to China over Hong Kong The British media have enthusiastically supported the recent demonstrations in Hong Kong, followed by the riots and loot- ing, while gloating over the alleged uprising of the population against Beijing. However, Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt outdid them all in his blustering remarks on July 2. He warned the Chinese government not to use the violent dem- onstrations as a “pretext for repression”, otherwise it would face “serious consequences” for undermining democracy in the former British colony.
Contrary to Mr. Hunt, many of the groups that were peace- fully demonstrating in Hong Kong against a specific issue of extradition to the mainland, had already expressed outrage at the vandalism and violence by the fringe group of rioters that had destroyed the Hong Kong legislature and other buildings.
Jeremy Hunt’s remarks led to some apropos counterattacks from China. The next day, Foreign Ministry Spokesman Geng Shuang retorted that Jeremy Hunt is “basking in the faded glo- ry of British colonialism and obsessed with lecturing others.” Under British rule, he added, there was no democracy in Hong Kong, and the “Hong Kong people didn’t even have the right to take to the street then.”
On the same day, the Chinese Ambassador to Great Britain, Liu Xiaoming, spoke out forcefully in an unusual press confer- ence at the Chinese Embassy called to comment on the Foreign Secretary’s remarks. They represent “gross and unacceptable interference” in China’s affairs, he said. “I think it is totally wrong for Jeremy Hunt to talk about freedom. This is not a matter about freedom, it’s a matter about breaking laws in Hong Kong. It’s very disappointing when the senior officials of his caliber show support of these lawbreaking people. We all remember what Hong Kong was 22 years ago under British rule: there was no freedom, democracy, whatever. We all know that all governors were appointed by the British government, people had no right to elect officials, no right to demonstrate, certainly, and they did not even have a right to have an inde- pendent judicial power.”
Ambassador Liu went on to warn that Britain’s relationship with China would be damaged by what he described as further interference of the British government into the affairs of Hong Kong.After that press conference, the Ambassador was called to the Foreign Office in protest...
Of course, the Chinese government is aware of the fact that Hunt’s intervention is directed at an internal audience in Great Britain, where he is quite unsuccessfully vying against Boris Johnson to become Prime Minister in place of the hapless The- resa May. In that respect, the Global Times reported July 5 on his threats of retaliation by reminding him that “this is not the 19th century when the Opium War broke out. The UK has gone past its prime.”
Schiller Institute Rep Addresses Second Wanshou Dialogue for Global Security The chairman of the Schiller Institute in Sweden Ulf Sandmark was invited to Beijing to take part in the Wanshou Dialogue for Global Security July 1-3, where he joined 27 other interna- tional guests and 23 Chinese participants. The Wanshou Dia- logue was set up last year by the Chinese People’s Association for Peace and Disarmament, an organization founded in 1985 which is by far the largest civil society organization in China dedicated to peace.
The round table discussions covered strategic problems in all regions and hotspots of the world. At the center howev-
we want to play a leading role as Italy in relations between Europe and Eurasia.”
He also said that he will head an economic mission to Russia soon. In the meantime, he will be in Washington next week for talks with Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer.
Geraci brought up another controversial theme for the EU on his Twitter account, accompanied by a video of him sitting across the dinner table from Vladimir Putin: “With President #Putin discussing why liberalism in the West may have run of out steam. I was encouraged to hear that we seem to agree the West has failed to understand the capacity of China to trans- form itself into an economic and high-tech super house, now we are one decade late.”
Renewables and Financial Speculation Threaten Germany with Severe Blackouts On three different days last month, June 6, 12 and 25, the base load of electricity produced in Germany experienced such critical shortages that it was impossible to keep the network functioning at the 50hertz tension needed to ensure an unin- terrupted power supply. The entire “security of the system”, according to the Federal Network Agency, was in danger of a total blackout. It was prevented only through imports of elec- tricity from Poland, the Czech Republic and France.
The acute shortage in supply amounted to 7,000 MW, while the balancing reserves, that is, the “control energy” held in re- serve by the leading power suppliers for instant intervention if need be, was only 3,000 MW. This had repercussions on the entire European power grid, that connects all member countries and obliges them to step in if one member lacks electricity.
Before the era of “renewables”, the base load was guaran- teed by the combination of nuclear, coal and gas plants, with only very rare vacillations. But now, with the emphasis on un- reliable and unpredictable solar and wind sources, a stable base load can often only be secured with massive imports from Ger- many’s neighbors.
But that’s not the only problem. Since electricity prices are set at the European Energy Exchange (EEX) in Leipzig, they are vulnerable to unregulated speculation. Thus, at the peak of the critical under-supply on Saturday, June 29, the price sky-rocketed to 37,856 euros (!) per megawatt/hour for four full hours between 12 am and 4 pm. On Sunday, the price was still 3,900 euros, and then dropped to “only” 400 on Monday. Electricity providers will have to increase end consumer prices to compensate for the pricing insanity on that Saturday.
This is a good example of the fact that the energy market is not oriented toward securing the base load but toward making maximum profits. Thus, there are indications that in addition to the physical cuts in the base load, speculators arranged the critical shortage to increase their gains. (Remember the cases of criminal speculation by ENRON in the United States, for which several culprits were sent to jail.)
Over the course of 2018, Germany experienced power out- ages about 100 times. Although not as serious as those of last month, they did force numerous large industrial facilities such as aluminum and steel plants to go off grid for a certain time, as their automated protection system turns off machines whenever the tension drops below 50hertz. The incidents of June are the result of several factors that have accumulated over time, and more are just waiting to happen -- unless Berlin decides to reverse the exit from nuclear and coal power. In that respect, Hopefully, these recent incidents are a wake-up call to stop the march into the era of “renewables” and discuss a return to nuclear power.
EIR STRATEGIC ALERT WEEKLY NEWSLETTER 3 N° 28 / 2019
er was the issue of relations between China and the United States. Would the economic rise of China be resisted with yet more trade war and even a cold war? Given the serious chal- lenges to world security, hos can the risk of nuclear war be avoided, when almost all nuclear treaties have broken down? One speaker after another called for a return to a rules-based security system with the United Nations as the universal arbi- ter. Many pointed to the difficulty of understanding the policies of President Trump, with the Chinese commenting that they never even know, if a planned meeting will occur from one day to the next.
The Schiller Institute expertise was called upon to contrib- ute to the panel on “The Emerging and New Technologies and Global Security.” Here several speakers warned against the militarization of space as well as President Trump’s plan to uni- laterally deploy space weapons.
This was an opportunity for Ulf Sandmark to uplift the dia- logue to a discussion of the “common aims of mankind” as a whole. His presentation focused on solutions to the strategic crises through cooperation among major powers to jointly in- troduce and deploy new technologies to meet the challenges posed to all nations. For example, the Strategic Defense Initia- tive, as conceptualized by Lyndon LaRouche, involves systems based on new physical principles which would make nuclear weapons obsolete. Another common aim of mankind proposed by Sandmark is to defend our planet Earth against threats coming from space under a Strategic Defense of Earth initia- tive. Space exploration is a “natural” area of international coop- eration, while the development of fusion power would make it possible to ensure raw materials security for all nations.
In addition, Sandmark showed that China’s Belt & Road Ini- tiative, which is open to all countries, helps stabilize global se- curity by developing the overall physical economy and building new infrastructure platforms, as the basis for a stable new fi- nancial system. Sandmark then went through the “four laws of LaRouche” as a strategic necessity that would ideally be imple- mented now through a “four powers agreement” among China, Russia, India and the United States. To conclude, he stressed the urgent need to bring these strategic proposals by Lyndon LaRouche into the international strategic discussion, and there- fore to support the campaign for his full exoneration.
Is Her Majesty’s Chatham House Running “Climate Civil Disobedience”? When they are not planning regime change operations and end- less wars, “fellows” at Her Majesty’s Chatham House (aka the Royal Institute of International Affairs) are promoting civil dis- obedience campaigns to “save the climate”, in particular those of the British-founded “Extinction Rebellion (XR)”.
Thus, on July 4, this staid think-tank of the British Empire sponsored a debate in London entitled, “Climate Action: A Role for Civil Disobedience?” The announcement for it noted that environmental scientists and activists have had trouble motivat- ing “the wider public, policymakers and corporations to push through the disruptive and ambitious policies needed” to stop what they call man-made climate change. “In recent months however, a new sense of urgency has been injected into the environmental debate by movements including the Extinction Rebellion in London and the Youth For Climate strikes inter- nationally.”
While the get-together included a few young activists, the featured debater was one of the RIIA’s own, namely Farhana Yamin, an “Associate Fellow [of the] Energy, Environment and Resources Department”. This gray-haired environmental law-
yer is also a leader of the Extinction Rebellion. At one of the latter’s recent “events” on April 16, members -- including Mrs. Yamin -- super-glued themselves to the walls and windows of the corporate headquarters of Royal Dutch Shell.
Since its inception in London in 2018, “XR” has engaged in repeated “civil disobedience” demonstrations, aimed at ma- nipulating hundreds and even thousands of youthful would-be activists to enter the fray. Their maiden event last Oct. 31 saw young Greta Thunberg give one of her rehearsed speeches. In addition to blocking roads and bridges, they are known for staging “die-ins” ostensibly to symbolize what will be the fate of all of us if CO2 emissions continue to rise.
Another image the British “XR” invokes is that of a “WWII mobilization” in defense of Mother Earth. An unspoken corol- lary of this parallel -- certainly not lost among the Antifa -- is that the “climate deniers” of today are equivalent to fascists from that time and should be targets of attack.
Another debater at the event was Sam Gaell, a Chatham House researcher on China and energy issues, who warned that governments and security services need to re-evaluate what they view as threats, comparing 10 minutes of traffic chaos with a million pounds of profits for oil companies that cause climate damage. By the way, when he is not calling for civil disobedience, Geall writes reports for Chatham House on the danger of the mega projects of the Belt and Road Initiative for the environment.
British Government Complicit in Fake News on Chemical Weapons in Syria The Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has been corrupted by the same British networks that created the White Helmets in Syria, which have been accused of staging the chemical weapons incidents in Syria which were then used as pretexts for two U.S./British/French cruise missile strikes on Syria, in April of 2017 and again in April of 2018. This is documented in a June 26 report of the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media, an ad hoc organization con- vened by Professor Piers Robinson, Chair in Politics, Society and Political Journalism at the University of Sheffield (England) from 2016 to 2019.
The report, entitled How the OPCW’s investigation of the Douma incident was nobbled is based on publicly available doc- umentation that the authors cite with internet links, and com- munications with OPCW staff who were angry at the behavior of upper-level management in these investigations. The Work- ing Group came to two explosive conclusions. They show, first, the deep connections between certain of the OPCW investiga- tors and the Syrian White Helmets organization; and second, the role of British government information warfare operations in suppressing any evidence that tended to contradict the of- ficial narrative that the Syrian government was responsible for the two cited and other chemical incidents in the Syrian war (cf. SAS 21, 22/19).
E.I.R. STRATEGIC ALERT www.eir.de Published by: E.I.R.GmbH, Bahnstr. 4, 65205 Wiesbaden Tel.: 0611/73650, Fax: 0611/9740935, 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 Übersetzung, Printed in Germany
EIR STRATEGIC ALERT WEEKLY NEWSLETTER 4 N°28 / 2019
