EDITORIAL
The Immediate, Grave Danger of Genocide
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—The U.S. and the world are facing an immediate grave danger. The Jan. 12 State of the Union address demonstrated that Obama is completely out of control, EIR Founding Editor Lyndon LaRouche said today. The speech was a total fraud, and anyone accepting Obama’s lies is opening the United States up for total destruction. On behalf of the British, Obama is ready to blow up the United States altogether. This is an immediate possibility. The Wall Street issue is actually a cover for the fact that the United States as a whole is being set up for genocide. This is the British policy of genocide, and Pope Francis has been thoroughly suckered into this British genocide scheme.
It’s not just Obama who’s doing the killing; Obama is only the lead dog. It’s the British,—the British Empire.
And, of course, people are frightened; maybe they’re not frightened enough. But in any case, this reality has to be stated explicitly.
This is the secret of the massive COP21 “climate-change” conference in Paris last November-December, with its estimated 50,000 participants representing 196 nations. But no binding treaty could possibly be reached, so what was its purpose then? It was the mass declaration of intention for this genocide. It was to rally the troops for the scheduled “big kill.” It was the Dance of Death.
And this Pope’s May 2015 encyclical Laudate Si’ calling for humankind to be sacrificed for the sake of the “climate,” was exactly the same thing. This Pope has come under British direction and control; he’s being used by a British operation. He’s committing crimes.
Worldwide terror attacks by the British-Saudi spawned ISIS are the same thing,—as in Paris, in California, and now in Jakarta,—the last the first ISIS attack in Southeast Asia. The Tuesday, Jan. 12 bombing in Istanbul, Turkey, whose Muslim Brotherhood-controlled government is friendly to ISIS, has been especially murky. The victims were German tourists, and the German mass media openly cast doubt on the Turkish government’s account of their investigation. And German television says that there is “no evidence” for the Turkish government’s claim that it has killed 200 ISIS militants across the border in Syria in retaliation.
The thrust of the genocide is aimed squarely at the trans-Atlantic region. But along with it, goes the British threat to destroy Asia by war. This is what Obama is doing in the western Pacific; the Russians understand this completely.
COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM
Not Since 2008…
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—“Impending Financial Crisis Will Destroy Eurozone: City Strategist” RT headlined its coverage of Société Générale strategist Albert Edwards’ presentation at a City of London investment conference Jan. 11. Guardian Economics Editor Larry Elliott linked Edwards’ meltdown warning to Royal Bank of Scotland’s earlier “sell everything!” cry. Said Edwards:
“The financial crisis will reawaken. It will be every bit as bad as in 2008-09 and it will turn very ugly indeed…. Can it get any worse? Of course it can. Emerging market currencies are still in freefall. The U.S. corporate sector is being crushed by the appreciation of the dollar…. We have seen massive credit expansion in the U.S. This is not for real economic activity; it is borrowing to finance share buybacks,” and people in Europe and the U.S. are going to lose confidence that policymakers know what they are doing. “If the global economy goes back into recession, it is curtains for the Eurozone,” he said.
In the first eight business days of 2016, there was $3.17 trillion wiped off global stock markets, reported Howard Silverblatt, a senior index analyst at S&P Dow Jones Indices, at the end of trading on Wednesday, Jan. 13. He added, according to Market Watch, that “based on monthly changes, that would be the biggest decline for global stock markets since October 2008’s $5.671 trillion decline.”
Not since the 2008 financial crash has there been such a wide split between “winners and losers” on the bond markets, Bloomberg reported Wednesday, citing Rogge Global Partners. By losers they mean those shut out of global credit markets; winners, those who can still sell something. The average yield on high-yield junk bonds rated CCC or lower, an already-high 9% in July 2014, is now up to an unpayable 20%. “Corporate defaults are the highest since 2009, and Standard & Poor’s said this week that the outlook for corporate borrowers worldwide is the worst since the global financial crisis,” Bloomberg reported.
European Central Bank ‘Distancing’ Itself from Portuguese Bail-In
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—The European Central Bank yesterday did the Pontius Pilate trick, trying to wash its hands by distancing itself from the Dec. 29 Portuguese central bank decision to bail in senior bondholders at Novo Banco. Charging discrimination, as losses were imposed on senior bondholders while others were unaffected, some depositors had asked the ECB to intervene. “The decision by Banco de Portugal to bail in some senior bondholders in Novo Banco was taken exclusively by BdP under its national resolution powers,” the ECB said in a statement. “The ECB neither requested nor approved a bail-in of senior bondholders in this case.”
As the bail-in took place before Jan. 1, when the EU bank resolution regulation went into effect, it was still governed by Portuguese authorities and did not require ECB approval. In its statement yesterday, the ECB, however, avoided declaring that the Portuguese bail-in of €2 billion worth of senior debt was illegal, and just passed the buck back to Lisbon.
The Portuguese government is also washing its hands of the affair, saying it was the “independent” central bank which made the decision!
That message was delivered to a meeting of investors convened by Morgan Stanley in London on Jan. 11, where the government representative was pounded because PIMCO, the world’s largest bond fund, and investment management company BlackRock took the major hit in the Novo Banco move, suffering “significant losses,” while retail customers were not hurt. The Financial Times reports today that there is a brawl over “how these [bail-in] losses would be shared between retail investors, who hold bank bonds in many peripheral countries, and international buyers of such debt.” Rating agencies such as Fitch worry that Europe’s “peripheral countries” may find it too politically difficult to steal from their poor as bail-in requires.
Bail-In Denounced as Grand Larceny
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—The British-based TruePublica “open source news network” published an article “U.K. Banking Industry—Most Unstable in G7—Implements Depositor Bail-In Scheme,” warning in particular against the mass theft of deposits at U.K. banks, caused by the new bail-in rules. This article is a follow-on to an article published in September under the headline, “Grand Theft Auto—U.K. and EU Bank Depositor Bail-In Regime Implemented,” which described how banks throughout the EU would simply steal deposits if any of them failed.
“On the first day of 2016,” author Graham Vanbergen says, “all banks located within the EU follow the ‘Anglosphere’ nations of Britain, America, Australia, New Zealand and Canada into an agreement, where the next bank failure and bail-in could cost depositors all their money.
“Think it won’t happen? Six years after the last financial calamity caused by reckless bankers aided by negligent politicians in late 2014, one in five European banks failed basic stress tests that would see bankruptcy on the first hint of trouble. What did they need to get past that stress test? Twenty four thousand million euros.
“One should not forget that the Bank of Cyprus passed its stress test with flying colors just before it crashed and burned. That bail-out and bail-in came in at €23 billion to the taxpayer but it also took 47.5% of depositors’ money over €100,000 as well.
“Think it won’t happen to British Banks? This from the Financial Times: ‘The Bank of England’s stress tests of the banking sector have been attacked as “fatally flawed” for setting hurdles that are too easy to clear and giving false comfort about the safety of the financial system.’ ”
STRATEGIC WAR DANGER
Obama and the British Thrilled with Philippine Recolonization; China Denounces U.S. War-Mongering
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—The Wall Street Journal today issued the British Empire’s delighted response to the Philippine Supreme Court’s ruling that the U.S. military occupation of the Philippines can proceed, by openly acknowledging that Obama’s “pivot” to Asia is finally making it possible to militarily confront China.
“The Obama Administration pivot to Asia has generally been more rhetoric than substance,” writes the Journal, “but the U.S. military’s return to the Philippines is a significant strategic step. Beijing should know that its behavior is alienating the region and spurring its neighbors to unite for their common defense.”
The official Chinese government news agency Xinhua on Wednesday minced no words regarding the reckless and dangerous U.S. militarization of the South China Sea, saying that the deal will “make the Philippines a launching pad for U.S. military intervention in the Asia-Pacific,” and will “only aggravate regional tensions and could push the situation to the brink of war.”
“Furthermore,” writes Xinhua, “it is ridiculous that Washington, while advocating ‘upholding international law,’ signed a deal with a country that spares no expense to sacrifice its sovereignty, Constitution and public opinion to achieve its questionable goal.”
Meanwhile, Philippines Defense spokesman Peter Paul Galvez, reporting on the meetings this week in Washington between the two nations’ foreign and defense secretaries, said the Philippines has “requested” that the U.S. and the Philippines hold joint naval patrols. “There is a need for more collaborative presence in the South China Sea,” he said, adding, “The U.S. emphasized that it will not allow China to control the South China Sea. It committed to maintaining its presence in the South China Sea to include naval, sub-sea, air and special forces,” Galvez said.
Islamic State Terrorism Reaches Southeast Asia
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—Islamic State terrorists carried out the first IS attack in Southeast Asia today, setting off two bombs and engaging in a gunfight with Indonesian police at a busy intersection in Jakarta. Two pedestrians and five terrorists were killed. According to the New York Times, Gen. Tito Karnavian, chief of the Jakarta Provincial Police and the former leader of the national police counterterrorism unit, told reporters at the presidential palace that the perpetrators were linked to leaders of the Islamic State in Raqqah, Syria.
General Karnavian said that the ringleader, Bahran Naim, head of a group called Katibah Nusantara, is currently in Syria. He said that Katibah Nusantara is part of Islamic State, which took credit for the attack in Jakarta on an IS website, and that in April 2015, fighters with Katibah Nusantara captured territory held by Kurdish forces in Syria. He added that the Islamic State was expanding its operations in countries in the region, including Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand.
In the Philippines, the Manila Times issued a stern warning today that the Supreme Court justices who ruled Jan. 12 to approve President Aquino’s deal with Barack Obama to set up multiple U.S. military bases across the country, were “oblivious to the geopolitical consequences of the accord that may include a heightened terrorist threat in the country.” The article quotes Professor Bobby Tuazon, director for policy studies of the Center for People Empowerment in Governance (CenPEG), who called the U.S. facilities a “magnet for terror attacks.” Tuazon said that there are already local extremists in the country who claim to be ISIS or are sympathetic to them.
“The Supreme Court justices forget that cases related to sovereign and territorial issues should be guided by the overarching constitutional principle of pursuing an independent foreign policy, prohibition against the presence of foreign forces and renouncing war as an instrument of foreign policy. On this basis, they will be accountable for the unfortunate implications of their ruling,” Tuazon said.
Syrian Army On the March On All Fronts
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—According to reports this week, the Syrian army and its allied militias are advancing on all fronts, against all armed opposition groups from the northwestern corner of the country to the east of Aleppo, along the front on the road from Aleppo to Damascus, to the south of Damascus towards the Jordanian border, and even towards Palmyra and Raqqah in the east. Gen. Sergei Rudskoy, Chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the Russian General Staff, reported on Jan. 11, that Russian jets in Syria had flown 311 strike sorties in the first 10 days of the year, hitting 1,097 targets in the Aleppo, Idlib, Latakia, Hama, Homs, Damascus, Deir ez-Zor, Hasakah, Daraa, and Raqqah provinces. “As a result of air strikes made by the aircraft of the Aerospace Forces, terrorist groupings are suffering significant losses in hardware and manpower,” Rudskoy said.
Rudskoy indicated that the Russian air campaign has had a tremendous impact on the war on the ground. “In December 2015, militants were dislodged from 134 cities and settlements, and in the first days of 2016 from another 19,” Rudskoy said, with the best success in the provinces of Aleppo, Latakia, Hama, Homs and Raqqah. Rudskoy went on to cite a number of locations (of which he displayed maps) where the Syrian army is expanding its areas of control, including the zone extending from the southern environs of Aleppo city to the Kuweires air base about 30 km to the east, the southwestern corner of Idlib province, northeastern Latakia, and elsewhere. “As a result … of the success achieved by the governmental troops, militants are suffering losses and are forced to leave their positions,” Rudskoy said.
U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC
The Seats Obama Didn’t Leave Empty during His State of the Union Address
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—In a scathing commentary on the website counterpunch.org, author James Bovard skewered the hypocritical symbolism of President Obama’s having left one seat open in the gallery during his State of the Union address on Tuesday, “for the victims of gun violence who no longer have a voice.” Bovard pointed out this was part of Obama’s campaign for new federal restrictions on firearms ownership. “But shouldn’t there also have been chairs left empty,” Bovard asked, “to memorialize other casualties—including those ‘who no longer have a voice’ thanks to Obama administration policies?” He then proceeded to point out those who should thus have had seats reserved for them.
First, the 968 people killed by police in the U.S. last year: “Many police departments,” Bovard proffered, “are aggressive—if not reckless—in part because the Justice Department always provides cover for them at the Supreme Court.”
Next, the 42 medical staff, patients, and others killed in October when an American gunship attacked the Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders, MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan.
A seat should have been left for U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, killed by guns provided to criminals by “Operation Fast and Furious.”
“On a more festive note,” twelve seats could have been left for a wedding party blasted by a drone strike in Yemen in December 2013.
Four seats could have been left for the four Americans—Ambassador Stevens, Foreign Service Officer Smith, and CIA contractors Woods and Doherty—in the Sept. 11, 2012 attack in Benghazi. “It would also be appropriate to include a hat tip to the hundreds, likely thousands, of Libyans who have been killed in the civil war unleashed after the Obama Administration bombed Libya to topple its ruler, Muammar Qaddafi.”
“An indeterminate number of chairs could have been left vacant for the Syrian and Iraqi women, children and men who have been beheaded, maimed or otherwise slaughtered as a result of the massive arms shipments the Obama administration provided to Syrian ‘moderate’ rebel groups who defected to al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra or other terrorist groups, including the Islamic State.”
Bovard concluded that “If the First Lady sat alone among the other 28 seats the White House receives in the First Lady’s box, it wouldn’t make room to represent the casualties of Obama administration policies at home and abroad.”
China Responds to Obama’s State of the Union
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—China’s official government news agency Xinhua today published a response to President Obama’s State of the Union address, as a commentary by one of its journalists, Liu Si. “Tuesday’s swan song for Barack Obama’s presidency was not impressive,” he wrote, “other than his lofty rhetoric—‘The United States of America is the most powerful nation on Earth.’ ”
Liu Si referenced Obama’s theme of “change” seven years ago, but the results were not much change: “First are the two wars in Afghanistan and Iraq Obama vowed to end when taking office in 2009. Then are the efforts towards a peace process between Israel and Palestine.” Instead, we see “a more troubled Middle East—a fallen society, endless conflicts, countless refugees, rise of the Islamic State, and a neglected peace process.” He notes that “military actions will not root out terrorists unless the White House reorients its foreign policy and military strategy.”
On China, Liu Si says that “Obama underlined in the address that it will be the United States rather than China to set the rules in Asia, in contrast with China’s notion that the Pacific is big enough to accommodate both China and the United States.”
He concludes: “No matter how Washington is nostalgic for its good old days, it has to face the reality that the world is moving fast toward multipolarization, and the false pride of ‘America leads the world’ will only prove to be counterproductive in U.S. interactions with the rest of the world.”
THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER
President Xi Takes New Silk Road to Iran and Saudi Arabia
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—In a rather unprecedented move, Chinese President Xi Jinping will travel to Iran and Saudi Arabia at a time of growing tensions between these two nations. This is a direct intervention into the Mideast political situation, in which China has often been reticent to become too deeply involved. Yet China earlier this month sent Deputy Foreign Minister Zhang Ming as an envoy to mediate in the conflict. Xi is also scheduled to visit Egypt on Jan. 20-22.
Xi’s One Belt, One Road initiative will be topping the President’s agenda as he travels through this crucial region, Guo Xiangang, vice president of the China Institute of International Studies, told Xinhua. While the visits have not yet been officially announced by the Foreign Ministry, the Ministry did release yesterday its first Arab Policy Paper on the nature and significance of China’s relations with the Arab countries on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the establishment of its relations with the Arab nations. China traditionally has close relations also with Iran which is its primary source of oil.
This first Arab Policy Paper calls for furthering “mutual development and win-win results with Arab states.” The document is focused on jointly building the Silk Road, and establishing a “1+2+3” cooperation. This refers to, first, taking energy cooperation as the core (Arab countries are China’s largest supplier of crude oil); second, infrastructure construction and trade and investment; and, three, cooperation in high and new technology fields. As Xinhua reports, this proposal has been well received by the Arab countries. The agency says that China is ready to continue to provide foreign aid loans on favorable terms to Arab countries, as well as export credits and overseas investment insurance. A China-Arab energy training center will be built, it says.
China will further develop space cooperation, Xinhua reports, exploring joint projects, such as in satellites and their application, space education and training, the acceleration of applications of China’s BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, and promoting exchanges and cooperation on manned space flight.
“We will be actively engaged in cooperation covering the whole nuclear industrial chain,” the paper states, and promote “cooperation in basic scientific research, nuclear fuels, research reactors, application of nuclear technology, nuclear security, disposal of radioactive waste, emergency responses, and nuclear safety.”
SCIENCE & INFRASTRUCTURE
China Firms Up Its Plan To Land on the Far Side of the Moon
Jan. 14 (EIRNS)—Chinese scientists reported today on the progress of the ambitious Chang’e-4 mission, to land a spacecraft on the far side of the Moon, which has never been attempted before. As Liu Jizhong, from the Lunar Exploration Aerospace Engineering Center, explained on CCTV’s “China 24” program today, the mission will be launched by 2020.
Recall that the Chang’e-4 spacecraft was designed to be a back-up to the Chang’e-3 lunar rover mission, in case that mission were not successful. But it was deemed to be unnecessary to repeat that mission, so the Chang’e-4 craft has been repurposed to land on the far side of the Moon. Liu explained that this requires changes in the design of the spacecraft, requiring some extra time. (Chang’e-5 will go next, in 2017, to do a very challenging sample return mission.)
Because the lander is facing away from Earth, sitting on the far side, communication cannot be direct. An orbiter will accompany the lander, in order for radio signals to go from the lander to the orbiter to Earth to send data, and in reverse for Chang’e-4 to receive commands from Earth.
China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp. space scientist Dr. Yang Yuguang told CCTV that China has just decided that the Chang’e-4 mission will be open to private investment by companies and individuals. He explained that the far side of the Moon is “very special,” but that the landing is very difficult. Asked why there would be private investment in such a high-risk mission, when there is no return on the investment, Yang said that there will be applications from the new technology, as there are from navigational satellites.
