EIR Daily Alert Service
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FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 2017 Volume 3, Number 74 EIR Daily Alert Service P.O. Box 17390, Washington, DC 20041-0390
EDITORIALTrapped!April 13 (EIRNS)—When an adversary is caught in the very process of mounting a coup, this provides an unparalleled opportunity to defeat that adversary once and for all. Now, EIR Founding Editor Lyndon LaRouche has caught the British Queen in the midst of a coup against President Donald Trump—which will lead straight into world war—nuclear war—if it is not stopped now. Not only that; LaRouche has insisted on an immediate summit between President Trump and Russian President Putin, to put a sudden stop to the plunge into war. The question now is whether those who have heard Mr. LaRouche’s message will act, and drive single-mindedly to push this point home. If they do, the British Empire can be defeated, and the British system ended. If not, the British coup against President Trump will probably slide into nuclear confrontation with Russia. LaRouche’s message has already been heard by many leaders in different countries. On Tuesday, the U.S. “Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity” ended their letter to President Trump on the fraud of the alleged April 4 Syrian chemical warfare attack in Khan Shaykhun in Idlib province, by appealing for an early Trump-Putin summit. On Wednesday, a White House reporter urgently called for that same summit at a briefing with Trump’s National Security Advisor Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster. At precisely the same moment, at the United Nations Security Council, Russia’s Deputy Permanent Representative Vladimir Safronkov accused the British UN Ambassador, Tony Blair’s accomplice Matthew Rycroft, who had been instrumental in orchestrating the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, of hampering all efforts to resolve the Syrian crisis peacefully and of creating “an atmosphere of confrontation and enmity in the Security Council.” Speaking forcefully, the Russian envoy continued, “The reason for all this is no secret for many in the United Nations headquarters. It is because you are afraid; you are losing sleep over the possibility that we will start cooperating with the United States. You are very much afraid of that, so you have been making every possible effort to disrupt our cooperation.” The British Empire has been caught at a moment of unprecedented weakness. Now is the time to finish it off. U.S. ECONOMIC & POLITICALWhite House Reporter Takes Up LaRouche Call for Immediate Trump-Putin SummitApril 13 (EIRNS)—Yesterday, during what was supposed to be a White House background briefing, a reporter asked National Security Advisor Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster whether there should be a summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin to ratchet tensions down between the two countries. “When will events—this is a question of urgency—can events actually spiral out of control?” the reporter asked, according to the White House transcript. “And might it be time for the two most powerful men in the world—President Trump and President Putin—to meet together for their own special summit to try to resolve all of these issues?” McMaster’s non-reply was that that’s entirely up to Putin and Trump. “I think what you see is an extremely positive and appropriate step taken already with Secretary Tillerson’s visit, during which he had extensive talks with Foreign Minister Lavrov and President Putin,” he said. “And so it really remains to be seen based on the work that Secretary Tillerson has done there what an appropriate path ahead is.” The briefing—which was supposed to be on background, but McMaster’s name appears in the transcript, anyway—was called to discuss U.S.-China relations and the UN Security Council vote on Syria that occurred that same afternoon. McMaster seems to believe that by condemnation and isolation, Russia can be persuaded to “abandon” Syrian President Bashar al Assad. He was asked specifically why he thinks Russia would change its policy with respect to its support for Assad. “Well, I think that maybe with the very strong international condemnation of their support for the Assad regime that this could change,” he said. (Not a chance.) “And also I think what you have seen in the last week is a United States that is committed to leading in the region. And that creates opportunities for all kinds of people—even Russia. And so I think that it’s time for a recalculation of how they can best protect their interests there.” British Intelligence Has Been on Trump’s Case Since 2015April 13 (EIRNS)—British Intelligence has been spying on the Trump presidential campaign since at least 2015. In what it claims is an “exclusive” story, the Guardian, citing unnamed “senior” sources, reports today that the GCHQ (General Communications Headquarters) spy command center alerted U.S. agencies of contacts between Trump associates and alleged Russian agents already in 2015. Naturally, the Guardian asserts, “It is understood that GCHQ was not carrying out a targeted operation against Trump or his team, but picked up the alleged conversations by chance.” These same sources told the Guardian that “Britain’s spy agencies played a crucial role in alerting their counterparts in Washington to contacts between members of Donald Trump’s campaign team and Russian intelligence operatives….” The British daily went on: “GCHQ first became aware in late 2015 of suspicious ‘interactions’ between figures connected to Trump and known or suspected Russian agents, a source close to U.K. intelligence said. This intelligence was passed to the U.S. as part of a routine exchange of information.” The British were in fact leading the pack of European-wide intelligence agencies which over the next six months, until the summer of 2016, were funneling information to the U.S. agencies. The countries included “Germany, Estonia and Poland. Australia, a member of the ‘Five Eyes’ spying alliance, also including the U.S., U.K., Canada and New Zealand, also relayed material, one source said.” Also the Dutch and the French spy agency, the General Directorate for Foreign Security (DGSE) played their role as well. One source told the Guardian, “the British eavesdropping agency was the ‘principal whistleblower’… GCHQ played an early, prominent role in kick-starting the FBI’s Trump-Russia investigation, which began in late July 2016.” The Guardian’s sources lamented that while all this information was “flagged to intelligence officials in the U.S.” the latter were “slow to appreciate” this information complaining that “U.S. law prohibits U.S. agencies from examining the private communications of American citizens without warrants. ‘They are trained not to do this,’ the source stressed.” (Unlike the British.) Ridiculing their U.S. colleagues, the sources told the Guardian, “It looks like the [U.S.] agencies were asleep. They [European agencies] were saying: ‘There are contacts going on between people close to Mr. Trump and people we believe are Russian intelligence agents. You should be wary of this.’ The message was: ‘Watch out. There’s something not right here.’ ” The Guardian writes that “According to one account, GCHQ’s then head, Robert Hannigan, passed material in summer 2016 to the CIA chief John Brennan. The matter was deemed so sensitive it was handled at ‘director level.’ After an initially slow start Brennan used GCHQ information and intelligence from other partners to launch a major inter-agency investigation.” Despite the fact that Brennan tried to mask the British sources, the Guardian said one source told them that Trump subsequently learned of GCHQ’s role. This is the first mention of Hannigan having been directly involved in the eavesdropping. On Jan. 23, three days after Trump’s inauguration and shortly after the first allegations that the British were involved in the anti-Trump activity through the “dossier” of former MI6 agent Christopher Steele, Hannigan resigned as head of GCHQ, citing “personal reasons.” Russians Comment on Rex Tillerson’s Meetings with Sergey Lavrov and President PutinApril 13 (EIRNS)—In the aftermath of the talks between U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian President Vladimir Putin, Russian leaders are expressing optimism for Russian-U.S. relations. Speaking today, Lavrov remarked that, “I like the way we held a meeting yesterday. First and foremost, there was an important conversation with President Vladimir Putin before that and it lasted for two hours almost.” He continued, “we also held talks before our meeting in the Kremlin,” and that after the news conference there was an informal conversation for about an hour “about the emerging opportunities.” Lavrov said that the results of the talks “may take a while to manifest themselves,” but “at least we agreed to establish day-to-day online dialogue on a number of major issues, including the inventorying of the problems that were created by the previous administration in bilateral relations, as well as mechanisms on matters related to the implementation of agreements we have in the military-political sphere and the mechanisms that are expected to narrow disagreements or improve the understanding of each other’s positions on various regional crises, first and foremost, the Syrian settlement.” After reporting that the next step is to begin the practical implementation of setting up negotiating mechanisms, Lavrov emphasized that, “this is very important, because it is always better to talk face to face, instead of making loud statements over a microphone telling each other what you think about your opponent without looking in the eyes.” The process won’t be speedy, he said, but that “if everything that we have agreed upon in such a methodological sense” materializes, it would be to everyone’s benefit. Lavrov reported that Tillerson was not prepared to accept Russia’s proposal for setting up a special group to investigate the alleged chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria. The chairman of the Federation Council (upper house of Russia’s parliament) International Affairs Committee Konstantin Kosachov posted to his Facebook page that, “the first impression is quite positive. No breakthrough occurred, and no one expected it. However, the two sides were able to avoid the temptation of overstated expectations, and the modest results of the meeting are still positive,” including a commitment by both two sides to maintain the dialogue by “institutionalizing it in the format of special representatives.” Kosachov stressed that in his opinion, “the Americans obviously did not come with some absurd proposals similar to exchanging (Syrian President Bashar al-Assad) for G7 membership, Ukraine for Syria and so on, and also not with moralizing and ultimatums. Otherwise, the meeting with (President Vladimir Putin) would not have taken place, as wasting time on empty words is not his style,” he underscored. Kremlin Spokesman Peskov Reports on Putin Meeting with TillersonApril 13 (EIRNS)—In his meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Russian President Vladimir Putin laid out the reasons behind the deterioration of Russian-U.S. relations and also the prospects of a Syrian settlement. Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters today that President Putin “gave a rather detailed account to his interlocutor (Tillerson) on his stance on the reasons that have led our bilateral relations to such a sad condition….” Peskov also said that Putin expects Tillerson to bring this information to U.S. President Donald Trump. “The President shared his analysis and his vision of precursors of the current crisis in bilateral relations,” Peskov said. He described their discussion on Syria as “substantive.” President Putin “outlined our vision of the current situation and the prospects of developing this situation,” he said. As for whether the meeting could be called a “shift” in Relations, Peskov said, “No, it can’t. It is early so far.” Asked whether the possibility of a meeting between Putin and Trump was discussed, Peskov replied, “No.” STRATEGIC WAR DANGERBlair’s Henchman against Saddam, Matthew Rycroft, Is Now Deployed To Get AssadApril 13 (EIRNS)—Lying through his teeth, British Ambassador to the UN Matthew Rycroft told the UN Security Council on April 12 that British chemical weapons scientists have analyzed samples obtained from Khan Shaykhun, the site of the alleged April 4 chemical attack in Idlib province. Rycroft told the Council “these have tested positive for the chemical nerve agent sarin or a sarin-like substance. The United Kingdom therefore shares the U.S. assessment that it is highly likely the regime was responsible for a sarin attack on Khan Shaykhun,” WGNO reported today. Rycroft was lying. He has been deployed by Britain’s Empire set to bust up the potential alliance between the United States and Russia vis-à-vis Syria that could lead to an eventual end to the bloody conflict. The “evidence” of the alleged April 4 attack is based entirely upon messages sent through social media, and Syrian President Assad has charged it is “a 100 percent fabrication.” Lying for British imperial geopolitical interests, however, is Rycroft’s specialty. He served as Private Secretary for Foreign Affairs in 2002-2003 to then-Prime Minister Tony Blair, who sucked George W. Bush, then-Secretary of State Collin Powell and the whole U.S. administration to remove Iraq’s Saddam Hussein and set that country on a path to total destruction. At the time, Rycroft earned kudos from his benefactors by participating fully in the offensive against Saddam. The infamous July 23, 2002 memo detailing plans to overthrow Saddam Hussein was discussed at a meeting held by Blair at which Rycroft was present. The memo, drafted by Rycroft and addressed to David Manning, Blair’s chief foreign policy advisor at the time, stated that, “We should work on the assumption that the U.K. would take part in any military action….” The document became public during the Chilcot Inquiry on Iraq in the U.K. which documented Blair’s filthy role in promoting the Iraq war. On Sept. 25, 2016, in another speech at the UN Security Council, Rycroft, using the same lying tactics Britain had used to goad Bush, Powell at al. to invade Iraq, raved that the Syrian people will not forget “the death and destruction that the sectarian Assad regime has unleashed,” nor “will they forget that Russia aided and abetted this ruthless sectarian dictator in waging war against his own people,” the British government website reported at the time. China Warns against Use of Force To Denuclearize North KoreaApril 13 (EIRNS)—As North Korea prepares to celebrate the 105th anniversary of the birth of founder Kim Il-Sung, the U.S. aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson strike group continues heading to the Sea of Japan amid heightened tensions between the U.S. and North Korea and following multiple missile tests conducted by the regime this year. The strike group, comprised of the aircraft carrier and three other ships, had just completed a port visit to Singapore before receiving orders to head into waters east of the Korean Peninsula, ABC News reported today. In light of the heightened danger of war, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has warned that military force cannot resolve tensions in the region. On April 12, China’s state-owned People’s Daily urged North Korea not to carry out any more nuclear weapons or missile tests. “Not only [is] Washington brimming with confidence and arrogance following the missile attacks on Syria, but Trump is also willing to be regarded as a man who honors his promises,” said People’s Daily. On the same day, the Foreign Ministry reiterated Beijing’s position of calming the situation via a “dual suspension” of North Korea’s nuclear tests and the United States’ joint military drills with South Korea, Reuters reported. An editorial today in the state-owned Global Times, states that, “As soon as the North Korea complies with China’s declared advice and suspends nuclear activities … China will actively work to protect the security of a denuclearized North Korean nation and regime. … This is Pyongyang’s best option,” it stressed. British Foreign Secretary Ridiculed for Failing To Ram Through Anti-Russia Sanctions at G7 MeetingApril 13 (EIRNS)—British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who campaigned loudly both before and during the recent G7 Foreign Ministers meeting for adoption of anti-Russia sanctions, is now the object of ridicule for failing to achieve that goal. Sanctions weren’t even mentioned in the final 30-page communiqué. Nonetheless the government, whose policy he was trying to deliver, is supporting him and reiterating its anti-Russian policy. Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond came to Johnson’s defense on April 12, telling Sky News: “The British government’s position has been, and will remain, to lead the way on arguing for a robust approach towards Russian aggression in Syria. We have been doing it for years and we will go on doing it.” The Labour Party’s shadow Chancellor John McDonnell charged that Johnson had erred in cancelling a planned trip to Moscow at the last minute and focused instead on the G7 meeting. “The idea of going along to the G7 to try and put together a coalition around sanctions was never going to succeed. It was a bad policy decision by Mr. Johnson. It should never have happened,” McDonnell told Sky News. “He should have gone to Moscow. When he went to Moscow he should have been clear with the Russians just how much we condemn what Assad has done, and what they’ve done in support of Assad, but try to get them back to the negotiating table. I’m hoping the initiative now by the Trump regime and others is going to enable that to happen. It’s a pity Mr. Johnson made such a poor judgment of this matter.” McDonnell also attacked Prime Minister Theresa May for vacationing in Wales, rather than taking control of the situation. “What we’ve got at the moment is neither a Prime Minister properly engaged nor someone who anybody, even on Tory backbenches and, from what we understand, even the government’s own cabinet, has confidence in, with regard to Boris Johnson. I think we’re in the worst of all worlds as a result.” COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEMGlass-Steagall Momentum Terrifies Wall Street and the City of LondonApril 13 (EIRNS)—Wall Street and the City of London are terrified of the pro-Glass-Steagall momentum after the meeting of Director of the National Economic Council Gary Cohn with U.S. Senators, and the bipartisan bill for the “21st Century Glass-Steagall Act” introduced in the Senate the next day. Three attacks on Glass-Steagall, one milder in the City of London’s Financial Times; a second, more open one in the New Yorker; and a third, obscene one from the Heritage Foundation/Forbes, reflect panic that this time, the situation is serious. John Authers in the Financial Times says that a return to Glass-Steagall is “invasive and difficult.” And by the way, he claims, the problem was the commercial banks giving out subprime loans. Nicholas Lemann in the New Yorker asks: “If the Trump Administration and finance’s most celebrated Democratic critics come to agreement on Glass-Steagall, should we rejoice? Not necessarily.” And then he goes into sophistries, claiming that it would give government protection to Too Big To Fail institutions! Norbert J. Michel of the Heritage Foundation and Forbes summarizes all possible lies, and then attacks deposit protection: “Federally-backed deposit insurance creates terrible incentives in the banking industry,” he argues. NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDERPutin Meets Chinese Vice-Premier in Moscow, Announces Plan To Attend the ‘Belt and Road Forum’April 13 (EIRNS)—Following Russian President Vladimir Putin’s meeting with the visiting Chinese Vice-Premier Zhang Gaoli in Moscow today, Sputnik reported that Putin plans to visit China in May to attend the international forum in Beijing on the Belt and Road Initiative. “I plan to participate in the work of the international ‘One Belt, One Road’ forum at the invitation of Chinese President [Xi Jinping] and therefore I plan to pay a working visit to Beijing,” Putin said at a meeting with Zhang Gaoli. Zhang pointed out that Putin’s attendance at the May 14-15 forum will be of great importance and reported that the Chinese President will visit Moscow in June. Prior to his meeting with Putin, Zhang had met with Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov at the Russian-Chinese Inter-Governmental Commission meeting on April 12. According to TASS, Shuvalov told Zhang that, “We discussed the high-speed railways in every detail. You will most certainly discuss the issue tomorrow (on Thursday) with President Vladimir Putin.” TASS also wrote that a section of the Moscow-Kazan high-speed railway may soon become part of the Moscow-Beijing high-speed rail and the Silk Road project, which will link China to markets in Europe and the Middle East. According to Russian Railways President Oleg Belozerov, it could be commissioned by 2022-23, TASS reported. SCIENCE & INFRASTRUCTUREKra Canal Is an Ideal Solution for Maritime Silk RoadApril 13 (EIRNS)—The New Scientist covers the three “mega canals,” the construction of which is now being intensely discussed, after the completion of the Second Suez Canal: the Nicaragua Isthmus Canal, the Kra Canal, and the Iran Canal. On the Kra project, the article explains that “Bypassing the Straits of Malacca would mean cutting a 50 km notch through a finger of land called the Kra Isthmus, in the south of Thailand. This would give China, the region’s superpower, the option for its ships to avoid the congested straits, shortening a route used at present by a third of all international cargo shipping. Container ships sailing between Shanghai and Mumbai, for example, would be able to shave more than two days off an 11-day journey. With an estimated cost of $20 billion, the Thai canal will be the cheapest of the proposed mega-canals, as well as the simplest to build. Another plus is that it would fulfill a promise made in 2013 by [Chinese President] Xi Jinping to create a ‘maritime silk road.’ ” But, the article continues, “both the Thai and Nicaraguan canals are dwarfed by a project being plotted to connect the Caspian Sea with the Persian Gulf. Its route would cleave right across Iran, stretching some 1,400 km. But length is hardly the biggest challenge. It would also need to traverse mountains up to 1,600 meters high, requiring more than 50 giant locks, says Peyman Moazzen, a marine engineer based in Singapore, who has studied the scheme. It concludes that “the geopolitical prize might be worth the effort. Such a link would give Russia a long-desired sea route to East Asia that avoids the circuitous journey via essentially Western-controlled seaways like the Bosporus and the Suez Canal. Any environmental concerns would probably be trumped by the fact that Iranians think one of the proposed routes could double as an irrigation canal, watering the desert sands of eastern Iran.” OTHERFrench Presidential Campaign: Nearly 5 Million See Cheminade Interview that Mentions LaRoucheApril 13 (EIRNS)—The unique feature of the interview Jacques Cheminade gave on April 10 to TF1, the major French television channel, was that the role of Lyndon LaRouche was brought up right at the beginning of the program viewed by an estimated 4.85 million Frenchmen. The 20-minute interview ran at evening prime time on a program called “Demain Président” (“Tomorrow President”). Cheminade was the first of the eleven candidates to be invited, for scheduling reasons. In the profile of Cheminade prepared by TF1 and presented at the beginning, the journalist noted that Cheminade was born in Argentina, where his French parents worked, and then came to France at the age of 20, where he successfully completed his higher education two elite schools, HEC and ENA. At the age of 33, the presenter continued in a somewhat sarcastic tone, Cheminade met “the American politician Lyndon LaRouche, who was combatting the world of international finance and drug trafficking, and who exposed the plots and conspiracies running the world.” Seven years after this crucial meeting, in 1981, “Cheminade left the French administration to fight for LaRouche’s ideas. That entitled him to a brief investigation by the FBI.” (At that point the program showed a facsimile.) After a few more details on Cheminade’s previous Presidential campaigns, the camera switched back to the interviewer who began by observing that LaRouche often exposes international conspiracies, and that Cheminade himself had mentioned orchestrations linked to the death of Osama bin Laden or 9/11. In response, Cheminade pointed to the complicities in 9/11, such as the role of Saudi Arabia as attested to in the 28 pages of the 2002 Joint Congressional Inquiry. Coming back to Lyndon LaRouche, Cheminade said he was at the conference in 1976 of the Non-Aligned Movement in Colombo, Sri Lanka, “to support, together with Fred Wills, the Foreign Minister of Guyana, a just new international economic order. That did not happen.” Then, in 1982, after a meeting Mexican President José López Portillo, LaRouche proposed to implement the “debt bomb.” That did not happen. “So little by little, we came to the situation we have today, of a crisis of the financial and monetary system.” The interview then continued with Cheminade’s proposals for French policy, which he was able to develop in some detail. |
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