WEDNESDAY, MARCH 20, 2019

Volume 6, Number 55

EIR Daily Alert Service

P.O. Box 17390, Washington, DC 20041-0390

• Behind the Belt and Road Initiative: ‘A Dialogue of Minds and Exchanges of Culture’
• Intense Chinese Diplomacy for the Belt and Road Initiative
• Xi Jinping Encourages Italian Students To Be Cultural Ambassadors Between Their Two Nations
• Conte Outflanks EU in Italian Parliament Debate on China Policy
• Chinas CGTN Runs EIR Coverage of Transaqua on Eve of Xi’s Visit to Italy

• Trump Tweet on British Opens Spring Offensive Against the Coup
• Scientists, Policy Experts Support Trump’s Climate Security Committee
• Neo-Cons Use Bolsonaro Visit To Try To Rope Trump into Regime-Change, Geopolitical Scheme
• Putin in Crimea Celebrates the Fifth Anniversary of Reunification
• More Brexit Chaos as Speaker of the House of Commons Blocks Third Vote on Deal
• Russian-U.S. Scientists Move Forward on a Joint Mission to Venus

EDITORIAL

Behind the Belt and Road Initiative: ‘A Dialogue of Minds and Exchanges of Culture’

March 19 (EIRNS)—On the eve of his historic state visit to Italy March 21-23, Chinese President Xi Jinping answered students of Rome’s Convitto Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele II boarding school, who had previously written a letter to him in Chinese: “I highly appreciate your determination to promote dialogue of minds and cultural exchanges between the young generations of the two countries and cement the friendship between the two peoples.”

The British Empire was already panicked enough about the Xi trip and the Memorandum of Understanding on the Belt and Road Initiative that the two nations announced they will sign during the visit. But then salt was poured on the wound when Michele Geraci—Italy’s Under Secretary of State at the Ministry of Economic Development and the architect of his country’s China pivot—joined Schiller Institute founder Helga Zepp-LaRouche in addressing a March 13 conference on the Belt and Road in Milan. The British Empire’s fervent prayer that Lyndon LaRouche’s ideas had been buried once he physically passed away last Feb. 12, were shattered, as forty years of in-depth organizing by Lyndon and Helga LaRouche and their associates can be seen shaping Italy’s strategic actions today.

On top of that, Xi is now engaging in extensive diplomacy building up to the Second Belt and Road Forum to be held in Beijing in late April, all premised on a concept of Man and of his social order for which they have no rejoinder—other than organized satanism.

Xi’s idea of “a community of shared future of mankind,” that Man’s Mind is creative, and that a “dialogue of minds” among the classical highpoints of the world’s major civilizations, provides a solution to the extreme crises the world faces under today’s Old Paradigm, is not new. It was the outlook of Plato, as demonstrated for example in hisTimaeus dialogue. It was the revolutionary breakthrough of Cusa’s coincidentia oppositorum. It is a central tenet of Confucianism. And it is at the heart of Lyndon LaRouche’s fundamental discoveries in the science of physical economy, which today guide Mankind towards safe harbor under the Belt and Road Initiative.

Taking note of these developments, Helga Zepp-LaRouche today remarked that major new developments are to be expected from Xi’s upcoming trip to Italy, including new ideas regarding Sino-Italian cooperation for the development of Africa—which is the only competent way to address the terrible refugee crisis. Very big historical changes are underway, Zepp-LaRouche stressed, which will redefine all of the parameters of international politics as we know it. They are changes which the Trump Administration must welcome and participate in.

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Intense Chinese Diplomacy for the Belt and Road Initiative

March 19 (EIRNS)—President Xi Jinping will pay state visits to Italy, Monaco and France from March 21 to 26, according to an announcement made by the Chinese Foreign Ministry on March 18. The Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation will be held in Beijing sometime in late April—the precise date has not yet been made public—which means that the next 30 days will see intense Chinese diplomacy on the BRI. Although a summit between Xi and President Donald Trump now seems unlikely during that time frame, it is not impossible that a U.S.-China trade deal could take shape, which would be critical to global progress on the BRI. That is of course one of the things that the British most devoutly fear and are therefore actively sabotaging—along with superpower cooperation between the U.S. and Russia.

Chinese State Councillor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi told a March 18 press conference in Brussels, where he participated in a China-EU strategic dialogue, that Xi’s three-country European visit will be “a journey to consolidate friendship, deepen cooperation and engage in strategic communication.” He added, according to Xinhua, that “it will also help step up connectivity on the Eurasian continent.”

In Italy, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang announced, according to Xinhua, “The visit will further consolidate political mutual trust between China and Italy, deepen practical cooperation in various areas under the framework of the Belt and Road, boost people-to-people and cultural exchanges and mutual learning among civilizations, promote new progress of the Sino-Italian comprehensive strategic partnership in the new era and make contributions to Sino-EU relations as well as world peace and development.”

In France, Geng stated, the two sides will work on “new progress and breakthroughs in pragmatic cooperation, and close communication and coordination on major issues including safeguarding multilateralism, improving global governance, and addressing climate change.”

Xi Jinping Encourages Italian Students To Be Cultural Ambassadors Between Their Two Nations

March 19 (EIRNS)—In a letter of response to President Paolo M. Reale and students of Rome Convitto Nazionale Vittorio Emanuele II, an Italian boarding school, who had written him, Xi wrote:

“I have received your letter and I’m very pleased to see that the students can express themselves in fluent Chinese. Your school has successfully opened a Chinese-language international scientific high school and nurtured a host of young men and women devoted to promoting China-Italy friendly relations… I highly appreciate your determination to promote dialogue of minds and cultural exchanges between the young generations of the two countries and cement the friendship between the two peoples. I hope you will become modern-day Marco Polos, as cultural ambassadors between Italy and China in this new era. You are welcome to study and work in China, and I hope China will be the place where your dreams come true.”

Conte Outflanks EU in Italian Parliament Debate on China Policy

March 19 (EIRNS)—In the foreign policy debate in the Chamber of Deputies this morning, Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte rebuffed all critics of the upcoming agreement between Italy and China on the Belt and Road, by describing the upcoming MOU as so pro-European that it complies with EU guidelines and principles and values as “no one has so far done in Europe.”

Conte said that the EU “will be strengthened by the Italian approach.” The MOU is not a treaty but a “programmatic agreement outlining targets in the framework of the BRI, which is a large project of international connectivity that Italy has expressed interest in, already back in 2016.” Italy’s interest “is legitimate” and it is responding to its “national interests.” Italy wants to increase its exports to a “market of giant dimensions,” increase investments in infrastructure, and “enjoy the natural economic advantages of the New Silk Road.”

The negotiations for the MOU have lasted many months and the text is “fully in line with the EU strategy,” he affirmed. Furthermore: “No one in the EU has done as much as we have” to advance EU policy vis-à-vis China. The MOU promotes European principles of mutual advantages, reciprocity, intellectual property, level playing field, etc. “Our approach to the BRI is the most far-sighted and effective ever adopted in the EU.”

In his rebuttal, after a debate in which the opposition distinguished itself by its hysteria, infantilism, and incompetence, Conte reiterated the “finalities” of the MOU with China: “First, balance trade relations. Our exports to China are far behind exports of our partners in the EU. Second, the BRI is a big project of infrastructure connectivity which offers opportunities to our companies. We have leading companies in know-how and technology which will be able to participate. Third, the BRI is of such a significance as to redefine major trade routes and we don’t want to miss any chance to be part of them. Fourth, protecting our strategic infrastructure is a primary, non-negotiable objective.”

China’s CGTN Runs EIR Coverage of Transaqua on Eve of Xi’s Visit to Italy

March 19 (EIRNS)—China Global Television Network (CGTN) today published an op-ed by EIR Washington Bureau chief William Jones on Transaqua as a model for Italy-China cooperation in Africa, which has attracted major attention in Italy on the eve of President Xi Jinping’s visit to Rome on March 22. In the op-ed, “China’s Experience: Helping Transform an African Desert into a Garden,” Jones writes: “With the upcoming visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Italy, there will no doubt be some discussion of cooperation between the two nations on the African continent. For Italy, helping to resolve the dire economic situation in Africa is both a humanitarian and an economic concern. The devastated economy in many African countries is bringing more and more refugees to Italy’s shore, and the burden is taking its toll on the Italian economy. For China, Africa has always been a particular concern having shared in the condition of underdevelopment for so many years. Even when both were clearly developing countries, China offered its assistance to its African brothers.

“One of the most significant projects in that regard is the Transaqua project,” the article states and goes on describing Transaqua as a project to refill Lake Chad but also to create a waterway, hydropower and agro-industrial development in Central Africa.

“The Italian engineering company, Bonifica SpA has been instrumental in working out the plans for this project and is fully committed to it. In 2017 Bonifica and PowerChina entered an agreement for the joint development of the project. China, with its own extensive south-to-north water diversion project, possesses a good deal of expertise in dealing with such a project. Such collaboration also fits in nicely with the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which has received strong support from the Italian government. The Transaqua project developed by Bonifica has in part been developed by PowerChina.

“While China has been ground-breaking in returning to the long-awaited—and much-delayed—project of African industrialization, the enormity of the project is of such a magnitude, that China alone cannot do it.  But the BRI opens the possibility of working together with other Western nations in realizing this goal. And the cooperation with Italy on the Lake Chad project can serve as a paradigm for how the BRI must work.”

CGTN identifies Jones as “Washington Bureau Chief for Executive Intelligence Review and a non-resident fellow of the Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies, Renmin University of China.”

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

Trump Tweet on British Opens Spring Offensive Against the Coup

March 19 (EIRNS)—It has become entirely clear over the past 24 hours that the President and his defenders are on an all-out offensive ahead of the release of the Mueller report, which many state is coming very soon.  The President opened this campaign by attacking John McCain as part of the Russiagate fraud against him and went on to attack the British instigators and sustainers of the coup.  On March 18, the President retweeted a tweet by William Craddick of Disobedient Media, one of the few outfits other than LaRouche PAC, and the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, with the guts to question the foundational premise of the coup, that the Russians hacked the DNC and Clinton Campaign Chair John Podesta.  Craddick had tweeted, “Russiagate was designed in part to help the UK counter Russian influence by baiting the United States into taking a hard line against them. Leaves us all with a more dangerous world as a consequence. Just another episode of the Great Game.”

The British Foreign Office responded directly to the President’s retweet, stating to the Independent, “This claim is completely false.”  The Independent, which went into a full froth about the tweet, is owned by former Russian oligarch Alexander Lebedev. TheIndependent didn’t just trot out the Foreign Office; they enlisted an even higher power to condemn the American President for the tweet, in the form of Conservative MP Nicholas Soames. Soames declared the President delusional. Soames is the grandson of Winston Churchill and the former consigliere for Prince Charles, beginning his career in that respect with slanders against Princess Diana.  He went on to work for Sir James Goldsmith and has compared those supporting Brexit to growling Alsatians which must be kicked hard in the balls.

Depositions of Christopher Steele and John McCain’s aide, David Kramer, have been unsealed, in part, by the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Florida in Aleksej Gubarev’s suit against BuzzFeed.  They reveal how Steele orchestrated the publication of the entire ugly and fake Steele dossier by BuzzFeed.  It will be recalled that this filthy operation resulted in the inauguration of the 46th President of the United States being dominated by the British intelligence-fabricated headline, disseminated worldwide, that Putin had caught Trump in perverse sexual acts in Moscow, when Trump, Steele alleged, paid prostitutes to pee on a bed formerly slept in by Barack and Michelle Obama. As we have previously reported, Steele’s 17 memos were so obviously fake that despite repeated efforts to launder them to media, most media held off on publication.  Most also believed that Hillary Clinton was going to win the election.

In November 2016, Sir Andrew Wood, one of Sir Richard Dearlove’s spies working with Steele, set up a meeting with John McCain to arrange to leak the entire dossier both to the media, Republican Congressmen, and the FBI (which, of course already had it—McCain’s providing it to them was supposed to be the news hook to get it published).  Steele tasked Kramer not only to give the dossier to John McCain for delivery to James Comey, but also to contact pre-selected reporters from the Guardian, Mother Jones, McClatchy, Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Carl Bernstein of CNN, and Ken Bensinger of BuzzFeed.  Chuck Ross of BuzzFeed does an adequate job tracing Steele’s use of the media and the Justice Department in his article in the Daily Caller published March 18th.

What Ross does not do, however, is pinpoint the entirely British intelligence origins of Christopher Steele’s full-spectrum information warfare operation against Trump the candidate, and the Trump Presidency.

On March 18th, both Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity claimed that there are new and devastating revelations about to hit about how the coup was conducted against the President including depositions, declassification of key documents, and other materials.  They say that these revelations will stun and shock the American public.  Congressman Mark Meadows, who appeared on Hannity, said some of these shocks will involve that currently sitting Ambassadors were involved, full bore, in the coup against the President.

Scientists, Policy Experts Support Trump’s Climate Security Committee

March 19 (EIRNS)—A letter supporting the President’s Commission on Climate Security was released on Monday, March 18, with the signatures of over 100 scientists, activists, and policy experts.

The letter opens: “The undersigned organizations and individuals write to express our strong support for the proposed President’s Commission on Climate Security. It is our understanding that this commission, which is being planned and would be directed by Dr. William Happer of the National Security Council staff, is currently being considered by your senior White House staff and relevant Cabinet secretaries and agency heads.”

“In our view,” they write, “an independent review of these reports is long overdue. Serious problems and shortcomings have been raised repeatedly in the past by highly-qualified scientists, only to be ignored or dismissed by the federal agencies in charge of producing the reports. Among major issues that have been raised and that we hope the commission will scrutinize: the models used have assumed climate sensitivities to CO2 concentrations significantly higher than recent research warrants; the models used have predicted much more warming than has actually occurred; … the positive impacts of warming have been ignored or minimized…. An underlying issue that we hope the commission will also address is the fact that so many of the scientific claims made in these reports and by many climate scientists are not falsifiable, that is, they cannot be tested by the scientific method.”

Considering the costs of trillions of dollars associated with proposed energy policies, a review of scientific conclusions is in order. They note that “major engineering projects are regularly subjected to the most rigorous and exhaustive adversarial review. We suggest that climate science requires at least the same level of scrutiny as the engineering employed in building a bridge or a new airplane.”

The letter denounces the attacks on Dr. William Happer, whom the signers know “to be a man of high capabilities, high achievements, and the highest integrity,” and concludes “we urge you to create by Executive Order a President’s Commission on Climate Security.”

Neo-Cons Use Bolsonaro Visit To Try To Rope Trump into Regime-Change, Geopolitical Schemes

March 19 (EIRNS)—There’s no doubt that the neo-cons surrounding President Donald Trump intended to use the visit to Washington of the extreme right-wing Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to try to rope the President into their regime-change agenda for Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, and similar action to trap Trump into a geopolitical quagmire.

Media insisted on calling Bolsonaro the “Trump of the Tropics”—a horrible misnomer, given Bolsonaro’s fascist leanings—while National Security Advisor John Bolton laughed to Sky News today that “we” like to call Trump “the Bolsonaro of America.” The meeting between the two represents a “very exciting moment” in bilateral relations, he said.

It was Bolton who traveled to Brazil at the end of November 2018 to personally invite Bolsonaro (who had not yet been sworn in) to visit Trump as soon as possible. Bolton told Sky News that the Trump-Bolsonaro meeting presaged “a possible political realignment within the Western Hemisphere.”

In their joint press conference this afternoon, Trump gave a speech that sounded like it had been written by Bolton: He called on “Cuban puppet” Nicolas Maduro to step down in Venezuela, and emphasized that Brazil and the U.S. together support the “long-suffering people of Cuba and Nicaragua.” The “twilight of socialism” has arrived in the Western Hemisphere, he warned. Trump announced that he intends to designate Brazil a “non-NATO ally” or even consider its entry into NATO. He also backed Brazil joining the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

The question of a possible U.S. military intervention in Venezuela came up repeatedly in the press conference, to which Trump replied that “all options are on the table.” Bolsonaro fudged on this, arguing that such a “strategic” matter shouldn’t be discussed publicly. Given the fact that the Brazilian military, including Vice President Gen. Antônio Hamilton Mourão (ret.), oppose any such intervention, Bolsonaro has to tread carefully. Note that Steve Bannon, former chief advisor to Trump who has been courting Bolsonaro, and Brazilian right-wing “philosopher” Olavo de Carvalho, said to serve as a “guru” to Bolsonaro, were prominent guests at two dinners held for the Brazilian delegation in Washington. Both oppose the presence of sane military leaders in Bolsonaro’s government, and in an interview with BBC, Bannon particularly complained about General Mourão. He is a “dissonant” voice in the government, Bannon said, and this is dangerous. He is not properly “aligned” with Bolsonaro’s policies.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Putin in Crimea Celebrates the Fifth Anniversary of Reunification

March 19 (EIRNS)—In a meeting in Simferopol with members of the public of Simferopol and Crimea, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that the Crimean spring of 2014, in which the population voted overwhelmingly to rejoin Russia, was a milestone in Russian history: “It demonstrated to ourselves and to the whole world that Russia is capable of protecting itself and its interests. We proceed from the interests of our people. This is the basic principle.”

Putin emphasized the importance of infrastructure projects: “I think it is obvious how much has been done over the past five years, but I immediately want to say this: everything that has been done and is being done now is of a fundamental nature and is a long cycle project. But development is impossible without it, because no area can develop without a certain amount of, say, electricity or heat—it would be impossible to connect new consumers, and if there are no new consumers, then there is no development, or without transport infrastructure. We still have to work on the water supply and so on, and all these are long cycle projects, but these things should form groundwork for direct local development projects—we must think about implementing this, primarily manufacturing, tourism, education, and science.”

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

More Brexit Chaos as Speaker of the House of Commons Blocks Third Vote on Deal

March 19 (EIRNS)—Her Majesty’s hapless Prime Minister Theresa May suffered another setback in trying to get her unacceptable Brexit deal through Parliament for a third time. Now the Speaker of the House of Commons John Bercow blocked her from introducing the deal for a third time in Parliament after it has been voted down twice before.  Bercow said he could not ask MPs to pass the same deal, after they rejected it twice by huge margins, unless it had substantial changes, which it does not have.

According to the Guardian, Bercow quoted from the guide to parliamentary procedure, and said the deal “may not be brought forward again during the same session” and that it was a “strong and longstanding convention” dating back to 1604. It must be “not different in terms of wording, but different in terms of substance,” he said. Bercow suggests he will not allow another Brexit deal vote unless EU agrees further changes.

Indicating that May now believes the U.K. is in a political crisis, her spokesman announced that she would be requesting a delay in Brexit in a letter to European Council President Donald Tusk.  “The prime minister will be writing to Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, before the European Council begins, in relation to an extension,” the spokesman said. He gave no other details, but he said they will be forthcoming once the letter has been drafted and released.

Brexit Secretary Steve Barclay said any delay would need another vote in Parliament.  “There would be a requirement to change the date in the Withdrawal Act and there would have to be a statutory instrument which would have to be approved in both Houses of Parliament,” Barclay said.

May met with her cabinet this morning for 90 minutes to discuss the situation. The meeting broke up with no official statement.  Although May reportedly demanded that no one leak the contents of the meeting, her demand fell on deaf ears, as leaks of all sorts were reported. Sam Coates, deputy political editor of The Times, tweeted comments of one cabinet source: “Where’s the strategy? It feels like the last days of Rome.”

If the delay goes beyond May 26 the British will have to participate in the European Parliament elections at the cost of £100 million.

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

Russian-U.S. Scientists Move Forward on a Joint Mission to Venus

March 19 (EIRNS)—The joint Venus working group of Russian and American scientists has worked out the scientific objectives of the Russia-initiated Venera-D mission, and are ready to start developing the necessary equipment for the mission, the Russian co-chair of the working group said yesterday. Two years ago, NASA scientists met with their Russian counterparts to identify shared scientific objectives for Venus exploration. In an interview yesterday with Sputnik International, Lyudmila Zasova, from Russia’s Space Research Institute, reported that, “As of now, the scientific part of the research has been completed: Scientific goals have been formulated, priorities have been set … the architecture of the mission has been assessed. Now we are ready to launch stage ‘A’ according to the U.S. designation, or the design and testing phase.” What will determine the pace of progress now will be the funding. Zasova estimates that the earliest launch date is 2027.

The basic mission architecture is a Russian orbiter and lander, and a small U.S. research station. Zasova reports that Japan has offered to contribute infrared and ultraviolet instruments, and Germany a near-infrared instrument to observe Venus on its night side. The “D” in the Venera-D designation of the mission is from the Russian wordDolgozhivushaya, or “long-lasting.” A major advance of the mission is to design the lander to last up to 30 days, rather than a few hours, on the hellish 900° F surface.

Russia has had the most extensive exploration missions of Earth’s “sister planet.” In 1965, a Soviet spacecraft reached Venus, after nine failures, mainly of rockets, and in 1970, Venera 7 transmitted the first data from the surface. The Venera spacecraft program is the only one to date to successfully land a spacecraft on Venus.

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