WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 2019

Volume 6, Number 115

EIR Daily Alert Service

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

• The Eyes of the World Are on LaRouche’s U.S.
• Xi, Putin and Modi To Hold Discussions on the Sidelines of the SCO Summit in Kyrgyzstan
• Russia Has Proposed U.S. and Russian Presidents Declare Use of Nuclear Weapons ‘Unacceptable’
• Pompeo and State Department Stick Their Noses in Hong Kong Protests
• Global Times Editorial Warns U.S. Against Using Trade War to Try to Contain China
• Pompeo Has a ‘Fossilized Mind-Set,’ But Other Americans Want Good Relations With China
• Justice Department Briefs House Judiciary on Durham Review, ‘Certain Foreign Actors’ Under Scrutiny
• On U.S.-Mexico Border Talks, a Bullet Dodged for Now, But the Central Issue Is Still Up in the Air
• Despite Global Slowdown China Trade Is Growing-Especially With Belt and Road Countries
• Senator Bagnai Rumored To Become Italy’s Future Negotiator With the EU
• Is the U.S. Justice Department’s ‘Car Wash’ Coup in Brazil in Trouble?
• President Xi Invites Brazil To Join in ‘Exploring Far Side of the Moon, an Idea Mourão Loves

EDITORIAL

The Eyes of the World Are on LaRouche’s U.S.

June 11 (EIRNS)—A memorial event celebrating the life and legacy of American statesman Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., was held in Manhattan on June 8, 2019, with simultaneous satellite events watching across the country. Around the world as well, the eyes of many of the leaders of humanity are trained on LaRouche and his United States, as the decisive factor in this most dangerous—and hopeful—of moments in history.

Jacques Cheminade, long-time friend and associate of Lyndon and Helga LaRouche, and head of the French Solidarité et Progrès party, began his report to European associates on the June 8 “Triumph of Lyndon LaRouche” Memorial, with the following thought:

“At the Conference on the Dialogue of Asian Civilizations on May 15 in Beijing, Helga Zepp-LaRouche said: ‘It is the characteristic of turning points in history that the majority of people have no concept of what is occurring.’ (The European elections are proof of that, I might add.) ‘Only those visionaries who have a clear idea of the positive potential of the future are able to intervene in the process at moments of decision, to avert potential catastrophes, and instead usher in a new epoch of humanity. We find ourselves in such a phase change.’

“And in that phase change, what was celebrated in the United States on June 8 as ‘The Triumph of Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr.’ is a key point for what is going to be our future, and for what we are doing to create that future, as Helga LaRouche defined it in Beijing. With Lyndon LaRouche’s presence in our minds and in our will, that is exactly the measure of the challenge.

“Lyndon LaRouche has always been a fighter against physical and mental serfdom; and now the fight against mental serfdom is key, together with the fight against oppression, exclusion, and exploitation in the social and economic realm,” Cheminade stated.

That decisive battle is in fact upon us now. With the financial, political and moral institutions of Western Europe and North and South America crumbling, developments in Asia now assume center stage. In Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, the leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) will meet on June 13-14, where there will also be a set of bilateral meetings on the sidelines of the main event among Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Their agenda will center on developing a workable, cooperative alternative to the military, economic, political and cultural clash of civilizations which the British Empire would unleash across the planet.

The fruit of those discussions will then be brought to the summit of the G20 nations that will be held in Osaka, Japan on June 28-29, where the critical additional voice of U.S. President Donald Trump, among others, will enter the discussion. The governments of China and Russia, in particular, continue to issue sharp warnings of the grave danger that the planet faces on its current economic and strategic trajectory, while urging President Trump to work with them on defining a different pathway.

Less than a week ago, President Putin used the occasion of a June 6 meeting with the heads of international news agencies  at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum to again warn the world of the danger of nuclear war: “If we do not keep this ‘fiery serpent’ under control, if we let it out of the bottle, God forbid, this could lead to a global catastrophe,” he stated. “Everyone is pretending to be deaf, blind or dyslexic. We have to react to this somehow, don’t we? Clearly, so.”

And again, on June 11, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reiterated: “It is of principal importance that Russia and the U.S. calm the rest of the world and pass a joint statement at a high level that there can be no victory in a nuclear war and therefore it is unacceptable and inadmissible.”

China, for its part, continues to urge the United States to abandon the course of economic confrontation and trade and technological warfare, and cooperate instead with the Belt and Road Initiative in a new, win-win global architecture. Many forces inside the United States, Chinese media have noted, fully favor such an approach as well.

The voice of the United States will be decisive in determining which way the whole planet goes, as President Trump is well aware. That is why the voice of the United States that must be heard is that of Lyndon LaRouche.

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Xi, Putin and Modi To Hold Discussions on the Sidelines of the SCO Summit in Kyrgyzstan

June 11 (EIRNS)—India’s Ambassador to China Vikram Misri announced today that India’s newly re-elected Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the June 13-14 Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The last meeting between the two leaders in Wuhan in April 2018 played an important role in defusing geopolitical tensions between India and China, long fostered by the British, and in laying the groundwork for India’s eventual joining of the Belt and Road Initiative.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will also be at the SCO meeting, and is expected to meet with both Modi and Xi as well, according to Livemint. In addition to regional security issues, one of the major topics that will be discussed at the SCO meeting and on its sidelines is how to defuse the U.S. trade war against China, and establish instead a cooperative relationship among all the major powers. Such an agenda will be critical going into the June 28-29 G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, where all four leaders (among others) will be present.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Russia Has Proposed U.S. and Russian Presidents Declare Use of Nuclear Weapons ‘Unacceptable’

June 11 (EIRNS)—Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reported in his address today to the “Primakov Readings 2019” conference in Moscow that Russian officials have proposed to the United States that their two Presidents jointly declare that the use of nuclear weapons is “unacceptable,” as the leaders of the Soviet Union and the U.S. had done in earlier days, TASS reports.

“From a political perspective, it is of principal importance that Russia and the U.S. calm the rest of the world and pass a joint statement at a high level that there can be no victory in a nuclear war and therefore it is unacceptable and inadmissible,” Lavrov said. It was done before, and “we do not understand why they cannot reconfirm this position now. Our proposal is being considered by the U.S. side.”

But Lavrov said that Russia has not received any response to its proposals on strategic stability issues, TASS reported.

The theme of this fifth Primakov Readings International Forum, is bluntly titled, “Returning to Confrontation: Are There Any Alternatives?” According to the website for the conference, 80 leading experts, diplomats, politicians and journalists from 29 countries and more than 600 representatives of Russian think tanks and universities, public authorities, political and business circles are taking part in the June 10-11 forum.

It was opened and chaired by President Vladimir Putin’s aide, Yuri Ushakov, who heads the Organizing Committee of the Readings.

Putin sent greetings, in which he referenced Yevgeny Primakov (1929-2015), the former Prime Minister, former Foreign Minister, diplomat, and strategic thinker for whom the forum is named: “Yevgeny Primakov’s unique creative legacy remains highly relevant in modern politics, diplomacy, academic and public life. And this is only logical because such fundamental values as love for humanity, responsibility for the destinies of the world and unfailing adherence to the Motherland’s national interests, as well as respect for legitimate interests of other countries and strict compliance with the norms of international law, form the foundation of the world outlook of this outstanding statesman and thinker.”

Putin urged participants “to jointly search for real and viable alternatives to the intensifying confrontation” which has brought the world to a dangerous stage.

Of the many speakers from the U.S., China, India, South Korea, Iran, France, Tunisia, and others, none were from the United Kingdom—although several nominally from other countries have been known to represent the British Empire admirably from their positions at the Atlantic Council, Kissinger Associates, the European Council on Foreign Affairs, and the like!

Pompeo and State Department Stick Their Noses in Hong Kong Protests

June 11 (EIRNS)—The State Department is giving full backing to the anti-China “democracy” demonstrators in Hong Kong whose latest campaign is against changes drafted by the Hong Kong government for its extradition treaty.

Spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus revealed yesterday that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had personally met with a group of the “pro-democracy” leaders from Hong Kong last month, specifically on the extradition treaty fight.

“The United States expresses its grave concern” about the proposed amendments, “which, if passed, would permit Chinese authorities to request the extradition of individuals to mainland China,” she said. She professed that the United States is very concerned that Hong Kong’s autonomy is being undermined, and the “democratic” terms of the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration by which Great Britain grudgingly ceded sovereignty over its colony stolen during the Opium Wars.

This being clearly an intervention into Chinese internal affairs, Ortagus stuck in an alleged concern that the extradition treaty amendments could “subject our citizens residing in or visiting Hong Kong to China’s capricious judicial system.”

Asked about these comments today, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang reminded the State Department that “Hong Kong affairs are purely China’s internal affairs. No other country, organization or individual has the right to interfere…. We urge the U.S. to view the relevant amendments in a fair and just manner, exercise caution in its words and deeds, and stop in whatever form interfering in Hong Kong affairs and China’s domestic affairs.”

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

Global Times Editorial Warns U.S. against Using Trade War To Try To Contain China

June 11 (EIRNS)—In the run-up to the G20 meeting on June 28-29, where Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Donald Trump are expected to meet, the Chinese media are brimming with discussions of U.S.-China relations and warnings about the dangerous track things are currently on. The June 10 Global Times editorial headlined “What Is True U.S. Motivation for Trade War?” stands out:

“The China-U.S. trade war is mired in a stalemate,” the editorial states. “Strategic distrust between the two sides is deepening. There is a severe lack of political motivation to break the deadlock. Is this a trade war in the traditional sense?” The editorial warns that President Trump “has many radical advisors around him,” and that “the U.S. crackdown on Chinese tech giant Huawei reinforces the understanding of Chinese society that the U.S. did not simply intend to address the trade imbalance but also wanted to deal a heavy blow to China’s high-tech development capability and further contain China’s development. The maximum pressure imposed by the U.S. has also generated a serious sense of crisis among the Chinese people. If China compromises, that means it renders the U.S. the right to define and reshape future China-U.S. relations at will. The U.S. would resort to maximum pressure as a means to make hegemonic demands at China, a catastrophe for China’s national security.”

The editorial is careful to distinguish: If the issue is trade matters, then China is prepared to negotiate these in good faith with the U.S. If, rather, the ulterior motive is the “containment of China’s development,” then this is something China cannot tolerate. “If the U.S. links the trade war with China to its suppression of the Chinese people’s wishes, it is a dangerous confrontation with the collective right of the Chinese people. China and the U.S. can negotiate their ways of trading…. China cannot accept the bossy U.S. approach. Washington uses tariffs as a stick, a hegemonic move that threatens China’s national interests. If the U.S. institutionalizes such an attitude toward China, uses tariffs and cuts off supply of high-tech products like chips as leverage, China will firmly resist U.S. pressure at whatever cost.”

The editorial calls for the two countries to cooperate instead: “China and the U.S. should avoid the worst-case scenario that will be detrimental to both countries and their peoples.”

Pompeo Has a ‘Fossilized Mind-Set,’ But Other Americans Want Good Relations with China

June 11 (EIRNS)—Zhang Wenzong of the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations published an article in the June 10 issue of Global Times which distinguished sharply between the anti-China hysteria displayed by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and others in Washington, and the many forces in the U.S. that would like to have a good, cooperative relationship with China.

“Pompeo’s China view shows a fossilized mind-set,” Zhang wrote, and stating that “it is not an exaggeration to say that Pompeo is the one who has exerted himself the most in tarnishing Chinese tech giant Huawei’s image…. But his arguments are always flawed.”

Zhang continued: “Although the U.S. has highlighted competition with China, forces inside the U.S. that support the continued development of relations with Beijing cannot be underestimated. Many U.S. states value exports to China; universities welcome Chinese students; some U.S. enterprises have long expected to benefit from the BRI [Belt and Road Initiative]. Many high-tech companies in Silicon Valley are the beneficiaries of globalization and Huawei’s win-win partners. They dare not express their opposition to the U.S. government’s crackdown on Huawei. Different voices can also be heard among elites about the way Pompeo and the current U.S. government handle relations with China. The right-wing Republicans have continued to create crises on the grounds of national security and have attempted to mobilize the American people. However, if McCarthyism resurfaces, people in the U.S. will be the first to be affected.”

Also outside the U.S., Zhang wrote, “many countries are not intimidated by the U.S. and boldly express their support for Chinese enterprises and policies.”

Justice Department Briefs House Judiciary on Durham Review, ‘Certain Foreign Actors’ under Scrutiny

June 11 (EIRNS)—House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler had demanded the Department of Justice report on its plans to investigate the origins of the counter-intelligence operations carried out against the Trump campaign during the 2016 election. Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd’s response on the “Review,” contained in a letter delivered yesterday, confirmed what Nadler, Obama’s intelligence community plotters and the British initiators of that operation most fear: It is serious, systematic, and investigating the British role (“our foreign allies”) is front and center.

“The Review is broad in scope and multifaceted, and is intended to illuminate open questions regarding the activities of U.S. and foreign intelligence services as well as non-governmental organizations and individuals,” Boyd wrote. “It is now well established that, in 2016, the U.S. government and others undertook certain intelligence-gathering and investigative steps directed at persons associated with the Trump Campaign. As the Attorney General has stated publicly at Congressional hearings and elsewhere, there remain open questions relating to the origins of this counter-intelligence investigation and the U.S. and foreign intelligence activities that took place prior to and during that investigation.”

To answer those questions, U.S. Attorney John Durham has been named to head the “Review Team,” and the President issued a memorandum directing the intelligence community to assist in the Review. “The Review is thus a collaborative, ongoing effort between the Department’s Review Team and the intelligence community as well as certain foreign actors,” Boyd reported.

“Certain intelligence community agencies” have been instructed to preserve relevant records, ensure pertinent witnesses be made available, and “begin identifying and assembling materials that may be relevant to the Review.” The Attorney General will use discretion in declassifying any such documents, to ensure the national security needs “of the U.S. and its foreign intelligence partners are adequately protected….

“The Attorney General looks forward to obtaining a better understanding of the critical period leading up to the 2016 presidential election,” especially as another election season is approaching, Boyd concluded.

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

On U.S.-Mexico Border Talks, a Bullet Dodged for Now, but the Central Issue Is Still Up in the Air

June 11 (EIRNS)—One key to understanding the real issue behind the migrant crisis on the U.S.-Mexican border, is the fact that, in the huge increase in illegal migrants being detained at the border—last month it reached the unprecedented level of 144,000—the overwhelming majority are Central Americans, and not Mexicans.

Why no Mexicans? Historically there have always been huge flows of Mexicans as well.

At least part of the reason is that the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) has actually gotten a few major infrastructure and other projects underway, which have helped create some job opportunities, and have given rise in the population to a sense of hope about prospects for the future inside the country. As AMLO himself has repeatedly stated, people don’t leave their homeland because they want to, but out of despair and need to simply survive. Help bring about development in Mexico and Central America, AMLO has told President Donald Trump, and that is the best way to start cutting into the migration problem. AMLO rightly argued that the worst thing to do to reduce migration, is to impose trade tariffs that would only sink the Mexican and Central American economies further into hell.

Imagine what could happen if the U.S. not only cooperated with Mexico on major infrastructure projects in the region, but also welcomed the participation of China and its Belt and Road capabilities in those projects—as the LaRouche movement has long advocated. This would be good for the U.S., good for Mexico, and good for China: win-win-win.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, however, has taken the opposite approach, which will only drive the region further into hell. Despite the fact that part of the agreement just reached between the U.S. and Mexico around Trump’s threatened 5% punitive import tariff on all Mexican goods shipped to the U.S., was to return to the approach of cooperating on the development of the entire region that Trump and AMLO had agreed to in principle, Pompeo yesterday went out of his way to pronounce that the U.S. would not be providing any additional funds: the U.S. “made no incremental resource commitments associated with this deal,” he stated; no “resource assistance” was offered to the Mexican government to deliver these outcomes, nor to Central America. “Where we find it in our interest in the Northern Triangle or in Mexico to provide resources that make sense to protect the American people, we’ll do that.  But in the first instance, these nations have the responsibility to take care of these immigration problems in their home country.”

Despite Global Slowdown, China Trade Is Growing—Especially with Belt and Road Countries

June 11 (EIRNS)—The Chinese government announced the official foreign trade statistics for the first four months of 2019, which indicate continuing overall growth of 4.1%, compared to same period of 2018. Exports rose 6.1%, imports grew by 1.8%. The official announcement pointed out that this happened despite the slowdown in global economic growth and international trade, where the World Bank has reduced its global forecast to a 2.6% annual growth rate.

The highest growth areas for China are trade with EU countries (11.7%), ASEAN (9.4%), and Belt and Road nations in general (9%). BRI trade accounted for 28.8% of China’s total trade volume.

Senator Bagnai Rumored To Become Italy’s Future Negotiator with the EU

June 11 (EIRNS)—Italian Senate Finance Committee Chairman Alberto Bagnai is strongly rumored to be appointed Minister for European Affairs, to fill the job left empty by Paolo Savona four months ago. Bagnai is a convinced euro-skeptic; however, he has made clear that the current Italian government neither intends to leave the euro, nor refuses to abide to EU deficit rules.

However, his appointment is a clear signal. As Minister for European Affairs, Bagnai would negotiate with the EU Commission in the next months. In a June 6 article in the Financial Times, Bagnai made it clear that he considers the current rules under the Stability Pact as “catastrophic” and called for eliminating them, going back to a 3% deficit rule, excluding, however, capital investments from the accounting. He also called for a European New Deal.

Bagnai’s ally, economist Antonio Maria Rinaldi, said the EU Commission letter to the Italian government, which has set a 48-hour deadline to have a clarification on budget and deficit figures, “has the flavor of 19th-century gunboat diplomacy.” Nevertheless, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte declared that Italy wants to avoid a violation proceeding and wants to come to an agreement with the Commission.

This, in a context in which the term of the current Commission term is about to end and negotiations have already started among EU member states for the choice of the next one. Also on the table is the succession of Mario Draghi as European Central Bank president and of Antonio Tajani as president of the European Parliament. Italy aims at getting a “heavy” Commissioner, since it cannot claim either the ECB or the European Parliament presidency again. Rumors give Giancarlo Giorgetti, a Lega member and currently Conte’s chief of staff, as the Italian candidate to get a Commissioner post.

Is the U.S. Justice Department’s ‘Car Wash’ Coup in Brazil in Trouble?

June 11 (EIRNS)—Two leading Brazilian Establishment dailies from São Paulo, O Estado and Folha, broke ranks today with the corrupt “Car Wash” investigation they had cheered on for years. Folhacharged that the connivance between the mastermind of “Car Wash,” now-Justice Minister Sergio Moro and its lead prosecutor Deltan Dallagnol, “bordered on promiscuity” and illegality. O Estado went further, and called for Moro and the entire Car Wash prosecutorial team to immediately resign, so that the shocking documentation of their illegalities and bias revealed by The Intercept on June 9 can be fully investigated.

That editorial shift—and the fact that encrypted communications between the Car Wash team were successfully leaked to Glenn Greenwald’s Intercept in the first place—reflects a broader institutional reaction from within Brazil against the destruction which the Car Wash operation has wreaked upon the nation’s political and economic institutions. The fight back now extends beyond the Workers’ Party (PT) of former Presidents Dilma Rousseff and Lula da Silva which Car Wash ran out of office.

It is no secret that Sergio Moro modeled his Car Wash operation on the British-run “Clean Hands” operation which wiped out the political parties and national industry of Italy in the 1990s—nor that Moro’s operation was directed and fed by the same networks in the U.S. Department of Justice that ran the attempted coup against President Donald Trump.

In its first installments of leaked material, The Interceptdocumented that then-Judge Moro, whose court heard all Car Wash cases, was directing the prosecution team. In Brazil, as in the U.S., judges are legally a neutral party. But Moro sent emails demanding new police raids by prosecutor Dallagnol (“Hasn’t it been a long time without an operation?”); reviewing and criticizing motions which Dallagnol planned to file in advance, etc. Four days before Lula da Silva was to be indicted, Dallagnol consulted Moro because he was “apprehensive” over the fact that they had no proof that the state oil company Petrobras was the source of the alleged bribe to Lula—the only basis for Car Wash to have jurisdiction over the case—or that Lula even owned the apartment he was accused of having purchased with that bribe!

Another set of text messages showed how desperate the Car Wash team was to ensure Lula was kept incommunicado before the election, because they feared that if he was allowed to give even one interview from jail, that might tip the election to the PT’s candidate.

A war and a half is now underway. President Jair Bolsonaro, already losing control of the country, has said nothing, but reportedly was to meet with Moro today; Vice President Hamilton Mourão and three key military ministers (Institutional Security, Defense, and Secretary of Government) issued statements of support for Moro. His radical right political base are whipping up supporters for a campaign to deport The Intercept’s editor, Greenwald.

The Brazilian Bar Association has called for Moro and the prosecutors to be suspended. Not surprisingly, the legal defense team of jailed former President Lula da Silva announced it is reviewing the material released to prepare a new filing seeking to overturn Lula’s conviction as illegal.

“This is merely the beginning,” The Intercept promised. The archive of leaked material is now secured “outside of Brazil, so that numerous journalists have access to it, ensuring that no authorities in any country will have the ability to prevent reporting based on these materials.”

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

President Xi Invites Brazil To Join in Exploring Far Side of the Moon, an Idea Mourão Loves

June 11 (EIRNS)—Brazilian Vice President Hamilton Mourão toldValor Econômico for June 7 that President Xi Jinping invited Brazil to participate in China’s program to explore the far side of the Moon, when the two met in Beijing in May. Mourão’s exchange with Valor is brief, but fascinating.

Brazil and China have had for 31 years a program to jointly design, manufacture, launch and use remote sensing satellites (CBERS). Five satellites have been produced, and the sixth is being completed now. During his visit, Mourão visited the Chinese Academy of Space Technology where the CBERS program operates. So Valor asked the Vice President if there were anything new on Brazil’s space program with China. Mourão replied:

“We have a satellite that is being built. The Brazilian part is being completed and as of November it will be in China to be launched.

“They have an exploration program for the hidden side of the Moon and they are offering people to participate in this practically for free. He [Xi] made a generic offer…. But I think it’s great. I put that in the report” for President Jair Bolsonaro about his trip to China.

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