TUESDAY, JUNE 25, 2019 Volume 6, Number 124 EIR Daily Alert Service P.O. Box 17390, Washington, DC 20041-0390

• Will the Current War Shocks Become Another Cuban Missile Crisis? We Can Prevent It
• Rvabkov Warns of New Cuban Missile Crisis ‘Right to the Limit’
• Former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Worries Iran Confrontation Could Spin Out of Control
• Trump Reveals Iran Approached Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Talks With U.S.
• Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Played Key Role in Trump Decision Not to Bomb Iran
• Progress on Budapest-Belgrade Rail Project
• White House Unveils Palestine ‘Peace to Prosperity’ But It’s Far From LaRouche ‘Oasis Plan’
• Promising Perspective for Chinese Cooperation With Africans
• More Recession Signs Appear in U.S. Economy
• American Suicide Rates Up 33% Since 1999
• Hungary Is Sticking With Huawei
• Growing Glaciers Give the Lie to National Park Service Apocalyptic Global Warming Displays

EDITORIAL

Will the Current War Shocks Become Another Cuban Missile Crisis? We Can Prevent It

June 24 (EIRNS)—A senior Russian official, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, has raised the specter of the war shocks of 2019, with the possible deployment of U.S. missiles near Russian borders, turning into a repeat of the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. No one who lived through that terrifying event imagined that it would, or even could ever happen again.

But Ryabkov is right. A dual-power split between President John F. Kennedy and the Dulles-McNamara-led military industrial complex, led to a U.S.-Russian showdown, then, in which many millions thought the end of human civilization was upon them. A dual-power split exists now, in which British media and U.S. war-party officialsannounce acts of war against Russia and/or nations allied with it, which are then stopped by President Donald Trump, who wants good great-power relations and an end to permanent war in Southwest Asia.

How many times will the President stop them? After the publicNew York Times claim of a cyber-bomb inside Russia’s electricity infrastructure, and John Bolton’s claim of a coming missile strike on Iran, not only the Russian leadership is asking this. Malaysia’s Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, one of the world’s most experienced and respected leaders, exclaimed “This can lead to nuclear world war!” China’s Global Times called it “only a matter of time before new war breaks out in the region,” in its editorial today.

We are on the verge of an absolutely critical G20 meeting in Japan this weekend, at which Presidents Trump and Xi Jinping are scheduled for an “extended meeting” looking for collaboration in economic exchange and progress in infrastructure projects; the “RIC” leaders—Russia’s Putin, India’s Modi, and China’s Xi—are meeting, potentially about a new economic and credit system; and Presidents Putin and Trump must meet for a strategic peace negotiation. Before and after every potential Trump-Putin meeting, the British intelligence-run “Russiagate” scandal in the United States has intervened to paralyze any cooperation; now, the British Empire “permanent war party” is acting to blow these summit meetings up in advance.

The foremost international enemy of this British Empire-led war party, throughout his adult life, was Lyndon LaRouche, and his 1980s prosecutions and media demonization was demanded of U.S. authorities in writing by the British government as early as 1982. Six weeks after LaRouche died in February of this year, The Times of London was still publishing attacks on him! That war party tried for three years to force Trump out; failing in that, it drives to force him to war.

Trump has one explosive weapon against this: Reopening LaRouche’s case, and LaRouche’s own posthumous exoneration. There is an all-out mobilization for this underway by the Schiller Institute and LaRouche Political Action Committee, rapidly circulating worldwide the videos “The LaRouche Case: Robert Mueller’s First Hit Job,” and the memorial “Triumph of Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr.,” along with a petition for his exoneration.

Schiller Institute President Helga Zepp-LaRouche commented today, with the world fearing a real superpower confrontation, “The whole world looks to us right now, if we can accomplish this task. People should have the courage of a Lyndon LaRouche.” We can prevent it.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Ryabkov Warns of New Cuban Missile Crisis ‘Right to the Limit’

June 24 (EIRNS)—The second day of Russian warnings about new U.S. nuclear-capable missiles in Europe, included a direct warning of “escalat[ing] right to the limit” of nuclear war between Russia and the United States.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted in RIA Novosti warning of a new Cuban Missile Crisis, according to Reuters; in October 1962 that naval standoff had both powers’ strategic nuclear forces on alert and ready to launch for more than two weeks. Only urgent—at times desperate—diplomatic efforts by the Kennedy White House and Nikita Khrushchev averted nuclear war.

TASS reported that Ryabkov told the senators in Russia’s Federation Council, during debates on a bill on the suspension of Russia’s participation in INF Treaty: “The current events, in particular, those involving the Russia-NATO Founding Act, which declares that the alliance has no plans, intentions or reasons to deploy considerable forces near Russian borders in the territories of newly-admitted NATO members, indicate that all this can be easily changed.”

Referring to the U.S. ABM batteries in Eastern Europe and U.S. withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), he told the senators: “We should brace for the worst scenario. There are no plans, but the Mk-41 launchers are a reality,” Ryabkov said. “NATO’s intentions have been aggressive all along and they remain so. If it comes to the real deployment of such systems on the ground, the situation will not just get worse, but aggravate to the maximum and we may find ourselves in the situation of a missile crisis pretty close to the Caribbean one.”

Reuters headlined its pickup from RIA Novosti, “Russia Warns of Repeat of 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.”

On June 23, Ryabkov had issued a related warning in a Kommersant interview against so-called “limited” nuclear war: “The United States is seeking to impose concepts saying that a nuclear war can be won” with very low-yield nuclear weapons “that cannot be seen as anything but meant for combat uses.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin during his meeting with media executives on June 6 in St. Petersburg warned: “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.” His Deputy Foreign Minister has given that greater specificity and force, especially for those old enough to remember the weeks of raw terror worldwide in October 1962.

Former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Worries Iran Confrontation Could Spin Out of Control

June 24 (EIRNS)—Retired Adm. Michael Mullen, who was Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2007-11, warned during an appearance on ABC News’ “This Week,” that tensions with Iran could escalate out of control. “My biggest concern is the President is running out of room, running out of options and while rhetoric goes back and forth on how close we came to hitting Iran just the other day, that this thing could spin out of control,” he said. “The last thing in the world we need right now is a war with Iran.”

Mullen, reported AFP, said politicians need to use diplomacy to prevent Iran’s nuclear ambitions. “That’s our system here and I think the politicians need to figure out a way to achieve the objective, which is Iran without a nuclear weapon—and, from my perspective, without regime change, without going to war,” he said.

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

Trump Reveals Iran Approached Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Talks with U.S.

June 24 (EIRNS)—President Trump announced on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” yesterday that he believes Iran “wants to negotiate. And I think they want to make a deal. And my deal is nuclear. Look, they’re not going to have a nuclear weapon. This isn’t about oil.”

The President said he refused the option of a strike on Iran, and denied having ordered one and then stopped it. Planes “were not in the air,” he asserted.

Trump then told Todd definitively that he had not sent a letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei via Japan Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. He went on, “Prime Minister Abe’s a great guy. He’s a friend of mine. And he obviously is close to them [the Iranians]. I think he was their largest buyer of oil from before. … According to Prime Minister Abe, they went to him, it’s according to the prime minister, and they said, ‘What do we do with Trump? Can we make a deal? Is there something that can be done?’ That’s what Prime Minster Abe told me. I said, ‘Do you mind if I say that if I have to?’ And he said, ‘Not particularly.’ So they [Iran] came to Prime Minister Abe. He then called me. I said, ‘Send the following message: you can’t have nuclear weapons. And other than that, we can sit down and make a deal. But you cannot have nuclear weapons.’ ”

The President told Chuck Todd there were no other conditions, but specified, that the nuclear sites had to be examined. Trump said that the U.S. had not been allowed to look at or inspect some of the most important sites. He pointed out that there are only a few years left in the 2015 agreement, which, Trump told Todd, would mean “after a very small number of years, they have a free pass to nuclear weapons. You can’t do that. So I want to be able to inspect all sites.”

Trump denied he had sent a message to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani or Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, supposedly saying “I don’t want war. I want to talk.” He said, “I did not send that message. … I’m not looking for war and if there is, it’ll be obliteration like you’ve never seen before. But I’m not looking to do that. But you can’t have a nuclear weapon.”

On Monday, Trump signed an Executive Order imposing new sanctions on the Supreme Leader of Iran and his office, and “authorizing the Department of the Treasury to impose sanctions on anyone who provides material support to the Supreme Leader’s Office” in response to the downing of the U.S. drone.

Fox News’ Tucker Carlson Played Key Role in Trump Decision Not To Bomb Iran

June 24 (EIRNS)—Fox News political commentator Tucker Carlson reportedly influenced U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision not to bomb Iran over the weekend, Fox News reported, as did Ha’aretz, RealClearPolitics, and other media.

Whether that is true or not, the highly striking feature of Carlson’s June 21 broadcast, just hours after Trump announced his decision Thursday night, June 20, was the large screen banner behind Carlson. It did not say “Trump Calls Off Strike” or the like euphemisms from the other media reports. Rather it said, truthfully, “War Averted!” And in a smaller scroll below, “U.S. was minutes from a disastrous mistake.”

On his Friday show, Carlson praised President Trump for not bombing Iran, while blasting Trump National Security Adviser John Bolton as a “bureaucratic tapeworm.” And he argued that the President’s decision not to bomb Iran saved his re-election bid, saying, “Bombing Iran would have ended his political career in a minute. There would be no chance of re-election after that.”

The Daily Beast reported that that Carlson “advised” Trump against taking military action against Iran, and “bashed the ‘more hawkish members’ of his administration.” The New York Times also reported that “among the voices that rang powerfully for President Trump was that of one of his favorite Fox News hosts: Tucker Carlson.”

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Progress on Budapest-Belgrade Rail Project

June 24 (EIRNS)—The CRE Consortium and the Chinese-Hungarian Railway Non-Profit Ltd Company (CHRN), set up by Hungarian State Railways MÁV and the Chinese government, have signed a $1.5 billion contract (590 billion forint) for upgrading the Hungarian segment of the Budapest-Belgrade rail line, reported International Railway Journal on June 21.

CHRN manages the development of the project and signed the contract, which covers the reconstruction of almost the entire Hungarian section of the Budapest-Belgrade line, between Soroksár, south of the capital, and the border crossing into Serbia at Kelebia. Work will include double tracking and electrification, raising the maximum line speed to 160 kph. Trains are currently limited to a maximum of 100 kph with numerous speed restrictions. When completed, the travel time between the Hungarian and Serbian capitals will be halved from eight hours to four.

The contract will be valid once a financing agreement between the Hungarian government and Exim Bank of China is signed. The bank loan has already been initiated by Hungary and approval is expected before the end of 2019.

Ownership of the CRE Consortium is split 50:50 between Chinese-owned and Hungarian companies. China Tiejiuju Engineering & Construction Hungary and China Railway Electrification Engineering Group (Hungary) will work with RM International, a subsidiary of Opus Global. Planning and construction will take five years once the bank loan is disbursed. The Serbian section of the route is being upgraded for 200 kph operation.

White House Unveils Palestine ‘Peace to Prosperity,’ but It’s Far from LaRouche ‘Oasis Plan’

June 24 (EIRNS)—The White House published an outline of its long-advertised “Peace to Prosperity” plan for Palestine on June 22. It should not be dismissed outright merely because it was designed by Jared Kushner; President Donald Trump’s son-in-law has conducted serious and successful Congressional negotiations on criminal justice reform legislation, for example, and he has also negotiated with Mexico over border issues, with limited success. But it is fundamentally a large-scale economic infrastructure development plan (Kushner has called it “the opportunity of the century” and made some Marshall Plan comparisons) to be carried out by private investors and large Wall Street funds. This, other problems aside, is sufficient to guarantee it will never work—in fact, will not happen at all.

The plan, which never mentions “State of Palestine” or even “Palestinian Authority,” clearly demands “economic reforms” of the Palestinians without allowing any sovereignty for them. Deregulatory “reforms” can allow real estate speculation, hotel development, etc. to occur. But none of the promised rail corridors, roads, water and other infrastructure can be built by private capital. And under conditions of great political instability and violence, and with Israel sure to block approval for a new West Bank-to-Gaza transportation corridor, for example, private capital will not even try.

It is being reported that June 25-26 Manama, Bahrain conference on the “Peace to Prosperity” is not drawing much in the way of international capital investors beyond Wall Street’s BlackRock, which is a designer of the plan with Kushner. Arab sheikhdoms and kingdoms are expected to put up funds to create an investment vehicle.

Palestine and its leadership is boycotting the conference, demanding that a “political solution” must precede an economic one. This was not true, as Lyndon LaRouche insisted, of his groundbreaking July 20, 1990 “Oasis Plan” proposal, which was to be carried out by nations. It is unfortunately true of this plan, however.

If “Peace to Prosperity” is taken by Iran’s leaders as an indication of President Trump’s intended “better deal” to replace the JCPOA, it will not be conducive for negotiations. It could also be a bad sign for Korean Peninsula—although there the involvement of the regional powers China, Russia, South Korea, Japan and the integration of the BRI make all the difference.

Promising Perspective for Chinese Cooperation with Africans

June 24 (EIRNS)—As Xinhua reports, Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China is willing to work with African countries to build a high-quality and sustainable relationship as well as deepen cooperation in infrastructure, agriculture, healthcare, telecommunications, and energy.  Wang made the remarks in meetings in Beijing on June 23 with foreign ministers from Sierra Leone, Gabon, Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville), São Tomé and Príncipe, Cameroun, Somalia, Madagascar, and Senegal. The ministers are in China for a Coordinators’ Meeting for the implementation of the follow-up actions of the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC). The FOCAC summit last Sept. 3-4 took place for the first time in Beijing, and involved nearly all of the 50-plus African heads of state and government.

Wang rebuked the lie about a debt trap in China-Africa cooperation. “China’s financial support to African countries does not come with any political strings,” he said at the meeting with the Cameroon Foreign Minister Lejeune Mbella Mbella, who expressed gratitude for Chinese support to Africa. “China-Africa cooperation under the framework of the Belt and Road will bring new hope for African countries and bring prosperity to African people,” Mbella said. After their bilateral meetings, Wang and the attending African foreign ministers and other representatives from 53 of Africa’s nations, also witnessed the signing of a number of cooperation agreements.

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

More Recession Signs Appear in U.S. Economy

June 24 (EIRNS)—A third Federal Reserve bank’s manufacturing index has plunged in June—this time that of the Dallas bank, which fell from +5.3 in April to ˗12.1 in June. Significantly, given President Donald Trump’s accomplished tariff aim of raising capacity utilization in the American steel industry, one respondent to the Dallas Bank stated, “Steel prices are dropping like a rock due to lack of demand and overcapacity.”

And the Cass Freight Index, which measures all modes of shipment combined, was 5.5% lower than a year before in May, then 6.5% lower than the previous year in June.

American Suicide Rates Up 33% Since 1999

June 24 (EIRNS)—New data released June 20 from the National Center for Health Statistics, a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), show the age-adjusted suicide rate was 33% higher in 2017 than in 1999: 14.0 per 100,000 as compared to 10.5 per 100,000. When broken down by race, however, certain groups showed astounding jumps, the largest being for American Indian or Alaska Natives (AIAN)—an area of persistent poverty—which jumped 139% for females (from 4.6 to 11.0 per 100,000), and males up 71% (from 19.8 to 33.8 per 100,000).

Rates for white females (charts not broken down by age) showed the next largest jump, going from 4.7 to 7.9 per 100,000.

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

Hungary Is Sticking with Huawei

June 24 (EIRNS)—On June 20, Hungarian Innovation and Technology Minister Laszlo Palkovics told Reuters that Hungary had yet to receive any evidence beyond what he called accusations leveled at Huawei. “We have taken a rather pragmatic stance, the same, in fact, as Germany,” Palkovics said. “It has not been proven that Huawei’s technology would pose any risk to Hungary, as we have seen no (data) to support that…. Until it is proven that Huawei, or Cisco, or any other technology, poses any threat to our community, that is Hungary, NATO, or the European Union, we will handle Huawei’s technology as any other technology.”

The Hungarian telecom regulator NMHH this week is publicizing the draft documentation for the sale of more than 400 MHZ of 5G spectrum later this year.  Palkovics said the country expected the auction to raise about 70 billion forints ($244.67 million).

Huawei employs some 2,000 people in Hungary, where it has invested $1.2 billion since 2005, according to company figures. Its European Supply Center near Budapest, launched in 2009, is Huawei’s biggest production base outside China, the group says.

Acknowledging that Hungary’s technological acumen lagged behind that of its U.S. and German allies, Palkovics said Budapest was studying the example of Germany where he said an assessment system was developed precisely to identify possible security threats. Germany is Hungary’s biggest foreign investor.

Palkovics said the government was planning talks with telecom companies and other players in the sector on ways to facilitate a faster rollout of 5G. The minister said he had met representatives of Germany’s Siemens and with BMW, which plans to build a €1 billion factory in eastern Hungary, for talks on possible uses of 5G technology.

Growing Glaciers Give the Lie to National Park Service Apocalyptic Global Warming Displays

June 24 (EIRNS)—Prof. Larry Bell, an articulate opponent of the global warming claim, and an endowed professor of space architecture at the University of Houston, ripped apart one of the global warmers’ favored narratives about disappearing glaciers, which is being refuted by the Glacier National Park glaciers themselves—they have been growing rapidly (for glaciers) over the last decade. Professor Bell reports on an article by Roger Roots, an attorney, who wrote in in WattsUpWithThat blog that he caught the National Parks Service in flagrante, scrambling to hide or obscure the evidence.

According to Professor Bell, who wrote “Climate Alarmists Meltdown Over Glacier National Park” for NewsMax, today, the centerpiece of the hysteria had featured a three-dimensional diorama at the Park’s St. Mary visitor center, where visitors could press a button to see how the glaciers would “disappear by 2020.” News media gave it a lot of attention blaming anthropogenic global warming for the imminent calamity, including the New York Times, National Geographic, and including international media.

However, Roger Roots’ blog demonstrates that last winter, when the visitor center was closed to the public, the doom-and-gloom signs were deftly edited to take out the doom dates, in exchange for “future generations,” or the signs themselves disappeared instead of the glaciers.

To make the hot seat still hotter for the global warmers, Lysander Spooner University research team visits had reported last September: “A major flaw in the government’s ‘before’ and ‘after’ approach is the omission of precise calendar dates. Every Montanan knows that mountain glaciers grow for nine months of the year and then melt for three months. Thus a picture of a glacier taken in June or July will always show the glacier much larger than will a photo taken in early September. Comparing one year (‘circa 1952’) to another year (‘2005’) can be highly manipulative. Only a year-by-year, date-by-date comparison of photos taken at the end of the melt season (generally around the second week of September) will establish whether a glacier is growing or shrinking.

“This year (2018) it quickly became clear that the glaciers have grown substantially in recent years. A startling example is seen at the Jackson Glacier overlook on the Going-to-the-Sun Road. The government has erected a sign with two photos: (1) the Glacier in 1911; and (2) the Glacier in 2009. The display shows the Jackson Glacier melting away to perhaps 10 or 20% of its 1911 size. But visitors to the marker in 2018 are able to look up above in the distance and see that the Jackson Glacier has grown significantly since 2009. The Glacier’s growth may be as much as 30% or more since 2009.  that the park’s two most famous glaciers—the Grinnell and the Jackson Glaciers—have been growing relentlessly, the Jackson by as much as 25% over the past decade.”

Nor is a local aberration, shows Bell: The largest glaciers in Iceland—Hofsjökull, Langjökull, Mýrdalsjökull, and Vatnajökull—after losing autumn-to-autumn ice mass over the past two decades, are now growing again.

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