FRIDAY, JULY 19, 2019

Volume 6, Number 142

EIR Daily Alert Service

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

• Let Us Take Up the Mission
• Russia-Africa Summit Taking Shape
• Ebola Outbreak in D.R. Congo Declared a ‘Public Health Emergency of International Concern’
• Von der Leyen Vote for EU Commission President Could Cause Italian Government To Fall
• Pincer Movement Afoot To Take Down Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Salvini, Lega Leader
• Germany Seeks New Green User Tax Legislation, as Industries Compete To Be the ‘Most Green’
• Sen. Rand Paul as Envoy to Iran for President Trump?
• Secretary Pompeo Aims To Build Anti-Iran Alliance in Four-Nation Ibero-America Tour
• U.S. Booting Turkey Out of F-35 Program
• Former NATO Military Chief General Kujat Slams Limited War Scenarios for Europe as ‘Absurd’
• Space Celebrates Its Role in Apollo 11 Moon Landing, and in Humanity’s Space Exploration

EDITORIAL

Let Us Take Up the Mission

July 18 (EIRNS)—The City of London-Wall Street financial empire is coming unstuck, even as its rulers face an American President who may not agree to follow their instructions to try to bail them out again, as Bush and Obama did in 2007-09, when it collapses.  If they are not able to throw him out during his first term, the British oligarchs are determined to deny President Donald Trump a second term in office.

This defines the continuing British coup-attempt against President Trump. The coup attempt did not end with the fizzling-out of the Mueller investigation—it continues in other ways, some evident, some not, even as Attorney General William Barr’s investigation moves towards its conclusion.  One way is to trick President Trump into violating his campaign promise of “no more endless wars.” The leaked reports of former British Ambassador Kim Darroch were quite open about his attempts to foment a U.S. war with Iran—which were aided by Secretary of State Pompeo and National Security Adviser John Bolton in various ways. On a broader scale, the British have always sought to pit the great continental powers against one another, to the point of war or beyond. Now they are able to line up huge, bipartisan majorities in both Houses of Congress to try to destroy U.S. relations with Russia, and often with China.  These typical British Imperial moves are part of, or closely aligned with their coup attempt against the President.

And what of today’s cacophony of racism-baiting of the President? Schiller Institute President Helga Zepp-LaRouche said today, in effect, that the dying system is responding by trying on every front to foster pessimism, not just through “green” frauds like anthropogenic climate change. This has been going on over the long term, for over 50 years.  The effort has been to change the paradigm, from the image of man for whom there are no limits to the reach of his imagination and his reason. To divert that into the race-baiting of Donald Trump. To make you look down into the gutter, one might add, rather than up to the stars.

Rather than do that, let us take up our mission.

To this end, we should note that Apollo 11 launched on July 16, 1969 to land on the Moon on July 20, so that we are already in the 50th anniversary—we are halfway to the Moon, in effect. It is our duty to achieve the utmost from the inspiration this is causing, especially when mankind is now heading back to the Moon—and far beyond.  And not only are Americans going—far from it. NASA is going to the Moon in 2024 with international partners.  But even more so, the subsequent mission of industrializing the Moon is far bigger than any one nation; it is an enormous international mission, or, as Zepp-LaRouche puts it, a task of the “one humanity.”

To begin by putting human beings on the Moon in 2024, as President Trump has directed, will not be “easy.” In President Kennedy’s words, it will be “hard.”  It will require an intense science-driver program of continual innovations and discoveries, amidst a level of commitment and effort only seen in war, or in programs like the original Apollo program. There are problems and difficulties throughout. The rocket designated for the 2024 mission, the SLS, has not yet flown, after many delays in testing. The Lunar Gateway satellite and the required lunar descent and ascent modules have not yet been designed. And NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine testified yesterday to the Senate that if Congress fails to agree on a budget and passes a Continuing Resolution for 2020 instead, essentially freezing appropriations, it would be “devastating” to the program.

The United States faced similar problems in May 1961, when President Kennedy vowed to land men on the Moon and bring them safely home within the decade. Back then, NASA would not be able to determine how it would get there (“Lunar Orbit Rendezvous”) for over a year, although thereafter it soon became clear that there was actually no other alternative.  And the plan to build the Saturn V rocket was not announced until January 1962. Everything had to be put together on the fly.

Today’s task is made harder after a half-century’s savage wrecking of the U.S. economy since the kill-off of the Apollo program in 1972. The factories, the labs and much else have been shut and abandoned.  And as statesman Lyndon LaRouche had already understood in 1986 in his feature, “The Science and Technology Needed To Colonize Mars,” American society today is less fit spiritually to take on the challenge of space than we were in the 1960s—precisely one of the reasons we must now do so. (See LaRouche’s feature, reprinted in two parts in EIR, April 26, 2019 and May 5, 2016.)

Nor can we beg out by saying that if we don’t make it to the Moon in 2024, we’ll simply get there a year or two later.  Some great projects are only possible as maximum-effort crash programs—or not at all. One of the several reasons is what NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine calls “political risk.”  Think—if we had not made it to the Moon in 1969, could we have done it in 1971? In 1972? Probably not. Probably never.

The significance is, as the same President Kennedy famously said, that “Things do not happen. Things are made to happen.” The 2024 human Moon landing—as the first step towards the industrialization of the Moon, and then the eventual colonization of Mars and beyond—will happen if and only if the American people, led by the most aware and courageous of us, make it happen. Equally important is that the plans and instructions of the late Lyndon LaRouche are the most important guideposts. In his many writings like the one mentioned above, and his video “The Woman on Mars,” building on the work of the great German-American space scientist Krafft Ehricke and earlier pioneers, Lyndon LaRouche laid bare the requirements and implications of this mission as a new stage of human evolution, as never done before or since. The declaration of this sort of Moon-Mars mission by an American President is a tribute to this great man, and one we cannot permit to fail.

NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Russia-Africa Summit Taking Shape

July 18 (EIRNS)—Russia’s Presidential Envoy for the Middle East and Africa, Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, reported yesterday that “about 35” leaders of African countries have confirmed their participation in the first-ever Russia-Africa Summit on Oct. 24 in Sochi. Acceptances are still coming in, and Bogdanov expects that “at least 40” heads of state or government will attend. The summit is not conceived as a one-time affair, he clarified; the intent is to hold Russia-Africa summits every two to three years on a regular basis, not always in Sochi.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who met yesterday with Côte d’Ivoire Foreign Minister Marcel Amon-Tanoh in Moscow, told reporters after their meeting that Russia expects that the summit, and the Russia-Africa economic forum to be held the day prior, will mark “a major milestone in Russian-African relations and will also help define our future partnership.”

Lavrov pointed out that African-Russian trade now exceeds $20 billion. That is small compared to Africa’s trade with China or some European countries, he said, but it is three times larger than trade in 2015, and the momentum of growth should continue.

He also reported that he and Amon-Tanoh had spoken “in detail” about anti-terrorism efforts, because of the growing terrorist activity on the African continent (e.g., ISIS) and the continuing conflicts (e.g., Somalia, Mali) which are breeding grounds for extremists and terrorists. Lavrov invited Africa to participate in the data bank for tracking foreign terrorist fighters established by the Russian Federal Security Service’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee as part of Russia’s efforts to create a global anti-terrorist coalition “without any double standards.” Some 40 special services from 35 countries are already using that anti-terrorist database, including Interpol, the UN Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure, Lavrov reported.

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

Ebola Outbreak in D.R. Congo Declared a ‘Public Health Emergency of International Concern’

July 18 (EIRNS)—The World Health Organization declared yesterday that the sustained length and geographic spread of the Ebola virus outbreak first identified on Aug. 1, 2018 in the Democratic Republic of Congo (D.R.C.), are grounds to declare the outbreak a Public Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). The outbreak was already classified as a Level 3 emergency (the worst). Once a PHEIC is declared, however, all 196 countries adhering to the International Health Regulations have “a binding international legal agreement” to “respond promptly.”

According to a MedPage news agency report on the conference call by WHO officials yesterday, the recent identification of a case in Goma, a city of almost 2 million on the border with Rwanda, was not the only alarm bell which led to the decision. “Intense transmission” of Ebola has recurred in the large city of Beni, months after its spread was thought to be stopped, the case of a woman with Ebola symptoms crossing into Uganda, and the assassination of two Ebola health workers were also cited.

The death toll of this outbreak is now nearing 1,700, with 2,512 other current cases identified.

WHO officials emphasized that so far, the outbreak is considered to be “a regional threat, but not a global threat,” and restrictions on travel and trade are not recommended.

Progress has been made since the Ebola PHEIC of 2014, in that vaccines now exist. But WHO officials called accelerating vaccine production a priority, because the one licensed Ebola vaccine which has been used so far is in such short supply that it is being distributed in half-doses right now. According to MedPage’s report, the WHO has proposed to the D.R. Congo that another vaccine, produced by Johnson & Johnson, be introduced also. TASS reported yesterday that Russia’s VECTOR Virology and Biotechnology State Research Center has offered to supply the D.R. Congo with its Ebola vaccine, which is approved for use in Russia. It operates on a different principle than the other vaccines, TASS reported.

Stopping this latest outbreak requires more than vaccines and short-term measures, however. As EIR stated repeatedly during the 2014 Ebola emergency, eradicating the threat of this most deadly of viruses, and others that will emerge, requires an international crash-program mobilization to provide adequate economic conditions (sanitation, water, power, housing) and first-class health care for Africa. (See, EIR, “Why We Are Losing the Battle against Ebola,” Sept. 19, 2014.)

Von der Leyen Vote for EU Commission President Could Cause Italian Government To Fall

July 18 (EIRNS)—The Five Star Movement (M5S) vote that has ensured the European Parliament election of Germany’s Ursula von der Leyen as EU Commission president has created a crisis in the Italian government coalition, with the Lega accusing the Five Stars of conspiring for regime change. Lega head and Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini has declared that he has “lost confidence” in his partner, deputy Prime Minister and Five Star leader Luigi Di Maio.

The Lega is accusing the Five Stars of plotting to dump the Lega and form a government with the Democratic Party (PD). “The PD and the M5S have been already in the government together for two days, in Strasbourg,” Salvini declared, referring to the fact that the M5S voted together with the PD in a quid pro quo in which the M5S was given a deputy chairman post at the European Parliament by its President Davide Sassoli, a PD member.

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte yesterday defended the M5S vote, saying that he had agreed with Merkel and Macron to support von der Leyen in exchange for a “heavy” post on the Commission for Italy. He then hinted that, contrary to previous deals among government coalition partners, the post won’t go to the Lega now. This was confirmed when the candidate, Lega member and cabinet minister Giancarlo Giorgetti officially renounced his candidacy.

Von der Leyen herself, in an interview with several European newspapers, said that governments can legitimately propose nominations, but that she makes the final decision.

The Lega also suspects that the so-called “Russiagate” against Salvini was timed with the Euro Parliament vote/negotiations and that Macron/Merkel are behind it (see below).

Pincer Movement Afoot To Take Down Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister Salvini, Lega Leader

July 18 (EIRNS)—What the Italian media have renamed “Moscopoli” (the “Russiagate” against Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini) is now being carried out at two levels, the judicial and the political.

Prosecutors in Milan (two of them from the “Mani Pulite” [“Clean Hands”] old guard) have searched the houses of two individuals who participated in the famous October, 2018 meeting at the Metropolitan hotel in Moscow, with Salvini’s friend Gianluca Savoini and alleged Russian emissaries. Numerous media reports allege that the meeting was to arrange a secret oil deal with the Russians, that would siphon money off to the Lega. The head of the prosecution office, Francesco Greco, said that they won’t interrogate Salvini—for the moment. It will be a long investigation, Greco said.

The Parliament Intelligence Oversight Commission (COPASIR) questioned Foreign Intelligence (AISE) head Gen. Luciano Carta yesterday, who said his agency had been monitoring Savoini for some time. AISE has generally monitored Russian “dense” activities in Italy, Carta said. COPASIR is chaired by a Democratic Party member, who said they want to pursue their investigation on “Moscopoli” and they might want to hear from Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte.

Whereas Salvini said he will not report to Parliament outside of the regular reports already scheduled, Conte announced that he will speak on Moscopoli before Parliament on July 24.

Speaking to journalists in Brussels today, Salvini compared Moscopoli to Russiagate. “They have been after Trump for two years and found nothing,” and “nothing happens accidentally. If they go after Trump, they easily can go after me.” Investigators won’t find anything, except that “Putin is a great leader.”

Germany Seeks New Green User Tax Legislation, as Industries Compete To Be the ‘Most Green’

July 18 (EIRNS)—The “climate cabinet” of the German government had another session in Berlin today, with an agenda of defining a roadmap for planned new legislation to drastically reduce CO2 emissions.

Social Democratic Environment Minister Svenja Schulze proposes a special tax for air flights which would price CO2 emissions and make tickets more expensive; then there is the plan for a general CO2 tax plus trade with anti-emissions certificates, the latter focussing on farming and transport. Schulze’s target is the same as the one of newly-elected European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (Christian Democrat)—reducing emissions by 55% (from the 1990 level) by 2030. The full legislation will be passed by September.

This governmental debate is flanked by similarly insane plans of private industry: BASF, Germany’s biggest chemical producer, wants to be emissions-neutral already by 2030-2040; Frankfurt Airport wants zero emissions for all buildings and ground operations by 2050; Thyssen-Krupp sees a future for steel in the production of facilities and special equipment to filter CO2 out of industrial processes.

But the justification of all these costly and inefficient measures, namely to finally close the gap between measured emissions and announced steps to reduce them, is as much of a paradox as the attempt to square the circle once and for all.

U.S. POLITICAL & ECONOMIC

Sen. Rand Paul as Envoy to Iran for President Trump?

July 18 (EIRNS)—Politico put out a much-cited story yesterday that President Donald Trump had accepted Republican Sen. Rand Paul’s proposal that he, Paul, meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif “to extend a fresh olive branch on the President’s behalf.” The proposal was reportedly made to Trump while the two were golfing together over the weekend with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC).Politico claimed four unnamed U.S. officials as its sources. One Trump Administration official “familiar with Iran issues,” when contacted by Politico about the proposed backchannel, reportedly responded: “He’s given up on all of us!”

In non-denials: President Trump today denied he had “appointed” Paul as any kind of envoy, while praising the Senator as “somebody I have a very good relationship with,” and continuing, “I respect Senator Paul and if he had some ideas I would listen.” Zarif, for his part, told reporters in New York City today only that he is “seeing people from Congress,” and if he were to see Paul, it would only be as “a respected representative,” not as an emissary.

Paul’s only report on his weekend golf discussions came in a Monday tweet replying to a Lindsey Graham tweet on the golf discussions: “Proud that Donald Trump and I argued with you against endless wars! @POTUS made it clear to all of us at the table, we are getting out of the Middle East quagmire. We’ve been there too long. Time to bring our troops home.”

Paul has been outspoken in recent weeks on the urgency of not driving Iran into a corner which leaves them with only two choices: to capitulate completely or go to war. Specifically, he has proposed that sanctions be waived on Iranian oil sales to the East (China, India, etc.), because the Iranians view the zero-sales sanctions as nothing short of an embargo. Paul also argues that a ballistic missile control agreement with Iran is needed, but that it would have been better to push negotiations on that from within the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), rather than outside it.

Secretary Pompeo Aims To Build Anti-Iran Alliance in Four-Nation Ibero-America Tour

July 18 (EIRNS)—Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will embark on a four-nation whistle stop tour of Ibero-America today, traveling to Argentina, Ecuador, Mexico and El Salvador ostensibly to strengthen “security” ties with these nations. Specifically, he seeks to consolidate an Ibero-American alliance against Hezbollah and Iran, something the U.S. has failed to do with its European allies.

Venezuela and the migration crisis will also be key topics of discussion, especially with El Salvador and Mexico.

Pompeo will be addressing the Second Western Hemisphere Counterterrorism Ministerial in Buenos Aires tomorrow, following meetings with President Mauricio Macri and other foreign ministers attending the conference. The same day, he will attend the 25th anniversary commemoration of the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish social center in Buenos Aires, which has been blamed on Hezbollah, with Iranian backing.

During a July 16 State Department briefing for media, one unnamed official specified that the 1994 AMIA bombing was “carried out by the Lebanese terrorist Hezbollah with Iranian support and direction.” Keep in mind that the investigation into that bombing, involving both the CIA and Mossad, was so badly botched, with tainted evidence and corrupt judges, that the final outcome blaming Hezbollah and Iran was suspect.

The State Department official explained that the U.S. seeks to have the ministerial conference issue a communiqué that will call for creating “domestic designations regimes” throughout the region. This is to ensure, the official said, that “countries have the same capabilities the U.S. does to impose sanctions on terrorist organizations and their financiers.” At the behest of the U.S. and Israel, Macri this week designated Hezbollah as a foreign terrorist organization.

On July 17, National Public Radio quoted former Pentagon adviser Seth Jones, who said Pompeo’s participation in AMIA event “will make the United States very happy … the U.S. is having a problem right now building a coalition against Iran.” Obama’s former National Security Director for South America Benjamin Gedan told NPR that Argentina’s designating Hezbollah as terrorist will help pressure other Ibero-American governments that have been reluctant to take unilateral action against Iran.

U.S. Booting Turkey Out of F-35 Program

July 18 (EIRNS)—The White House issued a statement yesterday, announcing that Turkish participation in the F-35 stealth fighter program is being terminated because Turkey is taking delivery of the S-400 air/missile defense system from Russia.

Turkey’s decision to purchase Russian S-400 air defense systems “renders its continued involvement with the F-35 impossible,” the statement said. “The F-35 cannot coexist with a Russian intelligence collection platform that will be used to learn about its advanced capabilities.” Pentagon officials estimated in a subsequent briefing that Turkey’s removal from the program will cost Turkish industry about $9 billion in work share, as production of components is shifted from Turkey to the U.S. and other countries participating in the program.

The Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a statement in response, warning that cutting Turkey out of the F-35 program will damage ties. The ministry called the decision “unfair” and said claims that the S-400 purchase will jeopardize the F-35’s secrets are “not valid.” It also accused the U.S. of lacking the will to resolve the problem in good faith.

The decision on Turkey’s participation in the F-35program is separate and apart from the decision on sanctions that President Donald Trump must make under the 2017 Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA). During a July 16 cabinet meeting, Trump expressed sympathy with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for being “forced” to make such a decision due to the Obama Administration’s failure to sell the Patriot air defense system to Turkey, as well as his own frustration at being forced by CAATSA to make a decision on sanctions.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Former NATO Military Chief General Kujat Slams Limited War Scenarios for Europe as ‘Absurd’

July 18 (EIRNS)—Retired German Gen. Harald Kujat, former Bundeswehr chief of staff (2000-2002) and former NATO Military Committee Chairman (2002-2005), said in an interview with Germany’s Focus weekly that scenarios making the rounds in NATO circles about an alleged Russian regionally-limited military attack on NATO member states are “totally absurd.”

Kujat says it is evident that Russia does have the military capacity to occupy the three Baltic states within a few hours, but the Russians could do that without having to go into a costly arms buildup. NATO’s rationale that it was forced to “respond” to what it claims the Russians are doing, is wrong, Kujat says.

Russia’s investments into modern weapons systems are designed to “maintain the strategic balance with the United States,” but that is not mentioned in Western defense assessments, Kujat explained. What is not mentioned at all, is that neither the United States nor NATO ever tried to insist on the continuation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF). The U.S. has “not once responded” to Russian offers to have mutual control of weapons systems onsite. And NATO itself has not shown any commitment, to this day, to resume the inspections. The right to inspect, naturally must also be granted to Russia, for instance in respect to the highly disputed “Baltic Missile Defense System” of NATO, Kujat says.

SCIENCE & INFRASTRUCTURE

Spain Celebrates Its Role in Apollo 11 Moon Landing, and in Humanity’s Space Exploration

July 18 (EIRNS)—Spanish media have recalled in recent days the role played by Spain in NASA’s Apollo program, and specifically the Apollo 11 landing. Communications between the astronauts and Houston required three points around the Earth, and the Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex was one. (The others were in California and Australia.) “Without the vital communications maintained between Apollo 11 and the Madrid space station (in Fresnedillas), we can state that our landing on the Moon would not have been possible,” astronaut Neil Armstrong said when he visited Spain three months after the historic landing.

Spanish-language Sputnik Mundo today features the remembrances of Spanish electronics engineer Carlos Gonzalez Pintado, the young maintenance and operations tech who became the first human to hear Neil Armstrong report back to Earth, “One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” He manned the NASA communications tracking and relay center in Madrid at touchdown.

Gonzalez told Sputnik today: “I like to think that above our quarrels and imperfections, our species will survive, united, throughout billions of years, thanks to the exploration of space which began in 1957 with the launching of Sputnik in an extraordinarily important historic moment for everyone.”

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