WEDNESDAY, JULY 24, 2019

Volume 6, Number 145

EIR Daily Alert Service

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

• The Broader Strategic Implications of the Moon-Mars Project
• China Congratulates India on Chandrayaan-2 Launch, Offers to Collaborate in Space Exploration
• NASA Has Invited Argentina’s Space Agency to Join the Artemis Moon Mission
• ‘Sic Semper Tyrannis’ Blogger Writes U.S. Would Do Well to Work With China on Belt and Road
• Bolivia Is Using Directed Credit To Reduce Poverty, Achieve Real Economic Growth
• New York Times Editorial: U.S. Must Split Russia and China To Stop the ‘Colossal Belt and Road Program’
• Bolton Trying to Drum Up Support for U.S. Persian Gulf Maritime Security Scheme
• Inspector General Has the Goods on James Comey’s ‘J. Edgar Hoover’ Replay Against Donald Trump
• Democrats Nadler and Harris Team Up With George Soros on Sweeping Marijuana ‘Reform’
• Boris Johnson Elected New Conservative Party Leader, Will Move into No. 10 Downing Street

EDITORIAL

The Broader Strategic Implications of the Moon-Mars Project

July 23 (EIRNS)—The world is engulfed in a wave of cultural optimism as it recalls the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon 50 years ago, and ponders the prospects of applying that same Kennedy-esque “can-do” approach to the daunting tasks facing humanity today. A leading obstacle in the way of the kind of international cooperation needed for our next step as a space-faring species, is the anti-China campaign being promoted by leading Establishment circles in the United Kingdom and the United States today.

The problem was evident at the recent space conference in Zhuhai, China, which brought together leading scientists from China, Russia, India, Europe and other nations—but not the United States—to discuss a joint effort to build a Moon research station. “The U.S. is shooting itself in the foot by not participating in such international cooperation,” Helga Zepp- LaRouche said today. The British geopolitical campaign which views China as an opponent and even an enemy—as repeated in a Sunday New York Times Editorial Board statement—is “wrong thinking” which needs to end, and end fast, she said.

We are at the dawn of a new age of civilization, in which Man will industrialize the Moon and colonize Mars. President Trump’s announcement that “We are going” to the Moon by 2024, as a stepping stone to Mars, carries the right spirit, but few of the economic and scientific policy specifics required to actually fulfill that mission. Those have been provided by visionary space scientist Krafft Ehricke, and by the renowned statesman Lyndon LaRouche, who presented, over 30 years ago, the policies required to carry out such a project.

It can be scientifically asserted, Zepp-LaRouche stated in a discussion with associates, that for that reason the exoneration of LaRouche and Mankind’s required space policy are one and the same issue.

“I think the most important thing is that you got a glimpse of what kind of human spirit is possible, once people concentrate on the common aims of mankind, on the tremendous creative potential of the human species to overcome every limitation, as Krafft Ehricke said, and as Lyndon LaRouche devoted his entire life’s work to this idea. The two issues—space exploration and LaRouche’s exoneration—are really one and the same thing.

“Because once he is exonerated, there would be a complete exploration and discussion of his ideas. Every student, every person could start to read LaRouche’s works in an unprejudiced way. The creative potential which would be unleashed by doing that is huge: his conceptions in almost every field of knowledge are the most advanced, and only very few people have even an inkling of what the scientific debate is, for example, between a Riemannian universe conception and that of the reductionist-deductionist approach.

“Once you have an unmediated discussion about that, this would be like the introduction of Plato into the fertile ferment of the Italian Renaissance, in which Nikolaus of Cusa was the founder of the modern nation-state, and modern science.

“The two times Europe came out of a dark age, going into a Renaissance, they always would refer back to the highest ideas which were produced by mankind up to that point, which meant the Italian Renaissance went back to the ancient Greek Classic; and the German Classic went back to both the ancient Greek Classic and the Italian Renaissance, and naturally also Shakespeare, who was translated into German at a point when he was less known even in Great Britain.

“Today we are in a dark age. And if we want to get out of this, we have to unleash the whole world—Chinese scholars, Indian scholars, Russian scholars—to look at LaRouche’s body of ideas in the same way as people look at Plato, and Cusa, and Leibniz, and Einstein. This is especially key now, with his ideas about a relativistic universe, which people have to consider once we start space travel. Once we go to Mars, it will not be by conventional propulsion, because that is just not bearable.

“And once we go into a relativistic idea of the universe, as the precondition to travel safely to Mars, and later beyond, it means a complete revolution in the thinking of man, and that is why we need LaRouche’s entire works to be available, unprejudiced with all the slanders he has been subjected to.

“So I think the excitement about this new revivalof the ‘Moon fever,’ the Apollo 11 50th anniversary, has to be combined with the exoneration of LaRouche. And we should concentrate on the idea that Buzz Aldrin stated—he was the only one who has mentioned this—that we need an international united space alliance for this to happen.”

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

China Congratulates India on Chandrayaan-2 Launch, Offers To Collaborate in Space Exploration

July 23 (EIRNS)—In today’s press briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying offered congratulations to India on the successful launch of the Chandrayaan-2 lunar probe.

“The exploration and utilization of outer-space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies,” she said, “is the common cause for mankind and should serve the common good of mankind. China has been committed to the peaceful use of outer-space and actively conducted relevant international communication and cooperation. We stand ready to work with India and other relevant parties to make contributions to the exploration of outer-space and bringing benefits to humankind.”

RT and other media make the obvious point that were China and India to collaborate on space exploration or a mission to the Moon, it would provide an opportunity for both powers to repair their relations.

The Hindu Business Line today quoted Wu Weiren, chief of China’s lunar exploration program, who also congratulated India on its launch success, and emphasized that while China is actively pursuing its own Moon mission, it is not in competition with any other nation planning their own space missions. China is paying close attention to other nations’ space endeavors, Wu stressed, but added that the “international trend will not play a decisive role in China’s planning on its lunar missions, and China is not going to compete with anyone on the matter.”

Wu also indicated that Chinese scientists are conducting feasibility studies on sending astronauts to the Moon, which he said, “won’t be too much of a problem.” But he offered no details as for a timetable for such a mission.

NASA Has Invited Argentina’s Space Agency To Join the Artemis Moon Mission

July 23 (EIRNS)—The Argentine daily Perfil reported July 22 that NASA has invited Argentina’s National Space Activities Commission (CONAE) to participate in the Artemis mission to return to the Moon in 2024, and then moving on to further space exploration.

CONAE’s executive director Raul Kulichevsky met with NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine at the end of March, during which, Kulichevsky reported, Bridenstine emphasized the importance “of having a consortium of nations, rather than an individual effort by the United States,” to fulfill the mission. Although Kulichevsky said that talks are still in the preliminary stages, there are many options for CONAE’s participation, given its decades of experience and international prestige. NASA knows, and “we know,” Kulichevsky said, “that we can contribute” to Artemis, “which is much broader than just returning to the Moon.” The U.S. plan is to first establish itself on the Moon, to then go on to other planets, and it understands, he emphasized, that it’s difficult to do this alone. Thus, it’s trying to establish an alliance among different space agencies.

Argentine aeronautical engineer Pablo de Leon, professor of Space Studies at the University of North Dakota and director of the NASA-financed Manned Space Flight Laboratory there, told Perfil that “these missions are undertakings of all of humanity, not just of one country. NASA is interested in working with countries with common interests, as is the peaceful exploration of space, and I have no doubt there will be great interest in bringing Argentina into the project.” Argentina in the past turned down a chance to participate in the International Space Station, De Leon said, but “now we have a chance to participate in this new adventure of human exploration of the cosmos, and we can’t miss it.”

Dr. de Leon has worked on prototypes of bases that NASA intends to set up on the Moon, and has also designed the NDX-2 space suit that astronauts will have to wear on the Moon, the Canadian Great Lakes Ledger reported a year ago August. The new spacesuit—as of that writing there hadn’t been a new one designed for the Moon since 1977—must regulate humidity, temperature and pressure, so it’s as complex as a spacecraft itself, as it also holds communications systems and protects astronauts from radiation. The suits used by astronauts on the ISS, are “patched up” ones from earlier use, but are not suitable for use on the Moon, De Leon explained.

Dr. de Leon founded in 1987 the Argentine Association of Space Technology (AATE), and since 199, has organized twice yearly meetings of the Argentine Space Technology Congress.

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

‘Sic Semper Tyrannis’ Blogger Writes U.S. Would Do Well To Work with China on Belt and Road

July 23 (EIRNS)—Writing in Col. Pat Lang’s “Sic Semper Tyrannis” blog, regular contributor “Harper” reviews the history of the Belt and Road Initiative from the time that President Xi Jinping first presented it in 2013, stating that the U.S., under Barack Obama, had refused to join the initiative, and tried, but failed to convince other nations to stay away from it and refuse to join such institutions as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

Writing under the headline, “The Belt and Road—a Marshall Plan with Chinese Characteristics,” Harper points out that Western nations have failed miserably to invest in urgently needed infrastructure in developing nations, so it should come as no surprise that China has moved into the vacuum. The U.S. has finally taken a small and belated action by passing the BUILD Act, which created the International Development Finance Corporation with an initial capital of $60 billion (to be spread throughout the developing sector).

This very limited step is moving in the right direction, Harper observes, but suggests a better option would be to provide alternative financing for infrastructure in the Southern part of the globe. And better yet, why not join the Chinese effort, which he suggests is a way to ensure it won’t become a “Chinese geopolitical trump card.”) Beijing invited the U.S. to join the AIIB and participate in joint investments, to no avail; it even proposed investing its $1 trillion in U.S. Treasury holdings in a national infrastructure bank “to redress America’s crumbling infrastructure.” The U.S. has yet to respond.

Bolivia Is Using Directed Credit To Reduce Poverty, Achieve Real Economic Growth

July 23 (EIRNS)—Bolivia’s Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera, while visiting Mexico last week, spoke with a reporter for CNN Mexico, who asked him how Bolivia had achieved the highest rate of economic growth in South America in recent years, under the Evo Morales presidency:

“It has been done by fusing financial capital with productive capital, by requiring the private banking sector to channel 60% of its money to productive investment and construction. Likewise, it was decided that 50% of the private bank sector’s earnings would go to the State. Since this money is returned to society and that invigorates the economy, that then returns to the banks…. What the banks lost with one hand, at the end they recover with the other.”

The approach is working—as it has whenever Hamiltonian credit policies have been applied around the world. If one looks at indices of physical production (i.e., not GDP or other monetary measures), manufacturing in Bolivia grew at an average annual rate of 2.5% in the 11 years between 1994 and 2005, and after Morales came into office in January 2006, over the next 11 years (2005-2016) the average annual growth rate jumped to 4.3%. Electricity generation grew by 3.7% per year in the first period, and by 5.3% per year under Morales. Cement production rose by 5.8% per year in the first period, and by 8.7% in the second one.

Such physical indices give a much more scientific reading of the country’s real economy than the standard GDP figures, which showing an even more dramatic shift, growing at an average annual rate of 5.3% from 1994-2005, and by 12.2% from 2005-2016.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

New York Times Editorial: U.S. Must Split Russia and China To Stop the ‘Colossal Belt and Road Program’

July 23 (EIRNS)—A July 21 editorial by the New York Times Editorial Board put on a dazzling display of ancien régime British geopolitical thinking, for which the Times is justly renowned.

Under the headline “What’s America’s Winning Hand if Russia Plays the China Card?” the editorial frets that “China and Russia are growing even closer, suggesting a more permanent arrangement that could pose a complex challenge to the United States.” The Timeseditorial ticks off a list of concerns, that they seem to have just discovered—although they have been happening for years: Presidents Putin and Xi have met 30 times since 2013; Xi called Putin his “best and greatest friend”; Russia is selling China its latest military technology; they are engaging in joint Arctic research; and “they often vote alike at the UN and have similar positions on Iran and North Korea.”

But the Times reserves its greatest alarm for the fact that “In his State of the Nation address in February, Mr. Putin expressed confidence that ties with China would enhance Russian security and prosperity, especially as he aligns his Eurasian Economic Union plan with China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative, a colossal infrastructure program designed to link China with Asia, Africa and Europe.”

The editorial then presents a number of unadulterated British utopian proposals, echoing the British imperial line of State Department Policy Planning head Kiron Skinner (whom they do not name), Pentagon white paper author John Arquilla (whom they do cite), and the establishment think-tank CSIS (also mentioned).

“Given its economic, military and technological trajectory, together with its authoritarian model, China, not Russia, represents by far the greater challenge to American objectives over the long term. That means President Trump is correct to try to establish a sounder relationship with Russia and peel it away from China.”

The Times editors thenhave a number of proposals for what Trump should do: “The United States and Russia could expand their cooperation in space. The United States is already dependent on Russian rockets to reach the International Space Station. They could also continue to work closely in the Arctic, as members of the Arctic Council that has negotiated legally binding agreements governing search and rescue operations and responses to oil spills. And they could revive cooperation on arms control, especially by extending the New Start Treaty.”

The New York Times editorial concludes: “China is a rising power and the dominant partner; Russia is declining. China has the world’s second largest economy; Russia’s is not even in the top 10. Still, their shared objectives could increase, further threatening Western interests. America needs to rally its democratic allies, rather than berate them, and project a more confident vision of its own political and economic model.”

Bolton Trying To Drum Up Support for U.S. Persian Gulf Maritime Security Scheme

July 23 (EIRNS)—U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton is now in Seoul, South Korea, after a stopover in Japan. Part of his mission, besides dealing with U.S.-Japan-South Korea matters, is to convince both governments that they should join the U.S. maritime security scheme aimed at Iran called Operation Sentinel. While in Tokyo, Bolton met with Foreign Minister Kono Taro, Defense Minister Iwaya Takeshi and Yachi Shotaro, a key security adviser to Prime Minister Abe Shinzo. According to the Japan Times, Iwaya told reporters that he and Bolton did not specifically discuss details of the U.S.-proposed maritime security operation. Japan will first focus on diplomatic efforts to ease tensions in the region and Tokyo will “consider the U.S. proposal after closely examining its details,” Iwaya said.

Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, just coming off a landslide parliamentary election victory, reiterated that he wants to learn more about Washington’s intentions before deciding if or how Japan can cooperate, hinting that he is not planning to join the effort immediately, reported Associated Press. “In order to ease tensions, we hope to make Japan’s own effort first,” Abe said. “We have to wait until we hear more about what the U.S. is talking about, as we don’t have a clear picture of its purposes and other details.”

More broadly, the U.S.-Iran confrontation remains on a razor’s edge and President Donald Trump, in remarks with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, stated: “We are ready for the absolute worst,” he said. “And we’re ready for sense, too. But we are very geared up.  And if they… they are really the number-one state of terror in the world.” Trump concluded: “And I’ll tell you, it could go either way very easily.  Very easily. And I’m okay either way it goes.”

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

Inspector General Has the Goods on James Comey’s ‘J. Edgar Hoover’ Replay against Donald Trump

July 23 (EIRNS)—In a piece on RealClearInvestigations on July 22, Paul Sperry provides details of James Comey’s attempted entrapment of President Donald Trump.  Sperry’s work is based on leaks from Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s investigation.  Horowitz’s report is now scheduled for release in early September.  Sperry’s shocking piece is clearly timed to precede Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s staged kabuki show before the U.S. Congress on July 24.

While this news service has long characterized Comey’s activities post-election as an illegal FBI entrapment and counterintelligence hit on the sitting President of the United States, Sperry’s article provides stunning new details.  It includes the fact, unreported until now, that Comey inserted FBI spies into the White House staff, while himself acting as an undercover FBI informant in the illegal operation targetting the President of the United States.

Sperry recounts in detail how Comey constantly told Trump he was not a target of the Russiagate investigation while “running a covert operation against” the President starting with what Comey falsely described as a “defensive” briefing of the President on Jan. 6, 2017 at Trump Tower in New York.  That briefing concerned one paragraph of British agent Christopher Steele’s dirty dossier on Donald Trump.  AsEIR and others have previously reported, Comey and FBI agents codenamed Christopher Steele’s fake dirty dossier and other British intelligence fabrications against Trump as the “Crown materials,” to wit attributed to the British Queen, in internal FBI documents.

According to Sperry’s sources, the details of that briefing were agreed to in a Jan. 5 Oval Office meeting attended by Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Susan Rice, Homeland Security’s Jeh Johnson, Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, and National Intelligence Director James Clapper.

Sperry reports that the next day, Comey departed for his mission.  Before leaving he met at FBI headquarters with a “group of counterespionage officials and agents who were read in on the plan—code-named the ‘sensitive matter team’—for an update on the allegations against Trump and the overall Russia investigation.”  It is probable that this team constituted what Comey referred to as his “murder board” in Congressional testimony.  In his Congressional testimony, Comey said that he met with this “Board” both before and after all of his meetings with the President, all of which he recounted in “secret” contemporaneous memoranda which he locked in his safe.

In his January counterintelligence operation, Comey only told the President about the filthy and fake Christopher Steele claims about Trump cavorting with Russian prostitutes while being taped, and never told the incoming President that Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, George Papadopoulos, and Carter Page were currently under formal investigation by the FBI, that the torrent of British flim-flam which triggered the FBI investigation had been paid for by Hillary Clinton, and that the President himself was the target of Comey’s investigation.  Instead, Comey lied to the President repeatedly, saying that he was not the target of an FBI investigation of individuals in his campaign, while trying to provoke the President into a perjury trap and obstruction of justice.  Comey’s Congressional testimony of May 3, 2017, saying that the President was and could be a target, immediately preceded his firing by Trump.

According to Sperry, Comey typed up his notes on his laptop in his government vehicle less than five minutes after he walked out of Trump Tower in January of 2017, according to a heavily redacted Jan. 7, 2017 email to his top aides. Comey self-classified the notes at the “SECRET” level. “I executed the session exactly as planned,” Comey reported back to his “sensitive matter team.”

Comey referred to this as his “J Edgar Hoover” moment in his Congressional testimony and the entire file of dirty, faked, Queen’s materials concerning the President-elect of the United States was almost immediately leaked to BuzzFeed for worldwide publication prior to the President’s inauguration.

Democrats Nadler and Harris Team Up with George Soros on Sweeping Marijuana ‘Reform’

July 23 (EIRNS)—Today, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) introduced legislation for a sweeping reform of federal marijuana laws in the United States to ensure that people are too doped up to realize what’s going on around them. Harris, a Democratic pre-candidate for President, intoned that “times have changed. Marijuana should not be a crime.”

This is being done in conjunction with drug kingpin George Soros’s Drug Policy Alliance (DPA), which chortled in a press release today that “we and our allies have been working with Representative Nadler and Senator Harris for months” to produce the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act (MORE). One of the bill’s priorities is to decriminalize marijuana at the federal level—marijuana is currently prohibited by the Federal Controlled Substances Act—and include social and criminal justice provisions, CNBC reported. Under new provisions, states would be able to write their own policies.

The justification offered for the bill is pernicious. As the DPA puts it, people’s lives “have been ruined for decades”—not by deindustrialization, unemployment, economic and cultural decay, drugs, etc. but “by prohibition,” which has “disproportionately affected people of color.” Removing marijuana from the federal Controlled Substances Act, the DPA explains, will make it possible to prioritize and “reinvest in those who have been most affected by our failed marijuana laws.” This will “correct the historical injustices caused by prohibition!”

Absent federal law, the bill will target minority communities, allowing them to participate in the “economic boom” offered by marijuana businesses, and “repair the damage by the war on drugs.” The bill will also require pot convictions to be expunged or resentenced.

A hearing by the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs was scheduled for today to discuss the “challenges the cannabis industry faces” in obtaining financial services. Maritza Perez, an analyst at the Center for American Progress extols the new law, as it will remove those obstacles which have prevented minorities from benefitting from the burgeoning marijuana business. According to CNBC, the Nadler-Harris bill will supposedly use cannabis tax revenue to set up three funds to help people in communities “that have been harmed in the War on Drugs.” The community reinvestment grant would provide job training, legal aid and other social programs. The bill calls for a Cannabis Justice Officer to administer the money.

OTHER

Boris Johnson Elected New Conservative Party Leader, Will Move into No. 10 Downing Street

July 23 (EIRNS)— As widely expected Boris Johnson has won the leadership race for the Conservative Party and will now move into No. 10 Downing Street as Her Majesty’s next prime minister. He will officially take office on July 24, Wednesday afternoon, when he will also present himself to the Queen. He won 66%, 92,153 votes, to Jeremy Hunt’s 46,656. Turnout was 87.4% among 159,320 party members. While he received more votes than other prime ministers, it is not considered spectacular. David Cameron had received 68%, when he ran in the last decade. While he received a higher percentage than Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn in the previous Labour Party race, it must be noted that the Labour Party has 600,000 members.

In his first speech before his ministers and party staff, he repeated his campaign mantra: “Deliver Brexit, unite the country and defeat Jeremy Corbyn.” He added that “some wag” had pointed out that the initials spelled out “dud,” and he went on to joke that the final “e, for energize,” had been left out. “I say to all the doubters: Dude, we are going to energize the country!” He said he would “get Brexit done by Oct. 31” with a “new spirit of can-do.”

President Donald Trump, upon hearing of Johnson’s election, tweeted: “He will be great!”

Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn stated of Johnson’s election: “After almost a decade of austerity, we need a prime minister on the side of the many, not the few,” pointing out he had won the support of fewer than 100,000 “unrepresentative” Conservative Party members by “promising tax cuts for the richest, presenting himself as the bankers’ best friend, and pushing for a damaging no-deal Brexit.”

Labour is holding a rally in Parliament Square on July 25 demanding a general election.

Johnson will be busy over the next days appointing cabinet ministers to positions vacated by ministers who resigned because they did not agree with his no deal Brexit policy. This includes Alan Duncan, who quit the Foreign Office, and Anne Milton as Education Minister, while Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond, Justice Secretary David Gauke, and International Development Secretary Rory Stewart are expected to resign in the coming days. He will also have to deal with the Tories’ wafer-thin parliamentary working majority, which could be whittled down further next week to two, if the Liberal Democrats win the Brecon and Radnorshire by-elections.

Reach us at eirdailyalert@larouchepub.com or call 1-571-293-0935