WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10, 2019

Volume 6, Number 70

EIR Daily Alert Service

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

British Opt for Dictatorship and Censorship

Missouri Basin Governors Insist Feds Build River-Control Systems, Need Space Age Mobilization

Palestine Leadership Warn of Trouble if Israel Annexes West Bank Settlements

Russian Exit from the Council of Europe, or ‘Ruxit,’ Could Be Disaster, Europeans Fear

Foreign Funding for Flood Relief in Iran Cut Off by U.S. Sanctions

Estonian President Is Visiting Moscow To Meet Putin

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EDITORIAL

London Would Be a Lot Happier, If Only Reality Didn’t Exist

April 9 (EIRNS)—The reality is that the spirit of JFK’s Apollo Project is once again stirring in the land, with the Trump Administration’s announcement last week of the country’s accelerated drive to return to the Moon, on our way to Mars. NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine delivered an enthusiastic keynote address to the Colorado Springs Space Symposium on April 9, where he stated: “This time we will go to the Moon to stay. And another thing that is unique is that, when we go to the Moon, we will go with a coalition of international partners.”

The reality is also that the Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, to be held in late April in Beijing, is taking shape as a major inflection point in the battle for economic development. There are now 124 countries and 29 international organizations that have signed cooperation agreements with China around the Belt and Road Initiative, China’s Politburo member Yang Jiechi announced a few days ago. “Support for the BRI is the mainstream view of the international community,” he noted.

And the reality, even more so, is that both of these revolutionary strategic initiatives are among the principal policies championed over decades by Lyndon LaRouche, and which are now taking shape on the world stage.

Nor has that point been lost on the British Empire, which has always tried to convince the world, philosophically and politically, that when a man dies, his power to affect change in the universe vanishes with his physical being. They are not amused—actually, they are terrified—by the growth of the power of LaRouche’s ideas, which they rightly consider an existential threat to their system.

What does the British Empire have to offer instead? Insanity. A disintegrating world financial system. A totally dysfunctional European Union (if the Brexit crisis continues much longer, the EU itself will vanish and there will be nothing for the U.K. to exit from). Regime-change destabilizations and wars, from Venezuela to Iran to Libya. The continuing lie that Russia interfered in the U.S. elections, intended to escalate into a direct confrontation with that nuclear superpower. The unending drive to destroy the Trump Presidency, undeterred by mere facts or truth. And of course the cultural depravity of a New Opium War being waged against the American population, along with the pornography and other counter-culture that go with it.

Helga Zepp-LaRouche earlier today summarized the strategic situation in the following terms:

“We have the most incredible potential for the world to move very rapidly in the direction of Lyndon LaRouche’s life’s dream— namely to create a completely different order, a New Paradigm, a new set of international relations based on science, on a vision for the future of humanity. This is clearly the dominant, underlying dynamic on the planet.”

She continued: “But it is also clear that we are in the most fierce battle, because the British Empire clearly realizes that, if they do not resort to their usual tricks of war and subversion and coups and whatnot, that they soon may be completely, historically irrelevant. So they are as dangerous as a wounded beast.”

Zepp-LaRouche added that it was crucial to help free President Trump from these British pressures, coming both from abroad and from within his own administration, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Advisor John Bolton, who have recently spearheaded the drive for confrontation and even war with China, Russia, Venezuela, Iran and others.

Zepp-LaRouche concluded: “This all comes together with the absolute need to escalate on the exoneration campaign for Lyndon LaRouche. The best and probably only way to stop the war machine is the exoneration of LaRouche, because it would target and bring out into the open the crimes committed by the same apparatus which prosecuted LaRouche, covered up 9/11, and is now running the Russiagate operation to overthrow Trump. Russiagate has been completely discredited, and that must come out in the open and be acknowledged.

“This period will be one of unbelievable changes. There will be earthquakes in Europe with the upcoming European election, which could change the landscape entirely. You have the pending clouds of what will happen with Brexit. You have a completely changed dynamic in many areas of the world.”

SCIENCE AND INFRASTRUCTURE

Bridenstine Speaks Out on the Moon-Mars Mission, ‘NASA Is Up to Doing It’

April 9 (EIRNS)—Speaking today at the 35th annual Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine laid out before the attendees what the mission is, and why it is important to carry it out.

He described how his generation missed out on the Apollo landing, and that his first space memory is from when he was in the 5th grade, and the class watched the Challenger accident. In 2003 Bridenstine was a military pilot aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, when the news was reporting the Columbia accident. He wants younger generations to “have memories of greatness, not tragedies,” he said. Referencing a discussion with ESA head Jan Woerner, he mentioned a phrase he has adopted from him: “We are not going back to the Moon, we are going forward to the Moon.”  “NASA is up to do it,” said Bridenstine.

He said the plan hasn’t changed, just the timing. He described the Gateway, which apparently they will keep in the plan (some of the hardware is already being built). The elements that are still needed, he said, are a descent vehicle from the Gateway high orbit to a lower Lunar orbit, a vehicle to take the lander to the surface, and a propulsion stage from the surface back to low Lunar orbit; to be done with public/private and international partnerships.

Bridenstine was very clear that the Lunar landing goal is primary. The program will be carried out in two phases, he explained:

In the first phase, he said, NASA “will get rid of distractions” that interfere with the 2024 goal. It starts with NASA science payloads on commercial landers, maybe by the end of this year. It will culminate in the manned landing.

In the second phase, by 2028, “sustainability” is key, by which he means reusability of all vehicles—landers, tugs between Lunar orbit, etc. Other capabilities would also be added, including using the resources on the Moon (water ice is the only thing ever mentioned). There is no plan (yet) to develop the Moon’s other resources. The Lunar program is envisioned as enabling the later mission to Mars. NASA will create a Moon-to-Mars group to consolidate all the related research.

Bridenstine then described the new discoveries by spacecraft on Mars, and the next, Mars 2020 rover, which is the first step in returning samples. He reported that the discoveries point further to the possibility of life on Mars.

He addressed, as he has before, the concern that funding the Lunar program will “cannibalize” other programs, especially in space science. He stated that there are political challenges (getting Congress onboard) and budget challenges (getting money out of the Office of Management and Budget), and that NASA is working on an amendment to the FY20 budget for an increase. NASA will also work on getting an exception if there is a continuing resolution.

Bridenstine again stressed that leadership will include partners, certainly the ISS partners, and also the many new space programs, which may not have a lot to contribute now, but will.

From Argonauts to Astronauts, Greece Is Preparing To Get to the Moon

April 9 (EIRNS)—The Hellenic Space Organization (ELDO), created in March 2018, is preparing Greece to participate in the exploration of the Moon, which will at some point involve the first Greek astronauts. This will be made possible by an agreement between ELDO and NASA, in which ELDO will become a partner NASA’s mission to establish a permanent presence on the Moon by 2024, as President Donald Trump announced on March 26.

ELDO has signed a Joint Declaration of Cooperation with NASA on the sidelines of the World Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, on April 8. Signatories included ELDO CEO Georgios Mantzouris and NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine with Greek Minister for Digital Policy Nikos Pappas and ELDO Chairman Christodoulos Protopappas also present.  NASA Administrator Bridenstine said: “This time we will go to the Moon to stay. And another thing that is unique is that when we go to the Moon, we will go with a coalition of international partners. And we are excited that the Hellenic Space Agency, which has now completed one year of operation, will be with us this time we return to the Moon.”

Under the agreement Greece will take part in the Lunar Orbital Platform—Gateway (LOP-G) and exchange of information and data for academic and scientific research, as well as include participation of Greek educational institutions in international programs, among other benefits.

ELDO intends to land, via the LOP-G, its own robotic lunar vehicle to carry out exploration and experiments. It is expected to take place in 2022.

Minister Pappas stressed: “Today’s agreement is historic. One year after the establishment of Hellenic Space Organization, Greece will go to the Moon. It will be in the small group of countries in the history of humanity who have sent their own vehicle to the Moon. The Greek research community does not have to envy any of the research communities in other countries and I think we have a section that will give a new breath to both the research and the international displacement of Greece.”

Mantzouris, said: “Today is a historic day for Greece, I am very happy and at the same time very excited because after nine months of hard work we manage to sign today a joint cooperative agreement with NASA based on two pillars: a) General space cooperation; and b) Sending the robotic vehicle to the Moon. The benefits will be immense for society, science, the economy, but especially for young people. That’s why we urge young people to join the Hellenic Space Organization and we all come to realize this co-operative agreement that we just signed up to. As CEO of ELDO, I am pleased to announce that we will shortly be in the process of completing the staffing of the organization, and with all our efforts we will serve the strategic goals that the state has set for the period until 2040 and who knows…. “

THE NEW GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Five-Day European Tour

April 9 (EIRNS)—Chinese Premier Li Keqiang will be in Europe from April 8-12, beginning with a China-EU annual meeting in Brussels. Li published an article in the German financial daily Handelsblatt, headlined “Embracing Openness and Cooperation for Mutual Benefit,” in which he wrote:

“Our two sides need to work together to promote an open world economy and address long-running issues and new challenges confronting the human society to inject stability into an increasingly uncertain world.” Li said further that “China is ready to work with Europe to promote two-way opening-up and provide a level playing field for our companies to strengthen cooperation in each other’s countries.”

After the China-EU leaders’ meeting, Li will go to Croatia for an official visit and the eighth heads of government meeting of China and Central and Eastern European Countries (China-CEEC, aka 16+1). According to China Daily, “At the 21st China-EU Leaders’ Meeting in Brussels on Tuesday, Premier Li Keqiang is expected to underscore China’s resolve to deepen strategic mutual trust and cooperation with the EU, including on the Belt and Road Initiative that China has proposed as a means for improving global connectivity and shared development. This year, Italy and Luxembourg signed memorandums of understanding with China to jointly advance the construction of the Belt and Road, bringing to 22 the total number of European countries that have signed cooperative agreements with China on the initiative.”

Panama Insists U.S. Join the Belt and Road Initiative, Too

April 9 (EIRNS)—Panama is an active participant in the Belt and Road Initiative initiated by China, which project is not viewed as opposed to Panama’s historic ties to the United States, but as a wide-open opportunity for vastly expanded cooperation for the Americas, emphatically including the United States.

This oft-stated view of the Panamanian government was reiterated most recently by the lead economist of the Panama Canal Authority and Ministry of Commerce consultant Eddie Tapiero, in an interview with Xinhua on the sidelines of the April 3 conference of the Brazil-Panama Chamber of Commerce and Investments in Panama City, which Tapiero had addressed.

Tapiero told Xinhua that the Second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation later this month in Beijing is an opportunity like no other. “The United States has to be part of the (Belt and) Road. It is a great commercial partner; it is an ally, and it has a lot to offer. It is not a question of exchanging one for another (the United States for China), but of working in collaboration, of invigorating the new 21st century and looking at the long term,” Tapiero argued.

In his presentation to an auditorium packed with Brazilian and Panamanian businessmen and officials, Tapiero spoke of this New Silk Road, reviving the old commercial routes of the Ancient Silk Road, as an opportunity which neither Brazil nor Panama should let pass. “Opportunities have risks, but that is not a reason to not take them.” China “represents an opportunity for change,” he said, reminding the audience of the hundreds of millions of people China has lifted out of poverty in a few decades.

ASEAN Will Reject Geopolitical Confrontation with China, Affirms Global Times Op-Ed

April 9 (EIRNS)—An April 8 op ed by Li Qingqing in Global Timesstated that the U.S. is trying to organize resistance to Huawei’s 5G capability among South East Asian nations, but “they are not heeding the warning about possible security risks…. Washington does not seem to be aware that its approach will eventually make it more and more marginalized. ASEAN has experienced profound changes and its cooperation with major economies such as China, Japan and South Korea is changing the political and economic structure of Asia. Economic and trade relations between China and ASEAN are becoming inseparable, and the free trade agreement between the two is also being upgraded. The two sides have also built cooperation mechanisms in financial cooperation, counter-terrorism, anti-piracy, health and epidemic prevention, as well as many other areas. China and ASEAN are both promoting negotiations on the Code of Conduct in the South China Sea. All these mechanisms will eventually help the two sides enhance bilateral exchanges and gradually form a new order in the region. In this process, ASEAN’s dependence on the U.S. will be inevitably weakened, especially its military dependence. In our world today, no country wants to help the U.S. start a war against China and benefit from it.”

Li Qingqing concluded: “The best way is for the U.S. to adjust its strategic stance and participate more actively in the development of the region. The U.S. should understand it is a member of the cooperation community rather than a boss who gives orders.”

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Lang Warns, U.S. Designating Iran’s IRGC as a Terrorist Organization Is a Declaration of War

April 9 (EIRNS)—On April 7, the day before the Trump Administration announced that it would be designating Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization, but as the press leaks on it were reaching a crescendo, retired Col. Patrick Lang put it in the context of the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF), which makes it legal for the U.S. military to attack any armed group deemed to be a terrorist threat.

“The official designation as ‘terrorist’ of the IRGC which is a 125,000 man army with its own navy and air force makes it legal for the U.S. Armed Forces to attack the IRGC and its people wherever they are found and under any circumstances that may occur,” he wrote on his blog, “Sic Semper Tyrannis.” “It is a declaration of war.”

“The neocon nitwits (Pompeo, Bolton, Hannah, etc.) may think that Iran’s reaction to this declaration of war will be submission to their will but IMO that is very unlikely,” he concluded. “IMO it is more likely that the IRGC will absorb the new reality and will prepare for war with the U.S.”

Lang’s warning that the designation is a declaration of war was echoed by a number of other observers, among them Mintpress journalist Whitney Webb, who quoted Lang to that effect, as well as some other experts. Trita Parsi, founder of the National Iranian American Council, told the Financial Times that the designation “closes yet another potential door for peacefully resolving tensions with Iran. Once all doors are closed, and diplomacy is rendered impossible, war will essentially become inevitable.”

Trump Risks Being Conned into a Quagmire, Admonishes Iran Foreign Minister Zarif

April 9 (EIRNS)—Iranian Foreign Minister Mohamed Javad Zarif responded to President Donald Trump’s announcement that the U.S. would soon be designating the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a foreign terrorist organization (aka FTO), by advising him not to be conned into another disastrous war. “#NetanyahuFirsters who have long agitated for FTO designation of the IRGC fully understand its consequences for U.S. forces in the region. In fact, they seek to drag U.S. into a quagmire on his behalf,” he said in a Twitter posting on Monday morning, reported Tasnim. “@realDonaldTrump should know better than to be conned into another U.S. disaster,” his tweet said.

Legislatively, the Iranian parliament is responding by passing a “triple urgency” bill that will label the U.S. military, specifically U.S. Central Command, a terrorist organization in the eyes of Iran. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi explained that this means that Tehran no longer regards U.S. troops in the Southwest Asia region as ordinary soldiers. “From now on, U.S. troops in the [Middle East] region will not be ordinary soldiers from our point of view. They are terrorist forces, and U.S. bases in the region are also terror bases, and the way we deal with them will definitely be different from that of the past,” he said. He made clear that Iran has sent the U.S. a clear message in that regard via the Embassy of Switzerland, which represents the U.S. interests in Iran.

Another Round of Heavy Russia-Bashing in German Media

April 9 (EIRNS)—Tonight, the German TV program ARTE will air the first of a three-part, prime-time series against Russia. The propaganda piece, titled “KGB—Shield and Sword,” was promoted in a four-page story on ARTE Magazin.

This comes on top of a hyped-up cover story in the April 6 issue ofDer Spiegel, the largest-circulation weekly in Europe, on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s alleged efforts to control the German Bundestag, through one Bundestag member, Markus Frohnmaier of the Alternative for Germany party. The story, which presents no proof whatever, was “researched” by international cooperation between Germany’s second national TV channel ZDF, Britain’s BBC, and the Italian news daily, La Repubblica. The supposed documents used for the story came from the “Dossier Center” of George Soros’s Russian oligarch buddy, Mikhail Khodorkovsky. This center was created to circulate leaked and hacked information designed to harm Putin and people around him. The German investigative platform “NachDenkSeiten,” however, yesterday suggested that the story might have come from a hack by Great Britain’s spy center, GCHQ—the equivalent of the U.S. NSA—drawing the parallel to Russiagate.

Put this together with ZDF anchorman Claus Kleber’s irresponsible announcement on April 4 on the prime time “Heute Journal” show, that NATO had just begun a war against Russia in Estonia, to “defeat the Russian forces, which have put themselves there, like in Crimea a few years back.” A few seconds later, Kleber acknowledged that this was only a fiction, but a “realistic one,” because in the event of a real attack against a NATO member states, even one as small as Estonia, NATO would have to respond. “If that [response] is put into question, deterrence will crumble, which for 70 years has secured peace in Europe. Today, the problem is that this Alliance at its 70th anniversary seems more volatile than ever in its history,” Kleber said on April 4, the same day NATO was celebrating its 70th anniversary in Washington.

One day later, Kleber again said on “Heute Journal”: “Good evening, we have to talk about war. There is war, you just don’t realize it. Modern wars no longer need any tanks and bombs, ideally. They are able to subvert the society, the public discussion and decision-making processes in other powers, in such a way that they give in. From the Brexit decision, to elections in Europe, to the U.S. presidency, there are obvious signs that Russian operatives have intervened,” Kleber intoned.

U.S. POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC

William Craddick Features ‘It’s Time for Bolton To Go’

April 9 (EIRNS)—Thus titled William Craddick of Disobedient Media his latest article, published yesterday. “Has there ever been a single individual in the Trump Administration who has caused more damage to the President’s agenda?” he asks.

It was President Donald Trump’s March 17 re-tweeting of a tweet by Craddick on the British hand behind Russiagate—“Russiagate was designed in part to help the UK counter Russian influence by baiting the United States into taking a hard line against them. Leaves us all with a more dangerous world as a consequence. Just another episode of the Great Game.”—which so upset London.

In his current article, Craddick warns the President that John Bolton represents an “extreme danger” as the establishment war party’s man deployed to sink his Presidency:

“Bolton’s hawkish views and his tendency to subvert anyone he personally feels poses a threat to American security and interests make him an extreme danger to the current government. A failure to replace him will leave Trump unable to secure the promises he made to his constituents about curtailing foreign wars and creating new economic opportunities for the United States.”

Craddick focuses on two particular fronts of Bolton’s warmongering: North Korea (advocating “the Libyan model”) and the campaign against Venezuela and the “Troika of Tyranny.” On the latter, Craddick accurately foresees that “the problems that are ongoing in Venezuela today play into a wider trend of regional destabilization across Latin America that would only be intensified by Bolton’s intended policies and cause a major refugee crisis for the United States.”

Craddick hammered on the pitfalls of this Venezuela operation with a tweet later in the day linked to an article on elements of the narcoterrorist FARC regrouping for war in Colombia, accompanied by his warning that “If Trump goes with the Bolton-Pence plan to destabilize Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba it won’t just be those three countries that fall apart. Ripple effects are serious and will have major consequences for the United States.”

Let Venezuela and North Korea become Bolton’s “Waterloo Moment,” Craddick insists. “Trump must dismiss Bolton before he does irreparable damage to the administration’s America First foreign policy approach. This agenda has served as a threat to the GOP and neoconservative establishment. Bolton is their plan to stave off any further damage.”

Climate Nuts Still Trying To Sink Presidential Climate Science Review

April 9 (EIRNS)—Unnamed senior administration officials told two different media this month that the creation of a Presidential Committee on Climate Security to review the actual causes of climate change is still “under active review,” with no final decision made.

The “man-made climate change” hoax apparatus is therefore scrambling. One proposal put forward by “several camps in the White House” is to replace the idea of a panel staffed by independent climate scientists with an “internal” review carried out by federal government climate researchers, McClatchy reported on April 2. This idea is reportedly coming from people in the Domestic Policy Council, the Council on Environmental Quality, and the Council of Economic Advisors, who “roundly oppose” any independent panel.

Roy Spencer, a former NASA scientist who is now the principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, calls the proposal to have government researchers “dependent upon climate alarmism for their programs to stay funded” carry out the review, “would be like having only tobacco company executives on a committee to look into the connection between smoking and cancer. Or like the EPA (until recently) having their Science Advisory Committee made up of only researchers who received tens of millions of dollars in EPA grants,” the Washington Times reported yesterday.

The Washington Post weighed in yesterday, too, profiling the Departments of Defense and State, the EPA, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence as keeping their distance from any such White House panel, and alleging staunch military support for the climate “threat.” The Post cites the testimony given before the Senate Armed Forces Committee last week by the Air Force Chief of Staff, the commanders of U.S. European Command and the U.S. Transportation Command, and by the NATO Supreme Allied Commander for Europe, each insisting on the threat to national security from climate change.

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