EDITORIAL

Western Society in Collapse—New Paradigm, or New Dark Age

July 26 (EIRNS)—Bloody mass killings now fill the headlines on a daily basis in every part of the “advanced sector” nations:

• A crazed former employee of a Japanese mental facility attacked the facility and slit the throats of 19 patients and seriously injured 26 more, after writing a letter to the Parliament explaining what he intended to do, as an act of “beneficial” euthanasia;
• Two terrorists attacked a church in France, slitting the throats of the priest and a nun, before being killed by police. IS took credit for the attack, feeding the anti-Muslim frenzy in the press;
• Two suicide bombers from al-Shabaab exploded their vehicles at a UN peacekeeping base in the capital of Somalia, Mogadishu, killing 13;
• Two teens were killed and 16 others wounded in Ft. Myers Florida, when three other teens opened fire at a crowd outside a nightclub;
• And in Germany, the fifth killing in a week, as a man killed his doctor and then himself in a hospital.

This is just today’s toll. These are not all terrorist assaults, as some are by people driven mad by their hopeless state in society, or by the violent culture, or by the psychosis-inducing video games and popular “entertainment,” or by drugs, or by all of these.

It is a symptom of a dying culture. While millions are driven from their homes in Southwest Asia by Obama’s policy of perpetual “regime change” wars, and as the media in the West hypes Obama’s lie that Russia and China are “aggressors” run by dictators who must be confronted militarily, the U.S. population are told to join in the Roman Circus of the political conventions, and unite behind leaders who offer only more economic destruction and global warfare.

The brainwashing is falling apart, however. Both U.S. political party conventions have been fiascos, producing candidates hated by the majority of the population, and leaving their party structures in disarray. The only thing left standing is the demand for Glass-Steagall, which is recognized in Congress and internationally as the result of EIR Founding Editor Lyndon LaRouche’s unrelenting campaign over the past decades to educate and mobilize the population and the political institutions, to understand that only a return to Franklin Roosevelt’s war on Wall Street can reverse the ongoing collapse of the western economies.

Roosevelt’s famous statement that the “only thing we have to fear is fear itself” is the operative principle in mobilizing the population to end the madness—together with LaRouche’s warning against any kind of pragmatism. No partial measures are possible in a world facing thermonuclear war. The leaders of the United Kingdom and the United States have been shown by their own governments to be war criminals, through the release of the Chilcot Report in England and the 28 pages of the Joint Congressional Inquiry on 9/11 in the U.S. Tony Blair, George W. Bush and Barack Obama have been shown to be guilty of launching illegal wars of aggression, and collaborating with (or controlling) terrorists to prosecute those wars. And yet these criminals remain out of jail, and Obama still sits in the White House with his finger on the trigger.

The Obama drive for war against Russia and China is also in danger. Vladimir Putin and his Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov have pulled Turkey out of the mobilization for war on Syria and Russia, while China has pulled the entire Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) out of the mobilization for war on China. The world is turning to Russia and China for leadership and development, rather than the West’s austerity and war. Even the European nations are beginning to see the insanity of the drive for war against Russia, and the benefits of peace and development through cooperation.

The New Paradigm posed by Lyndon and Helga LaRouche, based on the common aims of mankind, is within our grasp, if the citizens of the West have the courage to follow the Schiller Institute’s lead for a “New Silk Road” development of the entire world, and to follow the wise words of Friedrich Schiller that we must be both patriots of our nations and citizens of the world.

STRATEGIC WAR DANGER

Obama Administration Brawl over Russia/Syria Policy at Break Point

July 26 (EIRNS)—Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met today on the sidelines of the East Asian summit in Laos, to continue working out the details of the plan for greater U.S.-Russian cooperation in Syria agreed on during Kerry’s July 14 meetings with Lavrov and Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Both spoke of progress being made after their meeting.

Lavrov told reporters that “agreements were made on practical steps that should be made to effectively fight against terrorists, to prevent the situation when the so-called moderate opposition remains on terrorist-controlled territories and wants to participate in the ceasefire regime, and at the same time wants to ensure that this regime does not inflict any damage on Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra…. We discussed what needs to be done in order for this agreement to start working in practice, in the form of activities of Russian Aerospace Defense Forces and U.S. forces, as well as the U.S.-led coalition.”

For his part, Kerry reported that he is hopeful that if the U.S. and Russia continue “doing our homework … as effectively as it’s been done over the last days since I was in Moscow … somewhere in early August—the first week or so, somewhere in there,” a joint plan for Syria could be announced. We discussed today “the next piece of homework that needs to be completed before we are prepared to make a public announcement,” he added. He specified that this “homework” involves quiet meetings between technical teams who are to address differences, beforehand.

Kerry’s remarks were made in answer to a reporter’s question about statements from Defense Secretary Ash Carter and Gen. Joseph Dunford the day before, throwing cold water on Kerry’s negotiations with the Russians.

Both Dunford and Carter reflected Obama’s anti-Russia, pro-jihadi policy. Carter was the more bellicose, twice insisting that U.S. policy will remain one of regime-change before fighting terrorism, saying: “We’ll see whether it’s possible … for the Russians to begin to do the right thing in Syria. They obviously have been backing the regime, which has had the effect of prolonging the civil war, whereas we had hoped that they would promote a political solution and transition to put an end to the civil war which is the beginning of all this violence in Syria. And then combat extremists, rather than moderate opposition which has to be part of that transition. So, they’re a long way from doing that.”

Russia: Syrian Peace Talks Progress Depend on U.S.-Russian Military Coordination

July 26 (EIRNS)—Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov described today’s closed-door U.S.-Russia-UN meeting in Geneva, on how to get Syrian peace talks underway again, as “a fairly frank exchange of views”; but, he said, the participants—himself, U.S. Envoy to Syria Michael Ratney, and UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura—had come to “a consensus on the need for further efforts to promote the political process and the resumption of intra-Syrian dialogue.”

De Mistura, for his part, said that the aim is to proceed with a third round of talks towards the end of August. He added that he strongly hoped that the Kerry-Lavrov talks would make concrete and visible progress, as that would improve the situation on the ground and the environment for the peace talks.

Gatilov and a brief State Department statement on the meeting made clear that humanitarian crises and differences over the Aleppo siege and who should participate, were among the aspects discussed, but Gatilov was explicit that progress hangs first on a successful conclusion to the joint U.S.-Russian plan which Kerry, Lavrov, and Putin are hammering out.

According to reports in TASS and Sputnik, Gatilov said that that plan was the background for today’s trilateral talks, and that the date for the next round of intra-Syrian talks now depends on “how soon the documents Russian and American military experts are working on, are finalized…. It is yet to be identified where Jabhat al-Nusra is present and where not.” TASS added that, “in [Gatilov’s] words, such issues need coordination for the purpose of ‘delivering joint strikes.’ ”

According to Gatilov, the date for the next round of military discussions has not yet been set, but “I think it is a matter of days.”

Russia Urges Asia-Pacific Regional Security Structure To Ensure Stability

July 26 (EIRNS)—Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reported today that security problems had been the primary focus of discussions at the East Asia Foreign Ministers Meeting held today in Vientiane, Laos, with Russia raising the need to advance work on establishing a new security architecture, including all Asian Pacific Region countries, “without exception.” Such an organization would provide mechanisms to ensure security and stability, setting “uniform rules of conduct on a non-bloc basis, based on equal and indivisible security,” Lavrov indicated.

The East Asia Summit (EAS) grouping joins the ten member-nations of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) with eight of their partners: Russia, the U.S., India, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand.

Russia has promoted a similar initiative for Europe, Lavrov noted, but, so far, it has been “coldly received by the NATO countries. The situation is better here,” he added. With strong support from “our Chinese partner,” five rounds of dialogue between experts of the EAS countries to flesh out the idea have been held over the last three years, the latest this past June, he reported. The sixth round, scheduled for 2017, will be held in Thailand.

COLLAPSING WESTERN FINANCIAL SYSTEM

Germany’s BaFin Confirms the Ugly Truth Behind the Bail-in

July 26 (EIRNS)—EIR has exposed at an early stage that the European law on bail-in, the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD), excludes derivatives. An explanation of the bail-in published in 2015 by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, or BaFin, confirms this in the words of its own officials. The BaFin candidly admits that derivative positions are so complex, and that it would take such a long time to settle, that a bail-in procedure won’t be able to deal with them. Ergo, they will not be resolved.

“Since they are based on such complex contracts, it is barely possible to exhaustively calculate the obligations and the balanced positions, as required in a bail-in procedure.” Therefore, “It is meaningful first to ignore obligations which are connected with the mentioned difficulties and risks. Only when the other obligations are not enough to cover losses and recapitalization, should one include them.”

Additionally, EIR has confirmed that the BRRD contains a clause that excludes from the bail-in any obligation whose cancellation would endanger the “stability of the system.”

In quoting the BaFin report, Süddeutsche Zeitung yesterday gave an idea of what the dimension of a bail-in would be in a major bank crisis. Had a bail-in been implemented in the case of Commerzbank in 2008, it would have involved the seizure of €80 billion of shareholders’, bondholders’ and depositors’ money.

Brits Tell Depositors: Get Ready To Pay Us For Using Your Money

July 26 (EIRNS)—NatWest, which is owned by Royal Bank of Scotland (and therefore, by the British government), warned its customers in a letter that it might introduce negative interest rates on deposits. In its letter, NatWest said, according to the Guardian: “Global interest rates remain at very low levels and in some markets are currently negative. Dependent on future market conditions, this could result in us charging interest on credit balances.”

That is, you will pay us for our right to use your money. Bank run, anyone?

NatWest is the first British bank to consider charging interest on deposits, but not the very first bank to consider such a move. Last week, ABN Amro, a major Dutch bank, told customers that because of exceptional market conditions, it may be necessary to charge negative interest rates at some time in the future.

U.S ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL

The U.S. Democratic Party, Like the Republican, Is Disintegrating

July 26 (EIRNS)—The U.S. system of political parties is disintegrating. Lyndon LaRouche has identified what he calls the “potty system” as being at the root of the dumbing down of the American population, forcing people to choose between two evil forces, both controlled by Wall Street. Now, after the romp by the British/FBI asset Donald Trump over the shattered Republican Party, the Democratic Party is following suit. Tens of thousands of former Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ supporters flooded into Philadelphia, trying to somehow turn the tide against Wall Street’s darling Hillary Clinton, only to see their phony hero call for unity in support of Hillary. At a pre-convention meeting with his supporters, Sanders was met with heckling and booing, which was followed by a march by his supporters to the convention with chants such as: “Donald Trump is a racist bore, Hillary is a corporate whore.”

On Monday, Bernie’s army was breathing fire, yelling “Goldman Sachs” and “We trusted you,” when both Sanders, and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, called for unity behind Clinton. But by Tuesday afternoon, although Sanders’ supporters disrupted several state caucus breakfast meetings, observers said that the convention was like a morgue, both inside and out.

The hysterical effort by Clinton’s campaign to blame the leak of Democratic National Committee (DNC) emails (which led to the resignation of DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz for sabotaging the Sanders campaign) on Russian President Vladimir Putin, is backfiring, due to its incredible stupidity. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, asked about the charge, said he didn’t want to use four-letter words; meanwhile cartoons appearing everywhere are mocking the effort to call anyone not committed to the nuclear destruction of Russia (and the world) as “Putin’s useful fool.”

What will replace the broken parties? This must be determined by Americans mobilized around EIR Founding Editor Lyndon LaRouche, to create the required new institutions and policies which allow the restoration of the Hamiltonian American System, and to bring the nation into cooperation with Russia and China for global development and peace.

Glass-Steagall Named at Democratic Party Convention

July 26 (EIRNS)—Former Presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders last night stated from the podium of the Democratic National Convention that “the Democratic Party now calls for breaking up the major financial institutions on Wall Street and the passage of a 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act.” (That much, amidst his otherwise disgusting attempt to sell Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.)

That Glass-Steagall discussion continues to unsettle Wall Street. CNBC today put out another article on “Why Big Banks Could Be Broken Up No Matter Who Wins the White House,” featuring a new warning from Keefe, Bruyette & Woods investment bank analyst Brian Gardner that Wall Street should not dismiss the potential for Glass-Steagall to be enacted.

In his piece yesterday in the New York Times, entitled “One Thing Both Parties Want: Break Up the Banks Again,” columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin tries to argue that the likelihood of Glass-Steagall’s passage is slim, but he has to admit that “the language that was inserted into both parties’ formal platforms is raising eyebrows in Washington and the financial world.”

NEW WORLD ECONOMIC ORDER

New Billion-Dollar China-Africa Fund To Finance Africa’s Industrialization

July 26 (EIRNS)—Barring thermonuclear holocaust and an implosion of the world economy, Africa will industrialize. In a new step in that direction, the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), based in Cairo, and the Export-Import Bank of China have signed an agreement to create a $1 billion China-Africa Investment Program to develop light manufacturing and raw materials processing plants in Africa. The agreement was signed at the Afreximbank 23rd annual general shareholders’ meeting in Mahe, Seychelles, July 23. Afreximbank has branch offices in Abuja, Nigeria, and Harare, Zimbabwe. Its president is Dr. Benedict Oramah, a Nigerian.

The fund will also finance shipping equipment, railways and rolling stock, and electric power infrastructure. It will improve trade finance flows into Africa through several mechanisms.

Associated with this program is an agreement between Afreximbank and the Made in Africa Initiative to build and operate industrial and agro-processing parks. The partners will work to establish a pan-African equipment-leasing platform to supply heavy-duty and manufacturing equipment. The founder of Made in Africa is Helen Hai, formerly the Ethiopia-based vice president and general manager for overseas investment of the Huajian Company, one of China’s largest shoe manufacturers.

OTHER

Turkey’s Erdogan To Meet President Putin on August 9

July 26 (EIRNS)—Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Aug. 9 in St. Petersburg, according to Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simsek. Speaking from Moscow, where he is holding official talks with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich, Simsek also said the two countries will gradually unfreeze trade and economic relations.

“We are here to improve our relations and to bring them to an even higher level than before Nov. 24,” Simsek told Dvorkovich according to Hurriyet Daily News.

Turkey’s Economic Affairs Minister Nihat Zeybecki, who was in Moscow with Simsek, reported that in addition to the wide range of issues of trade and economic cooperation discussed, the two governments had reached a political decision to proceed on two key projects: the construction of the Turkish Stream gas pipeline to bring gas from the Russian Federation to Turkey, under the Black Sea; and the Akkuyu nuclear power plant project. The economic ministers of the two countries agreed to meet again on Aug. 6, just prior to the Erdogan-Putin meeting.

Indicating that Turkey’s foreign policy is converging with Russia’s, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu launched a “peace attack” during his official visit to Azerbaijan July 14-15, just before the coup attempt in Turkey. Hurriyet reported that Cavusoglu discussed the possibility of restarting talks with Armenia, including the possibility of reopening borders between Azerbaijan and Armenia at a time when tensions between the two have flared up over the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region.

Hurriyet columnist Fatih Cekirge, who had met with the Turkish foreign minister prior to his departure from Baku July 15, recalls telling Cavusoglu, “The crisis with Russia is being solved … friends are increasing,” to which Cavusoglu replied, “Yes, look how many other good things are about to happen. Believe me, there will be much good news for peace…. You should wait and see.”

Cristina Fernández de Kirchner: Alliance with the BRICS behind Assault on South American Nations

July 26 (EIRNS)—In a two-hour interview July 23, held at her home in El Calafate, Santa Cruz, former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner discussed a broad array of subjects, both national and international, and pointed to the absurdity of the charges launched against her by President Mauricio Macri’s “judicial party.”

“I’m not afraid of going to prison,” she said, explaining that she wouldn’t have implemented the anti-IMF, pro-growth measures she did as President had she feared going to jail. It used to take a military coup to impose the “policies of hunger and misery,” Fernández said, but today Macri is using the corrupt judiciary and the media he controls to achieve the same effect, at the same time attacking the rule of law and trampling on constitutional rights, in order to intimidate opponents.

Asked about the destabilization of several South American nations, Fernández pointed out that the strategic agreements that several governments, including her own, had signed with Russia and China, and the extraordinary July 2014 BRICS summit in Fortaleza, Brazil, must have set off “a red alert” in the U.S. After all, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and heads of state and regional organizations from Central and South America and the Caribbean gathered to discuss regional development; on top of that, she added, there was the BRICS New Development Bank, posed “as an alternative to the International Monetary Fund.” Surely, she said, the U.S. felt its geopolitical interests threatened.

Internationally, Fernández said, a new geopolitical map is being drawn in an increasingly complex world, in which global terrorism is the new ingredient, and there isn’t a clear strategy for dealing with it.

“There is a lack of leadership [willing] to sit down and come up with a different strategy, because if we continue … invading and bombing countries, the situation will get worse.” Leadership used to be a matter of individuals, she said. Nelson Mandela, Fidel Castro, Charles de Gaulle, John Kennedy, Juan Perón, and Yasser Arafat were leaders of great stature, she noted, but today, the “only glimpse of leadership” similar to theirs is Vladimir Putin.

Then you have Macri, she noted, surrounded by his unsavory political cronies, many guilty of financial crimes, offshore accounts, etc. “It turns out that every day, individuals are discovered who, if they don’t have accounts in HSBC and didn’t sneak money out of the country, they appear in the Panama Papers,” along with Macri.