FLASH! TROUBLEMAKERS CONVENTION
Global Elite Hunker Down in Greek Luxury Resort
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By James P. Tucker Jr.
DISPATCH RECEIVED MAY 14, 9:30 A.M. EDT
Bilderberg luminaries all appeared grim-faced as they stepped from their limos on to the grounds of the Nafsika Astir Palace Hotel in Vouliagmeni, Greece. They arrived from the airport in nearby Athens, escorted by police with sirens blaring. The world economy is at the top of the Bilderberg agenda. Bilderberg will debate how to exploit the global recession and fabrications about “swine flu” to advance its world government goals. Bilderberg’s agenda has expanded, even as public awareness has grown.
Sources within Bilderberg said President Obama will be instructed to make another effort to get the United States to sign on to the International Criminal Court. The ICC treaty, if ratified by the Senate, would be superior to the Constitution, able to overrule Congress and the Supreme Court and impose “world law” on America.
Bilderberg leaders said they understood the effort would have to be handled with “subtle delicacy” because of the Senate’s traditional hostility to joining the ICC.
Former President Bill Clinton, who attended Bilderberg as the obscure governor of Arkansas in 1991 and was elected president in 1992, OK’d the ICC treaty, even though a test vote showed more than 90 senators objecting to the treaty, including world government advocates who were scared off by patriotic voters made aware of the perils by The Spotlight, the inspiration for AMERICAN FREE PRESS. So Clinton dared not submit the ICC treaty for ratification, and was forced to wait for a wind change in politics.
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BILDERBERG OWNS OBAMA
But Bilderberg owns President Obama, who sees himself as a “citizen of the world.” He will be sweet-talking Senate supporters who are afraid to back the treaty. He will be hoping for an even more left-wing Senate after the 2010 election, His goal, as dictated by Bilderberg, is to persuade the new Senate (to be seated in January 2010), to ratify the ICC treaty late on a Saturday night, too late for the Sunday papers or to make changes in the Sunday TV talkies.
You will not read of this in the Bilderberg-controlled Washington Post, New York Times, Los Angeles Times or hear about it on network news broadcasts.
AFP editor James P. Tucker Jr. is a veteran journalist who spent many years as a member of the “elite” media in Washington. Since 1975 he has won widespread recognition, here and abroad, for his pursuit of on-the-scene stories reporting the intrigues of global power blocs such as the Bilderberg Group. Tucker is the author of Jim Tucker’s Bilderberg Diary: One Man’s 25-Year Battle to Shine the Light on the World Shadow Government. Bound in an attractive full-color softcover and containing 272 pages—loaded with photos, many never published before—the book recounts Tucker’s experiences over the last quarter century at Bilderberg meetings. $25 from AFP. No charge for S&H in U.S.
Subscribe to American Free Press. Online subscriptions: One year of weekly editions—$15 plus you get a BONUS ELECTRONIC BOOK - HIGH PRIESTS OF WAR - By Michael Piper.
Print subscriptions: 52 issues crammed into 47 weeks of the year plus six free issues of Whole Body Health: $59 Order on this website or call toll free 1-888-699-NEWS .
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Dumping the Dollar for Global Currency
The New American
Dumping the Dollar for Global Currency
Written by William F. Jasper
Friday, 22 May 2009 12:20
dollarsWill the Obama spend-a-rama finish off the dollar as the world's reserve currency? It well may, and sooner than most people think. Any day now we may wake up to headlines announcing that the International Monetary Fund's SDR (Special Drawing Rights) is being adopted as the new global currency.
That, of course, was the revolutionary plan adopted by the finance ministers, central bankers, and heads of state at the London G20 Summit in April. But you didn't read about it in the financial pages or see it reported in the extensive (surface) coverage of the summit meeting. One of the few reporters to reveal the real news of the conference was Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of Britain's Telegraph.
The headline of his April 7 report read, "The G20 moves the world a step closer to a global currency," while the subtitle ominously told the rest of the story: "The world is a step closer to a global currency, backed by a global central bank, running monetary policy for all humanity."
Evans-Pritchard expounds with these details:
A single clause in Point 19 of the communiqué issued by the G20 leaders amounts to revolution in the global financial order. "We have agreed to support a general SDR allocation which will inject $250bn (£170bn) into the world economy and increase global liquidity," it said. SDRs are Special Drawing Rights, a synthetic paper currency issued by the International Monetary Fund that has lain dormant for half a century.
In effect, the G20 leaders have activated the IMF's power to create money and begin global "quantitative easing." In doing so, they are putting a de facto world currency into play. It is outside the control of any sovereign body. Conspiracy theorists will love it.
Three weeks after the G20 confab, on April 25, following the IMF's annual spring meeting in Washington, D.C., IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn announced the IMF would begin selling bonds as a way to raise additional funds, ostensibly to lend to struggling nations. Although issuing bonds has been discussed previously, the IMF has never before taken such a step.
China, Brazil, Russia, and other countries have been pushing this "solution" for the past several months, and we can expect the anointed financial gurus to begin churning this idea ever more frequently to prep opinion molders for the planned currency switcheroo.
Thus, we see articles appearing such as this one entitled, "The dollar's last days as the dominant reserve currency?" by Onno Wijnholds on May 20 in the European Voice. Now, J. Onno de Beaufort Wijnholds is far from being a household name, but in the rarefied atmosphere of global finance, the Dutchman is well known. A former executive director of the International Monetary Fund and a former permanent representative of the European Central Bank in the United States, he is a regular at the concalves of the financial elites. Wijnholds writes:
Zhou Xiaochuan, the governor of the People's Bank of China, recently suggested that replacing the dollar with the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) special drawing rights (SDR) as the dominant reserve currency would bring greater stability to the global financial system.
The idea of a supranational reserve currency is also, it appears, supported by Russia and other emerging markets. And a United Nations advisory committee has argued for a new global reserve currency, possibly one based on the SDR.
Somewhat quicker out of the gate was C. Fred Bergsten, director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Bergsten, a protégé of Henry Kissinger, was a Treasury official in the Carter administration and a senior fellow at Brookings, the Carnegie Endowment, and the Council on Foreign Relations. On April 8, the Financial Times ran an op-ed by Bergsten entitled, "We Should Listen to Beijing's Currency Idea." In it, he wrote:
Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of China's central bank, has suggested creating a "super-sovereign reserve currency" to replace the dollar over the long run. He would sharply enhance the global role of special drawing rights (SDRs), the international asset created by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the late 1960s and just given an enormous boost by the decision of the Group of 20 to expand its issuance by $250 billion (€189 billion, £171 billion). These are the first big proposals for international monetary reform from China or indeed any emerging-market economy and deserve to be taken seriously for that reason alone.
Several other Asian countries, Brazil, and Russia have expressed support for Mr. Zhou's ideas. The United States and several other governments, however, have been quick to reject them, reaffirming their confidence in the central global role of the dollar.
However, while Bergsten, Wijnhold, and other globalists refer to the move toward the SDR global currency as Beijing's idea, that is more than a bit disingenuous. In truth, as Bergsten admits later on in his op-ed, the communist economists in Beijing merely adopted the proposal as he had put it forward in the Financial Times back in December of 2007 ("How to Solve the Problem of the Dollar").
Even that admission, though, concealed the fact that Bergsten has been pushing for global economic management by elites for decades. Twenty years ago, in a 1989 interview with the Christian Science Monitor, Bergsten asserted: "The world economy is in trouble unless there is some central steering mechanism." And in his articles, speeches, and books, he has made it plain that he and his fellow "wise men" should be entrusted with that steering.
One of those fellow globalist elites is Richard N. Cooper Maurits C. Boas, professor of international economics at Harvard, like Bergsten a former high-level Treasury official, and a leading light in the CFR brain trust. In a 1984 piece for the CFR journal Foreign Affairs entitled "A Monetary System for the Future," Dr. Cooper baldly proclaimed:
I suggest a radical alternative scheme for the next century: the creation of a common currency for all of the industrial democracies, with a common monetary policy and a joint Bank of Issue to determine that monetary policy.
Cooper went on to acknowledge that "a single currency is possible only if there is in effect a single monetary policy, and a single authority issuing the currency and directing the monetary policy."
"How can independent states accomplish that?" he asked rhetorically. Naturally, he had the answer: "They need to turn over the determination of monetary policy to a supranational body." The IMF.
Global monetary control, as proposed by Cooper, Bergsten, Zhou Xiaochuan, et al., would lead rapidly and ineluctably to global political control: world government. Is that the plan behind the rush to destroy what's left of the dollar's value? It certainly seems so to this writer.
Related articles:
Global Fusion: The G20, IMF, and World Government
G20 Pledges Supersized IMF
"Conspiracy Theorists" Not So Crazy After All
Global-currency Call Gets Nod From Geithner, Others
[x] close
Dumping the Dollar for Global Currency
Written by William F. Jasper
Friday, 22 May 2009 12:20
dollarsWill the Obama spend-a-rama finish off the dollar as the world's reserve currency? It well may, and sooner than most people think. Any day now we may wake up to headlines announcing that the International Monetary Fund's SDR (Special Drawing Rights) is being adopted as the new global currency.
That, of course, was the revolutionary plan adopted by the finance ministers, central bankers, and heads of state at the London G20 Summit in April. But you didn't read about it in the financial pages or see it reported in the extensive (surface) coverage of the summit meeting. One of the few reporters to reveal the real news of the conference was Ambrose Evans-Pritchard of Britain's Telegraph.
The headline of his April 7 report read, "The G20 moves the world a step closer to a global currency," while the subtitle ominously told the rest of the story: "The world is a step closer to a global currency, backed by a global central bank, running monetary policy for all humanity."
Evans-Pritchard expounds with these details:
A single clause in Point 19 of the communiqué issued by the G20 leaders amounts to revolution in the global financial order. "We have agreed to support a general SDR allocation which will inject $250bn (£170bn) into the world economy and increase global liquidity," it said. SDRs are Special Drawing Rights, a synthetic paper currency issued by the International Monetary Fund that has lain dormant for half a century.
In effect, the G20 leaders have activated the IMF's power to create money and begin global "quantitative easing." In doing so, they are putting a de facto world currency into play. It is outside the control of any sovereign body. Conspiracy theorists will love it.
Three weeks after the G20 confab, on April 25, following the IMF's annual spring meeting in Washington, D.C., IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn announced the IMF would begin selling bonds as a way to raise additional funds, ostensibly to lend to struggling nations. Although issuing bonds has been discussed previously, the IMF has never before taken such a step.
China, Brazil, Russia, and other countries have been pushing this "solution" for the past several months, and we can expect the anointed financial gurus to begin churning this idea ever more frequently to prep opinion molders for the planned currency switcheroo.
Thus, we see articles appearing such as this one entitled, "The dollar's last days as the dominant reserve currency?" by Onno Wijnholds on May 20 in the European Voice. Now, J. Onno de Beaufort Wijnholds is far from being a household name, but in the rarefied atmosphere of global finance, the Dutchman is well known. A former executive director of the International Monetary Fund and a former permanent representative of the European Central Bank in the United States, he is a regular at the concalves of the financial elites. Wijnholds writes:
Zhou Xiaochuan, the governor of the People's Bank of China, recently suggested that replacing the dollar with the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) special drawing rights (SDR) as the dominant reserve currency would bring greater stability to the global financial system.
The idea of a supranational reserve currency is also, it appears, supported by Russia and other emerging markets. And a United Nations advisory committee has argued for a new global reserve currency, possibly one based on the SDR.
Somewhat quicker out of the gate was C. Fred Bergsten, director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics. Bergsten, a protégé of Henry Kissinger, was a Treasury official in the Carter administration and a senior fellow at Brookings, the Carnegie Endowment, and the Council on Foreign Relations. On April 8, the Financial Times ran an op-ed by Bergsten entitled, "We Should Listen to Beijing's Currency Idea." In it, he wrote:
Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of China's central bank, has suggested creating a "super-sovereign reserve currency" to replace the dollar over the long run. He would sharply enhance the global role of special drawing rights (SDRs), the international asset created by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the late 1960s and just given an enormous boost by the decision of the Group of 20 to expand its issuance by $250 billion (€189 billion, £171 billion). These are the first big proposals for international monetary reform from China or indeed any emerging-market economy and deserve to be taken seriously for that reason alone.
Several other Asian countries, Brazil, and Russia have expressed support for Mr. Zhou's ideas. The United States and several other governments, however, have been quick to reject them, reaffirming their confidence in the central global role of the dollar.
However, while Bergsten, Wijnhold, and other globalists refer to the move toward the SDR global currency as Beijing's idea, that is more than a bit disingenuous. In truth, as Bergsten admits later on in his op-ed, the communist economists in Beijing merely adopted the proposal as he had put it forward in the Financial Times back in December of 2007 ("How to Solve the Problem of the Dollar").
Even that admission, though, concealed the fact that Bergsten has been pushing for global economic management by elites for decades. Twenty years ago, in a 1989 interview with the Christian Science Monitor, Bergsten asserted: "The world economy is in trouble unless there is some central steering mechanism." And in his articles, speeches, and books, he has made it plain that he and his fellow "wise men" should be entrusted with that steering.
One of those fellow globalist elites is Richard N. Cooper Maurits C. Boas, professor of international economics at Harvard, like Bergsten a former high-level Treasury official, and a leading light in the CFR brain trust. In a 1984 piece for the CFR journal Foreign Affairs entitled "A Monetary System for the Future," Dr. Cooper baldly proclaimed:
I suggest a radical alternative scheme for the next century: the creation of a common currency for all of the industrial democracies, with a common monetary policy and a joint Bank of Issue to determine that monetary policy.
Cooper went on to acknowledge that "a single currency is possible only if there is in effect a single monetary policy, and a single authority issuing the currency and directing the monetary policy."
"How can independent states accomplish that?" he asked rhetorically. Naturally, he had the answer: "They need to turn over the determination of monetary policy to a supranational body." The IMF.
Global monetary control, as proposed by Cooper, Bergsten, Zhou Xiaochuan, et al., would lead rapidly and ineluctably to global political control: world government. Is that the plan behind the rush to destroy what's left of the dollar's value? It certainly seems so to this writer.
Related articles:
Global Fusion: The G20, IMF, and World Government
G20 Pledges Supersized IMF
"Conspiracy Theorists" Not So Crazy After All
Global-currency Call Gets Nod From Geithner, Others
[x] close
Hitmen Contracts to Bust Comex
http://www.kitco.com/ind/willie/may292009.html
Hitmen Contracts to Bust Comex
By Jim Willie CB
May 29 2009 10:36AM
www.GoldenJackass.com
Use the above link to subscribe to the paid research reports, which include coverage of several smallcap companies positioned to rise during the ongoing panicky attempt to sustain an unsustainable system burdened by numerous imbalances aggravated by global village forces. An historically unprecedented mess has been created by compromised central bankers and inept economic advisors, whose interference has irreversibly altered and damaged the world financial system, urgently pushed after the removed anchor of money to gold. Analysis features Gold, Crude Oil, USDollar, Treasury bonds, and inter-market dynamics with the US Economy and US Federal Reserve monetary policy.
Major dislocations are coming. Tremendous disruptions are coming. Price discontinuities are coming. Price chart patterns might be rendered useless soon. Last week, the case for a grand Paradigm Shift was made, covering many elements in order to paint a mosaic. Taken in isolation, any one point is important in its own right, but not enough to convince of a structural change. Taken in entirety, the many points create a full picture that is more easily recognized. The ruinous events of the Wall Street banks last September and October surely served as an extreme event loaded with profound disruption. The Chinese have proceeded with a transition to yuan-based domestic banking, with an installation of yuan swap facilities around the world, with an ASEAN regional fund again supplied by yuan for flexible purposes, with permission granted to two Hong Kong banks to sell yuan-based bonds, with an admitted rise in significant gold bullion reserves, and with continued verbal battles over legitimacy of the USDollar as the global reserve currency. These Chinese initiatives in recent weeks, occurring rapidly, are serving as a collective extreme event with the potential for profound disruption. A gold-backed yuan currency would surely cause massive disruption in a climax merger of events. The barter system set up between Russia and Europe will bypass the US$-based settlement system, as will the barter system set up between Russia and China. The avoidance of contract settlement in USDollars would result in extreme disruption to the global banking system. The creditor nations are plotting to organize and launch alternative currencies, maybe to fortify existing currencies (like the euro or yuan or ruble) with a gold component, maybe also with a crude oil component. A challenge to the USDollar by asset-backed currencies would result in extreme disruption to the global banking system. The hidden nitroglycerine to the disruptions is the Russian military, and any pledges of support for nations attempted to force systemic changes. These are just some important examples of change agents.
All Paradigm Shifts result in extreme disruption. That is the essence of Paradigm Shifts. The entire table changes, like its shape, its seats, its location, even who sits at the table, and in particular who sits at the head of the table. Big disruptions are to come from the COMEX pit of corruption, the central nexus for controlling illicitly the price structure for gold, the USDollar, and the USTreasury Bonds. The COMEX in all likelihood is the weakest link in the US-UK chain of corrupted financial markets. For many months my view has been that gold fights the political battles, while silver gathers more than its share of rewards and spoils. Gold has a long history of experience fighting grand battles. It can be placed in dungeons, but not for more than a couple decades. The rot in financial systems without golden foundations forces gold to the surface!
THE HITMEN COMETH
It has come to my attention that several private parties have accepted contract assignments to neuter the COMEX and London Metals Exchange, to render ruin to its gold market. That bears repeating from the rooftops. MUTLIPLE HIRED HITMEN HAVE ASSIGNMENTS TO KILL THE COMEX GOLD MARKET. That is the lynchpin to control the USDollar, the USTreasurys, and the numerous mechanisms used by the New York and London financial centers of power. Their behavior is beyond the reach of those who seek justice and remedy, but they are not beyond the reach of hitmen. The USDollar has been in violation of the US Constitution since 1971, perpetuated by a series of wayward administrations. The global creditors for the USTreasury Bonds are so angry at the past suffered losses, the prospect of deep future losses, and the perceived impropriety laced throughout the US financial system, that they have hired third parties to kill off the US$-gold platforms, to harm the vehicles used by the US-UK bond peddlers who control the gold cartel itself. They have systemically been dismantling the COMEX pillars and levers over the last several months, quietly and without fanfare, surely without publicity. The upcoming events might be as swift as brutal.
The HITMEN have been hired, with highly lucrative contracts and wide berth in methods to be put to use. Their assigned task is to neuter the major players who keep the gold price and silver price artificially low using illicit methods. A short list of targeted banks facing a sudden demise is already known, details for Hat Trick Letter members. Some detailed speculation will be devoted to the June HTL reports, since too controversial. This will be an evolving story, with new chapters soon written. The bank fatalities will be sudden. The missing US-UK levers will be immediate. Since last autumn, the global powers have aligned against Wall Street, even if the central bankers have supported it. If one wants to destroy a building, then weaken its pillars, cut a few support beams, then rush in a crowd of people, and wait for a turbulent storm. In the case of the COMEX, the accused players will crowd the corrupted building. They will sink into ruin and then oblivion.
The financial cartel dominated by the United States and United Kingdom is soon to suffer some serious blows. The list of their victims is long. The harbored resentment is great by many global players. They waited patiently for the Obama Admin to install a new group, but the old group remains due to a revolving door from the same smoky club, dominated by Goldman Sachs once more. Their influence of the USCongress is in continuation, sufficient for unwanted obsequious approval. The regulatory agencies are from the same encrusted chambers. The Coup d’Etat of the USGovt financial offices has not changed with Obama, who sounds like a refreshing leader but whose actions speak a message of obvious continuity. The channeled funds directed to Wall Street firms continue unabated. The bread crumbs to Main Street and the people continue unabated. The primary changes are boardroom involvement and hastened bankruptcies, if not bondholder violations.
Some might wonder what was the turning point that resulted in hired hitmen to be under contract against certain US financial markets. Some might say the failures of Lehman Brothers, American Intl Group, and Fannie Mae. Not so! In my opinion, it was the invasion in the South Osettia region of Georgia in August 2008. The events around Georgia lit a fuse that set off a chain of events, with reaction starting in Moscow. In time, events led to orders given by high level powers, for the US fraud kings on Wall Street to swallow the medicine no later than first thing Monday morning on September 15th. When the Jackass inquired as to the nature of the urgency leading into that understood stated deadline date, no answer was given. The guess of the Bank For Intl Settlements was submitted by me, and it was confirmed. Other sources, the USTreasury Bond creditors, also applied the pressure, it was told. The US financial sector has been under siege since last autumn.
COMEX STRESS NEAR A BREAKING POINT
Sources from GATA (the Gold Anti-Trust Action committee) report growing distress for participants in the COMEX gold contracts, where a commercial party is very short and in deep trouble. They have sold more gold bullion than they can deliver. They are likely one of the big banks which violate the law with impunity, with USGovt sanctioned protection. By that is meant they routinely do not post 90% of the metal as collateral that they illegally sell. This is naked shorting by any other name. There are reports of grave concern over the upcoming June gold option expiration. If too many deliveries are ordered, then the commercial shorts would be under stress for exposure for naked shorting. They will eventually be caught in a bind and default on contracts. The important loaded monthly contracts are March, June, September, and December. The COMEX has tried to limit the ability of buyers to take delivery, running them around in circles, and entangling them in red tape, all clearly restraint of trade endorsed by the USGovt. Such rules are not in effect for cotton or soybeans or crude oil or pork bellies.
Background inventory strain has come from unexpected sources. The Germans have demanded that gold bullion held in US custodial accounts be returned to their owners, with physical gold shipped back to Germany. The Dubai bankers have demanded that gold bullion held in London custodial accounts be returned to their owners, with physical gold shipped back to the United Arab Emirates. They are following the hired German counsel. In all likelihood, neither US nor London sources are in possession of all the gold held in those custodial accounts, since at least some of it probably was improperly leased. By that is meant without owner permission or knowledge. So an uproar could come soon with charges of gold bullion theft, or at least failure of fiduciary responsibility. Theft is a simpler description.
China is the biggest gold producer in the world now, but none of its output is directed to the open market. Russia is a significant gold producer also, but none of its output is directed to the open market either. A near default occurred in early April from a close call to Deutsche Bank on 850 thousand ounces of gold. The tarnished bankers at D-Bank dug up over a million ounces on the quick from the ready Euro Central Bank mine shifts in the nick of time. Never ignore the basic fact that COMEX has no vested interest in truthful accounts of the gold bullion in its vaults, since audits do not occur, some is leased (replaced by paper certificates), and some is committed in some fashion to very wealthy parties (unavailable). Far less gold bullion rests in COMEX vaults than is advertised, in my view and the opinions of others closer to that arena. All signals point to serious strain in COMEX gold supply.
FEEDERS FOR GOLD FULLY LOADED
Two important feeder systems continue to be USDollar weakness and USTreasury Bond weakness. More important than these is the systematic ruin of the major global currencies generally, but a convenient chart is not offered to track it. Just note the near 0% official rates dictated by the central banks in most countries, or the movement toward 0%. They are Politburo look-alikes, in reality. The USDollar has broken below important support at 81. Expect it to fall further after more dithering. The long-term USTreasury Note has suffered a fast rising surge in its bond yield. Its target from different perspectives is 4.1%, and right quick. These two highly favorable charts will power the gold price to new highs very soon. Nobody knows how soon, but soon. Rarely does one see both the USDollar and USTreasurys fall in value simultaneously. They are now, and will provide a jet assist to gold, which is held back only by COMEX price suppression. Their illicit maneuvers are more obvious and desperate with each passing week. Someday their actions might even be on the news. The imminent Standard & Poors debt downgrade of the UKGilt (bonds from British Govt) hit the credit market last week like a bolt of lightning. My belief is that it might have short-circuited the US-UK financial foundation, and burned out some major circuit boards. The US and UK share Third World finance characteristics.
The gold price is on the verge of a breakout to new nominal highs. The chart demands it. It needs only a trigger, in a land where potential triggers dot the charred landscape. A gold event will be unavoidable. Its chronic strain has derived from the extreme disparities between the physical market mired in shortage, versus the paper market with unlimited supply. The tail is wagging the dog here, as it has been for years, soon to end. The silver price will easily recover to the 17 level in a flash. It has already surpassed the February high. It is loading up for the next little surge to resistance that awaits at the 17-19 range. The potential sling shot momentum boost for silver will be powerful, enough to send its price to 30 with ease. Think pendulum.
NOW FACTOR IN DISRUPTIVE EVENTS, THE PRICE DISLOCATIONS, AND THE OVER-ARCHING PARADIGM SHIFT IN PROGRESS. THE GOLD PRICE COULD REACH 1300 SUDDENLY. WITH EXTREME CONTROVERSY FROM COMEX, LIKE DELIVERY DEFAULTS, PUBLICIZED CORRUPTION, AND EVEN FRAUD INDICTMENTS, THE GOLD PRICE COULD OVER-RUN THE 1300 TARGET AND HEAD FOR 1500 AND BEYOND. SILVER COULD AS A RESULT FOLLOW ITS WARRIOR BROTHER, HEAD PAST 20 IN A FLASH, AND PURSUE 30 EASILY.
Little attention has been given lately to one of the most reliable time-tested forward indicators of the gold price. The ratio of the 10-year USTreasury Note yield to the 2-year USTreasury Bill yield has always been highly reliable in predicting a move in the gold price. The simple chart of bond yields versus maturity years is known better as the Treasury Yield Curve. The ratio is more amenable to chart analysis. A breakout in the Treasury Yield Ratio is in progress. All benefits from the mid-March monetization announcement have vanished. If the 2-year bond yield remains near 1%, where it appears stuck, then the breakout target would indicate that the 10-year bond yield is heading to 4.1% at least. Yet another method targets 4.1% in the long bond yield. The presented ratio contains information on the future prospect of price inflation, in a reliable contrast of time perspectives. Knuckleheads who insist on pounding the Deflation Tables might want to check this indicator, and look at the crude oil price. It is $63 per barrel, not the $20-25 predicted by these lost troopers. Yo Mish Bro, can you spare me a deflating dime? The strict definition of money is useless anymore. The Shadow Banking system is an actual part of the real world, which you do NOT count.
To the dreamweavers out there who cling to notions of recovery and Green Shoots, bless your heart. Hope has clouded your minds. Once more you believe the purveyors of propaganda, after being nearly fatally burned. The Case Shiller housing price index this week reported a 19.1% annual decline in 1Q2009 from Q1 last year. Foreclosures in April were up 32% over last year, as the nightmare continues. That is 1 in 374 homes with mortgages in America in some process of foreclosure. A relentless decline in home prices erases household wealth, and the source of consumer spending. Consumer confidence is ephemeral and baseless. The mortgage rate has just gone above the pre-March levels, when the USFed announced they would monetize $1050 billion in both USTreasury Bonds and USAgency Mortgage Bonds. The benefit has been erased. Today’s underwater mortgage is tomorrow’s foreclosure, made worse by job losses. The FDIC this week reported a 25% rise in non-current loans in 1Q2009 from Q4 of last year. Greater bank losses will come, much like floods follow hurricanes. And lastly, give credit to the USGovt statrats in their busy laboratories. They decided to ramp up the Q2 Gross Domestic Product by including all USGovt rescue funds for the big banks, including the diverse funds from the many liquidity facilities. All those funds will go directly into the GDP for Q2 as a special line item. Expect a miraculous economic recovery in the second quarter, based in vapor. The stock rally since March was based in accounting fraud. These are true American innovations! They are not exportable.
RELOCATION IN SPECTACULAR COSTA RICA
Living Costa Rica is an online magazine about many aspects of life in the tiny country perched strategically on the land bridge between North and South America. The magazine is a great means not only to learn about Costa Rica, but also to take actual steps on relocation. It has become an excellent tool to find important information about the country, a true tropical paradise in terms of nature and legal alternatives. Property, banks, natural wonders, climate, and demographics are covered. As from May 27th, visit their May-July 2009 issue with interesting information about lifestyle and options. The usual feature is the truly spectacular Central Pacific coast. Visit www.livingcr.com.
CREDIT CRISIS AUTOPSY
Trace Mayer comes to the gold community with a different slant and background. He has a law scholar with emphasis on the Constitution, especially how it applies to the gold and currency topics. In his e-book entitled “The Great Credit Contraction” one can read about the historical significance of a crisis that will surely reshape the world. The global economy is built upon a currency whose illusion is evaporating before our very eyes. This book is an autopsy of the current worldwide systems and begins with financial history, discusses the current great deflationary credit contraction, projects the future environment, and concludes with suggestions on how to generate and preserve wealth in this challenging time. An appendix analyzes important topics. (CLICK HERE TO ORDER)
THE HAT TRICK LETTER PROFITS IN THE CURRENT CRISIS
Jim Willie CB
Editor of the "HAT TRICK LETTER"
Hat Trick Letter
***
Jim Willie CB is a statistical analyst in marketing research and retail forecasting. He holds a PhD in Statistics. His career has stretched over 24 years. He aspires to thrive in the financial editor world, unencumbered by the limitations of economic credentials. Visit his free website to find articles from topflight authors at www.GoldenJackass.com . For personal questions about subscriptions, contact him at JimWillieCB@aol.com
Hitmen Contracts to Bust Comex
By Jim Willie CB
May 29 2009 10:36AM
www.GoldenJackass.com
Use the above link to subscribe to the paid research reports, which include coverage of several smallcap companies positioned to rise during the ongoing panicky attempt to sustain an unsustainable system burdened by numerous imbalances aggravated by global village forces. An historically unprecedented mess has been created by compromised central bankers and inept economic advisors, whose interference has irreversibly altered and damaged the world financial system, urgently pushed after the removed anchor of money to gold. Analysis features Gold, Crude Oil, USDollar, Treasury bonds, and inter-market dynamics with the US Economy and US Federal Reserve monetary policy.
Major dislocations are coming. Tremendous disruptions are coming. Price discontinuities are coming. Price chart patterns might be rendered useless soon. Last week, the case for a grand Paradigm Shift was made, covering many elements in order to paint a mosaic. Taken in isolation, any one point is important in its own right, but not enough to convince of a structural change. Taken in entirety, the many points create a full picture that is more easily recognized. The ruinous events of the Wall Street banks last September and October surely served as an extreme event loaded with profound disruption. The Chinese have proceeded with a transition to yuan-based domestic banking, with an installation of yuan swap facilities around the world, with an ASEAN regional fund again supplied by yuan for flexible purposes, with permission granted to two Hong Kong banks to sell yuan-based bonds, with an admitted rise in significant gold bullion reserves, and with continued verbal battles over legitimacy of the USDollar as the global reserve currency. These Chinese initiatives in recent weeks, occurring rapidly, are serving as a collective extreme event with the potential for profound disruption. A gold-backed yuan currency would surely cause massive disruption in a climax merger of events. The barter system set up between Russia and Europe will bypass the US$-based settlement system, as will the barter system set up between Russia and China. The avoidance of contract settlement in USDollars would result in extreme disruption to the global banking system. The creditor nations are plotting to organize and launch alternative currencies, maybe to fortify existing currencies (like the euro or yuan or ruble) with a gold component, maybe also with a crude oil component. A challenge to the USDollar by asset-backed currencies would result in extreme disruption to the global banking system. The hidden nitroglycerine to the disruptions is the Russian military, and any pledges of support for nations attempted to force systemic changes. These are just some important examples of change agents.
All Paradigm Shifts result in extreme disruption. That is the essence of Paradigm Shifts. The entire table changes, like its shape, its seats, its location, even who sits at the table, and in particular who sits at the head of the table. Big disruptions are to come from the COMEX pit of corruption, the central nexus for controlling illicitly the price structure for gold, the USDollar, and the USTreasury Bonds. The COMEX in all likelihood is the weakest link in the US-UK chain of corrupted financial markets. For many months my view has been that gold fights the political battles, while silver gathers more than its share of rewards and spoils. Gold has a long history of experience fighting grand battles. It can be placed in dungeons, but not for more than a couple decades. The rot in financial systems without golden foundations forces gold to the surface!
THE HITMEN COMETH
It has come to my attention that several private parties have accepted contract assignments to neuter the COMEX and London Metals Exchange, to render ruin to its gold market. That bears repeating from the rooftops. MUTLIPLE HIRED HITMEN HAVE ASSIGNMENTS TO KILL THE COMEX GOLD MARKET. That is the lynchpin to control the USDollar, the USTreasurys, and the numerous mechanisms used by the New York and London financial centers of power. Their behavior is beyond the reach of those who seek justice and remedy, but they are not beyond the reach of hitmen. The USDollar has been in violation of the US Constitution since 1971, perpetuated by a series of wayward administrations. The global creditors for the USTreasury Bonds are so angry at the past suffered losses, the prospect of deep future losses, and the perceived impropriety laced throughout the US financial system, that they have hired third parties to kill off the US$-gold platforms, to harm the vehicles used by the US-UK bond peddlers who control the gold cartel itself. They have systemically been dismantling the COMEX pillars and levers over the last several months, quietly and without fanfare, surely without publicity. The upcoming events might be as swift as brutal.
The HITMEN have been hired, with highly lucrative contracts and wide berth in methods to be put to use. Their assigned task is to neuter the major players who keep the gold price and silver price artificially low using illicit methods. A short list of targeted banks facing a sudden demise is already known, details for Hat Trick Letter members. Some detailed speculation will be devoted to the June HTL reports, since too controversial. This will be an evolving story, with new chapters soon written. The bank fatalities will be sudden. The missing US-UK levers will be immediate. Since last autumn, the global powers have aligned against Wall Street, even if the central bankers have supported it. If one wants to destroy a building, then weaken its pillars, cut a few support beams, then rush in a crowd of people, and wait for a turbulent storm. In the case of the COMEX, the accused players will crowd the corrupted building. They will sink into ruin and then oblivion.
The financial cartel dominated by the United States and United Kingdom is soon to suffer some serious blows. The list of their victims is long. The harbored resentment is great by many global players. They waited patiently for the Obama Admin to install a new group, but the old group remains due to a revolving door from the same smoky club, dominated by Goldman Sachs once more. Their influence of the USCongress is in continuation, sufficient for unwanted obsequious approval. The regulatory agencies are from the same encrusted chambers. The Coup d’Etat of the USGovt financial offices has not changed with Obama, who sounds like a refreshing leader but whose actions speak a message of obvious continuity. The channeled funds directed to Wall Street firms continue unabated. The bread crumbs to Main Street and the people continue unabated. The primary changes are boardroom involvement and hastened bankruptcies, if not bondholder violations.
Some might wonder what was the turning point that resulted in hired hitmen to be under contract against certain US financial markets. Some might say the failures of Lehman Brothers, American Intl Group, and Fannie Mae. Not so! In my opinion, it was the invasion in the South Osettia region of Georgia in August 2008. The events around Georgia lit a fuse that set off a chain of events, with reaction starting in Moscow. In time, events led to orders given by high level powers, for the US fraud kings on Wall Street to swallow the medicine no later than first thing Monday morning on September 15th. When the Jackass inquired as to the nature of the urgency leading into that understood stated deadline date, no answer was given. The guess of the Bank For Intl Settlements was submitted by me, and it was confirmed. Other sources, the USTreasury Bond creditors, also applied the pressure, it was told. The US financial sector has been under siege since last autumn.
COMEX STRESS NEAR A BREAKING POINT
Sources from GATA (the Gold Anti-Trust Action committee) report growing distress for participants in the COMEX gold contracts, where a commercial party is very short and in deep trouble. They have sold more gold bullion than they can deliver. They are likely one of the big banks which violate the law with impunity, with USGovt sanctioned protection. By that is meant they routinely do not post 90% of the metal as collateral that they illegally sell. This is naked shorting by any other name. There are reports of grave concern over the upcoming June gold option expiration. If too many deliveries are ordered, then the commercial shorts would be under stress for exposure for naked shorting. They will eventually be caught in a bind and default on contracts. The important loaded monthly contracts are March, June, September, and December. The COMEX has tried to limit the ability of buyers to take delivery, running them around in circles, and entangling them in red tape, all clearly restraint of trade endorsed by the USGovt. Such rules are not in effect for cotton or soybeans or crude oil or pork bellies.
Background inventory strain has come from unexpected sources. The Germans have demanded that gold bullion held in US custodial accounts be returned to their owners, with physical gold shipped back to Germany. The Dubai bankers have demanded that gold bullion held in London custodial accounts be returned to their owners, with physical gold shipped back to the United Arab Emirates. They are following the hired German counsel. In all likelihood, neither US nor London sources are in possession of all the gold held in those custodial accounts, since at least some of it probably was improperly leased. By that is meant without owner permission or knowledge. So an uproar could come soon with charges of gold bullion theft, or at least failure of fiduciary responsibility. Theft is a simpler description.
China is the biggest gold producer in the world now, but none of its output is directed to the open market. Russia is a significant gold producer also, but none of its output is directed to the open market either. A near default occurred in early April from a close call to Deutsche Bank on 850 thousand ounces of gold. The tarnished bankers at D-Bank dug up over a million ounces on the quick from the ready Euro Central Bank mine shifts in the nick of time. Never ignore the basic fact that COMEX has no vested interest in truthful accounts of the gold bullion in its vaults, since audits do not occur, some is leased (replaced by paper certificates), and some is committed in some fashion to very wealthy parties (unavailable). Far less gold bullion rests in COMEX vaults than is advertised, in my view and the opinions of others closer to that arena. All signals point to serious strain in COMEX gold supply.
FEEDERS FOR GOLD FULLY LOADED
Two important feeder systems continue to be USDollar weakness and USTreasury Bond weakness. More important than these is the systematic ruin of the major global currencies generally, but a convenient chart is not offered to track it. Just note the near 0% official rates dictated by the central banks in most countries, or the movement toward 0%. They are Politburo look-alikes, in reality. The USDollar has broken below important support at 81. Expect it to fall further after more dithering. The long-term USTreasury Note has suffered a fast rising surge in its bond yield. Its target from different perspectives is 4.1%, and right quick. These two highly favorable charts will power the gold price to new highs very soon. Nobody knows how soon, but soon. Rarely does one see both the USDollar and USTreasurys fall in value simultaneously. They are now, and will provide a jet assist to gold, which is held back only by COMEX price suppression. Their illicit maneuvers are more obvious and desperate with each passing week. Someday their actions might even be on the news. The imminent Standard & Poors debt downgrade of the UKGilt (bonds from British Govt) hit the credit market last week like a bolt of lightning. My belief is that it might have short-circuited the US-UK financial foundation, and burned out some major circuit boards. The US and UK share Third World finance characteristics.
The gold price is on the verge of a breakout to new nominal highs. The chart demands it. It needs only a trigger, in a land where potential triggers dot the charred landscape. A gold event will be unavoidable. Its chronic strain has derived from the extreme disparities between the physical market mired in shortage, versus the paper market with unlimited supply. The tail is wagging the dog here, as it has been for years, soon to end. The silver price will easily recover to the 17 level in a flash. It has already surpassed the February high. It is loading up for the next little surge to resistance that awaits at the 17-19 range. The potential sling shot momentum boost for silver will be powerful, enough to send its price to 30 with ease. Think pendulum.
NOW FACTOR IN DISRUPTIVE EVENTS, THE PRICE DISLOCATIONS, AND THE OVER-ARCHING PARADIGM SHIFT IN PROGRESS. THE GOLD PRICE COULD REACH 1300 SUDDENLY. WITH EXTREME CONTROVERSY FROM COMEX, LIKE DELIVERY DEFAULTS, PUBLICIZED CORRUPTION, AND EVEN FRAUD INDICTMENTS, THE GOLD PRICE COULD OVER-RUN THE 1300 TARGET AND HEAD FOR 1500 AND BEYOND. SILVER COULD AS A RESULT FOLLOW ITS WARRIOR BROTHER, HEAD PAST 20 IN A FLASH, AND PURSUE 30 EASILY.
Little attention has been given lately to one of the most reliable time-tested forward indicators of the gold price. The ratio of the 10-year USTreasury Note yield to the 2-year USTreasury Bill yield has always been highly reliable in predicting a move in the gold price. The simple chart of bond yields versus maturity years is known better as the Treasury Yield Curve. The ratio is more amenable to chart analysis. A breakout in the Treasury Yield Ratio is in progress. All benefits from the mid-March monetization announcement have vanished. If the 2-year bond yield remains near 1%, where it appears stuck, then the breakout target would indicate that the 10-year bond yield is heading to 4.1% at least. Yet another method targets 4.1% in the long bond yield. The presented ratio contains information on the future prospect of price inflation, in a reliable contrast of time perspectives. Knuckleheads who insist on pounding the Deflation Tables might want to check this indicator, and look at the crude oil price. It is $63 per barrel, not the $20-25 predicted by these lost troopers. Yo Mish Bro, can you spare me a deflating dime? The strict definition of money is useless anymore. The Shadow Banking system is an actual part of the real world, which you do NOT count.
To the dreamweavers out there who cling to notions of recovery and Green Shoots, bless your heart. Hope has clouded your minds. Once more you believe the purveyors of propaganda, after being nearly fatally burned. The Case Shiller housing price index this week reported a 19.1% annual decline in 1Q2009 from Q1 last year. Foreclosures in April were up 32% over last year, as the nightmare continues. That is 1 in 374 homes with mortgages in America in some process of foreclosure. A relentless decline in home prices erases household wealth, and the source of consumer spending. Consumer confidence is ephemeral and baseless. The mortgage rate has just gone above the pre-March levels, when the USFed announced they would monetize $1050 billion in both USTreasury Bonds and USAgency Mortgage Bonds. The benefit has been erased. Today’s underwater mortgage is tomorrow’s foreclosure, made worse by job losses. The FDIC this week reported a 25% rise in non-current loans in 1Q2009 from Q4 of last year. Greater bank losses will come, much like floods follow hurricanes. And lastly, give credit to the USGovt statrats in their busy laboratories. They decided to ramp up the Q2 Gross Domestic Product by including all USGovt rescue funds for the big banks, including the diverse funds from the many liquidity facilities. All those funds will go directly into the GDP for Q2 as a special line item. Expect a miraculous economic recovery in the second quarter, based in vapor. The stock rally since March was based in accounting fraud. These are true American innovations! They are not exportable.
RELOCATION IN SPECTACULAR COSTA RICA
Living Costa Rica is an online magazine about many aspects of life in the tiny country perched strategically on the land bridge between North and South America. The magazine is a great means not only to learn about Costa Rica, but also to take actual steps on relocation. It has become an excellent tool to find important information about the country, a true tropical paradise in terms of nature and legal alternatives. Property, banks, natural wonders, climate, and demographics are covered. As from May 27th, visit their May-July 2009 issue with interesting information about lifestyle and options. The usual feature is the truly spectacular Central Pacific coast. Visit www.livingcr.com.
CREDIT CRISIS AUTOPSY
Trace Mayer comes to the gold community with a different slant and background. He has a law scholar with emphasis on the Constitution, especially how it applies to the gold and currency topics. In his e-book entitled “The Great Credit Contraction” one can read about the historical significance of a crisis that will surely reshape the world. The global economy is built upon a currency whose illusion is evaporating before our very eyes. This book is an autopsy of the current worldwide systems and begins with financial history, discusses the current great deflationary credit contraction, projects the future environment, and concludes with suggestions on how to generate and preserve wealth in this challenging time. An appendix analyzes important topics. (CLICK HERE TO ORDER)
THE HAT TRICK LETTER PROFITS IN THE CURRENT CRISIS
Jim Willie CB
Editor of the "HAT TRICK LETTER"
Hat Trick Letter
***
Jim Willie CB is a statistical analyst in marketing research and retail forecasting. He holds a PhD in Statistics. His career has stretched over 24 years. He aspires to thrive in the financial editor world, unencumbered by the limitations of economic credentials. Visit his free website to find articles from topflight authors at www.GoldenJackass.com . For personal questions about subscriptions, contact him at JimWillieCB@aol.com
Super-secret clandestine organization remains elusive as ever - Wayne Madsen Report
May 27, 2009 -- Super-secret clandestine organization remains elusive as ever
publication date: May 27, 2009
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May 27, 2009 -- Super-secret clandestine organization remains elusive as ever
A super-secret entity, known as ISTO, or International Strategic and Tactical Organization, which this editor previously reported was involved in coups and assassinations primarily in Africa, including the April 6, 1994 double assassinations of the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi, remains as secretive and elusive as ever. However, WMR has been informed by a well-placed source that ISTO has been active as late as 2006.
After French Judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere named a number of Rwandan government officials as behind the 1994 missile attack on the Rwandan presidential aircraft that resulted in the deaths of Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira, ISTO, which reportedly consists of U.S. defense contractors, oil company executives, and wealthy Republicans, began a campaign via the Belgian media to spread the disinformation that it was France that brought down the aircraft of its ally, Habyarimana, and three French military officers said to have shot down the plane -- Cyrille Lafortune, Michel Billet et Raymond Meghuira -- were supplied to the Rwandan embassy in Canada. French investigators originally tracked down an ISTO operation in Canada. There is also a strong indication that ISTO elements were represented in Rosslyn, Virginia, the home to a number of defense and intelligence contractors.
The three French officers identified by ISTO's interlocutors in Belgium turned out to be bogus. Neither the French St. Cyr military academy nor INTERPOL and the French Judicial Police had any record of the individuals identified.
There are strong indications that ISTO operates as a front for the CIA.
The CIA's use of Canadian front operations to carry out some of its "wet affairs" is not new. The CIA's use of a Canadian firm that interacted with then-Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is well documented. After Tsvangirai became Prime Minister after a lengthy political stalemate with President Robert Mugabe, Tsvangirai's vehicle was struck on March 6 by a truck bearing U.S. embassy license plates. Tsvangirai's wife, Susan, was killed and Tsvangirai was injured. The truck that killed Susan Tsvangirai and almost killed Zimbabwe's new Prime Minister was owned by John Snow Inc., and contracted to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), a long-time cipher for CIA clandestine activities in Africa and elsewhere. However, three days after the crash, John Snow International sent out a confidential memo that stated that on the day of the crash with Tsvangirai's car, the driver was not a JSI [John Snow Inc.] driver on that particular day.
John Snow Inc., named after a 19th century physician who worked on cleaning up drinking water supplies to prevent epidemic outbreaks, manages public health projects in over 38 countries
The JSI memo stated: "'As you may have heard, there was a tragic car accident on Friday (March 6) in Zimbabwe in which the Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai was injured and his wife was killed. The vehicle involved in this accident was registered to USAID/Deliver (a JSI Project) although not driven by a JSI driver, as far as we know. At this point, further details about the accident are unknown. Understandably, this tragedy has generated a lot of media interest. If you receive any inquiries from the media, we ask that you please direct them to Penelope Riseborough, WEI/JSI Director of Communication in Boston."
After the crash, newspaper articles began to appear suggesting that Mugabe's loyalists had something to do with the crash It was the same modus operandi used by ISTO in the case of the aerial assassination of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents. Independent Member of Parliament Jonathan Moyo demanded a full inquiry into USAID's activities in Zimbabwe. WMR has recently learned of a strong link between a top former USAID official and ISTO's highly-covert operations.
In October 2004, Tsvangirai was accused by Mugabe's government of involvement in a plot to assassinate Mugabe. Tsvangirai's comments, allegedly implicating him in the plot, were secretly tape recorded at a meeting in Canada between Tsvangirai and officials of the political lobbying firm Dickens & Madsen, which was representing Tsvangirai's political party, Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), in North America. The firm also had a long-standing link to the Mugabe regime.
The alleged tape recording had been made by Israeli expatriate author and Dickens & Madsen employee Ari Ben-Menashe, who claims to have once worked for Mossad and who was born in Tehran before emigrating to Israel. A dubiously edited copy of the tape was later aired on the Australian SBS television network and resulted in Tsvangirai's trial in Zimbabwe on treason charges. Newsweek magazine and reporter Seymour Hersh, who previously used Ben-Menashe as a source, have called him a fabricator.
Whatever Tsvangirai knew about covert Western intelligence support for his party and presidential candidacy may have later earned him a death sentence by parties associated with ISTO.
Readers are solely responsible for the content of the comments they post on this web site. Comments are subject to the site's terms and conditions of use and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or approval of Wayne Madsen Report.com. Readers whose comments violate the terms of use may have their comments removed or all of their content blocked from viewing by other users without notification.
publication date: May 27, 2009
Download Print
Previous | Next
May 27, 2009 -- Super-secret clandestine organization remains elusive as ever
A super-secret entity, known as ISTO, or International Strategic and Tactical Organization, which this editor previously reported was involved in coups and assassinations primarily in Africa, including the April 6, 1994 double assassinations of the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi, remains as secretive and elusive as ever. However, WMR has been informed by a well-placed source that ISTO has been active as late as 2006.
After French Judge Jean-Louis Bruguiere named a number of Rwandan government officials as behind the 1994 missile attack on the Rwandan presidential aircraft that resulted in the deaths of Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira, ISTO, which reportedly consists of U.S. defense contractors, oil company executives, and wealthy Republicans, began a campaign via the Belgian media to spread the disinformation that it was France that brought down the aircraft of its ally, Habyarimana, and three French military officers said to have shot down the plane -- Cyrille Lafortune, Michel Billet et Raymond Meghuira -- were supplied to the Rwandan embassy in Canada. French investigators originally tracked down an ISTO operation in Canada. There is also a strong indication that ISTO elements were represented in Rosslyn, Virginia, the home to a number of defense and intelligence contractors.
The three French officers identified by ISTO's interlocutors in Belgium turned out to be bogus. Neither the French St. Cyr military academy nor INTERPOL and the French Judicial Police had any record of the individuals identified.
There are strong indications that ISTO operates as a front for the CIA.
The CIA's use of Canadian front operations to carry out some of its "wet affairs" is not new. The CIA's use of a Canadian firm that interacted with then-Zimbabwean opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai is well documented. After Tsvangirai became Prime Minister after a lengthy political stalemate with President Robert Mugabe, Tsvangirai's vehicle was struck on March 6 by a truck bearing U.S. embassy license plates. Tsvangirai's wife, Susan, was killed and Tsvangirai was injured. The truck that killed Susan Tsvangirai and almost killed Zimbabwe's new Prime Minister was owned by John Snow Inc., and contracted to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), a long-time cipher for CIA clandestine activities in Africa and elsewhere. However, three days after the crash, John Snow International sent out a confidential memo that stated that on the day of the crash with Tsvangirai's car, the driver was not a JSI [John Snow Inc.] driver on that particular day.
John Snow Inc., named after a 19th century physician who worked on cleaning up drinking water supplies to prevent epidemic outbreaks, manages public health projects in over 38 countries
The JSI memo stated: "'As you may have heard, there was a tragic car accident on Friday (March 6) in Zimbabwe in which the Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai was injured and his wife was killed. The vehicle involved in this accident was registered to USAID/Deliver (a JSI Project) although not driven by a JSI driver, as far as we know. At this point, further details about the accident are unknown. Understandably, this tragedy has generated a lot of media interest. If you receive any inquiries from the media, we ask that you please direct them to Penelope Riseborough, WEI/JSI Director of Communication in Boston."
After the crash, newspaper articles began to appear suggesting that Mugabe's loyalists had something to do with the crash It was the same modus operandi used by ISTO in the case of the aerial assassination of the Rwandan and Burundian presidents. Independent Member of Parliament Jonathan Moyo demanded a full inquiry into USAID's activities in Zimbabwe. WMR has recently learned of a strong link between a top former USAID official and ISTO's highly-covert operations.
In October 2004, Tsvangirai was accused by Mugabe's government of involvement in a plot to assassinate Mugabe. Tsvangirai's comments, allegedly implicating him in the plot, were secretly tape recorded at a meeting in Canada between Tsvangirai and officials of the political lobbying firm Dickens & Madsen, which was representing Tsvangirai's political party, Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), in North America. The firm also had a long-standing link to the Mugabe regime.
The alleged tape recording had been made by Israeli expatriate author and Dickens & Madsen employee Ari Ben-Menashe, who claims to have once worked for Mossad and who was born in Tehran before emigrating to Israel. A dubiously edited copy of the tape was later aired on the Australian SBS television network and resulted in Tsvangirai's trial in Zimbabwe on treason charges. Newsweek magazine and reporter Seymour Hersh, who previously used Ben-Menashe as a source, have called him a fabricator.
Whatever Tsvangirai knew about covert Western intelligence support for his party and presidential candidacy may have later earned him a death sentence by parties associated with ISTO.
Readers are solely responsible for the content of the comments they post on this web site. Comments are subject to the site's terms and conditions of use and do not necessarily reflect the opinion or approval of Wayne Madsen Report.com. Readers whose comments violate the terms of use may have their comments removed or all of their content blocked from viewing by other users without notification.
9/11 Press for Truth screening in Boulder
PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
May 29, 2009*
Contact:
Boulder – boulder911visibility@gmail.com
Kyle F. Hence, 401-935-7715
kylehence@earthlink.net mailto:kylehence@earthlink.net
*Filmmaker to present Documentary film exposing government cover-up of 9/11 at CU, Boulder, June 4th, 6:30pm – 9:30pm, Room 250, Eaton Humanities (HUMN) building.*
The documentary film, 9/11: Press for Truth
The event is to be held from 6:30pm – 9:30pm in room 250 of the Eaton Humanities (HUMN) building on the CU campus.
Local activist groups Boulder 9/11 Visibility, Colorado 9/11 Visibility and a University of Colorado student group “180-11”
Since its release in 2006, Hence, with writer and Executive Producer credits on the film, has been witness to the documentary’s success as an underground across the globe. The film has received near universally excellent critical reviews while being officially selected and screened at international film festivals in Brazil, Mexico and the Czech Republic. Here in the US several hundred home, library and theatrical screenings rallied tens of thousands to support a new investigation, while US satellite networks, Denver-based FreeSpeechTV and LINKTV, beamed the film to hundreds of thousands of households across the country in 2007 and 2008. Overseas, the film has reached millions in France, Spain, Poland, Switerland, Norway, Sweden, Australia and New Zealand and throughout the Middle East via Al-Jazeera. The complete film has also been downloaded hundreds of thousands of times from GoogleVideo. Last year, it peaked as a top 10 documentary on Apple’s iTunes.
On the political front, 9/11 Press for Truth has been central to ongoing national lobbying campaigns to have 9/11 re-investigated. DownsizeDC, a libertarian group, and a number of liberal organizations including Democrats.com and Progressive Democrats of America have supported the call for nationwide screenings and house parties as part of an effort to compel Congress to re-open inquiries into the unresolved, covered-up or outstanding issues surrounding the attacks.
Show up early seating is limited!
Learn more here:
http://www.meetup.com/Infowar-Boulder/calendar/10528297/
This message was sent from Boulder 9/11 Visibility
*******************************************************************************************************
Thanks to: beavercole@hughes.net
Architects & Engineers for 911 Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO2yT0uBQbM
Friday, May 29, 2009
The Practical Implications of the WHTI
from STRATFOR
The Practical Implications of the WHTI
May 28, 2009
By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton
External Link
• Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative Web site
(STRATFOR is not responsible for the content of other Web sites.)
On June 1, 2009, the land and sea portion of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) will go into effect. The WHTI is a program launched as a result of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 and intended to standardize the documents required to enter the United States. The stated goal of WHTI is to facilitate entry for U.S. citizens and legitimate foreign visitors while reducing the possibility of people entering the country using fraudulent documents.
Prior to the WHTI, American travelers to Mexico, Canada and several countries in the Caribbean needed only a driver’s license and birth certificate to re-enter the United States, while American travelers to other regions of the world required U.S. passports to return. This meant that immigration officials had to examine driver’s licenses and birth certificates from every state, and since the driver’s licenses and birth certificates of all the states change over time, there were literally hundreds of different types of documents that could be used by travelers at points of entry. In practical terms, this meant there was no way immigration officers could be familiar with the security features of each identification document, thereby making it easier for foreigners to use counterfeit or fraudulently altered documents to enter the country by claiming to be returning U.S. citizens.
The air portion of the WHTI went into effect in January 2007 and required that all international air travelers use passports to enter the United States. However, the land and sea implementation of WHTI will be a little different from the air portion. In addition to passports, travelers can also use U.S. passport cards (a driver’s license-sized identification document), an enhanced driver’s license (which are currently being issued by Michigan, New York, Vermont and Washington) or “special trusted” traveler identification cards such as Nexus and Sentri to enter the country by land or sea.
The WHTI will greatly simplify the number of travel documents that immigration officials have to scrutinize. It will also mean that the documents needed to enter the United States will be far harder to counterfeit, alter or obtain by fraud than the documents previously required for entry. This will make it more difficult for criminals, illegal aliens and militants to enter the United States, but it will by no means make it impossible.
An Evolutionary Process
Identity document fraud has existed for as long as identity documents have. Like much sophisticated crime, document fraud has been an evolutionary process. Advancements in document security have been followed by advancements in fraud techniques, which in turn have forced governments to continue to advance their security efforts. In recent years, the advent of color copiers, powerful desktop computers with sophisticated graphics programs and laser printers has propelled this document-fraud arms race into overdrive.
In addition to sophisticated physical security features such as ultraviolet markings and holograms, perhaps the most significant security features of newer identification documents such as passports and visas are that they are machine-readable and linked to a database that can be cross-checked when the document is swiped through a reader at a point of entry. Since 2007, U.S. passports have also incorporated small contactless integrated circuits embedded in the back cover to securely store the information contained on the passport’s photo page. These added security measures have limited the utility of completely counterfeit U.S. passports, which (for the most part) cannot be used to pass through a point of entry equipped with a reader connected to the central database. Such documents are used mostly for traveling abroad rather than for entering the United States.
Likewise, advancements in security features have also made it far more difficult to alter genuine documents by doing things like changing the photo affixed to it (referred to as a photo substitution or “photo sub”). Certainly, there are some very high-end document forgers who can still accomplish this — such as those employed by intelligence agencies — but such operations are very difficult and the documents produced are very expensive.
One of the benefits of the WHTI is that it will now force those wishing to obtain genuine documents by fraud to travel to a higher level — it has, in effect, upped the ante. As STRATFOR has long noted, driver’s licenses pose serious national security vulnerability. Driver’s licenses are, in fact, the closet thing to a U.S. national identity card. However, driver’s licenses are issued by each state, and the process of getting one differs greatly from state to state. Criminals clearly have figured out how to work the system to get fraudulent driver’s licenses. Some states make it easier to get licenses than others and people looking for fraudulent identification flock to those states. Within the states, there are also some department of motor vehicles (DMV) offices — and specific workers — known to be more lenient, and those seeking fraudulent licenses will intentionally visit those offices. In addition to corrupt DMV employees and states that issue driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants, an illegal industry has arisen devoted entirely to producing counterfeit identification documents, compounding the problem.
Birth certificates are also relatively easy to obtain illegally. The relative ease of fraudulently obtaining birth certificates as well as driver’s licenses is seen in federal document-fraud cases (both documents are required to apply for a U.S. passport). In a large majority of the passport-fraud cases worked by Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) special agents, the suspects have successfully obtained fraudulent driver’s licenses and birth certificates, which are submitted in support of a passport application. It is not uncommon for DSS special agents to arrest suspects who possess multiple driver’s licenses in different identities from the same state or even from different states. Such documents could have been used to travel across the U.S. border via land prior to the implementation of the WHTI.
Countermoves
For those able to afford the fees of high-end alien smugglers, who can charge up to $30,000 for a package of identification documents that contains a genuine U.S. passport with genuine supporting documents (birth certificate, social security card and driver’s license), or $10,000 to $15,000 for a genuine U.S. visa (tied to a database, the newer machine-readable visas are very difficult to counterfeit), the WHTI will not make much difference. These high-end document vendors obtain legitimate identification documents by paying corrupt officials who have been carefully cultivated.
That said, the WHTI should succeed in causing the vast majority of criminal aliens, illegal economic immigrants and even militants — people who have not traditionally patronized high-end document vendors — to change the way they enter the United States. Of course, perhaps the simplest way is to take the low road. That is, get to Canada or Mexico and then simply sneak across the border as an undocumented alien — something that hundreds of thousands of people do every year. Once inside the country, such aliens can link up with lower-level document vendors to obtain the driver’s licenses, social security cards and other identity documents they need in order to live, work and travel around the country.
But there are other ways that the WHTI measures can be circumvented. For example, the crush of passport applications the WHTI is now causing will create a distinct vulnerability in the short term. Although the U.S. Department of State has hired a large number of new examiners to process the flood of passport applications it is receiving (and also a number of new DSS special agents to investigate fraud cases), the system is currently overwhelmed by the volume of passport applications.
Historically, passport examiners have had their performance evaluations based on the number of passport applications they process rather than on the number of fraudulent applications they catch (which has long been a source of friction between the DSS and the Bureau of Consular Affairs). This emphasis on numerical quotas has been documented in U.S. Government Accountability Office reports that have noted that the quotas essentially force examiners to take shortcuts in their fraud-detection efforts. As a result, many genuine passports have been issued to people who did not have a legitimate right to them. The current overwhelming flood of passport applications as a result of WHTI, when combined with a batch of new examiners who are rated on numerical quotas, will further enhance this vulnerability. Unless a passport application has an obvious fraud indicator, it will likely slip through the cracks and a fraudulent applicant will receive a genuine U.S. passport.
Stolen passports are another area to consider. In addition to being photo-subbed, which has become more difficult, stolen passports can also be used as travel documents by people who resemble the owner of the document. All the holograms, microprinting and other security features that have been placed on the laminates of passport photo pages tend to make it difficult to clearly see the photo of the passport holder. Also, people change over time, so a person who was issued a passport eight years ago can look substantially different from their passport photo today. The passport process and the laminate can also make it especially difficult to see the facial features of dark-skinned people. This means it is not at all uncommon for a person to be able to impersonate someone and use his or her passport without altering it. This problem persists, even with digital photos being included with the information embedded electronically in the memory chips of newer electronic passports.
Because of these possibilities, stolen passports are worth a tidy sum on the black market. Indeed, shortly after U.S. passports with green covers were issued, they were found to be extremely easy to photo-sub and were soon fetching $7,000 apiece on the black market in places like Jamaica and Haiti. In fact, criminal gangs quickly began offering tourists cash or drugs in exchange for the documents, and the criminal gangs would then turn around and sell them for a profit to document vendors. The problem of U.S. citizens selling their passports also persists today.
On the flip side, many Americans are unaware of the monetary value of their passport — which is several times the $100 they paid to have it issued. They do not realize that when they carry their passport it is like toting around a wad of $100 bills. Tour guides who collect the passports of all the people in their tour group and then keep them in a bag or backpack can end up carrying around tens of thousands of dollars in identification documents — which would make a really nice haul for a petty criminal in the Third World.
But U.S. passports are not the only ones at risk of being stolen. The changes in travel documents required to enter the United States will also place a premium on passports from countries that are included in the U.S. “visa waiver” program — that is, those countries whose citizens can travel to and remain in the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. There are currently 35 countries in the visa waiver program, including EU member states, Australia, Japan and a few others. The risk of theft is especially acute for those countries on the visa waiver list that issue passports that are easier to photo-sub than a U.S. passport. In some visa waiver countries, it is also cheaper and easier to obtain a genuine passport from a corrupt government official than it is in the United States.
While there are efforts currently under way to create an international database to rapidly share data about lost and stolen blank and issued passports, there is generally a time lag before lost and stolen foreign passports are entered into U.S. lookout systems. This lag provides ample time for someone to enter the United States on a photo-subbed passport, and it is not clear if retroactive searches are made once the United States is notified of a stolen passport in order to determine if that passport was used to enter the United States during the lag period. Of course, once a person is inside the United States, it is fairly easy to obtain identification documents in another identity and simply disappear.
There have also been cases of jihadist groups using the passports of militants from visa waiver countries who have died in order to move other operatives into the United States. On Sept. 1, 1992, Ahmed Ajaj and Abdul Basit (also known as Ramzi Yousef) arrived at New York’s Kennedy Airport. The two men had boarded a flight in Karachi, Pakistan, using photo-subbed passports that had been acquired from deceased jihadists. Ajaj used a Swedish passport in the name Khurram Khan and Basit used a British passport in the name Mohamed Azan.
Ultimately, the WHTI will help close some significant loopholes — especially regarding the use of fraud-prone driver’s licenses and birth certificates for international travel — but the program will not end all document fraud. Document vendors will continue to shift and adjust their efforts to adapt to the WHTI and exploit other vulnerabilities in the system.
The Practical Implications of the WHTI
May 28, 2009
By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton
External Link
• Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative Web site
(STRATFOR is not responsible for the content of other Web sites.)
On June 1, 2009, the land and sea portion of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative (WHTI) will go into effect. The WHTI is a program launched as a result of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 and intended to standardize the documents required to enter the United States. The stated goal of WHTI is to facilitate entry for U.S. citizens and legitimate foreign visitors while reducing the possibility of people entering the country using fraudulent documents.
Prior to the WHTI, American travelers to Mexico, Canada and several countries in the Caribbean needed only a driver’s license and birth certificate to re-enter the United States, while American travelers to other regions of the world required U.S. passports to return. This meant that immigration officials had to examine driver’s licenses and birth certificates from every state, and since the driver’s licenses and birth certificates of all the states change over time, there were literally hundreds of different types of documents that could be used by travelers at points of entry. In practical terms, this meant there was no way immigration officers could be familiar with the security features of each identification document, thereby making it easier for foreigners to use counterfeit or fraudulently altered documents to enter the country by claiming to be returning U.S. citizens.
The air portion of the WHTI went into effect in January 2007 and required that all international air travelers use passports to enter the United States. However, the land and sea implementation of WHTI will be a little different from the air portion. In addition to passports, travelers can also use U.S. passport cards (a driver’s license-sized identification document), an enhanced driver’s license (which are currently being issued by Michigan, New York, Vermont and Washington) or “special trusted” traveler identification cards such as Nexus and Sentri to enter the country by land or sea.
The WHTI will greatly simplify the number of travel documents that immigration officials have to scrutinize. It will also mean that the documents needed to enter the United States will be far harder to counterfeit, alter or obtain by fraud than the documents previously required for entry. This will make it more difficult for criminals, illegal aliens and militants to enter the United States, but it will by no means make it impossible.
An Evolutionary Process
Identity document fraud has existed for as long as identity documents have. Like much sophisticated crime, document fraud has been an evolutionary process. Advancements in document security have been followed by advancements in fraud techniques, which in turn have forced governments to continue to advance their security efforts. In recent years, the advent of color copiers, powerful desktop computers with sophisticated graphics programs and laser printers has propelled this document-fraud arms race into overdrive.
In addition to sophisticated physical security features such as ultraviolet markings and holograms, perhaps the most significant security features of newer identification documents such as passports and visas are that they are machine-readable and linked to a database that can be cross-checked when the document is swiped through a reader at a point of entry. Since 2007, U.S. passports have also incorporated small contactless integrated circuits embedded in the back cover to securely store the information contained on the passport’s photo page. These added security measures have limited the utility of completely counterfeit U.S. passports, which (for the most part) cannot be used to pass through a point of entry equipped with a reader connected to the central database. Such documents are used mostly for traveling abroad rather than for entering the United States.
Likewise, advancements in security features have also made it far more difficult to alter genuine documents by doing things like changing the photo affixed to it (referred to as a photo substitution or “photo sub”). Certainly, there are some very high-end document forgers who can still accomplish this — such as those employed by intelligence agencies — but such operations are very difficult and the documents produced are very expensive.
One of the benefits of the WHTI is that it will now force those wishing to obtain genuine documents by fraud to travel to a higher level — it has, in effect, upped the ante. As STRATFOR has long noted, driver’s licenses pose serious national security vulnerability. Driver’s licenses are, in fact, the closet thing to a U.S. national identity card. However, driver’s licenses are issued by each state, and the process of getting one differs greatly from state to state. Criminals clearly have figured out how to work the system to get fraudulent driver’s licenses. Some states make it easier to get licenses than others and people looking for fraudulent identification flock to those states. Within the states, there are also some department of motor vehicles (DMV) offices — and specific workers — known to be more lenient, and those seeking fraudulent licenses will intentionally visit those offices. In addition to corrupt DMV employees and states that issue driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants, an illegal industry has arisen devoted entirely to producing counterfeit identification documents, compounding the problem.
Birth certificates are also relatively easy to obtain illegally. The relative ease of fraudulently obtaining birth certificates as well as driver’s licenses is seen in federal document-fraud cases (both documents are required to apply for a U.S. passport). In a large majority of the passport-fraud cases worked by Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) special agents, the suspects have successfully obtained fraudulent driver’s licenses and birth certificates, which are submitted in support of a passport application. It is not uncommon for DSS special agents to arrest suspects who possess multiple driver’s licenses in different identities from the same state or even from different states. Such documents could have been used to travel across the U.S. border via land prior to the implementation of the WHTI.
Countermoves
For those able to afford the fees of high-end alien smugglers, who can charge up to $30,000 for a package of identification documents that contains a genuine U.S. passport with genuine supporting documents (birth certificate, social security card and driver’s license), or $10,000 to $15,000 for a genuine U.S. visa (tied to a database, the newer machine-readable visas are very difficult to counterfeit), the WHTI will not make much difference. These high-end document vendors obtain legitimate identification documents by paying corrupt officials who have been carefully cultivated.
That said, the WHTI should succeed in causing the vast majority of criminal aliens, illegal economic immigrants and even militants — people who have not traditionally patronized high-end document vendors — to change the way they enter the United States. Of course, perhaps the simplest way is to take the low road. That is, get to Canada or Mexico and then simply sneak across the border as an undocumented alien — something that hundreds of thousands of people do every year. Once inside the country, such aliens can link up with lower-level document vendors to obtain the driver’s licenses, social security cards and other identity documents they need in order to live, work and travel around the country.
But there are other ways that the WHTI measures can be circumvented. For example, the crush of passport applications the WHTI is now causing will create a distinct vulnerability in the short term. Although the U.S. Department of State has hired a large number of new examiners to process the flood of passport applications it is receiving (and also a number of new DSS special agents to investigate fraud cases), the system is currently overwhelmed by the volume of passport applications.
Historically, passport examiners have had their performance evaluations based on the number of passport applications they process rather than on the number of fraudulent applications they catch (which has long been a source of friction between the DSS and the Bureau of Consular Affairs). This emphasis on numerical quotas has been documented in U.S. Government Accountability Office reports that have noted that the quotas essentially force examiners to take shortcuts in their fraud-detection efforts. As a result, many genuine passports have been issued to people who did not have a legitimate right to them. The current overwhelming flood of passport applications as a result of WHTI, when combined with a batch of new examiners who are rated on numerical quotas, will further enhance this vulnerability. Unless a passport application has an obvious fraud indicator, it will likely slip through the cracks and a fraudulent applicant will receive a genuine U.S. passport.
Stolen passports are another area to consider. In addition to being photo-subbed, which has become more difficult, stolen passports can also be used as travel documents by people who resemble the owner of the document. All the holograms, microprinting and other security features that have been placed on the laminates of passport photo pages tend to make it difficult to clearly see the photo of the passport holder. Also, people change over time, so a person who was issued a passport eight years ago can look substantially different from their passport photo today. The passport process and the laminate can also make it especially difficult to see the facial features of dark-skinned people. This means it is not at all uncommon for a person to be able to impersonate someone and use his or her passport without altering it. This problem persists, even with digital photos being included with the information embedded electronically in the memory chips of newer electronic passports.
Because of these possibilities, stolen passports are worth a tidy sum on the black market. Indeed, shortly after U.S. passports with green covers were issued, they were found to be extremely easy to photo-sub and were soon fetching $7,000 apiece on the black market in places like Jamaica and Haiti. In fact, criminal gangs quickly began offering tourists cash or drugs in exchange for the documents, and the criminal gangs would then turn around and sell them for a profit to document vendors. The problem of U.S. citizens selling their passports also persists today.
On the flip side, many Americans are unaware of the monetary value of their passport — which is several times the $100 they paid to have it issued. They do not realize that when they carry their passport it is like toting around a wad of $100 bills. Tour guides who collect the passports of all the people in their tour group and then keep them in a bag or backpack can end up carrying around tens of thousands of dollars in identification documents — which would make a really nice haul for a petty criminal in the Third World.
But U.S. passports are not the only ones at risk of being stolen. The changes in travel documents required to enter the United States will also place a premium on passports from countries that are included in the U.S. “visa waiver” program — that is, those countries whose citizens can travel to and remain in the United States for up to 90 days without a visa. There are currently 35 countries in the visa waiver program, including EU member states, Australia, Japan and a few others. The risk of theft is especially acute for those countries on the visa waiver list that issue passports that are easier to photo-sub than a U.S. passport. In some visa waiver countries, it is also cheaper and easier to obtain a genuine passport from a corrupt government official than it is in the United States.
While there are efforts currently under way to create an international database to rapidly share data about lost and stolen blank and issued passports, there is generally a time lag before lost and stolen foreign passports are entered into U.S. lookout systems. This lag provides ample time for someone to enter the United States on a photo-subbed passport, and it is not clear if retroactive searches are made once the United States is notified of a stolen passport in order to determine if that passport was used to enter the United States during the lag period. Of course, once a person is inside the United States, it is fairly easy to obtain identification documents in another identity and simply disappear.
There have also been cases of jihadist groups using the passports of militants from visa waiver countries who have died in order to move other operatives into the United States. On Sept. 1, 1992, Ahmed Ajaj and Abdul Basit (also known as Ramzi Yousef) arrived at New York’s Kennedy Airport. The two men had boarded a flight in Karachi, Pakistan, using photo-subbed passports that had been acquired from deceased jihadists. Ajaj used a Swedish passport in the name Khurram Khan and Basit used a British passport in the name Mohamed Azan.
Ultimately, the WHTI will help close some significant loopholes — especially regarding the use of fraud-prone driver’s licenses and birth certificates for international travel — but the program will not end all document fraud. Document vendors will continue to shift and adjust their efforts to adapt to the WHTI and exploit other vulnerabilities in the system.
Nancy Pelosi: Haute-ing up the planet
JunkScience.com Update
May 28, 2009
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By Steve Milloy, JunkScience.com
May 28, 2009
Nancy Pelosi told a Chinese audience that we need to "inventory" our personal lives
for their environmental impacts.
But what's her carbon footprint?
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From the inside flap...
Big Brother Has Turned Green
The environmental movement has cultivated a warm and fuzzy public image, but behind
the smiley-face rhetoric of "sustainability" and "conservation" lies a dark agenda.
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May 28, 2009
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Nancy Pelosi: Haute-ing up the planet [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVarbcJjaEjxT36yoXcW-hgwJJ8FVJl3PwFuIAfA-ujEiANj4c995MYanYwfqT_Hyxs7lYcNlP6EsSi1P_xBQmMCwrpMYmzzhTTojnq4QNf0gO-kARTxhMNkJLe8i00m6fcBtkRfJLk8NrY6lY00xUNBmtYDg_kq3giUqJ57-YighsMs4QKEXBrRDyfGny8SeiLys=]
By Steve Milloy, JunkScience.com
May 28, 2009
Nancy Pelosi told a Chinese audience that we need to "inventory" our personal lives
for their environmental impacts.
But what's her carbon footprint?
Check out full story [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVarbcJjaEjxT36yoXcW-hgwJJ8FVJl3PwFuIAfA-ujEiANj4c995MYanYwfqT_Hyxs7lYcNlP6EsSi1P_xBQmMCwrpMYmzzhTTojnq4QNf0gO-kARTxhMNkJLe8i00m6fcBtkRfJLk8NrY6lY00xUNBmtYDg_kq3giUqJ57-YighsMs4QKEXBrRDyfGny8SeiLys=]at
GreenHellBlog.com.
Don't forget to get your copy of Steve Milloy's new book Green Hell: How Environmentalists
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is available now!
Green Hell:
How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them
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From the inside flap...
Big Brother Has Turned Green
The environmental movement has cultivated a warm and fuzzy public image, but behind
the smiley-face rhetoric of "sustainability" and "conservation" lies a dark agenda.
The Greens aim to regulate your behavior, downsize your lifestyle, and invade the
most intimate aspects of your personal life.
In this stunning exposé, Steve Milloy unveils the authoritarian impulse underlying
the Green crusade. Whether they're demanding that you turn down your thermostat,
stop driving your car, or engage in some other senseless act of self-denial, the
Greens are envisioning a grim future for you marked by endless privation... more
[http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVarb3uh91lybkvrEEeYKnYUUEPKVsL88tlaPzcKdzivr2Eb9BatN_uyfli00R67ogr2Q7V_MeYLHwRx_RyslbnE8ikXDOzPGXfMCDmjWmKBYpu6ZJAKhqNW2Q7lHN28okncKCoybyu5Xu5i10EyQjElUCQNB5dytt1q2D2_rzPTPkN-HFBJMphRk844ktzYjnoHFTPwJDUzIEgMaQi-i7KjH0m5zQVpqTNWcZM8UPNmiuSM0CDxKwzUVTcYUjDr2-BfkDD-u0lJPJc6hTGb4KGugs]
Look who's endorsed Green Hell:
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is over' line on global warming. While we're all for the environment, Green Hell
explains why we need to oppose the environmentalists."
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"Green Hell is the `inconvenient truth' on extremist, growth-killing environmentalism.
A must-read for those interested in keeping America free and prosperous."
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"This book describes why the world can't afford to fall for global warming alarmism
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vision of our future."
--VACLAV KLAUS, President of the European Union and President of the Czech Republic
"Free market capitalism is still the best path to prosperity. Green Hell is a must-read
for anyone who wants to keep America on that path and away from Soviet-style command-and-control
environmentalism."
--Larry Kudlow, Host, CNBC's The Kudlow Report
Get Green Hell at Amazon.com! [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVarb3uh91lybkvrEEeYKnYUUEPKVsL88tlaPzcKdzivr2Eb9BatN_uyfli00R67ogr2Q7V_MeYLHwRx_RyslbnE8ikXDOzPGXfMCDmjWmKBYpu6ZJAKhqNW2Q7lHN28okncKCoybyu5Xu5i10EyQjElUCQNB5dytt1q2D2_rzPTPkN-HFBJMphRk844ktzYjnoHFTPwJDUzIEgMaQi-i7KjH0m5zQVpqTNWcZM8UPNmiuSM0CDxKwzUVTcYUjDr2-BfkDD-u0lJPJc6hTGb4KGugs]
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JunkScience.com needs your support to stay online.
Donate or shop at the JunkScience.com Store! [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVarahJa-E9bauYxy85-VUSINwTBLQQ96bIJujCt0aEYCDbVa8oas3MGKUuIu2KyxtBAi4yyCCSW5uXZBf2aDen0GywV3AlaCvoLJbxB_uTxVECcmBwONy5Zid]
Thanks!
Steven Milloy
Publisher, JunkScience.com
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Available at
Amazon.com!
GET IT AT
Amazon.com! [http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102593875846&s=13013&e=001V3yMnieVaraGkZoAGsqhPh45ok-gpMj1Huutn9lmkHpw-JEYogWLPldsYBDkEy17dP842WNLcHVmAKnO8dcRlorPhcfma751mFaSI_ZkL7P0kZfvv79OQ2utK_RgD75Wq1Wqt25HLbI7kZdFUzyuA4ier5WZ7JIhdqTKYojV4nNVh_GwDcXy0u-AIQoxGfGm5YcP6-MNbLfnv848MSjrOPY-yyXTXV87Y7FhdhfNETetu50y1KYBlCbA6mZa6qjWp75o7p8-lXbGVFeylnLBx3jI3mNlCnr-]
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Thursday, May 28, 2009
Who Will Stand Up to America and Israel? By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
Who Will Stand Up to America and Israel?
Doublespeak on North Korea
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
"Obama Calls on World to 'Stand Up To' North Korea" read the headline. The
United States, Obama said, was determined to protect "the peace and security
of the world."
Shades of doublespeak, doublethink, 1984.
North Korea is a small place. China alone could snuff it out in a few
minutes. Yet, the president of the US thinks that nothing less than the
entire world is a match for North Korea.
We are witnessing the Washington gangsters construct yet another threat like
Slobodan Milosevic, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, John Walker Lindh,
Hamdi, Padilla, Sami Al-Arian, Hamas, Mahkmoud Ahmadinejad, and the hapless
detainees demonized by the US Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld as "the 700 most
dangerous terrorists on the face of the earth," who were tortured for six
years at Gitmo only to be quietly released. Just another mistake, sorry.
The military/security complex that rules America, together with the Israel
Lobby and the financial banksters, needs a long list of dangerous enemies to
keep the taxpayers' money flowing into its coffers.
The Homeland Security lobby is dependent on endless threats to convince
Americans that they must forego civil liberty in order to be safe and
secure.
The real question is who is going to stand up to the American and Israeli
governments?
Who is going to protect Americans' and Israelis' civil liberties, especially
those of Israeli dissenters and Israel's Arab citizens?
Who is going to protect Palestinians, Iraqis, Afghans, Lebanese, Iranians,
and Syrians from Americans and Israelis?
Not Obama, and not the right-wing brownshirts that today rule Israel.
Obama's notion that it takes the entire world to stand up to N. Korea is
mind-boggling, but this mind-boggling idea pales in comparison to Obama's
guarantee that America will protect "the peace and security of the world."
Is this the same America that bombed Serbia, including Chinese diplomatic
offices and civilian passenger trains, and pried Kosovo loose from Serbia
and gave it to a gang of Muslin drug lords, lending them NATO troops to
protect their operation?
Is this the same America that is responsible for approximately one million
dead Iraqis, leaving orphans and widows everywhere and making refugees out
of one-firth of the Iraqi population?
Is this the same America that blocked the rest of the world from condemning
Israel for its murderous attack on Lebanese civilians in 2006 and on Gazans
most recently, the same America that has covered up for Israel's theft of
Palestine over the past 60 years, a theft that has produced four million
Palestinian refugees driven by Israeli violence and terror from their homes
and villages?
Is this the same America that is conducting military exercises in former
constituent parts of Russia and ringing Russia with missile bases?
Is this the same America that has bombed Afghanistan into rubble with
massive civilian casualties?
Is this the same America that has started a horrific new war in Pakistan, a
war that in its first few days has produced one million refugees?
"The peace and security of the world"? Whose world?
On his return from his consultation with Obama in Washington, the
brownshirted Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that it was
Israel's responsibility to "eliminate" the "nuclear threat" from Iran.
What nuclear threat? The US intelligence agencies are unanimous in their
conclusion that Iran has had no nuclear weapons program since 2003. The
inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency report that there is no
sign of a nuclear weapons program in Iran.
Who is Iran bombing? How many refugees is Iran sending fleeing for their
lives?
Who is North Korea bombing?
The two great murderous, refugee-producing countries are the US and Israel.
Between them, they have murdered and dislocated millions of people who were
a threat to no one.
No countries on earth rival the US and Israel for barbaric murderous
violence.
But Obama gives assurances that the US will protect "the peace and security
of the world." And the brownshirt Netanyahu assures the world that Israel
will save it from the "Iranian threat."
Where is the media?
Why aren't people laughing their heads off?
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan
administration. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be
reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com
Jack Perrine | Athena Programming | 626-798-6574
-----------------| 1175 N Altadena Dr | ---------------
Jack@Minerva.com | Pasadena CA 91107 |
Doublespeak on North Korea
By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS
"Obama Calls on World to 'Stand Up To' North Korea" read the headline. The
United States, Obama said, was determined to protect "the peace and security
of the world."
Shades of doublespeak, doublethink, 1984.
North Korea is a small place. China alone could snuff it out in a few
minutes. Yet, the president of the US thinks that nothing less than the
entire world is a match for North Korea.
We are witnessing the Washington gangsters construct yet another threat like
Slobodan Milosevic, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, John Walker Lindh,
Hamdi, Padilla, Sami Al-Arian, Hamas, Mahkmoud Ahmadinejad, and the hapless
detainees demonized by the US Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld as "the 700 most
dangerous terrorists on the face of the earth," who were tortured for six
years at Gitmo only to be quietly released. Just another mistake, sorry.
The military/security complex that rules America, together with the Israel
Lobby and the financial banksters, needs a long list of dangerous enemies to
keep the taxpayers' money flowing into its coffers.
The Homeland Security lobby is dependent on endless threats to convince
Americans that they must forego civil liberty in order to be safe and
secure.
The real question is who is going to stand up to the American and Israeli
governments?
Who is going to protect Americans' and Israelis' civil liberties, especially
those of Israeli dissenters and Israel's Arab citizens?
Who is going to protect Palestinians, Iraqis, Afghans, Lebanese, Iranians,
and Syrians from Americans and Israelis?
Not Obama, and not the right-wing brownshirts that today rule Israel.
Obama's notion that it takes the entire world to stand up to N. Korea is
mind-boggling, but this mind-boggling idea pales in comparison to Obama's
guarantee that America will protect "the peace and security of the world."
Is this the same America that bombed Serbia, including Chinese diplomatic
offices and civilian passenger trains, and pried Kosovo loose from Serbia
and gave it to a gang of Muslin drug lords, lending them NATO troops to
protect their operation?
Is this the same America that is responsible for approximately one million
dead Iraqis, leaving orphans and widows everywhere and making refugees out
of one-firth of the Iraqi population?
Is this the same America that blocked the rest of the world from condemning
Israel for its murderous attack on Lebanese civilians in 2006 and on Gazans
most recently, the same America that has covered up for Israel's theft of
Palestine over the past 60 years, a theft that has produced four million
Palestinian refugees driven by Israeli violence and terror from their homes
and villages?
Is this the same America that is conducting military exercises in former
constituent parts of Russia and ringing Russia with missile bases?
Is this the same America that has bombed Afghanistan into rubble with
massive civilian casualties?
Is this the same America that has started a horrific new war in Pakistan, a
war that in its first few days has produced one million refugees?
"The peace and security of the world"? Whose world?
On his return from his consultation with Obama in Washington, the
brownshirted Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that it was
Israel's responsibility to "eliminate" the "nuclear threat" from Iran.
What nuclear threat? The US intelligence agencies are unanimous in their
conclusion that Iran has had no nuclear weapons program since 2003. The
inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency report that there is no
sign of a nuclear weapons program in Iran.
Who is Iran bombing? How many refugees is Iran sending fleeing for their
lives?
Who is North Korea bombing?
The two great murderous, refugee-producing countries are the US and Israel.
Between them, they have murdered and dislocated millions of people who were
a threat to no one.
No countries on earth rival the US and Israel for barbaric murderous
violence.
But Obama gives assurances that the US will protect "the peace and security
of the world." And the brownshirt Netanyahu assures the world that Israel
will save it from the "Iranian threat."
Where is the media?
Why aren't people laughing their heads off?
Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan
administration. He is coauthor of The Tyranny of Good Intentions.He can be
reached at: PaulCraigRoberts@yahoo.com
Jack Perrine | Athena Programming | 626-798-6574
-----------------| 1175 N Altadena Dr | ---------------
Jack@Minerva.com | Pasadena CA 91107 |
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
ECONOMIC STING: THE IMF GRAND DECEPTION IN THE ASIAN CRISIS
ECONOMIC STING:
THE IMF GRAND DECEPTION
IN THE ASIAN FINANCIAL CRISIS
IMF's High-Interest-Rate Prescription Appeared as a GRAND DECEPTION in the Asian Crisis--It was Touted as Cure to Ailing Asian Economies, in Reality it Was Aimed at Hiding IMF's Prior Monumental Omission to Promote Hedging Against Exchange Losses on Foreign Loans of Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Corporations, Which Omission IMF Tried to Conceal During the Onset of Crisis Through Preventing Impending Exchange Losses the Disastrous Way: By Prescribing High Interest Rates Designed to Stabilize Exchange Rates and Avoid Exchange Losses on Unhedged Foreign Loans of Dollar-Debt-Laden Asian Companies, Thereby Saving from Corollary Bad Loans their Foreign Creditors in Advanced Nations that Rule IMF--and Never Mind the Concomitant Massacre of Asian Banks and Borrowers from High Interest Rates.
The Announced Objective
of High Interest Rates in the Asian Crisis
Highest IMF officials explained the immediate specific objective of their prescribed high interest rates in the Asian meltdown, as follows:
From then IMF First Deputy Managing Director, Stanley Fischer
(Stanley Fischer, "The IMF and the Asian Crisis," Forum Funds
Lecture at UCLA, Los Angeles on March 20, 1998):
When their governments "approached the IMF, the reserves of Thailand and Korea were perilously low, and the Indonesian Rupiah was excessively depreciated. Thus, the first order of business was...to restore confidence in the currency. To achieve this, countries have to make it more attractive to hold domestic currency, which in turn, requires increasing interest rates temporarily, even if higher interest costs complicate the situation of weak banks and corporations….
"Why not operate with lower interest rates and a greater devaluation? This is a relevant tradeoff, but there can be no question that the degree of devaluation in the Asian countries is excessive, both from the viewpoint of the individual countries, and from the viewpoint of the international system. Looking first to the individual country, companies with substantial foreign currency debts, as so many companies in these countries have, stood to suffer far more from… currency (depreciation) than from a temporary rise in domestic interest rates…. Thus on macroeconomics… monetary policy has to be kept tight to restore confidence in the currency…."
From the then IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus himself
("Doctor Knows Best?" Asiaweek, July 17, 1998, p. 46):
"To reverse (currency depreciation), countries have to make it more attractive to hold domestic currency, and that means temporarily raising interest rates, even if this (hurts) weak banks and corporations."
The Discernible Real Objective
of High Interest Rates in the Crisis
From the foregoing pronouncements of the two highest IMF management officials, Messrs. Michel Camdessus and Stanley Fischer, it appears that IMF simply FOOLED and deceived crisis-hit Asian governments, central banks, banks, and borrowers on the real reason for the IMF-prescribed high interest rates. The true objective was to save not the ailing Asian economies but the dollar-debt-ridden Asian corporations' foreign creditors—banks and non-banks—in advanced nations that rule IMF.
Clearly, IMF knew beforehand that high interest rates would ravage Asian banks and borrowers, but they had to be sacrificed for the greater goal of stabilizing exchange rates, curbing currency depreciation, and saving from huge exchange losses the dollar-debt-ridden Asian companies, otherwise it would be their foreign creditors in advanced nations that would bear the brunt of concomitant bad loans from the Asian corporations’ loan defaults and bankruptcies, the foreseeable result of their impending staggering exchange losses on their unhedged foreign loans. By all means, IMF had to prevent the Asian epidemic from going out of bounds and reaching the advanced nations' shores no matter what the cost might be—not to the advanced nations but to the distressed Asian economies.
IMF COMMITTED ERROR AFTER ERROR
BEFORE AND DURING THE ASIAN FINANCIAL CRISIS
Before the Crisis,
IMF Should Have Prescribed
Exchange Rate Hedging on Foreign Loans
of Dollar-Debt-Laden Asian Corporations,
to Avoid The Need for High Interest Rates in Addressing
Impending Exchange Losses on their Unhedged
Foreign Loans Once Economic Crisis Strikes
Actually, IMF could have totally or substantially avoided prescribing ultra high interest rates in the Asian meltdown had it been proactive rather than reactive in the attainment of its mission. As a prime mover of currency liberalization under globalization, IMF helped promote the free flow of advanced nations' massive investment funds to developing Asian countries. The foreign fund inflow fueled the phenomenal growth of affected Asian economies before the crisis. However, as the funds were in effect direct and indirect lending to the developing nations, in the long run, there was probability that future collections maybe marred by delinquencies and bad loans, especially if there were economic aberrations. Therefore, as part of IMF's planning and risk management, it should have instituted safety nets to currency liberalization, like exchange rate HEDGING on foreign loans obtained by dollar-debt-ridden Asian corporations.
When IMF did nothing and the Asian crisis erupted, naturally, it had to face an onrushing TSUNAMI of EXCHANGE LOSSES among dollar-debt ridden Asian companies—which losses could translate to bad loans in the origins of the massive investment funds that flowed into the region—the advanced nations that control IMF. To address the problem, IMF sacrificed Asian borrowers and banks through subsidy-laden, anti-market, disastrous but superfluous—in other words, technically wrong—high interest rates, culminating in humongous bad loans in victimized Asian economies.
Can’t IMF See that it is Absurd to Have Wrong Parties—
Borrowers—Sacrifice to the Extent of their Bankruptcy
for Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Companies that they Do Not Own
in the First Place—From Which they Never Profited in the Past,
and from Which they Will Never Profit in the Future?
In the past, when the going was great, DOLLAR-DEBT-RIDDEN ASIAN CORPORATIONS benefited from their FOREIGN LOANS which helped them generate PROFITS solely for their STOCKHOLDERS, who received the profits through cash and stock dividends. Then, when the Asian crisis struck and the going was tough, under free market the Asian corporations should suffer the consequences of their negligent act—RISK MISMANAGEMENT through failure to obtain exchange rate HEDGING on their foreign loans. However, this was not the case under IMF's violation of free market by way of its prescribed out-of-the-market HIGH INTEREST RATES, charged by banks on a no-choice basis to victimized captive old-loan borrowers. Through high interest rates as monetary tool against currency speculation, consequent currency depreciation, and corollary exchange losses, IMF in effect shifted the burden of saving these corporations from the right parties, their owners or stockholders, to the wrong ones—the Asian BORROWERS.
To begin with, the borrowers were totally unrelated to the corporations and NEVER BENEFITED from their FOREIGN LOANS and PAST PROFITS. Worse, borrowers had to save the corporations at the price of disasters to the borrowers themselves. Afterwards, when the crisis is gone, the dollar-debt-ridden corporations saved by borrowers will generate profits again—but none of their profits will ever be used to help the now bankrupt borrowers who saved them in the past. In short, in gross violation of sound economics, morals, fair play, logic, the governing generally accepted standard of fairness—the BENEFIT PRINCIPLE of public finance—and of course sacred FREE MARKET, IMF played God over the lives of unsuspecting Asians, by heaping all sacrifices upon discriminated borrowers and all profits upon favored dollar-debt-ridden-corporations.
During the Crisis,
Even With the General Lack of Foreign Loan Hedging by
Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Corporations, IMF Could Have Avoided Still
the Need for High Interest Rates—Through Less Disastrous Alternatives
During normal times, IMF should have prescribed HEDGING on foreign loans to developing countries under its sway in order to avoid the supposed need for high interest rates once unpredictable economic crisis suddenly strikes. High interest rates are supposedly needed to defend the local currency against speculative attacks, stabilize the exchange rate, curb currency depreciation, avoid huge exchange losses of dollar-debt-ridden corporate-borrowers, and prevent staggering bad loans of foreign creditors.
If so, even if IMF failed miserably before the Asian meltdown to prescribe exchange rate HEDGING on foreign loans of Asian corporations, it could have AVOIDED STILL the need for high interest rates during the crisis had it been imaginative enough to think of the less disastrous currency SPECULATION control, already provided in long standing Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) central bank regulations and amended under its BSP CIRCULAR No. 138 dated July 31, 1997, or shortly after the advent of the regional crisis, yet undiscerned and unimplemented by BSP during the entire duration of the crisis in 1997-1998.
Indeed, in response to the baffling global problem of currency speculation, interest rates were drastically raised during the Asian flu simply because IMF officials and "central bankers from around the globe have found no immediate solution to…currency speculators." ("Central bankers share gripes on speculation," Philippine Daily Inquirer, January 13, 1999, p. B5). IMF and central bank officials could not see, or think of on their own, the integrated currency SPECULATION control—the then available but unimplemented high-interest-rate alternative mandated right in old Philippine central bank circulars. They fought dollar speculation through high interest rates, when all they had to do was punish banks selling dollars to speculators—in the Philippines a violation of the cited BSP CIRCULAR No. 138 which disallowed sales of dollars for hoarding purposes, or those without proof of foreign obligations. Had they done so, they could have neutralized currency speculation even without high interest rates, as was successfully done in the Philippines in August 2001 and March 2003, when BSP finally but belatedly saw the light (pp. 123-124, 188-190 of the book Puzzlers: Economic Sting).
MARCELO L. TECSON
THE IMF GRAND DECEPTION
IN THE ASIAN FINANCIAL CRISIS
IMF's High-Interest-Rate Prescription Appeared as a GRAND DECEPTION in the Asian Crisis--It was Touted as Cure to Ailing Asian Economies, in Reality it Was Aimed at Hiding IMF's Prior Monumental Omission to Promote Hedging Against Exchange Losses on Foreign Loans of Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Corporations, Which Omission IMF Tried to Conceal During the Onset of Crisis Through Preventing Impending Exchange Losses the Disastrous Way: By Prescribing High Interest Rates Designed to Stabilize Exchange Rates and Avoid Exchange Losses on Unhedged Foreign Loans of Dollar-Debt-Laden Asian Companies, Thereby Saving from Corollary Bad Loans their Foreign Creditors in Advanced Nations that Rule IMF--and Never Mind the Concomitant Massacre of Asian Banks and Borrowers from High Interest Rates.
The Announced Objective
of High Interest Rates in the Asian Crisis
Highest IMF officials explained the immediate specific objective of their prescribed high interest rates in the Asian meltdown, as follows:
From then IMF First Deputy Managing Director, Stanley Fischer
(Stanley Fischer, "The IMF and the Asian Crisis," Forum Funds
Lecture at UCLA, Los Angeles on March 20, 1998):
When their governments "approached the IMF, the reserves of Thailand and Korea were perilously low, and the Indonesian Rupiah was excessively depreciated. Thus, the first order of business was...to restore confidence in the currency. To achieve this, countries have to make it more attractive to hold domestic currency, which in turn, requires increasing interest rates temporarily, even if higher interest costs complicate the situation of weak banks and corporations….
"Why not operate with lower interest rates and a greater devaluation? This is a relevant tradeoff, but there can be no question that the degree of devaluation in the Asian countries is excessive, both from the viewpoint of the individual countries, and from the viewpoint of the international system. Looking first to the individual country, companies with substantial foreign currency debts, as so many companies in these countries have, stood to suffer far more from… currency (depreciation) than from a temporary rise in domestic interest rates…. Thus on macroeconomics… monetary policy has to be kept tight to restore confidence in the currency…."
From the then IMF Managing Director Michel Camdessus himself
("Doctor Knows Best?" Asiaweek, July 17, 1998, p. 46):
"To reverse (currency depreciation), countries have to make it more attractive to hold domestic currency, and that means temporarily raising interest rates, even if this (hurts) weak banks and corporations."
The Discernible Real Objective
of High Interest Rates in the Crisis
From the foregoing pronouncements of the two highest IMF management officials, Messrs. Michel Camdessus and Stanley Fischer, it appears that IMF simply FOOLED and deceived crisis-hit Asian governments, central banks, banks, and borrowers on the real reason for the IMF-prescribed high interest rates. The true objective was to save not the ailing Asian economies but the dollar-debt-ridden Asian corporations' foreign creditors—banks and non-banks—in advanced nations that rule IMF.
Clearly, IMF knew beforehand that high interest rates would ravage Asian banks and borrowers, but they had to be sacrificed for the greater goal of stabilizing exchange rates, curbing currency depreciation, and saving from huge exchange losses the dollar-debt-ridden Asian companies, otherwise it would be their foreign creditors in advanced nations that would bear the brunt of concomitant bad loans from the Asian corporations’ loan defaults and bankruptcies, the foreseeable result of their impending staggering exchange losses on their unhedged foreign loans. By all means, IMF had to prevent the Asian epidemic from going out of bounds and reaching the advanced nations' shores no matter what the cost might be—not to the advanced nations but to the distressed Asian economies.
IMF COMMITTED ERROR AFTER ERROR
BEFORE AND DURING THE ASIAN FINANCIAL CRISIS
Before the Crisis,
IMF Should Have Prescribed
Exchange Rate Hedging on Foreign Loans
of Dollar-Debt-Laden Asian Corporations,
to Avoid The Need for High Interest Rates in Addressing
Impending Exchange Losses on their Unhedged
Foreign Loans Once Economic Crisis Strikes
Actually, IMF could have totally or substantially avoided prescribing ultra high interest rates in the Asian meltdown had it been proactive rather than reactive in the attainment of its mission. As a prime mover of currency liberalization under globalization, IMF helped promote the free flow of advanced nations' massive investment funds to developing Asian countries. The foreign fund inflow fueled the phenomenal growth of affected Asian economies before the crisis. However, as the funds were in effect direct and indirect lending to the developing nations, in the long run, there was probability that future collections maybe marred by delinquencies and bad loans, especially if there were economic aberrations. Therefore, as part of IMF's planning and risk management, it should have instituted safety nets to currency liberalization, like exchange rate HEDGING on foreign loans obtained by dollar-debt-ridden Asian corporations.
When IMF did nothing and the Asian crisis erupted, naturally, it had to face an onrushing TSUNAMI of EXCHANGE LOSSES among dollar-debt ridden Asian companies—which losses could translate to bad loans in the origins of the massive investment funds that flowed into the region—the advanced nations that control IMF. To address the problem, IMF sacrificed Asian borrowers and banks through subsidy-laden, anti-market, disastrous but superfluous—in other words, technically wrong—high interest rates, culminating in humongous bad loans in victimized Asian economies.
Can’t IMF See that it is Absurd to Have Wrong Parties—
Borrowers—Sacrifice to the Extent of their Bankruptcy
for Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Companies that they Do Not Own
in the First Place—From Which they Never Profited in the Past,
and from Which they Will Never Profit in the Future?
In the past, when the going was great, DOLLAR-DEBT-RIDDEN ASIAN CORPORATIONS benefited from their FOREIGN LOANS which helped them generate PROFITS solely for their STOCKHOLDERS, who received the profits through cash and stock dividends. Then, when the Asian crisis struck and the going was tough, under free market the Asian corporations should suffer the consequences of their negligent act—RISK MISMANAGEMENT through failure to obtain exchange rate HEDGING on their foreign loans. However, this was not the case under IMF's violation of free market by way of its prescribed out-of-the-market HIGH INTEREST RATES, charged by banks on a no-choice basis to victimized captive old-loan borrowers. Through high interest rates as monetary tool against currency speculation, consequent currency depreciation, and corollary exchange losses, IMF in effect shifted the burden of saving these corporations from the right parties, their owners or stockholders, to the wrong ones—the Asian BORROWERS.
To begin with, the borrowers were totally unrelated to the corporations and NEVER BENEFITED from their FOREIGN LOANS and PAST PROFITS. Worse, borrowers had to save the corporations at the price of disasters to the borrowers themselves. Afterwards, when the crisis is gone, the dollar-debt-ridden corporations saved by borrowers will generate profits again—but none of their profits will ever be used to help the now bankrupt borrowers who saved them in the past. In short, in gross violation of sound economics, morals, fair play, logic, the governing generally accepted standard of fairness—the BENEFIT PRINCIPLE of public finance—and of course sacred FREE MARKET, IMF played God over the lives of unsuspecting Asians, by heaping all sacrifices upon discriminated borrowers and all profits upon favored dollar-debt-ridden-corporations.
During the Crisis,
Even With the General Lack of Foreign Loan Hedging by
Dollar-Debt-Ridden Asian Corporations, IMF Could Have Avoided Still
the Need for High Interest Rates—Through Less Disastrous Alternatives
During normal times, IMF should have prescribed HEDGING on foreign loans to developing countries under its sway in order to avoid the supposed need for high interest rates once unpredictable economic crisis suddenly strikes. High interest rates are supposedly needed to defend the local currency against speculative attacks, stabilize the exchange rate, curb currency depreciation, avoid huge exchange losses of dollar-debt-ridden corporate-borrowers, and prevent staggering bad loans of foreign creditors.
If so, even if IMF failed miserably before the Asian meltdown to prescribe exchange rate HEDGING on foreign loans of Asian corporations, it could have AVOIDED STILL the need for high interest rates during the crisis had it been imaginative enough to think of the less disastrous currency SPECULATION control, already provided in long standing Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) central bank regulations and amended under its BSP CIRCULAR No. 138 dated July 31, 1997, or shortly after the advent of the regional crisis, yet undiscerned and unimplemented by BSP during the entire duration of the crisis in 1997-1998.
Indeed, in response to the baffling global problem of currency speculation, interest rates were drastically raised during the Asian flu simply because IMF officials and "central bankers from around the globe have found no immediate solution to…currency speculators." ("Central bankers share gripes on speculation," Philippine Daily Inquirer, January 13, 1999, p. B5). IMF and central bank officials could not see, or think of on their own, the integrated currency SPECULATION control—the then available but unimplemented high-interest-rate alternative mandated right in old Philippine central bank circulars. They fought dollar speculation through high interest rates, when all they had to do was punish banks selling dollars to speculators—in the Philippines a violation of the cited BSP CIRCULAR No. 138 which disallowed sales of dollars for hoarding purposes, or those without proof of foreign obligations. Had they done so, they could have neutralized currency speculation even without high interest rates, as was successfully done in the Philippines in August 2001 and March 2003, when BSP finally but belatedly saw the light (pp. 123-124, 188-190 of the book Puzzlers: Economic Sting).
MARCELO L. TECSON
The North Korean Nuclear Test and Geopolitical Reality
from STRATFOR
The North Korean Nuclear Test and Geopolitical Reality
May 26, 2009
By Nathan Hughes
North Korea tested a nuclear device for the second time in two and a half years May 25. Although North Korea’s nuclear weapons program continues to be a work in progress, the event is inherently significant. North Korea has carried out the only two nuclear detonations the world has seen in the 21st century. (The most recent tests prior to that were the spate of tests by India and Pakistan in 1998.)
Details continue to emerge through the analysis of seismographic and other data, and speculation about the precise nature of the atomic device that Pyongyang may now posses carries on, making this a good moment to examine the underlying reality of nuclear weapons. Examining their history, and the lessons that can be drawn from that history, will help us understand what it will really mean if North Korea does indeed join the nuclear club.
Nuclear Weapons in the 20th Century
Even before an atomic bomb was first detonated on July 16, 1945, both the scientists and engineers of the Manhattan Project and the U.S. military struggled with the implications of the science that they pursued. But ultimately, they were driven by a profound sense of urgency to complete the program in time to affect the outcome of the war, meaning understanding the implications of the atomic bomb was largely a luxury that would have to wait. Even after World War II ended, the frantic pace of the Cold War kept pushing weapons development forward at a break-neck pace. This meant that in their early days, atomic weapons were probably more advanced than the understanding of their moral and practical utility.
But the promise of nuclear weapons was immense. If appropriate delivery systems could be designed and built, and armed with more powerful nuclear warheads, a nation could continually threaten another country’s very means of existence: its people, industry, military installations and governmental institutions. Battlefield or tactical nuclear weapons would make the massing of military formations suicidal — or so military planners once thought. What seemed clear early on was that nuclear weapons had fundamentally changed everything. War was thought to have been made obsolete, simply too dangerous and too destructive to contemplate. Some of the most brilliant minds of the Manhattan Project talked of how atomic weapons made world government necessary.
But perhaps the most surprising aspect of the advent of the nuclear age is how little actually changed. Great power competition continued apace (despite a new, bilateral dynamic). The Soviets blockaded Berlin for nearly a year starting in 1948, in defiance of what was then the world’s sole nuclear power: the United States. Likewise, the United States refused to use nuclear weapons in the Korean War (despite the pleas of Gen. Douglas MacArthur) even as Chinese divisions surged across the Yalu River, overwhelming U.S., South Korean and allied forces and driving them back south, reversing the rapid gains of late 1950.
Again and again, the situations nuclear weapons were supposed to deter occurred. The military realities they would supposedly shift simply persisted. Thus, the United States lost in Vietnam. The Syrians and the Egyptians invaded Israel in 1973 (despite knowing that the Israelis had acquired nuclear weapons by that point). The Soviet Union lost in Afghanistan. India and Pakistan went to war in 1999 — and nearly went to war twice after that. In none of these cases was it judged appropriate to risk employing nuclear weapons — nor was it clear what utility they might have.
Enduring Geopolitical Stability
Wars of immense risk are born of desperation. In World War II, both Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan took immense geostrategic gambles — and lost — but knowingly took the risk because of untenable geopolitical circumstances. By comparison, the postwar United States and Soviet Union were geopolitically secure. Washington had come into its own as a global power secured by the buffer of two oceans, while Moscow enjoyed the greatest strategic depth it had ever known.
The U.S.-Soviet competition was, of course, intense, from the nuclear arms race to the space race to countless proxy wars. Yet underlying it was a fear that the other side would engage in a war that was on its face irrational. Western Europe promised the Soviet Union immense material wealth but would likely have been impossible to subdue. (Why should a Soviet leader expect to succeed where Napoleon and Hitler had failed?) Even without nuclear weapons in the calculus, the cost to the Soviets was too great, and fears of the Soviet invasion of Europe along the North European Plain were overblown. The desperation that caused Germany to seek control over Europe twice in the first half of the 20th century simply did not characterize either the Soviet or U.S. geopolitical position even without nuclear weapons in play. It was within this context that the concept of mutually assured destruction emerged — the idea that each side would possess sufficient retaliatory capability to inflict a devastating “second strike” in the event of even a surprise nuclear attack.
Through it all, the metrics of nuclear warfare became more intricate. Throw weights and penetration rates were calculated and recalculated. Targets were assigned and reassigned. A single city would begin to have multiple target points, each with multiple strategic warheads allocated to its destruction. Theorists and strategists would talk of successful scenarios for first strikes. But only in the Cuban Missile Crisis did the two sides really threaten one another’s fundamental national interests. There were certainly other moments when the world inched toward the nuclear brink. But each time, the global system found its balance, and there was little cause or incentive for political leaders on either side of the Iron Curtain to so fundamentally alter the status quo as to risk direct military confrontation — much less nuclear war.
So through it all, the world carried on, its fundamental dynamics unchanged by the ever-present threat of nuclear war. Indeed, history has shown that once a country has acquired nuclear weapons, the weapons fail to have any real impact on the country’s regional standing or pursuit of power in the international system.
Thus, not only were nuclear weapons never used in even desperate combat situations, their acquisition failed to entail any meaningful shift in geopolitical position. Even as the United Kingdom acquired nuclear weapons in the 1950s, its colonial empire crumbled. The Soviet Union was behaving aggressively all along its periphery before it acquired nuclear weapons. And the Soviet Union had the largest nuclear arsenal in the world when it collapsed — not only despite its arsenal, but in part because the economic burden of creating and maintaining it was unsustainable. Today, nuclear-armed France and non-nuclear armed Germany vie for dominance on the Continent with no regard for France’s small nuclear arsenal.
The Intersection of Weapons, Strategy and Politics
This August will mark 64 years since any nation used a nuclear weapon in combat. What was supposed to be the ultimate weapon has proved too risky and too inappropriate as a weapon ever to see the light of day again. Though nuclear weapons certainly played a role in the strategic calculus of the Cold War, they had no relation to a military strategy that anyone could seriously contemplate. Militaries, of course, had war plans and scenarios and target sets. But outside this world of role-play Armageddon, neither side was about to precipitate a global nuclear war.
Clausewitz long ago detailed the inescapable connection between national political objectives and military force and strategy. Under this thinking, if nuclear weapons had no relation to practical military strategy, then they were necessarily disconnected (at least in the Clausewitzian sense) from — and could not be integrated with — national and political objectives in a coherent fashion. True to the theory, despite ebbs and flows in the nuclear arms race, for 64 years, no one has found a good reason to detonate a nuclear bomb.
By this line of reasoning, STRATFOR is not suggesting that complete nuclear disarmament — or “getting to zero” — is either possible or likely. The nuclear genie can never be put back in the bottle. The idea that the world could ever remain nuclear-free is untenable. The potential for clandestine and crash nuclear programs will remain a reality of the international system, and the world’s nuclear powers are unlikely ever to trust the rest of the system enough to completely surrender their own strategic deterrents.
Legacy, Peer and Bargaining Programs
The countries in the world today with nuclear weapons programs can be divided into three main categories.
* Legacy Programs: This category comprises countries like the United Kingdom and France that maintain small arsenals even after the end of the threat they acquired them for; in this case, to stave off a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. In the last few years, both London and Paris have decided to sustain their small arsenals in some form for the foreseeable future. This category is also important for highlighting the unlikelihood that a country will surrender its weapons after it has acquired them (the only exceptions being South Africa and several Soviet Republics that repatriated their weapons back to Russia after the Soviet collapse).
* Peer Programs: The original peer program belonged to the Soviet Union, which aggressively and ruthlessly pursued a nuclear weapons capacity following the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 because its peer competitor, the United States, had them. The Pakistani and Indian nuclear programs also can be understood as peer programs.
* Bargaining Programs: These programs are about the threat of developing nuclear weapons, a strategy that involves quite a bit of tightrope walking to make the threat of acquiring nuclear weapons appear real and credible while at the same time not making it appear so urgent as to require military intervention. Pyongyang pioneered this strategy, and has wielded it deftly over the years. As North Korea continues to progress with its efforts, however, it will shift from a bargaining chip to an actual program — one it will be unlikely to surrender once it acquires weapons, like London and Paris. Iran also falls into this category, though it could also progress to a more substantial program if it gets far enough along. Though parts of its program are indeed clandestine, other parts are actually highly publicized and celebrated as milestones, both to continue to highlight progress internationally and for purposes of domestic consumption. Indeed, manipulating the international community with a nuclear weapon — or even a civilian nuclear program — has proved to be a rare instance of the utility of nuclear weapons beyond simple deterrence.
The Challenges of a Nuclear Weapons Program
Pursuing a nuclear weapons program is not without its risks. Another important distinction is that between a crude nuclear device and an actual weapon. The former requires only that a country demonstrate the capability to initiate an uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction, creating a rather large hole in the ground. That device may be crude, fragile or otherwise temperamental. But this does not automatically imply the capability to mount a rugged and reliable nuclear warhead on a delivery vehicle and send it flying to the other side of the earth. In other words, it does not immediately translate into a meaningful deterrent.
For that, a ruggedized, reliable nuclear weapon must be mated with some manner of reliable delivery vehicle to have real military meaning. After the end of World War II, the B-29’s limited range and the few nuclear weapons the United States had on hand meant that its vaunted nuclear arsenal was initially extremely difficult to bring to bear against the Soviet heartland. The United States would spend untold resources to overcome this obstacle in the decade that followed.
The modern nuclear weapon is not just a product of physics, but of decades of design work and full-scale nuclear testing. It combines expertise not just in nuclear physics, but materials science, rocketry, missile guidance and the like. A nuclear device does not come easy. A nuclear weapon is one of the most advanced syntheses of complex technologies ever achieved by man.
Many dangers exist for an aspiring nuclear power. Many of the facilities associated with a clandestine nuclear weapons program are large, fixed and complex. They are vulnerable to airstrikes — as Syria found in 2007. (And though history shows that nuclear weapons are unlikely to be employed, it is still in the interests of other powers to deny that capability to a potential adversary.)
The history of proliferation shows that few countries actually ever decide to pursue nuclear weapons. Obtaining them requires immense investment (and the more clandestine the attempt, the more costly the program becomes), and the ability to focus and coordinate a major national undertaking over time. It is not something a leader like Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez could decide to pursue on a whim. A national government must have cohesion over the long span of time necessary to go from the foundations of a weapons program to a meaningful deterrent capability.
The Exceptions
In addition to this sustained commitment must be the willingness to be suspected by the international community and endure pariah status and isolation — in and of themselves significant risks for even moderately integrated economies. One must also have reasonable means of deterring a pre-emptive strike by a competing power. A Venezuelan weapons program is therefore unlikely because the United States would act decisively the moment one was discovered, and there is little Venezuela could do to deter such action.
North Korea, on the other hand, has held downtown Seoul (just across the demilitarized zone) at risk for generations with one of the highest concentrations of deployed artillery, artillery rockets and short-range ballistic missiles on the planet. From the outside, Pyongyang is perceived as unpredictable enough that any potential pre-emptive strike on its nuclear facilities is too risky not because of some newfound nuclear capability, but because of Pyongyang’s capability to turn the South Korean capital city into a proverbial “sea of fire” via conventional means. A nuclear North Korea, the world has now seen, is not sufficient alone to risk renewed war on the Korean Peninsula.
Iran is similarly defended. It can threaten to close the Strait of Hormuz, to launch a barrage of medium-range ballistic missiles at Israel, and to use its proxies in Lebanon and elsewhere to respond with a new campaign of artillery rocket fire, guerrilla warfare and terrorism. But the biggest deterrent to a strike on Iran is Tehran’s ability to seriously interfere in ongoing U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan — efforts already tenuous enough without direct Iranian opposition.
In other words, some other deterrent (be it conventional or unconventional) against attack is a prerequisite for a nuclear program, since powerful potential adversaries can otherwise move to halt such efforts. North Korea and Iran have such deterrents. Most other countries widely considered major proliferation dangers — Iraq before 2003, Syria or Venezuela, for example — do not. And that fundamental deterrent remains in place after the country acquires nuclear weapons.
In short, no one was going to invade North Korea — or even launch limited military strikes against it — before its first nuclear test in 2006. And no one will do so now, nor will they do so after its next test. So North Korea – with or without nuclear weapons – remains secure from invasion. With or without nuclear weapons, North Korea remains a pariah state, isolated from the international community. And with or without them, the world will go on.
The Global Nuclear Dynamic
Despite how frantic the pace of nuclear proliferation may seem at the moment, the true pace of the global nuclear dynamic is slowing profoundly. With the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty already effectively in place (though it has not been ratified), the pace of nuclear weapons development has already slowed and stabilized dramatically. The world’s current nuclear powers are reliant to some degree on the generation of weapons that were validated and certified before testing was banned. They are currently working toward weapons and force structures that will provide them with a stable, sustainable deterrent for the foreseeable future rooted largely in this pre-existing weapons architecture.
New additions to the nuclear club are always cause for concern. But though North Korea’s nuclear program continues apace, it hardly threatens to shift underlying geopolitical realities. It may encourage the United States to retain a slightly larger arsenal to reassure Japan and South Korea about the credibility of its nuclear umbrella. It also could encourage Tokyo and Seoul to pursue their own weapons. But none of these shifts, though significant, is likely to alter the defining military, economic and political dynamics of the region fundamentally.
Nuclear arms are better understood as an insurance policy, one that no potential aggressor has any intention of steering afoul of. Without practical military or political use, they remain held in reserve — where in all likelihood they will remain for the foreseeable future.
The North Korean Nuclear Test and Geopolitical Reality
May 26, 2009
By Nathan Hughes
North Korea tested a nuclear device for the second time in two and a half years May 25. Although North Korea’s nuclear weapons program continues to be a work in progress, the event is inherently significant. North Korea has carried out the only two nuclear detonations the world has seen in the 21st century. (The most recent tests prior to that were the spate of tests by India and Pakistan in 1998.)
Details continue to emerge through the analysis of seismographic and other data, and speculation about the precise nature of the atomic device that Pyongyang may now posses carries on, making this a good moment to examine the underlying reality of nuclear weapons. Examining their history, and the lessons that can be drawn from that history, will help us understand what it will really mean if North Korea does indeed join the nuclear club.
Nuclear Weapons in the 20th Century
Even before an atomic bomb was first detonated on July 16, 1945, both the scientists and engineers of the Manhattan Project and the U.S. military struggled with the implications of the science that they pursued. But ultimately, they were driven by a profound sense of urgency to complete the program in time to affect the outcome of the war, meaning understanding the implications of the atomic bomb was largely a luxury that would have to wait. Even after World War II ended, the frantic pace of the Cold War kept pushing weapons development forward at a break-neck pace. This meant that in their early days, atomic weapons were probably more advanced than the understanding of their moral and practical utility.
But the promise of nuclear weapons was immense. If appropriate delivery systems could be designed and built, and armed with more powerful nuclear warheads, a nation could continually threaten another country’s very means of existence: its people, industry, military installations and governmental institutions. Battlefield or tactical nuclear weapons would make the massing of military formations suicidal — or so military planners once thought. What seemed clear early on was that nuclear weapons had fundamentally changed everything. War was thought to have been made obsolete, simply too dangerous and too destructive to contemplate. Some of the most brilliant minds of the Manhattan Project talked of how atomic weapons made world government necessary.
But perhaps the most surprising aspect of the advent of the nuclear age is how little actually changed. Great power competition continued apace (despite a new, bilateral dynamic). The Soviets blockaded Berlin for nearly a year starting in 1948, in defiance of what was then the world’s sole nuclear power: the United States. Likewise, the United States refused to use nuclear weapons in the Korean War (despite the pleas of Gen. Douglas MacArthur) even as Chinese divisions surged across the Yalu River, overwhelming U.S., South Korean and allied forces and driving them back south, reversing the rapid gains of late 1950.
Again and again, the situations nuclear weapons were supposed to deter occurred. The military realities they would supposedly shift simply persisted. Thus, the United States lost in Vietnam. The Syrians and the Egyptians invaded Israel in 1973 (despite knowing that the Israelis had acquired nuclear weapons by that point). The Soviet Union lost in Afghanistan. India and Pakistan went to war in 1999 — and nearly went to war twice after that. In none of these cases was it judged appropriate to risk employing nuclear weapons — nor was it clear what utility they might have.
Enduring Geopolitical Stability
Wars of immense risk are born of desperation. In World War II, both Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan took immense geostrategic gambles — and lost — but knowingly took the risk because of untenable geopolitical circumstances. By comparison, the postwar United States and Soviet Union were geopolitically secure. Washington had come into its own as a global power secured by the buffer of two oceans, while Moscow enjoyed the greatest strategic depth it had ever known.
The U.S.-Soviet competition was, of course, intense, from the nuclear arms race to the space race to countless proxy wars. Yet underlying it was a fear that the other side would engage in a war that was on its face irrational. Western Europe promised the Soviet Union immense material wealth but would likely have been impossible to subdue. (Why should a Soviet leader expect to succeed where Napoleon and Hitler had failed?) Even without nuclear weapons in the calculus, the cost to the Soviets was too great, and fears of the Soviet invasion of Europe along the North European Plain were overblown. The desperation that caused Germany to seek control over Europe twice in the first half of the 20th century simply did not characterize either the Soviet or U.S. geopolitical position even without nuclear weapons in play. It was within this context that the concept of mutually assured destruction emerged — the idea that each side would possess sufficient retaliatory capability to inflict a devastating “second strike” in the event of even a surprise nuclear attack.
Through it all, the metrics of nuclear warfare became more intricate. Throw weights and penetration rates were calculated and recalculated. Targets were assigned and reassigned. A single city would begin to have multiple target points, each with multiple strategic warheads allocated to its destruction. Theorists and strategists would talk of successful scenarios for first strikes. But only in the Cuban Missile Crisis did the two sides really threaten one another’s fundamental national interests. There were certainly other moments when the world inched toward the nuclear brink. But each time, the global system found its balance, and there was little cause or incentive for political leaders on either side of the Iron Curtain to so fundamentally alter the status quo as to risk direct military confrontation — much less nuclear war.
So through it all, the world carried on, its fundamental dynamics unchanged by the ever-present threat of nuclear war. Indeed, history has shown that once a country has acquired nuclear weapons, the weapons fail to have any real impact on the country’s regional standing or pursuit of power in the international system.
Thus, not only were nuclear weapons never used in even desperate combat situations, their acquisition failed to entail any meaningful shift in geopolitical position. Even as the United Kingdom acquired nuclear weapons in the 1950s, its colonial empire crumbled. The Soviet Union was behaving aggressively all along its periphery before it acquired nuclear weapons. And the Soviet Union had the largest nuclear arsenal in the world when it collapsed — not only despite its arsenal, but in part because the economic burden of creating and maintaining it was unsustainable. Today, nuclear-armed France and non-nuclear armed Germany vie for dominance on the Continent with no regard for France’s small nuclear arsenal.
The Intersection of Weapons, Strategy and Politics
This August will mark 64 years since any nation used a nuclear weapon in combat. What was supposed to be the ultimate weapon has proved too risky and too inappropriate as a weapon ever to see the light of day again. Though nuclear weapons certainly played a role in the strategic calculus of the Cold War, they had no relation to a military strategy that anyone could seriously contemplate. Militaries, of course, had war plans and scenarios and target sets. But outside this world of role-play Armageddon, neither side was about to precipitate a global nuclear war.
Clausewitz long ago detailed the inescapable connection between national political objectives and military force and strategy. Under this thinking, if nuclear weapons had no relation to practical military strategy, then they were necessarily disconnected (at least in the Clausewitzian sense) from — and could not be integrated with — national and political objectives in a coherent fashion. True to the theory, despite ebbs and flows in the nuclear arms race, for 64 years, no one has found a good reason to detonate a nuclear bomb.
By this line of reasoning, STRATFOR is not suggesting that complete nuclear disarmament — or “getting to zero” — is either possible or likely. The nuclear genie can never be put back in the bottle. The idea that the world could ever remain nuclear-free is untenable. The potential for clandestine and crash nuclear programs will remain a reality of the international system, and the world’s nuclear powers are unlikely ever to trust the rest of the system enough to completely surrender their own strategic deterrents.
Legacy, Peer and Bargaining Programs
The countries in the world today with nuclear weapons programs can be divided into three main categories.
* Legacy Programs: This category comprises countries like the United Kingdom and France that maintain small arsenals even after the end of the threat they acquired them for; in this case, to stave off a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. In the last few years, both London and Paris have decided to sustain their small arsenals in some form for the foreseeable future. This category is also important for highlighting the unlikelihood that a country will surrender its weapons after it has acquired them (the only exceptions being South Africa and several Soviet Republics that repatriated their weapons back to Russia after the Soviet collapse).
* Peer Programs: The original peer program belonged to the Soviet Union, which aggressively and ruthlessly pursued a nuclear weapons capacity following the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 because its peer competitor, the United States, had them. The Pakistani and Indian nuclear programs also can be understood as peer programs.
* Bargaining Programs: These programs are about the threat of developing nuclear weapons, a strategy that involves quite a bit of tightrope walking to make the threat of acquiring nuclear weapons appear real and credible while at the same time not making it appear so urgent as to require military intervention. Pyongyang pioneered this strategy, and has wielded it deftly over the years. As North Korea continues to progress with its efforts, however, it will shift from a bargaining chip to an actual program — one it will be unlikely to surrender once it acquires weapons, like London and Paris. Iran also falls into this category, though it could also progress to a more substantial program if it gets far enough along. Though parts of its program are indeed clandestine, other parts are actually highly publicized and celebrated as milestones, both to continue to highlight progress internationally and for purposes of domestic consumption. Indeed, manipulating the international community with a nuclear weapon — or even a civilian nuclear program — has proved to be a rare instance of the utility of nuclear weapons beyond simple deterrence.
The Challenges of a Nuclear Weapons Program
Pursuing a nuclear weapons program is not without its risks. Another important distinction is that between a crude nuclear device and an actual weapon. The former requires only that a country demonstrate the capability to initiate an uncontrolled nuclear chain reaction, creating a rather large hole in the ground. That device may be crude, fragile or otherwise temperamental. But this does not automatically imply the capability to mount a rugged and reliable nuclear warhead on a delivery vehicle and send it flying to the other side of the earth. In other words, it does not immediately translate into a meaningful deterrent.
For that, a ruggedized, reliable nuclear weapon must be mated with some manner of reliable delivery vehicle to have real military meaning. After the end of World War II, the B-29’s limited range and the few nuclear weapons the United States had on hand meant that its vaunted nuclear arsenal was initially extremely difficult to bring to bear against the Soviet heartland. The United States would spend untold resources to overcome this obstacle in the decade that followed.
The modern nuclear weapon is not just a product of physics, but of decades of design work and full-scale nuclear testing. It combines expertise not just in nuclear physics, but materials science, rocketry, missile guidance and the like. A nuclear device does not come easy. A nuclear weapon is one of the most advanced syntheses of complex technologies ever achieved by man.
Many dangers exist for an aspiring nuclear power. Many of the facilities associated with a clandestine nuclear weapons program are large, fixed and complex. They are vulnerable to airstrikes — as Syria found in 2007. (And though history shows that nuclear weapons are unlikely to be employed, it is still in the interests of other powers to deny that capability to a potential adversary.)
The history of proliferation shows that few countries actually ever decide to pursue nuclear weapons. Obtaining them requires immense investment (and the more clandestine the attempt, the more costly the program becomes), and the ability to focus and coordinate a major national undertaking over time. It is not something a leader like Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez could decide to pursue on a whim. A national government must have cohesion over the long span of time necessary to go from the foundations of a weapons program to a meaningful deterrent capability.
The Exceptions
In addition to this sustained commitment must be the willingness to be suspected by the international community and endure pariah status and isolation — in and of themselves significant risks for even moderately integrated economies. One must also have reasonable means of deterring a pre-emptive strike by a competing power. A Venezuelan weapons program is therefore unlikely because the United States would act decisively the moment one was discovered, and there is little Venezuela could do to deter such action.
North Korea, on the other hand, has held downtown Seoul (just across the demilitarized zone) at risk for generations with one of the highest concentrations of deployed artillery, artillery rockets and short-range ballistic missiles on the planet. From the outside, Pyongyang is perceived as unpredictable enough that any potential pre-emptive strike on its nuclear facilities is too risky not because of some newfound nuclear capability, but because of Pyongyang’s capability to turn the South Korean capital city into a proverbial “sea of fire” via conventional means. A nuclear North Korea, the world has now seen, is not sufficient alone to risk renewed war on the Korean Peninsula.
Iran is similarly defended. It can threaten to close the Strait of Hormuz, to launch a barrage of medium-range ballistic missiles at Israel, and to use its proxies in Lebanon and elsewhere to respond with a new campaign of artillery rocket fire, guerrilla warfare and terrorism. But the biggest deterrent to a strike on Iran is Tehran’s ability to seriously interfere in ongoing U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan — efforts already tenuous enough without direct Iranian opposition.
In other words, some other deterrent (be it conventional or unconventional) against attack is a prerequisite for a nuclear program, since powerful potential adversaries can otherwise move to halt such efforts. North Korea and Iran have such deterrents. Most other countries widely considered major proliferation dangers — Iraq before 2003, Syria or Venezuela, for example — do not. And that fundamental deterrent remains in place after the country acquires nuclear weapons.
In short, no one was going to invade North Korea — or even launch limited military strikes against it — before its first nuclear test in 2006. And no one will do so now, nor will they do so after its next test. So North Korea – with or without nuclear weapons – remains secure from invasion. With or without nuclear weapons, North Korea remains a pariah state, isolated from the international community. And with or without them, the world will go on.
The Global Nuclear Dynamic
Despite how frantic the pace of nuclear proliferation may seem at the moment, the true pace of the global nuclear dynamic is slowing profoundly. With the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty already effectively in place (though it has not been ratified), the pace of nuclear weapons development has already slowed and stabilized dramatically. The world’s current nuclear powers are reliant to some degree on the generation of weapons that were validated and certified before testing was banned. They are currently working toward weapons and force structures that will provide them with a stable, sustainable deterrent for the foreseeable future rooted largely in this pre-existing weapons architecture.
New additions to the nuclear club are always cause for concern. But though North Korea’s nuclear program continues apace, it hardly threatens to shift underlying geopolitical realities. It may encourage the United States to retain a slightly larger arsenal to reassure Japan and South Korea about the credibility of its nuclear umbrella. It also could encourage Tokyo and Seoul to pursue their own weapons. But none of these shifts, though significant, is likely to alter the defining military, economic and political dynamics of the region fundamentally.
Nuclear arms are better understood as an insurance policy, one that no potential aggressor has any intention of steering afoul of. Without practical military or political use, they remain held in reserve — where in all likelihood they will remain for the foreseeable future.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Swine Flu Hoax?
Dr. Lorraine Day is the lady who discovered where AIDS came from after spending a year or more in the Library of Congress. She wrote a book exposing it about 15 years ago. Bottom line is that AIDS was created in a lab at Ft. Deitrick, Maryland by the criminals posing as govt.
Here we go again.
sl
Swine Flu Hoax?
So who are the swine behind the swine flu?
That's what I wanted to know.
Whenever I begin to see blaring headlines regarding the word “pandemic”, I make a call to Dr. Lorraine Day, the former chief of Orthopedic Surgery at USF. http://www.drday.com/ Not one to mince words, and a dogged researcher, I can count on Lorraine to give me the big picture behind the headlines. I made that call yesterday. Her first words, underscored with a hearty laugh, were “It’s just another hoax!”
Here’s the long and short of it according to Lorraine. First, the government is continuing on it’s path to incite panic so we will ideally demand to have protection from these ‘killer virus’ via vaccinations. This would help avert a less popular mandatory vaccination program, which is what the Elite would like to see happen. Lorraine is also quick to point out that truly noxious vaccines are being developed in laboratories that combine human and animal virus' that can seriously compromise our immune systems if we allow them to be administered to us.
Secondly, she said that the Center for Disease Control needed to move their stockpiles of the flu drug Tamiflu, which didn't make it out to the masses during the last panic, which was the 'bird flu'. I find it interesting that Tamiflu was supposedly created as the antidote to bird flu, but the CDC now says it actually works just fine for swine flu too. It would appear that the stuff is quite non-specific in nature for what is considered to be a very specific strain of flu. Hummm. Anyway, pharmacy chains such as CVC are now stocking up in preparation for the “pandemic”.
As an aside, it may not surprise you to know that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is a major stockholder in Gilead Sciences, a California bio tech firm that owns the rights to Tamiflu. A CNN report from 2005, when we were were being threatened with the bird flu, put Rumsfeld’s holdings somewhere between $5,000,000 to $25,000,000. This is the same gentleman who brought us the excitotoxin Aspartame, now known to cause serious neurological problems in humans. But, less I digress.....
Lorraine went on to say that 12, 60, even 120 deaths from flu do not make a pandemic. More than 500,000 people a year die from various flu virus’. There are still active flu strains out there from all of the usual sources. In fact, it was just reported that 2 young people in the Sacramento area were tested to have been infected with the swine flu virus, but, no worries, they recovered from their flu in 24 hours. Sounds just like the flu that’s been going around through my friends and other acquaintances over the past few weeks in Sacramento.
To further the story, she said that Prince Charles recently pushed for the subject of Developmental Sustainability be pushed to the top of the G-20 agenda. Developmental Sustainability is the code word for de-population according to Dr. Day. As you may recall, Charles’ father, Prince Phillip, when asked what he would like to come back as if he had another life, said “A virus.” The idea was that he would then be able to kill off the useless members of society. What a gentleman.
In short, Lorraine says do not worry. Just do your body a favor by eating a good clean diet full of fresh vegetables and fruits, get some sunshine and fresh air, turn to your spiritual practice, relax and, under no circumstances, allow yourself to be vaccinated. We're all exposed to flu bugs, but if you can keep your immune system strong, you have nothing to worry about and the only swine involved here are those who are trying to keep us in fear.
Here we go again.
sl
Swine Flu Hoax?
So who are the swine behind the swine flu?
That's what I wanted to know.
Whenever I begin to see blaring headlines regarding the word “pandemic”, I make a call to Dr. Lorraine Day, the former chief of Orthopedic Surgery at USF. http://www.drday.com/ Not one to mince words, and a dogged researcher, I can count on Lorraine to give me the big picture behind the headlines. I made that call yesterday. Her first words, underscored with a hearty laugh, were “It’s just another hoax!”
Here’s the long and short of it according to Lorraine. First, the government is continuing on it’s path to incite panic so we will ideally demand to have protection from these ‘killer virus’ via vaccinations. This would help avert a less popular mandatory vaccination program, which is what the Elite would like to see happen. Lorraine is also quick to point out that truly noxious vaccines are being developed in laboratories that combine human and animal virus' that can seriously compromise our immune systems if we allow them to be administered to us.
Secondly, she said that the Center for Disease Control needed to move their stockpiles of the flu drug Tamiflu, which didn't make it out to the masses during the last panic, which was the 'bird flu'. I find it interesting that Tamiflu was supposedly created as the antidote to bird flu, but the CDC now says it actually works just fine for swine flu too. It would appear that the stuff is quite non-specific in nature for what is considered to be a very specific strain of flu. Hummm. Anyway, pharmacy chains such as CVC are now stocking up in preparation for the “pandemic”.
As an aside, it may not surprise you to know that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is a major stockholder in Gilead Sciences, a California bio tech firm that owns the rights to Tamiflu. A CNN report from 2005, when we were were being threatened with the bird flu, put Rumsfeld’s holdings somewhere between $5,000,000 to $25,000,000. This is the same gentleman who brought us the excitotoxin Aspartame, now known to cause serious neurological problems in humans. But, less I digress.....
Lorraine went on to say that 12, 60, even 120 deaths from flu do not make a pandemic. More than 500,000 people a year die from various flu virus’. There are still active flu strains out there from all of the usual sources. In fact, it was just reported that 2 young people in the Sacramento area were tested to have been infected with the swine flu virus, but, no worries, they recovered from their flu in 24 hours. Sounds just like the flu that’s been going around through my friends and other acquaintances over the past few weeks in Sacramento.
To further the story, she said that Prince Charles recently pushed for the subject of Developmental Sustainability be pushed to the top of the G-20 agenda. Developmental Sustainability is the code word for de-population according to Dr. Day. As you may recall, Charles’ father, Prince Phillip, when asked what he would like to come back as if he had another life, said “A virus.” The idea was that he would then be able to kill off the useless members of society. What a gentleman.
In short, Lorraine says do not worry. Just do your body a favor by eating a good clean diet full of fresh vegetables and fruits, get some sunshine and fresh air, turn to your spiritual practice, relax and, under no circumstances, allow yourself to be vaccinated. We're all exposed to flu bugs, but if you can keep your immune system strong, you have nothing to worry about and the only swine involved here are those who are trying to keep us in fear.
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