| Author | Message | | Guest | | Posted: Wed Dec 25, 2002 9:04 am Post subject: A War in the Planning for Four Years |
| The following (about Zbigniew Brzezinski) is most concerning because the Zionist (JINSA-Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs) extremist agenda (of Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Doug Feith, Dick Cheney, etc.) has Brzezinski's political thinking involved as mentioned in the following article:
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20020902&s=vest&c=1
http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/middle-east-and-asia/2002/12/23/brits-pull-support-for-iraq-invasion-to-thwart-zionists.php
http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/middle-east-and-asia/2002/12/24/passionate-attachment-to-israel.php
A War in the Planning for Four Years
HOW STUPID DO THEY THINK WE ARE?
Zbigniew Brzezinski and the CFR Put War Plans In a 1997 Book - It Is "A Blueprint for World Dictatorship," Says a Former German Defense and NATO Official Who Warned of Global Domination in 1984, in an Exclusive Interview With FTW
by
Michael C. Ruppert
[© Copyright 2001. All Rights Reserved, Michael C. Ruppert and From The Wilderness Publications, www.copvcia.com.] May be copied or distributed for non-profit purposes only. Posting on any ".com" web site is prohibited without express written consent from the author.]
Summary
"THE GRAND CHESSBOARD - American Primacy And It's Geostrategic Imperatives," Zbigniew Brzezinski, Basic Books, 1997.
These are the very first words in the book: "Ever since the continents started interacting politically, some five hundred years ago, Eurasia has been the center of world power."- p. xiii.æ Eurasia is all of the territory east of Germany and Poland, stretching all the way through Russia and China to the Pacific Ocean. It includes the Middle East and most of the Indian subcontinent. The key to controlling Eurasia, says Brzezinski, is controlling the Central Asian Republics. And the key to controlling the Central Asian republics is Uzbekistan. Thus, it comes as no surprise that Uzbekistan was forcefully mentioned by President George W. Bush in his address to a joint session of Congress, just days after the attacks of September 11, as the very first place that the U.S. military would be deployed.
As FTW has documented in previous stories, major deployments of U.S. and British forces had taken place before the attacks. And the U.S. Army and the CIA had been active in Uzbekistan for several years. There is now evidence that what the world is witnessing is a cold and calculated war plan - at least four years in the making - and that, from reading Brzezinski's own words about Pearl Harbor, the World Trade Center attacks were just the trigger needed to set the final conquest in motion.
----------
FTW, November 7, 2001, 1200 PST (Revised Jan. 21,2001) - There's a quote often attributed to Allen Dulles after it was noted that the final 1964 report of the Warren Commission on the assassination of JFK contained dramatic inconsistencies. Those inconsistencies, in effect, disproved the Commission's own final conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone on November 22, 1963. Dulles, a career spy, Wall Street lawyer, the CIA director whom JFK had fired after the 1961 Bay of Pigs fiasco - and the Warren Commission member who took charge of the investigation and final report - is reported to have said, "The American people don't read."
Some Americans do read. So do Europeans and Asians and Africans and Latin Americans.
World events since the attacks of September 11, 2001 have not only been predicted, but also planned, orchestrated and - as their architects would like to believe - controlled. The current Central Asian war is not a response to terrorism, nor is it a reaction to Islamic fundamentalism. It is in fact, in the words of one of the most powerful men on the planet, the beginning of a final conflict before total world domination by the United States leads to the dissolution of all national governments. This, says Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) member and former Carter National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzezinski, will lead to nation states being incorporated into a new world order, controlled solely by economic interests as dictated by banks, corporations and ruling elites concerned with the maintenance (by manipulation and war) of their power. As a means of intimidation for the unenlightened reader who happens upon this frightening plan - the plan of the CFR - Brzezinski offers the alternative of a world in chaos unless the U.S. controls the planet by whatever means are necessary and likely to succeed.
This position is corroborated by Dr. Johannes B. Koeppl, Ph.D. a former German defense ministry official and advisor to former NATO Secretary General Manfred Werner. On November 6, he told FTW, "The interests behind the Bush Administration, such as the CFR, The Trilateral Commission - founded by Brzezinski for David Rockefeller - and the Bilderberger Group, have prepared for and are now moving to implement open world dictatorship within the next five years. They are not fighting against terrorists. They are fighting against citizens."
Brzezinski's own words - laid against the current official line that the United States is waging a war to end terrorism - are self-incriminating. In an ongoing series of articles, FTW has consistently established that the U.S. government had foreknowledge of the World Trade Center attacks and chose not to stop them because it needed to secure public approval for a war that is now in progress. It is a war, as described by Vice President Dick Cheney, "that may not end in our lifetimes." What that means is that it will not end until all armed groups, anywhere in the world, which possess the political, economic or military ability to resist the imposition of this dictatorship, have been destroyed.
These are the "terrorists" the U.S. now fights in Afghanistan and plans to soon fight all over the globe.
Before exposing Brzezinski (and those he represents) with his own words, or hearing more from Dr. Koeppl, it is worthwhile to take a look at Brzezinski's background.
According to his resume Brzezinski, holding a 1953 Ph.D. from Harvard, lists the following achievements:
Counselor, Center for Strategic and International Studies
Professor of American Foreign Policy, Johns Hopkins University
National Security Advisor to President Jimmy Carter (1977-81)
Trustee and founder of the Trilateral Commission
International advisor of several major US/Global corporations
Associate of Henry Kissinger
Under Ronald Reagan - member of NSC-Defense Department Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy
Under Ronald Reagan - member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board
Past member, Board of Directors, The Council on Foreign Relations
1988 - Co-chairman of the Bush National Security Advisory Task Force.
Brzezinski is also a past attendee and presenter at several conferences of the Bilderberger group - a non-partisan affiliation of the wealthiest and most powerful families and corporations on the planet.
The Grand Chessboard
Brzezinski sets the tone for his strategy by describing Russia and China as the two most important countries - almost but not quite superpowers - whose interests that might threaten the U.S. in Central Asia. Of the two, Brzezinski considers Russia to be the more serious threat. Both nations border Central Asia. In a lesser context he describes the Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Iran and Kazakhstan as essential "lesser" nations that must be managed by the U.S. as buffers or counterweights to Russian and Chinese moves to control the oil, gas and minerals of the Central Asian Republics (Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan).
He also notes, quite clearly (p. 53) that any nation that might become predominant in Central Asia would directly threaten the current U.S. control of oil resources in the Persian Gulf. In reading the book it becomes clear why the U.S. had a direct motive for the looting of some $300 billion in Russian assets during the 1990s, destabilizing Russia's currency (1998) and ensuring that a weakened Russia would have to look westwardæ to Europe for economic and political survival, rather than southward to Central Asia. A dependent Russia would lack the military, economic and political clout to exert influence in the region and this weakening of Russia would explain why Russian President Vladimir Putin has been such a willing ally of U.S. efforts to date. (See FTW Vol. IV, No. 1 - March 31, 2001)
An examination of selected quotes from "The Grand Chessboard," in the context of current events reveals the darker agenda behind military operations that were planned long before September 11th, 2001.
"ƒThe last decade of the twentieth century has witnessed a tectonic shift in world affairs. For the first time ever, a non-Eurasian power has emerged not only as a key arbiter of Eurasian power relations but also as the world's paramount power. The defeat and collapse of the Soviet Union was the final step in the rapid ascendance of a Western Hemisphere power, the United States, as the sole and, indeed, the first truly global powerƒ (p. xiii)
"ƒ But in the meantime, it is imperative that no Eurasian challenger emerges, capable of dominating Eurasia and thus of also challenging America. The formulation of a comprehensive and integrated Eurasian geostrategy is therefore the purpose of this book. (p. xiv)
"The attitude of the American public toward the external projection of American power has been much more ambivalent. The public supported America's engagement in World War II largely because of the shock effect of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. (pp 24-5)
"For America, the chief geopolitical prize is Eurasiaƒ Now a non-Eurasian power is preeminent in Eurasia - and America's global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained. (p.30)
"America's withdrawal from the world or because of the sudden emergence of a successful rival - would produce massive international instability. It would prompt global anarchy." (p. 30)
"In that context, how America ïmanages' Eurasia is critical. Eurasia is the globe's largest continent and is geopolitically axial. A power that dominates Eurasia would control two of the world's three most advanced and economically productive regions. A mere glance at the map also suggests that control over Eurasia would almost automatically entail Africa's subordination, rendering the Western Hemisphere and Oceania geopolitically peripheral to the world's central continent. About 75 per cent of the world's people live in Eurasia, and most of the world's physical wealth is there as well, both in its enterprises and underneath its soil. Eurasia accounts for 60 per cent of the world's GNP and about three-fourths of the world's known energy resources." (p.31)
It is also a fact that America is too democratic at home to be autocratic abroad. This limits the use of America's power, especially its capacity for military intimidation. Never before has a populist democracy attained international supremacy. But the pursuit of power is not a goal that commands popular passion, except in conditions of a sudden threat or challenge to the public's sense of domestic well-being. The economic self-denial (that is, defense spending) and the human sacrifice (casualties, even among professional soldiers) required in the effort are uncongenial to democratic instincts. Democracy is inimical to imperial mobilization." (p.35)
"Two basic steps are thus required: first, to identify the geostrategically dynamic Eurasian states that have the power to cause a potentially important shift in the international distribution of power and to decipher the central external goals of their respective political elites and the likely consequences of their seeking to attain them;ƒ second, to formulate specific U.S. policies to offset, co-opt, and/or control the aboveƒ"æ (p. 40)
"ƒTo put it in a terminology that harkens back to the more brutal age of ancient empires, the three grand imperatives of imperial geostrategy are to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep tributaries pliant and protected, and to keep the barbarians from coming together." (p.40)
"Henceforth, the United States may have to determine how to cope with regional coalitions that seek to push America out of Eurasia, thereby threatening America's status as a global power." (p.55)
"Uzbekistan, nationally the most vital and the most populous of the central Asian states, represents the major obstacle to any renewed Russian control over the region. Its independence is critical to the survival of the other Central Asian states, and it is the least vulnerable to Russian pressures." (p. 121)
Referring to an area he calls the "Eurasian Balkans" and a 1997 map in which he has circled the exact location of the current conflict - describing it as the central region of pending conflict for world dominance - Brzezinski writes: "Moreover, they [the Central Asian Republics] are of importance from the standpoint of security and historical ambitions to at least three of their most immediate and more powerful neighbors, namely Russia, Turkey and Iran, with China also signaling an increasing political interest in the region. But the Eurasian Balkans are infinitely more important as a potential economic prize: an enormous concentration of natural gas and oil reserves is located in the region, in addition to important minerals, including gold." (p.124) [Emphasis added]
MY NOTE
The World War II.....started in the Yugoslavia. Hitler depended on Romania for his oil & gas supplies....If Romania (Hitler Blackmailed) had not cooperated, there would have been no war. World War II consumed the lives of 61 million people with the highest casualties in the Soviet Union. (Ukraine)
"The world's energy consumption is bound to vastly increase over the next two or three decades. Estimates by the U.S. Department of energy anticipate that world demand will rise by more than 50 percent between 1993 and 2015, with the most significant increase in consumption occurring in the Far East. The momentum of Asia's economic development is already generating massive pressures for the exploration and exploitation of new sources of energy and the Central Asian region and the Caspian Sea basin are known to contain reserves of natural gas and oil that dwarf those of Kuwait, the Gulf of Mexico, or the North Sea." (p.125)
"Uzbekistan is, in fact, the prime candidate for regional leadership in Central Asia." (p.130)
MY NOTE: Putin assembled his cabinet in lieu of Bush's request to build an air base and an increase in forces. Putin relinquished due to the World Terrorism Threat and his political ambitions to maintain former Soviet provinces.
"Once pipelines to the area have been developed, Turkmenistan's truly vast natural gas reserves augur a prosperous future for the country's people. (p.132)
"In fact, an Islamic revival - already abetted from the outside not only by Iran but also by Saudi Arabia - is likely to become the mobilizing impulse for the increasingly pervasive new nationalisms, determined to oppose any reintegration under Russian - and hence infidel - control." (p. 133).
"For Pakistan, the primary interest is to gain Geostrategic depth through political influence in Afghanistan - and to deny to Iran the exercise of such influence in Afghanistan and Tajikistan - and to benefit eventually from any pipeline construction linking Central Asia with the Arabian Sea."æ (p.139)
MY NOTE: Pakistan and Iran poltical leaders met in Pakistan the week of December 20, 2002 to heal long lasting political disagreements and to join together on a pipeline deal through Iran and other trade agreements. This allegence must have the Bush administration very concerned. This news was on BBC Friday, 12/20/02
"Turkmenistanƒ has been actively exploring the construction of a new pipeline through Afghanistan and Pakistan to the Arabian Seaƒ" (p.145)
"It follows that America's primary interest is to help ensure that no single power comes to control this geopolitical space and that the global community has unhindered financial and economic access to it." (p148)
"China's growing economic presence in the region and its political stake in the area's independence are also congruent with America's interests." (p.149)
"America is now the only global superpower, and Eurasia is the globe's central arena. Hence, what happens to the distribution of power on the Eurasian continent will be of decisive importance to America's global primacy and to America's historical legacy."æ (p.194)
"Without sustained and directed American involvement, before long the forces of global disorder could come to dominate the world scene. And the possibility of such a fragmentation is inherent in the geopolitical tensions not only of today's Eurasia but of the world more generally." (p.194)
"With warning signs on the horizon across Europe and Asia, any successful American policy must focus on Eurasia as a whole and be guided by a Geostrategic design." (p.197)
"That puts a premium on maneuver and manipulation in order to prevent the emergence of a hostile coalition that could eventually seek to challenge America's primacyƒ" (p. 198)
"The most immediate task is to make certain that no state or combination of states gains the capacity to expel the United States from Eurasia or even to diminish significantly its decisive arbitration role." (p. 198)
"In the long run, global politics are bound to become increasingly uncongenial to the concentration of hegemonic power in the hands of a single state. Hence, America is not only the first, as well as the only, truly global superpower, but it is also likely to be the very last." (p.209)
"Moreover, as America becomes an increasingly multi-cultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstance of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat."æ (p. 211) [Emphasis added]
The Horror - And Comments From Someone Who Worked With Brzezinski
Brzezinski's book is sublimely arrogant. While singing the praises of the IMF and the World Bank, which have economically terrorized nations on every continent, and while totally ignoring the worldwide terrorist actions of the U.S. government that have led to genocide; cluster bombings of civilian populations from Kosovo, to Laos, to Iraq, to Afghanistan; the development and battlefield use of both biological and chemical agents such as Sarin gas; and the financial rape of entire cultures, it would leave the reader believing that such actions are for the good of mankind.
While seconded from the German defense ministry to NATO in the late 1970s, Dr. Johannes Koeppl traveled to Washington on more than one occasion. He also met with Brzezinski in the White House on more than one occasion. His other Washington contacts included Steve Larabee from the CFR, John J. McCloy, former CIA Director, economist Milton Friedman, and officials from Carter's Office of Management and Budget. He is the first person I have ever interviewed who has made a direct presentation at a Bilderberger conference and he has also made numerous presentations to sub-groups of the Trilateral Commission. That was before he spoke out against them.
His fall was rapid after he realized that Brzezinski was part of a group intending to impose a world dictatorship. "In 1983/4 I warned of a take-over of world governments being orchestrated by these people. There was an obvious plan to subvert true democracies and selected leaders were not being chosen based upon character but upon their loyalty to an economic system run by the elites and dedicated to preserving their power.
"All we have now are pseudo-democracies."
Koeppl recalls meeting U.S. Congressman Larry McDonald in Nuremburg in the early 80s. McDonald, who was then contemplating a run for the Presidency, was a severe critic of these elites. He was killed in the Russian shootdown of Korean Air flight 007 in 1985. Koeppl believes that it might have been an assassination. Over the years many writers have made these allegations about 007 and the fact that someone with Koeppl's credentials believes that an entire plane full of passengers would be destroyed to eliminate one man offers a chilling opinion of the value placed on human life by the powers that be.
In 1983, Koeppl warned, through Op-Ed pieces published in NEWSWEEK and elsewhere, that Brzezinski and the CFR were part of an effort to impose a global dictatorship. His fall from grace was swift. "It was a criminal society that I was dealing with. It was not possible to publish anymore in the so-called respected publications. My 30 year career in politics ended.
"The people of the western world have been trained to be good consumers; to focus on money, sports cars, beauty, consumer goods. They have not been trained to look for character in people. Therefore what we need is education for politicians, a form of training that instills in them a higher sense of ethics than service to money. There is no training now for world leaders. This is a shame because of the responsibility that leaders hold to benefit all mankind rather than to blindly pursue destructive paths.
"We also need education for citizens to be more efficient in their democracies, in addition to education for politicians that will create a new network of elites based upon character and social intelligence."
Koeppl, who wrote his 1989 doctoral thesis on NATO management, also authored a 1989 book - largely ignored because of its controversial revelations - entitled "The Most Important Secrets in the World." He maintains a German language web site at www.antaris.com and he can be reached by email at jbk@antaris.com.
As to the present conflict Koeppl expressed the gravest concerns, "This is more than a war against terrorism. This is a war against the citizens of all countries. The current elites are creating so much fear that people don't know how to respond. But they must remember. This is a move to implement a world dictatorship within the next five years. There may not be another chance."
end | |  | | Guest | | Posted: Wed Dec 25, 2002 9:22 am Post subject: N Korea threatens to 'destroy world' |
| N Korea threatens to 'destroy world'
John Gittings in Hong Kong and Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Tuesday December 24, 2002
The Guardian
Desperate efforts began yesterday to head off the growing Korean crisis as Pyongyang and Washington continued to talk up the tension.
The UN has confirmed that North Korea has carried out its threat to remove UN seals and dismantle monitoring cameras at a laboratory used to produce weapons-grade plutonium.
Senator Joseph Biden, the outgoing chair of the Senate foreign relations committee, warned that North Korea's plan to restart a programme for plutonium extraction could allow it to produce bombs "within months".
A spokesman for the Vienna - based International Atomic Energy Agency said: "There isn't any legitimate purpose for the facility other than separating plutonium from spent fuel."
Pyongyang has issued a series of threats, including one to "destroy the earth" if the US resorted to nuclear war against it. South Korea's president, Kim Dae-jung, and the president-elect, Roh Moo-hyun, sought to calm the mood by saying they wanted a peaceful resolution.
While Russia expressed concern at the North's weekend announcement, the deputy foreign minister warned the US not to aggravate the crisis.
But the US state department yesterday rejected Pyongyang's insistence that the crisis can be solved if the US signs a treaty of non-aggression. "We will not bargain or offer inducements for North Korea to live up to the treaties and agreements it has signed," a spokesman said.
US intelligence sources were quoted by the BBC as saying they believe "North Korea may already have a small number of nuclear bombs and the material to make a few more".
Mr Biden said the crisis was "a greater danger immediately to US interests ... than Saddam Hussein."
Yesterday, the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, dismissed such concerns. "We are capable of fighting two major regional conflicts," he said.
"We're capable of winning decisively in one and swiftly defeating in the case of the other, and let there be no doubt about it."
He said Washington chose to pursue a diplomatic strategy against North Korea for the moment, as that crisis was still at a relatively early stage.
The North Korean media, which is never short of a fiery turn of phrase, has given Bush administration hardliners all the material they may want.
The communist party's newspaper Workers' Daily declared that "the army and people of the DPRK are fully ready to mercilessly strike the bulwark of US imperialist aggressors" - implying that they could hit targets in the US. | | | | Guest | | Posted: Wed Dec 25, 2002 10:18 am Post subject: JINSA ZIONIST EXTREMIST PERLE ALSO MEDDLING IN KOREA |
| >>From: trumpet@larouchepub.com
>>Reply-To: trumpet@larouchepub.com
>>Subject: LaRouche on Korea & World Peace
>>Date: 18 Dec 2002 22:41:52 -0500
>>
>>LAROUCHE IN 2004
>>P.O. Box 730 Leesburg VA 20178 www.larouchein2004.com
>>For more information, call 1-888-347-3258
>>
>>
>>KOREA & WORLD PEACE
>>by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr.
>>Sunday, December 15, 2002
>>
>> I am thankful for the U.S. Government's official apology to Spain, over
>>the attempt by some U.S. rogues to involve Spain in an attempted
>>destabilization of the ongoing Korea election campaigning. The restoration
>>of rail transport within Korea, which will allow us to connect Pusan to
>>western Europe, is an essential part of the effort to rescue the U.S.'s
>>partner Europe from the effects of a currently accelerating general
>>economic collapse around most of the planet. The currently continuing
>>attempts of U.S. official "Chickenhawks," such as Richard Perle and his
>>accomplices, to trigger a war-like crisis in the Korea Peninsula, must be
>>stepped on, hard.
>>
>> A group of Eurasian nations, including the Strategic Triangle of Russia,
>>China, and India, is emerging as the pivot of an increasing density of far-
>>reaching, long-term economic development projects within Asia. This
>>includes Korea, Japan, and Southeast Asia. The foundation of this ongoing
>>economic strategy includes large-scale infrastructure projects which will
>>serve as a critical margin of long-term stimulants to the entire region.
>>Among the effects will be a long-term growth of large margins of exports of
>>relevant technology from Europe, and similar opportunities for U.S. trans-
>>Pacific trade.
>>
>> Those benefits depend in significant degree upon strategically crucial
>>cooperation among Japan, Korea, and China. Japan urgently needs the
>>opportunity to return to the industrial- goods export orientation of the
>>period prior to Zbigniew Brzezinski's U.S. wrecking of Japan's oil-for-
>>technology relations with Mexico, for example. Japan's prospect for
>>participation in cooperation among Russia, China, and Korea, is therefore a
>>critical factor in Japan's early future. A revival of the pre-1997
>>industrial capabilities of Korea, and the development of the rail
>>connection from Pusan to Europe, is therefore a critical frontier of the
>>defense of the U.S. economy itself.
>>
>> Therefore, any other meddling madmen who are seeking to disrupt the Korea
>>rail connection, or target North Korea for U.S. Chickenhawks' attempts to
>>use it as a nuclear alternative for warfare on Iraq, must be considered as
>>a threat not only to our friends in Eurasia, but, also a menace to the
>>imperilled economic security of the U.S.A. itself.
>>
>>Paid for by LaRouche in 2004.
>>
>>********************************************************
>>If you have received this e-mail in error, or do not wish to receive e-
>>mails from us, please send an email to trumpet@larouchepub.com with REMOVE
>>LAR in the subject
>>line | | | | Guest | | Posted: Wed Dec 25, 2002 10:51 am Post subject: The Tangible Fear of Transfer |
| Iraq and during that attack there is a mega-
terrorist incident in Israel, then Ariel Sharon could exploit the
outbreak of rage in the Israeli public to conduct mass transfer of
Palestinians."
(And knowing what it means to zionists to deplete the population of
its Arab inhabitants, is it not possible they they themselves can
exploit rage in the Israeli public by being the creator of such an
incident. History speaks for itself.)
The tangible fear of transfer
By Danny Rubinstein
Monday, October 28, 2002
Haratez daily
The Palestinian national memory has been haunted for 50 years by the
experience of the Naqba during the War of Independence, when Israel
uprooted about half the Palestinian people from their land and homes
and turned them into refugees. There are many Palestinians who
believe the history of 1948 could repeat itself, because they believe
there is an innate urge in Zionism and the state of Israel to
displace the Palestinians. Since most understand the reality nowadays
in the West Bank and Gaza is very different from what existed in the
past, the fear now is of circumstances being created by the current
conflict, in which the Israeli government forces Arabs to leave their
homes. It would not be expulsion to another country since neighboring
states would not allow it. But what is possible is the destruction of
villages, neighborhoods, and possibly towns, forcing their residents
to seek shelter in other population centers.
Nobody suspects former Shin Bet chief Ami Ayalon of harboring
transfer ideologies, but the statement he made in a prominently
displayed interview last Friday in Al Quds, can be perceived as a
warning: "If the U.S. attacks Iraq and during that attack there is a
mega-terrorist incident in Israel, then Ariel Sharon could exploit
the outbreak of rage in the Israeli public to conduct mass transfer
of Palestinians."
But instead of trying to sketch out a transfer scenario for the
future, it's worth describing what is happening now in the
territories. Although there are no clear data on the number of
Palestinians who left the territories in the last two years, there
are many places where the phenomenon is well known. In the Ramallah
area, for example, many of the villagers and townspeople from the
surrounding areas have gone overseas, mostly to the U.S. Most of the
Christian residents of places like Jafna, Taibeh, Abud, Bir Zeit and
Ein Arik, have long since left for abroad, and there was emigration
to the U.S. from Muslim villages like Ein Yabrud and Bitunya even
before the intifada. As a result many of the inhabitants of those
places have American passports and both property and business
overseas. When life here becomes intolerable, they close their homes
and businesses here and go abroad until things calm down. This is a
well-known phenomenon in the Christian parts of Bethlehem. How many
have left since the intifada began? It's difficult to say.
The feeling among the Palestinian public is that IDF operations in
the territories have long since deviated from limited security
purposes for chasing down terrorists and that the Israeli intention
is to so embitter Palestinian lives that they'll leave of their own
accord. Until Operation Defensive Shield in March 2002, Israeli
spokesmen would explain their purpose was to force the suffering
Palestinian population to pressure Yasser Arafat's Palestinian
Authority to start chasing down the terrorists.
But ever since the West Bank was reoccupied and the besieged Arafat
no longer has security apparatuses and the Palestinian government has
been paralyzed, the Israeli argument about pressure on the population
rings hollow. "The goal of the Israeli occupation is to eradicate the
Palestinian existence in the homeland," the headlines in the
Palestinian press say on a daily basis. They are accompanied by
reports of curfews, checkpoints, house demolitions, closed factories
and ruined farmlands - and in a context that makes clear it has
nothing to do with security.
The settlers, of course, can always claim they shoot at olive
harvesters because the peasants are actually scouts meant to help
prepare terror attacks - but the clear truth is that it's really a
preparation for transfer. There's no other explanation, as far as the
Palestinians can tell, for the outposts affair and the sweeping
collective punishments in the territories, other than Israeli efforts
to make Palestinian life so miserable they'll choose to live elsewhere
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| The economics of war
Alan Reynolds
I am often asked about the cost of starting a war with Iraq — not just the cost to taxpayers, but also the potential impact on the economy, oil prices, the stock market, etc. Before we can even begin to answer such questions, we must first evaluate the odds that U.N. inspections will or will not prevent a full-scale war. Then we must try to arrive at an informed opinion about whether any war is likely to be brief or protracted.
Those most eager for a U.S. invasion use arguments that do not fit together very well. They claim to have indisputable information about Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction." Yet they are equally confident that inspections will fail because those same weapons will supposedly be impossible to find. If the weapons and factories are so impossible to find, how can we be so sure they exist?
Enthusiasts for war say we must be in a big hurry to invade before Iraq acquires weapons of mass destruction, thus changing the complaint from weapons Saddam has to weapons he wishes he had. But that is equivalent to admitting Iraq does not yet have the many dangerous weapons that were supposed to justify invasion in the first place — gas, germs, nukes and (more importantly) the means of delivering them to U.S. shores. Inspections do not "buy time" for Saddam. He could not start or expand a weapons program with ground inspectors and aerial photographers looking over his shoulder.
Those who claim to be certain Iraq has a formidable arsenal of fearsome weapons also express inexplicable confidence that those weapons pose no danger to U.S. troops. They declare that an invasion will be fast and easy. "I guarantee it will be over within 10 days," says Mort Zuckerman of U.S.News. Such assurances that Iraq is a feeble military power contradict the rationale for war — namely, the assertion that Iraq is in possession of terrifying weapons. Iraq may be a dangerous predator or an easy prey, but it cannot be both.
To maximize the alleged danger of Saddam's weapons while minimizing the risk to U.S. troops seems reckless. After reading "Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destruction" from the International Institute for Strategic Studies and "When Every Moment Counts" by Sen. Bill Frist, Tennessee Republican, my understanding is that homeland risks from chemical or biological terrorism are smaller than from, say, two snipers. Although it is unlikely Iraq has any method of delivering significant quantities of gas or germs as far as the United States, it is more plausible he might use whatever he has against invading U.S. troops.
My best guess is that war and its aftermath would be more costly and difficult than the optimists admit. The fact presidential adviser Larry Lindsey publicly estimates it would cost $100 billion to $200 billion implies the administration expects a second Iraq war to be 2 or 3 times more difficult than the first one.
Despite recent musings about deflation, wars are always inflationary. Money chases fewer goods, as labor and materials are diverted to military uses, boosting business costs and squeezing profits. Wholesale prices rose 122 percent from 1915 to 1920 and 52 percent from 1945 to 1948, but we are not talking about anything on such a horrific scale. News of an Iraq invasion would provoke a speculative and probably ephemeral rise in prices of metals and other military materials, as in 1990, but it would be a big mistake for the Fed to mistake that for sustained inflation.
Oil prices doubled in a couple of months after Iraq invaded Kuwait, approaching $40 a barrel, but the current situation is quite different. In 1990, there was a threat to Kuwait's oil, not just Iraq's, and there was some anxiety that a major power might end up taking Iraq's side in a conflict with the United States. Unlike 1990, oil is already fairly pricey today because (1) substantial risk of war has already been priced into the oil markets, and (2) the post-1991 "sanctions" have reduced world oil supplies while making the Iraqis more dependent on Saddam. In 1991, oil prices fell and stocks rallied when the United States attacked Iraq. But that was because pushing Iraq out of Kuwait reduced risks to world oil supplies. An attack on Iraq today would have the opposite effect.
The S&P stock index fell nearly 12 percent from 1941 to 1952, which spanned World War II and the Korean War. But risks of a relatively short war today probably explain only a fraction of the stock market's troubles, since even defense stocks have fared poorly. Risks of terrorism, on the other hand, have a paralyzing effect on business investments.
Perhaps the biggest risk of a war with Iraq is that it would divert the nation's security resources from fighting al Qaeda to fighting Saddam, and from homeland security to foreign affairs. Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III, chairman of the National Commission on Terrorism, recently told Fox News, "I don't buy the idea that there is a tradeoff." But the tradeoff is a mathematical certainty, not a matter of opinion.
It impossible to devote 100 percent of resources to two or three tasks at the same time. Assigning a higher priority to one thing (Iraq) means a lower priority for something else (al Qaeda). The president cannot work more than about 60 hours a week, for example, so devoting 30 hours to a foreign war and 10 hours to the domestic economy would leave only 20 for homeland security and everything else. More troops "over there" means fewer over here. More intelligence agents monitoring Iraq means fewer watching out for a Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan or for al Qaeda cells plotting trouble in U.S. cities.
In short, war is still hell, even if we call it liberation. And the unavoidable diversion of effort, attention and resources to any foreign war also implies greater risk of domestic troubles, including domestic terrorism. The prospect of war with Iraq is not as hellish as some other wars, but it is not necessarily unavoidable, either. Time has a way of solving many problems, and only time will tell.
Alan Reynolds is a senior fellow with the Cato Institute and a nationally syndicated columnist.
Collateral Damage:
the health and environmental costs of war on Iraq
Executive Summary
Up to four million people could die in a war on Iraq involving nuclear weapons. A more contained conflict could cause half a million deaths and have a devastating impact on the lives, health and environment of the combatants, Iraqi civilians, and people in neighbouring countries and beyond. It could also damage the global economy and thus indirectly harm the health and well-being of millions more people across the world.
Researched and written by health professionals, this evidence-based report examines the likely impact of a new war on Iraq from a public health perspective. Credible estimates of the total possible deaths on all sides during the conflict and the following three months range from 48,000 to over 260,000. Civil war within Iraq could add another 20,000 deaths. Additional later deaths from post-war adverse health effects could reach 200,000. If nuclear weapons were used the death toll could reach 3,900,000. In all scenarios the majority of casualties will be civilians.
The aftermath of a ‘conventional’ war could include civil war, famine and epidemics, millions of refugees and displaced people, catastrophic effects on children’s health and development, economic collapse including failure of agriculture and manufacturing, and a requirement for long-term peacekeeping. Destabilisation and possible regime change in countries neighbouring Iraq is also possible, as well as more terrorist attacks. Global economic crisis may be triggered through trade reduction and soaring oil prices, with particularly devastating consequences for developing countries.
The financial burden will be enormous on all sides, with arms spending, occupation costs, relief and reconstruction possibly exceeding $150-200bn. The US is likely to spend $50bn - $200bn on the war and $5bn - 20bn annually on the occupation. As the report points out, $100bn would fund about four years of expenditure to address the health needs of the world’s poorest people.
Conflict will be more destructive than 1990-1991 Gulf War
The avowed US aim of regime change means any new conflict will be much more intense and destructive than the 1990-91 Gulf War, and will involve more deadly weapons developed in the interim. Furthermore, the mental and physical health of ordinary Iraqis is far worse than it was in 1991, making them much more vulnerable this time round, and even less able to muster the resources needed for recovery and reconstruction.
Thanks to the oil revenues and social policies of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship, Iraq pre 1991 had become a reasonably prosperous, urbanised, middle-income country with a modern social infrastructure and good public services. The combined effects of war and sanctions, only partly offset by the humanitarian relief of the Oil-for-Food programme, relegated it to a pre-industrial age, and it now occupies a lowly 126th place out of 174 in the UN Human Development Index
The likely war scenario
The report bases its estimates on data from the earlier Gulf War, from comparable conflicts and crises elsewhere, and from the most reliable recent information on the health status of Iraq. It hypothesises a credible war scenario from current US military strategy, which envisages four different elements: sustained and devastating air attacks on government and military facilities and infrastructure in
Baghdad and other major urban centres; landing of ground forces to seize oil-producing regions in the south east; gaining control of north Iraq; and rapid deployment forces backed by air attacks to take Baghdad.
The US goal of leadership change is counterbalanced by Saddam Hussein’s goal of survival, so a short, clinical campaign is probably wishful thinking. The options open to Saddam Hussein include:
 firing oil wells and using radiological or chemical missiles to pollute the sites
 paramilitary attacks on Kuwaiti and Saudi oil fields, pipelines and facilities
 paramilitary attacks on civilian centres in other Gulf states
 paramilitary attacks on targets in the US, UK and other Coalition countries
 selective use of chemical and biological weapons (CBW).
The report considers the circumstances in which more substantial use of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons may occur. An Iraqi CBW attack on Israel or elsewhere could provoke immediate nuclear retaliation from Israel, the US and/or UK, while the UK and US have not ruled out the nuclear first-strike option.
Many questions remain unanswered about the aftermath and the likelihood of installing a stable new regime. The current problems of Afghanistan provide a reminder of the huge investment required to rebuild a shattered country, and the reluctance of the global community to support such long-term development.
Alternatives to war
As an objective report by health professionals, the report does not take a political stance on the alternatives to war on Iraq. Its main goal is to aid decision-making and encourage informed public debate by spelling out the true cost of a new war, against which any potential gains from going to war must be weighed. It lists non-violent strategies that have not yet been fully explored - some relating specifically to Iraq, and some to improving the international security context. It concludes that there is an urgent need for humane and wise global leadership which recognises that national security is impossible without international security.
Collateral Damage: the health and environmental costs of war on Iraq is being issued in London on 12 November 2002 by the global health organisation Medact, the UK affiliate of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War - winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985. It is being released on the same day in the US by IPPNW and its US affiliate Physicians for Social Responsibility, and by other IPPNW affiliates in ten other countries.
The report can be found on Medact’s website www.medact.org and on IPPNW’s website at www.ippnw.org. A longer version with additional information, references and statistics can also be viewed on the Medact website. | | | | Guest | | Posted: Thu Dec 26, 2002 11:12 pm Post subject: Forget Iraq: The Real Battle Is In Turkey |
| Forget Iraq: The Real Battle Is In Turkey:
http://www.heatherwokusch.com/ | | | | Guest | | Posted: Fri Dec 27, 2002 1:14 am Post subject: North Korea thumbs nose at US |
| http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3&art_id=vn20021224061501486C287301&set_id=1
North Korea thumbs nose at US
December 24 2002 at 06:15AM
Seoul - North Korea's decision to remove eight thousand spent nuclear fuel rods from international control is the most dangerous move yet in a two-month-old confrontation over nuclear weapons, analysts said on Monday.
"If North Korea decides that it is actually going to use those fuel rods, that decision will create a lot of problems," said professor Yu Suk-Ryul of the Institute of Foreign Affairs and National Security here.
The rods could be used to extract some 25kg of weapons-grade plutonium, enough for at least three nuclear weapons, experts say. They were sealed in 1994 under an accord North Korea signed with the United States to freeze its nuclear weapons programme in return for energy supplies and the construction in North Korea of two advanced light-water reactors by an international consortium.
The United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that North Korea began removing seals and monitoring cameras on Saturday from its frozen nuclear facilities.
The nuclear situation will shift rapidly into crisis
Pyongyang ignored IAEA appeals for restraint and took further action on Sunday to remove seals from a cooling pond containing the irradiated fuel rods at one of its nuclear reactors in Yongbyong.
"We still have some hope that what we have here is a game of brinkmanship," said an international affairs analyst at the Unification Ministry, which handles relations with North Korea.
But the Stalinist regime's decision to tap into the spent fuel can also mean something more sinister, experts warned.
"If North Korea starts work on the spent fuel rods again, the nuclear situation will shift rapidly into crisis," predicted Yu.
The US and North Korea went to the brink of war over Pyongyang's plutonium programme in the early 1990s.
'Bush will wait until after he has dealt one way or another with Iraq'
Washington believes Pyongyang derived enough weapons-grade plutonium from the programme for at least one nuclear bomb and that it could speedily produce more by reactivating the programme.
The confrontation was defused when Washington and Pyongyang signed the 1994 Agreed Framework, an arms control accord that has contributed to security in Northeast Asia for the past eight years.
North Korea agreed to freeze a five-megawatt reactor at Yongbyon, 60km north of Pyongyang, to halt the construction of two other reactors, and to put a cooling pond containing the spent fuel rods under control of the IAEA.
Since October, the Agreed Framework has been unravelling following the US announcement that Pyongyang has admitted to running a new nuclear programme based on enriched uranium technology in violation of the 1994 accord.
North Korea says its latest move to unseal its nuclear facilities was forced on it because of an energy crisis aggravated by the US-led decision last month to suspend heavy fuel shipments to punish Pyongyang for its uranium-based programme.
Throughout the crisis, Pyongyang has demanded talks with Washington and said it would address Washington's "security concerns" in return for a non-aggression pact, an offer Washington has so far turned down.
The US, supported by its main allies, wants the North to scrap its nuclear programmes first.
"North Korea is using the same tactics it used with the Clinton administration in 1994 during the last nuclear crisis," said Yu. "But the situation is quite different now. Their tactics will not work as well."
He said that President George W Bush, who earlier this year labelled the Pyongyang regime part of "an axis of evil" along with Iran and Iraq, was unlikely to bend to the latest Pyongyang threats.
"Bush will wait until after he has dealt one way or another with Iraq before paying full attention to Pyongyang," he said.
In the meantime, North Korea will be seeking to influence Roh Moo-Hyun, the South Korea president-elect who supports President Kim's Dae-Jung's "sunshine" policy of peaceful engagement with North Korea, he said.
Liberal Roh will travel to Washington early in his presidency for a summit with Bush.
"They will be very interested in that summit, and will be hoping that Roh pushes hard for engagement," said Yu. - Sapa-AFP
This article was originally published in The Cape Times on 23 December 2002 | | | | Guest | | | | Guest | | | | Guest | | | | | ©2002-2009 WarWithoutEnd.co.uk |
