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*** 16-Sep-18 World View -- Russian Orthodox Church in historic split with Constantinople over Ukraine issue

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Russian Orthodox Church in historic split with Constantinople over Ukraine issue
  
• Consequences of an independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church
  

****
**** Russian Orthodox Church in historic split with Constantinople over Ukraine issue
****


Putin's dream of an 'Orthodox Vatican' would be a major tourist and religious center in the city of Sergiev Posad, northeast of Moscow (BBC)

The Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) has taken the first steps in what is
being described as a "historic schism" in the Orthodox Christian
Church.

The ROC announced on Friday:

<QUOTE>"We have decided to suspend joint performance of
church services with the hierarchs of the Constantinople
Patriarchate, to suspend our membership in all structures, which
are headed or co-chaired by the representatives of
Constantinople."<END QUOTE>

An ROC spokesman said that this was only a "warning," and that the ROC
would break all relations with Constantinople if it grants
independence to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is currently
subordinate to the Russian Church.

The Constantinople Patriarchate and the Moscow Patriarchate are two of
several dozen Orthodox Patriarchates in the world, but they're the two
most influential.

The city of Constantinople was renamed Istanbul when it was conquered
by the Ottoman Muslims in 1453, bringing an end to the Byzantine
Empire. However, the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox
Christians is still considered to be the Constantinople Patriarchate.
All Patriarchates are considered to be equal, but Constantinople is
"first among equals."

Orthodox Christians in Ukraine are officially part of the Russian
Orthodox Church. There is a Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Kiev that
was formed in the 1990s, but it's not recognized by other Orthodox
churches.

After Russia invaded Ukraine, and then invaded and annexed Crimea in
2014, there was a movement in Ukraine to make the Ukrainian Orthodox
Church an "autocephalous church" or independent church. Instead of
being subordinate to the Russian Church, the Ukrainian church would
then be a peer to the Russian and Constantinople churches.

Right now, Patriarch Bartholomew I in Constantinople is leading a
debate about whether he should issue what is called a "Tomos of
autocephaly" (charter of independence), which would give the Ukraine
church the independence that it wants. It's believed that Bartholomew
favors doing so, and that a decision will be reached by the end of the
year. At that time, Patriarch Kirill in Moscow is expected to
completely several all relations with Constantinople. Russia Today and Moscow Times and BBC Russian
(Trans) and Telegraph (London)


****
**** Consequences of an independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church
****

Although the current split was triggered by the Ukrainian church's
request for independence, following Russia's invasion, occupation and
annexation of Crimea, the chances of a split between Russia and
Constantinople have been growing for years, particularly since the
collapse of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union was officially atheist. Nonetheless, during the time
of the Soviet Union, there was one Russian Orthodox Church, and all
Orthodox Christians in the Soviet Empire belonged to it. After the
Soviet collapse in 1991, independent Orthodox churches were formed in
Estonia and other former Soviet republics. Constantinople recognized
the Estonian church as independent, resulting in enormous friction
between Moscow and Constantinople.

Those disputes became even more prominent when Russia's president
Vladimir Putin came to power. Putin's dream is that the Russian
Patriarchate should replace the Constantinople Patriarchate as the
"first among equals." Furthermore, Putin dreamed of creating an
"Orthodox Vatican" in the ancient city of Sergiev Posad, northeast of
Moscow.

In line with this dream, Putin has been enticing, bribing and
threatening various Orthodox churches to pledge loyalty to the Russian
church, rather than the Constantinople church.

Putin's dream sounds reasonable when you consider that the Russian
church is the largest Orthodox Church in the world, in terms of
numbers of members and parishes. However, if Ukraine becomes an
independent church, then the Russian church will lose almost half its
parishes, and that will be the end of Putin's dream. It will also
cost the Russian Patriarchate a great deal of money. It will also
encourage other former Soviet republics, like Belarus and Georgia, to
follow the same path.

So this pending decision by Bartholomew is far more than symbolic. It
has major religious and geopolitical implications. Putin would
certainly retaliate. He might retaliate in Ukraine with a renewed
invasion. He might retaliate by trying to convince his new pal,
Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, to take some action in the
Phanar, the portion of Istanbul still occupied by the Constantinople
Patriarchate. So Bartholomew's decision, expected by the end of the
year, should have major consequences. Jamestown and Moscow Times and BBC Russian (Trans) Window on Eurasia

Related Articles:

• Russia's annexation of Crimea splits the Russian Orthodox Church (20-Mar-2014)
  
  
• Russian Duma goes after Protestant churches as 'sects and cults' (14-Dec-2015)
  
  
• Historic Orthodox Christian gathering in Crete exposes sharp divisions (20-Jun-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Russia, Ukraine, Constantinople,
Russian Orthodox Church, Ukrainian Orthodox Church,
Patriarch Bartholomew I, Patriarch Kirill,
Vladimir Putin, Sergiev Posad, Orthodox Vatican,
Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
Estonia, Belarus, Georgia

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 17-Sep-18 World View -- Kurdish protesters attack Iran's embassy in Paris

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Kurdish protesters attack Iran's embassy in Paris
  
• Kurds' anti-Iran Komala party denies involvement with Paris attack
  

****
**** Kurdish protesters attack Iran's embassy in Paris
****


Kurdish Peshmerga forces fire a mortar towards ISIS positions near Mosul in 2016. These forces are now turning against Iran. (Reuters)

Pro-Kurdish protesters attacked Iran's embassy in Paris on Friday.
Iran says that 15 Kurdish activists burned the Iranian flag in front
of the embassy. They threw stones, fire extinguishers and computers
at the embassy gate in an attempt to enter the premises, but were
unable to do so.

It's thought that the protests were triggered by last week's major
escalation by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) when it
launched a missile attack on anti-Iran opposition groups in Kurdistan
in northern Iraq. The IRGC used seven missiles in the attack, killing
11 people and wounding dozens more.

The IRGC attack occurred at the same time there had been several days
of violent anti-Iran protests in Basra in southern Iraq. However, the
IRGC attack apparently took several weeks to prepare, and so the two
events are not directly connected.

Iran confirmed that its embassy had been attacked, but Iran's foreign
ministry blamed the France's police for not acting quickly enough to
stop the attack:

<QUOTE>"It is necessary for France to take serious and
necessary measures and preparations to protect all Iranian
diplomatic missions in that country."<END QUOTE>

Iran is complaining that some French police refused to protect the
embassy and were not present at the time of the attack despite the
fact that it was aware of the assault.

Iran has to walk a fine line in not going too far to criticize France.
Iran has been demanding help from France and other European countries
in mitigating the damage to Iran's economy of President Trump's action
in pulling out of the nuclear deal and re-imposing sanctions.
Press TV (Iran) and AP and Reuters

****
**** Kurds' anti-Iran Komala party denies involvement with Paris attack
****

Iran accused the Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan of being
behind the attack on Iran's embassy in Paris. The statement
issued by the Komala party alluded to Iran's missile attack
on Kurdistan last weekend:

<QUOTE>"Komala rejects the accusations of being behind the
attack on Iran’s embassy in Paris.

[Our members in France took part] in a peaceful gathering outside
the Iranian embassy to protest Iran’s despicable actions against
the Kurdish nation [on September 8].

Unfortunately, some individuals from the gathering started to
violate the embassy, and even if we understand people’s anger, we
completely condemn this type of uncivilized acts."<END QUOTE>

The Komala party has an armed wing known as the Peshmerga. The
Peshmerga became internationally cheered in 2014-16 because it
provided many of the militias fighting ISIS after the latter overran
Mosul.

Once ISIS was defeated, last year the Peshmerga resumed, for the first
time in 25 years, being stationed just a few miles from Iran's border,
to threaten terror attacks on Iranian soil.

Komala is a Marxist-Leninist pro-Communist party that was originally
formed to oppose the government of the Shah of Iran, and in 1983
joined other Communist groups to form the Communist Party of Iran.

Over the years, there have been frequent clashes between the Komala
and the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan (PDKI), which was one of
the targets of last week's missile attack by Iran. Trend News (Azerbaijan) and Kurdistan 24 and Rudaw (Kurdistan, 30-Apr-2017) and Middle East Research and Information Project

Related Articles:

• In major escalation, Iran's missiles strike Kurdish targets in northern Iraq (10-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Riots in Iraq's Basra evoke fault lines of 1980s Iran-Iraq war (09-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Iran's anti-government protests expand as rial currency plummets (01-Aug-2018)
  
  
• Anti-government, anti-war and economic protests spread across Iran (30-Dec-2017)
  
  
• Kurdish militias drive ISIS out of the Syrian town of Kobani (27-Jan-2015)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, France, Paris, Iran,
Iraq, Kurdistan,
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, IRGC, Basra,
Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan, Peshmerga, Mosul,
Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, PDKI

Permanent web link to this article
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 18-Sep-18 World View -- Turkey scores diplomatic victory, as Russia backs down from Idlib assault in Syria

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Turkey scores diplomatic victory, as Russia backs down from Idlib assault in Syria
  
• The delusional terms of the Turkey-Russian Idlib agreement
  

****
**** Turkey scores diplomatic victory, as Russia backs down from Idlib assault in Syria
****


Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Vladimir Putin applaud themselves for having reached an agreement on Idlib on Monday in Sochi (RT)

Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russia's president
Vladimir Putin held a summit meeting on Monday at Russia's Sochi Black
Sea resort. After the meeting, the two leaders held a press
conference and announced that there would be no attack on Idlib
province in Syria, at least for the time being.

This would have to be viewed as a diplomatic victory for Erdogan,
after a recent summit meeting in Tehran on September 7 with Russia and
Iran where Turkey's attempt to avert the Idlib operation was rejected
by the other two parties. ( "8-Sep-18 World View -- Turkey fails to prevent Russia and Iran from mass slaughter in Idlib, Syria"
)

Turkey has been desperate to stop the Syria-Russia offensive, because
it would be a humanitarian disaster in Idlib, and because it would be
a humanitarian disaster for Turkey. Turkey already hosts 3.5 million
Syrian refugees, and there are potentially 3 million more in Idlib who
would try to flee across the the border into Turkey, and possibly
further on into Europe.

It's believed that Russia backed down from an immediate assault on
Idlib because of international pressure. After the Tehran meeting
two weeks ago, Erdogan said:

<QUOTE>"If the world turns a blind eye to the killing of tens
of thousands of innocent people to further the regime's interests,
we will neither watch from the sidelines nor participate in such a
game."<END QUOTE>

Since then, Turkey has been supplying additional weapons to "moderate"
rebels in Idlib, to prepare them for the assault. Separately, the US
and other Nato countries have repeatedly warned Russia and Syria.
President Donald Trump said that the assault would be a "grave
humanitarian error," while Nikki Haley said that it would provoke
"dire consequences."

And Russia's decision may have been swayed by the prospect of the
enormity of the humanitarian disaster, when al-Assad starts
perpetrating Putin's own "Grozny Strategy," exterminating women and
children in Idlib with attacks on hospitals, markets and schools, with
barrel bombs loaded with explosives, metals and chlorine gas, and with
Sarin gas, causing massive slaughter and massive crowds of fleeing
refugees.

There's one more reason why Putin might be reluctant to go ahead with
the mass slaughter in Idlib. Putin has said at least 9,000 people
from the republics of the former Soviet Union have gone to Syria to
fight for al-Qaeda or ISIS or other extremist groups. It's possible
that many of them are still in Idlib, and the Syrian-Russian assault
would allow them to join refugees pouring into Turkey, and from there
continue on to return home to their native countries to continue the
jihad there. Russia Today and AP and Daily Sabah (Ankara)

****
**** The delusional terms of the Turkey-Russian Idlib agreement
****

The agreement between Erdogan and Putin is a big relief to
a lot of people, especially the people in Idlib, because
it buys time. But it buys little more than that, because
the terms are delusional.

According to the agreement, Russia and Turkey will set up a 10-15 km
wide demilitarized buffer zone in Idlib province, to be policed by
Russia and Turkey.

All the anti-Assad "rebels" in this buffer zone are required to lay
down their arms, leave behind heavy artillery, and depart for other
enclaves. These include both "moderate" rebels, and also those in
al-Qaeda linked Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), formerly the al-Nusra
Front.

It will be Turkey's responsibility to separate the 60,000 or
so rebels from the other three million civilians in Idlib.
It would be nearly impossible anyway, but these are people
who will not want to be found, and are willing to die rather
than surrender.

But main objection to this temporary peace agreement is the
same as all the others in Putin's "Astana process." You have
a ceasefire agreement between Turkey, Russia and Iran. These
are supposed to be Syrian peace agreements, but there are never
Syrians involved in the agreement -- either al-Assad or
the opposition.

The whole Astana process has been nothing more than a farcical
cover for al-Assad's genocidal actions. The Astana process
identified four "de-escalation zones," or "ceasefire zones,"
but Russia never had any intention of meeting his own commitments.
The ceasefire zones were set up so that there would be a ceasefire
until al-Assad was ready for his extermination assaults, as
we've seen in Aleppo, Ghouta and Daraa.

The last de-escalation zone is Idlib, and it's different from the
others in that Turkey has been responsible for enforcing the
ceasefire. Al-Assad and Russia could attack at will in the other
de-escalation zones, because there was nobody opposed. But in Idlib
Turkey is opposed, and wants to enforce the ceasefire.

Russia and al-Assad never had any intention that Idlib would
remain a ceasefire zone, but now they've been forced by
international pressure to wait a while before going in for
the kill. And when they do, whether they will have to face
Turkey's military is an unknown.

Perhaps the biggest delusion of all, shared by many politicians
and journalists, is that the Syrian war is almost over.
Al-Assad said that the war would end after Aleppo was
assaulted. Then he said that the war was over after Daraa
was assaulted.

As I've written many times, al-Assad is a psychopathic monster, the
worst genocidal war criminal so far this century, comparable to Josef
Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong and Pol Pot from the last century.
For al-Assad, the extermination of the women and children in Idlib
would be the climax of his life, proving that he was better than his
father Hafez al-Assad was at committing mass slaughter and atrocities.
Thanks to Monday's agreement between Russia and Turkey, al-Assad is
going to have to wait a little longer to prove how much more of a man
he is than his father. BBC and
Al Jazeera and Asia Times and Hurriyet (Ankara)


Related Articles:

• Turkey, desperate to stop Syrian Idlib offensive, is supplying weapons to rebels (14-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Turkey fails to prevent Russia and Iran from mass slaughter in Idlib, Syria (08-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Syria and Russia prepare to inflict massive bloodbath on Idlib (05-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Russia demands that US and EU pay to rebuild Syria (23-Aug-2018)
  
  
• US increasingly expresses total disgust with Syria regime for Bashar al-Assad's atrocities (21-Sep-2016)
  
  
• Western leaders sickened by Assad's 'industrial strength' torture in Syria (22-Jan-2014)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Bashar al-Assad,
Russia, Vladimir Putin, Grozny strategy,
Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Iran, Hassan Rouhani,
Turkey, Idlib province, Astana, Kazakhstan,
Iran, Aleppo, Ghouta, Daraa, Saydnaya prison,
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, HTS, chlorine gas, Sarin gas

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

Once again, you present and distort Assad as some kind of psychopathic monster just looking for peoples to exterminate.

(09-18-2018, 11:20 AM)Cynic Hero 86 Wrote: [ -> ]> Once again, you present and distort Assad as some kind of
> psychopathic monster just looking for peoples to exterminate.
>

Well, you are consistent. Your love for al-Assad is exceeded only by
your love for Hitler.

*** 19-Sep-18 World View -- Book Announcement: World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy

Announcing a new book on Iran and Islam by John J. Xenakis

Book Announcement: World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy

Subtitle: Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle East


Book Announcement: World View: Iran's Struggle for Supremacy, by John J. Xenakis


$5 -- Buy the digital version on Amazon

$7 -- Buy the paperback on Amazon

I've kept the price low - $5 or $7. If you buy it, please write a
5-star amazon review. Thanks.


****
**** Book Description
****

Iran wants to be the master of the Mideast. It's threatening war with
Saudi Arabia. It's supporting wars in Iraq, Syria and Yemen. It's
supporting the Lebanon terror army Hezbollah to wage war in Syria and
to attack and eliminate Israel, and to attack the United States. This
book describes how a former United States ally has turned into a
radical, corrupt, theological regime threatening the entire region.

This book also addresses the controversies in Islam itself, including
the Sunni-Shia split, the authenticity of the Koran and Sharia Law,
polygamy and pedophilia in Islam, and whether the Koran commands all
Muslims to kill all non-Muslims.

About the author: John J. Xenakis is a historian, journalist and
analyst and a developer of generational theory, who has written
prolifically on geopolitical events, historical analysis, and
technology.

****
**** Supporting Generational Dynamics
****

Thousands of people start each day by reading the latest Generational
Dynamics World View article, which is provided each day free of cost
and ads.

This service has been provided, without income or funding, for 15
years as a public service. But this service will not be able to
continue much longer unless it receives a source of funding or income
to keep it alive.

This is a great book, and you can help support Generational Dynamics
by buying this book from Amazon and then writing a 5-star review so
that other people will buy it as well.

****
**** Book Contents - More Information
****

Most people in the West have little understanding of Islam and Iran,
even though both of these subjects are part of major news stories
almost every day.

The author, John J. Xenakis, has written thousands of articles on Iran
and Islam over two decades, and has written a book that provides, for
the serious reader, a serious, balanced, respectful history of Islam
and Iran.

Here are some of the topics covered in this book:

• Does the Koran command Muslims to kill all non-Muslims?
  
• Are Muslim jihadists at war with Christians and Jews?
  
• Why is there a split between Sunni and Shia Muslims, and what is
  its importance today?
  
• What is Shia theology, how was it redefined by Iran's Supreme
  Leader, and how is Iran's Supreme Leader violating it?
  
• What is the importance of ancient Persian empires and
  Zoroastrianism to Iran today?
  
• How is today's Iran, recognized as one of the most corrupt
  governments in the world, controlled by a Constitution with no checks
  and balances?
  
• Why is there a big generational split in Iran?
  
• How does the Koran compare to the Bible?
  
• What kind of "regime change" does Iran need to restore the
  country's former glory?

Furthermore, this book was written in a respectful, balanced,
non-ideological way that will be accessible to all points of view.

Some people may wonder whether it's possible or "appropriate" for a
non-Muslim to write a book on Islam and Iran. The opposite may be
true. A Muslim author might be able to write a balanced treatment of
Islam, but will suffer from the handicap that people within his own
religion or sect may criticize him if he's totally non-ideological,
and particularly if he discusses the very real controversies within
Islam itself, such as the validity of the Koran and Hadith, polygamy
and pedophilia in Islam, and whether the Koran commands all Muslims to
kill all non-Muslims.

The author is able to describe Islam and Iran in a respectful,
balanced, non-ideological way, but also describing the controversies
within Islam that Muslims themselves feel obligated to avoid
mentioning.

The author admits that he is biased against the current leadership in
Iran. An American cannot be indifferent to a leadership whose
security forces massacre, jail, rape and torture peacefully protesting
college students. And of course the book is also biased against
al-Qaeda, ISIS and other jihadist groups committing terror acts.

The ordering of the sections of this book is like "peeling an onion,"
starting with the most accessible political news about Iran over the
last 20 years, and then proceeding step by step to the core of Iran's
Shia Islam theology. A summary is as follows:

• Internal political conflicts in Iran, since the student riots
  beginning in 1999 that challenged the entire legitimacy of the 1979
  Great Islamic Revolution.
  
  
• A political history of Iran from the 1800s to the present,
  including the border wars with Britain and Russia, the Tobacco Revolt
  and Constitutional Revolution, the White Revolution and the Islamic
  Revolution. The book shows how each of these events flowed into the
  next one as new generations of Persians and Iranians grew up and
  replaced older generations.
  
  
• The great empires of Persian history, which still fill modern
  Iranians with pride even today.
  
  
• The conquest of Persia by Mohammed and the Islamic Arabs, and the
  Sunni-Shia split.
  
  
• Shia Islam's twelve infallible Imams, and development of Shia
  Islam Theology by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, through the
  "Guardianship of the Jurist." This involves a retelling of the
  history of Iran from 1800s to the present, but a theological history
  rather than a political history. This is the core of the onion, after
  all the layers have been peeled off.
  
  
• The future of Iran -- the selection of a new Supreme Leader, and
  the inevitable regime change.

By the time we reach the end, we'll have circled back to the
beginning, with what is hopefully a complete understanding of Iran
today.

This book also draws on the methodologies provided by advanced
generational theory as developed for 15 years on the GenerationalDynamics.com web site. These
methodologies explain, for example, why there's a big generational
split today between Iran's old government leaders versus young people,
and they explain such things as the transition from Iran's
Constitutional Revolution in 1905-09 to Iran's Islamic Revolution in
1979.

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Iran, Iran's Struggle for Supremacy

Permanent web link to this article
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

Iran is certainly an expansive state, but if you consider it's variety of Islam, it's pretty tame compared to what is going on in Saudi Arabia.

*** 20-Sep-18 World View -- Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women
  
• Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?
  
• The rape statistics
  

****
**** The international #MeToo movement continues to harm women
****


Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford

We're told that the #MeToo movement is becoming an increasingly global
phenomenon.

In May, the International Labor Organization held a conference to
debate whether or not to legislate for a global convention on sexual
harassment and abuse in the workplace. Thousands of women in many
countries have signed a letter urging international legislation, and
saying that a job should never ever include sexual harassment,
exploitation, coercion or abuse.

When I wrote about the #MeToo movement late last year, I described how
much it was hurting women, just as women in the workplace were
enormously harmed by the 1991 hearings for Supreme Court nominee
Clarence Thomas, where Anita Hill accused Thomas of asking her out
when they were both single and of telling he a couple of dirty jokes.
( "7-Dec-17 World View -- International #MeToo movement generates backlash against women from 'Mike Pence rule'"
)

Just as the Anita Hill accusations damaged women in the workplace for
a decade, because many men didn't want to work with women, the #MeToo
movement is having a similar effect today.

According to a recent survey, 63% of women are "How concerned
... about men being falsely accused of sexual assault and harassment."
The same survey showed that 60% of women are "concerned ... about the
#MeToo movement causing women to be denied professional opportunities
because men are reluctant to work with them."

This corresponds to what I found talking to men in the 1990s, and
talking to men today. Earlier this year, after several MeToo
scandals broke, one man told me that "working with a woman
is like working with an unexploded land mine -- you never know
when you'll say the wrong thing a trigger an explosion."

Women need experienced men to be mentors, but today you can't
turn on the television without hearing some feminist saying
that all older men are automatically guilty, and all should be
punished. Hatred of older men is rampant today.

And men know this. Researcher Sylvia Ann Hewlett at the Center for
Talent Innovation found that men aren’t comfortable taking female
protégés under their wings. "Our research shows that some 64% of
senior men avoid solo interactions with junior women because they fear
rumors about their motives." And as I said, fearing rumors
about the men's motives isn't the half of it, as the quote above
about the land mine illustrates.

In my lifetime, I've seen feminist politicians do enormous damage to
women. It's OK with them that Bill Clinton allegedly violently raped
seven women, but Clarence Thomas committed a crime by telling a dirty
joke. That's completely screwed up, and it's feminists who are
screwed up, and it's women that they're damaging. Guardian (London) and Law.com and Vox and World Economic Forum

****
**** Is Christine Blasey Ford accusing the wrong person?
****

If the #MeToo movement in general is a circus, then the circus act
going on in Washington today is disgusting and pathetic beyond belief.

There's a woman, Christine Blasey Ford accusing a Supreme Court
nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, of having attempted a failed sexual assault
when they were in high school thirty years ago. This is the kind of
pathetic situation that makes so many Americans completely disgusted
with politicians and the media, and makes one wonder how the country
will ever survive.

There are some statistics about rape that can clarify this situation,
but which feminists don't talk about. I'll get to these statistics
below.

I spent much of the 1990s decade doing research for a book on gender
issues called Fraternizing with the Enemy - A book on gender issues
for men and for women who care about men. I researched the whole
range of gender issues - divorce, domestic violence, rape, teen
motherhood, sexual harassment, child abuse, incest, including detailed
discussions of the discussions of Clarence Thomas and Bill Clinton,
and the "victims," including Anita Hill and Juanita Broaddrick. The
book was based on thousands of interviews and online conversations, as
well as extensive research into such things as "feminist legal theory"
and "feminist social theory."

The book is available as a free PDF, on my download page, http://generationaldynamics.com/download/.

So here are the most important facts about the Kavanaugh situation, as
I understand them:

• According to Ford, she and Kavanaugh and a friend were at a
  party where everyone was drinking a lot, but she can't say exactly
  where or when, even what year, and her story contains
  inconsistencies.
  
  
• According to Ford, Kavanaugh tried to remove her clothes, but she
  broke free and left the room.
  
  
• Ford didn't tell anyone until years later, and then didn't mention
  Kavanaugh's name.
  
  
• Kavanaugh denies the entire incident, says he doesn't know Ford,
  wasn't at any such party, and never did anything like that while in
  high school or after.
  
  
• Democrats are reflexively saying that Ford is extremely honest,
  and is telling the truth. Republicans are saying that Kavanaugh is a
  man of the the highest integrity, but they're withholding judgment
  until they can look Ford in the eye and question her in a
  hearing.

Most people think that either Ford or Kavanaugh must be lying, but
that's not true. There's a perfectly reasonable scenario in which
both are telling the truth. NBC News

****
**** The rape statistics
****

So here are the statistics about rape that feminists don't talk about:

• 6-7% of all rape charges are phony charges, made my women with
  emotional problems, or seeking revenge. This is comparable to phony
  charges in other crimes, so rape is no different than other
  crimes.
  
  
• In 25% of stranger rape cases, the victim identifies the wrong
  person. Once again, this is typical of eyewitness identification in
  ALL crimes -- 25% of eyewitness identifications were wrong -- so rape
  is no different from other crimes.

It's this last statistic that may be relevant here. 25% is a very
high number, and it's plausible that Ford was assaulted in the way she
described, but not by Kavanaugh.

Based on all I've heard about the sincere statements from both Ford
and Kavanaugh, a misidentification by Ford seems extremely likely to
have happened. This is a perfectly reasonable explanation, and it
would mean that both Ford and Kavanaugh are telling the truth, as they
know it.

The above statistics about rape were not pulled out of the air. We
know these figures because of a remarkable development that occurred
in the 1990s -- the use of DNA evidence to identify rapists. In many
cases in the 1980s, a man was convicted of rape simply because some
woman accused him, and feminists would pipe up and say, "Women are
never wrong about rape."

In the 1990s, Barry Scheck's Innocence Project was able to go back and
perform DNA tests on the rape kits that had been preserved. Of the
first 18,000 DNA tests, 5,000 accused suspects were eliminated --
27.8%.

Here's a quote from my book, describing a story that was widely
publicized in the 1990s:

<QUOTE>"One disturbing story was presented on PBS's
Frontline. In 1985, Ronald Cotton, a black man with a record, was
convicted of raping two women, based on an identification by one
of the victims, Jennifer Thomson, who was a very convincing and
compelling witness during the trial.

In 1995, DNA tests were performed, and Cotton was exonerated and
set free. Who was the real rapist? DNA tests showed it was Bobby
Poole, someone whom Jennifer had actually watched testify in
court, but who was excluded based on her eyewitness testimony.

According to Jennifer, "I remember feeling just an overwhelming
sense of just guilt that if, indeed, we had made a mistake and I
had contributed to taking away 11 years of this man's life.... I
felt so bad. I fell apart."

But amazingly, she still doesn't recognize Poole as the man who
actually raped her. She adds, "I have to accept the answer that's
been given to me and put faith in our system that the DNA tests,
the science, tells me we had the wrong guy. I just wish I had some
answers. I still see Ronald Cotton. And I'm not saying that to
point a finger. I'm just saying that's who I see. And I would love
to erase that face out of my mind. I would do anything to erase
that face out of my mind, but I can't. It's just .. it's in my
head. Sometimes it's more fuzzy than others because my mind now
says, 'Well, it's Bobby Poole.' But it's still the face I
see."<END QUOTE>

When Bill Clinton was credibly charged by seven women as being a
violent serial rapist, the feminists threw the women under the bus.
Then Hillary Clinton raped them all again (to use the feminist
phrase), along with Monica Lewinsky, by trashing all the women.

Now the feminists are throwing Ford under the bus as well. Senator
Dianne Feinstein handled this whole situation in such a way as to
inflict maximum damage on Ford. I cannot think of any way she could
have harmed Ford more.

She received Ford's letter in July, and sat on it. Then she revealed
it at the last minute, and is now refusing to release an unredacted
version to the Republicans. This is disastrous for Ford because it
suggests that when the letter is finally revealed, it will make Ford
look bad, and maybe even exonerate Kavanaugh.

There's another comparison that had to be made. Anita Hill was hated
by half of America in the 1990s. Bill Clinton's rape accusers, the
ones who were publicly known, were hated by half the country and
trashed by Democrats. And now, Ford is saying that she's receiving
death threats and have to hide out. Once again, I blame the feminists
for this. They're using her as a pawn, and they don't care how much
she's hurt. Book: Fraternizing with the Enemy (PDF) and University of Florida and PBS Frontline and
Fox News and Chicago Tribune

Related Articles

• International #MeToo movement generates backlash against women from 'Mike Pence rule' (07-Dec-2017)
  
  
• France's Dominique Strauss-Kahn acquitted of 'aggravated pimping' (13-Jun-2015)
  
  
• France's politics in turmoil from collapse of Strauss-Kahn rape case (02-Jul-2011)
  
  
• Collapse of Duke rape case represents cultural change (22-Apr-2007)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Brett Kavanaugh, Christine Blasey Ford,
#MeToo, Clarence Thomas, Anita Hill, Bill Clinton,
Juanita Broaddrick, Monica Lewinsky,
Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Center for Talent Innovation,
Barry Scheck, Innocence Project, PBS Frontline,
Ronald Cotton, Jennifer Thomson, Bob Poole,
Dianne Feinstein

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 21-Sep-18 World View -- Myanmar signs 'debt trap' agreement with China in response to Rohingya genocide censure

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Myanmar (Burma) and China agree to build China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC)
  
• Myanmar signs 'debt trap' agreement with China in response to Rohingya genocide censure
  

****
**** Myanmar (Burma) and China agree to build China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC)
****


Map of China-Myanmar Economic Corridor - CMEC (The Irrawaddy)

Earlier this month, Myanmar (Burma) signed a series of memos of
understanding (MOUs) for joint construction with China to build the
China-Myanmar Economic Corridor (CMEC), which is part of China's Belt
and Road Initiative (BRI). The CMEC will focus on 12 areas including
basic infrastructure, construction, manufacturing, agriculture,
transport, finance, human resource development and telecommunications.

According to the CMEC proposal, construction will begin with 24
projects costing $2 billion at the beginning, increasing later. The
corridor will start from Kunming, the capital of China’s Yunnan
Province. It will continue for 1,700-kilometers, through Myanmar’s
major economic hubs, ending at Myanmar's deep sea port in Kyaukphyu in
Rakhine State on the Bay of Bengal, leading to the Indian Ocean.

The project will create thousands of jobs for Burmese workers, but it
will provide far larger benefits for Chinese companies and workers.
The proposal claims that the CMEC would allow a direct flow of Chinese
goods into the southern and western regions of Myanmar and that
Chinese industries could transfer into Myanmar in order to abate the
rising labor cost and overcapacity of China’s industries. It said that
Myanmar would become a major trade hub for Chinese goods, between
China, Southeast Asia and South Asia.

Thus, the proposal indicates that this will be a huge boon for China's
industries. China is already developing the China-Pakistan Economic
Corridor (CPEC), connecting Xinjiang province in northwest China
through Pakistan to the Gwadar port and the Indian ocean. CMEC would
provide a second corridor for transporting Chinese goods to the Indian
Ocean, this time from Yunnan province in southwest China.

CPEC and CMEC provide two routes to the Indian Ocean, thus reducing
China's reliance on the Malacca straits — the narrow passage that
links the Indian Ocean with the Pacific, and which is dominated by the
United States. Global Times (China) and The Diplomat and The Irrawaddy (6-Jul)

****
**** Myanmar signs 'debt trap' agreement with China in response to Rohingya genocide censure
****

Since November 2017, when China announced the proposal to build CMEC,
Myanmar's public and media have raised a number of concerns.

First, the CMEC project runs ethnic conflict zones in Shan and Kachin
states near the border with China, and and in Rakhine State, near the
border with Bangladesh, where ethnic Rohingyas have been subjected to
genocide and ethnic cleansing by the Burmese army. The project could
provoke further conflicts in these ethnic areas, and even subject the
project and the Chinese workers to terrorist attacks. This is already
happening in the Balochistan region of Pakistan, affecting the CPEC
project.

Second, the Burmese public is very aware of the "debt trap" issue,
where China funds the infrastructure project with billions of dollars
that have to be paid back, or else forfeit land and infrastructure
that has been put up as collateral for the loans. The Burmese are
very well aware Sri Lanka lost its $1 billion Hambantota seaport in
exactly that way, and now the seaport and a substantial amount of land
around the seaport are occupied by the Chinese and thousands of
Chinese workers.

As I've described in the past,

China structures the aid agreements without concern for whether the
loan can be repaid, since China then has the option of taking control
of the country's infrastructure in case of default.

As I explained, it's actually worse than that. China loans the money
to the country, and requires that it only be used to pay the salaries
of Chinese workers, and to purchase parts and equipment from Chinese
factories. So the money is immediately returned to China, but still
has to be repaid, so the country is effectively forced to repay the
loan twice. After default, and the Chinese take control of the
infrastructure project, there is an enclave of Chinese workers and
their families who will be there forever.

Myanmar's Kyaukphyu seaport is not the only project facing debt-trap
concerns. For the CMEC agreement, there are industrial zones,
railways, roads and other infrastructure projects to be built along
the corridor for which Myanmar cannot find financing.

In a bit of black humor, Ning Jizhe, head of China’s National
Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) claimed that China's BRI
projects are not a debt trap. He said the countries with debt
problems have long-standing high debt levels which shouldn’t be blamed
on the BRI. But of course it's exactly people with debt problems
that loan sharks and payday loan operators prey on by offering
extortionary loans and then sending thugs out to collect the
loans in whatever way they can.

Myanmar's government in fact dropped a couple of projects related to
the Kyaukphyu seaport in July, in order to reduce the amount of debt.
However, the initial loan will still be $2 billion.

However, there are several reasons why Myanmar felt forced
to go ahead with CMEC proposal, even though it's almost impossible
that the debt will be repaid.

First, Myanmar is an economically weak country which, even in the best
of times, is unable to borrow money due to lack of transparency in its
government expenses and its relationship with China. According ton
one analyst, "Raising capital overseas will also likely be challenging
given that foreign investors will likely find it difficult to
determine Myanmar’s creditworthiness due to the lack of information."

Second, the United States is imposing sanctions on Myanmar, and
Australia is considering doing the same, because of the genocide and
ethnic cleansing of Rohingyas in the last seven years. Myanmar has
been extremely successful in its genocide and ethnic cleansing
efforts. Genocide and ethnic cleansing efforts by Bashar al-Assad in
Syria and Joseph Kabila in DR Congo have not yet been successful, and
are still ongoing. But Myanmar appears to have pretty much completed
the job.

The sanctions mean that whatever Myanmar's chances of borrowing money
internationally in the past, it will be almost impossible after the
sanctions are imposed. The threat of sanctions is isolating Myanmar
even further, so that its closest friend in China, where government
officials really don't care about such things as genocide and ethnic
cleansing.

So if the word "trapped" applies to any country, then it certainly
applies to Burma. China will certainly use its leverage to control
policies and developments in Burma in whatever way it feels necessary,
and will apparently receive full cooperation. The Irrawaddy (Burma) and Myanmar Times (7-Jul) and The Hindu

Related Articles:

• Thousands of ethnic Kachins flee from violence by Burma (Myanmar) army (29-Apr-2018)
  
  
• Genocide of Rohingyas in Burma (Myanmar) appears to be almost complete (27-Aug-2018)
  
  
• Devastating UN report on Burma shows scale of ghastly atrocities by Buddhists targeting Muslim Rohingyas (04-Feb-2017)
  
  
• Generational history of Burma (Myanmar) (26-Sep-2007)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Burma, Myanmar, China,
China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, CMEC,
Belt and Road Initiative, BRI,
Yunnan, Kyaukphyu seaport, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean,
Shan state, Kachin State, Rakhine State, Bangladesh,
China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, CPEC, Balochistan,
Ning Jizhe, National Development and Reform Commission, NDRC,
Syria, Bashar al-Assad, DR Congo, Joseph Kabila

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 22-Sep-18 World View -- China threatens multiple Western nations militarily over South China Sea

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• China threatens multiple Western nations militarily over South China Sea
  
• China's claims to the South China Sea are amazingly vacuous
  

****
**** China threatens multiple Western nations militarily over South China Sea
****


Radar towers, hangars and five-story buildings can be seen on Fiery Cross Reef from an onboard camera on a U.S. Navy P-8A Poseidon reconnaissance plane. (NY Times)

Two weeks ago, the HMS Albion, a British Royal Navy flagship
amphibious assault ship, was traveling through the South China Sea, en
route from Tokyo to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) in Vietnam. On August
31, the ship exercised its "freedom of navigation" rights as it passed
near the Paracel Islands. The Paracel Islands have been ruled by the
courts to be in international waters, but China has used military
force to annex them, in clear violation of international law. China
immediately launched a military challenge in the form of a frigate and
two helicopters, although both sides remained calm.

However, the Albion's freedom of navigation operation continues to
trigger hysterical, irrational threats by the Chinese. In the
aftermath of the incident, China made the usual threats, and these
statements have been growing more hysterical and threatening as time
goes on.

China's embassy in London issued this statement:

<QUOTE>"The [Paracel Islands are] an inherent part of the
Chinese territory. In accordance with the Law of the People's
Republic of China on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone,
the Chinese government promulgated the baseline of the territorial
sea of the [Paracel Islands] in May, 1996. The relevant behavior
of the British warship violated Chinese law and relevant
international law and infringed upon China's sovereignty. China is
firmly opposed to this. We have lodged stern representations with
the British side and expressed our strong dissatisfaction.

The Chinese side strongly urges Britain to stop this kind of
provocation lest it should undermine the overall picture of
bilateral ties as well as regional peace and stability. China will
continue to take all necessary measures to safeguard its
sovereignty and security."<END QUOTE>

The claim that the Paracel Islands are an inherent part of
Chinese territory is really laughable, as I'll explain below.
China has NO sovereignty there.

China's Ambassador to Britain Liu Xiaoming has said that the freedom
of navigation in the South China Sea has never been a problem, warning
that no one should underestimate China's determination to uphold
"peace and stability" in the region:

<QUOTE>"Yet to everyone’s confusion, some big countries
outside the region did not seem to appreciate the peace and
tranquility in the South China Sea. They sent warships
and aircraft all the way to the South China Sea to create
trouble. ...

This was a serious infringement [of China's sovereignty]. It
threatened China's security and put regional peace and stability
in jeopardy.

"Freedom of navigation is not a license to do whatever one wishes.
...

"Such 'freedom' must be stopped. Otherwise the South China Sea
will never be tranquil."<END QUOTE>

This is a military threat. The ambassador claims that it's about
warships making trouble, but it's also about fishing boats and oil.
China has repeatedly used military force to prevent Vietnam and the
Philippines from fishing in international waters, and as we recently reported,
China threatened war
with the Philippines if the latter drills for oil in its own
territorial waters.

In the last five years, islands near the Philippines have
turned into Chinese military bases, bristling with radar domes,
shelters for missiles, and warplane runways.

In 2015, Xi stood in the Rose Garden at the White House and promised,
"there is no intention to militarize" the South China Sea, which is
exactly what happened. Xi's lie is standard Chinese policy, as
advised by 1980s Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping: "Observe calmly; secure
our position; cope with affairs calmly; hide our capacities and bide
our time; be good at maintaining a low profile; and never claim
leadership."

But since 2015, China has completely abandoned Deng's advice, and is
now openly militaristic and threatening, and preparing to launch a
war.

According to a Pentagon assessment, China's military bases in the
Spratly Islands will be completed by the end of the year, and
presumably ready for full-scale war. The only question is what will
China do next -- take immediate military action, or else start
building military bases in Scarborough, in Philippines territorial
waters, an act of war in itself.

In May, U.S. Indo-Pacific commander Adm. Philip Davidson said, "In
short, China is now capable of controlling the South China Sea in all
scenarios short of war with the United States."

China does not recognize international law except when it favors
China. China believes that its own law supersedes international law.
China has been pursuing the Nazi Lebensraum objective,
at least since the time of Chiang Kai-shek
after World War II. The Chinese Communist Party view of Han Racial
Superiority is no different than the Nazi view of the Aryan Master
Race.

The "freedom of navigation operations" (FONOPs) are being conducted by
the US, Britain, Australian, and Japan. There's a temptation just to
abandon them, and just let China have its way. But then China would
just declare victory, and make further demands, prohibiting any other
country's vessels of any kind to pass through the South China Sea
without explicit permission of the Chinese.

So the Chinese make their hysterical statements and military threats
to "prove" their claims. The FONOPs are necessary to refute China's
hysterical statements and military threats. This is exactly the kind
of tit-for-tat escalation that leads to war during a generational
Crisis era.

The same thing is happening with trade policy between the US and
China. Neither the Trump administration nor Xi Jinping is going to
back down. Perhaps some intermediary can work for a truce of some
kind, but it's more likely that the tit-for-tat trade escalations will
also continue.

As I've written in the past, Generational Dynamics predicts that we're
headed for full-scale war with China with 100% certainty, and Donald
Trump is well aware of this. Many of his policies, which are totally
inscrutable and incomprehensible to the media, make perfect sense when
you realize that they're intended to try to prevent a world war.
Preventing a world war is impossible, but I'm not going to criticize
Trump for trying. Chinese Embassy in UK and Xinhua
and NY Times and South China Morning Post

****
**** China's claims to the South China Sea are amazingly vacuous
****

As we all know, in 2016 the Philippines won a historic case in the
United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague thoroughly
humiliating China by ruling that all of China's activities in the
South China Sea are illegal and in violation of international law.

The Chinese ambassador's statement quoted above says that "the British
warship violated Chinese law and relevant international law and
infringed upon China's sovereignty." China has no sovereignty in the
South China Sea. China's use of the phrase "relevant international
law" is laughable, since China believes itself superiod to
international law.

In recent weeks, I've been doing my own research on China's claims
to the South China Sea.

First, let's address the name, "South China Sea." This does not mean
that China owns it, any more than India owns the Indian Ocean. The
name South China Sea was invented by Westerners, around 1900. Prior
to that, different countries used various names, including Cham sea,
Luzon sea, Clove sea, South sea, East sea, and West Philippine sea.
According to historian Philip Bowring:

<QUOTE>"Do not imagine that the term “South China Sea” ever
implied Chinese ownership. It is a Western construction that dates
to about 1900. Previously, European maps referred to it as the
China Sea, and before that as part of the Indian Sea. When the
Portuguese arrived there in the early sixteenth century they
called it the Cham Sea, after the maritime kingdom of coastal
Vietnam. Other names at various times include Luzon Sea and (by
early Arab traders) the Clove Sea. To China it has long been the
South Sea and to Vietnamese the East Sea. The Philippines now
refers to it as the West Philippine Sea.

“Malay seas” is another term that has been applied to it and its
immediate neighbors, the Java, Sulu, and Banda seas. The South
China Sea itself is predominantly a Malay sea, as defined by the
culture and language group of the majority of people living along
its shores. Until European imperialism from the sixteenth century
onward gradually snuffed out these trade-based kingdoms and
sultanates, they were the region’s principal
traders."<END QUOTE>

The Chinese claim sovereignty going all the way to the Han Dynasty in
the 2nd century BC. Once again, this is laughable.

Starting from the beginning of the first millennium BC, there were
Malay-Polynesian people settling in all the Pacific islands from
Madagascar to Taiwan, conducting trade. This continued through most
of the 1st and 2nd millennium AD.

Ironically, China had no interest in these islands throughout this
period, and in fact discouraged its own traders from venturing out,
preferring to wait for foreign traders to come to China.

China was busy looking westward, conquering Central Asian lands,
including the Tibetans and the Uighur Turks. Today, these ethnic
groups the ones that China is treating as violently as possible. It's
even now emerging that China has locked up a million Uighurs in
reeducation camps, and has separated Uighur children from their
parents and locked them up in indoctrination camps.

This is standard Chinese practice. During Mao's Great Leap Forward,
500 million peasants were taken out of their homes and put into
communes, with children, wives and husbands all living separately.
Husbands and wives were allowed to be alone only at certain times of
the month and only for brief periods. All workers took part in
ideological training sessions. The purpose was to turn the population
into a giant machine, proving that Communism was better than anything
else. It was a disaster, resulting in tens of millions of deaths.
Now the Chinese are using the same techniques on the Uighurs, though
with different objectives, but just as likely to end in disaster.

Significantly, China's historical conquests were all to the west, but
never to the east. China tried to conquer Korea, but failed. China
apparently made no attempt to conquer the Philippines the way they
conquered the Uighurs. If they had, then the Chinese claim to the
South China Sea might actually have some validity.

So the historical evidence indicates that China wanted absolutely
nothing to do with the South China Sea until recently. It was only
after WW II that they decided that they had gotten enough Lebensraum
to the west, and now wanted Lebensraum to the east. They backed up
their claims by dredging up old maps and documents that were
supposedly created centuries ago, but those are meaningless. If
having a map of something means you own it, then the British
Geological Survey owns the whole world. National Geographic (18-Jun-2014) and New York Review of Books (13-Sep-2017) and Ancient History Encyclopedia

Related Articles

• Britain 'provokes' China by sending warship into South China Sea (07-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Tensions grow in Philippines as Duterte turns against China in South China Sea (11-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Philippines humiliates China in harsh Hague Tribunal ruling over South China Sea (13-Jul-2016)
  
  
• China's media 'accidentally' claims Philippines as part of China (10-May-2012)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, South China Sea,
Britain, HMS Albion, Paracel Islands,
Liu Xiaoming, Philippines, Deng Xiaoping, Xi Jinping,
Philip Davidson, Chiang Kai-shek, Australia, Japan,
United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague,
Scarborough Shoal, India, Indian Ocean,
Cham sea, Luzon sea, Clove sea, South sea,
East sea, West Philippine sea, Malay seas,
Malay-Polynesian, Madascar, Taiwan,
Uighurs, Tibetans, Nazis, Lebensraum,
British Geological Survey

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 23-Sep-18 World View -- Gunmen massacre IRGC soldiers and their families during military parade in Ahvaz, Iran

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Gunmen massacre IRGC soldiers and their families during military parade in Ahvaz, Iran
  
• Iran reflexively blames Saudi Arabia, UAE, Israel, Mossad, and United States
  
• Attack blamed on a local Arab terrorist group, al-Ahvazi separatist movement
  

****
**** Gunmen massacre IRGC soldiers and their families during military parade in Ahvaz, Iran
****


IRGC soldiers marching in military parade on Saturday, prior to terrorist attack (AFP)

Dozens of people, including women and children, were killed in a
terrorist attack on a military parade in Iran, in the city of Ahvaz,
the capital city of Khuzestan province, which is in southwest corner
of Iran, bordering Iraq and the Persian Gulf.

The attack occurred during a military parade marking the beginning of
the Sacred Defense Week, a nationwide ceremony commemorating the
anniversary of the start of the Iran/Iraq war that began with an
invasion by Iraq's Saddam Hussein, and continued from 1980-88. Some
1.5 million people were killed in the Iran/Iraq war, and it ended in
1988 with Saddam Hussein using the WMD mustard gas on Kurds and
Iranians.

The attack targeted members of the Iran's powerful paramilitary group,
the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and their families.
Four gunmen dressed in fake IRGC uniforms sprayed random gunfire into
a crowd of marching soldiers, bystanders and government officials.
The military parade was being televised live, saw Iranians saw
marching soldiers suddenly scramble to flee, or fall to the ground to
escape gunfire, many of them shielding children.

Ahvaz is the capital city of Khuzestan province, which has the
country's largest oil reserves. With its proximity to Iraq and the
presence of a large Arab minority, the area has seen ethnic violence
in the past. It was also a frontline in the eight-year Iran-Iraq War,
as Saddam Hussein was trying to gain control of Khuzestan province and
its oil wealth. Mehr News (Tehran) and AP and Press TV (Tehran)


****
**** Iran reflexively blames Saudi Arabia, UAE, Israel, Mossad, and United States
****

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei immediately said "This crime is a
continuation of the plots of the regional states that are puppets of
the United States, and their goal is to create insecurity in our dear
country."

The "regional states" that Khamenei alluded to are Saudi Arabia and
United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Iran's Foreign Minister Javad Zarif made a similar claim in a tweet:

<QUOTE>"Terrorists recruited, trained, armed & paid by a
foreign regime have attacked Ahvaz. Children and journos among
casualties. Iran holds regional terror sponsors and their US
masters accountable for such attacks. Iran will respond swiftly
and decisively in defense of Iranian lives."<END QUOTE>

At some level, these accusations are justified. Ministers from Saudi
Arabia and UAE have at times incendiary statements targeting Iran,
just as Iran has threatened Saudi Arabia and UAE.

A year ago, John R. Bolton, former US ambassador to the United
Nations, made a proposal to President Trump get out of the nuclear
deal with Iran, which was a subject still under discussion at that
time. Bolton recommended going beyond simple abrogation of the
agreement to take steps "to limit Iran’s malicious activities and
global adventurism." These actions included:

• End all landing and docking rights for all Iranian aircraft
  and ships at key allied ports;
  
  
• End all visas for Iranians, including so called “scholarly,”
  student, sports, or other exchanges;
  
  
• Demand payment with a set deadline on outstanding
  U.S. federal-court judgments against Iran for terrorism, including
  9/11;
  
  
• Announce U.S. support for the democratic Iranian opposition;
  
  
• Expedite delivery of bunker-buster bombs;
  
  
• Announce U.S. support for Kurdish national aspirations, including
  Kurds in Iran, Iraq, and Syria;
  
  
• Provide assistance to Balochis, Khuzestan Arabs, Kurds, and others
  — also to internal resistance among labor unions, students, and
  women’s groups;
  
  
• Actively organize opposition to Iranian political objectives in
  the U.N.

Bolton's plan, which he says is for discussion purposes only, is
extremely belligerent and threatening, and specifically recommends
providing assistance to groups that have had terrorist elements,
including Khuzestan Arabs, Pakistan's Balochis, and Iraq's Kurds.

Furthermore, although is not generally believed that the US funded any
such groups, some analysts believe that Saudi Arabia has funded
Khuzestan Arabs.

Iran's accusations against Israel and the United States are made
entirely without evidence. However, Iranian officials reflexively
blame everything on Israel and the United States, and in today's
febrile international environment, it's not surprising that Iranian
officials make those claims. Times of Israel and National Review (28-Aug-2017)

****
**** Attack blamed on a local Arab terrorist group, al-Ahvazi separatist movement
****

Two groups claimed credit for the attack.

The first to claim credit was ISIS. But ISIS claims credit for many
attacks in which it played no part, in order to puff up its own brand
name. So the ISIS claim is not generally believed.

An Arab nationalist separatist group, the Patriotic Arab Democratic
Movement in Ahwaz (al-Ahwaz or al-Ahvaziya or al-Ahvazi) also claimed
responsibility for the assault, and their claim is generally believed.
A statesman issued by a spokesman said that the attack on Saturday
"was in response to the repression of Ahvazi Arabs. We do not have a
choice but to carry out a resistance."

Little is known about the al-Ahvazi, except that it's an Arab
separatist group based in the city of Ahvaz, the site of Saturday's
attack. It's believed to be funded by Saudi Arabia.

In the past, the group has attacked only unguarded pipelines, so this
is a major escalation by the group.

However, the IRGC made its own escalation last week, attacking Kurdish
separatists in northern Iraq with missiles. Saturday's attack is
almost a mirror image of last week's missile attack on the Kurds, so
this may be a tit-for-tat escalation.

Some analysts are suggesting that Saturday's attack was the Saudis
laying a trap for Iran. According to this conspiracy theory, the
Saudis would like Iran to retaliate militarily in some way, to create
a wider war, forcing the United States military to get involved. My
response to this suggestion is the usual one: Be careful what you wish
for. Times of Israel and Guardian (London)

John J. Xenakis is author of the book, Iran's Struggle for
Supremacy: Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle
East, available on Amazon for $5 for the digital version or $7 for the paperback version.

Related Articles:

• Kurdish protesters attack Iran's embassy in Paris (17-Sep-2018)
  
  
• In major escalation, Iran's missiles strike Kurdish targets in northern Iraq (10-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Riots in Iraq's Basra evoke fault lines of 1980s Iran-Iraq war (09-Sep-2018)
  
  
• Anti-government, anti-war and economic protests spread across Iran (30-Dec-2017)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Iran, Ahvaz, Khuzestan, Iraq,
Iran/Iraq war, Saddam Hussein,
Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, IRGC,
Seyed Ali Hosseini Khamenei, Saudi Arabia, Israel,
Patriotic Arab Democratic Movement in Ahwaz,
al-Ahwaz, al-Ahvaziya, al-Ahvazi,
United Arab Emirates, UAE, John R. Bolton

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 24-Sep-18 World View -- Maldives in crisis as China-backed incumbent president Yameen loses election

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Maldives in crisis as China-backed incumbent president Yameen loses election
  
• Yameen's defeat is also a defeat for China's 'debt trap diplomacy'
  

****
**** Maldives in crisis as China-backed incumbent president Yameen loses election
****


Map showing strategic location of Maldives and Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean

People in the Maldives islands today are in something of a shock, as
the results of Sunday's presidential elections appear to indicate that
the incumbent president Abdulla Yameen has decisively lost to his
opponent, Ibrahim Mohamed Solih.

With more than 80% of the ballots countred on Sunday night, Solih was
winning by 58-41% of the vote. The results will be announced
officially on Friday, but this lead 17% lead is thought to be
insurmountable.

The Maldives is a 1,200 island archipelago in the India Ocean at the
southern tip of India. More than 260,000 of the Maldives' 400,000
people were eligible to vote at about 400 polling stations across the
islands. Voters also stood in long lines in Malaysia, the U.K., India
and Sri Lanka, where the opposition had encouraged overseas Maldivians
to participate.

The reason that everyone was expecting Yameen to win easily is because
he's used violence, human rights abuse, and suppression to guarantee
his victory. He jailed many of his political opponents on phony
"terrorism" charges, and rolled back press freedom.

Some political opponents have been in jail since 2015, including
Yameen's own half-brother. In February of this year, the Supreme
Court ruled that they should be set free. Yameen first announced that
he would honor the court's decision, but then changed his mind. He
declared a national state of emergency, and then sent the police to
arrest two of judges. The other three judges then decided that they
would reverse their decision and leave the political opponents in
jail.

On Saturday evening, the night before the election, police raided the
main campaign office of the opposition presidential candidate Ibrahim
Mohamed Solih on Saturday, saying they had acted to prevent "illegal
activities."

Even so, Sunday's election went a lot better than anyone expected,
without a lot of obvious election-rigging, because the United States
and the European Union had threatened sanctions. The European Union
said in July it was ready to impose travel bans and asset freezes on
individuals if the situation did not improve. The US State Department
this month warned it would "consider appropriate measures" if the
election was not free and fair.

Solih declared victory on Sunday evening:

<QUOTE>"This is a moment of happiness, a moment of hope, a
moment of history. For many of us this has been a difficult
journey, a journey that has led to a prison cells or years of
exile.

It's been a journey of a breakdown of government institutions.
But it's also been a journey that has ended at the ballot box. I
must thank all those people who have struggled for this
cause."<END QUOTE>

However, Yameen has not made any statement. There's a great deal of
tension and a sense of crisis in Malé, the capital city, because many
people are afraid that Yameen will do something violent in the next
couple of days to reverse the election results. Mihaaru.com (Maldives) and
Washington Post and Al Jazeera and CNN

****
**** Yameen's defeat is also a defeat for China's 'debt trap diplomacy'
****

Both Sri Lanka and the Maldives, both in the Indian Ocean just south
of the tip of India, have long had close relationships with India.
However, both countries have become closer to China in the last ten
years, alarming India.

The debt trap story of Sri Lanka has been told many times. China
funded the development of Sri Lanka's Hambantota seaport, and when Sri
Lanka couldn't pay its debt, China took control of the seaport and
substantial land in the region, creating a large enclave of Chinese
workers and their families.

Many in the Maldives are acutely aware of what happened to Sri Lanka,
of course, and they're afraid that Abdulla Yameen has already put
their country on the same course, with a debt trap of its own.
Already, China has loaned $830 million for an upgrade to the airport.
The Chinese are also building a 25-story apartment complex and a
hospital. These Chinese projects account for some 70% of the
country's total debt, and $92 million a year in payments to China,
roughly 10% of the entire budget.

Then there's the question of corruption. I 2014-15, Yameen's tourism
minister leased out more than 50 islands and lagoons to developers
without public bidding. There are signs that members of Yameen's own
family are heavily involved in China's infrastructure projects.

We've written about many countries where the leaders refuse to step
down, and corruption is often the reason. Typically, the leader's
family and cronies benefit from fat kickbacks and bribes, but those
are never revealed as long as the leader is in power, and can use
violence and human rights abuses to suppress that information. But
once somebody else takes power, the corruption can be revealed, and
the cronies become eligible to be jailed or executed.

So that's another reason why some people fear a major crisis in the
Maldives in the next few days. If Yameen has followed this corruption
path, and there are signs that he has, then turning power over to
Solih puts himself, his family and his cronies at risk of losing their
freedom or their lives. Guardian (London) and BBC and Foreign Policy (21-Mar) and AFP

Related Articles:

• Maldives crisis pits India vs China in the Indian Ocean (07-Feb-2018)
  
  
• Pakistan faces imminent financial crisis threatening China's CPEC (07-Aug-2018)
  
  
• Pakistan overwhelmed and China alarmed over the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) (12-Dec-2017)
  
  
• China takes control of strategic Hambantota seaport in Sri Lanka, raising concerns in India (11-Dec-2017)
  
  
• China establishes its first foreign military base, in Djibouti (13-Jul-2017)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Maldives, Abdulla Yameen,
Ibrahim Mohamed Solih,
China, Sri Lanka, Hambantota seaport

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 25-Sep-18 World View -- Russia will supply S-300 systems to Syria, and jam Israeli communications

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Russia blames Israel when Syria shoots down Russian plan
  
• Russia will supply S-300 systems to Syria, and jam Israeli communications
  

****
**** Russia blames Israel when Syria shoots down Russian plan
****


S-300 anti-aircraft missile launchers (RT)

The Israeli security cabinet will meet in urgent session on Tuesday
over the crisis in relations between Israel and Russia, a day after
Russia officially blamed Israel because Syrian surface to air missiles
shot down a Russian reconnaissance plane on September 17, killing all
15 Russians onboard.

On September 17, Israeli F-16 warplanes were carrying out airstrikes
in Syria to prevent Iran from deploying advanced weapons that the
Syrian regime or Lebanon's Hezbollah could use to strike Israel.
Earlier this month, an Israeli official admitted that Israel had
carried out more than 200 attacks against Iranian targets in Syria in
the last two years.

The Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad attempted to use an an S-200
anti-aircraft missile battery, previously supplied by the Russians, to
shoot down the Israeli warplanes, but instead shot down a Russian
Ilyushin Il-20 (IL-20) reconnaissance plane, killing all 15 Russian
service members onboard.

Shortly after the incident occurred, Russia's president Vladimir Putin
said that the shootdown was caused by a "series of tragic mistakes."

But on Sunday, Russia's Defense Ministry said:

<QUOTE>"Objective data says that the actions of Israeli
pilots, which led to the death of 15 Russian military personnel,
point to either lack of professionalism or criminal negligence.
This is why we believe that the Russian Il-20 aircraft tragedy is
solely the fault of the Israeli Air Force and those who made
decisions concerning such actions. ...

This is an extremely ungrateful response to all that Russia has
done for Israel and the Israeli people recently."<END QUOTE>

The Russians describe how extremely clever and tricky Israeli pilots
flew into the region and out again, tricking the hapless Syrians into
shooting the Russian reconnaissance plane before they even knew what
they were doing. The Foreign Ministry continued:

<QUOTE>"The Israeli pilot could not but understand that since
the Il-20 aircraft has a far larger radar cross-section compared
to an F-16 jet, it would be a preferred target for air defenses.
[Israel is aware that] Russian and Syrian militaries use different
friend or foe identification systems so Syrian radars could have
identified the Il-20 as a group of Israeli fighter
jets."<END QUOTE>

So, in other words, the Syrians couldn't identify Russian planes using
friend or foe identification systems, and Syrian radar operators
couldn't tell the difference between a Russian IL-20 reconnaissance
plane and an Israeli F-16 warplane, even though the F-16 is one-third
as big as the IL-20. So the Syrians shot down the Russian plane, and
therefore, the shootdown was "solely the fault of the Israeli Air
Force." Those Israeli pilots were pretty clever, weren't they?

Even some Russian commentators are saying that the Russian explanation
is ridiculous, and that the fault is with the total incompetence of
the Syrians. According to sarcastic commentaries in the the liberal
Russian media Echo Moskvy:

<QUOTE>"How could the Syrian air defense, upon seeing on
their radars a large IL-20 coming to a low speed landing, release
the S-200 on a small Israeli Air Force fighter, who was in same
air space sector?! Are there brainless ‘dummies’ sitting behind
the radars?"

"We always blame someone else. Anyone but us. [The Boeing MH17
passenger plane] was hit by Ukraine, the British themselves
poisoned the Skripals, White Helmets poured chlorine on the Syrian
insurgents, sanctions were imposed by Russophobes, doping was
planted by other Russophobes. ...

With whom have we not yet quarreled? Who else is still not to
blame for all our troubles? Israel - it is now on the line. Let's
go after the Jews! Moreover, our people have long suspected that
the true culprits of all misfortunes are the Jews and the Masons
who joined them."<END QUOTE>

A growing number of Russians are opposing Russia's involvement in the
war in Syria, and so Putin cannot afford to admit that it was the
incompetence of the Syrian military and the Russian military that led
to the deaths of the 15 Russian soldiers. Tass (Moscow, 23-Sep) and
Reuters (4-Sep) and The Hill and Echo Moskvy (Trans)

****
**** Russia will supply S-300 systems to Syria, and jam Israeli communications
****

After saying that Syria shooting down a Russian plane was "solely the
fault of the Israeli Air Force", Russia's defense minister Sergei
Shoigu announced on Mondayk that advanced S-300 anti-aircraft missile
systems will be supplied to Syria within two weeks. According to
Shoigu:

<QUOTE>"The S-300 is capable of intercepting air threats at a
range of more than 250 kilometers and simultaneously hitting
several aerial targets. Russia will also jam satellite
navigation, on-board radars and communication systems of combat
aircraft, which attack targets in the Syrian territory, in the
regions over the waters of the Mediterranean Sea bordering with
Syria."<END QUOTE>

This announcement has alarmed Israel's government. Israel's president
Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday initiated a phone conversation with Putin
to attempt to reverse the decision. However, Putin rejected the plea,
saying that "Russia’s decisions to strengthen combat capacities of
Syrian air defense meet the current situation and are geared, first of
all, to avert any potential threat to the lives of Russian servicemen
who are fighting against international terrorism."

National Security Advisor John Bolton called the decision “a
significant escalation” of the seven-year war, and Secretary of State
Mike Pompeo said on Monday he expected to meet with his Russian
counterpart Sergei Lavrov to discuss the matter.

The S-300 systems could potentially be a game-changer in the potential
conflict between Iran and Israel. Israel has sought for years to
convince the Russians not to supply S-300s to the Syrians or the
Iranians, and Russia has cooperated with the Israelis to the extent of
permitting them to conduct airstrikes against Iranian assets in Syria
which could threaten Israel.

But right now it looks like that cooperation may be changing. The
S-300 missiles, combined with jamming of electronic communications,
will make it easier for Iran to deploy weapons in Syria or Lebanon
that could be used by the Iranians or Hezbollah to attack Israel.

Israel does not have the capability to defeat Russia's electronic
jamming technology, but some reports indicate that the US does, and
Israel may request aid from the US. Reuters and Debka (Israel) and Tass (Moscow) and Al-Jazeera

Related Articles

• Russia-Israel alliance grows, while Russia-Iran alliance frays in Syria (19-Jun-2018)
  
  
• Israel and Syria have unprecedented missile clash over Jordan (19-Mar-2017)
  
  
• Israel bombs targets in Syria with Russia's tacit cooperation (06-Dec-2015)
  
  
• Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah heading for a military confrontation in Syria (26-Dec-2017)
  
  
• How Israel panicked in pursuing the summer Lebanon war with Hezbollah (23-Dec-2006)
  

John J. Xenakis is author of the book, Iran's Struggle for
Supremacy: Tehran's Obsession to Redraw the Map of the Middle
East, available on Amazon for $5 for the digital version or $7 for the paperback version.


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Russia, Syria, Israel,
S-200 anti-aircraft system. S-300 anti-aircraft system.
Vladimir Putin, Bashar al-Assad, Benjamin Netanyahu,
Ilyushin Il-20 reconnaissance plane, IL-20, F-16,
John Bolton, Mike Pompeo, Sergei Lavrov, Sergei Shoigu

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 26-Sep-18 World View -- World Health Organization fears 'perfect storm' could spread Ebola rapidly in DR Congo

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• World Health Organization fears 'perfect storm' could spread Ebola rapidly in DR Congo
  
• Violence escalates in North Kivu, DRC, along with Ebola
  

****
**** World Health Organization fears 'perfect storm' could spread Ebola rapidly in DR Congo
****


A makeshift site for internally displace people in North Kivu province of DRC (UNHCR)

The latest outbreak of Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) was
identified on August 1 in North Kivu province of DRC, near the borders
with Rwanda and Uganda. Since then, Ebola has been spreading fairly
rapidly. As of Tuesday, there are 119 confirmed cases, and 69
confirmed deaths from Ebola.

This outbreak has already become the seventh largest Ebola outbreak in
history.

As we reported a month ago ( "25-Aug-18 World View -- In dreaded scenario, Ebola spreads to densely populated war zone in Congo"
), Dr. Peter Salama, from
the World Health Organization (WHO), said that WHO was extremely
concerned because the disease was already spreading, and had reached
an "area of very high insecurity," because it was in densely populated
tribal war zone.

Now Salama's level of concern appears to have grown considerably. At
a news conference on Tuesday he said:

<QUOTE>"We are now extremely concerned that several factors
may be coming together over the next weeks and months to create a
potential perfect storm: A perfect storm of active conflict,
limiting our ability to access civilians, distress by segments of
the community, already traumatized by decades of conflict and of
murder."<END QUOTE>

Salama is particularly concerned about attacks on ordinary civilians
and on WHO personnel in and around the territory of Beni, which is the
base of WHO's operation. “We’ve seen attacks now on August 24,
September 3, 9, 11, 16, 21 and most recently and most dramatically
September 22 in the city itself of Beni. The ADF in particular has
enormous capabilities. They’ve been able to overrun entire
FARDC-bases in and around Beni, they’ve been able to ambush (UN)
forces." United Nations and Times Live (South Africa) and Reuters and AFP

****
**** Violence escalates in North Kivu, DRC, along with Ebola
****

The militia that Salama named as having "enormous capabilities is the
ADF, which is the Alliance of Democratic Forces, a group of Islamists
formed in the late 1990s in western Uganda to fight the government of
Uganda. Since then they've taken their mayhem and murder to North
Kivu province in DRC, and joined with other militia groups, as well as
elements of Congo's own army. The UN was particularly stunned in
December of last year, when the ADF attacked UN blue helmet peacekeepers,
killing 15 and wounding 54 in
one evening.

The fighting in North Kivu has been escalating in all six territories
of North Kivu, according to the UN's refugee agency, UNHCR. Thousands
of civilians have fled their burned out villages, bringing reports of
brutal attacks. It is estimated that more than a million people are
displaced in North Kivu. An estimated half a million people have been
forced from their homes this year alone.

The WHO's Dr. Salama mentioned a "perfect storm" of multiple risks.
One of those risks is attacks by the ADP and other armed militias. A
second risk is that politicians are attempting to exploit the
situation, with elections scheduled for December.

A third risk is "pockets of reluctance, refusal and resistance" by
civilians contacted by WHO workers. Many of the new cases of Ebola
are being generated by people who are refusing to accept an Ebola
vaccination. On Monday 80 percent of Ebola contacts — people at risk
of developing the disease and so requiring monitoring — and three
suspected cases in and around Beni could not be reached for disease
monitoring. This kind of contact is the only way to stop the further
spread of Ebola. If WHO workers can perform vaccinations or contact
tracing, and cannot isolate people who have already contracted the
disease, there is nothing to stop it from spreading rapidly.

Salama says that neighboring Uganda is now facing an “imminent
threat”, and social media posts were conflating Ebola with criticism
of the DRC government and the United Nations and “a range of
conspiracy theories”, which could put health workers at risk.

WHO currently has no plans to evacuate its health workers, but that
could change if the danger to them increases. "If WHO and its
partners had to leave North Kivu ... we would have grave concerns that
this outbreak would not be able to be well controlled in the coming
weeks or months." UNHCR and WHO Situation Reports for DRC

Related Articles:

• In dreaded scenario, Ebola spreads to densely populated war zone in Congo (25-Aug-2018)
  
  
• United Nations stunned as peacekeepers are massacred in DR Congo (09-Dec-2017)
  
  
• New Ebola outbreak in major DR Congo city is called potentially 'explosive' (18-May-2018)
  
  
• Thousands of DR Congo refugees pour into Uganda to escape tribal violence (13-Feb-2018)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC,
North Kivu, Beni, Ebola, Rwanda, Uganda,
World Health Organization, WHO, Peter Salama,
Alliance of Democratic Forces, ADP

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 27-Sep-18 World View -- Bill and Melinda Gates take Pollyannaish view of Rwanda and rest of world

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Bill and Melinda Gates take Pollyannaish view of Rwanda and rest of world
  
• Bill and Melinda Gates' programs for contraception availability
  
• Concerns grow about an approaching global financial crisis
  
• Today's major news from Europe: Meghan Markle closes a car door
  

****
**** Bill and Melinda Gates take Pollyannaish view of Rwanda and rest of world
****


Bill and Melinda Gates

Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, may be ideologically on the
left, but it's hard to criticize someone who is taking a global view
for the good of mankind, and is spending his own money to try to solve
world problems like poverty and HIV aids.

I met Bill Gates a few times during my past as a Senior Technology
Editor and technology journalist. I found him to be a brilliant man
at both marketing and technology. I recall digging into the code and
functionality of Windows 95 when it came out in 1995 and being
extremely impressed that so complex a product could work so well and
in so many diverse environments.

So when Melinda Gates was interviewed at length on CNBC on Tuesday, I
was curious to hear some specifics of her plans for how she and Bill
were going to save the world, and to analyze what she said from the
point of view of Generational Dynamics.

Like many people, she is completely oblivious to the growing
nationalism and xenophobia in the world, to the growing military
threats around the world, to the growing global financial crisis in
countries around the world, and how these things completely negate her
Pollyannaish view of the world, and how they make the investments
she's proposals either impossible or else completely worthless if they
occur, in this generational Crisis era.

I'll start with something she said near the end of the interview that
really caught my attention: (my transcription):

<QUOTE>As I traveled the world, I asked myself: is there
anywhere in the world where we have true equality for women, and
the answer is no, not even in the United States. ...

One of the places that have 40% women parliamentarians is Rwanda.
It's because President [Paul] Kagame said we will have 40% of
parliamentarians. They're way over that now."<END QUOTE>

In fact it is true that over 50% of the members of parliament in
Rwanda. Ms. Gates' point was that Paul Kagame is a great pro-woman
humanitarian who has bravely taken the political step to make sure
that there's gender equality in parliament.

But even someone without knowledge of generational theory can see
that's not what's going on here. Rwanda is in a region riven by
centuries of tribal war, particularly between ethnic Hutus and Tutsis.
In a three month period in 1994, Hutus massacred close to a million
Tutsis in the most brutal way.

I've described many times what happens in country after country in the
decades following a crisis ethnic civil war. Whoever comes to power
after the war uses brutal police power to suppress the opposition,
using the excuse that a new civil war must be prevented. This has
happened in DR Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Cameroon, Thailand, Cambodia,
Iran, Venezuela, Libya, and other places.

Paul Kagame was a Tutsi military leader who was killing Hutus in the
1980s, and continued doing so both before and after the 1994 genocide.
This is a person who has perpetrated some of the most horrific things
that one human being can do to another. Like many leaders in such
countries, he's refusing to give up power,
and he's using violence to suppress the opposition. Even
today, there are reports that he's using terror attacks to subvert the
Hutu government in Burundi. So he's no humanitarian, and if he
supposedly supported gender equality. There must be something else
going on.

An NPR article in 2016 described what happened:

<QUOTE>"Following 100 days of slaughter in 1994, Rwandan
society was left in chaos. The death toll was between 800,000 and
1 million. Many suspected perpetrators were arrested or fled the
country. Records show that immediately following the genocide,
Rwanda's population of 5.5 million to 6 million was 60 to 70
percent female. Most of these women had never been educated or
raised with the expectations of a career. In pre-genocide Rwanda,
it was almost unheard of for women to own land or take a job
outside the home.

The genocide changed all that. The war led to Rwanda's "Rosie the
Riveter" moment: It opened the workplace to Rwandan women just as
World War II had opened it to American women. ...

The call for equality was led not by thousands of women but by one
man — President Paul Kagame, who has led the country since his
army stopped the genocide. Kagame decided that Rwanda was so
demolished, so broken, it simply could not rebuild with men's
labor alone. So the country's new constitution, passed in 2003,
decreed that 30 percent of parliamentary seats be reserved for
women. The government also pledged that girls' education would be
encouraged. That women would be appointed to leadership roles,
like government ministers and police chiefs. Kagame vowed to not
merely play catch-up to the West but leapfrog ahead of
it."<END QUOTE>

So in a country whose population is 60-70% female, Paul Kagame sought
to appoint women to high positions. So when Ms. Gates uses Rwanda as
a model country to be emulated by other countries, you have to wonder
what she's thinking, or whether she knows anything about Rwanda before
the last six months.

I would assume the latter. I don't know anything personal about
Ms. Gates, but I would assume that she's like most Americans, and
thinks that "history always begins this morning."

The next question to ask is whether Rwanda is fundamentally different
from other countries, besides having a lot of women in parliament.
The same NPR article provides some answers:

<QUOTE>"But even though the change was dramatic and swift,
how deep was its impact? Can a country truly transform its core
culture from the outside in?

Justine Uvuza wondered that, and decided to find out. A Rwandan
herself who had grown up in a refugee camp in Uganda and then
moved back to Rwanda in 1994, after the genocide, she worked for a
while for the Kagame government promoting Rwanda's pro-women
policies. She was curious how much progress had been made. So when
she was getting her Ph.D. at Newcastle University, she returned to
Rwanda to interview female politicians about their lives — not
just their public positions but their private lives, with their
husbands and children. She found with rare exception that no
matter how powerful these women were in public, that power didn't
extend into their own homes.

"One told me how her husband expected her to make sure that his
shoes were polished, the water was put in the bathroom for him,
his clothes were ironed," Justine says. And this husband wanted
not only his shoes laid out in the morning, but his socks placed
on top of the shoes. And he wanted it done by his wife, the
parliamentarian."<END QUOTE>

So really, having women in parliament is great for show, but it makes
little difference in people's lives.

There are basic Generational Dynamics principles at work here. As
I've written many times, it's a core principle of Generational
Dynamics that, even in a dictatorship, major decisions are made by
masses of people, by generations of people. The attitudes of
politicians are irrelevant, except insofar as they represent the
attitudes of the people.

It's certainly commendable that Bill and Melinda Gates want to spend
their own money to promote gender equality. But I think that it's
unfortunate that they're wasting their money, time and effort on
programs that have a zero percent chance of succeeding.

Generational theory is not easy to understand, but Bill Gates is
capable of doing so. Gates and his wife should focus their attention
on programs that might actually work.
NPR (29-Jul-2016) and Newcastle University (PDF,2014)

****
**** Bill and Melinda Gates' programs for contraception availability
****

I'll give one more example from Ms. Gates' interview:

<QUOTE>"There's a youth boom in Africa - 60% of the
population is under the age of 25. If we invest in their health
and their education, they'll lift up their economies. They have
huge potential. They'll lift up the continent.

But the converse could also happen. If we don't make those
investments, you're going to see more HIV Aids, more deaths. So
we need to keep our eye on the ball and make these investments, as
a world. ...

I met women all over the world, and when I sit down and talk to
them, in their homes, in their villages, in a township, and really
listen to them ... they would say to me, "What about that tool,
what about that [contraceptive] shot. Why can't I get it?" They
would say, "I have five children, it's not fair to my youngest
child for me to have another women."

Somebody has to answer those cries, and somebody has to rise above
the politics, and say that this is important, has to be on the
global agenda.

I'm Catholic, I had many discussions with my family, my parents,
my siblings, with former priests and nums, and at the end of the
day I decided, I use these tools, I counsel all three of my
children, my sons, my daughter, to use these tools and know about
them, and I thought I have to follow my conscience. Women's
babies are dying because they're coming too quickly, and women's
bodies can't sustain what's going on. So at the end of the day, I
had to wrestle my conscience and my conscience says, this is the
right thing to do."<END QUOTE>

These are great objectives. And perhaps making contraceptive shots
available to women will will reduce population growth, especially if
the husband also thinks it's unfair to his five children to have a
sixth.

My personal opinion is that this kind of program will not work under
any circumstances, because the rate of population growth is deeply
embedded in the culture. Consider that in America there was a
reduction in fertility before WW II, and then a Baby Boom after WW II.
This had nothing to do with availability of contraceptives. There are
other examples of this type as well.

But even if the program worked, the effort would be totally wasted.
With nationalism and xenophobia increasing around the world in this
generational Crisis era, the world is headed for a world war, and
these contraceptive programs will simply fall off a cliff and be
totally irrelevant.

This should not be too difficult for Bill and Melinda Gates to
understand. Instead of wasting their effort on programs that a 100%
probability of failure, they should devote their efforts to preparing
for the world to come, after a world that has to be rebuilt by the 4-5
billion people who survive the world war, and then have to find their
way when the Singularity occurs. CNBC

Related Articles

• Rwanda's president Kagame becomes another leader refusing to leave office (19-Nov-2015)
  
  
• Generational history of Hutu and Tutsi tribes (30-Apr-2015)
  

****
**** Concerns grow about an approaching global financial crisis
****

In the last four or five years, I've noticed a major change in the
commentary of financial experts and analysts on television. It used
to be that the only view that was expressed was that the financial
system had recovered nicely from the financial crisis of ten years
ago, and that the worst that could happen is a mild recession, from
which the economy would recover quickly.

Ironically, even that hasn't happened. There has been a bull market
on Wall Street for years, much longer than history tells us is
possible.

So now what I'm hearing more and more is that analysts are strongly
hinting that a major financial crisis is coming.

In an interview on Bloomberg TV on Wednesday morning, JPMorgan's Mary
Erdoes was asked whether there are things in the global economy that
are too good to be true. She replied (my transcription):

<QUOTE>Oh lots of things. I mean everything from housing
prices in certain parts of the world, to currency prices in
certain parts of the world.

You can't possibly think we're in a normal world, when you have an
$11 dollars that was thrown at the market to buy whatever, to keep
things propped up.

Add to that a nice little tax reform in the United States of
America to help that, and you have negative yields in 40% of
europe. This is just not normal. You have not normal things, and
not normal things don't end well.

The problem is all of this stress testing in the world isn't
telling us what's going to manifest itself. next, because
everything - it seems too benign, everyone is so comfortable, and
that's exactly when you need to be the most
uncomfortable."<END QUOTE>

Other panelists concurred, mentioned other issues: inflexibility of
euro currency to meet crises, and closing of open borders.

I'm hearing this kind of thing a lot more these days. They clearly
are expecting a major global financial crash, triggered by something
completely unexpected - not a surprise to my readers. The S&P 500
Price/Earnings ratio is at 24.55, which is astronomical by historic
standards, where the historic average is 14, and it was around 5-6 as
recently as 1982, indicating that the stock market is in a huge
bubble.

Related Articles:

• Explanation of Price/Earnings ratio and Stock Valuations (28-Aug-2015)
  
  
• S&P 500 Price/Earnings ratio rockets to highest value in years (23-Apr-2016)
  
  
• Wharton School's Jeremy Siegel is lying about stock valuations (14-Apr-2012)
  

****
**** Today's major news from Europe: Meghan Markle closes a car door
****


Meghan Markle closes a car door (BBC)

Former "Suits" star Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex, the new wife of
Prince Harry, made big news on Wednesday when she closed a car door.

She was driven to the Royal Academy of Arts to see the opening of an
exhibition of works from the Oceania region.

She stepped out of the car, and closed the door. She's supposed to
wait for someone else to close the door for her.

This is now a major "moment" in the UK. The big question is: Will she
close her own car door again the next time she's driven to an event?
BBC

Related Articles:

• Britain's Prince Harry acknowledges that he killed Taliban insurgents (22-Jan-2013)
  
  
• Prince Harry will return to Afghanistan (17-Jun-2011)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Bill Gates, Melinda Gates,
Microsoft, Rwanda, Paul Kagame, Hutus, Tutsis, Burundi,
Justine Uvuza, Mary Erdoes,
Suits, Meghan Markle, Prince Harry

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John J. Xenakis
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Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 28-Sep-18 World View -- Number of Kashmir militants surges as India's 'Operation All-Out' fails

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Clashes in Kashmir after Indian police brutally kill innocent shepherd
  
• Number of Kashmir militants surges as India's 'Operation All-Out' fails
  

****
**** Clashes in Kashmir after Indian police brutally kill innocent shepherd
****


Mohammad Saleem Malik's mother grieves at the funeral for her son on Thursday (AP)

Details are scarce, but Mohammad Saleem Malik, a 26 year old shepherd
boy, was found dead in a courtyard by his family on Thursday morning,
near his home in Srinigar, the capital city of Indian-controlled
Kashmir. Two hours earlier, he had left his room and entered the
cattle shed to check his sheeps and goats. Indian government security
forces had been conducting a "cordon-and-search operation" (CASO), and
allegedly fired indiscriminately at the neighborhood houses before
dawn.

According to his father Muhammad Yaqoob Malik:

<QUOTE>"My son was fond of rearing sheep and pigeons and
never in his life he had picked up a stone in his hand [to fling
at police]. Why was he killed when he was not a militant, with
clean police record? Why was he killed when no militant was
present in the area and there was no encounter at
all?"<END QUOTE>

Clashes erupted soon after the news of the killing spread in the area
with the locals alleging that Malik was killed in forces’ firing. In
the ensuing exchange of fire, a militant was killed and three soldiers
were wounded, one of whom died.

A Kashmir separatist group, the Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL), is
calling for a shutdown of Kashmir on Friday. First Post (India) and Kashmir Watch and Rising Kashmir

****
**** Number of Kashmir militants surges as India's 'Operation All-Out' fails
****

In May of last year, with tit-for-tat violence between Kashmir
separatist insurgents and Indian security forces escalating, Indian
security forces launched a massive house-to-house sweep
in Kashmir, using 3,000 security forces to
root out terrorists.

Then in June Indian security forces launched "Operation All-Out."
According to India said that this would "deliver a lethal blow to
terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir with a long-term plan for a lasting
peace in the trouble-torn Valley."

At the time that Operation All-Out was announced, Indian
security forces had identified 128 militants in Kashmir
who would be targeted.

However, that was then. Earlier this month, the list of militants
kept by the Indian security forces had more than 300 names on it.
According to a senior police officer:

<QUOTE>"There has been a significant increase in the number
of militants. The main reason for the high number of militants
has been local recruitment since 2017. Last year 126 Valley youths
picked up guns- which was the highest number since 2010 and this
year over 130 have been inducted into militancy."<END QUOTE>

The significance of this statement is that it indicates a major
change. In the past, militants came from Pakistan. In most cases,
they were in Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), a Pakistan-based terrorist group
that was formed in the 1990s by Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence
(ISI) agency to fight India in the disputed regions of Kashmir and
Jammu. LeT was the perpetrator of the horrific "26/11" three-day
attack on Mumbai in 2008, killing 166 people and wounding hundreds
more. ( "After Mumbai's '26/11' nightmare finally ends, India - Pakistan relations face crisis"
from 2008)

The major change, as the police officer's statement indicates, is that
militants are now being recruited indigenously. Most of them join
Hizbul Mujahedeen (HM), a Kashmir-based terrorist group that has been
leading the anti-Indian stone-throwing riots, triggered by the July 8 2016 death of HM leader Burhan Wani in a gunfight with the Indian army.
Since then, thousands of
Kashmiris have been blinded in one or both eyes by pellet guns used by
Indian security forces, and thousands of youths have been arrested.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, Kashmir is replaying
previous generations of violence according to a fairly standard
template. India's previous two generational crisis wars were India's
1857 Rebellion, which pitted Hindu nationalists against British
colonists, and then the 1947 Partition War, one of the bloodiest wars
of the 20th century, pitting Hindus versus Muslims, following the
partitioning of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan.

Now, as the survivors of the 1947 Partition War have almost all died
off, leaving behind younger generations with no fear of repeating past
disasters, Kashmir is repeating the violence of 1857 and 1947.
Generational Dynamics predicts that Kashmir is returning to full-scale
war, re-fighting the extremely bloody partition war of 1947. Tribune India and DailyO (India)

Related Articles:

• India's Kashmir locked down after 3 civilians killed by police (09-Jul-2018)
  
  
• India's 'Operation All-Out' brings Kashmir closer to all-out war (24-Jun-2017)
  
  
• Pakistan celebrates its 70th birthday, wondering what Pakistan is (15-Aug-2017)
  
  
• India's Narendra Modi finally hits out at Cow Protectors ('Gau Rakshaks') (07-Aug-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, India, Kashmir, Mohammad Saleem Malik,
Muhammad Yaqoob Malik, Joint Resistance Leadership, JRL,
Operation All-Out, Lashkar-e-Toiba, LeT,
Hizbul Mujahedeen, HM, Burhan Wani

Permanent web link to this article
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 29-Sep-18 World View -- China, Russia demand that that some North Korea sanctions be lifted

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• China, Russia demand that that some North Korea sanctions be lifted
  
• North Korea denuclearization negotiations appear headed for another crisis
  

****
**** China, Russia demand that that some North Korea sanctions be lifted
****


China's foreign minister Wang Yi (AP)

Russia and China are starting to demand that the sanctions on
North Korea be reduced.

As I've said for many months, the objective of North Korea's
dictator Kim Jong-un has been to get the sanctions removed,
without having to denuclearize. His father was very successful
at that, having resumed nuclear development when the sanctions
were lifted, based on his promise to end nuclear development.
The child dictator wants to prove that he's as good as his
father at tricking and humiliating the West.

As I've said in the past, after they starved and viciously abused
their own people for decades, based on a promise to make North Korea a
great country, a world peer to the United States, it's my personal
opinion that if Kim actually did denuclearize, then he would be shot
dead by his own generals.

Since the beginning of the year, Kim has adopted a "charm offensive"
strategy, working with the Russians, Chinese and South Koreans to put
international pressure on the US administration to agree to reduce
sanctions. He's taken easily reversible "confidence building steps,"
including destroying a nuclear test facility that could easily be
rebuilt, and returning the remains of American Korean War soldiers,
when he has thousands more. He's also suspended open testing for
nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, but he's continued development
of these weapons and, even worse, is selling them to other countries.

At the UN Security Council meeting on Thursday, America's secretary of
state Mike Pompeo repeated previous criticisms of Russia and China for
violating the internationally agreed sanctions on North Korea, and
said that the sanctions must be continued to maintain pressure:

<QUOTE>"It is imperative for members of the United Nations to
take that to heart. Enforcement of UN Security Council sanctions
must continue vigorously and without fail until we realize the
fully, final, verified denuclearization. The members of this
council must set the example on that effort, and we must all hold
each other accountable."<END QUOTE>

However, Wang Yi, China's foreign affairs minister, responded by
saying the sanction measures could be "modified":

<QUOTE>"A provision in the Security Council resolutions that
the council is prepared to modify the sanction measures in light
of the DPRK’s [North Korea’s] compliance. Now given the positive
developments in the inter-Korean and DPRK- US relations, and the
DPRK’s important pledges and actions on denuclearization, China
believes that the Security Council needs to consider invoking in
due course this provision to encourage the DPRK and other relevant
parties to move denuclearization further ahead."<END QUOTE>

Russia's foreign minister Sergei Lavrov added to Wang Yi's remarks by
criticizing Western nations for "stubbornly" refusing to agree to
reduce sanctions. He said that, "Any negotiation is a two-way
street. Steps by the DPRK (North Korea) toward gradual disarmament
should be followed by the easing of sanctions," and that the continued
imposition of sanctions must not become “a hindrance” to dialogue
between the two Koreas. CBS News and Sputnik News and Guardian (London) and Reuters (17-Sep)

****
**** North Korea denuclearization negotiations appear headed for another crisis
****

The North Koreans have made some easily reversible "confidence
building" concessions, as described above.

The US has also made an easily revisible concession: The US
has suspended all joint military drills with the North Koreans.

Mike Pompeo is supposed to have another meeting with Kim Jong-un
in the near future.

The major demand that the US will make is for Kim to provide
a list of all nuclear weapon and ballistic missile development
sites, and then to allow UN IAEA inspectors to visit the
sites and verify that denuclearization is in progress.
I would be shocked and surprised if Kim agreed to that.

The major demand that the North Koreans will make will be to sign a
peace treaty formally ending the 1950s Korean War, and then to
withdraw thousands of American troops from South Vietnam.
I would be shocked and surprised if Trump agreed to that.

However, if both Kim and Trump shock and surprise me, then undoubtedly
some agreement would be reached to ease some sanctions.

Trump claims, in the spirit of The Art of the Deal, that he expects
North Korea to fully denuclearize by the end of 2019. I would be VERY
shocked and surprised if that happened.

This situation has seemed so benign for months that almost nobody has
been paying attention, especially with the distraction of people being
thrown to the lions in the great Washington Colosseum.

However, my expectations haven't changed. At some point, there will
be a renewal of the "North Korea" crisis, and the choice will be
either war, or else allowing North Korea to build an arsenal of
nuclear ballistic missiles pointed at the United States. AP and Asia Times

Related Articles:

• China, North and South Korea confounded by cancellation of Kim Jong-un meeting (26-Aug-2018)
  
  
• US imposes new North Korea sanctions on Chinese and Russian shipping companies (17-Aug-2018)
  
  
• John Bolton and Marco Rubio describe North Korea strategy, as sanctions are violated (06-Aug-2018)
  
  
• North Korea appears to dismantle its Sohae satellite launch site (26-Jul-2018)
  
  
• After the Kim-Trump summit, US and N. Korea plan denuclearization details (14-Jun-2018)
  
  
• NY Times publishes a generational analysis of South Korea (30-Jan-2018)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, North Korea, Kim Jong-un,
Russia, Sergei Lavrov, China, Wang Yi, Mike Pompeo

Permanent web link to this article
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 30-Sep-18 World View -- University of N. Florida and Pentagon cut ties with China's Confucius Institutes

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• University of N. Florida and Pentagon cut ties with China's Confucius Institutes
  
• Confucius and the roots of China's imperialism
  
• The Sayings and Aphorisms of Confucius
  

****
**** University of N. Florida and Pentagon cut ties with China's Confucius Institutes
****


Confucius

The University of North Florida announced that it will cut ties with
the China-funded Confucius Institute on its campus. Others of the
approximately 100 colleges and universities hosting Confucius
Institutes are considering doing so as well, or have already done so.

Ostensibly, Confucius Institutes are apolitical partnerships between
American and Chinese universities, giving American students
opportunities to learn to speak Chinese or study abroad. But the
Chinese themselves say that they serve as "an important part of
China's overseas propaganda," and they also serve as outposts of
China’s intelligence and surveillance operations, as FBI Director
Christopher Wray testified to the US Senate in February.

In addition to the 100-plus Confucius Institutes in the US, China runs
about 500 "Confucius Classrooms" at American K-12 schools. In
Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States and other countries,
China runs 1,500 Confucius Institutes and Classrooms, with 40% of them
in the US, more than any other country.

The Confucian Institutes are one of the programs of Beijing's
international coercive propaganda agency, the United Front Work Department (UFWD).
Every aspect of the
Confucian Institutes is tightly controlled by the Hanban agency, the
Chinese Communist Party agency that oversees all Confucius Institutes.
Teachers and teaching materials are all supplied by China. Taiwan and
Tibet are portrayed as undisputed territories of China, with no
alternate views permitted. The 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, the
one million Uighurs in re-education camps, the human rights abuses in
China are all forbidden subjects.

The Pentagon has been working with Confucius Institutes in some
colleges, and even co-funding some programs, in order to develop
Chinese-speaking students. However, the 2019 National Defense
Authorization Act, signed in August, contains provisions barring any
U.S. university from using Pentagon resources for any program
involving Confucius Institutes. In many cases, this will forces
universities to choose between receiving funding the Pentagon and
funding from Hanban. Folio Weekly and Washington Post (14-Aug) and Washington Examiner (29-Apr)

****
**** Confucius and the roots of China's imperialism
****

The Confucian Institutes really have nothing to do with Confucius, but
if they were called the "Chinese Communist Propaganda Institutes,"
then they would be rejected. However, most Americans associate
Confucius with wisdom, or cutesy aphorisms, so the use of the name
Confucius Institutes has been a great success for China.

In recent weeks, I've been doing my own research on China's ancient
philosophers, including Confucius, and this is a tentative summary of
what I've learned so far.

Confucius lived around 500 BC, and was a contemporary of Sun Tzu, who
wrote the Art of War, a book that is so popular that it's probably the
closest thing that the Chinese have to the Bible.

Sun Tzu was a brilliant war strategist and tactician. From deception
to beheadings, every tactic is on the table for winning wars.
Compromise or mercy are never possible.

If Sun Tzu's work was the recipe for imperialist warfare, Confucius'
work was the theology of imperialist warfare. Confucius lived at the
time of the Zhou Dynasty, about five centuries after it had beaten the
Shang Dynasty. How were the Zhou able to defeat the Shang? Much of
Confucius' work is devoted to answer that question in a theological
framework.

The Shang worshiped a heavenly ancestor called Shangdi ("the Lord on
high"), and kings were permitted to rule under the power of this god.
When the Zhou defeated the Shang, they replaced (or merged) Shang Di
with their own god, Tian, a sky god, a "deity above who rules the
Heavens."

Under the Zhou doctrine, a king is the Son of Heaven, and is allowed
to rule under a Mandate from Heaven, provided that he rules reverently
and virtuously. Thus, if the Zhou defeated the Shang, then the Shang
king must have lost his Mandate from Heaven. An excerpt from an
ancient history classic is the Zhou explanation of what happened:

<QUOTE>"We do not presume to know and to say that the lords
of Yin (Shang) received Heaven's Mandate for so many
years. ... But they did not reverently attend to their virtue and
so prematurely threw away the Mandate. ... Now our king has
succeeded and received the Mandate. ... Being king, his position
will be that of a leader of virtue. ... The Son of Heaven could
not properly fulfill his functions unless his moral nature was
pure and his conduct above reproach. Heaven could not be served by
a tyrant or a debauchee, the sacrifices of such a ruler would be
of no avail, the divine harmony would be upset, prodigies and
catastrophes would manifest the wrath of Heaven."<END QUOTE>

Confucius formalized and strengthened this doctrine of Tian and the
Mandate from Heaven. He wrestled with the same "theodicy"
contradiction that every religion faces: If God created everything,
the God created Good and Evil, so how could God be good if God created
evil?

For Confucius, this contradiction and its apparent manifestation in
the Zhou conquests, applies to Tian. He finds that Tian is an
absolute power in the universe, and he accepts three assumptions:

• its alignment with moral goodness;
• its dependence on
  human agents to actualize its will;
• the variable,
  unpredictable nature of its associations with mortal actors.

Since Tian depends on human actors to implement its will, Confucius
insists on moral, political, social, and even religious activism.
Only through this activism will a society maintain a harmonious order.

When you look at the work of Sun Tzu and Confucius, and use their work
to analyze modern events, you see that both philosophers lack any idea
of a "peace conference" or a "United Nations." Since the Chinese king
was the Son of Heaven and received its Mandate from Heaven to rule, it
would not make sense to sue for peace with anyone else, because no one
else had the Mandate from Heaven.

But if there's no peace, it's still possible to take advantage of a
"peace process." Sun Tzu said that "All warfare is based on
deception," and he advocated the use of deception first, and actual
war as a last resort.

So for China today, the United Nations is a tool to bring about peace,
but a tool to be used with deception to win the war. For example,
China treats international law with contempt, saying that its own law
supercedes international law as in the South China Sea, where China is
criminally violating international law, but still references
internation law when it favors China. This is a perfect example of
deception and manipulation. China is contemptuous of international
law, but still uses it as a tool of deception.

We might assume that the North Koreans are following the same kind of
strategy, with the child dictator Kim Jong-un having received his own
Mandate from Heaven. Kim will never denuclearize, and treats the
peace talks with South Korea and Trump with contempt, but will still
use them as tools to provide political pressure to get the sanctions
lifted, and make fools of and humiliate the US, as his father did ten
years ago. New World Encyclopedia and University of Tennesee and
Wolfram Eberhard, History of China

****
**** The Sayings and Aphorisms of Confucius
****

Many people know nothing about Confucius except his sayings, whether
or not he actually said them.

"Confucius say" sayings are often meant to be funny, and can often be
found as sayings in fortune cookies served after meals in a Chinese
restaurant. Here are some examples: "Confucius say: Man with one
chopstick go hungry." or "Confucius say: Man who cut self while
shaving, lose face. " or "Confucius say: Man who jump off cliff, jump
to conclusion! " or "Confucius say: Man should not sleep with woman
with more troubles than he have."

Those sayings are meant to be funny, but he probably never said them.

However, there is a large body of real Confucius sayings that carry a
great deal of wisdom, even though they were written down 15 centuries
ago. In fact, many of them have become common sayings. Here are some
examples:

• "Your life is what your thoughts make it."
  
  
• "What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others."
  (This is an early form of the Golden Rule.)
  
  
• "The journey with a 1000 miles begins with one step."
  
  
• "Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in
  your life."
  
  
• "Learn avidly. Question it repeatedly. Analyze it carefully. Then
  put what you have learned into practice intelligently."
  
  
• "If you are the smartest person in the room, then you are in the
  wrong room."
  
  
• "Act with kindness but do not expect gratitude."
  
  
• "I slept and dreamt life is beauty, I woke and found life is
  duty."
  
  
• "Respect yourself and others will respect you."
  
  
• "By nature, men are nearly alike; by practice, they get to be wide
  apart."
  
  
• "Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change."
  
  
• "Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire."
  
  
• "To see the right and not to do it is cowardice."
  
  
• "When anger rises, think of the consequences."
  
  
• "If we don’t know life, how can we know death?"
  
  
• "Give a bowl of rice to a man and you will feed him for a
  day. Teach him how to grow his own rice and you will save his
  life."
  
  
• "Never give a sword to a man who can’t dance."

Famous Confucius Quotes

Related Articles

• Australia passes foreign influence laws, targeting China (29-Jun-2018)
  
  
• New book documents extensive Chinese infiltration into Australia's organizations (26-Feb-2018)
  
  
• Concerns grow over China's covert infiltration into New Zealand's government (16-Feb-2018)
  
  
• China-Australia relations plummet over China's illegal militarization of South China Sea (16-Dec-2017)
  

KEYS:

Generational Dynamics, China, Confucius, Confucian Institutes,
University of North Florida,
United Front Work Department, UFWD, Hanban Agency,
Sun Tzu, Art of War, Shang Dynasty, Shangdi, Zhou Dynasty, Tian,
Xi Jinping, North Korea, Kim Jong-un

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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 1-Oct-18 World View -- UK to challenge Russia in Arctic, at time of tensions over Skripal poisoning

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• UK to challenge Russia in Arctic, at time of tensions over Skripal poisoning
  
• Russia says that UK violates its commitment to the Arctic Council
  

****
**** UK to challenge Russia in Arctic, at time of tensions over Skripal poisoning
****


British troops heading for the Arctic (Getty)

At a time when tensions between the UK and Russia are extremely high
because of the poisoning of the March 4 poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia,
using a Russia-developed nerve agent Novichok, UK's
defense secretary Gavin Williamson on Sunday announced that British
armed forces will confront Russia in the Arctic.

Williamson said that Russia was reopening Soviet-era bases in the
arctic and he warned that Britain's military must assert itself in the
newly navigable region.

According to Williamson:

<QUOTE>"We see Russian submarine activity very close to the
level that it was at the Cold War, and it's right that we start
responding to that.

If we could turn back the clock 10 years many people thought that
the era of submarine activity in the High North, in the North
Atlantic, and the threat that it posed did disappear with the fall
of the Berlin Wall. This threat has really come back to the fore.
If we want to be protecting our interests in what is effectively
our own back yard, this is something we need to be
doing."<END QUOTE>

Well, the Berlin Wall fell 30 years ago, not ten years, but who's
counting?

Williamson indicated that global warming was exposing Britain
to new military threats from Russia:

<QUOTE>"As the ice melts and new shipping routes emerge, the
significance of the High North and Arctic region increases.

Russia, with more submarines operating under the ice and ambitions
to build over 100 facilities in the Arctic, are staking a claim
and militarising the region. We must be ready to deal with all
threats as they emerge."<END QUOTE>

Britain is planning to open a new military base in the northern part
of Norway and deploy 800 Royal Marine and Army troops to the country
every winter for 10 years from 2019. They are to operate with the US
and Dutch troops there. Together with 3,000 commandos, sent to take
part in the NATO drills, the total number of the deployed troops will
top 40,000. In addition, four Royal Air Force Typhoon fighter planes
will patrol Icelandic Skies.

"Our Poseidon aircraft submarine hunters, based in Lossiemouth, will
track Russian submarines. They will keep us safe at home and assist
our NATO allies," said Williamson. That should be reassuring.
Daily Mail (London) and UK Government and Sputnik News (Russia)

****
**** Russia says that UK violates its commitment to the Arctic Council
****

Russia's embassy in London criticized Britain's announcement,
promoting the idea of a threat from Russia. In fact, Russia claims
that Britain is violating its own policy statement as an observer at
the Arctic Council. According to a spokesman:

<QUOTE>"These speculations are yet another attempt to promote
the idea of military build-up in the Arctic under imaginary
pretexts. They run counter to the existing international legal
framework and completely undermine huge efforts undertaken in the
Arctic Council, where the UK is an observer state.

We hope the British media notices the impressive prospects for
trade, economic and infrastructural cooperation in the Arctic and
stops echoing those who can’t wait to engage in saber-rattling in
this part of the globe."<END QUOTE>

According to the US State Department:

<QUOTE>"Established by the Ottawa Declaration in 1996, the
Arctic Council is the preeminent intergovernmental forum for
addressing issues related to the Arctic Region. The members of the
Arctic Council include the eight countries with territory above
the Arctic Circle (Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway,
Sweden, the Russian Federation, and the United States) plus six
Permanent Participants (PP) groups representing the indigenous
people of the Arctic, which include Aleut International
Association, Arctic Athabaskan Council, Gwich’in Council
International, Inuit Circumpolar Council, Russian Arctic
Indigenous Peoples of the North, and Saami Council. The Arctic
Council is not a treaty-based international organization but
rather an international forum that operates on the basis of
consensus, echoing the peaceful and cooperative nature of the
Arctic Region. The Council focuses its work on matters related to
sustainable development, the environment, and scientific
cooperation; its mandate explicitly excludes military
security. Traditionally, the Council is chaired by the foreign
minister of the country holding the chairmanship. Its day-to-day
work is carried out by the eight Senior Arctic Officials (SAO) and
six PP representatives, with input from working groups, expert
groups, and task forces."<END QUOTE>

Although the mandate of the Arctic Council specifically excludes
military security, Russia claims that an observer state like the UK
must "recognize Arctic States’ sovereignty, sovereign rights and
jurisdiction in the Arctic," and that the UK Foreign Office
specifically committed to doing so in 2013.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, Russia and Britain
are not headed for war. Historically, the Russians love the British,
and the British have no particular ill feelings towards any Russians
except Putin and his cadre of officials who are going around poisoning
people on British soil with the nerve agent Novichok. However,
eastern Europe is extremely volatile, and it's possible at some point
that Russia will be involved in a war with Ukraine or other east
European countries, as has happened many times in the past few
centuries. For that reason, Britain's decision to set up a new
military base in northern Norway could be quite significant. Russia Today
and US State Dept. and Arctic Council and Sputnik News (Russia) and Daily Express (London)

Related Articles:

• Britain threatens Russia with retaliation over nerve gas poisoning of Skripal (13-Mar-2018)
  
  
• Russia-China strategy to use the UN to control Western foreign policy has stopped working (29-Mar-2018)
  
  
• Dutch report confirms that Russian missile shot down airliner over Ukraine (14-Oct-2015)
  
  
• Vladimir Putin brags about how he lied about Russia's invasion of Crimea (10-Mar-2015)
  
  
• Russia's Putin confirms that he'll appoint Medvedev to be prime minister (16-Dec-2011)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, UK, Russia, Norway,
Novichok, Sergei Skripal, Yulia Skripal,
Gavin Williamson, Arctic Council

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John J. Xenakis
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Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe

*** 2-Oct-18 World View -- Cameroon's Paul Biya continues ethnic cleansing of Anglophones in Southern Cameroons

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Cameroon's Paul Biya continues ethnic cleansing of Anglophones in Southern Cameroons
  
• Cameroon Anglophone separatists act to block 86 yo Paul Biya's reelection
  

****
**** Cameroon's Paul Biya continues ethnic cleansing of Anglophones in Southern Cameroons
****


Ambazonia Defense Forces fighters (Vice)

Cameroon’s Francophone (French-speaking) President Paul Biya is the
favorite to win reelection as president on Sunday. A poll reveals
that none of the nine opposition candidates would be able to defeat
Biya, even though the economy is tanking, and most voters are opposed
to Biya's war and atrocities on the Anglophone (English-speaking)
population in the Southern Cameroons region of the county.

The atrocities began in November 2016,
when the Francophone (French-speaking) Cameroon government
security forces began beating and killing peaceful anti-government
demonstrators in the South Cameroons, the Anglophone
(English-speaking) regions of Cameroon. The demonstrators were
protesting systematic bias, discrimination and marginalization towards
Anglophones by the Francophone government. For example,
schoolteachers in the Anglophone regions were forbidden from teaching
any courses in English. Court cases had to be held in French, and it
was against the law to provide English translations of the laws.

The level of atrocities ticked up considerably in October 2017, when
the Anglophone separatists demanded independence for the Southern
Cameroons, calling it Ambazonia. A video emerged purporting to show
Francophone soldiers forcing Anglophone teenage girls to crawl through
mud in front of the Cameroon Protestant College, as the men jeer at
the girls and refer to them as Ambazonians.

The Anglophones began forming their own army called the Ambazonia Defense Forces (ADF),
with about 1,500
people spread around 20 camps in the Anglophone regions. In most
cases, the people are farmers who had been forced to leave their
villages, armed with hunting rifles that are made in Nigeria. In
September of last year, activist separatists began using small bombs
to target local security forces.

In December of last year, Biya declared full scale war on
the separatists, with this announcement:

<QUOTE>"I learned with emotion of the murder of four
Cameroonian soldiers and two policemen in the south-west of our
country. I think that things are now clear to everyone. Cameroon
is the victim of repeated attacks by a band of terrorists claiming
to be part of a secessionist movement.

Faced with these attacks of aggression, I assure the Cameroonian
people that all measures are being taken to end these criminals’
ability to do harm."<END QUOTE>

Human Rights Watch issued a report in July saying that the violence in
Cameroon has reached a crisis level, and could still get much worse.
The report Abuses by Government and Separatist Groups in Cameroon’s
Anglophone Regions":

<QUOTE>"found that both government forces and armed
separatists have abused civilians in the western part of the
country, displacing over 180,000 people since December
2017. Anglophone separatists have extorted, kidnapped and killed
civilians, and prevented children from going to school. In
response to protests and violence by armed separatists, government
forces have killed civilians, used excessive force against
demonstrators, tortured and mistreated suspected separatists and
detainees, and burned hundreds of homes in several
villages."<END QUOTE>

According to claims by the separatists, within the last month the
Francophone army has been burning down villages, and killing anyone
from 13 years to 50 years old.

Cameroon's last generational crisis war was the "UPC Revolt,"
1956-1960, which was a bloody civil war by communists attacking the
French government in the Cameroun colony. It has now been exactly 58
years since the ending climax of the UPC Revolt. Generational
Dynamics research shows that 58 years is the point where the
generations of survivors of the previous crisis war have retired or
died in sufficient number that they no longer hold enough power to
stop the excesses of the younger generations. Cameroon is spiraling
into a full-scale generational crisis war, and there is nothing to
stop it. Journal du Cameroun and Africa News and Human Rights Watch and Vice News

****
**** Cameroon Anglophone separatists act to block 86 yo Paul Biya's reelection
****

Paul Biya has been campaigning in Francophone Cameroon for a seventh
term in office, which he has held since 1982.

Cameroon's Francophone government has declared a 48-hour curfew in the
Southern Cameroons region, occupied by the Anglophones. October 1 is
the first anniversary of the day when tens of thousands of
demonstrators took to the streets, triggering an army massacre that
killed hundreds of people.

Separatist activists have vowed to block the presidential election in
any of the Anglophone regions. On Thursday, separatist militants
raided a prison and freed about 100 inmates, claiming that
the prisoners were innocent people that the army arrested at
random on the street.

Separatists have set up check points blocking traffic on major roads,
helping to paralyse activity across the region. According to Cho
Ayaba, a separatist leader, "There will be no election in Ambazonia.
We want to make sure there is no movement from Cameroon into
Ambazonia, including election materials." The Nation (Kenya) and AFP and Reuters

Related Articles:

• Cameroon's English-speaking provinces on the verge of full-scale violence (04-Dec-2017)
  
  
• Genocide of Rohingyas in Burma (Myanmar) appears to be almost complete (27-Aug-2018)
  
  
• Viral video shows Francophone Cameroon soldiers killing women and children (13-Jul-2018)
  
  
• Cameroon condemns scathing Amnesty report on government atrocities (16-Jun-2018)
  
  
• Dozens killed in English-speaking Cameroon region by French-speaking government police (28-May-2018)
  
  
• Nigeria threatens Cameroon as 40,000 refugees cross the border (08-Feb-2018)
  
  
• Cameroon Catholic Church splits over government 'barbarism' and 'growing genocide' (15-Jan-2018)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Cameroon, Paul Biya, Francophones
Anglophones, Southern Cameroons, Ambazonia,
Ambazonia Defense Forces, ADF, Cho Ayaba

Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
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John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe