Generational Dynamics World View - Printable Version +- Generational Theory Forum: The Fourth Turning Forum: A message board discussing generations and the Strauss Howe generational theory (http://generational-theory.com/forum) +-- Forum: Fourth Turning Forums (http://generational-theory.com/forum/forum-1.html) +--- Forum: Theories Of History (http://generational-theory.com/forum/forum-7.html) +--- Thread: Generational Dynamics World View (/thread-51.html) Pages:
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12-Dec-18 World View -- China jails Canadian journalist Michael Kovrig in apparent re - John J. Xenakis - 12-11-2018 *** 12-Dec-18 World View -- China jails Canadian journalist Michael Kovrig in apparent retaliation for Canada arrest of Meng Wanzhou This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** China jails Canadian journalist Michael Kovrig in apparent retaliation for Canada arrest of Meng Wanzhou **** Meng Wanzhou speaks to her lawyer at Tuesday's bail hearing (Toronto Star) Michael Kovrig, a Canadian journalist and analyst working as a China expert for the International Crisis Group, has suddenly disappeared while in China. Kovrig is also a former Canadian diplomat. It's assumed the Kovrig was arrested by China's security forces. According to one analyst, the Chinese will hold someone for 37 days before he's given access to a lawyer. Many people additionally believe that Kovrig was arrested, without charges or justification, in retaliation for Canada's arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, who was arrested after a multi-year investigation alleging that Meng conducted massive counts of bank fraud in order to violate US sanctions against Iran. The fact that Meng was charged with multiple real crimes, while Kovrig was arrested without any justification is just one of the differences between the two cases. A second difference is the Meng was immediately given access to her family and a lawyer, and was told what the charges were. Kovrig has completely disappeared, and is given access to no one. Third, Meng was tried in a real court, where her lawyer could defend her. If Kovrig's case is typical, he'll be thrown into jail, tortured, and forced to confess to a crime he knows nothing about. China is just being consistent as a criminal nation. Meng is being tried in a fair court procedure. China's abduction of Kovrig is criminal. China's activities in the South China Sea are criminal. China's theft of other countries' intellectual property is criminal. China's repeated violation of World Trade Organization (WTO) rules is criminal. China's repeated destruction of Christian churches is criminal. China's incredible actions sending a million Uighurs to "re-education camps" where they can be beaten, tortured, raped or killed for not reciting the party line is not only criminal, it's one of the stupidest and most insane policies in the history of mankind. And China is being led by president Xi Jinping who is terrified by Winnie the Pooh because they look the same. Can you imagine Donald Trump or any other world leading being terrified by a cartoon like Winnie the Pooh? Almost every day something new happens that makes China appear to be a country falling apart at the seams. This is not good, as it will lead to a great deal of bloodshed and a world war. Toronto Star and South China Morning Post and Canadian Broadcasting **** **** US State Dept considers stronger travel warning for China **** Michael Kovrig's arrest without charges or justification, apparently in retaliation for Canada's arrest of Meng, has raised alarm that any Westerner in China is now subject to arbitrary arrest without charges or justification. There are reports that the US State Department is considering toughening its travel warning for people considering travel to China. However, the State Dept's existing travel warning is already pretty tough, and shows that Kovrig's unjustified rest is pretty common in China: <QUOTE>"Chinese authorities have the broad ability to prohibit travelers from leaving China (also known as ‘exit bans’); exit bans have been imposed to compel U.S. citizens to resolve business disputes, force settlement of court orders, or facilitate government investigations. Individuals not involved in legal proceedings or suspected of wrongdoing have also be subjected to lengthy exit bans in order to compel their family members or colleagues to cooperate with Chinese courts or investigators. U.S. citizens visiting or residing in China have been arbitrarily interrogated or detained for reasons related to “state security.” Security personnel have detained and/or deported U.S. citizens for sending private electronic messages critical of the Chinese government."<END QUOTE> It's pretty clear from this State Dept. warning that things like arresting and burying Michael Kovrig are a fairly common occurrence in China. US State Dept. **** **** How Michael Kovrig infuriates the Chinese **** Michael Kovrig is a fluent Mandarin speaker and an analyst for the International Crisis Group. I was curious to see what he's written, and I found his most recent article on the ICG web site, "China Expands Its Peace and Security Footprint in Africa." It's a lengthy article, and here are some excerpts: <QUOTE>"[O]fficials from 53 African countries and the African Union (AU) [came] to Beijing for meetings that culminated in a resolution to continue strengthening ties and a renewed pledge of billions of dollars in Chinese loans, grants and investments. Over the past decade China’s role in peace and security has also grown rapidly through arms sales, military cooperation and peacekeeping deployments in Africa. ... A more controversial sign of China’s military footprint is the 36-hectare Djibouti facility that the PLA established in 2017 with a ten-year lease at $20 million annually. The PLA describes it as a support base for naval anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden, peacekeeping in South Sudan and humanitarian and other cooperation in the Horn of Africa, but has also used it to conduct live-fire military exercises. ... Less noticeable to outsiders but broader in impact is China’s direct defence and security cooperation with African counterparts. This takes place through a growing number of joint exercises, naval patrols and exchanges. In the first half of 2018 alone, the PLA Navy’s 27th and 28th anti-piracy escort task forces reportedly visited ports in Cameroon, Gabon, Ghana and Nigeria, while PLA units conducted drills in the same countries, and its medical teams did work in Ethiopia, Sierra Leone, Sudan and Zambia. Mere months after Burkina Faso’s May decision to switch diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing, the PLA is already working to develop military ties that will likely emphasize counter-terrorism cooperation. ... The political and defence relationships fostered by these programs grease the wheels for weapons sales. Data compiled by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) shows that China has become the top supplier of arms to sub-Saharan Africa, accounting for 27 per cent of the region’s imports over the four year period from 2013-2017, an increase of 55 per cent over 2008-2012. Some 22 countries in the region have procured major arms from Chinese suppliers in recent years, key among them Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Tanzania and Zambia. In June, China’s State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence reported that Beijing now has defence industry, science and technology ties with 45 African countries. ... China’s own expanding economic interests are a further driver. Africa’s largest trading partner since 2009, China increasingly counts on the continent for natural resources and markets to maintain its own growth and social stability. ... Moreover, roughly a million Chinese are estimated to live and work in Africa, and China’s leaders have a domestic political imperative to ensure their safety. Beijing has already contended with evacuations from Libya, South Sudan and Yemen, and incidents of violence and property damage elsewhere. The 2017 Chinese blockbuster action movie Wolf Warrior II brought home a Rambo-esque fantasy version of these concerns. Set in a nameless African country that descends into chaos, it closes with the hubristic message that China’s government will protect its citizens wherever they go."<END QUOTE> China's politicians are people that become infuriated by Winnie the Pooh, so it's not surprising that this criminal nation would be infuriated by this kind of analysis. It's quite possible that they've been planning to arrest and bury Michael Kovrig for some time, and the arrest of Meng Wanzhou provided the perfect opportunity. International Crisis Group (24-Oct) **** **** Canada releases Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou on bail **** There was a burst of applause on Tuesday afternoon in the Vancouver Supreme Court courtroom when the court granted bail to Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou. Meng is not scheduled to appear in court again until February 6, at which time a hearing will be held to determine whether Meng should be extradited to the United States for a setting up a complex international financial system, defrauding banks in several countries, in order to violate US sanctions laws with regard to Iran. The judge said that Meng's husband Liu Xiaozong would pledge a total of $15 million — including the value of two Vancouver homes and $7 million in cash — and live with her to ensure she obeys court conditions. Meng must also report to a bail supervisor, maintain good behavior, live at a house owned by her husband, and stay in that house between the hours of 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. She must also surrender her passports, wear an electronic monitoring bracelet on her ankle and live under surveillance 24/7. However, these people are billionaires, and this money means nothing to them. I don't believe anyone will be too surprised if Meng doesn't show up at the February 6 court hearing, and investigation shows that she eluded the police by wearing a turban, a long fake beard, and a Sikh chola, carrying a pair of swords. Apparently what convinced the judge is that four other friends were willing to guarantee that she would not skip bail. He told the courtroom he believed "the risk of her non-attendance in court can be reduced to an acceptable level" under the bail conditions. There is an unconfirmed suspicion that the arrest of Michael Kovrig in the criminal nation China was a factor, since not granting bail to Meng could mean torture and additional detention for Kovrig. Even with bail, the suspicion is that the fate of Kovrig is directly dependent on the fate of Meng in the Vancouver courtroom. Toronto Star and Canadian Broadcasting Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, Michael Kovrig, Canada, Vancouver, Liu Xiaozong Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 13-Dec-18 World View -- China recklessly arrests a second Canadian without justificat - John J. Xenakis - 12-12-2018 *** 13-Dec-18 World View -- China recklessly arrests a second Canadian without justification This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** China recklessly arrests a second Canadian without justification **** Chinese police arrest activist in Hong Kong (File, Reuters) As we reported yesterday, China arrested a Canadian journalist and former diplomat Michael Korvig with no charges or justification. ( "12-Dec-18 World View -- China jails Canadian journalist Michael Kovrig in apparent retaliation for Canada arrest of Meng Wanzhou" ) On Wednesday, Canada said that a second Canadian, Michael Spavor, has been arrested. He was initially questioned by Chinese police, and then contacted the Canadian government. After that, he disappeared. The international hostility to China has been growing palpably in the last year. It isn't just the Trump administration that has been critical of China's theft of intellectual property and violation of international trade rules. According to analysts I've heard, politicians in Canada and Europe and Japan are increasingly "fed up" with trying to deal with China. The Chinese are also growing angrier at the West, but it goes beyond that. At the same time, China increasingly gives the impression of a country in societal meltdown. The crackdown on Christianity has become more vitriolic, and the policy of sending a million Uighurs to "re-education camps" where they can be beaten, tortured, raped or killed for not reciting the party line is one of the most insane policies in the history of mankind. The number of "mass incidents" in China was increasing exponentially for years, until China stopped reporting the official statistics, and jailed reporters who did so unofficially. It's believed that an economic recession in China could trigger widespread protests or a civil war, as happened with Mao's Communist Revolution (1934-49) or the Taiping Rebellion (1852-64). Arresting another Canadian for the second day in a row is extremely reckless, because it's going to cause panic among all Western diplomats and executives in China. Even worse, it suggests that China's government no longer cares how bad it looks, and is losing control of its foreign policy. As long-time readers know, Generational Dynamics has been predicting for years that China and the West are headed for World War III in this generational Crisis era. Things appear to moving quickly now, as relations deteriorate. China Digital Times and Bloomberg and Guardian (London) Related Articles:
**** **** US blames China for Marriot data breach in plan to create massive database of American citizens **** US government investigators blame hackers working for China's spy agency, the Ministry of State Security (MSS), for a cyberattack on the Marriott Hotel chain that collected personal details of roughly 500 million guests between 2014 and 2018. The stolen data contains names, addresses, telephone numbers, credit card numbers, passport numbers, birthdates, passport photos, hotel arrival and departure dates, and information on where people traveled and with whom. Other data breaches attributed to China's MSS include a 2017 Equifax hack that collected detailed credit information on 145 million people, a 2013 Target breach that exposed payment card and contact information for 60 million customers, and a 2015 hack of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) that collected detailed personal information on more than 20 million government employees, family members and applicants. There were other breaches of health-care institutions, including Anthem and CareFirst, that provided health data. It's believed that China's MSS has created a large database of hundreds of millions of Americans, merging data from all these sources. This data can be used for spying, extortion, identity theft, and so forth. Taking this a step further, the Chinese company Huawei Technologies is the second largest manufacturer of smartphones in the world, behind Samsung. It's believed that Huawei phones and devices can be accessed remotely by China's military, as I described in detail last week, with the result that numerous Western companies are banning Huawei from supplying equipment for their networks. Huawei phones, like all smartphones, keep track of locations and calling data for its users. This data could be accessed from China and merged with the master data base described above to accumulate detailed personal information and activities of tens of millions of Americans. China is already doing this for its citizens in China. China's military collects massive amounts of data on online activities and uses street cameras and facial recognition algorithms to track the locations of millions of Chinese citizens in real time. This is particularly true in Xinjiang province, where Uighurs are constantly monitored for suspicious activity, and a million Uighurs have been sent to "re-education camps." Washington Post and AP (3-Dec) and New York Times **** **** Google CEO Sundar Pichai evades questions about helping China's military **** In a related matter, Google CEO Sundar Pichai testified before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. He was questioned about the massive amount of data that Google collects about Americans, though not nearly as much as the Chinese are collecting on the Chinese -- or on Americans. Pichai completely evaded answering questions about Project Dragonfly, the massive project to use search engine technology in China to collect data about search requests and add it to China's huge database of tens of millions of its citizens, where it could be used, for example, to identify "suspicious" activity. Pichai said that the project was under active development, but that there were "no plans" to deploy it in China at this time. However, Pichai was not asked about the state of the art Artificial Intelligence development center that Google is opening in Shanghai, to supply advanced AI technology to China's government and military, while Google refuses to work with the American military for even defensive purposes. Google apparently plans to help out the Chinese when China and the US are at war, just as IBM helped out the Nazis at the beginning of World War II. The Street Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Huawei, Canada, Michael Kovrig, Michael Spavor, Marriot Hotel, Ministry of State Security, MSS, Xinjiang province, Uighurs, re-education camps, Google, Sundar Pichai, Project Dragonfly Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 RE: Generational Dynamics World View - Tim Randal Walker - 12-13-2018 In the public library I came across a book about the Chinese infiltration of Australia-"Silent Invasion" by Clive Hamilton. RE: Generational Dynamics World View - John J. Xenakis - 12-13-2018 (12-13-2018, 01:45 PM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: > In the public library I came across a book about the Chinese ** 26-Feb-18 World View -- New book documents extensive Chinese infiltration into Australia's organizations ** Hamilton's book 'Silent Invasion' describes China's infiltration into Australia ** http://www.generationaldynamics.com/pg/xct.gd.e180226.htm#e180226 RE: Generational Dynamics World View - Tim Randal Walker - 12-13-2018 The aftermath of a Sino/American war is depicted in the remake of On The Beach. YouTube, On The Beach, 2000, Part 1. 14-Dec-18 World View -- Cuba eases economic restrictions, continuing on path from Soc - John J. Xenakis - 12-13-2018 *** 14-Dec-18 World View -- Cuba eases economic restrictions, continuing on path from Socialism to free markets This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Cuba eases economic restrictions, continuing on path from Socialism to free markets **** Shoes for sale displayed on a shelf inside the home of a small business owner in Havana, Cuba, in 2013. (AP) In the face of popular demand from artists and entrepreneurs, the government of Cuba has backed down on plans to implement harsh new restrictions on the private sector. In July, Cuba announced the harsh controls on private businesses, to take effect on December 7, claiming that the opening up of some free markets has fueled wealth inequality, tax evasion and the black market. Since 2010, when it became legal to run certain small businesses, life has been transformed for many people. Around 13% of Cuba's overall workforce is now self-employed, in areas like tourism and transport. However, the rapid growth of small businesses was apparently threatening to Cuba, and in 2017, it began freezing issuing licenses for some popular business categories. It appears that Cuba's government is struggling to avoid a total economic disaster as in Socialist Venezuela, at the same time pretending to maintain a Socialist façade in its economy. Thus the government wants people to earn money self-employed in private businesses, but the government wants forbid a person from making money in two private businesses, since then me might make too much money. Therefore, the government announced in July that it would be illegal for a person to own more than one business license. So for example, a person renting out a room in his home while driving a private taxi during the day would be making too much money, and would be forced, under the new regulations, to give up one source of income or the other. So it was a shock that, after years of unyielding authoritarian government under Fidel and Raúl Castro, the new president Miguel Diaz-Canel suddenly reversed some of the worst rules on December 6, just a day before they were to take effect. The biggest reversal is that Cubans will be permitted to work in two or more self-employment activities simultaneously. Another abolished rule had set a limit of 50 seats for private bars, restaurants and cafeterias. A law requiring many businesses to maintain bank accounts with a minimum deposit of three months taxes, a requirement that would have put many people out of business, was softened to require only two months taxes. Artists are applauding the delay in implementing another new law. The law, announced in July, requires prior government approval for artists, musicians, writers and performers who want to present their work in any spaces open to the public, including private homes and businesses. Implementation of the law will be delayed following protests and social media campaigns by many Cuban artists that it was another layer of censorship and control over artistic expression. Miami Herald and Reuters and AP and Miami Herald **** **** The unraveling of Cuba's Socialist economy **** There's a certain amusing irony that Xinhua, the official news service the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), in a country that is still officially Socialist (but "with Chinese characteristics"), congratulated Cuba on rolling back some of the restrictions on the private sector: "Cuba's government has taken new regulations that will spur the island's fledgling private sector to ensure it continues to expand and create jobs, local media said on Thursday." Indeed Cuba is in the process of abandoning its Socialist economy and turning to capitalistic free markets, just as China did decades ago, and just as one Socialist country after another had to do in the last 60 years, in order to avoid catastrophic economic meltdowns. Two Socialist countries -- Venezuela and North Korea -- did NOT make that transition, and the disastrous self-destructive results are there for all to see. From the point of view of Generation Dynamics, Cuba is in the midst of a generational Unraveling era, when the harsh rules set up after the last generational crisis war, in this case the 1960 Cuban Revolution, unravel because younger generations no longer are willing to tolerate them. America's last generational Unraveling era occurred in the 1990s, when the country dismantled the post-Depression financial regulations and opened its foreign policy to Communist countries like China and Russia. During the last ten years, the entire Socialist economy has been unraveling, step by step. In 2010, when Cuba's economy was in shambles, and president Raúl Castro announced the end of the Socialist economy. The government would lay off 500,000 government workers (Socialist bureaucrats) and privatize many businesses. In particular, Marx's Socialist Principle Of Distribution ("From each according to abilities, to each according to needs") was abandoned at the time, with the announcement: We must reinvigorate the socialist principle of distribution, to pay to each according to the quantity and quality of work provided." Within two years of the 2010 announcement, the size of the state payroll had been reduced by 20%, and more than 200,000 people had moved into private enterprise. For the first time, Havana was population with street stalls selling everything from pirate DVDs to kitchen implements. There were still many restrictions on private businesses, but these restrictions are being removed, one by one. Unfortunately, ending a Socialist economy does not mean ending the dictatorship. Like Nazi Germany and China, a dictatorship with free markets is Fascist. Whether Cuba's dictatorship will also unravel and turn into a democratic government remains to be seen. Xinhua and Reuters **** **** Cuba rolls out mobile internet services **** Another sign that Cuba's hardline control over business is unraveling is the availability of internet access to mobile phones across the country. Previously, internet access was limited to state-run internet cafes and public wi-fi hot spots. Cuba will offer packages of data data ranging from 600 MB for 7 convertible Cuban pesos ($7) to 4 GB for 30 Cuban pesos ($30). The average monthly salary for a Cuban is $30 per month, meaning that few Cubans will be able to afford the service. CNBC and Al Jazeera Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Cuba, Fidel Castro, Raúl Castro, Miguel Mario Díaz-Canel Bermúdez, Venezuela, North Korea, Socialist Principle Of Distribution, China, Chinese Communist Party, CCP, Unraveling era Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 15-Dec-18 World View -- Russian Orthodox Church asks world leaders to protect it from - John J. Xenakis - 12-14-2018 *** 15-Dec-18 World View -- Russian Orthodox Church asks world leaders to protect it from Ukrainian persecution This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Russian Orthodox Church asks world leaders to protect it from Ukrainian persecution **** Ukrainian border guards prevent Russian men, aged 16-60, from entering Ukraine. Sign says: 'Do not stop between the striped columns.' (RFE/RL) Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, the leader of the the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), has sent a letter to the pope and a number of other world leaders urging them to protect bishops and clergy of the ROC in Ukraine, who are under pressure to change allegiance to the Kiev Patriarchate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is the biggest Orthodox Christian Church in Ukraine, and is subordinate to the Moscow Patriarchate When the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s, the Church was also split, with a separate Kiev Patriarchate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In October, Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, the "first among equals" leader of all Orthodox Christian churches and of the world's 300 million Orthodox Christians, announced that he was reversing a 330 year old policy, and would make the Kiev Patriarchate a separate Church, independent of the Moscow Patriarchate. This infuriated the Russians, who promised revenge. This has led to pressure in Ukraine for clergy and bishops in Ukraine belonging to the Moscow Patriarchate to switch allegiance to the Kiev Patriarchate. According to Kirill: <QUOTE>"Recently, the intervention of the leaders of the secular Ukrainian state in church affairs has acquired the character of gross pressure on the episcopate and clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which allows us to speak about the beginning of full-scale persecutions."<END QUOTE> Kirill also accused Ukraine's government of a kind of identity theft: <QUOTE>"The state-run media continues a massive company to discredit the Ukrainian Church. In violation of the right to privacy and the prohibition of the use of personal data, personal information about the bishops and clergymen of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, available to the state, is published. In particular, the personal data of a significant part of the episcopate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church were published on the Peacemaker website along with comments that incited religious hatred, [The Peacemaker website exists with the direct support of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine], and has previously become notorious for publishing information about Ukrainian, American and European journalists, after which they were threatened, beaten and even deprived of life."<END QUOTE> Kirill's plea was sent to numerous world leaders, including Pope Francis, the head of the Anglican Community to the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the Secretary General of the World Council of Churches O. Fuxse Tveit, and the UN Secretary General A. Guterres, Secretary General of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe T. Gremymhramhym, the President of France E. Macron and the German Chancellor A. Merkel as heads of states of the Normandy Four. Kirill appealed to religious and state leaders, leaders of intergovernmental organizations to make every effort to protect the bishops, clergy and believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church from discrimination and pressure from the Ukrainian authorities, to defend the freedom of conscience and religion enshrined in international law. Moscow Times and Russian Orthodox Church (Trans) and AP and Moscow Times **** **** Military tensions between Ukraine and Russia are increasing **** The dispute over the Orthodox Church in Ukraine comes four years after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and at a time, when military tensions are rising again. The problem with Kirill's plea is that Kirill is following the policies of Russia's president Vladimir Putin, and Putin lies about everything. These include lying about Russian soldiers in Ukraine, lying after Russians shot down a passenger plane with a Buk missile, lying about not invading Crimea, lying about whether Russia is going to annex Crimea, and then annexing Crimea. There are lots more lies related to Bashar al-Assad's use of Sarin gas and chlorine gas. So we have to assume that Kirill is just as much a liar as Putin is. Maybe bishops and clergy are being targeted with "full-scale persecutions," and maybe they aren't -- we can't conclude anything from anything that Kirill says. On the other hand, Ukraine’s Security Service, the SBU, is claiming that Russians in east Ukraine are organizing church marches in numerous cities across Ukraine on Sunday, in order to disrupt a meeting of the unification council of Ukrainian Orthodox Church. We'll see if these church marches actually take place tomorrow (Sunday). Unfortunately, no one can exclude the possibility that Moscow may launch more serious military actions this weekend with the same purpose. What is apparent is that military tensions are purposely increasing on both sides. The original Ukraine war that started four years ago has not been in the news much, but it's still continuing at a low level, with both Russians and Ukrainians being killed every week. On November 25, Russia conducted an act of war by firing on Ukrainian navy ships in the Black Sea, boarding and seizing the ships, and blockading Ukraine's ports at the Kerch Strait. Russia abducted the crew of 24, and apparently tortured some of them in order to create a video and forcing them to confess to crimes they didn't commit. Russia continues to hold and bury the 24 Ukrainian sailors, possibly in retaliation for the Orthodox Church issue, just as the Chinese have abducted and buried two Canadian journalists, in apparent retaliation for the arrest in Canada of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, after an multi-year investigation revealed massive bank fraud by Huawei in order to violate US sanctions against Iran. On November 26, in retaliation for the Kerch Strait seizure, Ukraine's parliament voted to implement Martial Law in ten regions of Ukraine for 30 days, in preparation for a possible new invasion by Russia. Then, on November 30, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine prohibited Russian men aged 16-60 from entering Russia. The reason given was to prevent Russia from sending in troops to form private armies, but the restriction played havoc with men who cross the border every day for work. On December 1, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (UAF) announced short-term, 15-day training courses for reservists and members of the territorial defense forces. Window on Eurasia and Reuters and Jamestown and RFE/RL (Trans) Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Russia, Ukraine, Constantinople, Russian Orthodox Church, Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Moscow Patriarchate, Kiev Patriarchate, Patriarch Bartholomew I, Patriarch Kirill, Black Sea, Sea of Azov, Kerch Strait Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 16-Dec-18 World View -- Cambodia denies major China-funded seaport project is a milit - John J. Xenakis - 12-16-2018 *** 16-Dec-18 World View -- Cambodia denies major China-funded seaport project is a military base This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Cambodia denies major China-funded seaport project is a military base **** China is building a massive deep-water seaport project in Cambodia's Koh Kong province along the Gulf of Thailand Cambodia's prime minister Hun Sen has been forced repeatedly to deny that China was building a military naval base in Koh Kong province on the Gulf of Thailand. A naval base in that location would give China commanding control of the southern part of the South China Sea, which it currently is occupying in violation of international law. China has long been Cambodia's top provider of military equipment. For years, there has been a Chinese-built $3.8 billion land project in Koh Kong province in Cambodia, along the Gulf of Thailand. The project was begun a decade ago, operating under a 99-year lease granted to China. The land project contains a deep-water port which is said to be deep enough to potentially accommodate not just container ships, but Chinese navy frigates and destroyers as well. A report last month in Asia Times said that the naval base was already under construction, forcing Hun Sen to make a denial: <QUOTE>"I also received a letter from U.S. Vice President Mike Pence raising concerns of the possible presence of a Chinese naval base in Cambodia in the future. “I want to make clear to our compatriots and foreign friends that Cambodia will not violate its own constitution. Cambodia’s Constitution prohibits the presence of foreign armies or military bases inside the country ... Cambodia will not permit any foreign military base for a navy, army or air force.<END QUOTE> That Hun Sen is unwilling to violate Cambodia's constitution is laughable. Earlier this year, his party won a national parliamentary election, taking all 125 parliamentary seats that were up for election. He accomplished that amazing feat by jailing or assassinating political opponents, taking control of all of the media, closed all radio stations critical of the government, and ordered the complete dissolution of the opposition political party -- all of that, presumably, in violation of the constitution. The size of land granted to China under the 99 year lease is reported to be another violation of the constitution. The grant is 45,000 hectares, while Cambodial law limits such concessions to 10,000 hectares. So, just like Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Bashar al-Assad and other leaders, we can assume that anything that Hun Sen says is a complete lie, except by accident. At any rate his assurances to Mike Pence that China is not building a naval base are completely meaningless. Asia Times and Radio Free Asia and Khmer Times **** **** Cambodia is becoming increasingly Chinese and military **** Sihanoukville, which is in Preah Sihanouk province on the southern border of Koh Kong province, used to be a premier seaside resort and tourist attraction, but has now turned into a Chinese enclave. It's a visible example of the China's rising domination of Cambodia's economy. Hun Sen's critics claim that Hun Sen has enabled China's de facto "colonization" of Cambodia. Whether or not the Koh Kong deep water seaport will be a Chinese military base, there's little doubt of China's increasing military presence in Cambodia. Cambodia is a key country within Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and the seaport has taken on increasing significance. China has pledged $100 million in military grants for training and equipment for the Cambodian military. Sihanoukville has given itself over entirely to Chinese investment, with a $1.1 billion investment from China in just the past year. The key complaint for many in Sihanoukville is that even though Chinese investment brings wealth, it is mainly kept within their own community. Cambodia appears to be another victim of China's "debt trap diplomacy." About half of Cambodia's $6 in foreign debt is owed to China, and as usual, it's China that has benefited from the infrastructure projects, leaving Cambodia with little more than a pile of debt which it will never be able to pay back. As happened with Sri Lanka's Hambantota seaport, this could give China complete control over Cambodia's Koh Kong port, and China could use it as a military naval base whether doing so violates Cambodia's constitution or not. Asia Times and Reuters (19-Jun) and Asia Times and Diplomat Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Cambodia, Phnom Penh, Hun Sen, debt trap, Mike Pence, Gulf of Thailand, Koh Kong, Preah Sihanouk, Sihanoukville, Belt and Road Initiative, BRI, Sri Lanka, Hambantota seaport Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- North Korea threatens US with 'exchanges of fire' over new hu - John J. Xenakis - 12-16-2018 *** 17-Dec-18 World View -- North Korea threatens US with 'exchanges of fire' over new human rights sanctions This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** US issues new sanctions on North Korea over human rights abuses **** Japanese surveillance aircraft spots a Dominican-flagged Yuk Tung oil tanker after it transferred fuel to the North Korean-registered Rye Song tanker in the open South China Sea, in violation of sanctions. (AP) On Monday, the Trump administration announced new sanctions against three senior North Korean officials for for human rights abuses and censorship in the country. The new sanctions were in honor of the Otto Warmbier, the 22-year-old American college student who died after being released from North Korean custody in June 2017. According to Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin: <QUOTE>"Treasury is sanctioning senior North Korean officials who direct departments that perpetrate the regime’s brutal state-sponsored censorship activities, human rights violations and abuses, and other abuses in order to suppress and control the population. These sanctions demonstrate the United States’ ongoing support for freedom of expression, and opposition to endemic censorship and human rights abuses. The United States has consistently condemned the North Korean regime for its flagrant and egregious abuses of human rights and fundamental freedoms, and this Administration will continue to take action against human rights abusers around the globe."<END QUOTE> The sanctions are for human rights abuses by North Korean organizations that "conduct warrantless searches for unapproved foreign media or content, inspect and confiscate computer content, including external storage devices, and even kidnap defectors or foreign citizens who support human rights in North Korea." ABC News and US Treasury **** **** North Korea threatens retaliation for the sanctions **** North Korea on Sunday harshly condemned the U.S. administration for stepping up sanctions and pressure. and warned of a return to “exchanges of fire” and that the denuclearization process could be blocked forever. According to the North Korean statement, published by the North Korean news service KCNA: <QUOTE>"Now, the international society is unanimous in welcoming the proactive denuclearization steps taken by the DPRK [North Korea] and urging the U.S. to respond to these steps in a corresponding manner. And president Trump avails himself of every possible occasion to state his willingness to improve DPRK-U.S. relations. Far from the statements of the president, the State Department is instead bent on bringing the DPRK-U.S. relations back to the status of last year which was marked by exchanges of fire. I cannot help but throw doubt on the ulterior motive of the State Department. If they are a sort of diplomats of "only superpower", they should at least realize from the past record of the DPRK-U.S. relations that sanctions and pressure would not work against the DPRK. The United States will not be unaware of the self-evident fact that its threat, blackmail and pressure against the other side cannot be a solution under the relations of pent-up confrontation, mistrust and hostility between the DPRK and the U.S. and deterioration of the situation that might be incurred by these hostile actions would not be beneficial for peace and security of the Korean peninsula and beyond. Since we know too well that the deep-rooted hostility between the DPRK and the U.S. cannot be redressed overnight, we have been proposing that the DPRK-U.S. relations be improved on a step-by-step approach of resolving what is feasible one by one, by giving priority to confidence building. If the high-ranking politicians within the U.S. administration including the State Department had calculated that they could drive us into giving up nuclear weapons by way of increasing the anti-DPRK sanctions and pressure and human rights racket to an unprecedented level, which has nothing to do with confidence building, it will count as greatest miscalculation, and it will block the path to denuclearization on the Korean peninsula forever - a result desired by no one. The U.S. should realize before it is too late that "maximum pressure" would not work against us and take a sincere approach to implementing the Singapore DPRK-U.S. Joint Statement."<END QUOTE> North Korea gave this statement a great deal of publicity, and so they wanted it to be noticed. And indeed, the international networks all carried it prominently. An interesting thing about the statement is that it blames the State Dept., and praises president Trump. This is part of the game and the "charm offensive" that's been going on. This way, the North Koreans can threaten the United States, but encourage Trump to make more concessions. The statement refers to "the proactive denuclearization steps taken by the DPRK." Actually, there have been no such steps that aren't easily reversible. The one big "step" was blowing up the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, but recent satellite imagery indicates that the site is still usable, and that several dozen personnel are still working there. The one major step that the US has requested was a list of all of North Korea's nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles development sites, but North Korea has refused to provide this list. The US has also taken a reversible "proactive step" -- namely canceling all joint military drills with the South Koreans. However, since no progress was being made down the denuclearization path, the US and South Korea resumed some military drills last month. As I've been saying since the start of the year, when North Korea's "charm offensive" began, the North Koreans have absolutely no intention of denuclearizing. President Trump has been saying that he's in no hurry to conclude a deal, knowing that the sanctions remain on North Korea, and hoping that the sanctions might pressure them to agree to denuclearization. However, as the KCNA statement says, "The U.S. should realize before it is too late that "maximum pressure" would not work against us." It's worth pointing out that North Korea has been evading sanctions by transferring oil at sea, despite active surveillance and enforcement by an eight-nation coalition, including Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand, deploying warships and aircraft to better spot sanctions violations. As before, it's pretty clear to everyone (except the news media and the general public) that the charm offensive was all a show -- that North Korea would never denuclearize, and that Trump would never agree to reduce the sanctions. But all sides kept it up because it solve their immediate political problems by "kicking the can down the road" -- that is, masking and hiding problems and postponing them until later. In the meantime, North Korea now has completed a year more nuclear and missile development than it had as of a year ago, with the only restriction that they haven't been able to publicly test their latest weapons. It remains to be seen how long this can go on. Reuters and KCNA and Chosun Ilbo (Seoul) and NBC News Related Articles:
**** **** Japan-Korea relations worsen over 'comfort women' issue **** The question of Korean "comfort women" used by Japanese soldiers during World War II is reaching a boiling point again. On October 30, South Korea's supreme court awarded compensation to four Korean citizens forced to work for the Japanese during World War II. The Japanese claim that all such awards were already paid in a settlement concluded in a 1965 treaty. This has opened up the "comfort women" issue again. In 2015, Japan and Korean concluded a bilateral agrfeement which was intended at the time as the “final and irreversible” resolution of the comfort women issue. However, South Korea is now saying that demands from the victims is causing the agreement to "wither." I have witnessed an extremely vitriolic disagreement between two people who, fortunately, were disagreeing online and were not in the same room. The disagreement stems from a 1944 US Army report, based on interrogation of "20 Korean Comfort Girls," which indicates that the girls volunteered for these roles, and they were well-treated by the Japanese soldiers. This issue is certain to be raised again. Japan Today and Diplomat and US Army report (1-Oct-1944) Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, North Korea, Kim Jong-un, South Korea, Moon Jae-in, Mike Pompeo, Otto Warmbier, Steven T. Mnuchin Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Kashmir locked down after Indian security forces kill seven c - John J. Xenakis - 12-18-2018 *** 18-Dec-18 World View -- Kashmir locked down after Indian security forces kill seven civilians This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Kashmir locked down after Indian security forces kill seven civilians **** Kashmiris turn out for funeral of the civilians killed on Saturday (AP) Indian-governed Kashmir was locked down with curfew-like restrictions for a third day on Monday, after seven civilians were killed during a shootout between militants and Indian security forces on Saturday. Armed police and paramilitary soldiers in riot gear fanned out across the region in anticipation of further anti-India protests and clashes. Shops and businesses closed in other areas with no security restrictions. Authorities stopped train services and cut cellphone internet in Srinagar and other restive towns, and reduced connection speeds in other parts of the Kashmir Valley, in order to prevent anti-India demonstrations from being organized. Seven civilians were killed and at least 36 injured in clashes that erupted after three militants were shot dead in a gunfight in the village of Pulwama in Indian-governed Kashmir during the early hours on Saturday. Two soldiers were critically injured in the encounter, and one died. The three slain militants were identified as being associated with Hizbul Mujahideen (HM), a home-grown indigenous militant separatist group in Kashmir (as opposed to Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), a Pakistan-based terrorist group). One of the militants was Ahmad Thokar, who had deserted from the Indian army to join HM. These defections have been increasingly common recently. Tribune India and AP and Pakistan Today **** **** India's 'Operation all-out' to continue as more young Kashmiris become militants **** 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. We're now seeing the next step in this standard template, as generations of young Muslims in Kashmir become increasingly self-radicalized, and replace the Pakistani-supplied terrorists in Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) with indigenous Kashmiris joining Hizbul Mujahideen (HM). A major change occurred after the July 8 2016 death of HM leader Burhan Wani in a gunfight with the Indian army. This triggered a continuing series of demonstrations and riots. 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. In this generational Crisis era, the clashes between young Kashmiris and Indian security forces is providing the motivation for young people to simply disappear and join HM. Parents, according to news reports, are forced to search jihadist social media sites to search for pictures of their sons who have disappeared. Burhan Wani himself had joined HM after his brother Khalid was beaten up by Indian security forces. After he was killed, he was the inspiration for many others to join HM. Indian politicians and security forces, who have no understanding of generational theory, have no idea what's going on, and are looking desperately for a way to return to the "normalcy" of twenty years ago. This is impossible, since 20 years ago there were still survivors of the 1947 Partition War who were willing to accept any compromise to prevent anything so horrible from happening again. But those survivors are gone, and the younger generations simply want revenge. This led India's army in June 2017 to launch "Operation All-Out." Under this plan, the army identified 258 specific militants the would be specifically targeted and captured, thus delivering "a lethal blow to terrorism ... with a long-term plan for a listing peace." When Operation All-Out was announced last year, the 258 militants were almost all in Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT). Since then, hundreds of additional militants have been identified, and this time they're indigenous youths joining Hizbul Mujahideen (HM). However, the Kashmiris have been adapting to Operation All-Out. When Indian security forces are spotted traveling to the home of a suspected militant, the people pour out of their homes and block them. That's what happened on Saturday. The security forces were targeting three HM militants, when local youths thronged the forces and began hurling stones. This resulted in the live fire that killed not only the militants but at least seven civilians. Avinash Rai Khanna, a senior Indian politician, says that Operation All-Out will continue "until the last terrorist is eliminated." He blamed the deaths of the civilians on Saturday on the local youths who threw stones. According to Khanna: <QUOTE>"Civilian killings are unfortunate, but when people interfere in operations and try to divert the attention of the forces, mishaps are bound to happen. We can only appeal to people to let the forces do their job in eliminating terrorists and not indulge in activities like stone-throwing or cause obstruction in operations. We had come to power in the state with an agenda of peace and development, but had to back out when things started going haywire. ... We want [Kashmir] terrorism-free. Operation All-out will reach its logical end."<END QUOTE> Khanna assumes that the "normalcy" of twenty years ago can return, but Generational Dynamics predicts that the militancy will continue to worsen until the 1947 Partition War in Kashmir is refought. Tribune India and The Kashmir Walla and Hindustan Times and Dawn (Pakistan) Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, India, Pakistan, Kashmir, Pulwana, Operation All-Out, Lashkar-e-Toiba, LeT, Hizbul Mujahedeen, HM, Burhan Wani, Jaish-e-Mohammad, JeM, Partition War, Avinash Rai Khanna Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 19-Dec-18 World View -- Ceasefire in Hodeidah seaport in Yemen war holds on the first - John J. Xenakis - 12-18-2018 *** 19-Dec-18 World View -- Ceasefire in Hodeidah seaport in Yemen war holds on the first day This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Ceasefire in Hodeidah seaport in Yemen war holds on the first day **** Fishermen in the the seaport of Hodeidah on September 29 (AP) Much to the surprise of many people, including me, both sides in the Yemen war agreed to a ceasefire to begin on Tuesday, December 18, and after one day it seems to be holding. This follows months of heavy fighting in Yemen's seaport city of Hodeidah, in the proxy war between Yemen's official internationally-recognized government, backed by Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates (UAE) versus the Houthi rebels, backed by Iran. The ceasefire agreement was reached last week at UN-brokered talks in Stockhold, Sweden. The war began in 2015, when Houthi rebels from northwest Yemen took control of the capital city Sanaa, and seized the international airport. In response, warplanes from a mostly Arab coalition led by Saudi Arabia bombed Houthi rebel targets. The war escalated substantially in November of last year, when the Houthis launched a ballistic missile, undoubtedly supplied by Iran, that reached the King Khalid International Airport near Riyadh, about 800 km from the Yemen border. The Saudis reacted with its own escalation, a blockade of all of Yemen's land, sea and air ports. The Houthis increased their missile attacks on Saudi cities, and then in June of this year, Saudi Arabia and UAE launched a 'catastrophic' assault on Port Hodeidah in Yemen. The objective was to cut off supplies of Iranian weapons to the Houthis, as well as a source of income. The Hodeidah deep sea port on the Red Sea has become a crucial asset to the Houthi's war effort. NGOs use the port to import badly need humanitarian aid, including food, water and medicines, for 8 million Yeminis. The Houthis control these imports, and charge duties that fund their war efforts. Furthermore, the Houthis use the port to import Iranian weapons for the war effort. The blockade of the seaport may have been effective in preventing money and supplies from reaching the Houthis, but it also created the worst humanitarian disaster in the world today, since food, water and medicines could no longer reach Yemen civilians. Tuesday's ceasefire is not a peace deal. It's a temporary ceasefire that both sides have agreed to so that humanitarian aid -- food, water and medicines -- could be imported into Yemen to alleviate the humanitarian disaster. There are international efforts to extend the ceasefire into a complete peace deal but, assuming that can't be done, the ceasefire may end as quickly as it started. PBS and Sky News and National Interest **** **** The Jamal Khashoggi murder continues to affect the Yemen war **** Every we read about slaughter, torture, rapes, jailings and atrocities being perpetrated in many countries around the world, so it's still startling to see how the murder of one man on October 2, Saudi national Jamal Khashoggi, in the Saudi embassy in Istanbul, Turkey, is even still remembered today, over two months since it happened. If Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) had simply hired a pait hit man to shoot him dead in the street outside the embassy, it would have been an ordinary murder of the kind that leaders like MBS, Erdogan and others regularly order. Instead, MBS apparently arranged for something out of a horror movie -- kill him, dismember him, dissolve the pieces in acid, ship what's left out of the country -- and if I didn't know that atrocities like that are common these days, I would think it was impossible. But it is possible, it happened, and that's why so much of the world has turned against MBS. There are two reasons why both sides in the Yemen war agreed to the ceasefire deal. First is the humanitarian situation. We're used to wars where the atrocities have become unbelievably bad, and nobody cares. But in the case of Yemen, it seems that people on both sides do care -- enough to permit a few days of ceasefire and opening of the Hodeidah port to relieve at least some of the suffering. Also, I can't prove this, but reading and listening to news reports has given me the impression that the two sides fighting the Yemen war do not have the same level of vitriolic hatred for one another as, say, the two sides in the Syrian war. I read and hear lots of news reports about battles and wars in lots of countries, and there's no question that this war has been extremely bloody, but there seems to be something lacking in the level of vitriolic hatred. As I said, this is a feeling, and I can't prove it. The second reason is that the Khashoggi murder has motivated the Senate in Washington to pass a resolution directing president Trump to end American support for the Saudis in Yemen. The measure is purely symbolic, since it would be vetoed, but the fact that the Senate passed it has put pressure on MBS to agree to a ceasefire. The US has a long-standing relationship with Saudi Arabia, dating back to the 1930s, where the US is committed to provide security while the Saudis are committed to providing oil. The relationship has lasted through many crises and, in the end, no one in Washington wants this to be the crisis that ends it. AP and Washington Post and Axios Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Yemen, Hodeidah, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, UAE, Iran, Houthis, Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Jamal Khashoggi, Mohammed bin Salman, MBS Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 20-Dec-18 World View -- DR Congo's Kabila manipulates election to stay in power as Eb - John J. Xenakis - 12-19-2018 *** 20-Dec-18 World View -- DR Congo's Kabila manipulates election to stay in power as Ebola spreads This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** DR Congo's Joseph Kabila appoints his own personal 'Dmitry Medvedev' to stay in power **** Women walk past a campaign poster of Joseph Kabila’s chosen successor as president of DRC, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, in Kinshasa on Dec 18 (AFP) The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is scheduled to hold a presidential election on Sunday, and this time, Joseph Kabila isn't a candidate. That's because he's already been president for two 5-year terms, and the constitution he can't run again. Russia's president Vladimir Putin had the same problem in 2008. After serving two consecutive terms as president, Putin was no longer constitutionally allowed to run for president again in 2008. So Putin arranged for Dmitry Medvedev to win the election for president in 2008, so that Medvedev would appoint Putin as prime minister. In 2012, Putin admitted that the whole thing was a scam in order to keep himself in power, and that Medvedev was just a puppet. He ran for president again in 2012 and won, and then appointed Medvedev as prime minister. Joseph Kabila became president in 2001 after his father, Laurent Kabila, was assassinated. He ran for reelection in 2006, and did the same in 2011. When his mandate ran out in December, 2016, he refused to step down. Instead, he pulled a breathtaking stunt by doing everything possible to prevent new elections from taking place, and then claimed that he couldn't step down because there hadn't been any elections to select a president to replace him. The country was close to civil war, but the Catholic Church intervened and brokered an agreement: Elections would be held in December of 2017 to choose Kabila's successor, and this time Kabila would really step down. However, the agreement was a farce: It was signed by members of Kabila's government, but it wasn't even signed by Kabila himself. Kabila pulled the same stunt in December, 2017, by doing nothing to prepare for an election, then said he couldn't step down, because there hadn't been any elections. So this time there's apparently going to be an election, but Kabila has pulled a different stunt. He's arranged for his own puppet, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, a former interior minister, to run for president. Shadary was responsible for a violent, deadly crackdown on anti-Kabila protests in 2017, and so he's under sanctions by the European Union. Corruption in DRC is rampant. Kabila and his family own, either partially or wholly, more than 80 companies and businesses in the country and abroad. He and his children own more than 71,000 hectares (175,444 acres) of farmland. His family owns diamond mines, a part of the country's largest mobile phone network, companies that mine mineral deposits, gold and limestone, a luxury hotel, stakes in an airline, a share of the country's banks, and a fast-food franchise. With tentacles reaching into so many businesses, it's not surprising that Kabila is willing to use any method -- massacres, atrocities, jailings, torture -- to stay in power. Few people doubt Kabila's plan -- that Shadary become president for a term, so that Kabila can run again after Shadary's term ends, acting as Kabila's puppet in the same way that Medvedev served as Putin's puppet. Shadary may lose the election. He has no charisma, and he has no experience in politics. He's a nobody. However, he's expected to win anyway because there are two major candidates running against him, and over a dozen minor candidates, and they're expected to split the opposition vote, giving Shadary (and Kabila) the victory. Kabila has banned election rallies by the opposition. Al Jazeera and Council on Foreign Relations and Guardian (London) Related Articles
**** **** Ebola outbreak in DR Congo worsens **** Officials in Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have now reported 549 total Ebola cases and 326 deaths. Eighty-two suspected cases are under investigation. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), "The outbreak is intensifying in Butembo and Katwa, and new clusters are emerging elsewhere. Over the last 21 days (25 November to 16 December 2018), 120 confirmed and probable cases were reported from 14 health zones, the majority of which were reported from the major urban centres and towns in Katwa (27), Beni (27), Butembo (17), Komanda (16) and Mabalako (12)." The situation in North Kivu province is the worst possible scenario. There is a major ethnic war in progress, and Ebola is now spreading in the densely populated city of Beni, which became the epicenter of the pandemic. However, the number of cases in Beni seems to have peaked, while the disease has spread to the south and Butembo may be the new epicenter. The entire region is a war zone, and over one million people have been driven from their homes by armed rebel groups, the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), fighting government troops allied with Joseph Kabila. The fighting is preventing doctors and experts from reaching infected people, in order to educate the population and do contact tracing. Without contact tracing, there is no way to stop or slow the spread of the disease. The Ebola outbreak has been growing, but so far it's been confined to DRC. North Kivu is on the border with Uganda, and many people cross the border between Uganda and DRC each day. It's feared that Ebola will cross the border with the people, but that hasn't happened yet. According to one resident of the village of Mpondwe in Uganda, just across a bridge from the village of Lhubiriha: "I'm scared. Ebola hasn't reached our village but I hear it's coming." AFP and Center for Infectious Disease Research (CIDRAP) and AP and CNN Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC, Joseph Kabila, Laurent Kabila, Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, Russia, Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Medvedev, Ebola, World Health Organization, WHO, North Kivu, Beni, Butembo, Allied Democratic Forces, ADF, Lhubiriha, Uganda, Mpondwe Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- China hackers collect data on hundreds of millions of America - John J. Xenakis - 12-20-2018 *** 21-Dec-18 World View -- China hackers collect data on hundreds of millions of Americans and Westerners This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** China hackers collect data on hundreds of millions of Americans and Westerners **** Poster showing Chinese hackers displayed at Justice Dept. press conference on Thursday The Dept. of Justice on Thursday accused China of a massive international hacking scheme that penetrated commercial and military systems in at least 12 countries, including Brazil, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, India, Japan, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. An indictment charged two Chinese nationals, Zhu Hua and Zhang Shilong, with conspiracy to commit computer intrusions, conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft. According to the indictment: <QUOTE>"Over the course of the Technology Theft Campaign, which began in or about 2006, Zhu, Zhang, and their coconspirators in the APT10 Group successfully obtained unauthorized access to the computers of more than 45 technology companies and U.S. Government agencies based in at least 12 states, including Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Maryland, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Wisconsin. The APT10 Group stole hundreds of gigabytes of sensitive data and information from the victims’ computer systems, including from at least the following victims: seven companies involved in aviation, space and/or satellite technology; three companies involved in communications technology; three companies involved in manufacturing advanced electronic systems and/or laboratory analytical instruments; a company involved in maritime technology; a company involved in oil and gas drilling, production, and processing; and the NASA Goddard Space Center and Jet Propulsion Laboratory. In addition to those victims who had information stolen, Zhu, Zhang, and their co-conspirators successfully obtained unauthorized access to computers belonging to more than 25 other technology-related companies involved in, among other things, industrial factory automation, radar technology, oil exploration, information technology services, pharmaceutical manufacturing, and computer processor technology, as well as the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Finally, the APT10 Group compromised more than 40 computers in order to steal sensitive data belonging to the Navy, including the names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, salary information, personal phone numbers, and email addresses of more than 100,000 Navy personnel."<END QUOTE> Most of the news coverage has focused on the theft of commercial and military technology, and how that will be used by China's state-run companies and military. These technologies will be useful to the Chinese as they build weapons systems and prepare to launch a war on the United States. But for this article, I want to focus on the theft of personal data on Americans (and citizens of other Western countries). This indictment says that a hack of navy computers stole names, Social Security numbers, dates of birth, salary information, personal phone numbers, and email addresses of more than 100,000 Navy personnel. I recently described the Marriott hotel data breach by China's spy agency, the Ministry of State Security (MSS) which stole names, addresses, telephone numbers, credit card numbers, passport numbers, birthdates, passport photos, hotel arrival and departure dates, and information on where people traveled and with whom on roughly 500 million guests. Other data breaches attributed to China's MSS include a 2017 Equifax hack that collected detailed credit information on 145 million people, a 2013 Target breach that exposed payment card and contact information for 60 million customers, and a 2015 hack of the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) that collected detailed personal information on more than 20 million government employees, family members and applicants. There were other breaches of health-care institutions, including Anthem and CareFirst, that provided health data. China's military is creating a huge database of hundreds of millions of Americans. Such a database would be illegal in the United States, but it's being done by the Chinese. Dept of Justice and Dept of Justice and UK government and CNBC **** **** China cracks down on Twitter **** China's government has complete control over databases and servers in China, and can delete messages at will on Chinese social media platforms. But social media platforms outside of China, such as Twitter and Facebook, should be out of reach of the Chinese, right? In fact, since Twitter and Facebook are blocked in China, and only a person with sophisticated software skills can get to them from China, the Chinese can simply ignore then, right? Starting in early November, China's government launched a large campaign to remove from Twitter tweets that the government finds offensive. Many of these tweets were written years ago. Apparently this was done very rapidly, in order to maintain the element of surprise before Twitter users had a chance to arrange for all their tweets to be safely backed up. If the owner of the Twitter account is in China, the government security thugs simply arrested him, brought him into a police station, and demanded that he access his Twitter account immediately and delete all his tweets. This apparently happened to quite a few people. In many cases, however, the Chinese government was able to delete tweets from an account without the participation of the account owner, or knowing his password. The methods by which they did this are a sketchy in the reports, but I believe the following is how they accomplished it. In most online systems, you can change or reset your password automatically, and then the system sends you an e-mail message where you have to click on something to confirm the change. Only the owner of that e-mail account should have access to it, so that should provide a secure means of confirmation. However, if your e-mail account is in China, then the Chinese government can gain control of it, and then make the password change on the Twitter account, and confirm it on the e-mail account, without you even knowing. However, many online services go further and also use the telephone. Instead of (or in addition to) sending you an e-mail message. the online service will ring your telephone, using a phone number for you that it has on file, and then the recorded voice says, "press 1 to confirm or 2 to cancel," or something like that. In America, that should be secure means of confirmation, since only you can answer that phone number. But if it's a Chinese phone number then, as in the case of e-mail, the military can take control of your phone number and then use it to confirm a password change. There's one more method that China's military could be using. If you have Chinese-manufactured phone from Huawei or ZTE, it's believed that these phones have back doors that the Chinese military can use to access data, or even to control the phone. This would provide another method for confirming a password change. The point is that China's military is willing to use any means it can to steal information, and they're willing to try everything, no matter how obscure, until something works. That's why they already have a database containing personal information of hundreds of millions of Americans. Last week, I received a letter from Bowker Corp. saying that their database had been hacked, and my data might have been compromised. There are companies being hacked successfully every day, sometimes by kids in basements, sometimes by the Russians, and sometimes by the Chinese. The Chinese in particular are using every technique available to them to get as much data on ordinary Americans as they can, and merge it into a database that they can access at any time they want to track someone. Human Rights Watch and Radio Free Asia and Hong Kong Free Press and China Change **** **** China extends its 'social credit score' system to Americans and Westerners **** There has been a lot of news recently about China's "Social Credit Score" system that has been rumored for a long time and was officially announced in December. China is creating a large "big data" database of all of its 1.3 billion people, accumulating data from a variety of departments and agencies, combining the data in individual data agency databases into a large database, and using it to crease a credit score for every Chinese citizen. The system will reward "pro-social behaviors," such as volunteer work and blood donations. The system will penalize things like violating traffic laws or charging under-the-table fees. Agencies like tourism bodies, business regulators and transit authorities are supposed to work together. These agencies will provide data on private citizens to the central system, and will then use the credit score to reward or punish citizens. In fact, the system is already partially in place, in that people with unacceptable credit scores have already been blocked from booking more than 11 million flights and 4 million high-speed train trips. According to reports, other punishments include slower internet speeds, reducing access to good schools for individuals or their children, banning people from certain jobs, preventing booking at certain hotels and losing the right to own pets. Many Americans and Westerners view this system with little more than curiosity, thinking that applies only to Chinese citizens in China, so it doesn't matter to them. Starting with Thursday's indictments against Chinese hackers, it's becoming increasingly clear that the Chinese military is going a lot farther, and creating databases of hundreds of millions of people in other countries, whether American, or others. Of course, the data on foreign citizens is not readily available to the military in the way that domestic data is, but the Chinese are employing increasingly sophisticated methods to collect this data on foreign citizens, whether hacking Western commercial or government databases, or using its vast population studying and working overseas to collect data and information and pass it back to China. Bloomberg and Xinhua and Independent (London) and Life Site News **** **** Steve Bannon: Chinese engineers working on American weapons systems **** China has a massive population of 1.3 billion people and, as I've written several times in the past, China considers these people to be "magic weapons" to be used in other countries to infiltrate government, military and commercial organizations, and to influence these organizations as well as to collect information about them to be sent back to China's military. Steve Bannon, formerly the chief strategist and advisor to president Donal Trump, has researched the extent that Chinese engineers are working on American weapons systems. According to Bannon, many Chinese workers start out as students in American colleges, through Confucius Institutes, controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) through Beijing's international coercive propaganda agency, the United Front Work Department (UFWD), and funded by China's military. Every aspect of the Confucian Institutes is tightly controlled by the CCP. 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. Bannon says that Chinese students study in colleges to get access to the latest scientific research to be passed back to the CCP. These students become contractors to get access to the latest American weapons systems, once again for the CCP. According to Bannon, Defense Department reports on the infiltration of China into our research universities and our weapons labs shows extensive infiltration: <QUOTE>"I don't think people understand these reports. These reports are essentially declassified reports that showed that the 300,000 students are here on student visas and the 10,000 contractors that we have the weapons labs -- I think that up to 2/3 of them could be intelligence assets, intelligence officers or agents. This is political correctness and greed and avarice writ large. How did contractors-- and let's call them out-- Booz Allen and all these contractors-- how do these contractors and these big government programs get so many Chinese nationals working into our weapons labs? Our weapons labs are at the cutting edge of national security. How did it happen? ... The political correctness of it all-- the Financial Times of London leaked the other day that my colleague, Stephen Miller, who's a terrific young man, actually had the plan in place to get all 300,000 Chinese students out of the country with a way to cut the visas off right away. Not that we we're going to execute on it, but it was even in thinking. And obviously, it got leaked. In the Times, it goes around the State Department, et cetera. Look at all the appeasers. I am so glad. I take great pride that someone like Susan Thornton now owns a farm up in Maine because she was part of this kind of rational accommodationist, this softness in the Defense Department, in the State Department, in our intelligence services that basically went along with what China wanted to do and looked the other way."<END QUOTE> A book titled "Silent Invasion: How China Is Turning Australia into a Puppet State," written by Clive Hamilton, documents the extent to which Chinese nationals have infiltrated Australia's government, and influences its policies. Several publishers withdrew offers to publish the book because of pressure from the Chinese Communist Party. As one Australian commenter pointed out, he could walk into any bookstore or library in Australia and find a dozen books that accused the CIA of controlling Australia's government and institutions, and no one would care. However, just one book about China caused a furious, threatening response from China. ( "26-Feb-18 World View -- New book documents extensive Chinese infiltration into Australia's organizations" ) The book was finally published in February, thanks to pressure from alarmed members of the Australian parliament's national security committee. His research revealed evidence of CCP influence and infiltration in politics, culture, real estate, agriculture, universities, unions, and even primary schools. The book lists more than 40 former and sitting Australian politicians allegedly doing the work of China's totalitarian Government, if sometimes unwittingly. Another book documented similar infiltration into New Zealand's government. ( "16-Feb-18 World View -- Concerns grow over China's covert infiltration into New Zealand's government" ) There are some changes in the works. Some colleges have severed relations with Confucius Institutes, and 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 force universities to choose between receiving funding the Pentagon and funding from China's military. The information provided by China's "magic weapons," the Chinese nationals working and studing in the West, can provide a great deal more information to add to the data collected by hacks of hotel databases and other sources. ZeroHedge and RealVision Related Articles:
**** **** Huawei chairman challenges US to prove they're a security risk **** Several countries, including the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan have banned or are considering banning routers and other equipment from Huawei Technologies Ltd., the world's largest global maker of network gear, because it's feared that these products contain "back doors" that allow them to be secretly accessed and controlled from China. The result is that Huawei is being shut out of supplying products for the latest 5G networks. As I've said in the past, I've spent a part of my career as a senior software engineer developing chip-level operating system software for embedded systems, so I know exactly how any chip or any electronic device can be turned into a tool for espionage. Furthermore, I can tell you that not only is it doable, it's not even particularly difficult for someone with the right skills. Now Ken Hu, the chairman of Huawei, is challenging America and other companies to provide evidence that Huawei products are in fact security risks. He complains that the accusations stem from “ideology and geopolitics.” He warned that excluding Huawei from fifth-generation networks in Australia and other markets would hurt consumers by raising prices and slowing innovation. According to Hu: <QUOTE>"There has never been any evidence that our equipment poses a security threat. ...We have never accepted complaints from any government to damage the networks or business of any of our customers."<END QUOTE> The problem is that Huawei could develop a chipset that works exactly as described in the public specifications. The chipset could be subjected to thousands of tests, and they would all work perfectly. But what Huawei could do is install a "backdoor" into the chipset. When the chip receives, say, a secret 1024-bit code, then it will execute commands sent to it by Chinese engineers. Thus, the Chinese are then in control of any devices with Huawei chips, and it cannot be detected until it's too late. Now, as everyone knows, I'm a very helpful kind of guy, and I want to be helpful to Chairman Hu, and tell him how he can regain the confidence of the West that his chips and devices do not contain back doors. And I offer this advice in the spirit of peace, cooperation and friendship between America and China. Hu has the burden of proof backwards. He's asking America to prove there's a security risk. Actually, the burden is on him to do the opposite -- prove affirmatively that there's no security risk. How does he do that? Here's how:
This will permit Ken Hu to prove that Huawei's products pose no security risks, and he can then ask that the bans to their use can be lifted. I hope that Ken Hu will implement these suggestions, which have been offered in the spirit of peace, cooperation and friendship between the American and Chinese people, and because I would like to help him get the Huawei ban lifted. AP Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, Marriot Hotel, Ministry of State Security, MSS, Zhu Hua, Zhang Shilong, APT10, Twitter, Facebook, Social Credit Score, Steve Bannon, Clive Hamilton, Australia, Silent Invasion, New Zealand, Huawei, Ken Hu Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- China's CPEC project in Pakistan turns military, marginalizin - John J. Xenakis - 12-21-2018 &&3 *** bb: gde181222b 22-Dec-18 World View -- China's CPEC project in Pakistan turns military, marginalizing Balochistan *** 22-Dec-18 World View -- China's CPEC project in Pakistan turns military, marginalizing Balochistan 22-Dec-18 World View -- China's CPEC project in Pakistan turns military, marginalizing Balochistan <!---- ************* Start ****** --> *** 22-Dec-18 World View -- China's CPEC project in Pakistan turns military, marginalizing Balochistan This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** China's CPEC project marginalizes Pakistan's restive Balochistan province **** China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Balochistan province in the southwest occupies 44% of the land area, but is being marginalized by CPEC. (Independent.in) Ever since the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) was launched on May 22, 2013, both the Chinese and Pakistan government promised that the project would bring wealth to Balochistan province, home of Pakistan's marginalized ethnic Baloch people. Balochistan officials have been complaining for years that Balochistan is being shortchanged, and claim that both Pakistan and China denied. However, it couldn't be verified, because the details of the CPEC deal between Pakistan and China are top secret, just like all the deals in China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) program. Many of these deals are assumed to be "debt traps" for the countries involved, ensnaring a country in debt to China that can't be paid back, giving China leverage to take control of land and other assets in the client country. However, the Balochistan Cabinet were stunned on December 10 when some of the secrecy was pulled back in a briefing, revealing the following:
Pakistan government officials claim that the lack of funding to Balochistan are "concocted stories" to damage the China-Pakistan relationship, and that they are "fully committed" to more investment in Balochistan. The explosive report showed that the most extreme claims of Baloch activists have turned out to be true. The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist terror group, have opposed the project since its inception, claiming that Balochistan was being "colonized" by Punjabi and Chinese workers. ( "6-Nov-18 World View -- Pakistan's Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) claims credit for killing CPEC workers" ) Insurgents trying to disrupt construction of CPEC projects in Balochistan have killed 66 persons since 2014. The BLA have been conducting a series of terror attacks on Chinese and Punjabi workers, and are promising to continue. Dawn and South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP - India) and Asia Times Related Articles:
**** **** NY Times: CPEC in Pakistan will build military jets and weaponry for China **** China has demanded that all the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) deals be kept top secret, and a recent report has revealed one of the reasons why. BRI is supposed to be building roads and bridges and ports. But according to documents uncovered by the NY Times, China and Pakistan plan to create a special economic zone under CPEC in Pakistan to produce a new generation of fighter jets, navigation systems, radar systems, and onboard weapons. This would expand China and Pakistan’s current cooperation on the JF-17 fighter jet, which is assembled at Pakistan’s military-run Kamra Aeronautical Complex in Punjab province. China has already signed an agreement with Pakistan to build a network of satellite stations to establish the Beidou Navigation System as an alternative to the American GPS network. This will be major technology that China provides to numerous countries in Asia, Africa and Europe, and strengthens the military space capabilities of the Chinese military. Revelation of the military deal also resolves a mystery. As we've reported numerous times, Pakistan is on the brink of bankruptcy, and Pakistan’s first debt repayments to China are set for next year, starting at about $300 million and gradually increasing to reach about $3.2 billion by 2026. Pakistan has been begging for money from China, Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates, and all have refused. Finally, Pakistan asked the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for another loan, but one of the conditions of an IMF loan is that every detail of the relationship between Pakistan and China would have to be revealed. Apparently China has had a change of heart. The Chinese Embassy in Islamabad demanded that CPEC deals be kept secret and promised to loan more money to Pakistan. Generational Dynamics predicts that in the approaching Clash of Civilizations world war, the "allies" of America, India, Russia, Iran and the West will be at war with the "axis" of China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim countries. China is Pakistan's "all-weather friend," whose friendship is "higher than mountains, deeper than oceans, stronger than steel, sweeter than honey, and dearer than eyesight." This military relationship brings the two countries ever closer together. NY Times and The News (Pakistan) and India Times Related Articles
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Pakistan, Imran Khan, International Monetary Fund, IMF, China, China Pakistan Economic Corridor, CPEC, Balochistan, Balochistan Liberation Army, BLA, Belt and Road Initiative, BRI, India, Hubco Coal Power Plant, Gwadar Port Project, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, UAE, Punjab, Kamra Aeronautical Complex, Beidou Navigation System Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Al-Shabaab double bombing kills 16 people in Mogadishu, Somal - John J. Xenakis - 12-22-2018 *** 23-Dec-18 World View -- Al-Shabaab double bombing kills 16 people in Mogadishu, Somalia This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Al-Shabaab double bombing kills 16 people in Mogadishu, Somalia **** Site of Mogadishu bombing on Saturday (AP) A massive car bomb detonated at a military checkpoint near Somalia's presidential palace in the capital city Mogadishu on Saturday, followed by a smaller explosion nearby. At least 16 people were killed, and dozens injured. The bombings appeared to target people heading to work. Al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda linked terror group, took responsibility for the attacks. One of those killed was prominent journalist Awil Dahir Salad. The attack comes a week after six airstrikes from US warplanes killed 62 al-Shabaab militants, according to the US military. The US has a huge military base in neighboring Djibouti, from which the US has launched 40 air strikes so far this year, compared to 35 in 2017. It's estimated that at least 400 people have been killed in air strikes since the beginning of 2017, far more than the previous 10 years combined. US airstrikes have forced al-Shabaab to change its tactics. Instead of targeting Somali government with mass attacks and assassinations, which expose its fighters to airstrikes, they've instead increase urban guerrilla warfare of terrorist bombings. Al-Shabaab (AS) is an indigenous jihadist terror group which has pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda. There is a separate jihadist group in Puntland (northern Somalia) affiliated with ISIS called "IS Somalia" or ISS (Abnaa ul-Calipha). However, ISS has had nowhere near the success in blowing people up that AS has had. Both groups have been increasingly demanding that businesses pay them taxes, in exchange for "protection" from bombings and terror attacks. Thus, both AS and ISS are increasingly acting more and more like Mafia criminals, rather than pious jihadists. AP and Reuters and BBC and Hiraal Institute **** **** Somalia's 'Black Hawk Down' event affects US policy today **** In 1988, a full-scale generational crisis civil war began in Somalia which, combined with a growing famine, was killing tens of thousands of people. In the final days of his presidency, George H.W. Bush committed ordered more than 20,000 troops into Somalia to calm the situation and to “save thousands of innocents from death.” As always happens in a generational crisis war, the situation deteriorated, and in October 1993, elite American troops launched a disastrous raid in the Somali capital Mogadishu. Two American Black Hawk helicopters were shot down using rocket-propelled grenades. Some of the survivors were rescued, but two pilots were attacked by a mob of thousands of Somalis who hacked them to death with machetes and dragged their mutilated bodies through the streets as trophies. The result was a 15-hour battle that killed hundreds of Somalis, as well as about 18 Americans and two UN soldiers. The "Black Hawk Down" incident, which was later made into a movie, was the climax of the Battle of Mogadishu and also the climax of Somalia's civil war. Black Hawk Down shocked the American public, and caused the US under Bill Clinton to withdraw its forces from Somalia in 1994, and to be reluctant to intervene in African crises since then. So, for example, the US stayed out of the massive Rwanda massacre in 1994, which is probably just as well. The American military's hasty retreat was viewed by many as a sign of weakness -- that the United States could not tolerate military casualties. In 1996, Osama bin Laden taunted the Clinton administration about its withdrawal: "You left carrying disappointment, humiliation, defeat and your dead with you." After the terror attack on 9/11/2001, US Special Forces began gradually returning to Africa. By 2016, 17% of all Special Forces deployed overseas were in Africa. About 40 American soldiers were sent to Somalia in March 2017, the largest deployment of American troops to the Horn of Africa since Black Hawk Down in 1993. Their job was not combat, but was rather to train the Somalis to fight al-Shabaab on their own, supported by American airstrikes. Today, 17 years after 9/11, it seems clear that the "war on terror" is not being won, and this is causing the Trump administration to reevaluate its military policies. This has resulted in announcements of troop withdrawals from Syria and Afghanistan, and may lead to other announcements. Washington Post and AP Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Somalia, Mogadishu, Djibouti, al-Shabaab, AS, IS Somalia, ISS, Abnaa ul-Calipha, Battle of Mogadishu, Black Hawk Down, Rwanda, Osama bin Laden, Syria, Afghanistan Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from S - John J. Xenakis - 12-23-2018 *** 24-Dec-18 World View -- Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Donald Trump's announcement of troop withdrawal signals end of 'War on Terror' **** James Mattis and Donald Trump (Reuters) President Donald Trump's announcements of troop withdrawal from Syria and partial troop withdrawal from Afghanistan signal a major policy change, in that it signals the end of the "War on Terror" that began on 9/11/2001. The announcement is being widely ridiculed by the mainstream press and politicians, most of whom probably couldn't find Syria on a map if they had to. Much of the ridicule followed from the letter of resignation from Defense Secretary James Mattis, following Trump's announcement: <QUOTE>"My views on treating allies with respect and also being clear-eyed about both malign actors and strategic competitors are strongly held and informed by over four decades of immersion in these issues. We must do everything possible to advance an international order that is most conducive to our security, prosperity and values, and we are strengthened in this effort by the solidarity of our alliances. Because you have the right to have a Secretary of Defense whose views are better aligned with yours on these and other subjects, I believe it is right for me to step down from my position."<END QUOTE> Brett McGurk, special presidential envoy for the global coalition to defeat ISIS, also resigned. Typical remarks from the mainstream media are that the Trump White House is now in a downward spiral because Mattis was "the only adult in the room." With this major change of policy occurring right at the end of 2018, an end-of-the-year look at events is in order. As the end of the year approaches, this is a good time for a thorough review of many Generational Dynamics principles and to see how these principles apply to an in-depth analysis of the announced troop withdrawal from Syria. Military Times and Fox News **** **** Generational Dynamics analysis of the troop withdrawal from Syria **** In the last two years, I've seen and heard one hysterical condemnation of president Trump's policies after another in the mainstream media, mostly from so-called "experts" who have no clue what's going on in the world. These people have been wrong almost every time, but that never stops them. On the other hand, I've written thousands of generational analyses in the last 15 years, and they've all turned out to be true or are trending true. None has turned out to be wrong. The withdrawal from Syria signals a major change in policy that has completely baffled the mainstream "experts." So these people have been repeatedly wrong time after time for two years, and I've been repeatedly right for two years, so I'm pretty sure I'm going to be right again, and they're going to be wrong again. So, Dear Reader, believe whom you wish. In the last two years, I've pointed out many times that Trump's policies make perfect sense when viewed from the point of view of Generational Dynamics. Trump himself is familiar with Generational Dynamics analyses, because he was educated about them by his former chief strategist and advisor Steve Bannon, with whom I worked off and on for several years. And, once again, despite the fact that the mainstream "experts" are totally baffled, Trump's policies in Syria make perfect sense from the point of view of Generational Dynamics. Actually, this one is pretty easy. The Generational Dynamics prediction has always been that we're headed for a "Clash of Civilizations world war." The "allies" will be the United States, India, Russia and Iran, while the "axis" will be China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim countries. I've written about the reasons for this hundreds of times, and the summary behind the reasoning is as follows: China is very closely allied with Pakistan, which is very closely allied with the Sunni states. China and India are bitter enemies, as are Pakistan and India. Russia and India are very closely allied, and India is very closely allied with Iran, as Hindus have been allied with Shia Muslims going back to the Battle of Karbala in 680. Connecting the dots, the US is going to be allied with India, Russia and Iran, versus China, Pakistan, and the Sunni Muslim states. If that seems surprising, remember that Russia was our bitter enemy before WW II, was our ally during WW II, and was our bitter enemy after WW II, so you can't judge from today's political alignments how nations will act when they're facing an existential crisis in the form of a generational crisis war. So that's the Generational Dynamics prediction, and we assume that Trump is aware of it and believes it, as he should. Now we take note of the of the following:
So if you're baffled by Trump's withdrawal policy, just read the above list. When you look at that list, it makes perfect sense to withdraw some resources from Syria and Afghanistan, in order to allocate them to the approaching war with China. It makes perfect sense to prepare for the coming preemptive attack by China on the United States. Keeping troops in Syria does not do that. So why did Mattis and McGurk leave? I don't know for sure, of course, but I assume that Mattis and McGurk don't believe that we're headed for a war with China. They're wrong. I assume that many people reading this article don't believe that we're headed for a war with China. You're wrong. If Mattis and McGurk want to focus a lot of resources in Syria, then they're "fighting the last war." If Mattis and McGurk are unwilling to face what's going on in the world with China, with startling events unfolding in China almost every day, then Mattis and McGurk should go. On Sunday morning I listened to the news shows, and heard one "expert" after another talk about "chaos," "Trump out of control," "Trump is crazy," "the wheels are coming off," "Trump should be impeached," and so on. I would be concerned, except that it's no different from what I've heard every Sunday for two years, except that the screams today are perhaps a bit louder and a bit more hysterical and high-pitched. I have a theory. I think that most people are viscerally aware that we're headed for war with China, and they can't stand to think about it, so they become hysterical and displace their hysteria from China to Trump. There was a similar level of hysteria in the late 1930s directed at Franklin Roosevelt, as the war in Europe against Nazi Germany approached. The best example was Neville Chamberlain's promise of "Peace in our time." Washington Post **** **** The future of ISIS and the Kurds **** The big picture is that it makes sense to withdraw forces from Syria in order to prepare for an inevitable war with China. But many people believe that we have a moral obligation to protect the Kurds and to continue to fight ISIS. (Many other people claim that we never any business being in Syria in the first place.) An argument that I heard several times in mainstream media is: "Trump says ISIS is defeated and he's wrong. ISIS is still in Syria, in Egypt, in Nigeria, in Yemen, in Afghanistan, and so forth. ISIS is spreading around the world, and is nowhere near being defeated." This argument was put forth by several "experts" -- college professors, book authors, diplomats, etc. And yet, this argument is so dumb that it serves as a good example of brainless idiocy we're seeing as common fare today. Let's take Egypt for example. Has ISIS really spread to Egypt? The jihadist group in Egypt was originally the al-Qaeda linked Bedouin-based Sinai terrorist group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM). In 2015 it changed its name to al-Wilayat Sinai (Province of Sinai) and changed its allegiance to ISIS. This was a change for public relations reasons, and nothing else. It allows ABM to be associated with an up-and-coming brand name, and it allows Amaq, the ISIS public relations agency, to put out press releases about the group. But it's exactly the same group. Being aligned with ISIS or aligned with al-Qaeda is completely irrelevant. Now that ISIS is on the run, ABM may change their allegiance back to al-Qaeda, though they'll look like complete fools if they do. The point is that fighting ISIS in Syria has nothing to do with fighting ABM in Egypt. The two are completely unrelated except for a public relations link. This is really basic, obvious stuff, that any so-called "expert" should understand before calling himself an "expert." Instead, these "experts" have no clue what's going on, probably couldn't pick out Syria on map if they had to, are wrong time after time, and yet continue to say one really dumb thing after another. It reminds me of 2007, when a survey by Congressional Quarterly and the London Times revealed that so-called "experts" at the time didn't even know whether al-Qaeda was a Shia or Sunni group. ( "Guess what? British politicians and journalists are just as ignorant as Americans (14-Jan-2007)" ) All of this goes well beyond ideology. It's sheer ignorance and stupidity, by people who babble endlessly with no idea what they're saying. So what about ISIS in Syria? Is ISIS defeated there, as Trump claimed? ISIS mainly consists of jihadists who came to Syria to fight against Bashar al-Assad after he began genocidal attacks and ethnic cleansing targeting Arab Sunnis, particularly after his massive attack on innocent women and children in a Palestinian refugee camp near Latakia. ( "1-Dec-18 World View -- Evidence grows of Assad's 'final solution', extermination of Arab Sunnis in Syria" ) In November 2016, the US announced a joint operation with the Kurdish led Syrian Defense Forces (SDF) to recapture al-Raqqa, the ISIS "capital city" and "Caliphate," and a city of over 300,000 people, from ISIS. ( "7-Nov-16 World View -- US-backed Kurdish militias in Syria make surprise announcement of Raqqa operation" ) That was the commitment that President Obama made, and President Trump followed through on that commitment. There was no commitment to fight ISIS forever, and there was no commitment to protect the Kurds forever. The Kurds are better off today than they were when the joint operation began, and ISIS has been ejected from al-Raqqa, and has been reduced to just one of many local jihadist groups in the world. America's commitment has been met. I discussed some of these issues in yesterday's article on al-Shabaab in Somalia. America has been fighting the "war on terror" since 9/11/2001, and by one estimate, America is still conducting counterterror operations in 76 countries. And yet, after 17 years, the war on terror has been increasingly a failure. As I've written many times, the current violence in the Arab/Muslim world can be dated to three epochal events that occurred in 1979. These were Iran's Islamic Revolution, the Salafist attack on Saudi Arabia's Grand Mosque, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. These three events led to the growth of modern terrorism, including the 9/11 attacks, and there is absolutely nothing that the US can do to stop this, certainly not with US special forces. Here we have one more example of so-called Mideast "experts" having absolutely no clue what's going on. They have no idea what happened in 1979, they go on tv and make one dumb statement after another, they always turn out to be wrong, but it goes on anyway. That's the world we live in. One particularly laughable "expert" interview occurred on Sunday on the BBC World Service. The politician made every possible criticism of Trump and the Syria decision that he could think of. The interview lasted about four minutes, and at different times he said that Trump would be turning northeast Syria over to a reconstituted ISIS, and then to Iran, and then to Russia, and then to Turkey, and also to al-Assad. Oh really? Which one is it? And if there's a war among all these groups, does we really want the American military to be involved in it? On whose side? There's a war coming, no matter what we do. The point is that terrorism will not be stopped, and is the precursor to a larger regional Mideast war that is coming with 100% certainty, pitting Arabs vs Jews, Sunnis vs Shias, and various ethnic groups against each other. This will be part of the Clash of Civilizations world war, and nothing can be done to prevent it. America's joint operation with the SDF to eject ISIS from al-Raqqa was a benefit to America, to Europe, the Kurds, and the world. But it's over now. America is in no position to fight ISIS forever, or to protect the Kurds forever, and troop withdrawal from Syria was going to happen sometime. Business Insider **** **** The future of Afghanistan **** In addition to a troop withdrawal from Syria, President Trump announced that 7,000 of the 14,000 American troops in Afghanistan would be brought home. Ever since President Obama announced the troop surge into Afghanistan in 2009, I've written repeatedly that the Taliban cannot be defeated. This is an outcome of the 1980s Soviet war in Afghanistan and, more importantly, the extremely bloody Afghan civil war from 1991-96. This is yet another example of something that the mainstream so-called "experts" are completely oblivious to, and yet these are the crucial events to understanding what's going on today. The events of the last ten years have shown that this war cannot be won, and the situation is actually getting worse each year. Earlier this month, Lt. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the incoming head of the US Central Command, testified that the Afghanistan war is unsustainable. Reducing the number of American troops in Afghanistan does not end our commitment to Afghanistan, which is to aid in the training of Afghan soldiers to defend themselves. It does mean that the Taliban have fewer American targets to kill, which is probably a good thing. In the past, I've speculated that a part of President Trump's strategy is that, as war with China and Pakistan approaches, to keep American troops active in Afghanistan, and to continue to maintain several American military bases in Afghanistan, including two air bases in Bagram and Kandahar International Airport. If this is the strategy, then removing 7,000 troops will probably not affect it. Fox News **** **** The future of Generational Dynamics **** At my age, I'm unable to get employment as a journalist, analyst, or a senior software engineer, because no one wants to hire an older person. (Actually, age discrimination in the computer industry is so great that no one over age 45 or so can get a job anymore.) This means that my only income source is social security, and I'm going to run out of money in a few months, which will be the end of BOTH me and Generational Dynamics. I've done this work for years as a public service, but now that has to end. If you think that this work has been valuable, then any help that anyone can provide to resolve this situation would be greatly appreciated. Resume Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Afghanistan, al-Raqqa, James Mattis, Brett McGurk, Steve Bannon, Syrian Democratic Forces, SDF, Kurds, China, India, Pakistan, Russia, Iran, Battle of Karbala, Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh, Neville Chamberlain, Egypt, Ansar Jerusalem, Ansar Bayt al Maqdis, ABM, Champions of Jerusalem, Bedouins, Sinai Province, Al Wilayat Sinai, Libya, al-Shabaab, Saudi Arabia, Grand Mosque, Iran, Turkey Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Christmas in Bethlehem is the biggest in years - John J. Xenakis - 12-24-2018 *** 25-Dec-18 World View -- Christmas in Bethlehem is the biggest in years This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Christmas in Bethlehem is the biggest in years **** Christmas eve celebrations at Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem on Monday (AFP) It's Christmas in Bethlehem today (Tuesday). Bethlehem is unique in that it celebrates Christmas three times each year:
About 50% of the Palestinian Arab Christian community across Israel and the Palestinian territories belong to the Orthodox Church of Jerusalem, and celebrate Christmas on January 7. Pilgrims from around the world come to the West Bank city of Bethlemen each year to celebrate Christmas at the Church of the Nativity, venerated as the site of Jesus Christ's birth. In past years, tourists have stayed away because of tensions and violence between Israelis and Palestinians. Last year, tensions were high because of repeated violence around the al-Aqsa Mosque / Temple Mount compound, and then again when President Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. However, this has been a relatively quiet year in the West Bank, and so this has been a record setting year in terms of tourism. Some three million tourists have visited Bethlehem this year, and the city's hotels hosted an "astounding" 10,000 tourist overnight on Christmas eve. AFP and AP Related Articles:
**** **** DJIA falls 650 points on Monday **** The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) fell 652.83 points on Monday, and other Wall Street indexes fell proportionally. CNBC described the market decline as "very orderly." If the decline continues and becomes "disorderly," then that will be an actual stock market panic. The S&P 500 Price/Earnings ratio is around 20, and has been above 20 for years. The historic average is 14, which means that the stock market is in a huge bubble, and something will trigger a total panic and implosion. The P/E ratio fell to the 5-6 range three times in the last century, the last time in 1982, and when it does, the DJIA will fall to around 3000. There's been a lot of nonsense on television about President Trump blaming the Fed for a stock market crash. Blaming the Fed does no harm, but it does no good either. It's irrelevant. There was a similar stock market bubble in 1929. It's been 89 years since the 1929 panic, and to this day nobody knows what triggered it, and why it happened on August 28 rather than a few months earlier or later. The same will be true when the new panic occurs this time. I hope Trump understands that he who lives by the stock market dies by the stock market. Market Watch and Bloomberg Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Christmas, Bethlehem, West Bank, Church of the Nativity, al-Aqsa Mosque, Temple Mount compound, Jerusalem, Dow Jones Industrial Average, DJIA Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Sudan police crack down violently against anti-government pro - John J. Xenakis - 12-25-2018 *** 26-Dec-18 World View -- Sudan police crack down violently against anti-government protesters This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Sudan police crack down violently against anti-government protesters **** Anti-government protesters in Atbara, Sudan, on 20-Dec wave their hands at security forces (Sudan Tribune) As of Monday, at least 37 people have been killed by Sudan's security forces attempting to quash anti-government protests that began in the suburbs on Wednesday of last week, and spread to the capital city Khartoum. Security forces have been shooting live fire and teargas into crowds of thousands of peaceful demonstrators. On Tuesday, police fired into the air, used teargas and hit demonstrators with batons to disperse them as they marched to the presidential palace to demand that Omar al-Bashir, who has been president of Sudan for 29 years, step down. Four members of the Central Doctors Committee, including a doctor, surgeon and medical student -- were shot by snipers Tuesday and were recovering in the hospital. The protests began last Wednesday, initially over rising prices and shortages of food and fuel, but later escalated into calls for al-Bashir to step down. As we've seen in one African country after another, the leader who has been in power for decades refuses to step down and uses the army and security forces to bash, arrest, torture and kill anyone who opposes him. There's nothing new here. Al-Bashir is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) over alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed during the Darfur conflict in western Sudan. Sudan's last generational crisis war was World War II, and so it's deep into a generational Crisis era. The current widespread protests could possible spiral into a full conflict. Sudan is a country of more than 40 million people, and is a special case in one sense. It depends on oil revenue, and when South Sudan broke off and became independent in 2011, Sudan lost three-quarters of its oil revenue. CNN and Amnesty International and AFP and Sudan Tribune and Still Sudan blog **** **** Recent generational history of Sudan **** Sudan's name in Arabic means "land of the blacks," which gives an idea of the Arab view of the nature of Sudan. For the purposes of Generational Dynamics, it's easiest to view Sudan as three separate regions, on three separate generational timelines:
The Darfur conflict began in the 1970s as minor land disagreements between farmers and camel herders. Droughts in the 1980s exacerbated the tensions, causing low-level violence. In the 1990s, the Khartoum government armed the Arab herders as the Janjaweed militias, authorizing them to police the Darfur region. In 2003, the Darfur conflict grew into a full-fledged generational crisis war. In 2007, the United Nations Security Council authorized a large international peacekeeping force in Darfur called UNAMID, but in the last year has been reducing the size of UNAMID, even though hostilities are still occurring in parts of Darfur. Sudan Tribune (12-Nov) and Mideast Forum (March 2001) Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Sudan, Khartoum, Omar al-Bashir, Darfur, Janjaweed Militias, South Sudan Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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-Dec-18 World View -- Socialist Venezuela's oil output plummets as refugee outflow - John J. Xenakis - 12-27-2018 *** 27-Dec-18 World View -- Socialist Venezuela's oil output plummets as refugee outflow surges This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** Socialist Venezuela's oil output continues to crash -- except for China joint venture **** Venezuelan migrants travel aboard a truck in Tumbes, Peru, near the Ecuador border, on 1 November (AFP) Venezuela's economy desperately needs to be able to sell oil in order to survive. But Venezuela's Socialist presidents Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro have done what many might consider to be an almost impossible feat -- turned the country with the largest oil reserves in the world into a country that can't produce oil. When you see something like this, it's almost impossible to believe it happened, but this is always what happens with Socialism. Other "Socialist paradise" countries, including China, Russia, East Germany, Cuba and Sweden, have partially or completely turned to free markets as their economies spiraled into disaster, but only two countries in the world haven't -- Venezuela and North Korea. And both are economic disasters as a result. In Venezuela, Maduro has fulfilled his Socialist dreams by turning the country's nationalized oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA) over to army generals and other political cronies to run, lest some dirty capitalist make a profit on Venezuela's oil. Well, Maduro has made sure that nobody is making money on Venezuela's oil, including Venezuela. Oil accounts for about 98% of Venezuela's export revenue, and in November 2017, Maduro put Major General Manuel Quevedo in charge of PDVSA, in the hope of stopping its collapse. Quevedo is a Maduro crony but knows nothing about the oil industry. In July, Quevedo joined his wife, a Catholic priest and a gathering of oil workers in prayer to ask God to boost oil output. Prayer is a great management technique, but unfortunately, God wasn't listening this time. The collapse has continued, and production has dropped 20% since Quevedo took over, and is now at the lowest level in nearly 70 years. And now there are reports that Maduro is thinking of firing Quevedo and replacing him with another army general who has no oil industry expertise. Ironically, Quevedo is scheduled in January to assume the rotating presidency of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) for one year. There is one subsidiary of PDVSA that that has increased oil production this year. Sinovensa is jointly owned by PDVSA and China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), and it accounts for about 10% of Venezuela's oil output. China has lent over $50 billion to Venezuela through oil-for-loan agreements over the past decade. China has not been producing enough oil to make the debt repayments, and so earlier this year China took over additional control of Sinovensa, and now owns 49% of the joint venture. The result is that oil production from Sinovensa increased 46% since April. Reuters and S&P Global and Hellenic Shipping and OilPrice.com **** **** UN prepares Venezuelan refugee crisis, the largest in modern Latin American history **** The problem of refugees fleeing from Venezuela into neighboring countries has become so massive that the United Nations refugee agency has created a Regional Refugee and Migrant Response Plan (RMRP) involving 95 organizations in 16 countries to respond to the humanitarian needs of the refugees and migrants from Venezuela. Almost 3.3 million Venezuelans have fled into neighboring countries and beyond. This exodus is already the largest in the modern history of Latin America and the Caribbean and involves both refugees and migrants from Venezuela. UNHCR expects that another two million Venezuelans will flee in 2019, with the result that about 5.4 million Venezuelans, or 17% of the country's total population, will be living abroad by the end of 2019. The RMRP organizations are also asking for $738 million in financing in hopes of providing assistance to 2.2 million Venezuelans and 500,000 people in the host communities. The United States has earmarked more than $95 million in aid to Colombia, Brazil and other host nations to deal with the Venezuelan crisis since fiscal year 2017. It's interesting to compare Venezuela and North Korea, the only two major Socialist countries left in the world. Both have devastated economies and enormous poverty. Both of them are supported by Russia and China. Both are international pariahs. There are some differences. Unlike North Korea, Venezuela doesn't have nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, and people are permitted to leave the country without getting shot to death. Miami Herald and UNHCR and Refugee and Migrant Response Plan (RMRP, PDF) Related articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Venezuela, Hugo Chávez, Nicolás Maduro, Manuel Quevedo, Petróleos de Venezuela S.A., PDVSA, Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC, Russia, North Korea, China, Sinovensa, China National Petroleum Corporation, CNPC, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR, Regional Refugee and Migrant Response Plan, RMRP Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 28-Dec-18 World View -- UAE reopens embassy in Syria to counter influence from Iran - John J. Xenakis - 12-27-2018 *** 28-Dec-18 World View -- UAE reopens embassy in Syria to counter influence from Iran This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
**** **** UAE reopens embassy in Syria to counter influence from Iran **** The UAE embassy in Damascus Syria on Thursday (AP) In a dramatic turnaround, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced that it is restoring diplomatic relations with Bashar al-Assad's government in Syria, and reopening its embassy in Syria's capital city Damascus. On Thursday afternoon, the UAE’s chargé d’affaires Abdul Hakim Naimi visited the Damascus embassy and watched the flag being raised again. UAE's Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that the UAE hopes to contribute to a political solution to the war: <QUOTE>"[The reopening of the embassy] reaffirms the keenness of the UAE to restore relations between the two friendly countries to their normal course. It will strengthen and activate the Arab role in supporting the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Syrian Arab Republic and to prevent the dangers of regional interference in Syrian Arab affairs."<END QUOTE> The "regional interference" being referenced is thought to be interference from Turkey, Iran and Hezbollah. It may already be too late to "prevent the dangers of regional interference" from Iran and Hezbollah. In the past seven years, Bashar al-Assad, backed by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah, have brought about then genocide and ethnic cleansing of vast portions of the Syria's Sunni Arab population, and is repopulating the cleansed areas with Shia Muslims families from Iran and Lebanon's Hezbollah. ( "1-Dec-18 World View -- Evidence grows of Assad's 'final solution', extermination of Arab Sunnis in Syria" ) Al-Assad's Shia/Alawite Syrian army has always fought the civil war half-heartedly, with crippling defections and desertions. The army almost collapsed in 2015, until al-Assad begged for help and was saved by the massive intervention by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah. That massive intervention continues until the present time, in the form of the "regional interference" that UAE's foreign ministry was referring to. So that's why preventing "the dangers of regional interference" may no longer be possible. The National (UAE) and Reuter and AP and The National (UAE) **** **** Arabs scramble to regain influence in Syria **** Al-Assad's massive attacks on the Sunni Arabs had several major consequences. One was that Syria was expelled from the Arab League, something that may now be reversed, beginning with the restoration of diplomatic relations by UAE. Officials from some Arab countries are now expressing regret that Syria was expelled from the Arab League, since it meant a complete loss of influence by the other Arab League members. But these crocodile tears ignore the reality of what was going on in 2011. By August of 2011, it was becoming clear that al-Assad was conducting genocidal and ethnic cleansing attacks on Sunni Arabs, and this was shocking and repulsive to the other Arab states. Arab nations stayed silent for several months, hoping that the carnage would end, but finally they broke their silence in August, after the Syrian army first attacked Homa and then began attacking the city of Deir Ezzor. The technique being used in each of these cities is that tanks first surround the city to prevent anyone from fleeing and then, once the city is sealed, the tanks start flattening residential neighborhoods and the snipers kill anyone on the street, even children. This is a classic ethnic cleansing technique. Al-Assad's actions were so shocking that finally the Arab League Secretary-General issued a statement strongly condemning al-Assad, and Saudi Arabia and the UAE recalled their ambassadors to Syria. Al-Assad's ethnic cleansing continued to worsen as he attacked the El-Ramel Palestinian refugee camp in Latakia killing many women and children and shocking the entire Sunni Muslim world. By mid-November, the Arab League suspended Syria -- the first such suspension since it expelled Egypt in 1979 for signing a peace treaty with Israel. To claim today that Syria should never have been expelled completely ignores the fury and chaos at the time. The attack on the Latakia also led to the creation of ISIS. Al-Assad's attacks drew tens of thousands of young Sunni jihadists from over 80 countries to Syria to fight al-Assad, and by 2014 they had formed the Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria (IS or ISIS or ISIL), and took control of a large region of eastern Syria, with the headquarters of its Caliphate in the Syrian city of al-Raqqa, with a population over 300,000. It took a joint operation by American forces leading the Kurdish Syrian Defense Forces (SDF) to recapture al-Raqqa. With the recent announcement by President Trump that American troops will be withdrawn from Syria, UAE's decision to restore relations with Syria takes on a much greater significance and urgency than before. The American withdrawal will create a vacuum in the huge eastern part of Syria, and that region will might now be taken over by Iran and Hezbollah. It's also increasing calls across the Arab world to re-admit Syria into the Arab League. With millions of Sunni Arabs slaughtered or expelled from Syria, and their homes replaced by Shia Muslim families from Iran, it now seems likely that Iran will have a great deal of influence in Syria. The war in Syria is far from over. With American troops withdrawing, Turkey has promised to invade Syria and attack the Kurdish SDF, which might bring Turkish troops into conflict with Syrian troops. Even worse, Idlib province in northwest Syria is currently hosting over three million Sunni Arabs. Al-Assad has vowed to regain control of Idlib, which would amount to genocide and ethnic cleansing of the three million Sunni Arabs currently living there. Idlib is a "de-escalation zone," with Turkey responsible for maintaining the ceasefire. An attack by al-Assad could lead to a full war between Syria and Turkey. Also, it could create a new humanitarian disaster, with millions of Sunni Arabs pouring across the border into Turkey, and from there into Europe, bring back the days of 2015. The National (UAE) and Sky News and Press TV (Iran) and The National (UAE) and Al Jazeera Related Articles:
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Bashar al-Assad, United Arab Emirates, UAE, Hakim Naimi, Arab League, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Russia, Turkey, Iran, Hezbollah, Homa, Deir Ezzor, Latakia, El-Ramel, Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh, Syrian Defense Forces, SDF, Kurds, Idlib Permanent web link to this article Receive daily World View columns by e-mail Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal 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 |