Generational Dynamics World View

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 26-May-17 World View -- Trump's Mideast visit triggers renewal of sharp split between Saudi Arabia and Qatar

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Trump's Mideast visit triggers renewal of sharp split between Saudi Arabia and Qatar
  
• Qatar claims that it was cyber-attacked after media reports supporting Iran
  
• Vitriolic Saudi-Qatari fault line reopened this week by Trump's visit
  
• Some useful information that's good to know
  

****
**** Trump's Mideast visit triggers renewal of sharp split between Saudi Arabia and Qatar
****


Trump signs $110 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia

President Donald Trump's harsh condemnation of Iran during Monday's
visit to Saudi Arabia has apparently triggered a renewal of a
long-standing split between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, and within the GCC
(Gulf Cooperation Council) in general. The GCC is an organization of
Arab nations (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the
United Arab Emirates (UAE)) on the Arabian Gulf.

The joint statement issued after Trump's meeting with Saudi King
Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud said the following:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"22. The two leaders also agreed on the need to
> contain Iran’s malign interference in the internal affairs of
> other states, instigation of sectarian strife, support of
> terrorism and armed proxies, and efforts to destabilize the
> countries in the region.
>
> 23. The two leaders also stressed that Iran’s interference poses
> a threat to the security of the region and the world, and that the
> nuclear agreement with Iran needs to be re-examined in some of its
> clauses. The Iranian ballistic missile program poses a threat, not
> only to neighboring countries, but also a direct threat to the
> security of all countries in the region as well as global
> security."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

The next day, at a meeting with Israeli officials in Jerusalem, he
said, "Most importantly, the United States and Israel can declare with
one voice that Iran must never be allowed to possess a nuclear weapon
- never, ever - and must cease its deadly funding, training and
equipping of terrorists and militias, and it must cease immediately."

Iran's newly reelected president Hassan Rouhani called Trump's
appearance a "theatrical gathering with no practical or political
value," saying that "You can't solve terrorism just by giving your
people's money to a superpower."

Rouhani was alluding to the deals that Trump and Salman signed for
Saudi Arabia to purchase $110 billion in weapons from the US.

Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi called on Washington
to abandon its "warmongering policy, intervention, Iranophobia and
sales of dangerous and useless weapons to the main sponsors of
terrorism." White House and Reuters and CNN

****
**** Qatar claims that it was cyber-attacked after media reports supporting Iran
****

The above reactions from Iran were to be expected, and were just a
repetition of the sorts of things that Iranian hardliners say about
the United States every day. Nothing new there.

The reaction that created shocked waves was from Qatar, when Qatari
emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani was quoted as saying: "There is
no reason behind Arabs' hostility to Iran and our [Qatar's]
relationship with Israel is good." The statement also praised the
Muslim Brotherhood, as well as Iran's puppet terrorist group,
Hezbollah.

The statements were immediately picked up by media in Saudi Arabia and
other GCC countries. An official in the UAE said:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Qatar favoring the MB and Iran over Saudi Arabia, the
> Emirates, Kuwait and Bahrain is a serious political crisis.
>
> We concluded the summits in Riyadh, thanking God for uniting Arab,
> Islamic and international stances and the 3 summits were
> successful. However, we were surprised today to hear that Qatar’s
> stance has changed; we believe that is neither a suitable timing,
> nor suitable excuses or good statements. We ask Allah to guide
> Qatar."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Four Arab countries -- Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt and
Bahrain -- blocked al-Jazeera and other Qatari news sites.

Then there was a further surprise when Qatari Sheik al-Thani announced
that he had never made any such comments, and that Qatar's news web
sites had been hacked.

These claims were not universally believed. According to an editorial
in the Gulf News:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Today, the GCC is faced with another challenge. And
> unfortunately, it is coming from within the ranks of the
> group. Shortly after the conclusion of last week’s GCC
> Consultative Summit in Riyadh, we were stunned by remarks,
> attributed to the Emir of Qatar, Shaikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani,
> during a military ceremony on Tuesday, in which he appeared to
> defy not only the official GCC policies on most critical issues —
> particularly Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah — but also to hint that the
> American bases in Qatar were the only guarantee to safeguard his
> country from the “threat posed by some neighboring countries”.
>
> While the three summits hosted by Saudi Arabia last Saturday and
> Sunday, in the presence of United States President Donald Trump
> and leaders of 57 Muslim countries, agreed that Iran was fuelling
> conflicts and sectarian tension in the region, Shaikh Tamim has
> been quoted by the Qatari official news agency as saying: “Iran
> represents a regional and Islamic power that cannot be ignored and
> it is unwise to face up against it. It is a big power in the
> stabilization of the region.”"<END QUOTE>[/indent]

At this point it is not clear to me, an outsider, whether or not
al-Thani actually made the referenced remarks. However, the alleged
remarks have triggered a major backlash by other Arab countries, and
many officials of those countries believe that the quoted remarks,
whether real or not, actually represent Qatar's policies.

Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Bahrain are still
blocking Qatari news sites. Al-Arabiya (24-May) and BBC and
The Peninsula (Qatar) and Gulf News

****
**** Vitriolic Saudi-Qatari fault line reopened this week by Trump's visit
****

In 2004, I reported several times about a major Mideast realignment,
with Israel plus Egypt plus Saudi Arabia on one side, and Qatar plus
Hamas plus Turkey on the other side. In March of that year there was
an extremely bitter split among GCC members. After a stormy GCC
meeting, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain
recalled their ambassadors from Qatar

The trigger was the refusal of Qatar to support a security agreement
that was adopted by the GCC several months earlier, requiring all
members not to back "anyone threatening the security and stability of
the GCC whether as groups or individuals - via direct security work or
through political influence, and not to support hostile media." In
particular, Qatar has refused to implement three specific provisions:

• To stop supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, which at that time
  was the governing party in Egypt, led by Mohammed Morsi, and was
  strongly supported by Turkey.
  
  
• To place strict broadcast restrictions on the Egyptian cleric,
  Shaikh Yousuf al-Qaradawi, a Muslim Brother supporter who speaks
  frequently on Qatar's al-Jazeera Arabic.
  
  
• To severely restrict the movement of Iranian operatives within
  the GCC. There have been unconfirmed reports that Qatar facilitated
  the movement of Iranians through the GCC. Apparently this was the
  main cause of disagreement at the GCC meeting.

When Mohammed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood government were in
power in Egypt, then Egypt and Qatar had close relations, and Qatar
was providing aid to Egypt. However, in July 2013, army general Abdel
al-Fattah al-Sisi engineered a coup that overthrew Morsi, and later
became president himself.

The split grew larger during the summer, when there was a 60-day war
between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. Qatar and Iran strongly supported
Hamas, while many people believed that Egypt was on the side of Israel
and the Palestinian Authority.

Late in 2014, the vitriolic differences between the GCC countries were
papered over, thanks to mediation by Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah II,
the the older brother of the current King Salman.

What's happened now is that all the vitriolic feelings of 2014 are
resurfacing. It's quite possible that this is a momentary blip, and
that a way will be found in the next few days or weeks to paper those
feelings over again, but the events of the last week prove that those
feelings exist, and they can resurface and turn into conflict at any
time, if a new event triggers them. AP and Reuters

Related Articles

• Sunni Arab anger grows over Hezbollah's support for al-Assad (11-Jun-2013)
  
  
• Gulf Arab states have major split over Egypt and Iran (06-Mar-2014)
  
  
• Arab League holds annual meeting among bitter splits (26-Mar-2014)
  
  
• Mideast realignment continues following the Gaza war (03-Sep-2014)
  
  
• Gulf nations paper over their differences for GCC Summit in December (21-Nov-2014)
  

****
**** Some useful information that's good to know
****

If you live in Manchester, England, then you're a "Mancunian."
Manchester was the site of the recent terror attack,


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Gulf Cooperation Council, GCC, Bahrain,
Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, UAE,
Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, Iran, Hassan Rouhani, Bahram Qassem,
Muslim Brotherhood, Hezbollah, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani,
Turkey, Mohammed Morsi, Egypt, Abdel al-Fattah al-Sisi

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 27-May-17 World View -- Egypt's warplanes attack Libya camps after terror attack kills Coptic Christians

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Terrorists massacre dozens of Coptic Christians in Egypt
  
• Egypt's warplanes bomb al-Qaeda jihadist training camps in Libya
  

****
**** Terrorists massacre dozens of Coptic Christians in Egypt
****


Screen grab from terrorist public relations video showing Egyptian Coptic Christian fishermen just prior to beheading in Libya in Feb 2015

On Friday, ten masked gunmen driving three 4x4 wheelers opened fire
with "random shooting" about 140 miles south of Cairo, Egypt, on a
convoy of two buses carrying Coptic Christians who were traveling
towards Saint Samuel the Confessor Monastery in Maghagha to pray,
killing 26 and injuring 25.

Friday's killings were just the latest in a wave of terror attacks on
Coptic Christians. In December, dozens of people were killed
by a terrorist explosion during
Sunday prayers in the chapel of St Peter and St Paul (El-Botroseya)
adjoining Saint Mark's Coptic Orthodox Cathedral in Cairo.

Then last month in April, during Palm Sunday services, there were
coordinate bombing attacks on Coptic churches
in two different cities, killing over 75 people and
wounding dozens more. A furious president Abdel al-Fattah al-Sisi
declared a state of emergency in Egypt for three months, allowing
authorities to make arrests without warrants and search people's
homes. This gave the government near dictatorial powers that could
easily be abused, but they didn't prevent Friday's terror attack on
Coptic Christians.

Coptic Christians are vocal supporters of al-Sisi, but they are
furious at the al-Sisi government for not preventing these repeated
attacks, but al-Sisi seems helpless to stop them. The Coptic church
dates back nearly 2,000 years, almost to the time of Christ. Coptics
make up about 10 percent of Egypt's population of 92 million.

No one has yet claimed credit for Friday's attacks, but both the
previous attacks were claimed by the Sinai terror group called Ansar
Bayt al-Maqdis (ABM - Ansar Jerusalem - Champions of Jerusalem). The
group changed its name to Al Wilayat Sinai (Province of Sinai) when it
changed its allegiance in 2015 from al-Qaeda to the so-called Islamic
State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh). Al Ahram (Cairo) and France 24 and Reuters

Related Stories

• Egypt in 3-month state of emergency after Coptic church bombings (10-Apr-2017)
  
  
• ISIS forces hundreds of Christians to flee Egypt's North Sinai (28-Feb-2017)
  
  
• Terror bombing of Coptic Christian church in Cairo Egypt kills 25 (12-Dec-2016)
  

****
**** Egypt's warplanes bomb al-Qaeda jihadist training camps in Libya
****

In a TV speech late on Friday, Egypt's president Abdul Fattah al-Sisi
promised to "protect our people from evil," and announced that
warplanes were attacking the town of Derna in eastern Libya, near the
border with Egypt. According to al-Sisi,

> [indent]<QUOTE>"The terrorist incident that took place today will not
> pass unnoticed. We are currently targeting the camps where the
> terrorists are trained."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Forces from the East Libyan government (one of the three governments
currently in Libya) said that they participated in the airstrikes.

This was not the first time that al-Sisi ordered the bombing of
al-Qaeda camps in Libya. Readers may recall a widely publicized
terror attack from February 2015. The terrorist group Ansar
al-Sharia, which had recently changed allegiance from al-Qaeda to
ISIS, released a video showing the beheading of 21 Egyptian Coptic
Christian workers who had been kidnapped while serving as guest
workers in Sirte. The 21 hostages were identified as fishermen from
an impoverished village in northern Egypt.

At that time, al-Sisi declared seven days of national mourning, and
announced that warplanes has conducted air strikes against militant
targets in Libya, including training camps in arms depots. The
targets were in the region of Derna, the same as the latest
airstrikes. AP and BBC (16-Feb-2015) and Daily Mail (London)

Related Stories

• US, Britain, France preparing new Libya military offensive early in 2016 (06-Jan-2016)
  
  
• Egypt in mourning as ISIS-linked terrorists kill Coptic Christians in Libya (16-Feb-2015)
  
  
• Egypt faces two-front war with airstrikes in Libya (17-Feb-2015)
  
  
• Embassies in Tripoli evacuated, as Libya sinks into tribal war (28-Jul-2014)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Egypt, Coptic Christians, Libya, Derna, Sirte,
Saint Samuel the Confessor Monastery, Maghagha,
Ansar Jerusalem, Ansar Bayt al Maqdis, ABM, Champions of Jerusalem,
Sinai Province, Al Wilayat Sinai, Mohammed Morsi, Muslim Brotherhood,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Egypt, chapel of St Peter and St Paul, El-Botroseya,
Saint Mark's Coptic Orthodox Cathedral, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 28-May-17 World View -- More violence in Kashmir after another militant leader is killed

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• India declares nationwide prohibition on sales of cattle for slaughter
  
• More violence in Kashmir after another militant leader is killed
  
• India's army exults over the successful killing of Sabzar Ahmad Bhat
  

****
**** India declares nationwide prohibition on sales of cattle for slaughter
****


Cow slaughter is already illegal in India's Gujurat province

In a move that critics say will devastate the economy, India's
Environment Ministry on Friday issued regulations banning the sale of
cattle, when the intent is slaughter or religious sacrifice. Cattle
are defined as bovine animals, including bulls, bullocks, cows,
buffalos, steers, heifers and calves and includes camels.

The new regulations are seen as a move by prime minister Narendra Modi
to satisfy demands from his Hindu nationalist base, who have been
calling for a ban on all cow slaughter across the country. Banning
cow slaughter is seen as targeting Muslims, who kill cows for meat, a
practice that's followed by people of all faiths in almost all
countries of the world.

An analysis in the Hindustan Times points out that only 30% of cattle
slaughtered in India is used for meat – either local consumption or
export – while 70% of the carcass is traded for industries that deal
in dozens of items for daily use, including buttons, soap, toothpaste,
paint brushes and surgical stitches. India exported 2.4 million
tonnes of buffalo meat to 65 countries in 2014-15, or 23.5% of global
beef exports, worth about $4.6 billion.

The hardest hit, according to the analysis, will be rural farmers who
use cattle for ploughing. When a bull or bullock is no longer
productive, the farmer sells it for 40% of its original purchase
price, and uses the money to purchase a replacement animal. If the
farmer is unable to sell the unproductive animal for slaughter, then
the farmer will lose this money and, even worse, will not be able to
slaughter the animal himself, so will have to continue feeding it.
Hindustan Times and News 18 (India) and Times Now (India)

Related Articles

• Hindu activists push for ban on cow slaughter across India (11-Apr-2017)
  
  
• India's Narendra Modi finally hits out at Cow Protectors ('Gau Rakshaks') (07-Aug-2016)
  

****
**** More violence in Kashmir after another militant leader is killed
****

Indian security forces in India-governed Kashmir killed a prominent
militant commander, Sabzar Ahmad Bhat, and a fellow militant, along
with a civilian, early on Saturday after a gunfight that lasted for
hours. The death of the militants triggered widespread protests
across Kashmir Valley, and the imposition of new curfews.

The death of Bhat at the hands of security forces is significant
because he is the operational commander of the terrorist group Hizbul
Mujahideen, and successor to Burhan Wani, the Hizbul Mujahideen
commander who was killed by security forces last year on July 8. The
death of Wani last year triggered a major surge in violence that
continues to this day, claiming 78 lives, and blinding hundreds of
Kashmiris from the use of pellet guns by security forces.

Hizbul Mujahideen is a separatist terror group of Muslims demanding
independence for India-governed Kashmir, and that it be permitted to
merge with Pakistan-governed Kashmir, so that all of Kashmir is under
Pakistan control.

As news of the death of Bhat spread, there were widespread protests by
local citizens, as thousands of people began heading to Bhat's home
village Tral, about 30 miles south of the provincial capital
Srinagar, and pelting security forces with stones. According to some
reports, 80 people were injured. Authorities imposed restrictions in
parts of Kashmir Valley and suspended mobile internet services.

There's a romantic back story to Bhat. Bhat was a childhood friend of
Burhan Wani. Bhat reportedly turned to militancy after the family of
a girl he loved spurned his marriage proposal and ended the
relationship. Rising Kashmir and AP and News 18 (India)

****
**** India's army exults over the successful killing of Sabzar Ahmad Bhat
****

The killing of militant commander Sabzar Ahmad Bhat represents a
change of strategy by India's army in Kashmir, according to Major
General BS Raju, who heads the army's Victor Force in south Kashmir.
Raju considers the death of Bhat to be an outstanding success.
Instead of simply applying techniques to pacify protesters, he says
that "We are going after the leaders."

According to a news analysis in FirstPost:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"That was the strategy of then BSF IG Ashok Patel, who
> handled militancy at its worst, between 1990 and 1993. Patel
> targeted commanders based on specific intelligence. He laid
> cordons at specific locations on the basis of that information.
>
> The strategy worked well. The heads of major militant
> organizations, including Muslim Janbaz Force, Jammu and Kashmir
> Liberation Front, Students Liberation Front, Al Umar and Hizbullah
> were all rounded up (arrested) by April 1992.
>
> That only left the largely rural-based Hizb in the field. It was
> in December 1992 that Pakistan allowed the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the
> Afghan-based Harkat-ul Mujahideen to Kashmir. They dominated from
> then until that round of militancy ended around a decade ago. The
> new militancy emerged over the past five years."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

This is a mistake made by everyone -- politicians, security forces,
ordinary people. They remember what happened in the 1990s, and they
assume that if they try something that worked well at that time,
then it will work well again.

This assumption is completely wrong. The 1947 Partition War was one
of the bloodiest wars of the 20th century, pitting Hindus versus
Muslims, following the partitioning of the Indian subcontinent into
India and Pakistan. In the 1990s, the people in charge of both
the Indians, the Pakistanis and the Kashmiris were all traumatized
survivors of that extremely bloody war, and while they might
tolerate some peaceful protests and stone-pelting, they would do
everything possible to prevent a repeat of what happened in 1947.
It's ironic, but in the 1990s the Hindus and the Muslims would have
been cooperating with each other, whether consciously or by instinct,
to keep any protests from getting out of hand.

Those traumatized survivors are gone now, and the people in the
younger generations who are in charge now have absolutely no clue what
happened in 1947, nor what's going to be happening to them in the near
future.

So now in 2017, Indian army command BS Raju is going to duplicate the
1992 strategy of Indian army commander Ashok Patel, and he expects it
work the same way. There's absolutely no reason to believe that.
In fact, killing militant commanders in a generational Unraveling era
like the 1990s, may work to convince those traumatized survivors
to call off further protests rather than risk further bloodshed,
but in a generational Crisis era like today, there is no real fear
of further bloodshed on either side, with the result that tit-for-tat
escalations can lead to full scale war.

As I've written several times,

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 the 1947 Partition War, one of the bloodiest wars of
the 20th century, pitting Hindus versus Muslims. Kashmir is at the
heart of a re-fighting of those two wars. First Post (India)

Related Articles

• Kashmir violence surges as India launches massive house-to-house sweep (06-May-2017)
  
  
• Kashmiri students at two Indian colleges harassed and beaten (22-Apr-2017)
  
  
• Worries grow that India is 'losing Kashmir,' as violence increases (18-Apr-2017)
  
  
• The debate in Pakistan: Good terrorists vs Bad terrorists (09-Aug-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, India, cow slaughter, Narendra Modi,
Kashmir, Sabzar Ahmad Bhat, Burhan Wani, Hizbul Mujahideen,
BS Raju, Ashok Patel

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

[Cynic Hero '86]

Its obvious that John X's generational dynamics is just globalist propaganda. Just this week Terrorists killed 22 Britons in Manchester and yet the articles John X posted the following night was some nonsense about Russian Ambitions in the Caspian. The Next article the day after that was one about Chinese strategy against India. When he finally mentioned Islamism John X didn't even mention the Manchester attack. This is just more globalist propaganda by the political class of human rights tyrants. Say no to Human Rights Tyranny.

[John J. Xenakis]

(05-27-2017, 10:57 PM)Cynic Hero 86 Wrote: > Its obvious that John X's generational dynamics is just globalist
> propaganda. Just this week Terrorists killed 22 Britons in
> Manchester and yet the articles John X posted the following night
> was some nonsense about Russian Ambitions in the Caspian. The Next
> article the day after that was one about Chinese strategy against
> India. When he finally mentioned Islamism John X didn't even
> mention the Manchester attack. This is just more globalist
> propaganda by the political class of human rights tyrants. Say no
> to Human Rights Tyranny.

I did mention the Manchester attack. Look at the last section
of my May 26 article.

There have been a million articles all over the world on the
Manchester attack. There's no point in writing the same thing that
other people are writing about. When I have a unique analysis that
the idiots in the mainstream media are totally clueless about or at
least aren't writing about, then I'll write about it.

[John J. Xenakis]

I really have to laugh that you think that the articles about the
Caspian Sea and Kashmir are "nonsense." It just goes to show how many
Millennials are morons who don't have the vaguest clue what's going on
in the world. World War III is much more likely to start in Central
Asia or Kashmir than in Manchester.

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 29-May-17 World View -- North Korea launches another ballistic missile test, as talk of war increases

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• North Korea launches ninth ballistic missile test this year
  
• The US deploys three aircraft carriers to Korean waters amid talk of war
  

****
**** North Korea launches ninth ballistic missile test this year
****


USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier strike group (Reuters)

South Korea reports that early on Monday morning, North Korea
test-fired a ballistic missile, its ninth ballistic missile test this
year. This comes just one week after another ballistic missile test.
The missile flew about 450 km (280 miles), and landed in the Sea of
Japan.

The missile is assumed to be a "Scud" missile known as the KN-06, that
can be launched from a mobile platform, to target enemy aircraft or
nearby ground targets. North Korea has a large stockpile of Scud
missiles, originally developed by the Soviet Union.

North Korea's child dictator Kim Jong-un is quoted as saying that the
system should be deployed "all over the country like forests so as to
completely spoil the enemy’s wild dream to command the air, boasting
of air supremacy, and weapon almighty."

The usual steps have been taken in response to the latest ballistic
missile test: South Korea's President Moon Jae-in, who had hoped to
have friendly relations with North Korea, called a meeting of the
country's National Security Council. Japan launched a protest and
called the test "highly problematic, while Japan's prime minister
Shinzo Abe vowed action to deter North Korea's repeated provocations.
Reuters and The Diplomat and Sky News (Australia)

Related Articles

• North Korea test-fires another ballistic missile (22-May-2017)
  
  
• North Korea sends a message with a medium range ballistic missile test (15-May-2017)
  
  
• China announces it will block imports of North Korea's coal (19-Feb-2017)
  
  
• China-North Korea tensions high after nuclear test (09-Jan-2016)
  

****
**** The US deploys three aircraft carriers to Korean waters amid talk of war
****

The US Navy is deploying a third aircraft carrier strike group to the
waters around North Korea. The USS Nimitz will join the USS Carl
Vinson and USS Ronald Reagan, which were already in the region. That
decision was made before Sunday's ballistic missile test, so tensions
are growing high in the region.

These events are causing people to worry about war, and specifically
to worry that president Donald Trump will launch airstrike
on North Korea.

It's impossible to predict what any individual will do, and that
certainly includes politicians. So it's possible that Trump may order
some kind of attack on North Korea, and thus trigger a major new
Korean war, and subsequently a world war. My personal belief is that
three aircraft carriers are there to pressure North Korea politically,
and that the actions are being taken with the cooperation of the
Chinese, and possibly even the Russians.

For example, one scenario short of an attack is that China and the US
are playing good cop / bad cop. That's just a guess. Anyway, we'll
just have to wait and see.

Sunday's test was of a short-range mostly defensive ballistic missile,
so it may be possible to have fanciful thoughts that North Korea is
backing down, or at least slowing down. A new test of either a
nuclear weapon or an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), two
technologies which could be combined to deliver a nuclear weapon to
the US mainland, would raise tensions enormously.

No one doubts any longer that North Korea will inevitably develop the
technology to deliver a nuclear weapon to the US mainland. So there's
going to be a war now or in the near future. That's what Generational
Dynamics has been predicting anyway, so there's no surprise. Asahi Shimbun (Tokyo) and Daily Beast and CBS News

Related Articles

• US aircraft carrier strike force heads for Korean peninsula (10-Apr-2017)
  
  
• Ancient tensions flare between China and North Korea (08-May-2017)
  
  
• Russia's policies thrown into confusion as US resumes its 'world policeman' role (09-Apr-2017)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, North Korea, Scud KN-06 ballistic missile,
Kim Jong-un, South Korea, Moon Jae-in, Japan, Shinzo Abe,
USS Nimitz, USS Carl Vinson, USS Ronald Reagan

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

[Warren Dew]

(05-28-2017, 09:40 PM)John J. Xenakis Wrote: For example, one scenario short of an attack is that China and the US
are playing good cop / bad cop.

I don't think there's any doubt that's what's happening right now.  The question is, what happens when the good cop fails, and the bad cop starts breaking the prisoner's bones?  If the prisoner fights back, does the good cop side with the bad cop or with the prisoner?

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 30-May-17 World View -- Arrest of Berber activist in Morocco raises Berber-Arab tensions

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Arrest of Berber activist in Morocco raises Berber-Arab tensions
  
• Brief generational history of Berbers and Arabs
  

****
**** Arrest of Berber activist in Morocco raises Berber-Arab tensions
****


Fishmonger Mouhcine Fikri (L), and the picture that went viral of his death on October 26 in a garbage truck, triggering widespread anti-government protests

Police on Monday in the town of al-Hoceima in Morocco arrested
anti-government activist Nasser Zefzafi, on the charge of having
interrupted a prayer ceremony at a mosque in al-Hoceima. The arrest
warrant was issued on Friday, because he had "obstructed, in the
company of a group of individuals, freedom of worship" at the mosque,
according to prosecutors, and because he stopped "the preacher from
continuing his sermon, giving a provocative speech in which he
insulted the imam and fomented disturbances that undermined the calm
and sacredness of the place of worship."

Nasser Zefzafi is the leader of the anti-government Popular
Mobilization movement (Al-Hirak al-Shaabi), which he founded last year
in November, after the bizarre death on October 26 of a fishmonger who
was crushed by a garbage truck.

Mouhcine Fikri, a fishmonger, was illegally selling out-of-season
swordfish worth $10,000 that he had just purchased from the port in
al-Hoceima. A policeman confiscated his swordfish, and threw it into
a garbage truck. Fikri jumped into the garbage truck to retrieve his
fish, and he was crushed to death by the garbage truck. Some people
who were present claim that the policeman told the garbage truck
driver to crush him on purpose, though the police deny this.

Pictures of Fikri's horrific death went viral, and triggered regular
protests since then. Fikri and Zefzafi are both ethnic Berbers, and
al-Hoceima is a mostly Berber port city in northern Morocco, a country
governed almost entirely by Arabs.

Zefzafi has been accused of wanting for form an independent Berber
country, which he denies: "Our demands are economic and social, there
has never been a question of creation of an independent state. For
six months we have been resisting... And we will resist until they
respond to our demands for the economic and social development of our
region."

More than 20 activists were arrested over the weekend following
clashes between protesters and the police. BBC and AFP and Al-Jazeera

Related Articles

• Protests across Morocco after horrific death of fishmonger in garbage truck (02-Nov-2016)
  
  
• A look back at Libya in 2011 as the West debates another military intervention (05-Mar-2016)
  
  
• Concerns grow about Tunisia's stability as economic protests escalate (17-Sep-2016)
  

****
**** Brief generational history of Berbers and Arabs
****

Berbers or Amazighs claim to have lived in northern Africa for
thousands of years, since the dawn of civilization, and are referred
to as Libyans in classical texts. Although they had wars with the
Romans and Byzantines for centuries, they were not subjugated until
the arrival of the Arabs starting in the 680s, fifty years after the
death of Mohammed. Today there are still isolated tribes descended
from the original Berbers, maintaining ancient traditions and the
Berber's Tamazight language, but the population of Berbers has
diminished over the centuries, often due simply to intermarriage with
the dominant Arabs.

In modern times, Algeria's war of independence from France (1954-62)
united the Berbers and Arabs against the common enemy, the French.
However, during the generational Awakening era that followed, tensions
grew between the two ethnic groups, culminating a major
anti-government protest in Algeria, the Printemps Berbère (the "Berber
Spring") of April 1980. The Berbers demanded an end to discrimination
by the Arab majority, and recognition Tamazight as a national
language. The protests were bloodily suppressed by Algerian security
forces.

Since then there have been occasional new protests, the worst
occurring in July 2015, when at least 22 people were killed in ethnic
clashes between Berbers and Arabs in Algeria.

Berber anti-government protests have been growing again in Morocco,
ever since Berber fishmonger Mouhcine Fikri was crushed to death by a
garbage truck after a confrontation with an Arab policeman. Now the
arrest of anti-government activist Nasser Zefzafi is certain to
energize new protests, probably as early as the weekend. Ancient.eu and France 24 and Temehu.com (Libya)

Related Articles

• France's new president Macron commits troops to Mali 'as long as necessary' (20-May-2017)
  
  
• Bizarre monkey attack triggers tribal war in Jabha in southern Libya (21-Nov-2016)
  
  
• International Criminal Court gets conviction for 'cultural genocide' in Timbuktu Mali (23-Aug-2016)
  
  
• Tuareg rebels declare independent state of Azawad in northern Mali (07-Apr-2012)
  
  
• Timbuktu's ancient history at risk over chaotic Mali rebellion (04-Apr-2012)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Morocco, Berbers, Amazighs, Tamazight,
Arabs, Algeria, Libya, Mouhcine Fikri, al-Hoceima,
Nasser Zefzafi, Popular Mobilisation movement, Al-Hirak al-Shaabi

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

[Warren Dew]

From Merkel's latest speech, it sounds like the US and Germany may not be on the same side this time around (again).

[Galen]

(05-30-2017, 12:50 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: From Merkel's latest speech, it sounds like the US and Germany may not be on the same side this time around (again).

Not just Germany but the rest of Europe.  It is not really surprising so see the alliances resulting from the Second World War starting to come apart.  The assumptions they formed under do not apply any longer.

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 31-May-17 World View -- Turkey builds a northern Syria 'National Army' from Free Syrian Army militias

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Turkey builds a northern Syria 'National Army' from Free Syrian Army militias
  
• US begins arming YPG Kurds in northern Syria on eve of battle of Raqqa
  

****
**** Turkey builds a northern Syria 'National Army' from Free Syrian Army militias
****


A US officer speaking with a YPG fighter on April 25 (AFP)

Turkey is planning to form a new "National Army" in northern Syria,
bringing together factions from the Free Syrian Army (FSA) that fought
last year as part of Turkey's Operation Euphrates Shield, joined by
defectors from the Syrian regime's army. The objective of the
previous operation, which began on Aug 24 of last year and ended on
March 29 of this year, was to clear out both the the so-called Islamic
State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) and the Kurdish People's
Protection Units (YPG) from a region in northern Syria.

Turkey ended Operation Euphrates Shield in March under pressure from
Russia, but Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed that
military operations would continue to prevent either ISIS or the YPG
from regaining control of any part of the area cleared out by
Operation Euphrates Shield.

The YPG has links to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has
been fighting a separatist rebellion in Turkey since the 1980s, and
which has perpetrated a string of major terrorist attacks in Turkey in
the last two years. For these reasons, Turkish-led military actions
in northern Syria were intended to prevent the Kurds from taking
control of the entire northern border of Syria, and then declaring an
independent Kurdish state of Rojava.

An additional purpose of the new "Syrian National Army" was to create
a buffer zone or safe zone for Syrians fleeing the conflict, something
that Erdogan has been demanding for years. According to Erdogan:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Once we have created a safe zone, the Syrians will be
> able to establish their National Army, so they can feel
> safe."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

According to Turkish media, almost a million people so far have
returned to the area cleared of ISIS and the YPG, or have been
relocated there from other conflict areas.

The Syrian conflict has resulted in millions of refugees. Some three
million are in Turkey, about one million are in Europe, and millions
more are in Jordan and Lebanon. The safe zone or buffer zone in
northern Syria could provide for Syrian refugees that's within Syria
itself.

The role of the YPG is a major area of contention between Turkey and
the US. The YPG are allies of the US military who considers them to
be the most effective anti-ISIS fighting force in the region.
However, because of the YPG links with the PKK, Turkey considers the
YPG to be terrorists. It's believed that there are hundreds of US
special forces troops in the region, and one of their objectives is to
keep the Turks and the Kurds from shooting at each other. TRTWorld-Youtube (Turkey) and Al Monitor and Reuters (18-May)

Related Articles

• Turkey's warplanes strike Kurdish militias fighting ISIS in Syria and Iraq (26-Apr-2017)
  
  
• Turkey's 'Operation Euphrates Shield' turns into full-scale invasion of Syria (26-Aug-2016)
  
  
• Turkey's military intervention grows in Syria and Iraq (25-Oct-2016)
  
  
• Concerns grow over chaos in Iraq after ISIS is defeated in Mosul (22-Mar-2017)
  

****
**** US begins arming YPG Kurds in northern Syria on eve of battle of Raqqa
****

The US army has begun arming YPG Syrian Kurdish militias, as announced
early in May. The weapons
would include small arms, mortars, AK-47s, heavy machine guns,
shoulder-fired weapons, ammunition, bulldozers and armored vehicles
such as the M1117 Guardian. According to the military, the selected
weapons will address the specific threats that ISIS poses, such as the
Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Devices (VBIEDS), or car bombs of
the type that ISIS has used to break up assaults.

This comes on the eve of the assault on Raqqa, the major stronghold
and so-called Caliphate of ISIS. The YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces
(SDF) are now about two miles from the city, and the battle to eject
ISIS is expected to be extremely bloody and last for weeks or months.

The assault to eject ISIS from Raqqa in Syria is beginning, but the
assault by Iraq's army to eject ISIS from Mosul in Iraq continues,
after beginning in October of last year, and is also a long, bloody
battle.

It's believed that within a few months, ISIS will have been ejected
from both Raqqa and Mosul. Until then, all these various armies and
militias have a common enemy. After that, these armies will have no
one to fight except each other, and one possibility is that the
thousands of ISIS fighters will return to their home countries,
possibly to conduct lone wolf attacks. Military Times/AP and Fox News and NRT (Kurdistan) and Sputnik News (Moscow)

Related Articles

• Final push to expel ISIS from Raqqa, Syria, to begin in June (16-May-2017)
  
  
• US will 'quickly' arm Kurdish militias in Syria, despite Turkey's opposition (11-May-2017)
  
  
• As more American troops are deployed to Syria, the endgame is more uncertain (10-Mar-2017)
  
  
• From 2013: The history of how Syria's Bashar al-Assad created ISIS (07-Sep-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Turkey, Syria, National Army, Free Syrian Army, FSA,
Operation Euphrates Shield, Kurdish People's Protection Units, YPG,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Rojava, Raqqa, Mosul, Iraq,
Syrian Democratic Forces, SDF

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 1-Jun-17 World View -- Massive terror explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, as US considers sending more troops

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Massive terror explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, the largest in years
  
• Afghans blame Pakistan and the Taliban-linked Haqqani network
  
• Afghanistan situation deteriorates, as US considers sending more troops
  

****
**** Massive terror explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, the largest in years
****


Aerial view of Kabul, Afghanistan (UN)

The biggest terrorist explosion in Afghanistan in years took place in
the capital city Kabul during the morning rush hour on Wednesday,
killing 90 people and injuring almost 400. The explosion was caused
by a powerful truck bomb in a large truck designed to carry sewage.
Over 50 vehicles were either destroyed or damaged in the attack.
Buildings hundreds of meters away from the explosion were damaged or
had windows blown out.

According to one witness, "I have been to many attacks, taken wounded
people out of many blast sites, but I can say I have never seen such a
horrible attack as I saw this morning."

The area that was attacked is supposed to be the safest in Kabul, with
foreign embassies and government offices protected by dozens of
10ft-high blast walls guarded by police and national security forces.
Every vehicle entering the area is supposed to be checked for
explosives, leading some analysts to believe that the perpetrators had
the cooperation of someone in the security forces.

However, a statement from the Nato forces says that Afghan security
forces had prevented the vehicle from entering the heavily protected
Green Zone that houses many foreign embassies, suggesting it may not
have reached its intended target. Sky News (Australia) and Tolo News (Afghanistan)

Related Articles

• Multiple terror bombings cross Pakistan and Afghanistan (13-Nov-2016)
  
  
• Troubles mount for Afghanistan government as US withdrawal looms (12-Apr-2016)
  

****
**** Afghans blame Pakistan and the Taliban-linked Haqqani network
****

The Taliban have conducted numerous terror attacks in Kabul,
but they claim that they didn't perpetrate this one. According
to a statement issued by the Taliban:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"[The Taliban] condemn every explosion and attack
> carried out against civilians, or in which civilians are
> harmed. ...
>
> [Whoever] carried out this attack and for what purpose, that will
> become clear at a later stage."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

This statement from the Taliban is laughable. The Taliban regularly
attack innocent civilians, including women and children, and they
particularly target ethnic Hazaras and Shia Muslims in general. In
fact, the vast major of people killed by the Taliban are innocent
civilians. However, it's bad publicity for the Taliban to kill
innocent civilians, so they're reluctant to take credit for it for PR
reasons.

The so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) did claim
credit for the attack, but ISIS has developed a public relations
gimmick of taking credit for any terror attack, whether they've been
involved or not.

The Afghan intelligence agency NDS blamed the Haqqani network for the
attack. The Haqqani Network is linked to the Taliban, and is widely
believed to be funded and supported by Pakistan security services,
Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

According to an aide to Afghanistan's president Ashraf Ghani, "Today’s
enormous explosion absolutely was a Haqqani Network type attack. ISIS
[in Afghanistan] cannot carry out such a large and sophisticated
attack." Sky News (Australia) and AFP and Daily Beast

Related Articles

• U.S. decision on Haqqani Network will affect Pakistan relations (02-Sep-2012)
  
  
• Terrorist bombing of Kabul hotel shows power of Haqqani network (30-Jun-2011)
  
  
• ISIS claims responsibility for attack on Shia Hazaras in Kabul Afghanistan (24-Jul-2016)
  

****
**** Afghanistan situation deteriorates, as US considers sending more troops
****

Afghan security forces control only about 57 percent of the country's
territory. Around 2.5 million people live in areas controlled by the
Taliban and nine million more live in contested areas. According to
analysts, the Taliban are now stronger than at any point since the
2001 Afghan war.

U.S. General John Nicholson described the current military situation
in Afghanistan against the Taliban as a "stalemate," and he's
requested several thousand additional US troops to enhance the 8,400
American and 5,000 coalition forces already present.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, the security
situation in Afghanistan will only get worse. As I've explained many times,
Afghanistan's last
generational crisis war was the extremely bloody civil war of 1991-96
was fought between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the
Northern Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern
Afghanistan. The Taliban are from the Pashtun ethnic group, which
extends into Pakistan, and so the Taliban Pashtuns in Pakistan
cooperate with the Taliban Pashtuns in Afghanistan to conduct terror
attacks.

When America attacked Afghanistan in 2001, the Afghan Taliban
collapsed quickly, because Afghanistan was in a generational Recovery
era, with the traumatized survivors of the bloody 1991-96 civil war
still recovering, with little will to fight. However, since the 2001
war, younger generations of Pashtuns have come of age, and they're
more willing to conduct attacks against the government, and against
their parents' former enemies in the Northern Alliance.

So it really doesn't matter at all how many troops the US or Nato send
to Afghanistan. The security situation is going to continue to
deteriorate, and the Taliban and ISIS will continue to control
provinces of Afghanistan, at the expense of the government in Kabul.
Deutsche Welle (25-May) and ABC News and Russia Today and Deutsche Welle

Related Articles

• Trump considers new troop surge and strategy change in Afghanistan war (10-May-2017)
  
  
• CENTCOM commander: Afghanistan 'stalemate' requires 'thousands' more US troops (11-Mar-2017)
  
  
• Analysis of Afghanistan vs Iraq wars (26-Sep-2009)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Kabul, Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani,
Haqqani Network, Taliban, Pakistan, Inter-Services Intelligence, ISI,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
John Nicholson, Northern Alliance, Tajiks, Hazaras, Uzbeks

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 2-Jun-17 World View -- China-built railway in Kenya raises questions about 'debt trap diplomacy'

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Kenya launches new China-built railway from Mombasa port to Nairobi
  
• China accused of a policy of 'debt trap diplomacy' in infrastructure projects
  

****
**** Kenya launches new China-built railway from Mombasa port to Nairobi
****


Madaraka Express railway launch in Nairobi, Kenya, on Wednesday

Kenya on Wednesday launched a new railway line call he Madaraka
(Freedom) Express, linking Kenya's Port of Mombasa on the India Ocean
to the capital city Nairobi. The word "Madaraka" commemorates the day
that Kenya became independent in 1963.

The new 380-mile Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) line is expected to be
good for business. Cargo charges from the Port of Mombasa to Nairobi
will cost about $500 per container and take 8 hours transit time.
This is a significant saving over transit by road, which costs $900,
and requires 24 hours. The train can carry 1,260 passengers.

The new railway replaces "The Lunatic Express," a rail link built in
the late 1800s by British money and colonists. The Lunatic Express
was increasingly shaky, with old tracks and locomotives that were
increasingly difficult to service.

The new SGR was built with Chinese money and Chinese workers. China's
state-owned Export-Import Bank loaned Kenya $3.6 billion for the
project, which Kenya is expected to repay out of revenues. However,
some analysts are raising concerns that the SGR will be a "white
elephant," leaving Kenya with enormous unpayable debts, as has already
happened in Sri Lanka.

Even worse, the cost to build the Kenya railroad has been extremely
expensive even by regional standards. The cost of the railway was
roughly twice as great as another China-built railway, the
Djibouti-Ethiopia train, suggesting the possibility of corruption.

Perhaps Djibouti and Ethiopia were able to drive a harder bargain with
the Chinese, because China is also building a naval and air base on
the strategic Red Sea port in Djibouti, and the railway connects that
port to Ethiopia's capital city, Addis Ababa. The site of the Chinese
base is about 6 miles from an existing US base in Djibouti. China has
defended the base construction, citing evacuations of Chinese
nationals from nearby Yemen and Libya during recent conflicts.

In launching the new railway, Kenya's president Uhuru Kenyatta said:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"A history that was first started 122 years ago when
> the British, who had colonized this nation, kicked off the train
> to nowhere... it was then dubbed the 'Lunatic Express.' ...
>
> Today 122 years later, despite again a lot of criticism, we now
> celebrate, not the Lunatic Express but the Madaraka Express, that
> will begin to reshape the story of Kenya for the next 100 years.
> I am proud to be associated with this day. ...
>
> The drop in cost of freight and fares will make Kenya a more
> attractive investment destination. More investors will lead to
> more jobs and growth in our economy."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Another issue related to the railway is that it crosses Kenya’s
Nairobi National Park. Built by British settlers in 1946, this is a
wild animal park on the fringes of Nairobi, and is a leading tourist
attraction, and is responsible for a significant amount of Nairobi's
income.

However, wild animals occasionally migrate out of the part into nearby
homes and farms. With the SGR right through the middle of the park,
these visits by wild animals have increased. Earlier this year, two
lions escaped from the park and had to be shot, as they were
threatening humans. This has raised an outcry from environmentalists,
who are demanding a number of changes, including raising the railway
above the park, so that animals can move freely. The Shanghaiist and Radio France Internationale and African Business Magazine (5-May) and UPI (18-April) and Huffington Post

****
**** China accused of a policy of 'debt trap diplomacy' in infrastructure projects
****

There is no economic or financial case for the railway, according to a
World Bank report. There's a very realistic fear that the SGR will
generate far less income than is necessary to repay the China's $3.6
billion loan.

We've already seen exactly these problems in Sri Lanka. In 2009,
China invested $1.2 billion in Sri Lanka's Hambantota seaport. Sri
Lanka had expected to repay the debt through profits earned by the
port, but the slowdown in trade throughout the entire region in the
last few years has meant that Sri Lanka has been unable to repay the
debt, and now China has essentially taken over the port in lieu of
repayment of the debt, resulting in violent protests by Sri Lanka's
Buddhist monks and anti-government protesters. China will own a
significant piece of Sri Lankan real estate, and there will be a large
Chinese community that will be in Sri Lanka forever.

Professor Samuel Nyandemo of the University of Nairobi's School of
Economics refers to China's projects as "debt trap diplomacy"

> [indent]<QUOTE>“Extending loans for infrastructure projects is a good
> thing. But look at the projects being funded. Most of them are
> meant to open markets for Chinese goods in strategically-located
> countries and increase their access to natural resources.
>
> If there is one thing China is truly good at, it is using its
> economic assets to advance its geostrategic interests, which has
> left countries snared in a debt trap that makes them vulnerable to
> Chinese influence."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

In fact, however much revenue the new SGR railway generates, it will
have a significant negative economic impact on Kenya. That's because
there's an existing Nairobi-Mombasa railway run by Rift Valley
Railways (RVR). Amazingly, Kenyan authorities are now requiring that
a minimum of 40% of the cargo travelling between Nairobi and Mombasa
must be taken by the new SGR. This is presumably going to be a
financial disaster for RVR, but it also means that Kenya will have
little or no revenue gain from the new railway, since it will be
taking much of its business from the old railway.

When Kenya's president Uhuru Kenyatta recently visited the One Belt
One Road (OBOR) forum in Beijing, he signed a contract borrowing
another $3.5 billion from China for an extension to the SGR that was
just launched. Critics say that thanks to the president, Kenyans will
have to labor for China for years to come. Kenya Standard Media (28-May) and Times of India and African Business Magazine (23-May)

Related Articles

• China launches 'One Belt One Road', raising objections and violent protests (14-May-2017)
  
  
• Violent protests in Sri Lanka over China's takeover of Hambantota seaport (08-Jan-2017)
  
  
• Massive China-Pakistan CPEC energy project said to end energy crisis 'soon' (23-Mar-2017)
  
  
• Indians seek Kashmir solutions and blame CPEC intervention from Pakistan and China (22-Apr-2017)
  
  
• Iran-India sign 'historic' Chabahar port deal to counter Pakistan-China (25-May-2016)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta, Mombasa, Nairobi,
China, Export-Import Bank,
Madaraka Express, Standard Gauge Railway, SGR, Lunatic Express,
Djibouti, Ethiopia, Red Sea, Addis Ababa,
Nairobi National Park, Samuel Nyandemo,
debt trap diplomacy, Sri Lanka, Hambantota seaport,
Rift Valley Railways, RVR, One Belt One Road, OBOR

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 3-Jun-17 World View -- Kabul bombing brings back memories of bloody 1990s Afghan civil war

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Five people killed in clashes with police in anti-government rally in Kabul, Afghanistan
  
• Kabul bombing brings back memories of bloody 1990s Afghan civil war
  

****
**** Five people killed in clashes with police in anti-government rally in Kabul, Afghanistan
****


Afghan security forces and residents stand near the 13ft deep crater left by Wednesday's truck bomb attack in Kabul (AFP)

At least five people were killed and dozens injured on Friday in
Kabul, Afghanistan, when security forces opened fire on protesters
throwing stones at police.

The protesters were demanding that President Ashraf Ghani and Chief
Executive Abdullah Abdullah both step down, for failing to protect
citizens, following Wednesday's massive terror attack in Kabul
that killed 100 people and injured
hundreds more. The explosion was caused by a powerful truck bomb in a
large truck designed to carry sewage. Over 50 vehicles were either
destroyed or damaged in the attack. Buildings hundreds of meters away
from the explosion were damaged or had windows blown out.

The terror attack is thought to be the worst in Afghanistan's recent
history, and many people are furious that it was allowed to happen.

Over 1,000 protesters started marching towards the Presidential Palace
early Friday. However, once at Zanbaq Circle, which was the scene of
Wednesday’s deadly bombing, police started firing off tear gas
canisters. According to some reports, the protesters threw stones at
the police. Fire trucks also sprayed the demonstrators with water.

When this failed to disperse the crowd, police opened fire with live
rounds on the protestors. The result was that at least five people
were killed, with two of them shot in the mouth, and two more shot in
the chest. At least 15 people were wounded, but reports indicate that
they were mostlly shot in the legs and feet.

Chief executive Abdullah Abdullah addressed the nation on Friday
afternoon and called for calm, and said that the shooting of peaceful
protesters by security forces will be investigated. Tolo News (Afghanistan) and BBC

****
**** Kabul bombing brings back memories of bloody 1990s Afghan civil war
****

The Taliban are refusing to take credit for the massive Kabul bombing
on Wednesday. That's not surprising, because of the massive slaughter
of innocent civilians. The Taliban press releases like to portray
them as nice guys fighting against a corrupt government and the
infidels from the United States and Nato. Slaughtering and crippling
hundreds of innocent civilians doesn't fit with their sweet PR image.
Nonetheless, few people doubt that the Taliban, specifically the
Haqqani Network, were responsible for Wednesday's bloody slaughter.

Americans and Europeans who try to understand what's going on in
Afghanistan rarely dig any deeper than to refer to statements or
policies of Barack Obama or Donald Trump or Angela Merkel, as if one
of them could cause or prevent a truck bombing. Most people in Kabul
probably don't even know who those leaders are. What they do know is
that there was a bloody civil war from 1991 to 1996, with both sides
regularly committing massacres, torture, rapes, beheadings, and any
other atrocity that comes to mind, and the bitter memory of that
bloody civil war guides much of what they do, including Friday's
protests.

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar is the current leader of Hezb-e Islami
(abbreviated HIG for Hezb-e Islami-ye Gulbuddin), a Sunni Muslim
ethnic Pashtun group that fought on one side of Afghanistan's bloody
civil war in 1991-96. Hekmatyar himself was a warlord known as the
"Butcher of Kabul," because of his unparalleled record of atrocities,
killing thousands of innocent people.

Hekmatyar last month was allowed to return to Kabul after 20 years in
exile, mostly in the UK. Hekmatyar had signed a peace agreement that
granted him immunity for acts committed during the war. In return,
Hezb-e-Islami will renounce its ties with extremist groups.

Hekmatyar, now almost 70 years old, has had an epiphany, and is no
longer committing atrocities, One of his followers, Safia Sediqi, a
member of Hizb-e-Islami’s women’s committee, said:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"The country is tired, we were born in war
> Mr. president, we got old and our sons are getting old, you tell
> us when will peace come to Afghanistan."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

This is always the cry of survivors of generational crisis wars.
Traumatized by the war, all they want is peace.

But unfortunately Ms. Sediqi is going to learn that there will be no
peace. As I've explained in the past, Afghanistan is at the beginning
of a generational Awakening era, 21 years after the climax of the
civil war. If it were up to the traumatized survivors, there would be
peace, but it's not. It's up to the younger generations, growing up
after the war, who have no personal memory of the war,

There will be no return to general civil war -- the traumatized
survivors will see to that. But the young people will hold protests,
demonstrations and riots that sometimes become violent. Afghanistan
is also a special case because the Taliban are radicalized ethnic
Pashtuns, and they are receiving support from the Pashtuns in
Pakistan, which is in a generational Crisis era. So there will
more terrorist acts and no peace.

Two things are certain: First, the demands that Ashraf Ghani step down
are going to increase. And second, the war in Afghanistan is only
going to get worse, no matter how many extra troops are sent by the US
and Nato. Tolo News (Kabul) and Afghan Analysts (3-May) and NY Times

Related Articles

• Massive terror explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, as US considers sending more troops (01-Jun-2017)
  
  
• Afghanistan becomes more ungovernable as US-led coalition withdraws (19-Apr-2015)
  
  
• Bizarre Mullah Omar death announcement seals fate of Afghan peace talks (30-Jul-2015)
  
  
• Troubles mount for Afghanistan government as US withdrawal looms (12-Apr-2016)
  
  
• Terrorist bombing of Kabul hotel shows power of Haqqani network (30-Jun-2011)
  
  
• Analysis of Afghanistan vs Iraq wars (26-Sep-2009)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Kabul, Zanbaq Circle, Afghanistan,
Ashraf Ghani, Abdullah Abdullah, Taliban, Haqqani Network,
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, Hezb-e Islami, Hezb-e Islami-ye Gulbuddin, HIG,
Safia Sediqi, Pashtuns, Pakistan

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 4-Jun-17 World View -- Crisis in Afghanistan grows with three new suicide bombers in Kabul

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Three suicide bombers target Kabul Afghanistan funeral for previous victims
  
• Afghanistan seethes with renewed anger over the attacks
  

****
**** Three suicide bombers target Kabul Afghanistan funeral for previous victims
****


Mourners in Kabul run for safety Saturday after an explosion at a funeral (CNN)

Six people were killed and 87 wounded in coordinated suicide bombing
explosions at three sites in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Saturday,
targeting a funeral for Mohammad Salim Izadyar. Other reports
indicate that as many as 20 people were killed.

Izadyar was among six people killed and dozens injured on Friday by
Afghan security forces during anti-government demonstrations.

The demonstrators were demanding the resignation of Afghanistan's
president Ashraf Ghani for failure to protect the people, following a
huge truck bombing on Wednesday that kill 100 people and injured
hundreds more.

President Ashraf Ghani made a televised appeal for national unity:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"The country is under attack. We must stay strong and
> united. ...
>
> Terrorist groups plot to sow chaos. Their aim is to create poor
> governance and disorder in communities. We must not let ourselves
> fall into the trap that the enemies have brought to our
> country."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

No one has claimed credit for either Wednesday's attack or Saturday's
attack. Nonetheless, it's widely believed that the Taliban were
responsible, particularly the Haqqani Network, but that neither wants
to take credit because of the massive carnage of civilians, contrary
to the Taliban's cultivated image of wonderful people merely fighting
the infidels in the US and Nato. Khaama Press (Kabul) and Tolo News (Kabul) and CNN

Related Articles

• Kabul bombing brings back memories of bloody 1990s Afghan civil war (03-Jun-2017)
  
  
• Massive terror explosion in Kabul, Afghanistan, as US considers sending more troops (01-Jun-2017)
  
  
• Terrorist bombing of Kabul hotel shows power of Haqqani network (30-Jun-2011)
  

****
**** Afghanistan seethes with renewed anger over the attacks
****

Kabul, Afghanistan, has now had three deadly incidents in four days,
killing hundreds of people and injuring many hundreds more. People
are seething with anger at the Ashraf Ghani government.

Wednesday's and Saturday's attacks took place in what are supposed to
be the most secure parts of Kabul. Friday's victims were killed by
the government security forces. It's clear that no one is immune to
the rising violence in the city. Kabul was once considered the most
secure part of Afghanistan, but now it seems to be the most dangerous.

As we described yesterday,
the
attacks on Wednesday and Friday are bringing back memories of
Afghanistan's bloody civil war of 1991-96. That war was fought
between the Pashtuns in southern Afghanistan versus the Northern
Alliance of Tajiks, Hazaras and Uzbeks in northern Afghanistan.

That same ethnic split divided the two sides in Afghanistan during the
2001 Afghan war, where the US attacked the Taliban, with the help and
support of Afghanistan's Northern Alliance.

Saturday's funeral was for Salim Izadyar. He is the son of Mohammad
Alan Izadyar, the deputy speaker of the Afghan senate and former
Northern Alliance warlord who fought against the Taliban in 2001.
Many of the people attending the funeral were honoring Salim, as well
as his father. It seems likely that the Taliban were targeting the
funeral guests for that reason.

Another person attending the funeral was Abdullah Abdullah, the Chief
Executive of Afghanistan. In 2014, at US Secretary of State John
Kerry's suggestion, Abdullah and Ghani became "co-presidents" of a
sort.

The intention was to resolve a continuing governmental crisis at the
time, but an analyst, Baker Atyani, says that the chaos caused by this
co-presidency is leading to power struggles within the Afghan
government, and that's leading to the violence. Ghani is a Pashtun
while Abdullah is of mixed Pashtun-Tajik heritage, having supported
the Northern Alliance.

As we wrote yesterday,
Afghanistan
is entering a generational Awakening era, and this ethnic violence
will only increase. The two sides that respectively became the
Taliban and the Northern Alliance ended their war in 1996. Those
people are at peace, but their children are not.

The dilemma for the US and for that Nato coalition fighting in
Afghanistan is how to extricate themselves. The US is still policeman
of the world, and completely abandoning Afghanistan would be viewed as
similar to the Chicago police force completely abandoning South
Chicago because the fighting cannot be stopped. Unfortunately, the
alternative is remaining in Afghanistan, even increasing the number of
troops, even though there will never be peace between the Taliban and
the Northern Alliance. France 24 and BBC and Arab News and National Interest

Related Articles

• Pak-Afghan border crisis revives controversy over 120 year old Durand Line (19-Jun-2016)
  
  
• In a reversal, Obama allows US troops in Afghanistan in combat roles (11-Jun-2016)
  
  
• Turkmenistan fears jihadist invasion from Afghanistan (02-Apr-2015)
  
  
• The Afghanistan elections and the Afghan-Pakistan Taliban alliance (13-Apr-2014)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Kabul, Afghanistan,
Mohammad Salim Izadyar, Mohammad Alan Izadyar,
Ashraf Ghani, Abdullah Abdullah, Taliban, Haqqani Network,
Pashtuns, Northern Alliance, Baker Atyani

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 5-Jun-17 World View -- US and Iran-backed troops head for confrontation at al-Tanf on Iraq-Syria border

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• US and Iran-backed troops head for confrontation at al-Tanf on Iraq-Syria border
  
• Iran-backed forces massing near the al-Tanf American base
  

****
**** US and Iran-backed troops head for confrontation at al-Tanf on Iraq-Syria border
****


Al-Tanf is on the Syrian side of Iraq's al-Waleed border crossing, and is on the strategic Route 1 highway between Baghdad and Damascus

The United States military is increasing its "combat power" in
southern Syria around the American military training camp in al-Tanf,
a Syrian town on the border with Iraq, on the Syrian side of Iraq's
al-Waleed border crossing. The military buildup is in response to the
approach of Iran-backed Shia forces from Iraq and the Syrian regime.
Some unconfirmed reports indicate that the Shia forces are backed by
Russian paratroopers.

Col. Ryan Dillon, a US military spokesman said:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"We have increased our presence and our footprint and
> prepared for any threat that is presented by the pro-regime
> forces."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Dillon said of the Iranian-backed forces being massed, "We see that as
a threat." There are 150 US troops in the al-Tanf base.

There's already been one deadly confrontation, as we reported two weeks ago.
A pro-Syrian
regime convoy was headed in the direction of the al-Tanf camp. US
warplanes were scrambled in a "show of force" to dissuade the convoy
from proceeding further. That show of force was only partially
successful, as five of the vehicles continued approaching the base.
In response, American warplanes launched a series of airstrikes
against the military convoy, destroying all the vehicles. It's not
known whether there were any casualties.

It's believed that the militia forces in the convoy were not from the
regular Syrian army, but were Shia militias coming either directly
from Iraq or from Iran or from Iran's puppet Hezbollah militia in
Lebanon.

This is the situation that the US military is confronting. Al-Tanf is
on the strategically important Route 1 highway that connects Baghdad
to Damascus. Iran's objective is for Shia forces from Iran, Iraq,
Lebanon and the Syrian regime to control the entire length of Route 1,
so that Iran can easily supply weapons and transfer militias to the
Syrian regime and to Hezbollah in Lebanon. The US administration
under President Trump is opposed to allowing Iran to expand its
military presence in this way.

Al-Tanf is in a "deconfliction area," as specified by agreements
reached among Russia, Iran and Turkey in peace talks held recently in
Astana, Kazakhstan. The Iran-backed forces headed for al-Tanf are
actually in violation of the of the Astana agreement that Iran
signed. Reuters and Al Monitor and ARA News (Syria Kurds) and Ahlul Bayt (Iran)

Related Articles

• US warplanes strike Syrian regime military convoy near al-Tanf base (19-May-2017)
  
  
• President Trump plans military action on Syria after horrific nerve gas attack on civilians (06-Apr-2017)
  
  
• Russia's policies thrown into confusion as US resumes its 'world policeman' role (09-Apr-2017)
  

****
**** Iran-backed forces massing near the al-Tanf American base
****

The US Defense Department confirmed last week that hundreds of
Iranian-backed Shia militiamen, including troops of Syrian regime
president Bashar al-Assad, are massing near the American training base
near al-Tanf.

In response, US planes over the weekend dropped 90,000 leaflets on the
Iranian-backed militias:


The text reads: 1. Any movement toward al-Tanf will be seen as hostile intent and we will defend our forces. Return to Zaza Checkpoint. 2. You are within an established deconfliction zone, leave the area immediately. Return to Zaza Checkpoint

So far, these and other warnings have been ignored. The US military
believes that Iran's Quds Force plans to take control of large regions
of Syria now controlled by the so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or
ISIL or Daesh), once ISIS is defeated in its two remaining
strongholds, Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria.

However, the US military consider the Iranian militias to be a threat
to American forces. According to Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff
Davis:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"We continue to see massing [of forces] and we are
> concerned about that. These patrols are unacceptable and threaten
> coalition forces."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

He added that American forces are not looking for a conflict, but that
they would defend themselves. Kurdistan 24 and Asharq Al-Awsat (28-May) and Al-Alam (Iran)


KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Syria, Bashar al-Assad, al-Tanf,
al-Waleed, Iraq, Iran, Hezbollah, Russia,
Ryan Dillon, Jeff Davis,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh

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

[John J. Xenakis]

(06-05-2017, 10:26 AM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: > Instead of enjoying Ramadan feasts after each day of fasting, far
> too many people are finding themselves mourning dead loves ones
> and friends, or, running for their own lives. May the evil ones
> burn in Hell eternally.

I agree with you. It's all unbelievably sad. I write about it every
day, and a lot of it is extremely depressing. I just try to pretend
it's happening on some other planet, and I console myself with the
fact that I'm old enough so that death will be a blessing anyway.

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 6-Jun-17 World View -- Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations cut ties with Qatar in new Mideast crisis

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations cut ties with Qatar in new Mideast crisis
  
• Arab nations' split caused by Qatar's relations with Muslim Brotherhood and Iran
  

****
**** Saudi Arabia and other Arab nations cut ties with Qatar in new Mideast crisis
****


Doha, Qatar, skyline

As I reported two weeks ago, years of bitter relations between Saudi
Arabia and Qatar came out in the open when Trump's Mideast visit triggered a sharp split
between the
two supposed allies.

On Monday, the split widened much further, with hostile words
being replaced by hostile actions. Saudi Arabia broke diplomatic
relations with Qatar, closed the land border between the two
countries, and closed Saudi airspace to any airline flights
to or from Qatar.

Other Arab nations immediately followed suit. Bahrain, Egypt, and the
United Arab Emirates (UAE) also broke relations with Qatar and imposed
similar economic sanctions. The countries all ordered their citizens
out of Qatar and gave Qataris abroad 14 days to return home. The
island nation of Maldives announced later Monday that it, too, would
cut ties to Qatar.

If the diplomatic conflict continues, the economic impact on Qatar is
expected to be enormous. Qatar has only one land border, the one with
Saudi Arabia, and 99% of all Qatar's food, as well as other supplies,
come through that border. The announcement immediately triggered a
panic in Qatar, with people in supermarkets buying up all available
food, in anticipation of food shortages and high inflation. It's
estimated that Qatar has only three days' worth of food supply on hand
in the country.

Some analysts are predicting that Qatar will have to give in to Saudi
Arabia's demands to end the crisis. Other analysts believe that the
split may destabilize Qatar's government, making a coup likely.
However, other countries in the region, including Kuwait, Oman and
Turkey, are calling for restraint, and are offering to mediate to
resolve the dispute. AP and Al-Jazeera and Washington Post and Bloomberg

Related Articles

• Trump's Mideast visit triggers renewal of sharp split between Saudi Arabia and Qatar (26-May-2017)
  
  
• Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohamed Morsi declared President of Egypt (25-Jun-2012)
  
  
• Turkey's Erdogan gives four-finger 'R4BIA' salute, in signal to Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood (18-Jul-2016)
  

****
**** Arab nations' split caused by Qatar's relations with Muslim Brotherhood and Iran
****

As I described in my lengthy analysis
two weeks ago, the same countries recalled their
ambassadors from Qatar in March of 2014, although diplomatic relations
were restored later that year. At that time there was an extremely
bitter split among the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC),
which is an organization of Arab nations (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman,
Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)) on the Arabian
Gulf. The reasons for the split then are the same as the reasons for
the split now: Qatar's relations with the Muslim Brotherhood and with
Iran.

Although Qatar cannot be considered an ally of Iran, there are reasons
why Qatar wants to have good relations with Iran. One reason is that
there over a million Hindu migrants working in Qatar, and Hindus have
historically had good relations with Shia Muslims. Another reason is
that Qatar and Iran share the biggest natural gas field in the world,
making Qatar the world's top liquefied natural gas (LNG) exporter, and
with Iran expanding its own LNG exports with the western sanctions
removed.

These reasons do not make Qatar and Iran allies, but they do mean that
Qatar has to get along with Iran, at a time when the relations between
Iran and Saudi Arabia are becoming increasingly vitriolic.

Qatar's relations with the Muslim Brotherhood have also contributed to
split. There are two competing schools of conservative Sunni
Muslim ideology. Extreme versions of either of these competing
ideologies are used to justify Sunni terror acts.

One is the Salafist Wahhabi ideology, which has its roots in Saudi
Arabia, and is the official Saudi religion. The other is the Muslim
Brotherhood ideology, which has its roots in Egypt, and is strongly
supported by Qatar and Turkey. Hamas is an offshoot of the Muslim
Brotherhood, so Qatar supports Hamas as well.

Although the two ideologies have succeeded in coexisting for decades,
they've been growing apart, and the differences are now coming to a
head. The differences have been exacerbated by a number of events,
including the 2013 Egypt government coup that removed the Muslim
Brotherhood government of Mohammed Morsi, the 2014 Gaza war between
Israel and Hamas, and civil war in Syria.

European and American governments have been pressuring the Saudi
government to do something to stop terrorism by al-Qaeda linked groups
or by the so-called Islamic State (IS or ISIS or ISIL or Daesh).
According to some analysts, the reason for the split between Saudi
Arabia and Qatar is that the Saudis are using Qatar as a scapegoat in
response to that pressure.

However, now that the split has occurred, it seems likely that the
pressure will go in the opposite direction. Doha, Qatar's capital
city, is a major airline hub, and the Saudi sanctions have thrown
airline schedules in the entire region into chaos. There are 200,000
Egyptian workers in Qatar, and they will have to be withdrawn within
two weeks, causing further chaos around the region. The economic
sanctions on Qatar are going to affect the economies of the entire
region. And the split is going to push Qatar closer to Iran.

As I've written many times, Generational Dynamics predicts that the
Mideast is headed for a major regional war, pitting Sunnis versus
Shias, Jews versus Arabs, and various ethnic groups against each
other. With appropriate generational research and analysis, the split
between the Wahhabis and the Muslim Brotherhood can be used to
determine which ethnic groups will be fighting each other. I
certainly don't have anything like the resources to perform such an
analysis by myself, but any college student interested in this kind of
analysis could make an invaluable contribution to understanding what's
going on in the world today by taking on, as a thesis topic, a
generational analysis of the tribes and ethnic groups in the Mideast.
Al Arabiya and AP and BBC and Israel National News (13-May-2014)

Related Articles

• Gulf Arab states have major split over Egypt and Iran (06-Mar-2014)
  
  
• Arab League holds annual meeting among bitter splits (26-Mar-2014)
  
  
• Mideast realignment continues following the Gaza war (03-Sep-2014)
  
  
• Gulf nations paper over their differences for GCC Summit in December (21-Nov-2014)
  

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Gulf Cooperation Council, GCC, Bahrain,
Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, UAE,
Muslim Brotherhood, Hezbollah, Turkey, Mohammed Morsi, Egypt,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Iran, Gaza, Hamas, Syria

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

[John J. Xenakis]

*** 7-Jun-17 World View -- How to stop lone wolf attacks in London and Manchester

This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

• Qatar crisis triggered by $1 billion ransom payment to Iran and al-Qaeda
  
• How to stop lone wolf attacks in London and Manchester
  

****
**** Qatar crisis triggered by $1 billion ransom payment to Iran and al-Qaeda
****


The 26 men from the Qatari hunting party that were kidnapped in December 2015 and returned in April 2017 for a $1 billion random payment

We've been reporting on the growing Mideast crisis, with numerous Arab
nations, led by Saudi Arabia, breaking diplomatic relations with
Qatar, and imposing harsh commercial sanctions that threaten Qatar's
economy. It's been widely reported that the crisis was triggered by
President Donald Trump's recent visit to Saudi Arabia, but new reports
indicate that the reason was completely different.

It seems that in April, Qatar paid $700 million to Iran and Shia
militias supported by the Syrian regime. Furthermore, up to $300
million more was paid to the al-Qaeda linked group Hayat Tahrir
al-Sham (HTS, Liberation of the Levant Organization). The ransom was
paid to gain the freedom of 26 people in a hunting party that included
members of the Qatari royal family, who had been kidnapped in southern
Iraq in December 2015. The Saudis only learned of the ransom payment
in the last couple of weeks.

HTS is the latest name change for what was originally called Jabhat
al-Nusra (al-Nusra Front) when it was officially the Syrian branch of
al-Qaeda. Then, in July 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra announced that it was
splitting with al-Qaeda, and was changing its name to Jabhat Fateh
al-Sham (JFS, Front for the Conquest of Syria). The reason given was
that the group wanted to create an alliance with "moderate" militias
fighting against Bashar al-Assad, but could not do so because none of
them wanted to be linked to al-Qaeda. Then, in January of this year,
JFS did merge with four other militias, and called itself Hayat Tahrir
al-Sham, or HTS.

An unnamed official is quoted as saying:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"So, if you add that up [the $300 million paid to HTS]
> to the other $700 million they paid to Iran and its proxies, that
> means Qatar actually spent about a billion dollars on this crazy
> deal."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Well, this "crazy deal" was apparently the last straw for the Saudi
authorities, because it confirmed all the claims that Qatar was
funding al-Qaeda and Iranian extremism, although not in the way that
it had been reported. The Saudis were so furious, they initiated the
diplomatic break.

Many in the mainstream media have said that the Trump visit "caused"
the split by "emboldening" the Saudis. That concept never made sense
to me. I said that Trump's visit "triggered" the split, meaning that
the forces were in place for the split to occur sooner or later, when
the time was right.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is an important
distinction. Journalists like to take the easy road of saying that
politicians, especially the US president, cause all the events that
happen in the world. But the things that I write about are caused by
generational pressures that build up over years and decades, and
politicians have nothing to do with them, except perhaps to trigger an
event that was going to happen anyway.

So now president Trump believes that he's going to bring an end to
Islamist terrorism, and he's going to bring peace to the Israelis and
the Palestinians. I'm going to respond in pretty much the same way
that I responded to President Bush's "Mideast Roadmap to Peace" in May
2003. Just as Islamist terrorism is going to continue and grow, Jews
and Arabs are going to refight the bloody war that occurred in 1948
with the partitioning of Palestine and the creation of the state of
Israel. The generational pressures have been building to this war for
decades, as if a huge tsunami was launched in 1948 and is just about
to reach shore. And the war cannot be stopped by a politician any
more that you can stop the tsunami with a bucket. Times of Israel and Daily Mail (London)

Related Articles

• Al-Nusra descendant claims credit for massive terror attack in Damascus, Syria (13-Mar-2017)
  
  
• Syria's Al-Nusra splits with al-Qaeda, becoming Jabhat Fateh al-Sham (29-Jul-2016)
  
  
• Syria's so-called ceasefire collapses after terrorist bombings in Homs (26-Feb-2017)
  

****
**** How to stop lone wolf attacks in London and Manchester
****

Mr. Nazir Afzal was Chief Crown Prosecutor of the Crown Prosecution
Service for North West England from 2011–15. A Muslim himself, his
tenure was controversial because he vigorously prosecuted Muslim who
had committed crimes, and he was critical of the Muslim community for
not taking responsibility for stopping jihadist attacks.

He was interviewed on the BBC World Service on the question of what
authorities should do to prevent lone wolf attacks, after the recent
terror attacks in London and Manchester.

Afzal is highly critical of the political correctness that causes far
too much tolerance of extremism in the United Kingdom (my
transcription):

> [indent]<QUOTE>"People have been treading very carefully around
> issues. We've mentioned before, talked about honor killings,
> talked about grooming gangs, these are things I've prosecuted in
> my career over the last quarter century.
>
> And sadly they invariably involve the minority communities,
> predominately, and they also predominately involve the Muslim
> community.
>
> On each occasion, much of the reason why things weren't being
> processed, or justice wasn't being delivered effectively, was
> because people were thinking it was too difficult, or there were
> perhaps understandable concerns about being seen as racist or
> religiously discriminatory in some way, shape or
> form."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

The question being discussed is why young Muslims are being
radicalized, or turned into extremists who may one day conduct terror
attacks. Afzal said that his own Muslim beliefs are highly personal,
and he contrasted his Muslim beliefs to those of the jihadists:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"Islamists believe that they should be able to impose
> their version [of Islam] on everybody else, and much of that sadly
> is either preachers who are from abroad, and who are able to carry
> on proselytizing this kind of thing. Or online."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

Afzal's point is that if a young person is being exposed to this kind
of jihadist proselytizing over the internet, then there's no way for
authorities to get ahead of the problem and prevent radicalization,
since there's no way to stop someone from absorbing these ideas over
the internet from the privacy of his bedroom.

So then what should authorities do to prevent the radicalization of
Muslim youth? Who in the community should the authorities be talking
to? Afzal says that the authorities are talking to the wrong people.

> [indent]<QUOTE>"The lazy thing the government does - and by this I
> mean local government, national government, and anybody in
> authority - policing you name it - hospitals - anybody - they go
> to the usual suspects, and they are invariably what is commonly
> called 'the community leader.'
>
> Now I can assure you that we [Muslims] don't have community
> leaders. The majority of Muslims in the UK are under 25, they're
> female, and they're from relatively low income backgrounds. But
> these community leaders are invariably male, middle class,
> professionals, maybe over 40 or 50. And so when you talk to young
> people, and I've been doing a lot of that, they say, they don't
> have a voice. They say that nobody listens to them. They say
> that the people you -- you as in the state -- are listening to
> have no sense of what needs to happen."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

According to Afzal, authorities should be supporting and talking to
Muslim women's groups, because these groups live in the communities,
they know the families, and they know which children are likely to
become radicalized:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"To answer your second question, who should they be
> talking to, yes, they should be talking to those voices that don't
> have one. And the people who are doing the work. My experience
> is, and i've worked with dozens of women's groups around the
> country -- Muslim women's groups around the UK -- they're doing to
> phenomenal work. They already have access to families, they're
> already trusted in those communities. Once they identify somebody
> within a family, for example, who might be at risk of
> radicalization or extremism or any other vulnerability, they
> insure that they're given levels of support which protect not just
> that child, but protect the rest of us. And they are doing this
> on a shoestring. ...
>
> [The] signs are only indicators. You don't know until you've
> actually spoken to somebody whether they are being radicalized or
> not. You have to understand that so many people in this UK, and
> elsewhere I imagine, are having some kind of identity crisis. Many
> many others are suddenly falling into drugs. We have a
> significant problem in the UK with Muslim communities and drugs.
> You know, time and time again, I've tried to get major Muslim
> representative bodies to talk about issues like Muslims in prison,
> and women Muslims in prison. And they rarely ever do -- I can't
> think of any example actually where they've talked about it.
> There's a charity for example, Muslim women in Prison, and that
> charity is close to closing. and that tells me that we have our
> priorities wrong."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

This story about lone wolf attacks in Britain is paired with the
preceding story about the Qatar split because from the point of view
of Generational Dynamics, they both make the same point: That people
in authority, whether politicians or "community leaders," are not
really controlling major events. Events are determined by masses of
people, entire generations of people. In the Mideast, it's the rise
in popularity of the Muslim Brotherhood. In Britain, it's the rise of
a new generation of young people, 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants
from Muslim countries.

Back in 2005, when the 7/7 London subway bombings occurred, I was
always struck by the immense sadness of the parents of the kids who
had perpetrated the bombings. They had no idea what their kids were
planning. One Muslim man said that he was worried about the attitudes
of his own children. "The bombers were just like us. And if they're
just like us, then more of them could be anywhere, couldn't they?"

One of the bombers was 22-year-old Shehzad Tanweer. Months later, his
father, Mohammed Mumtaz Tanweer, spoke out for the first time:

> [indent]<QUOTE>"All the bombings and killings were awful. Only the
> group of four [bombers] or God alone knows why they carried out
> this terrible act." He added: "As far as I can understand, my son
> was more British in his orientation than anything else. He has
> planned his career in sport. Even on the night before he died, he
> was playing cricket."<END QUOTE>[/indent]

One can barely imagine the immense sadness of a parent whose child
commits suicide carrying out one of these heinous acts. I don't know
if Nazir Afzal's suggestion of working with Muslim women's groups
would work, but it makes enough sense that it's worth a try. Daily Mail (London)

Related Articles

• London Subway bombings - Defiant Britons in two minutes of silence (15-Jul-2005)
  
  
• Young July 7 London subway bomber was a wealthy man (09-Jan-2006)
  
  
• Robert Pape's 'Dying to Win' sheds light on suicide bombers. (18-Jul-2005)

KEYS: Generational Dynamics, Qatar, Syria, Iran, Saudi Arabia,
Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, HTS, Liberation of the Levant Organization,
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, JFS, Front for the Conquest of Syria,
Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Nusra Front,
Islamic State / of Iraq and Syria/Sham/the Levant, IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh,
Nazir Afzal, London, Manchester, Muslim Brotherhood,
7/7 London subway bombings, Shehzad Tanweer, Mohammed Mumtaz Tanweer

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John J. Xenakis
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